Jajo

Well I don't think most players upgrade every unique weapon, rather just the ones they use. I don't have the metrics but reading on this forum, most players seem to have an abundance of cash at the end of the game so it's not really shocking that the devs raise the cost of some items in game. Giving more crafting materials would have been a much better way to go about it, in my opinion. Not this time gated pyrite tombola that's in the game. Crafting would have been a good money sink, if people could actually craft... This material shortage also defeats the design purpose behind different physical damage types and giving weapon proficiencies out like candy, since no one's really able to adequately upgrade equipment of the whole party, let alone produce multiple equivalently powerful weapon sets for each character. Upgrading ship type on the other hand... does anyone find that worth it?

And I didn't bother with them even before, because I deemed them a complete waste of money. I mean, should I spend it to save myself from pressing "1" 3 fewer times, or on weapons that I'll actually use to resolve the conflict with and save time there?

I see there is still no option to auto-hide the annoying news screen. Here's hoping to v1.2... I really hope that spamming your customers with ads for DLCs that they already own is not worth more to you than aesthetics and visual integrity of your game.

I'm not getting them constantly, but I do get one occasionally.

Yeah, that makes it even more inane. They could perhaps use an icon at the bottom, like it is for listing DLCs. Make it glow or something, if there's BREAKING NEWS.

That's not true at all! Chanters use the power of emotions!!

Yeah, I know that, but I'd like to have it minimized by default. Ideally I would want to not be greeted by advertisements when launching a game...

I could swear there was an option, to have the news (screen) hidden by default at game start, before patch 1.1 (or am I mistaken?). Either way, I'm missing it, since I find being greeted by the news screen quite invasive and aesthetically displeasing. I understand that it can be very handy, but I already have a web browser and an email client and I therefore really do not need nor want a third venue to contact me about the game. Especially in such an involuntary and immersion breaking way. EDIT: Rephrased for clarity.

Yes, it's the MC leveling streamlining, that did it for the spell selections. Although why weapon proficiencies got their own screen and spells didn't is to me a mystery. Does anybody not get every weapon proficiency they could possibly want on a character by level ~10?

You're right - chanters and ciphers come on top there. That's because they are vastly different from the priest class. This however has absolutely nothing to do with my original statement: Priests are now mechanically almost identical to wizards without grimoires. Oh, but wait... Yes. Yes they are a valid example. Unless you are trying to argue, that D&D, PF and PoE1 got it completely wrong and should have limited their known set of spells years ago. I know that this is a ridiculous strawman, but unfortunately, this ridiculousness is the only way I can imagine dismissing my comparison in question (literally the first sentence in OP).

While I do not agree about their buffs being pathetic, the big issue for me is their offensive capabilities, like you've said. Limitations force specialization and since their offensive capabilities are lacking with respect to other classes, they are thus rather forcefully relegated to being a fully support class. A damn shame, if one asks me.

Because the old 'Per Rest' classes benefit from the shift to Per Encounter more than the other classes. All classes have/had per rest and per encounter abilities. To refer to my very first statement: how does this benefit priests more than (for example) wizards?

Points 1, 4 and 5: This is to be expected. It was the same in PoE1 and not the point of this thread, since this thread is about what has changed, not about what has stayed the same. Points 2 and 6: This I do no agree with. The spell pool is same-ish enough, that I can't really see the difference just from memory (this is, however, a personal 'not-fact'. My reference is ~250 hours in PoE1). Also, one of the reasons, why I made this topic is, that with a very limited spell selection I do in fact feel like I'm missing out (4/PL for a pure priest, LOL/PL for a MC one, if all you do is pick spells). Point 3: This is a global game mechanics, that is the same for all classes. I really don't see how this makes any particular class better than others.

Apparently priests are now wizards, but without the ability to swap grimoires (and oh, what fun ability that is). This is counterbalanced how, exactly? By the additional, fixed "domain" spell? In PoE1 there were many priest spells that were just too situational to ever cast, so I very seldom did. Now their uselessness is guaranteed, since they won't even have a chance to be cast. Ever. I thought, that balance changes were meant to make all the possibilities at least somewhat appealing and useful. This seems like a completely opposite direction. Also seeing how MC characters now have less skill points to spend (wasn't this also supposed to be the other way around?), MC priests get shafted even harder.

You are apparently supposed to not be in stealth mode when ringing the bell - that was the difference for me. Successful completion was: Clear the docks. Inform Lamond. Ring the bell while not in stealth. Benweth then runs right up to the bell.

I really don't get the reason behind releasing these small chunks of some mid-game content over the next half a year instead of releasing one aggregated expansion at the end of it. What is this release schedule trying to achieve? Do they expect people to replay the whole game every time an additional island is added? Is this then meant to keep people playing almost exactly the same content over and over again for months, because I really don't see that happening, no matter how good the game is. If "forcing" multiple replays is not the purpose, then is this rapid schedule supposed to provide people with additional content while they play? In that case, are there really so many people, that take more than half a year to finish a game (I'd imagine, one would already have forgotten half of the plot details after that long) to warrant basing DLC schedules and size on them? I just don't get it and it makes me worried. I hope, that these DLCs will together form a coherent addition with depth greater than its individual parts, but it does not seem like they will.

Regarding data presentation: I would love to see IQR on the bars the next time. Some questions looked like distribution of answers might be as interesting as the mean values themselves (average season pass price, for instance).

Well abilities aren't exactly forced, i mean when you get them yes but what you take no. You can be a figher/rogue and take 90% fighter abilities. So there is still some flexibility. And you get more overall abilities than a single class. The other defenses in POE are defined by Attributes so there is no progression issue there because they all progress the same. This change would only significantly affect health and maybe starting deflection in POE 2 which would be averaged since i think accuracy is the same for everyone now. Yeah, you're right - I went and checked PoE mechanics again and if they keep it as it is in PoE, only HP would have been affected (and starting deflection, but that's easier to control). I guess it's not a big issue after all.. certainly not as big as it first sounded to me.

How are these static class composition progressions (you're basically replacing 11 classes with 55 classes) addressing the third core aspect of multiclassing? It seems to me You're just replacing system that takes care of points 1 and 3 with a system that takes care of points 1 and 2. Multiclassed characters will after all be forced to have multiclass progression in everything, not just abilities*. To take your illustration (and I'm not quite sure what was it supposed to illustrate), one of the ideas behind taking 2rogue/18fighter in 3ed is, that HP pool is not significantly diminished. In PoE2 it would be, since HP is not something, that the player chooses at level up - it is something, that is attributed automatically. Saving throws and BAB also fall into this category - these are all very, very important derived stats. *I do not now what exactly is bundled together in this abstract term, so my concerns might be addressed already.

Kudos to Andy Adam Brennecke! That spell opacity feature is just pure awesomeness.

I'm hoping for something of similar quality to the global map in PoE I.

FTFY. Thank You for doing this, because we do like to hear interesting information from you all, but we will not get that from IGN. "So is this like a dungeon?" -- Professional Journalist

A very good point.

I do not have a twitter account; I do not have a tumblr account, I do not have a reddit account. I do have a something awful account, but this is a topic about pillars of eternity 2. How exactly is the official pillars of eternity 2 forum the wrong venue for asking about this? It is quite clear, that obsidian employees do follow and even answer on these forums. 1. I am making exactly two assumptions - I have explicitly stated this in both my posts, so I guess I am kind of admitting it. Explicitly. The first assumption is exactly what Sawyer said in the video: power level goes up every other level, like it did in D&D. The second assumption is more questionable, but as I have explained, it is by far the more conservative model among the known alternatives (being linear instead of quadratic). 2. This thread is me asking about it. What is your point? Should people assume, that developers have thought about absolutely everything? 3. I have never claimed, that "by beta it will be too late and not help anyone". I have claimed, that by beta it will be harder to change things, not impossible. This is not an assumption, this is a fact. My other claim was, that in beta we will not be given the end portion of the game to test. Too many potential spoilers. We sure didn't get to play it in PoE1 beta, TToN beta, [insert your game name here] beta...

My math is correct and gives the correct results if and only if my assumptions are correct. That is, that: power level vs power source progression remains linear from power level 6 onward (the trend from 3->4->5->6 indicates this) and ratio between different power levels is a good (or even precise) indication of efficacy. The second assumption here being the greater uncertainty, which is what You are rightfully aiming at. However I will not believe any number that is just plucked from thin air, because it is just too convenient to come up with something, that fits the model producing a desired result. There are also two other crucial things wrong with your numbers. First one being, that the point was for each individual class of a multiclass character to perform at ~80% effectiveness, not 40%. The second one is, that effectiveness is almost certainly not a simple sum. The inspiration for PoE have been D&D games and much of the mechanics is based on D&D. In D&D encounter levels were in a quadratic relation with the number of opponents, which means, that a level 5 NPC would have been at 1/32 of effectiveness of a level 10 NPC. This is, of course, another assumption, which I did not make in my initial calculations. The efficacy numbers would have been even worse otherwise. Oh, you mistake my purpose with this post. I'm not complaining at all. As I've said, I'm just pointing out a potential problem with the model. And of course I don't have extra insight, nor do I know how things will look in the game, but making two not really intrepid assumptions and the numbers we do know, I am just hoping to constructively comment on the presented model. Waiting for beta will not help anyone and would not accomplish anything in this case. It is harder to change mechanics by then and I am almost certain, that we will not get an opportunity to play level 16-18 characters in the beta. As I've said, the potential problems described in my original post would be most prominent at higher levels.