I like how different types of enemies have different strengths and weaknesses in these games. You can get a real edge by preparing right and bringing the optimal potions, weapons and spells for the dungeon you're raiding. And it feels good when the prep helps you win a fight that should have been too hard.

So far you either find out on the internet or find out when you get there what you'll be facing in an area or dungeon (and it's not practical to prepare for everything all the time). It seems a shame that there isnt any way to find out in game. Asking certain locals about locations on your map, and some knowledgable people responding with "It's overrun by goblins", "I've seen necromancers lurking in tho parts" or something. Who these people are (and who potential trainers are incidentally), maybe that's the kind of gossip innkeepers should be giving via a "locals" topic

Even just some explorers' journals in each town where you can get this kind of info would making planning for the raids more involving. As long as there's some way to deduce where they are, instead of relying on randomly coming across the info as with most books.

TLDR facilitate planning, innkeepers are a natural source for knowledge about notable locals via a topic

Does it make sense?

Sounds awesome. And it could make an 'if you die, reset' challenge a more accomplishable challenge

Books in stores should contain this information. Asking NPC merchants in books stores of it would lead to them finding the book you required. Asking about different creatures from soldiers, mages and thieves would bring up their knowledge about the creatures, sometimes inaccurate sometimes right on the stop or something in between. The overall weaknesses creatures have should be bigger, meaning that there is always a creature weak to something, meaning everything would matter in the game.
Weaknesses and resistance to all these, and more, should be included:
Fire, Ice, Shock, Poison, specific spell effects such as disple, paralyzis, soul trap etc. Slashing attack, crushing attacks, sneak attacks, thrusting attacks, piercing attacks, falling damage, normal damage, unnormal damage, high damage attacks, low damage attacks. really everything that can be used in an offensive way. Learning the exact magnitude of creature weaknesses and immunities should however be impossible, unless immunity is up to 100%. Information in the game could contain pictures, behavior, reaction, tacitics, movement, weaknesses and resistances. Trained soldiers could tell you that wolves attack in packs and usually won't attack unless you get too close to their hunting grounds. Wolves also seem ot have slight resistance to poison. Bears can attack alone, but usually only do it if you get too close or enter an area they protect. Their thick skin seem to protect them from immediate harm done with slashing attacks. Shock damages also seems to be just a little bit less effective against them. Their thick skin however grands resistance agains frost and poison. Best to use piercing attack on their thick skin.

Etc.

This could be truly interesting if implemented as asking innkeepers, adventurers and scouts about threats in the area you're going to.

Or it could end up implemented (if implemented at all) as color-coding the magic radar waypoints on the magic GPS map. :confused:

Bah, I just bring one of each kind of weapon and use restoration magic

? Say what? You mean like knowing exactly what creature is up against you behind a corner before seeing it, knowing the weakness of it by the color of the marker? Gaaaaah. That'd would horrible. Just horrible. How can you even think of such a thing?

I don′t mind not knowing what to expect and I′d be even bothered if I always got to know what was around the corner, so I say not to too much information about places, a hint about a place from now and then like the mentions of "Swamp gas" in Oblivion is okay but keep such hints very rare.

When it comes to knowledge about enemy weaknesses I′d like to only learn them from people who fight those creatures and from books written by scholars on the subject. You everyday farmer should not know how to bring down a lich or an ogre, a ogre hunter would know about ogres however. But same here, keep them rare, if we had monster hunters everywhere there would be no need for people like the PC to do all the chores, but in books I don′t mind there being plenty of info, just if it′s not all in the same place, a book about Atronachs and a book about Goblins perhaps, but not a book on "Creatures" or anything like that.

Edit: And such books should not even have the name of the creatures, like there could be a book about a vampire hunter cult called "The common adventures of Daedric worshipers and goodly servants of The Nine", the book could be about followers of Azura and Arkay joining forces to go on Vampire hunts that they perhaps believed they could not overcome if they went by themselves instead of joining up. And in that book could be a mention of how they "Prepared themselves with fire" before going to hunt down the vampires.

Easily: Experience with how Bethesda does things these days. Given the choice between adding piles of NPC conversation talking about various dungeons in the region and making the map marker for that dungeon's location color-coded based on the enemies within (Say, red for mostly Daedric foes, orange for lich-level undead, yellow for skeleton-level undead, and so on), which is more likely? Bear in mind the "Compass Radar" that shows you everything within a certain radius of your location and the Magic GPS Quest Pointer when assessing this, and... :shrug:

Yeah well that DID cross my mind... But I sure hope it's not like that

Sounds like Angband :thumbsup:

Bear in mind: less voice acted lines = more lilkely

edit: it's not much to add one line per dungeon type (undead, goblin, conjurer etc) per npc race i don't think, about 60 lines? no need to name the dungeon/area in the reply

Scouts and adventurers - nice idea

obviously i think this info shouldn't be forced on everyone, you should have to ask for it, but equally there should be a way to seek out the info when you need it rather than random book locations and random overheard conversations

Learning about one's enemies and their habitats from in-game lore seems okay. I don't think I would be very fond of color coded radar, however.

maybe as a service an adventurer/scout would add a little icon next to a location of your choice on the map: skull, goblin face, scamp face etc

Knowledge is power, power is pain, if you don't understand, there's no need to explain.

Don't get me wrong, I hope it's not like that too...but I'm trying not to get my hopes up about what we're likely to get, based on past experience. bliviongate:

I think the dialogue might be a stretch, because that would be a ton of extra (and redundant after a while) voice acting. I think bookstores and libraries should have useful books for information through out the game, not just fanciful stories and historical accounts. Heck, even the historical or fanciful books could have snippets of information that would be useful to a modern adventurer.

Actually, books in the game need to have a larger impact in general. Books could relate to quests or modern events with all manner of useful information.

It does. And I approve. And it sounds like Radiant Story is going to add that element, because quest givers sending you into a dungeon completely blind would just be stupid. It's only a matter of whether the devs will imploy that outside of quests.

I once made a post elsewhere along lines like this, about being able to find clues and information on possible dangers within the game world (as in a part of it, not UI elements or simple color-coding). This is what I had: