Gorbag

Nope. I tried that as well. The only option is to load your save from before jumping into the pit and go back from there. The game is kind enough to make a special save there for you. Once you're done with the expansion, you'll have to go back to the burial isle and jump in. I guess Obs will have to buff Thaos, but that's a different matter.

And miss the heart wrenching drama of Khalid not making it? I think not. Not gonna happen. The omnipresent authority figure has plans for Jaheira. They involve this locked cell and forever.

And here I thought that your party's gonna end up in the lowest parts of the Durgan's Battery with some impossible-to-open huge door that will only be accessible to the player after part 2 is installed. Phew You thought wrong. Take that, sarcasm!

Part I is supposed to be a complete story that does not end with a cliffhanger, so I think it would be fine. Since this is a Tales of the Sword Coast - like expansion, I expect Part II to pick up other stories in other places. Still, waiting to get both parts is worth it if you want to get the experience of an old school expansion pack.

Yeah, about that

1. Check RES + Athletics 2. Check CON + Survival 3. Reach for soul and move like Plato 4. Ask for directions 5. Ask about character background 6. Ask for plot exposition 7. Use rope 8. Use hammer and chisel (FFS, NO!) 9. Leave P.S. This is a troll topic from the start (i.e. luzarius).

So this soulbound weapons thing is kind of the MMO binding stuff mixed with Fable 3's weapon progression. I have a few questions in this regard revolving around how you balance enchanted/unique/soulbound? 1. Right now fully enchanted normal weapons are roughly at the same place in the loot ladder as uniques. That's ok-ish (minus the part where uniques don't feel unique), you either invest in making a weapon the way you want, or roll with whatever unique weapon you like (+/- one or two enchantments if possible). Now, if soulbound stuff is roughly in the same ballpark at max level, then why bother with it? If the soulbound weapons have the potential of exceeding enchanted/unique weapons in terms of usefulness, then why bother using anything unique or enchanting anything? In this regard: 2. Do you have to actually use these weapons to further their progression, or does it happen automatically once they are bound, while they are resting safely in your backpack/stash? If you have to use them and they have the potential to gain massive powers, then good luck ever using anything else. If not, then good luck using them instead of any enchanted/unique weapons until you unlock all their powers (which would basically make them inventory trinkets until max level, and from then on - a substitute for anything else you may be using). 3. Do you get more than one class-specific soulbound weapon, and if so, can you bind more than one at the same time to the same character? If you can, and you don't have to actually use any of them to advance them, then it's kind of a no-brainer. If you can and you do have to use one, then the choice is between soulbound weapons only. If you can only bind one at a time, and have to unbind to advance another, then you either stash the ones you find later in the game and roll with whatever you've already leveled, or get punished for not having the meta-knowledge required to know that you shouldn't bother advancing X and instead wait until you find Y. 4. What is the usual stuff you have to do to advance a soulbound weapon? If it is (for example) killing five trolls, then say hello to the grinder (why did we drop combat XP again?). If it is scoring 5 crits/placing 5 traps/using ability/spell 5 times, then it is exploitable. If it is finishing 5 quests (or a specific quest), then it is more of a gate than an actual requirement. 5. Does the stuff you've already done prior to finding the weapon (like killing a dragon for example) retroactively count towards its advancement once you bind it, or are you screwed if there are no dragons to fight anymore by the time you've found the weapon? 6. Does only the stuff the bound character does count towards weapon advancement, or does it take the rest of the party into account? For example, does Eder have to murder Aloth for stealing his frags on those trolls, or does the weapon's shared soul understand that Aloth is his buddy? And more!

Don't worry about that. The progression would probably expand to: Wyrm -> Drake -> Dragon (different types) -> Big ass mother****ing Dragon -> Cthŵlhŵ

After equipping it and doing a fight, it grants me 10% burn damage for like 20 seconds while my druid is transformed. Hmm, that's not what it should do as far as I know. Try hovering your pointer over some of your hits in the combat log that you landed while in animal form. If it only registers slash and corrode damage, then it either enchances corrode or does nothing. If it also displays burn damage, then that's what it adds.

It is supposed to work with any type of Wildstrike (including corrode). I don't know if it actually does, however - the item was bugged before and I don't know if it is fixed now.

I should note that afaik MCA's role in Pillars was more supervisory than hands-on (although he wrote Durance and Mother at least), so I suspect his absence wouldn't affect the expansion all that much and writing in it will be consistent with the original in terms of quality.

Wasn't it already dead? It was only mostly dead. Consult Miracle Max if you need a clear understanding of the various intricate levels of deadness that exist. That said those mind blades can be AOE so you probably many it dead dead with them OP. Nope, it is either alive or dead, don't let no quantum mechanics tell you otherwise. Unless it is undead. Then again when exactly is something that has nine lives considered undead is kind of a moot point. Aaaaaanyway, I guess that's a bug. Mind blades are not supposed to hit it.

Although you use Scouting mode ("stealth mode") to search for hidden items, it takes Mechanics, not Stealth to see them (Stealth only determines how good you are at sneaking, it does not affect your ability to find traps and hidden items - Mechanics does). Spend some points in Mechanics and come back later. It will show up.

Yup, I wondered about them as well. Could be a cut quest or just flavour stuff (you know, like those pirates in the cave beyond the hidden door in the Sea's Bounty tavern in BG2. There never was anything connected to them).

Know that he approves.

Nah, that's just some odd roll. I also got skeletons, spectres, ogres, oozes, vampires, you name it.

There was also this one time I had a pretty long travel between maps and when I got to my destination, I received a notification that there was a visitor from Gilded Vale in my stronghold asking for money, and immediately another one saying that the visitor has left because I didn't respond to his plea. Bottom line - my reputation with Gilded Vale got hit because of travel time. Luckily it recovered soon after that.

Nope. I've had two attacks in a row at the most. I still have a lot of problems with the stronghold though. Like all of my hirelings being permanently unpaid (one of the special ones disappeared without any kind of notification), every single prisoner I ever took escaping (thus no reason to take prisoners in the first place), Azzuro never once visiting, etc.

If this is true, then I am pretty much amazed by how the Codex works. You get one review for venting butthurt and one review for venting the butthurt of people who are butthurt over the previous review. Where is the actual review? Will there be any?

The problem, as explained before, is that at a certain point the script instructs the creature or everyone but one creature: "Now go back". So after you kill the only monster that chased you all the way, your per encounter abilities, talents and endurance points are restored. For this reason they should chase as a group to the end of the universe, and shouldn't desert the PC and his companions ever. I see what you mean, but chasing the party to the end of the universe would also disable running away from a fight, and that's crucial for Trial of Iron. What? You sad? It's really inconvenient to talk in typing that people can't see their faces and tones. I don't know is the lure thing you mean is exactly the lure thing I mean. Got surrounded on a ground or triggered a trap the first time if the player is not care enought to see the clue (or aware enough to avoid the danger). If the player can't still win in that bad situation, failed and retry to lure the mobs to fight in the player's spot is fine. What I mean is to lure the mobs far away to make them return back, and the last one mob hasn't. So that the player's team can deal the mobs one by one. If the player's team doesn't have the powerful ability, spell, or class to win, then the player can change the difficulty. Not doing this kid's cheating thing. Right, I recall it now. Kids like to cheat in games to prove themselves. And they are stubborn that they can't admit they are less good in something. Yes, this is what luring means. You lure the enemy to a spot of your choice and kill it there. For the love of God, man, stop with the "cheating" thing and the ridiculous hyperboles/conclusions. The internet is dark and full of terrors, and you have stumbled upon one of the few places that won't immediately turn you into a mascot. Please. Make. Sense. I tried my best to distill some arguments for you in order to pick something up.

Oh, well, language barriers aren't funny. Let me try to get you up to speed with what the problem is: It's not about whether or not other players should stop using the "luring" tactic because it's cheating. How other people play the game is their business, they may even use cheat codes to win, that's entirely beside the point. We are not competing against each other in an online game and we are not taking a test. Everyone plays however he/she wants. The discussion is about whether or not Obsidian should improve the game's AI so as take "luring" into account. On one hand you have the argument that "luring" is a completely viable and perfectly legitimate strategy: you find a choke-point (like a door) lure your enemies to it and start facing them one by one, instead of taking on the whole group. On the other hand you have the argument that the AI is too stupid to realize that it's being lured and slaughtered one by one, and does nothing to prevent it. The way I see it, those arguments aren't mutually exclusive. EDIT: Never mind. I didn't see that "Joke around with your life. I want to be a serious person." thing when I wrote this.

Dear rapists and criminals, Please stop pretending to be awesome. You guys suck. Try new tactics or change the difficulty.

It's no mystery, its mostly CPU, RAM and the speed of your disk (SSDs, newer ones anyway, tend to read and transfer faster). Also the loading time (area transition) depends very much on the area you are trying to access. For example: if you go to Copperlane and try to enter one of the houses there (or The Goose and Fox), your loading time will be shorther. Once you go in, if you try to go back out to Copperlane, your loading time will be much longer (imo there's not a whole lot you can do there). Also the time necessary to save and load from a save tend to be shorter in the beginning and longer near the end, as saves become more and more bloated (imo this is the process that needs enchancement). It is a common misconception that 2D isometric games should load faster than fully 3D games. Actually a 2D game has a hell of a lot to load. And if you think that ditching the 2D environments would solve the problem, it might, but consider that you probably wouldn't be able to run PoE as it is (not to mention that Obs wouldn't be able to make it) at all if those areas weren't pre-rendered. 2D is gorgeous, budget-friendly and PC-friendly at the same time, and loading times are a relatively small price to pay for that (though they can be further optimized imo). On a more positive side, if you intend to upgrade your PC in order to play high-end 3D games like the Witcher 3, going back to PoE, you'll notice that loading times have been at least halved. So, like it was with BG games, the problem will resolve itself in a couple of years.

@ abaris: That post was meant as a reply, I personally don't care about achievements (or getting every single item in the game either). @Crucis: Those switches you need to find in order to complete The blade of the Endless Paths light up right away if you are about level 10 and at least one of your characters has been building Mechanics. They are pretty low level really. The worst one I think is level 5. My point is that getting everything right away isn't a feature in PoE and that's not a fault of the game. It would have been if the game somehow forced you to use a mechanic you don't like, but that's not the case.

I'm just gonna stop you there because quite ****ing obviously 90% of things in the game aren't "mandatory" by this standard, so it's ridiculous to define it this way. It is mandatory TO find all secrets/traps, and since there's no in game downside you'll want to do it all the time. But there is a downside, you have to search for them. If you don't want to do it - you don't get them all. You either roll with that or do what is necessary to get them. it's a pretty simple choice about the way you want to play your game. Finding them all is not mandatory, even the items you find are not mandatory. FWIW, you don't even get an achievement for finding every single hidden item in the game. Not always. But occasionally there are hidden containers that contain keys and hidden switches either of which may be required to open hidden doors that may be required to progress. I might be wrong here, as I suppose that it's possible that there may be alternative ways to open or get around them to continue your progress. Never to progress, but yes, you have to be able to detect hidden switches if you want to complete "The blade of the Endless Paths" side quest. Searching is only necessary for low level parties though.