Gromnir

am understanding if you feel pitty for luck, but such empathy is not useful. honestly, luck is actual claiming, reduced to literal spamming no less, that those who advocate the ie games use o' insta-kills and hard counters can be meaningful differentiated from advocating d&d use o' insta-kills and hard counters. ... wacky. HA! Good Fun!

talk of deflection. insta-kills and hard counters is not your ambiguous "most arguments." the ie games used d&d mechanics. the hard counters and insta-kills in the ie games are directly the result o' the use o' d&d mechanics. am admitting that your irrationality on this matter does surprise us. is rare to see somebody so unapologetically obdurate in spite o' a clear error. HA! Good Fun!

Find me one that has been doing that on a serious level. oh, so the ones using ie games as examples is not serious? [...] Strawman. You said D&D. I was not talking about the IE games. You're addressing a question that was not asked. The problem is that you do this *constantly*, in your gibberish-speak, and it comes off as nothing short of smug and pathetic. There's a reason I've stop engaging you, because there's really no point. You just deflect and evade, put up the occasional strawman, and continue to fanboy, like PoE somehow needs you to be it's shield. It doesn't. And you're being a s***ty shield. So again, find me one that is doing that on a serious level, not just "Eh, I wish it was D&D, but whatever". you are being silly. the ie games used d&d mechanics. the insta-kill and hard-counter attributes o' the ie mechanics are directly the result o' the ie game's adoption of d&d. ... being obtuse just to entertain us is sweet and all, but unnecessary. HA! Good Fun! ps our gibberish is intentional. so what is your excuse?

Find me one that has been doing that on a serious level. oh, so the ones using ie games as examples is not serious? *chuckle* am s'posing you were just funning when you used troll example to point out bg2 goodness o'... whatever point you were trying to make at the time. am not gonna try and read minds. is more than a few references to the ie games as an enlightened alternative to poe rejection o' insta-kill. pretending that ain't true is foolish in the extreme. HA! Good Fun!

our paladins is, invariably, high intelligence-- am getting pretty darn close to 25 seconds before the reviving penalty hits. that is a Long time in most poe battles. that being said, paladin revive is not something we do as soon as a party member is knocked out as we must needs guestimate the length o' a battle and how our ~25 seconds is gonna figure into the equation. however, for the high int paladin, the revive ability is powerful. am admitting that we would be discouraged from take paladin revive if we did not have a starting int of 18-20 on paladins. even with the significant extended duration from high intelligence, the ability is of situational use, which is a flaw of many paladin abilities... too many. HA! Good Fun!

have you considered looking for hellboy images? HA! Good Fun!

actually,yeah, there is more than a few folks arguing for more d&d and more ie. so, am thinking there is actual a misunderstanding. *shrug* let's not get all hypocritical, eh? recall that our initial examples were vampires and mind flayers from bg2. those didn't work any better for you than the demi-lich, and they present similar problems to the player absent meta knowledge. however, you are right that the example we gave doesn't exist in poe. the reason why is 'cause the developers avoided such nonsense. luckman, who liked your response, is the guy who came up with the bg2 troll example, no? he noted the consternation that were possible for folks encountering trolls for the first time in bg2. now again, trolls is 'bout the worst example we could contemplate given how pervasive they are in d&d games and recognizing that they existed in ie games previous to bg2, but the fact is that there were no rhyme or reason behind the troll immunities and regeneration and there were no way for a first-time player to puzzle out the mechanics behind troll regeneration save through trial and error or meta-knowledge.... meta-knowledge which am still trying to puzzle out how you could personal be against given your position on hard-counters and "save or else." and "save or else" is still a meaningless bit o' nothing. obsidian specific rejected insta-kills. the so-called "save or else" shtick is little more than misdirection. however, if the graze/hit/critical results for status effects is too unforgiving for you, we get that. is nothing wrong with your preference. HA! Good Fun! ps am not suggesting that those who dislike poe is weak or soft, though am suspecting some will read our response that way. we found poe combat extreme frustrating when faced with some o' the more annoying status effects. however, as we got deeper into the game, we Personally discovered that we enjoyed the differences compared to ie combat. we don't reload 'cause o' a single missed save or a couple bad "rolls." am much more aware o' the inevitability o' fail in poe, and so we must plan acording. the tactical considerations in poe is different. is not better. different.

The IE games also had a solution to the stalemate problem for NON-magic battles. They use the D20 system, where 1 is always a miss and And a 20 is always a hit. Personally, though, I've come to terms with the Miss--Graze---Hit--Crit system that PoE uses. I like it. My only issue with it is how....universal it is. It applies to everything. Which means we'll never see those dramatic high level magic battle moments from BG2 and IWD2 where a heated, intense battle could end suddenly in a nail-biting moment due to, say, a Finger of Death, or a Wail of the Banshee. After all, what's the point of scoring a critical hit with your death spell? or a Graze with your Destruction spell? One thing I'd love to see is for more than just the duration of spell effects to vary with attack resolution. Particularly, CC spells need to apply different status effects based on the attack resolution - so on a hit you might charm, and on a crit you might dominate, but a graze only dazes. (just as an example) This would allow for a bit more counter-play on both the part of the player and the AI against status effects. As it is, you can confuse or paralyze even extremely powerful enemies for a decent amount of time since you can generally get a graze even when their defenses are very high. Extremely powerful status effects like confuse, charm/dominate, paralyze, etc should be difficult to apply and (IMO) should only ever apply on a hit or a crit, with the possible exception of some very powerful and very specialized (possibly single-target) spells. Maybe slicken doesn't inflict prone unless you hit, and just hobbles on a graze? Etc... There's been some serious missed opportunity to do interesting things with spell effects and the attack resolution system. Maybe they'll implement some more interesting stuff in the expansion? I definitely agree. I think the debuffs/soft CCs (hobbled, blind, etc) should cause their effects regardless of whether your graze, hit, or crit. Their duration should be effected based on whether it is a graze, hit, crit. Some single target hard CCs should also remain this way (Fighter Knockdown). However, big CCs like Charmed, Paralyze, and/or big AoEs that cause knockdown should only work when hitting or critting, and should hobble, daze, etc when they graze. Obviously, these abilities/spells should do nothing when they miss. If not, the AoE CCs need to go. They really trivialize the combat too much. Especially the way the AI doggy piles the Tank. @Gromnir - I won't argue for pre-buffing. I never cared for it, and I think it adds a lot of tedium by forcing the habit and then forcing the players to strip those effects from enemies. I understand why some like it, and admittedly have played games like NWN (1 and 2) as a Strength Bard that prebuffs. However, I think that gameplay style not being in PoE is fine. I know others think it needs to be here, but I definitely do not. However, I will stand by "hard counters" and "Save or else" being a good thing. You can call it archaic, obtuse, or what have you. However, it is in those moments where you failed with your spell, or the enemies are resisting your normal strategy, that you have to think up something else. Because of differing party compositions this forces you to do different things from one fight to another and from one play through to another. I see that as a good thing. Otherwise, it is far too easy to open almost every hard fight with Gaze of the Adragan (or some equivalent CC), and pretty much stomp the opponent. I always liken it to a popular quote from Return of the Jedi. "It's a trap!!!" The rebels were hard countered, and then they had to do what they could to come out on top. Or maybe the Empire was Pre-buffed. The effects of these CCs aren't really the problem, nor the consistency of them working, but the fact that a large portion of them are AoE is definitely an issue. Charming/Dominating 1 Ogre among the 7 in combat isn't a huge swing, but Charming/Paralyzing/Proning/etc 2 to 4 of them is a gigantic one. The fact that 1 or 2 buffs to accuracy can make those effects a near certainty (with a hefty duration, I might add) compounds the issue. The annoyance of being under the effects of these CCs would be diminished if we had ways to remove those effects. Reducing the time is ok, but sometimes you have to use a CC to counter the CC. It just isn't great gameplay IMHO, but YMMV. I would rather be able to devote resources to fixing the issue and not using a duct tape solution. EG - I would rather be able to remove the effect vs reduce the duration or casting hold on my Charmed Rogue party member. To each their own. I will say... that as annoying as these CCs can be that their not being removable has forced me to do some odd things to stop my Monk, with full wounds, under the effects of charm from tearing my squishies apart. However, if that kind of variability is ok then why are hard counters a problem? Because the outcomes are the same. The outcomes are " **** happened and now you gotta deal with it". I guess you could argue that the way the system works that it isn't a variability, but all that does is make me (and I would assume many others) metagame it on harder encounters. These Dank Spores are gonna Charm/dominate the party? Open combat with Priest's Prayer Against Treachery. Those Drakes going to drop some AoE frighten/terrify? Open with Prayer Against Fear. So on, and so forth. Anyway, to go on record... I really like the game, and I am really enjoying it, but I won't pretend that all is right in Eora. To use a metaphor, I think that this is a really good base for some amazing soup, but I still want to voice my opinion on what spices would be the best. I expect the Expacs and the Sequels to bring the spice. possible misunderstanding? you like the ie/d&d approach? fine. is nothing wrong with that. personally we see d&d as even more susceptible to the meatgame approach. hell, take demi-liches as an example o' the wacky meta-game silliness d&d were capable o' dumping on us. an astral or ethereal mage casting power word kill can insta-kill a demi-lich? yeah, trial and error or reason your way to figuring that out. sorry, but the meta-game argument is not your friend. regardless, the point were that obsidian ain't the folks who came up with "save or else." obsidian rejected insta-kills and hard counters and that resulted in different gameplay for poe. different. you don't need to like different, but some folks pretending as if obsidian abandoning insta-kills is somehow disingenuous or inconsistent with their message board and interview claims is utter hokum. we like different. the frustration we had to endure with poe combat was a challenge. dominated party members seem invariably to switch to ranged weapons? well then, before fighting dark spores, we make sure our party is armed with crappy ranged weapons to minimize the harm from our own party members. *chuckle* we found an alternative use for the disappointer. that ain't metagame but tactical awareness... and perhaps a bit o' an exploit. HA! Good Fun!

"save or else" is a bit o' nonsense invented by the ignorant or the obtuse. poe developers did not add insta-kill spells and effects to their game. great. am not sure what "save or else" is s'posed to mean to some o' you jokers. paralyze effects is not insta-kill, and neither is domination. you get hit by a powerful enough fireball blast, and don't make your save, you very well could die, but that is a factor o' damage rather than a "die" effect. same were true in bg2 btw. well guess what, all those adverse effects in poe is the same. take damage after getting hit with an effect and you may die... or you may die from the damage resulting from the effect. regardless, is no poe insta-kill effects. oh, and btw, with all the in-combat options for revives, death (knockout actually) is nothing more than another aspect o' combat, and an intriguing one at that. for many battles we plan ahead-- assume we is gonna lose a party member or two, and we tactical plan on when to revive. paladin revive ability bug needs be addressed though. we found all those domination, confusion and stun effects to be mighty annoying for much o' the game, but it ain't as if our characters don't have such stuff. *chuckle* combats can get kinda wacky when more o' the enemies is actually friendly than party members, eh? is different. is not like ie battles. in bg2 once we had the Ultimate Protection against level drain and mental domination/charm, vampires were a laughable foe. once we had the Ultimate Protection (pre-buffed in layers) 'gainst mind flayers, those battles were also cake walks. poe is different. we can't walk into a battle knowing we is immune to everything save melee damage. good. is different and frustrating and good. heck, we didn't think psychic backlash were much o' a talent, and it still isn't, but am thinking we will take it for virtual all our cipher characters henceforth. any help we can get to deal with those mental attacks is a good thing. poe is different and thank goodness for that. regardless, "save or else" were not the crpg/rpg evil obsidian were exorcising from poe... no more than they ever claimed that poe were the "spiritual successor" o' the ie games. HA! Good Fun!

I don't even know what "and legion" means and what is "embrace the PoE concept" supposed to mean? What about my criticisms suggests I'm not "embracing the PoE concept?" Might help to criticize my criticisms directly instead of making vague ambiguous statements like that. *facepalm* To say that your complaints were "legion" in the context above is to say that your complaints were many. Jeez. There's nothing ambiguous about saying that one's complaints are legion. As for embracing the PoE concept, you're on your own on that one. I don't exactly know what the "PoE concept" is, or at least what Gromnir thinks it is. what obsidian stated the paladin role is 'posed to be, not Gromnir. we keep linking obsidian pov, but few read. those few who do read tend to either ignore or imagine that the obsidian goals for the the class is irrelevant. ... am not gonna link again. HA! Good Fun!

don't read too much into it. bad reviews often inspire such reactions. also, the codex is tending to be extreme in ways more than merely their reactionary gaming pretensions. generating controversy is kinda a goal for codex as somehow that is a validation o' their existence. *shrug* also, please note that there has been, for a LONG period o' poe development, a small segment o' malcontents that voiced their concerns that obsidian were doing it wrong. such folks felt increasingly marginalized as their complaints were largely ignored. a review *gasp* is an excuse to resurrect the mouldering corpse o' long dead arguments. a review, oddly enough, is also taken by some as proof that marginalized were right when they complained even though all we got is a review by a random guy. as we noted in our first post in this thread, we don't get the fuss regarding reviews, particularly for games we has already purchased and played our self. HA! Good Fun!

the ability to leisurely explore the game world and complete non critical path quets in whatever order you desire makes the kinda pacing you enjoyed during the intro impossible to maintain. HA! Good Fun!

it's a welsh circumflex, no? shouldn't be too hard to track down the alt code for such... even without the aid o' a wizard. HA! Good Fun!

typically we do not purchase games until they have been available for at least six months. such a wait affords us a chance to buy a game cheaper and get a more stable offering. poe, as a kickstarter, had us pay years in advance, so it don't get our traditional wait-and-see approach. nevertheless, am gonna wait to review poe until after 1.05 as that is 'posed to be an expansive patch that alters many features in ways great and small. HA! Good Fun!

Why in the world would you bring up "unforeseeable immunities and defenses", when discussing trolls in the IE games? ... slow it is. *washes hands* HA! Good Fun! Just as I thought. You have no answer. it's a luckman quote about trolls in an ie game that Gromnir responded to. enough. is too hard helping you. perhaps you are related to vol? that could explain. HA! Good Fun!

I don't even know what "and legion" means and what is "embrace the PoE concept" supposed to mean? What about my criticisms suggests I'm not "embracing the PoE concept?" Might help to criticize my criticisms directly instead of making vague ambiguous statements like that. *groan* is the same freaking situation as maddem, and is the same thing eub complains 'bout but he contributed to. go back and read our previous criticisms o' your misguided paladin rant(s). HA! Good Fun!

see, is these kinda blanket generalizations that make folks look silly. HA! Good Fun!

maybe if aloth shared a body with with a possibly bisexual guttersnipe? that kinda thing? *snort* HA! Good Fun! ps:t had two ha-ha party companions. so too does poe.

is not a criticism o' mc, 'cause you are at least consistent. however, some o' the folks that find fault in poe for taking itself too serious seem to have forgotten their posts and opinions regarding ps:t, a game that could descend to a state o' lugubrious camp. HA! Good Fun!

Why in the world would you bring up "unforeseeable immunities and defenses", when discussing trolls in the IE games? ... slow it is. *washes hands* HA! Good Fun!

disagree. we noted already/elsewhere that far too many o' longknife complaints were based on fundamental misconceptions. the poe paladin is s'posed to be a support class... is s'posed to be a low-maintenance support class with admirable defensive qualities and powerful single target heals, debuffs and cleanses. is nothing wrong with that concept. is other poe classes that can fill striker roles in a multitude o' fashions, and if you want the paladin to be a better tank than it already is, we can suggest alternative classes as well. *shrug* am not saying all your suggestions is bad, but point to longknife complaints is a bad start. HA! Good Fun! And what portion of my complaints suggested anything but support? As I recall, my complaints were threefold: 1) Make Faith and Conviction actually work for NPC Paladins and just like eub, this is the only observation you made that we agree with... though we note that your post does not enumerate your complaints but a few proposed fixes. your complaints were silly and legion and we already have addressed your complete unwillingness to embrace the poe concept. am not seeing a need to have to repeat self Again in that regard. but yeah, faith and convictions not working for companion npcs is an impediment to recruiting a paladin. we suggested in another thread that a simple fix that would satisfy most folks is to offer a talent to npc paladins that would have their loyalty to the protagonist charge their faith and convictions. from a practical perspective, we would have the talent result in the companion paladin gain faith and conviction bonuses proportional to their levels rather than dispositions of the pc. a talent is an expensive fix, but it would be well-worth the expense for those desiring that their companion paladin be similarly resilient to a pc paladin. HA! Good Fun!

The example Luckman gave was NOT about unforeseeable immunities or defences. Was it, Gromnir. It was about Trolls. Specifically, trolls in the IE games...who won't die unless you use the fire and acid equipment that those games flood you with in the beginning of the very same dungeon/area where you encounter them.. BG2 even takes it a step further, throwing NPCs and load screens in your face who's only in-game purpose is to bark out instructions, like: "Make sure you use fire or acid on those trolls, or they'll get up again, Player!" you gotta learn to read your own posts before posting them. is wacky. "I'm talking about the trolls of Baldur's Gate 2, that frustrated everyone the first time they met them, unless you already knew you needed fire or acid." that is his quote. is a quote where he specific notes that the problem o' trolls evaporates with knowledge. so, suggesting that the issue presented is Not one regarding unforeseeable defenses is ridiculous. though why he would choose one o' the best known d&d critters with a special defense is completely beyond our understanding. ... am begining to think that the reason we have difficulty communicating with you is simple that you don't read posts before responding... or are a bit slow. the fact that luckman liked your post reveals some peculiarities 'bout him as well. HA! Good Fun!

I mentioned this in another thread some time ago, and I'll mention it again here. Remember *those* enemies in *that* game? You know which enemies I'm talking about. You know which game. I'm talking about the trolls of Baldur's Gate 2, that frustrated everyone the first time they met them, unless you already knew you needed fire or acid. will leave the rest, but we thought that were funny... 'cause nobody who had ever played pnp d&d, or most any d&d crpg game, ever would have been stymied by bg2 trolls... which, btw, were in iwd (a black isle game) first outta the ie games. unforeseeable immunities or defenses is jackarse stoopid. is the same idiocy that makes folks nostalgic 'bout the tomb o' horrors crapfest from old d&d. so far we has encountered more reasonable tactical and strategic decision making in poe than in any o' the ie games, or in all put together. Reasonable. we had played d&d as far back as the white box edition, and when bg2 were released, we were having ZERO concern with trolls, but the mage spell defense layering were a complete different issue. dispel magic didn't dispel all magic protections after all. to be effective in bg2 mage combats, we had to know which spells could lower which defenses and which layers had to be peeled back first, and our pnp experience and previous crpg experience gave us little initial insight. what the hell, how many o' us old pnp vets ever had characters in the +10 level range? so to learn the nuances o' bg2 mage combat we resorted to trial and error or read a guide. we had fun with bg2, but our initial approach to bg2 mage combat were not the least bit tactical or strategic. more amusing is that in bg1 we didn't need any tactics save for one: haste + ranged weapons + mobs o' monster summons = win. if we got bored with a long and tedious battle, we could throw in a few fireballs (or easily purchased arrows o' detonation) as well as hitting enemies with grease or perhaps entangle. every battle. don't let those rose-hued glasses blind you, eh? in poe we is able, after a brief bit o' pain, to discern what foes is resistant to and what their will, fort, reflex and deflection ratings is. one encounter or two gives us a good chance to make rational decisions about how to defeat such foes. we can build parties ahead o' time to make full use o' and to be maximizing the abilities o' our fellow party members and we know that if we is Reasonably prepared, we won't be blindsided by a sudden confrontation with a bg2 demi-lich that, oh, btw, has different immunities than the ad&d variety. trolls? *snort* even so, your nostalgia is oddly misplaced as it calls to mind a horribly anachronistic approach that thankfully were abandoned along with ad&d insta kills, inexplicable druid xp progressions and nonsensical attribute bonuses. HA! Good Fun!

I was actually referring to people that commented specifically on the article on the website. fair enough HA! Good Fun!

well, no. mat516 seemed to express our concerns about the review already, so no need to repeat. the thing is, where matt no doubt read the whole thing, we couldn't. am admitting that we got a few paragraphs deep before we realized it were offering little more than a bad nostalgia flashback to too many rants we recall from a couple years o' poe development. the disenfranchised, limited by the obsidian message board medium, found a new outlet to release pent up vitriol? am not actually opposed to such rampages as Gromnir has indulged once... maybe twice. *shrug* lewis black at least tries to make us laugh when he does this kinda thing. no harm though. it is just a review. why do we need a review to tell us about a game we already played? have never made it through an entire codexian review since spazmo's debacle o' a toee review, but at least spazmo pretended as if he were giving tim cain a fair review. sensuki's link had us rolling our eyes after two paragraphs. HA! Good Fun!