Kahsm

[Kahsm]

lfish wrote:

Being able to determine with any kind of specificity the attributes of your individual units undermines the feeling of being the head of a mercenary company,

Not being able to have any input into who I’m picking to be my founding members of my Merc group undermines the feeling of being head of a merc group.

But this doesn’t really have to be solved by customization. Just give us a long list of random people and let us pick 3.

GOD wrote:

What I’m emphasising is the need for good, tight design. That’s how you make a great game, rather than a forgettable one (people still play HoMM 2 and 3, while HoMM 4 is barely mentioned). A feature that seems fun on its own can ruin the kind of play experience that you’re trying to create. I’ve yet to see anyone actually address my arguments regarding that,

Maybe people aren’t addressing it because it’s a ridiculous assertion. Skyrim, GTA V, Minecraft, Terraria, Mount & Blade. These games are all insanely popular and not what anyone would consider “tight design”. Freedom is what people crave right now. Sandbox is the current fad. Look at all the survival games out there where people just want more and more stuff added constantly because they’re “fun features”. If the devs want to make something else, that’s their choice of course. But your point seems pretty far from reality.

BTW, a lot of good ideas there, hope to see many of them in game eventually. But the low-hanging fruit are the simple concepts that have the broadest possible impact on the player model of the game (The Simulation Dream). I believe customization is an easy win there.

Sky wrote:

I can even imgaine how many people will reroll the game just cuz they lost one of their custumized starters who they had big plans with.

They already do, so this cannot be used as an argument against customization. When you find a guy with the right face and decent stats, you rename him. That’s how customization is done now. No one can argue that customization will change the game, because it’s already done. The question is, should it be less infuriatingly annoying to do.

Sky wrote:

You are playing not as one (tho you definitely can RP that) but as a whole group of mercenaries who didn’t become this way because they like it, but had to.

You’re playing the leader of a company who doesn’t fight with the company. At every other point in the game you get a list of available people to pick from. You can see how they look and their background, just not their extra traits and their stats. Why couldn’t that be done at the start? How would that damage the narrative?

[Kahsm]

PsenBattle wrote:

Hethwill_Khan wrote:

Pretty much how I remember it from Xcoms. That random grunt that simply went over the top and saves everyone

This was exactly what we were going for. Im happy that it seems to work

And yet XCOM, in it’s recent form, lets you rename and design the look of your troops. They realize how important that is to a large group of people who play these types of games, and that it did not take anything away from those players that don’t care. Seems like a no-brainer, if resources permit.

As for the “we have more important things to work on given our limited time and resources” argument. I certainly get that. Adding something somewhat tangential to the main purpose of the game seems wrong at this stage. But it could increase the broader appeal, which might result in more resources. Get those Mount & Blade people.

If you don’t think people are starting, quitting, and restarting over and over to get the people they want to play, you’re kidding yourself. So it’s already happening. And it would be nice if they(we) didn’t have to get frustrated by how annoying that is to do.

This whole, “but people die a lot in this game” argument makes no sense to me. Yes, that’s true and fine. And I’d like to actually care that they’re dead and not shrug it off because he’s a random farmer whose name I can barely remember. I think customization makes the dangerous atmosphere even more powerful.

The fact that you’re able to change their names suggest that there is already a nod to those who want some personalization, and to feel more connected to their Battle Brothers.

Another option is modding capabilities. Rimworld has a similar design, where your first settlers are randomly generated. But there’s a mod you can get that changes that. Let the community help with the personalization tweaks.

[Kahsm]

I think people are responding to the strange narrative at the start of the game created by 3 totally random characters. I think the problem really stems from the “original member” trait.

3 characters are made special, when they aren’t special. As a matter of fact, they’re usually pretty crappy compared to the hedge knights I’m hiring later on when I have money.

If you let people pick a starting background and design their faces, there isn’t any min-maxing going on, so that should be fine for everyone. Other traits could be random, or just not apply to starting members.

[Kahsm]

Personally think it should skew more towards Mount&Blade style. Where you can generate your first guy, which is “you”. Then the rest can be whoever’s available. It never makes sense to me that I’m playing a mercenary party, but am I not _IN_ the merc group?

Someone mentioned that your starting guys should probably match your background, so there’s some narrative cohesion that explains why you’re together. I liked that too.

So if you can generate the name, look, background, and maybe trait of 1 guy. Then the rest can be hired people where you take what you can get.

That said, I’d prefer if every character could have their looks edited as well as the name.
Like in my mercenary company, I want us to all have the same haircut and beards. We’re very professional.

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