302 réponses à ce sujet

[Firky]

^ Hardly. I oscillated between all 4 difficulties on my first playthrough, but I didn't have the Black Emporium and couldn't respec. I found I'd built *so* badly, the pride demon at the end took me 10+ attempts on casual.

Second time I refused to drop it from nightmare, but chugged the respec potions like they were water.

[the_one_54321]

Avejajed wrote...
I play on casual so the whole game is easy. I don't feel any less accomplished when I'm finished. Though I have a feeling some people think I should be ashamed of myself for it.

:innocent:

[Firky]

@Avejajed That fight was a shocker. It had, like, an AoE crushing prision IIRC.

To link it back to the OP, I found that being high level and having a more careful choice of abilities on nightmare made *such* a difference by the end. It was that versatile play thing, whoever that designer in here was said, for me.

[Allan Schumacher]

Avejajed wrote...

I play on casual so the whole game is easy. I don't feel any less accomplished when I'm finished. Though I have a feeling some people think I should be ashamed of myself for it.

I don't think you're in as small of a minority as you may think.

Even myself, I have only played BioWare's games on Normal difficulty.  In BG2 it provided me with ample challenge, and since games like KOTOR I find myself playing them more for the story and the characters and not so much for the challenge.

That doesn't mean I think we should ignore those that prefer the challenging combat either though.  I don't think it's impossible to appeal to both in some capacity since the elements are not intrinsically linked in RPGs IMO (whether or not a game has a good story/combat is relatively independent of the other.  As long as the other doesn't get in the way I think most people are happy that they get what they want).

[the_one_54321]

It's easy enough to include difficulty options. But it never sounded like DAII did a particularly good job of that. Friendly fire only being available in nightmare, and possibly one-shot-ing your entire party, for example.

[Anomaly-]

Avejajed wrote...

Another thing- nobody answered my question earlier so maybe you can. If you never level up your character- do the enemies still level up?

Yes.

[AmstradHero]

Filament wrote...

hoorayforicecream wrote...

Filament wrote...

I like the sort of level scaling in Zelda where the enemies explicitly become higher-ranked versions of older enemies rather than simply being the older enemy with higher stats.

So, for example, you only encounter Hurlocks from levels 1-6, then Hurlock Mercenaries from 7-12, then Hurlock Marauders from 13-18, and finally Hurlock Deathbringers from 19+? Let's say they have some minimal amount of visual differences (palette/texture swap and the like), and possibly have new skills as you (and they) level up.

Wolf > Dire Wolf > Spirit Wolf > Demon Wolf

This sort of thing?

Yes, exactly like that.

/me feels disappointed that no one noticed he mentioned this several pages ago...

[Firky]

@ the_one I don't think it's easy to make difficulties. (DA2 cemented that idea for me.)

So many happy memories of casting Walking Bomb and killing everyone. (And, even better, casting Walking Bomb and missing the party.)

My understanding of the difficulty levels in DA2 were that casual and normal were designed to be played controlling one character and leaving the rest to their own devices (and tactics). Hard was meant to be for party players tweaking the tactics menu and optimising stuff. Nightmare was for micromanaging/optimising everything. Something like that. I can't recall where I got that idea, though.

It's logical, in some ways. If you are playing casual and not controlling mages in the back row, or whatever, you don't really know if someone is going to cast fireball on your head, so it causes no damage. Same with normal, but you're enjoying using more abilities or whatever. Not sure about why hard didn't have FF but, with the way the HP balanced out, for better or worse, (in my mind, it's just a rule set), FF may have been way too dangerous for the style of hard play they had in mind.

If there was a weakness with the difficulties, I think they might have misunderstood how more traditional players actually choose difficulty. I'm sure I played BGII on the easiest setting the first few times, micro-ing the party. Still didn't kill Firkraag until much later. Or, it might be that you *had* to micro the party in BG II, whereas people expect to be able to control one character and rely on tactics for the others, these days. I don't know.

Combat. Complicated.

Modifié par Firky, 24 avril 2012 - 07:41 .

[AkiKishi]

the_one_54321 wrote...

hoorayforicecream wrote...

Filament wrote...
I like the sort of level scaling in Zelda where the enemies explicitly become higher-ranked versions of older enemies rather than simply being the older enemy with higher stats.

So, for example, you only encounter Hurlocks from levels 1-6, then Hurlock Mercenaries from 7-12, then Hurlock Marauders from 13-18, and finally Hurlock Deathbringers from 19+? Let's say they have some minimal amount of visual differences (palette/texture swap and the like), and possibly have new skills as you (and they) level up.

Wolf > Dire Wolf > Spirit Wolf > Demon Wolf

This sort of thing?

Isn't this basically just level scaling mixed with re-skins? 

How does it make sense for new monsters to appear as you become tougher? 

Because weaker creatures are avoiding you, or not being sent after you.

[AkiKishi]

Firky wrote...
It's logical, in some ways. If you are playing casual and not controlling mages in the back row, or whatever, you don't really know if someone is going to cast fireball on your head, so it causes no damage. Same with normal, but you're enjoying using more abilities or whatever. Not sure about why hard didn't have FF but, with the way the HP balanced out, for better or worse, (in my mind, it's just a rule set), FF may have been way too dangerous for the style of hard play they had in mind.

If there was a weakness with the difficulties, I think they might have misunderstood how more traditional players actually choose difficulty. I'm sure I played BGII on the easiest setting the first few times, micro-ing the party. Still didn't kill Firkraag until much later. Or, it might be that you *had* to micro the party in BG II, whereas people expect to be able to control one character and rely on tactics for the others, these days. I don't know.

Combat. Complicated.

In DA I geared people to be able to take spell hits and not suffer much or any damage. Then just cast spells over them. Did the same thing in the IE games as well, much easier there because of the spell system.

There is a difference between difficult and tedious, it's something that Bioware have not really addressed. Giving things long hp point bars does not make the fight more difficult, it just makes it more tedious. You may need to buff more, or optimise weapons but tactically very little if anything changes. Unless you count cheesing your way via kiting or whatever a tactic.

[Firky]

BobSmith101 wrote...

Unless you count cheesing your way via kiting or whatever a tactic.

Me, personally?

I cheesed and kited a lot more in Origins. I'm using the word "kiting" to mean picking off enemies, though, whereas "kiting" in DA2 was more like manually dodging big hits; which was dramatically improved in Legacy, due to larger enemies having a variety of hits, and quicker.

I found the high HP thing was mitigated as I learned how to cause more damage. Not tedious.

I think DA2's one of the most strategic party RPGs I've played. They didn't get the action/TB balance exactly right, but it was pretty great to be able to dodge and use the ogre in the intro, for example, to bulldoze his own troops, in combination with a traditional style of party play. I love the old D&D rulesets in cRPGs, too, but they're not without their own problems. (And lots of cheese. I defeated Kangaxx one time at level 6. Don't ask how. I'm too embarrassed to say.)

Edit: Actually, it might have been level 8. Still.

Modifié par Firky, 24 avril 2012 - 09:25 .

[AkiKishi]

Firky wrote...

BobSmith101 wrote...

Unless you count cheesing your way via kiting or whatever a tactic.

Me, personally?

I cheesed and kited a lot more in Origins. I'm using the word "kiting" to mean picking off enemies, though, whereas "kiting" in DA2 was more like manually dodging big hits; which was dramatically improved in Legacy, due to larger enemies having a variety of hits, and quicker.

I found the high HP thing was mitigated as I learned how to cause more damage. Not tedious.

I think DA2's one of the most strategic party RPGs I've played. They didn't get the action/TB balance exactly right, but it was pretty great to be able to dodge and use the ogre in the intro, for example, to bulldoze his own troops, in combination with a traditional style of party play. I love the old D&D rulesets in cRPGs, too, but they're not without their own problems. (And lots of cheese. I defeated Kangaxx one time at level 6. Don't ask how. I'm too embarrassed to say.)

Edit: Actually, it might have been level 8. Still.

I had my party AI programmed to react on states for CCC's but that forces you down quite a narrow a path (as well as needing to redo it every time you change members). Even so , the Dragon fight almost put me to sleep. Knock off some hps, fight a couple of waves, rinse and repeat.

I guess it would depend on the games you have played. It's very low down on my list.Difficulties should involve better tactics rather than just repeating the same thing more often.
Just to bring it back on topic, cutting down the ammount of variables like stats would be helpful in that regard. The less unknowns you have, the easier it is to balance the game.

 

[Sylvius the Mad]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

I don't think you're in as small of a minority as you may think.

Even myself, I have only played BioWare's games on Normal difficulty.  In BG2 it provided me with ample challenge, and since games like KOTOR I find myself playing them more for the story and the characters and not so much for the challenge.

That doesn't mean I think we should ignore those that prefer the challenging combat either though.  I don't think it's impossible to appeal to both in some capacity since the elements are not intrinsically linked in RPGs IMO (whether or not a game has a good story/combat is relatively independent of the other.  As long as the other doesn't get in the way I think most people are happy that they get what they want).

I don't want a challenge just to be challenged.  I want the game to feel fair.  Most BioWare games offer me that on the setting one step above the default (usually Hard).  In DAO, Hard was the setting that levelled the field in terms of friendly fire.  In NWN and BG, Hardcore was the setting that correctly applied the most core D&D rules.  That's what I want from difficulty.

DA2 didn't offer any difficulty setting that did that.  First, limited friendly fire to Nightmare, which is intended to be punishingly difficult rather than fair, was a huge barrier to enjoyment, and the grossly asymmetrical combat mechanics probably rendered fairness impossible anyway.

I want a level playing field.  I want the rules that govern my characters to be fairly similar to the rules that govern my opponents.  I want my attacks to do to me roughly the same thing they do to my enemies.

Can we have that back, please?

[the_one_54321]

Friendly fire would not obliterate the party if the damage scales were equal. Changing that was a mistake.

[AkiKishi]

the_one_54321 wrote...

Friendly fire would not obliterate the party if the damage scales were equal. Changing that was a mistake.

I think that's another lesson they learned from Final Fantasy. Nothing quite like having one of your own party turn on you for major carnage.

D&D always kept the numbers under control ,for at least as long as I was playing it.

[the_one_54321]

Berserk was always the worst status effect.

[the_one_54321]

Confuse. I mean confuse, not berserk.

[BubbleDncr]

Attributes made a lot more sense to me in Origins than in DA2.

If you were a warrior, your main stat was strength, so you had to put most of your points there. But some of your skills required dex, so you had to pay attention to that if you wanted those skills. Then depending how much health you need, which most warriors need a lot of, you had to balance how much to put in endurance. And if you wanted to be a charming warrior, you had to put points into cunning to get coercion.

In DA2, they streamlined it to the point you didn't have to put any thought into it. All warriors, rogues, and mages, ended up being pretty much the same. I mean, because all mage armor required a certain amount of willpower, making a blood mage required you to fill up a stat you didn't really need.

So, levels and attributes are more relevant depending on the flexibility of the character classes. So I vote go more in the direction of Origins.

[Xewaka]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...
I don't want a challenge just to be challenged.  I want the game to feel fair.  Most BioWare games offer me that on the setting one step above the default (usually Hard).  In DAO, Hard was the setting that levelled the field in terms of friendly fire.  In NWN and BG, Hardcore was the setting that correctly applied the most core D&D rules.  That's what I want from difficulty.

DA2 didn't offer any difficulty setting that did that.  First, limited friendly fire to Nightmare, which is intended to be punishingly difficult rather than fair, was a huge barrier to enjoyment, and the grossly asymmetrical combat mechanics probably rendered fairness impossible anyway.

I want a level playing field.  I want the rules that govern my characters to be fairly similar to the rules that govern my opponents.  I want my attacks to do to me roughly the same thing they do to my enemies.

Can we have that back, please?

Yes, please. Have the rules that govern the PCs govern the NPCs as well. We need a game system that is internally consistent. Asymmetry tends to make consistency very hard, if not outright impossible, to achieve.

[Blastback]

Personally it would be nice to have some enemies that didn't scale. Like the goblins in Baldur's Gate. Yes I want most of my opponents to stay challenging. But give me a few peons who will always be easy cannon fodder, just for fun.