Wasteland The Wasteland 2 Beta Release Thread [GAME RELEASED, GO TO NEW THREAD]

[Sensuki]

The main writer is Nathan Long who is a novel writer, so I'm not surprised there's more tell than show.

I'd also definitely be in favor of hand-placed loot. Maybe not EVERYTHING but at least 50% of it.

And (I know this is not going to change) but because the printer is off on the far right of the screen, I don't usually end up noticing the combat barks, because I am focused on the actual combat, so it kinda defeats the point. People pay attention to the right side of things (their left) more strongly than the left of things (their right).

 

[Infinitron]

Question: Has anybody confirmed whether the difficulty level selection actually does anything? This might be a Blackguards situation.

 

[Sensuki]

I'd be inclined to believe that it doesn't.

 

[imweasel]

I wouldn't be surprised if changing the difficulty does nothing. The game is a breeze on ranger difficulty.

 

[hiver]

The main writer is Nathan Long who is a novel writer, so I'm not surprised there's more tell than show.

I'd also definitely be in favor of hand-placed loot. Maybe not EVERYTHING but at least 50% of it.

And (I know this is not going to change) but because the printer is off on the far right of the screen, I don't usually end up noticing the combat barks, because I am focused on the actual combat, so it kinda defeats the point. People pay attention to the right side of things (their left) more strongly than the left of things (their right).

Well, cant you move the HUD elements around and even resize them separately?

The printer thing looks horrendous as that feature is concerned. I cant see how you can even move it anywhere, except far low left and right, as it is now.

 

[Sensuki]

Well, cant you move the HUD elements around and even resize them separately?

Oh yeah, forgot about that. I might try reversing the UI and see how that feels. Although I am not 100% sure it works as it did in the very first video.

Got rid of some of the dead space, but the printer is a bit high, as I feel like I need to see the left side of the screen more often than the right ... can you change the paper height ?

 

[Kem0sabe]

The main writer is Nathan Long who is a novel writer, so I'm not surprised there's more tell than show.

This got me curious about the man, from Long's wikipedia page it's mostly filled with warhammer fantasy fodder. Not my type of thing, anyone read his books?

 

[Brother None]

The main writer is Nathan Long who is a novel writer, so I'm not surprised there's more tell than show.

This got me curious about the man, from Long's wikipedia page it's mostly filled with warhammer fantasy fodder. Not my type of thing, anyone read his books?

I've read his Jane Carver books, kind of John Carter parodies/homages. Not exactly deep prose (nor would I expect Gotrek and Felix to be), but amusing reads.

 

[Sensuki]

My Uncle read the Swords of Waar and said it was crap. YMMV.

 

[Kem0sabe]

The main writer is Nathan Long who is a novel writer, so I'm not surprised there's more tell than show.

This got me curious about the man, from Long's wikipedia page it's mostly filled with warhammer fantasy fodder. Not my type of thing, anyone read his books?

I've read his Jane Carver books, kind of John Carter parodies/homages. Not exactly deep prose (nor would I expect Gotrek and Felix to be), but amusing reads.

I love scifi/fantasy parody, have to look into this. Redshirts is probably one of my favorite scifi novels of the last few years. *goes off to amazon to check prices and reviews*

 

[Brother None]

My Uncle read the Swords of Waar and said it was crap. YMMV.

It might. For one, its angle is kind a parody of the old-fashioned masculine thinking of John Carter, and it has kind of a feminist angle (or kind of anti-tradionalism). Not necessarily an angle everyone will enjoy.

 

[imweasel]

can you change the paper height ?

Yes. Click and hold on the paper and pull it down.

 

[TwinkieGorilla]

Just quickly, regarding ammo: It seems pretty similar to WL1, no? You'd run across tons of loot but you couldn't always carry it all and you didn't always run across the type of ammo for the gun you specialized in, which I'm finding to be the case now, albeit I'm taking my sweet assed time and still not very far (Highpool).

Footnote: That said, I AM one of those people who prefers there to be a lack rather than an abundance.

felipepepe out of curiosity are you reporting your thoughts using the Centre form or on their official forum? I'm too lazy to do that and you seem to really know what bothers you and why...I think it could do some good.

 

[Daedalos]

People are pretty pessimistic it seems... This is a beta, and while I'm surely to get flamed for saying that, it is just that.

My savegame crashes now tho... everytime I try to exit he ag. center .. IT CRASHES....

Which means that potentially 6 hours of gameplay lost... and I have to start all over again... great


Will review the beta later

 

[SuicideBunny]

what's up with all those loot caches that pop up in absolutely inaccessible areas?

 

[Grotesque]

to whomever reads this thread and is a developer, please bring this interface back

 

[Sensuki]

Exactly what I've been saying.

 

[sea]

The main writer is Nathan Long who is a novel writer, so I'm not surprised there's more tell than show.

I'd also definitely be in favor of hand-placed loot. Maybe not EVERYTHING but at least 50% of it.

There are a few unique hand placed items, like the Ion Beamer in Ag Center. I think hidden caches are hand-picked too. I do not mind random loot so long as the meaningful stuff is hand-placed.

MLMarkland I wish you guys will rethink the whole health regen thing. I mean, it has place when you do dedicated resting, or if it's for the overworld only and uses water or something.. But just having it regen while walking around isn't the smartest design choice.

I was talking with Brother None about this a few days ago. I brought up the same points: that it strongly decreases the incentive for using healing items, especially for smaller wounds, and therefore hurts resource management, trivializes map travel and the game's economy, and downplays the Field Medic skill.

 

[Oesophagus]

Can anyone comment on random encounters?

 

[Sensuki]

Piss easy so far. A couple of times they weren't hostile, one was a merchant. One had a bunch of dead bodies on the map and nothing else.

Then again I have only encountered human enemies so far in those so far. No robots or any shit like that.

 

[SuicideBunny]

Can anyone comment on random encounters?

merchant with two guards, sells two rifles and 5 lead, goes down easy for more loot
deranged wastelander talking to himself about "them" being all dead and a few corpses without loot
4 wasters with a mix of melee and ranged weapons, go down easy
4 wasters with a mix of melee and ranged weapons attacking 4 wastelanders, go down easy and then you can kill the friendly wastelanders (wastelanders have only 5 hp but better loot than hostiles)
4 dead raiders and 4 or so dead wastelanders, no hostiles just random loot
5 wastelanders demanding 25 scrap that go down piss easy because 5hp, duh
2 mutated wasps and 2 mutaded rabbits
3 rail thieves with ranged weapons that can do some dmg due to map design
5 red scorpion militia of whom 1 is of a higher level (hardest actual encounter so far, but still easy, can kill your guys if you suck because they have ranged and are on the same map as the thieves)
5 red scorpion militia and 2 cuddly puppies attacking 4 wastelanders with one of the scorpions again being higher level.
then there is a random "robots" world location that's basically a random encounter that will wipe your party (two areas, one has 2 killers, 1 discobot and one octasomething, second area has 3 slicer dicers with 200 hp) and give you no loot because synth tech is unusable on their corpses despite highlighting.

 

[Goegoff]

By the way, what's the deal with the skill use progress bars?
They're not relevant to the combat, since time there is measured in action points, and consequentially they're not relevant outside of combat, since there's no apparent danger taking Your time when using skills.
So they look to me just as a pointless time sink, when attempting to succeed at a check over and over and over again.
Am I missing something obvious here?

 

[sea]

Can anyone comment on random encounters?

Most of them were last-minute additions that I saw pop up during the pre-beta. I would expect to see a lot of work done here in the coming weeks; inXile is likely aware that they are not great right now.

By the way, what's the deal with the skill use progress bars?
They're not relevant to the combat, since time there is measured in action points, and consequentially they're not relevant outside of combat, since there's no apparent danger taking Your time when using skills.
So they look to me just as a pointless time sink, when attempting to succeed at a check over and over and over again.
Am I missing something obvious here?

Since skill use is not 100%, there needs to be a disincentive for spamming them endlessly on objects and right now that is time wasted.

Still, I would much rather the game not tell you the chance of success when using a skill, because right now if you know you can always succeed you will only ever stand around spamming the skill and wasting time to get your loot. If you think it should be possible based on past experience, there is more incentive to increase your Lockpicking and Safecracking levels, and more incentive to return to old areas for containers you missed/passed over due to thinking they were impossible (even if technically there is still a low chance). In other words, intentional obfuscation of mechanics might do some good here.

 

[Frusciante]

Why did they go with 3d? I get the feeling it would look much much better with 2d isometric style (like the Chris Bisschof mock ups). Is it cost mostly and terrain (height) modifiers second?

 

[FeelTheRads]

In other words, intentional obfuscation of mechanics might do some good here.

Showing success chance is always a bad idea, but particularly so if the game allows you retry forever. Which is also bad.