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

[Kirtai]

In Project Eternity, now, the spells will replenish every encounter automatically!

No, some spells will replenish every encounter. Others only when you rest.

 

[almondblight]

Because strategy games are exactly the same as RPGs. o_O Not to mention that HOI 2 can be a better game if it were turn based like imperialism.

It at least shows that some of the main issues people say they have with RTwP aren't issues inherent in RTwP. For example, I haven't seen anyone claim that you need to have sharp reflexes to play HoI, or that HoI is just a RTS game that's watered down by a pause button.

 

[Harg Harfardarssen]

I call the resting in IWD2 retarded because you can rest almost anywhere. All you need to do is to find a spot away from the nearest enemy. A better way of handling that should have been completely avoiding rest once you enter a hostile area. I can see why such resting is necessary if there are a LOT of enemies (read Trash mobs). In my eyes, it is the poor encounter design that makes it necessary to have that.

This would reduce the resting abuse, but to make this totally effective you would have to lock people into the area. Otherwise you would still have resting abuse, but with more loading screens and boring walking back and forth to non-hostile areas. Locking down large hostile areas containing multiple encounters would be pretty annoying for a variety of reasons. Plus it could lead a player who isn't sufficiently thorough in their save archiving to be caught in an area beyond their power, with no ability to leave and respec. So locking down the area would probably require making the area locked down so small that you would end up with

Given the D&D ruleset, it seems like there's no way to completely eliminate rest spam without implementing mechanics that would be worse than rest spam. I think the best way (or least worst way) to ensure that each battle is challenging is keying the challenge to a fully rested party.

Which is why I think the per-encounter/per-rest abilities are actually a pretty good solution to the problem. 4E was annoying because of how generic the powers were across the different classes, but I think that was caused more by an attempt to make other classes play like wizards than those ability mechanics. This is still a worry with PE, but I'm cautiously optimistic due to Sawyer's statements regarding some classes having more passive abilities and 2) the way in which a party based crpg doesn't require each character class be individually fun to play so long as the party as a whole is fun to control.

 

[Jasede]

My solution is as video-gamey as it is simple:

Resting respawns _all_ enemies. They give no XP when killed twice. You're free to rest if your spell selection / tactics were lacking- but you do not get to progress until you get good enough. Bring some arcade into it.

 

[tuluse]

P:E isn't giving any xp for combat anyways.

 

[hiver]

Horrible idea. Plastering one disgusting, horrible feature over another does not make it better.

here's no way to completely eliminate rest spam

Oh yeah? How about resting only once per day, like you know... in reality?

PE angle is also good. You arseholes against it are all dumb.

 

[almondblight]

Tell you what.

I am tired, TIRED of telling people that I am NOT against RTwP. Why would I be? I am against RTwP that is a hassle. Stop making strawman argument by bringing in strategy games (grand strategy games!) in an argument where we are discussing RPGs.

Yeah...let's review:

RtWP can INDEED be highly complex and designed around tactical depth. The problem is the party. If you have to pause for micromanaging every party member midway of their actions, it is rather considered annoying than deep. It is simply more convenient (in my opinion) to allow for Single Player (no party) combat when designing RtWP games.

One of my own favourite RTwP games, Hearts of Iron 2, requires a lot of micromanagement as a large nation on the harder difficulties. That is also the part of the charm of the game. In terms of keeping watch over what's happening in the game, going to NWN 2 from there is like going back to kindergarten from university. If you think it's annoying to pause every time you want to give an orderin NWN 2, is it because your keyboard hand gets exhausted? I have a hard time seeing exactly why.

If you have problems with the AI, turn it off. It's often the most sensible thing to do anyway unless you're on autopilot.

Because strategy games are exactly the same as RPGs. o_O Not to mention that HOI 2 can be a better game if it were turn based like imperialism.

Where exactly is the straw man? All that's being said is that RTwP games have been good at what people said they wouldn't - micromanagement, being non-twitchy, being complex, making use of positioning, not being watered down RTS games, etc. The counter argument so far is "yeah, but those games aren't RPGs." Since there doesn't seem to be any reason why these systems couldn't be adopted by RPGs, that doesn't seem to be a terribly compelling argument.

 

[Arkeus]

Just a detail, but i am pretty sure that we have been told there would both be 'pause' and 'slow-motion' mode.

I guess "Slow-motion" would be perfect for you.

 

[almondblight]

Dude. Are you fucking retarded?

Where did anyone say that RTwP games can't be good?


Why the fuck do you keep on ranting again and again:

Let's look at what was actually said:

All that's being said is that RTwP games have been good at what people said they wouldn't - micromanagement, being non-twitchy, being complex, making use of positioning, not being watered down RTS games, etc.

See, I understand that if you only read "All that's being said is that RTwP games have been good...", flew into a rage, and didn't bother with the rest then you wouldn't understand what I'm saying. But you might want to, I don't know, finishing reading sentences before replying?

If you turn off the AI you have keep the game paused for a LONG time which negates any reason as to why the game is real time in the first place.
Same for IE games. If you rather want long term pause just fucking make it Turn based and not artificially micromanaged.

As I said, "...not being watered down RTS games..."

I keep HoI paused for a LONG time, but it doesn't negate the reason why the game is in real time. At all.

Have you ever played PvP NWN2? You are in for a surprise buddy. There is mostly no pause in there, so you have to play it like an MMO and start casting your most powerful spell and abilities in a memorized fashion against an enemy. Fuck.

OK? And this relates to what RtWP is capable of...how?

Now I admit that there are SOME RPGs that do RTwP right: one of them is NWN and the other is Drakensang1/2. NWN is NOT party based and thus it makes sense to control the char abilities one at a time until the end of the round. In Drakensang the rounds are SO slow that it is easy to micromanage without the pausing turning into a hassle. That means either you slow down the game, or you please do not have parties in the game, pretty please.

I never played either, but yes, "RTwP can work well" does not mean "RTwP always works well." Of course it has to be implemented correctly. HoI would probably suck if you could only play it on the fastest speed.

 

[Harg Harfardarssen]

Wut?

Locking people into areas?

Howdoody. Haven't IE games done that since ages? There are many instances in IE games where once you enter an area you can't exit. Not to mention that PE will also have moving back to areas where you can rest.

NO.

To clarify, when I said "large areas" I meant something on par with an entire dungeon, or a significant chunk (like say an entire floor of the Aurilite Temple). In other words, locking down whatever area you think people shouldn't rest in until its completed - you enter the area, you stay until you beat it.

Maybe some IE games did this (I don't remember seeing it, but I haven't played them all) but if this were the case it really doesn't change anything; since you could rest in them, the problems I mentioned wouldn't exist. Either the area has few enough encounters that its only marginally challenging or it has so many encounters that mistakes at the beginning will require you to reload a save from a few hours before. Sure you could hit that perfect level of difficulty for a single skill level, but across varying skill levels its likely not possible.

PE will allow you to move back to areas where you can rest, but the fact that your workaday abilities will be replenished after every encounter means that there are fewer reasons to do so. I think its perfectly reasonable to prefer a longer interval of resource management, I just don't think limiting the availability of resting in D&D type games will achieve that very well.

I liked the camping resources idea, but, since its very intimately tied to the game economy, if the economy is broken it will be broken as well. And the economy (like every other single player game economy) will almost certainly be broken. If it follows the usual trajectory, resting will be difficult for the first few levels then trivial for the rest of the game after you've sold all the shit you've picked up.

 

[Captain Shrek]

I liked the camping resources idea, but, since its very intimately tied to the game economy, if the economy is broken it will be broken as well. And the economy (like every other single player game economy) will almost certainly be broken. If it follows the usual trajectory, resting will be difficult for the first few levels then trivial for the rest of the game after you've sold all the shit you've picked up.

Don't break the economy by not having too much drops/gold.

 

[Harg Harfardarssen]

I liked the camping resources idea, but, since its very intimately tied to the game economy, if the economy is broken it will be broken as well. And the economy (like every other single player game economy) will almost certainly be broken. If it follows the usual trajectory, resting will be difficult for the first few levels then trivial for the rest of the game after you've sold all the shit you've picked up.

Don't break the economy by not having too much drops/gold.

Can you think of a game that does this? I can't, but I would love to play one that does if you have any suggestions.

I would guess the problem comes from needing to have enough gold for the player who ignores sidequests, meaning that the player who does quite a few side quests will always have a pretty large surplus. I'm sure its solvable, but its just not a big enough deal to devote resources to the required tweaking. If its not worth solving for its own sake I don't think solving it just to make sure the resting mechanics work will happen anytime soon.

 

[Harold]

Well, you can take things out of a bag of holding anywhere you want, so that would be weird.

Make the bag unaccessable during combat. Problem solved.

 

[Alex]

Well, you can take things out of a bag of holding anywhere you want, so that would be weird.

Make the bag unaccessable during combat. Problem solved.

First thing I would want to do is sell the magic bag and buy a mule instead.

 

[Harold]

Well, you can take things out of a bag of holding anywhere you want, so that would be weird.

Make the bag unaccessable during combat. Problem solved.

First thing I would want to do is sell the magic bag and buy a mule instead.

Make the mule killable during combat, make mule prices keep going up due to infaltion caused by vendors being haunted by the angry spirits of dead mules.
Holy shit, we just solved PE's economy problem.

 

[Infinitron]

Well, you can take things out of a bag of holding anywhere you want, so that would be weird.

Make the bag unaccessable during combat. Problem solved.

I don't think you understand.

PE's "stash" will be inaccessible everywhere except in towns. Everywhere else, you can put shit in, but you can't take it back out. Traditional Bags of Holding don't have that limitation. So trying to describe the stash as a Bag of Holding wouldn't exactly work.

 

[Harg Harfardarssen]

PE's stash is more like an interdimensional laundry chute. You can throw things in, but if you want them back you've got to go to the basement

 

[imweasel]

How about... "Stash of holding"?

 

[Harold]

Well, you can take things out of a bag of holding anywhere you want, so that would be weird.

Make the bag unaccessable during combat. Problem solved.

I don't think you understand.

PE's "stash" will be inaccessible everywhere except in towns. Everywhere else, you can put shit in, but you can't take it back out. Traditional "bags of holding" don't have that limitation. So trying to describe the stash as a "bag of holding" wouldn't exactly work.

I do understand. I was advocating replacing the stash with a bag of holding (bad wording on my part, I know) since, if you're gonna have infinite inventory, it's pointless to make it unaccessable outside of combat, save for going back to camp. Spending time to think everytime you pick a new item if you'll make use of it soon or not isn't very fun for most people. It also kills the momentum of going through a dungeon.

 

[Alex]

Make the mule killable during combat, make mule prices keep going up due to infaltion caused by vendors being haunted by the angry spirits of dead mules.
Holy shit, we just solved PE's economy problem.

Well, you are forgetting you can tweak your mount too. I heard Mule 5, Warhorse 5, Camel 1 (for the water storage feat), Magic Mount 9 combo is almost unbeatable.

Seriously though, I would like an interactive pack animal as your inventory a lot more than some abstracted magic hole you can only interact with in certain situations.

 

[Infinitron]

Well, you can take things out of a bag of holding anywhere you want, so that would be weird.

Make the bag unaccessable during combat. Problem solved.

I don't think you understand.

PE's "stash" will be inaccessible everywhere except in towns. Everywhere else, you can put shit in, but you can't take it back out. Traditional "bags of holding" don't have that limitation. So trying to describe the stash as a "bag of holding" wouldn't exactly work.

I do understand. I was advocating replacing the stash with a bag of holding (bad wording on my part, I know) since, if you're gonna have infinite inventory, it's pointless to make it unaccessable outside of combat, save for going back to camp. Spending time to think everytime you pick a new item if you'll make use of it soon or not isn't very fun for most people. It also kills the momentum of going through a dungeon.

Oh I see. I don't know, I think most players learn very quickly what is useful and what isn't.

 

[imweasel]

The size of the stash should limited (but very large) imo.

And the name of the stash should be changed to... I dunno, "magical hole of item stuffing" (something better than that actually).

 

[Raapys]

Why not just give everyone a Bag of Holding. I always loved those in IE games.

Anyway, does the game have a title yet? They're not actually gonna call it PE, are they?

 

[PlanHex]

Having the stash explained in game as one or more bags of holding or a similar-but-not-completely-ripped-from-dnd item kinda makes sense actually.

 

[Raapys]

Personally I wouldn't mind if you had to find/fight for/buy them either...