Is the main quest in the beta unbalanced?

Yes!

Most “Let`s play” videos start this quest as a diplomat. Why?
Because this quest is designed for diplomats, and there is too much talking for a fighter.

You can every important person persuade, but you can´t them intimidate.

For example:
Adela… there are two different talking lines for persuade, but no option for intimidate.
Mirka… when meet her the first time no intimidation.
Morcock… you can lie (persuade), but not intimidate(first meet).

Next problem:
talking, talking,… and talking.

To finish this quest you must talk, no matter if you play a tight-lipped warrior or a talkative juggler. The amount of reading lines is nearly the same. The minimum is around 80% of the maximum. (The dialog of Reeky is a concrete example!)

How is intimidation implemented?
It´s implemented by a variation of a talking line… Why?
If I ask and get no answer, I will not talk again. I give him or her a punch in the face!!
After this I will ask again… Give me ALL infomation, now!
This will reduce talking, I´m sure.
(There is only Timmy, who is going into a fight.)

If you play this quest, you will upgrade your Speech level for 2 points, no matter if you persuade or intimidate.
But you will not get any upgrade for strength (when intimidate)…
All the fights are not enough, to rise your Strength level significant (or at least similar to speech).
There must be a progress.
I´m not willing to start this quest as a tight-lipped warrior and end like a storytelling grandma! :slight_smile:

By the way, everything is a little to plain. Where is the black humor? The twists? The only interessting variation (helping Morcock) is a “dead” end. (“Normally” no chance to kill Runt. Or doing quests for the bandits-to provide confidence)

And Yes, there should be also a “persuade”, bribe way.

If this is a RPG, give us the chance to play it like we want it! :smile:

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Maybe I could´t make it clear.

When following the beta quest only, you get a speech upgrade for about 2-4 points. But if you intimidate you get no upgrade for strength. With all fights you add 0.2 points to your strength. That´s not balanced!

When starting the game you have low stats. How do you rise your strength to 18, when you get no bonus for intimidation?
Only with arena fights? Or with Archery contest?
With this (bonus) system you will not be able to “make” a fighter just by following the main quests.

Intimidation is threatening. It makes no sense to improve your strength simply by threatening someone. Of course in the case of Timmy, threatening him initiates a fight, so your strength will improve there.

Yes, pretty much. Arena fights, or fighting in general.

Sorry that´s not correct. It makes sense, because of the game mechanic.

Persuade is based on the speech level. Using persuade(successful) upgrades your Speech.
Intimidation is based on Strength! Using intimidate MUST upgrade your Strength!!

All the abilitys you are using, improve. To be constant there must be also a progress.

You can test this game mechanic. Start als Diplomat and you can´t intimidate Reekys father.

At the moment the Strength upgrade for fighting is very small. How long does it take to upgrade for one Strength point?
The archery contest is the complete opposite. It´s much to easy to upgrade one Strength point(everytime you win).

Summing up: The Strength system is not balanced! :slight_smile:

Nope. Intimidate is “be big” and “carry weapon”.

When intimidation fails it can lead to “hit smaller person with big weapon”, but it isn’t needed.

This is true for animals as much as for people. In real life as much as in game.

You get big and well armed by doing things that increase your strength. Not by “throwing it around” and flexing your neck.

You do however potentially get better at looking tough.

Also of course it is easiest to get bigger when you are smallest… at squire level you start at “18” and can intimidate 4 armed bandits, which eliminates one channel of cooperation or conflict. It is hard to do enough to make yourself stronger.

If starting as a diplomat, you cannot intimidate 4 armed bandits, and trying leads to a fight. Your base strength is only 12 though, and it is much easier to see the progress to higher levels, though I find that bugs creep in and break the quest progression before I actually make a new level there - it has been close by mid quest sequence a few times though.

The higher strength allows you to equip better equipment and to stay mobile, and also gives longer running or fighting before you need to rest.

It seems quite reasonable to me (5’5", 120lb) that it should take considerably longer to significantly alter your strength and flexibility than it does to learn a new way of turning a phrase, or donning a fancy hat to impress a peasant.

Being a game mechanic doesn’t make any sense, no. I completely disagree. If anything, using intimidation improves your skill at intimidation, which isn’t only based on strength. It also takes into account your clothing, reputation, and level of blood splatter.

Using persuade is based on your speech skill and here’s the important part, it USES your speech skill.

Intimidation is indeed based, in part, on your strength. Using intimidation does not USE your strength. So no, it must NOT upgrade your strength.

Even killing every bandit and Cuman in the beta, and doing a few arena matches, you will get about one strength.

Agreed. It takes a long time, but maybe that’s the point. Perhaps we will be able to train with trainers or something. Sitting around for hours hitting things does seem like an inefficient and boring way of raising your strength.

Be careful though… it is easy to get trapped by the ‘prior focus’ element.

You have already improved and trained the things you are good at. It should be relatively hard to improve further in these areas. You should see more scope for improvement in the ‘off’ skills. Speech for the Squire, Strength and similar skills for the Diplomat.

The diplomat does improve stamina and strength faster than the squire, but is slower to improve his speech skill (if the squire uses those options that give him successes - dress to impress, intimidate, find out facts and catch people in lies…)

Notice how quickly you improve at skills that you start ‘at the beginning’ with… how long does it take to boost your level 0 herbalism skill?

Bear in mind that (judging by unburdened carry weight) I’d come in as a Str6-7 character at best, a ‘12’ is already “strong”, just not enough to wow everyone. ‘18’ with appropriate equipment has been adequate for all the skill checks I’ve attempted with it, except for not being arrested for murder… Guess it didn’t aid my defence much :wink:

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Apparently strength makes people take your chamber pot threat seriously, and their response is to lower your fine for lesser crimes by a few groschen. Seems like a strange reaction to me.

Good that we agree in this point. :smile:

You are right, it should. But I could not test or check this before. I think a high level of blood splatter increases your conspicuity. Next time I will try to check this.
.

You are right, It´s better to compare the XPerience points and not the level points of speech and strength. I will focus this next time.

Does anyone here remember Dungeon Master on the Amiga? This was an early '90s game. Yeah the graphics were crude, but it may have been the first open world (or as open as you can be in a dungeon) 3d game. I spent a lot of time in that game. It featured a party of 4 adventurers that you selected at the start.

One of the things I liked about it was that each adventurer could, with practice become skilled in almost any area. Even Halk the Barbarian could, with a huge amount of practice, pick up magic skills. Wulf the Bika (who looked a lot like a Jack Russell terrier) who was strong in the magic department but hopelessly weak, could become relatively formidable at fighting (sort of like the 98lb weakling after the Charles Atlas course…).

Anyway I see some of the same in KCD. A diplomat can become a relatively ferocious fighter and a squire can grossly improve their speech.

These seem good to me.

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Yes maybe the quest is unbalanced.
But I don’t think the player should get more strength from intimidation.

I see it this way,

persuade is like playing good cop and intimidation like playing bad cop.
So intimidation is more a form of aggressive communication.

Sure if you try to intimidating, maybe you would punch the other person.
But this persons should also have options. maybe he fights back or just run.

For example Reeky. You try to intimidating him, but it doesn’t work right.
What would Reeky think in real life? There is someone who wants some information and at first he had said he don’t want to kill me. He works for the guardian of the law and tries to interrogate me in a brutal way. He did not promise me impunity, so why should I talk to him, if I will hang in a few days?
He is stronger and better equipped, so I would probably lose a fight. But I have only to fight for a chance to escape. I know the woods very well and have a good chance for escape. So why being a nice guy and let him beat be?

If Reeky fights, the player has to win this fight in a way that Reeky is still able to talk.
Reeky hasn’t to win the fight, he also wins if he is able to escape and his situation doesn’t change much if ge gives up at once or after he was forced to do so after a lost fight.

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