Suggestions and observations on the latest avernums

[xerex]

Hi,

I know nobody knows me here and has no reason to listen to what I have to say, but I post these anyway in hopes that someone will think them a good idea and make use of them. I have played both avernum 5 and avernum 4 (though I haven't finished either yet).

 

1. I like that the game is hard on torment, but I would still like it to be harder. The harder the game is, the more enjoyment I get from completing it. On torment, I seriously want to be tormented by the game.

 

2. Could we get a more in-depth description of *exactly* how different stats help you in game? For example..in game, the tooltip says hardiness gives 1% resistance per point. That is misleading and possibly just plain wrong.

 

According to my calculations, Hardiness multiplies all damage you recieve by (1-.02*Hardiness)*other_factors. Other factors include luck, armor, items,etc..depending on the damage type. Hardiness is actually a 2% bonus, but if you have 50% from other_factors, then it will only show up as a 1% bonus in your resistances section. I guess what I am saying is that I want to see this kind of stuff in the game.

 

%resistance to physical damage = (1-(1-.02*Hard)(1-.01*Luck)(1-armor))

 

for all stats. I want chance to hit formulas. I want xp formulas based on level of mob and level of pc. I want damage formulas.

How can a person make an informed decision about what skills to increase without this information? Answer: they can't. Experienced players will have tested these things. I remember reading that the developer felt torn between providing a game that casual gamers can enjoy and one that the addicts can enjoy. Providing these formulae would go a long way to reducing the learning curve and allowing the developer to make the game more difficult while also improving a casual gamer's ability to use the stat system effectively making the game easier for them.

 

3. Action points. I don't like the action point system of avernum 5. It has made ranged weapons obsolete. Most enemies can move the range of your bow AND attack you in one round and even move around any warriors that may be nearby. In avernum 4, they could up next to you, but they wouldn't have enough ap left to attack you. Warriors could effectively pin down enemies making them choose if they want to chase the archer or attack the warrior. Avernum 4 had a far better action point system. I would only make one suggestion for improving the AP system of avernum 4, and that is this. Allow a character to do an action so long as the character has more than half the points needed to complete the action, and take the rest of the action points off next round. So, a player with 8 action points can attack once..leaving 3 action points...and then attack again since he has more than 2.5 action points. Then, next round, he will only have 6 action points. Allowing players to save up to 2 action points for a next round would also be interesting tactically and makes sense too (Setting a spear to recieve a charge setting the arrow to the bow and waiting for the enemy to get in range. Preparing a spell...etc.)

 

4. Avernum 5 encumberance both makes more sense and is not annoying like in avernum 4 where your fine leather you are saving takes up all your weight allowance. Only samwise gamgee carries pots and pans into battle. Warriors drop their loot at the first sign of a fight. My only adjustments to the avernum 5 system would be that quick use items (potions, javelins, scrolls) that are put in the quick use slots should count towards the weight allowance, but should cost only a few action points to equip and some more to use. (potions are too easy to use IMO. Have you ever tried to drink a glass of water while fighting a vicious chitrach?). Accessing items in your inventory though, should take many more action points. This makes the quick use items mean something first of all, and also makes players pay attention to what their heroes are carrying into battle.

 

Those are all my suggestions for now. I hope you take them into consideration for future avernums which I greatly anticipate.

[Alorael at Large]

1. It's unlikely to happen, but since difficulty is just a few multipliers, it wouldn't be too hard for Jeff to toss in.

 

2. I think we all want this, but Jeff is coy with his formulas. I'm not sure why he lies outright sometimes, but it's apparently intentional.

 

3. Simplicity is a virtue. Your system is not simple. Most players prefer the A5 system to A4's. Ranged weapons in A5 still have no risk of riposte, can hit monsters you can't reach, and can be used while your tanks stand in the front and keep the archers from getting eaten by horrible beasts. It works well enough.

 

4. The current system may not be realistic, but it's not broken. Why tweak it?

 

—Alorael, who doesn't particularly want the AP system to become any more demanding, punishing, or tricky to balance. It works!

[xerex]

3. True enough, simplicity is A virtue, but there are other virtues as well. In A5, I need 3 tanks to run interference for one archer and that archer is still perpetually running away and only able to target whichever creature he can get in range of without allowing it to come eat him on its turn. No focus fire for archers. If they stand around to focus fire whatever the tanks are hitting, they get eaten by the monster that decides to just walk right by the tanks and attack him. Not being riposted is the only reason to have an archer really. I think equality of skills is a virtue more important than simplicity. Archers do less damage than melee and yet they still need to be able to soak damage like a melee because of the AP system. Additionally, it doesn't make sense that an archer can move 7 square AND fire an arrow in the same time it takes to move 8 squares without firing an arrow AND the same amount of time as it takes to JUST fire an arrow. There should be some advantage to standing still and focusing on firing arrows instead of running around the battlefield the whole time while firing arrows. Making sense is also a virtue...and running at 7/8ths your maximum movement speed while firing arrows at your maximum rate as well just doesn't make sense. And then...when you are hasted, you can fire 2 times per round, but then you CANT move while firing or you lose your extra attack? first you can move at 7/8ths speed while firing at maximum rate, then you cant move at while firing at maximum rate?

 

4. Well, in this case, broken is a matter of degrees. Its not totally broken, but it does make consumable items VERY strong because you can use them while still attacking at your maximum rate. Its not really fair. Consumables should give you a boost, but it shouldn't be like you just instantly swallow a potion or instantly read a scroll. Both of these things take time, and that isn't reflected in avernum 5 (you can make 2 moves, drink a potion, and still attack all in one round...or you can just attack once and do nothing else in the same amount of time. In avernum 4, you can drink a potion and attack in the same amount of time it takes to just attack. Perhaps this more relates to point 3 still. Realism = immersion. The more realistic a game is, the more players will get into it and not say (boy thats just stupid and doesn't make any sense). I can't seem to play avernum 5 past the docks. I just get disgusted with the AP system and go play avernum 4.

[Randomizer]

1. Jeff has been told by his extremely jaded beta testers that they would like a harder level than torment. Maybe next game. Part of the problem is that levels are changed by applying a multiplier to monster health, damage, and to hit and not by adding monsters or changing tactics. So harder levels just mean longer fights and increased chance in dying.

 

2. The best we can do is make calculations and test what happens as we change one variable. Having the character editor makes it possible to see these changes in repeated playing of a combat. As long as we have obsessive compulsive players we do have some ideas of the results.

 

3. This AP system is based on Geneforge 4 that made the major change that you could still act with 1 AP. A4 had the problem of if you moved just a little too far, then you could lose your action.

 

4. It used to be that using an item in the backpack cost extra AP. Maybe a slightly more realistic AP cost will appear in the next game.

 

Welcome to Spiderware Software, and please leave your sanity at the door. You still have too much if you expect realism.

[Mads]

1. The problem is perhaps the sidequests: the prizes, the money and the xp. If you seek out every enemy, the endgame will be too easy. Avernum 5 would be pure torture if Jeff had added some clock: The longer you stall and solve every single problem of every NPC the stronger Dorikas gets! That would be fun.

 

2. The most annoying aspect of this is that the cheapest points are the best and this is absurd. All your PCs end up looking a lot alike.

[Lilith]

If your archers are constantly getting attacked in melee, you're not using them right. The important thing is to make sure that monsters acquire your fighter as a target right from the start -- that means having your archers refrain from attacking until the fighter is already in position and surrounded by monsters. After that, keep your archers as far from the enemy as possible (this is important) and start shooting.

 

If one opponent breaks off from the pack and runs toward your archers, just kill it before it reaches you. Even on Torment it shouldn't take more than a round or two with your entire party focusing fire on it -- unless it's a boss, in which case you should have your archers run away and your fighter run towards it. It's actually a good thing if you can get a boss to chase your archers, because the boss is spending all its time running around while you're spending some of your time running around and some of your time attacking and shooting. I killed the Whirling Thrasher by getting it into a constant loop where it was chasing my archers around and never catching up with them.

 

I used one tank and three archers for the whole game, and while I won't say that keeping melee opponents away from archers was trivial, it was certainly possible.

[Student of Trinity]

Experienced players fight essentially all the time with Haste, so you have 10 AP rather than 8. This means that archers can always attack twice per round, while melee fighters can often hit only once.

 

Most of the worst opponents in A5 are hasted as well, so that running away from them is still effective, in that it cuts the damage you take from them in half.

 

The option to carry over action points to the next round does seem interesting. I think it needs to be simplified a bit, though, and limited sharply. Being able to save up to have 16 AP in one round is just asking for abuse. Enter combat just out of sight of the monsters, wait a round, then charge in with 16 AP for the first round, for free. Actually, this exploit would be hard to control if the carry over function is implemented in any way. And you could use it for every fight.

[xerex]

Quote:

Originally written by Student of Trinity:

The option to carry over action points to the next round does seem interesting. I think it needs to be simplified a bit, though, and limited sharply. Being able to save up to have 16 AP in one round is just asking for abuse. Enter combat just out of sight of the monsters, wait a round, then charge in with 16 AP for the first round, for free. Actually, this exploit would be hard to control if the carry over function is implemented in any way. And you could use it for every fight.

I may not have been clear enough in my OP.

I mentioned in my OP that only a maximum of 2 points should be able to be carried over to the next round. If you have 3 points or more, you should either move or attack or cast a spell.

So you woundn't be able to get 16 AP by waiting around and letting the enemy come to you. At best, you would get 2 more than your normal maximum. 10 for normal heroes. A fast on feet hero with a cryos spear and mercuric chain who is hasted could get up to 18 i suppose, but thats still only two more than his normal maximum of 16.

The reason I chose 2 points was because if you have 3 or more points, you have enough points to attack or cast a spell and not doing so is essentially wasting time, but if you only have 2 points left, you don't have enough points to attack.

Essentially, the two extra points you get next round reflects that you started attacking last round, but only finished this round.

One nice thing about this is that every action point counts and fast on feet becomes useful again. In avernum 4, it was mildly useful since you could take a step away from a single melee opponent and still get a shot off in the same round whenever it proced, but with this action point scheme, it would allow you to attack more often if your tanks kept the mobs tied up so you don't need to run around.

[Student of Trinity]

It would still give a free 2 bonus points to begin combat with. But maybe that wouldn't be so bad, in that you'd have to begin your round out of sight of the enemy. In the current system you can walk up to the enemy to initiate combat, and as long as your guys are fall faster, it probably leaves with the same number of AP when in range that you would get with the 2 bonus points.

 

But there are still a lot of questions before it could become clear that this would really be a good system. It has to be robust enough to resist abuse under a wide range of circumstances.

 

Abuses under unforeseen circumstances were the reason Jeff changed the AP system between A4 and A5. In fact, he changed it during beta-testing of Geneforge 4. The main changes were that you couldn't move after attacking or casting a spell, but that you could still attack if you had even one AP left, without any penalty in next round's AP or anything else. These changes were made to prevent shoot-and-hide tactics that let attackers take out armies very easily, as long as there were enough obstacles around to hide behind. The poor monsters often had no choice but to run up to the PC and stand there shuffling their big ugly feet, for lack of enough AP to attack with. Even shooting monsters could be flummoxed by running around a corner. If you played the distances right, the bad guys would have to use up 4 AP getting back into line of sight with you, and then they couldn't shoot any more.

 

The A5 system does seem to me to work okay. So far no-one has really broken it. I like how it lets me charge into battle, and eliminates the silliness of melee enemies being completely unable to touch me if I fight a running battle.

 

Perhaps there exists a yet better system; but it will have to really be compelling to replace a system that isn't broken. I expect Jeff's business depends on having an engine that is good enough to carry his story, but that it doesn't really pay him to spend too long tinkering with his game mechanics if he doesn't absolutely have to.

[xerex]

Quote:

Originally written by Student of Trinity:
It would still give a free 2 bonus points to begin combat with. But maybe that wouldn't be so bad, in that you'd have to begin your round out of sight of the enemy. In the current system you can walk up to the enemy to initiate combat, and as long as your guys are fall faster, it probably leaves with the same number of AP when in range that you would get with the 2 bonus points.

Yeah, there is that abuse possibility, but A: its not a big deal, and B: it can be a "feature". If you push the combat button, you are ambushing your opponents and get a little jump on them. {automatically getting the 2 bonus attack points in the first round so you dont have to mess with the whole waiting a round thing}. If a mob initiates the combat, they get the extra 2 points. This removes the potential for abuse and gives the mobs a little extra movement to deal with the problems you mention below.

Quote:

Originally written by Student of Trinity:

But there are still a lot of questions before it could become clear that this would really be a good system. It has to be robust enough to resist abuse under a wide range of circumstances.

Oh yeah, obviously it would need to be tested. If Jeff released some modding tools, all these game mechanics ideas could be tested for him for free via mods. I, for one, would write one to test ideas like this. I love the story of this game and the world and much of the skill system, but there are some game mechanics issues with spells, action points and level dependency that I really dislike. They were much better in avernum 4 IMO.

These days, most big companies get their really good ideas from Mods. Take DOTA for WC3. It spawned a PvP mode in WoW. Mods are free think tanks for these companies and if possible, I think it would really be in Jeff's interest to release some modding tools unless it is prohibitively time-consuming.

Quote:

Originally written by Student of Trinity:

Abuses under unforeseen circumstances were the reason Jeff changed the AP system between A4 and A5. In fact, he changed it during beta-testing of Geneforge 4. The main changes were that you couldn't move after attacking or casting a spell, but that you could still attack if you had even one AP left, without any penalty in next round's AP or anything else. These changes were made to prevent shoot-and-hide tactics that let attackers take out armies very easily, as long as there were enough obstacles around to hide behind. The poor monsters often had no choice but to run up to the PC and stand there shuffling their big ugly feet, for lack of enough AP to attack with. Even shooting monsters could be flummoxed by running around a corner. If you played the distances right, the bad guys would have to use up 4 AP getting back into line of sight with you, and then they couldn't shoot any more.

The A5 system does seem to me to work okay. So far no-one has really broken it. I like how it lets me charge into battle, and eliminates the silliness of melee enemies being completely unable to touch me if I fight a running battle.

It didn't eliminate that silliness as far as I can tell. If you are faster than your opponent, you can run away AP-1 squares and turn and shoot. In avernum 4, you could only run AP-5 squares and then shoot. It just made it so that mobs can move the entire length of a bow shot in one round and still attack. Since it only takes 1 action point to shoot an arrow, all you need is 1 AP more than your opponent and and opponent with AP < weapon range to make it so enemy melee can't hit you. Jeff just made it so that almost every melee mob has AP> weapon range and you can't move after you shoot. The attacking only takes 1 AP thing is unnecessary to solving the exploit and, in fact, makes the exploit worse if the other two changes aren't there as well.

If you were using my idea above and don't allow moving after a ranged attack {just like now, but gives melee more freedom of movement, since it isn't part of the exploit}, melee mobs with AP = weapon range would be able to get attacks on you by waiting with 2 action points one round, and then charging you the next with weapon range +2 AP. weapon range -1 Ap to get there and 3 to get the attack off. You could then run away at top speed to get out of melee range, but eventually you would turn to shoot and the melee mob would get another attack on you as long as it was smart and save its last 2 action points while it was chasing.

In other words, the same exploit has the same solution it does now. Fast melee mobs, and the same problem for slow mobs. Only, with my idea above, killing a mob slower than you with this exploit would take a long time because you would have to run several rounds per arrow {due to 5 AP per attack}. In the current game, any melee mob with AP < weapon range is a free kill for a fast solo archer.

I hope that made sense. Again, it would be easier to see it in action.

it also introduced silliness that I mentioned above like moving 7/8ths of your move speed and still attacking at your maximum speed...unless you are hasted in which case moving even 1 square reduces your attack speed by half.

For me, every battle is a running battle. I set my archer up 10 squares from the front lines and some mob with with 10 ap walks around my warrior by exploiting that moving diagonally only takes 1 action point. If my warrior is 3 squares away to the right, the mob takes 3 steps diagonally down and right. 3 steps to the upper right, 3 steps right, and attacks my archer when my warrior was standing directly between the mob and my archer.
{Moving diagonally should take 1.41 AP per square cumulative rounded however you want}.

Next round, I finally latch my warrior on to the mob and run what is left of my archer away, but, of course, the mob slows my archer down just like my warrior slows the mob down, so the mob just keeps chasing and attacking and even if I forgoe attacking and just focus on running, that only gives me 1 extra movement point which isn't enough to get away from mobs that have very high move speeds. I need two warriors just to allow my archer to get away. In avernum 4, if a mob got latched onto one of my weak characters, that character can forgoe attacking to run away. The mob then has to decide if it wants to continue chasing and not get an attack or attack somebody closer.

Quote:

Originally written by Student of Trinity:

Perhaps there exists a yet better system; but it will have to really be compelling to replace a system that isn't broken. I expect Jeff's business depends on having an engine that is good enough to carry his story, but that it doesn't really pay him to spend too long tinkering with his game mechanics if he doesn't absolutely have to.

Obviously, as with all companies, he has to prioritize his time in to what will make the most money. And I think you are right that as long as it works, Jeff won't spend a lot of time tinkering with it...all the more reason to release modding tools so players can tinker for him and he can see the end results and decide which system he wants to use in his next compelling story line.

[Lilith]

Quote:

Originally written by xerex:
{Moving diagonally should take 1.41 AP per square cumulative rounded however you want}.

I've gotta be honest here: when you say things like this, it makes me think you should be playing flight sims instead of RPGs. In most genres, a slavish devotion to "realism" makes for a lousy game that doesn't even end up being all that realistic anyway. There's a certain amount of abstraction that has to be accepted in order to make a game playable, and the most abstract games are usually the most playable. You don't hear people complaining that chess isn't realistic enough, do you?

The rules as they are work just fine, as long as you don't have too many preconceived ideas about what strategies "should" work.

[Kelandon]

Quote:

Originally written by xerex:
I think it would really be in Jeff's interest to release some modding tools unless it is prohibitively time-consuming.

Turns out it is prohibitively time-consuming. (See Blades of Avernum, "Nearly The End of Spiderweb As We Knew It.")

[ex post slarto]

Parts of the Geneforge engine games (which includes Avernum 4 and 5) are modular and text-based, and therefore moddable without special software. Graphics, mechanics, and the scenarios themselves aren't moddable, but pretty much everything about items, creatures, spells and abilities is completely customizable if you so desire. The script files use obvious variable names, too, so very little explanation is required.

[Tool]

I've noticed these games look worse and worse time goes on. The environments are really ugly in Avernum, but whatever cause the characters looked awesome.

 

But then the Poser thing in Avernum 4 and now Avernmum 5 is a terrible tradeoff, exchanging static but good looking sprites that reflected lots of your equiptment configurations, for bad animation and really ugly pictures. I really have a fondness for the series going back since I was 8 years old, or I wouldn't care

[Alorael at Large]

I have the opposite reaction. The earlier Avernums have pretty environments but godawful monster and character sprites. A4 fixes the sprites.

 

—Alorael, who supposes low-quality graphics will always be a matter of taste and Jeff can't please everyone. At least you can tell what's what in A4-5.

[Mav]

Getting a little off-topic to start (or maybe not since it's still an observation), I really miss the departure of the ninja/shinobi from the sprite collection. He was always my primary character. Just something cheeky-cool about a ninja outcast leading a merry band of misfit adventurers in a nation of underground caverns.

 

xerex: I'm no expert by any means, but about the archer situation, I guess it depends on how your characters are built. My frontline characters in Avernum are always warrior-archers, one being the Elite Warrior type and slightly better tank with enough archery skill to always hit his target, the other being the fast-on-feet, better-at-bows type with a healthy dose of roguish skills like higher Dexterity. Both have Quick Action so they almost always get to attack first, and both have sufficient Endurance to stay in the thick of non-boss combat so long as they have Augmentation/Steel Skin buffs as a base. Some of the frustration might have to do with this particular Avernum demanding that you always stay on your toes, casting all of your enchantments as a precaution before you turn the corner in a dungeon.

 

There was a kind of "saved AP" bonus from Avernum 1-3, which IIRC gave you a small parry bonus per AP unused when you ended your turn, but it's gone now.

[Sss-Chah]

maybe items could take a couple ap, but all of the other points in the original post are bad. especially the one about avernum 4's ap system, because it sucked.

[Tool]

As soon as avernum stopped being based on Exile titles, it seemed to get way less epic feeling. The scale is much smaller.

 

I'm probably more casual about 'completeness' than maybe some of you, but I feel less compelled to explore. I think its the lack of the outdoor map, which before would break up the narrative. Now, as a casual player, I feel more compelled to resolve the story. There's never that breathing room effect of going out into the 'big world' and looking around. And you obviously just don't feel like you've covered as much ground.

[bret]

If torment level isn't hard enough for you, take all frail characters through Torment level.

 

I'm still working on getting through it once on normal level.

[Student of Trinity]

Quote:

Originally written by Tool:
As soon as avernum stopped being based on Exile titles, it seemed to get way less epic feeling. The scale is much smaller.

This is an interesting observation. I'm not sure I quite know what it means, since I've never played the Exiles, and never gotten beyond the A2 demo in the Avernums. But I think I have some idea.

There seems at first thought to be a simple trade-off between immediacy and 'epicness'. If I'm free to wander freely around a static world, and from my various adventures I learn to appreciate certain basic facts about my world, but then I get a chance to change those facts, then I really appreciate that chance. I feel that I get to do something epic.

But on the other hand all the little things that I get to do, though they build up the context that makes my few main-plot-related actions important, still they themselves are rather unimportant. I can do them in any order, and know that none of them will affect anything else in the world.

Bu the very fact that all these little side-plots won't change anything else tends to distance me as the player from the world. When I'm on a side-plot, I know that it won't really change anything.

Or does it? Is it instead, that when I'm working on a side-plot, it is what matters to me, and I'm immersed in it. Then having finished it, this little immersive experience has embedded some lived context into me, and made some of the larger scale features of the world real to me. In this side-plot I had no opportunity to change these features of the world; but when later I do get this chance, it will mean a lot more to me because of the time I spent in the side-plot, living with these features as the unalterable law of existence.

Is that in fact how one creates the feeling of having done something significant, by letting one change something that one has previously experienced as an important but unchangeable background fact?

I think this may be right, and may be one of the basic rules of how to make a good RPG. In which case it can probably be adapted quite effectively to Jeff's newer game engines. I don't think it can really depend entirely on the old indoor/outdoor mechanic.

[ex post slarto]

Scale in general, including the indoor/outdoor issue, might be related. But that's definitely not the main source of the lack of epicness (except perhaps in A4, where the world was literally, physically, compacted from the epic scale as previously experienced).

 

Exile 1 had a whole new world to explore. Because the standards of the world were so rudimentary -- stone weapons and crappy food -- doing serious things with dragons and wizards seemed rather remarkable. Exile 2 had a strange new race of beings, and a terrible invading army -- and a war you could seriously impact in multiple, independent ways. Exile 3 had the novelty, and huge size, of the surface.

 

I think the EE article on the Exile 2 heroes conjures up the sense of 'epic' better than an analysis is going to, though.

[xerex]

Quote:

Originally written by bret:
If torment level isn't hard enough for you, take all frail characters through Torment level.

I'm still working on getting through it once on normal level.

I'm playing a frail/brittle bones singleton in A5 on Torment. By exploiting the current AP system, it is hard, but not very hard. I am not done yet, but once I get lethal blow, I expect things will get easier rather than harder. I am curious to see if I can one-hit dorikas with a lethal blow.

haste before a fight, summon two critters before a fight, acid to start the fight, then run away and summon as necessary to keep two critters on the battlefield and nuke from max range. It takes a LOT of mana, but 8 int takes care of that pretty well.

Granted A4 had door-fu or corner-fu that you could exploit that this game doesn't, but now summoning a critter to slow my pursuit down takes only 1 AP, whereas in A4, it took 5.