575 réponses à ce sujet

[Akka le Vil]

Grovermancer wrote...

@ the OP and like-minded...


Do you consider KOTOR (I & II) as fitting what you're advocating?

In the beginning, you struggle w/ regular human opponents.  By mid-levels, epsecially once you've regained your awareness of the Force, you maul through them when you encounter them.

Though by that time, either higher level opponents start appearing (Bounty Hunters, alien animals, enemy Force-users, etc) 'cause you're moving up through the ranks of the enemies , OR you're in difficult scanarios (large number of older, weaker opponents, no weapons, adverse environments, etc) to keep it challenging.

And when you encounter 'regular' humans who seemed tough at the beginning... you destroy them later on after you've grown.

In KOTOR, if you were to put in a cheat and start the game at a high level, the enemies do not scale up with you, and you demolish everything (at least till you hit formidable bosses).

Well, there IS some level scaling in KotOR II (even complete with an in-world explanation from Kreia ^^), so this one isn't a good example.

But as for KotOR I, it is possible that there is some, but I honestly didn't notice it. And yes, it's quite fitting as I advocate overall - I do not mean the game was perfect, but on this point it make a fine representation of the concept I like (how the game is tuned is a different beast altogether, I'm talking only about how it works).

Modifié par Akka le Vil, 24 mars 2010 - 02:01 .

[Akka le Vil]

booke63 wrote...

When you say:  they "did not appear/jump in skill just because you improved" I would agree since they improved not because I did but because THEY did by practicing and training as I did.

Plus what does "groups already there" mean?  Current top tennis players Federer and Nadal and others are not playing Sampras, Agassi, Courier, Becker, Edberg, much less McEnroe or Borg, even less Laver or Kramer or Tilden--those last 2 players being dead.  They're playing those of their own era who grew in skill over time (from childhood to adulthood) leaving most of the world's tennis players well behind.  I guess I don't see where that is not akin to level scaling.

What I mean is that there always had world-class players. They may have changed over the years, as time passes, old ones retire and new one rise, but there always is some few players that are very skilled ("high-leve"), quite a bit more that are less skilled ("medium-level") and the vast majority of people who don't play tennis that well ("low-level").
So yes, when you increase your skill, you can nearly always find people that are a match for you, but it's not because of a nonsensical "scaling" that adjust everyone on you, it's because they is always a certain number of people that have reached a certain level of skill.

Perhaps we simply see level scaling from different prespectives.  You as one looking from the outside in, as metagamer, who sees something like tennis et all as ranked squads whereas I'm looking from the inside out, as a roleplayer, actually playing tennis day to day, who keeps seeing dangerous opponents to fight as they and myself move faster, hit harder, hit more accurately, and improve in fitness.

Funny, because I have the EXACT SAME OPPOSITE take on this.
From my point of view, I am the one seeing it as a roleplayer, and hence being very annoyed when something that is obviously "gameplay mechanics" wrecks the in-game world logic.
From my point of view, you are the one seeing it as a roleplayer, seeing something that is completely nonsensical from a RP point of view, and trying to rationnalize it.

Are you saying that the mechanic of spawning monsters in DAO is in some
mathmatical way tied to the PC's level, and that you therefore cannot
imagine Darkspawn training and improving like your PC does?

Level scaling and having characters practicing and improving on their own are two fundamentally different concepts.

[Ulicus]

Akka le Vil wrote...

From my point of view, I am the one seeing it as a roleplayer, and hence being very annoyed when something that is obviously "gameplay mechanics" wrecks the in-game world logic.

To be fair, believing that levels represent anything other than gameplay mechanics wrecks the in-game world logic. It's nonsensical to believe that, say, a Noble Human becomes twenty times more powerful over the course of the story.

You're applying your own logic to the game world (namely: levels are an accurate reflection of reality and my character is actually advancing exactly as appears on his character sheet) and are surprised that it's being wrecked when, of course, the game wasn't designed to accomodate any logic but its own.

For example, those bandits you encounter on the road into Lothering? If you fight them, your party -- according to the story, as related by the knights Templars who saw you -- tears them apart in two seconds flat. Within the combat system, however, it might actually be a very tough battle depending on your class and what abilities you've picked out (assuming you're playing on Nightmare).

That's a point. If you really, really want the combat to reflect "reality", you could always change the difficulty to match what you think the challenge should be. High Dragon? Crank it up to nightmare. Street toughs? Back down to casual.

Hmm. That sounds like it could be amusing, actually. :happy:

Modifié par Ulicus, 24 mars 2010 - 02:16 .

[Akka le Vil]

Ulicus wrote...

To be fair, believing that levels represent anything other than gameplay mechanics wrecks the in-game world logic. It's nonsensical to believe that, say, a Noble Human becomes twenty times more powerful over the course of the story.

Levels are a gameplay mechanics, but a "natural" one if I may say so. Some guy is better than another at fighting, he is of a "higher level" (we even say that IRL, we just don't have a precise number to put on it).
Level scaling is a gameplay mechanics that doesn't reflect anything but a metagaming approach, as such it is much more obvious, and don't have any logical basis upon which it is build.

As for becoming several times stronger, well, Ahzrei will call me a troll that repeat the same thing again, but as I already answered to this part before, I'll have to repeat the same thing than I said at the time : it's a problem of tuning, not of principle. I do become better with practice and experience. Now it's up to the designer to make a power progression that makes sense.

Still, "becoming stronger with experience" is a sound concept, and I can have a much larger suspension of disbelief when it comes to the amplitude of the power progression, than I can have when it comes to accepting something that just make no sense - like level scaling.

You're applying your own logic to the game world (namely: levels are an accurate reflection of reality and my character is actually advancing exactly as appears on his character sheet) and are surprised that it's being wrecked when, of course, the game wasn't designed to accomodate any logic but its own.

That's precisely why I say I'm roleplaying it, and level scaling is meta-gaming it
And it's not the "game logic" that annoy me, but the "lack" of logic.

[Ulicus]

The point is that what your logic is demonstrably not that of Dragon Age: Origins. See the Lothering bandits example above.

By all means, say you disapprove of level scaling, say that it's no fun or unenjoyable -- as you did in the OP -- but don't start saying it's illogical, or doesn't make any sense... because you're the one choosing to mix gameplay with the story and setting, when the game itself clearly doesn't.

If you read a Dragon Age novel, don't expect Loghain to shout so loud that his foes collapse onto their backsides.

Modifié par Ulicus, 24 mars 2010 - 02:36 .

[alickar]

Akka le Vil wrote...

Yeah, I know that not everyone agree, but I'm frustrated enough that I need to get it out of my chest.

I've tried now several times to make a second playthrough of the game. But each time I try, I'm demotivated by how it feels exactly the same to fight every single foe in the game, whatever the level or the location I am.
The total lack of any character progression relative to the world is really a bummer and remove a lot of the fun I can have from playing.
I know that Bioware use some kind of big worded name for their own version of level scaling, but in the practice it just feels exactly like Oblivion, the only difference being that you don't actually SEE the enemies in full daedric armor - but the difference is purely cosmetic.

It feel exactly the same to fight a same-coloured darkspawn at level 1 or at level 10 or at level 20.

Extremely frustrating, because I'd like to replay the game, but it really spoil my fun to feel like everything is always the same, and to have absolutely no sense of becoming stronger - or fighting "stronger" or "weaker" enemies. Even the enemies themselves don't matter - you'd think that such creature would be quite more dangerous than this one, and that such trained soldier would be stronger than this average brigand. But no. Monsters are simply "mélée", "mage" or "archer" and "white", "yellow" or "orange". Everything else is simply cosmetic, and I don't feel some creature are more dangerous/weaker than other, they simply are "at the same level as everyone".
Make in the end for a VERY bland feeling of "everything is always the same" and a distinct lack of "believable world" and "fluff".

Yes, I needed to rant. Ruining so much fun because of such a stupid feature is really an extremely frustrating waste.

Gah...

u disagree with it being lvl 30 u are the one who needs improvement

[Haexpane]

Well for those defending the scaling, how do you explain DAO: Awakenings combat being even easier as your level goes up and the mobs are supposedly scaling too?



BIoware told us in the FAQ that the higher level mobs would be tougher because they also have the high level abilities.



However everyone and their mother knows that DAO is only hard from level 1-10, gets easier level 10-15, and becomes very easy 16-20.



At level 21-32, the bosses become an absolute joke. You don't even need to cast offensive mage spells



This is all on HARD difficulty.



This is further evidence that the scaling is NOT working as INTENDED.



Which was my main point, scaling always sounds reasonable on paper. But it *never* works as intended, in any game. It always requires multiple balance patches.



People are soloing the Awakenings bosses on Nightmare... the balance is way off.

[Upper_Krust]

Lancer347 wrote...

Level scaling does allow you to determine your path through the game, but I agree with the OP about the surrealisticness of it. Maybe there could be a compromise, using the most tried pen and paper approach?
More bad guys!

Say we set genlocks to be level 8 all the time, and a certain encounter calls for them. You're level 8? You have to fight 2-3, you're level 20? You have to fight a dozen. You could justify this by saying the blight is becoming worse and darkspawn are becoming more prevalent as the game progresses.

That wouldn't work. Beyond a few levels characters are either too weak or too powerful against an enemy of static level.

As I explained in my previous post, the best way to do this is with Rank Scaling replacing Level Scaling.

ie. Basic Hurlock is a Level 8 Normal Rank enemy. But it could also be a Level 3 Lieutenant Rank or a Level 13 Weak Normal Rank.

Make each rank jump a 5 Level difference.

Weak Normal = -5
Normal = +/-0
Lieutenant = +5
Boss = +10
Elite Boss = +15

So if we make a Genlock Level 3 Normal and an Ogre level 18 Normal, the Ogre could be a Level 3 Elite Boss, or a Level 8 Boss or a Level 13 Lieutenant. etc.

So at the start of the game you might be battling Genlocks...then you'll progress to Hurlocks...then Shrieks...then Ogres.

Level 3 Weak Normal: Deepstalker
Level 3 Normal: Genlock Sneak, Genlock Grenadier
Level 3 Lieutenants: Genlock Alpha (Assassin), Genlock Emissary, Blight Wolf
Level 3 Boss: Genlock Forgemaster
Level 3 Elite Boss: Ogre

Level 8 Weak Normal: Genlock Sneak, Genlock Grenadier
Level 8 Normal: Hurlock Warrior, Hurlock Archer
Level 8 Lieutenant: Hurlock Alpha (Berserker), Hurlock Emissary, Bereskarn
Level 8 Boss: Hurlock General, Ogre
Level 8 Elite Boss: Disciple

Level 13 Weak Normal: Hurlock Warrior, Hurlock Archer
Level 13 Normal: Shriek, Hurlock Alpha
Level 13 Lieutenant: Shriek Alpha, Shriek Emissary, Ogre
Level 13 Boss: Shriek Omega, Ogre Alpha
Level 13 Elite Boss: Broodmother

Level 18 Weak Normal: Shriek, Hurlock Alpha
Level 18 Normal: Shriek Alpha, Hurlock General
Level 18 Lieutenant: Ogre Alpha, Ogre Emissary, Disciple
Level 18 Boss: Ogre General (Armoured Ogre), Disciple Emissary
Level 18 Elite Boss: Archdemon

etc.

Modifié par Upper_Krust, 24 mars 2010 - 07:34 .

[booke63]

Akka le Vil wrote...

booke63 wrote...

When you say:  they "did not appear/jump in skill just because you improved" I would agree since they improved not because I did but because THEY did by practicing and training as I did.

Plus what does "groups already there" mean?  Current top tennis players Federer and Nadal and others are not playing Sampras, Agassi, Courier, Becker, Edberg, much less McEnroe or Borg, even less Laver or Kramer or Tilden--those last 2 players being dead.  They're playing those of their own era who grew in skill over time (from childhood to adulthood) leaving most of the world's tennis players well behind.  I guess I don't see where that is not akin to level scaling.

What I mean is that there always had world-class players. They may have changed over the years, as time passes, old ones retire and new one rise, but there always is some few players that are very skilled ("high-leve"), quite a bit more that are less skilled ("medium-level") and the vast majority of people who don't play tennis that well ("low-level").
So yes, when you increase your skill, you can nearly always find people that are a match for you, but it's not because of a nonsensical "scaling" that adjust everyone on you, it's because they is always a certain number of people that have reached a certain level of skill.

Perhaps we simply see level scaling from different prespectives.  You as one looking from the outside in, as metagamer, who sees something like tennis et all as ranked squads whereas I'm looking from the inside out, as a roleplayer, actually playing tennis day to day, who keeps seeing dangerous opponents to fight as they and myself move faster, hit harder, hit more accurately, and improve in fitness.

Funny, because I have the EXACT SAME OPPOSITE take on this.
From my point of view, I am the one seeing it as a roleplayer, and hence being very annoyed when something that is obviously "gameplay mechanics" wrecks the in-game world logic.
From my point of view, you are the one seeing it as a roleplayer, seeing something that is completely nonsensical from a RP point of view, and trying to rationnalize it.

Are you saying that the mechanic of spawning monsters in DAO is in some
mathmatical way tied to the PC's level, and that you therefore cannot
imagine Darkspawn training and improving like your PC does?

Level scaling and having characters practicing and improving on their own are two fundamentally different concepts.

Heh yah we're ships passing in the night, it seems.  Ah well, sail on!  I'm off on shore leave however.

[Akka le Vil]

Upper_Krust wrote...

That wouldn't work. Beyond a few levels characters are either too weak or too powerful against an enemy of static level.

That's up to how they set up their system, not anything inherent to having a higher or lower level.
(not that it wasn't already said several times )

[Upper_Krust]

Akka le Vil wrote...

Upper_Krust wrote...

That wouldn't work. Beyond a few levels characters are either too weak or too powerful against an enemy of static level.

That's up to how they set up their system, not anything inherent to having a higher or lower level.
(not that it wasn't already said several times )

Correct, but the more 'gaining a level' actually means in mechanical terms (additional ability bonuses, health, stamina/mana, etc.) then the greater the disparity between each level.

Dragon Age currently does have a large disparity between levels, meaning that a swing of more than about 2-3 levels makes the game either too easy or too hard.

Incidently Akka, I think you have eventually swung me round to thinking Level Scaling does ruin the game. It became even more glaring with Awakening, where you are still battling the same enemies (with much the same results).

I definately think my suggestion of RANK SCALING sorts the whole mess out.

[Haexpane]

Set levels fixes it instead of scaling. On Hard, enemies would be 10 levels higher, be harder to hit, take less damage, have higher level attributes etc...

[tmp7704]

Akka le Vil wrote...

Seriously, you can't tell the difference between the character gaining experience getting slight increase of power, and everyone in the world getting several large increase in power ?

Yes, let's presume i can't. Please, explain what is so much different in practice between everyone gaining power at the same rate which keeps them equally strong, and characters becoming minimally stronger per level, which still keeps the characters pretty much equally strong no matter what level they are?

Both go hand in hand. I already pointed that the problem in DOA is that they tried to put a concept of "you start as a greenhorn and ends up as a mighty battle machine" in a story where you are already a very strong hero right from the beginning. They tried to cope by using a fundamentally flawed concept (level scaling) rather than simply going with a more logical "let's just let the player begin at a higher level", but keep the levels static.

You keep saying the level scaling is "fundamentally flawed" but the thing is, the examples of why it's so flawed don't have much to do with actual level scaling, but the way the game story is arranged. It's just not making your point -- if the fix in this situation should be "let's let player start at high level" then you don't actually need to remove level scaling, nor again, it is to blame.

This is a joke, right ?
There is a little part of the map in the south-west where you encounter centaurs and supermutant. Basically everything else is fair game. Maybe a bit dangerous, but you can flee.
Are you talking about the game ?

I'm talking about he original Fallout. Which had 12 places total including your starting vault and the only thing south-west in that game was ocean. If you were talking about Fallout 3 then my apologies, but i really didn't think this would be the case given F3 uses level scaling itself so to use it as example how fixed levels are better would be rather absurd.

Err... And so what ?
The combat system has nothing to do with level scaling. I could just as well argue that level scaling is bad because DAO had a brown colour theme ? That would be such an argument !

Uhmm no. Let's backtrack a bit? You were complaining how all fights in DA feel absolutely the same, and claimed this is due to level scaling and the fix would be to use fixed levels, then cited Fallout as example of game where it worked. My counter-point was the fights in Fallout also feel absolutely the same, hence i couldn't see how that game would show in any way that fixed levels address your complaint (fights feeling always the same) in any way.

[tmp7704]

Haexpane wrote...

Well for those defending the scaling, how do you explain DAO: Awakenings combat being even easier as your level goes up and the mobs are supposedly scaling too?

You know this happens? Funnily enough this is a result of large part of enemies not scaling in Awakening -- except for the elite and bosses, the regular darkspawn you experience through most of the game is capped at l.13-15 and number of them are 'critter' rank enemies. You can view it easily if your character has nature talents trained, enemy levels and ranks can be then inspected on the minimap. So lot of enemies you fight is "naturally" 5-10+ levels below you.

In a way Awakening shows how DA would play if it was all done with fixed levels instead of its current system -- it'd be even easier than it already was, much like Awakening is.

[Upper_Krust]

tmp7704 wrote...

You know this happens? Funnily enough this is a result of large part of enemies not scaling in Awakening -- except for the elite and bosses, the regular darkspawn you experience through most of the game is capped at l.13-15 and number of them are 'critter' rank enemies. You can view it easily if your character has nature talents trained, enemy levels and ranks can be then inspected on the minimap. So lot of enemies you fight is "naturally" 5-10+ levels below you.

In a way Awakening shows how DA would play if it was all done with fixed levels instead of its current system -- it'd be even easier than it already was, much like Awakening is.

Then how come even the new enemies in Awakening are totally easy...Disciples, Children, Charred Sylvans, Blight-born Werewolves? etc.

[Zem_]

Upper_Krust wrote...

Then how come even the new enemies in Awakening are totally easy...Disciples, Children, Charred Sylvans, Blight-born Werewolves? etc.

What does this have to do with level scaling though?  The problem in this case isn't that enemies levels adjust to match yours.  It's that enemies of the same level are not a challenge in Awakening, presumably.  That's a problem either with the design of the enemies, their AI, or simply that to challenge a human opponent at this level you need to have the enemies scaler to a HIGHER level rather than the same level.

Any way you slice it though it's not a problem with scaling vs. not scaling.  You could make the same mistake with fixed spawns if you didn't make them all higher level as well.

[Edelwolf]

This game just gets easier and easier when you're climbing teen levels. Yeah DA level scales, but not nearly enough to create a challenge.

It shouldn't be a problem.

[tmp7704]

Upper_Krust wrote...

Then how come even the new enemies in Awakening are totally easy...Disciples, Children, Charred Sylvans, Blight-born Werewolves? etc.

A lot of the Children are also critter rank mobs, that generally leaves you with fights where you tend to face no more than 3-6 opponents around your own level against your team of 4. A fight like that was by no means hard in the original DA, so it's no surprise it's just as easy in the expansion.

In the original DA the fights which could cause some problems were ones where you'd face 10+ enemies of your own level at once, i have yet to run into a single such encounter in the expansion. But it's not something to blame on the level scaling, as it's not something the level scaling controls. Rather, it seems to be conscious adjustment made by the devs -- perhaps in reaction to complaints the original game could be 'too hard'?
 
Add to it the equipment you can get is more powerful (since people whined items in basic DA were not interesting enough) and new crazy abilities which can easily net you 500+ damage per click and you get considerably easier game overall.

Modifié par tmp7704, 25 mars 2010 - 09:43 .

[Haexpane]

tmp7704 wrote...

Haexpane wrote...

Well for those defending the scaling, how do you explain DAO: Awakenings combat being even easier as your level goes up and the mobs are supposedly scaling too?

You know this happens? Funnily enough this is a result of large part of enemies not scaling in Awakening -- except for the elite and bosses, the regular darkspawn you experience through most of the game is capped at l.13-15 and number of them are 'critter' rank enemies. You can view it easily if your character has nature talents trained, enemy levels and ranks can be then inspected on the minimap. So lot of enemies you fight is "naturally" 5-10+ levels below you.

In a way Awakening shows how DA would play if it was all done with fixed levels instead of its current system -- it'd be even easier than it already was, much like Awakening is.

You don't need scaling to fix the problem.  The obvious solution is more critter mobs, and more higher level mobs spawned in those zones.

You don't need low level critters to scale up, you need higher level mobs to provide the challenge.

[Haexpane]

tmp7704 wrote...

Upper_Krust wrote...

Then how come even the new enemies in Awakening are totally easy...Disciples, Children, Charred Sylvans, Blight-born Werewolves? etc.

A lot of the Children are also critter rank mobs, that generally leaves you with fights where you tend to face no more than 3-6 opponents around your own level against your team of 4. A fight like that was by no means hard in the original DA, so it's no surprise it's just as easy in the expansion.

In the original DA the fights which could cause some problems were ones where you'd face 10+ enemies of your own level at once, i have yet to run into a single such encounter in the expansion. But it's not something to blame on the level scaling, as it's not something the level scaling controls. Rather, it seems to be conscious adjustment made by the devs -- perhaps in reaction to complaints the original game could be 'too hard'?
 
Add to it the equipment you can get is more powerful (since people whined items in basic DA were not interesting enough) and new crazy abilities which can easily net you 500+ damage per click and you get considerably easier game overall.

Mobs should be able to hit for 400 a whack too, you don't need scaling for that either

[tmp7704]

Haexpane wrote...

You don't need scaling to fix the problem.  The obvious solution is more critter mobs, and more higher level mobs spawned in those zones.

You don't need low level critters to scale up, you need higher level mobs to provide the challenge.

And wouldn't having the low level mobs scaled to the correct level achieve the very thing you claim would be the fix, i.e. "more higher level mobs spawned in those zones"? In the sense it'd result in having 10-20 mobs of level 25+ per encounter instead of them being mostly critters and l.15's.

Of course you can instead just throw even bigger heaps of fixed level thrash on the players too, but that has hardly anything to do with your initial question of 'why doesn't scaling work in the expansion'.

Modifié par tmp7704, 25 mars 2010 - 10:09 .

[LH000]

Ulicus wrote...

The point is that what your logic is demonstrably not that of Dragon Age: Origins. See the Lothering bandits example above.

By all means, say you disapprove of level scaling, say that it's no fun or unenjoyable -- as you did in the OP -- but don't start saying it's illogical, or doesn't make any sense... because you're the one choosing to mix gameplay with the story and setting, when the game itself clearly doesn't.

If you read a Dragon Age novel, don't expect Loghain to shout so loud that his foes collapse onto their backsides.

Well, gameplay  of most games includes elements which are weird or nonsensical in comparison (in respect) to our real world experience, some are even illogical. That doesn't mean that level of their "weirdness" when playing a game is identical. Some of them are even, evidently, helping immersion into game.

While you are right that level scaling has nothing to do with logics, you are wrong that one can't say that it doesn't make sense (I hope you can see the difference).

Btw, to me, being able to shout so loud that foes collapse onto their backs is less imersion-breaking that level scaling, and this difference does matter.    

 

[ladydesire]

Haexpane wrote...

Well for those defending the scaling, how do you explain DAO: Awakenings combat being even easier as your level goes up and the mobs are supposedly scaling too?

<snip>

People are soloing the Awakenings bosses on Nightmare... the balance is way off.

Is it? Is Bioware supposed to balance the game for the people that use Min/Max builds? If they did that, what happens to the people that don't know how to do it, or refuse to do it?

[Vaeliorin]

ladydesire wrote...

Haexpane wrote...
Well for those defending the scaling, how do you explain DAO: Awakenings combat being even easier as your level goes up and the mobs are supposedly scaling too?

People are soloing the Awakenings bosses on Nightmare... the balance is way off.

Is it? Is Bioware supposed to balance the game for the people that use Min/Max builds? If they did that, what happens to the people that don't know how to do it, or refuse to do it?

They play on easy or normal.  NIghtmare should require near perfection in every fight, not fights that you can let play out completely through your party's tactics while you go get a drink or something.

[DragonShepard138]

I just hope the Archdemon isn't too hard if I end up at level 20+, or should I rush through the game and be about level 17 and fight it?