anfoglia

I encountered the same problem with some additional Xaurip-like creatures later in the game (output log below). Updating my drivers does not seem to have solved the issue. output_log.txt

Description: Upon killing a Xaurip High Priest, the game freezes and ultimately crashes to desktop. I have experienced this bug outside Poko Kahara and with the Lord Admiral Imp's party in Queen's Berth. I don't think other types of Xaurips trigger the crash. As an experiment, I killed only the leftmost Xaurip champion (or maybe it was a skirmisher) outside Poko Kahara but left the rest of the pod alone. The game did not crash. Steps to Reproduce the Issue: (1) Find one of these two Xaurip parties; (2) Kill the high priests. EDIT: WELP, it might be more complicated than that. After reproducing the crash five or six times at Poko Kahara and Queen's Berth, I just went to grab a screenshot and made it through just fine. Save: https://www.dropbox.com/s/wvixvsusfv3kz2p/Kaja%20%28ca338bfb-5bb6-4b17-af4b-00f43d7480d4%29%20quicksave.zip?dl=0 Apologies if this has already been identified. I ran a search and did not see a thread, but it wouldn't be the first time I'd missed an earlier thread. output_log.txt output_log.txt DxDiag.txt

Fighter works well because you get extra survivability and accuracy (and more, if you go devoted). Paladin also has complementary abilities.

I finished a run of Beta 4 last night. My general thoughts: + Combat Speed Slider: the interface is fiddly, but this is a god-send. The slowest setting makes the action much more legible for me. It's almost like playing a semi-turn based game like Grandia or something. I imagine the faster settings are just as much a relief for people who hate waiting for things to happen. + Graphics/performance: this is a beautiful-looking game. I can't wait to see more of the world. + Single-class buffs: the extra ability point makes a world of difference. In other builds, multiclassing was more appealing, even when it wasn't strictly stronger, because you had so many more (and more interesting) choices. Now single-class feels properly good and strong, and multiclassing feels like an alternative you might pursue for an off-the-beaten path character concept. + Wizards: they're really good, imo. + Penetration: I think this is in a better place now. It's still quite clear when you've got the wrong damage type and need to switch things up, but the values are now friendly enough that it no longer feels like stacking PEN is the name of the game. - Ship combat: it's not fun. I am confused as to what kinds of tactics you can employ other than "get in range and hope you hit them harder than they hit you." I didn't try boarding on this playthrough, but I have to imagine it would be difficult to close all the way without taking critical damage. The FTL influence on the "report to" function doesn't translate all that well. In FTL, the whole point was that all these things were happening at once, and you had to respond under pressure and with good timing (whether for sequencing attacks or opening/closing airlocks). Here, you can only ever do one thing at a time. You can't send some people to board while others work the cannons. It's not even clear to me that, in sequence, you can both apply significant damage and get in position to board, so everything sort of sticks around trading volleys. If there are tactics to this minigame that I'm missing, they need to be clearer. If it's as limited as it appears, then I have to say I prefer the straightforward rock-paper-scissors of Suikoden 1's war minigame: at least those were fast. - Missing UI info: for example, it would be helpful to see what a weapon's damage type/properties are from the proficiency screen, as those are significant factors in choosing proficiency. I'll also join in the requests for an option to pin enemy info windows during combat.

It depends what the ability progression looks like at higher levels. For the levels we see in the beta, this seems workable to me. The abilities you get at level 7/8 aren't that much more powerful, and the actives are still limited by your power source or spell allotment and the fact that many of them have lower-level pre-reqs. It might not take many tweaks to ensure that a character who takes, say, the full 2 abilities at Power Level 3 is not strictly worse than a character who holds off and doubles up on the "better" abilities at power level 4. But in the end it's probably easier to continue tuning when certain abilities become available to make sure that each class has interesting choices at each level.

+1 I'm on classic. The titan itself is not an issue. He spends the entire fight blinded and exposed and stripped of armor and deflection. But then four blights spawn and wipe my party within seconds. On my second try, I did maneuver my characters away from the blights, but not nearly far enough, it seems. Guess I'll have to try this kiting plan.

I am interested in the idea of characters building up empower during combat, with Resolve affecting the rate of growth. If you start at zero, then you limit the potential for alpha strike problems and get off per-rest, which is a bit of an awkward fit for a game that has broadly embraced a per encounter design.

Well, I have to admit I hadn't considered those downsides to resolve reducing hostile durations. I'm persuaded that, at the very least, it's not something worth trying to implement in the month leading up to launch. I've needed to remind myself that even though POE1 Resolve was a dump stat for many characters, that just wasn't a big problem for the game. Not only was POE still fun, but I think if you polled the community about the game as a whole, buffing resolve would not have been a top five request. Which is not to say I wouldn't be excited about a Resolve solution. But a simple reversion would not be dispiriting or anything.

One suggestion someone made on another site was to have Resolve decrease the duration of afflictions. I like it because it's simple, on-theme, and attractive to all classes. I don't know whether it would run into any of the same issues that made the concentration-related change unworkable. Nor did I follow previous Resolve discussions closely enough to know whether this idea was already raised and problems were identified. Another idea I had was for Resolve to mitigate the effects of injuries, but I'm skeptical that would help the stat if (as seems likely) the game ends up in a place where everyone is resting as soon as they pick up an injury anyway. I'm also wary of tying Resolve to a mechanic (injuries) that should probably be overhauled at some point in Deadfire's life. I suppose Resolve could lower the damage of disengagement attacks. This would make the stat more attractive for fighters who need to move about and change the battle lines. A squishy character may want more resolve in lieu of the abilities meant to escape engagement. Idk.

I don't know how to evaluate the ship encounters until I know how they fit into the broader sailing system. The updates Josh has discussed (removing the full sail/half sail distinction, tweaking jibe, adding options to flee or "close to board") all seem like positive steps. But supposing you actually want to try trading volleys, it doesn't seem like the framework supports fun, tactical battles. It needs another dimension or two. Maybe that comes in when you can actually select cannons and crew members. Idk. I can see a bit of the FTL influence in how you order crew members to report to different stations, but I can't say it feels all that fun yet. FTL had a fair amount more going on in a given battle (targeting different areas, boarding as a part of the general combat flow rather than the end of the encounter, repairing, managing airlocks, et al.).* *I understand FTL's influence was on the report function, but I think it's worth looking at the fact that FTL had a simpler supply system than Deadfire. It's not clear from the Beta what Deadfire is getting out of water, food, medicine, and repair rather than a consolidated "supplies" category and then separate, more tailored mechanics for healing crew members and repairing the ship.

The appeal is that it has some of the better party-based combat this side of Divinity: Original Sin. But then I generally prefer TB to RTwP.

I wonder about this. The penetration and proficiency mechanics both seem designed with the idea that players would comfortably switch between weapons, but if it turns out many players don't like pausing to check penetration for each party member and each enemy and/or don't like switching from a preferred weapon, then those mechanics become something of a dead weight. Going back to the change from DR to pen, I believe Josh said that POE players found DR mushy or unclear about what damage types were appropriate. But what if they just didn't like reviewing the numbers? Penetration may be a little clearer (less so now that different scaling thresholds have been introduced), but it doesn't change the basic task for the player. EDIT: To be clear, I have no idea if a significant number of players feel that way. It just crossed my mind because I was separately curious about Josh's comment that players still seem reluctant to use non-proficient weapons, even with a system designed to make proficiency both common and low-value. (although the more likely explanation there is that everyone except devoted starts the beta with a ton of proficiency points, so why wouldn't players fill their weapon slots with proficient weapons?)

Temple of Elemental Evil wants a word.

Best + Improved reactivity: even in this relatively small area of the game, there are a wide range of dialogue options based on race, origin, class, and skills. This is tremendously encouraging. + AI scripting: I admit that this was not a priority for me during the crowdfunding campaign, but it's a very cool feature, and I've enjoyed my experiments with it. I can't wait for someone to send me improvements on my garbage scripts. + Subclasses: these are fun, and I appreciate Obsidian giving multiple options for every class. Worst - Rules communication: Taking a step back, the team deserves credit for how much information it does communicate in a clear and visually attractive fashion. But the biggest thing nagging me through my beta playthroughs (from the character creation menu on through ship encounters) is missing information about what certain choices will do. For example, and we've had a few threads on this, the proficiency screen doesn't allow you to see any of the weapons' parameters (speed, base damage, damage type, etc.). The level-up screen isn't clear about which abilities will stack. Naval combat has this whole "advantage" mechanic without explaining how it works. - Penetration: changes since the beta's release have brought this to a more comfortable place, where I at least can do something other than stack penetration. But I don't think the system is either clearer or more fun than the one it replaced. - Spell selection: I actually don't mind the longer casting times (particularly if you all are going to be refunding canceled spells), but right now wizards aren't much fun for me because their spell selection feels constrained. I'm also not wild about the new grimoire mechanic, which adds clutter and busywork to the wizard's life for a pretty limited return. I think I'd prefer a system where a wizard could still copy spells, but either her power level or the grimoire itself influenced the total "weight" of spells she could keep in her grimoire at once, with higher-tier spells costing more than lower-tier ones. - Weapon proficiency: I don't really understand what this system is accomplishing. The modals are either boring or bad, so the only time I feel good about getting a new proficiency is when I've got a separate ability (like the fighter's) that gives bonuses with proficient weapons. It's just not a choice that feels interesting on the merits or as a statement of character identity. EDIT: It looks like Josh just discussed some of the system's goals on tumblr: https://jesawyer.tumblr.com/ One goal, according to Josh, was to allow players to associate skill with a particular weapon type with their character(s). I don't think this is working all that well at the moment. Most characters get so many proficient weapons, with so little effect, that it doesn't feel to me like, "yeah, this cipher's trained with a flail and can do better than most with a flail." Increasing the rate of proficiency gain (from 1/4 levels to 1/3 levels) is only going to make this problem worse. A second goal was to "move most/all of the weapon-based talent modals to proficiencies, with the focus on the modals being situational rather than "turn on and leave on." I'm afraid the first part is more a description of what the system does than an explanation of why the designers would want to do it. A third goal was to avoid discouraging players from using non-proficient weapons. This is naturally in tension with goal number one. Obsidian has attempted to resolve the tension by making proficiency bonuses situational, but right now the system seems to be in a place where the bonuses aren't interesting enough for to feel like a meaningful character choice but the mere existence of the proficiency mechanic is still driving people to stick with proficient weapons. Question: if you're going to be handing out tons of weapon proficiencies, then why is it so important that players not feel discouraged from using non-proficient weapons? - Dialogue icons: Sorry to be annoying on this point (last time I'll bring it up, promise!), but I don't like the tiny icons replacing bracketed text (e.g., [rational] or [benevolent]) to indicate a particular reputation, skill, or background is associated with a dialogue option. Several of the icons are not obvious. Is a dove diplomacy or benevolence? Is a human head insight or intelligence? The tooltips resolve any initial confusion, and I guess over time players will just learn the icons. But is the extra text space that valuable? Otherwise Multiclassing is pretty fun at the moment, even if I prefer a more class-less direction. I'm neutral so far on the Might change.

Again. I simply beg to differ. And has nothing to do with my point. A Minsc or Dorn is a much easier, straight forward build in BG. It isn't impossible in PoE, but it is a more complex issue. Joe It isn't complex at all, you pump 3 stats and ignore the rest in either case. You are literally complaining about having options here as opposed to your knowledge you acquired in D&D. No it is not that simple because of how PoE has balanced out the dynamics of the stats, never mind you can't _just_ pump all three stats enough to get to a Dorn or Minsc character. First you have to Min/Max the stats, which is dicey if you aren't already familiar with how to counter balance for the mins. Then you have to select the right talents and skills and know the right gear to get at which points in the game, to build the right synergy. I am not complaining about options. I can't tell if you are just being deliberately obtuse or not. The point is the options and inherent complexities of PoE don't make certain builds as clear cut as they are in BG/D&D. To Wormerine's point, this is a deliberate move on Obsidian's part, the flattening of stats' dynamics, so it is difficult to build a bad character. But this also has the adverse effect on the ease to create characters like Minsc or Edwin. Why do you think building a Minsc archetype is significantly easier in BG? I mean, in BG you still need to know which stats you can afford to drop, which weapons you'll want, and how to spend your proficiency points. Is it just that certain stats are clearly useless for the build (assuming you've read the manual or have the background in D&D) whereas in POE the stats that don't go directly to hitting hard or taking punches still have some attraction? POE does have in-game attribute descriptions to tell you that, for example, intelligence will not make your fighter hit harder or take more punches... Hey, I won't deny it takes a certain zen acceptance to appreciate probability. Personally I think it adds variety and requires resourceful, on the fly thinking. I am not a big fan of predetermined outcomes. I would never make a good Lutheran. Joe Do you mean Calvinist? (I mean, my understanding is that Lutherans do believe in a kind of predestination, but the Calvinists are famous for it). Anyway, I tend to dislike probability-based checks in computer games, but I can understanding wanting to import the sense of dynamism and improvisation from the tabletop world.

Like you, I don't really go in for the serious number crunching. I'm glad others do. Because if they and Obsidian can get the subtler elements to the point where they don't imbalance the game for casual players (on every difficulty level), then I'm basically fine with it all staying inaccessible to me. A dagger can secretly be better than a sword for X build as long as I, the naive player who looks at the rules and (reasonably) thinks a sword is a good fit for X, can pick one up and feel like it's powerful and works as intended.

I think the challenge of optimizing a build in POE is partly a byproduct of something POE does well -- the attributes are (generally) useful for any character and so a huge variety of builds are "good" in the sense of being viable. I also think you may be overrating how straightforward optimizing was in the IE games. If you're a first-time player with no detailed knowledge of the game mechanics, how do you know what amount of DEX is "good enough" for a fighter? How do you know how far you can drop your mage's CON? (never mind advanced questions like "when should you dual class?"). I'm not sure a smaller number of useful stats for a given class actually answers much of the optimization question, and it brings real risks that a player will unknowingly create a build that is not just suboptimal but unworkable.

I think Deadfire's combat is, on the whole, more accessible for new players, but it's a small difference because the changes are a mixed bag and the game does not make a dent in the biggest obstacle -- communicating information to players. I'll start with the streamlining choices that seem to have worked. Five-person parties are clearer and easier to manage without sacrificing too much tactical depth. Getting rid of per-rest abilities probably is helpful for people not schooled in vancian casting. Dropping the health/endurance split is simpler (even if I liked that mechanic). And inspirations/afflictions should ultimately be a clean system. Other choices appear less successful. I suspect armor penetration will induce headaches in newcomers already fatigued from trying to learn a thousand other tiny icons and combat parameters. I know slash/pierce/blunt damage types/resistances for weapons and armor are fun for experienced players and those who enjoy realistic touches, but if Obsidian really wants combat to be more accessible, it should consider (in a future POE game--it's too late for this one) just collapsing the damage types or making the difference so small it's practically an easter egg (e.g., a hammer will do a flat 3 more damage to plate armor than a sword). Weapons have enough parameters and players have enough defenses as it is. When I started POE (as someone who had played some Pathfinder and muddled through BG2 but was not super experienced with IE games), this was the single most intimidating thing about the character sheet. Ultimately, however, these changes are marginal. The central challenge this kind of combat system has is communicating information to players. POE's UI was a significant improvement on the old IE games'. Deadfire's is even better (the character filter in the combat log is a particularly nice addition). And it's still not easy enough for a player to see why the Watcher did 32 damage or took 12. The OP described some behavior he couldn't understand. Others have pointed to unclear power level and empower effects. If the team had infinite resources (including time), I think one solution would be a far more hand-holdy systems tutorial accessible from the menu. Start with a one-on-one combat encounter. Automatically pause at every single dice roll and display the detailed view in the center of the screen. Walk the player through what happened and why. Slowly add party members and shift focus among mechanics (try attacking with this spear; try dual-wielding; try casting a spell). After finally working his or her way up to a full party, the player would be comfortable enough to follow the action without automatic display of the detailed combat log. As to the separate debate about going from a 3.0 system to a 1.0 system, I'm basically okay with it. I mean, I happened to like where POE ended up. Like everyone else, I was excited that POE2 would be building on such a solid base that it could focus on creating huge amounts of high-quality content. The thing is, even with the dramatic systems changes, we're still getting huge amounts of high-quality content and major new systems like companion relationships, naval exploration, AI scripting, and multiclassing. And I think the combat is in a better place than POE 1.0. So it doesn't seem like the change has cost Deadfire anything I was really excited about.

I'm not wild about the modals. POE weapons already have distinguishing properties (e.g., base damage, damage type, speed, interrupt, and bonuses like reach, split damage, better crits, etc.). And those are plenty for the player to consider when picking weapons for a particular build. You don't really want an additional layer of, "does this have a good modal or not?" Which is probably part of the reason why many modals seem low-value. But the fact that they're low-value and common also makes them feel insubstantial as a way of defining your character. I guess the upside is that there's less of a "lock-in" effect than if the bonuses were large and the proficiency points were rare. Still, I wonder if a small, flat bonus wouldn't be better (higher accuracy, faster recovery, more pen, % chance to proc a double-attack, whatever). Or if you really wanted to go wild, give the player a choice between two upgrades.

I think you are underrating Beguiler a bit. Whisper of Treason is very powerful for a 10 focus ability. You can open just about every battle in the beta by charming one of the enemies (an effect that will last well well beyond the decisive phase of the fight). It's cheap enough to charm two enemies and still gain enough focus to unleash mental binding or mindblades (if you're into that sort of thing). Sluggish focus gain matters less when all a character needs to do is spam 10- or 20-focus abilities. Granted, this build is a one-trick pony. Fights with resistant enemies (or ones that can suppress charm) are bound to come up in the actual game. But in the beta it performs better than trash.

I have no strong feelings about this, but the suggestion makes sense, so if other people do feel strongly about it, I'm all for them getting their way. I agree with this. I sort of share this intuition that background fits with sex and race as, well, background biographical information before you get to the sharp end of character creation, but because background choice does give an attribute bonus, I think it helps to know what those attributes are and what they do first. So I'm fine with the current arrangement. I may be singing a different tune when I have to choose between companions (and have even less room for adventurers), but five party members feels good to me right now. Party composition still feels interesting. Combat is a little cleaner. And while I take the author's point about party interactions, I tend to think that's just life in RPGs with appealing companions--I'll always want more of them in my party at once. Choosing four out of seven companions (I forget how many Deadfire has, excluding those half-companions) is sufficiently similar to the percentages in POE1 that I don't feel like I'm missing out on more this time around. I think I'm in the minority on this one, but I continue to find the hypertext distracting and believe that the sharper scenes don't require hypertext because the foreign terms are (or should be) either clear from context or merit a dialogue prompt to ask what the word means. If the meaning of the term is unclear but there's no dialogue option, hypertext may help the player, but it doesn't explain how the Watcher would understand what's going on (barring an applicable background--which the game usually handles by a special dialogue option). I could go either way on this. I see the reason for the change: players spend way more time fishing things out of the stash than moving them between companions. But it's true that it was nice being able to see all the party members' bags on one screen. I am currently feeling down on the grimoire system. The idea sounded reasonable enough: instead of adding all the spells in the world to your grimoire and then selecting the active ones, you'd have some permanent spells plus a bunch of different fixed grimoires you could swap in and out. Grimoires become a more interesting thing to find in the world. Cool. The thing is, swapping grimoires isn't fun. I don't know. It just seems like more of a hassle for a class that is feeling pretty dull at the moment.

I think playing specific characters' functions (whether visualized as a card or not) is an odd fit for naval combat, which tends to de-emphasize individual heroics. That doesn't mean you couldn't make a fun system out it. And there are obvious advantages to sailors having unique traits. Finding and recruiting them becomes a pleasure rather than the rote task of pulling the next person off the menu and training him/her up. But I think the benefits you see in a card-like system (quick but tactical; dynamic; makes individual crew members more interesting) are achievable within the current framework, with some adjustments.

You don't need a card-based system to improve on the knife-throwing game (ship combat is already better than knife throwing and still has plenty of room for improvement within the text-based approach). And I don't think cards would be on theme for how Deadfire handles physical events involving your characters. It's really hard to judge Obsidian's concept for naval combat without seeing how it fits into the full game. If it's a neat extra thing you can do (or not do), then I think they're reasonably close to a good system. If, however, encounters are a regular part of exploring or you need to sink a lot of ships to get cool items and sidequests, then adding more tactical options (e.g., sidegrades to cannons/ammo; different sailing options that increase/decrease your odds of getting a wind advantage; hulls that ride higher/lower bringing weather/geography into play) becomes essential. In any case, I'm not going to expect something as as robust as Gwent or other minigames people like as well as the game proper. There's obviously a lot of potential in naval combat (like Dr. Hieronymous Alloy, my mind drifts toward Patrick O'Brian novels), but I don't think Obsidian promised all that much here.

At the risk of bringing the truly trivial into the this thread, I continue to be baffled by the qualifier icons in dialogue. Why put the player through the extra work of hovering over the icon to learn that a dove is benevolent and not diplomacy, a scroll is diplomacy and not history, and this type of head means insight while that kind of head means intelligence? Maybe there's a technical or aesthetic reason I'm missing. It's not a big deal -- if it bugs me so much, I can turn off the dialogue tags and embrace role-playing. But it strikes me as a weird change to a convention (just spelling out [Mechanics]) that I can't recall anyone criticizing.

The pace actually feels good to me now (I sense I'm a bit of an outlier here). Recovery times were closer to "okay, I see that you are in recovery, and I can turn my attention elsewhere for a moment" than "foot-tapping while I wait for you to please god swing your sword again." EDIT: As you can probably guess, I'm a slow mode person. So I would be more than happy with a tradeoff that involved reduced recovery for the return of slow mode.