http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1233173-no-attributes/

Disclaimer: This thread is not a thread to complain, nor a thread to fight about classes and attributes. This is more of a civil discussion and is semi continuing off of another thread. Kind of sort of.

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So, I have noticed that people have explained that some people have liked attributes and numbers to be a power player. I might be getting that wrong. However, has there anyone just been like me? I'm crazy super OCD in real life. I have everything ready and prepared. As stated before I have my suitcase filled with scrap paper and extra pens just in case. I have a ruler, despite no longer going to school, but you never know when you'll need a portable ruler. Nothing in my life, in my real life is a spontanous action. I do not like spotanous, frivilous events that occur willy nilly.

The point I am trying to make is that in RPGs I was never a power player when it came to attributes and class. It was just another many of my organization tricks. In Oblivion, I made a lot of my classes. But I always liked attributes, skills and classes in game because it helped me track down what I was doing. I'm the type of person who already knows what I am playing as. I know in Skyrim I will have a mage and someone who combines stealth and magic. I'll probably write down on a piece of paper for each character the skills I am focusing on in a more specific order.

For me, this whole do whatever play however you like with no skills, no classes, no attributes. Not only is it somewhat new territory for me, but it feels like spontanous play. And I have never been the type to spontanously do something. It's one of the reasons I enjoyed and disliked Two Worlds 2. There wasn an argument a long time ago I heard on these forums, about how in Oblivion it was hard to be a pure mage and that somewhere along the line they needed a sword and had to use blade. All though this is a statement I greatly disagree with, spontanous play that Skyrim has promoted gives me the worry or fear it will be harder to play a pure class.

Now I know that there are perks and in some ways those are attributes. But they are a little harder to follow, if that makes sense. I loved Fallout 3 don't get me wrong. See in a game like that I see no need of a class system. But in midieval and fantasy settings I always prefered a class system. And even in Fallout 3 I had to write down where I was focusing my target skills because I do not like spontanous play. The problem I have with big wide worlds without that chart and table, is that I feel lost. "Here is a sword, go kill something" [not what Skyrim will be it's just an example]

My response most likely would be, "Um okay...but I wanted to be a mage...um.."

Game, "Well no problem, go find a tome..."

Me, "Okay, so I have basic skills for magic right? To...well ya know...don't want the sword.."

Game, "Nope, you must find the magic before you use it..." [for this example we'll pretend this is the way the game is]

Me, "um...but...I...wanted...to be...a magic user..."

Game, "It's an open world no class system...more freedom...no more funky classes and attributes..."

Me, "All right....I guess I'll take the sword...."

I already feel limited. It's weird how some people feel limited with class systems and charts. And yet I feel limited when given a spontanous world of play. Probably the worse game to use an example and a game I couldn't play because I was so lost was Grand Theft Auto. No classes, no attributes, open world, spontanous do whatever you like, etc. They gave me a gun and said follow the story or do whatever you like. And I'm like...all right then.

I suppose I should wrap this up and I hope I actually made any sense.

Are there any organizational players out there whom feel a little lost when given a little more freedom?

What are your views on classes and attributes as organization?

As well as more of an open view of your summed up thoughts on any other topics that concern you that relate to attributes and classes.

I don't feel lost at all. More freedom is exactly what I wanted. Couldn't be happier Beth obliged.

I think it's the different roleplaying approaches. Some want to experience the same things their character did, and see that reflected in the character's abilities.

I want my character to have a background I imagined myself. I want no kid who just climbed out from under that rock. I want a character who made decisions faced the consequences and has the scars to prove it. This, my character's background is the base for all of his / her decisions in the game. If my character hates Dunmer, it's because she had a run-in with several dunmer in the past. If my character hates thieves, it's because he was brought up to be a decent member of society. If another character is a thief, she has her reasons too, whether poverty or the boredom of a pampered life is up to me to decide. This is my contribution to the game, together, Bethesda and I are telling the story, this is roleplaying - interactive storytelling.

So when my character is supposed to be a mage and first has to learn the basics of the trade, that's just detrimental to my experience. I don't want to start as Elminster, but if my character has spent most of his previous life studying magic, he should be better at it than that street urchin, who had to learn to steal bread to survive.

This does not have much to do with attributes really...

Heck, Fallout (even the first two) had this, you could pick energy weapons as your tag skill, but you wouldn't find one until later in the game...


But yeah, this is something that's easily fixed. Make you start out with a spell. Give you some money and have a cheap spellshop in the Riverwood, so you can buy some starting spells in other schools.

Classes to me equaled basically, Job.

Class was another word for Job. And now my character is a blank slate who's never had a job before?

@Bukee: Buy spells at Riverwood. And what in the tutorial? Run it?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Choice_overload

Point is, people usually need some guidelines, some orientation. Even though there are no classes in Skyrim, I have a very definite idea of what my character would be - as do most other people when you read some of the "what character are you going to play?" threads.
However, I don't feel Skyrim offers more choices than previous games, on the contrary. So I'm not really suffering from choice overload.

You have the starting spell for that...

Maybe even spelltomes on the ground.

Let's hope. Or else I'll look ridiculous running like a coward.

Use a weapon like any sane person would do when in danger? Or run like a coward like any real life sane person would do...

The problem with the current build is that X27 and "Everything Beth has ever done is perfection" Dragonborn1 could have both been very happy.

There was no need to gut attributes and move some of their effects into the skill trees. The better design would be skill trees attached to attributes (with skill strains within those trees). The basic function of attributes could have remained and you would have a better designed and more compact set of perk trees.

This way there would be no need to eliminate skills to fit the perk tree constellation design. It would actually make adding skills very easy. It would even allow for the gimmicky activities of chopping wood, cooking, etc to be skills that have some level of benefit to the character when done. The design would actually make sense, constellations devoted to the base human characteristics of Strength, Intelligence, etc actually make sense as opposed to heavenly constellations named for stupid things like sticking your hands in peoples pockets or holding things in two hands...

The only freedom the current design allows for is more superficial choices in plus ups from the perkolator. These are things an attributes system could have done better and more realistically.

I am still creating classes by myself, I don't need the game to do that for me. :shrug:

The only freedom I see is in the mind, which has ALWAYS been the case, and Im pretty sure we aren't at the point where if you think of a red ballon appearing in the game with no additional input that a red ballon will appear in the game. some of us Like the option of tailoring our character as per game rules, not thinking about it a having an immurshun slap that the "I think therefore I am" doesnt do much in gameplay.

in essense there is no point to wonder about classes or some such because as the game is concerned it doesn't matter.

which brings me to the point.

If you're happy with Imagination, why do you care whether or not its in? do you see the irony? one cares only about what they think about their character, so HOW exactly are classes and attributes restrictive

How would attributes suddenly fix that?

"eliminate skills to fit the perk tree constellation design."? What?


But still, attributes have nothing to do with the problem at hand. You might be more intelligent but that will hardly matter when there's no spell to cast...

Exactly. Less restrictive this way by far.

It is not about being a power player. I consider it more about dynamics of the character itself. I like it better that attributes represent the physical body's capacities and the skills represent technical abilities. To merge the two into one, will ultimately degrade the variation in character types: such as... Strong but slow swordsman with magic, quick but weak swordsman with magic, strong and quick swordsman with no magic, intelligent mage with weak willpower but has awesome diplomacy, pure mage with no other skills...

I could go on and on and on....


The attribute system was also more intuitive, and gave a realistic sense of steady progression. From what I hear about the perks, you will get the same progression, but all at once in some big lump that needs to be unlocked tediously. This seems overwhelming clunky to be honest; it could have been smoothed and complimented with attributes.

My belief is that they could have kept the attribute system while improving it with the perk system. They should automatically distribute modified points to
governing attributes reflecting your skill choices. To do this, just add one point to any attribute adequately used and modified by multipliers accordingly. Make it hands off as well, so that the player really feels the consequnces and rewards of using certain groups of skills.