SoZ - win or fail?

[Volourn]

Why the fuck would anyone use party AI in a game like SOZ? that's just fuckin' dumb.

 

[janjetina]

I do it because I'm lazy, when the opponents are so easy I don't need to micromanage. Also, sometimes it takes me a while to notice that my characters' current target has been killed, especially if I'm controlling a spellcaster (which always on puppet mode) and keeping him/her out of the fray.

 

[yes plz]

Meh.

It felt more like I paid for a demo of the new gameplay mechanics than I did for a new campaign. I didn't find it particuarly bad or especially good, but rather completely average.

 

[AlanC9]

Given the high frequency of the potential random encounters, high Hide skill is a must have for a group leader

That simply does not follow; in fact, it makes no sense at all. If the random encounters do not drain party resources, then increasing the number of random encounters does not make Hide skill more necessary, because the REs are not making the party worse off. Except in the sense that the player might get bored enough to quit playing.

We saw the exact same thing in ToEE,where Temple random encounters were not only not dangerous, but were the best way to replenish the party's supply of healing potions.

 

[serch]

Hey, Volourn! How did you find the Yuan-Ti temple battle? Was it challenging? At what level did you face it? I found it hard enough to have to run, level up and select the right spells before going back (alarm stones don't work). If SoZ had the ToEE combat everyone here will be praising it like a fun little expansion, I think. It's an engine problem, Electron won't get you very far in the fun-tactical battle direction.

 

[bat_boro]

*********Kind of spoiler*************













Do I meet Many of One somewhere in Sword Coast, or is he only in Saramach?

 

[notnats]

Afaik only in Samarach.

 

[Darth Roxor]

It's about context. A game should be fun. If something isn't fun in a game than it is most certainly not worthwhile. It's like saying a quest that gives you 5gp when you are 15th level is 'worthwhile'. LMAO Random encounters in SOZ do not add to a worthwhile experience. Period.

It's not about the fucking context. Even if you analyze it by the etymology, it means that it's 'worth your while', which means that 'wasting your time' will be worth it after the deed, it has no connection at all with being *interesting*. A quest that gives you 5gp at level 15 is not worthwhile, because you can do shitloads of other things at that level that will take the same amount of time and give you better rewards.

Starting area? You are a moron. You start the game at level 4, and I finished playing at level 9 still in this 'starting area'. Samarach doesn't fit the profile of a starting area since it is a huge part of the game. Candlekeep in BG1 is the starting area. Vault 13 in FO1 is the starting area. In SOZ, the starting ara is the ship and the beach area when you first land.

Even if Samarach is too big (which it is, see my previous post responding to NiM82), it still doesn't change the fact that you are bitching about the encounters that are piss easy, and are made exclusively for the starting area

Easily. people who don't have the hide skill seem to have an easier time with the game since they basically get free xp. ie. they're being rewarded for not having a skill. LMAO

And the hide skill rewards you with the ability to avoid fighting every five seconds.

What a fuckin' idiot. How cna I suck at a agme that I find fuckin' easy? I have surivial. I don't need hide because only pussies hide from easy encounters. The problem here isn't having key skills, it's that the encounters are too many which you fuckin' agree with. Get out of SOZ's ass.

Failure in logic detected. First you say that the encounters are boring, suck, etc, etc while next you say that you pretty much rush to them on purpose. Surely this makes sense.

the concept is bad.

Ayup, that's all I needed to know.

No. No, they aren't.

Behold, Volourn can take on earth elementals, wyverns, One-Of-Many and ogres the moment he leaves Samargol for the first time without taking a scratch.



Anyway, I'm done with this flamefest. There's nothing more except 'no u, moron, r00fles' going on for a longer while now, and even I can't stand so much continuous retardation.

 

[janjetina]

Given the high frequency of the potential random encounters, high Hide skill is a must have for a group leader

That simply does not follow; in fact, it makes no sense at all. If the random encounters do not drain party resources, then increasing the number of random encounters does not make Hide skill more necessary, because the REs are not making the party worse off. Except in the sense that the player might get bored enough to quit playing.

We saw the exact same thing in ToEE,where Temple random encounters were not only not dangerous, but were the best way to replenish the party's supply of healing potions.

But they do drain party resources, i.e. prepared spells. Also, sometimes it makes sense for a party to avoid a random encounter, for example when there is an urgency to do something lese and they cannot be bothered.

 

[AlanC9]

But they do drain party resources, i.e. prepared spells.

No, they don't. The encounters aren't difficult enough to make you do that, unless you've deliberately built a party with inadequate melee capability.

Also, sometimes it makes sense for a party to avoid a random encounter, for example when there is an urgency to do something lese and they cannot be bothered.

Huh? Since when were there time-critical quests? In any event, the time spent in a battle is trivial compared to the actual overland travel time (though the NWN2 clock screws this up somewhat)

 

[Silellak]

Finally got SoZ. Played it for awhile last night.

As someone else said in another thread, it is basically Pirates! meets D&D. I didn't expect interesting characters or a good plot. I expected...Pirates! to meet D&D.

And in that regard, I haven't been disappointed so far. Maybe it's the fact the short dungeons are actually a relief after all the dungeon crawling FO3 required.

It's actually not very IWD-ish at all, other than being shallow plot/character-wise. I wasn't a giant of the IWD games, but then again I might've been if they'd had SoZ's awesome overland map.

I do wish the combat was turn-based, as it gets annoying to keep manually pausing, but I'll deal. I haven't had much trouble with the camera; there are enough options to set it to my liking.

 

[Demnogonis Saastuttaja]

The random encounters attack your caravans, which is really annoying. (And you get sick of staring the "Loading" screen.)

Say, how do you get to that mountain cave in the sword coast, far in the north? There doesn't seem to be any route to it.

*SPOILER* And are there any more cohorts in the game to be sacrificed than Umoja, Ranger Bitch (can't remember name), Finch, Beluele, elf woman, halfling captain, hm, oh yes I forgot to sacrifice that paladin and won't sacrifice Ribsmasher *SPOILER*

 

[Darth Roxor]

The random encounters attack your caravans, which is really annoying. (And you get sick of staring the "Loading" screen.)

Uh, it's not like you have to assist all the caravans to safety. They can manage the encounters on their own

Say, how do you get to that mountain cave in the sword coast, far in the north? There doesn't seem to be any route to it.

You have to do a quest connected with arcane nexuses

*SPOILER* And are there any more cohorts in the game to be sacrificed than Umoja, Ranger Bitch (can't remember name), Finch, Beluele, elf woman, halfling captain, hm, oh yes I forgot to sacrifice that paladin and won't sacrifice Ribsmasher *SPOILER*

There's a doomguide in Port Llast that you can acquire by doing his quest and convincing him to stay with you and a half-drow warlock in West Harbour but I'm not entirely sure how to get him

 

[flabbyjack]

I'll wait for the bundle thank-you-very-much.

 

[Erebus]

The random encounters attack your caravans, which is really annoying.

I rather liked that, actually. The first few times, it made me go "Hey, that's MY caravan you're attacking !!" and run to the rescue.

The fact that your caravans could run across other problems requiring your intervention was also a nice touch.

*SPOILER* And are there any more cohorts in the game to be sacrificed than Umoja, Ranger Bitch (can't remember name), Finch, Beluele, elf woman, halfling captain, hm, oh yes I forgot to sacrifice that paladin and won't sacrifice Ribsmasher *SPOILER*

Wow, I never met half of those ! Is the ranger one of the two sisters you meet in the first city ? As mentioned above, you can meet a doomguide named Septimund in Port Llast.

The conclusion told me what happened to Septimund and the halfling captain even though I never took any cohort with me...

 

[Volourn]

"Hey, Volourn! How did you find the Yuan-Ti temple battle? Was it challenging? At what level did you face it? I found it hard enough to have to run, level up and select the right spells before going back (alarm stones don't work). If SoZ had the ToEE combat everyone here will be praising it like a fun little expansion, I think. It's an engine problem, Electron won't get you very far in the fun-tactical battle direction."

I quit the game before getting there. And, no, it's no an engine problem. Not for me, anyways. The combat in NWN2 OC, and MOTB, while not super hard, were actually fun. SOZ combat is not fun. I don't even need buffs.



"It's not about the fucking context. Even if you analyze it by the etymology, it means that it's 'worth your while', which means that 'wasting your time' will be worth it after the deed, it has no connection at all with being *interesting*. A quest that gives you 5gp at level 15 is not worthwhile, because you can do shitloads of other things at that level that will take the same amount of time and give you better rewards."

You simply know nothing about what D&D random encounters are supposed to accomplish. They're not just there for free xp. They're there to ADD to the gaming experience. Not make you want to quit playing. Something that is worthwhile makes you *want* to play; not *want* to quit.


"Even if Samarach is too big (which it is, see my previous post responding to NiM82), it still doesn't change the fact that you are bitching about the encounters that are piss easy, and are made exclusively for the starting area"

You are retarded. Samarach is evry likely have the game. It kind ruins the notion that it is the 'starting' area.


"And the hide skill rewards you with the ability to avoid fighting every five seconds."

It doesn't reward. In fact, according to you and others. It hinders your progress through the game since you gain less experience than those who have to fight. So, in essence, it's dman if you do damn if you doubt. You eitehr get annoyed with the random encounters like me and quit, or get frustrated by how hard later main encounters are 'cause you ar en't high enough level. LMAO Poor design at its advantage. You should get xp fort successfully using abiltiies not be punished for it. Did you know you cna get xp for AVOIDING combat in pnp? WOW!


"Failure in logic detected. First you say that the encounters are boring, suck, etc, etc while next you say that you pretty much rush to them on purpose. Surely this makes sense.'

No, I don't go for them on purpose; but when they're all ove rthe damn fuckin' map; you really have no choice but to slaughter them.


"Ayup, that's all I needed to know."

You agree with me that the random encounter system is bad yet you still argue. That's retarded.


"Behold, Volourn can take on earth elementals, wyverns, One-Of-Many and ogres the moment he leaves Samargol for the first time without taking a scratch"

Outside of OOM who didn't get to meet, those are damn easy. But, you lie. i never said I didn't take a scratch. In fact, I stated quite clearly I use cure spells to heal minor damage recieved. Here's soem more food for thought - i don't even bother with stuff like cure poison/disease/lesser restoration so even the 'special attacks' ar ehandled lamely.

P.S. It's sad that MOTB handles combat - random or otherwise - better than a combat focused game like SOZ. LMAO

 

[Demnogonis Saastuttaja]

Uh, it's not like you have to assist all the caravans to safety. They can manage the encounters on their own

I rather liked that, actually. The first few times, it made me go "Hey, that's MY caravan you're attacking !!" and run to the rescue.

Yeah, it makes sense that the caravans get attacked, but I kind of wish I could have improved their guards or something. Still, I suppose it just seemed like a problem, since now I have, was it ten million gold + many trade bars. Still, I'm the kind of player that just can't let something be suboptimal, hence I always made sure the caravans are moving and not killed by monsters.

You have to do a quest connected with arcane nexuses

Thanks, I completely forgot that guy promised to tell something later.

There's a doomguide in Port Llast that you can acquire by doing his quest and convincing him to stay with you and a half-drow warlock in West Harbour but I'm not entirely sure how to get him

Oh yeah, I forgot that Septimund ran off when I asked help from some spirit. What a pussy. And I found that warlock, though I killed OOM already. Good thing, though, I don't know what it takes to finish the last battle, maybe I'll have to get leadership and have two cohorts with me. That just means a lot of grinding, being that I'm already lvl21. Was this game supposed to end by level 15, by the way? :D

 

[Jaesun]

The sheer fact that Volo hates SoZ and continues to masturbate furiously over that the NWN1 OC is the greatest RPG of all time, makes me me enjoy SoZ even more.

 

[Silellak]

The sheer fact that Volo hates SoZ and continues to masturbate furiously over that the NWN1 OC is the greatest RPG of all time, makes me me enjoy SoZ even more.

I never thought of it that way. I have to agree.

 

[Volourn]

"continues to masturbate furiously over that the NWN1 OC is the greatest RPG of all time"

Why lie?

 

[Silellak]

"continues to masturbate furiously over that the NWN1 OC is the greatest RPG of all time"

Why lie?

For some reason, I remember you claiming you liked the NWN1 OC, but hardly believed it was the greatest RPG of all time. Ah, here we go:

Now, here comes the big one... NWN. I like this game. *sees the lynch mob preparing to termiante his existence*. Woah there. This doesn't mean that I think it's the best game ever as far as the OC goes. In fact, I would rate it somehwere in the 70's on a scale of 1-100.

So either your opinion of the game has vastly improved with time for some reason, or you consider every other RPG ever made to be "somewhere in the 70's" or lower.

Or, more likely, you just enjoy pushing people's buttons.

 

[kenney bounces]

It fails horribly at the jungle area.

It becomes a fantastic game once you get to crossroad keep and begin the trading game.

My advice for players: Do the main quests immediately until crossroads, then slow down and enjoy the game.

 

[Volourn]

"So either your opinion of the game has vastly improved with time for some reason, or you consider every other RPG ever made to be "somewhere in the 70's" or lower.

Or, more likely, you just enjoy pushing people's buttons."

Huh? WTF? My opinion of the NWN OC is the same it's always been. Middle of the road, maybe sligghtly abover average (because most CRPGs are just crap), in the mid 70s is exactly where it belongs.

SOZ, on the other hand, is just shit. POR2 style shit.

Anyone who claims that i feel NWN OC is the 'best ever' is lying or trolling. Probably both.


"My advice for players:"

My advice to players is if that you want GOOD old school D&D, don't play the shit known as SOZ.

 

[Black]

SoZ and Motb show that Obsidian is evolving. Motb's shown that they can create amazing story with great dialogue and SoZ's shown they can create more light-hearted RPGs with shitload of skillchecks and fun exploration.
Now: get new engine, gather what you've learned and make a new game- better than all previous ones!


And besides, did anyone catch that Shymon and Scarbunkel duet?
Is their song text based on a S&G's song or what?

 

[Annie Mitsoda]

Hee. Yes, that song was based on "Scarborough Fair" in theme, but that song is really short and writing lyrics to it was tricky BUT. Honest truth. I wrote those lyrics in like 10 minutes. Hee.

ALSO THAT IS ALEX BRANDON SINGING! Don't let this "Andrew Barnabas" folderol fool you, that's all him. Also he did Volo's voice. HE IS AWESUM.

...Also, I imagine there's some sense I'm gonna defend SoZ here. I can say I wish we'd had more time to flesh out the story, but that it was purposefully kept pruned to make the player feel they had more freedom, and writing stuff for a hojillion characters is tricky. I don't like to make them be like "And HERE IS the life story PROVING I am nuanced and three-dimensional" because you don't walk into a fuckin' Target and all of a sudden the cashier starts telling you about the secret miscarriage she had when she was 17. ...at least not at the Targets I go to.

Anyhow. For the game we made and for the point we were shootin' for, I think we hit it. 'S not gonna be for everyone. BUT YEAH. ...Singing! How about it! :twisted: