Better without stronghold?

[halfoat]

I've upgraded my keep to 38 Prestige and 37 Security with 4 hirelings and yet I seem to be running at a net loss on taxes. Just lost 606cp to bandits and only gained 75cp from taxes. I haven't even made enough to pay my hirelings! This seems crazy considering how much I've spent on upgrading the keep.

 

Is it actually better for you if you don't upgrade the keep at all? That way you can spend money on other things and not waste it on hirelings and upgrades? I honestly can't see the point of it otherwise.

[brionkj]

The way I read it was that you had a net gain of 75cp, after a loss of 606cp to bandits. That's the only way to explain why I've got money in the thousands, as the loot I get hardly earn me much.

 

However it still beggars the question why we should be losing this much with high keep security. Hmm...

[Katarack21]

The curio shop and the botanical gardens are worth it as a source of otherwise rare enchanting ingrediants, I think. And the warden for bounties. Brighthollow to rest, and the merchant to buy campfire supplies--for clearing the Endless Paths with. Other than that, it's no good.

[tinderbox]

I would love to see more interactivity with the stronghold. A few servants, even if they just have written rather than voiced dialogue, and maybe construction workers hurrying back and forth while you have a construction phase going on.

 

Perhaps a base number of hirelings too, even two or three. A captain of guards or something? Just make the place a bit more lived-in once you get it going. Right now, it's just a bit ded.

 

I was also thinking, what if you could add to your library as you go? You collect all these books and times. What if you could add them to your library collection and slowly increase your lore resting bonus as a result? Could be cool. Better than selling them.

[Katarack21]

You can add them to your library now, manually. I think it would be nice to have a mechanic where the game tracked that and had it influence the lore bonus in Brighthollow.

[tinderbox]

You can add them to your library now, manually. I think it would be nice to have a mechanic where the game tracked that and had it influence the lore bonus in Brighthollow.

 

Yeah I actually did that as a RP thing. But a mechanic for it to have some in-game effect as well would be neat.

[Guest BugsVendor]

To me the whole stronghold mini game is a miss.

 

I wouldn't mind some minor hideout you could get to sleep there for free at some point in the game.

 

However being a lord of huge castle kills the idea of being an unknown adventurer.

 

Claiming such a big piece of land, and very much known by the locals, you would be the most talked about person in the whole realm.

 

Game play mechanics wise it didn't bother me at all. Story wise... I pretended it is not there. 

[sparklecat]

I wouldn't really call the bounties worth it, either, unless I'm missing out on some really good items by skipping them; been hearing they give a ton of xp and I'm already overlevelled, I don't need to make it worse.

[Gorgon]

It looks pretty deserted. There's a few hirelings pacing around but where are the servants, the janitors, the groundsman, the people who run the place ?.

 

Why am I not dealing with land disputes and local politics with other lords. Seems like a missed opportunity. Resting is not practical. There are two area loads before you can get to bright.. whatstheplace.. the inn and no one seems to have resting supplies so I tend to use inns in towns as a base of operations. The ingredient shop and the bounties are worth getting, the rest not so much.  

[sparklecat]

As it is, I'm never going to bother trekking all the way out there to rest and get my useless +1 to a single stat bonus, but even if it were better, I think it could use something like a... Brighthollow housekeeper or something who's hanging out in the middle of the main map, so you can just talk to them if you want to rest rather than having to go through four loading screens before you can leave again.

[Varana]

Remember that the stronghold was one of the stretch goals. It isn't a core feature of the game; they obviously had a lot of ideas and tried to include as many of them as they could, but in the end, polishing the really important aspects of the game was where the resources went. I'd really like them to iterate on the stronghold in the next game - some of the things could certainly be improved.
 
Anyway, expect to make a net loss from your stronghold, at least in pure money. You gain access to the Endless Paths, giving you a lot of loot and XP, the bounties pay quite well (gold as well as XP), and some of the shops give moderately rare crafting items.

 

The way I read it was that you had a net gain of 75cp, after a loss of 606cp to bandits. That's the only way to explain why I've got money in the thousands, as the loot I get hardly earn me much.
 
However it still beggars the question why we should be losing this much with high keep security. Hmm...

The connection between loss of taxes to bandits and security isn't really apparent - to the point where it's not even clear that there is a connection.

But one thing is clear: Your money does not come from the stronghold. Quests and loot; taxes are negligible.

[dirigible]

Money isn't really an issue to me. I'm running around at level 8 with 71,000 copper and nothing to spend it on. I could pay all of the hirelings out of pocket until the end of time and not care.

[halfoat]

Yeah, the keep's a nice idea but poorly implemented. In the beginning, I assumed those rest bonuses would be cumulative and you'd have all of them, so was pretty surprised when I found it was far better to rest in inns. I'd enjoy it much more if there was some life around there too, with people wandering around, not just big empty spaces.

[matthewfarmery]

the stronghold needs a lot of tweaking, and yes, I'm also running into the problem that it doesn't really matter how high the security is, you still lose a fair amount of gold, and get attacked a fair amount. so something isn't right, and needs to be rebalanced.

 

the stronghold idea looked good on paper, but the system is flawed, getting more bad events then good, and yes, the place really needs to be fleshed out more. so I hope there will be a lot more tweaking and adding to the place to make it worthwhile.

[mighij]

You normally make more money then your hirelings upkeep but you'll never earn back the cost of the upgrades.

 

The most convenient upgrade is the Botanic Garden. Together with the Curioso shop and the Warden it's the only one you actually want. The Inn was a bit dissapointing. If it gave you all resting bonusses instead of one it would be worth it, sometimes, but as it is there are much better inns in the world. Some even increase you're stats by 6, the best you can get in your own inn is +1stat and +1skill.

 

As Varana said, it was a stretch goal and it more or less, serves it's purpose.

[Katarack21]

There are two area loads before you can get to bright.. whatstheplace.. the inn and no one seems to have resting supplies so I tend to use inns in towns as a base of operations. The ingredient shop and the bounties are worth getting, the rest not so much.  

You can buy resting supplies in your treasury once you've got the merchant.

[Serdan]

Something I'm curious about: Is there any point in taking prisoners?

[drunetovich]

Overall castle seem inconsequential, off-screen adventures are slow and scarce, attacks are a bother, most upgrades are useless.

[drunetovich]

Something I'm curious about: Is there any point in taking prisoners?

 

No point at all.

[dirigible]

Something I'm curious about: Is there any point in taking prisoners?

Well... sort of.

 

There was one npc who I thought was wrong, but didn't deserve to die. Unfortunately, my only options were "side with him" or "attack him". Fortunately, attacking him allowed me to take him prisoner. I wanted to reform him and release him as a better person, but the game doesn't really allow that. So instead I just kept him in my dungeon until someone came and paid me money to release him.

[Sugam]

Something I'm curious about: Is there any point in taking prisoners?

From what I understand, you can ransom some of them. But it's not very much and they could escape at any moment regardless how high your security is. You could also get less of rewards as well from quests if you put them in the slammer. It's just worth it in its current state.

[Starwars]

I like the general idea of the stronghold, and I like the basic functionality of it. I like the upgrading and I like the idea of people coming and going to it and adventures for the companions to go on. But it just needs a lot of fleshing out in my opinion. Was probably a bit too much to bite off for them to be honest but from the latest PcGamer interview with Feargus it kinda seems like they *may* have some plan of expanding upon it in the future (maybe in the expansion). That'd be good I think.

 

I also don't think it quite works in the "feels" department at times. I like that you can send your companions off to do stuff but to just have it be called "Minor or Major adventure" is just lame... Give us some flavor there. It's not fun to read as is.

 

Same with the attack on the keep, it's just weird that we would let monsters inside the bloody keep. Why not have the fight out in the open? Just seems weird to me to have it in the keep. Maybe there's some technical reason for it.

 

And why do we need to go through several loading screens to rest... ?

 

Also, areas like the library and so forth just feel like filler. I visited them once, after I had built them, and then never again. Just seems kinda pointless.

 

Crossroad Keep in NWN2 felt lackluster mechanically to me. It didn't really feel like I was *doing* much that mattered. But what it did brilliantly was that... well, it made me feel like I was running a keep. Just the feeling of it.

For Caed Nua, I really like the underlying stuff you can do with it, the interface and so on, but I don't feel anything when I go there, except perhaps dread of going through the loading screens to rest (and hearing the beginning of the music loop a few times, no offense Justin, I love the actual music but the looping gets a bit tiresome).

[SesameTree]

I wasn't that impressed with the stronghold, it is one of the few things that I didn't like. In general I like the idea of a stronghold. However the mechanics are really shallow and it seems as if the stronghold is manned by ghosts, there isn't anyone there except the few hirelings which just stand there.

 

I think it would have been much better if the keep was smaller in size, but with more detailed mechanics and some storytelling elements to it.

[ioci]

your stronghold seems to have more buildings than Raedric's behind the wall, yet Raedric is still definitely richer than you. he can rise an army, while your watcher can only have 8 guards. maybe the security level means how many armed men you have o how well their equipment are, but they just refuse to join you when you decided to end raedric's rule

maybe that chair is the real lord of caed nua, the old watcher already seen though it, so he locked himself up underground to avoid been manipulate by that chair, but the young watcher is still too naive to recognize the truth behind those words, so the tax is going directly to the pocket of the lord chair, and you, as a poppet, gain almost nothing.

don't forget that the one who lives INSIDE of the main keep is the lord Chair, and you can only sleep in a 3 star hotel OUTSIDE of the main keep, don't mention that even those 8 guards can sleep inside of the main keep. your watcher is nothing but a dog who has a fancy dog house along with the kitchen, yet still not allowed to share the same roof with your domina.

still complaining the idea of having a stronghold? too young too naive!

[Yenkaz]

your stronghold seems to have more buildings than Raedric's behind the wall, yet Raedric is still definitely richer than you. he can rise an army, while your watcher can only have 8 guards. maybe the security level means how many armed men you have o how well their equipment are, but they just refuse to join you when you decided to end raedric's rule

maybe that chair is the real lord of caed nua, the old watcher already seen though it, so he locked himself up underground to avoid been manipulate by that chair, but the young watcher is still too naive to recognize the truth behind those words, so the tax is going directly to the pocket of the lord chair, and you, as a poppet, gain almost nothing.

don't forget that the one who lives INSIDE of the main keep is the lord Chair, and you can only sleep in a 3 star hotel OUTSIDE of the main keep, don't mention that even those 8 guards can sleep inside of the main keep. your watcher is nothing but a dog who has a fancy dog house along with the kitchen, yet still not allowed to share the same roof with your domina.

still complaining the idea of having a stronghold? too young too naive!

 

And the watcher is paying for everything.

 

Damn.