Stronghold improvements in 2.0/White March

[Aotrs Commander]

I just went to rest at Brighthollow, prior to starting the expansion...

 

Unholy fracking crap that's an improvement!

 

Not only are most of the bonus now +3 (stealth was +2), but they also last for 3 rests!

 

NOW that feels more like it was worth the extra gold and time!

 

(Also, my hirelings appearf to have been paid as well...!)

 

 

 

(Cue the inevitable few people complaining that's now too good, just to prove you can't ever please some people...!)

[Springwight]

Wow. That is pretty damn impressive.

[Aotrs Commander]

And if the first area of the expansion is anything to go by, we might need that extra buff...!

 

All I will say here is that on Normal with a party at max level (two of which are ciphers), there were not many fights I had to re-do and i found I could do most areas one a single rest (maybe a little more). First area of the expansion, and I've had to rest once already (nearly out of health) and I will have to do so again once I've completed the area! My initial impresson - a bit like BG's Durlag's Tower - there's a bit of a difficulty spike! (Which hopefully should please the ladies and gentleman who complained it was too easy for them!)

[Matt516]

It's good to hear that the expansion is challenging!! You mentioned that you're at max level - I assume you opted into the level scaling of the expansion?

 

Also - glad they fixed the resting bonuses in Brighthollow. I still wish we could select multiple bonuses, but improving them is good enough.

[Aotrs Commander]

Sorry, when I meant max level, I meant max level of the original games (I.e. level 12).

 

All I did was go back to my last save before jumping down the pit.

 

Well, in theory (I haven't tried it) you could rest three times in succession at Brighthollow which would leave you with three bonuses until you next rest, when you'd lose the first one or stack with the inn bonuses, assuming the bonus don't overwrite.

 

(I'm assuming the rest bonuses at normal inns don't last any longer than usual, as that would potentially allow you to stack the top three inns...!)

 

From the looks of the forums, part of the increased difficulty appears to be the improved creature AI meaning things will sometimes move past your tanks - though I've not found that quite so much the problem myself (I  guess my usual fairly high focus on damage and offense keeps Eder still a big enough threat), but more some nasty stuff like what presumably must be very high Int-backed Clear Out attacks, which throw your characters back a good half a screen width and knock them prone for nearly ten seconds. (At one point four out of seven characters (six+pet) got hit, and it was only becase Eder actually got away with it and hit with his own knock-down hard immediately thereafter that I managed to salvage the situation!)

 

I'm also not used to hitting a mook something with two cipher maximised blunderbusses with envenomed strike (and appropriate slaying enchantment) and it NOT dying...!

[Doppelschwert]

Actually, many bonuses in the vanilla game already lasted several rests before they expired, there just wasn't any UI indication of that. Regardless, josh announced some while ago that the would rebalance the resting bonuses through the entire game, so it's certainly better than before.