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

[Prime Junta]

May 9th: Pillars of Eternity 2 is like SoZ and it's fucking awesome

Eh, it's way too early to compare it to BG2. The overall structure is a lot like SoZ though, with a world map with tons of stuff to discover -- locations, CYOAs, encounters, what have you -- and a similar sense of general freedom.

I wouldn't even call it fucking awesome yet, but it does have promise. It could still turn into a slog -- it's clear that it's bloody huge, even by sprawling turn-of-the-millennium standards -- and that could easily do that. But we'll see. I'm regretting a bit that I'll only be able to tool with this for a couple of days now.

 

[Jezal_k23]

I wanted the POTD patch now but no hope for it this month, for sure.

 

[MajorMace]

Nobody can let me know about the companion reputations ? I'd appreciate it, because if it's bugged I'm not gonna bother keeping on playing and imma just wait until this whole mess is somewhat fixed.

 

[Parabalus]

Nobody can let me know about the companion reputations ? I'd appreciate it, because if it's bugged I'm not gonna bother keeping on playing and imma just wait until this whole mess is somewhat fixed.

It's working fine for me, I had them as soon as I got Xoti.

 

[Cross]

May 7th: Pillars of Eternity 2 better be as good as BG2 or Obsidian is a failure

May 9th: Pillars of Eternity 2 is like SoZ and it's fucking awesome

They certainly seem to have nailed the feel of SoZ combat (or more accurately, NWN2 combat), I'll give them that.

Though I don't think anyone was clamoring for that.

 

[Alienman]

I hope there isn't a chapter 2 moment in Deadfire. It would make more sense I guess, random giant comes in and crush everything to death. Anyway, that was the key moment in PoE for me that kinda ruined the whole experience.

 

[MajorMace]

It's working fine for me, I had them as soon as I got Xoti.

Thanks mate.
Alright, the only thing I was eager to verify is if infighting can occur, and what latitude the player has in shaping relations in the party.
Might as well drop the game until it's actually working.

 

[Parabalus]

It's working fine for me, I had them as soon as I got Xoti.

Thanks mate.
Alright, the only thing I was eager to verify is if infighting can occur, and what latitude the player has in shaping relations in the party.
Might as well drop the game until it's actually working.

I had a situation where Xoti and Pallegina would go Edwin vs Minsc on each other, if not for a skill check. Guessing that won't work for major stuff.

 

[Malpercio]

Call me autistic if you will, but:

book of Aedyran poetry by the artist Scilba

How do our characters know that? Can they see the book's cover? And if they can: does it really matter to me, as a player? Also

Looking more closely

So the first thing we noticed was

1. What the book was about, and
2. Who wrote the book.

As opposed to the dude picking a padlock with his free hand? What?

EDIT:

This reminds me of something my Screenplay professor told us the other day: don't focus on meaningless details; the only details worth describing are those that are actually important (e.g. the eagle foreshadows that character's affiliation with a certain faction or group of people). I understand there's a difference between a book and a film, but IMO videogames are much closer to movies than books are. And Obsidian insists on focusing on the meaningless details that provide NO INFORMATION WHATSOEVER on the characters, as opposed to the ones that actually do.

It is one thing to describe Cass' breath smells like alcohol (in an isometric Fallout game). It is another thing to descibre what material her shoes are made of. Granted, I have no idea if this lanky dude's love for poetry comes into play at any moment, but I wouldn't be surprised if it didn't.

I agree, although I'd say you're still being a bit too lenient on Obsidian and understating the problem. To put things into perspective:

That's backers' shit, what kind of moronic comparison is this? It's not like anyone at Obsidian, or any professional writer for what matters, wrote the tl;dr novella.

 

[Shadenuat]

• At-a-glance visual clarity of battles. The animation system, speed, and VFX of PoE 1 often made fights feel like a muddy mess compared to the IE games

Better, by far.

• Set piece combat. How are the 'big' set piece battles in PoE 2? Is there much of a lock and key aspect to skill usage reminiscent of SCS mage duels, or is it more of a MMO-style DPS race?

So far killed everything with basic skill rotations and tank&spank/shoot mage with guns then blast shit with aoe. Immunities exist (fly creatures can't be entangled) but since you have no risk at using everything every battle since you're good after, you just unload all guns regardless of creature type, collect loot. That's PoTD + maxed level scaling. Still there's micro involved and dual classes have interesting combos.

• Itemization, as compared to BG2. Are there weapons that inhabit the same class (sword, axe, etc) but offer distinctly different ways to play your character (per granted effects, for example) or shine situationally (double damage to undead, etc) in a meaningful way? Is there an abundance of flaming / epic weapons and gear, such that nothing stands out because it's all so epic? Is the presentation of item stats more AD&D-ish, or do players find color coded items of +5%?

There is a shortsword which boosts sword and shield combat. There's aura item from previous game boosting Will defence. There is an item getting stacking bonuses for character's Religion skill. Character having this unique items of hers have unique animations. There is broken weapon from previous game you can reforge and enhance. There's enough +1 junk too. So seems good. Banalced, but on the level of White March.

• Pacing. Is the story broken up into Acts, and do those Acts present geographic restrictions? Such as Chapter 2 to 3 3 to 4 in BG2.

The pacing is the thing which I think is the better part of the game. You have sailing your boat and talking to companions, and ship combat and customizing&repairing your ship. You have SoZ exploration. You have city hubs with main quests and side quests. You have random encounters with text quests and skill checks. All of that together mashes into decent gameplay and complements the feeling of adventure, traveling and doing adventurous things.

 

[duanth123]

Lmao this subform, a pro-Obsidian circlejerk? Last 2 years if you as much say that Josh Sawyer might not be as bad as Stalin, the next day it's a mathematical guarantee that you will open up a thread to 10 pages of whining from Lacrymas, Lurker King and Sensuski.

Get the fuck out of here with your martyr complex about being oppressed by everpresent fanboys.

Three people that are regularly castigated by low IQ posters such as yourself for taking issue with PoE and the developers.

And it's not a martyr complex. I'm just sad to see what this place has become with respect to standards beyond more-same mediocrity.

 

[Valtiel]

FULL NUDITY IN THE SAUNA

 

[AwesomeButton]

The combat AI is having trouble reacting to IE games habits of simply pulling back anyone low on health. It may try to follow you with short-range teleport abilities, ignoring that this would set him up surrounded by three party members :D

 

[Doma]

Sooo.. how do Grimoires work? I cant learn spells like in the first game.

What am I to do with the ones I find around?

 

[Tigranes]

Bleh. Restarting my playthrough at 4 hours. "Normal" is too easy, I haven't lost a single fight except one where I blew up gunpowder on my own party. The difficulty is shit.

Why the hell would you play any game released this century on normal

The combat AI is having trouble reacting to IE games habits of simply pulling back anyone low on health. It may try to follow you with short-range teleport abilities, ignoring that this would set him up surrounded by three party members :D

Heh. I mean, IE dudes would just chase you wherever and run round and round while you kited them. I wonder when we can get to a point where, in real-time/RTWP games, it's more about us assailing enemies defending a good position, rather than throwing a stone at them and watch them all line up to come to you?

 

[Jenkem]

according to Josh they've figured out why imported saves/created histories are fucking up.. said it will be in a "hotfix"
on reddit Obsidian_Eric says the "hotfix" will be out on Tuesday May 15th..

This is not how hotfixes work you fucking nincompoops... holy shit how can one company be so fucking retarded?

 

[Riddler]

Bilingual speakers do this when speaking to another bilingual. They unconsciously interject words in either language that better convey their meaning. They do not randomly insert one word to remind you they speak another language or more like for the writer to heavy handedly remind the player of what kind of person they're talking to in game. And they usually wouldn't regardless to a mono lingual

I've never experienced this in my entire life of english conversations with scandinavians, germans, french, belgians, even the british. Only time I've ever seen this happen is in american movies and TV shows. Then again, I notice my sample size is all northern europeans. Perhaps culturally inferior southerners like the spanish and italians and the greek and other non-whites do indeed do this compulsively.

Younger Swedes and business people do this all the time. They would never randomly insert Swedish words when speaking English though, that's just retarded.

 

[SophosTheWise]

Wh ... what if it flops but the codex will actually like the game?

Not gonna happen. The Codex defines success as "an RPG that more than 100 people have heard of", so PoE 2 will be a massive success and therefore sucks.

That's what I meant, but everything above 100 people is definitely mainstream and therefore Popamole. Brb, gonna play Ultizurk now.

________

Until yesterday I didn't even know about its release date and sailing around tropical islands mixed with PoE sounded really unintriguing. And, Deadfire? What a shitty name, seriously. I was on the verge of skipping this game, especially because how boring I found PoE to be.
I've played for around 4 hours now. Gotta say I'm kind of impressed. Didn't expect this at all. It's already leagues above PoE, especially in terms of writing, pacing and setting. Characters so far are interesting (I couldn't bother with any of the PoE companions) and the setting is, really, really cool. So far, no random character in a tavern gave me any history lessons and loredumps seem absolutely avoidable. Voice work is pretty cool so far, having that Gaun priest speak in a southern accent gives it some kind of new fun dimension.

I can't say how long this honeymoon phase will last, though one thing is clear: I never had a honeymoon phase with PoE. So this is surprisingly pleasant. Gonna play some more now.

Edit: As an SJW myself, I can definitely appreciate this game on all fronts. Nice

 

[Lady_Error]

has anyone tried to run it on a low end laptop?for science purposes of course.

On my AMD A6 I had to turn many of the graphics settings down and it works and looks pretty good nevertheless. Quick save is instantenous so far, but the loading times were faster in POE1, I think.

There might be a bug with loading save games, like someone mentioned - currently trying to load my latest save for the second time and it gets stuck on a black screen.

 

[fantadomat]

btw, always love to see posts on the codex by europoors jealous of others' computers saying shit like "lol you have an i7 to play crpgs" etc. maybe they play other genres? maybe they do a lot of photo/video editing...maybe they did a cost benefit analysis and realize it is better to pay a little more to have room for creeping computing needs, etc

I am from Bulgarian and have I7,what is the matter with those people. CPU's are not that expensive.

 

[fantadomat]

Bleh. Restarting my playthrough at 4 hours. "Normal" is too easy, I haven't lost a single fight except one where I blew up gunpowder on my own party. The difficulty is shit.

You do know that you can change difficulty mid game? Also i am nearly 20 hours in and have fought less than 10 battles,a lot of sneaking and thieving thou.

 

[Mazisky]

A curious thing about PoE 2 performance and Unity:

In the Gullet Inn (a district of neketaka), everything is smooth but when you go\scroll on a specific part of the INN, lot of stuttering appear. The funny thing is that the stutter it is only on that precise part, not even a crowded area. (go test yourself)

In the temple district there are lot of complex architectures and lot of people walking around, but everything is smooth. In other (less crowded) areas of the game, stuttering appears.

All of this make me think that the quantity of stuff in the environment at the moment (like Josh said) is not the issue, it's something else. It's more like some areas are just more optimized than others, no matter how graphic-intensive they are.

 

[SophosTheWise]

Is it just me or is it insanely cool that the game takes place in a colonial Half-Orc Polynesia setting? I mean I'm a graverobber-pirate captain with a flamboyant hat. That's just awesome. I can't remember any game with a similar cultural theme.

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

Okay, two massive complaints so far:

The game is insanely easy. Normal difficulty is literally unplayable, my guys just delete the enemies before I can scratch my balls.

The second complaint feeds into the first one - leveling is insanely fast which makes you even more overpowered than you already were.

 

[Kyl Von Kull]

The game is insanely easy. Normal difficulty is literally unplayable, my guys just delete the enemies before I can scratch my balls.

The second complaint feeds into the first one - leveling is insanely fast which makes you even more overpowered than you already were.

Why the hell are you playing on normal? This is 2018. Normal is the new story mode.

Leveling goes much more slowly once you get a few more hours in.