Then they should strive to make each combat encounter interesting.
Now, if some developer actually managed that, it'd be a sight to see. Turn-based combat is fine, it just always has parts that end up being a slog.
I think Temple of Elemental Evil might be the only game that's managed this, at least in terms of complex tabletop (or tabletop-like) rules presented in turn-based form. There were still some bullshit combat scenarios, but for the most part, each fight was interesting and took a lot of thought to make work out.
On the other hand, much like Divinity, it also tends to mean your game focuses on the combat, because for whatever damn reason, game developers refuse to go with a less is more philosophy, and make maybe 1-3 big fights per level (or whatever term you might use in a non-level-based game), while focusing on story and character interaction otherwise. If we could ever move past (or even just one or two games could) the idea that what makes RPGs interesting is leveling dudes by fighting a lot, then we could see some pretty neat shit. The original Torment accomplishes this in a way, if you utilize cheats to make every combat end in a few seconds and just pretend like they never happened.
Eh, I'm not sure Turn based equates combat focus. You can make a game that doesn't emphasis combat, but when you do get into an encounter it uses turn based mechanics. Or you could make a game that is heavy combat but uses RTwP.
I don't have a specific preference in mode of combat, though I think I lean towards pausing. I'm actually a little surprised that there is such a divide among the RPG community.
As for the quicklook, the game looks promising. I wish they spent some time getting into the nitty gritty of mechanics/showed off some spells or something. Rorie was trying, but it definitely sounded like they were given a list of things to show/talk about and to not deviate
At the risk of the whole "That's why they didn't show any videos before!". I'm not that huge a fan of how fast it seems to be animated. That's like, almost DA2 fast. Which was way too fast.
It looks sped up. Like, unnaturally so. The attack animations in DA2 were fast, but it looked right... if that makes any sense. This looks like a slider option or something.
Then they should strive to make each combat encounter interesting.
Now, if some developer actually managed that, it'd be a sight to see. Turn-based combat is fine, it just always has parts that end up being a slog.
Let's not act like Real Time with Pause never has slog-like parts. It's a symptom that is endemic throughout the genre, no matter what type of system you're using.
For some reason I cannot even begin to fathom, turn-based games that do have a "this is boring, skip it" button still resolve molasses-entrenched slow.
This is the singular reason I prefer RTwP. At least it's over quickly.
Ninja Snarl PMy helmet is my burden.Ninja Snarl: Gone, but not forgotten.Registered Userregular
Transistor pretty much sold me on pausable real-time combat, though that game is decidedly more action-oriented as well. Combat is as slow as you want or as fast as the game is designed for, instead of wasting masses and masses of time on trivial stuff like having to mash attack buttons over and over again because your character's turns came up.
There's a time and a place for that sort of thing, but these days, letting the player control the flow is generally a straight-up improvement over letting the game do it.
Then they should strive to make each combat encounter interesting.
Now, if some developer actually managed that, it'd be a sight to see. Turn-based combat is fine, it just always has parts that end up being a slog.
Let's not act like Real Time with Pause never has slog-like parts. It's a symptom that is endemic throughout the genre, no matter what type of system you're using.
The difference is that with RTwP you can at least let the less interesting parts go by much faster. The "nothing is going to pass you by"-part of turn-based combat can be great for the interesting parts of nitty-gritty combat, but it also makes the boring parts an incredible slog to go through, since they go past just as glacially.
Then they should strive to make each combat encounter interesting.
Now, if some developer actually managed that, it'd be a sight to see. Turn-based combat is fine, it just always has parts that end up being a slog.
I think Temple of Elemental Evil might be the only game that's managed this, at least in terms of complex tabletop (or tabletop-like) rules presented in turn-based form. There were still some bullshit combat scenarios, but for the most part, each fight was interesting and took a lot of thought to make work out.
On the other hand, much like Divinity, it also tends to mean your game focuses on the combat, because for whatever damn reason, game developers refuse to go with a less is more philosophy, and make maybe 1-3 big fights per level (or whatever term you might use in a non-level-based game), while focusing on story and character interaction otherwise. If we could ever move past (or even just one or two games could) the idea that what makes RPGs interesting is leveling dudes by fighting a lot, then we could see some pretty neat shit. The original Torment accomplishes this in a way, if you utilize cheats to make every combat end in a few seconds and just pretend like they never happened.
Eh, I'm not sure Turn based equates combat focus. You can make a game that doesn't emphasis combat, but when you do get into an encounter it uses turn based mechanics. Or you could make a game that is heavy combat but uses RTwP.
You *can* make a game that way, but I've never played one. It feels like in a lot of games, going full turn-based (in a battlefield, like Fallout, ToEE, etc, rather than JRPG-style) just means combat takes a long time, and since it's pretty frequent, you end up spending the bulk of the gameplay time on combat. It certainly doesn't *have* to be that way, but I have yet to see any game do what I'd like to see, which is make combat rare and exciting, but still deep and complex.
Then they should strive to make each combat encounter interesting.
Now, if some developer actually managed that, it'd be a sight to see. Turn-based combat is fine, it just always has parts that end up being a slog.
I think Temple of Elemental Evil might be the only game that's managed this, at least in terms of complex tabletop (or tabletop-like) rules presented in turn-based form. There were still some bullshit combat scenarios, but for the most part, each fight was interesting and took a lot of thought to make work out.
On the other hand, much like Divinity, it also tends to mean your game focuses on the combat, because for whatever damn reason, game developers refuse to go with a less is more philosophy, and make maybe 1-3 big fights per level (or whatever term you might use in a non-level-based game), while focusing on story and character interaction otherwise. If we could ever move past (or even just one or two games could) the idea that what makes RPGs interesting is leveling dudes by fighting a lot, then we could see some pretty neat shit. The original Torment accomplishes this in a way, if you utilize cheats to make every combat end in a few seconds and just pretend like they never happened.
Eh, I'm not sure Turn based equates combat focus. You can make a game that doesn't emphasis combat, but when you do get into an encounter it uses turn based mechanics. Or you could make a game that is heavy combat but uses RTwP.
You *can* make a game that way, but I've never played one. It feels like in a lot of games, going full turn-based (in a battlefield, like Fallout, ToEE, etc, rather than JRPG-style) just means combat takes a long time, and since it's pretty frequent, you end up spending the bulk of the gameplay time on combat. It certainly doesn't *have* to be that way, but I have yet to see any game do what I'd like to see, which is make combat rare and exciting, but still deep and complex.
I can only guess we've played different games, as my recent play of Divinity suggests that, while things are slower, everything I do has a much more meaningful effect on the encounter, even at level 1 (I haven't felt the combat to be a slog at all), while in BG the entire first half of the game felt like a slog because unless I wanted to rest after just about every fight, fights were equipping every character with a sling and kiting enemies, else be killed by one unfortunate crit (or at really low levels, one unfortunate hit). Or spend several minutes missing.
Mind you, I'm not actually blaming RTwP for that. But I also have a hard time equating turned based with slow/boring combat, since my experience has been contrary.
Edit: And since I didn't originally intend to turn this into a us vs. them thread, I'll refrain from posting anymore about TB vs RTwP. If anyone wants to continue the discussion, feel free to PM me.
There's a lot of ways that RTwP can be terrible. For example, like giving too many active abilities like the Dragon Age games do. With those games, either you're heavily depending on the AI script and playing a singleplayer World of Warcraft or you're pausing every second for every single bullshit ability that comes off cooldown.
The best way to do it would be to limit each party member to 1-2 active ability and have them all on a single hotbar that's accessible no matter what character is selected.
What makes the infinity engine games kinda good in the combat department is that they have limited active abilities for most classes, pretty much all you have to worry about with most of them is positioning. The real fun was in the preparation and the sheer challenge, the execution is a fairly meh experience.
But I wouldn't want either system to dominate the field. What makes the crpg field so exciting is that both systems are well represented for the most part.
Once upon a time I would have sworn up and down that I was a turn-based fella, through and through. Then along came XCom Apocalypse which had both and gave you the choice. After a few particularly sloggy apartment complex clearnings I figured I'd give RTwP a try. Whattya know? I like this a lot! Granted it was sometimes abusable (like setting up an impenetrable phalanx of toxin guns at the entrance to a battleship and waiting). But it was still the same system under the hood, and tense as hell when you watched squinting with one eye as your your green soldier with a tommy gun tried to rip off a salvo in time at the bright blue popper blazing a slow motion smoke trail straight down the hallway you just breached.
Mostly, to @am0n's point, I'm happy we're around when demonstrably top tier and hopefully top tier games are being made that let us have both.
I honestly don't mind either way. I loved BG2, and I'm loving Divinity. So long as it's done well, it's all good.
Dragon Age 2 had shit combat, but that's not really the fault of the pause system.
Yeah, if I had to point fingers at anything combat-related in DA2, it'd be at the rate of encounters. I don't need a major fight breaking out every time I go shopping for groceries, followed by another major fight as 20 dudes appear to replace the 20 dudes I just killed.
Frankly I, too, would love to see an RPG (of any style) that doesn't feel a need for padding the fights in the name of more gameplay. The fights themselves don't even have to be that interesting, just so long as there aren't so many of them that it wears out its welcome. Granted, that's a fairly subjective threshold, but the larger point is that I hope the game doesn't feel the need to have more combat than the plot actually requires.
The best combat system is simultaneous turn based. I dunno if any RPGs do it though.
It's a good system generally but it comes with it's own drawbacks. An especially bad one affects melee combat... you cannot tell where people will be when your done moving so trying to get into melee can be very hard to do.
The best combat system is simultaneous turn based. I dunno if any RPGs do it though.
The only one I can think of is a JRPG (and an SRPG at that). Vandal Hearts 2 had simultaneous turns. It made the game way too easy though since it wasn't programmed very well and it was super easy to go "okay this dude's gonna move here to attack my guy, so I'll move that guy to behind where the enemy will end up and attack them instead"
You mean where both sides take a turn and try to guess what the other person is going to do? I've played a game like that. Was fun trying to figure out what the AI was going to do based on which character of theirs was up, their movement squares and abilities. Sometimes you'd move around behind them and they'd swing at air while you got them in the back. Sometimes you'd move and swing at air only to have them launch a fireball at your allies.
Edit: Yeah, VH2 is what I was thinking of. Once you knew the system, it got easy, but it was still a great concept.
I don't know, I'm kind of unimpressed by the latest showing?
I mean, look what Larian has been able to accomplish with their budget, compared to that Obsidian simply recreating the antiquated Infinity Engine from BG2 feels underwhelming. I mean if that's all they're going to do why not just license the original, they probably could have gotten it for a song.
I don't know, I'm kind of unimpressed by the latest showing?
I mean, look what Larian has been able to accomplish with their budget, compared to that Obsidian simply recreating the antiquated Infinity Engine from BG2 feels underwhelming. I mean if that's all they're going to do why not just license the original, they probably could have gotten it for a song.
I liked divinity's turn based, but then again divinity has no respawning enemies, once you've cleared an area it's clear forever, if you overmatch a fight it's often over in the first turn
IMO every single rpg should copy south park the stick of truth/paper mario's combat system though
when I say "copy the combat system" I don't mean copy the stats/interactions/numbers of the items and abilities anymore than someone who says they prefer RTWP means they want to copy Baldur's Gate 1's, getting one-shotted by a pigeon on your level 1 mage
although for a serious RPG the lack of movement would really hamper possibilities, but I really like the use item/action being seperate things and the timing thing
that's just me though, but I really enjoyed Divinity most recently until around level 15 when I broke the game and every fight became a joke
You can totally have turn-based in a RTwP game. Just either add the option for auto-pause every round, like KotOR had, or add an internal 1 second global cooldown and give the player the option to auto-pause after each action is used.
What I'm saying is, why not both?
Battlenet ID: MildC#11186 - If I'm in the game, send me an invite at anytime and I'll play.
I don't know, I'm kind of unimpressed by the latest showing?
I mean, look what Larian has been able to accomplish with their budget, compared to that Obsidian simply recreating the antiquated Infinity Engine from BG2 feels underwhelming. I mean if that's all they're going to do why not just license the original, they probably could have gotten it for a song.
Can't tell if serious.gif
It can't be serious
- Divinity: Original Sin more time than Pillars. The game was already in production in 2010.
- The Infinity Engine is completly different from Obsidian's approach to Unity. Apart from the general concept, but even that has its differences.
Edit:
- Pillars was pitched as a return to the Infinity Engine games and sticking close to it. Thats the entire point.
(I personally prefer the graphics in Pillars. Divnity while great, is too exaggerated colorful + I just prefer the detail the pre-rendered backgrounds give)
I don't know, I'm kind of unimpressed by the latest showing?
I mean, look what Larian has been able to accomplish with their budget, compared to that Obsidian simply recreating the antiquated Infinity Engine from BG2 feels underwhelming. I mean if that's all they're going to do why not just license the original, they probably could have gotten it for a song.
Can't tell if serious.gif
- Divinity: Original Sin had a larger budget and more time than Pillars. The game was already in production in 2010 and the Kickstarter *just* paid for the final stretch.
Divinity had a budget of 4M euros, while Pillars has 4M dollars - it's about the same in purchasing power.
I don't know, I'm kind of unimpressed by the latest showing?
I mean, look what Larian has been able to accomplish with their budget, compared to that Obsidian simply recreating the antiquated Infinity Engine from BG2 feels underwhelming. I mean if that's all they're going to do why not just license the original, they probably could have gotten it for a song.
Can't tell if serious.gif
- Divinity: Original Sin had a larger budget and more time than Pillars. The game was already in production in 2010 and the Kickstarter *just* paid for the final stretch.
Divinity had a budget of 4M euros, while Pillars has 4M dollars - it's about the same in purchasing power.
Missed that article, thought it was a bit higher (I somehow thought it was 6M euros). Anyway, thanks! Fixed.
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SanguineAngelLordCentre of the UniverseRegistered Userregular
In the war between cRPG combat systems I'm a dirty, hippy, free love kinda guy.
I am a firm believer that there is no single correct design philosophy for any genre of game. but I would definitely like to see a few more cRPGs that focussed less on combat altogether. And I don't mean to take it out entirely but to redefine its role in a cRPG would be exciting. I would love some games where getting into a fight is a rare Big Deal, a huge risk and might have serious ramifications, whatever the outcome. I think RPGs in particular devalue combat through over exposure, especially when we know from PnP games that RPGs have so much to offer besides combat.
SanguineAngelLordCentre of the UniverseRegistered Userregular
edited July 2014
@Elvenshae Yeah, I backed that sucker as soon as it hit Kickstarter; their words spoke directly to my brain. I am very excited for it and am hopeful that if it takes off we'll see more of that sort of thing. In fact, with all these varying approaches to the genre appearing in good shape thanks to crowd funding I am pretty hopeful we'll see more experimentation in approaches across the board
In the war between cRPG combat systems I'm a dirty, hippy, free love kinda guy.
I am a firm believer that there is no single correct design philosophy for any genre of game. but I would definitely like to see a few more cRPGs that focussed less on combat altogether. And I don't mean to take it out entirely but to redefine its role in a cRPG would be exciting. I would love some games where getting into a fight is a rare Big Deal, a huge risk and might have serious ramifications, whatever the outcome. I think RPGs in particular devalue combat through over exposure, especially when we know from PnP games that RPGs have so much to offer besides combat.
Yeah, as a long time D&D player, that's always bothered me. I love that in a given major story arc of a D&D campaign, we might have a total of a dozen fights, all of which are either elaborate and fun, or have serious story-related implications, and it kills me that there's basically not a single computer/console RPG that works that way.
One thing I think they'd need to do to make that work well is remove experience from killing shit and make it part of learning/accomplishing shit. That's always my biggest cripe with video games that tout "open ended" stuff; you still get the best reward for just killing everything. Instead, make the experience be awarded for completing the mission (retrieve the royal gem). You can choose to kill everything along the way, sneak in and take it without being seen or maybe persuade/bribe the guard on duty to distract the other guards while you make a clean getaway. All of those should offer the same reward (but maybe different repercussions). However, in pretty much every game to date (or at least the ones I've played) killing everything is the best reward.
I think if you did that, you'd go a long way to making combat feel less like a necessity and more like one of several options.
That's always my biggest cripe with video games that tout "open ended" stuff; you still get the best reward for just killing everything. [...] However, in pretty much every game to date (or at least the ones I've played) killing everything is the best reward.
The other pitfall to avoid when doing this is making the best way to complete things being "complete the quest by talking, and then kill everything anyway for the kill XPs."
That's always my biggest cripe with video games that tout "open ended" stuff; you still get the best reward for just killing everything. [...] However, in pretty much every game to date (or at least the ones I've played) killing everything is the best reward.
The other pitfall to avoid when doing this is making the best way to complete things being "complete the quest by talking, and then kill everything anyway for the kill XPs."
Yeah, that's what I mean. Take all experience away from killing. So the best they'd get from completing it and then killing everyone is maybe some money/gear, but then there may be the repercussion that it is found out they did it and things get tougher down the road.
Speaking of that, I just read about the original Torment. I never played, but it very much sounds like it is a kind of game where combat isn't a necessity (although Wiki doesn't say if killing everything anyway is still the better reward). It's 2E, which I am 'eh' on, but maybe if I don't have to worry as much about combat I can find more enjoyment in that system. I'll have to add it to my list.
Yeah, get on that. Turn the combat difficulty down to Easy, if you want - that'll just reduce enemy armor and HP and make the fights go by a lot quicker. Make sure you cast every spell at least once, though - the animations are fantastic.
That's always my biggest cripe with video games that tout "open ended" stuff; you still get the best reward for just killing everything. [...] However, in pretty much every game to date (or at least the ones I've played) killing everything is the best reward.
The other pitfall to avoid when doing this is making the best way to complete things being "complete the quest by talking, and then kill everything anyway for the kill XPs."
Yeah, that's what I mean. Take all experience away from killing. So the best they'd get from completing it and then killing everyone is maybe some money/gear, but then there may be the repercussion that it is found out they did it and things get tougher down the road.
Speaking of that, I just read about the original Torment. I never played, but it very much sounds like it is a kind of game where combat isn't a necessity (although Wiki doesn't say if killing everything anyway is still the better reward). It's 2E, which I am 'eh' on, but maybe if I don't have to worry as much about combat I can find more enjoyment in that system. I'll have to add it to my list.
Yes, the vast majority of your XP in Torment will come from quests and dialogue, rather than combat. Combat is still there, and frequently annoying and pointless, but it's far less frequent than most similar titles, and doesn't generally reward you more than a smattering of XP. Whereas some end-game quests/dialogue options result in literally gaining millions of XP at once.
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Eh, I'm not sure Turn based equates combat focus. You can make a game that doesn't emphasis combat, but when you do get into an encounter it uses turn based mechanics. Or you could make a game that is heavy combat but uses RTwP.
As for the quicklook, the game looks promising. I wish they spent some time getting into the nitty gritty of mechanics/showed off some spells or something. Rorie was trying, but it definitely sounded like they were given a list of things to show/talk about and to not deviate
It looks sped up. Like, unnaturally so. The attack animations in DA2 were fast, but it looked right... if that makes any sense. This looks like a slider option or something.
This is the singular reason I prefer RTwP. At least it's over quickly.
There's a time and a place for that sort of thing, but these days, letting the player control the flow is generally a straight-up improvement over letting the game do it.
The difference is that with RTwP you can at least let the less interesting parts go by much faster. The "nothing is going to pass you by"-part of turn-based combat can be great for the interesting parts of nitty-gritty combat, but it also makes the boring parts an incredible slog to go through, since they go past just as glacially.
You *can* make a game that way, but I've never played one. It feels like in a lot of games, going full turn-based (in a battlefield, like Fallout, ToEE, etc, rather than JRPG-style) just means combat takes a long time, and since it's pretty frequent, you end up spending the bulk of the gameplay time on combat. It certainly doesn't *have* to be that way, but I have yet to see any game do what I'd like to see, which is make combat rare and exciting, but still deep and complex.
I can only guess we've played different games, as my recent play of Divinity suggests that, while things are slower, everything I do has a much more meaningful effect on the encounter, even at level 1 (I haven't felt the combat to be a slog at all), while in BG the entire first half of the game felt like a slog because unless I wanted to rest after just about every fight, fights were equipping every character with a sling and kiting enemies, else be killed by one unfortunate crit (or at really low levels, one unfortunate hit). Or spend several minutes missing.
Mind you, I'm not actually blaming RTwP for that. But I also have a hard time equating turned based with slow/boring combat, since my experience has been contrary.
Edit: And since I didn't originally intend to turn this into a us vs. them thread, I'll refrain from posting anymore about TB vs RTwP. If anyone wants to continue the discussion, feel free to PM me.
Let's fight about it!
In the end, I like both systems, and I'll be really interested in seeing if Torment manages their turn-based, no-filler-combat implementation.
Really looking forward to PoE's BG-inspired system, too.
There are good and bad implantations of both systems, and I hope they're both good.
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
The best way to do it would be to limit each party member to 1-2 active ability and have them all on a single hotbar that's accessible no matter what character is selected.
What makes the infinity engine games kinda good in the combat department is that they have limited active abilities for most classes, pretty much all you have to worry about with most of them is positioning. The real fun was in the preparation and the sheer challenge, the execution is a fairly meh experience.
But I wouldn't want either system to dominate the field. What makes the crpg field so exciting is that both systems are well represented for the most part.
Mostly, to @am0n's point, I'm happy we're around when demonstrably top tier and hopefully top tier games are being made that let us have both.
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Dragon Age 2 had shit combat, but that's not really the fault of the pause system.
Yeah, if I had to point fingers at anything combat-related in DA2, it'd be at the rate of encounters. I don't need a major fight breaking out every time I go shopping for groceries, followed by another major fight as 20 dudes appear to replace the 20 dudes I just killed.
Frankly I, too, would love to see an RPG (of any style) that doesn't feel a need for padding the fights in the name of more gameplay. The fights themselves don't even have to be that interesting, just so long as there aren't so many of them that it wears out its welcome. Granted, that's a fairly subjective threshold, but the larger point is that I hope the game doesn't feel the need to have more combat than the plot actually requires.
Now playing: Teardown and Baldur's Gate 3 (co-op)
Sunday Spotlight: Horror Tales: The Wine
It's a good system generally but it comes with it's own drawbacks. An especially bad one affects melee combat... you cannot tell where people will be when your done moving so trying to get into melee can be very hard to do.
The only one I can think of is a JRPG (and an SRPG at that). Vandal Hearts 2 had simultaneous turns. It made the game way too easy though since it wasn't programmed very well and it was super easy to go "okay this dude's gonna move here to attack my guy, so I'll move that guy to behind where the enemy will end up and attack them instead"
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Edit: Yeah, VH2 is what I was thinking of. Once you knew the system, it got easy, but it was still a great concept.
I mean, look what Larian has been able to accomplish with their budget, compared to that Obsidian simply recreating the antiquated Infinity Engine from BG2 feels underwhelming. I mean if that's all they're going to do why not just license the original, they probably could have gotten it for a song.
Can't tell if serious.gif
IMO every single rpg should copy south park the stick of truth/paper mario's combat system though
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although for a serious RPG the lack of movement would really hamper possibilities, but I really like the use item/action being seperate things and the timing thing
that's just me though, but I really enjoyed Divinity most recently until around level 15 when I broke the game and every fight became a joke
What I'm saying is, why not both?
Battlenet ID: MildC#11186 - If I'm in the game, send me an invite at anytime and I'll play.
It can't be serious
- Divinity: Original Sin more time than Pillars. The game was already in production in 2010.
- The Infinity Engine is completly different from Obsidian's approach to Unity. Apart from the general concept, but even that has its differences.
Edit:
- Pillars was pitched as a return to the Infinity Engine games and sticking close to it. Thats the entire point.
(I personally prefer the graphics in Pillars. Divnity while great, is too exaggerated colorful + I just prefer the detail the pre-rendered backgrounds give)
Divinity had a budget of 4M euros, while Pillars has 4M dollars - it's about the same in purchasing power.
Missed that article, thought it was a bit higher (I somehow thought it was 6M euros). Anyway, thanks! Fixed.
I am a firm believer that there is no single correct design philosophy for any genre of game. but I would definitely like to see a few more cRPGs that focussed less on combat altogether. And I don't mean to take it out entirely but to redefine its role in a cRPG would be exciting. I would love some games where getting into a fight is a rare Big Deal, a huge risk and might have serious ramifications, whatever the outcome. I think RPGs in particular devalue combat through over exposure, especially when we know from PnP games that RPGs have so much to offer besides combat.
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
Yeah, as a long time D&D player, that's always bothered me. I love that in a given major story arc of a D&D campaign, we might have a total of a dozen fights, all of which are either elaborate and fun, or have serious story-related implications, and it kills me that there's basically not a single computer/console RPG that works that way.
I think if you did that, you'd go a long way to making combat feel less like a necessity and more like one of several options.
The other pitfall to avoid when doing this is making the best way to complete things being "complete the quest by talking, and then kill everything anyway for the kill XPs."
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
Yeah, that's what I mean. Take all experience away from killing. So the best they'd get from completing it and then killing everyone is maybe some money/gear, but then there may be the repercussion that it is found out they did it and things get tougher down the road.
Speaking of that, I just read about the original Torment. I never played, but it very much sounds like it is a kind of game where combat isn't a necessity (although Wiki doesn't say if killing everything anyway is still the better reward). It's 2E, which I am 'eh' on, but maybe if I don't have to worry as much about combat I can find more enjoyment in that system. I'll have to add it to my list.
Yeah, get on that. Turn the combat difficulty down to Easy, if you want - that'll just reduce enemy armor and HP and make the fights go by a lot quicker. Make sure you cast every spell at least once, though - the animations are fantastic.
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
Yes, the vast majority of your XP in Torment will come from quests and dialogue, rather than combat. Combat is still there, and frequently annoying and pointless, but it's far less frequent than most similar titles, and doesn't generally reward you more than a smattering of XP. Whereas some end-game quests/dialogue options result in literally gaining millions of XP at once.