KickStarter Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pre-DLC Thread [GO TO NEW THREAD]

[Alienman]

More and more people seem to reach the more buggy parts now if you read the Steam forum. People are not happy. One big issue seem to be the Kingdom management, how you get fucked over basically in the later chapters with nothing to counter it. Wonder how this will effect the score... and other things.

 

[fantadomat]

Is your barony super wealthy or something

I said "kingdom"

Except your holdings is what? A town and a couple of villages. Such kingdom, so much kingdomness.

I take it you are pretty bad with history then. It seem you haven't heard about the glorious Holy Roman Empire?!
Also you play as a baron...

What has Holy Roman Empire has to do with anything? It was larger than today's Germany for its whole history until its dissolution in early 1800s during Napoleonic era. Talking about "bad with history"...
Also I never said that you didn't.

It was made by small baronies and duchies that were no bigger than the one in the game. It was not a real country but a collective of such small states with similar culture.

Heres the kingdom of navarra and neighbors, few towns too, not so impressive either.

And the empire of Trebizond:
One big city only:

Yes,there are many small kingdoms in European history. I just game one example that came to mind.

 

[Cael]

Is your barony super wealthy or something

I said "kingdom"

Except your holdings is what? A town and a couple of villages. Such kingdom, so much kingdomness.

I take it you are pretty bad with history then. It seem you haven't heard about the glorious Holy Roman Empire?!
Also you play as a baron...

What has Holy Roman Empire has to do with anything? It was larger than today's Germany for its whole history until its dissolution in early 1800s during Napoleonic era. Talking about "bad with history"...
Also I never said that you didn't.

It was made by small baronies and duchies that were no bigger than the one in the game. It was not a real country but a collective of such small states with similar culture.

Heres the kingdom of navarra and neighbors, few towns too, not so impressive either.

And the empire of Trebizond:
One big city only:

Yes,there are many small kingdoms in European history. I just game one example that came to mind.

There is a good reason why the noun "city-state" exist...

 

[Fenix]

Ещё немного народного творчества.

Spoiler

 

[razvedchiki]

Translate plox comrade.

 

[Lawntoilet]

Just got to the point where you have to split the party, died, and reloaded.
Now whenever I try to

Spoiler

poison the Everblooming flower

the monsters don't spawn and I'm stuck in the area.
Googling it doesn't help, seems like this is wholly my own problem.

Edit: It was raining in game when the monsters triggered the first time, so I spammed F8 until it rained again - and the monsters triggered.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Just got to the point where you have to split the party, died, and reloaded.
Now whenever I try to

Spoiler

poison the Everblooming flower

the monsters don't spawn and I'm stuck in the area.
Googling it doesn't help, seems like this is wholly my own problem.

Edit: It was raining in game when the monsters triggered the first time, so I spammed F8 until it rained again - and the monsters triggered.

if the game gets bugged exit to the main menu and reload the save
the game doesn't reload the entire scene upon loading a save, it just 'resets' the scene. This causes a lot of bugs in my experience.

 

[AwesomeButton]

Ещё немного народного творчества.

Spoiler

Lol, I need to look this portrait up without the letters.

 

[gestalt11]

Just got to the point where you have to split the party, died, and reloaded.
Now whenever I try to

Spoiler

poison the Everblooming flower

the monsters don't spawn and I'm stuck in the area.
Googling it doesn't help, seems like this is wholly my own problem.

Edit: It was raining in game when the monsters triggered the first time, so I spammed F8 until it rained again - and the monsters triggered.

if the game gets bugged exit to the main menu and reload the save
the game doesn't reload the entire scene upon loading a save, it just 'resets' the scene. This causes a lot of bugs in my experience.

Certain bugs have also required a full restart of the game, like the stacking bugs had that behavior. If you are still having trouble nuke it from orbit, its the only way to be sure.

 

[BrotherFrank]

How does the kingdom building compare to previous attempts (Crossroad keep, or Dragon Age: Awakening stronghold) when it comes to management itself, and integration with the roleplaying part?

Oh boy... Ok the best metaphor I got for the kingdom management of pathfinder is it's like a nagging wife who you married young but after you married she completely let herself go and it turns out her personality is horrible, yet as much as you hate her you have to stick with her for the sake of your newly born children. And any time you are out having fun, you get constant angry calls and texts from her asking where you are, and you need to come back RIGHT now. And the drive back home is something stupidly long and it turns out she only wanted you back for some stupid minor thing or to yell at you.

Basically at first kingdom management looks fun. Oh I can place buildings in towns? I can like develop my towns and shit, and placement matters! Oh I can assign people to deal with problems and events and sometimes this leads to interesting semi rp moments where you have to decide if you'd rather want your general to kill bandits or help some peasants, but omg you haven't got time to do them both, which to go for?

But then you learn to loathe it. You need to return to your throne room at least once a month (and in practice, much more frequently then that since you don't know in advance if the advisor that wants to talk to you urgently wants to chat to you for some unimportant thing that can wait or if it's some emergency that you need to attend to immediately or suffer negative consequences), and the frequent trips will mean seeing a lot of loading screens, leading to a lot of dead game time as you just wait and do other stuff instead of playing the game.

Then you start realizing how utterly pointless buildings are, the real way to raise your stats is through successful resolution of events. And that you're better off saving your bp for either feast events or advisor training opportunities, then finally trade agreements if you've managed to squirrel away that much. I don't think I built a single military building yet military was a stat I was able to max easily, I guess my nation built entirely around brothels, breweries and taverns have bred a sturdy bunch.

Anyways kingdom management just ends up becoming a major distraction that keeps you from actually playing the fun part of the game. Also you never really get to see the impact that your style of governing does nor does stats seem to matter in the game. You could have max military and your guards will still be the same as if you were mil 1. You could have rushed to max out loyalty and have the mood of your people be content, yet for a story event people will still be equally as pissed as you as if you ruled with an iron fist and neglected nurturing your people's loyalty and love.

In conclusion, the integration of the 2 systems are poor, if anything it's segregation. What happens in 1 system is independent of what happens in the other, yet the kingdom management will keep interrupting your adventuring and demand your constant attention. The one fun thing is the court visits and dilemnas but they are tainted by association with the worst loading screens of the game so even those will lose their shine fast.

I'm sad to say this but... Out of the titles you listed, Dragon Age Inquisition did the keep thing best, not only was it less obnoxious to navigate yet was still a big chunk of play area, but you felt more of an attachment to that place then you ever do in crossroad keep or your kingdom in pathfinder. Inquisition keep also evolved with time and you could put your own personal touch on it, and there was some areas like the forge which felt like a second home when I played it and I legit enjoyed returning there to just forge some new gear or tinker with people's inventory before setting off again. I never experienced that same feeling with either of the other 2 games.

 

[Cael]

You could have rushed to max out loyalty and have the mood of your people be content, yet for a story event people will still be equally as pissed as you as if you ruled with an iron fist and neglected nurturing your people's loyalty and love.

This just seems like bad DM-ing with a shovel of railroading thrown in for good measure.

Come on, guys! Even Civ4 did a better "what you do matters" when it came to random events...!

 

[Lawntoilet]

if the game gets bugged exit to the main menu and reload the save
the game doesn't reload the entire scene upon loading a save, it just 'resets' the scene. This causes a lot of bugs in my experience.

Certain bugs have also required a full restart of the game, like the stacking bugs had that behavior. If you are still having trouble nuke it from orbit, its the only way to be sure.

Got it working, then it would stay zoomed in and not trigger combat after the little dialogue about

Spoiler

splitting the party,

quit to desktop and reloaded and everything worked fine.
Except for Valerie (with Displacement and 42 AC) getting critted for 92 damage by the boss, of course, that's clearly some kind of bug.

 

[thesheeep]

I was planning to start playing the end of this month.
Maybe I should wait until the end of this year

 

[Jaedar]

Then you start realizing how utterly pointless buildings are, the real way to raise your stats is through successful resolution of events. And that you're better off saving your bp for either feast events or advisor training opportunities, then finally trade agreements if you've managed to squirrel away that much. I don't think I built a single military building yet military was a stat I was able to max easily, I guess my nation built entirely around brothels, breweries and taverns have bred a sturdy bunch.

I think this is the major problem really. Almost all the buildings and projects are traps, where you pay tens of BP for each stat point, and stat points are worth less than one tenth of a BP per week. This means that it takes more than half a year of in game time before it starts to generate value. The way to actually get ahead is to buy artifacts that buff stats of your advisors and get good dice (admittedly evil/lawful baronies can construct buildings that boost these rolls) so you get the free points from it. But this also means your choice of advisor is really low, because your party members very quickly outclass the NPCs, so in practice there's one viable option for most advisor slots.

In the end I *guess* it might be worthwhile to build buildings to 'rush' advisor slots so you miss less events, but I really am not sure.

It's a shame, because in theory there is enough depth here to be a fun minigame. Buildings get bonuses depending on other buildings in the settlement or nearby, some advisor event resolutions let you get permanent bonuses in your own lands (like poison immunity or morale bonus on all attack rolls). Developing your kingdom attracts craftsmen that sell better gear. And apparently the lategame has some parts where if you have not developed correctly, you can get game overs?

But the balance ruins it. Craftsmen only care that a town is founded, even if it's empty. The return on investment on lots of stuff is too low or negative. And the constant loading screens also punish you. Why oh why does the map view where I travel need to be separated by a load screen from the map screen where I manage my kingdom? Kingdom stuff should just be an overlay over the travel map. You also can't see what upgrading a building does until you have upgraded it.

and integration with the roleplaying part?

How about this for roleplaying: The kingdom building and management really makes you wish you were a simple adventurer again, murdering and looting without responsibilities.

I actually like this, makes me feel like a responsible adult

 

[Cael]

(admittedly evil/lawful baronies can construct buildings that boost these rolls)

This is even worse. I can see why Lawful states would benefit but Evil? Really? Are the developers telling us that it is better to be Evil than Good? That a state that is a benevolent dictatorship is worse than the worst excesses of Imperial Japan circa WW2? Really?

 

[Luckmann]

... You need to return to your throne room at least once a month (and in practice, much more frequently then that since you don't know in advance if the advisor that wants to talk to you urgently wants to chat to you for some unimportant thing that can wait or if it's some emergency that you need to attend to immediately or suffer negative consequences) ...

I don't understand this particular complaint. I keep seeing it and I just don't get it. I did almost everything in Chapter II and explored the entirety of the South Narlmarches, only to return to my keep less than a week later (I think ~3 days).

What are people doing that is pissing away all this time? Is the resting mechanic not restrictive enough? Do people think that they need to rest just because a single dude is fatigued? Does the hunting need to be toned down? Is everyone resting 8 hours after each combat? I don't get it.

(admittedly evil/lawful baronies can construct buildings that boost these rolls)

This is even worse. I can see why Lawful states would benefit but Evil? Really? Are the developers telling us that it is better to be Evil than Good? That a state that is a benevolent dictatorship is worse than the worst excesses of Imperial Japan circa WW2? Really?

On thing really pisses me off: Lawful evil stockades. For whatever reason, the very idea of lawful punishment is considered evil in this game, and that drives me up the fucking wall.

 

[Jaedar]

(admittedly evil/lawful baronies can construct buildings that boost these rolls)

This is even worse. I can see why Lawful states would benefit but Evil? Really? Are the developers telling us that it is better to be Evil than Good? That a state that is a benevolent dictatorship is worse than the worst excesses of Imperial Japan circa WW2? Really?

Lol, political extremist much?
Lawful gets bulletin boards of +2, Evil can build stocks that give +1.

I don't understand this particular complaint. I keep seeing it and I just don't get it. I did almost everything in Chapter II and explored the entirety of the South Narlmarches, only to return to my keep less than a week later (I think ~3 days).

movement speed depends on terrain, when you have to trudge a week (one direction) through the mountains to reach your objective, you may understand it more. S. Narl has mostly plains movement speed iirc, so you're never more than a day or two from the capital. Also resting time with rations is like 10 hours, if you hunt for all rations it easily takes more than 20. And I think to be sure you don't miss events, you have to check in (ie visit your lands, not your capital) once every two weeks in practice.

 

[Cael]

... You need to return to your throne room at least once a month (and in practice, much more frequently then that since you don't know in advance if the advisor that wants to talk to you urgently wants to chat to you for some unimportant thing that can wait or if it's some emergency that you need to attend to immediately or suffer negative consequences) ...

I don't understand this particular complaint. I keep seeing it and I just don't get it. I did almost everything in Chapter II and explored the entirety of the South Narlmarches, only to return to my keep less than a week later (I think ~3 days).

What are people doing that is pissing away all this time? Is the resting mechanic not restrictive enough? Do people think that they need to rest just because a single dude is fatigued? Does the hunting need to be toned down? Is everyone resting 8 hours after each combat? I don't get it.

(admittedly evil/lawful baronies can construct buildings that boost these rolls)

This is even worse. I can see why Lawful states would benefit but Evil? Really? Are the developers telling us that it is better to be Evil than Good? That a state that is a benevolent dictatorship is worse than the worst excesses of Imperial Japan circa WW2? Really?

On thing really pisses me off: Lawful evil stockades. For whatever reason, the very idea of lawful punishment is considered evil in this game, and that drives me up the fucking wall.

Fucking Paizotards probably think that any form of punishment is an Evil thing. You should, you know, rehabilitate them instead. And they say there is no SJW shit in the game...

 

[ArchAngel]

(admittedly evil/lawful baronies can construct buildings that boost these rolls)

This is even worse. I can see why Lawful states would benefit but Evil? Really? Are the developers telling us that it is better to be Evil than Good? That a state that is a benevolent dictatorship is worse than the worst excesses of Imperial Japan circa WW2? Really?

Evil ones can build Stocks in every town to publicly show criminals to everyone. This apparently makes everyone perform better

 

[Ruchy]

They should have added spells such as these https://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic/all-spells/c/create-food-and-water/ for people that want to give up spell slots for lower rest times.

 

[Lagole Gon]

I've just realized... Amiri is a licensed character... That's why she's so flat.

...

Why would you have a licensed party member...? Did they pay extra... just to have less creative freedom with a party member?

What were they thinking? That this will be some kind of crowd drawer? "Wow, Regdar the Human Fighter is in this DnD 3.0 game, I must buy it!"

 

[BrotherFrank]

Chapter II

That's why. Chapter 2 is when you just got introduced to kingdom management and it's not that obnoxious yet. You got what, 4-5 advisors tops by this point? Your stats are also low so you don't particularly care about missing out events that just spawned in the last week of a month and more importantly your travels don't take you too far from your capital, you're never more then a few days away.

By the time you do the Varhold questline (chap 3 I believe?) travel times will start becoming a factor (one location in particular is so far away deep in the mountains it all but guarantees you will miss out on a month) you need to plan around but it's still manageable. By later chapters the frequency and difficulty of events will intensify and necessitate more looking after, leading to a lot more check ups.

And while in theory checking in twice a month should be ok (once in the first week, second in the last week for those late events), in practice it was more like 5-6. Granted due to a previously mentioned bug I had (I couldn't level up most of my advisors and their related kingdom attribute because their event bugged out), I only had 3 advisors high levelled, and this meant I was frequently in situations where I'd have to juggle having few advisors try to solve twice or thrice their amount of problems, leading to situations where I would need to return 14 days later to reuse my treasurer for a quick 5 day feast followed by a 9 day long event then have him free to deal with any last sec event.

Perhaps someone not having this bug and a wider variety of competent levelled up advisors might have had an easier time of it.

BTW speaking of competent advisors. Nintendo power tip: The priestess of Lamashtu is awesome if you get a chance to recruit her. She and Jubilost were the real mvps in my game keeping the kingdom together whilst apparently everyone else whored and partied.

 

[Thonius]

Oof it's like Dzirt in BG, but more. Some nerds just like/love to see famous char in the game. Owlcats just went beyond and added her as companion.

 

[ArchAngel]

I've just realized... Amiri is a licensed character... That's why she's so flat.

...

Why would you have a licensed party member...? Did they pay extra... just to have less creative freedom with a party member?

What were they thinking? That this will be some kind of crowd drawer? "Wow, Regdar the Human Fighter is in this DnD 3.0 game, I must buy it!"

Because they wanted to do something for the PnP Pathfinder crowd and Amiri is apparently one of the more popular ones.

 

[Elex]

(admittedly evil/lawful baronies can construct buildings that boost these rolls)

This is even worse. I can see why Lawful states would benefit but Evil? Really? Are the developers telling us that it is better to be Evil than Good? That a state that is a benevolent dictatorship is worse than the worst excesses of Imperial Japan circa WW2? Really?

hitler was a min/maxer.