Astromarine
Erudite
Well, actually let's not. I don't have the time, patience, and creativity to do one of those threads, especially screenshots. But I *am* playing it. After I got involved in a discussion about it in another message board, I realized that I was mostly spouting Codex talking points, since I played Obli for about 2 hours when it came out. Since the Codex is a bunch of inbred rednecks I disagree with about almost everything anyway (but I wubs ya), I decided to check for myself what the current state of the game is.
However, I am not a retard. I've read enough about the game to know that I disagree with almost every single design decision Beth made. I wanted to try to play the game as an immersive experience, not necessarily to finish it but to see how well the game gives the feeling of exploration and immersion.
This led to two solid days of installation, and around 3 gigabytes of mod downloads. I have mods that change:
- the levelling system
- the creature spawns
- the item spawns
- the autolevelling stuff
- the whole magic system
- the whole persuasion system (original was a gamebreaker for me.)
- the whole sneaking system
- the whole race and sign balance
- the whole economy
- the whole Daedra Invasion (now they do war parties and go attack cities, and get attacked by soldiers at the gates as well. The player's not the only one who notices the invasion anymore)
- the whole UI
additionally, I've installed a lot of mods that improve the immersion experience. I have a sleep cycle, a hunger cycle, fatigue actually matters, gold coins have weight, lockpicking is done blind now, there's a lot of thieving additions, etc. Most importantly, I disabled the compass completely and removed the stupid window that feeds you what to do next on all quests. What I haven't done is mess with the environment. Stuff like darker dungeons, better forests, better textures, etc I've postponed till later because I just wanted to get in and play.
The result is... OK for now. I've decided on a balanced mix of stealth, diplomacy, combat, and magic, so I can experience a bit of everything and worry about tailoring my class in a later playthrough. My character, Grimnuz, is a slightly amoral Breton, with the following custom class:
Spec: Stealth
Majors: Speech, Blade, Mercantile, Stealth, Illusion, Alteration, Alchemy.
Adventures so far: Haven't had time to do much yet. After escaping, had to sleep so I saw the ruins ahead and decided it looked like a nice place to lie down. Swam there, and saw it was occupied. Tried to approach, was attacked, responded. I was amazed at how hard the fight was, with the new changes. Just the fact that healing potions aren't instant any more, but a timed effect, is *huge*. The khajiit that attacked me made a chameleon spell first thing. And the fatigue mod makes that a wimp like me gets tired after a bit of running and swinging a sword, so had to fight it blind, with the screen blurring due to lack of breath, and with every hit I blocked rocking my screen a lot. After I killed it, his friend appeared, with a huge fucking battle axe. Managed to live, but with like 5 life left.
After that was done I got into their beds, rested till morning, then took the bedroll with me and explored the place a bit. gathering plants and loot on my way to the city. Once there, it's been a bargain-fest. I'm exploring the market district, got a couple quests to check out, but as soon as I'm resupplied I want to go to the Abby the emperor told me to go to. I want to play it as a "real" character in that world, including deciding what's urgent and what isn't.
So, the verdict so far is positive. Then again, I haven't done much that would sour the experience for me. All of the gameplay systems are tweaked to remove annoyances, so they can only come from the actual world, like quest design and so on. I'm wondering when I see the first thing I'll consider bloody stupid.
Damn. Apparently this is a LTP thread after all. Someone tell me how to do the screenshot thing so it isn't *completely* boring.
However, I am not a retard. I've read enough about the game to know that I disagree with almost every single design decision Beth made. I wanted to try to play the game as an immersive experience, not necessarily to finish it but to see how well the game gives the feeling of exploration and immersion.
This led to two solid days of installation, and around 3 gigabytes of mod downloads. I have mods that change:
- the levelling system
- the creature spawns
- the item spawns
- the autolevelling stuff
- the whole magic system
- the whole persuasion system (original was a gamebreaker for me.)
- the whole sneaking system
- the whole race and sign balance
- the whole economy
- the whole Daedra Invasion (now they do war parties and go attack cities, and get attacked by soldiers at the gates as well. The player's not the only one who notices the invasion anymore)
- the whole UI
additionally, I've installed a lot of mods that improve the immersion experience. I have a sleep cycle, a hunger cycle, fatigue actually matters, gold coins have weight, lockpicking is done blind now, there's a lot of thieving additions, etc. Most importantly, I disabled the compass completely and removed the stupid window that feeds you what to do next on all quests. What I haven't done is mess with the environment. Stuff like darker dungeons, better forests, better textures, etc I've postponed till later because I just wanted to get in and play.
The result is... OK for now. I've decided on a balanced mix of stealth, diplomacy, combat, and magic, so I can experience a bit of everything and worry about tailoring my class in a later playthrough. My character, Grimnuz, is a slightly amoral Breton, with the following custom class:
Spec: Stealth
Majors: Speech, Blade, Mercantile, Stealth, Illusion, Alteration, Alchemy.
Adventures so far: Haven't had time to do much yet. After escaping, had to sleep so I saw the ruins ahead and decided it looked like a nice place to lie down. Swam there, and saw it was occupied. Tried to approach, was attacked, responded. I was amazed at how hard the fight was, with the new changes. Just the fact that healing potions aren't instant any more, but a timed effect, is *huge*. The khajiit that attacked me made a chameleon spell first thing. And the fatigue mod makes that a wimp like me gets tired after a bit of running and swinging a sword, so had to fight it blind, with the screen blurring due to lack of breath, and with every hit I blocked rocking my screen a lot. After I killed it, his friend appeared, with a huge fucking battle axe. Managed to live, but with like 5 life left.
After that was done I got into their beds, rested till morning, then took the bedroll with me and explored the place a bit. gathering plants and loot on my way to the city. Once there, it's been a bargain-fest. I'm exploring the market district, got a couple quests to check out, but as soon as I'm resupplied I want to go to the Abby the emperor told me to go to. I want to play it as a "real" character in that world, including deciding what's urgent and what isn't.
So, the verdict so far is positive. Then again, I haven't done much that would sour the experience for me. All of the gameplay systems are tweaked to remove annoyances, so they can only come from the actual world, like quest design and so on. I'm wondering when I see the first thing I'll consider bloody stupid.
Damn. Apparently this is a LTP thread after all. Someone tell me how to do the screenshot thing so it isn't *completely* boring.