52 réponses à ce sujet

[MadDemiurg]

/sigh... fine. My problem with it is that at the end of the day they just traded heal spamming for barrier spamming. There really is nothing gained. So the solution is simple. Bring healing back and allow mages to have either that or barrier. Also bw needs to stop being so racist against healers, it's a legitimate role that people do like.

Well, barrier spamming is not exactly equal to healing spamming. It's more like heal spamming where you can heal only up to a certain % of your health. Bringing heal back is another option, but it should have less power and higher cooldowns than enemy damaging abilities, You should not be able to cancel all the damage dealt in other words. Healing in DA:O was pretty ridiculous. I remember soloing a revenant at level 7 or so in DA:O with 0 potions used as AW by just stacking rock armor with heavy armor and constantly spamming regenerate on self while attacking him with staff.

 

 

In many ways I think the bigger problem is that you don't heal at the end of combat.  What this means is that you go into casual combats trying to avoid taking any damage, so you always have to spam barrier and war cry.  This is far worse than healing spells that you would only use when you were getting low on life.  It means that mages don't use, much variety in spells because they have to cast barrier so much.  Which in turn makes combat less tactical and more repetitive.

 

A fair point as well

[Elhanan]

In many ways I think the bigger problem is that you don't heal at the end of combat.  What this means is that you go into casual combats trying to avoid taking any damage, so you always have to spam barrier and war cry.  This is far worse than healing spells that you would only use when you were getting low on life.  It means that mages don't use, much variety in spells because they have to cast barrier so much.  Which in turn makes combat less tactical and more repetitive.

You do heal at the end of battle based on Difficulty, I believe. It is 10% for Hard and Nightmare, 25% for Normal, and 50% for Easy. Pls get confirmation as I have only been using NM myself.

[Iakus]

How is having to take a Barrier bot any better than having to take a Heal bot? If the goal was to make taking a particular class not feel mandatory, it failed badly.

I'd say it had the exact opposite effect.

 

Trinity play feels more necessary than ever in DAI

[Nirual86]

You do heal at the end of battle based on Difficulty, I believe. It is 10% for Hard and Nightmare, 25% for Normal, and 50% for Easy. Pls get confirmation as I have only been using NM myself.

 

Only if you were downed. Though once you get some "heal on kill" rings or weapon effects, those kinda work in the same way.

[Farangbaa]

It did change the pace of combat a lot.  After I beat DA:I, I've been replaying Origins (I hadn't played it in a while) and each battle definitely feels more intense.  I mean, the game still gets too easy after a while, but the enemies definitely pack more of a punch.  Every time you see an enemy mage you have that "OK, kill that fucker, otherwise he will just wipe my whole party" thought, which is fun.  
 
They also entirely got rid of tactics though, and gave us a tac cam that is so bad its annoying to use, so maybe the easier encounters are better, I would get really frustrated with this combat system and DA:O style encounters.

That's peculiar. Every time I saw a mage in DA:O I just went lolmanaclashinyoface.

[MadDemiurg]

That's peculiar. Every time I saw a mage in DA:O I just went lolmanaclashinyoface.

Well, DA:O had its share of broken abilities but at least it had mods to deal with it. Overall combat mechanics were more suitable to introduce more challenging individual encounters though.

[fireproof_boots]

That's peculiar. Every time I saw a mage in DA:O I just went lolmanaclashinyoface.

 

Yeah, clearly, that's why I said the game gets too easy.  Certain spells in DA:O were crazy strong.  Still, at least you have to go out of your way to do use mana clash quick to avoid letting them cast their spells.

 

 

Well, DA:O had its share of broken abilities but at least it had mods to deal with it. Overall combat mechanics were more suitable to introduce more challenging individual encounters though.

 

Healing aside, I think this game could be made into one of the best RPGs in years if they had full mod support, most of my issues with it (don't get me wrong, I actually loved it for the most part) are ones I think modders could fix extremely elegantly.  

 

That being said, while I agree that the change in healing mechanics changed the pace of combat I don't really think it could reasonably be changed at this point, nor am I sure it should.  

 

The change in healing means that standard battles throughout a dungeon are about rationing your potions and avoiding damage which promotes things like tanking well and using skills like barrier.  They then tend to put restock boxes near boss fights and the such making those battles feel like the big one off fights where you might have to use everything at your disposal.  I kind of like this pacing, it switches things up and gives the inquisitor a sense of power.  Also, even if you don't like it, changing it at this point would mean a re-balancing  of every encounter in the game which seems unrealistic.

 

I think the new healing mechanics also made it easier for Bioware to balance the spawns of a more open-world environment to facilitate just wandering around for a while. 

[Iakus]

Yeah, clearly, that's why I said the game gets too easy.  Certain spells in DA:O were crazy strong.  Still, at least you have to go out of your way to do use mana clash quick to avoid letting them cast their spells.

 

Gets less easy when you have the bug that causes the game to crash whenever you mana clash/cleanse.

[MadDemiurg]

Yeah, clearly, that's why I said the game gets too easy.  Certain spells in DA:O were crazy strong.  Still, at least you have to go out of your way to do use mana clash quick to avoid letting them cast their spells.

 

Healing aside, I think this game could be made into one of the best RPGs in years if they had full mod support, most of my issues with it (don't get me wrong, I actually loved it for the most part) are ones I think modders could fix extremely elegantly.  

 

That being said, while I agree that the change in healing mechanics changed the pace of combat I don't really think it could reasonably be changed at this point, nor am I sure it should.  

 

The change in healing means that standard battles throughout a dungeon are about rationing your potions and avoiding damage which promotes things like tanking well and using skills like barrier.  They then tend to put restock boxes near boss fights and the such making those battles feel like the big one off fights where you might have to use everything at your disposal.  I kind of like this pacing, it switches things up and gives the inquisitor a sense of power.  Also, even if you don't like it, changing it at this point would mean a re-balancing  of every encounter in the game which seems unrealistic.

 

I think the new healing mechanics also made it easier for Bioware to balance the spawns of a more open-world environment to facilitate just wandering around for a while. 

I'm not suggesting this change for the current game, it's already too late as I've pointed out earlier. I'm not sure that current system works better for open world, because with full heal between encounters you could wander off as long as you can actually beat enemies. I think current system (in regards to healing), works relatively well for boss fights, but dumbs down all the regular encounters.

 

Mods wouldn't fix the issues I have with the plot (apart from introducing entirely new campaigns), but I think the combat part would be salvageable with some modding. Namely:

• Full gear, crafting and abilities rebalance mod
• Better Tac Cam
• Better AI and tactics
• Some encounter and mobs redesign - more enemies per encounter, more CC used by enemies, better AI etc
• No grind (everything is purchasable) mod

Unfortunately I don't think this is going to happen and BW is unlikely to fix this either

[Emu8207]

I like no healing spells, just wish the game had more level scaling so that it wouldn't be a cakewalk.

[fireproof_boots]

I'm not suggesting this change for the current game, it's already too late as I've pointed out earlier. I'm not sure that current system works better for open world, because with full heal between encounters you could wander off as long as you can actually beat enemies. I think current system (in regards to healing), works relatively well for boss fights, but dumbs down all the regular encounters.

 

Mods wouldn't fix the issues I have with the plot (apart from introducing entirely new campaigns), but I think the combat part would be salvageable with some modding. Namely:

• Full gear, crafting and abilities rebalance mod
• Better Tac Cam
• Better AI and tactics
• Some encounter and mobs redesign - more enemies per encounter, more CC used by enemies, better AI etc
• No grind (everything is purchasable) mod

Unfortunately I don't think this is going to happen and BW is unlikely to fix this either

 

 

I think something modders could fix really well is the lack of customization for Skyhold.    I could see the modding community making some really beautiful and fun upgrades to the keep.

[AlanC9]

The reason is simple. Removal of healing means that for a party to survive multiple consequent encounters all of them need to be toned down so players can get through with little to no health loss. That means that instead of fighting for their lives in every combat players are faced with multiple pushover encounters that require zero tactics to beat.
 

I've got to take issue with the premise of the thread. In theory an unlimited healing game could make every single fight a real challenge, but in practice, no. DA:O, like every other Bio game except early BG1 and maybe Golems of Amgarrak, presents the player with multiple pushover encounters that require zero tactics to beat.

[Gambit458]

After replaying Origins, and though I mentioned it already, I noticed that the cooldown on heal is extremely fast. As soon as I heal a character it's like heal is ready to go again not long after. An increased cooldown would fix that

[Slapstick83]

I don't think it turnes fights into pushover fights so that they don't require healing, it's the other way around. It makes every single fight tactically important to pull off without a missed step. Which I love! In previous games I just had to "make it" but I could ignore how well. Most of the time I put no effort into the fights, because only the "big" fights were difficult enough to warrant an actual effort on my part.

 

Now I make an effort to have the "perfect engage" fights, because I know just around the corner I might run into a nightmare of a fight and I'll need those potions. This is much better. Trash is no longer "just trash", they are critical to pull off without a glitch or you'll be sorry. Granted, I am playing on nightmare, where a single hit from a generic sword-wielding mob will cut my mages health in half. Let's not talk about how much I hate Arcane Horrors.

[MadDemiurg]

I think something modders could fix really well is the lack of customization for Skyhold.    I could see the modding community making some really beautiful and fun upgrades to the keep.

Well, that too for sure, although I consider this as a nice to have feature only, worth fixing when the core gameplay problems are dealt with

 

I've got to take issue with the premise of the thread. In theory an unlimited healing game could make every single fight a real challenge, but in practice, no. DA:O, like every other Bio game except early BG1 and maybe Golems of Amgarrak, presents the player with multiple pushover encounters that require zero tactics to beat.

I dunno, DA:O combat was more engaging for me than DA:I, even though the healing was super OP. Of course it got easy after some time, but the encounters were more intense than "kill these 3 punchbags" in DA:I. Also, why are we considering bio games only? From the recent games, lets take Banner Saga for instance, Its pretty simplistic and has no healing in combat with full healing between combats and an injury system. I found a lot of the fights in the game satisfactory in terms of challenge on hard. 

 

 

After replaying Origins, and though I mentioned it already, I noticed that the cooldown on heal is extremely fast. As soon as I heal a character it's like heal is ready to go again not long after. An increased cooldown would fix that

 

Yep, healing could work well if it wasn't so OP in the origins. Generally healing abilities should have higher cooldowns and lesser effect than the damaging ones. For Origins, the reverse was true.

 

I don't think it turnes fights into pushover fights so that they don't require healing, it's the other way around. It makes every single fight tactically important to pull off without a missed step. Which I love! In previous games I just had to "make it" but I could ignore how well. Most of the time I put no effort into the fights, because only the "big" fights were difficult enough to warrant an actual effort on my part.

 

Now I make an effort to have the "perfect engage" fights, because I know just around the corner I might run into a nightmare of a fight and I'll need those potions. This is much better. Trash is no longer "just trash", they are critical to pull off without a glitch or you'll be sorry. Granted, I am playing on nightmare, where a single hit from a generic sword-wielding mob will cut my mages health in half. Let's not talk about how much I hate Arcane Horrors.

That's true only if so called "trash" encounters are designed to be easy. If the combat is balanced around every encounter being hard it can be pushed much further in terms of difficulty with health recovery between encounters. You make a fair point about making "perfect engages" though.

[In Exile]

I think a lot of the posters did not get my original idea.

My main issue with this is laughable difficulty of encounters in the game and I see healing system changes as one of the main reasons that influenced the encounter design in such way.

It's not. DAO encounters were equally a joke. You had to powergame differently but it amounted to the same thing. It was only DA2 on nightmare that made you work for it because of the insane odds and damage soaking enemies.

[In Exile]

Well, DA:O had its share of broken abilities but at least it had mods to deal with it. Overall combat mechanics were more suitable to introduce more challenging individual encounters though.

You didn't need manaclash (and it did fail on nightmare). A fireball was good enough. By the time the mage got up it was dead because it couldn't soak damage. Mana clash was useful for HP bloat - like mage bosses or Revenants.

[MadDemiurg]

It's not. DAO encounters were equally a joke. You had to powergame differently but it amounted to the same thing. It was only DA2 on nightmare that made you work for it because of the insane odds and damage soaking enemies.

Surely in DA:O you also could break the game with stats and certain abilities. I soloed DA:O so I'm pretty familiar with the topic. However, discounting that, in DA:O an enemy mage could potentially fry your whole party with a fireball and crushing prison cast on you hurt a lot as well. Yep, you could stack spell res to ridiculous values or cheese mages with mana clash (but not only mages had these kinds of abilities). Most enemies in DA:I are nothing more than punchbags though. Mainly because if they had means of dealing unavoidable damage/CC that would make fighting through multiple encounters too hard for many players in context of limited healing. One of the few enemies in DA:I i found fun to be dealing with are Terror demons, but that's more of an exception to the general rule.

 

I do agree that DA2 probably had the best combat balance in DA series (and it DID have healing spells).

[AlanC9]

I dunno, DA:O combat was more engaging for me than DA:I, even though the healing was super OP. Of course it got easy after some time, but the encounters were more intense than "kill these 3 punchbags" in DA:I. Also, why are we considering bio games only? From the recent games, lets take Banner Saga for instance, Its pretty simplistic and has no healing in combat with full healing between combats and an injury system. I found a lot of the fights in the game satisfactory in terms of challenge on hard. 

Haven't played Banner Saga, though since Steam keeps pushing it at me I suppose I'll give it a shot someday. But I can't say that there's any CRPG I've ever played that didn't have a lot of filler combat. Seems like we also may simply have different subjective experiences of DAO.

[Babaganoosh013]

I guess enough people complained in Origins that you could take healing poultices like candy, so they've really, really, really taken that one to heart.

[MadDemiurg]

Haven't played Banner Saga, though since Steam keeps pushing it at me I suppose I'll give it a shot someday. But I can't say that there's any CRPG I've ever played that didn't have a lot of filler combat. Seems like we also may simply have different subjective experiences of DAO.

Well, there are different degrees of filler, ranging from "I have to actually think about what I'm doing" to "put a brick on this button" . From recent games Shadowrun Dragonfall also had much more engaging combat than DA:I for me, even though it did feature a (semi) limited healing system - you only got healed from the last wound after combat and healing spells did the same thing.

 

I guess enough people complained in Origins that you could take healing poultices like candy, so they've really, really, really taken that one to heart.

Well that thing was pretty ridiculous and I'm not asking to bring it back. Personally I was playing DA:O as no potions only.

[Dherelv]

I'm not suggesting this change for the current game, it's already too late as I've pointed out earlier. I'm not sure that current system works better for open world, because with full heal between encounters you could wander off as long as you can actually beat enemies. I think current system (in regards to healing), works relatively well for boss fights, but dumbs down all the regular encounters.

 

Actually, i think you got to the point Bioware tried to make with this whole no healing thing. It's true that they created a big open world, but many of the fun in the game lies in the things you can do at your HQs, like Skyhold or the strongholds you conquer in the different areas.

 

I think the idea was to create a inevitable scarcity system that would eventually drive you back to the HQ. I mean, when you have to retreat all the way back to the camp because potions ended, you may as well naturally give up in the path you were trailing and go back to do things like crafting, NPC talk or War Table. Kinda like to influence the player to have contact with those things, after all they are important parts of the game, as well as helping to avoid players to be wandering about the land for dozens of hours in a row which would mean they could miss important things like companion missions, area related war table operations and so forth.