Obsidian's Pillars of Eternity [BETA RELEASED, GO TO THE NEW THREAD]

[ZagorTeNej]

Josh can think what he wants, but what I'm saying is, if he's told to make a PoE2 with BG2-like mage abilities, he'll find a way to make it work. Just like he's doing things with PoE that he'd otherwise not do, due to IE loyalty.

Right, because it's that easy to "fix"/balance a complex magic system like BG2 had without losing anything in the process. Honestly, where does this blind faith in Josh come from? Let the man deliver on PoE first.

 

[dryan]

Balance is boring :/

Being an invincible god is boring.

Being a useless class is annoying.

seeing things black and white is boring

But there is a total balance between black and white.

Of course not. White is privileged

 

[AW8]

This means that when it doesn't seem like the character would naturally say something witty or cruel (for example), we don't try to force that reply into the node. We do try to provide regular "play it straight" replies so the player doesn't feel shoehorned into picking an uncharacteristic response. That said, occasionally those responses are in tense or crazy situations and will earn you a reputation for being stoic.

This sounds promising! Saw-yer! Saw-yer! SAW-YER! SAW-YER! SAW-YER! SAW-YER!

It's not necessarily "false choices", just different options to set the tone of the dialogue. Like letting you be cynical or professional or charming without necessarily having FAR REACHING CONSEKKKUENCES OMG

rpg codex > we like consekkkuences

 

[Roguey]

I can't find where I read it but Josh thinks contingencies and spell sequencers are stupid, rote, and rely too much on prescience/post-reload metagaming.

Josh can think what he wants, but what I'm saying is, if he's told to make a PoE2 with BG2-like mage abilities, he'll find a way to make it work. Just like he's doing things with PoE that he'd otherwise not do, due to IE loyalty.

There are some things from BG2 that he's clearly not bringing over because he thinks they're bad ideas. Some people really want hard counters. Too bad.

Reading it again, I know I've played a game or games that have this and I HATEHATEHATE the idea that you would give a false choice in dialogue (I could swear Josh or some ex-BIS person released an inhouse dialogue scripting tutorial where they said false choices and loaded dialogue are no good, which it seems like this is).

Josh doesn't consider it a false choice if it modifies something (whether it's an indirect reaction system or a slightly different response from the NPC). When he says "false choices" he means "three different ways of saying the same thing and they all lead to the same node."

 

[DalekFlay]

There's nothing wrong with slight flavor choice shit as long as the game also has actual choice and consequence.

 

[Ninjerk]

The way he said it made it sound like there would be no consequence (ie. modifies nothing, like Roguey's favorite game, SRR).

 

[Hormalakh]

Right, because it's that easy to "fix"/balance a complex magic system like BG2 had without losing anything in the process. Honestly, where does this blind faith in Josh come from? Let the man deliver on PoE first.

A good portion of this "blind" faith comes from his mod for FO:NV. He made a lot of "balancing" mods to that game that didn't make the game less fun, it made it more fun- so I hear: I haven't played the original nor the mod.

 

[Roguey]

Still unable to find Josh-slams regarding BG2's magic system (I vaguely remember his saying that it didn't play like any D&D game he's ever been involved in, whether crpg or tabletop) but I did find some other choice quotes.

Back when he was working on Gauntlet with John Romero:
http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/33006-will-bg3-be-at-e3/page-2#entry322903

Well, I don't see why Sawyer would not come back to making rpg games... It just might take a while.

Explaining why would involve flaming other game companies, so I'll refrain.

http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/33006-will-bg3-be-at-e3/page-3#entry325501

I often felt like I shouldn't be designing games for the BG audience because I loathed the NPCs in BG/BG2/TotSC so much.

Yesssssssssssss.

And now for some hardcore D&D magic system slams, arguing with Volourn:
http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/28510-magic-system-discussion/#entry249420

The spell memorization system based off of Jack Vance's "fire and forget" concept has got to be one of the most awful game mechanics ever. It astounds me that people champion it. So, lovers of fire and forget, what are the "pros" of the D&D system?

http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/28510-magic-system-discussion/page-2#entry249441

The D&D wizard spell memorization/preparation system is bad because it is extremely inflexible on a moment to moment basis. It often trades off frequency of use for power. E.g., a magic missile only does 1d4+1 damage per shot, but it is unerring and has a long range. Sleep has the potential to affect a number of creatures, but many creatures have no resistance to it. Spells take an entire slot, which for wizards, must be prepared ahead of time, but the effects are often powerful. This gives the low-level wizard effectively one, two, or three chances to make a difference with their magic. At all other times, they are waiting around to get their spells back, running in terror, or making feeble attacks with their melee/ranged weapons.

Compared to a system like the one found in Ars Magica -- well, there is no comparison. The flexibility of an Ars Magica system could be mated to a low power effect pool with more frequent hits on the caster's fatigue. It effectively becomes a "mana-based" system where minor spells are free (but not very powerful) and more significant spells weaken the caster.

http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/28510-magic-system-discussion/page-5#entry250360

Why do you converse with people? Do you do it to learn, do you do it to "win", or do you do it for some other purpose? I'm trying to figure out what your goals are from how you carry on these conversations. In my limited observation, it seems to follow a similar pattern:

* Statement of opinion, often with the disclaimer of "Period."
* Period of somewhat even debate
* You erect strawmen, building up and tearing down arguments that other people didn't make.
* You get called on this behavior and tell the person they are free to not converse with you.

Do you think you'd ever like to see a discussion through to its conclusion? Do you actually think it's beneficial to a discussion to construct arguments from another person's statements that the individual did not, and would not, state on their own? How is that helpful to you or the other person? What is your goal?

http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/28510-magic-system-discussion/page-5#entry250395

I'll hopefully have time to discuss this topic more tomorrow, but I would like to state that there is currently a CRPG with a mana system that very effectively prevents spamming: World of Warcraft.

Every power has a "cooldown" before it can be used again, ranging from a second to sixty minutes. It is pretty much impossible for my paladin to spam anything. Though I can use healing powers back to back, their casting time is so long that it's far from a "spam". I have to switch constantly between various blessings, seals, my judgment effect, purify, exorcism, and all sorts of other, different effects. Mages and warlocks are the same way. I never see them using the same abilities over and over again. Even if they wanted to, it would be impossible. I have two full quickbars of twelve spells that I use and I'm about to start a third. I need to switch between those as well, often adapting for whatever new situation I am in. It works very well, and I think that "cooldown" is the key to ensuring a variety of tactics.

The way he said it made it sound like there would be no consequence (ie. modifies nothing, like Roguey's favorite game, SRR).

What gave you the impression that was my favorite?

Anyway, choosing a different line there at times would result in different dialogue, so it didn't modify nothing all the time.

 

[Zed]

Sawyer vs. Volourn is fucking hilarious.

 

[J_C]

The spell memorization system based off of Jack Vance's "fire and forget" concept has got to be one of the most awful game mechanics ever. It astounds me that people champion it. So, lovers of fire and forget, what are the "pros" of the D&D system?

http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/28510-magic-system-discussion/page-2#entry249441
The D&D wizard spell memorization/preparation system is bad because it is extremely inflexible on a moment to moment basis. It often trades off frequency of use for power. E.g., a magic missile only does 1d4+1 damage per shot, but it is unerring and has a long range. Sleep has the potential to affect a number of creatures, but many creatures have no resistance to it. Spells take an entire slot, which for wizards, must be prepared ahead of time, but the effects are often powerful. This gives the low-level wizard effectively one, two, or three chances to make a difference with their magic. At all other times, they are waiting around to get their spells back, running in terror, or making feeble attacks with their melee/ranged weapons.

Josh being the champion of balance, and the stupid notion of every chacter has to be useful at every time, I understand he is not able to grasp this. But it is pretty simple. Wizards weren't magic gunslingers in D&D, who are shooting magic on a constant basis. They are heavy hitters, who leap into battle when they are needed, when they made a difference. When I was playing the IE games, most of the time my wizards were laying back, and didn't fight, or as Josh said, only made feeble attacks with ranged weapons. But I didn't need them, I had a party of 5-6 people, who worked as a team. Why would my wizard waste precious magic fighting with goblins and orks. Now when you meet a bunch of beholders or a group of skilled adventurers, you take out the mage and make a few strategic important magic tricks. That is the role of mages and wizards.

 

[Hormalakh]

^ which makes complete sense in a cRPG because only one player is playing 6 characters. DnD mages don't make sense in PnP when the singular character is played by one player. it also makes sense for rogues to be skill masters because of the very reason taht only one player is playing all 6 characters.

 

[Infinitron]

Josh being the champion of balance, and the stupid notion of every chacter has to be useful at every time, I understand he is not able to grasp this. But it is pretty simple.

He grasps it just fine, he just doesn't think that SHOULD be the role of mages and wizards.

 

[J_C]

Josh being the champion of balance, and the stupid notion of every chacter has to be useful at every time, I understand he is not able to grasp this. But it is pretty simple.

He grasps it just fine, he just doesn't think that SHOULD be the role of mages and wizards.

Well that is his problem. :D Ugh, now that I think of it, it is our problem, because he is designing our game.

 

[Infinitron]

^ which makes complete sense in a cRPG because only one player is playing 6 characters. DnD mages don't make sense in PnP when the singular character is played by one player. it also makes sense for rogues to be skill masters because of the very reason taht only one player is playing all 6 characters.

The reason for designing a game where all classes are useful at all times isn't just because it's boring to play classes if you don't make them useful. It's also about overall party composition flexibility.

If your goal is to make a game where every party composition is a viable choice, then a "skill master class" doesn't really fit and doesn't "make sense".

 

[Roguey]

Foooooooooooooooooound it.

Buying that SA account with all the bells and whistles really paid off.
http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3586742&userid=17931#post423617426

BioWare included a lot of hard counter defensive spells in BG2. There's also an extreme metagaming aspect that gets introduced into a save-and-reload environment when you have spells like Contingency and Spell Immunity at the player's disposal. Those are cool spells in tabletop because, short of careful planning and divination, you're guessing and hypothesizing. BG2's caster fights are tuned for very specific counters and tactics that depend heavily on trial and error. Technically yes, those spells are part of AD&D, but caster battles typically did not go that way in any 1st or 2nd Ed. campaigns I ever played or DMed. The only way you could be prepared for all of those hard counters is through prescience.

 

[Infinitron]

Foooooooooooooooooound it.

Buying that SA account with all the bells and whistles really paid off.
http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3586742&userid=17931#post423617426

BioWare included a lot of hard counter defensive spells in BG2. There's also an extreme metagaming aspect that gets introduced into a save-and-reload environment when you have spells like Contingency and Spell Immunity at the player's disposal. Those are cool spells in tabletop because, short of careful planning and divination, you're guessing and hypothesizing. BG2's caster fights are tuned for very specific counters and tactics that depend heavily on trial and error. Technically yes, those spells are part of AD&D, but caster battles typically did not go that way in any 1st or 2nd Ed. campaigns I ever played or DMed. The only way you could be prepared for all of those hard counters is through prescience.

He's arguing against the specific use of Contigency in BG2 (as a means to win hard countery mage duels), not against the concept of Contigency itself.

PoE already has Vancian spell memorization. Adding in Contigency would just offer a way to cast those spells faster. This can be useful even outside the context of BG2-style mage duels.

 

[FeelTheRads]

All Sawyer's comments regarding the D&D systems sound dumb as shit, in the light of "KEWLDOWN!!! BEST GAEM EVER"

 

[Xeon]

All of it? I kinda agree with him about having prescience while playing D&D.

While I was playing IE games* most times I got my ass handed to me because I didn't have appropriate spells setup and had to reload and set my spells and sleep and fight. Maybe its because of my inexperience of D&D or something but I thought it was a little retarded.

* BG, BG2, IWD and IWD2.

 

[Copper]

I really should replay these games at some point, because I'm really drawing a blank on these ass-handing hard counter fights. Mind you, I can't even remember what my default party was, or even what class my MC was. I certainly don't remember anything too frustrating, and I played as a pure storyfag with no interest in min-maxing. (No 3 int/wis/cha fighters at any rate).

 

[J_C]

All of it? I kinda agree with him about having prescience while playing D&D.

While I was playing IE games* most times I got my ass handed to me because I didn't have appropriate spells setup and had to reload and set my spells and sleep and fight. Maybe its because of my inexperience of D&D or something but I thought it was a little retarded.

* BG, BG2, IWD and IWD2.

While I was playing IE game, I almost never got my ass handed to me because I didn't have appropriate spells setup, and almost never had to reload ans set my spells and sleep and fitght. And I never had experience of D&D before.

And God sees my soul, I'm not trying to be edgy here, this is what happened with me in the IE games. Yes, I had 2 or 3 encounters, which I was forced to reload, but it was exceptionally rare. Sure, the hard fights might have been easier if I do that, but I don't like to play that way. If I screwed up the spell selection, I manned up and used my party to overcome the obstacles. C&C bitches!

I never understood when people bithced about being fucked if you make the wrong spell selection. You have 6 characters in your party FFS!

 

[belated]

Meh, makes me wonder if Sawyer's ever actually played a game without reloading after a fight just because he deemed the result suboptimal. If he'd only just set up that contingency beforehand...

 

[Xeon]

While I was playing IE game, I almost never got my ass handed to me because I didn't have appropriate spells setup, and almost never had to reload ans set my spells and sleep and fitght. And I never had experience of D&D before.

And God sees my soul, I'm not trying to be edgy here, this is what happened with me in the IE games. Yes, I had 2 or 3 encounters, which I was forced to reload, but it was exceptionally rare. Sure, the hard fights might have been easier if I do that, but I don't like to play that way. If I screwed up the spell selection, I manned up and used my party to overcome the obstacles. C&C bitches!

I never understood when people bithced about being fucked if you make the wrong spell selection. You have 6 characters in your party FFS!

Man, I don't know. Like I said its probably because of my inexperience but getting stuck in spiderweb pretty much annihilates most of my party members if I don't have free movement spell/item or be extra careful for example. Or if I am up against mages, some of them are pretty much immune to mele damage and I think I needed a specific spell to break their shield so I can damage them or kite them until it wears off and hope a fireball doesn't hit me or something like that.

 

[Infinitron]

It's not all the IE games that had this, mostly just BG2.

 

[Roguey]

He's arguing against the specific use of Contigency in BG2 (as a means to win hard countery mage duels), not against the concept of Contigency itself.

PoE already has Vancian spell memorization. Adding in Contigency would just offer a way to cast those spells faster. This can be useful even outside the context of BG2-style mage duels.

Can't have a contingency that doesn't encourage metagaming.

Also contingency and spell sequencer didn't even exist in the IWD games.

http://www.pinoyexchange.com/forums/showthread.php?t=81350

Currently, inventory and weapon slots work as they did in IWD:HoW.

Tracking: like HoW.

Familiars: None.

Contingencies and Sequencers: No.

Spell Protections/Counter-Protections: No.

Multiplayer Enhancements: Same as HoW.

Romances and sex: No and no.

I like how Biodrones were already requesting that last one as early as 2002.

Project Eternity will take the central hero, memorable companions and the epic exploration of Baldur’s Gate, add in the fun, intense combat and dungeon diving of Icewind Dale, and tie it all together with the emotional writing and mature thematic exploration of Planescape: Torment.

They're under no obligation to deliver a BG2-esque combat experience because they've never promised it.

 

[tuluse]

He's arguing against the specific use of Contigency in BG2 (as a means to win hard countery mage duels), not against the concept of Contigency itself.

PoE already has Vancian spell memorization. Adding in Contigency would just offer a way to cast those spells faster. This can be useful even outside the context of BG2-style mage duels.

I think in PoE all casters are like sorcerers not wizards. So you have a limited number of casts, but you don't have to predistribute them.