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Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug
Man, I really like the RTS/Dragon gameplay. Can't loving wait to try the strategic map.

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Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug
Ugggh, it's not unlocking til 3am EDT? Goddamit, I was hoping to play a bit before I went to bed.


EDIT: It's unlocked on Steam, and I really need to find a way to fix my insomnia because jesus christ, this is not okay.

Ugly In The Morning fucked around with this message at 08:06 on Aug 6, 2013

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug
God drat, this is the most fun I've had with a strategy game in a while. I'm enjoying it a lot more than the Total War series, since it's more streamlined. Sometimes I just want to play Risk and not have to juggle my economy while I do it.

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

Stabbey_the_Clown posted:

Hey guys, before making a decision with your Generals or Princess, can you quickly check the popularity with each of the races, and see if it changes after you make the decision? I know that it does for the Edmund-Imp Ceremony decision in Chapter 1.




Click the Empire Summary in the top right of the screen, it gives you a breakdown and shows your gold per turn, luck, motivation, etc.

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

Stabbey_the_Clown posted:

I'm not sure you can select buildings in Dragon form. That's why when I build them, I always Shift-Click + 1 to add them to control group 1, so I can access the buildings whenever I want.


I guess so. If your win chance is up above 80%, you'll probably win most autoresolves.

You can stack it pretty well in your favor if you build enough card buildings. Some mercs can turn things around pretty drat well.

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

Ainsley McTree posted:



I'm finding that I'm getting some serious framerate lag on the strategic map (where you play cards, move armies, buy buildings, etc) of all places. It's fine on the battle map, but for some reason it's slow as molasses on the strategic map. It's also a bit crap on the Raven (especially in the engine room, probably because of all the steam effects). You'd think that the battle map, where all the graphics and processes are happening would be the worst, but nope! It's the fastest!

Same here. I also have skipping/hanging on cutscenes.

Has anyone tried any of the deals with Curvo yet? I'm curious to see what they do.

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

Excelsiortothemax posted:



The things I don't like? Not being able to take Scarlett as a concubine

I'm like 90 percent sure that her secret is that she's a lesbian, so that really doesn't bother me

Tried using one of the Curvo options. If you give him your wife, you get 3 cards, and it says "Curvo's power has increased by 10 percent" which sounds, uh, menacing. 'Cause, you know. Big demon guy. Not a chill fellow. . That was all savescum stuff, though, so I don't know any later effects.

Oh! You can reread that turns newspaper at any time, btw, by clicking on the copy in the Royal Chambers on the table in the lower left. Did not know that.

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug
I feel like troopers capture buildings waaaaay too quickly. Even if it's only like two of them, they'll take a recruitment center in like two seconds, which can be so fast you can't react even with units present.

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

Rascyc posted:

Yeah you pretty much have to counter cap. On the other hand, troopers die pretty much instantly after the first chapter. AoE splash damage and such from grenadiers and warlocks, etc.

Yeah, it's just annoying when one sneaks through and captures an important building in no time. And the AI loves to send over a transport with two or three of the little fuckers when you're busy doing something else.

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug
My loading times are too long to really give it a shot right now, but has anyone tried feeding ALL of the princesses to Curvos? Can you do that? I get the impression that making him more powerful is a Bad Thing, and I want to know what happens when you go whole-hog with it.

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

Rascyc posted:


The decloak and the cleanse powers for dragons is an absolute must. The AI abuses cloak/polymorph so goddamn much it is maddening. It's like 60 seconds too!

And you can attack without decloaking! The time limits on cloak and that loving beetle spell are way too goddamn long, in my opinion.

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug
Man, having Devastation as a passive ability and popping the Breach Fire breath ability makes Transports your bitch. It's so satisfying when you sink a small convoy that was trying to flank your base with some armor and devastators.

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

Rascyc posted:

Personally I still can't get used to the hotkeys in dragon form. I just frequently shift in/out, which is probably perfectly fine since it makes dodging the zillion AA missiles easy.

My one problem with shifting in and out is how touchy the game is about the "you must be near friendly units to spawn your dragon". Hey man, I have a guy selected, why not just spawn me over them?

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

LibbyM posted:

Can the enemy ai run out of population during a battle too?

Yes, once the recruit pool is gone, they're stuck with what they have. If their reserves hit 0 after that, they usually surrender pretty quickly.

Woah, time to fight Corvus! Does using him during chapter 2 effect chapter 3 at all?

Ugly In The Morning fucked around with this message at 20:53 on Aug 7, 2013

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

A Steampunk Gent posted:

If you stop to think about it, that you can force surrender by dragging on the battle to the point where you've depleted the population of the surrounding countryside is pretty horrific.

Not if it's because you took all of the recruitment points and they're all sitting in your reserves. :getin:

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug
Holy poo poo, the RTS battles get hard at chapter 3. I can't see a way to feasibly win them, my starting units get wiped out before I have time to get my dragon out, or even a battle forge.

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

Captain Oblivious posted:

I'm doing pretty well on the commanding front, but every time I morph into Dragon form I get absolutely clowned. Can you select buildings while in dragon form? It's very unwieldly overall.

Z/x/c/v are the hotkeys for factories, then it'll give you the hotkeys for units in the lower right part of the screen.

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

Captain Oblivious posted:

Biggest problem I'm having right now is it seems like the Dragon just needs to get entirely too close for his fireballs to connect. So close that exploding is inevitable.

Do the different dragons have different projectile ranges?

As near as I can tell, no, but when you're going in on an attack run you want to go in and use the RMB dodge a LOT, then bug out with your jetpack and quickly despawn to avoid all the missiles. I think some of the abilities like Pillar of Fire have more range than the fireball does, though.

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

Zereth posted:

Yeah, I got a battle earlier where I had it yelling at me that my army was less than 11% of the total army, so I'd lose soon!

Of course this was in a territory which had been a constant battleground for a few turns so the population was very low, so I went dragon and murdered enemy troops until I was okay again.

I don't think you can lose if you have any of the tier 3 AoE skills and a good entrenchment bonus so you can get the dragon out early. And if you have both Eye of the Patriarch and Pillar of Fire, hoooooboy, they don't stand a chance.

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

LibbyM posted:

In chapter 2 I've been buying as many troops as possible every turn, and am still rediculously outnumbered in troops on the turn based map. Which leads to me having to manually defend many battles with the Dragon. The enemies start out with way higher potential than you for troop producing, and you have to really grind through the map.
I wouldn't call it hard, just slow and tedious.
I think I will try turning down the difficulty and having a chill dragon time next time I play.

Taverns. Merc cards are a major game changer, especially in autoresolve fights. Way stronger than the other boosts, and they let you double your forces or put some good hard counters in when you need it. Don't underestimate entrenchment for defense, either, it can nearly double the amount of units on hand in a defensive battle. I had a high motivation level, so my entrenchment went up so fast it was hard to take territory from me once I took it.

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug
I think too many people beeline the Red capitol in chapter 2 because it's close- you REALLY need a foothold on the main continent to both give yourself the money/research points, and to stop Green from getting them. If you don't rush the continent, one of the two AI commanders will get too much of an advantage to beat. Red, near as I can tell, barely expands. Worry about the other guys first, then use the rest of the map to build an unbeatable deathstack to take out Red with after.

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

goldjas posted:

I actually tried to take as much as i could in the early game(since that's generally the go to way to win in any risk type game), and I've had more land then the opponent has had for most of the game, but I'm still always super outnumbered. I'm also actually slowly winning without any real loss in sight, but that's just because I'm guaranteed one win a day even at 0 % chance victory by abusing dragon more then anything else.

Are you building a lot of buildings? Remember to plop your War Factories on turf with a lot of income, since the income of its territory determines how many units it can make per turn.

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

goldjas posted:

Well, I just finally beat the first chapter, after I got to a certain point and owned enough stuff I just straight up had so many troops I could risk fight every battle and win.

Also is it mostly true that the only card producing building worth it is the mercenary one, or am i missing something?

Wizard Towers are hot garbage. They only give you dragon cards, which can be powers you already have and are worthless once you've gotten any decent amount of research done. Academies are ok because of the one research point, I guess. Parliments can be worth it on occasion, but their cards are situational. If you're autoresolving often, and you should be expanding enough that you are, mercenary cards are your best friend. Each one tends to be a 10-20 percent bonus to your chance to win, and they act as a bit of a meat shield to lower the chances of losing units that you built permanently.

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

Stabbey_the_Clown posted:



B) Add an additional Function to the Wizard Tower
Keep the existing functionality of the Wizard Tower as is, but add a "Transmute Cards" function to it, that lets you transmute 3-5 cards for a single other random card, which could be anything, even stuff from the Emporium. That would solve the useless card situation, and the useless building situation, and add an element of gambling to the Wizard Tower, which can be addicting. Maybe a fee of 3 gold per transmutation?

B would actually be pretty awesome. Great way to dump those "transport mercenaries" cards, too. Those are the worst.

EDIT:

Stabbey_the_Clown posted:

Academies give you a bonus research point, and the unit buff/debuff cards can be really important in an RTS match, as anyone who's ever had a -75% Shaman Movement speed card land on them can attest.


It's weird how little they effect autoresolve, though. Even when an opposing army is like, 75 percent of whatever unit type I'm debuffing with the card, it'll only boost my chances by 1-2 percent.

Ugly In The Morning fucked around with this message at 05:22 on Aug 10, 2013

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

FuSchnick posted:

Is there any "autocast" setting? gently caress micromanaging buffs like Shaman immunity.

This would be good to know. Right now it gives the AI a big advantage since it can actually take full advantage of spells like that. And the beetle one, too. (Man, gently caress that beetle transformation spell).

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

Zereth posted:

Frankly I don't understand why there are any single-target dragon skills at all other than fire breath and the firebreath upgrades.

And firebreath at least has a pretty significant splash radius. Stuff like Aegis or Friends With Benefits has too small of an effect for the size of the battles in this.

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug
Generals also get a LOT more useful when you've gotten a bit into their quest and gotten them some new traits. If you get a good combination of traits they can add 10-15 percent to your odds if you have them managing the right units.

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

Captain Oblivious posted:

Speaking of Corvus does anyone know what his various faustian bargains DO yet? I'm curious as to their benefits and/or if they have ramifications in Act 3.

I've been asking this for a while with no luck. I think it's a little too obvious that you don't want to give him a drat thing that he wants because seriously, everything anyone tells you when he comes up is "THIS GUY WILL BETRAY YOU", so nobody is using him in their first runthrough.

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

DrManiac posted:

I have to agree act III was pretty boring. It (and act 2) would have been much better if you got to actually see and talk to your insane brothers and sisters/the demon during the campaign.

There is some new dialogue for Corvus in Chapter 3, at least, but not being able to talk to your siblings any was kind of a pain.

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug
^^^^Had the recruit pool been depleted? When the AI runs out of recruits it likes to surrender.


Rivensteel posted:

Question: I got my DC key for Steam through the Larian Vault after pledging to the D:OS kickstarter. It doesn't look like I have the imperial edition, despite having the GOG add-on. How do I tell for certain? Anyone else having this issue?

Do you have the Earth Map? If you have that, you have the Imperial Edition. The gold dragon skin seems to be missing in action, though.

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

Djeser posted:



As a bonus, I just beat Act 2. I took both citadels solely through the TBS battles because gently caress those citadel maps.

This is what the final battle movements looked like.



In Chapter 2 I thought the citadel battles were pretty easy (when you take it, not so much with defending it) if you just crank out a fair few juggernaughts and shell the citadel from a distance. Couple juggs, couple ironclads, the palace falls pretty easily.

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

ZeusJupitar posted:

If it's not too late in the game, I'd recommend restarting and focusing on upgrading your dragon first and foremost, buying new units but ignoring their abilities. I found the RTS combat too fast paced and too zoomed out to really make us of unit abilities, but quite easy when my strategy was 1. Build a mixed army (with emphasis on counters for whatever the AI is massing) 2. Group select everyone and 3. Shift to dragon and charge in. I found that the AI generally doesn't launch more than one offensive at once, so simply keeping everyone together in a blob with the dragon works well.



Also, in Dragon form you should be shooting at the back of the blob, not the front. Your units will be chewing the front up well enough, and you'll save more of them and do more damage by taking out the stuff that'll be replacing whatever they're killing.

(Also, as soon as you can afford getting Eye of the Patriarch for your dragon, get it. That skill owns)

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

Chomp8645 posted:

I suspect this is some kind of bug with Steam. I didn't have the beta for this game, but I did have the beta for Stardrive. For me "StarDrive Beta" disappeared when the game launched, but just this week has mysteriously reappeared and is hanging out in my Steam list.

I still have both, but StarDrive's ended up in its own category at the bottom of my list for some reason.

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

Yodzilla posted:

So as someone who is currently playing through Divinity II, how much does this game reference that and previous games? Or is it more just a general world and lore thing?

General world and lore, basically. One character who comes up a lot in people's pasts in Divinity II is a major character in this game, but you could easily understand one without the other.

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Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

Hieronymous Alloy posted:


Overall it seems like the dragon is most useful in the early phases when he can turn the tide of small battles, but later in the act when battles are larger he just gets toasted too fast and/or you lose track of the rest of the fight while dragoning (all your units get caught in a gas cloud, etc).


I find the Dragon gets really handy again in the late game, because you can use Eye of the Patriarch to wipe out a really good-sized group of enemy forces to swing a lopsided battle in your favor. Pillar of Fire is great, too, because its area denial aspect can help buy time for you to get some reinforcements to your lines. If the enemy doesn't hold back or try to go around it, they'll take enough damage that your units should be able to start killing them off effectively.

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