1056 réponses à ce sujet

[ColorsFade]

Tchos wrote...

One bit of philosophy regarding my lighting -- if I'm taking the time to create lighting that evokes a particular mood (and using light to draw the eye to important places), what could quickly ruin that mood by washing out all of my lighting? A light spell, perhaps. Or an equipped torch. When would a player be tempted to use one of those things? When they can't see, of course. So, then, the player should never be left in so much darkness as to be tempted to break out the torch or light spell.

I agree with this. I've often wondered why developers don't seem to put as much care into this area. Lightning can be very influential to the quality of a scene or a mood. If players can't see, they're just going to light it up. 

[PJ156]

ColorsFade wrote...

Tchos wrote...

One bit of philosophy regarding my lighting -- if I'm taking the time to create lighting that evokes a particular mood (and using light to draw the eye to important places), what could quickly ruin that mood by washing out all of my lighting? A light spell, perhaps. Or an equipped torch. When would a player be tempted to use one of those things? When they can't see, of course. So, then, the player should never be left in so much darkness as to be tempted to break out the torch or light spell.

I agree with this. I've often wondered why developers don't seem to put as much care into this area. Lightning can be very influential to the quality of a scene or a mood. If players can't see, they're just going to light it up. 

Lighting up has value too, but flat darkness is not to my liking. A lone torch in an otherwise darkened area works well sometimes; get the music right and you have a very interesting area. For me it's about mixing it up, what ever you do though, lighting is one of the key things to get right.
 
The only senses you can play to when we design is sight and hearing, you have to work those to your advantage. Taste, touch and smell we can only desribe in text whixh will always be limited.

PJ

Modifié par PJ156, 18 février 2013 - 11:42 .

[Dann-J]

You could always try deliberately scripting some nasty recursive loops that tax the processor or graphics card, in order to generate a burning smell.

[ColorsFade]

Tchos wrote...

I just wanted to say, I think this screenshot is really cool! I love it. 

I'm curious about a couple of things Tchos. First, I see from your development journal that you've been working on this project for about 9 months now. How do you feel about it? Still enthusiastic? Stil excited about working on it? 

When I started writing down my ideas for my campaign I figured it will take about a year's worth of time (since it's a part-time, in-my-spare-time endeavor). I was wondering how you felt about your velicity and progress and the project overall. 

Second - Do you have a projected month when you think you'll finish? 

Third - How are you dealing with your earliest work on the campaign as you progress? What I mean by that is, as you have progressed through learnign the toolset these past 9 months, and as you have built area after area, and encounter after encounter, do you find yourself wanting to go back and redo and/or polish previous areas you first built, because you know more now and want to improve upon those areas? Or do you just take the approach that what's done is done, and any work on past areas is time wasted on stuff that has yet to be built? 

This looks like a fun mod. I'm excited to see how it turns out and to play it for myself. 

[Tchos]

PJ: I personally really like textual description.  I think it does a better job than these graphics do, in many cases.  How do you find it limited?

ColorsFade:

• I don't know what you mean by "velicity", but I'm in no danger of burnout, if that's what you're asking.  I thought that would be a danger early on, but it doesn't seem to have been the case, as long as I allow myself to also play.
• I've come to see that kind of question as one that should not be asked of anyone, except perhaps one who has a great love of counting and scheduling.
• Any past area that I considered "done" at the time is still done.  There were some places that were unsatisfactory at the time, but I had no way to fix them, and those I've fixed.  When I discovered the issue of some lighting present having full-black shadows, I went through all my past areas and checked them for that, and fixed them where I found them.  Those are bugs, and bugs need to be fixed whether I consider an area done or not.

I keep a "to do" list in the form of a bulleted list in a free desktop program called Stickies, where I used to use a notepad.  I make notes of things that I notice are missing or need to be fixed when I test my areas, and fix them, test them again, and remove them from the list.

Modifié par Tchos, 19 février 2013 - 08:59 .

[Tchos]

To expand a bit on #3, I should also say that I've changed methods and approaches many times for many things (mainly scripting systems) as I've progressed and learned more and better ways of doing things, but I have not changed the ones that were already done and working. I keep those same systems and just use the new methods for new things.

[ColorsFade]

Thanks for taking the time to answer Tchos.

I misspelled "velocity" In the programming world, we consider it a metric that is roughly equivalent to "throughput" - the amount of work you can get done in a given period of time (like say, two weeks, which is a typical cycle for Agile teams).

If you're maintaining a constant velocity after 9 months, that's awesome. And that's key for progress. A consistent velocity is key, I think, on projects like this.

I understand your reasoning behind #2; it's solid. I was just curious. I firmly believe in the mantra of "it will be done when it's done". I remember when I was an undergraduate, I admired Blizzard quite a bit as a company at the time, because among game developers they were unique in that they shipped when they considered the game done, and not due to some arbitrary marketing date. My question for you was more sheer curiosity - if you felt like you were getting close to your original goals, whatever those may be.

Your #3 sounds similar to mine, although I am still old-school in that I don't use a program to track mine. I just use a yellow legal pad. I do the same for my real job. It works, and there's a satisfaction in being able to cross stuff off the list. I'm a list-crosser-offer kind of guy.

[Tchos]

Using an actual physical list also has the advantage that if you cross it off after fixing it, but before testing it, you probably won't forget to check it next time you run through, whereas if you just delete the entry, it may fall victim to the phenomenon "out of sight, out of mind". At least until you fill up the paper and throw away the page, as I was doing when I did it on paper.

I was not familiar with that programming term. To use the term, my velocity has not been consistent, because at the beginning I was doing a solid amount of work every day, except for weekends. Now, I'm working on it every other day or every third day, though sometimes I still work on it in several consecutive days in a row. If you take any month's sample range along the timeline in isolation, though, it is more or less consistent.

I think there's a lot to admire about Blizzard, though I don't think I like the direction they've been heading. I am close, and closer than I've ever been. Close enough that I'm making plans for the beta testing.

[ColorsFade]

Tchos wrote...
 I am close, and closer than I've ever been. Close enough that I'm making plans for the beta testing.

Very cool. 

Your work looks fun. Good luck with it. I'll enjoy playing it when you're finished. 

[Tchos]

I finished up the ship interior mini-dungeon I mentioned before. A couple of interactive mechanics and other such things that required writing some more scripts, but nothing major. I hope it'll be a pleasant extra diversion, if I can say that of a dungeon crawl.

Something I need to be sure is in the readme file and elsewhere -- examine everything that can be manipulated. They all have descriptions, and you'd be missing out on some context if you don't take a moment to look over an object before you activate it.

For one of the scripts, I noticed I had been doing some repeated tasks with a certain situation (that I don't want to divulge for the sake of spoilers), and decided that this time I'd write a generic script to get the basics out of the way for any future situations like that. I've generally been building my variable-based generic scripts to be both expandable and also able to fire off additional scripts if necessary, also from the variables, so that they're as flexible as possible.

I might have to tune one of the encounters a bit, because I found it a bit too difficult for my mostly level 10 party, even with a couple of level 20s thrown in. It's possible I'm just lacking the appropriate form of protection, though, and it's a bonus, entirely optional encounter, which you don't need to take unless you want some extra XP and loot, so I think I should just leave it as it is. It would be fine if not for some aggro issues, I think. I separated the mobs and put a wall between them, and made their perception ranges short, but they still attack together.

I checked the Monster Manual III to read up on some specifics about these creatures, and I found that despite being CR8, they have 20 HD (some of you now know which creatures I'm talking about, but I want to keep it vague). It seems a little excessive, so I removed one of them, and that made the fight much, much easier. Maybe too easy now. It was the difference between party wipe and total victory with no deaths. No happy medium? I'll put the one back in. Between the two options, I think I like it better as a tough challenge.

That time, they did not all attack together, but the first one sought my party out once I started to move, despite still being on the other side of a wall. Now I'm thinking they just have high listen checks, and this is working as intended.

The treasure to be had here, by the way, is mostly "fun" treasure. At level 10, gold may no longer have the kind of allure that it would have had at earlier levels, when you're still struggling to outfit yourself with decent gear and consumables, but at the same time, I don't want to be dropping powerful magic items left and right. The bosses carry good items, but if it doesn't happen to perfectly match your character build, you may want to sell it anyway, and use the money to pick up something more appropriate at the well-stocked port town shops.

I started adding companion environmental interactions, so that the companions you can pick up will have a few lines to say in certain situations, such as observations on the new locations, and at the same time throwing in some that player-created party members can say, based on their attributes. For the former, I'm using the SoZ method, with specially-named dialogue files for each companion, with gc_node conditionals marking which line to use in which situation, with the standard gtr_bark_node script. This way, your characters (whether created or recruited) will be able to notice things that they should notice due to their skills, and inform the player.

I found an item in one of my shops was selling for only 1g, despite the base cost being much higher. Based on an incident earlier, I thought it might be set as a plot item, but it's not. I decided to just remove it from the shop.

Er...I decided to make another new placeable (or two). The pirate treasure really needed a grinning human skull watching over it, and the skullpile wouldn't cut it. Neither would Myrkul's skull scaled down, since scaling something down that much makes it hate lights, and of course it has all those spikes all over it. So I took a human skeleton and isolated the head. The jawbone is broken on the skeleton, and the head is rotated to the side, and I saved one placeable with that being the same. Then I made a second one with the skull rotated so that it would rest properly on the ground upright. Also reattached its broken jawbone, though I think it might have a bit of an underbite.

Modifié par Tchos, 22 février 2013 - 10:18 .

[ColorsFade]

Tchos wrote...

I checked the Monster Manual III to read up on some specifics about these creatures, and I found that despite being CR8, they have 20 HD (some of you now know which creatures I'm talking about, but I want to keep it vague). It seems a little excessive, so I removed one of them, and that made the fight much, much easier. Maybe too easy now. It was the difference between party wipe and total victory with no deaths. No happy medium? I'll put the one back in. Between the two options, I think I like it better as a tough challenge.

That time, they did not all attack together, but the first one sought my party out once I started to move, despite still being on the other side of a wall. Now I'm thinking they just have high listen checks, and this is working as intended.

Is scripting the encounter differently an option? Can you, for instance, script the baddies on the other side of the wall to not appear/engage until (a) baddie in first fight is dead/near death or maybe ( character crosses some line?

From what little I've seen of the scripting system so far, it seems pretty flexible. 

[Tchos]

Well, yes to both, but if I were to do that, it would have to be the "not engage" option, since I don't like having things appear out of nowhere, when a stealthy character may have already checked to see that nothing was there before. Scripting it to appear would be easy, though, and although I know how to script it to not engage, it's a little more involved, and I'd rather leave it and move on.

[MokahTGS]

 FYI, there are skeleton placeables such as skulls and bones and whatnot avaialble in the Crypt Pit Tileset addon available on the vault.  I use these all the time in Jabberwocky and other projects.  I know they aren't obvious by the authors description but they are quality work.

[Tchos]

Thank you. It's true, I searched for placeable skulls first before making my own, and didn't find any, but since this author doesn't use the word "skull" in the description, I missed it. That, and the placeables are bundled in a tileset, though I should know from RWS' fine work that sometimes excellent quality placeables are bundled with tilesets.

I'll take a look at those (wish there were a demo module for it). Although I don't think I'll need any further skulls or skeletons for this module, my next one will probably make heavy use of them.

[Tchos]

Well, it turns out I would have needed to make my own version of the skulls anyway.  I tried out the Crypt Pit tileset, and the skulls included are rotated in such a way as to be unbalanced, so that they could not sit on a surface without support.  They look to be meant to be attached to the skeleton bodies, and they're provided separately so that the builder can rotate or move them in other directions for the sake of variety, but due to our being limited to rotating objects only along one axis, they cannot be rotated in such a way as to make them believably free-standing on a flat surface.



Compare to my version, which I rotated so that it would rest solidly on a flat surface:



Of course, only a single skull would be sufficient if we just had the ability to rotate objects along all three axes in the toolset, and that's a function sorely missed by me, since Oblivion has that ability.

I really like some of the posed skeleton figures, though, and there are other nice placeables in that pack, too (not to mention the tiles themselves), so it's definitely a nice pack for other reasons.

[Tchos]

On the subject of the crypt tileset, I finally got around to fixing something that had bugged me since I first saw it in the OC back in 2011. Someone's probably going to tell me this has already been done, too, but again, I've never seen such a fix.



Those ugly, jagged cobwebs in the default crypt texture set. I complained about them in my first post about NWN2. The texture files themselves have very artisticly drawn, nicely antialiased cobwebs, but as we know, the decision was made at some point for alpha channels in placeables/tilesets to be only 1-bit, meaning no antialiasing.

So why did they leave these horrible cobwebs in the tiles? I can see from the later official crypt texture sets that they recognised the problem, and didn't include cobwebs in them. They could have removed them from the existing tiles, but didn't. I got rid of them by just blacking out the alpha channel in the texture where the cobwebs were.



Not as creepy or old-looking as it would be with cobwebs, obviously, but there are much better cobweb placeables out there than what was built into the tileset, and it's up to the builder to use them.

If, by the way, this has not been done already, then someone let me know, and I'll upload my fix as an override for others.

Modifié par Tchos, 24 février 2013 - 12:17 .

[Dorateen]

Cobwebs? I thought those were chains hanging from the default crypt tileset.

Maybe I'm thinking of something else.

[Tchos]

There are chains and ropes hanging from it, in addition to the cobwebs. I left the chains and ropes alone.

[Tchos]

Today, after loading up the game to test some more additions and changes, I was greeted with a dreaded warning -- " Could not load the Module. Module file might be corrupt."

The last thing I had done was to delete an unneeded area, which I had been keeping around because it was a copy of the earlier version of the bard shop, with the shelves I had so carefully placed and then found would not properly contain the instruments I wanted to display, and I thought it could be useful for something later. I finally exported it to ERF and deleted it from the module, because it was taking up unnecessary extra loading time.

So, when I got that warning, I figured it had something to do with the now-deleted area, and it did. As I've mentioned before, I use the -home command line switch to keep my user files on a different (bigger) hard drive than C:, but this switch doesn't seem to work for the toolset, so I've been keeping an extra working copy of my module's campaign folder and hak file on the C: drive, and using a folder-syncing utility to keep them synchronised, but the trouble is that I have to manually tell it to sync each time. This time I forgot, and this is apparently the first time that something so major was missing that would cause that kind of failure. After syncing, it was fine.

I worked on the second underwater area. First order of business was just to get the important points of interest added and made functional, and connecting them to the overwater map and the final location.

By necessity, there's no underwater combat. I think there's some existing code that would accomodate changes to game rules in an underwater environment, but the animation isn't suited for underwater combat. Story-wise, it's required that the players must wear a diving suit and stow their gear in a magic bag of some kind, and have no weapons or cloaks equipped. I justify this in the dialogue in that if you're wearing armour or carrying heavy weapons, you'll just sink to the bottom of the ocean, and that much is reasonable, I think. In practical terms, though, some of this is necessary because of serious clipping and limitations in the animation set (cloaks make it glitch). You will not have to actually place all of your gear into a bag, and remove it afterward, but in dialogue, it should be "understood" that that's what you're doing, and you can do so for RP purposes. The On Enter code will unequip the problematic gear, and equip a diving suit for you, which will be removed On Exit.

I was going to have a couple of other options for this part, such as a Necklace of Adaptation that could be crafted at the local magic shop by request, or a water breathing potion that could be crafted by the local alchemist, but in the end I went with the less complicated solution. All of those things were going to be expensive, too, and would have required the player of average wealth to raise money via the side quests.

Next up is creating a new VFX for use in a spawned item in the overwater map for the underwater quest, and more work on the underwater area.

[ColorsFade]

Tchos wrote...

So, when I got that warning, I figured it had something to do with the now-deleted area, and it did. As I've mentioned before, I use the -home command line switch to keep my user files on a different (bigger) hard drive than C:, but this switch doesn't seem to work for the toolset, so I've been keeping an extra working copy of my module's campaign folder and hak file on the C: drive, and using a folder-syncing utility to keep them synchronised, but the trouble is that I have to manually tell it to sync each time. This time I forgot, and this is apparently the first time that something so major was missing that would cause that kind of failure. After syncing, it was fine.

This is a situation when source control shines. 

The first thing I did with my campaign was put it and the module directory under source control (I use Mercurial, but anything would work). I've already been saved at least three times by the fact that my campaign and module folders are under source control, and with a button click I was able to restore the last revision. 

If it's something you want know more about, let me know. It's a quick install and super-easy to use. Having a full revision history of every file is priceless. 

[Tchos]

I use FileHamster for source control and Dropbox for backup.  At some point if you continue reading my earlier posts, you'll see several posts elaborating.

Modifié par Tchos, 02 mars 2013 - 06:36 .

[Tchos]

I thought it would be best if I relegated my talk of game design philosophy to my own thread. The topics are the role of the game designer, the role of story, and the role of player-created party members whether being used instead of, or in combination with, author-created NPC companions.

First I must say that my personal preference as a player is to take author-created companions along, even when there is the ability to create my own party, because I prefer to experience as much content as possible. However, player-created parties have a long and important history in RPGs, from the Infinity Engine games to the Temple of Elemental Evil, and going back to the venerable SSI Gold Box series, and I personally know people who prefer their parties to be made that way, and that's why I offer that option, and I speak as an advocate on their behalf.

I certainly do not build all possibilities or "what-if" situations into my work. Only specific ones that either I think are important, or that take so little effort that there's no reason not to, such as this.

Now, this leads on to the role of the designer in the equation. As I've said before, what I am making is a game. And I'm designing the kind of game that I want to see as a player, but that doesn't mean that I want to prevent other players from enjoying it in any way they happen to prefer. Bioware's recent statements indicate that they want to tightly control the player's experience, and have them experience the game in the way that the designers envision it. And that's why I haven't bought any of Bioware's more recent games (past Dragon Age: Origins). I want to play, not to be led along by the nose.

I find myself in agreement with something Chris Avellone said on the subject. Chris worked on several games that I really like, such as Planescape: Torment, where he worked as lead developer. He said, in an interview on Matt Chat:

You have to be able to make meaningful choices in constructing your character and developing the character in the game. That's the first part. The other part is that the game world -- dungeons, people -- have to react in meaningful ways to those character choices and how your character is developing. I would even argue that having a strong storyline in an RPG is absolutely secondary, or even tertiary to those things. It's the game system, it's allowing the players to develop, and it's allowing them to see the consequences of that development in the RPG.

Most RPG players will form a stronger narrative themselves, based on actions that occur in the game, that have nothing to do with the NPCs they talk to or the big "wow" moment you threw at them. They don't care! What they care about is their 3rd level dwarven fighter that was able to fight off those 20 orcs in a corridor with a ball-peen hammer. And that's the story that gets them excited. That's the story that they tell, because they were able to pull it off with their character build and their game mechanics. And I totally respect that, and I'm fine. I mean, I'll still try and do a good story, but chances are, your experiences are going to trump anything I try and throw at you.

Consider that this is the person who brought us such story-heavy and character-focused games as Planescape: Torment and Mask of the Betrayer, who is arguing that story and NPCs rank second or even third in importance, under giving the player freedom, choices, and the ability to develop their characters as they please, and having the game react to that.

Now, I think he might be exaggerating a bit when he says that most RPG players feel this way, but I do agree that it's a significant portion, and it's a portion that I believe have precious few modules made in such a way that they can enjoy them in the way that they prefer (in this case, creating their whole party). Especially since only the final expansion (Storm of Zehir) made that option available to them, and perhaps the majority of the modules currently in existence were made before that expansion came out.

This all, I think, falls under one of my primary design rubrics for my work, that being player freedom.

[ColorsFade]

Interesting quotes from Avellone...

It's interesting to me that he was the lead on Torment. Of all the AD&D games I played over the years, that one was the one I disliked the most. I know it has legions of fans, but I despised it. I consider it to be the one game that got the player character totally wrong. To me, Torment was always a classic example of how not to design a protagonist. 

What I hated about it was that I could not identify with the PC at all because of the way the game designers created him. The Nameless never felt like "my" character - it felt like someone else's invention. The fact that you could switch between rogue, wizard or fighter classes made it even more infuriating for me, and made me, as a player, feel more adrift and disconnected from the character. I never knew when I should be switching classes, and I never felt like I had a grasp on the character, ever. Also, the complete lack of armor/weapons/combat... there were so few ways to distinguish your Nameless character and make him your own. Torment, to me,  was a game that really should have been a book instead. The RPG game was the wrong format for that story. 

So, I find Avellon's comments really odd. If player choice is so important, why did Torment have the least choice in a PC? You're stuck with a character you didn't create, didn't define, and who never forms any kind of identity or bond with the player. Worse, he has no memory of his past, so you, the player, are given the illusion that your choices matter.

The Nameless was a character that was an illusion of choice. He was really a pre-packaged, pre-defined NPC that you were meant to play. The class-shifting and loss of memory were tricks to get the player to *think* you had a choice in shaping his character into your own. But you didn't. And he was never yours to begin with. 

The other interesting thing, to me, about Avellon's comments, is how he perceives narrative and the relationship with the PC and NPC's and game mechanics.

I think it is true, what he says, about players caring the most about their "build" being able to fight off 20 orcs in a corridor with a ball-peen hammer. He's right about that - that's why we're playing a game instead of watching a film. If all we cared about was the NPC's and their dialog/story, well, film and books are better mediums for passive engagement in a story. 

At the same time, I see that part of a game more as the "game" part - the mechanics - and the NPC's and their stories, and the overall arc of the game story, as the "story" part. To me, mechanics and story are two distinct parts of a game that have to work together to achieve something greater. 

A good game, to me, is one that melds mechanics and story together in a way that engages the player fully. It's been my experience that players play games for both parts. They play to create builds to engage in battles and use their skills/spells/talents in crafty ways to advance through the game. Players love carrots, advancement, and scraping through encounters by the skin of their teeth. But they also care about story and motives, and these things exist irrespective of the mechanics. 

We've all played games that do one part better, at the expense of the other. Some games have awesome combat and character progression/customization elements (mechanics), but lack sorely in the story department. Others (like Torment - for me) have great stories, but lack in the mechanics/character progression/character customization department. If either part is neglected, players can be turned off. 

Certainly there are players at each end of the spectrum as well. Some care more about mechanics than story, and others care more about story than mechanics. But I think the majority of players, especially those who enjoy the Forgotten Realms style of games, prefer to have both make a difference. 

story and NPCs rank second or even third in importance, under giving the player freedom, choices, and the ability to develop their characters as they please, and having the game react to that. 

The trick with choice is having it mean something. We've all played games that gave us the illusion of choice, and come to find out when it matters, our choices didn't really make a difference. Nothing irks me more as a player. Even the NWN2 OC is guilty of this - the trial being a prime candidate. Why all the work gathering influence and buliding a case when the Luskan's can just choose trial by combat anyway? That was one of the dumbest design decisions of all time. I sat through 30 minutes of cut-scene dialog and it was all for nothing. On replays, I don't even bother - just cut to the fight already. Lame. 

But yes, the overall point is a valid one: players play games to build *their* character and customize and advance that character. Giving them the freedom to do that is generally a good thing. 

[Tchos]

CF: You've seized on a particular aspect of PS:T that I actually dislike myself, and which has nothing to do with my reason for the quote, and it is not one of the goals of my module. A large portion of your post is devoted to that aspect on which we do not in fact disagree, so there's nothing really to address there. I'll just state for the record that I do not like playing fixed protagonists, and such a thing is quite antithetical to everything I've been saying. In fact, I'm a bit dismayed that a fixed protagonist is one of the several things they picked for their new game Torment: Tides of Numenera to reprise, which I did not enjoy about the original game, but which they evidently think is necessary to make a spiritual successor. There are many, many aspects to a game such as PS:T -- some good, some bad. I'll try to explain which ones I like.

What impressed me the most about PS:T were its highly manipulatable items (such as the puzzle earring near the beginning), the depth of the interactivity with the environment (when there was some), and the style of dialogue. Baldur's Gate had some nice, long dialogues, and paragraph-length response choices, but PS:T took it even further, and I loved it. More than just speaking to someone immediately on clicking on them, you would first get a description of the NPCs, and what they were doing as you approached them. Then you were given the choice to actually greet them, or leave them alone if you decided they seemed too dangerous, for instance. And descriptions of their actions and expressions continued throughout the dialogue.

In general, the characters were much more lively and vivid than in any other game I've played, because of this level of descriptiveness. This is one of the things that I do in my module. I do not use the cinematic style dialogue and deliver lines in little bites -- I use the dialogue box, like in the Infinity Engine games, where the player controls the pace of the conversation and doesn't have wait for them to finish talking, and where I can provide a dozen responses in the cases that warrant it. There's a scrollbar on the dialogue box.

I also strive to have plenty of interactivity with the environment.  Things that make sense.  No pointless manipulation of things that don't actually do anything.  But things that can be touched or moved will do something or give some information.

A good game, to me, is one that melds mechanics and story together in a way that engages the player fully. It's been my experience that players play games for both parts.

Of course, and if either of us were saying that they didn't, then the quote would have been "I would even argue that having a strong storyline in an RPG is absolutely unimportant, and you shouldn't do it." So far, we do not disagree.

I agree that the trial by combat, regardless of whether you win or lose the trial, was an irritating part of the OC, and there's nothing like that in my module. In my case, though, consequences tend to be more or less immediate, not coming up later. Sometimes it would be more personally advantageous to do the good thing, sometimes the bad thing. Sometimes it doesn't matter, and that's fine, too. Not every decision necessarily should be a momentous, meaningful event, and sometimes a character may go ahead and do whatever he was going to do in the first place, no matter what you say. You may wonder what was the point of having the conversation at all, but the answer can be something as simple as, "My character felt strongly about it, and on principle, he had to try."

Modifié par Tchos, 07 mars 2013 - 07:34 .