Heijoushin

But the ones we grow up with hold a special place in our hearts. Call it nostalgia goggles or whatever, but people get sad when the latest iteration of their favorite childhood series is rubbish.

I'll leave the technical details of it to Boeroer and them, but basically it's a great combo that's also easy to play. All you have to do is keep your distance, which means you can dump your defensive stats and go for damage. You might be in a pinch if you get attacked in the rear though. Also, consider a sharpshooter/black jacket that switches between four guns

Indeed, that portrait is going right into the spank bank my portraits folder

They should allow Aumaua to use a two-handed weapon in a single hand. That would actually be an interesting racial trait.

I think that even if you've never played any of the other Ultimas, the average gamer knows what a paladin is, so it was also a serious case of treating the players like morons.

I suppose I like RPGs that allow for a little creativity... so like everyone says, expansive character creation. On the other hand, J-RPGs tend to have very little character customization, so from them I expect a damn good story. Tone-wise, I'm good with a broad range in theory, though I draw the line at goofy. Divinity Original Sin and Dungeons were two games that should have been right up my alley, but turned me off with over the top cheesy humor. Combat system... uh, this is tricky. I don't like this action mixed with RPG trend in recent years (FF13&14 for example). Either make a good solid action game (like Devil May Cry) or an RPG, but don't do a half-way mess.

Hey, even ancient China had their own vampire myth. The infamous jiangshi (僵尸). To this day, I find corpse eater a very odd subclass for a barbarian. I wonder what train of thought lead them to make it. Some old barbarian culture that devoured the eyes of their enemies? Vicious tribes of cannibals?

I have the utmost respect for your Pillars knowledge... but when exactly do you find the time to work and raise a family? I've already played around with the character creation thanks to the beta. So, I guess I'm just looking forward to finally diving into the story. And meeting the new companions.

Of course it's easy to misinterpret written words. That's why there are so many arguments on the internet. I dunno, I guess I knew he was joking, but sometimes it's easier to just answer things at face value instead of looking for subtle meaning.

I love that dudes videos on the Ultima series. Not sure how full voice over leads to that level of bad writing though.

Well, being "really really good" at something implies that you should have more power, more stamina (extra castings) and enough insight to create unique spells. Honestly, if we're going to lose out on two whole schools of magic, I think the specialists can get all of that stuff.

Don't feel bad, the titan was accidentally over buffed in the last patch. See: https://forums.obsidian.net/topic/96623-so-that-first-engwithan-titan-fight-got-really-hard-impossible-on-path-of-the-damned-with-latest-bb-update/

I suppose that's easy to implement, but I would much prefer unique spells for each wizard subclass. "Form of the Fearsome Brute" is the one single interesting ability that a specialist wizard has. If they could have just done a few more like that...

I see where you're coming from, but I disagree with the idea. Apart from decreasing replayability (as you mentioned), it also "standardizes" the experience. I mean, everyone will hear exactly the same dialogue. Which admittedly, is how things go in a lot of games (especially JRPGs), but I'd prefer to keep the choice and have a unique player experience. I know this choice isn't as dramatic as say, different endings, but it's still a choice I want to make as a player. I would also argue that if you're so worried about missing out on a few trivial throw away lines from the supporting cast, then you should find the time to replay the game;)

Thanks for compiling everything in one place. I'd been meaning to go through that thread to choose the best portraits.

Your character seems fine, though personally, I'm not very impressed with the priest buffs. Apart from the chanter idea above (which is very good), a combo with a devoted or a rogue would boost damage and give you some extra toys to play with ability-wise.

Apart from the Black Jacket and Specialist Wizard mentioned above... Beguiler (Can a cypher really make a living from deception based spells?) Nalpazca (Is continually guzzling drugs an effective way to play? Or is it just tiresome?) Trickster (I guess you've already done rogue, but... I dunno, trickster sounds so cool in concept, but his abilities seem very "meh.") Priest (Maybe it's just me, but I wasn't very impressed with their spellbook this time. All those + 5 to ability X. Does that stuff actually work?)

I like arenas. Are they cliche? Sure, but so are dwarves and elves and everything else. You can't escape cliches, but you can put a new spin on them or improve them.

I think it may be somewhat lighter. Literally (because of the tropical island color palette) and thematically (just 'cause it's hard to top Soul-less babies in terms of morbidity). But as goofy as Divinity? Surely not. I couldn't stand that game's humour either.

Wait, he used to post here? What happened? What rude chump doomed us to an eternity (no pun intended) of being ignored by the developers?

I just tried a Black Jacket. Played like Josh mentioned in the Q&A: 3 weapon slots, put a gun in each, cycle through 'em. BANG BANG BANG. In longer battles, you have to reload of course, but I think it's quite a fun style for a ranged character. Maybe next I'll make a ranger/black jacket or something.

Nah, I love portraits. They're beautiful to look at and they help to bring a character to life. I acknowledge the downside that it can be hard to find exactly the portrait you need sometimes (I doubt Obsidian will ever be able to chug out 10 portraits for every race and class combination) and in that sense, Wasteland's system makes sense. But still, custom portraits are fun, especially if there's a certain theme you're going for.

Great post OP. I especially hate the lack of info when choosing 1st level spells. Okay, this one's fire and this one's acid, but give me some solid numbers!

Hey, I never doubted them. How about a doing a vanilla wizard experiment next to see if they truly suck as much as everyone says?

The world has necromancy and animancy *and* people come back with their own determination? Methinks its just a little too easy to return from the grave in PoE;)