Tools and Blackjack: Yay or Nay

[Destined]

Hi guys,

 

in my WIP, I want the protagonist to be an exiled pagan hunter and let the difficulty levels reflect the moral standards he holds himself to. Easy and Hard are pretty much set: On easy difficutly everything is permitted (the hunter has fallen all the way and does not care anymore) and on hard killing is forbidden, but anything else is permitted (after being exiled he became a thief, who does not want to kill). My problem now is the expert difficulty. In this he tried to stay a hunter in the city (even though the outskirts of the city hold little game) and survives with honest work (not necessarily only hunting, but rat catching etc.; basically anything, that falls into the hunter's skill set). That is why he will not have lockpicks at his disposal, because he never learned how to use them, so this makes sense. But other tools are more problematic: Flashbombs are pretty much self-explanatory, so he should be able to use them (the same is true for mines, although lethal ones are not permitted). Still he might not know, where to get these tools, so I can also explain, why they are not usable. One of the biggest problems for me is the blackjack: My first thought was to omit it as well, since I believe it should take some practice to use it correctly. On the other hand, this would mean that I would force a ghosting playstyle on the player, which I am not sure I should do. It is the way I personally play, but, of course, I also want other people to enjoy the mission (preferably on all difficulty levels).

 

So, what are your thoughts? Should I exclude the blackjack and other tools (if so, which ones) on the highest difficulty and thus force a ghost playstyle for the expert difficulty (which makes more sense background wise) or should I include tools, that allow for more variety?

[Spooks]

Constraints breed creativity! If you have an alternate set of (gameplay) rules like that it should lead to interesting new design. If it's only an expert thing, sure, it would make for a nice challenge. You can definitely do a map without lockpicks too but as a thought you might as well not make locked doors/chests w/o a key frobable at all (for clarity). For other tools, holy water's probably a no-no for a pagan. One way you could offset the lack of a blackjack for those who still want to knock out people on Expert is putting some gas arrows but those might have to be an Expert only thing or else it'd upset the difficulty of the other settings.

[SeriousToni]

I agree on the holy water with Sppoks.

 

Also, if you want to take away the black jack on expert ONLY it would be fine imho, as long as you write this down somewhere in the mission info / download info, so that I know if I get annoyed on expert that I still can go back to hard and then use my BJ

[teh_saccade]

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Edited July 17, 2016 by teh_saccade

[STiFU]

I always hate it when missions restrict my play due to some meta game objectives. It completely kills immersion, when you fail a mission for an objective like that. To me, removing gameplay options is basically the same as turning a free-roaming level into a linear level. It simply sucks! ^^

[demagogue]

I usually like it best when a level starts with a restriction that's taken away later when you find the blackjack or whatever.

[Destined]

First of all, thanks for the input so far. I hope there will be more. And sorry, that this post is quite long and may be a bit confusing. The problem with wanting to answer multiple people at the same time (with sometimes overlapping answers).

 

You can definitely do a map without lockpicks too but as a thought you might as well not make locked doors/chests w/o a key frobable at all (for clarity). For other tools, holy water's probably a no-no for a pagan. One way you could offset the lack of a blackjack for those who still want to knock out people on Expert is putting some gas arrows but those might have to be an Expert only thing or else it'd upset the difficulty of the other settings.

I did not plan to deny access to rooms/chests by not giving lockpicks. Just make it more challenging by forcing the player to find keys or alternative routes. I did not think about the holy water so far (I am not a great undead fan myself), but you (and SeriousToni) are right, it would not fit too well with pagans. On the other hand: Who said that pagans do not have holy water? It might be blessed by another deity, but does that make it less harmful for the undead? I have to admit I forgot about the gas arrows, but I also have not finalised the available tools. I will definitely keep them in mind as "limited KOs".

 

If the game is about no alerts or knockouts else you fail, for me it becomes a quicksave / quickload til I get that bit right, and it really breaks up the mission, I forget what I was doing 10 mins ago (30s game time) and is frustrating to go over a bit again and again just to figure out the actions exactly as the guy laid them.

As optional objectives, it's nice to be able to carry on if something does happen - deal with the consequences of the mistake.

 

I'd much rather have the blackjack and choose not to use it to get an optional objective, than not have it and need to use it to get the main objective. It's another decision to weigh up in a pressured situation, so the extra thinking adds to my tension level.

Maybe it's an item in the shop, and it costs nearly all the money you have (10gp is it?) and you really want 3 water arrows.

Maybe you could leave it at the start, or make it hard to get or go back for, so it is a player decision to make use of it or not as they weigh up failing or winning even more than would have otherwise?

I want to avoid no alerts / no knockouts, because it is something that can be necessary (or at least happen quickly for the alarms). But for the knockouts, no blackjack will be available (at least on Expert, there are two other difficulties, that have it). For other tools, I will have to see, what I want. Problem here is: as a map author you never know, which tools the player bought or if tools are available in a certain situation. So you have to design each situation to be solvable without any tools in case the player has not bought them/already used them.

 

I always hate it when missions restrict my play due to some meta game objectives. It completely kills immersion, when you fail a mission for an objective like that. To me, removing gameplay options is basically the same as turning a free-roaming level into a linear level. It simply sucks! ^^

This thought about meta objectives has not occured to me yet (I qicksave and -load very frequently, so immersion always depends on how well I am doing, anyway). The main problem for me is, that in one level it is hard to let the player feel consequences to his behaviour. In campaigns you can increase the number of AIs or make it otherwise difficult, if an optional objective like "don't kill" is not met. That is why I wanted the conciousness of the player to be reflected by the difficulty. But maybe I will reconsider meta objectives for my missions.

 

 

If there are any movable objects on the map that are heavy enough, i will drop on someone's head.
Blackjacks are over-rated, but in missions where I am not allowed to use one - more often than not I find a way.

If the mission doesn't let me do knock-outs, I find a way to kill people (it's surprising the number of "no weapons" missions that leave in a pick-pocket arrow to headshot everyone on the level) since that often bypasses the knock-out rule.

I usually like it best when a level starts with a restriction that's taken away later when you find the blackjack or whatever.

The premise here is that the player does not know how to use a blackjack, but he can still use other means to KO AIs, so gas arrows and dropping objects would be a way to get around this restriction, that would still fit perfectly into the setting I have in mind.

Edited March 2, 2016 by Destined