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

[Murk]

This is correct, their god grants them so many castings/abilities per day when they pray (abstracted to us as a series of slots they fill out). This is also why they start with their full spell book, their god's powers are known and so the cleric just prays to be given certain established aspects.

EDIT: In terms of basic functionality, if they want to give wizards at-will cantrips or some dumbed down Eldritch Blast like ability I honestly don't mind, so long as the wizard can't out auto-damage the fighter classes.

 

[tuluse]

Now that's a motherfucking update.

Spend the time to write in-setting, the extra effort is worth it.

 

[suejak]

Wow, do you guys actually like that awful D&D spell-casting system?

I don't think there has been a single time in my life that I enjoyed the one-spell-a-day magic of AD&D. I'm all about mana pools or something similar.

 

[groke]

Fuck, this is the first update they've gotten right! The dungeon sounds great, if they finish with ~80,000 like DoubleFine, that's a 15 level goddamn dungeon! Crafting and Enchanting are great stretch goals, too, not dumb shit like the player house, or nebulous, meaningless goals like "another faction" or "THIS much more game".

 

[Murk]

Yeah dude that's like an opinion. People sometimes have them n stuff.

 

[Lord Andre]

I like it because it prevents you from buying 100 mana/stamina potions than chain-casting fireball to solve each and every battle.

I also like that sometimes one utility spell is enough to win a battle instead of blowing your load - e.g. see above.

I like that utility spells are not useless.

I like that some people have to walk back to inn after every fight because they can't into tactiks'.

I like d&d not because it's perfect but because it's solid.

 

[Jaesun]

The dungeon sounds awesome. <3

 

[Murk]

I think one of my favorite things is that spells scale with level and so even in end-game, low level spells can still be very useful, especially when you get access to powerful metamagic like persistent spell.

 

[Jasede]

I think I'll burn an orphanage if Sawyer puts cooldowns into this game just because kids need their wizard to do something awesome every turn. Fuck everything.

Edit: D&D magic is tried and true, no argument.

 

[Lord Andre]

When I saw the block of flavor text I thought "This is going to be lame."
Then I read it and I was

 

[Infinitron]

It sounds like Durlag's Tower 2.

Not that that's bad.

 

[suejak]

I wonder if Diablo-style potion-chugging is the inevitable outcome of a mana-based system.

The scarcity of magic and the power of spells is one upside to the D&D system, for sure. I wouldn't mind it if it didn't encourage tons of random "rest-for-8-hours" sessions.

Edit: I don't really think you can make the argument that something is "tried and true" in a context in which a number of people have always disliked it.

 

[tuluse]

Wow, do you guys actually like that awful D&D spell-casting system?

I don't think there has been a single time in my life that I enjoyed the one-spell-a-day magic of AD&D. I'm all about mana pools or something similar.

You're supposed to be fragile as fuck at level 1 in DnD.

Assuming you didn't make a retarded Wizard, in 3E, you have 5 spells per day by level 3, which is plenty for any single encounter.

Also, in Baldur's Gate, I think you can get about 1000 xp just for dicking around in Candlekeep. It doesn't take long at all to reach level 2, before you really have to worry about any hard fights.

 

[tuluse]

I wonder if Diablo-style potion-chugging is the inevitable outcome of a mana-based system.

The scarcity of magic and the power of spells is one upside to the D&D system, for sure. I wouldn't mind it if it didn't encourage tons of random "rest-for-8-hours" sessions.

I wouldn't say it's the inevitable outcome. You can have so much mana and such a high regen rate, you just don't have to worry about it like KoTOR

 

[suejak]

Wow, do you guys actually like that awful D&D spell-casting system?

I don't think there has been a single time in my life that I enjoyed the one-spell-a-day magic of AD&D. I'm all about mana pools or something similar.

You're supposed to be fragile as fuck at level 1 in DnD.

Assuming you didn't make a retarded Wizard, in 3E, you have 5 spells per day by level 3, which is plenty for any single encounter.

Also, in Baldur's Gate, I think you can get about 1000 xp just for dicking around in Candlekeep. It doesn't take long at all to reach level 2, before you really have to worry about any hard fights.

Even at level 20 I thought the rest-to-recover-all-spells mechanic was bad.

If they simply rethought that mechanic but preserved the scarcity/power of magic, I'd be happy.

 

[Infinitron]

What I think the classic Vancian system does (ideally, at least) is encourage a roguelike mentality where the players try to survive as long as possible before resting for more spells.

That can be pretty challenging and fun.

 

[tuluse]

Wow, do you guys actually like that awful D&D spell-casting system?

I don't think there has been a single time in my life that I enjoyed the one-spell-a-day magic of AD&D. I'm all about mana pools or something similar.

You're supposed to be fragile as fuck at level 1 in DnD.

Assuming you didn't make a retarded Wizard, in 3E, you have 5 spells per day by level 3, which is plenty for any single encounter.

Also, in Baldur's Gate, I think you can get about 1000 xp just for dicking around in Candlekeep. It doesn't take long at all to reach level 2, before you really have to worry about any hard fights.

Even at level 20 I thought the rest-to-recover-all-spells mechanic was bad.

If they simply rethought that mechanic but preserved the scarcity/power of magic, I'd be happy.

It doesn't work great for cRPGs, but that's because it's designed for table top. Basically you're supposed to have access to all your spells for a given session then your character sleeps while you're away and you have them back the next time you play. Barring special circumstances the DM sets up. This works very well. So well, it's lasted for 30 years, and the only time people bitch about it is when cRPGs combine this mechanic with trash mobs.

 

[suejak]

What I think the classic Vancian system does (ideally, at least) is encourage a roguelike mentality where the players try to survive as long as possible before resting for more spells.

That can be pretty challenging and fun.

That's great if it works. Unfortunately, you end up doing lots of resting/potion-chugging anyway,resting especially to get healing spells back. Yawn.

 

[suejak]

It doesn't work great for cRPGs, but that's because it's designed for table top. Basically you're supposed to have access to all your spells for a given session then your character sleeps while you're away and you have them back the next time you play. Barring special circumstances the DM sets up. This works very well. So well, it's lasted for 30 years, and the only time people bitch about it is when cRPGs combine this mechanic with trash mobs.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but we just agreed that a lot of people dislike the mechanic.

 

[Roguey]

I'd feel a lot better if Sawyer would leave the game mechanics to Cain and the story to Avellone.

Good lord no, Fallout and Arcanum prove that Cain utterly fails. OTOH I agreed with pretty much all of Sawyer's system changes in NV and what he had planned for VB.

 

[tuluse]

It doesn't work great for cRPGs, but that's because it's designed for table top. Basically you're supposed to have access to all your spells for a given session then your character sleeps while you're away and you have them back the next time you play. Barring special circumstances the DM sets up. This works very well. So well, it's lasted for 30 years, and the only time people bitch about it is when cRPGs combine this mechanic with trash mobs.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but we just agreed that a lot of people dislike the mechanic.

Context is everything

In the context of cRPGs, the vancian system has problems yes.

 

[toro]

I have KS fatigue. Fuck this shit. Wake me up in 2013.

 

[Infinitron]

LORE DUMP: http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/60823-drows-in-this-game/page__st__60#entry1218042

Dark elves are an old concept, but the dark-skinned "drow" are a Gygax invention. We have a few elven subraces, some of which will seem more familiar than others. In addition to the subraces, there is significant cultural division between separate groups even within one subrace. The elves that came across the sea with their human allies to settle in the Dyrwood encountered Glanfathan elves that looked almost identical to them, physically, but spoke a completely dissimilar language, dressed differently, had different values and customs, and lived virtually at a Stone Age level of technology -- all this despite abundant evidence that an ancient empire once stood around them. As a result, the elves who settled in the Dyrwood tend to feel much more kinship toward human neighbors, with whom they share a language and hundreds of years of coexistence, than the Glanfathans.

Native American Elves confirmed.

 

[groke]

Uh. So, wood elves, then.

 

[Captain Shrek]

Uh. So, wood elves, then.

Stone elves.