http://steamcommunity.com/app/291650/discussions/0/618457398961083320/
I'm feeling a little... streamlined.
As a quick disclaimer, I suppose I haven't exactly racked up hours. I haven't precisely invested a massive amount of time.
However, despite the aforementioned I'm feeling a little bit upset by the experience currently presented (queue, 'hater!'). I naturally pick wizard/mage where possible. I greatly enjoy the experience as I believe a wizard is - when prepared and equipped - the greatest force to be reckoned with. A prepared wizard can overcome any obstacle, that a fighter may be inevitably stuck at.
I was so pumped. I know my isometrics, I know my spells. I know what I need - I need to move quick or otherwise they'll tear me apart. I need some reliable defence buff, a little AOE and a little single target.
I walk through the old ruin gates. I know this scenario too well. I can guess what lies ahead. I quickly move my mouse down to my spell tab, at my low level marked only as an 'I' to indicate the level of spell. I proceed to cast my spell of ar-
Wait...
I can't activate my armour spell?
Or my haste?
Or double image?
...What in the fu- Okay... so I guess it's a modern, streamlined experienced in which one has to do this stuff in combat. Guess my own intuition has to step back a little - that's okay.
I'll try hit and run tactics, letting off my most powerful abilities in a short time frame, then using my haste spell (assuming I haven't already been ripped apart) to get clear and rest, recovering my most powerful abilities for the next attack. I manage to make it clear, sweat drips down my face as I slowly reassure myself the monstrosities that wish my demise are unaware as to where I will reside over the next eight hours.
Except... I've only got camping supplies for the next two nights. I sigh, realising that my hit and run tactic is also now out the proverbial window. My only tactic is to rely on those character abilities. But even then I'm reluctant to use them. A wizard should be a class of sleep and preparation, with a damage and destructive output of immense proportion that, after a large battle, is forced to sleep or be completely defenceless. That is no longer the case, the wizard feels like the half-breed between some sort of modern RPG warrior and a classic RPG mage, and has the pleasure of neither I might add.
And with that, I am inevitably forced to take party members. The games that Pillars of Eternity claims to 'spiritually' hang on to understood that you - the protagonist - may not desire a rogue, or a mage, or a warrior, a bard or anything of the adventurous ilk at all. Perhaps just preferring either for pride, challenge, or anti-social roleplay to just avoid party members. You where undeniably handicapped; you were a 1/6 of the strength you could be.
But as time passed and as you and your character gained experience that gap between a six man party and just you began to narrow. A single character is challenging yet viable. A six man party is uniform and reliable, as well as deep to meet such complex and developed characters. Pillars of Eternity does not feel as if it wants you to strike out on your own - but not in the way its ancestors did. It's ancestors stood and said "Hey, you ain't special! If you walk the wilderness by yourself, you are going to get beaten up! But I mean... experience ain't being shared y'know, you'll get very powerful very quickly *Wink wink*. The new kid on the block (Pillars) does not do this, but rather if you attempt to rely on your own cunning and intuition to make up got additional party members you're abruptly struck round the head and told "Yeah, no."
Perhaps this is all just a matter of taste. Or experience. Or maybe I'm a troll, or maybe I just need to play that little bit more, but as it stands so far I can't help but feel just that little bit disappointed.