One of the few things I like about BG3 is the level cap
Why? It reduces a lot the replayability, variety and build diversity.
Everyone considers BG2 the best one exactly because you spend too much time on "autoattacks" on BG1. A fighter will get 2 attacks at lv 5 and end the game with 2 attacks...
I've always felt players' criticism of the simplified combat of BG1 to be somewhat misguided. I think your attitude is quite widespread, though I can't prove this absolutely. Game designers certainly seem to be siding with you.
However, I think it's one big explanation for why RPG's have gravitated back towards turn based and towards smaller parties. Tossing tons of active abilities onto every class starts to push design prerogatives towards things like smaller parties and turn-based, because combat feels grindy with constant pausing and constant order placement. This is certainly what Obsidian felt going from PoE1 to PoE2. It seems to also somewhat be the case with Pathfinder, and the decision to add in a TB mode.
It's perfectly acceptable, imo, to have some members of your party be relatively passive units where their positioning is important but micromanaging them beyond that isn't. This is how combat worked in the RTS games that inspired this whole development in RPG's anyways. Even RTS missions where you had a small crew of units and no base building did this. Some active abilities for those classes at the highest levels is good, and even perhaps a handful at the low levels is good as well. But it's actually a mistake, imo, to want realtime combat and then to never encourage the player to actually enjoy the benefits of watching significant clips of action take place in realtime. That's the whole benefit of the system! If I'm pausing every 3 seconds in every single battle because I have to reissue specific, active orders to every single member of my party... well, I might as well be playing a turn-based game at that point. Just my opinion of course.
Well, hey!! A @DinoDin post for which I can finally click the "Agree" button.
The only thing I'd add is that moving towards smaller party-size and TB combat as the solution to this problem is no solution at all. The other alternative to this problem is going with non-party-based solo character games with real-time combat (the Witcher 3 approach), and I'd MUCH rather take that alternative over the 'smaller party and TB combat' approach (which is saying a LOT because I sooooo love party-based RPGs).
To me, action RPG's like the Witcher are so different from tactical-combat RPG's that I don't believe they're comparable. In the combat system at least.
An action RPG is closer (in its combat systems) to platformer games or even FPS games. It's testing quick reactions, execution under duress, and other things. There's some tactical thinking in them, but it's not the main point. Whereas a tactical combat RPG is closer to chess or to a strategy wargame.
To me, it seems that you just have a personal dislike of TBS in general, and thus cannot bring yourself to understand what it is that is making developers and gamers gravitate towards TBS in this subgenre. IMO someone is never going to be able to accurately diagnose what is a solution or not a solution if they can't extricate themselves from their own narrow tastes. Not intended to pick on you here in particular. One has to take a dispassionate (not to be confused with passion-less) look at the situation. The argument that TBS is "no solution at all" for tactical-combat RPG's seems to be belied by the existence of games that dominate that subgenre's market and receive near universal praise. It certainly seems to be a solution for many.
The point I'm trying to make is the same one I made on Tyranny above, about its branching and mutually exclusive narrative structure. Games features or design choices are not inherently good or bad. They are only good or bad in terms of how they cohere with the rest of the game. An RPG with a wide set of branching paths is probably not a smart design goal for an RPG with a 100+ hour runtime. Along these same lines, a combat system that uses realtime is probably not great if every piece on the board, so to speak, has to be micromanaged with the same intensity as a mage. Original Sin combat works, imo, because the player controls few pieces and those pieces have a wide range of active abilities. Deadfire's combat, fails to be fun, imo, because the player has too many pieces that have too many active abilities. And combat is a slog because, at high difficulty, it requires repetitive execution of the same active abilities in nearly every fight. I would rather just have BG1 style auto attackers!
Kingmaker FWIW, imo, seems to strike a pretty good balance of somewhat limiting the fighter class abilities and relying more on things like modals or infrequently used skills. So it does seem to be succeeding at smartly designing its RT combat, it's for sure better than Deadfire. But I can't be definitive on it yet, as I haven't played it enough.
Sorry but no. This I disagree with. Firstly, saying TB is more tactical is imo a way to try and boost TB over RT. The most basic element of tactics is being able to handle challenges dynamically, and as such the static nature of TB combat is, as far as I am concerned, a-tactical. For example, TB fans often lament that in a RTwP game they cannot "target" enemies by placing a spell exactly where they want so a bunch of enemies are affected but none of the party. This is the opposite of being tactical. Being tactical is precisely anticipating where your enemies and friends are going to be moving to in the next several seconds and timing and placing your spell accordingly. That is being tactical. If the Persians were to invent a game today to help their king be better on the battlefield, they would surely make it RT(wP) and not TB. Chess was created as a TB game only because there was no other possible way for two players to play such a tabletop game, fully accepting that this was a limitation in chess's ability to truly simulate tactics on a (dynamic) battlefield.
Furthermore, speaking of TW3, the combat in TW3 is far from just a test of your reactions as a player. There are a bunch of tactical elements involved in TW3 combat beyond positioning such as moving, parrying, counterattacking, rolling, retreat, the use of cover, and most importantly, reading what your opponent is going to do next. Very tactical.
As for PoE v. D:OS, yes many PoE fans themselves have pointed out that those games had far too many active abilities that most players never bothered to use. But, Larian's own survey on D:OS showed that despite being TB most players didn't bother with most of the active abilities in D:OS either. I know I certainly didn't, and just kept spamming the same few spells again and again from every one of my four party-members and this worked just fine.
Tactics will differ in TB vs RtwP, but it's just an unproductive perversion of language to say that turn-based not tactical. Chess has tactics, no?
But you at least implied that RTwP is not tactical, didn't you?
Regardless, no, chess is not very tactical. It is actually a strategic game, and quite brilliant at that, involving looking ahead and strategizing across many turns to achieve a certain end-game. The "tactics" on each turn are pretty rudimentary.
I also think build diversity is overrated in games like PF:KM. There are countless combinations that the player can make but will be useless in the game. PF:KM is also designed for optimized builds, not role playing builds so those useful combinations are dwindled down even more.
(...)
A game like Kingmaker and even WotR will miss this type of replayability. In WotR it should be excused as everyone is gathering together to defeat a common enemy. Even powerbuilding, IMO, is more excusable as it fits the storyline more.
Wrong. See my pathfinder kingmaker posts. I did a lot of pure RP builds on pathfinder kingmaker.
To name my first one, i made a sorcerer of silver draconic heritage and picked ZERO fire based spells. That means no fire snake, no sirroco or other really powerful spells and had no problem playing on difficulties a little above normal...
And is not just "everyone organizing to defeat a common enemy", a guy which choses a Lawful Evil path and a Chaotic Good Azata path will have complete different experiences. Each companion has his own unique story and will be a romanceable succubus which can become chaotic good(source : P&P)
(...)because combat feels grindy with constant pausing and constant order placement. This is certainly what Obsidian felt going from PoE1 to PoE2. It seems to also somewhat be the case with Pathfinder, and the decision to add in a TB mode.
Wrong. You can easily solo or even play with a small party of and use more simplistic classes.
A sorcerer, a barbarian and a druid with animal companion was my party on my first PFKM run, i din't micro managed a lot... With a arcane, a divine and a martial guy, you can beat any infinity engine game without micromanaging or cheesing.
Tactics will differ in TB vs RtwP, but it's just an unproductive perversion of language to say that turn-based not tactical. Chess has tactics, no?
But you at least implied that RTwP is not tactical, didn't you?
Regardless, no, chess is not very tactical. It is actually a strategic game, and quite brilliant at that, involving looking ahead and strategizing across many turns to achieve a certain end-game. The "tactics" on each turn are pretty rudimentary.
No, I didn't. I specifically said they are both tactical.
Wrong. You can easily solo or even play with a small party of and use more simplistic classes.
Regarding Deadfire, there is no more "simplistic class". As I said, all the classes are given virtually the same active point pool, that they can exhaust in every single combat. This was my entire point. The distinction between how warriors play versus casters in BG is essentially gone in Deadfire. All the classes play roughly the same in terms of constant spamming of active abilities. I never said anything about Pathfinder having this issue.
And soloing does not have quite the same advantages as it does in the IE games but is definitely more of a challenge mode for extreme veterans. Almost no one plays these games solo.
Ex, Steam achievement data: Original Pillars of Eternity, since Deadfire doesn't seem to track the solo achievement (afaik):
Solo beat the game: 0.3% players
Beat the game: 13.6% players
Just for comparison even trial of Iron (no reload challenge) is much higher than solo at 0.8%.
Wrong. You can easily solo or even play with a small party of and use more simplistic classes.
There is no more simplistic class in Deadfire. As I said, all the classes are given virtually the same active point pool, that they can exhaust in every single combat. All the classes play roughly the same in terms of constant spamming of active abilities. And soloing does not have quite the same advantages as it does in the IE games but is definitely more of a challenge mode for extreme veterans. Almost no one plays these games solo.
That is the biggest problem that i have with Pillars. Both are TWO balanced.
To the point that your choices doesn't matters.
Just like accessibility and depth are exclusionary, balance and variety and immersion are exclusionary. Wanna see a example? Hellgate londom and Fallout New Vegas. New Vegas is a amazing game, considered a cult classic, hellgate is considered a good loot hunt game but not a good immersive game. Why? In order to balance melee and ranged, they limited the ranges of assault rifles to ultra small distances like 15m and skills that allow you to attack from """"great"""" ranges always had a awful cooldown with no lore explanation on it. Melee vs ranged on hellgate is pretty balanced. On New Vegas, you with a katana had no chance against a sniper with stealth kit, anti materiel rifle and explosive rounds at 200m+.
The spells on Pillars are extremely lackluster.
Just compare Malignant Cloud with Cloudkill from Kingmaker.
Kineticists and Sorcerers on Kingmaker are both great but both plays in completely different ways. I hate when every class is the same or they take out suff or worst, nerf for the sake of "everything needs to be the same"
Tactics will differ in TB vs RtwP, but it's just an unproductive perversion of language to say that turn-based not tactical. Chess has tactics, no?
But you at least implied that RTwP is not tactical, didn't you?
Regardless, no, chess is not very tactical. It is actually a strategic game, and quite brilliant at that, involving looking ahead and strategizing across many turns to achieve a certain end-game. The "tactics" on each turn are pretty rudimentary.
This is actually a poor understanding of chess imo. Chess is very much about keeping track of the current relationships of pieces simultaneously. Anyone who has played the game at the competitive level will understand that one of the hardest skills in the game is keeping all of the ongoing attacks or potential attacks present in your mind. Even though you only move a single piece in a turn, that single move can alter all sorts of relationships on the board. Even veteran players blunder in moving a piece only realize it exposed a separate piece or valuable position.
Again, I don't understand the insistence on your own special definitions of words. It seems counter-productive. There is no denying that chess is a tactical game. There is a whole wealth of literature, hundreds of years long on "chess tactics".
I'll also add that chess "strategies" are less about having a fixed long term plan, and instead understanding some of the deeper concepts of the game such as relative piece value, importance of certain squares, and how different phases of the game call for different tactics. It's more akin to thinking about builds, gear or party compostion in an RPG as opposed to in-combat tactics.
Wrong. See my pathfinder kingmaker posts. I did a lot of pure RP builds on pathfinder kingmaker.
To name my first one, i made a sorcerer of silver draconic heritage and picked ZERO fire based spells. That means no fire snake, no sirroco or other really powerful spells and had no problem playing on difficulties a little above normal...
Great, now go play a Gnomish Archeologist Feyspeaker who wants to traverse the Stolen Lands looking for lost artifacts there and tell me how the playthrough goes. I'd say he should be book smart more than fit, so stats would be 12/10/12/16/14/16 and his skills should be the two knowledge's & religious lore, perception and persuasion and either UMD, Trickery or Nature Lore. Feats should be those that enhance those skills first (like deceitful) and spells should be those that would help them in their task of recovering artifacts like feather step.
That is what I mean when I say a RP build. Not, I am not going to choose one or two powerful spells.
Wrong. See my pathfinder kingmaker posts. I did a lot of pure RP builds on pathfinder kingmaker.
To name my first one, i made a sorcerer of silver draconic heritage and picked ZERO fire based spells. That means no fire snake, no sirroco or other really powerful spells and had no problem playing on difficulties a little above normal...
Great, now go play a Gnomish Archeologist Feyspeaker who wants to traverse the Stolen Lands looking for lost artifacts there and tell me how the playthrough goes. I'd say he should be book smart more than fit, so stats would be 12/10/12/16/14/16 and his skills should be the two knowledge's & religious lore, perception and persuasion and either UMD, Trickery or Nature Lore. Feats should be those that enhance those skills first (like deceitful) and spells should be those that would help them in their task of recovering artifacts like feather step.
That is what I mean when I say a RP build. Not, I am not going to choose one or two powerful spells.
As for spells, he can use BOMBS. But lets be real, a gnome with 16 INT would realize that he is in a dangerous place and he needs some firepower. HE can't survive with utility only spells. Even if he could't learn anything, he would try to hire a mercenary to save him. And that is it. In a dangerous place very linked to a chaotic region like Stolen Lands, you need power.
I certainly can't beat the game on UNFAIR with that build; but with the right companions, the game is COMPLETELY BEATABLE on normal, if not, i grantee that is beatable on easy or story mode.
The same can be said about Fallout 1. Or arcanum. A dumb ugly melee orc would suffer far more on conversations and quests than a high charismatic and intelligent elf or tech human.
Wrong. See my pathfinder kingmaker posts. I did a lot of pure RP builds on pathfinder kingmaker.
To name my first one, i made a sorcerer of silver draconic heritage and picked ZERO fire based spells. That means no fire snake, no sirroco or other really powerful spells and had no problem playing on difficulties a little above normal...
Great, now go play a Gnomish Archeologist Feyspeaker who wants to traverse the Stolen Lands looking for lost artifacts there and tell me how the playthrough goes. I'd say he should be book smart more than fit, so stats would be 12/10/12/16/14/16 and his skills should be the two knowledge's & religious lore, perception and persuasion and either UMD, Trickery or Nature Lore. Feats should be those that enhance those skills first (like deceitful) and spells should be those that would help them in their task of recovering artifacts like feather step.
That is what I mean when I say a RP build. Not, I am not going to choose one or two powerful spells.
The archaeologist archetype wasn't made for that type of character, it was made to be Indiana Jones. And sure, you can say that Indiana is street smart more than he is fit. But he certainly isn't physically unsuited to fighting and adventuring.
Archetypes are made to fit certain kind of concepts, not to be all kinds of character that might go by the name of archetype in-setting. Ie, not all characters who are archaeologists (the occupation) in the setting are Archaeologists (the subclass). Most book smart NPC archaeologists would just be Experts (the class). There's no class or archetype suited to cover this concept for PCs in the computer game.
Basically what I'm saying is. You don't make RP builds by choosing and archetype that is contrary to the role-playing you want to do. That is the opposite of the purpose of archetypes. The point of them is to change the base classes to be more suited to role-playing certain concepts and play to the strengths of those concepts. Choosing an archetype because it's name is a shallow and un-RPing way to make a character.
So change the difficulty level (to either of the easiest settings) or make sure to have the ‘right’ companions. Thanks for pretty much proving:
I also think build diversity is overrated in games like PF:KM. There are countless combinations that the player can make but will be useless in the game. PF:KM is also designed for optimized builds, not role playing builds so those useful combinations are dwindled down even more.
But then I’d be hard pressed to figure out any build that’d use the Archaeologist class over any other bard class. Choosing a self buff of +1 saves and +1 skill checks over a party based +1 attack & dmg and fear and charm saves. Not to mention losing inspire competence for danger sense +1 to reflex and dodge AC against traps only and a +1 Perception against being surprised seems like an unfair trade off as well. I guess Evasion and Uncanny Dodge looks appealing until you realize a rogue gets them at lvl 2 & 3 and the Arch gets them at 2 & 6. So why is Archaeologist in the game? It doesn’t have flavour like the other two kits (Thundercaller & Flame Dancer) and is fat weaker than the base kit. It’s a useless choice.
So change the difficulty level (to either of the easiest settings) or make sure to have the ‘right’ companions. Thanks for pretty much proving:
I also think build diversity is overrated in games like PF:KM. There are countless combinations that the player can make but will be useless in the game. PF:KM is also designed for optimized builds, not role playing builds so those useful combinations are dwindled down even more.
But then I’d be hard pressed to figure out any build that’d use the Archaeologist class over any other bard class. Choosing a self buff of +1 saves and +1 skill checks over a party based +1 attack & dmg and fear and charm saves. Not to mention losing inspire competence for danger sense +1 to reflex and dodge AC against traps only and a +1 Perception against being surprised seems like an unfair trade off as well. I guess Evasion and Uncanny Dodge looks appealing until you realize a rogue gets them at lvl 2 & 3 and the Arch gets them at 2 & 6. So why is Archaeologist in the game? It doesn’t have flavour like the other two kits (Thundercaller & Flame Dancer) and is fat weaker than the base kit. It’s a useless choice.
You are not doing a RP build; you are making a character with almost no combat capability and wanting him to be great on combat...
A lot of people who always says that Bards are awful on most CRPGs loved PFKM bards.
To anyone who actually got through Pathfinder Kingmaker, would you say its worth another try for someone who about midway through chapter 2 gave up because they found everything about the game a slog, like the world map resting mechanics etc. didn't really like any of the characters, or the clear as mud indications about where you should be going or what you should be doing?
I feel like the answer is probably not but worth asking
To anyone who actually got through Pathfinder Kingmaker, would you say its worth another try for someone who about midway through chapter 2 gave up because they found everything about the game a slog, like the world map resting mechanics etc. didn't really like any of the characters, or the clear as mud indications about where you should be going or what you should be doing?
I feel like the answer is probably not but worth asking
Well the answer is yes from me, because I love the game and have replayed it. If you did not like how the story is laid out or the quests or the characters, however, then I don't know what to say because obviously then there's probably not much point to playing the game.
@hybridial If the first playthrough took place before the Enhanced Edition update (June 2019), I'd heartly recommend giving Kingmaker another go. If only just to experience the much needed changes it brought on the table. If not: you may first look at the rather active modding community over at the nexus. Chances are that something relevant to your interest was released since you last touched Kingmaker.
Seeing as none of the companions are to your liking: might be worth a thought to hire merchs instead and run the game solely with a custom party. Since the 2.0 update merchs can also be used as advisors. Technically there is no reason to keep the companions around, if you so choose.
@SorcererV1ct0r "You are not doing a RP build; you are making a character with almost no combat capability and wanting him to be great on combat..."
No, that's very much an rp build. A researcher exploring for knowledge? That's a great concept! But the game just doesn't let you do stuff like that. Its so tuned for optimization.
No, that's very much an rp build. A researcher exploring for knowledge? That's a great concept! But the game just doesn't let you do stuff like that. Its so tuned for optimization.
I had lots of fun with my dwarven "Indiana Jones" using exactly this roleplaying concept.
Just compare Malignant Cloud with Cloudkill from Kingmaker.
Yep, I agree. The thing is, spells *have* to be lackluster in Deadfire (not so in the first game) because they are being balanced against the ability to use them in every single fight.
@SorcererV1ct0r "You are not doing a RP build; you are making a character with almost no combat capability and wanting him to be great on combat..."
No, that's very much an rp build. A researcher exploring for knowledge? That's a great concept! But the game just doesn't let you do stuff like that. Its so tuned for optimization.
I think you can do these at the lower difficulties, no?
Just compare Malignant Cloud with Cloudkill from Kingmaker.
Yep, I agree. The thing is, spells *have* to be lackluster in Deadfire (not so in the first game) because they are being balanced against the ability to use them in every single fight.
Wrong. On PoE1 your spells was per rest an was extremely weak. One thing is to have few casts per rest of cloudkill. Other thing is the same casting for Malignant Cloud. They changed it for "per encounter" on PoE 2 because you was using most of the time, your main weapon.
Most of PoE 1/2 spells seems like a very weakling version of spells which exists in tons of other games.
Everything that Obsidian did on PoE 1/2, they did better on previous games. The stronghold? Crossroad keep is far better. Spells, even the ultra nerfed version of nwn2 which requires spell fixes and warlock reworked to be playable seems better. Crafting weapons? On nwn2 crafting weapons was amazing, you find recipes, get the ingredients and can make weapons which deals a lot of damage. On PoE, every weapon creation is extremely ""balanced""
No, that's very much an rp build. A researcher exploring for knowledge? That's a great concept! But the game just doesn't let you do stuff like that. Its so tuned for optimization.
No, a explorer in really dangerous places would learn a little of combat or hire mercenaries to help him in any game.
To anyone who actually got through Pathfinder Kingmaker, would you say its worth another try for someone who about midway through chapter 2 gave up because they found everything about the game a slog, like the world map resting mechanics etc. didn't really like any of the characters, or the clear as mud indications about where you should be going or what you should be doing?
I feel like the answer is probably not but worth asking
Maybe you tried the non-enhanced edition of the game? Right now with all the patches, improvements and expansions the game is great, actually. Just give it a try with an open mind.
No, a explorer in really dangerous places would learn a little of combat or hire mercenaries to help him in any game.
I feel like you're just reconfirming their point each time you say this. If the answer is that the RP build needs to optimize itself because the game is hard, then the game is not forgiving for RP builds.
Which is honestly fine by me, but I can see why some people would prefer it to be different (and I'd like some better balancing of archetypes while we're at it, but game meta knowledge is more powerful than any archetype. My first character was waaaaaay more powerful than my second, but my second playthrough was much easier).
To anyone who actually got through Pathfinder Kingmaker, would you say its worth another try for someone who about midway through chapter 2 gave up because they found everything about the game a slog, like the world map resting mechanics etc. didn't really like any of the characters, or the clear as mud indications about where you should be going or what you should be doing?
I feel like the answer is probably not but worth asking
Hard to say. It really is a good game. I guess I'll answer it in a few ways:
First - The world/resting mechanics/characters and what to do stuff isnt going to change a lot. If you got halfway through chapter 2, you probably got most of the characters and saw what they're about - mostly.
Second - The story doesnt get considerably better (or worse) from that point out. It sometimes drags a bit here and there, but the quality of the story stays about the same.
Third - As you level up, the game encounter design does feel more enjoyable. More tools and levels makes encounters more interesting. If you enjoyed the combat, that would be a good reason to go back.
Lastly - You could always try some mods that will hopefully make the resting part a little less cumbersome for you.
So for the endless dungeon stand alone my favorite party is BARD PARTY. Which is a party of all bards/skalds. It's RP as heck and I play on challenging (sometimes I lower enemy stats to 'normal' but keep everything else the same) and usually get to like floor 30 before I re-roll for funsies.
Cu Sidhe - Agathion Aasimar Skald Court Poet
Piro Faeren - Gnome Thundercaller Bard
Rifi Totentanz- Halfling Dirge Bard
Serene Sand of the Silent Shore Clan (Sand)- Beastblood Tiefling Archaeologist Bard
Quest-For-Knowledge (Quest) - Beastblood Tiefling Evangelist Cleric (Not technically a bard but has inspire courage and bard-like abilities, originally she was a bard/cleric/mystic theurge but I now make her a evangelist since that got introduced with Call of the Wild)
Aldred - Half-Orc Herald of the Horn Skald
Point being, if bard party can work I'm sure any party can? I think you just need a martial damage dealer, trap disarmer, debuff curer, and a CC caster.
To anyone who actually got through Pathfinder Kingmaker, would you say its worth another try for someone who about midway through chapter 2 gave up because they found everything about the game a slog, like the world map resting mechanics etc. didn't really like any of the characters, or the clear as mud indications about where you should be going or what you should be doing?
I feel like the answer is probably not but worth asking
Maybe you tried the non-enhanced edition of the game? Right now with all the patches, improvements and expansions the game is great, actually. Just give it a try with an open mind.
The main problem with P:K is that it is a kingdom management simulator with rpg elements not the other way around. Second main problem is game design. You are confused most of the times, like during the Barbarian Hordes events. Your kingdom is wrecked by their attacks, but the game won't give you any hint what to do to prevent it. What's even worse, if you understand what to do, by googling it out, the solution doesn't work for you. And you don't know if this is because you don't have specific skill high enough (doubtful) or the game bugged. Funny thing, this is not a quest that you just miss , but can live without it. Those barb attacks will eventually tear your kingdom apart resulting in game over. I'm so disappointed by this game, I have spent 90 hours, having mostly a good time only to stuck because of what I feel is VERY BAD design. I have searched entire areas having Jaethal to run Perception checks with +38 bonus and non of those hidden locations she has foud is this bloody tomb. That makes me think I failed to activate this quest somehow along the way, even I'm 95% I have passed this ferryman/boatman encounter. What is bad design here is that those barb hordes events shouldn't activate until you have this quest activated too. It's the freaking main quest (I think) it shouldn't be dependant on some obscure encounter or high Perception skill. Yeah, I'm definitely on board with @JuliusBorisov with this game. Makes me wonder if I did a right thing backing WoTR. I fear it will be even more strateg game rather than crpg game.
I'm starting to think my only run of the game must have been a fluke or something, I played through with basically zero issues, everything flowed together well and I found everything in a reasonable time. The only time I had to reload was I accidentally skipped forward from a kingdom event and missed the tournament, but I just reloaded and did the tournament first.
I will say the House at the edge of time is AWFUL but I haven't played it since they revamped it like twice.
Edit: like, this game is my favorite CRPG and beats out BG2, NWN2, and Pillars 1 for me, so I want to re-play it eventually to see if I end up playing through it with little issue again.
I've completed the game multiple times and not once had a problem with anything bugging out, so I doubt the game is bugged. Actually, come to think of it, I can't recall any serious bugs or game crashes, so I am pleasantly surprised that the game is almost bug free. There were some mechanics however that were a bit bugged, such as slayer studied target (fixed now), kineticist double damage on first round of AoE, and a few others.
Completing the game with a roleplaying build (with a party) is entirely possible (actually quite easy on Core difficulty or lower). A roleplaying build solo would be very difficult, but with a party it's trivial. The game practically hits you over the head with some key components of an effective party: Valerie as a tank, Tristian as a healer, Linzi as your bard buffer, Octavia as your bombardier mage. That's several boxes ticked already, so you can create any kind of roleplaying build you like and then flesh out your party with whatever you are still lacking. However what the game doesn't give you is too many alternatives as far as NPC companions go. If you don't want Valerie as your tank, you don't have many options: either your PC, hire a mercenary, or respec/multiclass someone like Amiri into a tank role. That's different to something like BG2, where you would have several options for the tank role (Korgan, Keldorn, Anomen etc) but that's partly due to complexity. It's quite similar to PoE1 where you have maybe two NPC options (Eder and Pallegina).
I feel quite confident WoTR should be a better game than P:K, at least because everything I read about that game (interviews and comments) confirm the developers acknowledge the problems of the first game.
That's very unfortunate you spent 90 hours in the game and ended with a disappointment, @Cahir, but in a way, I saw it coming, based on your previously shared opinions. My own cure from a similar disappointment was just to move on and play what you think is fun, without any need to research what is good and what is bad and what could be better, which game is worse or better etc. In my case, I switched to playing SoD and then BGII:EE with a character I finished BG:EE with, and I really had fun, I'm still having fun with it.
I haven't closed the door entirely on P:K (I have 79 hours in it) and will try again. But PoE took me more than 150 hours to start enjoying it. It still doesn't stop me from criticizing the game, but I found a way to enjoy it.
Comments
Well, hey!! A @DinoDin post for which I can finally click the "Agree" button.
The only thing I'd add is that moving towards smaller party-size and TB combat as the solution to this problem is no solution at all. The other alternative to this problem is going with non-party-based solo character games with real-time combat (the Witcher 3 approach), and I'd MUCH rather take that alternative over the 'smaller party and TB combat' approach (which is saying a LOT because I sooooo love party-based RPGs).
An action RPG is closer (in its combat systems) to platformer games or even FPS games. It's testing quick reactions, execution under duress, and other things. There's some tactical thinking in them, but it's not the main point. Whereas a tactical combat RPG is closer to chess or to a strategy wargame.
To me, it seems that you just have a personal dislike of TBS in general, and thus cannot bring yourself to understand what it is that is making developers and gamers gravitate towards TBS in this subgenre. IMO someone is never going to be able to accurately diagnose what is a solution or not a solution if they can't extricate themselves from their own narrow tastes. Not intended to pick on you here in particular. One has to take a dispassionate (not to be confused with passion-less) look at the situation. The argument that TBS is "no solution at all" for tactical-combat RPG's seems to be belied by the existence of games that dominate that subgenre's market and receive near universal praise. It certainly seems to be a solution for many.
The point I'm trying to make is the same one I made on Tyranny above, about its branching and mutually exclusive narrative structure. Games features or design choices are not inherently good or bad. They are only good or bad in terms of how they cohere with the rest of the game. An RPG with a wide set of branching paths is probably not a smart design goal for an RPG with a 100+ hour runtime. Along these same lines, a combat system that uses realtime is probably not great if every piece on the board, so to speak, has to be micromanaged with the same intensity as a mage. Original Sin combat works, imo, because the player controls few pieces and those pieces have a wide range of active abilities. Deadfire's combat, fails to be fun, imo, because the player has too many pieces that have too many active abilities. And combat is a slog because, at high difficulty, it requires repetitive execution of the same active abilities in nearly every fight. I would rather just have BG1 style auto attackers!
Kingmaker FWIW, imo, seems to strike a pretty good balance of somewhat limiting the fighter class abilities and relying more on things like modals or infrequently used skills. So it does seem to be succeeding at smartly designing its RT combat, it's for sure better than Deadfire. But I can't be definitive on it yet, as I haven't played it enough.
Furthermore, speaking of TW3, the combat in TW3 is far from just a test of your reactions as a player. There are a bunch of tactical elements involved in TW3 combat beyond positioning such as moving, parrying, counterattacking, rolling, retreat, the use of cover, and most importantly, reading what your opponent is going to do next. Very tactical.
As for PoE v. D:OS, yes many PoE fans themselves have pointed out that those games had far too many active abilities that most players never bothered to use. But, Larian's own survey on D:OS showed that despite being TB most players didn't bother with most of the active abilities in D:OS either. I know I certainly didn't, and just kept spamming the same few spells again and again from every one of my four party-members and this worked just fine.
But you at least implied that RTwP is not tactical, didn't you?
Regardless, no, chess is not very tactical. It is actually a strategic game, and quite brilliant at that, involving looking ahead and strategizing across many turns to achieve a certain end-game. The "tactics" on each turn are pretty rudimentary.
Wrong. See my pathfinder kingmaker posts. I did a lot of pure RP builds on pathfinder kingmaker.
To name my first one, i made a sorcerer of silver draconic heritage and picked ZERO fire based spells. That means no fire snake, no sirroco or other really powerful spells and had no problem playing on difficulties a little above normal...
And is not just "everyone organizing to defeat a common enemy", a guy which choses a Lawful Evil path and a Chaotic Good Azata path will have complete different experiences. Each companion has his own unique story and will be a romanceable succubus which can become chaotic good(source : P&P)
Wrong. You can easily solo or even play with a small party of and use more simplistic classes.
A sorcerer, a barbarian and a druid with animal companion was my party on my first PFKM run, i din't micro managed a lot... With a arcane, a divine and a martial guy, you can beat any infinity engine game without micromanaging or cheesing.
No, I didn't. I specifically said they are both tactical.
Regarding Deadfire, there is no more "simplistic class". As I said, all the classes are given virtually the same active point pool, that they can exhaust in every single combat. This was my entire point. The distinction between how warriors play versus casters in BG is essentially gone in Deadfire. All the classes play roughly the same in terms of constant spamming of active abilities. I never said anything about Pathfinder having this issue.
And soloing does not have quite the same advantages as it does in the IE games but is definitely more of a challenge mode for extreme veterans. Almost no one plays these games solo.
Ex, Steam achievement data: Original Pillars of Eternity, since Deadfire doesn't seem to track the solo achievement (afaik):
Solo beat the game: 0.3% players
Beat the game: 13.6% players
Just for comparison even trial of Iron (no reload challenge) is much higher than solo at 0.8%.
That is the biggest problem that i have with Pillars. Both are TWO balanced.
To the point that your choices doesn't matters.
Just like accessibility and depth are exclusionary, balance and variety and immersion are exclusionary. Wanna see a example? Hellgate londom and Fallout New Vegas. New Vegas is a amazing game, considered a cult classic, hellgate is considered a good loot hunt game but not a good immersive game. Why? In order to balance melee and ranged, they limited the ranges of assault rifles to ultra small distances like 15m and skills that allow you to attack from """"great"""" ranges always had a awful cooldown with no lore explanation on it. Melee vs ranged on hellgate is pretty balanced. On New Vegas, you with a katana had no chance against a sniper with stealth kit, anti materiel rifle and explosive rounds at 200m+.
The spells on Pillars are extremely lackluster.
Just compare Malignant Cloud with Cloudkill from Kingmaker.
Kineticists and Sorcerers on Kingmaker are both great but both plays in completely different ways. I hate when every class is the same or they take out suff or worst, nerf for the sake of "everything needs to be the same"
This is actually a poor understanding of chess imo. Chess is very much about keeping track of the current relationships of pieces simultaneously. Anyone who has played the game at the competitive level will understand that one of the hardest skills in the game is keeping all of the ongoing attacks or potential attacks present in your mind. Even though you only move a single piece in a turn, that single move can alter all sorts of relationships on the board. Even veteran players blunder in moving a piece only realize it exposed a separate piece or valuable position.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chess_tactic
Again, I don't understand the insistence on your own special definitions of words. It seems counter-productive. There is no denying that chess is a tactical game. There is a whole wealth of literature, hundreds of years long on "chess tactics".
I'll also add that chess "strategies" are less about having a fixed long term plan, and instead understanding some of the deeper concepts of the game such as relative piece value, importance of certain squares, and how different phases of the game call for different tactics. It's more akin to thinking about builds, gear or party compostion in an RPG as opposed to in-combat tactics.
Great, now go play a Gnomish Archeologist Feyspeaker who wants to traverse the Stolen Lands looking for lost artifacts there and tell me how the playthrough goes. I'd say he should be book smart more than fit, so stats would be 12/10/12/16/14/16 and his skills should be the two knowledge's & religious lore, perception and persuasion and either UMD, Trickery or Nature Lore. Feats should be those that enhance those skills first (like deceitful) and spells should be those that would help them in their task of recovering artifacts like feather step.
That is what I mean when I say a RP build. Not, I am not going to choose one or two powerful spells.
As for spells, he can use BOMBS. But lets be real, a gnome with 16 INT would realize that he is in a dangerous place and he needs some firepower. HE can't survive with utility only spells. Even if he could't learn anything, he would try to hire a mercenary to save him. And that is it. In a dangerous place very linked to a chaotic region like Stolen Lands, you need power.
I certainly can't beat the game on UNFAIR with that build; but with the right companions, the game is COMPLETELY BEATABLE on normal, if not, i grantee that is beatable on easy or story mode.
The same can be said about Fallout 1. Or arcanum. A dumb ugly melee orc would suffer far more on conversations and quests than a high charismatic and intelligent elf or tech human.
The archaeologist archetype wasn't made for that type of character, it was made to be Indiana Jones. And sure, you can say that Indiana is street smart more than he is fit. But he certainly isn't physically unsuited to fighting and adventuring.
Archetypes are made to fit certain kind of concepts, not to be all kinds of character that might go by the name of archetype in-setting. Ie, not all characters who are archaeologists (the occupation) in the setting are Archaeologists (the subclass). Most book smart NPC archaeologists would just be Experts (the class). There's no class or archetype suited to cover this concept for PCs in the computer game.
Basically what I'm saying is. You don't make RP builds by choosing and archetype that is contrary to the role-playing you want to do. That is the opposite of the purpose of archetypes. The point of them is to change the base classes to be more suited to role-playing certain concepts and play to the strengths of those concepts. Choosing an archetype because it's name is a shallow and un-RPing way to make a character.
But then I’d be hard pressed to figure out any build that’d use the Archaeologist class over any other bard class. Choosing a self buff of +1 saves and +1 skill checks over a party based +1 attack & dmg and fear and charm saves. Not to mention losing inspire competence for danger sense +1 to reflex and dodge AC against traps only and a +1 Perception against being surprised seems like an unfair trade off as well. I guess Evasion and Uncanny Dodge looks appealing until you realize a rogue gets them at lvl 2 & 3 and the Arch gets them at 2 & 6. So why is Archaeologist in the game? It doesn’t have flavour like the other two kits (Thundercaller & Flame Dancer) and is fat weaker than the base kit. It’s a useless choice.
You are not doing a RP build; you are making a character with almost no combat capability and wanting him to be great on combat...
A lot of people who always says that Bards are awful on most CRPGs loved PFKM bards.
I feel like the answer is probably not but worth asking
Well the answer is yes from me, because I love the game and have replayed it. If you did not like how the story is laid out or the quests or the characters, however, then I don't know what to say because obviously then there's probably not much point to playing the game.
Seeing as none of the companions are to your liking: might be worth a thought to hire merchs instead and run the game solely with a custom party. Since the 2.0 update merchs can also be used as advisors. Technically there is no reason to keep the companions around, if you so choose.
No, that's very much an rp build. A researcher exploring for knowledge? That's a great concept! But the game just doesn't let you do stuff like that. Its so tuned for optimization.
I had lots of fun with my dwarven "Indiana Jones" using exactly this roleplaying concept.
Yep, I agree. The thing is, spells *have* to be lackluster in Deadfire (not so in the first game) because they are being balanced against the ability to use them in every single fight.
I think you can do these at the lower difficulties, no?
Wrong. On PoE1 your spells was per rest an was extremely weak. One thing is to have few casts per rest of cloudkill. Other thing is the same casting for Malignant Cloud. They changed it for "per encounter" on PoE 2 because you was using most of the time, your main weapon.
Most of PoE 1/2 spells seems like a very weakling version of spells which exists in tons of other games.
Everything that Obsidian did on PoE 1/2, they did better on previous games. The stronghold? Crossroad keep is far better. Spells, even the ultra nerfed version of nwn2 which requires spell fixes and warlock reworked to be playable seems better. Crafting weapons? On nwn2 crafting weapons was amazing, you find recipes, get the ingredients and can make weapons which deals a lot of damage. On PoE, every weapon creation is extremely ""balanced""
No, a explorer in really dangerous places would learn a little of combat or hire mercenaries to help him in any game.
Maybe you tried the non-enhanced edition of the game? Right now with all the patches, improvements and expansions the game is great, actually. Just give it a try with an open mind.
I feel like you're just reconfirming their point each time you say this. If the answer is that the RP build needs to optimize itself because the game is hard, then the game is not forgiving for RP builds.
Which is honestly fine by me, but I can see why some people would prefer it to be different (and I'd like some better balancing of archetypes while we're at it, but game meta knowledge is more powerful than any archetype. My first character was waaaaaay more powerful than my second, but my second playthrough was much easier).
Hard to say. It really is a good game. I guess I'll answer it in a few ways:
First - The world/resting mechanics/characters and what to do stuff isnt going to change a lot. If you got halfway through chapter 2, you probably got most of the characters and saw what they're about - mostly.
Second - The story doesnt get considerably better (or worse) from that point out. It sometimes drags a bit here and there, but the quality of the story stays about the same.
Third - As you level up, the game encounter design does feel more enjoyable. More tools and levels makes encounters more interesting. If you enjoyed the combat, that would be a good reason to go back.
Lastly - You could always try some mods that will hopefully make the resting part a little less cumbersome for you.
Cu Sidhe - Agathion Aasimar Skald Court Poet
Piro Faeren - Gnome Thundercaller Bard
Rifi Totentanz- Halfling Dirge Bard
Serene Sand of the Silent Shore Clan (Sand)- Beastblood Tiefling Archaeologist Bard
Quest-For-Knowledge (Quest) - Beastblood Tiefling Evangelist Cleric (Not technically a bard but has inspire courage and bard-like abilities, originally she was a bard/cleric/mystic theurge but I now make her a evangelist since that got introduced with Call of the Wild)
Aldred - Half-Orc Herald of the Horn Skald
Point being, if bard party can work I'm sure any party can? I think you just need a martial damage dealer, trap disarmer, debuff curer, and a CC caster.
The main problem with P:K is that it is a kingdom management simulator with rpg elements not the other way around. Second main problem is game design. You are confused most of the times, like during the Barbarian Hordes events. Your kingdom is wrecked by their attacks, but the game won't give you any hint what to do to prevent it. What's even worse, if you understand what to do, by googling it out, the solution doesn't work for you. And you don't know if this is because you don't have specific skill high enough (doubtful) or the game bugged. Funny thing, this is not a quest that you just miss , but can live without it. Those barb attacks will eventually tear your kingdom apart resulting in game over. I'm so disappointed by this game, I have spent 90 hours, having mostly a good time only to stuck because of what I feel is VERY BAD design. I have searched entire areas having Jaethal to run Perception checks with +38 bonus and non of those hidden locations she has foud is this bloody tomb. That makes me think I failed to activate this quest somehow along the way, even I'm 95% I have passed this ferryman/boatman encounter. What is bad design here is that those barb hordes events shouldn't activate until you have this quest activated too. It's the freaking main quest (I think) it shouldn't be dependant on some obscure encounter or high Perception skill. Yeah, I'm definitely on board with @JuliusBorisov with this game. Makes me wonder if I did a right thing backing WoTR. I fear it will be even more strateg game rather than crpg game.
I will say the House at the edge of time is AWFUL but I haven't played it since they revamped it like twice.
Edit: like, this game is my favorite CRPG and beats out BG2, NWN2, and Pillars 1 for me, so I want to re-play it eventually to see if I end up playing through it with little issue again.
Completing the game with a roleplaying build (with a party) is entirely possible (actually quite easy on Core difficulty or lower). A roleplaying build solo would be very difficult, but with a party it's trivial. The game practically hits you over the head with some key components of an effective party: Valerie as a tank, Tristian as a healer, Linzi as your bard buffer, Octavia as your bombardier mage. That's several boxes ticked already, so you can create any kind of roleplaying build you like and then flesh out your party with whatever you are still lacking. However what the game doesn't give you is too many alternatives as far as NPC companions go. If you don't want Valerie as your tank, you don't have many options: either your PC, hire a mercenary, or respec/multiclass someone like Amiri into a tank role. That's different to something like BG2, where you would have several options for the tank role (Korgan, Keldorn, Anomen etc) but that's partly due to complexity. It's quite similar to PoE1 where you have maybe two NPC options (Eder and Pallegina).
That's very unfortunate you spent 90 hours in the game and ended with a disappointment, @Cahir, but in a way, I saw it coming, based on your previously shared opinions. My own cure from a similar disappointment was just to move on and play what you think is fun, without any need to research what is good and what is bad and what could be better, which game is worse or better etc. In my case, I switched to playing SoD and then BGII:EE with a character I finished BG:EE with, and I really had fun, I'm still having fun with it.
I haven't closed the door entirely on P:K (I have 79 hours in it) and will try again. But PoE took me more than 150 hours to start enjoying it. It still doesn't stop me from criticizing the game, but I found a way to enjoy it.