I am a hardcore role player if The dice or the choice got sour that is.the story of that character. I always can create another.
There is no single playthrough in BG3 where I have even half of characters. In my main I even had to create custom mercenaries to end game.
If you need to, head to Dragon of Steelthorne and check the CityHub file. Be warned, it’s one gigantic mess.
I do feel bad now… In Skyrim, I literally reloaded the first Dragon fight something like 20 times, and sometimes, I beat the dragon but just felt that the victory wasn’t ‘cool’ enough, so I just reloaded the game.
You don’t have to. Each one play what is fun for them. I don’t play in hard combat difficult. Because combat is not why I role play. I like poke fun of meta gamers and all that but is fun. At the end of the day we are all role play fans.
The Mara way to defeat first dragon is literally poison crossbow potions and invisibility.
I’ve spent hours in Disco Elysium just reloading and rerolling because I kept succeeding in a dice roll I wanted to fail. 
How did that happen? 
I have not played Baldur’s Gate 3. Is it really possible for all the party characters to die?
I killed them all of didn’t save them. 80% are very fussy about not genocide thieflings. (context I only play Evil. And I mean Evil no lets pretending evil)
I’m usually very cautious in games, but I’ve been delighted to embrace playing more riskily in Pathologic 2 - even though it ended up with me failing miserably a great deal. Somehow it feels appropriate for the character, not just me being bad at the game (though it’s the latter as well). Brilliant game for many reasons!
@NMCannon You can also create checkpoints or multiple saves using the relatively new checkpoint code. When I was first doing save points, I used the method of copying every variable, the same way that Stars Arisen does - but the new command makes it much easier with less workload, and there’s less potential for bugs.
I used the new code for Royal Affairs - if you search for “save_checkpoint” at the link you should be able to see how it’s done. For Honor Bound I’m doing more complicated stuff with enabling players to keep named save slots, but the Royal Affairs method is pretty straightforward - it just enables players to roll back to the start of the chapter if they want. I have an option in the stats page where they can do that whenever they want.
I was considering buying it a while ago, but I’m lowkey terrified of dolls, and the marketing material alone was giving me nightmares, so I decided against it.
Always sad to miss on something that might be useful learning material for game design perspective, but it is what it is.
Yeah, I get nightmares very easily and have had a few since starting playing so that’s a good idea to skip it. (The masked figures are actually rather friendly and helpful, at least so far, but that doesn’t help much in the moment! The introductory sequence disturbed me a great deal.)
It’s giving me lots of ideas though, even if I don’t write such intense horror.
What games do you all get inspired by? Any that get you in the writing mood?
I’ve added checkpoints at the beginning of each chapter (or after character creation in ch 1) and there is an option at the end of each chapter (except the last one) to go back and replay any previous chapter. Beta testers are really liking having that option. Similar to what @HarrisPS did in Royal Affairs but only accessed at the end of the chapters so maybe a bit simpler? If you’d like to see how it works DM me and I can send you access to the Ink and Intrigue beta. 
If I’m planning to write, I’d better not open a game, because then I’ll just end up playing for the rest of the day. (Other way around it works though. First I write, and then I play a game to calm down my brain so that I can sleep.)
I love picking bits and pieces of mechanics and UIs so much that I couldn’t really tell all of them (currently my top favourites are the structure of Our Life: Beginnings & Always, the skill system in Disco Elysium, obeserving what I like and don’t like in different Mass Effect titles, and a bunch of TTRPG systems). My top ones for setting/story/lore-wise inspirations are the Fallout, Deus Ex, Mass Effect, and (Knights of the) Old Republic (meaning KotORs + SWTOR) series.
Funnily enough, the one thing that’s been helping keep me on task is the unseasonal streak of sunlight we’ve had these past few weeks.
See, I have a south-west facing window right next to my desk, which means from about 2PM to 7PM, I have so much visible radiation from the accursed daystar hitting my screen that any game I play looks like it’s been set on the lowest gamma and brightness settings possible.
Which is a problem when I’m playing Fallout London, a mod which is already quite dark, visually. As a result, my only options are to play something else (which I don’t really want to do right now), or work until the sun goes the fuck away.
Of course, now we’re back to our regular cloud cover, my productivity may or may not plummet.
@HarrisPS @leiatalon A resounding yes for checkpoints then! I bookmarked Harris’s post for the links. Thanks, everyone!
This is a very generous offer, but I’d want to play the whole thing and be, yanno, helpful. I’m too swamped to give any game a proper beta. 
Tell me about London darkness I have visual problems and that night is far more dark than a black hole in winter.
But I understand why they did there is a perk who give player dark vision at night when sneak. And they wanted enchance the value of high tech perks crafting and loot.
I’m just trying to stick to a schedule, and keep myself motivated by promising myself I can play after I’ve reached the goal for the day. It works… if I can actually gather the energy to start.
Recent updates to CS have made checkpoints so much easier. There’s just a command for it now.
I’ve been manually setting up record/retrieve pages for save variables for a decade now, and I’m so glad I never have to do it again.
No worries! I totally understand. But the offer stands, even if you just want to check the way it works and not play the game.
More than once, on the mobile app, I accidentally selected an option by scrolling too hard. 
Exactly! Then there’s also accidentally hitting Next, and accidentally picking the option next to the option you were trying to pick and then hitting next without double-checking because you thought it was the right one. Or just skimming. Or misreading.
I know it’s not really time for mid-month snippet sharing yet, but I’m just so proud that I wrote anything at all that I can’t help myself.
It’s kinda-brainstorming for the Halloween Jam too, though I’m not sure I’ll participate because of a lack of time to allocate to it.
Prompt: Your character has somehow ended up in possession of an animal they have no clue how to care for, but are forced to care for anyway.
You ushered out the last of the late night party crowd and are cleaning the bar when Gina turns off first the strobe lights and then the music. It is blissfully quiet for all of three seconds before a piercing cry from one of the back rooms makes you fumble the wet rag, which leaves a smear down your pants leg as it goes.
Between one blink and the next Gloria is in front of you, fangs bared and hissing up a storm. Gina is not much better, ripping the storage room door of its hinges before you can get in a word edgewise. Rhonda is the only one who’s still a little composed, but even she has grabbed a broom off the wall to defend herself if necessary.
Gina disappears from the room in a blur. Something stumbles in the back room, and then she’s back, holding her nose shut with thumb and index finger.
“There’s a. Thing. There. Like, a sheep, I think? It has four legs, and hooves, and fur, and it’s pretty tiny and cute, I think? Oh, and it shat all over the floor and ate half your coat, Brenda.”
You push past Gloria cursing up a storm, and duck into the back room where you find your bright magenta pea coat half on the floor half in the mouth of some hairy creature with a goatee. The coat comes loose with a tearing sound, leaving one sleeve to the thing while you cradle the rest of it against your chest, murmuring soft promises of bloody vengeance.
The pair of vampires and Rhonda peek into the room, and the latter hands you a bucket of warm water and a mop.
“I think you’re sitting in the droppings, boss.”
You groan in frustration while the maybe sheep. Baby sheep? It really is tiny. Loses interest in the torn sleeve and starts nibbling on your shoulder.
“What in the world is this thing, and why is it here?!”
Gloria sniffs the air and pulls a face. “Someone’s late night snack, maybe? It’s alive and big enough for it. How the crap anyone could get past that smell is beyond me, though.”
You keep the baby sheep, who now makes a sound like a tortured cat, at a distance with one hand while you run through the options in your head.
“This isn’t the kind of emergency we can call Sherriff Willis for, is it?”
Gina very deliberately shakes her head, and you slump back against the wall with a theatric groan. “Well, fuck me. We can’t just lock this thing in a bathroom stall and call it a night, can we?”
Gloria gestures her chin at where the baby sheep is now trying to eat one of your boots. “At the rate it’s going it’d eat its way out before we could get a hold of animal control in the morning. Better keep an eye on it to limit the damage.”
And that is how you find yourself on the floor of your bathroom at four in the morning, staring down what might be a baby sheep who is happily nibbling a hole in the boots of your asshole ex. Not groovy.