... on the topic of possibilities and difficulty.

One side are the "I want a challenge"-camp. They want spells and effects to be curbed to ward against OP. Maybe they object to Levitation, because it makes the dungeons "non-linear". Likes level-scaling if it is done right, and so on and so forth.

The other side seems to be the "Lol, DEMIGOD"-camp. They like running around with an acrobatics-skill of 230, jumping from mountain-peak to mountain-peak while the stench of stacked enchantments makes Ascended Sleepers and Daedroths give them a wide berth. Maybe they want loads of unique artifacts and wizard-tower homes and flying dragon-mounts.

Now I am not implying that everyone falls in one of the two categories - most of us probably like a little bit of both.
But catering to both groups does pose a pretty harsh challenge to devs... If you put level-scaling in the game to allow demons that are challenging even to a 70-80+ game-hours character, then you risk throwing the suspension of disbelief out the window, because world-eating Balrog-Predator-Cyborgs seems to be E.v.e.r.y-where.

But, equally - if 80% of the battles your character gets into at some point are just "routine-slash-block-BOOMFINGEROFTHEMOUNTAIN-Iwinagain-hooray" then the challenge-seekers are disappointed.

Personally - I fall far enough into the latter camp that I want the Devs to include every possible spell, effect and weapon, no matter how exploitable, because at the end of the day I like going to hand-to-hand against Azhklan Trolls, knowing I have a fire-spell ready that would sear the eyebrows of Ysgramor himself. But that's just me - I guess I don't play for the adrenaline - at least not TES-games.

Do you agree ? and how do you play ?
Please discuss balance issues and make clever suggestions for how to keep everyone happy, if you have them.

Bethesda can do both, can't they? They can nix the enemies leveling up with you while still providing rare powerful spells and powerful enemies that you'll never be able to match in battle. Battles got tedious in Oblivion since most enemies could be easily dispatched by Dawnfang/Duskfang and the Escutcheon of Chorrol.

I'm on both sides. I would love to have some balance, but imbalance is fun every now and again.

Just make the imbalances harder to attain that how it was in Oblivion.

I would say the spectrum of gamers is infinite; none of us want exactly the same experience from these games. There are likely other major sub-categories in addition to those you defined, and that is one of the great challenges of making these games for any Dev shop - getting the difficulty right. Overall I think Bethesda has done well with the sliding scale of difficulty, though some crazy people like me want it even more difficult than the Very Hard modes, that's where modding comes in. In general I would say the games work for just about all of us, look at the mad following TES has generated.

basically, keep it a challenge.
and to the "lolz omg npc noobs" its simple... "activate god mode" plus other similar "cheats"

In Skyrim I'd actually like to have an option to be completely invincible, or perhaps some process to complete like getting 100% chameleon in Oblivion that would provide 100% invincibility. I don't know, but I just find everything the most fun when it's not trying to be challenging. Reality presents enough adrenaline to me so I don't care to have too much of it in games. I would fit towards the side of not desiring a challenge. To me, when I played Grand Theft Auto: Vice City using a Code Breaker which gave complete invincibility it was the most fun experience for me with that game. I liked the idea of being able to shoot endless amounts of cops without having to worry about dying. It was fun to just relax and see how you could inflict the most satisfying and fun deaths on cops. So, I think games should provide an invincibility option or way to get it in the game, at the least. It shouldn't just be restricted to having to buy a PC to get invincibility, I feel. So yeah, I'm on the side of infinite possibilities and options in games provided without modifications.

My Camp is this: I dont want Items to be level scaled like in Oblivion, Unless they level up with me if i happened to find a rare item at level 4.
But Monsters could be level scaled. I Dont want a Frost astronatch at my front door at level 4, They can be left like that aslong as theres difficulty slider.

I love the challenge, and the adrenaline of a hard fought combat, far away from my base, no potions or hammers left, loaded down with loot. I find most games too easy. At the same time, I love the depth, and want a good story, freedom, and a detailed world. I also like, once my character has faced the challenge, to be rewarded, and love having a high level character with 100 agility and acrobatics, and speed, and access to world shattering spells and magic items, and all that. There's a time and a place for everything in my character's career. I want it all, baby.

When I play Oblivion I have a simple rule I follow. I can use fast travel to go from major city to major city, but whenever I leave a city to go into the wilderness, I can't use fast travel again until I get back to a city. So I gear up for an expedition, then adventure to my destination, then I have to return. If fast travel is similar in Skyrim, I'll probably continue doing it this way. It limits me, but doesn't hamstring me.

Not a fan of the rampant level scaling in Oblivion, nor of the leveled loot. A weapons characteristics should be a constant. If it's powerful, it should be guarded by powerful foes, wicked traps, or be located far away from where I enter the game. The challenge should be equal to the reward.

You forgot Morrowind lovers vs. Oblivion lovers vs. Fallout newbies vs. Daggerfall lovers.

That said, I like the challenge at first. As I level, I regard that point when I achieve "demigod" status as a reward. In fact, I almost believe it's immoral to complete the main quest when you're NOT a demigod.

Personally I think they should just make a good game. Sure they might lose some of the "lol I has acrobatics 600 hehe" fans and not make AS much money but don't game devs get into this career because of a passion to make great games?


When making art you CANNOT appeal to everyone and make something epic at the same time. You just can't. It's better to make a game thats either Love/Hate then everyone thinking "Yeah its a good game". Some people never liked morrowind, some people hated it but I garentee the people who liked it LOVED it.

When companies start trying to appeal to everyone to make a buck thats when the games start to go down hill. (Not saying Bethesda has done this).

Meh, I'm a PC gamer, so for demigod fun I cheat. Throw in some kick ass mods with some hilarious spells, and tgm, some modded stats and I'm good to go.

But I also play non demigod as well. I usually go demigod when I feel like killing as many people as I can or toying with them.

Well I`m in both camps then. I like a hard challenge in my RPG`s (any one, not just TES) and tend to walk/run every where instead of using fast travel, play on hardest difficulty etc, but I also enjoy my character becoming more powerful and the ultimate enjoyment (for me) is when the character becomes almost demi-god like at the end of it. I love collecting artifacts and armor/weapons etc.

I prefer to have less level scaling as I love the thought that there are "no go areas" until you are well powerful.

FO3:NV just sprang to mind, when I made the mistake of trying to take out the deathclaws at that settlement. I got a shock when they tore me apart..

The road to becoming a demi-god can be very rewarding if it`s a long road with many hardships, it`s if you get it handed on a plate, then it ruins the game.

I like it to be challenging at the beginning. Demigod status should come much later, after I have earned it by mastering my key skills and finding powerful artifact. I really have no problem with being "overpowered", so long as a feel that I have earned it. That's the fun of RPGs, in my opinion, to go from being a weak little peon to a superpower over the course of the game.

When I saw the topic title, I was afraid it was going to be about a certain other matter that seems to have divided Elder Scrolls fans, but fortunately, it's not what I feared it might be.

As for which camp I fall into, I like to have some challenge in games. I want to have to work to succeed, and I want the obstacles I face in the game to pose a real threat, but reward is also important. I want to be rewarded for overcoming challenges, and allowing the player to gain significant amounts of power is an effective way to reward players, but getting the best rewards should not be easy, I want to earn power, not have it handed to me. Though I would like if SOME enemies, not all, but some, can still be challenging even for high level character's, because in Morrowind I'd often find myself not wanting to play a specific character anymore once I got to the point where I could one hit kill most enemies, because the game just started to get too easy. For me, the best part of any character's lifetime in Morrowind is often when I get to the point that I'm strong enough to be able to actually start exploring, but still not strong enough to be able to go anywhere safely. Because then, I have a bit more freedom to explore, but still get that feeling that I'm not sure if I can handle what I'll face next or not.

And the reason I WANT levitation back is because it makes dungeons, and the world in general, really, non-linear, it allows players more ways to approach things and allowed Bethesda to hide things in out of the way places that could not be reached simply by walking, I liked being able to find some nice loot hidden in an out of the way corner of a cave that I might never have found had I not poked around with levitation, and that's something I never got in Oblivion.

Balance is often a question of cost, and the problem is the casual players desire for "no cost", and some game mechanics involving no cost or reason to use. I want all the mechanics to be desired (like, there are beds around but no reason to use them, food but no reason to eat) and have a consequence (like, think twice before casting a spell, think twice before attacking). They cannot game something that suits everybody, it's just impossible. But they can have several difficulty options that let's us tweak our own gaming experience. If a GM gave us a new battle for every 100 meters we moved, it would get tedious and we'd complain and he'd adjust the game to suit. At the same time, in the beginning of a characters life, you might want to focus on the battles to buff those stats and focus less on nature survival.

If I gave the game to my dad, he would be happy about the exploring and possibly the need to fight against the elements of nature, since these are things that interests him and can be done at his own speed. Fighting requires a bit of coordination old guys don't possess, but setting a single slider now makes everything too easy for him. So let's get as much "fun stuff" into the game, tedious or not, and let us choose how much we want to be bothered with it. I.e. trying to do main quest without fast travel isn't tedious for me because of the travels, but because I have to fight every 100 meters along the way I just cleared a few days ago. So I want the uber hard fights I get from maximum difficulty, but there is no way in hell I can endure it every 100 meters. Having a few sliders adjust such aspects of the game would allow me to create my own game.

I could care less if others wants to cheat themselves out of an experience, just don't cheat me out of mine.

That statement right there told me exactly what camp your in. Tell me, how does that work exactly? How does levitation make a dungeon non-linear?

True!
Since level scaling is simply a matter of simple formulae of presenting lvl of ennemies, this should be handled to the player so he can adjust the game to his liking.

Bring a variety of sliders to adjust lvl scaling in the area it should be presented with hand placed in some locations.

Slider could be well documented in the following order
Overall difficulty presented by the lvl scaling (i m a coward wimp / please dont spank me much(just a bit, i like a slap) / as intended / Send more cops !!/ I don t have time to bleed)
Bracket level of ennemy lvl when scaled. being adjustable separatedle the below lvl and the above lvl.
Lvl of randomness of the ennemies presented.

This shouldn t be much complicated to do.

you got the camps wrong mate...



on one side, you have these idiots that want to whack things, make vampires attractive people with glitter, get rid of spiders and so on, in the other camp you have the lore gods who want skrim to be perfect

I definately fall within the second camp - TES isn't an mmorpg where you need to be absolutely certain every other player has the same chances by watering down, well, everything. I know a friend of mine who actually refuses to play Oblivion just because it doesn't have Levitate - I think it's pretty much the same for many other TES players, though to a different degree. The only inconsistencies that ever apall me is how the game sometimes favors one type of approach and not another (I'm talking about Oblivion, where everything is stacked up such that you have no reason not to be a warrior).

You don't explore in the pattern the devs intended you to. You get to the hidden loot before dispatching every last enemy.
Personally I never liked dungeon linearity. After you've explored a certain number of dungeons the others get mundane.

I think the whole thing has to do with causal gamers vs rpgers . I am rpger and i want the game to be a true rpg, a causal guy will want a challenge at level 80 so he is okay with level scaling, mini games , voice acting , fedex quests , less skills etc etc , there is nothing bad in either side .
Of course as a true dedicated rpger i will call most of the TES installations dumped down pieces of [censored] and i will be right because they fail to cover my hardcoe needs ; on the other hand a casual gamer will call latest TES games best games ever because there are very few free roam , SP games in the market.

I guess I'm somewhere in the middle.

I want my game to be challenging. I want to have at least a few (preferably rare and hard to find, actually) areas or enemies that are still difficult to take down even when I'm god-like. And I want becoming god-like to be a real achievement, something that requires epic play time and investment. BUT, that said, once I AM god-like, with the exception of the few aforementioned areas or enemies that are still challenging, I do want to be able to leap around the world like the Incredible Hulk, fly, and just generally tear ass through everything like a hot dagger through scrib jelly.

So for me there needs to be a balance, which none of the games has quite struck to my full satisfaction yet (not that that ruined the experience or anything; this is just my personal ideal scenario. Not required for the game to be amazing to me.)

I like a bit of both. I like to have everything as a challenge at the beggining and mid sections of the game, but at the end I like becoming a super powerful god. However, I don't really care that much. Just as long as there's challenge.



Yes, why don't you skip right to finger pointing and bickering instead of actually participating in the discussion? That makes perfect sense to me.

Well, say there is an overhead bridge, and vertical walls. Perhaps I can get up on that bridge and walk straight into the main treasure-chamber and steal the "Boots of Winning errything forever" which I want. I can also get there by following the dungeons layout, but then I'd have to actually fight the T800 and his Dremora buddies, and since I am lvl. 3 I don't want that. So you could argue that having levitation "breaks" the dungeon by making it non-linear, potentially giving you access to places that should be too hard for you.


You are a gentleman and a sage.

TES games and fallout are always best when low on supplies, lost, struggling to find shelter and somewhere to restock.

once you become a demigod, with tonnes of ammo/weapons and 100'000 gold the game gets boring.

my character in new vegas was recently stuck in the black mountains at night, surrounded by supermutants, I couldnt wait, had no aid whatsoever, a varmint rifle with a few rounds and only my sneak skill to save me. Totally epic and awesome. You dont get this edge of life and death feeling when you're a demigod.