Influence System

[Ctrl Alt Del]

A lot of people say that they really love that influence system of Kotor 2. Well, my opinion about it? Not a very good idea. Of course, at first sight, that system seems to get near reality showing the relations between people on a understandable degree, but soon it degenerate into stuff you just don't want to say.

 

See, you're as bad as devil himself, and, still, you've got to be gentle and a nice guy to the Handmaiden if you don't wanna get stuck up with her - forever. Or the contrary. You're a good person, but then you happen to don't agree with one of Kreia's opinions. What can you do? Lie, agreeing with her earning darkside points, or say your true feelings while losing influence with her? Worst, you can only bother with the influence, bedcause that's the only way of discovering the storis of your crew (even if those side-stories are completely insufficient or small).

 

And that's how it degenaretes. A system that should be one step closer to further relationship, becomes artificial, since you know your probably awnser will be whatever the other person is wanting to hear. Post your thoughs

[Marauder's Fury]

Great idea, poor implementation. Getting on your companions' good side to make them see things your way (alignment) and building up trust in them (stories/training) should be a nice addition to the game. However, most of your companions are so easily influenced (weak minds?) that you're done with them in less than five minutes.

 

Visas

grants you a "power" you'll never ever need to use -though I admit, it's a nice thing from a role-playing point of view- and you get it in one single conversation.

 

 

Mira

accepts to be trained in the ways of the Force, and again, you talk her into it in one single conversation. Oh, sorry, my bad. Two parts of conversation, since she'll get offended and cut it abruptly in the middle.

 

 

Disciple - see Mira.

 

You see, the INF system works pretty lame with some of your party members, though it takes more time with some others. But you can achieve the very same results by losing INF with them as well! Now what's with that?

 

Besides, I don't get this. You can change, even completely reverse their alignment, but the way they react won't change at all, resulting in inconsistent player exchanges. I mean, Disciple is going to die of creases, yet he's still giving you a pat in the back because of the compassionate act you just committed.

 

If it weren't as rewarding when your INF with your friends is down the drains, their reactions would vary according to their alignment, and you weren't done with some of them in mere minutes... the idea would work wonders, but it's wasted now and looks silly most of the time with the current system.

[SilentScope001]

And that's how it degenaretes. A system that should be one step closer to further relationship, becomes artificial, since you know your probably awnser will be whatever the other person is wanting to hear. Post your thoughs

 

Which is how all relationships are supposed to work. If I told a ugly girl that she's truly ugly, I shouldn't expect her to fall in love with me. I love that sort of realism.

 

Sure, you have to manlipuate your party members, even if you secretly hate them, like say, manlipuate Kreia to think you actually listen to her. Again, I like this sort of realism. Fits in with Kreia's themes.

 

Quite buggy and I needed a guide in order to infulence my party members. The fact that you can get the same backstory by saying bad stuff to them to lose INF really makes me upset. Though the idea is quite good, and if I had to choose between K1's system and K2's system, I'll stick with K2's system. Improvements are necessary.

[Jediphile]

^^

 

Yeah. The Influence system has several bugs. For instance, it's pretty bad that Handmaiden continues to scold you for doing evil acts after you've already corrupted her and turned her to the dark side. Lots of stuff like that that need fixing. But other than that it's a pretty good idea. It's a shame it wasn't implemented well.

[Ctrl Alt Del]

Well, not that the Influence system is totally crappy, but it has a vast room for improvements. And I still dislikes on how that dictates your behavior through the game.

[ThoraxeRMG]

Hated it, kept going from dark to light.

[SilentScope001]

Hated it, kept going from dark to light.

 

It's a bug that occurs if you have high CHAR and high INF. It would then switch from DS to LS rather quickly.

[JawaJoey]

Am I the only one who simply didn't bother with characters I didn't want to please? There are plenty of characters in my party as it is, I don't need all of them to be good, just so I have a harder time choosing who to use.

 

From a roleplaying perspective alone, you shouldn't appease your party members in a way you don't want to, but personally, I just don't give enough of a crap to bother with characters I simply don't like, such as Bao-dur and Visas.

 

It gets slightly trickier when it comes to things that you, the player actually gets from influence. Hanharr, Handmaiden, Visas, T3, and HK-47, and Disciple all give you something, I think. Disciples' and Visas' suck a lot, and it's not like you can't live without any of them anyways. So whatever. Get the ones that work with your alignment, and forget the rest.

 

Then there's backstory, but there's nothing at all that says you should always get all the backstory each game.

 

What I do is usually at the beginning of the game, I decide which party members I'm going to focus on, based largely on how I'm going to play the game that time around. I'll do everything I can for them, but the rest I won't bother worrying about, I can always start another game when I want to hang out with XXXX party member.

 

 

 

I'll agree that the influence system could have been better, but I'm shocked at how many other people seem to be jumping through all these hoops to do something for no real benefit. They didn't design those conflicts to make it hard to play the game, they made it that way so that the player would have to make a choice.