Wormerine

For the most part Steward is pretty much irrelevant, except for the quest which kicks of Seeker, Slayer, Survivor. However, if I remember well Steward starts conversation with you, which means it might works just fine - I can't interact with her either, but her "tutorial" when boarding the ship for the first time works just fine. Seeker, Slayer, Survivor won't start until you finish the mission in Ashen Maw, so you pretty much have majority of the game you can do before tackling that one.

To the excellent list of suggestion I would like to add my own concern - so far this is the biggest issue I have with current iteration of the turn based gameplay: I feel that Dexterity and Inteligence don't really make for useful stats. It is possible that currect obfuscation of how those stats interact with individual skills (I still don't quite understand how initiative works and why would I care about it, except for spellcasting and tooltips for how many turns spells last still show information in real-time terms (duration in seconds). Inteligence's effect of AoE spells is useful as always, but the duration is unclear. Even if high/low inteligence can influence spell's duration by a turn those points are really extreme. I have characters with varied inteligence spread and I can't say I see any difference when it comes to spell duration. Similarly, Dexterity's boost to Initiative seems like a very nieche benefit. I cant' say I see a big advantage to moving before enemies as they do a poor job disabling my team. Even further, having a higher initative gives better chanes to interupt enemies as if they cast after my characters move, they tend to finish casting before the next turn begins. I must say, I don't really have a suggestions that would help fix those issues. Some ideas has been thrown around the forums which like liked - Dexterity influencing how many attacks can be done with a weapon ala. D&D 2nd edition, or moving away from strick one turn for everyone systen, in favour of initiative based turn order (character with higher initiative take turns more often), but I don't know how feasible those are to implement design and engine wise, nor if they would break more than they would fix. In addition current attack system really disfavours weapons which benefit was shorter recovery time, as it is lost in turn-based system.

I found one more way to infinitely gain reputation with a companion. After completing Xoti's vision quest, and convincing her to release gathered souls into a luminous adra pillar Watcher can ask Xoti how her is she sleeping now. Her answer is positive and she states she will remember who helped her (minor reputation gain). This conversation can be repeated indefinitely. Save: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1nS_v6m3fwSgg9mBPsb03__fQQEW9miJm/view?usp=sharing

Nothing is impossible.

It's still called fortepian in Polish. The table-like instrument at any rate.It does those in English it’s simply called piano, or Grand Piano (to distinguish from compact square piano). As it is usually the case history of the instrument is long and complicated and I am not versed well enough in it to provide any meaningful information. I just remember during my education in Poland term “pianoforte” was used to describe an older type of piano, while in US I usually heard “fortepiano”. Whenever it was conscious reference to specific models, or different general term used to describe the same thing I do know know. All I do know, is that piano we have today is a fairly late invention and a big chunk of music traditionally performed on a grand piano wasn’t written with characteristics of that instrument in mind. There are some really interesting things coming out, in terms of phrasing and colour of the sound, when such piece is performed on an instrument which more faithfully conveys the original intent. This look about right, though I do not have knowledge necessary to review the information:

I have this happning as well. The debuff is active even though Re-Hand isn't currently equipped: It doesn't work the other way around - the buff only works when used with Red-Hand... however, when testing I noticed another oddity - Red-Hand get a buff from Cutthroad Cosmo which I equipped at the start of the game, even though I didn't use Cosmo for a while now and Red-Hand and Cosmo didn't even see each other (didn't use both at the same time). save: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Lu2JJB3MZ3o-_0UL4GIony7ZxUHWEOpr/view?usp=sharing

I didn't create a monk (Poor Xoti - pure priest once again) for that very reason. I also noticed enemy monks being far less effective. Two hits with fists with the same frequency as everyone else just isn't very frightening. On the similar note - I got my hands on the Red Hand yesterday: you know, the best arquebus in the game, due to allowing to fire twice before reloading. In turn based it amounts to: nothing really. One gets super good initiative for the second shot (which playing as ranger/wizard can be used to do some really effective casting) but other then that doesn't provide much advantage over other weapons. It's good in a way, as I might finally use something different, but various weapons/items/skills which were boosting recovery just aren't appealing in turn-basd.

I don't see misses to occur that often. The thing is: PoE combat is about rolls, hits and misses. The difficulty of encounters is figuring out how to best avoid damage and how to effectively disable enemies. Analysing stats is gameplay. Not that I would oppose an RPG designed differently - things like Invisible Inc. or Into the Breach make for excellent turn based games while providing reliable results. But entire system of PoE would be broken if hits were guaranteed - make attacks more likely to hit, and the main aspect of decision making is gone. However, I do think that fights can go one forever if one lands in the spot of fighting with wrong equipement or just makes wrong decisions. Just yesterday, I was making my way through the Old city and on my first attempt on the "ambush" encounter I found it a slog. I also lost. For a second attempt I switched my equippemend and things went much more smoothly - in terms of success and in how many hits enemies would die. EDIT: I feel maybe a bit of HP could be cut from both my party and enemies. It might not work as I would hope, but Pallegina herself is able to talk turns worth of damage. Similarly some of the boss fights (fought grub yesterday) comes down to waiting for HP to end. It is an issue the RTwP suffered from as well, but its much more noticable when player confirms each attack manually.

Gorecci street is one of the hardest encounters in the game on PotD if attempted before leaving the Isle - the powercreep doesn't kick in at this point yet. I didn't try it in Turn-Based but I never managed to beat it before recruiting Aloth and finding animancers. As above I do feel Turn-Based to be easier than RTwP as it's easier to play efficiently.

Violinist in an orchestra.

Amazing. https://mobile.twitter.com/jesawyer/status/1091096484810903553

xD. If you can do it once you can do it whenever you want. That's a silly suggestion. It's no that they don't allow you to switch between mods to forbid players abusing the system or something - it's probably just completely another thing to create a single system which can switch between the two.

I wasn't sure if its a bug, or post-storm feature. I don't remember it floating like that.

I do t think it’s explained more that that. It’s possible to conjure beings out of soul energy, see: previous two DLC and Chanters. I remember she came with the instrument/crossbow thingy. I just assumed she was some kind of ultra powerful disturbed chanter.

Alright! Never noticed it in RTwP EDIT: actually I did! Now I remember containers constantly disappearing. Now I know why.

Stepping in puddles of "water" in the old city makes characters sickened, which in turn makes combat UI pop up: Think makes saving and looting impossible while you stay in the puddle. Here is save from the Old City for you convenience: https://drive.google.com/file/d/12UnPxN0lr8PekMC080mFcIuOgojx9VeN/view?usp=sharing

Good post and I agree with the majority of your points. As a side not RTwP combat and encounters has been heavily improved upon since initial release, so the game is much more satisfying to play in a traditional way. I feel that turn-based system brings out the best and the worst out of the combat design. The tougher fights are an absolute joy (certainly will do a later playthrough with some Berath challenges and Deadly Deadfire mod, if it works/will be updated for turn-based) and I can't wait to reach expansions, were I found the difficulty level to be the most satisfying. However, when fight is too easy, or doesn't have an interesting enemy conposition then it really turns into a slog.

If strick turn system were ditched and units were to act in order and frequency dictated by Initiative, inteligence buff could be a bit more flexible expanding duration by aound of actions (how many units take their turns before it expires) rather than current "per turn" duration - and extra turn is a lot of milage, and some spells have been buffed to accout for "shorter" duration. I do believe the bigger issue is inteligence not adding much beyond defences.

I do get quite a but if milage out of 1 turn spells - more than I expected. One turn doesn't sound like much, but as it lasts all the way until that unit takes his/her turn means there are quite a few action inbetween to take an advantage of the spell. I think with proper data, Obsidian should be able to see if it is enough or if they need to last longer.

Everyone has his/her preferences. I personally really can’t stomach Takehu.

Wait... Two Handed Style affects all twohanded ranged weapons? See. All weapon stills give buff to ranged weapons as well.

I think this is what is exactly happening; the monster that "spots" you gets a turn, your team gets a turn, and then everyone else as usual. I was wondering why the battles in PotD seemed so much easier than the regular game mode. Yeah, at this rate I am being able to kill spellcasters before the combat proper really begins.

Are you sure you don't have uniue armors you can upgrade? Half of the companions come with unique armors (Eder, Pallegina, Maia), and I on level 6 and already have most of my party equipped in upgratable armors. Your party seems solid enough, and at that level single class characters are effective. It's been a while since I fought kraken so he might got buffed lately - on my last PotD playthrough I didn't fight him, as my PC was fond of Galawain.

Like any marriage it will be good for a year or two and after that it will fall apart and lead to a divorce or to a slow but steady destruction. Just kidding, business aquisitions are nothing like marriages. I hope it will work out for both parties!

It’s easy to see what history she had: what breastplate did she have? Banished history: https://pillarsofeternity.gamepedia.com/Desgraza_Breastplate Loyal history: https://pillarsofeternity.gamepedia.com/Honor_Guard_Breastplate_(Pallegina)