Game News Project Eternity Kickstarter Update #16: Mod Support, Exclusive Backer Pet, and Combat with Tim Cain

[LeStryfe79]

Eh, a dazed status effect where upright animations are used with prone like penalties is fine. Good update. I still get the sense that this entire kickstarter is an illusion for what they already had planned, but whatever, it's actually coming together rather well. Hopefully that south stick game brings a little extra cash flow to their coffers in the mean time.

 

[Infinitron]

Here Josh explains with context how Eternity's magic system will work:

 

[commie]

I'll lap this shit up no problem like all of Obsidian's stuff(bar DS3, though that more because I don't like H&S), but Jesus how strangely unexciting this KS project is compared to how W2 was. Maybe it's cause I know what to expect from Obsidian in that it's always going to be a slightly more hard core version of the mainstream rather than some truly old school or experimental thing and thus it doesn't grab me by the balls in the same way?

 

[Shannow]

Here Josh explains with context how Eternity's magic system will work:

*snip*

Sounds good. Will depend on final balancing of course. Locking out a certain spell level for some time after a specific number of castings sounds quite gamey, though. "I've cast so many Magic Missles that I'm all exhausted on level one spells. Lets throw some Fireballs untill my Magic Missle recharges..."
I'd suggest something like:
The caster can cast his at-will-spells a number of times that equals his level+int/wis-modifier divided by 2. So a level 10 wizard with 18 int could cast 7 spell levels of his at-will-spells (7x Magic Missles or 2x Fireball+1x MM , etc).
Problems with the system in general are balancing the recharge rate, and the effectivenes of low-level spells. (In BG2 spells like Chromatic Orb or even Magic Missles could be extremely effective. So much so, that I'd always use them even if higher level spells were available when the enemy was strong but had no protection that negated low-level spells.)

I'm also not sold on the whole grimoir system... *shrug*

 

[J_C]

I'll lap this shit up no problem like all of Obsidian's stuff(bar DS3, though that more because I don't like H&S), but Jesus how strangely unexciting this KS project is compared to how W2 was. Maybe it's cause I know what to expect from Obsidian in that it's always going to be a slightly more hard core version of the mainstream rather than some truly old school or experimental thing and thus it doesn't grab me by the balls in the same way?

I don't know about you, but to me PE is much more exciting than W2. And W2's was very exciting. But we are getting more and more info about PE, which W2 lacked in the updates.

 

[almondblight]

It's not graphics, it's animation - difference being that unless you choose to make a text based game, you'll need animations no matter what graphics you have - 2d, 3d or a mix. So it really comes down to how much time/money you want to invest in specific features. I think they have made all the right choices trying to avoid unnecessary work by choosing Unity as their engine and using the assets store. If the say tripling animation work is too much considering the project's constraints then life is tough. Nothing to do with them trying to go for the eye candy and cutting features as a result.

Knights of the Chalice had grapple and it wasn't a text game. But it also had simpler graphics. Now, I know that Obsidian needs to have better graphics to appeal to a certain audience, but this is a good reminder of how improved graphics (errr...."animations") can come at the expense of gameplay.

 

[Malpercio]

If someone starts to bitch about the pet, remember Arcanum had one too and managed to do just fine.

 

[Johannes]

[Locking out a certain spell level for some time after a specific number of castings sounds quite gamey, though. "I've cast so many Magic Missles that I'm all exhausted on level one spells. Lets throw some Fireballs untill my Magic Missle recharges..."
I'd suggest something like:
The caster can cast his at-will-spells a number of times that equals his level+int/wis-modifier divided by 2. So a level 10 wizard with 18 int could cast 7 spell levels of his at-will-spells (7x Magic Missles or 2x Fireball+1x MM , etc).

You understand that that's basically a simplified mana system, right? Which is a lot more organic solution than checking only for spells of the same level as to whether you can cast a certain spell or not.


Actually, a simple recharging mana bar, would mostly reach same results as their system while being technically much cleaner.

 

[Shannow]

[Locking out a certain spell level for some time after a specific number of castings sounds quite gamey, though. "I've cast so many Magic Missles that I'm all exhausted on level one spells. Lets throw some Fireballs untill my Magic Missle recharges..."
I'd suggest something like:
The caster can cast his at-will-spells a number of times that equals his level+int/wis-modifier divided by 2. So a level 10 wizard with 18 int could cast 7 spell levels of his at-will-spells (7x Magic Missles or 2x Fireball+1x MM , etc).

You understand that that's basically a simplified mana system, right? Which is a lot more organic solution than checking only for spells of the same level as to whether you can cast a certain spell or not.


Actually, a simple recharging mana bar, would mostly reach same results as their system while being technically much cleaner.

No. But whatever floats your boat, J.

 

[Dorateen]

Good news about mod support. Now we can mod in Adventure Halls all over the damn place.

Harumph!