the reason I don't want perks to determine my weapon attacks isn't because I like numbers, but because its nonsensical and at the same time makes skills redundant. why should I make any effort to increase skills if they don't impact the value of their use. and even disregarding that, increasing weapon damage via perks every level up is clunky and lame, not to mention having to decide between picking perks to make my character improve in damage or having a nerfed svcky character because I wanted to play around with non weapon oriented perks.

Odd that I haven't seen those two arguments offered AT ALL, much less to the exclusion of all others.

Beyond that, I'm curious as to what it is that you believe your response adds to a discussion of the potential mechanics, advantages and disadvantages of substituting some number of perks for some number of effects formerly governed by attributes.

One would think that those in favor of the removal of attributes would be in here brainstorming over the specific ways in which perks might substitute for them and the effects that will have rather than just beating on an off-topic horse, yet again......


Well then you're in luck, because the specific focus of this thread is supposed to be how and to what extent perks will actually serve that function and the potential advantages and disadvantages of such a system, NOT whether or not their "removal" was a good idea.

Perks effecting weapons isn't nonsensical and it definitely doesn't make skills redundant or useless. Skills still give a big bonus to damage but perks add effects that add a big boost to damage as well. The fact of the matter, if you somehow got 2H weapon perks and have very low weapon skill in your 2H weapon your using, your probably going to get your ass handed to you, but you can play with a character that is good with 1H axes and have no perks for 1H axes and still play the game. Skills and perks resonate from each other. Perks need skills to function, but skills don't need perks to function, though perks give a nice chunk of power to your skills. Think of it as a kind've symbiosis.

Also, it's not nonsensical. I've given examples many times how it makes sense that someone after training a lot just gains a bonus. Say a guy has been training with maces a lot. Well during his long training, he discovers that if he hit someone in just the right way, he can transfer all the force of his mace directly into the target instead of into their armor (which is what armor does, it disperses energy along itself instead of the wearer). This is how someone can learn to ignore armor with a mace in an instant while training. See, it makes plenty of sense.



Actually, the two arguments he listed are usually the only two arguments for keeping attributes and only Terror of Death has even shown any initiative to think up a way to keep the old attributes in.

However, I think you haven't been reading the posts of us that think that removal of the old attributes were fine because most of us have shown how they could (and probably are) put in this game. In fact, I had a whole post about it earlier in this thread. Those of us saying that the old attributes are still in this game isn't speculation, it's a fact, a fact which Todd Howard said himself and we have given examples of how they can still be in this game with the same function.

Attributes, as a system, were removed. It is the effects of the attributes that were scattered about.

Attributes as a system still exists. The only thing that was removed was those 8 words. H/M/S are an attribute system, the attribute system is still in the game. You still choose attributes when you level and everything. There was no "removal of attributes"

I believe I heard that there are perks not related to leveling up. Quest related perks or guild related perks. Maybe both,

It is also possible to have an attribute system that are sequences of perks that are not linked to a specific skill. Again, that would not eliminate the attribute system that I fear they did, it would just change the style of the system itself.

I was very cautious in my wording. I didn't say "Damage", I said "DPS". Take Axes for example, and their Bleeding Effect, that's not actually increasing the Damage of the axe, that is however, increasing their DPS. The same goes for the Swords and their Critical hit chance.

Skills themselves serve as the vessel for experience. If you understand anything in game design, you'll know that Bethesda's current solution is actually really intuitive. It gives the player some hands-on time with certain playstyles, before throwing them to the mercy of character-breaking choices. While the Skills themselves may not play a whole lot of function in the statistical variances, compared to the perks, their tie-in with the "XP" bar is what makes them about as Redundant as a dedicated Graphics board.



Lame is an opinion, I think it's awesome, so we're at an impasse there. As for Clunky? I guess we'll just have to see in game, but it's no more clunky than class-selection, attribute raises, governing attribute system or spellcrafting.



Discussing the actual subject is kind of pointless, because we don't have enough to go on. I assume the concern is things like Movement Speed, Encumbrance, and um... Stagger-resistance? Stuff like that?

For speed in particular, if that's shoveled into perks, I do not see the issue. The "Have your cake and eat it too" argument, comes from someone saying that they want their unarmored character to automatically be faster? In Fallout 3, encumbrance didn't actually effect your movement speed, but your equipment burden did. If you were wearing Heavy-Armor, you ran slower than Light/No Armor, but the actual encumbrance score didn't play into that. I'd imagine this is the track they're going with.

Encumbrance itself is the only thing I'm genuinely curious about. I'm actually starting to really consider the possibility of an "Equip grid" based inventory...

While I do not enjoy responding to rote repetition of already discredited talking points this issue is interesting enough to clear the cobwebs, imo.

Response: Attaching attribute effects to the health bars is not keeping attributes. qed. Please don't bother with another pointless repetition. It really does get tiresome.

Attributes won't be gone from the game, just hidden :ninja: . Strength, Agility, Endurance, Charisma, Intelligence, & Perception attributes will be quietly working unseen. They won't be increased by Health/Stamina/Magicka. Skill/Perk increases will simultaneously increase the attributes that previously governed the skills. H/S/M will in turn be increased automatically by the increased attributes. Is anyone getting this yet? Order of control has changed from attributes determining skill bonuses and H/S/M stats like in ES3:Morrowwind & ES4:Oblivion--- to Skills/Perks increasing attributes, attributes increasing H/S/M and other non-skill governed stats (poison/disease resist, strength based melee bonuses, critical chance, etc.)
I know in the G4TV interview Todd specifically said Health/Stamina/Magicka were "attributes", but the thing he seems to focus on & emphasize in the interview is the new Skill/Perk system & it's importance to the game. If there is an official post :deal: from Todd, not an interview that is unscripted word for word, that goes into details of the games' atts & stats management to support the Health/Stamina/Magicka as atts then I'll gladly accept that. However, until then I don't see a logical way that Health/Stamina/Magicka would determine attributes, it just doesn't make sense without a detailed explanation, maybe not even then in the terms already used. I'm looking at it as a small mistake that has gotten hung up on. :ahhh:

That was my big issue with it - the way the attributes & stat gains worked, you spent more time on metagaming your skills/stat bonuses/levels, than you did on actually playing the game.

So I'm looking forward to seeing how the new system works.


---------

On the main topic.... "I'm going to be forced to take stat gains as perks"

We don't know enough about the perk system to know that. And even then, that doesn't sound like anything they'd do. "Attribute Perks" seems like a dumb thing to do, if you're removing attributes.

(Especially given the interview quote, where the one developer explains how they viewed the attributes as doing very little besides "+damage" "+health" "+magika" "+fatigue". Given that they viewed the attributes as being that flat and boring, why do you assume that they'll then make perks that somehow do the same thing, which you'll then feel "forced" to waste perk choices on?)


edit: additionally - if you think a perk does something that's so important to you that you'll always take it..... why do you see it as a "waste" of a choice? If you're so hyped on "run fast", the chance to take a "run faster" perk would seem like a good thing. (Like, I'm obsessed with carrying lots of loot. So every single Fallout 3 character I have has Strong Back. That doesn't mean that I sit around feeling bitter that they're "forcing" me to waste a perk on Strong Back, when they could have just made Strength give more carrying capacity.... it means I really like the effect of that perk, and it's important enough to me to take each time. Where's the problem? :shrug:)

Attributes working behind the scenes would be great. But in the interview Todd specifically mentions direct increases to the life bars during level up and specifically that they are the "attributes." While it is entirely possible he was "mistaken" I am doubtful.



There is no logical way. Health bars are just that, health bars. They are not attributes. UESP now calls the health bars derived attributes which I think may be a recent change as a flip though my old MW and OB 360 manuals says they are health meters.

In OB they were derived from your attributes so they were derived attributes. Remove the base and the next layer up then becomes the new base. They are now your base attributes.

Really? Discredited? Let's see, we still have attributes in Skyrim so.....oops, the attributes system is still in the game. The effects of the attributes are still in the game also but this comes down to your side saying "Attribute system is removed" and it's not, in either capacity, whether it be you talking about the effects of the attributes or just being attributes.



Health bars are now the attributes. Besides, Strength, intelligence, willpower and so on really aren't attributes if you want to split hairs, they are more traits then attributes. Health, Magicka and fatigue (now stamina) were the attributes those traits affected.



There are several articles where he says H/M/S are attributes.

Reading and responding to these rediculous rote talking points is really dull. Again, to clear the cobwebs:

Response: Can I drive down to my local Perkomart and buy Strong Back? When I work out do I get stronger by getting a perk in the mail called Strong Back? Why should we accept that when developers can create a dynamic gaming system that more accurately depicts real life? Why should we accept the arbitrary fakery of "Strong Back" or, what..., "Slash Harder" ? ? ? BSG has a chance to make a gaming system that takes character development leaps and bound beyond what is out there. Why should we accept cartoonish "Strong Back" over something more?

Hmmmm....*reads posts*.......note to self: never put "attributes" in a discussion topic ever.....this isnt the way i expected this topic to go at all...most are still arguing wether or not perks are even attributes still....And to clear things up...this topic is about if bethesda would put down perks that give u more strength,intellegence,ect through a +10 perk or watever instead of say using ur sword more or reading books and junk...they've kept this whole thing about immersion and wat they dont need in game but they have 280 chances to break immersion if the perk isnt believable..if i kill 15 goblins but get a perk called strength..that be kinda dumb compared to goblin smasher...criticles on goblins...i feel as though they want attributes in the background but having thrm in perks without them being put in there cleverly or immersively may put a hamper on the experience...i guess....

OT, According to the info we have received so far, there are no side perks just for attributes or so on, only for skills and weapon types. Supposedly each skill tree has 12-20 perks (I'm guess the non-combat skills have the 12 perks and the combat skills have the 20).

My gas gauge does not derive the carrying capacity of my gas tank. If I cut out the gas tank keeping the meter means nothing. It does not depict the rate at which the gas is burned. It does nothing to describe the engine in the car, nor the base values that describe the capabilities of the car. If I were making a car driving game I would not try to turn the gas gauge into that. I would try to simulate things like horsepower, drag coefficient, and all of those other attributes and values that go into differentiating the capabilities of one car over another. I would add in a tech tree for upgrades, etc.

OR, I could go the Mario Kart route and make a completely fake driving game that, while fun, only mirrors what is possible.

The Mario Kart equivalent to TES already exists. Why would they want to move backwards?

That's what the old attributes did. They didn't depict anything about your character, they were just random numbers that through a formula turned into the actual capabilities of the character, which was Health, Fatigue and Magicka.



Which is what Skyrim does through the new attributes and perks, which allow for much more differentiation between characters than past games. In past games, most melee characters would have put all their points in Strength, Willpower, Endurance and Agility. In Skyrim, one melee character may be more of a berserker type so they will choose health while another is a more agile melee character so they will want more stamina for drawn out fights. Then we go even further in-depth and choose perks for the berserker that perpetuates berserking and the agile swordsman might choose perks to increase his survivability or to gain more sustained damage.

1. it is nonsensical (its clearly your opinion that they are not) when some one is learning to dance they don't suddenly know how to tango its a gradual process of learning that improves your ability to use your skills. spontaneous knowlegde is nonesensical.

having perks determine every aspect of the game is annoying and gets in my way if its the only way for me to affect my characters strengths and improvements, I don't want to have to pick and choose between a fun perk and a perk that is necessary for me to have a good character.

third of all, any one who scrolls up will here more than two reasons why the condensation of attributes is not as optimal as the previous system (it obviously does not apply to you, but it does to me and other people and this arguement that we don't know what we do and do not enjoy is assinine, you can't tellme that a system is going to work for me even if I say other wise.)

The gas is your car only serves one purpose and is bound by earthly limitations to be nothing more than fuel. Health in a game however can represent whatever you want it to and It's not at all preposterous for one's health pool to represent more than just how much damage they can take such as over all strength.

Another case of not making a clear cut distinction between different aspects by using terminology that is too similar: attributes-derived attributes? Just boil it down to attributes and character stats (max health, stamina, magicka- stuff that is "derived" from the attributes), separate from total gameplay stats such as distance traveled on foot- I'd call them achievements but then I'd get sued by Microsoft or something....
No, I'm not going to look for the wiki definitions to these words to prove anything.
What I'm saying is that the terminology used thus far hasn't been as clear as it could be, need to use different words or things get all confused and screwy, hence this thread continuing to flog the dead horse.
The facts are we have not "seen" any hard evidence of this system, wild speculation based on a TV interview quote is just that, wild speculation. I doubt Todd was reading off a TES official teleprompter... he's the game dev director, not a professional speech writer. Not that there's anything horribly wrong with his interview, I just think some of us fixated on that one sentence and ignored the emphasis on the new Skill/Perk system. Keywords there being "new" & "emphasis", which is why I'm pretty sure the new Skill/Perk system is the foundation for where the attributes are derived from. If anyone can (intelligently) explain how your health, stamina, or magicka would determine your carrying capacity, melee/magic damage bonuses, etc. please do so.
Let me shoot these explanations down first
1) I have lots of Health so I strong=FAIL
2) I have lots of Stamina so I stand around with heavy stuff forever=FAIL
3) I have lots of Magicka so I make spells hit harder=FAIL
Are we done?

I just showed you how it's not nonsensical and you still say it is? Your comparing apples and oranges. The tango (or any other dance for that matter) is a specific sequence of motions to perform, figuring out how to hit somebody in just the right place to do maximum damage is not a sequence and would be discovered all of a sudden. It's a eureka moment and these eureka moments happen all the time in real life and is how most discovery has happened over the course of human history. Gun powder was a eureka moment when chinese alchemists tried to discover immortality.



Perks don't determine every aspect of the game and I have pointed this out many times. However, I'm not sure how it gets in your way, it gives your more control over your characters customization.



I scrolled back up and most of those reasons fall under those two reasons in some capacity. Also, I never said I know what you are supposed to enjoy, nor did anyone else. We are trying to show you the gross potential of the new system from information we have gotten and then we get fought every step of the way.

I am not sure how to respond....what you say here is complete fabrication. I am not sure why you would say this.... :confused:


Again, I am not really sure how to respond. You are not arguing against an attributes system here. All you are arguing for is the addition of some type of perk system for unlocking skills and abilities. Which is what perks should do. And that would be great.

I don't think we ever will be. it had already come to an impasse... what? four five threads ago. I am not going to change my mind, I know what I like and don't like, I don't like what the new system appears to be. maybe it won't be what I think it will be, but a moderate amount of doubt is not enough reason imo for me to shut my eyes and tell bgs to do what ever tickles their fancy and I'll like it no matter what. because I won't like it no matter what, if its bad its bad and I won't give benefit of the doubt because I think its important for critisizm to be heard.

Your just trying to downplay the intelligence of someone elses post to try to deflect the fact that my responses made perfect sense in comparison to your statements and you are just trying to shoot down any discussion that isn't in your favor. You used an anology to show that you want things that will differentiate between one character and the next and I pointed out that's exactly what perks do best on top of attributes and skills. I don't see how that didn't make sense in this discussion.



1.Well no one that I know of ever said health decided how strong you are. What decides how strong you are in Skyrim is the body type you pick when you make your character.
2. Lots of stamina would mean you can walk around with heavy stuff, that actually works out well.
3. No one ever said Magicka makes spells hit harder (in fact, no attribute ever made spells hit harder, new or old.)