sorry in advance for post length, it is real monster of ungodly proportions.
Originally Posted by
Aielyn
You do not understand the is/ought fallacy, and have confused what we're saying. Your arguments all stem from "the way it is is how it should be" - not because you like the status quo, but because you aren't considering alternate possibilities in the first place. You assert that the strength cutoff needs to be 18 and not the PC's potential because otherwise it will screw with the balance of the game... but that cutoff was introduced to rebalance the game because of an underlying problem. The need for this hard-coded limit of 18 is what you're confusing "is" with "ought" on, not the limit itself. Basically, the game as it stands is patches on top of patches, but you're asserting that that's how it ought to be, because that's how it currently is.
You're telling me I don't like the status quo, but I
do like the
new status quo, and not because I'm not considering your alternatives. [I expound on this more below, but I've already experienced your alternate possibility]. I think you currently have some meaningful choices that would be taken away if you were to be able to train strength close to potential [more on this in super long, discombobulated paragraphs somewhere below]. Given how strength currently works w/ carrying capacity, I think the current unburdened capacity that increases to ~1500 stones by end of early game is pretty good [in my experience having this much unburdened carrying capacity is sufficient that you don't have to micromanage inventory at different stages of the game]. So, yes, the hard-coded limit of 18 isn't needed, you could make it 10 or 50 if the ~1500 stones unburdened capacity is kept, which is a nice convenience feature. Sure, we could change carrying capacity around to fit some new definition of strength, I guess, but that's only one of many things you'd need to fix to put some of the meaningful choices back in the game.
Originally Posted by
Aielyn
Your entire argument is rooted in the current situation, and every time someone offers an alternative idea, you assert that it's a bad one because it would cause issues with <insert artificial gameplay patch here>, which in many cases were introduced specifically to "fix" the problems that people are suggesting alternative ideas for. This is your is/ought problem.
I don't think most of my arguments involve an artificial gameplay patch (obviously you think the 18 St is an artificial gameplay patch, but what else are you talking about here? I would hope not stat draining – I hate it, but it's an interesting mechanic). Yes, most of my arguments do involve the current situation
because I like the new current situation and by changing this one thing (how strength is trained), you create an avalanche of other changes that need to be made in order to start putting things back in order. I don't regard this as illegitimate, and I'm not sure why you do.
Originally Posted by
Aielyn
What, exactly, do you think the current system is doing? The way the game is currently set up makes it so that PCs may technically start with very different Strengths and Potential Strengths, but when it comes down to it, through something as simple as picking things up a lot, most PCs end up at around the same Strength anyway. So why bother with having the variations in Strength/Potential in the first place - right NOW, the game has R/C combinations with technically different Strengths on paper, but not really in reality. And this is precisely what I'm arguing needs to be fixed.
Yes, I agree this is how the current system works. Difference is, the current system is already in place and doesn't require you to first change things then go back and balance them...to get stats that are technically different on paper but not so much in reality. [or so youseem to imply by stating we can rebalance new strength for +dam capability, among other things]
Originally Posted by
Aielyn
Also keep in mind that my suggestion also asserts that the stat/potential gap should be smaller for classes who use the stat a lot, so classes like Beastfighters, who depend more on Strength, wouldn't get much out of pack-muling at all - they might start with a Strength of 25 (for all I know), but they wouldn't be able to train it much beyond, say, 27. On the other hand, an R/C combination that starts with Strength at, say, 5, would probably have a potential at least around 15.
Actually this is much better than what I thought you were saying - I wasn't considering changes applied together, so you're right there.
However, this doesn't change my position because it is still removing a lot of things from the game - who cares about giant corpses anymore [this would change slightly if they affect potentials, but not hugely so since it is % based chance in first place, and best suggestion is to make it % chance to budge potential]? so what if you get drained by shadow? who cares if you lose some st to greater daemon? all these things were formerly fairly important if you had St at 19+ [in fact, very big consideration for me when considering tactics I use in graveyard], but once you add ability to train strength to like 90% of potential, they are completely removed without reworking them [what, you get potential and stat drained now? I actually considered this, but it's practically unworkable under revised system because you can't budge your potential by strength training - someone with St 13 (90% in your St 15 example) can get totally boned. They only drain potential when stat is not at max? there are some alternatives, but whole stat draining system for strength would have to be redone to give it any meaning]. You introduce a whole host of complications with how potions of strength / potential strength work [let's even disregard the poorly thought out and very bad mino maze change] – as now you can raise your strength to really high levels. How will hurthlings even work? I could go on and on and on about things that need to be thought about [some I've mentioned before but not here, such as +dam and +carrying cap.], but this section is already positively enormous, so I'll stop here so you can actually get through whole post.
Suffice it to say I have thought about this a bit and the things you need to change to get strength back in what I consider working order are very extensive - it is a very complicated task. Since p7 or so, strength has become one of those stats you fight for precious points above 18 because it's become much harder to raise [and pretty damn useful]; removing that completely changes the stat and there just
aren't "alternate possibilities" to force the same considerations. This is a pretty big change from 1.1.1 [no ring of weakness, sickness/starvation training w/ ogres – I used to do the latter A LOT], and I really like the way it forces you to consider now. [of course, most of this breaks down in late game now, due to mino maze being fundamentally broken on every level, but let's disregard that for now because I have sliver of hope that TB will eventually see the light and roll back this very bad, game-breaking change]. Obviously I've dealt with limited carrying capacity before [who hasn't], so I've experienced much of this "alternate possibility" of yours and I like ITS "alternate possibility" better, where you have to consider things more carefully.
Originally Posted by
Aielyn
Is this not pretty much exactly what you want to have happen? R/Cs that have problems with Strength can train it up a reasonable amount, those for whom Strength is higher at the start can't train it up much further, but still come out significantly ahead once all training is done? It makes both logical sense (training prior to entry into the Chain would lift the stat closer to the potential) and gameplay sense (PCs closer to their potential get less benefit from training, so that beastfighter gets a lot less value from walking around Strained, which is important when they use their offensive melee abilities to survive, while wizards, who depend more on magic, get more value from it).
This is partly what I want, but our definition of "reasonable amount" differs heavily, and the way we each want it implemented differs heavily, as well. Plus, I disagree with how you want current/potential to work (see last paragraph).
Originally Posted by
Aielyn
Every single change that is made to the game will result in some rebalancing having to happen. Arguing against the changes because it would force some rebalancing is like arguing that computers shouldn't be given new control interfaces because that would mean having to alter the GUI to account for people using it.
Well, I of course agree with this – having to rebalance is never my
primary argument against something. [I am big advocate for rebalancing things, as you can seeif you look at some of my RFEs]. What I'm against is changes that require lots of
pointless rebalancing – i.e. changes that can instead be achieved by working with the current system and doing the necessary rebalancing there, which I think
can be done for potentials. For example, why would I support reworking all stats to consider potential first then stat when the same thing can be done given that we already determine current stat first [I obviously have not been saying we can't reconsider HOW potentials are determined - in this thread and I believe elsewhere, I've advocated rebalancing them for change in how potentials work]. I guess I haven't been very clear here, but literally what you are advocating by determining potential then stat can also be achieved by first determining current stat then potential, which is already how things sort of work! Unless you think that the
current stat for characters is broken in some way (and hopefully some huge way), why would you want to change this and then work backwards to get current stat into a usable state again? If the problem is potentials, then fix them in the existing framework if possible [it is very possible – one could even fix them to work the way you suggest, by determining the current stat first, even though I wouldn't like it].
You say above that "as far as I can tell, the current system sees the PC's stats determined based on Race and Class, and then potentials are worked out from the stats. And as such, potentials are strangely distributed, which is probably why those built-in limits were added." I do not think potentials are determined solely on current stat (or else there is quite huge variance, or different tiers with big difference, which is possible). But even if this is the case – why can't potentials be adjusted based on current stat, race, and class (i.e. same as your suggestion for potentials, but opposite)? Like, I'm not opposed to this, I'm opposed to a huge investment of work (that is much less to has zero chance to get done) that involves reworking entire system when there's a much simpler solution that achieves the same thing without having to rework the entire system! Hopefully this is clear now.
That's a big part of why I completely disagree with your proposed change. [other big part is that I dislike general outline of current being close to potential for people that use it as, in general, that hurts melee classes more than spellcasting classes unless stats are raised across the board for melee classes, which I think would be a pretty bad idea]. [though if mana potential became hard cap I would giggle evilly]