Holy.Death

[Holy.Death]

I see you’ve got a new haircut, Psen. And a new suit of armor.

[Holy.Death]

PsenBattle wrote:

maybe I have been a bit misleading The worldmap rework refers mostly to game design. Size of the world, factions, contracts, reputation – goal of the game.

It looks like it was I who was imprecise.

I simply threw in some examples where map has been used in an interesting way, one that made them resemble a board games. With that said your game does share same approach that I like (even more so in tactical battles, thanks to the stands all characters are located on). Besides that I was simply wondering what kind of rework you had in mind when you mentioned reworking the big worldmap rework as it sounded more than just redrawing it.

Here are some examples I mentioned ealier: Hegemony Rome: The Rise of Ceasar, Endless Legend, Ticket to Ride.

[Holy.Death]

RusBear – Agreed.

Psen – I have huge sympathy for drawn maps with figurines moving on it from my board game times and from Medieval: Total War (1). Hegemony (Wars of Ancient Greece and The Rise of Ceasar) had quite unique take on this. Rework of the worldmap is something I am very interested to see. I assume it’ll be only after the goblins or will it happen along with them making an appearance?

[Holy.Death]

PsenBattle wrote:

The problem with a def bonus would be the early game. People start out with pretty low melee accuracy and they all wear the lightest armor in the game. Battles would drag on forever without anybody hitting anything :)

Indeed. I recall someone making a post that certain weapons are not as effective when used against certain types of armor. It could mix very well with what you plan to do while giving weapons even more diversity. But I guess it’d be best to wait for the content before judging anything.

RusBear wrote:

Revision of the armor system – this is a very important step in changing the gameplay, it is very important not to stumble. And do not sacrifice realism and common sense for the sake of gameplay. light armor can not be protected from getting damaged (by any means), better than heavy. And who said that my well-trained warrior can not move quickly in heavy armor and better than this one has just hired a thief in a leather cape? This is nonsense. You can not avoid throwing spears or crossbow bolts and even hitting ax – if it is made a master blow – not your shitty movies about elves, do not delusions.

You can avoid javelins and crossbow bolts in this game: it depends on your stats, perks and equipment (kite shield).

It’s a game and like any game can’t be too realistic. If you make ultra realistic game while sacrificing gameplay, then you have a game that could be – perhaps – closer to what’s considered “realistic”, but wouldn’t be enjoyable to play. That’s why gameplay is more important. Realism in games is ALWAYS contractual.

It’s good that armor system is being revisited, because its previous iteration created, as you yourself have said, “a certain pattern”. To break that pattern there must be more choices that are viable for a player. But to make choices viable (or to scale down too good choices) changes are needed to the system. And that’s what the game is: the system made up of certain rules.

You ask “why your well-trained warrior can not move quickly in heavy armor and better than this one has just hired a thief in a leather cape?”. That’s why. You say you want realism over gameplay, but suddenly you sound like you want your own image of realism over the actual realism…

[Holy.Death]

We stack heavy because it’s the only real protection. If you’d maybe counterbalance that with adding more dodge and evade skills mechanics it may be more effective to fight large, lumbering orcs in light, agile armour, quickly striking and retreating, thus keeping your guy alive.

That’s a good point. What about making lighter armor increasing melee defense bonus and/or decreasing the chances of being hit while moving through enemy control zone(s)? This, in addition to changing the armor system, should give people the incentive to use armor (because it’d give protection) but not the thickest there is (because heavy armor would be more limiting that light armor).

Only the game is currently so punishing with fatigue (even if I select I’ll make one strong guy my tank, but then the leveling gives me shitty stats, all 2’s and I can’t pump up his fatigue), if I give him not even the heaviest armour, but some level 3 or 4 stuff, he’s too heavy and only has enough stamina for one strike, then has to rest. Bit too restrictive if you ask me.

Well, what other drawbacks the heavy armor could have, besides costing more stamina to wear? I mean, real drawbacks? Perhaps you couldn’t move as far (it’d cost more fatigue/APs per tile)? Or it’d lower your melee defense, turning you into damage sponge (because your man is easier to hit, which could be both desirable or not: Desirable, because you’d make him into a tank and heavy armor could allow him to soak more damage. Undesirable, because with new armor system armor won’t soak everything and he might die. He could also be more susceptible to crossbows and javelins)?

[Holy.Death]

Jago wrote:

Imho the backgrounds COULD be tweaked a lttle, to give more obvious info and more variation. That’s nothing game breaking.

The answer could be in linking positive and negative traits together – instead of having 4 traits (2 bad, 2 good) we could get 2 traits that’d have their ups and downs. That way even a negative trait would have some positives and there would be no obvious positive traits. A trade off. It is the only way I can see giving more info on recruits that could potentially work out while keeping the original idea (of having imperfect men around) in mind. The “only” problem would be then in developing and balancing such system.

in my humble opinion – suggested by me above option with the disclosure of non-obvious character traits as you gain level up and game events and actions of the squad as a whole – seems logical, hardcore, and solves the problem with save/ download if for whom it is a problem.

They said something about thinking on someone’s idea of hiring a recruiter (I am not sure if that’d be just another background of a battle brother or a follower, like blacksmith et al) that could unravel more about men for hire you encounter. But it’s merely a thought from the developer on a suggestion, so take that with a pinch of salt in regards to actual implementation. It might happen or not.

[Holy.Death]

I use spears and billhooks (billhooks are safe, spears are more accurate). If you have some people with Fortified Mind perk you can send them out ALONE to kill enemies. Why alone? Because the perk doesn’t protect from morale checks that happen when your battle brothers see allies fleeing in terror. Other than that I cannot say, because I don’t think there is another way of dealing with them (although some people said that highly leveled up archers can kill Lost Souls from afar).

[Holy.Death]

There are many different ways to play the game. And I am not saying mine is the most effective or anything. But I tend to choose similar skills and similar type of equipment. Which might be because I totally lack imagination, but may also be because it’s effetive and no reason to alternate.

– At some point in game (level 5 or 6) enemies tend to stop being a problem. It’s a known balancing issue and will be adressed with time and further development. There is no real end game as of now. That’s one of the reasons why people don’t have to change their play style so much (excluding early game).

– There are more types of enemies and environments planned to break players’ habits (such as using only one strategy/build to deal with all enemies). That’s where goblins come into play as they use different tactics than the of other factions. They also want to make some other perks more viable (such as Fortified Mind, because so far we only have only one enemy type that’s affecting morale, making it too situational). Changes to skill system are already confirmed, although there are no details on that yet.

– Archery is very good, but archers need time to get to a point where they’ll prove to be greater asset to their team than a liability. I find archers to be among the best members of my team as they mow down unarmored targets and soften up armored ones before lines close to one another. And even after than with high enough ranged skill they hit enemies reliably enough for me not to be afraid of friendly fire. They basically fire until they have no stamina left.

– It’s possible to protect archers. It requires a lot of smart positioning and controlling what’s going on (orcs are the worst), but I have no problems in stopping enemies in their tracks before they even get close to my archers (and I have 4 of them, so that’s 8 people to zone enemies out).

[Holy.Death]

It is in fact not clear in the quotes (at least not the ones I read) that devs do understand the consequences here. If they come here and say they do understand that their desire for users to have bad traits of their mercenaries will be void with the current implementation and that they don’t care about it, then I stand corrected.

If you want to ignore what developers said and want them to answer you directly, then you’re free to wait. Good luck.

[Holy.Death]

Honestly? I doubt that many would be able tell the difference, especially in-game, where art is smaller. Perhaps the old arts look a bit less clear and have less details on them, but overall it’s still great work. I am just glad that you’re working on this game, because you provide a lot of visual feedback that makes the game look so appealing and fresh when compared to other games (very few models resulting in a lot of cloning, often ugly 3D, etc.).

[Holy.Death]

Out of curiosity – why are you reworking BB armors? To provide more visual variety (which is great) or to make them somehow reflect the new planned armor system?

[Holy.Death]

Not ironclad parallel perhaps… but that is what I try to argue. I will voice my own personal taste in hope that it’s something that others like, but this entire thread has mostly been about me explaining what the effect will be of certain things. And that are perceived facts, not personal taste.

Everybody knows that. It’s even in the developer’s quote.

Very charming. And you are now supplying information to change the circumstances.

I am merely proving that:

– Developers know about gaming the system by save-loading.
– Developers don’t think they should address that.
– Not being able to see traits is a conscious design decision.
– Developers think that backgrounds provide enough information as-is.

[Holy.Death]

You cannot force people to play a game exactly the way you want when it goes against the nature of people. It doesn’t make sense. […] I am looking forward to a dev explaining the thought behind incentives to save/reload.

The fact that something is not following your point of view doesn’t mean it makes no sense. Here is the direct response to that:

I can imagine not having all character traits be permanent, and your reasoning on this is sound. One thing to consider, though, is that those character traits are also character-defining to some extent. Having “the fat guy” you came to love suddenly being “the regularly-sized guy” among a bunch of other regularly-sized guys makes him also less special, which is what those character traits are all about. Then again, maybe he just started out as “the fat guy” and has long since become “the axe guy, slayer of dragons and sole survivor of the battle of xy”. I suppose this warrants some more reflection once we’re further on with development of the campaign worldmap.

Regarding your other point, the thing is that everything can and probably will be “gamed”, as you put it. We can discourage people in this instance by making the difference between 2 positive and 2 negative traits just strong enough to be taken seriously, but not in any way crippling. We can discourage throwing away people for their traits with prohibitive recruiting costs and recruits being rare. But ultimately, that mindset of powergaming can apply to everything, and attempting to design the game in a way that suppresses this without having gameplay suffer for it is a fool’s errant. Some people will reload the game for everything, from unfavourable battle results to characters gaining negative traits like being traumatized, as Levi suggested. That shouldn’t stop us from adding such traits in the first place. We’ll do our best to make this a balanced game that doesn’t necessitate or encourage any such powergaming, but ultimately, it comes down to how each individual player chooses to play the game for him or herself.

Although I think the answer is intelligently put and correct in that the background is so much more than +5 x and -10 y as planned. It makes little sense to listing those bonus/penalties as it just forces people that care about it to go to a wiki or record it for themselves.

Nothing is stopping them. If people want to game the system, they’ll do it.

Anyhow. Thanks for clearing up where your view of devs intentions came from and (indirectly) why your argument was firm but inconsistent. I see now that you were right in your impression of what the devs said they would do.

Right. Impression. I actually read developer’s diaries (Character traits and backgrounds, Character generation, hiring, shopping) as well as the FAQ and some other stuff that can be easily found on the internet if you look for it. That’s not an “impression” when something is stated clearly.

[Holy.Death]

Here is an answer directly from the developer directly on subject of being able to see character’s traits.

[Holy.Death]

If you find that word provoking (english is not may native language) then perhaps we should call it: “not keeping an open mind”?

Are you sure you’re using that word correctly? Because from where I am standing it’s not about keeping an open mind at all. Why? Because we are talking about a game that’s design and made in a certain way for certain reasons. I am simply pointing that out. The fact that I like said direction comes out from another fact that these features were advertised…:

Q: Will the game have flavor content or extra content like background stories for characters, areas, special weapons, statistics and so on?

Yes! We’re big fans of all those little details that come together to give a game that extra bit of atmosphere, sense of wonder and exploration. It’s one of the reasons we liked both the original X-Com and Jagged Alliance 2 that much. There will be short, proceduraly generated backstories for all Battle Brothers that also influence a Brother’s combat stats and traits.

…and I like such games, so I bought this one.

Sure, you can add any suggestion you want. I am not questioning that. I am questioning the approach of going directly against what developers want the game to be.

a) I point out that there is a huge random factor in the usefulness in team members when recruiting as we get little or no information on the characterstics of the characters we recruit. We know what background they have, but we don’t get any information (unless I am mistaken – perhaps what he is asking in pay is a hint or the text? But I haven’t spotted a pattern.) whether he is big, tall, fat or any other characteristics that intuitively should be spotted. Besides this being unrealistic (not something I care that much about) it’s also gives the effect that it’s impossible to make a good decision. It’s a gamble.

Yes, it’s a gamble, but the one that can be managed (as I tried to explain). And – much more importantly – working as intended. What would be the point of making various traits (including the negative ones) had the people been avoiding hiring them due to hints of characters having negatives? From design standpoint it makes no sense. You make such traits to be there, to be used. If not, then you don’t make them.

b) I point out that in my experience this leads to users using save/load and make playing ironman much less enjoyable as you get stuck with team members you don’t want due to the random recruitment effect.

But that’s not a problem. If you’re playing a game in a different way than it was planned, then it’s on you. That’s what I am trying to say. While you are not forced to play “the one and only correct way” you shouldn’t reasonably expect game/developers to accommodate your play style. Especially if this play style goes against what the game stands for.

d) I point out that I have nothing against a random feature for those who want to gamble, but I find it important (assuming the game is about making decisions) that management of the crew is more about informed decision and less of a gamble. Now if you want to make an informed decision to gamble.. that is your choice ? Forcing those that want to make informed decisions instead of gambling to save/reload isn’t really a good practice imo.

When I am talking about how to use the guys you get (and when I am talking about planning which ones to get) I am directly talking about making a decision that is the core of managing the crew by making an informed decision (basing on their equipment, background, salary and needs of my group). I do not hire men blindly, because it’s not a complete roulette as you suggested by asking why not randomly recruit a brother.

e) You seem to not understand the philosophy about making informed decisions and question that I should ask for this to be part of the game when it comes to recruiting.

The question would be “How much informed must one be in order to make his decision informed?” and “Why so much?”. But I will ask the most important question: “Would you hire that man, had you known all his traits?”. Then here comes the part speaking about the design and why you don’t put features that people avoid. Then I think the conversation should drift towards talking about the sensibility of cutting a large portion of the game – and developers’ vision – because of that.

And here comes a puzzlin part. The quote you supply from devs seem to NOT be an answer to my suggestion or informed decisions whatsoever. It kind of strengthens the perception that you seem to not grasp the concept.

I think I covered this in the beginning of this post, but I will add that this developer’s post plus quote from the FAQ should be enough to come to a conclusion that by “We want you to pick up less-than-ideal candidates and mold them into mercenaries […]” they meant hiring people who come up with less than ideal traits. Note that they also meant: “[…] and we want you to keep an eye out for fitting recruits as you roam the lands […]”, meaning that they do seem to believe that you have enough information during recruitment in order to know which recruits will be fitting.

So perhaps read back? Either you seem to misunderstand the whole purpose of my suggestion, or perhaps you didn’t read the thread you try to use as argument against it. Either way, feel free to argue as long as you bother to understand first and question later?

But I do understand your position. I simply argue against it for reasons mentioned above. Maybe I am the minority, maybe I am wrong or whatever. Ultimately it’s up to the developers to make the final call, but I am speaking my mind, because I think it’s better to have feedback than to be silent.

One more thing, you put “Random vs. Decisions” in your thread. This is quite telling on its own, but also wrong – it’s not really “random vs decisions” as you suggest. It’s “decisions and more decisions caused by the outcome (which is based on some randomness)”. In a big scale you could just as well say that “this game is all about randomness” (and I did hear many people saying that about any game with RNG involved), but that’s why I say it’s about managing your luck. Can you manage what traits your man will have? No, but you can give him stats after you level him up and decide on the background (thus impacting his stats) as well as pick skills.

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