Game tells me to go to a place, events kick my butt.

[eobet]

I got to the stronghold, and I was told a wizard is under siege and needs urgent help. I go there, and it's almost one hit kills on all of my guys.

 

So I continue the main quest and take part in some ritual in the sewers of the first large city. Quest then tells me to go to the sanitarium, where I get ambushed in the north ward again, by things that just steamrolls all of my people.

 

The wizard thing, ok, you could escape from that, but the ward ambush has no warning, no escape.

 

Imo, that's bad game design. Now I just have to re-load and walk straight out of there and try to level somewhere else? What fun is that?

 

I see the story now... the hero went all the way down in the the sanitarium to investigate, and just when he reached his goal, he stopped and turned around, and went out and grinded some mobs for a few levels.

 

Sorry. Had to vent a bit. This is truly old-school because you don't design a game like this these days. Or did I miss something obvious?

[Boeroer]

You seem to have missed the clear warning of your steward - who told you that the Torn Bannermen are too strong for you. That stuff is late game content but most people miss that because it's

a) on the way to WM (geographically) and

b) the warning comes last... and the modern player doesn't seem to like reading stuff until the end.

 

With the Sanatorium you seemed to have followed the critical path without doing any side quests. This usually leads to a situation where you are a bit underleveled. I'm still surprised that you could do stuff like Maerwald and oozes + trolls in the sewer but die in the Sanatorium. That fight isn't considered to be particularly hard. You're past the point where most people complain that the game is too hard (Maerwald). But maybe the situation just wasn't optimal for you (e.g. no resting before or stuff like that).

 

It's kind of difficult to balance XP gain of the critical path and thr side content in an rpg (that's not railroaded). It gets too easy if you do all side quests or too hard if you do none.

But not taking the player by the hand all the time but letting him explore a semi-opeen world might lead to some encounters that are too hard for you - but it's also less boring in my opinion.

But when I look at Skyrim, Dark Souls and the like it seems lots of recent games did the old-school thing...

Edited October 5, 2018 by Boeroer

[eobet]

I guess what I reacted badly too was the game actually locking you inside and ambushing you.  Maybe the goldbox series of games did that (I don't remember), but the Ultimas certainly never did, and I do believe you can even flee from the 99 barbarians in Bard's Tale.

 

I mean, if I could have actually looked at those glowing guys in the corridors and analyzed their stats, I would have gotten a clue that I shouldn't be there yet, but I don't think you can do that? A spell I missed perhaps?

[eobet]

Ok, I'm even more pissed now, actually.

 

I wanted to set the difficulty down for that encounter, but when I try it says that it only works for maps I haven't visited yet. I don't have a save from before I entered that map!

 

And I tried the battle a few more times. Not only are the big glowy guys super tough, there's spellcasters and someone who turns into a big demon in addition to the trash mobs (who still hit very hard). Why would I have expected that from a sanitarium inside a city?

 

The trolls in that previous dungeon were nothing compared to this, because they came alone. This is such an insane spike in difficulty, because it's not only twice the amount of enemies ever encountered before, there's three new enemy types as well.

 

Seriously, is there a mod that makes this fight not ludicrous?

[Boeroer]

That fight is not hard. You are just underleveled. Why don't you do some side quests in the city (there are tons from all sorts of bystanders) and then come back?

[eobet]

I want to see a book where the hero goes right up to the place he's supposed to go, but then suddenly turns around and goes straight out to whack a few random orcs over the head until he feels he is stronger.

 

Really stupid, imo. I've played CRPGs for 30+ years and maybe I'm getting old and fuzzy, but I only know of grinding in MMOs and JRPGs.

[eobet]

Oh, wow. Ok, so I bloody left the last door, and the game tells me there's a message at the keep.

 

So I go there, and I'm supposed to meet the chancellour in a bar. AND GUESS WHAT HAPPENS????

 

ANOTHER DAMN AMBUSH!

 

What is it with this game and it's cheap tactics to trap the player and force them to reload and then go and grind?

 

I've never seen something so stupid.

[InsaneCommander]

I remember the first time I went to see the Torn Bannermen. It was like a boss battle

 

I came back later and turned them into the Banner Torn men.

[eobet]

Ok, so I actually managed to win that bar ambush after about 5 tries.

 

Then I found another ambush in Heritage Hill (top right corner), load, backtrack.

 

Then I found another ambush in an ogre cave (insane amount of spiders), load, backtrack.

 

This game is a bloody backtrack-fest in order to find the correct path that doesn't get you instantly killed. What a joke any blind iron man playthrough would be in this game.

 

Old school does not equal lazy game balancing, imo.

[eobet]

Ok, none of my previous comments have been approved yet, so I don't know if I'm shouting into the void or not, but I just wanted to say that it's time for me to stop playing and uninstall the game.

 

I set it to "story only", just to see what happens, and I discoverd a massive temple that came up beneath a village and NOBODY CARED! I tried to talk to the inkeeper about it, but the only dialogue options were related to finding the daughter whom I already had freed in the temple. I then didn't get any good options with the nobleman in the inn either so I killed him where he stood for what he did to the daugher. Two random npcs outside seemd to care about that in random dialogue interactions.

 

And then a slaver comes to my castle and wants help, and there's not even an option to kill him where he stands. The only options are to help him or have him wait.

 

So, I'm done. This was a mistake from the beginning. I was lured in by the discount. I was never a Baldur's Gate fan (although I loved Temple of Elemental Evil for some reason), I was always more of an Ultima fan, so I'm going to go and play the Divinity games now instead.

[Boeroer]

You seem to be really bad at this game. No offense. I suck at baking...

[Grubworm]

Ok, none of my previous comments have been approved yet, so I don't know if I'm shouting into the void or not, but I just wanted to say that it's time for me to stop playing and uninstall the game.

 

I set it to "story only", just to see what happens, and I discoverd a massive temple that came up beneath a village and NOBODY CARED! I tried to talk to the inkeeper about it, but the only dialogue options were related to finding the daughter whom I already had freed in the temple. I then didn't get any good options with the nobleman in the inn either so I killed him where he stood for what he did to the daugher. Two random npcs outside seemd to care about that in random dialogue interactions.

 

And then a slaver comes to my castle and wants help, and there's not even an option to kill him where he stands. The only options are to help him or have him wait.

 

So, I'm done. This was a mistake from the beginning. I was lured in by the discount. I was never a Baldur's Gate fan (although I loved Temple of Elemental Evil for some reason), I was always more of an Ultima fan, so I'm going to go and play the Divinity games now instead.

to bad this game is awesome. 

[eobet]

You seem to be really bad at this game. No offense. I suck at baking...

Mhm, but do you enjoy baking? You don’t have to be good at something in order to still enjoy the experience.

 

But I admit I made a mistake. 77 000 backers apparently enjoy it and I wasn’t one and that GoG sale made me temporarily forget why. I remember now.

[Boeroer]

You are right.

 

I would like to be able to bake (it's quite fun to do with my children). Unfortunately everything I bake either tastes like a sponge or has the consistency of a brick. Cookies may work sometimes.

It's funny because I'm doing quite ok when cooking.

 

If you don't like the game (or that types of games) that's totally fine. I nearly only like these types of games - limits my options somehow.

[Grubworm]

 

You seem to be really bad at this game. No offense. I suck at baking...

Mhm, but do you enjoy baking? You don’t have to be good at something in order to still enjoy the experience.

 

But I admit I made a mistake. 77 000 backers apparently enjoy it and I wasn’t one and that GoG sale made me temporarily forget why. I remember now.

 

I love to bake and am great at it. I remember playing wasteland back in the 80's and wondering into the wrong area and dying. For me I like that kind of danger. Life ins't a book. Nor should the games be.

[Xsanf]

 

And then a slaver comes to my castle and wants help, and there's not even an option to kill him where he stands.

My, if only you had some patience you might discover an option to hang him on your keep's gates...a hot-tempered ruler is a disaster to his subjects, you know.