Warhammer Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader Pre-Release Thread [GAME RELEASED, GO TO NEW THREAD]

[Infinitron]

Owlcat was founded by former strategy game developers from Nival (creators of Heroes of Might & Magic 5 among other titles). So yes, they do like that stuff.

 

[volklore]

I liked kingdom shit in kingmaker. If only because it was tied to the rest restriction.
Crusade mode can suck it though.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Owlcat was founded by former strategy game developers from Nival (creators of Heroes of Might & Magic 5 among other titles). So yes, they do like that stuff.

Same dudes made silent storm, and what strategy minigame did it have?

 

[Axel_am]

I liked kingdom shit in kingmaker. If only because it was tied to the rest restriction.
Crusade mode can suck it though.

I liked the kingdom shit in Kingmaker too. If only because it had a nice turn off switch.

 

[skaraher]

The problem with Owlcat's minigame is that there are only two ways of playing them : the right one and the wrong one, both are tedious, and the wrong railroads you into game over. Most options are trap and every successful playthrough tends to be the same. Spam bulletin board and use Setsuna shy.

 

[InD_ImaginE]

The problem with Owlcat's minigame is that there are only two ways of playing them : the right one and the wrong one, both are tedious, and the wrong railroad you into game over. Most options are trap and every successful playthrough tends to be the same. Spam bulletin board and use Setsuna shy.

KM Kingdom management is literally a series of skill checks. Even if you are inefficient as shit the worst thing that happens is that you lose on artisans or smth? Especially later on after the patches. Unless you intentionally put someone with low attributes that you faied the skill checks roll multiple times

Crusade can fuck itself tho

 

[Harthwain]

I suppose many players do associate their PC with themselves to an extent and basically roleplay a fantasy version of themselves, but come on, roleplay is more than that.
The NPC does not need to be attractive to the player, but provide interesting roleplay options for the varied PCs the player might want to play.

You're being fabulously optimistic here if you think players can disassociate themselves from their characters to the point where they can roleplay romances. You have to make companions interesting for the player to bother with their stories and whatsonot. You have to make them attractive (and by that I don't mean just pretty) in order to make them romance material for the player. That's how people are (most of them, anyway). Roleplay options in romance (if that's your thing) are provided by backgrounds.

 

[Dishonoredbr]

 

[Grunker]

The problem with Owlcat's minigame is that there are only two ways of playing them : the right one and the wrong one

crusade management literally plays itself, it's that easy

behead anyone defending owlcat's time-wasting mini games

 

[Irxy]

It wouldn't be a Owlcat RPG without a MiniGame that you download a mod to remove.

Can't they just be turned off in the options?
I personally like those systems, calling them minigames is incorrect, since they are inherent part of the gameplay and not some gimmick mechanic with qte or something.
I'd actually prefer for them to be even more complex and integrated.
Some people are just too fixated on genre boundaries which are actually stereotypes, that's why the devs barely experiment nowadays and all games are basically clones of each other.

 

[janior]

they also need some better artists, all their games look like shit(2d and 3d stuff)

 

[volklore]

I still think kingdom management in kingmaker was a super good idea to implement rest restrictions and force players to push with less than ideal resources. It wasn't executed that well, but the idea is great imo. Much better than any attempt at doing so in other RPGs.
I thought they would expand on it, polish it/continue to explore in wrath but seemingly they decided (probably due to surveys since owlcats seems to love their surveys) that people didn't like rest restriction and made the whole thing much worse by making the ''mini-game'' entirely detached from the RPG mechanics. And basically made resting restrictions so low that single character with high religion would basically allow you to rest 4-5 times per dungeon.

 

[Jaedar]

behead anyone defending owlcat's time-wasting mini games

Them's fighting words.

If you are playing an RPG where you are the king, or the commander general of a crusade then you should in fact do some kingly and commander generally things. If you don't like it then go back to playing RPGs where you are a random lowlife adventurer. Don't let the door hit you on the way out.

With that being said:
Are owlcats minigames good? By no means.
Is it the very essence of endorsing to demand their removal instead of improvement? Certainly.

 

[Grunker]

If you don't like it then go back to playing RPGs where you are a random lowlife adventurer.

Lol, that's gotta be the weakest response I've ever read to criticism of their kingdom management.

"Don't like this terribly designed thing? Well, don't play a game whose main content you enjoy!"

Why? Why would I ever avoid a game I like playing rather than criticize the things I don't and wish for their exclusion?

If they want to include management mini games, they should be good. If they are not good, they should be criticized for being terrible.

If they are necessary to include because of the game's nature, then the problem isn't people not enjoying them, but them not being enjoyable.

This shit is so basic, it's a wonder you could even push yourself to write something as unfathomably apologetic as "go play another game" - that's IGN-tier fanboyism and obviously retarded to boot. It's like if I enjoyed playing soccer but someone designed a soccer match where you had to eat grass during half-time and I suggested "hey guys, what about we play the same awesome game, just without eating grass" and some idiot went "MIGHT AS WELL PLAY ANOTHER GAME THEN COULDN'T YOU".

As for your "Are they good? No, but that's no argument for removal!" we are now at three Owlcat games, the first two having had terrible minigames which I would much, much rather have been without. Let's say that predictably happens the third time. Then maybe you shouldn't fucking design your games around the inclusion of management games if you are terrible at making them.

I didn't write they should make kingdom management games without kingdom management. I said their kingdom management was fucking horrible shit.

 

[Irxy]

"Don't like this terribly designed thing? Well, don't play a game whose main content you enjoy!"

Kingdom & crucade management *are* the main content, a part of it, and the games would loose a lot by excluding those.
Also they are not terrible by any means. Not great either, but pretty much none of the aspects of these games is great, yet as a whole experience they do make good games.

 

[Orud]

behead anyone defending owlcat's time-wasting mini games

Them's fighting words.

If you are playing an RPG where you are the king, or the commander general of a crusade then you should in fact do some kingly and commander generally things. If you don't like it then go back to playing RPGs where you are a random lowlife adventurer. Don't let the door hit you on the way out.

With that being said:
Are owlcats minigames good? By no means.
Is it the very essence of endorsing to demand their removal instead of improvement? Certainly.

Following your logic, why aren't you up in arms that you don't need to manually move your character to an outhouse or a bush to take a shit every 24 in-game hours?

• You're playing races that all need to defecate.
• You're playing races that sit and eat around campfires, so there's definitely calories being taken in.

Is it the very essence of endorsing to avoid unnecessary tedium? Apparently!

 

[Roguey]

You're being fabulously optimistic here if you think players can disassociate themselves from their characters to the point where they can roleplay romances. You have to make companions interesting for the player to bother with their stories and whatsonot. You have to make them attractive (and by that I don't mean just pretty) in order to make them romance material for the player. That's how people are (most of them, anyway). Roleplay options in romance (if that's your thing) are provided by backgrounds.

I have roleplayed romances.

 

[Jaedar]

"Don't like this terribly designed thing? Well, don't play a game whose main content you enjoy!"

Way to fail your reading check. I'll help:

If they want to include management mini games, they should be good. If they are not good, they should be criticized for being terrible.

SO CRITICIZE THEM FOR BEING TERRIBLE INSTEAD OF SAYING THEY SHOULD BE REMOVED.

As for your "Are they good? No, but that's no argument for removal!" we are now at three Owlcat games, the first two having had terrible minigames which I would much, much rather have been without. Let's say that predictably happens the third time.

I could just as easily say that kingdom management was incredibly poor, crusade management was a big step up (I think it would actually have been good if the balance hadn't been so poor. Because HOMM is good, even on maps where you don't get a town) and so predictably the next one will be another step up and actually be good. And if not this one then maybe the next, or the one after that.

• You're playing races that sit and eat around campfires, so there's definitely calories being taken in.

Yes. There are games where this matters, and you'll note that "campfire supplies" is a thing in many RPGs. Games that focus more on this aspect tend to be called "survival" games and they often require you to keep track of exactly what you eat (1 smoked fish is not the same as 1 can of pickled onions).
But if I'm playing the role of someone who is the king, I expect to do kingly things. It is part of the fantasy and novelty of playing that character, in the same way eating is part of the fantasy of being a lone survivor in the apocalypse.

It's fine if you don't wanna play games where your character is more than a regular adventurer, but there are lots of games like that so please don't come to one of the few with loftier ambitions and demand it be made more generic to suit your tastes. Say that owlcat's minigames are shit if you want, because I agree on that. But when you call them retards for adding them you are shooting yourself in the foot at best, or trying to sabotage future games made with my tastes over yours at worst. And I do feel entitled to tell you to fuck off in the latter case, especially on the codex. Because the games industry at large followed the route of removing elements that were abrasive to many instead of trying to fix them, and that way lay banal shit boring games.

 

[Grunker]

Way to fail your reading check

SO CRITICIZE THEM FOR BEING TERRIBLE INSTEAD OF SAYING THEY SHOULD BE REMOVED.

crusade management literally plays itself, it's that easy

behead anyone defending owlcat's time-wasting mini games

Let me know where I wrote to remove them in the post you responded to.

I'll wait while you ponder the irony of calling me out for a reading fail.

crusade management was a big step up

Nice one that you don't respond to the bulk of my post - you know the core of your post, "go play another game", was the height of retardation, Jaedar, come on.

Here is our actual disagreement, if we can drop the shitflinging idiocy:

You: I really want a kingdom game with good management.

Me: OK, but Owlcat games ain't that.

You: They could be that.

Me: What gives you just any amount of faith in that considering they've been the epitomy of terrible time wasters so far?

You: I guess I just think that though bad, they weren't that bad.

Me: OK well you're wrong then.

There. I wrote out how our argument may have proceeded without your preprosterous insistance that if I dislike something in a game I really, really like, I shouldn't play it.

 

[skaraher]

The problem with Owlcat's minigame is that there are only two ways of playing them : the right one and the wrong one

crusade management literally plays itself, it's that easy

behead anyone defending owlcat's time-wasting mini games

Try to play it without mage general.

 

[Grunker]

The problem with Owlcat's minigame is that there are only two ways of playing them : the right one and the wrong one

crusade management literally plays itself, it's that easy

behead anyone defending owlcat's time-wasting mini games

Try to play it without mage general.

I literally did, lol

 

[Orud]

Yes. There are games where this matters, and you'll note that "campfire supplies" is a thing in many RPGs. Games that focus more on this aspect tend to be called "survival" games and they often require you to keep track of exactly what you eat (1 smoked fish is not the same as 1 can of pickled onions).
But if I'm playing the role of someone who is the king, I expect to do kingly things. It is part of the fantasy and novelty of playing that character, in the same way eating is part of the fantasy of being a lone survivor in the apocalypse.

It's fine if you don't wanna play games where your character is more than a regular adventurer, but there are lots of games like that so please don't come to one of the few with loftier ambitions and demand it be made more generic to suit your tastes. Say that owlcat's minigames are shit if you want, because I agree on that. But when you call them retards for adding them you are shooting yourself in the foot at best, or trying to sabotage future games made with my tastes over yours at worst. And I do feel entitled to tell you to fuck off in the latter case, especially on the codex. Because the games industry at large followed the route of removing elements that were abrasive to many instead of trying to fix them, and that way lay banal shit boring games.

But why insist on the kingdom management minigame? There are other ways already in the game that portray that aspect of your kingdom:

• Judging over criminals
• Receive and aid special guests
• Kingdom issues that lead to quests and whole subplots

Why does it need additional bad mechanics? A survival game does not need you to click on the shit icon every 24hrs to be a good game. It can stand to lose nothing and gain a lot by cutting unnecessary, tedious actions. Other examples could be specific calories you'd need to track while it adds literally nothing. If it's detrimental to a game, it should be cut. Shit mechanics should not be kept simply because of their possible existence. Quality, not quantity.

 

[Shaki]

Kingdom management in Kingmaker was a brilliant idea, and while not executed perfectly, it still added a lot of value to the game. And they added the option for game journos to make the minigame play itself, letting you ignore it completely, so idk why all the crying. Y'all feel like zoomers whining about inclusion of harder difficulty options, because unless the game bends over backwards to make you feel like you're a very smart, very special boy, you won't be satisfied. Just git gud or use journo difficulty and play for "muh story", applies both to main game and minigames.

 

[Jaedar]

I'll wait while you ponder the irony of calling me out for a reading fail.

I'll wait for you to ponder the irony of calling me out of shitflinging when you started with "behead everyone who disagrees with me"

Nice one that you don't respond to the bulk of my post - you know the core of your post, "go play another game", was the height of retardation, Jaedar, come on.

I stand by it as an appropriate response to the notion that owlgame minigames should be cut. There are lots of RPGs that go for a more barebones approach to the genre. Don't play the only RPG that dares to aim more loftily and say it needs to stick to the dirt just because it broke its foot trying to stand up.

I think it's valid in the same way as if someone said "I think the game is cool but I would prefer it it weren't turn-based, everyone who likes TB games are stupid" to a hypothetical different RPG, it would be fine to point them at rtwp RPGs.

You: I really want a kingdom game with good management.

Me: OK, but Owlcat games ain't that.

You: They could be that.

Me: What gives you just any amount of faith in that considering they've been the epitomy of terrible time wasters so far?

You: I guess I just think that though bad, they weren't that bad.

Me: OK well you're wrong then.

I think kingdom management was really bad. Crusade management just has massive balance issues. I still think the game would be lesser if I hadn't gotten to kill every demon in a week through the power of necromancy on my lich run. I remain hopeful that owlcat will get it right this time, especially since it seems they just copied the ship combat from the ttrpg wholesale.

So yeah, in the end this as I see it: I like that owlcat are ambitious, even when it leads to the inclusion of bad parts (I think the overly large dungeons are a far bigger problem in the 'terrible time wasting' department). You would like them to become less ambitious. There are more unambitious RPGs/Developers then there are ambitious ones. So I suggest that we'd both be better off with you letting me have my ambitious one, including warts and that if this means you don't want to play it then there's lots of other games/devs that are unambitious.

I guess I think my preference is more valid than yours in this case because it is more specific, because I do recognize we're both essentially arguing for the game to cater more to our personal preferences. Also because I feel that gaming as a whole and mainstream RPGs in particular went down the slope of cutting rather than improving/expanding and it didn't end in a nice place.

 

[Grunker]

I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised. “I like bad ambitious things more than good restrained things” might as well be the Codex’ tagline