The nitpicking thread

[jack1974]

Okay I've implemented your texts suggestions for the lizardmen, I think now should be fine. Maybe a line after the first explanation:
pl "If they are slaves too, can't we just, like, talk to them and tell them we don't mean them any harm?"
vae "Do you speak lizard?"
pl "Um..."
vae "Then that's not an option."

maybe here something like:
ot "We'll try to avoid them as much as we can, but that might not always be possible."

[fabulaparva]

Depends on how bloodthirsty you want Krimm to look
Vaelis:"Then that's not an option."
Other Twin: "We'll try to avoid them as much as we can."
Krimm: "Only if they'll avoid us."


It's pretty much the same as what you typed above. This, since the rest is coming from Krimm, it's a bit more menacing. Main thing is that, either way, the other twin, Krimm, and for sure, Vaelis, all know that they can avoid the lizardmen only if the lizardmen choose to avoid them - narrow tunnels and all. Whatever you choose just depends on how clearly you want to spell that out for the player and if you want to be more or less subtle about Krimm not minding the possible battle --she's already grinning in the scenes when talking about handling a few lizardmen, so that's probably obvious enough.

Just my 2 mahal.

[Troyen]

Dunno if these have been mentioned yet.

During character creation, while assigning attributes:
"You should put a few points to Constitution and Will" should be "You should put a few points in Constitution and Will" or maybe "You should put a few points in Constitution or Will."

Selecting traits. No, not those traits, but the ones where you pick a story outcome. At the bottom of the screen:
"Click to advance the story and to make a choice for this event to get a permanent trait." The "to" in orange bugs me. Technically, it's correct, but it's a lot of "to"s for one sentence. The sentence is also really long as it is. Something like "Click to advance the story and earn a permanent trait." is much more to the point.

This one isn't a text nitpick, but a design nitpick. The "Learn Skill" (and "Auto Assign") button is darker than the boxes with the SP, delay time, target area, and range, yet it's also the box you want to draw the most attention to. Shouldn't this button stand out more than all the others, especially if it's tucked in the corner?

Definitely worthy of a nitpick: Why is there a "Next" button when picking initial skills? Picking a skill automatically goes to the next page. You can't click "Next" to skip picking a skill. If you go "back" to the first twin, her skill is reset so you have to pick a skill again. Could just remove this button.

I still think the very first line of the game needs another comma. Anyone else feel this way? "Esteemed ladies and sirs, both noble and common, welcome..." (If you can't see it, it's after "sirs")

[yayswords]

I still think the very first line of the game needs another comma. Anyone else feel this way?

Yes

[Troyen]

Resistances tooltips (the things that pop up when you click on the icons - nice addition, by the way!):

Fire:
Currently reads "This icon represents the resistance against Fire attacks. The higher the value, the less damage will take. For the elemental and physical conditions (Burning, Weakened, etc) will influence the chances and the duration of the damage over time debuffs."

Could change to: "Resistance against Fire attacks. The higher the value, the less damage will be taken. Also lowers the chance to receive Burning and Weakened, and reduces the duration of fire-based damage over time debuffs."

1. "This icon represents" is unnecessary because it's implied by being a tooltip and the less text you have, the better. We want to spend our time reading the story, not the manual.
2. "Will take" was missing a subject and you really don't want to use "he/she" if you can avoid it. I actually don't like the second sentence at all, but I'm not 100% sure you can just cut it.
3. The third sentence was a bit awkward and a little misleading. I am assuming Fire resistance only affects Burning and Weakened, and Burning and Weakened should probably show up in yellow text like Fire does.
4. I forgot what resistance does now. Does it actually reduce the duration of debuffs still or just the damage on them?

Burning:
Currently reads "This icon represents the resistance against Burning attacks. The higher the value, the less damage will take. For the elemental and physical conditions (Burning, Weakened, etc) will influence the chances and the duration of the damage over time debuffs."

Umm...is that what it does? Does it help against Weakened or just Burning?

If not, I'd suggest: "Resistance against Burning attacks. The higher the value, the less damage will be taken. Also reduces the chance to receive and the duration of Burning."

The first and third sentences seem redundant, but I need to think on them more.

Weakened:
Currently reads "This icon represents the resistance against Weakened attacks. The higher the value, the less damage will take. For the elemental and physical conditions (Burning, Weakened, etc) will influence the chances and the duration of the damage over time debuffs."

Same comments as Burning. "Resistance against Weakened attacks. The higher the value, the less damage will be taken. Also reduces the chance to receive and the duration of Weakened."

Water:
Currently reads "This icon represents the resistance against Water attacks. The higher the value, the less damage will take. For the elemental and physical conditions (Burning, Weakened, etc) will influence the chances and the duration of the damage over time debuffs."

Something tells me you copied and pasted these...

"Resistance against Water attacks. The higher the value, the less damage will be taken. Also lowers the chance to receive Frozen and Scared, and reduces the duration of water-based damage over time debuffs."

Frozen, Scared, Tired, Slowed, Shattered, Confused, Poisoned, and Paralyzed should also follow the same pattern as Burning.

Air:
Change to "Resistance against Air attacks. The higher the value, the less damage will be taken. Also lowers the chance to receive Tired and Slowed, and reduces the duration of air-based damage over time debuffs."

Earth:
Change to "Resistance against Earth attacks. The higher the value, the less damage will be taken. Also lowers the chance to receive Shattered and Confused, and reduces the duration of earth-based damage over time debuffs."

Dark:
Change to "Resistance against Dark attacks. The higher the value, the less damage will be taken. Also lowers the chance to receive Poisoned and Paralyzed, and reduces the duration of dark-based damage over time debuffs."

Wait, does Dark resistance actually help against Paralyzed? I don't remember. Also, it's too late now, but might sound cooler if this was "Shadow" instead of "Dark".

[Troyen]

The quick help text explaining combat:

First Screen:
"The number on the red flag indicates..." Same for blue one.

Melee and Ranged Attacks:
General nitpick: The help talks about thieves and warriors. I don't see anything in-game at this stage (it's the first battle) saying who are the thieves and warriors. According to the character creation, I have a ranger and a druid, and I don't see what the enemies are.

At any rate, "However, if you are in the front row, you incur a penalty..." (Comma after "row", delete "in" from "incur in a")

"The Thief class..."

The Warrior vs Thief explanation is confusing because you use "row" when you really mean column on battle screens ("front row", "back row"), but here it actually should mean row. Not sure how to rephrase this. The current text, in case someone else wants to give it a shot:
"If you attack a Thief with a Warrior, the damage will be reduced proportionally to the distance (in term of rows) between the attacker and defender."

If nothing else, add an "s" to "term" since it's paired with "distance".

Repeating last attack
All the other titles are title-case, but this one isn't. "Repeating Last Attack"

Stagger Value
Capitalize "every" (first word in the description). Instead of "value" I would say "Stagger Value" on that sentence too.

"staggered" is lower-case, but all other conditions are capitalized (Burning, Weakened, etc). Should this be Staggered?

"his attributes are reduced and opens him up to powerful attacks." -> "his attributes are reduced and he is vulnerable to powerful attacks"

"Your party and your enemies are both capable of staggering." This sentence isn't really needed. The first sentence already said this, in a different way.

Anger Value
"Similar to the Stagger Value, as you hit the enemy, the Anger Value will increase." Similar to the Stagger Value, make sure that first letter is capitalized.

("Anger Value" sounds really...in need of an alternative name? "His 'Anger Value' is over 9000!")

"If the Anger Value reaches the enemy's maximum level, the enemy will perform a deadly 'Overdrive' attack!" 'Maximum level' seems like the wrong term to use. Sounds too much like actual character level. Maybe rephrase to "If the enemy's Anger Value reaches the maximum, the enemy will perform..."

Aggro Value
Capitalize the first letter of the description ("Measured").


P.S. I got to listen to four new battle songs while doing the tutorial. Some nice additions!

[yayswords]

Hmm, the resistances are a real mess indeed. I don't know that fire resistance reduces chance to be affected by Burning etc. I'm pretty damn sure Ice Spike never fails to apply its debuff, no matter the target's resistance.

[Troyen]

Yeah, I have no idea about what resistances actually do anymore. I just Ice Spiked an orc with 10% Water and 25% Frozen resistance and he gained two turns of Frozen. Same with an orc that had 25% Water and 25% Frozen. I guess it just affects duration?

[yayswords]

The way I know it: Frozen resistance reduces duration of the debuff. Water resistance the Ice Spike's upfront damage*. Nothing reduces the damage of the Frozen DoT.

* by half the stated %, for the record

[jack1974]

Thanks fixed several things from your suggestions.
For resistances is not like copy/paste but a template that reads from the resistance code but couldn't read the associated effects so that's why you see "Water damage" and "Burning, Weakaned, etc".
Maybe is time to redo that properly.
Anyway:
Fire = reduces Fire-based attacks damage, though it always deals 100% (base damage) to prevent problems with target with 99% resistance (could break the game completely making them immune to damage). So let's say your damage against a 99% Fire resistant target is 100, against 50% is 150, against 0% is 200 (more or less, depends also on target's magic resistance of course).
Burning = reduces duration of debuffs only. So if by default duration is 3, with 25-30% you are affected only 2 turns instead. Some spells/attacks also have a minimum value duration.