gkathellar

It was "spare harmke" as far as i know. Sparing Harmke makes her walk into the sea in the end. No, you have that backwards. She only achieves peace if you kill Harmke. If she spares him, she goes back to being a loony serial killer and eventually gets torn apart by the mob. There was a bug where the breastplate appeared if you sacrificed her. I have no idea if it's been fixed. [insert repeated plea to make the breastplate show up if she walked into the sea, since this is a game taking place on that exact same sea.]

So this is actually a business discussion, not an, "Obsidian you would make me happy if you did this," discussion. I'm just gonna bullet point this. "D&D video games" is an IP license, and iirc, it is either still owned by Atari or else has defaulted back to Hasbro. This was actually a whole big thing in PoE1's development, and is perhaps Obsidian's strongest reason to stay the hell away from something like this: PoE is their IP, which they can develop at their leisure and maintain full control of. A new D&D game would bring money and resources, but there's a reasonably compelling argument to be made that Obsidian pursued that business model for over a decade with little to show for it beyond a good reputation. If the current IP owner wants to make a new D&D game, they will reach out to people of their choice. History indicates that would be Bioware, but I doubt EA would be interested. Obsidian would probably not be on the short list unless the publisher specifically wanted a BG2-style isometric. Personally, Larian would be my first pick even in that case. However, I say "if" because the last D&D game to do fantastically was NWN, or maybe NWN2 or DDO if you squint. Shameful as it is that there was never a successful adaptation of 4E, which would have been a great fit, D&D games have not been a lucrative venture recently, and 5E is poorly suited to computer conversion for a number of reasons. This brings us to ... Hasbro's marketing strategy for D&D since the beginning of fifth edition has been interesting, and has involved heavy cutbacks on the creation of actual content as well as quality investment (by this I mean that 5e has had visible reductions in printing quality, art direction, staff size, digital support, etc), and an emphasis on streaming and "D&D as lifestyle" marketing. Consider, also, Hasbro's failure to capitalize on key aspects of the TTRPG market, namely PDF distribution, OGL and equivalents, and online community building. This suggests that the main goal for D&D at this point in time is to make it saleable, which makes a kind of sense - even now, D&D is one of Hasbro's weakest returns-on-investment, and in spite of being godawful Pathfinder continues to eat a large portion of the market that D&D tends to cultivate. tl;dr Obsidian could only make a D&D game if the current license owner let them, and there are ample reasons not to expect anything of the sort.

Thanks for the reply! Another question: will this change NPCs, or only player-controlled characters?

I guess that make sense. Really, I don't see why it can't just be equal to Transcendent Suffering - spending an ability point to get access to something that still isn't as good as most legendary weapons seems like it would be fine. >_>

Having chosen crippling strike at character creation, and since upgraded it to Arterial Strike, when I respec crippling strike is lost entirely. I've done this repeatedly to make sure the issue can be duplicated - it can.

Miscreant's Leather ain't bad

What does this actually mean? Is it just talking about an animation change, or what?

How does one go about changing the abilities of one subclass, specifically to replace them with those of another? I'd like to give a Priests of Eothas the bonus spells of a Priest of Wael - how can I do that?

Oh? Why so?

I dunno, maybe on PotD or while soloing, but I've been replaying on Veteran and I didn't think it was all that hard compared to other stuff. I was level 3 when I tackled it with Eder and Xoti, and it was tough, sure, but I didn't wipe or need to use my consumables or anything. I definitely would've had a bad time of it if I hadn't used stealth for pre-combat positioning, but in general I thought several of the Engwithan dig site fights were harder.

Basically all of your passives will apply while spiritshifted. Wildstrike is of course the go-to example.

Not that I'm aware of. Feel free to ask any specific questions you have.

This is a count of how many companions and sidekicks in the game have any given class, in single-class and multi-class configurations, what multi-class combos appear among those characters and in how many cases, and which companions must always be a member of that class in some form (noted as "true" class members. I created this for my own reference purposes, not to make any kind of point. Barbarians Single-class: 2 (Serafen, Konstanten) Multi-class only: 1 (Rekke) Multi-classes represented: Cipher (1), Fighter (1), Chanter (1) True barbarians: 0 Chanters Single-class: 2 (Konstanten, Tekehu) Multi-class only: 3 (Pallegina, Fassina, Vatnir) Multi-classes represented: Barbarian (1), Druid (1), Paladin (1), Priest (1), Wizard (1) True chanters: 0 Ciphers Single-class: 2 (Serafen, Ydwin) Multi-class only: 0 Multi-classes represented: Barbarian (1), Rogue (1) True ciphers: 0 Druids Single-class: 1 (Tekehu) Multi-class only: 1 (Fassina) Multi-classes represented: Chanter (1), Wizard (1) True druids: 0 Fighters Single-class: 2 (Eder, Rekke) Multi-class only: 3 (Mirke, Aloth, Pallegina) Multi-classes represented: Monk (2), Rogue (1), Wizard, (1), Paladin (1), Barbarian (1) True fighters: 1 (Rekke) Monks Single-class: 2 (Mirke, Xoti) Multi-class only: 1 (Rekke) Multi-classes represented: Fighter (2), Rogue (1), Priest (1) True monks: 1 (Mirke) Paladins Single-class: 1 (Pallegina) Multi-class only: 0 Multi-classes represented: Chanter (1), Fighter (1) True paladins: 1 (Pallegina) Priests Single-class: 2 (Vatnir, Xoti) Multi-class only: 0 Multi-classes represented: Chanter (1), Monk (1), Rogue (1) True priests: 1 Rangers Single-class: 1 (Maia Rua) Multi-class only: 0 Multi-classes represented: Rogue (1), Wizard (1) True rangers: 1 (Maia-Rua) Rogues Single-class: 2 (Eder, Ydwin) Multi-class only: 4 (Aloth, Maia Rua, Mirke, Vatnir) Multi-classes represented: Fighter (1), Cipher (1), Wizard (1), Ranger (1), Monk (1), Priest (1) True rogues: 0 Wizards Single-class: 2 (Aloth, Fassina) Multi-class only: 1 (Maia Rua) Multi-classes represented: Fighter (1), Rogue (1), Chanter (1), Druid (1), Ranger (1) True wizards: 2 (Aloth, Fassina) In general, the most-represented classes are fighter, chanter, and rogue, while the least represented are paladin and ranger. Assuming a player picks up every companion and sidekick, they will always have at least 2 wizards, 1 ranger, 1 fighter, 1 paladin, 1 priest, and 1 monk on staff.

Really? I guess that sort of makes sense, since Llengrath is a hereditary title, but ... Bluh.

There was an issue in the past of Blade of the Endless Paths, and another with Devil of Caroc's ending choice. The former has been ironed out, and the latter just made/makes the Devil breastplate accessible if you sacrificed her to the Skaen pool. As is, I think the history creator's in pretty solid shape. The only thing I'm not certain about is the big White March ending choice - as is, it only gives you the option of either reforging Abydon or destroying the Eyeless. I'm not sure if tempering is inaccessible, or if it's just lumped together with reforging for Deadfire's purposes.

okay but seriously why are normal barrels not just containers they dont do anything

By mid-to-late game it's +5 to +15 to defenses over a cloak of greater protection. That's fairly significant. Obviously you don't need the Giftbearer's Cloth to function, but from a pure optimization perspective, I'm curious about strong cases for not wearing it.

See topic. Giftbearer's Cloth is amazing, especially for frontliners, tank or otherwise, which raises the question - what builds are (a) likely to come under heavy fire and (b) distinctly don't want the huge defensive bonuses offered by maxing History?

That makes zero sense. If you already know how to cast the spell, then you should be able to cast the spell. "Whoops, I suddenly forgot how to cast this spell I just 5 times in a row, time t go completely re-learn it" is incredibly stupid. Vancian memorization assumes that spells are far too complex to learn in any real sense. What it actually consists of is doing the mental work - the real heavy lifting - of casting a spell beforehand, and holding the almost-complete product in one's mind until it's ready to be released. A Vancian caster isn't forgetting something they used to know so much as using their memory for temporary storage. Mind you, that doesn't really make sense in PoE's milieu. But there is a coherent logic to it in D&D.

It also becomes a bit of a truism - "this game requires metaknowledge and therefore is bad!" is an argument you see bounced around a lot, and I don't think it's a good one. Rewarding meta knowledge means rewarding investment in the game and its systems. In my most recent playthrough of BG2, I solo'd Kangaxx with a level 16 thief that couldn't use armor or gauntlets, and I did it without scrolls of protection from magic or protection from undead. It required a ton of meta knowledge and demanded that I work out extremely specific aspects of how stealth, traps, and several items worked in game, as well as the timing and precise positioning of several scripts. It was also extremely satisfying when I succeeded.

BG2 had many virtues - area design, atmospheric depth, clever worldbuilding, combat that ranged from pleasantly simplistic to chess-like in its complexity, memorable quests and villains, a willingness to be bizarre, and sheer scope. It had flaws, too, which others have spoken to, but I've seen enough modern gamers that have never touched an IE game suddenly enchanted as they play it to be sure that its greatness is more than just nostalgia. But BG2 was also the product of another time, even in terms of its inspirations on the tabletop and the general design norms of various forms of gaming when it was created. At that time, it was a phenomenal risk that ran way over budget and could easily have ruined Bioware (even though it was the sequel to an enormous hit). It's also a game that has been in many ways vindicated by history - an expansion pack, twelve patches, hundreds of fixpack releases, and an absurdly dedicated modding community have helped make the game far, far better than it was at release. I find it difficult to compare BG2 to anything, because it's an astonishingly beloved, nineteen-year-old bottle of lightning, and so few other games have an even remotely similar context. PoE2 is something else entirely, something that I cannot say I love as much, but which I can appreciate for what it is. And even if I did feel I could confidently say, "BG2 is better than PoE2," I'm not sure what the point of doing so would be. I've played a lot of games that weren't as good as other games I've played, and I've never felt like my time was wasted for that reason. I don't play BG1 on endless repeat because Durlag's Tower is absolutely amazing. I don't play Jade Empire over and over again because the scene at the end with the Water Dragon makes me cry. I didn't think, "well, Battletech seems fun, but will it have a scene like when Kreia sits on the edge of a dried-up fountain in KotOR 2 and for the first time seems old?" and then strike it off of my list. The story and setting of P5 failed to grab me in the way that P3 and P4 did, but I don't think my time would've been better spent playing those again. Riven still stands out in the adventure game genre for a variety of reasons, but that doesn't mean that the only adventure game worth playing is Riven. Analogue: A Hate Story is almost certainly better than Digital: A Love Story, but damned if Digital isn't worth exploring for its sheer inventiveness. Duel Savior is in no way the equal of something like Odin Sphere, but I still had a lot of fun with Duel Savior on its own merits. Momoyo's route in Majikoi resonated powerfully with me, but that didn't make the other routes unworthy of my attention. I guess what I'm saying is that trying to compare pieces of entertainment and art as if they were mathematical sums is insane, even when it's possible ... and it's almost never possible. Comparison serves well as the source of analysis and critique, but it has no intrinsic merit. Art may exist in context, but context is not the entire source of value.

wait there are people who don't rotate all of the companions constantly

I love the Helm of Ultimate Balance. :D

I don't suppose there are animations in the game for something like Abydon's Hammer? Because I'm still grumpy that they took away one of the coolest items ever.

Kaylon's notes in mind, this is a really good thing to see from a theorycrafting perspective. Good job.