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Armor... really doesn't change the "CC till dead" thing either. You just wait. And instead of you hoping that the CC fires off, you know it's gonna happen every time 100% of the time.

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The current system has flaws, but it still infinitely preferable to a system in which your skills only have a chance to work.

If you have an ability that has a % chance to work, it is not reliable. If you need that proc to win the fight, you've already screwed up and are now relying on chance to win the fight. If you don't need that proc to win the fight, it's effectively worthless and you might as well go with a harder hitting skill to win the fight more quickly. This is true not only in this game, but ANY similar game. (In Pathfinder, if I'm playing a caster, I will NEVER rely on spells that allow a save and have zero effect on a successful save; any spell I cast will either be one that doesn't allow saves, or that still has a useful effect on a successful save. Every spell cast will be effective; the level of effectiveness will vary, but I will never have my action be wasted due to random chance if there is a viable alternative. Same concept.)

Control abilities aren't always useful in this game, but I'll take this system every time over "XX% chance to stun/knock down/whatever".

As for issues with the current system... the biggest issues are the split armor types and the lack of physical resistance. The system encourages parties to focus on a single damage type, and the fact that there is elemental resistance but no comparable stat for physical damage means that physical damage will typically be a superior choice. I also don't think armor should block non-control debuffs, but that's a less severe issue.

I also think it would be less of a problem if you had more pure damage abilities or abilities that dealt with breaking armor specifically. Most of the Warfare and Scoundrel abilities focus on utility or debuffs, so breaking armor is a matter of pure attack damage. There are some easy alternatives though.

Warfare: Armor breaking skills, that deal no damage to vitality (even if armor is already down) but do increased damage to physical armor. Overpower has kinda the same vibe, but is too limited and too binary.

Scoundrel: The sneaky school, it does have some piercing damage but should be able to apply some of its debuffs through the armor; Ruptured Tendons already does this, just expand the idea. Chloroform is a pretty weak control, so letting it bypass armor doesn't feel like it would be overpowered.

Universal: You could also let any ability which applies a control blocked by armor do bonus damage to armor if the debuff fails. Knock Down failed because physical armor is still intact? Extra physical damage! Freeze failed because magical armor is still intact? Extra cold damage!

Alternatively, you could rework the school abilities themselves. Instead of buffing damage, Warfare and the Elemental schools could grant bonus damage against armor, or extra bonuses against armor.

There are a lot of different ways you could take the system, but rather than consider it a failed system, I just think it's a bit incomplete. Armor's a major part of battle in this game; you want yours intact, and you want to break your enemy's. There should be more abilities and skills to deal with that directly.

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See, I have no problem with additional effects just not happening. Hell, you have a chance to not have things work now: missing. I don't find it frustrating, I genuinely find it exciting! You cheer when it goes off and you curse when it doesn't. It swings the other way too, you curse when something CC's you and cheer when the effect doesn't fire.

I think there's no way to make the amount of hard CC in this game exciting without adding chance back to it. When just anyone can take off their offhand and knock a guy down when their physical armor's down, you lose a lot of satisfaction.

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If the problem is with hard CC, why not just remove hard CC from the game? Or make it very limited, e.g., only a few spells have it, they cost a lot, are on long cooldowns, don't work on bosses, etc.

Why do so many skills need to come with some form of hard CC? You can start the game with 3 hard CC spells and add many more immediately afterwards with little effort on every single character. Why?

All of that said, even if you did this, the armor system would still be a problem because it still incentivizes you to stack only physical or only magical characters.

I posted my proposed system here:

http://larian.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Main=76060&Number=621580#Post621580

Very similar to the OPs.

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It took a little getting used to but I like how armor and CC work in DOS2. I disagree with those who have said it oversimplifies things; having to "set up" CC by breaking through the relevant armor first requires you to plan out moves between characters in a way that wasn't necessary in DOS1 where an elementalist with glass cannon could pretty much keep enemies on lock-down by themselves while the rest of the party cleaned house. I personally find myself putting a lot more thought into each move in DOS2 than I ever did in the first game.

I do agree that the downside of the system is that it heavily favors parties that focus solely on one damage/armor type. But I think the best solution to this isn't to change how armor works but rather to add some more skills to each ability school that give characters more flexibility in dealing with both armor types without having to hybridize between strength/finesse and intelligence (which has its own issues) and thus allow mixed parties to work together. Strength and finesse-focused characters need more skills like Chloroform that allow them to deal magic armor and/or piercing damage that scales off of their weapon attribute and to apply magic status effects so that they can help their magic damage-focused teammates against enemies with low magic armor. Likewise, intelligence-focused characters need some spells that allow them to deal physical/piercing damage that scales with intelligence and to apply physical status effects so they can help their physical damage-focused teammates against enemies with low physical armor.

Below are a few ideas for some skills like this, just off the top of my head.

Gust (Aerotheurge): A blast of wind that knocks down all characters in a wide arc in front of the caster. Resisted by physical armor. Basically Battlestomp with a wider cone of effect but no damage.

Implosion (Aerotheurge): Violently warp space in an area, dealing X physical damage to all characters in a 3m radius. Basically a physical damage version of Fireball.

Brittle Frost (Hydrosophist): Flash freeze an enemy's armor leaving it brittle. For the next 3 turns, the targeted enemy takes double damage to its physical armor.

Ice Spike (Hydrosophist): A spike of ice that pierces enemies in a line, dealing X piercing damage, Y cold damage, and applying chilled/frozen condition. Like Marksman's Fang but with the additional cold damage status effects.

Ice Fan (Hydrosophist): Change this skill to do a portion of its damage as piercing damage alongside the cold damage.

Melt Metal (Pyrokinetic): Destroy X% of a enemy's physical armor and deal an equivalent amount of fire damage to the target. I'm thinking along the lines of how Reactive Armor works in terms of % damage to physical armor, except you are using this on an enemy instead of yourself.

Searing Daggers (Pyrokinetic): Change this skill to do a portion of its damage as piercing damage alongside the fire damage.

Concussive Blow (Warfare): Bash an enemy in the head, dealing X physical damage, destroying Y magic armor, and setting sleeping (resisted by magic armor). Sort of like chloroform, but deals normal weapon attack physical damage alongside the magic armor damage and sleep effect. Limited to melee range. Hey, if chemically-induced unconsciousness counts as magic damage why not blunt-force-trauma-to-the-head-induced unconsciousness? Perhaps make this require a hammer.

Impale (Warfare): Lunge forward and skewer an enemy with your weapon, dealing X piercing damage and setting bleeding if the target does not have physical armor.
Requires a sword or spear. Basically functions like Sawtooth Knife, but instead of being backstab-compatible it gets an extra bit of movement, like a shorter ranged Battering Ram.

Imbue Arrow (Huntsman): Conjure an arrow of pure magic to shatter an enemy's magical defenses. Deals normal attack damage but to magic armor instead of physical armor.

Basically I think every ability school should have at least two or three skills like this that either do damage/CC effects to the opposite armor type of the main focus of the school or do piercing damage that ignores armor altogether. Obviously these would need to have the appropriate cooldowns and AP and Source costs to make them balanced; they shouldn't be spammable but should be there to give physical damage dealers some tools to help out the magic-damage dealing members of a party with magic armor, and vice versa, allowing mixed parties to be more viable. If every character had the potential for this kind of flexibility I personally don't think the armor system would be a problem at all. And ultimately I think adding a few more skills to each school is a much more reasonable ask for a patch post-release than trying to get Larian to overhaul the game's core systems.

Last edited by DMorrow; 29/09/17 11:35 PM.
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let all the gamage go directly for vitality (so mages and figthers could cooperate effectively) but grant mobs with 1 single "CC-shield" parameter that could be reduced by some special skills, so you got сhoice - kill fast with burst damage or focus on CCing them.

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Another option (which is already in the game script with the saving throw calculations) is just make all skills debuffs have duration based on rank in the skill-type (and talent bonuses) that stack in duration and then % of that duration (rounded by +/- 0.25) is applied proportionally to % of current shield you did in damage. If a 600 hit with 2 turn knockdown hits a 2k shield, there is no knockdown, but if you had torturer, you would get a 1 turn knockdown since 3-70%=0.9 thus rounded to 1.

Soft cc and dot debuffs would have higher base turn count, hard cc lower, if warm>burning would be resisted, it would still roll for increased duration of warm then (same for chill>freeze), but poison and non-ground oil would need rolls to explode (or wet to freeze).

Taunt, Madness and Charmed success rate could even be based on more flavor based/classic D&D thing like caster vs targets Constitution, Memory and Wits respectively with small bonus given by Ret, Leadership and Perseverance (again respectively).

Perseverance could then also be a universal on hard cc proc for the armour restores AND be a nice boss stat (do you cc and prolong the fight a bit depending on how high it is vs take a round of meteors to the face, but not "heal" the boss).

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Originally Posted by Andele
Another option (which is already in the game script with the saving throw calculations) is just make all skills debuffs have duration based on rank in the skill-type (and talent bonuses) that stack in duration and then % of that duration (rounded by +/- 0.25) is applied proportionally to % of current shield you did in damage. If a 600 hit with 2 turn knockdown hits a 2k shield, there is no knockdown, but if you had torturer, you would get a 1 turn knockdown since 3-70%=0.9 thus rounded to 1.

Soft cc and dot debuffs would have higher base turn count, hard cc lower, if warm>burning would be resisted, it would still roll for increased duration of warm then (same for chill>freeze), but poison and non-ground oil would need rolls to explode (or wet to freeze).

Taunt, Madness and Charmed success rate could even be based on more flavor based/classic D&D thing like caster vs targets Constitution, Memory and Wits respectively with small bonus given by Ret, Leadership and Perseverance (again respectively).

Perseverance could then also be a universal on hard cc proc for the armour restores AND be a nice boss stat (do you cc and prolong the fight a bit depending on how high it is vs take a round of meteors to the face, but not "heal" the boss).


Torturer doesn't do what you think it does. It only applies to DAMAGE status effects, meaning things like burning, bleeding, poison etc. I didn't notice it being applied to rupture tendons either, so it seems it only works on standard DOT effects (probably not Shackles of Pain either).

Nearly all CC effects in the game last only one turn. There are a couple of two turn effects, but they are very rare (love grenade is all I can think of). Thing is, they don't really HAVE to last more than one turn. You just re-apply CC any time during the round and perma-CC from there. Not very many enemies have Perseverance, and those that do don't normally have too much of it.

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10/10 at missing the entire point and all of its implications.

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How is armor a failure? I completed the game and the mechanic was fine. It protects against CC and it serves as an extra life bar. You can also give someone armor to remove CC. After having 130+ hours in the game I think the system is fine.

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Even after having finished the game I'd request a refund if they reworked armor into a vegas night diceroll system. I've long past grown tired of save or die gameplay. OS1 was of the most broken rpgs I've ever played and tactician was a joke past the very early game. OS2 is also an extremely easy rpg, but with the armor system I at least had to pay attention to what's happening and couldn't just autopilot almost every fight.

Last edited by Vreyn; 30/09/17 06:33 PM.
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Originally Posted by Vreyn
Even after having finished the game I'd request a refund if they reworked armor into a vegas night diceroll system. I've long past grown tired of save or die gameplay. OS1 was of the most broken rpgs I've ever played and tactician was a joke past the very early game. OS2 is also an extremely easy rpg, but with the armor system I at least had to pay attention to what's happening and couldn't just autopilot almost every fight.


If it was that bad why you bought the second game?, so stupid this fanboys.

Last edited by Zherot; 30/09/17 06:46 PM.
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Originally Posted by Zherot

If it was that bad why you bought the second game?, so stupid this fanboys.


Because the game had a large early access build that allowed you to preview the changes from the previous one and see if you liked it? What kind of dumb question is that?

Last edited by vometia; 30/09/17 07:21 PM. Reason: formatting
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Originally Posted by Vreyn
Originally Posted by Zherot

If it was that bad why you bought the second game?, so stupid this fanboys.


Because the game had a large early access build that allowed you to preview the changes from the previous one and see if you liked it? What kind of dumb question is that?


Yeah but the game was terrible why bother right?, unless you are truly stupid.

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Originally Posted by Zherot
Originally Posted by Vreyn
Originally Posted by Zherot

If it was that bad why you bought the second game?, so stupid this fanboys.


Because the game had a large early access build that allowed you to preview the changes from the previous one and see if you liked it? What kind of dumb question is that?


Yeah but the game was terrible why bother right?, unless you are truly stupid.


I didn't say it was terrible, I said it was broken. Arcanum and Baldur's Gate 2 are also extremely broken games and they're still fun despite this. Don't know why you can't defend your stance in this thread without open hostility and altering the statements of others to suit you.

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Originally Posted by Vreyn
Originally Posted by Zherot
Originally Posted by Vreyn
Originally Posted by Zherot

If it was that bad why you bought the second game?, so stupid this fanboys.


Because the game had a large early access build that allowed you to preview the changes from the previous one and see if you liked it? What kind of dumb question is that?


Yeah but the game was terrible why bother right?, unless you are truly stupid.


I didn't say it was terrible, I said it was broken. Arcanum and Baldur's Gate 2 are also extremely broken games and they're still fun despite this. Don't know why you can't defend your stance in this thread without open hostility and altering the statements of others to suit you.


Jokes on you because now the combat is truly terrible, even ME has a better armor system than this game.

Laugh now.

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Originally Posted by Vreyn
Originally Posted by Zherot
Originally Posted by Vreyn
Originally Posted by Zherot

If it was that bad why you bought the second game?, so stupid this fanboys.


Because the game had a large early access build that allowed you to preview the changes from the previous one and see if you liked it? What kind of dumb question is that?


Yeah but the game was terrible why bother right?, unless you are truly stupid.


I didn't say it was terrible, I said it was broken. Arcanum and Baldur's Gate 2 are also extremely broken games and they're still fun despite this. Don't know why you can't defend your stance in this thread without open hostility and altering the statements of others to suit you.

Yeah that's kind of Zherot's stick: Trying to prove his opinions by insulting and offending everyone that disagrees with him smile

Last edited by Bokajon; 30/09/17 10:05 PM.
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Originally Posted by Bokajon
Yeah that's kind of Zherot's stick: Trying to prove his opinions by insulting and offending everyone that disagrees with him smile


Yeah, his bs not worth responding to, really.

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Originally Posted by Gaidax
Originally Posted by Bokajon
Yeah that's kind of Zherot's stick: Trying to prove his opinions by insulting and offending everyone that disagrees with him smile


Yeah, his bs not worth responding to, really.


Why V hasn't banned this d-bag yet is a mystery for the ages. He is absolutely t o x i c and adds no net value.

They need but search his name and take a cross section of his last 20 posts or so. Constant complaining, creating topic AFTER topic stating the same thing over and over ad infinitum, egregious personal attacks, whining, taunts, etc.

Why is he still here? I was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt yesterday when this was proposed by others but I see he has since continued to flame, insult, throw gas on a fire, whine, and copypasta the SAME topic over, and over. And over. and over. AND over. dafuq??

Last edited by Darkwind; 01/10/17 07:25 PM.
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Originally Posted by Darkwind
Originally Posted by Gaidax
Originally Posted by Bokajon
Yeah that's kind of Zherot's stick: Trying to prove his opinions by insulting and offending everyone that disagrees with him smile


Yeah, his bs not worth responding to, really.


Why V hasn't banned this d-bag yet is a mystery for the ages. He is absolutely t o x i c and adds no net value.

They need but search his name and take a cross section of his last 20 posts or so. Constant complaining, creating topic AFTER topic stating the same thing over and over ad infinitum, egregious personal attacks, whining, taunts, etc.

Why is he still here? I was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt yesterday when this was proposed by others but I see he has since continued to flame, insult, throw gas on a fire, whine, and copypasta the SAME topic over, and over. And over. and over. AND over. WTF?!


If you don't like my post you are free to leave and don't respond to it no one is forcing you, in fact you are being more toxic with that last comment than anything i have said so far.

Last time i respond to you, leave if you don't like my post or if you don't have anything to say about the topic, that is the end of it.

Last edited by Zherot; 01/10/17 07:25 PM.
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