So that first Engwithan Titan fight got _really_ hard (impossible?) on Path of the Damned with latest BB update

[MaxQuest]

Just tried this fight in beta4.

It's indeed tough, and the main difficulty comes from Sirocco, and specifically: +100% recovery from blind coupled with mini-stuns which combined are making your party really unresponsive. Having 10s recovery after something like Holy Radiance... hurts badly if you need something urgent like an extra heal.

 

Btw, had an idea of shutting down the Blights from using Scirocco via terrifying and frightening effects (repulsive vissage / bear roar). Turns out they just don't care.

 

Still managed to do it... but had a crapton of healing)

Video: link

Edited April 6, 2018 by MaxQuest

[Dr. Hieronymous Alloy]

If you're having problems here, you can kite them over to the explosive barrels by the kobolds.

[ShakotanSolari]

I dominated the titan and the blights killed it and my party 

[Soulmojo]

It has to be a two part fight. Kiting the titan and deal with the blights later.

 

these Bligths can be interrupted, even knocked down.

 

I used all my characters to chain interrupt the enemies. If you focus on disables it is a cakewalk. Well it is if you do a two part fight.

[Alot]

I found a video of someone managing to complete the fight without kiting the Titan away from all of the blights. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1kjtuAZh2ho

 

Makes me kind of want to try the fight without cheesing it too hard.

[mrmonocle]

the fight got a bit harder and it's alright imo. At least I had to reload once. No need to nerf anything.

[theBalthazar]

Problem, this phase need a complete strategy and custom team.

 

If you have no cipher and you are a glass cannon, you cannot beat the game.

 

I also think to a solo player... who cannot separate people against sirrocco effect beecause... he is alone.

 

No, this phase is too much hard. It is easy to say : I put in place  a full perso team for this fight and It is easy "no need to nerf".

 

But in reality, in videogame, you must always have a chance to recover the situation, at least once. Here if you screw, it is always over, even for an hardcore gamer. Definitely not legit, nerf is a good thing.

Edited April 3, 2018 by theBalthazar

[PIP-Clownboy]

POTD should be masochistically HARD. Just because you struggled against the Titan with a under-geared beta party shouldn't automatically mean the difficulty should be nerfed when in fact I and plenty of other people were able to beat this iteration of the Titan. 

 

It's sad because the OP's title is acting like the fight is impossible when it's not if you actually approached it strategically. And now looks like a Obsidian employee believed that hyperbole. 

Edited April 3, 2018 by PIP-Clownboy

[Wormerine]

It's sad because the OP's title is acting like the fight is impossible when it's not if you actually approached it strategically. And now looks like a Obsidian employee believed that hyperbole.

 

He didn’t. It was changed before the post was mad . This fight isn’t problematic design wise in PotD only, though it fleshes out its problems.

 

Harder doesn’t necessarily mean better. Complaints here aren’t about it being per say too hard, but rather about it being a bit bull****. I didn’t find it fun in its current iteration, I didn’t find satisfaction in beating it.

[PIP-Clownboy]

POTD is a joke in POE1 and becomes a snowball steamroll fest quite early. I guess we're headed in that direction once again which is a shame. 

[JerekKruger]

Harder doesn’t necessarily mean better. Complaints here aren’t about it being per say too hard, but rather about it being a bit bull****. I didn’t find it fun in its current iteration, I didn’t find satisfaction in beating it.

 

This. It's easy to make a hard encounter, making a hard encounter that's interesting and not just bull**** is not so easy.

 

I'd argue that stacking a bunch of high damage movement interrupting sirocco wind abilities on top of each other is on the bull**** side of things.

[Wormerine]

POTD is a joke in POE1 and becomes a snowball steamroll fest quite early. I guess we're headed in that direction once again which is a shame.

 

Yes. Most of the encounters were poorly designed, and XP overfloat is way too big, especially with White March. Content scaling doesn’t really fix the problem.

 

It has little correlation to current discussion.

[PIP-Clownboy]

People are struggling because their normal routine of actions didn't work. Claiming something is 'bull****' is subjective and I would counter that it's actually the most interesting encounter as it forces you out of your comfort zone. Fact is the encounter is very beatable on POTD and not in any way 'impossible'. 

 

We have been here before. People cried about their party members being knocked out by Beetles. Now you can basically attack move through the Dyrford ruins in POTD. 

 

Tune the game around Veteran, whatever. Path of Damned needs to actually live up to it's name otherwise another difficulty needs to be added for people that enjoy what you call 'bull****'. 

Edited April 4, 2018 by PIP-Clownboy

[theBalthazar]

Ideally, with all team (and a solo character) and a good micro-management, I must be end all fight. Even in POTD.

 

Here it is not really the case except with weird strategies. In POTD this becoming absurd.

 

And gears yes. But we are level 6 at the moment of the game. So... We can't be sure of the quality of gears.

Edited April 4, 2018 by theBalthazar

[Wormerine]

Ideally, with all team (and a solo character) and a good micro-management, I must be end all fight. Even in POTD.

 

Ok, I wouldn’t mind if game wasn’t beatable with a solo character. Not to ruin fun for people who do soloruns but I can’t see how one could design a good team based game, which is also beatable with one character. If a difficulty requires a careful coordination of 5 characters, surely it shouldn’t be beatable with just one.

[Dr <3]

I have done it solo ( but on normal, non potd) with a nature godlike monk/devoted fist user. Wellspring of life (via swif stykes) + aware ( from tactical stryke (?) gives you semi-costant +3 power lvl, wich is cool for both trascendent suffering and veteran recovery.

 

Really main problems came from greater blights. with a bit of luck i managed to kill the titan before the blights reached me, after that i managed to survive to the scirocco ( tks to boosted veteran recovery and an on-time second wind). After that i focused on the weakest blight ( also using trascendent suffering for interrupt when needed), when it died it triggered the aoe full attack from mob stance, after that all the blights were in yellow ( half life). Some more hit on a random blight --> chain mob stance reaction --> everything died.

[thelee]

People are struggling because their normal routine of actions didn't work. Claiming something is 'bull****' is subjective and I would counter that it's actually the most interesting encounter as it forces you out of your comfort zone. Fact is the encounter is very beatable on POTD and not in any way 'impossible'. 

 

The big problem is that the blights spawn in huge numbers without any announcement. If there's an element of surprise of such a huge swing in degree (versus a couple scarabs, or even a couple scarabs plus a blight or two), it is bad game design to not forecast it to the player. If a player is to lose, the player should lose because they weren't good enough, not because they lacked some particular metagame knowledge about the fight.

 

I'd actually like to see you post a video of you taking on the fight as it is, on PotD. I reckon that it is essentially impossible without dissecting the fight into an encounter that was not intended by design (i.e. separating the fight in some way).

 

We have been here before. People cried about their party members being knocked out by Beetles. Now you can basically attack move through the Dyrford ruins in POTD. 

 

Tune the game around Veteran, whatever. Path of Damned needs to actually live up to it's name otherwise another difficulty needs to be added for people that enjoy what you call 'bull****'.

 

Way to rewrite history. People cried about their party members being knocked out by beetles because the early PoE backer beta had a bug with them that made them hardier than intended. They were never supposed to be that hard. Obsidian has already confirmed in this thread that the fight as it is right now is already not the fight that they have intended, so I don't know what you're trying to defend here.

Edited April 4, 2018 by thelee

[theBalthazar]

Ok, I wouldn’t mind if game wasn’t beatable with a solo character. Not to ruin fun for people who do soloruns but I can’t see how one could design a good team based game, which is also beatable with one character. If a difficulty requires a careful coordination of 5 characters, surely it shouldn’t be beatable with just one. 

 

 

Yes. Totally agree. That's why I prefer that Obsidian erase all useless options ("Scales" "only up" story and all expert mode and create ONE GAME) and create a mode for solo player with a different difficulty.

 

And allow a mode for team building with 5 characters. It will become more accurate for POTD with a higher difficulty.

 

Plus, side note don't Forget, me, you, Josh, we are hardcore gamer and expert of pillars. They are people who want MAX difficulty but in a reasonnable measure. Stay with a lot of team building for fun+difficulty. It is understandable. That's why I hate game where your choice is imposed and you have no more freedom with the greatest difficulty (Fire Emblem is the perfect example in hightest difficulty : 3/4 of characters are good for trash. Stay the main hero + Oifaye Character + 1-2 horse knight of the start of the game. Level of choice when there is optimization = 0). Absurd difficulty is not desirable. Limit is : A good challenge with optimal teams. No more, no less. Like that, you have very hard challenge with only "viable" teams. But all this stay "possible".

Edited April 4, 2018 by theBalthazar

[Dr. Hieronymous Alloy]

Keep in mind that the names of the difficulty settings are a bit rhetorical.

 

Practically speaking it goes "I  just want a choose your own adventure book, but with graphics" -> "I am a father of children and do not have time to reload fights every twenty minutes" -> "I am fine with reloading but do not understand how the game works yet" -> "I am fine with reloading and also have put some time into understanding how the numbers work". Actual real difficulty comes from Ironman or similar self-inflicted personal challenges (solo, etc.) 

Edited April 4, 2018 by Dr. Hieronymous Alloy

[MadDemiurg]

Honestly solo is bit dull cause you only have 1 char and all party synergies and multiple char build complexity goes out of the window. But it's the only way to challenge yourself atm.

 

I too would prefer the game that is not soloable so you would actually get interesting and challenging party based combat.

 

Pillars 2 seems to be closer to DA2+ and Divinity OS 2 where all the "tactics" end up being about doing some number crunching and then exploding the final boss with 1 hit though.

 

The thing I liked about pillars 1 is that it had much more controllable environment in terms of possible stats, it still wasn't tuned enough for the party play but oh well.

 

Pillars 2 seems to be way worse in this regard, at least currently. Actually most of the core mechanics changes seem detrimental to the gameplay, although conceptually stuff like multiclasses is cool. Maybe they'll manage to balance it, but I'm not too hopeful. There's plenty of unbalanced stuff from pillars 1 on top of new unbalanced stuff in pillars 2 as well as a bunch of old stuff broken by PoE2 rebalancing.

 

Tbh it's pretty disappointing, I mean Josh is a really smart guy that knows his stuff and they had a ton of exp with pillars 1 to learn from, but it feels like a good chunk of design work is done by interns. It also seems like the beta keeps pivoting on some core design decisions all the time while the release is getting closer and closer. My current estimate that the game would need at least several patches and maybe a dlc or two to be actually enjoyable (if they keep supporting it).

Edited April 4, 2018 by MadDemiurg

[Dr. Hieronymous Alloy]

Honestly solo is bit dull cause you only have 1 char and all party synergies and multiple char build complexity goes out of the window. But it's the only way to challenge yourself atm.

 

I too would prefer the game that is not soloable so you would actually get interesting and challenging party based combat.

 

Pillars 2 seems to be closer to DA2+ and Divinity OS 2 where all the "tactics" end up being about doing some number crunching and then exploding the final boss with 1 hit though.

 

The thing I liked about pillars 1 is that it had much more controllable environment in terms of possible stats, it still wasn't tuned enough for the party play but oh well.

 

Pillars 2 seems to be way worse in this regard, at least currently. Actually most of the core mechanics changes seem detrimental to the gameplay, although conceptually stuff like multiclasses is cool. Maybe they'll manage to balance it, but I'm not too hopeful. There's plenty of unbalanced stuff from pillars 1 on top of new unbalanced stuff in pillars 2 as well as a bunch of old stuff broken by PoE2 rebalancing.

 

Tbh it's pretty disappointing, I mean Josh is a really smart guy that knows his stuff and they had a ton of exp with pillars 1 to learn from, but it feels like a good chunk of design work is done by interns. It also seems like the beta keeps pivoting on some core design decisions all the time while the release is getting closer and closer. My current estimate that the game would need at least several patches and maybe a dlc or two to be actually enjoyable (if they keep supporting it).

 

 

It's just still pretty rough. It's easy to forget now but PoE 1 had years of additional development and refinement post-release; it's a dramatically better game now than it was on release day. 

 

Most of the really successful RPG's went through a similar process; DA:O they released a whole new replacement game a year later. 

[vanyel54]

I successfully manage to do it on my first time in veteran :

1) my team blast the titan

2) the blights came and destroy my team

3) EXCEPT my little paladin/chanter (full def build) who kill them all with the new soft winds of death (and a lot of paralyzed). And you have to be well positioned...

 

Well on solo/potd, it will be a challenge.

[TheC]

I must admit that this fight was hard enough on standard difficulty. I cant imagine hard. I usually win just by blocking the greater sand with summons to buy time to take them out. Doubt this would work on hard.

[TheC]

Honestly solo is bit dull cause you only have 1 char and all party synergies and multiple char build complexity goes out of the window. But it's the only way to challenge yourself atm.

 

I too would prefer the game that is not soloable so you would actually get interesting and challenging party based combat.

 

Pillars 2 seems to be closer to DA2+ and Divinity OS 2 where all the "tactics" end up being about doing some number crunching and then exploding the final boss with 1 hit though.

 

The thing I liked about pillars 1 is that it had much more controllable environment in terms of possible stats, it still wasn't tuned enough for the party play but oh well.

 

Pillars 2 seems to be way worse in this regard, at least currently. Actually most of the core mechanics changes seem detrimental to the gameplay, although conceptually stuff like multiclasses is cool. Maybe they'll manage to balance it, but I'm not too hopeful. There's plenty of unbalanced stuff from pillars 1 on top of new unbalanced stuff in pillars 2 as well as a bunch of old stuff broken by PoE2 rebalancing.

 

Tbh it's pretty disappointing, I mean Josh is a really smart guy that knows his stuff and they had a ton of exp with pillars 1 to learn from, but it feels like a good chunk of design work is done by interns. It also seems like the beta keeps pivoting on some core design decisions all the time while the release is getting closer and closer. My current estimate that the game would need at least several patches and maybe a dlc or two to be actually enjoyable (if they keep supporting it).

 

 

Looks like you need to make your own game and show us all how its suppose to be done. Just a simple 8bit game showcasing your... uh... expertise in gameplay design. I mean, that is an AWFUL lot of criticism their buddy.

Edited April 4, 2018 by TheC

[playerone]

Had the same problem on Classic and agree with general consensus, it's too much. Game also froze a few times and crashed on exit after this fight but that happens in other situations too. Other than this particular battle I really liked the challenge level of this update. Glad to hear this is fixed. Kind of hope we have a chance to test play the fixed version.

Regarding difficultly levels i general, a game that you have to reload fights over and over and know exactly the right way to win the fight would be miserable to me. I'm glad there are accommodations for people who want to relax and play or want to face hordes or even go it alone. That kind of design ability is a real gift and gives a lot of different players, and even the same player, lots of options.

 

 

We were tweaking that fight prior to the last Backer Beta.  It looks like the final changes did not make it into the last Backer Beta release unfortunately.

 

We've already fixed it internally.

Edited April 4, 2018 by playerone