Yosharian
Arcane
I'm a motherfucking DM. But I play CRPGs too.
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Pathfinder Pathfinder: Kingmaker - Enhanced Plus Edition - now with turn-based combat
- Thread starter Elex
- Start date
They patched their personal quests later again so you can get good ending for both.
Doing Amiri's part first only breaks Tristian's romance now and makes you miss extra dialogue with Nyrissa, that depending on her "approval" could be crucial for her romance and perfect ending.
Last edited:
hell bovine
Arcane
Modron
Arcane
- Joined
- May 5, 2012
- Messages
- 11,154
Thank you for your answer. Now I see the pattern.
Educate me, oh knowledgeable one. What is this pattern? I don't understand.
Grampy_Bone
Arcane
He's probably making the connection that PnP player = your criticism is invalid.
At risk of misrepresenting him, this is a point many have brought up to disqualify arguments instead of addressing them. I would say if Owlcat didn't want to invite criticism from PnP players then they shouldn't have adapted a PnP ruleset.
Part of what makes Kingmaker so frustrating to me is that it does get many things right. If the game was just generally bad it wouldn't be worth complaining about. See: Sword Coast Legends.
In fact, Sword Coast Legends is an example of a game that threw out the PnP ruleset in favor of more generic CRPG design and look how that turned out. Kingmaker's strengths come from the ruleset, many of its weaknesses come from the inexperienced devs.
Seriously the difficulty based stat inflation is one of the few things I hated about Kingmaker. Nothing like bandits with the strength of storm giants.
It also made hard difficulty the last one I enjoyed playing at. I found hard easyish at times, but unfair was straight cancer due to the magnitude of the stat inflation + double damage resulting in things like one shotting your full hp fighter to permadead. I found it resulted in pushing degenerate tactics like sending Jaethal in alone to brute force some encounters and grind xp which was completely the opposite of interesting, fun, or challenging.
Grampy_Bone
Arcane
Nerf the obviously broken Crane wing feat line, that will knock you down to a manageable 93 AC.
what I want to say is that rpgs are about numerical advantages; the real difference is if player can interact with them or not. and I don't see them implementing such interactions that easy.
more feats/spells = higher level. for casuals it's same deal. "they trown 20 level balor at me this is bullshit" (ToEE)
I just don't see how to win at this easily.
more feats/spells = higher level. for casuals it's same deal. "they trown 20 level balor at me this is bullshit" (ToEE)
I just don't see how to win at this easily.
Grampy_Bone
Arcane
Pathfinder already has decent numerical guidelines for stat balancing through the CR system. The way you make it tougher is through better encounter design and AI.
If a group of enemy archers target random PCs and spread their damage around, no big deal. If they focus-fire on your mage and burn him down fast, much bigger deal. Letting enemies pre-buff is another way to increase challenge (it's only fair, and it gives dispel and other tactics more weight). Creating interesting scenarios where enemies can bullrush you off a cliff but you can do the same is also good.
Players want classes and roles that are intuitive. Making a fighter, giving him platemail, and putting him on the front line is intuitive and natural, but will get you killed fast in Kingmaker. Making a monk/sword saint/vivisectionist/bard and taking unarmed combat feats, sneak attack, and use magic device to use ranger spells via a wand is not so intuitive. Balancing for the latter is foolishness, because people who set out to break the game will always be able to do so.
If a group of enemy archers target random PCs and spread their damage around, no big deal. If they focus-fire on your mage and burn him down fast, much bigger deal. Letting enemies pre-buff is another way to increase challenge (it's only fair, and it gives dispel and other tactics more weight). Creating interesting scenarios where enemies can bullrush you off a cliff but you can do the same is also good.
Players want classes and roles that are intuitive. Making a fighter, giving him platemail, and putting him on the front line is intuitive and natural, but will get you killed fast in Kingmaker. Making a monk/sword saint/vivisectionist/bard and taking unarmed combat feats, sneak attack, and use magic device to use ranger spells via a wand is not so intuitive. Balancing for the latter is foolishness, because people who set out to break the game will always be able to do so.
hell bovine
Arcane
How many PK players run around with 100 ac characters, though? Ultimately it's about what type of players you want to attract with your game, and considering the similarities, I'd say they are clearly aiming for BG & BG2's fanbase. And that crowd was never about min-maxing characters. That's why the SCS mod is so popular; the author listens to the feedback from the game's fans.
edit: hey, weren't you the one who left Owlcat a comment how they should play SCS?
hell bovine
Arcane
And SCS on the highest difficuty setting is not using stat increases (which is why you don't need to min-max to play it). At worst you have the optional hp bloat element for certain enemies. You gave Owlcate the idea, don't start complaining now.
hell bovine
Arcane
But you can stack numbers in BG2. E.g. calculate how low you have to go with saves to be in the 'safe zone', because BG & BG2 don't have critical failure on saving throws. But most players don't bother, because it's not really necessary. Combat in BG2 - even with SCS installed - is not a numbers game of 100 ac vs. -100 thaco. IWD2 went in that direction and imo it's one of the reasons why it failed; it went from IWd's LotR-like adventure to gnomish illusionist-monk-barbarian-rangers.
Happy to oblige.
Pretty much that.
Judging by the complaints from PnP players their experience is so different from computer games that their reasoning ranges from bizarre to incomprehensible. It seems they have some logic; but for a pure CRPG player this logic is alien.
Owlcat did not adapt the ruleset and nor should they. They exploited the ruleset - and that is how it should be done to create a good computer game. Any ruleset needs to be chopped up, ground, wrapped in small pieces of dough and presented to computer players as nice pelmeni instead of the slab of meat it had been before.
Grampy_Bone
Arcane
This is a pretty bizarre statement, there's a large overlap between PnP players and CRPG players. I know every D&D game I ran everyone at the table played CRPGs, myself included.
From the original kickstarter: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/owlcatgames/pathfinder-kingmaker
Whether you’re new to the Pathfinder® universe or you’re a seasoned veteran, Pathfinder: Kingmaker® is the CRPG you’ve been waiting for.
Seasoned veteran means PnP player, because there were no Pathfinder CRPGs before this. I don't know how else to interpret this statement but if you insist it means "We want to alienate PnP players in favor of warping and twisting the rules," okay.
We chose to adapt the Kingmaker adventure path because it features a host of open-world mechanics, allowing players to experience the story at their own pace as they explore the Stolen Lands,
This is just funny because "at their own pace" is obviously wrong.
From the new Kickstarter: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/owlcatgames/pathfinder-wrath-of-the-righteous/
As you may know, we at Owlcat Games have spent countless hours playing the Pathfinder tabletop RPG. We enjoyed it so much that we decided to bring this experience to the videogame format
Bring tabletop experience to videogame means bring tabletop experience to videogame, not alienate PnP players by destroying what they enjoy about the game. At least, IMO. Feel free to ask them for clarification.
Besides that, the whole "CYOA book" segments were all clearly attempts to recreate PnP gameplay in a CRPG. I don't know why you keep insisting it's invalid to point to the source material, but again, this is the internet where it is always easier to disqualify someone's argument rather than admit you are wrong.
Pink Eye
Also, speaking about Western PnP players (because I don't know if Eastern European PnP is present here).
Remember when Obsidian introduced Pillars I and their combat system? Josh Sawyer was talking about it, and it went something along the lines of "in CRPG's we have the computing power that is inaccessible for a human DM, so we can create more complex system". And they introduced 3-digit stats, percentages, non-integer ranges and so on.
Think about it. Experienced and intelligent dungeon master Josh Sawyer is certain that he needs a computer program to extend numbers in his game besides 1-2 dozen. It's fair to say by this reasoning that Western PnP players can perform mental arithmetic only in range from 0 to 20-30.
Now imagine Russian programmers who studied the multiplication table in their 2nd-3d grade and know it by heart till late Alzheimer's. Who can more or less freely reason in numbers from -1000 to +1000, with decimals if need be. They see combat logs, and it's clear as day for them how to overcome those 35 AC of Owlbears. And they need to dumb down not the game system, but their own mentality to match Westerners.
I have to admit, though, that as writers Western PnP players are quite nice. I picked up some new English words from them.
Also, speaking about Western PnP players (because I don't know if Eastern European PnP is present here).
Remember when Obsidian introduced Pillars I and their combat system? Josh Sawyer was talking about it, and it went something along the lines of "in CRPG's we have the computing power that is inaccessible for a human DM, so we can create more complex system". And they introduced 3-digit stats, percentages, non-integer ranges and so on.
Think about it. Experienced and intelligent dungeon master Josh Sawyer is certain that he needs a computer program to extend numbers in his game besides 1-2 dozen. It's fair to say by this reasoning that Western PnP players can perform mental arithmetic only in range from 0 to 20-30.
Now imagine Russian programmers who studied the multiplication table in their 2nd-3d grade and know it by heart till late Alzheimer's. Who can more or less freely reason in numbers from -1000 to +1000, with decimals if need be. They see combat logs, and it's clear as day for them how to overcome those 35 AC of Owlbears. And they need to dumb down not the game system, but their own mentality to match Westerners.
I have to admit, though, that as writers Western PnP players are quite nice. I picked up some new English words from them.
I'm not getting involved in this discussion. I've had my fair share of fighting with pnp players back on steam, before I got perma banned. Thanks for explaining your reasoning though, LannTheStupid
See, Shade knows. HE KNOWS! The horror of steam days. THE HORROR!
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