Crucis

The problem that I see for an "arachnophobic" mode is this. Sure, you could replace all the spiders with something else. But IIRC, a lot of the maps where spiders reside have areas that look like spider nests, with webs and everything. Does the arachnophobic mode adjust the maps to "tweak" those areas for whatever replaces spiders? It's a real shame that some people have a legitimate arachnophobia. But I'm not sure how one gets around not using spiders in a fantasy setting since, as others have pointed out, they're a common monster in such settings. And beyond that, even if one was willing to have a "arachnophobia" mode, it would seem to necessary to make the maps more generic so that replacing spiders with something else (crabs, bears, orcs, goblins, whatever) didn't also require changing a map to get rid of the spider nests and webs and such. And beyond even this, what would the next phobia that would come along that would need a special mode? Skeletons? Wild animals? I don't think that there's an easy answer to this issue.

This is a really harsh attitude. People with legitimate phobias don't just "get over" them, particularly if those phobias are really strong. Someone who has panic attacks, like the OP writes, when they even see a depiction of spiders isn't going to "get over it".

I doubt that the size of the portrait affects its cost much here. After all, the artist isn't creating a portrait that's what? 110 by 40 something pixels. He's creating a much larger portrait that eventually gets resized. I have no idea but if I was able to choose one over the other I would choose the voice over. A static portrait would add little for me but the voice does add a lot. Honestly, I think that the combo of a nice pic and voice-over really makes the important NPC's come alive, but is it worth the cost? I don't know, particularly since I don't know how much these portraits cost on an individual basis. But if they weren't too costly, it would have been nice to have portraits for a few of the really major NPCs, such as Lady Webb, Lord Raedric (both versions) would probably be my first two choices. Then on a second level, possibly, the leaders of each of the 3 factions in Defiance Bay. On a third level, maybe Duc Aivar and the clan leader you meet with near the beginning of Act 3. You don't interact with them often, but they are major NPC's in terms of their importance, I suppose. After this, there's really no one all that important that might justify the cost of the pic. You're starting to get into NPCs who are merchants or innkeepers, etc. About the only one in this group that stands out a little might be the Aumaua woman who runs the Salty Mast. It might be nice to have a pic of her, but hardly all that important.

Dang! 20k gold or the Misery's End stiletto? That's easy! Take the money and run! As for the Crucible Knights reward sword, yeah, it's extremely lackluster. Of all the 3 reward weapons the factions give, the Cloudpiercer warbow is far and away the best of the three, particularly since it's probably the best warbow in the game. I'm not even sure that the Superb warbow, Rain of (something) Field, would be better even if its Speed mod actually worked! The Rain Warbow doesn't have any other special effects on it other than the currently non-functional Speed mod, so it might as well be a generic warbow. Honestly, though, it'd be nice if in an upcoming patch if the devs would have the reward items of the Knights and the Doemenels be more competitively balanced in comparison to the Dozens' reward weapon, Cloudpiercer. (Of course, I suppose I should be careful what I wish for since they could "fix" the balance by making the Dozens' reward weapon weaker, etc.) Still, it'd be nice if the Knights' reward sword was better and the Doemenels' reward weapon was better. (And I'm not even sure if making Misery's End into a Superb stiletto would be enough to do this, since it'd still just be a stiletto.)

Googled a bit and came up with: http://www.usgamer.net/articles/what-faction-should-i-choose-in-pillars-of-eternity Seems like the favor part might be opting for more Stronghold protection. Doesn't really appeal to me but YMMV. As for Misery's End, I agree that while its fairly decent, you may have equal or better 1-handed weapons at that stage. My party doesn't really have a lot of people using 1-handers for dps and I already had Ravenwing and Resolution at that stage, amongst others. Didn't notice any option for money or favor for Dozens during my playthrough (supported by the above linked article). Cloudpiercer with its Jolting Touch proc is a really nice weapon though, especially in view of a lack of unique Warbow drops in the early game (for me at least). Ordinarily you might not be getting a whole lot of crits, but once an opponent is Paralyzed (from say Mental Binding or other means), chances go up very significantly. Yeah, that stiletto, Misery's End, is not all that great. Would have been nicer if it was a Superb stiletto. Its Vicious effect could be useful for a melee rogue, since it should synergize well with sneak attacks. If instead of the Accurate +3 effect, it had a full Superb effect (+12 acc and x1.45 damage) to go along with the Vicious effect, it'd be better. But in the end, it's still just a stiletto, and it doesn't seem worth it to upgrade it to Superb unless one really gets off on playing sneak attacking melee rogues using "traditional" thief weapons.

If you give Azureths an enchantment that improves the quality of the weapon (i.e. Fine, Exceptional, or Superb), it should improve the base damage accordingly. Regardless, it's a shame that stilettos and daggers aren't in the same WF group, since they seem like they'd both be natural weapons for rogues wanting to use small, hide-able weapons.

Hey, Gromniir, there was one BG2-TOB enemy that was kinda, sorta memorable. Talked funny. Sorta like you, as a matter of fact. Can't imagine what his name might have been. Seriously though, I find Pallegina very memorable, if for no other reason than her wonderful exotic "foreign" completely un-bland accent!

While I would never say that the Survival skill is critical, if you have a character who doesn't really need most of the other skills, points spent on Survival aren't wasted. Extending the duration of short-ish duration combat potions is worthwhile, particularly if you get your survival up high enough to get a 30% or higher boost. Of course, I will say that on Normal mode, one can get by without any potions, outside of healing ones. I will say that the Arcane Accuracy (?) potion is a great one for Ranged Rogues, particularly late in the game if you're trying to use a Finishing Blow attack on a high level boss enemy. Nothing like increasing the chance that you'll hit, or even better get a crit on that sort of attack!

It may depend on what class the character is. If you're playing a Rogue (EDIT: as I see you are), the Vicious mod perfectly synergizes with Sneak Attack, whereas you can only trigger a spell strike once per battle, IIRC. I will say that a Jolting Touch spell strike is excellent, no matter what weapon it's on, as long as your character is good enough to get critical hits to trigger it.

http://pillarsofeternity.gamepedia.com/Animancer%27s_Boots Found on the body of an animancer as you enter Brackenbury after the hearings I didn't know that you could enter the sanitarium after the hearings. Is this before or after you get kicked out of Defiance Bay at the end of Act 2?

What are these animancer boots you mention, Omicron?

Overall, I agree with you, with perhaps the single glaring exception being Gilded Vale. That place was rather dark, with the hanging tree, and the lack of any foliage, and so forth. For all Defiance Bay's supposed unrest, other than perhaps about a dozen people listening to a Dozen's rabble-rouser in Copperlane and 2-3 protesters at the front door of the Ducal Palace, it was hard to actually SEE or feel that Defiance Bay was on edge as much as was claimed ... well, at least until the end of Act 2, if ya know what I mean (this is the No Spoilers section after all).

Carnage applies to all "on-hit" effects of weapons: Wounding, Disorienting, DR Bypass, Draining, Overbearing, Stunning, Convert Graze to Hit, et cetera. for the on-crit effects, i believe the Carnage attack has to crit, not the parent attack. it's a wildly powerful skill. as for proc, it depends on who you talk to or where you are reading as to its etymology. some say its shorthand for Programmed Random OCurrence (eg, x has a y% chance to activate z's effect). others will tell you its short for procedure. with relation to gaming, it's just a synonym for trigger, activate, et cetera. This makes sense, since it's not uncommon for words, slang or otherwise, to have unknown origins and multiple theories as to those origins. I prefer "trigger" myself, though. It seems much more accurate and descriptive. Looking at the list of effects that Carnage might be able to apply, there are some good ones there. But I'm tempted to think that Draining could be among the best simply because Barbarians (from my understanding of the class) tend to take a fair amount of damage, and a carnage AoE drain on multiple enemies could heal a LOT of END in a short time! Particularly since it's not an on-crit only effect.

The thing is that Imoen being tortured is an individual event (and there are some other similar individual events, of course), whereas in PoE, it's the entire setting that has this tone. Everywhere you go, it's all about the Hollowborn problem, how it's affecting people, what other people are trying to do to fix it, why people think it's happening, and so on and so on and so on. There's a vast gulf of difference between the two. In BG2, it's not like Irenicus is going all around Amn torturing people everywhere. He's only picking on a very tiny select group of people. But in PoE, the darkness of the tone, i.e. the Hollowborn problem, is affecting everyone and every thing to some degree or other and in some way or other. In BG2, it's like a few random rooms in a random building here and there in a city loses power and goes dark. In PoE, the entire city has gone dark. In BG2 it's highly localized. In PoE it's totally pervasive.

1. Actually, I've heard that if your PC is a priest, you can affect what god is worshiped in the chapel, which may or may not have some further effect on things. 2. The Garden is one of the more worthwhile things, since it provides a constant supply of plants you'd need for enchantments. 3. Yes, the Craft Hall is a big disappointment. It'd be a lot better if that merchant, Azurro, who randomly visits the SH, would just take up residence with his supply of unique items. 4. 100% agree on the dungeon. I never take prisoners. If I can't have their loot when I throw them in the pokey, it's off with their heads! No loot, no mercy! 5. Obviously, if you want the bounty missions (who wouldn't?), you need to repair the warden's lodge. And given that amount of XP, gold, and loot to be had from those missions, they far more than offset the cost of the repair.

It's also made worse because as I recall, those ogre encounters where you find an ogre druid usually seem to have 2 or 3 ogre druids and all of them cast insect Plague at once. If one is doing the Ogre bounty fairly late and you have a high level cipher, the level 6 power that knocks every enemy on their butts and stuns them (or whatever it does) is probably also a good thing as well as it should almost certainly interrupt any casting by those darned Ogre Druids.

Sorry, what I meant by "where does it come from" is what is it short for. It seems pretty clear that it's a shortened version of some other word, though it escapes me what it could be. Edit: Hmmm.... I just googled it and the best thing I got was that "procs" means it "processed an effect". Well that's lame. The computer may "process" an effect, but the "character" triggers the effect by getting a critical hit, which in turn requires the computer to process said effect. Blah.

What the hell is "procs" (and where does it come from)? To me, the proper verb is "triggers". I have no clue what this "procs" is.

Soldier looks pretty good then Tidefall: Draining & Wounding Hours of St. Rumbal : Prone Tall Grass: Prone Strike Hard: Disorientating You can have fun with that all over; Adventurer: The White Spire (Estoc, Disorienting), Half-Mast (Pollaxe, Prone), Gaun's Share (Flail, Draining), and Starcaller (Flail, Stunning, Spell-Striking) Noble: Drawn in Spring (Dagger, Wounding), Mosquito (Rapier, Draining) Ruffian: Azureith's Stiletto (Spell-Striking), Oidhreacht (Stiletto, Draining), Blesca's Labor (Club, Draining), and Purgatory (Sabre, Draining) And a personal favorite, Peasant: The Vile Loner's Lance (Spear, Disorienting) and Cladhaliath (Spear, Stunning) First time playing a Barbarian and doing so in 1.06. I now finally see how this works, pretty sweet (I know it is old news to most, but did not see it when I did a quick search) 1st line reads that Durthal Crits Troll the 3/4 Targets gets hit with Jolting touch. Then not 100% how it works, but carnage gives jolting touch an additional 18 "hits" bug report material But is it really a "bug" or just an instance of that spellstriking effect that seems grossly OP (and perhaps needs to be addressed)?

Damn, that's a nasty thing to do to your enemies, Omicron! A double whammy of Jolting Touch!!! I wonder if using draining weapons during a carnage attack drain from all of the enemies your carnage hits. If so, that could be one really powerful way to heal your barbarian!

I don't know. PoE's environment seemed OK to me. Honestly though, it's hard to discuss this problem in a General, no spoilers sub-forum, since it seems to me that to properly discuss it requires talking about the spoilery details that cause the setting to be what it is. But the thing is with the setting's problem is that it was region wide. It wasn't localized to any one city or town. You couldn't escape it by traveling a couple of hours to another town. Frankly, I had no sense that this game took itself "too seriously". I honestly never liked Jan Jansen from BG2. I like a games, movies, and TV shows that take the subject matter seriously. For example, I like that the Lord of the Rings movies took the subject matter seriously, unlike other more campy fantasy movies that always seemed to have to have some sort of a fool character along just so we didn't take the movie "too seriously". Being serious about the subject matter doesn't have to mean being serious to the point of being positively morose. That's not to say that there isn't a little room for levity. But I don't need some "fool character" hanging around just so things aren't taken "too seriously".

A good tip for what imo is the hardest bounty. I often go with heavy dps, summons, ranged interrupt, Aoe druid,mage etc I wouldn't discount the final bounty mission, a group of Vithracks. They can be brutally tough if you let them get off their paralyzing spells. They're another group that's worth Confusing, etc. The thing is with the Viths, Durance has a buffing spell that he can cast to give your entire party protection against the Vith paralyzing spell. So as long as your party is high enough level for him to have it, I'd make getting that spell cast a priest's highest priority, cuz nothing is worse than letting those Vith jerks paralyze your entire party. One thing that I like about this game, and was true with the IE games as well, is that you can get totally owned by an enemy in a battle, and with some tweaks in your plan, you can come back and completely turn the tables on them and massacre them just as badly the next time as they massacred you the time before. And regarding your described strat, that's sorta what I was doing when I was having trouble with the ogre bounty, i.e. trying to take'em down with brute force and nuking. If it was just the regular ogres themselves, that strat might work out OK. But those ogre druids are a game changer for them, and seem to require a different way of approaching the problem.

Agree 100%. If I make the effort to get back to the Stronghold to defend it, I oughta get to keep all the loot from the enemies my party kills. Also agree about how it's bogus to not get to strip any prisoners and keep their stuff. Those prisoners should be going into their cells with little more than an orange jumpsuit .... or the fantasy RPG equivalent (simple clothes?). Frankly, it's why I don't take prisoners. Also note that you have no choice but to take over the strong hold and repair the Eastern Barbican if you want to get to the areas to the east of Caed Nua. Another thing that annoys me is that I have spent all this gold repairing the castle, but it seems that enemies are breaching its defenses constantly! Why can't there be another area just outside of Caed Nua where you get to fight the attackers rather than having them miraculously always getting inside its defenses as if I, the Lord of Caed Nua, invited them in for a party and an obligatory sword fight.

Boots of speed are interesting at times. Most of the time I've had them, I put them on my most dangerous offensive melee character. However, when it's time for the final battle, I move however many Boots of Speed I have over to my squishy characters so that they can (ahem) move to a safer location ASAP away from those 2 nasty statues, while I have my tanks engage them.

The best way to deal with ogre druids and their insect plague to heavily spam spells like Confusion, and prevent them from getting those spells off, or at least get them attacking each other. Confusion is one of the most potent spells in the game, but it seems particularly useful against Ogres because their Will saves are nothing special and they have so much END that they don't die easily. So getting them to attack each other is a great way to turn their strength against themselves.