RPG Design: Importing main characters to sequels

Surlent · Jan 11, 2005

I remember ppl complained on forums when they heard you couldn't import character from BG2 to NWN and told importing characters had always been a big taboo in ancient times.

Now at first it sounds worthless, since sequels tend to be worse than originals or switch developers and rpgs don't get that much of titles per year, but it could add totally new features in the game.

Since rpgs especially crpgs, have highly customized main characters, you wouldn't need to go with one version made up by the devs in the sequel or just make blatant mentions of the previous hero/heroine/wacko. Instead you could stick that in the new character's face and maybe throw some dialogue to go with it. Your old character advising the newbie pc.

Fighting against your previous character would be fun too. If you made munchin before, too bad, cuz now the game is low level campaign only and your unlucky sod gets to try to whack him/her/it.
Imagine IWD2 with a battle against your previous party from IWD, what a battle it would have been.

But what if you don't want to import ? Would it just be better to throw some random dude to play the x-pc ? Making it optional bonus quest only for importers could add lot of work too, but it could work on commercial level. Buy the original game and import your character to new game you just bought, so you can unlock new features. Ripoff, but it could work I tell ya.

Vault Dweller · Jan 11, 2005

I don't think that importing your characters is such a good idea.

First, importing takes away the best part of character development - the early levels, the choices, etc. Second, it fucks the balance, unless you want to see 200 HPs goblins and +50 loot scaled to your level. Third, what would be the point? If your ex-PC played an important role, it would be hard to reflect all the choices you've made in the sequel. If the role wasn't important and doesn't have any impact on the sequel's story (KOTOR 2 ) then why bother importing pointless characters just for flavor and recognition?

Dark Elf · Jan 11, 2005

Also, even if a new game uses roughly the same character system, there's no way in hell there won't be a bunch of new cool skills and spells and stuff to invest in. Thus, you feel buttfucked if you import a character that had no opportunity to get a chance on them.

Sarvis · Jan 11, 2005

Ah, the narrowmindedness of RPGCodex shines forth again!

Vault Dweller:

First, importing takes away the best part of character development - the early levels, the choices, etc.

Bull. If the high levels aren't as interesting to play as the lower levels your ruleset sucks in the first place. Not to mention that you can have games which don't take you all the way through the levels. For instance, in Pool of Radiance you end at level 6! That's right, measly little level 6.

Second, it fucks the balance, unless you want to see 200 HPs goblins and +50 loot scaled to your level.

Yeah, it fucks the balance if your system SUCKS. If you have proper rules for high levels then yo ucan have several games with the balance still there, and the player just getting more tactical options in each game.

Third, what would be the point? If your ex-PC played an important role, it would be hard to reflect all the choices you've made in the sequel. If the role wasn't important and doesn't have any impact on the sequel's story (KOTOR 2 ) then why bother importing pointless characters just for flavor and recognition?

First of all, reflecting a players choices over multiple games shouldn't be any more difficult than doing it in a single game. It's not asking any more, really, than what you guys regularly do of every RPG.

Why bother? Because players can get attached to their characters, and might like to play with them again and again. I LIKED taking the same party through Pool of Radiance, Secret of the Silver Blades... etc. I LIKED taking the same hero through all the Quest for Glory games, it was fun to build him up and progress him.

In fact, it was one of the few things that were better about PC rpgs compared to console RPGs...

Dark Elf

Yeah, again that's true if the design sucks. Or, you know, you could just make the new skills for higher levels so that people can build up to get them...

Jed · Jan 11, 2005

Meh. One of my favorite things is creating new characters. I think it only makes sense in closely-related sequels. Then it's nice to continue the story.

Re: NWN, I don't think there's anything stopping someone from firing up the toolset and/or editor to recreate their BG-series UBAR-MUNCHKIN PC.

Spazmo · Jan 11, 2005

I (aargh) agree with Sarvis. In the case of games like BG-BG2, where it's a story about the same characters and the character from the first game isn't totally uber, it works. Plus, it's kind of an accomplishment to drag the same character through an entire saga like BG (I've never done it myself; BG playthroughs I try always lose steam pretty fast). But, if your first game ends with the PC(s) being ridiculously powerful, then leave them be.

But there's some really cool stuff you can do with continuing past parties without necessarily giving player control. Right now, my friends and I are slowly devising a great big D&D setting (yes, I play PnP D&D a lot--it's why I so adamantly want sci-fi CRPGs for a bit of variety). What we're doing is running a bunch of different campaigns in different parts of the world and levelling up a lot of characters at a good pace. When these characters hit some high levels, they essentially become the 'gods' of the setting. They're not really divine, but their power and exploits are so great that to the people of the world, they become the icons of magic or good or hunting the undead or whatever. Basically, we're making our own history and heroes not just by writing it, but by playing it out with dice and everything and writing that into the books.

I'm not suggesting anything so grand for a CRPG, but, as we know, there's few things more gratifying in an RPG than to have the gameworld react to the player. So how cool would it be to start a sequel to a game where you brought one or more adventurers to greatness and then to meet your previous PC(s) in the sequel? Or better yet, have them play a significant role in the plot? Granted, it'd be a bitch to design, taking into consideration the various characteristics of your old characters and giving them decent dialog. But still, let's say a game has three factions. One for good guys, one for bad guys, one for neutral guys. Based on what kind of a person your character was, s/he'd end up being a bigwig in one of these factions. If you work with that faction, s/he could be a big quest giver, but if you're opposed to that faction, well, you might have to kill yourself. It wouldn't be all that hard to do, and it'd kick ass.

Vault Dweller · Jan 11, 2005

Sarvis said:
Ah, the narrowmindedness of RPGCodex shines forth again!

Ah, the joy of seeing a well deserved rank, Sarvis. I'm not the Codex, so whatever shines here, it's just my opinion.

Bull. If the high levels aren't as interesting to play as the lower levels your ruleset sucks in the first place.

It has nothing to do with the ruleset, it's the nature of things. Same in real life, staring out when all your options are open, making steps that open some doors, and close other is more interesting (from char development point of view) then becoming whatever it is you wanted to be. At this point the journey is basically over, and that was my point. Any game I've ever played was like that from FO to BG2 to Diablo 2. It doesn't mean, of course, that a system where char development at higher level is as good as it is at low levels couldn't be done, but would that be fun? The goal of char development is to become good at something, and the moment that you actually manage to do that, you lose some interest because you've achieved your goal. The only way to stop that is to make sure you wouldn't become good for a very long time (like 2 games) but where is fun in that?

Not to mention that you can have games which don't take you all the way through the levels. For instance, in Pool of Radiance you end at level 6! That's right, measly little level 6.

That's the only way where importing would work, but then again, BG2 featured several improvements and additions (like kits, weapon styles, etc) that made old characters less interesting. Similarly, based on what's known about KOTOR 2, a lot of previosuly useless skills are now useful, so it would make more sense to develop new characters using the updated and tweaked char system than stick with the old ones.

Yeah, it fucks the balance if your system SUCKS. If you have proper rules for high levels then yo ucan have several games with the balance still there, and the player just getting more tactical options in each game.

What are you talking about here? Do you understand the difference betwen a lvl 1 and lvl 20 character, for example? What tactical options? If the game is balanced for lvl 1 you are going to destroy everything in your path at lvl 20 effortlessly unless your system SUCKS as you'd say. The only solution here is to scale the difficulty, but that sucks even more in my opinion.

First of all, reflecting a players choices over multiple games shouldn't be any more difficult than doing it in a single game. It's not asking any more, really, than what you guys regularly do of every RPG.

Well, take KOTOR for example, you either saved the galaxy or ruled it. Assuming that the next game cares about it (instead of sending Revan away on a business trip like in K2), which one would you pick? Developing two games based on 2 different outcomes is absurd; making one game where "shit happened anyway, no matter what you did" is kinda stupid, and it cheapens whatever you did in the first game.

Elwro · Jan 11, 2005

When in secondary school a group of my friends (including me) began writing a roguelike game (of course, nothing more than level generator and working LOS was done), I had this idea that there would be a hotel somewhere in the game you could retire your characters to. (Similar to highscore, but only with those characters who surviived

) The point of the hotel was to allow the heroes to mate producing varied offspring, which could be used by the player as PCs.
For example when playing your favourite roguelike you might, after a week or two, realise that although you like your character very much, you don't have the chance to complete the game with him. In all games he eventually dies and that's it. But with such a "living character pool" his experience could maybe yield interest in the future, influencing your starting characters. Of course we never got to the point of considering any details.

Vault Dweller · Jan 11, 2005

Spazmo said:
When these characters hit some high levels, they essentially become the 'gods' of the setting.

That sounds really cool, but the important fact here is that you and your friends agree on the events. In case of CRPGs, the difference is obvious, these characters took different paths and unless the game sucks (or it's a Bio game and all paths lead to the same thing), it would be impossible to reflect all potential choices and satisfy everyone. I played a true shaper in GF, and all the references to a kind shaper in GF2 kinda bug me. I wish there was no mentioning of previous games whatsover in sequels.

But still, let's say a game has three factions. One for good guys, one for bad guys, one for neutral guys. Based on what kind of a person your character was, s/he'd end up being a bigwig in one of these factions. If you work with that faction, s/he could be a big quest giver, but if you're opposed to that faction, well, you might have to kill yourself. It wouldn't be all that hard to do, and it'd kick ass.

The problem here, as I see it, is to make an ex-PC NPC that behaves like the PC under your command in the prev game. Once again, it's easy to do that in a PnP game, but in a CRPG it would raise all kinda questions and issues in regard to the behavior.

DemonKing · Jan 11, 2005

Well, the only games I can think of that have allowed character importation in sequels are a bunch of D&D franchises (Gold Box series, BG->BG2, SOU->HOTU, EOB series) and the Wizardry & Bard's Tale series.

I never really liked it in D&D games because 1st and 2nd edition rules were really boring and restrictive at high levels and you also have so much uber-loot that you end up leaving vanilla +4 longswords on the ground because it's not worth the bother of carting them back to base. It kind of devalued the loot, IMHO.

I didn't mind the uber-levels in HOTU since 3rd ed is a bit better at a managing high levels and you did have to take down Mephistopheles, after all... :wink:

The Wizardry series, where importing was allowed, basically bumped you down to 5th level or lower when you imported, and stripped a lot of your uber loot. I think only the second (ancient) game in the series let you import at the same level (Knight of Diamonds).

I remember Bard's Tale 2 was pretty easy if you had 2 archmages from the first game with you, but it did allow importing and retaining levels.

I also dislike how in a lot of sequels your characters are mysteriously "stripped of all loot" at the beginning of the game. Again this devalues a lot of the hard work you did in the original game(s).

Shagnak · Jan 11, 2005

DemonKing said:
The Wizardry series, where importing was allowed, basically bumped you down to 5th level or lower when you imported, and stripped a lot of your uber loot. I think only the second (ancient) game in the series let you import at the same level (Knight of Diamonds).

I was wondering what happened there - didn't play the early Wizardry games, but I always prefer new characters.

I was quite amazed that you could import Wiz7 characters into Wiz8. The games were released 9 years apart!

Anyone here try this (importing, I mean), and how did it effect there success?

suibhne · Jan 11, 2005

Vault Dweller said:
That's the only way where importing would work, but then again, BG2 featured several improvements and additions (like kits, weapon styles, etc) that made old characters less interesting. Similarly, based on what's known about KOTOR 2, a lot of previosuly useless skills are now useful, so it would make more sense to develop new characters using the updated and tweaked char system than stick with the old ones.

BG2 allowed you to choose kits for your imported characters, and it required you to re-choose weapon proficiency slots. Sure, it introduced some new classes (or at least one), but the other new character features applied to both old and new characters. Questions of BG's role-playing quality aside, I thought the character importation worked rather well.

So, yeah, I'll throw my weight behind "It's a great feature if the games and their narratives are designed to effectively take advantage of it. If they're not, sure, it can royally suck."

Otaku_Hanzo · Jan 11, 2005

Shagnak said:
Anyone here try this (importing, I mean), and how did it effect there success?

There were some easter eggs that your party could only see if imported from Wiz7, but it was nothing "SUPAR OMG TEH WIN GOES 2 ME!!1!!1" and didn't add any new plot points or endings.

Vault Dweller · Jan 11, 2005

suibhne said:
BG2 allowed you to choose kits for your imported characters, and it required you to re-choose weapon proficiency slots.

Hmm, don't recall that, but I'll take your word for it. That was nicely done then.

EvoG · Jan 11, 2005

Elwro said:
When in secondary school a group of my friends (including me) began writing a roguelike game (of course, nothing more than level generator and working LOS was done), I had this idea that there would be a hotel somewhere in the game you could retire your characters to. (Similar to highscore, but only with those characters who surviived ) The point of the hotel was to allow the heroes to mate producing varied offspring, which could be used by the player as PCs.
For example when playing your favourite roguelike you might, after a week or two, realise that although you like your character very much, you don't have the chance to complete the game with him. In all games he eventually dies and that's it. But with such a "living character pool" his experience could maybe yield interest in the future, influencing your starting characters. Of course we never got to the point of considering any details.

I'm surprised no one commented. I found this very original and interesting. Great idea *scribbles great idea down for later use unbeknownst to Elwro*

Cheers

EEVIAC · Jan 12, 2005

EvoG said:
I'm surprised no one commented. I found this very original and interesting.

Well, I was going to until you made such a big deal out of it.

I argued a very similar "Generations" idea with VD almost two years ago. Unfortunately, the part I really wanted to read was answered by :

Elwro said:
Of course we never got to the point of considering any details.

Because I haven't figured out how to make it work either. If a previous character cleared the first five levels of a dungeon before retiring with his loot, do you repopulate those levels? If the game is more complex, how do you keep track of all the changes that previous characters made? After four or five generations would there still be stuff for the characters to do?

Or you could just ignore all that and use it as the neat character generation tool that it is.

Elwro · Jan 12, 2005

EEVIAC said:
Or you could just ignore all that and use it as the neat character generation tool that it is.

Yes, that was the idea. You could have a "Character pool access" option in the main menu and produce new PCs via a fancy breeding algorithm. If you trained your character for 2 real-time weeks to be a great archer, but you realize that you were having no luck with him and didn't get the sponge of doom which was absolutely necessary for some quests you desperately wanted to accomplish, you could use him as a father to your next character, who would inherit some archery (or, as my dictionary says, "toxophilitic"

) talent. All random world elements would get randomized anew and the game would not keep track of the stuff that previous characters did.

Of course, balance would be an issue here.

Sarvis · Jan 12, 2005

Vault Dweller said:
Sarvis said:

Ah, the narrowmindedness of RPGCodex shines forth again!

Click to expand...

Ah, the joy of seeing a well deserved rank, Sarvis. I'm not the Codex, so whatever shines here, it's just my opinion.

Yeah, because there is absolutely no way whatsoever in which the attitudes of most Codexers are similar. :roll:

Nor do you guys single out people who have differing opinions and give them special ranks!

It has nothing to do with the ruleset, it's the nature of things. Same in real life, staring out when all your options are open, making steps that open some doors, and close other is more interesting (from char development point of view) then becoming whatever it is you wanted to be. At this point the journey is basically over, and that was my point. Any game I've ever played was like that from FO to BG2 to Diablo 2. It doesn't mean, of course, that a system where char development at higher level is as good as it is at low levels couldn't be done, but would that be fun? The goal of char development is to become good at something, and the moment that you actually manage to do that, you lose some interest because you've achieved your goal. The only way to stop that is to make sure you wouldn't become good for a very long time (like 2 games) but where is fun in that?

If your ruleset contains lots of options and choices to choose from through all levels, you can still have interesting choices throughout all levels.

That's the only way where importing would work, but then again, BG2 featured several improvements and additions (like kits, weapon styles, etc) that made old characters less interesting. Similarly, based on what's known about KOTOR 2, a lot of previosuly useless skills are now useful, so it would make more sense to develop new characters using the updated and tweaked char system than stick with the old ones.

As I said before, if you have the first game end at level 6 or 7 or whatever then make most of the new skills added for levels higher than 6. Then you still give the player lots of choices! It's amazing, really. You know, how someone who isn't so narrowminded can think of ways to make gameplay more fun!

What are you talking about here? Do you understand the difference betwen a lvl 1 and lvl 20 character, for example? What tactical options? If the game is balanced for lvl 1 you are going to destroy everything in your path at lvl 20 effortlessly unless your system SUCKS as you'd say. The only solution here is to scale the difficulty, but that sucks even more in my opinion.

And I'm the one with a dumbfuck tag? Yes, if you balance your game for level 1 and then have level 20 characters imported the balance is screwed. Of course, the developer would have to be retarded to do such a thing when you could just design the game for level 20 characters! It's amazing how a balanced system would have plenty of enemies to challenge level 20 characters, and how people could have fun at those levels!

Of course, now you're probably thinking "what about people who didn't play the first game!?!" Well, they get to roll a level 20 character up right from scratch if they need to.

Well, take KOTOR for example, you either saved the galaxy or ruled it. Assuming that the next game cares about it (instead of sending Revan away on a business trip like in K2), which one would you pick? Developing two games based on 2 different outcomes is absurd; making one game where "shit happened anyway, no matter what you did" is kinda stupid, and it cheapens whatever you did in the first game.

[/quote]

Hey now, remember that I'm the one who thinks it's quite difficult for developers to come up with actual differing paths in their games. You're the one who thinks it's easy!

Jinxed · Jan 12, 2005

There difference in EOB was very big, not only would you import a characters who would be at least 1 level higher, but you would get all their equipment, a +5 sword if you found it compared to a measly +1 sword of crap if you were lucky.

BG ->BG II wasn't really imbalanced if you didn't have the add on, plus, as a fiighter the only edge you had was the lame +1 bonuses to stats from those books you could find. It gets more complicated as a mage, but that's only in the beginning, because fresh characters can buy and write magic later on.

Oh yeah, and Spazmo, I played 1 character through all the BG games and addons, it was fun.

EvoG · Jan 12, 2005

Oh to add something concrete here, VD has it on the nose with regards to the excitement of starting out the fresh young newb and attaining signiifcant goals. That growth is very significant. To be perfectly honest, I get bored very quickly with high level characters, ever since my PnP days...high level modules having the party fight lvl 36 beholder ancients just seemed ridiculous and meaningless. In kotor, though I was eager to finish the story at the end...I was so powerful that combat was nothing more than speedbump after speedbump. The danger is a big part of the excitment of exploring the world anew. Every fight you win a big achievement. Sure nothing beats being able to effortlessly lay the smack on lots of foes...but at the same time, the challenge is gone, and most goals have been met. Sure you could always adjust the gameplay to always make you feel like a 'less powerful' player, but beyond combat, there isn't a lot more you can adjust before you are arbitrarily making all things difficult for a god-like character.

Cheers

Spazmo · Jan 12, 2005

In D&D, and I guess this applies evenly to most games, I find it's the mid-levels (in the 8-12 range for D&D) that are the most fun. You've got enough abilities, skills and magic items (and more importantly, the mage has enough fireballs and the cleric has enough cure spells) that you really can kick some butt, but you're still frail enough that things are dangerous. Plus (and this is more specific to D&D), those levels start opening new and interesting enemies to a DM, who usually gets stuck dicking around with variations on goblins and orcs in low levels.

The real problem with high level characters in many games is that fights will generally end very fast. Characters start getting so many hit points and such good armour classes and immunities to this and that and the other that about the only thing that has a solid chance of hurting them is an instakill effect. Think of D&D spells like wail of the banshee. Epic level D&D fights are generally a race to see who fumbles their fortitude save first. Or think back to Fallout's late game, when you had power armour. Remember how super mutants with big effing miniguns would either do diddly squat to you because the damage of each bullet was being absorbed or they'd kill you in one burst because of a lucky instant death critical? Good balancing can reduce this effect, but high level characters still tend to get a bit out of whack.

Sarvis · Jan 12, 2005

Spazmo said:
and more importantly, the mage has enough fireballs and the cleric has enough cure spells)

*snicker*

The real problem with high level characters in many games is that fights will generally end very fast. Characters start getting so many hit points and such good armour classes and immunities to this and that and the other that about the only thing that has a solid chance of hurting them is an instakill effect. Think of D&D spells like wail of the banshee. Epic level D&D fights are generally a race to see who fumbles their fortitude save first. Or think back to Fallout's late game, when you had power armour. Remember how super mutants with big effing miniguns would either do diddly squat to you because the damage of each bullet was being absorbed or they'd kill you in one burst because of a lucky instant death critical? Good balancing can reduce this effect, but high level characters still tend to get a bit out of whack.

I'm not sure this is strictly true. In fact, I know that you can challenge high level characters. For instance, I was never able to beat the last battle in Pools of Darkness with my uber characters!

If you have powerful creatures to challenge the player, then the game will be challenging at high levels. The other option, of course, is to make it so that a high level character isn't really all that powerful.

Jinxed · Jan 12, 2005

That's like playing heart of fury mode in IWD2, Sarvis. Or different difficulty levels in Diablo. Same shit different day, I say.

DemonKing · Jan 12, 2005

Sarvis said:
In fact, I know that you can challenge high level characters. For instance, I was never able to beat the last battle in Pools of Darkness with my uber characters!

You too?

Damn that was one tough fight...a wave of beholders and evil dragons, and if you manage to survive that - a second wave!

Frankly I thought it was ridiculous - but then I never liked Pools of Darkness so much...it was just too Munchkin. Pools of Radiance and Curse of the Azure Bonds were infinitely superior.

Otaku_Hanzo · Jan 12, 2005

DemonKing said:
Frankly I thought it was ridiculous - but then I never liked Pools of Darkness so much...it was just too Munchkin. Pools of Radiance and Curse of the Azure Bonds were infinitely superior.

I managed to muscle through that final fight in PoD. There were quite a few items hidden throughout the game that helped alot in that final fight. Rings and such. The fight's not impossible, just extremely difficult if you didn't get the items.

And, yes, Curse was definitely the shit. First Gold Box game I played too. I think I played through that game at least five times before moving on to another one. Had a Compaq portable XT system with a tiny ass EGA monitor which I played it on. Ahhhh, memories....

RPG Design: Importing main characters to sequels

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