Grimoire

I took the comment about someone beating the game "and only missing a couple areas" to mean that all the maps were explored in 80 hours except for a couple. I have no idea if that is accurate, and if there really are 250+ maps, 80 hours does seem short, but I'm also just guesstimating that the average map takes awhile to get through.

But again, just going to wait and see. For what I've said about the game I still find it interesting and it's my kind of thing, so I'm waiting it out.
 
I took the comment about someone beating the game "and only missing a couple areas" to mean that all the maps were explored in 80 hours except for a couple. I have no idea if that is accurate, and if there really are 250+ maps, 80 hours does seem short, but I'm also just guesstimating that the average map takes awhile to get through.

But again, just going to wait and see. For what I've said about the game I still find it interesting and it's my kind of thing, so I'm waiting it out.

I seem to remember you liked Elminage Gothic sometime back, which is basically a clone of the early wiz games. So if that is the case I'd be very surprised if you didn't like Grimoire. It appears to have settled down, since the early problems at launch. In any case it will be interesting to see how quickly you manage to complete all the maps in the game :). Actually it was 244+ maps that Cleve mentioned. I tell you that, just so you don't feel cheated.

Oh and BTW there were about 40 maps in Wiz 7, which was considered a pretty big game (much bigger than wiz 6) and that includes the small ones.
 
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What might be helpful would be a list of all of the things that are grossly overpowered in the game so that those of us who want a reasonable challenge could avoid them. We know that bards and NPCs are way too good. But my understanding on the forum is that those aren't the only things. There are other spells and abilities that are ridiculously strong and which trivialize the game which come up later. It's probably easier to wait until the game gets some semblance of balance, but for people who choose not wait and instead to "self balance" it would probably be good to know what to avoid before a huge commitment to a class has been made.
 
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Hmmm I don't think I've run into many things that I'd consider overpowering in the game, but that changed yesterday when I got a spell called deep freeze for my wizard. That spell hits like a frigging truck, so now I don't use it.

Now, I've not tried any of the companions so I don't know how overwhelming they may be. Honestly, the only complaint I really have to this point is all of the loot I've come across seems to be quite generic and repetitive. My bard has maybe five instruments to choose from, yet until yesterday none of my true combatants had a single magical weapon between them. I wouldn't have thought in the beginning of the game that I'd be level five before laying my hands on an actual magical weapon.
 
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Deep freeze is definitely talked about on the forums as being one of the problems, apparently it hits for over 1000, which I'm guessing is a lot given that some characters start with single digit hp.

I guess the question is whether you should avoid wizards entirely, or if you can get away with just avoiding that one spell.
 
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I imagine shortly that that spell will be altered, as I've already seen a few patches hit the game with significant changes. Honestly, I bet in a month or two this very well might be a great and balanced game, benefiting to those that wait it out. Heck, it's already good, far better than I expected it to be.
 
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I mean this as an honest question. Why weren't these things taken care of in the 20 years this game was being developed? Surely a Neanderthal of Cleve's incredible intellect couldn't have missed these types of balance issues, could he?
 
I mean this as an honest question. Why weren't these things taken care of in the 20 years this game was being developed? Surely a Neanderthal of Cleve's incredible intellect couldn't have missed these types of balance issues, could he?

Having been involved in the betas for a lot of games over the course of many many years, both on the CRPG level and on the P&P level, I've found that some developers just flat out don't understand game balance. Some people can instinctively look at an ability and say "that looks too strong" or "that looks too weak" and some people just absolutely can't . Cleve is clearly one of the people who can't.

You could argue that it doesn't have anything to do with intelligence, and that it's more about intuition. Although if you've ever seen Cleve talk about his supposed IQ scores in detail, it's clear he's lying about them, as he claims to have scores that don't exist. You'd think he'd actually take the time to look up what scores were actually possible. So I'm not saying he might not still be smart, but he is clearly not as smart as he claims.....
 
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Seems weird though. He could design (if we believe him :p) an intensely complex stat system for the game, but doesn't notice hugely overpowered things?

I'm of the group that doesn't require nor want perfect balance. I like Morrowind/Arcanum/etc. etc. style. But I'd prefer if the OP stuff was harder to discover, or took some more tampering than it appears to do here.

Somewhat side note but I actually like OP optional characters who join you. That can be balanced while still keeping them OP, if that makes sense. A couple characters from Final Fantasy Tactics come to mind. You get them rather late in the game and the old dude with the sword skills is completely badass and OP. Yet the game factors that into the balance and remains a challenge/interesting, despite his OP'ness. Cool stuff, IMO.

This seems like a broken version of OP, though.
 
Having been involved in the betas for a lot of games over the course of many many years, both on the CRPG level and on the P&P level, I've found that some developers just flat out don't understand game balance. Some people can instinctively look at an ability and say "that looks too strong" or "that looks too weak" and some people just absolutely can't . Cleve is clearly one of the people who can't.

You could argue that it doesn't have anything to do with intelligence, and that it's more about intuition. Although if you've ever seen Cleve talk about his supposed IQ scores in detail, it's clear he's lying about them, as he claims to have scores that don't exist. You'd think he'd actually take the time to look up what scores were actually possible. So I'm not saying he might not still be smart, but he is clearly not as smart as he claims…..

That's not necessarily true.

If you're developing a huge game full of intricate mechanics and rules - it's much, much harder for a single person to thoroughly test every single combination for extended periods of time.

I mean, you should take a look at the earlier editions of D&D and AD&D. Dozens of people were involved in designing and developing those systems - and many of them were veterans of balance from tactical wargames.

Still, the systems were FULL of obscenely broken mechanics, powers and spells.

Does that mean all the designers and internal playtesters were lacking in "intuition"?

Nah, not really.

It's just that it's much easier for people to spot when there are thousands of them playing.

Just because it's obvious that the Bard is overpowered right now - doesn't mean any of us would have found out immediately without someone else informing us first.

People tend to vastly underestimate the challenge of balancing complex games.

It's much, much, MUCH more complicated and involved than you might think.

For a single person to develop something like Grimoire is one thing. To actually ensure a reasonable balance - is quite another. It will take years for Cleve to accomplish.

Unless, of course, he starts introducing caps and other dreary limitations that will absolutely destroy the flavor of the old-school.

Pillars of Eternity is a good example of a system that was overdesigned and with a lot of anti-fun limitations in place. Even so, it was utterly broken at release in terms of balance.
 
If you're developing a huge game full of intricate mechanics and rules - it's much, much harder for a single person to thoroughly test every single combination for extended periods of time.

Yeah, very good points. Another example is Guild Wars 1, which had a huge number of skills you could combine onto the 8 skill bar. And it was an ongoing nightmare for Arenanet to balance, years after launch as players kept finding new ways to game the system.

And this was always going to be the achilles heal of Grimoire, because not only is the game complex, with practically every conceivable skill anyone has thought of for turn based combat, but also up to now the game is almost entirely untested, other than by Cleve. And further, the game is very long, so even minor balance problems are likely to accumulate over the course of play.
 
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Testing should always be done by another person (or better persons) than the developer(s). Most developers are not very good testers. It requires a very different approach and in many cases also a different skill set.
Cleve doens't look to be an exception to this. According to him the game was as smooth as butter before the release. Either he is using some very strange butter or he just isn't that good at testing perhaps.
 
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Or for marketing reason he is afraid to admit the truth.

Testing should always be done by another person (or better persons) than the developer(s). Most developers are not very good testers. It requires a very different approach and in many cases also a different skill set.
Cleve doens't look to be an exception to this. According to him the game was as smooth as butter before the release. Either he is using some very strange butter or he just isn't that good at testing perhaps.
 
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Testing should always be done by another person (or better persons) than the developer(s). Most developers are not very good testers. It requires a very different approach and in many cases also a different skill set.
Cleve doens't look to be an exception to this. According to him the game was as smooth as butter before the release. Either he is using some very strange butter or he just isn't that good at testing perhaps.

Nah, developers should definitely be a part of testing the game if possible. They usually are, too.

Especially for a solo project like this, it would make a lot of sense that testing has the main developer heavily involved.

A huge game like this having issues is absolutely unavoidable - no matter how many testers you're using. Well, unless you spend years testing it after you're essentially done.

Suggesting he's bad at testing because of some balance issues is pretty unfair.

Heck, even Blizzard games have serious balance issues at launch - and they have some of the most elaborate and thorough testing approaches in the industry.

As for what Cleve "claims" - there's really no need to argue about that. We all know he's completely full of shit.

That's not really the issue here.
 
Also, it is becoming apparent that there are some blank spots in the game after the first act (according to FelipePepe who claims to have finished the game now), so Dart's suspicion on that appears not to be unfounded. Apparently, the game picks up again in the end game. All in all Cleve *should* have launched it as early access. And it seems unlikely that all these balance & broken features & bare areas can be fixed with just a few patches. More like six months (minimum) to a year or more. One can only hope that Ripper was not correct when he suggested that Cleve might be just cashing in his chips now. Although I don't think that is the case, it is a possibility - there is always a diminishing return in improving a game that is already released, unless you have a piad expansion planned. But Cleve can hardly charge for fixing broken features, that should have been in the initial release...
 
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Also, it is becoming apparent that there are some blank spots in the game after the first act (according to FelipePepe who claims to have finished the game now), so Dart's suspicion on that appears not to be unfounded. Apparently, the game picks up again in the end game. All in all Cleve *should* have launched it as early access. And it seems unlikely that all these balance & broken features & bare areas can be fixed with just a few patches. More like six months (minimum) to a year or more. One can only hope that Ripper was not correct when he suggested that Cleve might be just cashing in his chips now. Although I don't think that is the case, it is a possibility - there is always a diminishing return in improving a game that is already released, unless you have a piad expansion planned.

I had no such suspicion - I just don't assume that much based on nothing at all.

Based on my experience with complex CRPGs and given this is a one-person game that's also pretty huge - I would say it will take at least a year to get the game to a reasonably balanced state.

But that doesn't mean it can't be great fun regardless. No one is forcing people to take advantage of exploits or broken builds.

Some of the most fun games - for me - have had ridiculously broken mechanics.

Master of Magic comes to mind as one of the most glaring examples :)
 
Nah, developers should definitely be a part of testing the game if possible. They usually are, too.

Especially for a solo project like this, it would make a lot of sense that testing has the main developer heavily involved.

A huge game like this having issues is absolutely unavoidable - no matter how many testers you're using. Well, unless you spend years testing it after you're essentially done.

Suggesting he's bad at testing because of some balance issues is pretty unfair.

Heck, even Blizzard games have serious balance issues at launch - and they have some of the most elaborate and thorough testing approaches in the industry.

As for what Cleve "claims" - there's really no need to argue about that. We all know he's completely full of shit.

That's not really the issue here.
I have no experience in game development, but have 25 years of experience in leading software projects, from small to large. I've seen all types of software developers and all kinds of views that they have on their skills passing by. Simply put, developers suck at both qualitative and quantative testing on a product level. They need others to take the lead in that. Obviously it is a cooperative thing with the developer, but a developer will never find the amount of issues in their product that somebody skilled in testing can, so they should definitely not be in the lead. Testing is a skill that not everybody has and most developers don't (beyond unit testing their own work, which is something a developer should do), as it is requires a very different skill set from developing software.
The amount of developers that think they are good in testing on a system or product level, but in reality are not, is staggering. With the results of the last weeks, the broken bug fixes, save games, and whatnot, yes I conclude that Cleve is not good at testing his product.
Fortunately for him, he has paying customers who are fine with it being released like that.
 
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I have no experience in game development, but have 25 years of experience in leading software projects, from small to large. I've seen all types of software developers and all kinds of views that they have on their skills passing by. Simply put, developers suck at both qualitative and quantative testing on a product level. They need others to take the lead in that. Obviously it is a cooperative thing with the developer, but a developer will never find the amount of issues in their product that somebody skilled in testing can, so they should definitely not be in the lead. Testing is a skill that not everybody has and most developers don't (beyond unit testing their own work, which is something a developer should do), as it is requires a very different skill set from developing software.
The amount of developers that think they are good in testing on a system or product level, but in reality are not, is staggering. With the results of the last weeks, the broken bug fixes, save games, and whatnot, yes I conclude that Cleve is not good at testing his product.
Fortunately for him, he has paying customers who are fine with it being released like that.

There's no such thing as a "tester" in terms of a human being. That's a job title.

Meaning, a tester can be a great developer and a developer can be a great tester.

There's absolutely no conflict there. That's in your mind.

Also, when it comes to overall testing - it's 100% common practice that the developers (many of them) take part in the process. In fact, they do this DURING development every time they're experimenting with something - and they do it as part of the job, it's just not the primary part of their job.

Beyond that, it's very common to have after-work playsessions that are primarily about testing balance and "fun" - and that WILL include developers.

I know this, because I know game development.

When it comes to traditional Q/A testing - as in, quality assurance, that's largely about bug fixes and making sure the game actually works. Severe balance issues are a natural part of it - but it's really the job of the designers (and especially the project lead) to balance the game, and then give directives to Q/A in terms of what to look out for.

All that is kind irrelevant here, though - as we're not talking about a normal game.

We're talking about a one-person game - and there's really no alternative to Cleve testing the game that's realistic, considering the scope and time in development.

Is he necessarily a great tester? Of course not.

Is there some kind of rule or standard that makes him a bad tester exclusively because he's a developer? Of course not.

Whatever your opinion of testers may be - it seems both ill informed and biased.

The reason developers don't usually focus on testing games is that they're busy developing. The reason you use testers is NOT that they're not developers - it's because you need them to focus on that job, and not another job.

You and I could be fantastic testers - or we could be fantastic developers. We could also suck majorly at both.

You can't know from looking at a job title.
 
I never said that a developer shouldn't participate in the process, it is just something you want to read. I actually said they do, but for that and the rest, whatever you want to belief on this topic is fine by me.
 
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How magnanimous of you ;)

However, since you're basing your opinion of Cleve's ability to test his game on hear-say and issues not uncommon at all for a huge one-man project - as well as your time in software development (where there isn't even a thing called balance) - I might have been able to make do without your ok.

It's very unlike you to generalise about developers so harshly.

One can't help but suspect a little bias is at work here.

Nah, that couldn't happen with Myrthos - the pinnacle of reason ;)
 
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