Daidre

Now, correct me if I'm wrong (and I'll be very happy to be proven wrong), but my sense is that well-written computer game reviews no longer exist. Closest example that comes to mind is KOTOR 2. Most dialogs there have a huge advantage of being written by the same, very talented, person. Thanks to it KOTOR has very consistent quality and, I dont know, style accross all game. No oververbose descriptions (except Kreya), no modern slang too. I like P:K writing a lot, but when you compare english and russian versions, parts that was originally-russian is quite easy to notice. This mix of translation and original creates huge disparity in text quality. But Numenera and Deadfire do not have same excuse and looks like prime examples of how thesaurus in the hands of game writer could ruin even best concepts/quests. Edit: Oh, you were talking about reviews, not games. For me they are either useless or funny, but never informative. Usually read them about games I do not intend to play (like Anthem).

Well, that explains a lot about all writing awards nominations Deadfire got. Excellent professional reviews too.

I am chronic restarter and for me something like this is really hard to foget: If this is not a purple prose at its worst finest, I do not know what is. Especially this part: I mean, it is first dialog in the game and his portrait is right here!

Well, Benevolent and Cruel is really loaded judgmental words for my tastes.

In the same time when I tried to RP cleric of Magran who actually respects gods and support them as ideas to guide societies I was constantly running into situations when all my responses was 3 different flavor of snark and generally not-respectful. Trying to RP Pale Elf with nonexistent sense of humor was even worse. I love to explore themes and topics, it annoy me when all opinions I hear so modern american from so colorful cast of characters with different backgrounds.

And Deadfire hits you with two paragraphs(!) of horrific adjectives right in the first dialog when describes weird dwarf who opened the door. Two voiced paragraphs...

But POE does exactly same thing with Dispositions all the time. Sometimes it looks like every writer has his own idea what "passionate" or "aggressive" even is. And solution is the same for both games - if you are not alignment-dependent cleric/paladin switching them off in dialogs is easier then constant annoyance: why "this" is benevolent? I did this quest hoping for money/faction rep! POE allows wider range of responses, yes, but in Deadfire it is extremely glaring that all this fancy RP options lead to same 1-2 dialog nodes and completely ignored by NPC more often than not. P:K has more different reactions and much more real consequents that could appear several chapters(!) after some choice. All while Maya eagerly helps you clean Ruatai headquarters after refusing their quest and never notices it even happened.

I think you are very close with gender angle. Of course, it depends on person a lot, but my main gripe with Xoti that I never allowed to be rude with her. She is dumb and needy and in denial all the time, but reactions available to me range from romantic and endeared (meh!) to friendly - neutral. I constantly feel like I stuck in bad fanfic talking to Mary Sue. It is like Octavia in P:K. Hers "I am a rose and you are my thorns. Give me your complements!" is barely noticeable for guys (maybe even cute) but makes most of the girls really nasty. Still, I was pretty ok with Aerie in BG and loved how bitchy she could be when competing over the man. Anomen is another story though since there is no other choice. But he is so distasteful in his opinions that it is funny.

It was same in first POE. PoTD with Priest and without one was like two different difficulties. Alas, they are pretty pathetic in Deadfire (except salvation of time shenanigans).

Avellone wrote Nok-Nok. I am not aware whether here second companion in P:K written by him.

I started new run of Deadfire, this time with DLC, and writing here feels horrible after P:K. I am drowning in all purple prose (smiling rotting rictus right in first dialog), twitter-style snark and Ekera's. Just got to Xoti and "please let me kill this thing with fire" is only reaction she provokes.

In my experience, building anything gun-focused without at least 0.5 of ranger is kinda questionable. Driving Flight at lvl 9/13 for single/multi is just this amazing. For full attack abilities it is two extra hits from dual wielded guns. + It has lots of acc bonuses to negate in-build penalty on all guns, Gunner for extra -20 reload and other useful passives. So Ghost Heart (or Sharpshooter for RP) looks pretty good. Ranger/Rogue is natural conclusion, with only problem, that everything MC can do as one, Maya will do better, because of passive bonuses from her Gun Hawk unique class. If you want to mix it with a chanter, Ghost Heart with Troubadour looks really solid (almost everything is solid with Troubadour), but Skald imho is also worth a try. All this extra hits from Driving Flight with huge acc bonuses from ranger should generate tons of extra phrases. But honestly, I had no idea how blunderbuss AOE interacts with Skald ability. If you still want to give Cipher a chance, you could try single class Ascendant. He is more than capable of building full focus himself with two good guns and do not need martial multi for this. Borrowed Instinct at lvl 9 and Amplified Wave at lvl 11 with all PL scaling it will get later * Strength bonus is quite impressive.