@semiticgod has a great view on level scaling and I agree with him 100%.
...except for the fact that BG should have level scaling. As was pointed out in his very well-written post, Oblivion's level scaling was very poorly implemented and I would be afraid that something like that would happen with BG. Oblivion vanilla was so frustrating to get a "powerful" quest-end weapon at level 1 that you couldn't use later. I hated that once you reached level 20 you had to use cheap tactics just to stay alive. If everyone in the wilderness is this powerful, why haven't they overrun the city yet? It makes it feel like the game revolves around the player, rather than the player is just a person in another world. Level scaling could totally destroy immersion for me if it was done poorly.
Using level scaling as an RP tool is a great idea, btw. It just requires a lot of work to implement properly. Level scaling is already the easy way out of managing balance... making it more difficult to program than not using level scaling kind of defeats the purpose.
It would be awesome if properly implemented though. Don't remove the weaker enemies, and don't always improve them, either. As Charname's level increases, so does his reputation as a killing machine. The weaker goblins, although stupid, should be smart enough to know when they are outmatched. So instead of charging blindly on, even though they are obviously outmatched, and instead of having the foresight to find some ogrillons to help them out because Charname is now level 5 and we can't beat him if he's over level 3, they run away like good little goblins should.
Problem is, that is more programming work also, in the name of enemies that don't even matter. But it would still be fun.
actually, after thinking a bit, i agree with arguments for very conservative automatic level-scaling from the yes team. combining a bit of this "true" level-scaling with discrete, scripted difficulty-increasing events dependent on factors such as time and story progress would be a massive improvement to the game.
Personally, I can't escape the feeling that 'scaling' is simply an excuse to further dumb down the game playing experience, in the same way that 'balancing' often leads to samness and the elimination of difference.
Don't go into the ruined temple, they said in the tavern, something evil lurks there.... Don't venture unawares into the ruined temple, said the wise woman on the road, something undead lurks there.... the bard in the pub where I had a pint was singing a song about a mighty Lord that died and rose again as undead.... on the deserted track leading up to the ruined temple were several half eaten corpses of adventurers..... further up the track I passed a mail box with the name label 'Lich Lord' written on it....
And then I DIED! What kind of crazy game puts a Lich in when I'm only second level!!!!!!!!!!! What a stupid game!!!!!!!!!!
with comprehensive level-scaling how would you explain not encountering, say, kobolds in static encounters anymore? in let's say sewers... so the kobolds saw you coming from a distance and they scuttled away? okay, i can live with that. i'm not really looking forward butchering more of these poor fellows.
but then, how come a pack of stronger enemies has instantly arrived? where did they come from? did they see the kobolds evacuating so they overtook their turf? if they're already stronger why wait for them to run away?
but of course all this is okay and can be constructed for several instances. but you can only take it so far. real level-scaling requires *a lot* of abstraction and rationalizations like this fall apart. the abstraction consumes the world-building.
so sometimes you would have to meet these weak critters too.
if without level-scaling you meet them at a rate of occurence of N you shouldn't now meet them at N/50 or never when going to the areas they normally reside in, or when backtracking, but rather N/2, or N/3.
you need that element of familiarity to keep the environment believable.
That's the already mentioned compromise. You really want this game to be "believable", there's a laundry list of things that make no sense whatsoever. Suspension of disbelief is an accepted compromise to provide a better gameplay experience.
I'm not talking about smashing all the RP to bits and have the streets run rampant with epic-level liches lurking behind every barrel. Those are the extremes, and they're bad for many reasons, not just RP violations. Besides, a lot of the established paradigms are already completely fictional and largely arbitrary. Modifying them a little isn't a world-shattering change, I don't think.
What I'd prefer is to meet stronger versions of them for a while; but then, yes, not meeting them anymore. There is nothing saying "here be Kobolds" other than the fact that the vanilla version of the game happened to put them there.
with comprehensive level-scaling how would you explain not encountering, say, kobolds in static encounters anymore? in let's say sewers... so the kobolds saw you coming from a distance and they scuttled away? okay, i can live with that. i'm not really looking forward butchering more of these poor fellows.
but then, how come a pack of stronger enemies has instantly arrived? where did they come from? did they see the kobolds evacuating so they overtook their turf? if they're already stronger why wait for them to run away?
but of course all this is okay and can be constructed for several instances. but you can only take it so far. real level-scaling requires *a lot* of abstraction and rationalizations like this fall apart. the abstraction consumes the world-building.
so sometimes you would have to meet these weak critters too.
if without level-scaling you meet them at a rate of occurence of N you shouldn't now meet them at N/50 or never when going to the areas they normally reside in, or when backtracking, but rather N/2, or N/3.
you need that element of familiarity to keep the environment believable.
You are metagaming.
How does the player know there are kobolds ahead instead of something more dangerous? From the characters position, (s)he has never been in that area before?
And if they have been, and they got massacred, perhaps the kobolds went looking for a safer area. If kobolds keep spawning, i usually ask myself how many of these creatures are there? How have I not dented the ecological structure of the area? Kobolds leaving lets what they eat, grow more in abundance. Before, those number might not have sufficed a larger creature(s) but now it is suffice and sustainable hunting grounds.
@Lord_Tansheron@deltago yeah it seems like i am metagaming, but consider this: in BG games there's a fair bit of backtracking. enemies may respawn. so that's how you know.
So now there's some other enemy there. Could be any number of reasons why. Heck, if anything, you can always go the ol' "they heard I was coming and want a piece of me"-route. Works pretty much for anything.
Also there isn't actually whole lot of backtracking, is there? Unless you go somewhere then leave before finishing whatever is going on there and come back later. If you progress steadily, you very rarely come back to areas with lots of monsters that you've been to before.
But either way, I'm more than happy with some RP inconsistencies for the sake of smoother gameplay.
So now there's some other enemy there. Could be any number of reasons why. Heck, if anything, you can always go the ol' "they heard I was coming and want a piece of me"-route. Works pretty much for anything.
Also there isn't actually whole lot of backtracking, is there? Unless you go somewhere then leave before finishing whatever is going on there and come back later. If you progress steadily, you very rarely come back to areas with lots of monsters that you've been to before.
But either way, I'm more than happy with some RP inconsistencies for the sake of smoother gameplay.
when i play there's some backtracking. i agree that it's not strictly necessary to backtrack much but (ehhm i know the following sounds obnoxious, forgive me) i think a lot of players do it. those that are a bit less-efficient - they don't say that bg2 offers 100+ hrs of gameplay for nothing
there's this thing that's a bit hard to describe... i'll put it like this - you kill bad guys and "clear" areas and you may feel satisfied (yaay these pests / bandits won't harass the locals anymore / come out of the sewers to snatch kids) and then, when you return, surprise! the bad guys have been replaced by badder guys! and it's something that would *always* happen. it's counterintuitive to me.
however
i surrender. i now think you're right and your points are overall more important than mine. you just have to give me one thing and i'll meet you there - weak (non-upscaled) enemies appearing *sometimes*. more rarely, maybe even a token presence, but not never-ever like kobolds have been eradicated from the region.
One of the issues I have with BG is that while the non-linearity gives people more choice and helps the game feel fresh, the average mobs are quickly trivialized to the point that they might as well not exist. The areas are tuned in a way that it is possible for players straight out of Chateau Irenicus to tackle - and it makes things utter faceroll for characters with few more levels. I don't really find it fun to see band of goblins or orcs in dungeons that die in a touch.
There are few mobs that scale (Adamantite Golems, Elder Orbs, etc), but they are largely confined to certain areas and even these eventually can be overleveled.
On the other hand, some people hate level scaling because it removes a sense of progression. It is legitimate issue to have level 18 characters struggle to band of goblins, and while it can be circumvented with more elite mobs spawning in its place it can also create RP problems.
So are you for or against mobs scaling to match the player power?
I enjoy a bit of mob scaling because it keeps the game a bit more exciting. However, HOW the mob scaling is done is where the real issue tends to lie. I would generally prefer it to work more like my tabletop games. Specifically, where there's a sort of range of possible foes and groups, with a tendency to add more creatures than simply make them stronger.
For example, if an area is supposed to have an encounter with some gnolls, at a certain level/XP value it might generate 1-3 normal gnolls. However, at higher levels, it might generate 2-12 gnolls and 1-3 elite gnolls of some sort (such as a gnoll shaman, a gnoll sorcerer, or a gnoll chief). The strength of the enemies remains more or less consistent but lightly seasoned with heroic versions of those enemies and allows players to cut down lots of baddies in epic fashion.
A higher level kobold encounter might look more like 3-18 kobolds and a kobold sorcerer who casts things like haste on the kobolds and monster summoning I spells, flooding a party with a sea of buffed minions.
The point is, having more varied encounters or encounters that aren't just inflated numbers but semi-tactical bridges the gap significantly between "just another gnoll encounter" and "super gnolls". When the encounter is a mixture of more gnolls + support heroes casting things like prayer and strength of one on their teams, the encounter becomes more interesting, more challenging, and more rewarding, without it breaking verisimilitude/RP.
Even better if the random encounters still include the older weak encounters as well.
there's this thing that's a bit hard to describe... i'll put it like this - you kill bad guys and "clear" areas and you may feel satisfied (yaay these pests / bandits won't harass the locals anymore / come out of the sewers to snatch kids) and then, when you return, surprise! the bad guys have been replaced by badder guys! and it's something that would *always* happen. it's counterintuitive to me.
I always feel like that's just to be expected. When you have a power vacuum, someone else moves in. Isn't that how it usually goes? Some castle falls to ruins, now trolls live there. Trolls get killed off, now a necromancer moves in. Etc.
i surrender. i now think you're right and your points are overall more important than mine. you just have to give me one thing and i'll meet you there - weak (non-upscaled) enemies appearing *sometimes*. more rarely, maybe even a token presence, but not never-ever like kobolds have been eradicated from the region.
Sure, that could be fun. Like, give some room for randomness when choosing encounters. Could be weaker enemies than appropriate for your level, could be a bit stronger. Most of the time they'd match your experience, but with some variance there could be additional spice, as well as a nice one-sided massacre every now and then. I do recognize that can be a cool thing, as @booinyoureyes pointed out.
I always feel like that's just to be expected. When you have a power vacuum, someone else moves in. Isn't that how it usually goes? Some castle falls to ruins, now trolls live there. Trolls get killed off, now a necromancer moves in. Etc.
If anything, that would make someone less powerful take their place. If someone more powerful wanted e.g. a dungeon they would just take it whereas someone less powerful would have to wait until the current possessor was destroyed.
I've voted no because it's so often done poorly in open world environments.
I get frustrated with scaling when all of a sudden every nook and cranny is hiding a boss level enemy. Skyrim is bad for this: early on you have a dungeon full of Draugr minions with an overlord or similar in an easy to understand hierarchy... wind forward a dozen levels or so and the only thing distinguishing the boss is the fact that he has a name (sometimes).
To clarify, it isn't that I find the difficulty off-putting... more that the universe seems to lose its integrity/ rationality.
SoA has an interesting example in the Temple Ruins dungeon: if you enter this area at a high enough level there can be two Liches operating within about 100' of one another (either side of the fire/lava pool). I can't help but end up wondering how the hell these two have been coexisting... not to mention why either of them tolerate the puny Shade Lord.
I hate scaling and have yet to see a good implementation of it. There might be several, but I haven't played them. For me it's about immersion. Having ememies scale (skyrim being a good example of ridiculous scaling) makes the world revolving around my char and I hate that.
I'd rather have alot of areas where I'll be one-shotted if I stray there too soon, then being able to venture anywhere I want from the get-go. Just because my character levels, doesn't mean the enemies have to. Also, I think enemy levels is a good way to funnel players into directions with gentle nudges which can guide new players but which also can be overcome with metagaming when more experienced.
@BGlover explains it well in his post. The player recieves info about a powerful enemy and should indeed wait until he/she ventures there instead of rushing into the lich lord's cave, looking for teh lootz and some easy xp. Newer games (and gamers) seem to prefer the latter, for some reason. I think it may be the overall lack of patience that seem to be integral to all gaming nowadays.
I'd rather have alot of areas where I'll be one-shotted if I stray there too soon, then being able to venture anywhere I want from the get-go.
Different philosophies maybe, but I really, really don't like being forced into a linear progression by cheesy mechanics like that. You want to lock me out, close the door. Don't put one-shot mobs in there that I need 20 more levels to defeat.
What ends up happening in a system like that is that you figure out a way to gain power quickly, and then all of a sudden a lot of areas become utterly trivial. I don't want to plow through enemies secure in the knowledge I can never die. Why would that be fun? Now don't get me wrong, I definitely see the appeal of a huge killing spree every now and then, but too many games just become way too trivial too quickly.
Of course, not everyone likes a challenge. They put in that Story Mode difficulty for a reason, apparently people want it. That's cool. We have a difficulty slider, and it could easily be used as a point of reference.
I guess in some circumstances scaling can make internal sense. Particularly with regard to a main quest if war is a-brewin'.
Take Mass Effect for instance... if the Big Bad is gaining strength and really starting to turn the screw, it makes sense that their forces steadily become more numerous, better equipped, better organised and more "elite".
Even side quests can be fudged this way as you can imagine local government/law-enforcement (or equivalent) being drawn into the major conflict leaving their usual prey to thrive in their absence.
@Skatan fortunately in SoA and ToB there are generally no such areas (in which you will be one-shotted). the game conspicuously tries to avoid that. everything except for the toughest enemies can already be beaten with a minimally levelled party if you put a bigger than normal mental effort into it, and have a bit of luck. a rare exception is the beholder lair before figuring out the cheese for it.
so scaling for me is not relevant to the default "difficulty geography", it's just relevant to the time when you become stronger and some things become an extreme pushover.
I'd rather have alot of areas where I'll be one-shotted if I stray there too soon, then being able to venture anywhere I want from the get-go.
Different philosophies maybe, but I really, really don't like being forced into a linear progression by cheesy mechanics like that. You want to lock me out, close the door. Don't put one-shot mobs in there that I need 20 more levels to defeat.
What ends up happening in a system like that is that you figure out a way to gain power quickly, and then all of a sudden a lot of areas become utterly trivial. I don't want to plow through enemies secure in the knowledge I can never die. Why would that be fun? Now don't get me wrong, I definitely see the appeal of a huge killing spree every now and then, but too many games just become way too trivial too quickly.
Of course, not everyone likes a challenge. They put in that Story Mode difficulty for a reason, apparently people want it. That's cool. We have a difficulty slider, and it could easily be used as a point of reference.
I hear you and understand your point of view, but don't agree with your opinion on how it is implemented. You don't want to be able to progress by a locked door? To me, that sounds very intrusive and like a cheap way of funneling the player into a linear way of playing but giving the illusion of 'choice'. Yes, gaining levels will make some fights trivial, but isn't that really the point? CHARNAME is a bhaal spawn, your average kobold isn't. They should flee by the mere mentioning of his/her name, and just because you visited some area before and thus became stronger, doesn't mean these mobs suddenly disappear only to be magically changed into something stronger and less scared of you.
Just because I dislike level scaling of enemies does not mean I like to wade through legions of low-leveled mobs and feel like a god. If I have say 2-3 different areas to go to, lets call them eg D'arnise keep, Windspear hills and Umar hills, should I be able to visit any of these areas? Yes, I believe so, unless RP elements stops it. Should I be able to FINISH them directly? No, not necessarely. See, you could implement different sub-areas of difficulty within the areas, like Firkraags dungeon which has a supereasy outside area, a slightly more and increasingly difficult interior (the battle with the vamp's etc), and a very difficult boss which even gives you the option to leave and return once you are stronger. So, lets say I go there first, I finish eveything but the last boss, then exit and go to somewhere else, lets say D'arnise keep. Should suddenly the trolls who had invaded leveled up and become stronger because I have? No, I think not. Instead I would have increased the level of difficult per level in the keep (though this ofc isn't really donein d'arnise keep).
You mistakenly presume that No to level scaling means No to challenge, when really it's the opposite. Level scaling usually means that it's kinda equally difficult/easy all the time whilst the lack of level scaling mean you suck in the beginning and will die to stuff stronger than you, but once you become stronger, they suck compared to you. You will still have a great challenge vs the higher level mobs you had to avoid, whilst weaker, and the bosses you never dared to face before aquiring a new set of skills and/or items etc. All this whilst not sacrificing immersion for a quite bland experience without ups and downs on the powerscale.
@Skatan fortunately in SoA and ToB there are generally no such areas (in which you will be one-shotted). the game conspicuously tries to avoid that. everything except for the toughest enemies can already be beaten with a minimally levelled party if you put a bigger than normal mental effort into it, and have a bit of luck. a rare exception is the beholder lair before figuring out the cheese for it.
so scaling for me is not relevant to the default "difficulty geography", it's just relevant to the time when you become stronger and some things become an extreme pushover.
There are eg. a couple of liches that might have been scaled to be "average" difficulty if you encounter them directly out of the starting dungeon and similar. I prefer that they aren't and if you try it when to low level, you will either die or you will have to use alot of metagaming in order to win.
And btw, even though I ofc (for obvious reasons) refer to BG in this thread, my opinion on level scaling is not purely based on the BG games. I'm speaking more broadly than that.
On a sidenote, one way to more "intelligently" implement level scaling is to have mobs advance when eg chapters advance, so that certain areas spawn different mobs in chapter 2 vs 3 etc. If you, as a player, choose to advance the main plot thus opening up the next chapter, you will encounter higher level mobs, and you can do so at very low level or at a higher level. It's not level scaling of mobs based on your charname, but on progress. Just as it should be, IMHO. This could have been used to a greater extent in BG and would probably not break immersion for me (in most cases, though depending or area etc ofc).
I hear you and understand your point of view, but don't agree with your opinion on how it is implemented. You don't want to be able to progress by a locked door? To me, that sounds very intrusive and like a cheap way of funneling the player into a linear way of playing but giving the illusion of 'choice'.
True, and I don't like it either. But if they do that, at least it doesn't mean you trivialize all the other areas. When you open something up but gate it behind high level monsters, why is it even accessible at low levels unless there's ways to go there early? And if there are, that means that all the OTHER areas that aren't high level end up becoming completely trivial, simply because you wanted to go to Place X first.
Both are an illusion of choice, it's only that one of them is at least honest about it. Doesn't mean I want that in any game, of course.
Yes, gaining levels will make some fights trivial, but isn't that really the point?
No. I NEVER want any fight to be TRIVIAL. I want some to get easier as I get better (levels, gear, skill, whatever), but I also want to maintain a challenge for as long as possible. Games are fun because they are a challenge. They're not walls you have to climb over and then it's smooth walking from there. That's never fun. There's a reason the hardest fights tend to be towards the end of the game, if levels trivialized things that wouldn't be the case. In fact, it's a sign of bad balancing.
CHARNAME is a bhaal spawn, your average kobold isn't. They should flee by the mere mentioning of his/her name, and just because you visited some area before and thus became stronger, doesn't mean these mobs suddenly disappear only to be magically changed into something stronger and less scared of you.
I get the logic, but this is a game. I don't want it to be 100% consistent with logic if that means I'm not having any fun. Can you really imagine everyone fleeing before you at the mere mention of your passage? Great fun, walking through all those deserted streets and empty hills, where nothing and no one stands against you. Much game. Very engaging.
People tend to get too hung up on the RP aspect. Maybe that's because this is D&D-based, and they're used to campaigns being run by humans. But there, too, things are adapting. DMs don't bore you by making you fight twenty encounters of lvl 1 goblins for six hours straight.
Just because I dislike level scaling of enemies does not mean I like to wade through legions of low-leveled mobs and feel like a god. If I have say 2-3 different areas to go to, lets call them eg D'arnise keep, Windspear hills and Umar hills, should I be able to visit any of these areas? Yes, I believe so, unless RP elements stops it. Should I be able to FINISH them directly? No, not necessarely. See, you could implement different sub-areas of difficulty within the areas, like Firkraags dungeon which has a supereasy outside area, a slightly more and increasingly difficult interior (the battle with the vamp's etc), and a very difficult boss which even gives you the option to leave and return once you are stronger. So, lets say I go there first, I finish eveything but the last boss, then exit and go to somewhere else, lets say D'arnise keep. Should suddenly the trolls who had invaded leveled up and become stronger because I have? No, I think not. Instead I would have increased the level of difficult per level in the keep (though this ofc isn't really donein d'arnise keep).
See my first point again. If they're super strong, why can you go there? In terms of game mechanics, mind you. Either it's just a tease and you're not supposed to be there yet, in which case the game is offering illusion of choice and forces you into a certain progression path; or you can be there if you gain the power early somehow, in which case all the OTHER areas you go to afterwards are suddenly trivial. Neither is good for engaging, fun gameplay.
You mistakenly presume that No to level scaling means No to challenge, when really it's the opposite. Level scaling usually means that it's kinda equally difficult/easy all the time whilst the lack of level scaling mean you suck in the beginning and will die to stuff stronger than you, but once you become stronger, they suck compared to you. You will still have a great challenge vs the higher level mobs you had to avoid, whilst weaker, and the bosses you never dared to face before aquiring a new set of skills and/or items etc. All this whilst not sacrificing immersion for a quite bland experience without ups and downs on the powerscale.
While that makes sense in theory, the static nature of the enemy distribution means that you essentially have a set progression path. Go to Area A, then B, then C. If you go to Area C first, you get stomped. But if you then level up so you can survive Area C, Areas A and B are ridiculously easy and no challenge at all - i.e. as soon as you deviate from the path set before you, the game goes out of whack. That's why scaling is put into games in the first place, usually.
Edit: To further elaborate, I generally don't care for level scaling and would prefer to avoid it. Difficulty level scaling I would be more interested in, but again, only if optional.
Comments
edit: hadn't looked at the poll when i wrote this, my bad
...except for the fact that BG should have level scaling. As was pointed out in his very well-written post, Oblivion's level scaling was very poorly implemented and I would be afraid that something like that would happen with BG. Oblivion vanilla was so frustrating to get a "powerful" quest-end weapon at level 1 that you couldn't use later. I hated that once you reached level 20 you had to use cheap tactics just to stay alive. If everyone in the wilderness is this powerful, why haven't they overrun the city yet? It makes it feel like the game revolves around the player, rather than the player is just a person in another world. Level scaling could totally destroy immersion for me if it was done poorly.
It would be awesome if properly implemented though. Don't remove the weaker enemies, and don't always improve them, either. As Charname's level increases, so does his reputation as a killing machine. The weaker goblins, although stupid, should be smart enough to know when they are outmatched. So instead of charging blindly on, even though they are obviously outmatched, and instead of having the foresight to find some ogrillons to help them out because Charname is now level 5 and we can't beat him if he's over level 3, they run away like good little goblins should.
Problem is, that is more programming work also, in the name of enemies that don't even matter. But it would still be fun.
Don't go into the ruined temple, they said in the tavern, something evil lurks there.... Don't venture unawares into the ruined temple, said the wise woman on the road, something undead lurks there.... the bard in the pub where I had a pint was singing a song about a mighty Lord that died and rose again as undead.... on the deserted track leading up to the ruined temple were several half eaten corpses of adventurers..... further up the track I passed a mail box with the name label 'Lich Lord' written on it....
And then I DIED! What kind of crazy game puts a Lich in when I'm only second level!!!!!!!!!!! What a stupid game!!!!!!!!!!
i'm really interested in your opinion on this:
with comprehensive level-scaling how would you explain not encountering, say, kobolds in static encounters anymore? in let's say sewers... so the kobolds saw you coming from a distance and they scuttled away? okay, i can live with that. i'm not really looking forward butchering more of these poor fellows.
but then, how come a pack of stronger enemies has instantly arrived? where did they come from? did they see the kobolds evacuating so they overtook their turf? if they're already stronger why wait for them to run away?
but of course all this is okay and can be constructed for several instances. but you can only take it so far. real level-scaling requires *a lot* of abstraction and rationalizations like this fall apart. the abstraction consumes the world-building.
so sometimes you would have to meet these weak critters too.
if without level-scaling you meet them at a rate of occurence of N you shouldn't now meet them at N/50 or never when going to the areas they normally reside in, or when backtracking, but rather N/2, or N/3.
you need that element of familiarity to keep the environment believable.
I'm not talking about smashing all the RP to bits and have the streets run rampant with epic-level liches lurking behind every barrel. Those are the extremes, and they're bad for many reasons, not just RP violations. Besides, a lot of the established paradigms are already completely fictional and largely arbitrary. Modifying them a little isn't a world-shattering change, I don't think.
How does the player know there are kobolds ahead instead of something more dangerous? From the characters position, (s)he has never been in that area before?
And if they have been, and they got massacred, perhaps the kobolds went looking for a safer area. If kobolds keep spawning, i usually ask myself how many of these creatures are there? How have I not dented the ecological structure of the area? Kobolds leaving lets what they eat, grow more in abundance. Before, those number might not have sufficed a larger creature(s) but now it is suffice and sustainable hunting grounds.
yeah it seems like i am metagaming, but consider this: in BG games there's a fair bit of backtracking. enemies may respawn. so that's how you know.
Also there isn't actually whole lot of backtracking, is there? Unless you go somewhere then leave before finishing whatever is going on there and come back later. If you progress steadily, you very rarely come back to areas with lots of monsters that you've been to before.
But either way, I'm more than happy with some RP inconsistencies for the sake of smoother gameplay.
Can you really tell me that the Great Ghoul Genocide doesn't sound delightfully amusing in a situation like this?
there's this thing that's a bit hard to describe... i'll put it like this - you kill bad guys and "clear" areas and you may feel satisfied (yaay these pests / bandits won't harass the locals anymore / come out of the sewers to snatch kids) and then, when you return, surprise! the bad guys have been replaced by badder guys! and it's something that would *always* happen. it's counterintuitive to me.
however
i surrender. i now think you're right and your points are overall more important than mine. you just have to give me one thing and i'll meet you there - weak (non-upscaled) enemies appearing *sometimes*. more rarely, maybe even a token presence, but not never-ever like kobolds have been eradicated from the region.
For example, if an area is supposed to have an encounter with some gnolls, at a certain level/XP value it might generate 1-3 normal gnolls. However, at higher levels, it might generate 2-12 gnolls and 1-3 elite gnolls of some sort (such as a gnoll shaman, a gnoll sorcerer, or a gnoll chief). The strength of the enemies remains more or less consistent but lightly seasoned with heroic versions of those enemies and allows players to cut down lots of baddies in epic fashion.
A higher level kobold encounter might look more like 3-18 kobolds and a kobold sorcerer who casts things like haste on the kobolds and monster summoning I spells, flooding a party with a sea of buffed minions.
The point is, having more varied encounters or encounters that aren't just inflated numbers but semi-tactical bridges the gap significantly between "just another gnoll encounter" and "super gnolls". When the encounter is a mixture of more gnolls + support heroes casting things like prayer and strength of one on their teams, the encounter becomes more interesting, more challenging, and more rewarding, without it breaking verisimilitude/RP.
Even better if the random encounters still include the older weak encounters as well.
I get frustrated with scaling when all of a sudden every nook and cranny is hiding a boss level enemy. Skyrim is bad for this: early on you have a dungeon full of Draugr minions with an overlord or similar in an easy to understand hierarchy... wind forward a dozen levels or so and the only thing distinguishing the boss is the fact that he has a name (sometimes).
To clarify, it isn't that I find the difficulty off-putting... more that the universe seems to lose its integrity/ rationality.
SoA has an interesting example in the Temple Ruins dungeon: if you enter this area at a high enough level there can be two Liches operating within about 100' of one another (either side of the fire/lava pool). I can't help but end up wondering how the hell these two have been coexisting... not to mention why either of them tolerate the puny Shade Lord.
I'd rather have alot of areas where I'll be one-shotted if I stray there too soon, then being able to venture anywhere I want from the get-go. Just because my character levels, doesn't mean the enemies have to. Also, I think enemy levels is a good way to funnel players into directions with gentle nudges which can guide new players but which also can be overcome with metagaming when more experienced.
@BGlover explains it well in his post. The player recieves info about a powerful enemy and should indeed wait until he/she ventures there instead of rushing into the lich lord's cave, looking for teh lootz and some easy xp. Newer games (and gamers) seem to prefer the latter, for some reason. I think it may be the overall lack of patience that seem to be integral to all gaming nowadays.
What ends up happening in a system like that is that you figure out a way to gain power quickly, and then all of a sudden a lot of areas become utterly trivial. I don't want to plow through enemies secure in the knowledge I can never die. Why would that be fun? Now don't get me wrong, I definitely see the appeal of a huge killing spree every now and then, but too many games just become way too trivial too quickly.
Of course, not everyone likes a challenge. They put in that Story Mode difficulty for a reason, apparently people want it. That's cool. We have a difficulty slider, and it could easily be used as a point of reference.
Take Mass Effect for instance... if the Big Bad is gaining strength and really starting to turn the screw, it makes sense that their forces steadily become more numerous, better equipped, better organised and more "elite".
Even side quests can be fudged this way as you can imagine local government/law-enforcement (or equivalent) being drawn into the major conflict leaving their usual prey to thrive in their absence.
fortunately in SoA and ToB there are generally no such areas (in which you will be one-shotted). the game conspicuously tries to avoid that.
everything except for the toughest enemies can already be beaten with a minimally levelled party if you put a bigger than normal mental effort into it, and have a bit of luck.
a rare exception is the beholder lair before figuring out the cheese for it.
so scaling for me is not relevant to the default "difficulty geography", it's just relevant to the time when you become stronger and some things become an extreme pushover.
Yes, gaining levels will make some fights trivial, but isn't that really the point? CHARNAME is a bhaal spawn, your average kobold isn't. They should flee by the mere mentioning of his/her name, and just because you visited some area before and thus became stronger, doesn't mean these mobs suddenly disappear only to be magically changed into something stronger and less scared of you.
Just because I dislike level scaling of enemies does not mean I like to wade through legions of low-leveled mobs and feel like a god. If I have say 2-3 different areas to go to, lets call them eg D'arnise keep, Windspear hills and Umar hills, should I be able to visit any of these areas? Yes, I believe so, unless RP elements stops it. Should I be able to FINISH them directly? No, not necessarely. See, you could implement different sub-areas of difficulty within the areas, like Firkraags dungeon which has a supereasy outside area, a slightly more and increasingly difficult interior (the battle with the vamp's etc), and a very difficult boss which even gives you the option to leave and return once you are stronger. So, lets say I go there first, I finish eveything but the last boss, then exit and go to somewhere else, lets say D'arnise keep. Should suddenly the trolls who had invaded leveled up and become stronger because I have? No, I think not. Instead I would have increased the level of difficult per level in the keep (though this ofc isn't really donein d'arnise keep).
You mistakenly presume that No to level scaling means No to challenge, when really it's the opposite. Level scaling usually means that it's kinda equally difficult/easy all the time whilst the lack of level scaling mean you suck in the beginning and will die to stuff stronger than you, but once you become stronger, they suck compared to you. You will still have a great challenge vs the higher level mobs you had to avoid, whilst weaker, and the bosses you never dared to face before aquiring a new set of skills and/or items etc. All this whilst not sacrificing immersion for a quite bland experience without ups and downs on the powerscale.
And btw, even though I ofc (for obvious reasons) refer to BG in this thread, my opinion on level scaling is not purely based on the BG games. I'm speaking more broadly than that.
On a sidenote, one way to more "intelligently" implement level scaling is to have mobs advance when eg chapters advance, so that certain areas spawn different mobs in chapter 2 vs 3 etc. If you, as a player, choose to advance the main plot thus opening up the next chapter, you will encounter higher level mobs, and you can do so at very low level or at a higher level. It's not level scaling of mobs based on your charname, but on progress. Just as it should be, IMHO. This could have been used to a greater extent in BG and would probably not break immersion for me (in most cases, though depending or area etc ofc).
Both are an illusion of choice, it's only that one of them is at least honest about it. Doesn't mean I want that in any game, of course. No. I NEVER want any fight to be TRIVIAL. I want some to get easier as I get better (levels, gear, skill, whatever), but I also want to maintain a challenge for as long as possible. Games are fun because they are a challenge. They're not walls you have to climb over and then it's smooth walking from there. That's never fun. There's a reason the hardest fights tend to be towards the end of the game, if levels trivialized things that wouldn't be the case. In fact, it's a sign of bad balancing. I get the logic, but this is a game. I don't want it to be 100% consistent with logic if that means I'm not having any fun. Can you really imagine everyone fleeing before you at the mere mention of your passage? Great fun, walking through all those deserted streets and empty hills, where nothing and no one stands against you. Much game. Very engaging.
People tend to get too hung up on the RP aspect. Maybe that's because this is D&D-based, and they're used to campaigns being run by humans. But there, too, things are adapting. DMs don't bore you by making you fight twenty encounters of lvl 1 goblins for six hours straight.
See my first point again. If they're super strong, why can you go there? In terms of game mechanics, mind you. Either it's just a tease and you're not supposed to be there yet, in which case the game is offering illusion of choice and forces you into a certain progression path; or you can be there if you gain the power early somehow, in which case all the OTHER areas you go to afterwards are suddenly trivial. Neither is good for engaging, fun gameplay. While that makes sense in theory, the static nature of the enemy distribution means that you essentially have a set progression path. Go to Area A, then B, then C. If you go to Area C first, you get stomped. But if you then level up so you can survive Area C, Areas A and B are ridiculously easy and no challenge at all - i.e. as soon as you deviate from the path set before you, the game goes out of whack. That's why scaling is put into games in the first place, usually.
Edit: To further elaborate, I generally don't care for level scaling and would prefer to avoid it. Difficulty level scaling I would be more interested in, but again, only if optional.