From Fargol on Steam forum :
Since I only control my main character, suppose I roll a Healer or a ranged character and hire melee mercs to support me. When exploring a dungeon, it appears I would "lead the team" into rooms, which makes no sense. I'd expect the melee merc to do that. That's what I'm paying them for, after all
If one of my ranged/caster mercs is threatened in melee, will they switch to a melee weapon, or continue to fire at close range and (presumably) get smacked around with AoO?
Will my ranged characters properly prioritize enemy targets - i.e. focus on enemy healers, casters, and ranged units before opening up on the melee'ers?
If the enemy AI is smart enough to do what I'd expect my ranged mercs to do in point 3, will my mercs respond appropriately? i.e. if my healer/caster is being targeted, will my melee merc peel off to defend him/her (if not engaged)?
If one of my ranged/caster mercs is threatened in melee, will they switch to a melee weapon, or continue to fire at close range and (presumably) get smacked around with AoO?
It still seems odd to me that I have zero influence on the mercs, despite the fact I'm (presumably) paying them. I should have at least rudimentary control, such as instructing my ranged mercs to harass enemy casters, then ranged units, then whatever's left. Or, I can instruct one of my melee mercs to hang back and protect my squishiness, and only attack if I'm secure.
You can give commands to the henchmen such as 'explore that room'. We also have an option to listen by the door, so you can (if your Perception roll succeeds) if there are enemies there and then decide who to send in.
They switch to melee weapons.
No, but that's been taken into account in balancing.
See above.
This is the same question as 2?
You can use the map to leave markers to which the henchmen respond to.
The henchmen are completely AI controlled, yes. But from the above AMA answer we do know that players can influence them. Albeit nowhere near as versatile as taking direct control over them like with the henchmen in Kingmaker. Also worth noting:
I understand that the companions are mercs that have varying price ranges based on their skillset - eg level 1 mercs are cheaper than more capable ones. Will these mercs get better over time, or are they set as in their gear and skills never change?
No, the mercs stay the same, you just unlock more experienced ones over the course of the game.
Thanks. This is what I feared. I think I would be extremely frustrated with this setup. The only positive here is that the game runs as a series of independent short adventures, so you can in theory tailor your selection of mercs for each adventure. But I don't think that will be enough for me to be ok with this, so, sadly, I will have to pass on the game at least for now. I will look at extended gameplay videos when those become available and see if changing my mind is justified.
@Kamigoroshi, did the AMA address whether this game can be played without a party/henchmen? If I can't fully control my henchmen, then I would rather just play solo, if the game can be played that way.
Yes. And in the current state I actually heartly recommend singleplayers rolling exclusively as a solo adventurer. No matter their chosen profession.
In other news: I have now clocked over three hours inside BoH.
The Good:
Environmental art style of dungeons, forests and other locations truly feel cosy to explore. Even the undead ridden caves.
Music tracks are fitting for the setting and actually quite good even for listening outside of the game.
Character creation has to be one of the most intuitive and refreshing ones I saw since Daggerfall. Not only does it have four classes, each with three different professions. All those backgrounds, origins and reasons for you to start adventuring all come with both advantages and disadvantages. And I love every second of it myself
Dungeons change with each replay. Sometimes offering puzzles, sometimes battles, sometimes encounters which can be dealt with diplomacy.
The Bad:
Henchmen. They are nothing but frustrating to have in your party. Yes, the beginner mercenaries are for free. But are basically really weak meatshields. Once you completed a level three difficult dungeon you get the possibility of hiring better ones for 300 gold. That's the price tag you have to pay for each advanced mercenary you unlock. And for each dungeon challenge anew.
Blacksmithing is currently limited to flenching arrows or bolts, traps, lockpicks and similar consumables. No armor, shield or weapon crafting. Hopefully that comes later on.
The Ugly:
To put it in a single word... "unoptimized". Even on my 16GB RAM with a GTX 1080 I experience performance drops at certain dungeons. Those RAM leaks have to get fixed sooner rather than later.
Said RAM issues can sometimes lead to your character not properly rendering either hairstyle or armor. Becoming bald as a monk. Which, to be fair, can be entertaining in its own right.
Bugs. Many bugs.
All in all it's an interesting title if you are aware of what the game sets out to do. No companions. No controllable mercs. No main story. No D&D ruleset where spellcaster can just nuke everything in their path. Instead you get independed, short adventures. Bit of akin to NwN modules with the focus being in dungeon crawling. I do not regret buying it on day one. But I would recommend waiting for the upcoming patch to hit steam first. The devs are working since release date on fixing various gameplay issues. And it should be ready in a matter of days.
So you can play solo. But is solo-play reasonable? By that I mean can you successfully get through the adventures without unreasonable frustration playing solo? Do you need to drop the difficulty level down to go solo?
The game automatically scales dungeons according to the number of players inside a party. This, however, does not apply to henchmen. You won't find much difference in difficulty between going solo or having three mercs with you. The number of encounters is the same and so is the loot (as well as traps).
Currently the player consensus is that playing with less than four people inside co-op is too brutal. This is especially so for when two friends try to challenge a dungeon. The game designer mentioned over at discord that this will be hopefully fixed for the upcoming update. I imagine that singleplayer will become also more forgiving as well. Like reducing an orc veteran dungeon boss to a common orc. Or somesuch.
Hey @Kamigoroshi, what's the latest on this game? Have the devs said anything about what their plans are for the game post-release? On their Steam page everything looks quite dead: no updates, no patches, nothing. It's like in the face of the avalanche of bad reviews the devs have decided to just walk away from their game.
@kanisatha As of now Random Potion delivered four patches for their game. The latest one being 1.0.5 from the 6th of July. Next one will apparently drop “soonish“, according to the devs. We also know that post-release will also see both Russian and Korean as new localizations. Beyond that? Your guess is as good as mine.
In other news: some folks may be interested in reading this Compendium of Heroes. A very well written guide to the game.
Version 1.0.6 of Book of Heroes is live. The main focus this time was on adding Russian as a language option and fixing issues with the existing languages.
Added
Support for Russian language
Localization fixes
Dice rolls in tooltips etc. are now localized
Suggested character names are now localized
Henchman names are now localized
Inrah Shrine hint is now properly localized
The Long Action Bar now uses localized spell and interaction names
Fixed unlocalized "Opportunity Attack" messages in Combat Log
Fixed some spells displaying two log messages, with one incorrectly localized
Fixed various texts not updating when the game language was changed
Fixed various other untranslated texts ("Ancient Blessing", "Paused" etc.)
Other fixes
Journal now scrolls instead of shrinking the text to unreadable sizes with long storyline texts
Fixed characters getting stuck when interrupting a long action with another long action
Fixed Klarum Purum triggering on failed check
Fixed Catch Blade
Fixed Card Details tooltips triggering even when the details were hidden
New update with Russian localization hit steam today. Looks like Korean support will come with 1.0.7.
The only additional change update 1.07 brought this month on the table is the previously announced Korean localization. Otherwise singleplayer is pretty much the same state as with 1.06. It had become plenty more playable when compared to its initial release build. Can't speak for coop though, as I never tried that one.
I was sad, when only one reshade mod was made for this game. In my experience that is the difference between the hype and what fans really think of it. Luckily, there is up to 70% discount on that game by now, so it may be a cheap purchase in these winter months.
Comments
Thanks. This is what I feared. I think I would be extremely frustrated with this setup. The only positive here is that the game runs as a series of independent short adventures, so you can in theory tailor your selection of mercs for each adventure. But I don't think that will be enough for me to be ok with this, so, sadly, I will have to pass on the game at least for now. I will look at extended gameplay videos when those become available and see if changing my mind is justified.
In other news: I have now clocked over three hours inside BoH.
The Good:
The Bad:
The Ugly:
All in all it's an interesting title if you are aware of what the game sets out to do. No companions. No controllable mercs. No main story. No D&D ruleset where spellcaster can just nuke everything in their path. Instead you get independed, short adventures. Bit of akin to NwN modules with the focus being in dungeon crawling. I do not regret buying it on day one. But I would recommend waiting for the upcoming patch to hit steam first. The devs are working since release date on fixing various gameplay issues. And it should be ready in a matter of days.
So you can play solo. But is solo-play reasonable? By that I mean can you successfully get through the adventures without unreasonable frustration playing solo? Do you need to drop the difficulty level down to go solo?
Currently the player consensus is that playing with less than four people inside co-op is too brutal. This is especially so for when two friends try to challenge a dungeon. The game designer mentioned over at discord that this will be hopefully fixed for the upcoming update. I imagine that singleplayer will become also more forgiving as well. Like reducing an orc veteran dungeon boss to a common orc. Or somesuch.
In other news: some folks may be interested in reading this Compendium of Heroes. A very well written guide to the game.
New update with Russian localization hit steam today. Looks like Korean support will come with 1.0.7.