Larian Studios Forums Divinity: Original Sin 2 Divinity - Original Sin 2 - General Killing shouldn't be the solution for everything!

Absolutely agree.

What if an NPC had a "Reward Pool" and that reward pool were given out upon EITHER successfully interacting with NPC, or killing them? That would totally eliminate anyone min-maxing the "system" by non-combat means and gaining the XP, and then returning and killing them. Same goes for monetary treasure -- I've seen games where you can pickpocket an NPC and gain some gold/treasure, and then kill them and gain more gold/treasure.

I don't see any immediate problems with the reward pool suggestion.
You may still have people who argue that killing an NPC outside of a quest should still give them experience for the fight they just took part in.
But I think a change to a reward pool system would allow more control from a balance perspective and result in a greater number of happy players.

As for loot, I'd like it if a character's loot was generated when they spawn. (either when you enter the zone or when they appear in an ambush)
So that theif players could steal anything that NPC could drop. Maybe allow a theif who has either a high enough level or the required talent, to be able to steal equipped items.

But that's slightly off topic.

I think that the most important problem is, that exp is often the ONLY significant reward in an RPG.

Money: In most RPGs (including the larian games I played DD, D2 and D:OS) you have tons of money very soon. After some point, getting a bit more money from a quest does not make any difference.

items: Usually you can get the best items from bosses, as quest rewards or from certain locations (like the trapped and hidden treasure chamber of a dungeon. Once you have some basic equipment, killing villagers or "trash mobs" will not give you something useful.

EXP are always useful unless you have reached the highest possible level (assuming you use a level system) or you have maxed out all skills (if you can spend the points to raise your char directly). EXP are also very addictive because you get an reward every time you perform an action (kill something, finish a quest, . . .). In some games the game became more boring when I reached the max level because I did not get a reward for every action (arcanum, fallout 3, even mass effect 1)

There was an interesting mechanic in Divinity 2: Mind Reading. You get an exp penalty for reading minds, but it could give you better skills, new quests or new ways to solve old quests, access to some places or just some very funny lines. This gave me an idea:

suggestion:
When you accept a quest, you can select if you want just the basic quest or if you select extra goals. if you select an extra goal, you get an exp penalty. If you have success in your extra goal, you get a bigger reward (more exp, a new skill, a powerful item or something that outwights the penalty). But if you fail the extra goal you get the normal reward and no compensation for the exp penalty.

example:
quest giver says: "I want you to get me the diamond from the museum."
you can answer:
1.) "Yes, I will do so." (You get the normal reward and no penalty.)
2.) "Yes, I will get the diamond and I will not kill anyone [1000 exp penalty]." (When you say this you will need 1000 exp more to reach the next level. If you do not kill anybody and bring back the diamond you will get the normal reward plus a bonus like 2000exp or a powerful item. But if you kill somebody you get the normal reward and you have lost 1000exp. This way you could run to the diamond, grab it and run away while the guards try to attack you and you still get the bonus reward.)
3.) "Yes, I will get the diamond, I will not kill anyone, I will not be detected and I will not trigger any alarm [2000 exp penalty]." (When you succeed, you get 4000 exp, a powerful item and a skill bonus, but if you are detected you get the normal reward and lose 2000 exp.)
4.) "No, I am not a thief" (no quest, no reward)

This way the player can select the difficulty and reward he likes and you do not have to remove the exp for combat. While this sounds nice in some situations, there may be some quests where it makes no sense at all. The biggest question: Why should the quest giver give a better reward if the player chooses to make his (the players) life harder?

If we were to go with a system of different levels of quest completion. (Basic, more in line with quest givers wishes, perfectly according to their wishes) then o believe cases like the one you mentioned should have comparable XP from the combat itself to the sneaky approach. This is to ensure the game is relatively equal depending on your playstyle. The other option would be to have quests where they want you to kill everyone equal to the non violent quests to try and keep a balance but that becomes more and more difficult to manage.

Fundamentally it is another workable system that could make players happy.

My only problem is I don't like the player picking which option they are going to take via dialogue, it just seems a bit immersion breaking. If the NPC is developed in such a way that the player believes they would prefer one course of action, or mentions stuff in their dialogue, that would feel more organic.

I should say though that you still need to give players the ability to hit the max levels... so yeah offering more or offering less EXP cannot really be a reward.

@ NinjaSteave: You are right, my suggestion is too immersion breaking. It may be a good idea in a mindless action game, where the player has several options to make his life harder however he likes. I do not have such a game, but I think I saw something where you have tons of options to make the game harder or easier for you.

I aggree that the most important factor for possible rewards should be how happy is the quest giver with the result of your actions. Please note that sometimes the player himself can be the quest giver. The player does not only exist to do what others say. In an immersive world the player character is a person who has some goals of his own. Sometimes it may be wise of the player to ignore the wishes of somebody else because the players himself profits from doing so. The game should somehow react if the player is nice (up to being lawful stupid, like always doing what others say no matter how dumb) or selfish (up to being evil stupid, like killing and destroying things for no reason).

@ Neonivek: As I have written before, most games became more boring once you hit max level. Many players want to get stronger during the entire game.

In Pillars of Eternity many players complained that they hit max level too early. Some of them created a mod that reduces the exp you get and they dicussed if 33%less or 50%less exp is the best value.

On the topic of max levels, D:OS uses a soft cap system. This is a system that does not artificially give a limit to the level of the player, but since there are no repeatable quests or encounters still has a max theoretical level.

Since encounters do not scale with player level, this means the experience awarded needs to be balanced with the difficulty of the encounters the player is likely to face.

Even if D:OS 2 were to change to a hard cap system, which I do not think it should, it would not fix the fact that during the leveling process some playstyle would put the player ahead or behind of the encounters they will be facing.

I would like it if there was an option or difficulty where enemies always scale up to the players level. That is to say if you have an encounter where you are over leveled the fight can still be challenging but if a player is playing through the game without killing every source of XP they will still have the same relative level to the enemy.

That is not to say that enemies should scale down to a players level. If you go down a path where the enemies are too difficult the game shouldn't put on training wheels for you. The difficulty of enemies was an effective way to steer players towards certain paths as well as give a sense of accomplishment when you were finally strong enough to beat them and I'd like it to stay.

Please no level scaling.
I still remember Oblivion: After fighting thouthands of demons you have epic battles against rats and goblins. In this game you have the feeling you get weaker as you level up.

Maybe exp scaling works. That means you get little or no exp for fighting weak enemies and many exp for fighting hard enemies, depending on your level vs the enemy level.
Larian did this in DD and D2 (maybe others, I am not sure). You could exploit the system by killing everything first and returning quests later because quests gave always the same amount of exp.

One of the few games with just the right difficulty was "Legend of Heroes. Trails in the sky". Monsters gave lots of expn when they have a higher level than you and they give only 1 exp if their level is much lower than yours. Quests do not give exp, only combat. But this is a very linear JRPG (a very good one), and the system makes sure that you have always more or less the same level when you meet the next boss. I am not sure if such a strong exp scaling works in a more open world.

While think level scaling could be done correctly in a game like D:OS with a few extra rules put in. I agree that putting it as the default runs the elder scrolls risk of lack of progression (hence the suggestion to put it as an option or difficulty if it were to be implemented).

At least in D:OS you are getting access to more skills, spells and talents, as you level so killing a scaled enemy would not be without benefit on your side.

If scaled enemies were put in I'd like for enemies to have a modifier, so that if you were supposed to be above each individual enemy by 2 levels they would always have a your level - 2 at max.



All that being said I'm not terribly attached to the idea, just one I'd like to see to resolve the issue the tactician mode had in EE. (Where you would actually be stronger late game than in easy due to the extra enemies to give you XP) making fights too easy in a harder difficulty.


None of this really addresses the issue of non-combat XP in a direct manor.

Sword Coast Legends had this option to be able to "offset" enemy levels +/- 4 levels if I recall.

The only problem is that that offset means immensely more to the player that is level 4 than the player that is level 24. If there is some sort of level-scaling "option" I hope it would allow a percentage increase/decrease rather than a fixed level range.

And that raises the problem with how levelling up is designed in some games.

I really feel that the difference between levels 23 & 24 should be just as significant in practical terms as the difference between 3 & 4.

But yes. Level scaling is rubbish. I mean, what's the point of giving me extra damage if you give all the enemies extra HP? This just means that the game doesn't really want to give me the extra damage in the first place. If you're going to make my character more powerful, then you should be able to balance it without needing to level scale. The whole point of getting stronger is so you can curb-stomp some rats.

My perspective on leveling-up is that it should be more about unlocking new and more advanced gameplay mechanics. Low levels are essentially a tutorial for the complex strategies you'll unlock at higher levels.

And this is also why I really feel experience should be more localised to the kind of task you're performing. The game can see you've gotten some practice at persuading NPCs, so it unlocks a new (more fun and complex) mechanic that will allow you to persuade more effectively.

In Bethesda games, it often seems they take the opposite approach. The better you are at lockpicking, the easier it is and that's all there is to it. A lot of games handle this a little bit better when it comes to something like hacking. In Bioshock & Deus Ex: Human Revolution, there was a hacking minigame, and as you progressed you would access more complex versions of that minigame.

The only problem for me is that these were effectively still minigames. I really feel that a properly designed RPG should design these kinds of mechanics as primary components of the game, to be just as deep as the combat portions of the game. Renowned Explorers: International Society also has an interesting solution to this, by treating persuasion as a form of combat. However, Metal Gear Solid is still my favourite example, as it balanced its stealth & combat mechanics by treating them as distinct but equally fundamental to the game.

I think Ace Attorney (and similar games) have the best dedicated "persuasion" mechanics I've seen so far.

I think one of the underlying "reasons" for level-scaling is a lack of enemy mobs available at each level. It takes a looong time to 3-D model, and animate each individual mob, along with any equipment variations, etc.

While I don't like "too much" level scaling, I understand the development investment. One way to offset that is what Sword Coast Legends is doing and that is allowing customization of the combat/magic "abilities" of existing enemies and changing their equipment/colors/etc. This allows a much wider range of difficulty. I would, I think, prefer no "level scaling" of a "base" enemy (other than perhaps +/- 10% adjustment) and then allowing customization of their abilities. This way an "Orc" is basically an Orc. But an Orc with firey armor and a lightning-tinged greatsword is something to be more cautious about.



I also liked the Diplomacy mechanic in Vanguard: Saga of Heroes.

I'm okay with "reskins" and "elites" and new variations and such. I also liked the way MGS5 did this where the enemies reacted to your strategies. For example, if you're getting a lot of headshots, then they're more likely to start wearing helmets. There is a logical explanation as to why the existing enemies have gotten more powerful.


Never played it. Haha. Looks like they've used it as their obligatory RPG cardgame. Looks pretty cool, though still just a minigame?

Just make the Charisma skill really matter!

Killing good guys shouldn't be a solution to gain XP!

Killing bad guys should be one of a number of possible strategic/tactical options to gain XP!


Killing everyone and everything should be nevertheless possible.
It gives Players the freedom to play how they want.
This feeling to be free is particularly important.

I play a bad guy who kills each sunshine I meet. Its dangerous work, therfore I deserve a heap of xp.

Sure -- along with a notorious reputation, wanted posters in cities, hyper-aware citizens, bounty hunters, vigilantes, and increased guard patrols. Hope you don't need anything from the general store.

Very good idea for curbing the players who are killing everyone and everything to gain (wrongful) XP!

"Reputation" has nearly no influence on the game....

I would like to see that "Reputation" and "Charisma" really matter!

Example:
If you kill a good guy, "wanted posters" will appear in the Cities and it will be much more difficult to get and complete quests and the guards will have more and more an eye on you!

This sounds like a good idea. But you have to do it right.

A bad example is reputation in baldurs gate1+2. It goes up automatically when you finish some quests. You have to kill or steal randomly to lower it. Edwin, Viconia or Korgan may be good (sorry, evil) chars, but I never used them because I hit max reputation fast and I did not want to kill or steal just to keep them in my party.

At the moment I play Vampire the Masquerade Bloodlines. There you have the humanity value. You can have different dialogue options when it is very high or low. This gave me an idea:

I think we know for sure that chars in D:OS2 will have some tags. Some of them are fixed at char creation (race, gender, background) and some will be earned by your actions. I do not know how they will be called, so I use the names from Pillars of Eternity. You have a system of tags that oppose each other. Lets say cruel vs benelovent or stoic vs passionate (It is not neccessary to have 2 opposing pairs, maybe its something more complex like the tides in the new torment). If you follow one extreme way, you get new options that are extreme in this way, but it is harder for you to chose opposing ways. If you stay in a middle ground you have more options, but you miss options that are extreme in one way or another.

example: You have the option to be mean or nice. If you are mean all the time you gain the option to torture, kill or rob those people to get what you want, but the nicest things you can say is: "This is your lucky day. Today I am not in the mood of torturing you to death. Get lost before I change my mind". So when you are mean, it is hard to get back on the nice side.
If you are nice all the time, you get the option to heal that person, give him some money and escort him to the next town. But the meanest thing you can do is that you say you will send a letter to the local judge if he does not give you the money you deserve.

I admit that this restricts players who want to play a chaotic char who changes his mind often. In reality you can torture somebody one day and save somebody else the next day. If you do so, most people would call you an insane psycho. maybe the game should do the same.

This kind of dichotomy is absurd to begin with.


What is choice?
Choice isn't about deciding whether to kiss the baby or to kill the baby. Everyone knows that it's "evil" to kill the baby. Anyone who's legitimately trying to roleplay a character is going to ignore this option. People who kill everything in sight are not just psychopaths -- they are suicidal psychopaths. Stupid evil is not a real alignment, and I cannot stress strongly enough that I have no interest in being provided with the stupid evil option.



I believe the premise of Undertale is that the game tempts you to follow the standard RPG mechanic of fighting (and killing) everything, before hitting you with consequences and making you think, "Oh god. What have I become?" I really love this premise (although I don't like what I've seen of the gameplay). The evil option is actually made attractive.

In the Witcher 3, it benefits from having a character with an explicit personality, so it can quite easily put you in the position where you know Geralt wants to do the right thing. Then it throws a curve ball at you by making it hard to work out how to make the "right choice".

But it doesn't even have to be a fixed character for this to be possible. Bioware has improved their design in recent games. Commander Shepard is essentially a blank slate, but he has a general purpose. Because he wants to save the universe (who wouldn't!?), they updated the dichotomy to be "paragon" and "renegade". These are different paths to the same goal. Still handled much more poorly than the Witcher, but it reflects a trend in the RPG genre to make choice about more than just black & white good & evil.

D:OS took the Mass Effect style one step further where dialogue options affect a range of individual traits, rather than just an overall "good" & "evil" stat. It's more nuanced, but I feel this still misses the point.


Wasted choices
If my biggest choice in the game is whether to be good or evil, then I'm going to make this choice once, at the beginning of the game. For the rest of the game, the other options are going to be wasted on me. This also applies to D:OS traits.

Fallout 4 had different factions, where you could help the Brotherhood and hunt the Railroad, for example. Each faction is well-meaning in its own way. This is a very basic way to make a choice more complex than just the binary "good" or "evil". But I still don't really like it because it's still not particularly personal.

The Witcher 3 established clearly that the primary effect of your choices is meaningful emotional consequences. Do you release the demon to save the children? Now you have to live with the consequences of your choice. There's no global tracker, and there's no clear "good" option. Every time you make a choice, you consider the circumstances and make the best choice you can. You make a choice every time.

Don't waste your time giving me choices when there's zero chance of me taking them. Make me think before I choose. Not just, "(roleplaying good) I'll kiss any baby I find." Or, "(roleplaying evil) I'll kill anything that even looks like a baby." I want to challenged every time I have to make a choice.


More than just good and evil
There are other choices we make. Choices about how to design my character. Will the character be a warrior? A lizardman? Will you be stealthy? Persuasive? What are the consequences of these choices?

Well, if you focus on stealth or on being persuasive, then you have to be prepared for the fact that the D:OS is fundamentally designed against you. The mechanics for these play styles are not terribly deep, and the game is not designed to let you finish the game by entirely focusing on these specialties.

But guess what? You can finish the game basically just by murdering anyone and anything. That's the only choice you really wanted to make, right?

I'd love to be able to make choices to be stealthy or persuasive and feel like it's a meaningful choice that will result in an entertaining game. But there is a stark lack of mechanical gameplay design when it comes to these non-violent options.

Long post, but finaly you nailed it. It looks like that ability to do an action (kiss or kill) is not so important as consequences. The wide range of response of enviroment on the player's action is the issue. Make every one in the game killable is nice, but if the only one consequence is xp gain - meh.

It looks like : consequences and optional ways of solving a quest are bigger value for a player than the majestic rule - everyone could be killed.

D:OS speciality - choose a skill which is totaly dull
Whetherproof or Guerilla these are painful example of non-consequence options. There might be Hairdresser or Sheppard talents with same amount of consequences - non.

Option to do something, option to choose somethin withou any usefullnes/consequences/enviroment reaction drags the RPG down. The reaction is true value of any RPG world.


I think that Larians preview for DOS2 focused for add options to do. Add wide range of options. Add races, add origins, add spells, add mechanics, add vertiaclity, add ...

But there is no emphasis on consequences. You could cast a super might source mega spell. One of 300 spells in the game. It plays a nice vfx effect for 3sec. then it dissapear so forniture in there remains shiny, carpet is like a new only characters with HP are heap of ashes. And xp ding sound comes. Very limited consequences. It looks like DOS2 grows wide but players would welcome deep. It looks like the Dragon commander issue - heaps of options with blury results would strike DOS2 again.

Just my 2cents.