What should I know before starting PF:K?

[ItsChon]

I'm finally going to try to get into this game, can anyone give me a basic rundown of things I need to know, what classes are fun, and things I should watch for? Thanks, much appreciated.

 

[Bester]

The gnome is a traitor, better kill him immediately and report back how it affects the game.

 

[Delterius]

just play a sylvan sorcerer tbh

 

[Butter]

I've heard there are some very dangerous spiders early on. Best avoid them!

 

[Lord Commissar Alexer]

Keep your torches, you will need them.

 

[ItsChon]

Which Druid subclass lets you shapeshift a bunch? I've always wanted to play something like that.

 

[Jack Of Owls]

One of your companions is homosexual and will make a pass at you even though I don't think he has any genitals. What you do with this information in the privacy of your own computer chair is entirely up to you.

 

[Saxon1974]

Prepare for plenty of political correctness with the NPCs. One is very oppressed because she is beautiful...oh the horror but look out she can fight as well as any man. Another beat up her whole tribe of men and left.

 

[Deleted Member 16721]

Play on Challenging for the closest to Core Rules (maybe someone can help you more with that, I forget the fine details.) Don't worry about powergaming, just wing it and enjoy the ride, my man!

 

[razvedchiki]

Why is the core rules considered the correct way to play?havent see any such advice to no other crpg based in pnp rulesets.
Its all about players ego right?

 

[Trashos]

I have also started with PKM recently. If you are new to Pathfinder, I suggest that you keep your builds simple at this point, because there is a lot going on, and it is going to be confusing otherwise. So my suggestion for a good start is to pick a class that you won't multiclass.

Due to the available companions, I think you 'd be better off building a tank/off tank for you first tries. Sword Saint might be a good idea (although I have personally started with a Vivisectionist), but you 'll probably want to listen to more experienced people.

I am playing on Challenging, and this far (Ch2) it looks like this is the right difficulty for me to start with. I can move forward (with some reloading and some "I 'll get back to this later"), but I also have to gradually go deeper into the system to meet some great challenges I face. So I am learning as I go, and it is a good experience. The game is not easy for sure, but you can also change difficulty on the fly, so you 'll be fine.

 

[Fedora Master]

1. There is no pure-class Arcane spellcaster companion.
2. Valerie is a dumb bitch with a terrible class, turn her into a Kinetic Knight instead.
3. Time matters. Don't muck about too long. Always use camping supplies to reduce rest times.
4. Grease is your friend.
5. Delay Poison is the most important spell in the game, not even kidding.
6. Do companion quests even if you don't want to use them otherwise.

 

[Yosharian]

Which Druid subclass lets you shapeshift a bunch? I've always wanted to play something like that.

If you want to play a shapeshifter, any Arcane class that gets access to high level spells is fairly good, because Dragon Form III is insanely powerful.

Druid is actually not the best for shapeshifting in this game, unfortunately.

 

[deuxhero]

You'll want to grab Call of the Wild, Eldritch Arcana, Arcane Tide, Touch of Magic, Craft Magic Items, Vendor Progression, intro skip, UI extensions, and most importantly, Turn Based Combat+Closer to Tabletop

Which Druid subclass lets you shapeshift a bunch? I've always wanted to play something like that.

None of the subclasses buff wildshape, though Feyspeaker nerfs it. Sadly Goliath Druid was not included in this game.

Druid's main advantage in shapeshifting is the long duration (hours per druid level while Sorcerer/Wizard spells are typically six seconds per casting level) and their class is built for frontline combat (D8 HD and attack accuracy increasing at 3/4 level ups vs d6 and only increasing at half of level ups). Sorcerer/Wizard by contrast gets more variety and some more powerful ones (Druid gets really poor options for wildshape: Beast Shape is highly dependant upon getting pounce, which isn't available as soon as it should be (It should be first obtainable with Beastshape II) in Kingmaker (but in the game neither of the given options have pounce). I'm not sure if it's doable in Kingmaker, but the other option for making shapeshifting really awesome was to take something with a single, powerful, natural attack (Dire Hippo being the best, not sure if there's anything good enough allowed in this game) and stack as die size increases on it (Powerful Shape, Vital Strike, ect.) as possible because past a point it stops being meh +1.5 to average damage and starts becoming a huge increase.

If you want to focus on shapeshifting, note that in Pathfinder shapeshifting gives bonuses (and penalty in the case of dex when turning into something big) so you want to actually have ability scores conductive to melee combat in the first place.

 

[Urthor]

The companion wizards the game gives you have character sheets that are even more terrible than normal.

Make of this what you will.

 

[Citizen]

Alphabet, basic math, how to operate a PC and some experience with D&D cRPGs wouldn't hurt

 

[ItsChon]

You'll want to grab Call of the Wild, Eldritch Arcana, Arcane Tide, Touch of Magic, Craft Magic Items, Vendor Progression, intro skip, UI extensions, and most importantly, Turn Based Combat+Closer to Tabletop

These are all mods I take it? Simple to install?

None of the subclasses buff wildshape, though Feyspeaker nerfs it. Sadly Goliath Druid was not included in this game.

Druid's main advantage in shapeshifting is the long duration (hours per druid level while Sorcerer/Wizard spells are typically six seconds per casting level) and their class is built for frontline combat (D8 HD and attack accuracy increasing at 3/4 level ups vs d6 and only increasing at half of level ups). Sorcerer/Wizard by contrast gets more variety and some more powerful ones (Druid gets really poor options for wildshape: Beast Shape is highly dependant upon getting pounce, which isn't available as soon as it should be (It should be first obtainable with Beastshape II) in Kingmaker (but in the game neither of the given options have pounce). I'm not sure if it's doable in Kingmaker, but the other option for making shapeshifting really awesome was to take something with a single, powerful, natural attack (Dire Hippo being the best, not sure if there's anything good enough allowed in this game) and stack as die size increases on it (Powerful Shape, Vital Strike, ect.) as possible because past a point it stops being meh +1.5 to average damage and starts becoming a huge increase.

If you want to focus on shapeshifting, note that in Pathfinder shapeshifting gives bonuses (and penalty in the case of dex when turning into something big) so you want to actually have ability scores conductive to melee combat in the first place.

If you want to play a shapeshifter, any Arcane class that gets access to high level spells is fairly good, because Dragon Form III is insanely powerful.

Druid is actually not the best for shapeshifting in this game, unfortunately.

I'm honestly not too interested in the power level, as long as it's able to do game content. I just want to be able to shapeshift into various different animals ranging from super quick and nimble, to hulking, powerful tanks.

 

[Yosharian]

Yeah you say that but wait until you see the dragon form you can shift into.

And having different forms is useless, this ain't PnP

 

[GentlemanCthulhu]

What should I know before starting PF:K?

There is a chance you might encounter a rare but crippling and un-fixable bug that'll make it impossible to play the game. Look up stutter-bug on reddit. I highly suggest you pirate the game first, make sure it'll run fine on your system, and then buy it.

 

[PrK]

Why is the core rules considered the correct way to play?havent see any such advice to no other crpg based in pnp rulesets.
Its all about players ego right?

Does anyone play Baldur's Gate in any other difficulty?

 

[deuxhero]

You'll want to grab Call of the Wild, Eldritch Arcana, Arcane Tide, Touch of Magic, Craft Magic Items, Vendor Progression, intro skip, UI extensions, and most importantly, Turn Based Combat+Closer to Tabletop

These are all mods I take it? Simple to install?

Yes. Just grab Unity Mod Manager and install via that. Call of the Wild has some extra "features" like rebalancing skill points (for the worse) you'll want to disable, but that's as simple as pulling up the config files in a text editor.

You may also want Visual Adjustments (set your appearance independent of your equipment), Infinity Engine like Statistics page (keep track of your kill count, highest damage, ect.), and PlayerBiography (allows you to enter a bio page so you aren't treated to a blank space if a custom character is highlighted on the loading screen). These are all purely aesthetic, but add some nice options to the game.

 

[Delterius]

Why is the core rules considered the correct way to play?havent see any such advice to no other crpg based in pnp rulesets.
Its all about players ego right?

Not really, back in NwNs the 'Normal' difficulty removed friendly fire from all items and spells and back in the 2E games it became much more reasonable for a new-ish player to minimize rest spam (which trivializes the game at all difficulties) if they played at Core Rules. In a game like Kingmaker where time keeping is a central aspect of the game and where the base saving throws are already boosted due to party size -- not to mention the early release bugs that doubled said boosts -- then it becomes a matter of playstyle not to bloat the enemies' stats. Who knows, you might just want to play something other than the handful of builds which maximize efficiency at all times.

To me there's a special appeal in how, generally speaking, if I play a game based off PnP then odds are my level 4 sorcerer is pretty much the same as an enemy level 4 sorcerer. As opposed to homebrew RPG systems that distribute NPC only special rules like candy.

 

[jungl]

grease and summons are more useful tanking strategy then actual ac tank even more true on higher difficulties. Don't bother playing on challenging or higher difficulty. Its not interesting or adds anything new unless you like seeing enemies randomly crit one shot your guys.

Very few rpgs add different gameplay experience on higher difficulties now days even in the past it was rare. Valkyrie profile game I can think of top of my head where playing normal and hard mode are two vastly different experiences.

 

[PrettyDeadman]

Play as sylvan sorcerer yourself with a kitty pet.
Make undead elf into dog barbarian and give her a kitty pet.
Make sad dwarf into a druid and give him a kitty pet.
Make valerie into thug mong etc tank.

 

[drgames]

A complete playthrough takes 100+ hours.
If I recall correctly, the first 4 chapters are the funnier ones, after that it is a slowly but steady decline.
Do not understimate the kingdom management part of the game, focus on economy, and get spies, etc. ASAP.
Go to help the strong and indepedent lady THEN the not so good priest.
Custom companions can't be choosen ad advisor.
During the game, if you are not too careful you may lose some of your companions, and ,consequently, the role they managed in your barony.
At the beginning, do not choose as advisor the nameless one. I would suggest you to choose the lady.