70 réponses à ce sujet

[TurretSyndrome]

My objective, however, is to roleplay my character effectively. To do this, I don't always choose optimal combat tactics. I play suboptimally if it fits my character. And if I lose, then that's where that character's story ends.

Other players might play to see how oddly they can construct a party.

Winning the battle and advancing through the story are not everyone's ultimate objectives. I just wanted to make you aware of your assumption, and that other people might not share it.

 

If your objective is to roleplay, which happens to limit your options to efficiently use the game's mechanics, then you can make use of a lower difficulty setting to continue. But if you are playing on a higher difficulty mode, you can't expect to manually limit yourself and also be able to beat the challenge. There's no need for the mode itself to be modified to fit your preference since one already exists for that very purpose.

[Sylvius the Mad]

If your objective is to roleplay, which happens to limit your options to efficiently use the game's mechanics, then you can make use of a lower difficulty setting to continue. But if you are playing on a higher difficulty mode, you can't expect to manually limit yourself and also be able to beat the challenge. There's no need for the mode itself to be modified to fit your preference since one already exists for that very purpose.

And no one is asking for that. I don't want Nightmare to be easier. Frankly, I think DA2's Hard setting was too easy (I don't play on Nightmare, because the mechanics tend not to make any in-setting sense - why are Qunari immune to fire, for example).

But we're not talking about hiw difficult the game is. We're talking about whether the tactical camera has value without regard for difficulty. I think it does.

[Amfortas]

The mistake is calling it tactical camera. It should just be called isometric view.

[In Exile]

Neither DAO nor DA2 were difficult in a meaningful sense, even on nightmare difficulty. Like with BG (or any other RPG) it all came down to your talent for building characters.

The games could be hard with suboptimal builds - say a warrior focused heavily on WILL versus STR/DEX in DA:O and used as a 2H warrior (or a melee class in BG1 with low DEX). There were a lot of trap abilities in DAO - just pure garbage that wasn't worth using.

But a well built party could easily curbstomp any opposition.

The tactical camera is important for the kind of control it offers - full party - and not because the difficulty required it. While I would always play in this game mode, there are many console powergamers who could best the game with 1 character in OTS.

[In Exile]

And no one is asking for that. I don't want Nightmare to be easier. Frankly, I think DA2's Hard setting was too easy (I don't play on Nightmare, because the mechanics tend not to make any in-setting sense - why are Qunari immune to fire, for example).

But we're not talking about hiw difficult the game is. We're talking about whether the tactical camera has value without regard for difficulty. I think it does.

Why is the player immune to fire with fire runes? To me the immunities in DA2 respected the ruleset rather well - by allowing NPCs to share the same advantages as the player.

The real issue was the HP/damage assymetry, not the immunities.

[Sylvius the Mad]

Why is the player immune to fire with fire runes? To me the immunities in DA2 respected the ruleset rather well - by allowing NPCs to share the same advantages as the player.

The real issue was the HP/damage assymetry, not the immunities.

To be honest, I didn't know that the player character could be immune to fire (I never understood DA2's resistance numbers).

If that's the case, then perhaps the immunities should have been distributed randomly, rather than having all enemies of one type immune to a specific kind of damage.

And that asymmetry problem existed on all difficulty levels, not just Nightmare.

[In Exile]

To be honest, I didn't know that the player character could be immune to fire (I never understood DA2's resistance numbers).

If that's the case, then perhaps the immunities should have been distributed randomly, rather than having all enemies of one type immune to a specific kind of damage.

And that asymmetry problem existed on all difficulty levels, not just Nightmare.

 

Patches actually nerfered resistance in a frustrating way so that you could never reach 100% resistance, but you could at release. DA2's resistance numbers were confusing because the raw #s were completely meaningless and referenced without the scale that changed with each level-up. It was pretty much trial and error via slotting runes into free armor slots. 

 

I would agree that random distribution is more realistic, but I think pre-defined resistances allows the game to have a level of strategic planning in terms of future encounters that just wouldn't be possible if the resistance was truly randomly distributed (rather than random, that is to say working as just a base spell resistance %, as it was in DA:O).

[Cyberstrike nTo]

Nothing that offers the player options is a useless feature.

 

That then begs the question: if no player ever uses a feature then does it become useless?

[In Exile]

That then begs the question: if no player ever uses a feature then does it become useless?

 

Not according to his logic, which ascribes the value to the mere existence of the option. 

[Realmzmaster]

No option is useless because it is not used. The potential for use is still there. The option in and of itself has value. The assumption being made is that it will never be used which may not be a valid assumption. I agree with StM that by its existence it has value because it allows choice.

[Gtdef]

To be honest, I didn't know that the player character could be immune to fire (I never understood DA2's resistance numbers).

If that's the case, then perhaps the immunities should have been distributed randomly, rather than having all enemies of one type immune to a specific kind of damage.

And that asymmetry problem existed on all difficulty levels, not just Nightmare.

 

You could stack resistance runes in your gear. If you kept your gear relatively updated (because you get diminishing returns from leveling), you could reach 100% resistance with 2 runes. With dlc and other gear that had a lot of rune slots you could easily become immune to 3 elements and runes are very cheap, ~50-75 silver.

 

This made friendly fire irrelevant, you could just stack resistances to your melee, and just use aoe on them. The most dangerous spells are firestorm and walking bomb, so just get 100% fire resistance and spirit resistance and you don't have to worry.

 

Then they patched it so it would hard cap at 95% resistance, which made walking bomb harder to use cause even with 95% res it's still enough to kill you but left the others largely unaffected.

 

As for enemies, if the resistances were random that would be a massive problem against mages and other npcs because they oneshot you. You would have to win the lottery or die instantly. Nightmare is pretty unforgiving as far as enemy damage goes, you need either to mitigate a huge percentage or prevent it by killing the enemy fast. I wouldn't object if the damage was more balanced and allowed some breathing room against certain enemies, but in it's current state it would just be frustrating rng.

[Sylvius the Mad]

You could stack resistance runes in your gear. If you kept your gear relatively updated (because you get diminishing returns from leveling), you could reach 100% resistance with 2 runes. With dlc and other gear that had a lot of rune slots you could easily become immune to 3 elements and runes are very cheap, ~50-75 silver.

This made friendly fire irrelevant, you could just stack resistances to your melee, and just use aoe on them. The most dangerous spells are firestorm and walking bomb, so just get 100% fire resistance and spirit resistance and you don't have to worry.

Then they patched it so it would hard cap at 95% resistance, which made walking bomb harder to use cause even with 95% res it's still enough to kill you but left the others largely unaffected.

As for enemies, if the resistances were random that would be a massive problem against mages and other npcs because they oneshot you. You would have to win the lottery or die instantly. Nightmare is pretty unforgiving as far as enemy damage goes, you need either to mitigate a huge percentage or prevent it by killing the enemy fast. I wouldn't object if the damage was more balanced and allowed some breathing room against certain enemies, but in it's current state it would just be frustrating rng.

I'd call anything that highlights the absurdity of asymmetrical mechanics a good thing.

[In Exile]

No option is useless because it is not used. The potential for use is still there. The option in and of itself has value. The assumption being made is that it will never be used which may not be a valid assumption. I agree with StM that by its existence it has value because it allows choice.

 

To be fair, though, we might question whether a particular option should be in versus another option if no one uses it. 

[Sylvius the Mad]

To be fair, though, we might question whether a particular option should be in versus another option if no one uses it.

Certainly. Whether to replace a disused option with another option is a discusion worth having.

But never to simply remove it.

[lessthanjake]

The "pause" ability is NOT the "tactical view." The tactical view is literally that--an tactical "view." View refers to vision. Camera.

 

Tactical view is not pause. Tactical view is the camera. Pause is pause.

 

Edit: DA ][ did not have a "tactical view." DA ][ did have a pause button.

 

Yes, I suppose the wording I used was confusing.

 

Here's how I see it, though. Tactical view is designed for pause and play. So if pause and play is useless, then so is tactical view.

 

And if the game is too easy, then pause and play is useless. Therefore, tactical view would be useless as well.

 

I didn't really make that logical progression clear originally.

 

But yes, it is about the pausing, not the view. You COULD pause in DA2, but the view was so zoomed in that it was tremendously frustrating to pause and play, and since the game was designed to be played in real time, it was so easy that you did not need to pause. I was not going to do something frustrating that I did not need to do. Tactical view will make pause and play at least not frustrating, so the last hurdle remaining to bringing back strategic pausing play to the game is to make it necessary. You do that by having a higher difficulty option that essentially requires it. I want Bioware to do that. That makes sense, no?

[Sylvius the Mad]

Our point of disagreement seems to be that you equate the view with pause, while I don't feel the two are necessarily connected.

They're not connected at all. In fact, each one arguably makes the other less necessary.

I'm sure you would agree that if you had a game with the tactical view but no pause, and a game with pause but no tactical view, both games would be superior to a game that had neither.

[Gtdef]

Yes, I suppose the wording I used was confusing.

 

Here's how I see it, though. Tactical view is designed for pause and play. So if pause and play is useless, then so is tactical view.

 

And if the game is too easy, then pause and play is useless. Therefore, tactical view would be useless as well.

 

I didn't really make that logical progression clear originally.

 

It's wrong to associate pause with tactical view.

Tactical view is designed to help in controlling multiple characters. It's not exclusive to rpgs.

The pause and play replaces the turn based mechanics of the pnp games. 

 

It's a byproduct of making movement a free action. In a system that movement costs resources there is no point in pausing.

[addiction21]

In all honesty I do not care because there appears to be a heavy focus on the combat encounters for DAI (something they failed at DA2 with but clearly put more focus on with the DLCs) and that this Tactical/engage mode has a queue. Am I the only one that picked up in the very limited bit we have seen they sorta set waypoints for movement and some actions along the way.

 

Difficulty levels are in so if it makes it to easy turn it up. If you are still moving thru the highest difficulty good for you. You get a gold star.

[Amfortas]

 
The way most fights would go for me is this: *pause* Use Backstab *pause* Select enemy that's close enough for Hawke to jump to, far enough that Hawke does not run--use Twin Blades *pause* same thing, use Assassinate *pause* find cluster of enemies, use Rush/Whatsitcalled Flask *pause* use Backstab again *pause* attack one enemy, then another, until chain fills, then find another enemy and use Explosive Strike

 

Reading this reminds me of how much the game needs proper keybinds for the whole quickbar and some form of tab targeting, so that we don't have to click stuff and pause so much. I hope Inquisition finally includes it, it's one of the things that I'm waiting to see before I decide between pc and console.

[rocsage]

the designers aren't catering to SWII gosus; people of all rts capacities, including none, should be able to play through the game on any difficulty.

sure, watching someone solo nightmare malvernis without pausing is a terrific experience, but that kind of skill shouldn't be a prerequisite.

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however, I don't see tactical view as a feature pivotal enough to require difficulty-related justification.

sure, inability to see that emissary in a blind spot is an issue, but knowledge alone isn't what keeps the party alive; victory requires action.

people who try and take reasonable measures will succeed, and that would be a fairly agreeable rule of thumb for games short of hard-core design.

someone said that higher difficulty should entail more comprehensive, thorough application of resources, and this sounds like another guideline.

As difficulty increases, each skill should be required to be increasingly specialized in usage and have a valid purpose; abilities shouldn't be garbage under nightmare difficulties because the jrpg/mmo mechanism makes friendly fire fatal or that enemies essentially become aegis incarnate that the concept of force becomes null for most attacks.

[addiction21]

I THOUGHT I saw a queue kind of working, but I don't think so. If what you're referring to is the branched path for sending a party member to another point in battle--I think that only shows their potential path. You can't set queues for it.

 

Please show me if you're sure we can, because that would be great news.

 

I am in no way sure  of it.  I know the "branched path" confused me because it was so quick and smooth but I had to rewatch to pick that up.

 

What I thought is showing and actual sort of waypoint where they moved here, then moved there, used a ability the moved again.

 

Likely it is all in my head.