Stupid faction choice in Defiance Bay!

[Varana]

Edit: @pi2repsion

But the point is - for the umpteenth time - that that is not what happens.

All my actions in Defiance Bay - from what I said about animancy to what I did in the various quests involving it to my reputation screen (I mean, what that's even for if not for showing, like, reputation?) cry out loud that I favour the view of faction X. However because I accepted (not even completed) a certain quest all those other indicators play no role at all and this one faction trusts me with arguing their side even if I consistently acted otherwise? Please.

Edited April 13, 2015 by Varana

[Bugged Wolf Companion]

So, you were spoiled enough concerning the game's story that you planned from the beginning to join a specific faction in the Defiance Bay conflict that you wouldn't hear about in-game before act 2, but not spoiled enough that you knew which steps to take... and somehow this is a problem, because you were able to take steps that prevented you from reaching your goal without warning you as you were taking them?

 

If I heard about some nice artifact or companion in the game before playing and thought it would be great to have only to discover that actions I've taken in-game preclude me from getting what I want, I don't consider that to be a problem with the game or something to be upset about, as I have no expectation that the game will confirm to my desires in such respects by handing me what I want, and I'm struggling to see what the difference is here.

 

I mean, I get that you are upset, for you say so and I have no reason to doubt you, but I'm really struggling to see why.

 

 

Leaving aside that issue, while the player may consider this joining a faction, the game is very clear that the main character is not, in fact, choosing to join any faction - the main character operates as a free agent, gets a reputation with the various factions, and it is not a question of whom he wants to join but about what they are willing to entrust him with as part of their power struggle based on his actions for them and for their opponents. This then, in the story, leads to the main character to ask those that are likeliest to grant him a favour when he desperately wants to be invited to the ducal audience.

 

To put it bluntly, if the main character (operated by the player) strongly favours one faction, the rational thing for him to do would be to support that faction, not strengthen the other factions and then wonder why his favourite faction isn't willing to trust him with the hard stuff.

i wasnt spoiled at all i just liked to join the knights regardless of the other factions or future rewards which i had no clue about if that was your post about (not sure).

 

Anyways its not that big of a deal an easy bracket block would have solved this issue as i mentioned before. For those who dont like those tool tips there is expert mode i dont see a problem at all.

 

Aditionally i dont see it that dramatically to write an essay back so enjoy.

[vezon]

I thought it was perfectly clear - I refused the quest from the crucible knight because he downright said - this'll make you unpopular with the 2 other factions.. The dozen said the same when I took their quest.

 

Are people not reading the text or what? The quest givers make it obvious that you can't side with the others afterwards. It's extremely blatant. 

 

I don't know what was so clear for u guys, but I can assure the faction choice was done really poorly.

First of all I knew that I can side with only ONE faction, but that didn't stop me trying to finish as much quests as I could for all of them. (minus Doemenel where I did exact the opposite from the start). Anyway I did 2 quest for Dozens and 2 for the Knights. And yes at the second one it tells u that the others will not like it, but guess what? They didn't care. The reputation was not affected with the other  factions (btw the "show reputation/personality" option is checked). But after awhile I realized that I'm sided with one, guess how? I found a NEW TALENT. And not when I joined them. If u can point me where they say u are now or will get membership I will gladly take my words back.

2nd. Are there any more quest given from the faction u joined?

[Rosbjerg]

First of all I knew that I can side with only ONE faction, but that didn't stop me trying to finish as much quests as I could for all of them.

 

And that's really the crux of the issue - we've become so used to being able to do everything and see everything that when we are presented with a limitation it's so "out of character" of a game that it pisses people off.

 

Interesting actually. Of course this is against the normal tropes, but then Obsidian has always tried to do that - and as evident, to greater or lesser success.

[Hiro Protagonist II]

I thought it was pretty obvious that if you help one faction and step on the toes of another, it's going to lock you into that faction and the other is going to be hostile towards you. Just like Bodhi and the Thieves Guild in BG2. But this time, there's three factions in PoE.

[PhroX]

I thought it was pretty obvious that if you help one faction and step on the toes of another, it's going to lock you into that faction and the other is going to be hostile towards you. Just like Bodhi and the Thieves Guild in BG2. But this time, there's three factions in PoE.

 

Again, I have no problem with it locking you in once you've actually significantly helped a faction. I have a problem with it locking you in once you say you're going to help a faction. The lockout should occur at the end of those quests, once you've actually done what the faction in question wants, not at the beginning. Why can't I, once I've been asked by the Dozens to go fetch some ancient weapons, go straight over to the knights, tell them what the Dozens are up to?

[Smorensky]

We can argue forever on this, some ppl find the faction choices annoying others find them ok. But the main reason this thread exists is because of a rather annoying bug.

 

As the developer said, there was a bug allowing you to pick up BOTH FACTION QUESTS, for knights and dozens at the same time, effectively preventing you from being invited by both sides.

 

As it was stated before, the quests in question are Winds Of Steel and Bronze Beneath The Lake, those 2 quests were supposed to be mutually exclusive, meaning if you pick up one you can't get take the other. The bug allowed you to pick up both.

 

That was the only real issue here. This bug was fixed with the last patch for all new plythroughs, but unfortunatelly the fix is not retroactive, meaning you would have to reload an earlier save or start a new game.

 

As far as the choices go, I find that The Doemenels quest Changing Of The Guard is the most annoying and uninventive as far as all three go. Someone from the dev team should rly check it out and change the location where it happens completely, because atm that quest is just stupid as hell...

[Matt_K]

Like many of you I've also 'accidentally joined the Dozens' in my current (first) playthrough. I agree with some of you that this is slightly illogical even in a game where our choices can have unforeseen and potentially unwanted consequences (which I really applaud Obsidian for doing). I've been playing cRPGs since the 90s and I've always believed myself to be an attentive reader when it came to quests and such. However here, as a person who knew very little about the game before I started (I only read a couple pages of the Collector's Book to learn a few basic facts about the setting, but other than that I knew almost nothing about the story of the game. As such, I didn't even know there would be factions to choose from in Defiance Bay NOR what those factions would be. I entered the city, exploring around Copperlane and as many of you stumbled upon the Adventure Hall, which I assumed was a neutral establishment where the Dozens hang out (and NOT the HQ of the Dozens). So when I got the first job from Wenan I assumed it was just another contract and I glossed over the fact (yes, I'll admit it) that he warns me (rather subtly) that it may affect my standing with them. I didn't do the quest, simply continued exploring the city. Not until MANY HOURS LATER did I realize that accepting that contract was essentially joining / allying closely with the Dozens (that, the conversation does NOT imply).

Anyway, I was frustrated by this fact as by then I discovered and learned more about the other factions and decided I wish to join House Doemenel. I completed their first tasks and was about to receive the quest from their leader when he said: 'Nope, sorry you're too close with the Dozens'. I was shocked... I haven't done anything for them save the armor quest for Osric. This frustrated me and to be honest (if a bit overzealous) it kinda ruined my playthrough. I resented the fact that I accidentally robbed myself of the choice of faction in the game. As I was MANY hours ahead of entering the city, reloading seemed like too much of a sacrifice so I searched the internet for ANY way to 'leave the Dozen'. Either by removing the Bronze Beneath the Lake quest or changing faction reputations. I played around with console commands (to no avail), tried killing all members of the Dozens- nothing.

Then somewhere on one of the forums someone mentioned altering the .conversation game files but never elaborated on what to change (and he was talking about it from the Knights perspective). That person (whose username escapes me) mentioned only 'ExpressionComponents'. With that knowledge I embarked on my last ditch desperate attempt to 'fix' my problem and save my immersion in the game (call me petty, but I could not stomach being associated with the Dozens). I analyzed Gedmar's conversation file and after a few hours I found what I was looking for. Good news- it WORKS. After this change I successfully managed to trigger the Changing of the Guard quest in my playthrough, even though I had Bronze Beneath the Lake. I decided to share it with the community, since I'm sure many- like me, are really pissed about being accidental Dozens loyalists.

*BE WARNED! * What I am about to describe involves editing the game files. It may bug your game/saves or lead to unforeseen circumstances. *ATTEMPT AT YOUR OWN RISK*

How to trigger the Changing of the Guard quest (while having either Bronze Beneath the Lake and/or Winds of Steel active):

1. Find the '04_cv_edmar_doemenel.conversation' file (found in the Pillars of eternity folder \ PillarsOfEternity_data \ conversations \ 04_defiance_bay_brackenbury).
2. Make a backup copy of the file in case something goes wrong.
3. Open it using Notepad.
4. Search the document for: <string>n_MercenaryHire_State</string>
5. Below that line you should see:

<string>GreaterThan</string>
                <string>0</string>

Change <string>0</string>'= to <string>1</string>

What this does is it eliminates the restriction for this quest being open to you if you ACCEPTED the Bronze Beneath the Lake quest. If the String is 0- you don't have the quest, if the string is 1- you do. So if the condition is set to 'Greater than 1' then just having the quest won't impact the availability of the Doemenel Quest.

(IF you instead have the Winds of Steel quest for the Knights the procedure is the same but you have to search the document for: <string>n_Clyver_Quest_Stage</string> )
6. Save the file.

*ADDITIONAL WARNING* I have no idea how this may influence the later quests related to the hearings as honestly I haven't reached that point yet. As such I suggest either doing everything else and leaving these two quests for last (which is what I intend to do) and testing it fully then. In that way if it messes you up and leaves you with being unable to be sponsored, you can revert to an earlier save without losing too much progress.

If someone else tries this before me and it causes no conflicts down the line- let us know! =P

 

[DeathQuaker]

I thought it was pretty obvious that if you help one faction and step on the toes of another, it's going to lock you into that faction and the other is going to be hostile towards you. Just like Bodhi and the Thieves Guild in BG2. But this time, there's three factions in PoE.

 

What makes it NOT obvious are two factors:

1. The reputation system. If you're unspoiled and thus unaware you are ostensibly SIDING with a particular faction to angle for an invitation, hearing them say "X and Y Factions won't be pleased," can lead you to make a very logical conclusion that all you're being warned about is a REPUTATION LOSS, NOT a quest lockout. Moreover, since you can play the game so that you have reasonably good reputation with ALL THREE factions, you could equally logically decide taking the quest would probably not lower your rep enough to lose friendship with a given faction. (Even after the hearings, my rep with the Crucible Knights is pretty much equal to my rep with the Dozens.)

 

2. You perform the necessary quests to get the invitation before you have any idea you need an invitation. Moreover, the quests involved are pretty banal fetch quests that don't seem plot-important on their own, and have absolutely nothing to do, directly, with getting into the duc's palace. If the quests were, say, "Assassinate the Head of House Doemenel" rather than, "Find some rusty useless weapons," that might help make the matter clearer.

 

A VERY EASY FIX for this: Keep all three faction quests locked, completely unavailable, UNTIL you talk to Lady Webb and she tells you you need an invitation to the Duc's Palace. Then when that conversation occurs, you could add a single line of dialogue from Lady Webb that says something along the lines of, "Each faction will probably want you to do a favor for them to prove your loyalty before they name you a delegate; bear in mind if you do this favor for one faction, the others will surely withdraw interest in naming you a delegate." Word it so it's clear "if you do this you don't get an invitation," not "if you do this they won't like you," which, again, suggests rep loss, not quest lockout.

 

And I think the Bodhi/Thieves Guild comparison is flawed for a simple reason: Bodhi and the Thieves Guild are the only major influencable factions in BG2, and IIRC there's no faction reputation system in BG2 the way there is in POE (IIRC BG2 had universal reputation but not faction rep) -- and in POE there's also town reputations and other group factions as well, and it isn't apparent any given one allows (or not) access (or not) to key plot quests. POE in terms of factions is more like Fallout: New Vegas (which in many ways sets the standard of what to expect from present-day Obsidian) ---- and I think a KEY issue here is that as far as factions go, many unspoiled players get the sense that the Dozens, Crucible Knights, and House Doemenel are like, say, the Chairmen, the White Glove Society, and the Omertas, when they are in fact more like, say, The NCR, Mr. House, and the Legion ---- in other words, they feel like lesser factions who add flavor to the city and you can befriend or destroy in whatever combination you like and this just more minorly affects the game's outcomes, when they are actually more plot-important groups whom you must pick at one point at the cost of losing the opportunity to support the other. (Though in fairness, I don't think they are as majorly plot crucial as the New Vegas comparisons.)

 

All this said, I haven't hit the endgame yet, but it seems like all this does is set up how you get into the hearings, and I haven't seen any other consequences yet. It's annoying, but doesn't seem dire or game breaking either. Am I wrong?

Edited April 17, 2015 by DeathQuaker

[Varana]

It changes some ending slides. That's all.

[Ceranai]

1) Has very little effect of your game what faction you side with aside from RP fanatics

2) I thought it was really clear from the dialogue text that siding with a faction was exclusive. I mean of the two (knights and dozens) that i have sided with they made it clear i wouldn t be able to side with otehrs and when i refused to side with the other one they made it clear it was exclusive as well. Anyone who didnt pick up on this clearly ddnt read the text that quite clearly states that they wont tolerate split loyalties etc etc

[hughsviii]

Hi, Kickstarter backer here, only I used my real name for my account and I'd rather not post on a forum under it.

 

Exactly the same thing as mentioned by the OP happened to me, and whilst I wouldn't consider myself an "RP fanatic" I have found this to be a big shock to my immersion. It might only be a little thing, but I feel like I've been railroaded and my interest in continuing to play the game has dipped. Unintended consequences are fine, but these consequences are a result of clunky game design rather than am attempt to immerse or tell a complete narrative.

 

I ran into this because:

 

The first thing which is unclear is how the Dozens are introduced to the player. "The Adventuring Hall" sounds like an utterly generic quest hub and looks like a ski chalet rather than the HQ of a religious paramilitary organisation. In the first quest you do for The Dozens you are assigned to go after an individual Knight of the Crucible by another individual for a personal reason, and in the process you expose this Knight as an imposter according to the bylaws of his organisation. This is a win-win scenario, and the main difference which emerges from this quest is that the Knights are snobs and the Dozens don't seem to do anything at all.

 

That this contrasts with the crazy preacher you first meet and a companion's comment that they're bigots led me to assume I hadn't worked for the Dozens but just some nice guy who was kicked out of the Knights by a fraud. I didn't actually learn anything about the Dozens, which is why I am now annoyed to learn I am locked onto that path.

 

The second thing which is unclear is that whilst the second questgiver makes it fairly clear that actually delivering the weapons will make the Knights angry, since you're delivering them to arm the Dozens against the Knights, nothing tells you that agreeing to look into it locks you into supporting this little theocratic militia. As others have said, this can be dealt with redesigning the quest in different ways.

 

But the reason why I accepted before going on to do lots of other stuff in Defiance Bay was because I was still trying to understand the politics of Defiance Bay. Whilst it's clear there's a lot of controversy over animancy, each faction's view on this controversy is absent from their first quest. Wandering around Defiance Bay solving people's quests, I very quickly understood that animancy is divisive - what I didn't understand was how this division was manifest in the politics of Defiance Bay. Even if the first quest for the Dozens had actually managed to communicate it was a quest from the Dozens, I would still have accepted the second without a warning because A) accepting quests in an RPG is like picking up keys - you always do it when you see one - and B) I didn't know enough about the Dozens themselves and their relationship to the controversey within Defiance Bay.

 

In short, the reason this is a problem is because this quest suffers from a combination of poor design and poor writing. This caught me by surprise as the standard for both up until this point has been excellent.

 

So, I'm now at a point where I am locked onto a path I really do not want to pursue because of clunky development, and reloading to a state previous would undo many, many hours of side questing. Personally, I'm going to hold off for now on either playing it or recommending it to people (which I have been doing) until we get some idea of how Obsidian are going to respond to these complaints. I'm not calling for an entire rewrite of the three factions' quest chains (although that probably would be a good thing, especially in the Dozens' case), but it seems pretty clear to me that this undesired locking is effectively a bug in that players are having poor experiences as a result of bad design. Please consider making the lock only apply after finishing the quest, not on accepting it.

Edited April 22, 2015 by hughsviii

[Powerpaul]

If you want to join the crucible knights and you are beeing rejected by clyver because of accepting the second quest of the dozens, you can just edit the conversation file accordingly

 

 

Open following file with editor or notepad:

\Pillars of Eternity\PillarsOfEternity_Data\data\conversations\02_defiance_bay_first_fires\02_cv_clyver_rimgund.conversation

 

(Make a backup file at this point, just for safety if you screw it up)

 

Then search for: "n_MercenaryHire_State"

You will find two matches in the file looking like this

 

            <Parameters>

                <string>n_MercenaryHire_State</string>

                <string>GreaterThan</string>

                <string>0</string>      

              </Parameters>

 

Change them both to this:

 

            <Parameters>

                <string>n_MercenaryHire_State</string>

                <string>GreaterThan</string>

                <string>1</string>      

              </Parameters>

 

 

 

This will just increase clyvers limit for the variable indicating your progress of the dozens questline. 

(You can increase the limit probably even further if you take a higher number than 1...)

Edited April 23, 2015 by Powerpaul

[hughsviii]

I actually tried that, but the option to progress further doesn't come up? I've got inside the dungeon where said Bronzes are located, so should I maybe increase it to a number higher than 1?

[Exoduss]

You people are taking a wrong approach think like this : Dozens this is where you are supposed to be for your first playtrough unless you go out of the way and get rewarded for that . Also Dozens wont tell you anything because : they are pretty much common scumbag graverobers and nothing more 

[Crucis]

1) Has very little effect of your game what faction you side with aside from RP fanatics

2) I thought it was really clear from the dialogue text that siding with a faction was exclusive. I mean of the two (knights and dozens) that i have sided with they made it clear i wouldn t be able to side with otehrs and when i refused to side with the other one they made it clear it was exclusive as well. Anyone who didnt pick up on this clearly ddnt read the text that quite clearly states that they wont tolerate split loyalties etc etc

 

"RP fanatics"?  Seriously?  This is a ROLE PLAYING GAME, for crying out loud!  Why shouldn't people take their role playing seriously?

 

 

And frankly, I don't think that it's clear at all when you've supposedly been committed to a particular faction.  I certainly made no conscious choice to do so.  Mind you, I'm on my second significant play-thru. First time, I sided with the Knights.  This time, I've been committed to the Dozen pretty much against my will.  This seems particularly a problem with the Dozens, since they're supposed to be this group that sends out adventuring parties.  Why should someone think that taking a Dozens sponsored adventure constitutes formally aligning your party with them?

 

IMO, it ought to be possible to do a couple of missions (quests, whatever) for each faction without being formally committed to them.  And when it comes to formally aligning with a faction, it should be absolutely 1000% obvious that that's what's occurring.  With the crime family, formal alignment might mean becoming "part of the family business", so to speak.  And with the other two groups, something similar and very obvious should occur, whether it's becoming a member of their "inner circle" or whatever.

[Luckmann]

1) Has very little effect of your game what faction you side with aside from RP fanatics

2) I thought it was really clear from the dialogue text that siding with a faction was exclusive. I mean of the two (knights and dozens) that i have sided with they made it clear i wouldn t be able to side with otehrs and when i refused to side with the other one they made it clear it was exclusive as well. Anyone who didnt pick up on this clearly ddnt read the text that quite clearly states that they wont tolerate split loyalties etc etc

 

1.  ...it's a roleplaying game. Roleplaying is literallly the purpose of the game. By any right, issues like this should warrant greater discussion than any systemic error.
2. The issue isn't really that they're exclusive, but that they are exclusive before you even finish the quests - you become locked out for merely agreeing to do the quests - and are uninteresting in that you cannot lie or do anything once it's been revealed what they want you to do. You lose player agency. This is in addition to even more screwed-up issues.

[hughsviii]

IMO, it ought to be possible to do a couple of missions (quests, whatever) for each faction without being formally committed to them.  And when it comes to formally aligning with a faction, it should be absolutely 1000% obvious that that's what's occurring.  With the crime family, formal alignment might mean becoming "part of the family business", so to speak.  And with the other two groups, something similar and very obvious should occur, whether it's becoming a member of their "inner circle" or whatever.

 

 

It's also rather odd considering the earlier quests you do for each faction demonstrate you're a valuable, high-skill asset the factions don't realise "Wow, this person is good - we're definitely going to want to keep them as an ace up our sleeve". Instead the complete opposite happens, and you get "You've done good work for the Dozens as well? Sorry, we don't want to poach you from our rivals."

 

It's a weird way for political organisations to behave, based on a weird barometer of trust.

[yaggaz]

Your cake, you can't have it, and eat it, too. 

 

You can when GOOD RPG designers make games.

 

And besides, your comment was a self indulgent strawman argument that has nothing to do with anything here.  He's not asking to be part of both, just have a warning that a faction lock is about to happen.  Learn to read k?

[yaggaz]

 

If you want to join the crucible knights and you are beeing rejected by clyver because of accepting the second quest of the dozens, you can just edit the conversation file accordingly

 

 

Open following file with editor or notepad:

\Pillars of Eternity\PillarsOfEternity_Data\data\conversations\02_defiance_bay_first_fires\02_cv_clyver_rimgund.conversation

 

(Make a backup file at this point, just for safety if you screw it up)

 

Then search for: "n_MercenaryHire_State"

You will find two matches in the file looking like this

 

            <Parameters>

                <string>n_MercenaryHire_State</string>

                <string>GreaterThan</string>

                <string>0</string>      

              </Parameters>

 

Change them both to this:

 

            <Parameters>

                <string>n_MercenaryHire_State</string>

                <string>GreaterThan</string>

                <string>1</string>      

              </Parameters>

 

 

 

This will just increase clyvers limit for the variable indicating your progress of the dozens questline. 

(You can increase the limit probably even further if you take a higher number than 1...)

 

 

Thank you very much.  Nice to see you can edit your way out of bad game design.

[codectified]

 

If you want to join the crucible knights and you are beeing rejected by clyver because of accepting the second quest of the dozens, you can just edit the conversation file accordingly

 

 

Open following file with editor or notepad:

\Pillars of Eternity\PillarsOfEternity_Data\data\conversations\02_defiance_bay_first_fires\02_cv_clyver_rimgund.conversation

 

(Make a backup file at this point, just for safety if you screw it up)

 

Then search for: "n_MercenaryHire_State"

You will find two matches in the file looking like this

 

            <Parameters>

                <string>n_MercenaryHire_State</string>

                <string>GreaterThan</string>

                <string>0</string>      

              </Parameters>

 

Change them both to this:

 

            <Parameters>

                <string>n_MercenaryHire_State</string>

                <string>GreaterThan</string>

                <string>1</string>      

              </Parameters>

 

 

 

This will just increase clyvers limit for the variable indicating your progress of the dozens questline. 

(You can increase the limit probably even further if you take a higher number than 1...)

 

this is awesomeness.. any idea how it can be done to be able to do the Doemenel quests and get the crit ability?  would one be effectively double crossing factions at this point.. would be fitting for me rogue.. but also would have been cool if the developers allowed this option in the first place..

[Kazuma]

Nice necro there. Assuming that the game files haven't changed due to patches in the last year+ I'd venture to guess you'd find a similar file named after the npc handling the Doemenel quests. Well assuming they exist in the same area/map. That appears to be how the directory structure is organized from the above quote. I haven't played in that long so I can't really confirm anything (don't remember the npc name to start with).

 

That all said it's not like the quest was written with double crossing in mind, right? So it's not like you'll get a reaction out of anyone for having done so. If all you want is to get an ability.. why not just add it to your character through the console? It's probably less likely to break anything compared to modifying game resources. The downside being you'd disable achievements but then I don't see how one can claim modifying game resources to get the same effect is not in fact cheating. If you knew what you were doing you could probably modify a convo file to allow you to get infinite quest rewards by modifying the state check in a similar way. That's a fairly common bug in these sorts of games after release. Infinite money/xp exploits are usually just a matter of discovering dialog trees that aren't properly checking the token/variable that indicates quest competition.

 

But either way you should backup your saves and any files you tinker with. There's a chance you could crash the game if you managed to get variables outside their expected range. Or there could be unintended consequences if it's used down the line in another quest/convo. You might break something and not realize until hours later into your playthru. /shrug. To me using the console seems like the less risky choice.

Edited July 12, 2016 by Kazuma

[codectified]

thanks! any resources for messing with the console.. I'll probably just play the game through once as it is for achievements sake.. but am curious about messing around later..