VincentNZ

Do we yet have the console commands for spawning items? We could just get the grimoire through there, if the quest is bugged.

Couldn't one get the grimoire through console commands if we knew the right parameters? Well I just did it: If the Grimoire did not drop for you jsut open the console and spawn it via: GiveItem Grimoire_Lich_Brawler

Fair points on both sides. I prefer a party size of six as well, but thought the four of Tyranny was appropriate. You have to keep in mind thought that BG 2 you had 16 (17 with ToB and 21 with EE) companions to choose from, each one with a quest, dialogue and interaction. Tyranny had six companions, but introduced the last three rather late, and if I recall correctly they were also bound to certain alignments. Deadfire has 7 companions, as well as four sidekicks, which puts them between those two, so it makes sense in a numerical way to have a party size of five. Also the management argument is valid, as PoE is a lot about skills and synergy between them to get the best out of it. On a high difficulty level that is. Managing another party member would increase the workload on an already micro heavy game. However, as it is a Infinity game, and it definitely is a spiritual successor to BG and direct to PoE1, a party of six is the default. When people think about these RPGs they have their old party from BG1 and 2 in mind. So that is indeed a valid argument for six. Furthermore, while Deadfire is in between when counting the sheer number of companions, both Tyranny and BG2 offered a deeper level of characters, quests, story relevance and interaction. I would even include the first PoE to have deeper companions, since we met three of them and shaped their form. Yes, we got romances and actual interaction in dialogues, meaning one-liners, as well as idle chatter. Nevertheless, the moment I leave Neketake with my full party I have depleted all dialogue options, interactions and am stuck with a mostly silent party for the rest of the game. I can still switch and might here something new, but the relevance and depth of other games is just not reachable in PoE2 concerning the companions. If I switched companions around in BG2 I could still have interactions 40 hours into the game, and in Tyranny Barik, Verse and Lantry always commented on the issues at hand. In the end this is what we have, and we are stuck with it. I would not want a mod that allowed a crew of six either, because it would break the balance as well as the artistic choice the Obsidians made for this game.

Old city is likely the biggest dungeon with three levels and quite extensive areas per layer. I would say there is a dungeon missing similar to the watcher's keep and the endless stairs, a dungeon that takes a couple of hours to go through with hard fights, riddles and bosses. What I certainly do not miss though are dungeons that tire me with long fights against trash mobs and bullet sponges for every room. However, with the current difficulty issues I think the current approach of three-room-dungeons with a boss is not helpful either. I think though it is hard to please the crowd, the setting naturally allowed for smaller dungeons and the hunt for special characters, like famous captains, sea monsters, slavers and whatnot. Added to that you have dozens of islands and islets with their own environments ranging form crazy new stuff to the traditional. The possibilities are endless. And you can rightfully say that if you expected this all, Obsidian did not deliver. However, naturally this sheer amount of content can not be created with the optimal amount of content. Yeah you could have ships with three levels and multi-stage ship fights, as an example, but with 30 or so ships on the map this would get just as stale. As doing Firkraags Dungeon in BG2 for 45 minutes, and that was one of the best multi-stage dungeons. Edit: THough one has to remember that the Watcher's Keep came available with Throne of Bhaal, so we might see something similar with the DLCs. Not saying that there will be a full expansion, or a really huge dungeon, but we should expect something to deepen the game experience that we have now, be it sea monsters or bigger ships or whatnot.

I am torn on this subject. I do like that you do not spend half an hour in one dark dungeon, that has four layers, but I think a small map with two rooms everywhere is not much fun either. Also most places are not tied to any marked or unmarked quests but are plain dungeons with no real "purpose". Exceptions include the things like the mentioned Wael dungeon, or the shipwrecked crew near Port Maje, where you actually have to do something else than fighting, and/or where you gain a bit of backstory on the place. This is something that is really missing, stuff that puts the place into context. Say you enter a dungeon that is beautifully painted and is full of imps. You wonder why the imps are here, what they are doing etc.. Like in Fallout every place you go has a terminal, or similar that tells you why this place has relevance. That does count for the shipfights as well. You killed a named captain, but what was he all about anyway? At times Exploration feels like a Conveyor belt where you just move from one station to the next. If that is adressed then I would be happier with the small dungeons. Oh and further on that matter: The riddles in this game definitely need to be more difficult than just pushing stuff in the right order.

Yeah I just noticed the same issue, it worked mostly fine, PoE was always a bit prone to missing clicks, but I thought the issues were minor. Unti today, where basically every thrid click will not work (left-click that is). I cleaned my mouse yesterday, and thought this might be the issue, but it works fine in every other application, so I am rather glad that other people have this issue. :D Anyway at this moment it is really annoying. Is there word, when the patch will go live?

At first it struck me as odd as well, but since I thought more about I came to this conclusion: We are accustomed to solutions that suits us best, which is always the option where everyone just gets along with each other, but that is never realistic. Why would any of the two factions back down? The Fleetmaster has an entire fleet behind him, they will not leave the island and the druids have no place to go, and are also fanatics. There is no room for a solution that benefits both sides, it is just that the player wants them to have a loghter conscience, or the best reward possible. That is what hard decisions are about.

There is Una's luxury items store in the Serpent's Crown District in Neketaka. She sells a range of gemstones as well. She will only be there in the daytime though, but her shop is marked on the map.

Yeah this definitely needs a decent tutorial or a way better interface. Or at the very least one should be able to revert the changes, it is really annoying to not know what you end up with.

Yeah I stood there like a baffoon as well for a minute. You have to leave the combat via the button in the top center of your screen. :D

I figured I might just add my opinion on the game to the mix, since I have just started a new game with the blessings, although I have not finished the game in my first playthrough. Generally I can definitely say, PoE 2 is an excellent game, which I find more enjoyable than the also great PoE 1. I was doubtful about the pirate theme and the more sandbox-type gameplay, but it works really well. My biggest praises go to the VA, which I found to be very immersive to the point that I would have wanted this in PoE 1 as well. Also the ship combat is a fun feature and synergizes well with the exploration, and in general the sidequests and the main story are intriguing. ANother thing that I really wanted got fully fleshed out and that is the skillchecks in the textbox encounters. I think these little stories stand for themselves and it is a great way to give meaning to small unmarked quests and could be even further expanded on. I do have a lot of rather small negative points though, that stick out more, since the game is so good: - There should be a tutorial for ship combat, and it should be expanded upon as a feature for quests and the main story. There should also be more enemy and faction vessels on the map, later in the game it gets rather empty. - Tied in to this: Why are no seamonsters attacking? Where are the krakens, leviathans etc. that must haunt these oceans? This is most disappointing. - The combat system works, but there are obvious issues with armour penetration, balance etc.. Needs to be looked at, because some spells/skills are just useless against certain mobs, which can turn some mobs in undangerous meathunks. - Related to this: Difficulty is rather low. This is partly due to balance and mostly I would say because level scaling does not seem to work right now, you level too fast, when you try to do all sidequests, and you level up fast in the beginning. Should be adjusted. Maybe there should also be some mobs, that are always scaled (Nemnok and the Dragons come to mind) so that they will always be at least two levels further than the player. - While the amount of content is great, and I appreciate the many small dungeons, with their own little stories, I would like to have some more background on the locations. What is that temple for? What is the story behind this cursed swamp? Basically the stuff you would read on terminals in Fallout. - There could also be a few more islands, some areas seem rather unpopulated. Also there should be more ports or the ones we have should be expaned on. Not Neketake scale of content, but similar to Furrantes pirate haven. - Some bugs need to be quished, I only had one crash so far 5 minutes into my first game, though, but I read a few complaints. -The framerates drop heavily over the course of playing, I think it might have to do with changing areas often, or with switching to sailing and fighting there. Also the loading times are horrible, when you are not on an SSD. This should really be fixed. - Companions: This is a bigger one, saved for the last. I do not think that the companions are rather shallow, but their quests are a bit uninspiring since they all work in the same way and remain unconcluded and with no consequences or different outcomes. I do not like the decreased party size, and the companion interactions bound to quest stages make sure that all interactions between them will be over after a couple of hours. If you have only 7 companions, then they should be really interactive. Otherwise you will just be on a Mass Effect level. - Romances are definitely shallow. While I have no problem that every gender or race wants in my pants, it is all a bit fast and random. I had Tekehu in the party for 50 minutes, got him to rep 2 in that time, and the random level of initiating dialogue made him come at me, before anyone else. I guess I will always choose Xoti, but I suppose I will really have to wait until she randomly comes up to me. Basically you do not have to work for it either, there seem to be two dialogues and then you are a couple. Then another one, where you bonk, and nobody ever speaks about it again. I mean in Mass Effect, I could call the Alien of my choice to my room, and in BG2 this was a much more immerisve "task" with different outcomes, and maybe even a baby at a much later stage. Generally I really do not care as much for my companions than in the first game, and much less than in BG2. That is a shame, which is further enhanced that I only have one spot free in my party so I am missing out a bit on the interactions between characters. So thoughts anyone? What do you guys think about the game and my points? Any additions, criticism or explanations?

Sorry just got up. Yeah you can talk to the queen and do the Hasongo Quest, but afterwards you are sent up to the very top of the map, and when you turn in that quest there is a possibility that final quests will go into your log without being able to say: "Let me think on it.", or that declining will give you a reputation loss, or that you can not turn in sidequests, because the priority of the questgiver is to give you the final quest first. It is a bit complicated. :D

As I understand it, you can complete all but the last quest for each faction, until you are tasked to go to Ondra's Mortar. You can then still finish some quests, but others can not be handed in, because the next quest will be initiated with no real way to decline it. I suppose you can then only com back and get your rewards after the game has finished. You have to be really careful. While the quest tells you pretty clear that at this point you need to make allies, the game does not gove you the chance to hear all the options and then think about it. The consequences range from nothing, to losing reputation, to losing companions. Edit: To avoid this, I believe you should not continue the main quest until you are tasked to head to the far north and then finish the faction quests.

Yeah I wonder as well, when I start a new game, use these blessings and then start yet another game, will I still have the same amount of blessings to use? Also I do wonder what made them add this system, when there is not a new game+ option. I actually wanted to start over again today, and use these blessings, but I think I might refrain from this until the difficulty issues are patched.

Showing the dispositions should be a separate option in the difficulty menu. I also had some hiccups where people told me I was cruel, when I went around doing all the good things, while I decided to kill people trying to mug me once. I also have most things maxed out, because some dialogue options just appeal to me but are flagged as shady/cruel/aggressive. I think these are just scripted dialogues though, and the dispostions do not really matter, right? So this is more of a fluff issue.