223 réponses à ce sujet

[Renmiri1]

Fast Jimmy wrote...

Medhia Nox wrote...

I support this - it's the same as fast forwarding through dialogue to me.

You can't lose these games - defeat in battle never actually happens in terms of the story - still, some people like fighting battles for one reason or another. For those who think Combat Obstacle courses are tedious enough - I think skipping conflicts with some form of pre-set "Battle Plan" and a "Level of Success" measurement would be great.

Didn't one of the DA2 writers suggest this and then got crucified by BSN for not being "a real gamer" ?

[Renmiri1]

Fast Jimmy wrote...

In Final Fantasy 3 (US), during one of the opening sequences, you can lose a fight that will not result in a game over, but will siginificantly delay you obtaining two characters, Mog and Umaro. In addition, you will lose the chance to unlock a certain type of move for Mog (the River Dance) at all in the game.

In Final Fantasy 12 if you loot a chest on Act 1 you will never get  one of the best weapons in the game to spawn for you later. On a completely different dungeon!  

PS: FF12 did have a fun way to avoid random encounters with trash if you were more story oriented, you just equiped a ring if i recall correctly.

But it had fun surprises while exploring. Act 1's city has a level 20 T-Rex roaming the place where you begin while you are merely leve 3 or 4, You go "cool a dino, let me kill it to get some loot" and then OUCH! 

The entire game is full of those hidden killer mobs so exploring never gets old. "What's up that hill ? Ooo a cave ! Let's explore it.  Aieeee!" 

Those kinds of self inflicted wipes can be fun if there's a save point near them 

Modifié par Renmiri1, 20 mars 2013 - 05:59 .

[Nefla]

I wish combat was just engaging, challenging, and fun enough to make me not want to skip it all. In DA2 standing there pressing "A A A A A A A A" with the occasional spell or ability on a loooong cooldown thrown into the mix was an utter chore. Playing on higher difficulties just meant I had to spend MORE time doing that boring combat and use more potions. Where is my moogle charm (no random encounters) when I need it?

[Nefla]

Renmiri1 wrote...

Fast Jimmy wrote...

Medhia Nox wrote...

I support this - it's the same as fast forwarding through dialogue to me.

You can't lose these games - defeat in battle never actually happens in terms of the story - still, some people like fighting battles for one reason or another. For those who think Combat Obstacle courses are tedious enough - I think skipping conflicts with some form of pre-set "Battle Plan" and a "Level of Success" measurement would be great.

Didn't one of the DA2 writers suggest this and then got crucified by BSN for not being "a real gamer" ?

Yes, Jennifer Hepler I think. The whole thing was retarded and unreasonable, why attack someone because they want skippable combat or skippable cutscenes or skippable dialogue  or whatever as an OPTION?

[In Exile]

Fast Jimmy wrote...
I thought the injury system in DA:O was a good middle ground, with room for expansion. Like possibly some injuries being permanent (if, for example, you let multiple temp injuries stack without using an injury kit, or there are certain Plot Injuries that could happen to you or your companions if you make certain choices, just like there are certain stat bonuses if you make certain choices). Instead, DA2 did away with the system entirely and just went to an atuo-heal system.

?

DA2 has injuries. It was 20% or 10% of your max HP locked off. On nightmare, this can go up to a point where your characters only have 20% of HP left, if you stack enough. Of course, injury kits are plentiful, so this isn't a big issue... but the solution is, as Wulfram says, to have less drops.

The actual impact was quite significant. 

[In Exile]

Fast Jimmy wrote..
All of that is terrible design to allow anything other than combat as a problem solver. DA:O had many of these aspects, although not to the level of DA2. That's why its non-combat skills were less than stellar. But, instead of understanding why they weren't as useful and why everyone put skill points in Combat Mastery and Tactics, they just scrapped the whole system. That's not a wise move, in my book. 

I'll repeat your list below, because I believe you are being quite unfair in your characterization of DA2 (or, alternatively, are too grand in your praise of DA:O). 

In short, in DA:O you could never "worry about choosing the right dialogue option" because of the fact that there was no choice but to take persaude ranks (unless you wanted to gimp yourself); there was no point to sneaking (because encounters were easy, scouting gave no benefits, and being seen pulled you into combat right away); and traps were useless. The only thing preventing you from making a character "an absolute terror" was a the cumbersome level-up system. 

Non-combat skills were not "less than steller". They were useless flavour to irrelevant. Let's list in order the things that had no bearing on DA:O combat:

• The need to scout ahead. It added no value, and once seen, you triggered the encounter anyway.
• Traps. They did nothing. The best possible traps in the game added less value than a single dmg spell from a mage, and that ignores the absolute horror it was to actually pull an enemy into a trap.
• Persuade skills existed, but they were broken. Pick persuade rank III+, and you basically auto-win all dialogue. It has the delightful [Persuade = WIN] button next to it, so there is never a danger you're confused about how you're going to win the conversation.  
• Other skills were useless, making it absolutely a no-brainer to pick persuade (unless you chose to gimp yourself). Therefore, you were a "superman, best of all worlds".
• Level scaling combat. DA2 does this to a greater degree than DA:O. But DA:O combat isn't hard. You can take on Orzammar from the start if you have a mage PC. Which was the problem with DA:O - all abilities except DMG-dealing abilities generally sucked, and mages had AOE DMG, meaning that "first to fireball" = WIN.

Wave combat, where enemies fall from the sky or jump out of walls, eliminates the need to sneak or scout and also eliminates the usefullness of traps in the more original sense (not just dropping a bomb as a move in combat, that is hardly a trap). Having no skill based ability to talk someone out of combat, meaning you would have to sacrifice skill points that would have been allocated to combat to, instead, a persuasion type skill, means you can have the best of all worlds, being a super-man that can kill anything and also being able to talk past anything when the game gives you the option (I'll give you a hint, it basically means the number of times you can talk your way past anything drops to less than I can count on my hand). Level scaling so that combat can always be won means that combat will always be the easiest option. Why worry about choosing the right dialogue, or meticulously sneaking or laying traps? You can just run in and kill everyone. I mean, you've got the math skills of a fourth grader, you know how to level up your character to get the highest DPS (another thing, simplified leveling that consists of dumping all your stat points into two stats, chalk that up to this list as well). So you can make every character an absolute terror in combat with minimal effort. Why should you spend more time doing something that makes your character feel less bad ****?

[metatheurgist]

It's been a long time but didn't companions in BG die permanently as a result of combat? 'course you could say that with save games you can erase that consequence just by reloading.

[Plaintiff]

Fast Jimmy wrote...

*snip*

You can't make combat interesting to everyone. Some people just want to experience the story, and there's nothing wrong with that. Some people are fine at puzzle-solving and other gameplay aspects, but just really suck at combat.

I don't want a "skip combat" button and wouldn't use one if there was one, but I see no reason not to have one. Your entire argument relies pretty heavily on slippery slope fallacy and the unsupported assumption that if combat can be skipped, it must be terrible, because why else would developers allow you to skip it?

Modifié par Plaintiff, 20 mars 2013 - 09:03 .

[milena87]

I wouldn't like to see a skip-combat mechanic: I agree with others that it would be a step in the wrong direction. I understand that people may not like the combat and only want to play for the story, but that's essentially what easy mode is for.

I'd rather they find a way to make encounters more interesting and diverse actually, so that maybe it would be enjoyable even to people who didn't like the combat before.
Getting rid of most of the filler combat would also be a great improvement for me: I like the combat in both DAO and DA2, but have to admit that there's too much of it. Pretty much all the problems in Thedas get resolved in blood.
Last but not least, adding different ways to solve the problems and/or to avoid the combat entirely (through cunning, intimidation, persuasion, magic, bribery, sneaking, etc... the usual stuff) would also greatly improve things in my opinion.

[Allan Schumacher]

metatheurgist wrote...

It's been a long time but didn't companions in BG die permanently as a result of combat? 'course you could say that with save games you can erase that consequence just by reloading.

In my experience this was the most common thing that would happen (it's what my friends and I did)

[JakePT]

I don't really want to see an 'auto-resolve', but I love the ide aof 'losing' combat not ending in a game-over, but rather weaving it into the story.

[Fast Jimmy]

Nefla wrote...

Renmiri1 wrote...

Fast Jimmy wrote...

Medhia Nox wrote...

I support this - it's the same as fast forwarding through dialogue to me.

You can't lose these games - defeat in battle never actually happens in terms of the story - still, some people like fighting battles for one reason or another. For those who think Combat Obstacle courses are tedious enough - I think skipping conflicts with some form of pre-set "Battle Plan" and a "Level of Success" measurement would be great.

Didn't one of the DA2 writers suggest this and then got crucified by BSN for not being "a real gamer" ?

Yes, Jennifer Hepler I think. The whole thing was retarded and unreasonable, why attack someone because they want skippable combat or skippable cutscenes or skippable dialogue  or whatever as an OPTION?

This is correct.

Although, the discussion led me to post a thread here that was in the same vein as what this discussion has turned into. It was one of my finer threads, though.

[Fast Jimmy]

Plaintiff wrote...

Fast Jimmy wrote...

*snip*

You can't make combat interesting to everyone. Some people just want to experience the story, and there's nothing wrong with that. Some people are fine at puzzle-solving and other gameplay aspects, but just really suck at combat.

I don't want a "skip combat" button and wouldn't use one if there was one, but I see no reason not to have one. Your entire argument relies pretty heavily on slippery slope fallacy and the unsupported assumption that if combat can be skipped, it must be terrible, because why else would developers allow you to skip it?

But that ISN'T my entire argument. Some people won't like combat, no matter how you gussy it up...  I agree. But maybe that's because there should be a different gameplay alternative to fighting that the person would enjoy much, much more. Sneaking, or utilizing the environment, or having a context-sensitive speech/persuasion system, etc. 

In Fallout 2, there was a location where a group of insanely powered enemies existed, called the Wannamigo's, that could hand you your taint if you didn't have the right level build and weapons. The game, though, offered different ways to take out these enemies, including a way (originally in the game that was cut, but brought back to life in the Restoration Project mod, for those paying attention) to flood the mines these creatures were in using a very high Repair skill along with a specific part to a water pump that the player could find. A totally logical, non-combat solution to some of the hardest buggers in the game. That way, you could go into the mine they were inhabiting and get the item you needed to complete the main objective quest in that town.

Point being, it was something you had to look decently hard for, which means the game assumes you probably wandered down in the mines and got your butt handed to you in combat before trying to find a more obscure way to get what you wanted. If the game had a "skip combat button" rather than a truly unique and context-sensitive solution, then wouldn't that defeat the benefit of offering multiple solutions?

That's my concern. Not only that combat would never be better, but that offering a combat-only game solution would not just be the norm, but the solution offered EVER. After all, if anyone has a problem with the combat, they can just skip it, right? So why offer anything else?

[MichaelStuart]

I support a skip combat option.
But I support making combat more fun.

[Vaeliorin]

MichaelStuart wrote...
I support a skip combat option.
But I support making combat more fun.

While I'm ambivalent to a skip combat option, I definitely agree they should make combat more fun.

First way to do so?  Go steal Jake Solomon from Firaxis.

[HolyAvenger]

Vaeliorin wrote...

MichaelStuart wrote...
I support a skip combat option.
But I support making combat more fun.

While I'm ambivalent to a skip combat option, I definitely agree they should make combat more fun.

First way to do so?  Go steal Jake Solomon from Firaxis.

 

I love XCOM EU, but I don't want to play a tactical chess match for every combat scenario. 

[Rawgrim]

metatheurgist wrote...

It's been a long time but didn't companions in BG die permanently as a result of combat? 'course you could say that with save games you can erase that consequence just by reloading.

You could carry their bodies to a temple and pay for ressurection. Or, if you had a cleric in the party, buy a rod of ressurection for him\\her to use in case things like this happens. If the cleric was powerful enough, he\\she got a ressurection spell too. 7th level priest spell, I think.

[HolyAvenger]

Rawgrim wrote...

metatheurgist wrote...

It's been a long time but didn't companions in BG die permanently as a result of combat? 'course you could say that with save games you can erase that consequence just by reloading.

You could carry their bodies to a temple and pay for ressurection. Or, if you had a cleric in the party, buy a rod of ressurection for himher to use in case things like this happens. If the cleric was powerful enough, heshe got a ressurection spell too. 7th level priest spell, I think.

 

They would perma-die if chunked.