|
Anyone complaining about the stronghold being hoisted clumsily on the player with the first few hours needs to play BG2 again – specifically D'Arnise Keep. I don't know what to say about classes not having powers strong enough to feel powerful. Pretty much every class in the game, between level 7 to level 9 or so, starts getting ridiculously good abilities and the ridiculousness only really increases the higher your level goes. It's kind of analogues to AD&D actually where every class is boring in the beginning but diversifies a bit later on – except more so in Pillars. As far as items go, there's a lot more item variety and items with unique effects in Pillars than there is in BG1/BG2. Enemy placement is a matter of taste I suppose. The mechanics definitely aren't transparent though that's for sure.
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 13:19
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 3, 2024 19:23 |
|
|
B2 has tons of memorable items. Poe has nothing worth remembering.
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 13:25
|
|
|
cheesetriangles posted:B2 has tons of memorable items. Poe has nothing worth remembering. Again this is a matter of taste. Off the top of my head I can say: Tidefall, Sanguine Plate, Shod in Faith, Stormcaller, Bittercut, St. Ydwin's Reedmer, Gloves of Swift Action, Hours of St. Rumbalt, Little Saviour, Munaca Arret, Spirit Spiral, The Blade of the Endless Paths, Binding Rope, Shame or Glory, Maegfolc Skull, Garodh's Chorus, Outworn Buckler etc .... Most of the above are game-changing items for builds. I could go on.
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 13:30
|
|
|
Entropy238 posted:Anyone complaining about the stronghold being hoisted clumsily on the player with the first few hours needs to play BG2 again – specifically D'Arnise Keep. It also comes at a different point in the BG story arc than the stronghold. By that time in BG2 your character has already Been Adventuring with a set of companions you can either keep or ditch (even if you didn't play BG1, your links with the characters are well established in the starting area), and one of them is already the driving point for the story. Your characters are pretty powerful fighters, clerics, mages etc. by that point too. Caed Nua you get after a couple of hours ambling around while your character is pretty weak and you have basically no idea what's going on, at all. quote:The mechanics definitely aren't transparent though that's for sure.
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 13:36
|
|
|
Fruits of the sea posted:Yeah, I wish there were some more personality to Thaos. The other driving force in the game is supposed to be ridding the PC of their visions, since they lead to madness. Unfortunately, somewhere along the way, they forgot the mantra "show, don't tell" as there are literally no negative repercussions to the player becoming a watcher. I get to talk to ghosts and see into the past. Neat! Why get rid of that? But if you do, you might just accidentally kill yourself through your insane hunger for power.
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 13:43
|
|
|
Entropy238 posted:Again this is a matter of taste. Tall Grass, Cladhalíath, Grey Sleeper. Okay I admit i had to look up Cladhalíath's correct name because that thing is a bitch to spell.
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 13:43
|
|
|
jBrereton posted:It's not even that they aren't transparent (they are, in quite an ugly way), it's that there's too many of them, and they don't interact elegantly. I've always thought that where Pillar's combat mechanics end up is fine, it's how they get there and how that's conveyed to the player is the problem. I'd wager though that if you took a person who'd never played CRPGs before and sat them down in front of Pillars and then sat them down in front of BG2, they'd have a much better idea of what's happening in Pillars. I've played the Baldurs Gate series off and on for about 15 years and I still only really fully got to grips with the mechanics a few years ago. Not sure if that's what you mean by elegance
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 13:50
|
|
|
jBrereton posted:By that time in BG2 your character has already Been Adventuring with a set of companions you can either keep or ditch (even if you didn't play BG1, your links with the characters are well established in the starting area), and one of them is already the driving point for the story. Your characters are pretty powerful fighters, clerics, mages etc. by that point too. My favorite BG2 stronghold is the playhouse. It's rare for DnD video games to let a bard PC actually be a bard, and it's a fun little storyline.
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 14:17
|
|
|
Entropy238 posted:I've always thought that where Pillar's combat mechanics end up is fine, it's how they get there and how that's conveyed to the player is the problem. THAC0, the brilliant system that only makes sense to people who played AD&D 20 years ago! BG2's overly complicated and unbalanced as heck spell protections/dispelling has a certain charm though, since you feel like an actual wizard once you finally master it. For once in a fantasy game, it really, really does make sense for wizards to spend half their lives studying.
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 14:28
|
|
|
Fruits of the sea posted:THAC0, the brilliant system that only makes sense to people who played AD&D 20 years ago! BG1 was 19 years ago.
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 14:37
|
|
|
cheesetriangles posted:BG1 was 19 years ago. aauugh right in the age 
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 14:43
|
|
|
Fruits of the sea posted:THAC0, the brilliant system that only makes sense to people who played AD&D 20 years ago!
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 15:13
|
|
|
Through sheer osmosis, lower=better is burned into my brain for AC and THAC0. The rest I keep forgetting and re-learning. Oh, one other thing I haven't forgotten is that Haste is the number one OP low-level spell that you should have your mage cast all the time
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 15:50
|
|
|
cheesetriangles posted:B2 has tons of memorable items. Poe has nothing worth remembering. I feel like PoE does, but the problem is that I read the item descriptions and abilities and all the words kinda slide off my brain. That's probably a result 2nd Edition D&D being a pretty big part of my youth. I hear "Holy Avenger" or "Hammer of Thunderbolts" and my ears perk up. And nothing in PoE can do that. That's not really PoE's fault though.
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 16:51
|
|
|
jBrereton posted:Right. Again not technically an IE game but NWN2's Mask of the Betrayer, although a kind of mechanically weak experience, did a good job of this with the spirit-eating mechanic. I think you're the only person besides me who actually likes the spirit eater mechanic.
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 17:07
|
|
|
Samuel Clemens posted:I think you're the only person besides me who actually likes the spirit eater mechanic. I like the spirit eater mechanic as a concept, and it certainly does provide an impetus to want to get rid of it. But I feel its implementation leaves much to be desired.
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 17:12
|
|
|
POE lacks some of the texture of other CRPGs, in part because every aspect of the UI and combat system has been modernized. People who want a custom X/Y/Z adventurer even get the option, which is good. But the designers failed to realize that a lot of good texture comes from imparting a little confusion and frustration on the player. I should say, rather, than the unintended confusion and frustration of older systems has an unintended positive side effect. Archaic to-hit rules and spell landing priorities, as others pointed out, made the player want to figure the game out in spite of itself. The world was compelling enough to persevere and eventually learn it all. POE's combat, on the other hand, establishes itself as something that is pleasant and should stand in support of a larger central thing of awesomeness (plot, party, visuals, whatever). The combat has been so balanced and over-normalized that it feels like whacky memorable weapons, encounters, a certain despised creature type (okay, gently caress ogre druids, nothing is fun about that) have been mechanically balanced out of existence. Everything is ridiculous about the notion of questing around a medieval world with six (why six?) gullible humanoids following your fool's errand and succeeding against all odds; when combat makes sense and seems excessively fair/balanced, that is what stands out as wrong. I think the best example of this is armor, which might as well just be a slider with high DR on one end and high recovery rate on the other. I have never cared less about armor in a game. The world is decent but not amazing and the party is decent but amazing. Nothing comes to the foreground and grabs the player and says "this is awesome, and you will love every second of it and ask for more when it's done." Nothing is overwhelmingly awful or fills the player with dread either, which is fine. The game takes such good care of the player that they never get to worry as in the past, when sailing to Spellhold or limping out of Nashkel mines.
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 17:41
|
|
|
I think it's refreshing to see people earnestly argue that badly thought-out mechanics and unbalanced combat design are actually good things. A far cry from the usual boring discussions on the subject.Cythereal posted:I like the spirit eater mechanic as a concept, and it certainly does provide an impetus to want to get rid of it. But I feel its implementation leaves much to be desired. To be honest, I'm not sure there is a good way to implement it. It's kind of meant to be a nuisance, and it succeeds rather admirably at that.
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 17:54
|
|
|
How the gently caress do I beat Yxunomei. I actually killed her once, but then one of my party members died.
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 18:04
|
|
|
Samuel Clemens posted:I think it's refreshing to see people earnestly argue that badly thought-out mechanics and unbalanced combat design are actually good things. A far cry from the usual boring discussions on the subject. Seems appropriate when the primary complaint against POE is that it doesn't hit the nostalgia buttons.
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 18:11
|
|
|
PoE isn't quite as meticulously "balanced" as people think it is. Many of the classes, if used correctly, have abilities that can completely break many of the challenges that the game throws at you (which is fine, because discovering and implementing these strategies on different playthroughs is part of the fun). The design philosophy behind many of the balance choices throughout development seems to have been made with a view to increasing the choices available to the player, rather than the challenge of the game.
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 18:19
|
|
|
Entropy238 posted:The design philosophy behind many of the balance choices throughout development seems to have been made with a view to increasing the choices available to the player, rather than the challenge of the game. IMO this is an extremely good design philosophy and it's a big part of why I like F:NV and PoE so much.
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 18:21
|
|
|
The problem with having systems be too fair is there's no sense of accomplishment or creativity possible. Take World of Warcraft as an example. When you're level X, you will only ever do quests that are level X, and any tactics or methods that let you punch above your sanctioned weight class will be aggressively patched away because they represent an escape from the the skinner-box model that drives the game's profits. This can be an issue in single-player games too, where bizarre outlying scenarios like Fruits of the sea posted:BG2's overly complicated and unbalanced as heck spell protections/dispelling Zeris posted:I think the best example of this is armor, which might as well just be a slider with high DR on one end and high recovery rate on the other. I have never cared less about armor in a game.
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 18:37
|
|
|
Samuel Clemens posted:I think it's refreshing to see people earnestly argue that badly thought-out mechanics and unbalanced combat design are actually good things. A far cry from the usual boring discussions on the subject. Yeah like, it is breaking my brain as I'm usually yelled at in the POE thread for being a grog, but like man, if you really want to game to be confusing on purpose, just play it in Portuguese or something. Edit: I do agree that there should have been a lot more wacky equipment, even if it risked being overpowered or game breaking.
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 18:41
|
|
|
Phlegmish posted:How the gently caress do I beat Yxunomei. I actually killed her once, but then one of my party members died. Generally, you want to have your tankiest party member enter the room and then back out again. That room is full of traps and there are good choke points everywhere. Then just use summons to delay her. She's not going to be damaged by a lot of summons (I think Totemic Druid spirit animals can harm her at that point and that's it), but she's not immune to Bombardier Beetle farts, so if you've got the insect summoning spell, this is a good time for it. While she works through the summons, have an archer shoot her with any +2 arrows you've got and let the rest of the party deal with the Yuan-Ti. Dealing with the Yuan-Ti just boils down to casting Web everywhere and interrupting or blinding the casters. You might occasionally have to use the archer that's supposed to weaken Yxunomei to shoot some mage, depending on how many archers/casters you've got. By the time Yxunomei needs to be dealt with in melee, she should be weakened and the most dangerous Yuan-Ti should be dead, the rest ideally stuck in a web or otherwise CC'd. Wizard Styles fucked around with this message at 19:03 on Jun 28, 2017 |
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 19:01
|
|
|
Wizard Styles posted:You need +2 weapons to hit her. You should have a couple at this point (if you somehow don't have any that are useful to your party, the smith in Kuldahar sells some cheap generic +3 ones), and there are +2 arrows to be found on the way to her. Which is good, because you don't want to melee her early on in the fight, and only with tanky party members later on. Thanks for all the tips, though I somehow managed to beat her in the meantime. The game changer was when I finally put +2 arrows on my archer. She got hit probably the majority of the time and I eventually managed to take her out that way. One of my problems is that I still have a +1 sword on my main tank guy. I just haven't found any +2 two-handed swords at all. I know the smith in Kuldahar is selling some good two-handed swords, but I don't find it to be that cheap? I don't have 50,000 gp at this point, though I hope to get decent money from selling all my loot from the Yuan-Ti dungeon.
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 19:13
|
|
|
jBrereton posted:The most basic problem with PoE was its self-indulgence and egotistical plotting/design choices. What the gently caress Zeris posted:POE lacks some of the texture of other CRPGs, in part because every aspect of the UI and combat system has been modernized. People who want a custom X/Y/Z adventurer even get the option, which is good. But the designers failed to realize that a lot of good texture comes from imparting a little confusion and frustration on the player. I should say, rather, than the unintended confusion and frustration of older systems has an unintended positive side effect. Archaic to-hit rules and spell landing priorities, as others pointed out, made the player want to figure the game out in spite of itself. The world was compelling enough to persevere and eventually learn it all. What the gently caress!!
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 19:19
|
|
|
Also, again, I'm not seeing where people are getting this notion of excessive balance from on Pillars. There are item/class/racial combos in Pillars that you can use which utterly break the game, similar to what there is in BG. Edit: hell, a bog standard wizard in Pillars with deleterious alacrity of motion on is pretty analogues to a decked out sorcerer in BG with improved alacrity
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 19:21
|
|
|
The "the unintended confusion and frustration of older systems has an unintended positive side effect" claim, reminds me of some of the nostalgia I have for Everquest. Not just in terms of there being less shared knowledge about how everything works than there is now for any new MMORPG, but also the fact that I had no idea what was going on and everything was new and had to be figured out. I remember it with more fondness than I have for other similar games, but I doubt I'd enjoy revisiting it. Nostalgia only goes so far. In other news I'm about to start PoE so should be able to definitively inform everyone whether it's good or not in a couple of weeks. E: Any basic "before I start stuff" I should know? Like screwing myself over from the beginning, or is it all good in that respect. Gravy Jones fucked around with this message at 19:25 on Jun 28, 2017 |
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 19:22
|
|
|
I mean, my favorite game is loving 7.62 High Caliber, but I love it despite it's flaws, not for them. If someone came out with the non-broken version of that game I would never play the original again.
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 19:26
|
|
|
Regarding balance, all I want is to be able to ask "What is the best build for a Wizard Slayer" without the obvious answer being "Inquisitor". 
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 19:30
|
|
|
I think both the newest pokemon and persona games suffer from too many 'quality of life' improvements. I don't even particularly like hard games, but I do like obfuscated game mechanics and navigating a system more than hitting the Super Effective Button and trudging on to the next fight
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 19:31
|
|
|
I haven't played the newest pokemon games but Persona 5 only lets you press that button after you discovered an enemy's weakness and literally the only thing it does is prevent you from going through 3 menus to hit it. You're still navigating the trial-and-error gameplay before hitting their weakness once. How is this bad?
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 19:36
|
|
|
Phlegmish posted:I know the smith in Kuldahar is selling some good two-handed swords, but I don't find it to be that cheap? I don't have 50,000 gp at this point, though I hope to get decent money from selling all my loot from the Yuan-Ti dungeon. Gravy Jones posted:E: Any basic "before I start stuff" I should know? Like screwing myself over from the beginning, or is it all good in that respect. Guns and crossbows/arbalests are, for most of the game, not great for sustained damage, but good alpha strike weapons. If you play a Rogue, Backstab is kinda bad. Intellect, Perception and Resolve are the main stats for extra conversation options. Resolve is probably the least generally useful stat overall, unless you play a dedicated tank. Meanwhile, everyone can use some extra Perception, except dedicated tanks. One-handed style is subpar. If you don't have the expansions (which are great), you won't get a Monk, Rogue or Barbarian companion. Hire a mercenary/create a generic party member at the first inn, you won't get a full party during the first chapter otherwise.
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 19:38
|
|
|
Samuel Clemens posted:Regarding balance, all I want is to be able to ask "What is the best build for a Wizard Slayer" without the obvious answer being "Inquisitor".
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 19:39
|
|
|
Lt. Danger posted:What the gently caress
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 19:41
|
|
|
Deltasquid posted:I haven't played the newest pokemon games but Persona 5 only lets you press that button after you discovered an enemy's weakness and literally the only thing it does is prevent you from going through 3 menus to hit it. You're still navigating the trial-and-error gameplay before hitting their weakness once. How is this bad? Because its mindless
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 19:43
|
|
|
Deltasquid posted:I haven't played the newest pokemon games but Persona 5 only lets you press that button after you discovered an enemy's weakness and literally the only thing it does is prevent you from going through 3 menus to hit it. You're still navigating the trial-and-error gameplay before hitting their weakness once. How is this bad?
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 19:51
|
|
|
Super No Vacancy posted:Because its mindless So is mashing through the appropriate menus to hit their weakness once you know it. the problem with Persona's combat is that hitting a weakness essentially sets the enemy team up to wipe them out, and not doing that means they can do the same to you. That's not a quality of life problem, but one intrinsic to the "one more!" system they use. jBrereton posted:Why even have the combat at that point? Genuine question. Not every enemy has the same weakness and the enemies come in different groups/mixes, and some just don't have a weakness. Additionally, casting spells uses up mp that you can only replenish with items or leaving the dungeon, until you get some special replenishing skills late in the game. So it's a balancing act between mashing the spells and conserving your mp for later in the dungeon, as well as recruiting the monsters of the dungeon to use them for yourself and fuzing them to have the required skillset to tackle the different segments of the dungeon. In theory this could allow for quite a lot of challenge with resource conservation and getting a balanced team together, where you hit enemy weaknesses, avoid getting your own hit and don't cast "damage all" spells when some enemies in the fight can reflect them, but I'm overselling the complexity of Persona's combat. In practice you go through a floor of the dungeon, there's 4-5 "groups" of enemies that you fight a few times each and by the time you've discovered all of their weaknesses you get to the next segment of the dungeon and there's new enemies with undiscovered weaknesses. Except the devs forget about that part and sometimes you can go through 3-4 levels with just one specific spell and wipe out everything. The problem isn't the UI or quality of life improvements, it's that the new "press this button to save 3 menus worth of time and instantly hit the enemy's weakness" reveals the flaw of this system: if the devs didn't give enough variety to the enemy groups you face, the system itself is bland.
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 20:03
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 3, 2024 19:23 |
|
|
Like why even play video games at all if obfuscated mechanics and lovely UI design doesn't get you rock hard???
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2017 20:06
|
|
