Eternity Pillars of Eternity + The White March Expansion Thread

[Lacrymas]

You become way too overpowered at level 10, so it's just mopping up after that. Well, it kinda depends on party composition, but most parties will be op.

 

[Just Locus]

Yeah I hear most characters get strong by level 6 and I'm already decently strong but that's also because I bought some strong weapons due to selling massive amounts of apparel and weapons that I found while exploring, I'm not planning on respec-ing my character at all and I wouldn't say I like that feature in singleplayer RPGs since it reduces replay value to a significant chunk.

 

[Butter]

In my experience, by the time I get to Twin Elms I want the game to be done. There's a bunch of side quests (including the one with the little girl in Deadfire) but I have no patience for them at that point. This is actually something where BG2 got it right. Put all those side quests early in the game, and let the late game be more laser-focused on the main quest.

 

[Just Locus]

I would say I'm exceedingly patient when it comes to video games, so I don't think it'll wear off, I'm not playing PoE in like, 2-4hr sessions or whatnot, and I don't usually have the time, I just finished Quake 1 and am playing through Arcane Dimensions, I'm more or less playing the game in chunks but if it grabs my attention for a particular quest/moment, I'll usually stick around for whatever lies ahead. I'm also the type of people who enjoy looking at every nook and cranny on my first playthroughs since you can only play a game for the first time once. and I usually am appreciative of games that make it impossible to see everything major on the first play.

Basically, TL;DR is that I'm fine with a bunch of side quests being tucked away at the late games since I'm patient enough to go through it but I wholeheartedly understand why many don't though, and I usually like to experience everything the game has to offer before I finish it so it evens out.

 

[luj1]

In my experience, by the time I get to Twin Elms I want the game to be done.

That was where I quit the game.

 

[Axel_am]

You can skip Twin Elms in like 2 minutes.

 

[Lacrymas]

You need to do at least one quest that the gods give you in order to safely jump down the pit, but otherwise Twin Elms is quite skippable.

 

[Russia is over. The end.]

You can skip Twin Elms in like 2 minutes.

You can skip the game in an infinitesimal zeptosecond. I do it all the time. Many times a day, every day.

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

Noob: plays all the way to Twin Elms

Pro: Quits after Raedrik and maybe throne room fight in Cad Nua, it's all downhill from there.

 

[AwesomeButton]

maybe throne room fight in Cad Nua,

That was where one of my last attempts ended actually. I pictured having to do Defiance bay's cliche factions' questlines and just couldn't bring myself to carry on.

 

[Lacrymas]

You are doing yourself a disservice by not playing WM before quitting.

 

[GentlemanCthulhu]

Started my second playthrough of this. Last one was in 2017 - a +100 hours run with both DLCs as a barbarian. This time i'm going cypher. Class is OP.

 

[Lacrymas]

Both Chanters and Ciphers are op imo because they break the rules of the game, i.e. they don't operate within the Vancian casting system. Either stick to a system or have unique casting rules for every class (within reason).

 

[Axel_am]

Started my second playthrough of this. Last one was in 2017 - a +100 hours run with both DLCs as a barbarian. This time i'm going cypher. Class is OP.

Now this is a man of culture who clearly knows what he's doing. I'm starting to question if the rest of you even have the grit to finish the game on Normal.

 

[GentlemanCthulhu]

Started my second playthrough of this. Last one was in 2017 - a +100 hours run with both DLCs as a barbarian. This time i'm going cypher. Class is OP.

Now this is a man of culture who clearly knows what he's doing. I'm starting to question if the rest of you even have the grit to finish the game on Normal.

Codex loves to hate. Simply ignore. Btw since it was brought up, i'm playing on path of the damned.

 

[GentlemanCthulhu]

Playing cipher is really cool. It lets you do some interesting emergent shit:
Woman has her husband murdered by her lover and wants to run away with him? Cast charm on her and watch her stab her lover to death.
Necromancer thinks she's hot shit? Cast charm on her and watch as she gets ripped to shreds fighting her own undead.
I could go on.
In general i really love atmosphere and vibes. Lots of edgy choices and consequences.

 

[Haplo]

Both Chanters and Ciphers are op imo because they break the rules of the game, i.e. they don't operate within the Vancian casting system. Either stick to a system or have unique casting rules for every class (within reason).

Now that's a retarded take if I ever saw one.
Its one of the best things about PoE class system, that different classes have differing mechanics, combat flow - and strenghts and weaknesses. Really makes the ciphers and chanters play differently then mages, clerics or druids.

I lament the class ability unification that came with Deadfire move to per encounter powers and multiclassing.

 

[Lacrymas]

Now that's a retarded take if I ever saw one.
Its one of the best things about PoE class system, that different classes have differing mechanics, combat flow - and strenghts and weaknesses.

But that's not the case in PoE. Since Wizards, Priests and Druids operate on the same system, Chanters and Ciphers seem foreign and their ability to go on casting forever is counter to the attrition the limiting camping supplies suggest. If the game had actual attrition, you can bet Chanters and Ciphers would be the most popular and broken classes.

 

[Haplo]

Yeah, the other classes are more similar, but their selection of spells plus unique class abilities do provide them separate niches (like Priest is king of buffing & debuffing).

Meanwhile Ciphers and Chanters theoretically have endless resources... but in practice very different combat impact, because they have to gather the resources to cast first.
In particular Chanters are pretty slow casters. And ciphers cannot compare to an aoe barrage a mid-high level nuker wizard can unload either.
So the momentum is very different.

Of course, I still love the Cipher class. And Barbarians.

 

[Technomancer]

And ciphers cannot compare to an aoe barrage a mid-high level nuker wizard can unload either.
So the momentum is very different.

Yeah I dunno. Ripping blades casted on a monk for easy focus gen + maybe a shotgun with focus increasing items can make you drop nukes like crazy. I recall that AoE that does raw and knockdowns. And best part its infinite.

I liked how cyphers were felt OP and probably endured the most nerfs. And are still OP. Fun class.

 

[GentlemanCthulhu]

I don't think Ciphers are OP on Hard+. In my experience, PoE encounter and class design is such way that every class can fill specific roles in the party quite well. I don't think the game has any weak classes per-se. None of that matters on difficulties below hard though, as encounters finish well before your class specific mechanics begin to matter. Also, what I find about PoE is that it encourages having a well thought-out party composition. You can also build each class in a few different ways to fill specific roles.

My Cypher right now is focused on CC, while the companion cypher in my previous role was a nuker. They mechanically feel different to me and I like that. In the last playthrough the wizard was doing CC/Nuking, while now he's mostly playing the single-target assassin role (which was filled by a rogue or ranger before).

 

[Axel_am]

The most overpowered class is the Priest, but I doubt any of the elite gamers we've got over here is going to mention that since all they seem to care about is big dmg and having everybody operate within the same system.

 

[Haplo]

I don't think Ciphers are OP on Hard+. In my experience, PoE encounter and class design is such way that every class can fill specific roles in the party quite well. I don't think the game has any weak classes per-se. None of that matters on difficulties below hard though, as encounters finish well before your class specific mechanics begin to matter. Also, what I find about PoE is that it encourages having a well thought-out party composition. You can also build each class in a few different ways to fill specific roles.

My Cypher right now is focused on CC, while the companion cypher in my previous role was a nuker. They mechanically feel different to me and I like that. In the last playthrough the wizard was doing CC/Nuking, while now he's mostly playing the single-target assassin role (which was filled by a rogue or ranger before).

Yeah, Ciphers are great, but on their own struggle a bit with Accuracy versus the tougher enemies on the highest difficulties. And if they have trouble hitting, they can't build Focus.
So its not all roses.
Of course, nothing a friendly Priest can't fix...

 

[Lacrymas]

We know Priest is op, there's a significant difference between playing with and without one, probably the most significant choice you can make regarding party composition. Chanters and Ciphers didn't end up op simply because there's 0 attrition going on.

 

[Axel_am]

In truth by end game all of the classes preform well. I think they've achieved a good balance with how the classes were designed. Maybe some were better at others at that one specific thing, but I never felt like that was part of bad game design.

From my experience you can still have a strong group with pretty much every reasonable party composition. And what's written in this thread confirms it. Yes, the Cipher does more DMG than the Barb, but if I replace my Cipher with a Barb I'll still be able to crush my enemies. This applies for pretty much everything except for the Priest.

Class synergy isn't really an issue with Pillars and neither is the way Cipher and Chanter were designed.