Register a SA Forums Account here!
JOINING THE SA FORUMS WILL REMOVE THIS BIG AD, THE ANNOYING UNDERLINED ADS, AND STUPID INTERSTITIAL ADS!!!

You can: log in, read the tech support FAQ, or request your lost password. This dumb message (and those ads) will appear on every screen until you register! Get rid of this crap by registering your own SA Forums Account and joining roughly 150,000 Goons, for the one-time price of $9.95! We charge money because it costs us money per month for bills, and since we don't believe in showing ads to our users, we try to make the money back through forum registrations.
 
  • Locked thread
Scorchy
Jul 15, 2006

Smug Statement: Elementary, my dear meatbag.
Link to Pillars of Eternity 1

Release date: Q1 2018

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ln_plWALAoI

Crowdfunding campaign for the sequel is finished (4.4 million). But PayPal backing is still open: https://eternity.obsidian.net/backer. Backer beta is currently live!

We're on a boat! Obsidian has crowdfunded a sequel to Pillars of Eternity, a PC/Mac isometric RPG in the vein of Baldur's Gate, Icewind Date, and Planescape Torment. Real-time with pause combat, 2D painted backgrounds, puzzles and dungeons and a lot of dragons. A lot of reading. The works.

The first game was kickstarted in 2012, released in 2015 to great reviews. It's now on XB1 and PS4. Get it if you haven't already.

In Deadfire, you're playing/importing the same character from the first game, off to sail the southern seas and hunting a 700-foot tall pissed off god. Your stronghold is a boat! You can hire a crew and run around adventuring on the ocean!

New to PoE2 is multi-classing, subclass kits, the death of Vancian casting, a companion influence system, and shorter load times.









Multi-class combos!



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Es15qyjoJ8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dk0wIKSWIWY

Scorchy fucked around with this message at 20:03 on Nov 15, 2017

Adbot
ADBOT LOVES YOU

Scorchy
Jul 15, 2006

Smug Statement: Elementary, my dear meatbag.
Pillars of Eternity 1

Reviews pretty unaminous - instant classic cRPG, 89% on Metacritic.

Newbie Guide - Some tips for starting out

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Irx2T6ZIYL0

Pillars of Eternity is an old-school cRPG from Obsidian Entertainment, makers of Fallout: New Vegas, Knights of the Old Republic 2, Neverwinter Nights 2, and South Park: Stick of Truth. The goal was to create an experience reminiscent of classic Infinity Engine franchises, such as Icewind Dale, Planescape: Torment, and Baldur's Gate. That means a 6 player party, with adjustable formations, and interesting companions to talk to. It's got an isometric view, Real-time-with-Pause combat, and hand-painted 2D backgrounds. Voice acting is sparse, and there are lots of dungeons, puzzles, looting and crafting. It's an original setting and there's no D&D license attached.

The story revolves around a fledgling colonial empire called Dyrwood. It's a place where souls are a scientifically observable phenomenon, underground experimentations on people is common, and gods openly interfere with mortal affairs. It explores themes like ethics, religion, technology, existentialism, and reincarnation. It's got elves and dwarves, big guns, drugs, wizards, small guns, incest, psychic detectives, shotguns, magic missiles cast into the darkness, trickster gods, and bombs that kill gods.

It's built on the Unity 4 engine and available on PC, Mac, and Linux. It's also been ported to XBox One and Playstation 4. Since the backgrounds are 2D, the system requirements are very low, we've got people running it on old laptops.

Is the expansion (The White March I/II) worth getting?

Yes! It's even better than the base game, is of a decent length, has nice area design and adds neat items and companions.

The expansion starts at around level 7-8 so you have a bit of time deciding if you like the base game before buying it.





There are 11 classes to choose from. There are the stereotypical 'standard' builds, but you can twist almost any class around into damage dealers, support, frontliners, or ranged if you want. With the way the attributes and stats work, it's really loving hard to make an unplayable character unless you're actively trying, so feel free to experiment.

Fighters - Frontline stalwarts. High accuracy, high endurance, lots of knockdowns, lots of passives and an ability to lock enemies down around them.
For: People who want to stand in a doorway tanking 5 guys without breaking a sweat.

Wizards - Extremely flexible casters with Vancian magic casting. They memorize a mix of nukes, CCs, AoEs, and weapon fighting spells.
For: People who can't go without five different types of magic missiles to cast.

Priests - Group support casters, they have massive AoE support spells and some martial abilities. They keep your group fighting for way longer than they should.
For: People who want to make their allies more or less invincible..

Rogues - Murder specialists, highest single-target DPS, but fragile. Lots of ways to apply conditions and make sneak attacks, and also able to move in and out of battlefield positions and break engagements.
For: People who want to gib the enemy backlines before disappearing in a puff of smoke.

Barbarians - Melee AoE kings. They can rage and air-drop into the largest group of enemies they find, automatically dealing AoE damage with every swing.
For: People who enjoyed the Hulk in Avengers.

Rangers - Ranged single-target murder machines, also has an animal companion to tank and run interference.
For: People who want to shoot arrows like a machine gun and perma-stun an enemy from across the room.

Monks - Melee specialists with fun CC and self-buff abilities. The more attacks they suffer, the more abilities they can use.
For: People who want to punch their enemies across the map.

Ciphers - Martial casters with a litany of mental-themed spells. They are slightly more tactically dependent than other casters and need to physically attack people to restore their mana.
For: People who want to mind control enemies and set their souls on fire.

Paladins - A defensive support and command class, they provide allies with auras and beneficial effects, and they can also holding their own on the frontlines.
For: People who want to buff their friends to the gills while swinging a flaming axe.

Druids - The masters of the AoE nuke and CC. Can also shapeshift into animal forms and smash things.
For: People who want to turn into a giant were-boar and then call lightning from the sky.

Chanters - Bard equivalents, can chain together small continual buffs, while fighting normally. Also one of the only two summoning classes, somewhat like necromancers.
For: People who want to flood a battlefield with ogre and ghosts while reciting poetry.

Newbie Recommendations: Fighter, Paladin, Druid or Cipher



There are 6 main races (further divided into selectable cultures and backgrounds):

Humans - Boring old humans. Might +1, Resolve +1
Elves - Long ears and very fancy. Dexterity +1, Perception +1
Dwarves - Short and stumpy and beardy. Might +2, Dexterity -1, Constitution +1
Godlike - Crazy-looking descendents of the gods in the world. You can have flames for hair. Dexterity +1, Intellect +1
Orlans - Tiny, furry people who mostly live in the woods. Kinda like halflings or gnomes. Might -1, Perception +2, Resolve +1
Aumaua - Towering semi-aquatic race. Might +2

Each class is also divided into subraces, each with their own unique bonuses.





There's a 6 character party limit - your player, plus 5 NPCs. There is fully written NPC companion per class to fill out your party.

Fighter - Eder, in Gilded Vale - after resting at the Inn
Mage - Aloth, Gilded Vale - in front of Inn
Paladin - Pallegina, Defiance Bay - Ondra's Gift in front of Trading Company
Chanter - Kana Rua, in Caed Nua - across the west bridge
Cipher - Grieving Mother, Dyrford Village - Southeast corner in town
Priest - Durance, Magran's Fork - at the crossroads statue
Ranger - Sagani, Woodend Plains - at the crossroads
Druid - Hiravias, Stormwall Gorge - look for where the road forks south

White March Part I:
Rogue - Devil of Caroc - Durgan's Battery, under Galvino's cabin
Monk - Zahua - Stalwart, next to the Fishery after the initial attack

White March Part II:
Barbarian - Meneha - Stalwart, near Fishery after initial attack - exit map and come back

You can hire custom NPCs instead; go to any inn and hire adventurers to customize yourself. They will not have written lines or personalities.





The ruleset is a brand new system designed in-house by Obsidian. Endurance is the tactical resource, expended during fights and recovered quickly. If a character loses all Endurance during a fight, they get knocked out for the duration of combat. Health is the long term strategic resource, it gets drained over time. If you lose all that you get maimed or even permanently die. Forever. Kaput. Heal effects or spells are rare or non-existent, health is recoverable only by Resting, so you have be careful with your health over many fights. The 6 character attributes are currently as follows:

Attributes



The game is designed so that all attributes can be useful to every class. If you want to play a high Intelligence Barbarian, or a high Dexterity Wizard, that's a legit choice and there are (good) ways to play that style.

Each point in attribute gives a linear bonus, there are no trap thresholds you really need to pay attention to. Just make the character you want. Also bear in mind that all stats have some use in conversation checks as well.

Might - +3% Damage/Healing, +2 Fortitude
Constitution - +5% Endurance and Health, +2 Fortitude
Dexterity - +3% action speed, +2 Reflex
Perception - +3 Interrupt, +1 Accuracy, +2 Reflex
Intellect - +5% Ability Duration, +6% Area of Effect, +1 Will
Resolve - +3 Concentration, +1 Deflection, +2 Will

It's all very old-school RPG as hell. There's an in-game glossary explaining what this all is, and the game gives you recommendations for each class. Don't be intimidated, it's very hard to screw up, and you can always respec.

Abilities and Talents

You get new class abilities on odd levels, and a myriad of selectable talents on every even level-up, equivalent to D&D feats. It's where you can specialize your character into a particular role. There are like, 100+ talents, you have a wide array of options to customize your character.

Some talents are class specific. Some you can use to specialize into a defensive role, or to up your weapon accuracy for more offense. Some allow you to gain extra healing abilities. Some let affect your speed and mobility in the battlefield. Pick the ones that cater to your playstyle.

Skills

There are non-combat skills; they level up separately from combat abilities. These skills govern dialogue interaction, world travel, and learning new things. Most encounters have alternate skill-checked solutions that let you avoid combat, without losing on experience gains.

Stealth - Sneaking past enemies
Athletics - Grants a small heal in combat
Lore - Learn about enemy stats faster, cast spells from scrolls
Mechanics - Disarms traps and open locks, spots hidden objects
Survival - Grants special resting bonuses

Classes can will get different bonuses to these, but none are locked out. You can totally make a stealthy, lockpicking Mage if you want.



This is not a turn-based game, rather it's 'Real-Time with Pause'. It's like an overhead strategy game like Starcraft, but at any time you can hit Spacebar and pause the game to issue commands. You will pause a lot. There are also like 18 different auto-pause options in the menu depending on different conditions.

If you want more real-time, there's also a slow mode - the game moves at 2/3rd speed so you have more reaction time. Conversely there's a fast mode - game moves at double speed, so you can use it to zoom around previously-traversed areas. You no longer need Boots of Speed for all your characters.

Engagement

The biggest change from Infinity Engine games is a new 'engagement' mechanic. When two combatants are next to each other, they'll 'engage' - if one combatant tries to back off or leave, their opponent gets a free attack at high accuracy. If the attack connects it'll bring the victim to a halt. It encourages positional stickiness and prevents units from running around the battlefield unhindered. For example your fighter can 'snag' enemies, to stop them from rushing your glass cannon mage in the back. You use engagement against enemies, and enemies use it against you. There's no aggro mechanic, so this is the main way to tank.

If you ignore this mechanic you will die very very quickly.

Weapon Style

Each type of weapon wielding you use has its own advantages and disadvantages:

One-handed Weapon - Increased Accuracy
Dual-wielding - Increased Attack Speed
One-handed Weapon and Shield - Increased Deflection, lowered Accuracy
Two-handed Weapon - Increased damage
Ranged - No engagement

Damage

Physical damage is dependent on what weapon is used:

Pierce - Ranged, spears, stilettos, etc.
Crush - Maces, staves, flails, etc.
Slash - Swords, axes, daggers, etc.
Raw - A special, rare damage type that bypasses armor and DR

Elemental Spell damage is divided into four types:

Shock - Lightning spells
Burn - Fire spells
Freeze - Ice and wind spells
Corrode - Acid and nature spells

The armour you find and the creatures you fight will have varying strengths and weaknesses to all of them - check the in-game cyclopedia for details.

Attacking

Accuracy is king. All attacks and spells are subject to an Accuracy check.

Whether you hit the opponent is a calculation of the attacker's Accuracy versus the opponent's Defense. The difference is added to a random roll of 1-100 to see if the hit lands. See below chart for an example:



Miss - 0% damage
Graze - 50% damage/duration
Hit - 100% damage/duration
Crit - 150% damage/duration

How hard you hit (Damage) depends on the weapon/spell, the Might bonus, and any additional effects you have minus the opponent's Damage Reduction (DR).

Defense

Attacker accuracy is pitted against 4 different types of defense:

Deflection - Used against most physical attacks (most common)
Fortitude - Used as defense against stun/knockdown, poison, disease attacks
Reflex - Used against area of effect attacks like fireballs or traps
Will - Used as defense against mental, psychic attacks

So if an attacker casts Fireball (a spell that attacks Reflex), this is treated much like any other attack with a sword or bow - the attacker's accuracy is rolled against the defender's Reflex score (instead of Deflection), and this will determine whether the spell is a miss/graze/hit/crit.

There is also a separate stat called Damage Reduction (DR) which subtracts a flat amount from incoming damage. DR is usually granted by the armour or clothing worn. A minimum of 20% damage will get through regardless, even if your DR blocks the entire attack.

Remember to mouse-over enemies to view their defenses and weaknesses on the tooltip. It's worth carrying around two different weapon sets with different damage types, so you can adjust on the fly if an enemy is strong against a certain defense type.

Scouting and Stealing

Hitting "Alt" will put you into Scouting Mode. This mode combines Stealth and Mechanics (checking for hidden objects), but you will move slower. When you're not in Scout mode, your mechanics detection will function at 50% capability.

When stealthed, enemies can see if you get too close. A yellow circle underneath your character means enemies are getting suspicious, a red circle means enemies will move towards you to investigate. When the red circle fills up, you are detected, and will probably start combat.

Traps show up in red (they hurt). You need points in the Mechanics skill to disarm them, or you can try to walk around them. Hidden objects show up in purple; they usually contain some bonus loot.

Stealing stuff from people's houses won't put neutral NPCs into combat, but it will incur a reputation penalty. Make sure you aren't detected if you try.

Resting

Resting replenishes all health and fatigue, and removes negative effects. It also restores spells for casters and resets per-rest abilities on other classes. You want to carefully manage how often you rest versus how often you get hurt.

You rest by either going to an inn, your stronghold, or by using up camping supplies. Resting at nicer places can get you significant combat bonuses.





There's three separate game modes that can be turned on for increased difficulty:

Expert Mode - Turns off ease-of-use features like showing reputation gains, skill checks, and gameplay elements.
Trial of Iron - Ironman/Hardcore mode. You get one save. Once you die, the save gets deleted.
Path of the Damned - Spawns all enemies from across all difficulties, and combat difficulty is amplified.

Scorchy fucked around with this message at 10:27 on Aug 29, 2017

Scorchy
Jul 15, 2006

Smug Statement: Elementary, my dear meatbag.


Newbie's Guide

Character Creation

- First thing to know is stop worrying, it's very hard to screw up making a character in this game. A slightly suboptimal stat here and there isn't going to matter.
- You can respec later as well! You can change everything except your class and race. Go to any inn to do it.
- Don't do Path of the Damned, Expert Mode, or especially Ironman Mode on your first run. Save it for the 2nd run.
- For beginners, Fighters and Paladins are easy to manage melee characters. Ciphers are the easiest spellcasters to play if you're not comfortable with Vancian magic (which means spells are limited and replenish only on rest). Fighters are more passive tanks, Paladins are mixed support, and Ciphers very powerful DPS.
- Attributes do not gate any skills or items in the game, you don't have to worry about putting 14 into Intelligence so you can wear that cool hat later, etc.
- Dialogue checks are spread across all attributes and skills, but the most frequent are for Resolve and Perception. A class that can focus on those two attributes is the Paladin.
- If you're not sure what Skills to take, Athletics, Lore and Survival are very useful for every class. I advise at least 4 Survival for every non-support class.
- For traps, you want at least one party member that's maxing Mechanics at every opportunity.

Starting Out

- 'A' slows down the game and 'D' speeds it up. The game is set to slow down in combat by default. 'Alt' is stealth.
- F5 is quicksave. Remember standard RPG rules and save in rotating different slots occasionally.
- The first bear you see is probably going to kill you. Don't wander off the paths in the wilderness at first.
- The hardest parts of the game is around level 3-8. If you're having difficulty it's perfectly normal.
- Start picking up party members right away. Eder and Aloth in the first town, Durance is 1 zone south of it. Two more zones east is Kana. You can also hire NPCs at the inn. Within about 15 minutes of hitting the first town you could have a 6 man party.
- For the Temple dungeon in the first town, the lower level is disproportionately difficult. Hint: Ghosts are vulnerable to fire.
- Ditto for the Defiance Bay lighthouse.
- Never be afraid to leave and come back if it's too hard. Each level matters a lot.

Suggested Levels
- Temple of Eothas - Level 4
- Caed Nua - Level 5
- Raedric's Keep - Level 5
- Defiance Bay - Level 6
- Dyrford Village - Level 7
- The White March (DLC) - Level 8
- The Master Below - Level 12
- Cragholdt Bluffs - Level 14
- Alpine Dragon - Level 14
- Mowrghek Îen - Level 16

- For The Endless Paths, the idea is you start at around level 4, keep going until it gets too hard, then leave and come back later.

Auto-Pause

At first I suggest you set up your auto-pause options like this:



--------------- --------------- --------------- ---------------

PC Gamer has a very good beginner's article on the combat system: http://www.pcgamer.com//pillars-of-eternity-a-beginners-guide-to-combat/

The Master Below fight, aka the Endless Paths - My guide on beating it easily: http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3706905&pagenumber=502&perpage=40#post445141295



Unfortunately Pillars is built on Unity 4 which isn't very mod-friendly. There are scattered mods like IEMod which add some fringe functionality but your options are fairly limited.

Portrait Packs

Custom portraits are 72ppi JPG/PNGs placed in: [Installation Folder]\PillarsOfEternity_Data\data\art\gui\portraits\player\(male or female)\

Large portraits: 210x330px (append '_lg' to filename)
Small portraits: 76x96px (append '_sm' to filename)

Here's a good site to resize the images to an appropriate size: http://www.notra.fr/portrait.php

Several original paintings for PoE - http://www.jasonseow.com/poeportraits
Colour-shifted portraits from the real game - http://www.nexusmods.com/pillarsofeternity/mods/94/
304 varying fantasy style portraits - https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0B7QQ6Sdap3aGZDlnSmpvcHZjdmM&usp=sharing
423 more portraits - https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0B1LxW6pKr9omfmlzYjR5ZDFFYzZCcmxRQ2l2aUJHanpwTl9Pb1Z6U1Nlak1UWFZ3b0ZjTm8&usp=sharing
59 variety, mostly female portraits - http://imgur.com/a/1bQAJ
32 male portraits - https://www.dropbox.com/s/v9kvxr557bqjr1n/male%20batch%20v2.rar?dl=0
157 female portraits - https://www.dropbox.com/s/kkcxt9r7bvliacp/Female%20Batch%20v2.rar?dl=0

Scorchy fucked around with this message at 09:16 on Mar 16, 2017

Prokhor Zakharov
Dec 31, 2008

This is me as I make another great post


Good luck with your depression!
Fig sucks bad and this is probably the only thing I'll ever back on it

precision
May 7, 2006

by VideoGames
Just started a replay of PoE (and I never finished White March :shobon: ) in honor of the news.

Fair Bear Maiden
Jun 17, 2013
Just for poo poo and giggles, Chris Avellone is now openly claiming on Twitter his cut stuff was more Torment-esque than the rest of PoE and "apologizing" for the state of the game.

Honestly, this kind of behavior made me lose a lot of respect for the guy.

The Ol Spicy Keychain
Jan 17, 2013

I MEPHISTO MY OWN ASSHOLE
Any news about combat changes in the sequel? PoE1 was a bit much for me. Way too much micromanaging. I liked it better in the old IE games where you didn't have to micromanage so much.

Torment is looking amazing btw. Probably the only RPG I'll play this year.

precision
May 7, 2006

by VideoGames

Fair Bear Maiden posted:

Just for poo poo and giggles, Chris Avellone is now openly claiming on Twitter his cut stuff was more Torment-esque than the rest of PoE and "apologizing" for the state of the game.

Honestly, this kind of behavior made me lose a lot of respect for the guy.

Oh good grief.

netcat
Apr 29, 2008
Wasn't Torment complete awful garbage? Or did it get better somehow?

Megazver
Jan 13, 2006

Fair Bear Maiden posted:

Just for poo poo and giggles, Chris Avellone is now openly claiming on Twitter his cut stuff was more Torment-esque than the rest of PoE and "apologizing" for the state of the game.

Honestly, this kind of behavior made me lose a lot of respect for the guy.

I am not a blind Avellone fanboy - I love PS:T as much as everyone and like a lot of his other stuff, but I also didn't enjoy his writing in Lonesome Road and Pillars and he might have bought into his own hype a bit - but this is a very uncharitable reading. Someone specifically @mentioned him while saying they wanted Pillars to be more Torment-y. Avellone says "yeah there was some content like that, it was cut, sorry".

Which, incidentally, is true:

quote:

At a specific level, in Eternity, the original premise of the companions I wrote (Durance and the Grieving Mother) was unpeeling the layers and discovering what they were at the core – unpeeling these layers involved slipping stealthily into their unconscious, a dungeon made out of their memories. There, the player could go through an adventure game-like series of interactions, exploring their memories using psychological items important to both your character and to them as emotional keys to thread your way through the memories – but carefully, without revealing your presence. The memory dungeon was to uncover their shared history, how it impacted you, and the core of who they were as people.

And their core was pretty unpleasant. Both of them were very bad, very weak people, committing not only violations on each other, but on the player as well. When faced with the discovery that your allies, even if they fiercely support you and fight for a larger cause, have some pretty horrid faults, what do you do? Do you pass sentence? Do you forgive? Do you assist them to reach an understanding? And what I found more interesting with the spiritual physics in the Eternity world is that a death sentence isn't a sentence – killing someone actually sets a soul free to move on to the next generation. So if you intend to punish someone in a world like that, either out of revenge or to correct their behavior, how do you do it when execution is not an answer?

The elements above got stripped out of the companions in the end, so I'm happy to share it here (and I may re-examine it in the future). Overall, I thought they raised interesting questions for the player to chew on, and it was interesting to explore those themes, as most game narratives and franchises wouldn't allow for such examinations – still, Eternity was intended to be a more personal project for Obsidian where we can stretch our narrative legs more, both in structure and themes.

He's not wrong, this is more Torment-like than the rest of the game. I am also okay with it being cut.

netcat posted:

Wasn't Torment complete awful garbage? Or did it get better somehow?

o u

Tijuana Bibliophile
Dec 30, 2008

Scratchmo

Fair Bear Maiden posted:

Just for poo poo and giggles, Chris Avellone is now openly claiming on Twitter his cut stuff was more Torment-esque than the rest of PoE and "apologizing" for the state of the game.

Honestly, this kind of behavior made me lose a lot of respect for the guy.

That's just... uh. Wow. What's caused this, the Armored warfare layoffs? They didn't ask him to join the PoE2 campaign?

I mean it sucks that your stuff got cut Chris, it really did, but that was a while ago

jBrereton
May 30, 2013
Grimey Drawer
Durance was a tedious edgelord and if all his content was supposed to be PST/NWN 'fighting in a dungeon but the dungeon is your own remorse' bollocks, I'm glad it got cut lol

Tijuana Bibliophile
Dec 30, 2008

Scratchmo

Megazver posted:

I am not a blind Avellone fanboy - I love PS:T as much as everyone and like a lot of his other stuff, but I also didn't enjoy his writing in Lonesome Road and Pillars and he might have bought into his own hype a bit - but this is a very uncharitable reading. Someone specifically @mentioned him while saying they wanted Pillars to be more Torment-y. Avellone says "yeah there was some content like that, it was cut, sorry".

I read it as "I'm so sorry about the end result" which doesn't leave a whole lot of room for interpretation. Also Lonesome Road was pretty good I seem to recall

Fair Bear Maiden
Jun 17, 2013
I mean, I might be uncharitable, but if you jump into a random conversation to apologize to someone who wanted a more Torment-y game while pointing out *wink wink, nudge nudge* your own cut stuff was Torment-y, you're gonna end up sounding like a super passive-aggressive dude to me.

EDIT: This has nothing to do with Numenera, btw, which I'm super-excited for, or any future Avellone or Obsidian project. I can be excited for those while still finding public behavior like that to be kind of petty and unprofessional.

Fair Bear Maiden fucked around with this message at 10:12 on Jan 26, 2017

Furism
Feb 21, 2006

Live long and headbang
I liked his idea of a mind-dungeon but as I understand it required special code just for those sections and they couldn't do it because of budget constraints. I understand if he's bitter that his great idea had to be cut but if he doesn't understand that was for The Greater Good, and that the game turned out great anyway, then he's just being childish.

Psycho Landlord
Oct 10, 2012

What are you gonna do, dance with me?

So Deadfire's official, huh? Then I am excited for Pirates of Eternity 2: Half of our Enemy Types are Some Form of Squid Monster.

Megazver
Jan 13, 2006
I am sure they'll have some crab monsters as well, come on.

Psycho Landlord
Oct 10, 2012

What are you gonna do, dance with me?

Did you read the Deadfire book in the first game? There's a sea serpent, like three kinds of squid or half-squid, and something that might just be a giant mouth but also might be a giant mouth attached to a squid.

precision
May 7, 2006

by VideoGames
I think you mean 90% of the enemies will be shark men.

e: oh and we'll get to fight those things that are described as walking on tentacles and have no bones and can flow under doors so they're basically Terminators

Psycho Landlord
Oct 10, 2012

What are you gonna do, dance with me?

Terminator squids.

Furism
Feb 21, 2006

Live long and headbang
So if Obsidian does a package for groups or forums or something like that, do we want to pool Goons money to make a Lowtax Bounty NPC or something?

Entropy238
Oct 21, 2010

Fallen Rib
All aboard the hype train.

So glad they went for Deadfire – which seems to be somewhere exotic – rather than the Vaillian republics which seems to be more Venice like.

From the in-game book "Monsters of the Deadfire Archipelago:

quote:

The Archipelago winds its way between The Great Eastern Ocean and The Restless Ocean - hundreds of small islands in the midst of the water. Few dare brave its treacherous rapids, and fewer still have returned to tell tale of their adventures through it.

Travel between the two oceans is virtually impossible. Great storms hammer any ships foolhardy enough to attempt to navigate, and this alone should be enough to deter anyone from attempting the voyage as untold ships have gone down, tossed against the rocks. The weather and treacherous rocks are only a precursor to the actual horror of the archipelago, the terrors of the deep. No one knows how many creatures stalk the oceans, waiting for unsuspecting sailors to drift into their waters. But we do know of some.

Barbed Ravager

A giant shark that is known to ram passing vessels, trying to knock sailors off the deck and smash a hole in the hull. It has tremendous spines protruding from its side and back that are presumed to be poisonous. The largest sighted Barbed Ravager (with survivors) was estimated to be almost 30 feet long.

Winding Serpent

Smaller around than the Ravager, but potentially longer, the Winding Serpent attacks in small packs, usually 3-8. They have long, sharp heads, somewhat reminiscent of a barracuda. Like the Ravager, they repeatedly slam into the side of a ship hoping to crack a hole in it or knock someone from the deck. They have also been known to swim to the depths and shoot up out of the ocean, landing on the deck, coiling and winding their way around, snapping up any crew they can before plunging back into the ocean.

Leviathan

Imagine the largest whale you have ever seen. The leviathan is at least ten times that size. By the time a ship sees a leviathan, it is already too late. As they rise from the depths, the water around them begins to spin and sink, creating a whirlpool. The leviathan's body surrounds the hapless vessel, preventing escape, and as it goes down, the enormous mouth opens, pulling all aboard to their watery deaths.

Polpovir

All the creatures you've read about in this book are nothing compared to the Polpovir. Barely the size of a man, what they lack in size and strength, they make up for in numbers and terrifying viciousness. Their lower halves are a mass of tentacles like an octopus or squid, but more numerous. The tentacles are long, black whips with suction cups on the underside and small thorny barbs on the top. The sheer number of tentacles gives them frightening speed when walking on land, pulling themselves forward almost as fast as a running horse. While they vaguely resemble a human from the waist up, any extended examination proves how wrong that assumption is. Long, stringy black hair falls from the top of their heads to cover a face taken directly from a nightmare. A wide, gaping mouth, cuts across the bottom of its head from ear to ear, full of wicked dagger-like teeth. Two large round eyes are sunken into its head, black as coal, shining with a malevolent fire. A small antenna protrudes from the middle of its forehead, ending in a small nodule that can glow with an eerie blue light. One can imagine a sailor on the deck of his ship at night, looking out across the black water, blood freezing as countless lights appear beneath the surface, rising toward him as the Polpovir swarm upward. Because they seem to be more octopus than man, they can collapse in on themselves, fitting into spaces no person should be able to. The smallest crack in a hull, the slightest separation between boards offers them entrance. It is not unknown for them to slaughter an entire crew from hold up to deck by infiltrating the ship from underneath. Fortunately they do not seem to have spread too far outside of the archipelago, but there may come a day when Polpovir attacks become commonplace.

Entropy238
Oct 21, 2010

Fallen Rib

Furism posted:

So if Obsidian does a package for groups or forums or something like that, do we want to pool Goons money to make a Lowtax Bounty NPC or something?

100% definitely

Lprsti99
Apr 7, 2011

Everything's coming up explodey!

Pillbug

Furism posted:

So if Obsidian does a package for groups or forums or something like that, do we want to pool Goons money to make a Lowtax Bounty NPC or something?

I'm down for that.

Under the vegetable
Nov 2, 2004

by Smythe
can i just mail rope kid an envelope of cash so none of it gets to hack scam artist tim schafer

CottonWolf
Jul 20, 2012

Good ideas generator

Furism posted:

So if Obsidian does a package for groups or forums or something like that, do we want to pool Goons money to make a Lowtax Bounty NPC or something?

I'm in. Obviously I'll back it individually too, but I'd throw $10 to a SA fundraiser.

Also, gently caress Eothas for destroying my pretty tower. I hope we had insurance.

Cinnamon Bear
Aug 29, 2016

by FactsAreUseless
I never made it past the tutorial for Pillars of Eternity and the voice acting was so bad my ears began to bleed as fantasy Welsh scrabble names were struggled to be pronounced by the voice actors. Glaaaaaaanfaaaaerythwyth

I was also a huge Obsidian fanboy. Is there any chance of this being less aggressively generic with a tedious combat system?

CottonWolf
Jul 20, 2012

Good ideas generator

It looks like you're pirates chasing around a god in a 500ft statue by boat. Not the most generic of premises.

Entropy238
Oct 21, 2010

Fallen Rib

Cinnamon Bear posted:

I never made it past the tutorial for Pillars of Eternity and the voice acting was so bad my ears began to bleed as fantasy Welsh scrabble names were struggled to be pronounced by the voice actors. Glaaaaaaanfaaaaerythwyth

I was also a huge Obsidian fanboy. Is there any chance of this being less aggressively generic with a tedious combat system?

You're probably not likely to find anyone here that really agrees with your opinion, but for what it's worth the game improved significantly as development went on with the additional content from the DLCs as well as a lot of tuning of how the game's mechanics function. Trash encounters were reduced pretty significantly too.

But, if you were put off to the extent that you found the tutorial level tedious in the first game, chances are it's not for you.

Lt. Danger
Dec 22, 2006

jolly good chaps we sure showed the hun

Cinnamon Bear posted:

I never made it past the tutorial for Pillars of Eternity and the voice acting was so bad my ears began to bleed as fantasy Welsh scrabble names were struggled to be pronounced by the voice actors. Glaaaaaaanfaaaaerythwyth

I was also a huge Obsidian fanboy. Is there any chance of this being less aggressively generic with a tedious combat system?

I'm hoping we'll get a more exciting story and setting but I don't think the base mechanics are going to change, unfortunately.

Ratios and Tendency
Apr 23, 2010

:swoon: MURALI :swoon:


Caed Nua being totally destroyed as part of the premise for the sequel is kinda funny.

Fair Bear Maiden
Jun 17, 2013
It's fine to dislike a game, but I'm not sure why you'd expect a sequel to change so much that it wouldn't resemble the original anymore. It's a bizarre expectation, especially considering the game sold decently by all metrics.

frajaq
Jan 30, 2009

#acolyte GM of 2014


Yay Aloth and Eder are back and will never ever leave the party just like before

Under the vegetable
Nov 2, 2004

by Smythe
I was under the impression combat was going to be undergoing significant overhauling tbh. I don't remember where I got that idea.

Jimbot
Jul 22, 2008

I'm glad the Planescape-type stuff got cut, to be honest. It's not what I backed the project for to begin with. It seems like he had a different idea of what the game was going to be than the rest of the team. I liked Planescape well enough but Icewind Dale and Baldur's Gate were always my jam and rather have more games like those.

frajaq
Jan 30, 2009

#acolyte GM of 2014


Let's kill a god and put his soul on a baby

bongwizzard
May 19, 2005

Then one day I meet a man,
He came to me and said,
"Hard work good and hard work fine,
but first take care of head"
Grimey Drawer
Direct sequel is lame as gently caress but so long as nothing from Tyranny bleeds into it, day one but for sure.

CottonWolf
Jul 20, 2012

Good ideas generator

bongwizzard posted:

Direct sequel is lame as gently caress but so long as nothing from Tyranny bleeds into it, day one but for sure.

You are wrong. Direct sequels are actually both cool and good.

I hope we get prestige classes. Make it so you're your original class to 20, then pick from 5 or 6 prestige classes that have extensive branching.

Grim
Sep 11, 2003

Grimey Drawer

Ratios and Tendency posted:

Caed Nua being totally destroyed as part of the premise for the sequel is kinda funny.

it's got some comedy to it, I guess also thats why they never developed the Scrooge McDuck style money vault for the keep - better to have that in the back pocket for when you go around pirating the Deadfire

Adbot
ADBOT LOVES YOU

Gyshall
Feb 24, 2009

Had a couple of drinks.
Saw a couple of things.
ayo rope kid, something new with the lighting engine? Screenshots look amazing.

  • Locked thread