Game News Underrail Dev Log #54: Specialization and Veteran Level Changes

[torpid]

I'm just rooting for anything that makes the game harder post-Junkyard tbh. Hopefully the expansion itself and the rebalance achieves that.

 

[Lacrymas]

You can frame it well, though, there's no need for the main quest to be urgent, it can still be important, but not urgent. Also, this is a game-y explanation, but doing other stuff generally prepares you better for the main task, i.e. xp and items. The "unrelated thing" can actually be related, why not? It still depends on how the main quest is framed.

Tales of the Sword Coast isn't a midgame expansion, it and Heart of Winter are post-game expansions that can be started once you're near the end of the base campaigns (well if you've been lawn-mowing BG content I suppose you can start it much earlier) and then go beyond.

I'd say only the underground levels of Durlag's Tower are max level content, everything else can be done way earlier. It isn't post-game content, no matter how you look at it, as you can't finish it after the end. I think TotSC is a very successful expansion in what it tried to do and it should be used as a model more. There's also no need to bunch up the expansion's content in one swoop, it can be divided into chunks at different levels.

 

[Roguey]

Styg can't (or well he shouldn't) go back and change the writing of the base campaign.

I'd say only the underground levels of Durlag's Tower are max level content, everything else can be done way earlier.

Disagree. That wizard's maze and werewolf island were noticeably more difficult than just about anything in the base campaign when I went through it.

It isn't post-game content, no matter how you look at it, as you can't finish it after the end.

Sure you can. Import your characters into the expansion. That's also how you do it in Heart of Winter (where in IWD2, it's canon that the heroes did IWD first, then HoW, then TotLM where they either died or were teleported to parts unknown).

 

[Parabalus]

It's weird that there will be two different versions of the original campaign: one for people with the expansion and one without. That's some extra balls to juggle on Styg's part.

Indeed. It's going to be quite a bit of overlapping extra work to maintain two branches of the late game. But that might just be the only way to have a mid-game expansion without ruining balance of one or the other.

The previous flat progression seemed good enough. Don't really see a reason why adding specialization points instead of veteran feats would change that, just seems like a lot of headache for almost no gain.

Mid-game expansion makes more sense from a narrative/atmospheric point of view, though. Good luck!

"I know you're on this important mission, but how about going to an entirely different place to do something entirely unrelated" will never make sense from a narrative perspective. It's just something you accept because this is a role playing game and that's what happens.

There is very little urgency in Underrail's plot, until you see the Cube snatched in front of you there is almost none, even after it's debatable.

 

[Kem0sabe]

I think the only mid game expansions i enjoyed were the ones for Witcher 3, because the first one had an amazing story and characters, and the second one had a pretty cool zone, but they did mess up the balance in the game, making a lot of the subsequent content trivial, especially because Blood and Wine was such a high level map compared to the endgame content of the base game.

 

[Roguey]

Both Witcher 3 DLC were post-game content considering their starting levels compared to the base. Blood and Wine even concludes with a post-endgame conversation.

There is very little urgency in Underrail's plot, until you see the Cube snatched in front of you there is almost none, even after it's debatable.

"Gotta give these guys whatever they want so they'll go away and stop attacking us" seems pretty urgent to me, and that starts after you're done with the tutorial area.

 

[Parabalus]

Both Witcher 3 DLC were post-game content considering their starting levels compared to the base. Blood and Wine even concludes with a post-endgame conversation.

There is very little urgency in Underrail's plot, until you see the Cube snatched in front of you there is almost none, even after it's debatable.

"Gotta give these guys whatever they want so they'll go away and stop attacking us" seems pretty urgent to me, and that starts after you're done with the tutorial area.

Also a early main quest in BaW flat out says you defeated the Wild Hunt, regardless of where you are in the original game.

You don't even know they are attacking until you get there, and after you do you go on to core city without much urgency except following up, you only realise the importance of the cube after you've been at it for a while.

 

[Tygrende]

"Gotta give these guys whatever they want so they'll go away and stop attacking us" seems pretty urgent to me, and that starts after you're done with the tutorial area.

The reason why you're looking for the Cube and what do you want to do with it after you find it is completly up to the player. Just because Tanner claims he wants to return it to the Faceless and tells you to find it does not mean that's your motivation as well. You could be looking for it to complete your task, to obtain power, to learn the truth, because you have nothing better to do, or even go full chaotic stupid and just leave it on the ground after you find it.

Whether there is any urgency or not is completely up to you. Not to mention we do not know what will be the reason to go on an expedition to the Black Sea yet, chances are it's related to the main plot, possibly just as or even more urgent.

 

[Kem0sabe]

Also a early main quest in BaW flat out says you defeated the Wild Hunt, regardless of where you are in the original game.

You don't even know they are attacking until you get there, and after you do you go on to core city without much urgency except following up, you only realise the importance of the cube after you've been at it for a while.

Forgot about that completely.

 

[Roguey]

"Gotta give these guys whatever they want so they'll go away and stop attacking us" seems pretty urgent to me, and that starts after you're done with the tutorial area.

The reason why you're looking for the Cube and what do you want to do with it after you find it is completly up to the player. Just because Tanner claims he wants to return it to the Faceless and tells you to find it does not mean that's your motivation as well. You could be looking for it to complete your task, to obtain power, to learn the truth, because you have nothing better to do, or even go full chaotic stupid and just leave it on the ground after you find it.

Whether there is any urgency or not is completely up to you. Not to mention we do not know what will be the reason to go on an expedition to the Black Sea yet, chances are it's related to the main plot, possibly just as or even more urgent.

In the endgame of Underrail you have to give the cube back, and your only options are to either give up your adventuring ways for a cushy pencil pusher job or chase after the guy who started the whole mess to begin with. Any other motivation is LARPing.

 

[Tygrende]

In the endgame of Underrail you have to give the cube back

You don't have to give it back. You can leave it on the ground or resist both Faceless and Six. You cannot prevent Six from stealing it from you, true, but you are not giving it back willingly.

your only options are to either give up your adventuring ways for a cushy pencil pusher job or chase after the guy who started the whole mess to begin with. Any other motivation is LARPing.

True, but that has nothing to do with my point.

 

[Lurker King]

The previous flat progression seemed good enough. Don't really see a reason why adding specialization points instead of veteran feats would change that, just seems like a lot of headache for almost no gain.

No gain? He is trying to improve character building and testing new things with milimetric precision.

 

[Parabalus]

The previous flat progression seemed good enough. Don't really see a reason why adding specialization points instead of veteran feats would change that, just seems like a lot of headache for almost no gain.

No gain? He is trying to improve character building and testing new things with milimetric precision.

The worst part of UR char building is when you bulldoze content because of level derived stats, e.g. when my char with 3 PER has enough detection to breeze through rathound king lair because it scales with levels.

While that can all be tuned, the previous idea of capping those at 25 seemed like a simple and effective solution, you still had a lot of customisation options, which are cooler than raw power.

 

[lukaszek]

deterministic system > RNG

 

[Parabalus]

The worst part of UR char building is when you bulldoze content because of level derived stats, e.g. when my char with 3 PER has enough detection to breeze through rathound king lair because it scales with levels.

Trap detection chance is based on Detection or both detection and traps skill. There are two formulas for trap detection value, the greater of the two for the particular character is used:

• Pure detection equals 75% of regular detection value.
• Hybrid detection equals 50% of regular detection value plus 75% of effective trap skill.

Detection scales explicitly with level, so not sure what you're getting at.

My point was that regardless of your trap skill you can see traps/crawlers thanks to only levelling up, without any skill/attribute point allocation, as in my example, which I don't think is a highlight of the system.

 

[lukaszek]

deterministic system > RNG

 

[Iluvcheezcake]

Spoiler tags please! D'oh! :/

 

[Roguey]

Spoiler tags please! D'oh! :/

It was released nearly two years ago and the last patch was over half a year ago. The time for being considerate with spoilers has long passed.

 

[Iluvcheezcake]

Spoiler tags please! D'oh! :/

It was released nearly two years ago and the last patch was over half a year ago. The time for being considerate with spoilers has long passed.

But-but-but-bhuuuuuuuut