Pathfinder Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous - Game of the Year Edition

[Zayne]

So, I went for the second playthrough. After all, they've released 4th DLC, there must be lots of new and interesting stuff.

And... it was too easy for my liking on Core difficulty with increased number of enemies and additional behaviors on.

Played as Zen Archer(3)->Sanctified Slayer(Community domain) with Aeon mythic, dumping everything into wisdom. Party: Seelah, Camelia->Woljif as frontliners, Lann and Commander as archers/secondary tanks, Nenio and Ember as buffers/casters. Only Woljif multiclassed into Vivisectionist, rest - pure classes with suboptimal builds.

I've really enjoyed myself combatwise in only one location - Blackwater, I went there right after taking Drezen, before Midnight Fane, Dragon Hunt and Wintersun. There I was forced to use every single trick in my arsenal to stay alive. To kill augmented demons I pulled them with Nenio and ran under Expeditious Retreat back to my Guarded Hearth - the only place in dungeon, where I could reasonably fight them.

After that it all went down the hill.

Playful Darkness, which in first playthrough I was forced to cheese with summons, wands and magic, I've simply... killed. Attack bonus from Smite Evil and Guarded Hearth was enough to consistently penetrate her AC.

In act 4 I've killed everything in real-time mode, including Baphomet and both dragons. The only challenging encounter worthy of turn-based mode was in demodand lair.

Now I'm in act 5 and I literally don't want to finish it - because I know that I can easily rightclick through every encounter left. (And I'm horrified when I think about Areshkagal's puzzles and temple)


In the end, I thought that hard & insane difficulties are for crazyass minmaxing builds like sylvan sorcerer/paladin/scaled fist/some-other-charisma-based-shit-on-top for every character in party. But it seems they're mandatory if you have a good grasp of the system. Also, new DLCs probably injected too much EXP and loot into early game.

 

[Yosharian]

The new min-maxing for Owlcat games is to make a party that is just powerful enough to struggle like hell with the optional bosses and find the main content just the right side of challenging.

A good starting point is no cleric and no paladin. Both of those classes make the game pitifully easy.

Also no mounted characters whatsoever.

 

[razvedchiki]

in the TTT mod you cant crit with mounted charge anymore?

 

[Mr. Magniloquent]

This game can't keep my interest as much as KM did. On some weekends I look forward to sitting down for a long session, but after an hour or so I drift away. I don't know if its because I spent so much time screwing around in the DLC before I started the campaign. I find myself mostly jonesing for the next mythic level and not being interested in much else.

 

[Delterius]

Someone was so miffed that Camellia's romance ends on a bittersweet note (no shit right) that they not only made a mod but commissioned the original artist to make a portrait of her wearing a wedding dress:

 

[LannTheStupid]

This is quite a famous mod, especially because the mod author actually paid money to the artist who made Camellia. I like the original Camellia quest better, but this is cute, and the artist had a little bit extra.

 

[InD_ImaginE]

Someone was so miffed that Camellia's romance ends on a bittersweet note (no shit right) that they not only made a mod but commissioned the original artist to make a portrait of her wearing a wedding dress:

I mean you can appreciate the dedication I guess.

Someone also painstakingly made a Woljiff romance mod in a game without scene editor

 

[Delterius]

I mean you can appreciate the dedication I guess.

I do like that it exists, probably because I spent way too much time on the 4chan threads after release. There was less build autism and more people memeing each other's choice of path and romance.

 

[Grampy_Bone]

Is crane wing finally fixed?

 

[Average Manatee]

Someone was so miffed that Camellia's romance ends on a bittersweet note (no shit right) that they not only made a mod but commissioned the original artist to make a portrait of her wearing a wedding dress:

Truly the man is a hero. Do you get to "fix" her?

Btw if somebody wonders what happens if you let Miammir, the crazy woman in Wintersun, stay with the Siabre, and he says "your wisdom will be rewarded for this decision" or something similar.

Here is what happens, since I just finished a run trying it:

nothing at all!

Seems to me that you are wiser now for knowing this.

 

[LannTheStupid]

Is crane wing finally fixed?

It does not require any fixes. It's household Owlcat rules; deal with them.

 

[Average Manatee]

Is crane wing finally fixed?

It does not require any fixes. It's household Owlcat rules; deal with them.

Even if its a house rule then the description is bugged.

 

[LannTheStupid]

Is crane wing finally fixed?

It does not require any fixes. It's household Owlcat rules; deal with them.

Even if its a house rule then the description is bugged.

I agree with that, but descriptions require effort, too!

Also, what if all the household rules are not described intentionally? As, you know, the fight club rules.

 

[Grampy_Bone]

It's important to understand for build purposes, so I'll ask again, did they fix it or can you still use crane wing/riposte while fully armed and armored?

 

[Average Manatee]

You can use it while not having the other hand free. I don't think there's ever been anything in it about being armored, despite it generally being a thing for monks.

 

[Mr. Magniloquent]

After dicking around in Drezen after conquering it and doing mostly crusade stuff, I went directly south to Wintersun. Holy fuck is this place challenging. I don't think I'm suppose to be here yet. I spent most of my hour trying to kill that Ancient Treant. After finally pulling it off, I come across another one. Reload be thy name. There are lots of tough enemies here, but most of them are managable. Even that savage barbarian horde that sends about a dozen charging warriors right at you. I think I might have to sit this one out and return when I have my big boy pants on. It's just not quite worth the effort at this level. I'm on the cusp of 11.

 

[Roguey]

After dicking around in Drezen after conquering it and doing mostly crusade stuff, I went directly south to Wintersun. Holy fuck is this place challenging. I don't think I'm suppose to be here yet. I spent most of my hour trying to kill that Ancient Treant. After finally pulling it off, I come across another one. Reload be thy name. There are lots of tough enemies here, but most of them are managable. Even that savage barbarian horde that sends about a dozen charging warriors right at you. I think I might have to sit this one out and return when I have my big boy pants on. It's just not quite worth the effort at this level. I'm on the cusp of 11.

Yeah, every location you can visit now is going to be higher level than you are with the exception of maybe the place you have to find to discover what the deal is with those ambushing enemies.

 

[Haplo]

Hmm. For the PD fight I was perfectly fine with him trying to charge my back line, it made the fight challenging and I had to rethink my strategy.

It's just unfortunate that the solution to most tricky encounters tends to be throwing a shit ton of summons at the problem

Not to mention that if you use creeping doom then the summons are also basically invulnerable

Well if you want another surefire way to deal with almost any boss encounter in the game, Litanny of Eloquence on a palading or inquisitor (lann can do this well) with spell pen gear and feats basically means you can CC PD for many rounds (as many as your caster has casts of it) without a saving throw. Works great in TB because you can easily manipulate turn order. Probably doesn't work as well in RT but at least you Can keep controlling him while spending rounds to debuff/dispel without dealing damage and start attacking when he is stripped of everything. PD isn't immune to MA or charm and you only need pass a spell pen check which isn't too difficult since it's not scaled by difficulty.

And it is a swift action spell. Lan can get a class that use it and can full attack after it. Effects nearly every enemy, even most bosses and can be extended.

I think you meant full attack before it... as you'd immediately wake him by attacking afterwards...

 

[Haplo]

So, I went for the second playthrough. After all, they've released 4th DLC, there must be lots of new and interesting stuff.

And... it was too easy for my liking on Core difficulty with increased number of enemies and additional behaviors on.

Played as Zen Archer(3)->Sanctified Slayer(Community domain) with Aeon mythic, dumping everything into wisdom. Party: Seelah, Camelia->Woljif as frontliners, Lann and Commander as archers/secondary tanks, Nenio and Ember as buffers/casters. Only Woljif multiclassed into Vivisectionist, rest - pure classes with suboptimal builds.

I've really enjoyed myself combatwise in only one location - Blackwater, I went there right after taking Drezen, before Midnight Fane, Dragon Hunt and Wintersun. There I was forced to use every single trick in my arsenal to stay alive. To kill augmented demons I pulled them with Nenio and ran under Expeditious Retreat back to my Guarded Hearth - the only place in dungeon, where I could reasonably fight them.

After that it all went down the hill.

Playful Darkness, which in first playthrough I was forced to cheese with summons, wands and magic, I've simply... killed. Attack bonus from Smite Evil and Guarded Hearth was enough to consistently penetrate her AC.

In act 4 I've killed everything in real-time mode, including Baphomet and both dragons. The only challenging encounter worthy of turn-based mode was in demodand lair.

Now I'm in act 5 and I literally don't want to finish it - because I know that I can easily rightclick through every encounter left. (And I'm horrified when I think about Areshkagal's puzzles and temple)


In the end, I thought that hard & insane difficulties are for crazyass minmaxing builds like sylvan sorcerer/paladin/scaled fist/some-other-charisma-based-shit-on-top for every character in party. But it seems they're mandatory if you have a good grasp of the system. Also, new DLCs probably injected too much EXP and loot into early game.

Yeah, for experienced players I'd definately recommend Hard.

Unfair if you enjoy min-maxing, stacking buffs/debuffs and exploiting systems (like say, pulling enemies to the Guarded Hearth you've set earlier).

 

[Haplo]

in the TTT mod you cant crit with mounted charge anymore?

Sure you can. It simply won't multiply the charge multipliers.
The multipliers will stack instead.
So if you do a Spirited Charge with a longspear for x3 damage and crit, you'll do x5 damage, not x9.

 

[Cyberarmy]

I think you meant full attack before it... as you'd immediately wake him by attacking afterwards...

Attacking something else ofc Unless it's a single enemy encounter. If it is I just use some buff or scroll.

 

[Haplo]

After dicking around in Drezen after conquering it and doing mostly crusade stuff, I went directly south to Wintersun. Holy fuck is this place challenging. I don't think I'm suppose to be here yet. I spent most of my hour trying to kill that Ancient Treant. After finally pulling it off, I come across another one. Reload be thy name. There are lots of tough enemies here, but most of them are managable. Even that savage barbarian horde that sends about a dozen charging warriors right at you. I think I might have to sit this one out and return when I have my big boy pants on. It's just not quite worth the effort at this level. I'm on the cusp of 11.

Well, I like to do some small stuff before it (Greengates, that area with captured crusaders), but still Wintersun is one of my first areas in Act 3. Its lovely! Like 2 levels worth of xp there!

The Ancient treant is indeed challenging - you should better have some ray caster to dispose of it from safety - and pets or summons to keep him at a distance, as trying to melee it is just a big NOPE!
Then there are optional ancient ghosts you can anger, which also need decent tactics - but give a shit ton of xp, so totally worth it!

Otherwise I'd say the area is not that difficult. The cave fight isn't very easy, but is not that hard either.

Easy xp farm overall!
Always do it before the dragon.

 

[Nikanuur]

I'm thinking replay. I've finished the first run shortly after the full release. Could someone please summ up; have there been any significant changes I can look forward too? DLC's any good?

 

[volklore]

Demons get good aspects at M5 instead of later which is nice, Aeon has slightly improved action economy, some shit got fixed like elemental barrage etc...
The scroll vendor in act 1 got nerfed hard.
Oh, and apparently, every single dretch in act 1 opens with casting stinking cloud now so there is use in having 1 cast of single target delay poison.

 

[volklore]

I've been playing a lot of act1 on unfair with TTT and I just realized magic weapon spells don't stack with existing weapon enhancement bonus (was written in changelog but didn't see).
Is there any other way to bump it up bar the arcane poll style class abilities that do so or are you relegated to finding new weapons?