Purudaya

Most of the critical release bugs (and many others) have been squashed and the game is closer to being balanced difficulty-wise. As for classes, is there anything more specific? What re: classes/ciphers do you have a question about?

This is the main reason I don't play single classes (except for wizard). Short of a system overhaul, which is probably unlikely, they could partially address this by adding a few items that increase power pool for single classes only - maybe a handful of "amulets of specialization" or something.

Helwalker/Trickster is a blast. Max perception and dexterity, dump resolve, put remaining points in intellect and might. The simultaneous +10 might and +10 intellect (from turning wheel) at max wounds will make you formidable in melee and give long spell durations, while swift flurry increases both melee and casting speed. A good opening strategy is to activate swift flurry, enduring dance, mirrored/displaced image, and repulsive visage in quick succession, then refresh as necessary once your intellect is buffed to pretty much infinitely terror-lock most (at least kith) enemies. There are a few good single-target debuffs as well; it's just a really versatile multi that's both adaptable and a lot of fun to play

Right. Cheers, lad. Is there any way to tell what line or option triggers a romance? It will be pretty obvious - the romance triggers in Deadfire aren't exactly subtle, and for a developer that previously criticized CRPG romances/said they shouldn't be implemented unless they can be done "right," Obsidian's romances are some of the most shallow and bare-bones I've ever played. That's not an indictment of Deadfire as a whole - it's a great game - but its qualities come more from excellent worldbuilding, lore, and combat than from companion character development. The companions have dialogue, will interject in conversations, each have a personal quest, and (some) offer a romance that plays out over 5-6 interactions or so. They're okay, but they're by no means a game-defining experience.

If aesthetics are an issue (I can relate), you can use the unity console mod to add or remove effects from different armors...if you don't like how one armor looks, just note down the names of the perks/effects, equip a different armor, and add/remove as necessary. You can obviously run into balancing issues if you mix and match, but just transferring qualities from one breastplate to another that looks better doesn't count as cheating in any meaningful sense imo.

Yeah, they were very upfront about not adding companions in the expansions. Where? Everybody keeps saying how obvious it was, but I don't remember hearing this and feel like I've followed the game's development reasonably well. Then you clearly remember the many times they mentioned how expensive and lengthy and complicated the companion implementation process is. Sure sounded like, “don’t get your hopes up” to me. Especially since they said it every time the topic came up *shrug* Taken with the other comments being made (see above), I don’t see how that would be a reasonable assumption to make. “Upgrading” a companion was something they consistently said was expensive, time consuming, and expensive. smh. Ok. Yeah, there's really no need for the condescension. During the Twitch Q&A from four months ago that I was referencing, Josh Sawyer was directly asked if any sidekicks would be fleshed out into full companions in the upcoming DLCs. His answer at 31:03: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/261766778?t=31m03s Does that sound like "don't get your hopes up" to you? I'm terribly sorry that I am disappointed about something that you're not disappointed about, but no - when the director of the game himself hints that strongly that the developers are listening to a specific request for content, it's not unreasonable for players to hope to see that content make it into the game. What would be odd would be insisting repeatedly that this has been a hard "no" at every stage when Josh Sawyer is on tape not coming anywhere close to ruling out the possibility when specifically asked. You did this once before and I replied with the full quote for context. Alll he says is that they are aware that this is what people want. That is literally *all* he says. It's the equivalent of a parent telling a child, "I heard you" after the 15 millionth request for a pony. Did what once before? Sorry if I took something out of context - your argument was that it was "not a reasonable assumption to make" in response to my view that Obsidian was "looking at least at giving that sidekick an upgrade." I posted the video to illustrate that the latter could easily be inferred from Sawyer's response to the question - not a confirmation, but a possibility. If "no additional companions" had been as firmly baked into the conversation from day one as you say, I imagine he would've simply reiterated that rather than leaving the possibility open. I'm not the only person in the subreddit where I sourced that link (or in these forums, for that matter) who drew the conclusion that a sidekick upgrade might yet be possible. --- For whatever reason, I didn't get the same impression of finality on this subject that you did. Maybe we didn't see all of the same developer comments, maybe I didn't follow the Fig campaign as closely as you did, maybe I interpreted "companion content is costly and time consuming" as tamping down expectations for the amount of potential content rather than precluding it altogether, or maybe I watched that video and thought - because of fan demand - that some of the developer's calculations on the matter might have changed. Is that really so unreasonable? Is it even worth arguing about?

Yeah, they were very upfront about not adding companions in the expansions. Where? Everybody keeps saying how obvious it was, but I don't remember hearing this and feel like I've followed the game's development reasonably well. Then you clearly remember the many times they mentioned how expensive and lengthy and complicated the companion implementation process is. Sure sounded like, “don’t get your hopes up” to me. Especially since they said it every time the topic came up *shrug* Taken with the other comments being made (see above), I don’t see how that would be a reasonable assumption to make. “Upgrading” a companion was something they consistently said was expensive, time consuming, and expensive. smh. Ok. Yeah, there's really no need for the condescension. During the Twitch Q&A from four months ago that I was referencing, Josh Sawyer was directly asked if any sidekicks would be fleshed out into full companions in the upcoming DLCs. His answer at 31:03: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/261766778?t=31m03s Does that sound like "don't get your hopes up" to you? I'm terribly sorry that I am disappointed about something that you're not disappointed about, but no - when the director of the game himself hints that strongly that the developers are listening to a specific request for content, it's not unreasonable for players to hope to see that content make it into the game. What would be odd would be insisting repeatedly that this has been a hard "no" at every stage when Josh Sawyer is on tape not coming anywhere close to ruling out the possibility when specifically asked.

Yeah, they were very upfront about not adding companions in the expansions. Where? Everybody keeps saying how obvious it was, but I don't remember hearing this and feel like I've followed the game's development reasonably well. When Josh Sawyer said that the team was "very aware" of the Ydwin fanbase (I'm not really a Ydwin fan, but to each their own) when asked about future companion content, I think it was reasonable to assume that they were looking at giving at least that sidekick an upgrade. We now know he was just talking about tacking on a handful of non-interactive lines in BoW, but it definitely didn't sound like meatier content was off the table at the time. I think "shooting themselves in the foot" is a little strong. First, Pillars 1 had too many companions. Understandably, they "had" to cover all the classes, so 11 companions makes sense from a certain perspective, but that justification doesn't hold up in Deadfire due to multiclassing. Second, "interesting" is completely subjective. Yes, the Pillars 1 crew had some witty banters, but I do think there's more depth to it in Deadfire. Maybe that's not your thing and that's ok, but I don't think it was a mistake or a failure. Third, as someone who has ditched Xoti for a hireling, I can 100% confirm that sidekicks have value. They may not be as vocal as companions, but they aren't mute. They don't come out of the box 1 level behind, never to catch up. They don't share assets with ship crew members. Where I do agree with you is that the deeper companinon relationship system isn't finished baking yet. It needs more work. And they defintely need to go back to their "no romance unless it can be done well" policy. Exceot that the companions AREN'T deeper or more interesting than in PoE1. All the relationship thing has done is make me read, "Aloth raises an eyebrow." About 5,000 times. This adds NOTHING to his character. You could even argue that PoE2 companions have less depth. In PoE1, I was able to sift through Grieving Mother's memories and decide whether she should be forgiven for her actions, was able to help Aloth choose between suppressing or reconciling the split in his soul/personality, talk at length with Durance and Eder and either reinforce or sow doubt in their respective faiths, decide whether to help or deter the Devil of Caroc on her path of revenge, and on and on. In PoE2, the majority of the companions are static. The game strongly hints that you'll be able to persuade an increasingly conflicted and doubtful Maia away from the RDC only to have her turn out to be a blind follower no matter everything else that's happened. Eder, Pallegina, and Serafen don't grow, they just have problems that you help solve (and briefly, at that). Heck, even taking Eder and Xoti to the Burning Bridge - while an excellent level in an excellent DLC - doesn't deliver the narrative payoff you might expect from a character development standpoint. I wish Obsidian would draw half as much from Mask of the Betrayer as they do from Fallout: NV in informing their approach to narrative design. Deadfire is still a great game, but it's a bummer that I play it more for the worldbuilding and combat than for the characters. That's why I was holding out hope for more - maybe the remaining DLCs will yet add some much needed depth, but I think "a few extra lines" is probably the more likely approach.

As a non-backer, this only reinforces my decision to wait until post-release to buy both PoE1 and PoE2. If Obsidian wants people to pay 100+ USD for their game months to a year before release in exchange for extra content/merch, they should at least aim to fulfill expectations as stated. If I backed a game expecting a physical copy (even if it was amended to a disc with an activation code) and instead got a box with a card in it, I would never support that developer again. Obsidian could make it right by offering a refund to anyone who isn't happy with the physical components of their backer purchase. It seems like there are quite a few.

Exactly. I'm not going to play with a party member that has virtually nothing to say outside of a few lines in a specific DLC, no matter how much "love" they get on the single island said DLC offers. I don't care if they don't add new companions into the relationship system if they instead gave sidekicks new content throughout the game, but it sounds like they're just going with the "Konstanten will get two new lines of non-interactive dialogue if you take him on this one specific quest and nowhere else" approach. --- As for being 'surprised' about there not being any other companions...yeah, I am. Most party-based CRPGs gain at least one companion somewhere in the DLC process, and while it may have been sensible to expect *fewer* companions added in the DLC season than in PoE1, did everybody really expect that there would be zero when they made their purchase? As it stands, we went from 11 companions to 7 with no significant jump in quality, imo (maybe excepting Maneha). For people who really enjoy companion development as part of the narrative, that's a downgrade.

I would agree If they were better.

I would partially agree with you if we actually had sidekicks with a half-decent amount of dialogue, but we don't. It's really too bad that the reputation/relationship system was so cumbersome/buggy/poorly implemented - it would be fine if the end result had been fewer companions with an increase in content/depth, but that's not what we got.

At around 45:30 in the most recent Twitch stream, the devs essentially confirmed that there aren't going to be any new companions added to PoE2. It also doesn't sound like any sidekicks will be upgraded to full companions given their reasoning: https://m.twitch.tv/videos/309622653 This is disappointing. Given that PoE1 started with 8 companions and ended with 11, I think it was reasonable for players to expect at least somewhat similar content additions when making their decisions to buy PoE2 (I know I did). I would understand if the companions in Deadfire had significantly more depth than they did in PoE1, but that hasn't been the case unless you count the (imo) relatively meaningless relationship system which seems itself to be a big factor in precluding new companion content. From what I've seen so far, I would take a major content pack for new and existing companions over the entire Seeker/Slayer/Survivor DLC any day. I really wish Obsidian would get that rich/expansive party content is part of what draws many CRPG fans to the genre and that this aspect of their (otherwise excellent) games really needs some focus/improvement.

This. Also, I know it lessens the "achievement" aspect but I'd like to be able to play the god challenges with mods enabled. I'm starting to get the feeling that players will ultimately have to address certain balance issues themselves, so it would be nice if we could combine certain challenges with player-made content in order to create a fun experience on our terms.

Are you kidding me i hope ;D @achilles: obviously you've never played the games i mentioned before or Ultima 7. PoE2 is open world, but still suffers from the “too many distractions” problem that *all* open world game have. Currently on my 4th playthrough and finally have a good idea of what needs to be ignored in order to keep a consistent narrative.You can never have too much to do. To each his own an all but having more to do than you could possibly want to complete gives a layer of immersion linear experiences simply do not have. Being able to come back to a game time and time again and always having something new to be discovered is what keeps bringing me back to games like Skyrim, Witcher 3, or any recent fallout title for example. You can say its a problem (and some agree) but that element is a huge draw for a lot of people also.Yeah. Some people really like that. Some people really like games for the story. Thank you for repeating it again.Yeah not mutually exclusive lol...Except that they are. Your options are 1) play in the sandbox and throw narrative to wind or 2) chase the narrative and ignore the sandbox. There is no middle ground. The point that I (and others) have tried to make is that while option 2 is available for narrative-focused players, it usually involves multiple (sometimes frustrating) playthroughs. There is middle ground, and many games prove that. If you want a straight narrative, from A to B, ok, it's awful for a crpg unless you're playing a beat em up or a fps but ot each its own i guess, there are people who eat pizza with pineapple. Even a pnp rpg camoaign is not devoid of freedom given to the players unless you're a bad master. I used to be a DM and the worst sessions were those where the narrative hook wasn't compelling enough to keep the players moving in a unified direction. Our general view was that character choice and roleplaying flourished more under a structured narrative (I dive off the cliff and leave my party behind to save the artifact) than an open narrative that allows a high degree of physical freedom (I go to the nearest inn. Are there wenches?). As for choice and linearity in video games, I'd add the Mass Effect series. Those games were linear as hell in terms of physical freedom (the occasional exploration element was mainly empty planets) and they had more reactivity and meaningful player choice than any other crpg before or since. The ending was sadly nonsensical garbage and turned me away from Bioware for good, but it is a proof point that linear games can offer NPC depth and an engaging narrative without sacrificing player choice or roleplaying. I agree with you about eating pizza with pineapple, though.

Yet another reason why the 35% damage penalty is such a poor solution to fixing full attacks.

Depends on what you expect from a game, I suppose. If you play for narrative, then sandbox games are a frustrating experience. but you can have narrative with an open world approach. I've yet to see a sandbox game that conveys a compelling and urgent narrative better than a linear game with the same objective. It doesn't have to be either/or, btw - some of the best CRPG games have had linear narratives with exploration elements/worlds that open up in stages, which is the optimal mix imo.

Are you really suggesting that Fighter has an advantage over Rogue for single target DPS ? Come on, that is only 1 strike and it costs a bunch of discipline. I think rogue still have the proper tools. Yeah I don't know what I was thinking when I wrote that, I must've had penetrating strike or something in my head or had forgotten about the high discipline cost. And I'm definitely not arguing that rogues are weak on single target DPS, I just have some criticisms with how Obsidian has handled them and drew a really odd cross-class comparison likely fueled by poor sleep and Cheetos. Please ignore.

Lol power strike is now twice as powerful as backstab. I swear, sometimes I think obs doesn't get rogues at all. A lot of good changes here otherwise. Except for the attempt at weapon style balancing — it's like they read through the full attack suggestion threads and managed to find the one solution that absolutely no one was suggesting. Edit: just spent some time testing it and it appears to be an additive damage nerf. On a dual-wielding rogue, you won't even notice the difference. I really hope they revisit this. Ah well. I suppose recognizing it is at least a step in the right direction.

It's too bad that this is how they decided to address weapon styles — it would've been so much more interesting to create improvements to OHS and THS when making full attacks. If that would've resulted in too much DPS, then it would've been more consistent to just remove full attacks altogether. As it stands now, there is no difference between primary and full attacks for 3/4 of the weapon styles and the main benefit for TWS (the two proc chances) remains. I mean, I'm glad to see any fix to weapon styles, it just seems like kind of a meh solution.

Incidentally, if you don't click on this "X has something to say" icon, will they ever speak? Has this been tested? I for sure know from my PoE1 experience that it took me a long while to realise people wanted to talk to me, by which point there were plenty of them and they'd probably been wanting to talk for quite some time. I found this approach slightly immersion-breaking, because it strengthened the sense that I am the center of the universe and nothing will ever happen until I will it to -- and this, in turn, strengthened the sense that the world of the game is essentially dead. I wouldn't say that the game world is dead, but I agree with you about the player as the center of the universe/willing things to happen bit a lot. In the BG games, stuff happened to you. Whether it was the Yoshimo betrayal, the Sahuagin boarding party, the abduction of Imoen, Firkraag's deception, Harper meddling, the Aboleth in Ust Natha, being forced to do quests for the vampires/thieves' guild, the death and revival of CHARNAME's romance, being poisoned by Marek in BG1, etc, the characters in the world had agency and weren't just static vessels for you to talk to or kill. You sometimes *gasp* were forced to do something that you didn't want to do for the sake of heightening the story's dramatic tension toward a better narrative payoff. I don't even blame Obsidian for moving away from this kind of storytelling (most games have), I blame players who grew up on Bethesda titles and who think that role-playing means being 100% in charge of their character's story. Wouldn't this game have been more interesting if we had an antagonist dogging our every step (I originally thought the pirate who boards you at the beginning of the game - whose name I tellingly can't remember - would be this), gods actually interfering in our lives rather than just calling us in for a talk, or maybe the imprisonment or separation of our party by a hostile faction? Again, I'm not really criticizing Obsidian on this and actually think they did a great job with Deadfire by and large (it might even be my favorite CRPG since BG2). My beef is with players who can't seem to tolerate any linearity or even temporary loss of agency. Narratives where the protagonist is in charge of deciding virtually everything that happens to her just aren't as engaging as narratives that are willing to push the player around once in a while.

If that's the case, I'd really like to see the removal of the relationship system in future games - it sounds like an awful lot of work for relatively little gain from a player perspective, and if it precludes the upgrading of sidekicks to full companions then that's a strong net loss imo. New sidekick content is nice, but I'm really hoping for at least another proper companion out of the season pass given that PoE1's DLCs gave us 3.

Soulbound weapons don't usually talk and levelling them has been a grind since PoE1. Modwyr is an exception as explained through her backstory - multiple talking weapons just floating around the Deadfire would both diminish the novelty and kind of stress the lore a bit. As for the beta state, yeah it's kind of frustrating. But it's not (and should not be) surprising these days given the scope of the game and the size of the developer.

I thought the banters were mostly fine; nothing hugely memorable but nothing cringe-worthy either. I just wish there would have been more that required player input to advance - that doesn't have to mean extensive branching dialogues (which are more expensive and time consuming), but just a few pop-up dialogues that briefly interrupt play and force the player to respond to or dismiss companions. This worked really well in BG2 (I know, I know): even if you had relatively few options to interject in a banter, just having to click "continue" forced you to interact and made the dialogue feel more memorable/less ambient. Obsidian flirted with this a little bit early on where Eder approaches you to talk about Xoti, which had me expecting some banter between the two of them that the player might be able to play a role in. Turned out not to be the case, unfortunately. I'm really not a fan of the Bioware-style "NPC x has something to say" icon, either - outside of fights and certain areas, it would be way more natural for them to just start talking to you.

They need to either give one-handed style and two-handed style bonuses for full attacks or get rid of full attacks altogether. The speed bonuses and double active weapon enchantments are already a significant bonus for TWS - having an entire attack feature with double chances to deal damage/inflict status effects (with no equivalent feature for any other style) both disincentivizes certain class builds and creates a barrier between optimization and role playing. I know that the game is winnable with any weapon/class, but that's beside the point. Players who know the mechanics should be able to explore builds utilizing various weapon styles without having to incur an intentional self-nerf for choosing OHS or THS.