Pillars of Eternity Beta Discussion [GAME RELEASED, GO TO NEW THREAD]

JES solved the 'resting after every encounter exploit' by making this option so obnoxious to use that most people will prefer to stop playing the game altogether instead of resorting to it.

Another success to mark on the list of improvements over IE games.

 

In before Town Portal mod.

 

Heh.

Worst part is most of the time I have to go back because one of my character is really screwed with Health, even though I got plenty spells/abilities left for that "adventuring day".

Apparently I'm expected to split damage among the entire group, I just cannot wrap my head around not trying to keep mobs locked down by my two tanks in supra heavy armor and shield, and instead send my mage and cleric in padded armor to take the brunt of the damage.

Anyway, rambling!

 

You should probably just switch the armor and weapon on characters - give the melee weapon and plate to the current tank (i.e. the character with the most healt at the moment).

Although, now that I think of it, this does make the game being less about tactical class-based combat and more about tactical equipment-based combat, as the flesh inside the armor is interchangeable.

 

Instead of trying to split oncoming damage, just use crowd control attacks and debuffs. Wizard/rogue type squishies really go down quick if enemy focuses on them which lefts you with only tankers.

 

That's what I'm doing, it's very rare that anyone but my main tanks take much stamina damage (they got so high DT now and class based stamina regen) but they still do take some damage to Health, which makes them die from thousands paper cuts at the end of the day (well that and crazy poisons/petrify/whatever).
And I got some nice damage dealing potential, but you gotta realize, most spells are affected by DT and can very easily miss since they use the exact same system as attacking in melee or range (ACC vs DEFs/DT/etc).

edit:
But wtf am I saying!
The problem is not the difficulty of fights, it's me having to zone/load/zone/load back to the inn to rest, then zone/load/zone/load all the way back

 

New Episode of Sensuki vs The Beatles



720p and 1080p should be done in 5-10 mins

Keep forgetting to use the Fighter and Rogue modals, laf.

 

There is one camping supplies for sale at one of the vendors in town (he's in a building, not the inn and not the tanner, name starts with a W). There is another under the tower just before you come to the beetles down there. Don't know if it is fixed now, but I found that picking up/buying camp supplies while you are maxed (3 on hard) would just take one from you

I thought supplies would just fill back up on town visit, or a rest at an inn. Can't imagine them sticking with a finite number available considering, as you say, inns are always there. Just makes for tedious map hopping.

 

Welcome to the future of gaming

This can be easly solved by giving some inns supplying you more, or characters with survival skill seldom finds supplys while you rest. (depends on the map ofc)
Or by town portal/ beacon type spells

 

Can anyone tell me in which page the drama impressions start?

 

TBH I was looking forward to Rest Locations rather than a resource. KotC style. Shame they changed it.

 

Aside from changing the stamina-health ratio as Sensuki suggested, I think it would help there was some middle ground between resting and spamming healing potions. For the moment, the best I can think of is some type of bandage with a......cooldown. Outside of that, maybe put limited rest locations back in.

 

Or you can just ask they to rip off learn from 4E and use healing surges and the mechanics dealing with it which I going to totally do for my game.
It still make healing potions viable and help increase the amount of encounters you can do before every rest.

 

They just need to put some "free" resting locations in wilderness, like campfires or cabins. Maybe make them usable once per day/week to avoid people spamming rest. (why? balace of course)
Edit: Or healing potions that are really rare?? Dunno if this is against lore.

 

JE always talks about IE games being too difficult for new/casual users, because there are a lot of exceptions in the mechanics. But from what I have seen from PoE so far, it's outright newbie-unfriendly.

In BG you could just click on an enemy and only interfere (pause) when something went wrong. PoE plays like a turn-based game, in that you, the player, has to initiate each and every action. Spam that space bar!

 

Oh, it's gonna be easily solved: an easy to use batch file that automatically edits the campaign supplies in my quicksave file to the max value.

 

am I too late for teh draw?

 

Thanks.

It's often hard to understand the reasoning behind a lot of stuff, because it's so very gamey. There is hardly a link between the system in Josh's head and what we see on the screen.

The only thing that seems consistent is the DPS.

 

Some impressions from briefly playing the updated beta:

Character and creature models stand out much better from the environment, though there's still room for improvement. Models being obscured by the environment or SFX is still an issue, however. Combat in general seems a bit weightier/slower.

Pathfinding is hugely improved. I played around with it at the narrowest passages I could find and was surprised at how intelligently the characters navigated.

Not sure if footstep sounds were in the previous build, but I am noticing them now - there are different sounds for different surfaces, as well. They don't factor in the stealth system obviously - perhaps an idea for PoE 2?

 

Infinitron
Fascinating rationale when Josh often chooses to use pretentious dorkwords to describe all sorts of other things.

 

Pathfinding does an even worse job taking units into account though

 

You also use spells too sparingly, probably an IE habit. And your spell choices are not optimal (minoleta spam). PoE spell levels are all more effective, level 1 heal isn't that worse than level 3 heal. You know beetles are tougher than, say, wolves or drakes or adventuring party near egg (if you intimidate 2 of them), so might as well cast +armor, circle of protection, healing circle, and so on. Fighter's knockdown too.

When I clean beetles I pull next group of mobs before my buffs from first fight run out, saves me some spells.

You also would have much better equipment if you killed a few idiots in village, like party you spawn near, there's an arquebus on one of them I think.