Random video game news... the critical eyes have it

[Gfted1]

Surely the ability to upgrade the chainmail made it worthwhile?

[uuuhhii]

15 minutes ago, xzar_monty said:

In my view, Obsidian's excessive emphasis on "balance" in Poe and Deadfire is best exemplified by the fact that there's essentially no treasure or loot that makes you go "Wow!". Now, I don't know about everybody, but I would still sort of claim that this kind of thing is a big draw for a lot of people: it just feels good, for an adventurer, to find something that really helps you on your way. And yes, I understand the pitfalls of overpowered items or even items-that-are-so-much-better-than-the-rest-that-everybody-basically-regards-them-as-necessary. But still.

Remember the pirate map in Deadfire? The one that you had to assemble from maybe four or five pieces collected from various foes in the game? That was a brilliant example of a letdown created by excessive emphasis on "balance". Because once you finally had that map and went to the location it described, you found... nothing that was worth squat.

does kitchen stove not overpowered enough

there are many build making unique item in deadfire

but the whole system are hold back by the extra stat difficulty level added

[xzar_monty]

12 minutes ago, Gfted1 said:

Surely the ability to upgrade the chainmail made it worthwhile?

Not to the extent that I would have ever even tried putting it on on either of my playthroughs. But this is related to another matter caused by excessive emphasis on balance: after a certain point in the game, gear ceases to matter, for the most part, because everything is essentially as good as everything else[*]. Goes for combat, too: after a certain level, there are no challenges anymore, even if the enemies come with three red skulls (were they skulls?) in their icon. (The fights that are really, really difficult are Gorecci Street, the Engwithian Digsite and the pirates on the waters before you're about lvl 7.)

[*] For example, I completely stopped skipping and even trying new spellbooks, because they all just work, thanks. Never used potions other than healing, never used scrolls, never used traps, never used bombs. Never any need whatsoever.

 

EDIT: Great game! No question about that. But this "balance" stuff war poorly implemented.

Edited July 24, 2023 by xzar_monty

[uuuhhii]

10 hours ago, bugarup said:

One man's balance is another's idea of fun. I personally found PoE and especially Deadfire way, way more fun to play than that double-cheese deluxe aka Wrathfinder. It means I can get creative within given set of rules and experience this wondrous, liberating thing of playing with any possible class combination instead of "take loremaster for spellcasting gouda, take a level in monk for camembert style, (alignment? **** that, you can change it later anyway); rogue? Don't be stupid, play a vivisectionist, oh and did I mention fondue monk dip? () you totally should take that" etc. 

To each their own of course, but my fingers crossed for Sawyer not taking parmesan bites from Owlcat's charcuterie.

pathfinder 1e are always a pre buff nightmare

owlcat copied most of its flaw

[Sarex]

I'm looking forward to a game from Owlcat that uses the new PF ruleset, if that ever comes to fruition.

@xzar_monty I never played Deadfire, I didn't finish PoE either. Once I hit the level cap I kind of lost interest.

[xzar_monty]

29 minutes ago, Sarex said:

@xzar_monty I never played Deadfire, I didn't finish PoE either. Once I hit the level cap I kind of lost interest.

Yeah, I understand that. I remember when PoE first came out. I hit the level cap upon entering Twin Elms and felt like what the heck, why bother anymore. Once the DLCs came out, however, I learned that they increased the level cap, and so I started again. Obviously I reached the level cap again (although later), but at that point I was enjoying the story so much that I finished the game.

Twin Elms is still quite poor, by the way. Just bad pacing. It exists in a time and a place in the story where most players (I strongly suspect) won't have any interest in exploring another town/city. Pacing is so important. Like, if you're directing a comedy film, you must make sure that you don't put the funniest scenes too close to one another, even if the story would suggest that that's how they appear.

[Keyrock]

10 minutes ago, Sarex said:

I'm looking forward to a game from Owlcat that uses the new PF ruleset, if that ever comes to fruition.

@xzar_monty I never played Deadfire, I didn't finish PoE either. Once I hit the level cap I kind of lost interest.

I recently got my Pathfinder 2e core rulebook in the mail and I'm slowly sifting through the 640 pages to see how it has changed. It seems like most of the streamlining is for the better. I like complexity and options as much as the next guy, but 1e can get quite overwhelming. I think I like 2e better than 1e; too early to say if I like it better than D&D 5e. I suppose it's all speculation until I put it into action.

As for Pillars, I finished the first game and I liked it well enough at first, but that faded over time and about 2/3 of the way through, around the time I encountered the 857th filler battle, I really really wanted to quit. I was so worn out but I forced myself to finish the game. As for Deadfire, by all rights it should have been a game I enjoyed more than the first, but it just didn't hold my interest. I don't know if I even got halfway through it.

[Keyrock]

 

[uuuhhii]

still look so low budget for a decades old franchise

seems to have many same portrait as 14

[Keyrock]

58 minutes ago, uuuhhii said:

still look so low budget for a decades old franchise

You could say they were lacking...

Ambition.

I'll show myself out.

[Wormerine]

 

Edited July 26, 2023 by Wormerine

[uuuhhii]

43 minutes ago, Keyrock said:

You could say they were lacking...

Ambition.

I'll show myself out.

wish obsidian forum have a facepalm emote

[Gromnir]

On 7/24/2023 at 12:30 PM, xzar_monty said:

But still.

"but still" is an admission o' self undercutting, yes? you make the counter argument and then "but still," for your main point? 

not to mention we disagree. honest makes us wonder if we played the same game. 

gonna limit to weapons:

kitchen stove led to multiple builds being developed 'round the weapon. https://forums.obsidian.net/search/?q=kitchen stove&quick=1 silly op.

marux amanth were not only powerful but were useful for multiple different classes and builds. we got extreme use from the burn + the extra attack chance for priests. am thinking people didn't fully understand the deadfire maths if they failed to recognize just how many extra attacks is functional possible generated with a priest wielding marux amanth. 

magran's favor were kinda op for fire users, which is what our contemplative were. we had never used a battle axe the whole game but 'cause o' the way deadfire didn't force us into single weapon specialization, we were able to get serious benefit from the axe late gam. in fact, for our first deadfire run, we started dual wielding sceptres with our contemplative, cause the helwalker+ priest o' eothas were kinda squish and range made sense. then switched to marux amanth + whatever relative early. the ball and chain flail seemed world beater effective for our high crit build. 'course late game were a dagger + axe 'cause with our contemplative wielding magran's favor we could lay down over-the-top pillars of fire. were no mechanical punishment for using the axe or the dagger or the flail. 

lord darryn's voulge were the primary weapon for our shaman and it were extreme fun to use... and strongk. stacking daze on crit and with a barbarian we were critting frequent enough. late game we might be tempted to switch to the also ridiculous powerful chromoprismatic staff, but for a shaman, the lightning aoe were tough to ignore.

speaking o' our shaman, modwyr not only had the speed stacking quality (again, am thinking people didn't understand the maths, so perhaps seeming small stacking bonuses were overlooked too often) but the weapon were easy to upgrade and it eventual provided immunity to the confused state, which until mid game were our one shortcoming as a shaman.

for the shaman we also thought tekēhu's weapon were mighty keen and so we upgraded and used for much o' the game when needing a ranged alternative. worked a bit like kitchen stove with our berserker.

do we need to mention the plethora o' sabres? were actual a problem 'cause so many backers who paid for a custom weapon wanted sabres, so there were more good sabres than anything else at release. is not difficult to find threads complaining about why there were so many great sabres and not many hatchets... or whatever.

etc.

edit: shouldn't need be stated, but am thinking a main point o' deadfire gear scheme is missed. gear is important in deadfire, but is almost never what defines a character or makes a build strong. xzar serious undersells the kitchen stove, but that weapon is almost unique in that is more than a few builds which is dependent on the weapon. a major goal o' deadfire were to exorcise that stoopid. in wotr, we near always have ember go the fire route or focus enchantment spells. why? 'cause gear makes enchantment and fire the obvious wins. most wotr builds is as much gear dependent as they is focused on player abilities.bg2 were even worse with gear almost wholly defining the efficacy o' a majority o' builds. obsidan were specific trying to avoid such in deadfire. somehow the deadfire gear goal, one we see as a positive, needs be explained and apologized... which kinda misses what obsidian successful did. 

and for @Sarex and others who once again mention that deadfire were not perfect balanced, we observe such were never promised or even a goal. the obsidian developers observed that particular with creative players, there were always gonna be exploits if people looked hard enough. the actual goal were not to eliminate every powerful build but rather to make sure every class and build were viable and fun. observe the existence o' "outliers" is strawman 'cause obsidian specific noted on multiple occasions how elimination o' outliers were not a goal o' their balancing efforts. sure, the developers nerfed stuff more than once, but the real focus were to make every class viable... and potential fun.

so, what were the prohibitive weak class in deadfire? if you tried hard or had extreme bad luck am s'posing were possible to self gimp with multi class, which is something obsidian warned 'bout in-game as well as on the boards. a not viable single class in deadfire? not seeing it. somebody in this thread actual mentioned a monk subclass, which were kinda insane. every monk were arguable too powerful in deadfire, so even the arguable worst were strong.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yiIu1d_T9Uk

streetfighter + shattered pillar were extreme strong, but even a vanilla shattered pillar, particular with an instruments of pain build, was a wrecker.  you will find no shortage of shatter pillars builds in the deadfire forum.

aside, am recalling how during the beta we kept seeing complaints that rogues were weak.

*snort*

rogues weren't noticeable buffed during the beta, but sure enough, when deadfire were released and people actual played 'em, the rogue complaints disappeared. 

the rogue complaints, coming almost entire from people who hadn't bothered to play a rogue, were illustrative o' a major problem. 'cause deadfire were once again implementing rules different even from the original pathfinder, players made assumptions after reading class and item descriptions w/o realizing the actual gameplay efficacy o' those classes and items. everybody knew rouges sucked, but nobody had bothered to test 'em? 'ccording to obsidian's deadfire telemetry, literal nobody had played a shaman for a month or two following release, and near nobody had played a contemplative, but there were plenty o' opinions on shaman and contemplative builds. is why we played a shaman berserker + priest o' wael shaman. our first run were the helwalker + priest o' eothas. to say we were satisfied with our powha is an understatement. 

regardless, while there were indeed outliers in deadfire, there were no classes which were not viable. every class was effective.

however, we will note an oft mentioned obsidian example were misleading. to show the range o' possible builds possible in pillars and again in deadfire, obsidian developers would reflexive mention how you could build a sooper smart barbarian. 

...

the obsidian barbarian example is opposite o' what the developers suggest. we played pillars and deadfire priests with high resolve or high might or high dexterity and all were viable and even fun. however, am thinking there were self gimpage involved if a player attempted to build a not sooper smart barbarian unless they were particular deft with the system. the example obsidian used all the time to identify more options actual represented one o' the rare cases o' homogenization.

HA! Good Fun!

 

Edited July 26, 2023 by Gromnir

[Keyrock]

The last Armored Core game I played was one of the PS2 games, I don't remember if it was 2 or 3. Anyway, AC6 looks really good. It's cool to see From Software return to its roots. Well, I guess From Software's roots would be King's Field, but there's not much point in returning to that series when Dark Souls exists.

[Sarex]

9 hours ago, uuuhhii said:

wish obsidian forum have a facepalm emote

[Hawke64]

"The Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB) have proposed a new method for guaranteeing parental consent to help protect children's privacy online. The method involves "Privacy-Protective Facial Age Estimation" technology, which would scan an adult's face to confirm their age before they're able to consent on behalf a child".

https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/the-ftc-wants-to-know-whether-you-think-facial-age-estimation-technology-is-a-good-idea

I can't quite understand how anyone could think that this is a good idea or could work reliably on the technical level.

[MrBrown]

24 minutes ago, Hawke64 said:

"The Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB) have proposed a new method for guaranteeing parental consent to help protect children's privacy online. The method involves "Privacy-Protective Facial Age Estimation" technology, which would scan an adult's face to confirm their age before they're able to consent on behalf a child".

https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/the-ftc-wants-to-know-whether-you-think-facial-age-estimation-technology-is-a-good-idea

I can't quite understand how anyone could think that this is a good idea or could work reliably on the technical level.

Imagine being a 30-year old babyface who couldn't play games.

[uuuhhii]

40 minutes ago, Hawke64 said:

"The Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB) have proposed a new method for guaranteeing parental consent to help protect children's privacy online. The method involves "Privacy-Protective Facial Age Estimation" technology, which would scan an adult's face to confirm their age before they're able to consent on behalf a child".

https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/the-ftc-wants-to-know-whether-you-think-facial-age-estimation-technology-is-a-good-idea

I can't quite understand how anyone could think that this is a good idea or could work reliably on the technical level.

that sound more stupid and painful than drm

hoped drm would just die out

but things rarely get better after it get worse

[Mamoulian War]

4 hours ago, Hawke64 said:

"The Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB) have proposed a new method for guaranteeing parental consent to help protect children's privacy online. The method involves "Privacy-Protective Facial Age Estimation" technology, which would scan an adult's face to confirm their age before they're able to consent on behalf a child".

https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/the-ftc-wants-to-know-whether-you-think-facial-age-estimation-technology-is-a-good-idea

I can't quite understand how anyone could think that this is a good idea or could work reliably on the technical level.

LOL

this one is perfectly suited for facepalm emote as well

[Malcador]

6 hours ago, Hawke64 said:

"The Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB) have proposed a new method for guaranteeing parental consent to help protect children's privacy online. The method involves "Privacy-Protective Facial Age Estimation" technology, which would scan an adult's face to confirm their age before they're able to consent on behalf a child".

https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/the-ftc-wants-to-know-whether-you-think-facial-age-estimation-technology-is-a-good-idea

I can't quite understand how anyone could think that this is a good idea or could work reliably on the technical level.

Solution in search of a problem.

[MrBrown]

 

[Gizmo]

2 hours ago, Malcador said:

9 hours ago, Hawke64 said:

https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/the-ftc-wants-to-know-whether-you-think-facial-age-estimation-technology-is-a-good-idea

I can't quite understand how anyone could think that this is a good idea or could work reliably on the technical level.

Solution in search of a problem.

A solution with an ulterior motive.

 

Edited July 26, 2023 by Gizmo

[LadyCrimson]

As that old saying goes, just because you can doesn't mean you should.

[majestic]

23 hours ago, Gromnir said:

(again, am thinking people didn't understand the maths, so perhaps seeming small stacking bonuses were overlooked too often)

Actually, that might be a good reason. To make loot memorable it does not even have to be particularily great, it just needs to appear impressive to the player*. Baldur's Gate 2 is full of beloved items with questionable effectiveness, like all those weapons with vorpal effects. The Ravager was pretty well received from what I remember from the Interplay forums, for its 10% instant kill effect with no saving throw.

The math says the effect is not worth it, because the enemies that it can kill in Throne of Bhaal are also going to die within a combat round whether the effect happens or not. It does have a nice animation and it sounds impressive, and the Ravager is not a bad weapon by any means, but if you want to get the most out of a vorpal weapon, the Silver Sword is certainly going to instantly kill enemies more often (although outside of a few outliers, namely bosses Bioware forgot ot make immune to instant death effects, the same reasoning still applies, it is much less effective in reality than it appears on paper, but instantly killing enemies is kewl, and it is hard to argue against kewl).

The inverse can also be seen in Baldur's Gate 2, with items like the Mace of Disruption, which does not sound spectacular at all due to being called Mace of Disruption +1/+2, but it carries a hidden +3 before and a +5 enchantment after the upgrade, making it a quite readily available weapon that works against any of the plentiful undead enemies in the game. Some of Deadfire's loot maybe falls into that category, it works well, is even overpowered when applied properly, but it does not appear too impressive at a first glance.

Edit: Some of the items of the Collector's Edition vendor have the same problem. The Sling of Everard is a rather useful tool if one wants to explore very early battles against highly powerful undead enemies, and the Defender of Easthaven is arguably a better shield than any, uhm, actual shield in the game. Hard to know without in-depth knowledge of how the game and the items work.

*Well, there's the other option, loot that is funny or has a unique effect that lingers for a long time, who has played Baldur's Gate and does not remember the cursed girdle from the very beginning? Not only did you have to fight a dangerous and large ogre to get it, it also turned out to be totally worthless. Probably plenty of players who just put it on without identifying it. I sure did. That said, the character that put the girlde on was a Fighter/Mage/Thief wielding halberds, arguably the very thing that Obsidian tried to prevent with Pillars of Eternity and Deadfire. Halberds are a terrible choice for weapons in Baldur's Gate 1. Well, how was I to know that starting out?

Edited July 26, 2023 by majestic

[Bartimaeus]

1 minute ago, majestic said:

*Well, there's the other option, loot that is funny or has a unique effect that lingers for a long time, who has played Baldur's Gate and does not remember the cursed girdle from the very beginning? Not only did you have to fight a dangerous and large ogre to get it, it also turned out to be totally worthless. Probably plenty of players who just put it on without identifying it. I sure did.

Hey, the Girdle of Masculinity/Femininity is NOT worthless. Just ask Edwin!