Obsidian's Pillars of Eternity [BETA RELEASED, GO TO THE NEW THREAD]

[Cosmo]

Exactly. Wouldn't that be cool ?

 

[logrus]

Hmm... I did solo run of IWD2 and while I gained not so much XP from killling single monster since it was not divided amongst 6 members I levelled fast enough to deal with encounters.

What was the character you used for your solo run? I tried to solo the game at first, but it was just too brutal. The game kept throwing at me huge number of enemies - much more then a full 6 character party would ever fight because of its broken scaling system. I finally settled for a two character party and got quite far before giving up in disgust.

But anyway, I'm still against scaling of xp rewards by character level. I agree that an experienced fighter should not get as much from fighting weaker opponents compared to an inexperienced one, but there is already a much more elegant way to ensure that - increase of the amount of experience points needed to achieve the next level. An experienced high level fighter would need much more experience to get to the next level and will need to defeat many, many weaker opponents to do so. The low level fighter will on the other hand level-up quickly even by fighting just those weaker opponents. This is already so in DnD and similar systems and further scaling of experience you get by defeating enemies is unnecessary balancing that just complicates things and gives the player the feeling that he is being punished for doing too well.

My approach was quite tricky and required some meta-gaming knowledge.
I decided that cleric was a way to go as a main class since it’s very universal class in IWD2 - quite good melee abilities, heavy armor and spell casting and you still can learn some thieving abilities. And buffed cleric has nearly the same combat stats as pure fighter (except number of attacks and bonus fighter feats) further closing the gap. Since good cleric has spontaneous casting of healing spells you can memorize only (de)buffs/offensive spells and still be able to heal yourself on the fly.
As for the race I have chosen drow. +2 levels penalty is not a problem when you play solo and gain loads of XP, you get some bonus attribute upgrades, spell resistance (for me it’s drow’s killer feature, especially that it’s rising with character level), immunity to Charm/Sleep, darkvision and some minor bonuses. -2 to hit/damage in sunlight is noticeable in the beginning but ones you gain some levels and get enough buffing spells even fighting in the sunlight is not so terrible. And you may wait until dawn to go hunting outside :> And guess what? Female drow has cleric as favoured class!
On the other hand it’s good to finally gain access to some serious weapon and the ultimate choice is Holy Avenger (*): +5 sword, +2d6 bonus damage to evil, unlimited dispel magic and last but not least +15 spell resistance. So a drow of character level 15 with holy avenger has 11+15+15 = 41 spell resistance just like that! It’s one handed sword, so you can still have a shield! Too bad it’s usable only by paladins… But if you make your female drow lawfull good and she is Painbearer of Ilmater then she can multi class to Paladin of Ilmater and advance in both classes! And if you invest some points in charisma then being paladin gives you bonuses to saving throws, and even 2 leveles of paladin gives you immunity to diseases and fear.
Palladin of Ilmater (2)/Painbearer of Ilmater (17) = 19 character level, not a problem solo – 19 is reachable with party of 6 I think. 17th level of cleric gives you access to one 9th level spell slot, and each next gives you one more until level 20 which gives 4 slots for 9th level spells. Anyway, if you boost wisdom really, really high it’s not necessary to advance beyond level 17 as Cleric (you already have access to 9th level spells) since you start to get bonus 9th level spells because of your Wisdom. But AFAIR it’s something around score equal 30. Remaining levels go into Paladin. Theoretically you can also start as Paladin until level 3, switch to fighter and gain 4 levels to get some bonus combat feats and weapon specialization to maximize effectiveness of Holy Avenger (+1 to hit/+2damage) and after that go with cleric. Please have in mind that you temporarily have XP penalty when leveling fighter until he reaches level 2. But it’s not a huge problem since at the beginning of the game you gain levels at lightning speed anyway. And since cleric is favored class of female drows, this does not count. So this build would look like this:
Palladin of Ilmater (3)/Fighter (4 levels)/Cleric - Painbearer of Ilmater (17/20)
So the character level required for a full build is 3+4+17=24/27 (+2 drow penalty), so full potential (high level cleric spells) is achieved very, very late game or even not at all. So I would stay with Palladin of Ilmater (2+)/Painbearer of Ilmater (20).
Anyway, game is beatable with such character, but not an Iron Man mode really. I had to reload a lot! Maybe there are some better builds for solo but I was so proud when I analyzed the IWD2 manual on my own, discovered all theses synergies and was able to finish the game with my own build. But feel free to dig the internet – some people have finished solo with a pure Sorcerer (can’t imagine this!) or some WTF hybrids like Sorcer/Barbarian...

 

[DwarvenFood]

My money is on your stronghold being the centre of your own town that gets inhabitants as it develops.

Would be great if the game simply changes genres in mid-game and turns into a full scale fortress siege simulator like Stronghold, or a 4X fortress management game.

I would love a game to just become a different genre in the middle

You mean like in Spore ?

 

[J_C]

Oh gawd, this day is looking to be fantastic. And we are not even at the last hour rush yet.

 

[Blaine]

Dude, there's Paypal. We hit it hours ago.

They're counting funds received by other means? Fantastic.

I've only been viewing their Kickstarter main page, and not following official forum threads (nor this one) too closely. I guess I'll have to do some digging.

 

[Vault Dweller]

That's gonna be some dungeon. The next level is almost unlocked.

 

[Captain Shrek]

Oh gawd, this day is looking to be fantastic. And we are not even at the last hour rush yet.

Announce the TB stretch goal already!!!

 

[~RAGING BONER~]

i love the idea of new stretch goals...but this fucking beast of a game already seems like it will be huge what with the 2 athkatla like cities in it now. So frankly, I kind of agree that perhaps that extra bit of cash they make go towards polish and bug removal.

 

[J_C]

That's gonna be some dungeon. The next level is almost unlocked.

Yes, we are reaching level 11 soon. I hope we stop here, this is starting to get ridiculously huge. Which means lots of extra work to make it a well designed dungeon.

i love the idea of new stretch goals...but this fucking beast of a game already seems like it will be huge what with the 2 athkatla like cities in it now. So frankly, I kind of agree that perhaps that extra bit of cash they make go towards polish and bug removal.

Did they really say that the cities will be as big as Athkatla? I will be satisfied with a Baldur's Gate sized, and one which is a bit smaller.

Oh gawd, this day is looking to be fantastic. And we are not even at the last hour rush yet.
pic

Announce the TB stretch goal already!!!

It would be funny to see people withdrawing their pledges.

 

[Mrowak]

That's gonna be some dungeon. The next level is almost unlocked.

Yes, we are reaching level 11 soon. I hope we stop here, this is starting to get ridiculously huge. Which means lots of extra work to make it a well designed dungeon.

Hurr, hurr. They didn't say anything about how big exactly each level of dungeon is, nor anything about the amount of content, so no number of levels makes any difference to them.

 

[~RAGING BONER~]

That's gonna be some dungeon. The next level is almost unlocked.

Yes, we are reaching level 11 soon. I hope we stop here, this is starting to get ridiculously huge. Which means lots of extra work to make it a well designed dungeon.

honestly i think they are being very jewishly cunning by leaving the game files easily accessible to modders... because lets be real here, even the best gaming company in the world would be hard pressed to release a game like this in 18 months bug free. And lets face it, Obsidian is known for storytelling and swiss cheese-style programming.

nope, they are counting on a lot of community help for bug fixes and patches. This game will one day be a masterpiece, but i suspect that will be some time after a strong modding community sinks its teeth into it. (which i firmly support)

 

[logrus]

That's gonna be some dungeon. The next level is almost unlocked.

Yes, we are reaching level 11 soon. I hope we stop here, this is starting to get ridiculously huge. Which means lots of extra work to make it a well designed dungeon.

i love the idea of new stretch goals...but this fucking beast of a game already seems like it will be huge what with the 2 athkatla like cities in it now. So frankly, I kind of agree that perhaps that extra bit of cash they make go towards polish and bug removal.

Did they really say that the cities will be as big as Athkatla? I will be satisfied with a Baldur's Gate sized, and one which is a bit smaller.

Oh gawd, this day is looking to be fantastic. And we are not even at the last hour rush yet.
pic

Announce the TB stretch goal already!!!

It would be funny to see people withdrawing their pledges.

Unless they announce the stretch goal after the Kickstarter is finished "oh, we have 150K extra so bonus TB mode"

 

[Hamster]

That's gonna be some dungeon. The next level is almost unlocked.

I hope it won't turn out to be the new Derp Roads.

 

[Esquilax]

That would be a bit of a PR embarrassment, I think.

They should just make the stretch goal something completely mindblowing but unattainable, then when it inevitably fails to reach the goal set, just use the extra money for polish.

Of course, this could backfire seriously if they actually hit the goal, then have to deliver.

 

[Zero Credibility]

Hmm... I did solo run of IWD2 and while I gained not so much XP from killling single monster since it was not divided amongst 6 members I levelled fast enough to deal with encounters.

What was the character you used for your solo run? I tried to solo the game at first, but it was just too brutal. The game kept throwing at me huge number of enemies - much more then a full 6 character party would ever fight because of its broken scaling system. I finally settled for a two character party and got quite far before giving up in disgust.

My approach was quite tricky and required some meta-gaming knowledge.

See, that was my problem. I just took my favourite character concept and decided to mage-thief (mostly mage) this game. You can guess how that ended. I should have realized that cleric (or druid) is the way to go in a dungeon crawler like this. High level spells without compromising fighting skills, hit points or armor class.

 

[Raygun_elf]

That's gonna be some dungeon. The next level is almost unlocked.

Yes, we are reaching level 11 soon. I hope we stop here, this is starting to get ridiculously huge. Which means lots of extra work to make it a well designed dungeon.

i love the idea of new stretch goals...but this fucking beast of a game already seems like it will be huge what with the 2 athkatla like cities in it now. So frankly, I kind of agree that perhaps that extra bit of cash they make go towards polish and bug removal.

Did they really say that the cities will be as big as Athkatla? I will be satisfied with a Baldur's Gate sized, and one which is a bit smaller.

Oh gawd, this day is looking to be fantastic. And we are not even at the last hour rush yet.
pic

Announce the TB stretch goal already!!!

It would be funny to see people withdrawing their pledges.

Unless they announce the stretch goal after the Kickstarter is finished "oh, we have 150K extra so bonus TB mode"

I would rather no TB at all than trying to make real-time and turn-based systems work in the same game and not break combat. Do you remember Arcanum?

 

[PlanHex]

That would be a bit of a PR embarrassment, I think.

They should just make the stretch goal something completely mindblowing but unattainable, then when it inevitably fails to reach the goal set, just use the extra money for polish.

Of course, this could backfire seriously if they actually hit the goal, then have to deliver.

5 billion dollar stretch goal:
MCA will have sex with all backers (no matter their pledge, even people who pledge a penny on the Codex/GameBanshee/others) and Tim Cain will bake them a nice cake afterwards.

 

[~RAGING BONER~]

depending on what that last stretch goal is (ie too ambitious) will let us know whether or not it is likely that Feargus Urkyheart will panic at the sheer enormity of the project he's just taken on and flee with all our moneys to a non-extradition country

 

[Infinitron]

Tim Cain was thoroughly traumatized by having to make a hybrid TB/RT model. It's not gonna happen.

 

[Captain Shrek]

depending on what that last stretch goal is (ie too ambitious) will let us know whether or not it is likely that Feargus Urkyheart will panic at the sheer enormity of the project he's just taken on and flee with all our moneys to a non-extradition country

With Chris who will draw Trolls dressed in Hawaiis and sipping martinis, resting on deckchairs.

 

[Arkeus]

Did they really say that the cities will be as big as Athkatla? I will be satisfied with a Baldur's Gate sized, and one which is a bit smaller.

Baldur's Gate and Athkatla are big cities. Spanning multiple large maps with a ton of interiors, characters and quests, big cities are a lot of fun. Like strongholds, they also take a lot of work to do well. We're going to have one big city in Project Eternity. Would you like two? If you take us on an exciting adventure to $3.5 Million, we will take you on an exciting adventure to another big city.

This would be very misleading if the two cities were much smaller than Athkatla.

 

[Jasede]

That would be a bit of a PR embarrassment, I think.

They should just make the stretch goal something completely mindblowing but unattainable, then when it inevitably fails to reach the goal set, just use the extra money for polish.

Of course, this could backfire seriously if they actually hit the goal, then have to deliver.

But that's exactly what happened! >_>

I mean, two huge cities? Huge mega dungeon? They'll either be rushed - and we all know how we feel about Obsidian and rushing content - or the game will be way delayed ( = not enough money to keep paying the staff). I'm actually a little concerned at how big this got. ._.

 

[Hobo Elf]

That's gonna be some dungeon. The next level is almost unlocked.

Yes, we are reaching level 11 soon. I hope we stop here, this is starting to get ridiculously huge. Which means lots of extra work to make it a well designed dungeon.

I wouldn't have minded a hard cap to the mega dungeon levels to be honest. It's gonna be one long ass crawl. They are going to need to design it in a smart way so to not make it a tedious bore. Gonna need some peaceful stuff there to break the pace from hacking and slashing.

 

[asper]

If they design it exactly like in the picture it would be fine with me, lots of variety there. Just needs more strange contraptions and more mystery.

Yeah, 18 months to make this game is ridiculously short. If they pull it off it's going to be some kind of record. Fallout 2 had the same development time, but used exisiting assets and a fully implemented engine, and still was filled with lame nonsense.

I hope they have the money to go way over this strange deadline to make a really good game.

 

[Infinitron]

( = not enough money to keep paying the staff)

Remember that as a large company that does work for publishers, Obsidian has alternate sources of income. We're talking less than 20 employees working on this full-time.