Jojobobo

That's the second time I see this argument and I still have no idea who said anything along those lines. We know Obsidian has fixed the game-breaking bugs. You are making a mistake. You are assuming what they are calling "game breaking bugs" are actually in fact "game breaking bugs". They aren't. Eternity has never had very many game breaking bugs and any that were there has been fixed some time ago. Meanwhile.... Jojobo... where in your right mind are you getting these numbers? You have no clue how fast this patch can be ready to release, you don't know how many people are on it now, and there is absolutely no freaking way in hell anyone can know for a fact putting 10 more people on it for one week will be some magical catch all fix that will see it pushed out tomorrow. Get over it. You are asking for something unreasonable and it isn't going to happen no matter how much you complain or use flawed logic to make yourself believe it is reasonable. 10 is an arbitrary number and an a week was an arbitrary length, the point is they could be doing more and they could be putting more people on it - or splitting the focus less of the people who are currently on it. I guess as you say though, I should just "get over it" and enjoy the fact that Obsidian is using those resources elsewhere. But I get it, we should cut them infinite slack, even though the wait already has been huge. We have entirely differing stances on this issue, and I get it you think I'm small minded and can't grasp the bigger picture of running a business, etc. I'm saying I can, but it's been too long now. It actually affects any save, manual/auto/quick. I presume it affects quick-savers worst because they're so used to just hitting quicksave multiple times in any given map, but it does affect all saves. Given the rest mechanic, and the fact it's not exactly uncommon to want to (a) save on a map and (b) come back to an area with more camping supplies (hence autosaving) it is a particularly nasty bug - even if it's only certain talents and abilities it stacks. It's especially punitive for solo players/people who use glass cannons/people who play with a party of fewer than 6 - which is quite a lot of people. To me, I would say it is borderline game-breaking, and does require counter-intuitive gameplay (i.e. not using the rest mechanics as you normally would due to autosaving also triggering the bug: use of camping supplies requiring you to go purchase more triggering an additional save) in order to minimise its impact and make the game more playable. Do you really think, if it was just as simple as not quick-saving, people would be complaining this much? I'm not just some insane moron who literally can't help but hit quicksave all the time. It's literally a case where last night I was clearing another level of the Endless Paths, and I'd been playing for about half an hour without saving to avoid the stacking bug. But then of course, one of my summons gets paralysed before it dies, meaning it will appear of every map ever from then on in (another charming Obsidian bug). So I have to choose between an emersion breaking crapfest, or literally just try again and waste half an hour of my time. I decided the "waste half an hour" option. I don't know, maybe people around here think it's hilarious to waste their free time for no good reason, but I sure as hell don't.

Double post. Please delete.

Fenixp and I decided to delete our slight bitchiness, as it wasn't really relevant, hence this edit.

No it's a different bug, causing some bonuses from certain abilities and talents (e.g. Weapon and Shield Style, causing massive boosts to Deflection and Reflex) upon each save in an area. Still you're right, there does seem to be a common trend of stacking bugs.

Actually, Skyrim still has game-breaking bugs in the main quest line (I faced one during the last playthrough, the only way to fix it was to forward the quest stage via console). Also, just look at the changelog for the Skyrim unofficial patch. Well maybe I'm extremely fortunate then, but on several 100 plus hour play-throughs I never found anything I would call a severe bug. Ummm... Of course it wasn't WoW that brought Blizzard serious bank at first, Diablo I, II and StarCraft are still amongst the best selling PC games in history. Yes, to date. In 2016. I'm sure they did make money, but as they whole company would have been developing WoW they definitely will have been wasting costly resources for the sake of keeping the player base happy. I'm pretty bored about arguing this point to be honest, I'm not going to be convinced that their conduct here isn't poor and I wasn't looking to debate this issue in the first place - rather it was to let Obsidian know that they're beginning to lose respect from some of their fanbase. They chose to make a crowd funded game, they should be trying to keep that same crowd happy - and in my opinion as with many others who have posted here they're not to the extent they should be. If you are happy to sit on your thumbs and wait for ages until they finally release a patch, then good for you, but it's not good enough for me - at least not with the completely ridiculous delay we're looking at currently.

I'll be blunt, Diablo 2 Lord of Destruction released in 2001, World of Warcraft released in 2004. As far as I'm concerned, it was WoW that brought Blizzard serious bank, and yet the patching was very good on Diablo 2 up until that point regardless. So yes, the comparison is completely valid, and maybe you should have fact checked before you threw your opinion out there. And no, a 10 man team for a week isn't the most ridiculous thing ever. I appreciate it's costly, but as Pillars fans are the very reason they aren't on the breadline in the first place some cost is fine.

Those bugs In Skyrim that you mentioned are extremely minor, nothing like which we are facing in Pillars currently or have every moment since its release. As you say, open world RPGs are more buggy, so if Skyrim could and did land with a less bug filled release it's crazy that games like Pillars didn't. And as I said, I am fine with waiting, but as everyone else has mentioned, it is taking ages - and I've mentioned all the reasons as to why that's a bit of a joke.

What the hell are you talking about? Yes I expect a game I fund not to have major bugs in it, or even minor bugs in it, that are persistently annoying a year plus after release. This isn't a minor set of rules, this is a goddamn minimum standard. Jesus, Skyrim delivered better on this front, and I would never clamour for it being the pinnacle of RPG games. My god, me and my "arbitrary standards" of not wanting buggy games. Put me on the cross. PS Blizzard might be like McScrooge now, but back then they gave a crap - case in point the example given.

That is why I thought the things that I did think.

Pillars of Eternity was released 26th March 2015. Right now it's 3rd July 2016. We know Obsidian is still working on patching the game given the fact they have released beta for patch 3.03. This means that they've been working on fixing and improving the game for more than 1 year and 3 months. Obsidian was happy to waste money in return for people who gave them vital seed money to begin. You're still trying to pass the company as one which did not go beyond what would have been expected of them if it were not a KS project when they very clearly did. Diablo II was patched for ages without any incentive and with Blizzard forking out to keep the servers afloat. So I don't think Obsidian's relatively minimal effort deserves a standing ovation. Are they better than other AAA+ companies, sometimes - yeah maybe, sure. Better than other kickstarter funded more-indie developers - no, because a lot of them are more grateful. Regardless of what the industry standard of giving a crap is, I did and do want a little more care for this game. I also think Obsidian markets themselves on being a game company for the gamers (i.e. you want IE games you hardcore fans, we got IE-style games!) so even beyond a kickstarter backing I feel like they have a greater obligation to customer service than other companies as their unique selling point. They aren't delivering.

As far as I know, it increased both, doesn't it? I.e. both min damage after high DR, and minimum weapon damage?

Sorry for releasing the juicy spoilers to the question I guess maybe he is referring to something different.

Few problems with this statement. 1: We have absolutely no clue how complex fixing these issues will be or if other bugs that were caught and needed to be resolved were created by the fixes. 2: Those people you want to pull off don't come from no where. They are working on some other project, a project maybe being funded by a company with strict deadlines that will pay Obsidian less money if they fail to meet those deadlines.... or maybe kill the project altogether. Those people are working on something that will make the company money in the future, not a product that has reached the end of it's life cycle. There comes a time where you have to make the smart business choice and invest your employees into something progressive. We have no clue what taking people from other projects for this patch would cost but I am willing to bet someone at Obsidian does, they did the math, and the cost benefit analysis said it was a bad idea. I appreciate both those things, and I understand they would be working on another project, but they shouldn't have coded their game in a way that it had so many gaping bugs initially - and even if it does expend their resources they did make a commitment to people who likely saved their company from administration and gave them money in good faith. IMO, a "mostly bug free game" under the definition I stipulated above, isn't a lot to ask (I'd hope it was a bare minimum standard in this industry, but it sadly isn't) - and it should have been sorted a damn while ago, and if they needed to spend more resources then do it and retain some damn credibility. The bugs in this game, and the amount of restarts I've done because of them (in the region of 15+, at the very least), are not good. On the whole money vs credibility issue, I thought Obsidian would be happy to waste some money in return for the people who gave them vital seed money to begin with to feel satisfied. Should we all be happy they don't care enough, and are fine moving onto the bigger and better things that our seed money facilitated rather than trying to make that base contented? I really don't think so.

I think it's not represented in the damage tooltips, I don't think it's not working. And also, it didn't take as much saving as you'd think. Even if his damage was in the 80-100 range, is that still okay? It's not.

Well on that basis, you're spot on. I guess I was just looking to spread the joy of Wound Binding, if that hadn't been done enough already in the Glass Tsunami build.

I'm personally fine giving them more time, but I can perfectly see why people are annoyed. I mean why can't they stick 10 people on it for a couple of weeks, get it sorted, then keep the skeleton team? Probably even a couple of people would be good enough then, they'd just need one more minor bug fix patch and it'd be done. Seems like a fine business decision to me, a burst of effort on something that's been dogging them for ages and then little to no hassle with it from there on. When a game releases that is this buggy, and it's still not sorted a year plus down the line, and attention has shifted way from the game to a detrimental extent - I think it's fine for people to be annoyed. And it isn't good enough; how buggy this game has been and how quickly they've sorted those bugs really has been crappy and I think their reputation will have been hindered for it in the long run. It took some of the shine off what could have been extremely shiny, when with a little more care they could have maintained extremely shiny and really raised their profile; they're now a company that makes good rpgs, so long as would expect a lot of bugs - but they could have just been a company that makes good rpgs (or at least, buried that reputation that had existed before with this game, rather than thoroughly stoking the fire).

I said this elsewhere on the forums, but I thought I'd mention it in a General Discussion thread as not as many people will be looking in Technical Issues. I link Obsidian's lack of support currently is not good enough. This is a crowd funded game, without backer support like mine it sounds like Obsidian would have gone into administration, and so it's beginning to feel like this is a big middle finger to the fan base who got them out of that hole. I know delegating more resources to the patching at this time won't make Obsidian any money, but I feel there is a defined obligation here - especially because of the crowd funding - that is being ignored. It's also not like the fans are even demanding them to reinvent the wheel, they just want 1-year-and-change down the line to have a mostly bug free game (mostly bug free, IMO, meaning a game that lacks any bugs that can't be fixed with an easy reload and affect game balance) but that still hasn't been delivered. It's pretty shoddy, in all honesty. Any bug that affects player enjoyment is a problem, and the stacking bug is pretty game breaking to any person who wants to play the game as a normal person would - i.e. save when they like - and it is game-breaking quite often, no matter how many people are claiming it isn't (I mean, 110 Deflection Animats in Ondra's Gift - an early location laden with quests you'd want to save after - that's perfectly fun right?). I think Obsidian taking major delays over this is not something should be supported, in fact it does feel a bit like they've washed their hands of their hardcore fans who did reinvigorate their company by backing their game. I for one am starting to reconsider my continued support of their games in the future. I backed this game, I shouldn't still have unpleasantness in the forms of bugs I have to pussyfoot around when I come to play it a year and more on. In fact, I took a long hiatus from v1 to v3 from this game purely so they could bug fix which is complete madness, and yet there's still issues. Why should I back something of theirs again if this is how they treat people who believed in them and wanted to take a chance on them?

I really want them to nail this patch, so I'm still okay with waiting. But if they do introduce additional bugs in the process of patching (e.g. the case of Confident Aim currently in the Beta) I will be spitting blood, I have literally never heard of a company introduce more bugs in the process of patching. So please Obsidian, fix the current bugs, do not introduce more bugs - and I will be content. Still, there's things like the weird paralysis bug on summoned creatures where if they're paralysed when they die they appear on every map - I doubt they'll ever fix that and it is immersion breaking. On the whole I would have enjoyed this game dramatically more if the game had had dramatically less bugs, and although that sounds like stating the obvious most games are reasonably playable on release but Pillars certainly wasn't - and for some reason they've never quite mastered kicking all the bugs into touch. If this really is the final patch, or the final major patch at the very least, it wouldn't hurt them to delegate workflow away from a current project and into this for a couple of weeks to get it really ironed out. Diablo II for example had a great history of patching, and though there was a multiplayer online element I always thought it was more of a single player game, and Blizzard continued to support that because it made the player base happy and satisfied with their purchase. While Obsidian did introduce new free content in patches (the Stronghold stuff), their haphazard support for getting the really irritating bugs out of the game has been a bit poor. From my perspective, I'd had preferred a solid bug fixing of irritating issues, both major and minor - rather than the new content - in the first place. Even though they won't be making money by supporting this game further, I think the fact there is a tangible lack of support when it was crowd funded is quite frankly not good enough.

I think Confident Aim is affected by the well documented save stacking bug, I know when I was facing off against Sly Cyrdel he was doing 150-200 damage against me and he definitely has Confident Aim. @ the OP, as KDubya mentions take both. I find fighters aren't awash with abilities that you're absolutely desperate to take, so there's usually enough room for both on one character. If you have to take one, as KDubya says Confident Aim maybe has the slight edge - with Fighters' natural sturdiness I find against high deflection enemies the graze -> hit proc does happen at a reasonable rate.

I wouldn't say that, as far as I'm aware from my current character Wound Binding is affected by all current healing multipliers (it's definitely affected by Might), and as far as I'm aware all current healing multipliers are multiplicative. So for Might 21 (x1.33, which I always like as any number with a factor of 3 ends up nice and round): 1.4 (40% Wound Binding heal) x 1.33 = 1.86, i.e. close to your entire health pool (I'm too lazy to respec and test a lower Might character to finding out whether the survival modifier and x healing items also affect it, but I'm pretty sure they would). In other words, so long as you have a Con pitched at a level that'll let that character take the strong one-off hits you want to take, and so long as you have enough ways to heal endurance to make extra health worth it you get a massively increased health pool to play with at the cost of only a single talent point - easily allowing for you to shift points from Con and into something else, particularly on the high base endurance classes. And I know it's one per rest, but this is only really something you're going to have to bust out in times of need in the first place or against a big boss fight - so I think that's a perfectly reasonable trade off. Even with me using it on solo, I'm not feeling the per rest pinch - if anything against hoards of trash mobs it increases the time between rests as you don't have to rest to heal. Infuse with Vital Essence on the other hand is nice for restoring both health and endurance, as it's certainly very nice Wizards get to use it per encounter if you choose it to master, but it nowhere near gets close to the colossal health healing of Wound Binding - in fact it'd probably work nicely with Wounding Binding if you can get even more endurance healing in place. Field Triage, as it heals a lesser amount and requires one of your characters to go up to the other character, is very meh. EDIT: In game test, got 282 health per tick, with 3 ticks over 9 seconds (I have base Intelligence) with x1.4 survival modifier, 21 Might and x1.25 for Belt of Bountiful Healing (though Fulvano's Amulet works just as well). 282 x 3 = 846, my health is 910 - a 92.8% heal. 910 x 0.4 = 364. 846 / 364 = 2.32 1.33 (Might) x 1.25 x 1.4 = 2.33, 2.32 rounding down. So it is affected by healing items, and with it being duration based it's almost certainly affected by intellect too (any Int that gives you an extra 3 seconds will give you another tick). With third stage healing bonuses from survival, and/or a nice combo of Int/Mig/healing items, it's extremely easy to double your health - and obviously all those healing items make any self endurance heals all the more worth increased health.

Sorry, was not aware @jojobo: yes healing remains, you can heal yourself from Red to full in 2-3 fights. That is pretty sweet, I wonder if it is a bug (seeing as the spell description says it's supposed to increase max health for 15s) or whether it's intentionally meant to remain until later.

Doesn't the time on it run out? Or is it the case that once the timer does run out, that health restored remains (e.g. 300/800 health left, vital essence makes it 350/850 or whatever might adjusted, then does it remain 350/800 after the effect goes down)? If so, yeah that's pretty damn handy. If a solo a wizard, I'll definitely pick that up.

Also, please don't introduce this bug (https://forums.obsidian.net/topic/87873-303-confident-aim-loading-damage-bug/) into the game. I'm currently playing as a Fighter and I don't want it to spoil my playthrough. I guess I could just leave the game at v3.02, but I really want the new hatchet that's been put in the game for the build.

I would be extremely happy if this could be worked out before the actual 3.03 release. I'm currently playing a fighter on 3.02 for the sole reason that there were no bugs for the class and no planned rehashes - I think you're running into issues when your player base, even if it's a minority, is selecting classes on that basis. I've still yet to complete this game since v1.0, due to all the bugs that have been around since its release. Please, don't introduce a new bug for 3.03 and ruin some solid enjoyment I'm finally getting out of the game.

Thanks for the info, I'll try and play around it more when I need to. Still, a hotfix should have been made for this, especially seeing as somehow they managed to introduce it retrospectively.