Review NWN 2 review extravaganza

[Faustus]

As for a better, realistic, dynamic yet simple combat system I would suggest this (zipped PDF - thanks HigherGame)

An excerpt...

The Riddle of Steel was first conceived after
Jake Norwood discovered it was possible to throw
yourself over a hundred-foot-cliff, get up, and run
away with seven arrows sticking out of you – as
long as you were a high-level fighter in a certain
well-known fantasy game.

 

[Zomg]

What do you mean by set-piecey, Zomg? I don't suppose you could describe the encounter somewhat, could you? Perhaps I gave up on this game too soon. I could forgive its short comings if combat was challenging and there was more to it other than spam fireball while the AI runs around stupidly.

Eh, it was a passing thing. This spoils something either near the end of the first act or at the beginning of the second act:

There's a forest location where magic is disabled, and any effects you get from potions or the like get dispelled off of you in short order. I believe you are forced to have a wizard with you at this point, or at least it's a good idea for a plot reason. At a certain point there's a fight with two werewolves and three or so other things at the same time in an enclosed space with no realistic means of retreat. It's a tough fight if you don't know about it beforehand and aren't messing around with crafting or hoarding magic weapons, and you have to consider placement, target priority, etc. I think that was the last thing I did before play stoppage one evening and since that part of the game is good in general (the trial stuff) I got a little overly enthusiastic at my "Sawyer made the rast of the game goud u guyz!!" hope/theory.

After that, I can think of a handful of fights that aren't strictly "watch the AI pinball around killing things, buff occasionally".

 

[Volourn]

LOL You thoguht the werewolves were a tough fight? HAHAHAHAHAHAHA! You suck!!!

 

[kris]

Of course I'm from the old guard where a trying to convince an NPC of something in character is more fun than 'I use my diplomacy- I rolled a 17'.

I always liked a combination. with no roll in any way it is all up to the DM to decide. I like to have people say it and then it is about as difficult as I think it should be after how good it was, if you are getting what I am meaning. Still both subjective and random, but less of the randomness and the character skill is taken into account.

spoiler warning for same scene as Zomg.

It can be though depending on which party you have. first time I fought it it was a breeze, the second time I only had two people up standing by end of it. the mistake you can do is focusing on the werewolves, they don't hit you hard, but can take a lot of damage (plus heal themselves), the dire wolves on the other hand can't take much damage but dish out quite a bit. so my mistake in the second try was to focus on the wrong targets first.

 

[Lomer]

I had only one party member standing at the end of this particular battle. It was Khelgar at 10% health against the 2 werewolves. Then I remembered of the silver weapon I have found long time ago, equipped the dwarf with it and the lycanthropes were dead in 10-15 seconds (and I am playing at ‘very hard” difficulty settings and rarely use the puppet mode). So the battle is easy, if you use some simple resources (everybody will find at least one silver weapon by that point).