Thoughts from a casual gamer

[Sensuki]

And that it's free of recovery time, there's technically no limit on how many targets or how often it can proc.

 

Removing it and making stickiness ability based would require less work to get right as well, and the programmers could focus on more important things.

Edited November 9, 2014 by Sensuki

[Shevek]

I wouldn't focus on INT and MIG I'd make sure you max Perception first, tbh CON also gives more survival than INT does for Barbarians, because they have a low deflection anyway. Deflection is only better for survival than CON if Deflection is already quite a bit better than enemy ACC, which is pretty much never in v333.

I am focusing on the barbs aoe. I like to get that interupting feat also so making that aoe big helps. I do put some in con and per though.

[Sensuki]

Currently AoE only is 3% per point though, the Carnage AoE is pretty small, and 18 Int would make it like only a few pixels bigger, you'll rarely ever hit anyone extra with the increase because enemies are larger sized than the IE games and have large selection circles and can't clump up closely.

 

They are going to be increasing AoE to 6% though, it will be better then.

 

Looking up the AoE size in Unity I think it's 1.5m, a 24% increase in size from 18 INT makes it 1.86m

 

Not sure how big that is in game off the top of my head, but I don't think it's very big

 

You should try using the Barbaric Blow talent Shevek, it's pretty insane.

 

Barbaric Blow - AoE 1.25x damage, 30% bonus hit to crit percent to blow and carnage hits - 1 PER ENCOUNTER LOL

Edited November 9, 2014 by Sensuki

[Lord Wafflebum]

After I try Shevek's suggestions and watch Sensuki's new tutorial video a couple times I'll try things out again and reevaluate. I admit there's a possibility I'm mainly suffering from lack of tutorial. If nothing else I at least feel optimistic about making some progress again.

[Sensuki]

Yeah it's not a difficult game it's literally just a bit of a steep hill at the beginning. Once you learn some of the basics it'll be comfortable for you.

 

If it helps, when I first faced the beetles I got KO'd just like Adam Brennecke

Edited November 9, 2014 by Sensuki

[Cubiq]

abort abort

Edited November 9, 2014 by Cubiq

[Razsius]

 

I'll throw you a bone here Sen.  No aggro mechanics or things like that and simple play that you should be used to if you've played the IE games.  The first and broadest part of the "rework" is for multiple targets to be able to engage a single one and for it to play into disengagement as well.  So if you say have a boss engaged to your fighter and you need to run your fighter out you send in a melee to engage the boss and the fighter can now run without eating disengagement damage (though he might still die to normal attacks, abilities, etc.).  What about multiple enemies?  Don't worry I have ideas for those as well but with the above you should be able to easily understand how the system is suddenly a whole lot less limiting.  More on all this later as i'm a slower typer and I might as well post it in whole at some point and get everyone's thoughts.

 

Note: I dislike AoO myself in real time games but I don't think it's going anywhere so I don't consider complete removal an option.

Yeah I've never actually lost to Medreth, but I just reload when one of my characters gets KO'd because to me that's a loss. Because v333 was so different from v301 and I was so used to just auto attacking stuff doing nothing it was a bit of a cold shower like "oh I actually have to try now". Eventually I worked out how to easily beat it, just had to read that the Monk was dealing 120 damage per hit if I so much as hit him once with anything.

 

Here's my idea anyway:

 

I don't like either of the components of Melee Engagement - targeting clauses that make your units attack enemies when engaged or vice versa, and I don't like the disengagement attack system. It's a poor attempt at implementing a turn-based system in real-time combat. So I just don't think Engagement should be a concept. The AI targeting clauses should be sensible and classes that 'should' have stickiness should be given passive/modal/active abilities to be sticky. Enemies probably aren't going to run away/move around much but they could stuff to give the player a harder time.

 

When Melee Engagement is removed (tried it by modding it) it feels way more like playing an IE game because you can freely maneuver around. However there's a couple of things that need to be done in order to make it feel better. Currently the interaction between attacks and moving targets is not very good, and there are basically no AI targeting clauses outside of 'first enemy sighted' or 'enemy that attacked me first'. IE style targeting (from HoW or IWD2 or BG2) combined with some abilities for players to control melee should be fine, and those abilities while also being used to make units sticky also have other uses, such as being able to safely get away and will also likely create interesting chain combos and stuff like that.

 

Have you seen my videos showing how broken Engagement is? I think we can make a case personally because for me it's like the #1 thing making it not play like an Infinity Engine game. I know heaps of people that don't like it as well. There's a couple of vocal forumites here that do though. Most people seem to be more concerned about being able to make the enemy attack them, and that's easy to do with targeting clauses. Right now it's actively working against the player though.

 

 

I know, I know I hear ya Sen.  Yes, i've watched almost every one of your videos and I do agree with a great many things that you post about.  The "IE feel" is something I am MOST concerned about as i've probably got a good 800+ hours accumulated over the 5+ playthroughs of the Baldur's Gate series that i've done and only recently has Baldur's Gate fallen off my list of #1 most favorite game (series) that Razsius has ever played and been replaced with The Legend of Heroes VI: Trails in the Sky First Chapter (and soon friends).  Trust me, i've got more than my fair share of vested interest in Pillars of Eternity kicking ass.  I don't even want it to be "just good" I want it to smoke Baldur's Gate.  However, I believe with some work on improving both visuals and enemy AI that the engagement system could be workable.  It would be a swing away from a more RTS style (which I do enjoy) but it would probably add some strategic elements on ability use and party positioning.  As for player abuse of AoO that was my biggest concern and probably the weakest part of my "rework" but I have at least 2 ideas for that as well.

 

 

Note: I dislike AoO myself in real time games but I don't think it's going anywhere so I don't consider complete removal an option.

I think that keeping the engagement system is not a sane option.

 

And when people say "well it's just an AoO after all, what's so wrong about it?" it's basically not looking at the whole picture. You can't detach melee engagement from the rest of combat system and defend it on the ground that there's nothing wrong with the concept itself. Eating an AoO is a really big deal in PoE not because AoO is a bad concept but because of how health/endurance and resting supplies systems make health a very limited and precious resource.

 

 

I hear ya but there's a great many things already tied into the engagement system and considering how slow Josh is to change things...

 

(I mean a freakin month of development time to split the abilities you got on your classes in half and allow you to choose one every other level and call it "choice")

[YunikoYokai5]

 

On the difficulty I want to play I don't feel I should have to pay excruciating detail to damage mechanics, what weapons do and don't work on what enemies, flawless tactics and wise use of spells and abilities. This was a huge issue for me in v278, and it feels even worse in v333. I don't know what it was like in v301, because unfortunately it seems being at work is my new hobby.

 

My hope is that someone takes notice of this and tweaks a difficulty setting for folks like me. I have enough analysis and planning to do at work; I have neither the time or patience for it in what is supposed to be my relaxing activities. 

 

You aren't alone, I'm the same. I normally play for story (one reason I trudged through DA:2 despite all the problems, just so I could see what the ending/relationship result was). And it is no different here either. In my videos, I named my party members (Paladin is Lesley (despite being broken in this patch, I refused to change for the sake of character continuity) who is also transgender since she looks like a girl but sounds like a man, Fighter is Robert, Priest is Carol, Rogue is Fluffy and Wizard is Whilbur) for the simple sake of trying to build a story. That's just how I roll, despite this being a beta. 

 

 

[...] the fact remains that game as it is presented is brutal. That's really all there is to it.

 

So probably what's missing is an option to play the game without having to initially read pages and pages of rules, study the numbers, and then make a solid character - or, as it is now, a max/min build. To even survive the first fight on easy. I mean, it used to be possible early on to make any party survive ..three, four times longer by just knowing a tiny little bit about how the mechanics worked, exploiting the classes' strengths, and casting the right spells.

 

But that too is a high initial threshold - even if everyone in the beta accepted that you're probably supposed to pick up a couple of things during act1 (which starts with a tiny party, and where you get to whack small minions, and use one power at a time, etc) - you can't expect that people will play the beta, somehow understand all of the meta-game intuitively, and then somehow make in-depth mechanical design critiques.

 

I think I love you just now. You've basically summed up my first opinions when I started playing the beta. 

 

 

Waffle:

1. I just ran through Dyrford Crossing on normal. I only pause to retarget when an enemy went down. I used no active abilities. I killed all the beetles, spiders, wyverns etc using auto attack and a chanters song. It was easy on normal. Easy is easier than normal. Therefore, easy is easier than easy already.

 

I've been reading your comments and one thing keeps striking me when I read the comments between you and Waffle. How much experience do you have with these styles of games? How many hours have you put into PoE alone? Is that the same as Waffle? The comparison I'm drawing here - just from what both of you are saying - is comparing a Learner driver to a driver of 30 years experience. You obviously have so much more experience than Waffle which is why you are finding it so easy on normal. You know the tactics, you know the tricks, you know how to manage your party. And you have experience actually putting that into practice. You can tell me to position my party like so, but from my early experience of trying party positioning, I still get my backside handed to me, simply because I don't have the experience to back up the knowledge if something goes pear-shaped. Your reactions are going to be faster too because you notice problems as they happen, while players like I won't notice it until it's nearly too late to sort it. Even then, I might not have the experience to sort it out since I won't know how to fix it. 

 

In short, you have more experience, from what I've read. Waffle doesn't. Your easy is vastly different to Waffle's. It might be difficult to see it from their perspective, but try to think back to when you started out on isometric RPGs. That might be a better comparison than your current experience of easy. I don't wish to sound argumentative and I didn't mean to rant as I did, I just wanted to try and help you see why Waffle might be finding it difficult to replicate your success. I hope your advice helps them. 

[Shevek]

My experience? My tactics? Tank goes out. Tank makes things mad. Tank runs back. Pause. Select all. Hit A. Click on enemy. Unpause. Rinse. Repeat. Killing trash is easy in this game.

[Lord Wafflebum]

 

You aren't alone, I'm the same. I normally play for story (one reason I trudged through DA:2 despite all the problems, just so I could see what the ending/relationship result was). And it is no different here either. In my videos, I named my party members (Paladin is Lesley (despite being broken in this patch, I refused to change for the sake of character continuity) who is also transgender since she looks like a girl but sounds like a man, Fighter is Robert, Priest is Carol, Rogue is Fluffy and Wizard is Whilbur) for the simple sake of trying to build a story. That's just how I roll, despite this being a beta.

Based on the feedback here and on some of the other threads I've come to the conclusion that all buillds are not currently viable. How you prefer to play and what you play have to mesh up otherwise you're taking an express trip to dead town. Those of us that prefer to concentrate of the role playing aspect are out of luck, at least for now anyway. When I get off work tonight I'm gonna try the advice of the beta veterans and rock out some barbarian action. If it allows me to get at least somewhat immersed in the game again then I'll be much less unhappy.

[YunikoYokai5]

Shevek:

I've said my piece, regardless if you agree or find it otherwise odd. It doesn't help me that I play Paladin regardless of how broken it is just now but I suppose that is a challenge in itself. I've also found the 'surround and wail until it dies' doesn't work very often in v333, even on easy. At least with me but that may have to do with equipment and/or classes. It worked wonderfully in v301. But I'll be leaving it here.

 

Waffle:

I hope the full game will be more friendly to more role-playing players. I think at the moment the beta is concentrated on the mechanics and function and overall making the game work as bug free as possible rather than balancing for different types of players. If not, then I can only hope easy is somewhere between 301 and 333 in terms of difficulty. I could survive with that. 

[Shevek]

Its not about all builds being viable; its about building a party for how you want to play. If you want to make a party you have to micromanage, you can do that but it requires you micromanage and pause alot. If you dont want to pause alot then you have build for that too. The game gives you enough rope to hang yourself with so you have to make sure to think things through when allocating stats and choosing talents.

 

Yuniko: No offense but this is BETA. The paladin is bugged. Just report the bug and move on.

Edited November 9, 2014 by Shevek

[Cubiq]

@wafflebum if all else fails use a monk. Give him high might, accuracy and constitution.

Give him the starting talent that gives him fire damage on his attacks. And give him the stunning blow talent when you level him up.

Make him tank one of the enemies so that he takes some damage, then stun them and let the party focus fire it down.

Since he is stunned a lot of hits will be crits.

Also once your monk takes some damage his attack power will skyrocket.

I was grazing for 45 damage.

[prodigydancer]

I wouldn't expect Monk to stay what it is right now for long. Any class that is vastly overpowered in beta is often miserable in release version. At any rate Turning Wheel is going to be toned down.

Edited November 9, 2014 by prodigydancer

[YunikoYokai5]

Shevek: with all due respect, its already on the known issues thread, I don't think I need to report it again.

 

Cubiq: I'll try the monk, but I don't know the classes at all very well, especially the magic based ones. I'll try out your tips since I am not a barbarian fan (they tend to have reasonably low defence, something I'm not keen on unless I am mistaken)

Edited November 9, 2014 by YunikoYokai5

[IndiraLightfoot]

My experience? My tactics? Tank goes out. Tank makes things mad. Tank runs back. Pause. Select all. Hit A. Click on enemy. Unpause. Rinse. Repeat. Killing trash is easy in this game.

It's not a tactic. It's the only way to play the game, and it's not a very fun or rewarding one, at that. The big question is: How can combat become varied enough, without being frustrating, even if we use more RL than P? And an equally important question: How can such a varied-enough combat be supported by a generous assorted collection of combat styles via the classes?

Edited November 10, 2014 by IndiraLightfoot

[Shevek]

That how to play against trash mobs. Thats exactly what I did in the IE games against trash mobs. Honestly, I didnt feel the need to do much else against the hordes of Gnolls and Gibberlings those games tossed at you.

[IndiraLightfoot]

Disregarding when your party is a bit brittle at level 1-2 in BG1, thrash mobs like that are per definition devoid of any need for tactical counters. They are indeed trash mobs and can be killed in each and every way conceivable - for instance, you can easily solo them.

However, most importantly, that you need any tactics at all to take on trash mobs in this game, just as you described, is most telling: It means something is wrong with combat. In BG1-2 or IWD (perhaps not IWD2), most trash mobs you can handle in a multitude of ways, many of which have no need for any kind of tank at all.

 

In all fairness to this discussion, any suggestions for variety in tactics should for obvious reasons disregard trash mobs and focus on encounters of medium difficulty and above, were it not for even trash mobs on easy difficulty being "too hard" (read frustratingly magnetic and abrasive).

[Shevek]

Not sure if you are serious... Are you being sarcastic? Its hard to tell with text. So needing any tactics AT ALL is too much? That means theres a problem? What? I think its funny that folks are advocating for more pointless encounters that are totally devoid of challenge.

Edited November 10, 2014 by Shevek

[Sensuki]

@Indira, Shevek just posted how he plays it: http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/69294-newb-guide/

 

He gets Medreth's gear first, hires another companion and when he goes into the Dyrford Crossing he pulls single beetles at a time (which you can't really pull off as easily on Hard). Obviously when you do that, it's going to be much easier and he can just stand there auto attacking without much consequence.

 

All of my videos are done with the stock party and gear against a group on Hard and I try and take on the whole group at once and see how well I can do, so it's obvious why he has a different experience to me.

 

But yeah when I played Icewind Dale recently I used the pull a few at a time tactic in Kresselack's Tomb against the skeleton warriors to prolong my adventuring day.

Edited November 10, 2014 by Sensuki

[Shevek]

Hard should be hard. Normal should be normal. Game difficulty is working as intended.

[Sensuki]

Hard isn't hard though, it's just boring and has no tactical depth. The only difference is it requires more pausing - that's it.

Edited November 10, 2014 by Sensuki

[Quantics]

TL;DR pages 1-7

 

 

Hard is too easy. Easy is too hard. 

[Cubiq]

TL;DR pages 1-7

 

 

Hard is too easy. Easy is too hard. 

It's not like that.

The problem i find on hard is that it's either boring play where you know how 80% of the battle will work at the start.

Or it turns in to a tedious task of trying to save your companions with brute force like spells like withdraw and heals and trying to burst down the enemy before they kill someone.

Using tactical play like CC to effectively reposition your tank and save your party memebers is just too unreliable since it reqires multiple rolls of luck to work and the length of execution is too long.

[Sensuki]

and 99% of the time it's better to just deal raw damage instead, because combat is over very quickly all the time.

Edited November 10, 2014 by Sensuki