Pathfinder Wrath of the Righteous, Part 5

[xzar_monty]

@majestic, so where was this?

[majestic]

14 minutes ago, xzar_monty said:

@majestic, so where was this?

Federal Banana Republic of Austria

The article quotes the press conferences wrong, for some reason. They really did say nothing left to find. Which implies something different than the translated "nothing will be found", of course. Anyway, there are no English links to the case brought forth by Die Tagespresse, but apparently I was wrong as the case was not dismissed (it was actually accepted), but Die Tagespresse chose to withdraw the action.

Edited October 18, 2022 by majestic

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

WotR dialogues are like

1. "You're forgiven." (Good)

2. "You broke the Law. Die!" [Attack] (Lawful)

3. "General Bofa says I have to let you go." (Chaotic)

4. "I don't like you. Die!" [Attack] (Evil)

If it's parody it is brilliant. I have seen countless discussions about wanting to be a serious villain in a videogame RPG and parodying that with some absolute cheeseball stuff to show how ridiculous wanting to be evil is would be an absolute power move. Unfortunately I do not get the sense that it is parody and instead is the continuation of very cheesy RPG stuff dialed up to 11.

Anyways, I found out that Legend gets to fight a god now.

Spoiler

Cayden Cailean shows up to your party, challenges you to a drinking contest, then arm wrestling, then you can challenge him to a fight.

 

[bugarup]

3 hours ago, Gromnir said:

converse, is quite possible owlcat is as much victims o' their own efforts as is the rest o' us. in an effort to make sure players get it, perhaps owlcat consciously abandoned any pretense o' subtle and so we end up with exaggeration which feels like parody?

My money is on that they know their audience. Like, Demon path is so edgy McEdgelordy it'd make a 15-yr old poetry writing black metal fan cringe with embarrassment, it literally uses "Assert dominance" unironically and there were tons of people over Reddit going "**** yeah Demon path! So awesome! So badass!"

[Gromnir]

35 minutes ago, bugarup said:

My money is on that they know their audience. Like, Demon path is so edgy McEdgelordy it'd make a 15-yr old poetry writing black metal fan cringe with embarrassment, it literally uses "Assert dominance" unironically and there were tons of people over Reddit going "**** yeah Demon path! So awesome! So badass!"

see, that is where am conflicted. owlcat efforts to pander to their audience is so extreme it feels like parody. is owlcat perhaps indulging a bit o' mockery o' their fans? it is possible the developers is doing their best and their best results in cartoony extremes.  the thing is, as you note, a significant portion o' the wotr groupthink is encouraging owlcat to continue with the over-the-top antics.

we will observe how if there is a setting which already embraces owlcat penchant for accidental or intentional parody level excess it is warhammer 40k.  perhaps too many fans o' 40k fail to recognize the over-the-top and tongue-in-cheek qualities o' the grimdark setting, but that just makes the situation more amusing. 

HA! Good Fun!

Edited October 18, 2022 by Gromnir

[xzar_monty]

24 minutes ago, Gromnir said:

see, that is where am conflicted. owlcat efforts to pander to their audience is so extreme it feels like parody. is owlcat perhaps indulging a bit o' mockery o' their fans? it is possible the developers is doing their best and their best results in cartoony extremes.  the thing is, as you note, a significant portion o' the wotr groupthink is encouraging owlcat to continue with the over-the-top antics.

Just to indulge in a silly analogy of sorts: what we're discussing here is whether Owlcat is producing the cRPG equivalent of wrestling of the Hulk Hogan variety and whether a significant proportion of its customers represent that possibly fictitious[*] part of the audience that doesn't realize it's all a show and a joke. I don't know.

But in my view it doesn't really matter, because the storytelling and characters are still silly, no matter what the Owlcat take on them actually is. It's like that old chestnut about "true stories" and their meaninglessness: if you're watching a rubbish movie and someone comes up to you and says, "This is a true story, you know", it doesn't make it any better.

However, I do enjoy playing the game -- once that silly new bug gets fixed.

[*] Here in the almost absolute north of Europe, there at least used to be a fairly widespread assumption that "some Americans are so stupid they think their wrestling is for real". I have no idea whether this was ever true. I suppose some Americans would know.

[Zoraptor]

8 hours ago, bugarup said:

Owlcat seem to support the axis where Evil is always Stupid, and Lawful is almost always Evil, so just stick to Lawful if you want to be slightly less moronic Evil. Still no Machiavellian choices, but those would require writing chops outside of Catowl's range.

They'd probably do better if they used the full alignment spectrum for the choices rather than just good/ evil/ lawful/ chaotic. "It's the law here so slavery is OK with me!" is pretty clearly far closer to the Lawful Evil approach than the LG, might as well specify it as such. Especially when they already have multiple options for the same alignment in some conversations.

I did a fair number of evil choices in the Abyss- when in Rome, do as the Romans do after all; and many of the good options seemed dumb in the context of the abyss- and most of them weren't particularly stupid, certainly not the way they were in Baldur's Gate. Obviously there are a lot of "murder everyone while cackling maniacally" type options too though but that issue would be 'fixed' if they were CE options rather than just evil.

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

44 minutes ago, xzar_monty said:

Here in the almost absolute north of Europe, there at least used to be a fairly widespread assumption that "some Americans are so stupid they think their wrestling is for real". I have no idea whether this was ever true. I suppose some Americans would know.

Wrestling is real in the sense that the stunts are performed by real people who can easily **** their bodies up.

29 minutes ago, Zoraptor said:

They'd probably do better if they used the full alignment spectrum for the choices rather than just good/ evil/ lawful/ chaotic. "It's the law here so slavery is OK with me!" is pretty clearly far closer to the Lawful Evil approach than the LG, might as well specify it as such. Especially when they already have multiple options for the same alignment in some conversations.

I did a fair number of evil choices in the Abyss- when in Rome, do as the Romans do after all; and many of the good options seemed dumb in the context of the abyss- and most of them weren't particularly stupid, certainly not the way they were in Baldur's Gate. Obviously there are a lot of "murder everyone while cackling maniacally" type options too though but that issue would be 'fixed' if they were CE options rather than just evil.

I agree that having explicit choices for the corner alignments would be an improvement. Mechanically speaking, it sucks to have a Paladin fall because you picked too many of the (Good) choices.

But I like the way that Owlcat didn't treat Chaotic Evil as Evil Evil and instead all the Evil options are equally hilariously psychotic.

[ShadySands]

The only bit of mythic path railroading that bothered me was some late game lich stuff. I won't spoil it but it was not what I was going for. I don't think that the writing is an intentional parody just normal RPG cringe turned up to 11.

I thought wrasslin' was real for about a minute in elementary until I actually watched it and realized they should all be dead and the weird stylistic choices in their fighting was to cover some of the fakery. This actually made me appreciate it more and I was a big fan for a few years.

[Gromnir]

1) d&d legacy alignment is idiotic and anachronistic.

...

really ain't much more need be said. alignment exists as a limit on role-play and it inhibits decent storytelling-- camellia being a useful example.

as to making all wotr alignment dialogue choices axis specific, such would at least cure the nonsense wherein a paladin choosing "good" choices reflexive in wotr, absent a single chaos option, nevertheless falls from grace. however, as a practical matter, without serious increasing current dialogue option numbers, am suspecting a few alignments would be receiving very little attention... which just goes to show how idiotic is the alignment mechanic as any character with an alignment restriction is already needing game the alignment mechanic as 'posed to necessarily playing the character they envisioned when they started wotr. regardless, without additional writing investment, one need accept a few alignments would benefit from relative paltry coverage. an alternative would be to create significant additional trash (alignment) dialogues. huzzah. am personal fine with seeing a relative insignificant number o' dialogues for a few characters, but for some inexplicable reason players complain if their chosen whatever isn't identified in a crpg, even if the identification is managed with preternatural clumsiness. why would you want more bad dialogue options is baffling to us, but try and deny it wouldn't be a thing where some helpful person literal counted every alignment dialogue in the game to reveal how a few players were getting shortchanged. 

that said, this is kinda a dead horse, even for wotr.

referencing an earlier post from november 2021 and no doubt ignoring multiple other such posts from the beta period mentioning how ordinary busted is wotr's application o' tired arsed d&d alignment.

regardless, the real solution is exorcising alignment from d&d legacy systems such as pathfinder, which ain't near as difficult as you might believe as we have done so more than once in pnp. obvious ain't gonna happen in a pathfinder game, but am disappointed every time a pnp game developer updates their d20 based system to a new edition w/o dumping alignment. lost opportunity.

HA! Good Fun!

Edited October 18, 2022 by Gromnir

[InsaneCommander]

3 hours ago, Zoraptor said:

They'd probably do better if they used the full alignment spectrum for the choices rather than just good/ evil/ lawful/ chaotic. "It's the law here so slavery is OK with me!" is pretty clearly far closer to the Lawful Evil approach than the LG, might as well specify it as such. Especially when they already have multiple options for the same alignment in some conversations.

 

3 hours ago, KP From Another World said:

Mechanically speaking, it sucks to have a Paladin fall because you picked too many of the (Good) choices.

The conversation with the mother of the boy diving into the abyss ocean is a good example of that. The Lawful option is clearly evil. And the Chaotic one is closer to CG.

Maybe they didn't want to write more dialogue lines and simplified to using just these four?

Edit: it could have been worse. There could be an option like (Evil) "I'm killing you and the boy!"

Edited October 18, 2022 by InsaneCommander

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

1 minute ago, InsaneCommander said:

 

The conversation with the mother of the boy diving into the abyss ocean is a good example of that. The Lawful option is clearly evil. And the Chaotic one is closer to CG.

Maybe they didn't want to write more dialogue lines and simplified to using just these four?

The (Chaotic) option outright says it's doing a good deed lmao.

I don't think that it's really feasible to write out an option for all 9 alignments for every choice, but damn you end up with some absolute doozies. That (Lawful) option is pretty ****ing crazy for anyone who isn't some kinda creep. Imagine that you've put dozens or hours into this game as a Paladin or Monk and what makes you fall is preventing a demon from torturing her child. Real headscratcher ****.

I get the alignment is almost certainly gonna be in any D&D or Pathfinder game because of "THE RULES" but **** me if the implementations of it could use more than a bit of finesse to work better.

[InsaneCommander]

1 minute ago, KP From Another World said:

The (Chaotic) option outright says it's doing a good deed lmao.

I don't think that it's really feasible to write out an option for all 9 alignments for every choice, but damn you end up with some absolute doozies. That (Lawful) option is pretty ****ing crazy for anyone who isn't some kinda creep. Imagine that you've put dozens or hours into this game as a Paladin or Monk and what makes you fall is preventing a demon from torturing her child. Real headscratcher ****.

I get the alignment is almost certainly gonna be in any D&D or Pathfinder game because of "THE RULES" but **** me if the implementations of it could use more than a bit of finesse to work better.

Exactly. But they could include the 9 alignments in alternate dialogues. Some options are already in the game, like the LE and CG above. Or they could at least include LG options for Paladins.

[Gromnir]

1 hour ago, ShadySands said:

I don't think that the writing is an intentional parody just normal RPG cringe turned up to 11.

am kinda leaning in this direction as we don't see any signs o' self mockery or camp from owlcat. cartoony cringe as 'posed to subtle parody... which effective has us at the same place. 

regardless, if wotr purchasers is ok with the current situation, we don't see any motivation for owlcat change. 

that said, 40k is kinda an ideal property for the cringe+ approach. 

HA! Good Fun!

 

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

14 minutes ago, InsaneCommander said:

Exactly. But they could include the 9 alignments in alternate dialogues. Some options are already in the game, like the LE and CG above. Or they could at least include LG options for Paladins.

I agree. With the way WotR works it seems very difficult to play a Lawful alignment locked character without turning into some kinda ****. Such characters shouldn't have to imitate a pint-sized fascist to keep their holy powers.

I think in terms of alignment implementation where you're tracking it with some sort of point system the square grid works better than the wheel in Owlcat games. Not a good solution by any means, but better than the game failing your Paladin because you did the WotR equivalent of giving a kid ice cream instead of executing his dog because he didn't pick up poop.

[Hawke64]

Scrolls of Atonement. Not particularly RP-friendly/immersive, but efficient. Considering games cannot track the player's thoughts unless they are clearly expressed (e.g. setting the alignment at character creation) and most actions can have wildly different motivations, removing the alignment system and replacing it with faction-/NPC-specific affiliation/loyalty (e.g. Tyranny) seems preferable.
Speaking of writing, comparing to the Larian games, Owlcat's feel tamer or more subtle, though both are rather sarcastic (not the right word, but "over-the-top humourous" does not fit either).

Edited October 19, 2022 by Hawke64

[ShadySands]

I dunno why Owlcat thought it'd be a good idea to have good and evil choices also move you towards neutral, but they did. Unless it's another launch bug that still hasn't been fixed it seems intentional because if modders fixed it right away then Owlcat should be able to fix it eventually.

Edited October 19, 2022 by ShadySands

[Gromnir]

 

11 minutes ago, ShadySands said:

I dunno why Owlcat thought it'd be a good idea to have good and evil choices also move you towards neutral, but they did. Unless it's another launch bug that still hasn't been fixed it seems intentional because if modders fixed it right away then Owlcat should be able to fix it eventually.

given the ease with which modders addressed the issue, am suspecting the reason for not changing is less a mater o' capacity than it is o' desire. if we assume that from owlcat pov the feature is working as designed, and recognizing the existence o' a mod which "fixes" the issue for those who do not like owlcat implementation, it is possible the developer is seeing no need to alter the status quo. is hardly as if this would be the only curious owlcat design choice based more on a preternatural capacity to be obdurate than any other explanation. is why we keep getting more puzzle content, yes? 

HA! Good Fun!

 

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

57 minutes ago, Hawke64 said:

Scrolls of Atonement. Not particularly RP-friendly/immersive, but efficient. Considering games cannot track the player's thoughts unless they are clearly expressed (e.g. setting the alignment at character creation) and most actions can have wildly different motivations, removing the alignment system and replacing it with faction-/NPC-specific affiliation/loyalty (e.g. Tyranny) seems preferable.
Speaking of writing, comparing to the Larian games, Owlcat's feel tamer or more subtle, though both are rather sarcastic (not the right word, but "over-the-top humourous" does not fit either).

Scrolls of Atonement are a 750 gold bandaid on a bad implementation of a bad system. Nice to have and all that for the game, but dumb that a holy warrior who oozes holiness needs one because they picked too many (Good) choices. 

While I strongly prefer the reputation system in Pillars to D&D alignment, I think the fact that reputation can't degrade or cancel out was a mistake. If I spend half the game lying and the other half being honest or do a bunch of helpful stuff for a town only to go on a killing spree later, it's not great that the game tracks the reputations separately rather than have them cancel out. Doubly so when certain (sub)classes benefit from certain reputations while being hurt by others. Really I think the thing is to disentangle class mechanics from Alignment or Reputation to avoid creating a mechanical need to act in a specific way.

I think Larian games are open about being a joke while Owlcat games are played straight. While we can wonder whether or not Owlcat was making a joke on the players or are being genuine, I think if you play an hour of either Original Sin you know it's a joke.

Edited October 19, 2022 by KP From Another World

[InsaneCommander]

More fun in the Abyss

I went to the slave market, aka “how to lose your money if you are Good”*, where I discovered that being Lawful is being pro-slavery. Ok.

Someone tried to sell my Aasimar some Aasimar fillets. Everyone always ignores my background as a noble, but not noticing an Aasimar in the Abyss is far worse. Ember is probably the only person who will be happy when somebody tries to turn her into a slave. And I don’t wanna know how Arue paid the floating meat ball when buying slaves.

*I was buying the slaves to free them, planning on killing all the slavers later, once I was sure they wouldn't serve any other purpose, but Aivu was impatient so I decided to reload and not waste my money, regardless of the consequences. I'll see how it goes tomorrow, when I play again.

 

Early Sunset

Spoiler

He can’t hear the Hand or didn’t bother replying. Now I assume he is evil. This could be a red herring, but in a game with Camellia’s battle cries and other not so subtle stuff, I don’t think so.

Even some demons on the streets curse me for bringing “the angel” to the Abyss, why wouldn't he acknowledge the Hand?

 

[xzar_monty]

Dang. New patch out today but the corrupted save game bug remains: I still get the "Killed the Giants" message when I load my save game (and I also get XP), even though I'm still in Kenabres. I get the same message even if I load an even earlier save where I'm still in the Shield Maze.

[Gromnir]

on the positive side, the isle nine boss did make an appearance post patch and it spawns w/o needing to replay the entire area.

https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1184370/view/3389547565066423854

"Shake It Off team feat now works correctly. It has a proper radius of effect now, and will be displayed in the battle log;"

another respec? we had removed the teamwork feat from numerous party members as it were functional useless. 

HA! Good Fun!

Edited October 20, 2022 by Gromnir

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1184370/view/3389547565066423854

"You can buy alcohol from Wilcer Garms now."

The most important fix.

[Gorth]

 

I'm currently downloading the 13gb patch. It does take a very long time to download. Anyway, it's just in time for the weekend (it's Thursday night/Friday morning here at the time of writing). Maybe the treasure islands will be doable tomorrow night...

[InsaneCommander]

2 hours ago, KP From Another World said:

https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1184370/view/3389547565066423854

"You can buy alcohol from Wilcer Garms now."

The most important fix.

 

Quote

Photomode no longer lets you control the weather;

Why?

Quote

Sometimes your companions could undress when changing the colors of their costume – fixed;

Edited October 20, 2022 by InsaneCommander