Eternity Pillars of Eternity + The White March Expansion Thread

[Sannom]

The most BG-like silly thing I can think of is Eder's obsession with petting anything that looks soft, from Itumaak's fur to Hiravias' head. Despite probably knowing that he really shouldn't.

 

[mitochondritom]

Quite a lot of any NPC's interactions with Durance are quite at odds with his character. They sort of speak to him as if he is a sort of dirty/racist uncle and mock him, but actually its like he is some sort of dirty/racist uncle with a history of murdering heretics and also detonating a magical nuclear bomb on a god. From your interactions with him early on he seems dangerous, the dialogue talks about his staff and how he seems like he is about to fuck someone up. Hell if your character is an Orlan he will tell you he thinks you should be skinned and turned into a stool. It seems like all the party should be wary of him and not make jokes about his pox ridden dick.

It is tricky to add humour in these games though, too much and you risk losing any semblance of seriousness in the plot (Divinity OS). Bioware's more recent games suffer massively from irreverent shit popping up in their desperately serious cutscenes. Pillars just about gets it, there are some humorous bits but it doesn't really stray into lol monkey cheese garbage. Its nowhere near as bad as Jans turnip shit followed by 2000 words of Aeire weeping about her wings though.

 

[agris]

I don't know if this has been posted already, but it's the last snapshot of PoE's steam ownership data before Paradox went IPO: https://web.archive.org/web/20160405052444/http://steamspy.com/app/291650

edit: when they went IPO, all Paradox published games had Steam Spy hide their data.

 

[AwesomeButton]

If they had passed 1 million, they would have bragged about it. 800-something thousand is where it's probably still at.

 

[Morality Games]

Quite a lot of any NPC's interactions with Durance are quite at odds with his character. They sort of speak to him as if he is a sort of dirty/racist uncle and mock him, but actually its like he is some sort of dirty/racist uncle with a history of murdering heretics and also detonating a magical nuclear bomb on a god. From your interactions with him early on he seems dangerous, the dialogue talks about his staff and how he seems like he is about to fuck someone up. Hell if your character is an Orlan he will tell you he thinks you should be skinned and turned into a stool. It seems like all the party should be wary of him and not make jokes about his pox ridden dick.

It is tricky to add humour in these games though, too much and you risk losing any semblance of seriousness in the plot (Divinity OS). Bioware's more recent games suffer massively from irreverent shit popping up in their desperately serious cutscenes. Pillars just about gets it, there are some humorous bits but it doesn't really stray into lol monkey cheese garbage. Its nowhere near as bad as Jans turnip shit followed by 2000 words of Aeire weeping about her wings though.

Codex is full of faux (?) Nazis but our most prominent moderator is a Jewish inhabitant of Israel. Or, Communists and Nationalists in China joined together to fight the Japanese when they roasted each other alive before and after. Democrat and Republican bipartisanship etc...

Point is, shared circumstances can coax fierce enemies into a state of functional solidarity.

Of course, it would have been better if rival companions were programmed to kill each other or leave the party ala Annah in PS:T.

It's also worth noting that Durance is a "fire and brimstone" preacher who is mostly talk unless he gets caught up with a mob.

 

[Sizzle]

Quite a lot of any NPC's interactions with Durance are quite at odds with his character. They sort of speak to him as if he is a sort of dirty/racist uncle and mock him, but actually its like he is some sort of dirty/racist uncle with a history of murdering heretics and also detonating a magical nuclear bomb on a god. From your interactions with him early on he seems dangerous, the dialogue talks about his staff and how he seems like he is about to fuck someone up. Hell if your character is an Orlan he will tell you he thinks you should be skinned and turned into a stool. It seems like all the party should be wary of him and not make jokes about his pox ridden dick.

Being the Watcher, you're the only one who can perceive Durance for what he really is, he'd never confide about his past if you weren't. So besides that, all the other characters only see an ugly dude who's constantly talking smack about fiery whores and Eothas getting blown up. If they knew the truth, some of them (Eder, for one) would probably refuse to travel with him.

It's also worth noting that before Durance and Grieving Mother got cut, their stories were intertwined - Durance was supposed to have tortured her during the Purges, and she lashed out in defense, wounding his soul.

As it stands now, he's the only character who's personal quest and story are directly tied to the main story (and reveal) of PoE.

 

[Sannom]

Of course, it would have been better if rival companions were programmed to kill each other or leave the party ala Annah in PS:T.

How can the bold part happen?

 

[Neanderthal]

Spoiler

Have Grace in your party an admit feelings for her in Ravel's Maze I think, Annah tells you to fuck off a bit later usually. Then again I think i've had it happen in Sigil once or twice, so might be just gettin friendly wi Grace sets er off.

 

[Roguey]

http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/88592-unique-backer-related-issue-need-some-help-here/#entry1834724

We should have a DVD 3.03 DLC download available for purchase soon.

Note: I will not be purchasing the DLC for already-stated reasons.

Additional Note: I noticed that he said "3.03" instead of "3.04" but it'll do.

 

[AwesomeButton]

So when exactly will you play the game?

 

[Infinitron]

http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/88592-unique-backer-related-issue-need-some-help-here/#entry1834724

We should have a DVD 3.03 DLC download available for purchase soon.

Note: I will not be purchasing the DLC for already-stated reasons.

Additional Note: I noticed that he said "3.03" instead of "3.04" but it'll do.

He didn't actually say they would release a patch for the DVD version. Inb4 the only way to update to 3.03 is to buy the expansion.

 

[Florian Gheorghe]

Today I finished the game again with the White March expansion completed as a hole. Managed to surpass 400 hours of play and it was such an epic journey. Finally an expansion that fixed a lot of the problems (there are still problems) but it made the game better and with choices and consequences that you can see even in the end of the game (results from expansion). Can't wait for PoE2! Until then I hope I can have a blast with Tyranny and TTON.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B0JJj3iiOF0iSzBucVYzMVpablE/view?usp=sharing

 

[Roguey]

So when exactly will you play the game?

Whenever "soon" is.

 

[Shadenuat]

That feeling when you realise you killed your own fun by coming to Mowrghek Îen at level 16

Why did Sawyer try to fight everything he thought wrong with RPGs except level gains trivializing content?





I ctrl-v'ed Mowrghek Îen from Steam achievements because I could't write it right in Google to find how you actually write it.

 

[Roguey]

Level gains trivializing content is a deliberate feature on account of the "higher hit chance increases criticals" that they're also carrying over into Tyranny. A non-trivial number of people like the feeling of crushing lower level enemies with no effort. If you don't like it, there's always their awkward optional level scaling feature (which will be mandatory in Tyranny).

 

[Rivmusique]

Mowrghek Îen is level 16 content. It's the optional-toughest-area, like Cragholdt (and ice dragon) to TWM1 (14) and lower endless paths (12). If that's not made for 16, nothing is.

 

[Shadenuat]

Not a fan of attribute level scaling, I'd probably prefer monster(encounter) tables. Either way it's a problem that shouldn't be fixed on systemic level alone, some sort of reactivity should happen if you meet/slay creatures that are too low or high level.

Mowrghek Îen is level 16 content. It's the optional-toughest-area, like Cragholdt (and ice dragon) to TWM1 (14) and lower endless paths (12). If that's not made for 16, nothing is.

Everything except boss is easy for level 12-14 party. I decided to gain a few levels but ended up in an awkward situation of just roflstomping boss at level 16.
I believe she's optimised for level 14.

It was same for me with Ice Dragon. Suddenly a few levels make something which looks unkillable (with these enemies now being immune to exploits like paralyze and 90% of all best control spells in the game) into a trivial battle where 2 rounds of good buffs win everything for you.

New immunities really screw up control builds btw. Before it was good to carry 2 nukers around, but control-wizard for example was a viable option too. Now I would never play a CC-char again - priest buffs and then dd/nukes nukes nukes. That's JS approved strategy now.

 

[Grimnir]

I had 2 cc-chars and no nukers. You can still cc everybody pretty easily. Alpine dragon can be petrified, adra dragon can be paralyzed, etc.

 

[Shadenuat]

Yea for 4 seconds?
I think 16th level Durance just annihilated whole boss encounter for me with his fire rain spell and buffs. My Wizard's Wall of Many Colors was way less impressive in the end than I thought.

Also druids of all classes got a buff, and paid just with petrify in one of spells. Like they needed more cool shit.

Grieving Mom is still meh. Tried with SilverFlash/twin crossbow/other toys & DR piercing modal, maybe I'm doing something wrong.
Devil of Caroc also felt meh.
Sagani seems like better and more reliable source of damage.
Zahua with all the super items is a rape train.

And Maneha, game agreed with my opinion on her with this strange bug:

Spoiler

 

[Grimnir]

Yea for 4 seconds?
I think 16th level Durance just annihilated whole boss encounter for me with his fire rain spell and buffs. My Wizard's Wall of Many Colors was way less impressive in the end than I thought.

Also druids of all classes got a buff, and paid just with petrify in one of spells. Like they needed more cool shit.

Grieving Mom is still meh. Tried with SilverFlash/twin crossbow/other toys & DR piercing modal, maybe I'm doing something wrong.

Devil of Caroc also felt meh.
Sagani seems like better and more reliable source of damage.
Zahua with all the super items is a rape train.

And Maneha, game agreed with my opinion on her with this strange bug:

I get 15 seconds with enough buffs & debuffs, which is enough to murder anything or apply more cc.

If you have both Grieving Mother and Zahua and on your team, cast Reaping Knives on him. Zahua's unarmed attacks become raw damage (bypasses immunities and DR), and Grieving Mother has practically unlimited focus..

 

[Shadenuat]

Knives, good idea, although costly in focus.
I picked that ability that adds fire damage per wound and he killed Ice Dragon that way (-DR=0 damage +17.5 whatever fire damage per hit) worked fine.

 

[Infinitron]

Sawyer going GDC Europe (August 15-16 at Cologne, Germany): http://schedule.gdceurope.com/session/looking-back-and-moving-forward-with-pillars-of-eternity

Looking Back and Moving Forward with Pillars of Eternity

'Pillars of Eternity' is a crowdfunded PC RPG with its roots in 'Baldur's Gate', 'Icewind Dale', and 'Planescape: Torment'. Creating a spiritual successor to such beloved games after more than a decade presented a number of challenges. This talk looks at several of these problems and examines how the team at Obsidian attempted to achieve a classic look and feel while accounting for contemporary design sensibilities. The session will also show what Obsidian learned from its successes and failures and how the team plans to apply those lessons in the future.

Takeaway
Attendees will gain insights into the benefits and pitfalls of making a "retro classic", especially for a crowdfunding audience that is emotionally (and financially) invested from the start of the project. Special emphasis will be given to feeling and its significance to players.

Intended Audience
This talk will benefit anyone involved in the creation of retro classic / "old school" games as well as people involved in working with an active community of crowdfunding backers. The lecture will use RPG terms, but will not require deep RPG knowledge.

Looks more general post-mortem talk than the attributes talk.

Here it comes:

 

[Ninjerk]

I wonder if this one will be as strange as the Linear-Scaling-Supremacy talk.

 

[Infinitron]

I think this may be a troll attempt

 

[Infinitron]