258 réponses à ce sujet

[Pocketgb]

Lazylog wrote...

Yeah I agree that why I said that it could just kill the fun of the game, you end up putting more hours in the macro and seeing if the actiong is caried out currectly (and without any bugs in the system) than actually playing the game. And I am counting on the fact that I already know how to do it. Think about the pour ignorant saps who would have to start from scratch! Although if their was a mod to add that (with a tester to make sure you dont inadvertently creat loops and such) I would give it a try but even then...

Kill the fun? I feel like it could add to it, yo. Plus you could come to these forums and discuss other interesting macros and tactic set-ups, as well as sharing your ideas with those who aren't to familiar with it. It would be another awesome feature in an already kick-ass game.

Also, I completely agree with Statue's posts.

Modifié par Pocketgb, 03 janvier 2010 - 05:26 .

[Lazylog]

''Kill the fun? I feel like it could add to it, yo. Plus you could come to these forums and discuss other interesting macros and tactic set-ups, as well as sharing your ideas with those who aren't to familiar with it. It would be another awesome feature in an already kick-ass game.''



I can so see that happening



'', I completely agree with Statue's posts.''



Second that

[Sylixe]

fchopin wrote...

The point is it would have been nice if we could play the game without using pause all the time.

If you try to play the game without using pause you would die very quickly as the tactics are not good enough to allow this.

If the tactics did a better job then both micromanagement and a more live game would be possible and bioware would sell more games.

You would be wrong as i have played the game on normal and setup the tactics to win all but 3 encounters in the game without using pause.  That's how easy the game really is.  However not everyone i guess has tested out the tactics as extensively and thusly a pause feature was needed.

[Dex1701]

JackFuzz wrote...
Pausing on nightmare means pausing every 1.2 seconds... which destroys, utterly destroys the heat of combat.

Well, this just isn't true, and we already know that we disagree about your opinion that pausing "destroys" the feel of combat.  You're still just presenting your opinions (and some straight-up hyperbole) as facts here, and I still don't understand how pausing is "God Mode."

If the game is too hard to play on the higher difficulty settings without pausing, and the difficulty becomes manageable but not too easy (speaking of the PC version here...I know there are fewer enemies in the console versions), then isn't pausing just a game mechanic?  If it were "God Mode" wouldn't it make the game too easy on Nightmare as well?  I'm not following your logic here.

If you don't like to pause then play on Easy.  If you want more difficult tactical challenges that require more micro-management (and therefore pausing) then play on higher difficulties.  Is it just that you don't want to play on Easy?  Would it help if it were called "No Pausing" instead of "Easy?"

Another issue here could be the control scheme.  Issuing orders to your characters is a breeze with a mouse...it's a lot more tedious with a controller.  Bioware tried to offset this a bit by putting fewer enemies in the console versions to make the battles less complex, but I still find using a controller for this type of thing a little tedious.

Ethan009 wrote...
I'm not the one charging
people 60 bucks a pop for games and additional for DLC while a multi
million (billion?) dollar company is sponsering me [smilie]../../../images/forum/emoticons/kissing.png[/smilie]

Also FF12 Tactic system that DAO is based off? Is much better. WAY better

Ehm...the combat in FF12 had a lot, lot, LOT fewer variables to contend with than DA:O does.  The spacial (movement, battlefield position, threat evaluation, friendly fire, flanking, etc.) variables alone make the AI programming for a game like DA exponentially more difficult than a game like FF12.  You really can't compare the two.  At all.

Also, the fact that EA has a lot of money does not mean that Bioware has unlimited time and money to create the mother of all bleeding edge AI systems.  There's a thing called a budget...businesses like to use them to help them to avoid losing a ton of money on a project.

Plausible Prejudice wrote...

Pocketgb wrote...
The
group that wants a pause button don't have any problems, but - as Kaya
nicely pointed out - those who want a more seamless and real-time
experience do: tactics are buggy, AI is icky, gameplay in general is a
bit sticky.

That's the problem. I don't mind
having the ABILITY to pause and select my action twice a second. I just
don't want to be FORCED to use it. If the AI was better, or if the
combat tactics worked properly I would have no issue, as I could
completely ignore the pause/command/pause gameplay style in favor of a
much more enjoyable real time strategy.

As it stands, I'm forced to use the pause button or play on easy mode. That's the problem.

Yes, exactly.  It's not a problem, though.  The tactical decisions that you need to make to win battles at higher difficulties are too complex for the best of video game AIs to deal with.  You have to micro-manage.  Even if the tactics AI were the best video game AI evah there would be battles that you'd have to micro-manage.  It's really difficult for a person to micro-manage 4 characters at that level of complexity in real time.  Therefore, you can pause. 

Honestly, (and I'm not trying to be condescending here) why can't some people grasp this?  The Easy difficulty is there for people that don't want to have to pause.  If it somehow hurts your ego to play on a level called "Easy" then pretend it's called something else.  If you don't pause then Easy is not that easy.  If you want to pause then up the difficulty to Normal, Hard, or Nightmare depending on how much micro-management you want to do.

Is it so hard to understand that the higher difficulties require tactical decisions to be made by the player that are difficult to manage without pausing?  Seriously...no video game AI is smart enough to deal with some of the larger battles on Hard and Nightmare...if you don't want to pause at the higher difficulties you just have to be a really, really fast player.  Faster than I am, anyway...I can get by without much pausing on Hard, but not on Nightmare.

Modifié par Dex1701, 03 janvier 2010 - 09:16 .

[Pocketgb]

The AI being a bit shabby is rather understandable. It's the lack of skill queuing, simplicity of tactics, and lack of any form of targeting sans clicking the bad guy that rather enforce pausing quite a bit more often.

[RetrOldSchool]

Honestly, I think the KOTOR/DA:O type of gameplay with semi-realtime and micro manage pausing is the ultimate RPG battle system.

But that's just the way I feel about it. I play on hard and I do pause a lot, not in every encounter, but in alot of encounters. But I wouldnt have it any other way

[Dex1701]

Pocketgb wrote...

The AI being a bit shabby is rather understandable. It's the lack of skill queuing, simplicity of tactics, and lack of any form of targeting sans clicking the bad guy that rather enforce pausing quite a bit more often.

Yeah, I agree that the UI could use a bit of streamlining.  Targeting and skill queuing are things I've thought could use some improvement as well.  Also simple things like displaying icons next to character portraits indicating negative effects and remaining duration would be a time-saver.

[SleeplessInSigil]

For what it's worth, battle in real-time D&D[-like] RPGs never had any real element of TENSION beyond clicking once every now and then while keeping an eye on the HP bars and cooldowns.

Try Temple of Elemental Evil, where you can actually get nervous while the enemies are all taking their turns, afraid of one of them rolling a 20 or you rolling a 1, and you have to make every single one of your own moves COUNT, because you can't take it back.

[The Rottweiler]

I would never have gotten this game if I could not pause it, Tactical combat makes this game fun. I play on nightmare and love the battles and strategy the game needs me to use to win battles.

[Callie K]

Despite the fact that I complain about almost everything, I think pausing is great. I'm a much bigger fan of turn based RPGs than "real time," though, and I think there's just about the right balance of being able to stop and strategize and play on the fly for me. My only complaint would be that the right trigger button on the X-box version doesn't allow a command to be queued to the A button (somewhat nonsensically). Otherwise I'm 100% happy with the pause/real time function.



One time I got a crazy glitch where I could only use the radial menu while NOT paused and could only pause to a blank screen. That was wacky. Also, I died.

[Atosniper]

Pausing is awesome.



Why even make this stupid thread; if you dont like pausing the option is there for you not to use it. Sheesh...

[Elanareon]

 Well nobody really told you to pause now, did we? And if you like your camera to be constantly flying around giving commands to the whole party, then more power to you! =D I, for one, can't handle the camera always flying around changing character views. How do you manage by the way? You must be reaaaaallllyyyyy good...

[Badger8126]

Taking out pause for me would mean having 3 less party members with me and real time hit detection (like oblivion).

the AI is just too stupid for me to babysit them in RT.

[sassperella]

Serenity84 wrote...

sassperella wrote...
The problem with pausing IMO is that it doesn't seem t translate well to the console. From what I've read, you can pause and give all four characters directions while paused on the PC but on the console when you take control of a player the game unpauses and everyone else does what they want, so by the time the controlled npc is in position the rest of the party can be dead on harder modes.

Which is a reason to not play such a game on consoles. Not to dumb it down to console standards.

Aside from that, I don't see why it has to be that way even with the limitations of controllers. A console interface could have simultaneous movement too. Either by moving a cursor around or, possibly better, driving the character without actually excuting the movement until you unpause.

Consoles are now a big part of the gaming market, Bioware would miss out on a huge amount of sales  making a PC only game. That said, there may have been ways to make it more like the PC game, and keeping the game paused while you moved all characters about.

I actually prefer not pausing it, but a lot of people obviously find that a big part of the game. I think the way they have done it is a pretty good compromise, though if you don't want to pause you really need to play on casual, which plays pretty much like an action RPG. The only real pausing I do is to make the party hold and scout in stealth with my rogue character to disarm traps etc.

The fact that they included tactics at all indicates that they wanted people to have that choice, but if they're going to make a hybrid game that allows choice between tactics and real time, then they really need to improve the AI to compensate.

[Fantus]

I am not entirely thrilled about _having_ to pause either, which is why I played the game in Easy mode, so I didn't have to (I just wish you wouldn't need to "earn" tactical slots for your chars - the tactics system otherwise owns). However, I still think that having the pause option in conjunction with the more difficult settings is a good thing for those of us who want a more tactical approach to combat. I would not like seeing that option removed. Having game modes for both types of players is a good thing. Choice ALWAYS is a good thing.

[Fleb]

Im playing the game on nightmare mode atm, and I have run into several ambushes that I would of had no way of winning without pause, maybe a mode that lets you turn off pause in addition to difficulty would be the best compromise.

[Urik187]

the pausing adds to the style of gameplay. it gives you a greater sense of strategy and planning also in a tough battle it lets you sit back and way out the options and its awesome when you see your plans carried out to success. HOWEVER on that note i think there is way too much pausing needed. sometime for simple battles even. I attribute this to not having a stacking system. take KOTOR for example. you could pause the game and the stack up all sorts of actions and then watch it all unfold in real-time. That was one of my favourite things of KOTOR actually.

hmmm.... i wonder if a mod could be made for this...

[MerinTB]

JackFuzz wrote...

Tirigon wrote...

Dex1701 wrote...

JackFuzz wrote...
but still bullet time instead of a flat out god mode pause would be sooo much better while preserving the moment.

Seriously, play the PC version on Nightmare and tell me that pausing is God Mode.

Tirigon approves +17

Pausing on nightmare means pausing every 1.2 seconds... which destroys, utterly destroys the heat of combat.

For you.

JackFuzz, you need to start amending your sentences with "for me" at either the start or the end.  What you want is not what everyone wants.  What you find fun or ruining of your fun is not the same as other people.

This game was obviously not the kind of game you like.  Period.  End of story.

[Sylvius the Mad]

I'd love a definition of "the heat of combat. If that's the frantic panic of combat, I don't ever want that. I like my game playing to be a calm, reasoned experience. Being excited or anxious during combat should occur only rarely.

[TheGreenLion]

In my opinion, I like to be able to pause so the combat doesn't get too "hasty". Some of the alley fights in Denerim were rough as an example, in real-time you'd have a second or maybe two to heal your tank whilst being beat upon by 6-7 melee mobs and a similar number of archers.



Take away one second to select your healer, click on heal, select your target and take away another second to cast it...if your tank is stunnable or able to be knocked down you lose out on using a potion. Using pause I was able to get around the need to have cat-like reflexes in such situations where even the fractions of a second would count. I make good use of tactics so I don't need to pause very often even on Nightmare but if your AI fails where you expect them not to you would rely heavily on luck that everything still turned out okay.



There were even times when I paused and pulled all the tricks I could think of, and after un-pausing I still got my ass handed to me....that helpless feeling was great cause you'd sit and mull over all the things you could try and know that it still might end up with you dead.

[Ghandorian]

I really like the middel ground between Turn Based and Real Time.



It allows me to leave it on rt for action packed thrills or pause so I can take the time to think about strategy for specific moment of the fight. Perfect medium for this brand of game imho.



And I really do think the OP needs to evaluate why being a troll is being a troll and playing IP hopscotch is the only way they feel secure in being here.

[DragonRageGT]

I just finished 3 Redcliffe battles with my 3 chars in the 3-some run I'm playing. NM all of course. I challenge anyone to play that battle and save everyone in town without using pause. I'd say even in Easy for that. But I've no idea if in Easy it is doable so I'll stick with NM for the challenge!

It is a hell of a fun battle and requires some concentration and a lot of pausing! and I just feel a triple hero! =)

[Leyt22]

Obviously pausing is useful. But what I don't like is how much of a habit it has become. I feel like I'm pausing too often--to find a target (often is a reason for frequent pausing), to check on my teammates, etc. I know this is probably common and odd as a complaint, but I hate how I so easily cease combat to perform something trivial.



I'm not complaining about the feature of pausing, but rather posting my opinion on my unwanted habit. When I get into other games again, I can imagine myself pressing the space bar in the midst of combat because my health is getting low or whatever else.

[bzombo]

JackFuzz wrote...

Genuine
This post is genuine and not a troll.   One of the reasons I do not put my registration key into these forums is because of the odd moderation of posts. I'm not cursing, I'm not cussing and I'm totally respectful. Yet I always get in trouble for personal views of the game I enjoy playing (to a certain extent). 


Original Thought
Aah yes, let's face it...  Pausing is dumb.  It's either realtime or turn based. There is no middle ground.

If it wasn't for the strong story, voice overs & plot in the game I would of never played dragon age.  I absolutely hate pausing. I hate it so much I play on easy mode.. BUT still sometimes I have to pause.   

Pausing means you admit defeat.  It means the situation was so overwhelming you were forced to pause, accept defeat in order to win. Once a situation is "overwhelming", that is usually the moment you are about to lose and suffer a defeat. 

A Mod
I'm currently in the process of trying to find out if pausing can be disabled via a mod, I will then attempt to make modifications to the game to make a "realtime" mod that is balanced.  Realtime decisions leading to realtime victories are soo much more rewarding than pausing space & time in order to do a 360 with the mouse looking for enemy mages.

Pausing to fix broken AI

I understand that one needs to pause to control their companions.  But isn't that what combat tactics are for? The problem is the AI for your companions is broken. Often times your companions wil do the dumbest things possible and you have to pause in order to fix their broken AI.   That isn't tactics, that is retarded.  Pausing to fix broken AI is a design flaw.

There is a mod that attempts to repair the idea of "combat tactics" and it's making progress. But still.  

I'm just voicing my opinion that I do not like pausing.  If there are others who don't like it either let me know here. If there is enough support then a mod is definitely in order.  

A realtime mod would be ideal for people who want to preseve the intensity of battle.

Pausing destroys the moment
Because when you pause the moment is lost, you've admitted defeat and turned on a form of god mode (pausing).  You might as well spam a 1000 healing potions while you're at and then turn on the cheat console and teleport yourself into the black city.

if that's your preference, then fine. i know some who like real time better. i don't see pausing as admitting defeat, though. it's the type of game dragon age is. i like to pause so i can control who does what. ai will never be perfect. it has to please so many styles of play. i'm sure you'll find enough on here that hate pausing, but the nice thing about this game is you can play in real time if you choose. have you thought about blanking out the space bar as the pause key so nothing can pause it? if you're playing on easy, no battle is overwhelming.