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Path of the Damned for first POE playtrough?

Santander02

Arcane
Joined
Sep 29, 2009
Messages
3,363
Finally decided to give this game whirl instead of letting it rot on my gog library. I've read PotD is the only way one should play this, but then I've also read you HAVE to min max your stats to get trough it, which I dislike.

Maybe leaving PotD for white march would be a better idea, thoughts?
 

Morkar Left

Guest
There will be some hard points in the beginning (mostly ghosts and the like) but otherwise it's fairly doable. Just playing on hard will probably do as well.
 

Roguey

Codex Staff
Staff Member
Sawyerite
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May 29, 2010
Messages
35,660
It depends entirely on your skill level. Do you find most RPGs easy? Set it to PotD. Are you satisfied with their level of difficulty? Stick to hard, possibly turn it down if that's too much (with potd you're locked in and can never change it).
 

Starwars

Arcane
Joined
Jan 31, 2007
Messages
2,829
Location
Sweden
If you feel proficient at the Baldurs Gate games, you should do fine I think.

I played on Hard first which felt too easy (back at release). Finished it at PotD later and didn't have too much of a problem, except with some fights from the White March content.
 

prodigydancer

Arcane
In My Safe Space
Joined
Feb 16, 2015
Messages
1,399
I've also read you HAVE to min max your stats to get trough it, which I dislike.
There's no need to minmax unless you plan to solo. When you don't know what you're doing or make too many mistakes, stats won't save you from losing the encounter. Likewise, suboptimal stats make fights longer but not unwinnable.
 

Iznaliu

Arbiter
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Apr 28, 2016
Messages
3,686
It depends entirely on your skill level. Do you find most RPGs easy? Set it to PotD. Are you satisfied with their level of difficulty? Stick to hard, possibly turn it down if that's too much (with potd you're locked in and can never change it).

What if it's the first RPG you've played?
 

Roguey

Codex Staff
Staff Member
Sawyerite
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Messages
35,660
It depends entirely on your skill level. Do you find most RPGs easy? Set it to PotD. Are you satisfied with their level of difficulty? Stick to hard, possibly turn it down if that's too much (with potd you're locked in and can never change it).

What if it's the first RPG you've played?

If you have experience with strategy/tactical games, hard. If not, normal.
 

Morkar Left

Guest
It depends entirely on your skill level. Do you find most RPGs easy? Set it to PotD. Are you satisfied with their level of difficulty? Stick to hard, possibly turn it down if that's too much (with potd you're locked in and can never change it).

What if it's the first RPG you've played?

If you have experience with strategy/tactical games, hard. If not, normal.

Hard is the default mode and should be played for first timers. If it's your first GAME with stats you should choose normal, except you really like telltale games than you should choose storymode.
 
Self-Ejected

Excidium II

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I think the odds of wanting to replay PoE after finishing it are p. low so if you really want to be challenged pick PotD right away. But keep in mind it makes the game much slower. Every monster pack is yuge and you have to constantly pause to issue commands.

Hard is p. much BG2 difficulty.
 

fobia

Guest
I think it's a good idea to start with PotD.
I played on hard the first time and i barely checked things like the bestiary or hovered over monsters to check for weaknesses, which is sth I had to do quite often in PotD later. So that was a bad habit that I had to get rid off, basically just rushing in everywhere. Especially if you stumble into areas which have a spike in difficulty on lower levels.

So yeah, go for it!
 

bminorkey

Guest
I don't think you'll enjoy it, the game has a *ton* of filler combat and PotD just means there's more trash mobs in every encounter and every encounter takes forever and you'll get sick of the game by the end of it

The combat system isn't even fun except for gearing up IMO
 

Prime Junta

Guest
I'd say go with Hard for your first playthrough. By version 3.02 the difference between Hard and PotD isn't as big as it used to be anyway.
 

Morkar Left

Guest
I expect when someone plays rpgs (let's say 6) he's perfectly fine with "hard". And if not he should learn how to play and enjoy the learning experience. If he's unwilling to do it he's not really into rpgs but into stories. He shouldn't be bothered with rpg mechanics at all in that case and just play storymode (to "immerse" hinself into his character) or just watch a LP (if he's too lazy to click himself through dialog).
 

Delterius

Arcane
Joined
Dec 12, 2012
Messages
15,956
Location
Entre a serra e o mar.
I've read PotD is the only way one should play this, but then I've also read you HAVE to min max your stats to get trough it, which I dislike.

I think its important to note where people came from with this notion.

Back when the game was released, Sawyer was still fine tuning the engine and was particularly weary of throwing 'gamechangers' into it. Mostly to the benefit of game journos and Something Awful posters. Things like more powerful weapons and items, or so called 'Hard Counters' -- enemies and abilities which are only effectively countered by a small number of tactics. For an example, the Basilisk area in Baldur's Gate 1 borderline requires the 'Hard Counters' of undead minions or Protection against Petrification.

Pillars lacked such 'interesting' moments. At most there were ghosts and a little something called Ogre Druids to fuck people up. As such, PotD became 'the way' to play Pillars: to bloats encounters and enemy modifiers to the point where the game forces you to use every avaiable bonus and debuff just to hit enemies.

Things have changed since 3.0 and WM, new items and abilities were added and monsters were changed. You'll be warding off against mind control and attacking elementals with their weaknesses. And you'll use the special abilities of your 'Soulbound' weapons very often. Etc. I'm not sure its quite up there with BG2, but its already miles ahead of the release version.

This is the point where the game has grown up to a position where you no longer need to bloat enemy stats to make things interesting. Its like in the IE games. You can certainly up the difficulty to Insane and enjoy goblins with a 20 bonus to hit. But the game hangs not to so much on difficulty itself but the variety of encounters and their AI. Much like how SCS is the main mod for BG, Pillars doesn't need stat bloat to stand its ground. The rules mostly stand on their own.

That said, many of those who first played the game on PotD did it back at release. I did it and didn't even need to know most of the rules to make it to the end. With all the changes, I think Hard is a fair mode to pick for first timers.
 
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Galdred

Studio Draconis
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Developer
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Middle Empire
Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
I have started playing it not too long ago, and went with PoTD.
I minmax anyway, so it did not change much for me, and I have been playing with 3 stock companions + 2 adventurers.
It is supposed to be entirely doable with stock companions only, but some of the companions(mostly Durance) have such bad stat allocations that it pained me to bring them along.
Some fights in the beginning were very hard, but I could easily have delayed them, and it became much more manageable later on.
 
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Wizfall

Cipher
Joined
Oct 3, 2012
Messages
816
It depends how you want to play it and if your are familiar with this kind of combat system (IE experience).
If you are rather familiar with IE game and intend to play with a full party (or almost full party) you should go PoTD, you will certainly find the beginning too hard and frustrating (until level 5/6) but as you got more party members and levels it will get much easier.
On hard the beginning is great balance wise but it becomes later on way too easy with a full party IMO.

The best is maybe starting on hard and switch to PotD around level 5/6 (you will need to use the console command though as you can't switch to PotD otherwise) or play with a party of 3 max on hard only.
 

Iznaliu

Arbiter
Joined
Apr 28, 2016
Messages
3,686
The best is maybe starting on hard and switch to PotD around level 5/6 (you will need to use the console command though as you can't switch to PotD otherwise) or play with a party of 3 max on hard only.

They should let you switch to PoTD, with a warning about how you should never switch back.
 

Monkeyfinger

Cipher
Joined
Aug 5, 2004
Messages
778
There's no "my build sucks so bad that I'm completely stuck on PotD with 6 characters" situation. The worst thing that will happen is that you have to retry some of the harder fights a bunch of times.
 

Santander02

Arcane
Joined
Sep 29, 2009
Messages
3,363
Thanks guys, I decided to just bite the bullet and go on the path of the damned. Think I'm gonna roll up a Paladin, pick up a gun and pike, put on a red tabbard and pretend I'm a knight of St. John Elcga, if anyone knows of some gun-totting palla builds I'd be interested to take a look at then to know if that would work (seen some on the web but nearly all of them are from 2015 or so, not sure if they are still viable on the latest version)
 

Santander02

Arcane
Joined
Sep 29, 2009
Messages
3,363
An update for those who were in my situation and weren't sure if they could handle PoTD the first time around.

Like I said I'm playing as a Palla of St Elcga, (M16,D10,C10, P12, I14, R16, yeah I can hear the powergamers groan) first part I had trouble with was the temple of eothas, I advanced as far as I could alongside Eder and Aloth, letting the fighter block passageways while my char poked the enemies with his pike after initiating combat with an FoD charged crossbow bolt (haven't found mah boomstick yet), while Aloth just blasted Consehaults, Minoletas and chill fogs, before realizing my party was just not hitting hard enough to beat the toughest monsters of each group (Skuldr Kings, Shades) even if I could easily defeat the lesser ones, so I retreated and made my way to Caed Nua, doing the stolen weapon cache side quest in the process (I just used scouting mode and lured the bandits to the trolls right next to them, fun times) got Kana and advanced into Caed Nuad until getting assraped by all the spirits, went back the temple of Eothas and cleared it out at last, then went south, recruited Durance and powered trough Caed Nua, beating Maerwald after a few tries and getting the stronghold. Now about to head into Defiance bay.

Lots of fun so far, but I gotta say that as much I appreciate the attempt to restrict rest spamming, only being able to carry 2 camp supplies when dungeon crawling is annoying as fuck, and only ads on tedium rather than challenge. each time I ran out I just retreated back to the surface, fast traveled to a store and bought some more before going right back into the dungeons, should have made it so that supplies are only needed inside dungeons so all the player had to do is get back outdoors to rest up rather than go all the way to the nearest store to buy supplies.

All in all it's been fun, and I haven't played and old school RPG in years so to any other PoE noobs I say just go for Path of the Damned, it's totally doable.

I think that Might affecting ALL kinds of damage, including spells and ranged attacks, is p. silly to be honest. A mage has to be a beefcake rather than a braniac to be effective...
 
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Lacrymas

Arcane
Joined
Sep 23, 2015
Messages
17,949
Pathfinder: Wrath
If you aren't a retard like the examples Roguey provided, the only stat you need is accuracy. Everything else just helps you kill faster/more effectively. Otherwise, yeah, that stat spread is awful. St. Elcga is also not the best, but is workable.
 

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