[Is it just me or combat is really tedious?]

combat is pretty decent thus far, but at times i have ended up in tedious situations of my characters slowly wearing down their opponents once their abilities have run out. however, this is not unlike other crpgs out there, so no big issues there yet. maybe non-ability/spell damage could be increased in some ways.

 

i do miss the ability to see combat rolls etc. on the message bar. but again, it's not a big issue and certainly nothing that need great improvement.

[Don't complain about battles being too hard]

battles feel a bit too easy currently. I've been playing above normal difficulty and have only lost a battle once, and that's because i basically just went in swinging and didn't bother to pause etc.

[Was the backer beta a good idea?]

I think it was a good thing to have the beta. The beta only shows a very small part of the overall story and landmass. I think most people who are interested in PoE have a huge interest in the storyline, which is a major part of IE games, which has not been revealed yet.

 

but i do hope the developers have thick skin and the will to go through with their vision for the game and its systems. there are some VERY loud armchair developers in this forum trying to make obsidian design a game for them. a lot of the discussion in this forum is sometimes very muddled by people just citing IE games as scripture, giving UNDULY praise to its AI, attribute system use etc. which is kind of mind-blowing in a way to see how much nostaligia seems to obfuscate objective discussion for some.

[Second impressions thread! [Build 278 version]]

Somewhat smoother experience thus far, feels a bit more stable. Still a few small things I would look into:

 

Clicking on the magnifying glass icon for inspecting things; would be nice if one simply gets the information without ones party members rushing to the inspection-icon.

 

Clicking on NPCs passing by; would be nice if they stop so ones characters don't have to run after them.

 

Combat feels kind of easy even on hard difficulty, but it's too early to tell.

[Pretty disappointed, this launches in December?]

 

They created this Forum for FEEDBACK. Do not for a minute think that your "/thread!" retorts and tireless attempts to shut dissention up is doing them (or anyone else) any good at all.

 

However, some of this feedback seems kind of distracting to the overall discussion about the bugs and problems with the beta; a few very loud developer-wannabes in this and many other threads that try to aggressively push their vision of how the game should be.

[No Arrows Good thing or bad?]

seems like some things like inventory management is simplified, but other things like dialogue and combat are more complicated comparing to Baldurs Gate and IWD.

[This game needs polish!]

 

Plus, with perhaps a few exceptions, the backers aren't professional beta testers, so it is not appropriate in my view for Obsidian to expect us to conduct ourselves as if we are. If Obsidian truly expected the majority of the backers to understand that they were receiving a something that was known to be largely unplayable, without offering a single word of warning beforehand, than I say that was poor judgment on their part. They did offer a list of known bugs in update 84, but there was no mention of the game breaking bugs in that list. It's almost as if they want to sweep those under the rug.

 

Again, comparing to the Wasteland 2 Beta, the backers were only brought in once the game had a solid foundation, was generally stable, and game breaking bugs were very rare. For a larger scale beta that includes fans rather than professional beta testers, this seems like a much more reasonable way to handle it.

 

It is not unplayable, I have played several hours of it, even without any major crashes. There are some serious bugs, mainly regarding inventory and exp, and some serious balancing issues. The game is playable for sure, but needs polish. But to me, polish does not mean "break down and rebuild from scratch". There was plenty of warning before hand of known issues. The beta has only been going for 5 days, let's see how it looks in 2 months.

[The General Suggestions Thread]

Could wandering NPCs stop when you click to talk to them? Even if they don't have anything special to say it's still a nice touch. So far they just keep walking away while my characters run after them. "Hey you! I'm talking to you!!"

[Faster edge scrolling?]

Yeah, definitely agree with the need for faster screen scroll speed.