Boeroer

- Bleak Walker/Arcane Archer with Ring of Focused Flame and Spearcaster: TONs of accuracy and great dmg. Max Arcana skill. - Bleak Walker/Assassin with Dragon's Dowry: great dmg from stealth and invisibility, but limited use of invisibility - Assassin/Priest of Skaen with Dragon's Dowry: less dmg per shot, but more uses of invisibility - Assassin/Bloodmage with Blightheart: less dmg per shot, but even more uses of invisibility (Arkemyr's Brilliant Departure), more squishy - Streetfighter/Troubadour with Red Hand, Myth Fyr and Sure Handed Ila: summon whisps, distract yourself and fire high DMG rounds with lash and reload speed. - Sharpshooter with Red Hand: once you get Twinned Shot... And there's many more options... I like the first option a lot and played it for a complete playthrough. You will have stellar ACC with Flames of Devotion and Imbue shots (especially Imbue:Fireball).

Is it a pet that gives bonus AoE damage to the MC (or Edér) only or to the party?

@thelee: Well, my examples that added 1 spell per PL were just examples. As I said I can totally see trinkets that only add one single spell - or two or three. Not necessarily one per PL progression. And als not necessarily at the usual PL. You could do a trinket that adds a PL 8 spell to your PL 6 or so... endless possibilities basically. A trinket named "Book of Prayers " that only adds the Prayer and Linany spells and gives them +1 PL could be a thing. I also would like to add "unique" spells that only come with that trinket (I love the unique grimoires). That, added with some "special" features like bonus PL for certain keywords (+2 PL to punishment or whatever), bonus durations, bigger AoE, you name it - should solve the problem that some spell levels of the Priest and his spell selections are very narrow and motivate to use some spells that you normally wouldn't consider. Ot take a route with your build you didn't consider before. Same with Druids: no need to give them a 1:1 copy of the grimoire mechanics, but add some nice trinkets that are cool, fitting and help them a bit to develop more specific build ideas/routes that are fun. For example: currently there's not much motivation to build a Decay-Druid (not a single item with special Decay bonus afaik - besides Chromopr. Staff that does +1 PL to Acid) while Beast/Plant Druids (Spine of Thicket Green, Ancient), Healer Druids (Lifegiver, Spine of Thicket Green, diverse +healing items), Summons Druid (Ancient, Animancy Cat) and Elemental Druids (Fury, Fire PL bonus gear, Storms PL bonus gear, Shock PL bonus gear) get all the love. Hence my example ot the shrinkhead. Of course it would be nice if we could find a special approach for both class-trinkets that seperates them from each other (and grimoires) a bit but still keeps things consistent and kind of uniform. @Phenomenum: great work!

Usually I find the Fire Dragon to be a wussy.

All those PL bonuses and whatnot are nice and most people know I'm one of the biggest fans of PoE's Inspiring Radiance. But that will not solve the issue I was talking about: that Priests and Druids suffer from a very narrow portfolio of "picked" spells which leads to a situation where there's always an optional spell choice and thus a very narrow build variety. If Priests have half of the possible spells that Wizards have - how can give them only half of the bonus spells via trinket be a problem? Then wizards would have the same problem. Which they don't have. You could easily pick a nice trinket and invest more in passives for example. It is indeed a bit meta-gamey. But grimoires are as well.

Wrong. It's an idea that seems stupid to you. But in reality it's a good solution that solves a problem that comes with the new ability system. That you don't use it doesn't mean that it's bad or stupid. It only shows that you don't like it and that you don't play your wizards effectively. Anyway those changes you suggest touch the core mechanics of the game and thus are not "polishing".

Imo the biggest problem with Priests and Druids is their very limited spell portfolio which forces you to forgo the circumstancial spells and always pick the same old spells. Grimoires solve this problem for Wizards - so it's only logical that trinkets that function somewhat similarly will solve that problem for Priests and Druids as well. They can be somewhat different (hence I only added on spell per PL or even a passive and added another bonuses) but in general that's what I think trinkets should be for. It's also nothing new that is difficult to implement/may cause balancing issues that are hard to foresee/easily understandable/uniform with grimoire trinkets.

Because that's totally not messing with the core mechanics...?

Temples, merchants, loot drop? Like grimoires basically. My only gripe with grimoires is that only wizards can have them.

That's because grazes made them too strong in PoE. PoE's afflictions are what PEN is in Deadfire.

I agree A LOT on the AR raise for PotD (I mean not having it). It narrows everything down to PEN vs AR - which already is balanced on a knife's edge. I like Driving Echoes. It's PL 9 after all. Something completely different what I would have likes and which is only a matter of taste: I would have liked that Shifters don't shift between several forms but instead still pick a form but their shifting is a modal. Modal on = shifted, no casting. Modal off = not shifted, able to cast. No healing in between. I don't like that you can't "devote" yourself to a form but shift to everything. Yes, I meant "cause tier-1-affliction -> get tier-2-inspiration" with Wild Leech. Sorry. Periodic Haunting Chains sounds nice. I would still add a smallish AoE centered on the initial target. Specific examples for trinkets: - Holy Symbol of St. Spasematucki (a big fat golden coin that shows a helping hand): you get the following spells added to your spell selection: Lvl 1: Blessing Lvl 2: Holy Meditation Lvl 3: Consecrated Ground Lvl 4: Triumph of the Crusaders Lvl 5: Champion's Boon Lvl 6: Salvation of Time Lvl 7: Minor Avatar Lvl 8: Crowns for the Faithful Lvl 9: Prestige All inspirations gain +1 PL and/or +20% duration. This would be a good trinket for a support priest. - Witch Doctor's Shrinkhead (a shrinkhead): Lvl 1: Touch of Rot Lvl 2: Autumn's Decay Lvl 3: Infestation of Maggots Lvl 4: Spirit of Decay Lvl 5: Plague of Insects Lvl 6: Rot Skulls Lvl 7: Rusted Armor Lvl 8: Entropy Lvl 9: Touch of Death You get +3 PL on all decay spells - but you can't shift. Stuff like that. I would also like to change PLs of spells - for example give Rot Skulls at lvl 1 and that would the only thing the trinket does. Or give a Priest trinket Firebrand as spell. But I don't know hopw much hassel it is to "copy" a spell and give it another PL and/or to another class.

Listen up! The design expert is talking.

I only speak from my own experience as a software engineer, but that is not really the plan: to leave bugs for the customers to find when developing software because it's cheap. In fact the reputation loss is most likely going to cost you more money. You can of course develop very robust software. But you need experts and establish certain procedures - strict standards, guidelines also schooling You also need time. As I understand it the game industry lacks developers and at the same time treats them poorly, always has deadlines and crunch time and also doesn't pay too well. So what can you expect? The only thing that delivers awesome games nowadays is strong dedication and passion it seems. Those things don't help too much with bugs though.

Then you need patience . Snarkyness (is that a word?) won't speed things up. But posting bugs does indeed help.

If you don't behave like a professional why should they? Anyway I guess you get my point. Awesome new avatar by the way. :D

Well I didn't test is excessively but I can't (for example) lure away most shopkeepers with Dazzling Lights etc. Only with Sparkcrackers.

Then hopefully your bug reports will be put to good use and the game improves. But after all, it's just a game. If you can't live with its flaws you can get a refund. I hear Obsidian is accomodating with those.

Yes, sure. But if people dislike the guy who makes the points because of his douchebaggery the chances that his opinion gets respected, his points get heared and his reasoning is considered will drop significantly.

Well no cost is not correct. They have to pay the QA guys to answer all your bug reports and put them into the ticket system for the devs - then test after they go fixed. It's impossible for humans to deliver a bug free software (if it's complex) and stay at reasonable costs/prices. If you like the game and want to contribute then that's fine. Most bug reports lead to a fix. If you don't that's also fine. Just don't expect a bug free game unless we get KI to do all the programming.

I don't think it's possible to put an effect on the enemies without doing an attack resolution. And that would most likely break your stealth (without tweaks to the stealth/discovery/start-encounter mechanics). And I also think that the time that enemies are "distracted" is not altered by the effect which caused the distraction. What could be done (maybe) is to prolong the duration of the "cracking" sound/noise which attracts the enemies. I mean that Sparkcrackers could not just go *pouf-pouf-pouf* all at once but keep on cracking for a few seconds (with some delays in between - like real ones) - this could mean that enemies get distracted longer. The argument that a consumable should have a better/different effect than a spell that can be used freely from stealth is valid. Sparkcrackers already have the advatange that you can lure neutral npcs away with them though (important when trying to steal stuff or if you want to pass a spot where "neutral" guards will usually send you away). But a bit longer effect would not hurt. On the other hand they are pretty cheap to craft. And you can throw multiple ones to keep the enemies distracted. So I think it's not too bad all in all.

I blame Turn Based Mode. It most likely lead to a ton of code changes which then broke some stuff that we thought was stable.

Well, luckily we have a dedicated forum for feedback on the new beta Turn Based mode. You missed it by only a few inches: https://forums.obsidian.net/forum/136-beta-feedback-for-turn-based-mode/

One part, yes. You could just leave out the last part and your post's constructivism wouldn't suffer. As the song goes "Who wants to f*ck needs to be friendly".

That should work. Maybe even a mod sees it and moves it there. Anyway, good catch.

I don't need an explanation why you add sarcastic and petty comments about Deadfire to all your recent posts. I just want you to stop it. It's totally fine with me to point out bugs and show/discuss about flaws and what could have been better. There are def. still a lot of things that can be improved. But those 5-year-old-is-frustrated-because-mommy-bought-him-a-cherry-popsickle-instead-of-a-strawberry-one vibes won't really help to sell the point.