Seroster01

No really, it doesn't. Wizards are one of the most OP classes in both games because of their varied & powerful toolkits. A small list of really good Wizard abilities: Chill Fog Any "Missles" spell Most of their defensive buffs Arcane Dampener (removes ALL positive effects) Chain Lightning Gaze of the Adrian Sure all of these have a cast time, but the results for any of these are better than most of comparable martial classes abilities. Now if you wanted to compare Priests or Ciphers you'd have a better case. But Druids, Chanters & Wizards are all very solid classes that I would qualify as casters.

How about a comparison that is more apt for the setting and topic? Let's compare an NFL Defensive Back to an Olympic Sprinter. Both are people who have trained & studied their whole lives to essentially do one thing: run really fast. Everybody. IRL who isn't physically disabled somehow can run. But only a handful of people are skilled, trained, have the necessary level of commitment & physiological gifts to be world-class runners. Cutting-edge elite athletes are just as rare, or rarer than top-tier scientists and doctors, and have years of exceptionally specialized knowledge & experience in their specific fields. Even then an Olympic sprinter isn't automatically going to be able to play defensive back at an NFL level, as football has showed us many times that just Being Really Fast doesn't automatically make you good at football. In the same vein, a Defensive Back who isn't as flat-out fast as his opponents can frequently make up for it with proper technique and knowledge of the game. Thus we get to how "soul magic" works in Eora. A Barbarian has learned that through channeling the power of his soul into his body in different ways, he can augment his physical abilities to perform super-human feats that we would qualify as magical. A wizard, after years of study and experience in his craft has learned how to warp reality at his will with the power of HIS soul. This allows him to command the elements, summon weapons & armor, or cast illusions to confuse & bewilder his foes. Like the sprinter & the DB, both use the same base ability inherent to every being in their respective world's people (running vs soul-power utilization). Yet like the sprinter vs. the DB, they utilize specialized knowledge in their fields of expertise to accomplish different feats with the same basic ability. Now you may not like that that's how the setting works, since you seem to think that only people who have devoted their lives to studying the building blocks of reality should be able to do things other than hit people with sticks and do sick gymnastics. But that's not how it is, and frankly you can't convince me that it SHOULD be that way.

So you think adding some flashy special effects to the same boring animations and calling it "soul magic" is more interesting than using a bit of imagination to make some real abilities that fit with the archtype? How about the rogue using flips and rolls, explosives, grenades, throwing daggers, grappling hooks, and other gadgets? How about turning their stealth into a smoke bomb. And clarifying that is what it is, rather than suggesting its soul magic. How about giving the barbarian some cool animations with cool attacks. Kicks, normal leaps without magic flames. You know, use a bit of effort to make unique skill sets. But I guess I am just crazed. How about just a weapon throw that doesnt explode into a nuke? Rather than put some effort into animation, they slap some magic effects onto it and call it soul magic. I mean, you and I are never going to agree on whether a Barbarian shouting people to death is an appropriately Barbarian-ish thing to do, or leaping into the air & crashing down hard enough to cause an explosion. I do understand your general criticism of the Barbarian ability to throw a weapon that somehow turns into the spell Fireball, and it seems out of place to me as well. But I don't act like I somehow have the intellectual high ground, and dismiss your right to your own opinions, because we disagree. You like what you like. Obviously that's not POE. But don't act like your opinions are the only correct ones, or that people who disagree are somehow less intelligent or have no imagination. Which you have stated several times in this thread.

I've given up on the OP. It apparently isn't enough that casters have more unique, and frequently more powerful, options than their martial counterparts due to the caster's years of studying how to properly invoke their abilities (exactly what he's asking for). Apparently, martial classes should only be allowed to do things which fit his very narrow view of "appropriate" actions. It doesn't matter that these "appropriate" actions are antiquated by decades & have been stated several times in this thread to be un-interesting (or at least significantly LESS interesting than what we got) to the people who want to play those classes. And obviously, as he has stated several times, anyone who disagrees with him has a lesser intellect. To summarize the current state of this thread:

Xoti can end up with Maia actually. Its the case that devs were talking about when they said companions could develop relationships between themselves. But from what I understand the Watcher is always a priority when it comes to romance. There is no way to mess it up unless you outright tell them to stop bothering you, then the option is closed and companion relationships kick in. Well yes, but what I was afraid of is me throwing her at Eder would qualify as telling her to stop bothering me.

Thanks for the responses, between the 2 posts it sounds safe to distract her with Eder while I try to get a better feel for her character & actually find Maia.

I am aware that nothing comes of it, my concern is that we're at the Y in the road here: Does throwing her at Eder end my options with her? Based on the writing involved, I'm 99% sure that the different dialogue options involving the Watcher result in a pretty binary "We're on or we're off!" So IDK. If I don't pursue her now, am I locked out? If I do pursue her now, it feels like I'm locked in. And I seemingly have no way to avoid this conversation except reloading an earlier save.

That's what I was afraid of, and now I'm moderately annoyed. She initiates the Eder dialogue w/ me every time now, when I load my most recent save. The only options seem to be to throw her at Eder or to commit to the Xoti route...

Since 32 pages is kinda extreme to read through all of it, I'll ask a series question that may have already been answered: Are the romances in the game exclusive? (my assumption is yes, but you never know...) If so, do they have the standard "point of no return" which will lock you out of other companion's options if you pass said point? If the above are true, does anyone have a... list I guess I would say? of when those points are hit? The reason for all of the above questions, I'm in my first visit to Nekataka and Xoti just initiated the dialogue about pursuing Eder. I feel like I haven't had enough involvement with her for me to tell if I want to pursue her yet, and have yet to even come across Maia (I think the only other romance-able female? Interestingly, the dialogue with Xoti brings up she'd get along better with Maia, whom we have not met... ). As such, I don't want to pass the point of no return in either getting her with Eder or locking myself into the Xoti route here. The options I had available & their results in the conversation seemed a bit more... impactful than what I was expecting for this early in the game. Anyone got some pointers/tips?

Question per title. I looked through the game menus & nothing jumped out at me immediately, but I frequently miss things like this even when they are there. The reason is I feel like I'm getting low FPS in Nekata, but it's one of those deals where it feels choppy, but not choppy enough for me to be sure it's not just the slower movement of POE2 compared to POE1. Thanks for any feedback.

I still can't edit the abilities bundle in the editor, when I make changes in that bundle the export window still says "You have not modified anything yet".

Well someone already mentioned the UI bug for Berserker frenzy upgrades so I'll just bring up the 2nd point: Mage Slayer states it reduces all effect durations, both negative AND positive. Does this not affect frenzy? I remember watching a video that said it did, but this may be the typical "I trusted the character creation UI, and it was wrong."

It breaks YOUR concept of a fighter/barbarian. Even in D&D, going back to 3e at least, Barbarians at least have many powers/abilities that would qualify as supernatural IRL. They've even got a subclass in 5e that makes fire & lightning storms to attack their enemies! So unless you're going back to like Conan-style definitions of martial vs. arcane classes IDK where you're getting this concept, or which games you're seeing it in. What separates them from a wizard? The fact that they channel their powers primarily into body enhancements and physical attacks instead of throwing fire/ice/lighting/acid. The fact that a Barbarian leaps into combat to punch his enemies in the mouth, and the landing causes an explosion, is thematically very different from a caster throwing a fireball from the back line being all safe & cozy.

My opinion on the subject is divided based on your stat distribution & sub-class choice (by which I mean no subclass or Berserker, cause the other 2 have more drawbacks than positives). If you have high-int & no subclass, or high int & are a Berserker with a way to get rid of the confusion effect, I'd say take the Spirit line. The CC effects are great, having high INT means you don't have to worry too much about the duration, and if you single-class and get it to the final upgrade the AOE damage is surprising high. The Blood upgrades are useful if you have low INT, picked the mage-killer subclass for some unfathomable reason, or are a Zerker who just eats the confusion effect. (This seems like you'd cause serious issues though so I'm not sure how common this actually is...) You don't want the spirit effects hitting your allies, and the bonus duration on kill works out since you're going to have low-ish duration because of the build choices you made.

Well I mean, he DOES have a thread in this forum where he promotes just that.

This line perplexes me. ESO (Zenimax/bethesda) and POE (Obsidian) have no ties to each other, except Obsidian once made a Fallout game for Bethesda. So not sure what Dragonknights would have to do with this game? If you weren't saying the 2 were made by the same company, where did the second line come from and what does it have to do with anything? Dragonknight is ostensibly a martial class but it uses spells for its abilities, that's all he was getting at. It's like a fighter that's been jedified or merlinized. He wasn't comparing the two companies. Then why would he say "I'm starting to wonder if it's an issue with the company?" If he's not saying they're the same company, why would he wonder if it's an "issue with the company"?He didn't compare it to another Obsidian game, and the only other Obsidian game I'm aware of that wasn't based on a pre-existing universe or the POE setting is Tyranny. Tyranny is basically built on the concept that everyone is functionally a mage (or at least anyone who's going to fight) and the more martial types use magic to buff themselves, if nothing else. It's a statement that doesn't make a lot of sense without further explanation, thus why I asked for clarification.

So I should be denied my enjoyment of Paladin-style characters with flaming weapons to smite their enemies? Or of Barbarians that do super-human feats (Shouting to damage enemies, leaping into combat) through strength & willpower rather than waggling their fingers? Should fighters not get charge because moving instantly through all targets, while stunning them, to attack my targeted enemy behind all the bodies in the way is too magic-ey for your tastes of what martial classes should be capable of? Cause the Charge presented in-game is too super-human to be non-magical. Casters already have many more combat options & useful effects than most martial casters, especially in AOE terms. Why would you take away the options martial classes do have? You're basically advocating for other people's enjoyment of the game to be limited to promote your own. That sounds just like the sentiment you expressed in the end of your post to me. "Why do other people get abilities with fancy particle effects when only Spellcasters should be able to??? Wehhhhhhh, that's not fair! I want to be special!" It goes both ways.

This line perplexes me. ESO (Zenimax/bethesda) and POE (Obsidian) have no ties to each other, except Obsidian once made a Fallout game for Bethesda. So not sure what Dragonknights would have to do with this game? If you weren't saying the 2 were made by the same company, where did the second line come from and what does it have to do with anything?

QFT. I get that you like to play a wizard and feel all bad ass & full of arcane might. But I like playing melee classes that do kick-ass things with awesome abilities. Having martial classes being auto-attack bots is terribly, terribly boring. Also, to have more than 1 martial class in a game you essentially HAVE to include the type of abilities you're complaining about. It makes me feel like your post is very selfish. "I want my preferred class archetype to be special and unique! Screw those martial classes & all the people who like them!"

I don't know if this is a bug, but you get this line with any background (along with "It's rare to see one of your kind so far north" or something like that, which I get even on my Living Lands character - what are you even talking about, people, my homeland is as far in the north as it can be!). My assumption would be it's based on the choice of MCs race rather than the choice of MCs culture/nationality, w/e. IE you could be a Pale Elf from the Living Lands, but people still react like they think you're from The White that Wends cause you're a pale elf. Not sure what other races this would apply to, but that one would make sense for sure. Boreal Dwarves too I guess.

I got quite a few responses even in the early game about being a Godlike. IDK how much it evens out afterwards, but I was surprised since I don't remember seeing it nearly as often in the first game.

I mean, a MQ chain you can beat in 30 min as long as you have the monetary funds to skip the "side quests" that make up most of the game sounds like it's short on dialogue to me. From what I read, the dialogue Sawyer was talking about refers specifically to slides removed from the end-game dialogue tree, not the whole quest chain. That's the basis of the issue we're discussing here. The MQ is short on dialogue because the MQ, as a whole, is short. Either way, he already clarified his statement once & you asked for more, so I tried to help clarify it. If you're now splitting hairs about "he didn't say what he meant" it feels like we're getting into the territory of "arguing for argument's sake." Edit: clarified things in 1st paragraph.

I'll jump in here: all he's saying is that the one we got IS very sparse. You could add a lot more explanation to it in many different directions and it would still have room for more. He wasn't saying it was sparse before the cut. Just that what we did get was sparse, and there could've been a lot more added. Why would you cut out any main story content when you can, in the release version, complete the game in <30m as long as you had ~100k moneys & good stealth? That's the crux of the question.

Where is this stated? I could see things happening this way, but it there any information in the game supporting this version of events? Iovara certainly doesn't say that she learned about "the plans", and it seems the gods were already there at the time of her death as her soul got stuck at the Court of the Penitents. Everything from the flashbacks indicated that the Engwithians were still a functional, thriving civilization during the Iovara parts. And as far as I know, Thaos was the only survivor of the Engwithians. We know from the WM expansions that there were enough Engwithians left over after the gods were created for Ondra to feel like it was worth dropping a moon on ancient Dyrwood to prevent the secret from being revealed later. They eventually let themselves die off on purpose according to the wiki, but there was definitely a significant population left over after the initial creation.

Not sure I understand the question? If you mean "Where do they physically exist" then we get into those existential "Everywhere & nowhere". As far as I understand it, they seem to primarily exist in the "in-between", which seems to be something like the "spiritual space" between the physical world of Eora & a place/dimension that I can't remember the name of that is the original source of essence/souls. Souls pass from Eora->In-Between->Source->reincarnated into Eora in my understanding of the cosmology, and while passing through the in-between the gods siphon a portion of every soul to "recharge their batteries" basically. Functionally, from what we see in-game & experience for ourselves in POE1, Gods seem to be able to see/hear/know just about anything they want to in the Physical plane of Eora. They don't seem to be interested in doing much about it, but they always seem to know more than you do about what's going on when you interact with them in the first game.