Redesigning DA combat

[Grunker]

There is just no way a game-developer will be able to design anything near the functionality of a proven system.

In a long thread with many bizarre quote and opinions, this one takes the cake.

Modern video games are developed by a team of dozens for 10s of Millions of dollars. RPGs are written by random basement dwellers in their spare time for free (although occasionally developing cult-like followings and significant market share). You don't think by allocating $100K to a game designer to work on the "RPG" system for a cRPG you would get one as good or better than any "proven" system? The reason big game companies don't do this is because they don't think it's important.

Most of these systems are every bit as good as DnD or GURPS or Chaosium or whatever the hell else the kids play theses days. What is hard about writing RPGs is not the game system, it's the world.

PnP RPG "systems" are actually wholly unsuited to computer games. They are not play tested for balance. Game balance comes from a human agent (GM) who essentially arbitrates any rule ambiguity. And ALL PnP Rule sets have lots of ambiguity or areas that are left undeveloped. The bigger ones have more "rules" about how much damage you take when you fall (does it matter if you land on a pillow or spike?) or how long you are distracted in combat if you sneeze ... but those are just made up rules. Anyone can do it.

They are designed to be simple and straight forward and fit the needs of a particular RPG world (generic systems like GURPS excepted). Why do they have 7 stats? because they do. Some have 4, some have 14. But none have 70. Why? Because 70 has been tried and found to be inferior? No. Because how the fuck are you going to fit 70 stats on an 8.5x11" character sheet and still find anything!

The one big advantage of using an existing, proven RPG system in a cRPG is familiarty. If you already know the difference between Wisdom and Intelligence, I don't have to explain it to you again.

In case this strikes you as wrong - people have been playing DnD for 30 years.... It's proven and tested!?!

I give you one example:
Weapon damages, for "medium" creature from http://www.d20srd.org/srd/equipment/weapons.htm

Dagger  	1d4  	
Shortspear 1d6 	
Falchion     2d4 	
Longsword 1d8 	
Bastard Sword  1d10 
Greataxe  1d12 	
Greatsword 2d6

I played the original 1st ed D&D in 1979, and I will tell you, 30 YEARS LATER the weapon damage is essentially unchanged.

What is this based on? Who knows? Weight and sharpness of the weapon I guess.
Does it matter? No, some dude 30 years ago JUST MADE IT UP.

I know this for a fact, because a "longsword" allegedly weighs 4 lbs. Medieval longswords actually weighed more like 2. But I bet that this value is unchanged since the days of "Chainmail" miniature rules.... because who cares! Do you think it matters that a longsword does 4.5 points of damage on average and a falchion does 5? (even though, according to the tables above, a falchion weighs TWICE AS MUCH) Do you think that this distinction was carefully measured and discussed?

There is literally no reason to think that PnP RPG rules are well suited to cRPG, other than the fact that they both have RPG in them. They are completely different sorts of games - with completely different needs and wants, strengths and weaknesses.

BWAHAHAHAHA!

 

[sheek]

Actually D&D 3rd Edition was relatively balanced/tested on the stats and skill check side. I remember reading an article about it, how using the 3d6 pretty much replicates actual real world distribution of ability, weigh that can be carried by STR 14+ is the same as a trained Special Forces soldier can carry in his backpack, which only x% of the population is capable of which = x% chance of rolling 14 or more on 3d6. Etc.

2nd Ed was a huge mess. 3rd Ed still has silly parts, and I do not think is a fun system... and as you said having all weapon damages as normal distributions with different means and ranges is still pretty dumb.

 

[GarfunkeL]

Lots of money = well designed system? Oh wow. Silly man, all the money Bioware and EA pumped into making DA:O was for actually making the game, not the system. And have a look at DnD 3.75 edition, Pathfinder, to find a really well balanced and tested system. Or Twilight 2000, where even the first edition was very comprehensive.

Just because 2nd ed D&D had idiotic rules, doesn't mean that P&P-systems across the board are faulty by default. Since you know, when making a P&P-system, you don't have to worry about graphics or dialog or voice acting or programming - the things that nearly all the money in cRPG studios have to use their money.

 

[sheek]

I think it is more franchise popularity than money, but yes, PnP rule systems are not hard to make, and PnP is a very small industry compared to video games. Bioware employs 500+ dudes, if they paid 5 of them (with PnP experience like MCA) to work on mechanics full time for 2 years and they are not morons I am sure they would come up with something as good and more adapted to CRPGs than D&D.

 

[zenbitz]

how using the 3d6 pretty much replicates actual real world distribution of ability, weigh that can be carried by STR 14+ is the same as a trained Special Forces soldier can carry in his backpack, which only x% of the population is capable of which = x% chance of rolling 14 or more on 3d6. Etc.

Yes, it's called a normal distribution. However, it's pretty rare to play an RPG (any RPG) with a "normal" character. Actually, it's mostly passe' to ROLL you character up!

But that's just looking stuff up. In fact, special forces or not, most historical infantry men had a kit of about 60lbs. (Romans maybe a little more).

I guess I didn't mean that all the rules are just based on nothing (although many of the original games were) but it's not like the research to look up stuff like carrying capactity is particularly difficult or novel.

Lots of money = well designed system? Oh wow. Silly man, all the money Bioware and EA pumped into making DA:O was for actually making the game, not the system. And have a look at DnD 3.75 edition, Pathfinder, to find a really well balanced and tested system. Or Twilight 2000, where even the first edition was very comprehensive.

First off - that's what I said. OP said that Bioware etc. "don't have the resources to develop a good RPG system so they should license one" - THAT'S bunk. They HAVE the resources, they just don't USE THEM IN THIS WAY. The could use a tiny fraction of their resources to develop a system, but they don't because it's not important to game sales. What is, (a little) important to game sales is having "Dungeons and Dragons" (TM) on it.

I guess I wasn't clear about the other points... The point is not that the D&D rules are bad or untested... is that any testing done in a PnP setting is basically useless for a computerized setting. And most RPG systems have their strengths and weaknesses... but the weaknesses are all covered by having a human GM.

I think when people complain about cRPG "systems" they are not complaing about the ruleset, they are complaining about the implementation.

Just because 2nd ed D&D had idiotic rules, doesn't mean that P&P-systems across the board are faulty by default. Since you know, when making a P&P-system, you don't have to worry about graphics or dialog or voice acting or programming - the things that nearly all the money in cRPG studios have to use their money.

They are not faulty for what they are (playing games on paper), they are not well suited to conversion to computer game. And the parts that ARE well suited (lists of skills, and items, stats, quantitative effects are basically trivial). It's not that they shouldn't use a GOOD system, it's that they should use A system - but not a system that people know, one that is suited to a cRPG.

 

[Twinkle]

SPECIAL and TES other than traits and perks (which Daggerfall used to have, btw)?

I'm surprised you are pretending not to see a difference between SPECIAL's leveling up and "throw x fireballs at the wall and get a bonus to Destruction".

In Fallout 3 we are back to ruins, shacks, and junktowns.

It's set in a different location. Progress shouldn't be the same everywhere.

The organizations ... are different.

No, they aren't. Bethesda just dumbed down old concepts to generic paladins, zombies, ogres etc. familar to "next-gen" market. You are dissastified with how the old factions were recreated in FO3 and "cool shit" design philosophy. That doesn't make them completely unrelated.

completely different tale set in a completely different land.

Again, there is nothing "completely" different about them. Mostly the same stuff done wrong.

 

[Kaanyrvhok]

Trying too hard.

As for the question: Make it turnbased, obviously. Also: Drop letting devs design rulesystems.

with all the filler and the difficulty TB would be a nightmare.

I will agree that the game would be better if it was TB****** .

I prefer a RTpause system with larger parties especially when you have shity encounters. DA has some of the worse combat encounters I have ever seen. You cant address the combat without addressing the battlefield.

So first thing you need are better encounters but before that you have to dump level scaling.

If I’m a dev that’s rushed for time I would dump level scaling then redo all of the encounters so they were realistic. You couldn’t fit that many damn cultist in a temple and they sure as hell wouldn’t platoon fight you. That’s another reason why the game would remain realtime. The game needs a dose of reality. Wondering creatures, or creatures that respond to noise are realistic yet it doesn’t fit well with TB combat. TB combat requires a TB world with TB encounters.

Then you fix the BS. You, un-unify the inventory, add a few more party slots, give archers a boost, dump autoregen, balance classes a little better, fix stealth so its not MMO BS with enamies that have autoregen etc etc the next step is to test her. That’s QA’s job but I want to know how often they die, when they die, and what kills them. I would then tweak the game so death occurs about as frequently as it would in real life.

Ok so now you have a simi-competent system. Now you can have fun as a designer. I add some terrain effects, fix the console controls, add some enemy stealth encounters, and stuff that takes advantage of 3D like flight spells, environmental effects, and other shat. Then maybe you can call it a spiratual succesor to BG and keep a straight face.


God I didnt eve get into the rules. I like Pathfinder but I would still tweak Pathfinder some.