[Pillars III Speculation Thread]

Personally I think they could easily do a prequel, there is literally thousands of years of "stuff" that happened between Engwithan collapse, and the Saint's War.  Yes we know how it turned out sort of, but there are plenty of story options in between.  Could be a game about the fall of Old Vailia, the rise of Aedyr, defeating a skaenite rebellion we just don't know happened cause it wasn't relevant to Eternity 1-2.  If they do a prequel, it certainly should not be about the Saint's War.

 

Anyway just for my own silliness, this is what I think would be possible for all existing companions sidekicks in a sequel -

 

TLDR Version: Aloth, Hiravias (eh sorta), Zahua (maybe), Maneha, Serafen, Fessina, Mirke, Rekke, and Ydwin could all be easy to bring back as companions in a sequel.  I would really like to see Rekke and Ydwin as full companions actually.  If you want my detailed verbal diarrhea version of why I think this keep reading.

 

 

 

• Aloth: Yeah he could show up again, mostly because he is a busy body with nothing really tying him down in any way.  His story also gives him an excuse to travel all over regardless of how it pans out.
• Eder: Nope.  I feel like after Deadfire it really makes no sense for him to appear again.  He has the events of Deadfire to cope with, he might be a mayor somewhere, yada yada yada.  He doesn't have a lot of good reasons to continue as an adventurer.
• Kana Rua: Unlikely, too busy dealing with his Ruatai nonsense now, no reason for him to run off at a glance.  I could see it happening depending on the plot of a sequel and Ruatai's involvement in said plot.
• Durance: No.  Not only because of the Avellone stuff (ps, good riddance), but because he is basically insane, probably living in a ditch, and would be likely to try to kill you as an "agent of the gods".
• Sagani: Big fat nope, she is back in Nasitaaq by now living the good life with the fam/village... or an outcast just doing what she can to get by depending.  Either way, no reason to be out adventuring anymore.
• Pallegina: Highly unlikely, not only because of Sawyer wanting to refocus, but because of the multitude of ways Deadfire could have ended.  Additionally with her dedication to Valia, unless they have a strong reason for being highly involved in the next plot there would be no reason for her to be there anyway.  She has always been self motivated and an ally of convenience, your goals just happened to align.
• Hiravias: Please Gaun no.  Seriously there is no real justification, his reasons for joining in the first place were always very uh... weak.  He is just a self interested guy doing his own thing, very little reason to team up with anyone.  I could see it happening if Obsidian wanted, it just wouldn't be that interesting in my opinion.
• Grieving Mother: AKA Grieving lack of Personality, no, she has zero motivation to be adventuring regardless of how things turned out.  I can't imagine any story blurb that could cause her to show up again.
• Devil of Caroc: As much as I would like to say it is possible, no, her endings in Eternity pretty much remove any chance of her ever showing up again even if she is alive.
• Zahua: Probably not, he is too busy doing whatever it is he decided to do.  Now depending on location of the next game it is possible he could be there, and if he does try to "pass on" his skills you might get to recruit say a student of his.  I could see that working.
• Maneha: Heck she was actually in Deadfire, I think she didn't offer to join simply because she was too busy having fun.  I could see her as a party member again, but only if the story had a reason for her getting interested in events.  Nothing really tying her down, and unlike some others, she is not a lone wolf type.
• Maia Rua: Same as her brother, just not likely unless Ruatai is highly involved in the next game.
• Serafen: He could make another appearance.  He isn't really tied down, nothing says a Principi pirate can't travel outside Deadfire, and it wouldn't be that hard writing him into just about anything.  Biggest thing is he's kind of a free wheeling do gooder, despite being a pirate, and like Maneha isn't a lone wolf and values teammates.
• Tekehu: No way.  He is too tied down with responsibility in Deadfire regardless of how the game ends.  He is never really going to leave the Huana.
• Xoti: Also really unlikely.  She is too busy with her duty, and doesn't have any strong reason to leave the Dawnstars regardless of how stuff plays out.
• Fassina: Yeah I could see it, she doesn't like being tied down, and could easily be written into any number of locations for all sorts of reasons.  Her boss is a major busy body and even though she "left his employ" I could easily see the council calling on her for odd jobs.
• Konstanten: No reason to bring him back, sorry Dwarf lovers.  No one has ever had less of a reason for adventuring in the first place, and there is just nothing happening with his character to justify it.
• Mirke: Hilariously enough, just like Serafen, nothing stops her from going wherever or doing whatever.  So yeah, you could easily write her into just about any situation, just throw some money and booze at her and she will be motivated for any insanity.  Not sure they will want to write her back in, but it could easily be done.
• Rekke: He could definitely return in a later games, he has no reason to return to his homeland, no loyalties keeping him in place, and he is definitely the adventuring type.
• Vatnir: Well gotta play the DLC to have a better idea, but something tells me it will be unlikely for him to show up in future games.  At a glance he seems very situational.
• Ydwin: Absolutely could return, she has tons of reasons to move around, do different research, and as a character her back story is very tied in with many overall plot/society issues of Eternity 1 and 2.  It was honestly a mistake in my opinion not making her a full companion to begin with.

 

 

 

I actually think Eder is the only one of those that is a 100% lock on reappearing.

 

 

 

Doesn't his ending basically say he chooses to stick with the watcher regardless of the outcome?

 

 

[POLL - Where would you like to travel if PoE saga continues]

Yezuha personally, but with the Living Lands as a second choice.

[Why wasn't the game released as an early access?]

 

 

A story focused game like Deadfire wouldn't translate well into early access, in my opinion.

 

And seriously, this game wasn't/isn't more bug infested than any other equivalent game in the same genre.

 

Personally, I wasn't too worried about the bugs. I didn't have anything game breaking, though I did have a couple of quest breaking bugs on my first runthrough. It's more the complete lack of difficulty of Veteran/PotD, which they've acknowledged was because they ran out of time. It seems like they could have avoided a large number of negative Steam reviews (which presumably actually do matter to sales) if they've pushed it back a month.

 

Well, you can't have early access for the sake of adjusting combat difficulty, without also spoiling the story.

 

And they did the beta, and apparently that didn't benefit the combat part of the game.

 

Probably made it considerably less buggy than it otherwise would have been though!

[Why wasn't the game released as an early access?]

A story focused game like Deadfire wouldn't translate well into early access, in my opinion.

 

And seriously, this game wasn't/isn't more bug infested than any other equivalent game in the same genre.

 

Personally, I wasn't too worried about the bugs. I didn't have anything game breaking, though I did have a couple of quest breaking bugs on my first runthrough. It's more the complete lack of difficulty of Veteran/PotD, which they've acknowledged was because they ran out of time. It seems like they could have avoided a large number of negative Steam reviews (which presumably actually do matter to sales) if they've pushed it back a month.

[Why wasn't the game released as an early access?]

Too bad. Even if they improve the game in months to come, and Deadfire will become a gem it has potential to be, luke-warm reviews and initial reception will stay. 

 

Yeah. I'm a bit puzzled by the choice to be honest. They knew it wasn't done. Hell, they even admitted it wasn't done before the game was released. Surely they would have been better served by another 2-3 month delay?

 

Perhaps they literally ran out of money and had to get it out, but it does feel like they shot themselves in the foot by not delaying it.

[What do you want to see in the franchise]

- A divine campaign

- More Vithrak stuff -- a Vithrak companion?

- Visit Rekke's homeland

[Why wasn't the game released as an early access?]

The answer is simple: Money, dear boy.

[Boarding enemy ships with 0 crew remaining in patch 1.10]

Doesn't the tooltip for defenders explicitly say "you can't reduce this number"?

 

Yep. There's the crew and then a set number of unkillable defenders.

[Which sidekick would you most want to see become a full companion in a future Pillars game or DLC?]

Mirke's obviously great, but alcoholism can only be taken so far as a character trait, so the obvious answers are Ydwin or Rekke.

 

I'd be happy with either, but I voted Rekke, simply because his perspective is completely new.

[Some Concerns Regarding Patch 1.1]

 

Please take a look at Corpse Eater subclass. Firstly the flesh commune ability casting time of 3 secs is absurd for a 50hp heal. Then after mid-game all corpses explode somehow(crit?) and my barb can't eat anything. 

You can turn off gibs in the game options and people will stop exploding.

 

That said, the viability of a subclass shouldn't be determined by a graphical option.

[In Defense of the Story]

Just my two cents on this. I think Deadfire is a really good game, bugs excepted, but I do agree that the Eothas plotline was underdeveloped and didn't really gel with the rest of the game. The fact that he is allegedly continuing to do *SPOILERS* the whole time doesn't make sense. He should be far faster at than the player at *SPOILERS* if they do any side quests at all. The only way the timeline works out is if the MC mainlines the critical path then goes the independent route.

 

As other people have pointed out, lots of games do this. But they don't have to, you could easily have a hard gate where something in Eothas' plan can't happen (or would take significantly) until the MC does something in the penultimate mission that sets the timer going, and that forces you into the endgame. As it is, the game pretends that the time pressure that exists at the narrative level doesn't exist at the gameplay level, which is always unsatisfactory.

 

That said, I don't have any issues with the details of Eothas' plan itself. I agree it should have been linked to the faction stuff (which is 100% the best part of the game) more, but I never felt lost or that the motivations didn't make sense after the reveal, even if the background of the *SPOILERS* themselves was very vague.

 

Anyway, I think Deadfire will be a better game than Pillars when the bugs are fixed and the difficulty is upped, with better gameplay, characters and side content, but it has a weaker critical path.

[PSA: Adjusting dispositions is really easy]

 

You said "through no fault of mine". Are you implying this is bugged, then? Otherwise I'm not sure what you're talking about.

 

I heard that even if you play as a Bleak Walker you are forced to take a diplomatic dialogue option. It must be something like that, a conversation with no good choice for that paladin subclass.

 

 

Yeah. There's at least one dialogue branch you can reach where you end up with two dialogue options, one being marked benevolent the other being marked diplomatic. Considering, a) you can take neither on a Bleak Walker and b) one choice is often enough to give you level 1 of that disposition, this is not ideal.

[Favorite and least favorite companions + sidekicks]

Since this is the no spoilers forum, I can't really talk about why, but Xoti, Eder, and Rekke are top for me. Konstantin, Aloth and Maia bottom. I don't think Maia was badly written, but I am genuinely uncertain as to why Aloth was there. He had nothing to do the whole game.

 

I think Rekke and Ydwin are both asking for companionification.

 

 

Well, this interesting. I'm reviewing the results, when suddenly...

 

WHO DISLIKED EDER?!

 

I think this is asking for an old-style Dyrwood'n lynching.

[Should the Kapana Taga change its weapon type to club?]

Definitely, not enough clubs.

[The Deadfire Scavenger Codes - WE FOUND THEM ALL - Cutthroat Cosmo! - Bonus Pets!]

And then there were 8.

[Pillars of Eternity II Review Thread]

I think the most anyone knows at the moment is that it's "tomorrow". Often it's midnight in some timezone, but we have nothing specific.

[Thread for those of us who want to roll a single or multi rogue....lets talk]

So does this also means Deathblow also scales with PL, so they change it from +100% damage to +50%, same as FoD?

 

What about Carnage? Imo 33% of weapon damage is a bit low

 

This might well be the start of a large post-launch balancing of passives to scale with power level. It's always been very weird as to why they don't...

[First impression on full ability tree]

Eder as a swashbuckler is an interesting idea I might go with too. He can perhaps dual wield hatchets or hatchet + dagger with dagger modal (adds +10 melee deflection at the cost of -25% damage with the dagger, which for a dual wielding tank seems really good), and then abuse reposte and some of the rogue cc abilites.

 

That's exactly what I'm going. Hatchet/Dagger for riposte abuse.

[Thread for those of us who want to roll a single or multi rogue....lets talk]

Man, might as well remove rogue from the game!!

 

Secret right answer. There are too many martial classes. Rogue should just be something you can build a fighter into.

[Companion sub-classes?]

Let's not forget that there's always the possibility of enemy paladins that keep getting up at high level. I kinda like the idea of a barbarian that starts hitting harder and faster because his opponent just keeps popping back up.

 

Let me tell you about a little book series called the Malazan Book of the Fallen...

 

I want a Malazan RPG so much.

[What class(s) are you planning making your first character and why?]

What's the problem with Mage Slayer, in more detail?

 

Basically the malus is far too strong. All their own self-buffs have -50% duration, as well as anything from an outsite source. Considering that that effects frenzy, stalwart defiance and sprint, as well as all their on kill effects, it just makes the class useless. It looked like they were getting rid of it in beta 4, but I have no idea whether they went through with it for the final release. If they have I'm playing one, otherwise I'll go berserker.

[Companion sub-classes?]

I'm actually considering Xoti as Priest/Monk. My current 'alpha team' (Working team name: "What is a tank?"):

 

- Watcher (Wizard singleclass)

- Edér (Swashbuckler)

- Pallegina (Herald)

- Maia Rua (Scout)

- Xoti (Priest)

 

It seems like the team could use a decent 3rd front liner. Do you want a priest casting constantly or is throwing 1-2 buffs, then smacking fools and casting once in a while worthwhile? Anyone who've played a Contemplative who can comment?

 

I think your right, in that you need three characters who could potentially act blockers. I'm just giving Xoti a shield and heavy armour and letting her take that role. But if we're doing this as a post your team thing, I'm going with:

 

Watcher (Mage Slayer barbarian) - DPS/Off-tank

Xoti (priest) - Tank/Buffer

Eder (fighter/rogue) - Tank/DPS

Aloth (wizard) - CC/DPS

Serafen (cipher) - CC

[What class(s) are you planning making your first character and why?]

Was planning on single class Mage Slayer but after watching the streams, changed my mind. I'll be a Marauder(Mage Slayer + Streetfighter). Shodey will contemplate. Tekehu, Theurge. Rest will be single class; Eder being a fighter & Serafen, Cipher.

 

edit: Incidentally, this template will use all classes without overlap while not missing out on unique companion subclasses.(not counting sidekicks) 

 

Oh, is one of the streamers using a Mage Slayer? Did they fix the 50% duration reduction for release? They're removed it from the character creator descriptor in beta 4, but it was still applied in game.

[Just watched EA but only the skill trees (Potential Spoliers)]

Since we're meeting Arkemyr I guess we will also see some grimoires with unique spells.

 

And we know that Concelhaut's Crushing Doom is modelled in game, but not on the spell lists, so...

[What class(s) are you planning making your first character and why?]

Mage Slayer barbarian. Why? Because Archmages gotta die, yo.