Hiro Protagonist II

I'm already well over 100 hours and nearing the end of Arizona. Also, I'm glad I picked up Pizepi. She's a great replacement for Angela. She has more hit points and says some interesting stuff. Also, after distributing an attribute point and getting an extra AP (now 10), she can fire the pulse rifle (4 AP) and meson cannon (6 AP) in one turn.

I've been using the 'preview post' button more often now than ever before. It's a great feature and good to see how your posts come out. Especially when you're multi-quoting and breaking up quotes to answer specific points. I'd recommend take the extra 5-10 seconds to preview it before hitting the 'add reply' button. When you're finding mistakes and doing edits, just hit preview again and it updates your preview.

It's never been any different since the beta went live. The gorge map is a prime example of this. Nothing on the left or right sides of the map but you have to walk to one of these transition points. I'm wondering if it would be better to have these invisible locations become visible like with WL2. I'd like to know where these transition points are so I can run to them. But I'd like it to be like the IE games. For example, if I'm running away and out of sight of enemies, I'd like to be able to click on the side of the map and transition. Not for the game to tell me I need to now walk halfway down the side to transition. Also, I'd like to be able to split my party and be able to keep some party members outside of houses while the rest of my party is inside. You can do this with WL2. In fact, you can have party members in different areas with WL2 such as the cave under the Prison and the first lot of Red Scorpions you meet outside at the start of the prison map. I think the WL2 dev's made the cave as a 'house' which is why you can have party members in it while having other party members outside, even though you could have come through the cave first which is what I do.

This sort of comment makes me think you haven't played the beta. No, you can't transition anywhere on the side of the map to another map. It's not like the IE games where you can click on any part of the map edge to go to another map. There are only certain points you can transition and your party has to walk up to one of those points. Similar to WL2. While it works for WL2 because there's usually only one entrance/exit, it feels out of place with PoE. It doesn't make sense that I have to walk alongside the edge of the map, up to the transition point. There's no cliffs or anything along the edge of the map. It should be like the IE games and I click on the side of the map to transition to another map, unless there's something blocking my way like a cliff, water, etc.

I agree. I can't get enough of this game. I'm already planning a couple of parties in my head after I finish my current play through and I'm only nearing the end of Arizona. I'll be playing this for a very long time.

It's what I'm finding too, although I did build my party around the NPCs that I'd pick up so I knew I was going to have a powergaming party. But what surprised me is when I picked up Pizepi I didn't know she was going to be level 16 when I was still level 11. And giving her the Meson Cannon from Ranger Citadel put her on the same level as Angela with firepower and similar hit points, although she can only shoot once a turn with it which isn't too OP. It seems she's more for the end part of AZ to pick up as a party member. But when you have two OP characters, it's now quite easy. I'm going to give her a less powerful weapon that she can shoot twice a turn but still be okay in combat. I'll keep the Meson Cannon as her secondary weapon if I need it. The disadvantage with Pizepi in the beginning is she can go rogue and lose control more than Rose and it's hilarious when she runs in and blasts someone with the cannon, especially when it crits. Instant death. I've pumped up Leadership on my high CHA character (Rick) so it's very rare now. And Rose never goes rogue anymore. Most battles now I don't have my Higgins character engage in combat which is one of the reasons why he still has the two dogs. He's the medic who stays behind and then comes in and heals everyone. He now has the +1 INT Rat with him. Love the NIMH reference.

What NPC's do you have in your party Keyrock? I'm finding Pizepi with the Meson Cannon is ripping through everything. Rose is pretty good with hand guns and already has 2 points in handguns when you pick her up. You just need to give her a handgun and swap out her normal gun Rose' Thorn (which is like a shotgun). In the end I gave Rose the assault rifles skill due to the high amount of skill points she receives on level up. I still have about 40 skill points to allocate with Rose. I'll be picking up Brother Thomas when I get to L.A. which will round out my party.

Again.. A Gross over exaggeration of those games.. "Grind XP" never entered peoples vocabulary until MMO's became popular. You never had to grind anything in any IE game unless you wanted to.. which IMO was stupid/pointless.Mmmm i remember in secret of mana grinding away to level up my fire spells and levels before the first main boss and basically every new area whenever i gain new caps on my abilities. Ff3 i remember grinding up my characters to learn new magic and become higher levels. Same with FF7. I remember grinding alot in dragon warrior games, basically spending a whole afternoon grinding slimes to get enough cash for all the gear the first town had and to be able to successfully survive wandering trying to find next town. I remember grinding in legends of lagoon because of just simply following the quest line strictly meant that u were under level and undergeared for the boss fights. I remember grinding in earthbound for new weapons and being able to survive because i felt i needed higher level spells and abilities to survive. In dragon age and mass effect, I remember going and finding every enemy so i could be at the topest level as i was doing the main quests. Ahhh i could go on and on about the many games ive played thru the years and will say ive known about grinding wayyyyy before wow even came out lmao. And i havent even touched isometric games yet until the past few years. Yeah and a lot of us have played games in the past as well. And I've never heard of the term 'grinding' before MMOs. However, I have heard other terms like farming. You know like farming resources in rts games to make your side more powerful. Exploring other parts of the map to farm resources before the enemy does. Depends on how you view it. I don't ever recall 'grinding' and it never felt like a grind in those early games. However, in MMO's which I don't play anymore, it did feel like a grind.

I've noticed during my play through with trying to get Pizepi Joren asap that the game is easier with her with going back and finishing off quests.

There's five to choose from. In the end I went with 'Before the Fall'.

It was a signed print I pledged for. Colin McComb and Kevin Saunders from the dev team did the same by pledging for a signed print as well. Looks like I'll have something to frame and put on the wall in my home office/games room. It's great to see inXile extend the date and it appears on track to reaching it. Great decision by inXile and it appears they really want it in as much as the backers.

I know WL2 seems to be brought up a lot with clearing land mines but does it really unbalance the game for that one character if you do/don't clear them? Only one of your characters benefits from clearing mines and I haven't seen any unbalancing issues, even if you do/don't clear every mine in the game which I think would be tedious. I've found your character is neither OP or gimped in either case. The argument of unlocking something without using a key to get xp depends on how it's implemented. In WL2, you can do the same if you have a high enough skill. Did you do that in WL2 with unlocking things even though you had the key? I did check the percentage and always went with the key. And with Torment, I noticed Kevin Saunders and Colin McComb pledged for a signed print so I did as well. I'm not too concerned about the xp system in Torment. It sounds like it's very light on combat and it's mostly about storytelling.

http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/61543-are-you-for-or-against-gaining-experience-points-only-for-completing-objectives/?p=1242415 I was really hoping someone else would post a link. There are other things, but this is from over two years ago. Note that the salient point regards gaming the system, which I would take to include lock/trap XP. I'm sure someone could make the disingenuous (well... let's just call it intellectually dishonest since that's what it really is) argument that he's only talking about kill XP. The fact is, "[g]ameplay degeneration occurs when a player engages in gameplay not because they enjoy that gameplay but because the game's mechanics put the player at a disadvantage for not taking advantage of it[.]" clearly describes a system where you go out of your way to disarm traps because the system incentivizes you to do so even in situations where you would benefit from leaving the trap in place. It clearly describes a system where you are better off *not* finding a key before you find the locked chest because you actually get an additional award for picking the lock. lol They should just put in an option for every chest and door saying, "would you like to pick the lock for experience or just use the key that you found on the body of a tough enemy who yielded you no XP when you killed him?" Kill XP is bad because opportunities to kill will be ubiquitous. ...But I actually have more sympathy for kill XP. Sure, even with mine fields galore, it's doubtful that traps/locks XP will be unbalancing, so I guess the advocates have a point. On the other hand, if the argument is that it won't yield too terribly much XP, why worry if you don't get it? If it's significant enough for advocates to evoke strong feelings, then it is potentially unbalancing. ...And my gut instinct is that there are fewer people clamoring for lock/trap XP than kill, so why cater to that crowd rather than the kill XP crowd? Because the XP probably won't be significant enough to worry about, so, while it makes even less sense than kill XP, it creates less of a nuisance for the design team, so just give it as a way to shut up a minority so small it isn't even causing much of a ruckus anyhow. All of this leads me personally to believe that the design team itself has internal debates regarding the issue. I think they're trying to ignore the elephant in the room that is kill xp by rewarding players with other types of xp regardless if that other type is degenerative or not. There's obviously 'something' missing if the dev's are introducing other forms of xp and their original design with quest only xp hasn't achieved the desired results. The whole design right from the start has shown with trying to eliminate degenerative gameplay, the game still has degenerative gameplay including introducing new unintended types that were never in the IE games. This is not something new I'm bringing up and has been brought up before.

Hopefully, someone can post this philosophy and see how lock/trap xp goes against it. I'm genuinely curious about this.

The PoE XP philosophy? What would that be? I didn't know there was one.

WL2 is a fun game. The combat is tactical and often sitting on the edge of my seat. I love the randomness, the crits, the misses, the gun jams (although I haven't had any for a while due to upgrades), and the overall unpredictability of it. There's no everything hits or grazes. It's randomness like the old games I enjoyed. And it's great to see that come back. I love the setting and the pop culture references. Some of the 'junk' items I've kept is just plain fun and great to see in a game. The humour and writing is great. Good to see some politically incorrect writing and jokes. While it might have some flaws and what game doesn't have flaws, they're easily forgotten when I realise it's 2am in the morning and I need to get some sleep. I actually like the things that I see some people complain about. The Camera? It's great that I can have a top down view and look at where everyone is, and then I can rotate around and see different views of the combat and zoom in and see it at a different angle. It's pretty easy to navigate the camera. The graphics? I think it looks good for the setting. Trees not moving? lol wut? I do see trees moving. I even see grass moving in the AG centre when I went back to the shrine. I also enjoy the dialogue and have three characters who have pumped the 3 ass skills so I'm selecting different dialogue options which is also great. And this can have an effect on outcomes with quests if you choose some of those dialogue options but you don't need to pump these skills because not having them isn't critical. I also like that a character with the Smart Ass skill who uses it in dialogue is rewarded for being a Smart Ass with xp and no other character in my party. It's an individual reward and my Smart Ass is becoming a better smart ass. I like the individual reward system of having my animal whisperer be rewarded for using their skill and no one else. My demolitions expert is being rewarded with xp for disarming explosives and no one else. And so on. I like the individual reward system, as well as the combat and quest system. There's a great meld there and it works. Overall, for me it's a fun game and I'm enjoying it immensely. I can see myself playing this a lot and coming back to it years later.

So what's people's strategies that make a hard fight easier? I'm finding I immediately go to any cover I can find not for the evasion but for the 10% extra to hit. And I'm finding that extra 10% is great. I also use the ambush quite a bit as well. If I'm not happy with the percentage to hit, I'll just hit ambush on some characters and wait for the enemy to walk into a barrage of bullets. I posted a screen shot earlier in the thread (shown below) where I massacred everything before they even got to me. And you'll notice I'm around the cars except for one guy. They just tore through everything and if I do find myself with enemies right on top of me, I usually go ring a round-a-rosey around the cover or along a wall but still stick on it for the extra % to hit.

You remember the other day how I was saying that the lower camera angle isn't good for combat? Well that's why. It's even worse when tall creatures (such as Forest Lurkers) are in front of player characters, you can't even see your own units. I know mechanics are more important than graphics, especially at this stage, but that screenshot is a bit of an eye opener. I hope work will be done to clean up the display of the player models (and enemy models) so they are distinct and clear in any environment. Been brought up many times in feedback. I prefer a more top down look from the IE games where you can see enemies and your characters better. The IE games had a more RTS angle to see all the characters from each other on the screen. The PoE angle is a lot lower and hides characters behind others and it's even worse with multiple enemies and aoe spell effects. No exaggeration. Your characters can disappear altogether (behind bigger enemies as Sensuki pointed out) and with some aoe effects you have no idea where they are, who they're targeting or if they're in engagement with more than one enemy.

The old Lephys, I never said, you said, she said, he said, whoever said, never said, talking in circles word play. Good to see you're true to form. So you agree that you don't know you'll encounter lions later in the game. Therefore, will you kill those lions now to get the xp reward? And if you do encounter the same type of lion in the game and it can be avoided, will you avoid it? And I haven't inadvertently pre-emptively responded. So you're arguing for the sake of arguing? Okay. It is more compelling because as I said, you have no idea if you are going to meet that exact same type of enemy again. As I said, it's not a case of encountering a lion again. It's encountering that same type of lion again. And the only type of game I've come across that's similar is Diablo 3 and achievements. Kill X amount of something and unlock an achievement. Bestiary xp is the same thing but with an xp reward and bestiary page for your cyclopaedia. Kill 10 crystal spiders, get an xp reward and bestiary page. No need to kill anymore in the game if you can avoid them. Unless you want trash loot or crafting materials but comes down to is it worth it? Maybe not. Especially later in the game when it's trash loot, you have enough money and better equipment and the crafting material is something you may not be using. Kill 10 crystal spiders. XP Reward. Bestiary Page in cyclopaedia. Achievement unlocked! No, you're missing the point as always. How do you know there's enough XP in the game to reach the level cap without completing every objective and quest in the game, or every bestiary page or picking/disarming every lock/trap? You don't. If anything how do you know that loot from quests drops a unique item, how do you know that won't be useful, and/or you won't need that some other time? You don't. And you're simply trusting the design of the game makes friggin' sense, and that some of the things in the game are going to be optional, because the developers told you that when they advertised their game design. So, I'm not arguing that there's no reason to desire to "play it safe" and complete all optional quests up-front to make sure you go ahead and get that XP reward. I'm just saying, unknowns are there and are promoting erring-on-the-side-of-caution, any form of XP or no. Hell, even without XP... You don't know anything concrete, without meta-knowledge. See what I did there? You're argument makes no sense. LOL. 'Some people' is your answer with the WL2 question. Funny how you didn't mention you did/didn't do it. Sounds like you avoid the encounters too. Ahh, the truth comes out. So in a combat centric, xp kill game like Wasteland 2, you avoid or try to avoid those random spawning encounters which to the best of my knowledge only happen on the World map. LMAO. So there's no concern over grinding xp from random encounters in WL2. Yeah, you're arguing it can be done. Well a lot of things 'can be done', doesn't mean that it is done. Sounds like you're arguing just to argue. And you are arguing and using conjecture. Infinite xp? infinite things. Oh god. Also, I'm not acting like it doesn't exist. Where did I say bestiary xp doesn't exist? Can you move the goal posts any further? And I prefer to go off real life stuff like the beta and other games like WL2, to get a sense of how games work, not things like 'infinite xp' and 'infinite things' which you're doing. Finally, we get to see you list why Bestiary xp is bad in your opinion. So you agree that going off and killing something that's not even in your way encourages a certain play style. eg. kill spree to get that bestiary page and xp reward. Seems more compelling that bestiary xp encourages kill sprees and going out of your way to get it. To go off the beaten track and get those kills. Something a lot of people have argued wasn't a huge problem with the IE games.

I never said you could avoid lions always in the whole game. Also, how do you know if you can avoid all lions in the whole game? How do you know if we'll see lions later in the game? You don't unless you have meta-knowledge. So you using conjecture doesn't disprove my point. If you encounter lions in the game for the first time, will you kill them to get the bestiary page and xp reward now or will you avoid half of them and get the bestiary page and xp reward later because you think you'll see more lions later in the game? I know what I will do. I'll get that xp reward now because I have no idea if I will see lions again and due to xp being sparse in the game. It is more compelling to grind that xp as I stated above. And it's more compelling than any other system. For the simple fact that players may feel compelled to grind and go on kill sprees because they have no idea if they will encounter that SAME enemy again. It's not a case of meeting 'lions' or 'beetles' or 'spiders'. It's a case of lion, elder lion, wood beetle, stone beetle, spider, crystal spider, and many other types of those critters. It's not a case of will I see a 'lion' but a particular type of lion or other critter later in the game. Also, in a regular per-kill-xp system, it doesn't matter how many enemies there are later in the game. I never once thought to myself in the IE games or WL2 or any other game. Gee, I wonder how many more enemies there will be? I know, I better go on a kill spree now because there won't be any left later in the game! However in PoE, I would be wondering how many type of a particular critter there would be later in the game. Am I going to see another elder lion near the end of the game? I have no idea, so I'll kill them now and get the xp reward. Obviously someone who's never played WL2. Random encounters on the world map to farm kill xp in WL2? Why would you want to do that? And who does that? More conjecture. And yeah, lets hear your points on why Bestiary xp is bad and no good points please. It'd be good to see you go to town on criticising PoE and its bestiary xp.

Yes quite. Because, A) Dyrford crossing and the Gorge map are examples where there are trash mobs you either i) don't have to kill or ii) don't need to kill a lot of. There's no reason to kill the wolves, wyrms or shambling mounds at all. They are totally avoidable. You can also avoid most of the spiders in the ogre cave and only have to kill two to get to the Ogre. There's also no reason to kill so many lions as you can stay near the bottom of the Gorge map and avoid most of them. B) I've already brought this point up before in another thread. At the start of the game, players may feel compelled to go on kill sprees to get bestiary pages because of wanting to level up early in the game. A level 1 mage is going to be just plain bad compared to a level 10 mage, so you will want to kill as much in the early game to get those bestiary pages and xp rewards, to kill all those beetles and level up than killing beetles later in the game when that same xp reward is going to have a lesser value. A beetle bestiary page is worth more for a level 1 character than a level 10 character. So regardless if there's more of that same type of enemy later in the game, if I can get that reward earlier, then I'll try and get that reward earlier for my low level party. And this leads to more inherently grinding, to go on kill sprees early because xp rewards are more sparse than other games. And you have no idea if you will encounter those same enemies anywhere else in the game unless you have meta-knowledge. eg. I've just come across a map with lions and will I see more lions later in the game? I have no idea so I'll just kill all these lions and get the bestiary page and xp reward. And you're saying that's not going out of your way to get an xp reward? That's not grinding for the sake of grinding? Sounds like grinding to me. And if you do come across a map later in the game where you do come across lions but are avoidable, then I'll avoid them because I've already been rewarded with xp in an earlier map. It's encourages grinding and kill sprees if you haven't received that bestiary page because you have no idea if you're going to encounter that same enemy again. This also leads into how do you balance the game? Do you balance it for the kill spree player who receives all the bestiary pages early in the game and make it hard for those players who don't go on kill sprees? Or do you balance it for the player who doesn't go on kill sprees and receives those bestiary pages earlier which in turn makes it easier for the kill spree player as they are at a higher level now? Even if you take the middle of the road, the kill spree player will have an advantage over the non-kill spree player who has less bestiary pages. WL2 does a good job with individual, combat and quest xp rewards. You can have one character get xp rewards for the medic skill and only that character. Similar with another character getting xp rewards for mechanical repair and only that character. And another character with dialogue choice with getting rewarded for using one of the Kiss/Hard/Smart Ass skills and only that character. Also, WL2 has kill xp and there is no need for 'grinding' even though it's a combat centric game. In fact, I avoid quite a few fights even though I can see critters off in the distance. I never feel compelled to go after every single enemy to get all that xp even though I could, even though I have a tonne of ammo and med packs.

No it's not. You have to kill a certain amount of a specific critter, say 5 wood beetles and you get a 'completed' bestiary page in your cyclopaedia. Once that bestiary page is completed by killing the amount required (say 5 wood beetles), you only get a one off xp reward, regardless of what level you are. And then you get no xp rewards after that for that type of beetle. And so on for other critters like a spider, troll, goblin, wyrm, etc. It's a one off xp reward for killing a certain amount and completing a bestiary page in your cyclopaedia. You don't get any xp rewards until you kill a certain amount. That to me sounds more like grinding. I'm grinding through these enemies to get that bestiary page and one off xp reward.

Have you updated your drivers?

Starting tomorrow, last half of Oct, Nov, Dec 2014. Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr 2015. Approximately Six months. I doubt it will be Jan or Feb. I'm thinking more end of March or April at the earliest. Also have to consider the Christmas holiday season when most of the Obsidian staff are off. So yes, I'm expecting another 6 months.

We must be playing a different game because I'm seeing trees sway side to side in WL2.