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

[Blaine]

Also, who are these people who don't both pick up and buy? Why does Josh want to cater to weird fetish players so badly?

That's what I'd like to know.

They should have expected it. Like I said, the people who oppose durability are the same people who oppose time limits, for basically the same reasons. And Obsidian knows quite well how vocal the time limit haters are.

And what reasons would those be? I approve of the time limit in Fallout 1, but not of shoehorning durability into PE. What do you make of that?

 

[Infinitron]

I've already answered both those questions ITT.

 

[Blaine]

I've already answered both those questions ITT.

No you haven't. You've said that people who oppose durability are the same people who oppose time limits, and for the same reasons. You've also danced around the fact that there are at least three people in this thread who think time limits are fine, but that durability (in PE's case specifically; not universally) is inappropriate. It's a blatantly obvious attempt to insult those who disagree with your opinion.

So what are those "same reasons"?

Edit: There's also the fact that Josh Sawyer cited currency sinking as the primary motivation behind item durability, whereas you and some others are inventing more noble reasons for its inclusion and then arguing in its favor on that basis. Difficulty creep in long dungeons is perfectly doable without any durability mechanic.

 

[Grunker]

I do hope they keep it in, just to cause massive butthurt.

I'm just explaining what it does.

And I'm disagreeing with your explanation.

 

[The Bishop]

Item maintenance can have an interesting strategic side to it. It can add an additional layer of complexity for planning loadouts for your characters and offer interesting economic considerations. The problem with maintenance is that in order for it to work it must be consequential for the entire game system, but not too demanding so it doesn't put an economic wall in front of the player progress. That's a very fine balance to strike, and most games play this safe and make it too easy to accommodate players making really bad decisions. That results in an inconsequential mechanic that is just a lot of busywork to deal with, but provides no real improvement to gameplay in general. So the main question is whether Obsidian have guts to make maintenance difficult enough for it to become important. And if they don't then PE is better off without durability mechanics altogether.

 

[Excidium]

I've already answered both those questions ITT.

No you haven't. You've said that people who oppose durability are the same people who oppose time limits, and for the same reasons. You've also danced around the fact that there are at least three people in this thread who think time limits are fine, but that durability (in PE's case specifically; not universally) is inappropriate. It's a blatantly obvious attempt to insult those who disagree with your opinion.

So what are those "same reasons"?

Edit: There's also the fact that Josh Sawyer cited currency sinking as the primary motivation behind item durability, whereas you and some others are inventing more noble reasons for its inclusion and then arguing in its favor on that basis. Difficulty creep in long dungeons is perfectly doable without any durability mechanic.

Shitty implimentations like this one is why people hate time limits and durability systems in the first place.

 

[Blaine]

Item maintenance can have an interesting strategic side to it. It can add an additional layer of complexity for planning loadouts for your characters and offer interesting economic considerations. The problem with maintenance is that in order for it to work it must be consequential for the entire game system, but not too demanding so it doesn't put an economic wall in front of the player progress. That's a very fine balance to strike, and most games play this safe and make it too easy to accommodate players making really bad decisions. That results in an inconsequential mechanic that is just a lot of busywork to deal with, but provides no real improvement to gameplay in general. So the main question is whether Obsidian have guts to make maintenance difficult enough for it to become important. And if they don't then PE is better off without durability mechanics altogether.

Yes, and from Sawyer's own mouth (or keyboard, as it were), siphoning off excess funds is his primary motivation in adding durability. That's the wrong reason to add a durability mechanic. There are good reasons, but he hasn't mentioned any of them yet.

Hopefully he'll muddle his way to some good reasons at some point.

 

[Excidium]

Likely because he didn't think of any. That durability system is just copied directly from games where that's the only purpose it serves.

 

[Grunker]

The durability mechanic is Tim Cain's design.

 

[Excidium]

The durability mechanic is Tim Cain's design.

Why am I not surprised?

But doesn't everything have to go through Sawyer anyway?

 

[Grunker]

The durability mechanic is Tim Cain's design.

Why am I not surprised?

But doesn't everything have to go through Sawyer anyway?

As far I understand it, gameplay is mainly Cain + Sawyer, with them designing different areas of it.

 

[Blaine]

The durability mechanic is Tim Cain's design.

Oh, well, I... uh... but, but... it....

 

[Excidium]

Someone mainly known for Fallout, Arcanum and TOEE in charge of systems design, what could possibly go wrong?

 

[Rake]

The durability mechanic is Tim Cain's design.

Oh, well, I... uh... but, but... it....

Why? It has Arcanum writen all over it.

 

[Rake]

Someone mainly known for Fallout, Arcanum and TOEE in charge of systems design, what could possibly go wrong?

in b4 Obsidian's superteam of "legendery designers" are in fact incompetent....

 

[hiver]

Someone mainly known for Fallout, Arcanum and TOEE in charge of systems design, what could possibly go wrong?

can there be anyone this stupid?

I like item durability when it presents meaningful choices, like: "should I buy more food or should I repair my gear at risk of starving to death later". As pure money sink it's one of the most annoying and pointless mechanics that can plague a game.
If you want to prevent players from getting too rich then adjusting money faucet works way better than adjusting the sink. But, IMHO, more important question is: why would you prevent that at all?

Adventurers (the succesful ones at least) in heroic fantasy are the rockstars of our world. They shouldbe filthy rich. They should be able to buy every single piece of random merchant's stock and still have enough money to fuck every whore in town. Twice.

How about - No.

What horrible laughable cheap wankery.
wtf... your game would be fantasy rockstars ? Banging chicks?

blaarrghh...!

Send the script to Bioware! immediately!

Otherwise, what's the point of risking your life raiding the Tomb of Horrible Horrors when you can earn more money peddling cabbage on a street corner.

Heights of logic!
the efficiency of facts and actual relevance, worth and utility data between raiding toombs in fantasy games and selling cabage!
Who would not believe this guy!? EH?

If you need to get rid of player's money because "consumables" or "store items" would totally destroy game balance - they you have problem with basic mechanics, not with the economy.

Let players get rich and let them act like they rich -

Fuck you - no. Rich larping faggot.

but scale the problems and obstacles accordingly. Give them options to meddle in local politics.

:LOL:

:O

Let them use their wealth to hire armies of mercenaries to clear goblin camps in the way without forcing them grind through those themselves.

High level quests! Grind goblin caves by grinding armies to clear them so you dont have to clear themahaha ahahaha...

Make them face problems that can't be solved by throwing money at it - e.g. deadly curse that can only be dispelled by killing the guy who cast it.

No.. stop..haha...hahahaha... no moreee...



You killed him by...ahahaha... throwing money at him!!
Did you hit him in the eye with a coin? Or you just smacked him with paper bills?

I know those examples are shit - but better ones can be made.

oh.. Oohohoho...

I know it hard to make such game - filling dungeons with trash mobs and towns with obvious money sinks is easier and costs less to develop. But I think it would be nice if someone made a good RPG for a change, without implementing same shitty mechanics over and over again.

:picard lolcopter:


ah, sorry... but i thought only the first few lines were hilariously ridiculous and i wanted to quote just those... but then i read the rest!



its a symphony!




-edit-
man... and i just got up to smoke a cig and eat a banana.

 

[Gurkog]

The idiots whining about Sawyer picking apart IE game mechanics because he thinks they can be better are hypocrites. This is the Codex, where subhuman degenerates waste their lives nitpicking RPGs to show how shitty they are no matter how much praise they feel the games deserve. I think Sawyer is a true bro and goons like Grunker are just jealous that he is doing their dream job of improving on classic games instead of just bitching and moaning about what could/should have been.

Your tears sustain me.

 

[Excidium]

 

[Blaine]

The idiots whining about Sawyer picking apart IE game mechanics because he thinks they can be better are hypocrites. This is the Codex, where subhuman degenerates waste their lives nitpicking RPGs to show how shitty they are no matter how much praise they feel the games deserve.

Sawyer's actually a game designer. We don't want him to be a subhuman degenerate like the rest of us—we want him to be better than that.

I think Sawyer is a true bro and goons like Grunker are just jealous that he is doing their dream job of improving on classic games instead of just bitching and moaning about what could/should have been.

Dream job? If I'd been born a decade earlier and had been dreaming about becoming a game developer as a teenager in the 1980s, rather than in the 1990s (when it was soon to be too late), then I might be jealous.

The dream died with the decline. The crowdfunding revival (and we've yet to see how successful it is) doesn't change that. My dream of driving to Sierra On-Line's offices in Oakhurst early in the morning, steaming mug of coffee on the dash (we don't have dashes in our cars anymore, either) to work on Space Quest or Quest for Glory... that dream is nothing more than a crushed, desiccated husk. It's meaningless to me now. I found a new dream; now I just want to play the games.

 

[Sensuki]

Okay so the aim is to have every skill have a degradable benefit in combat???????

 

[Blaine]

I just don't know anymore.

 

[Sensuki]

^ Exactly.

If that is the case. Crafting should not be a skill. Problem solved.

 

[Logic_error]

"It's producing the same result"

This mathematics was brought to you by department of social studies.

 

[Lancehead]

"It's producing the same result"

This mathematics was brought to you by department of social studies.

What are you talking about?

 

[tuluse]

Okay so the aim is to have every skill have a degradable benefit in combat???????

No, the aim is that you would theoretically want every skill with every character.

This durability system is not a good way to do it.