Hope PoE2 will come faster... and well-made, which i don't doubt... coz DOS2 is so much worse for me in many things than DOS1EE and first of those things is combat, armor and balance - they destroy DOS2 on all difficulties. Played 100+ hours in it but won't ever replay it till the combat will be as minimum like in DOS1EE, without "energy shields" in the medieval (so-called armor mechanic) and 1shoting last bosses and fights with 1 spell oh Honour while other classes being total useless. I agree with several posts in this section that say that game was made more casual to get a bigger audience to sell better.
I have no idea where people have difficulties in the game, probably in first ~20 hours OR in the 2nd island, i heard different people having problem OR here OR there, usually in some 1 place for some reason.
Including Honour mod, personally i didn't find it hard at all. Not balanced in some parts, e.g fight with one ancient, where are 7+ summoned wolves, each deals more dmg than they have hp and have 3 actions per turn. If you come there being underlvled - you'll have a funny time. But that's coz it's bad made, even logically. It's the only fight though that i remembered from the whole game. Further and further it gets easier and easier. The game on Honour is easier than PoE on classic. Did you finish the game already? I hope yes. Geo mage can one-shot any fight with his Boulders source skill. With Meteor/Ice/Arrow shower you can 1-shot any boss, including the end game boss. Literally finished it with 1 button. H - for Hard and Honour. That's why i played the whole game without using Source Skills at all as much as possible, coz they 1 shot anything. Also 2H warfare + 2h maxed make you one shot everything aswell, same for warfare + archering.
And still the worst part of me are energy shields" in the medieval. I have no idea why some people complain about DOS1EE (or you played DOS1, not EE?). I played it from the start till the end once again specifically before the DOS2 came out, so near month ago. And it's so much more polished and well made in every combat RPG way than DOS. Fights, combos, status effects, crafting - everything there is better. You need to lvl up your resistance to resist effects and it's logical.
You won't just put heavier armor on you, better rings and say "no no no" when fireball flies to your face or super cold ice supposes to freeze you but doesn't coz you have... hm... just gloves, hat and boots and.. energy shield? And when it breaks - you do whatever you want, CCing enemy for all the eternity if you want - i even tested it once on a boss, CCed him for 20 rounds untill i got bored. Very well made combat system, very well made. Enemies in DOS1EE also have resists so they don't get "CCed each turn". And you don't need to try to CC them each turn aswell if you don't want. But you had combos. Like in D&D and real life logic well. Melee and ranged worked fine aswell, finished it with 2H melee and rogue and 1 mage. And i could not one shot the last boss in any ways.
DOS2 very much depends on your gear. You better change it each 2 lvls, or you will be in a bad situation on higher difficulties.
Only some quests and the immersion saved the game for me, still there are a lot of quests "go there - kill that", main quest is eh...
What i really liked is Lohse's quest though and it's ending. Recommend getting her as your companion if you only play to start it.
Also the "mod" section gives me a hope the game will be better in future, currently would not rate it more than 8/10 as an RPG. What i felt after i finished it slowly, done everything there i could, was "damn i miss DOS1EE / Shadowrun (yes) / PoE fights".
You can agree or not agree with this text - it's your decision, i don't care and it's fine. So i won't answer any comments, coz won't read them, it's a topic of opinions as it supposed to be - but feel free to disagree/agree if you want. If you like DOS2 in every way - then go have fun, you will have great 70-100 hours, also i would recommend you to take Lohse -> and may be Red Prince -> Beast as your companions, their companion's quests are probably the best!
