PrimeJunta

Questions, especially to Stun and Sensuki. (And yes, this is relevant to P:E, bear with me.) I'm noticing that a lot of my preconceptions about how you're "supposed" to play this type of game are interefering with the way I'm playing it (which I'm trying to shake, more on that below). I also notice that it appears that both of you have a somewhat different approach to playing it. For example, the umber hulks in the Keep. This time I didn't have Cloudkill available, and the fight was a lot tougher. I tried to "man fight" it, as per Sensuki, and it did not work. Even when buffed to the hilt, Korgan didn't survive a massed umber hulk assault for long, certainly not when I sent him into the room, and not even at the door, and they move so fast I'm just not able to keep up with the AI to manipulate it, other than to the extent of having my Chaotic Command-protected Korgan absorb the Confusion attacks. I eventually won it with a fairly intricate combination of Web + Ice Storm + fireballs + Korgan mopping up the survivors. And a fair bit of reloading. But that was OK, going into this with a three-toon party I'm expecting some things to be a bit harder. Now: Sensuki's general strategy appears to be based on having figured out how the AI does targeting, and manipulating that. Stun, on the other hand, appears to have an encyclopedic knowledge of everything in the game, and is able to find the optimal mechanical solution to any situation with whatever's available. ("Just polymorph into a mustard jelly. WOW!") I.e., Sensuki's approaching this more like an RTS, and Stun is approaching this more like a set of problems with a set of tools to solve them. (Incidentally, Stun's approach is more to my liking.) Am I at all on track here? And Stun: did you learn all this yourself from the game, or did you use resources that didn't come with it (a little/sometimes/a lot/yeah baby!) Then: I notice that there are efficient things I don't want to do because, for some reason, I don't think a game "should" be played that way. These things include: "Easy" strategies, unless I discover them myself, while playing the game. Web + Cloudkill on the umber hulks was fun because I figured it out myself (and used an expendable). I didn't know Cloudkill yet, and I didn't go buy the scroll because "my character wouldn't know about this." I did the same thing with the beholder quest: I knew -- metagame -- that I'd be facing beholders, and I knew -- also metagame, probably derived from reading it somewhere ages ago -- that Glitterdust would be extremely useful against them, but when going into the sewers "my characters wouldn't know that" so I didn't pop by Adventurers' Mart to buy it. Instead I set myself up for a highly frustrating tiptoe crawl involving summons out the wazoo which I did not enjoy. Use of metagame knowledge, like which quests I should take in which order because of the challenge level or some particularly cool item/character/whatever I should get early on. Clearly for many of you, discovering this in multiple playthroughs is a big part of the appeal. I think to really appreciate BG2, I'd have to shake this preconception as well. This is why I enjoy roguelikes: there's the same process of learning the game, but the particular content is different every time. Exploiting the AI -- Sensuki's favorite strategy, basically. For some reason I feel I should pretend to myself that there's an actual intelligence behind there, and thinking "if I do X, then I know the AI will switch targets like so, and I'll win" feels like I'm exploiting the system rather than playing it "fairly," whatever that means. I.e., Stun's approach of using the right tool for the job is much more appealing to me. (Mah immershun!) Believing what the characters in the game tell me. For example, if someone says something is urgent and "won't wait too long," I tend to take that at face value. This was one of the things that ruined things for me in the first attempt. I think I get the famous ludo-narrative dissonance (got to use the term in context!) when I agree to do something urgently and then ignore it. (I'm like this IRL too by the way. If I promise to do something by some time, I do my level best to get it done. I'd rather not promise.) Going through the same content again, unless there's some materially different way to do it. I didn't enjoy de'Arnise keep all that much this time; I knew what to expect and what to do, and just did it. The umber hulks gave me pause because no Cloudkill, but that's about it. So, another question: you who have played this game through multiple times -- say, more times than there is gated content in it, like the class strongholds -- what keeps you at it? How do you keep it feeling fresh? And finally, the relevance to P:E. (1) Other than adding lots more gated content, is there a way to make the game less punishing for a first-time run (or even a run 10+ years after the first run) while maintaining a similar level of replayability? If so, what would these be? (2) How should metagame knowledge be taken into account when designing a game like P:E? For example, in a game where you get to pick the order in which you do things, if you place a powerful artifact somewhere, players who know it's there will beeline for it. When is this good or bad? (I just beelined for Frost Reaver +3 and I don't think it'll make the game less fun. OTOH beelining for the Enclave in Fallout 2 will kind of make the whole game derp since the Enclave Power Armor is effectively godmode). (3) How important is mechanical and narrative consistency? If a character tells you something is urgent, for example, should the game enforce it? Always? Sometimes? Not at all? Should you know how urgent? What should the consequences be?

Ahhh... good. I'm not 100% hip on what the stats of each summoned creature is. Is this information (e.g. about an aerial servant's fists) available in the game somewhere? How about elementals? I read the spell descriptions and there was nothing there. I've used Lower Resistances but it hadn't occurred to me that it would work on golems. My mind equated 100% resistance with immunity. Subtle, but def. something that a smart player can figure out. -- Did de'Arnise Keep again. The maps were much easier to navigate with a party of three, but I still didn't care for them. The lowest floor in particular has you progressing from north to south, and if e.g. you're holding the Umber Hulks at a doorway, it gets very tricky to click on them because the door is in the way. I wonder if it was developed early? The Umar Hills maps were much more polished, as was the tomb map for Kograk's axe. It'll also be interesting to see if the level of polish in the P:E BB maps is characteristic of the full game, or if there will be similar differences in quality there.

Interim report. I busted Xzars buddy out of the Harper hall, only it wasn't him at all! **** move, Harpers. **** move! In other words, cool twist. As quests go, this one was good. Then one thing sort of led to another, and now I'm running my own thieves' guild. Left a trail of corpses in my wake, including that one traitor. His fault for not wanting to talk to Renal Bloodscalp. In other words, yeah, this is fun again. I hope the thieves' guild timed stuff won't mess too much with plain ol' adventuring; I kinda like the idea of checking in every 5-10 days, as it also serves to "organically" limit resting. And I know what the schedule is. I gave some orders more or less at random; hope the place is still standing when I get back from wherever. It'll also be interesting to see what tips, if any, P:E's stronghold mechanics take from that. The whole lieutenant-and-assigning-orders thing is clearly similar to the stronghold in NWN2, which was IMO one of the better parts of the game. The wizard fight in that quest had me trekking back to a shop by the way. I had no +2 weapons, and those stone golems needed dismantling. It was OK though; there was an affordable +2 mace which Korgan used to clobber it, and now Viconia has it (shame she's not much good at hitting anything with it). Anyway: the Xzar/Montaron questline and the Thieves' Guild questline were both highly enjoyable... when played from a Neutral Evil mage/thief point of view that is. Also, still leveling up like blue blazes. Am liking this three-toon strike team much better than the previous full party. Banter is much less annoying too. I think that's enough BG2 for today though. I will definitely continue this later. Maybe use mah metagame knowledge and go do that de'Arnise Keep again -- there's a sweet axe there for Korgan whose +1 battleaxe is really not cutting it. -- So yeah, I can see why you guys thought this was a good questline. It is. I stand by my original criticism though, that it should have featured more reactivity for those drawn into it willy-nilly. There were obvious evil or at least selfish dialog options in the poisoned-dude quest, so it should not have been hard to add them converse there. So, here's another thing I dig, and I hope P:E will be able to feature: I took off in a completely different direction, am having a completely different experience, and it's working out great. That's a good kind of content density. As I've said, my beef with Athkatla isn't what's in it; it's how it's presented/flung at you. @Stun: Thank you. I'll pay more attention to items especially. I have been using consumables a lot more this time around, as there really are a lot, and they're only taking up inventory space anyway. Having to overcome a certain amount of hoarding instinct, but that's all good. Re golems, I'm curious -- besides +2 or better weapons, how do you kill a stone golem? I had no problem with the ones I met since I could just go out and buy one, but I'm curious.

... But hey: let's reflect on P:E. Here's another thing that's different between BG2 and P:E -- alignment. We've been talking a quite a bit about how (not) to play a paladin, or a Lawful Good character in general. Now we're talking about Neutral Evil. P:E doesn't have alignment, only reputation and disposition, and the various paladin orders have their ethoi you're supposed to follow. It seems these are being tracked, since there are some talents which let you work around them if you do the "wrong" things. I've always felt ambivalent about alignment in DnD and am in fact not sorry to see it gone in P:E. On the one hand it's constraining and pushes especially less experienced RPG'ers into caricatured Chaotic Evil mwahahaha stereotypes. On the other hand, I really dig the Planes, and the Planes would not work if they weren't aligned to the ethoi. Alignment gives us the Blood War, spells like Protection from Evil, Holy Smite, Unholy Blight, the good DnD3 priests' spontaneous spell conversion, Turn/Rebuke Undead and so on. It's quite crucial to many mechanics, and greately enriches the multiverse. So, thoughts. No alignment. Gain or loss?

There was a quite a bit in the other thread (not that it went down very well in certain quarters). I don't want to force it, but I'm fairly certain I'll have things to say about it as I go along. Of course if you feel C&C is better for this, by all means move it (and change the thread title).

I've always figured there are two kinds of aligned people: those who are actually ethically committed to their alignment, and those who just are what they are. The paladin is the extreme example of ethically committed. The NE you're describing here would be an ethically committed NE, i.e. a stark staring psychopath. I think a far more common variety of NE is just someone who's selfish, calculating, and constantly looking for an advantage. Not necessarily utterly devoid of empathy or emotion. For example, the poisoned guy offered "his gratitude and that of his friends," which is actually entirely appealing to this type of NE suddenly alone and adrift in a strange and obviously dangerous city -- and after all it's not like taking him somewhere is a huge inconvenience. I read a column a while back by a thrusting business type on how to get ahead. He said "Always buy everybody lunches. They cost practically nothing and people will feel they're in debt to you." That is an extremely Neutral Evil sentiment from where I'm at.

@Malekith Yup, that would be entirely satisfactory. I never demanded that my plan should work, I just hoped the attempt would be acknowledged. That's what quest design is all about.

OK, first interim report. One, I'm having fun again. Two, the evil options have so far been very well catered to. I got the poisoned man quest again, and took him back, asked for a reward for the "good deed." Got a few pennies, but then when that Xzar guy approached me, it's fairly clear there's an evil path to follow here. Me gusta. However, I was on Korgan's quest, and with my paranoia about timers I was totes beelining it. It was a good quest. There was one seriously good fight in the tomb, which took me a couple of tries to win but was challenging in a good way. This time my spell prep was right out of the box; going into a tomb, I had memorized Negative Plane Protections, summons, various direct damage, a Haste, and a Lesser Restoration, and it was exactly what was needed. I also liked that map a lot -- not too constrained and visually very very cool. I'm liking the gameplay with my mage/thief a lot better too. Sneaking and backstabbing is fun rather than teeth-grating, and I'm feeling my three mean tomb raiders are at least as efficient at mummy-punching as my big emo party from the previous attempt. Korgan's writing is also less grating than any of the other party-member NPC's so far, even if the Scots thing is laid on a bit thick. I LOLed at some of the insults. I've also been simply not talking to people to avoid getting overencumbered with quests. I trust both Korgan and Viconia will now stick with me as long as I don't turn into a knight in shining armor. Taking a breather now before deciding what to do next. Someone on the street offered me a government job, would you believe it?

Give it a rest already. I was just unhappy that some of the quests were linear and offered no options other than violence or don't do it at all.

Despite a promising start, my first attempt at enjoying BG2 ended in abject failure as I was unable to play Iggy the Inquisitor the way I wanted to, which was also apparently wrong. The reasons for the failure I listed here. Not to be daunted, I started another attempt, this time tailoring my build to address at least some of the things that were annoying me, and determined to change some things about my play-style as well. I am going with Badiat the Bad Hmm-Hmm neutral evil elven mage/thief. She's good at stealth/scouting, which addresses my irritation with that mechanic ("click-and-wait-until-it-bites"). She's good at magic and has INT 18, which addresses my irritation with the spell-memorization mechanic. Also, I know from before that magic scales up very well in BG2. She's neutral evil, which means I won't be bellyaching about ethical choices or staying in character, and just do whatever. She's a she, which means I won't get the awkward and cringeworthy flirts from fellow party-members. Other things I'm resolved to change, or at least try out: Smaller party, to avoid the herding-cats feel of navigating constrained maps with bad pathfinding (and to level up faster, because multiclass) Different party members, to avoid the same quests. At this point, I'm out of Irenicus' dungeon, where I told Jaheira and Minsc to go fly a kite, and cleared it with Imoen. Didn't fight the cambion because magic resistance and lousy THAC0, but otherwise cleared all the content without much trouble. Rested for 14 days once though LOL. Recruited Korgan from the Copper Coronet, then spoiled myself about where to find Viconia, and recruited her. Korgan glugged one of my speed potions and murdered everyone who needed murdering, so that was easy. Going to attempt Korgan's quest next, with just me and him and Viconia, to stop him from running off on me. I've already leveled up a few times. Will stop by Waukeen's Promenade to pick up some spells, then head off to the tomb. And, Stun, Hiro, and others who think I suck -- I honestly am trying to enjoy this. I believe there's a great game underneat there somewhere and I'm trying hard to dig it out.

Okay, two votes: one for new thread, one for not. I vote new thread, so I'll make one. :sigh:

Anyway, forget Iggy the Paladin. I started over. Elven mage/thief, longsword+longbow (duh), neutral evil. Since I had to crawl through Irenicus's digs again, I decided to make it at least a little different, so I told Jaheira and Minsc to go boil an egg and did ith with Imoen only. Didn't fight the cambion because lousy THAC0 but cheerfully murdered everything else. Leveled up like blue blazes, and it's actually more enjoyable to play with just two toons since the pathfinding doesn't trip me up so much. It was not bad actually; let rip with spells at every occasion, then rested for 14 days to heal up. Lots of backstabbing also. I'm hoping this build addresses a few of the secondary issues detracting from my enjoyment: Stealth, because she actually can into sneaking. So far, much less irritating. A couple more thief levels and it'll be fine. Roleplaying aspects, because neutral evil can basically do whatever. So far the evil dialog options were not bad actually. Choice acknowledged there at least. Spell memorization, because INT 18 makes it much less annoying. I will also see how it feels with a three-member party: fighter and cleric in addition to me. I will probably spoil myself a bit to see where I can pick up Viconia since I remember what a prat Anomen is, and recruit Korgan Bloodaxe from the Coronet to take point. That ought to make the pathfinding less annoying and ought to let me level up nice and fast too, which is always good for a multiclass. Shall I continue the commentary here, or make another thread?

You guys are really good at rationalizing away the huge plot holes, area design inconsistencies, and quest omissions though. If you get to do that, then I get to say that my god ordered my paladin to go undercover and eliminate both groups of thieves. Neener neener.

I don't care when it's IWD, as it's clear from the start that it's a linear dungeon crawl. I do care in a quest-based game. If there's no choice and no acknowledgement of choice, I'm just a glorified errand-boy.

BG2 doesn't let you play a one-dimensional LG-bound freak. If that's how far your definition of Paladin class goes, it's probably a bad idea to roll a paladin in any game. But don't be so upset - it's a very common mistake. Many people think that playing a paladin is about casting Detect Evil before talking to anyone and, in general, smiting some "evil" at every corner. "Hey you! You, crossing the road in the wrong place! Feel my holy wrath!" If you read this thread, you'd find out that I attempted to have my paladin infiltrate the Shadow Thieves and Mae'varis's outfit in order to rat both out to the Cowled Wizards so they would take them down. The game did not let me, and several people on this thread objected loudly that a paladin couldn't do that to start with. One of them went as far as to say that accepting to work for Bloodscalp would have been an automatic fall from grace in PnP. I.e., it's not my idea of what a paladin can or can't do that you're arguing with.

Fuuuu... fine, I'll give it a shot. Despite it not being your thing, going with a mage/thief. Neutral Evil just to be a not-paladin and see if the game has more to offer on that side.

Looked at Assassin. How do you get around the lousy THAC0?

@Sensuki Thanks, those links worked. Any thoughts on mage/thief? One of my annoyances was scouting; Nalia was terrible at it and Yoshimo wasn't so good either. I'd like to have hide/move silently/find traps high enough for my scout that I don't need to do that click-wait-click-wait thing to successfully stealth. OTOH thieves aren't much fun in combat because of the THAC0. Don't want to dual-class, I hate hate hate the part when they're baggage.

@Sensuki Tried downloading the Gibberlings mods, but the Download button goes to the forums. What gives?

Thanks, but nope. I don't want tips on playing an Inquisitor, as I certainly won't roll another one. I'd just have to slog through the same content again. Also, since the game doesn't offer choices within quests, I'd rather play as a class/alignment who doesn't often (in-character) need to turn down quests. I also don't want content spoilers, so thanks but no thanks on the video. Suggestions that would be helpful: "Play as [insert class/alignment]." "Don't take quest Q until you're level L." "Check out area A in district D first." (You mentioned the Temple District.) "You can safely ignore the events E, F, G you experienced in Iggy's playthrough."

Soo, guys -- your turn. What did I do wrong? Collecting some of the suggestions: "You should have played to your paladin's role by not accepting quests unsuited for him." (Stun, archangel, Hiro Protagonist II) Fair point. My expectation though was that the game acknowledges my choice of class/alignment not only by having content suitable for him, but by offering suitable choices within the content it offers. It did not do that, and I consider that a fairly major flaw. Also, because of BG1, I'm paranoid about quest timers related to party members, which is why I felt extremely pressured to take Yoshimo's quest. Yoshimo being the sole party member who's only a little irritating. "You should have installed mods." (Sensuki) Fine, I'll do that if I start a new game. "You should have played the quests in a different order." (Sensuki) Fine, but how am I supposed to know which order I'm supposed to play them? ("By playing it repeatedly.") ("But I much prefer the feeling of discovering new things to playing through stuff repeatedly.") "You should have played more." (jones) If I'm hating it, why should I continue? "You're wrong, the game is awesome and if you're not having fun it's your fault." (Mr. Magniloquent, Hiro Protagonist II) Thank you, that was helpful. Any others? Honestly, guys -- I wanted to enjoy this, I thought I was going to enjoy this, and up until the beholder quest and subsequently being swamped by events and quests, I was enjoying it. About that "playing it repeatedly thing." One thing I do not particularly enjoy is tearing through the same content I already did again. Not unless there's a materially different way of tearing through it. I.e. I don't relish facing the same monsters again and fighting them in the same way again, not unless I find a materially different way of doing it. Now you know how I tried to play this. Your turn: how should I have tried to play this?

Nah. I've played enough to know that it's not up to my standards. Can you define your standard? And not in vague terms. But using specific examples from crpgs? I'm not trying to flame you, but I can't figure out what you would be comparing this too. I can list cRPG's I've thought have been worth playing for various reasons: PS:T, IWD, Fallout 1/2/NV, Arcanum, NWN: MotB, NWN: SoZ, Gothic 2, Morrowind, The Witcher/2, KOTOR/2, ToEE, Jade Empire, Shadowrun Returns: Dragonfall. I can also list cRPG's I've thought have been more frustrating, dull, or otherwise flawed than enjoyable: Oblivion, IWD2, DA:O, DA:I, ME1-2-3 (occasional moments of brilliance aside), FO3, Gothic 3. I can't define it any better than that. BG1 and 2 are both in the second bin. It may yet move into the first. I haven't ruled out another shot at it.

If it's BG/2 with better writing and my pet annoyances removed -- and so far it appears to be just that, more or less -- then I'll certainly love it.

By "filler combat" I mean stuff like facing mob after mob of goblins, then orcs, then barbarians etc., where each fight is won by repeating the same tactics as before. There is very little character customization in IWD as it uses the AD&D2 ruleset. No modal abilities.

Nah. I've played enough to know that it's not up to my standards.