5 replies to this topic

[Karmapowered]

I would like to start a new thread about Big World Project, but specifically focused on game-play this time (contrary to the one I opened about what I objectively consider as bugs).

Please keep in mind that my feedback, again, this is not meant to be belittle in any way or fashion the terrific work of all the contributors to this community project, and you may very well chose to discard it, if you are inclined to believe that it is too subjective. It is meant as a personal and constructive contribution, that I hope to be of at least moderate value to some modders working on the BWP mega-mod.

My current setup is a customized "standard" version, installed by the BWP beta version.

Anyway, here goes :

1/ AI challenge globally improved = blends out uniqueness ?

I tremendously enjoyed encountering the new foes in my modded game, especially casters (mages, priests), using their powers in a reliably smart and rather unpredictable way. I do think it adds a lot to my fun, and should have been present even in the most basic configuration (vanilla) of the game. Fighting the improved duergar (Iliych) in the Irenicus dungeon, or the improved Shadelord, have been the highlights of my game so far.

However, I think that it is over the top if each and *every* group of foes you encounter uses the same, awesome AI, because it gets... tiring, which I think is no longer fun.

Let's take the battles around, and inside the "deArnise's Keep", for example. Shadow trolls seem to use the same AI that battle-hardened thieves or assassins would, which makes them go stealthy, attack, go stealthy again, attack again, etc. If I don't abuse of invisibility purges, which only last 5 rounds, I have to micromanage my troops, waiting for the trolls to appear again, to attack once, wait, attack once, etc. This is aggravated by the fact that the trolls regenerate while I cannot hurt them, and that there is usually a whole lot of them, constantly respawning throughout the whole keep.

Another example, the orc mages, or hobgoblin shamans, at Windspear Hills, which seem to abide by the same evolved cognitive patterns than the Cowled Wizards or Talos Priests in Athkatla. Since, according to FR lore, these populations are present in a much higher number to any other in the Realms, this left me wondering why they wouldn't have taken over Toril at this time ?

Next, while I don't mind enemy groups of humanoids (Shadow thieves, etc.) using potions, quite like my party uses them, I think that savage troops (orcs, goblins, trolls, etc.) should not have such a leisure at such an extended degree. I won't delve into how "unrealistic" this might seem to some (who makes such a large number of these expensive potions for trolls to start with ? even if they found those on corpses of slain humanoids, why would a potion work for a troll the same than for a humanoid ?), because it is not really the matter in a video-game.

However, again, the fact that even the most random orc mage, or hobgoblin shaman, gets access to such powerful magics that even Elminster could start to look like a common mage apprentice, when he should remain the exception, makes the whole thing bothersome to me. This is not to mention the numerous potions of fire giant strength, extra-healing and invisibility, contained in the inventory of most everything that comes out of the "random spawn" routine.

Next, I would like to mention the enhanced AI settings of some "standard" (non-randomized, non boss) fights, like Ruhk the transmuter. I realize that as a high-level Rakshasa in the original game, he is supposed to be a challenging match to start with.

My party (level 11 at the time) went in fully prepared (buffed, with potions and scrolls), and yet I couldn't even put in a dent into the defences of the guy, till his spells actually ran out by themselves. So this had become for me a "Benny Hill" battle (run in, run out, heal, run in, etc.), which made the whole thing more laughable than actually challenging. Maybe am I not experienced enough with the game (despite owning, and playing it for a couple of years now, reading forums, and usually enjoying the extra-challenge), but I think there should be a good medium to be achieved between what is supposed to happen, and between what is fun to happen.

Fights can thus quickly become a pure battle of attrition, giving the number of healing potions in the inventory of my party a higher edge than they should have over any smart tactics that I may use.

This gets me to my first point : if game-play design places the same challenge into each and every random battle, it belittles the satisfaction one ultimately gets out of winning challenging battles, in a game in which one is supposed to be THE hero. I want my battles in Bodhi's lair to be remembered, yes. The battles against Dragons, Liches, Beholders, Demons and whatnot, yes again. I couldn't care less about the random orc mage, or troll shaman, in front of my party to be "smart", forcing me to use the whole she-bang (rest + fully buff up + debuff) on them.

As Jaheira would say, we should strive for balance, and it should be a constant goal throughout the game. Make some enemy groups stronger, those that rightfully deserve it, but it shouldn't serve as excuse to give the first dwarven opponent met in the sewers (around level 9) the wing-sweeping powers of a Dragon ><

2/ Give the players some power back!

Not every player enjoys the game in the same way. From casual to hardcore, the spectrum is extremely wide and open, and a customized game should cater to that.

While it is obviously not possible to please everyone, because every mod isn't conceived to be micromanaged in a large-scale mega mod architecture, I think that some key factors should still be emphasized.

In my opinion, the setup categories ("recommended" to "tactic") are a great, first step. Inevitably, as players get more and more experienced with the game, and curious about exploring customized modules further, they will want to switch to the higher categories. Documenting crucial features, like the AI, directly inside the tool (through "tooltips"à is a must, especially since the online documentation ("readmes") is not necessarily avalaible or accurate any longer.

This could be further improved by pulling out of some "obscure" (to the player that isn't used yet to the tool) module settings the following features :

• the XP gains of creatures and quests
  
• the gold rewards from kills and quests
  
• the equipment of enemy parties ("low magic" world -> "high magic" world)
  
• the assets of enemy parties (number and potency of additional potions and scrolls for a type of enemy)
  
• the AI settings for summons and party members
  
• the AI settings for standard, non-boss encounters : Ilyich in Irenicus dungeon, high shaman troll in deArnise's Keep, enemy adventurer parties, etc., but not singled out, like boss encounters are)
  
• the AI settings for random encounters, generated "on the fly", according to the level of the player party : respawning or not, at which frequency, etc.
  
• the AI settings for boss encounters (Thorgal, Shadelord, etc., singled out, as it already has been done)

Now, you will tell me : it is already very possible to do that!

Yes, but... no, I think it isn't, not to the average player that just started a new, modded game, or hasn't the knowledge or time to dig some deeper into the mod settings.

For example, not everyone will want to install all the big additional quest modules, handing out plethora of extra XP, warranting to downgrade the XP return that quests yield, and yet most will get the downgraded experience setting (forcing to "grind" experience inside the game), because they ignored there was a setting in the BG2 tweaks section.

As such, I would suggest asking for the explicit input of the player beforehand for such major game-play settings, as it has been done for the resolution settings of the wide-screen mod. The player should remain in complete control of what to expect once in the modded game, gameplay-wise.


Conclusion

Finally, I would like to say that I don't want to ever look back, and play the game without the additional extra-content of quality mods, like BGT, "Sword Coast Stratagems", "Spell revisions", the fix and tweak packs, and some great quest and npc mods. The game has achieved a whole new level for me, and despite the occasional and rare bug here and there, I am totally addicted to it again.

I feel but gratitude for all the people that give us their time and competence to enjoy, for free, and I will probably repeat this till the end of my gaming days

Yet, if you cared for some feedback on BWP's game-play of someone who thinks himself a fairly grizzled cRPG player, this would be it. There is room for improvement, and for someone who only has an outside view of the intrinsics of the project, I think and hope it can be achieved without too much hassle for the modders.

Thank you for your attention, and reading through this "wall of text".


TLDR;
Please consider giving the non-hardcore player more control over how to tweak major game settings directly inside BWP's interface, especially the AI challenge. Thank you for your work

Edited by Karmapowered, 30 March 2011 - 07:19 PM.

[JohnMoonlord]

I haven't went in the BG2 section yet, but for BG1, the only thing that really baffled me so far regarding such issues was seing Dynaheir get blasted repetitively into oblivion by Orc Mages using "Disintegrate?!?" against my average level 4 party, on a Standard setting install. Aside from this personal pet-peeve, I managed to adapt to the Standard install difficulty for the first 5 chapters of the modded game I played.

I assume Tactic and Expert settings are a whole new ball game, though.

Edited by JohnMoonlord, 31 March 2011 - 03:10 AM.

[Fennek]

Hm, the AI should almost alwasy be SCSII (or SCS), if one doesn't leave it out... Most mods only improve the stats of enemies or add additional ones.

[Karmapowered]

Hm, the AI should almost alwasy be SCSII (or SCS), if one doesn't leave it out... Most mods only improve the stats of enemies or add additional ones.

The BWP/BWS team cannot be asked to foresee "balance" tweaks for each and every mod combination out there.

Likewise, the SCS/SCSII mod author(s) cannot be blamed if the original (Bioware) game had pre-existing features, such as potions or spells that just weren't adequately used by NPCs. The SCS/SCSII doesn't cheat, by adding unwarranted resources, just improves on the use of existing ones, which is a good reason for me to continue using it for any of my subsequent game runs.

I guess my point was to outline with my feedback that some particular settings, especially major settings applied at the very end of the install process, could be lost to the player, that isn't used yet to the BWS tool, in the sea of other minor settings . Ideally, they should be pulled out and brought directly under the nose of the player, kind of warning them : is this really what you want ?

Hence why I keep thinking that the BWS beta, with a more streamlined install process, with clearer categories, and especially mod sub-options fitting most every style of player (casual to hardcore), is a great step in the direction of helping the player to better enjoy a modded game, by customizing and balancing it to their desires.

These settings probably simply ought to be put more under the spotlights, why not with a separate list in the GUI, complementing the rest.

The architecture of the tool seems to be built around that design to start with :

• unofficial fixpacks (G3 BG2 fixpack, etc.) and extensions (tobex, etc.) to the game
  
• mods (quests, stores, npcs, etc.)
  
• unofficial fixpacks for the mods above
  
• tweaks that globally affect all the mods above (Aurora, BG2 tweaks, ding0, etc.)

Personally, I found my happiness with BWP and SCS/SCSII by un-"improving" the mages that come with the random encounters of the "recommended version" (green options), while adding more "challenging" boss fights (yellow options). So everything is there, one just needs to be aware where to find to find it

Edited by Karmapowered, 31 March 2011 - 12:14 PM.

[Fennek]

I guess if you want to have these small changes and modificationss, you'll have to talk with DavidW in the SCS and SCSII forums. The BWP won't be able to provide only a part of the enemies with AI. Normally DavidW is always happy about suggestions, although this doesn't guarantee that he will implement them...
(But these's a small probability that he'll read your post here, even if you don't mention it at the SCSII forum.)

(Most of the potions are actually added by SCS - it's not cheating because there's no reason why enemies should'n't have potions if the player has them - if you think that trolls shouldn't have potions, make a suggestion to DavidW, what you actually did, and wait for his answer... Maybe he makes another component, splitting the current one: Potions for monster (in addition to potions for humanoid enemies)).

Edited by Fennek, 31 March 2011 - 01:24 PM.

[dabus]

Just a quick note:
I thought about some warnings if certain conditions are matched.
It wouldn't be that hard, the BWS can check for certain components and can display message-boxes (questions). There'd be another section in a config-file and some text that would be displayed.

But then again: There are many things that are important to different players.
One reinstalled the game since NEJ2 replaced the standard intro/menu music-theme.
Rogue Rebalancing may be a big issue for some, gold, values and so on. And where's the point of a detailed selection screen if you make X exceptions and pull those options out of it? Who tells you what's important? For instance, I never thought about a "do you want adult content-question".

Another option would be adding some new (special) groups to the BWS. Currently, those are about fun-mods, AI and armoring. If you are interested in those, you can mark / show them. If someone put those together, those could be added easily.

You could also add some other preselections like "Arkenor's Adventure Picks", which is just an "Export selection to file" away.