Thoughts About Minimum Attributes in Character Creation

[cokane]

Ability scores are way different in the Eternity games than traditional DnD. They don't completely shut down abilities or even completely nerf your stats. Whereas in DnD you could straight up shut yourself out of abilities or carrying certain gear or being effective at one of your class's signature abilities with a low score. Nor is there the god-level takeoff of having high level stats as was the case in DnD. People make a lot of the ability scores in Eternity on threads like build descriptions, but the actual truth is that (aside from dialogue/interaction checks) they don't matter all that much. They're mostly just ways to slightly buff/debuff aspects of your character.

Edited May 21, 2019 by cokane

[wih]

3 hours ago, Yosharian said:

So essentially, PoE is not a CRPG?

I don't know about that.

Of course it is a CRPG. I was talking only about its attribute system. What makes a game a CRPG is its writing and the reactivity and some other things of which the attribute system is a small part.

Edited May 21, 2019 by wih

[Yosharian]

2 hours ago, wih said:

Of course it is a CRPG. I was talking only about its attribute system. What makes a game a CRPG is its writing and the reactivity and some other things of which the attribute system is a small part.

But it's not, because apparently your attributes don't even matter as far as role-playing goes?

 

Quote: "PoE'sattribute system is a battle system, not RPG system."

Edited May 21, 2019 by Yosharian

[wih]

3 hours ago, Yosharian said:

But it's not, because apparently your attributes don't even matter as far as role-playing goes?

 

Quote: "PoE'sattribute system is a battle system, not RPG system."

Battles are an important part of CRPGs, and PoE attribute system is good for the battles part of the game. The attribute system just isn't very good for roleplaying, because attributes don't make much sense for roleplaying. People have complained they cannot make a frail wizard. Most barbarians should not be intelligent. When I create a healer build I tend to maximize its Dexterity, but not because I imagine it as someone who can jump over tall obstacles. I just want my char to be effective for its battle role. In conversations I imagine my char differently and I RP him differently.

[cokane]

5 hours ago, wih said:

Battles are an important part of CRPGs, and PoE attribute system is good for the battles part of the game. The attribute system just isn't very good for roleplaying, because attributes don't make much sense for roleplaying. People have complained they cannot make a frail wizard. Most barbarians should not be intelligent. When I create a healer build I tend to maximize its Dexterity, but not because I imagine it as someone who can jump over tall obstacles. I just want my char to be effective for its battle role. In conversations I imagine my char differently and I RP him differently.

I have to disagree with this. If anything, I think the RP elements of the stats is more important in Eternity games than it was in the old IE games or even modern DnD games like Pathfinder: Kingmaker. Because of the role of dialogue and other interactions.

It's not even true, for example, that Wizards can't be "frail". It can be quite effective to make a high intelligence, high perception and low might wizard that just casts debuffs and summons. Barbarians and intelligence were one of the peculiar exceptions here, but that was simply because the carnage skill was super imbalanced (i.e. it wasn't really worth it to build a barbarian that failed to take advantage of the skill). This was especially true in the first game. But overall, you were at great liberty to do whatever you wanted with your stats, especially if you weren't playing on PotD.

Hell, if anything, I think the stats were somewhat imbalanced not because of their effects in combat, but because of their disparate frequency on dialogue and interaction checks. Perception, intelligence and resolve do way more for you than dexterity and constitution.

[xzar_monty]

Actually, I don't think a high intelligence, high perception mage is that much more effective than a mediocre-intelligence, mediocre-perception mage. One big reason is that everything is per encounter. which means that you're not going to get the bonus spells so common in many CRPGs (DD-based particularly). Your spells are going to be a tiny bit more effective, but not a lot.

 

As for builds: my take is that pretty much everything works, that's how unimportant and interchangeable the skills, ability points, items etc. are. This is not a good thing or a bad thing in my view, it's just the way it is. It took me a while to realize that there is no need to hunt for any special items in the game -- some are nice, no question, and slightly more effective than others, but none are needed. For instance, I haven't re-equipped my ship, much less purchased an ostensibly better one. There's no need.

Edited May 21, 2019 by xzar_monty

[Boeroer]

I wouldn't say that high INT only has a tiny bit of advantage. Of course it depends on the ability, but since Power Level scaling adds 5% to base duration - which mutiplies with any duration bonus you might have - it makes quite the difference if you have 10 INT or 15. 

For AoE the difference is not that big in Deadfire as it was in PoE. So if you focus on spells that don't rely on duration much (direct damage for example or beams) then a few points of INT do indeed make not much of a difference.

Same with MIG: the MIG bonus pays off once you start to accumulate Power Level scaling for your abilites. PL adds 5% base damage wich multiplies with the MIG bonus. This can make a significant difference for any character who doesn't have a lot of dmg bonuses (usually casters with their spells for example).

That's why Helwalker/Caster is so popular.  It brings +MIG and +INT. Instead of PER it brings up to +12 ACC and also +2 PEN. Especially good with most DoTs where INT bonus even means a muliplicative dmg increase. 

[cokane]

That's a fair summary Boeroer. I just wanted to throw out that it's just not as much of a difference in these games as it was in IE games or other DnD CRPG's. Failing to max the stat of your primary class often resulted in a significantly gimped character in regards to their combat role. Think of even a 16 strength melee fighter, which isn't even that bad of a strength score! But often had/has little to no effect on the RP elements of those games. It's quite the opposite in Pillars, in my experience. You can play just fine with a ~14 or so in might for your damage dealer or intelligence for your crowd control caster.

[Boeroer]

Indeed

[daven]

Good point. You had to be as strong as Thor Bjornsson in DND to be an effective fighter, anything less wasn't good enough. Even if you only wielded a long sword and shield. Surely you don't need to be a power lifter to be devastating with a long sword???

Edited May 22, 2019 by daven

[wih]

15 minutes ago, daven said:

Good point. You had to be as strong as Thor Bjornsson in DND to be an effective fighter, anything less wasn't good enough. Even if you only wielded a long sword and shield. Surely you don't need to be a power lifter to be devastating with a long sword???

When I played Infinity games I thought in DND 16-18 was a normal strength for a trained fighter. In my thinking, to start being something extraordinary, your fighter needed to have strength above 18/50. Usually I tried to roll 18/00 (shorthand for 18/100), which gave really good bonuses. 19 was for orcs and half-orcs, 20 and above was giant's strength.

Edited May 22, 2019 by wih

[Yosharian]

Yes, but ALSO in those games, a Fighter with 12 Str and one with 19, both have the same strength when they equip a Belt of Storm Giant Strength.