575 réponses à ce sujet

[Shaigunjoe]

Fast Jimmy wrote...

This isn't a bad idea, per se, but it does incentivize one way to play. If you make every match so hard that you might die if you don't give it your full attention, then you really push players to create the strongest party possible, meaning you max/min DPS to mana/stamina consumption. 

It doesn't allow a more open design for character builds or party makeups. 

I would say giving such a challenge that you can actively stifle variant gameplay and easily frustrate the player is dangerous. My way of just making a player experience avoidance behaviors is ever-present, like a more punshing difficulty/encounter design, but at the same time, gives the player the freedom to suffer these losses with a penalty that people would hate, but which would ,ultimately, have a negligible effect on success or failure.

If the player is someone who is easily frustrated at high difficulties...then, I don't know...don't play at high difficulties?

Also, there are ways to make encounters more difficult without them being simple dps checks, so the need to min/max isn't as bad as you think it is.  Although DAO design is already not very good about party makeup anyway, but its mostly hampered by only having 4 slots.

gives the player the freedom to suffer these losses with a penalty that
people would hate, but which would ,ultimately, have a negligible effect
on success or failure.

Then it seems to may that once it is realized it has a negligible effect on failure or success, people would stop caring about it.

[AlanC9]

Fast Jimmy wrote...
Hmmmmm. Okay, first off, I'm not a big fan of your tone. 

You weren't supposed to be. I was going for mild mockery there.

So I am a star culprit of someone who could engage the system more, but feels no need to.

And like I said upthread, not engaging with the combat is just a symptom of the weak difficulty level. 

There might be a case to be made for having a fail state that is less drastic than a TPW, but this isn't it.

And there certainly is a reason to avoid a character falling in combat -- having that happen brings you closer to a TPW. It's something any sensible player tries to avoid. Of course, there are times when it won't matter because you're about to win anyway, but what of it?

Modifié par AlanC9, 22 mai 2013 - 08:23 .

[AlanC9]

Fast Jimmy wrote...

This isn't a bad idea, per se, but it does incentivize one way to play. If you make every match so hard that you might die if you don't give it your full attention, then you really push players to create the strongest party possible, meaning you max/min DPS to mana/stamina consumption. 

And your ideas wouldn't provide the exact same incentives? If I'm trying to avoid the penalties from having any character drop, my incentives are to build the strongest party possible and crush the opposition.

I don't see how your ideas are supposed to have the effect you say they'll have.

Modifié par AlanC9, 22 mai 2013 - 08:28 .

[In Exile]

Fast Jimmy wrote...
This isn't a bad idea, per se, but it does incentivize one way to play. If you make every match so hard that you might die if you don't give it your full attention, then you really push players to create the strongest party possible, meaning you max/min DPS to mana/stamina consumption. 

I'm confused - the major aspect to playing an RPG "well" is to min/max your build. That's really 95% of the battle in most games. 

[Sylvius the Mad]

In Exile wrote...

Fast Jimmy wrote...

This isn't a bad idea, per se, but it does incentivize one way to play. If you make every match so hard that you might die if you don't give it your full attention, then you really push players to create the strongest party possible, meaning you max/min DPS to mana/stamina consumption.

I'm confused - the major aspect to playing an RPG "well" is to min/max your build. That's really 95% of the battle in most games.

Roleplaying?

[Fast Jimmy]

In Exile wrote...

Fast Jimmy wrote...
This isn't a bad idea, per se, but it does incentivize one way to play. If you make every match so hard that you might die if you don't give it your full attention, then you really push players to create the strongest party possible, meaning you max/min DPS to mana/stamina consumption. 

I'm confused - the major aspect to playing an RPG "well" is to min/max your build. That's really 95% of the battle in most games. 

Yet there are skill trees in DA:O and DA2 that aren't part of max/min mindset, such as DA:O's Entropy school. A player shouldn't be afraid to go down that route of using these skills for fear of not being as effective in battle.

In regards to my suggestion "doing the exact same thing," I would disagree. Smart use of the Tactics feature, resource management of items like potions or bombs and proper control of battle can overcome a sub-optimal build. If the difficulty bar is raised across the board to make combat difficult to survive, this may not be the case. 

[AlanC9]

Fast Jimmy wrote...
In regards to my suggestion "doing the exact same thing," I would disagree. Smart use of the Tactics feature, resource management of items like potions or bombs and proper control of battle can overcome a sub-optimal build. If the difficulty bar is raised across the board to make combat difficult to survive, this may not be the case. 

I don't see what the difference is. Whether the difficulty is caused by tougher enemies or PCs who are weaker because of crappy builds, the effect is the same; the relative strength of the enemies is greater.

Modifié par AlanC9, 23 mai 2013 - 01:16 .

[In Exile]

Fast Jimmy wrote...
Yet there are skill trees in DA:O and DA2 that aren't part of max/min mindset, such as DA:O's Entropy school. A player shouldn't be afraid to go down that route of using these skills for fear of not being as effective in battle.  

Right, but if I actually wanted to avoid perma stat loss, I wouldn't use the garbage abilities in the entropy school, I would pump magic, ignore willpower and load up on fireball and direct damage skills, because there are no resistances in DA:O and AOE stunlock is overpowering. 

In regards to my suggestion "doing the exact same thing," I would disagree. Smart use of the Tactics feature, resource management of items like potions or bombs and proper control of battle can overcome a sub-optimal build. If the difficulty bar is raised across the board to make combat difficult to survive, this may not be the case. 

The tactics feature is not very useful. If you want to actually be effective, IMO, you're going to control every single party member and pause often. 

More generally, the bolded part is just not true. Even if we agree that the tactic feature could work very well, all that it means is that you've automated a series of actions in combat that are very effective. But that's just another way of saying that players that are good at the combat itself will be able to overcome poor builds. And the problem with that is that the players that are good at the combat itself are usually the same players who min/max, because of how driven they are for performance. 

StreetMagic wrote...

Some combat ideas in DA2 have nothing to do with min maxing. There are effect mechanics (staggers, etc), and chains. As well as some arcade-ish pattern reading with the newer bosses (Cory and Prosper). I'd prefer them improving more upon that direction (while retaining essential RPG mechanics too).

The CCCs are totally about min/max. You need to pump your stats to get the right outputs, then optimize what you're triggering your combo off, and then just go for it and (sometimes) wait for the cooldown. 

Modifié par In Exile, 23 mai 2013 - 01:37 .

[MerinTB]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

In Exile wrote...

Fast Jimmy wrote...
This isn't a bad idea, per se, but it does incentivize one way to play. If you make every match so hard that you might die if you don't give it your full attention, then you really push players to create the strongest party possible, meaning you max/min DPS to mana/stamina consumption.

I'm confused - the major aspect to playing an RPG "well" is to min/max your build. That's really 95% of the battle in most games.

Roleplaying?

That's just crazy talk, Sylvius.  You know it's all about who's epeen is bigger.

[In Exile]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

Roleplaying?

I apparently forgot to reply. I had "well" in quotations because I was running of Jimmy's notion that the fun part about the game is being challanged with the combat a certain way. I was trying to get that I think an RPG is about more than that, but clearly failed. 

[Fast Jimmy]

Right, but if I actually wanted to avoid perma stat loss, I wouldn't use the garbage abilities in the entropy school, I would pump magic, ignore willpower and load up on fireball and direct damage skills, because there are no resistances in DA:O and AOE stunlock is overpowering.

Even if we agree that the tactic feature could work very well, all that it means is that you've automated a series of actions in combat that are very effective. But that's just another way of saying that players that are good at the combat itself will be able to overcome poor builds. And the problem with that is that the players that are good at the combat itself are usually the same players who min/max, because of how driven they are for performance.

But you are also forgetting resource management. Something that the developers of both Mass Effect and DA have said is a HUGE issue when they look at player behaviors. Players would rather let a companion drop in battle and fight without them than use what they perceive as a scarce resource (potions or medigel). Players hold onto these as tightly as possible, avoiding using them even as they see their party drop like flies.

In addition, items like poisons, bombs and traps are similarly under-utilized. The Arishok fight, often cited as a terrible effort in whittling, could be made significantly easier by the correct use of poisons. No tactics, no combat skills, no max/minning, but just the correct use of a few items most players will have in their inventory.

If, instead, a player knows that if their character is knocked down that they could run the risk of a minor permanent stat reduction, this could quite easily make them much less hesitant to use these items in combat.

Essentially, if you give people a motive to start throwing the kitchen sink at not only surviving an encounter, but surviving it with no casualties, suddenly the player will start engaging in behaviors hey didn't otherwise, with people learning and experiencing more of the whole system instead of the more "vanilla" version that is on the surface.

[Fast Jimmy]

In Exile wrote...

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

Roleplaying?

I apparently forgot to reply. I had "well" in quotations because I was running of Jimmy's notion that the fun part about the game is being challanged with the combat a certain way. I was trying to get that I think an RPG is about more than that, but clearly failed. 

Are you trying to paint me as a combat tactics junkie then? Anyone who knows anything about what I am like knows this is not the case. It is a very uninformed suggestion to make. 

[BlueMagitek]

To be fair, in ME 2 Medigel was suddenly extremely restricted for no reason. I'm not sure why they gave it "Elixer" status.

As for Traps... they were a huge investment in DA:O, and you usually needed a strong Stealth to make the most out of it. If players were allowed to set more of their own ambushes / defenses, I imagine traps would gain popularity.

[Allan Schumacher]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

StreetMagic wrote...

Not wanting to take any damage at all sounds more like obsessive compulsive behavior, than a flaw in game design per se.

If you were in a fight, would it be your objective merely to survive, or also to avoid being hurt?

If Hit points were in any way a meaningful representation of real life, this would have more significance.

I actually found myself losing more fights in Karate if I was too concerned about not getting hit, as it tempered my aggression too much and made me hesitate.  I'd argue that through learning how to take hits, and recognizing the vulnerabilities I presented to open up said hit, my skill growth in kumite was accelerated.  To the point where I'd understand an appreciable amount of improved experience gain in an RPG if you didn't flawlessly defeat your enemy.

[Allan Schumacher]

EntropicAngel wrote...

I don't like the idea of permanent penalties, personally. Probably a result of my years of coddling by this generation of gaming.

I was never a fan, and seeing such a thing was often a reload for me while growing up, so I doubt it's really changed that much.


I remember playing Jagged Alliance 2, and taking a critical hit in the shoulder and losing like 47 points of dexterity.  That's a reloadin'.
Hit in the head losing 15 points of wisdom?  You better believe that's a reloadin'.


Note, however, that that doesn't mean it's not necessarily a good thing.  Though I "hated" it, it was a mechanic I understood and, oddly, appreciated.  I just often treated it as equivalent to death excepting minimal situations.

[Allan Schumacher]

That may be true, but my suggestion would be to have the effect occur after a period of time. So the player would have to go back to a save before receiving the initial injury to avoid it. It would be limited to hard or above modes..

One concern with this is that, the later a consequence is presented, the weaker the relationship to the stimulus is. Giving players permanent stat decreases some time after the event runs the risk of seeming arbitrary, and placing barriers on the player understanding why said penalties were enacted.

Even if there was only a remote chance of it happening? I don't think it would. If only once out of 100 times a character "falls" in combat they had a chance at a permanent injury, who would reload every time?

This is a logical hypothesis, which makes sense, but is it reflected in reality? My logical counterpoint would be: "If the player knows it's an effect that will only happen infrequently, won't they be assured that they can replay the encounter and likely come out ahead?"

[In Exile]

Fast Jimmy wrote...
But you are also forgetting resource management. Something that the developers of both Mass Effect and DA have said is a HUGE issue when they look at player behaviors. Players would rather let a companion drop in battle and fight without them than use what they perceive as a scarce resource (potions or medigel). Players hold onto these as tightly as possible, avoiding using them even as they see their party drop like flies. 

But isn't the problem that the game doesn't convey that potions and medigel isn't a scarce resource? Even if players were worried about perma damage to stats, that doesn't mean they'd use their potions early on (they might worry that even more desperate battles would come by later, and potions would still be limited).

In addition, items like poisons, bombs and traps are similarly under-utilized. The Arishok fight, often cited as a terrible effort in whittling, could be made significantly easier by the correct use of poisons. No tactics, no combat skills, no max/minning, but just the correct use of a few items most players will have in their inventory. 

You mentioned this in other threads, I believe, but the problem here isn't combat, it's that poison is irrelevant for 99% of the game. There is no reason to use it, it adds nothing to any encounter, and if it happened to be marginally useful in one, players would have had no reason to discover it. 

The gameplay could incorporate poisons more without having to penalize death. So I agree with you - just like I agree with you that players should be encouraged to use consumables more - but I just don't see how the incentive system you're proposing is actually going to get players using it.

The Arishok battle is a great example, because there's no party at all (potentially). Yet even with KO = Game Over, players don't abuse their potions or rely on poisons. 

If, instead, a player knows that if their character is knocked down that they could run the risk of a minor permanent stat reduction, this could quite easily make them much less hesitant to use these items in combat. 

Or it could make them even more hesitant, because if they're going to play on with even crappier characters as enemise level up, those potions might become even more valuable. What you're proposing could easily encourage hoarding. 

Essentially, if you give people a motive to start throwing the kitchen sink at not only surviving an encounter, but surviving it with no casualties, suddenly the player will start engaging in behaviors hey didn't otherwise, with people learning and experiencing more of the whole system instead of the more "vanilla" version that is on the surface. 

Or people will turn down the difficutly, hoard potions and items even more for the future, or just search for overpowered builds to avoid the difficutly. 

I just don't get this idea that you can force people to challenge themselves when they don't want to. 

Fast Jimmy wrote...
Are you trying to paint me as a combat tactics junkie then? Anyone who knows anything about what I am like knows this is not the case. It is a very uninformed suggestion to make. 

No, not at all. I just meant that in the context of the thread, you scoped gameplay down to combat. 

[In Exile]

StreetMagic wrote...
 Diehard RPG players are more averse to skill based mechanics though, so it's hit or miss. But it's a challenge that relies more on pattern recognition. Not stats/potions/elite builds/etc.. If you play it a few times, it stops becoming a challenge and the pattern is easily recognized, but at least it forces a challenge the first time around.

I don't mind skill-based mechanics, but not when the challenge is stupid. Corypheus was all about fighting the camera and the poor pathfinding AI, and much less about the actual enemies.  I'd say a close second is the Rock Wraith, which is just a pain to fight because there's absolutely no way to judge the reach of it's swinging/spinning arm attack, and your NPC AI is not smart enough to get out of the way.

The Tallis DLC (name escapes me now) DLC boss fight was much better about that, because while there were patterns involved, there wasn't a ridiculous level of camera fighting. 

I don't know why people don't like it though. The kind of bosses that rely on stats and simple brute force are boring. The Lady of the Skies boss in MotA, for example. Orsino is pretty straightforward as well. They're tough, but merely for being so overpowered. Not unpredictable.

See above. The issue is what actual skills they're asking from you. 

[AlanC9]

Fast Jimmy wrote...
Players would rather let a companion drop in battle and fight without them than use what they perceive as a scarce resource (potions or medigel). Players hold onto these as tightly as possible, avoiding using them even as they see their party drop like flies.

Yep; they're responding rationally to the incentives in the game. You don't like them letting characters drop,, so you want to change the incentives. 

Essentially, if you give people a motive to start throwing the kitchen sink at not only surviving an encounter, but surviving it with no casualties, suddenly the player will start engaging in behaviors hey didn't otherwise, with people learning and experiencing more of the whole system instead of the more "vanilla" version that is on the surface.

It would also lead players to avoid any strategies and abilities that can't be justified on a min/max basis. You can't simultaneously encourage good play and diverse play. It might clear up the Arishok problem, but only if earlier battles showed poison to be an effective tactic.

And again, this is the same effect you'd get from raising the general difficulty level.

Modifié par AlanC9, 23 mai 2013 - 04:20 .

[Plaintiff]

If the goal is to incentivize players to engage more with different styles of play, then wouldn't it better to reward them for experimenting, rather than punish them for not? Or provide a comprehensive tutorial of different possible tactics that demonstrates the potential? Or craft situations that telegraph "a new type of tactic would be helpful now"?

Deus Ex: Human Revolution is a good example of all three of these things, I feel.

1) It grants different EXP bonuses for lethal and non-lethal takedowns, hacking, talking, exploring and so on, so that a mixture of playstyles is encouraged. Dragon Age does a bit of this, but it could expand on it by offering EXP bonuses for pulling off combo kills, or using traps and grenades.

2) It also provides you with a range of weapons, and teaches you to recognize which ones are useful for which situation. Then it provides you with a mix of enemies that each have different abilities and weaknesses. This is something that Dragon Age doesn't really do at all, in my estimation. At least on the lower dififculties, using traps and grenades doesn't offer any distinct advantage over simply wailing on the enemy with your weapons.

3) There are several situations in Deus Ex that telegraph the need to change tactics. Boss fights are one, but there is another instance where Adam Jensen is required to defend himself from on-coming waves of enemies while he waits for an elevator, and is given a few minutes to "prepare", during which he can hack turrets, place mines, find a place to hide, and generally booby trap the entire room. Neither Dragon Age game has a situation like this that I can recall. Sure, there were situations where traps might've been helpful, but they weren't well telegraphed.

Of course, if you want players to experiment with traps, poisons and grenades, you first have to make them more readily available. Rarely in either DA game does the player find a poison or trap or grenade just lying around waiting to be used. These are things that the player must go out of their way to purchase or craft. But why would they bother when they haven't needed them for the entire game so far?

Modifié par Plaintiff, 23 mai 2013 - 04:30 .

[AlanC9]

In Exile wrote...
But isn't the problem that the game doesn't convey that potions and medigel isn't a scarce resource? Even if players were worried about perma damage to stats, that doesn't mean they'd use their potions early on (they might worry that even more desperate battles would come by later, and potions would still be limited).

What was actual player behavior in DA:O? I heard a lot about people powering through the game by using lots of potions; the Combat Tweaks mod puts all healing potion types on the same cooldown timer to limit this.

Of course, potions are unlimited in DA:O as soon as you've unlocked unlimited elfroot.

[Fast Jimmy]

If the goal is to incentivize players to engage more with different styles of play, then wouldn't it better to reward them for experimenting, rather than punish them for not? Or provide a comprehensive tutorial of different possible tactics that demonstrates the potential? Or craft situations that telegraph "a new type of tactic would be helpful now"?

For what it is worth, my suggested model would use ways to gain temporary and permanent stat boosts (just like the injuries would have a chance at temporary and permanent stat reductions) that rewarded not just brute efficiency or max DPS, but more tactical or smart behavior in combat.

I also said that having a tutorial is of the prime importance for any future DA games, covering everything from cool downs to Tactics to consumables.

It is just that the conversation keeps coming back and focusing on the permanent penalties above anything else.

[Fast Jimmy]

Of course, if you want players to experiment with traps, poisons and grenades, you first have to make them more readily available. Rarely in either DA game does the player find a poison or trap or grenade just lying around waiting to be used. These are things that the player must go out of their way to purchase or craft. But why would they bother when they haven't needed them for the entire game so far?

I would make a caveat here. I don't think making potions/poisons/etc. more available would help. Players will hoard items even if they can carry 10, 20 or even 100 of them and they fall from the sky like gumdrops. HOWEVER, I think DA2 took a step in the right direction with this, but implemented the feature incorrectly.

If you had below a certain threshold of an item, enemies/loot would drop them. Otherwise, they would not. Example: if you had only one healing potion, it would be quite likely that an enemy would drop a potion. If you had five, an enemy would never drop a potion. This was done to prevent hoarding huge inventories (where it was successful) but it still didn't increase utilization rates because players felt the consumables were even MORE rare than before... even though actually consuming said consumables would result in more consumables being dropped!

So what I would suggest is this - hard inventory limits (like, say, five potions) that do not affect drop rates in the least. A player who can't pick up a healing potion until they use one they own, a player that has to pass up loot because of their playstyle, will change their behaviors, guaranteed. The potions will no longer seem like a scarce resource, but one that they own too much of to loot effectively. They will see it as a surplus.

I think that this would be drastically more effective than the way DA2 did it or by simply increasing the drop rates for all consumables across the board.

Modifié par Fast Jimmy, 23 mai 2013 - 11:21 .