Turn-based mode - any good? Buggy? Balanced? (Also: is this party OK for it?)

[Yosharian]

So, firstly: I'm interested in trying out this turn-based mode, but is it any good?  Also, is in a good state, i.e. no bugs and so on?  I figured it might be cool for a new playthrough, but I'm not too interested in experiencing a whole new raft of bugs, or unbalanced gameplay.

 

Secondly, I'm planning on using the party from my previous playthrough, which I never finished; I was wondering if this party will 'work' in turn-based, or if I need to rethink some of the characters?  You can see the party here, but here's a basic summary:

 

1) Devoted/Enchanter 2H melee gish

2) Unbroken/Trickster 1H+Sh riposte tank

3) Helwalker/Lifegiver Fate Testarossa-style glass cannon healer/nuker

4) Evoker glass cannon

5) Priest of Magran/Bleak Walker 1H+Sh off-tank nuker/support/DPS hybrid

 

To be clear, I'm looking for feedback like 'oh yeah that build just doesn't work in turn-based because X', that kind of thing.

 

Thirdly, are there any new character builds that you would suggest because they're just tons of fun in turn-based, or they work really well, that kind of thing?  Not looking for anything broken.  Just fun stuff.

Edited April 19, 2019 by Yosharian

[Kanasuke]

Turn Based is fun but it has its own balance.

 

Action speed or recovery speed means nothing in this because every1 gets 1 action per round regardless of speed, be it one swing or one spell. everyone wears the heaviest plate armor they can find. a whole slew of weapon categories are complete useless because you want big base weapon dmg w/ slow swing speeds, and you want to abuse broken modals that increase recovery speed bcuz u dont care about speed, u can take hits to your speeds as much as you like with 0 penalty to your dps. you always drop dexterity to 3 so now you are overflowing in points. you see the problem? do you still want to play?? 

 

But if you're still ok with that then turn-based can be a lot of fun. so long as you are also ok with the fact that hard crowd-control effects like stuns are completely busted in this mode. even a 0.1 second stun equals 1 round. so on most CC abilities you only need to graze the opponent to get full effect. the wizard spell Slicken is overpowered and should not be used since proning the enemy on their turn causes them to lose their turn 

 

 

In terms of bugs, not that many. The main bug for me is enemies sometimes wasting their turn doing nothing for no apparent reason (or sometimes pathing fails, stuck behind objects etc.) It doesn't happen super often, but when it does especially on hard fights, it feels like I was cheated out of my encounter experience :<

 

The most egregious example of this is when it happens to bosses. especially the one that starts with K. that boss is completely broken atm.

 

Also i noticed enemies drop off their afflictions that you have applied randomly, when it's not even their turn, but doesn't happen too often. Also wall of flame (and other 'wall' spells) are buggy atm because sometimes they tick in real time even though you are in turn-based mode. 

 

 

 

 

as for your party i think it's more than fine and will destroy this mode. i don't have specifics but generally, most builds will work except those that rely on fast recovery speed, (e.g. streetfighter). on the converse anything that penalized your recovery speed is now stronger (e.g. sharpshooter, evoker).

 

single-class monks and barbarians are weaker imo. all martial classes are weaker relative to casters (bcuz 1 swing = 1 spell), dual-wield is also usually weaker, you can't make use of the passive or the swing speed. tactician is stronger, assassin is stronger. skald is weaker. anything that required lots of micro is now stronger.

btw if you use the deadfire tweaks bundle of mods, arquebus might be too strong bcuz it was balanced for real time, so u may want to edit the files to make it in line again. (inside   poe_2_deadfire_Arquebus.gamedatabundle)  <--- this is what i did to a bunch of weapon modals to make them useable again

 

also you might consider using Unity console to add the ability: 'Black Jacket' to all your characters because swapping weapons takes an entire round in this which u may find is too punishing and punishes martial classes even more, and they are already at a bad spot in this. 

Edited April 19, 2019 by Kanasuke

[Taudis]

TB is actually pretty good rn. There's occasionally glitches with NPCs randomly just standing there for ~10 secs instead of taking their turn but it's uncommon.

 

Your Team

1) Probably fine. 2H is pretty good for single target damage in TB. If you have been using the AI scripts to self buff, it might be annoying to play. It's gonna get shown up by the casters on your team.

2) Riposte is really hard to make work in TB due to the increased graze range. Trickster/Unbroken can probably make it work but it's gonna proc a lot less. Persistent distraction and interrupts are really good in TB so you might still want a Swash but you'd probably be better off with a dual wielder.

3) This character is a powerhouse in TB and will probably be winning encounters by themselves. Relentless Storm just wins 3/4s of encounters by itself in TB. If winning easily is your jam, definitely play this char.

The HoTs are pretty good in TB and AoE casters are really good so even if Relentless is too OP for you, then just not using it and playing this character they'll still be useful.

4) Casters are great DPR in TB. Evoker is still good, maybe even a bit better.

5) Same thing I've been saying about nuker casters - they're good. Priests IMO get a significant boost in TB bc their relatively slow cast times are mitigated by the nature of it.

 

I've been really enjoying Chanters in TB. Killers Froze Stiff and The Thunder Rolled are hard control and phrase generation is way faster feeling as 1/round.

 

Terrified doesn't break engagement in TB, so Trickster/Soulblade is pretty fun. You can generate focus by casting Ryngrim's and getting disengagement attacks.

Edited April 19, 2019 by Taudis