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[scriver]

I eventually stuck with a Paladin, they were decent enough and their favoured stats coincide with the two main dialogue attributes, and I wanted those too.

Ciphers are very thematically fitting to the story, though.

[Teneb]

Barbarians can get ridiculous, too.

You jump into the middle of an enemy group. You spin. Everyone explodes.

[ChairmanPoo]

It's not just powergaming. Many classes can be stupidly powerful. It's... interestingness of gameplay and... fitness from a RP perspective.

I don't quite feel that cipher fits with my main character, you know, that's the thing... It kind of feels like cipher and watcher are too similar or somesuch...

[Harry Baldman]

I eventually stuck with a Paladin, they were decent enough and their favoured stats coincide with the two main dialogue attributes, and I wanted those too.

Ciphers are very thematically fitting to the story, though.

I loved playing an Orlan Paladin, maxing Perception and being basically impossible to hit by any means. I played the order that requires you ask for payment for anything and got bonuses for being Rational, the synergy with my playstyle was really something else there.

[ChairmanPoo]

mmm... I kind of want to play a ranged combat, scholar character, not a frontline fighter.


Cypher can fit... after a fashion, even if the more obvious choices are wizards, priests, druids or chanters, I guess.  But chanters are kinda boring right now. No story involvement either.

I think I'll keep on with my cypher now that I'm getting used to weird cypher combat. As it turns out, the abilities are quite powerful, its only that the first level ones are very reliant on party members so the first few minutes of play can feel awkard. But once shocking soul hits more or less reliably you can spam it as a deadly AOE.

[scriver]

I eventually stuck with a Paladin, they were decent enough and their favoured stats coincide with the two main dialogue attributes, and I wanted those too.

Ciphers are very thematically fitting to the story, though.

I loved playing an Orlan Paladin, maxing Perception and being basically impossible to hit by any means. I played the order that requires you ask for payment for anything and got bonuses for being Rational, the synergy with my playstyle was really something else there.

I was an Orlan too! Although i went with the Knight Errant order, I feel it's very suitable to a person who runs around solving everybody's problems all the time. Backstory was that she was a slave back in the old world who murdered her masters and ran away. Ran into a Road Warrior and became his dquire, learned all about honour and goodness and all that bullshit, then eventually escaped to the new world to begin a new life in the spirit of her site's way.

I don't quite feel that cipher fits with my main character, you know, that's the thing... It kind of feels like cipher and watcher are too similar or somesuch...

That's the reason I felt they align so well thematically, actually.

[Naryar]

So, I've been spending most of the last days on that game. My feelings on it so far :

-I like the worldbuilding. It looks pretty solid, none of the nations or gods are terribly cliché. The books are also a nice way to get more in-depth about the lore. Although some of the things are quite obviously a reskinned D&D monster.

-Characters are interesting enough, I guess, but I feel they don't interact enough, or have enough dialogue. (Tyranny did that better, iirc)

-Class/character building system is alright. Although some of it is weird (raising Might on a caster type to get more spell/ability damage ? What ? How is Might both psychic strength and mental strength ? Just make those depend on Resolve or something) and it's so obviously inspired by D&D that it should just have kept the D&D system. The spells are just plain out of a D&D manual, but they "repainted" them. Why not use the original spells and not confuse people ?

-The game is quite dark. Sometimes it tries too hard to be edgy, but it's usually quite reasonable about that. It's like a weird mix of Baldur's Gate, Frankenstein and Berserk. Which I appreciate.

-Difficulty is terribly schizophrenic. (I am playing on Normal, started on Hard then went at Normal) On the very start of the game it's quite easy, although don't get into that bear cave. Then the difficulty ramps up exponentially if you don't get a tank (kiting those trolls with a cipher and wizard...), and as you get more party members it becomes normal or even easy. And then... some enemies are an afterthought, more speedbumps than anything else, and some are BS, and you're not sure which ones are. (Well, mostly druids with Call Lightning, the undead/fair folk that spam Maggot Infestation or Insect Swarm...). Again, I am playing on normal and I feel most fights are too easy, but considering the difficulty who's all other the place, I think I'd just wipe next time I find a difficulty spike if I go to Hard mode.

-I like the large amount of quests, they seem quite well written for the most part. Dialogue is good.

-I dislike the backer content. It breaks my immersion (golden NPC names, same approach), it could have been included better, it isn't interactive, it doesn't reward you other than just reading stories, and it seems like Mary Sue and bad writing bait. I just stopped looking at them after looking at a few. Now I'm sure there are some that are well-written and worth reading, but there are just so much of them... And I don't know which ones are worth reading. Well, it's just a way to get money from the backers.

-I like the reputation system a lot. I play a Honest/Stoic/Rational Golden Pact Knight Paladin, and I enjoyed that trial where you could convince others with your reputation for honesty.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Too bad Thaos ruined it.

-There are some bugs with doors and interaction with doors, also, the pathfinding is somewhat poor. Also ally AI is very lacking, Tyranny did it much better. (I am playing v1.03)

In general I really like the game, despite it's flaws. It's a worthy successor to Baldur's Gate II, and while I like Tyranny quite a bit, I seem to prefer this one. It doesn't reach BG2's/Torment's level of greatness, of course, but then what does ?

[ChairmanPoo]

I'm liking it better than BG2. TBH I always felt the BG series were a bit overrated.  In part it's because the world setting is more original, I think.

I agree that the stats feel off. Moreover, most 'viable' characters (unless you go for low diff) are reliant on min-maxing that will limit your conversational options. I kind of feel a bit cajoled into playing some sort of characters.  Still, you can haxor your way. Arguably you're less stat bound here than in BG.

I agree that it feels better than Tyranny, too..

[Retropunch]

I had the same problem with 'almost DnD but not quite'. It just feels a bit off putting, like they've had to mix stuff up just for the sake of it (the whole might thing as you mentioned) instead of it actually mattering.

I loved BG2, but then again I played it nearer to when it came out and the times I've played afterwards I've really been in the mood for it. It also has a lot of nostalgia factor with it, which helps smooth over those jagged edges.

[ChairmanPoo]

I'm going to give another go to chanter.

How viable is Str 10, Con 8, Dex 8, Per 16, Int 18, Resolve 18?

[Harry Baldman]

I'm going to give another go to chanter.

How viable is Str 10, Con 8, Dex 8, Per 16, Int 18, Resolve 18?

I forget if chanter powers are dependent on your action speed or if there was something else at play there, but in case they are you might want to dial Dex up a few notches at the expense of Percep. Though I guess not wearing any armor is more important there.

Just make sure to take that power that lets you summon a phantom. That thing is crazy OP at low levels (makes mincemeat out of the bear in the cave) and is actually pretty good even later on. Then again I haven't played since before either of The White Marches came out so maybe they nerfed that power somewhat in the interim period just like they did the Grease one.

Now I kinda wanna give this another shot myself. Maybe I should get those expansions.

[ChairmanPoo]

The phantom... lasts for 12 seconds. Its actually fairly good, but I've come to favor skeletons as perma-meatshields (until I get access to wurms).

Dex doesn't affect chanter speed, though it can affect recovery from invocations, but, eeh, those are spaced out enough anyway.  I didnt do a full dump because I want to take pot shots at stuff. But I feel its more important to hit and crit...

I considered oomphing might, but as it turns out many chanter invs dont use might at all...  so I left it flat.  All in all I tried to keep the more physical stats flattish, so that even though I dont reap huge minmax benefits, I dont get terrible penalyies eithrr

[Harry Baldman]

So they did nerf the phantom! Used to be you could just drag it around for a good long time with its great defensive abilities and pretty excellent damage as far as I recall. Pretty okay balancing they've done in that case.

I'm not sure you need to do much with the hitting part of things, at least not on Normal. I tended to load down my less combat-built party members with arbalests and muskets and shit instead so that they could have fun blasting away at people a bunch from the back. Those I found to be pretty good for at least giving off the appearance of putting out solid damage.

[ChairmanPoo]

That's the plan, and another reason why I didn't concern myself much with dex... a -6% malus is not going to be very significant with firearms

[Sartain]

Reason they didn't use D&D mechanics is probably because of right issues. I'm sure it would cost a fair pot of cash to be allowed to stick Dungeons & Dragons on the game, and display ruleset etc.
I really like Pillars of Eternity for it's setting, mood and writing, but the mechanics are quite uninteresting to me. Too much work getting into a mediocre system. Playing a Druid works for me because I can pretty much default to buff-shapeshift-throw magical damage at enemies, although it becomes a bit samey.
I wish the character generation was more interesting, but pretty much all characters level the same way, with access to the same "traits" (perks? abilities?) which is rather bland. It's about the same level as BGII in terms of player involvement with character mechanics and that was fine 17 years ago, but not today I think.

I miss the level of character customization you had access to in Neverwinter Nights, with multi-classing, feats and prestige classes, that was one solid system for complex-yet-understandable character mechanics. Maybe just because I played a ton of D&D 3.5