JFutral

Deja vu all over again! Joe

Worst: Wizards in general. Out of all the spell caster rethinking I feel like wizards were harmed the most. In PoE I I liked that wizards actually contributed to combat, unlike in BG where the goal was to have as many magic missile or chromatic orb spells memorized as possible, and maybe a few chain lighting spells. Now in DF, especially with casting times, the best way for my wizard to contribute consistently is using a wand or scepter. Seems counter intuitive t having a wizard along. Spell school subclasses is a great idea, but I don't think the depth of spells are there, outside evoker and possibly conjurer. I don't see why my wizard has to be forced to select a weapon proficiency. Grimoires were weird in PoE I to get used to. Now I have no idea how they will work. Will I really need a battery of grimoires to have access to various spells? And is a quick slot really necessary for them to hangout until I want a different grimoire? Or did I miss something in the beta (which is entirely possible)? Out of all the changes to spell casters, wizards seem the most adversely affected to me. I'm not a big cipher fan, so I can't speak to them. Druids and Priests have other abilities that make them useful outside of casting spells. But Wizards, to me, are supposed to be spell casting specialists. That seems hampered now. Joe

I'd be willing to give up more weapon proficiencies for added spell capacity. I have a spell caster to cast spells. Optionally, of course, for those who want to create fighting wizard. Joe

I have nothing to really add. Some of it is hard to judge since the beta is such a deliberately limited experience. But in terms of mechanics and what is currently known about the game with the beta, I agree with most of what everyone has already written. I actually dug the Might vs Strength thing in PoE I. I liked that Might didn't HAVE to mean physical strength. But, okay. The change isn't a deal breaker. I would like an 18 stat to actually have a stronger effect. Where I think diminishing returns should start to set in is as one get's higher than 18. A nice "hockey stick" curve of benefits as you get to 18 and an inverted hockey stick as you go past 18. [eta: I mean it's not like I can keep rolling until I get all 18s anyway. You have balanced that out by giving a limited number of points available with limited chances to add more depending on race. After that it is a dependent on gear and inns] I don't want to see imposed level caps. But if you really don't want people to advance beyond a certain level before expansions, then just don't offer as many experience points. Or make certain choice paths exclusive. I admit to my problem of being a "completionist". I've tried seeking help for it, but it is a hard monkey to get off my back. I hope the performance of the finished game is better than the beta. If how the beta performs on my computer now is indicative of how the release will perform, I'm pretty screwed. I am looking forward to the release of the full game. Joe

Hey, I won't deny it takes a certain zen acceptance to appreciate probability. Personally I think it adds variety and requires resourceful, on the fly thinking. I am not a big fan of predetermined outcomes. I would never make a good Lutheran. Joe

Wait. Isn't that the whole premise of the min/max builds? That you can dump a stat? have I missed something here? there is no difference between BG and PoE on this matter. Joe

If that is what you think, then, no, you are not starting to understand me. Joe

I think some of that thinking (all of that thinking?) was built on the original premise of roll your stats and decide what class best suits the resulting rolls. Of course, back in the day, Charisma was always fodder for some animated discussions on what it was exactly, too, never mind how important it should be. I'll give BG credit for having it affect shop pricing. I never thought of that as a DM. Makes sense. What I liked about stats in at least PnP D&D vs PoE is that having a certain stat score did not always guaruntee outcomes. It increased chances for things, but sometimes, depending on how DMs weighted certain encounters an intelligence or other attribute score could be high enough with at least had a _chance_. Now with PoE your stat is either high enough or it isn't. You don't even get a probability roll. To me that removes role playing entirely from many encounters. And it still makes no sense to me why my Wizard's intelligence doesn't contribute to some of those encounters. Surely he is listening in on the conversation, too, and would have a say. Everything is give and take. I get it. Joe

Meh. I still think his wisdom/intelligence was aided by Boo. Boo had enough wisdom and intelligence for both of them. But I totally disagree about stats in PoE. PoE made them matter less for any class. Flattened across the board. Joe

It all gets smoothed out in the fog of war. I imagine as long as they don't use a difficulty level of more than "Normal", they should be fine. PoE has a very forgiving difficulty spread. Joe

Be kind, now. He suffered a head injury. Okay, probably MANY head injuries. To be fair, though, he always described himself more as a berserker than a (technical) ranger. Boo is likely the only thing holding him together. Joe

Wait. That's not how everyone plays this game? Joe

Again. I simply beg to differ. And has nothing to do with my point. A Minsc or Dorn is a much easier, straight forward build in BG. It isn't impossible in PoE, but it is a more complex issue. Joe It isn't complex at all, you pump 3 stats and ignore the rest in either case. You are literally complaining about having options here as opposed to your knowledge you acquired in D&D. No it is not that simple because of how PoE has balanced out the dynamics of the stats, never mind you can't _just_ pump all three stats enough to get to a Dorn or Minsc character. First you have to Min/Max the stats, which is dicey if you aren't already familiar with how to counter balance for the mins. Then you have to select the right talents and skills and know the right gear to get at which points in the game, to build the right synergy. I am not complaining about options. I can't tell if you are just being deliberately obtuse or not. The point is the options and inherent complexities of PoE don't make certain builds as clear cut as they are in BG/D&D. To Wormerine's point, this is a deliberate move on Obsidian's part, the flattening of stats' dynamics, so it is difficult to build a bad character. But this also has the adverse effect on the ease to create characters like Minsc or Edwin. You can prefer the Obsidian way if you want. I won't argue which is _better_. That's just a matter of taste, and in matters taste there is no dispute. But don't try to make out like PoE is either as easy as BG/D&D or maybe even easier or less complex than it is. It isn't. In a real sense, Obsidian has made the complexities a non-issue to a certain degree for inexperienced players _because of_ the flattening of the stats' effects. I proved that at least to myself when I created a party with natural 10s across the board and could still complete at least the main story line. But there is a material difference in an 18 stat between BG/D&D and PoE. That is unarguable, but I am sure you will find a way. So carry on. I've made my point and my peace. Back to my OP, the complexities at the moment have made actually understanding what is going on in combat and why, difficult for even the most seasoned PoE veteran with no addition to enjoyability to the game. It has made combat more a slog than an exciting part of the game. Joe

Again. I simply beg to differ. And has nothing to do with my point. A Minsc or Dorn is a much easier, straight forward build in BG. It isn't impossible in PoE, but it is a more complex issue. Joe

To me that is a big minus. It shouldn't take an applied mathematics masters degree to figure out to make a fighter who is strong enough wielding the weapon of their choice to do massive damage and take damage, AKA either Minsc or Dorn. Or how to make a wizard on par with either Edwin or Dynaheir. This is a simplicity that doesn't even exist in PoE I. Not that you can't build them, but it is a simpler design in BG/D&D. Well, but building a melee combat specialist who hits hard, and can take a lot of hits is still easy - favour strength, resolve and constitution. Same with casters - resolve will give you the biggest boom. But they will suffer in other areas. Why have attribute system at all, if your class defines what attributes you have to take? At this point you might tie attributes to classes and not allow players to distribute them at all. A big boon of PoE system is that, like me, you can create character by your roleplaying desires and have him work fine, even on a hard difficulty. I will leave min-maxing to rocket engineers. All I am going to say is I pretty much disagree with everything you've said there. I don't see how it is less roleplaying with a slightly dimwitted gorilla who loves his hamster. Seems the heart of roleplaying to me. Joe

To me that is a big minus. It shouldn't take an applied mathematics masters degree to figure out to make a fighter who is strong enough wielding the weapon of their choice to do massive damage and take damage, AKA either Minsc or Dorn. Or how to make a wizard on par with either Edwin or Dynaheir. This is a simplicity that doesn't even exist in PoE I. Not that you can't build them, but it is a simpler design in BG/D&D. I'm torn on how they have structured MC. It is nice to be able to multi-class ANY two classes. Sometimes it takes a bit more thought. I built a ranger/wizard and had to decide which one was going to be the primary class and use the second class secondarily as some added support. there was no way to distribute enough of the 15+ attributes all the related fields to come up with a power house at both. This time I opted for primary ranger, with some wizard spell support to handle CC with my wolf. Besides there are so many limitations placed on wizards, he was going to be a fighter most of the time anyway. The joy of casting spells is long gone. In reality PoE was always _kind of_ multi-class already. You could build a viable melee wizard that could continue to contribute even when spells were depleted. And there were those smaller versions of class specific skills, that added a bit of flavor. I think the Chanter is superior to the D&D/BG Bard. But in PoE I the wizard was still a wizard first. Just some more musings. Joe

Yeah, I get that some of this is still being figured out in light that some of the foundational elements have changed dramatically, or at least they seem to have changed dramatically (health/endurance, AR, penetration). Everything affects everything. For the longest time I kept trying to figure out why my characters needed a pen while fighting. Were they trying to sign a contract or something? "No pen"? WTF? "I know they say the pen is mightier than the sword, but right now I need you to use your sword!" Joe

I do get that. usually if I have a character doing basic fighting they continue until the enemy is dead. And I am talking about a single target that hasn't been killed off yet. Only the ranger and occasionally a ranged rogue seems to have the three dots pop up before the target is killed and I need to retarget. I don't know if these three dots are part of recovery or telling me "If you want to retarget or have your guy do something else, now's your chance!" Or if he just stopped, which has happened before, to much frustration. If I don't get to him, he sometimes picks back up shooting arrows. I just can't tell. Oh, yeah. The pause/pause thing is exactly that. I kind of wish when I hit the space bar it served as an override for all automated functions, too. But like I said it is pretty comical. "Pause. No, really PAUSE! D'oh!" But sometimes it really does take a second for the pause to kick in. Joe

This could just be because I am not a math player like most everyone here seems to be. But combat seems inordinately and unnecessarily complex. I know many here really look for the "balance" and some sort of realistic corollaries with things like recovery (which still baffles me to no end) and interrupts. But even now I am not sure when my character's inaction is a bug or if it is a feature. I watched my paladin last night die as I tried to heal him from another character casting a spell, drink a potion, and even using Second Wind. Nothing took. If he was affected in some way to preclude any of these attempts I couldn't see it. I am still unclear when my character is actually finished with an action and ready for a new "command". I have it set up to pause when action is complete, but the little marching ants marquee is still active around the last action I selected, so I am not sure when I can do something. I am a little tired of interrupting a previous action/command thinking it is done. If the whole shift-select-next-action thing works, I can't tell. Even when all I need my ranger to do is keep shooting arrows, the little three dots pop up as if he is not doing anything. Then I feel like I need to pay unneeded attention to him. It seems like, especially in this recent build EVERYTHING is too slow, not just casting times. Limiting spells for spell casters really throws a wrench in enjoying them, never mind the whole casting time issue. My wizard is better off blasting away with his wand/scepter combo at this point. Why do I have a wizard if that's his best offense? I am a pause player (never really liking what most any AI thinks is important, so I never use it). Sometimes the game keeps going after I hit pause. I am just not sure if that is a computer performance issue, a game performance issue, or a feature of letting certain actions finish before allowing a pause. Between the automatic pauses and my trying to pause everything things get quite comical. I know many of the new features add some depth to skills and abilities, but so far nothing really contributes to a more enjoyable game over PoE I. Not for me anyway. I am still unsure why this whole "Mana pool" thingy for abilities is even necessary. There seems a billion things that nerf their effectiveness anyway, why limit the use of abilities and skills? At least it doesn't seem like my potion quaffing doesn't get constantly interrupted like it used to. Anyway. Just a rant. Maybe the full game will make things clearer and this is just the effect of such a limited campaign in the beta. Maybe I just need to put the beta away for a little while. I am finding less and less to enjoy about this game. Thanks for listening, Joe

I started a new game since I couldn't get my druid to reset. Of course, since druids are one of my favorites, I tried a druid again. Same thing sort of happened again. She didn't become a floating head, but she lost all non-shifted equipped armor, cape, and weapons. She was in her skivvies. At first I couldn't re-equip any new armor. Restarted the game. I could re-equip gear, but she is still in this in-between state. The shapeshift special attack is always available, but she can't shift into animal form. In case any of this info is helpful. I guess I have to hold off on druids for a while. Joe

I have a little sandgrubling I can't target and he is effectively killing my party! Sneaky little devil. Also, my druid/ranger got stuck in this inbetween-world after shapeshifting. At first she seemed like a floating head after the fight was over. Then I noticed in her inventory her spiritshift armor and claws still equipped. And in battle she can't shift back into animal form. her animal form is a lion (to go along with her ranger lion companion, of course). Joe

The type of encounter the issue caused me frustration is the world map encounters when I don't have a chance to quaff a rogue potion to help boost my stealth to sneak up on either the Delemgan/Spore or the Lagufaeth/boars. Joe

Sure. To be fair, I get the singe character check more than I get the party contribution. It just seems in the scripted encounters there is never (yet, anyway) party contribution, i.e. it all seems arbitrary so far. Joe

I just want a better representation of my ship location to the enemy ship location. I had no idea where I was in relation to the enemy. Gave me no assistance in assessing direction to turn to get away or engage, either away or toward. Joe

Is it deliberate that the party contribution to a particular character's active or passive skills do not count in the scripted encounters? Or do they, but it just doesn't show in the character summary? Joe