What do YOU want to see in G4?
Pages
| Author | Topic: What do YOU want to see in G4? |
|---|---|
|
Apprentice
Member # 5929
|
written Sunday, June 12 2005 19:04
Profile
you know how you can eather be a servile lover/hater? well why can't you mistreat your own creations? i know it sounds mean and all, but wouldn't it be neat? -------------------- Nothing beats Star Wars Posts: 17 | Registered: Thursday, June 9 2005 07:00 |
|
Apprentice
Member # 5929
|
written Sunday, June 12 2005 19:08
Profile
sinc there are continents still not enhabited, maybe have another "shaper" society with different beliefs. how about, instead of absolute control, they worship the creatures.and the humans would be "slaves", but not absolutely. -------------------- Nothing beats Star Wars Posts: 17 | Registered: Thursday, June 9 2005 07:00 |
|
Shaper
Member # 5437
|
written Sunday, June 12 2005 19:13
Profile
quote:I think I would pass on that one. If you damage your creations they wouldn't be very useful protectors. If you really want to hurt them you could make and absorb them a lot, or hit them a few times and heal them, but that sounds a bit off to me. Edit: sp [ Tuesday, June 14, 2005 15:27: Message edited by: A Tail of Many Stripes ] Posts: 2032 | Registered: Wednesday, January 26 2005 08:00 |
|
Apprentice
Member # 5929
|
written Sunday, June 12 2005 19:14
Profile
and why do you always have to join a faction, well not have to, but you know what i mean. it would be cool if you started your own faction. convince others to join, build buildings and such, and have a list of different guidelines and beliefs to pick from. have a navy. send a battalion to raid a caravan. [ Sunday, June 12, 2005 19:22: Message edited by: lowbaca ] -------------------- Nothing beats Star Wars Posts: 17 | Registered: Thursday, June 9 2005 07:00 |
|
Shaper
Member # 5437
|
written Sunday, June 12 2005 19:17
Profile
Please use the edit button instead of triple posting. Posts: 2032 | Registered: Wednesday, January 26 2005 08:00 |
|
Apprentice
Member # 5929
|
written Sunday, June 12 2005 19:18
Profile
I think I would pass on that one. If you damage your creations they wouldn't be very useful protectors. If you really want to hurt them you could make and absorb them a lot, or hit them a few times and heal them, but that sounds a bit off too me. well, not beat them, just have a whip you can use. and if you do it to much they go rogue {oh, i didn't know about the edit until you said something] [ Sunday, June 12, 2005 19:19: Message edited by: lowbaca ] -------------------- Nothing beats Star Wars Posts: 17 | Registered: Thursday, June 9 2005 07:00 |
|
...b10010b...
Member # 869
|
written Sunday, June 12 2005 19:22
Profile
Homepage
Note also the use of the quote button. It's the big black set of quote marks just to the right of the Edit button. Use it when you want to quote someone. -------------------- The Empire Always Loses: This Time For Sure! Posts: 9973 | Registered: Saturday, March 30 2002 08:00 |
|
Apprentice
Member # 3618
|
written Monday, June 13 2005 09:17
Profile
Magic: I several spells could be added to increase interestingness:(M) Stealth (decrease monster sight range to make sneaking easier)(M) Detect Life (another sneaking tool)(M) Disarm (for those times when a trap or mine is causing serious trouble; perhaps sometimes it will fail and just detonate nearby traps and mines)(B or M) Move Mountains(B or L) Force Cage (call it "Essence Cage", of course)(B or L) some sort of stun/slow/paralyze spell(L) Martyr's Shield(H) a recover-health-over-time spell(H) a convert-essence-into-energy spellRedundant spells, like the three Heals, the two Essence Shields, the two Dazes, etc. should be eliminated; let ability level determine effectiveness. ----- Shaping: Rather than third-tier creations, I'd like to see an additional creation type in each category. After all, there is little difference between a Brutal Thahd and an Alpha, or between an Ur-Drayk (if there were such a thing) and a Drakon. The new creations should be geared toward making on-the-fly creation a more interesting option. For example: Battle: push everything up a notch and insert Ornk as the lowest level battle creation. It can attack somewhat (although it's slow: -1 to its AP), but its most valuable ability would be the power to transfer health and energy from itself to an ally. Create them in advance and have them tag along the party, acting as a meat shield (no pun intended) and being consumed if a battle turns ugly. Fire: insert between Roamer and Drayk the Turret. It's immobile, which means that you'll pretty much have to reabsorb it after a battle, but it makes up for it by its powerful ranged physical attack (it's nice to be able to fire ranged attacks against things that resist magic). Magic: Maybe over in the Battle section the Thahd Shade could be replaced by a Charged Thahd (it could be essentially a Thahd with +2AP, which makes it significantly different tactically from Alphas), thus making room for inserting Essence Shade in between Artila and Vlish. Essence Shade could be designed for reabsorbtion: intsead of recovering only 50% of essence on absorb, the player could recover 75% or so, which (along with the hard-to-hit trait of the shade) would make create-reabsorb-recreate at least a remotely viable battle strategy. In addition to the Ornk's ability, I'd give some friendly spells to other creations as well: Ur-Drakons should have Battle Roar, Clawbugs should have Move Mountains, some type of Vlish could maybe have Heal, etc. As other people have mentioned, let the environment react a bit to your party composition. For example, a particular rogue might slink off rather than attacking if it sees a Vlish in your party; if you have a Battle Alpha in your party a Shaper might start up a conversation about how to improve such things; Drayks might be pleased to see you creating more of their number; etc. Furthermore, some important figures might insist that you chain your creations up outside their camps rather than letting them enter; and some rebels might look askance at you for having creations at all. (Perhaps an option could be added alongside Absorb called "Release" that does the same thing but doesn't give the 50% essence recovery. The game could take note of whether or not you've ever absorbed a creation that had been with you long enough to gain a level, and of whether or not you'd ever released such a creation. These flags could change how willing people are to trust you. ('"The Eyes see all! You deceive the eared creatures, claiming you want creations free, but the Eyes cannot be fooled. The Eyes see many creations of your essence dying, none ever freed! Look into the Eyes and receive your judgment!" The conversation ends.') ----- Equipment: More interesting items; some equipment, for example, could improve a particular ability rather than a general trait. More anvil recipes, the best ones to be pieced together by analogy from others rather than from instructions (make the player really start to figure out which reagents will bind energy, which have energy to be bound, and so on). Discourage trial-and-error: perhaps you'd need to consume a Magic Solvent to get your reagents back after a failed experiment (or to unbind an enhancement from an item so a more powerful enhancement can be used in its place). At the same time, encourage some experimentation: let the player find recipes that don't quite work, but fail in ways which suggest fixes. (Imagine this: you find a recipe for a powerful belt; but when you create it, you find that although it gives the bonuses you wanted, it weighs 50 pounds and is horribly encumbering--the recipe had an error in it. Luckily, you've learned that items can be made lighter by infusing them with a Vlish Air Sac; you apply some Magic Solvent, add Air Sac to the mix, and voila--the belt is finally a success.) ----- Plot: I want to see factions and subfactions, a chance to pick not just which side you want to be on but which individual actor you want to support (imagine Khyryk and Rahul fighting side-by-side; you'd nominally be working for both, but you'd have an eye for which one you wanted to see have the most success). Posts: 33 | Registered: Thursday, October 30 2003 08:00 |
|
Apprentice
Member # 5929
|
written Monday, June 13 2005 09:34
Profile
everything sounds good. except for the "redundent" spells. each healing spell is meant for a certain level. you usually start off with the minor heal. which is good until your health gets higher then 30, then it doesnt do anything {since it only heals up to what, 8?}. then heal is more powerful, for further in the game. you don't start off knowing this because it uses too much essence and magic. then group heal is for someone more then halfway through the game. when you have enough essence and such to use it. and i agree with the daze spells, i never use it, it's just a waste of space and money. one thing that makes no sense, is that there aren't any natural wild animals. all the wild ones were created and abandoned/lost. were they all just killed off or something? another thing is that there isn't a government. i'm pretty sure that the shapers aren't a gov.how would the world be under order if there is noone to ensure it? [ Monday, June 13, 2005 09:53: Message edited by: lowbaca ] -------------------- Nothing beats Star Wars Posts: 17 | Registered: Thursday, June 9 2005 07:00 |
|
Infiltrator
Member # 5785
|
written Monday, June 13 2005 10:24
Profile
Flying, burrowing, swimming creations. Drayks and Drakons have wings, do they not? So let them fly, and because of this they get some kind of bonus (like being harder to hit with melee weapons). Other, new creations can be allowed to fly aswell. Some creations can move underground if you press a button, to avoid being damaged but can't damage themselves. Swimming creations can move over water and perhaps even carry you on their backs (Like the specialized Drayk from G1) -------------------- "..The seventh wave of Thrall stumbled and climbed over the slippery, piled dead and Mazzarin saw The Watcher with them and at last knew the number of his days." Posts: 522 | Registered: Wednesday, May 4 2005 07:00 |
|
Shock Trooper
Member # 549
|
written Monday, June 13 2005 14:26
Profile
-The option of giving creations extra abilities by spending more essense like adding poison to the clawbug's stingers or adding two extra legs on the glaahk to give it more action points. -The ability to improve creations in labs like changing a regular fyora into a charged fyora. -Creations that require two shaping skills to make like a clawbug/artilla hybrid. -Items that creations can equip. -Ridable creations. Posts: 227 | Registered: Thursday, January 24 2002 08:00 |
|
Shaper
Member # 5437
|
written Monday, June 13 2005 14:39
Profile
I like the idea of shaping Serviles. The spell casting Serviles can be pretty strong, and they could equip weapons, armor, or carry things for you. I would also like to see the boats improve. Avernum's boats work very well, and would be an improvement to the ones in GF3. [ Monday, June 13, 2005 14:39: Message edited by: A Tail of Many Stripes ] Posts: 2032 | Registered: Wednesday, January 26 2005 08:00 |
|
Agent
Member # 2210
|
written Tuesday, June 14 2005 08:58
Profile
Hello, There is no indication that shapers ever die of old age or disease. The humans do, but the shapers don't age. I think of the council as ancient. Once you become more powerful you age a lot less. If you use the geneforge you live a long long time. I bet the shaper council has been around for a long long time. They would prefer you get your power slowly because you are less likely to be rash and youthful with it. Also it allows them to keep tabs on everybody. Think of a level 80 character in an unaging body... Thus they could make super powerful creations by boosting the stats of their critters to insane levels. There would be no need for drakes, etc. I bet a single council member could match three or four geneforged ur-drakons in a stand up fight. Having 500 years of experience under your belt heps. Another thought on how there could be a balanced outcome would be the introduction of a world changing character. A backstory idea. About 25 years ago, a shaper did something absolutely forbidden. She shaped a human being from essence, then fell in love. The shaper council found out. They caught her and executed her, but her husband the essence creation escaped with the perfect child they had shaped. The created one sought out a reclusive rogue shaper on the isles where he was raised in a hidden community. He has decided to go out into the world. Basically you have the ultimate shaper a combination of creation/shaper. -------------------- Wasting your time and mine looking for a good laugh. Star Bright, Star Light, Oh I Wish I May, I Wish Might, Wish For One Star Tonight. Posts: 1084 | Registered: Thursday, November 7 2002 08:00 |
|
Warrior
Member # 5731
|
written Tuesday, June 14 2005 09:44
Profile
quote:Actually, doesn't Rahul say something towards the end about how his days are coming to an end but yours are just beginning? It doesn't sound like he's dying or anything but it did sound like retirement wasn't too far around the corner. Anyone else remember this? Posts: 107 | Registered: Tuesday, April 19 2005 07:00 |
|
Shock Trooper
Member # 549
|
written Tuesday, June 14 2005 09:45
Profile
I think that having the character start the game as a fully trained Shaper/Guardian/Agent should be seriously considered. A lot of big things are going to be happening and the whole weak guy that no one's heard of coming out of nowhere to become a powerful warrior and saving the world thing is getting old. Posts: 227 | Registered: Thursday, January 24 2002 08:00 |
|
His Mighty Tentacle
Member # 627
|
written Tuesday, June 14 2005 10:16
Profile
The ability to learn forbidden magic. Like Necromancy. Damnit, I want a Shaper with a loyal army of shades! -------------------- If I could make just one wish, I would want a tasty vlish. Geneforge IV. Still no tasty vlish. Posts: 1104 | Registered: Tuesday, February 12 2002 08:00 |
|
Apprentice
Member # 5368
|
written Tuesday, June 14 2005 15:02
Profile
This probably wouldn't work, but I really want some input in any case. Any comment at all. I would like to see a nonshaped creation. Imagine a neglected geneforge left in some secluded spot for centuries. The shapers wiped out the heritics and all their creations, leaving nobody to use it. Only automated machinery and some machine golems are left to take care of it. Over time, its strange energies mutate local plant and animal life in semi-random and unpredictable ways. Most that was touched died... but some lived on. Darwinism kicks in at an accelerated rate. Thick mats of fiberous green algae coat rocks. Strange, but eerily beautiful plants decorate the landscape. Animals and fish that have never been seen by human eyes abound in truely alien forms. But things change too fast for there to be any real balance of nature. It is a violent and dangerous landscape. Consuming the abandoned heretic citadel, and the geneforge itself, is the strangest lifeform of all. Evolved out of simple fungi and bacteria that grew too close to the forge (symbiotic life forms that make up essence pools), it is like a massive coral reef. Gradually, it gained an alien type of sapience and learned to shape new organisms... but not in the same way as the shapers. It produces essence bearers. Delicate, glassine creatures with a transparant bulb or cup shaped organ on their backs. These transport the essence necessary to keep its component creations alive. Some are modified to carry acid, making them dangerous enemies. It produces dopplegangers. These are stupid creatures made in human form. Decent spies or deadly assassins. In battle, they are anything but human. It produces brutes. These are thaal or battle alpha analogues. They do the heavy lifting as well as being shock troops. These muscled giants are pale and have an unformed appearance, not even having eyelids, noses, or mouths. It has a thousand other things it can make... and it will only learn from watching shapers in action. Shapers find this area and decide to study it... just as it studies them. They do not know its origins, having forgotten the battle that once took place here. Several parties eventually come to play against each other. Survivors of the heretics, modern rebels, some of the smarter rogues, the shapers themselves, this creature... and you. [ Tuesday, June 14, 2005 15:06: Message edited by: Hectonkhyres ] Posts: 43 | Registered: Friday, January 7 2005 08:00 |
|
Agent
Member # 2210
|
written Wednesday, June 15 2005 14:52
Profile
Here is an idea. You have the cross breed shaper/creation living in an awakened community on one of the islands. He quietly absorbs their philosophy, then he twists it in a maddening way. He decides that it is his duty to bring his philosophy to the masses. He produces an insane but convincing text which starts spreading out to the shaper and drakon lands. Then he starts building a militant philosophy that is a mix of shaper and human. Those who shape at the top-- drakons and humans, those who fight, use magic, and make things in the middle, and everyone else servile and human as slaves. He starts recruiting and it spreads quickly... -------------------- Wasting your time and mine looking for a good laugh. Star Bright, Star Light, Oh I Wish I May, I Wish Might, Wish For One Star Tonight. Posts: 1084 | Registered: Thursday, November 7 2002 08:00 |
|
Shock Trooper
Member # 549
|
written Wednesday, June 15 2005 20:57
Profile
It would be cool if G4 had the original creatures that the creations were based on. We know from G1 that the serviles and fyora were once actual species that evolved on their own and were enslaved by the Shapers’ ancestors so it’s reasonable to assume that many if not all of the other creations were also based on species that evolved on their own and it is possible that some of those creatures escaped enslavement and still exist somewhere. For all we know, there could be an entire Drayk empire out there somewhere. Posts: 227 | Registered: Thursday, January 24 2002 08:00 |
|
Apprentice
Member # 5368
|
written Wednesday, June 15 2005 21:34
Profile
A few more of the dirty little secrets that the shapers have been hiding... of have just plain forgotten. Things that were put in motion with the very founding of the science of shaping. In the course of the plot, you should find instructions on how to manufacture forgotten things. Creations which were left as footnotes on somebody's recordbook but either dropped out of everyday use, were banned, or never left prototype stage. Posts: 43 | Registered: Friday, January 7 2005 08:00 |
|
Agent
Member # 2210
|
written Thursday, June 16 2005 11:11
Profile
I would like to be able to build a golem or fix a broken automaton so it could be one of the creations that joins my character. Iron clawbug, flaming golem, etc. Whatever happened to the drakon golem. Somewhere out there, an awakened servile is planning his revenge and building a mechanized army... Reaper batons, iron clawbugs, drakon golems, etc. -------------------- Wasting your time and mine looking for a good laugh. Star Bright, Star Light, Oh I Wish I May, I Wish Might, Wish For One Star Tonight. Posts: 1084 | Registered: Thursday, November 7 2002 08:00 |
|
Apprentice
Member # 5929
|
written Thursday, June 16 2005 11:38
Profile
i agree, it would be nice to make a golem. i still think you should start off as a nobody. if you think about it, most rpg's are like this.[zelda,final fantasy, and so on] but through out the game you can increase in rank and have people join, or give orders to attack or something. and fighting in a huge battle would be sweet. like fighting side by side with 50 other shapers against an army of drayks.[remember in g2, where you got a quest from a guy in medab to eradicate an army of serviles and battle alphas, and you fought 5 or 6 serviles from medab, that was cool]. -------------------- Nothing beats Star Wars Posts: 17 | Registered: Thursday, June 9 2005 07:00 |
|
Agent
Member # 2210
|
written Saturday, June 18 2005 11:35
Profile
Hmm, another thing I would like would be reintroducing the Sholai. An idea comes to mind -- the awakened are close to Sholai lands right now. They get in conflict with the Sholai and end up pulling a conquistador type maneuver on them-- a small heavily armed group of serviles attacks a local kingdom and annexes the capital. They recruit mercenaries and press gang people into an awakened army... preparing to return to shaper lands... They attack not because they want to conquer but because they are threatened by the ruler. [ Saturday, June 18, 2005 11:37: Message edited by: I'll Steal Your Toast ] -------------------- Wasting your time and mine looking for a good laugh. Star Bright, Star Light, Oh I Wish I May, I Wish Might, Wish For One Star Tonight. Posts: 1084 | Registered: Thursday, November 7 2002 08:00 |
|
Infiltrator
Member # 5785
|
written Monday, June 20 2005 07:42
Profile
I would not be surprised if the Sholai appear in the next game as allies to your character or atleast appearing more like good guys (a' la Awakened) than the bad ones. This idea with the geneforge evolving to be a sentinent being is fun, too bad a few games have done things like that before. -------------------- "..The seventh wave of Thrall stumbled and climbed over the slippery, piled dead and Mazzarin saw The Watcher with them and at last knew the number of his days." Posts: 522 | Registered: Wednesday, May 4 2005 07:00 |
|
Agent
Member # 2210
|
written Monday, June 20 2005 11:36
Profile
Another idea if the Sholai appear. The Sholai have tried to suppress their own form of Shaper-- they are terrified of them. Change Shaper to shapeshifter. -------------------- Wasting your time and mine looking for a good laugh. Star Bright, Star Light, Oh I Wish I May, I Wish Might, Wish For One Star Tonight. Posts: 1084 | Registered: Thursday, November 7 2002 08:00 |