Some wishes for the future

[1varangian]

I absolutely dislike the idea of the perception skill.

The whole point is figuring this out yourself. Your RL perception skill grows as you play the game. After a while, your perception sense tingles and you just "know" that this chest is going to be a bit more annoying or that this wall particular wall lined with traps will have a secret button.

After playing grimrock 2 for some 30-odd hours I'd say I have about 3 points in perception already. Making this a mechanic would reduce my fun figuring out secrets.

Secondly, I like the idea of random loot, but it should be a start option, not something that's forced upon every game. I like how the game gradually peppers you with upgrades for different roles. For the first playthrough, fixed loot is a great idea. Random loot should be an option like ironman.

So lucky you would get to spend those pics in something else and keep eyeballing the walls.

I liked it how in EoB 2 the characters would sometimes detect something like illusionary walls. It gives the characters some character.

[1varangian]

4. SPELLS
A lot more spells are needed to make casters fun. Walls, runes, teleport to runes, stuns, confusion, holds, levitate into pits, summons, illusions, mind control, disintegrate, petrify, buff, breathe under water... and less forced skill combinations like Fire/Air or Ice/Air are now. Elemental combos should be reserved for something special and spectacular instead of basics like Fireball. (This should've been nr. 1 on the list.)

Actually I would rather the opposite. Specializing in an element should only give you basic magics. Anything more interesting than "fireburst" or "lightning bolt" should require a combination of things. Great mages and wizards would therefore require a lot of skillpoints (and thus levels) to have access to a large amount of spells, which seems fitting.

A system that forces all Fire mages heavily into Air is flawed. And only Air mages being able to cast projectiles is silly.

All ranged spells don't have to be projectiles though.

And if Grimrock only has elemental mages the elements could have a psychic side associated with them so the spells could be a bit more varied and interesting. Such as:

Fire = strength, chaos, rage
Air = dexterity, intellect, illusion, confusion
Ice = willpower, law, control
Earth = vitality, fortitude, nature, calm mind

[thufir]

4. SPELLS
A lot more spells are needed to make casters fun. Walls, runes, teleport to runes, stuns, confusion, holds, levitate into pits, summons, illusions, mind control, disintegrate, petrify, buff, breathe under water... and less forced skill combinations like Fire/Air or Ice/Air are now. Elemental combos should be reserved for something special and spectacular instead of basics like Fireball. (This should've been nr. 1 on the list.)

Actually I would rather the opposite. Specializing in an element should only give you basic magics. Anything more interesting than "fireburst" or "lightning bolt" should require a combination of things. Great mages and wizards would therefore require a lot of skillpoints (and thus levels) to have access to a large amount of spells, which seems fitting.

A system that forces all Fire mages heavily into Air is flawed. And only Air mages being able to cast projectiles is silly.

All ranged spells don't have to be projectiles though.

And if Grimrock only has elemental mages the elements could have a psychic side associated with them so the spells could be a bit more varied and interesting. Such as:

Fire = strength, chaos, rage
Air = dexterity, intellect, illusion, confusion
Ice = willpower, law, control
Earth = vitality, fortitude, nature, calm mind

Don't really agree with your first sentence there, nobody is "forced" to do anything. To be a well-rounded mage that can do many things, yes, you should have to have points across the board imo. But this is all opinion anyway, to each their own. =)

I do like those ideas about the elements being associated with various other qualities, that seems like a good start to an expanded magic system. But I also get how they didn't want to have *too* many special magics in Grimrock 2 because those things have a tendency to get out of control. I can imagine a "passwall" spell breaking a lot of puzzles, for example.

[Isaac]

I absolutely dislike the idea of the perception skill.

The whole point is figuring this out yourself. Your RL perception skill grows as you play the game.

While I agree... (and prefer puzzling it out myself), a perception skill would add a further aspect of roleplaying (one kind of it) for allowing deliberately astute characters to act accordingly; and point stuff out.

There is more than one way to do this... but in either case, it should be up to the designer to to set a threshold for spotting the secret; (And players would of course be free to not increase the perception skill high enough to have any effect).

The Wizardry series took things a step further, and allowed the PC to spot things that weren't there to be seen... meaning the player had no chance of noticing it anyway, but it was created on the fly when the PC noticed it. This alternative seems a little awkward and dodgy to me, but I can understand the logic behind it... though I'm not sure if I'd like it or not in a dungeon crawler... But I once suggested similar for FO3, that the traps not even appear in the game unless the PC makes a perception check; or triggers it.

IMO dungeon crawlers a completely different animal than franken-shooters like FO3, but [Lands of Lore: Throne of Chaos] one of the best dungeon crawlers I know of did have acquired PCs spot things like secret doors and ethereal walls. It worked well too.

[1varangian]

Putting points in perception could of course generate extra food and ingredients on the fly. I like it.