Eternity Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pre-DLC Thread [GO TO NEW THREAD]

[Trashos]

Everyone who said narrator is bad has garbage tastes. Her voice is fitting and pleasant.

The intro has been made to appeal to teenage girls. Especially note how careful the whole intro is to not attack the senses in any manner. And the narrator is part of it.

At first I felt sleepy, then I started laughing uncontrollably with how out sync the intro was with my expectations of a game that is supposed to be largely combat-based. To cut a long story short, my first try to view a Deadfire let's play has been adjourned indefinitely.

 

[AN4RCHID]

I went with ultra-boring Assassin/Devoted combo, and it's still fun. Rogue class is just fun because of it's mobility, no matter with what you pair it with. I'm on PotD as well. I think Rogue/Pally is probably most boring because you'll be using the same strategy throughout the entire game: alpha-striking with FoD-augmented backstab.

Then again what some consider boring others find fun, so what do I know. I suppose we could use the word "predictable" instead. Barbarian or Monk with a non-Martial class is something that seems very fun to me, what with complementing spell-casting or chanting with those two classes many ways to "power up" mid-battle. Cipher is also looking very good to pair with almost anything, especially the Ascendant sub-class variant.

Can't wait till people start modding the classes and abilities.

I'm rolling a Rogue Priest combo. I had the idea that I could use Priest debufs and then fuck people up with Rogue damage, but tbh I haven't gotten much use out of the priest abilities yet. Seems easy enough to just rely on blinding strike/hobbling strike.

 

[aweigh]

The way afflictions work now in PoE2 basically neutered Priests. Don't know if it was unintentional byproduct of simplifying affliction mechanics or if it was Josh's clapback to Priests being "OP" in PoE1.

I bet future balance passes will incrementally add new variables to affliction mechanics, possibly bringing them close to PoE1 versions; the same type of backpedaling seen with Immunities in the first game.

 

[aweigh]

At first I felt sleepy, then I started laughing uncontrollably

Sounds like you need to get diagnosed m8

 

[Generic-Giant-Spider]

Waiting for this to DL still, probably gonna try an Assassin/Soul Blade combination. Raw damage = bypasses everything, correct?

 

[Ruzen]

Killing lots of people in port maje,
Xoti felt the third time and dies,
After the fight ends Xoti resurrects but as an enemy and dies again.

 

[boobio]

But is it because of the writing? Thing that hooks me is the setting and the exploration. There's just so much stuff to do and discover, and a lot of it is genuinely delightful -- the locations, the items, the fights, the sheer variety of everything, plus the way the world feels like it exists on its own terms and not just as a theme park for your benefit (more than in most cRPGs anyway). I can't think of many games since BG2 that have given the feeling that there are secrets to discover behind every door and under every rock. So I'm really digging the worldbuilding and the way it's hooked up to a whole bunch of game systems -- the faction reputations, the impact that has on party relations, and so on.

I have to echo this sentiment. The writing is indeed pretty sub-par as a whole, but what I enjoy is the fleshing out of the setting/lore bits. Don't get me wrong, I do enjoy some of the characters and find them "fun," particularly Xoti and Serafen, and the old bros Aloth and Eder. I've even chuckled out loud a couple of times. But the real draw is exploring this unique setting, finding cool shit, fighting interesting battles, and enjoying the much improved overall design/mechanics of the game.

Also, I'm still only about 15 hours in and haven't felt like I've been grabbed by the throat with the "diversity" aspect. I don't feel like I'm being force fed these things, but rather that they are occurring naturally in the course of the setting. My feeling on this could definitely change though. I don't mind at all if there are gay people in the game I'm playing, and it would actually be kind of weird if there weren't, but it's when I feel like my face is being rubbed in it that I start to get very annoyed.

As for the critical path narrative itself. I'm not particularly interested, but I'm not offended by it either. The idea of a colossus traveling around and essentially acting as a walking Biawac is interesting enough at its core for me to continue following. But I very rarely play RPGs for the main storyline.

Just stop now and play a better game like Divinity Original Sin 2 which is now only $14.99 on http://discountmall.storenvy.com/pr...-2-pc-download-game-key-code-windows-computer

 

[Fredward]

Why does Josh Sawyer abandon animals in terrible places and what does this say about him as a person.

 

[Lady_Error]

All right, give me some good Rogue multiclass ideas. I was thinking Ranger, specifically with Assassin for big dick range burst but I kind of want to try Cipher. Has anyone tried Trickster?

Ranger + Chanter is my favorite so far. Can conjur up to an upgraded Drake, which should probably be enough as a distraction later on. Not a dragon, but still.

And you get the free tank from the Ranger class too. In POE1 I had a wolf, but they keep dying too much. Went with a bear this time.

 

[AwesomeButton]

Have you seen this yet? An in-game GUI that executes most known console commands, along with support for running custom scripts

I think this is what Infinitron posted about some pages ago, but without the screenshots. It will be useful for testing changes made with The Spiritual Successor.

Is the fishtits Ondra? That's not how I imagined her, fuck

Don't worry that's just how she chose to look in front of the Watcher. She can look differently in other cases.

I really fucking wonder why you people are talking about whether bisexuality is okay. I mean, yeah, this is the Codex, so I might be stupid to expect otherwise, but ma

From what I know in the majority of cases bisexual men end up with a gay partner and finally accept they are actually gay. As for women, most are ok switching to and from homosexual (lesbian) behavior.

implementing jiggle physics.

Now there is a worthy "stretch" goal, I would have upgraded my pledge for.

The voice acting is actually stellar, despite the writing quality.

Maybe you need a bigger sample size.

Everyone who said narrator is bad has garbage tastes. Her voice is fitting and pleasant.

My impression is that she was overdoing it at times, but don't let me make you go out of your way and notice things if you are enjoying the game.

 

[DeepOcean]

Playing this thing and I have to say that I dunno how long the honeymoon will last but I'm enjoying the beginning of the game alot better than I did PoE 1, there are two things I like on a game storywise, that the developer come with a clear goal and why wouldn't you just travel into a vacation to the Bahamas instead of going after that goal. I don't require a super fancy storyline, just a clear goal and a clear why and the beginning delivered it much better than PoE.

You are hunting a big walking statue, if you don't hunt down the big statue, you gonna die... simple and straightforward as it should be.

The game is really pretty too, the lighting system, the animations, the models, everything is much better visually than PoE. It has some REALLY nice looking 2d backdrops.

It is too early to me to have a verdict about the systems as I'm still learning it but at a face value, the game offers alot more options on character customization. There is some potential for min maxing here.

The companions aren't anything incredibly amazing or anything, I didn't get some Durance moments of brilliance so far with any of the characters but they are serviceable enough, certain there were more attempts at light heart humor that sometimes land well and sometimes fail miserably but it is a much better tone than the cold/nihilist depressive tone of PoE 1. It is mediocrity, totally what I expect since Obsidian lost its most talented writers, it won't blow your mind up like a Planescape or a MotB but it is far more interesting than Tyranny.

Like that there were a few CYOA interaction screens so far still on the tutorial area and that you can use party skills to achieve a stat check, hope they keep this up instated of almost forgetting about it on PoE 1.

There is a certain event described on a CYOA screen that is quite hilarious if you say no to Berath and don't accept her quest, they are certainly taking more fun with the design of this one.



The not so good stuff:

Oh God, the prose descriptions are fucking awful and they are double awful because you need to hear the narrator. The writer loves to repeat the same expressions and words over and over again, it is dark corners of darkness here, wet water on the ocean there... thank God not all narration is voice acter and can be safely ignored.

Why this game has health regeneration as a default and a level scaling option? Jesus, only Radiant Ai is missing. The health resource system of PoE while problematic, it had its qualities, why remove it? Couldn't Sawyer fix it instead of removing it?

 

[Cross]

Props for what? Josh is the narrative lead, he approved of the other writers making everyone bisexual.

Josh's official stance was "I let the individual writers do what they wanted to with their characters with regard to romance/sexuality." He washed his hands of it..

Do you seriously think that it's just a coincidence that despite each companion being assigned to a different writer, every single one of them turned out to be bisexual, with the exception of Eder and Pallegina since they were already established as heterosexual in the first game (Aloth's sexuality was always ambiguous due to the whole Iselmyr thing)?

Someone mandated this, either an owner like Feargus or Josh 'I yell at people to make my games gayer' Sawyer.

 

[veevoir]

So.. I tested some of the low morale COYA and results are good (aside from probably a bug where crew members don't die like they should).

I had crewmembers fight each other over petty shit, kill each other, I flogged one to death, I keelhauled one and in the end I killed everyone in a mutiny attempt.

 

[Jenkem]

where are the sea shanties? I have the option turned on in audio settings but only hearing music

 

[AN4RCHID]

Fort Deadlight was pretty cool. Got strong Raedric's vibes. Finally got a (little) bit of challenge too.

 

[Perkel]

Why this game has health regeneration as a default and a level scaling option? Jesus, only Radiant Ai is missing. The health resource system of PoE while problematic, it had its qualities, why remove it? Couldn't Sawyer fix it instead of removing it?

Because healing yourself after battle was never a problem in both IE games and PoE1 so no reason to keep it and waste time spaming rest (which was barely controlled in previous games).

Injuries make much more sense but resting mechanic is like usually retarded so no reason to not rest either.

 

[dragonul09]

Props for what? Josh is the narrative lead, he approved of the other writers making everyone bisexual.

Josh's official stance was "I let the individual writers do what they wanted to with their characters with regard to romance/sexuality." He washed his hands of it..

Do you seriously think that it's just a coincidence that despite each companion being assigned to a different writer, every single one of them turned out to be bisexual, with the exception of Eder and Pallegina since they were already established as heterosexual in the first game (Aloth's sexuality was always ambiguous due to the whole Iselmyr thing)?

Someone mandated this, either an owner like Feargus or Josh 'I yell at people to make my games gayer' Sawyer.

And people are still delusional enough to think there's no agenda involved. They do it because they want to be inclusive and they also fear the backlash from the jurnous and liberals, you could call it, involuntarily pushing an agenda and in the end it's still the basic concept of pushing an agenda. And I don't know why people keep complaining about these things anymore, it's clearly here to stay and will go even further in the future to the point where it will become the new ''normal'' way of life, which means you need to learn to deal with it. There's a new generation coming in that doesn't put much price on who's dick Eder suck or whatever, it's sad, but that's what happens when you are starting to become an old fossil and expect the world to stay true to your ''outdated'' visions.

 

[veevoir]

where are the sea shanties? I have the option turned on in audio settings but only hearing music

I think this is a high morale thingy, with 100/100 they sing all the time. With 1/100 it is silent

 

[Shadenuat]

I wouldn't say narrator voice is bad, although the delivery could be better. The problem is
what she says and
there are other voices there and
the whole thing can become glitchy echo cave
compare it to little bits in IWD2 narrated by Aerie, twas way more pleasant.

As for combat, I think it's too easy, shallow, and instead of tactics and moment to moment decisions is won by a repetetive micromanagement routine.

Since everyone has about same amount of abilities and they take a universal resource, I just spam best one. For example, I tend to just do 5 ranger shots that upgraded have +20 acc and raw damage, since it means 5 crits into anything. Or a knockdown on pets with +100% damage after, press it 5 times, and eventually even very protected enemy gets knocked down +all the other benefits. Or a barbarian blow with extra damage, hit multiple times for the win.

And then you have awesome button, so if you don't win combat, just hit awesome button on everyone and restore like all spells and repeat your +20 buff +15 buff +50 heal +oifhuewhfasf144
no extra cost since you have 299 rice in your stash for that resting.

That is if enemies are not so weak (even on PoTD with everything on) that you can, unlike PoE1 PoTD, select all>left click which seems to become more true by the minute I play the game.

Creature abilities don't seem to stand in the way of this either, eventually party wipes enemy group even just by glancing them to death. And now there are not one (accuracy) but two (acc&penetration) mechanics that seem to make many choices like weapons&spells garbage.

 

[Darth Roxor]

narrator is p bad

but to be honest i think even ron pearlman would be bad with such high quality material to werk with

cuz the narration, which is like the bellowing resounding of a hundred shrill voices from the depths of the ethereal astrality, is not very gud

 

[Xeon]

Just finished and I kinda enjoyed the game overall.

I did almost everything at the start, exploring/killing everything and looking and try and do all quests for exp but kinda got bored later and wanted to see the story play out, that kinda made things a lot harder combat wise by the end. I played on PoD and was good for the most part, combat wasn't terrible and there wasn't a lot of trash combat. Not quite sure if it was visual bugs or what but the reputation thing is kinda confusing, after every reputation changes or dialogue exchange I check and most times, things stay the same but then I get minor positive or negative and get a big change that even results in a rank change or something so yeah I kinda think the entire thing is buggy or something and stopped caring about it.

Quest I kinda enjoyed and factions also seem pretty good but I kinda didn't like the gods bits. I dropped the first game after the trial so no clue what happens afterwards and I tend to skip dialogues even if voiced so my opinion on that might improve if I kept better attention. I saw someone mention that you could take the souls or whatever in the first game into you and become a god like or something. At the start of the game I thought since the golem took the Watcher's soul, that means he took his divinity or some shit like that and you could become free from the Pale Lady after you get your soul back.

I chose the Survival of the better or something history so I improved myself and those around me alongside Dyrwood.

Spoiler

but that didn't happen, the golem was the one who freed me at the end, that kinda sucks. Also my choice at the end ended up making the Pale Lady be the leader of the gods so that kinda really sucks, hope one of the other choices will allow me to strip them of a potion of their powers or something, none of the choices seemed to allow me to request to take the power and become a god myself.

For companions, I just stuck with the people who came with me first (Eder, priest, cypher, Aloth) since all of them seemed optional, I figured I'll stick with them since I got used to them.

During the ending slideshow, it didn't look like doing companions personal quests did anything or maybe it was subtle change or something. I didn't do the quests for Cypher and Aloth since those were late or took long. Eder's quest was pretty great, it didn't take long and it was on the way along with everything else. The priest girl was annoyingly hyper, her slideshow made her out to be a pervert or something, she trying to go to the Watcher's personal cabin a few times to get laid even tho he kept telling her off.

 

[Shadenuat]

narrator is p bad

but to be honest i think even ron pearlman would be bad with such high quality material to werk with

cuz the narration, which is like the bellowing resounding of a hundred shrill voices from the depths of the ethereal astrality, is not very gud

Yea and at times they couldn't even fit all that into 1 page. So you press button and it's still going, and going.

 

[veevoir]

A pro tip found on teh internets:


Every hired adventurer (the ones you make at taverns) and every other person that you can have in the party shows on deck during boarding.

STEP 1: Make tons of FoD bleakwalkers, hired adventurers are cheap.
STEP 2: Give them Arquebuses that you get by the ton in this game and AI to spam FoD.
STEP 3: ???
STEP 4: Profit!


Obviously need to test it in some spare time, but I think I just found out how to be king of boarding.

 

[Darth Roxor]

finally bonerbill is back to shitting my posts

i was wondering what took him so long

 

[Bonerbill]

finally bonerbill is back to shitting my posts

i was wondering what took him so long

I just hate you in general. I'llkeep doing it till the day I die. :p