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Divinity: Original Sin is a game in the tradition of the true classics of the tactial party RPG genre like the Infinity engine games. Perhaps still the best game of this genre (at least in many aspects) is Baldur's Gate 2 which should be known by most of you.

There are a lot of discussions about difficulty, about systems, about wishlists and about what the game should offer and which features should be included. I think it's worth to compare the game to the reference of the genre. This way we could maybe identify in which elements Divinity: Original Sin could still improve.

Of course this will be a personal assessment of my one, with my own opinions and experienced heavily involved. This should be clear from the very beginning. In the following I will try to explain which parts of Baldur's Gate 2 were exceptional and made it one of the best RPGs up to this date and how Divinity: Original Sin could benefit from similar systems and elements.

Let's start:

Combat

1) One of the biggest and most important features of Baldur's Gate 2's combat system was its foundation in the ruleset of Dungeons and Dragons. The biggest advantage of the decision to base the game on this ruleset was that the systems were already playtested by thousands of people in pen and paper games. Another huge advantage of the system itself was its trancparency. Every action in D&D is based on the random result of dice throws. That's something people can relate to. It's easy to understand that a "1d6" sword has a damage value based on the random result of the throw of one dice with six sides (damage value = 1 to 6). So a 2d10 sword has a damage value based on the random result of the throws of two dices with 10 sides (damage value = 2 to 10). It's a system based on random events but also on integer numbers and not on percentages. In a system like that players don't have to perform complicated calculations to determine the outcome of certain actions.
In D:OS however, the outcome of certain actions is way less transparent or easy to understand. Many systems rely on percentages (like chance to hit or resistencies) but there is no obvious pattern or basic values to easily understand the system in each and every occasion.

2) Of course Baldur's Gate 2 offered a real time with pause (RTwP) combat system instead of a turn-based system. Both systems are imo pretty solid if well designed and it often depends on whether you like a more fast paced or a more slowed down gameplay experience. But one of the biggest advantages of Baldur's Gate 2's combat system were casting times. By using casting times players had to come up with a real strategy what to do with their mages, druids and clerics. Very powerful spells needed quite some time (or behind-the-scene turns...) to be casted, letting the caster defenseless in the meantime. Mages could be interrupted all the time and their allies and tanks had to protect them (and stay alive) in the meantime. Party combat was much more tactical in a system with casting times than in a system with cool-down times like in Divinty: Original Sin. In D:OS mages can perform their most powerful spells in turn 1. There is no reason to wait with casting the spell. Another effect of that is that mages in D:OS sometimes have rounds in which they don't have anything to do because they have to wait until their cool-down times are over. The usual pattern here is: stron spell, weak spell, weak spell, strong spell, weak spell, weak spell, following cool-down times. In Baldur's Gate mages had to really come up with a strategy when and how to use spells (defense spells, attack spells, slow-down spells, healing spells, buffing spells, support spells), all with different casting times. Another strategic layer of spells and skills was the system's reliance on resting. Resting means that your spells and skills are consumable and you can't used them more than once or twice until you've rested which usually meant that you couldn't use them more than once or twice in a single battle or in even few battles (depended on resting possibilities). That way you even had to plan more carefully which spell or skill to use in whih situation.

3) Baldur's Gate 2 offered a huge amount of spells from different categories, most or all of them based on D&D. The positive effect of that was the wide variety of spells with very unique ones not based on putting out damage as the main goal but to incapacitate players by a huge variety. BG2 offered a whole lot of very dangerous "instant kill" spells for example and dangerious spells and abilites which resulted in permanent damage to your party members (turn to stone, entomb, brain feed, finger of death,...). I like D:OS's reliance on environment spells and the combination of ground effects and spells but imo the game lacks really powerful spells to really harm or incapacitate a single enemy. Group control is almost too powerful in D:OS but one-enemy spells are lacking, both in variety and effect.

4) You were not able to save your game during combat in Baldur's Gate 2! It's one of the very foundations of a game like that imo to prevent saving during combat. Why? Well, the core issue with that is that these games are based on randomness (dice throws in BG2 and whatever is used for D:OS). That means that every action in combat can vary in results. One of the core fascinations of games like BG2 was that you managed to overcome enemies and combat situations. The possibility to save during combat really "dumbs that down". XCOM EU tried to solve that by deciding on everything when loading up a level based on the stats of the team members. But I neither like this system nor does D:Os have seperated combat level which makes that solution almost impossible to implement. I therefore guess that every action has its direct random result (like hitting chance). That means that saving and loading can "exloit" combat in the way like "I try to kill/ignite/stun/whatever this enemy with that spell. If it doesn't happen now I will reload at exactly this position until it happens due to random chances." In Baldur's Gate you couldn't even save a game if any enemies were nearby (in a certain radius). That often meant that you couldn't just heal and rest between two fights but you had to fight the way you were and with the spells and skills you had left. In D:Os you can just easily save everywhere and heal the whole party each and every two steps, waiting for all your cool-down times to be over. That discourages a huge amount of strategical and tactical thinking imo.

5) Baldur's Gate offered a party size of 6 members at the maximum while in D:OS only 4 regular members are supported. Imo 6 members were the optimal size for a party consisting of members of different professions. You often used 2 tanks (warriors, paladins, clerics, rangers,...) for melee control and defense, a ranger for support, one rogue for trap finding and shadow attacks and two spell casters (mages, wizards, druids, clerics,...) for attack, defense and support spells. Playing with 6 members offered tactical depth. Playing with only 4 members reduces tactical depth by a big margin. Of course you can also summon two additional members but atm these additional members can only engage in melee or with one single spell. And they disappear very soon. Often they are just used as distraction instead of as a full pary member. The problem with 6 party members is that you really need a solid systemic foundation which was given with BG2 and D&D. To make such a system for 6 party members from scratch is obviously pretty hard and needs a lot of work and skill. So, playing with 4 players in D:OS is nice, but it never reaches the possibilites or tacital depth of a bigger party like in BG2 (or for example XCOM EU).


Role-playing and decision making

Well, the comparion here should be pretty obivous. In Baldur's Gate you had extensive well written dialogues with a massive amount of decision-making. I mean real decision-making. Most of the stuff you chose in dialogues led to different results. Some answers led to combat, others not. Some led to party member leaving your party, some led to love stories. Some were just there to increase atmosphere. In my whole playthrough of the actual beta content of Divinity: Original Sin I can't recall more than a few real decision-making situations. Often you only have to choose between two answers or there is no decision to make after all. That is, actually, pretty weak for a role-playing game. Of course there is also the co-op aspect, which is pretty unique and a core feature of the game, but even the co-op dialogues only offer two answer options, often two extreme positions, probably both not fitting the way you want to roleplay your character. Compared to the massive amount of decisions and answer possibilites in Baldur's Gate 2 that's something Larian could or should improve on imo.


Story, quests presentation and lore

Baldur's Gate 2 is known as a game with a huge scope and an amount of well designed quests that is almost impossible to make today. D:OS can't offer that. But the quests offered in D:OS are often well written and presented with the quite typical Larian humour which is a rarity in western RPGs and highly appreciated. But it's pretty sad that right now there is almost no lore in the beta. There are no lore books, there are no unique items, there are no backstories. An RPG lives by and through its lore and its backstory. The main story and quests are of course important but you have to establish a real world. Personally, I really miss unique items with a back story. Stuff like that adds personality and atomospere to the game. Actually, the Divinty games have a pretty solid lore but it isn't shown or presented in the game so far. I hope something changes here soon. The main story itself wasn't that important in Baldur's Gate 2 once reached the main city. But that wasn't because it wasn't interesting but because of the richness of other quests and things to do. In D:Os however I somehow missed the golden thread, what the main story is all about. The beta of course only consists of perhaps 25 or 30% of the game but that can't justify for that imo.


Graphics, sound and design

For its time Baldur's Gate 2 offered one of the most lovely looks possible in a 2.5D world. The world was crafted by hand and every room and every place on the map had its purpose or felt at least naturally. And thanks to mods the game also aged quite well compared to other games. The soundtrack is one I still remember today, fitting the situation in which the player was. The soundtrack of D:OS is great as well, thanks to Krill Pokrovsky. Graphics and art design are pretty good as well (at least since the latest beta) but there is a typcial "fantasy game design problem": proportions and internal logics don't always match. The most obvious example should be a town only consisting of five houses but with many more inhabitants and places which would only exist in much larger town. Baldur's Gate 2 successfully prevented that by just offering slices of the whole world, distinctive levels which felt natural. With a 3D world this is much, much harder to achieve, no question. That's of course the price you have to pay for 3D (even if you don't really use the strenghts of 3D like in D:OS with an isometric view and limited camera rotation...)



Summary

Both Baldur's Gate 2 and Divinity: Original Sin are great games and I like both. But it should be pretty obvious that D:Os is miles away from the pure scope, richness of content, depth of gameplay and elegance of execution of Baldur's Gate 2. Divinity: Original Sin shines in areas like humor and ideas and it's co-op aspect, but for all the other "traditional" aspects there is still much to improve. It's a nice and fun game, but it lacks depth and scope (for whatever obvious or less obvious reason of course) and it's nowhere near Swen's overall hope to once make "the RPG to dwarf them all". Maybe Larian should take the inward turn once and think again what makes former classics of the genre the landmarks they are. Not everything can be achieved but some systems and elements and design decisions are imo worth to (re)consider. Nevertheless I would recommend Divinity: Original Sin to everyone who likes isometric party RPGs. smile



And why the hell are there no toilets in the game? cheer

Last edited by LordCrash; 03/05/14 10:39 PM.

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Combat

1) A lot of things are somewhat clear. You can see your weapon damage and chance to hit. The skills and spells give a damage range and chance for an effect, and the combat log shows the dice rolls or explains why an effect was saved against or not. Maybe it could do more, but I think that this game does a decent job of explaining things.


2) I would not mind some spells and such needing charge time, Unfortunately, I think that idea was cut, which is a shame because Willpower could have affected it.

Still though, there is a pretty easy way to avoid having higher-tier skills castable on the first turn: Have their AP cost be higher than your starting AP, which is based on Speed and Perception.

Keep in mind that we're only seeing spells up to Rank 3 - the most powerful ones aren't in the game yet.

Because spells are acquired through plentiful gold, Mages generally can learn enough spells that they're really unlikely to have nothing to do on a turn, and if they do, well, that's what Staff of Magus is for.

As Forktong said in a recent post (and others in that thread), balance is still clearly an issue which has to be worked on.


3) All the schools - not even just magic, but all classes - have different buffs and debuffs available. If you want to incapacitate a certain foe, pile your party members onto it.


4) Personally, I never save in combat ever. I either beat the fight in one attempt or I die. I would not mind at all personally if in-combat saving were disabled. However, I don't agree with disabling saving if you're in some general area where enemies might be.

Also, this is not frickin' Dungeons and Dragons, and D&D is not a perfect gold standard which all games should slavishly follow.


5) This is not D&D, it is a different system with different challenges. Going down a list of features and saying "this works differently than D&D so it must be changed" is missing the point, I think.

It may be a smaller party, but that's part of the challenge, and you'll probably want to swap out your companions from time to time as things change.


Role-playing and decision making

I think this may be a case where Larian's reach exceeded its grasp. The need to accommodate co-op play complicated things. A lot of quests which were intended to have consequences which extended farther seem to have been reduced to one-offs, because it turns out that long quest chains in highly reactive games can be a huge pain to debug especially when you add in free roaming co-op into the mix.

As I've said in another thread, increased dialogue options are nice, but would potentially quadruple the workload for those, so that's a potential issue.


Story, quests presentation and lore

I have to agree, there's not a lot of that kind of thing around. I especially want a Source Hunter's manual. The player is placed in the role of a Source Hunter, but aren't given enough information to understand the things they're seeing.

Why is an ordinary-looking fire, indistinguishable from a normal fire surface clear evidence of Source Magic? If the Source Hunters are going to declare the crime scene as Source Magic, I want to see some proof. Show me creepy runes written in blood. Or at the very least, change the fire to burn with an unnatural purple colour.

If Jake was killed by Source Magic, why is a bloody dagger evidence? I felt like an idiot when the suspect I presented it too laughed at me for being stupid because Jake was killed by Source not steel. If the suspect was the one mistaken and the Source Hunters were right, I have to understand why.

Where is the lore about Cyseal's history, the Source King, Luculla forest, that kind of thing?

Please feed me new lore, Larian, not just references to names from Divine Divinity.


Graphics, sound and design

Walking around Cyseal, it was quite clear that despite the stretch goal of NPC schedules, the game was never designed for them. Yes, a suburb of houses for the generic citizens wouldn't be interesting to put in, but a lot of named NPC's had no houses or places to go. Kelvania, Bertie, Robin - they had nowhere to go even if there were schedules.

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Originally Posted by Stabbey
Combat

1) A lot of things are somewhat clear. You can see your weapon damage and chance to hit. The skills and spells give a damage range and chance for an effect, and the combat log shows the dice rolls or explains why an effect was saved against or not. Maybe it could do more, but I think that this game does a decent job of explaining things.

But what are the chances? What is the basic value? I don't share your opinion that D:OS explains its systems well. Maybe you just know everything because you've already put hundreds of hours in the various alphas and betas? I don't want to offend you but put yourself in the shoes of someone who hasn't played more than 10 or 20 hours...
Can you explain me for example what "10 percent fire resistence" means? Does that mean that I receive 10% less damage from every attack based on fire? And how much is 10%? Do I have to calculate that myself?


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2) I would not mind some spells and such needing charge time, Unfortunately, I think that idea was cut, which is a shame because Willpower could have affected it.

Still though, there is a pretty easy way to avoid having higher-tier skills castable on the first turn: Have their AP cost be higher than your starting AP, which is based on Speed and Perception.

Keep in mind that we're only seeing spells up to Rank 3 - the most powerful ones aren't in the game yet.

Well, if they do increase action points by a large margin for powerful spells there would be two effects:

1) Mages who want to use that spell would just stay around for one or more turns (saving action points).
2) Once they have saved enough points they would perform the spell in one turn.

To me that doesn't sound like a well designed system. It's basically a system based on "casting times" but without proper animation and any roleplaying feel. Just letting mages stand around for multiple turns doing nothing is plain silly, from a lot of points of view imo.

But I indeed have a solution for that which would greatly improve the system and wouldn't require that much of extra work or basic changes of the system in place:
Mages should be able to cast spells without having enough action points. In that case we would see the mage performing an "endless casting animation" and he would use up all his action points for this round. The system then remembers how many action points are left and needed in the next turn. If there are enough points available in the next turn the mage would automatically end the casting animation and the spell would be accomplished.
Even additional systems like the possibility of enemies to break the casting (combined with enemy attrackting skills of warriors...) would be possible to improve the system.

But I guess that will stay a dream...

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Because spells are acquired through plentiful gold, Mages generally can learn enough spells that they're really unlikely to have nothing to do on a turn, and if they do, well, that's what Staff of Magus is for.

Sure, but there is no point to use Stuff of Magus every second turn. Staff of Magus doesn't make enough damage to be useful and it more seems like ergotherapy to use it.

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As Forktong said in a recent post (and others in that thread), balance is still clearly an issue which has to be worked on.

I know, I know. But I didn't even talk about balancing here. I talk about the systems themselves. Creating a certain system and balancing it are two different things. On top of that I compared the game/beta in its current status with BG2. It's definitely possible or even likely that there will be changes in D:OS' combat system (and balancing) until release. This topic is meant as a stimulus to rethink basic design. wink

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3) All the schools - not even just magic, but all classes - have different buffs and debuffs available. If you want to incapacitate a certain foe, pile your party members onto it.

I know. But many of them just feel "the same". And there is no variation in effects. In BG2 there were nets, plants from the ground and other stuff. Just some more variety would be nice. It's ok as it is though.

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4) Personally, I never save in combat ever. I either beat the fight in one attempt or I die. I would not mind at all personally if in-combat saving were disabled. However, I don't agree with disabling saving if you're in some general area where enemies might be.

Also, this is not frickin' Dungeons and Dragons, and D&D is not a perfect gold standard which all games should slavishly follow.

I don't even vote for disabling savegames out of combat in this case. This only makes sense in combination with a resting system which is not implemented here. But saves during combat are still pointless. I usually don't use them myself as well. But the temptation is always there, especially if you are in a hard fight and beaten. Then the temptation is quite high to load a game from the middle of a fight in which things went good for you (at least if difficulty is set higher)... wink

As for D&D: of course D&D has weaknesses itself. And I haven't said that D:OS should be based on D&D. But it should be possible to compare systems and their pros and cons. And imo the D&D system implemented in BG2 had a way "better" combat system than D:OS as right now. It just have more strategic and tactical layers and more depth of combat (it's not a turn-based or RTwP issue for me).

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5) This is not D&D, it is a different system with different challenges. Going down a list of features and saying "this works differently than D&D so it must be changed" is missing the point, I think.

It may be a smaller party, but that's part of the challenge, and you'll probably want to swap out your companions from time to time as things change.

You can swap out companions in every system. And it's again not about "D&D is better than anything". It's about the direct comparison of two games and how I've personally experienced them. Imho 6 party members offer a more tactical and strategcial combat than 4 party members (backed up with enough meat on the system). You can of course disagree with me. And I can't recall me saying that D:OS "must" change anything. I've said that some things are worth a second thought.
And I indeed think that a system based on four characters is "easier" to make than a system based on six characters. That's perfectly understandable if you want to come up with an own, new system (Bioware has done the same with Dragon Age...) which isn't playtested. Balancing a tactical fantasy RPG properly for a party of 6 must be a developer's nightmare tbh. But nevertheless it's imo sad that "modern" party RPGs are all only based on 4 characters or less...

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Role-playing and decision making

I think this may be a case where Larian's reach exceeded its grasp. The need to accommodate co-op play complicated things. A lot of quests which were intended to have consequences which extended farther seem to have been reduced to one-offs, because it turns out that long quest chains in highly reactive games can be a huge pain to debug especially when you add in free roaming co-op into the mix.

As I've said in another thread, increased dialogue options are nice, but would potentially quadruple the workload for those, so that's a potential issue.

Only half true. Many people erroneously think that multiple answers would lead to multiple results in most RPGs. But hat's just not the case. Mass Effect is a good example in which clever and well done writing leads to the feel of having a sophisticated choice, to "player agency". Behind the curtain many answers lead to (almost) the same result but that's not the important thing. The important thing is that the player feels that his answer can have some impact. You only notice the "trick" if you play the game several times, trying all different answers.
Good writing is the key for making a good RPG, not much writing or even branching storylines like in Witcher 2. That's nice of course but you can reach much with a lot less work but clever design...

I recommend this video about "the illusion of choice" on the topic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=45PdtGDGhac

Co-op dialogue could be a little bit more tricky because it's based on trait rewards and player interaction here. But every other dialogue, like the ones of the main quest, could profit from more choice.

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Story, quests presentation and lore

I have to agree, there's not a lot of that kind of thing around. I especially want a Source Hunter's manual. The player is placed in the role of a Source Hunter, but aren't given enough information to understand the things they're seeing.

Why is an ordinary-looking fire, indistinguishable from a normal fire surface clear evidence of Source Magic? If the Source Hunters are going to declare the crime scene as Source Magic, I want to see some proof. Show me creepy runes written in blood. Or at the very least, change the fire to burn with an unnatural purple colour.

If Jake was killed by Source Magic, why is a bloody dagger evidence? I felt like an idiot when the suspect I presented it too laughed at me for being stupid because Jake was killed by Source not steel. If the suspect was the one mistaken and the Source Hunters were right, I have to understand why.

Where is the lore about Cyseal's history, the Source King, Luculla forest, that kind of thing?

Please feed me new lore, Larian, not just references to names from Divine Divinity.

I agree.

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Graphics, sound and design

Walking around Cyseal, it was quite clear that despite the stretch goal of NPC schedules, the game was never designed for them. Yes, a suburb of houses for the generic citizens wouldn't be interesting to put in, but a lot of named NPC's had no houses or places to go. Kelvania, Bertie, Robin - they had nowhere to go even if there were schedules.

Yeah, true. But that's not only a "problem" of D:OS, it's a problem of most more or less open-world games I know. They are either out of dimension or without internal logic or generic as well. Here it's just the workload which limits the scope. It's indeed one of my personal biggest points of critique of open world games in general. wink

Last edited by LordCrash; 04/05/14 02:00 AM.

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Originally Posted by LordCrash

Can you explain me for example what "10 percent fire resistence" means? Does that mean that I receive 10% less damage from every attack based on fire? And how much is 10%? Do I have to calculate that myself?


I can! 10% fire resistance means fire does 10% less damage to you, and it's automatically calculated - the damage numbers which pop up show the reduced damage. That's really pretty common knowledge to most RPG players.


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Only half true. Many people erroneously think that multiple answers would lead to multiple results in most RPGs. But hat's just not the case. Mass Effect is a good example in which clever and well done writing leads to the feel of having a sophisticated choice, to "player agency". Behind the curtain many answers lead to (almost) the same result but that's not the important thing. The important thing is that the player feels that his answer can have some impact. You only notice the "trick" if you play the game several times, trying all different answers.


I know that making the results wouldn't be hard. You gain a certain amount of positive or negative affection points based on your responses, and having more responses just means adjusting the number of points each response get. That's simple.

It's literally just the writing of the responses that could be an issue: Right now there are four possible combinations:

Very Nice - Very Nice
Very Nice - Very Nasty
Very Nasty - Very Nice
Very Nasty - Very Nasty

The second person has four unique things to say, based on what the first person said, and what they choose to reply with. If you give each person four variants (Very Nice - Nice - Nasty - Very Nasty) on the scale, then that second person could have up to 16 unique lines. Now, that's a really cool thing from a roleplaying perspective, I agree... but it would increase the workload on the two writers.

Would I like to see all that choice? Absolutely. Would it be too much work for the writers to do for all the dialogues, on top of everything else? I don't know.

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Good summary and review, but i don't agree with everything... hehe

Originally Posted by LordCrash


Combat
In D:OS however, the outcome of certain actions is way less transparent or easy to understand. Many systems rely on percentages (like chance to hit or resistencies) but there is no obvious pattern or basic values to easily understand the system in each and every occasion.

In BG, lets say you have a +5 magic sword with 1d8+5 (or 6-13), but you also have Str 18/76 so you get another +4 (10-18), and you are a Kenasai for +2, and you are Specialised +2, and often get the strength spell, sometimes might even be buffed with multiple spells. No problem, if you are an experienced D&D player. But i would actually prefer to see the final numbers like in D:OS (you deal 14-22 damage, minus DR) instead.

To hit is about the same in BG, but you only see the likelyhood of hitting after the fact in the combat log, while in D:OS you get to see it before that (even shows your flanking modifiers). And D20+class+proficiency+magic bonus+bless+other vs AC isn't really transparent, i would prefer a percentage instead (and it is a percentage in BG, only with 5% steps). For any non-P&P-Player, its actually quite intransparent.

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2) By using casting times players had to come up with a real strategy what to do with their mages, druids and clerics. Very powerful spells needed quite some time (or behind-the-scene turns...) to be casted, letting the caster defenseless in the meantime. Mages could be interrupted all the time and their allies and tanks had to protect them (and stay alive) in the meantime.


Well, normally i used mirror image and stone skin, in the computer game spells/day were never a limitation, unlike P&P smile. Pure Mages should be protected anyway, not just due to interrupts but especially due to their health and armor.

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Party combat was much more tactical in a system with casting times than in a system with cool-down times like in Divinty: Original Sin. In D:OS mages can perform their most powerful spells in turn 1. There is no reason to wait with casting the spell.

Poor slow BG2 Mages with their Time Stop/Improved Alacrity casting feast, Chain Contingency etc^^. But i agree, during the mid levels, casting time adds a tactical element with a dungeon master / good AI present (=not in BG2 unless you intentionally break formation).

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Another effect of that is that mages in D:OS sometimes have rounds in which they don't have anything to do because they have to wait until their cool-down times are over. The usual pattern here is: stron spell, weak spell, weak spell, strong spell, weak spell, weak spell, following cool-down times.

At low levels i agree, but you also had a similar problem with the limited number of spells in BG1 (below lvl 10). But a dedicated mage with some levels in D:OS really never needs to resort to the basic damage spell.

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3) Baldur's Gate 2 offered a huge amount of spells from different categories, most or all of them based on D&D. The positive effect of that was the wide variety of spells with very unique ones not based on putting out damage as the main goal but to incapacitate players by a huge variety. BG2 offered a whole lot of very dangerous "instant kill" spells for example and dangerious spells and abilites which resulted in permanent damage to your party members (turn to stone, entomb, brain feed, finger of death,...). I like D:OS's reliance on environment spells and the combination of ground effects and spells but imo the game lacks really powerful spells to really harm or incapacitate a single enemy.

The spell interaction and effects combination system in D:OS is better than anything i remember in BG, but the damage potential of mages is definitely behind the other classes. However, i think this is both intentional and a good idea: If mages are a great at area damage, great in controlling, great damage dealers, the other classes are just filler. In P&P, this was balanced by the limited spells/day. In BG2, it wasn't balanced at all: Who needs fighters, i can summon an army. Who needs sneak attack rogues, i can stack high damage and save or die spells until my time stops run out. Who needs clerics, i take no damage anyway. Etc.

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4) You were not able to save your game during combat in Baldur's Gate 2! It's one of the very foundations of a game like that imo to prevent saving during combat. Why? Well, the core issue with that is that these games are based on randomness (dice throws in BG2 and whatever is used for D:OS). That means that every action in combat can vary in results. One of the core fascinations of games like BG2 was that you managed to overcome enemies and combat situations. The possibility to save during combat really "dumbs that down".

Agreed, i hope for an iron man mode. But if you take a look at other threads, some people are even frustrated by the game difficulty now. Not everyone is a P&P/Tactical cRPG veteran smile.

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In Baldur's Gate you couldn't even save a game if any enemies were nearby (in a certain radius). That often meant that you couldn't just heal and rest between two fights but you had to fight the way you were and with the spells and skills you had left.

But in most cases, you could just go back and save/rest.

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5) Baldur's Gate offered a party size of 6 members at the maximum while in D:OS only 4 regular members are supported. Imo 6 members were the optimal size for a party consisting of members of different professions. You often used 2 tanks (warriors, paladins, clerics, rangers,...) for melee control and defense, a ranger for support, one rogue for trap finding and shadow attacks and two spell casters (mages, wizards, druids, clerics,...) for attack, defense and support spells.

But the tanks didn't have any tactical depth in BG, the right position and focus was really all you needed. In D:OS, the Rogue/Ranger/Fighter special abilities mean you have the tactical equivalent of a 4 wizard party (in terms of micromanagement). I also think, due to turn based combat, that single turns would last too long in a bigger party, especially considering the ability to add 4 summons to the mix.

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Role-playing and decision making

Well, the comparion here should be pretty obivous. In Baldur's Gate you had extensive well written dialogues with a massive amount of decision-making. I mean real decision-making. Most of the stuff you chose in dialogues led to different results. Some answers led to combat, others not. Some led to party member leaving your party, some led to love stories. Some were just there to increase atmosphere. In my whole playthrough of the actual beta content of Divinity: Original Sin I can't recall more than a few real decision-making situations. Often you only have to choose between two answers or there is no decision to make after all. That is, actually, pretty weak for a role-playing game. Of course there is also the co-op aspect, which is pretty unique and a core feature of the game, but even the co-op dialogues only offer two answer options, often two extreme positions, probably both not fitting the way you want to roleplay your character. Compared to the massive amount of decisions and answer possibilites in Baldur's Gate 2 that's something Larian could or should improve on imo.

Quoted in full for truth, unfortunately. There are multiple interesting ways to solve quests (like pickpocketing a handkerchief and give it to a dog to check the persons guilt in a certain crime, if you can speak to animals), but the choices in dialogue itself are a bit lacking.

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Story, quests presentation and lore


I agree completely. Recepies and funny ironic stuff is ok, but some lore about the game world would be great!

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Graphics, sound and design


I agree, but thats a problem of every game with an open world (instead of snapshots and a world map like baldurs gate). I can only remember one cRPG with believable city and farm sizes (TES:Daggerfall btw.).

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Summary
And why the hell are there no toilets in the game? cheer

Also wondered about that in about every cRPG (except fallout) ;-)

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Why would someone choose, when comparing D:OS to old-school classics, an infinity engine game rather than Ultima, which has been stated multiple times to be the main inspiration behind D:OS ?

Anyway, in terms of combat, particularly, I feel like the comparison falls flat, the systems are so different from each other. I personnaly enjoy the combat in D:OS more than I have any IE game, even in its current state. That doesn't mean it can be improved still (particularly in terms of AI reactivity and challenge provided, systems & mechanics are actually OK), but I'm not sure BG2 is the optimal source of inspiration for that, I feel like the two systems aim at achieving different things.

As far as lore, story, roleplaying & quests design are concerned, well : I've never cared much for the Forgotten Realm backstories nor have I ever wasted any time entirely reading some in-game lore book in an Elder Scrolls game, which some gamers seem to be fond of. I just don't find them to be that good or interesting. To be honest, I don't care that much for Rivellon as a setting either : standard fantasy fare, nothing special to see here. I'd rather see Larian focusing on the quests depth and showing me an interesting main plot.

And about those quests, particularly, I must say that I would take D:OS reactivity, free exploration, and its quests that can be solved in multiple ways over Bioware's morality & romance "C&C" any day of the week. I actually felt like my actions as a character had more of an impact in this game : I'm investigating a murder and I can get someone arrested, even if it's not the culprit, etc. "Player agency" is defintely stronger in this game than any IE games I've played.

So, all in all, I agree that the game is far from perfect yet and that it can still be improved during the remaining development time, but I'd strongly disagree that BG2 should be taken as a model for this process. I don't want D:OS to resemble more an IE game : it already does most things in a different way, one that I personnally find preferable.

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I haven't played the game at all yet, so I can't contribute much about the specifics of the points raised but I found this thread really interesting.

The OP reads like a pretty fair and thought-provoking critique of the game. I hope Larian duly considers it. If I was to criticise the critique in turn I would suggest it seems a bit one-sided. That is, a little too much like 'I love Baldur's Gate 2 and want RPGs to be more like it, without addressing the comparative strengths of D:OS except as a side-note in passing. I appreciate that it was noted as a personal assessment and this in no way detracts from the points made, however if the aim is to consider what would make an ultimate RPG by comparison with BG2 I think we should address/debate the strengths and weaknesses of both games.

It's worth mentioning that some people think the Baldur's Gate games are pretty poor and can make substantive arguments detailing why they feel that way. I'm not arguing for relativism here, merely noting that some subjectivity is inevitable in game design discussion. Personally, I love BG2, even if I'm not sure how much I would want Larian's future games to emulate it.

I also think it's worth mentioning that Original Sin was never intended to be the big one and indeed, its initial more modest scope was greatly expanded by the kickstarter so a lot has been designed on-the-fly. I think the amount of iteration and creativity that has gone into D:OS will have been a tremendous learning experience for Larian, indeed a very valuable and important step on the road to RPG nirvana ;-)

I do wonder what Larian's vision of an 'ultimate RPG' looks like.

I mean cRPGs are so diversely feature rich that the vision will be markedly different for everybody. I could certainly agree with a vision that includes a party (six is good) in a richly lore-filled world with a deep tactical combat system and plenty of reactivity, choice & consequence, exploration and world interactivity. Not asking for much I know. Where we go from there is where things start to get tricky.


1) Combat

Having not played I can't really comment except to agree that transparency and documentation of the ruleset makes for a better experience. I would also love a game to have the depth and variety of BG2's spell casting, however I'm open to it being very different systemically. I don't think that cooldowns are fundamentally flawed in themselves, however I do think that any system that relies on them will stunt its tactical depth. I also enjoy the additional tactical layer of resource management that the Vancian casting system (spell use limited by memorisation at rest) provides, and would encourage Larian to consider, not using the system itself but, the benefits it brings to a gaming experience and how those benefits could be implemented in their own games.

About the saving thing dare I even suggest a toggle? I agree it's better to not be able to save in combat in that it makes for a more vital and dramatic experience if there is not even the possibility of save-scumming your way through it. XCOM ironman is the only way to play that game ;-) Yet there is something to be said for giving people choice in their own game. If people choose to exploit the option then they are only cheating themselves.

2) Roleplaying & Decision Making

I'm disappointed to hear that Larian may have come up short here though perhaps I shouldn't be surprised given the complexity and overall ambition of this game, its relatively modest budget and the degree of iteration involved. The dual dialogue system is just so brimming with possibilities for reactivity and C&C that I hope Larian will one day be able to fulfil its potential. Obviously I'd prefer mechanical reactivity but I'll take illusion and flavour over nothing. I enjoy using my imagination in cRPGs to go beyond what is mechanically accounted for anyway.

3) Story, Quests, Presentation & Lore

That's one of the main things I've found wanting in Larian's games to date, a lack of serious lore and world-building. I appreciate that there is probably a trade-off with the freedom of their games (for both the player and in terms of design) yet I still feel an RPG won't reach its zenith without a profound world. Of course, what Larian probably really needs is to be able to afford more staff and writers. I'm pretty damn impressed with what they have been able to achieve so far with a relatively small team. I mean think about it, here we are hoping for them to one day produce this amazing RPG. It should seem like a pipedream yet I actually believe they can do it.

I am taken aback however to learn that there are no lore books or unique items in the beta. I can only hope there is a reason for this, eg to minimise spoilers and save stuff for the release, as I was expecting this sort of stuff to be in the game, especially in an RPG that features such awesome item interactivity and discovery.

4) Graphics, Sound & Design

I happen to love the more realistic fantasy look of the Infinity Engine games (and Pillars of Eternity looks absolutely gorgeous) however I'm really glad that not all games look like that.

From what I've seen of D:OS it is looking truly beautiful now and very charming. To my eye it just 'fits' the style of game it is (how's that for a vague and subjective assertion) Actually, D:OS has made me much more open to the potential merits of 3D for 'traditional-style' cRPGs. Incidentally, to provide a contrary perspective, I found the 'slices' of the world in BG2 to be a bit dissonant and disjointed. I mean, I thought Athkatla was really well done and all, but had hoped that such 2D cities could be done better. The interlinking areas didn't seem especially organic to me and required a different kind of willing suspension of disbelief than continuous 3D games.

Variety is the spice of life (so long as we always have 2D-painted ones wink

***

Leaving the topic of D:OS and BG2 aside, my own wishes for an ultimate Larian RPG include:

1) Developing and building on this fantastic new dialogue system to provide greater reactivity and C&C. The entire party discussing things and at pivotal moments of the adventure? I can hardly imagine how complex that would be to create yet oh my god if it could be accomplished...

2) Developing an even richer combat and magic system. More, I always want more...

3) Retaining the wonderful humour, whimsy and player freedom, yet somehow combining this with a more serious and engaging overarching story and world. So far for me the story and lore of Larian's games have been fun, but haven't really made me care about Rivellon. It's more just a fun, magical wonderland to play in than a believable world that enchants me, transporting me into that fantasy.

4) The awesome world/item interactivity apparently in D:OS.

***



There are no toilets in D:OS? Immersion broken!


*Edited to fix formatting translation errors.

Last edited by Robcat; 04/05/14 08:08 AM.

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Great posts, all! smile

And a special thank you to LordCrash and Robcat for theirs. In fact, if you somehow could meld them together, you'll most likely have a fantastic piece of reflections of where D:OS is at right now. I have only played a few hours in alpha and one hour in this last beta, but I really have to join this choir of lamentation over this lack of a deeper and more engaging world. Ultima VII was extremely captivating and every item placed seemed to have some significance. And in Forgotten Realms, you get an almost Tolkien-deep lore. It's almost no end to the history, diversity and cultures there. Sometimes, Rivellon feels a bit gimmicky, like a RPG world by proxy. In Divine Divinity, this made me care less about the world, but all the humour and cool twists and turns certainly made up for that. Perhaps Rivellon needs to be taken more seriously.

As for combat, it's far too early for me to have an opinion.


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A whole wall of text to read so early in the morning hehe

I just would like to contribute one small thing. I have never played a pen-and-paper RPG, so I had not known anything about Dungeons and Dragons rules before starting Baldur's gate and Planescape Torment. So, as a result I had no idea what was going on during combats. What is 1d8 or 1d6 damage? Why is a smaller armor class value better than a bigger - it is completely confusing! What the hell is the thac0 value? A weapon proficiency - what is it good for? What is my hit chance based upon? These is just a few questions by which I was completely overwhelmed! (Not to mention that you have to manually choose the option to see the dice rolls). Of course, for a veteran D&D player these questions may seem ridiculous, but just imagine a newbie who has no idea about the existence of D&D at all! The end of my story: I think I spent almost 10 hours googling and reading and trying to understand how D&D works! Therefore, I think D:OS with its percentages is much more user friendly for new players.

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Originally Posted by Clemens

Anyway, in terms of combat...I feel like the two systems aim at achieving different things.


Quote
And about those quests, particularly, I must say that I would take D:OS reactivity, free exploration, and its quests that can be solved in multiple ways over Bioware's morality & romance "C&C" any day of the week. I actually felt like my actions as a character had more of an impact in this game.


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...I'd strongly disagree that BG2 should be taken as a model for this process. I don't want D:OS to resemble more an IE game : it already does most things in a different way, one that I personnally find preferable.


I really like these points.

Player agency is not the function of dialogue and its reactivity alone, but also of gameplay generally; Which is something I have the impression D:OS excels at, indeed far exceeding BG2.

Plus, apparently you can pull the chair out from under the mayor of Cyseal and watch him fall over? I mean, let's think about this people wink

However, I feel that D:OS and Larian's future games can certainly be informed by what made BG2 so enjoyable to so many, while still doing things differently and being games uniquely their own.


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Originally Posted by Robcat
[

Player agency is not the function of dialogue and its reactivity alone, but also of gameplay generally; Which is something I have the impression D:OS excels at, indeed far exceeding BG2.



This pretty much synthesizes what I was clumsily trying to get at. This is indeed the main quality of D:OS and, in this department, I think it (will) surpass(es) many crpgs, and notably the old IE games.

I have no problem with people arguing that Larian could take inspiration from the IE classics they enjoyed, but it certainly shouldn't be at the sacrifice of what makes D:OS really unique compared to these other games.

From what I've seen from the beta and the latest Larian presentations showcasing later game content, the complexity of the quest design and the variable outcomes, the value in exploration, the possible approaches to different obstacles, brought by the interactivity, are much more impressive than in the IE games :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2IedXabDFWw&feature=player_detailpage

The quest design around this Goblin village impressed me very much. (You also have some nice examples of C&C there) I think this is the main strength of this game and what they should keep on polishing with what little time remains, even tough some systems and the lore could be improved too.

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Wow, thanks for your contribution to everyone! It's great that so many of you wanted to take part in this discussion in a polite and stimulating manner, I haven't expected that (but I do appreciate it). I'll try to answer to you specifically in the following posts. smile


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Originally Posted by pts

In BG, lets say you have a +5 magic sword with 1d8+5 (or 6-13), but you also have Str 18/76 so you get another +4 (10-18), and you are a Kenasai for +2, and you are Specialised +2, and often get the strength spell, sometimes might even be buffed with multiple spells. No problem, if you are an experienced D&D player. But i would actually prefer to see the final numbers like in D:OS (you deal 14-22 damage, minus DR) instead.

To hit is about the same in BG, but you only see the likelyhood of hitting after the fact in the combat log, while in D:OS you get to see it before that (even shows your flanking modifiers). And D20+class+proficiency+magic bonus+bless+other vs AC isn't really transparent, i would prefer a percentage instead (and it is a percentage in BG, only with 5% steps). For any non-P&P-Player, its actually quite intransparent.

Hm, that's actually a good point. If taken all the buffs and supporting stats into account every system is way less transparent. It just happens to me that I'm one of these guys who don't have a "natural access" to the world or probabilities (though I studied maths on university...) and I always found that a system based on dice throwing and integer values is better understandable that one based on percentages, probabilities and decimal numbers. I agree that some systems in BG2 are a percentage value as well (seems like you cannot avoid that in a system based on probablities after all).
I guess that my critique of the system in D:OS is maybe at least partly based on its actual presentation or transparency. With a better explanation (in tutorial and/or manual) it could possibly improved by a significant margin. I want to know, for example, what it means if my sword has a damage of "70-177" and what that means for the "attacking value" of my warrior. To me that isn't clear or obvious enough so far.

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Well, normally i used mirror image and stone skin, in the computer game spells/day were never a limitation, unlike P&P smile. Pure Mages should be protected anyway, not just due to interrupts but especially due to their health and armor.

[...]

Poor slow BG2 Mages with their Time Stop/Improved Alacrity casting feast, Chain Contingency etc^^. But i agree, during the mid levels, casting time adds a tactical element with a dungeon master / good AI present (=not in BG2 unless you intentionally break formation).

I agree that in late/end game in BG2 most people used a certain combination or sequence of spells for their mages (with additional buffing before the combat encounter even triggered). But nevertheless I had the feeling that casting times added depth to the system. And there were indeed situations in which you could be interrupted, even in end game. Firkraag for example could insta-kill almost everyone in your party, with its fire exlosions definitely interrupting mages. The point was that they were interrupted by every damage they took (even if it was just one point). With stone skin and mirror and stuff they were no defenseless in a way that everyone could kill them instantly but in a way that enemies could indeed make your mage way less effective by interrupting your spells.

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At low levels i agree, but you also had a similar problem with the limited number of spells in BG1 (below lvl 10). But a dedicated mage with some levels in D:OS really never needs to resort to the basic damage spell.

Well, I had two mages in my D:OS playthrough of the beta, both on level 10 at the end. My fire/earth mage could only use his better fire skills once every three turns (I think fireball even once every five turns). So basically every second round the mage had to use a flare or even Stuff of Magus which doesn't seem like the best way a mage could be of use to me.
My water/air mage instead could use his lightning spell every turn. There wasn't even much of an incentive to use any other spell in combat since lightning offered much damage and a stun probability. This is even worse when lightning is used on a puddle each round.
I just prefer a system in which you have more skills at hand but can't use them as often as you want in combat. That way you have to decide which spell to use in which moment and for which enemy. Together with a great variety of spells this is more fun to me than basically casting the same two or three (or even one spell in the example with my water/air mage...) spells the whole time.

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The spell interaction and effects combination system in D:OS is better than anything i remember in BG, but the damage potential of mages is definitely behind the other classes. However, i think this is both intentional and a good idea: If mages are a great at area damage, great in controlling, great damage dealers, the other classes are just filler. In P&P, this was balanced by the limited spells/day. In BG2, it wasn't balanced at all: Who needs fighters, i can summon an army. Who needs sneak attack rogues, i can stack high damage and save or die spells until my time stops run out. Who needs clerics, i take no damage anyway. Etc.

Well, I guess it depended on how you've played BG2. I had some pretty effective fighters in my playthroughs whos "killing stats" matched those of my attack mages. A properly buffed paladin wearing Carsomyr for example was a killer machine and not comparable to summoned creatures. And again, mages could be interrupted. You needed warriors/tanks to keep enemies away from them. I agree that time stop in BG2 was overpowered. But it never appeared game breaking or completely balancing breaking to me though.
Clerics and healers of course had their part in the party, healing the tanks in the right moment. In my experience healing abilities were among the most important skills back in the days...
But I agree on your point that in D:OS mages seem more like made for crowd control and environmental combinations. Don't get me wrong, I love this feature and it's something D:OS really stands out. But imo there is also the danger of "one-dimensional" playstyle for mages. There is hardly any incentive to not set enemy groups on fire with a fire mage or to not stun groups of enemies with lightning and water. That's a cool feature but it can get boring after some time I fear.

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Agreed, i hope for an iron man mode. But if you take a look at other threads, some people are even frustrated by the game difficulty now. Not everyone is a P&P/Tactical cRPG veteran smile.

True indeed. But I don't think that the ability to save during combat is directly connected with the difficulty of the game. The game should be easy enough in easy mode to win almost every encounter without the need of saves during combat. To me the ability to save during combat is more or less a design decision. Maybe it was invented as a try to bring some convenience to the game but imo there is no need for that since combat encounters hardly last more than a few minutes and it definitely takes away from the fascination of "solving" solutions and enconunters.

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But in most cases, you could just go back and save/rest.

True. The resting system wasn't without flaws. Most people tried to rest as often as they could, travelling back and forth the whole time. At least there was the "random encounter" functionality which tried to prevent you from resting everywhere. Each system has its pros and cons. But to me the cons were simply outweighted by the pros in BG2.

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But the tanks didn't have any tactical depth in BG, the right position and focus was really all you needed. In D:OS, the Rogue/Ranger/Fighter special abilities mean you have the tactical equivalent of a 4 wizard party (in terms of micromanagement). I also think, due to turn based combat, that single turns would last too long in a bigger party, especially considering the ability to add 4 summons to the mix.

Well, first of all I don't think that summons add anything to the combat at the moment. They don't stand for full party members. I actually hoped for something like that during the kickstarter. It was never communicated that clear that summons are just elementals who are there for only 2-3 turn and who can only hit in melee and use ONE spell/skill at the maximum. That's boring and doesn't add to the depth of combat. Mostly you just use summons to distract or occupy enemies (to take them out of the equation for a while) instead of using them for more sophisticated group tactics.
I can't agree on the micromanagement of a "4 wizards party". First, I don't use micromanagement that much after all in D:OS. The game is pretty straight-forward which cuts out the need for it imo. Second, I don't see warriors and rangers as wizards. Sure, they maybe have more skills than their equivalents in BG2, but they are still used for the same purpose, basically doing the same. You still put your warrior in melee combat and let your ranger shoot arrows. That doesn't make them wizards to me tbh. wink
I agree that more party members can make turn-based combat lasting a lot longer. But at the moment combat encounters doesn't last more than a view minutes so I don't see the point. And other games like Dragon Age which is based on a RTwP system has reduced party numbers as well which is an indication to me that devs tend to reduce party size in order to make balancing easier and to reduce the workload. That's ok and I know there are limitations but it's still sad somehow.

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Quoted in full for truth, unfortunately. There are multiple interesting ways to solve quests (like pickpocketing a handkerchief and give it to a dog to check the persons guilt in a certain crime, if you can speak to animals), but the choices in dialogue itself are a bit lacking.

I agree. Quests indeed offer nice ways of solving which are not based on dialogue but on finding secrets or items and stuff. But the dialogues themselves are lacking compared to other games, both in scope and in player agency.


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Originally Posted by Clemens
Why would someone choose, when comparing D:OS to old-school classics, an infinity engine game rather than Ultima, which has been stated multiple times to be the main inspiration behind D:OS ?

Well, it was my intention to compare D:OS to BG 2 because BG 2 is seen by many people (though there are of course people who disagree on that) as the best game of its genre. It wasn't my intention to say that D:OS should be like BG 2, not after all. I just wanted to show why BG 2 was so captivating in many aspects and how D:OS does compared to that.
If you want to make a comprehensive comparison between D:OS and Ultima VII, feel free to do so. I thnk it would be very much appreciated. smile

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Anyway, in terms of combat, particularly, I feel like the comparison falls flat, the systems are so different from each other. I personnaly enjoy the combat in D:OS more than I have any IE game, even in its current state. That doesn't mean it can be improved still (particularly in terms of AI reactivity and challenge provided, systems & mechanics are actually OK), but I'm not sure BG2 is the optimal source of inspiration for that, I feel like the two systems aim at achieving different things.

Even if systems are different you can always take inspiration from working solutions. That doesn't mean that you follow the same route or abandon your own solution. But imo it's worth to see how other games solved similar problems, for better or worse.

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As far as lore, story, roleplaying & quests design are concerned, well : I've never cared much for the Forgotten Realm backstories nor have I ever wasted any time entirely reading some in-game lore book in an Elder Scrolls game, which some gamers seem to be fond of. I just don't find them to be that good or interesting. To be honest, I don't care that much for Rivellon as a setting either : standard fantasy fare, nothing special to see here. I'd rather see Larian focusing on the quests depth and showing me an interesting main plot.

If you are generally not that interested in lore then it's of course not an important element of the game. That is quite understandable. I admit that I don't read any book in Tamriel or every item description in the Forgotten Realms as well. But just their existence adds to the atmosphere and "richness" of the game world to me, you know. It's more about a feeling for me than about the actual enjoyment of reading stuff... wink

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And about those quests, particularly, I must say that I would take D:OS reactivity, free exploration, and its quests that can be solved in multiple ways over Bioware's morality & romance "C&C" any day of the week. I actually felt like my actions as a character had more of an impact in this game : I'm investigating a murder and I can get someone arrested, even if it's not the culprit, etc. "Player agency" is defintely stronger in this game than any IE games I've played.

Hm, I think there is a great difference between the Bioware of BG2 and the Bioware of Dragon Age/ Mass effect, for once. But I think you either misunderstood what I was trying to say or I wasn't able to make my point clear enough. I agree that maybe your actions in D:OS have more actual impact. But that's not what I critizied here. I critized the lack of possibilites for actual role playing. Let's take for example the co-op dialogues. In the current state of the beta you have to choose between two answers, both extreme positions. This actually destroys roleplaying because your have to take one of these extreme positions even if it doesn't fit your character and the way you want to play. So maybe those are two different levels of player agency. The first, which is quite good in D:OS, about what you can actually do and influence, and the second, which is lacking in D:OS, about how you can roleplay your character.
I agree that games like Ultima VII and D:OS have their focus on the first one, interactivty and influencing and changing the world like you want. Bioware games usually have a focus on the latter one with a quite "solid and unchangable environment" but pretty strong options to roleplay a character. I think it's maybe even two distinctive way of game design: a more linear, emotional approach like in Bioware games and a more sand-boxy, open approach like in a game like D:OS.
Well, I do admit that I'm quite a fan of Bioware games (though I think that BG 2 was the top and they slowly decayed after...) and I somehow miss the depth or role-playing the the richness of dialogue. To each their own I guess. wink

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So, all in all, I agree that the game is far from perfect yet and that it can still be improved during the remaining development time, but I'd strongly disagree that BG2 should be taken as a model for this process. I don't want D:OS to resemble more an IE game : it already does most things in a different way, one that I personnally find preferable.

Again, it wasn't my intention to say that D:OS should be more like BG 2 or even adopt its systems. It was my intention to detect weaknesses in system design. A comparion with a great game of the same genre (often the reference game) is actually a good way for doing so. wink


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Originally Posted by LordCrash

Well, it was my intention to compare D:OS to BG 2 because BG 2 is seen by many people (though there are of course people who disagree on that) as the best game of its genre. It wasn't my intention to say that D:OS should be like BG 2, not after all. I just wanted to show why BG 2 was so captivating in many aspects and how D:OS does compared to that.

[...]

Even if systems are different you can always take inspiration from working solutions. That doesn't mean that you follow the same route or abandon your own solution. But imo it's worth to see how other games solved similar problems, for better or worse.



Which is understandable and commendable, even if I don't necessarily agree with that methodology or that BG2 is the greatest rpg, there's certainly good things to be taken from it, that's a given.

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It's more about a feeling for me than about the actual enjoyment of reading stuff... wink

[...]

Hm, I think there is a great difference between the Bioware of BG2 and the Bioware of Dragon Age/ Mass effect, for once. But I think you either misunderstood what I was trying to say or I wasn't able to make my point clear enough. I agree that maybe your actions in D:OS have more actual impact. But that's not what I critizied here. I critized the lack of possibilites for actual role playing. Let's take for example the co-op dialogues. In the current state of the beta you have to choose between two answers, both extreme positions. This actually destroys roleplaying because your have to take one of these extreme positions even if it doesn't fit your character and the way you want to play. So maybe those are two different levels of player agency. The first, which is quite good in D:OS, about what you can actually do and influence, and the second, which is lacking in D:OS, about how you can roleplay your character.
I agree that games like Ultima VII and D:OS have their focus on the first one, interactivty and influencing and changing the world like you want. Bioware games usually have a focus on the latter one with a quite "solid and unchangable environment" but pretty strong options to roleplay a character. I think it's maybe even two distinctive way of game design: a more linear, emotional approach like in Bioware games and a more sand-boxy, open approach like in a game like D:OS.
Well, I do admit that I'm quite a fan of Bioware games (though I think that BG 2 was the top and they slowly decayed after...) and I somehow miss the depth or role-playing the the richness of dialogue. To each their own I guess. wink



I guess this is where we diverge the most. I did enjoy some Bioware games myself, but this is one design philosophy/goal about which I strongly stand on Larian's side : I don't care about roleplaying options that don't actually have any impact in the game, because, as far as I'm concerned, those are not roleplaying opportunities.

I see no value in "roleplaying" something that's only for you, something that the game world or other characters will never acknowledge (something that some slightly less friendly posters on some slightly less friendly forum might call "larping"). I can see how it can seem appealing to some and how it can add some flavor to their game experience, but I'd rather see Larian focusing on polishing quests & dialogues with already existing, actual variable outcomes than divert resources to implementing new things like that.

So, I don't have a problem with the "extreme" positions you can currently choose in decision dialogues : I care that whatever my choice is, it will affect the game in a (relatively speaking) meaningful, tangible way. I'll always prefer limited, meaningful choices, than multiple, purely cosmetic options. So far, D:OS didn't disappoint me on this, and this pleases me very much ! smile

As you said, to each their own, but don't ask me to get on board to make D:OS more Biowarian in this regard. wink

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Again, it wasn't my intention to say that D:OS should be more like BG 2 or even adopt its systems. It was my intention to detect weaknesses in system design. A comparion with a great game of the same genre (often the reference game) is actually a good way for doing so. wink


You're right about that and it indeed makes for an interesting discussion, cheers. wink

Last edited by Clemens; 04/05/14 02:32 PM.
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Originally Posted by Robcat

The OP reads like a pretty fair and thought-provoking critique of the game. I hope Larian duly considers it. If I was to criticise the critique in turn I would suggest it seems a bit one-sided. That is, a little too much like 'I love Baldur's Gate 2 and want RPGs to be more like it, without addressing the comparative strengths of D:OS except as a side-note in passing. I appreciate that it was noted as a personal assessment and this in no way detracts from the points made, however if the aim is to consider what would make an ultimate RPG by comparison with BG2 I think we should address/debate the strengths and weaknesses of both games.

I admit it: BG 2 is my personal favorite game of all times (until now). So it's quite natural for me personally to compare D:OS with BG 2 given the fact that both games are incidentially in the same genre... wink

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It's worth mentioning that some people think the Baldur's Gate games are pretty poor and can make substantive arguments detailing why they feel that way. I'm not arguing for relativism here, merely noting that some subjectivity is inevitable in game design discussion. Personally, I love BG2, even if I'm not sure how much I would want Larian's future games to emulate it.

Of course there are people who don't like BG 2 that much. There are even (numerous) people who think that BG 2's combat system is "weaksauce" (though most of them are just against RTwP combat in general and not against the particular basic systems working in the background). My post was just my personal assessment, no question. People are free to disagree and actually there are quite a few people here on this topic already who did so. I think that's great and I love to talk about my favorite games with other people. It's not so much about "Hey Larian, you have to adopt system X in D:OS" but more about "Hey Larian, there was once this great game called BG 2. It could be worth a second look why this game was good and where it was possibly lacking." I think a thread like that can be indeed thought provocing which is everything I ask for. Discussing about game mechnics, assessing their pros and cons, reflecting interfering systems, thinking about solutions, that's how game design comes to life in the first place. It can't be wrong to open your mind and think about different solutions. I mean there must be some reason why you came up with your solution in the first place so you must have pretty solid arguments for its existence. "Testing" these arguments against other solutions is a pretty strong and essential way of actually assessing whether you have a good and working system or not. And sometimes (or often) you just come to the conclusion that both systems are pretty cool and working and just solve the problem with different elements and features. That's indeed pretty cool because it adds variety to gaming. wink

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I also think it's worth mentioning that Original Sin was never intended to be the big one and indeed, its initial more modest scope was greatly expanded by the kickstarter so a lot has been designed on-the-fly. I think the amount of iteration and creativity that has gone into D:OS will have been a tremendous learning experience for Larian, indeed a very valuable and important step on the road to RPG nirvana ;-)

I know. I just wanted to spike Swen a little bit for his "the RPG to dwarf them all" statement once in his blog. I do know that D:Os never was intended to be that game, to make that sure. Nevertheless Swen mentioned in the latest kickstarter update that with all the additional funding D:OS acutally is quite closer to this final "end goal" than Larian intially thought. Well, that statement needed a little assessment I thought for myself... laugh

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I do wonder what Larian's vision of an 'ultimate RPG' looks like.

Then we are already two... smile

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I mean cRPGs are so diversely feature rich that the vision will be markedly different for everybody. I could certainly agree with a vision that includes a party (six is good) in a richly lore-filled world with a deep tactical combat system and plenty of reactivity, choice & consequence, exploration and world interactivity. Not asking for much I know. Where we go from there is where things start to get tricky.

Well, the issue is (though some people might disagree again) than RPGs are the most complex and difficult games to develop. You need pretty strong skills in almost every possible department and you need a very good design for various interfering systems in the first place. This can be very tricky indeed. The problem here in particular is that "failures" or "weaknesses" in core systems are hard to solve or balance later in development. You can't just change your basic systems one month before release. That's illusional. So maybe BG 2's biggest strength was to rely on its pen & paper solution. That system was playtested for years with several editions and improvements made over the years and the biggest challenge was to adopt it to a computer experience. The challenge is even harder if you have to come up with every basic system on your own. There is hardly no experience whether things will work in the end or not. Of course you make a lot of internal playtesting but you will never be able to make real long-term tests with hundreds of people. I mean, look at the alpha and beta versions of D:OS. Can you even imagine what the game would look like without the tons of player feedback given to Larian during the past months and weeks? That's already a great source of both inspiration and system assessment and I hope that it will result in a pretty solid RPG experience.
And of course I know the realities of game development. It's pretty impossible to make a game of BG 2's scope today. I even wonder how they managed to make a game like that in 2000. Every today's bigger or smaller publisher would call them insane.
I also fear that my intial post here might look a little bit "overcritizicing" but that wasn't my intention. You could just read my Steam review to see that I actually pretty love D:OS. Comparing a game with my-all time favorite is imo already a damn honor. There is a great difference between being great and being almost perfect though. Maybe I would give BG 2 a 9.5/10 and D:OS an 8.5/10. That would still pretty much be a damn great game which makes a lot of things quite different than my personal reference but is nevertheless enjoying as hell. I do respect what Larian did with its resources and I think D:OS is a quite strong and entertaining game. But it could need some improvements here and there and some things are just impossible to fulfil today (like the scope of BG 2). That's just a reality and no actual critique. wink

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1) Combat

Having not played I can't really comment except to agree that transparency and documentation of the ruleset makes for a better experience. I would also love a game to have the depth and variety of BG2's spell casting, however I'm open to it being very different systemically. I don't think that cooldowns are fundamentally flawed in themselves, however I do think that any system that relies on them will stunt its tactical depth. I also enjoy the additional tactical layer of resource management that the Vancian casting system (spell use limited by memorisation at rest) provides, and would encourage Larian to consider, not using the system itself but, the benefits it brings to a gaming experience and how those benefits could be implemented in their own games.

That's a pretty decent assessment, I like it. I think that the development of D:OS is far too progressed to actually think about basic design enhancements or changes (like inventing some variations of the Vancian system). But as you said, it's worth considering the strenghts (and weaknesses) of such a system for future games (or even mods???). And as you perfectl said yourself, there is no need to adopt a system. There are endless possiblities to combine systems and to come up with new solutions based on old solutions. wink

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About the saving thing dare I even suggest a toggle? I agree it's better to not be able to save in combat in that it makes for a more vital and dramatic experience if there is not even the possibility of save-scumming your way through it. XCOM ironman is the only way to play that game ;-) Yet there is something to be said for giving people choice in their own game. If people choose to exploit the option then they are only cheating themselves.

To be honest, I'd always vote for more freedom. Giving the player various sliders and options to personalize their gaming experience before starting a new campaign would be a highly appreciated solution. I don't think that stuff like that should only be possible in an "ironman mode" though tbh. Why not seperating difficulty settings and other distinctive options to give the player even more freedom? Just add some sliders and toggles on top of difficutly settings (like no saving during fights, no resurrection/perma-death,...). It wouldn't be that much work to actually implement a system like that but it would result in a very important improvement for quite a few people (me included) I guess. PC gamers and especially RPG gamers imo always look for ways to personalize their gaming experience. Just give them options! smile

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2) Roleplaying & Decision Making

I'm disappointed to hear that Larian may have come up short here though perhaps I shouldn't be surprised given the complexity and overall ambition of this game, its relatively modest budget and the degree of iteration involved. The dual dialogue system is just so brimming with possibilities for reactivity and C&C that I hope Larian will one day be able to fulfil its potential. Obviously I'd prefer mechanical reactivity but I'll take illusion and flavour over nothing. I enjoy using my imagination in cRPGs to go beyond what is mechanically accounted for anyway.

And again I agree. Like I said before, there is quite a difference between the "illusion of choice" and the "mechanical reactivity". Mechanical reactivity would mean a simple cause and effect system. Choosing A results in B. With a system not only based on mechanical reactivity but also on the illusion of choice there are also things possible like choosing A results in B and choosing C results in B as well (maybe with little deviations). The biggest problem with a system like that is that it's extremely challenging to create. You don't only have to write a lot of dialogues but they must be written and connected in a way to still actually make sense. Players should FEEL that their choice results in a fitting reaction but it doesn't have to be another reaction than another choice would have resulted in. That's the really tricky part. Bioware are quite good in doing so. It's one of the reasons why their games offer a huge load of different dialogue options (at least more than D:OS in its current state). Bioware was critizised for their "illusion of choice" model but imo the critique was rather unfair. You can always review a system from the end, deconstructing how it is created and stating "Hey, it's no real choice. It's just an illusion." That's quite easy but not very solid because you don't feel that way while you're playing (which is in fact way more important than everything else). While playing you have the feeling of having a choice just by the possibility to choose among different answers. More answers raise the possiblity to actually find one that fits your role and your thinking. Who really cares if another answer would have resulted in the same reward or answer? You maybe never find that out if you don't replay the game numerous times, always choosing different answers. wink

I talked a lot about dialogues now but I want to say again that I personally think that outside of dialogues roleplaying and decision making is pretty solid in D:OS. Its humurous take on many tropes and its own game world and systems and clever ideas make up for a lot which is missing in actual dialogues. However, I would really like more options in dialogue.

One thing I've mentioned on top of that is that I can't recall any dialogue line with a regular NPC that required a certain ability from my character. I think the initial charm, intimidate, reason system had a huge potential to open certain dialogue branches (maybe like in Mass Effect in which some dialogue lines are only accessible if you have the fitting reputition). It's pretty sad that maybe this potential won't come to fruition due to time and budget limitations. frown

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3) Story, Quests, Presentation & Lore

That's one of the main things I've found wanting in Larian's games to date, a lack of serious lore and world-building. I appreciate that there is probably a trade-off with the freedom of their games (for both the player and in terms of design) yet I still feel an RPG won't reach its zenith without a profound world. Of course, what Larian probably really needs is to be able to afford more staff and writers. I'm pretty damn impressed with what they have been able to achieve so far with a relatively small team. I mean think about it, here we are hoping for them to one day produce this amazing RPG. It should seem like a pipedream yet I actually believe they can do it.

I am taken aback however to learn that there are no lore books or unique items in the beta. I can only hope there is a reason for this, eg to minimise spoilers and save stuff for the release, as I was expecting this sort of stuff to be in the game, especially in an RPG that features such awesome item interactivity and discovery.

I think we're pretty much on the same level, you and me. I agree again. smile
To be honest, games like Baldur's Gate and for example the Witcher have one great advantage in term of lore and the richness of their respective gaming worlds: both are based on novels or other sources of story and lore buildng. They can just make use of what is already there in most cases without the need to come up with completely new ideas and world mechanics and internal logics. That's probably a huge work relief for writers.
Elder Scrolls on the other hand is known for its lore. Lore in Elder Scrolls is one of its core features, one of its unique selling points. I mean, the latest Elder Scrolls games are that lacking in many aspects (like quests and story and internal logics for example) it would be a shame if they couldn't at least come up with some pretty decent lore... laugh
Back to Divinity: I really hope that we will see at least some more lore and backstory in the final game. At least some books to read, some secrets to explore, some unique items, some additional dialogue lines about the world and stuff. I know that the time is short and I guess that the writers are already quite occupied but it would be a tragedy to not bestow Rivellon the respective honor it deserves in D:OS. wink

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4) Graphics, Sound & Design

I happen to love the more realistic fantasy look of the Infinity Engine games (and Pillars of Eternity looks absolutely gorgeous) however I'm really glad that not all games look like that.

From what I've seen of D:OS it is looking truly beautiful now and very charming. To my eye it just 'fits' the style of game it is (how's that for a vague and subjective assertion) Actually, D:OS has made me much more open to the potential merits of 3D for 'traditional-style' cRPGs. Incidentally, to provide a contrary perspective, I found the 'slices' of the world in BG2 to be a bit dissonant and disjointed. I mean, I thought Athkatla was really well done and all, but had hoped that such 2D cities could be done better. The interlinking areas didn't seem especially organic to me and required a different kind of willing suspension of disbelief than continuous 3D games.

Variety is the spice of life (so long as we always have 2D-painted ones wink

I think that in terms of art design D:OS truly stands out. The style of the game just fits the overall design of the game quite well, I absolutely agree. Same is true for BG 2 of course, which had a more "serious" world design based on a more serious story (in comparison to the more easy-minded and humorous take in D:OS).
Both 2D and 3D worlds have their pros and cons. As you've said, the transitions between maps are one of the biggest challenges in 2D worlds and you have to have some pretty decent imagination to not "fall out of immersion" here. But in general, classic 2D gamer like Baldur's Gate rely heavily on imagination. Their whole design is based on imagination (we shouldn't forget that these games were direct transfers of pen&paper games which were ALL about imagination...). Games with a coherent 3D design and world tend to take away from that need of imagination and add to the immersion by system (as I would call it). Today, we gamers are used to that kind of game since almost all the modern games we play are based on more or less realistic 3D worlds, created to be more movie-like with a heavy focus on senses and less focus on imagination (voice-overs instead of written dialogues are another one of these paradigm changes).
D:OS is imo a game which tries to cater to both possible game design approaches to a certain extend, the games-as-movie approach("please the senses") and the games-as-novels approach ("use your imagination"). That's really cool but it comes with certain compromises as you might expect. There is just no way to make the "perfect" game in terms of general game design. In the end it always comes down to personal taste.
However, there is one certain strength of 2D and distinctive levels than can't be rivaled by 3D coherent worlds: the human imagination can always add to what is missing but it cannot change what is there. That means: I can imagine the city of Athkatla even if only slices are presented to me. I just imagine the rest in my head. But I can't think of additional houses or other stuff in my mind and add them to Cyseal in my imagination. That just doesn't work because the world is coherent. There is nothing left for imagination. wink

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***

Leaving the topic of D:OS and BG2 aside, my own wishes for an ultimate Larian RPG include:

1) Developing and building on this fantastic new dialogue system to provide greater reactivity and C&C. The entire party discussing things and at pivotal moments of the adventure? I can hardly imagine how complex that would be to create yet oh my god if it could be accomplished...

2) Developing an even richer combat and magic system. More, I always want more...

3) Retaining the wonderful humour, whimsy and player freedom, yet somehow combining this with a more serious and engaging overarching story and world. So far for me the story and lore of Larian's games have been fun, but haven't really made me care about Rivellon. It's more just a fun, magical wonderland to play in than a believable world that enchants me, transporting me into that fantasy.

4) The awesome world/item interactivity apparently in D:OS.

***

You have my full support on each point mentioned. smile


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There are no toilets in D:OS? Immersion broken!

5/10 because missing toilets. Real shame... laugh


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Originally Posted by LordCrash
I want to know, for example, what it means if my sword has a damage of "70-177" and what that means for the "attacking value" of my warrior.


I honestly don't understand what you find so confusing about this.

Your damage value is listed in the stats screen, so if your damage is listed as "70-177", that means that you will do somewhere between 70 and 177 damage with an attack, before armour and resistances of the target are taken into account.

What are the armour and resistances of the target? Put points into Loremaster to find out (once it isn't bugged, that is). Points into Loremaster will also let you know how much health the enemy has so you can decide if targeting it is a good use of your time.

What is an "attacking value"?

***

I agree that casting times for high-level spells could be interesting and something that D:OS could make use of, as well as giving Willpower something else to do, since so far, mental statuses seem very rare.

I don't think under such a system, once a spell is charged it should automatically cast, though. The battlefield can have changed quite a bit in the turns since. You should have the choice whether to cast it or not, heck, maybe even you can hold off on using it until later in the fight, since you did spend those turns charging it up.

I don't think that being able to walk around in real-time means that you can't use spells which take multiple turns to charge. One round is 6 seconds of real time, so when casting the spell in real time, your character freezes and a little progress bar appears overhead like with crafting or identifying to show your progress until the spell is charged and ready.


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My water/air mage instead could use his lightning spell every turn.


You are mistaken. Blitzbolt has a 2 turn cooldown, so you can only use it every other turn. You can't use it every turn. It also has only a 35% chance to stun (I believe higher if the enemy is wet).

***

I also don't really agree with your wish for magic. You want mages, in addition to their existing wide variety of damage, AoE, status-inflicting, heals, buffs, debuffs, summons, and control spells, to also get high-damage single-target spells, and you want them to be able to cast an important spell every single turn. A "button you press to make something awesome happen", as it were.

You essentially want D:OS to follow the unbalanced "Linear Warriors, Quadratic Wizards" formula, and be able to do everything with ease.

Sorry, but I can't agree that would be the right direction to take D:OS.


Originally Posted by Clemens
So, I don't have a problem with the "extreme" positions you can currently choose in decision dialogues : I care that whatever my choice is, it will affect the game in a (relatively speaking) meaningful, tangible way. I'll always prefer limited, meaningful choices, than multiple, purely cosmetic options.


If there were multiple different dialogue options, then they WOULDN'T be cosmetic, it would be easy to adjust the numbers they move the affection stat behind the scenes for each of the options, so that each option would give a different amount of positive or negative affection.

It's the actual writing of all those dialogue options that would be the hard part.



Last edited by Stabbey; 04/05/14 02:41 PM. Reason: clemens
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Originally Posted by Clemens
Originally Posted by LordCrash

It's more about a feeling for me than about the actual enjoyment of reading stuff... wink

[...]

Hm, I think there is a great difference between the Bioware of BG2 and the Bioware of Dragon Age/ Mass effect, for once. But I think you either misunderstood what I was trying to say or I wasn't able to make my point clear enough. I agree that maybe your actions in D:OS have more actual impact. But that's not what I critizied here. I critized the lack of possibilites for actual role playing. Let's take for example the co-op dialogues. In the current state of the beta you have to choose between two answers, both extreme positions. This actually destroys roleplaying because your have to take one of these extreme positions even if it doesn't fit your character and the way you want to play. So maybe those are two different levels of player agency. The first, which is quite good in D:OS, about what you can actually do and influence, and the second, which is lacking in D:OS, about how you can roleplay your character.
I agree that games like Ultima VII and D:OS have their focus on the first one, interactivty and influencing and changing the world like you want. Bioware games usually have a focus on the latter one with a quite "solid and unchangable environment" but pretty strong options to roleplay a character. I think it's maybe even two distinctive way of game design: a more linear, emotional approach like in Bioware games and a more sand-boxy, open approach like in a game like D:OS.
Well, I do admit that I'm quite a fan of Bioware games (though I think that BG 2 was the top and they slowly decayed after...) and I somehow miss the depth or role-playing the the richness of dialogue. To each their own I guess. wink



I guess this is where we diverge the most. I did enjoy some Bioware games myself, but this is one design philosophy/goal for which I strongly stand on Larian's side : I don't care of roleplaying options that don't actually have any impact in the game, because, as far as I'm concerned, those are not roleplaying opportunities.

I see no value in "roleplaying" something that's only for you, something that the game world or other characters will never acknowledge (something that some slightly less friendly posters on some slightly less friendly forum might call "larping"). I can see how it can seem appealing to some and how it can add some flavor to their game experience, but I'd rather see Larian focusing on polishing quests & dialogues with already existing, actual variable outcomes than divert resources to implementing new things like that.


Well, I know that opinions vary on this point by a great margin. It all depends on how you role play and what you personally expect from an RPG.
Personally, I don't see games, especially RPGs, as "games-by-systems". I see RPGs mostly as emotional experiences. Giving me the illusion of choice indeed changes the way I feel in games.

Example:
1) Game A gives me only two answer possibilites: one extremely positive one and one extremely negatie one. Both answers result in different story branches or outcomes.
2) Game B gives me four answer possibilities: one extremely positive, one moderately positve, one moderately negative, one extremely negative. Both the positive answers and both the negative answers result in different story branches or outcomes (the only difference between each of the two is a slightly divergent answer to match the tone of your own reply).

Some people (like you I guess, correct me if not) would now argue that game B is cheating and that there is no reason for two distinct positive or negative answers to exist because they both result in the same story branch or outcome. I can partly understand that opinion although I don't share it. It seems that you don't play the game to "play a role for yourself" but to explore what the game has to offer in systems and possibilities. For me, on the opposite, there is a great difference and I would always prefer game B (if well constructed/written). The reason is quite simple: if I can only choose between two extreme answers but none of these feel correct for what I personally think (or my roleplaying avatar should think...) I "fell out of character" which results in an instant break of immersion. But even before I have a better experience with more options available to choose from. I don't care if the results are the same (why even should I if I don't know the answer?), I care about what COULD happen with taking different answers.

Apart from Bioware games maybe Telltale's games are the best example for almost perfect illusion of choice. Let's take Walking Dead. Most people love the game because it causes them to make decisions, decisions with more or less tragic outcomes. The players know that so each decision causes a moral dilemma for some, thinking about the possible outcomes and feeling responsible for their actions. But again behind the curtain the differences aren't that big no matter which answer you choose. The system kind of betrays you but it never directly affects you because the illusion is just working. Some people though can't feel that moral dilemma of choice (I have talked with quite some of them). They care more for the systems and real outcomes than for the direct decisions presented. They feel cheated if the outcome stays the same, reviewing the action from the end, for whatever reason.

Maybe you could enlighten me what your main concern with games like that is? I try to understand it but I don't really get it. What is the problem with illusion of choice for you? You said that you don't care for "roleplaying [...] that's only for you". Why? I mean, don't you play for yourself and your own experience, at least in single player? For whom do you play if you don't care that much about the roleplaying aspects for yourself? Did I misunderstand you here?


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Originally Posted by Stabbey
Originally Posted by LordCrash
I want to know, for example, what it means if my sword has a damage of "70-177" and what that means for the "attacking value" of my warrior.


I honestly don't understand what you find so confusing about this.

Your damage value is listed in the stats screen, so if your damage is listed as "70-177", that means that you will do somewhere between 70 and 177 damage with an attack, before armour and resistances of the target are taken into account.

What are the armour and resistances of the target? Put points into Loremaster to find out (once it isn't bugged, that is). Points into Loremaster will also let you know how much health the enemy has so you can decide if targeting it is a good use of your time.

Hm, then again my loremaster skill didn't work properly (and I thought perception would cause these effects...)

Maybe it's also just my game, but I recall that the damage indicators shown on screen in combat don't always match the combat log or are just lacking values. When my fire mages casted Staff of Maugs with e.g. 30-50 air damage there was just 25 damage shown on screen with no indication how much damage points were nullified by armour or resistencies...

As I've said before, maybe with some more clarification on concepts and more transparency the system would be better understandable. Not only in theory but also in each combat situation. wink

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I agree that casting times for high-level spells could be interesting and something that D:OS could make use of, as well as giving Willpower something else to do, since so far, mental statuses seem very rare.

I don't think under such a system, once a spell is charged it should automatically cast, though. The battlefield can have changed quite a bit in the turns since. You should have the choice whether to cast it or not, heck, maybe even you can hold off on using it until later in the fight, since you did spend those turns charging it up.

Hm, I don't know if I understand what you mean or if you understood what I meant...

I'll give it a try though: so you basically agree on my suggestion but you want to give the player the decision to actually cast the spell once casted? I actually agree on that if the mage is "occupied with casting" until the spell is ready. Giving the player the option to abort the currently casted spell in each turn is actually a really good idea. Of course the system should also automatically abort the casting if the targeted enemy is already dead for example.

The main point of my suggestion was that mages shouldn't be able to move or do anything as long as they cast powerful spells. That makes them actually pretty vulnerable and their inability to move/act adds depth to the tactical system. wink

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I don't think that being able to walk around in real-time means that you can't use spells which take multiple turns to charge. One round is 6 seconds of real time, so when casting the spell in real time, your character freezes and a little progress bar appears overhead like with crafting or identifying to show your progress until the spell is charged and ready.

Hm, I never talked about real-time. There is no sense of casting times in real-time imo since real-time means that there is no combat... wink

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My water/air mage instead could use his lightning spell every turn.


You are mistaken. Blitzbolt has a 2 turn cooldown, so you can only use it every other turn. You can't use it every turn. It also has only a 35% chance to stun (I believe higher if the enemy is wet).

Hm, maybe my games was bugged then. I could cast lightning every turn later in the game. And usually you use rain in combination with lightning (to make enemies wet and to create puddles). That's a really overpowered combination imo. wink

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I also don't really agree with your wish for magic. You want mages, in addition to their existing wide variety of damage, AoE, status-inflicting, heals, buffs, debuffs, summons, and control spells, to also get high-damage single-target spells, and you want them to be able to cast an important spell every single turn. A "button you press to make something awesome happen", as it were.

You essentially want D:OS to follow the unbalanced "Linear Warriors, Quadratic Wizards" formula, and be able to do everything with ease.

I don't think that "Linear warriors, quadratic wizards" is unbalanced by nature. I would even say that D:OS in its current state is way more unbalanced than any game I know with the formula above.

I think your main mistconception is that you think that I want mages to perform a powerful spell each turn. I want the opposite tbh. That's the reason why I actually want casting times. Casting times makes mages extremely less powerful but adds tactical depth at the same time. With casting times which leave mages defenseless you actually need your warriors to "hold the line" and occupy the enemy. And I do think that some spells are actually overpowered atm, a lot of them environmental combinations.

Of course you don't have to like the concept/formula but I do. I do quite a lot tbh. And it's only your assumption that this has to be unbalanced. That really depends on how you design the system in particular.

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Originally Posted by Clemens
So, I don't have a problem with the "extreme" positions you can currently choose in decision dialogues : I care that whatever my choice is, it will affect the game in a (relatively speaking) meaningful, tangible way. I'll always prefer limited, meaningful choices, than multiple, purely cosmetic options.


If there were multiple different dialogue options, then they WOULDN'T be cosmetic, it would be easy to adjust the numbers they move the affection stat behind the scenes for each of the options, so that each option would give a different amount of positive or negative affection.

It's the actual writing of all those dialogue options that would be the hard part.

Well, I think trait rewards are a "cheap" incentive to choose an answer anyway. Answers should be chosen to match your character. But then again it seems to be a basic "philosophic" disagreement I've addressed in my previous post.

Last edited by LordCrash; 04/05/14 03:25 PM.

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LordCrash, I agree with your summary 100%


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