What cRPG has the most ridiculously (unnecessarily) elaborate mechanics?

[Rake]

Of course the AI scripts are not different. But that's not what we were discussing anyway, as I specifically mentioned manual control, not using AI scripts.
As I tried to explain, scripts are continually checked, so the pathfinding is usually not a problem in those cases. The problem is when you use manual control and neglect/forget to babysit the characters, and they behave like morons due to blocking or lack of line of sight at the moment they got their order.

Sorry, but no part of BG AI is defensible.
Enemies can be drawn around in front of the archers for cheesy kills, small sight radius and disabling AI outside of player's visual range makes for some extremely cheesy exploits resulting from merely trying to fight smart. Scripts are good to have, but they too are pretty bare-bones.
Whether or not pathfinding behaves differently for selected units doesn't change the fact that it's an inexcusable clusterfuck.

Why not play BG1 with Sword Coast Stratagems installed instead of debating the AI of vanilla unpatched BG1 which was only relevant back in 1998-1999?

I thought the discusion was about vanilla games. BG2 with SCS has the best combat i ever played in an RPG, bar none. But i'm not sure if i would use it as a point for BG2 being the best game of all time etc. I don't count mods in a game's evaluation.

 

[octavius]

I don't count mods in a game's evaluation.

Moddability counts to me at least. Especially BG1 benefits hugely from mods. Vanilla unpatched BG1 vs BG1 wits SCS is like two different games. If the former is the only version you have played I can understand people disliking it.

 

[SwiftCrack]

BG1 Vanilla is still a good game. Come at me.

 

[DraQ]

Why not play BG1 with Sword Coast Stratagems installed instead of debating the AI of vanilla unpatched BG1 which was only relevant back in 1998-1999?

1. We're discussing BG, not BG mods.

2. BG AI wasn't relevant back in 1998-1999 it was already clear to be sloppy shit.

 

[Tommy Wiseau]

Statistics in roleplaying games need to be tied to a unique gameplay element to be justified. Redundant, poorly-implemented, and one-note abilities only decrease the quality of gameplay. A pen & paper roleplaying game can afford to have as many attributes with no concern about balance because everything from a roleplaying session can be adapted and made to fit your story arc. It's better to have fewer merged 'essential' attributes than ten skills tied to slightly different concepts. Many RPGs don't pass this check, in my opinion.

 

[octavius]

Why not play BG1 with Sword Coast Stratagems installed instead of debating the AI of vanilla unpatched BG1 which was only relevant back in 1998-1999?

1. We're discussing BG, not BG mods.

2. BG AI wasn't relevant back in 1998-1999 it was already clear to be sloppy shit.

1. We're discussing BG with mods, because that's what non-casual gamers play. But if you want to further discuss the AI of vanilla, unpatched BG1 then by all means knock yourself out.

2. Which is why the obvious thing to do is to install mods that improve the AI, instead of complaining about the AI for 15 years.

 

[Lujo]

Not everything needs to be D&D. Combat in Fallout is based more on positioning and how you use the items and help you have at your disposal (and a bit of luck) rather than simply having the best gear.

In theory, maybe, in practice... not so much. One of the bigger problems with modding the game is the impossibility to add more rewards/item into the game which wouldn't either be unneccessary or obsolete what's allready there. There's no cc in it apart from AoE damage or aimed shots (which are also nukes), and the positioning works in two ways - step aside while I AoE these guys, and duck behind a corner so you can take guys out with less resource investment. There are only 2 real buffs, one makes you immune to damage, one gives you 2 AP and makes you an addict, and the healing consists of opening your inventory to reload and also using as many stimpaks as you want.

When you look at it, shadowrun returns could've came out a year after Fallout 2 (with time-appropriate graphics), but it's own simplistic combat system seems like space-age tech compared to the fallout one. And that game give you a lot fewer inventory items, but quite a bit more to do with them. Just saying, I'm a huge Fo 1/2 fan, don't get me wrong, but having played and replayed them a dozen times, it made me really appreciate systems which do include options other than just shooting stuff.

handled by humans.

I bolded the relevant part. This type of design only works because you're playing against other humans and because not only is every game short compared to an RPG but because every game starts from square one. This would not translate very well at all to a single-player RPG.

Well, you do have a point there, but if your ability slots were rotating so you could mix and match abilities you wouldn't need to start at square one all the time. And the human AI is kinda needed when it comes to Real time stuff and RTS stuff - with that out of the way, you probably could code an AI to handle combat encounters.

You make it sound easier than it actually is.

Allthough, yeah, I probably do. Still, if shadowrun had proper writing and a bunch of work done on it's party handling and combat options for the AI, it'd be quite good IMO. It's kinda almost there when it comes to what I'd call a satisfying RPG, or at least the bare bones of it.

 

[DraQ]

 

[Perkel]

Complexity isn't a problem. Problem is when design is simply shitty or system which was created for PnP doesn't work in computer game.

Like for example D&D3.5.

ToEE and NWN2 has same basic rules (with some minor changes) but due to one being actuall turn based and other RTwP one is playable other is sloggy shit in which you watch ankward fight where most of the fight is dudes looking at each other and what is more important you beat your head in wall everytime someone does something you did not want to do due to shitty path-finding or sketchy AI.


As for complexity itself... Fighter class in D&D3.5 and generally in newer line of PnP rulesets, most of designers want to make out of Fighter actually caster class just without shinny FX because they can't accept that Fighter/Warrior job is bash thing with hunk of metal and there isn't really that much he should do. But nonono we should introduce cleave ! How awesome is that ! Now your fighter can be as good as caster and cleave whole group of mediacore monsters in second ! Nonono i have better idea ! Let's make Fighter choose what he wants to use STRENGHT OR DEXTERITY and make feat from that !

I mean those kind of things are there just because designers couldn't came with something that would make fighters viable in late game compared to mages which are broken with non Roleplay play-trough like in cRPGs.

Most of those things are from one basic idea: That all classes and races should be more or leas equal. So figher should have AoE ability ! So we will add complexity so that fighter will be able to fight mages in end game !

 

[octavius]

Mages are only overpowered if they can rest after each battle. If they are out spells, having spammed them all, a Fighter or even a Thief is more powerful. If all characters are supposed to be equally powerful at any give time, then get rid of the class system.

 

[Damned Registrations]

That line of thought is bullshit though. It presumes that the fighter is invincible and never takes damage. In practice, the exact opposite is true; an encounter that costs some trivial fraction of a wizard's arsenal will bring a fighter halfway to death's door. Assuming the fighter can even survive the encounter at all.

A wizard without spells is indeed pretty helpless... but so is a fighter without weapons or armour, who has been blinded and crippled. There's no reason for either situation to be a common occurrence.

 

[octavius]

A fighter fights just as well with 1 HP as with 255 HP.
And unlike a mage's spells there's no limits to how many times a fighter can swing his sword.

 

[Perkel]

This may be good point but every wizard has scribe scroll spell which in early game is reaaaaly helpful for those situations and in later game it will take long as fuck to spend most of spells.

 

[Damned Registrations]

A fighter with 1 hp can lose a fight with a housecat. What scenario do you imagine a 1 hp fighter being more useful than a full hp mage with no spells?

A wizard can swing his sword just as many times as a fighter. (More to the point, an army of zombies can swing a lot of fucking swords for eternity, the fighter needs to sleep and eat eventually.) Unlike a fighter the mage can also just teleport past anything you might swing a sword at. Or fly. Or go invisible. Or turn into smoke. Or a rat. Or put everyone to sleep. Or become ethereal. Which is the real reason a wizard is in a different league entirely from a fighter: wizards can kill shit that fighters couldn't even hurt if they were twice the level and had infinite hitpoints and 50 years to make the attempt.

 

[octavius]

A fighter with 1 hp can lose a fight with a housecat. What scenario do you imagine a 1 hp fighter being more useful than a full hp mage with no spells?

A wizard can swing his sword just as many times as a fighter. (More to the point, an army of zombies can swing a lot of fucking swords for eternity, the fighter needs to sleep and eat eventually.) Unlike a fighter the mage can also just teleport past anything you might swing a sword at. Or fly. Or go invisible. Or turn into smoke. Or a rat. Or put everyone to sleep. Or become ethereal. Which is the real reason a wizard is in a different league entirely from a fighter: wizards can kill shit that fighters couldn't even hurt if they were twice the level and had infinite hitpoints and 50 years to make the attempt.

Of course a high level mage is much more powerful than a fighter of same level, but only if he has the spells memorized.
But a fighter will always fight at full strength as long as he has a least 1 HP and in not otherwise incapacitated.
That's how the classes are somewhat balanced. If the mage can rest after each and every battle of course the fighter is totally underpowered. But if all classes should be equally powerful and have similar abilities, you may as well just the class concept all together.

 

[Damned Registrations]

I'm sorry, but you're full of shit if you think a fighter with 1 hp is as powerful as a mage at full hp with no spells. Or that a mage uses every spell he has after a single battle.

Fighters run out of hp and die long before mages run out of spells after the first few levels.

It's not a matter of having similar abilities, it's a matter of fighters having NO abilities. Why can't they innately see invisible, regenerate hp, move three times as fast or make guaranteed critical strikes? None of that would be the same as a mage, none of it would make them overpowered (if anything they'd still be lagging behind), and none of it would be out of theme for them.

If I made a class that has no features except an exceptionally high will saving throw, that doesn't make it balanced because it's the most useful when facing save or die spells that target will saves which are so difficult only that class would make it. That isn't how fucking balance works. Being the best at an obscure situation that never occurs is irrelevant.

 

[octavius]

A Fighter with 1 HP needs only a friendly Heal spell to be at max again. A mage with full HP and no spells need hours or days of rest. In the "real world" that would have been a serious weakness, but in a computer games time does not matter; just hit the lolFix button, and the mage is ready to spam Delayed Blast Fireballs again.
Point is that a fighter's prowess (or a Thief's Backstab) is not something that is used up and need to be replenished, unlike a mage's weapons. But of course if you can rest anytime and anywhere it does not matter, since the mage need not conserves his spells, and can use them just as freely as a fighter uses his sword.

 

[J_C]

BG1 Vanilla is still a good game. Come at me.

BG1 is awesome and BG2 is by a gigantic margin the best cRPG ever made. Come at me too.

BG1 is indeed a good game, and BG2 is even better. Come at me everybody!E!!!4444

 

[Damned Registrations]

A Fighter with 1 HP needs only a friendly Heal spell to be at max again. A mage with full HP and no spells need hours or days of rest. In the "real world" that would have been a serious weakness, but in a computer games time does not matter; just hit the lolFix button, and the mage is ready to spam Delayed Blast Fireballs again.
Point is that a fighter's prowess (or a Thief's Backstab) is not something that is used up and need to be replenished, unlike a mage's weapons. But of course if you can rest anytime and anywhere it does not matter, since the mage need not conserves his spells, and can use them just as freely as a fighter uses his sword.

In other words, a fighter only needs a mage to be useful. Gotcha.

 

[Cadmus]

A Fighter with 1 HP needs only a friendly Heal spell to be at max again. A mage with full HP and no spells need hours or days of rest. In the "real world" that would have been a serious weakness, but in a computer games time does not matter; just hit the lolFix button, and the mage is ready to spam Delayed Blast Fireballs again.
Point is that a fighter's prowess (or a Thief's Backstab) is not something that is used up and need to be replenished, unlike a mage's weapons. But of course if you can rest anytime and anywhere it does not matter, since the mage need not conserves his spells, and can use them just as freely as a fighter uses his sword.

I think you're missing the fact that a part of fighter's usefulness is his ability to soak up the damage as well as deal it, playing as a part of the team and protecting his party. So while a full HP fighter has the same offensive capability as a 1 HP fighter, he is not as useful because he has other roles than just dealing damage.

 

[octavius]

A Fighter with 1 HP needs only a friendly Heal spell to be at max again. A mage with full HP and no spells need hours or days of rest. In the "real world" that would have been a serious weakness, but in a computer games time does not matter; just hit the lolFix button, and the mage is ready to spam Delayed Blast Fireballs again.
Point is that a fighter's prowess (or a Thief's Backstab) is not something that is used up and need to be replenished, unlike a mage's weapons. But of course if you can rest anytime and anywhere it does not matter, since the mage need not conserves his spells, and can use them just as freely as a fighter uses his sword.

In other words, a fighter only needs a mage to be useful. Gotcha.

Huh? How did you possibly come to that conclusion?

I think you're missing the fact that a part of fighter's usefulness is his ability to soak up the damage as well as deal it, playing as a part of the team and protecting his party. So while a full HP fighter has the same offensive capability as a 1 HP fighter, he is not as useful because he has other roles than just dealing damage.

I'm not missing the fact, it just goes without saying. And 1 HP is of course an extreme example, but still, a Fighter with 1 HP does just as much damage as one with 255 HP.

 

[Cadmus]

I think you're missing the fact that a part of fighter's usefulness is his ability to soak up the damage as well as deal it, playing as a part of the team and protecting his party. So while a full HP fighter has the same offensive capability as a 1 HP fighter, he is not as useful because he has other roles than just dealing damage.

I'm not missing the fact, it just goes without saying. And 1 HP is of course an extreme example, but still, a Fighter with 1 HP does just as much damage as one with 255 HP.

Well, you are kinda not including it in your argument. It seemed like you argue that a fighter can function as he is intended to over multiple encounters but you are not including the fact that his HP are used in a similar way as the mage's spell points.

 

[octavius]

I think you're missing the fact that a part of fighter's usefulness is his ability to soak up the damage as well as deal it, playing as a part of the team and protecting his party. So while a full HP fighter has the same offensive capability as a 1 HP fighter, he is not as useful because he has other roles than just dealing damage.

I'm not missing the fact, it just goes without saying. And 1 HP is of course an extreme example, but still, a Fighter with 1 HP does just as much damage as one with 255 HP.

Well, you are kinda not including it in your argument. It seemed like you argue that a fighter can function as he is intended to over multiple encounters but you are not including the fact that his HP are used in a similar way as the mage's spell points.

I was just using an extreme example. Anyway, a fighter could always stack up on healing potions to replenish Hit Points ASAP after battle. Although in computer games some gamers have been known to just rest 200 days to get back to max HP.

 

[Perkel]

You know what ? I did that a lot in BG. From role playing standpoint it was fine imo. I almost died and then i took half a year to cure before i continued my journey...

I remember i played solo Fighter/Mage in BG1 and my playtrhough was like 3-4 years in game time which imo give it a bit of realness as it is hard to believe someone could fuck up bunch of ogres, flood mines and fuck up things in BG in manner of week. (BGT though)

 

[SwiftCrack]

My BG pt's always take over 100 days.