Grim Epiphany

Full disclosure: I'm pretty bad at Action Role-playing Games.

I love playing them. There's nothing I enjoy more than the click-click-click-squish-loot style of game play they offer. I spend entire play sessions at the edge of my seat, literally perched right on the edge, excited to see what cool loot I'll get next. I love the visceral, non-stop nature of the combat. I love having to constantly be prepared for an unexpected change in enemy mob composition that could totally ruin your day. Or the boss level monsters that just come out of no where to break your face. I actually get a thrill out of the fact that at any moment, one tiny mistake could lead to my character being dead.

None of that changes the fact that I'm bad at them.

You see, good ARPGs, like Diablo 2, Titan Quest, and of course, Grim Dawn, have complex character development systems that are heavily stat based and rely on a deep understanding of the game mechanics and how those complex stats synergize with one another. Even merely decent ARPGs, such as Diablo and the Torchlight series, where a deep understanding of the stats isn't necessary but can result in crazy powerful character builds, have layers of rules and numbers that you need to get a grasp on for the most satisfying results. Then of course there's Diablo 3, which sort of has a stat based system... but really you can kind of just do whatever you want and get straight to the action. D3 isn't bad, mind you, but it's an ARPG for people who don't math good.

I'm good at Diablo 3.

This all came to me last night as I was playing Grim Dawn. You see, in Grim Dawn the player character has three basic stats: physique, cunning, and spirit. Physique makes you tough and allows the use of heavy armor and weapons. Cunning improves physical damage and allows the use of better guns. Spirit improves magical and elemental damage and allows the use of caster gear. From the first time I loaded up the alpha-build of the game I have been attracted to the "Demolishionist" class. They are primarily based around guns, grenades, and traps so I made the logical assumption that their most beneficial stat would be cunning. I couldn't figure out why my Demolishionist characters were struggling so much. Last night, I had a moment of clarity.

You see, the majority of Demolishionist skills revolve around dealing fire damage. Sure, you fight with a gun, and having a more powerful gun is good, but the base damage type for the Demolishionist class is fire. That means that spirit, the elemental damage stat, is far and away more important than cunning. This realization felt like a slap in the face. It also kind of felt like the heavens had opened and choirs of angels were singing. It was a "light bulb" moment. I think we all love those.

Now, this on'y really seems strange and significant to me because I love playing table top war games like Warhammer 40,000, Warmachine, and Malifaux. Table top war games also have layered rules and complex stat based systems. Creating truly powerful army lists requires a deep understanding of those rules and being able to create synergy between the different parts of your army in order to achieve victory. I'm pretty good at table top war games, so why am I so bad at ARPGs?

I think the answer lies in accessibility.

When I play a table top game, just getting together with others to play requires a significant amount of planning. There is a lot of time to just sit and think about the game while not playing the game. I've spent days at a time studying rule books and crunching numbers for no reason other than, at the time, it was the only way to get my Warhammer fix. All that time spent thinking about playing rather than actually playing, gave me time to assimilate the rules and really grasp how everything fits together.

When I play an ARPG I'm able to jump right in. I don't need anything other than a little free time and my computer to get into hacking and slashing. I'm so focused on the action aspect of the game that rather than processing the rules and numbers, my brain just blows a raspberry and says "Whatever, let's go kill stuff." I don't spend any time thinking rather than playing, which retards my ability to master the rules.

I wonder how many other gamers struggle with, or simply don't play, ARPGs because of this. Is it that, like me, they jump right to the action without thinking the system through. Or is it that they simply aren't willing to put in the effort? How many of the people who are awesome at ARPGs consciously think about what their doing and how many of them intuitively grasp the mechanics and just roll with it?

Either way, I think that, from now on, I'm going to do a much better job of thinking about and learning the rules when I play ARPGs. I expect that before too long, I wont suck at them anymore.

Click-click-click-squish...