Pillars of Eternity Beta Discussion [GAME RELEASED, GO TO NEW THREAD]

[Rake]

There shouldn't be randomized loot at all.

 

[Diablo169]

Yup i prefer static loot containers. Lets you plan things out.

 

[prodigydancer]

I strongly support static loot though I don't believe it's going to happen.

What is the fucking obsession with randomized container loot these days?

Random loot is a pillar of lazy design. I understand that nobody wants to handpick items (or even item categories) for every container but they could at least pre-randomiize and then apply some human touch to make it semi-handpicked.

 

[J_C]

but they could at least pre-randomiize and then apply some human touch to make it semi-handpicked.

Looking at Sensuki's videos, this is exactly what happened. There is a table of items which are reoccuring in every randomization.

Random loot is a pillar of lazy design.

No, there a million other things which are more important than randomized loot, probably this is why the devs don't put much effort into it.

 

[prodigydancer]

Random loot is a pillar of lazy design.

No, there a million other things which are more important

It's how people always justify laziness, isn't it? But if the guy responsible for the loot design (among other things, I know) cuts corners, why shouldn't everyone else cut corners on something? It's only fair. Misaligned textures and lighting bugs are minor issues too but it's often the multitude of the minor issues that comprises the impression of a shoddy product.

 

[Seari]

Fuck randomized loot.

 

[aleph]

the dark bits on the stained glass are misaligned.
how can you not see it?

Oh that, something you only notice when you are looking for it. I thought there was an actual problem there that was worth dev time fixing it.

 

[Infinitron]

they could at least pre-randomiize and then apply some human touch to make it semi-handpicked.

I'd be surprised if the miscellaneous loot chests in Baldur's Gate (the ones that contain "Star Diopside Gems" and "Tiger Cowrie Shell Necklaces" and weird shit like that) weren't generated like this

 

[Haba]

I dunno how anyone would handle manual loot in a game of this scale. Especially if you're lead by a balance freak like Sawyer.

 

[imweasel]

Baldur's Gate had some random loot drops. But it was actually balanced.

Kinda funny when you think about it.

 

[Apexeon]

What is the fucking obsession with randomized container loot these days?

http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/70712-435-loot-list-container-issues/

So you also hate random loot.

Pillars of eternal lazy design.

 

[Sensuki]

I'd be surprised if the miscellaneous loot chests in Baldur's Gate (the ones that contain "Star Diopside Gems" and "Tiger Cowrie Shell Necklaces" and weird shit like that) weren't generated like this

Baldur's Gate had some random loot drops. But it was actually balanced.

Kinda funny when you think about it.

BG had random trash rewards but you always got something. It was like either a mage scroll or a gem or something. You didn't randomly not get stuff and randomly get way better shit instead - which is the problem here.

BTW start complaining about the random loot and get them to change it: http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/70712-435-loot-list-container-issues/

 

[J_C]

Sensuki from Obs boards:

I didn't like how in Icewind Dale you had to save scum chests to get the item you wanted. I hope in this game that if an item does not spawn in said chest, it spawns somewhere else.



Seems like it's worth save scumming every container if there are gonna be differences of up to 600cp+ every time ...

Probably I'm the dumb guy again, but who plays like this? (Apart from Sensuki.) Really, constatnly save scumming chests, save scumming battle encounters, save scumming character generation? What does it mean that you HAD to save scum? If you save scuming a dozen time just to get an item, just use a cheatcode and get it. The end result is the same.

 

[Sensuki]

Well you wouldn't if you didn't know that you could be getting double the worth of the contents of a container and could potentially be missing out on items, and you can just quicksave/quickload to produce the best result.

Magic item prices in this game are a bit more like Icewind Dale, where they are really expensive, and there are Stronghold upgrades to purchase among other things. If there's 500 containers in the game and the value you can get from them can be doubled by a quick save - then that's pretty shit design tbh.

This problem didn't exist in BG1 because random loot was like gems/low level mage scrolls and gold, and they were worth around the same, so it didn't matter anyway - unless you were a Wizard and saved the scrolls.

Here it has randomized uniques (which I hated, in IWD) and unfair random loot lists.

 

[Ellef]

Hopefully they recognise it as an issue because it's a pretty easy fix you would think. This game has more money sinks by the looks of it, so I would definitely be save scumming if the loot variance isn't fixed.

 

[J_C]

I don't know, I always feel that save scumming is just cheating. I just deal with the cards tha game gives me. IMO it is more exciting to know that you have a slight chance to get something good from a loot, not just the same crap at every walkthrough.

 

[Sensuki]

Sure, I ignore things in games that I consider to be not fun as well, however - it would be much better if this issue was remedied before release. You may not have cared about a single exploit that I've uncovered in this game, but there've been quite a few of them. Better to have them gone/fixed than still in there.

 

[Duraframe300]

http://www.eurogamer.de/articles/20...llars-of-eternity-ist-fast-fertig-was-geht-ab

 

[Cyberarmy]

What is the fucking obsession with randomized container loot these days?

http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/70712-435-loot-list-container-issues/

I'll save scum the shit out of this game if they'll go IWD style or worse. I'm OK for BG1 style randomisation where random thrash mobs dropping random thrash loot, anything more than this is a no in my book for this kind of RPGs.
KS based RPG designers really love them random loot nowadays. Divinty OS, Wasteland 2 (toasters only helped a bit) Lords of Xulima and now PoE. After killing a great enemy or completing a great quest just to find uninspired random loot really kills the mood for me...

 

[Sensuki]

Nice to see Nick Carver in an interview.

 

[Infinitron]

I am pretty sure that most RPGs with random loot have the kind of "gold value variance" that Sensuki is pointing out, so I'm treating his bug report as an off-handed way of trying to get random loot removed entirely

imweasel I wouldn't call anything related to money in any IE game "balanced". There's nowhere to go here but up.

 

[ushas]

I would really worry about it, if there wouldn't be enough nonrandom means to obtain things you need or special items.

You can also see it statistically, like the mean across dungeon you can obtain. But having a lot of random containers in an area is just boring. And yeah, they are really making it easy to savescum on each chest (why not make it easy to prebuff).

Anyway, isn't it possible that the BB is modified compare to the full game in this regard too? I don't know, maybe to let us see and try more things...

 

[Grunker]

imweasel I wouldn't call anything related to money in any IE game "balanced". There's nowhere to go here but up.

The IWDs are probably the games where you can be starved for gold the longest. BG1 and BG2 have you as rich as you could possibly want within a very short timespan.

 

[Sensuki]

It's not really the gold value variance it's the fact that you miss out on certain items. Infinitron I think you've stated that you don't use consumables (or you forget to) in games, but not getting a consumable can be a big deal. It's also unfair to randomly get no armor / normal armor or fine armor IMO.

That one isn't even the worst chest, it's one of the milder ones. The variance in some of the chests ushas found were around 600cp, and I'll bet there are cases that are worse than that.

The IWDs are probably the games where you can be starved for gold the longest.

That's right, and in this game, unique items are expensive and Stronghold upgrades will also be expensive, so I imagine you'll often be low on cash.

ushas - they probably have global loot lists that they assign to containers, so they should be able to easily fix them so that you get more consistent loot - like instead of no armor, normal armor or fine armor to just pick one of those outcomes and stick with it.

 

[Duraframe300]

Nice to see Nick Carver in an interview.

Like this bit

"Oh, unser Abteilungsleiter ist so etwas wie ein Leitbild, er hat sehr viel Geduld", lacht Carver und erzählt von den "erschöpfenden Stunden", in denen er und seine Kollegen das Spiel täglich rauf und runter spielen, von den zusätzlichen Testern, die ihnen Vertrieb Paradox zur Seite stellte, und einem weiteren extern angeheuerten Team zur Unterstützung. Jeder Fehler wird doppelt gecheckt, zeitversetzt. "Das ist ein unglaublicher Prozess bei einem Rollenspiel mit so vielen Variablen und Aspekten. Du kannst alles auf tausend verschiedene Wege tun."

Das lässt dich nachts wachliegen?

"Wenn du zehn bis zwölf Stunden täglich ein Spiel spielst, Bug-Reports schreibst, nach Hause gehst und nachts aus einem Traum erwachst, in dem du Bug-Reports ausfüllst... nun, ich denke, das gibt dir schlaflose Nächte!", lacht Carver. "Manchmal entdeckt man im Schlaf auch Dinge und denkt dann 'Was, wenn ich das so oder so machen würde?'. Am nächsten Tag probiert man es und merkt manchmal: Gott sei Dank, es funktioniert."