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The Dark Eye Blackguards - turn-based tactical RPG set in The Dark Eye world

Darth Roxor

Royal Dongsmith
Staff Member
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Djibouti
you gotta equip the ring
 

Miner 2049er

Scholar
Joined
Apr 27, 2016
Messages
185
Holy shit ! I just came around playing it from the pile of shame and I'm having a blast. I'm a combatfag and I think the depth of character building and the combat enounters of Blackguards is up there with ToEE. Hexes, the animations, the dark tone, the difficulty...I'm in love.
How long does one playthrough last ?

I'm owning Blackguards 2 too, but I have red what an letdown of epic proportions it is. Come on. It can't be that bad. Just because they streamlined it a bit.
Okay it might be a step back in terms of depth, but that alone can't render the game a steaming pile of banal boring bullshit. Perhaps it improves on other aspects.
If I can forgive some streamlining, can Blackguards 2 be worth playing ?
 

Maculo

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Jul 30, 2013
Messages
2,533
Strap Yourselves In Pathfinder: Wrath
Well, that succinctly answers my question whether to buy the sequel. That's disappointing.
 

Gord

Arcane
Joined
Feb 16, 2011
Messages
7,049
Well, if you already own it, give it a go. It's not complete shit, but they sadly went in the wrong direction with it.
 

Modron

Arcane
Joined
May 5, 2012
Messages
9,934
Blackguards 2 is nowhere near as crappy as it's been made out to be (it feels like every few years reviewers pick a game to pile on so they can sell that they are not paid shills and still have some integrity to their casual audience), it's actually decent enough just not as good as the first game unfortunately.
 

Abu Antar

Turn-based Poster
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Messages
13,514
Enjoy the Revolution! Another revolution around the sun that is. Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
felipepepe and Darth Roxor are both right.

Encounter design took a nosedive, imo. So many long and annoying encounters. Fights that take too long. Retaking cities was a pita. Systems are simplified and streamlined, which sucks. I loved tinkering with building my characters in the first game. I gave up at the 18h mark. Bought the game day one.
 
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Grunker

RPG Codex Ghost
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Joined
Oct 19, 2009
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27,385
Location
Copenhagen
Blackguard is the best RPG of its decade for a single reason: the degree to which it succeeds at doing its one great thing so insanely well. Being PNP Encounters: The Vidya Game.

Blackguards 2 partly abandons this concept in favor of copy-pastaed battle maps and on top of this the systems are torn to pieces and the game is unbalanced so fights are simply not tested enough to be fun. Instead they are drawn out and filled with mechanics that don't work the way they're designed to.

Games are night and day, really.
 
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agris

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Apr 16, 2004
Messages
6,761
so I just started playing this. i'm unfamiliar with TDE (although found felipepepe's BG1 guide on steam) and am playing on hard. I made my own character, a spell sword - kinda like a physical adept from SRR. Self buffs, enemy debuffs, and a big 2h sword + leather armor.

am i b0ned? i'm actually using consumables, tight on money and equipment, and i love it. not far in tho, only in the 3rd city. wood troll was fun, hoping for more encounters like that. crypt lice and having to cover their holes felt kinda gimmicky, i'm 50/50 on that type of mechanic. i hope it isn't used much.

still, i really like the game so far. i can't help but compare these battle maps to what we got in the banner saga 1. imagine if TBS's maps had been like this?
 

VentilatorOfDoom

Administrator
Staff Member
Joined
Apr 4, 2009
Messages
8,600
Location
Deutschland
am i b0ned? i'm actually using consumables, tight on money and equipment, and i love it. not far in tho, only in the 3rd city. wood troll was fun, hoping for more encounters like that. crypt lice and having to cover their holes felt kinda gimmicky, i'm 50/50 on that type of mechanic. i hope it isn't used much.
There's no shame playing the game on normal for the first time, especially if you're unfamiliar with the ruleset. It's not like normal will be easy. Never played a melee fighter with leather armor, sounds a bit risky. Weapons with infantry damage are the best (mostly 2h bashing weapons).
 

whydoibother

Arcane
Patron
Joined
May 2, 2018
Messages
15,479
Location
bulgaristan
Codex Year of the Donut
am i b0ned?
To have a good time, try to explore what works and what doesn't, instead of asking. That discovery is where much of the fun lies.
I always hate myself for ruining games I am having fun with by being weak and looking up the calculated minmaxed solved strategy, and going with that. If this is a necessary step, the game must be shit.
 

anvi

Prophet
Village Idiot
Joined
Oct 12, 2016
Messages
7,530
Location
Kelethin
so I just started playing this. i'm unfamiliar with TDE (although found felipepepe's BG1 guide on steam) and am playing on hard. I made my own character, a spell sword - kinda like a physical adept from SRR. Self buffs, enemy debuffs, and a big 2h sword + leather armor.

am i b0ned? i'm actually using consumables, tight on money and equipment, and i love it. not far in tho, only in the 3rd city. wood troll was fun, hoping for more encounters like that. crypt lice and having to cover their holes felt kinda gimmicky, i'm 50/50 on that type of mechanic. i hope it isn't used much.

still, i really like the game so far. i can't help but compare these battle maps to what we got in the banner saga 1. imagine if TBS's maps had been like this?
You may be boned for picking hard. I completed it twice on medium and some fights are brutal and near the end it becomes kind of a joke... But I focus on magic which is kind of weak, apparently some spells are so powerful it makes the game easy but I can't resist doing mind control shit. It is satisfying. If you find it hard just find out which of the spells are OP and make sure you use that.
 

Grunker

RPG Codex Ghost
Patron
Joined
Oct 19, 2009
Messages
27,385
Location
Copenhagen
so I just started playing this. i'm unfamiliar with TDE (although found felipepepe's BG1 guide on steam) and am playing on hard. I made my own character, a spell sword - kinda like a physical adept from SRR. Self buffs, enemy debuffs, and a big 2h sword + leather armor.

am i b0ned? i'm actually using consumables, tight on money and equipment, and i love it. not far in tho, only in the 3rd city. wood troll was fun, hoping for more encounters like that. crypt lice and having to cover their holes felt kinda gimmicky, i'm 50/50 on that type of mechanic. i hope it isn't used much.

still, i really like the game so far. i can't help but compare these battle maps to what we got in the banner saga 1. imagine if TBS's maps had been like this?

You're not boned at all, I beat the game on Hard with such a character.
 

CryptRat

Arcane
Developer
Joined
Sep 10, 2014
Messages
3,548
It's praised because of carefully crafted encounters and free and deep character customization, even if you control only a few and don't create them past the first one.
 

Abu Antar

Turn-based Poster
Patron
Joined
Jan 19, 2014
Messages
13,514
Enjoy the Revolution! Another revolution around the sun that is. Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
Why is this game praised? It feels like a mobile game, like a really poor eurojank.
I completely disagree. Other than its buginess, I had a blast with it. I really liked the character building. The combat was also fun and challenging. Tell me of a mobile game of the same quality as Blackguards and I will happily play it.
 
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Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,232
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
This game's combat engine was pretty solid. I'm surprised that Daedalic haven't revisited it in the age of Divinity: Original Sin turn-based mania.
 

Stavrophore

Most trustworthy slavic man
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Vatnik
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don't identify with EU-NPC land
Strap Yourselves In
The combat is nice, but the game has this barebone feel. Im after the cemetery fights[so beginning] and ive yet to see any skills used. It's move all people to one enemy->kill>attack next one and repeat. Do the game open up later? More skills, items, spells etc? So far the start is slow. Are all cities just this generic Battle Brothers type of one screen with interactions? This looks rather like Dungeon Rats type of game[dungeon crawler], rather than full fledged RPG.
 

CryptRat

Arcane
Developer
Joined
Sep 10, 2014
Messages
3,548
Yes, it felt a lot like Dungeon Rats to me, 1 created + pregens, the focus on cool encounters, the gfx, the small party and low scale encounters (with appropriate types of attack), combat system, number range, equipment, the mostly low epicness story ...
 

Abu Antar

Turn-based Poster
Patron
Joined
Jan 19, 2014
Messages
13,514
Enjoy the Revolution! Another revolution around the sun that is. Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
The combat is nice, but the game has this barebone feel. Im after the cemetery fights[so beginning] and ive yet to see any skills used. It's move all people to one enemy->kill>attack next one and repeat. Do the game open up later? More skills, items, spells etc? So far the start is slow. Are all cities just this generic Battle Brothers type of one screen with interactions? This looks rather like Dungeon Rats type of game[dungeon crawler], rather than full fledged RPG.
It's a tactical rpg. It's not an rpg in the vein of the Drakensang games where exploration is a big part of the gameplay. It's combat focused and that's the main selling point of the game. You will unlock spells and abilities as you gain more levels. And I wouldn't say you can just play this without any planning your turns/actions. You'll soon learn that you'll get your butt kicked.
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7h30n

Augur
Joined
Aug 14, 2012
Messages
311
That create walls spell is the best spell in the game! Saved my life in countless battles.

I learned a lot about encounter design from this game and it translates really well to me DMing D&D as I don't have the time to craft detailed and large maps. This game really shows that you can with varied game objectives and simple tools craft interesting battle scenarios on a small to medium sized grid.
 

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