I mean, I talked to her, she didn't give a tip. Was there a way to understand I should enter the tavern again after that? Don't you think this is getting too complicated, about Ekundayo. Believe me, I put tons of hours in games, I don't ignore the details. But the barmaid looked at that time as a character who is just there.
I understand you adore the game, but I'm just sharing my opinion.
Losing content because you din't payed attention is a quintessential RPG element. I lost a puzzle in the first dungeon that i only saw on my second run.
Baldur's Gate 2 has a quest involving player stronghold and a secret mindflayer area that i have lost in my first run... Hell, playing Gothic 2 returning with the poor english translation made me lost a lot of content.
I'm going to stick this question in a set of spoiler tag, but I have a general question relating to companions and the house at the edge of time.
There are DEFINITE spoilers in this. So dont clicky if you havent beaten the game yet!
So my question is: I generally understand that if I skip a companion's side quests, they'll generally die or turn against me at the end of the game. Mostly - I've read Valerie never will, but it sounds like everyone else does.
I also understand that if I do the "right" thing in most cases (I.E - the good guy option. Stopping Jaethal from all her machinations. Forgiving Tristian, etc), I'll get to keep everyone. On my first playthough, I almost kept everyone (lost Jaethal).
What I dont know is: If you complete every character side quest, but through an evil outcome (Say: Jublihost - I'm blanking on the specifics of his quest, but I remember I can basically make him be selfish (evil) or help the other gnomes (good). If I make him do the good thing, he wont turn on me at the end. If I make him do the evil thing... will he still turn on me the same as if I didnt do his quest at all?)
Same with Reg and Octavia. I know the good solution is to let the slave master guy escape while saving the slaves. If I choose not to save the slaves, will they both be alive? Or will it cause one of them to kill the other in their trial?
Amiri - I dont know. I feel like I didnt do her quest perfectly the first time and she joined me, but I bet I didnt do it as evilly as possible either.
Ekun - Would he still join me if I let me go all super revenge mode with the lady (who's name I'm forgetting).
Harrim - I guess the evil approach is to not do his quest at all? Or is there a different route that's more evil here?
I do know that if I go full evil, Tristian is 100% gone. I'm fine with that. What would be a pain is to go full evil on most of these quests only to find out that means I lose everyone but Jaethal and Valerie. I know Nok Nok is also technically evil, but I think the evil approach to his companion quests is to not treat him like a hero. Which is kind of weird... would he die, too?
I'd love some insight, as I'm starting to get to the point in the game where I have to make character choices. My evil Necromancer/Cleric/Mystic Theurige isnt messing around being nice).
I'm going to stick this question in a set of spoiler tag, but I have a general question relating to companions and the house at the edge of time.
There are DEFINITE spoilers in this. So dont clicky if you havent beaten the game yet!
So my question is: I generally understand that if I skip a companion's side quests, they'll generally die or turn against me at the end of the game. Mostly - I've read Valerie never will, but it sounds like everyone else does.
I also understand that if I do the "right" thing in most cases (I.E - the good guy option. Stopping Jaethal from all her machinations. Forgiving Tristian, etc), I'll get to keep everyone. On my first playthough, I almost kept everyone (lost Jaethal).
What I dont know is: If you complete every character side quest, but through an evil outcome (Say: Jublihost - I'm blanking on the specifics of his quest, but I remember I can basically make him be selfish (evil) or help the other gnomes (good). If I make him do the good thing, he wont turn on me at the end. If I make him do the evil thing... will he still turn on me the same as if I didnt do his quest at all?)
Same with Reg and Octavia. I know the good solution is to let the slave master guy escape while saving the slaves. If I choose not to save the slaves, will they both be alive? Or will it cause one of them to kill the other in their trial?
Amiri - I dont know. I feel like I didnt do her quest perfectly the first time and she joined me, but I bet I didnt do it as evilly as possible either.
Ekun - Would he still join me if I let me go all super revenge mode with the lady (who's name I'm forgetting).
Harrim - I guess the evil approach is to not do his quest at all? Or is there a different route that's more evil here?
I do know that if I go full evil, Tristian is 100% gone. I'm fine with that. What would be a pain is to go full evil on most of these quests only to find out that means I lose everyone but Jaethal and Valerie. I know Nok Nok is also technically evil, but I think the evil approach to his companion quests is to not treat him like a hero. Which is kind of weird... would he die, too?
I'd love some insight, as I'm starting to get to the point in the game where I have to make character choices. My evil Necromancer/Cleric/Mystic Theurige isnt messing around being nice).
Here's what I know.
Amiri, if Nilak dies I think she'll refuse to move when you find her at the HATOT.
Harrim, So long as you do his quests he should be good any way that they turn out.
Ekun, I had an early run where I set him on a path of vengeance and he died, but last time I did that he didn't. So I think maybe something changed here at some point?
Nok Nok, I've treated him as a hero and he's pulled through fine. I think you just have to do all his quests, too.
Reg and Octavia, I've never tried the bad ways of completing their quest, but heard one of them dies if you don't save the slaves at the Technic League hideout in the mountains.
You meet Khalid and Jaheira in the FAI - probably the first place the player goes to - considering Gorion mentioned the FAI and even told you about Khalid and Jaheira!
Do a quick run to see. Don't go to FAI, complete the Naskel mines quest, go directly to the FAI and J&K won't be there.
Yes, this I know of. I mean, you know about them from Gorion. How was I supposed to know about Ekundayo? See, this is the difference.
See, I have some sympathy for some of the other complaints. Not all of them, some just feels like you're looking for things to feel negative about, but some. But this though? It's just wrong.
I really have no clue how anyone could possibly miss Ekundayo. His dog companion will lead you right to him. You can't not run into the, it's literally just a few steps (down the only path from the entry ) into the area they're in. You'd almost have to go out of your way not to find him.
I mean, sure. You made a mistake, it happens. But don't say the game is badly designed because you weren't paying attention to it when it clearly hints at you to go up that path.
I an not sure if they changed but do you lose your mercenaries(not pre made companions) in that part?
Not sure about losing your existing mercs, but in later versions Anoriel 8 Eyes gets teleported in with you along with some mercs, so you can hire some.
Couple of remarks while I'm progressing with the story:
* Story seems to be a bit more interesting after defeating Stag Lord and claiming the kingdom as my own. There are a couple of quests that seems interesting and hooked me up (i.e the twin sisters story).
* Political affairs between baronies and countries are quite interesting, made me to invest more attention to the world and geography. It's the one way to hook me up with the setting, the other way is the story itself, how it's unfolding, introducing new characters, places and histories. Anyway Kingmaker does a hell of a lot job in this aspect than PoE1.
* Kingdom management - I'm undecided yet. It doesn't seem to be a chore as I feared, but it does seem as a distraction from adventuring. Let's see how it goes. For now, it's neither yay or meh.
* Fight difficulties - if not the fact that STORY is what interests me the most, I would be in similar spot as @JuliusBorisov. I find mechanics complicated and fights overly difficult. I quickly set difficulty setting to Easy and even then I receive a proper beating once in a while. Like the cursed Ratnook Hill. I mean, what the hell? Wererats? And why I get this massive beating from those guys, whereas Wererats (and greater Wererats/Werewolves) in Tenebrous Depths are manageable? I mean these guys are also nasty, but I can beat them with proper preparation. Those rodents in Ratnook Hill, not so much. I mean, I can understand I cannot beat dragon being on lvl5, but when I see a creature that logic tells me I can beat and I get my as pounded, clearly encounter design sucks. I admit I'm no tactician, mods like SCS are a nightmare to me, but I shouldn't need to decrease difficulty to Easy to be able to beat regular battles.
* Locations design - come on. Let's compare it with BG1/BG2... let's compare Tenebrous Depths to any other dungeon in BG2 or IWD. Not even remotely the same level of quality. When you walk around the Umar Hills, Durlag's Tower, Firkraag lair or any dungeon in IWD, the location itself tells a story. Each corridor, each chamber adds up to the immersion. Here? It's just one similar chamber after another. Meh Owlcat...
I feel like comparing Tenebrous Depths in particular is a bad decision since it's intended purpose is the rogue-like randomly generated mode, I feel like the version in the main campaign is just a bonus to the "real" DLC.
If you're level 5 ratnook hill shouldn't be too bad, you just need your cleric to cast resist energy, communal on the party. That should be one of the spells you keep a slot memorized for, it and the 4th level spell protection from energy, communal, are life savers. The spells even let you pick the energy type on the fly. The clerics the game gives you can spontaneously convert any spell they have memorized to the healing spell of the same level (Little arrow above the spell), so there's literally no reason to actually memorize most of the healing spells on them. My first run I really got my ass handed to me until I figured out you always have the resist/protection from energy and delay poison, communal spells memorized at all times. You can also hideous laughter the rats to shut down the rogues.
Tenebruous depths would be more along the lines of icewind dale, a really long boring dungeon crawl. Can you tell I've never finished Icewind Dale? I finished the depths once and will probably never play it again. Overly long dungeon crawls with little story don't do anything for me. I will say Watcher's Keep in BG2 was the perfect long dungeon for me and a rare gem. There are some cool areas to look forward to, but overall the rest of the dungeons are not anywhere near as huge, and I'm thankful for it.
Anyone defeated the Spawn of Rovagug as a magician? I had to create custom mercs and abandon my party limit of 3 idea to fight him... He was very hard even on normal.
Started another run on PF:KM. OMG. The loadings are so fast compared to launch date. And encounters are far easier. They even traded the swarms for giant spiders in a encounter due the complains from journalists "this game doesn't let me solve everything from a insect swarm to a stone golem with a fast swinging blade"...
Talking to people and exploring the game world will reward you. An unknown concept in RPG's, I know.
yeah, i wish PFKM was a game like that
with all these BS time limits to do anything you can't explore the game world and talk to everyone
i even have a mod to get rid of exhaustion and fatigue from travelling because you can't move more than 2 nano meters before everyone in your team is tired and have crazy penalties
and i still dont have time to explore everywhere i still have a million places on my map that i want to go to but i cant because there is always some new curse or some garbage plot line i have to go to or the kingdom thing is on fire and if you dont do those you lose and all that trash
like a couple of days ago, i was trying to explore the map uncover areas find goodies and i was making sure that i still had lots of time left before the next curse and i got a game over because my kingdom got destroyed, what lol? and then i found out is was because of the "troll rampage" nonsense in the kingdom management part, but the problem was, i was getting 3 at a time and i could only use 1 advisor to solve it, which was stupid, and there was no sign telling me to hurry my ass up to the troll fortress because i was still looking for the stupid thing which was part of the quest in of itself *sigh*
so i had to put my kingdom on invincible to continue on, and then finally they gave me a time limit to finish that off or else it would be a permanent game over, so i had to stop exploring and start doing every single quest that they wanted me to do
i think one part about this game that turns off a lot of players is that you are dragged by the nose, except for chapter 1, i feel like i never have enough time to go out and explore, because any wasted time doing that, my kingdom is falling apart or running out of time and bleh bleh blah, so now i rushing to save my kingdom and stuff and i just can't relax ever
and now, there part im in 2 of my party members just peaced out ( amiri and tristian ) and both of their quests are telling me to; hurry up before its to late! thank god each of their quests are on opposite sides of the map ffs
so i had to take a break, sometimes this game's nonsense just gets on my nerves, it was devloped in such a weird masochistic way, that i can only take so much before it makes me want to give up
in fact, i think i have a perfect analogy of this game; PFKM is like a jaw breaker, do you remember what jaw breakers are? ( i dont know if they are still around or even exist in other countries ) but to bring those up to speed a jaw breaker is a candy about the size of a golf ball, some bigger some smaller, and you could never straight up eat this candy, so you had to suck on it for ages, and while you sucked on this diabetes filled treat, there would be different layers of candy as you went with different flavors and all that jazz to make it fun
this game, is a jaw breaker, but unfortunately every 2 layer is a layer of feces not candy, so you start off on a candy layer, everything is good, but then you go a bit and hit a feces layer, and think to yourself; uh, thats awful, but then you remember the first layer being pretty decent so you reluctantly go through the feces layer hoping that candy is coming back, and your gamble pays off, you go through the feces and we are back to candy, so now we are back on track, but then when you finish off that candy layer; another feces layer comes up, and this time its more feces tasting than ever, but again reluctantly you plow through it hoping for a candy layer and again you find another one, but the problem is; you never find 2 candy layers in a row, it goes candy, feces, candy, feces, and then eventually you get 2 feces layers in a row and its over, you just cant take the crap anymore ( pun intended ) and you throw it away which i have done with this game multiple times
now, im as far as i've ever been at level 12 and i want to finish this game so badly just for the sake that i never need to play it again, but man is it ever such a chore
and with this i think i made a realization, this game is not for casuals, this game is not for wanting to discover new worlds and friends, this game is all about builds with hints of RP
now for me, im not real into the RP thing, although i like it there, kind of like when you are working or doing some activity, its nice to do it with some music in the back ground, and although the music isnt necessary it helps the mood i sort of deal
but in this game, its all about builds, and im not talking about 20 class levels in a class with good feats, im talking about arbitrary class dipping, weird item usage, bizarre feat taking that would make absolutely zero RP sense or even conventional logic to take
every time i see someone come to the beam dog forums, and ask what the best "build" for characters are in the IE games, i always laugh thinking; what are you talking about? that is completely unnecessary and in fact you get better enjoyment out of the game being "unoptimized" than you would being an OP god
switch that over to PFKM and if you even make the slightest mistake in your character you are crippled forever and you WILL be punished for it
and in my opinion this is just piss poor game design
how is that i can easily beat BG1 with a solo barbarian on insane, while in PFKM i have a balanced team of 6 and im getting my ass handed to me on normal? the answer; masochism
so in the BG games, enemies were not optimized in the slightest, they were average, boiler plate, run of the mill, and it worked perfectly fine, and the enemies that did have some optimization for the 99.99% of the time it was pretty fair/reasonable/made sense
then here we are with PFKM where every single enemy is optimized to the 9s hell i would even say 11s, enemies have such insane to hit/to damage and never fail fortitude saves, it forces ridiculous save and reload scumming
in the BG series even if you were up against something that was way pass your level it was either mind boggling obvious you shouldn't be there or there was always a non cheap way to win the encounter, encounters in the BG series never felt unfair
now in PFKM unfairness is part of the game, half the fights i do is just reload scum until i win ( now granted im a dumbass playing this game on a difficulty between normal and challenging thinking; ah i know how the rules work, i should be good to go..... lol ) and since my "builds" are "wrong" there is no; "oh there is always something you can do to win" nope, because of the goofball way saving throws work, low level spells will always be saved against ( well not always, but damn well near close to ) because of the idiotic huge stats of the baddies so it just comes down to hopefully they roll 1s or else you lose *sigh* in fact i believe i've seen things online talking about how all the enemies in PFKM are way stronger than they are in the table top game, so its quite puzzling as why they did that, did they want to make something harder than dark souls? did they want the title for hardest game ever? hmm
now i bet there is people out there that can play this game on unfair with one CHAR and says its piss easy and all that wank, and thats good for you, hopefully owlcat gave you a medal in real life so you can put that on your resume the next time you go in for a job interview and see how much the interviewer cares
now if you'll excuse me, im going to continuing playing my play through because i must be as smart as a sack of hammers, but at least i didn't buy a million rolls of toilet paper...
Time limits AREN'T a problem. Lets be real. If trolls are attacking your city, spend months in other side of the world consequence free makes no sense.
@sarevok57 play the game the opposite of how you play most RPGs. By that I mean, when somebody tells you to do something, you should probably do it. In between the main/companion quest events you'll get plenty of time to explore and build your kingdom. You've got some leeway when something comes up, but you generally want to look into things people ask you about in a week or 2. So main quest first, then side quests.
Fallout 1 had time limit on many quests And certain things that you do influence the time limit. The idea of wasting time without any consequence is a modern "idea"...
I disagree strongly that this game is about builds. You sound like this conclusion is just a knee-jerk reaction because you didn't like the game. You can't peace out and go around exploring for treasure in the middle of your domain being invaded by trolls, so "the game is all about builds"? That's a nonsensical deduction. The whole idea that you can just go about your day itself hinges on the anti-roleplay meta-idea that the game will just make the plot wait for you and dallying won't have any consequences despite the narrative clearly describing a crisis.
Now, I agree about enemies being too difficult at times. But there's extensive options available to amend that. So I'd agree that you could draw your conclusion about builds from that. But if you were to look at the unoptimized way they built their companion characters, I'd say that they really did not expect this game to be about "builds" or minmaxing. I think they just had a flawed idea of what kind of difficulty was difficult, likely simply because of being too use-blind to the Pathfinder system. It's the same situation as with the spider swarms where they greatly underestimated the potential players understanding of what a "swarm" entails mechanically.
There is also some encounters and some zones where the enemies are simply much more high level than you, or your party just do not have the tools or spells needed until later. Thing is, it´s a crpg, they do not warn you that you are in a zone not intended to your level even if you have access to it. Several examples of that are with the encounter with the owlbears in the hidden clearing or maybe candlemere lake, the roc in the peak and the witch hut at the start of the chapter.
You do not really have to fight and win every enemy you met at your level with every party setup possible and without prior preparation. If you can do it that way, that would be a bad design of a game, IMHO.
There is also some encounters and some zones where the enemies are simply much more high level than you, or your party just do not have the tools or spells needed until later. Thing is, it´s a crpg, they do not warn you that you are in a zone not intended to your level even if you have access to it. Several examples of that are with the encounter with the owlbears in the hidden clearing or maybe candlemere lake, the roc in the peak and the witch hut at the start of the chapter.
You do not really have to fight and win every enemy you met at your level with every party setup possible and without prior preparation. If you can do it that way, that would be a bad design of a game, IMHO.
This. Just because you can get to somewhere doesn't mean you should be there at your level. Exploration means you can wander into somewhere you'll get your ass handed to you.
There is also some encounters and some zones where the enemies are simply much more high level than you, or your party just do not have the tools or spells needed until later. Thing is, it´s a crpg, they do not warn you that you are in a zone not intended to your level even if you have access to it. Several examples of that are with the encounter with the owlbears in the hidden clearing or maybe candlemere lake, the roc in the peak and the witch hut at the start of the chapter.
You do not really have to fight and win every enemy you met at your level with every party setup possible and without prior preparation. If you can do it that way, that would be a bad design of a game, IMHO.
There are some interesting designs that go along with this, although I dont completely love or agree with them. For example - I was in the lonely mound last night. Bandits, Skeleton Champions etc - all pretty easy to deal with for my level 5 party.
The last room has the "Lonely Wander", which is a level 13 Barbarian / 2 Undead enemy. His AC is like 27, his saves are insane and he hits on every attack.
Now, I totally dont mind the idea of being able to stumble onto an area with fights that are too challenging for me right now. I dont mind when there are "hidden" encounters like the owlbears, that you're supposed to come back to later.
I dont love the design for the lonely mound, where it's 1 dungeon, and the final room has an enemy that isnt in step with the rest of the enemies. I think a more cohesive dungeon would have been one where every fight was clearly meant to be done by a higher level party, or where that final enemy isnt just 8 levels above the average enemy in the dungeon.
There is also some encounters and some zones where the enemies are simply much more high level than you, or your party just do not have the tools or spells needed until later. Thing is, it´s a crpg, they do not warn you that you are in a zone not intended to your level even if you have access to it. Several examples of that are with the encounter with the owlbears in the hidden clearing or maybe candlemere lake, the roc in the peak and the witch hut at the start of the chapter.
You do not really have to fight and win every enemy you met at your level with every party setup possible and without prior preparation. If you can do it that way, that would be a bad design of a game, IMHO.
There are some interesting designs that go along with this, although I dont completely love or agree with them. For example - I was in the lonely mound last night. Bandits, Skeleton Champions etc - all pretty easy to deal with for my level 5 party.
The last room has the "Lonely Wander", which is a level 13 Barbarian / 2 Undead enemy. His AC is like 27, his saves are insane and he hits on every attack.
Now, I totally dont mind the idea of being able to stumble onto an area with fights that are too challenging for me right now. I dont mind when there are "hidden" encounters like the owlbears, that you're supposed to come back to later.
I dont love the design for the lonely mound, where it's 1 dungeon, and the final room has an enemy that isnt in step with the rest of the enemies. I think a more cohesive dungeon would have been one where every fight was clearly meant to be done by a higher level party, or where that final enemy isnt just 8 levels above the average enemy in the dungeon.
Hah, I got stuck there my first time and had to reload from before I entered. Candlemere is one of the better designed areas for exploration, since it's got one wisp near where you enter. I wandered in there my first time and barely survived that first wisp and knew it was time to go somewhere else.
There is also some encounters and some zones where the enemies are simply much more high level than you, or your party just do not have the tools or spells needed until later. Thing is, it´s a crpg, they do not warn you that you are in a zone not intended to your level even if you have access to it. Several examples of that are with the encounter with the owlbears in the hidden clearing or maybe candlemere lake, the roc in the peak and the witch hut at the start of the chapter.
You do not really have to fight and win every enemy you met at your level with every party setup possible and without prior preparation. If you can do it that way, that would be a bad design of a game, IMHO.
There are some interesting designs that go along with this, although I dont completely love or agree with them. For example - I was in the lonely mound last night. Bandits, Skeleton Champions etc - all pretty easy to deal with for my level 5 party.
The last room has the "Lonely Wander", which is a level 13 Barbarian / 2 Undead enemy. His AC is like 27, his saves are insane and he hits on every attack.
Now, I totally dont mind the idea of being able to stumble onto an area with fights that are too challenging for me right now. I dont mind when there are "hidden" encounters like the owlbears, that you're supposed to come back to later.
I dont love the design for the lonely mound, where it's 1 dungeon, and the final room has an enemy that isnt in step with the rest of the enemies. I think a more cohesive dungeon would have been one where every fight was clearly meant to be done by a higher level party, or where that final enemy isnt just 8 levels above the average enemy in the dungeon.
Hah, I got stuck there my first time and had to reload from before I entered. Candlemere is one of the better designed areas for exploration, since it's got one wisp near where you enter. I wandered in there my first time and barely survived that first wisp and knew it was time to go somewhere else.
Wisps are insane. I honestly think the first real "wake up call" I had from the game was the optional wisp encounter you can have outside the old sycamore tree. You're given context clues about a hard enemy, and that fight is WILDLY out of scope for your first visit to the tree in all likelihood. That said, it's totally optional, and so I think it's a wonderful piece of design.
This is one of those "gotcha" moments @BelgarathMTH mentioned. I'm fine with you thinking this is a wonderful piece of design, - I didn't like it personally. The fact you can't retreat from fights when things go crazy is something that makes me think so.
Hah, I got stuck there my first time and had to reload from before I entered. Candlemere is one of the better designed areas for exploration, since it's got one wisp near where you enter. I wandered in there my first time and barely survived that first wisp and knew it was time to go somewhere else.
Candlemere Tower was... a disappointment for me. It got great environmental storytelling and helluva interesting cosmic horror writings on the tower walls. Not to mentioning those tasty diary entries of the dead adventurer group. But every single encounter there is either will-o-wisps or war-o-wisps... creatures which can be easily dealt with Protection from Elements/ Resistances to Electricity.
The fact that not a single abominable entity from the Dark Tapestry can be located inside the map was probably my greatest disappointed of Pathfinder: Kingmaker. *sigh*
For me one disppointment is that Wiches appears in many quests, since the chapter 2 to the last chapter. The game revolves around feyfolk BUT you can't be a Witch in the game... The dungen design is not good as BG2 but the character creation is the best on the genre.
According to Owlcat, the Witch class was already planned for Kingmaker's kickstarter campaign all along. But its particular stretch goal just wasn't unlocked by the backers back then.
This is one of those "gotcha" moments @BelgarathMTH mentioned. I'm fine with you thinking this is a wonderful piece of design, - I didn't like it personally. The fact you can't retreat from fights when things go crazy is something that makes me think so.
You can retreat in BG from nearly everything.
You can retreat from fights. The two main methods are invisibility and speed. Like, you know, the realistic options? If you're in a fight with a vicious monster, how do you get away? You run or you hide. You don't just get to walk away.
Nearly everything you come up with is either plain wrong or a complaint about realism.
They could launch as a DLC. A lot of people will pay $5 for it. If i remember correctly sorcerer din't reached on solasta kickstarter and will come as a DLC
Comments
I understand you adore the game, but I'm just sharing my opinion.
Baldur's Gate 2 has a quest involving player stronghold and a secret mindflayer area that i have lost in my first run... Hell, playing Gothic 2 returning with the poor english translation made me lost a lot of content.
There are DEFINITE spoilers in this. So dont clicky if you havent beaten the game yet!
So my question is: I generally understand that if I skip a companion's side quests, they'll generally die or turn against me at the end of the game. Mostly - I've read Valerie never will, but it sounds like everyone else does.
I also understand that if I do the "right" thing in most cases (I.E - the good guy option. Stopping Jaethal from all her machinations. Forgiving Tristian, etc), I'll get to keep everyone. On my first playthough, I almost kept everyone (lost Jaethal).
What I dont know is: If you complete every character side quest, but through an evil outcome (Say: Jublihost - I'm blanking on the specifics of his quest, but I remember I can basically make him be selfish (evil) or help the other gnomes (good). If I make him do the good thing, he wont turn on me at the end. If I make him do the evil thing... will he still turn on me the same as if I didnt do his quest at all?)
Same with Reg and Octavia. I know the good solution is to let the slave master guy escape while saving the slaves. If I choose not to save the slaves, will they both be alive? Or will it cause one of them to kill the other in their trial?
Amiri - I dont know. I feel like I didnt do her quest perfectly the first time and she joined me, but I bet I didnt do it as evilly as possible either.
Ekun - Would he still join me if I let me go all super revenge mode with the lady (who's name I'm forgetting).
Harrim - I guess the evil approach is to not do his quest at all? Or is there a different route that's more evil here?
I do know that if I go full evil, Tristian is 100% gone. I'm fine with that. What would be a pain is to go full evil on most of these quests only to find out that means I lose everyone but Jaethal and Valerie. I know Nok Nok is also technically evil, but I think the evil approach to his companion quests is to not treat him like a hero. Which is kind of weird... would he die, too?
I'd love some insight, as I'm starting to get to the point in the game where I have to make character choices. My evil Necromancer/Cleric/Mystic Theurige isnt messing around being nice).
Harrim, So long as you do his quests he should be good any way that they turn out.
Ekun, I had an early run where I set him on a path of vengeance and he died, but last time I did that he didn't. So I think maybe something changed here at some point?
Nok Nok, I've treated him as a hero and he's pulled through fine. I think you just have to do all his quests, too.
Reg and Octavia, I've never tried the bad ways of completing their quest, but heard one of them dies if you don't save the slaves at the Technic League hideout in the mountains.
See, I have some sympathy for some of the other complaints. Not all of them, some just feels like you're looking for things to feel negative about, but some. But this though? It's just wrong.
I really have no clue how anyone could possibly miss Ekundayo. His dog companion will lead you right to him. You can't not run into the, it's literally just a few steps (down the only path from the entry ) into the area they're in. You'd almost have to go out of your way not to find him.
I mean, sure. You made a mistake, it happens. But don't say the game is badly designed because you weren't paying attention to it when it clearly hints at you to go up that path.
Not sure about losing your existing mercs, but in later versions Anoriel 8 Eyes gets teleported in with you along with some mercs, so you can hire some.
* Story seems to be a bit more interesting after defeating Stag Lord and claiming the kingdom as my own. There are a couple of quests that seems interesting and hooked me up (i.e the twin sisters story).
* Political affairs between baronies and countries are quite interesting, made me to invest more attention to the world and geography. It's the one way to hook me up with the setting, the other way is the story itself, how it's unfolding, introducing new characters, places and histories. Anyway Kingmaker does a hell of a lot job in this aspect than PoE1.
* Kingdom management - I'm undecided yet. It doesn't seem to be a chore as I feared, but it does seem as a distraction from adventuring. Let's see how it goes. For now, it's neither yay or meh.
* Fight difficulties - if not the fact that STORY is what interests me the most, I would be in similar spot as @JuliusBorisov. I find mechanics complicated and fights overly difficult. I quickly set difficulty setting to Easy and even then I receive a proper beating once in a while. Like the cursed Ratnook Hill. I mean, what the hell? Wererats? And why I get this massive beating from those guys, whereas Wererats (and greater Wererats/Werewolves) in Tenebrous Depths are manageable? I mean these guys are also nasty, but I can beat them with proper preparation. Those rodents in Ratnook Hill, not so much. I mean, I can understand I cannot beat dragon being on lvl5, but when I see a creature that logic tells me I can beat and I get my as pounded, clearly encounter design sucks. I admit I'm no tactician, mods like SCS are a nightmare to me, but I shouldn't need to decrease difficulty to Easy to be able to beat regular battles.
* Locations design - come on. Let's compare it with BG1/BG2... let's compare Tenebrous Depths to any other dungeon in BG2 or IWD. Not even remotely the same level of quality. When you walk around the Umar Hills, Durlag's Tower, Firkraag lair or any dungeon in IWD, the location itself tells a story. Each corridor, each chamber adds up to the immersion. Here? It's just one similar chamber after another. Meh Owlcat...
Tenebruous depths would be more along the lines of icewind dale, a really long boring dungeon crawl. Can you tell I've never finished Icewind Dale? I finished the depths once and will probably never play it again. Overly long dungeon crawls with little story don't do anything for me. I will say Watcher's Keep in BG2 was the perfect long dungeon for me and a rare gem. There are some cool areas to look forward to, but overall the rest of the dungeons are not anywhere near as huge, and I'm thankful for it.
yeah, i wish PFKM was a game like that
with all these BS time limits to do anything you can't explore the game world and talk to everyone
i even have a mod to get rid of exhaustion and fatigue from travelling because you can't move more than 2 nano meters before everyone in your team is tired and have crazy penalties
and i still dont have time to explore everywhere i still have a million places on my map that i want to go to but i cant because there is always some new curse or some garbage plot line i have to go to or the kingdom thing is on fire and if you dont do those you lose and all that trash
like a couple of days ago, i was trying to explore the map uncover areas find goodies and i was making sure that i still had lots of time left before the next curse and i got a game over because my kingdom got destroyed, what lol? and then i found out is was because of the "troll rampage" nonsense in the kingdom management part, but the problem was, i was getting 3 at a time and i could only use 1 advisor to solve it, which was stupid, and there was no sign telling me to hurry my ass up to the troll fortress because i was still looking for the stupid thing which was part of the quest in of itself *sigh*
so i had to put my kingdom on invincible to continue on, and then finally they gave me a time limit to finish that off or else it would be a permanent game over, so i had to stop exploring and start doing every single quest that they wanted me to do
i think one part about this game that turns off a lot of players is that you are dragged by the nose, except for chapter 1, i feel like i never have enough time to go out and explore, because any wasted time doing that, my kingdom is falling apart or running out of time and bleh bleh blah, so now i rushing to save my kingdom and stuff and i just can't relax ever
and now, there part im in 2 of my party members just peaced out ( amiri and tristian ) and both of their quests are telling me to; hurry up before its to late! thank god each of their quests are on opposite sides of the map ffs
so i had to take a break, sometimes this game's nonsense just gets on my nerves, it was devloped in such a weird masochistic way, that i can only take so much before it makes me want to give up
in fact, i think i have a perfect analogy of this game; PFKM is like a jaw breaker, do you remember what jaw breakers are? ( i dont know if they are still around or even exist in other countries ) but to bring those up to speed a jaw breaker is a candy about the size of a golf ball, some bigger some smaller, and you could never straight up eat this candy, so you had to suck on it for ages, and while you sucked on this diabetes filled treat, there would be different layers of candy as you went with different flavors and all that jazz to make it fun
this game, is a jaw breaker, but unfortunately every 2 layer is a layer of feces not candy, so you start off on a candy layer, everything is good, but then you go a bit and hit a feces layer, and think to yourself; uh, thats awful, but then you remember the first layer being pretty decent so you reluctantly go through the feces layer hoping that candy is coming back, and your gamble pays off, you go through the feces and we are back to candy, so now we are back on track, but then when you finish off that candy layer; another feces layer comes up, and this time its more feces tasting than ever, but again reluctantly you plow through it hoping for a candy layer and again you find another one, but the problem is; you never find 2 candy layers in a row, it goes candy, feces, candy, feces, and then eventually you get 2 feces layers in a row and its over, you just cant take the crap anymore ( pun intended ) and you throw it away which i have done with this game multiple times
now, im as far as i've ever been at level 12 and i want to finish this game so badly just for the sake that i never need to play it again, but man is it ever such a chore
and with this i think i made a realization, this game is not for casuals, this game is not for wanting to discover new worlds and friends, this game is all about builds with hints of RP
now for me, im not real into the RP thing, although i like it there, kind of like when you are working or doing some activity, its nice to do it with some music in the back ground, and although the music isnt necessary it helps the mood i sort of deal
but in this game, its all about builds, and im not talking about 20 class levels in a class with good feats, im talking about arbitrary class dipping, weird item usage, bizarre feat taking that would make absolutely zero RP sense or even conventional logic to take
every time i see someone come to the beam dog forums, and ask what the best "build" for characters are in the IE games, i always laugh thinking; what are you talking about? that is completely unnecessary and in fact you get better enjoyment out of the game being "unoptimized" than you would being an OP god
switch that over to PFKM and if you even make the slightest mistake in your character you are crippled forever and you WILL be punished for it
and in my opinion this is just piss poor game design
how is that i can easily beat BG1 with a solo barbarian on insane, while in PFKM i have a balanced team of 6 and im getting my ass handed to me on normal? the answer; masochism
so in the BG games, enemies were not optimized in the slightest, they were average, boiler plate, run of the mill, and it worked perfectly fine, and the enemies that did have some optimization for the 99.99% of the time it was pretty fair/reasonable/made sense
then here we are with PFKM where every single enemy is optimized to the 9s hell i would even say 11s, enemies have such insane to hit/to damage and never fail fortitude saves, it forces ridiculous save and reload scumming
in the BG series even if you were up against something that was way pass your level it was either mind boggling obvious you shouldn't be there or there was always a non cheap way to win the encounter, encounters in the BG series never felt unfair
now in PFKM unfairness is part of the game, half the fights i do is just reload scum until i win ( now granted im a dumbass playing this game on a difficulty between normal and challenging thinking; ah i know how the rules work, i should be good to go..... lol ) and since my "builds" are "wrong" there is no; "oh there is always something you can do to win" nope, because of the goofball way saving throws work, low level spells will always be saved against ( well not always, but damn well near close to ) because of the idiotic huge stats of the baddies so it just comes down to hopefully they roll 1s or else you lose *sigh* in fact i believe i've seen things online talking about how all the enemies in PFKM are way stronger than they are in the table top game, so its quite puzzling as why they did that, did they want to make something harder than dark souls? did they want the title for hardest game ever? hmm
now i bet there is people out there that can play this game on unfair with one CHAR and says its piss easy and all that wank, and thats good for you, hopefully owlcat gave you a medal in real life so you can put that on your resume the next time you go in for a job interview and see how much the interviewer cares
now if you'll excuse me, im going to continuing playing my play through because i must be as smart as a sack of hammers, but at least i didn't buy a million rolls of toilet paper...
Now, I agree about enemies being too difficult at times. But there's extensive options available to amend that. So I'd agree that you could draw your conclusion about builds from that. But if you were to look at the unoptimized way they built their companion characters, I'd say that they really did not expect this game to be about "builds" or minmaxing. I think they just had a flawed idea of what kind of difficulty was difficult, likely simply because of being too use-blind to the Pathfinder system. It's the same situation as with the spider swarms where they greatly underestimated the potential players understanding of what a "swarm" entails mechanically.
You do not really have to fight and win every enemy you met at your level with every party setup possible and without prior preparation. If you can do it that way, that would be a bad design of a game, IMHO.
This. Just because you can get to somewhere doesn't mean you should be there at your level. Exploration means you can wander into somewhere you'll get your ass handed to you.
There are some interesting designs that go along with this, although I dont completely love or agree with them. For example - I was in the lonely mound last night. Bandits, Skeleton Champions etc - all pretty easy to deal with for my level 5 party.
The last room has the "Lonely Wander", which is a level 13 Barbarian / 2 Undead enemy. His AC is like 27, his saves are insane and he hits on every attack.
Now, I totally dont mind the idea of being able to stumble onto an area with fights that are too challenging for me right now. I dont mind when there are "hidden" encounters like the owlbears, that you're supposed to come back to later.
I dont love the design for the lonely mound, where it's 1 dungeon, and the final room has an enemy that isnt in step with the rest of the enemies. I think a more cohesive dungeon would have been one where every fight was clearly meant to be done by a higher level party, or where that final enemy isnt just 8 levels above the average enemy in the dungeon.
Hah, I got stuck there my first time and had to reload from before I entered. Candlemere is one of the better designed areas for exploration, since it's got one wisp near where you enter. I wandered in there my first time and barely survived that first wisp and knew it was time to go somewhere else.
Wisps are insane. I honestly think the first real "wake up call" I had from the game was the optional wisp encounter you can have outside the old sycamore tree. You're given context clues about a hard enemy, and that fight is WILDLY out of scope for your first visit to the tree in all likelihood. That said, it's totally optional, and so I think it's a wonderful piece of design.
You can retreat in BG from nearly everything.
The fact that not a single abominable entity from the Dark Tapestry can be located inside the map was probably my greatest disappointed of Pathfinder: Kingmaker. *sigh*
You can retreat from fights. The two main methods are invisibility and speed. Like, you know, the realistic options? If you're in a fight with a vicious monster, how do you get away? You run or you hide. You don't just get to walk away.
Nearly everything you come up with is either plain wrong or a complaint about realism.