Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous - Owlcat Games' next isometric Pathfinder RPG

[kanisatha]

I myself don't know because I'm not playing the beta, but several posters on the Owlcat forum have commented that the tone of the writing in WotR is more somber and serious and darker than Km as a result of the nature of the story of the WotR module - demon hordes laying waste to everything.

[xzar_monty]

16 hours ago, kanisatha said:

I myself don't know because I'm not playing the beta, but several posters on the Owlcat forum have commented that the tone of the writing in WotR is more somber and serious and darker than Km as a result of the nature of the story of the WotR module - demon hordes laying waste to everything.

This is one thing I've been wondering. If demon hordes are laying waste to everything, how can you start at level 1. Well, I suppose you're not going to meet the demon hordes for a while...

[kanisatha]

6 hours ago, xzar_monty said:

This is one thing I've been wondering. If demon hordes are laying waste to everything, how can you start at level 1. Well, I suppose you're not going to meet the demon hordes for a while...

Yeah that's what your army is for. Well, not your army but the queen's army.

Plus, I believe there are some low level demon types ... and lots of undead too.

[Gromnir]

owlcat has announced the next beta update is may 5. also, 'cause am knowing folks such as @ShadySands is interested, there is new info 'bout the intelligent weapon feature.

HA! Good Fun!

ps have not played the beta in some time 'cause we became smidge frustrated with a few bugs and 'cause we were aware o' the late april guestimate for the next beta version. as such we will wait until may 5 to do more beta.

Edited April 22, 2021 by Gromnir

[ShadySands]

I'm glad that their taking an Enserric approach and making the sentient weapon be able to transform into any weapon. Better actually because I think his options were limited but still better than Lilarcor or the like that's locked into one form. That also solves one of the big complaints in the beta of there not being enough of X type of weapon to build around.

Very cool.

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

The variable weapon choice is very nice, especially considering how some feats and classes rely on certain weapons to work and the potential lack of good weapons. Sounds like there is progression with Finnean as well, I wonder if it will be like Soulbound or have a selection of upgrades at intervals. Guess I have a reason to give the beta another spin.

28 minutes ago, ShadySands said:

I'm glad that their taking an Enserric approach and making the sentient weapon be able to transform into any weapon. Better actually because I think his options were limited but still better than Lilarcor or the like that's locked into one form.

I think Enserric was limited to the basic martial swords and a dagger. And you could easily block more enchantment because he had too many abilities compared to regular weapons.

[Sarex]

Never understood that about kingmaker, how hard was it to add a good weapon for each type... Alternatively why not just remove some weapon types, if it was hard.

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

3 minutes ago, Sarex said:

Never understood that about kingmaker, how hard was it to add a good weapon for each type... Alternatively why not just remove some weapon types, if it was hard.

Yeah, did we really need Dwarven War Axes, Estocs, Kamas, and Sais? Dueling Swords made sense due to proximity to Restov, but unless you're going with a specific build it's just an off-brand katana or finesse lomgsword.

[Gromnir]

funny sai and kama should get mention. we were considering a not str based monkish multiclass build which would take advantage o' flurry, but since were multiclass, depend on unarmed attacks would be doomed. there is feats for adding dex modifier to piercing and/or slashing weapons so monk levels for flurry coupled with monk weapons is a natural synergy. sai and kama make sense. can buy a decent sai (expensive) before drezen. can find a decent kama in the drezen stronghold. 

the selling point o' owlcat's games is breadth as 'posed to depth. am understanding the appeal o' getting as many pnp features into wotr as is possible. am not necessarily agreeing with such goals, but am understanding.

one o' poe2's more common pre-release derided changes made that game better than the preceding poe title: no weapon specialization options. 

find a battleaxe late in poe2. well fudge, am only good with longswords, and none o' our companions specialized in battleaxes, so the soopergrooveykeen battleaxe is a sell item next item we make it back to town? nope. in poe2, unless am a dedicated 2h weapon wielder, is a good chances we will be able to make use o' the fantasmagoric axe... and if am a 2h wielder, then that means the late game quarterstaff is useful in spite o' fact we were using  lord darryn's voulge for the past few dozen hours of gameplay. 

in a pnp campaign, a living dm looks at party composition and makes certain the guy who wants to wield a spiked chain is not complete f'd  for 20 levels. in a crpg, one needs either make certain there is every weapon option possible for every possible build (unlikely) or accept that the lack o' such weapons in a system such as pathfinder 1e means more than few builds will be dogs, and other builds will be particular strong for no reason save for how the player lucked out or meta'd the perfect dress-up barbie minigame options; best in slot nonsense.  

were many poe2 complaints, and many such complaints were deserved. what were curious to us were how vocal the lack o' weapon specialization complaints were from people before they played poe2, but those complaints were hard to find from people who played more than a few hours.

unfortunate, weapon specializations and focuses for crit range and such is part o' pathfinder, so, owlcat is stuck with a whole lotta not great options to satisfy players who want more options. more options from the developer insofar as weapons is concerned makes increasing likely more people will be disappointed with the options provided, and not provided. 

HA! Good Fun!

ps am gonna take a moment to just vent how much we loathe the nelson muntz approach pathfinder takes to game design, which owlcat actual magnified. am betting +90% o' wotr players will have camellia continue improving her rapier feats, which makes her somewhere twixt dead weight and considerable less effective when fighting foes who is piercing weapon resistant or even immune.

...

sure, is a number o' pathfinder critters who is immune to compulsions n' similar effects, but owlcat in kingmaker and wotr just sorta lumps a whole spectrum o' mind-affecting and kinda/similar effects together, so your owlcat enchanter, particular late game, is getting the nelson muntz far worse than pnp.

not a fan.

Edited April 23, 2021 by Gromnir

[kanisatha]

23 hours ago, ShadySands said:

I'm glad that their taking an Enserric approach and making the sentient weapon be able to transform into any weapon. Better actually because I think his options were limited but still better than Lilarcor or the like that's locked into one form. That also solves one of the big complaints in the beta of there not being enough of X type of weapon to build around.

Very cool.

On the Owlcat forum people were asking if it can be made a shield. Owlcat has said 'no' to that. The other question still to be answered is whether deciding on what weapon it should be is a one-time thing or whether we can shapeshift it at will. I personally highly doubt such an option, but that would be especially awesome.

[xzar_monty]

On 4/22/2021 at 7:28 PM, ShadySands said:

I'm glad that their taking an Enserric approach and making the sentient weapon be able to transform into any weapon. Better actually because I think his options were limited but still better than Lilarcor or the like that's locked into one form. That also solves one of the big complaints in the beta of there not being enough of X type of weapon to build around.

Hmm. I understand the logic here, but it appears it speaks of an entirely different approach from the one I tend to have. Broadly speaking, the choices appear to be these:

1) Playing the game in a way where optimization is key and where one of your primary aims is to squeeze out as much potential as is mathematically possible. By potential I mean your capacity for damage output, AC, all that. Along with this, there may be a desire to exploit the system, even actively look for possible loopholes in it.

2) Playing the game in a way where the emphasis is on building your characters according to your personal preferences and role-playing desires. You make choices and then you live with them, even if some of them may not be ideal in terms of how much damage you can deal, and so on. The point is role-playing, adventuring, all that.

These approaches are not mutually exclusive, but the more strictly you commit to one of them, the more different they become.

If there is a sentient weapon in the game and if that weapon is able to transform into any shape, then it also means that your choices don't really matter that much anymore. Whichever choice you made, this weapon will serve you. From an optimization perspective, this is perfectly fine, but from a role-playing perspective, it's an obvious cop-out.

[Gromnir]

27 minutes ago, xzar_monty said:

From an optimization perspective, this is perfectly fine, but from a role-playing perspective, it's an obvious cop-out.

disagree... complete. the cop-out is not giving meaning to the player choices, 'cause is harder to do so in a crpg. chose race or class or weapon should not result in polar better or worse results, but should result in different experience. if the only meaningful difference in gameplay experience is numeric effectiveness o' combat numbers, then developer failed and blame on the vagaries o' role-play choice is the cop-out. meaningful role-play requires different consequences. the problem is the lazy and bad game developers/dms/gms is willing to allow significant better and worse consequences for basic character development options.  is much harder to come up with different experiences which is all viable and fun, even if in a math based system there will always be a best or worst.

similar, side with the merchants over the church as part o' a critical path quest resolution should have consequences. make the consequences meaningful. however, if the merchant and church quest happens at level fifteen and 'cause you made wrong character development choices at level one thru three you is precluded from making an objective good or better choice, that is lazy and stoopid and limiting... is anti-roleplay as it effective railroads the knowledgeable player into finding the handful o' best ways to play a game, rather than making more role-play approaches viable. 

as we noted in an earlier post, in a pnp campaign, the dm/gm gets to tailor. even if the game system is sh!te, a decent dm/gm will be able to make sure that a player with a perfectly reasonable character build that 'cause o' poor crafted rules is less effective, nevertheless feels like they is contributing.  and of course if the rules system forces weapon specializations to be effective, then the dm is gonna make certain a player with weapon specialization in ___________ is able to find, purchase or craft useful weapons.  no matter how much o' an rp purist one claims to be, one guy forced to sit impotent through game session after game session 'cause o' bad level one choices he had no way o' knowing were bad at the time is gonna be fun for who exact? dm/gm will fix in pnp in ways impossible in a crpg.

gotta recognize character character generation and development choices should result in different gameplay experiences as 'posed to qualitative superiors or inferiors.

gotta recognize crpgs is not like pnp.

is ironic, but game developers rare admit that more options frequent makes a game worse as 'posed to better. more choice makes increasing likely there will be busted good or bad combinations o' weapons, class abilities and spells... or whatever is the features o' a particular system. you win choices is obvious a mistake. you lose choices is just as bad. the more options and more complex the system gets, the more difficult it is for the developer to anticipate the win and lose options-- too many possible combinations. nevertheless, the cop out is for the developer to provide more options and then ignore the consequences while blaming the disparate results on some kinda fuzzy notion o' role-play purity. 

HA! Good Fun!

 

[xzar_monty]

There is that, I agree. I believe Deadfire made a huge effort to balance things so that pretty much all reasonable choices lead to a good (or at least not bad) game. And I must say Obsidian succeeded really well. The game is not able to react to choices in the way the GM is in a PnP, but choices tend to be rewarded.

For me, the downside of all this balancing was obvious in the items, both loot and shop items: nothing stood out. Nothing made me go wow. It's a logical consequence of this balancing, but it was still disappointing. (However, Deadfire is a great game.)

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

4 hours ago, xzar_monty said:

If there is a sentient weapon in the game and if that weapon is able to transform into any shape, then it also means that your choices don't really matter that much anymore. Whichever choice you made, this weapon will serve you. From an optimization perspective, this is perfectly fine, but from a role-playing perspective, it's an obvious cop-out.

Pathfinder has had transforming weapons for almost a decade.

https://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic-items/magic-weapons/magic-weapon-special-abilities/transformative/

It's puzzling to see this as a cop out from a role-playing perspective when it fits the lore of the setting. All it does is put a band-aid on a very big issue with itemization in a game system where having certain weapons is a requirement for some archetypes and a lack of good choices is crippling for them.

[xzar_monty]

Ok, fair point, thanks for that. I am by no means an expert on Pathfinder lore, and if it's indeed there in the PnP, then it's a different matter. Good clarification, that.

(The whole transforming weapon thing looks a bit silly to me, but that doesn't matter, and I'm not using that as an argument.)

Edited April 24, 2021 by xzar_monty

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/owlcatgames/pathfinder-wrath-of-the-righteous/posts/3180554

Dinosaurs have arrived.

[Gromnir]

2 hours ago, ArtistFormerlyKnownasKP said:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/owlcatgames/pathfinder-wrath-of-the-righteous/posts/3180554

Dinosaurs have arrived.

downside is previous saves do not work with the new build. 

HA! Good Fun!

ps the hunter outfit includes a dead racoon suspended from your belt. am all but certain nobody in-game will ever comment on the corpsfied procyon you have dangling at your waist, which is a real shame to our way o' thinking. so many joke opportunities wasted.

Edited May 5, 2021 by Gromnir

[ShadySands]

Still in the prologue dungeon but a couple of quick thoughts. 

+A lot more character customization and some more classes and archetypes to chose from. -Still a lot of broken ones. Loremaster doesn't even display the name.

+You can now bash containers open, dunno about doors as I haven't seen the option on the one locked door that I've encountered. -It now takes 2 clicks to open locked containers.

Spoiler

Devil shows up as a mythic path when I did the unlock all mythic paths cheat but doesn't seem fully implemented. The first several levels just give you stuff with nothing to pick from and you don't even get to pick from the mythic feats and abilities lists. The remaining levels don't do anything at all. The bug list said that Legend may show up but not to pick it but I didn't get it to appear with the cheat. The menu still shows 2 locked paths which I'm guessing are the Swarm and Gold Dragon paths.

I also tested sorcerous reflex because there was an issue with it that was bothering me in my game on the last beta version. Often after the swift action cast my character will run into stabby range and use his attack action to fight. I guess I could try giving him a ranged weapon but I'm afraid that he's just going to do the same thing, swift action spell then pew pew with his crossbow. That's still in. I never tried it with quicken spell since there was an issue with metamagic but maybe I'll test that out now that it's supposed to be fixed

[Gromnir]

@ShadySands

am personal trying not to use mods 'cause am not wanting it to impact our feedback. however, am not above asking shady to do so.

there were a curious "bug" in the previous build which involved the sacred hunstmaster inquisitor favoured enemies feature and the demonslayer ranger fe. IF your sacred hunstmaster hit level 5 and chose outsiders as his/her fe, then a subsequent level of demonslayer would effective stack, resulting in +4 to-hit and +4 damage v. those nasty outsiders so prevalent in the game. did not count as a progression o' the sacred huntsmaster's fe feature, but the benefis did stack. however, if a character chose the demonslayer class before adding levels o' hunstmaster, then the outsider option would be unavailable when the inquisitor finally reached level five and were able to pick a favoured enemy. am wondering if the demonslayer + sacred huntsmaster situation is same or different.

sure, we can level a character to six and then hire a merc to test our self, but that is gonna necessitate literal dozens o' hours the way Gromnir is playing. 

if you get a chance...

as an aside, pounce for the velociraptor is nice, and we could add the bully class which is now selectable, but in such a case am wondering why we don't just choose smilodon + bully.  the trike has good str and am able to add trip with bully, so am s'posing such is an option. am just not able to do w/o trip in some way. am addicted to animal companion trip. so either leopard, dog or wolf + any animal companion class OR the no trip animal companions + bully. automatic trip for leopard, wolf and/or dogs feels like it would be superior, but am gonna need play with such options.

am intrigued by the quarterstaff master for monk, but am wondering how to combine eleven levels o' it with other classes. 

overall, only having perused a bit o' character generation, everything looks nicer in the new build. 

HA! Good Fun!

 

Edited May 5, 2021 by Gromnir

[ShadySands]

Oh yeah, I don't report bugs unless I can reproduce them on my no mod install. I do play most of the time with mods installed because I want to try a bunch of things without putting in a dozen or more hours first

Edited May 6, 2021 by ShadySands
I won't be able to test that until tomorrow

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

Do the mods work with the latest update? I'd probably want to use respec and the spellcasting tweak

[ShadySands]

Yep, at least the main mod with the most options has been updated.

[Gromnir]

the most significant change observed while playing the newest beta build is doorways are no longer impenetrable barriers in tb mode. this were a serious issue in the previous build. if you didn't get your entire party through a doorway before combat started, you could be fubar.

we just noticed the leopard may be the new win animal companion. take bully animal companion class and leopard gains access to fury's fall feat, which adds dex modifier to cmb. 

HA! Good Fun!

ps lann being a follower o' iomedae makes narrative sense, but he is now a bit less ideal as a cleric multiclass. lann does kinda works as a sacred huntsmaster multi for those few who do not hate inquisitors. regardless, here is hoping some o' the oracle issues is fixed in this build; would make daeran more useful. 

Edited May 6, 2021 by Gromnir

[ShadySands]

17 hours ago, Gromnir said:

there were a curious "bug" in the previous build which involved the sacred hunstmaster inquisitor favoured enemies feature and the demonslayer ranger fe. IF your sacred hunstmaster hit level 5 and chose outsiders as his/her fe, then a subsequent level of demonslayer would effective stack, resulting in +4 to-hit and +4 damage v. those nasty outsiders so prevalent in the game. did not count as a progression o' the sacred huntsmaster's fe feature, but the benefis did stack. however, if a character chose the demonslayer class before adding levels o' hunstmaster, then the outsider option would be unavailable when the inquisitor finally reached level five and were able to pick a favoured enemy. am wondering if the demonslayer + sacred huntsmaster situation is same or different.

This seems to still be the same. I was able to get both feats only by going SH then DS and not the other way around. I haven't tested it in combat though.

Also, my velociraptor's portrait is a bear. Weird but I like it.

Edited May 6, 2021 by ShadySands

[Gromnir]

@ShadySands

thanks.

is a curious implementation quirk which has a demonslayer barred from gaining the benefits of sacred huntsmaster outsider fe, but only when choosing demonslayer before sacred hunstmaster level 5.  not a huge problem, but now we won't need wait to level 6 to realize whether or not this curious implementation were addressed.

am playing around with quarterstaff master. level 5 would be nice but we might be able to manage with 4 levels. 12 (we misidentified as 11 earlier) is the point where diminishing returns is making further monk levels tough to bear. doubt we go past five for any multi.

is mentioned in the patch notes, but it is kinda odd the animal companions need select a deity choice. 

at the defender's heart, we do not seem to be able to access party members character record tabs and accessing inventory is bass ackwards as we kinda gotta use one o' the merchants to get into party member inventory. akward.

HA! Good Fun!