Baldur's Gate PoE vs IE: Do wizards need to have more stuff to do in combat? DISCUSS!

[Mangoose]

Okay. Say you go ahead and make Intellect not affect AoE

size (not damage).

Why do you try to make your argument by presenting a blatantly false dichotomy?

Uh, what? I said "not damage" because eremita thought it increases AOE damage. Just pointing out a fact. You're a fucking retard if you thought I was presenting size and damage as choices. Especially since I said "say you make Intellect NOT affect AoE." Stupid.

Why should intelligence... sorry, "intellect", have anything to do with AoE?

When did I say it should? There was more to my post, you know:

First, what are you gonna Stat are you gonna replace it with so that Intellect still affects an equal number of Stats? Note that this Stat would also have to "make sense."

Secondly, what Attribute will instead affect AoE size? It is an important stat because it interacts with the Engagement mechanic. An ability or spell that paralyzes or knocks down an opponent breaks Engagement, allowing characters to move away from melee range without suffering a Disengagement Attack. That means a larger AoE (that paralyzes or knocks down) can break more Engagements than a smaller AoE.

Then, if you add AoE size to a different Attribute, then what Stat will you remove so that this Attribute affects an equal number of Stats? If that removed Stat is important, where are you going to put it? If you attach it to Intellect, then again it has to "make sense." If you attach it to another Attribute, then you have to again consider which Attribute to remove and possibly attach to another Attribute.

My point was there is a lot to address, not just change one thing to another. Especially considering the Engagement mechanic.

 

[Applypoison]

Have to admit this discussion is thought-provoking, though one term I would like to understand a bit better is "monocled". Is that a way to imply tunnel-vision/bias, or a local term for prestige?

 

[DraQ]

And why do you need to unify mechanics for magic and other attacks? Aren't they supposed to work differently?

Why can't melee AoE be determined by might (because you swing stuff right through shit) in addition to might determining tons of other things (that might be more relevant to non-melee classes), while magical AoE be determined by something else (like resolve or whatever) along with ton of yet different things?

You can make stats relevant to all classes without them affecting every build in the same manner.
If stats are affecting all classes in the same manner, then why have classes?

This is true but on the other hand, if you want to be completely simulationist, you can say that about almost every attribute. Why does dexterity affect both hand-eye coordination and agility? Some people have great hand-eye coordination but are completely not agile. Some people are agile but have bad hand-eye coordination. Why does Constitution affect your physical toughness and your stamina? Being able to take a hit without falling down doesn't mean you can run a marathon (I am an example of this). And a high Constitution also defends against stuff like poison and disease. But being physically tough or having great lung capacity doesn't necessarily mean your immune system is strong. And Resolve? Just because I am a disciplined/determined person doesn't mean I'm good at lying to people.

Then change things around.
Split Agility and Dexterity - congratulations! you can now have corpulent guy that's good at lockpicking and a great shoot.
Move physical toughness to might as opposed to ability to exert prolonged effort and withstand diseases.
Split individual charm from resolve - why the fuck do you need exactly 6 stats anyway?
TES had 8, Wizardry and Fallout had 7 and yet I haven't heard anyone complaining.

That's what I consider ass backwards design - you come up with some abstract idea of how your system should look like, and then try to shoehorn the actual stuff your system is supposed to do into your asspulled preconceptions even if it doesn't fit (and why should it? you designed your sorry excuse of a system in complete vacuum, after all).

No, it's stupid when the label becomes more important than what it represents.

Label doesn't represent anything. It's the mechanics that represents the stuff indicated by label.

There's nothing post-modern about using words as symbols to represent concepts.

Highlighted the part that's lacking.

So to you the label is more important than what it represents. OK! Have fun with that!

Label doesn't represent mechanics.

Mechanics represnts the concept indicated by the label.

It's not quantum fucking mechanics or something that just fails to be properly described by usual concepts (and even that calls for coining new labels rather than misusing old ones), it's a game about stabbing shit in the face.

 

[Mangoose]

Why the fuck do you think I'm defending the system? I was presenting possible complications so that people would think more in depth about how to best make changes. Is it that hard to read that I agreed Intellect affecting melee AOE is dumb, but that it may or may not be an easy fix.

And why do you need to unify mechanics for magic and other attacks? Aren't they supposed to work differently?

You don't need to. Earlier in development, Intellect affected magic damage while Might affected physical damage. It was changed. It can be changed back, or changed to something different. Like I said, you're a moron if you think I'm defending the system. I just expect ideas - and developed ones that considered possible complications - rather than COMPLAIN COMPLAIN COMPLAIN which is what was going on during the pages when I made that post. In other words, read the context of the discussion before going full autist.

Why can't melee AoE be determined by might (because you swing stuff right through shit) in addition to might determining tons of other things (that might be more relevant to non-melee classes), while magical AoE be determined by something else (like resolve or whatever) along with ton of yet different things?

That is a good idea.

By the way, you don't even have to agree with me that an AoE stat is important. I was simply suggesting why it could be important. Maybe it's not. It's food for thought.

This is true but on the other hand, if you want to be completely simulationist, you can say that about almost every attribute. Why does dexterity affect both hand-eye coordination and agility? Some people have great hand-eye coordination but are completely not agile. Some people are agile but have bad hand-eye coordination. Why does Constitution affect your physical toughness and your stamina? Being able to take a hit without falling down doesn't mean you can run a marathon (I am an example of this). And a high Constitution also defends against stuff like poison and disease. But being physically tough or having great lung capacity doesn't necessarily mean your immune system is strong. And Resolve? Just because I am a disciplined/determined person doesn't mean I'm good at lying to people.

Then change things around.
Split Agility and Dexterity - congratulations! you can now have corpulent guy that's good at lockpicking and a great shoot.
Move physical toughness to might as opposed to ability to exert prolonged effort and withstand diseases.
Split individual charm from resolve - why the fuck do you need exactly 6 stats anyway?
TES had 8, Wizardry and Fallout had 7 and yet I haven't heard anyone complaining.

I was using complete hyperbole, moron. What's with you and taking replies out of context? I was replying to someone saying that RPGs must be fully simulationist. Not that an RPG can't put a moderate-to-strong focus on simulation.

That's what I consider ass backwards design - you come up with some abstract idea of how your system should look like, and then try to shoehorn the actual stuff your system is supposed to do into your asspulled preconceptions even if it doesn't fit (and why should it? you designed your sorry excuse of a system in complete vacuum.

The funny thing about calling it ass backwards design is that the regular forwards design has resulted in 0 satisfying gameplay from RPGs. Again I've noted several times that Sawyer's issue may be not being ass backwards but going too extreme in focusing on gameplay. On the other hand most RPGs in the past have started with too extreme focus on simulation first and this also resulted in issues. (Or they don't even give a shit and just make romances). What probably is best is balanced focus on simulation and gameplay. Like again, I suggested several times in this thread, a middle ground between Sawyer's extreme desire for 0 dump stats and the typical IE amount of 3-5 dump stats would probably work better. Like 2-3 dump stats, or whatever.

 

[DraQ]

Technically, the best way to resolve all this and keep Sawyer's system would be to do what they sort of did with strength/might and just change the name. In fact change all the names. Might becomes "soul power" and INT becomes "soul control"

Then call them fucking "Power" and "Control" respectively instead of sowing wrong preconceptions in the minds of the players?

But they won't do that because it interferes with Sawyer's vision of 'a stupid mage with big muscles', which as we all know is essential to the RPG experience. :/

Someone should cast Fist on him.
:musclewizard:

What adds insult to injury here is that i don't see how this system is better than what we had in DnD in the first place. Big muscled wizards? Who the fuck ever asked for that shit?

Muscled wizard can benefit from being able to swing a better weapon in melee, using better armor, withstanding more damage or carrying more of whatever wizard may be carrying around to do stuff.

It should be a desirable but secondary benefit compared to what high mental stats confer, and it could be made actually useful by ensuring that player has some surplus points after satisfying character's primary needs.

Lack of dump stats doesn't imply lack of primary stats or class attribute requirements.

"Having big muscles makes muh fireballs stronger". This makes sense because "soul power".

"Because souls" is essentially a one word "explanation". As such it conveys no depth nor information and is as disgraceful as midichlorians.

But even there you could perhaps have a school of spells which take a physical toll on the body and require a minimum amount of strength to start with.

Neat idea.

These are just a couple of random ideas of the top of my head, not saying they're perfect. I just really can't understand how this current system is favoured by someone like Sawyer. I guess his system is clean and balanced in a mathematical / structural sense, with everything affecting the same number of stats, every possible character equally awesome. Perhaps that was the priority.

It reeks of Bethpizda and their stat cutting and rearrangements to have the same amount of skills for each specialization or controlling stat.

Both options are certainly shit, but this is where I think a different conclusion can be drawn; the answer lies outside the box. PoE's 'Blast' example mentioned above is a decent example of tactical variety.

It doesn't always have to be direct damage, either. For example, 'stacking' debuffs applied through wands (or free cantrips) which reset after a certain mount of time and culminate in an additional minor effect after X stacks, can be interesting if well-tweaked (and simple to compute in a real-time setting). A Wizard's contribution outside of spellcasting doesn't have to be binary or particularly strong, it just has to be useful and balanced; possibly short-ranged so the Wizard is put in harm's way, but rewarding and properly paced to minimize tedium and keep it meaningful once you toss your fighters a little helping hand.

Varying power of wizard's actions is certainly an answer (and wizards applying non-mundane status effects via melee attacks is a nice idea overall, as I have acknowledged), but there is always the problem of thematic consistency, and having Wizard do something visibly arcane every turn just turns arcane into mundane negating the whole point of having wizards and magic.

I was using complete hyperbole, moron.

I was going to address your points, but now I think I'll propose that you suck a dick instead.

What's with you and taking replies out of context?

Reading and replying to over 12 pages of discussion in rapid succession does that to you.

The funny thing about calling it ass backwards design is that the regular forwards design has resulted in 0 satisfying gameplay from RPGs.

Care to cite those regular ford design examples? Because most of cRPGs are just sad cases of PnP cargo cult with dumbing down applied to it.

As a matter of fact Sawyer doesn't focus as much on gameplay as he simply engages in D&D/IE cargo cult, with predictable results.
Hell, maybe PoE will actually be a good game afterall, but certainly no thanks to his mentally impaired musclewizards.

For the record, I do agree with dump stats being bad design, but you can avoid non-viable or suboptimal builds being even possible without making every stat equal for everybody.

 

[Mangoose]

Muscled wizard can benefit from being able to swing a better weapon in melee, using better armor, withstanding more damage or carrying more of whatever wizard may be carrying around to do stuff.

It should be a desirable but secondary benefit compared to what high mental stats confer, and it could be made actually useful by ensuring that player has some surplus points after satisfying character's primary needs.

True. This lends support to reverting to the previous system with Intellect affecting Magic Damage while Strength being Physical Damage + other useful affects for Wizards.

I really don't think Sawyer wants Muscle Wizards, btw. Otherwise that would have been in the first iteration.

Lack of dump stats doesn't imply lack of primary stats or class attribute requirements.

Good point. I didn't notice the middle ground of secondary stats between primary stats and dump stats.

I was going to address your points, but now I think I'll propose that you suck a dick instead.

Can I suck yours? I really do like your idea of separating Magical AOE with Physical AOE. I didn't think of that, and I feel Obsidian hasn't either.

So I like your proposals a lot, Draq. Having secondary but not dump stats. Separating Magical and Physical AOE.

I'll see if I can go through the last pages of interesting proposals later and do a compilation. Then post on Obsidian forums or whatnot.

 

[Infinitron]

Mangoose There were never two different stats for determining physical damage and magic damage in Pillars of Eternity. The stat was changed from Intellect to Might at one point, though.

DraQ The primary difference between classes in PoE lies in discrete feats/talents and other unique class abilities. The stats are essentially an array of modifiers that allow you to somewhat adjust each class towards your preferred playstyle, although not every class will be equally effective with every playstyle of course.

 

[Mangoose]

Mangoose There were never two different stats for determining physical damage and magic damage in Pillars of Eternity. The stat was changed from Intellect to Might at one point, though.

Whut, so before Intellect affected Physical Damage? lol.

 

[Zorba the Hutt]

Have to admit this discussion is thought-provoking, though one term I would like to understand a bit better is "monocled". Is that a way to imply tunnel-vision/bias, or a local term for prestige?

Er... both?

(actually the latter )

 

[Athelas]

As a matter of fact Sawyer doesn't focus as much on gameplay as he simply engages in D&D/IE cargo cult, with predictable results.

I don't think you understand what cargo cult means. PoE's stat mechanics may turn out to be shit (though hopefully not), but I don't believe an RPG has ever done them in this way before. Even jRPG's and MMORPG's have more simulationist stats.

 

[eremita]

Technically, the best way to resolve all this and keep Sawyer's system would be to do what they sort of did with strength/might and just change the name. In fact change all the names. Might becomes "soul power" and INT becomes "soul control"

Then call them fucking "Power" and "Control" respectively instead of sowing wrong preconceptions in the minds of the players?

But they won't do that because it interferes with Sawyer's vision of 'a stupid mage with big muscles', which as we all know is essential to the RPG experience. :/

Someone should cast Fist on him.
:musclewizard:

What adds insult to injury here is that i don't see how this system is better than what we had in DnD in the first place. Big muscled wizards? Who the fuck ever asked for that shit?

Muscled wizard can benefit from being able to swing a better weapon in melee, using better armor, withstanding more damage or carrying more of whatever wizard may be carrying around to do stuff.

It should be a desirable but secondary benefit compared to what high mental stats confer, and it could be made actually useful by ensuring that player has some surplus points after satisfying character's primary needs.

Lack of dump stats doesn't imply lack of primary stats or class attribute requirements.

"Having big muscles makes muh fireballs stronger". This makes sense because "soul power".

"Because souls" is essentially a one word "explanation". As such it conveys no depth nor information and is as disgraceful as midichlorians.

But even there you could perhaps have a school of spells which take a physical toll on the body and require a minimum amount of strength to start with.

Neat idea.

These are just a couple of random ideas of the top of my head, not saying they're perfect. I just really can't understand how this current system is favoured by someone like Sawyer. I guess his system is clean and balanced in a mathematical / structural sense, with everything affecting the same number of stats, every possible character equally awesome. Perhaps that was the priority.

It reeks of Bethpizda and their stat cutting and rearrangements to have the same amount of skills for each specialization or controlling stat.

Both options are certainly shit, but this is where I think a different conclusion can be drawn; the answer lies outside the box. PoE's 'Blast' example mentioned above is a decent example of tactical variety.

It doesn't always have to be direct damage, either. For example, 'stacking' debuffs applied through wands (or free cantrips) which reset after a certain mount of time and culminate in an additional minor effect after X stacks, can be interesting if well-tweaked (and simple to compute in a real-time setting). A Wizard's contribution outside of spellcasting doesn't have to be binary or particularly strong, it just has to be useful and balanced; possibly short-ranged so the Wizard is put in harm's way, but rewarding and properly paced to minimize tedium and keep it meaningful once you toss your fighters a little helping hand.

Varying power of wizard's actions is certainly an answer (and wizards applying non-mundane status effects via melee attacks is a nice idea overall, as I have acknowledged), but there is always the problem of thematic consistency, and having Wizard do something visibly arcane every turn just turns arcane into mundane negating the whole point of having wizards and magic.

I was using complete hyperbole, moron.

I was going to address your points, but now I think I'll propose that you suck a dick instead.

What's with you and taking replies out of context?

Reading and replying to over 12 pages of discussion in rapid succession does that to you.

The funny thing about calling it ass backwards design is that the regular forwards design has resulted in 0 satisfying gameplay from RPGs.

Care to cite those regular ford design examples? Because most of cRPGs are just sad cases of PnP cargo cult with dumbing down applied to it.

As a matter of fact Sawyer doesn't focus as much on gameplay as he simply engages in D&D/IE cargo cult, with predictable results.
Hell, maybe PoE will actually be a good game afterall, but certainly no thanks to his mentally impaired musclewizards.

For the record, I do agree with dump stats being bad design, but you can avoid non-viable or suboptimal builds being even possible without making every stat equal for everybody.

Well, here we are dealing with a problem which many POST-MODERN

Spoiler

authors mentioned; we're inclined to understand those labels with regard to previous systems, most notably DnD of course. It's probably not possible to describe a stat altogether in character creation screen. I guess we'll have to dig more into the game mechanics. Also, good old Wittgenstein understood that "lables" are arbitrary and restrictive, only the usage of those words has meaning - how do we treat those words in sentences, in specific language games. In any case, when you guys are talking about "big muscles -> strong fireballs" shit, you're maybe too harsh (aka biased cause you're used to certain kind of settings). I recently watched some Mike Tyson documentary and holy fuck! When he was young, his focus, attention, explosiveness, will and overall energy was fucking remarkable. He was like a fucking machine perfectly focused on every opponent's move and ready to unleash hell when spotting slightest mistake (especially with his ability to utilize aggression/raw power). If you think about it, it's not about "muscles" when it comes to raw and destructive power of an individual - it's all in mind. Don't get me wrong, he was an overall perfect, technical athlete but that's not where his "might" came from. Now why the fuck am I talking about Mike Tyson here... We have to observe Obsidian's line of thinking. First, they wanted a system with numerous mutations of certain classes. No archetypes only, if you will. So they got that. Then, they had to make some sense of all those "muscular wizards" and "genial fighters" and shit and I refuse to believe they haven't thought about it... So we now have a specific gameplay mechanics which correspond with the usage of "words" (wittgenstein) and we don't want to be against intuition but that doesn't mean we had to work with our system like IE games did (Dumb Wizard bad wizard, weak fighter bad fighter). Mike Tyson example shows that there is a reasonable way to deal with "muscled wizards". They managed to have stat which is not physical, nor mental only.

 

[Bubbles]

It's not like IE is the only possible point of comparison for magic systems either. Look at Blackguards/TDE:

- casting a specific spell requires rolling on up to three different main stats, which are matched to the type of spell (making a clone of yourself would check CON, giving someone more weapon power might check STR, etc.) = no dump stats for spell capable characters

- spells can be freely reduced in power and work off a regenerating mana pool, so you can choose to constantly cast a weak version of a spell, or choose to use a ranged attack and cast a stronger version/something else entirely later

Blackguards sold well enough for a sequel, so it's not like lamestream gamers rejected it either. I'm sure somebody who didn't feel mentally tethered to D&D could come up with better ideas for a balanced, logical and accessible system than what PoE has shown so far.

 

[Infinitron]

I'm sure somebody who didn't feel mentally tethered to D&D could come up with better ideas for a balanced, logical and accessible system than what PoE has shown so far.

Maybe so, but this game is tethered to D&D so mana pools aren't an option. If Sawyer told people he was putting mana in PoE our megathread would now have 2000 pages of rage instead of just 1200

And Blackguards locks you to a specific party so I don't really see how you can reason about its class balance. Its spell selection is certainly quite imbalanced.

 

[Bubbles]

I only compared magic systems, not spell selection or class balance (which I wouldn't expect PoE to slavishly emulate from Blackguards anyway, especially since that game doesn't even have classes).

For that matter, there's no reason a game with a Blackguards-style magic system couldn't have "spells" for pure fighters that check Intelligence or Charisma based on their effect.

 

[Infinitron]

I only compared magic systems. not spell selection or class balance (which I wouldn't expect PoE to slavishly emulate from Blackguards anyway). For that matter, there's no reason a game with a Blackguards-style magic system couldn't have "spells" for pure fighters that check Intelligence or Charisma based on their effect.

Fair enough. I would say however that having stats whose only use is ensuring that your spells/abilities don't fail is probably a bit boring, even if it ensures that they aren't technically dump stats.

Now, you'll probably respond to this with "Wait, what if they're not just for checking failure? What if they also strengthen the spell/ability?"

Well, in that case, we're basically back to the question about "Why doesn't the game have Intellect affect soul-based ability damage and Strength affect physical damage? Why just one stat for all damage?"

The answer to that is that having one single stat to affect all damage in the game isn't really strictly about removing dump stats. It has more to do with another one of Sawyer's design principles - consistency.

 

[SymbolicFrank]

The problem is, that dump stats as we see them don't contribute to DPS, which makes them useless when combat is what the game is all about.

There are multiple ways to solve that:

1. Make things outside combat worthwhile. Like, CHA for recruiting, trading and storyline.

2. Have party skills that help fighting by getting better equipment through stealing and / or crafting.

3. Require certain party skills to prevent deadly traps or solve puzzles.

On the other hand, there is no use for many different stats to determine things like damage done. Simply because we can have the computer resolve any equation, so we can use linear equations instead of throwing dices.

That would also make other equipment but the best and heaviest useful. Because, as it is you really want your monk to wear full plate armor...


And having classes is not a requirement for diversity either; D-OS might have a bland implementation of the above, but it works very well.

 

[SymbolicFrank]

Another way to look at it, is that you're a group of specialists; only the best of the best!

Either go for one or two jacks of all trades, and become strong because your level is twice the expected one, or have a large group of specialists.

 

[Krash]

You know, it strikes me people are approaching the stats the wrong way. What if say Might represents something different depending on the class you pick? So for warrior/barb Might is hulk smash power, but for wizards it's the raw power of their magic aptitude? Or for intellect, for wizard it's self explanatory, but for warrior/barb it's something akin to battle cunning?

 

[a cut of domestic sheep prime]

What if say Might represents something different depending on the class you pick? So for warrior/barb Might is hulk smash power, but for wizards it's the raw power of their magic aptitude? Or for intellect, for wizard it's self explanatory, but for warrior/barb it's something akin to battle cunning?

Unfortunately, not the case. Again, that would invalidate Josh's concept of being able to build "idiot muscle mages" (can't just be magical power if it's muscle and vice versa, it's both merged into one). It's pretty clear they are treating "might" as strength and just want to sidestep being called morons for now by changing the name. 9/10 chance there will be might checks in the game that will in essence be strength checks just based on the number of times Josh has made references to dumb, strong mages in recent interviews.

http://news.softpedia.com/news/Obsi...e-Clumsy-Thieves-and-Idiot-Mages-452587.shtml

If you want to build an idiot muscle mage or a clumsy thief, you can do it.

Did go to the school of giving people things they never asked for or will this new system blow all of us naysayers away with its inovashun? You decide.

Spoiler

I think it's probably the former though

 

[Krash]

Did go to the school of giving people things they never asked for or will this new system blow all of us naysayers away with its inovashun? You decide.

Spoiler

I think it's probably the former though

Well maybe he just made the explanation retard proof. Still, I'd like to know his thoughts on this.

And it's just as much about how you use the ruleset rather than which one you use - see DivOs and BG2, both use pretty shitty rulesets but they're fun anyways.

 

[Infinitron]

You know, it strikes me people are approaching the stats the wrong way. What if say Might represents something different depending on the class you pick? So for warrior/barb Might is hulk smash power, but for wizards it's the raw power of their magic aptitude? Or for intellect, for wizard it's self explanatory, but for warrior/barb it's something akin to battle cunning?

I just addressed this. It's about consistency. He wants to make a game where you have one universal "knob" that allows you to tweak a character's damage output to your liking, another knob for its AoE ranges, and so forth.

For lack of a better term, streamlining.

 

[a cut of domestic sheep prime]

He wants to make a game where you have one universal "knob" that allows you to tweak a character's damage output to your liking, another knob for its AoE ranges, and so forth.

What part of "make us a new game like Baldur's Gate" sounded like "'streamline' BG with your pet design ideas" to him?

It's like ordering a pizza from a chef with asperger's:
"One large cheese please."
20 minutes later.
"Ok, so here's your pizza. You'll notice I stuffed 40 small pieces of broccoli in the crust because it's healthier and I also cooked it upside down - that's superior design as the tastiest part of the pizza is the cheese and now it hits your mouth first. I've been making pizzas for years, you see, and I'm tired of seeing pizzas that don't let the customer experience the rich flavor of broccoli and hot cheese in every bite. I thought I could do better."
"I hate broccoli and the cheese is burnt."
"You paid in advance." *walks off*

 

[Infinitron]

Oh, wait, I just realized I didn't properly comprehend Krash's post. Yeah, that wouldn't work because the stats are supposed to work in dialogue as stat checks as well.

What I said is still true though.

What part of "make us a new game like Baldur's Gate" sounded like "'streamline' BG with your pet design ideas" to him?

I guess he didn't think the stats were that important to the Baldur's Gate experience. They are, after all, just something you set at chargen and then basically forget about it for the rest of the game. They don't even increase on level up occasionally like in 3rd Edition.

 

[a cut of domestic sheep prime]

I guess he didn't think the stats were that important to the Baldur's Gate experience. They are, after all, just something you set at chargen and then forget about it for the rest of the game.

So there were no stat affecting items or potions in the game? So stats didn't influence how your character would perform?

 

[Infinitron]

I guess he didn't think the stats were that important to the Baldur's Gate experience. They are, after all, just something you set at chargen and then forget about it for the rest of the game.

So there were no stat affecting items or potions in the game? So stats didn't influence how your character would perform?

Of course they did, but it's not like, say, Fallout, where maintaining your character sheet by spending skill points was a constant occupation. You picked a class, rolled up some stats, and then did what your class was supposed to do - melee things if you were a fighter, cast spells if you were a mage, etc. You didn't really need to think about stats much after that, except maybe for selecting your party members from the NPCs in the world if you were powergaming.