Codex Review RPG Codex Retrospective Review: Pillars of Eternity Revisited

[tripedal]

Regardless of the simplicity of the system, I have to say that exponential power curves are superior to logarithmic ones.

 

[you know what time it is]

Even though I never actively disliked PoE and felt like it was a solid foundation for a proper game in the future, it never deserved that much attention back when it was released, let alone now.

At this point you are just reviewing a mediocre game that's neither old nor interesting.

 

[almondblight]

I don't know any RPGs where all skills are equally useful, do you?

The post I was responding to didn't think the system was unbalanced. "Sure it's unbalanced, but so are other systems" does mean it isn't unbalanced.

Throwing isn't that bad either and first aid and doctor are very useful assuming we don't save scum (otherwise you can heal a crippled limb or other injuries even with very low skill). Same goes for lockpicking or gambling. Try to use these skills while having them at less than 100% and not using the load feature.

Isn't it Doctor and not First Aid that heals crippled limbs? Anyway, I don't recall ever getting a crippled limb in the game, and this suggests I'm not the only one (looks like it's more of an issue for low stamina low luck chars). Though it's possible that it happened and I just went to a doctor - either way it wasn't much of an issue.

Yeah, gambling with a low gambling skill is probably a bad idea, but why even gamble in the first place? Money's almost never tight in the game.

And there are skills where there's no use in rasing them above the 50% threshold (100% in the game terms, since max is 200%). What's the highest repair check, around 100? And then they give you a bunch of repair books beforehand to raise it up without putting skill points in?

 

[Rivmusique]

impressively coded mages will sling a multitude of spells that change dynamically depending on your own combat actions and, if you are good enough, you will face off against two dragons AND an archmage (I had to give up on that one and solve it through dialogue – making it the only fight in Pillars I have not beat).

Wall of Many Colors was my MVP for this fight. Dragons are huge so spend a lot of time in it and seem to eat every affliction.

The news that more Archmages will be in 2 was definitely the most exciting for me, more of these will be great.

 

[Jaedar]

Glad to see that as the world changes, Codex remains Codex

Just keep up the good work. It is articles like yours that ultimately decide the industry's perception of this place, much more so than whatever is the current consensus among the most edgy and vocal posters.
It is easy to hate on stuff when you're anonymous poster who doesn't need to care about the site's reputation and its relationship with devs and publishers.

Newfagging intensifies.

The actual article ain't that bad. It seems to have some concrete examples of good encounter design, but none about how the char system has improved. Quite a shame, because the former are meaningless unless you have played the game, whereas the latter could be understood anyway (especially for people who played 1.0). I wound up googling the PoE multiclass talents to get a feel for these supposed improvements, but they were shit.

All told, I was almost tempted to check it out, but then I reclaimed my reason and realized Grunker is a massive fanboy for anything abbreviated PoE and the game is probably still painfully mediocre.

 

[Quillon]

What changed? Philosophy or the game? Sawyer's gonna sue codex over questioning his integrity!

 

[Ulfhednar]

Pillars is ultimately always going to be a flawed game because the attack of opportunity mechanic and the complete lack of most kinds of crowd control outside that awful system, in a RTWP game where 90% of the appeal of the Infinity Engine games was managing positioning in combat, is hot garbage.

Nearly every class has crowd controlling abilities that can have very long durations if you boost your intelligence, and they stack. Positioning is more important in PoE than it is in the IE games. I can understand not liking AoO, but if anything it makes positioning even more important and gives weight to items and talents that change movement speed.

 

[Mynon]

What changed? Philosophy or the game? Sawyer's gonna sue codex over questioning his integrity!

Change as in evolution and growth. That philosophy is now made manifest in a more perfect manner.

 

[VentilatorOfDoom]

We clearly need longer titles: "RPG Codex Short Introductory Retrospective Comparative Review: The Infinity Engine Games, Pillars of Eternity, and The White March, their Evolution, Challenges, Design, History, and Future Prospects, vol. I-XXIII."

Spoiler

It would be even better in German.

RPG Codex Kurze einführende, vergleichende, rückblickende Besprechung: Die >>Infinity Engine<< Spiele, Die Säulen der Ewigkeit, und Der Weiße Marsch, ihre Entwicklung, Herausforderungen, Aufbau, Geschichte, und Zukunftsaussichten, vol. I-XXIII.

 

[Infinitron]

The news that more Archmages will be in 2

If you're talking about this Sawyer tweet, it's clearly a joke.

 

[Quillon]

The news that more Archmages will be in 2

If you're talking about this Sawyer tweet, it's clearly a joke.

They said there'll be more, prolly in one the streams.

Found it:

Will we run into Archmages in Deadfire as we did in The White March?

<Josh looks at the camera knowingly>

KA: Didn't we have a backer tier for that?

JS: Oh, to make an Archmage? There is that. But...the answer is yes. You will. We're not saying who, but yes, the boys are back in town.

 

[cruelio]

Pillars is ultimately always going to be a flawed game because the attack of opportunity mechanic and the complete lack of most kinds of crowd control outside that awful system, in a RTWP game where 90% of the appeal of the Infinity Engine games was managing positioning in combat, is hot garbage.

Nearly every class has crowd controlling abilities that can have very long durations if you boost your intelligence, and they stack. Positioning is more important in PoE than it is in the IE games. I can understand not liking AoO, but if anything it makes positioning even more important and gives weight to items and talents that change movement speed.

You can't talk to these people because they remember liking BG1 when they were four years old and then played PoE for five minutes and decided it's the worst game ever. The amount of times I've seen people complain about PoE things that literally are not factually true and then just make up things about the infinity games is insane.

 

[FreeKaner]

Regardless of the simplicity of the system, I have to say that exponential power curves are superior to logarithmic ones.

Logarithmic curves are expotential. You mean arithmetic curves.

Either case just looking at PoE's curve in vacuum with assumption the enemy doesn't have any deflection is disingenious at best, especially considering PoE has DR which is a layer that simply doesn't exist in older I.E games.

 

[Infinitron]

Heh: http://www.gamebanshee.com/news/119...eview-real-time-with-pause-retrospective.html

Funnily enough, the timing here is impeccable, since I've played through these expansions myself a couple of days ago. And while I still believe that some systems in Pillars of Eternity are fundamentally broken, and despite a myriad of patches there are still stray bugs and typos to be found, for the most part I agree with this Codex review. Playing The White March is like playing a completely different, well-crafted game. For anyone who found the base Pillars of Eternity to be a bit on the dull side, I would strongly recommend giving The White March a chance.

 

[Ulfhednar]

You can't talk to these people because they remember liking BG1 when they were four years old and then played PoE for five minutes and decided it's the worst game ever. The amount of times I've seen people complain about PoE things that literally are not factually true and then just make up things about the infinity games is insane.

Yeah, this game has no CC... **charms Adra Dragon**

 

[ga♥]

I want to be a shill too, how much is the pay? What have I to do?

Infinitron I think I can write another neutral positive review of PoE to be published next week, please give me a chance.

 

[Konjad]

Now I feel like I need to write negative quickie about PoE to balance things out.

 

[Decado]

Can I do the review of PoE 2? And by "the" review I mean "one of the several" reviews?

 

[Infinitron]

Can I do the review of PoE 2? And by "the" review I mean "one of the several" reviews?

I thought you'd decided you weren't cut out for Kodex-kaliber reviewing.

 

[Hamster]

It is a harsh companion, nostalgia. It deceives you into thinking the magic of childhood remains magical and sours what should be enjoyment of modern marvels. So many Kickstarted games have fallen prey to its lies, implementing stock ideas that were already outdated at the time in misunderstood attempts to stay true to the source material.
...
Pillars of Eternity: The White March is a rare phenomenon because it sorts through the past with clarity of vision, doing away with quaint mechanics and obsolete system design while holding onto what always worked,

Nostalgia, my ass. I remember hearing all the same arguments against IE impementation of AD&D back in 2000. Seems to me that after 17 fucking years no game managed to surpass the pure joy of BG2's combat, but instead of finally admiting that maybe, just maybe, the system design was not so obsolete after all, the Cult of Balance now wants to gaslight us and attribute everything to nostalgia.

 

[I ASK INANE QUESTIONS]

gr8 b8 m8

 

[I ASK INANE QUESTIONS]

I thought you'd decided you weren't cut out for Kodex-kaliber reviewing.

Well the caliber dropped slightly since then, didn't it? :^)

 

[l3loodAngel]

How many of the people in this thread have actually played White March pt1 and 2 I wonder?

Love it or hate it, it has to be said the expansion is dramatically different from the base game. And considering many of the issues people had with Pillars of Eternity were encounter and level design, not system based, the change in the expansion is pretty significant.

Pillars is ultimately always going to be a flawed game because the attack of opportunity mechanic and the complete lack of most kinds of crowd control outside that awful system, in a RTWP game where 90% of the appeal of the Infinity Engine games was managing positioning in combat, is hot garbage.

But shouting down an expansion that is pretty seriously different to the base game is pretty moronic.

The White March content is different enough that the comparison I'd draw is between Shadowrun Dragonfall and the base game. Same fundamentals but thoroughly different outcome.

Should've been released as a standalone game then

But it wasn't, and if the Codex's review system can't cope with that simple fact it's that's just nitpicking. Some expansions are very similar to the basegame, the White March feels more like a module for Neverwinter than something connected to the basegame, there's fuck all narrative threads connecting the two at the end of the day.

There's a bunch of REAL issues with White March that you can draw an actual bone with other than that shallow argument.

What encounter design if there are no solid systems and hard counters? WTF are you talking about? Besides we played patched POE. Was it better? Hahahaha oh wow.

 

[l3loodAngel]

If not for Crooked Bee Infinitron wouldn't have that much influence. Someone has to approve these shit news and allow for inXile/Obsidian spam (plus high-profile Kickstarter spams for games with budgets 1 M $ and more), if you ask me that someone is the main culprit and the reason that this site is becoming another IGN/NeoGaf.

Notice that in the age of incline votes, Crooked Bee gave PoE a 5 and Tyranny a 4. The list of people who gave PoE a 4 includes Zed, Felipepepe, Jedi Exile, and Mastermind. So yeah, they are trying really hard to make this place into a Obsidian central fanboy club, and they will treat the next PoE as a classic on release. They couldn't believe their luck when people decide to use Infinitron as a scapegoat for their sins.

"Hi, my name is Infinitron!"

Well he is the most obnoxious cuck here and is setting Codex cuckhold standard. We must reward innovators appropriately.

 

[Mortmal]

Does this game really deserve all this extra attention?

Today someone posted a poll about needing different newsposters and infinitron not doing his job, poll is extemely positive towards infinitron .... So after celebrating and a drug fuelled party at codex HQ , backed by obisidian marketing department, they had to post another poe review.

That said game with the expansions is stilll an average at best rpg, only worth getting if you really desesperate , bored, have plenty of time and played everything else.

 

[Anthedon]

Let's not kid ourselves. The PoE review racket is far from over.