AndreaColombo

It seems that Carnage attacks do not benefit from the Weapon Focus skill, nor do they benefit from a weapon's enchantment bonus: Is this intended? If so, the UI does not communicate it in any way. Never have I read anywhere that Weapon Focus would not apply to my Carnage attacks, or that a weapon's enchantment wouldn't contribute to their Accuracy. I understand Carnage is supposed to have lower Accuracy than normal attacks, and Accurate Carnage exists to partially make up for it. However, in the first game this was accomplished via a flat -10 penalty on Carnage attacks; Weapon Focus and weapon enchantment still applied. This way, the penalty is harsher as your weapons can bestow more than 10 points of Accuracy that you end up missing out on—and I see no reason why Weapon Focus shouldn't apply. EDIT: Also not sure why the Devoted's penetration isn't applied but Tenacious is? I reckon penetration doesn't factor in at all because it's Raw damage anyway, so probably both should be "Conditional" in this case. How is the Raw damage calculated? Is it a percentage of damage dealt? If so, what percentage is it?

While perusing the description for Baubles of the Fin from my inventory, hovering the pointer on the Cruelty and Curios ability tells you to "right-click for details": However, if you actually right-click the description will disappear and you'll be taken back to your inventory. If you want to see the details for Cruelty and Curios you need to left-click instead. Either the UI should read "left-click", or behavior should be inverted for mouse buttons.

From that standpoint I don't find that much of a difference. Now they need MIG, DEX, PER, INT. Later they'll need DEX, PER, INT, RES. The difference is that their damage with weapons will suck in the new system, whereas it was good in the old one. Ciphers get gimped big time by this change, but so do Wizards that want to use summoned weapons (unless you decide to focus solely on those and dump RES in favor of STR.)

According to the latest stream, this will no longer be the case in the upcoming backer beta update. However, my concern in this case is with internal consistency and clarity of the rules. You know your stacking rules are good when they're immediately obvious to your players. You know your UI is good when it's informative and unambiguous. If I can learn that a Goldpact Knight/Berserker is a poor choice before I roll one, the UI is doing its job*. Right now, I have to roll one and find myself with two core abilities that don't stack for seemingly no reason in order to learn about it. *Granted, if this combo was not poorer than other Paladin/Barbarian combos, the game's rules would also be doing theirs. You can roll a Devoted/Berserker and stack penetration to +7, but you can't roll a Goldpact Knight/Berserker and stack Armor Rating to +8. This is inconsistent. As Boeroer says, everything should stack unless it's the same Inspiration or Affliction. The Goldpact Knight's non-denominational bonus should stack with Hardy and Robust. Then we can discuss balance if we think it's too powerful—after we've tested it, that is. But we need the UI to be unambiguous and the rules to be consistent.

It depends? If you want a spiritshifted Druid with Flame Shield and Mirrored Image, for example, it is.

CON used to be 3% until patch 2.0 in Pillars of Eternity, if memory serves. Back then it was the dump stat par excellence. At 5% it’s still dumpable, but it hurts more to do so. I guess it boils down to play style, mostly. I wouldn’t pump CON if it gave 10% as I prefer offense to defense.

Well, the answer is yes and no—it depends True: Your spells are weaker, though not by much (as mentioned in the post SaruNi quoted above, 1 power level typically adds a fraction of something; multiclassed characters end up 2 power levels behind) and your progression is slower. In exchange, you gain the extra flexibility and the synergy of playing two classes at the same time. Additionally, some things are scaling with actual character level to prevent them from being weaker on multiclassed characters. Examples are summoned weapons, spiritshift, and—IIRC—a Ranger’s animal companion.

I was thinking—the effects of power level and Empower on skills could be added to tooltips via code, which would save the team a lot of time (on top of being less prone to error.) The original IE games included a section in weapon descriptions that listed which classes could or could not use that weapon. That section was manual, as in written manually for each weapon. In the Enhanced Editions it is automated: The engine reads usability flags in each item and populates the list. Something similar could be done in Deadfire, where code adds to each description a section for Empowered stats and a section for power level effects.

Well, yes—you can take Cipher powers, but since they take forever to cast, you’re better off attacking anyway most of the time, and dumping focus into Soul Annihilation for peak damage. If spells/powers have their casting times reduced, things may change. EDIT: MaxQuest ninja’d me big on this one.

I would add that while a multiclassed martial character with Soulblade is certainly effective, it tends to be a little boring specifically because your Cipher half boils down to Biting Whip and Hammering Thoughts. At that point, rather build a Monk/Fighter or a Barbarian/Fighter for pure melee prowess.

Agreed. Though I believe the devs rely a lot on our feedback to make changes to the UI; such was my impression after listening to Josh and Brian on the latest stream. I would encourage everyone to contribute to the thread I linked earlier with ideas and suggestions to make things clearer, unambiguous and user-friendly.

The problem with making spells scale with actual character levels instead of power levels is that multiclassed casters would be straight-up better than their single-classed counterparts. Scaling via power level is a way to give single-classed casters an edge (the extent to which that edge is effective is of course debatable; but IMO the principle is sound.) It’s the UI’s job to explain to you how the mechanics work in a way that is informative and unambiguous. I think we can all agree that the Deadfire UI in its current implementation falls short in that department.

Ah, I suspected that much. Odd bug; Devastating Blow is applying Accuracy and Pen but not damage. Hopefully the upcoming build addresses this.

I did mention in a post in this thread: https://forums.obsidian.net/topic/94591-ui-minor-ease-of-use-tweak-request/?fromsearch=1 That it would be nice if tooltips could show the effect of Empower on abilities and spells. As Josh mentioned in the latest stream, all Empower does is add 10 power levels to the ability it applies to. At this point, a section in the tooltip that shows the effects of +1 power level would suffice; we could take it from there. I like the mechanic myself. It’s kewl to have spells, especially, scale with power level and gain additional projectiles and bounces. As is the case with many mechanics in Deadfire, it just needs better communication via the UI.

Wasn’t it added to the crit damage (listed as 125% instead of just 25%)? That’s some serious peak damage

It doesn't seem to make a lot of sense for it not to stack with Hardy. I understand two different effects that bestow Hardy wouldn't stack, but a Goldpact Knight's Sworn Enemy just adds a non-denominational +4 Armor Rating. It's absolutely unobvious that they wouldn't stack. As it stands, Goldpact Knight/Berserker is a worse solution than any other Paladin order/Berserker combination.

Another Thaos was spotted in the backer beta build they streamed yesterday (not just in this screen; it was there basically all the time):

I think it’s intended. You get back the cost of using the ability, which can be anything depending on the ability itself.

If it gets me through my regular start-of-combat buffing routine (including potions) without clicks, I’m sold. I’ll handle the rest of the battle.

I agree with KDubya on all accounts. I’m eager to try out the balance changes and see what they play like, though I doubt that will happen much earlier than the first week of January—I’ll have no access to my PC from Monday until then Doesn’t look like summoned weapons were made fast cast, though

Lighting: https://twitter.com/jesawyer/status/941158152581529605

Adding to what Boeroer said, this is also a discussion on game balance; not flavor.

Kalakoth's Minor Blights benefit from the Ranger talent "Marksman": However, that is not reflected in the Accuracy breakdown accessible from within the weapon's description: This breakdown also fails to show the bonus Accuracy from scaling (as reported in the OP) and the extra +20 Accuracy bonus the Blights seem to get (visible in the other breakdown shown above.) By the way, where's the +20 coming from? It doesn't seem to be documented anywhere.

Trying to get the details for the Monk's ability Dance of Death in the combat log: