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unfortunately the game assumes, after a certain point, that you are either using a priest to cast a bunch of "protection against X" spells every fight, or you're duplicating a priest with crafted scrolls or other consumables. If you don't then a lot of fights you'll just spend paralyzed or charmed or whatever. Pallegina can pinch hit for some of it as can rings of unshackling.
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Feb 19, 2024 18:29
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:If you don't then a lot of fights you'll just spend paralyzed or charmed or whatever. One of the least charming aspects of the spell system is remembering which priest spell grants protection against which status effect and what level it is.
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Feb 19, 2024 18:31
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Halloween Jack posted:A-ha! yep, the sequel at least fixes this issue
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Feb 19, 2024 18:49
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Radia posted:yep, the sequel at least fixes this issue In Deadfire, I tend to run with a priest anyway due to their accuracy stacking, but I like that the change to the Inspiration/Affliction system makes them a lot less mandatory than they were in POE1. In fact, if I have only one slot available for a support role in my Deadfire party, I gravitate more towards a chanter than a priest because they bring so much utility and value to a team. Like a priest, they can heal, clear afflictions, and buff. But they also have access to the best summons, early spells that deal respectable damage, CC, or debuffs, and buffs that can cover every attribute. A main character chanter who can select the subclasses and build around their bonuses gets a big jump in power over baseline chanter. Chanter also multiclasses well with other classes, providing strong synergies while not losing out as much to progression like some other caster multis. On top of that, they have particularly powerful, meta itemization in Deadfire. All of this and the changes they made to chanter phrase mechanics is why I think chanter justifiably gets the most improved class award moving into the sequel.
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Feb 19, 2024 21:17
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How do chants work? If I want to repeatedly chant The Dragon Thrashed, how many times should it be added to the staff? And do the different chants (a, b, c, d) ever overlap in any way? TIA
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Feb 22, 2024 02:10
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Trip Hazard posted:How do chants work? If I want to repeatedly chant The Dragon Thrashed, how many times should it be added to the staff? And do the different chants (a, b, c, d) ever overlap in any way? TIA You would only need to add it once; chants work by looping through a given "song". They can overlap, but it depends on things like Intellect, if you're a Troubadour (Deadfire subclass) your linger lasts long enough that 2 chants will always overlap, things like that. Generally the rule of thumb is you can count on two overlapping for some duration, but three is Troubadour-only. In PoE1 chants the above is universally true, with the caveat that later level songs have such long duration/linger that.. they'll feel "weaker" if you rely on overlapping.
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Feb 22, 2024 02:37
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:If you don't then a lot of fights you'll just spend paralyzed or charmed or whatever.
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Feb 22, 2024 17:36
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Halloween Jack posted:I'm impressed with how this game has built on and learned from not just Neverwinter and similar games, but from the current state of tabletop design. Fights consistently present interesting tactical challenges. I don't know which I like best: the wights that inflict Charmed and Confused, the vampires that inflict Charmed and Confused, the slimes that inflict Charmed and Confused, or the mushrooms that inflict Charmed and Confused. this but unironically. Pillars ftw
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Feb 22, 2024 23:52
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As part of a larger discussion here on Black Jacket Fighters, I had previously mentioned some interesting meta interaction with this subclass's unique ability to instantly swap between weapon sets with no recovery penalty combined with Squid's Grasp, a unique rapier with an action speed bonus enchantment:moot the hopple posted:
What I didn't mention in the above post is that swapping to Squid's Grasp after performing an action will actually reduce the in-progress recovery bar due to the sudden modification in action speed. A recent discussion on the Obsidian builds board with some of the big brains there and doing some retesting has revealed that repeatedly swapping to Squid's Grasp on a Black Jacket character will progressively and recursively reduce the recovery bar of a performed action (provided you are paused after performing the action and also fulfilling the weapon's conditional to activate its action speed bonus) to the point that you can reduce recovery to nearly zero. It gets even more busted. Sasha's Singing Scimitar has a similar action speed bonus when equipped on a Chanter that scales off the number of their current Phrases. It also has the Companion's Prelude upgrade which grants this action speed bonus to party members as well. So a Chanter can repeatedly swap back and forth with this weapon to reduce recovery bars on the whole god dang party  I've mentioned in the past how insanely broken the zero recovery meta was in POE1. While this isn't strictly speaking zero recovery like in POE1, you can technically reduce it down to like 0.00001 millisecond recovery which is effectively the same thing in practice. This also requires spamming the weapon switch hotkey to progressively reduce recovery so YMMV depending on your tolerance for microing. Despite these minor limitations, I would consider the above setup even more powerful than POE1's zero recovery because it also works on spell recovery and benefits the entire team. Just thought I'd share this discovery here as well. To be honest, I'm kind of reeling at how bonkers it is.
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Feb 23, 2024 02:40
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That just feels like a bug exploitation more than most builds, even ones that rely on unexpected niche synergies.
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Feb 23, 2024 03:29
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Mr. Prokosch posted:That just feels like a bug exploitation more than most builds, even ones that rely on unexpected niche synergies. it is an exploit but i dont think i would push it into bug exploit, because like, it is just taking the existing systems and threading the needle on breaking what is otherwise tight as hell.
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Feb 23, 2024 03:42
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im not saying it is INTENDED mind just. i dunno. deadfire having poo poo finally break like that, but FIVE YEARS after release, in an evolving meta - that's insanely good and cool
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Feb 23, 2024 03:43
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It depends on how you look at it, too. You might argue that zero recovery in POE1 is broken and you might have a case for that since the devs did change the action speed formula in the sequel. However, getting to zero recovery in POE1 wasn't exactly some arcane science or required a really deep understanding of game mechanics -- some folks early on naturally stumbled upon it because their particular build stacked action speed and recovery bonuses, which is a reasonable path to go. It's even quite easy on some classes who already have access to talents/abilities/spells with those bonuses, and there's gear and upgrades like Durgan iron that incentivize this stacking. When making any build in generally, you stack towards a particular focus, and it just so happens that action speed stacking can produce a disgustingly, brokenly effective build in POE1 through no fault of your own. I think it's the same case with this Black Jacket and Squid's Grasp combo, where what you see is exactly what you get. I don't think it's a "bug" at all because it operates technically and mechanically as it says on the tin: Black Jackets can swap between weapon sets with no recovery penalty and Squid's Grasp gives you an action speed bonus. To be fair, it only occurred to me to swap to this weapon during the recovery period for flanking immunity (I believe I tested this with some kind of tanking priest build) and I was pleased to see that it also reduced the recovery for my spells when swapping over to it. It was Constentin Lévine over at the Obsidian forums, who has also discovered many other interesting mechanics, who had the suggestion of "why don't we make the entire plane out of the black box" by continuing to swap and get the bonus repeatedly. But there's a lot of mechanics like that in Deadfire that may be considered so good that they seem like exploits, yet I don't think the devs were just dumb or overlooked them, especially with Obsidian's reputation for balance. The Barring Death's Door + Salvation of Time + Brilliant is a notorious example that essentially guarantees victory every time. Yet it is a staple of of The Ultimate and clearly sanctioned by the devs who, as part of the challenge guidelines, would have had to review footage of the multiple submissions that used this arguably broken combo, yet never deigned to remove it. Some Ultimate players even rely on self-damaging themselves until proccing Shroud of the Phantasm as their source of Brilliant, which feels arguably more cheesy, yet was used as a legit strategy in some of these runs. Even setting aside the perhaps idiosyncratic parameters of the Ultimate challenge, there's plenty of other examples where game mechanics technically function as the game designers probably intended, yet provided the leeway to go crazy with it. For instance, I previously discovered this behavior with reflected beams where a new beam is replicated when reflected. It seems weird at first but I have no objection to how the devs implemented this because it is technically consistent with how other targeted spells get reflected -- it's just that beams have a duration and multiple procs throughout. That fact alone might not be that interesting, but then you combine it with a Monk's innate reflection, a Blood Mage's access to Blood Sacrifice and fire beam spells, some fire and push/pull immunity gear, and you suddenly have a combination that gives you endless class resources for a duo who can probably win the game by themselves. It's funny because a couple of posts back, I was arguing that I like games when they're more balanced and that devs should try to take out the more egregiously broken stuff. I believe Obsidian has done that for the most part in Deadfire, yet still left room for doing insanely crazy things when doing deep dives into its mechanics. I'm still discovering new things and interesting builds to this day which is why I keep coming back to this game and its fun, dense, and intricate systems.
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Feb 23, 2024 04:55
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Good interview imo: https://twitter.com/PRBG_Aesthetics/status/1762543660174811368
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Feb 27, 2024 20:24
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Very nice, thanks! I know we probably won't get another game with pre-rendered backgrounds from Obsidian, so I will continue to cherish those we got from Pillars of Eternity, Tyranny and Deadfire. He really should be proud of the word he did on the White March, that had some pretty spectacular scenes!
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Feb 27, 2024 20:55
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It's a shame, since the prerendered backgrounds give PoE1/2 such a unique artistic identity, especially with all the engine upgrades in Deadfire. I've tried replicating the process before and it seems like an enormous technical headache compared to faking the funk with a regular 3D environment, so I don't fault Obsidian if they stick with industry standards in a theoretical PoE3.
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Feb 27, 2024 21:13
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I remember during the Kickstarter updates, when Obsidian would release short articles explaining some things they were working on. When they described the pipeline for coming up with these maps I was genuinely impressed, and still am to this day. And I agree that these technique really set apart Pillars from other games, and that because of it it'll hold up very well even 10 or 20 years from now.
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Feb 28, 2024 15:47
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Agreed, it's a real differentiator. It shows in how I play too: I run Pillars/Deadfire zoomed in whereas I run PF/D:OS/BG3 more zoomed out. The map design also factors in the fixed camera brilliantly. I've never really felt the need to have rotation for the most part whereas a free camera mod is one of the first things I downloaded for PF. It's just very good design all around.
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Feb 28, 2024 16:51
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I still think the original Baldur's Gate Trilogy still looks amazing to this day, and Pillars even more so. As previously stated, that opinion will hold easily for another 10-20 years. And it's a shame Deadfire will likely be the last serious attempt to replicate that aesthetic, outside of possibly some indie studios doing an Infinity-like for nostalgia purposes.
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Feb 28, 2024 17:27
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chaosapiant posted:I still think the original Baldur's Gate Trilogy still looks amazing to this day, and Pillars even more so. As previously stated, that opinion will hold easily for another 10-20 years. And it's a shame Deadfire will likely be the last serious attempt to replicate that aesthetic, outside of possibly some indie studios doing an Infinity-like for nostalgia purposes. Indeed, maybe 15 years from now someone will want to do a spiritual sequel to Deadfire!
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Feb 28, 2024 17:33
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It looks incredible but the lack of real 3D space sometimes made the gameplay annoying and limited the interactions, like how you can't aim an AoE over a hole and level verticality is practically impossible
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Feb 28, 2024 17:35
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No Dignity posted:you can't aim an AoE over a hole and level verticality is practically impossible I think that has literally never ever come up to my mind during my hundreds of hours of gameplay, and it might be a case of "other games do it so this one should too." I never felt the need for those things, I think because the levels are designed around those limitations and so you don't need to send a spell over a hole or use the Z axis. If your game is 2D then you design it in a 2D plane. The little extra 3D-ish things they added (like light sources casting dynamic shadows ) are just bonus 3D features you get to make your 2D game prettier.
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Feb 29, 2024 09:30
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I think that's you being used to the system, not being able to target impassable terrain comes up every time enemies start out gathered around a machine or sacrificial pit or big campfire or whatever feature represents their reason for hanging out together. Maybe that's just me wanting to open battles with a big AOE from stealth though.
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Feb 29, 2024 13:03
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pun pundit posted:I think that's you being used to the system, Yes, that's entirely possible, to be fair.
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Feb 29, 2024 13:53
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"targeting impassable terrain" has come up so infrequently for me I think this might be the first time I'm learning the games don't let you do it
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Feb 29, 2024 13:55
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I've never occurred to me that you can't target, like, cliff sides, huh. Pixel art games are timeless even when they're from the 80s it feels like an aesthetic. We seem to be able to feel the same way about the early low poly games too though so it may just be that good games look good. TF2 would be a later generation example. Currently replaying Diablo 1 and I was just admiring the spell tomes in my bag, they're such great little illustrations.
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Feb 29, 2024 14:45
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Well of course I can’t cast Whisper of Treason on a rock; it doesn’t have a soul.
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Feb 29, 2024 15:00
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KOGAHAZAN!! posted:"targeting impassable terrain" has come up so infrequently for me I think this might be the first time I'm learning the games don't let you do it See there were so many time I thought 'that's a perfectly sensible place to drop an AoE' and just couldn't, having coherent mechanically consistent 3D spaces would be an improvement imo even if it doesn't look quite as nice
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Feb 29, 2024 15:28
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Put me as well in the camp that hasn't been bothered by it. I like the mechanical aspects of the environments well enough, and what we get in exchange is vital to me in these types of games. For instance, while I don't think BG3 is a bad looking game, it rarely led me to stop and think, "holy poo poo, that looks nice." Offhand the only things that come to mind are the areas in and around Rosymorn Monastery and the interlude involving the Nightsong. That's a short list in a big game. Conversely, I thought that all the time in Deadfire (and frequently in PoE1). If we could marry the two without sacrificing what makes each good, that'd be a real achievement. I'd expect it to be ferociously expensive.
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Feb 29, 2024 16:59
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Jack B Nimble posted:Pixel art games are timeless even when they're from the 80s it feels like an aesthetic. We seem to be able to feel the same way about the early low poly games too though so it may just be that good games look good. TF2 would be a later generation example. Vampire Survivors is another example of using 16-bits style graphics and music, while providing a modern game-style, they completely nailed it and made the game the quintessential best of both worlds, in my opinion. isk posted:For instance, while I don't think BG3 is a bad looking game, it rarely led me to stop and think, "holy poo poo, that looks nice." Offhand the only things that come to mind are the areas in and around Rosymorn Monastery and the interlude involving the Nightsong. That's a short list in a big game. I think it comes down to technology vs style. Style will always win. BG3 is very strong in the "uncanny valley" department. It's not even that uncanny really, for instance I find that characters tend to shine too much and their surfaces lack texture (in the sense of "this looks like skin, this looks like leather and this looks like rust over metal"). It's something I immediately noticed. And the transitions between animations are janky, as I remember. Like a single animation will be great (like casting a spell), but then the transition with the next set of animation doesn't seem too fluid. It's not a big deal but it does tend to take people (me, at least) out of the suspension of disbelief.
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Feb 29, 2024 18:15
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in terms of art and theatrics, i think bg3 pretty much nailed the conclusion. there were a few parts where i really appreciated the level of detail they put into an environment, too. i think i just like the art direction of poe1/2 more
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Feb 29, 2024 20:39
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The Underdark looks cool in BG3, but that's the only area that really jumps out at me. Maybe the Monastery as well? In BG3 BG city is very boring visually. In fact I feel like the cities in BG1/2 are more interesting visually than they are in BG3.
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Feb 29, 2024 21:16
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BG3 feels very generic fantasy for me. There's not a large amount that makes it stand out. Probably could transpose any location into Dragon Age or vice-vera and not notice. What I felt was quite weird is seeing the city of Baldurs Gate be very very different between the two games. I get it would have been less visually impactful to recreate an isometric location into their style for the third game. But it doesn't feel like the same city even a little bit (imo).
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Feb 29, 2024 23:09
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mitochondritom posted:BG3 feels very generic fantasy for me. There's not a large amount that makes it stand out. Probably could transpose any location into Dragon Age or vice-vera and not notice. Having just played BG3 and BG1 back to back, they’re actually pretty drat similar in design city-wise. Not to mention stuff would naturally change after 120 years.
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Mar 1, 2024 01:51
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chaosapiant posted:Having just played BG3 and BG1 back to back, they’re actually pretty drat similar in design city-wise. Not to mention stuff would naturally change after 120 years. 120 years and several magical apocalypti (apocalyptoses?)
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Mar 1, 2024 02:15
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Are you confusing "apocalypse" and "eucalyptus" ? For the talk of 3D, I would be curious to see Obsidian make a RtwP RPG using all the movement options that are made possible with a full 3D map.
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Mar 1, 2024 09:47
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moot the hopple posted:
Does anyone know what this build is? Stunlocking small groups of enemies sure does found fun. I wonder if it works (or gets close to working) in PoE1... edit: I think I found it https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?noseen=1&threadid=3856099&pagenumber=837&perpage=40&highlight=morningstar#post527749858 time to do some math. Edit 2: I think a Pillars 1 version, which is not as good since it can't take any Monk stuff and Spirit Frenzy does not exist in PoE1, looks like a barbarian focused on attack speed enhancements, optionally with Threatening Presence to lower Fort to boost Brute Force, and accuracy bonuses. Here's the Ability and Talent breakdown I made for it: For Pillars 1 Basically Stun/Status Effect of Choice AoE Striker (similar to cauterizer, no fire focus, optimized for attack speed for stunning) Hearth Orlan, Death Godlike, or Human Might 17 Con 10 Dex 9 Per 20 Int 19 Res 4 Old Valia +1 Int, Colonist Skills - Survival & Athletics Ability choices 1 - Frenzy (Attack speed) 3 - Blooded (needed to know when health in bad state in Frenzy) 5 - Savage Defiance 7 - Blood Thirst (free attack) 9 - Bloodlust (+20% attack speed, 8 seconds after downing 2 enemies) 11 - Heart of Fury 13 - Dragon Leap 15 - One Stands Alone (tank and dmg bonuses) Optional 13 - Brute Force (Attack fort instead of defl) 15 - Threatening Presence (Sickened: -10 fort & will inflicted) Talent Choices 2 - veteren's recovery (not tanky enough) 4 - Accurate Carnage 6 - Stalwart Defiance 8 - Savage Attack (damage modal, -5 Accuracy penalty) 10 - Bloody Slaughter 12 - Two-Handed Style (+15% damage) 14 - Greater Frenzy 16 - Barbaric Blow rocketrobot fucked around with this message at 04:21 on Mar 6, 2024 |
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Mar 5, 2024 16:58
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The real MVP move with a PoE 1 Barbarian is getting the Belt of the Deadfire Cannoneer and the Forge Gauntlets, so you can summon Firebrand for every single fight. With Damaging 3 and Annihilating, a high-INT Barbarian is basically hitting the entire fight with a Fireball every time they attack. It's one of the few weapon-using builds where you can legitimately dump DEX without a notable loss of killing power, since you're stacking so many attack speed buffs and clearing your recovery every time you kill something that you can circumvent the entire recovery system.
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Mar 5, 2024 20:56
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rocketrobot posted:Does anyone know what this build is? Stunlocking small groups of enemies sure does found fun. I wonder if it works (or gets close to working) in PoE1... An analogous group-stunlocking Barbarian build is quite possible in POE1 thanks to their ability to extend weapon effects like stun in an AoE with Carnage (whereas Deadfire changed it so that Carnage is damage only). The big caveat is that availability for melee weapons with the stunning property is skewed towards the late game once you have access to Twin Elms. You can potentially get access earlier to a unique spear that can be enchanted with stunning, but it requires you to side with The Dozens and choose a non-peaceful outcome for a quest, both of which may conflict with your roleplaying. Alternatively, there is a unique stunning morningstar that you can purchase from Azzuro who periodically visits Caed Nua after doing a keep event. However, it requires you to build up Caed Nua first for high prestige, and the window for him to actually show up is exceedingly low. I believe v1ld dug into the code and found that he only sticks around for a few hours so it's quite possible for him to leave in the time that you travel around the map. I at least never got him to show up in my most recent playthrough. Another CC option is to go with weapons that can prone instead. Like Carnage, prone is a little bit better than in Deadfire because it can knock down enemies for longer and it imparts various stat debuffs. You can get access to these prone weapons relatively early in Defiance Bay and Dyrford Village. Tall Grass, a unique pike with prone that's available for sale in Dyrford, is particularly nice because it is a reach weapon which allows you to attack from behind a tank/meat wall and build your barbarian a bit glassier to maximize your crit chance and AoE size. quote:edit: I think I found it https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?noseen=1&threadid=3856099&pagenumber=837&perpage=40&highlight=morningstar#post527749858 The only revision/updates I would make to the linked build is to include Helm of the White Void as a late game candidate for the helmet slot. Its +10 Accuracy with Afflictions will apply to our main attack abilities, Raised Torment and Stunning Surge, due to the stun affliction attached to them. That's quite a potent accuracy buff for crits, especially in conjunction with the -45 Fortitude we're already inflicting on enemies. Also, I mentioned that Saru Sichr is more of an early game weapon but I would now designate Saru Sichr as this build's weapon of choice over The Willbreaker. This is because Saru Sichr's Poisoned Dipped counts as another attack roll when you hit an enemy in terms of proccing Swift Flurry or Heartbeat Drumming, meaning it increase the odds of gaining free attack crit chains. The Paralytic upgrade is also nice for diversification on this build because it gives us an alternative hard CC effect that is Dexterity-based, in case we run into an enemy with Might Resistance like Coastal Aumauas who can resist our stuns.
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Mar 5, 2024 21:25
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Zeerust posted:The real MVP move with a PoE 1 Barbarian is getting the Belt of the Deadfire Cannoneer and the Forge Gauntlets, so you can summon Firebrand for every single fight. With Damaging 3 and Annihilating, a high-INT Barbarian is basically hitting the entire fight with a Fireball every time they attack. Yeah the abilities for that build with stunlocking in mind are almost identical. That's a fun build.
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Mar 5, 2024 21:52
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