Better without stronghold?

[Sugam]

Like most aspects of the game, they rushed/did not have enough time to really flesh out these things. I really hope they add more to it otherwise I'd just build the shops and the inn and that's it. The rest is just a waste, at lest feels that way to me. Was really hoping it be like the keep the fighter class gets in bg2. Kinda a let down

[Tigranes]

It was never going to be feasible to take 4 million and build a new system, all that art, a stronghold, a 15 level mega-dungeon, so on and so forth, and do it all at the complexity and size of, say, BG2, which remains an unparalleled achievement. I too would have preferred that they cut out the stronghold, as it stands now it's pretty... facebook-gamey. 

 

Obsidian know how to do it better (NWN2's keep invasion, the 'trading' system in SOZ, etc), so hopefully POE2 can improve on this.

[khango]

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

 

I built a dungeon but never got the choice to take anyone prisoner. : /  Is there a trick? (Or maybe I just didn't complete it early enough?)

 

Also, by the end of the game I was only losing around 15cp per keep turn to bandits, so security goes a long way, I guess. (Or maybe bandits were afraid of my ogre.)

[Badmojo]

Well - I was a little bummed about thought Stronghold as it was implemented:

 

1. Minor gripe. Resting is tedious - too many load screens to get there, and bonuses were very poor compared to what you could get at the inns.

 

2. Minor gripe. It's at least 24 hours travel time to everywhere else in the game. This means as soon as you go somewhere else, you're probably going to have to rest again. Your special rest home you pay so much for is pretty much only useful if you are doing the local dungeon - and this only barely. Sometimes even just traveling from this place you miss adventures or even invasions because their window is much shorter than it is to travel where you want to go. Of course, this is kind of a general gripe for the entire game itself. It's like 12 or 16 hours of travel time from the starting village to Raedric hold - how can you hear the bells from their towers notifying of a Raedric death?

 

3. Minor gripe. Everything except the Warden, and maybe a couple of the other buildings are just a waste of time and money. Even the hirelings you buy get instantly steamrolled by whatever invades you, and at 50 defense you're expending more on them than you get in taxes.

 

4. Major gripe. As another person here has said, it *feels* shallow, and kind of dead. The only real people who talk to you at any length are a posessed chair (pretty weird btw), and the warden. There's no activity of you being an actual "lord", No passing judgments on crimes. There's no indication of who in the world you are taxing, or what's being taxed. Visitors are rare and have nothing to say. Invasions are tedious and generic.

 

5. Major gripe. Doesn't tie in at all with the rest of the story. I don't think there's any instance of the character ever referencing himself/herself as the Lord/Lady of Caed Nua. One would think the rulers of Defiance Bay might be interested to know they have a new noble in their midsts (and may strongly object or approve such a fact).

 

I agree with this, the stronghold feels like an afterthought and only half assed it without thinking it through.  Whoever though putting beds on the second floor and having to go through two+ loading screens should be fired.  Resting is a MAJOR gripe with me and a stupid design.  It isn't just horrible resting, it is not even just the stupid time sink traveling to a place to rest to magically heal and recharge your magic, it is not even the stupid camping limitations, its the damn loading screens of hell that just pushes me over the edge.  Just general exploring is tedius and painful.  Did anybody do any optimizing on this game at all?  I do not understand how something like this can take so long loading while other games with much more on their map can be almost instantaneous to load.

 

I wish there was a fast travel/teleportation in this game just to avoid the loading screen hell.

[Malovane]

 

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

 

I built a dungeon but never got the choice to take anyone prisoner. : /  Is there a trick? (Or maybe I just didn't complete it early enough?)

 

Also, by the end of the game I was only losing around 15cp per keep turn to bandits, so security goes a long way, I guess. (Or maybe bandits were afraid of my ogre.)

 

 

Dungeon should be built relatively early in the scheme of things, as you get a couple opportunities to get prisoners in short order after you get the keep. You might have noticed this in certain cases where your enemies went out of combat and begged for mercy - only for you to have one option of killing them. Also, there's at least one who you can take prisoner entirely through dialogue.

 

In my first playthrough I did manage to have a small retinue of prisoners. One escaped, and another had someone offer 300g for his release. Supposedly there items you can get through this method, but I haven't seen this yet.

Edited April 7, 2015 by Malovane

[Hassat Hunter]

@ Badmojo; Just wait 5 years and PoE loadscreens go over without you being able to read what's on it just like BG2 loadscreens are now (and definitely were NOT in 2000).

[grumbold99]

I'm delighted the stronghold is there, because it's the sort of feature that would just be too huge an undertaking for mods to produce. Now the bones are done, Obsidian and others can build on it more and more. It has a lot of unfulfilled potential. Hopefully some of it will be unlocked in DLC

[tinderbox]

In terms of resource management during a hectic dev process with a limited budget, I can understand why the Stronghold may have got a bit less love and development than optimal.  That's certainly what it feels like, and that's okay.

 

But now that the game is out I do want to de more thought put into refining -- and deepening -- its systems as the expension material is produced. It's a bare pass mark right now, but I want it to be much, much better.

[Evange]

We need a pocket plane stronghold.