Human Characters

[lilywillow]

Now that turned bases combat has finally returned to CRPGs, it is time to address the unfair advantage that Human characters have been getting due to designer interface choices.

Other forums often have threads that lament the weakness of the half-elf, but much of this is caused by giving human characters a free ride for their lack of low light visibility capabilities. In the age of designers extolling their achievements in graphic resolution and effects, shouldn't the use of torches and lighting effects have an impact on human characters? This is a tactical considerations if one includes the need for; magic users to cast light enhansing spells, someone required to hold a torch instead of a shield, torches used as weapons, what does a party do if the guy with the torch is taken out, I can't see those guys firing arrows at me? If using light requirements seems too much of a hastle, don't choose a human character (who gets extra feats and skill points) or include some kind of feat or skill that addresses the issue.

Same thing goes for languages. Why can't designers include some language based SIDE quests that are available only to parties that have access to that language ability? "It seems that the parties gnome is the only one who can communicate the the survivors of the village, I guess that we're lucky that we brought this guy along." Or how about merchants that choose to speak the language that is most advantagous to them? Talking to the half-orc barbarian with a int of 5 and a char of 4 is more in the merchants best interest that trying to outwit the parties bard. Having access to an advanced language ability would allow the party to get the nice to have items in this shop at a lower cost. Obviously not every shop would be like this but such features add a bit of spice and atmosphere to the game.

The half-elf isn't much use as a party member when compared to their human counterparts - unless lighting and language effects are brought into play. Don't let these things get in the way of a party finishing the game, but adding them levels the playing field, adds replay features, and spices things up tactically.

Please don't bring up eating, clothes, cooking fires, etc..., they don't add anything to the game but tedium.

[seanly]

You make a couple of good points, but it comes down to the question of fun. Restrictive quests are in this game, but they have made them available only to certian alignments rather than races. So that could be done. And I think some games have had things were having a dwarf, for example, made some dialogue available or made it easier to solve a puzzle.

The vision question is a bit trickier. I think designers ignore the lighting aspects to make it easier on the programmers.

I choose the make-up of my party for what I want them to be. Some power gamers may select all humans for the extra skill points, but all I care about is if my group can get weapons & armor & fight. A handful of extra skill points won't me power game them.

[Midnite Cruiser]

Good points.

I'm sure this is on the mind of some game designers. I imagine we will see it eventually- that is the negative aspects of picking a human class.

[Banedir]

I generally prefer human characters, but then, I always did.

Including languages would be a nice feature, but a merchant isn't going to pretend he can only speak in orcish to get extra coins from the half-orc - that's just silly. Having languages included would probably make humans more powerful in the long run - more skill points can easily equal more languages. Languages are a nice feature to include, but if they aren't included, it's not really much of an issue.

The absence of non-magical light/darkness effects will negate a few advantages/disadvantages. The human comes out ahead, 'cos he's light dependent, and the dwarf loses out most - he should have full on darkvision. Still, it's a relatively minor point - a couple of 0-level spells can provide you with all the light you need for most of the time. It would have been nice to have lighting in as a feature, but it's not, and that's no big deal. Humans aren't suddenly any more powerful, it's just that some of the other races may not get to use some of their racial abilities, which is often the case in an adventure anyway. Not every adventure has stonework, giants and goblinoids, for example.

I remember IWDII had one quest in Targos that humans can't solve right away. Goblin thingy.

[roonechr]

It is also important to note that low-light vision doesn't eliminate the need for light in any way. You still need torches,light spells, and so on, you just get to see further than a human under the same light conditions would. So really only dwaves and half-orcs lose out seriously and they really don't need help. In a party based CRPG the Int and Cha penalties don't come close to evening out the Half-orc's Str bonus and Dwarves have a ton of useful abilites (arguably the best racial benefits of any race).

[lilywillow]

Many folks complain that some CRPGs contain too much "hack and slash" and not enough role playing. The use (or non-use) of lighting by a party provides a designer the ability to add more options to the game. Hostile sentries may notice torchlight or artificial lighting and set up a trap, dwarven scouts move ahead of a party and plot a path through a dangerous area, etc...

Designers, by enforcing light effects, have the opportunity to augment the AI and increase the difficulty level for the brash or careless player. Strategy requires players to plan ahead, that should include spells learned/memorized, torches carried, dungeon movement plans, etc.

Also, language and dialogue options increase replay value while adding to the role play element. A good designer won't have anything along this line be a show stopper, but it adds flavor to a game like the Targos portion of IWD2.

Finally, in a game a detailed as TOEE, why not include these effects? It puts human characters more in line with the other races, and may get the half elf more playing time.

[Banedir]

Even with low light vision, I wouldn't touch a half-elf with a ten foot pole.

I agree that there's tons that could be done with proper rules for lighting, but ToEE was a relatively short project; I think it's impressive that they've gotten done as much as they have. I'd also love to see a game that made use of multiple languages, it's such a simple effect that can really add lots of depth and little interesting side-bits. I don't think a language should ever be a skill that determines whether you can get or complete a quest or not, but having clues and warnings written in other languages where appropriate could be great fun. I like the idea of master linguist wizards, especially if they end up taking Loremaster levels.

These two features would be great to include in a sequel, if there's time, or if not, then in some other game. If you're looking to add some originality and bring something special to the genre, then you could do worse than start with these two things.

[lilywillow]

Don't get me wrong, I'm not bashing TOEE. I figure that if they had the courage to buck the "realtime" trend and implement the system the way it was designed, then maybe on their next effort they will push the boundries even farther.

It leaves me hope that one day someone will translate Squad Leader to the computer in a turn based format. That game had such a great following in a board game format and, just like D&D, its dedicated fanbase is waiting for someone to do it justice. CPT Wetzelburg, SGT Steiner and CPL Uhl are standing by and hoping for the return of the turn-based game.

I remember playing The Sunless Citadel in NWN with a gnome who used a two-handed weapon. The mod made good use of NWN's lighting abilities in certain areas, and it was a huge advantage for my character that he didn't need to switch to a small weapon so he could hold a torch. (Yes, NWN blurs the distinction between low-light and darkvision, but that's another discussion).

Hardly the most important feature in the world, but it is a nice touch.

[roonechr]

Lighting effects would be cool, but they also would take an awfully long time to implement well. I'd rather that every race gets its own model, crossbows and wizards are implemented, and I can have a five character party, all which are things that previous D&D games failed to do.

[Demifool]

posted by lilywillow
The half-elf isn't much use as a party member when compared to their human counterparts - unless lighting and language effects are brought into play. Don't let these things get in the way of a party finishing the game, but adding them levels the playing field, adds replay features, and spices things up tactically.

half-elves have immunity to sleep and racial bonuses for enchantment spells. and there able to mutliclass much easier.

[livonya]

When I was in college I shared a house with a Squad Leader fanatic. For an entire year we had a game runing. We would do one turn every other day or so... no reason staying around while the opponent figured out their next turn.

Such fun.

There was also an awesome turn based board game with a huge rule set called GunSlinger. It was a western themed game of course. An awesome game. It had a gritty realism where getting shot was basically a slow death sentence.

[Jujax]

I think it isn't too difficult to add languages in a game.

The rules for languages are used in D&D 3.5 and in a 5 people party, it could be significant to add language based quest.

It is a real advantage to use languages for the magic-users and some weird races (like half-elf...).

I remember old spell-books in Orcish or Evil tongue...

It could be fun to use.

J.

[BlackOmne]

Originally posted by lilywillow
Don't get me wrong, I'm not bashing TOEE. I figure that if they had the courage to buck the "realtime" trend and implement the system the way it was designed, then maybe on their next effort they will push the boundries even farther.

It leaves me hope that one day someone will translate Squad Leader to the computer in a turn based format. That game had such a great following in a board game format and, just like D&D, its dedicated fanbase is waiting for someone to do it justice. CPT Wetzelburg, SGT Steiner and CPL Uhl are standing by and hoping for the return of the turn-based game.

Did you ever play the Steel Panther series of computer games? They were very much like a computer version of Squad Leader. And since they were turned based, the AI was much more challenging than the AI in the RTS Close Combat games that used the same scale.

[lilywillow]

Folks seem to think that implementing lighting effects for torches would be of some excessive high degree of difficulty - I don't. Sure, it wouldn't be easy, but neither are the lighting effects already included for chain lightning, flaming swords, or other advertised special spell effects. Again, I'm not in any way bashing the TOEE, this is just an effect that I would like to see included in the future.

I did play and enjoy Steel Panthers. The problem that I had with it was its lack of personalized leader units. That was the great thing about Squad Leader, historical scenarios using leader units added a role playing element to every game. You just knew that Cpl Uhl would would bring that magic "luck" required to influence the dice role in you favor.

I did not know that NWNs included torches and torch lighting.

[AlanC9]

I did not know that NWN included torches and torch lighting.

You wouldn't know this if you didn't play any user mods. Bio's designers didn't do any fully dark areas. A few dim ones, but that's it.

Originally posted by lilywillow
Folks seem to think that implementing lighting effects for torches would be of some excessive high degree of difficulty - I don't. Sure, it wouldn't be easy, but neither are the lighting effects already included for chain lightning, flaming swords, or other advertised special spell effects. Again, I'm not in any way bashing the TOEE, this is just an effect that I would like to see included in the future.

From the Uber-Faq:

Q. Why were spells like light left out?
A. (S.M. 3/27) Since we have prerendered backgrounds changing the local lighting of an area isn't really possible. And unless the spell has ulterior effects wasn't even considered (e.g. light, dancing lights). We wanted, and still do want, to include darkness and daylight (e.g. of spells that effected dynamic lighting AND had significant gameplay effects) and a lot of the other spells that are on the list but we eventually had to stop putting programmer time on spells and get some other key features and bugs fixed.

A fairly simple fix (I think) would be to just give a penalty to all creatures without low-light/darkvision in areas of near darkness or total darkness. Couldn't that be done? If so, it'd make half elves more of a viable option again.

[troika_hnguyen]

Originally posted by Dromin
A fairly simple fix (I think) would be to just give a penalty to all creatures without low-light/darkvision in areas of near darkness or total darkness. Couldn't that be done? If so, it'd make half elves more of a viable option again.

actually, the easiest fix to dynamic lighting and its effects on characters is to not worry about it at all ...which, unfortunately, are the kinds of design/implementation decisions that have to be made on this kind of game and its engine, given the time constraints of the schedule.

trust me, there isn't anyone on the team who wouldn't enjoy at least another year or so to include all the features that we wanted, but couldn't include!

a design issue all in itself is the question of visibility when given that your viewpoint of the game world as a player, is from the entire party, not any particular character. i don't want to get into it too much, but i'm sure you can imagine the situations that arise when you have one character who cannot see, and others in the party who can - how do you properly relay that information to the player in the best way that best approaches gameplay and game-world immersion?

definitely open to much discussion, probably with many examples from other games that successful/unsuccessfully handle this; so it was decided that this is the way it is. and the game doesn't suffer too terribly much at all because of it, in my opinion

btw, languages were brought up as well, but it was also something that would not have been implemented satisfactorily given our design schedule. hmm, i wonder how translation on perceived gibberish would turn out? hehe...

human: "hi! how are you?"
elf: "sdjdk;flkjsd;lfkjsllkjasdfsd;;k" (in elvish, to the human)

localization of elf gibberish: ?

[Vash_HS]

I actually find Half-Elves to be viable. They get +1 to Spot, Listen and Search, +2 to Diplomacy and Gather Info plus the whole immunity to sleep and +2 to save vs Enchantments. Finally they have unlimited mulit-classing. Overall not bad.

As for languages, I feel they should be in. Perhaps allowing you to talk out of a fight or solve a puzzle.

Actually, I wasn't talking about changing the way the player sees the world on the screen, I was talking about adding a penalty onto a character that's in a low lit area who hasn't got the racial feats to function well in it.

But I understand the reasons it's not included. There's only so much time ...

Even if those things aren't implemented in game program terms, if it really means something, then they can pretend that one of the characters has cast a light spell (cantrip level 0- pretty common if you ask me) or one of the characters in your party can understand the language and tells the other party members what is going on. When in doubt, make it up. Its an imaginary game.