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Should RPGs let you blow up locked doors with fireballs? DISCUSS

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Anything in a chest that is burnable should be destroyed if you used a fireball to open it. Pretty simple solution, yes?

Also Roguey's "I'll just kill everything first" strategy to actions that alert the map has a bit of a problem if the map is a friendly area full of NPCs that you need alive.
 

Kem0sabe

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Josh Sawyer says: If you want to open a locked door, invest in lockpicking.

Of course it's perfectly fine to make a door-bursting game if you don't even bother with the inclusion of a lockpicking skill.
Not only should it blow open a door, it should blow a hole in the wall and burn anything near it.

The problem with magic in rpgs is that it lacks 'impact', its often a self contained action whose powers only apply to itself and it's target with little regard to the outside world.

In my opinion, a truly good magic system will only be possible in a completely physics driven game world where all the geometry can be affected by player action.
 

Roguey

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Anything in a chest that is burnable should be destroyed if you used a fireball to open it. Pretty simple solution, yes?

Are those destroyed items worth a lockpick investment?

Also Roguey's "I'll just kill everything first" strategy to actions that alert the map has a bit of a problem if the map is a friendly area full of NPCs that you need alive.

I mentioned the civilized areas aspect. IME most civilized areas in RPGs aren't worth stealing from, but hypothetically if someone wants to make it really worth it, they can knock themselves out.
 

Damned Registrations

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I mean, the most obvious answer to 'why should lockpicking be useful?' is the same as in real life; for a sufficiently heavy lock/door, it's impractical to break it open. If you can tear apart a metal reinforced door or chest, there probably shouldn't be much of anything (relatively) valuable behind it, and the people relying on it for protection are probably not a threat. People use doors they can't break themselves if they use them for protection. Sure, I am a big strong dude that could smash open a 6 year old's bedroom door and break the piggy bank and rip open the diary- but that doesn't really fucking get me anything. Lockpick skill should be appealing because it's a more efficient investment for it's purpose. A lvl 3 dude should be able to lockpick open doors that you wouldn't be able to blast or bash open until level 6+, thereby getting better loot at any given level.
 

Alex

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Why not just use a pry bar then? Having the items inside the chest always break when using force is just as bad. The problem here is that you are arguing the wrong question, you are trying to argue how to make lockpick "balanced" with other skills. The real question should be how to make it "fun", or more formally, how to design the lockpick skill so the game enables you to roleplay a thief (or whatever kind of role lockpick would be associated to).
 
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Anything in a chest that is burnable should be destroyed if you used a fireball to open it. Pretty simple solution, yes?

Are those destroyed items worth a lockpick investment?

How important would something like the only available scrolls of a high level magic be to you? Or magical gloves or cloaks or something?

It's always up to the designer what to put in the chest, just as its always up to the designer to determine how much investment a skill requires. If we're talking a D&D-like game then you probably have a thief around for detecting and disarming traps and shit, so the opportunity cost of also leveling your lockpicking skills is almost zero. In that case providing an alternate means for a thief-less party to open some things at the cost of loot can be a good thing.

IME most civilized areas in RPGs aren't worth stealing from, but hypothetically if someone wants to make it really worth it, they can knock themselves out.

It's usually a problem of "if we allowed the players to steal from merchants, it would be way too OP", and for small items that aren't a giant pile of equipment stored in a locked room, you use the pickpockted skill on a person.

That said it works for TES and Gothic games pretty well. Early TES games even allowed bashing the doors at the cost of waking the guards.
 
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Wayward Son

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I feel like if the game is designed around it (limited spell points/ammo and/or low chance of success), then it'd make a great re-addition to the genre.
 
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Or make gigantic fiery explosions appropriately damaging (i.e. when swords take over from IEDs as anti-tank weapons, then come back and talk about swords being the better single target damage option) AND limit their use through resource management.

Aka: Deus Ex. So many ways to open the door (or, you know, forget about the lock and break the glass because it's a glass door...or just launch a GEP into the room and let the blast open every door and locker in the vicinity if you don't give a crap about everyone knowing you're there). And yet lockpicking remains useful throughout.
 

Severian Silk

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Lightning bolt-proof doors would be gud too.

Vw02cMV.gif


^ This thread.
 

Carrion

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"Sneak" is a special mode that allows you to score critical hits.
"Stealth" means killing everything but just doing it with a bow or a dagger using said critical hits.
"Lockpicking" is something that you do to open all those chests in a room after you've murdered all of the inhabitants first.
Okay, we've got the Thief class covered, let's move on to the next item on the list.

Man, RPG designers fucking suck.
 

Alex

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I agree with the spirit of the question, which is really about interactivity, reactivity, sandboxiness etc. A game where systems are complex enough to let players find creative solutions that are the logical conclusions of their in-game powers. Obviously we would all like that, all things being equal.

My nitpicky answer is that a universe with fireballs is one where most doors worth breaking down would be resistant to them. Just like our contemporary world has safes, bulletproof glass etc.

I dunno, that is more of a setting thing. Traditionally, wizards are supposed to be rare and most people wouldn't really have any means to make their doors unbreakable.

By the way, here are a few ways an AD&D wizard could use to open or get through a chest or door:
  1. Charm Person (charm whomever has the key)
  2. Reduce (cast on the lock)
  3. Magic Missile (same principle as the fireball, but no chance of burning stuff (or even damaging them, I would argue, since magic missiles always aim at their target unerringly).
  4. Ventriloquism (fool whomever has the key into thinking you are someone they know, or into thinking there is some kind of magic creature in the chest you want open.
  5. Fools Gold (buy the key with fake gold)
  6. Invisibility (wait nearby until someone opens whatever you need open)
  7. Locate Object (if the location of the key is unknown, won't work if it isn't nearby, though)
  8. Strength
  9. Lightning Bolt (kinda obvious, but the spell mentions breaking doors in its own description, so I though I should include it)
  10. Monster Summoning (needs a bit of luck, but depending on where you are, you could easily end up with some thieving monster)
  11. Wizard Eye (see into the lock itself, so you can see how to open it)
  12. Magic Jar (posses whomever is on the other side of the door, or has the key)
  13. Stone Shape (if the chest/door is made of stone)
  14. Telekinesis (you will probably need someway to see the tumblers)
  15. Teleport (use reduce on yourself if you want to get inside a chest)
  16. Duo Dimension (Slide under the door)
  17. Passwall (just walk around the door)
  18. Of course, you could just use the knock spell.
Also, a cleric could use animate object and simply ask for the object to open itself. A lot of this depends on the situation, but that is exactly what makes this kind of thing interesting.
 

Morkar Left

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We're talking about a roleplaying model where a mage's fireball can destroy a group of kobolds but can never be used to break through a door, "because those are the rules". Is that really what we invented computer games for?

Josh Sawyer says: If you want to open a locked door, invest in lockpicking.

Of course it's perfectly fine to make a door-bursting game if you don't even bother with the inclusion of a lockpicking skill.

Depends on the door ofc. I would go even further and allow simple doors to get kicked in. It's noisy and can catch unwanted attention when using a fireball. Furthermore you just wasted a fireball for a simple door.
If you fail to kick in the door you can lose health. W2 actually let you do that.
 

laclongquan

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Point number 1: because there's benefit to leave a door intact instead of broken. Which is why we invest in lockpicking skill in the 1st place. There is tactical benefit to it.

Point number 2: Because there's benefit to go through a door silently by lockpicking instead of fireballing. it's a tactical benefit as well as a gameplay one.

Point number 3: Because there's benefit to lockpick than fireball, which is XP. Fallout Tactic got this, which is why one permanent character of my team has that skill invested.

That's the benefit of lockpick compared to just brute force.

As for OP question, yeah fireball should. But it should go with some other mechanic like noise alarm.
 

Gregz

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We're talking about a roleplaying model where a mage's fireball can destroy a group of kobolds but can never be used to break through a door, "because those are the rules". Is that really what we invented computer games for?

Josh Sawyer says: If you want to open a locked door, invest in lockpicking.

Of course it's perfectly fine to make a door-bursting game if you don't even bother with the inclusion of a lockpicking skill.

AFAIK fireball does no 'concussive' damage, it fills a fixed volume with heat and burning.

A solid oak door would be minimally affected, therefore fireball shouldn't be useful for breaching.

It's a good balance because fireball is easily one of the most OP spells in the rule-set already, it shouldn't displace Bend Bars/Lift Gates and thief skills too. Complementary party skills make for good cooperative role-playing (everyone has fun and feels they are contributing).
 
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tindrli

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Should RPGs let you blow up locked doors with fireballs?



yes yeaaaaaaaaaars ago, at least the wooden type ones .. end of discussion
 

GlutenBurger

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Just put a magical unbreakable chastity belt on the final boss that requires maximum lockpick skill. Unlocking it triggers a tasteful secret ending and awards a Steam achievement. Problem solved.
 

Unkillable Cat

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Josh Sawyer says: If you want to open a locked door, invest in lockpicking.
Shit, you just managed to make me hate a man.

:bro:

Ditto.

By the way, here are a few ways an AD&D wizard could use to open or get through a chest or door:

[List of spells]

Reduce - cast it upon the lock.

Or, you know, just cast Reduce on the door. The reverse spell, Enlarge, should also do nicely to do away with the door.

Point number 1: because there's benefit to leave a door intact instead of broken. Which is why we invest in lockpicking skill in the 1st place. There is tactical benefit to it.

No, we invest in lockpicking because we can't blow the door down and aren't given other options to get past it than to pick the lock.

Point number 2: Because there's benefit to go through a door silently by lockpicking instead of fireballing. it's a tactical benefit as well as a gameplay one.

There's also a benefit of going through a door quickly by blowing it up instead of wasting time lockpicking it. It's a tactical benefit as well as a gameplay one.

Point number 3: Because there's benefit to lockpick than fireball, which is XP. Fallout Tactic got this, which is why one permanent character of my team has that skill invested.

Fake incentives to solve a task in one preferred manner, rather than allowing players to come up with their own solution, does not a good game make. There's also a strong argument here that one could accuse FO:T of making players waste skillpoints by forcing them to invest in a skill with marginal use. How many skillpoints are sunk into Lockpick on average during a playthrough of FO:T, 60? More? Those skillpoints could come in handy in combat skills, healing, or even those 'magic' skills requires to fireball every door in the Wastes.

That's the benefit of brute force compared to lockpicking.
 

laclongquan

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Are you just being difficult for the sake of being difficult?

Lockpick is a necessity for a stealth approach, leaving door intact and no sign of broken. While certainly a brute force approach is refreshing, it's not always preferable, not with a bunch of guns pointing at the doorway.
 

Roguey

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You guise sure are into hypothetical scenarios that have never happened in the nearly four decade long history of crpgs (and likely never will in the next four decades).
 

Lhynn

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You guise sure are into hypothetical scenarios that have never happened in the nearly four decade long history of crpgs (and likely never will in the next four decades).
wat? some of the most loved RPGs on this site allow for such scenarios.
 

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