f13.net

Obsidian Entertainment and our legendary game designers Chris Avellone, Tim Cain, and Josh Sawyer are excited to bring you a new role-playing game for the PC. Project Eternity (working title) pays homage to the great Infinity Engine games of years past: Baldur’s Gate, Icewind Dale, and Planescape: Torment.


Project Eternity aims to recapture the magic, imagination, depth, and nostalgia of classic RPGs that we enjoyed making - and playing. At Obsidian, we have the people responsible for many of those classic games and we want to bring those games back… and that’s why we’re here - we need your help to make it a reality!

Oh, they ran out of sequels to ruin huh?  :why_so_serious:

Well, that just officially made me sign up a kickstart account, dammit.

Project Eternity is an isometric, party-based RPG set in a new fantasy world developed by Obsidian Entertainment.

Combat will be old-school. "It'll feel like Baldur's Gate 2. After discussions here, we decided to pursue a similar combat style to the [games on the Infinity Engine, like Baldur's Gate and Icewind Dale]—real time with pause. It'll offer the same breadth and depth of combat choices as you'd expect from combats in Baldur's Gate, and our combat system has been one of the first systems we've delved into for the Kickstarter."

The world is totally original. "It's fantasy with its own voice. Josh Sawyer has been leading the charge with the world and race creation—at first glance, players will recognize archetypes and seemingly-familiar landscapes, but often, we just use that as a means to draw you in and let you begin to see the subtleties and differences. Our first goal with the world creation was to make a world that's fun to explore first, and then construct the lore, factions, and conflicts around that."

This is a game with soul. "So there are a few things—we want the player to be able to build their own character, and we want the player to be able to evolve and grow. And this growth wouldn't be limited to the first game, but would continue into subsequent titles as well. The story and world is built around the concept of magic and power tied to a character's soul, and the player's soul and the souls of his companions are... special."

You won't get to create your own party. That's not a bad thing. "Much like Baldur's Gate and Planescape Torment, the player creates one character and gathers a party while exploring the world. We'll be giving the companions as much love and attention as we've done in our titles in the past, from Torment all the way up to [Neverwinter Nights 2:] Mask of the Betrayer and Fallout: New Vegas. We don't want them to outshine the player, but support him and act as a sounding board for his decisions and choices in the game. Our desire is the player character and the companions (if they survive) will go beyond simply one title into future installments."

It will look like the old classic isometric games. "While Project: Eternity heralds back to the Infinity Engine games our fans have played, we'll be using a different engine and it will be isometric. We feel isometric lends itself to more tactical party-based play."

If the Kickstarter fails, they'll just try again. "[We'll] refine the idea, figure out what didn't work, then try again. The nice thing about KS is that you know in 30 days (often, less) if your idea doesn't resonate with the public, rather than 2-3 years down the line or trying to pump so many marketing dollars at people they become brainwashed into liking an idea that never resonated with them in the first place. (That's my final rant.)"

If the Kickstarter succeeds, this will be a franchise. "It means we FINALLY have a world of our own that we can build upon, not just for this title but for future releases down the line. We've wanted to do our own RPG world for a long, long time, and it's been hard to pursue outside of existing franchises. Project: Eternity is our chance to take all the RPG knowledge, mechanics, lore, and characterization we've learned over the years and turn it into the game our fans have been hungering for."

1.1 million, Base Goal – Achieved!
Base game includes three races, five classes, and five companions. We have ideas for these, but we want to hear your opinions on what you'd like to see. Stay tuned to Kickstarter, our website, and our forums to join in on the conversation.

1.4 million, New Playable Race, Class, and Companion!
Expands your options for character creation and adds a companion of the new class.

1.6 million, a Mac Version of Project Eternity and The Story Grows!
We've listened and we’ll make a Mac version of the game at this tier. We're also going to add a new major storyline along with new quests, locations, NPCs, and unique loot (special histories everyone?).

1.8 million, New Playable Race, Class, and Companion!
The options grow for your main character and the roster of your motley crew expands with the addition of a new companion from the selected class.

2.0 million, Player House!
Get your own house in the game that you can customize, store equipment in, and where your companions hang out, or, as the elves say, "chillax".

2.2 million, a new Region, a new Faction and another new Companion! And, dare we say it... ? LINUX!
Great news, everyone! For the Tarball Knights of Gzippia out there, we'll be adding Linux support!
Also, the world of Project Eternity grows in a major way with the inclusion of a whole new faction and the territory it holds. This adds new NPCs, quests, magic items, and hours of gameplay. And yes, you got it, another companion.

We've been listening to your feedback, and have the following announcements:

DRM Free: We are looking into it! Please check back for updates.

I can't help but notice that "Game ships with a finished ending" is missing from the stretch goals. :why_so_serious:

Rumor is that they didn't have time to finish describing the stretch goals.  Some fans are working on a patch to restore the missing goals.

e·ter·ni·ty  (-tûrn-t)
n. pl. e·ter·ni·ties
1.  A very long or seemingly endless time: waited in the dentist's office for an eternity.

I note that their delivery estimate has moved out to April of 2014  :why_so_serious:

edit: hmm, unless it was always April 2014, and I'm mixing these guys up with a different KS

Obsidian working without a publisher to force them to do QA sounds very dangerous. I expect a game with a large scope that barely functions.

Obsidian working without a publisher to force them to do QA sounds very dangerous. I expect a game with a large scope that barely functions.

I'm thinking it's a scam.  This will be the Duke Nukem Forever of western RPGs.

Or he moves to another country on the windfall and gives no fucks.

Scaaaaaaaaaam.

Obsidian working without a publisher to force them to do QA sounds very dangerous. I expect a game with a large scope that barely functions.

just happen to think that modern games are beyond the ability of Obsidian

New Vegas was basically flawless other than one really shitty DLC. Well, flawless might not be the word. It was "without any major issues" perhaps.

Dead Money is the crappy one.

I don't know what magical thing they did to make the FO3 engine work, but FO3 crashed for me literally dozens of times. I had lockups maybe 2 or 3 times in New Vegas. Beyond that though, I think pretty much every system in the game is improved in New Vegas compared to FO3, the story is better, the characters are better, the game feels far more "Fallout" probably because the people who were making it, you know, made Fallout.

And none of that is to say that FO3 was a bad game, it was pretty good when it wasn't locking up or going all video-crazy, but New Vegas is several notches above IMO.

Am I the only one that thinks this is totally crazytown? Also, am I the only one that thinks that if a company like Obsidian having worked on properties like SWTOR and such can't fund a goddamn few million dollar game, that they probably won't be able to do it even with the funding? (Here's to hoping I'm wrong)

Twenty bucks is really nothing though.  That's a cheap date.  I pre-bought GW2 for $60 and I hardly played it.  Buying games is always this sort of risk.  Also Obsidian didn't work on SWTOR did they?   They've always been the type of studio to work off publisher loans anyways.

I feel like we're sort of missing something as a collective in this thread. When I give money to an indie thing on Kickstarter, it's between $20 and $100 and I get the product within 6 months outside of insanely bad outliers that are rare in the current days of Kickstarter (but were fairly common a year ago - Glory to Rome Black Box and Dice Age spring to mind).

This Kickstarter is for a game that will not come out for well over a year if it EVER comes out.

Am I the only one that thinks this is totally crazytown? Also, am I the only one that thinks that if a company like Obsidian having worked on properties like SWTOR and such can't fund a goddamn few million dollar game, that they probably won't be able to do it even with the funding? (Here's to hoping I'm wrong)

The player witnesses an extraordinary and horrific supernatural event that thrusts them into a unique and difficult circumstance. Burdened with the consequences of this event, the player has to investigate what has happened in order to free themselves from the restless forces that follow and haunt them wherever they go.

I am willing to go in on a game very early if they will give me a copy of the game AND (note AND) give me something playable right away.  I went in Minecraft pretty early in alpha, I went in on Project Zomboid very early in alpha, and I went in on Natural Selection 2 very early in beta.  In all cases I got something playable (in all cases admittedly barely), but to me that made it go from "would never do" to "Well, if all else fails I got to play something for a while."

So in other words, yes, I think this is crazytown.

Another thing that bothers me about this is that game design should naturally change during development. It's really odd to commit to very specific things like companion counts or how they should work exactly before going through any prototyping and testing.

New Vegas was basically flawless other than one really shitty DLC. Well, flawless might not be the word. It was "without any major issues" perhaps.

A lot of gamers have come to see the publishers as the bad guys, so that if only there were no publishers holding studios to ransom then the games would be better.

Dead Money is the crappy one.

I don't know what magical thing they did to make the FO3 engine work, but FO3 crashed for me literally dozens of times. I had lockups maybe 2 or 3 times in New Vegas. Beyond that though, I think pretty much every system in the game is improved in New Vegas compared to FO3, the story is better, the characters are better, the game feels far more "Fallout" probably because the people who were making it, you know, made Fallout.

And none of that is to say that FO3 was a bad game, it was pretty good when it wasn't locking up or going all video-crazy, but New Vegas is several notches above IMO.

While I'll agree with you on story and gameplay stuff, FO3 ran MUCH better for me than NV. I had very few technical problems with 3, while NV gave me a lot of crashes/lockups, and several glitchy quests including one that was broken entirely for me due to dialogue selection.

Project Eternity won't be built on Dungeons & Dragons rules. "We are making our own RPG mechanics," Cain revealed, even though D&D has been "a huge influence" on them.
At the core of the rules will be souls. In the Kickstarter video, Josh Sawyer said a character's soul was tied to the magic system. Cain expanded: "No, you don't have to be evil to access any abilities. They aren't categorised like that. Instead, in this world, your soul is connected to your power. Simply put, people who have whole, unbroken souls are more powerful than those people who just have fragments of souls. The nature of these souls, and how they might break, is something we will explore in the game.
"While there are social concepts of good and evil," he added, "the game does not track an alignment for the player. Instead we will use a reputation system to keep track of what different groups in the world think of you. Consequences of your actions will matter in Project Eternity."

There is a new article on Eurogamer: it combines new info from Tim Cain and what Sawyer said in yesterday's update:

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2012-09-18-project-eternity-interview-new-information-tentative-spring-2014-release-date

We will be doing an update on the technology of P:E, but in brief, the firearms of this world are relatively recent inventions and equivalent to the single-shot wheellock weapons found in 16th century Europe.  Their use is uncommon and for specific purposes.

- Beta access for those who pledged $140

I wish I had faith they would actually be able to complete this on time and budget.  Anyone want to bet on when they come back asking for more money?

The comment about donations was merely because it would've been neat to have an f13 sponsored thing in it.

my eyes



are full of scam

Can anyone suggest why this particular offering is better to get into now rather than waiting to see if it actually gets made?

At this point, I'd say not worth it. It's funded, so it's being made. The main reason to hop on the kickstarter is to get the project going. Now that it's going ... I'd wait.

Being funded does not necessarily mean it will get made. At this point, it just means that you won't get your money back.

Being funded does not necessarily mean it will get made. At this point, it just means that you won't get your money back.

But if it does get made, then you can reserve a copy now for $25, instead of whatever they'll charge for it once it goes retail.
If you're into the perks, you can decide for yourself if they're worth the money.

Can anyone suggest why this particular offering is better to get into now rather than waiting to see if it actually gets made?

Alpha Protocol also rules, the timed dialogue along with the multiple paths the game can take are fucking rad, and it's almost always totally obvious what the protagonist will say, especially if you think of the options as "James Bond", "Jason Bourne", and "Jack Bauer". 

Can anyone suggest why this particular offering is better to get into now rather than waiting to see if it actually gets made?

NWN 2 was great, NWN MOTB even better. And bugs...pff!

I’m assuming $1.1 million is a fraction of what you’d typically require to make games like Neverwinter Nights 2 or Fallout: New Vegas. How’d you settle on this figure?

Yep, it’s a much reduced amount because you’re not doing all the extraneous features (total voice acting across all languages, the latest super graphic video card enhancements with tint control and crotch rumble™ technology, multiple skews across consoles, etc.).

We looked carefully at the budgets for previous Infinity Engine titles we’d done in the past at Black Isle [Studios], made adjustments for personnel (personnel costs have risen a great deal since then), kept the technology costs in mind and made a reasonable estimation of what we can accomplish. Our CEO (Feargus Urquhart) is pretty ruthless about stuff like that.

We’re in a good position because a number of us have made this type of game before (Josh, Tim, Feargus, me, etc.) – and even better, we’ve done this type of game several times. Now this is our opportunity to take that production knowledge and make it even better. Knowing the process from start to finish helps reduce a lot of the X factors in terms of implementation and avoid many of the pitfalls in development.

Can you ensure the game won’t go over budget without sacrificing anything as you roll forward?

It’s hard to ensure anything. That said, we’re not subject to last minute changes, unusual feature requests that may or may not help the game, contract revisions and move in/move out dates from various quarters. Add to this the fact that this is the type of game we absolutely know how to make, we feel confident about being able to weather any development hurdles and challenges that come up.

Plus, we’re able to see those hurdles a lot earlier, in my opinion, especially since we can share content and progress with the public.

Yep, it’s a much reduced amount because you’re not doing all the extraneous features (total voice acting across all languages, the latest super graphic video card enhancements with tint control and crotch rumble™ technology, multiple skews across consoles, etc.).

Oh hey, look, yet another goddamn fantasy RPG.

It's an interesting way to do art on a budget.  They can render with cheap prop models then paint on details.

Paint overs have been used for a long...long time......

I'm tempted to take my $20 back at this point just because they keep spamming me with updates. 

I can't believe they hit the 3.5 million mark. That is a lot of Ice Wind Dale and Baldurs Gate fans right there.

OK! After much team deliberation we have one final ultimate stretch goal. At $4.0m we will be enhancing the whole game. We will use live instrumentation for the soundtrack, add developer in-game commentary, and use every dollar between $3.5m and $4m to enhance the game. Also at $4.0m Chris Avellone will be forced to play Arcanum.

There is a large lake of disappointment hiding behind a shoddy earthen dam on which someone has planted quite a few rose bushes.

So they're good at making an expansion pack (the stability might have been better for you, but wasn't for all, and it might have been due to work others did on the engine, not them) - doesn't mean they have gained the ability to make a good game from scratch.

Dungeon Siege 3 got excellent reviews on here from people who played it.

Dungeon Siege 3 got excellent reviews on here from people who played it.

People who played the demo you mean.

No, from people who like games. i.e. not you or yegolev.
Cue RK47 posting for the umpteenth time he's not supporting this.

orlan - A race of people found mostly in northern, temperate climates but also as far south as the Dyrwood. Physically, they are notable for their small stature, two-toned skin, and exceptionally large, hair-covered ears. Due to their size, orlans have been victimized and marginalized by most of the cultures with whom they have come into contact. As a result, it is rare to find large communities of them and they have progressively retreated into heavily wooded environments over the last few centuries. Many orlan communities have also adopted brutal guerilla tactics including heavy use of traps and poison in the surrounding environment. As a result, even orlans raised in urban cultures often share their rural kin's nasty reputation.

This might end up being the best thing to come about from Project Eternity:

Chris Avellone Let's Plays Arcanum:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=aO9Qa8KbeMc

(hopefully he uploads in a resolution where you can actually read the text from now on though)

Just jumping in to say that Dungeon Siege 3 was shit, objectively speaking.

1 and 2 weren't that great, either.

I liked Dungeon Siege 2. 4-man co-op in a seamless varied world and being able to mix classes before anyone even heard of Path of Exile.

What are the different races we can play?
Players can select from six main races found in this part of the world: humans, elves, dwarves, orlans, aumaua, and godlike.  Orlans, aumaua, and godlike are unique to the world of Project Eternity, though godlike have similarities to "planetouched" races in other settings.  Orlans are small humanoids physically notable for their two-tone skin, extensive body hair, and extremely long ears.  Aumaua are large, semiaquatic humanoids with a diverse array of skin patterns, elongated heads, and semi-webbed hands and feet.
 
Godlike are not a separate race, but a phenomenon found among all races.  They are individuals whom many people believe were transformed by the gods before birth.  Godlike have distinctive appearances that invariably make them stand out from other people, with different cultures and individuals holding wildly different biases toward or against them.
 
All of the races have different ethnicities from which the player can choose.  For elves, Wood and Pale, for dwarves, Mountain and Boreal, for orlans, Hearth and Wild, and for aumaua, Island and Coastal.  Humans have three ethnicities: Meadow, Ocean, and Savannah.  Godlike can be found among any race and their appearance always sets them apart from their parents.

What about the classes?
Characters may be one of eleven classes: barbarian, chanter, cipher, druid, fighter, monk, paladin, priest, ranger, rogue, or wizard.  The "core four" classes (fighter, priest, rogue, wizard) are most similar to their traditional tabletop analogues.  The non-core classes, barbarians, druids, monks, paladins, and rangers, are somewhat similar to their counterparts but differ more significantly.  The two completely new classes are the chanter and the cipher, which are unique to the world of Project Eternity.
 
Traditional classes vary in how high- or low-maintenance they are based on their traditional counterparts.  E.g. fighters are generally lower maintenance than wizards.  However, the advancement system allows players to bend those roles, making higher-maintenance, active-use fighters or more passive wizards (for example).  Class balance is important to us, but we also want playing each class to feel distinctive and complementary to other classes.

How about the setting and story?
Project Eternity is set in a world created by Obsidian Entertainment, where mortal souls are bound to an eternal, and often mystifying, cycle of life and reincarnation believed to be watched over by the gods.  Though cultures and individuals have different beliefs about the nature and purpose of this cycle, it is only recently that mortals have made significant advancements in understanding its fundamental mechanics through the science of animancy.
 
The story takes place in a small nation in the world's southern hemisphere called the Dyrwood (DEER-wood).  The Dyrwood is a heavily forested, coastal region where colonial powers from across the ocean have settled and formed an uneasy relationship with the local residents, tribes of orlans and elves who are protective of the ancient ruins of Eír Glanfath on the forest's interior.  Eír Glanfath was an ancient melting pot of races that built elaborate, often massive, structures out of a living shell-like substance called adra.  Though the fate of the ancient Glanfathans is unknown, their dangerous and complex ruins show evidence they possessed extensive knowledge of how souls work.  For this reason, all of the surrounding colonial powers aggressively fight for the chance to explore and plunder Glanfathan structures, often bringing the local tribes into conflict with their relatively new neighbors -- and the neighbors into conflict with each other.
 
The central character in the story is a newcomer to the Dyrwood, a man or woman who is caught up in a bizarre supernatural phenomenon.  This event puts them in a difficult position, where they must explore the new world to solve a series of problems that have been thrust upon them.

What is the combat like?
Project Eternity's combat will feel very similar to the combat in the Infinity Engine games, which used a "real-time with pause" system.  In such a system, events between combatants occur simultaneously, but the player can pause the game at any time.  The player selects and commands one or more of his or her party members to issue orders, ranging from continuous activities, like making standard attacks, to the activation of limited-use tactical abilities, such as spells.
 
Like the Infinity Engine games, Project Eternity will support auto-pause features that allow players to establish conditions under which the game will automatically pause (e.g., if a party member becomes unconscious).  It will also feature a slow combat toggle that can be used with or in lieu of the pause feature.  In slow combat, players can manage the flow of combat without needing to halt the game entirely.

What other cool stuff will be in the game?
Thanks to our backers, players will have access to both a player house as well as a full stronghold in the game.  Also, players will have the chance to explore all fifteen levels of the backer-funded mega-dungeon, the Endless Paths of Od Nua.  Players who want a more extreme challenge can enable up to three optional game modes: Expert Mode (turns off "helper" features), Path of the Damned (dramatically increases the difficulty and complexity of encounters), and Trial of Iron (only one save game, party death = game over, save game deleted).

Of the ones I've backed, this is the one I expect to enjoy the most in the end. Different strokes, I guess. "Like Baldur's Gate" is really all I need to know about the game from a mechanical sense, and adding more companions, more content, etc., is the sort of thing I want from stretch goals in general. I don't really care about things like adding more platforms - if the platform I wanted wasn't the original offering I'd never have looked twice at the game. Same thing with languages, etc.

I will say that in an RPG, lore/setting/background content is anything but superficial.

It's also a trademark and copyright lawsuit waiting to happen since companies like Games Workshop and Wizards of the Coast (neé TSR) have trademarked quite a lot of the RPG staples and agressively defend those.

Creating your own world setting and rules for an old school computer RPG can be a distraction from making the game and might leave you with a world that is neither compelling nor interesting and a ruleset that is unbalanced or broken. It's also a trademark and copyright lawsuit waiting to happen since companies like Games Workshop and Wizards of the Coast (neé TSR) have trademarked quite a lot of the RPG staples and agressively defend those.

There are quite a lot great RPG rulesets and settings that you could license for very little money to spare you the time and resources to create your own world setting.

This is 100% incorrect. The OGL established that you cannot copyright or trademark systems. You can copyright specific instances of text and you can copyrightk art. That's it. You cannot copyright math. Obsidian can release a game under the 2nd edition ruleset tomorrow if they want to, so long as they avoid exact copies of rules text and a few trademarked terms (githyanki, for example).

If you want  to see precisely how far you can take this, pick up the Swords & Wizardry monster books sometime.

edit: I should edit this to say that that very well might apply to text only. But, in text, that's how it is and I suspect video games would pan out the same way.

The biggest problem we've found with software and the OGL is that programmers aren't paying attention to Section 8 of the OGL. Section 8 states: ñIf you distribute Open Game Content You must clearly indicate which portions of the work that you are distributing are Open Content.î This doesn't mean you can say ñall rules in my program are Openî, the users need to be able to see all that Open Content. You can do this by putting Open Content in a format that is easy to understand. Popular solutions have been to place everything in text files that the program pulls info from, having everything in a viewable database within the software, using Java script on a webpage (viewing the source of the webpage will display the code and Java script is relatively easy for a user to interpret). The key is that the user has to see everything that is Open Content that the program uses and be able to understand it without too much effort. The whole point of the OGL is that once information is declared Open everyone has free access to it under the OGL. Compiling that information into a program denies the user that access and violates the spirit of the Open Gaming License.

I'd like a sincere answer to this question, though I know not all of you are of the same mind: what do you want to spend (in-game) money on?
 
I worked on IWD, HoW, TotL, and IWD2.  In virtually all of these games, I heard these two complaints over and over and over:
 
When unique items were in stores:
* I don't want to buy unique items in stores.
 
When unique items were in dungeons:
* I have nothing to spend my money on.
 
In all of these games, items you found on adventures were almost always one of the following: a) directly usable (i.e. gear or consumables) b) wealth items or c) quest items.  If something wasn't usable, it was usually a wealth item (gold, gem, etc.).  A wealth item only existed to give you gold, but for gold to have some sort of value, there needs to be something you want that costs x gold.  If high-value items aren't what you spend your gold on, what do you spend your gold on?  In PE, you may spend gold on your stronghold, but there's no guarantee of that.  And according to a lot of you, you don't use consumables, so if consumables aren't used, they're just wealth items -- not something you would want to spend gold on.
 
Part of the reason for having a crafting system was to make consumables less common in the world.  Only people who want to make/use them would see a relatively large quantity of them.  Since crafting ingredients are stored and sorted separately from other items, their presence subtracts nothing from the carrying capabilities of players who ignore the system entirely.
 
There are recurring trends I'm seeing:
 
* Don't like crafting.
* Don't like durability.
* Don't like consumables.
 
Combining those with with the two points at the top, it's hard for me to figure out where the gold is going to go.  There is also the possibility that players don't actually want a long-term gold economy in a SP game, that gold in the mid- and late-game is ultimately something to accumulate and that most/all forms of gear upgrading simply happens through quests and exploration.  That's not an invalid way to go, but I'd like to hear thoughts on it if you have the time.

Don't put in currency?

Don't put in currency?

I was jus' gon' say dat.

Also, they should not waste time listening to forum douchebags. I'd rather have a mediocre game developed by a game studio than a mediocre game with a thousand forum geniuses crapping all over it.

A few points of clarification:
 
* "Crafting" is one skill, but the crafting system uses multiple skills.  I.e., the crafting system does not rely on the existence of the Crafting skill.
* Other than reaching the edge of a map to access the world map, there is no fast-travel in PE.  That said, we will likely avoid the IWD-style 5-level dungeons without semi-regular shortcuts back to the surface (N.B.: this does not mean Skyrim-style loops).
* Most items do take up space in personal inventories!  The party Stash is unlimited, but the Pack (made of personal inventories) is not.  Crafting items (and quest items) always go into (and come out of) the Stash.  We are doing this specifically to address common complaints about crafting items cluttering the inventory.  Since crafting is typically done at camps or other non-combat locations, allowing the items to come out of the Stash doesn't seem to create any problems.
 
As I posted on SA, Crafting (the skill) and its associated subsystems (like durability) were the elements I felt least confident about in our skill system.  I strongly believe that choices within an array should give the player reasonably balanced benefits.  Because certain fundamental skills (like Stealth) can clearly benefit from multiple party members taking them and can contribute to party effectiveness in combat, I believe that other skills should do the same in their own way -- enough to make all of them appealing choices on multiple party members.  This also has the benefit of making the uses of skills much higher-frequency than the individual uses that depend on designer content (e.g. unlocking doors or gaining a dialogue/quest option).
 
As an example, Medicine in its various Fallout forms contributes to the efficacy of stimpaks.  There are many other places were Medicine can be used in quests and dialogue, but it has high-frequency use with stimpaks (in or between combats).  It's a benefit that can apply to any character who has the skill, even if a character with a higher rating in a party may be "the guy" to perform the high-difficulty actions.
 
With all of the skills other than Crafting (specifically), those high-frequency benefits/uses were easy to come by.  Crafting presented some difficulties and, as I wrote previously, I was concerned about the lack of systemic drains in the economy.  Many people have mentioned a lot of potential uses for wealth.  Most of them are great ideas and ones that we plan to use, but the vast majority of them are not systemic, rather content-dependent or scripted instances (e.g. bribes).  However, it is clear from discussions here and elsewhere that the long-term balance of the economy is not a concern for most players who voiced their opinions -- and almost certainly not in the endgame.
 
Based on discussions on the forums and conversations I had with people on the team, we will be doing the following:
 
* Removing durability as a mechanic on items.
* Removing the Crafting skill (specifically).  The crafting system and its associated mechanics will remain, as-is.
 
Ultimately, solving skill imbalance and endgame wealth abundance problems is not worth what players perceive as uninteresting and unenjoyable gameplay.  I can still solve the skill imbalance problems by removing the problem skill.  As for endgame wealth abundance, we will continue to create places for you to use wealth in the economy: unique items, the stronghold, optional quest/dialogue gates, etc.  Ultimately, if those options go unused, I'll have to trust that the majority of players won't be significantly troubled by an excess of wealth in the late game.
 
Thanks for all of your feedback.

My point is that you don't KNOW if it's a bad idea. You presume it is based on experience in another game.

The designer should, at the very least, wait until people play the game before soliciting and implementing their feedback. And even then, you need a singular vision driving the game's design or it will end up seeming fragmented and conflicting.

You don't KNOW if it's a good idea either, going by that logic. I believe it is, in fact, a bad mechanic to have in a game; Nox was just a single example.

I find durability mechanics to be a pain and a drain, with no positive benefit on a singleplayer game. And now is the time to think about making these changes - not after development resources have been spent, or after the game is released. It's much cheaper to do it now, so as not to waste those precious KS bucks.

I find durability mechanics to be a pain and a drain, with no positive benefit on a singleplayer game.

Also, in that particular scenario durability can be used to highlight legendary items by having those items be mechanically indestructible. The system is not without its place in the world.

Do you also wish you had unlimited ammunition in survival horror games? I think there's a space for games with durability mechanics that can work just fine. We don't really know if this is one of them yet - it very well may have been awful in this game - but I think the point that knee-jerking against it isn't useful is a good one.

I actually just played a game that did that, and all it did was mean you never repaired gear ever.  The system was more or less pointlessly tacked on.  The game in question however was pretty terrible in other regards, so this wasn't really surprising.

Its been a long time, but the Ring of Gaxx was Activations/Day, not an Item with charges, no?

Really quick, I want to clarify what I meant about “challenge mechanics.” That doesn’t always mean combat – it’s whatever the primary challenge in the game is. If we were doing a Thief-style RPG, then stealth and avoiding detection becomes the primary challenge mechanic, not combat. Depending on the RPG and its range of challenges, a character can still be fairly weak in combat, but if that’s the case, we try to think of how they’re helpful with regards to the game’s other challenges (giving an edge in dialogue, healing, fast travel).
 
For all the characters I’ve seen or designed for games that don’t cater to at least one of the game’s primary challenge mechanics, those guys are often unpopular or unused because they’re not helping out with the systematic gameplay, regardless of how cool they might seem. And the more actively these characters can participate in the mechanics (vs. passive), the stronger their appeal.
 
Also at the same time, I try to be careful that the companion's skill set doesn’t overlap with the challenge roles of the other characters. We try to indicate in the companion briefs how each companion's challenge role is intended – one thing I learned as a pen-and-paper Gamemaster is you want to be careful about two players sharing the same role (Tank, Mage, Priest, etc.) – if one is clearly stronger than another, then the second one needs something else to make them stand out and be “special” in the party and fulfill an equally cool role in the party dynamic, otherwise one ends up getting upstaged by the other. And feelings get hurt. Which isn’t something you want in a game designed to entertain.

Anyone going to declare where they think this will fall on the huge success/massive failure scale?

Seems to me that they are trying to do too much out of the gate, which makes me feel like that haven't learn their lessons. I'd love to be optimistic, but even if they only make half a decent game maybe they will be able to follow up with s decent one second time around?

Hello! I have spent much of my time for the last few weeks devoted to making the game’s stronghold system, which was one of our Kickstarter project’s biggest stretch goals, into one of the best systems in the game. Josh has created an amazing and detailed stronghold design, with lots of upgrades and activities and random events that really make owning a stronghold fun and exciting. I want to spend this update explaining what we have made in the game, but first, let’s talk about the stronghold itself.
 
First, a caveat: I am going to describe the stronghold as it is currently designed. This design is mostly programmed already too, but as with all development, it might change as we finish the art and audio, fix any bugs, and tune the game play. So please view this as a snapshot of the stronghold development as it exists today.
 
You will be offered the stronghold early in the game, before you finish Act 1. But the stronghold itself is old and dilapidated, and you will want to upgrade it as soon as you can. These upgrades will, in turn, open up new activities and events that can happen, which will make the stronghold a dynamic and fun place to own.
 
So let’s go through the many reasons why you will want to have a stronghold.
 
Bonuses
There are five bonuses you will receive for getting and upgrading your stronghold.
 
- Resting bonuses. Some of the upgrades to your stronghold will grant temporary bonuses to your attributes or non-combat skills when you rest there. As examples, you can build Training Grounds to improve your Strength or a Library to improve your Lore skill. Some of these upgrades are expensive, but you’re worth it.

- Adventures for idle companions. You will eventually have more companions than will fit in your party, so you will have leave some of them behind. While they are idling away at the stronghold, they can take part in their own adventures, earning additional experience for themselves and extra money, items and reputation bonuses for you!

- Ingredients. Many of the stronghold upgrades will generate ingredients used by non-combat skills. For example, Botanical Gardens create Survival ingredients over time, and a Curio Shop produces ingredients for use by both Lore and Mechanics.

- Special offers. Sometimes visitors to your stronghold will have rare items for sale, or perhaps they will offer you items in return for something else. Pay attention to these visitors. Some of these items may be nearly impossible to find any other way!

- Wealth. Don’t forget that by owning a stronghold, you also own all of the surrounding lands and impose a tax on all of the inhabitants. It will feel nice for a change to have someone recognize your high standing and give you the money that you so richly deserve.
 
These bonuses all sound great, right? Well, they are great, but they are just the passive benefits from owning and upgrading a stronghold. There are a lot of activities you can do too, once you take possession of your stronghold.
 
Activities
First and foremost, when you get your stronghold, you are going to want to upgrade it. Upgrades are improvements to various parts of the castle, usually to add to the security or prestige of the place. Security affects how much taxes you collect as well as helps reduce the number of “bad” random events, while prestige increases the number of “good” random events as well as increasing tax collections, too. Upgrades can also serve as prerequisites for other upgrades. For example, you cannot build your Training Grounds (and get your Strength bonus after resting at the stronghold) until you have repaired the inner bailey of the stronghold.
 
Every upgrade costs money and takes time to build, but as long as you have the prerequisites completed, you can have as many upgrades building simultaneously as you can afford. And you don’t have to wait at the stronghold while they are built, either. You can continue adventuring, and you will be notified when they are built.
 
You can begin collecting taxes from your populace as soon as you gain the stronghold. The amount of taxes you collect increases with your prestige (because people know of you and like you), but the amount also increases with higher security, since some taxes are lost to banditry. You will want to keep both of those values high.
 
You can also employ hirelings to stay at your stronghold. These people will provide bonuses to your prestige and security, but they cost money to employ. Some will leave your castle if you stop paying them, but others will wait around to get paid again (but not provide any bonuses until they are).
 
If you have cleared the dungeon and built a prison under your stronghold, then when you are fighting some of the named NPC’s in the game, you will be given an option to take them prisoner instead of killing them. Prisoners are kept in a cell in your prison, where you can visit them and talk to them, and occasionally use them as leverage later in the game. But you will need to keep your security level high, or you might suffer from a prison break!
Finally, several upgrades will produce ingredients used by non-combat skills. This feature, along with upgrades that can improve your skills, makes your stronghold a great place to craft and store items. You can stop by your castle occasionally and make food, potions, scrolls, armors and weapons, and any that you don’t need immediately can be stored in chests and other containers in a variety of places around the stronghold. You know, in case of an emergency.
 
Which brings us to random stronghold events.
 
Random Events
As you play the game after getting the stronghold, whether or not you are physically there, you will be told if a random event happens at the stronghold. Sometimes, you will need to deal with the event immediately, but usually you are given some time to decide what to do.
 
The most common event at your stronghold is having a visitor arrive. There are all kinds of visitors, but they all share one thing. They can adjust your prestige and/or security just by being at your stronghold. Some visitors are wonderful and give good bonuses, and you will want them to stay as long as possible. Some of these visitors can even be employed as hirelings and will stay on as long as you pay them. Others are not so great, and you will want to offer them one of your companions to act as an escort to their next location, or perhaps simply pay them to leave. Some visitors will offer rare items for sale, and some might even offer a very rare item in exchange for one of the prisoners in your dungeon. As you can see, visitors require some decision making on your part.
 
As mentioned above, your idle companions can take part in adventures as those events arise. You will be informed of what adventures are available, how long they will last, and what the rewards will be (in general terms). If you send a companion on an adventure, he or she is unavailable until they complete it and return with the rewards. You can recall any companions early, but then they earn nothing. Why would you ever want to recall them then? Because your stronghold can get attacked!
 
Attacks are the most potentially dangerous of all stronghold events. Occasionally troublemakers (of various sorts) will decide to attack your castle. You will be warned ahead of time of any such attack, so you can return to the stronghold and take part in it directly, if you want. Otherwise, the attack is simulated and you are told the results. A well-defended stronghold can repel any but the most concerted attacks, but there is always a chance of damage which can destroy upgrades, kill hirelings, and cost money. The threat of attacks is the most important reason to keep your security level as high as you can afford.
 
I hope you have enjoyed this sneak peek into the world of Project Eternity and the role your stronghold will play in the game. No matter how you play the game, your stronghold is certain to provide many benefits and also be a lot fun too!

South Park RPG will save them  :awesome_for_real:
They're fucked. But I'm too cynical against Obsidian. Aside from New Vegas and KOTOR 2(yeah it's still shit in the end) most of their games are flawed or in Dungeon Siege III case, too darn boring.

I want this game to be great, but all I see with these updates is "we're trying to do too much!"
It either won't work, or will me nothing like advertised.
I hope I'm wrong.

IG: The outpouring of support‭ (‬and cash‭!) ‬for‭ ‬Eternity shows that people were crying out for a new,‭ ‬Infinity Engine-style RPG.‭ ‬What do you think those‭ ‬90s RPG titles had that more contemporary RPGs are no longer providing‭?

AB: I think there are a few differences for me that distinguish an IE game from a modern RPG.‭ ‬One is the party based tactical combat‭ ‬-‭ ‬you don’t see too many games with full party control with‭ ‬6‭ ‬party members‭ ‬today.‭ ‬Secondly,‭ ‬IE games left room for the player to contribute to the‭ ‬experience‭ ‬-‭ ‬some which‭ ‬was necessitated by‭ ‬technology,‭ ‬the rest aesthetically.‭ ‬As an example,‭ ‬from how quests work,‭ ‬to the amount of dialogue we have,‭ ‬to the lore and item descriptions‭ ‬there’s a lot of reading‭ ‬in Project Eternity.‭ ‬This has allowed us to both add more content and also allow players a level of active immersion sometimes lost with modern VO and animation,‭ ‬which often fills in the blanks for the players.‭ ‬I enjoy having to use my imagination.‭

‬Last,‭ ‬while we want to make the game fun for everyone,‭ ‬we aren’t going to treat the player like a‭ ‬baby,‭ ‬which for some reason has become the standard in recent years.‭ ‬Our quests require you to think,‭ ‬the‭ ‬combat will be challenging,‭ ‬the choices might be difficult,‭ ‬and you won’t be hammered over the head with‭ ‬quest markers.

2.) The backer beta will not contain story spoilers. We are still discussing exactly what we want to do for it.

But the main point is that you don't need to have people play the actual game in order to test the engine out and make sure most things works.

But the main point is that you don't need to have people play the actual game in order to test the engine out and make sure most things works.

The name of the KS should be Speculation.

Or either a "spiritual successor" (hate this wording) to Vampire: Bloodlines with Tim Cain as Project Director  :drill: :awesome_for_real:

We don't have a final area count but it's pretty high, comfortably in the IE game range.

- Interview with Josh Sawyer on Eurogamer: no romances in Pillars of Eternity! (more in the interview...I mean, not more romances, just more stuff to read :P)  :awesome_for_real:
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2014-02-10-pillars-of-eternity-interview-off-cuts

Obsidian's internal testers? :awesome_for_real:

While I usually agree with you, in this case I think there's room for both gameplay styles. The real-time "turn-based" approach works for me. My only worry is that they've given all the classes too many options; obstensibly a Good Thing but it might make combat too busy without an excellent AI/Scripting system (on par with FFXII).

nothing in the Backer Beta has a direct connection to the critical path/main story of Pillars of Eternity. We have intentionally excluded any spoiler content so our backers can play the beta worry-free. None of the quests are connected to the crit path and none of the pre-made companions are going to be in the final game.

Until now their justification for that has alway been that those issues came from publisher interference. That they can't do great work when budgets and deadlines are forced on you externally and you have to ship regardless of the game being done or not. They also said, that this would no longer be the case with Pillards of Eternety due to the kickstarter model and the 'when it's done philosophy'.

We'll see if this is shown to be true or not.

Facts and stuff.  Can see trees, but not forest.

Sounds like a disappointing start, sounds like 'Publisher interference' may have been just designers blaming the fact that they actually have a schedule and deadlines as part of the production process rather than things actually being unrealistically rushed in the past. Which means when you've got finite time and money resources you're game is going to have problems and that ain't the publisher being a jackass.

Not meant as a dig on you, Jeff, I think I can tell from your posts that you are a probably fan of these games as wll and are just armchairing a bit. 

Yep, the "Bugsidian" rep is a bit overblown. I understand that NV was pretty buggy right after launch, but then so was every other game with that engine. I played it ~6-9mo after release and had pretty much zero issues. Their last IE game (IWD2) was done on a ridiculously short schedule and still ended up decent-ish. NWN2... well... the engine was terrible, so I didn't get past the prologue (though I heard good things about MOTB). Alpha Protocol wasn't anywhere near as fun as Deus Ex, but it was still an interesting game to play.

My problems with Obsidian games are mostly related to them making games I'm just plain not interested in (lately: Dungeon Siege 3, South Park, and they're also apparently working on a World of Tanks clone). Pillars of Eternity looks like it's right up my alley, though, despite my preference for turn-based combat!

e: also, the Pillars lead designer shares his philosophy on RPGs here (http://kotaku.com/how-to-balance-an-rpg-1625516832), it's an interesting read (WARNING: KOTAKU LINK) I guess the main takeaway is that balance > all, even in single-player games. It certainly explains some of the design choices I've seen -- and in that case, IMO the main challenge PoE will be to make sure that the different archetypes / options are actually distinct enough despite being "balanced" against each other.

I'm in the new X-Com camp on this one. Do a few classes/combos but do them right and make sure synergy and tactical options fit. Then do the itemization for those classes. Once you have the holy trinity down then think about how you can extend/broaden the class system. What usually happens is that you have lots of classes that are indiscernable from each other and an itemization that stinks.

I doN#t get why so many developers fuck this up. Most of your game emchanics in rpgs/tactical combat sims is combat, so get your initial classes down, get your combat system down, get the itemization down. Then extend. 80% of my gameplay will involve that so it be better good and tight.

new X-Com had this down. The limited base classes hurt its replay value a bit but what they had was lean and tight.

I doN#t get why so many developers fuck this up. Most of your game emchanics in rpgs/tactical combat sims is combat, so get your initial classes down, get your combat system down, get the itemization down. Then extend. 80% of my gameplay will involve that so it be better good and tight.

Except when it comes to paying employees. AMIRITE?  :why_so_serious:

Which means I'll just end up making a bunch of plain humans because the trade-offs are often terrible.

Pre-loading now.

You can redeem keys now for backers. I'm preloading on steam at the moment.

I suspect the stat system might suck balls, I think D&D-ish Baldur's Gate was the best.

I really hope both games are good and successful and we can have a new era of 1999. I even got an email from Prince yesterday (seriously).

A Note From Prince

Sorry 2 bother U.

Just wanted 2 send U this
baby picture of Judith Hill with Her 1st piano.

Loox like her parents, who r also musicians- had a plan.
Well, that plan succeeded.

This is Judith Hill's debut album BACK IN TIME.

Please spend some time with this music and then share it with someone U love.

Pre-ordered this today, the hype train has left the station and I'm pulling the whistle!  Going in very ignorant about the whole game.  My first character is usually a thief type because you can find meatshields everywhere and I like unlocking cabinets and looking at ladies' knickers.

Update by Josh Sawyer, Project Director and Brandon Adler, Lead Producer
 
Hey, everyone. After two and a half years, we're happy that you're finally going be able to get your hands on Pillars of Eternity. It's been a great pleasure to work on a traditional PC RPG again and it wouldn't have been possible without your interest, support, and feedback. We hope that playing Pillars of Eternity gives you the same feelings you had when you played the Infinity Engine games. Many of you have told us how much these games have meant to you over the years. It's always been our goal to recapture that experience as well as we can. We've worked hard to provide you with a beautiful world to explore, flexible systems that allow you to build all the characters and parties you can dream up, and a rich story that responds to the choices you make. Nothing can replace the Infinity Engine games, but we hope Pillars of Eternity is a worthy successor to that heritage.
 
Thank you again for all you have done.
 
-Josh Sawyer

Hm. Rogue solo playthrough? :awesome_for_real:

Combat Options[5]
Perma Death, characters whose health reduced to 0 will permanently die, instead of becoming Maimed.
Hide Highlighting from area of effect spells and abilities.
Hide Defense and Accuracy tool-tips.
Brief vs. Verbose system feedback
Non-Combat Options[5]
Hide unqualified conversation options.
Hide Attributes and Skills checks thresholds for conversation options.
Hide the earned reputation and disposition effect of an option.
Hide the disposition values in the character sheet.[6]
Hide companion influence messages.[7]
Hide explicit quest objectives in Journal i.e. show just the journal text of the quest, without explicit objectives saying what to do.

Who actually looks at your character beyond the portrait anyway? Viconia always had a helmet on as did Minsk. They look like their portraits to me.

by the way, looks like Steam  has yet to include the Day 1 patch (GOG download already comes with it).

This is indeed the "day one" patch. There is no new patch coming today (unless there's a crazy hotfix issue.) We are working on 1.03, but that's not locking down until next week. We'd like to collect issues reported here and elsewhere to make sure any immediate stuff gets resolved.
 
Generally, that number at the end (508) is the daily build number. We don't fire off lots and lots of builds - it would take way too much time too do that. They usually only occur once daily, sometimes 2-3 times a day depending on the situation.

I can't advise playing a ranger as pets appear to be broken. Mine never fights and now he's disappeared after the first mini-dungeon.  As a result I can't leave the map. Reloading has done nothing.

Also, I've got a bug with sound. The "closing scroll" sound just plays the first 1/4 second on repeat. Endlessly.  I had to turn off sounds to avoid the "Thap thap thap thap thap thap thap"

Fun other than that.

Liking character options! Death godlike Monk with the aquaman body is my first go. Huge!

Hard Trial of Iron here we come...

Ranger pet thing is a known bug. I believe the work-around is to load a save in a different area, then go back to your current save. Sometimes works... sometimes doesn't. I haven't had any issues with the created Adventurer of mine who's a Ranger.. but I've only had her for an hour or so.

The scroll sound bug I've only heard of in conjunction with some Cheat Engine stuff, so no idea how to fix it or what.

I didn't enable the cheat engine, so no idea there. Hopefully it's just a bug with that save that won't pop up in the next.

Not sure how true this is, but I looked around and saw someone report the issue with the sound effect bug is from minimizing combat and tutorial pages. Not sure what the cause of the bug is, but if you have something suppressing those things (an Expert mode feature?), maybe turn that off and see if it goes away? I haven't had that bug and have those things set to pop up.

In gameplay news, other than the inability to name my one save game and the crippling lack of ability hotkeys, it's pretty good so far.

Monk so far is a bit eh, but hopefully improves.

I started a few new games with different classes. Monk seemed awesome but I've found its mechanic to be too reliant on your opponents attacking you a lot; but not too much.

Cipher has been rather pleasant. A great gish implementation.

Path of the Damned has been a decent high difficulty mode so far, and certainly much better than the usual Bioware difficulty mods (which tend to polarise their gameplay mechanics). Eg - so far I'm not finding any abilities or classes marginalised by the difficulty level, whereas in Dragon Age and Mass Effect a high difficulty was kind of laborious in how it mode most character choices utterly ineffectual, promoting the more boring play styles or long, drawn out but ultimately easy combats.

Stop. All of  you.  I don't want to buy this yet.  :awesome_for_real:

Don't despair tho! Paradox is also shipping my physical Collector's Edition, that will include an extra digital copy with another code, of course.

f you double click an item to equip it to your character, your character loses ALL Passives/Racials/Permanent Buffs, forever.

Dragging and dropping works fine, but do not double click or you might find yourself having to restart your game. Loading the game up from a previous save thankfully does fix it.

webm of the bug in action: http://webmup.com/HArIv/vid.webm

As you can see, I lose several passive effects (And am already missing my Wood Elf racial from a previous time before I learned about the bug), including a talent and a class ability. The abilities remain listed in the abilities/talents section, but if they aren't in active effects, then perhaps you've already encountered the bug first hand.

EDIT: Another webm http://webmup.com/aDSfX/vid.webm

Kana loses his 3rd Weapon Slot as soon as I double click so it's not just a visual display bug, you do actually lose all bonuses.

Also thought I'd stress that it only happens when you double click to REPLACE an item, if the slot is empty you won't lose anything. So please double check before you post saying that it isn't happening to you.

Hmm, guess I also got another physical copy in coming.  Thought I had stuck with digital only.

In any event, I generated the key for the hero edition.  Several of you have shown interest, and you're all cool.  So.

(https://shastimuli.files.wordpress.com/2014/11/tryouts-joker.gif)

Figure out amongst yourselves who deserves the key, and I'll message it to them.  Don't feel like picking.

I dont feel comfortable giving Paradox money.

This makes no sense to me. At all.

Hit another "crap, have to start over" bug.  I'm trapped in the Evil Lord's castle after killing him and any time I try to exit the game crashes. Hooray.

It stems from a long history of making weird buggy eurotrash with impenetrable mechanics. I'll get over it eventually, just not yet. It's a personal issue. It isn't like my boycott against EA. This is more of a "I am mildly annoyed by them and my way of dealing with it has been to just ignore them."

Edit (I'm mildly weak on Pillars since Planescape: Torment is one of my top 5 games ever and I'd like to think this one touches on some of its finer aspects)

Oh, and I backed the Torment sequel being done by the same guys to a pretty high amount.  Think I have alpha access and other dumb shit.  So I'll have some goodies to give away for that as well Schild (and hopefully development on that will start speeding up now that this is done).

Ok, looks like Schild pulls seniority.   :awesome_for_real:

He'll get it unless somebody is brave enough to object.  If my physical copy comes with a free digital edition as mentioned before, then that means I'll have another to give away.  Anybody else other than Lucas and I back this thing to a higher than basic amount?

It stems from a long history of making weird buggy eurotrash with impenetrable mechanics. I'll get over it eventually, just not yet. It's a personal issue. It isn't like my boycott against EA. This is more of a "I am mildly annoyed by them and my way of dealing with it has been to just ignore them."

Edit (I'm mildly weak on Pillars since Planescape: Torment is one of my top 5 games ever and I'd like to think this one touches on some of its finer aspects)

There's a thread on how to maybe fix a bug which sounds similar here: http://www.reddit.com/r/projecteternity/comments/30mf9g/reminder_save_often_every_for_1_hour_of_gameplay/

hopefully of some help.

One thing that is annoying me, the foreplay/sex metaphors. WTF? Writing is generally good, but one of them has issues...

Hmm, guess I also got another physical copy in coming.  Thought I had stuck with digital only.

In any event, I generated the key for the hero edition.  Several of you have shown interest, and you're all cool.  So.

(https://shastimuli.files.wordpress.com/2014/11/tryouts-joker.gif)

Figure out amongst yourselves who deserves the key, and I'll message it to them.  Don't feel like picking.

I ... Want. I want hard.

What are the gold labeled npcs?  Was that some sort of kickstarter thing where for a certain amount of money you could name/create an npc?  There are too many of them to be possible party members.

So I made a boring ass fighter that hits things with swords for my first play-through. 90 minutes in I'm basically having screensaver fights. Since I'm windowed I just click out and come back when things are dead.

That's annoying. Just because it's inspired by some of the best games of the 90s doesn't mean that shit has to still exist.

So I made a boring ass fighter that hits things with swords for my first play-through. 90 minutes in I'm basically having screensaver fights. Since I'm windowed I just click out and come back when things are dead.

My monk has done 50% of my damage though, so maybe I'm just missing something with how to get the best from the rest, and not playing very defensively.

So I made a boring ass fighter that hits things with swords for my first play-through. 90 minutes in I'm basically having screensaver fights. Since I'm windowed I just click out and come back when things are dead.

That's annoying. Just because it's inspired by some of the best games of the 90s doesn't mean that shit has to still exist.

What difficulty are you playing on? Even the fighter has things to do in combat…

I noticed that with my fighter, too. There was an early fight with a guy that has 6DR and I was only taking a point of damage off him at max hit. I had to reload and skip that fight for the time being.

Pulls rank to get a free copy of the game, ragequits within an hour and a half. Well played sir.

So far I'm playing a Cipher and I'm just about to get to the first town - only thing I've had real trouble with was a mean-ass bear.

Also, opening a fight with blind + ranged rogue shots are pure money.

I'm going to attempt to go against type and see how it works out if I concentrate on getting and using all sorts of status effect/disabling abilities.

Have no idea if I'm building my Cipher correctly so far, but it's fun nonetheless. I also really like how they've seemingly solved the issue of having to constantly heal between fights.

Get a mace.

I killed the bear!  I play on easy though :awesome_for_real:.

7) Scout everywhere so that you can find all the hidden treasure.

4) Recruit adventurers.  The inns, including the very first one allow you to recruit an adventurer which essentially just rolls a new character for you.  You can ditch them later when you fill up with true companions.

Get a mace.

Fuck that; you get 2 free companions in the first village like literally 10 minutes into the main quest, two others on next two map screens and then one more right past the stronghold. That's full party with decent equipment that doesn't cost you a dime.

Is that what that shit is? Lol

I can see it now. "Wow, Jerry. You're even fucking annoying as a non plot relevant character in a video game."

Alright. Who on f13 has a jibber jabber npc? Someone must.

I don't think torment was very good... Merely good. I didn't play it until 8 years later, though.

I don't think your opinion matters then.  :geezer:

Torment is an ugly game with a shocking combat system, a self important and overly verbose attitude towards writing, and a rather cliche plot.

350 portraits, plus 59 more:

http://imgur.com/a/eOhqV (350)

http://imgur.com/a/1bQAJ  (59)

souls of Kickstart Backers? 

:why_so_serious:

C'mon guise, give us a toggle to turn those people off. I'm not interested in reading a bunch of fanfics that had nothing to do with the game. I can't even talk to them nor interact with them in any meaningful way.

Later on weapons with the DR bypass become real good.

Companions are good, but hired adventurers are better, as you get to build them up from scratch, meaning they are much, much better put together and don't have wasted attributes/talents. That said, I'm running a full Companion party for this first run. I'd ditch Durance if I could, but he's a Cleric. Already ditched Kana for the dwarf ranger who I like more. I've just reached the big city, though. Which brings me to an important tip (mild spoilers);

I have 30000 money, I literally cannot spend it fast enough. And there is a seversevere companion shortage in many class options. Second play through I'm building half the squad as I like it.

I'm a big fan of Obsidian games but I have to say how glad I am that I didn't  purchase this at release. I'm willing to pay full price but I haven't got the patience to deal with Obsidian's typical release day game-stopping bugs.

Well, I was talking about the starting part (first village and such) where I definitely didn't have 30k or even 1k to spend. Although even 30k doesn't seem that hard to get rid of -- I see vendor stuff listed at 5-10k a pop, and that's not even the allegedly good vendor plus then there's stronghold upgrades and whatnot. Granted, there's decent gear to be obtained from questing and such but if you really want to get rid of money you easily can.

Also unrelated but holy shit people paid 1k a pop to put these Soul Fanfics in the game? :uhrr:

You can kill them for being obnoxious without the real people of that world minding? That annoying feature just got awesome.

I for one, plan on going back and killing Desslock. I recall him as being particularly obnoxious back in the day.


If they do another Kickstater, I am totally going to buy an NPC and have him remember a flame war from a forum board that no longer exists, about a world no one cares about. There's some guy with a hat I need to hunt down one day....

For an Obsidian game this has an astonishingly low amount of bugs.

I've experienced zero so far. Of any kind.

. Seems more or less like 'don't play a ranger and you're fine'.

Sure, but until you realize this isn't a feature like in Divinity 2 (where reading thoughts could led to quests) you read enough fanfic crap to let you seriously contemplate suicide.

Same here. Seems more or less like 'don't play a ranger and you're fine'.

I've experienced zero so far. Of any kind.

i think your monk's toughness might be one: http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/73449-stat-bonus-modifiers-can-erroneously-be-applied-multiple-times-allowing-stats-to-grow-beyond-intended-values/

that particular bug aside (which has made hard mode trivial in act 2 :( ) i've had a great run so far.

I don't think that bug can happen to the PC, only to companions (from the description anyway.)

i think your monk's toughness might be one: http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/73449-stat-bonus-modifiers-can-erroneously-be-applied-multiple-times-allowing-stats-to-grow-beyond-intended-values/

that particular bug aside (which has made hard mode trivial in act 2 :( ) i've had a great run so far.

Apparently there are a couple bugs with stats and such as well, but they haven't hit my game.

Hmm.  I'm missing a point after character creation and I thought it was just me being thick.  But I think maybe it's not.

What kind of world are we living in to tolerate that kind of discrimination on trans?

Hey asshole,  it reads... "Firedorn Lightbringer Here lies Firedorn, a hero in bed He once was alive and now he's dead The last woman be bedded, turned out a man and crying in shame, of a cliff he ran"

What kind of world are we living in to tolerate that kind of discrimination on trans?
Holy shit. Wake up man, it's 2015!

You really want to drag this games thread into the Politics Forum crying and screaming, do you?
Let me veer this back ontopic.

I tried to erradicte those Fanfic dummies from the face of Eora, but as it turns out the rest of the city turns against you and attack when you do so. You lying liars that lie!

Stop shitting up the thread you egotistical twit. Who fucking cares.

Why does the name Desslock sound familiar?

Also, you should let that beef with Arcadaian just go. Guy wound-up managing a Chic-Fil-A someone else owned. Be happy at that and move on.

Hmm.  I'm missing a point after character creation and I thought it was just me being thick.  But I think maybe it's not.

I think Desslock was an old gamespot reviewer?

What's a good difficulty for playing this game in "ironman mode" (only one save game)?


Also did they rename "Ironman" into "Trial of Iron" for PC reasons?  :uhrr: :grin: *runs*

That would make sense and I hope so.

Why don't we complain about the bug that has retroactively fucked over our characters ??

Never had a ranger bug because the D&D games taught me to never play a ranger.

I got lazy one day and decide to have fun.  (https://youtu.be/IEDAu-kVJDo) :awesome_for_real:

(https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/829607/daily/79/therightobeararms.jpg)

What to do?  Do I give up Steam Achievements (yet again) and use the console to fix my characters?  Or do I wait for a patch? 

Remember when I said I don't give Paradox money because everything they release is riddled with bugs. And then people said that's crazy.

Is it?

is it crazy?

Remember when I said I don't give Paradox money because everything they release is riddled with bugs. And then people said that's crazy.

Is it?

is it crazy?

Personally, I haven't complained about bugs because.. well, I haven't experienced any. I never double-clicked equipment, so never got that bug (for which there's a work around unless it happens to the pc). Never had the permament buff bug, because I've never buffed, saved, loaded. Never had a ranger bug because the D&D games taught me to never play a ranger. Didn't get stuck anywhere or anything. Didn't even get the Act 2 quest line bug with the three factions (which is related to the Winds of Steel knights quest).

Didn't even try to avoid them, just never got them, so nothing to complain about. The patch this week should help a lot of these (and, knowing Obsidian, create some new interesting ones), but I haven't put off playing waiting for it (just because I haven't had time, sadly).

It is not crazy.  You're talking to the crazy people here.  I'd bet you a sum of American money that they do, in fact, remember Knights of the Old Republic II yet still get hard dicks thinking about how awesome this game will be now that Obsidian is "free" to do what they wanted all along.  Which, I would wager, is perform half-ass game development.

Also, the more reasonable ones remember you have avoided Dying Light simply because of the intro movie and so you maintain an aura of suspicious motive.

Okay:
 
Don't double-click to equip.
 
Don't save and load the game in a location where you recruited a companion.
 
Save regularly and don't overwrite your saves, you want to be able to back up if you hit a problem.  Probably not a terrible idea to occasionally copy the save folder over somewhere else.
 
If you equip any items that boost stats, keep an eye on the person wearing them that the stat in question isn't having its base value increased beyond where it should be over time.
 
Avoid the Drinking Horn of Moderation amulet.
 
Maybe avoid rangers for the time being; their animal companions can disappear and apparently remain disappeared across all your saves, preventing you from moving between areas.
 
Make sure you have a proper save before going to Raedric's Hold, as well as before entering the Sanitarium.
 
If you are playing a goody two shoes benevolent type, don't do the quest that starts with a godlike woman called Pallegina saying something to you, it'll end up broken.

Kotor 2 was better than kotor 1 in every way except for the rushed story/final.

Unfortunately we are unable to add new strings into the game at this point. These may get changed in future releases, but at the moment just look at the effects portion of the spell description.

Is rogue backstab ever useful? I cant recall ever getting very close to an enemy before being revealed, even with decent stealth. Stealth seems useless?

just pull out an arbalest or aquerbus in sneak attack.
blam. you just hit the guy for 75 dmg.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JulJxOIfPYo (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JulJxOIfPYo)

Aye, that's all very well, but Stealth has no place in combat beyond the first hit.

- Bears and Cats can now be equipped with hats. This is most likely not a joke... but might be a joke.

- Double-clicking to equip items was causing passive abilities to get removed from the character. This has been fixed and we were able to retroactively fix the problem for people that have already run into the issue. If you open your saved game in the latest patch, your characters will be repaired.

- Fixed a problem where attributes on characters could permanently increase by equipping certain items. This will also retroactively fix the problem in saved games that have characters with this issue.

- The crash in Raedric's Hold has been fixed.

- Fixed the looping audio sounds that can occur if you play with minimized tooltips.

- Previously Wizard summoned items could persist after the spell's duration. This has been fixed and it will also retroactively fix the problem in saved games that have characters with this issue.

- The items Drinking Horn of Moderation and Talisman of the Unconquerable were causing Ciphers to permanently lower their amount of focus gain. We've included a fix to retroactively resolve the issue on Ciphers but the effect is still on the items. Unfortunately the fix will not fix the broken effect on those items, so you'll need to keep those items unequipped until the next patch. If you do equip them, perform a Save/Load to fix your Cipher.

Now I know it's a BG-legacy game. Melee classes are ass.   :why_so_serious:

I'm going to disable automatic patching until I hear an all-clear that it doesn't corrupt or otherwise destroy current save files.

Holy crap there is no longer a way to just disable updates, the only choices are auto, really fast auto and update at launch.  Assholes.  I know these "retoractive" fixes are going to destroy some peoples games what with how terrible Obsidian QA is.

We have hotfixed the problem with adventurer hall-created companions not being able to unlock doors or chests. This should work correctly now. Without getting into too much detail, it looks like adding and removing a companion in the Stronghold can cause its voice set to be stripped. This was causing a null reference exception when they tried to unlock items.

Hotfix available on Steam (580MB....Unity  :oh_i_see:) :

Oh good. I was having that exact problem last night. 

I'm getting bored.  When I try to go any place to advance quests my team gets its ass kicked right now. Level 6 but can't take out the drakes for that quest and I can't figure out how to get to the 2nd town.  (Not the village with the ogre).

Oh good. I was having that exact problem last night. 

I'm getting bored.  When I try to go any place to advance quests my team gets its ass kicked right now. Level 6 but can't take out the drakes for that quest and I can't figure out how to get to the 2nd town.  (Not the village with the ogre).

I can 100% reproduce this bug in my current save which I think is to do with the sickened status effect from a gul's attack.
 
In my specific save, my party is around the dial with 3 remaining gul creatures.
 
1. I attack them with no spells, just plain regular attacks, win the fight obviously.
2. Let one of more of you party members get either sickened or poisoned status effect.
 
Either one or more of my party members will see an increase in max HP if they got the status effect, you can see it in combat, sometimes it works fine in battle by reducing max HP, but other times you can see the max HP skyrocket. At one point I got my Eder to 570+ HP.
 
I also noticed that my player created companion wasn't getting affected, more tests need to be done on that.
 
If the developers want, I can send my save file, I just need to know where to look.
 
Hope this help.

It feels half done in the end. And had such a promising start.

Do you have any plans for an Eternity tabletop RPG or anything like that? I mean, you created this new world and all this new lore, do you see that expanding out to other media?

Absolutely. So, actually one of the things we're going to announce very soon, I don't even know if I talked about it. Not in the latest backer update but the next backer update, we're definitely going to talk about how we're going to be Kickstarting... not us, but another group is going to be Kickstarting a Pillars of Eternity card game. This isn't like a CCG or anything like that, but it's more just a fun, kind of, four people get around and play a single session card game. You have heros, and you have a village, and all that kind of stuff, and you can take your heroes into a dungeon, and you can also take your heroes and armies and attack your friends while they're playing, so it's kind a very fun card game and it's actually designed by Chris Taylor. Not... there's two Chris Taylors. [Laughs] It's Chris Taylor, a friend of mine for many many years who was the lead designer of Fallout.
So, that's the first thing we're really looking at, and also, absolutely on the tabletop roleplaying. We're not sure yet how we're going to do it, we were kind of going back and forth on, do we use the game's rules, do we use someone else's rules, do we come up with another set of rules? And it's something we're going to be talking [about] soon. But absolutely, we want to expand. New books, roleplaying, all that kind of stuff.

Speaking of expansions, can you give us any details on what might be coming in the future?

Sure. So, with the Kickstarter we announced that we were going to do an expansion, and so how we're approaching that is to actually do the expansion in two parts, and have one part out sooner than the other part. The idea being that people are really enjoying Pillars right now and they're going to get finished their first or second playthrough within in the next two weeks, a month, something like that. And so, we definitely want there to be content for them to enjoy and I think we're going to be talking about that pretty soon. I don't think we've released anything specifically, but it really ends up being this concept of this story that expands parts of what you would see in those sort of old school expansions we made for Icewind Dale and Baldur's Gate. So not just these three, four hour downloadable DLCs, but definitely big chunks of a story and a new hub to go to and things like that.
So that's kind of how we're really approaching it, like we've done with Eternity throughout is this idea of, these games kind of went away but not for a reason they should have. The industry shifted to so much console with this idea that PC wasn't so much of a gaming platform, which I know no one thinks that anymore. So, back then when you got an expansion you got this meaty thing with hours and hours of gameplay. And that's really what we're trying to do. So, while we're splitting it in two, it is like one continual story that people get to play.[/b]