What are you playing now?

[Keyrock]

84 hours in on Pillars and I feel I'm getting close to finishing Act 3.  I'm going to take a break from the main story and pop into the Paths of Od Nua and push down into lev 8 and deeper.  The plan is to clear all levels through lev 12, then finish Act 3 and do the last few levels in Act 4, assuming that's possible and Act 4 isn't just a linear push to the end.

[Rosbjerg]

 

You need to place your bases so that you can cover most of the with 3 of them and use planes to scout. Otherwise the ufos do terror missions out of your range.

 

So 3 bases is the optimal number then? I had 4 by the time I quit, 1 in construction, 3 operational as interceptor bases but only one from which to launch ground teams. I've noticed that radar installations are obviously artificially overpriced, at a whopping $250k apiece, I guess to prevent you from just setting up a network of listening posts and force you to scout with interceptors.

 

Unchecked terror sprees really do a number on funding, which is great. However, successfully shooting down UFOs and recovering stuff rarely makes up for that. Numbers may change down the road though, as my biggest catches so far are just corvettes. I take it that carriers and battleships are sufficiently profitable to make me less sensitive to council tantrums?

 

 

3 is optimal for the first year and then you'll get enough cash to build 1 or 2 pure interceptor bases (without any installations) as you begin to prioritize the initial bases into construction, research and one that has the main grounds team (and is usally ½ research and ½ constructions for the smaller and more immediate projects)

 

The first 3 bases should preferable be Egypt, around Cuba and Philippines to cover as much as possible. Now I use an extra radar when income warrants it, but some players prefer to sink money into other projects. Then I go with 2 interceptor bases, one in south/east south America and one in Alaska - to get those ****ers who hide around the poles - and to catch those who go towards South Africa and other hard to reach places. . When you have money (should be after a year or so)

 

Then it's just trying to keep up with the aliens who will be throwing bigger and bigger ships at you.

 

Of coures that just my strategy and mainly used as a sort of easy win one, when you get better and can predict the kind of mission they throw in response to your meddling, you can place bases a lot more strategically. It can pay off to avoid some UFOs as their mission can create other missions that are more profitable etc etc.  

 

 

 

There are some great mods too - and ones that help a lot with funding issues (too high costs and too low etc) and makes the game a lot more realistic and fun.

[Guard Dog]

Out of the Park Baseball 16. It is awesome. You guys wouldn't like it though. No swords.

[Malcador]

D3, grinding to get my crusader better gear. Not much luck though, bah.

[Hurlshort]

Out of the Park Baseball 16. It is awesome. You guys wouldn't like it though. No swords.

 

I am busy making my mark as the latest phenom in MLB The Show

[GhostofAnakin]

Just starting Chapter II in the Witcher.  Up to this point, I gotta say I enjoyed the Witcher 2 more.  Better story, better characters, etc.

[Keyrock]

Change of plans for Pillars, most likely.  I think I'm going to say "screw it" with the remaining levels of the Paths of Od Nua (I just finished lev 8 ) and any remaining side quests and just head straight for the main story to finish the game as quickly as possible.  I'm getting super burned out on the game.  Granted, I'm at 86+ hours and there are not too many games that I wouldn't get burned out on after playing them for that long.  All the little things I could laugh off before are really starting to irritate me, like the SHOCKINGLY horrible pathfinding.  Plus, I'm so freakin' tired of filler battles.  I know the Infinity Engine games had tons of combat and Pillars is emulating those games, but there is entirely way too many filler battles in the game.  Hopefully I can bang the rest of the game out in a couple of days.  After that, I'm going to play something else...  not sure what yet.  I'll almost certainly play Pillars again in the future, but not for a good long while.

Edited April 26, 2015 by Keyrock

[Bartimaeus]

The difference, I felt, between filler battles in Baldur's Gate and filler battles in P:E is that in BG most (outside of stupid trolls, which I usually just CTRL+Y because I seriously get tired of fighting those idiots) took roughly 10-15 seconds to deal with as you have such seriously destructive magic like fireballs and haste and chain lightning and horrid wilting...while it's always an annoying ordeal in P:E pretty much without fail.

Edited April 27, 2015 by Bartimaeus

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

The difference, I felt, between filler battles in Baldur's Gate and filler battles in P:E is that in BG most (outside of stupid trolls, which I usually just CTRL+Y because I seriously get tired of fighting those idiots) took roughly 10-15 seconds to deal with as you have such seriously destructive magic like fireballs and haste and chain lightning and horrid wilting...while it's always an annoying ordeal in P:E pretty much without fail.

Yeah, PoE has some serious balance problems that steer the game towards long drawn out encounters and PotD makes it a lot worse. I've considered using console commands to buff the **** out of my characters and slide on through.

 

Now I want to play BGT more, but my need to finish PoE is too strong.

[Fighter]

PoE has more than 3 Acts? Oh my. I'm on a long break after finishing act 2. I've also completed all of the Endless Paths dungeon and all of the side quests in the area. 70 hours in total. I though Act 3 would be final.

[Bartimaeus]

 

The difference, I felt, between filler battles in Baldur's Gate and filler battles in P:E is that in BG most (outside of stupid trolls, which I usually just CTRL+Y because I seriously get tired of fighting those idiots) took roughly 10-15 seconds to deal with as you have such seriously destructive magic like fireballs and haste and chain lightning and horrid wilting...while it's always an annoying ordeal in P:E pretty much without fail.

Yeah, PoE has some serious balance problems that steer the game towards long drawn out encounters and PotD makes it a lot worse. I've considered using console commands to buff the **** out of my characters and slide on through.

 

Now I want to play BGT more, but my need to finish PoE is too strong.

 

 

 

I more or less just finished my playthrough of BG2. 50% creature and quest XP reducer made it tough, but I was still able to pull through. I didn't finish ToB, though, because I got to it and a variety of glitches happened (including the world map not being updated for some reason, making myself unable to travel to ToB areas - as well as randomly losing my Bhaalspawn powers INCLUDING the pocket plane ability) and also I don't think ToB is all that fun in general - though I am curious as to how I would handle these end game fights without having hardly any HLAs and such. I fixed all the glitches via a bunch of different utilities, but then I lost interest as I usually do when I hit ToB.

Edited April 27, 2015 by Bartimaeus

[Humanoid]

So I didn't have time to play PoE between pre-patch launch state and after the 1.04 patch. On continuing the previous save this past weekend, I found that the game design didn't really support the character I wanted to play - my standard "neutral evil" thief - it wasn't working out both in a roleplaying sense or mechanically. It's always been a character that kind of needs to be played solo, or at the most with a minimal party, but I was completely ineffectual like that.

 

So I've started over. I'll go for a gun-toting rogue who disregards stealth: I'd have gone a fighter but the rogue mechanics support the character concept better. It does cheese me off that I need to 'stealth' anyway to detect secrets, I'd have liked it to be passively available - at a reduced rate or whatever - while moving normally. And while I'm on about stealth annoyances, I also don't like that exiting stealth is an all-or-nothing affair (the whole party gets into combat the moment one member is spotted), and that there seems to be no "run away and hide" function for sneaky-type characters: even the lightest armoured and agile guys get run down by brutes in heavy armour and weapons.

 

All in all though, most all of the shortcomings of the game are due to its heritage in the IE games, games I always thought were good in spite of their mechanics, not because of them. I expected this to be the case before I'd even pledged for the game, and I accept it's what a lot of people want, and that the campaign would have probably taken a significantly less impressive sum if it had been otherwise. I do absolutely hope that the next independent project takes a different approach though, ideally balanced out around the singular player character, with perhaps one optional NPC, New Vegas-style.

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

PoE has more than 3 Acts? Oh my. I'm on a long break after finishing act 2. I've also completed all of the Endless Paths dungeon and all of the side quests in the area. 70 hours in total. I though Act 3 would be final.

My understanding is that Act 4 is just the final quest.

 

I more or less just finished my playthrough of BG2. 50% creature and quest XP reducer made it tough, but I was still able to pull through. I didn't finish ToB, though, because I got to it and a variety of glitches happened (including the world map not being updated for some reason, making myself unable to travel to ToB areas - as well as randomly losing my Bhaalspawn powers INCLUDING the pocket plane ability) and also I don't think ToB is all that fun in general - though I am curious as to how I would handle these end game fights without having hardly any HLAs and such. I fixed all the glitches via a bunch of different utilities, but then I lost interest as I usually do when I hit ToB.

IMO, ToB is probably the weakest section of BGT. I do appreciate epic level gameplay, but with almost every enemy in ToB being immune to backstabs or crits it gets a bit boring. *shrug*

[Humanoid]

Struggled with the starting dungeon of MoTB for the same reason. I know, I know, don't need to tell me that it's a brilliant game I need to play, I know that, but I just don't have the desire to deal with the edge-cases of DnD mechanics at this point.

[Gorgon]

The communal stealth thing is a terrible idea. 

[LadyCrimson]

I do absolutely hope that the next independent project takes a different approach though, ideally balanced out around the singular player character, with perhaps one optional NPC, New Vegas-style.

Yeah, I'm kind of in agreement, although probably for different reasons. I like party rpg's, but these days I'm not as into managing large parties. I much prefer having 2-3, I think. It feels more ... personal. (not that I didn't goof off with mods to have more companions in FO:NV...but that was for lulz after finishing the game).

 

Since I was never a big stealth/rogue type, Pillar's version doesn't really bother me ... but neither does it reinvent the wheel in a way that made me go "cool, now I like stealth." It's definitely a bit weird.

[Bartimaeus]

Struggled with the starting dungeon of MoTB for the same reason. I know, I know, don't need to tell me that it's a brilliant game I need to play, I know that, but I just don't have the desire to deal with the edge-cases of DnD mechanics at this point.

 

NWN/2's combat was kinda dodgy in general, though. Thankfully, if you're playing on just core difficulty, you can get away with letting the AI control your party sans the main character probably 95% of the time without too much difficulty. Which is good, because if I actually had to really bother with combat like I do with BG, I probably never would've finished it.

 

 

 

PoE has more than 3 Acts? Oh my. I'm on a long break after finishing act 2. I've also completed all of the Endless Paths dungeon and all of the side quests in the area. 70 hours in total. I though Act 3 would be final.

IMO, ToB is probably the weakest section of BGT. I do appreciate epic level gameplay, but with almost every enemy in ToB being immune to backstabs or crits it gets a bit boring. *shrug*

 

 

I've never actually bothered with backstabbing in any of the IE games. There are so many different ways it can be exploited to ridiculous effect that I've never felt comfortable using it as the player. Seriously, if you have Boots of Speed and Cloak of Non-Detection on as a high level thief, you're basically invincible if you feel like it - just keep running out of sight of enemies, hiding in the shadows, backstab. Repeat until you win. I soloed Drizzt in BG1 as like a level 5 thief one time doing this, and promptly remembered why I don't backstab when he was completely and utterly helpless to my attacks.

Edited April 27, 2015 by Bartimaeus

[Mamoulian War]

Few days ago I finished another Star Ocean 4 playthrough, this time on Universe difficulty. Still needs to do some battle trophies with Faize and then to go to Chaos difficulty and hope that I will get Platinum trophy before Star Ocean 5 will be released :D

 

Currently I have around 700 hours played with this game, but I started it in winter 2010

 

Right after I have finished it I have jumped right into Pillars of Eternity, and enjoying it a lot. I am taking my time having few days of pause while the new patch is in beta, but I probably finish the game before 1.05. We'll see about that )

 

Once in a while I am playing Gran Turismo 6 online championships with one Czech fan site. Pretty hard racing there, the best racer there is currently at 64th position in Gran Turismo Academy 2015 and 2nd best in racer in CEE region O.o. He is really crazy and I am always happy, if he does not lap me during 1 hour races.

[marelooke]

 

I do absolutely hope that the next independent project takes a different approach though, ideally balanced out around the singular player character, with perhaps one optional NPC, New Vegas-style.

Yeah, I'm kind of in agreement, although probably for different reasons. I like party rpg's, but these days I'm not as into managing large parties. I much prefer having 2-3, I think. It feels more ... personal. (not that I didn't goof off with mods to have more companions in FO:NV...but that was for lulz after finishing the game).

 

Since I was never a big stealth/rogue type, Pillar's version doesn't really bother me ... but neither does it reinvent the wheel in a way that made me go "cool, now I like stealth." It's definitely a bit weird.

 

 

It's odd that the party management hasn't really ever bothered me in the BGT (even in a recent playthrough I started, so I can't blame changing tastes), while it does annoy me in PoE (and I tended to have loads of casters in my BGT parties, so the hands-offness of most melee classes ain't it either).

 

Maybe it's the engagement system that's more complicated than (imho) necessary (especially for trash fights). BGT seemed to have *very* simple aggro mechanics and no disengagement penalties ("whoever is closest gets the first punches and whoever hurts me the most is the one I am gonna chase" seems like a rather good summary) and aside from the PC always being plunked at the front after a conversation (better Stoneskin up before a convo, just in case...) I can't recall them ever really bothering me (simple to understand and easy to work with).

 

Or maybe it's something else entirely that I haven't figured out yet.

 

 

In other news getting near the end of Saints Row 3, found the last collectible I was missing and completed all the vehicle theft challenges. Think I just unlocked a few more assassinations and once those are done there's probably only a few missions left before the credits roll (oh, and Sad Panda Skyblazing stuff from the Genki DLC, a gamemode I don't really fancy so I'm probably just going to skip those)

Edited April 27, 2015 by marelooke

[Bartimaeus]

It's also really annoying that your casters in PoE don't have hardly any magic to protect themselves, and that the oft-annoying (dis)engagement mechanics are basically your only method of actively protecting them. No Stoneskin, no Mirror Image, no Invisibility...get your fighters to intercept every enemy, or enjoy having your casters more or less insta-gibbed.

 

The movement "mechanics" in BG are extremely exploitable, if you so desire. But...I prefer that and exercising restraint as the player so you're not essentially exploiting the game's limitations versus what PoE does. There's probably a better solution in between the two, though.

Edited April 27, 2015 by Bartimaeus

[Amentep]

Another weekend...another restart of PoE.  We'll see if this character is the final one...

[213374U]

Struggled with the starting dungeon of MoTB for the same reason. I know, I know, don't need to tell me that it's a brilliant game I need to play, I know that, but I just don't have the desire to deal with the edge-cases of DnD mechanics at this point.

 

Unlike in ToB, it remains that way for most of MotB. Spirits/undead make up the majority of enemies throughout the expansion, totally gimping certain builds. Bad, bad design.

 

 

I've never actually bothered with backstabbing in any of the IE games. There are so many different ways it can be exploited to ridiculous effect that I've never felt comfortable using it as the player. Seriously, if you have Boots of Speed and Cloak of Non-Detection on as a high level thief, you're basically invincible if you feel like it - just keep running out of sight of enemies, hiding in the shadows, backstab. Repeat until you win. I soloed Drizzt in BG1 as like a level 5 thief one time doing this, and promptly remembered why I don't backstab when he was completely and utterly helpless to my attacks.

Might be some mod I had on last time I played, but I believe BG1 Drizzt was perma-hasted, making it difficult to run away from him to hide.

 

I don't know, I like backstabbing, but I agree that it's oh! exploitable. The "Chosen of Cyric" encounter in Rogue Rebalancing (damn you aVENGER!) is as fun as it is frustrating because it's programmed to abuse backstabbing as the player would. I remember that one time I made Imoen a multiclass mage/thief and cheesed through the game with the mislead/chain-backstab combo... fun times.

[Malcador]

Got my Crusader up to 720 k dps and 16 MM toughness. Still can only doe T3 though, bah.

[Keyrock]

It's also really annoying that your casters in PoE don't have hardly any magic to protect themselves, and that the oft-annoying (dis)engagement mechanics are basically your only method of actively protecting them. No Stoneskin, no Mirror Image, no Invisibility...get your fighters to intercept every enemy, or enjoy having your casters more or less insta-gibbed.

 

Aloth has the Grimoire Slam to create space and let him get away and any spell/ability that hobbles, stuns, paralyzed, knockdows, etc a target can be used to get away.  There's also that spell (I forget what it's called) that lets you trade places with an ally, doing damage to everyone in between, but that's obviously highly situational as to whether it puts your caster in a better or worse spot.  For me it's very rarely an issue as I have a 3 1/2 meatshield party with Beefstick the Barbarian, Eder, and Pallegina acting as full time meat shields and Grieving Mother making a surprisingly serviceable support meat shield when someone manages to get past my front line.  Outside of spirits, which just laugh at my defensive line and teleport right through it, it's pretty rare that anyone gets into melee range with Durance or Aloth.

 

My current favorite mage spell, I call it the Nighty Night spell (Call to Slumber, I think), is one of the most insanely useful spells in the game, in my opinion.  Decent size AoE, no friendly fire, and it puts enemies on their asses for a good long time.  That is some seriously awesome crowd control.

[Bartimaeus]

Might be some mod I had on last time I played, but I believe BG1 Drizzt was perma-hasted, making it difficult to run away from him to hide.

 

 

I don't know, I like backstabbing, but I agree that it's oh! exploitable. The "Chosen of Cyric" encounter in Rogue Rebalancing (damn you aVENGER!) is as fun as it is frustrating because it's programmed to abuse backstabbing as the player would. I remember that one time I made Imoen a multiclass mage/thief and cheesed through the game with the mislead/chain-backstab combo... fun times.

 

 

Yes...I recalled an additional detail about my encounter with Drizzt: I was playing my first and only playthrough of BG:EE, and it was the initial release. Probably had something to do with it, haha.

 

I've never used the Chosen of Cyric Encounter component. I should probably check that out sometime, but I dislike in general how Rogue Rebalancing adds content that wasn't there originally - like the additional weapons the Shadow Thieves get, or the random portraits it gives to certain characters, or... It's a more hamfisted approach than I like. I edited the mod install files to have that stuff cut out, and so that if I need to reinstall further down the line, I have the files already ready. I spent like three to four hours editing Item Revisions to be completely compatible with 1pp...gosh, what a travesty that was. I would cry if I lost my edited install files for that,

 

Is it Rogue Rebalancing that makes AI backstabbing so friggan' annoying? I figured it was SCS, but maybe not. Need like two or three different casters having True Sight/Detect Invisibility active on them to counteract that crap...so annoying. They're just constantly guzzling potions of invisibility, too.

 

Aloth has the Grimoire Slam to create space and let him get away and any spell/ability that hobbles, stuns, paralyzed, knockdows, etc a target can be used to get away.  There's also that spell (I forget what it's called) that lets you trade places with an ally, doing damage to everyone in between, but that's obviously highly situational as to whether it puts your caster in a better or worse spot.  For me it's very rarely an issue as I have a 3 1/2 meatshield party with Beefstick the Barbarian, Eder, and Pallegina acting as full time meat shields and Grieving Mother making a surprisingly serviceable support meat shield when someone manages to get past my front line.  Outside of spirits, which just laugh at my defensive line and teleport right through it, it's pretty rare that anyone gets into melee range with Durance or Aloth.

 

My current favorite mage spell, I call it the Nighty Night spell (Call to Slumber, I think), is one of the most insanely useful spells in the game, in my opinion.  Decent size AoE, no friendly fire, and it puts enemies on their asses for a good long time.  That is some seriously awesome crowd control.

 

 

Oh, no doubt that offensive magic is capable enough...PoE has crowd control up the wazoo...but I find it really annoying that unless my fighters are acting as direct stopgaps between the enemies and my casters, my casters are in deep trouble. That's probably from years of playing BG where enemies besides other mages generally target your fighters instead of casters first, because your fighters are the ones actually doing most of the DPS...and if they tried to target your mages first, they'd be ineffectual in taking down Stoneskins and Mirror Images while being murdered by your own fighters...just for your mage to end up casting a dumb Shadow Door when their combat defenses finally break down or whatever. I think the management of movement in PoE is more annoying than whatever tactical elements it's supposed to add are worth, personally. But then again, I don't like the combat mechanics in PoE in general, so that probably doesn't mean much.

Edited April 27, 2015 by Bartimaeus