RPG dumbed down

[[Heretic]Rivga]

A lot of the most recent posts, seem to highlight just why RPG have been dumbed down over recent years, most have been make a cake walk and so easy to understand it borders on patronising, and yet despite this some gamers are still able to find them too complex.

To hear people crying that they want to have the achievement for finishing on unfair, and then to cry on the forums unironically about how "unfair" it is. Or literally have someone state that Owlcat is to blame for not teaching someone how to play the game, this stupidity works in no other walk of life,
"It is the failing of the supermarket that sold me the potato peeler, for not giving me adequate guidance" has been said my no one, ever.

Please stop embarrassing yourselves with these posts. I really do not want to see the last game that actually seems to some what respect the fact some gamers have a brain.

God imagine the outcry if you tried to make a morrowind game now.

[Aliceskysareblue]

Ive been hearing "dumbed down" since when dragon age origin came out and bioware was bought by ea.

admittingly it was accurate in future titles, but alot of it really was to appeal to a broader audiance,, developers will streamline features becuase not everyone is really in to number crunching and pnp ruleset.

this is not one of those.

this game can get insanely complex and core or above, my issues with the games is that not all the paths are as balanced or complete as each other (secret path being my major gripe) and the weird state inflations that owlcat did and the overuse of resistances, like I get demons have damage reductions but its really annoying and at times unfair.

but maybeit was designed that way ? you are fighting against demons, wich do have alot of supernatural resistance so plan accordingly and choose mythic feats wisely

[Soft Lockpick]

Цитата допису Sador:

Цитата допису Soft Lockpick:

I have no issue learning the rules in this game, I had a ton of 3.0/3.5 time. But I am not so thick headed that I can't put myself in the shoes of a reasonably competent player who is just less familiar with the kind of system. So they go in, make an ok character, but hit a wall and the games fix for that is not "get better" it's "go reprogram your character." This is not good design.

Honestly, it seems like the defenders of the VERY inconsistent difficulty spikes are largely eastern euros who want to come off as tough. "Git gud" doesn't apply when getting good is redesigning your character. It stops being roleplaying at the point your kitsune arcanist has to become a tiefling monk.

But there are so, so many difficulty settings that you can use whenever you want. There are tutorial popups everywhere to tell you what you're messing up. There's even a setting that auto levels your companions for you so you don't have to bother (which I'm sure is very far from optimized but probably still on the playable level for normal difficulty).

Obviously, if you don't know the D&D / Pathfinder system, and don't put in the effort to learn it, you're going to struggle with this game, especially if you're not playing on a very easy difficulty setting. That sucks, but that's the reality of it. Secondly, as long as you have at least some semblance of a balanced team (in terms of spellcaster, tank, ranged DPS and buff / healer) you'll probably be fine. If you just follow the default companion classes, it's pretty hard to mess up other than maybe with picking terrible spells. Even then your divine casters should mostly carry you through with their buffs. And then you get a whole bunch of mythical super powers that you can use to overcome whatever you're having difficulty with. Hell, you can ignore immunities or get total magic immunity yourself.

I have all understanding for people struggling with the game. The big thing is being honest with yourself. If you consistently find the game hard, you should probably turn down the difficulty to better match your knowledge and skills. If you don't, it's kinda on you.

You don't seem to understand. Within a difficulty setting there shouldn't be massive inconsistent difficulty spikes unless you've gone the open "breathing world" style of game where you can run into high level enemies too early and need to come back to that area much later to deal. Normal should be normal pretty much across the board, with enemies at a certain level of difficulty. Core, harder than that but pretty smoothed out. Unfair even, while it's perfectly fine to have them be unfair, shouldn't have massive massive variance in seemingly random encounters.

If a player starts on normal or core and is doing perfectly fine through a boss fight or two, then randomly the game throws a big wall in their face that is not good design. A difficulty level should be telegraphing to you if you have a shot at it or not by having relatively smooth difficulty. Yes it gets harder as you go on, but it also doesn't spike and valley all the time to trick you into thinking you're good then forcing you to do unfun things like lower difficulty 15 hours later.

Nobody said it's impossible to adjust the difficulty or respec your character. What they said is Owlcat has objectively bad encounter design. And that is true.

Like I said, the defenders of this game sound very much like eastern euro wannabe tough guys showing off, saying they're so great for getting over it and you just need to lower the difficulty nerd. When the truth is, the game has very inconsistent difficulty WITHIN each difficulty setting and that's a sign of a really bad encounter designer.

[Sador]

Цитата допису Soft Lockpick:

You don't seem to understand. Within a difficulty setting there shouldn't be massive inconsistent difficulty spikes

Sort of depends on what you mean with difficulty spikes. There are optional bosses that you don't have to fight - I'm fine with them being a difficulty spike. That's what they are there for.

I do agree that the main story line shouldn't randomly jump up and down in difficulty (as far as D&D / Pathfinder games don't already naturally do that due to how leveling works). But, as far as I can tell, that's not really the case in WoTR.

The problem, from what I read on the forums, is more that a lot of people don't really learn how to deal with specific threats. Blackwater is a great example of where a lot of people suddenly struggle due to high AC monsters that are perfectly destroyable if you don't just rely on bruteforcing with auto attacks.

Цитата допису Soft Lockpick:

Nobody said it's impossible to adjust the difficulty or respec your character. What they said is Owlcat has objectively bad encounter design. And that is true.

No offense but people need to learn what objectively means.

[Elnidfse]

Цитата допису Sador:

No offense but people need to learn what objectively means.

He's not wrong. The second before last boss encounter of the game is harder than all variations of the final encounter.

[Takichi]

Цитата допису Soft Lockpick:

Цитата допису Sador:

But there are so, so many difficulty settings that you can use whenever you want. There are tutorial popups everywhere to tell you what you're messing up. There's even a setting that auto levels your companions for you so you don't have to bother (which I'm sure is very far from optimized but probably still on the playable level for normal difficulty).

Obviously, if you don't know the D&D / Pathfinder system, and don't put in the effort to learn it, you're going to struggle with this game, especially if you're not playing on a very easy difficulty setting. That sucks, but that's the reality of it. Secondly, as long as you have at least some semblance of a balanced team (in terms of spellcaster, tank, ranged DPS and buff / healer) you'll probably be fine. If you just follow the default companion classes, it's pretty hard to mess up other than maybe with picking terrible spells. Even then your divine casters should mostly carry you through with their buffs. And then you get a whole bunch of mythical super powers that you can use to overcome whatever you're having difficulty with. Hell, you can ignore immunities or get total magic immunity yourself.

I have all understanding for people struggling with the game. The big thing is being honest with yourself. If you consistently find the game hard, you should probably turn down the difficulty to better match your knowledge and skills. If you don't, it's kinda on you.

unless you've gone the open "breathing world" style of game where you can run into high level enemies too early and need to come back to that area much later to deal. .

Yes thats exactly how it Works ;) If all Enemys got AC 20-25 and you Fight something on the Same Map/Same Area with 50 AC its a Side-Boss or Optional Boss ;)
The Game has Difficulty Spikes if you Advance Story yes, but thats because you are Progressing and the Game gets harder and harder. Everything Else, if you meet an extra Hard Enemy is basicly always Optional and you dont need to fight him at all or can(for the most part) come back later and fight him.

[Tanchyon]

Цитата допису Thariorn:

B-b-but, in this *other mildly similiar game* playing on Hard was totally easy.

I want my unfair dopamin now

lmao this is so true

[zpc]

Цитата допису Sador:

Цитата допису Soft Lockpick:

You don't seem to understand. Within a difficulty setting there shouldn't be massive inconsistent difficulty spikes

Sort of depends on what you mean with difficulty spikes. There are optional bosses that you don't have to fight - I'm fine with them being a difficulty spike. That's what they are there for.

I do agree that the main story line shouldn't randomly jump up and down in difficulty (as far as D&D / Pathfinder games don't already naturally do that due to how leveling works). But, as far as I can tell, that's not really the case in WoTR.

IMHO that "jumping difficulty spike" is what makes the game so good. If I'm playing a cleric I don't fear undead oponents. If I build my whole party out of clerics & paladins I would absolutely roflstomp every undead army. But I might not be so good against assassins or dedicated magic users.

The spikes result - IMHO again - mostly because the gameworld is not streamlined into one polished "progression game" and becomes a no-brainer like most of the games out there. Instead, you get surprised and even your god like party can get seriously in trouble if they step into conflicts unprepared. (good old "I don't need buffs here" situation)

[Arlen]

Цитата допису Dixon Sider:

Цитата допису HereticRivga:

To hear people crying that they want to have the achievement for finishing on unfair, and then to cry on the forums unironically about how "unfair" it is.

Owlcat nerfed the living hell out of unfair and ruined my playthrough

but they did not "nerf" unfair - read the freaking patch notes - "unfair" was not the way they themselves intended - that had nothing to do with players - and everything to do with the developers vision. and the developers have repeatedly stated, in these very forums, that their vision was what prompted the change. You cannot nerf soemthing that was never intended.

[Takichi]

Цитата допису billybobtexan1000:

Цитата допису Dixon Sider:

Owlcat nerfed the living hell out of unfair and ruined my playthrough

but they did not "nerf" unfair - read the freaking patch notes - "unfair" was not the way they themselves intended - that had nothing to do with players - and everything to do with the developers vision. and the developers have repeatedly stated, in these very forums, that their vision was what prompted the change. You cannot nerf soemthing that was never intended.

Dont mind him hes a troll, who Propably never beat the Game on Normal anyway :D

[Great_One]

I play normal, because I don't want to play unfair. I have also played over a decade of TT PF1E. I am not a min maxer, just not my style. That's my buddy Dave. But I do have a decent understanding of builds.

I have run into several places where I have had to back pedal and come back to later. The spirits in Wintersun for example. They were hitting my main on 2's and I had to have 20's. With a scythe fighter build. They hit me 95% and I hit them 5%, yes I can turn off power attack and jump it to a 15% before someone says it, that still feels unfair. Yes I know with Death Ward active the non-casters couldn't really hurt me but it was boring. I counted it, I missed 14 straight attacks with my MC and 27 straight attacks from the party. No matter the difficulty that feels unfair. As for come back later, I did, but it felt like the story was leading me there at that time.

I found the same thing with the ghostly mino in the sanctum. Could not hit that bastard for the life of me. And the last one that had the trap going off that healed it was simply annoying. Yes I know mr. elitist I ran him away from the trap. It just took a reload to understand what has happening. How it was fearing me though is beyond me. I have a +18 to my will stat against fear. But I ran like a ♥♥♥♥♥ almost every time.

I really question the RNG in this game, sometimes. I swear it's rolling on one of those MTG counter die's. lol.

All of that to say I am playing on normal. I don't want to have to have perfect builds, perfect gear and arrive at the perfect level. You play how you enjoy the game and I'll play how I enjoy the game. Just don't shame people because they don't want to have the perfect gear, perfect build and still reload 30 times to get lucky enough to crit at the right time.

[Red Phantom]

Цитата допису HereticRivga:

this stupidity works in no other walk of life,

Unfortunately, that's where you're wrong.

[Dixon Sider]

Цитата допису billybobtexan1000:

but they did not "nerf" unfair

They nerfed it last friday

[Elnidfse]

Цитата допису Great_One:

I found the same thing with the ghostly mino in the sanctum.

This guy?[i.imgur.com]
I ended up having a lot to say on him after I checked his stats on normal but I ended up never getting around to it having just bulldozed all of their touch AC and kept going about my business.
Ultimately he was optional and had an easy "solution" even if that solution is party dependent so it ended up slipping my mind.

[Sador]

Цитата допису Great_One:

I have run into several places where I have had to back pedal and come back to later. The spirits in Wintersun for example. They were hitting my main on 2's and I had to have 20's. With a scythe fighter build. They hit me 95% and I hit them 5%, yes I can turn off power attack and jump it to a 15% before someone says it, that still feels unfair. Yes I know with Death Ward active the non-casters couldn't really hurt me but it was boring. I counted it, I missed 14 straight attacks with my MC and 27 straight attacks from the party. No matter the difficulty that feels unfair. As for come back later, I did, but it felt like the story was leading me there at that time.

The spirits are specifically a punishment for taking a specific item, which you are warned about when you do it, and they'll despawn if you put the item back where you found it.

[Takichi]

Цитата допису Dixon Sider:

Цитата допису billybobtexan1000:

but they did not "nerf" unfair

They nerfed it last friday

Go play your next try on Easy Dude, not a single Real Player(aka non Whinner) Thinks your Opinion is based on Facts :)