Obsidian's Pillars of Eternity [BETA RELEASED, GO TO THE NEW THREAD]

[oldmanpaco]

Meh

 

[boobio]

This sounds really good. They're actually thinking about how to improve the genre. It's not pure nostalgia.

The genre has already been "improved" by the elder scrolls games and Final Fantasy 2 way back in the 90s. Why don't they just separate xp so that for disarming a trap you can't put points in to speech? And how will xp be distributed; if my rogue disarms a trap while every one is standing around will the fighter get the noncombat xp?

 

[kaizoku]

It's ok because it's Obsidian. Also that kinda confirms binary skill checks.

Man if somebody else comes here to say they are improving the genre I'm gonna be extra bitchy

They are making it more accessible to non-combat fags


While some of what he said was something that I remember being discussed and asked here (or was it at ITS? oh wait, I think it was related to AoD), it's also something I don't quite agree.

- you should decide how you want to invest your points. If there is dualism (split between combat and non-combat skills), that is up to you.
In reality this is a bitch to balance.
If you give the player room to decide where to spend points and the game is too hard, he will be forced to go all combat or all diplomat.
If you force the player to split, then you end up with Barbarian diplomats.

- IMO skills shouldn't all have the same applicability.
There should be skills that are used more often but don't have much impact, while others are used rarely but have a more important impact. Sounds like choices to me.
Rarely used and not so useful skills should be replaced as perks/feats.

 

[Ismaul]

If that was the case they wouldn't make non-combat a sort of secondary skillset. The way it says "You shouldn't have to choose between Magic Missile and Herbalism" makes it p. obvious that non-combat skills won't be that useful.

Well... the fact that they want you to be useful in combat even if you want to be a diplomat, that does indeed sound like combat has a big place and they want every character to be effective at it. BUT, by forcing every character to spend options on non-combat, they're also making ALL characters good at some non-combat abilities. That, to me, sounds like they're also commiting to making non-combat (what a shitty term) a big part of the game. If not, they're shooting themselves in the foot. Imagine you have 6 characters in your party, everyone of them with some non-combat abilities, and no situations in which to use them. Sounds like we are getting a lot of that non-combat.

Basically, they're going the way of D&D 5e. The designers there are also splitting combat (class + specialty) and non-combat (background aka skills) choices, with race being a mix. That doesn't mean your fighter will be uber for example, but he won't just be a stupid fighter like in the old editions with next to no skills aside for swinging that weapon; he might be a Noble with the diplomacy & etiquette skills, responsabilities in the world and stuff, or a crafter with some bow & arrow making skills, and some haggling knowledge. All that without compromising your combat build. Done well, it's a positive thing.

 

[Emily]

It is stupid as shit, as it means that every character can be good at some form of non combat. And i doubt we will have many of those skills so what that means is that we will have situation where everything is covered by those 6 chars, and the worst part is it, they are not sacrificing anything to get it. :/

 

[maverick]

Finally watched the video. Sounds really good. I'll assume they will be working on a small set of non-combat skills so they they ARE actually useful, if you choose them. Unlike say Fallout's rather broken system.

It almost sounds like they are kinda doing a Bloodlines type of system. As in you are given a task. HOW you finish it is entirely up to you (as the example head through the blockade at the bridge and kill all the brigands, OR use your Sneak skill and just make your way past them). Both options will yield you the same XP. Kind of hoping they will work on alternate solutions to assigned tasks as well.

That's what I really loved about Deus Ex. To solve something, one could sneak, talk his way into, hack, or just blow everything up. Maybe even ignore the whole thing. To me, that and story is what an CRPG should be about.

 

[Clockwork Knight]

It is stupid as shit, as it means that every character can be good at some form of non combat. And i doubt we will have many of those skills so what that means is that we will have situation where everything is covered by those 6 chars, and the worst part is it, they are not sacrificing anything to get it. :/

That's not exactly bad, that way the party will resemble actual characters instead of 1 skill monkey + a bunch of social retards who only know how to kill things...but I agree with non-bolded part.

 

[Jaesun]

Finally watched the video. Sounds really good. I'll assume they will be working on a small set of non-combat skills so they they ARE actually useful, if you choose them. Unlike say Fallout's rather broken system.

It almost sounds like they are kinda doing a Bloodlines type of system. As in you are given a task. HOW you finish it is entirely up to you (as the example head through the blockade at the bridge and kill all the brigands, OR use your Sneak skill and just make your way past them). Both options will yield you the same XP. Kind of hoping they will work on alternate solutions to assigned tasks as well.

That's what I really loved about Deus Ex. To solve something, one could sneak, talk his way into, hack, or just blow everything up. Maybe even ignore the whole thing. To me, that and story is what an CRPG should be about.

I just take the point of say a good PnP session with a GOOD DM. Me and my bro's would come up with numerous ways of accomplishing a quest (that would blow the mind of our DM). Ways the DM never thought of, and he played along, and gave us appropriate info to continue on., and encouraged us (But with that came consequences).

THAT is the way all good cRPG's should be doing. Search. Use your skills. And find (and be rewarded) for accomplishing a task/quest. There should be many ways to accomplish it.

 

[Volrath]

I don't really understand the scepticism this proposed system is getting. We've yet to see it in action but there looks to be a lot of choice and specialisation involved.

 

[InspectorRumpole]

Taking choice away from character development sure is an improvement to the genre. You can be effective both in combat AND out of combat! Barbarian by day, diplomat by night!

Haha nailed it!

 

[TwinkieGorilla]

Am I the only one who took what he said to be basically nothing different from his approach to Fallout? I.E. "If you want a character who can specialize in non-combat it will be just as rewarding a game for you?" Where the hell are you guys getting the "It will mean you can do everything, wahhh!" bullshit from? Bunch of goddamn spoiled, retarded, mongoloid fucking babies you are.

 

[skuphundaku]

Am I the only one who took what he said to be basically nothing different from his approach to Fallout? I.E. "If you want a character who can specialize in non-combat it will be just as rewarding a game for you?" Where the hell are you guys getting the "It will mean you can do everything, wahhh!" bullshit from? Bunch of goddamn spoiled, retarded, mongoloid fucking babies you are.

In Fallout, you had only one type of skill points and a single skill pool with all kind of shills, both for combat and non-combat. The way I'm reading the PE update (and I don't seem to be the only one interpreting it this way), in PE there are going to be two kinds of skill points and two skill pools, one for combat, one for non-combat, all of which it would mean that you can, indeed, become good both at combat and at non-combat approaches. That's pure .

 

[Grunker]

gurps

 

[Infinitron]

you can, indeed, become good both at combat and at non-combat approaches. That's pure .

But you can "become good" at combat and at non-combat approaches in Fallout, too. If the game doesn't force extreme specialization, there is no functional difference between these two systems.

And there's nothing illegitimate about a game that encourages a a jack-of-all-trades approach.

Why is EXTREME MINMAXING specialization considered "hardcore", but jack-of-all-trades considered decline?

 

[skuphundaku]

you can, indeed, become good both at combat and at non-combat approaches. That's pure .

But you can "become good" at combat and at non-combat approaches in Fallout, too. If the game doesn't force extreme specialization, there is no functional difference between these two systems.

And there's nothing illegitimate about a game that encourages a a jack-of-all-trades approach.

Why is EXTREME MINMAXING specialization considered "hardcore", but jack-of-all-trades considered decline?

There's a difference between "encourage" and "force down your throat". They could have found a less ham-fisted approach to encourage jack-of-all-trades characters. On second though, they don't even need to encourage that too much because most players will do that anyway, the min-maxers being a minority. All they needed to do is make gameplay relatively forgiving, so that one didn't need to dump everything into combat or non-combat like in Age of Decadence.

Extreme min-maxing is considered hardcore because you need to understand the game system in order to know what to minimize and what to maximize in order to achieve the build you desire. Creating a jack-of-all-trades character doesn't require any expertise.

The decline is not in the fact that a jack-of-all-trades characters are viable. I would go as far as saying that a game in which a jack-of-all-trades character is viable is a better game because it's balanced better for all choices that the player may make, thus creating a more credible illusion of freedom. The decline comes from the fact that the jack-of-all-trades is forced upon the player, thus eliminating the need of the player to understand the system anymore. If you fail at combat because your build is weak against a certain enemy or encounter, you always have a non-combat backup in the PE system, which is shit because it doesn't punish idiocy. In modern games, the player is insulated from failure, unlike in old-timey games, and PE, with this system, is going to be guilty of this too. This is the reason I'm calling .

 

[Norfleet]

I'm not seeing the problem. A combat/non-combat skill pool is not even a new concept, this was around at least as far back as Ye Olde AD&D 2E with Non-Weapon Proficiencies. I don't really see this as detracting from character building so much as making it so characters don't appear to all be autistic psychopaths. I mean, what the hell kind of a system is it where it's considered normal, accepted, and indeed, mandatory, to create characters that can ginsu a dragon in over 30 different ways, yet can't tie their own shoes? How does someone like that even come into existence?

 

[Infinitron]

skuphundaku and others: Remember that this is a class-based game.

It's possible/likely that it will borrow the 3E concept of class and cross-class skills. Perhaps different classes will get different amounts of different skill points. Your thief isn't going to be as good as combat as your fighter, no matter how skill points are divided.

 

[Zed]

Combat should be an "oh fuck" moment for diplomat characters. It should be a last resort for them, and they should fucking suck at it. That's why they should also have to gather a party of good combatants and good supporters -- because it's a class & party-based game. You should have to make sacrifices at what you want to be good at. Your PARTY should somewhat be able to "cover all bases", not YOUR CHARACTER.

 

[Infinitron]

SHOCKER! The poster 'alanschu' on the forums is a Bioware developer: https://www.facebook.com/alanschu

 

[Infinitron]

Combat should be an "oh fuck" moment for diplomat characters. It should be a last resort for them, and they should fucking suck at it. That's why they should also have to gather a party of good combatants and good supporters -- because it's a class & party-based game. You should have to make sacrifices at what you want to be good at. Your PARTY should somewhat be able to "cover all bases", not YOUR CHARACTER.

Yes, this is a class-based game inspired by the Infinity Engine games, ie, D&D. The problem here is that because Tim Cain explained this system, people are automatically thinking about Fallout. It's not Fallout.

 

[Jarpie]

http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/60585-tropes-vs-women/

I'm really looking forward to this game, it makes me want to replay all of the old games (now, if I could just get PS:T to work properly...).

However, something I really hope to not see is the stereotypical Damsels in Distress and other unpleasant tropes. I mean, this is a fantasy world, equality is a possibility!

This isn't to say that Baldur's Gate, Planescape and all the other games are filled with such tropes, but I do think that it would be awesome if, when making Project Eternity, this is given some real consideration.

Maybe talk to Anita, who is behind Tropes vs Women in Video Games?

 

[Infinitron]

 

[CrustyBot]

I'll soften my stance a bit and say it depends on the implementation more than anything.

I'm just so used to games nowadays going out of their way to handhold the player, my initial reaction to having combat/non-combat skills draw from different pools was that this would be another case of that. I don't see the issue with having rounded and balanced characters or jack of all trades types, what I'm afraid of seeing of a king of all trades type where it is possible to master both combat and non-combat skills as they don't draw from the same pool. Admittedly, that's possible with a universal skill pool as well over time, but a segregated one implies that from the onset, the PC is talented at both combat and non-combat skills as opposed to being talented at combat skills, non-combat skills, or a mixture of both.

It also nullifies in part the role of the party, certain party members have strengths and weaknesses that are covered up by the other members. While it's not ideal from a storyfag sense to min max the party so that you have one guy doing all the talking, one guy to do all the repairing and a couple of guys doing all the hitting, there's a bit of redundancy in having everyone have broadly the same skillset in terms of non-combat abilities.

I'm also afraid it will adopt a design where non-combat skills will only be useful in certain areas or situations, as opposed to being more omnipresent. I.e stealth sections instead of being able to use stealth everywhere.

I guess we'll see what they do with it.

 

[Hobz]

There's a difference between "encourage" and "force down your throat". They could have found a less ham-fisted approach to encourage jack-of-all-trades characters. On second though, they don't even need to encourage that too much because most players will do that anyway, the min-maxers being a minority. All they needed to do is make gameplay relatively forgiving, so that one didn't need to dump everything into combat or non-combat like in Age of Decadence.

Extreme min-maxing is considered hardcore because you need to understand the game system in order to know what to minimize and what to maximize in order to achieve the build you desire. Creating a jack-of-all-trades character doesn't require any expertise.

The decline is not in the fact that a jack-of-all-trades characters are viable. I would go as far as saying that a game in which a jack-of-all-trades character is viable is a better game because it's balanced better for all choices that the player may make, thus creating a more credible illusion of freedom. The decline comes from the fact that the jack-of-all-trades is forced upon the player, thus eliminating the need of the player to understand the system anymore. If you fail at combat because your build is weak against a certain enemy or encounter, you always have a non-combat backup in the PE system, which is shit because it doesn't punish idiocy. In modern games, the player is insulated from failure, unlike in old-timey games, and PE, with this system, is going to be guilty of this too. This is the reason I'm calling .

Knowledge is never a good way to discriminate players, knowledge is not skill. What you call "understanding the game system" is in fact "knowing how the game works, probably because you played it before", don't fool yourself, you can't min/max on your first playthrough. On the other hand, this systems allows the devs to design encounters that are not "relatively forgiving", to quote your own words, and still offer a wide variety of non-combat solutions to explore.

I understand how you feel, yuo're not the only one making that mistake. Having the upper hand in knowledge is the "easy way" to feel better than other "idiots". You don't need better tactical skills, or quick thinking, you don't have to be smarter or to think outside of the box. You just need to know than "earth magic is crap" or that "you don't need to put tons of points in dark magic to be deadly" or that "trap disarming is useless" while others don't, to succeed where others struggle. And that makes you feel smarter, while in reality you just know the game better.

I'd rather have more choices to customize my character and more paths to explore, than protecting the ego of children thinking that this way will allow "noobs to succeed".

 

[CappenVarra]

http://www.formspring.me/JESawyer/q/166425411759137825

You mad? This is obviously going to be a HP game.

I know you were replying to DraQ and VD, but since they're not biting, guess I'll have to do.

I have no problems with HP games. At the end of the day, I started with D&D first, and can always fall back to it and have fun. I have a problem with shitty D&D computer implementations that don't cap PC hit dice, but that's a whole 'nother topic So if they show a screenshot with the PC having 200 hit points, I'll be mildly grumpy, but nothing that would make me ragequit (because an average sword could theoretically do 100-500 damage per hit, which would be an inelegant abuse of numbers, but oh well).

I have no problems with the "I can't believe it's not D&D" setting, even if I can, perhaps, imagine something I'd consider better. Because if there's anyone that can pull it off in a manner somewhat resembling interesting, it's Obsidian. Hell, even if it's something as dull as (placeholder descriptor) "Dragon Age done right", I'll probably survive. I have no problem with guns, and if they showed a screenshot with M&M style blasters, I'd consider it decent trolling and make popcorn while waiting for delicious butthurt backlash of "fantasy purists" (horrible creatures). I have no problems with elves and dwarves, even if (as somebody recently wrote here) I've seen more elves than Belgians

I have no problems with RTwP, even if they are talking about IE all the time and IE is far from a decent RTwP implementation. Perhaps they'll even manage to make non-retarded party movement and formations that aren't just endpoints for individual character pathfinding and whatnot - time will tell. If they announced they will use a by-the-AD&D-book phase-based combat instead, I'd even consider doing something rash like upping my pledge by an order of magnitude - but I'm not holding my breath. In the meantime, whatever.

I have no problem with Deep Personalityfull (TM) NPCs, even if I'd prefer full party creation and characters defined by stats only. Reading about companion interactions and how exploring their personality by choosing Option A, B, or C in dialogue trees will be as involved as exploring dungeons makes ghost voices in my head go all We explore dungeons, not characters /gygaxian and I have no interest in Japanese visual novels and hypertext romance /mondblut and Even if we imagine a parallel universe in which I did, actual VNs and IF games do that sort of thing much better than any "RPG" will /blackcat. But they already said NPCs won't be mandatory, and I can always solo the game when they bore me (like even rare well-written ones inevitably do). Hell, if they announced gay/interspecies/furry/pedo romance with detailed marriage simulation rules tomorrow, I'd curse and sigh - but I'd still believe they're not stupid enough to make such shit anything but highly optional and avoidable for sane players.

So, in a nutshell, I think people who withdraw their pledge because they realize the game doesn't match some wishful first impression they had are kinda stupidish. That said (and in contrast to everything written above), if they showed a screenshot of an in-game item with the three letters D, P and S, I'd withdraw my pledge so fast that the echo would travel back in time and create a positive feedback loop of butthurt that would undo the very concept of Kickstarter itself. Why? Because I'd be 99% sure the resulting game mechanics will suck and not interest me in the least. (I can check for presence of 1% probability exception by playing the demo when it's out, but there's no way I'm preordering that).