Pathfinder Kingmaker is bigger then Deadfire

[PatrioticChief]

The only thing I don't like about Pathfinder is how I constantly become fatigued and my characters slow to a crawl. Honestly I'm done with that until there is a mod to remove it. I don't want to wait twenty billions years to watch my characters cross a screen because they won't camp without rations and you can't hunt for rations in the dungeon. It's not like Fall Out where you can just dump some weight and you have to prioritize what you want. The fatigue is realistic but freaking annoying permanent status. 

Edited September 27, 2018 by PatrioticChief

[dunehunter]

I played Pathfinder Kingmaker a little bit and the experience is pretty bad.

 

Playing on Unfair mode, and the party got one shot by the first 3 assassins. Also, you get two casters intead of frontliners as companions, and cannot rest. I just wonder have the Devs there test play the game on Unfair mode themselves. Even if you reduce the difficulty to normal, it can be a rough time for caster main characters. Every enemies seem to have 18+ Dex, 20+ AC, the only reliable way to hit them is True Strike + Charge, but since u cannot rest, I run out of spells after two kills and have to rely on Save/Load and potions. Heard the later combats are even rougher tho, I have played Baldur's Gate on insane + tactical mode a lot times but this is just overtuned

Edited September 27, 2018 by dunehunter

[Hurlshort]

That does sound unfair, so I'm not sure what you were expecting. I mean, do you understand what unfair means?

[Volourn]

Seriously. Why can't people get that? UNFAIR is UNFAIR. Imagine that. LMAO

[the_dog_days]

I've heard lots of complaints about balance and, frankly, I have to agree. I'm running an area that I think is supposed to be where I'm supposed to be and half the enemies die in one hit and the other half hold person or fear spam me until my tanks die. There's no consistency.

 

It's not even off the main quest. I'm on the main quest and running into traps that my Bard failed and triggered three times in a row. Then swarmed by giant centipedes that fall down dead, who then get backed up by rogues and priests who hold spam my tanks so the rogues can gank them.

 

There was one part on this main quest where I got a new party member who was standing right next to a sword and board bad guy the moment they joined me. He crushed her in two swings. My guys killed two other guys, went to face that one, and he crushed two of them as well before going down. He wasn't a boss. Dude didn't have a name. He was just some mook who got enlarge person cast on him in round one.

 

Took me three reloads before I daze spammed that guy enough to save the new party member, and then had her light cure spam one of the tanks. He still took the tank out and then her. So I took the win of only 2 of my party going down instead of 4.

 

This is my experience. I don't mind the difficulty spikes so much as the lack of communicating to the player what's going on. I'm also getting a greater appreciation for the Pillars series quality of life changes to the formula (fast walking, no equipment weight, no fatigue mechanic, etc.)

[ShadySands]

Yeah, agreed on the newfound appreciation for some of the stuff Pillars did differently.

[SonicMage117]

I played Pathfinder Kingmaker a little bit and the experience is pretty bad.

 

Playing on Unfair mode, and the party got one shot by the first 3 assassins. Also, you get two casters intead of frontliners as companions, and cannot rest. I just wonder have the Devs there test play the game on Unfair mode themselves. Even if you reduce the difficulty to normal, it can be a rough time for caster main characters. Every enemies seem to have 18+ Dex, 20+ AC, the only reliable way to hit them is True Strike + Charge, but since u cannot rest, I run out of spells after two kills and have to rely on Save/Load and potions. Heard the later combats are even rougher tho, I have played Baldur's Gate on insane + tactical mode a lot times but this is just overtuned

I saw the word "Dex" and immediately thought of the awesome rpg called "Dex"

[xzar_monty]

The detailed digital walk-through is behind schedule so they will release what they have now, which only goes through chapter 3, and release the whole thing later when it gets done.

 

 

Why is the game developer spending any time on a walkthrough? Assuming you are right here, I find this quite baffling. I thought they just made the game, and others played it. If someone out there wanted to do a walkthrough, they could, but I don't see why. (Isn't using a walkthrough the best possible way to ruin your game? Like, voluntarily giving the joy of discovery to other people, not having any yourself?)

[dunehunter]

That does sound unfair, so I'm not sure what you were expecting. I mean, do you understand what unfair means?

 

Unfair is not equal to impossible, if you played it on unfair, you will understand. There's no tactical depths, just luck.

 

Path of damned in DF is very difficult too, but not in the tutorial where u have no level no resource to spend on tactics.

Edited September 27, 2018 by dunehunter

[Gairnulf]

No equipment weight and fatigue are quality of life changes IRL, not in a game. In the game, they were just features that were dropped, because no one knew how to implement them properly.

[xzar_monty]

The game does look excellent, I have to say. Will wait for a couple of patches and then start it properly.

[daven]

Yeah I like equipment weight and that in some games, makes you have to think what to actually carry. Instead of everything that isn't nailed down!

 

Downloading the game... taking a thousand years. Oh well I'll check it out after work.

[Mamoulian War]

The only thing I don't like about Pathfinder is how I constantly become fatigued and my characters slow to a crawl. Honestly I'm done with that until there is a mod to remove it. I don't want to wait twenty billions years to watch my characters cross a screen because they won't camp without rations and you can't hunt for rations in the dungeon. It's not like Fall Out where you can just dump some weight and you have to prioritize what you want. The fatigue is realistic but freaking annoying permanent status.

I do not know if it is possible in the game, but when playing PnP with my group during Serpent's Skull Adventure Path, after getting exhausted few times, they started to hunt for 8-16 hours before venturing into very big dungeons or caves, and had always enough rations to spent there more than a few days.

[majestic]

This is my experience. I don't mind the difficulty spikes so much as the lack of communicating to the player what's going on.

 

Enemy tooltips like in Pillars of Eternity would be nice where you just hover over them and see what resistances and armor class they have. It's stuff you can find out from the combat log anyway but it would go a long way to help realize what's going on.

 

 

Point in case, that bear-like treant on the main quest. It got a hefty 10/- to slashing and piercing damage but the way the game tells you this is really old school, if not to say annoying. The info is already there, just format it a bit better maybe?

 

 

Also WTB a sell vendor trash button. The inventory filters are nice but why's the vendor trash lumped together with crafting materials? That's sort of... annoying.

[IndiraLightfoot]

Sure, the game is rough around the edges here and there, but in so many ways, P:KM reminds me of a very good and ambitious mod.

And I mean this in a good way. It's like a dream mod made by experienced gamers who love Pathfinder and PnP, and they want others to share their enjoyment via the challenges they've devised and the story and kingdom building they provide. Seen in this light, of course this game would be hard - even its tutorial is at least somewhat demanding.

And never forget that unless you go down the route of PoE and especially Deadfire, the starting levels will be extra tough due to low HPs, the damage ranges and the random nature of dice rolled (that's the very purpose of them being dice, hehe). 

 

I feel like the Owlcats get PnP roleplaying, and they haven't really cared that much about adopting everything to a computer game flow, and for the most part, this scratches some of us "grognards" in the right places. I get the same feel playing this game as when I cranked up the difficulty on BG1 a long time ago, and was then taken aback by the sheer joy of playing it with a barrel of a gun pointing to my head. Before I said "sadist", I probably should've said "masochistic".

[LittleRose]

I'm just playing on normal difficulty. No need to overdo it, I'm a bit rusty when it comes to D&D cRPGs. At the moment I'm stuck at Oleg's tradepost. The Bandits are absolutely no problem for my party, thanks to the ambush, but they keep killing Oleg, and I want to save him.

Maybe if I speed up Amiri and have her kill the archers, while Val and my ranger attack the melee fighters before they get to him. Linzi could support us with a few spells or a song. Hmmm...

Edited September 27, 2018 by LittleRose

[IndiraLightfoot]

After a few hours, it's safe to say that plenty of encounters in the game have enemy range attackers in the back, and even worse

 It's not uncommon with bandit Conjurers - kill them on sight - charge, true strike, if you have a clear sight line, both Harrim and Amiri can do this

, which means that your party is very vulnerable during the first 3-4 levels. Heh, lvl 2: two arrows and bolts hitting one of your characters is usually enough to take it out. So, you have to plan accordingly. Up your armor and other shielding effects by all means available. There are defensive modes/stances available for some chars, use them. Pick range AoE spells that can stop ranged attackers quickly. I gave Linzi Sleep. It's not as powerful as in BG1, but it certainly helps. I've also found something that lets her cast Color Spray 3 times per encounter, and that makes the enemies prone and blinded. Then, you just kill them off.  Color Spray is one of the very first spells I recall, playing D&D way back when. My 2nd character ever was a gnome illusionist, and this very spell saved us during early levels several times.

Edited September 27, 2018 by IndiraLightfoot

[Raithe]

I just made it into the 2nd Chapter and you get the Kingdom management aspects going. On the one hand, it seems nicely set up for the majority of it... For the other, I have just found myself incredibly frustrated because I set my companions to do some basic kingdom project / event stuff.. then a week later I get emergency projects jump up that have to be handled RIGHT NOW!.... But I have no companions to do them, because they're busy and you can't cancel projects... So unless I reload a save from way earlier and lose a couple of hours of gameplay, I get automatic failure and/or massive penalties from not handling those emergencies.  

[Manveru123]

The game is getting Mixed on Steam. Why?

 

Because its higher difficulty levels are effing HARD AS HELL and most players aren't even familiar with the setting.

 

So great news for all "potd is too easy" players! Go play this game instead, for a bit. You will crawl back crying.

[IndiraLightfoot]

I just made it into the 2nd Chapter and you get the Kingdom management aspects going. On the one hand, it seems nicely set up for the majority of it... For the other, I have just found myself incredibly frustrated because I set my companions to do some basic kingdom project / event stuff.. then a week later I get emergency projects jump up that have to be handled RIGHT NOW!.... But I have no companions to do them, because they're busy and you can't cancel projects... So unless I reload a save from way earlier and lose a couple of hours of gameplay, I get automatic failure and/or massive penalties from not handling those emergencies.

One of the loading screens says something to the effect of: Take care of problems ASAP, and only then focus on opportunities, during your kingdom management. Thanks to you, I now know it won't be as clear-cut as that. Thank you for the heads-up!

 

The game is getting Mixed on Steam. Why?

 

Because its higher difficulty levels are effing HARD AS HELL and most players aren't even familiar with the setting.

 

So great news for all "potd is too easy" players! Go play this game instead, for a bit. You will crawl back crying.

People are weird. Why do they pick higher difficulty levels, one's even called "Unfair", and then freak out when it's too hard?

And even weirder: They even take the time to lower their praise in Steam reviews to the level of bland "mixed".

If you don't have enough knowledge about D&D 3.5 and/or Pathfinder, a game like this will take weeks to come to grips with, surely. The system is huge!

Edited September 27, 2018 by IndiraLightfoot

[daven]

I guess a lot of people want to just put in a game and breeze through it on hard even without putting effort in to learn the game systems or anything.

 

God damn I can't wait to finish work to go play.......! Euuurggghhhh! 5 hours and 51 minutes.

[LittleRose]

I know exactly why I've chosen normal difficulty. I had to play Baldur's Gate 1 and 2 several times to really master them in normal mode back in their day. I know my limits, and I'm not afraid to lower the difficulty for one fight after I've failed a dozen times or so. I can turn it back up afterwards. Some old school games require a lot more than just clicking on time. And sometimes you need to fail a few times to find the right tactical approach. It's a learning process, not a competition.

[IndiraLightfoot]

Great point there, LittleRose!

 

I wouldn't hesitate to lower my difficulty if I get stuck or if it all becomes a chore. And yeah, no leaderboards here. This is a SP experience. I just guesstimated what kind of challenge I would find fun this first time around with a Pathfinder CRPG, which I knew very well would be very much akin to D&D 3.5.

[daven]

The Souls games are celebrated for the same reason this is apparently being criticized. HMMMMMMMM.

 

Well I haven't played it for myself yet, maybe I'll start whinging later.

[IndiraLightfoot]

One important advice, even to experienced Pathinder/D&D players:

Check a lot of pause game during combat boxes under your settings. Unlike Deadfire, this is a game where you have to micromanage to survive. Your orders matter heaps!

Also, your choice of spells and abilities used at specific points in time during an encounter will be decisive. Sometimes, you should skip buffing the party, because there is no time. There are arrows raining down on you. Move and kill now, buff later, and other cool situs like those.

 

To put it bluntly, P:KM is certainly not a game to mess around. Taking it a bit more seriously will pay dividends.

Edited September 27, 2018 by IndiraLightfoot