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kuertee Offline OP
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Just wondering...

In the areas around the first city, Syceal, the path to leveling seems to be:
1. West towards the lighthouse, encountering level 4 and 5 enemies.
2. Then follow the paths to the North visiting the
elemental "twin" caves, the cave with the mech, etc.
, with level 5 and 6 enemies.
3. Then towards the East, with level 6 and 7 enemies.

I've not progressed any further, but I guess the next path is:
4. South-west beach towards the cave, with orcs.

Or whichever route. I'm not sure because I've not progressed past point 3.

MY QUESTIONS ARE:
1. Is this type of set encounters going to be the same in the next town? Will the path to leveling in the next town be dictated by the levels of the set encounters? Or will the path to leveling be truly "open"?
2. Is there an opportunity to level up your avatars to overtake, by a substantial amount, the levels of the set encounters through repeatable missions or encounters?
3. Or is the path to leveling the same through the whole game? And replayability aspect of the game is with trying different combinations of character skills rather than in the illusory "open world"?

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There is no level scaling.

There is no respawning, or repeatable encounters. There is experience for explorations and quests, in addition to combat.

There is flexibility in where you explore depending on difficulty level, party builds and tactics.
At higher levels, there will not be as much of difference between levels as there is at the start of the game.

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kuertee Offline OP
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Cool that there is no level scaling.

But the point I was trying to make is that the "path to leveling" is linear through the map. The map is not "open world" per se. Because the encounters are "set pieces", and the encounters have pre-set level requirements, the "path to leveling" is linear. Sure, the game allows low-level players to attempt high-level encounters like Arhu's cave or those in the Abandoned Church. Of course, low-level players will not survive. Players need to attemp each combat encounter as set down by the developers. Ergo: adventuring around Syceal is linear and the same at every single play-through and is not "open world". Mind you, this is in regards to combat leveling.

Leveling through "talky" quests, of course, is not linear because you can choose who you talk to in any order.

It's safe to assume that it'll be the same in the next town.

EDIT: There are different methods to designing an adventuring rpg game without resorting to level scaling of encounters and without resorting to "set pieces".

Last edited by kuertee; 21/04/18 10:45 AM. Reason: other methods of encounter designs
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Originally Posted by kuertee

But the point I was trying to make is that the "path to leveling" is linear through the map. The map is not "open world" per se. Because the encounters are "set pieces", and the encounters have pre-set level requirements, the "path to leveling" is linear.

Overall yes, but in a given area, enemies are roughly the same level, so you can wander around freely and take the encounters in your own sequence. So, it's more an "open regions" game in that regard, but there are only a very few games big enough to be really open world.

With proper preparation and tactics, it's even possible to take on more powerful enemies within a certain range to your own level. My co-op partner and I stumbled upon enemies "not meant for us yet" more than a few times. Sometimes we had to save them for later, but nearly as often we managed to beat them, if only by a hair's breadth. The option to (try to) flee from a battle is a nice feature that allows "testing" enemies without reloading a save state like in other games. It somewhat feels more natural and realistic this way.

More casual players may have to follow the enemies level progression more closely, but that applies to most "open" games.


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