morhilane

I like all that a lot more than just "BEGONE, MAGIC!" dispel. Wiping everything that could possibly be beneficial to your enemies isn't a tactical choice. It's like Samuel Adams... it's always a good decision. Well, it's a decision when it might be useful to have the other one around. Remember Remove Magic in BG2? It was always a tough choice, deciding whether to memorize one more Remove Magic, or one more Dispel Magic. "Just remove negative effects on allies" actually strikes me as more boring. I mean, that's always the right choice. You actually have more tough choices in PoE. The first one is to decide if the spell is worth putting in one of the four spell slots of the grimoire and the other if the spell is worth using in a fight compared to the other three spells that share per-rest cast with it while taking "adventuring day" into considerations.

Eh, I think PoE could use a bit of counter magic. At least a Dispel Spell or something would be nice. The Wizard can use any Non-AoE-Damage Spell he can get IMO. Can someone confirm/deconfirm my gut feeling while we're at it? Is the damage output of most wizard spells a bit mediocre, or ist that just me? Throwing Fireballs just feels kinda lackluster to me. Wizards have a dispel (well, half a dispel): Arcane Dampener suppress buff on enemies, it's a level 3 spell. Priests get the other side of the dispel with Suppress Affliction (level 2 spell), that one remove negatives effects on allies. There is also a bunch of chants/spells/abilities on various classes to counter specific buff/negative effects. For example, Chanters have an invocation that lower enemies DT, that could counter a Priest's Armor of Faith buff. As for spell damage, it's not mediocre on paper. It's just that it works like weapons: misses, graze, hit, crits and DT/DR reduce the final number. AoE are calculated per targets too. Basically, if the number is low, it's probably because it's a graze and/or the targets has high resistance against the damage type of that spell. I've seen a fireball deal 86 damage on a target in PoE beta, just like I've seen 5 damage on the target right beside the other one.

Probably a lot less than you think. Outside of these forums, the only people I've seen cry over not combat XP are people who do not have access to the beta. The people, I know who played the beta didn't even realize there was no combat XP, myself included.

I agree with Semper. Pausing differs per individuals. There is even a big dose of "YMMV", I know people who pretty much plays the IE games in turn-based mode (setting auto-pause at every turn-start). They just love to micro-manage everything, even when it's not necessary.

Do you have any proof that someone changed his mind here? From what I'm seeing, people against pre-buffing are still against pre-buffing, people who wanted pre-buffing just got a new thread to, once again, voice their opinions. Currently, the problems with combat buffing is recovery time for buff spells (too long), casting times for buff (too slow), party members not doing what they are asked and stuff dying to fast because of imbalanced abilities/features. The last two have nothing to do with buffs, but they affect buff usages. I personally don't see the point of pre-buffing unless the game is designed so it is necessary for most fights. It's not just a "don't do it if you don't like it" thing, it's something that directly affect the game balance of every players.

I had no idea, although I'm not surprised, they are clever people Are they still experimenting with diffent systems, or is that time passed in the development? I would say it's pretty much locked down by now, they didn't really experiment with different systems, they designed the classes form the get-go to work like that.

Yeah I don't understand why this hasn't been the design from the beginning. Neither do I. When they said "objective" exp this is what I was expecting. It is how it is done in every other game I have played that is Objective EXP based, like Deus Ex for example. I'm not sure I get what you two are talking about. You get XP each time you get a quest update. I can get 3 xp updates for Cat&Mouse if I take the time to talk to both sides or one update if I just kill Medreth right away and talk to the Orlan in the Inn. There is various XP update for Blood Legacy starting with talking with the guy in the Inn. Entering the Ogre's cave gives 1500XP if you have Pilgrim's Pligth's in your logbook.

Pretty much everyone one goes down after one arbalest bolt form a Rogue right now (unless it's a graze).

I don't think any of the classes need a major rework. Also, I think that the class specialization should be kept over any kind of flexibility, a Ranger should always keep his pet and be primarily a ranged class we got enough melee-oriented class has is. Or a Wizard shouldn't become a summoner because some people can't stand the word Druid or Chanter on their character sheet. Classes Clerics are now just healbots in v301: AoE size reduction made their support spells too costly to use and they have really low health value making them backline casters. Also, level two spell list has 3 spells that restore endurance, that's a bit much. Although, the main reason they are healbot is because between level 1 and 5 they are the only class with any healing spells (beside Paladins getting one Lay On Hand). In previous beta, they were still healbot, but you didn't feel like you wasted a per-rest spells because it would affect everyone (less or more). The other "Leader" is the Chanter, which do no get a single healing chant/invocation despite being "Leaders". They only get Ancient Memories that heals a very small amount once in a while. They can pad in for a Cleric in term of buff, but not healing. The Druids can be played has melee (shapeshifting) or has mid/melee-range casters and their spell list isn't that bad (although low on buff, but there is plenty of buff among the other classes so it's probably by design). Their first heal spell is a level 3 spell, they cannot replace a Cleric in that duty in the early level of the game (although, I'm not requesting them to be able to do so). Fighter, Paladin and Barbarian, with the merging of base accuracy, mostly just need talents to specialize in ranged or melee weaponry (it doesn't need to be a class ability from my point-of-view). Basically, Savage Attacks need a ranged counterpart. Some of the Ranger class abilities should probably be universal talent: Swift Aim/Vicious Aim. Fighter's are probably getting too many defensive abilities though. Wizard, I need to play a self-made one. I do know that BB Wizard's grimoire sucks for the type of Wizard I usually make, but the full spell list seems to have the spells I seek. Also, rod/scepter/wand do pitiful damage, but I guess they are the throwing dart/sling of PoE. Beside that they do have flexibility in term of melee, ranged and AoE spells selection, along with a few self-buff spells. Ciphers need a visual effect for the whip, you have to check the focus pool to know if it's working or not. Right now it's quite a debuff/damage oriented class, it might need more "spell" like Psychovampiric Shield where they steal something from a target and give themselves a buff in the process (or give an ally a buff, used like Soul Shock which result in a buff on the ally while debuffing the nearby enemies). Rangers are kind of the opposite of the Fighter/Paladin/Barbarian, but there is already talent to improve melee. They mostly need their bug/balance fixed. Also, maybe alter receiving the ranger's abilities and the pet's related abilities, right now the class seems to get most ranger's ability first and the pet stuff at "end-game" (unless these were removed). Rogues were much improved with v301. They can be scout, heavy hitters (melee and ranged), get CCed and the best mechanic around...and all that at the same time. Something more generic Differentiation of spells between beneficial and harmful. The IE games color-coded their spells icons: blues = beneficial , red = harmful, white=utility. For example, Cleric's spell list contains many harmful spells, you just don't know that without reading all the spell descriptions. The color-coding is makes spell selection faster (well until you know all of them by heart at least). There is a lack of "suppress/suspend" status affects spread around the classes. This is another case where you need a Priest in the party. The Druid and Chanter can remove only a subset each. Paladin can suspend for a time, but not remove them. The Monk has a seflfy.

After using the Ebony Spider figuring and getting my little spider army, BB Wizard spell gets "deactivated" and never "happen" despite losing a spell per encounter. Also the spiders are being "teleported" around, but the combat log suggest they are re-summoned. [steps] - Create new character - Once in the game world, go in the inventory and select BB Wizard - Once there, select Ebony Spider figurine and put it into one of BB Wizard quickslots - Exit Inventory - Select BB Wizard to be able to use the figurine in the quickslot - select where spiders should show up (anywhere doesn't matter) - Once spiders are there, move BB Wizard closer to Medreth's group - Select the fireball spell and watch has the spiders move and the spell is cancelled In the combat log, you can see BB Wizard casts [spell] Widowmaker has joined party Widowmaker Spiderling has joined party Widowmaker Spiderling has joined party BB Wizard deactivates [spell]

Nevermind. I wanted to edit something, not quote it.

@Sensuki I forgot about some spells getting accuracy bonus. I don't play casters often. I tried to see how weapon accuracy bonus is applied and that's a pain in the ass because the value is not updated on the paper doll. The value only change if you are using a single weapon or not. Also, it appear that using a single weapon gives you much better accuracy if you are a Fighter. Is that mentioned somewhere, because it doesn't show up on the fighter description. BB Fighter + one-handed axe (or a one-handed sword) : 52 accuracy BB Fighter with axe/shield, axe/sword, morning star, empty handed or even naked: 37 accuracy He has 10 Perception, so 37 is his normal base class + level up accuracy. When using a one handed weapon, he gets a bonus 25 accuracy to reach 52 (I tested it on a self made fighter and the bonus is 15 until level 5, then it move to 25). That's on the paper doll though. When in combat, naked, no modal up, with a single one-handed sword is accuracy read has 56 in the combat log (this is correct, the sword is fine and get a +4 accuracy). I made a test with an enchanted sword (well the same fine sword) and added Accurate 3 on it (+12 accuracy) and the accuracy in the combat log was 64. So 52+12. Seems like enchantment of the same type do not stack, even if you can apply them on something.

Right now, from what I tested yesterday, you can put 4 enchantments on a weapon (armor or shield). The "Exceptional" is a single enchantment. I need to verify if the DT Reduction count has one, I don't remember. So you can add 2 more enchantments on that Estoc. Also, the enchant button on the weapon always show up, you need to go in the enchant panel to see that you can't put more enchantments on a weapons and try some enchantments (nothing is telling you that you reached the max anywhere). When I try enchant it, the known recipes list don't show +weapon mods selection, so I can't add any enchantments on it. Same thing has happened also other equipment that should be enchant-able, which is I think it is bug, but I can't be sure as I don't know for sure that I should be able to enchant it (and those other items). It work fine for me, I just enchanted a rapier, some armor and an exceptional estoc. Might want to open a bug (with your output_log.txt file and probably a screenshot), seems like your enchantment UI isn't working properly.

First you need to keep in mind that most enchantments use 3 increments spread over 12 levels. Kind of like DnD +1 at level 2-4, +2 at level 5-8, +3 at level 9-12. I don't think you are really supposed to have a +3 Might item at level 5. Now for your example. Base class accuracy goes from 15 (low) to 25 (very high) depending on the class. Then you add +3 every level. So the final range at level 12 will be 48 to 58 with Perception at 10 and no gear. Perception provide +1 accuracy for each increment over 10. With an Orlan you can start with +10 (Per at 20). Some race also have racial that provide accuracy bonus, but under certain conditions so I will ignore them. I will also ignore classes models/buff that increase accuracy (too numerous and missing some tooltips). You can have more than one enchantments per weapon (different ones) right now and I believe that it's stack. I actually didn't validate that one...hmm, something to do today. The rest is based under the assumption that enchantments stacks per item. Now, the lowest quality (Fine) and lowest accuracy bonus (Accurate 1) will provide a total bonus of +8 accuracy (+4 for both), that's equivalent to having a starting Perception of 18. Everything is relatively linear in PoE, the ratio stay quite similar between low level and higher level (i.e. Superb and Accurate 3 provide a combine +24 accuracy bonus). This result in that idea that gear accuracy bonus can be ~33.3% of the total accuracy for the low accuracy classes and ~30% for the high accuracy classes for weapons. I'm not sure if weapon accuracy enchantments affect only that weapon or it it's global. If the bonus is per item only, this mean that casters are better served with increasing Perception (which affect everything) and using buff, because they won't get anything from the weapon's bonus for casting spells. I hope I didn't screw any of the math...

Right now, from what I tested yesterday, you can put 4 enchantments on a weapon (armor or shield). The "Exceptional" is a single enchantment. I need to verify if the DT Reduction count has one, I don't remember. So you can add 2 more enchantments on that Estoc. Also, the enchant button on the weapon always show up, you need to go in the enchant panel to see that you can't put more enchantments on a weapons and try some enchantments (nothing is telling you that you reached the max anywhere).

Bumping up this thread because I decided to give enchanting a go (by cheating in ingredients and money, not enough of both in the beta to really do anything with it). The UI I really think the tree should have sub-sections based on what the enchantments do. Well maybe not Shield Mod because there is few of them, but Armor and Weapons have a lot of choices that could be categorized. Example: Armor mods can be categorized in damage type resistance (all the X-proofed), skills upgrade, attribute increase (Of attribute_name), quality (fine, exceptional, superb) and others (stuff like Retaliation/Break-out). They should be grouped together, has opposed to go through all the list to find the one that you want. Same goes for Weapon: slaying, quality, accuracy related mods, damage related mods and others (stuff like Overbearing). What can and can't be enchanted BB Fighter's helmet, BB Wizard's cape and starter clothing (some class can start with that on their back) can't be enchanted. The sash you can buy at Dyrwood village tanner can be enchanted further because it haven't reached the max yet and it's already enchanted. I think that players should be able to make their own enchanted helmet/cap/cloth with probably a subset of the Armor Mods selection. Enchantments Some stuff looks a bit crazy to me, especially once you start to add them at the same time. For example, Damaging 3 adding a x2.5 damage multiplier to weapons or Overbearing adding knock-down to all critical hits...and you can add both at the same time on a weapon. I know that Damaging 3 is a "end-game" enchantments but unless everyone will require that x2.5 damage multiplier seems a lot to me. Possible bugs/issues In the Shield mods, Harbringer does -10 accuracy and no positive. That doesn't look like something you really want to add on your shield... After adding an enchantment, the Enchant button will still look usable but you get a popup telling you the enchant is already on the item. It should become greyed out after usage, unless you can add the same enchantment more than once (which doesn't look to be the case). The max number of enchantments on a items is confusing. Seems to be 4, but I'm not sure. The reason for that is that it appear some enchants are unavailable after you put 3 on the item or their are mutually exclusive which is not mentioned/shown anywhere in the game.

I'm currently checking enchanting and the BB Fighter's helmet can't be enchanted. Which means we can't make our own enchanted helmet. I personally think they should allow at least +skill increase on helmet, would make them a bit more useful beside decoration.

I'm saying it's cosmetic because the only thing they have to do to get the exact same numbers output is tweak the balance. They don't have to rewrite the algorithm in the background or rename anything.

I realized it, but I also realize that the game is not balanced on bit so what the numbers do right now and what they did before is kind of inconsequential at this point in time.

It's not hypothetical, players have been requesting more and more actives for years. Just go into the Fighter and Rogue are boring thread in the Gameplay & Mechanics sub-forums and read some of the posts there to see such requests. A small part of me think that WoW is to blame for that, it made a lots of new gamers believe that having 30+ active abilities was how a cRPGs was supposed to be played (even if you technically use only like 5 of them).

It's not cosmetic. The attribute bonuses have been nerfed through the roof. Previously 18 Might gave you +36% damage, and changed your Morningstar damage (base 18-28) to 24.48 - 38.08 Now 18 Might gives you +16% damage, and you get 20.88 - 32.48 Pretty big difference. 18 Dexterity used to give you 18 Accuracy, now 18 Perception gives you 8. And so on and so forth. It's cosmetic in the sense that how the math works did not change. The values were nerfed but considering the game balance is all over the place before and after the change I don't think that was much of concern for the dev at the time.

I know... It work perfectly on another computers. I have try with different characters & classes, different difficulty level etc... always stuck at level 5... Maybe you should provide your DxDiag file for that computer. Seems more like a computer compatibility issues to me. How to generate the DxDiag information *copied form this thread*: You can also attach a DxDiag if you are in Windows. To get a DxDiag press Windows Key + R, then type in dxdiag and hit run. On the menu that comes up, press the "Save All Information" button and save out the file. A DxDiag will list most of your computer's information so we can diagnose the problem properly. You might also want to share the game output_log.txt (found in pathto\Steam\steamapps\common\Pillars of Eternity - Public Beta\PillarsOfEternity_Data), the dev might be able to see something in there to help them (mine is full of errors so don't make assumptions by what you read in it).

Not sure that's entirely fair. Yeah ultimately the decisions are in their hands, but that doesn't mean that we can't make them change their minds about something. They probably had their reasons not to implement Matt and Sensuki's attribute system. Now as to speculate what those reasons were... You're not going to change their mind, unless it's something that doesn't interfere (much) with their design intentions and/or goals. For example, switching attributes value with 0 bonus to value 10 is cosmetic so they did it. or putting inventory size to 16 or the stash access changes (now available in town map, not just by resting). People where asking for scalable AoE, but they went with their idea. Same goes for the attribute systems. That's because those beta testers suggestions were not 100% inline with what the Sawyer believed would fulfill his design intentions and goals (which is part "religion", part YMMV and part pure maths).

I level up a few times with v301 through different characters, mostly through doing Cat&Mouse, the Medreth's group gives more XP now that they are level 8. My last level up was a few hours ago with a Chanter. Playing on normal if that might matter.

I'm not sure if people realized it also affected enemies' spells. I had party members affected by Cowled Dwarf's beneficial spells (Medreth's priest buddy). Just to make sure the revamp doesn't forget them...