ELEX ELEX II - Jax is back

[Darth Roxor]

i am now resolving each fight by the following winning formula:

roll back -> speshul attack forward -> repeat previous two steps until nigga runs out of stamina -> coup de grace -> repeat process until desired effect is achieved

of course two problems with this winning formula are that the hitbox on the speshul attack is rather floaty (lags don't help either) and that jakusu loves to get stuck on every single fucking prop he rolls into

i cant even with this dumbass combat

 

[lukaszek]

when you do special air attacks enemies go nuts and start equipping bows even in melee range with you on the ground. Even when you keep slashing them. It doesnt interrupt draw bow animation or anything like it. Normally enemies switch to melee when you get in range


Any one noticed quest density for various factions? In zerkers territory almost every npc is named and got quest for you. Meanwhile you can run around outlaws and there would be close to nothing.

 

[TripJack]

mid-air ranged doesn't even work well
90% of the time the enemies just run directly below where you're floating in the air and you can't shoot them because the game doesn't let you aim directly down

sounds like brilliant tactical positioning on the AI’s part

 

[notpl]

So what's magic like in this one?

 

[Jinn]

i am now resolving each fight by the following winning formula:

roll back -> speshul attack forward -> repeat previous two steps until nigga runs out of stamina -> coup de grace -> repeat process until desired effect is achieved

Absolutely moronic that this kind of cheese is available in the game, but I actually tried doing this and it was annoying and stupid looking enough that I just stopped. I rarely used rolling in the first game for the same reason.

There's no excuse for them to design their combat this way, but I tend to have a better time utilizing roll only in the most dire situation, and relying on parry/counter attack to drain stamina. Also, someone should record a video of them doing this rolling tactic with a slightly higher level enemy so we can post it in their discord for negative feedback.

Meanwhile you can run around outlaws and there would be close to nothing.

Probably because Outlaws are a minor faction, I would guess. I know there's supposed to be a shit ton of sidequests in the game from Hellion's review stating he had an 80 hour playthrough with a fair amount of sidequests left undone.

 

[Darth Roxor]

relying on parry/counter attack to drain stamina.

i would rely on this if it weren't so unreliable

I dunno, maybe it's my lag influencing this, but I find the window of opportunity for parrying so stupidly narrow that I never get it right - and it's only worse with the generally stupid attack animations. Out of a hundred tries I may have gotten it to work maybe three times, and one of those didn't even knock the enemy off balance - instead it let me avoid the damage of one attack and then eat the second one that followed which killed me.

Any one noticed quest density for various factions? In zerkers territory almost every npc is named and got quest for you. Meanwhile you can run around outlaws and there would be close to nothing.

Cleric outpost has like 3 or 4.

 

[lukaszek]

i would rely on this if it weren't so unreliable

I dunno, maybe it's my lag influencing this, but I find the window of opportunity for parrying so stupidly narrow that I never get it right - and it's only worse with the generally stupid attack animations. Out of a hundred tries I may have gotten it to work maybe three times, and one of those didn't even knock the enemy off balance - instead it let me avoid the damage of one attack and then eat the second one that followed which killed me.

its especially annoying against slow 2hander attacks. Enemy is already in full swing, parry/tackle/whatever that is does nothing. You need to execute it at the very end of enemy swing.

Or you know... just get out of range. Which is what Im doing

 

[Jinn]

I dunno, maybe it's my lag influencing this, but I find the window of opportunity for parrying so stupidly narrow that I never get it right

It could very well be the lag, if it's that severe on your end. Which isn't your fault, of course.

I would say I get a successful parry/counter attack in 2/3-3/4s of the time. Which is good. I'm glad I can't reliably read exactly what's coming every time, or manage to lose track of how much stamina I have left and flail as a result. Playing melee this way has made the combat a lot more fun in general for me, and mixing in some low-tech ranged helps spice things up too.

Anyway, sucks that's the way you've had to find to play it. Doubly sucks that the combat is flawed enough to introduce such problems in the first place. Rolling dodge should have never been in a thing in PB games. A more precise and fallible side-step and back-step would fit the whole design much better, and I guess that's just how defaulted into playing it myself.

 

[Darth Roxor]

Anyway, sucks that's the way you've had to find to play it.

I don't really have to play it that way, and I don't think I will - as you also observed, this is just patently retarded and not at all fun. I bashed through a few jackals and skinless mutants (whatever they are called in inglese) that way and I think I've had enough.

What disappointed me a little was making it to the cleric outpost and finding that it has p. much no opportunities for growth. I really, really didn't want to go to the Fort (which is the closest) and start with the Berserkers again and the Morkons just look kind of retarded so I figured I'll try to get over to the Albs. I found the clerics along the way and thought 'oh cool time to hulk the fuck up', but all I got there was 2 levels in melee combat and das it, off you go into the wilderness again Roxorowski. So my plan B was to get to the Outlaws and maybe hulk the fuck up there, but now I read there are almost no quests there either. So I guess I'll have to sprint to Albtown (wherever it is) while avoiding everything along the way, but my autism declares open rebellion when faced even with thoughts like that alone.

 

[Jinn]

What disappointed me a little was making it to the cleric outpost and finding that it has p. much no opportunities for growth. I really, really didn't want to go to the Fort (which is the closest) and start with the Berserkers again and the Morkons just look kind of retarded so I figured I'll try to get over to the Albs. I found the clerics along the way and thought 'oh cool time to hulk the fuck up', but all I got there was 2 levels in melee combat and das it, off you go into the wilderness again Roxorowski. So my plan B was to get to the Outlaws and maybe hulk the fuck up there, but now I read there are almost no quests there either. So I guess I'll have to sprint to Albtown (wherever it is) while avoiding everything along the way, but my autism declares open rebellion when faced even with only thoughts like that.

Yeah, I understand that. As a fan of the Berserkers, it wasn't a problem for me, and I was happy to find a bit more depth than I expected in what's actually going on with the Berserkers in Tavar. I agree the Morkons look kind of retarded too, but I do need to get to their fort and see what their faction is all about. If I end up replaying this game 3 times in the future, it's probably going to go Berserkers -> Albs -> Morkons for faction choices. I appreciate they left the weakened factions in for some additional character building options and world building, but I know it's going to disappoint a lot of people who really liked them, think they're going to be able to devote themselves to them as a full faction, and find that they are merely side-factions.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Morkons are just retarded evil clerics.

 

[Crispy]

This is actually the first computer game in a LONG time that, if I play it for more than an hour, gives me motion sickness.

 

[Darth Roxor]

I appreciate they left the weakened factions in for some additional character building options and world building, but I know it's going to disappoint a lot of people who really liked them, think they're going to be able to devote themselves to them as a full faction, and find that they are merely side-factions.

The disappointment for me wasn't that the clerics are a minor faction (I knew it would be the case) but that their outpost doesn't have enough questing material to take you up a notch. When I play a PB game and I see civilisation, I expect that I'll be staying there for a while picking turnips.

 

[notpl]

So just to confirm, the "5 factions (with a secret 6th)" thing was a total lie, right? There's three factions, same as ever, and then two irrelevant ones and the enemy faction?

 

[Hellion]

During my playthrough I remember returning to factions' outposts as I progressed further through the chapters of the main storyline in order to do more quests there. So what you see during the 1st chapter might not really be indicative of all the stuff there is to do at each location.

 

[lukaszek]

So my plan B was to get to the Outlaws and maybe hulk the fuck up there, but now I read there are almost no quests there either.

there is hidden outlaw faction

 

[Darth Roxor]

So just to confirm, the "5 factions (with a secret 6th)" thing was a total lie, right? There's three factions, same as ever, and then two irrelevant ones and the enemy faction?

The secret sixth might just mean going unaligned, since it's an option now.

 

[Darth Roxor]

Also re this:

there's a bug with shadows on buildings, you can see it in roxor's screenshot here:

I don't know if this particular thing happens for others, but Roxor's screenshots shouldn't be taken as representative of the game, because I keep experimenting with shit I find in the .ini files all the time.

For example I think I confirmed Tacgnol's suspicion that my 'memory leaks' are caused by a cached buggy shader, because each time I get that crap, I set the "Shadows" value in the ConfigUser to "Off" (which isn't possible to do via the in-game options) and everything works again. And if you compare the list of stuff for Off and Low in ConfigDefault:

Spoiler

<Shadows
<Off
TerrainShadowMapSize="512"
TerrainShadowMapMaxDistance="400000.0"
TerrainShadowMapCount="3"
SmallObjectThreshold="0.100000"
SmallObjectFadeRange="0.020000"
ShadowDepthBias="0.999985"
SSAOQuality="0"
EnableShadows="false"
DetailShadowMapViewRange="3500.000000"
DetailShadowMapSplitFactor="0.65000"
DetailShadowMapSize="512"
DetailShadowMapOcclusionSize="64"
DetailShadowMapNearSplitFactorOverwrite="0.000000"
DetailShadowMapFixedFoV="65.000000"
DetailShadowMapFilterQuality="0"
DetailShadowMapCount="2"
CachedShadowMapWidth="0"
CachedShadowMapQuality="2"
CachedShadowMapNodeWidth="0"
CachedShadowMapNodeHeight="0"
CachedShadowMapLevelSizeRatio="1000.0f"
CachedShadowMapLevelDistanceRatio="1.5f"
CachedShadowMapLevelCount="4"
CachedShadowMapHeight="0"
/>
<Low
TerrainShadowMapSize="512"
TerrainShadowMapMaxDistance="200000.0"
TerrainShadowMapCount="2"
SmallObjectThreshold="0.100000"
SmallObjectFadeRange="0.050000"
ShadowDepthBias="6.0"
SSAOQuality="1"
EnableShadows="true"
DetailShadowMapViewRange="7500.0"
DetailShadowMapSplitFactor="0.2"
DetailShadowMapSize="512"
DetailShadowMapFixedFoV="60"
DetailShadowMapFilterQuality="1"
DetailShadowMapCount="4"
CachedShadowMapWidth="4096"
CachedShadowMapQuality="0"
CachedShadowMapNodeWidth="8"
CachedShadowMapNodeHeight="4"
CachedShadowMapLevelSizeRatio="2000.0f"
CachedShadowMapLevelDistanceRatio="1.0f"
CachedShadowMapLevelCount="4"
CachedShadowMapHeight="2048"

Setting it to 'off' seems to clear the cache (or rather, it makes nothing get cached to begin with).

Also interestingly enough I still get shadows despite the EnableShadows="false" line.

 

[lukaszek]

So just to confirm, the "5 factions (with a secret 6th)" thing was a total lie, right? There's three factions, same as ever, and then two irrelevant ones and the enemy faction?

The secret sixth might just mean going unaligned, since it's an option now.

i didnt go that far since it requires some higher level thievery, but I think there is hidden outlaw within outlaw thing

 

[The_Mask]

Average Joe take:



"euro charm"

 

[Smerlus]

It sucks that Elex came put so long ago I keep getting dialog options saying the PC remembers the character but I don't remember shit about hardly any of these characters.

Other than that I'm enjoying the game. Going around mopping up quests and killing creatures all over. I thought it was a nice touch that initiating dialogue to the boss of the cultivators gets her pissed off. I don't like how killing rats adds destruction but whatever.

 

[Maggot]

What's you guys opinion on Melee vs. Dakka?

I usually find Melee more rewarding, but I'm not at the point yet where floating-melee becomes possible (or even necessary?).

Having second thoughts on whether I'd enjoy that.

It's trivial to do, Jax automatically zooms to the target with his jetpack with every swing.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

"bows, crossbows, and harpoons"
uses bullets as an icon
quality!

just realized there's no bullets in the entire game :D

 

[Tacgnol]

For example I think I confirmed Tacgnol's suspicion that my 'memory leaks' are caused by a cached buggy shader, because each time I get that crap, I set the "Shadows" value in the ConfigUser to "Off" (which isn't possible to do via the in-game options) and everything works again. And if you compare the list of stuff for Off and Low in ConfigDefault:

Amusing thing is they fixed the G3 shader cache issue well over a decade ago, and I hadn't seen the bug in any other Genome engine games.

If this is a partial cause of many issues, they've somehow managed to revive an approx 15 year old bug in their engine.

 

[Darth Roxor]

If this is a partial cause of many issues, they've somehow managed to revive an approx 15 year old bug in their engine.

it's just that patented piranha bytes brand of recycling