Underrail [PRE-RELEASE THREAD, GO TO NEW THREAD]

[Kalasanty11]

Level scaling is an obvious answer

Spoiler

 

[Fenix]

I click every container, never avoid combat and do all the quests.
My gripe with both XP systems is that there's too much of the good stuff to go around. I'd always hit the level cap with a good chunk of the game still unplayed and even before that I'm always overleveled for the foes I face.
IMO game would be much better off with less XP available.

There was already one nerf of exp in oddity system, and Styg said as I remember, that both classic and oddity still in process of testing\changing\balancing.
All he need actually - feedback.
I'm, sadly never went too far in game - before it was issues with lack of map, this time I just don't want to spoile a game.
So we definitely need feedback from those who explore all available content.

 

[gestalt11]

gestalt11 I disagree with some of your premises regarding comparison between oddity and classic, but I would brofist you had I the ability simply because you were able to lay out your argument in a logical manner. The thread will have to forgive me for plowing further into this discussion.

Having played through the game extensively, my position is that the oddity system is overall superior because the actual practical effect it has is to remove the game-within-a-game that is XP grinding. With classic, the player always can ask themselves "should I do [task] or go back and do that combat again for XP?" or "should I continue on or stop here and tediously disable all these traps for XP?" etc. With oddity, there's simply no background hum of optimization niggle. The only way to "grind" XP with the oddity system is to go to newer and newer places, having depleted the old of oddities. This behavior lines up very closely with simply playing the game as if XP was handed out by a game master, at the very least much more closely than the classic system. This fact thus releases the player from the need to worry about XP, as the character's XP will be a reflection of the depth and breadth of the player's progress through the game itself.

Especially for new players, I feel it's important to communicate the superiority of the oddity system. In classic XP, there is the opportunity for an over-clever player to spend inordinate amounts of time repeating certain steps to level without actually progressing through the breadth or depth of the game itself. This is a design flaw that so many XP-based games hold, and in many of those games it's a flaw that players can benefit from substantially. This is not the case in Underrail, but that's not necessarily clear to someone new to the game. I say it's better for mankind to simply choose the oddity system and remove not only the design flaw but the potential of time poorly spent. And that's not mentioning the flavorful nature of the oddities themselves, or the great sensation of reward upon finding a cool, difficult area with a bunch of new or rare oddities.

There has been a characterization of oddity XP in this recent discussion that makes it sound like some kind of Pottery Smashing Hell where the very ground is littered with junk and boxes, all of which must be scoured for the hope of an oddity. The reality is that while many oddities do lie in random desk drawers or barrels, the highest concentrations of oddities are always sequestered behind some interesting area, tucked away behind puzzles, strong enemy groups, fortified positions, or other obstacles of note.

Mmmmmmm. I don't think I disagree with anything you are saying here. But for someone who does want to optimize, repeated oddity playthroughs is actually considerably less container opening than classic, which is kind of funny.

Personally I tend to open everything either way. The main thing that bothers me is the "casting time" on open things, not really anything else.

I prefer oddity for the most part. There are certain encounters where oddity is a weak reward vs classic. But overall I find oddity a good bit more just plain "fun".

A good early example of poor performance in a sub-area for oddity is the bottom of the warehouse area where the raiders are holding the various guys hostage. That area there is fine, the oddity vs classic xp is mostly balanced and there are multiple ways to get stuff etc. However if you go into the tunnels where the raiders came from there are a couple small maps with about 5 raiders each. Clearing that is pretty low on oddity but pretty good on classic.

This doesn't make classic superior for me. But its something to be aware of. Not everywhere is great oddity rewards. Personally I don't care about that. In fact I think if everything everwhere reward oddity there would be no peaks and valleys to the awards and it would be more boring.

Anyway people are too concerned about levels anyway you can get considerably ahaed of the crafting curve by level 16. With a bit of work you can make pretty advanced equipment pretty early. Yeah levels certainly help the attibute points are a big deal and so are feats. You can easily kill level 20 things at level 15 with a decent build.

I have played both and my conclusion is, play whichever tickles your fancy because it will work out fine either way. I am willing to believe that different playstyles in each system can have a 1-2 level difference, this would be on eithe one. You do oddity a certain way you can get behind or ahead you do classic a certain way you can get behind or ahead. If not getting good XP when clearing out a map like the example above bothers you then play classic. If you like more in your face and more "surprise" like reward system that has a feeling of exploration tied directly to the system then go with oddity. All in all I actually found the first 8 levels felt slower in classic, but for the most part the levels were close.

 

[Alfons]

Styg I just found out that electricity damage kills from electroshock weapons don't trigger hit and run, and I'm not talking about the AOE. If you do 32 mechanical 18 electricity to a rathound with no movement points it doesn't trigger. Is this intentional or is it a bug?

 

[Alfons]

Actually it doesn't trigger taste for blood either. So either the shock from an electroshock weapon doesn't count as a weapon kill or that is a huge fucking oversight.

 

[Fenix]

Styg I just found out that electricity damage kills from electroshock weapons don't trigger hit and run, and I'm not talking about the AOE. If you do 32 mechanical 18 electricity to a rathound with no movement points it doesn't trigger. Is this intentional or is it a bug?

Reported!

 

[Alfons]

Where can I get a tabi boots blueprint?

 

[TwinkieGorilla]

I'm actually completely ok with the amount of oddities found in relation to leveling up, but what I wish existed (*cough* Styg *cough*) was a three-tiered difficulty setting instead of the two. And I wish the highest difficulty setting doubled the amount of oddities/xp needed to level up.

 

[Ulminati]

I click every container, never avoid combat and do all the quests.
My gripe with both XP systems is that there's too much of the good stuff to go around. I'd always hit the level cap with a good chunk of the game still unplayed and even before that I'm always overleveled for the foes I face.
IMO game would be much better off with less XP available.

The problem is that not everyone has OCD. Lower the availability too much and people who want to follow the main story on their first playthrough will be forced to backtrack and grind early said once they become under levelled. Your suggestion would limit the number of ways you can play the game, as some silly build are reliant on early xp abundance to work.

So no, it wouldn't make the game better. It would cater to the one particular way you like to play.

Twinkiegorilla has a good idea though. You could even self-enforce OCD mode and discard half the oddities you find as a stopgap solution

 

[Styg]

Styg I just found out that electricity damage kills from electroshock weapons don't trigger hit and run, and I'm not talking about the AOE. If you do 32 mechanical 18 electricity to a rathound with no movement points it doesn't trigger. Is this intentional or is it a bug?

I'll look into it.

 

[Alfons]

Come on motherfuckers does anyone know where you get tabi boots blueprint? I can't fucking find it.

 

[epeli]

Alfons try Blaine's shop in the under-passages near SGS?

 

[Grotesque]

people who want to follow the main story on their first playthrough

for fucktards like you there are games with "story mode" difficulty.

The problem is that not everyone has OCD

not everyone, the majority. and it's not OCD as you call it because you liked to sound like a cretin, it's called common sense and thoroughness.

 

[Fenix]

Alfons try Blaine's shop in the under-passages near SGS?

Yeah, it's one of the few places when you guaranteed to get it. And a stealthed shop in Rail Crossing.
Or there is only tabi itself?

 

[Ulminati]

The problem is that not everyone has OCD

not everyone, the majority. and it's not OCD as you call it because you liked to sound like a cretin, it's called common sense and thoroughness.

Stop trying to sound angry and edgy. It only works on newfags and you're not very good at it to begin with.
For your xth playthrough of any game you will likely scoop up all the side content and XP and that's when it can be relevant. But the vast majority if players will miss some sidequests or hidden loot on their first playthrough unless they're either using a walkthrough or compelled by their OCD to go through everything with a fine-toothed comb for fear of missing something.

Currently, the game lets you either do that, or pick and choose to some degree what parts of the content you want to go through. You won't get punished fo rmissing a hidden cache in the early areas by being criplingly under-levelled in the late ones. Your suggestion would force some people - normal people - to backtrack or fail at some point, effectively reducing the number of ways you can play underrail. And the gam eletting you play it however you like is one of its current strengths.

 

[Fenix]

I don't know what is OCD but given the context, sound like some form of mental disorder.
Do you mean that if player pick every thing up he is mentally sick and somewhat retarded?
If yes, then it's obvious pure demagoguery.

As inhabitant of barren lands of Underrail, with obvious resource hunger, it would be wise move to took everything that is not nailed to the floor.
As gamer playing this game I just want my charons!!11

 

[epeli]

Leveling speed and other balance tweaks will be taken care of before release, even though Underrail already had its final alpha version:

Once we get all the content in and polish up the game we'll have a (likely closed) beta testing phase in which we'll focus on crushing bugs and tweaking the balance further.

I have full confidence in the dev team and any players willing to take part in the beta. So far things have worked very well with short internal testing periods before new version releases, followed by quick bug fixing based on player feedback. Once the devs get into full-time testing, there won't be a single flaw left in Underrail.

My view on the leveling speed:
Underrail is a game about exploration just as much as it is about combat. If you skip all of that and try to railroad your way through the main questline, you will miss a lot and you will be underleveled. That's intended. It's like Fallout 2 in that regard, there's so much more to the game than the main quest. The current leveling speed will most likely be slowed down, because it is fairly easy to hit the level cap already and there's a large chunk of endgame still missing.

I think the most critical thing about leveling speed is the early game, up to a point where majority of the game world opens up. This early game culminates in a long, challenging dungeon. The average player needs be able to reach a certain level by that point. After that, slowing the leveling speed down to a snail's pace wouldn't matter as much. Your character is already fairly strong and there's a whole open world to explore. It's even possible to skip the "main questline" totally at that point, only to find clues towards it while doing seemingly unrelated stuff elsewhere and then pick it up again from a later point in the story.

 

[Fenix]

any players willing to take part in the beta

It's me, if it assumes full walkthrough of finished game. ) I don't want to eat cake piece by piece.

 

[Alfons]

I must say the commoner AI is insanely stupid. The guy lost half his health because he was shot by someone that wasn't even aiming at him. So what does he do? Take cover? Run? No no no no no. NO! He acts like a real man would. He runs up to the heavily armed juggernaut and promptly starts hitting the insolent fool in his steel armor with his bare hands for 0 damage.

 

[Ulminati]

I don't know what is OCD but given the context, sound like some form of mental disorder.
Do you mean that if player pick every thing up he is mentally sick and somewhat retarded?
If yes, then it's obvious pure demagoguery.

There's a difference between
1) Skipping most/all side content and powering through the main quest
2) Following the main quest and doing some exploration on the side
3) Going through every area with a fine-toothed comb, not advancing until you're 100% certain you've uncovered every last nook and cranny

Unless the game makes all the secrets painfully obvious - which it doesn't - it should be expected that a large chunk of players will miss some of the side content on the first playthrough. Since the original comment I replied to stressed that he made sure to get every last quest, fight and container available, it should be clear he falls into #3. There's nothing inherently wrong about being obsessive in your gaming. It's your hobby and you should be allowed however you like. But a lot of people have more jobs and less single-minded dedication to a single game. So if you balance around people in the third category, it's going to be at the expense of the large group of gamers who fall into category #1 and 2.

Adding a "Obligatory 100% Completion or Die" mode for people who want to be challenged while still doing every possible side task to increase their power is a less destructive solution. It makes both parties happy and if being told to toggle OCD mode offends someone, they should consider growing thicker skin before posting here.

I must say the commoner AI is insanely stupid. The guy lost half his health because he was shot by someone that wasn't even aiming at him. So what does he do? Take cover? Run? No no no no no. NO! He acts like a real man would. He runs up to the heavily armed juggernaut and promptly starts hitting the insolent fool in his steel armor with his bare hands for 0 damage.

Stupid, but also pretty normal for the genre. See Skyrim merchants chasing dragons and regular patrons in the copper coronet going toe to toe with the Bhaalspawn. Most RPGs that allow you to injure civilians make them turn hostile and attack you.

 

[Fenix]

Wow, that's... something.
Let's start from the begining.

There's a difference between
1) Skipping most/all side content and powering through the main quest
2) Following the main quest and doing some exploration on the side
3) Going through every area with a fine-toothed comb, not advancing until you're 100% certain you've uncovered every last nook and cranny

Unless the game makes all the secrets painfully obvious - which it doesn't - it should be expected that a large chunk of players will miss some of the side content on the first playthrough. Since the original comment I replied to stressed that he made sure to get every last quest, fight and container available, it should be clear he falls into #3. There's nothing inherently wrong about being obsessive in your gaming. It's your hobby and you should be allowed however you like. But a lot of people have more jobs and less single-minded dedication to a single game. So if you balance around people in the third category, it's going to be at the expense of the large group of gamers who fall into category #1 and 2.

First of all, its all look like you attach too much importance to marketing, while I'm as a player don't interest in it at all.
Why are you at all talking about it? I don't care that certain John or Mary have, or have no job or family.
And, quoting Vault Dweller - "isometric RPG is a niche among niche", so this game aim at niche auditory, where are already not enough games, and terrible hunger for RPG is rampant for decades.
Forget about large auditory if you are not 3D-withtitisandpowerarmour, everybody else will happily play this game.

There is no need to build game around those who can't or don't want devote time to the game, "if you balance around people in the third category" you'll need another bullshit-Fallout4.
Everybody alse search all containers and corners.

Btw, when people start to talk about game in terms of "main quest", "side quest", because they do not perceive the game as a whole, alive entity, but rather as sum of the mechanical components, it mean game already failed for them.
This is often seen in the discussion of the films - a character so-and-so made a cool thing and the other will do another cool thing, so basically film for them is a circus where they came to take a look at the numbers\shows performed by different clowns.

When I loot every corner this tells about my dedication to the game, and when certain has no desire to look at every corner it would be better for him to get back to family and Fallout 4.

 

[razvedchiki]

Unless the game makes all the secrets painfully obvious - which it doesn't - it should be expected that a large chunk of players will miss some of the side content on the first playthrough. Since the original comment I replied to stressed that he made sure to get every last quest, fight and container available, it should be clear he falls into #3. There's nothing inherently wrong about being obsessive in your gaming. It's your hobby and you should be allowed however you like. But a lot of people have more jobs and less single-minded dedication to a single game. So if you balance around people in the third category, it's going to be at the expense of the large group of gamers who fall into category #1 and 2.

congratulations ulminati for giving us your true corrupted popamole self
what you wrote is exactly what the popamole fallout 3 retards say new vegas did wrong.

if you dont have time for games get back to your other hobbies,namely sucking dicks.

i suggest ullminati be left with 1 brofist and everything else be distributed among the true pc gamers as punishment of his sins against the codex.

 

[TwinkieGorilla]

Dudes. Plz sort out yr fucking avatars thx.

 

[gestalt11]

I click every container, never avoid combat and do all the quests.
My gripe with both XP systems is that there's too much of the good stuff to go around. I'd always hit the level cap with a good chunk of the game still unplayed and even before that I'm always overleveled for the foes I face.
IMO game would be much better off with less XP available.

The problem is that not everyone has OCD. Lower the availability too much and people who want to follow the main story on their first playthrough will be forced to backtrack and grind early said once they become under levelled. Your suggestion would limit the number of ways you can play the game, as some silly build are reliant on early xp abundance to work.

So no, it wouldn't make the game better. It would cater to the one particular way you like to play.

Twinkiegorilla has a good idea though. You could even self-enforce OCD mode and discard half the oddities you find as a stopgap solution

There is always a tension between a completely open world and some main quest with a somewhat static level progression.

But Underrail is "partially" open in that its very difficult and unlikely someone strays all over the place before clearing the rail tunnel or before doing certain things in "Act 2". There may be a few levels of variance as to when people get the driller parts, but it not like you are gonna be level 20 when you do that part, but you could be I dunno level 8 instead of level 12.

Once the tunnel is clear the game open up a bit more with about 4 main/obvious ways to go. And you can even take the train further but won't really be let in anywhere. Again there can be some variance here. You could do the Beast at level 14 or you could wind up doing it at level 20.

This variance is unavoidable in an open world-ish game regardless of XP system. Its also not the big of a deal Underrail has a number of limitation to compress the variance into an OK range, not just levels but also equipment. You are highly unlikely to get an energy shield before tunnels are cleared (its possible I have found one in junkyard, but crafting one is not gonna happen).

There are stop gap controls that make sure people do not get too wildly off through the progression of the game and for the most part a level 15 is not that much less powerful than a level 20 so it mostly works out ok. I haven't gone to the end so I can't speak towards total XP etc or whether people would hit max level way to early or what. I personally don't even care much about that I think hitting max level right at the end is kind of dumb, I actually like being max level for last quarter of the game because I like to use my fully matured build. Some people hate it because they need rewards stimulation.

 

[Fenix]

but crafting one is not gonna happen

Actually I have seen in let'splay how Pope Amole II found blueprints.