Asking for a favor from the Hivemind

[Athelas]

1)Just like VtmB didn't receive any praise because back in 2004 everyone thought that a new baldur's gate was going to come out every year and that RPGs were still alive.

You might be on the wrong forum. Baldur's Gate generally isn't seen as the be-all end end-all of RPG's here (often quite the opposite).

This incessent praise for Divinity, my god. Imagine Divinity coming out in 2000 with appropriate graphics for those days. It would've been just another mediocre-shit rpg that people would hardly notice. It would have had zero impact and would've been forgotten a few months later. It would've had nothing on Nox, and Nox is now basically forgotten. See where it leaves Divinity?

One of these is real-time and the other is turn-based. That should tell you all about their reception. And I don't remember Nox being particularly good or anything.

 

[Seari]

What is? Skyrim?

 

[Sensuki]

The Codex's top three for a few years running have been Planetscape Tournament, Fallout 1 and Arcanum IIRC.

 

[Seari]

I've never played Arcanum. How good is it really?

 

[Sensuki]

I'm not the person to ask.

 

[Abu Antar]

I've never played Arcanum. How good is it really?

Think Steampunk Fallout with broken combat and an unbalanced way to develop your character. I still like it.

 

[vivec]

I've never played Arcanum. How good is it really?

You need to be patient with the combat.

The game is super duper amazing. The world and the setting is immaculate. The hypothetical mechanics is actually great (magic vs tech). The skills are alluring. But the implementation of that in practice is not good. I feel that it is so due to the fact they tried to cater to both RTwP and TB audience. If the game was purely designed from TB combat in mind it would be the best game ever.

 

[Weirdstuffinspace]

Asking a favor from the dev team: Just fucking start over.

wait wait wait, I know how to respond to this one in Codex fashion!

Joined:
Sep 20, 2014

Failed:
2015

 

[Infinitron]

Who are you on the Obsidian forums Weirdstuff

 

[Seari]

I'll give it a go after my BGT run.

 

[Roguey]

Let's see that quote again.

Hard counters are tactical, actually. They require you to acknowledge that you need to counter something, and then you have to counter it via whichever method. That is tactics. Sometimes they can be implemented poorly and there is always a best way of dealing with something, and it is always better if there is more than one way to handle a situation.

I don't overly care that there are no hard counters in Pillars of Eternity, but the lack of them and the current implementations has certain negative effects on the gameplay compared to IE using them.

Save or die effects are really easy to abuse offensively (as a player) and they require either luck or hard counters to defend against as a player -- neither of which are very interesting, tactically.
...
Hard counters in a single-player RPG are obnoxious, IMO because either you're prepped for them or you aren't. If you aren't, you reload and voila, you are. If you prepared save-or-die tactic that the enemy is immune to, you're hard countered through no fault of your own. If not, you steamroll the enemy. Or you do what many players do, which is reload until the primary target fails its save and the entire tactical challenge of the fight is rendered trivial/pointless.
...
I believe this does make the game better. It's not second-guessing; it's simple observation. If players can use save-or-die effects against an enemy as a tactic that has a 10% chance of success, many would rather reload repeatedly until the target drops than develop adaptive tactics to deal with the specific threats posed by the enemy. Why should a player bother attempting to adapt when they have a big hammer with a 10% chance of ending the fight each time it's swung? We give them the tools. But we don't have to include save-or-die effects, and the game isn't made worse by doing so, IMO. Luck is an element of conflict resolution, but the larger element in A/D&D as levels rise is, of course, BONUSES. In 3E/3.5, saves progress in such a way that at higher levels, many classes have virtually no hope of making saves against their weak save categories and it can be extremely difficult to shore up against the numerical disadvantage. When the effect is a save-or-die (or equivalent), it can immediately remove the character from combat. If the saves are hopelessly improbable, the solution becomes a hard counter (like Death Ward) which typically relies on post-reload metagaming to make the deadly effect completely impotent. Even in tabletop, where reload is not an option, the virtual absence of save-or-die effects from 4E was never missed by our gaming groups in over 2 years of play and two different campaigns (albeit one much longer than the other).

Sawyer has spoken, thus it is so.

Sensuki quote here talks about hard counters. Sawyer quote here talks about save-or-die effects most of all, only mentioning hard counters in relation to those. So yeah your quotation is totally off the mark, it's not relevant here at all.

I haven't really seen anyone clamor to bring save-or-die effects back actually. I'm sure someone has, but it's a very small minority compared to the people wishing for more tactical hard counters.

Are you blind? But fine here is a slightly more relevant quote:

Combat scenarios that build around hard counters turn into puzzles for which there are not good solutions if you don't have the hard counters prepped (assuming you have access to that hard counter at all)

Puzzles are not tactics.

Classic Roguey not reading what people are saying and just pasting a Sawyer quote. Obviously since not having played the beta, has no idea what I'm talking about.

You've spent hours/days of your life playing a beta you don't and likely won't ever enjoy, and to paraphrase a hot meme, you're doing it for free. Who's the sucker in this situation?

 

[Sensuki]

The game will probably be alright with mods. The more shit that I get into the game via feedback, the less I have to change myself.

 

[Weirdstuffinspace]

Who are you on the Obsidian forums Weirdstuff

I'm not on the Obs forums. I'm just butthurt bout the development and make my dumb jokes here in exchange putting too much cash towards the KS.

Bowing out

 

[Johannes]

Let's see that quote again.

Hard counters are tactical, actually. They require you to acknowledge that you need to counter something, and then you have to counter it via whichever method. That is tactics. Sometimes they can be implemented poorly and there is always a best way of dealing with something, and it is always better if there is more than one way to handle a situation.

I don't overly care that there are no hard counters in Pillars of Eternity, but the lack of them and the current implementations has certain negative effects on the gameplay compared to IE using them.

Save or die effects are really easy to abuse offensively (as a player) and they require either luck or hard counters to defend against as a player -- neither of which are very interesting, tactically.
...
Hard counters in a single-player RPG are obnoxious, IMO because either you're prepped for them or you aren't. If you aren't, you reload and voila, you are. If you prepared save-or-die tactic that the enemy is immune to, you're hard countered through no fault of your own. If not, you steamroll the enemy. Or you do what many players do, which is reload until the primary target fails its save and the entire tactical challenge of the fight is rendered trivial/pointless.
...
I believe this does make the game better. It's not second-guessing; it's simple observation. If players can use save-or-die effects against an enemy as a tactic that has a 10% chance of success, many would rather reload repeatedly until the target drops than develop adaptive tactics to deal with the specific threats posed by the enemy. Why should a player bother attempting to adapt when they have a big hammer with a 10% chance of ending the fight each time it's swung? We give them the tools. But we don't have to include save-or-die effects, and the game isn't made worse by doing so, IMO. Luck is an element of conflict resolution, but the larger element in A/D&D as levels rise is, of course, BONUSES. In 3E/3.5, saves progress in such a way that at higher levels, many classes have virtually no hope of making saves against their weak save categories and it can be extremely difficult to shore up against the numerical disadvantage. When the effect is a save-or-die (or equivalent), it can immediately remove the character from combat. If the saves are hopelessly improbable, the solution becomes a hard counter (like Death Ward) which typically relies on post-reload metagaming to make the deadly effect completely impotent. Even in tabletop, where reload is not an option, the virtual absence of save-or-die effects from 4E was never missed by our gaming groups in over 2 years of play and two different campaigns (albeit one much longer than the other).

Sawyer has spoken, thus it is so.

Sensuki quote here talks about hard counters. Sawyer quote here talks about save-or-die effects most of all, only mentioning hard counters in relation to those. So yeah your quotation is totally off the mark, it's not relevant here at all.

I haven't really seen anyone clamor to bring save-or-die effects back actually. I'm sure someone has, but it's a very small minority compared to the people wishing for more tactical hard counters.

Are you blind? But fine here is a slightly more relevant quote:

Combat scenarios that build around hard counters turn into puzzles for which there are not good solutions if you don't have the hard counters prepped (assuming you have access to that hard counter at all)

Puzzles are not tactics.

That is a relevant quote unlike the first one. Alas, he is pretty wrong - just look at D&D / IE combat. Full of hard counters yet not puzzle-like by any means - there's so much variety in the different counters that a diverse party of sufficient level does not auto-lose to anything, and there's no fight that'd only have a single correct approach to it.

Making shit blander doesn't make it more tactical, this is insanity.

 

[Athelas]

I'm not sure why people even call the mage duels puzzles. Unless reading the spell description suddenly qualifies as solving a puzzle.

 

[Cowboy Moment]

Those good old days when people attempted things, knowing they can't bring you perfection. The lost knowledge now it seems. It's so good that they're not attempting anything anymore, such improvement.

Larian attempted. They had over 3 years to do it - just like Bioware did when they made Baldur's Gate. Lucky them.

It may be that ultimately, a lot of the issues people have with games like Wasteland 2 and Pillars of Eternity are the inevitable result of demanding 4-year development cycle results from 2.5-year development cycle games

1) The programming part of making games is much less time consuming than it used to be. Maybe not twice less consuming, but 1.5 times - certainly. The rest can be outsourced to professionals to speed things up too. And there you have it - 2 years instead of 3. Pillars of Eternity development - 2 years and a half. And no stealing??? That's a clear DECLINE to me.

2) This incessent praise for Divinity, my god. Imagine Divinity coming out in 2000 with appropriate graphics for those days. It would've been just another mediocre-shit rpg that people would hardly notice. It would have had zero impact and would've been forgotten a few months later. It would've had nothing on Nox, and Nox is now basically forgotten. See where it leaves Divinity?
Of course now when RPGs are inexistent, Divinity receives praise. Just like VtmB didn't receive any praise because back in 2004 everyone thought that a new baldur's gate was going to come out every year and that RPGs were still alive. As far as I'm concerned, Divinity is mediocre shit and can't be used as an example of something good. I rate it like this because I don't have problems with memory and can still remember what good games are supposed to do to you.

Nox

How the hell do these people find their way to the Codex?

 

[Zorba the Hutt]

I think the story/world/background, is rich and deep. The writers are doing a great job with the dialog - and to me, the combat is more fun than IE.

 

[GordonHalfman]

Josh should be annakin surely? "The one who will bring the balance" and all that.

gif possibilities include:

-Josh killing younglings with codex troll heads saying things like "muh immersion" or "such balance" as they die
-Josh choking Padme with the PoE logo replacing her head
-Feargus as emperor telling Darth Josh his next project will be based on D&D rules leading to "Nooooooooooo" etc
-Avellone/Obi Wan asking Fargo/Yoda for permission to train young Sawyer, Fargo says "know anything about mobile games do you?"

 

[vivec]

"From my point of view it's fun that's evil!"

 

[Roguey]

That is a relevant quote unlike the first one. Alas, he is pretty wrong - just look at D&D / IE combat. Full of hard counters yet not puzzle-like by any means - there's so much variety in the different counters that a diverse party of sufficient level does not auto-lose to anything, and there's no fight that'd only have a single correct approach to it.

Not my experience.

Making shit blander doesn't make it more tactical, this is insanity.

Here's a question for you: what kind of hard counters do you want that were also present in BG? Because I double-checked the list of spells and all I found was pointless silence/vocalize crap and nonsense like protection from petrification that turned basilisks into trash mobs.

I'm pretty sure it also had enemies that needed magic weapons to be hit, but anyone who would want that 2nd edition garbage back is utterly fucking stupid so.

 

[tuluse]

You also had non-magical equipment for all of about 5 hours in BG for the entire series.

 

[Ninjerk]

I've never played Arcanum. How good is it really?

I hated it when I first played it, but if you "think correctly" it becomes quite a bit more fun (ie. spell selection with regards to the Black Mountain area).

 

[Seaking4]

Josh should be annakin surely? "The one who will bring the balance" and all that.

gif possibilities include:

-Josh killing younglings with codex troll heads saying things like "muh immersion" or "such balance" as they die
-Josh choking Padme with the PoE logo replacing her head
-Feargus as emperor telling Darth Josh his next project will be based on D&D rules leading to "Nooooooooooo" etc
-Avellone/Obi Wan asking Fargo/Yoda for permission to train young Sawyer, Fargo says "know anything about mobile games do you?"

Is Josh an immersion guy? He seems like a 'gamey' is better than realism person.

 

[Johannes]

Here's a question for you: what kind of hard counters do you want that were also present in BG?

What does BG have? At least:

(Improved) Invisibility vs. detection spells/skills
Various spell protections (Globe of Invulnerability, Spell Trap, ...) vs. various spell protection removal spells (Ruby Ray, Spell Thrust, Secret Word...)
Protection from Magic Weapons / Normal Weapons / Fire / Cold / Acid / Electricity / Magic Energy, Mantle, Improved Mantle, Absolute Immunity, Chaotic Commands, Resist Fear, Free Action, ... vs. relevant effect - then Breach against said spells.
Or Dispel Magic against any of above.

Cutting down the amount of these various damage- and effect types would be sensible, different elements were not that different in IE.


Kinda puzzled how badly people here of all places understand how IE (or BG2 mostly) combat works, tbh

 

[Seari]

Kinda puzzled how badly people here of all places understand how IE (or BG2 mostly) combat works, tbh

QFT