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

[Volrath]

Our boy George seems a bit obsessed with the concept of epic high level divine campaigns.

D&D starts to get fun when you go full retard so it doesn't surprise me.

 

[Jaesun]

He likes the concept of it. Not the horrible broken mechanics that entails.

 

[Rake]

From his pitch doesn't seems that he intended your character to become stronger than ToB levels. Maybe more special abilities. His whole consept is about your adventure,gaining allies and influence etc. Power levels shouldn't be too difirent than ToB.

 

[Koschey]

as well as revisiting old favorites like Sigil, though seeing the City of Doors through the eyes of a minor deity could be a very different experience.

I think Ziets does great work in general, but whenever I reread that sentence I can't help but facepalm

 

[Kirtai]

as well as revisiting old favorites like Sigil, though seeing the City of Doors through the eyes of a minor deity could be a very different experience.

I think Ziets does great work in general, but whenever I reread that sentence I can't help but facepalm

There was a section in one of the novels where a minor deity gets through Sigil by hiding his divinity inside an artefact. Of course, he gets spotted just before he leaves.

 

[uaciaut]

as well as revisiting old favorites like Sigil, though seeing the City of Doors through the eyes of a minor deity could be a very different experience.

I think Ziets does great work in general, but whenever I reread that sentence I can't help but facepalm

There was a section in one of the novels where a minor deity gets through Sigil by hiding his divinity inside an artefact. Of course, he gets spotted just before he leaves.

What's the result? I'm curious how a lady of pain - god direct conflict would go. A lot of her mystique is in the fact that you don't exactly know how powerful she is or where exactly she draws her strength from, though i find Ravel's theory on Sigil being her prison and/or her being a guardian of sorts plausible, i wonder if she really can keep the major deities outside (i doubt she could do anything to Ao)

 

[Kirtai]

There was a section in one of the novels where a minor deity gets through Sigil by hiding his divinity inside an artefact. Of course, he gets spotted just before he leaves.

What's the result? I'm curious how a lady of pain - god direct conflict would go. A lot of her mystique is in the fact that you don't exactly know how powerful she is or where exactly she draws her strength from, though i find Ravel's theory on Sigil being her prison and/or her being a guardian of sorts plausible, i wonder if she really can keep the major deities outside (i doubt she could do anything to Ao)

His reaction was pretty much "Oh shit, run for it" and they legged it out a portal.

 

[Murk]

The problem here is that... wait for it... you're thinking in terms of epic levels.

To reiterate that in more detail - you're thinking in terms of a continuous power curve that stretches from "I can stab a rat and emerge victorious 2 out of 3 times" to "I can stab gods, take whatever they dish out in return and emerge victorious 10 out of 10 times".
That's just shit and it causes stuff in all layers of your design to just break down and fold upon itself.
Seriously, it's just wrong and causes shitload of problems - mere mortals being able to take dozens of crossbow bolts through the sternum, hitting stuff for massive vs not so massive damage, encounters fluctuating wildly in terms of power because "durr challenge rating" and shit.

Pretty much the only kind of character for whom this kind of curve could be postulated is caster, but even then it's not curve you can reasonably traverse with a character over the course a game.
For all the other characters progression is very much bounded (at fairly low level too) and can be assumed asympthotic.
That's in terms of skill, in terms of stats like health or base attributes it can be assumed barely existent at best.

Anything beyond that must be a function of gear or special innate or acquired ability that doesn't just come as result of accumulating enough levels, but specific blessing, curse, being born a son of deity or something like that.

tl;dr
Epic levels are a superset of HP bloat and therefore shit.

No, not really -- I'm thinking in terms of making a D&D game in a D&D setting using D&D rules in a manner that fits the theme of the game. You play a god-devouring, soul-eating, powerful almost-a-god yourself. For your character to not exhibit power in any way other than plot-device abilities that completely transcend the rest of the campaign is a major break down.

Anyway, how would you fix it so that you can still eat the souls of Myrkul, Oku, the Shape of Fire, and command a cross-alignment army of (pseudo)immortal celestials, dragons, and demi-liches to invade a God's own domain without using 20+ levels in D&D 3.5?

 

[Roguey]

He is dumb for wanting to make money? BG is really a safe bet among RPGs

As if he'd make anything but his usual salary from it.

 

[dnf]

At least he woudn't lose the job

 

[Akarnir]

For those that stalks the developer's formspring, twitter... daily, have they given any extra explanations on guns, gunpowder or modernity?

For example what would prevent guns from evolving further just like they did IRL, and end up being the dominant weapons in 300 years?

Primitive rifles are already considered powerful, now just imagine a WWI riffle.
A simple AK-47 would make combat mages completely obsolete, as well as most magic weapons anyway.

That could limit the future perspective to only a few decades, max a century, before modern weaponery kick in.

How are they gonna nerf the guns and gunpowder to prevent that?

Unless of course, they want to make it arcanum style, but they haven't said anything about magic disrupting technology and vice versa, which puts the 2 on even grounds (hence the cycles...).

 

[Infinitron]

Oh god not another genre war

 

[Excidium]

For those that stalks the developer's formspring, twitter... daily, have they given any extra explanations on guns, gunpowder or modernity?

For example what would prevent guns from evolving further just like they did IRL, and end up being the dominant weapons in 300 years?

A simple AK-47 would make combat mages completely obsolete, as well as most magic weapons anyway.

That could limit the future perspective to only a few decades, max a century, before modern weaponery kick in.

How are they gonna nerf the guns and gunpowder to prevent that?

Unless of course, they want to make it arcanum style, but they haven't said anything about magic disrupting technology and vice versa, which puts the 2 on even grounds (hence the cycles...).

The answer is SOULS.

 

[Akarnir]

Well actually they could make up an explanation with that. That wouldn't be too far stretched. Like powerful souls fucking up physics around them or something (hence why magic comes from that).
So subtle reactions... cannot work, only big old, simple, rough fireworks.

 

[Shadenuat]

For example what would prevent guns from evolving further just like they did IRL, and end up being the dominant weapons in 300 years

Maybe nothing. Maybe they won't actually place their world in technology stagnation bubble to preserve it's original flavour, and maybe in Project Eternity 5 we will roam jungle with rifles, wearing spanish helmets and plate in a search of City of Gold where elves still make sacrifices and drink blood from jars made out of potatoes.

 

[Akarnir]

For example what would prevent guns from evolving further just like they did IRL, and end up being the dominant weapons in 300 years

Maybe nothing. Maybe they won't actually place their world in technology stagnation bulb to preserve it's original flavour, and maybe in Project Eternity 5 we will roam jungle with rifles, wearing spanish helmets and plate in a search of City of Gold where elves still make sacrifices and drink blood from jars made out of potatoes.

Actually, that would probably be the case in PE 2. PE 5 would be about fat guys piloting drones to bomb a civilian district that is deemed ''suspicious'' by the HQ.

If this is a potential outcome, That would be sad.

 

[Delterius]

For example what would prevent guns from evolving further just like they did IRL, and end up being the dominant weapons in 300 years

Maybe nothing. Maybe they won't actually place their world in technology stagnation bulb to preserve it's original flavour, and maybe in Project Eternity 5 we will roam jungle with rifles, wearing spanish helmets and plate in a search of City of Gold where elves still make sacrifices and drink blood from jars made out of potatoes.

Yes, hopefully nothing would halt technological development just as magical development is capable of adapting to newer times.

 

[Infinitron]

The Project Eternity setting already has bombs, actually.

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/obsidian/project-eternity/posts/326585

Magran - The Aedyran name for a goddess of war and fire. Her priests commonly employ firearms and some helped construct the "Godhammer" bomb used to destroy St. Waidwen. Following the Saint's War, she became the most popular faith in Dyrwood. In Aedyr, her symbol is a flame, but in Dyrwood, it is a flaming bomb. Worship of Magran is extensively persecuted in Readceras.

 

[Akarnir]

For example what would prevent guns from evolving further just like they did IRL, and end up being the dominant weapons in 300 years

Maybe nothing. Maybe they won't actually place their world in technology stagnation bulb to preserve it's original flavour, and maybe in Project Eternity 5 we will roam jungle with rifles, wearing spanish helmets and plate in a search of City of Gold where elves still make sacrifices and drink blood from jars made out of potatoes.

Yes, hopefully nothing would halt technological development just as magical development is capable of adapting to newer times.

Yeah another shadowrun setting.

 

[Shadenuat]

Actually, that would probably be the case in PE 2. PE 5 would be about fat guys piloting drones to bomb a civilian district that is deemed ''suspicious'' by the HQ.
If this is a potential outcome, That would be sad.

Next game can always just play a year or two into the future instead of 300 years.

Yes, hopefully nothing would halt technological development just as magical development is capable of adapting to newer times.

That would just open new possibilities to explore real history for interesting scenarios and adapt them to the reality of their own setting. I too see that as a good thing.

 

[Akarnir]

That would just open new possibilities to explore real history for interesting scenarios and adapt them to the reality of their own setting. I too see that as a good thing.

Meh, newer times... I'm probably gonna get shot for saying that here, but I would rather have a setting perpetually stuck in ancient times (Pre modern era), with magic as a flavor. That's just more comforting.
In the case of PE of course. I still like Torment, and shadowrun settings.

 

[Delterius]

For example what would prevent guns from evolving further just like they did IRL, and end up being the dominant weapons in 300 years

Maybe nothing. Maybe they won't actually place their world in technology stagnation bulb to preserve it's original flavour, and maybe in Project Eternity 5 we will roam jungle with rifles, wearing spanish helmets and plate in a search of City of Gold where elves still make sacrifices and drink blood from jars made out of potatoes.

Yes, hopefully nothing would halt technological development just as magical development is capable of adapting to newer times.

Yeah another shadowrun setting.

Preferably not, I'm a fantasy man myself. Just saying that one thing is to continually explore the same period of time with different stories and places (thus, not bothering to illustrate technical development, though it is a possibility for the unexplored future), and another is to effectively stunt technology and magic into the uncanny valley.

Rather, its best that Obsidian doesn't tell us wether something holds the development of technology or not. Even if they plan not to develop it.

 

[Akarnir]

For example what would prevent guns from evolving further just like they did IRL, and end up being the dominant weapons in 300 years

Maybe nothing. Maybe they won't actually place their world in technology stagnation bulb to preserve it's original flavour, and maybe in Project Eternity 5 we will roam jungle with rifles, wearing spanish helmets and plate in a search of City of Gold where elves still make sacrifices and drink blood from jars made out of potatoes.

Yes, hopefully nothing would halt technological development just as magical development is capable of adapting to newer times.

Yeah another shadowrun setting.

Preferably not, I'm a fantasy man myself. Just saying that one thing is to continually explore the same period of time with different stories and places (thus, not bothering to illustrate technical development, though it is a possibility for the unexplored future), and another is to effectively stunt technology and magic into the uncanny valley.

Rather, its best that Obsidian doesn't tell us wether something holds the development of technology or not. Even if they plan not to develop it.

Well, ancient times provide much diversity. From 4000BC to 1500AD, hundreds of completely different civilizations succeeded each other, so there's a lot of inspiration to draw from. And therefore a lot of different civlizational development to explore.
You can avoid modernity for a while with so much material.


I would rather leave the technological development to science fictions. Unless of course, it's relevant to the fantasy element (and no magitech please).

 

[Delterius]

Indeed, with just a little bit of creativity, writers can draw upon so much material that there's no need to advance tech in order to renew the setting. Just as there's no need to estabilish a practical ceilling that stunts technology. I'd rather they just kept exploring more or less the same technological context without saying wether or not the future holds automatic rifles and armored tanks.

 

[Akarnir]

Indeed, with just a little bit of creativity, writers can draw upon so much material that there's no need to advance tech in order to renew the setting. Just as there's no need to estabilish a practical ceilling that stunts technology. I'd rather they just kept exploring more or less the same technological context without saying wether or not the future holds automatic rifles and armored tanks.

Yeah that makes sense.

It's really a matter of comfort for me. To be sure that they never move too far away from the ancient time theme, which I personally prefer in this particular case.

Also the fact that it's somehow refreshing to know for sure, that technology, science and ''boring'' school stuff aren't the way here, and it's all about magic (instant gratification as opposed to physics/chemistry/math...), exploration, lyricism....