Gromnir

did you post to prove us right? no spiritual successor. no bg2. you are objective terrible at this. so is clear, there is absolute nothing wrong with preferring kingmaker and wotr to poe and deadfire. am not sure if is still the case, but for a time, pathfinder were the most popular pnp rpg system, eclipsing d&d by a fair amount. people like pathfinder and d&d legacy. we also observed how in spite o' our opinion 'bout kingdom management in kingmaker and the buginess o' the title, the appeal and potential o' the title were not lost on us. there were plenty o' reasons why people could enjoy kingmaker more than poe or deadfire. however, multiple sarex observations is just objective wrong and/or misleading. the one million sales bit w/o recognizing the publisher announced after the 600k worth o' bundled sales? spiritual successor silliness? bg2? serious, why post image which confirms you are wrong on multiple points? HA! Good Fun!

weird. we went to an inner city chicago high school with metal detectors and drug sniffing dogs making frequent patrols o' lockers. not a us news and world reports top 100 high school. nevertheless, we got aristotle coverage... twice. admitted the second dose were for an ap course our school were offering first time evar and the five o' us in the "class" had to take during lunch. literal slept through most o' the course and did none o' the reading assignments. we do recall the greek philosophers getting coverage between our naps. converse, we got almost no texas history, so no doubt kp kicks our arse on texas history jeopardy questions. most o' the subject matter requirements for history is utter inconsequential from our pov. thanks to internet, facts is accessible to even the most limited student. way too much effort spent on breadth rather than depth. is our opinion history classes should focus. teach kids how to do research and get 'em thinking critical and teach 'em how to write. ... we mentioned how we attended a chicago high school. spend a semester in a chicago high school class teaching only turn o' the century labor issues in chicago would not be a waste IF were done in depth and with a focus on teaching kids how to teach themselves. all too often we see a shotgun approach to history being commonplace with an attempt to teach as many important events and personages as possible in a limited amount o' time. *descends from soapbox* HA! Good Fun! ps in reality am not finding all that weird that texas and illinois and california all teach middle and high school history different. is a US federalism thing whereby each state has its own standards and a few states, particular after nclb, went out o' their way to show they were not gonna be compelled to follow any national standards regardless o' what the folks in washington might legislate.

am not sure how many ways a person can be wrong, but perhaps you are trying to break records. 1) am thinking is arguable, and we agree, deadfire sales made apparent some poe purchasers were not interested in the sequel. not all. clear not all. most sequels undersell the original title, but obsidian observed how larian spent much more on the development o' their d:os sequel and managed to attract a bigger audience, so obsidan believed they were capable o' the same feat. mistake. possibly just a grammar fail by sarex with the "all"? wrong nevertheless. again, the deadfire fig campaign garnered more money than wotr kickstarter. is a safe bet many o' those fig backers for deadfire were looking forward to a sequel. duh. 2) you were the one who brought up spiritual successor, in spite o' fact obsidian never made such a claim. in spite o' being corrected 'bout the misrepresentation, you are returning to spiritual successor? who is stuck? however, since you insist... 3) the poe kickstarter notably did NOT mention bg2. so, wrong again. can check for yourself. however, obsidian went one step further and in an effort to manage expectations, distinguished bg2 specific via developer feedback. pointed out how seeing as bg2 were a sequel which had benefited from the contributions and additions o' multiple previous ie game developments, and recognizing poe would be the firstest game o' a new ip, comparisons to bg2 were unfair and unreasonable. most assured not bg2. 4) your syllogism is lacking. wotr sales will not change kingmaker sales. period. regardless, situations is much different for wotr compared to deadfire. you got a curious anticipatory confirmation bias all ready and waiting, but is not supported or convincing. 5) good luck finding the video as already noted, your memory is suspect. no bg2. no spiritual successor. HA! Good Fun! ps misspelled larian. weird

bad logic detector. develop your syllogism. sales o' deadfire failing to match expectations did not reduce sales o' poe. is a fact kingmaker sales exceeded a million after the outward bundle. is a fact the clearing o' one million threshold occurred three years after the release o' kingmaker. how many titles can you name which received a sudden spike in sales three years after the initial release w/o similar bundling? *chuckle* am recalling interplay did something similar with ps:t... announced a sales achievement but were sneaky in not mentioning such were achieved following a bundling with, of all things, soulbringer. not three years however. and am agreeing there is a market for crpgs. ok? now what? one reason we went and supported wotr in spite o' our criticisms o' kingmaker is 'cause it were functional the only option available for the kinda crpg we ordinarily prefer. we played the bg3 beta for a few hours and have no desire whatsoever to play more bg3. is a good chance if there were a poe3 being released simultaneous with wotr, we would never play a minute o' wotr, but such ain't reality. perhaps amusing, but o' the three new titles we played most in 2018, battletech is the one we continue to play and the other two titles were crpgs. sure, we put a whole lotta hours into deadfire, but battletech has had the enduring appeal. if there were a battletech sequel being released 2021, then am guaranteeing our wotr gameplay hours would be negligible. instead, we already has many hundreds o' hours invested in the wotr beta. HA! Good Fun! ps battletech is another case where lack o' a sequel is less telling than one might expect. pps anybody who got baited by specific by "spiritual successor" puffery deserves to be mocked and ridiculed. am s'posing is same people who act surprised when their new and improved laundry detergent doesn't clean any better than the previous version? oh, and to be clear, obsidian never claimed "spiritual successor." had this debate with @Amentep and others years past. were claim o' "homage" to past ie games. (edit: added the pps and homage link in part to lament the recognition there is absolute nothing new to be said on these issues.)

quest xp makes so much more sense than trying to tie an xp total to every possible action or activity. the obvious reward for disarming a trap is not being blown to smithereens by the trap. the reward for opening a lock is being able to take a shortcut past ______ or being able to loot whatever were in the locked chest. quest xp makes so developers need not try and balance xp rewards and it encourages creative gameplay. if sneaking past a bunch o' critters or bluffing your way outta a fight gets you closer to your goal, then you need not be concerned 'bout what happens when the player bluffs for an xp reward and then kills the enemies for xp. sure, not killing the goblins means you don't get their rusty swords and battered helmets, but you aren't sacrificing xp by choosing the non murder route. degenerative nonsense avoided. quest rewards make so awards is balanced and it also makes possible for players to achieve goals in ways even the developers did not expect w/o such efforts needing result in an xp sacrifice. HA! Good Fun!

you do realize this is a joke, yes? kingmaker sold over a million copies three years after initial release and the reason is 'cause the title were bundled with another title, outward, which sold over 600k copies. so the publisher claimed kingmaker sold in excess o' a million copies 'cause 600k + kingmaker solo sales = more than 1 million copies. and the anecdotal, i beat it without a problem stuff is always amusing 'cause is not difficult to find equal compelling anecdotal from many others who sudden found their endgame kingmaker party useless, in part 'cause that is what pathfinder does to the uninitiated player and also 'cause owlcat implementation o' stat bloat to account for reload makes the situation worse for those playing w/o knowledge o' the system and the game itself. build a party with feats and spells appropriate for early game and you may be roll stomping your way to victory for dozens o' hours, only to find that sudden at mid or late levels you can't hit anything with spells or weapons and you can't defend from a constant barrage o' sneak attacks. is not that those players complaining o' kingmaker difficulty spikes were stoopid, but they didn't know in spite of all the available choices, there were a far more limited number o' right ways to play a pathfinder game. pathfinder has trap build and trap feats and trap spells. not enuff special weapons feels? can't respond to that one. is a legit observation though 'cause feels is important, just not particular helpful. that said, am thinking the poe2 approach were much better for weapons than were poe with the ability to customize many weapons a major improvement o' the sequel. it was bad 'cause josh hates ie games? *chuckle* am thinking obsidian did make a mistake and underestimated nostalgia. pillars was never gonna be bg3 although many expected such. no d&d license, so pillars couldn't be bg3 in any event. couldn't be pathfinder for same reasons. so developers tried to identify what made the ie games fun and with poe they achieved great success with many players (which is why the fig campaign for deadfire brought in more money by a fair amount than did the wotr kickstarter... if you want a money argument,) but the problem is that poe turned out being niche and the developers o' deadfire made clear they were going for more niche than were poe. all the d&d, pathfinder and ie game purists who played poe and realized it were not bg3 were not happy to hear that deadfire were gonna get even more distant from the rosy-hued memories o' bg2. obsidian spent far more money on the deadfire development than they did on poe, but they were curious unaware they were making a game with more narrow appeal. and yeah, josh admitted he didn't particular like ie game implementation o' d&d rules, but josh were not the boss on poe. that point appears to be forgotten. what josh did do was he asked the frothing purists offended by poe implementation why per kill xp rewards, pre-buffing, hard counters, spells which became useless after a few levels, prerequisite feats which were individually useless but essential for some later feat or power, and a multitude o' other ie game or d&d staples were essential to a spiritual successor to the ie games? never got decent answers. the problem josh and obsidian made is that they were rational. ignore the, "How PoE weapon, armors and other items never felt special," 'cause such an observation is wholly subjective and kinda meaningless don't change fact people still had their feels. is a significant % of poe backers and purchasers who were expecting their idealized bg3 and when they didn't get it, they were quits with the franchise. am suspecting obsidian, in part 'cause poe were an ip created by obsidian, coulda' made profitable poe games for many years, but deadfire were a colossal blunder o' expectations. obsidian spent more resources making the poe sequel when they shoulda' realized the were necessarily selling to a smaller audience than poe enjoyed. fig campaign revealed just how much support there were for a poe sequel, but while the dollar numbers were better than poe or wotr kickstarters, the number o' backers were actual diminished. obsidian created a rabid fanbase for a homegrown ip and then flubbed the sequel by failing to recognize those rabid fans were more niche and less numerous than poe purchasers. one o' the longest pre release poe threads were ie purists complaining 'bout the announced absence o' per kill exp. serious. there were just no reasoning with the feels crowd, but they were earnest and they were disappointed by poe. HA! Good Fun! (edit) full disclosure: never finished kingmaker 'cause it were so buggy and the terribleness o' kingdom building severe undershot our minimum threshold for fun. however, we understood the appeal o' the title regardless o' fact it wrecked the best part o' the pnp ap. kingmaker appeal were not writing or, ironic, kingdom building. kingmaker were a pathfinder game which implemented a pathfinder ap allowing folks to fully indulge the addictive loot and level grind while presenting players with a decent realization o' paizo combat encounters. is a whole lotta bloat and trash in the pathfinder rules, but (ignoring bugs for the moment) owlcat did a decent job o' implementing pathfinder and they made the game look nice and play intuitive. we couldn't finish kingmaker, but we saw the potential and we understood the appeal.

is why the second battle with raedric and his undead minions were similar memorable. vithrack and the radiant spore also posed similar issues. 'course the adra dragon were memorable, and a few o' the fights with ogre druids were requiring Gromnir to come up with tactics different from that which had been effective earlier in the game. lagufaeth broodmothers were memorable, particular given how the attendant mobs went direct for our backline squishies. concelhaut weren't too bad for us, and the alpine dragon were less troublesome than were the adra dragon encounter, but the darn monks at the abbey of the fallen moon initial gave us a fair bit of trouble, and the llengrath encounter were requiring a few reloads to get right. etc. ... what were we talking 'bout? how not memorable were the poe fights? now for poe2... *chuckle* biggest difference 'tween the memorable fights in poe and wotr thus far is not challenge but rather the ludicrous pre buffing ritual we need endure for wotr battles of note. HA! Good Fun!

got a couple crusade bugs, one o' which may impede further logistics progress, so following completion o' midnight fane, am taking a bit o' a break in the hope a few issues get fixed. am thinking if we want relative unencumbered crusade and story progression, it is likely we need replay a significant portion o' chapter three 'cause o' our angel mythic path quirk and 'cause o' crusade bugs, so am reluctant to keep plunging ahead. HA! Good Fun!

have not seen it mentioned in patch notes, but as far as we know, ranged weapons, when mounted, is not functioning in tb mode. am mmaking this observation 'cause were our intention to stick lann on a dog and have him rush forward into melee range and snap shot the stuffing outta everything. with excellent ac, lann is an ideal frontline archer. HA! Good Fun!

with the crusade, 'cause the rules is hidden, am not even certain what is busted. we no longer get a prompt to upgrade forts to bastions. is this a bug or is there a max number o' bastions for logistics five? we got a fortress upgrade option and from the patch notes am now suspecting such were a bug. am also thinking that were the point we stopped getting fort-->bastion decrees. our current run is likely borked in multiple different ways and am not actual expecting retroactive fixes. might need to reload a save from the start o' chapter three. HA! Good Fun!

had a yellow banner in act two 'cause road to drezen literal only counted the direct road to drezen battles. side battles and exploration had us in the yellow more than once. in act three we had a bug upgrading a bastion to fortress. literal had to replay many hours 'cause we couldn't figure out what were the issue, but am suspecting that the game mistaken checks to see if you have minimum resources for the upgrade not only when you initial choose to upgrade but also when the days needed for the upgrade elapse. had a permanent exclamation mark for crusade and we kinda tracked down to the fortress upgrade never having been implemented, which also functional locked up our logistics rank. am also suspecting am never gonna be able to upgrade at least three relics. was informed a few relics has a leadership requirement in addition to stated diplomacy, but we got leadership four, diplomacy five and am nevertheless unable to upgrade soulshear, chillroar hide and tusks and the crest of the fallen knight. not a big deal save would be a nice addition for sosiel to have an upgraded soulshear. crusade has become a headache but am also concerned by how deep am into chapter three w/o a few companion quests initiating. we considered the release to be nothing more than another beta stage, so is not a shock to us am facing issues. am given to understand the bugs multiply as one adds chapters, which also is confirming our expectations. am disappointed by a few bugs which has been 'round since the initial beta, including skald issues, but am not able to even pretend surprise the game is an unfinished product. HA! Good Fun!

good to know. is much 'bout the current crusade system which is obscure. given the four day timer for morale loss w/o a battle victory and the thirty day timer for capture o' forts, we were being restrained in our efforts to send out armies and crush the opposition blitzkrieg style. our current main army is able to beat the snot out o' any and all comers on the chapter three map, but have been cautious 'cause o' the damnable timers. do the rando demon army spawns count towards the four day timer? we assumed they did not, but am also aware we got zero to base such an assumption 'pon. am also concerned numerous chapter three companion quests is not advancing as anticipated and other than ivory sanctum, we got few map points which remain un explored. HA! Good Fun!

you do realize Gromnir seeming to be a "know-it-all" does not in any way preclude the recognition o' your lack o' knowledge, yes? you spout off 'bout issues you obvious have extreme limited knowledge concerning and then make broad generalizations relying on what you so clear do not know or misrepresent. Gromnir's elitism is relevant to such a flaw in what way? don't blame us for your lack o' knowledge. instead, given your newfound awareness there is a possibility some know-it-all elitist is gonna challenge your absence o' facts or support when you make a generalization or posit a conclusion, maybe first do the work and educate self instead. this way, instead o' complaining when persons highlight your error or ignorance, you may instead have a knowledgeable response. again, notice you ain't defending the notion there has been an absence o' american generals o' integrity since civil war. your complaint is 'bout Gromnir. reflect for a moment and you are gonna see how such a response does not make you appear less ignorant. you posit an extreme example, but once again am observing there is a difference 'tween rightness and requirements o' being a general in the US military. the decisions milley made is purposeful taken outta the hands o' the military leadership and given over to civilian authority. can't have generals ignoring civilian commanders, even if is the right thing to do. again, is possible to be moral right and ethic wrong. as such am seeing no conflict in the recognition that if allegations is true, it is appropriate to fire milley and even to kick him outta the military while at the same time observing milley deserves to be applauded for resisting tyranny. HA! Good Fun!

none since civil war? serious? am not surprised by your ignorance. immediate thought o' general william sharp who when he reluctant surrendered to the japenese, he refused to identify the identities o' his filipino soldiers to his captors. the general suffered torture until 1945 'cause o' his integrity and died short after final being rescued. hardly a solitary example from ww2. is also a fair number o' examples o' post civil war american generals and admirals who were punished for speaking truth to power, which isn't too surprising 'cause is a notoriously american thing to do. doing the right thing is often the hard choice because it exposes the righteous man/woman to legit punishment. have mentioned previous, but is a poor kept secret o' the criminal defense bar that a noteworthy % o' "anonymous tips" which lead to capture/prosecution o' criminals is lawyers calling the police to provide info regarding their clients or the associates o' said clients. ethics violation. if is info gained via privilege and is 'bout past crime, then is verboten for an attorney to divulge info. more rare than the anonymous call to authorities is the lawyer who public shares info with the Court or cops. so imagine a situation where 'cause o' police error, a criminal is about to have murder charges dropped. it happens. exclusionary rule here in the US is a bit o' an outlier as we not only punish cops for failure, but we allow the guilty to avoid justice when cops, prosecutors or judges make mistakes. so, knowing her client is about to be set free 'cause o' some kinda fruit of the poisonous tree fail, a lawyer tells the court 'bout the additional three adolescents his client killed and dumped in a new jersey landfill, victims which the cops is unaware. is arguable the lawyer in our example did the moral thing by communicating with the authorities. even so, the lawyer should lose her license to practice law. what milley did were unethical and consequences is appropriate. assuming the allegations regarding milley in the book is true, am reassured by the knowledge the general chose to protect the nation even if it meant sacrificing his career to do so, but such a recognition does not mean milley should go unpunished. september 28 testimony will be... interesting. HA! Good Fun!

which is precise why the initial question were creating confusion. well, seems you got the answer regardless. finished blackwater, a bunch o' crusade stuff, as well as companion quests for seelah and sosiel. leadership would appear to be the one stat am lacking insofar as the crusade is concerned. most o' the leadership options is appearing to be timed events (other than recruiting devas for 80 power a pop?) so am not quite sure what am doing wrong. oh well, we has purposeful allowed two demon forts to remain and enough demon armies to get us through an additional +two months o' calendar time w/o suffering morale loss. am nevertheless gonna wail and moan like a poopy pants toddler if our angel mythic is busted and am doing all this for naught. HA! Good Fun!

democrats don't vote... or such was the ordinary case until the last Presidential election. one reason why arnold schwarznegger won the office o' governor in a recall election is 'cause democrats didn't vote then either. in the past, democrats rare came out to vote unless a candidate somehow did the unthinkable and inspired hope. am thinking the gop needs be a bit concerned. all their shenanigans with voting restrictions and past gerrymandering is gonna be for naught in national elections if democrats come out and vote, 'cause math says there is more democrats than republicans. elder's "un-california" policies, which a few years ago woulda' been sounding all kinda fringe even for a gop candidate, were all kinda trumpy. not fringe. in california, democrats did what they almost never do: they voted. the reason why they voted is 'cause the polarization embraced by the nation has a significant % o' people genuine afraid what will happen to them if the other guys win. counter-intuitive, but trump is good for democrats. trump candidates and trump and trump politics has people frightened enough to vote. no longer need a democrat candidate who inspires hope. trumpy candidates inspire enough fear to convince democrats to vote. ... california is also one o' those states which mails ballots to pretty much every age-appropriate individual with a valid driver's license. ca might be misleading, but georgia during the last presidential election saw historic kinda turnout and that were after stacy abrahms successful championed near universal managed mail-in ballots sent to folks with a valid driver's license. democrats in washington dc maybe need be a bit more strategic and focused with their voting rights efforts. trump candidates is gonna encourage democrats who typical do not bother to vote to exercise the franchise. even so, is human nature to be lazy. the more hurdles there is to voting, the less likely young people in particular will do so. am knowing democrats wanna enshrine a laundry list o' voting rights to endure for perpetuity, but am thinking if you get legislation passed which would guarantee universal mail-in registration/ballots, that would be an enormous win and coupled with trumpy candidates who has democrats afraid the next senator or President is gonna be a pro-insurrectionist and anti-vaxxer is enough motivation to convince democrats to use their mail-in options. HA! Good Fun!

am not understanding the question. retrieval o' the sword of valor is the primary goal of chapter two. won't find it in camp. HA! Good Fun!

terrible part is am not knowing if our game is busted and won't know until chapter four when a certain pivotal npc is required to advance quests. maybe won't know 'til later. game says we didn't save her, but we spoke to her same as usual in drezen after attaining level four mythic for angel, so... am level thirteen (perhaps 1/4 o' the way to fourteen) and am about to start blackwater, but have been doing crusade purposeful slow, and we already spent a day doing nothing save the aforementioned area. got at least a couple days before we make it to the end of chapter three. first world problems if ever there were one. we roll our eyes as folks jabber on 'bout the recent met gala-- who wore what and showed up with whom? who cares? 'course here we is getting annoyed by a pc game we knew would be bugged? ... unfortunate, recognition o' the triviality does not decrease our frustration. HA! Good Fun!

personal we got a six month wait rule, but we contributed to the kickstarter and paid for beta, so would be kinda weird if after six months o' buggy beta testing we sudden decided the game were too unstable to play. aside, there is a new patch o' +9gb. no notes as yet. we got a couple extreme annoying bugs (missing feats for camellia and animal companions) and am dubious this patch will fix those issues. am having one possible game stopper nobody else has mentioned at owlcat boards, so am having even less confidence our biggest problem is gonna be addressed. replayed a portion o' the game many times trying to find a workaround to what may or may not be a serious roadblock for a mythic path am not wanting to play another few dozen hours only to find advancement hampered or stymied. HA! Good Fun! edit:https://steamcommunity.com/app/1184370/eventcomments/3044985412487813247/ pps another bug which ain't game breaking but is unfortunate is the inability to use ranged weapons in tb mode while mounted. is a known issue and has not been addressed the last couple patch iterations, which is hindering the usefulness o' our snapshot lann. on the positive side o' the ledger, am gonna assume camellia will be able to take the intimidating display hex. not sure if we need respec to fix.

almost 3:30 am pst and there is an update o' ~3.5gb. am not certain what are the fixes. we had finished chapter two yesterday and were debating holding off on more wotr gaming until a few crusade bugs were addressed. mayhap the wait will be shorter than anticipated. (edit) patch notes. a few notables fixed. a few notables missing. HA! Good Fun!

the question is less straightforward than it might appear to be at first glance. wotr provides so many options and one suspects a great many options are working properly or if they are not, most people won't realize if a roll that should be a functional 10% boost is only providing 8%. the thing is, based on board feedback, a few mythic paths are not advancing properly due to either quest issues or mechanics problems. also, if you are unlucky or unknowing and choose a broken class, spells or feats, then no doubt a wotr gaming experience will be frustrating. regardless, it is rare when the best advice regarding a pc game release would be other than delaying your initial purchase for a few months. there is a good chance the game will drop in price after six months or so (not always) and you most certainly will be playing a more stable product after a few robust patches have fixed many problems. for this individual, the game is not unplayable in its current state, but such is because our expectations were for the wotr release to be a functional additional beta stage. HA! Good Fun! ps am already having invested dozens of hours into the game and the end of chapter two (of six total chapters) is gonna happen sometime today. am suspecting less pokey players have gotten a fair bit deeper into the game. not unplayable, but not polished by any means and there is a few bugs which could result in significant frustration depending on your character and quest choices.

can't use ranged weapons on a mount while in tb. is a number of tb quirks regarding mounted combat. a few is dispelled with a simple switch to rt for a second, but not all. in drezen we have had multiple party members drop through floors; that bug almost feels nostalgic. demonslayer favored enemies feature does not play well with other similar features. most obvious quirk is another oldie: sacred huntsmaster and demonslayer favored enemies features overlap different 'depending on which class gets fe first. and what's with the flying mug? etc. is a few minor crusade bugs so far but am given to understand they proliferate more than a little in act 3. oh, and is worth noting the upgraded army units current are in most instances not upgrades. would appear the base units were improved at some point by owlcat but they never bothered to give enhanced units a proportional power boost so now the base units often outperform the enhanced versions. HA! Good Fun!

reality is a harsh mistress. am recalling an owlcat developer mentioning pre beta that one thing they learned from kingmaker were to avoid the timer and so wotr quests and crusade management weren't gonna be near as punishing from a time management aspect as were the case in their previous title. then the beta happened and people advanced the calendar by 10 years to build sooper armies. owlcat solution: create a timer for crusade management. crude and lacking in creativity were the owlcat response to beta players predictable breaking the crusade/army management model, but such a response were not entirely unforeseeable. we didn't genuine expect a back to the drawing board approach, but am nevertheless disappointed by how blunt were the owlcat efforts. HA! Good Fun!

is worth noting that the fact we are having a discussion 'bout cheesey and/or well developed crpg characters requires the recognition o' multiple improbabilities. consider your favorite all-time crpg companions. any o' them pre-ps:t? possible dogmeat, and is not 'cause he were well written. ps:t were the first game where companion development were a focus o' the title, and ps:t did not sell. chris avellone, for all our criticism, deserves a whole lotta credit for changing the fundamental crpg paradigm. chris took a chance and complete altered the way crpgs were made and he did so with a sales failure for black isle and interplay. 'course is questionable if the change(s) mr. avellone brought about woulda' stuck if not for the success o' bg2. bioware also deserves more credit than many is willing to offer. bg1 sold and sold well with a multitude o' companions who had little to offer beyond the four corners o' their character record sheet and a handful o' vo catch phrases. ps:t is released and does not sell well. so in spite o' folks such as Gromnir and others pushing for better character development o' the bg2 companions, what motivation were there for bio to do so save for fact that the biowarians were also fans o' ps:t regardless o' underwhelming sales? bio looked with envy 'pon what chris avellone achieved and wondered how to make such crpg storytelling marketable. sneer if you will, but game developers is in the business o' selling games. too many ps:t players were unable to enjoy the wall o' text dialogues from a few ps:t companions. solution: bioware implemented a loose three-line guideline for bg2 dialogues. just one example o' bio changes. primarily as a cost and time saving approach, black isle, the developer who made ps:t, released iwd before bg2 and they cut companions complete from their title. iwd ended up saving black isle's arse 'cause it sold well and were cheap. so what happens if bg2 has companions same old same old as bg1? diablo 2 is released during same time as bg2 and iwd and is worth recalling that the diablo clones were the most popular crpgs o' the day. does ps:t style companion development become a functional one off? regardless, an aspect o' crpg development most take for granted were hardly obvious back in early 2000. the fact we all assume companions should be developed beyond a cheesy catchphrase is the result o' improbabilities. just sayin' HA! Good Fun!

at least through chapter four, is nothing too significant lost by going full merc party. do the companion quests for the loot and then just leave 'em in camp is gonna short you a handful o' dialogue options you don't want anyways. but serious, is writing for a crpg and not a novel. by the very nature o' the medium you got limited dialogue-centric opportunities for developing character and then you drop those characters into a chosen one story where gods and demon lords are fighting and not just through proxies. tolkien addressed a similar issue by abandoning character development almost entirely. is almost no plot driven fantasy fiction being written nowadays and we wouldn't be talking 'bout cheesy characters if the tolkien approach were actual in vogue and embraced by owlcat. we would get bg level o' companion interaction and wouldn't think twice 'bout how coran were the most developed character, and a deadbeat dad at that. however, am gonna need repeat once more so is clear, am acknowledging owlcat writing efforts is at best eye-roll worthy. "writing o' the companions (writing period) were kinda sucktastic in kingmaker. does not bode well if one cares 'bout narrative issues. am thinking owlcat should kinda play to their hack n' slash strengths rather than getting themselves into a situation where enjoyment o' a title depends on quality o' writing."-- Gromnir, 12/5/2019 owlcat writing in kingmaker were not a highpoint o' the title, and wotr, by the very nature o' the story elements which is fixed via the contributions o' paizo, were making it so that anybody expecting other than cheese from owlcat's second title were optimistic beyond reason. ... from our pov, listening to people complain about owlcat taking the wrath of the righteous ap and making it cheesey is similar to listening to folks complain 'bout the acting and character development in pr0n. yes, the acting and character development in pr0n is almost w/o exception laughable, but is a curious complaint, no? HA! Good Fun!