Eternity Pillars of Eternity II Beta Thread [GAME RELEASED, GO TO NEW THREAD]

[TT1]

So I installed PoE2 last night and played for about 30 minutes, just to take a look at creating characters.

I found the entire creation process EXTREMELY overwhelming, for several reasons. Seriously, I really got confused and had several doubts about what I was actually doing. That sucks for a lot of reasons. And if I was a newbie, I would have given up the game right there.

Some points:

1) I do not know if the new NVIDIA driver has tampered with the "optimal settings", but I found all the fonts very small.
2) It took me a few seconds to understand the flow of character creation. The buttons are the same color as the panel and everything is kinda hidden. Several of the new skills made no sense to me and I was a bit shocked to discover that "mechanics" now help discover traps, not just perception.
3) I have the impression that I gave "next" without choosing any skill and the game simply went ahead, without letting me choose a skill later. I'll try to play it tonight.

The game could be clearer, but I believe they will sort this out until the release, since PoE and Tyranny do not have this problem.

 

[Mazisky]

In Deadfire Druids gets 1 spell at lvl 1, 6 spells at lvl 6 and the game goes up to level 18, so a max level Druid will have ton of spells and passives and whatever. Same for Priest.

This means that casters are more useless than fighters or other classes at start, but they will become powerful once they will get ton of stuff to use per encounter.

Unless people expect casters to be overpowered from lvl 1 (that would be extremely retarded), i don't see where is the issue.

The only issue i see is the cast time being extremely long, but the progression (few spells early, tons late) is a right thing.

 

[Grotesque]

So, anybody around here donated a beta key to Sensuki ?

I dream for one last post of his on the Obsidian forum, his magnum opus in bitching about the design flaws, one last gesture of good will before dropping the mic and leaving the rabid fanboys to devour between themselves.

 

[Quillon]

I was a bit shocked to discover that "mechanics" now help discover traps, not just perception.

FFS, are you sure? That question has been asked in the latest Q&A and it was a constant question floated around for 3 years.

ed: I think the question in the q&a was about stealth's effect on discovering traps but mechanic's effect was also ambiguous for a long time.

 

[TT1]

I was a bit shocked to discover that "mechanics" now help discover traps, not just perception.

FFS, are you sure? That question has been asked in the latest Q&A and it was a constant question floated around for 3 years.

Yeah, its written in the skill description. I had the same reaction as you

 

[fantadomat]

I agree with Prime Junta that pure casters feel anemic. In the PotD fights, I cannot tell to what extent, if any, they contribute relative to multi-class or martial class characters.

Yup. When the fights drag on casters become fairly useless -- they don't have that many casts, those casts aren't as impactful as they used to be, and once spent they're sitting there with their thumb up their ass plinking away with whatever weapon they have. Since cross-class martial skills are now gone, they're always going to be pretty bad at that. Martial classes OTOH just keep on truckin'.

-------> multiclass casters are much better, because they have access to their other class's martial skills. With the casting times and risk of interrupt though, even they're better off fighting rather than casting a lot of the time.

That is a shame,my favourite thing is run around the back lines with a caster watch people die while saving my spells because i could need them later. If the best weapon for pure caster is not a sling or spell buffing staff,then something is wrong with the game.

 

[Neanderthal]

So, anybody around here donated a beta key to Sensuki ?

I dream for one last post of his on the Obsidian forum, his magnum opus in bitching about the design flaws, one last gesture of good will before dropping the mike and leaving the rabid fanboys to devour between themselves.

Yeah it were fucking glorious seeing amount o butthurt old Sensuki harvested, think a bloke called Nipsen or someat were gonna do plane tickets bitch if he'd have stayed around.

 

[Lacrymas]

Lacrymas I forgot to upload the screen shot, but Priests of Skaen get sneak attack as their subclass feat.

Still bummed about the general talents. It seems like I have to multi-class so I can make a similar build to P1. I kind of don't see the point of single-classed characters anymore, they are infinitely more limited than multi-classed ones, the only benefit they get is at high level, which is end-game, you have to be inferior for 90% of the game for a chance to not be so sucky at the highest levels. Seems stupid.

Shapeshifting Druids still seem really boring and limited as well.

 

[Grotesque]

the only benefit they get is at high level, which is end-game, you have to be inferior for 90% of the game

don't fret!
the way Obsidian balances the XP income, you will reach level cap around mid game so single class characters FTW!

 

[Mazisky]

What about increased cast time for multiclass and faster casts + more dmg\aoe for singleclass?

Could be a solution?

It would make sense having those buffs for specialized casters

 

[One-and-a-half-Ivan]

I was a bit shocked to discover that "mechanics" now help discover traps, not just perception.

FFS, are you sure? That question has been asked in the latest Q&A and it was a constant question floated around for 3 years.

ed: I think the question in the q&a was about stealth's effect on discovering traps but mechanic's effect was also ambiguous for a long time.

I thought that mechanics was always used to locate traps and hidden treasures? I mean, at least in the first game.
Am I wrong, Prime Junta?

 

[Maculo]

I am hesitant to suggest a buff to spells, because I know some casters started off weak (i.e., Priest) and later became Death Stars (i.e., also Priest). At the same time, the trade off for longer cast times and limited spell selections should have been stronger spells. Right now, I just see weaker spells.

I also suggested the return of general feats on the forum. If you play paladin, there already is a divided skill tree for active abilities and passive feats. Therefore, I do not think it would be cumbersome for Obsidian to include a general feat skill tree for each class.

 

[anvi]

Me: Finally, a trader.

NPC: I suppose introductions are in order. Aloth Corfiser, at your service. I'm a wizard by training and an adventurer by necessity. I was born in the Cythwood, part of the mainland of the Aedyr Empire. Both of my parents served the nobility, which afforded me an education for which I'm grateful. However, there were no open positions in those houses, and so I decided to seek new means in a new land.

Me: *Frantically uninstalls*

You saw a guy fighting outside an inn and you thought "finally a trader" ? Not the brightest tool in the shed?

I was mostly referring to how every single NPC has a massive amount of shit to say and none of it is interesting or well written. But I guess you guys like that having no standards and never having read a book or watched a decent film or had a conversation with a real person. But at least the combat makes up for oh... wait...

 

[Infinitron]

I was a bit shocked to discover that "mechanics" now help discover traps, not just perception.

FFS, are you sure? That question has been asked in the latest Q&A and it was a constant question floated around for 3 years.

ed: I think the question in the q&a was about stealth's effect on discovering traps but mechanic's effect was also ambiguous for a long time.

I thought that mechanics was always used to locate traps and hidden treasures? I mean, at least in the first game.
Am I wrong, Prime Junta?

PoE used only Mechanics. There were some rumors that it also used Perception, this was an urban legend.

PoE2 is supposed to be using only Perception.

 

[anvi]

BTW one thing that is worth mentioning is encounter density. It's much better. There are plenty of fights but there's also space between them, not every map is stuffed full of trash mobs.

The density wouldn't matter if the combat was fun. I know I'm alone on this but I think if you are making an RPG and your combat is shit, then you should harm yourself and then resign.

 

[TT1]

I was a bit shocked to discover that "mechanics" now help discover traps, not just perception.

FFS, are you sure? That question has been asked in the latest Q&A and it was a constant question floated around for 3 years.

ed: I think the question in the q&a was about stealth's effect on discovering traps but mechanic's effect was also ambiguous for a long time.

I thought that mechanics was always used to locate traps and hidden treasures? I mean, at least in the first game.
Am I wrong, Prime Junta?

PoE used only Mechanics. There were some rumors that it also used Perception, this was an urban legend.

PoE2 is supposed to be using only Perception.

Maybe they just used the same old description, idk.

 

[Tartantyco]

I was a bit shocked to discover that "mechanics" now help discover traps, not just perception.

FFS, are you sure? That question has been asked in the latest Q&A and it was a constant question floated around for 3 years.

ed: I think the question in the q&a was about stealth's effect on discovering traps but mechanic's effect was also ambiguous for a long time.

Mechanics was used to discover traps in PoE1. In PoE2, Perception will be used to discover them. All the tooltips in the Backer Beta are just copy/pasted over from PoE1 and are not accurate in regards to changes made in PoE2.

 

[soulburner]

Seeing how poorly PoE1 ran on my laptop with intergrated Intel HD4000 graphics (pretty much unplayable and makes the CPU exceed 90*C) does PoE2, with extended graphical stuff run much worse, just worse or same?

 

[Starwars]

Is there a reaction from Obsidian's part to the criticism so far? Do they for example agree that combat is fast or that wizards get too few spells ?

I posted a thread on the Obsidian boards, whining about the lack of slow mode, and a dev answered that it's the sort of thing they want more feedback and encouraged people to give their views on it.

I guess it will take a while before we see "official word" on these things, since the beta is just released I imagine they are really just gathering feedback at the moment.

 

[jungl]

havent tried out the beta but reading the obsidian forum about it makes me think people are retarded. Yes casters pick spells like the original game. There was absolutely nothing separating casters from other classes then their spells. It the exact same shit as the first game but without the cross class talents but now they put it in a UI similar to tyranny skill tree people are getting butt blasted.

 

[TalesfromtheCrypt]

Seeing how poorly PoE1 ran on my laptop with intergrated Intel HD4000 graphics (pretty much unplayable and makes the CPU exceed 90*C) does PoE2, with extended graphical stuff run much worse, just worse or same?

Heh, forget it. I also have an integrated HD4000 that just barely ran PoE1 with accetable framerates (and yeah, I nearly fried the damn CPU), the Deadfire Beta runs at 3 or 4 FPS and crashes.

Time to get a new computer for christmas

 

[Pope Amole II]

Anyone got a spare beta key? Or a contact with Obsidian, maybe? I'm just a poor russian so I took no part in figstarter but my audience kinda expects soms beta content from be (those lazy bastards could've donated more, lol). I've tried writing to their publisher's press email but they kinda ignored me (aww).

 

[TT1]

Wow, now we have virtual beggars. Codex always surprising me.

 

[Lacrymas]

The "discussions" at the Obs forums are retarded. I hope Obsidian can filter the shit and find the good bits in there, not take everything wholesale. Like the "injury system is too hard!" thread.

 

[Parabalus]

I agree with Prime Junta that pure casters feel anemic. In the PotD fights, I cannot tell to what extent, if any, they contribute relative to multi-class or martial class characters.

Yup. When the fights drag on casters become fairly useless -- they don't have that many casts, those casts aren't as impactful as they used to be, and once spent they're sitting there with their thumb up their ass plinking away with whatever weapon they have. Since cross-class martial skills are now gone, they're always going to be pretty bad at that. Martial classes OTOH just keep on truckin'.

-------> multiclass casters are much better, because they have access to their other class's martial skills. With the casting times and risk of interrupt though, even they're better off fighting rather than casting a lot of the time.

How are Ciphers? They are somewhat of a natural martial/caster mix, so they should be pretty well off?