Wanted to give this thread a gentle bump in hopes it gets addressed in more detail, and respond to something that was said earlier I don't feel I properly addressed.
Mithreas wrote:
But then in the body of the post, referring to something as "cruel and bad design" is... not fine. For one thing, there are different opinions on what makes good and bad design, and context is important (e.g. Liareth commented that D&D mechanics are well defined and look-up-able... which is usually true.
The current system is 'cruel and bad design.' It manages to punish both those who plan their builds in advance, and also punish those who build on the fly. It hinges on three main factors.
First, not all classes get ride.
Second, not all classes can afford mounted combat, or mounted archery.
Third, epic skill investment and defying 3.0 core skill rules.
Now, those whom have read this topic should be familiar with the following quote;
Rather than you all complaining, why not play the game and explore. Grab a horse with 6 ride and see how you do. Fall off? Well put another point in when you level.
Rinse and repeat.
This is 'cruel and bad design' for a few reasons.
The first, those that do not plan their build may end up inadvertently wasting many more skill points then they need. If they just want enough ride for a casual trot around Cordor, but keep falling off their horse because they don't know that's because they're a half-orc on an elven horse (something only explained as mattering in this topic I believe), they may add more points then needed. Additionally, the feats required are not obvious, being disabled on the server for years and years, only now popping back into re-existence. These players are heavily punished, already 'behind' those that plan their builds to the last skill point, they are now even farther behind, as they may hit a point where they realize their ranger cannot properly mounted range unless they invest two feats (combat and archery) as well as a full suite of skill points. Of course, they won't realize this until they are, as a dwarf, trying to ride an elven horse that's attacked by a badger with an 'on fire' debuff, but as it's impossible to know what that DC is by design, they may make a character that fails in its core concept simply because of the obtuseness of the implementation. It's specifically punishing for these individuals, whom do not have or choose not to use Discord and learn how ride works, as they opt to take up 'ride' later in a characters life as the RP dictated they should begin riding. With re-leveling being a huge pain and not all builds having the 'free' feats, they may end up with a character that cannot execute it's main design (mounted combat) simply because the skill functions as it currently does with many avenues for dysfunctional character building caused by totally hidden mechanics.
The second, those that plan their build, are at a loss and simply not making 'ride' focused characters. This is particularly frustrating for me, as I had an idea for a build I wanted to do, unfortunately it does not take a class level of a class that gets ride in epic, meaning the amount of 'ride' I can get is quite low. The archetype is a 'knightly' one, and a mount would be ideal, but the build simply falls apart with even one level of a ride-skilling class in epic, simply due to how NWN handles epic levels. Ergo, the character was dead before it got made, because, as this topic demonstrates, the requirements to ride a horse are totally unknowable, and why level up a character if it's core concept may not be functional, or may be rendered nonfunctional, OR may end up with dead feats (mounted and archery) when or if the system changes? Why risk a busted character?
The third, there has still been no reason given for the necessity of Ride to be so complex and totally hidden from the playerbase. The inner-workings of every other skill are easy to understand, even the ones with complex interactions have a 'table' you can look up and determine how much you need. Ride, on Arelith, is so complex it apparently cannot be expressed in words, and as of yet there has been no attempt made to justify or explain it's singular complexity in a game that has 99% of it's content defined by a simple 1d20+attribute+skill+item. Because something can be a core concept to a character, but also because the system was made to hide its inner workings from players, players that may opt for a class spread that does not get a 'ride' class, I find this design philosophy quite bad, and the suggestion to simply put a point into ride every time you level until you stop falling off a particularly cruel one. Ride should not be FOIG.
Because characters cannot so easily level back down to get ride, and because not every build can spare the one (or two) feats that may not even be ultimately required for ride to work (as it's still indev) I feel the current system is both cruel and bad design. It has the potential to punish early adopters (I personally took 8 points in ride, but the required ride was reduced to 6, meaning I wasted 4 skill points), punishes casual builders heavily, and stops built-planners from taking part in the system at all.
I would be interested to see a breakdown of the current design goals of the ride system and how the current implementation meets them.
Also as an addendum, I do not believe that work done for free renders that work immune to criticism. People have implied i'm 'entitled,' and I do not feel that is a fair or helpful avenue of discussion.
