Baldur's Gate : The Sword Coast Chronicles : NWN2 Persistent World

I think you can move forward with the idea, Valefort. It's not taking anything away from the game. Items already break on bash occasionally, so it's not like there's not already a reason to put at least one skill point in "Open Lock" if you have the skill points to spare.

Plus picking locks gives you XP.

Ideally, sure, you'd recruit a rogue. But realistically that's more of an RP decision based on the availability of a rogue at the time (if you happen to be standing near one when you decide to go on a dungeon run, or can round one up in a hurry through in-game means like a Sending spell). Mechanically speaking, the reason you want a rogue is because they tend to be high DPS and can help you chew through a dungeon quickly if you have someone who can tank for them, plus if they have invested in Search then they can help you clear sometimes very dangerous traps -- it's usually not because they can pick locks that you want to recruit one from a purely mechanical perspective, though it's a great reason from an RP point of view.

In the end, this doesn't take anything away from rogues, who will still remain valuable for the reasons above; but it adds the possibility that you might need to hunt down a caster to help with your broken item. I don't know if "NPC identification" needs to be available at shops directly, though? Maybe try it without first? Then people can decide which they'd rather do -- spend gold to repair something blind, or hunt down someone with analyze dweomer to help them identify their broken items, or just grab a rogue the next time they go dungeon delving? Unless someone's playing a caster/rogue, they will at least need to look outside themselves for one of the options if they don't want to spend gold blindly.

And I guess my POV is that if items already break, why not give players a means of repairing them?

Maecius wrote:And I guess my POV is that if items already break, why not give players a means of repairing them?

Do they already break? I guess my interpretation with the low frequency of these "broken item" items was that it was just one of those ale steins or rags that the loot system just sometimes drops into the container.

As I understand it, if you bash chests, items inside have a small percentage of breaking. A dev can confirm for me by checking, maybe? But I don't think "broken item" is randomly generated like the steins, etc.

I seem to remember even seeing the mechanical text, "something inside broke" or something along those lines, when brashly breaking open chests in the past. Because Maecius orcs wait for no rogue!

(Cut to scene of a partied rogue yelling at Maecius that they can pick the lock, while Maecius just bashes it anyway.)

sneakily creeps in, and puts down a sign in the middle of the area

This Idea Opens Up General Crafting & Blacksmithy Crafting/Repair for Toman/Phoenix Company Smithy

No, Deathgrowl is right, there's no mechanic at the moment where items break : when the item "broken item" appears it's just one of the possibilities of the 0 gold items.

My idea would effectively make bashing chests less profitable as you would sometimes break items and you would have to repair those (but I can't really think that as "not fun", we already have the cursed item system whose idea is a bit similar (you need remove curse)).

Reparing items that have broken sounds cool. Adding a significantly higher chance of breaking items upon bash... not so cool. I think it would favor high strength chars, that can just vacuum clean up everything they see regardless, more than it would encourage people to bring rogues along (and why would anyone not want a rogue along already?) High strength chars are already favored in the looting system, even more so now that storage is disabled.

Valefort wrote: My idea would effectively make bashing chests less profitable as you would sometimes break items and you would have to repair those (but I can't really think that as "not fun", we already have the cursed item system whose idea is a bit similar (you need remove curse)).

I like this idea, IF that when repaired there is a decent percentile the the outcome-repaired item would be even nicer than what was originally generated (but broken).

Of course, there would also have to be a percentile that in trying to repair, it breaks irreparably...and that gold spent in the trying, is thus gambled away....

Hmm, my memory is faulting me then. Maybe it's been discussed before, or was a possibility in another game I played, not sure.

Either way, I'm not against the idea; though I do agree that it should only have a very small chance of happening. I don't like the idea of punishing people for not taking "Open Lock" or bringing a rogue along in the party. But having it as a 1 in 50 type situation might not be too bad an idea. I mean, you kind of are taking a risk hurling that chest against the floor until it pops open, right? (Which, incidentally, is how I open most locked things in real life too.)

Besides, if you add the option to repair it afterwards, it's not like you've completely lost the Holy Avenger you just looted because you decided to bash the chest. Which I think acts as a bit of a salve for when items do occasionally break.

Steve wrote:I like this idea, IF that when repaired there is a decent percentile the the outcome-repaired item would be even nicer than what was originally generated (but broken).

A former broken stein turns out as an ale stein

Theodore01 wrote:

Steve wrote:I like this idea, IF that when repaired there is a decent percentile the the outcome-repaired item would be even nicer than what was originally generated (but broken).

A former broken stein turns out as an ale stein

Ale Stein +4 with +6 Poison Saves.

But realistically, bashing chests does not definitively mean you break open the chest—it could just as easily be understood you bash open the lock mechanism! I mean, there are some pretty stupid Characters out there, but even then...I think an 8 INT is enough reasoning to know you don't have to clobber the chest just to open its lid.

What seems more reasonable, in the department of "bring along a rogue-skilled adventurer," is to just replace many of the normal chests with iron chests, or whatever those chests are that CANNOT be bashed. I really don't understand why more of those are not around. And as well, wouldn't those be MORE LUCRATIVE, if we keep the current find-stuff-all-the-time-so-you-can-vendor-like-a-boss paradigm?!?

Valefort wrote:No, Deathgrowl is right, there's no mechanic at the moment where items break : when the item "broken item" appears it's just one of the possibilities of the 0 gold items.

My idea would effectively make bashing chests less profitable as you would sometimes break items and you would have to repair those (but I can't really think that as "not fun", we already have the cursed item system whose idea is a bit similar (you need remove curse)).

I like the idea's here but I think that if you add a mechanic that creates a chance to break items when bashing chests, though it is realistic and fun, a lot of players will revolt in anger.. especially the low strength ones who already get weepy eyes over changes. Maybe just keep broken item in the loot tables, give them a purpose like crafting or exchanging or what not but don't punish people who don't splash rogue?

By the way I splash Rogue so either way will work for me.

Personally, I think broken items would be a great thing to glue into some sort of crafting system.

As I wrote earlier, my smith has all the skills needed to build standard equipment (he's the Phoenix Company smith afterall) and has a basic forge. I'd love to get that expanded and then draw in an overall crafting system. Hell, I've already got a standing request to ANYONE who wants (Both npc farmers, crafters, guards, etc and players) that if they need repair work done, all they need to do is talk to Toman.

Throwing in actual items that need repairs rather then just RPing it (ie, a farmer needs their plow sharpened or straightened from hitting a rock) would be a GREAT thing, I think.

Maecius wrote:Hmm, my memory is faulting me then. Maybe it's been discussed before, or was a possibility in another game I played, not sure.

In stock NWN2, Campaign, etc, there was some chance to break items when you bashed chests. Such as potions, and non-magical items mostly. Years ago it used to happen on this server too, but because the loot chests were rather rare and didn't really respawn - so this 'feature' was taken out.

Currently, if you open a lock, you can find broken items inside... That's enough. No need to make items break...

im a chest basher and i would like to see items break from bashing. and removed from loot table. it seems right. it brings much more to the game then you guys are really anticipating.

i am for bashing breaks stuff 100%

I am wholeheartedly for the idea as proposed, and I even think it would be fun, regardless. Not just because I am a rogue build, because I have chest bashers too. No, it won't encourage cooperative play to include rogues, it's more likely to encourage people to just drop a few skill points in open lock, and then prodigiously use lock picks. But that's not the point imho. It's to add an element of uncertainty, an element of real world physics, and a way to not be completely screwed by it. I have been on servers where you just break the stuff, and that was that. You could vendor the scraps for, like, a gold piece. But other than that, you got nothing. A repair chance, though, would take that middle finger away.