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MaterialConceptual
Jan 18, 2011

"It is rather that precisely in that which is newest the face of the world never alters, that this newest remains, in every aspect, the same. - This constitutes the eternity of hell."

-Walter Benjamin, "The Arcades Project"
Thanks for the great advice as always, I'll try to implement (and remember) as much as I can!

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Pvt.Scott
Feb 16, 2007

What God wants, God gets, God help us all
Ah, the skill system is where 3e/pathfinder deliciously breaks.

MechaCrash posted:

The deurgar lady was not impressed by your massive charisma, because by this level, +5 or +6 due to that isn't going to be enough. It can help, but if you haven't been investing in the relevant social skill, you're probably wasting your time.

A +5 or 6 from raw ability is a massive bonus, both systemically (where skills are considered) and in the fictional world. A tiny fraction of humanoids have a +3, let alone a +4 in charisma, with 0 and -1 being the most common. So with a +5-6 you've got more charisma than any humanoid race in the core book can start with, i.e. supernatural charisma. A lot of times pcs are comparing their stats and abilities to foes stronger than themselves, when they are already in the top 5% most powerful humanoids in the world after a few levels. It's kinda like how a second place athlete in the olympics gets shat on, even though that athlete is the second best in the world, often by only a few hundredths of a second or some other almost imperceptible measure.

Let's make a level one expert with the standard terrible npc array, and we'll put his +1 into cha. At first level we'll give him max ranks in all the social skills and skill focus: bluff and skill focus: diplomacy. We now have an adult confidence man who is highly skilled in his craft, with a +8 in both bluff and diplomacy. (+1 cha, +4 skill ranks, +3 skill focus) When running a con he will work with a partner/apprentice (+2 aid bonus) and wear the appropriate clothing and gear(spending time/money if needed) for whatever role he is playing. (masterwork gear +2 equipment bonus) Let's say our man does his research and sweetens the pot with a bribe or gift tailored to the mark or he engineers a situation where the mark owes him gratitude(+2 circumstance bonus)

So, now he has a +14 on bluff or diplomacy. Let's look at DCs. Whoa! The highest DC is 50! That's for changing someone from hostile (will take risks to harm you, a combat encounter or enemy) to helpful (will take risks to help you, i.e. a party member or ally) in the course of a short conversation. I'd call that a supernatural feat, so the DC fits.
Getting someone from unfriendly (1 step up from hostile) to indifferent is DC 15. Our conman literally cannot fail if he is prepared. On an 11, he'll hit DC 25 and bump that up to friendly, but he still can't touch DC 40 to go from unfriendly to helpful in one swoop.

If our man picked a good target, he's chosen someone indifferent or friendly, making his schemes much more likely to succeed in very few attempts. He needs a 30 or a 20 to get to helpful from indifferent or friendly respectively, with his +14. On any reaction other than hostile, it is literally impossible for our conman to actually lower the target's attitude because he cannot roll low enough. He cannot roll low enough even with just his raw +8. It is important to note that 1s and 20s in the skill system are just numbers, no crits or fumbles here.

This is an npc with lovely stats and one level a feat and mundane equipment. He can already rock very hard checks with proper prep. All extra levels do is make bonus fishing less necessary for more mundane tasks and make the harder tasks more and more trivial.

DC 25 or 30 is the highest DC for a lot of skills with those DCs representing supernatural feats of prowess. If you have a +30 hide bonus, you are the god of hiding. Before level 6, PCs can outperform our best real-world athletes and our greatest scientific minds.

On skills that you can take 10 and 20 on and are highly unlikely to ever be used during anything but non stress situations (like craft, pick locks, search, etc) you can calculate how much you need to do what you want when given access to tools and helpers (and magic bonuses too!) etc if applicable, and never put another point in it. Hell in 3.5, you only need a total +14 tumble bonus to never provoke an attack of opportunity while moving (at half speed,mind you) because the DC for that is 15 and you can't roll less than 1. Pathfinder "patched" this by making you beat the Combat Maneuver Defense (CMD) of potential threats, a number that actually takes into account the combat skill of the tumble target.( CMD is 10+BAB+STR+DEX+Misc. if I remember right. It's used to unify special attacks like trips, bull rushes, grapples, disarms etc under a singleish mechanic. CMD is like AC and CMB is like your normal attack bonus, but for the weird poo poo) I say "patched" because skill bonuses from leveling, feats, items and more far outstrip anything you could do to pump CMD, assuming it was even 15 in the first place. So the nimble dude might fail at ALWAYS moving freely at very early levels, but past that, it's trivial again.

I'll try to dig up some cool essays later on how 3e actually did a good job of modeling a close approximation of real world stuff when you look at the very early levels, and a neat one for how npc commoners and the like might reach level 10 or whatever while leading a normalish life.

E: Skill Focus is sillier in Pathfinder because the bonus doubles to +6 at level 10? Somewhere around there.

Pvt.Scott fucked around with this message at 22:50 on Feb 15, 2016

MechaCrash
Jan 1, 2013

Well, to qualify my statement, yeah, a +4 to +6 from charisma is pretty good. But it isn't nearly enough by itself, because stuff that was being put in for you to talk your way out of was done on the assumption that "talk your way out of it" was one of the things you were built to do, which means you were investing skill points in it. So you're getting a +5ish on things that assume you're swinging around a +20 at least, maybe +25 to +30.

And the way the Pathfinder version of Skill Focus works is that it gives +3 on the relevant skill checks, +6 when you have ten or more ranks.

Pvt.Scott
Feb 16, 2007

What God wants, God gets, God help us all
Well, that's my point I guess. I haven't caught up on the update, but was the NPC openly uncooperative? I realize NWN doesn't exactly hew to tabletop rules, but it does make the bad assumption of scaling the world around the abilities of superheroes and not mortals. That +5 bonus should be enough to have a shot at budging a neutral npc a little.

A +30 diplomacy bonus is enough to give you a 5% chance to turn Orcus, Demon Lord of the Undead ( we'll assume he's hostile) from wanting to kill you to your best buddy in a few words. Even if you don't hit that DC of 50, you're guaranteed to deescalate the situation from violence to civil conversation. A lot of game designers make the mistake of just scaling the challenges with the player's abilities whether or not it makes sense at all. Wizards of the Coast certainly did that with a lot of their stuff. 3e starts to fall to pieces around level 10 at latest. I still like the system.

Guildenstern Mother
Mar 31, 2010

Why walk when you can ride?
Well one of the problems is that there are only so many skills worth putting more than 10 points into if we were to scale it around regular mortals. Not counting the fact that it's probably bad story telling in this instance for my barely epic bard to be able to sweet talk the big bad into reconsidering her life choices and joining a quiet monastic order. I can see where you're coming from, and it does seem gamey at times, but well...it *is* a game.

Pvt.Scott
Feb 16, 2007

What God wants, God gets, God help us all
There's an elegant solution to 3e scaling poorly past a certain point, and I enjoy it thoroughly in table top. E6 (or P6) puts epic level at 6th and players then advance through feats. Higher level spells and class abilities are available as epic feats and ritual magic. By stopping the traditional linear advancement at 6th level ( or 8th or 10th in some variants) player characters hit a nice arc where they quickly harden from novices into heroes about on scale with the Fellowship of the Ring, especially Aragorn, Boromir Legolas and Gimli, where they then diversify, specialize and slowly grow more powerful in a more organic fashion, rather than in huge "level" chunks all of the time. It works pretty well. Just think, at level cap orcs can still mob you, ogres are still scary and CR 10 monsters are something you have to loving prepare for or flee from. It's even simple enough to stat up a stable of foes, say demon cultist 1st 3rd 5th 6th and if you want a billy badass add feats to the level 6 chassis, give him a cool name and bam, epic dark lord. E6 P6

Guildenstern Mother
Mar 31, 2010

Why walk when you can ride?
Which all sounds fabulous (it really does, I've love to play a game like that), except we're discussing NWN, which probably predates that system.

Pvt.Scott
Feb 16, 2007

What God wants, God gets, God help us all

WanderingMinstrel I posted:

Which all sounds fabulous (it really does, I've love to play a game like that), except we're discussing NWN, which probably predates that system.

True. I should stop spergin' and get back to spectatin'.

MechaCrash
Jan 1, 2013

You're overestimating the depth of the conversation system in Neverwinter Nights. There are no degrees of cooperation, it's just "I want you to do this thing, I will now roll the relevant skill to see if you comply." I don't know if it's a fixed "you must have this much skill to get result" thing, or if there's a DC and you roll against it, but in either case, an 18 charisma is not nearly enough to make up for not having any skill points in the social things.

I couldn't tell you how they calibrate the DCs, but I assume that a charismatic person who doesn't necessarily invest in the skills (such as a sorcerer) can get through on pure stat bonuses at first, but it quickly comes to the point where you need the actual skill. There might be some challenges that someone who's dabbling or investing cross-class skill points in it can pass, but there's presumably going to be challenges you can only clear if it's a class skill and you've been investing in it every level. Otherwise, what's the point of keeping your talky-skills up to snuff?

Pvt.Scott
Feb 16, 2007

What God wants, God gets, God help us all

MechaCrash posted:

You're overestimating the depth of the conversation system in Neverwinter Nights. There are no degrees of cooperation, it's just "I want you to do this thing, I will now roll the relevant skill to see if you comply." I don't know if it's a fixed "you must have this much skill to get result" thing, or if there's a DC and you roll against it, but in either case, an 18 charisma is not nearly enough to make up for not having any skill points in the social things.

I couldn't tell you how they calibrate the DCs, but I assume that a charismatic person who doesn't necessarily invest in the skills (such as a sorcerer) can get through on pure stat bonuses at first, but it quickly comes to the point where you need the actual skill. There might be some challenges that someone who's dabbling or investing cross-class skill points in it can pass, but there's presumably going to be challenges you can only clear if it's a class skill and you've been investing in it every level. Otherwise, what's the point of keeping your talky-skills up to snuff?

That's a problem with the D20 skill system. Any skills with only set DCs have clear point where there is no reason to invest in them (though nothing in the text helpfully points this out), and depending on your magical gear and spell loadout, you might be able to cut that number down further or avoid making the check at all. The only skills you "need" to continually invest in are opposed checks like Hide vs Spot, because if you have hide as a class skill you want the highest number in there because you're working with a fluctuating bonus of 1-20 against another guy with a fluctuating bonus of 1-20, not counting skill bonuses. Since 3e brought in more "tailored" encounter design using CR as threat measurement, if you are the party scout, you have to put points into the stealth and spot skills every level because the foes that are an "average challenge" for a group of four yous, if they have stealth or observation skills have them maxed, and sometimes arbitrary racial bonuses and more on top. This is despite the fact that most beings in the world cant detect you hiding if you have a +20 bonus. Hell every 10 feet between spotter and spotee adds to the difficulty, a rule no other gm I've played with has ever used. It's actually useful, because you roll a 16 for sneaking orcs ( a good result for them) and the party spotter gets a 20(average result), that means the orcs are spotted 40 feet out if it was relatively clear terrain, like plains. It's just that a slavering hellbeast can be supernaturally stealthy because it has a lot of hit dice and hide and move silent are it's only racial skills because it was supposed to be sneaky, but what that means in the reality of the game world is that unless you can read fine print on a contract at a thousand yards and hear a butterfly fart in a hurricane, the monster might as well just have invisibility and silence cast on it.

E: To clarify, you either scale DCs based on player level (as in open-ended opposed checks ala monster with nothing to do but specialize in a few skills as an artifact of 3e design), meaning perpetual investment in a skill is mandatory and dabbling is worthless, or you try and constrain the numbers to a range where they still all make sense and you can have set DCs and opposed checks and still allow those who don't heavily invest in a skill to still see return from some investment. That's why I said much past level 10 the skill system can't even pretend it's working any longer.

Pvt.Scott fucked around with this message at 06:44 on Feb 17, 2016

MechaCrash
Jan 1, 2013

Yeah, I get what you're saying. That's one of the things that Fallout 3 hosed up and Fallout 4 did right: In FO3, there came a point where if you weren't investing in the lockpicking and hacking skills, you should just not even bother, because you weren't going to get the shiny. FO4 still had stuff that you had to really focus on those skills to do, but they'd throw bones to dabblers and people who hadn't invested in it at all with lower skill rating locks and terminals.

I don't know what the point of that would be in a D&D campaign, though, which is supposed to be a multi-person experience. I guess have the occasional locked door that your dabbling wizard (or whatever) can open up while the rogue is otherwise busy? The problem is having it be a common enough thing that the team wizard doesn't feel like a schmuck for spending points, but not so common that you wonder why you bothered bringing a specialist at all. Finding the middle ground between "go big or go home" and "eh, nobody has this as a class skill but who cares" is tricky.

ThisIsNoZaku
Apr 22, 2013

Pew Pew Pew!

MechaCrash posted:

I don't know what the point of that would be in a D&D campaign, though, which is supposed to be a multi-person experience. I guess have the occasional locked door that your dabbling wizard (or whatever) can open up while the rogue is otherwise busy? The problem is having it be a common enough thing that the team wizard doesn't feel like a schmuck for spending points, but not so common that you wonder why you bothered bringing a specialist at all. Finding the middle ground between "go big or go home" and "eh, nobody has this as a class skill but who cares" is tricky.

Almost like many of those games weigh themselves down with ridiculous ideas about "realism."

Guildenstern Mother
Mar 31, 2010

Why walk when you can ride?
Goddammit I swear we already finished this conversation

MechaCrash
Jan 1, 2013

I think it's relevant, because I may have used a couple of Fallouts, but the example holds true here. Like in this campaign, we're seeing it in action with the Deurgar lady, after a fashion I tried looking up the Persuade and Intimidate DCs to convince her, and while I still don't know how to get those numbers, the fact that a "success" state isn't even in the scripts tells me all I need to know (and I'm only saying that because we're past the point where it matters). We're seeing calls for skill checks, and they are pretty clearly "if you didn't specialize in this, don't waste your time." Like even if Material had put skill points into Search, do you think he would've been able to find what looked like four layered traps that instagibbed him when he went for the golden armor? It's not a problem for a single class build, because you pick however many skills you can max and just max them out, but it's a problem for for a multiclass build. Like when did my ranger/rogue, I'd save up skill points so I could put two into the rogue-only Disable Device on my rogue levels to keep it maxed out. The skills that Ranger has but Rogue doesn't are Animal Empathy and Concentration, the skills that Rogues have and Rangers don't are Disable Trap, Open Lock, Persuade, Pick Pocket, and Use Magic Device. I couldn't just pick a suite of skills for each class and max those class's skills out every level, because if I did, then I wouldn't have enough lock picking and trap disabling to matter. (We will, for the moment, overlook that half the function of the Rogue class can be replicated by two spells, and the other half -- massive combat damage -- is easily obtained as a caster, to say nothing of "save or die" spells.)

So the dabbling thing is mostly an issue for multiclasses, because they have to hold on to their skill points until the levels where they can spend them where needed. Which is a huge difference from how it works in tabletop. You have to spend your points immediately, even having useless half-ranks in skills until you can raise them again. Which is another thing Pathfinder cleaned up: you just spent skill points, one point is one rank, class skills you spent points on get +3.

MaterialConceptual
Jan 18, 2011

"It is rather that precisely in that which is newest the face of the world never alters, that this newest remains, in every aspect, the same. - This constitutes the eternity of hell."

-Walter Benjamin, "The Arcades Project"
Here's the next set of episodes, Lefur Smar is starting to get really strong by this point:

Episode 25
Episode 26

MechaCrash
Jan 1, 2013

It's "good" to see Nathyrra displaying her keen tactical prowess by, instead of getting in there with her two potent weapons with plenty of bonus damage, hanging back and throwing first level spells with crappy DCs and catching you in the blast radius (and the only reason you weren't getting hurt is because the difficulty setting isn't high enough). No, wait, not good. The other thing. I don't know if she was doing that because the AI is bad about "if you have spells, use them" or if it was going "these things are immune to sneak attack, go for the nukes," but in either case, I'm pretty sure stabbing them would have hurt more. It makes putting the dagger that dings her intelligence in her hands pretty tempting, though, if only because it will make her stop sucking all the rear end. There's only so much a dual wielding rogue can do against things immune to sneak attacks, though.

In the library with the dead Deurgar rogue, there was some treasure by the body. I don't know what it was or if it's worth going back for, but it's the kind of thing you can probably do off camera if you give a poo poo.

The phrase you were looking for on your stat is "ability modifier." However, an important thing to note: while your bonus spells look at your modified casting stat, the highest spell level you can use is determined by your base stat. So you won't be able to use ninth level spells until you get another point of wisdom.

The major thing I know about Pillars of Eternity, other than I need to get around to playing the drat thing, is that the game mechanics were designed to be run on a PC. Neverwinter Nights, like Baldur's Gate before it, is an adaption of a tabletop RPG, and all the simplifications necessary to make that not a complete pain in the rear end to play (see: Rolemaster, Rifts, FATAL...on second thought, don't see FATAL). Pillars of Eternity, however, is written on the assumption that all the super fiddly bullshit will be handled by a computer, so it can do stuff like "wearing this armor reduces attack speed by 10%" and "this weapon makes eight different attack/damage rolls every time you use it" without making someone at the table chuck their books out the window. It tells you what all the fiddly stuff is, of course, because having a ton of fiddly poo poo and not telling you about it is incredibly obnoxious at best, but the numbers are pre-crunched.

A demon flesh golem is pretty loving metal, but even for that, I can't help but wonder if not taking the notes with you so you could show them to him kept you from having a peaceful resolution. Ah well, I suspect you would've had to bust him up anyway. I did notice a few things in that fight, though, namely that Deekin won't put away his loving crossbow. I know I keep saying it, but you really should switch him over to a melee weapon, because he can attack much more effectively with it, won't use up expensive ammo, and also won't deal with eating an attack of opportunity every time he fires. I also noticed you kept swinging at the boss you couldn't hurt instead of mowing down the minions. If you're going to take the time to get Cleave, you might as well use it to cut down the crappy little guys, you know? Even a Level poo poo guy can roll a 20 now and then. Pity you didn't use any of the sweet anti-golem items on them, that probably would've hosed him up right proper.

I think if you right click on one of your flunkies, you can give them orders to deal with traps. I don't know if Nathyrra has the stats/skills for it, but it's worth a shot before you blow a spell on it. Or maybe not, it's only a second level spell that's massively upgraded from the tabletop version which just gives you a bonus on finding traps and lets you do it like rogues, it doesn't even help you disarm them, let alone just do it, but I guess anybody who's not a caster just isn't allowed to have nice things. Not that I'm bitter.

MaterialConceptual
Jan 18, 2011

"It is rather that precisely in that which is newest the face of the world never alters, that this newest remains, in every aspect, the same. - This constitutes the eternity of hell."

-Walter Benjamin, "The Arcades Project"

MechaCrash posted:

A demon flesh golem is pretty loving metal, but even for that, I can't help but wonder if not taking the notes with you so you could show them to him kept you from having a peaceful resolution. Ah well, I suspect you would've had to bust him up anyway. I did notice a few things in that fight, though, namely that Deekin won't put away his loving crossbow. I know I keep saying it, but you really should switch him over to a melee weapon, because he can attack much more effectively with it, won't use up expensive ammo, and also won't deal with eating an attack of opportunity every time he fires. I also noticed you kept swinging at the boss you couldn't hurt instead of mowing down the minions. If you're going to take the time to get Cleave, you might as well use it to cut down the crappy little guys, you know? Even a Level poo poo guy can roll a 20 now and then. Pity you didn't use any of the sweet anti-golem items on them, that probably would've hosed him up right proper.

I think if you right click on one of your flunkies, you can give them orders to deal with traps. I don't know if Nathyrra has the stats/skills for it, but it's worth a shot before you blow a spell on it. Or maybe not, it's only a second level spell that's massively upgraded from the tabletop version which just gives you a bonus on finding traps and lets you do it like rogues, it doesn't even help you disarm them, let alone just do it, but I guess anybody who's not a caster just isn't allowed to have nice things. Not that I'm bitter.

I think the two facts that I was recording at one in the morning and that this dungeon was such a breeze made me completely forget about the sweet golem busting stuff and targeting enemies effectively in that fight (I guess I can blow some charges mopping up the rest of the dungeon but it does kind of suck that I missed out...). I'll make a point of getting rid of that crossbow on Deekin and replacing it with a melee weapon once I get back to town.

Mordaedil
Oct 25, 2007

Oh wow, cool. Good job.
So?
Grimey Drawer
You can disable Nathyrra's spellcasting by right-clicking her, picking the top-left option on radial menu and picking disable spellcasting and instead have her cast her buff spells via the conversation window. Leads to less time wasted on stupid casting. Also, you could have talked to her to tell her to stop advancing as a wizard.

MechaCrash
Jan 1, 2013

I wouldn't get rid of Deekin's crossbow entirely. Just put the sword in his hands, see if he keeps it in his hand. He's not going to be a damage powerhouse either way, but at least he can help flank, and won't get his face wrecked via attacking.

I'm pretty sure that "stop advancing as a wizard, go pure assassin" was already taken care of, the problem is that she's already a wizard when you find her, and she sucks at it, due to a combination of poor stats and poor AI. A wizard/rogue/assassin can be pretty solid, just...not this one. The companions are often pretty bad, like the previously cited example of the monk that spends four feats on armor proficiency and shields.

MaterialConceptual
Jan 18, 2011

"It is rather that precisely in that which is newest the face of the world never alters, that this newest remains, in every aspect, the same. - This constitutes the eternity of hell."

-Walter Benjamin, "The Arcades Project"
I've been under the weather for the last few days, hence the lack of updates. I think I should be able to record some more tomorrow.

Pvt.Scott
Feb 16, 2007

What God wants, God gets, God help us all
This is what happens when we teach our kids that only the PC classes are cool. I bet all of the local zealots wanted to be Clerics or Paladins or Druids and whatnot and washed right out of basic training and dejectedly took up commoner. If we taught them that being an Adept is much more attainable, practical and useful to the community, maybe OP could have had his disease removed.

Cathode Raymond
Dec 30, 2015

My antenna is telling me that you're probably wrong about this.
Soiled Meat

Pvt.Scott posted:

This is what happens when we teach our kids that only the PC classes are cool. I bet all of the local zealots wanted to be Clerics or Paladins or Druids and whatnot and washed right out of basic training and dejectedly took up commoner. If we taught them that being an Adept is much more attainable, practical and useful to the community, maybe OP could have had his disease removed.

Thumbs up, I agree. Increase funding for NPC trade schools to fill all the Adept/Warrior/Expert job vacancies.

MaterialConceptual
Jan 18, 2011

"It is rather that precisely in that which is newest the face of the world never alters, that this newest remains, in every aspect, the same. - This constitutes the eternity of hell."

-Walter Benjamin, "The Arcades Project"
After quite the hiatus, I'm back with another couple episodes! Apologies in advance for Episode 28...

Episode 27
Episode 28

MechaCrash
Jan 1, 2013

I thought you might have missed one of the lab notes, but I guess there's no way to end it peacefully after all. But given that Aghaaz wants to stay and the Silver Golems want to leave, there's kind of no way to compromise on this one: someone is going to get hosed, so it's not surprising that the demon-meat Frankensteins get the short end of the stick on that one.

I'm surprised that you still have the Yawning Portal Dagger. It's a lovely weapon, and while it won't sell for much, it's going to be more useful than what you have now. On a related note, bards having hosed weapon proficiencies is a thing I had forgotten in this game, and that's going to make equipping Deekin a little bit harder. Still, I didn't realize Deekin had taken weapon focus in the crossbow and Rapid Reload. That helps a lot with his offensive abilities, and given his choice of feats, he's actually way better with it than I thought he would be. All of my "give him a melee weapon" talk was based on the assumption that he hadn't been choosing feats based around using a crossbow, because that would be kind of stupid, but you'd think I'd learn not to overestimate the ability of these characters to pick feats. Anyway, my "Deekin will contribute a lot more to combat with a melee weapon" stuff is no longer valid (at least, not with what you have available), but there's still the "he eats tons of AOOs in combat." Maybe give that crappy dagger to Deekin? It sucks, but it's at least some kind of melee weapon he can use in a pinch, such as when surrounded by giant robot minotaurs that carry axes with heads as big as the rest of him.

Speaking of bad builds, I knew Nathyrra's build would be poo poo, because all of their builds are poo poo, but holy gently caress, no anti-trap skills? I understand that trap stuff is only half of what rogues do, and she's technically an assassin which is all about the shanking, but that is mind-bogglingly awful. It's great that she's super good at sneaking up on people and ruining their poo poo, but it's not like you really need someone to do that. And it's great that you shut off her spells so she'll get in there and start shanking, but alas, that is only of so much utility against golems, not that she did anything to help against the Greater Minogons. At least it's just one sub-dungeon of one chapter full of things that shut down rogues so far, I hear that Neverwinter Nights 2 is really bad about things immune to sneak attacks towards the end.

Although even if you don't have an actual trap-springer, or the stupidly overpowered version of the trapfinding spell, you at least have good ol' Cleric's Disarm, a close relative of Cleric's Feather Fall.

As you said, comparisons between Pillars of Eternity and Neverwinter Nights can be made, but they're awkward. The thing is that one of the complaints about Neverwinter Nights was "why does everything in this game rely on rolling dice," which went over about like you'd expect. Pillars of Eternity is what happens when you design a game from the ground up with those comments in mind, which is not to say that the "ugh why is everything d20 based" people weren't point-missing morons, but they did have a point about the fact that with a computer taking over for the DM, you could afford to have things work in real time and have a fucktillion fiddly bits that would make the most battle-hardened accountant cry at the notion of running the clunky piece of poo poo. The bar for "so complicated it's no fun to play" is set way, way higher when you don't have to do the math yourself, after all.

Deekin dying is indeed a tragedy, but Raise Dead is a fifth level spell, and by this point I don't think you'd miss the slot too much. Raise Dead brings the target back with one hit point, so it's best saved for after combat. Resurrection, which is what the rod casts, is a seventh level spell, and brings the target back with full hit points. An argument could be made for having a single Resurrection ready to go, but I think that even at level 20, seventh level spells are still a significant resource better spent on making sure nobody dies in the first place.

As soon as I saw the sling, I figured shooting the mirrors would be the solution to the puzzle. Why else would there be a mundane ranged weapon with some mundane ammo that anybody can use? And needless to say, there's a way to not have to fight two very large angry mithril golems, but just handing you the solution seems unsporting. Especially because if you wanted it, hell, you have the same internet I do. I guess it's a question of if you think "track down the Word" or "fight the golems" would make for a better show.

MaterialConceptual
Jan 18, 2011

"It is rather that precisely in that which is newest the face of the world never alters, that this newest remains, in every aspect, the same. - This constitutes the eternity of hell."

-Walter Benjamin, "The Arcades Project"
I looked into the options for the golem boss and I'll give the fight another try tomorrow. Was going to record today but got a bit distracted. I'll have more to say about the whole thing in the episode.

Mordaedil
Oct 25, 2007

Oh wow, cool. Good job.
So?
Grimey Drawer
There aren't all that many great spells past level 7 for clerics as they were originally designed with that as highest spell level in mind (in original D&D). Preparing a resurrection spell can always be done after the fact anyway, as long as you can rest (unless you play multiplayer, where people will insist you prepare at least 3 of them because people are going to be dying.

Also, there is a file you could put into your override folder to reduce resting times if it is too annoying or whatnot. After all, the rest mechanic just is kinda annoying in how it keeps taking longer the higher level you are. But my favorite part of this game is how customizable it is.

ThisIsNoZaku
Apr 22, 2013

Pew Pew Pew!

Mordaedil posted:

After all, the rest mechanic just is kinda annoying in how it keeps taking longer the higher level you are. But my favorite part of this game is how customizable it is.

Wait, really?

Mordaedil
Oct 25, 2007

Oh wow, cool. Good job.
So?
Grimey Drawer

ThisIsNoZaku posted:

Wait, really?

http://nwn.wikia.com/wiki/Restduration.2da_(contents)

Measured in milliseconds or some such.

MaterialConceptual
Jan 18, 2011

"It is rather that precisely in that which is newest the face of the world never alters, that this newest remains, in every aspect, the same. - This constitutes the eternity of hell."

-Walter Benjamin, "The Arcades Project"
Here's the next episode! This one ran a bit long so there's only one today.

Episode 29

MechaCrash
Jan 1, 2013

This is the same length as a regular episode, isn't it? About half an hour, but I can see how the technical oopsies would make you just say "gently caress it" and do the one.

I think that +6 Small Shield is better than the one you have, which is a +3 Large Shield that gives Spell Resist 12. The new shield will have a better armor check (irrelevant) and lower arcane failure chance (also irrelevant), but it will give you +7 armor. The Mirror Shield is +5 armor. You'll lose the Spell Resist, but SR12 is worthless by now anyway, for reasons I've already covered.

It's kind of funny that the hammer is meant to gently caress up constructs, and gives a bonus to critical hits, but constructs are immune to those. Oh well! Still, the massive criticals work on non-golem things, but even if you were specced for warhammers, you can do better by this point.

I think it's okay for the golems to be really hard. You only fight the golems if you don't know the password, after all, although I'm not sure if "there's a password, and you're in for a hard fight if you don't know it" is adequately conveyed. To put an actual number on it, I looked at the challenge rating in the tool kit, and it's 39. Your level, at the time you fought them, was 20. And you had to fight two of them at once.

Demiliches, as you've seen, are fairly high-octane foes. One of them is an optional superboss in Baldur's Gate 2, and the prize is one of the best rings in the game (you can get two if you pick his pocket; a bug that may or may not be fixed in the HD Remaster version). You don't fight their likes again until...I want to say you fight a pair of them in Throne of Bhaal's optional superdungeon Watcher's Keep, on the fourth floor out of five that leads to the expansion's optional superboss Demogorgon. So it may just be a floating skull (or hand, or spine, or foot; the skull is popular but not required), but it's still really dangerous. Not as dangerous as the two golems, though (this guy was CR 31).

Although it makes me wonder, is there a way to talk this guy down? The SRD describes the process that turns you into a lich as "unspeakably evil," and since a demilich is to a lich what a lich is to a regular caster, you can see where this tells me that a peaceful resolution is unlikely.

You probably could have ruined his poo poo if you managed to stick a Heal. A demilich is undead, after all, and if you tag an undead with that, they're reduced to 1d4 HP. The tricky bit, of course, would be actually landing the hit (it's just a touch attack, but a touch attack on a floating skull) and overcoming spell resistance.

GuyUpNorth
Apr 29, 2014

Witty phrases on random basis
Last time I played that bit, I honestly just cheesed the gently caress out of both of them - turns out neither golems or demilich can eat Maximized Greater Missile Barrages.

Pvt.Scott
Feb 16, 2007

What God wants, God gets, God help us all
The CR system is another idea that looks good on paper and functions ok in the range most groups play, 1-10, but the higher level your PCs get, the more worthless it becomes. A CR 30+ caster creature might get chumped by a high level party but the same party might have to retreat from 4 CR ~20 bruisers, simply due to the action economy and individual character builds. Put those two encounters together, which might be logical in the game fiction,
(big bad is paranoid and has his monstrous guards always at his side) and you might get a TPK depending on your PCs target priority and tactical acumen.

MaterialConceptual
Jan 18, 2011

"It is rather that precisely in that which is newest the face of the world never alters, that this newest remains, in every aspect, the same. - This constitutes the eternity of hell."

-Walter Benjamin, "The Arcades Project"
I've got another single episode this time, as I didn't quite have enough energy to do two of them tonight. In any case we wrap up the Isle of the Maker with this one!

Episode 30

MaterialConceptual
Jan 18, 2011

"It is rather that precisely in that which is newest the face of the world never alters, that this newest remains, in every aspect, the same. - This constitutes the eternity of hell."

-Walter Benjamin, "The Arcades Project"
As promised, here are another couple episodes. In this batch we take on the mind flayers!

Episode 31
Episode 32

MonsterEnvy
Feb 4, 2012

Shocked I tell you
Mindflayers are always fun.

MechaCrash
Jan 1, 2013

The problem with putting levels into a non-Cleric class is that a lot of the stuff that you do has your caster level factored in pretty heavily. By taking classes that don't advance your clerical casting, which in Neverwinter Nights 1 would be "everything that's not a cleric," you're weakening your ability to magically wreck faces. The undead you're going to face in the next area are a decent example: you're rolling in there thinking you're a level 21 cleric, but the problem is that you aren't. You're a level 17 cleric, and that may not be enough to actually turn anything in there. And spell resistance is also going to be a problem too, because the way that works is you have to roll a 1d20, add your caster level (and any modifiers), and the result is compared to their spell resistance. You're getting a +17 on the roll and the things were built assuming a +21, so that's a lot more of your spells that are going to bounce off them. Not only that, but once you hit epic levels, you can start taking crazy powerful epic spells, like "40d6 in a huge radius" or "summon a dragon to fight for you," but only if you can cast ninth-level spells, and while you have the levels for it, I don't know if you have enough unmodified Wisdom, plus you have to take an actual cleric level to be able to pick the feat (or, I assume, any other casting class, but taking a non-cleric casting level at this stage would be a catastrophically bad idea). On the bright side, your buff spells don't have to pass any checks or anything, and if all else fails, you can hit stuff with your axe until it falls down.

When Nathyrra cast Knock to unlock those chests, I was pretty shocked. She actually had a useful spell prepared! And she cast it in an intelligent manner! That's the kind of poo poo she should be doing with he spell slots, not friggin' Magic Missile. Speaking of which, that Wand of Missiles is basically garbage at this point, because a CL3 Magic Missile is not going to make a noticeable dent in anything you'd want to burn expendables to fight. You'd get what is basically couch cushion change at this level for it, though, so eh, sell it or give it to a flunky, it doesn't really matter. Do note, however, that Deekin can only use it if he has enough ranks in Use Magic Device, and I don't know if he has any at all. But Deekin can use that Lichskull thing, because he's a Red Dragon Disciple. I don't know what he's got on his noggin right now, though, if anything. If it boosts charisma, leave it there, if not then think about swapping. He can also make use of the Concentration gloves, because "cast defensively" seems alien to him and he keeps dropping his spells when he gets hit. It's your call if that's worth swapping out the dex gloves, though.

My initial assessment of the Searing Armor kind of missed the "no shorties" part of it. Oh well, at least that makes it easy to decide between it and the dragonscale! v:v:v

Mighty on a bow is pretty nice if you have the strength for it. It adds your strength bonus to ranged damage attacks, up to its rating. There's no downside to using a bow with a higher Mighty rating than your strength here, but in some editions you take a to-hit penalty for trying to use a bow with more pull than you can handle. Which reminds me, you can and probably should ditch that crossbow you're carrying. Crossbows are not as good as longbows, and because of your Dwarven Defender levels, you can use those. Not that you're using any ranged weapons, but y'know. Good to know for the future.

Speaking of equipment, yes, giving Deekin that shield causes him to suffer from arcane failure chance. The fact that bards are built to wear armor and then punished for it was one of the things that 3.5 fixed, because now bards don't suffer arcane failure for bard spells while wearing light armor. Cleaning up armor proficiencies in general was one of the things 3.5 did, because 3E had a lot of stuff like "this class can use up to medium armor but loses a bunch of class features if they wear anything more than light." Feels like a waste of time, you know? And I know I spent the past however the gently caress many episodes saying GIVE DEEKIN A MELEE WEAPON but now that I've seen his actual feats, I think you should go back to his crossbow. And take that light shield for yourself, it's better than what you have. And I will admit to laughing when you upgraded the crossbow and then searched around in your inventory and couldn't find it, because it was still in your hands.

I did like the conversation Deekin and Nathyrra had about how Deekin's survival defies logic. But let's be fair here: Deekin has, in fact, died. It's just that he has a cleric buddy to make sure that doesn't stick. And did you see the kind of damage Nathyrra was cranking out? When you fought the Umber Hulks on your way to the mind flayer place, I saw her deal a couple of hits for about 50 damage each. A dual wielding rogue can churn out a fuckload of damage.

Mind flayers were absolute bastards to fight, because every time they hit you, they lowered your intelligence. If your intelligence hit zero, you died. I don't remember how the int damage works here, but the "if it hits zero, you die" thing is still true.

While the conversation between Nathyrra and Deekin makes me wonder what Vaelan would have to say to either of them, this is somewhat overridden by the fact that he sucks and is a douche, so gently caress that guy.

That golem bartender makes me wonder: where do people get their drinks if not from that guy? If no money is coming in, where does he get anything? Or is this place just some building where the slavers chill and the golem stands around to serve drinks nobody wants or needs because they brought their own?

That illusion makes me wonder: do you still get dumped in there if you keep the helmet? (The helmet is gone, by the way, you gave it to those guys to get entrance to the brain pool.) I'm assuming you do, because from the sounds of it, it keeps them from reading your mind, but that's all it does. They can still gently caress with your head in more brute force ways.

I don't know what that illitid device does, but using it gave you a few points towards Evil. It scrolled by really fast, so I don't think you noticed it, but there you go. Clerics do operate under alignment restrictions to an extent, but since it's on a 0-100 scale and it was some single-digit number, who gives a poo poo? You can take the occasional alignment hit like that without a problem.

I thought that the fact that you could do an intelligence check to see if you can get the prime number puzzle was a nice touch. Although it'd be nice if you could wave flunkies over and say "I don't get it, you take a crack at it." Like, Deekin is a bard, why can't you let him translate the bridge controls? He may not be able to solve it, but hell, he could at least tell us what the buttons do so we're not pushing them as blindly while dealing with this Roguelike ASCII bullshit.

If I didn't have a big-rear end backlog of games to deal with already, I'd play through this as a chaotic stupid puppy kicking sorcerer just for the contrast. But, well, I do, so there you go. :v:

MaterialConceptual
Jan 18, 2011

"It is rather that precisely in that which is newest the face of the world never alters, that this newest remains, in every aspect, the same. - This constitutes the eternity of hell."

-Walter Benjamin, "The Arcades Project"
I hope to have another batch of episodes up tomorrow. Things have been a bit crazy with me lately but they're looking up at the moment.

MaterialConceptual
Jan 18, 2011

"It is rather that precisely in that which is newest the face of the world never alters, that this newest remains, in every aspect, the same. - This constitutes the eternity of hell."

-Walter Benjamin, "The Arcades Project"
Only one episode today, but not because I ran out of time...

Episode 33

MechaCrash
Jan 1, 2013

Like I've said previously, Alignment in this game is a 0-100 scale.I don't know what the cutoff points are, but picking Lawful Good puts you at 85 for each. I don't know if Hordes of the Underdark has anything to gently caress with the law/chaos axis (the original campaign didn't), but thanks to having 87 Good, you are now more good than when you started, even taking the "incidents" with the buttons into account. I still don't know what those did, of course, but clearly nothing bad enough to make you actually evil.

I didn't want to come across as saying "you took Dwarven Defender, RUINED FOREVER" but there's a reason that I said that those few extra levels of casting were a big make-or-break deal between Arcane Archer and Eldritch Knight. :( With the way things work out in this system, if you're going to go for a prestige class as a caster and you aren't trying to leverage some Weird Class poo poo, then your options boil down to "increases casting" and "garbage." :( I'm still not sure how much Wisdom you've got, though. If it isn't an unmodified 19, you can't cast level 9 spells. so raising that should be very high priority. Like "use your next feat to get Great Wisdom" level priority, but since I think your next feat is at 24 and that's when you get a stat bonus, you can use the stat bonus on Wisdom, and won't necessarily have to spend the feat that way. You have at least an 18 because you have eighth-level spells, though.

I like that in almost every dialogue, no matter how terrible an idea it is, or what kind of sociopathic dipshit you'd have to be to use it, there is a "cut the yakking, get to smacking" option that lets you just shank a fucker. You might be able to get out of this without having to fight, but that's going to require the Persuade option, because you have ranks in that but not Bluff or Intimidate. So you can sweet talk, but you can't bluster or bullshit. I don't know if you'll then have to open your wallet to make him go away after that or what, but the "persuade" option looks like you want to cut a deal, so I'd say save buying him off as a last resort and Plan A should be to tell him to eat a heaping bag of dicks with a side of your axe to the face. I don't know if you could pull that off anyway, since you have 14 ranks in the skill, and if you'd been maxing it out every level you'd have 24. And while there was the digression about "easy to moderate checks so people can feel like dabbling is worthwhile" earlier, this strikes me as the kind of thing where if you want to talk your way out of it, a dabbling diplomancer is not pulling that poo poo off.

All I've really got as far as beating that guy's face in is that now that you know he's there, you can prepare. Don't just rely on the buffs that Nathyrra and Deekin can use, because they're poorly chosen and also they're idiots who use them poorly. Clerical buffing is not the world's greatest, but you have access to a pretty good array, and even if you didn't you're surely packing many potions for it. So what I'd suggest doing, then, is gathering all your buff potions on one page of your inventory, lining them up, and then pounding those fuckers like a fratboy doing shots. Barkskin, Bull's Strength, Bear's Endurance, even useless poo poo like Fox's Cunning (okay, useless for a cleric going into battle), casting Aura Against Evil, maybe your best elemental resistance spells against Electricity and Fire (I saw those flying around). Then roll up and try to act surprised, and maybe throw around some Destructions for the Fort-based save or dies at the wizards (and c'mon, they're wizards, making their saving throw means they take 10d6 Divine damage and that's going to tear a chunk out of their HP pool).

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MaterialConceptual
Jan 18, 2011

"It is rather that precisely in that which is newest the face of the world never alters, that this newest remains, in every aspect, the same. - This constitutes the eternity of hell."

-Walter Benjamin, "The Arcades Project"

MechaCrash posted:

Like I've said previously, Alignment in this game is a 0-100 scale.I don't know what the cutoff points are, but picking Lawful Good puts you at 85 for each. I don't know if Hordes of the Underdark has anything to gently caress with the law/chaos axis (the original campaign didn't), but thanks to having 87 Good, you are now more good than when you started, even taking the "incidents" with the buttons into account. I still don't know what those did, of course, but clearly nothing bad enough to make you actually evil.

I didn't want to come across as saying "you took Dwarven Defender, RUINED FOREVER" but there's a reason that I said that those few extra levels of casting were a big make-or-break deal between Arcane Archer and Eldritch Knight. :( With the way things work out in this system, if you're going to go for a prestige class as a caster and you aren't trying to leverage some Weird Class poo poo, then your options boil down to "increases casting" and "garbage." :( I'm still not sure how much Wisdom you've got, though. If it isn't an unmodified 19, you can't cast level 9 spells. so raising that should be very high priority. Like "use your next feat to get Great Wisdom" level priority, but since I think your next feat is at 24 and that's when you get a stat bonus, you can use the stat bonus on Wisdom, and won't necessarily have to spend the feat that way. You have at least an 18 because you have eighth-level spells, though.

I like that in almost every dialogue, no matter how terrible an idea it is, or what kind of sociopathic dipshit you'd have to be to use it, there is a "cut the yakking, get to smacking" option that lets you just shank a fucker. You might be able to get out of this without having to fight, but that's going to require the Persuade option, because you have ranks in that but not Bluff or Intimidate. So you can sweet talk, but you can't bluster or bullshit. I don't know if you'll then have to open your wallet to make him go away after that or what, but the "persuade" option looks like you want to cut a deal, so I'd say save buying him off as a last resort and Plan A should be to tell him to eat a heaping bag of dicks with a side of your axe to the face. I don't know if you could pull that off anyway, since you have 14 ranks in the skill, and if you'd been maxing it out every level you'd have 24. And while there was the digression about "easy to moderate checks so people can feel like dabbling is worthwhile" earlier, this strikes me as the kind of thing where if you want to talk your way out of it, a dabbling diplomancer is not pulling that poo poo off.

All I've really got as far as beating that guy's face in is that now that you know he's there, you can prepare. Don't just rely on the buffs that Nathyrra and Deekin can use, because they're poorly chosen and also they're idiots who use them poorly. Clerical buffing is not the world's greatest, but you have access to a pretty good array, and even if you didn't you're surely packing many potions for it. So what I'd suggest doing, then, is gathering all your buff potions on one page of your inventory, lining them up, and then pounding those fuckers like a fratboy doing shots. Barkskin, Bull's Strength, Bear's Endurance, even useless poo poo like Fox's Cunning (okay, useless for a cleric going into battle), casting Aura Against Evil, maybe your best elemental resistance spells against Electricity and Fire (I saw those flying around). Then roll up and try to act surprised, and maybe throw around some Destructions for the Fort-based save or dies at the wizards (and c'mon, they're wizards, making their saving throw means they take 10d6 Divine damage and that's going to tear a chunk out of their HP pool).

Thanks for the advice, I'll see what I can do next time to beat this bastard.

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