Various role-playing RPG game stuff not deserving its own thread

[Oyster Sauce]

Straw man. The complaints were the lack of being able to ignore/kill phrase/non-lethal the bosses.

You should have been able to tranq or run away from the bosses. Simons didn't have a kill phrase.

That's stupid. What happens when the boss wakes up two minutes after you leave the room? Does he disappear from the narrative for no reason or just keep popping up every time you make him fall asleep?

[maidenhaver]

Running away from bosses works.

[J1M]

Straw man. The complaints were the lack of being able to ignore/kill phrase/non-lethal the bosses.

You should have been able to tranq or run away from the bosses. Simons didn't have a kill phrase.

You can run away. And they will block your path until you decide to play the game. The "I don't want to play the game" option is the Typhoon ammo.

[Roguey]

That's stupid. What happens when the boss wakes up two minutes after you leave the room? Does he disappear from the narrative for no reason or just keep popping up every time you make him fall asleep?

It's not "no reason" - the world is a big place and they could just never run across your path again (which is the case if you avoid killing Anna and Gunther). Alternately, they could all show up at the end, which is what happens when you run away from Simons the first time. Then you can run away again.

Straw man. The complaints were the lack of being able to ignore/kill phrase/non-lethal the bosses.

You should have been able to tranq or run away from the bosses. Simons didn't have a kill phrase.

You can run away. And they will block your path until you decide to play the game. The "I don't want to play the game" option is the Typhoon ammo.

Haven't played it in a decade, but my recollection is that some of the barriers are artificial. Nammir's gatekeeping his girlfriend so yeah you have to beat him. You also have to beat the final boss (easily too if you have the laser rifle). The first two? I'm not sure.

Though apparently I was wrong and you can "knock" them out.

With the exception of the final boss, all bosses can be defeated with Gas Grenades as well. Using a combination of the Stun Gun and two or three Gas Grenades, these bosses can be stunned and gassed repeatedly, allowing them to be killed without executing a single attack.

To do this, start with your Stun Gun and Gas Grenades equipped before the boss battle begins. As soon as the cutscene ends, rush forwards and fire your stun gun as soon as the reticle turns red. The target will temporarily be stunned. While they are down, toss a Gas Grenade at their feet. Continue to Stun the boss repeatedly, replacing the Gas Grenades as they expire.

Eventually the boss will die from suffocation. If you have the Rebreather Chest Augmentation (2 Praxis Points) you will be immune to the Gas Effect making this tactic an acceptable one.

[rusty_shackleford]

Don't think I actually like skill-based systems

Never really seen a skill-based system where I partially specialize in something and get a tangible benefit from it anyways, it always ends up being a more tedious version of just creating my own class from parts

At most you abuse holding onto skill points in games that allow it to get past a skill check which I consider cheating so I don't do it

[J1M]

That's stupid. What happens when the boss wakes up two minutes after you leave the room? Does he disappear from the narrative for no reason or just keep popping up every time you make him fall asleep?

It's not "no reason" - the world is a big place and they could just never run across your path again (which is the case if you avoid killing Anna and Gunther). Alternately, they could all show up at the end, which is what happens when you run away from Simons the first time. Then you can run away again.

You should have been able to tranq or run away from the bosses. Simons didn't have a kill phrase.

You can run away. And they will block your path until you decide to play the game. The "I don't want to play the game" option is the Typhoon ammo.

Haven't played it in a decade, but my recollection is that some of the barriers are artificial. Nammir's gatekeeping his girlfriend so yeah you have to beat him. You also have to beat the final boss (easily too if you have the laser rifle). The first two? I'm not sure.

Though apparently I was wrong and you can "knock" them out.

With the exception of the final boss, all bosses can be defeated with Gas Grenades as well. Using a combination of the Stun Gun and two or three Gas Grenades, these bosses can be stunned and gassed repeatedly, allowing them to be killed without executing a single attack.

To do this, start with your Stun Gun and Gas Grenades equipped before the boss battle begins. As soon as the cutscene ends, rush forwards and fire your stun gun as soon as the reticle turns red. The target will temporarily be stunned. While they are down, toss a Gas Grenade at their feet. Continue to Stun the boss repeatedly, replacing the Gas Grenades as they expire.

Eventually the boss will die from suffocation. If you have the Rebreather Chest Augmentation (2 Praxis Points) you will be immune to the Gas Effect making this tactic an acceptable one.

As I mentioned earlier, the nonlethal option was added later due to the whining, and it's why oyster has to bully you now.

[stormvermin]

Straw man. The complaints were the lack of being able to ignore/kill phrase/non-lethal the bosses.

You should have been able to tranq or run away from the bosses. Simons didn't have a kill phrase.

There's no reason a nano augmented super soldier should go down to a tranq dart.

As I mentioned earlier, the nonlethal option was added later due to the whining, and it's why oyster has to bully you now.

Weren't the complaints something like "noo our heckin nonlethal build that only has points in carrying capacity and hacking gets royally ****** by Barrett, fix pls." I don't mind there being alternate routes to dealing with the bosses but nonlethal shouldn't be one of them considering who they are. Leaving a boss alive should come back to bite the player in the *** later which would actually be interesting like allowing Navarre to kill Lebedev versus sending her packing early. HR screwed the pooch by making nonlethal takedowns award bonus experience.

[rusty_shackleford]

the issue isn't the bosses, it's the game
the "sneak/talk/fight your way through" is boring, formulaic, and falls apart the moment you create an encounter that doesn't support all(or at least two) of those specific routes

stems from doosex not being an immy simmy, it's just a good enough stagecraft approach that it fools people into believing it is one until it completely falls apart

If I were forced to improve the design without throwing the entire thing out, I'd probably do it more like Of Orcs and Men, where you have a character that is a glass cannon with stealth and a character that is a brute with high health/armor. You no longer have an issue with boss fights or mandatory combat segments.

[J1M]

Straw man. The complaints were the lack of being able to ignore/kill phrase/non-lethal the bosses.

You should have been able to tranq or run away from the bosses. Simons didn't have a kill phrase.

There's no reason a nano augmented super soldier should go down to a tranq dart.

As I mentioned earlier, the nonlethal option was added later due to the whining, and it's why oyster has to bully you now.

Weren't the complaints something like "noo our heckin nonlethal build that only has points in carrying capacity and hacking gets royally ****** by Barrett, fix pls." I don't mind there being alternate routes to dealing with the bosses but nonlethal shouldn't be one of them considering who they are. Leaving a boss alive should come back to bite the player in the *** later which would actually be interesting like allowing Navarre to kill Lebedev versus sending her packing early. HR screwed the pooch by making nonlethal takedowns award bonus experience.

It was only a problem of mindset. Room is full of ammo and such.

[roldet]

So how bad DA2 and DAI without comparing them to DAO? Are they at the level of Risen 2 or Greedfall at least? They seem like console games with no tactical camera or pause, so using a gamepad seem to be better than keyboard. What is the optimal way to play?

[rusty_shackleford]

So how bad DA2 and DAI without comparing them to DAO? Are they at the level of Risen 2 or Greedfall at least? They seem like console games with no tactical camera or pause, so using a gamepad seem to be better than keyboard. What is the optimal way to play?

Dragon age 2 is a terrible 4/10 game. Inquisition is an actual finished game, not a great one.

[roldet]

So how bad DA2 and DAI without comparing them to DAO? Are they at the level of Risen 2 or Greedfall at least? They seem like console games with no tactical camera or pause, so using a gamepad seem to be better than keyboard. What is the optimal way to play?

Dragon age 2 is a terrible 4/10 game. Inquisition is an actual finished game, not a great one.

Well, i can handle a honest bad game due to time constraints as long as narrative is fine, it seems casting and companions at the same level of DAO at least. Combat looks like trash but maybe it can be fun with gamepad like Greedfall. Hope it does not have respawning enemies and backtracking like Technomancer/Mars War Logs though.

[Oyster Sauce]

So how bad DA2 and DAI without comparing them to DAO? Are they at the level of Risen 2 or Greedfall at least? They seem like console games with no tactical camera or pause, so using a gamepad seem to be better than keyboard. What is the optimal way to play?

Dragon age 2 is a terrible 4/10 game. Inquisition is an actual finished game, not a great one.

Well, i can handle a honest bad game due to time constraints as long as narrative is fine, it seems casting and companions at the same level of DAO at least. Combat looks like trash but maybe it can be fun with gamepad like Greedfall. Hope it does not have respawning enemies and backtracking like Technomancer/Mars War Logs though.

Don't play it

[Kolgrim]

So how bad DA2 and DAI without comparing them to DAO? Are they at the level of Risen 2 or Greedfall at least? They seem like console games with no tactical camera or pause, so using a gamepad seem to be better than keyboard. What is the optimal way to play?

The narrative for DA2 is like three different scripts stapled together. Nothing ever really feels resolved or thought out and if I remember right the majority of the writing team were women which makes sense as to why we went from grounded dark fantasy in DAO to interpersonal drama with a helping of faggotry in DA2. I haven't played Risen 2 in a long time but Greedfall is definitely better then DA2. DA2's combat revolves around the "awesome button" which just means you spam attack relentlessly in between using spells or abilities. I don't know if a controller would be any better or worse honestly. You probably could make macro for M+KB to take some of the tedium away from constantly having to click attack. Also you're going to be in Kirkwall 90% of the time running through narrow corridors and streets. The game isn't open at all.

I remember kind of enjoying the combat in DAI. That's probably just because anything would be an upgrade over the previous game. The cast was mostly forgettable as was the story. You could at least be other races other then human and weren't basically a premade character like Hawke. I really wouldn't recommend either game tbh though beyond just playing it for morbid curiosity to see how far an IP can fall.

[Tangerine]

DAI felt like an offline MMO and had too many "Supreme Commander, we need you to pick 20 flowers" type of quests.

[Godjjjita]

[rusty_shackleford]

Don't think I actually like skill-based systems

Go so far as to say I'd rather just pick a class and start the game than spend an hour weighing if I want 1 more point in this attribute or that attribute, which skills to prioritize etc.,
I'm sure there are some people who enjoy this, but I just don't find any fun in it. I always end up with choice paralysis.

I prefer when choices are made while I play the game

[Norfleet]

Never really seen a skill-based system where I partially specialize in something and get a tangible benefit from it anyways, it always ends up being a more tedious version of just creating my own class from parts

I mean, either you can pass the skill check or you can't. Given that skill checks increase in difficulty, a decision to buy a skill tends to mean maxing it, unless the game doesn't actually have anything that uses that level of skill...but you wouldn't know this without prior knowledge. So now you just get another trap option that you have no reason or way to predict. Thus, there's no clear benefit to half-assing a skill unless you already have foreknowledge of what breakpoints you're trying to hit with it. Otherwise you just start failing checks, which means that you could have just invested nothing for the same outcome.

[DemoGraph]

Go so far as to say I'd rather just pick a class and start the game than spend an hour weighing if I want 1 more point

This is not a problem of a skill-based system. This is a dev problem.
Adding starting skill packs is easy, they're called classes.

Otherwise you just start failing checks, which means that you could have just invested nothing for the same outcome.

Oh yeah, I know that feeling. I created a thief char for Iren's PbP. Then, several months later, I actually read the rules for ACKS. 1 ed. (like D&D proper) makes thieves completely useless. Even 2 ed has them gimped somewhat.
If I could reroll, I probably would've chosen that trader class (whatever it's called).
Or fighter/pally, since I've rolled >16 str and dex. But I don't want to play sword-and-boardman in a proper RPG (we have aRPGs for that).

That is, any system can be ****** up. And your argument is irrelevant, because it boils down to "powergaming good".

[Norfleet]

That is, any system can be ****** up. And your argument is irrelevant, because it boils down to "powergaming good".

I mean, you don't have to really be "powergaming" to understand this: A skill is just naturally an all-or-nothing deal on its naive presentation: If you can pass every check with maximum investment and not anything less, then this is now also the minimum. If you can't pass every check even with maximum investment, the skill is thus useless since no amount of investment does anything.

[rusty_shackleford]

skill checks suck

[jdcp]

skill checks suck

Badly designed skill checks suck*

[rusty_shackleford]

skill checks suck

Badly designed skill checks suck*

I'd really struggle to think of good or interesting ones unless you stretch the definition of a "skill check"

[jdcp]

I'd really struggle to think of good or interesting ones unless you stretch the definition of a "skill check"

It's like communism, real skill checks have never been done the right way. (jk)

But yes if I wanted to give examples I'd have to go well beyond what a skill check is and incorporate more systems on it, sadly, skills checks are but 1s and 0s, that's as deep as they can be.

So yes they suck alone, but they can be a medium to tell a game's narrative in different ways so that every player can have different outcomes according to the things they value the most out of themselves, in that sense, they succeed.

I prefer when choices are made while I play the game

BUT I do agree here with you, I don't like going through a whole hour of just making a character, that's stupid, I wanna build it ingame not in a menu.

[DemoGraph]

If you can pass every check with maximum investment and not anything less, then this is now also the minimum.

Thank god, he gave us partial successes, long-term skill-based projects and other toys.

[rusty_shackleford]

I'm fine with skills that make you better at doing something, and skills that unlock new abilities as it's raised, but skills that just let you do something that has an arbitrary difficulty threshold you need to keep up with suck.
"everything just gets harder to do as the game goes on because… it just does, okay???"
that's lame, it's just level scaling wearing a different coat of paint.

[jdcp]

I'm fine with skills that make you better at doing something, and skills that unlock new abilities as it's raised, but skills that just let you do something that has an arbitrary difficulty threshold you need to keep up with suck.
"everything just gets harder to do as the game goes on because… it just does, okay???"
that's lame, it's just level scaling wearing a different coat of paint.

Had a detailed answer for this but **** it, I agree.

Still I must mention you just described what a bad skill check is.

[Mordred]

https://www.gog.com/en/game/drakensang

Drakensang is for the grabs if someone needs a filler

[Norfleet]

Thank god, he gave us partial successes

That's a fancy way to say FAILURE.

[Norfleet]

I'm fine with skills that make you better at doing something, and skills that unlock new abilities as it's raised, but skills that just let you do something that has an arbitrary difficulty threshold you need to keep up with suck.
"everything just gets harder to do as the game goes on because… it just does, okay???"
that's lame, it's just level scaling wearing a different coat of paint.

Well, where that isn't true, you hit a situation where investment beyond a certain point becomes a trap as you already beat the hardest the game offers before then. So either the skill has content all the way to the top, and therefore, less than full investment is useless, or investment beyond what it takes to beat the top content is a trap.

It also naturally follows that the hardest content approaches the end of the game, otherwise the content is simply impossible as you would encounter it BEFORE it is physically possible to have the skill.