I guess you've never min maxed before.

Im sure pen and paper d&d players complained about video game rpgs when they first started becoming popular. The idea of progression is to move away from bland number laden menus once technology allows you to do so. I rather see a dragon attacking a large city randomly then swinging a sword at animated cardboard hoping my skill will cause said sword to hit.

Im sure pen and paper d&d players complained about video game rpgs when they first started becoming popular. The idea of progression is to move away from bland number laden menus once technology allows you to do so. I rather see a dragon attacking a large city randomly then swinging a sword at animated cardboard hoping my skill will cause said sword to hit.

Except Morrowind allowed for more choices within the world than Skyrim does. Your argument fails.

Where exactly did I say Orcs have to only be Warriors and cannot be Mages? Orcs are born physically stronger, as it's a racial trait, but you can train yourself in whatever job class you want. Read about, what's the point of ever picking an Orc if a High Elf can easily match your strength? It boils it down to nothing more than "do I want to wear red socks or blue socks?"

I guess you've never mind maxed before. Anyways I understand that not all numbers can be eliminated however you'll notice that the numbers that have an actual effect on your character are percents rather than numerical values ranging from 0-100. The point is now that my character is no longer 79 points strong, he is 10% stronger because nothing in real life is based upon 79 points. When I lift weights I'm not getting 5 points stronger I'm increasing my strength by X percentage. That's why if feels more organic.

Aren't Orc also supposed to be of lesser intelligence than elves? Wouldn't that mean they cannot, or have a harder time learning magic? You're arguing for a racially based start that doesn't define anything over the long run? Making it useless.

Im sure pen and paper d&d players complained about video game rpgs when they first started becoming popular. The idea of progression is to move away from bland number laden menus once technology allows you to do so. I rather see a dragon attacking a large city randomly then swinging a sword at animated cardboard hoping my skill will cause said sword to hit.

I really don't understand why people still keep bringing up attributes. Frankly, I think their botched handling of the guilds by trying to force epic storylines in rushed faction quests is far more critical than the fact they removed some redundant stats that ended up being detrimental to the gameplay of earlier installments.

Nope, never min/max, I RP. Hell, most of my builds could pass off as deep NPCs. With no prerogative for saving the world, or perhaps not even the power to do so.

As for the rest of what you say, its representation. You know, what RPGs are all about. Our perceived existence is nothing but numbers, I have no problem with a game trying to represent a world, having variables in numerical form. I dont think its the 'old' or draconian way of doing things. Unless we are saying that numbers are so yesterdecade, like totally?!

I really don't understand why people still keep bringing up attributes. Frankly, I think their botched handling of the guilds by trying to force epic storylines in rushed faction quests is far more critical than the fact they removed some redundant stats that ended up being detrimental to the gameplay of earlier installments.

That's fine however I'm more abstract in that I don't need a mathematical representation of my character. That being said my main point was never that numbers are gross, but more that the problem with the game isn't a lack of numbers. If people are saying that's why the game is shallower than they're crazy. The problem is that a macro level the game looks limitless. For ever input there seems to be thousands of outputs. However at a micro level you'll notice that for quests there is 1, maybe 2 outcomes that can be arrived at.

I really don't understand why people still keep bringing up attributes. Frankly, I think their botched handling of the guilds by trying to force epic storylines in rushed faction quests is far more critical than the fact they removed some redundant stats that ended up being detrimental to the gameplay of earlier installments.

In all honesty, I don't think Bethesda is going to streamline the game any further. The more plausible reason why they've pulled out features since Morrowind is because of voice acting. To keep the game marketable to a wide audience, they did away with the text-based NPC conversations and replaced it with oral-based conversations. This limited the content greatly given that voice acting is extraordinarily expensive compared to writing scripts. This is what limited Oblivion and Skyrim in terms of RPGing because there are less options for the player and less avenues to go down. I wouldn't mind text-based conversations in a game even in 2012, but that's unlikely to happen, and unless Bethesda can dig deeper into their coffers and expand the NPC content (which is unlikely), a future game will be no more complex than Skyrim.

Apparently you missed the point entirely.

Very true, if I was a serious fan of the series as an rpg fan I would also criticize the storyline and quests much more than the removal of attributes and features that mostly appeal to powergamers anyway.

Orcs and Goblins in D&D are especially stupid yet they still have Shamans, Priests, Wizards, etc.

That's fine however I'm more abstract in that I don't need a mathematical representation of my character. That being said my main point was never that numbers are gross, but more that the problem with the game isn't a lack of numbers. If people are saying that's why the game is shallower than they're crazy. The problem is that a macro level the game looks limitless. For ever input there seems to be thousands of outputs. However at a micro level you'll notice that for quests there is 1, maybe 2 outcomes that can be arrived at.

Right back at ya

I got your point and addressed it in my post. Not my fault if you miss MY point

Yet to learn magic in skyrim your intelligence would need to be at a certain level. If racial restrictions were applied to stats Orc would rarely be able to use magic because his ability to increase his intelligence would be limited due to racial differences. Unless you only want a starting difference which is basically meaningless in the long run. There are no numbers and I'm okay with that somewhat limiting what my beginning Orc does however his racial ability more than makes up for that.

As for my base strength I don't have one because knowing I increased my strength by X% is fine with me.

But you're only looking at it by a strictly numbers view, which is ironic.

I never felt like i was haggling in either Oblivion or Morrowind. In oblivion i felt like i just changed a percentage an in morrowind i just kept lowering value while pressing A multiple times. Not a missed feature

In previous games, say like Oblivion, even if you hated the mechanic, Haggling (which had a whole load of numbers) made the game deeper because you felt like you were actually vying for the prices you felt you deserved. In Skyrim however it's nothing more than simply selecting a Perk and viola, this merchant (even if I've never met him before) will now give me 5 extra gold than he did two minutes ago. That makes the game shallow because it's a lack of accomplishment.

Yet to learn magic in skyrim your intelligence would need to be at a certain level. If racial restrictions were applied to stats Orc would rarely be able to use magic because his ability to increase his intelligence would be limited due to racial differences. Unless you only want a starting difference which is basically meaningless in the long run. There are no numbers and I'm okay with that somewhat limiting what my beginning Orc does however his racial ability more than makes up for that.

As for my base strength I don't have one because knowing I increased my strength by X% is fine with me.

So you put in Fallout attributes. Have them picked at the beginning, though make them more static (something that's been proposed since Beth announced that they gutted attributes). That however would be choices with actual consequences, along with having to make a character in actual character creation. Something Beth is now against since its not newb friendly enough for the dabblers.

Never felt like i was haggling, only lowering a percenatge or spamming A button in terms of Morrowind

That′s not necessarily making it less complex, it′s a different approach to character development where you create your character as you go along.

In Planescape Torment you pretty much start out with a blank slate, and then your character developed and progressed with the story, and I dare anyone to make the statement that Planescape Torment was shallow!

Whether you prefer pre-generated characters or identical characters from the start is a subjective opinion, but both styles can be made complex and with depth.

Um... not so much, no.

An Orc could boost his magical abilities through training, however it would take a longer amount of time and not be as good as a High Elf because of their inherent bonuses. Meaning, if used, High Elves would have such things as the +50 Magicka bonus they have, a damage bonus to magic cast, etc, etc, things that Orcs wouldn't have and would have to specifically work towards.

And great... you don't even know how much damage you're doing, awesome.