JFutral

I am curious if anyone has any insight on the game's AI and equipment used when fighting enemies versus the left overs after the fight. I mean, for enemies that mostly drop only basic (whether base, fine, exceptional, or superb) weapons and armor most of the time, with the few exceptions of unique magic items, the computer enemies do some serious damage and escape damage until usually at least one play through to figure out a strategy. Only when my players get high enough level do I feel like I can just charge into combat with minimal buffs to take out certain groups of enemies. Just curious, Joe

1&2. Baldur's Gate I&II, even though I never felt like my spell casters couldn't really get off many (if any) high level spells. I still go back and play BGII from time to time. 3. Neverwinter Night, primarily the user generated modules. NWN2 was a sad attempt to update the original. 3.5 I really enjoyed Diablo 1&2, but 3 was also a bust. Joe

I had him at the same time as a visitor and also wanting to sell me stuff. Two times, too. Joe

Are you talking about the resting bonus? Or is there some other benefit with Survival that I missed as I am still unsure of all the intricacies of the game? Joe

I'm not sure how the NPCs stats are figured. My next play through his Mech stats weren't as high. I don't know if they are predetermined or rolled each time. Or maybe my memory is faulty, which is just as likely. Joe

My first play through I think I used Aloth until I came across Durance, who seemed to have a good bit of mechanics when I found him. It took me a while to get used to the idea that I didn't _need_ a rogue. As such it was problematic to get someone with high enough Mech points to be useful later in the game until I got used to the notion of respecing someone to better fit the bill. I still felt like I never got it right. So the next playthrough I "hired" a rogue. I really enjoyed that character and decided to restart the game as a rogue. That was a lot of fun. This playthrough I decided to use Grieving Mother (now that I better understand ciphers. I usually dropped her quickly after finding her, not understanding how useful a cipher can be. I mean most of the enemies were dead. How could a mindbender affect undead? Seemed like built in immunity to me.) Besides I want to finally complete her quest. But once again I keep hitting the ceiling of how much I can put into her Mech points in WM I Durgan's Battery quests. So I ditched her for a short while and used the NPC mechanical rogue. Now she's back and we'll see how she does. I respeced her to max Mech points and Weapon Focus the Storm-thingy hunting bow. Joe

Next thing you'll tell me it is possible to play a computer RPG without killing things! Joe

I'm such a lazy player. I almost always forget about food, potions, and scrolls. Out of sight out of mind..... until PotD kicked my a** right off the bat. There was no way, with my play style anyway, that I would have made it to level 5 in any semblance of sanity without any of that. The Combat mode of so many things still annoys the crap out of me and still makes no sense other than an imposed limitations for some sort of game balance sake. I still have to consciously remember all those special abilities and items under the "backpack" icon, for some strange reason. I still forget, especially as my party gets stronger and the combat gets easier. This is one reason I've started using a rogue—I set a couple of traps, keep the bulk of my party set behind those, then send my rogue sneaking in to initiate combat [eta: with ranged weapon] and use his retreat skill to get back before any "engagement" stalls him. That gives my party some time to buff with a spell or potion before the combat _actually_ starts. Somehow in PotD all the enemies seem to be able to get off spells faster than my party at the beginning of combat. I don't know if this is deliberate or I am missing something in my builds. Joe

I liked the game provided party members. They added a nice ambience to the game, particularly their banter with each other. A couple of the quests are lame, but they also added nice flavor. JMO, Joe

I don't know if you fell into the same trap I did when I played my first game. I came with traditional D&D style character thinking—from Baldur's Gate and NWN, type characters. A wizard here can actually be a fairly good weapon wielder. Not sure why but my wizards usually are my default choice for the Gyrd scepter. But the thing I couldn't shale through most of my first play through is there are no weapon restrictions. And the attribute preferences for class are a bit more non-specific. So you can equip wiz with any weapon that makes sense to you and wiz can do respectable damage. So low level wizards aren't as completely useless at combat as they are in other games. But then, even if you want to keep the focus on spells, it is easy enough to craft some scrolls to sling. That said, there are a LOT of nuances to this game that I am still trying to figure out (the whole weapon speed vs recovery speed thing, and, I think, the whole unnecessary hit (pun intended) to accuracy issue using a shield can create. Not sure why this game has it in for one-handed weapons, used singly or dual-wielding). And only being able to use food to prebuff is an odd wrinkle. If you are game, I would suggest a druid as your next character, if you like spell slingers. Druids here are actually pretty darn decent—a good selection of useful spells and can actually do damage with either weapons or shape-shifted. But I did enjoy my barbarian, too, even though I didn't have a clue how to best use her. I used her as a tank, but it seems heavy armor starts to affect some of the barbarian specific talents. Others here can probably help with that unless I am just plain wrong. Joe

Hmm. An RPG that doesn't require combat. Are you sure? That sounds wrong. Joe

Yeah, I've noticed the difference one level can make! I may be coming from too much Diablo/NWN/BG in this case, but if you aren't killing things early on, how in the world do you get enough experience to level up soon enough? Particularly when the Vale is your primary base. The few side quests there are don't award that much. And I am really talking PotD/Expert mode. Nothing was difficult under that difficulty. Joe eta: I will say only recently did I understand that, particularly with the cipher, much of the CC skills are fairly enemy agnostic. I had to change my thinking from "mental" effects to... IDK... something else. I mean really, how do you muck with an undead's mind?

Just saying that in PotD on Expert mode I found it more difficult to win battles with a lot of lower level characters than fewer higher level characters. So it doesn't really help to have a larger party if they just aren't strong enough to do damage, much less kill. But like I said, too, I could just be bad at this game. If you've done this already, let me know how. It kicked my butt. My most successful strategy was setting traps and drawing the enemy out across them to at least soften them up. Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn't if they had healing of any sort (self or a battery of clerics). YMMV, Joe

Yeah, the convenience thing was big on my list, too. It just didn't work out as strategically as I thought I would. Somewhere around level 7/6 or 8/7 it ll starts to even out a bit in terms of having a strong party to tackle most things. But it sure was hell trying to get there. I think I made it harder on myself than I needed to. I probably could have waited until at least level 3 or 4 before filling out my party fully. That's about when you have found enough gak to equip the party dcently enough. I mean, you have to sell off some useful stuff to get marginal benefit. IMO. YMMV. Joe eta: Or I could just be really bad at this game. I can't discount that. I have found myself enchanting and crafting a whole lot more than I did before.

I am just about half way through Act 2 in PotD/Expert Mode. My biggest regret early on was actually trying to completely fill out my party. By the time I got to Gilded Vale (not knowing the trick to sell everything at the camp! Good tip to remember!) I think I had enough to sell and pick up two or three (I'd have to boot the game to remember better) companions. Then I went back and cleared out the previous area, ran all the side quests in the Vale that were easy enough, and built up to a total party of 5 to start the temple ruins. A bit of the way through that I picked up my 6th. The reason I think this was a mistake is I think (unless I don't understand how experience is distributed, which could absolutely be possible) I hobbled everyone's leveling up possibilities. I don't think it is a coincidence that you only really get two jNPCs early on. It made getting everyone to level three extremely difficult and some encounters were just impossible before that. Or maybe I should have made my main character a fighter type instead of a wizard. I can't remember which major battle it was, but pretty much everyone was healing faster than I could do damage no matter the buffs or protections. I think I just got everyone leveled up enough for the main quests again and get further than the Ogres in Endless Paths. I tried one of the bounties and got spanked pretty well for a solid 40 or so restarts (yes, i get like a dog with a bone sometimes). Finally everything rolled in my favour. I figure I'll wait a little longer before the next bounty. All that to say I think getting a party of 6 early on is over rated, even if somewhat fulfilling to have a full party. Joe

I haven't played many RPGs, just the popular ones like BG, Diablo, or NWN. I wish these would make it tactically neutral if not beneficial to play more zoomed in. The graphics are really quite nice on all of them, but it is hard to stay that zoomed in when you need to know what is going on as far out from your position as possible or to keep an eye on the "big picture" of combat. I just feel like I miss so much of the great graphics work the developers have poured in just to be able to stay alive and keep tactical advantage. Joe

It's been kind of annoyingly fun to see my reputation all over the place with Expert Mode turned on. I didn't always agree that some of the choices matched with the reputation associated with it and a couple of times I found myself saying "That's Rational? Really? Okay..." Joe

This was an interesting read. This is why I couldn't figure out why be or use a cipher since few of your opponents are human or kith. Apparently that doesn't matter. Good to know. Although I would think immunity level based on difficulty setting could be easily enough implemented. I still fondly remember figuring out how to use a Lightning Spearazon on the Hell difficulty setting in Diablo II! Joe

Ah! Expert mode! That must be it. I don't ever remember selecting that, but there it was. I'll deselect it and play again later to see if that solves things. It's only my third play-through, but Normal was too easy except just to get a good overview of the game, and Hard was disappointingly not hard. I must have hit that at some point thinking it affected combat difficulty. I have to admit, now, though, that PotD/Expert is exceptionally challenging and I'm not sure I won't to turn Expert mode off. I mean the jump in difficulty from Hard to PotD was not what I was expecting (now _every_ encounter is life or death). I just wish the NPC voices were distinctive enough (not the jNPCs, I'm using my own "team") to know who was speaking when they say their weapon isn't doing anything. Thanks! I feel better now. Joe

Maybe it is a PotD setting, then. A lot of information is truncated. I just wish i knew what was the immunity and that the characters voices or comments were distinct enough to know who isn't doing any damage. Joe

In different situations every once in a while I hear a character say something like "My weapon is useless" (I forget the exact phrase) or sometimes i see the text "Immune" float up above an enemy. But I can't find what any of that is referencing. Who is saying to use a different weapon? What attack was the enemy immune to? I pause and scroll through the text window but that is next to useless. It tells me thing I usually can already figure out, just not info I want more details about. Am I looking in the wrong place? Am I not supposed to figure these things out? Is that part of the game experience? For all the issues with BG battle mechanics I could always pretty much figure out who was doing what in combat and what needed to change. I feel like I am missing something that is probably painfully obvious to veteran players. Thanks, Joe

I haven't read all the comments, so if I am needlessly repeating something, my apologies. I am fairly new to this game and only have a few thoughts. I appreciate that this is not a BG or NWN clone per se and that they are presenting some new perspectives to the game. I keep that in mind as I play. After two runs through (twice with different sets of jNPCs, and this third time with my own NPCs) I am still trying to get the hang of the whole damage and damage reduction mechanics and how that affects weapon or spell choice. It is not very intuitive, but it is unique for me. Health vs Endurance is still confusing, but I am getting it in terms of how to play it. I am still baffled why a priest can't heal health. In terms of weapons it is never really clear if I have a found good weapon, especially if it is a unique. Do other players just keep a battery of weapons handy and change out as appropriate? Heck, I feel the same about the armor, too. I just don't know how to build an effective tank or cannon in this game. All the variations of debilitating conditions (stun, fazed, prone, stuck, confused, etc.) and all the differing counter spells are quite a challenge to keep track of. And sometimes useless. I gave up choosing any of the skills or abilities that supposedly increase my defense against such conditions because as soon as I leveled up that defense, it seemed my character became even more susceptible. At the very least it did not help. So I don't know if the buff is bugged or just nerfed beyond usefulness. I wish the Watcher abilities were more compelling. Most of the time I forget I have them. Sometimes I don't see how they would be beneficial. I certaily don't see the effect they have on enemies. What is the point of messing with someone's mind if they are dead or a bug? Does a spider really feel dread? I wish my NPCs could contribute to skill/talent based conversation options. I may not have high Intelligence, Lore, or Perception, but I have an NPC who does. Surely, if he is my colleague he or she would pipe up and offer advice. And while I get the idea of balance, not being able to buff up with _something_ when 'Enemy Spotted' before going into combat makes no sense whatsoever. Surely I would quickly quaff one potion or cast one protection spell. The modality restrictions don't always make sense. So while I get and can appreciate the principal of game play balance, we are still supposed to be epic heroes of a sort. If I've taken the time and skill/ability/talent slot to give my character some defense against Prone, for example, it would be great if he was actually more defended against Prone. I feel like the drive to provide a more "balanced" game also flattens out the character and interest potential of a character driven games somewhat. Well, it definitely makes it more complex. I am sure some of this will make more sense and I'll better understand some of the mechanics as I play more. It was enjoyable enough that I am playing again, so there's that. I mean, sometimes it works out great. As I said in another thread, I feel like my spell casters have a chance for high level spells to make a difference. In BG it always seemed like by the time my spell casters cast a high level spell, one side or the other was already dead, so I wasted a spell. Or by the time my spell caster could get off a high level spell, like Time Stop, the enemy was immune. WTF? Or it was otherwise too easy to get one-shotted. Balance does have its benefits. Just some thoughts, Joe

My only real complaint is not being able to prep for a battle when I spot an enemy. This whole spot enemy vs start combat delineation doesn't make sense in my world. Well, sort of, but not how is affects game mechanics. I do get that as a way to balance the whole BG and eve NWN, IIRC, way of buffing before a fight. But really, if I see an enemy and want to engage I would fully expect to be able to at least drink a potion or cast a quick protection spell before engaging. And isn't engagement a way to balance the whole pre-combat buffing thing anyway? I mean, obviously it is harder to sneak when I am casting a spell or drinking a potion, so engagement kicks in to inhibit further buffs. And when I am not in combat mode the buffs deplete faster. Seems there is a better way. I still don't get the cipher class. I may be thinking too hard about this one. Sort of also follows my confusion about Watcher special abilities. With so many undead I am uncertain about those spells/abilities efficacy. Seems like fkcing with an enemy's mind or soul when they are already "dead" is useless. But I probably don't understand the thinking here. Otherwise, I do like the combat mechanics over the BG engine. I feel like I can actually use the high level spells before getting nerfed. In BG I always felt like by the time my spell casters got off a high level spell everyone on one side or the other was already dead. I do wish the important battles scaled a little better. After the expansions, by the time I got to the end game at max level, Thaos was pretty easy to take down, even when adjusting to "hard" when prompted by the game when it thinks I am a high level. Or maybe level cap should vary depending on party size. Nah, that won't work, either. I'm not usually fan of level caps, but so much of the game gets too easy by the time I get to certain points in either the core game or the expansions. I also waited until max level (post expansions) to take out the final boss in the endless dungeon's quest and that was pretty painless. So obviously I waited too long to fight that battle. Or maybe there is a better order to handle the WM1, WM2, and core game? There was/is a lot of little, but important. nuances to get used to coming from other game systems (like the whole slew of disabling conditions that each seem to need their own counter spells—charmed, confusion, dazed, stunned, etc, Oy!). But it is enjoyable all the same. Joe