702 réponses à ce sujet

[Haexpane]

Yeah lets get rid of XP, levels, hit points, gameplay, swords, orcs, dragons!



Instead we should have a Cover Based Shooter with Marines in Space! Who needs this cRPG crap

[B3taMaxxx]

filaminstrel wrote...

But evading the fight requires you to invest in the stealth talent tree as well, and cunning (or dex, I don't remember).

 Yeah, you got me there. Maybe half xp awarded? I don't know, but do remeber this isn't Splinter Cell or Thief.

 Besides are you willing to pass up the mediocre loot?

 A problem that definately needs to be addressed is the level of difficulty to xp earned ratio. It doesn't have to be a large increase, but shouldn't there be some?

[In Exile]

Kalfear wrote...

So totally agree

If they went with ME2 bull**** sytem of mission xp in DA2.

I would never buy anouther Bioware product again in this life time!
That would literally be the final straw for me that broke my back!

I take it you totally hated the Vampire The Masquerade: Bloodlines system, eh?

Haexpane wrote...

Yeah lets get rid of XP, levels, hit
points, gameplay, swords, orcs, dragons!

Instead we should have a
Cover Based Shooter with Marines in Space! Who needs this cRPG
crap

Or we can add vampires and LA, and we can get one of the deepest RPGs of the decade!

Seriously, if you want to pretend you're a connoisseur of the genre, at least be familiar with genre conventions.

Modifié par In Exile, 21 juillet 2010 - 08:36 .

[Aratham Darksight]

B3taMaxxx wrote...

 But you're sorta missing the point. *I (as in me, myself and...) found xp pops gratifying. And don't most if not all rpgs have the "filling up bars" structure? Sure not all are graphically displayed in a neat lttle on screen bar, but they all have it, so why not an xp bar?

I don't have a problem with XP meters being bar-shaped. I have a problem with how an abstraction created to facilitate an experience (being an increasingly kickass adventurer) seems to have become the whole purpose of the game. People talk like they're playing Dragon Age not to experience a story, or immerse themselves in a different world, but to watch numbers go up.

[Vulee94]

In Exile wrote...

I take it you totally hated the Vampire The Masquerade: Bloodlines system, eh?

I wish they used a similar system in DA:O.

[Haexpane]

In Exile wrote...

Kalfear wrote...

So totally agree

If they went with ME2 bull**** sytem of mission xp in DA2.

I would never buy anouther Bioware product again in this life time!
That would literally be the final straw for me that broke my back!

I take it you totally hated the Vampire The Masquerade: Bloodlines system, eh?

SOme systems work ok for certain games.  "Mission XP" works well for God of War.  IMO it was one of the many things that keep me from even attempting to finish ME2.

I don't mind it that much when  game switches styles, as long as the core spirit is still there, somewhere in the gameplay.

For instance,   Fallout 3.  They kept SPECIAL and added VATS to simulate the body part targetting from FO1.   They kept the art style, and the fact that it was an RPG w/ XP and success is based on a combo of strategy, stats, gear and luck

Now imagine Fallout 3 without SPECIAL or VATS and "MISSION RANK UP" screens after each quest?  It sounds horrendous.

Mass Effect was a new IP so the change from ME1 to ME2 while jarring and disappointing, you can sort of understand.  It's not like they had a great RPG system in ME1 to begin with.  Personally I thought it was better than ME2, but far from perfect.

Inventory was a mess, but I enjoy things like SNIPER skill affects how good you can aim.  Straight out of Deus Ex

[B3taMaxxx]

Aratham Darksight wrote...

I don't have a problem with XP meters being bar-shaped. I have a problem with how an abstraction created to facilitate an experience (being an increasingly kickass adventurer) seems to have become the whole purpose of the game. People talk like they're playing Dragon Age not to experience a story, or immerse themselves in a different world, but to watch numbers go up.

 They do?

 Perhaps I've been reading the wrong threads?

 If it was between story and "xp pops", I would go with story, but it isn't, so we get both...................

[Haexpane]

Aratham Darksight wrote...
  People talk like they're playing Dragon Age not to experience a story, or immerse themselves in a different world, but to watch numbers go up.

Lets be realistic here, if the Story of DAO was a film or TV series, it would not be very interesting.  The story of DAO fits well into the game world and is interesting COMBINED w/ the gameplay.

I understand there are many DAO fans who only care about the story.  

I am of the camp that believes gameplay is critical in videogames.  In particular, in RPGs I am very interested in combat/magic/leveling/stats/gear etc...

Some of the highest rated RPGs of all time have mediocre stories but almost all of them have great gameplay.

Fallout 1 for example.  The story is - wander around and look for a part for the plumber.   But it's one of the greatest RPGs ever.

[orpheus333]

I've always liked the storyteller systems experiance for key story event and progress things that change your character for better or worse. XP for combat is very 'gamey' and honestly a bit clumsy. Vampire: Bloodlines system was pretty good in this.

[B3taMaxxx]

andyr1986 wrote...

I've always liked the storyteller systems experiance for key story event and progress things that change your character for better or worse. XP for combat is very 'gamey' and honestly a bit clumsy. Vampire: Bloodlines system was pretty good in this.

 "Gamey"???   Oh no he didn't!

[orpheus333]

B3taMaxxx wrote...

andyr1986 wrote...

I've always liked the storyteller systems experiance for key story event and progress things that change your character for better or worse. XP for combat is very 'gamey' and honestly a bit clumsy. Vampire: Bloodlines system was pretty good in this.

 "Gamey"???   Oh no he didn't!

Oh yea he did!1one

[Aratham Darksight]

B3taMaxxx wrote...
 They do? 

 Perhaps I've been reading the wrong threads?

I've been reading this thread.

Haexpane wrote...

Lets be realistic here, if the Story of DAO was a film or TV series, it would not be very interesting.  The story of DAO fits well into the game world and is interesting COMBINED w/ the gameplay.

I understand there are many DAO fans who only care about the story.  

I am of the camp that believes gameplay is critical in videogames.  In particular, in RPGs I am very interested in combat/magic/leveling/stats/gear etc...

Some of the highest rated RPGs of all time have mediocre stories but almost all of them have great gameplay.

Fallout 1 for example.  The story is - wander around and look for a part for the plumber.   But it's one of the greatest RPGs ever.

That was a bit of poor phrasing on my part. I didn't mean that only story was important and not gameplay, but that having your XP bar grow longer with every single thing that dies on-screen isn't - or at least shouldn't - be the point of DA's gameplay. The post I was originally responding to suggested that if combat doesn't result in XP and loot, then it is inherently uninteresting.

Haexpane wrote...

SOme systems work ok for certain games.  "Mission XP" works well for God of War.

..... God of War doesn't have mission XP. It, in fact, awards "XP" for kills.

Modifié par Aratham Darksight, 21 juillet 2010 - 09:00 .

[Dick Delaware]

Haexpane wrote...

Yeah lets get rid of XP, levels, hit points, gameplay, swords, orcs, dragons!

Instead we should have a Cover Based Shooter with Marines in Space! Who needs this cRPG crap

The OP here didn't suggest getting rid of any of those things, neither did folks like myself who agreed. All that I'm suggesting is that the XP per kill system is not a good one because it encourages you to actually seek out and kill things instead of also rewarding you with alternate solutions. Even worse, it limits the designer, because in order to make the player progress it means that he has to be given waves after waves of enemies for level-ups, resulting in the trash mobs we see so often in Origins. Sure, you can talk your way out of things once in a blue moon during Origins, but it's pretty rare.

Providing XP upon mission completion (btw, Bloodlines had neither XP per kill, hit points, or "levels", yet it is undeniably an RPG) rather than the ph4t l3wt method of Diablo has been around for awhile - it's not exactly like ME2 is the first game that did that.

So yeah, what is the problem with providing it according to quest completion, or at least a combination of monster-killing (i.e. boss fights) and quest completion, particularly if you managed to complete a quest without using violence.

I thought that including alternate solutions would be cool in a few places in Origins. Doing something like buying Rogek's lyrium dust, selling it to the Circle, then coming back to Rogek and using his newfound trust in you as a business contact to arrange a meeting with Jarvia so that you can kill her would be a pretty cool alternate solution. You wouldn't need to rework the story all that much.

[soteria]

also there will have to be a lot of substitutions for it then if we wanna lvl decently. thats something that was a big minus in GW as well. not enough lvls. so there should be more puzzles, more quests that aint all about killing. killing is needed and getting xp is needed ffrom it as well(otherwise nobody wants to kill anymore exept for sport).

...

i certainly dont want that either. just mission xp, why bother attacking verything you see?

This argument has come up a few times, and it doesn't strike me as very sound. If you need a reward to enjoy each and every kill in combat, don't we have an underlying issue? And why, indeed, should your character be attacking everything you see?

But as long as about the only benefit of gaining the xp is unlocking new moves that allow one to kill things even more efficiently, associating this with activities which avoid combat doesn't make much sense nor has much to do with "allowing true role-play". If there's problem with the system here then it runs quite deeper, and that's by not providing player with options other than combat to begin with.

This is a good point. Dragon Age really didn't have alternative methods of resolving questlines, the stealth engine was shoddy, and dialogue checks took little investment or effort. Certainly in DA:O, a large amount of combat makes some sense, given your objective. But in DA2? I don't know. Killing hordes of enemies isn't the only way to become a hero or champion.

One advantage of moving away from granting exp per kill is it allows you to design encounters a little differently. In Dragon Age, encounter designers have to be conscious of the amount of experience they're giving the player through kills. Respawning enemies are out automatically, since they don't want to allow infinite exp. If the player isn't looking for an exp reward from kills, certain choices become a lot more interesting. Instead of, "Heck yes, I'll wipe that goblin horde out for you," the player might pause to consider other options.

[CybAnt1]

BTW, the alternative to XP systems is the other wonderful system of "do-it-to-improve-it" utilized by Dungeon Siege and other games. Yes, it does seem illogical to get better at lockpicking by killing rats, or better at killing rats by opening traps. But where logic leads is us games where people sit there throwing fireballs at midair to improve their magic score, because every time they throw a fireball their "fireball throwing" skill goes up. It seems more logical, but leads to a ****ty gaming experience (imho).

[Kalfear]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

In principle I agree with the OP. In fact, even D&D never actually had XP per kill. D&D awarded XP for defeating encounters, but how you defeated it (sneaking past it, scaring it away, killing it, tricking it) was up to you.
XP per kill arose in CRPGs because killing enemies was pretty much the only way to defeat them in the early computer adaptations of RPGs, and then it became a convention. A silly one.

And DA:O rewarded XP for completeing quests, disarming traps as well.
Killing enemies was only apart of the XP and YES D&D DID AWARD XP FOR MONSTER KILLS.
I know this because I have original Monster Manuals and they have xp associated to each monster and how you increase the xp for increasing the monster difficulty!

If was totally up to the GM you had and not all GMs let you sneak around enounters  or intimidating the creatures (I know, bigger word then scaring them, me bad) so it wasnt the norm or the standard as you try to claim!

Modifié par Kalfear, 21 juillet 2010 - 09:05 .

[Sylvius the Mad]

Haexpane wrote...

Yeah lets get rid of XP, levels, hit points, gameplay, swords, orcs, dragons!

Instead we should have a Cover Based Shooter with Marines in Space! Who needs this cRPG crap

I would argue that an RPG only needs to include roleplaying and a coherent setting in which to do it (which would probabaly require everything be stat-driven - so no action combat).

But that would make XP, levels, and hit points entirely optional.

[In Exile]

Haexpane wrote...
SOme systems work ok for certain games.  "Mission XP" works well for God of War.  IMO it was one of the many things that keep me from even attempting to finish ME2.

I don't mind it that much when  game switches styles, as long as the core spirit is still there, somewhere in the gameplay. 

Bloodlines was more RPG than DA:O. Hell, it had more origins. I'm pretty sure it was the first game to meaningfully integrate your character background with the story. Playing as a Malkavian versus a Toreador made a huge difference. Characters acknowledged your clan in the game, and your clan impacted what skills you could have.

You're free to love combat XP. I'm just saying, don't act as if it matters to a cRPG, because at least one absolutely brilliant CRPG does away with it entirely.

For instance,   Fallout 3.  They kept SPECIAL and added VATS to simulate the body part targetting from FO1.   They kept the art style, and the fact that it was an RPG w/ XP and success is based on a combo of strategy, stats, gear and luck

Now imagine Fallout 3 without SPECIAL or VATS and "MISSION RANK UP" screens after each quest?  It sounds horrendous.

Depending on who you ask, SPECIAL and VATS was brutalized (VATS moreso) for Fallout 3 by Bestheda.

Mass Effect was a new IP so the change from ME1 to ME2 while jarring and disappointing, you can sort of understand.  It's not like they had a great RPG system in ME1 to begin with.  Personally I thought it was better than ME2, but far from perfect.

Inventory was a mess, but I enjoy things like SNIPER skill affects how good you can aim.  Straight out of Deus Ex

Right, but none of that has to do with anything we were talking about, specifically you saying that mission XP is not RPG like.

[Sylvius the Mad]

Kalfear wrote...

And DA:O rewarded XP for completeing quests, disarming traps as well.
Killing enemies was only apart of the XP and YES D&D DID AWARD XP FOR MONSTER KILLS.
I know this because I have original Monster Manuals and they have xp associated to each monster and how you increase the xp for increasing the monster difficulty!

But read the DM Guide.  That was the XP for that monster because of the threat it posed.  How you dealt with it was up to you.

If you encountered a monster that would have been terrifying, but you found it in a trap someone else had built and all you had to do was throw a switch, you shouldn't get XP for that (certainly not much).  The Rachni Queen in ME would be a good example of this (and a well-executed one).

[B3taMaxxx]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

Haexpane wrote...

Yeah lets get rid of XP, levels, hit points, gameplay, swords, orcs, dragons!

Instead we should have a Cover Based Shooter with Marines in Space! Who needs this cRPG crap

I would argue that an RPG only needs to include roleplaying and a coherent setting in which to do it (which would probabaly require everything be stat-driven - so no action combat).

But that would make XP, levels, and hit points entirely optional.

 The SIMS?

[In Exile]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...
I would argue that an RPG only needs to include roleplaying and a coherent setting in which to do it (which would probabaly require everything be stat-driven - so no action combat).

But that would make XP, levels, and hit points entirely optional.

Just as an aside, I find it funny that I would entirely agree with the claim that an RPG needs only to include role-play and a setting to do it in to be an RPG, yet we would disagree on absolutely everything else, including what it means to include roleplay and have a coherent setting.

Just had to get that off my chest.

[Dick Delaware]

soteria wrote...
This is a good point. Dragon Age really didn't have alternative methods of resolving questlines, the stealth engine was shoddy, and dialogue checks took little investment or effort. Certainly in DA:O, a large amount of combat makes some sense, given your objective. But in DA2? I don't know. Killing hordes of enemies isn't the only way to become a hero or champion.
One advantage of moving away from granting exp per kill is it allows you to design encounters a little differently. In Dragon Age, encounter designers have to be conscious of the amount of experience they're giving the player through kills. Respawning enemies are out automatically, since they don't want to allow infinite exp. If the player isn't looking for an exp reward from kills, certain choices become a lot more interesting. Instead of, "Heck yes, I'll wipe that goblin horde out for you," the player might pause to consider other options.

And that's what it's all about. A system that relies heavily on XP per kill really hampers that kind of freedom. The player thinks in terms of killing the entire goblin cave, and the designer makes that the only viable solution because the game is designed such that the player is rewarded with XP only through combat. It's something that the Black Isle RPG's were moving away from, as well as games like Bloodlines, yet people decry it as dumbing-down and removal of RPG elements, when it's really the opposite.

[In Exile]

Dick Delaware wrote...
 It's something that the Black Isle RPG's were moving away from, as well as games like Bloodlines, yet people decry it as dumbing-down and removal of RPG elements, when it's really the opposite.

It's a dramatic re-invention of power-gaming and character-builds and general dungeon crawling, and to some people, that is the essence of an RPG. Which goes right back to what one of the devs (I think it was David Gaider) said about RPGs: ask a group to define RPGs and you'll have six opinions and one guy talking angrily about Fallout.

[tmp7704]

Dick Delaware wrote...

However, it doesn't necessarily have to be that way. Look at the conversation with the desire demon in The Fade. I think that's a good example of a well-developed diplomatic encounter, because even though you might use diplomacy, there are several different ways of going about it. You can accept her deal and get a talent book, blood mage spec, or seXorz (though, why would you compared to the other options?). You can also intimidate her into giving you the talent book and leaving, though I'm pretty sure you need high stats, if it works at all.

Well, just to get it straight. This is interesting diplomatic encounter because you get to choose the kind of reward you get?

Another great example of this is the templar being under the desire demon's spell. No persuasion checks there, but a lot of solid dialogue and an interesting choice. It added a lot to the atmosphere there and is a nice change of pace compared to just combat-combat-combat against mobs of enemies that with similar abilities.

But at the bottom of it and when all the solid dialogue is ignored, this encounter boils down to: choose option A and skip the fight or choose option B and have to duke it out. You mention something important here -- that it is "nice change of pace" when you get through hours of nothing but combat only. But what if the OP got their wish and this "interesting choice" was just another in series of 20-30+ such encounters the player already clicked through on their way to get there? (always picking option A because, duh, they don't want to fight)  Leaving aside the mental work associated with inventing all these interesting problems for every NPC on the way (since otherwise player goes "zomg no alternative solution, oooooldskool!") ... would it be really so entertaining experience as game?

Incidentally, i'm bit surprised these are cited as examples when there's bits in game which actually do require some more complicated mental "diplomatic" work -- the Landsmeet and the discussion with Alistair about the Dark Ritual. Both require the player to be careful about arguments they make, because these can just as well damage the player's position rather than help it. But then it may be telling there's quite a few complaints about these sections if anything. And well even if there wasn't, there's still this small problem of workload involved in preparing such content in amount which would allow to use it as viable alternative path for most of the game.