Divinity: Original Sin 2 Early Access Thread [GAME RELEASED, GO TO NEW THREAD]

[DraQ]

There is really no excuse for such lazy design after Larian sold 1.8M copies of D:OS.

Swen is a huge fan of what he describes as "item fever" and he'll tell you its presence helped sales.

That's not item fever. That's item apathy. When items with colored names and 1% advantage over what you already have pop out of every mob, chest and orrifice, you no longer care.
Good itemization has you excited about new items but for that interesting modifiers should be diverse, but rare and new items should rarely supplant old ones.

A cool item is only cool if you don't switch it 15' after you've found it.

Another thing is weapon/character stat inflation. Continuous item treadmill and character HP inflation make for orders of magnitude increase of stats during the gameplay, which means that the numbers game display no longer mean anything on intuitive level.
A disconnect between mechanics and simulation was one thing that plagued D:OS - yes, D:OS was heavily on gamist side of things, but its elemental system was heavily based on elements having their intuitive meanings.
The problem is that when you have damages and HP counts that can mean anything and nothing, abstract elemental damage types (hurr... earth damage), and strength based skill that somehow flattens distant enemy with a giant airborne magical fist, then your ability to make sense of game's mechanics shuts off and you start seeing just tokens. And abstract tokens no longer make it apparent that, for example wetting an exploskeleton will put out its fuse and prevent it from exploding, because the only thing you can still be sure of is that "wet" token cancels out the "burning" one, and exploskeleton with lit fuse lacks the latter.

 

[gaussgunner]

Well, thankfully, we have sjws moving in to police tabletop games now too!

OFFENDING ART:

tldr, HEAVY METAL

I haven't seen anything like that in DOS1, just some NPCs with low-poly cleavage, and I assume DOS2 is the same. Nothing to see here.

I can only imagine that the complainers actually think these are amazingly lifelike 3D characters, and the whole exploration/combat/story thing is just a sideshow.

 

[DeepOcean]

At least on Diablolol clones, you can get unique weapons with unique properties, D:OS doesn't do that what makes its item system even worse than Diablo clones because the uniques on D:OS are terrible, that is a fucking lazy design. Guess developers are going for this MMO sweet money because items on MMOs aren't designed to be interesting but to estimulate the slot machine mentality of people and keep the money flowing, they only offer you the illusion of progression and the illusion of reward to keep the treadmill turning. I like items with story and unique effects, people talk to this day of the disruption mace, holy avenger, lilalcor and other items on RPGs.

When magic isn't something special on your game and every other hobo has a magical weapon, sorry, your setting sucks balls and items are useless becoming just a straight damage exponential progression treadmill. It would be better to completely remove the items and every time you level up, your sword gets automaticaly upgraded, at least that saves you from the time of sorting out all those crappy items. Even on the DnD setting where magic items are almost handed as candy, there was some restraint in comparison with D:OS and its loot system.

I don't think that magical scale armor + 5% dropping on every other hobo you kill is something that makes sense or it is more interesting than unique items but that sweet MMO money, man... there isn't a single developer that likes quality more than money.

 

[veevoir]

Not even DnD is that retarded.

You'd be wrong. You don't even need higher tier armor to get something's that lighter and protects better. http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Armor

In addition to that, I remember a few games where I replaced something heavier with a magical lighter armor.

True, but you dont get 100 scale armors and 100 leather ones each having 1% difference from each other. You get +1,2,3,4 and thats all(unless you go mega turbo hero levels)nce you find +3/+4 in DnD its something you dont switch from. Armor is a choice you make rarely and stick with it.


In D:OS you switch every 5 mins for that extra armor point. Diablo style, not rpg style.

 

[gaussgunner]

Realistic items would be a good thing IMHO. Taking a slightly different sword off a slain foe can't possibly matter. It's how you use it. Combat boots, you're not gonna find any better than the ones on your feet, just wrong sizes. You're not gonna take the filthy clothes off their back. No point taking anything that weighs you down unless it's a quest item.

JA2 had it almost right. Lots of identical loot items in case you need them, not so many insignificant details to waste your time.

There is really no excuse for such lazy design after Larian sold 1.8M copies of D:OS.

Swen is a huge fan of what he describes as "item fever" and he'll tell you its presence helped sales.

I know, heh.. nobody's perfect. All the Divinity games are like Diablo and Borderlands in that regard. If a game needs a GUI to compare item stats side by side with currently equipped - or unlimited inventory - it suffers from item bloat. But it doesn't ruin the game.

 

[Zombra]

I wonder how many gameplay hours will be spent meaninglessly equipping and unequipping items.

I wonder how different gameplay would be if changing equipment when you got something objectively superior was completely automated, with no need for player input.

I wonder how many RPG players have ever vocally praised a game because "There's so much inventory management!"

 

[Kem0sabe]

it suffers from item bloat. But it doesn't ruin the game.

Of course it does...

 

[Black]

Inventory management is one of many reasons why I need small parties in DOS.

 

[gaussgunner]

In D:OS you switch every 5 mins for that extra armor point. Diablo style, not rpg style.

You do. I just grab everything like in a Spiderweb rpg. Wait till I have a pretty big hoard, identify mystery items, equip the good stuff, sell the rest.

 

[Ivan]

how is the loot in the Alpha. pure random shit or cool placed loot?

 

[Roguey]

I wonder how many gameplay hours will be spent meaninglessly equipping and unequipping items.

I wonder how different gameplay would be if changing equipment when you got something objectively superior was completely automated, with no need for player input.

I wonder how many RPG players have ever vocally praised a game because "there's so much inventory management!"

http://www.lar.net/2014/12/18/leaked-the-larian-plans-for-20152016-and-beyond/

For the Inventory and looting, I would invite you guys to look at Wasteland 2′s looting button. One of them allow the game to automatically send items to the characters with the relevant skills. A character with shotgun skills for instance would be automatically sent all the shells and shotguns, and spread between multiple characters if they both have the skill. This feature saved so much inventory time, it would be great if you guys would implement a similar one as well.

We’ve thought about it but thought it took away from the item fever.

Iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiitemmmmmmmmmmm feeeeeeeeeeeeeeeverrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

 

[Alienman]

Swen has played too much Borderlands it seems.

When I played Original Sin, me and my co-op partner vendored 95% of the items.

 

[Zombra]

http://www.lar.net/2014/12/18/leaked-the-larian-plans-for-20152016-and-beyond/

For the Inventory and looting, I would invite you guys to look at Wasteland 2′s looting button. One of them allow the game to automatically send items to the characters with the relevant skills. A character with shotgun skills for instance would be automatically sent all the shells and shotguns, and spread between multiple characters if they both have the skill. This feature saved so much inventory time, it would be great if you guys would implement a similar one as well.

We’ve thought about it but thought it took away from the item fever.

Iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiitemmmmmmmmmmm feeeeeeeeeeeeeeeverrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Jesus christ. Wasteland 2 style automation is a very, very good idea. Horrible to see any developer consciously rejecting it. Picking through screens of items, finding the shotgun shells, and dragging them to the character that uses a shotgun is not a fun adventure. More fucking busywork, added deliberately.

 

[DeepOcean]

Wasteland 2 is better than D:OS in terms of itemization for the fact that there aren't one thousand different versions of an M16 with barely any difference from each other, an M16 is an M16, once you see that you got another M16, you knew just by barely looking at it that it was something to be sold. On D:OS, I wish I could code to make a script:

"If more damage than currently equiped, equip, otherwise, sell on the first opportunity."

 

[CptMace]

Wasteland 2 is better than D:OS in terms of itemization for the fact that there aren't one thousand different versions of an M16 with barely any difference from each other, an M16 is an M16, once you see that you got another M16, you knew just by barely looking at it that it was something to be sold. On D:OS, I wish I could code to make a script:

"If more damage than currently equiped, equip, otherwise, sell on the first opportunity."

So that's why itemization is great in PoE !

 

[Zombra]

So that's why itemization is great in PoE !

Any RPG whose inventory system is not memorably awful counts as remarkably good in my book. So yes, PoE's itemization must have been a triumph because I don't remember it at all.

 

[SniperHF]

Just do what I do in D:OS and ignore items (outside of picking them all up that is) and only mess with the inventory when you absolutely have to. Sucks but it ain't changing.

 

[DeepOcean]

Wasteland 2 is better than D:OS in terms of itemization for the fact that there aren't one thousand different versions of an M16 with barely any difference from each other, an M16 is an M16, once you see that you got another M16, you knew just by barely looking at it that it was something to be sold. On D:OS, I wish I could code to make a script:

"If more damage than currently equiped, equip, otherwise, sell on the first opportunity."

So that's why itemization is great in PoE !

PoE lacks good unique weapons, D:OS lacks good unique weapons and has the item fever, at least PoE is ahead on the race to discover a decent looting system, maybe one day both companies will make one.

 

[Zombra]

Swen has played too much Borderlands it seems.

Just to go on record, I think "item fever" is an appropriate feature for some games. In Borderlands, at least, the decisions were interesting. Lower damage per shot might be acceptable with a higher rate of fire, larger clip size, or even faster reload time; and you could tangibly feel those little differences in every gun. I have high hopes that Barkley 2 will be just as interesting. But in a turn-based game (without hundred-grain TUs), these nuances are necessarily lost. With an abstracted format like this, only two things matter: damage inflicted/blocked per turn, and "Do I need to unequip this for now because the damage type is wrong?" There's no reason to have a billion item types to answer those two questions.

 

[Black]

I wonder how much of the stuff that's being complained about will get fixed, it's early access after all

 

[Zombra]

So if I'm reading this right, there's no option to change the combat speed because of the problems it might cause with the multiplayer? Why not make it a singleplayer-only setting then?

Swen is not into enabling people who play the game wrong, and single-player is clearly playing it wrong. We're lucky single-player mode exists at all. You should be thankful.

 

[a bear named spigot]

I wonder how much of the stuff that's being complained about will get fixed, it's early access after all

dos itemization was dogshit and everyone knew it yet here it is again, so I'm guessing nope

 

[DraQ]

Continuing my previous post, regardless if your goals are gamist, simulationist or narrativist, the only way you can expect player to try and make sense of your game is through simulationism.

Narrativism in itself gives you shit to work with.
Gamism gives you self consistent mechanics player can work with but nothing beyond what they've been explicitly told.
Simulationism, OTOH allows player to infer mechanics from the fluff and their own preconceptions, it's the only approach that allows cleverness.

In this regard simulationism really is the king, which is what makes all us simulationist folk so smug - even if you don't accept it as goal, you'd better accept it as methodology.

 

[SniperHF]

Warlord talent is overpowerd as fuck .
Just wrecked through all but 2 of Griffs crew in one turn with one character.

 

[Nostaljaded]

...If a game needs a GUI to compare item stats side by side with currently equipped - or unlimited inventory - it suffers from item bloat. But it doesn't ruin the game.

Item fever could be made more tolerable...

Meant for *somebody* if they are following this thread.