Jake Martinez said:
I get what you're saying and I sort of agree with it at a basic level, but I think your analogy leaves a lot to be desired. A single fighter in Baldur's gate is just part of the 6 part team, plus there is the entire meta game of choosing the appropriate equipment, appropriate classes and level ups in different classes and spells. It's actually quite deep in terms of the amount of thinking and planning that goes into the game before you even begin a combat encounter.
Every time someone acts like AD&D second edition was a deep and involving system, an angel gets her wings. I won't go into the many many many many many many problems with it, but let's just say that the company that made it originally collapsed under its obsolescence before BioWare got even close to it. 2nd was a bad system.
The same is not true for Mass Effect 2, and certainly not for Dragon Age 2, which I actually find more disappointing since it's "supposed" to be more of a traditional RPG. Really, they have massively regressed from DA:O to DA:2, for example take character attributes:
Except that it has additional mechanics that the AD&D system did not have. Threat, weapon speed (real weapon speed not 'you attack three segments later on average'), abilities for each character class rather than 'Wizards are deep and other classes are derp'
In DA:2 you get 3 attribute points at each level up that you should be able to spread across something like 6 attributes, each attribute having a different derived outcome for your character. Sounds great, but in practice, each character class has to use equipment, which (surprisingly enough) is usually restricted to either a character class, or requires 2 out of those 6 attribute points in order to use. So, if you are a warrior, well I hope you enjoy putting all your points into STR and CON until you're almost done with the game, otherwise you will never be able to use most of the loot you find.
And your third point goes into cunning. Where the difference comes in is if you put more points into con for your tank or strength for your dps warrior. Willpower isn't necessary, the warrior's stamina needs are covered by Bolster, Second Wind, and a trail of mook bodies.
If you're drinking potions on a Warrior, your doin it wrong. And you welcome waves cause they allow you to get free stamina back. Hit button, kill the critters, have more stamina than before you started.
Same goes for the other classes as well and their respective "class attributes". (Here's a fun idea - try building a blood mage in DA:2 and using HP as your mana pool - you can do it, so long as you're willing to restrict yourself to equipment with laughably low willpower requirements to use, which means generally stuff far below your level and taking half of the fun, ergo loot acquisition, out of the game)
You can easily wear all the equipment you want simply by putting one point into your armor-reqs each level. And that's if you need it. However, constitution isn't something you need a huge amount of for a bloodmage, as you should be regenerating health pretty quickly.
Cunning is far more important. Don't make the mistake of ignoring cunning, that's the real stat you need; it's more important to put a point every level into that, than into your armor.
What busts my nuts here is that at the same time, you're lauding Balder's Gate for it's depth here.... in a game where you NEVER add to your stats, only add abilities that you choose if you're a spellcaster, and the ONLY difference between fighter A and fighter B is what weapon you decide to use with your platemail, and does a shield go with that.
But there's TONS of depth, what with the difference between a 0 Int and a 14 Int meaning so much for a fighter, what with it being the difference between zero bonus languages and zero bonus languages.
Not that it mattered, I mean it wasn't like every class in the game wasn't 'You need Dex, Con, and ______' where _____ was either Strength, Intellegence, Wisdom, or nothing cause you were a rogue.
Seriously, you're complaining you can put points into something as being less flexible than a game where you can't put points into something as you level. Cause 1d10 hps and +1 to hit = MOAR DEPTHS
This is just poor game design and I'm more than willing to bet it came about by a desire to cater for the lowest common denominator and the end result is a shallow system that is actually easier for a novice gamer to screw up if they aren't paying attention - for example, a younger friend of mine got almost to the end of the first act before he realized his warrior would never be able to dual wield in DA:2 because the appropriate weapons were restricted to an ability that he'll never posses, regardless of if his attributes met the requirements for the equipment.
Yes, because people not having fun and doing things wrong because the system isn't transperent is great game design, and how all games should be made?
Mind you, if he got all the way through Act 1 without realising that none of his trees say 'Dual Wield' then that's hardly the fault of anyone but himself. Go to the Black Emporium, and fix his attribute spread. It costs less than 2 gold. You should be able to get that easily enough.
Frankly, I'm not a fan of this at all. Bethesda/Obsidian managed to do a far better job with the SPECIAL system from Fallout in terms of making it more accessible yet still providing depth and while I don't know if we can compare sales across titles here as easily (ergo: I don't have the numbers in front of me), you'd be hard pressed to argue that FO:3 and FO:NV were anything but huge commercial successes.
Completely different games. DA:2 is about the interaction of abilities. FO didn't have those ability things, unless 'pull trigger' is a superpower.
Anyway, I actually think that DA:2 is a mediocre game, which for a company with a reputation like Bioware, makes it a bad game. It's easily one of the worst in their recent catalog and what makes it even more frustrating is that it didn't need to be so bad. They made several gameplay decisions that seem completely unjustified, even considering the claim that they wanted to make it more "action oriented".
Sadly, your only actual complaint so far is that it isn't AD&D second edition. Everything else has been utter nonsense. I respect your opinion, or rather your right to it, but you're nuts.
Right now I'm at the point where a new Bioware title has gone from "Must buy on sight" to actually wondering what the quality will be like. For someone like me who has been a huge fan of theirs for almost 2 decades, I think that would give them pause.
Sadly, you can't have your D&D system any more. Nor should you, Linear Fighters Quadratic Wizards is a dead concept, and thank god. There's no depth in that, let me tell you.
),but today main western RPG studios have nothing to be ashamed off,Bioware,Obsidian,Bethesda and several smaller ones that make smaller jewels(see Mount and Blade). So really enjoy today these games since they will be the classics in 10 years.Too quote Total Biscuit "this is why we can't have good things".
