228 réponses à ce sujet

[Damazig]

The limited abilities was supposedly because "tactical decisions"

 

Then BW removed 90% of tactics. Brilliance.

That's pretty much the way I see it too =\

 

He's probably a mage player.

I'm a mage yeah, and I agre with what you said about it being a market trend for action rpgs, but that trend primarily exists due to consoles, that the majority of triple A games are making the most money out of console games and so the style of play dedicated to it it indeed console related.

 

The third person became a big thing for games cause its good for consoles, you dont see the textures in your face as much. RTS or tactical games that zoom out are also not good for consoles, more taxing, same for decent mmo rpgs etc.

[Herethos]

My main is a "sword and board" need my taunts to keep mobs off the squishies... I just got the "rift upgrade" which maxed out my action bar and I haven't even got to selecting a specialisation tree yet. 8 skill slots is waaaay too low its like playing a free-trial version of SWTOR with only one action bar. Try playing SWTOR at level 55 with only one action bar and see how you like it...

[Swordfishtrombone]

This needs to be changed, in a patch, and soon.

 

There are some really bizarre decisions in this game. It's as if they though the game would just be too good without hobbling it with some severe annoyances. Effectively removing meaningful tactics customization for characters, and restricting us to only 8 skill slots to use just seems so obviously the sort of thing that is bound to create wide spread player discontent, that I don't understand why they stepped into those mines.

 

The great thing about DA:O was it's moddability. Not enough skill slots? No problem, just download a mod that adds more! Not enough tactics options? No problem, just download a mod that expands tactic options! Too few tactics slots?.... well, you get the point.

 

The thing about Inquisition is that now, when it comes to non-superficial stuff like this, we are entirely at the mercy of what the developers deem worth their time.

 

I sincerely hope that simple convenience, which seems to have been forgotten in a few places, gets a new look, and these sorts of sources of frustration are addressed soon.

[They call me a SpaceCowboy]

This needs to be changed, in a patch, and soon.

 

There are some really bizarre decisions in this game. It's as if they though the game would just be too good without hobbling it with some severe annoyances. Effectively removing meaningful tactics customization for characters, and restricting us to only 8 skill slots to use just seems so obviously the sort of thing that is bound to create wide spread player discontent, that I don't understand why they stepped into those mines.

 

The great thing about DA:O was it's moddability. Not enough skill slots? No problem, just download a mod that adds more! Not enough tactics options? No problem, just download a mod that expands tactic options! Too few tactics slots?.... well, you get the point.

 

The thing about Inquisition is that now, when it comes to non-superficial stuff like this, we are entirely at the mercy of what the developers deem worth their time.

 

I sincerely hope that simple convenience, which seems to have been forgotten in a few places, gets a new look, and these sorts of sources of frustration are addressed soon.

 

It won't be changed, it can't. Not without rewriting the entire game. They made those decisions for a reason. It's just not a reason that we like.

[They call me a SpaceCowboy]

That's pretty much the way I see it too =\

 

I'm a mage yeah, and I agre with what you said about it being a market trend for action rpgs, but that trend primarily exists due to consoles, that the majority of triple A games are making the most money out of console games and so the style of play dedicated to it it indeed console related.

 

The third person became a big thing for games cause its good for consoles, you dont see the textures in your face as much. RTS or tactical games that zoom out are also not good for consoles, more taxing, same for decent mmo rpgs etc.

 

 

Good points.

[AshesEleven]

not every person follows every single game in the whole entire industry for the whole months and/or years leading up to a release. Especially in the case of Dragon Age. With number two being so poor a lot of Dragon Age fans werent too interested in the following the lead up. Its decisions like this and the ghastly UI explain why.

I don't know, I feel like if you're letting 8 abilities blind you from an amazing game, you're doing yourself a disservice. And what's wrong with the UI? Looks fine to me...

[Ieolus]

It won't be changed, it can't. Not without rewriting the entire game. They made those decisions for a reason. It's just not a reason that we like.

Lol, they can't add more ability slots to the bar without rewriting the entire game? What are you smoking?

[Prideaux]

I don't know, I feel like if you're letting 8 abilities blind you from an amazing game, you're doing yourself a disservice. And what's wrong with the UI? Looks fine to me...

 

where to start

1. the font in most windows is far too HUGE

2. then there is the fact that lore and codex is ALL IN CAPS, ANYTHING MORE THAN A FEW WORDS IS REALLY HARD TO READ. Especially when its white caps on black background (they are easier to read on the loading screens) but for some reason they dont give you time to read them, which makes no sense.

3. the fact that all the deep tactics have been ripped out of the game and worse you cant even cue attacks in tactics screen. And with all the flashy effects and lake of zoom you cant see the whole battle ground even Xcom did this heaps better with less)

4. there is no 'design' in the UI it looks like a beta placeholder waiting for a graphic designer to bring in the design

5. Its convoluted and counter-initiative

6. so much is buried within submenus, so instead of getting somewhere with one click it can take a few or a lot. hell even bringing up the map takes two clicks.

7. cant even see your romance level and other such things

 

but the worse by far is the waste of space and the EPIC size of some of the elements. Lets take for example the Inquisition Perks window. The one that has the map behind and has the four (or is that five?) flag type shapes on the left hand side. Every time I open the window I only see three flag and have to scroll down to see all four. WHY?! given there is never anything on the map behind it so why cant they just resize the flags slightly and have all four permanently on show. There is no reason why I should have scroll there. This happens to some degree on every UI window. This the very same mistake that Skyrim default UI did, it is appalling design (there is a link around the internet that gives a break down explaining how bad it is from a design point of view). There is a reason why SkyUI for PC is the high rated mod around. Yet these devs pretend they never saw how good you can make a UI that works for PC/consoles at same time. Why do always have to scroll down to see full lists of things when they is heaps of wasted room on the screen. Even for consoles writing doesnt need to be that huge. It looks cheap, tacky and under realised.

 

I really do try and love this game but the UI is just awful. Game for me like 9/10, the UI 2/10 and it is constantly not making me want to play. Sad becase the rest is brilliant.

[They call me a SpaceCowboy]

Lol, they can't add more ability slots to the bar without rewriting the entire game? What are you smoking?

They wrote the combat rules around having 8 abilities at any one time. They would have to rebalance every encounter. In the entire game. That's my assumption anyway.

[wepeel_]

I agree this seems like a very weird design decision. It can't be because of tactics as it doesn't seem to encourage tactical thinking but rather limiting it by forcing you to depend on a limited number of all-round viable abilities. Taking into account the over-all amount of abilities being kind of a selling point, it makes even less sense; like saying "we have 100 weapons but YOU can only use 2!"

 

I would expect "normal" design in this case to include at least twice as many action slots, or better yet simply allow players to personalize their UI and assign whatever key combination they want to any spell, even without having to graphically place it on the UI. Heck, even Throne of Bhaal allowed for this and that was a clunky UI and 13 years ago. But back then games were not console ports. A lot of pointers in terms of world building, quest structure and control scheme were taken from MMOs, so why the frugality with this?

 

Having said that, I do agree that many other things about the game are good - but this thread is about one of the things that isn't.

[Noien]

I would be satisfied with 8 slots, if only they would bring back the old skill sets. I love a lot of the "improvements" and really do not have much to complain about. Though  the old skill/attribute system was fine imo. The limited potion and mana/ stamina I can live with, the higher level you are the more you get and can chain skills/spells, I always go for pure dd any ways. As long as it does not keep veering towards hack and slash I can cope. I am not as thrilled about this one as DAO or even DA2 but I still enjoy it, as frustrating as it can be at times. They are still refining it so in time who knows.

[Morroian]

It won't be changed, it can't. Not without rewriting the entire game. They made those decisions for a reason. It's just not a reason that we like.

 

How do we know when they haven't given us a reason? There's been no transparency on this at all. Its such a pity because so much of the game is so good. If they thought they were making combat better and more tactical they haven't succeeded at all, the combat is the worst of the 3 DA games.

[DarkKnightHolmes]

I can bet my ass that they'll bring back more than 8 abilities in the next game.

 

I really don't see the point of this restriction and I really can't be bothered to go back to character record (which takes bloody long to load for companions on Xbox One) and change their abilities after every little fight. Bioware says they did it for tactics but I think they just did it to give the game a pointless extra limitation difficulty.

[Hazegurl]

I heard the next Dragon age game will have only three ability slots and no tactics screen for tactical reasons. Also potions will be gone for lore reasons and whenever your PC dies they wake up in an infirmary with a 1000 gold medical bill. Don't worry, you can pay it off by owning a large farm you can upgrade by farming more supplies. Next gen is here folks.

[Volourn]

"Parity. If consoles can't have more than 8, why PC is allowed more than that? Common sense."

 

Consoles can have more than 8 slots. BIO just chose to develop that way. Plenty of console games allow you to have more than 8 abilities at once. This was a poor decision by the developers and to blame it on consoles is silly.

[Lee T]

I'm a mage yeah, and I agre with what you said about it being a market trend for action rpgs, but that trend primarily exists due to consoles, that the majority of triple A games are making the most money out of console games and so the style of play dedicated to it it indeed console related.

If that if they had truly gone for an action game they would have found a way to limit the number of active to fit the number of slots. Since console versions of DAO and DA2 had no such limits there is no ground to put the blame for this limitations on consoles.

As mindboggingly as it may seem, I'm starting to think that just like they thought that scanning was fun in ME2, eavesdropping quest were immersing in ME3, or repeted environnments in DA2 had artistic value, it's very possible that they really believed that limiting the number of available actives was both elegant (beautiful symmetry on the screen ) and tactic (as in frustrating).

This is not the first Bioware gameplay decisions that makes no sense to me. These are the guys that brought back no auto attack despite the uproar it caused in DA2 (with both PC and console players).

As unfortunate as it is, this game has problems because people at Bioware made poor decisions. The existence of consoles and the eventual market skew toward consoles is not a valid excuse for a company developping PC games for twenty years to suddendly forget how to make a PC UI.

This does not explain the 8 ability slot limit, the absence of a chest, the reduction of companion tactics, the MMO style side quests, etc. All unfun on all platforms.

For the record I game on PC since I bought Dark Forces and Warcraft 2 in the mid nineties and I bought my first console to play Mass Effect at launch almost eight years ago. i have enough experience playing on both to see when something is a problem on one or both machines.

[FrontlinerDelta]

  Even  gamepad users should be able to flick through a larger toolbar with no problem.

 

You have just proven my point. If Bioware wanted you to have a larger selection of abilities at all times, it would be easy enough to implement. As you yourself point out, it would be relatively easy for even gamepad users to select from 12+ spells.

But they did not do this.

 

I just don't see why it's so hard to believe that Bioware simply had a different design goal this time around. I feel like they wanted you to choose loadouts with the entire party in mind, not just load everything you have onto the hotbar. 

 

 

 

This whole debate reminds me of Xcom, lots of players asserting that being able to only have 1 skyranger made it "less" tactical. They wanted to be respond to everything, (ie not have to make a choice). Instead we have one skyranger and must choose 1 crisis to respond to and suffer the consequences of what not choosing the other ones leads to. The same is applicable here.


ALTHOUGH, I do agree that some kind of "loadout" where we can quickly swap between different "loadouts" out of combat would be a nice addition. Especially in MP where your party composition and skills are much more important and are not under your control. 

[Hitchno]

It won't be changed, it can't. Not without rewriting the entire game. They made those decisions for a reason. It's just not a reason that we like.

Oh please.  Frostbite uses LUA for scripting and the UI, you want to know how difficult it is to change the UI?  Examine The Witcher 2, which also uses LUA for scripting and the UI.  If they release a toolset for this, the UI would be fixed in 48 hours.  If they don't, we're going to have to suffer through the insanity of someone who thinks "they know what's best."

[Obadiah]

Parity? Don't consoles only have 6 slots?

[Edit] Oops, looks like it is 8 on the console.

Modifié par Obadiah, 26 novembre 2014 - 03:37 .

[They call me a SpaceCowboy]

Oh please.  Frostbite uses LUA for scripting and the UI, you want to know how difficult it is to change the UI?  Examine The Witcher 2, which also uses LUA for scripting and the UI.  If they release a toolset for this, the UI would be fixed in 48 hours.  If they don't, we're going to have to suffer through the insanity of someone who thinks "they know what's best."

 

What I said has nothing to do with the UI, it has to do with the design of the game. They wanted a more action oriented game, that means less abilities to think about at one time.

[holdenagincourt]

OP: This is the design decision bioware has gone with. You must choose strategically which spells are worth taking and which are not. 

 

I would be a lot happier with this "design decision" if you didn't have to unlock tons of actives you might not even want to use just to gain access to passive perks you might not even care about, just to upgrade your character's basic attributes to be up to snuff for his level, in a game in which level-ups happen infrequently and in which perk points are hard to come by.

 

Given the amount of work we have to put in for the aforementioned, I strongly believe the least we can ask for is the ability to use all the powers we have in a single fight (and don't get me started on not being able to access the inventory menu in combat to switch between short and long-range weapons; what are we, five?).

[Daeion]

Parity. If consoles can't have more than 8, why PC is allowed more than that? Common sense.

 

Because they are different systems?  One of the main reasons to play on a PC is to utilize a KB+M, so lets utilize it.

[BLOOD LORDS]

They could have made it so LT sifted though sets of four abilities like cards, instead of having it toggle between two sets of four. The trigger is easy to press and you could speed thru them easy. Sad move Bioware. Stink move.

[goishen]

This stopped for me about the 3rd time I was going through Origins.  I'm a PC player, and I was all about the new shiny spells that I had.  Except they're not that powerful.  Then, once I started a tree, I finished the tree.  Made my life so much more simple.

 

I'm not saying it works for everyone, just tossing my two cents out there.

[Zorlagius]

This is indeed one easily the fixable flaws. Second row of ability slots or even just access to console type radial quick menu would help immensely.