My argument is that the damage received by the player from Fire and poison surfaces in the environment should be affected by his resistance to the element - at that precise time, whether it is achieved through potions or food or equipment or otherwise - at that precise moment.
Not by levels, not by any level scaling.
Such surfaces, the burning ground, or lava or burning dead soldiers, furniture and the like should also be further balanced in their output and amount of damage.
I mean that various burning and poisonous surfaces should not cause that much damage, that fast as they do now.
Because the current amounts of damage and how fast it happens is just ridiculous.
Adjusting that would not make it weak. It will just make it playable.
It is unplayable now because the amounts and speed of damage gained from them are not properly adjusted or balanced and any resistances dont play a role in that in any way. As far as ive seen.
Right now just brush some deadly surface and you literally light up like a matchstick or just receive numerous damage hits from poison - so fast that you dont have time to click on any potion or some spell.
In combat such fiery burning surface kill almost all enemies in a turn or two at the most. Once an enemy or my character catches fire - its over. You are mostly instantly dead. Or you never get a chance to use some potion or cast a spell on that character.
Currently, a low level fire spell like Firefly (creates a burning surface on the ground) is a literal win button in almost all encounters. for 95% of the game. That spell is more powerful then any other - including the fiery meteor storm that the end boss can use.
All that could be mitigated if resistance would actually incrementally lower the amount of damage and how fast it burns. Having some resistance should lower damage just a bit - but also lower its rate - how fast the element creates damage.
It would still be plenty dangerous.
And deadly if you dont have proper equipment and potions and food. Or protective spells.
Additionally - protective spells now basically just give you immunity over it.
You either burn like a matchstick or youre completely immune?
Thats just cheap. And it plays horribly.
(those spells are all high level so you cant get them for most of the beta or at all if you dont have that magic skill and at most you have a few scrolls of them with you which are enough for one situation)
Suggestion:
Lower the speed and rate at which we get damage from these surfaces into something at least theoretically manageable and playable.
Enable resistance to that element to reduce these factors even further - but incrementally. Not too much.
***
As for the levels and the early start of the game...
Going out into the western area is not early game. By that time the player is already on level 3 - or 4, depending on how much youve done in the city. (and by that time you are or you should be full of all kinds of potions, equipment and food which gives various resistances)
Just somehow making the undead in the western area be that easy and gimped as Thorska suggest would work directly against the narrative, against the story and the plot.
Those undead defeated the whole legion. And they are besieging the city.
If they are that much ineffective and weak as thorska would make them - then any three or four Legionnares could go out and simply wipe the whole area clean.
Any two stronger Orcs could clean up anything in the game, save some bosses.
... and that just doesnt make any sense at all.
There are other, mush simpler ways to make it clear to the players that they shouldnt go out too early. Rather then to destroy internal coherence and consistency of the game main narrative and plot.
One of them could be simply locking all other gates except the western one.
Or preventing the player to leave the city until he got to some stage of his original main quest - the murder case. Thus ensuring the players are at some appropriate level before they exit the city and go fight "nasty" undead - which are actually relatively easy in the western area.
The narrative and the plot would support this. Easily.
