Pillars of Eternity

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rope kid: Feb 3, 2001; Warte nur! Balde
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MegaGatts posted:

I'm getting a eastern european vibe from the dywoodan. Something like Lithuania or Muscovy, Is that intentional? Also, in regards to all the cultures; will analog to the real world be mostly cosmetic and linguistic or will their military follow their historical inspirations. Like will the Aedyran favor heavy infantry with various auxiliaries and would a PC gain any bonus from a factions specialization? Such as a Aedyran bonus with shields? Finally I'm wondering if there's any Eastern/ Western empire split going on. Cause I think having legionaries and Cataphracts would be cool.

Moving to an unrelated topic, I figure it wont be in this game, but have you ever considered something like horses or other mounts in a real time with pause game like this?

There aren't any intentional eastern European sources for the Dyrwoodan clothing, no. Most of the cultural references will be for language, clothing, and a small amount of politics.

Horses would be difficult for us to incorporate in a game like this for a variety of reasons. Technical limitations are one aspect, but map size is where it really becomes a problem.

# ¿ Apr 22, 2014 13:41

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# ¿ Apr 25, 2024 23:53

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Republican Vampire posted:

Thanks for replying, and it's cool that this is something you think about. I'm just weirdly into it because I took a couple courses and read a couple books and got weirdly into the history of textiles.

Most of my exposure comes from studying the history of tattooing. The English word "tattoo" is derived from a Polynesian word and tattooing is found in a lot of Polynesian, Micronesian, and Melanesian cultures (often having a similar cultural relevance).

# ¿ Apr 22, 2014 13:53

rope kid: Feb 3, 2001; Warte nur! Balde
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The actual model of that creature is really crazy looking.

# ¿ Apr 22, 2014 18:17

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Party stats are now up and I realize I have to tune the arquebuses down. The cipher with Soul Whip + arquebus = deathlord by a huge margin.

# ¿ Apr 22, 2014 22:48

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Mr.Pibbleton posted:

Hey an Aleut here chiming in on racial representation in video games.

We loving love this. An archer friend of mine is getting double represented and I know a tribeswoman with hormonal dwarfism, she's getting like, triple represented in this. Keep on being cool Obsidian!

Sweet.

# ¿ Apr 22, 2014 23:31

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We have quests to create unique armor and weapon items and a crafting system to create consumables and enchant weapons and armor.

Every creature (other than PC races) drops ingredients for crafting.

# ¿ Apr 23, 2014 00:09

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CommissarMega posted:

You know, we've had discussions about guns and such, but what about other technological items? Are there pocket watches, or calculators, or the like? Is there such a thing as a fusion of technology and magic? I'd love to see how such a world would develop.

There are some clocks and a very small number of early watches. Animancers tend to be mechanical inventors and tinkerers since so much of animancy is only possible through technology. Animancy itself is not so much a fusion of technology and magic as it is a field of study that uses machines to examine essence, i.e. soul energy.

Prokhor Zakharov posted:

Are tattoos going to get any exposure in-game? Either as a little character customization or portraits or magic, etc?

I think the only character who currently has any tattoos is Sagani. It's not a big part of any of the cultures that are highly present in the Eastern Reach (this part of the world).

SunAndSpring posted:

So, how do people who worship one god react to a Godlike of that deity? Do they get really excited about it or just go, "Eh, just another dude"?

It depends on local attitudes and personal beliefs. Devout people who truly believe that godlike are blessed may be extremely reverent around godlike characters. Some people think that godlike are cursed or may be hostile toward godlike "of" a faith they don't like. E.g. godlike associated with Eothas are treated badly in the Dyrwood due to the Saint's War. Godlike associated with Magran are received much more positively for the same reason. The godlike themselves have varying attitudes about it.

# ¿ Apr 23, 2014 19:33

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No one actually knows for certain that godlike are created by divine intervention. Their appearances suggest strong alignment with certain deities -- e.g. there are godlike who exhibit physical properties associating them with the moon and water, which are both aspects of Ondra -- but there is no direct proof or divine confirmation.

# ¿ Apr 23, 2014 21:47

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User0015 posted:

It's been discussed before that players would like to see a 'low intelligence' run that contains unique dialogue and situations. I say forget that. Add a 'low lore awareness' run where the player is both, in and out of character, entirely ignorant of what is going on in the game world. A spin on the classic, where the player constantly makes mistakes and references to characters, places and events that do not match with the game, that NPC's will call you out on. Player's can even have a long diatribe exclaiming their hatred of some given culture/race/magic/etc.. at some point, only to be pointedly reminded they made several mistakes because they lack any and all sense, context or rationale.

A path through the game where it assumes the player is utterly oblivious, at all times.

The player is assumed to be a foreigner to the Dyrwood, so a lot of these terms will be explained by characters in the game if they are asked.

# ¿ Apr 24, 2014 00:22

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SunAndSpring posted:

So what kind of utility spells do wizards have? Will we have anything like Tenser's Floating Disk or Mordenkainen's Mystic Mansion?

Virtually none. They were never really a focus of the IE games and they weren't for us either.

# ¿ Apr 24, 2014 18:50

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Jackard posted:

Does the game have any mechanics similar to 4e rituals?

Which is like "wizard bullshit" except more useful and minus the wizard

Not exactly, but our scripted interactions allow for more unusual types of interactions via attributes and skills (climbing walls, swimming around, deciphering arcane markings). For long-term minor bonuses, we have food items and inn/stronghold bonuses. Resting out in the wild doesn't grant any special bonuses. If you rest at an inn or at your stronghold, you can select from different types of long-term bonuses based on the room (in an inn) or the stronghold upgrades you've purchased.

# ¿ Apr 24, 2014 19:25

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Gyshall posted:

Can you go into the food items at all? Will they be detailed items (Aedyr Cheese, Eir Glanfath Ale, Drywood Troll Jerky)? Are there bonuses for eating higher quality foods? Do they give buffs at all?

The base food items are very straightforward (e.g. cheese, cocoa, egg, fruits, meat, etc.). The recipe foods (that you typically have to craft) have more specific names and give more/longer bonuses.

# ¿ Apr 24, 2014 19:57

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Fair Bear Maiden posted:

Will those recipes be included in the Tim Cain cookbook?

Yes.

# ¿ Apr 24, 2014 20:01

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prometheus12345 posted:

So If I have built/repaired the forum and the Library, I can choose if I want to get an Intellect or Lore bonus and I don't get a bonus in both skills if I rest at the Stronghold.

That's the plan.

# ¿ Apr 24, 2014 20:39

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SunAndSpring posted:

I suppose that's true. After all, people are a bit... sensitive relating to race, and if they gently caress up the African-influenced things, it's not going reflect well on the company.

There's an Ars Magica book for the Transylvanian Tribunal called Against the Dark. It's the only tribunal book that starts with a disclaimer about how they're not trying to offend anyone's national pride or pick one version of history as "true" over another. Even when you have done a lot of research on something, you can still piss people off.

BTW if anyone is interested in a good d20 African-styled setting, check out Nyambe from Atlas Games. I've seen people argue that it could be better, but it's clear a lot of research went into making it.

# ¿ Apr 24, 2014 21:00

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Merry Magpie posted:

Will the Tim Cain cookbook include recipes for dessert?

The very first recipe is The Darkest Cookie.

# ¿ Apr 25, 2014 06:39

rope kid: Feb 3, 2001; Warte nur! Balde
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That and handle other physical fulfillments, PR, and similar publisher things. It's still completely our IP and product to develop.

# ¿ Apr 27, 2014 18:27

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coffeetable posted:

Considering the amount of thought that's gone into eliminating inventory juggling, I'd guess that crafting kit is taken directly from the stash when it's needed.

It is.

# ¿ Apr 28, 2014 06:36

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Eddain posted:

Will Rangers (or some sort of Survival / nature skill) affect the camp supplies requirement for outdoor resting? Will you be able to discover or create rudimentary camp supplies while in the wild if you have the necessary skills/items?

Nothing affects the camp supplies requirement. There may be some areas where a high Survival will help you scrounge together resources as a specific interaction that grants camp supplies.

# ¿ Apr 28, 2014 23:04

rope kid: Feb 3, 2001; Warte nur! Balde
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Pretty much all casting buffs are combat-only spells, so there's always an opportunity cost to using them.

# ¿ Apr 30, 2014 01:31

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Basic Chunnel posted:

It'll be interesting to see how dank (not in the nug sense) they'll make dungeons now that we have an IE-style game with real-time lighting. On the one hand it'll be cool, on the other hand it might add an unnecessary wrinkle to navigation.

They shouldn't ever be significantly darker than IE areas. The dynamic lighting elements are very cool, but we don't want to rely on them.

# ¿ Apr 30, 2014 05:57

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As far as most people know, there is one moon, Senn Bel�fa (or Ondran Bel�fa, "Ondra's Beloved", but most people just call it "Bel�fa"). It is smaller than Earth's moon but closer to the planet and has a faster orbit. Tides in some coastal areas are more extreme than on Earth. Though uneducated people are unaware of it, there is also a second moon called Cawldha Dev (Glanfathan for "Black Runner"). It has a very fast and irregular orbit. When circumstances are right (wrong), Bel�fa and the Cawldha Dev create what the Glanfathans call "Lovers' Tides", which are catastrophically destructive. During the Dyrwoodan revolution, the Glanfathans predicted a Lovers' Tide and helped the colonists use it to their advantage when the Aedyran navy attacked Defiance Bay (then New Dunryd). A huge number of Aedyran ships were destroyed and the ancient adra levee facing the Pearlwood Gulf was broken, creating the still partially-flooded district now known as Ondra's Gift.

# ¿ Apr 30, 2014 18:28

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CommissarMega posted:

Did the Aedyrans make the connection between the Lovers' Tide and their defeat? Or did they just go "poo poo, that was some high tide. Better luck next time."?

Enough Lovers' Tides have happened that they are a known catastrophic event that happens every few hundred years. The Aedyrans recognized what it was after the fact but they didn't know that the Dyrwoodans had forewarning of it until much later.

# ¿ Apr 30, 2014 18:55

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Celestial bodies and calendars go hand-in-hand and just seem like sort of basic world-building stuff to me.

# ¿ Apr 30, 2014 19:28

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I haven't developed the rest of the star system, just the planet itself, the star, and the two moons. It's easy to give the impression that I've planned all of this stuff out if I only answer the questions to which I have answers but there you go, I just *~ ruined the illusion ~*.

# ¿ Apr 30, 2014 22:14

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Sea Otter posted:

This may be just about presentation but, personally, I'm more into in-world explanations: For example, an animancer tries to explain a certain phenomenon rather than data which seem to be gathered by scientists in our world, a chanter tells oral history rather than our historians, or a priest "teaches" how the world is built according to his religious view. Indeed, having knowledge similar to our pre-modern one, some people may have a similar view as we do. Then again, do they have something equivalent to computers?

Animancers effectively are scientists. This area of the world is, at its most advanced, in the equivalent of Europe's early modern period. So while common people and chanters say, "Yes, Senn Bel�fa is actually the beloved of the goddess of the sea, Ondra, and the tides are caused by her reaching out to touch him," there are groups of educated people who have put together enough collective observation-based research to make more sound hypotheses about what's going on.

# ¿ May 1, 2014 00:50

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Some conventions can easily cross media but even short stories and plays (two media in which Checkhov wrote) have different approaches to how the author (director, for plays) can highlight elements. In written stories, there is only the text (okay, sometimes illustrations, but that's rare and generally not under the direct and full control of the text's author). In The Seagull, when Konstantin enters with the titular bird, Chekhov specifies that Konstantin is carrying a gun. However, the audience doesn't know that (in fact, many play authors are extremely sparse with prop and staging directions out of the spoken lines; compare Shakespeare and Arthur Miller); it could just as easily have been the director's specification, as could any other element held or worn by the characters or seen in the environment. Props in plays and films often give actors a focus for character demonstration while occupied with other activities. A character carrying a gun in a play, an environment where the audience is free to move their eyes across the entire stage, is different than framing a character carrying a gun in a film, which is also different from a writer describing the character carrying the gun. This is also true in a game like Pillars of Eternity, where there is a great deal outside of the spoken/descriptive text and in which pacing and even quantity/routes of selected writing varies from player to player.

# ¿ May 2, 2014 18:30

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I would say that PoE's arquebuses are on a different storytelling layer than the gun in Konstantin's hand. Individual characters having arquebuses are not necessary to tell our specific story in PoE, but arquebuses existing at all and being used by certain groups of people does help characterize the world. Most communities in Fallout: New Vegas have a nearby water tower that sits somewhere nearby. I don't think there are many (any?) quests that discuss the water towers or make you interact with them, but they help characterize those communities and what it means to live in the Mojave Wasteland. Many of the lit signs in the wilderness have wired batteries or gas generators next to them. Broadly, the story of F:NV is about water and power. The design of the world helps reinforce why this matters, but in an open world setting, the player has to at least subconsciously pick up on those elements for it to work, so as a result we repeated those elements (water towers and wired batteries) as much as we could.

# ¿ May 2, 2014 21:17

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kujeger posted:

Not exactly poe and I'd guess the rights are all over the place, but ropekid: has the ever been any talk of doing a sort of EE-version of the icewind dales?

I think I've heard discussion of such things but I'm not *~ in the loop ~*.

# ¿ May 6, 2014 02:06

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Sensuki posted:

Why is frame-based animation speed being used instead of time-based animation speed, and how (if at all) will this be affected by the game's frame rate (which I hope will not be locked)?

Because animators animate in frames and not at all.

# ¿ May 6, 2014 17:17

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GreatGreen posted:

So the frame rate will be capped then?

No.

# ¿ May 6, 2014 20:28

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Furism posted:

Yeah, pretty sure they asked the community to hold off on those because they have them covered and also maybe because more crazy stuff can come from not-armor and not-swords. "Crowd-designing" those is the way to go, it'll be more varied.

I already designed two uniques for every weapon type, but I was more concerned with trying to differentiate and distribute 40+ swords that were all creator-described as being "the best weapon in the game". Thankfully, backers designed a variety of items at different power levels, which allows us to fill a lot of gaps pretty easily.

# ¿ May 13, 2014 20:02

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I laugh every time I see our frog helm.

# ¿ May 13, 2014 20:24

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Lotish posted:

One sword should be the one from Sword and the Sorcerer, which shoots two of its three blades. A sword that shoots swords.

The guys who compiled the Encyclopedia Magica effectively made that into an AD&D sword (see: Tri-Entity).

http://theillusion.wordpress.com/weaponsitems/regalia-of-darkness/the-sword-of-domination/

# ¿ May 13, 2014 23:25

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There will be a fighter companion. In PoE there is no better substitute for the character who holds the line. It's difficult to get past them and even if you plant them in a hallway and don't pay much attention, they can take a lot of abuse. With their active use abilities, they die very hard and can shield their allies well.

# ¿ May 14, 2014 21:49

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The Bleak Walkers' behavior generally reinforces cruelty and brutality because the quickest resolution is one in which the Bleak Walkers' arrival is announced and a surrender immediately follows. To ensure that people believe that no mercy will ever be given by Bleak Walkers, they avoid any dealings where they could be seen as merciful given the right circumstances. For the Bleak Walkers, there are no right circumstances. If the bell has been rung, it won't be un-rung. If you wanted mercy before, you should have asked for it. Now it's too late.

Bleak Walkers aren't sadists (at least, not as a rule), and while they are effectively mercenaries, the control that they allow their employers to exert is fairly limited. Much like guns, Bleak Walkers should only be pointed at things you don't mind being completely destroyed.

# ¿ May 14, 2014 22:33

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There is a less gnarly group of mercenary paladins called the Goldpact Knights. They are believers in the idea that payment/gold is a solemn bond that must be upheld at all costs. They are the most "professional" and least morally-concerned paladin order players can select.

# ¿ May 14, 2014 22:35

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Yeah, Polina did the aumaua portrait.

# ¿ May 15, 2014 02:24

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CottonWolf posted:

I'm interested to see how that works with chanters as they have a progression of phrases through time. Does it take longer to voice them? Longer till you get an invocation? Or as they're a 'constant effect' is it only other actions that are affected?

Constant/modal abilities aren't affected by armor, but chanters have to build up to using an invocation, so they will likely spend most of their time in weapon-based combat. Both invocations and weapon attacks have recovery times and those are affected by armor.

# ¿ May 15, 2014 18:11

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# ¿ Apr 25, 2024 23:53

rope kid: Feb 3, 2001; Warte nur! Balde
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You can make Bleak Walker or Goldpact Knight paladins. They don't have separate storylines or anything like that, but each order emphasizes different personalities.

# ¿ May 15, 2014 18:52

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