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[Zeliard]

Sawyer said this in the SA thread, which is what I figured:

Without a more broadly-applicable per-character benefit, it becomes a skill that one character takes and no one else should ever take -- unlike something like Stealth, for example. If you put points into Crafting and you gain a companion who also has points in Crafting, one of you just wasted a bunch of skill points.

Durability is what adds value to the skill, albeit in a sort of addition by subtraction way. You remove durability and crafting suddenly becomes totally unnecessary to have on more than one character, as is often the case.

Honestly, crafting is never something I've particularly cared for in most RPGs. Crafting tends to work decently in single-character games like The Witcher series, but in a party-based affair you have to add value to the skill or you'll simply have one set crafting character and the skill is suddenly void for everyone else. You'd be making it completely redundant to put on more than one character.

People wanted crafting as a stretch goal, after all! The devs are beholden to it. The other potential option would be to remove the durability mechanic and have crafting as some inherent ability of certain companions right off the bat, removing it as a set skill that can be chosen by anyone. Though in the end, people would probably just feel pressured to take some crafting companion around that they may not otherwise like (similar to a mule companion). Perhaps another option is to give every character crafting as some natural skill, with some more adept at it than others.

What I'm curious about is how durability will affect characters who rarely or never use physical melee attacks, i.e. wizards, and who also tend not to be hit as often. Ideally, there should be value in putting crafting on that sort of character as well, so that making the choice to take the skill is something you have to consider for everyone. Tim Cain's follow-up post should clear up a lot of it.

 

[Sensuki]

They should just make Crafting an arbitrary action and not a skill. Keep the prerequisites of stuff to recipes and remove Item Durability.

 

[duckroll]

Ultimately the question will is how much of a disadvantage damaged equipment will cause. Is it going to be a huge gap like -50% damage and accuracy, at which point you have to repair the item or it becomes practically useless? Or is it going to be something like -10% which doesn't really have much of an impact on shitty equipment at all, but might have more of a negative effect on better equipment?

The point is: equipment upkeep should not be annoying. Even in games which are built around it and have the simplest ways to "repair all", like Diablo, upkeep is not a fun part of the game. It's there as a distraction and a reminder that each time you fail or as you progress further, you have to sink more money into equipment tax. For a party based RPG where each character has their own equipment sets, if players are expected to have to check and repair every weapon and main armor piece at rest points, it can become monotonous and annoying.

Durability will have to be presented in a way which doesn't create that psychological effect on players. I understand the desire to have a practical passive bonus for craftsmen characters such that their equipment are maintained better and hence perform better than those who aren't craftsmen, but it's also very easy for players to miss out on this angle and instead interpret the system as an annoying one which serves entirely as a time and money sink in an unfun way. If players feel that they have to worry about durability all the time in a party based CRPG, I think the system will be a flaw rather than a benefit.

 

[Sentenza]

Sawyer said this in the SA thread, which is what I figured:

Durability is what adds value to the skill, albeit in a sort of addition by subtraction way. You remove durability and crafting suddenly becomes totally unnecessary to have on more than one character, as is often the case..

Which... is something I was always completely fine with?

 

[mclem]

I wonder if they'll release their vertical slice to the players to get feedback and stuff. Could be a very interesting approach if they do.

Vertical slices are typically shown to publishers to greenlight the rest of the project, so its interesting that they have done one.

If I were them, I'd consider using a vertical slice populated with a few simple quests (HEY GO GET THE TREASURE FROM THE DRAGON IN THE CAVE sort of thing) and distribute it as an alpha to backers - no meaningful story, but a chance to stress-test the actual engine systems and check they function adequately.

 

[Zeliard]

Which... is something I was always completely fine with?

I think it's too limiting to have a skill so shallow you only ever need to put it on one character. Skills should ideally be weighed against other skills for most every character, to make such decisions more meaningful. Always felt that diplomacy, intimidation, etc only serving the main char in NWN2/MotB to be fairly silly since it never factors in into skill choices for anyone else, yet they can still be chosen. Storm of Zehir attempted to combat just that with its party conversation system.

Durability is an imperfect solution to this issue as far as crafting but it's understandable where they're coming from. It doesn't mean you're going to put crafting on every character, but it does probably mean you'll consider it for more than just one of them.

 

[Sinatar]

The real problem with crafting is that the more emphasis developers put on it, the less awesome loot you find in the world.

Absolutely *nothing* worse in an RPG then going through a tough dungeon, slaying the powerful dragon and your reward is some toenails that you have to combine with some other shit you found 14 hours ago, plus 6000 gold worth of metal that can only be bought in one town just so you can craft the sword that it should have just dropped in the first place.

Crafting is bad. Bad bad bad, well except for alchemy, mixing potions is fine.

 

[trab pu kcip]

The real problem with crafting is that the more emphasis developers put on it, the less awesome loot you find in the world.

Absolutely *nothing* worse in an RPG then going through a tough dungeon, slaying the powerful dragon and your reward is some toenails that you have to combine with some other shit you found 14 hours ago, plus 6000 gold worth of metal that can only be bought in one town just so you can craft the sword that it should have just dropped in the first place.

Crafting is bad. Bad bad bad, well except for alchemy, mixing potions is fine.

that's what I thought too. I would prefer if it's more of an optional thing just to enhance weapons or armor, for example: you already have some legendary weapon but if you have a high crafting skill you're able to make it even better. this also leads to interesting ways of handling loot, you may either constantly try to find better stuff if you wish to do so (like described in the quoted post) or you could keep upgrading some special piece of equipment and maybe even end up having it your entire playthrough. I don't know why but having this option sounds kind of tempting to me. but you'd still have a choice since it's not the "you have to do crafting or your clothes will rot away" stuff.
normaly this kind of thing is not bound to a skill at all or only achieved through spells/magic or finding gems and stones etc. I think dragon age - awakening introduced some kind of runecrafting skill though that was aiming for this direction. it sure was interesting.

 

[SquiddyCracker]

I second the notion of crafting being an optional that when engaged in by players gives the crafting-interested a different sort of enjoyment that people who don't care about crafting won't mind missing out on.

Just gotta figure out what crafting-interested players want from crafting (customizable gear?) and just give them that rather than making crafting ubiquitous. As for the problem of party members joining with skills you've already made your Mc learn, you could always just give either the MC or new member a way of redoing skill points.
Or you can make it a party-wide skill, e. g. pooling together everyone's crafting skills to simulate crafting being a joint venture between the characters who knows how to craft (which makes sense).

 

[duckroll]

http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/64048-update-58-crafting-with-tim-cain/page-18

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.

I recommend reading the actual post by Josh Sawyer, since it contains a lot more details about what led to this discussion, but the crafting skill itself is being removed along with durability (which only existed to make crafting as a skill more attractive), while the crafting system itself (which will use other skills as well) remains.

 

[EviLore]

Much better. Thanks for listening to feedback, as always, Josh et al.

 

[zkylon]

cool

good on them for taking feedback to heart

 

[FACE]

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.

Thumbs up.

 

[SquiddyCracker]

Man, this is why a kickstarted game development is so much more exciting than a publisher controlled one
The buyers of the game actually have a say in what goes into the game.

 

[injurai]

J-Saw is easily my favorite dev at the moment.

 

[Mystic Theurge]

I didn't think they would actually change their mind; I'm glad that they did.

 

[injurai]

I didn't think they would actually change their mind; I'm glad that they did.

They mentioned that their design process is to closely work off of community feedback. Because without us, they wouldn't be making this at all.

 

[Labadal]

Should have called it update #59.

 

[Sentenza]

Very glad about this change.
it wasn't a deal-breaker for me, but I can't really see that kind of mechanic adding anything enjoyable to this kind of game.

 

[Count of Monte Sawed-Off]

Sweet. While I thought the way they were doing it wasn't that bad if they felt they had to do it. But I'm much happier that weapon/armor degradation is gone.

 

[Zeliard]

Excellent and impressively quick response to feedback.

 

[pa22word]

This is actually something that's pretty scary about kickstarter. Even though I understand durability isn't a pleasant mechanic, it is a good one in order to both provide incentive for certain playstyles and balance. Sometimes the audience isn't right, and unfortunately with kickstarter when the audience is the one supplying the money....

Reminds me a lot of how stripped down Dead Rising got in later entries in the interest of "fun".

Don't get me wrong, I have no doubt this game will still end up a great title, but I think this sets a dangerous precedent, and I hope they don't end up compromising their game for the sake of the fans. Because then we'd just be in a barely better position as we were with publishers funding this game, if not worse.

 

[trab pu kcip]

This is actually something that's pretty scary about kickstarter. Even though I understand durability isn't a pleasant mechanic, it is a good one in order to both provide incentive for certain playstyles and balance. Sometimes the audience isn't right, and unfortunately with kickstarter when the audience is the one supplying the money....

Reminds me a lot of how stripped down Dead Rising got in later entries in the interest of "fun".

Don't get me wrong, I have no doubt this game will still end up a great title, but I think this sets a dangerous precedent, and I hope they don't end up compromising their game for the sake of the fans. Because then we'd just be in a barely better position as we were with publishers funding this game, if not worse.

I disagree. I really like this aspect about crowd-funded games. especially since in this case the terms "fans" or "backers" refer to a crpg-educated audience and not just some random casual gamers with no real idea about how a role playing game works. at least that's the impression I got

 

[duckroll]

This is actually something that's pretty scary about kickstarter. Even though I understand durability isn't a pleasant mechanic, it is a good one in order to both provide incentive for certain playstyles and balance. Sometimes the audience isn't right, and unfortunately with kickstarter when the audience is the one supplying the money....

Reminds me a lot of how stripped down Dead Rising got in later entries in the interest of "fun".

Don't get me wrong, I have no doubt this game will still end up a great title, but I think this sets a dangerous precedent, and I hope they don't end up compromising their game for the sake of the fans. Because then we'd just be in a barely better position as we were with publishers funding this game, if not worse.

You should read why he is making the change before you claim that the audience is dictating the direction of the game. Feedback is one element of it, but more importantly, it was a system which never quite fit the game itself. Sawyer himself doesn't seem to be too keen on it. When he went asking for more feedback in the Obsidian forum thread, he already stated that durability was something he wasn't really sure about himself, unlike many other systems he was very confident in even if some people don't like the sound of certain things.

Let's not pretend the developers here are idiots who are simply swaying to public opinion and letting fans vote on game design. Have some respect for their experience on games, and also their judgement in how they gather feedback and what they do with the feedback.

 

[zkylon]

This is actually something that's pretty scary about kickstarter. Even though I understand durability isn't a pleasant mechanic, it is a good one in order to both provide incentive for certain playstyles and balance. Sometimes the audience isn't right, and unfortunately with kickstarter when the audience is the one supplying the money....

Reminds me a lot of how stripped down Dead Rising got in later entries in the interest of "fun".

Don't get me wrong, I have no doubt this game will still end up a great title, but I think this sets a dangerous precedent, and I hope they don't end up compromising their game for the sake of the fans. Because then we'd just be in a barely better position as we were with publishers funding this game, if not worse.

I guess, jesawyer said this was a subject they were unsure about so backer reaction helped cement their decision, I don't see anything wrong about that

 

[Zeliard]

This is actually something that's pretty scary about kickstarter. Even though I understand durability isn't a pleasant mechanic, it is a good one in order to both provide incentive for certain playstyles and balance. Sometimes the audience isn't right, and unfortunately with kickstarter when the audience is the one supplying the money....

Reminds me a lot of how stripped down Dead Rising got in later entries in the interest of "fun".

Don't get me wrong, I have no doubt this game will still end up a great title, but I think this sets a dangerous precedent, and I hope they don't end up compromising their game for the sake of the fans. Because then we'd just be in a barely better position as we were with publishers funding this game, if not worse.

Sawyer said crafting and durability were elements he already felt the shakiest on, so the feedback probably just confirmed his trepidation there.

They'll keep a crafting system because that was one of the stretch goals, but they're removing it as a character skill so as to solve whatever skill-balancing issues come with it and kill any need for durability.

This also just sounds more interesting now. The crafting system will make use of a number of skills, so you can presumably still have one primary crafter if their skills coalesce into good crafting ability, and that'll come through much more organically than if you just give one dude the "crafting skill" and ignore it for everyone else.

 

[trab pu kcip]

poor pa22word really rocked the boat with this one huh

 

[FACE]

This is actually something that's pretty scary about kickstarter. Even though I understand durability isn't a pleasant mechanic, it is a good one in order to both provide incentive for certain playstyles and balance. Sometimes the audience isn't right, and unfortunately with kickstarter when the audience is the one supplying the money....

Reminds me a lot of how stripped down Dead Rising got in later entries in the interest of "fun".

Don't get me wrong, I have no doubt this game will still end up a great title, but I think this sets a dangerous precedent, and I hope they don't end up compromising their game for the sake of the fans. Because then we'd just be in a barely better position as we were with publishers funding this game, if not worse.

People bitched about the experience system(which I think is great) in P:E and they didn't change it, don't fret too much.

 

[Sentenza]

Just posted on their forum about this thing so I'm just going to paste how I see it:

there were a lot of very faulty premises behind the whole concept.

For a start, the idea that having a single character capable of using a crafting kill was "a problem to solve" is senseless, when the whole point of party-based games is the subdivision of roles. "But in that way you will need just ONE blacksmith!". Yeah, so?

Second, durability can (eventually) work in a game with a single character, but there's virtually no scenario where it doesn't become an annoyance when you have to manage a whole party of fully equipped characters; the only alternative to having it as an annoying process is to automatize it a lot, which is going to make it even more pointless and not enjoyable. Just a purposeless money sink.

Third, a strictly balanced economy is not that crucial, but even going with the assumption that it is, a constant money sink would probably be the worst possible solution.
And frankly what's far more annoying than "having too much money" in these games is often constant inflation. How it is that you start a game in a world where 50 coins sound a lot and you end it considering thousands of coins like peanuts with items pricing around the hundreds of thousands? Incidentally, that's also a problem which isn't solved with durability.

Games like Gothic 2 or Risen, on the other hand, didn't have durability or repair and yet managed the economy far better than any Infinity Engine game ever had.
In Risen, for instance, you start a game considering 200 coins like a valuable sum, maybe even out of your reach at first, but completely achievable... And you end the game somewhat more rich but still considering those 200 coins a valuable sum (even if easier to gather in the end game).
It's more about how you balance loot, rewards and prices than about putting an arbitrary money sink just for the sake of it.

 

[Zeliard]

For a start, the idea that having a single character capable of using a crafting kill was "a problem to solve" is senseless, when the whole point of party-based games is the subdivision of roles. "But in that way you will need just ONE blacksmith!". Yeah, so?

It isn't a problem with subdivision of roles, though. It's about the extent to which choice is meaningful when attributing skill points.

Given Sawyer's comments on the subject, the team is clearly intending for every skill to have such value that various characters could potentially make good use of it, which is not the case with a single-character ability like crafting. It would have automatically created a skill imbalance.

Crafting as a skill was the specific problem. As an overall system and ability you attain through an accumulation of various skills, that particular problem is defeated. I think this is actually a pretty clever solution.

 

[mclem]

People bitched about the experience system(which I think is great) in P:E and they didn't change it, don't fret too much.

I might be mixing up my kickstarted RPGs, but it's this the one that have separate skill points for combat skills and non-combat ones? I don't recall many complaints about that.

 

[mclem]

For a start, the idea that having a single character capable of using a crafting kill was "a problem to solve" is senseless, when the whole point of party-based games is the subdivision of roles. "But in that way you will need just ONE blacksmith!". Yeah, so?

Consider this situation:

Create your crafter character. Build him up, you're attached to him, he's an awesome character.

Meet an NPC. She's fun, she's awesome, you want to have her in your party.

She's a crafter.

So now, you can either have the party you want, but in doing so you've wasted a whole bunch of skill points, or you don't, and are left feeling dissatisfied since the game has actively discouraged you from what you want.

 

[FACE]

I might be mixing up my kickstarted RPGs, but it's this the one that have separate skill points for combat skills and non-combat ones? I don't recall many complaints about that.

Lots of dudes bitched that you aren't going to get XP for killing mobs on the Obsidian forums.

 

[Sentenza]

Consider this situation:

Create your crafter character. Build him up, you're attached to him, he's an awesome character.

Meet an NPC. She's fun, she's awesome, you want to have her in your party.

She's a crafter.

I would deal with it, getting rid of one of the two if I feel he/she's redundant, if necessary.
*OR*
they could not tie crafting to a specific skill/character in the first place, if that's actually the kind of situation they want to avoid.

Lots of dudes bitched that you aren't going to get XP for killing mobs on the Obsidian forums.

But they are wrong, because that's an awesome decision.
Goal-driven exp rewards are a clever mechanic and the best way to prevent grinding as a way to exploit progression. Bloodlines proved it years ago.

 

[FACE]

But they are wrong, because that's an awesome decision.
Goal-driven exp rewards are a clever mechanic and the best way to prevent grinding as a way to exploit progression. Bloodlines proved it years ago.

Deus Ex and SS2 had a similar system and it is, in fact, the best.

 

[Nikodemos]

Goal-driven exp rewards are a clever mechanic and the best way to prevent grinding as a way to exploit progression. Bloodlines proved it years ago.

They also serve as incentives to take different routes when accomplishing an objective, instead of always going for "chop people up for whatever xp they may provide".

 

[The Technomancer]

They also serve as incentives to take different routes when accomplishing an objective, instead of always going for "chop people up for whatever xp they may provide".

This is the big one for me.

 

[Sentenza]

They also serve as incentives to take different routes when accomplishing an objective, instead of always going for "chop people up for whatever xp they may provide".

Or worst, weird combo-exploits like "resolve everything peacefully/stealthy, take all the exp rewards and THEN chop everyone anyway for extra experience".

 

[FACE]

They also serve as incentives to take different routes when accomplishing an objective, instead of always going for "chop people up for whatever xp they may provide".

That's how all RPGs that allow a greater flexibility in how to solve situations should be.

*glares at Human Revolution*

 

[Nikodemos]

Or worst, weird combo-exploits like "resolve everything peacefully/stealthy, take all the exp rewards and THEN chop everyone anyway for extra experience".

Oh, yeah, Baldur's Gate series was terrible in that respect.

 

[PFD]

That's how all RPGs that allow a greater flexibility in how to solve situations should be.

*glares at Human Revolution*

Yeah that was a big offender in that regard. I forced myself to ignore xp rewards just so I could play it the way I intended.

 

[injurai]

That's how all RPGs that allow a greater flexibility in how to solve situations should be.

*glares at Human Revolution*

there was an exp system in that game...?

 

[Sentenza]

there was an exp system in that game...?

Yep, and a pretty broken one.
Beside what we were already saying in previous posts, let me give you a shiny example of it: it was always more convenient to hack a computer for extra exp even if you had the right password, because using a password didn't reward you with any exp.

That's where a goal-driven system comes almost as a magical solution to all problems.

 

[injurai]

Yep, and a pretty broken one.
Beside what we were already saying in previous posts, let me give you a shiny example of it: it was always more convenient to hack a computer for extra exp even if you had the right password, because using a password didn't reward you with any exp.

That's where a goal-driven system comes almost as a magical solution to all problems.

oh makes sense. Yeah there we're a lot of systems in that game that didn't make sense or feel right. It was still fun because it was just working off the great template of the first game.

You do have to be very careful with how systems like exp are conveyed in a game. Especially since exp is very different than how we learn skills in real life.

 

[Labadal]

Or worst, weird combo-exploits like "resolve everything peacefully/stealthy, take all the exp rewards and THEN chop everyone anyway for extra experience".

Sawyer has talked about this and used Human Revolution as na example. he would like to avoid this for Eternity.

 

[Zeliard]

they could not tie crafting to a specific skill/character in the first place, if that's actually the kind of situation they want to avoid.

Which is.... precisely what they're doing to solve the issue. Crafting is no longer a skill.

All of this should be much easier to understand if you realize that Sawyer wants no dump skills.

 

[trab pu kcip]

That's how all RPGs that allow a greater flexibility in how to solve situations should be.

*glares at Human Revolution*

hahaha that's so true.
I wonder why so many people want all this grinding shit so bad...I mean it CAN be fun if it's essential to the game and paired with some excessive looting like diablo, it also felt right for games like some final fantasy titles (I can't even explain why) but in most recent games it just feels like a cheap way of adding more playtime. must be some psychological stuff that people are so fond of it I guess. but it's cool they want to handle it in a different way in this case, it's a nice way to provide a better symbiosis of gameplay and narration

 

[Sentenza]

Which is.... precisely what they're doing to solve the issue. Crafting is no longer a skill.

Yeah. And I'm happy with that, in fact. Wasn't it clear before?

EDIT: Also, I have a custom tag now, apparently. And I have no idea what's supposed to mean and where it comes from, but I'm guessing from that "garbagico" that someone doesn't like my posts too much.

 

[trab pu kcip]

Avellone Interview

We'd like to do more games in the Eternity universe. We have the expansion plan, we'd also like to be able to do sequels to the franchise if the initial one sells well enough.

Also we'd like to branch the Eternity world to books and comics and other forms of media as well. That's worked really well for BioWare and a lot of other companies including inXile.

We'd like to, we still talk to publishers, we still do games for publishers, we wouldn't want to necessarily be exclusive to Kickstarter but if we can make our own funding and finance ourselves that's kinda the route we'd like to go down.

 

[SquiddyCracker]

Avellone Interview

Well, what I've seen from the world is super interesting, but if they create more games in the universe I'd love for them to completely skip the Middle-earth fantasy aspects and create something super exotic that's never been seen before.