My man has no words to what they have done to the beloved franchise he helped build. The amount of force he must be exerting to not show up destroying this game must be colossal.
Interesting to see fumbles brought up as an example by a video game developer. In the tabletop community this is a known problem. I've seen countless discussions on the topic. I've suffered under DMs using such rules and even tried my hand at designing fumbles that didn't suck. (My attempt involved only penalties that would not allow you to maim yourself attacking a dummy - e.g. leaving yourself open for attacks, but not straight up injuring yourself + a form of compensation, so as not to punish martial characters more.)
Are you gonna have to wait a year or so to do a video on veilguard? I don't wanna bother you with my opinions too much until that video is dropped haha. I guess my main question is why was the last 5 hours so polished and good while the rest seemed like at the minimum someone had to sit the writers down and get them all on the same page. Also why was everything until the last 5 hours except mabye 2 main story quests so uncontroversial and safe in terms of tones and themes? I felt like i got 5 hours of a dragon age game and 45 hours of a disney game tbh. I can tell the talent is there from those last 5 hours so what happened to the rest of it, it could have been a 25 hour game of high quality if the team was directed well and all on the same page it seems.
in more complex games you really can't prevent everything, the question is just how easily accessible/avoidable is that feature. like in dai you can kill every single dragon by standing outside of her attack range and shoot her with a mage (since staffs don't have max range, unlike bows), but in some cases finding the right spot is more tricky, and lbr, most ppl is not willing to spent 30 minutes just standing in one place, shooting at a dragon. i like exploits like this, bcos even if you discover them by accident, it's very easy to just not do it and play the regular way. i feel like at some point trying to fix stuff like that is just really wasting everyone's time, like cdpr did in witcher, they managed to prevent ppl playing as ciri after one of her quest (which could only be done by some wild parkouring anyway, nothing anyone could do by accident). just leave it in the game, who cares. it think the other side of this that you actually talk about, when badly thought out mechanics make player experience worse, is what i have bigger problem with. obviously you can't really prevent everything and sometimes players are bringing stuff on themselves by doing weird stuff, but other times it's just bad design. i'm a total war player and ca has this tendency to put player traps to, i guess, make the game more challenging? but it just makes it more obnoxious. their infamous warhammer 3 main campaign was so bad that it was better to actually not engage with the main mechanic, as the only "reward" was a wave of enemies spawning on top of your cities. or there are instances where upgrading units actually makes them worse and more expensive than the lower level ones. having hundreds of hours in those games i know what to avoid, but those mechanics should just not be in the game in the first place.
Isn't doing something like weak & strong points for every build to balance it also makes it less realistic sometimes to the point where it breaks immersion, like a mage for example can burn a whole city while a rogue or warrior won't be able to do that, a mage may be weak in close combat fights while rogue, warriors shine there... I feel like they sometimes balance things without really considering anything else beyond having all builds be on equal terms.
Typically in a game you need to take SOME balance consideration of the systems break. Jedi in the old West End Star Wars TTRPGF were so much more powerful that they robbed the un from the other players in the campaign
For crit failures, here's a solution I just came up with: rolling a 1 means you have disadvantage on your next attack. Since fighters have more attacks, they're more likely to get crit failures, but it also means that getting disadvantage on a single attack is less of a big deal. I will admit, disadvantage is much more painful for rogues than others, so I'm not sure if this is the best solution.
You could probably work with it and get something. It still hits martial harder then caster but you could potentially offset that by making critical better a well
I'm going to throw out a wild question about a design choice. I know David Gaider talked about critical path and how there is usually not enough resources to go around to address different world states etc. Would taking a step back from something like Frost Bite and not trying to be the most visually appealing game offer any savings or allow games to release quicker? I look at Origins, Pillars of Eternity or I suppose on the high end, BG3...maybe Unreal 5 engine is as good as it can go? I know people worry about it looking "last gen" but the Dragon Age franchise never seemed like it needed to be cutting edge in graphics but just great writing / story / gameplay and "good" combat. I don't think Veil Guard was received well but maybe the above would represent a way to move the franchise forward? The budgets for AAA games these days seem insane...surely it doesn't need to be that expensive?
I'm not really sure what you are asking. Reacting to world state and visual fidelity aren't rally in conflict over resources. Other than both things cost money, I suppose
@ Would changing engines or dialling back high end visuals in a series like Dragon Age have allowed you to explore more of the different world state possibilities? David Gaider talked about wanting to do more with old god baby for example, it was something from 2 games ago, cinematically demanding because of how many different scenarios there were with Kieran and resources are a stretch such as time &/or money. I’d be fine with something like Origins visually at this point if there wasn’t janky because you just need good game play / story / characters so I don’t need something visually amazing, just “good” or “fine”. And would it allow you release games say every 2-3 years versus 4-6?
My main Skyrim character was a destruction mage (I don’t remember all of Skyrims terms so apologies). My entire build was based on magika and magika regeneration. I wore robes and a dragon priest mask that increased magika regeneration upwards of 150% or more I think. The fire bolt spell stuns enemies after it hits them, but normally fire bolt takes so much magika that you can’t cast it repeatedly. However, because my ENTIRE build was around magika regeneration, it meant that I could stun lock any enemy. I could cast fore bolt endlessly as my magika would regenerate by the time the enemy recovered from the stun. Dragons? Stun locked. Dragon priests? Stun locked. The ebony warrior? Stun locked lol I would also stun lock enemies, quickly swap spells over to fire wall, cast that at an enemy’s feet, then switch back to my bolt so enemies would be stun locked while standing in fire haha good times!
I have a question. Do devs kind of like hidden broken game mechanics that will make your player absolutely OP? Sometimes they almost seem like easter eggs for you to find if you're observant enough.
I know that potion economy in final fantasy with 99 potions is intentional, but it's only broken if you are user player who master the game already, it's designed to be a simple resources management game, that's why bosses have almost instant kill move, it force beginner to learn prioritisation, and eventually learn advanced mechanics that protect against such move. Intermediate skill players will prioritise other expensive equipments, but skilled player will simply apply best strategies to the enemy weaknesses. The issues is that a lot of broken powerful OP build are just artifact of conquering the game system, some might say the rewards, most player, especially starting player won't have the literacy to get there first, so there is a "progression" until the game is imbalanced. My first time realising this was playing secret of mana as a kid, I almost maxed out the level and still struggled against the final boss, but on replay I beat the game easily with only a third of the level 😂
I hate and love one ability in DA Inqisition - combat roll with damage upgrade. It delivers more damage than other abilities and you can just roll everything to death, including dragons. It is fun for a while, but it quickly becomes dominant strategy and you use it, even if you know that it makes game less fun. On the other hand combat system in DAI is not that fun for me, so ability to just roll everything and quickly end all encouters makes game less boring for me. I playing DAV now and for some reason i find few OP builds but i will not use it, cause i like me as Grey Warden with shield and sword with cool blocks etc. And i just love it even after 90 hours. So i wonder if player willingness to not break the system is connected to how fun initialy it is for him.
are there any good ways to use automated testing to try and find a subset of the anomalies within a system from which a broken experience might emerge? perhaps not to find undiscovered edge cases, but to guard against breaking certain known ones
If you know a pattern, you can build a test. Not always cheaply enough to be worth it... Basically if you could give a QA person with 0 experience clear enough instructions to test it, you can build a test
I never design "system", I design progression! Hp is just a highly localised progression, it's the combat real "board", instead of designing system, skills, etc... I design move within this board and its pacing, by breaking it into area, then classifying area per type, then derive system that manage each area type. Then disguise these "moves" as expected traditional mechanics 😂
How do you fell about dragon age the veilguard?
As fan of the franchise I was really disappointed of the direction the game took
It a miracle that it managed to get to the quality level that it did
My man has no words to what they have done to the beloved franchise he helped build. The amount of force he must be exerting to not show up destroying this game must be colossal.
In my experience, unintended consequences are common is complex systems, and are almost humanly impossible to prevent.
For sure
1e AD&D treated a 1 on attack roll as always a miss. A 20 was treated like you rolled a 25 before applying "to hit" modifers.
That's true I'd forgotten a 20 could still miss in AD&D
Interesting to see fumbles brought up as an example by a video game developer. In the tabletop community this is a known problem. I've seen countless discussions on the topic. I've suffered under DMs using such rules and even tried my hand at designing fumbles that didn't suck.
(My attempt involved only penalties that would not allow you to maim yourself attacking a dummy - e.g. leaving yourself open for attacks, but not straight up injuring yourself + a form of compensation, so as not to punish martial characters more.)
It seemed like one that members of the VG design community would be aware of but not necessarily have thought on
Are you gonna have to wait a year or so to do a video on veilguard? I don't wanna bother you with my opinions too much until that video is dropped haha. I guess my main question is why was the last 5 hours so polished and good while the rest seemed like at the minimum someone had to sit the writers down and get them all on the same page. Also why was everything until the last 5 hours except mabye 2 main story quests so uncontroversial and safe in terms of tones and themes? I felt like i got 5 hours of a dragon age game and 45 hours of a disney game tbh. I can tell the talent is there from those last 5 hours so what happened to the rest of it, it could have been a 25 hour game of high quality if the team was directed well and all on the same page it seems.
It will be a while for a video on Veilguard
in more complex games you really can't prevent everything, the question is just how easily accessible/avoidable is that feature. like in dai you can kill every single dragon by standing outside of her attack range and shoot her with a mage (since staffs don't have max range, unlike bows), but in some cases finding the right spot is more tricky, and lbr, most ppl is not willing to spent 30 minutes just standing in one place, shooting at a dragon. i like exploits like this, bcos even if you discover them by accident, it's very easy to just not do it and play the regular way. i feel like at some point trying to fix stuff like that is just really wasting everyone's time, like cdpr did in witcher, they managed to prevent ppl playing as ciri after one of her quest (which could only be done by some wild parkouring anyway, nothing anyone could do by accident). just leave it in the game, who cares.
it think the other side of this that you actually talk about, when badly thought out mechanics make player experience worse, is what i have bigger problem with. obviously you can't really prevent everything and sometimes players are bringing stuff on themselves by doing weird stuff, but other times it's just bad design. i'm a total war player and ca has this tendency to put player traps to, i guess, make the game more challenging? but it just makes it more obnoxious. their infamous warhammer 3 main campaign was so bad that it was better to actually not engage with the main mechanic, as the only "reward" was a wave of enemies spawning on top of your cities. or there are instances where upgrading units actually makes them worse and more expensive than the lower level ones. having hundreds of hours in those games i know what to avoid, but those mechanics should just not be in the game in the first place.
You can’t avoid everything, the testing matrix is too large
Helpful, thanks!
Glad to help
Isn't doing something like weak & strong points for every build to balance it also makes it less realistic sometimes to the point where it breaks immersion, like a mage for example can burn a whole city while a rogue or warrior won't be able to do that, a mage may be weak in close combat fights while rogue, warriors shine there... I feel like they sometimes balance things without really considering anything else beyond having all builds be on equal terms.
Typically in a game you need to take SOME balance consideration of the systems break.
Jedi in the old West End Star Wars TTRPGF were so much more powerful that they robbed the un from the other players in the campaign
For crit failures, here's a solution I just came up with: rolling a 1 means you have disadvantage on your next attack. Since fighters have more attacks, they're more likely to get crit failures, but it also means that getting disadvantage on a single attack is less of a big deal.
I will admit, disadvantage is much more painful for rogues than others, so I'm not sure if this is the best solution.
You could probably work with it and get something.
It still hits martial harder then caster but you could potentially offset that by making critical better a well
I'm going to throw out a wild question about a design choice. I know David Gaider talked about critical path and how there is usually not enough resources to go around to address different world states etc.
Would taking a step back from something like Frost Bite and not trying to be the most visually appealing game offer any savings or allow games to release quicker? I look at Origins, Pillars of Eternity or I suppose on the high end, BG3...maybe Unreal 5 engine is as good as it can go? I know people worry about it looking "last gen" but the Dragon Age franchise never seemed like it needed to be cutting edge in graphics but just great writing / story / gameplay and "good" combat.
I don't think Veil Guard was received well but maybe the above would represent a way to move the franchise forward? The budgets for AAA games these days seem insane...surely it doesn't need to be that expensive?
I'm not really sure what you are asking.
Reacting to world state and visual fidelity aren't rally in conflict over resources.
Other than both things cost money, I suppose
@ Would changing engines or dialling back high end visuals in a series like Dragon Age have allowed you to explore more of the different world state possibilities?
David Gaider talked about wanting to do more with old god baby for example, it was something from 2 games ago, cinematically demanding because of how many different scenarios there were with Kieran and resources are a stretch such as time &/or money.
I’d be fine with something like Origins visually at this point if there wasn’t janky because you just need good game play / story / characters so I don’t need something visually amazing, just “good” or “fine”.
And would it allow you release games say every 2-3 years versus 4-6?
My main Skyrim character was a destruction mage (I don’t remember all of Skyrims terms so apologies). My entire build was based on magika and magika regeneration. I wore robes and a dragon priest mask that increased magika regeneration upwards of 150% or more I think. The fire bolt spell stuns enemies after it hits them, but normally fire bolt takes so much magika that you can’t cast it repeatedly. However, because my ENTIRE build was around magika regeneration, it meant that I could stun lock any enemy. I could cast fore bolt endlessly as my magika would regenerate by the time the enemy recovered from the stun. Dragons? Stun locked. Dragon priests? Stun locked. The ebony warrior? Stun locked lol I would also stun lock enemies, quickly swap spells over to fire wall, cast that at an enemy’s feet, then switch back to my bolt so enemies would be stun locked while standing in fire haha good times!
Lol
I have a question. Do devs kind of like hidden broken game mechanics that will make your player absolutely OP? Sometimes they almost seem like easter eggs for you to find if you're observant enough.
Mostly accidents but sometimes
@@MarkDarrah you could always hire Spiffing Brit as a play tester... lol
I know that potion economy in final fantasy with 99 potions is intentional, but it's only broken if you are user player who master the game already, it's designed to be a simple resources management game, that's why bosses have almost instant kill move, it force beginner to learn prioritisation, and eventually learn advanced mechanics that protect against such move. Intermediate skill players will prioritise other expensive equipments, but skilled player will simply apply best strategies to the enemy weaknesses.
The issues is that a lot of broken powerful OP build are just artifact of conquering the game system, some might say the rewards, most player, especially starting player won't have the literacy to get there first, so there is a "progression" until the game is imbalanced.
My first time realising this was playing secret of mana as a kid, I almost maxed out the level and still struggled against the final boss, but on replay I beat the game easily with only a third of the level 😂
I hate and love one ability in DA Inqisition - combat roll with damage upgrade. It delivers more damage than other abilities and you can just roll everything to death, including dragons. It is fun for a while, but it quickly becomes dominant strategy and you use it, even if you know that it makes game less fun. On the other hand combat system in DAI is not that fun for me, so ability to just roll everything and quickly end all encouters makes game less boring for me. I playing DAV now and for some reason i find few OP builds but i will not use it, cause i like me as Grey Warden with shield and sword with cool blocks etc. And i just love it even after 90 hours. So i wonder if player willingness to not break the system is connected to how fun initialy it is for him.
There may be something to that… if they are in a fun “rut” they are less likely to jump into the OP one…
Omg I love the damaging combat roll!
DATV's combat is the first time in a DA game where instead of avoiding the slog of optional combat, I'll jump right into it. Bring on the mooks!
are there any good ways to use automated testing to try and find a subset of the anomalies within a system from which a broken experience might emerge? perhaps not to find undiscovered edge cases, but to guard against breaking certain known ones
If you know a pattern, you can build a test.
Not always cheaply enough to be worth it...
Basically if you could give a QA person with 0 experience clear enough instructions to test it, you can build a test
I never design "system", I design progression! Hp is just a highly localised progression, it's the combat real "board", instead of designing system, skills, etc... I design move within this board and its pacing, by breaking it into area, then classifying area per type, then derive system that manage each area type. Then disguise these "moves" as expected traditional mechanics 😂
Interesting perspective.
Algorithm comment for the algorithm gods
Engagement for the Engagement god!
It is not fair DA Vailguard deserved to be nominated for best RPG.Narrative and GOTY
Yup. Journos shamefully bowing to GamerTM politics.
There were a lot of good RPGs this year…
@@MarkDarrah yes but Veilguard is the best in my opinion and it is original game not remake or DLC
No, no it didn't. Veilguard is mediocre at best. Let's not kid ourselves.
@@marconeves1979 this is not true