immortalfrieza said:
Happyninja42 said:
I was referring to a lethal stealth run vs. a nonlethal stealth run, and I'm also only applying this to players that are going blind and thus are probably believing they need to squeeze every point they can get rather than those players that know in advance they'll end up with more Praxis points than they could ever spend no matter what they do.
Ok, but their ignorance of the actual facts of the game mechanics doesn't make your statement correct. The reality is that you don't need as much XP as you think you might before is all said and done. Now I will acknowledge, that if you are talking lethal/non stealth runs, then yes, going lethal would slow things down, as far as progress speed, but in the end, you still end up with extra Praxis.
immortalfrieza said:
One could use silenced lethal weapons and lethal takedowns on everything and it would still give much less experience overall than using silenced nonlethal weapons and nonlethal takedowns. This basically forces the player especially early on to go nonlethal for the experience bonuses, and due to the screams and loud noises a victim makes when killed with lethal weapons even when using silenced weapons and takedowns it's just more practical to go nonlethal in a stealth run. The same problems also drive the player toward being inclined to take a stealth run over a loud run as well.
I wouldn't say it forces the player to do so. You can simply avoid actually taking down lots of the enemies if you are doing a stealth run. That's kind of the point, most of the stealth powers you get, open up routes that simply bypass the threats entirely. So you still don't need to take everyone out to get through the place. And if you get through without killing anyone or being seen (both of which can be done with low praxis ablities), you get a large XP bonus, mainly to offset the lost XP because you didn't kill everyone there.
And now you mention a "loud" run in comparison to a stealth run. I'm assuming in this case you are actually referring to a LOUD run? Not a non-lethal stealth run yes? If so, then I still stand by my statement that if you are going this route, you dont
need the extra XP, because the number of powers that you have access to, that augment your loudness, are less Praxis intensive than the stealth. You don't have to worry about cloaking (you can, but it's not needed for a loud run), you don't need the Icarus drop power that lets you knock people out, (if you're going loud, they're almost certainly aware of you, and not in a pre-arranged position to drop down on from above.) You don't need the hacking stuff (or at least not much of it), because most of the exits, you can find the codes for them on the corpses cooling at your feet. Also, all of the plot specific doors that you
have to go through, to continue the storyline, are all Rating 1, which means your default level of hacking ability is enough to progress through the story from start to finish. So you really don't need to bother investing tons of points into hacking either. So that's tons of stuff that's just simply not needed for a loud run, which means having less XP isn't a hindrance at all.
immortalfrieza said:
It's also important for balancing reasons. Praxis points both gained through level ups and through kits should be distributed throughout the game in such a way as to ensure the player will always have something to spend them on, and giving out differing EXP rewards gets in the way of that.
Oh I agree, having the Praxis available in alternate methods is definitely the way to go, but the problem with the Human Revolution, is that if you are being OCD about clearing a map, you will end up getting everything anyway. Yeah you could simply hack your way through those rooms and ignore all those guys, but if you go back through the area and knock them all out, you get more XP! And you can hack more computers! More XP! Which means you end up getting everything anyway. I noticed this about my first time playing. I would sneak through, hack open alternate routes that would let me bypass badguys and get to the objective. Then, I would feel compelled to sneak back into the area to knock those guys out, because they were XP on feet that I was missing out on! And all those computers I could hack for more XP and data! But, then I learned that it's frequently just redundancy, so that you can find all the information you need, no matter which route you take. The access code I find by hacking a security computer in a side room, is the same code you find on the dead guard in a letter he's got on him. So there isn't actually any
need to complete everything. Of course we gamers are bad about doing that anyway. xD I'm not sure how they could pull off what you want to see happen, without simply shutting off the alternate path you avoided, to prevent you from doubling back and getting more XP/Praxis. I mean, they could do a mission result kind of thing I guess, where you get your XP tallied up at the end of a mission? But I'd rather they kept the flow of the game how it is, with progressive advancement as you play.
Actually...now that I think about it, a cool way they could balance it out, is to have the "ghost/non-lethal" bonus be equal to the amount of XP you would get if you killed everyone. So that no matter which way you progress through the area, in the end, you will have the same XP. Go in guns blazing, fine, you don't get the Ghost/Non-Lethal bonus, but that's ok, because you just harvested your XP directly from their spinal columns! xD Want to play the sneaky bastard who gets in and out without any of them seeing you? No problem, you will lose XP from avoiding all those tasty XP meat popsicles, but you will make it up with the Ghost/Non-Lethal bonus. That might be better in a way. Then the extra XP for things like hacking computers and doors and such is just extra XP that either playthrough could get, if they spec that way.
Also, Lord Frieza, in reaction to our security forces...ex..ploding, we've decided to form a union!
MCerberus said:
Soooo lots of questions:
How much of the trailer was actioned up in order to fuel the hype train?
Uh, all of it? It's a trailer, that's kind of what they're for. xD If it is similar to the cinematic trailer for Human Revolution, most of the elements shown will have a specific reflection on the story. The elements in the first trailer included characters from the plot, and some scenes directly ripped from the game itself, with a change in location.
MCerberus said:
Are we getting any official divergence from the original's timeline?
Dunno, I hope so as while I loved the original game, I don't feel that the new games should be required to stick to their canon. I'm totally fine with them diverging for the sake of story. But, considering how much original stuff they've kept in, and hinted at, I doubt they will diverge too much. The major elements will probably still be there, but the final outcomes could vary wildly.
MCerberus said:
What ending from the ending-o-matic did they go with?
Dunno, I think the release said it wasn't going to be from any of those? *shrugs* I might be remembering that wrong. It either said "it won't take your personal choice into consideration, and will simply follow a specific choice that we pre-determine" Which I'm fine with, they've done that for other games in the past, simply because it cleans up the fuzziness of the game, and reduces the amount of potential voice work and content you have to include. And with what, 4 radically different endings, it would be hard to code basically 4 different games. Especially since at least one of those endings wouldn't allow for the current state of the game at all, if I recall correctly.
MCerberus said:
Will they explain how you're better than the original protagonist with the quite disturbing but possible technological regression?
Uh...what? What do you mean here? He's not better than the original protagonist, unless you just mean "the original guy didn't have all those cool powers!" Because it was made 20+ years ago, and they've had more time to think up cooler stuff. If that's what you mean, well, I don't know what to say. Time moves on, new people come up with cooler new powers for their characters. To force them to neuter their character because it makes the original badass look lame is unfair and silly. It's like the people who complain about the layout of the ship in the tv show Enterprise, saying "it's hundreds of years before the original show! Everything should look all clunky and stupid!" Sorry, it was the 70s when that show was made, Gene worked with what he had. If he had the ability to make everything look slick and awesome, he would've.
MCerberus said:
Who's the oddball third faction opposed to both the terrorists and Illuminati, since there's always an oddball third faction?
Dunno, the game seems to be between the establishment, which is anti-aug, and the pro-aug terrorists. If i had to guess, the third group will be the "let's all get along" group maybe? *shrugs*
