Divinity Divinity: Original Sin 2 - Definitive Edition

[Black]

Oh my god, I just read that

redditor Ulminati

Don't ever leave the Codex, kids

 

[Fairfax]

A common concept that I would consider foundational to the very concept of turn-based as an enjoyable way to play out key resolution mechanics is the ability to think ahead and act upon the perceived development of the landscape as it is (and by landscape, I don't just mean environment, I mean it in the widest possible meaning of the word).

In D:OS2, that's simply absent. Or at least it seems to have been lost as a key source of enjoyment, because it is practically impossible to plan ahead, because a single turn later, the landscape may be completely different than from when you ended your previous turn. And then it changes during your turn, but is immediately undone the next.

Great post, but I disagree here. I see where you're coming from, but I'd argue the round robin initiative doesn't make combat too unpredictable, it does the opposite, which is worse.

• The round-robin initiative and the armour system make elaborate plans and set-ups unreliable, but that seems to working as intended. You know for a fact you won't be able to stomp the enemies with an opening sequence, but that means it won't happen to you either. They killed creative set-ups in favour of making things less random and safer for the average player.
• The extremely weak defensive abilities, combined with the armour system, make sure there's no proper tank, a character who can manipulate and provoke enemies while soaking a ton of damage. This makes things easier for them to balance, since you don't have to take tanking into account for the better part of every encounter.
• They made accuracy naturally high or even guaranteed for everything. I think the strongest accuracy debuff is Blinded, which only reduces accuracy by 35% IIRC, but weapons and abilities give a ton of accuracy, so the hit probability remains high. I assume this is because the devs wanted to prevent players from crying about misses, which would also explain why Finesse doesn't increase dodge as it did in early access.
• The high accuracy also affected spell/skill design. In traditional RPGs, you have a lot of powerful attacks/spells that are hard to hit, have very limited uses, and sometimes can even backfire and hurt you and/or your companions. This makes combat more dynamic and interesting, because the turn/round-based nature with actual initiative rolls force players to take risks and adapt to the situation on the fly. This doesn't exist in D:OS2. Attacks and spells had to be reliable and consistent, so they couldn't be too strong. Their solution was to add cooldowns turn a bunch of high-level skills into generic multi-target/AoE attacks. The supposedly high-risk/high-reward skills are poorly designed, such as Death Wish and Last Rites.
• Armour blocks most forms of CC entirely and there's no damage reduction. This means you can always check your physical/magic armour and eliminate a ton of possible outcomes while planning your next move. With cooldowns, capped APs, and RR initiative, things are even more predictable.

Everything about the game's combat was designed to make options more reliable and the experience more consistent. As a result, whatever breaks or exploits these rules is significantly more useful and powerful, such as Rupture Tendons, Chicken Claw, Smoke Cover, and Summoning in general. Most of these exploits are actually fun, precisely because they deviate from the format they tried to enforce, and also because they are a glimpse of what could've been.

The heavy MMORPG influence has its psychological benefits with the average player, which certainly helped the game's reception and sales, but it'll hurt the game's legacy and its completion rate, and potentially alienate many of Larian's core fans.

 

[Eyestabber]

i know aboot all this, but for a while now i've been finding very few sticks to turn into shafts, gotta buy them all from merches

also i think i generally make little use of speshul arrows cuz my partay is more tilted towards physical domoges (rainjerk, roguey, wammo, airwater magus), which in turn means that i can't really use them much (cuz hurrdurr magical forcefields)

oh and also speaking of arrow craftung - that you can't immediately assemble a whole arrow from "shaft + arrowhead + elemental thingy" but instead have to do it in 2 steps is hhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnngggggggggggggggggggggggggggggg

Your party is similar to mine so, let's be honest: knockdown arrows are the only special arrows that really matter. And you're gonna go crazy (well, crazier) trying to find all the necessary junk for the craftung. Just wait until the second act and buy the arrows themselves from merchants. My main character is a ranger and I use knockdown arrows on most fights. With high barter you can buy them for like...not much.

As for your other point, yeah. Sucks that all the skills are limited to regular arrows. But if it wasn't then people would use barrage to knockdown 3 enemies at a time. Can you imagine how UNBALANCED that would be? Teh horror!

Side note: use the debloat mod, guise. It makes the itemization in this game a little less retarded. It's fucking amazing how Larian managed to turn "NICE, LEVEL UP! Time to get some new goodies" into "urgh...leveled up. Again. Time to ditch all my gear and frantically check merchant inventories for purples. Why do I keep doing this to myself?". THe mod doesn't "fix" the issue, but at least it will give you some extra milleage out of your [currentlvl-1] gear.

 

[toro]

This looks like a completely different game from what I've played.

The Lone Wolf's additional +2 AP(s) represent a huge advantage each round which means that a 2-members lone wolf party is always better than a 4-members regular party (!?) What the fuck.

I did not pay attention to this but I think this is the first time when I encounter such a design in a RPG or in a game for that matter.

Congratz to Ulminati

 

[Lacrymas]

I think it was said fairly early on that a solo or 2 lone wolves are better than a whole party.

 

[Freakydemon]

Can any one combine 's bobbing head with ?

I fucking hate fixing transparency artefacts so this'll be the best you're getting.

 

[AwesomeButton]

For 75 hours of gameplay, I've been subjected to more kisses, gentle hand touches, femmes fatales, flashing thighs with roses arranged on them, and misunderstood theory of bait-and-switch tactics (on the girl's side) than I've seen in my entire gaming career. And mind you, I've played through the likes of BGII and The Longest Journey without batting an eyelid.

I'm 75 hours in as well . And I haven't even flirted with anybody , aside from prince randomly offering me sex when I asked him about succubus . I have no idea how you people are doing this .

Maybe you are better at ignoring the dialogue than i am. Also, I'm playing as the red prince, so naturally, everyone wants to fuck me, lol.
You have no way out of a sticky episode if you enter the skull shaped cave on Joy island.

Hey, Kniles was a fag? I had no idea about that, where is it revealed? A twisted bad guy sadist being a fag is actually unexpected and counter-sjw when you come to think of it.

 

[dragonul09]

The itemization in this game is disgusting,you can't wear anything for more than 30 minutes and bam totally outdated.It's laughable,especially when they put those armor level gated sets in and they are complete garbage by the time you get them.
As soon as I level up it's over for me,I have to go change everything and this disgusts me to no end.

And gotta love finding my best items in a barrel through lucky charm,so much for fighting for good equipment.

 

[toro]

I think it was said fairly early on that a solo or 2 lone wolves are better than a whole party.

I know but I did not realize that the perk was granting additional APs. My bad.

 

[Eyestabber]

The itemization in this game is disgusting,you can't wear anything for more than 30 minutes and bam totally outdated.It's laughable,especially when they put those armor level gated sets in and they are complete garbage by the time you get them.
As soon as I level up it's over for me,I have to go change everything and this disgusts me to no end.

And gotta love finding my best items in a barrel through lucky charm,so much for fighting for good equipment.

Not to mention hunting down the pieces of the legendary armor of King Biguss Dickuss only to realize a generic "breastplate" you can buy from a prisoner lizard in a cave has better stats by virtue of being level 9 instead of 6. Such ...

 

[Immortal]

The itemization in this game is disgusting,you can't wear anything for more than 30 minutes and bam totally outdated.It's laughable,especially when they put those armor level gated sets in and they are complete garbage by the time you get them.
As soon as I level up it's over for me,I have to go change everything and this disgusts me to no end.

And gotta love finding my best items in a barrel through lucky charm,so much for fighting for good equipment.

Not to mention hunting down the pieces of the legendary armor of King Biguss Dickuss only to realize a generic "breastplate" you can buy from a prisoner lizard in a cave has better stats by virtue of being level 9 instead of 6. Such ...

How dare they give better armor later in the game!
Muh Braccus Armor must be the best armor foreverrrr!

 

[Murk]

The only thing that's really upsetting is the lack of a set bonus (unless there is one and I didn't realize it.) Would have been cool to be under permanent mend or steel heart or something else like that. Hell, even just a passive +1 to all stats and +10% life-steal.

Also, some-what related, the ring that curses you? If you just unequip and re-equip it, the negative effects are removed from your character screen but you still retain the curse icon + animation -- but accuracy/dodge/damage is fine.

Without a set bonus, should have just been something you trade can keep or trade for a source orb or something else like that.

edit: the more I read other people's woes about itemization, the more I think I either keep having a radically different game experience than others or that I have a very high tolerance for this issue. I don't mind checking merchant inventories after leveling up, but I don't have an urge or drive to either unless I'm interested in doing so separately. I also don't mind if I get lucky and get a purple armor off a random chest that beats my unique armor. In this game, uniques don't seem to be objectively great but rather pre-set, so I'm just taking it as it comes.

 

[dragonul09]

The itemization in this game is disgusting,you can't wear anything for more than 30 minutes and bam totally outdated.It's laughable,especially when they put those armor level gated sets in and they are complete garbage by the time you get them.
As soon as I level up it's over for me,I have to go change everything and this disgusts me to no end.

And gotta love finding my best items in a barrel through lucky charm,so much for fighting for good equipment.

Not to mention hunting down the pieces of the legendary armor of King Biguss Dickuss only to realize a generic "breastplate" you can buy from a prisoner lizard in a cave has better stats by virtue of being level 9 instead of 6. Such ...

How dare they give better armor later in the game!
Muh Braccus Armor must be the best armor foreverrrr!

The problem is that the armor becomes obsolete by the time you get it and has nothing going for it when compared with my uber set that I found in that perilous barrel.

 

[Darth Roxor]

How dare they give better armor later in the game!
Muh Braccus Armor must be the best armor foreverrrr!

yeah

1 hour later

 

[Immortal]

How dare they give better armor later in the game!
Muh Braccus Armor must be the best armor foreverrrr!

yeah

1 hour later

Nobody bitched about Itemization more than me - Swen didn't give a shit.

 

[dragonul09]

How dare they give better armor later in the game!
Muh Braccus Armor must be the best armor foreverrrr!

yeah

1 hour later

Nobody bitched about Itemization more than me - Swen didn't give a shit.

So you decided to turn around and bitch to us,wheres the logic in that?

 

[Immortal]

How dare they give better armor later in the game!
Muh Braccus Armor must be the best armor foreverrrr!

yeah

1 hour later

Nobody bitched about Itemization more than me - Swen didn't give a shit.

So you decided to turn around and bitch to us,wheres the logic in that?

It's fun..? Durrr

 

[Eyestabber]

How dare they give better armor later in the game!
Muh Braccus Armor must be the best armor foreverrrr!

yeah

1 hour later

One fucking hour?! Install that "faster run speed" mod, so your stuff can become obsolete every 30 minutes instead. Waiting an entire hour for another round of cheap gratification in 2017!? Smh...

 

[Stavrophore]

Hey, Kniles was a fag? I had no idea about that, where is it revealed? A twisted bad guy sadist being a fag is actually unexpected and counter-sjw when you come to think of it.

Actually prevalence of BDSM practices among LGBT is much higher than in normal population. So not that diff from truth

 

[Prime Junta]

Got bored again. Got that damn collar off and found Fane's mask, and now I just can't be arsed to care about it. Gonna prolly take a few days off this again before getting back to this.

Perhaps it's the Stygian demo, it was just way more interesting. (Combat's not as good though but eh.)

 

[Tigranes]

Got off the island. Alexander fight I thought would be incredibly difficult and fun... and then the big thing showed up and the retarded AI sat there ignoring me even as I killed them first. Sigh. I wonder if the early game curve is now over and the bloat mod & reduced Tactician armour makes the game too easy.

The story is banal shit boring, but I do feel that their moment to moment writing has genuinely improved - it's still got that Larian flavour while actually being a competent and coherent piece, instead of the ye olde "HA HA CHICKENS!!!!" or just becoming diluted into Bioware droning.

Itemisation is what it always was in Larian games: Diablo but not as good.

 

[dragonul09]

Got bored again. Got that damn collar off and found Fane's mask, and now I just can't be arsed to care about it. Gonna prolly take a few days off this again before getting back to this.

Perhaps it's the Stygian demo, it was just way more interesting. (Combat's not as good though but eh.)

The problem with the game is that there's nothing to give an arse about,I just killed everyone in Fort Joy, nobody gave a shit,killed almost everyone in Reaper's Coast,nobody gave a shit.So what's the point of playing this game? The story is absolute shite,the itemization is garbage,most quests are meaningless and the writing is still full of belgian humor which amounts to dirty sex and fart jokes.
I'm playing this shit because I don't have better things to do at the moment,but this is not a game I will ever replay,same with DoS 1.

People that gave this shit 9 and 10's are high on drudanae

 

[Grampy_Bone]

Wow I thought I was having fun but you guys convinced me I was having fun wrong. I'm going to go play a real RPG like Fallout 4 or Dragon Age Inquisition instead of this casual trash.

 

[Azarkon]

Their story writing has always been pretty shit. I do enjoy their faux medieval Belgian English, because it captures a flavor American writers rarely do, but on the whole, not a storyfag company.

 

[Mark Richard]

The itemization in this game is disgusting,you can't wear anything for more than 30 minutes and bam totally outdated.It's laughable,especially when they put those armor level gated sets in and they are complete garbage by the time you get them.
As soon as I level up it's over for me,I have to go change everything and this disgusts me to no end.

And gotta love finding my best items in a barrel through lucky charm,so much for fighting for good equipment.

More importantly it's impossible to remain fashionable under these conditions. A massive stock of invisibility potions can hide the mismatched garments, but they can't hide the shame.

On an unrelated note, I can't seem to craft an orange mocha frappuccino.