My collected criticism on Pillars of Eternity (very minor spoilers)

[Owlish]

The PoE stronghold is total crap.

A wanted criminal travels to your lands, lowering its prestige (which doesn't seem to matter at all). You can only escort him a way or pay him to leave. You can't imprison him in your dungeons. You can't order him killed. You can't banish him from your lands.

Here is what he says to you if you click on him:

I manually killed him and the drunkard that kept coming to my castle.

The stronghold has been pretty irrelevant to the story so far except for a small mention of having it. I also took some guy prisoner in a quest and it was really nonsensical that that was even an option that satisfied all sides.

 

[evdk]

But the keep isn't a moneysink. I sink nothing into it. I give it pennies and it spits pennies back. It's like a bank that only takes very small loans.

The keep had potential, but is terribly half assed.

All the upgrades are pretty much useless, I did not manage to find any correlation between the security score and the amount of money you collect, the events are boring and there is pretty much no consequence involved and the resting bonuses are weak, because you actually have to pick instead of getting them all as you should after sinking 30k+ into the buildings.

I hoped there would actually be some NPCs, but apart from the shopkeepers the place is even more lifeless than the other game areas.

 

[Rake]

I want the non-linear epicness of Fallout 2 and/or Arcanum improved upon.

No one gives a shit about your wants. The game was sold as a IE successor. It has many faults, but not being Arcanum isn't one of them.
Wait for the Arcanum spiritual successor to bitch about your "non-linear epicness"

Because you would consider BG2 to be linear? You poor millennial.

The main story? Yeah, p. much. First half of the game? Not so much, but we knew for some time now that Sawyer doesn't wanted to "overwhelm the player with content" and allow complete fredom on how he does content. So he gated it behind story chocepoints. I don't agree with his decision, but i don't think it's the bigest problem PoE has. (or that it's a real problem anywhay, except BG series, the rest of the IE games were linear as well

 

[AwesomeDude]

I voted "Better than Baldur's Gate 2" but I would have preferred a "As Good As Baldur's Gate 2" option. The poll is flawed and doesnt give enough options.

Oh, just like PoE?

 

[prodigydancer]

if the battlefield lights up like a christmas tree when people fight, that's a pretty sure-fire sign of high fantasy. ffs there ghosts walking around on the streets and people blowing up gods with magical mcguffin bombs

/sigh Sometimes I forget that visual effects are important to some people

And yes, tackling mature themes is being mature. It's a video game, not a novel. You refuse to take the limitations of them medium into account, fine. But at least do come up with an example - which game was better at low fantasy than PoE without becoming a boring sim?

Normally I would just shrug because I don't even believe that low fantasy is necessarily better. But your post surprised me because what you describe is not what I see in the game. I actually expected PoE to be a high fantasy game but it's not.

 

[Grunker]

Visual effects? lol. Any game where I am throwing fireballs willy nilly and fucking mass mentally dominating living mushrooms is a high fantasy game. Otherwise you're operating on a definition so weird that you're the one person in the world holding it.

Also, what is this shit about tackling mature themes? What does mature themes have to do with high or low fantasy? Planescape: Torment tackles mature themes all over the place and it might be the most high fantasy of any high fantasy game I've played. It's so high fantasy it has you talking to angels and demons on the street within the first half hour of the game. The whole point of the game is to use a deconstruction of high fantasy tropes to discuss mature themes.

You refuse to take the limitations of them medium into account

Limitations of the medium, lol. The Game of Thrones RPG is low fantasy, why isn't it held back by these "limitations on the medium"? But hey, why take my word for it:

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2014/07/24/freedom-and-fantasy-pillars-of-eternity-interview/

but nah, I'm sure the lead designer doesn't know what he is talking about

 

[Lady_Error]

the resting bonuses are weak, because you actually have to pick instead of getting them all as you should after sinking 30k+ into the buildings.

I guess not having all the resting bonuses together is what balance™ is all about.

 

[felipepepe]

No keep resting bonus would be worth the 6 loading screens that comes with it.

 

[Vault Dweller]

No. Just no. A keep doesn't have to be at odds with a game's narrative, unless weare talking about an idea of adventuring that is illogical and retarded in the first place. (as in "wandering around the wilderness for no reason")

The idea of the lord of a castle running errands for anyone with a problem for a few hundred coins and battling monsters in crypts and dungeons is at odds with logic and realism.

As for the crafting system, it's one of the two reasons itemization in PoE is bland and boring. "lessen the reliance on random items" is dealing with the problem ass backwards. There shouldn't be random items at all (at least from a power level and above). Junk loot and jems/consumables should be the only random items.

I meant randomly found items. As in you have no idea beforehand which items you'll acquire in your travels. So if I decide to focus and specialize in swords and then find an awesome saber or two-hander, I don't have to curse my fate but can make a decent sword myself.

In practice, every crafting system is shit....

 

[SoupNazi]

the resting bonuses are weak, because you actually have to pick instead of getting them all as you should after sinking 30k+ into the buildings.

I guess not having all the resting bonuses together is what balance™ is all about.

I never even found out that's how it works because instead of having to go to the room - after my first try of resting there - whenever I was visiting the keep for any reason, I just used console, went iroll20s, rest, and told the game to fuck off.

 

[evdk]

No keep resting bonus would be worth the 6 loading screens that comes with it.

Oh god, this. Getting out of the Endless Paths to rest was more horrifying than any of the copy pasted vampire fights in there.

 

[Rake]

In practice, every crafting system is shit....

Pls elaborate.

 

[Immortal]

Once they came to the conclusion that keep activities should be 100% optional because a lot of players have an extremely negative reaction to it, they should have left it as a homestead. Once again Josh failed his own principles (i.e. any given thing in a game should be designed for the people who enjoy that kind of gameplay; those who enjoy keep management gameplay won't/didn't enjoy something that's light on content by necessity on account of everything else they had to do and also completely divorced from everything else).

I think the entire game suffers from a bit of this - stuff is basically there because they promised it rather than what made sense for the game. That in itself isn't a problem but it is if you don't have a clear vision of what you want.

Nothing in the game is even remotely as bland and useless as the keep, IMO. Not even consumables crafting.

Itemization is a close second.. It's feels bland and neutered, again catering to people who wanted to skip encounters, they had to make sure not to incentivize killing.

There are treasure chests and graves and all the other nice RPG tropes besides looting corpses though. So I don't see how boring itemization is linked to skippable encounters.

Boring Itemization in general, Items are either too strong or too weak, don't make sense, don't have history or background or context for their locations, randomized loot tables, ect.. Skippable Encounters is one (large) reason why the bad itemization came about.

No thought or effort was put into itemization so you get just the same mundane shit. Just like no thought was put into the keep so it's just this mundane money making useless piece of shit mechanic.

 

[TheGreatOne]

I'm impressed with Sawyer, his game is less dull than BG1. Though if there's one game I associate with his personality, it's BG1.

I'm being consistent.

PoE will be the first elegantly designed, good RPG in the history of the genre

I'm sure I'll enjoy Pillars, but I probably won't consider it a good game

Or did you mean forming an opinion on games before ever playing them? I guess you are consistent. You should try to form an opinion on Darklands and Wizardry 8 while Sensuki/Sawyer works on that patch, then you can atleast get a some kind of concrete idea of what kind of design greatness Sawyer's been striving for and failing at his entire career. Funny thing is that his ideas might actually work in a game like Darklands/TB blobber, but he's stuck making Obsidian titles and his fanboys are allergic to golden age games.

As you can see after such a great success he can't even keep up the act anymore

Like I said earlier, it's like SJWs who fake outrage about not having enough women in games and comics they don't even play/read. It's all about ruining it for others.

 

[Vault Dweller]

In practice, every crafting system is shit....

Pls elaborate.

What's there to elaborate? Try Underrail, then come and tell me that its crafting system is shit.

 

[Grunker]

In practice, every crafting system is shit....

Pls elaborate.

What's there to elaborate? Try Underrail, then come and tell me that its crafting system is shit.

KotOR2 has a p. great crafting system actually. It's very small and minor, but it's also very compelling (since it vastly upgrades your gear) and doesn't compete with the main systems at all. Just to say that there are to ends of the spectrum: great, deep crafting (like UR) and complimentary systems (like K2).

 

[felipepepe]

I enjoyed the crafting system in Bound by Flame as well, shame that the game itself had very few weapons.

 

[Vault Dweller]

The issue with K2 system was that it was unnecessary and the game was too easy. PoE is fairly challenging on Hard (for the first time player who doesn't know the system inside out) and there are plenty of places I have to stay clear off, which makes the crafting system very useful.

 

[Rake]

In practice, every crafting system is shit....

Pls elaborate.

What's there to elaborate? Try Underrail, then come and tell me that its crafting system is shit.

I'll take your word for it untill the game is out.

 

[GloomFrost]

I want the non-linear epicness of Fallout 2 and/or Arcanum improved upon.

No one gives a shit about your wants. The game was sold as a IE successor. It has many faults, but not being Arcanum isn't one of them.
Wait for the Arcanum spiritual successor to bitch about your "non-linear epicness"

Because you would consider BG2 to be linear? You poor millennial.

Oh please, enlighten us. Tell us about bg2 amazing non linear quests that can be completed in so many different ways, about branching dialogues with dozens of replays depending on your class, race and skills, and of course about different endings.

 

[Mastermind]

To people who finished PoE: Do you ever find more weapon/armor enchanting recipes other than the ones you start off with?

 

[potatojohn]

Recipes? If you mean if you can craft more effects, then no. Some effects are reserved for unique items.

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

As others have said the biggest thing with the keep is that its just a money sink. If it was tied to any quests or even scripted events it would have been so much better.

You mean additional quests other than 15 level mega-dungeon and half a dozen quests from Warden's Lodge?

The real problem I've had with it is that there's zero point being there because bonuses for sleeping in are worse than those in a random Inn in a shed.

 

[Jaedar]

PoE is fairly challenging on Hard (for the first time player who doesn't know the system inside out) and there are plenty of places I have to stay clear off, which makes the crafting system very useful.

 

[Grunker]

The issue with K2 system was that it was unnecessary and the game was too easy.

Disagree vastly. Yes the game was too easy, but that was a problem with balancing. The crafting was an awesome complement to the core systems and a good way to make you feel like you were tinkering with and personalizing your light sabers, guns and armor.

PoE is fairly challenging on Hard (for the first time player who doesn't know the system inside out) and there are plenty of places I have to stay clear off, which makes the crafting system very useful.

NO JAEDAR DON'T TELL ME THAT DIFFERENT PEOPLE ARE BETTER OR WORSE AT THE GAME



PoE is one of the harder RPGs I've played. That doesn't mean there won't still be people trashing it, as in every RPG.