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Nah, they could have fixed this with one simple change. Move Rheagal's death to the siege of King's Landing and boom, fully explained. Instead it just seems like bells gave her the willies.

MW said nothing of the sort. He said "like it was 15 years ago?" Considering that 15 years ago expansions weren't free, he wasn't agreeing that we should return to the good old days when everything was free. Rather it's a comparison to a time when you weren't sold a one-time use dye for $15. When games didn't live or die based on their ****ing daily Twitch viewership. When devs weren't in perma-crunch trying to fix their broken ass games while putting out new content. But you knew that. Pretty sure I paid close to $100 for each of the NWNs and their expansions, and the only reason I didn't pay more is because they didn't keep them coming. I've also spent way more than $100 in subscription fees in each of the few MMOs I've played over the years. The hours/dollar ratio tends to be pretty good and it is, by far, the cheapest of my vices. The problem is someone did the math, and they figured that that model just wasn't bringing in enough money to hit double-digit profits or whatever. So they decided to go with this freemium-but-full-price with totally not gambling thrown in for good measure model, instead. And if you're not happy, too bad, because there's a whale out there somewhere that makes up for your lack of spending, that of everyone you know, and then some.

The even more winning move is to wait a year and buy the complete edition that includes everything in the season pass for 50% of the original price of the base game. Patience is a virtue. Anyway, Rage 2 is out.

Short update: Only Wizards' subclass icons are left...

Another Vampire: The Masquerade game has been announced, no, not the V:TM2 we already know about. Details are scant and it's only been described as a "Narrative RPG" but what has me excited is that it's being developed by Big Bad Wolf who made The Council, my 2018 GotY. http://www.bigbadwolf-studio.com/

Paradox is a bit of an anomaly. They keep updating and changing the base game so that there's usually very significant differences one year after launch, whether you buy any of their content patches or not. And for the most part, their paid DLC have offered good value for the price tag (Plantoids Pack etc excluded). Yet, after my own recent experience with Stellaris and from reading I:R and MtG user reviews (currently sitting at a dismal 39% and 38% respectively), I get the feeling they are also veering towards a focus on profits rather than delivering genuinely great games. I can't help but be reminded of the fact that all of these flops have coincidentally occurred a few months after the company's long-time CEO stepped down and was replaced by someone whose previous experience was managing an online gambling services company. Post hoc ergo propter hoc and all that, sure. In any case, the ratings speak for themselves.

I don't know what game you're playing, but Deadfire is an extremely balanced game in RTWP, and your examples do not in any way prove otherwise. Resolve may be a dump stat, but it's nowhere near as severe a dump stat as Dexterity (which you can dump completely with no consequence) or even itself (both attributes which are reliant on duration are worse, not to mention that low defenses don't mean as much because you aren't being attacked nearly as much) in Turn-Based Mode. And well... that's the only substantive point you made to that effect so there's not much else to argue against. Regardless, the suggestion that there's "very little to ruin" is absurd. Each attribute in real-time has value (yes, even Resolve). In Turn-Based, half of the attributes either suck or are worse in almost every situation unless you're gaming the system towards specific break points. This irrevocably makes combat worse, because the problem isn't just that you "can't follow build guides" anymore, it's that there are much fewer good and viable builds to begin with. Equipment choice has been similarly damaged, since Initiative is only situationally useful, unlike the original Action Speed which was always useful (meaning balance-wise there's almost no reason not to dump your Dex and then throw Heavy Armor onto most of your characters). Turn-Based also rewards extremely cheesy strategies like kiting with ranged characters and just generally running around like an idiot because there's nothing that really punishes you from moving around all the time when attacking and even if you dump your Dexterity you generally still have more than enough Stride to outrun monsters for a little bit (except for the faster ones, I'm sure). It has a LOT of issues that the original version of the game (even beyond this, and this is just the stuff I had marked down after the first HOUR of playing TBM, I'm sure there are many more nuanced flaws) didn't have because the original mechanics were actually designed to operate in the format they were created for, and they still are but have just been kind of tossed into the Turn-Based Mode without much consideration. Either way, Deadfire is really well-balanced in RTWP. There's an incredible amount of build diversity, attributes scale reliably in a way that makes sure every point is always useful and dumping any one will always be felt, there's a compelling reason to choose between different armor weights and weapon speeds because Action Speed/Recovery Time fundamentally effects your damage output and number of hits as compared to the other side, running around recklessly is quickly punished and you're consistently rewarded for having your units in position before battle conditions change, and so on. I don't know where you got this impression that Deadfire is somehow not a balanced game, there was certainly a problem with difficulty for a while, but on a mechanical level Deadfire has always been exceptionally well polished and thoughtfully designed, with a perfect balance between clarity and depth. And in terms of buildcraft, you could pick basically anything and make it viable as long as you had a basic understanding of the mechanics. I'm not saying you're wrong that TBM can be fun, because as I said earlier it benefits from many of Deadfire's strengths. It still has the really awesome Afflictions/Inspiration system, and I like how TBM plays up elements of combat like the Interruption/Concentration system (and other such nuanced factors) because you really have the time to buckle down and consider your moves. I also don't mind if you prefer it due to just generally enjoying the format a little better. But it's a tad (and that's an understatement) ridiculous to suggest that it hasn't broken the vanilla game's mechanics on a fundamental level. And no it's not simply a "new meta", Turn-Based is provably a shallower, less balanced, more unpolished, and significantly worse version of the game. I honestly believe it's absolutely crazy to suggest that it's somehow an "improvement" to Deadfire's combat, you'd have to be looking at this situation through an insanely tinted pair of glasses to see it that way, especially if you've ever even touched other far more polished and well-considered Turn-Based systems like Divinity or XCOM. It's an alternative, one that may be more fun for a certain type of audience, but it is in no way an improvement (especially when core mechanics often don't function properly or are ignored by the AI, Engagement is so ridiculously finicky there and the AI often seems to just intentionally provoke Disengagement Attacks even when it's a hilariously bad idea, which is something that never happens in real-time and thus greatly mystifies me... and have you tried Galawain's Challenge? Man those enemies do not seem to be aware of their bonuses). PS: Couldn't find somewhere to fit this, but this claim that individual actions are more significant in TBM just doesn't sit right with me. Like, sure, they get spotlighted more thanks to the way the mode works. But the way the mode works also makes those individual actions less significant. It's much easier to miss AOEs without the ability to retarget them, attacks are less effective and deal less damage over time because you output so much fewer of them with the dexterity changes, and because there's less punishment for moving and attacking simultaneously (since enemies can't react right away) you're under quite a bit less pressure while trying to set up any particular strategy. PSS: I think you're underselling just how tedious TBM is. As I said, damage values are still tuned for real-time, but the pacing of the game is much slower. Even on fast mode, battles take an absolute eternity. The beach cavern on POTD in Real-Time takes 10 maybe 15 minutes at most to clear, the same cavern takes more than an hour on TBM (I believe I even have video evidence of this). TBM makes combat encounters more than five times longer on average from what I can tell, and even worse it reduces the importance of resource management. Whereas in RT when your abilities were all gone, the fight would be almost over, in TBM the fight's still in full swing. There's a construct encounter in that cave which took me more than 30 minutes, and 80% of the fight was spent flank killing the one dude (with only basic attacks) because he has so much health and you do so little damage. That fight takes maybe 5 minutes at most in RTWP, and he's much easier to cleave through because he's so slow that you can get out nearly five attacks by the time he outputs one, but TBM puts enemies designed like that onto an even playing field they weren't designed for and it creates extreme tedium. I literally cannot imagine trying to beat the whole game on TBM, I imagine it's already 60-100 hours long with the DLCs, and I'm sure just by the virtue of playing TBM you'd more than double that playtime due to just how long combat takes (and that's probably underselling it as far as I'm concerned). TLDR: No, it still feels very, very tacked on. Which is not to suggest the devs didn't put a lot of work onto it, but that it was stapled onto the existing game in an inefficient way despite not being a good fit. PSSS: btw I just want to make clear that I'm also glad the mode exists, but you are greatly understating the depth of its incredible number of very problematic issues, and greatly overstating the original games flaws in comparison.

I have checked it just now: Clear Out with mortar (in MH) and melee weapon (in OH) will use the mortar. Clear Out with melee weapon (in MH) and mortar (in OH) will use melee weapon. Mule Kick with mortar (in MH) and melee weapon (in OH) will use melee weapon. Mule Kick with melee weapon (in MH) and mortar (in OH) will use melee weapon. And without melee weapon (in at least one hand), you can't use these abilities at all (and icons are greyed out) P.S. AoE Mule Kick works fine with WotEP though.

I have no idea how Obsidian wants to determine if somebody used a save copy or not. Afaik there's no way to do that. The video footage will have cuts - because you can't do the challenge in a single day (if you have at least a rest of a real life). So that's also not suited to proof you didn't cheat. Of course they could always disqualify your attempt on a whim because they don't believe you did it properly... but dealing with it highhandedly also doesn't feel right. Imagine there's some player who can indeed pull it off properly but they just don't believe him... the frustration and anger will be enormous given how much energy you'll have to put into this in order to be successful und not to viloate "the spirit of the challenge".

I've experienced this for a long time (since Sept. 2018) and also reported it. But it seems to be difficult to reproduce it. Some playthrough I see it all the time, on the other not at all:

Switch to frostseeker and stack some hit to crit, you will use much less time to kill hellfire. It seems Resonant Touch and Frostseeker has some interesting synergy, and u will stack RT much faster with frostseeker than blunderbuss. Friend told me that if you crit with Frostseeker u stack 9 RT on target, will need to test it later myself. And he shows me a pic of RT with 40 raw damage per stack, with Potion of Ascension. So you only need 400 stacks to kill hellfire. I don't think exploit food stack really matters here or not. Just need to optimize your build.

I remember people used to whine sooooo much about the subscription model for MMO's, but I was always feeling like I got a good value out of them. Now the new microtransaction world is soooo much murkier.

Thank you for the suggestion, we will begin work on it immediately. Query: If we went with Starjammer instead, would you still buy it?

And we GOTO 10 again. 😛 People really should be wiser with their money but..well, I guess that is a vain hope.

Yeah, it's totally ridiculous and lazy to write new dialogue, draw new scenes and doing new voiceover one year after release - and for free.

underappreciated talking heads bassist tina weymouth david byrne may have been the face o' the band, but ms. weymouth deserves more credit for the sound and soul. HA! Good Fun!

WotEP has the enchantment "Run Through" which is 1/encounter and is perfect for Backstabs. If you want to make sure your Soul annihilation lands use Rännig's Wrath + modal in the main hand (+29 ACC) and a fast weapon in the offhand (e.g. Pukestabber). While SA is a primary attack and thus you will feel the longer recovery of the modal, all of the Rogue's Full Attacks will skip the Rapier's recovery and only execute the dagger's. That lets you build focus more quickly but you still keep the very high ACC for Soul Annihilation so that it doesn miss (and wastes all the focus). Or you use Sun & Moon: it has two flail heads that each do a seperate attack roll. Sou you have twice the chance to not miss. Ad if you hit your SA with the first flail head the second one will already regenerate focus.

Ha-hah. True. This is the most heavy benchmark ever. I remember the times, when no gaming configuration was able to run Crysis 1 at 60 FPS, but graphics on Max settings was a real breakthrough. It was a hell of a years ago. And now we have a new leader - but who could ever imagined it will be isometric game with 2D backgrounds! We a living in crazy times, man, crazy times...

Hmm. Interesting.. how does this work... Galawain_Exalted_SE_Robust and Greater_Lay_On_Hands_SE_Robust look extremely similar, the only difference being DurationType Infinite (1s) versus UseDurationTime (8s). Brilliant_Tactician_SE_Brilliant also has infinite duration, so yeah, it will most likely behave the same as Exalted Robust. In rest.. they are like regular inspirations. P.S. Checked Vela's Cower ability. It applies [terrified effect] directly, and not [terrified affliction] (which consists of -5 RES, -3 PL, terrified effect). So Cap of the Laughingstock most likely won't help (since it gives immunity vs affliction) \

i think there's a significant overestimation of the availability and underestimation of the necessity of withdraw on the SC monk path. I could be wrong (i haven't actually tried act 2 or beyond yet, merely doing a lot of critical path mapping and testing/preplanning), but a) withdraw doesn't last nearly as long as you think, even in fights you are wrecking b) scrolls of withdraw aren't nearly as common as you think, especially since you can't just spam rest to refresh vendor supplies (recall your last run of pillars, how many scrolls of withdraw did you actually find? because you probably need tens of them unless you want to leave a lot of fights to the RNG gods. i don't remember finding that much) edit: i agree though that of the possible viable builds, monk is definitely a strong candidate. just personally i am erring on the side of low-risk, and to me infinite withdraw (or vela with infinite bdd+salvation) and low dps is much lower risk than finite withdraw with very fast dps. i think anyone attempting the ultimate should just go with what they feel is the best option, because we won't truly know what's possible until someone actually does it.

Ooze 2 min, dorugudan 5 min seems like an extreme exaggeration if you count it in actual in-game time (which is the time you should keep in mind if you want to estimat how many scrolls you need).

hm, i haven't tested it specifically, but Galawain's will sometimes add a durationless (e.g. tactician-style) tier-3 inspiration on beasts, and at least pre-5.0 the interaction was weird. if I remember correctly, it won't prevent you from applying an affliction, they'll just sort of co-exist, which is extremely weird. on occasion i actually managed to dispel the "permanent" tier 3 inspiration, but wasn't able to reproduce this consistently or have this happen more than a couple of times. edit: now that i think about it, post-5.0 i had a few early ultimate attempts with a forbidden fist monk, and enfeebled I could use to prevent robust boars from being immortal in the opening part of port maje island (probably the worst early game RNG you can get for an ultimate run is to have the boars have Robust on them). the enfeebled didn't dispel the robust, both effects just co-existed and the enfeebled just blocked the robust healing until the enfeebled wore off. my hypothesis is that something similar will happen: you'll still have brilliant, and a confuse/charm/dominate effect will also simultaneously affect your character. it will dispel any "normal" int inspiration.

^ Regarding stealth and wisps: Will-o-Wisps have supernatural perception type. (while ice wisps have normal) Other enemies that have same supernatural perception type are: phantoms + spectres + wraiths (but not shadows) skulldrak + skulldrak screecher crypt deathguards + liches Neryscirlas Also there are a few enemies with keen type: tyrant of decay + warden of decay + scourge + soul collector Scyorielaphas Jadaferlas As the names suggest, keen enemies are hard to sneak by; and supernatural are even harder.

I slept well for the first time in several days, despite the fact that I did not sleep longer than usual. It seems to me that I have discovered a way to feel good after waking up. Tonight I will test this way again. 30 minutes before falling asleep, I take a small tablet with magnesium. Next to the bed I put a glass with water and aloe. I set the alarm clock for 3 hours after the first falling asleep, I wake up, I go to the toilet, I drink a lot of mineral water, I go to sleep again. When I wake up again (without an alarm clock), I drink water with aloe and go to sleep further. My head did not hurt, I do not even know when I started to work and it took me a moment to realize "Hey, I'm doing my job well and I'm fine." For me, to sleep well is the most important part of the day. Is I going to sleep well or not define my whole day. Life is beautiful when you feel like you are 21 again.

I don't know about that, I've bought a few new games recently for $60. The enhanced editions just usually offer a bunch of extra online stuff that I don't care about. The thing is I know I will typically play a game for a month and then move on, so I don't want or care about new content that will come out months down the line, and I don't usually care about online modes. Unfortunately it seems a bunch of people do care about dumb booster packs, because it must be selling. It would be great if we got content instead of simple assets, but consumers are not driving the market that way. I do miss the actual physical collectors editions that used to come out for an extra $10. I got some neat swag that way.

Is a nice thing to have, no need for them to muck about with F2P that can be sketchy like TOR's was at start or not. Although WoW does have subscriptions and a fair amount of services, I don't really feel those are all that bad aside from people's own issues - apparently some high end raiders race and faction change like fiends though. And then there's Paradox games... 😛

Bandages can stop bleeding, but you can't get that feat til lev 20 something. Status effects like bleeding and poison are king in Conan Exiles, it's what makes snake arrows so good and also why I favor war axes (shieldsmash + bleed) for melee weapons. Keep in mind that only heavy attacks proc melee weapon special abilities, light attacks don't. I've killed big bad bosses that were probably meant for a group of 3 or 4 lev 40+ chars solo by hopping up on a high ledge and just shooting them with snake arrows. It may take a long time, but that 10 stack of poison kills them eventually.

Yup 👍 Nope

It's best to do it during a double XP event though so you can ignore the generic sidequests (which are identical for all characters) and just do the story stuff.

I've gone to eBay to purchase some special edition games/codes for unique exclusive items but never for cosmetics My shame is deep but I'm not that shallow🤓 PS I really don't care how people want to spend their money but I don't like when games get chopped up and monetized as 2k Sports has done with their NBA games

A game's upgrades should be free forever vs a game should be upgraded forever, for free. People are saying the first, not that Richard Garriot should now be updating Akallabeth to run on win10 w/raytracing, gratis. Children do have to take some responsibility for their actions as well- if they don't then that's bad parenting. If a parent is giving a child a credit card and not monitoring what they do with it then that's bad parenting; if a child is stealing their card then there isn't much they can do about it except stop it happening again. I'd put money on it being the former most of the time, with a dash of technological ignorance too; parents simply not realising that credit card details get saved to accounts unless you opt out.

One last time. Fighting your waifu... Shura. "Hesitation is defeat" Looking forward to the DLC and hopefully a sequel.

I've made an interesting find : Upgraded abilities usually use their new PL for scaling. A PL1 ability with a PL3 upgrade will usually count as PL3 and thus will only benefit from PL above 3. However, there are some exceptions to that rule. It does make a difference, but not so much because usually there are a couple of PL difference between the initial ability and the upgraded one. Both Barbarian Shout-line and Frenzy-line do apply the initial PL1 though. And that makes a HUGE difference since their ultimate upgrades are PL7 and PL9. It is basically a +30% and +40% bonus to the PL scaling of these abilities. Now I understand better why Spirit Tornado and Driving Roar are my Favorites Barbs abilities 😃

****... Too many icons.

Just another reason, why the Live Service model is unsustainable in the long term.

the only reason is the focus on multiplayer

Chris and Tina were a stunning rhythm section, and made Talking Heads one of the grooviest bands in the planet. Their studio recordings are good, but live they were unstoppable.

It is not only switching on all God Challenges. It adds PotD, Expert Mode, Trial of Iron, disables Berath's Blessings, disables cheats via console, disables all mods, adds the additional challenge to have to kill all bosses and more. So you can't do it manually.

Another reason to return to Deadfire! Thank you for enhancing the critical path!

Ha! I didn't even play one single god challenge so far (but also no Berath's Blessings besides Edér's pet slot). I also didn't do a proper solo run. I did most all boss fights with solo test-characters though. But imagine the hassle with the video recording. Imagine you play for two hours and afterwards you realize that you video footage is corrupted or something. Also no mods (I mean of course😞 that means I can't use those really good "improved UI" mods that don't change the game mechanics at all. A patch and a name on a plate - although both is cool - are not worth the hassle. I do have a real life with wife and kids and cleaning woman and cat and house and job after all.

Very cool. Time for a last playthrough I guess. I'm 100% sure it will not be an "Ultimate" one.

Rogue is usually consindered to be the weakest class on Path of the Damned Difficulty. But it's not a huge margin - generally all classes are fairly well balanced and you can solo with a rogue as you can solo the game with any other class on the highest difficulty. So no "gimpage" when picking Rogue. On lower difficulty settings than PotD (most new players will start on normal I presume) Rogues are actually quite potent. Generally speaking: the more enemies on the field the less a Rogue will shine (because he's focused on single target damage). Higher difficulties mean longer fights and more enemies which shifts the "balance" towards classes with Area of Effect capabilites. The Chanter class is the opposite: the higher the difficulty (the longer the fights and the more enemies) the better a Chanter becomes. So - if you are planning to play on normal a Rogue is an absolutely solid choice. Suggestions: - Rogue with Rapier + Dagger (google Sword of Daenysis + March Steel Dagger/Drawn in Spring) - Rogue with dual sabres (can't go wrong with that one) - Rogue with low INT, high stealth & Backstab, wielding Tidefall (great sword) - Rogue with Pike, attacking from second row (google Tall Grass pike) - Rogue with Hours of St. Rumbalt - Rogue with Battle Axes, aiming for We Toki (offhand) and Rimecutter or Edge of Reason or whatever axe is there. - Rogue with Belt of the Royal Deadfire Cannoneer and Forgemaster Gloves, using Firebrand as summoned weapon - Rogue with high deflection and Riposte (especially good with normal difficulty). Use a bashing shield to make use of Full Attacks (shield will hit first, applies affliction, main weapon will strike second with Sneak Attack enabled). Aim for Godanythunyr hammer + Badgradr's Barricade shield. Sturdy rogue with amazing dps (for a shield bearer). - Rogue with focus on items with Spell Bindings (items which hold spells like a wizard would use). Secret is that Deathblows works with damaging spells (giving them awesome damage) and also Deep Wounds work with spells which deal pierce crush or slash damage. YOu are basically playing a spell slinging rogue/wizard who also is great with weapons. And so on...

If you like rogues then i would play them. Rogues may be at bottom of list but its not like Baldur's gate where a class at the bottom is so far away its a joke. Rogues still do great single target damage and you will have fun playing them. They are considered bottomish because they dont have a second trick in the base class. They excel at single target dps are pretty much nothing else. with some single target cc while still being squishy. Yes spell casters are considered better than other classes but again the gulf is not really that wide like Baldur's Gate wizard. Usually they are considered this way because they are more versatile and perform more functions on the battle field. This game was designed where classes would be balanced and compared to those old Infinity Engine Games they succeeded spectacularly. Also dont worry about the stats. They are not remotely as important as D&D and were designed for you to roleplay the character you wanted to and feel like the game rewarded you. There really are no trap builds or stats in this game unlike D&D. I feel like the power gaming part of this game was a secondary focus in this game. Its there but i believe Josh wanted players to roleplay first and power game second. Especially for those who are not playing the game multiple times. My favorite class is melee ranger that plays like two rogues with ranger and animal. This setup is not a power build and i still felt rewarded and that as i progressed i could do my flanking job really well. This is due to the games commitment to no bad builds. Also This is partly because like i said stats arent as big a deal and there is great gear in game to build around that can have big impacts on your characters.