Larian Studios Forums General Chat RPG Chat Which Method has Worked Best for Larian - levellin

I've so far played two Larian games, Divine Divinity and Original Sin (classic). To my untrained eye, it appears that levelling dampers were handled differently. In DD, as one levels up, EPs are harder to earn because lesser creatures give you less experience points then when you were at a lower level. In OS, each level costs more skill points. So, which works best or are they more different then better?

This is just curiosity on my part; no real reason for asking other then I don't know.

Both games use the same formula for determining the experience needed to level (goes up as the cube of the level)
E = 1000*(L^3 - L)/3

In DD the experience was greater for higher level opponents and lower for lower level opponents, eventually dropping to zero for those (IIRC) 8 level below the character level. Quest experience was higher at higher levels (capped; IIRC curing a sick patient in Aleroth [or maybe it was opening the catacombs] gives 1000 XP on level 1, 1500 on level 2, and 2000 at level 3 or higher).
D:OS has fixed experience, and added exploration experience in addition to combat and quest.

Beyond Divinity was similar to DD, and Divinity 2 had the same for combat experience, but fixed quest experience.
Presumably the system in D:OS is easier to balance, even though the variance in DD between a normal playthrough and trying to optimize experience is probably only a level, at best (the Wisdom skill only results in an extra level by the end of the game).

Interesting; kind of wish computer gaming wasn't in it's infancy when I finished my BS degree. Even when I returned to school years later to finish an MS, PC gaming was around but wasn't what many people thought of as a use for a physics based degree. Well, the money was good in oil exploration (probably still better then game development which I imagine isn't very lucrative) and my later career in weather was fulfilling anyway. Besides, what game programmer/developer uses FORTRAN77?

Loads of the old beards I worked with when I started seemed to regard that sort of behaviour as witchcraft and still used S/370 assembler. Well, and reams of COBOL but I think nobody ever wanted to speak about that.

I remember being viewed as some sort of young miscreant when I came along knowing about Unix and C. I remember complaining to one of said beards about the impenetrable nature of JCL and he just guffawed at me considering the stuff I used looked like Martian.

And now here I am doing the same. "If it can't be done in C, it's not worth doing." C++ and all that newfangled hipster stuff that came after is just a passing fad. Bloody interweb, it'll never amount to anything.