Hiro Protagonist II

Well in that case I tip my hat to your exquisite memory, good sir. No wonder you don't need any in-game helpers. I do have a decent memory but it is far from exquisite. I believe this is more a question of playing style and general mentality. It goes something like this. There is an underlying mechanism that is pretty much reducible to mathematics. In other words, there are certain constants and then there are variables affecting them. This stuff is better kept as much under the hood as possible, simply because it's more fun that way. The main exception that always happens is in a PnP battle: if an encounter against a single enemy lasts for a number of rounds, it is inevitable that the enemy AC gets mapped out. First, we find that 23 is not enough to hit. Then we find that 27 is. Eventually we find out that the AC is 25. And of course we make assumptions and observations: if a fiery-looking salamanderish creature attacks us, we are not likely to rely on fire, and if we have cold available, we will use it. But writing stats down and making lists of them sounds like turning a PnP session into a lesson in math, statistics and accounting. Fair enough, if that's what you like, but I don't see any attraction in that. I've never heard of a DM allowing players to write down stats of enemies they encounter. As a player, I wouldn't even entertain the possibility. It would never occur to us to do that. And even if one of the players suggested it, our DM wouldn't allow it. As players, we're too busy roleplaying our characters and being involved in the story than to put on our statistician hat. It comes across as metagaming and something my or other players characters wouldn't do.

Too hard for a lot of people. They go off the main quest and encounter something that's too difficult. Similar to Baldur's Gate. Go off the main quest and you might find yourself encountering a basilisk, get turned to stone and then complain on Steam that the difficulty is too hard and all over the place.

This has exceeded my expectations and glad I backed this. Having a lot of fun playing D&D again. This is the game I've been waiting so many years for,

This looks like the game I was expecting with PoE which I found disappointing. I'm liking what I see even though I've never played or don't know anything about the pathfinder universe.

Some games series I've never played and will never play. Arma Assassin's Creed Dark Souls Dragon Age 2 and DA:I (DA:O is the exception to this series but never bought DA:2 or DA:I) Grand Theft Auto Mass Effect Sid Meier's Civilization The Sims Tom Clancy's <insert game title> Tyranny Train or Truck Simulators Not because they're good or bad. Mainly because I spend most of my time on games I've already bought over the years that I've enjoyed or never played and see no need to buy more games. There are some very rare exceptions with buying new games but I probably by one game a year now. I see no reason in having hundreds of games I've never played only to buy more games that I will never play regardless of price. That's just throwing money away. I prefer to play games I already own.

So they've gone the Star Citizen route. They couldn't get funding on KS, so they're conning convincing people to donate money with them directly. It was always doomed to fail from the start and only the true believers will pour money into this, a la Star Citizen.

The only money I'm giving out to is Beautiful Desolation. The more I read about it, the more I want to play this. I also saw this from the Codex from Christopher Bischoff http://www.rpgcodex.net/forums/index.php?threads/beautiful-desolation-from-the-makers-of-stasis-kickstarter-now-live.110743/page-7#post-4936716.

I've stopped looking at games through crowdfunding but couldn't pass up Beautiful Desolation. This looks great. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0f5RFXfLSZ8

From the guys who did STASIS. BEAUTIFUL DESOLATION KICKSTARTER LAUNCHING 24 JANUARY! Sign up at www.desolationgame.com for the launch notification! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aX3im12d3k8 Also don't forget to wishlist CAYNE - releasing for FREE on the same day! http://store.steampowered.com/app/532840/

I'm the opposite. I spend time finishing games to the point of being a completionist and trying to get every achievement if the game has them, before going onto another game. It's probably why I don't have many games on Steam. I can't even fathom how some people have hundreds of games and not even play them. I find it also saves me a lot of money.

They already had well over a million before the campaign went live.

As an investor myself, two things I look at is 1) making money and 2) tax minimisation. I honestly don't see how I'm minimising tax and no idea how much money I will make. It's not a good investment for me which is why I have no inclination to look into it any further. At least with something like property, I can be cash flow positive with a property, negative gear at the same time, pay no tax from the property and reduce my work income tax from the property. The reduced work income tax from my job also gives me more money. Thus earning more money from my job due to a lower income tax rate due to having a 'paper loss' through my properties even though I'm cash positive with those properties, and paying no tax on my property income at all. All perfectly legal for me. I see no tax benefit with fig and the income is all up in the air.

I registered for fig (under a username/email address I hardly use) just to see what the whole W3 thing is all about. It's ready to go live in 5 days time and everything is up already. Pledge tiers, etc. The investor thing is a little diabolical imo. I won't be taking part in it but can see a lot of people jumping in because 'investor'.

Also, the new game from the Stasis creators has been announced. This time, they're going post-apocalyptic. http://www.desolationgame.com/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1IkbdiJCrwo

The prequel to Stasis is drawing near. New game trailer released. CAYNE will be absolutely free to download and enjoy. It is a freestanding chapter, so you won't need STASIS to play CAYNE. It will be available on STEAM and directly from the developers site. http://www.playcayne.com/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9f99QQf4l_w

The Warlock of Firetop Mountain has been released. http://store.steampowered.com/app/324740/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VE8OhYrkYoA Apparently it started on Kickstarter that flew under my radar. Not often that I buy a game on day 1 but this looked too good to pass up. Really enjoying it now.

That's not what I got from redneckdevil's post. More like you can't say, 'No thanks' which isn't impolite but the game can take it as being impolite. You have to tippy toe on eggshells and say it in the most polite manner possible while still sounding slightly interested which is giving a false impression to the NPC that there might still be hope for them. It's similar to the NPCs in SoD. I tried to say no thanks, to some of the Beamdog NPCs including if they wanted to join my party and instead of the dialogue finishing, the dialogue keeps continuing as if there's still a chance. Even when you refuse that NPC joining your party, they get all in a huff about it.

That really is odd. If Beamdog planned to have Imoen leave your party, then she should have left after the starting dungeon like everyone else and not be recruitable later. Also, I would find it odd that if I had Eldoth and Skie in my party. Eldoth disappearing in a puff of smoke and Skie not mentioning him at all in all the dialogue I had with her throughout the game.

Oh Bruce. Some people didn't like the changes and dialogue for Viconia in SoD. One complaint I saw was she's less drow like and says stuff that a drow wouldn't say. I guess more human like? I don't know. And then she goes back being herself in BG2. Another point was while some people might say there was a plot hole between BG1 and BG2 with Viconia, I think she mentions last seeing you in Beregost when you meet up with her in BG2, that could easily be explained with where you were ambushed prior to BG2 starting and she escaped. So in effect she's telling the truth. It's that's the way you're going to go with the story. However, SoD introduces more plot holes with her because it changes everything with her and when you last see her. There was a thread about it on the Beamdog forums. While the plot holes were always there in the original games, you may or may not like Viconia 2.0 with how she's turned out and how it all fits in the games.

Yes, but she vanishes after the starting dungeon and then reappears when you're about to leave Baldur's Gate. She also leaves your party at the end. 1. Original recruitable NPCs in order of appearance (depending on what you do first in Baldur's Gate) in the game after the starting dungeon. Minsc, Dynaheir, Safana (are the first three you can recruit straight away), Viconia, Edwin, Jaheria and Khalid. 2. Original NPCs that make an appearance but are not recruitable. Imoen, Skie, Garrick, Coran, Tiax, 3. Original NPCs that do not make an appearance in the game at all. Ajantis, Alora, Branwen, Eldoth, Faldorn, Kagain, Kivan, Montaron, Quayle, Shar-Teel, Yeslick, Xan, Xzar Now if you had any NPCs from Point 3 from the base game, they do transfer across from the final battle with Sarevok and appear in the starting dungeon of SoD. When you finish the starting dungeon, they vanish into thin air. I don't know what happens when you have Imoen in your party for the final battle with Sarevok and then SoD starts, because you can't recruit Imoen in the starting dungeon. So now you have 5 party members instead of 6 if you did have her? That's what I assume.

Oh yeah. When I tried to put my party back together. Kagain, Khalid, Jaheira, Tiax, and Edwin are the only ones I could recruit (later in the game). After the first dungeon, I now had two front liners, two healers, a thief and a mage missing from my party. Kagain vanishes and Khalid is quite some way off before you meet up with him. Khalid and Jaheira are not together in the same area. You meet Jaheira before Khalid. Edwin you meet before Jaheira. However, to have a front liner in my party, I had to recruit Minsc which in turn makes Dynaheir part of your party, because you can't split them. You do meet Edwin first after you leave the city and if you try and recruit him, Minsc and Dynaheir leave your party. So now I have a problem. If I take Edwin as part of my original party, I have no front line person. I have to recruit one of the new NPCs and I think Corwin (Archer) is probably the only one able to be a front liner. And then a couple of maps later, you meet up with Jaheira. Then a couple of maps later, you meet up with Khalid. So now I have Khalid, Jaheira and Edwin from my original party. But who to replace Tiax and Kagain? The gay Gnome called Glint seems to be the replacement for Tiax as he is also a Cleric/Thief but instead of being evil like Tiax, he's the good gay version. And for Kagain's replacement? In the end my character being a level 8 Fighter / Level 11 Mage took over the front line. I also took M'khiin the shaman (similar to a Druid - Level 8 - 90hp with her Goblin Hide Armor) . Original Party NPCs. Two front liners, two healers, a thief and a mage. SoD party NPCs. One front liner, three healers, a thief and a mage. Addendum: The Beamdog NPC Dorn is on the same map as Khalid. I looked at Dorn (Blackguard (anti-paladin) Level 8 - 66 hp, Two handed sword, Crossbow) and felt he was a terrible substitute for Kagain (Fighter - Level 8 - 120hp, Axe + Shield, Crossbow) which is why I didn't pick him. Personally, I think Kagain is one of the best front liners in the base game. Khalid is also good when you pick him up (Level 9 - 117hp or 122hp with Balduran's Helm, 4 pips in Long Sword, Longbow) plus great AC with Gauntlets of Dex and +4 Dragon Scale Shield when using his Long sword and never had any morale issues with him. I must have levelled up when I did add Khalid as it's showing him as level 9 on my save at the time. Also, having three 'healers' with Jaheira (Fighter/Druid), Glint (Cleric/Thief) and M'Khiin (Shaman) allowed me to use more offensive spells as I could cut down on the healing side of things when I had three of them. Jaheira also took a more front line role though I would have preferred someone similar to Kagain. One of the complaints on the Beamdog forums with not enough choice for front liners in the game.

On the Beamdog forums, some people aren't happy that Imoen isn't recruitable. She's off learning magic and doesn't appear for most of the game. One person even said, it's not a BG game if you can't recruit Imoen.

Okay. So you already know how the Bhaalspawn story ends and don't want to go back and check out one of the 'chapters'. Like reading a saga (eg. Lord of the Rings) and a writer inserts a new chapter in the middle? You're not going to go back and read the whole thing again for that one missing chapter?

Hang on. So you bought the game and now you're not going to play it because the ending has already been determined?

When are you going to play it? As I said, I'd be interested to know if you're going to do a run through the base game and then into SoD. As well as what companions you had in the base game and how you found the transition. eg. Depending on what companions you have, they disappear into thin air after the first dungeon in SoD. For instance, my party had Kagain, Khalid, Jaheira, Tiax, and Edwin. I was a dual classed Fighter/Mage. After the first dungeon, Kagain disappears in a puff of smoke never to return again. Khalid and Jaheira and Edwin also disappear in a puff off smoke and go off somewhere North. Tiax also disappears but later found him in jail at the Flaming Fist headquarters. Tiax is not recruitable. So here I am at the beginning and all my party members have vanished except for Tiax who isn't recruitable anymore. Out of the 25 original NPCs, only 12 make an appearance and seven are recruitable.