Larian Studios Forums Divinity: Original Sin 2 Divinity - Original Sin 2 - General Let's talk about durability

Thank you, this is the kind of stuff I've been trying to convey that others seem to disregard.

Like i've said, your feelings are mirrored by many saying 'just remove' it. I find the idea that they dont even want to contemplate trying to fix things slightly unbearable and that they are more willing to work to remove it, since that requires work of it's own, slightly annoying.

To others the concept of keeping durability in is slightly more important. So I feel more would be happy if things were simply changed and fixed.

As to whether that work should go here or other problems? I leave that to the devs. Personally, I'm the kind that would work continuously on one mechanic, no matter how others see it, till I got it right before moving on.

The fact that it's kind of a controversy an the devs care and seem to want it in makes me inclined to think they may slate this higher.

Lots of things need work and some are obviously higher priority: Ex. Stat system

But i can not comment on how the general priority list should go for them; not my place.

All, I've done is try give feedback on how to fix something that's 'broken'....which is really how I see this should be discussed.

How to fix it, not whether it's important or not, and certainly not whether it's inconsequential enough to be removed......Those later considerations are dev ones as far as I'm concerned

To be relevant and engaging a system for siphoning players resources must, by the very nature of what it's meant to do, be an inconvenience when ignored.

If durability maintenance is made to require no effort, and cause no frustration, it might as well not exist.
It doesn't really matter if the enemies drop 10% less gold, or if I spend 10% of the gold on repairs when I get back to town. The end result is I have 10% less gold.

As far as the engaging parts such a system can have, I already made a suggestion which retains all of them with none of the pains of maintenance.

-A way to open containers you can't lockpick, with a cost attached to it(crowbars instead of spares).
-The interesting part of weapons being broken mid-combat(having to re-equip).

I'm aware of your suggestions; and if you noticed, I endorsed the concept behind them on using a crowbar and removing enemy weapons and armor in combat...I just enjoy the idea of durability as more mentally engaging foundation than what you suggest.

As for painless = pointless, well my points and suggestions were to make it not tedious; as in there's costs and gains, but the process itself need not be painful in management: ex. point and click for each individual item.

Like wise, having to worry about weapon breakage every couple hits is taking things too far.

There's a necessary balancing act in things like this.

The resource drain needs to be felt, but also manageable. The resource need be relevant. Managing the resource should be tied to other mechanics for more engagement. Proper well done management should return rewards. The resource should also be tied to other core mechanics like combat in interesting and engaging ways.

Quite frankly, if you remove durability and the stats of broken or not broken and took your ideas as is, where you de-equip enemy armor for a few turns, I'd balk at it. I'd rather not have those in at all.

Either have durability in some form and work with it or toss the concept all together. No half measures.

If you're going to move away from things like durability, remove food as well, and drinks too I guess. No point there either. And plenty of other RP related mechanics that don't directly related to merchants, story, and combat......

But at the end of the day, I......cannot find games like that compelling. Diablo for instance only has combat, buying/crafting things to make your character better at combat, and a story line.....that game is incredibly dull in my eyes

EDIT:
There's indirect value to all those little things. Hell, I also want the food and drink systems made more relevant and beds too for that matter. Even if as only gimicks or niche things

Please, no. I'm sure if the mod tools are good after the release somebody'll make one of those survival mods I never install. Personally I hate managing food in games. Unless the game is specifically desined around managing very limited resourses to survive. But that'd be a different genre.

I wouldn't miss food if they decided to remove it btw.

*sigh* Which is my point. None of those things, nor durability, should be a necessary mechanic to gameplay nor should they be a reminder of survival mechanics. Food and drink for instance are there for sheer fun value and as an interesting thing for crafters to do to also help in combat and stuff.

There mere existence, however, lends weight to the experience. They add things that help being the setting to life.

If D:OS 2 ends up boiled down to nothing more than a chess like combat strategy game? I'd be very disappointed. The RPG values in the jokes, the storyline, the little things that bring life into the settings such as food and the ability to get drunk. The durability too. All these add to the experience heavily to me as a complete package.

I guess I just value different things in an RPG. I'm annoyed when Sebille kills Stingtail and the Red Prince is quietly watching. Or when the whole party joins Lohse attacking Sahelia. Or when magisters magically know I left fort Joy even though I quietly teleported out of it. Or when after slaughtering the entire fort Joy I'm starting to wonder how these weaklings were able to control prisoners at all. Or when after said deed prisoners behave like nothing changed. Or when nobody notices my party are murdering psychopats slaughtering everybody in sight.

These are immersion breaking for me. The lack of gear repairing? Not so much.

That all matters to me as well. *shrug* I just see it all as one package. One complete package. Which means I want every mechanic and component to be the best it can.

Saying I value durability and the ability to cook and make food doesn't mean I don't equally value other things.

I definately like a durability system. Sadly with the, imho, quite crappy controls of characters and inventory (can't select multiple characters or do things simultaneously) it's indeed a PITA.
So there's imho the place to fix it.

As for the "%-chance to break irrepairable weapon on smashing doors/etc" idea... HELL, PLEASE NO!
Why? Well... break, reload, break, reload, break, reload... I think you get my point. That's bad enough with the loot RNG already.
Plus... how much integrity does the game world offer if your steel sword breaks hitting a single wooden door but you can slay a hundred adamantium golems with it? Thanks, but no thanks.

I do like the idea of food/drink/sleep as a requirement and usually use it when it's an option; I kinda miss it when it's not, although with no day/night cycle I guess it's of more questionable relevance. Though I can see why some people aren't keen on it in the same way that I'm not so keen on the current implementation of durability, especially not with consumable hammers. I wouldn't want it to go completely, but I definitely think it could be revised somewhat.

I also like the idea of enhanced wear when using a weapon as a crowbar: if it breaks it breaks and I have to live with the consequences. I guess I don't see any more need to reload than whatever inclination I feel when I get unimpressive loot (which is to say fairly little, with the exception of legendary type items when I admit I will often do multiple reloads to get something not crap).

But one-shot items like hammers and glasses irk me. I think in part it's due to the naming: if they were instead called "repair kits" and "identifying scrolls" (as someone suggested a while back) I'd be a bit more okay with it. But still fairly grumpy. Then again, I'm usually fairly grumpy anyway.

Ah, but you see, if gear maintenance was anything like food, it'd actually be a good system.
Effect duration aside, food is a great form of optional management.

Preparing and managing your meals(and potions, it is done the same way after all) is a task that takes some effort to perform, but it is entirely optional when you don't want to go through the effort.
If you don't take the time to eat before every fight(which should really be "eat in between fights"), you don't get the benefits from that, but you can win fights without it.
The system is also usable at a minimum effort: just eat whatever you have mid-combat and hope for the best.

When you choose to interact with the food system, you gain benefits.
When you're forced to maintain your gear, you do it to avoid penalties.

You've actually managed to convey a point I have to concede makes sense from certain values.

I don't necessarily agree with it, but I see it clearly and now understand your stance better.

Making durability the same would inherently go against the concept of durability and by the stance you point out, that does kind of make it make sense to remove it.

I get the angle. I just don't agree with it.

Seems to my view:
- The limited interaction to avoiding penalties can be brought to a level of little to no worry, so avoiding penalties isnt really a realistic problem or tedious task
- The possible rewards for interacting with the system can be varied and interesting
- The conceptual ideas behind durability as an idea in and of itself has much value to me

The idea of purely optional management has me a bit flummoxed, since I don't really see a way to counter that at all or even debate it really.

It's kind of a clear line in the sand that divides views on whether thats bad or not

Kinda have to agree with naqel here. Couldn't have said it better myself.

Hello! Just here to give my own thoughts on durability.

I will likely misspell a few things.

First off, i am certain that before this patch so was repair hammers allready a consumable and tongs is what gave infinite amount of repairs, i remember it clearly because i put it in my feedback thread how i didnt see the point in repair hammers when you had tongs.

But perhaps i am just crazy?

Anyway, we will now go with the premise that tongs dont repair and we just got the repair hammers now.

How to punish bashing chest and doors without durability

I am a bit suprised this was one of the issues with removing durability.
I have never paused and thought about my decision if i wish to bash down a door or not because of the durability hit, for the simple reason that i find spells actiully more efficient.

If you want to make players think more carefully about bashing chest and doors i would not look at durability but look on the chest and doors.

Chest is a easy one which many has suggested, make it clear you have destroyed items in the chest, having useless loot pop up called "broken item" when you do it.

Doors is a bit more tricky because it depends on the area they are in, but if there is npc around then have them react and be alarmed.

If they are more in a dungeon you could make a sort of mimic door that attacks back if you attack it, spitting splinters, or they could have seals/runes/whatever on them that either give extra protection like regenerating armor/magic armor, or work like traps that for example cause a poison cloud when attacking.

These things is what i believe would make people pause and consider if they really want to bash that chest or door, very few has probebly ever decided not to bash in order to save durability.

So remove durability then?

Well i am not saying that, durability can have a place as long it aint annoying and serves a purpose, the annoying part is honestly rather easy, and it is what many has pointed out, have a repair all, both at vendors and somewhere outside like on the repair hammer itself or a button beside the character sheet.

So what purpose would durability serve?

Sure some find immersion in it, but that is rather subjective and i will focus more on a practical purpose.

You could have it in combat, but i aint so sure how well that would work, only if durability is at 0 so is that useful for you as the aggressor, a wepon at 1 durability works just as fine as one with 60, if this process is slow then it aint worth it, just focus on taking down the health.

And if the process is fast, then that is just annying as the defender, remember that gear gives more then just armor and damage, they give stats, and sometimes you can not use certain abilities or even other gear without it, and getting durability to 0 in combat is a permanent debuff, it aint like stun that goes away after a turn or two, trying to fix it with repairing mid combat honestly sound more annoying then fun.

So what purpose can you give durability?

You could change so you dont lose durability when wearing it, and instead focus more on it being a way to achieve loot, with that i mean you find broken items, perhaps just be chance on a field, or as a penelty because you bashed a chest, and in order to use the item so must you repair it.

You could as well have so if you repair something that is full durability so will it be "refined" and give for example 20% more armor or 5% more damage, and the effect wears off like current durability works until it reach the base amount.

You could also use the hammers for repairing objects in the world, such as a broken door, table, chair etc.
It serves no real purpose on its own but one could always make some sort of quest or path centered around it, for example there could be a broken lever to a bridge/gate and you can either go around it, or you can repair the lever and go throu.

The point is that these suggestions would make it so you can go throu the game without even repairing once, but if you do repair so are you rewarded.

And yes with these suggestions so do i think hammers should be consumables.

PS: Dont like identify glass be a consumable, dont see the point with it, just makes you either run back to town or hold on un-identified items in case you find something you want to identify more, what is the reasoning behind that?

This is why durability as a stat has to go.
The fantasy for a blacksmith character isn't "I won't have to pay a sucker to fix my gear", it is "I'll make the best <favorite weapon> ever."

Equipment maintenance should be fun.
I we'd replace durability with upgrades, even if the system was as simple as "Sword +1", you'd still have gear maintenance, but it would operate on the same rules as food: optional benefit.
Using a "blacksmith's hammer" to dismantle an item for upgrade components would be infinitely more fun than using a "repair hammer" to make it not break can ever be.



There is a whole bunch of reasons as to why bashing doors is generally a poor idea, chief of which is the fact that there will be doors you can't bash for plot/puzzle reasons.

Magic bashing is just a cherry on top.

That is one of the best things I have read so far.
Until now we only talked about equipment being damaged through use in combat (plus bashing items) and we repair it back to the normal state.

I aggree that repair would be more meaningful if we can use it on other things than items in our inventory (In fallout 1 you needed some repair skill to get the water chip from the machine) or if we can use the skill to fix broken items that we find. The item can be broken because we just find a broken item somewhere or because we broke it ourselves (from bashing maybe).
In that case repairing would not be nessessary but it could give you some benefit if you do it (find different solutions for quests or repair things that broke because of bashing) and in that case it would make sense to have consumable repair items.

wow, I did not expect to find something new and meaningful after 10 pages of discussion.
I am really impressed

A simple and fast solution would be:

Explorer Mode: no durability (non existent, or all items are never damaged)
Classic Mode: baby mode durability (need to repair is extremely rare, hammers don't disappear after usage)
Tactical Mode: items receive more damage and repair is really a need (hammers disappear after usage)

Some may not like fiddling around their inventories caring about every item, but I know it's something extremely enjoyable for people who are into itemization, micromanagement, economy and resource usage. I fear if people keep asking to remove things they think are a "chore", the game may become an ultraconsolized, streamlined crap, that require no brains, no effort on part of the players.

Wanting a more streamlined game, is not the same as wanting a shit one. The entire MOBA genre came from streamlining the Strategy genre down to a single unit per player, and going by it's popularity, the genre is anything but shit.

Altering how tedious repair is by difficulty solves none of the issues with the system and completely ignores the people who want to play against the toughest enemies, without also playing against the most tedious of maintenance.

Actually, I find MOBAS incredibly.....? What's the word? Not horrible, but you'd never find me playing one

At this point, me and you seem to have a fundamental differences in taste



Also, this. He pretty much captures my feelings on the matter and the fact that I do hate the idea of boiling down RPGs to their base components.

Skyirm is a good example of them streamlining things. I find Oblivion much better game over all.

EDIT:
As for Ludvig? I actually like his take on things. It's not my ideal, but like food and drinking and sleeping; it's a middle ground I can work with and around, I guess.

The idea of completely optional mechanics for everything isn't something that jives with me ultimately.

Oblivion still remains my favourite RPG overall. Out of the box, it has some issues with scaling and loot, but they're easily enough fixed with an overhaul like OOO. I think the point being is that even if it needed some tweaking, the basic mechanisms were present in the game rather than being removed entirely.

Which is what I'd like to see in D:OS II: I don't want to chuck away durability completely (and yes, I usually play on explorer mode because I'm not very tactically-minded) but would just like to see it somewhat revised to be a bit less tedious. I'd probably be happy enough with a "repair all" option and slightly more durable repair kits, though as with Oblivion, it'd be nice if repair kits could become unbreakable with a high enough skill level.