Going into Dragon Age 2, the differences in Inventory systems are quite Jarring. I wasnt a fan of not being able to use potions while in the menu. So I was wondering what Kind of inventory system people would be looking for in Inquistion.
An Origins style one or Dragon Age 2 version?
Not sure what you mean. I used potions from my menu bar all the time. Although I'm betting you're talking about console, and I always play on PC.
I have some complaints from time to time about DA2 
but all in all, I liked the inventory system. It sorted Junk all into one "Folder"/column and let you sell it all at once. Plus it also sorted other things like weapons and armor into their own columns, or consumables and crafting ingredients. Most things, like runes, would auto-stack into stacks.
Auto-sorting in inventory is a feature all games should have. I gotta say I loved it when WoW started making available the crafting bags which automatically put all crafting ingredients into them when you pick them up. What's really amusing is now you can even carry around a portable refrigerator for cooking ingredients that you get from the Pandaren at Halfhill, which is silly as crap (how exactly are you lugging this around, and who made it, gnome or goblin engineers?), but convenient.
There's every reason to carry forward that into DAI, and from what I've seen of alpha screenshots, it looks like they will.
I know Realmz hopes they will implement weight/encumbrance as well as item limits, but I don't think they will. Others seem to want a personal inventory for all 4 chars instead of a party inventory, but I think they're sticking to that.
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I think inventory is one of the less complex things in games due to it just being a collection of objects. I think where the complexity comes in is the user interface.
I would like an inventory that isn't a list. I'm not sure what the substitute should be - the grid isn't that much better - but list inventories are a huge pain to navigate, especially when they're not well sorted.
My problem with the DA2 list inventory is with the way they handled randomized items -- the "ornate rings" and so forth. It generates a lot of noise in the accessories list, and with mage staves if you're keeping those around for the different damage types. Other than that I thought it worked fine.
My problem with the DA2 list inventory is with the way they handled randomized items -- the "ornate rings" and so forth. It generates a lot of noise in the accessories list, and with mage staves if you're keeping those around for the different damage types. Other than that I thought it worked fine.
I just would have liked more specificity. Even if the items didn't have generic names/were randomized, they'd still clutter.
I've always preferred a grid to a list because it allows me to display more items on screen at the same time. It also lends itself to custom corting, so that the thing I want will always be in the same place on the screen when I want it.
List inventories require that we navigate them every time we want to go find something, and that's wasted time. If you added up all the time you spend scrolling through your inventory it would likely be more than the time you would have spent organizing your inventory the one time at the beginning.
So I don't like lists.
Also don't like how DA2 identified Junk items. I don't think the UI should give me that sort of metagame information. I much preferred how NWN handled inventory, where everything was grouped together and it was up to the player to give that collection structure. And this also meant that sometimes the player might misidentify something. And that makes sense. If you haven't yet encountered the quest that relies on this item, you should then have no reason to believe that it is a quest item. You might think it's junk. Or you might think that some junk has a use (like the sheets of vellum in DAO).
I'd also like to see weight limits on inventory. BioWare hasn't used weight limits since they stopped having individual inventories, but weight limits can work with a group inventory, as demonstrated by Wizardry 8.
I would like an inventory that isn't a list. I'm not sure what the substitute should be - the grid isn't that much better - but list inventories are a huge pain to navigate, especially when they're not well sorted.
i agree. list inventory sucks, i just hope they make a better one.
DA2's wasn't so bad. Well, it didn't handle the swarms of magical jewellery with identical names and icons well, but what would?
Though I wonder if we couldn't put the items stats on the actual list rather than requiring the player to mouse over it?
Superior Longsword 32(60) physical +38 health +108 attack
rather than
Superior Longsword ***
I guess screenspace might be an issue at lower resolutions, though even putting the basic attack/armour stat would help.
I find grids worse than lists once we get past a couple of primary items and I have to think about , e.g., which one of these things is the ring of fire resistance.List inventories require that we navigate them every time we want to go find something, and that's wasted time. If you added up all the time you spend scrolling through your inventory it would likely be more than the time you would have spent organizing your inventory the one time at the beginning.
The ME2 route was dreadful. Loot grants us regular - even constant - opportunities to make in-character decisions. I think taking that away diminishes the game.I find grids worse than lists once we get past a couple of primary items and I have to think about , e.g., which one of these things is the ring of fire resistance.
Ideally, there wouldn't be so many items kicking around in the first place. But I suppose it's too much to hope that DAI's going to go the ME2 route.
One of the best things was the way you could move stuff to the junk list . Much easier to go to a merchant and one click and all sold instead of going thru all of your inventory . I have gone back to Skyrim and it`s a pain in the butt to go thru the inventory .
The ME2 route was dreadful. Loot grants us regular - even constant - opportunities to make in-character decisions. I think taking that away diminishes the game.
I also think that ME2's approach only looks good because of the incredibly uninspired loot of ME. Moreover, ME's system was still a list.
Grids make it easy to find things as long as you take a few moments to impart some structure. Those few moments of planning will take far less time than repeatedly navigating through a list.
Well, this is one of those cases where we have different tastes in RPGs. I burned out on loot-heavy PnP systems back in 1985 or thereabouts. Anyway, there's approximately zero chance of the DA series ever going this route.
I've always preferred a grid to a list because it allows me to display more items on screen at the same time. It also lends itself to custom corting, so that the thing I want will always be in the same place on the screen when I want it.
List inventories require that we navigate them every time we want to go find something, and that's wasted time. If you added up all the time you spend scrolling through your inventory it would likely be more than the time you would have spent organizing your inventory the one time at the beginning.
So I don't like lists.
i agree. list inventory sucks, i just hope they make a better one.
I would like an inventory that isn't a list. I'm not sure what the substitute should be - the grid isn't that much better - but list inventories are a huge pain to navigate, especially when they're not well sorted.
Yes, lists are annoying. It can be such a pain to outfit your party or sort out junk you don't need anymore with a list based inventory. I usually keep armor and other items with high bonuses (like fire resistance) in my inventory, in case I might need it later, which makes things even worse. I can cope, but it is just so annoying.
Grid based inventories (like in Diablo) are ok, but slot based inventories (BG series, numerous MMORPGs, etc.) are my personal favorite. Sadly they don't work well with gamepads, so you usually only see them in PC exclusive games nowadays.
I made a thread about this recently, but it didn't get much attention (I think I wrote too much, it is like a wall of text xD), so I have abandoned it for the time being.
The ME2 route was dreadful. Loot grants us regular - even constant - opportunities to make in-character decisions. I think taking that away diminishes the game.
I also think that ME2's approach only looks good because of the incredibly uninspired loot of ME. Moreover, ME's system was still a list.
Grids make it easy to find things as long as you take a few moments to impart some structure. Those few moments of planning will take far less time than repeatedly navigating through a list.
They're mostly not very interesting in-character decisions - shall I use this weapon, or keep the one that's obviously inferior to it? A bit better if you have multiple characters who can use the same item, but still pretty uninteresting.
ME2 was a bit sparse in choices, but ME3 gave more real decisions in equipment, because a lot more weapons were viable options.
I don't think that grids vs lists matters a whole lot to me. Grids need good, distinct icons. Lists need at the least good communicative item names (not "Ornate Ring" hundreds of times), and ideally should be able to give more information.
Yeah, I think of that particular problem in DA2 as being more of a "loot naming" problem than an inventory problem, per se.
WoW and Diablo always make sure that every item always has a unique name. It was indeed annoying in DA2 that you can be carrying around three magical Ornate Rings or Ornate Necklaces, and they would have different bonuses/effects, but were otherwise named the same.
The other thing I would say got confusing was that the game had a "star" system with the "bestness" of the item being rated 1 to 5 stars, but it didn't seem to work consistently. For example, a lot of the items scaled with level, and so might not have been better than other items until they reached a certain point. It just seemed to me that both the star rating and the color (purple being best, for example) were not always completely "accurate" in indicating which items were best.
We could also get into the perennial problem of the item properties not being properly described (at least in-game, as opposed to on the Wiki) or at least in DAO, even implemented.
Played on pc, don't see any option in the DA2 inventory to use potions. Without moving them to the quickbar.
An inventory system not dissimilar to how skyrim did it might be interesting.
Played on pc, don't see any option in the DA2 inventory to use potions. Without moving them to the quickbar.
Double click
Double click
Yeah, I think of that particular problem in DA2 as being more of a "loot naming" problem than an inventory problem, per se.
Yes, I agree. When you have a list system and all items appear as names without icons, the problem is having lots of items with the same names (but different properties).
When you have a grid system (and item names for things in the grid only appear with tooltips), the problem is visually distinguishing them. And for sure, while weapons look different from each other (although all axes look like all axes, but at least axes don't look like swords), all rings look like all rings.
I think the other problem with grid/slot systems - for the developers, not the users, though it becomes a user problem - is that you have to be able to often create something visually very small (to fit in a small grid/slot space) to represent a larger object. And as much of a BG2 fan as I was, the tiny icons in the slot used to represent various bigger items required a lot of squinting to see what they actually were.
Plus don't get me going on the bizarre disconnect between the little squiggly spell/ability icons, and the spells they represented.
Some of these make sense. Of course the tiny little snail is the slow spell. Anything with a "red cross" like cross in it is a healing spell (although you may not always be sure which one).
But some of them, honestly, make no fracking sense, and thank the Maker the spell name comes up on a tooltip. (The problem is this doesn't seem to work too consistently on the iPad, where I've been trying, with some frustration, to replay the BG2 Enhanced Edition.)
Yes, I agree. When you have a list system and all items appear as names without icons, the problem is having lots of items with the same names (but different properties).
When you have a grid system (and item names for things in the grid only appear with tooltips), the problem is visually distinguishing them. And for sure, while weapons look different from each other (although all axes look like all axes, but at least axes don't look like swords), all rings look like all rings.
This is less of a problem, though, if the player an arrange the icons himself. Then, he doesn't even need to look at the icons. If he knows that Slow is the furthest icon left on the second row, he can select it without even looking at it.
That's something lists never allow. A good UI is one you can navigate with your eyes closed, and a list simply cannot offer this without the player having perfect knowledge of the inventory contents all of the time.
They're mostly not very interesting in-character decisions - shall I use this weapon, or keep the one that's obviously inferior to it? A bit better if you have multiple characters who can use the same item, but still pretty uninteresting.
[...] the problem is visually distinguishing them [...] all rings look like all rings.
Well, the spells and abilities go into the quickbar, and quickbars only have icons - no text. I've never seen anybody complain about the fact that icons in the quickbar don't have a text description.Plus don't get me going on the bizarre disconnect between the little squiggly spell/ability icons, and the spells they represented.
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