Larian Studios Forums Divinity: Original Sin 2 Divinity - Original Sin 2 - Game Master Larian: Let's Talk About Adding More to GM Mode

I love DOS, and I'm loving DOS2, but the GM mode is giving me major Sword Coast Legends vibes. It works in its very basic form, but it could be so much more, or at the very least more intuitive. Is it really up to the community to fill in the monster/NPC ranks and provide levels that are not fully explorable in 2 seconds? This just really seems like a "lets throw in this feature because people want it (I'm looking at you single-player games that add a crappy halfassed multi-player mode cough Mass Effect cough cough Dragon Age), but lets not put as much work into it as the rest of the game" kind of thing. It may be only one part of the game, but it is still a part of the game, you know? If you make an apple pie with premium apples but sub-par crust, you bring down the whole experience. I really want to emphasize that I love this game, and Larian Studios. I know I can be super critical, but I am only this way towards things I love and want to see as perfect as it can be. All I'm saying really is: Hey Larian, maybe sometime down the line, maybe in an EE, add stuff to make GM mode the same quality as the main game.

I think you're taking it a bit too harsh. The GM mode is an additional feature, not the main one. And you have to judge it from that perspective. It wasn't even advertised as a killer feature like Sword Coast Legends did, just one of the many.
And I don't understand what's wrong with the idea "up to the community to fill in the monster/NPC ranks and provide levels". They give us the great tools, so why not? This is how the mods working. It's already much more than most of the developers did.
Sure, I'm unhappy that a lot of features from the game editor is not available in GM mode, especially normal NPC movement without possessing them, but the campaign's quality alone justify the game's price. I hope that developers will do some major improvements to this mode, but IMO they should do it as a DLC because it's one of the rare cases I feel that game should cost more than I've paid for it.

It was the final ULTIMATE stretch goal on the kickstarter. You have to judge it from that perspective.

And frankly almost ALL the stretch goals and promises were bait and switches... so why not additional features?

The beauty is that they gave us the same editor they used to make the game so, theoretically, we can add whatever we want to any part of the game, including GM mode. You might be interested in checking out my mod. It adds *almost* everything to GM mode character wise and I'll be adding the remainder of NPCs eventually.

I'm with Mordred here, yes, it was a stretch goal, no, it was THE stretch goal.
For me this is a game-seller. The only reason my friends and I weren't interested on D:OS1 was because the possibility of the editor excited us but...only pre-made campaigns with no GM.
Now we have a GM, it is still a stretchgoal, yes, but is still part of the game. It has sold more than half a million copies already, the game was funded in less than 12 hours on kickstarter. They had (and I suppose than they still have) the funds and resources to make it Top-notch. And some of the design choices on that editor are just...weird.
Not able to create an npc from scratch but from a template that locks part of the clothing/hairs, GUIs in shockwave (little bit old, i think, and hard to modify) an absurd 4 player limit for custom campaigns (I understand that limit in the main story, but for the rest? c'mon, give us freedom!) Not all the monsters from the main campaign are active on the GM and had to be activated by a community-made mod? (Come on that makes no sense) And i won't start with the excruciating difficulty to change/add new visual content and their obscure pipelines (visual effects, skin colors, textures, changing the color of...the fire paintable effect f.ex, or, geez, add new ones just by changing the color of the existing ones) when they promised us pen-and-paper freedom we have a limited hardcoded system (Just had to see these forums to read people asking to tweak, change, add or do things with skills/classes) and a system that is difficult in some details for no reason (One dumb example: picking colors for the armor, that menu is uncomfortable to use, instead of selecting the color from a list, or better, a color wheel, we have to go color by color of pre-accepted hues. Why?)

We all love the game, we all see the possibilities, but is not a crime to admit that certain things can (and should) be done better. Now is the time to say what things we DO NOT like and what things we DO WANT, and Larian will be there to listen, they have a powerful tool, with some changes it can be THE ULTIMATE tool. And some changes aren't that hard/drastic to do, most of them are just "quality of life" fixes.
But we have to yell, we have to cry, and they have to listen, they have the skills, the talent, and the resources to make this much, MUCH better.

I bought this specifically for gamemaster mode.

[quote=Shapeshifter777]You might be interested in checking out my mod. It adds *almost* everything to GM mode character wise and I'll be adding the remainder of NPCs eventually.[/quote]

Would you be interested in uploading to Nexus for those using GOG?

Eventually, but not just yet. I want to get the last few npcs done and make like 20 new huge levels first.

There are some serious limitations and I'd like to hear a Larian response on what the long term plans are for the modding tools and the GM mode.

There is alot missing that players can fix, but there are also basic UI features missing that we can't.

i.e. Let me move/control multiple npcs at once (drag to select RTS move style etc).

Oh and Shapeshifter, loved your work. Can't wait to see your new zones if you publish them!

It should not be up to the modders to fix things! Shapeshifter has been slinging his mod in almost every one of my posts. We get it, you made things, but you are not a professional designer with responsibilities to its consumer base. It is because of people like you, who make content that is decent but ultimately not as good as the devs could/should, that video game developers do not do the work they should. This is how capitalism works people: if someone will do work you need to do for free, you let them! If modders are willing to fix the game, the devs will sit back and let them, even awesome ones like Larian.

Point two: People say, "oh, it's extra content" or "it's not part of the main game" like that means anything. The whole is only as great as the sum of its parts. It is this kind of half-assed attitude that is behind the crumbling of western civilization. Individualization has caused massive apathy towards the health of the collective people; instead, most only care about individuals. Can you see how only caring about part of a thing can be unhealthy? This principle is true in all endeavors, including game design.

Alright, enough philosophy. Third point: People throw around the editor like, "hey, don't like it? Fix it in the editor!" Well, I shouldn't have to fix things. That is not the experience I payed for. Additionally, the editor is not an etch-a-sketch. It is not something so easy and usable by everyone. I have no skill with that level of design software, and no time to learn a freaking career skill to a professional degree just to make my hobby experience up to quality.

So, in summation:

Larian, please step up and make GM mode the quality it deserves to be.

People, please wake up and stop allowing capitalism to ruin everything.

Shapeshifter, please wise up and stop spamming your mod as a solution to everything just to get reputation or whatever.

I definitely will. I'm building a huge world I've had inside my head for years now, so there's going to be a lot of stuff I have to make. I figured I might as well share my work with the world, so people can use it in their own campaigns.

@Mordred_Morghul: What kind of backwards reasoning is this? Player-made content doesn't somehow prevent Larian from improving their game.

@Shapeshifter777: Sounds good!

That backwards reasoning is how capitalism works. I do not disagree with you that it is backwards reasoning, but it is also how business works. Making quality material costs big bucks, and if the community is willing to put in the work for free, It is super unwise business practice to also expend resources to add/fix things. Whether or not the community mods will disincentivize Larian from also doing more quality work on the game, I cannot say. What I can say is that, as a business trend, this is how it generally works, and you can see it not only all over the games industry but everywhere. The most popular example is McDonalds' response to a higher minimum wage demand: to replace the tellers with computers. If something/one can do the work for less or free, you use that thing/person. It is one of the first things you learn as a business major, and one among many reasons why I am no longer a business major. If you have a soul and take any upper division business classes, you will become a card carrying socialist, I guarantee it.

Hard to take any of that seriously, comes across as ranting from a young conspiracy theorist.

Anyone familiar with the Neverwinter Nights series could tell you that's not how things have played out in the past.

Wow. You have drank too much of the crazy kool-aid. And used Larian's own forum to post your crazy talk. Larian is successful because of capitalism and you and I are enjoying the fruits of Larian's thousands of hours of labor and millions of dollars in resources for only less than $50. You and I were not forced to pay anything. Completely voluntary. And Larian has been wildly successful as a result. Impressive how capitalism works....everybody wins!

It's because of capitalism Larian and DOS happens. Anyone with a soul would recognize this.

Larian has given their own tools to everyone that pays the cheap price to make their own version of DOS. You are free to learn and use them since you paid for them. Some have taken the initiative to make great things that...cost nothing and increase the value of the game...more than the $50 I paid.

I can't wait for more modders to improve the game for free so that DOS continues to increase in value and set the standard for rpg games. Yay!

Despite of crazy rants (Capitalism dude? seriously?that was the main block of your argument?) Let's keep it real.
The Engine is amazing. No one is telling otherwise, but I'm sure I'm not the only one that see's absurd or arbitrary limitations to it and the game itself. Not being able to create NPCs from scratch (blocking hairs/clothing/armor depending on the base template you use for the same race. Also, color have their RGB code for the alpha color channel, but instead of a circular color picker to pick freely from millions of colors for that alpha we have just a few for no evident reason), not all the monsters are available (and a player has to mod them to activate them. ) a New campaign requires extra scripting to trigger the character creation at start (Yes i know that the wiki says that they are correcting this issue but that seems big to me), GUI is in flash, making it heavy, unoptimized and nearly impossible to modify. You can add images super easily to the vignette system...but you can't add music nor sounds, also, they don't have a Loop button. Surface effects look cool, but if you want to have blue fire for your main bad Lich guy of your campaign (f.ex), it has to be blessed fire and heals characters, insteaf of giving you a colour picker and a condition and effects selector to create your own. The engine is an upgraded version of D:OS1 and again we have an expanded, but still limited absurd limit on player number for custom campaigns. They're all just tiny details, most of the fixes are "quality of life ones", but they are there, and they are needed. Is just that the design philosophy behind the engine/game is weird, and makes things harder for no reason. When you copy a Connection ID to join the game you can't press CONTROL+V to paste it, you have to click the tiny button "paste from clipboard" that someone had to program for no reason. Most are things like that, tiny bity details that seems obstacles for unknown reasons. That, joined with bigger ones i think it's what making people a little bit upset about this. Specially with the huge amount of money they made with kickstarter and after hitting the 500k copies sold in less than 5 days.

And, on a personal note...You can script classes, but we can't create races or monsters due to the animation software used that we already pointed out in other thread instead of using fbx.
And no spanish translation. One of the most spoken languages in the world.

Yes capitalism "dude". A society molds the actions of those in it. One behaves (generally) according to one's society, or one is ostracized or falls into hard times through natural course. Most international business behaves according to westernized business society (capitalism), and thus behave accordingly. But lets not make anyone uncomfortable. God forbid anyone is made to feel the existential dread of the reality that everything is connected, and what damages a part damages the whole. So, go ahead and pretend the DOS2's GM mode has nothing to do with the main game, which has nothing to do with modern design principles, which has nothing to do with game development as a whole, which has nothing to do with capitalism, which has nothing to do with society at large. I will, however, live in the real world where all things are shaped by a society's health, practices, values, and economic system. More importantly, I will continue to support business and artists that break away from unhealthy socio-economic practices. Larian, with DOS1 has proven to be a good company, and all I am asking is that they do not succumb to unhealthy capitalist behavior, and make improvements to the system that is not what was promised, which I am confident they will do.

It's like there are two shades for Mordred - absolutely evil corporate or a white angel helping hand Larian.

Take a sip coffee and just relax a bit. Talking about society and capitalism throwing the product's one part off the rail is bit too much and sensitive. Bottom line - you are not being reasonable.

Again, I will repeat, I know it is not reasonable. This is the world that we live in, and it. is. not. reasonable! This is why I am so impassioned about even the littlest of good things happening, like a game developer ignoring "good" capitalist business practice to do the right thing, because the world is unreasonable, and skewed towards making money for money's own sake. All actions in western society are driven towards that end. This is why I got my masters in community organizing, and am working on my PhD in social engineering. However, responses such as, "this has nothing to do with that" or "you're just being too sensitive" are the reason we've long exited the era of logic and reason. I am not stating opinion, I am stating facts. 2+2=4 logic. The problem with any statement, as the baby boomers found out and used to bring us into the "Grey Area" era, is that the person on the receiving end of a stated fact can just say "I disbelieve" and that's it. The second in a conversation has all of the power. If the first in a conversation is a few very intelligent people and the second are the masses, the masses have the power. No matter what logical and/or scientific facts are stated (climate change is happening, race is an invented concept, gender doesn't mean anything, etc...) the masses can simply state, "I disbelieve" and there's nothing more to be done. The rest of the forum writers being the second in this conversation, no doubt will respond to this with something that can be summarized into "I disbelieve". While everything is related, the scope of this thread has gotten a bit broad. So, lets narrow it back down. All I am asking is that Larian make an effort to make GM mode up to snuff with what was promised/the rest of the game, and for modders to make new awesome stuff, but not try and fix stuff that is the dev's responsibility (at least until it is super obvious it is not getting fixed).

Mordred, with all due respect, you can't fix society ranting about a game in a forum.
This is about the editor, and the GM Mode, and i agree with you and many others that it still needs A LOT of work and it should be a high priority because it feels like that part is still in early access or alpha. As I said in my post (that you probably didn't read because i was giving you the reason) let's keep it on subject. The editor. GM Mode. UX and Game Design.