What are you playing now.

[WDeranged]

I've decided to skip the DLC for this playthrough, I won't have the time before Fallout 4 and also last time I tried to do them all I ended up burning out on the game, it's nice just playing through the original game with the restored content.

 

On the subject of crashes, I find New Vegas to be reasonably stable at least compared to Fallout 3, also now we have NVAC which genuinely prevents most crashes.

[GhostofAnakin]

GhostOfAnakin: Which map are you talking about? What's your party composition? What exactly is the issue, I mean, in which area are you having issues - combat? Unlocking stuff? Can't uncover mines? Feel free to reply over here I suppose.

 

I'm responding to that Ag Center distress call.  The combat itself isn't the issue, it's the other stuff (opening doors, etc.) where my party doesn't seem to have nearly enough skill.  For instance, one door needs to be lockpicked, but I've only had chance to level up once and my best lockpicker's success rate on that door sits at a paltry 13% success chance.

 

There's also the fact that the two NPCs I've picked up so far (Angela Deth and the female Dr.) are like 4 or 5 levels higher than my party.  It's just left me wondering why my party is so under-leveled for what should be the first quest of the game.

[Rosbjerg]

Hmm yeah, I think I was lvl 5 or something when I reached AG/High first time - didn't you do the Ace investigation? I believe I got at least 2-3 levels doing that.

[Fenixp]

I'm responding to that Ag Center distress call.  The combat itself isn't the issue, it's the other stuff (opening doors, etc.) where my party doesn't seem to have nearly enough skill.  For instance, one door needs to be lockpicked, but I've only had chance to level up once and my best lockpicker's success rate on that door sits at a paltry 13% success chance.

Yeah, I figured you're probably somewhere at the beginning. Above all, you need to make sure to specialize (every character should take 3-4 skills) and that your statistics don't actually influence your skills at all (aside from charisma increasing leadership radius). You should keep your skills at roughly the same levels (there's no need to overly invest in weapons skill), and to me it always paid off to have a character with high charisma and leadership to globally increase chances to hit. Always sit on a bunch of skill points to be able to adjust to checks you can't quite make. And yeah, the NPCs you find are supposed to be way above your level at that point, especially Angela. Oh and explosives automatically 'unlock' most doors and chests, at risk that they'll destroy something.

 

Still, I'm afraid that at this point, you can either go trough AG center without being able to loot the locked containers there and return later on (you can freely do so) or reroll your party to better suit your playstyle now that you know more about the game.

[Starwars]

Pretty keen on playing Pathologic HD which is out today. Can't remember much of the original other than loving it and finding the translation wonky.

[GhostofAnakin]

Hmm yeah, I think I was lvl 5 or something when I reached AG/High first time - didn't you do the Ace investigation? I believe I got at least 2-3 levels doing that.

 

I was on my way to doing the Ace investigation when I got the distress call from Ag Center.  I figured it was on the way, so why not.  Apparently that was a mistake.

 

Also, a damn bug is making moving forward in the game difficult/impossible.  Skinner is behind a door that I need to get through, but I examined the door first rather than interact with it.  Problem is now there is no interact option, and my lockpick and brutal force skills are too low to open the door an alternate way.

 

I might just restart. 

[Tale]

This may be the most important question you are asked today.

 

Is Divinity Original Sin worth $60? Is it that much better than Wasteland 2?

[Hurlshort]

This may be the most important question you are asked today.

 

Is Divinity Original Sin worth $60? Is it that much better than Wasteland 2?

 

Yikes, that's a bit pricey.  It's hard to compare it to Wasteland 2, but I wouldn't say it is better.  I think as a console game (which is why I assume it is $60) it probably will have better gameplay and graphics than Wasteland 2.  But really, we are comparing two gems.  

[GhostofAnakin]

Okay, I ended up blowing up the door with TNT.  Sucks, because that was the last stick of explosives I had in inventory and didn't really want to use it on something that should have been solvable without it.

 

My party was dangerously close to dying, too.  I ran out of stuff to regain health (forget what it's called), so I had to wait until they leveled up to regain full health.  Angie Deth was down to about 5 health.

[Humanoid]

 

This may be the most important question you are asked today.

 

Is Divinity Original Sin worth $60? Is it that much better than Wasteland 2?

 

Yikes, that's a bit pricey.  It's hard to compare it to Wasteland 2, but I wouldn't say it is better.  I think as a console game (which is why I assume it is $60) it probably will have better gameplay and graphics than Wasteland 2.  But really, we are comparing two gems.  

 

 

I would say that it's worth $60 but not worth $30.

 

By that I mean I found that my single player run kinda petered out by the end of chapter 1, and I left it at that for about a year. But then I played it multiplayer and had a blast, so it's definitely a game I feel you need two copies to get full value out of. This is based on the non-Enhanced edition though.

[Humanoid]

Back when it was announced, I thought the Way of Life DLC for CK2 was exactly what I wanted to be added to the game. I've only really started playing the game again this last month, but unfortunately it seems my expectations far surpassed reality. It's an unbalanced, lazy, and often outright broken addition to the game, and even when it's working it's not very interesting at all. I'm going to disable it for the next game I play, placing it on even footing with that other DLC everyone disables, Sunset Invasion.

 

I'm not even talking about the screwed-up Seduction focus which tends to cause a worldwide herpes pandemic, though that is a perfect illustration of how poorly integrated the DLC is. No, I knew about that in advance and modded it out. But the Intrigue focus is just as, if not more broken, allowing treasonous acts with no negative consequences whatsoever.

 

I realised this when I was kidnapped by a vassal and had to ransom myself out of prison, and finding I had absolutely no recourse to do anything against him - kidnapping your king is apparently not treason or even remotely dishonorable. It works for the player too, mind, after finding that out, I proceeded to kidnap people repeatedly (often the same people multiple times each), and as soon as they paid their ransom everything went back to normal with not even one point of negative opinion against me. Then I looked up the mechanics behind it: as soon as the random option to kidnap someone fires, you are in a no-lose position, either choose to do nothing, or make the attempt at the trivial cost of 5g. It's then a simple 50% chance to succeed, and 50% chance to fail without being discovered - that is, it's impossible to be discovered, it's absolutely risk free.

 

There's an equivalent murder event with the same chance to fire, and this one at least allows for the chance to be discovered, but again it's a fixed 50% success chance, and feels much more reliable than the "normal" murder plots which at least has some complexity to it. The Way of Life method feels cheaty and unsatisfying.

[GhostofAnakin]

Giant rabbits are going to give me nightmares.

[Fenixp]

Giant rabbits are going to give me nightmares.

Giant rabbits are why animal whisperer skill exists. When creating your characters, you're thinking "Animal Whisperer? That's worthless!" and then you meet these guys.

[HoonDing]

Should I play New Vegas DLC before main quest?

[the_dog_days]

This may be the most important question you are asked today.

 

Is Divinity Original Sin worth $60? Is it that much better than Wasteland 2?

I'm playing both right now, and I like DOS much more than Wasteland 2. They were built on similar themes of allowing the player to accomplish their tasks through several means, but to me W2 fails and instead encourages save spamming.

[Humanoid]

Technically each DLC has a recommended level range, being 10-15-20-25 for Honest Hearts, Old World Blues, Dead Money and Lonesome Road respectively. In reality though, level scaling means you can pretty much do them at any level you like, indeed going in nominally very underlevelled can often make things too easy.

 

Consequently it's probably best to just do the one that corresponds to your mood at the time. Frontier exploration? Camp sci-fi? Survival horror?

[HoonDing]

Wasn't Dead Money first DLC?

[Humanoid]

In terms of when it was released, yes, then came Honest Hearts - Old World Blues - Lonesome Road. But that doesn't correspond to the official recommended levels for whatever reason.

[Rosbjerg]

Consequently it's probably best to just do the one that corresponds to your mood at the time. Frontier exploration? Camp sci-fi? Survival horror?

 

Although Old World Blues + Dead Money and Honest Hearts + Lonesome Road are very connected as the main antagonist in DM and LS respectively have been through the other area first.

[Darkpriest]

Ag center is doable. Yes. You will miss out some loot BUT you can go back there later. Besides ag cneter and high pool trigger before the tower mission only if you do not bee-line for the tower and start walking around.

[HoonDing]

Ran into endless loading screen bug in New Vegas.

Thankfully google fu turned up a fix.

 

 

This time I killed Vulpes immediately in Nipton, literally two minutes later I already had legion assassins after my behind.

 

If I hadn't raided some decent weapons (Lucky) beforehand I'd be toast.

Edited October 30, 2015 by HoonDing

[Rosbjerg]

Well makes sense he would travel with shadow contingencies.. Getting assassins after you that early is both somewhat of an obstacle and a boon. They can be pretty tough, but so is their gear.

[GhostofAnakin]

Finished off Ag Center in Wasteland 2.  Thank God Rose and Angela joined my crew, otherwise I'd have been sunk.  Angela, in particular, was money in combat.  She kept hitting the enemy while the rest of my party (minus my sniper) kept missing.

[WDeranged]

Ran into endless loading screen bug in New Vegas.

 

Thankfully google fu turned up a fix.

 

https://www.reddit.com/r/Fallout/comments/373ib1/fallout_new_vegas_is_literally_unplayable_stuck/

 

This time I killed Vulpes immediately in Nipton, literally two minutes later I already had legion assassins after my behind.

 

If I hadn't raided some decent weapons (Lucky) beforehand I'd be toast.

 

I remember people saying that NVSE's heap enlargement option cured their infinite loading screens, also installing Stutter Remover and NVAC should keep the crashes down.

[Nonek]

Ran a special Ravenloft AD&D episode tonight, the party fresh from escaping Strahd's wolves and running into the Mists stumbled into a down full of barrows (original eh?) and the creepy little village nestling amidst them. The party accepted the burgomeisters request to rid them of the devils from the hills, and marched into the downs. I ran a mostly story focused campaign, with a few foes that attacked and then fled back into the gloom. The story of these cursed moors and the ancient civilisation that once laid their dead to rest here was told on standing stones, carved in runes and sigils that needed time to translate and attracted watchers whose eyes shone from the darkness.

 

Eventually they found clues leading to a distant keep, under which a king of these ancient people was laid to rest, and that stood lone on the horizon. In that windblasted place, situated at the heart of a long disappeared hillfort they found a skeletal guard still stood at attention in the tower, propped up by wooden crosses bearing their crumbling forms and rotted harness. They made camp here and as the moon rose and night crept in the skeletons began to sing a dirge, first one then the other, praising their dead lord and pledging eternal fealty to his long vanished kingdom. Double watch that night for some reason, until finally our Half Orc Grim smashed the choir to bits in anger. With that silence descended, no bird, beast or even wind stirred the night and the party got more paranoid not less, as I described a sense of presence brooding in the darkness all about them.

 

They awoke to a blood red dawn, the sun too bright, painful to the eyes, its brightness not bringing warmth while everything seemed too clear and defined. They descended into the keep, lifting a great bronze trap door, and entering a dungeon where skeletons similar to the one they had smashed stood in alcoves, watching them pass. As they descended further the skeletons far behind them began their dirge, and from the corner of their eyes they saw glimpses of movement, skulls shifting, hands tightening around spears. The party stopped Grim from attacking the skeletons, worrying that they'd animate, and shortly after green witch light sprang to life in the corpses eyes.

 

A single skeleton warrior barred their path at the end of the passage, stood before rune covered bronze doors, the thing intoned. "I am the champion that could not be felled, I am the blade that was never sheathed, I am my masters dread will made flesh, I am the enemies end and my lords shield. Come in peace or die!" Instead of saying they came in peace the party attacked and were almost (thanks to poor rolling) wiped out by the skeleton warrior, which for four fifth level characters should have been fairly easy. Healing up with spells, kits and potions they cracked open the door and stepped into the kings tomb.

 

Here he sat upon an iron throne, a sword alight with witchfire blazing in his gnarled fist, his flesh black as jest, his long white hair rising and writhing in an unfelt wind and his eyes blazing with the same witchfire as that which radiated from his sword. All around him lay the treasures of his life, shining copper, bronze, silver and gold and reflecting the dread fire suffusing the place. In the walls skeletons whispered their mournful dirge and stepped down from their alcoves, clashing their spears against their shields, eyes springing to life with green fire. The king stood, his great height enhanced by the shadow that rushed forth from him seeming to leap at the characters as if eager to attack, with his left hand he pointed at the party and spoke.

 

"So, my mortal servants at last send me my pound of flesh...come my blade thirsts for your sweet blood and my retinue must dine on your marrow!"

 

With that the kings eyes blaze with the light of the midday sun and he and his skeletal minions step forward ready to attack, everybody roll initiative. At this point our suspicious Half Orc Grim says, "Nope!" and declares that he is running for the entrance, the rest of the party mutter various expletives and do the same. I'm amazed but play along, having an ocassional skeleton step down from its plinth to block their path and be smashed aside, telling them that they can feel a coldness from beyond the grave clutching at their backs until finally they burst out into daylight.

 

The ironic thing is that the king was just a Wight, 5HD, a +1 sword, no real challenge, less so than his skeletal champion. His skeletal servants were just that, 1HD skeletons and not really a problem or shouldn't be. Admittedly we had a Druid and not a Cleric to turn Undead, but still the party stood a a great chance of survival. Must have done a good job on the atmosphere. Ended the session there with the party headed back to the village, intent on revenge, looking forward to the next.