3 réponses à ce sujet

[verrall20]

I was expecting so much more from her as a character rather than some optinal boss. I was hoping for her to be a hidden companion or at least a very importent npc which bioware rather falsly said she would. maybe a civil war dlc or any dlc may change this.

[David Gaider]

My take from this is that perhaps Persuade options should simply be taken out. Persuasion is intended to be abstracted a little, and not every line of reasoning spelled out -- but perhaps that is difficult to understand when you can otherwise say so much? Or perhaps you simply shouldn't get to indulge in long conversations with characters that you can Persuade. One of the two, really. I know the response is that you should have both -- long conversations AND Persuade options that are also long conversations, but that's not going to happen.



Thanks for the feedback.

[David Gaider]

Estelindis wrote...
Actually, David, I got the impression that the opposite was being said.

There's a world of difference between what you say and why you say it. Most often I'm fairly certain if you got what you were actually asking for, you wouldn't enjoy it. Either that or what you're asking for just isn't feasible.

And I don't think it would be especially difficult to insert a link to the Persuade node (the one that already exists) into all the explanation branches, so that you can elaborate your argument and then go for the clincher.  Really, why is that "not going to happen"?  I know a kitten dies every time a player says "but it wouldn't be that hard to implement," but... really!  I can't help but think that, when both the explanation and the persuade dialogue already exists, a few extra linkies would take care of the issues expressed here.  Sorry for any kitten death...

Like this. Perhaps you people actually do think that you can simply heap dialogue upon dialogue and end up with Planescape Torment -- and that the end result wouldn't be an expectation of even more dialogue ("I got to explain my entire argument in thesis format in that one major dialogue, why can't I do it in this minor dialogue here?") -- but the difference between us is that I need to concern myself with cost and implementation and you do not. That's the "kitten death" you're referring to.

[David Gaider]

Original182 wrote...
I'm saying now Planescape: Torment was a great game! Surely you wrote some part of it. Planescape: Torment should be living proof that wordy logical persuade options work. I don't understand where the cost and implementation is coming from. Dragon Age already had thousands and thousands of dialogue, adding longer persuade conversations surely won't hurt.

I did not write any part of Planescape: Torment, no. Seeing as it was a game with no voice over (and a lot of narrative text) simply adding more text to that game didn't add much more cost outside of translation (if it was translated).

Adding longer persuade options can work in isolation, sure, but the difference comes in the expectations they generate. If the expectation is that persuade should only come about as a result of a long dialogue where you get options to explain your reasoning then there are two inevitable results:

1) Less persuade options.
2) Remove the persuade mechanic.

Either of these are workable, and #1 may certainly lead to more effective use of the persuade mechanic -- if we agree that the use of persuade does indeed require changing. But saying adding more dialogue "couldn't hurt" is exactly the kind of thinking I was talking about. Of course it hurts. And it's never simply one dialogue. Add it to Ser Cauthrien's dialogue and suddenly somewhere else will look deficient -- that's how it goes. So you mentally add more here and more there, more story on this part that isn't quite right and more dialogue to solve this problem and... suddenly we have a brilliant masterpiece or an unworkable mess of wordiness. Chances are you've got something inbetween, and either way the cost of it is going to have to come from somewhere else. All that mentally-added story and dialogue never results in any kind of negative for fans that don't need to concern themselves about such things.

Which is exactly my point. My words are probably wasted, however, which is why I should have just stopped at "Interesting. Thanks for the feedback!" and moved on from that.

Suffice it to say that I understand what you want. You want more and better. In this specific instance of Ser Cauthrien's dialogue I can certainly understand how that might be applied, for it to be more and better, but it's never quite that easy, is it?