Dragon Age impressions

[DreadMessiah]

"Extremely dumb AI" compared to what, exactly? I can think of very few RPGs that don't have AI you can exploit in some manner or another.

So now you're defending a game that doesn't send all enemies at once after you go back a room? Ridiculous.

Short of casting Dispel Magic, there was nothing I could do since there are no spell scrolls whatsoever. Saving throws are really fucked up in DA, as are real-time stun mini-interrupts.

Glyph of Warding can help against archers. Also ups mental resistence and defense.

 

[1eyedking]

Glyph of Warding can help against archers. Also ups mental resistence and defense.

There were no archers. I had 100 mental resistance, the maximum.

 

[DreadMessiah]

FO2 enemies for starters didn't resort to 500 HP enemies crap, didn't have INSTAWTFPWN abilities, nor did you, you couldn't instantly heal yourself unless you spent 4 APs to access your inventory, your companions couldn't use this exploit (which is more of an afterthought) - and guess what: once dead, they stayed dead and you couldn't revive them. Hardcore, I know. For all of its simplicity, FO had good, fun combat.

<.< Is called Power word reload... >.> No more dead companion :D

 

[Grunker]

Hey VD, one thing I didn't get: You explained what the Witcher lacked, with which I agree, but not why this lack was smaller than DA's lack of good writing, full characters and so on and so forth. My reasoning for rating TW above DA is exactly that, and you neglected to compare the too in your own reasoning.

 

[1eyedking]

But mommy, mommy, I don't like reloading since it's a very stressful and unimmersive process and makes me feel like the game beat me.

I want instaresurrection because everyone knows I would have reloaded, and instaregeneration because everyone knows I would have drank potions and rested.

 

[DreadMessiah]

But mommy, mommy, I don't like reloading since it's a very stressful and unimmersive process and makes me feel like the game beat me.

I want instaresurrection because everyone knows I would have reloaded, and instaregeneration because everyone knows I would have drank potions and rested.

Tru dat.

 

[Silellak]

You must have a lot of free time, to continue playing a game you obviously care so little for.

I find it amusing you actually think Fallout's combat is better than combat in Dragon Age, but to each their own I guess.

 

[DreadMessiah]

Hey VD, one thing I didn't get: You explained what the Witcher lacked, with which I agree, but not why this lack was smaller than DA's lack of good writing, full characters and so on and so forth. My reasoning for rating TW above DA is exactly that, and you neglected to compare the too in your own reasoning.

I like the witcher enhanced edition. Something about certain moments connected with me while most of DA does not except for brood mother lead up, origins, and that orphanage in the alienage. Only other stuff was the fade in the mage origin and the retaking of the tower (somewhat).

 

[Genma:TheDestroyer]

But mommy, mommy, I don't like reloading since it's a very stressful and unimmersive process and makes me feel like the game beat me.

I want instaresurrection because everyone knows I would have reloaded, and instaregeneration because everyone knows I would have drank potions and rested.

Okay, when did the conversation switch to talking about un-patched Bioshock?

 

[DreadMessiah]

You must have a lot of free time, to continue playing a game you obviously care so little for.

I find it amusing you actually think Fallout's combat is better than combat in Dragon Age, but to each their own I guess.

What helped me with DA was the fix for having to restart the game every so often on my pc because of I guess multi/hyper threading. My i7 920 processor I set affinity to 4,5,6,7 cores which fixed the "memory leak" problem for me. Now I can play without needing to restart the game every couple hours because of long load times. Also hot fix for archery is nice :D

 

[DreadMessiah]

But mommy, mommy, I don't like reloading since it's a very stressful and unimmersive process and makes me feel like the game beat me.

I want instaresurrection because everyone knows I would have reloaded, and instaregeneration because everyone knows I would have drank potions and rested.

Okay, when did the conversation switch to talking about un-patched Bioshock?

I never died once playing bioshock. So all that was pointless for me... Now Doom 3 on hardest setting at first was another story.

 

[1eyedking]

You must have a lot of free time, to continue playing a game you obviously care so little for.

I find it amusing you actually think Fallout's combat is better than combat in Dragon Age, but to each their own I guess.

This sounds extremely familiar to the usual stupidity you read in, what a coincidence, BioWare forums.

 

[Grunker]

The good people of Codexia are really good at this.

EDIT: People can officially stop crying about auto-regen: http://www.damods.com/forums/index.php?topic=28.0

Go play that, and let us sane people have our fun.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Hey VD, one thing I didn't get: You explained what the Witcher lacked, with which I agree, but not why this lack was smaller than DA's lack of good writing, full characters and so on and so forth. My reasoning for rating TW above DA is exactly that, and you neglected to compare the too in your own reasoning.

First, I don't think that DA writing is bad. Sure, some lines are questionable, but overall it's good to very good. Second, DA writing is much better than the Witcher's translated writing (which is always an issue with European games).

Overall, here is how I see the Witcher:

- truly suberb atmosphere
- truly superb journal
- good writing
- poorly designed character system
- horrible combat system (all you do is watch for the visual clue to click again; too easy)
- great alchemy system
- enjoyable mini-game
- superb visual design
- no dialogue skills, no stat- or skill-checks - bummer
- interesting characters
- way too fucking linear; developers cared more about telling their awesome (not really) story than about letting you play the game.
- limited options, decent but often meaningless choices
- butchered setting*
- poorly designed inventory and item systems

* I was bored and bought the book** to see what the fuss is about. I was shocked to discoverer that in the book monsters are very rare (two creatures? one brought in for examination, one killed by Geralt) and Geralt is more of a diplomat (way to miss an opportunity to load him up with speech skills) than a monster slayer.

Anyway, in my opinion, Dragon Age simply delivers more. Solid character system, challenging tactical combat, suberb interiors, well designed world, and solid role-playing options once the gameworld opens up beat the Witcher's atmosphere, visuals, characters, journal, alchemy, and occasional options.

** http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Last_Wish_(book)

 

[Grunker]

Wow. I almost can't keep track of it. One moment I am in complete agreeance with you, the next I want to tell you how wrong you are

You summarization of The Witcher is almost on the spot, except for the stuff about linearity. It's a beef of mine that non-linearity and roleplaying are tied together. But nevermind that.

But DA having good to very good writing? Seriously? Now it's my time to be weak, I admit that. I don't have the inclination to get into a lengthy discussion about the writing, 'cause that will take ALOT of time. Suffice to say, I disagree strongly with you. I will give some examples, but since I don't go into a lengthy analysis, feel free to ignore me:

1) Lelianas dialogue consists mostly of telling stories. These stories break several of the golden rules in writing; stuff even newly hatched writers know not to. For example, all her stories have no foundation; no reason they should interest us. They are simply "I went there, this happened, and I did this." There is no meaning in them. In fact, it's so bad, 90% of her stories don't even matter to the situation you're in, or say something about her. Overall, Leliana is the worst example, but...

2) The writing is extremely inconsistent. One time, a is said, and the next, b is done. DA's characters are mostly flat (Arl Howe being the prime example), so it hinges its quality on the nonflat ones. And every single one of the nonflat characters are inconsistent as hell. Loghain, Duncan, and so on. The inconsistensy is also there in the rest of the writing. For example, Duncan comments he can't act solely on a feeling in regards to the archdemon, but Alistair and other Gray Wardens can tell you it really isn't a feeling, he knows for sure.

3) It's packed with clichés, as I've already argued.

4) It has trouble with incentives. Real trouble. It can't figure out what it wants to focus on. Are you after the blight? Is it Loghain? The school example of this is Baldur's Gate 2: it lets you choose if you're after Imoen or Irenicus, and then fucks up the focus whenever it claims you're only after one of them. DA is even worse, since it won't even let you choose. This again leads back to the inconsitency.

5) It's plain bland. Almost all party dialogue has traces of "Leliana-syndrome", in which the characters will blather on about stuff that has no real meaning or relation to the story. When there are exceptions, for example Wynne's teachings, they are so stupid they make you want to bang your head against the wall. The only points in conversation with characters are as follows: "God is good," "Love will save us," "Serving your own ends is smartest," "There will come a time when you'll have to choose" and "X is your worst enemy."

DISCLAIMER: I haven't spoken much to Sten, Oghren or Morrigan yet, so I can't tell if they're different.

All in all, the writing in DA is BAD, all in CAPS. The setting certainly beats Baldur's Gate, as well as some parts of the writing and story (Landsmeet, for example). But other parts are even worse than Baldur's Gate, boring you to tears with filler-text.

In conclusion: Writing is a core part of an RPG. It's the most important thing, in my mind, since it determines what you react to, how you're able to react, and, indeed: What role you play.

A game with writing as abysmal as DA's sometimes is, will not make the top10 list in my book.

Again: The game is good. But it's not better than Bloodlines or The Witcher by far.

 

[Jaesun]

r00fles!

 

[Silellak]

You must have a lot of free time, to continue playing a game you obviously care so little for.

I find it amusing you actually think Fallout's combat is better than combat in Dragon Age, but to each their own I guess.

This sounds extremely familiar to the usual stupidity you read in, what a coincidence, BioWare forums.

Can you have a debate without being insulting, or is that concept entirely lost on you?

I'm not saying IF YOU DON'T LIKE THE GAME DON'T PLAY IT AND STFU LOLOLOL - I don't particularly care how you spend your time or what you think of DA - you just spend what appears to be a decent amount of time both playing, and discussing, a game you don't particularly like. I find this to be strange, as I prefer to spend what limited free-time I have playing and discussing games I actually find enjoyable. So, I commented on this strangeness.

 

[Silellak]

The good people of Codexia are really good at this.

EDIT: People can officially stop crying about auto-regen: http://www.damods.com/forums/index.php?topic=28.0

Go play that, and let us sane people have our fun.

Dear lord, that mod looks terrible. No offense to the creator - maybe he and his audience enjoy that sort of thing - but it seems like most of these changes are knee-jerk reactions rather than a result of him sitting down and actually figuring out how to make the game more challenging and fun. It really seemed to boil down to him hating mages and thus raping them in every way possible while still leaving them barely-playable.

I wouldn't expect a decently balanced "hardcore" mod to come out for another 2-3 months at the very earliest, once people have a more intimidate understanding on how the mechanics work and can give some serious thought behind how they could best be altered.

One of the people who posted on the thread had some ideas that could be used as a basis for a much better mod further down the line:

- Make health potions cooldown 3 times the original
- Make the health potion drinking animation twice as long
- Make health and mana potions more expensive/rare in the game
- Make injury kits partywide 30 minutes cooldown
- Make injuries more severe, really affecting your playstyle when you have an injured party member
- Make shapeshifting a tad stronger (indeed, the current no cooldown change works for this)
- Enhance enemy AI
- Increase health/resistance/attack of enemies where appropriate but don't overdo it.

I would definitely support improved AI, longer health potion cooldown, injuries being much more severe, and injury kits have a long party-wide cooldown.

 

[Grunker]

Yeap. Those kind of mods kindda echo my thoughts on the subject. And it does look horrible.

 

[Drakron]

A lot of "hardcore" and "balance" mods can be replaced by this following instructions.

"Cut off your right hand and blind yourself."

 

[Volourn]

Yeah, no doubt. DA's combat is crafted with BIO knowing you will have max health and mana. You would have to retool encounters if you make those changes.

Anyways, anyone who thinks DA's writing is bad is bullshit. Anyone who thinks DA's writing is worse than TW is on crack. This does not mean there aren't example of questionable writing in DA 'cause there is.

Only Western RPGs with potentially better writing than DA is PST, MOTB, ARC, BL, ME and BG2.

 

[1eyedking]

Level scaling in effect:

Enemies went from Level 0 to Level 13 (in this case) to 15 as I approached. Frostback Mountains are supposed to be Level 7+, but 15 - 7 = 8, so the 5-Level difference is bullshit.

Thus, BioWare seems to have utterly defeated what makes sandbox RPGs so much fun.

/edit: uploaded better versions.

 

[Azrael the cat]

Level scaling in effect:

Enemies went from Level 0 to Level 13 (in this case) to 15 as I approached. Frostback Mountains are supposed to be Level 7+, but 15 - 7 = 8, so the 5-Level difference is bullshit.

Thus, BioWare seems to have utterly defeated what makes sandbox RPGs so much fun.

Level 7+ doesn't mean that the enemies will be around level 7. To the contrary, enemies will usually be many levels higher than that - say around level 13-15 in some cases, so that you must use your combined party to take them out.

I don't believe that it's possible to encounter a level 0 enemy in the game, so I'm going to assume that's just the game's way of indicating that you're too far away to see the level, or that the level hasn't been generated yet. Most likely is that the 'level-scaling' was the change from 13 to 15 that you saw when you approached. So that's 2 levels, easily within a 5 level range.

 

[made]

Force field is so overpowered that I can't help but think that it was only intended to be used on a player character to tank (regardless the mention of FF). After all, it says "protects a character BUT they can't move", which seems to imply that cant move is the downside when you put it on yourself. BTW, great DA ambiguity there. Apparently "Cannot move" means "paralyzed and can't attack nor move". But then spells that "slow movement" actually only slow movement speed but not attack speed.

FF is overpowered when used defensively as well. Open up with fireball/some bomb, FF whoever has aggro, casually pick off enemies one by one while they all beat on the immune character. Reapply FF as necessary because duration and cd are virtually the same. Even WoW's AI knows better than to stick on an immune player when there are other valid targets around.

They copied combat straight out of MMOs but totally disregard any design lessons that, for example, WoW learned over the years. The result is easily exploitable combat. You know something isn't right when you consciously decide not to use certain spells/techniques because they trivialize the game.

ps. 1eyed: Looks like the old DA forums have been closed down and all operations moved to the new "social" site, where I am loath to register for the moment.

 

[Aditya]

I don't believe that it's possible to encounter a level 0 enemy in the game, so I'm going to assume that's just the game's way of indicating that you're too far away to see the level, or that the level hasn't been generated yet. Most likely is that the 'level-scaling' was the change from 13 to 15 that you saw when you approached. So that's 2 levels, easily within a 5 level range.

This is correct. The 'Level 0' is showing on the map because he seems to have enabled full plot assistance markers for unexplored areas.