Which did you enjoy more, Poe or Poe2?

[xzar_monty]

thelee, I'm really very surprised by that report. I don't doubt you, but I am genuinely very surprised. It never even occurred to me to spam rest. Different eras, maybe? I started with RPGs in the 1980s, and I do like a challenge. I also appreciate the concept of "fairness", which is nebulous, I admit it. But spam rest is not fair. It's not exactly cheating, but I wouldn't want a spam rester as a friend, let's put it like that. :-D

Edited April 11, 2019 by xzar_monty

[Boeroer]

In PoE I always tried to fight as many fights as I could without resting. That was fun for me and maybe that's why I like parts of PoE better. Of course: if you rest after every fight "per-rest" makes not much sense. Wonder why Deadfire still has it then though. Empower, trinkets several enchantments, figurines - all per-rest. Why didn't they consummate the change?

[thelee]

In PoE I always tried to fight as many fights as I could without resting. That was fun for me and maybe that's why I like parts of PoE better. Of course: if you rest after every fight "per-rest" makes not much sense. Wonder why Deadfire still has it then though. Empower, trinkets several enchantments, figurines - all per-rest. Why didn't they consummate the change?

 

the moment i saw empower as a mechanic in BB (before even all the per-rest items), i was immediately like "what??"

[anishar]

i feel like empower was introduced for casters to have their "big moment" back, as they lost it when going from per rest to per encounter, it does the job, but for martial classes huh.. ressource refil is handy "sometimes" i guess ^^

[Boeroer]

I din't think it's bad though. I just wonder: with those arguments gainst per-rest at hand, why stick to such a potentially balance-screwing mechanic? To make potential per-encounter spamfest less monotonous maybe? And what anishar said?

 

Empower is fine to me. I kind of like the idea in general. It's rel. unique and it "only" leads to one rel. manageable power spike with one of your own abilites or to a few more uses of you overall balanced per-encounter stuff. I don't feel the same about per-rest abilites on items. Those add some powerful effects per rest that have nothing to do with your class - potentially breaking balance. Resting is even easier than in PoE, so you can easily make those items quasi per-encounter effects. If you are doing blance based on a per-encounter basis - better to give items weaker effects but per encounter instead of powerful effects per rest.

 

I almost never use the per-rest abilites on items because they feel alien in this system. Although I like per-rest in PoE.

[anameforobsidian]

 

I would agree with this guy but he actually put toon.

 

agreed.  well, except for the fact that everything he/she said is wrong.

 

is just as likely to be decisive moments in deadfire battles as poe battles.  depending on party composition, gorecci street on potd still has us frequent facing decisive moments whenever we play it. if an encounter is challenging, then there is likely to be a decisive moment, and there is nothing 'bout vancian which affects likelihood o' decisive poe moments poe... unless a "decisive moment" is reduced to the realization by player a more recent rest woulda' been smart. 

 

 

The early game isn't very indicative of this problem, because the early game is still resource limited, just by level rather than sleep.  At later levels, where there's some pretty significant HP bloat, it definitely falls prey to chipping down boss HP with a prepared order of spells.

[ShadySands]

I enjoyed the story more in the first game and the mechanics more in the second

[Gromnir]

I enjoyed the story more in the first game and the mechanics more in the second

much the cliff's notes version o' our own feelings regarding the two games.  deadfire mechanics were a big improvement over poe (excepting penetration) but we were relegated to inconsequential observer status in a story we had a hard time caring 'bout. 

 

can hope we got a three bears kinda progression.

 

HA! Good Fun!

[Evange]

Just landed in Neketaka and glad to be enjoying it as much as PoE 1! The ship combat is kinda tedious though and feels disconnected from the game. I mean what are the rest of my party members doing when enemies are throwing cannonballs at us?

[xzar_monty]

Just landed in Neketaka and glad to be enjoying it as much as PoE 1! The ship combat is kinda tedious though and feels disconnected from the game. I mean what are the rest of my party members doing when enemies are throwing cannonballs at us?

 

The ship combat is tedious, not inviting and entirely skippable -- so if you don't enjoy it, I'd recommend just skipping it.

 

In fact, I myself have never fired my cannons once in the whole game. I always maneuver into close combat (i.e. boarding) as quickly as possible. While doing this, I have never been hit by enemy cannons more than once, and so the damage I have taken has always been inconsequential. I'm not sure if being able to deal with ship combat like this indicates bad planning or not, but anyway, that's the way I deal with it -- the whole thing just looks so uninvitingly done.

 

(And yes, there are naval enemies that are clearly superior to me. Those I simply avoid. That's another strange thing: the Defiant can easily outrun all the other ships in the game.)

[Gromnir]

Just landed in Neketaka and glad to be enjoying it as much as PoE 1! The ship combat is kinda tedious though and feels disconnected from the game. I mean what are the rest of my party members doing when enemies are throwing cannonballs at us?

ship combat were intended to be a tangential mini-game, sorta like kotor swoop racing or pazak.  the disconnect is natural and arguable intentional. as xar-monty mentions, you may skip ship combat entirely, which is possible in part 'cause o' the fact such encounters is non-essential.

 

that said, particular for a potd and/or solo run, ship combat, while repetitive, is offering the best early-game 1007 and xp opportunity.  is difficult for us to not exhaust ship combat opportunities o' named captains for a potd game as avoidance feels a bit like voluntarily handicapping our self.

 

HA! Good Fun!

 

ps following threads have useful ship combat insights

 

https://forums.obsidian.net/topic/107827-need-help-with-ship-battles/?p=2130159

 

https://forums.obsidian.net/topic/107286-avoiding-instant-death-on-ship/?p=2123453

Edited April 14, 2019 by Gromnir

[Boeroer]

I thought the same (ship combat = bad) for a long time. But funnily enough: the more I do it the more I like it. Besides the motivation that Gromnir mentioned which is absolutely right: there's no easier and faster way to come by loot and XP than using ship combat.

 

The criticism I still have: so poorly explained.

[xzar_monty]

I thought the same (ship combat = bad) for a long time. But funnily enough: the more I do it the more I like it. Besides the motivation that Gromnir mentioned which is absolutely right: there's no easier and faster way to come by loot and XP than using ship combat.

 

I might get into ship combat if it incurred an XP penalty. I mean, there's far too much free XP thrown my way anyway, so if there were a decent way to turn that down, I'd happily choose it.

 

As for it being poorly explained: oh my word, yes.

Edited April 15, 2019 by xzar_monty

[thelee]

The criticism I still have: so poorly explained.

I have more detailed criticisms:

- still 99% sure that deckhand rank accomplishes nothing, which to me is a major oversight or bug with system. a random person in the hold will perform just as well as a deckhand for ship events. deckhand rank only appears to matter for world map encounters, and you don't need much to pass them.

- no way to more directly try to take out enemy surgeons. In high-level ship combat there's almost no point to use anything other than cannonballs, because injured above-deck sailors get healed so freaking rapidly by their rank 3 or 4 surgeons (same goes for you). you basically end up just having to use cannonballs and only if you get lucky early on taking out their surgeon can you then bother with other types of targeting.

- sails generally need to have less health and it should be more punishing if sail health reaches 0. there's no point doing chainshot in almost any fight - on easier ships you can accomplish more (and more punishingly) by using grapeshot and taking out their above-deck crew - once the helmsman and deckhand are taken out the ship can't even turn, much less move. on harder ships, there's so much sail health, that using chainshot is basically wasting your turn when you could have been doing actual hull damage or taking out their crew. even if you reduce sail health to 0 enemy ships can still do half-sail movements.

- all close-range fire cannons appear to ignore specific targeting and target randomly, which makes them worse than they should be (because like the point above, every time they hit sails it's essentially a wasted shot)

 

though, still a million% better than random poe1 stronghold fights that you have to stop your dungeon-crawling for just to deal with

Edited April 15, 2019 by thelee

[Almaar]

I'm very peculiar i think, growing up i became way more interested in what videogames can do in terms of storytelling and writing in general.

In the last decade one of my best experience was with the Telltale game The Walking Dead, even though the gameplay was very simple i really enjoyed it.

I like to play other games like the occasional racing game, F1 in particular or strategy games like xCOM, but clearly my favourite games are rpgs.

 

So i liked PoE 1 a lot more, in fact i consider that game to be one of the best i've played in my life.

I think the companions, the dialogue, the lore, the scenario and the themes of the game are a lot better than Deadfire.

 

I feel like PoE 1 it's truly a spiritual successor of games like Baldur's Gate, Icewind Dale and Planescape: Torment while Deadfire winks more at modern rpgs.

 

I didn't expect a swashbuckling adventure (for the most past) after themes like religion and faith, science and atheism, bitter truth or sweet lies featured in the first game.

 

The reason why i didn't like Deadfire as much it's the same as a lot of other open world rpgs, there is a sense of false urgency given by the complete disconnection between the main and the side quests.

 

After so many years probably Baldur's Gate 2 is the game that did the best job in making the player experience the side content in a mostly coherent way.

Long story short, your character have very few good reasons to do the (really good btw) side content, exploring Deadfire while Eothas is on the run and his soul is on the line.

 

That was a huge disappointment for me. Especially coming from Obsidian.

PoE 1 for sure could be less polished in some aspects but overall it featured a more cohesive and coherent narrative, that's why i enjoyed it more.

Edited April 15, 2019 by Almaar

[Amentep]

Unless you feel like you have to save Imoen or murderize Irenicus, there's little reason to to do any of the quests (or stay in Athkatla, for that matter) in BG2.  But that's the difference between a computer RPG and P&P, the plot has to be something and can't really be adjusted once it is something.

[Almaar]

Unless you feel like you have to save Imoen or murderize Irenicus, there's little reason to to do any of the quests (or stay in Athkatla, for that matter) in BG2.  But that's the difference between a computer RPG and P&P, the plot has to be something and can't really be adjusted once it is something.

 

Of course i wanted to save Imoen and face Irenicus. She's been with me from the beginning of the first game and Irenicus also killed Khalid.  

[Amentep]

A lot of players had their PC kill Khalid in the first game so they didn't have to spend a slot on him to get Jaheira (apparently similar happened with Dynahier vis-a-vis Minsc) rather than wait for Irenicus to do it for them.

 

But what I mean is that BG2 is great if you buy into the framing sequence - to either save Imoen or to face down Irenicus or to find out what he knows about unlocking your power.  But there are a lot of places the game breaks down - when you finish BG1 you don't have to have Imoen in your party so may not have a relationship with them; you might not have spend time with Khalid or Dynaheir to feel strongly about revenge; you may be playing a neutral character who doesn't care about revenge or power, and sees the Cowled Wizards as the appropriate balance to Irenicus and want to leave well enough alone...

 

I hear that PoEII fails in contextualizing the PC's primary actions doing side quests with the end goals of the plot of the people, but I'd argue that this is probably only a matter of degree and that any RPG where the PC isn't on plot rails runs the risk of it (or put another way, hides the issue better or worse than others).

 

YMMV.

[xzar_monty]

Unless you feel like you have to save Imoen or murderize Irenicus, there's little reason to to do any of the quests (or stay in Athkatla, for that matter) in BG2.  But that's the difference between a computer RPG and P&P, the plot has to be something and can't really be adjusted once it is something.

 

Both Ultima IV and Ultima V, by the way, back in the day, accomplished this rather marvelously: especially in Ultima IV, it took a while to even find out what the plot was, much less follow it. And yes, of course they were of their era and don't stand up to critical scrutiny these days, but there are some aspects in both that I think remain unsurpassed to this day -- which is saying something. I mean, neither PoE nor Deadfire even attempt some of the stuff those games had, in terms of how the world operates and how alive it is.

 

And yes, your point is absolutely valid, too.

 

Incidentally, I've been continuing to play Pathfinder: Kingmaker while waiting for the Deadfire patch, and it appears that in some aspects, that game combines the worst of both worlds: there is both plenty of CRPG railroading and the sense of a really mean and unpleasant P&P GM -- the kind whose playing group you'd want to leave after, like, two sessions. Not good. That's not the whole of the game, though, but it definitely has a dark side.

[Evange]

 

Just landed in Neketaka and glad to be enjoying it as much as PoE 1! The ship combat is kinda tedious though and feels disconnected from the game. I mean what are the rest of my party members doing when enemies are throwing cannonballs at us?

ship combat were intended to be a tangential mini-game, sorta like kotor swoop racing or pazak.  the disconnect is natural and arguable intentional. as xar-monty mentions, you may skip ship combat entirely, which is possible in part 'cause o' the fact such encounters is non-essential.

 

that said, particular for a potd and/or solo run, ship combat, while repetitive, is offering the best early-game 1007 and xp opportunity.  is difficult for us to not exhaust ship combat opportunities o' named captains for a potd game as avoidance feels a bit like voluntarily handicapping our self.

 

HA! Good Fun!

 

ps following threads have useful ship combat insights

 

https://forums.obsidian.net/topic/107827-need-help-with-ship-battles/?p=2130159

 

https://forums.obsidian.net/topic/107286-avoiding-instant-death-on-ship/?p=2123453

 

 

Thank you so much!

[bugarup]

Unless you feel like you have to save Imoen or murderize Irenicus, there's little reason to to do any of the quests (or stay in Athkatla, for that matter) in BG2.  But that's the difference between a computer RPG and P&P, the plot has to be something and can't really be adjusted once it is something.

 

I played BG2 first, did not give a toss about Imoen, "Khalid who?" and Irenicus was such a cheesy and hammy pile of videogame Big Bad's cliches that I couldn't ever invest in him as personal nemesis. That's why I always eyeroll at people who are all "Deadfire gives me no motivation, waaah!" and then "Baldur's Gate 2 is perfectly perfect slice of perfection with perfect motivation!" No, it's f†cking not. Not everyone who's into RPGs worship that thing and it's not the pinnacle of videogame perfection. No, seriously. Eye of the beholder, tentacle of the illithid, all that.  I loved the game, by the way --  the setting, the cities, all the sidequests and secrets, and my indifference about anything Irenicus did not ruin my enjoyment of those things in a slightest. 

[daven]

 

Unless you feel like you have to save Imoen or murderize Irenicus, there's little reason to to do any of the quests (or stay in Athkatla, for that matter) in BG2.  But that's the difference between a computer RPG and P&P, the plot has to be something and can't really be adjusted once it is something.

 

 

I played BG2 first, did not give a toss about Imoen, "Khalid who?" and Irenicus was such a cheesy and hammy pile of videogame Big Bad's cliches that I couldn't ever invest in him as personal nemesis. That's why I always eyeroll at people who are all "Deadfire gives me no motivation, waaah!" and then "Baldur's Gate 2 is perfectly perfect slice of perfection with perfect motivation!" No, it's f†cking not. Not everyone who's into RPGs worship that thing and it's not the pinnacle of videogame perfection. No, seriously. Eye of the beholder, tentacle of the illithid, all that.  I loved the game, by the way --  the setting, the cities, all the sidequests and secrets, and my indifference about anything Irenicus did not ruin my enjoyment of those things in a slightest.

Get out.

[Boeroer]

I played both BG I and II and liked them. But I didn't play them that often. I think they are inferior games compared to PoE and Deadfire - but at their time they were very awesome. This may have something to do with the fact that I never played P&P D&D - so there was no nostalgia or bias or whatever. I only know D&D rules by CRPGs.

 

I found Irenicus to be rather lame as main antatonist. But it didn't have much impact on the game itself - at least for me.

 

One of the coolest enemies I encountered in a D&D game was Dran Draggore.

Edited April 16, 2019 by Boeroer

[xzar_monty]

It's interesting how passionate people are about the BG titles. I regard BG2 as an absolute classic, but BG1, it has to be said, is not very interesting. So much aimless wandering around on maps with essentially nothing on them. That sucks.

 

I thought Irenicus was great, mainly because of the voice acting.

 

BG2 is probably still my favorite CRPG, although Deadfire might come very close or even surpass it. ToB, by the way, as the finale, was a very disappointing ending to the Bhaalspawn saga. Too much railroading.

[Gromnir]

 

Unless you feel like you have to save Imoen or murderize Irenicus, there's little reason to to do any of the quests (or stay in Athkatla, for that matter) in BG2.  But that's the difference between a computer RPG and P&P, the plot has to be something and can't really be adjusted once it is something.

 

I played BG2 first, did not give a toss about Imoen, "Khalid who?" and Irenicus was such a cheesy and hammy pile of videogame Big Bad's cliches that I couldn't ever invest in him as personal nemesis. That's why I always eyeroll at people who are all "Deadfire gives me no motivation, waaah!" and then "Baldur's Gate 2 is perfectly perfect slice of perfection with perfect motivation!" No, it's f†cking not. Not everyone who's into RPGs worship that thing and it's not the pinnacle of videogame perfection. No, seriously. Eye of the beholder, tentacle of the illithid, all that.  I loved the game, by the way --  the setting, the cities, all the sidequests and secrets, and my indifference about anything Irenicus did not ruin my enjoyment of those things in a slightest. 

 

our fave crpg is ps:t, but we wouldn't call it a pinnacle o' video game perfection.  combat were bordering on bad and much o' the dialogue were comical overwrought.  bg2, by comparison were a better game, even if it weren't our favorite.  irenicus were supposed to be a tragic character, and we get how many players didn't see him that way. many o' the joinable npcs were well-written, but a few weren't, and we had no interest whatsoever in the cringe-worthy romances which is so popular. even so, bg2 were an extreme large and deep crpg with intriguing locations, vast improved combat over its predecessor, and the villains and companions were developed far beyond what were done in bg.  maybe not our fave, but am thinking bg2 deserves to be discussed when arguing 'bout crpg pinnacles... in spite o' fact Gromnir is not an ad&d fan... and we kinda dislike the forgotten realms setting.

 

'course  you may be taking commentary 'bout bg story the wrong way, 'cause the side-quests and setting is very much is part o' the bg2 story.  sure, critical path plot is largely insular and discrete, though kalah's circus tent and the bard quest and others actual were all reinforcing the main irenicus plot whether you realize or not, but those major side-quests in bg2 also had narratives which could be intriguing and even compelling.  cult of the eyeless (speaking o' beholders) were a largeish set piece side quest in bg2... so too were spellhold and de'arnise keep and umar hills and the thieves guild  and others.  bg2, unlike bg, were less 'bout the sandbox and more 'bout developing larger and more involved sidequests, each with their own plot and characters.  if you didn't care for irenicus, there were a goodly number o' sizeable side quests which you could find compelling.  

 

with a few exceptions, deadfire eschewed the larger set piece stuff and instead attempted to maximize "exploration." had loads o' small encounters on small islands or quests in nekataka which required only a couple steps to complete.  if you didn't care 'bout the main quest, there weren't much else to care 'bout in deadfire, and unlike poe, where all the companions had common thematic elements, deadfire were once again having companions be largely insular and isolated and utter tangential to the critical path story.  

 

when Gromnir says his favorite crpg story is ps:t, we ain't even talking 'bout the tno-focused critical path plot 'bout which we have difficulty maintaining interest once plane-hoping starts.  even so, we care 'bout the joinables and ravel is our pinnacle crpg character.  setting and characters is as much a part o' story as is plot, and ps:t had fantastic setting and characters.

 

as an aside, seeing how chrisA were revisiting his ravel chatracter with kotor2 kreia, is no surprise kreia is, on most days, our second favorite crpg character... evar.

 

regardless, if bg2 ain't a best, am thinking it deserves to be discussed when making such a claim, and am not a rose-hued glasses kinda guy.  we much prefer deadfire and poe mechanics to bg2's kinda/sorta ad&d. heck, from a mechanics pov, we prefer iwd2 to bg2... and that would be an ee offering for which we would be willing to pay good money.  bg2 with iwd2 mechanics? ideal ie pairing. regardless, bg2 did story elements well (not just plot) and had so many well-designed and unique quests it is difficult to think o' a game with similar depth and breadth. as such, bg2 is an arguable crpg high-water mark... regardless o' our many criticisms.

 

HA! Good Fun!