yorname

I wouldn't hate pirate theme if it's a new game, but when first time playing POE and 2 back to back, personally I just thought "They thought adding guns was a genius idea (it was) and when all out on it". The gameplay was great for me but "sold less" is something objective, probably what we (people are still here after these years) like just doesn't matter that much. It's been repeated too many times but if POE2 and DOS2 were listed side by side it's not a hard choice for a "new" player. Same thing for BG3. After all we're talking about why it wasn't as successful, not whether or not I think it's good. If we put Deadfire, WotR and DOS2 together, I'd say people just like full 3D and being well-designed in specifically RTwP combat won't save it. I took a quick look at steamdb and both WotR and DOS2 have a 10x more currently playing compared to POE or Deadfire. Even DOS has a higher number than both.

Maybe it's unnecessary for OP now, as for BG1 and 2, IMO there isn't a huge reason to even play 2 today. 2 was great because of a relatively compelling story and amazing amount of choices and consequences at the time, but today POE offers much better gameplay while maintaining the overall style; BG2's story, characters and freedom aren't really dated by now, but also no longer groundbreakingly good. You can certainly play it, you won't regret it, but IMO it's better if you're interested in its influence on the history of RPGs, otherwise there are much better choices.

I'm not sure about 2), for example there are already tons of push/pull effects in Deadfire, I found the reason I never use them is purely that they don't do anything beneficial for me, moving enemies away just means I have to reposition. not because I can't find an ideal chance to push them in the direction I want. Also for things like barrels, the problem is other isometric CRPGs don't let players to move them at all, not necessarily because it's hard to aim in real time. In comparison Larian maps feel much more alive even outside of combat. But for being chaotic, that's a fair point. Limiting party size and making encounters of less but stronger enemies can help. I also noticed something else: PoE games have very dull sound effects and animation, while Larian makes every action comically impactful, both visual and audio. That's probably another advantage of TB to make the game attractive. Other than maybe Obsidian was just bad at it (character voices also have awful recording quality), it would be so messy if everyone is doing the Larian style animation and bombarding my ear at the same time.

Do you think RTwP games can learn at least something from Larian? I've finally tried BG3 (didn't finish it though, computer can't handle it mid to late game), it's clearly by far the best combat from Larian and even for a TB "hater" like me, I have to admit I can't complain about pretty much anything except for it being TB. I've seen people arguing that the Larian style of terrain utilizing and verticality are hard to adapt for RT or RTwP, but I don't know, isn't using Z-axis already in modern ACT or general RPGs? Maybe it's something technical, rather than a design problem? It's kind of funny that BG3 as a turn-based game allows saving mid-combat, while I've seen at various points in Pathfinder games, the auto-save checkpoints Owlcat put there don't work because they conflict with a cutscene or combat has begun, so a reload means going through cutscenes and dialogues again and again. I think this choice from Larian also helps reduce the punishment on player's mistakes.

I have some off topic questions, how did you solo with furyshaper? Limited resources and expensive healing, no pet or summon... Even the terror ward has awful ACC that I had trouble hitting mediocre enemies even with a party for debuffing, that I ended up just using the frenzy ward and it felt very general when I played one.

The thundercat build in the forum is great since cat form+wall of draining is one of the few ways to actually make use of shapeshift. Conjurer has all the damage spells a wizard needs (as multiclass, at least), as long as you focus on them sorcerer is one of the best offensive casters in the game.

Do you think it's possible to make a build *really* good and fun at the same time? Like if you can delete everything with a few spells, it being noninteractive is the result of being overpowered so there is no need to consider survival, strategy etc. Other builds are more interactive because they are not powerful enough to neglect other aspects, or have to do extra things to reach the same level of survivability or damage. Got me thinking if we have to deliberately go for "weaker" builds to have fun.

Do you mind using exploits? I found that without them, viable classes are quite limited. After running out of those I went back to party.

I realized I've procastenated finishing my sorcerer run for months. The class isn't boring, quite the opposite in fact, but my problem is that combat becomes really uninteractive and repetitive. It's always queueing up a few buffs from Xoti, then blindly throw whatever spells I have and it's over. It's one of the few runs that I almost never needed support from the paladin. Not the case with Deadfire, "having to do something" is also unfun imo. Like in Pathfinder WotR it's either stacking buffs then breeze through with melee, or use exploits, or suffer.

Yeah damage scaling is already consistent, having to do completely normal punches to gain 1 resource seems too bad, even by Shattered Pillar standard. Do you think it can have a fixed bonus accuracy and/or PEN? Will help greatly with early game but no real impact (or slight nerf) for late game.

It does benefit from DW though, that's why it's so OP. You can wear the heaviest armor, have decent INT and still deliver a deadly punch every 2-3 seconds. Holding Tuolio's Palm a FF gets all the benifits from a shield but always attacks with the main weapon at DW speed. Even PL scaling for damage and accuracy on top as if it's not enough. Even though I do think the ability is OP, my petition is mainly for consistency rather than balance. Some weapon abilities have a fixed bonus accuracy, but not from PL scaling. Given that a character needs to "build" a high RES around the map, combined with the scaling of fists and the healing, it also makes FF too reliant on leveling and game progress, more than it needs to be imo. At low levels a FF misses a lot and the healing barely covers the DoT yet can't reliably get wounds for other abilities, while later they are simply too good. A missed FF attack still gets the debuff, so nerfing the accuracy won't diminish their survivability. Their playstyle is one-dimensional but is by far the most tanky monk subclass and probably the best for single target damage. There are things that other monks can do but a FF will never be able to do, but in 95% cases FF can single-handedly handle the fight with an one-entry script. I think making the nerf will still leave them on the OP side of all classed.

Currently playing a sorcerer and it changed my view on conjurer. Their spells aren't ideal on their own but at least they have access to wall of flame, chill fog, freezing pillar etc. Sorcerer naturally leans to using tons of DoT/AoE spells combined with combusting wounds so conjurer will have most of the tools at hand. Caster/caster multiclass is also better in BPM compared to vanilla, since the spells we get from brilliant is limited in power, in longer fights a MC caster isn't far behind compared to SC casters.

Do you think Forbidden Fist (ability) need a minor nerf from CM version? It's effectively a fist attack, so imo should be treated like other weapon abilities in terms of PL scaling - no bonus accuracy.

I also noticed something about enemies queued up ability: if Dorudugan begins "casting" and the monk knocks it up, then a priest casts writ of war on it when it's targetable, it still uses that ability right after it stands up.

Finished the run with ranger/monk doing skyward kick. Accuracy can reach 210+ so that's not a problem at all. The problem is Dorudugan will spend more than half of the time flying that Arkemyr's Wondrous Torment misses a lot, then the knock up effect can be too short that it still does one thing or two. Wasn't 100% autopilot but still a solid strategy that you can dial up the speed to max.

I mean the high tier spells, for example when I used Gaze of Adragon against Dorudugan the flanking frequently dropped and the cycle broke several times . It didn't really matter since 9s is not too long, but I imagine if a similar cycle requires tier 7-9 spells it can be tricky.

Probably unexpected but balanced consequence: tactician/caster can be worse than before even if the battlefield is completely under control, as hard CC can make enemies immune to engagement for a moment, the free brilliant can break every now and then, so the tactician may never get their high tier spells back without phantom foes/perception afflictions. I don't think this is a problem since they get brilliant way too easily against few enemies. just an interesting observation.

It doesn't seem to benefit from multi-hit, with blunderbuss or Sun and Moon I can only reduce 30s. Why is blunderbuss recommended for it? Am I missing something? It has weird interaction with Refreshing Defense. With a few hits from a single-hit weapon, I increased it from ~100s to 600s. Doesn't seem to be exponential though. It also can't remove the actual HoT of Unbending.

What makes Engoliero do Espirs so good in your opinion? It seems to be the least powerful of the 3, lacking something other weapons don't offer. This seem to be a win-more case, the wielder needs to have extremely high accuracy to get this to work on more powerful enemies. To use that accuracy for something like chain stun/knock or enabling the party is a interesting question. Might be worth trying on the wanderer I'm running.

They're decent weapons for gambit rogue, at least if use BPM to fix the guile refund. Before the fix you only get guile back if the 1st of 4 hits crits, and after the fix you only need any of the hits crits, making them one of the best gambit weapons. Kitchen Stove's Hurried works for both hands, and Xefa's Empirical Explication has 30% total lash, can both knock back and knock down on crit. With this set you can knock most bosses to death.

Yeah I think the group is very problematic. It pays damage for pierce pen and offers even more pen with modal. It's useless. Stiletto is a similar case but it's so much better for simply being 1-handed, also Rust's Poignard and Azure Blade have some interesting enchantments. With the unique estocs, we only get some additional accuracy (which we could've had if we just use a slow 1H weapon), some speed (which we could have had if we dual wield), or some AoE on kill (that I can simply use a hand mortar if I really need). Blade of the Endless Paths has a potentially -20 DEF, but if I desperately want it on someone, how can I crit it 5 times to get the debuff? Why not just use pike modal. I just can't justify using them for anything but style points.

My very first character was a Devoted/something with Estoc and I gave up. Looking back now I probably picked the worst choice possible (at least one of them).

After targeting its fortitude with spells... Using weapons doesn't look that bad anymore. Isn't consistent crit harder to achieve?

I forgot the PL scaling part, since for most other classes low tier weapon abilities tend to be a waste of resources or function over damage I never thought about their damage potential.

That's promising indeed. Worst case can just let someone else attack the monk. I'm considering maybe berserker/some monk to easily spam skyward kick or raised torment.