Jeff Vogel vs Pillars of Eternity

[Maxie]

lore should be a disgustingly tangled self-contradictory clusterfuck full of rumours and legends and cultural cues that you learn to identify as you spend time in the game and interact with the world
if its just a bunch of very factual history books with appendices like "culture X perceives this event in a different light" then it's not lore at all

 

[Azarkon]

To give an example of what INTERESTING lore looks like:

Now the Egyptians, before the reign of their king Psammetichus, believed themselves to be the most ancient of mankind. Since Psammetichus, however, made an attempt to discover who were actually the primitive race, they have been of opinion that while they surpass all other nations, the Phrygians surpass them in antiquity. This king, finding it impossible to make out by dint of inquiry what men were the most ancient, contrived the following method of discovery:- He took two children of the common sort, and gave them over to a herdsman to bring up at his folds, strictly charging him to let no one utter a word in their presence, but to keep them in a sequestered cottage, and from time to time introduce goats to their apartment, see that they got their fill of milk, and in all other respects look after them. His object herein was to know, after the indistinct babblings of infancy were over, what word they would first articulate. It happened as he had anticipated. The herdsman obeyed his orders for two years, and at the end of that time, on his one day opening the door of their room and going in, the children both ran up to him with outstretched arms, and distinctly said "Becos." When this first happened the herdsman took no notice; but afterwards when he observed, on coming often to see after them, that the word was constantly in their mouths, he informed his lord, and by his command brought the children into his presence. Psammetichus then himself heard them say the word, upon which he proceeded to make inquiry what people there was who called anything "becos," and hereupon he learnt that "becos" was the Phrygian name for bread. In consideration of this circumstance the Egyptians yielded their claims, and admitted the greater antiquity of the Phrygians.

Guess where this is from?

 

[Telengard]

Hidden leftist agendas? They are everywhere, right out in the open.

I'm just saying, these tick-a-box "identity politics" group labels are retarded. They don't define a person. If you think the most important thing about me is "gamergater" you're wrong (I'm not in lockstep with that movement), and you're disregarding my long-held principles that led me to side with GG. Also it tells you jack shit about my strengths and weaknesses.

If it's not SJW pandering, name another reason why developers include so many character creation choices without consequences?

The character creation of Pillars of Eternity seems so familiar....

Where have I seen it before?

An rpg where gender means nothing, and race and subrace have only minor mechanical differences. And where all the non-human races are oppressed or in retreat.

It seems like it's a game something I should know, what was the name of it again...


























...oh yeah, it was called 2e D&D. A strange game with some minor popularity, with its grey elves and its drow (S&M mass oppression at every level of society trigger alert), its kanganesti and its shunned hill dwarves, its Luskans and its Thays, its Solamnias and its Abanasians, not to mention its non-choice choice of gender.

Now, I know what you're going to say - all the SJW crap that permeates 2e D&D has horribly oppressed and offended your delicate sensibilities. And that's fine for you to feel that way, of course.

But at the same time, when I hear you say that, I have to scratch my head and wonder: So, why were you interested in Pillars of Eternity again? I mean, it's a game that is quite literally a budget version of Baldur's Gate's 2e D&D design, after all, and the race/subrace design doesn't even try to hide its directly copied origins. So, why is it you are spending your money on these games to begin with?

 

[Fry]

There's plenty of interesting lore in the PoE guide book, and actually reading that book helps a lot.

Sure, reading extensive lore in-game shouldn't be a requirement. Tyranny solved this problem with mouseover text. PoE2 will be using the same system.

 

[pippin]

I just wanted to save her

 

[Azarkon]

Calisca - generic fantasy tough female fighter.

Heodan - a Khalid-like (insecure scaredy cat) character. He was interesting in the beginning - primarily because you usually don't see such characters in games like this - but I suspect his shtick would have gotten old fast were he a full-fledged companion.

I suspect the reason some folks prefer them to the real companions is that they're more like the starting BG series ones, which join you out of necessity and loyalty.

In contrast to: Aloth (afraid to be alone and without anyone to order him about in a foreign land), Eder (bored of waiting to get whacked for being a known Eothas worshiper).

I've always wondered whether developers are doing themselves a disservice by enforcing the party-based dynamic. I get it. Party based combat system = got to have a party. But when the social cohesion of these parties is so weak, it becomes a burden for the narrative. You can get around the problem by concocting various plot devices for why the player character & other party members stick together, but ultimately you're limiting your narrative choice.

A better idea might be to make all potential allies optional, and to have them join you, or leave you, on the basis of temporary personal motivations. Thus, a character like Heodan would run for the hills at the first opportunity, but might run into trouble shortly after, and come crying to you for help. Should you help him, he then owes you a favor, and that could be the basis of your interactions with Heodan - he'd help you on a quest, but then you'd have to help him on a quest, and when he's not doing that, he's off living his own life, pursuing his own goals, etc.

That's how it works in life. People don't just follow you around all day, offering to sacrifice their lives whenever you need them to. They operate as independent agents until the need or desire for cooperation and companionship arises. Friendship and loyalty are a matrix of intersecting social and practical goals. They shouldn't be taken for granted. A party based CRPG where the party is constantly forming, disbanding, and reforming is much closer to our everyday social experience, and in fact, it is the way it works in MMORPGs where actual people are your companions.

 

[Quillon]

MCA just retweeted the article.

I'm shocked Chris promoted yet another negative shit related to Obs. As indirect as ever.

 

[J_C]

and in fact, it is the way it works in MMORPGs where actual people are your companions.

And this is why this idea sucks.

*Party reaches the depts of hell and facing Diablo...
- All right people, this is it. We killed the minions of the devil himself, we smashed every opposition, we sacrificed so much. But we are here. In this moment we are making history. And when our grandchildren will tell the tale of the battle of...
- Sorry to interrupt boss, but I really have to leave. Wife is on her period and will flip out if I'm not at home in a few hours.
- What...? But we have to face Diablo, we have-
- Umm, I have to go as well.
- But, but you are the healer in the party.
- Yeah, but I heared a dragon threatens my home town, I should really go.
*2 characters leaves the party.
- All right so 3 of us remained. Come on men, lets finish this.
*Party killed in 10 seconds.

Long story short, you cannot balance the game if all of the companions come and go as the like. NPCs leaving the party in BG1 because of your alignment sucks in itself, and what you are suggesting is way worse.

 

[Azarkon]

I don't want to hear the word balance after Pillars of Eternity...

But it wouldn't irritate me very much for a game to attach an actual cost to being a social failure. You don't want to invest in friendship and loyalty? Then don't. But don't be surprised when it's extra hard to go at it alone.

 

[PrettyDeadman]

MCA just retweeted the article.

I'm shocked Chris promoted yet another negative shit related to Obs. As indirect as ever.

Chris is giving Obsidian some tough love. He only wishes them the best.

 

[PrettyDeadman]

Long story short, you cannot balance the game if all of the companions come and go as the like. NPCs leaving the party in BG1 because of your alignment sucks in itself, and what you are suggesting is way worse.

There are tons of games which make it work, they are mostly jrpgs.
The only thing that makes you think that this is bad idea is incompetence of western rpg developers.

 

[Fry]

MCA just retweeted the article.

I'm shocked Chris promoted yet another negative shit related to Obs. As indirect as ever.

Chris is giving Obsidian some tough love. He only wishes them the best.

It's a direct criticism of PoE, but I'm not sure why you don't think he's including himself...

 

[Quillon]

MCA just retweeted the article.

I'm shocked Chris promoted yet another negative shit related to Obs. As indirect as ever.

Chris is giving Obsidian some tough love. He only wishes them the best.

It's a direct criticism of PoE, but I'm not sure why you don't think he's including himself...

People think you're great & you're saying to them "I too have made mistakes" which makes them think you are even greater.

 

[Telengard]

Lore is one of the fundamental issues with current rpg design. A problem that exists because rpg mechanics were not built with having story in mind. The traditions of rpg are rooted in having a group of wandering adventures travel to distant lands and loot the local peoples' belongings and women. And there's not much narrative there, and that's fine. Now, your rpg since Hickman is more focused on story, and that's okay too. But the story-rpg designers brought over the mechanics and traditions of the adventure/loot model of rpg into these stories, and that's not at all okay.

A story where the characters have no root in the story at hand, no emotional ties to anything that happens, no personal motivation, that story will ultimately have limits to both how good and how powerful a narrative it can be. In such a story construction, lore will always be external to the character - one step removed from who he is and what he is doing. Since he is unrelated to the story, he is naturally unrelated to its lore, and thus the lore can only affect things intangible and external to him. He is the tourist, ever apart from the local going-on. You may get involved in the local gang war, but you don't really care care. Not like you would if your cahracter were a member of one of the gangs. Thus, the lore will never be woven into the plot in a personal way. (That is, unless you have someone tricksy like Avellone, who will give you a character that pretends like it can be anything you want it to be, as long as what you choose to be is that one character.)

Now then, D&D games greatly benefited from a shared lore with the p&p game. If one actually read the lore books, it was dull stuff. But D&D was popular enough that, at least for RPG fans, the lore essentially became common, shared knowledge. One didn't need to delve into the lore of what a mage is or how they get their powers, or what the general populace thought of them, because the audience already knew. That is, unless you did something weird with it, like Dark Sun. And even Dark Sun had basically the same lore as all the others, just with a twist, so not much needed explaining. It was still the lore of the D&D/Tolkein storyline.

Cue a different decade, though, and a different world, and now there is no longer that common, shared knowledge, and we're not talking a D&D world either. And that's where the problem comes in. Because, remember, the PC(s) is unrelated to the lore, the lore will never appear naturally around him. Since he is external, the outsider, he thus needs the lore explained to him. But he only needs it explained to him because he cares about the goings-on of the story. If he was only there to loot the treasures and women, then the lore is just an interesting tidbit to make the area look different and the natives act different. Involve a story, though, and suddenly you have a need for the PC to understand the whys and wherefores of all these alien goings-on around him. If the PC is an outsider, then that means the path to understanding involves having things explained by the locals. While this sort of construction can be useful, since the PC and the viewer thus know the same - nothing - and thus learn about these strange going-on together, keeping everything very simple, it's also boring as fuck.

And with boring as fuck things, you can't put just anyone on it and expect them to make it interesting with words. That's about the same as handling a flight manual of a 747 to someone and saying, Make it interesting. The only type of dev who can really do something with that flight manual is the tricksy kind. And they're not exactly a dime a dozen.

TLDR: Lore dumps are dumb, so either let rpgs be classic wandering/looting adventures, or go full-on story rpg and have the PC play a personal part of the story, so that the lore naturally flows from his personal experiences. For instance, Garrett of Thief fame telling you what he thinks of the various factions of the world and what he's going to do to them, instead of some rinky-dink NPC explaining everything to you and trying to give you a motivation.

 

[Sizzle]

A big problem is the disconnect between lore and gameplay solutions.

It would be great if the purpose of lore wasn't just mitigated to background fluff, but could provide the attentive player with extra quest options.

For example, you read a book about the relationships of Glanfathan tribes. In it, you learn that two of the tribes can't stand each other. And this is something that's available only in that book, you won't find random NPCs going: "Oh, those Twice-Split Arrows and Three-Tusk Stelgaer tribes sure do hate each other!" You receive a quest from the leaders of one of those tribes. Instead of following through with it, you go to the leader of the other tribe with an offer to help them shame their foes. But the important thing is to not have the option of the double-cross telegraphed in any way - you either knew about because you took the time to get acquainted with the world, or the option would have never dawned on you.

This is just a silly little example, and I know that it belongs more in a game like Age of Decadence than PoE, but it's one possible solution to making lore relevant.

 

[gaussgunner]

But at the same time, when I hear you say that, I have to scratch my head and wonder: So, why were you interested in Pillars of Eternity again? I mean, it's a game that is quite literally a budget version of Baldur's Gate's 2e D&D design, after all, and the race/subrace design doesn't even try to hide its directly copied origins. So, why is it you are spending your money on these games to begin with?

Don't worry, I got it on sale. I just wanted to see what all the fuss was about, i.e. why are rpgs like PoE and D:OS so popular. And BG for that matter; I never played those games.

Maybe it wasn't SJW pandering, just some of the writers trying to "make a statement" about current issues. I honestly forget most of those details. It was just bad.

 

[Lacrymas]

A big problem is the disconnect between lore and gameplay solutions.

It would be great if the purpose of lore wasn't just mitigated to background fluff, but could provide the attentive player with extra quest options.

For example, you read a book about the relationships of Glanfathan tribes. In it, you learn that two of the tribes can't stand each other. And this is something that's available only in that book, you won't find random NPCs going: "Oh, those Twice-Split Arrows and Three-Tusk Stelgaer tribes sure do hate each other!" You receive a quest from the leaders of one of those tribes. Instead of following through with it, you go to the leader of the other tribe with an offer to help them shame their foes. But the important thing is to not have the option of the double-cross telegraphed in any way - you either knew about because you took the time to get acquainted with the world, or the option would have never dawned on you.

This is just a silly little example, and I know that it belongs more in a game like Age of Decadence than PoE, but it's one possible solution to making lore relevant.

All of this is a bit too complicated for ol' Obs. Not only do they have to write lore, but make it have gameplay ramifications, in effect making it meaningful? Inconceivable! I don't think it necessarily fits AoD-type games more than PoE though, since even Dishonored 2 (surprisingly good game btw, I recommend it) does it with very successful results. I wouldn't mind expanding it to not only alternate solutions, but extra quests and treasures as well. Optional hard bosses. Exploration opportunities. Even just interesting locales.

 

[gaussgunner]

and in fact, it is the way it works in MMORPGs where actual people are your companions.

And this is why this idea sucks.

Long story short, you cannot balance the game if all of the companions come and go as the like. NPCs leaving the party in BG1 because of your alignment sucks in itself, and what you are suggesting is way worse.

Totally agree with you there; that's too much realism. I like crpg's that just let you (the player) role-play all the party members yourself instead of telling the story of your relationship with them. They could be mind-controlled mercenary slaves for all I care.

 

[Sizzle]

A big problem is the disconnect between lore and gameplay solutions.

It would be great if the purpose of lore wasn't just mitigated to background fluff, but could provide the attentive player with extra quest options.

For example, you read a book about the relationships of Glanfathan tribes. In it, you learn that two of the tribes can't stand each other. And this is something that's available only in that book, you won't find random NPCs going: "Oh, those Twice-Split Arrows and Three-Tusk Stelgaer tribes sure do hate each other!" You receive a quest from the leaders of one of those tribes. Instead of following through with it, you go to the leader of the other tribe with an offer to help them shame their foes. But the important thing is to not have the option of the double-cross telegraphed in any way - you either knew about because you took the time to get acquainted with the world, or the option would have never dawned on you.

This is just a silly little example, and I know that it belongs more in a game like Age of Decadence than PoE, but it's one possible solution to making lore relevant.

All of this is a bit too complicated for ol' Obs. Not only do they have to write lore, but make it have gameplay ramifications, in effect making it meaningful? Inconceivable! I don't think it necessarily fits AoD-type games more than PoE though, since even Dishonored 2 (surprisingly good game btw, I recommend it) does it with very successful results. I wouldn't mind expanding it to not only alternate solutions, but extra quests and treasures as well. Optional hard bosses. Exploration opportunities. Even just interesting locales.

I don't think this approach is necessarily too complicated for them - just that it goes against one of Sawyer's design goals, which is to have all the (non-faction related) content available to all players, regardless of class/race choice.

Now, I can understand the necessity of doing it like that for the Main Quest path, but they really could have experimented a lot more with side quests. And I'm not even talking about outright gating content, but just putting an extra step (or removing one) in a quest if, for example, you are a Wild Orlan who wants to join The Dozens.

Even a tiny amount of reactivity there, even if it's all just fluff, would have made the game feel much more alive. One of the most fondly remembered parts of Arcanum were all the different reactions you would get based on your character's race, outfit, magic/tech affinity, etc.

 

[vonAchdorf]

Oh, so people reply to Jeff Vogel's remake of Darth Roxor's article, but not to the original? I C....

Roxor's article has too many words and no ponies.

 

[Iznaliu]

I wouldn't mind expanding it to not only alternate solutions, but extra quests and treasures as well. Optional hard bosses. Exploration opportunities. Even just interesting locales.

I think PoE2 would have more of that stuff with the whole exploration element.

 

[Chaotic_Heretic]

A big problem is the disconnect between lore and gameplay

In MotB, you start the game and in a short while figure out you are cursed with unending hunger. AND THE GAMEPLAY REFLECTS THAT, with the spirit meter, spirit eating abilities and worsening stat penalties leading to death/game over if not dealt with. As a player, you were invested on how to manage your curse and what/when to eat/not to eat. And the consequemces could be VASTLY DIFFERENT depending on your choices. And the hook driving you to explore and learn avout the world was to rid you of your curse.

In P:E, your PC starts with diarrhoea; which is cured shortly. Before and After that; it is just literary diarrhoea in the form of banal expositions and innane lore dumps which have nothing to do with gameplay. You have no reason to care at all.

Noticed the difference?

That is why Motb is great; and PoE is Piles of Shit.

 

[Fry]

Whut? A nagging meter doesn't make me care, it just annoys me. You should probably pick a better example if you're trying to shit on PoE.

MotB is great because the story and prose are great, not because of a lame gimmick best disabled in console.

 

[Sizzle]

Though the execution of the Spirit Meter in MoTB is lacking, the idea of it, as well as how they tied it to gameplay and story - is fantastic in itself. And it's something that hasn't been topped in RPGs since.

I've written about this several times before, but the problem with the "affliction" of the PC in PoE is that, unlike the one from MoTB, it fails to motivate or interest players for several reasons:

- Your status as a Watcher doesn't provide you with any really cool new powers. I can remember using these anemic abilities only a couple of times in several playthroughs. Now contrast this with the Spirit Curse from MoTB - you gain the power to devour gods!

- Only a few quests hinged on you being the Watcher in order to solve them. This was greatly rectified in TWM expansion, and I hope they continue in that vein for the sequel.

- You "slowly going insane" was very badly presented. A few characters commenting that you are "not sleeping well" does not do a good enough job of informing the player that his character is in danger. Again, contrast this to MoTB: if you don't sate/suppress your hunger, you will die.

 

[Iznaliu]

Now contrast this with the Spirit Curse from MoTB - you gain the power to devour gods!

You could frame the Watcher in the same way: "You gain the power to read souls!"