Putting the 'role' back in role-playing games since 2002.
Donate to Codex
Good Old Games
  • Welcome to rpgcodex.net, a site dedicated to discussing computer based role-playing games in a free and open fashion. We're less strict than other forums, but please refer to the rules.

    "This message is awaiting moderator approval": All new users must pass through our moderation queue before they will be able to post normally. Until your account has "passed" your posts will only be visible to yourself (and moderators) until they are approved. Give us a week to get around to approving / deleting / ignoring your mundane opinion on crap before hassling us about it. Once you have passed the moderation period (think of it as a test), you will be able to post normally, just like all the other retards.

Dragon Age: Inquisition is a better game than Pillars of Eternity

Sothpaw

Learned
Joined
Mar 2, 2015
Messages
227
I haven't played POE yet because I am waiting on WM2 and "final" patches. That said, POE even being in the same conversation as DAI is scary because DAI is by far the worst RPG I have ever played. Even DA II is better.
 

Jimmious

Arcane
Patron
Joined
May 18, 2015
Messages
5,132
Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
I haven't played POE yet because I am waiting on WM2 and "final" patches. That said, POE even being in the same conversation as DAI is scary because DAI is by far the worst RPG I have ever played. Even DA II is better.
Do not worry. There is nothing similar between the two and the only reason this comparison exists is for Codex edginess credits.
 

Suicidal

Arcane
Joined
Apr 29, 2007
Messages
2,208
The problem with PoE's combat for me is mostly with difficulty and variety. The system itself is fine, at least, I don't see how it's much worse than BG's, but it has the same issue like every other Kickstarter RPG I've played (and many non-kickstarter ones as well) in that on hardest difficulty it starts off reasonably hard but after you've gathered your party, gained some useful spells or found good items, somewhere at around 30-40% of the game, the difficulty drops to rock bottom. Same thing happened in Divinity. Same thing happened in Wasteland 2. Same thing happened in Lords of Xulima.

That's why I partially agree with Lhynn's comments about difficulty. If we talk about the first third or so of the game, then I will disagree with the claims that the game is too easy, that it requires no thought or tactics and you can just tank and dps every encounter. I started playing PoE on PotD on release and then made a break from it and came back and finished it later. I think patch 2.0 was out by that time (it was funny coming back to the game and finding out that elementals were now immune to piercing attacks when half of my party used guns). My experience was as follows:

In the beginning and early mid game surviving was difficult. When fighting ghosts, 5 of them would just teleport surround Aloth and instagib him, and then move on to my next lowest hp character. A tiny boar could run up to one of my casters and crit him for 60 damage (when the max hp was 30-40). If left unchecked, an ogre shaman's insect swarm will completely drain all your character's hp (except for maybe the tankiest fighter), and when you heal them, it will drain them all over again again. Also hitting anything was hard, cause enemies' defenses were inflated on PotD and your accuracy is shit in the beginning so at least 2 times out of 3 you will miss or glance. I had to do different shit in order to survive - abuse choke points, place traps, mess around with positioning, buff and debuff and use spell combinations (my favorite was summoning a ghost behind enemy lines with Kana and then casting my cipher's mind link (the one that damages all enemies between you and your target) on it and use it to run around the enemies constantly damaging them). I couldn't just select all my guys and right click the nearest cunt - I would die, really fast.

However, the longer the game went the easier it became because you started getting shit like stronger heals, combat resurrection, large aoe stun spells and etc. until eventually the combat kinda devolved into selecting all my dudes and clicking on the nearest cunt while using 2-3 of the same spells, like Lhynn described. Yes you do get a number of tactical options in PoE - it's not just DPS spam and claiming otherwise is bullshit. For example, buffs and debuffs are actually really useful, and no they do not last only 5 seconds, they last enough time to be valuable. Casting a couple of accuracy buffs can increase your chance of hitting a particularly agile enemy from 30% to 60-70%. That's huge. A 10 second AoE stun is also a great spell, because during those 10 seconds you can sometimes kill a powerful enemy with basic attacks alone. Also, initially I hated the fact that you couldn't buff outside combat, but later I've learned to appreciate it. It gives you meaningful choice - do you spend precious seconds on a damaging spell that may or may not kill the target, or you can buff your accuracy and damage before that to guarantee a kill, or defend yourself from a status effect it will use, etc. Yes it's stupid that the game arbitrarily restricts you from using certain spells when you're not fighting because, but you know what - pre-buffing in BG2 was fun the first few times but then it just becomes as existing and involving as going through a supermarket checklist, so I don't miss it.

However, all of these tactical options become meaningless because in the mid-late game there are really very few enemies that can pose a threat to you. In BG2 when you're fighting a powerful mage you need to remove his protections before you can hit him, but you can't cast a protection removing spell on him because first you must remove his greater invisibility or whatever, and you better do it fast because if you don't he will time stop and cast 5 meteor showers on your ass. There's simply not a single enemy in PoE that presents this level of danger to the player. The closest thing is the Endless Paths final boss, which, I admit, I didn't even bother fighting, because I was really late in the game and wanted to see how the story ends and when the fucker oneshotted half of my party with his breath attack as soon as combat started, I thought "nope, can't be dealing with this shit right now" and reloaded and went for the peaceful solution. Another thing that makes combat more boring than BG2 is that there's not enough spell variety and many of the high level spells are very underwhelming and not as effective as a tier 3 fireball.

TL;DR - PoE systems are fine but the combat is shit because the enemies are weak and there's not enough different impactful spells
 

Lhynn

Arcane
Joined
Aug 28, 2013
Messages
9,824
The system is shit by design, spells, items, skills, they are all useful, ive never claimed the opposite. but they dont feel impactful, every victory or progress in the game feels like you are stacking cards on top of eachother instead of playing a good, satisfying, hand.
In an RPG the system is what accomodates the gameplay, and its the very reason i claim its shit. It may work at the most basic level, but it fails at being fun and satisfying to interact with and its the reason even WL2 is a much superior experience flawed as it is.

Either way, the system is the smallest of PoEs problem, bad as it is i dont think anyone here would have cared that much if the writing in general wasnt that bland and boring. And this is a point where DA:I simply has PoE beat. Not due to quality, both are awful, but DA:I is more colorful and even cringing is better than having a blank stare as you play it.
 

Mebrilia the Viera Queen

Guest
i have to admit i been disappointed by pillars of eternity.....But inquisition XD.... Inquisition is just a pile of juvenile trashy teenager turd
 

DeN DarK

Educated
Joined
Dec 23, 2015
Messages
54
Location
Whitestone One, First Throne, Forty Forties
I haven't played POE yet because I am waiting on WM2 and "final" patches. That said, POE even being in the same conversation as DAI is scary because DAI is by far the worst RPG I have ever played. Even DA II is better.

Don't worry. DA:I is shit and it is all that can be said about it. DA2 was really better. I managed to finish it for the story.

PoE isn't much liked by some people because they have huge expectations from this game, they wanted all goodness of the past concentrate there, maybe another PST (but bigger and better). Another group just hate it from kickstarter times - just because they didn't like games like BG at all. (actually third group exist but they are just trolls)
All in all game isn't bad. Almost none C&C and not all companions and theirs quests are interesting. Still it have lot side quests, big dungeon and interesting new setting. With hardest difficulty game can be challenging and interestig in combat. Mechanics actually is good. Story nice too. Not pinnacle of all RPGs but still ok.
I heard much good about WM1 and wait for WM2 and v3.0 for my third run.
First two runs I made one after another - 1 with party, 1 triple crown solo. Glad I funded that game. It can't be compared to DA:I at all.
 

Trashos

Arcane
Joined
Dec 28, 2015
Messages
3,413
I believe PoE will find its way into the Codex top 30 eventually. Possibly even top 20, depending on how many people will decide to judge it for what it is instead of what they would have liked it to be.
 

Prime Junta

Guest
I won't make any predictions like that. I've been surprised by how much it's improved since release though. When it came out I would've ranked it near the bottom of the IE game stack -- better than IWD2 or BG1, although not by much, and a good deal behind IWD, BG2, and PS:T. Since 2.0 I'd say it's closed the gap and passed IWD.

However, I think it's close to as good as it can be with the content it has. There can be incremental improvements and I'm curious to see if 3.0 is a step forward or just churn; I would be very surprised if it's anywhere near as big a leap as 1.0 to 2.0. To get to BG2 level however it would need a lot more and a lot deeper content and much more intricate area/encounter design, and to get to PS:T it would need new writing -- and these are things that can't be addressed in patches.

PoE2, on the other hand...
 

Monkeysattva

Cipher
Joined
Oct 5, 2012
Messages
396
The reason POE is shit is because it brings NOTHING truly new to the table in terms of pure mechanics. They could have made something marvelous in that regard and they just copy pasted. But, even then, it could have been a great retro-nostalgia-game had the story, and especially the pacing, been anything more than the utter mind-numbing, insane, convoluted drivel that it is.

So, in that regard, DA: I is, in a way, better. The difference between stale shit and fresh shit.
 
Joined
Jul 26, 2015
Messages
1,350
PC RPG Website of the Year, 2015 Codex 2016 - The Age of Grimoire Make the Codex Great Again! Grab the Codex by the pussy Divinity: Original Sin 2 BattleTech Bubbles In Memoria A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
I believe PoE will find its way into the Codex top 30 eventually. Possibly even top 20, depending on how many people will decide to judge it for what it is instead of what they would have liked it to be.

Joined: Dec 28, 2015
 

Trashos

Arcane
Joined
Dec 28, 2015
Messages
3,413
I believe PoE will find its way into the Codex top 30 eventually. Possibly even top 20, depending on how many people will decide to judge it for what it is instead of what they would have liked it to be.

Joined: Dec 28, 2015

So? I fit right in here. And I did use an if-clause.

Anyway, BG1 is currently #17, IWD #22, and DAO #33. I can see PoE falling somewhere in there. That's where it belongs.
 

Theldaran

Liturgist
Joined
Oct 10, 2015
Messages
1,772
Probably the answer to OP lies along the lines of, both games are pretty bad. Bad times.
 

Lhynn

Arcane
Joined
Aug 28, 2013
Messages
9,824
I believe PoE will find its way into the Codex top 30 eventually. Possibly even top 20, depending on how many people will decide to judge it for what it is instead of what they would have liked it to be.

Joined: Dec 28, 2015

So? I fit right in here. And I did use an if-clause.

Anyway, BG1 is currently #17, IWD #22, and DAO #33. I can see PoE falling somewhere in there. That's where it belongs.
PoE is worse than most of the 30 that didnt make it into the top 70. You are fucking delusional.
 
Joined
Jul 26, 2015
Messages
1,350
PC RPG Website of the Year, 2015 Codex 2016 - The Age of Grimoire Make the Codex Great Again! Grab the Codex by the pussy Divinity: Original Sin 2 BattleTech Bubbles In Memoria A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.

kwanzabot

Cipher
Shitposter
Joined
Aug 29, 2009
Messages
597
I believe PoE will find its way into the Codex top 30 eventually. Possibly even top 20, depending on how many people will decide to judge it for what it is instead of what they would have liked it to be.

Joined: Dec 28, 2015

you joined in 2015 aswell lol, how fucking retarded can you be?
Not retarded enough to think that PoE belongs in the Codex top 30.
i've never played it but i have a really hard time seeing it being worse then alpha protocol or morrowind(which is top 10 LOL)
 

Jaesun

Fabulous Ex-Moderator
Patron
Joined
May 14, 2004
Messages
37,241
Location
Seattle, WA USA
MCA
PoE will easily fit into the top 15

You know, if POE had somehow been a Dungeon's and Dragons Official™ game, it more than likely would not cause as much OUTRAGE and would indeed be possibly even higher than BG or BGII.

But then again, the entire point of POE was to have a title that they exclusively owned.
 
Unwanted

Irenaeus III

Unwanted
Shitposter
Joined
Jan 10, 2016
Messages
990
True, I wish PoE was the official™Dungeons and Dragons cRPG. Instead we got whatever the hell that Sword Coast abomination was :(
 

As an Amazon Associate, rpgcodex.net earns from qualifying purchases.
Back
Top Bottom