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[alexandertnt]

I'm talking more about a different architecture which would be analogue based. So instead of calculating bits, you would be measuring currents and voltage and something like that. A lot of physical equations can be simulated through correctly set up circuits.

What advantage does this analogue architecture have over digital with a decent time step + good integrator?

[Sergarr]

I'm talking more about a different architecture which would be analogue based. So instead of calculating bits, you would be measuring currents and voltage and something like that. A lot of physical equations can be simulated through correctly set up circuits.

What advantage does this analogue architecture have over digital with a decent time step + good integrator?

Ability to simulate differential equations on hardware level.

And in digital calculations you need to increase memory for variables if you want to increase the time step, and this is going to only delay the divergence...

[alexandertnt]

Analogue systems are still limited in the amount of information they can represent - you go from having your accuracy being limited by the number of bits representing numbers, to being limited by things like voltage stability, max voltage etc.

Errors will still be introduced in your integration step by things like noise, and your values still limited by the voltage your components can take before they fry.

[Sergarr]

Analogue systems are still limited in the amount of information they can represent - you go from having your accuracy being limited by the number of bits representing numbers, to being limited by things like voltage stability, max voltage etc.

Errors will still be introduced in your integration step by things like noise, and your values still limited by the voltage your components can take before they fry.

Eh. At least they don't have the time discretization issue.

[KA101]

Extensive freeform character creation at game start.
I can't know if most of those skills are actually useful. I can't know if the option for hybridization actually results in viable characters.
And I sure as hell don't want to spend dozens of hours finding out.

Have you ever played Arcanum?  It's probably the worst offender of this.

Ugh.  And it took at least 2 levels to actually progress in a chosen tech field.  KA101 thought electricity sounded neat, lost out on the Vivifier as didn't have Herbalism 1 and hit the level cap.

[itisnotlogical]

And yet if you put in that kind of system, the finality of item creation would always boil down to "what does the most damage/soaks the most damage for reasonable item creation effort? Use that one."

For the "mix and match" solution, you don't allow one thing to be best at everything... Basic gameplay balancing with that route.

In a system where one thing can be better than another thing, there will be a dominant strategy. It's inevitable unless everything is exactly as effective as everything else, in which case there's no real choice. It's why every online multiplayer game ever has had balance tweaks at some point; true balance and variety in gameplay don't mix all that well.

[Sergarr]

And yet if you put in that kind of system, the finality of item creation would always boil down to "what does the most damage/soaks the most damage for reasonable item creation effort? Use that one."

For the "mix and match" solution, you don't allow one thing to be best at everything... Basic gameplay balancing with that route.

In a system where one thing can be better than another thing, there will be a dominant strategy. It's inevitable unless everything is exactly as effective as everything else, in which case there's no real choice. It's why every online multiplayer game ever has had balance tweaks at some point; true balance and variety in gameplay don't mix all that well.

The good way to balance dominant strategies is to create 5-6 new strategies that counter it.

[Henny]

Speaking of random enemies, what about ToME's wandering elites? They pick two player classes and get a smattering of abilities from each. It can be the worst, most disjointed pushover mess... or completely end you in a couple turns if you don't take a look at it beforehand. Unfortunately, far more of them were the former, so you were never prepared for the latter.

Its a roguelike. It being completely unfair and killing you because you weren't prepared 2 years in advance is fairly typical.

Then again this is ToME which as a whole has a huge feeling that it basically tries to avoid the typical ToME terribleness so anything that is fairly typically roguelike is felt even more.

Yes the Wandering Elites are a rather lazy feature. It easily could have been rectified had they put any real time and effort towards it... but I have a feeling their view of it is "Hey its a roguelike".

Hey did I ever tell you that I think Roguelikes are fun but the constant apologetic nature of the rogue-like community and developers holds back the entire genre and as such many roguelikes use the typical RL features like a crutch in place of genuinely fun and engaging gameplay or don't actually support those aspects well? I say this because my disdain is rather obvious.

Actually add that to my list

-Roguelike: Used to be a feature that I loved, honestly the first time I heard of a game where if you don't wear protection when picking up a poisonous orb, that you would get poisoned. I jumped on it. Heck the dying a lot didn't but me at first. Then however I started learning what you had to do to win those games and found out that for the most part Roguelikes is pretty much a garbage genre as a whole with a few notable exceptions. Even the exemplars like Nethack are just dreadful in how they expect you to play the game.

This, this, this. The most egregious example (well, besides ASCII idiots) being permadeath. There seem to be a few reasons this scrappy mechanic is still thought of as integral:

1) Excitement, usually one of the most cited ones. This is an inherently contradictory example because of its evil twin: frustration. Nobody likes just throwing away their hard work. The argument then goes that if there's little work invested in a character anyway, it's less frustrating. But obviously, then it's less exciting - I can only care so much for my ShIt generation IV being shot by a Centaur for the third time.

2) Replayability. Actually, given the constrained race and class combinations, skill aptitudes etc. it gives more replayability, but that's only because they're also pretty shitty mechanics. Permadeath does not inherently infer replayability, it's merely a requisite for having permadeath be palatable at all.

3) (Maybe more like 1b) It's somehow a requisite for complex thinking and strategy. Perhaps this is because of a feeling of disappointment with games where characters is stacked out with the best stats, armour, items, etc. This is a flaw of game design that is only slightly ameliorated by permadeath (and the cure is surely worse than the disease) as shown by the fact that it applies to roguelikes in the late-games, which also leads to roguelikes being easier later on, contrary to game design 101.

[Darkmere]

If there's no possibility of actually losing, every game plays out the same way. Obsessively save, load when you die. Repeat until victory screen. Imagining something like FTL playing out that way just guts the whole system because by then it's simply a complicated choose your own adventure book where every choice eventually leads to a neat, pretty retconned history of ultimate victory.

[Henny]

If there's no possibility of actually losing, every game plays out the same way. Obsessively save, load when you die. Repeat until victory screen. Imagining something like FTL playing out that way just guts the whole system because by then it's simply a complicated choose your own adventure book where every choice eventually leads to a neat, pretty retconned history of ultimate victory.

Uh, I don't think you've quite understand the point of games: it's the journey that counts. Every playthrough is different because of things like procedural generation, chance, skill and player choices etc. Something that plays out the exact same is not a game, it's a movie. I like my journey to be fun, and starting over all the time sure as hell ain't - likewise, I don't save and reload every single turn. You don't use every single exploit because the game engine allows it, do you?*

FTL is a super-short coffee break game designed with permadeath in mind. Asking to imagine it without it is like asking to imagine Kaizo Mario World without savestates.

*I suppose depending on the roguelike, this is actually a legit question.

[Neonivek]

Darkmere it isn't that pernadeath cannot be a great feature. It is that it rarely is, it is often used as a tool to give the game a dose of artificial difficulty.

FTL's is basically like a dart throw where you are trying to hit bullseye and because the game is short and designed for its quick gameplay it works.

Longer games with pernadeath should feel like one extra long game over multiple lives, where each life is a learning experience needed to complete the game. Which this isn't the only way to do pernadeath with longer games, most roguelikes just have pernadeath for the sake of having pernadeath and never support it with features or structure the gameplay around it. The sheer number of "Wikiroguelikes" is staggering.

You have no idea how much my imagination was running the second I found games with ghosts of dead adventurers in it. I know RIGHT THERE that it was a genius feature for a game that features pernadeath and bone files could be implemented in so many ways. Yet they rarely are.

It really is sort of why it fits so well with this topic because this topic isn't "List features that stink" another way to rewrite the topic is "Great Features you love that tend to be executed poorly"

[GlyphGryph]

Certain games, like Xcom/Xenonauts and FTL or Chess, need a point where you admit you lost, and it's time to start over, and they need loses that feel real and decisions that have real consequences.

But advertising permadeath as a feature is just so weird.

Extensive freeform character creation at game start.
I can't know if most of those skills are actually useful. I can't know if the option for hybridization actually results in viable characters.
And I sure as hell don't want to spend dozens of hours finding out.

Hey now, this is my favorite part of some games. :V It's really just a completely different game on top of the regular game, and much how like my favorite part of Magic the Gathering was always building decks rather than playing (playing really only happens so I can get some info and then go back to the fun part of building decks) elaborate character creation is something I personally love. I just wish it was more like deck-building systems, where the actual "game" resulting from it was nice and short so you can get back to the fun part right quick.

In a system where one thing can be better than another thing, there will be a dominant strategy. It's inevitable unless everything is exactly as effective as everything else, in which case there's no real choice. It's why every online multiplayer game ever has had balance tweaks at some point; true balance and variety in gameplay don't mix all that well.

Tell me, what is the dominant strategy in Rock, Paper, Scissors? Because I assure you, Rock DEFINITELY beats scissors! Even in the variants with lots of throws, some of which beat meany more things than others, there still isn't a "dominant" strategy beyond "don't be predictable". It's all about circumstances, synergies, preparation and adaptation to changing situations!

[Neonivek]

The thing is with "Dominant strategy" is that it doesn't NESSISARILY matter, so long as it isn't that dominant or if there are play style differences or if there are reasons why someone cannot rely on that strategy.

What is the best weapon in Kirby Superstar? Mirror and Motorcycle (for 2-player). What is the best attack skill in Fallout 1 and 2? Energy Weapons (I think it is still energy weapons in 2). Yet many players don't just go around using mirror or energy weapons. Heck in Mass Effect 1 there was a best class (I think it was the engineer I forget).

As well a lot of games are about finding that dominant strategy... or where you are supposed to recognize the dominant strategy immediately but where it is difficult to do so.

[GlyphGryph]

I particularly enjoy the games where there is an "obvious dominant strategy" that turns out to be not so dominant after all, once you start actually understanding how things work, and which put the "dominant" strategy to shame (or where the dominant strategy ends up falling apart as circumstances change, forcing you to adapt).

[Darkmere]

Eh the thread's gone on long enough that I feel the need to clarify. I like permadeath as an option *provided the game has fair mechanisms that can be overcome to prevent death.* The FTL example fits to me because you can learn the rough chance for success of particular events and play to maximize that. Binding of Isaac is similar in my head because there's a very small set of drops that makes the game unwinnable, but there's a large range of player skill involved that can mitigate or even take advantage of some item drops.

On the other end something like ToME can be excessive on permadeath, because the tedium involved in checking the skillset of every single rare spawn in the game to make sure it isn't the one combo especially suited to kill your character only promotes tedium and frustration at having to play the first set of dungeons in the same order over and over again until you get the right stuff to make your character shine.

As I said before, I'm only a fan of permadeath in shorter games where player skill is a mitigating factor in the odds of success for a playthrough, and that present a fair challenge to the player. Randomly causing the dungeon to collapse is BS of the highest caliber.