I have morality system fatigue.
Not RPG.
>>3842076It's a life lesson. Sometimes you have to do unpleasant things, sometimes you have to be ruthless.Sometimes you have to smash the puppy. It's a doggy dog world.
>>3842076Pic unrelated? A game with a morality system would give you the option to not kill the dog (changes nothing) or kill the dog (changes nothing).
>>3842084>You have to kill the puppy because my bad game design won't let you do anything else You always were a shitter, Steve
>>3842076Why don't you provide some examples of games with the sorts of systems that have got gotten you fatigued?
I don't like video game morality systems since they always try to bribe the player into doing "good" thingsimo it should work likedo evil thing: get in-game benefitsdo good thing: get nothing other than the warm feeling in your heart
>muh good muh evil blah blah blah i hate alignments blah blah blah evil path sucksah sweet, a midwit thread!
>morality systemFuck this game>faction reputation systemCount me in
>>3842084No, the life lesson is to say no to authorities who think you have to do what they say (stop playing the game).
>>3842184But you already paid for the game (taxes).
>>3842076Fatigue? Just say you hate it.
>>3842076I don't. When was the last time you even saw one anywhere? Even feminists 10 years ago fought against it, nevermind now, they all hate the universal nature of it.
>>3842117>faction reputation systemhate that shit, from new vegas to kenshi, it's always lame and turns choices into a math formula.
>>3842200Every aspect of a video game is simply a resource for you to use to win. Survival/crafting/morality/gold/hp/mana/items/spells/guns/reputation/guildmates/time. Math is the basis for everything.
>>3842076So stop playing games with "morality systems". Are you fucking retarded?
i have rpg fatigue
>>3842200Not quite sure what you mean by that. I'm not a fan of metagaming, so I don't treat reputation systems as something I need to extract maximum mathematical value from. They simply reflect the station of my character in the world, which I think is a great fit for RPG's.Morality systems on the other hand should not exist at all. They're an attempt to cover for shit writing, unable to make the player truly feel their actions have consequences without arbitrary good/evil bars.
>>3842100spec ops the line. that one went through a weird cycle. rightly called out like this when it was released then some time later every time people talked about it they'd call it genius. with that said, yeah, honestly dont know if this specific thing happens often enough to be called a trend, cant think of any other examples
>>3842224You aren't naming any particular games because you've got nothing. Did you play the Pathfinder games or something? Shit like Kotor and Jade Empire is definitely older than you are.
>>3842206The ultimate, perfected videogame is the Visual Novel.
>>3842200>turns choices into a math formulabut this is what rpgs should follow
>>3842225>some time later every time people talked about it they'd call it geniusLearn to recognize bait.
>>3842078what
>>3842225I loved spec ops the line and thought it was great, though I didn’t play it until it was ported to pc years after release.>t. read the book
>>3842346OP's image isn't anything to do with RPGs.
>>3842224>They simply reflect the station of my character in the world, which I think is a great fit for RPG's.but they don't, they simply tally good/bad boy points and cover for shit quest design.>Morality systems on the other hand should not exist at all. They're an attempt to cover for shit writingmorality systems simply reflect the status of your character's soul, it's a great fit for RPGs
>>3842225Not an RPG and doesn't have a morality system.
>>3842076>I have morality system fatigue.I've had this for 15 years.>>3842078yeah well what can you do? tons of retards think an rpg requires a morality system
>>3842200>and turns choices into a math formulaYou could always try role-playing instead.
>>3842085>(changes nothing)Disagree. The change happens withing you.Never regretted your moral choices in a RPG? It's a sign you're playing a good game.
>>3842591>You could always try role-playing instead.Bold words for /vrpg/
>>3842591If paying attention to the mechanics is against "roleplay" in a genre that is about engaging with roleplaying mechancis, then why do you need a numerical reputation system at all?
>>3842355Spec Ops the Line is great if you don't try to self-insert. Just choose what you think the main character would choose at that moment and let the story play out.>>3842117My nigga
Is this a take from 10 years ago, what recent RPGs even have morality systems?
>>3842693it's a shitpost with a pic made about spec ops the line, lol. just another /v/tard thread.
>>3842102Good =/= selfless. Good acts can be selfless acts, but that does not mean they are necessarily bereft of additional benefit. Opportunism is not inherently wrong, and saying that good acts can never have positive consequences for the one carrying out the act is just faulty.
>>3842620Dude, just do what you think your character would do and don't worry about it so much. The devs made the game and handled all of the math and quest design. How about you just try the game as intended for once and play it through the lens of the character within the world?
>>3842102Why? In real life, cooperating with others usually gives a better outcome than fucking them over for no reason.
>>3842794>Dude, just ignore the game part of the game.Some people like games, anon, and want to engage with them. You can literally play pretend without any mechanics at all. Faction reputation takes you out of the roleplay by quantifying every action you take and can create situations where your character hates a faction, in roleplay, but mechanically is loved by them because you did certain quests in certain ways.Like, you keep thinking this is metagaming as a cope, but it's just playing the game.
>>3842855Another problem I have with it is that it reduces organizations to a hivemind. Which is gay.
>>3842076It's just another mechanic to brainwash/reprogram you.They force you to do things a certain way, or you won't be able to enjoy the game you bought.Just like r*ddit, you get locked out and shamed if you don't follow THEIR line of "thinking". And everyone always submits to evil, because most "humans" don't have souls.
>>3842233Why should I have to name games? Surely everyone in an rpg forum knows the games I'm talking about? And yes, Mass Effect and Jade empire are examples. Kotor kinda gets a pass because it fits the theme of SW universe, making it an exception. Doesn't mean the theme is good though.No idea what's up with the unnecessary personal insult. Have you been mistreated irl?>>3842359>simply tally good/bad boy pointsThey're don't though. It's common to lose reputation with one faction while simultaniously gaining it with another. That's the whole point, whether your actions are wrong/right, or good/bad depends on perspective. Factions points reflect that.>morality systems simply reflect the status of your character's soul, it's a great fit for RPGsPretending to be dumber than you actually are is not an argument, anon. Reducing moral decisions to good-/badboy-points undermines the fact that morality is mostly subjective. You know, the opposite of what factions points do?It also underestimates the ability of the players themselves to judge the morality of their own actions. Then again, reading your post, maybe it doesn't.
>>3842900>lose reputation with one faction while simultaniously gaining it with anotherWhich is dumb in those games that do so, because interests aren't universally connected even within an organization, much less across them. It creates less interesting choices, factional interplay, and inhibits nuanced roleplay.>You know, the opposite of what factions points do?Faction points turn organizations, comprised of individuals, and quests and encounters into scoreboards. They are just as artificial as morality scores or companion influence.You really shouldn't be so cocky, you're not that bright, just attached to a methodology.
>>3842901>Faction points turn organizations, comprised of individuals, and quests and encounters into scoreboardsIt's a matter of writing. I've played plenty of games where an organization generally has a positive view of my character but some individual members hate my guts. And vice versa. To me, that's a pretty decent reflection of how things actually work. As opposed to having a bar in my character screen telling me I'm a good/bad person.It would also seem an extremely difficult task to build a responsive gameworld, something usually viewed as very important in rpg's, with no reputation system at all.If you have a better system in mind, do tell.
>>3842914>It's a matter of writing. I've played plenty of games where an organization generally has a positive view of my character but some individual members hate my gutsCite examples? And what of the reverse? Where you work with an individual in an organization that hates you? Most faction based games lock you out of interactions or have you attacked on sight.It's okay, you grew up with New Vegas and imprinted on it. Just don't try to justify it as some vital system.>If you have a better system in mind, do tell.Brother, it isn't my place to design video games. I don't have any interest in anything but critique of hypocrisy. This is the response of a child.
>>3842921Really difficult not to sound cocky when talking to a person contradicting himself at every turn in some weird attempt to sound like an edgy teenager. You wish me to provide examples but act offended when I ask you to do the same.On the off chance someone with an actual interest in the subject will read this, I can mention Morrowind as an example. Doing quests for a faction improves your reputation with them, but each member also has their individual opinion of you, depicted by an admittedly clumsy bar. Gaining reputation with a certain faction makes the members of a rival faction dislike you generally, but you can influense them individually via bribes etc to keep getting their services. The execution could use some polishing, but the system itself makes perfect sense. And no good boy points.
>>3842934>Really difficult not to sound cockyIt really isn't.>I can mention Morrowind as an exampleIn Morrowind your faction rep's not that impactful because it's just one modifier among many you and you can easily bypass it on a personal level with magic. That's a better way of handling it, making it a non-issue mostly there for fluff, I agree, but few games do it that way.
>>3842831If being good is more rewarding than being evil, why would anyone be evil?
>be good boy>quest giver gives you the super duper elite weapon as a reward>reload save>be evil and kill him>the weapon is not on his person
>>38420761) This isn't an RPG problem since RPGs are characterized as giving you a choice.2) Games that do this often don't have a morality system.3) Morality systems stop being popular after the 7th gen.Morality systems or alignment systems are the last vestiges of roleplaying from P&P RPGs.
>>3842620>roleplaying mechanics
>>3842975Being and understanding cooperation requires an ethnic precursor to be in place to allow for multiple members of a population to even begin to comprehend that teamwork will allow for better outcomes than selfishness. Mutants within this population by definition will have this ethnic precursor switched off or warped in some way, and will fall back to basic selfish instinct. In other populations, they simply never evolved social systems and the prerequisite mental composure and impulses required, to realise the benefits on a large scale. Likely because their environment did not reward it.
>>3842076>Fallout 3>Get more bad karma bullying a teenaged girl in the prologue than you do nuking an entire townWhat did Todd mean by this?
>>3842076>morality system fatigueWhen is the last RPG released with a morality system? BG3 doesn't even have alignment.
>>3843186Removing alignment from DnD while the damn setting is still based on it is so stupid...
>>3843191>Removing alignment from DnD while the damn setting is still based on it is so stupid...Don't worry, they're working on that part too.
>>3843192>>3843191Anti-alignment fags are retarded and will still bitch about alignment because people didn't retroactively remove alignment from every RPG released. It is would be like complaining about how tedious it is to input passwords instead of saves.
>>3843199>Basically evil-elementals of the evil-plane in the good-evil duality cosmic system with the sole purpose of doing evil as the literal embodiement of the abstract allignment.>Snowflakes want to play their rainbow haired devil paladin pansexual in their soap opera theater groups they call pnp groups.>Yeah they are not evil anymore. DnD has to be the most shit system in existence.
>>3842243*Kinetic Novel
>>3842225Nice RPG, retard
Still the greatest to ever do it
>>3843241>>Basically evil-elementals of the evil-plane in the good-evil duality cosmic system with the sole purpose of doing evil as the literal embodiement of the abstract allignment.Wow can we go one day without more thinly-veiled anti-Semitism on this board? Mods??
>>3843059And somehow these "mutants" end up in the top echelons of society, while you're a random-ass nobody that doesn't matter. Evil is 100% more rewarding.
>>3842975If you don't think making things harder for yourself for no reason is an interesting challenge, why do you keep fantasizing about a game where you're actively punished for trying to do the right thing?Being a vampire in Morrowind is absolutely not worth it in mechanical terms, but it's an interesting experience. You're a true social pariah in a world where normal players use NPC services for everything. Equipment, repairs, training, fast travel, finding quests. By becoming an unholy parasitic monster you give up all that. In return you get some middling stat buffs. But you also get to experience the whole game in a new way.If you're asking why people would be evil in real life, the answer is that most of them really aren't.
>>3843241>good-elementals of the good-plane in the good-evil duality cosmic system with the sole purpose of doing good as the literal embodiment of the abstract alignment>in pre-DnD sources a third of them are evil
>>3842855I LOVE games for many reasons, and choosing to play the game in a genuine, joyful way without bogging myself down in the minute numbers game or needing to minmax everything feels much better. I freed myself from the compulsion to fret over every little mechanic and my enjoyment increased tenfold because I began playing the games the way they were meant to be played. It's not "ignoring the game part of the game," it's not obsessing over the systems to the point of throwing away the opportunity for a rich roleplay experience. You do not need to pay attention to the numbers because the numbers are just the numerical representation of the results of your choices. Trying to manipulate them is divorcing yourself from the larger roleplay experience so that you can seek out a specific outcome instead of just playing the game and getting the result that comes from your natural choices.>You can literally play pretend without any mechanics at allAnd you don't need to because the game is a designed experience with mechanics that are meant to respond to your attempts to roleplay. It's fun. >but mechanically is loved by them because you did certain quests in certain waysThat just sounds like in-world unintended consequences of actions you, the character, did not understand the implications of. This is not an inherent contradiction. "Playing the game" is engaging with the game gameplay as a vehicle for immersion and enjoying the game. You literally are metagaming by trying to force a result because you're obsessing over the numbers instead of just doing what feels correct.
>>3842900>morality is mostly subjective. You know, the opposite of what factions points doAnd being liked by a group of people is the result of your choices and subjective experience. Good boy points are "you did things these people like." Losing good boy points isn't punishment. It's the payout for your actions.
>>3843546You seem to think using your imagination to fill in the gaps of poor design elevates you as a player but I think it subsidizes bad design. Like, you're never going to grow or change, you'll make it good in your head because you feel good making it good. This isn't enlightenment, it's stasis.
>>3843645I pity you.
>>3843647Of course you do, it allows you to feel correct in your inability to relate.
>>3842200>eat x calories to not starve>earn y dollars to pay rent life is a math problem anon
>>3842076This reminds me how Elder Scrolls games turn you into schizo psycho, where you save the world, but if you half of the guild quests you become a murderer and a criminal. Real disconnect in there.I guess it doesn't matter, if you roleplay and avoid doing certain quests, but if it's canon that MC did all guild quests then that is bad.
>>3842200It doesn't, really. In New Vegas you just pic certain factions you align (or ignore or fight) and do their quests (or not).
>>3842357Yes it does. Stop touching grass and play games.
>>3843712>eat x calories to not starve>earn y dollars to pay rentDo you min-max your diet with a spreadsheet to optimize your energy cost in kilocalories per dollar, regardless of taste?
>>3843850Aw, you little guys are cute.Keep it up, you'll get there one day.
>>3842076What you mean is you have Bioware fatigue. Bioware is the only company that hard pushed the idea of good vs evil and CHOICES AND CONSEQUENCES when most other games you either had the correct option the devs expected you to take and railroaded you hard to it, and the contrarian option you took with little to no reward.
>help bandits ransack the town>500 gold>help town clear all bandit dens, monster infested mines and set up trade routes>town looks nicer (useless), shops sell more resources (useless) and there are npc guards patrolling the roads (useless)
>>3842102No, a good morality system should make others treat you by the reputation you'd get for your actions and choices.Do you always take the psycho choice? You have a perma bounty on your head and basically can't enter cities unless you're disguised because the moment you do everyone straps up assuming (rightfully) you're there to burn the place down. You won't have any companions except for total psychos like yourself, and they constantly fuck up your game play by acting like schizos too.Do you consistently betray people? The steadfast and trustworthy NPCs won't work with you, shop keepers won't give you loans, no one will make deals with you it will always be cash up front.Are you a kind hearted doormat who always tells quest givers you need no reward besides the feeling of a job well done? People will really like you but they will constantly try to get the best for themselves at your expense. Some shopkeepers will try to charge a little more, some quest givers will try to avoid giving you material rewards for quests, some people will try to exploit you by asking you to do unimportant things that they just don't want to be bothered with. And in an actually good morality game, if you get tired of this treatment and finally stand up for yourself and demand proper compensation or fair treatment won't give you negative karma or diminish your good standing.The problem with morality systems is either they're secondary to the core game play, like KOTOR 1 or Fallout 3, so they're hard binary systems that don't really affect anything so they could basically just be written out. Or they're central to the game, but the writer/devs are mouthbreathing mindbroken autismos who want to force their brainlet concept of morality on you by throwing in constant "gotcha!" moments from your choices, like basically any Avellone written game or The Witcher.
I've never seen a good morality system. Your choices are always either a saint or a particularly evil version of Pennywise. I remember years ago playing a neutral druid in BG2. You could never take the evil choice because that made you a fucking psychopath. If you were trying to have a neutral reputation you'd have to help the villagers rescuing their cat, and then to balance that out you'd kill and sell children into slavery.
>>3846175This has nothing to do with the morality system itself, but rather a poor implementation of D&D's morality system in game. Bioware never really made interesting choices in any of their games.
>>3846167A reputation system where you have to earn respect would good. Be a hero but not a doormat.
The fact is that there should be no points rewarded for alignment or reputation because that leaves you at the whims of the developer's interpretation of your character's actions and rationale, which is anti-roleplay. Similarly most NPC companions are awful in that they like you for agreeing with them rather than convincing them, which is anti-roleplay.
>>3846175In BG2, your party members would eventually leave if you got too good or too evil.Perhaps a better way to do that would be to have party members disagree with your approach on certain quests, and potentially try to sabotage you or even join the other side unless you could use your charisma and goodwill from their personal quests to get them to back you.Say you had a barbarian in the party, and you were trying to negotiate with someone even after they insulted and attacked you. He is going to insist on taking the violent route to satisfy honour. If you fail your charisma check, he should just step forward and punch the person, screwing up your negotiation.I can't think of any games that do this, off the top of my head. Your party are usually just simpering followers.
>>3846204Not exactly that but I liked how one time Sten in the first Dragon Age would complain about the PC doing too many side activities that don't directly contribute to fighting the darkspawn and you'd have to reassert your authority in a duel.
>>3842975>If being good is more rewarding than being evil, why would anyone be evil?Game theory. The optimal outcome from the group as a whole is for everyone to be altruistic and cooperate, however the optimal outcome for an individual is to be selfish, while being surrounded by an altruistic group for them to effectively parasitize. That is the incentive to be evil, and it is very strong. However, when there are too many selfish/“defectors” actors, the system crumbles under their weight and this produces the worst outcome of all. Civilization is predicated on these dynamics, and different groups evolved different strategies to deal with “defectors”. Much of this behavior is genetic and strongly ingrained in the individual. Kevin MacDonald discusses this in his trilogy of books, he refers to the theory of “altruistic punishment” as one such group strategy, where the optimal outcomes are produced by the group initially cooperating and assuming goodwill among all members, but then harshly punishing and exiling selfish individuals once they have demonstrated selfish/defector behavior.
>>3846224
>>3842188>Fatigue? Just say you hate it.You can be tired of something and yet not hate it on principle. Sometimes you just get tired of seeing it do so much and poorly.
>>3842076Good for you.
>>3842076This the Spec Ops The Line thread?
>>3842243Actually it's pen n paper, real life human pulling the strings instead of a computer.
>>3842243>Visual Novel
>>3846440Then it wouldn't be a videogame, would it.
>>3846224>Much of this behavior is genetic and strongly ingrained in the individual.opinion discarded at this point
>>3846272If OP is just tired of it they wouldnt make a thread mocking it with bad faith examples
>>3846544Rather OP would mock it because he's disgusted by what it became instead of what it could have been.
>>3846167PoE made an attempt of such a system, it was as muted and boring as rest of the game however.
>>3843199>>3843191>>3843241>Ravenloft will now be called Rainbowloft, the Demiplane of DEIMust we really do this every time
>>3846559The OP wants his morality system in RPGs to be as intriguing and non-existent as in Spec Ops: the Line but instead he gets shit like Mass Effect? OP should have clarified that, because everyone thinks his thread starter has no relation to the board it was posted on and his image has no relation to what he complains about.
>>3842102Nah, should be:>Do Evil thing>get immediate material benefit>Do good thing>get long term social benefit
>>3843424It's funny that this is how they unironically reacted to orcs>A war monger monster race>have poor speech ability>big, green and strong but dumb as bricks>everything in their society revolves around glorifying violence>"OMG how has no one realised in the last 40 years that these poor orcs are BLACK PEOPLE! We must immediately allow them to be intelligent and good aligned!"I don't know how they come to this idea when there has always been the ability to choose to have your human be black. It is like they can't fathom that black people are humans in their lust to find racism lol
>>3846733Tolkien's orcs were based on russians, not niggers.A shame no gamified RPG morality system can ever do justice to the complexities, causes and timeframes of real life ontological evil.
>>3846733Anti-racists are the real racists.
>>3846751Tolkien's orc medicine was based on whatever bad shit Anglos fed their soldiers to keep them in some shape during WW. Clearly, his orcs were based on Anglosaxons.
>>3846733>these poor orcs are BLACK PEOPLE!Every time I hear this, I'm reminded that LotR had actual black people in it. They're on Sauron's side, but Samwise instantly recognizes them as human beings.>Sam, eager to see more, went now and joined the guards. He scrambled a little way up into one of the larger of the bay-trees. For a moment he caught a glimpse of swarthy men in red running down the slope some way off with green-clad warriors leaping after them, hewing them down as they fled. Arrows were thick in the air. Then suddenly straight over the rim of their sheltering bank, a man fell, crashing through the slender trees, nearly on top of them. He came to rest in the fern a few feet away, face downward, green arrow-feathers sticking from his neck below a golden collar. His scarlet robes were tattered, his corslet of overlapping brazen plates was rent and hewn, his black plaits of hair braided with gold were drenched with blood. His brown hand still clutched the hilt of a broken sword. >It was Sam's first view of a battle of Men against Men, and he did not like it much. He was glad that he could not see the dead face. He wondered what the man's name was and were he came from; and if he really was evil at heart, or what lies or threats had led him on the long march from his home; and if he would not really rather have stayed there in peace - all in a flash of thought which was quickly driven from his mind.
>>3846751>>3846869I was talking about DnD, but yeah, they had a similar opinion of Tolkein orcs too. They even did it with the demons from Devil May Cry. Saying literal demons from hell were the same as the illegal immigrants yet somehow thought they were fighting racism. Even had them wearing head wraps lol
>>3842214man you might be on the wrong board
>>3846968Their ideal would be everyone being exactly the same, with any differences being purely cosmetic.
>>3846968Yeah, but at least Mundus is now a groomer who raised Vergil into his little soldier instead of stupid magic brainwashing. Very realistic.
>>3846751They were based on the Yellow Peril. Tolkien mentions their slitty eyes and sickly yellow skin.
>>3846869>He wondered what the man's name was and were he came from; and if he really was evil at heart, or what lies or threats had led him on the long march from his home; and if he would not really rather have stayed there in peaceI thought I was done with LotR, but now I want to read it again.
