Larian Studios Forums Divinity - Original Sin Divinity - Original Sin - General Weapon types for Original Sin, ideas ?

We've already launched the question on our facebook page, but we thought our regular forumites might have something to say on the subject:

Anyone have any input on extra weapon types for Original Sin?

Yes, what about a sling?

1) A wide variety of weapon types works well when the game is designed around the possibility of using any of them.

Divine Divinity had Daggers, Swords, Axes, Maces, Spears, Bows, and Crossbows all as separate types. Guess what? Only swords were worth investing in - not just because it took until the Good Old Games v1.4 release before all the non-sword mastery skills were changed to percentage bonuses instead of fixed bonuses. The problem was that there were three great swords for every one of any other type. I think there were maybe two magical spears all game, and hardly any magical maces, one or two magic bows, no crossbows. If you want to make weapon types, remember to have a fairly even distribution of valuable ones, and not 3 awesome swords per awesome other weapon.

Adding in nun-chucks and a hundred other weapon types might sound fabulous, but how long would it be until the player finds any of them? How many unique upgrades would they be able to find for nun-chucks? If nun-chucks and their two-dozen cousins are added to random loot tables, that could frustrate users of more conventional weapons, because there are only so many places where something could drop, and instead they keep finding lots of weapons worthless to them.

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2) Doesn't OS have like 4 out of 6 skill categories dedicated to magic?

That was the last I'd heard - that there were only two non-magical skill sets. It sounds like this game is based more around elemental damage/resistance than slashing/thrusting/piercing resistance (which is fine, that didn't work so well in Beyond Divinity). I think a simple "Imbue Weapon - [Element]" spell, which imbues the current weapon with 3-10 charges of whatever element the spell was cast in (probably one of the skills should be on each elemental tree) would be a good idea.

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Okay, with that out of the way, more on topic, weapon types.

3) With two players, distraction, flanking and getting behind an enemy becomes much more viable, so DAGGERS designed to work with a Backstab skill are a good idea - one player distracts and tanks, the other flanks and stabs. (Maybe an invisibility spell lasting 3-5 turns would work as well.)

4) SPEARS because some Skyrim and Oblivion players just can't let go. Spears work especially well in turn-based games because with careful movement and positioning, they should have enough reach to hit a melee enemy who ran out of movement a square too far to hit the player. You know what would be helpful? Being able to see the range of an enemy's movement so you can know how far to stay away and kite them. And of course, with spears, you can Skewer two enemies together, and maybe that would let a spell affect both.

5) MACES because this game has a slip-and-fall mechanic, Maces could have a small, but helpful chance to knock down whoever is hit, making them lose one turn. Note that this could happen to the player as well, so it could be dangerous.

6) SHIELDS - specifically, shield bashing and shield charging. Perhaps at the end of your the turn you could also switch to a defensive stance to lessen damage / evade attacks, and Shields increase the amount of damage reduction.

I believe we already had piercing/crushing/slashing resistances in Divinity, but it just wasn't exposed to the player. I could be wrong.

Imbuing weapons with elemental dmg: yes indeed!

Flanking, backstabbing: yes, and we're trying to get more typical turnbased stuff in. Like indeed, weapon range and knockback and shield bash. We're trying to make sure weapons have tradeoffs (e.g. two handed swords do more damage but take more action points; daggers don't do a lot of damage and you have to get close to your enemy, but take less action points and have a higher chance to do critical damage, and can be used to backstab without the enemy seeing you).

I think you make a very good point when you say that many different types of weapons don't make sense if you can't find trade-offs like these. We are bound to a system that we want to keep simple yet deep, so within that system, it's often hard to imagine, for instance, the in-game difference between a crossbow and a normal bow. Plus, you sometimes have to adhere to unwritten RPG-rules that don't always make sense

War Fans. To make them interesting, they could be a variation on shields, with less defense, possibility to attack (which they actually were).

Spears too !

1. Greater variety of large weapons (two-handed) like: greataxe, greatsword, halberd, trident, double axe, scythe and two-bladed sword. Of course, the corresponding piercing/bludgeoning(crushing?)/slashing is properly applied to each weapon.

I have greater doubts that my next suggestion will be implemented but I'm typing it nonetheless.

2. For any weapon type, make a unique item under that type that is end-game worthy. Somehow, by the end of the game a player can compare a dagger wielding character against a great sword wielding character and be satisfied with both builds. Balance, so to speak.

For me it isn't important to have many different weapon types, but I very like it to see showing up many different "looks" for any kind of weapon type :
Each sword, spear, mace, bow, dagger, etc ... can have many "looks/faces" that make them "special/unique/your favorite/..." ONLY because of it's from and/or colours, inscriptions, backstory, ....
Let's say you have a favorite NPC or place or whatever and you find a weapon that is 'named as' or 'looks like' you favorite thing ... that would be awesome to use that weapon, even if it isn't that powerful !

And what about making a weapon yourself or set a Enchantment on it ? An Enchantment of one of the "Elemental Forces" (earth, wind, fire, water) to deal special damage or make your hero more resistance to that element via a Shield or armor with that Enchantment ...
But to be short: weapons you can "Enchant" make them even more special/unique !!

I don't know if gear will have "Durability quality" ? But if so , make it possible the player can find/buy a magical enchantment that give (for example) an (almost) unbreakable piece of weapon/equipment
I always loved in DD the special damages on weapons like Mana Leech, Life Leech, Fire/Frost/Lightning/Spiritual/ .. damage !!! Please do this in D:OS in some sort of formula again !!
I know, this is maybe not possible, but it are just MY feelings of nostalgy ...

Give me a lot of maces and shields and some spears and I'll be happy with it!

Some weapons I've not seen well iplemented in other games include:
whips (unique damage type; ineffect against armor but could have better range and stuff like poison)
spears (better range, higher damage but ineffective against armor)
halbred (heavy slower swing, ....)
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I was going to name a few more but to be honest I don't know enough about how you implemented combat to make effective comments. For example (i believe oringal sin is real time) but do you ahve gun powder? Does distance between combatants play a role in your tactics do you have guard funtions and does positioning of party members matter (i.e, weapons with reach, front row, guard, ...)
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Simply adding additional weapon types seems kind of weak with regards to time spent vs game benefit unless the weapons provide a real advantage/disadvantage that make the player use them in some cases (in this situation I better use the spear but in that situation the sword is clearly better).

AGL-based rapier for few slashes/turns at once.
Double-bladed glaive (two-handed speciality)
Shurikens just for the giggles.


But honestly, I just want to see some nice, setting-wise unique weapons, be it a sword or axe. Remember the Lightbringer sword (or whatever the proper name was, I played Russian version) you could took from the first Paladin you met in DD? or these legendary weapon? I just want something like that something that is piece of the game world/universe, something, that connects player to it. May be we can find some books in the beginning that describes some epic tale of a hero and then later we can discover his grave/crypt and find his weapon and gear or something?


More unique weapons with very unique abilities (not just stats) and story behind. That's all I want.

If there's spears I'll be happy.

I also hope you'll RARELY get like super enchanted way OP weapons. I hate that in RPG's when you just find over the top fancy blades right from the start.

The COMBAT in Original Sin is Turn Based




Yes, for me the same ! No overpowered weapons, especially not in the beginning .
But on the other hand: finding a really nice piece at the "finale battle" is also no need for ... or how should I say it

I believe that the more weapons, the better. People always liked the freedom of choice. The more choices, the better. And the weapon does not become useless things that can easily be replaced, for it we can to dream a little. You gave an example with a bow and a crossbow. Come on, think about it, what's the difference between a real bow and crossbow? To shoot a bow, you nock and shoot. Because your hands are strained when holding an arrow, the accuracy may suffer. Crossbow, you must first charge, and then shoot. In this case, the arrow is already fixed and effort to support it is not necessary. Therefore more accurate.
Bow damages depending on the tension. Crossbow has fixing damage because tension is the same. The damage of the bow depends more on the characteristics of the character, and can range from small to very large values. The damage of the crossbow over fixed and depends little on the characteristics of, and more from the crossbow. The accuracy of the onion less than crossbow. So we have two very different types of weapons.
Bow - unpredictable weapon with not very high accuracy and strong dependence on the characteristics of the hero (Str / Dex).
Crossbow - a more accurate weapon damage and only slightly dependent on the characteristics of a hero.
Besides bows faster weapon than the crossbow. Therefore it is logical to do to crossbow demanded more action points.
And have you ever seen a crossbow with flaming arrows? It may therefore be less of crossbow arrows (poisoned, the magical, the usual), and more for bows (poisoning, magical, fire, usual).
Since, I have started to offer their ideas. How about a throwing hook? Throw it at the enemy and attracts.
If you've played Diablo, and there was such a wonderful thing - throwing potions. You can throw the bottle of poison or oil. Imagine you throw into a monster bottle of oil, and then a ball of fire. ^ ^
P.S. Sorry for my bad English. I hope you understand what I mean.

The only problem I have with a lot of different weapon types is that after you pass about 12 separate types or so, it starts getting harder to find one specific weapon type. The more weapon types, the harder it is to balance them.

I think the way Divinity 2 handled masteries (one handed, one handed + shield, dual wielding, two handed) was better than Divine Divinity's 6 or so masteries, one for each type (sword, axe, mace). Divinity 2 did only have one type of two-handed weapons, swords - no 2H axes or warhammers.

Just keep in mind that there can be too much of a good thing.

Stabbey, Yes. Developers more difficult when a lot of weapons. But good for the players.

In general I think it would be great to share these types of weapons on:
1. Polearms (Spears, Pikes, Staves)
2. Heavy weapon (hammers, clubs, maces, Two-Handed Swords)
3. Ranged weapons (bows, crossbows)
4. Light weapons (One-Handed Swords, Daggers)
5. Throwing Weapons (Hooks, Potions)
That and more skills:
1. shield Mastery
2. two weapons

You could throw potions in Divine Divinity, as well. In fact, you could throw barrels, etc, to attack opponents (breaking the barrels first made them do more damage).

As for crossbows vs bows, don't the bolts/arrows come into play as much as draw effort when aiming? Bows would be more accurate, at least at longer distances. Crossbows also have a much longer reload time.

The COMBAT in Original Sin is Turn Based


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Wow that is great! Then I can see a definite usage of whip; as there are a lot of nifty things you could do such as entangle; stun and similar. These things are much easier to do with turn base combat than real time. In addition positioning (if lateral distance is part of combat) could come into play for whips, spears and similar.

There are weapons in other countries we don't know mich about.

And what about an Atlatl ? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlatl

Subpages at Wikipedia :

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Ancient_weapons
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Primitive_weapons
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Indigenous_weapons_of_the_Americas
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ancient_weapons

Also an interesting weapon, although probbly difficult to implement : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bolas

Interesting look : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gunstock_war_club

personnaly I am interesetd in the idea that everything can be use as a weapon. there is generic kind of weapon (swords, axe, shield, wand, staff etc...) and we could put everything in those generic kind like for example, a cat can be use as an hammer....