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

[Rake]

Shrek's post is the obvious response but, seriously, MCA fandom has got to creep him out at least a little bit.

MCA's fandom likes his writing and story ideas. We know tactical gameplay isn't his thing. Sure, most didn't expected him to be SO bad, but still...
PS:T, KOTOR2, Alpha Protocol. See a trent here?

 

[Roguey]

Unless a later patch fixed things, damage threshold in New Vegas was terribly implemented. Because there was one universal stat for damage threshold (unlike Fallout 1/2, which had multiple ones for different types of damage), it greatly favored weapons with a higher damage-per-shot and punished the use of automatic weaponry, especially in the late game where everyone and their brother had high DT.

JSawyer does in fact add DR to certain armors.

Also using high DAM/low DPS weapons against cazadores (who never ever get DT) is foolish and inefficient and plenty of automatic weapons had armor piercing variants.

 

[Onholyservicebound]

Bad example because they made the fairly bizarre decision to have party time mentats, egregious even amongst the general background radiation of poorly designed buff-tedium

FNV was mass-market and probably self-consciously designed not to prevent you from making the PC into Bethesdaman, able to do anything in a single playthrough and pass any stat check or combat by stacking thousands of console inventory-fucking buffs while studiously avoiding any sense of character or personhood in favor of being a pure cipher.

I never came across party time mentats once in my non-meta gaming playthrough. The wiki says they're sold in one place in the entire game, which belongs to a faction allied with Caesar's Legion(Which is probably the least played faction, and has very little benefits overall). Only available after passing a science check.(Or craftable for the same check and ingredients.)

Even then, what does that help really? Gives you a minute of having tougher companions, or passing a speech check of 30 when your speech is only 20? But I agree that it could have been done better, however, consider it an improvement from what it was built on. Obsidian said that part of making a sequel is living up to fan expectations, which in this case were mostly a bunch of frothing consoletard FO3 fans. They don't have that weighing them down this time.

Bethesda-man is not possible with vanilla FNV, with every single DLC, yes. But every DLC added more perks, so you'll never be a true bethesda man.(Anyone see Skyrim's latest patch? They decided that having 2/3rds of the perks in the game was stupid, so they took off the level/perk cap indefinitely, lol.)

Unless a later patch fixed things, damage threshold in New Vegas was terribly implemented. Because there was one universal stat for damage threshold (unlike Fallout 1/2, which had multiple ones for different types of damage), it greatly favored weapons with a higher damage-per-shot and punished the use of automatic weaponry, especially in the late game where everyone and their brother had high DT.

And the silly workaround of adding a certain percentage of the damage to "bleed through" hardly helped automatic weapons stay relevant while eliminating one of the most satisfying results of a damage threshold mechanic; feeling like a tank when in high-level armor. No longer could your Vault-Dweller Courier strike a Superman pose against raiders armed with nothing but rifles, impervious to all (but a freak critical) in his power armor.

This is what the different ammo types were for, match ammo negated extra DT and added more damage, AP negated lots of DT for a damage decrease, increasing viability of these weapons. Besides that, there was the BAR rifle with damage equal to most non automatic weapons, and the LMG itself was fairly high damage. All weapons that used 5mm rounds(Minigun, assault carbine) had a -5 DT, -10 for match, and -(Really big number) for AP rounds. Cazadores, Legionaries, great khans, geckos, mutants, centaurs, yaoi guai, mantises, all have low enough DT for a LMG to be effective against. It's also a bit logical don't you think? Why should shooting a bunch of tiny bullets at armour they can't pierce do lots of damage?

 

[Infinitron]

And you know, multiplayer games are between a rock and a hard place here, because they need to be as balanced, and as fun as possible, at the same time, and very, very few get this completely right. What I don't get is why anyone would willingly tie this boulder around his neck when designing a successor to IE games, which you yourself admitted were imbalanced as fuck, and everybody loved them anyway. This is true for a lot of the Codex' most loved games, actually. Fallouts, PST, Arcanum, System Shock 2, to name a few, are heavily imbalanced as well. And it honestly doesn't matter that much (well, it does in Arcanum's case to an extent, because you have to larp harm not existing).

Of course it doesn't matter that much. Haven't you heard me repeat "content is king" over and over again?

Nevertheless, all serious SS2 players these days play with the rebalancing ADaoB mod. Ask yourself, why is that? It's because awesome content is great for papering over systemic flaws the first time you play a game, but after you've played it N times, they become increasingly apparent and you begin to ask yourself, "Couldn't this be better?"

I say it can be better.

My point is, designing them while also focusing on balance is extremely difficult, because in many ways, "interesting" and "balanced" are at odds when it comes to gameplay mechanics.

"You press a button, something interesting has to happen! Button, interesting, connected now, in RPG Codex!"

 

[Gozma]

I never came across party time mentats once in my non-meta gaming playthrough. The wiki says they're sold in one place in the entire game, which belongs to a faction allied with Caesar's Legion(Which is probably the least played faction, and has very little benefits overall). Only available after passing a science check.(Or craftable for the same check and ingredients.)

It's on the craft list at every camp fire in the game, which tells you the ingredients, which are all dirt common. You need 50 science... 50 temporary science.

I only use it as an example because it is so over-the-top (+5 to a stat in a game with a no-overflow 10 point stat cap) in a game with untold volumes of dumb, tedious-menufucking buffs you can stack and whatever as much as you care to. The rarefied gameplay of the 10 point charisma character that watches Boone shoot things is but a single tedious menufuck away~~!

 

[Ninjerk]

Did you guys actually care about all these irrelevant details in that game? I just spammed either plasma or Fire. It always worked.

I pumped stealth, small guns, and speech and savescummed Benny. I figured I'd be more interested in the writing than the combat (I was right).

 

[Gozma]

Did you guys actually care about all these irrelevant details in that game? I just spammed either plasma or Fire. It always worked.

FNV is yet another Obsidian game that is exactly good enough to get me engaged to the point that the shit they fucked up starts bothering me

 

[Chaotic_Heretic]

FNV was not really balanced. Riot shotgun build. JESawyer has failed

 

[Roguey]

FNV was not really balanced. Riot shotgun build. JESawyer has failed

That's a top tier gun. They're overpowered by design to compensate for bad players.

 

[Blaine]

That's a top tier gun. They're overpowered by design to compensate for bad players.

 

[Roguey]

But that's the reason.
http://www.formspring.me/JESawyer/q/266614622633592520

Yeah but the tiers aren't really that differentiated. Sure, I probably couldn't beat the endgame easily with a .357 or a 9mm, But I could with a .44 or a 5.56.

A lot of players are... not very good. "Bad" you might say. They need the statistical bump of higher tier weapons. For good players, it eventually becomes overkill.

 

[Blaine]

Then he succeeded in designing the game to cater to retards, which... really isn't much of an improvement, from my perspective. That's what the difficulty settings should be for.

 

[Rake]

Then he succeeded in designing the game to cater to retards, which... really isn't much of an improvement, from my perspective. That's what the difficulty settings should be for.

But that is Sawyer difference with the Codex in a nutshell.
There are many retards bad players out there. Sawyer wants his game to be playable by them as well as the , so he intoduces fail safes and emergency exits for them.
Most of the Codex would be happy if the said retards were killed outright in the first area. As VD said, good fucking riddance

 

[Infinitron]

Then he succeeded in designing the game to cater to retards, which... really isn't much of an improvement, from my perspective. That's what the difficulty settings should be for.

But that is Sawyer difference with the Codex in a nutshell.
There are many retards bad players out there. Sawyer wants his game to be playable by them as well as the , so he intoduces fail safes and emergency exits for them.
Most of the Codex would be happy if the said retards were killed outright in the first area. As VD said, good fucking riddance

We're talking about a Bethesda-published console game here. PE isn't being designed with the same "frustration avoidance" target goal

 

[Rake]

Then he succeeded in designing the game to cater to retards, which... really isn't much of an improvement, from my perspective. That's what the difficulty settings should be for.

But that is Sawyer difference with the Codex in a nutshell.
There are many retards bad players out there. Sawyer wants his game to be playable by them as well as the , so he intoduces fail safes and emergency exits for them.
Most of the Codex would be happy if the said retards were killed outright in the first area. As VD said, good fucking riddance

We're talking about a Bethesda-published console game here. PE isn't being designed with the same "frustration avoidance" target goal

No, but his principles are the same. Just the bar is set higher.

 

[Roguey]

Then he succeeded in designing the game to cater to retards, which... really isn't much of an improvement, from my perspective. That's what the difficulty settings should be for.

http://www.formspring.me/JESawyer/q/173532614789991655

You also hardly ever feel like you're struggling to survive in F1 and F2. The point of Hardcore Mode was to introduce a game mode that changed the combat and inventory mechanics in a way that added another layer of challenge to the base game.

Even with Hardcore Mode, the game isn't exactly Das Schwarze Auge-level difficulty, but it's a step up. We also left a lot of the mechanics exposed in the GECK for modders to further alter Hardcore Mode to their (and your) tastes on the PC.

http://www.formspring.me/JESawyer/q/219173045271562659

My goal was to increment the difficulty above Fallout 3 without taking such a large step that F3 fans would be unable or unwilling to adapt.

Also see http://www.rpgcodex.net/forums/inde...t-eternity-thread.75947/page-657#post-2643064

http://www.formspring.me/JESawyer/q/251387678707157226

Why couldn't you make your hardcore tweaks part of the game in a higher difficulty setting?

Making them my own default in a mod is different from making them part of an optional mode. Additionally, I only do superficial testing of my own mod because it's just for me. Finally, it would appeal to a decreasingly small number of players.

http://www.formspring.me/JESawyer/q/332069220244288050

Frustration is a fundamental element of "real" games, with gamers pushing past the frustration to achieve a sense of triumph. As designers, our goal should always be to find the right balance point for our audience. If the argument is that the gaming audience is much larger and, therefore, less h4rdc0r3 because the pool has been diluted, okay, but it's still our job to find the right balance points and feature set for the audience and its different segments.

One of the reasons I really wanted to include Hardcore Mode in F:NV was because I recognized that there was a significant chunk of the audience that would likely want something a bit tougher than sliding HP and DAM values around. I don't think Hardcore Mode is "really" hard, but compared to the default mode, it does require more attention and a bit more care in combat.

I know there's a subset of that group that wants things even more brutal and survivalist-oriented, for whom even the JSawyer mod doesn't go far enough. I don't think we should try to make everyone happy, but I do think that as developers we should recognize and try to appeal to the major "chunks" of our audience. With 5 million+ players, I don't think it's realistic to think one play still will fit all. And I don't think that saying, "Well, it's hard," absolves us of responsibility. We get paid pretty good money to figure out how people will play games. We should probably put some effort into actually understanding the audience and designing things that will work for them.

 

[Chaotic_Heretic]

JESawyer... I want all options to be equally viable and balanced...leads to stat like power.
Then when someone finds something imbalanced and OP, he says its for bad players
Also, when someone finds unbalanced Under Powered, I am sure he will say it is to challenge good players.

Exactly like Roguey's arguments

That's a top tier gun. They're overpowered by design to compensate for bad players.

View attachment 1822

 

[Gozma]

The riot shotgun is actually the type of thing that's too good for spergs (you have to combo perks and/or manage the bad-interface/obtuse ammo creation system) but weak for facerollers because of the mystaries of DT and multi-hits

Retard guns are ones like the 12.7mm stuff that works on everything with default ammo and has high DPS

 

[garren]

Misery is like the top mod in moddb and hovering always in the top 5 when it isn't in first place. There's certainly a big chunk of players who like high difficulty and the satisfaction that comes from it.

 

[Hormalakh]

Not that the FONV discussion isn't interesting, but maybe this will rile up some feathers; or not.

9 months ago you stated that P:E's attributes (as opposed to speech skills) would affect conversation responses and that they weren't insta-win options but rather allowed improved player choices. Can you speak more to this; have you made any adjustments?

We haven't made any adjustments to it, no. That's still the way it works. Sometimes the option is advantageous, sometimes it's just another option, and sometimes it will work against you. The physical attributes are represented as well as the mental attributes, with the physical attributes often allowing you to perform actions within the conversation.

Hi. Thanks for your response. I wonder whether you'll let the more discerning player "figure out" which conversation options are "poor" choices in some way (outside of meta-gaming). Also, does this preclude a speech skill then? I wasn't really clear there

Yeah, there still isn't a speech skill.

http://www.formspring.me/JESawyer/q/490007616387301738

 

[Infinitron]

That's nothing new

 

[SymbolicFrank]

I have a question: what would be a good system for an cRPG?

There is much talk about what isn't, on this forum, but little of what is.

 

[Roguey]

Also, when someone finds unbalanced Under Powered, I am sure he will say it is to challenge good players.

That doesn't sound like something he'd say at all. More like

http://www.formspring.me/JESawyer/q/166746913020873994

Is the Automatic Rifle gonna be tuned up for the patch? I love the BAR and it's a great weapon, but it was pretty useless.

According to some people it is the most OP weapon that ever OPed!

http://www.formspring.me/JESawyer/q/182735042655590155

Oh, man. Am I the only one *not* looking forward for the patch? Let me guess... The BAR is way too overpowered to be left like that... *sigh* It will backfire or completely break when using JSP ammo, am I right?

I didn't re-tune the Automatic Rifle at all and I'm not sure why you'd assume that in spite of my previous comments about tuning most automatic weapons *up*.

Community opinions on the Automatic Rifle are a pretty good example for why "doing what the community thinks should be done" is often impossible. I have as many people telling me that the Automatic Rifle is the Most OP OP That Ever OPed as I have people telling me that it's terrible and there are no good weapons in Dead Money.

http://www.formspring.me/JESawyer/q/182663657874811943

perfect balance isn't really achievable since balance is subjective and applicability varies based on character build, play style, and content.

http://www.formspring.me/JESawyer/q/182577277844885075

Are weapon balance changes in patches as a response to community issues or gameplay balance? Do you feel you are further balancing the weapons, or do you feel the weapons were balanced and your just responding to the lack of understanding of that balance?

Community feedback helps determine balance issues, but the community at large does not dictate changes. Besides that, what we hear on forums are often split opinions and obviously only a fraction of total players.

Community feedback does draw my attention to things, but when I examine the problem, I may find that the issue is not what individuals think it is -- or I may decide to fix the problem in a way that is different from what people suggest.

 

[Chaotic_Heretic]

So josh is just sperging, trying to achieve the zenith of balance, then going hurr durr, balance cannot be perfect

he claims some stuff easy some stuff tougher in his design philosophy with equivalent classes. but riot shotgun made everything easy

 

[Infinitron]

So josh is just sperging, trying to achieve the zenith of balance

This is something people on the Codex made up. AFAIK he's never gone beyond saying "I do not want to knowingly design useless features."