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

[Zakhad]

http://www.formspring.me/JESawyer/q/411073454213716744

Hi Josh! Which of the games you've worked on -- completed or not -- do you feel you learned the most from? How do you feel Project Eternity is benefiting from that experience?

I think I've learned a lot from every project I've been on, but I guess F:NV was the most illuminating. It had the longest development cycle of any game I've shipped and, by far, sold the most units on the most platforms. I think that wider-than-usual net helped show how much people "got" or didn't get certain types of gameplay mechanics, narrative structures, etc.

I also had more freedom to mess with the rules on F:NV than I did on any of the D&D games I contributed to, and seeing how people responded to the minor and major shifts between F3 and F:NV was very informative.

I think the biggest thing I took away, more definitively than ever, is that how things actually work matters more than how people react to the idea of how they will work. I.e., there are really two levels of response to something in the game: the idea of what it is (often interpreted outside of the game) and the reality of what it is. The idea is often more upsetting or disconcerting to people than the reality. But the bottom line is that the reality actually has to be enjoyable in the context of the game, regardless of where the idea started or what the intent was.

When we eliminated Big Guns and spread the weapons around to other skills, there was a lot of head-shaking. After the game came out, not many people complained about or or really even seemed to care. That isn't to say that NO ONE cared -- some people cared, and still care, a lot about it. But the end result didn't generate a lot of negativity and most people responded positively to it or just didn't care.

On the other hand, the way the map was illustrated was logical and map-like but confused people because they thought it was literally at the same scale as the F3 map. In F3, the map border *is* the border of the world. In F:NV, the map border is the extreme outer extent that encapsulates the irregular border of the world. Essentially it was like forcing Colorado and Nevada to be fit into an identical square frame map that's 10" by 10". Nevada is larger than Colorado in reality, but it is always going to take up less space if pushed to the edges of a 10" by 10" map because Colorado has a rectilinear shape and Nevada doesn't. Long story short: it makes sense, but it confused a huge number of people who thought that we were wasting portions of the map. We addressed this in Honest Hearts by using an irregular border instead of a square one.

And speaking of Honest Hearts, I also learned that between the free-wheeling nature of F:NV's content implementation and the strict, low-risk implementation of Honest Hearts content, OEI content usually needs to fall somewhere in-between. A quest that is completely cut-and-dry bog-standard will usually come across that way even if it takes place in a new setting. A quest that is a tangled skein of nightmare scripting will probably ship as a broken mess of half-fulfilled dreams. So when it comes to working with designers, it's good to start with a really solid, stable core of gameplay but leave time for (and encourage) more risky secondary elements after the core has been developed.

Having content that's just "in" and works isn't enough -- both for designers and for people who are playing an Obsidian RPG. People enjoy weird and wacky stuff in quests; it just has to work properly. Our concepting, design, and review processes need to account for the basics but also ensure there's time for the cool and unusual stuff.

(that's for both infinitron and JES)

 

[Jaedar]

Removal of misses does not necessarily remove the ability to dodge/parry/block attacks.

So, if it changes nothing - as he claims - then why the fuck implement it ?

Misses would also need to be implemented.

 

[Infinitron]

Zakhad
Well, we can't say yet that it will be a complete non-issue. It depends on the specific values for damage and DT, which we don't know yet.

In general, I think that with correct selection of values and good encounter design, almost any sufficiently complex system can be . In this type of game, the exact rules of a system matter less than how you use it to create content.

 

[Lord Andre]

Removal of misses does not necessarily remove the ability to dodge/parry/block attacks.

So, if it changes nothing - as he claims - then why the fuck implement it ?

Misses would also need to be implemented.

So ? They got almost four times the money they initially asked for. How about they take the time to implement misses.

 

[Zakhad]

Zakhad
Well, we can't say yet that it will be a complete non-issue. It depends on the specific values for damage and DT, which we don't know yet.

In general, I think that with correct selection of values and good encounter design, almost any sufficiently complex system can be . In this type of game, the exact rules of a system matter less than how you use it to create content.

Exactly. But people are getting plenty worked up and drawing conclusions/spitting venom, not just too early, but without even considering the already-reported other elements of said complex system.

Oh right, the codex.

 

[SwiftCrack]

RIP 2013, Year of the Incline. We hardly knew ye.

 

[Lord Andre]

Zakhad
Well, we can't say yet that it will be a complete non-issue. It depends on the specific values for damage and DT, which we don't know yet.

In general, I think that with correct selection of values and good encounter design, almost any sufficiently complex system can be . In this type of game, the exact rules of a system matter less than how you use it to create content.

Exactly. But people are getting plenty worked up and drawing conclusions/spitting venom, not just too early, but without even considering the already-reported other elements of said complex system.

Oh right, the codex.

Why did you join then ? If you already know exactly what codexers think and do and you don't agree, then why don't you just fuck off back to rpgwatch ? I'm sure they miss your wisdom.

 

[Infinitron]

RIP 2013, Year of the Incline. We hardly knew ye.

Wrong, Project Eternity comes out in 2014.

 

[Zakhad]

Zakhad
Well, we can't say yet that it will be a complete non-issue. It depends on the specific values for damage and DT, which we don't know yet.

In general, I think that with correct selection of values and good encounter design, almost any sufficiently complex system can be . In this type of game, the exact rules of a system matter less than how you use it to create content.

Exactly. But people are getting plenty worked up and drawing conclusions/spitting venom, not just too early, but without even considering the already-reported other elements of said complex system.

Oh right, the codex.

Why did you join then ? If you already know exactly what codexers think and do and you don't agree, then why don't you just fuck off back to rpgwatch ? I'm sure they miss your wisdom.

Why do you still play new RPGs if all the modern ones are shit?

Why are you posting in the PE thread if you aren't interested in it?

Keep up with the intelligent and balanced posting!

 

[SwiftCrack]

RIP 2013, Year of the Incline. We hardly knew ye.

Wrong, Project Eternity comes out in 2014.

Oops got the Wasteland 2 and PE threads mixed up

 

[oscar]

Zakhad
Well, we can't say yet that it will be a complete non-issue. It depends on the specific values for damage and DT, which we don't know yet.

In general, I think that with correct selection of values and good encounter design, almost any sufficiently complex system can be . In this type of game, the exact rules of a system matter less than how you use it to create content.

Exactly. But people are getting plenty worked up and drawing conclusions/spitting venom, not just too early, but without even considering the already-reported other elements of said complex system.

Oh right, the codex.

Why did you join then ? If you already know exactly what codexers think and do and you don't agree, then why don't you just fuck off back to rpgwatch ? I'm sure they miss your wisdom.

4chan is truly the worst shit on the internet. Please don't post this here.

>implying codex is good

Most of this guy's posts are whining about how shitty the Codex is. Pretty amusing for a guy whose been here for less than two months.

 

[Kem0sabe]

Wrong, Project Eternity comes out in 2014.

Any good RPG´s coming out in 2013? I was hoping PE would come out this year, so that leaves me with nothing much in terms of expectations for this new year RPG wise.

 

[SwiftCrack]

Wrong, Project Eternity comes out in 2014.

Any good RPG´s coming out in 2013? I was hoping PE would come out this year, so that leaves me with nothing much in terms of expectations for this new year RPG wise.

Shadowrun returns / Wasteland 2.

 

[Infinitron]

Wasteland 2? Shadowrun Returns? Chaos Chronicles? Age of Decadence?

inb4 sarcastic comments

 

[Chateaubryan]

Some reactions on the Codex reminds me of the kind of reactions some BSNers would have if they learned the next Dragon Age won't have any homosexual romances.

If PE system was exactly the same than old IE games - minus the hit/miss/crit rule - I could understand the rage but since they have already begun tweaking/reinventing the whole ruleset, we will have to wait for further details and judge the game on the whole package, see how all those sawyerians obsessions work with each others, rather than nitpicking and directly translating those tweaks in a well-identified, loved and worshipped ruleset.

Now, some would answer that they shouldn't pretend doing an IE style game (as general and vague that statement may be) if they are not going to do it. Personally, I don't share that pavlovian reflex that consist of associating IE to D&D and won't mourn Baldur's Gate and Icewind Dale's tedium : if the balance between roll dice and strategic choices can be tipped in favor of strategic choices, I'm all for it. For what it's worth, I would take SMT III's combat (which keeps random dice rolls to a bare minimum and where hit/miss mechanics are a much less prevalent (or at least not in the same way)) over IE's one.

 

[Lord Andre]

Zakhad
Well, we can't say yet that it will be a complete non-issue. It depends on the specific values for damage and DT, which we don't know yet.

In general, I think that with correct selection of values and good encounter design, almost any sufficiently complex system can be . In this type of game, the exact rules of a system matter less than how you use it to create content.

Exactly. But people are getting plenty worked up and drawing conclusions/spitting venom, not just too early, but without even considering the already-reported other elements of said complex system.

Oh right, the codex.

Why did you join then ? If you already know exactly what codexers think and do and you don't agree, then why don't you just fuck off back to rpgwatch ? I'm sure they miss your wisdom.

4chan is truly the worst shit on the internet. Please don't post this here.

>implying codex is good

Most of this guy's posts are whining about how shitty the Codex is. Pretty amusing for a guy whose been here for less than two months.

Yeah. I'll just ignore him in the future. My fault for taking the bait really.

 

[Infinitron]

I think the ability to miss can create some interesting character gimmicks for both PCs and enemies, though I suppose it's nothing that can't be replicated with sufficiently high DT in PE's system.

For example, being swarmed by a crowd of powerful ghosts or shadow type creatures, with 1 hit point and extremely high AC. The challenge being to successfully land a hit on each of them as quickly as possible.

 

[Kem0sabe]

Wasteland 2? Shadowrun Returns? Chaos Chronicles? Age of Decadence?

inb4 sarcastic comments

I haven´t been keeping up with release dates but it´s awesome that Age of Decadence is finally coming out, i remember following the development of the game years ago.

I thought that Wasteland 2 and Shadowrun would be farther off, but it´s nice to know that they are out this year as well.

 

[suejak]

Hello?? Grimoire??

 

[Infinitron]

From your mouth to Cleve's God's ears, suejak.

 

[Zakhad]

Most of this guy's posts are whining about how shitty the Codex is. Pretty amusing for a guy whose been here for less than two months.

Yeah. I'll just ignore him in the future. My fault for taking the bait really.

"All new users must pass through our moderation queue before they will be able to post normally. Until your account has "passed" your posts will only be visible to yourself (and moderators) until they are approved. Give us a week to get around to approving / deleting / ignoring your mundane opinion on crap before hassling us about it. Once you have passed the moderation period (think of it as a test), you will be able to post normally, just like all the other retards.

You should probably ignore the codex itself then, since it seems to hate its own members. Yeah, That would probably be for the best.

 

[Lord Andre]

I think the ability to miss can create some interesting character gimmicks for both PCs and enemies, though I suppose it's nothing that can't be replicated with sufficiently high DT in PE's system.

For example, being swarmed by a crowd of powerful ghosts or shadow type creatures, with 1 hit point and extremely high AC. The challenge being to successfully land a hit on each of them as quickly as possible.

I think it's self-evident that a system with misses has greater room for variety in class, enemy and encounter design than a system without. Can Obsidian make good, complex combat despite this limitation. Perhaps, maybe, probably. My issue is: why limit yourself in the first place ?

 

[Infinitron]

Hmm, I tend to agree that Josh could still leave in critical misses that actually do miss entirely and still preserve his vision for the game.

 

[oscar]

Dice rolls are more strategic than an averaging-out procedure or fixed and predictable results system. They represent how in warfare no plan survives contact with the enemy and the best you can do is create conditions where your lot have all the possible advantage (terrain, buffs, equipment, smartly used abilities, positioning etc) and are thus more likely to succeed. It also leads to memorable and fun moments where you manage to pull off some crazy plan or your barbarian manages to hack his toe off while swinging an axe at a rat. It forces you to think on the fly and roll with the punches, reacting to new and unpredictable circumstances as opposed to being mathematically certain of victory.

A final reason I like the use of luck and dice rolls is that it forces the player to be wary, rather than being overconfident. A fight should pretty much always be a risky undertaking what can go horribly wrong even if one guy looks like he has all the advantages. Large rolling parameters simulate this by allowing the occasional moment where the obvious underdog manages to fluke it by pure luck against someone bigger, tougher and meaner. Granted it's rare, but it keeps you on your toes.

 

[Infinitron]

Dice rolls are more strategic than an averaging-out procedure or fixed and predictable results system. They represent how in warfare no plan survives contact with the enemy

Well, you could say that rather than having dice rolls represent (simulate) this stuff, the game should create actual unpredictable results by making the enemy AI behave unpredictably, pull out unexpected abilities and spells on you, etc.