I'm not sure anymore if it's even possible to make a good game using dialogue skills and non-violent gameplay as a core design element. See, on the codex you could always read that Fallout provided three different character types, fighter, diplomat, thief - and each of those would offer a unique path through the game and gameplay experience. But that's basically bullshit.
Let's ignore the Thief archetype here (because everyone knows how underdeveloped thieving and stealth elements in Fallout were) and concentrate on the diplomat vs. fighter dilemma. At least for me both Fallout 1 and 2 never promoted this exclusive style of playing, where you need to choose between being a strict talker or a fighter.
I played through both games as a diplomat many times, but every time my diplomatic character has been some kind of hybrid - i.e. a somewhat weaker, but still capable fighter who as a tradeoff could use his silver tongue in different situations to make life easier for himself (I'm using the fallouts as an example, but it was really the same for me in Arcanum, even more so in PS:T, Mask of the Betrayer etc.). Sure, at least in Fallout 1 technically you could finish the game without killing anyone - but the completely non-violent path seemed always more of a cool gimmick to me ("wow, how amazing that somebody actually thought about implementing that!").
See, I love non-violent solutions, alternative paths, using dialogue skills etc. I don't agree with people who say that this is not gameplay. Discovering alternative solutions, finding out about the different possibilities the game world offers you not only gives your game a sense of freedom and player-choice, makes the world more reactive, detailed and charming, but it is also a genuinely fun element from a gamist perspective.
However, it is one thing to add those little details, options, secrets and non-violent possibilities to your game and let the player discover them. It is something entirely different to choose non-violent gameplay as your core element and design your entire game around it. The non-violent elements stop being cool extra options that the player has to discover by being perceptive or experimenting with different character builds in the game. Instead, the become a key gameplay element and in this process they become a boring and little engaging CYOA. The joy of discovering those options is gone, because they are presented to you on a silver-table. Once you take those elements for granted (because they have become a core element and not something that has been added on top of the combat-gameplay) they lose all their appeal.
That's why I never got the Codex bitching about Bloodlines. OH NOES YOU CAN'T FINISH THE GAME WITH A DIPLOMATIC CHARACTER! Well guess what, who the fuck cares? You can create a combat-capable character that with a few tradeoffs to his fighting abilities can make full use of all the diplomatic skills the game offers.
For me, the choice in Fallout, Arcanum, Mask of the Betrayer or Bloodlines was never about playing a diplomat or a fighter. Rather, it was a choice between playing a fully-fledged super strong fighter or playing a hybrid, ie. a much weaker fighter (who could still hold his ground in combat though) who has access to interesting extra options during the game.
I feel that denying the player option to be a hybrid and forcing him to choose exclusively between being a pure fighter and a pure diplomatic character is disastrous for gameplay. Because let’s face it, clicking through dialogue options and using your [intimidate] [persuade] etc. skills JUST ISN'T THAT MUCH FUN from a gameplay perspective. Without more or less regular combat encounters to balance them out these options become boring pretty fast.
The codex obsession with so called C and C and exclusive and radically different gameplay paths for different character archetypes (diplomat, fighter, thief) has been unhealthy from the start. No existing game ever fulfilled these criteria, neither Fallout nor Arcanum. AoD is the product of this unhealthy obsession and the ultimate proof how misguided it was.
I will still buy the game propably because I want to reward the hard work and courage that VD and his team have shown, and judging from the demo there is still a lot of stuff I like about the game. But I don’t feel this is the direction in which RPGs should be heading.
