Divinity Divinity: Original Sin 2 - Definitive Edition

[Fenix]

how about Obsidian?

At least it is not inExile.
Actually I don't see they listen, I see they do what they usually do, with their BALANCE all over the place and non game content at all.

There are many (small & big) things were about to be changed for PoE2: D

Until they won't change whole game to make it actually interesting to play, all these changes just an ash in eyes.

About the initiative, It is very frustrating to see 2/5 of the attributes are almost useless.

Alternative?

Level-gating(enemies, items, and skills) is another boring mechanic which locks the char progression and exploration very much.

Yes, and... what? Twicher did it too, and won BEST Codex RPG of 2016?
Seriously, alternative when?

In short, you didn't answer my question, and told about everything else - looks like whining sodomy.

and the combat became better even for grognards

No matter what you do, you can't turn shit into chocolate.
This is a Spacebar game now and forever.

the massive issues with this game

I see no real issues (only whining), and for sure DOS2 has significantly less problems than PoE. Like times less.

 

[Reapa]

ffs, what is it with this game and scaling?
i just equipped a new breastplate i found and noticed i got like 50% more armor value than what was written in the stats of the breastplate, so i did some quick testing with other gear. any and every single piece of equipment will contribute about 50% more to your armor or magic armor value than it says in the description. what the fuck is going on?
i'm level 10 on tactician, btw. does tactician increase the player character values as well as the enemies by the same amount?
i didn't check on classic, does it happen there too?
what is the point of this bullshit? if armor stats get changed by any percentage why don't they also get changed in the description? why do you have to equip something first for it to have an effect?
and no, it's not because of lone wolf, since lone wolf is supposed to raise your armor value only by 30%. i see no other skills, traits, attributes that would change equipment values.

 

[Black]

So, vanilla DOS 1 had the best system?

 

[DeepOcean]

Now seriously, all edgyness aside, I hope Larian see this and try to fix the system, I really wanna play a good RPG with good combat, hope they don't have a cynical attitude of casual pandering in detriment of the quality of the game.

 

[Iznaliu]

So, vanilla DOS 1 had the best system?

That seems to be the consensus around here for some reason.

 

[Black]

for some reason.

The reason is that it offered a great variety of things to do and try, for vanilla players, casuls, min maxers and everything in between.
Then EE happened with its. And now compare stats of DOS 2 to those of 1.

 

[Tigranes]

Reapa +% to armour from some attrib/skill/thing? That's what it would be with wepaons.

 

[Ruchy]

I have just finished fort joy area with three friends, gotta say it has been a blast multi player. Cannot say much for the story as it can be hard to absorb all the points while 3 others are running around having independent conversations but overall probably the best RPG multi player experience I have had.

 

[Payd Shell]

Now seriously, all edgyness aside, I hope Larian see this and try to fix the system, I really wanna play a good RPG with good combat, hope they don't have a cynical attitude of casual pandering in detriment of the quality of the game.

Consumers are good at pointing out flaws but are rarely able to tell you the reason or a fix for said flaws. The worst part about the initiative for example is that the game simply doesn't tell you that all it does is creating an in-group competition on who gets his turn when. The round-robin system can be exploited as well for your gains, it just works absolutely counter-intuitive. Normally you'd think that killing the enemy that has his turn between two of your guys is a benefit for you because next round two of your guys can have their turn after each other. With D:OS 2 however, this approach can fuck you over without you knowing what you did wrong. In this game, the better choice is to keep the enemies that have their turns between your turns locked down with CC but alive and kill the guys at the very end of the turn first to prevent potentially negative results from the re-shuffling that inevitably happens if you kill one of the enemis that has his turn between your turns. Wits and initiative is only important for the internal turn-order so you want to give your geomancer one point in wits more than your pyro and also lock the enemy down that has his turn between those two so they can do their oil-fire combo. That being said, the current incarnation smells like a last-minute-change - a pretty bad one if I might add.

As far as the armor and CC-immunity that comes with it is concerned, I'd also have to disagree with how it is depicted here. There are ways to lock down enemies without breaking their armor, though the results may vary. You can use ice to make enemies slip (bonus points if you put nails on your shoes to make you immune to just that), oil to slow them down to a crawl, smoke / LoS in general and surfaces to funnel them through a path that is advantageous for you - just make sure to actually try to leave a path without harmful surfaces for them, otherwise they'll just run straight through them. If given the chance however, the AI tends to avoid the surfaces so if it can it acts rather predictable, even if they have to waste AP to avoid the surfaces. And of course teleport, if positioned correctly you can make an enemy waste two turns or more to make it back to the fight or pull a high priority target into your personal rape pit. Those are of course more situational than average hard CC like knockdowns and such but they can be applied to almost anyone. If you go into poly, spider legs also provide you with an AoE immobilize with a 1 AP cost and 1 turn CD that can't be resisted unless the enemy is flying/floating - with a chance for them to get enwebbed again if they try to move through the web.

That's not that I think that the game has no flaws, I'd also rather have a normal initiative-system but I have to say I do like the armor system, at least in concept. RNG causes you to lose battles that you should've won and causes you to win battles you should've lost. No matter the tactics you employ (or the lack thereof) the dice roll has the final say. And while it may feel good every now and then, you know that victories you've earned through sheer luck aren't earned and that battles lost through bad luck aren't justified. People in general are also more likely to remember that missed 95% that caused them to lose a battle than they are to remember the 5% success that saved the day. That being said, I don't think the armor system is anywhere near perfection but I do appreciate that the stuff I do isn't jeopardized through RNG and if I die it is my fault almost entirely.

 

[Reapa]

Reapa +% to armour from some attrib/skill/thing? That's what it would be with wepaons.

already mentioned that i checked all attributes, skills and traits and none are supposed to increase armor from equipment except lone wolf. geomancer raises armor boosts but only from potions and spells and i checked geomancer by equipping and unequipping a geomancer ring. it doesn't change armor values.

 

[Ruzen]

At least it is not inExile.
Actually I don't see they listen, I see they do what they usually do, with their BALANCE all over the place and non game content at all.

After all the examples I gave If you still think that. I dunno how can we communicate further.

If you don’t play the game at least 11 times, once each for the cast of origin characters and once for each of the five races, you don’t have a chance of seeing everything in the game.

 

[Darth Roxor]

Mmm...no. It's bad design, sure, but it doesn't make the ranger weaker. Knockdown arrows are blocked by grey shield, use those. Special arrows (fire/poison etc) will CONVERT your damage to elemental (magical), targetting the blue shield. So that makes the ranger the only class that can use his basic attacks to target either shield, allowing for much greater versatility. Also, get yourself some charm arrows, they are gud.

Except you can't use speshul arrows with skills that do all the big domoges like ballistic shot. Also, arrow shafts are (at least in my experience) limited enuff that you'd have to be dumb to use the speshuls constantly, even with arrow recovery.

Now, someone might argue that "the AI doesn't know that you have Opportunist, nor should they!" - and that's a fair point, and one I happen to agree with

Except this is not a fair point, because you can see enemy talents (including opportunist) when you use loremaster to examine a goy, so it's definitely not any kind of "psychic power".

 

[Lahey]

Volrath working overtime for that fanboy tag. It's telling that you haven't posted in the thread since page 28 or addressed any criticisms, yet negrep them all anyway. Please tell me you're not doing this for free because that's just sad. Larian made a killing, i'm sure they can spare a few shekels to buy you some courage, cowardly lion.

It's also rather telling that none of the other usual suspects have responded to Luckmann's wall, instead content to bury their heads in the sand. It's great if y'all are enjoying the game and nobody really cares if you like OS2's design, but some well-considered arguments would be refreshing for a change. I've been reading this thread as it unfolds and dropped in for the occasional shitpost, yet haven't seen a single intelligent rebuttal to the common issues raised. I guess nobody really cares to form one, even those who worked on the game posting here anonymously.

By contrast, even as a lurker, other release threads were better. full of polemics, debate, discussion, energy. People were engaged and passionate. In the PoE thread, for instance, the staunchest Obshitian fans were still able to identify the game's faults within days and talk about them without regressing to mudslinging. Likewise with nearly every release thread aside from Grimoire for obvious reasons.

This thread on the other hand is like a bad lay from a jaded hooker lifelessly going through the motions with one eye on the clock, hoping without hope that when the hour runs out Swen will swoop in like Richard Gere in Pretty Woman.

 

[Daedalos]

Luckmann has alot of good points, tho they are all regard systemic and mechanic problems, which are all valid.

The UI deserves criticism aswell, and the combat slowness deserves alot of criticism.

I feel there might be a good game hiddden beneath all this decline, question is, if Larian can patch and change it.

 

[Akka]

Combat: I'm liking D:OS2 combat better in every way than the first one. I'm not playing tactician so I won't speak to that. But so far the added element of height advantages and armor has added quite a bit of complexity I think. In D:OS1 I only remember bothering to set positioning prior to battle one time and that was the Braccus Rex fight because he totaled my team with one meteor storm. I've done so multiple times in D:OS2, mainly due to the height advantage with added range and damage for a Huntsman type character. I agree with a lot of people that splitting armor into two varieties is a weakness as it results in wanting to stack one particular damage type for your team. They could change it into one armor type with physical/magical armor penalties as percentages. Or they could spread around magical/physical damage types amongst all the schools rather than Warfare targeting physical all the time and almost all the spell schools targeting magical armor. I like the fact that damage spells play a larger part early on with CC being a sort of mid-level choice after stripping armor away. This feels better than instantly starting off with CC.

The height advantage is a good addition, yeah.
For the rest, though, I feel that the fighting system is actually vastly inferior to the first. Positioning feels required more due to the fact that nearly every fight is some sort of ambush in which your party gets wrecked if you don't pre-place it (so a completely artificial and cheesy situation).
The armour system is very inelegant and just not immersive (I don't see why they couldn't instead make armour works like an actual one, reducing the impact of CC instead of adding a life bar), and restricting options more than opening tactical opportunity.
The initiative system is completely botched and utterly messy. It's not even a correctly-done round robin, the constant tweaking of the order causes many absurdities and destroy planning.
The stat have been butchered, the characters have zero defense (their armour does all the work) and half of them are pointless.

I feel that OS1 had a perfectly good system that only needed a small amount of adjustment to fix a few problems, and instead their broke half of it trying to reinvent the wheel.

 

[Grunker]

Luckmann why not write a codex review?

 

[Luckmann]

Except this is not a fair point, because you can see enemy talents (including opportunist) when you use loremaster to examine a goy, so it's definitely not any kind of "psychic power".

Except I do consider it psychic power, and see no inherent reason why the enemies should be held to the same standards and abilities as the player. If anything, I think that the player, too, should be trickable in case someone would show up with certain abilities or in certain circumstances, such as someone being undead but you can't tell since it's cloaked and covered.

Luckmann why not write a codex review?

Because I'd have to actually finish the game, and that won't happen anytime soon, especially since I've practically shelved it for now because of the issues. It's not good for my blood pressure.

I mean, I could write a review anyway, like 90% of the gaming journos, but I simply don't think I'm in a position to write a fair review without having played the entirety of the game at least once seven times.

 

[lukaszek]

deterministic system > RNG

 

[Darth Roxor]

Also, arrow shafts are (at least in my experience) limited enuff that you'd have to be dumb to use the speshuls constantly, even with arrow recovery.

small branch + knife = plenty of shafts. Basically use knife on wood until you get them.
sharp rock/metal + knife = arrow tips.
honey jar + beehive = charming arrow + empty jar
This means that you can always be stocked with poison, charming arrows, slow, water arrows. Also they weight close to nothing(unlike grenades).
Rest require ingredients that are a bit harder to get large quantities of, still its easy to have 10+ of other types if you keep junk + know recipes

i know aboot all this, but for a while now i've been finding very few sticks to turn into shafts, gotta buy them all from merches

also i think i generally make little use of speshul arrows cuz my partay is more tilted towards physical domoges (rainjerk, roguey, wammo, airwater magus), which in turn means that i can't really use them much (cuz hurrdurr magical forcefields)

oh and also speaking of arrow craftung - that you can't immediately assemble a whole arrow from "shaft + arrowhead + elemental thingy" but instead have to do it in 2 steps is hhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnngggggggggggggggggggggggggggggg

 

[Chaotic_Heretic]

About the reduced bloat mod:

Lv1 equip are still competive at lv 5 or so.
So many of the unique equips you find in fort joy prison are good till 2/3rd of act 1.

This means that you actually have a hope of tackling lv 7 or even lv8 encounters at lv 5 or so without resorting to reloading metagaming ultra cheese (as a difference of 2 - 3 levels doesn't result in gazillion more armor, health and damage)

Not yet left the 1st island with this mod, but it makes for far more enjoyable encounrers and equipment tetris has to be done only once every 4-5 levels or so

 

[Luckmann]

Honestly, I should probably have addressed the numbers bloat, too.

Which reminds me that I also forgot to mention the effect of armor on Tactician combat pacing due to numbers bloat.

 

[Infinitron]

Ulminati makes it into PC Gamer: http://www.pcgamer.com/divinity-ori...ughest-enemies-by-turning-them-into-chickens/

Divinity: Original Sin 2 players are killing the toughest enemies by turning them into chickens
Sometimes the best offense is to run screaming through clouds of poison and flame.

Divinity: Original Sin is a game known for it's extremely flexible (and ridiculous) combat. After all, speedrunners routinely beat the final boss by filling a box with barrels until it's so heavy that simply dropping it on the beast instantly kills it. Fortunately, Original Sin 2 players are already finding equally absurd ways to kill enemies thanks to its much more refined combat. Sure, you could approach Original Sin 2's tough-as-nails fights in a serious manner, or you could turn your enemies into chickens and watch them murder themselves.

Right now, two popular methods involve a skill called Rupture Tendons. It's a Scoundrel skill purchased from Hilde in Fort Joy once you reach level four. Once an enemy is hit with Rupture Tendons, every step they take causes additional piercing damage. Normally you'd use it on an enemy and hope they'll take a step or two after, but some clever players have found a way to make Rupture Tendons deal incredible amounts of damage.

The first method is called the Chicken Combo. While you have to wait until level four to get Rupture Tendons, characters who specialize in Polymorph skills can pick up Chicken Claw from Doctor Leste in Fort Joy at any time (Shadowblade and Metamorph classes start with Chicken Claw, and can pick up Rupture Tendons later with two points in Scoundrel). This spell turns foes into squabbling chickens that run around aimlessly for two turns. Get the idea?

Reduce any physical armor an enemy has to zero, hit them with Rupture Tendons, follow up by turning them into a chicken, and let natural selection do its job. As the chicken flees (feel free to cast Haste to give your chicken foe a boost), it'll accrue massive amounts of piercing damage that will kill weaker characters almost instantly. The best part is that Rupture Tendons scales with your basic attack and Finesse values, so the higher level you are the more damage the chicken takes with each step.

This video shows exactly how it works (potential spoilers):

The Chicken Combo has quickly become a community favorite, but redditor Ulminati has taken the idea in a bizarre direction: What if you cast Rupture Tendons on yourself?

You'll need a character with Necromancer skills Shackles of Pain (sold by Mona in Fort Joy Ghetto at level four) and Living on the Edge (drops randomly around level 11 or is a starter skill for Witch mercenaries hired in act two). Shackles of Pain forges a link between the caster and a target enemy so that any damage the caster receives is transferred to the victim. Living on the Edge prevents a character's health from dropping below 1 HP for two rounds.

See where this is going?

Reduce the boss's armor points and have one character cast Shackles of Pain on it, then have your Scoundrel attack that character with Rupture Tendons and your Necromancer cast Living on the Edge so that they'll stay alive. Now, every step that character takes will do damage that is channeled directly to the boss.

When it's your turn again, have your character with Shackles of Pain run around like a headless chicken (preferably through fire and poison to transfer even more damage). If you can run them past other enemies, that'll provoke opportunity attacks that, again, will transfer to the boss. As Ulminati explains, "Your guy won't die, but it'll transfer an absolutely hideous amount of damage through Shackles of Pain, and probably kill the boss."

Again, you can cast Haste (sold by Stingtail in Fort Joy Ghetto) to give your shackled character some extra space to run around. The only thing is this combo will leave your character with just 1 HP, so be sure to have some healing ready to go once Shackles of Pain and Living on the Edge wears off.

It's a trickier combo to pull off, but Ulminati promises you can fell bosses in just a turn if done properly. And, better yet, this doesn't appear to be an exploit like the previous combo we wrote about that Larian is already planning on patching out.

Divinity: Original Sin 2 has only been out for a week, so I can't wait to see what other kooky ideas people come up with. If you've discovered your own deadly combos (bonus points if they're as ridiculous as these ones) let us know in the comments. And be sure to check out our beginner's guide if you're having a little trouble getting started.

 

[Infinitron]

Whoops, I missed that: http://www.pcgamer.com/after-furthe...sin-2s-infinite-damage-loop-is-being-removed/

After further review, Divinity: Original Sin 2's infinite damage loop is being removed
It turns out it's an "unintended bug," despite what we heard yesterday.

I was surprised yesterday when Divinity: Original Sin 2 producer David Walgrave told me that the damage loop seen in the video above would not be removed. "It appears that it is not a never-ending loop and you're not doing anything else while you're doing it," he wrote.

As you can see in the video, however, the trick cycles through a feedback loop that drains a troll's entire health bar. (Head to yesterday's story for an explanation of how it works.) So even if it is within the confines of Original Sin 2's spell logic, it's just a tad OP.

I followed up with Larian, and today the developer informed me that after looking into the trick further, "the team determined that this is in fact an unintended bug, for which a patch will be issued ASAP."

Despite this particular instance of clever spell synergies being identified as a bug, Larian reiterated what it told me yesterday, saying that it "applauds creative approaches to the game" and only 'fixes' one if it "really breaks the fun of the game or something goes wrong at some point."

So while there are many, many allowable—and possibly very powerful—spell synergies accounted for, this was apparently one that slipped through testing undetected, and wasn't intentional. Personally, I didn't plan to pursue the trick, as wiping 6000 HP with a few spells doesn't feel quite like it's in the spirit of the tactical turn-based combat I've been enjoying so far. Though if you were enjoying the trick, I'm sorry to say it's on its way out.

With or without the Soul Mate loop trick, Divinity: Original Sin 2 is one of my favorite games of the year. Fraser digs in to why in his review.

 

[Lacrymas]

Oh, no, is here to take your fun away! Quick, RAGE!!1!!one!!! Call Sawyer names!!

 

[Akka]

Ulminati makes it into PC Gamer:

Fortunately, Original Sin 2 players are already finding equally absurd ways to kill enemies thanks to its much more refined combat.

I take offense at that part.