Slashe
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Posts posted by Slashe
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I'm sorry this is wrong friend. BG1 was capped at level 5+. This game is a rival to that franchise starter not BG2.
And comparing game hours BG2 was 100+ hours while this awesome baby is around 60+ (BG1 was around 40+).
If anything you can compare level progression to PoE II when it arrives, and is a 100+ hours game which takes characters from 10 to say 25
It was 89k xp if I remember correctly, level 7 or so. But that's beside my point. My point was:
- that in this system due to the lack of dual/multiclassing you can't make a jack of all trades character which will be able to properly solo. A monk will be a monk only he will be level 20 instead of 12. But he won't get chanter ablities ever. And that's what I'm missing the most - 2nd and especially 4th edition is so much fun due to the abilities to mix classes and find synergies. Why should I get a simple monk when I can get a monk/priest/sacred fist getting multiple times the benefit of high wis?
- that the depth of the classes is way less. There were hundreds of spells in BG for wiz or priest. There are a few dozen here. And we are solely missing utility spells which are numerous in D&D. If we start to compare feats, well, classes feel empty here. The base ideas are awesome, but they need much more content, they need choices. We barely have those now.
- that the AI is dumb plain and simple. Fights are difficult due to the superiority of the enemy (their numbers or their stats) not because they make a good team which you have to break up. Fights here are tank and spank. Due to this and my point above combat is stale - you have one or two approaches for a fight and the whole system feels rigid.
Don't get me wrong I'm not hating on the game, but - for me at least - there are serious underlying issues which cannot be patched with a 'we dropped 10% hp off the adra dragon' kind of balancing.
This. I love the game for the team and the lore and writing, but the combat system is rather disappointing, and the character creation system, though inspired, feels almost incomplete, with more balancing needed.
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It works. Its funny how powerful the phantom summon is, that it even outclasses the lvl2 invocation summon.
You really don't need might at all because you're not doing the damage (I had mine at 10). Because, the difference between 100% and 130% (from 20 might) is not that great when you're not really attacking, just tanking like a boss. You do need to tank though, cause the phantom is a little paper at the later stages, though I can foresee difficulty getting to lvl 3 invocations. After all, I never expected the lvl 2 summons to be THAT ****e. Seriously.
And don't underestimate the endurance drain song (come, come soft winds of death). Because combat lasts around a minute or 2 for me, its drains about 120 damage over the course of a combat, perhaps even more.
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Finally found a build I was happy with.
On easy (start the game on easy, changing from normal to easy is apparently still more difficult),
Play a chanter with about 17 or 18 in both perception and resolve, and a decent (16?) int, dumping dex to 5 or 6 (you're not gonna be attacking much).
Use a hatchet and a shield, picking up the shield from the smithy's lost shipment later and enchanting it to fine.
Pick Sword and shield style and cautious attack and superior deflection later on.
Get the chant that slowly sucks endurance, and pick the ghost summon.
That's it, I got to lvl 6 now, and its just tanky to the max. I'm sitting at 118 deflection I think, and while I'm not nigh unhittable, I am extremely tanky while my ghost kills everything or my chant slowly drains everyone. Do remember to attack though, cause you still contribute non-insignificant dps with a fine hatchet.
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Wait wait wait wait wait
Carnage works with leech?
Please tell me that is true.
and Rot finger gloves... where do you find it again?
A barb with carnage + leech + RFG seems like pure madness
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The martial classes are going to have a harder time than the spellcasters in soloing. I'm currently on my second character which is a monk on PoTD solo. The first one was a paladin which I doubt could have cleared any further due to a lack of any AoE. I'm just hit level 7 which is a big power spike for monks.
Really? I think that perhaps Barbarian would be quite good because of carnage, though after having a Fighter solo till lvl 5, I can't live without constant recovery any more.
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I just tried a cipher, but the inability to cast charm as my opening move (can't cast most cipher powers "out of combat") wrecks me as the other non-charm monsters just ignores the charmed monster.
Gonna try the chanter now.
You know Fallout 1 and 2 were also very combat-padded and they are some of my most beloved games still. I don't think they wanted to emulate only BG, but also BG and Icewind Dale series. I believe Josh's first involvements with the Obsidian seniors began with Icewind Dale (which is itself an awesome example of a combat padded game). I'm just very learned in AD&D so I knew what I expected. I knew Psionicists (Ciphers) would be good because way back when they first came out with TSR everyone was rioting about how insanely useful and overpowered they could be with regards to other classes which used Wisdom (Will here) as a dump stat etc.
I have very high standards but I really sincerely like PoE's combat. I realize how sadistically difficult it must be to the Planescape Torment crowd, but remember Torment was the most combat-light of the IE games. I love how it doesn't hold your hand either, like AT ALL, which takes me back to Fallout 2 days where you made a snap decision to go to New Reno early and got owned on the way over by utterly overpowered mobs compared to your power level.
In my view Barbarian and Rogue are very overpowered currently (I play a Barbarian main character right now, and a custom rogue and they carry the entire group's dps). I'm level 8ish and the Rogue regularly sneak attacks 80-90s, and he finishing blows 200-250 damage sometimes, obliterating drakes singlehandedly. Barbarian is a little bit more realistic but they went a little overboard with Rogue dps potential. Not even Aloth spewing all his spells comes close to a Rogue's encounter damage with an Arbalest.
Again I digress, I just like the system aside from a couple of pet peeves that I KNOW they will adress (xp being divided to 6 by default is a big no no imo / resting supplies is a mechanic that seems like a last minute limitation that could easily be fixed by modifying combat fatigue to require inn / house rest) etc.
Other than those I just love the combat. It's like the perfect sweet spot between IWD and BG1. (BG2 was a different beast with LvL 18+ cap its not fair to compare it to a lvl 11+ cap game)
I can see that you like it, but I still don't understand why. Is it the encounter design? The classes? I hope I don't sound condescending or insincere, but could you elaborate because I really want to know what you see/experience that I'm just not seeing.
For me, I don't like it because it seems to prevent to from doing alot of interesting things while not giving much in return. Its 1 steps forward, 2 steps back, in terms of likeability for me.
For example: Ooo... endurance + health system to solve the d&d health system? Awesome. Can't drink potions before combat? Whut. Can't cast spells from stealth to start of combat? Lame.
Hey, nice variety of weapon differenciation! Choose betwen DR bypass/accuracy/graze-to-hits/bonus deflection, diff interrupt lengths, seems cool. Accuracy bonus/deflection bonus/DR bypass doesn't scale? Huh? TWF uses a strange attack speed formula that is not explained? Weapon set switching takes 2 sec unless you waste a talent, whereby you would just use crossbows/guns to alpha strike at the start of encounters? Err.. All weapons follow the progression of fine/exceptional/superb, except you can't have fine and accurate together, or damaging and fine, and the fine tree is always strictly better than the accurate tree? And you can't override fine with exceptional, or accurate I with fine?It just seems like one after another.
Back on topic though, I realized I found a pretty potent bug/exploit. If you take the talent that cuts your weapon set switching recovery time from 2.0 to 0.5, you can abuse it making ALL your recovery times set to 0.5. Basically, after your THF attack animation or spell animation or crossbow shot animation is complete, simply cycle weapon sets back to your intented weapon, and do your next action. Instead of the 1.0 sec it takes for THF to attack again, or the 1.5 for crossbow to start reloading, it will allow you to attack again/cast again/reload in 0.5 sec, basically making recovery time a moot point for most weapons. I don't know if this is affected by armor modifers though.
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AD&D, a system I adore, was built on the idea of a person creating a good character through knowledge of the mechanics. 18(100) STR, 19 DEX ELF with good HP rolls, and you were king of the world.
A thief utterly sucked in combat. Horrible thac0, beyond horrible staying power etc. The notion of a "combat dps rogue" thing only appeared with WoW.
So what you mean as pacing is "combat was rewarding for a select few good builds". Believe me, AD&D would be a nightmare for players who had no idea how to build at the time. Way back in BG1, I would facepalm in every terribly difficult encounter with my level 2s slogging through ruin and suffering vs. kobolds.
Pillars has a great system. Maybe they designed it a little bit more accessible, but not that much. There are a few imbalances that the devs will surely iron out eventually, but combat has great pacing. The DNA of the game system is very similar to AD&D as I believe Josh is a great fan of it as well.
But dare I say, I think this is a more fun system. Baldur's Gate combat was a means to an end (furthering the plot)-- and despite all my cynicisim about BG RTwP combat being surpassed (no matter how much I respect and appreciate the design pedigree of Obsidian), I think they pulled it off.
PoE is a far better game than BG1, and without having a boat load of materials and modules and mechanics errata for years, the combat system is ingenius. As an AD&D fanatic, the Pillars game system has won me over.
There is still a lot more balancing to be done, classes to be tuned. Solo play aside, rogues and barbs need to be nerfed (they are ridiculously beyond all other classes in every arena right now), spells to be adjusted, etc. etc.
But I digress, if you want a solo run on easy and maybe, MAYBE normal, go for a mobile ranged rogue, or str/con/int twohander barbarian.
I don't think Hard and above is possible at solo as of yet.
Maybe its due to unrealistic expectations, but I had expected alot less combat in this game, as remarked earlier, due to the removal of kill exp (save beastiary) and the introduction of the scroll thingy before certain encounters allowing you to use stats/skills and make interesting decisions.
Please do enlighten me on the fun you find in the game, for now while I love the lore and the world, the combat is just really off putting for me.
Maybe I've been playing it wrong, but I've already given up on soloing, yet I still find the combat wholly uninteresting.
You mentioned that BG's combat was a means to an end, which is perhaps what frustrates me about PoE's combat, it seems to serve little purpose other than padding, a means to no end, while being an unending flood.
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But seriously, why are there just SO MANY groups of monsters EVERYWHERE? And why are do they ALL have some sort of CC?
I've recently been playing again through whole BG saga and having it fresh in my memory I have to say PoE combat system is by far more punishing and strategic. One character, even with major xp buff simply cannot do it.
Example that shocked me: My 4-men lvl 2-3 party was ambushed by group of wolves in the woods. I died quickly. I tried this fight twice again and finally, with better positioning and using of more cc spells instead of damage ones, I've managed to kill them easily, having a lot of hp left. I quickly checked the difficulty setting because I felt like it switched itself to easy by some mistake. A while later same story happened with a pack of boars nearby.
CC is king, positioning is king. In older IE games it was kinda whatever, you just used your strongest stuff first and focused the casters, or just cheesed it with cloud kill spell from afar ;-). PoE combat can be frustrating trial and error, even with full party. Nearly every encounter with more than one enemy feels like an mini-boss fight.
Yea, well....
The BG games had more.... pacing? Like the difficulty of the combat encounters in the area varied, rather than all of them being hard or easy.
Also, because the combat had both loot and exp, they were alot more rewarding.
In PoE, not so much. Extremely poor/unexciting loot, no exp, little enemy variation made the encounters feel like more of a chore than proper gameplay.
Also, that encounter -> dialogue -> combat with no ability to save before combat is so frustrating, especially since its almost considered an archaic design mistake.
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Perhaps if there was a mod that gives 1.5x or 2x exp (putting me a level or three ahead of most parties), with a slight reduction in mob group size would make me consider solo again.
I'm thinking... 1.5x or 2.0x exp, 25% more to 33% more build points for character creation, 25% increased resistance to crowd countrol, 25% decrease in crowd countrol time, 25~50% increase in max health and endurance. That might make the game solo-able on normal.
But seriously, why are there just SO MANY groups of monsters EVERYWHERE? And why are do they ALL have some sort of CC?
Even a graze knocks you down for 3 secs at minimum, while you get mawed by 5 guys continually.
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@zenzei
In light of that I'm about to give up, since now my fighter is lvl 6, and the groups of enemies are becoming larger and larger as the game anticipates your party to be at size 6 for the encounters, whereras in the earlier levels it provided smaller scale encounters to account for the fact that you've only met 2 companions.
This is on easy btw, and enemies groups of 6 and larger are showing up, with about 2 permastunners each group (why do skirmishers have an always-on paralyze on hit effect?)
I think I'll just use myself (speech build) with 5 adventurers (all rogues) meant to alpha-strike down enemies the moment combat begins.
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I'm gonna have to ask you where it is, roughly now, because, yikes.
The best part is they spawned a ranged spell attack all of a sudden.
I just gave up and started on the stronghold dungeon (endless path), because, no.
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Just entered the Wailing Banshee / Lighthouse and got ambushed by 9 shades. NINE. ON EASY.
What is going on....
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Interesting.... I might leave it for a second playthrough, but for now, prolly not.
Being a sitting duck for 12 seconds of combat doesn't really sit well with me, and when I found out lvl 2 abilities come at lvl 5 for chanters, I just abandoned that idea.
I can see it though, with full armor, hatchet + shield, just relying on summons.
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Got this as well, and I frigging solo-ed that encounter...... on easy....
Still, was it not intended for us to save Verzano, or is the quest just broken?
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Nope, giving up. Kept dying at all the mandatory encounters due to the lack of dps from low dex (10) and insufficient might.
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@Odd Hermit
I can see that. A high int max stealth rogue that avoids most combat, getting by with high resolve (this is speech, right?) with some might for alpha strikes to deal with forced encounters and bosses (I'm looking at you, Maerwald). Trying that now. Getting to level 4 would be annoying though. -
As an aside, do you guys think that eschewing armor for the lower recovery speed is worth it, or the 35% penalty for 7 dr is worth it, considering that ale provides an essentially free +2 dr?
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Yep, I do mean withouto any NPCs whatsoever (or hiding them in a corner of the map while my PC goes exploring/fighting)
I do invite the NPCs to join my stronghold after I get it though, not the total misantrope, just a lone wolf.
@Odd hermit: Would fat runner actually help? The likes of skalks and boars move so terrifyingly fast that I'm unsure what +1 move actually mean in terms of move speed, since I'm not using console cheats for my exploration. I would rather not do hit-and-runs because of its cheesy nature, but if I have to, I have to.
I've considered making a high deflection based character, except the bear high accuracy level + damage couplped with to hit system (resolve providing only +1 deflection in a d100 system) dissuaded me. Still, A hatchet + shield combination might be an interesting path (base 25 deflection +10 resolve + 5 hatchet + 12 med shield + 6 talent =58), though it would be difficult to break any opponent DR.
Looking at how accuracy and the graze/critical system work, I'm starting to come around to the idea that a duelist-esque build might be the way to go. Since twf only confers a 20% bonus in attack speed (from talent) on top of a lowered resolution time, the +12 accuracy bonus might be much more handy. I might be wrong however, since I've read that attack bonuses are reductive rather than divisive, meaning the provide a higher than expected dps increase.
However, I am completely disappointed how weak the graze to hit conversion feat / weapon types are.
Under most circumstances, the +5 accuracy bonus from spears would translate into a rough dps increase of at least 5%, changing 5 possible rolls that would lead to a miss into a graze (2.5%dps increase) and 5 possible grazes into hits (2.5%). I'm not considering critical yet, since enemies seem to have such freakishly high deflection. The calculation is based on how each damage step upgrade moves by 50% (0%->50% for miss to graze, 50%->100% for graze to hit, 100%-> 150% for hit to critical)
In ideal circumstances, this would translate to 7.5%, since now we would get crits, though such enemies with low deflection are rare.
By contrast, graze to hit increase by 10% entails a flat 3.5% dps increase, since grazes always land between a roll of 16-50. Hence, it is always better to take the rapier over the flail.
In the same vein, the single weapon focus (according to the wiki) grants a 30% graze to hit conversation, or a 10.5% dps increase. This pales in comparison to two weapon fighting's 20% attack speed increase or two handed fighting's 1.15 damage mod.
I've also realized the the DT bypass for the weapons are practically damage increases, since all enemy seem to have a decent dr value (some reaching absurdly high values), making twf fast weapons not a great style to be in due to the damage lost to DR, though I'm not sure if THF fighting would work with its lower speed. SWF might still win out due to its higher accuracy and the ability to focus on a singular weapon via enchantments and the such,but I can be convinced eitherwise.
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I've experimented soloing PoE with almost every class, and it's killing me.
Fundementally, I can't seem to play any rpg non-solo, so please help me to "crack" this puzzle here, in terms of classes and build styles.
So far, I've gotten the furthest until about level 3 or 4 on normal difficulty with the rogue and the fighter which seem the most effective, by "alpha striking" + "hit and running" enemies down with loaded crossbow/arbalest switching technique, with max might and dex. Thereafter, combat becomes too frustrating because of stunlocking enemies.
I'm considering knocking down the difficulty to easy permenantly for the sake of my sanity, though I was kinda disappointed since it was stated that they would be greatly toning down the experience from combat (using the beastiary method), I had assumed that there would be more encounters or enemy groups that could be circumvented via items, dialogue, etc, rather than combat. But nope, PoE was a complete brawlfest.
So guys, do you have any other ideas how to build for solo other than the alphastrike and the hit and run method?
PS: Does anyone know what decreasing the difficulty actually does?
Combat Mechanics? Attack Speed, Recovery
in Pillars of Eternity: Characters Builds, Strategies & the Unity Engine (Spoiler Warning!)
Posted
Ugh. the code they are using are so spagehetti right now.
I've found that you can practically set recovery time to 0.5 by doing the switching trick: Get the quick swap talent, excute your attack, before recovery starts and after you hit, cycle the weapons til your desired weapon.
What happens is that you will attack -> weapon switch recovery -> attack -> weapn switch recovery -> and so on
Its pretty tedious in terms of micro managing, but its great for solo-ers or characters with really high armor.
Pretty sure its a bug/exploit though
PS: is 0.5 recovery itme = 30 frames?