JerekKruger

I wouldn't say that PoE is personal, or at least not more so than BG2. In PoE you foil a plot by an ancient secret organisation, headed up by an essentially immortal super dude, to bring the cast down queen of the gods to her former glory. You start off your quest because of your awakening but I think by the end that's not the reason I was trying to thwart Thaos. In Baldur's Gate 2 you foil a plot by an incredibly powerful mage to take your soul and use it to achieve (demi)godhood. You start off your quest to try to rescue your half sister and/or to find out how to unlock your potential, but by the end that wasn't the reason I cared about thwarting Irenicus. They seem pretty similar in terms of epic vs. personal. Now if we compare PoE to ToB then sure, that's far more epic, but it was an epic level adventure and honestly the villain(s) were nowhere near as awesome as Irenicus. The IWD games were by definition less personal given the lack of inter party banter and the bigger focus on dungeons. I don't think IWD was particularly epic, IWD was towards the end.

I believe Zahua will, though you get one opportunity to delay it. Other than that I don't think so.

Personally I didn't find Sarevok a particularly compelling villain, even at the time. Indeed I didn't find the plot of BG1 that good, though the reveal was pretty cool since I had the FR novel Waterdeep so recognised some of the background (that was the only FR novel I had read at the time, and in retrospect I wish it had remained the only FR novel I ever read). Irenicus on the other hand was excellent. His first dialogue did an excellent job of portraying him as dispassionately evil, the fight in Waukeen's Promenade made it clear that he exceptionally powerful, his voice acting was top notch ("you dare to attack me here, do you even know whom you face? You will suffer, you will ALL suffer!") but what really was his attitude towards the Bhaalspawn: he didn't hate you, he didn't like you, you just had something he wanted, he needed, and so he was pitted against you. You were simply a thing to him you were so beneath him. This made it feel really epic when you finally fight and defeat him. I think Obsidian were going for a similar feeling with Thaos, and they hit some of the marks. Thaos's voice acting is, as the OP says, really good. It's hard to say whether it's as good as Irenicus's since Irenicus's is tied up with all the awesome that is Irenicus, but I think it's comparable. They also did a good job of making it clear that you were a mere nothing to Thaos. I didn't feel that Obsidian managed to make Thaos feel as amazingly powerful as Irenicus. The scene in the Brackenbury Sanitorium came close, but I always found the fight that followed rather easy so it lost some of its impact as a result. What really didn't work for me was the killing of Wolfgrin: I don't know how you would do that scene better, but I just didn't feel like it had enough impact. The other issue I felt lacked with Thaos is that whilst we had a reason (albeit a little bit of a weak one) to be chasing him, he had literally no interest in us. With Irenicus it was two way: he wanted our soul and we wanted to rescue Imoen/unlock our potential. In PoE, if the main character were to simply give up Thaos wouldn't have chased him down: he would have simply executed his plot and that would be that. One imagines that in BG2, had the Bhaalspawn just settled down in Athkatla, eventually Irenicus would have come calling. Hmm... that was a little off topic. To answer the OPs question more directly I'd tend to agree that PoE lacked the really strong "oh wow" moments that BG2 had, but it had plenty of memorable moments.

In the Iliad the gods take sides in the Trojan war, sometimes literally. I think it's safe to say they weren't jolly friendly chaps.

Given the behaviours attributed to the Olympian pantheon I don't think it's strange that the Eoran gods are often petty and short sighted. Remember that, as I understand it, all of the gods were formed by amalgamating lots of kith souls so I imagine many of the flaws of kith would remain. I think the difficulty comes from the fact that (probably) everyone on these boards is used to the notion of a god being that of a monotheistic god in the mould of the Abrahamic religions and, even if you're consciously aware that this isn't what the Eoran gods are, it's hard to completely abandon your preconceptions about godhood. Some things to remember about the Eoran gods: they definitely did not create the world since they were created after it; they are definitely not omnipotent since; and it seems unlikely that they are omniscient.

There definitely is Flintlock, it's that you haven't executed your own plan yet

I thought most, if not all, had been added by now.

I would have been incredibly surprised if there wasn't a PoE2 eventually.

Oh right, I get you.

Wait, you can add a lash to the scepter?

This is true, but I doubt that lady in the Gref's Rest would be singing about it if it had been a pebble

Ha! For a moment there I thought "I wonder why, usually Boeroer's builds are pretty good and could work in solo play"...

I don't know of one that's in Excel sadly, but I think the Gamebanshee page is a well updated source of them. I've been toying with the idea of updating the official wiki for a while now. Every time I go there are find another page that needs creating I think someone really needs to spend some time making it a useful resource. So far, unfortunately, I haven't got round to it.

There seems to be something about time that is more inherent than other measurements I think. I learnt recently that, when the US rail-road companies tried to introduce railway time there were protests and even riots in various cities. People simply could not accept the idea that midday wouldn't be the time when the sun was at its highest where they were.

The main problem with this, as mentioned in another thread, is that a moon falling into Eora would be an extinction event at best and a total destruction of all life at worst (depending on the size of the moon) so you're trading one problem for another sadly. Then again, if skyward kick is anything to go by, gravity is very low on Eora so maybe that makes a difference

This question has been bugging me for a while too. I don't really understand what it adds to a setting to make such an arbitrary decision. Exactly. An hour isn't a fundamental unit of time, it's based on a period of time (the time it takes the Earth to rotate once fully) which is not something that makes sense on another planet. Whatever an hour is on Eora, it would be based on the length of an Eoran day. There are good reasons for defining 24 as the number of hours in the day, it is by no means the best or only choice, but 27 doesn't compare. @omgFIREBALLS: it's worth noting that revolutionary France tried to bring in a decimal time along with the rest of the decimal metric system, and that whilst the metric system wasn't too hard to make stick, people really couldn't accept decimal time. So in this case it seems our obsession with base-10 wasn't enough.

Sure, why not, it adds variety to the items. This game isn't particularly hard so you don't really need more powerful weapons. Would I prefer it if they procced more often? Sure. Would I prefer another weapon with X-lash and chance to stun or knock down on crit? No. We have those already, and they're not that exciting.

I agree that the proc rates on some of them are too low. Steadfast and Twin Sting improved matters with better proc rates, and I have to say that when Eder was wielding the Redeemer it seemed to proc often enough to be noticeable (probably partly because Pillar of Faith would often knock down three of four enemies at once). As I spell striking being annoying, I guess we just see things differently. I suppose the one thing that would have been better is if the weapons had unique proc effects (a few do) rather than reproducing existing spell effects. Agreed. Actually I'd argue that none of the soulbound weapons are horrible weapons since they all end up at least superb. I guess Greenstone is the exception since it can only be wielded by classes who aren't particularly going to benefit from a superb weapon (and Monks who have much better crushing weapons already). I'd agree, I'd have preferred something more akin to the Staff of the Magi though, as you say, less powerful. I also agree that the unlock process is awful for a Wizard. I tend to equip it on Hiravias since I feel it looks druidy but I don't put much effort into upgrading it for him. It's a shame that the best proc on it is the one for the Monk. Certainly 5% is a very small proc rate, but petrify is an amazing affliction. The problem is, of course, that Monk fists are so much better at causing crush damage than the staff, and if my Monk is going to wield a weapon it's going to be to do a different damage type. Had the Greenstone Staff done crushing/corrode, say, it'd make an amazing secondary weapon for a Monk. Agreed, though I'd actually prefer quarter staffs to be a two handed weapon with +5 deflection, but I definitely think reach is the wrong improvement for them. That's actually a really good point that I'd never really considered. I don't know for sure, but I imagine they still use the universal weapon group so could make a useful secondary weapon for different damage types. That does sound kinda awesome. Out of interest what do you think of the WM2 Soulbounds? I think they did a better job here. The Scepter is one of the best implement type weapons in the game I'd say, and the Druid unique ability opens up new options for builds. The Hammer is pretty damn powerful, perhaps not as good as a well upgraded Tidefall but comparable at least (and cooler imo). Twin Sting is, as you say, a good crossbow and unlike the WM1 SBs its proc rates are pretty high. I love Steadfast, but that's cause I love swords and was always a bit disappointed by the lack of good ones in the base game (the Outmaneuvering passive and the Champion's Boon proc are both pretty damn good too). Despite what the OP says, the unlabored blade is damn good (once upgraded obviously), particularly for a Barbarian. What I really like though are the shield and breastplate. It provided a new direction for Soulbounds and, in particular, removed the huge loss you got from not being able to Durganise them (I don't think Durganised shields and armour are anywhere near as important as weapons). Also I think Breastplates are the coolest looking piece of armour, and the bonuses Ryona's gets make it a viable alternative to Superb Plate.

I like the spell-striking effects. It adds a bit of variety to what the player can create themselves and makes for cool effects in game. St. Ydwen's Redeemer could simply have the overbearing property and a crushing lash, but to my mind it's a lot cooler when a Fighter wielding it periodically summons a pillar that does crushing damage and knocks enemies down. Obviously that's just a matter of personal taste though. I will agree that most of the WM1 ones were a bit underwhelming. Stormcaller is cool, particularly in the hands of a Ranger, and the Redeemer is great against vessels obviously, but the Greenstone Staff is fairly meh and I've hardly ever used Nightshroud. The upgrade process is sometimes annoying I'll agree, though I quite like having to go through it to unlock new properties of the weapon.

Yeah, I probably should have emphasised that I didn't know the area codes. Thanks Tigranes.

It is a bad earworm, I didn't even have to listen to it to get it stuck in my head. Thanks Boeroer

Could be, I haven't used to console in quite some time, and have never used the area transition command.

For easy, normal and hard enemy stats remain the same, there are just more of them and possibly harder variants the higher the difficulty. For example, an encounter on easy might consist of a wolf and two young wolves, on normal it might be two wolves and two young wolves and on hard it might be two wolves and three young wolves (this example is entirely invented). The important thing to remember is the individual wolves and young wolves won't get stronger the harder the difficulty, there are just more of them. On PotD all enemies get +15 accuracy and deflection and, I think, a bonus to the health pool and other saves. This is where the real noticeable change in difficulty occurs. I have no idea what story mode changes, but I assume it's a sort of reverse PotD. Given your preference, I'd suggest playing on hard. Enemy stats remain balanced as normal, you'll just face a few more of them. I will warn you that if you are a veteran of IE games you might find hard mode quite easy, particularly once you get past act I, but if you're not opposed to playing the game more than once you can always play PotD on your next playthrough. EDIT: oh yeah, as Fenixp says on normal you can carry 3 camping supplies whereas on hard you can only carry 2. If you're not familiar camping supplies are a consumable required for resting in the wilderness or dungeons, so on hard you can rest less often before heading back to town to resupply. That said, I tended to find most wilderness areas and dungeons had one or more camping supplies lying around somewhere so I rarely felt this limitation (but I like to camp fairly rarely).

As KDubya says, in the hands of a Barbarian the Unlabored Blade will be more powerful than those options you describe.

What values did you enter for <name> and <start point>? I imagine the full command would look something like "Areatransition Caed_Nua West1" (without the quotation marks obviously). You may need to try a few different values for <start point> since not every map will have all those start points (I think). Oh also did you type the "iroll20s" command before trying the area transition command? I believe that is required first.