Originally Posted by Count Turnipsome
Unfortunately, current rpgs have the false goal of being foolproof. If you go to the Pillars of Eternity (first one) page there is, or at least was, a video there by the lead designer who described all the (horrible and misguided, IMO) things he and they did to remove from their game everything that makes Wizardry 8 great for example.

1) making character choices foolproof so even a new player blundering through the process will have a party capable of playing and finishing the game without extreme difficulty

2) removing all of the strategy by redefining attributes so every character needs all of them and so their effects are "linearized", i.e. so there is no major impact for raising attributes to a certain level.
2a) all characters needing all attributes is to destroy what he derogatorily calls, "min maxing", i.e. all of the strategic aspects of character creation and development which enable the characters and party to sink or swim depending upon the quality and wisdom of the choices.
2b) Strength for example is required by casters because for them it has been made to translate into the strength of their spells.
2c) The linearizing is to eliminate anything powerful from the character design process. A little bit more of an attribute means a little bit more only of whatever it does. Something like the Expert Skills in Wizardry 8 or the Novice-Expert-Master-Grandmaster exponential curve of abilities and spell effectiveness in the Might and Magic games is vigorously avoided.
Overall these measures are directly intended to make the entire creation and development process for characters less meaningful and important, instead there is a focusing on just the tactics, exploration and story aspects and eliminating character creation and development as an important part of the game (in large degree).

Modern rpgs can be fun, but do not expect an in-depth and meaningful creation of the party that opens up the possibility of utter failure. The utter lack of this in current rpgs is directly, overtly and shamefully saying players cannot handle a meaningful creation and development of characters and parties that allows them to fail utterly.
I think Josh were right on most of things except for being foolproof. There is no cure for it.

But the system he designed is indeed making role-playing potentially more fun.

Anybody here ever make a Spellcasting Paladin in BG3? Or A rogue that can sneak attack with spells? Or Melee Mage? --- and finish the game with "viable" build on the highest difficulty?

I bet most of you can't (hopefully this bit doesn't offend people as it wasn't my intention, so I typed this just in case).

In Pillars of Eternity 2 (and 1, too actually), you can, absolutely. So I am not sure which part of the system feels "linearized", because all stats has value for all class for whatever character you're trying to make.

The only thing that missing for both game is the lack of class/race reactivity, the thing we got for granted in Baldur's Gate 3. For me personally, Deadfire is better than DOS2, it is the best role-playing game of the last decade.

In BG3, the most "wacky" character I made is Dex-based Paladin, with High charisma, the idea is to spam compel to duel, using that Medium armor that allows no restriction to Dex bonus for AC, smite and eldritch blasting and of course opening that DC 30 locks with ease. It is viable, but not optimize, and in this game, unless I know exactly how to use the skillset, I'm going to have a hard time fighting bosses.


Councellor Florrick's favorite Warlock.

Back Black Geyser's DLC: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/grapeocean/black-geyser-dlc-tales-of-the-moon-cult (RTwP Isometric cRPG inspired by BG1).