The DLCs want me me to bin this game

[Boeroer]

Gorecci Str. is def. the hardest fight for most people on PotD if you exclude Megabosses. Because you have not a lot of options and usually only two party members. And you'll have a lot less meta knowledge than later which always helps immensely. 

Fighting enemies who are three levels above you is a lot harder if your own level is low. The more you advance the less three levels will matter. 

It can be rel. easy with the right character (e.g. one that is heavily front loaded with good abilities right from the start and equipped with a unusually good weapon like Essence Interrupter) but on average it's a nightmare. I don't know why it's designed in a way that you can solve the quest peacefully but run into a hefty fight before which is not easy to avoid unless you know you can enter the street from the south.

Edited January 14, 2021 by Boeroer

[Tillbot87]

3 hours ago, Boeroer said:

[...] unless you know you can enter the street from the south.

Hahaha I did not know that and just died a bit inside.

Edited January 14, 2021 by Tillbot87

[Boeroer]

Haha.

Usually if you reload the autosave (after you got obliterated) the looters won't turn hostile anymore because that scripted scene will be missing (which seems to trigger the hostility). So you should also be able to run past them after you reload. Don't know if that works reliably (didn't die at Gorecci Str. for a long time) but at least that was helpful and prevented frustration the first few times I went there.

I believe if you do a quicksave aftr the autosave you're not getting that option...?

Most people found out ba accident that leaving Port Maje and returning (and going right to Gorecci Str.) lets them enter from the south and easily sneak past the looters even with the lowest stealth values.  

Edited January 14, 2021 by Boeroer

[Helz]

19 hours ago, paulyy_y said:

The natural power curve in the main game is broken with the DLC's,

It dawned on me last night that turning level scaling up helped smooth out PoE2's difficulty curve. It was challenging the entire time because I rarely out-leveled anything and was often under-leveled.

18 hours ago, paulyy_y said:

causing the issue of a huge spike compared to regular MQ.

I experienced that spike in PoE so I understand how its frustrating. There is harder content in PoE2 outside the main quest though, and I think it's fair to make you play it. You have to 'gear up' for the DLCs. Now if you do all that and still have no chance it might be unfair.

 

5 hours ago, Boeroer said:

Fighting enemies who are three levels above you is a lot harder if your own level is low. The more you advance the less three levels will matter.

That's true. It's really easy to die in Gorecci Street so if someone is playing on Ironman I can see why it's "the hardest". But its hard like the beginning of Baldur's Gate is hard. I wiped on it so I went and hired a companion.

[NotDumbEnough]

21 hours ago, paulyy_y said:

Deadfire DLC's (at least 2 of them) are not properly balanced, no question about that. The natural power curve in the main game is broken with the DLC's, causing the issue of a huge spike compared to regular MQ. Not really defensible other than allowing for the hardcore uber gamers to get their fix, but it should be advertised and scoped like that instead of awkwardly shoehorning it into the game when players expect the same level of hardship on the same difficulty and not a spike just because its DLC content. It's been really killing my enjoyment going from being able to confidently handle regular end-game encounters to being destroyed by the HP sponge enemies. The only DLC that was fair in my opinion was the Rymrgand one, the others are a cheese factory.

As for Boeroer's suggestion that "most players have no issues with increased difficulty of DLC's" I'll assume this is coming from the ether of made-up-statements unless you have some actual backing. I'd wager it's more likely that most people just avoid the DLC's when finding the difficulty spikes, or resort to cheesing using full custom party, or lower the difficulty. One shouldn't have to alter their entire playstyle in the end-game for DLC's. 

I don't think it's a problem with the DLCs being too hard, but with the rest of the game being too easy. e.g. for most of the game you can mostly disregard interrupting enemies, but it's really important against Neriscylas or else she uses Llengrath's Safeguard. Meanwhile on PotD Upscaled 90% of the basegame high level fights you encounter are cakewalks that are almost instantly resolved by having Tekehu using Great Maelstrom, Aloth using Wall of Many Colors, and Xoti using Call of Rymrgand simultaneously from stealth. Melting enemies with wombo comboes is fun the first few times but quickly becomes boring. If you're accustomed to walking over everything by just dropping a few high level spells then many of the DLC fights can be problematic.

My guess is that the devs didn't understand the game well enough to quite grasp what players were capable of while designing base game encounters. They were able to do much better in the DLCs do to having player feedback and telemetry to understand what players are capable of.

Edited January 14, 2021 by NotDumbEnough

[Boeroer]

Again I recommend to watch J. Sawyers post mortem talk about Deadfire "Breaking the Mold".

He explains that usually when beta-testers (who are among the most effective powergamers your game will ever see) tell you that your game is too easy it should be just fine for the average player. But in this case the beta-testers were right, he was admittedly wrong and the game really turned out to be too easy.

Remember that when Deadfire was released PotD was a LOT easier than today.

 

[xzar_monty]

14 hours ago, NotDumbEnough said:

e.g. for most of the game you can mostly disregard interrupting enemies, but it's really important against Neriscylas or else she uses Llengrath's Safeguard.

My experience, having done two playthroughs, is that after the first island, Neriscyrlas is the only difficult fight. Note: I don't play on PotD.

[Boeroer]

I didn't understand the complaints about her (my first defeat was with a solo PotD melee Geomancer and it was quite easy) until I realized that most players just don't use interrupts.

Maybe because in PoE interrupts were nothing too special (just added a little bit of recovery time - the most impactful ones "only" 1 sec, the weakest ones 0.3 secs.) - and all casting times were much shorter - so why bother?
In Deadfire an interrupt is significantly more impactful (casts take a lot longer on average and interrupted enemies will not only lose time but also resources and it's annoying af if you get interrupted). 

So while I was using interrupts most of times* I initially didn't think about how fights might be if you just ignored them.  

)* I really value Thrust of Tattered Veil in Deadfire: a level-1 fast-cast auto-hit interrupt? Yeah! Take this tough nut boss! Llengrath's Safeguard my ass!  

[Desmodeus]

17 minutes ago, Boeroer said:

In Deadfire an interrupt is significantly more impactful (casts take a lot longer on average and interrupted enemies will not only lose time but also resources and it's annoying af if you get interrupted). 

Also thats why concentration is very important in PoE2 and why stuff like Tactical Barrage/Whiteleaf is significally more useful and important in PoE2

[xzar_monty]

34 minutes ago, Boeroer said:

In Deadfire an interrupt is significantly more impactful (casts take a lot longer on average and interrupted enemies will not only lose time but also resources and it's annoying af if you get interrupted).

Yes. But in the specific case of Neriscyrlas: I don't know how many Safeguards that beast can cast, but sure seemed like a lot.

Also, in a regular fight, Aloth might be able to cast two Tattered Veils (unless pre-equipped with scrolls[*]), and Neriscyrlas can certainly cast more Safeguards than that. So it was annoying.

[*] The fact that inventory is not usable in battles tended to annoy me quite a bit, especially because the number of quickslots was so small. It almost forced metagaming: if a battle is too tough, give up, reload your save, re-equip and return. I only had to do that with some encounters, but I didn't like it. (Mind you, I didn't do the megabosses.)

[Desmodeus]

6 minutes ago, xzar_monty said:

The fact that inventory is not usable in battles tended to annoy me quite a bit, especially because the number of quickslots was so small. It almost forced metagaming: if a battle is too tough, give up, reload your save, re-equip and return. I only had to do that with some encounters, but I didn't like it.

TO be fair thats double edged sword. Allow unrestricted item usage - game pretty much becomes trivialized as you can buy over 9000 heal potions and just drink them till enemy empties out... Same with prebuffing. Allow prebuffing and prolong effect - player will not move anywhere until he has all his buffs precasted, have it restricted - some boss fights(like Alpine Dragon in PoE1) feels like crapshoot.

[xzar_monty]

You are quite correct. All in all, this is not an easy question to solve.

[thelee]

4 hours ago, xzar_monty said:

Yes. But in the specific case of Neriscyrlas: I don't know how many Safeguards that beast can cast, but sure seemed like a lot.

Infinite. It's just on a long timer that happens once Ner gets to a low enough health, by my telling. So very important to interrupt and have decent offense (and/or a cleansing effect), or else Ner will keep trying over and over until it dies.

 

4 hours ago, Desmodeus said:

TO be fair thats double edged sword. Allow unrestricted item usage - game pretty much becomes trivialized as you can buy over 9000 heal potions and just drink them till enemy empties out...

the closest, best solution I can think of is in the vein of Diablo 3, where consumables are "equipped" but then infinitely usable but with a cooldown. That way it's less likely to induce hoarding behavior from players (there's nothing to use up, it's more of a "use it or lose it" per fight), you can balance fights around the existence of consumables, and you can predictably know that a player can't just spam consumables all day long. (By contrast, ahhh the days of playing Diablo 1 or Diablo 2 with an inventory full of potions and just keeping it open while facetanking enemies...)

Edited January 15, 2021 by thelee

[Boeroer]

Uarrrgh! Somebody said "cooldown" on the internet which immediately fills me with nausea.

[frostling]

For me the issue with combat is that the high level battles are not really designed for turn based. Early game was great, the Gorecci street for example was both fun & exciting. But the final area in Beast of Winder was such a chore to get through. It had this "rolling wind" that would periodically appear on the map and every time that happened, whomever turn it was (enemy or party) would have to wait until the animation played out before they got to act. This made the battle drag on and on.

I actually gave up on the two "boss battles" that were not story related. Sigilmaster bugged halfway through and since the fight is lengthy, and there is no guarantee this bug won't occur again, I'd rather not replay it. Giant crystal spider I've quit because so many spiders started appearing, that the "wait your turn list" got too long. Large enemy groups is not something that works in turn based.

So I have to agree with the op, albeit for a different reason. The battles in the dlcs are just not fun.

[Desmodeus]

Must say, after one proper Oraclevof Wael fightbI just said "screw it" and cheesed him to hell and back using two chanters with skeleton chants and two monks with dichotomous souls. Just swarmed oracle with meat while mopping up enemies as they come. At least bull**** unavoidable rays were wasted on skeletons

[xzar_monty]

On 1/29/2021 at 10:17 PM, frostling said:

For me the issue with combat is that the high level battles are not really designed for turn based.

This is quite literally true. Turn-based was a late addition to the game, it was patched in, so basically nothing was designed for turn-based.

[OCapn]

On 1/13/2021 at 2:25 PM, paulyy_y said:

Deadfire DLC's (at least 2 of them) are not properly balanced, no question about that. The natural power curve in the main game is broken with the DLC's, causing the issue of a huge spike compared to regular MQ. Not really defensible other than allowing for the hardcore uber gamers to get their fix, but it should be advertised and scoped like that instead of awkwardly shoehorning it into the game when players expect the same level of hardship on the same difficulty and not a spike just because its DLC content. It's been really killing my enjoyment going from being able to confidently handle regular end-game encounters to being destroyed by the HP sponge enemies. The only DLC that was fair in my opinion was the Rymrgand one, the others are a cheese factory.

As for Boeroer's suggestion that "most players have no issues with increased difficulty of DLC's" I'll assume this is coming from the ether of made-up-statements unless you have some actual backing. I'd wager it's more likely that most people just avoid the DLC's when finding the difficulty spikes, or resort to cheesing using full custom party, or lower the difficulty. One shouldn't have to alter their entire playstyle in the end-game for DLC's. 

I think this is true. I play through POE1 & 2 about once a year to attempt the triple crown challenge, which usually involves dying repeatedly to bosses until I find a party that clicks, at which point I give up on triple crown and enjoy a normal playthrough with my strongest builds. To me respeccing a character or relying on custom adventurers instead of story companions feels like a failure so I rarely do either. And on my latest run (potd unscaled) I really noticed how out of whack the Deadfire DLC areas are with the rest of the game, even when "overleveled." I don't think it's my fault anymore. I think Deadfire needed a lot more development time to smooth things out. The White March parts 1 & 2 fit perfectly well at almost any point a player chooses to do them in a POE 1 playthrough. This is not the case with POE 2's DLCs, which is especially unfortunate because the open world map design should encourage exploration instead of punishing it. This isn't only an issue with the DLCs either. The narrative momentum of Deadfire stumbles when you reach Neketaka and get sent to Hasongo, because if you sail straight to Hasongo you're too weak to fight the Naga, but if you level up with side quests, the rest of the game is too easy -- until you hit the ridiculous DLCs, at which point your progress effectively gets reset to zero. I love both games but after all this time I have to admit that while Deadfire improved on the first game tremendously with muliticlassing and QOL tweaks, POE 1 was better designed when it came to dungeons and bosses and pacing, which is most of the game. 

[Wormerine]

On 1/13/2021 at 9:25 PM, paulyy_y said:

Deadfire DLC's (at least 2 of them) are not properly balanced, no question about that. The natural power curve in the main game is broken with the DLC's, causing the issue of a huge spike compared to regular MQ.

I somewhat agree, except I would say that base game is not properly balanced. Base campaign still is really, really easy even on PotD. DLCs bring them back where they should be, however, the issue is that some players can play on harder difficulties and than run into a brick wall of difficulty with the DLCs.

Personally, I found DLCs on veteran just right, and on upscale PotD quite challenging, so it was right what I would expect from those difficuties.

Edited January 17, 2023 by Wormerine

[Boeroer]

"DLCs want me to bin this game instead of lowering the difficulty setting."

[Wormerine]

1 hour ago, Boeroer said:

"DLCs want me to bin this game instead of lowering the difficulty setting."

I get it though. I am fine with playing on lower difficulty myself, or skip intentionally very hard content (megabosses) but I find it unpleasant to have to lower the difficulty deep into the game. Game having major difficulty spikes is a very valid complain. What happens is that player is suddently forced to closely examined their build, their weapon upgrade, thier items - something they likely didn't have to worry about before.

Edited January 17, 2023 by Wormerine

[Boeroer]

Not liking it is one thing - and voicing that dislike, too. And indeed you can experience a raise in difficulty if you don't level up enough during the main game first or if your party is somehow not very well suited for the specific tasks at hand in the DLCs.

But feeling you have to stop to play the game altogether instead of lowering the difficulty is something else. Like... injured pride?  

[Wormerine]

On 1/17/2023 at 12:43 PM, Boeroer said:

But feeling you have to stop to play the game altogether instead of lowering the difficulty is something else. Like... injured pride?  

Unless one is stuck playing on PotD, and can't switch to lower difficulty. I am pretty sure there is a mod or console command for that though.

[Boeroer]

3 hours ago, Wormerine said:

Unless one is stuck playing on PotD, and can't switch to lower difficulty. I am pretty sure there is a mod or console command for that though.

In Deadfire I can lower the difficulty from PotD at any time:

Edited January 18, 2023 by Boeroer

[Shai Hulud]

On 1/18/2023 at 2:55 PM, Boeroer said:

In Deadfire I can lower the difficulty from PotD at any time:

Yeah you're only actually "stuck" on a difficulty if you're doing magran's fires or other challenges like trial of iron, though even with these you can change difficulty by console, however it is considered a cheat and requires iroll20s to change difficulty in this setting

setgodchallenge enabled abydon 0 for instance turns off abydon challenge, challengemode expert turns on/off expert mode, and the difficulty is just e.g. difficulty easy