Questions for Q&A

[Lord Tenebris]

Greetings Obsidian and fellow players. 

 

Yesterday I have watched the Q&A on youtube for the new game Pillars of Eternity II and I really liked the many answers but I also have questions of my own. The moderator invited us to post our questions on the forum so here they are:

 

- Will PoE II have more summons and minions, or more subclasses which are "pet classes"?

 

- Will you include the "familiars" feature for wizards? I thought it a great addition for the flavor of the class (say a minion grimoire hehe)

 

- Since animats are a thing, will it be possible to make one of your own as an animancer?

 

- I love the ranger class but I would really like to have a bird for my animal companion, will it be possible in PoE II?

 

- I really liked the idea of "artifacts" in Tyranny and our "reputation" with them to unlock their power. Could something similar appear in PoE II?

 

- The ship feature video was very interesting. Will we see just the exterior of the ship or also the internal rooms of it?

 

- Will you include more regional clothing and armor for the races? Say an Aedyr would dress in a certain way, or at least keep the clothing which is part of his culture. Could this be an option for the "cosmetic" armor tab, if there will be one?

 

- Class quests, yay or nay?

 

- You said that rock, paper and scissors is not your take on magic combat, for which I applaud you, but could you please tell us if we will be able to play a proper magic duel as a wizard?

 

- Cannons require a trained crew to fire, especially in the heat of battle. Will it be possible to have more control over this feature, say hire more expert gunners, change ammunition or just sometimes unlimber a cannon during a quest and fire it as a proper seadog should (Hornblower TV series, The Frogs and the Lobsters episode)?

 

- I see what you did with the combat on the high seas (D&D 3,5 Stormwrack book) and I am eagerly awaiting it to play. Will you include more of such cutscenes and events with a more swashbuckler vibe? Will we have options to shine as a seasoned seadog on land too (like rope mastery, knots, gunnery, navigation)? This is a great theme to use extensively throughout our adventure. 

 

Questions about classes:

 

- Will the priest have more dialogue options regarding his philosophy, religion and inclination? For example a priest of Magran would have a better knowledge of war and firearms than say a priest of Eothas.

 

- The priest had the option to focus on his deity preferred weapon (a theme I love still in D&D) in the previous game. Sadly the options were not as competitive as the alternatives or were quickly overridden by better and more enhanced weapons as the game progressed. My question is the following, say my priest takes talents for the estoc, will this option allow me to enjoy the weapon choice even at higher levels?

 

- The "invocations" mechanic is a thing that made me curious. Will this be akin to prayers, powerful spells but used only in dire need? It would fit well with the theme of the priest. Could you elaborate more on this game mechanic?

 

- A ranger is usually a hunter, a marksman or a skirmisher. It fits the theme but the ranger could be also an investigator or a champion of the wilds. Will we have such subclasses options?

 

- I love paladins but I would like to ask if there will be an option for the so called "wild or green knight", a zealot still but one who is either enthralled to some spirit of the wild or blessed by "nature"? 

 

- Fighters are a staple but as some fellow forum members said, they can become boring quickly. What are the options for the fighter class to be more engaging for the player and not suffer from the "door basher and goblin arrow fodder" archetype?

 

- You said that you will make grimoires more integral to the wizard as their special trinkets. This is good. Care to elaborate more on the mechanic of trinkets and grimoires in particular?

 

- A staple of fantasy games is to search far and wide to acquire a spell or particular power or level? It is a mechanic I enjoy most from the Rpgs and I would love to see some really rare and unique spells to be found in the most dangerous and remote places. It would make the wizard play that much more akin to scholar or knowledge seeker. Could you please elaborate more on the spells of the wizard class on PoE II?

 

- The barbarian is in PoE the premier tank for crowds of enemies. Will it possible to make him as a more single target tank? What other options will be given to the class as subclasses?

 

- Rogues are awesome! Due to inclusion of thrown weapons will it be possible to have a knife thrower subclass which was often aligned with the rogue classes in classic TT Rpgs?

 

 

Narrative:

 

- We know that Eothas is now running around and almost killed the player character. Will there be an option to side with the Eothosians or somehow redeem the faith for its past misdeeds?

 

- You said that the factions are more akin to those of Fallout NV. I liked FNV because they offered plenty of options but ultimately it ended as following: good ending, bad ending, neutral ending and selfish ending since those were the options given once you sided with the factions. Will we have more choice on how to direct the fate or ending once we take upon ourselves the burdens of a faction?

 

- Class factions will be included? Will the "Orders, lodges, faiths, etc." be included? 

 

- As a priest (by now you guessed which is my favorite class) will we be able to "practice" our religion. Namely, will we be able to run a temple, take upon church specific quests, give sermons, or in general act and behave as priests consecrated into a religious order? Same applies for the other classes. 

 

- Can we sacrifice or betray our companions at some time during the quests?

 

- Can we betray the faction alliance in a similar way to Tyranny?

 

 

This is for now. I would really appreciate if some of those questions make it to a live QnA, but overall any answer by the developer would be most eagerly appreciated. I thank you for your cooperation. 

 

If some of these questions have already been answered I apologize and if you would be so kind point me to the topic with answers. Thanks

 

 

Lord Tenebris aka "in love with your games since NWN"

 

 

[blotter]

A few of these have been answered in this week's Q&A and/or the ones before it; for full transcripts or links to videos, check the Deadfire Announcements and News area and click on the threads pertaining to the past Q&As. I wish you luck getting answers on the rest.

 

 

 

 love the ranger class but I would really like to have a bird for my animal companion, will it be possible in PoE II?

 

Sawyer stated that the player's animal companion options won't be changed from Pillars 1. The bird animal companion is a custom one available only to Maia.

 

 

Will the priest have more dialogue options regarding his philosophy,

religion and inclination? For example a priest of Magran would have a better knowledge of war and firearms than say a priest of Eothas.

 

One of the goals for Pillars 2 is enhanced overall reactivity. Specific examples of this that have been discussed include additional dialogue options based on paladin order and more skill-based dialogue options. They've also mentioned priest of particular deities as examples of characters who should have unique dialogue options in certain situations.

 

 

- The priest had the option to focus on his deity preferred weapon (a theme I love still in D&D) in the previous game. Sadly the options were not as competitive as the alternatives or were quickly overridden by better and more enhanced weapons as the game progressed. My question is the following, say my priest takes talents for the estoc, will this option allow me to enjoy the weapon choice even at higher levels?

 

This hasn't been directly answered, but the implementation of weapon proficiencies as a separate resource from talents and abilities is worth mentioning here, particularly in relation to your estoc-wielding priest. The way in which deity-specific priest abilities or talents will interact with these proficiencies, if at all, has not been discussed during any Q&A that I'm aware of, but it's definitely possible that I missed something.

 

 

- The "invocations" mechanic is a thing that made me curious. Will this be akin to prayers, powerful spells but used only in dire need? It would fit well with the theme of the priest. Could you elaborate more on this game mechanic?

 

Invocations are the chanter equivalent to spells. They are limited to per-day or per-encounter uses, but the chanter needs to build up the requisite number of phrases to use them in combat, with more phrases being required to use more powerful invocations.

 

This perhaps a stretch on my part, but are you referring to empowerment? If so, the general idea appears to be drawing more heavily on one's reserves to strengthen a particular spell or ability, increasing the effective power level that's tied to it (e.g., Arcane for wizards, Guile for rogues, etc.) by +3 during that particular use of the ability. All classes can empower their abilities but only a certain number of times before needing to rest to regain access to this option.

 

 

 

I love paladins but I would like to ask if there will be an option for the so called "wild or green knight", a zealot still but one who is either enthralled to some spirit of the wild or blessed by "nature"?

 

The developers are not currently planning to add more paladin orders or priest deities to the game, but you might be able to develop this concept by multiclassing as a druid/paladin or a paladin/ranger.

 

 

 

Fighters are a staple but as some fellow forum members said, they can become boring quickly. What are the options for the fighter class to be more engaging for the player and not suffer from the "door basher and goblin arrow fodder" archetype?

 

The Black Jacket fighter subclass may be something that would attract your interest. Its emphasis is more on diversity in weaponry than specialization and its ability to switch between weapons more quickly and effectively may allow for a more dynamic playstyle.

 

 

Rogues are awesome! Due to inclusion of thrown weapons will it be possible to have a knife thrower subclass which was often aligned with the rogue classes in classic TT Rpgs?

 

Last I heard, there are currently no plans to include thrown weapons in the game.

 

 

 

You said that you will make grimoires more integral to the wizard as their special trinkets. This is good. Care to elaborate more on the mechanic of trinkets and grimoires in particular?

 

- A staple of fantasy games is to search far and wide to acquire a spell or particular power or level? It is a mechanic I enjoy most from the Rpgs and I would love to see some really rare and unique spells to be found in the most dangerous and remote places. It would make the wizard play that much more akin to scholar or knowledge seeker. Could you please elaborate more on the spells of the wizard class on PoE II?

 

Grimoires are changing from Pillars 1 in that they're moving away from allowing the transcription of spells from one grimoire to another. The spells that are in a particular grimoire will not change (presumably with the exception of a given wizard's personal grimoire as they add more when leveling up). Along with benefits tied to the use of specific grimoires (one example that was mentioned is a grimoire that boosts fire spells, if memory serves) this may provide stronger incentives for actually switching from one grimoire to another as they will be more strongly differentiated from each other. There's plenty more to be said on this subject, of course, and I'd be interested in further elaboration as well.

 

 

 

Class factions will be included? Will the "Orders, lodges, faiths, etc." be included?

 

Based on the last Q&A, it appears that we can expect to encounter more paladin orders throughout the game. During preceding Q&As they also mentioned that there would be more concerning the gods in the narrative of Pillars 2, so that likely means we can expect to see more of their associated priesthoods.

 

 

 

Can we betray the faction alliance in a similar way to Tyranny?

 

In this recent Q&A, Sawyer mentioned that the cut-off point for factions would likely be extended in comparison to Pillars 1, allowing you to interact with them more before committing to them irreversibly. Whether this actually translates to opportunities to betray a given faction will likely depend on the specifics of how their quests interact with those of other factions and we probably can't expect developers to get into those specifics this early on.