Update #78: The Leaders of the Band: Chanters and Priests

[bonarbill]

I'll be really disappointed if Priests end up being nothing but support bots.  I was really hoping for them to be similar to D&D 3.5 clerics at least.  Oh well, hopefully the final spell list will contain some more interesting offensive spells and self buffs.

Edited May 14, 2014 by bonarbill

[Fiaryn]

Similar to 3.5 Clerics how? As in being objectively better than nearly everyone?

[Valorian]

 

Is Holy Radiance a passive or active ability? I can imagine 6 priests carbonizing and frightening undeads while simultaneously healing each other. Not fair.   Unless it doesn't stack, of course.

 

Holy Radiance is a limited-use active ability.

 

 

Ok, thanks.

[Prometheus]

 

"Eora"

 

Did I miss something -- is this the planet's/world's name where Eterntiy takes place? Or is it just a continent? Don't recall reading it before.

 

I think this is the first time we've used it in an update.  People in this part of the world commonly call the world "Eora".  This general region is called The Eastern Reach by colonists.

 

And what is Norwaech? The name of the continent or something different?

[Frusciante]

Great update guys. Love how you can roleplay a priest/paladin with this system.

 

I like how the chant of the spellcaster (Cadegund?) has an echo. Is that because it's inside a dungeon?

 

Also, spell effects, character models and environment look great. Seems character blend in much better with the environment now. Is that also what Adam's update is going to be about?

Edited May 14, 2014 by Frusciante

[Gumbercules]

I think that most of the spells and abilities as they've been presented thus far seem a little bland and difficult to remember. It's probably just a presentational issue, but right now everything feels like "large glowy circle that makes this number go up a bit" vs "small glowy circle that makes that number go up a lot." On the one hand you do want things to be standardized and clearly explained to provide a fair challenge for players, but on the other hand a lot of similar, well balanced, and standardized abilities can be difficult to remember and choose between. I hope that in the final game the spell/ability descriptions, animations, and icons are all distinct and memorable enough that even the most basic spells and abilities stand out.

 

From the short description those orders and deities sound rather two-dimensional (maybe not the god of death) and that is a BIG disappointment.
I mean, PLEASE tell me there is more nuance than the short descriptions given in this post, otherwise, perhaps you can have a look at one or two of the gods posted in the Gods thread in my signature

 

I think there will be more nuance. The description of Woedica for example had much more variety and subjectivity to it. But even take Eothas. In this update he's described as a simple goody two-shoes of light and benevolence, but we know that his followers established an oppressive theocracy and waged an attempted war of conquest

[J.E. Sawyer]

PoE's priests are designed for people who enjoy support characters.  I've noticed a trend in support class design in recent years to load support characters with offensive abilities to rival other classes while retaining (or improving) all of their support abilities.  I think it makes the classes less distinctive and in the end the people who want to pump out damage are still going to skip something that's an "off-striker" class.  I don't think every class has to appeal to every player.

[Forlorn Hope]

Thank you for the update. Interesting stuff. I think I need to try every class and that's great. Spell descriptions sound familiar yet different, good stuff. However, I'm not sure if I like the incantations... Maybe I'll learn to like them. By the way, Kana literally means chicken in Finnish and Pallegina sounds a bit silly/funny. Palle can be translated as "a hem", among other things, although the word is not used very much anymore. Anyway, Kana Rua looks like a jovial chap (and high as f**k). I really enjoy the art in this game.

As a side note, the female cleric with her scale mail and all didn't look bad regarding bewbs, even though I'd still prefer consistency.

 

All in all good job, I approve this update.

[J.E. Sawyer]

 

And what is Norwaech? The name of the continent or something different?

 

 

Norwaech is the northernmost erldom in the Dyrwood.  It's ruled by the Rafendr (RAH-ven-dur) family (arms: party per pale vert and azure overall a tower argent).

[HoopyFreud]

Any of higher-tier backers want to design a Dathon NPC now? :D

[J.E. Sawyer]

By the way, Kana literally means chicken in Finnish and Pallegina sounds a bit silly/funny. Palle can be translated as "a hem", among other things, although the word is not used very much anymore.

 

Not to be overly dismissive, but this is one of the reasons I don't worry a whole lot about what names mean in other languages.  I think almost every name that's been revealed has, at some point in time, revealed to be "dog's butt" or "stupid idiot" or "jolly prostitute" in Basque/Hungarian/Lombard/Vietnamese/Esperanto.  Really long names can sometimes get around that, but they often wind up being really cumbersome, IMO.

[Flow]

I'm definitely naming my first character "Dog's Butt".

[Enoch]

I like the aumaua chanter portrait. Is that an island or coastal aumaua, are they male or female, and are they one of the companions?

 

So far we seem to have:

Aloth - male wood elf wizard

Cadegund - female meadow human priest

Edér - male meadow human rogue

Forton - male savannah human monk

Pallegina - female godlike ocean human paladin

Sagani - female boreal dwarf ranger

? - male hearth orlan cipher

Kana Rua - ? ? aumaua chanter

 

That would fill all eight companion slots and give representation to all of the available races. One of the UI screens from a while back also mentioned a party member called the Devil of Caroc. Is that a title for one of the existing companions or are there more than eight?

 

Is there some confirmation that I'm aware of that this "Kana Rua" is a potential party-member?  Might just be a prominent non-joinable NPC.  (From a party-balance perspective, that roster looks a little short in front-liners.  And "Devil of Caroc" sounds like a barbarian-type...) 

 

Anyhow, I'm not normally a Bard guy, but I'm loving how they've re-thought that into the Chanter.  Toss out the lute nonsense and replace it with ancient epic poetry and legend. 

[Sabotin]

The portrait is pretty nice. I'm kinda glad to see happy faces, specially with something like shark people; nowadays you'd think they'd all be grimdark badasses and such.

 

The chanter concept sounds fun. While other classes are depleting abilities through time, chanters keep on stacking the buffs. The priest's Salvation of Time seems to be a good combo (since chants last longer you can stack more of them I guess?)

I love the names, too. The first thing I thought when I read them was Darmok . I'm hoping some names will be references to some stories or events in the game.

 

Priests seem priestly? Nothing special, but that's not necessarily bad. No need to reinvent hot water everywhere. The little bit of flavor with their abilities and their "alignment" being connected seems nice though. Sounds like it's a "softening" of cleric domains/spell lists from dnd. Or you plan on changing available spells based on deity still?

 

Now for something negative. I can't say I like the appearance of the spell vfx shown. They look to be in the same style as NWN2, which I didn't like that much. Too fuzzy and shiny, which only gets worse when you have multiple on your party (you are considering that I hope?). Besides, you don't wanna hide the pretty backgrounds .

Edited May 14, 2014 by Sabotin

[Forlorn Hope]

 

By the way, Kana literally means chicken in Finnish and Pallegina sounds a bit silly/funny. Palle can be translated as "a hem", among other things, although the word is not used very much anymore.

 

Not to be overly dismissive, but this is one of the reasons I don't worry a whole lot about what names mean in other languages.  I think almost every name that's been revealed has, at some point in time, revealed to be "dog's butt" or "stupid idiot" or "jolly prostitute" in Basque/Hungarian/Lombard/Vietnamese/Esperanto.  Really long names can sometimes get around that, but they often wind up being really cumbersome, IMO.

 

Ah, yes of course. I'm aware that (fantasy) names have the potential to mean something wacky in some other language. For example, I believe Lumia as in Nokia's Lumia phones, is a word meaning prostitute in Spanish (although the word is a bit old-ish). I just wanted to let you know. I don't think Kana Rua or Pallegina are bad names and after a while I'm sure I won't even think of them as names containing Finnish. Or maybe I'll just roleplay Kana Rua and think that (s)he really likes the taste of chicken.

Edited May 14, 2014 by Forlorn Hope

[xsikal]

Slightly off-topic, but has it been confirmed whether or not we will be able to use custom portraits for ourselves and NPCs?

 

Also, from the description, it sounds like the boost/penalty for a priest/paladin who adheres to/strays from their deity applies only to the PC? I guess I can understand that, depending on how much autonomy the NPC is given, but it's a little odd.

 

Otherwise, sounds good. The chanter is very reminiscent of an everquest bard (with chant effects lasting a short time after a new chant has begun, allowing twisting). Hopefully, it won't be quite as intensive as that game's implementation (every four seconds, switch song), as that would be very difficult in a party-based game.

 

Also, any spell that starts with Achtung really should end with Baby!

Edited May 14, 2014 by xsikal

[Osvir]

 

Update by Josh Sawyer, Project Director

• Kind Wayfarers - Knights-errant who assist troubled travelers and celebrate love, condemning deception and malice even when dealing with their enemies. The Kind Wayfarers are a diverse group of people and can be found all over the known world.

 

One now knows whom the main enemy of the game is, death to the Kind Wayfarer's!

 

Their trademark move: Hug of Deathly Love

[Messier-31]

I like the aumaua chanter portrait. Is that an island or coastal aumaua, are they male or female, and are they one of the companions?

 

So far we seem to have:

Aloth - male wood elf wizard

Cadegund - female meadow human priest

Edér - male meadow human rogue

Forton - male savannah human monk

Pallegina - female godlike ocean human paladin

Sagani - female boreal dwarf ranger

? - male hearth orlan cipher

Kana Rua - ? ? aumaua chanter

 

Not so fast, mister!

 

These characters have been introduced during the Kickstarter Campaign:

• Edair – will be in the final game, but the name changed to Edér and the appearance also changed.
• Aloth – an elven wizard
• Cadegund – a human priest
• Forton – a Savannah human monk
• Sagani – a boreal dwarven ranger

All of these character ideas were generated by Josh Sawyer without input from anyone else. While some of them will be appearing as companions more-or-less as they described them, some may appear in a different guise, some may appear as non-companion NPCs, and some may not appear at all.

 

 

Source: http://pillarsofeternity.gamepedia.com/Companion

[Gfted1]

Slightly off-topic, but has it been confirmed whether or not we will be able to use custom portraits for ourselves and NPCs?

This reply from Sawyer is a little old so Im not sure if its still valid:

 

 

Any word from the devs on whether custom portraits can be used and if so, what are the dimensions?

We want to support custom portraits and make it very easy for players to drop in whatever they want. We're still playing around with portrait sizes but right now they're around 660x850 on the character/inventory screen and get downsampled for use on other parts of the GUI.

 

[Mannock]

 

I like the aumaua chanter portrait. Is that an island or coastal aumaua, are they male or female, and are they one of the companions?

 

So far we seem to have:

Aloth - male wood elf wizard

Cadegund - female meadow human priest

Edér - male meadow human rogue

Forton - male savannah human monk

Pallegina - female godlike ocean human paladin

Sagani - female boreal dwarf ranger

? - male hearth orlan cipher

Kana Rua - ? ? aumaua chanter

 

Not so fast, mister!

 

These characters have been introduced during the Kickstarter Campaign:

• Edair – will be in the final game, but the name changed to Edér and the appearance also changed.
• Aloth – an elven wizard
• Cadegund – a human priest
• Forton – a Savannah human monk
• Sagani – a boreal dwarven ranger

All of these character ideas were generated by Josh Sawyer without input from anyone else. While some of them will be appearing as companions more-or-less as they described them, some may appear in a different guise, some may appear as non-companion NPCs, and some may not appear at all.

 

 

Source: http://pillarsofeternity.gamepedia.com/Companion

 

 

The only "truly" confirmed companions are Edér, Pallegina and an unnamed orlan cipher.

 

Though it is likely some of the characters on your list will make it into the game as joinable companions.

[SeekDWay]

Mr. Sawyer, as someone who really enjoyed playing melee or combat bards in older DnD editions, I would like to ask if we will be able to build Chanters as passable melee combatants ?

 

This is the big factor for my main character. Bard or Ranger that is. Jack's of all trades is what floats my boat.

Edited May 14, 2014 by SeekDWay

[Forlorn Hope]

This business with names, Finnish and Josh Sawyer brings me fond memories of Icewind Dale 2 and particularly "the wandering village". Many of villagers had Finnish names such as Jari, Venla, Kyösti etc. and other names sounded Finnish (Suoma, Kurtta etc.) even though they were not actually names used in Finland, well perhaps among the Sami people. I was like what the hell is happening here? Good times! 

[Jarrakul]

Oh god chanters sound so cool. They are everything I want a bard to be. :D

[Labadal]

Didn't even think to comment on how happy I am about spells/abilities being shown.

 

I wonder, how will improved stats from buss be shown.

 

Let's say I have 18 agility. Will a +3 buff show as 21 or as 21 (+3)?

 

How will buffs stacking work? Will there be a limit on how much a stat can be buffed like in the IE games?

[Keyrock]

Is Holy Radiance a passive or active ability? I can imagine 6 priests carbonizing and frightening undeads while simultaneously healing each other. Not fair.   Unless it doesn't stack, of course.

In fairness, a group of 6 priests should, by all means, be the bane of the undead.

 

I'm definitely leaning toward priest as my first character.  Nothing really surprising, they're pretty much how I envisioned them, which is fine.