96 réponses à ce sujet

[Bob the Insane]

I agree with the first half, but not so much with the second, then then I do agree with the end...

You are dragged around by the nose a bit and railroaded into situations a bit. If there is a cutsceen before a fight you do end up all grouped up. And sometime your game forces you to talk to these people (that you fully intend to kill) rather than giving you the opportunity to attack them. However that it a simplification inherent in the design I think, there is only one context sensitive action available against NPC at any one time. You don't have the opportunity to attack friendly (or "not yet aggressive") targets without talking to them, although often the first lines of dialog will allow you to simply attack...

I think this is a bit of a weakness in the system but does allow the conceptual "GM" to have more control of situations. The storyteller knows they will not have to deal with the outcome of the player doing some really off base because it is impossible for them to do so. The up side of this in a CRPG is that they can build a storger narrative. Having said that I agree the "force the entire party into the cutsceen thing" could be better implimented. I would note that abstractions should work both ways however and games which allowed you to perfectly pre-position you characters for the ultimate surprise attack before every encounter was not necessarily any more "realistic"...

I don't agree with most of the issues raised about the combat system and that you are outnumbered most of the time.That is simply the system they are using to tell a heroic story. I have some personal issues with any CRPG that levels up the world to match the player (in fact as old PnP RPG'er i have always harboured a dislike of level based systems anyway), however it is just a mechanisim to tell a story and maintain the level of challenge in this case.

I agree very storyly with the last point, it has always been a pet hate of mine in multiple genres that the equipment an enemy was attacking with a minute ago is suddenly no longer available to take. There are plenty of other mechanisims to deal with players getting uber rich at a point an inconvient point in a game.

I remember the good old days playing Shadowrun, we would take a guest GM by surprise when after defeating his carefully crafted bad guy we would drag to body off with us to butcher for all the "special" cyberware and sell it off for more cash than this adveture itself was going to pay out... Got to keep your GM on their toes...

Modifié par Bob the Insane, 16 novembre 2009 - 02:50 .

[SheffSteel]

Ambushes are supposed to put you at a disadvantage. If I were to criticise DAO's ambush design, I'd say that most often the attacking force would be weaker than you but would have a better tactical situation, most of the time the combat would start with the party leader triggering a trap, and - the most important aspect - if the party survives the initial surprise and starts to kill their attackers, the rest should turn and flee.

As for looting systems:-
Not since Baldur's Gate and its poisoned iron has an RPG really tried to justify the "sparse loot" system.
Oblivion made a good stab at a "full loot / limited inventory" system, but it still didn't get it right - most of the gear you got was in too good a condition, and if you went back to town to sell what you could carry, you'd expect scavengers to carry off the rest.

But we don't really want realism. Realism would mean all sorts of problems for the developers and for the players. You want to carry a pack full of potions, traps, grenades, and poisons around on a battlefield? How long will it take you to put it down safely, without triggering or breaking anything, before you can start to fight effectively? Or would you rather take your chances on your pack being hit in combat?

[ItsToofy]

SheffSteel wrote...

Ambushes are supposed to put you at a disadvantage.

Did anyone else get the encounter where you actualy get to say

"Spring your own ambush for a change"

as an option?

I think BioWare realized you were getting ambushed alot, it was as intended, so I agree here, they wanted to put the party at a disadvantage alot, it's not like you're character is the one ambushing the unsuspected group of people you were sent out to track, it is YOU that are the one being tracked...or did we just omit reading that part of the story to go "ub3r treasu43 hunt1ng!" (sorry, I don't speak leet fluently) and "OMG GRIND 4 LVLZ!"

[BluesMan1956]

Archie591 wrote...
Thinking about the negative makes you like the game even less. It's no fun to concentrate on it. It's no different in life, if you constantly think how bad everything is you are going to be miserable.
Think about the positive.
...
Have fun!

Ser Archie has eloqently stated an undeniable truth.  This is probably the most brilliant post I have read anywhere on this site!  

It really doesn't take any effort to find fault in something.  And living that way makes life miserable.

[Elfarch]

Pretty much everything already covered but occasionally I would like my "archer" set archer to swith to H-H on close enemies as I have very nasty back up weapons on her. As it is she can only fire arrows unless I take her off the "archer" setting.



On loot you do realize that when the inventory is empty of specialty arrows/bolts the missile users have a never ending supply of normal arrows/bolts. Would be nice to be able to switch between types against different enemies in the same encounter though. But that's a comp gaming limitation so I live (or die) with it and other bugbears.

[Ickabod27]

I don't have a problem with most of what the OP posted, but at least it was a well thought out post.



As for hte positioning and cut scenes, I have no problem with this, it would be odd to be having a conversation with a group of people where you're essentially standing behind them all.



On the random attacks they are generally ambushes so they are going to be in optimal position to fight you. The wolves is stupid becuase of the traps, and those should affect the wolves themselves.



The party combat, my tactics are pretty much all set up now so I don't have any problems with my party AI. I'll still pick a lot of their commands, but I know they won't do anything stupid if I'm not watching over them. But I still need to place those cone of cold shots.



What I really really don't like is that my party memembers never attack from behind unless I move them, that is just stupid.

[Wretched Gnu]

Most of the OP's problems stem from the fact that he apparently does not know how to play a tactical game -- and given that he expects to greet all enemies in neat little clusters in front of his party, he clearly doesn't want to play a tactical game.

Modifié par Wretched Gnu, 16 novembre 2009 - 04:12 .

[lordmangafee]

I have to say that I agree with much of what the OP discussed. I love the game, but I won't be blind to obvious improvements that could be made. I would be curious what the 'spotting' rules are in this game, or is it just a zone trigger. I know a lot of the character behavior could be adjusted with the tactics, but it's such a tease. More conditionals would be nice, like: enemies grouped > (additional conditional) and PARTY is not in MELEE with them > launch a fireball.

This is a pretty epic game though, and with the release of the toolset, I am sure that Bioware has lots of updates and expansions planned for this game. I just hope they have enough widgets to address some of the considerate thoughts/issues of the OP (and I am sure many others). I wouldn't call it bashing (I myself am having a blast), but just insight from people who think the game can be even better than it is.

[Wolff Laarcen]

Wretched Gnu wrote...
Most of the OP's problems stem from the fact that he apparently does not know how to play a tactical game -- and given that he expects all greet all enemies in neat little clusters in front of his party, he clearly doesn't want to play a tactical game.

You're ignoring the issue: that the game makes a large degree of tactical decisions FOR you.

Many fights where a proper setup would prevail are unnecessarily complicated by point #1. Its stupid to position a group in the middle of over 9000 archers when its OBVIOUS there's about to be a fight.

This brings point #4 into play. What good are 'tactics' in a situation where not only am i outnumbered 4 to 1, but im also prevented from setting up my group in a tactical manner? Its absurd, and frankly it boggles the mind how a feature like that made it through development.

#3 is an outstanding issue too. While its possible - using a mod for max tactic slots - to set your characters up with things like heal/rejuv priorities, focus fire and debuff rotations based on target rank, its sometimes difficult to produce exactly the behavior you want. The tactic system does have a rather steep learning curve.

Many times you'll be hopelessly mired down in tedious micromanagement, clicking the same move or attack command over and over, hoping it will execute while 18 enemy archers are shooting your face.

Modifié par Wolff Laarcen, 16 novembre 2009 - 04:20 .

[LFDog]

Today I tool some time to look at the strategy video from Bioware (it comes with the Collector's edition, but the concepts are all about the game).



It occurs to me that almost every point from the OP can be addressed by:



1) read the manual and learn about tactics

2) learn the skill-trees for the classes you play and in your party. I was particularly interested in some of the rougue advice in the strategy video - especially on how to use the skill tree's to develope a striker vs. ranger. It was also very interesting to see how a fighter could use skills such as threaten and taunt to affect game play and battles - check them out.



I'm not trying to be disrespectful of the well-put thoughts of the OP, but I've been playing RPG's since the earliest days of D&D when they were paper-based and combat systems have always been an area of heated debate and criticism. he trick is not to lament about what you think they should be, but rather learn them and use them as part of having some fun.



I *think* that Bioware uses a D&D combat system as a foundation - I prefer a combat system that was used in a game called "Aftermath" - except that wouldn't work in a video game because a critical head shot would take out a character regardless of how many "hit" points they have - so it wouldn't be much of a story when you build to 15th level and a single arrow through your head ends the "journey".



So to be very honest, I think that there is a responsibility on the part of the player to understand the way the game is played. Bioware, in my opinion, did an excellent job on this game and all the original complaints in the first post can be addressed through the use of more management from the player standpoint. It's not a FPS so you need to think through each battle to some degree.

[Kelston]

BluesMan1956 wrote...

Ser Archie has eloqently stated an undeniable truth.  This is probably the most brilliant post I have read anywhere on this site!  

It really doesn't take any effort to find fault in something.  And living that way makes life miserable.

Settling for mediocrity merely pushes the bar lower. What's wrong with continually moving the bar higher rather than attempting to justify oversights, errors, and imbalances?

It's only miserable if you make it so. More people would be miserable if every product's downsides was continually ignored so that the producers of those products never feel the need to improve upon them. Living in your world is living delusionally, not happily. There's a difference.

[JHorwath]

That used to bother me. Then I just started to immediately pause when the fight started and set party movement to hold. Next step would be to position my warrior and then move everyone else. 9/10 I often fight with the party in hold mode. That way characters don't run off and do stupid things. Don't get me wrong that little bit is a pita but I've learned to deal with it.

*Plus, if you pause at the start you can see where the enemies are and get a grasp for the strategy you will use.  I find this to be a necessity if you don't want to get slaughtered.

Modifié par JHorwath, 16 novembre 2009 - 06:43 .

[Sensuki]

moved to http://social.biowar.../9/index/208337

Modifié par Sensuki, 16 novembre 2009 - 07:22 .

[Dauphin2]

To the people who think it's ok to carefully place all your NPCs before the fight begins, this is a form of 'godmode'. You're characters wouldn't know they were going to be attacked before hand. I think it's good that the characters are reset to prevent this. You should have to react like in a real fight, and move to where you want to be while the battle rages.

[rlnoe]

I can agree with some of the things the OP says.  I especially find number 1 irritating. 

One thing I find even more annoying is running past an enemy and showing him my back or charging into the middle of enemies around my tank as I try to get behind them.  Why does this happen?  Because while trying to click on the mob I miss and click the ground.  Easy to do when you're in top down mode.  Either they move or I click outside the hit box or whatever.  I take more damage from that and have fights drag out longer because of that than anything else.  I use wasdqe to move not the mouse.  Why isn't there an option to turn off the click to move?  Such a simple thing would solve this problem. 

I also think it's a bad idea to have to use skill points to get more tactics slots.  They should just give each companion 10 slots at the beginning and leave it at that.

I freely admit that I have issues controlling companions.  I had the same problems thru both Neverwinter Nights games.  I'm much more used to only having to control my character (in games like Morrowind, Oblivion, The Witcher and various MMOs).  That said I do think I'm starting to get the hang of it.

[Project Mercy]

You forgot where it wipes your traps during a cutscene too. I love that part.

Bioware made a tactical game by making sure you were (quite possibly) the most ignorant, naive and least educated strategist in the history of ever. I've seen 8-year-old boy scouts camping in in their parent's backyard set themselves up to defend against he boogieman better than your seasoned adventuerers.

Modifié par Project Mercy, 16 novembre 2009 - 08:43 .

[Meggor]

My own concerns and feelings are perfectly worded in point 1 - 4. Thanks for saving me the time to find the words for those horrible design decisions.

I don't agree on points 5 and 6.

5. I don't mind firendly fire. It's up to me to control battle and my team so I don't kill my own.
If I know my mage's gonna cast ice cone into a heap of mixed team and enemies (fighting those revenants in the elf forsts on hard difficulty) then let the other eat some anti-freeze potion first etc.
In other games I have felt slightly (hm?) disturbed about the lack of friendly fire: I blast enemies with AoE and my team is hit but doesn't take damage from that fire, ice or whatever it is.
In DAO eniemies doing AoE damage their own too.
To repeat: I think this part of game design is ok.

6. Yes, maybe dissapointing phatz doesn't drop from every bioss type mob. On the other hand, we get good stuff as rewards, from handing in meteor ore or dragon scales etc to the right NPC craftsman, and from vendors.
Earthroot and potions are pretty valuable loot now because there is a shortage in game of potions (at least on hard difficulty I need many), have to craft them becasue vendors have too few and/or want too much pay need to save money for nthat 128 gold staff and other vendor goodies.
Actually it's like in The Witcher (incidently built on the Neverwinter Night game machine like DAO is): most drops are for making potions, coatings etc that hardest level can't be won without. ANd I think that's OK that that stuff have some real importance iin game.

Modifié par Meggor, 16 novembre 2009 - 08:51 .

[Wolff Laarcen]

Regarding Friendly Fire:

True enough, the computer doesnt give a damn about blasting its own players and will happily eradicate several of its own to get 1 of yours.

I don't really like it but I can see the rationale and the balancing effect it has on mage tactics so I can play around it. The possibility of blasting the crap out of your own group makes you look for AoE-CC setups or other ways to use it effectively, which works better for some than others.

The cone spells are a bit more forgiving but imo moving a mage that close to his target defeats the purpose of ranged spells and the advantage they confer in the first place. The one thing I feel is lacking is a solid arsenal of single-target spells for those who just dont feel AoE use is worth the friendly fire tradeoff, nor the hassle of setting it up.

Modifié par Wolff Laarcen, 16 novembre 2009 - 09:09 .

[SamoanX]

I love the fact that a shnee load of the OP's complaints are the fact that he doesn't know how to play the game ( not being a douche just fact )



Half of it is solved with tactics. Then he complains about bad AI but 3 seconds later complains that they are using their skills too much ( knockdowns )



Coming from this I say you much suck at the game and didn't take the time to try and learn it before coming on a forum and complaining.



That's my constructive critisism

[Wretched Gnu]

Wolff Laarcen wrote...

Wretched Gnu wrote...
Most of the OP's problems stem from the fact that he apparently does not know how to play a tactical game -- and given that he expects all greet all enemies in neat little clusters in front of his party, he clearly doesn't want to play a tactical game.

You're ignoring the issue: that the game makes a large degree of tactical decisions FOR you.

Many fights where a proper setup would prevail are unnecessarily complicated by point #1. Its stupid to position a group in the middle of over 9000 archers when its OBVIOUS there's about to be a fight.

But this only happens in the very small number of fights that follow a cutscene.  And even then, just move your guys into the position you want.  That's the point of the game.  You lose maybe 2 seconds by doing that -- which is just one of the many disadvantages your party ought to have, considering that each of your characters is at least as powerful as 4 of your enemies (which is why complaining about being "outnumbered" is such a head-scratcher.  In what game like this are you not outnumbered?)

What the game really needs are not nerfs, but just more tactical choices.  You ought to at least be able to set up a default formation, like in BG2, and set a queue of actions.

[Wolff Laarcen]

Dauphin2 wrote...
To the people who think it's ok to carefully place all your NPCs before the fight begins, this is a form of 'godmode'. You're characters wouldn't know they were going to be attacked before hand.

I'm pretty certain that if i walked into a room full of snarling werewolves that I'd be expecting a fight (for example).  What's more, If i were a mage or a rogue in such a situation I'd DEFINITELY be standing behind the big dude with the shield and plate armor... but I guess that's just me.

Wretched Gnu wrote...
...this only happens in the very small number of fights that follow a cutscene.  And even then, just move your guys into the position you want.  That's the point of the game.  You lose maybe 2 seconds by doing that...

I'm playing through on Hard difficulty atm and I've seen fights that were made or broken by those first 2 seconds.  Sometimes you get lucky and sometimes you reload.

Wretched Gnu wrote...
What the game really needs are not nerfs, but just more tactical choices.  You ought to at least be able to set up a default formation, like in BG2, and set a queue of actions.

I would gladly welcome more tactical choices.

Modifié par Wolff Laarcen, 16 novembre 2009 - 09:22 .

[mmu1]

I agree with all of the OP's points to some degree - most quite strongly, some like #6 only marginally.



For lack of a better word, the combat in this game does feel "cheap" - as in "cheap shot", or "cheap trick". Much of the challenge comes not from how clever the encounters are, and how well scripted the AI is, but from the fact you're constantly - and blatantly - being put at a disadvantage by an enemy that isn't playing by the rules.



1. Perfectly placed ambushes (which often beg the question of how exactly you managed to get surprised by a bunch of people sitting behind what amounts to simple field fortifications - I'm surprised I haven't seen any Darkspawn field latrines yet...)



2. Enemies appearing from thin air to "cleverly" flank you, or directly behind your party because you tripped an invisible trigger



3. Dungeons which contain a dozen identical or nearly identical encounters - 3-5 melee enemies, 2-4 archers, 1-2 mages (hey, weren't those supposed to be rare?)



4. The "spamming" of stun / knockdown by enemies - my fighters have close to 100 physical resistance, why are they constantly getting knocked around when I have a hard time keeping a Lieutenant-level monster stunned? Since my party is always outnumbered so badly, shouldn't I be the one with the superior crowd control abilities, not the computer?



5. If I want to reposition my characters in the middle of a combat, I feel like I'm fighting the controls. Even if the AI has to deal with the same issues (which I'm not 100% convinced of) there are usually so many enemies, it ends up being irrelevant - like a locust swarm, they fill all the available space, getting into flanking positions through sheer volume.



I'm grateful for the "Easy" mode, it lets me experience all the great stuff the game has to offer from an RPG / storytelling point of view without having to deal with how awful they made the combat. The biggest challenge in DAO aren't the enemy tactics, but the design and the interface. I'm in this for the immersion, not the metagame...

[leotime0]

gah!

Stop nitpicking and enjoy the game for what it is

[SkiTheMadRussian]

Wretched Gnu wrote...

Wolff Laarcen wrote...

Wretched Gnu wrote...
Most of the OP's problems stem from the fact that he apparently does not know how to play a tactical game -- and given that he expects all greet all enemies in neat little clusters in front of his party, he clearly doesn't want to play a tactical game.

You're ignoring the issue: that the game makes a large degree of tactical decisions FOR you.

Many fights where a proper setup would prevail are unnecessarily complicated by point #1. Its stupid to position a group in the middle of over 9000 archers when its OBVIOUS there's about to be a fight.

But this only happens in the very small number of fights that follow a cutscene.  And even then, just move your guys into the position you want.  That's the point of the game.  You lose maybe 2 seconds by doing that -- which is just one of the many disadvantages your party ought to have, considering that each of your characters is at least as powerful as 4 of your enemies (which is why complaining about being "outnumbered" is such a head-scratcher.  In what game like this are you not outnumbered?)

What the game really needs are not nerfs, but just more tactical choices.  You ought to at least be able to set up a default formation, like in BG2, and set a queue of actions.

Oh come on, it happens in every fight that actually matters. Sure it doesn't happen for trash mobs, but you really don't need to worry about tactics for those. Nearly every fight with an orange mob is a teleport

[SkiTheMadRussian]

leotime0 wrote...

gah!
Stop nitpicking and enjoy the game for what it is

What it IS is what we're talking about. We're saying it IS lacking. Stop trolling