KickStarter Knights of the Chalice 2 Thread - Augury of Chaos

[Tweed]

Ok, another update.

My wizard bros are lvl 11 (chaos and acid fog), atm banking xp. Can level em to 15 but hoarding xp so i can transform em all at one occasion. Everything dies to massive aoe and magic missile.
Oh and magic missile feats are bugged, you do not get the 6th and 7th missile on 11 and 13th lvl.
Got 1 group of those tentacle douchebags left, queen sattram and death snare.
Any advice on last room in death snare?

Wall in the mastermind and either dominate or chaos the rest and probably summon some stuff, you need the room to be preoccupied before the demon shows up. Not sure how pure magic is going to do on him, he's very resistant and nearly impossible to hit without true seeing/true strike. He'll always open up with an SLA fear attack.

 

[Tweed]

felipepepe No? Why no?

 

[cruelio]

who is Asharzaelle and how did i miss them

 

[Tweed]

who is Asharzaelle and how did i miss them

That's the paladin slut, she's a statue in the hag room you have to free her and then you have to sink a bunch of healing and a level restore on her. Even then she won't join you unless you free all the other statues. She's a money pit and a succubus slut.

 

[felipepepe]

felipepepe No? Why no?

I was on the phone and misscliked, sorry

 

[NJClaw]

who is Asharzaelle and how did i miss them

To free her you either need to defeat the crones or give them the book.

 

[Iluvcheezcake]

How concerned should we be with Pierre getting rid of his QA guy?

Not suprised tbh, considering Pierre.

 

[Tacgnol]

Just noticed Rpgguy stopped posting in this thread since he was mocked for suggesting savescumming till you had perfect luck was a valid and legit tactic for beating hard fights.

Concerning that guy seems to be someone Pierre listens to.

 

[NJClaw]

Just noticed Rpgguy stopped posting in this thread since he was mocked for suggesting savescumming till you had perfect luck was a valid and legit tactic for beating hard fights.

Concerning that guy seems to be someone Pierre listens to.

He probably has been savescumming uninterruptedly for the last few days trying to beat the gate encounter with an unoptimized party.

 

[The Red Knight]

Some credits excerpts:

 

[Mortmal]

How concerned should we be with Pierre getting rid of his QA guy?

He wasnt his QA guy, he was doing QA and help promote the game for free, if youa re talking about zappastuff. Nothing more concerning than usual given the game in his current state is enjoyable to only a few people.Tbh nothing can be more concerning than giving cheat options to solve balance issues.

 

[Tacgnol]

How concerned should we be with Pierre getting rid of his QA guy?

He wasnt his QA guy, he was doing QA and help promote the game for free, if youa re talking about zappastuff. Nothing more concerning than usual given the game in his current state is enjoyable to only a few people.Tbh nothing can be more concerning than giving cheat options to solve balance issues.

It doesn't help the official discord is full of sycophants who think everything is fine.

 

[Darth Canoli]

He wasnt his QA guy, he was doing QA and help promote the game for free, if youa re talking about zappastuff. Nothing more concerning than usual given the game in his current state is enjoyable to only a few people.Tbh nothing can be more concerning than giving cheat options to solve balance issues.

It's not cheat options, just difficulty settings, a lot of games have those, like Dark Sun ...
Besides, the game is way more fun if you get more feats so your build is more flexible.
A lot of feats aren't tied to one type of weapon like attack focus and improve crit, which is also great.

Regarding balance issues, the game is tough but what made it slip on the dark side is mostly the attributes starvation, with a ToEE character roll, you can get a powerful party to face the challenge.

If you take some time to look at the monsters in-game, you'll notice there is no stat inflation like in Kingmaker.
Of course, some legendary monsters like the hydra or the ice demon have high STR but nothing over the top considering and they have "plenty" of weaknesses.

Just grow a pair or play BG 3, it'll be balanced alright, i can guarantee it.

 

[Tacgnol]

He wasnt his QA guy, he was doing QA and help promote the game for free, if youa re talking about zappastuff. Nothing more concerning than usual given the game in his current state is enjoyable to only a few people.Tbh nothing can be more concerning than giving cheat options to solve balance issues.

It's not cheat options, just difficulty settings, a lot of games have those, like Dark Sun ...
Besides, the game is way more fun if you get more feats so your build is more flexible.
A lot of feats aren't tied to one type of weapon like attack focus and improve crit, which is also great.

Regarding balance issues, the game is tough but what made it slip on the dark side is mostly the attributes starvation, with a ToEE character roll, you can get a powerful party to face the challenge.

If you take some time to look at the monsters in-game, you'll notice there is no stat inflation like in Kingmaker.
Of course, some legendary monsters like the hydra or the ice demon have high STR but nothing over the top considering and they have "plenty" of weaknesses.

Just grow a pair or play BG 3, it'll be balanced alright, i can guarantee it.

 

[Iluvcheezcake]

How concerned should we be with Pierre getting rid of his QA guy?

He wasnt his QA guy, he was doing QA and help promote the game for free, if youa re talking about zappastuff. Nothing more concerning than usual given the game in his current state is enjoyable to only a few people.Tbh nothing can be more concerning than giving cheat options to solve balance issues.

It doesn't help the official discord is full of sycophants who think everything is fine.

As far as I can see there are just a couple of guys on discord, and most of em do not think everything is fine

 

[Tacgnol]

How concerned should we be with Pierre getting rid of his QA guy?

He wasnt his QA guy, he was doing QA and help promote the game for free, if youa re talking about zappastuff. Nothing more concerning than usual given the game in his current state is enjoyable to only a few people.Tbh nothing can be more concerning than giving cheat options to solve balance issues.

It doesn't help the official discord is full of sycophants who think everything is fine.

As far as I can see there are just a couple of guys on discord, and most of em do not think everything is fine

Yep in fairness it does look a little bit better on there the last few days, so maybe there is some hope from the feedback angle.

It was worse on there a week ago. Maybe some of the defenders destroyed their keyboards in a rage?

 

[Darth Canoli]

I think i'll suggest Pierre to add a score system if it's not there already or to use the steam points leaderboard and every option making the game easier reduces the score.

I'm 100% certain it'll change everyone's perception, hardcore players will be happy to get a higher score multiplier than the pleb and will actually get higher scores to gloat.

And the weaklings will still be able to complete the game but their score will reflect their worth.

And everyone will be happy...

 

[NJClaw]

Regarding balance issues, the game is tough but what made it slip on the dark side is mostly the attributes starvation, with a ToEE character roll, you can get a powerful party to face the challenge.

What made it "slip on the dark side" is definitely not attributes starvation, but the fact that all of the most "difficult" encounters consist of a very challenging and interesting set of monsters PLUS a single enemy that can one-shot your entire party with a single action. If you lose the initiative to those particular enemies, your only chance of survival is hoping that they decide not to use said one-shotting actions.

Because if they do, you have to reload.

 

[Tacgnol]

Regarding balance issues, the game is tough but what made it slip on the dark side is mostly the attributes starvation, with a ToEE character roll, you can get a powerful party to face the challenge.

What made it "slip on the dark side" is definitely not attributes starvation, but the fact that all of the most "difficult" encounters consist of a very challenging and interesting set of monsters PLUS a single enemy that can one-shot your entire party with a single action. If you lose the initiative to those particular enemies, your only chance of survival is hoping that they decide not to use said one-shotting actions.

I've never known a game so keen on surprise rounds. On the tabletop even the harshest GM would normally give every PC a perception check so they can at least have a chance to act in the surprise round.

Surprise rounds combined with standard actions that can murder the entire party are not particularly pleasant.

Even when you don't have surprise rounds, so many enemies have stupidly high initiative bonuses.

 

[Darth Canoli]

What made it "slip on the dark side" is definitely not attributes starvation, but the fact that all of the most "difficult" encounters consist of a very challenging and interesting set of monsters PLUS a single enemy that can one-shot your entire party with a single action. If you lose the initiative to those particular enemies, your only chance of survival is hoping that they decide not to use said one-shotting actions.

Which ones can do that, didn't get any yet but i didn't go farther than beating Pizzara in chapter 3?

The Djinn from chapter 2 can only KO one weak character, maybe two if he's lucky and you didn't invest into CON.
The Hydra doesn't wipe out your party in one go either, maybe 2/3 turns if you let her.
The Gob King is in his room south and can't wipe anything out until turn 2/3 if you put someone in from of him to get nuked.

 

[NJClaw]

Regarding balance issues, the game is tough but what made it slip on the dark side is mostly the attributes starvation, with a ToEE character roll, you can get a powerful party to face the challenge.

What made it "slip on the dark side" is definitely not attributes starvation, but the fact that all of the most "difficult" encounters consist of a very challenging and interesting set of monsters PLUS a single enemy that can one-shot your entire party with a single action. If you lose the initiative to those particular enemies, your only chance of survival is hoping that they decide not to use said one-shotting actions.

I've never known a game so keen on surprise rounds. On the tabletop even the harshest GM would normally give every PC a perception check so they can at least have a chance to act in the surprise round.

Surprise rounds combined with standard actions that can murder the entire party are not particularly pleasant.

Even when you don't have surprise rounds, so many enemies have stupidly high initiative bonuses.

In my opinion, the worst offender is the spider queen encounter, where the initiative system doesn't even work properly: the queen and her goons just get added to the fight, without a proper adjustment of current initiatives. This means that, depending on when she enters the fight, you might want her to roll an higher initiative so that she won't act on the current round. Enemies with lower initiative scores that act before other enemies with an higher score doesn't really make any sense.

 

[NJClaw]

What made it "slip on the dark side" is definitely not attributes starvation, but the fact that all of the most "difficult" encounters consist of a very challenging and interesting set of monsters PLUS a single enemy that can one-shot your entire party with a single action. If you lose the initiative to those particular enemies, your only chance of survival is hoping that they decide not to use said one-shotting actions.

Which ones can do that, didn't get any yet but i didn't go farther than beating Pizzara in chapter 3.

The Djinn from chapter 2 can only KO one weak character, maybe two if he's lucky and you didn't invest into CON.
The Hydra doesn't wipe out your party in one go either, maybe 2/3 turns if you let her.
The Gob King is in his room south and can't wipe anything out until turn 2/3 if you put someone in from of him to get nuked.

The fire salamander in the lava room in chapter 2 has a fireball that deals something around 60 damage.

Let's put it this way: even with the perfect knowledge of the encounters in chapters 1 and 2 that you should have by now, start a new game in ironman mode and tell me where you end up dying. I don't see how you can survive the first Pizarra fight with unlucky initiative rolls, or even the underwater lizardmen encounter.

 

[Darth Canoli]

I've never known a game so keen on surprise rounds. On the tabletop even the harshest GM would normally give every PC a perception check so they can at least have a chance to act in the surprise round.

Surprise rounds combined with standard actions that can murder the entire party are not particularly pleasant.

Even when you don't have surprise rounds, so many enemies have stupidly high initiative bonuses.

I agree but if you have a variety of classes and races, YOU get the surprise rounds most of the time.

In my opinion, the worst offender is the spider queen encounter, where the initiative system doesn't even work properly: the queen and her goons just get added to the fight, without a proper adjustment of current initiatives. This means that, depending on when she enters the fight, you might want her to roll an higher initiative so that she won't act on the current round. Enemies with lower initiative scores that act before other enemies with an higher score doesn't really make any sense.

Can't talk about this one but from reading this and that, it seems that at the very least, you can delay it by a lot, is it even a mandatory fight ?

The fire salamander in the lava room in chapter 2 has a fireball that deals something around 60 damage.

Let's put it this way: even with the perfect knowledge of the encounters in chapters 1 and 2 that you should have by now, start a new game in ironman mode and tell me where you end up dying. I don't see how you can survive the first Pizarra fight with unlucky initiative rolls, or even the underwater lizardmen encounter.

60 ? Is it not more like 10-60 damage ? It'd be 35 on average.
The Salamander doesn't even have a high initiative, a simple silence spell and the fight is over.

Lizardmen ? The sharkman druid you mean ? This one is tough but optional and the rewards aren't even that great but i didn't find the extra rewards after decoding the message yet so you never know.

About chapter 1 Pizarra, i only did it twice and won them both, stomp, summon, cleave some improve initiative here and there, it was nothing special (and optional as well).

If every fight can be won by any team, even when they all roll 1 initiative, the game would be worthless.
Luckily, it's not the case.

 

[Tacgnol]

I agree but if you have a variety of classes and races, YOU get the surprise rounds most of the time.

A lot of them seem to be gated behind having specific companions at certain times. Not that I necessarily disagree with those kinds of checks, but alternatives that make use of your party would be nice on occasion.

 

[The Red Knight]

Spidey queen uses CHARACTER INITIATIVE ROLL from this:

But it could have been a misclick or forgetting to change to one of the other two options (unlikely with Pierre's stance on encounter difficulty but otherwise likely for human beings if you don't check the scripts or playtest enough, as the current option's change doesn't update in the Script Command box until you switch to another changeable option or click the next/previous button):

And I'm not sure why this script exists in addition to the above one:

As it seems to be a more limited version of it that offers nothing the above one doesn't, that nonetheless gets used too in at least one encounter. Plus it's also available as some backup in the script adding the queen (it's after the script-ending command so it has no in-game effect - but if it's some obsolete command why leave it in the script that got the upgraded one?).