1120 réponses à ce sujet

[Brogan]

Side note: Happy the PC guys finally got to see the UI!

 

The only thing left to squash the rest of my fears is a gameplay vid of the wonderful panning and zooming (and not solely for the purpose of the sweet screenshots of my Inquisitor).

 

Here's hoping it's coming in the next few days.

[Rawgrim]

Yes I hope so too. I am entertaining the idea of how Raistlin Majere worked it - that he must 'commit spells to memory' each day and each time he uses it. As you say there is no indication in the DA lore that this is how magic works in Thedas however, but I'll come up with something

 

Mana. That is how it works in Thedas. Its like stamina for magic.

[Ponendus]

Mana. That is how it works in Thedas. Its like stamina for magic.

 

Sure, mana is a reasoning for why one can't use spells relentlessly, it doesn't justify why one can't select to cast a spell one has in memory however.

[Nukekitten]

The question to my mind is not one of it forcing strategic considerations on the user, that's hand-wavey and it's not clear why that would generate interesting complexity:

If you can scout ahead and then switch out your abilities, then that's a one time solvable problem. See what's coming, drop into a menu. Ever thereafter it will be nothing but a chore. It's not really something that's going to be fun on a visceral or problem solving level. And frankly the ability to problem solve is something on that sort of level depends on a high rate of iteration to be interesting: Observe Orient Decide Act, as the old principle has it. The shorter that loop, the more changes it encompasses, the more challenging/interesting the problem - provided the person can keep up.

If, however, eight abilities covers for most situations, then the variation in those situations seems likely to be limited to something that that range of options can account for.

So... is that a good thing? The question to my mind is whether eight abilities contains a sufficiently different range of options that they can be applied in a high number of interesting combinations. How many abilities did people really use, on a regular basis, in the past DA games? That weren't just 'This is a better fireball?'

I could honestly see most people using less than eight abilities - if there are fewer sustains at least and that's taken out into passives - so I'm not too concerned on this point. As always, I'll wait for the Let's Plays to come out before making a decision either way.

[AresKeith]

Well, big enough that they thought it would be profitable to add MP which is almost nothing but combat.

 

You mean something they always wanted to add since DAO

[Sylvius the Mad]

Wow, I'm upset about the 8 abilities limit as much as the next guy/gal but some people are really upset! Seriously when was combat ever the main draw of the DA series?

Combat has typically been a strength of BioWare's games. But starting with DA2 they seem to be trying to force a specific playstyle on us.

[Reznore57]

I'm not happy at all with the whole stuck with 8 spells.

Not looking forward to changing my quickbar when I have different party member etc...

Which I probably won't even bother , because I'll have better things to do.

 

Anyway I wanted to maybe play on hard in DAI , I'm going to stick with casual...I'm probably going to have more fun , and spend less time in the UI.

[Neverwinter_Knight77]

It's been so long since I've played DA2 that I don't know what's different. But still, I hope everything will be reasonably familiar.

[Sylvius the Mad]

Who knows, maybe there's a new dynamic we are as yet unaware of.

Maybe there is, but then they should have revealed that all together.

Again, them releasing the mechanics would fo a long way toward explaining thus, for good or ill.

Can we please see the ability list, with prereqs, costs, and effects (with numbers)?

[Sylvius the Mad]

You mean something they always wanted to add since DAO

Did they say that then? If they told us when DAO was in development that they wanted to include MP, then I'll buy it.

But nothing they say now should be interpreted as anything other than an attempt to make us buy this one. Remember how they talked down DAO prior to DA2's release, and said DA2 was the game they always wanted to make. And then when people didn't like it, they retroactively changed their minds and started to talk down DA2, and now they say that Inquisition is the game they always wanted to make.

But unless they're a whole different group of people now, that doesn't make a lot of sense.

[seraphymon]

Did they say that then? If they told us when DAO was in development that they wanted to include MP, then I'll buy it.

But nothing they say now should be interpreted as anything other than an attempt to make us buy this one. Remember how they talked down DAO prior to DA2's release, and said DA2 was the game they always wanted to make. And then when people didn't like it, they retroactively changed their minds and started to talk down DA2, and now they say that Inquisition is the game they always wanted to make.

But unless they're a whole different group of people now, that doesn't make a lot of sense.

Yeah its the same old PR talk, just like with movies. Oh this sequel is the best so far in the series, number 1 blah blah blah.  Really though I am more in agreement with Brent Knowles, he was cool, but the direction they seem to go is just.. questionable, like DA is still trying to form an identity and fixing things that arent broken.

[Wild]

the UI for PC is nothing more than the radial menu that is on consoles, there's no real adaptation for PC.

 

8 abilty to use on joypad

8 ability to use with mouse and keyboards.

Is simple...

[Jester]

Ok, so I've been positively suprised with almost everything that was revealed about this game so far. 

But this is just freaking riddiculous.

 

I just checked my current save in DA2, with my rogue near the end of Act II. I have 11 abilities on my bar, 2 of them sustained the rest are activated. On a rogue. By the end of the game, I'll probably get at least 2 more.

Now, considering that we will have 8 possible slots, one of the following is true:

 

1. The whole hype about tons of abilities is just a scam, and most of them are passives with very few activated/sustained talents or spells (enough to fill the 8 slots bar near the end of the game, for any class including a mage). This would mean, that Inquisition has far fewer talents/spells than DA2.

2. We will have to choose only some of availible talents/spells, meaning that during certain fights, access to some skills will be restricted or downright denied. Even if there is some gameplay mechanism allowing the player to predict which of their skills they'll need for the upcoming fight, we would have to customize skill bar before every quest. 

 

And don't give me the "but you're not using all of the abilities on the bar anyway!", because I do use all of the abilities I have on my bar during my rogue playthrough. I almost every fight. 

 

 Just saying people get carried away saying Dragon Age games aren't about the combat, the combat sucks, etc.

 

For people who claim that Dragon Age is not about combat: what is it about? In Origins I'd estimate that I spend about 60% of my play time doing combat. In DA2 this increased to about 70%. 

[Yomond]

What if I want to take off all my clothes and see how many healing potions it takes to punch a ogre to death? If I can only carry nine potions then the answer better be "fewer then nine".

 

Looking back I don’t think I ever needed more then 8 skills to get through any one fight in DAO or 2. But Im not really looking to "beat" the game so much as play with it.

I’ll have my tried and true tactics but I also like trying new things on the fly. If a fights going well(or not) see what that one or two talents you never really use do.

There are a bunch of whole skill trees in Origins that I never would have tried if not for just goofing around with them and ended up loving.

 

What about the goofing around? Optimal party builds are not always the most fun. but not having access to the one ability you need also sucks.

 

Needing to plan ahead is great but this feels like a ham fisted way to do it.

Ill take freedom of play style over challenge any day because I can always self impose tactical challenges. But what if I want to just go hogwild a cast every spell I know to kill three bandits?

 

What about the goofing around!?!

 

One screen shot is not a lot of context and it is way too early to really say but this sounds... well dull.

[Muspade]

I look forward to all these fragile hearts breaking...when the game hasn't even reached the shelves yet.

[Maria Caliban]

It's not because of MP. It's not because of consoles. It's because that's the design decisions they made for the games they are making.

These aren't unrelated.

Using the radial menu slows down play on the consoles. If XBox/PS4 controllers had five buttons instead of four then we'd be looking at ten hotkeys instead of eight.

BioWare didn't pull eight out of a hat; it's what you get with four buttons + L trigger toggle.

And yes, MP influenced this decision as well. The 4 abilities + 4 utility items is taken straight from ME 3 MP. Again, that's a system designed around four buttons + L trigger toggle. It's also much easier to balance classes and abilities when classes all have the same number of skills.

I will also assume that the game has mostly been tested with controllers, and having the PC interface be similar makes it easier to fine tune the difficulty of monsters and encounters. Despite what Mike says about having 32 abilities, normal difficulty assumes you'll be using your PC the majority of the time and not constantly pausing. Giving xbox PCs 8 skills and computer PCs 17 means you have to change the game in other ways. Previous BioWare games typically had some difference when it came to immunities and HP depending on platform.

I think limiting the PC to only 8 abilities probably will lead to a better experience... but not because it's tactical*. If DA:I were only a singleplayer PC game, I expect that, like DAO, I'd have a massive toolbar of abilities for my mage and a smaller one for my non-mages.

Of course, having a massive toolbar of abilities isn’t inherently good. I play TOR and the pure number of skills and buttons to click can be overwhelming. I have a Trooper (Vanguard) and a Bounty Hunter (Power Tech) – they’re the exact same class with different names/icons for the same skills, and when I switch from one to another, I usually have to take several minutes to rememorize what everything does.

The kb/m control scheme encourages questionable design at times. I am a PC gamer, but I can see how designing for a controller first has some positives.

If each class + specialization only had 8 abilities total, I’d consider that a more elegant solution. As is, this seems a sort of cludgy way to take a development system from DnD that was altered for a cRPG and now needs to have parity between console and PC systems while providing both smooth real-time combat AND strategic, pausing party-based combat. Oh, and now there's MP.

What I'm saying is: Dragon Age is a platypus.

* Guild Wars and Diablo III use a similar limited ability set, but they were designed from the ground up around that. In Diablo III, my monk has access to ALL monk abilities and all possible upgrades for them. Likewise, all classes have the same number of active and passive abilities.

At level 70, there's literally no difference between the abilities of any two monks - only what they choose to put at their toolbar at any moment. At level 30 in DA:I, two different mages could have different attributes, different skill trees they've sunk points into, and different specializations.

[seraphymon]

What if I want to take off all my clothes and see how many healing potions it takes to punch a ogre to death? If I can only carry nine potions then the answer better be "fewer then nine".

 

Looking back I don’t think I ever needed more then 8 skills to get through any one fight in DAO or 2. But Im not really looking to "beat" the game so much as play with it.

I’ll have my tried and true tactics but I also like trying new things on the fly. If a fights going well(or not) see what that one or two talents you never really use do.

There are a bunch of whole skill trees in Origins that I never would have tried if not for just goofing around with them and ended up loving.

 

What about the goofing around? Optimal party builds are not always the most fun. but not having access to the one ability you need also sucks.

 

Needing to plan ahead is great but this feels like a ham fisted way to do it.

Ill take freedom of play style over challenge any day because I can always self impose tactical challenges. But what if I want to just go hogwild a cast every spell I know to kill three bandits?

 

What about the goofing around!?!

 

One screen shot is not a lot of context and it is way too early to really say but this sounds... well dull.

exactly this.. If we have unlimited or at least however many we need for ability slots. we are free to impose challenges or "Tactful" styles on ourselves.  With this decision it is forced upon us to play how they want us to play. That in it of itself is bad decision making. Is it really overpowered to have more abilities  than we might need and thats why it was cut?

[spacediscosaurus]

 I just can't reconcile from a roleplaying perspective why if my mage has 20 spells in his memory, he can only use eight of them. Having difficulty coming up with an explanation for that one, but I'll work on it.

 

It's just a gameplay thing. The same reason there are cooldowns on abilities, or that you can carry more things in your inventory than would be possible in real life, or that you can survive fire breath from a dragon. Not every gameplay decision can be given a realistic explanation..

[wolfhowwl]

I don't see the problem here.

 

The "master race" was told more than once to stop stealing games and now the chickens are coming home to roost.

 

Is it any wonder that developers aren't interested in catering to users of a platform that feel entitled to not pay for games?

[Ponendus]

It's just a gameplay thing. ... Not every gameplay decision can be given a realistic explanation..

 

Agreed, but in a role-playing game (RPG) it should at least be attempted. Realism is not relevant, it just needs to be realistic in the context of the world and lore, not the real world, but this decision is just a difficult one to justify from that perspective is all. 

[realguile]

Above anything else it seems people are angry that console mechanics are moving to PC and not the other way around....

 

I can see how this can be an issue especially if the radial menu removes the ability for you to use unmapped skills in battle. That does suck. Especially for mages. But you know what? At this freakin point I could care less. I'll roll with 3 mages inc. my inquisitor and deal with it. For now I want this gorgeous game and I want it NOW.

[BellPeppers&Beef023]

I'm gonna attempt to put a positive spin on this, for my own sake more than anything, i guess. First game in the series that I'm interested in playing a mage, and the restriction-hammer hits down hard. Go figure.

 

I'm gonna treat the "moar than 200 abilities!" claim as marketing hype, as if I'm not mistaken, it includes both the passive abilities, which won't take up a slot, and upgrades (if they again go the route of at least 2 upgrades per skill, then thats a large portion of the 200 abilities), which again won't take up additional slots.

 

Combine this with the elimination of sustainables, and we may in fact have a far smaller pool of abilities to choose from than initially thought, which will make the 8-ability limit look better.

 

In Theory.

 

Maybe.

 

Hopefully.

 

Damn.

[They call me a SpaceCowboy]

I don't see the problem here.

 

The "master race" was told more than once to stop stealing games and now the chickens are coming home to roost.

 

Is it any wonder that developers aren't interested in catering to users of a platform that feel entitled to not pay for games?

 

Most PC gamers are not thieves