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Divine Divinity on Hard is kicking my ass

Rpgsaurus Rex

Guest
Hungry for a diablo-like, I fired up this baby for the first time. Picked "hard" because I heard it gets too easy on normal, and went for a fighter because I like fighters - and this game is kicking my ass in the "starter dungeon". I'm pretty much forced to buy a ton of potions to survive groups of normal skeletons. Guardians just one-shot me, and so do some Conjurers and Ghouls (some seem weaker than others? not sure), so I'm avoiding more than a few mobs - that never happened to me in a diablo-like before. Am I doing something wrong, or is the game really that kick-ass on hard?

Am I supposed to invest in spells/ranged on a melee build - can I diversify or will it punish me like Gothic2:NotR?
 

abnaxus

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Put one point in Meteor strike for the first dungeon.

Put one point in Freeze to kill Orcs after Aleroth.

Then get sword with Freeze enchantment and win the game.
 

catfood

AGAIN
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Well I am playing this for the first time as well so I couldn't give you too many tips since I have an archer build. If you want to make the game super easy get the "deadly gift" (or poison something-something, I don't remember its name) from the survivor's skill tree. All you need is poison potions, apply them to the weapon and then attack the enemy. You don't even have to actually HIT them to get them poisoned. Poison is MEGA IMBA. Seriously, just one dose of poison is enough to kill almost any enemy in the begining, such as orcs and animals, however certain creatures are immune to it, namely undead and other critters which deal poison damage as well (like spiders).

Also #1, yes, the game is really difficult in the begining, but soon after you finish the first dungeon and gain some levels it becomes a breeze. Apparently fighters get even more broken than archers and mages the more you progress through it.

Also #2, I didn't do the starter dungeon until after I gained about 5-6 level or so going outside the town and doing some quests on the farms/killing some shit. The orcs just outside of town are probably going to rape you in the ass bad so I'd say it's in your best interest to run past them by the river towards the south where the fights won't be as challenging. When I went back to the catacombs beneath Aleroth I was pwning skellies left and right with my bow.

Also #3, don't make the mistake of thinking that this is a Diablo clone. It's anything but. I promise you will be pleasently surprised the more you play it. It's been a long time since a game made me eager to come back home to work to fire it up.

EDIT: and put one point in the healing spell once you get acccess to it. It's awesome.
And one point into alchemy so you can mix potions. Mix health and mana pots to get restoration pots, they replenish both a percentage of health and mana which isn't so useful at low levels, but at high levels when you have high H/M pools they are great. It makes even those minor potions useful later in the game.
 

sea

inXile Entertainment
Developer
Joined
May 3, 2011
Messages
5,698
I found even on normal, it's pretty brutal. The game gets easier as it goes on - the beginning dungeon and the outlying area around town are by far some of the toughest challenges in the game, and where most people stop playing because of that. I would recommend focusing on survival as much as possible early on - you will be able to fight off the enemies using hit and run tactics, and you'll be able to buy potions to heal up even if it means repeated trips to town. As catfood said, also look into both the healing spells and alchemy as soon as possible, they are both real life-savers.
 

Rpgsaurus Rex

Guest
Thanks for the tips bros.

My completionist syndrome forces me to explore every inch of the map, meaning this game is shaping up to be *very* long... unless I burn myself out before I finish it.
 

Machocruz

Arcane
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Jul 7, 2011
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Hyperborea
Putting points into other attributes besides what your starting class demands is the road to hardship. So if you want to make a fighter-mage hybrid character, you need to focus on either the melee attributes (Con and Str, and eventually Agi for two handed swords) or the mage attritbutes (Int and Con), otherwise you will be both magically and physically below par. I had to respec because by the halfway mark it got too difficult to do most of the quests I had. Frankly, I don't think this game is good for hybrid builds so I wouldn't even mess around with trying to make a fighter-mage or the like. Stick to your class' main attributes and only take skills from other classes that are universally useful, like Lockpick, Freeze, Elven Sight, Alchemy etc. You can still make different builds within each class.

And yes, once you get a sword with freeze, especially a two hander, you've scaled the mountain.
 

Murk

Arcane
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Jan 17, 2008
Messages
13,459
Archery is a viable option for the initial onslaught. The mastery skill speeds up it to being a machine gun, and bows tend to have higher damage potential initially. Finally, you can poison them using level 1 poison weapon which is amazingly broken.

Poison works like this -- after you poison your weapon you have a limited number of 'charges'. Each shot/hit counts as a charge being used up. Each time a charged hit lands on an enemy they will be poisoned and take a large amount of damage over time that also hit-locks them a bit.

Damn near everything can be killed as poison is very powerful.

Meteorstrike is super spammable and can be used to empty out a few mana bars on stronger enemies (like melee guardians).

You get less mana as a warrior than you would as a mage per point in int, and vice versa. So your class determines your derived stats, but there's no real penalty to multi-classing and I personally would suggest it to some extent (especially for healing, bless, and some other neat spells). Keep in mind, I am referring to skills and not stats. I would not suggest getting int as a warrior -- for mana, you can get a ton of mana using charms for specialized gear.

Even if you plan to go melee I would honestly suggest maxing bow mastery and getting a decent bow -- you'll have enough skill points (spell books can be bought from stores, and are random so you will find some eventually) to go around.
Thanks for the tips bros.

My completionist syndrome forces me to explore every inch of the map, meaning this game is shaping up to be *very* long... unless I burn myself out before I finish it.

You're in for some very nice moments -- the game has some reallllly good encounters and quests that won't happen unless you go exploring. It's one of my favorite games to just explore.
 

Rpgsaurus Rex

Guest
Since poison + freeze weapon will make the game too easy (apparently?), is it viable to avoid them and pretend they didn't exist altogether? I'm quite enjoying getting raped left and right and being forced to conserve resources in an RPG, I wouldn't really want to "powergame" this time.
 

SCO

Arcane
In My Safe Space
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Shadorwun: Hong Kong
It's actually very hard to find all content in some maps... hidden 2 pixel caves with unfindable object combination patterns inside and such.

But one of them is possible to find without knowing about it... if you pay attention to the church syllabus.
 

markec

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If you are playing without the latest patch scorpion traps are pretty much "I WIN" button. Even the last boss can be beaten by only dropping few of them.
 

catfood

AGAIN
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If you are playing without the latest patch scorpion traps are pretty much "I WIN" button. Even the last boss can be beaten by only dropping few of them.
Yeah, but you don't get any XP from kills made by traps so there's less incentive to abuse them.
 

catfood

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Since poison + freeze weapon will make the game too easy (apparently?), is it viable to avoid them and pretend they didn't exist altogether? I'm quite enjoying getting raped left and right and being forced to conserve resources in an RPG, I wouldn't really want to "powergame" this time.
I'd say put some points into poison for those times when you are bored of "being challenged" and get through with shit as soon as possible. The orc camp comes to mind.....
 

markec

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If you are playing without the latest patch scorpion traps are pretty much "I WIN" button. Even the last boss can be beaten by only dropping few of them.
Yeah, but you don't get any XP from kills made by traps so there's less incentive to abuse them.

True but if he find himself in a battle he has trouble winning they can be a easy solution to the problem.
 

Murk

Arcane
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Messages
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You can completely avoid freeze/poison -- I'd suggest putting a single point into poison for the same reasons catfood suggested, though I personally liked hacking through the orc camp.

I've never used the scorpion trap trick, honestly just never struck me as necessary even on harder difficulties.
 

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