PoE Thoughts/discussion/first impressions of Pillars of Eternity!

[Kordanor]

Don't see any issue with that. So many quickslots that you can hardly fill them out anyways.

But I got a question regarding to that: How do you split stacks? Shift+Click doesnt do the trick as it sends it right to the stash.

 

[Deleted User]

Double click splits stacks.

 

[ChienAboyeur]

Potions are useless because you cannot use them during combat if you didn't already have them equipped. That was such a terrible design decision.

That is a non issue: the gameplay calls for gathering information before triggering a fight. This leaves all the time available to prepare the quick slots.

Being unable to drink potions in advance goes against the emphasis put on scouting.
That is probably because there is no system to limit spamming potion use other than the time it takes during a fight to drink a potion.
A party buffed on potions pre fight would unbalance the game severely. Potions are potent and stacking their effect would kill fighting.

 

[zahratustra]

Potions are useless because you cannot use them during combat if you didn't already have them equipped. That was such a terrible design decision.

Absolutely Chien! Funny how some people dismiss as a terrible design something which is, in fact, a feature which adds another level to an encounter

I am not sure how to counter spells or abilities that deal raw damage over time? I may have missed a priest spell that removes these, not sure, but I had some higher level "insect plague" cast on my party by a druid (in a cramped space!) and it was continuous damage (quite a lot) for a long time and that was the end of me. There is one priest spell that temporarily suspends "debilitating" effects, but I don't know if that woudl work - shouldn't really. it's not like you're charming/cursing someone - it's damage. But I assume there is a some kind of counter?

Priest spells include a range of prayers: against bewilderment, restraint, fear and infirmity. There is also a very useful all rounder called "Suppress Affliction" - it just suspends an affliction but at higher levels it last long enough to get you through the combat. And then there are various scrolls which work in similar capacity.

 

[booboo]

Yes, that "suppress affliction" was the one I ended up using, doesn't sound like it should work against domination, but it does, In fact, it seems too overpowered and seems to pretty much suspend most hostile effects? I'm now 10th level and my priest can cast that several times....

My objection to potions is simply: it's makes no sense from a game playing perspective not to be able to drink them except in combat. It's clearly a contrived game balance mechanic and I don't like it. They could have simply limited how many potions you can drink - or have toxicity like the witcher or insist you can only have 1 or 2 potions effects at any one time, perhaps improved via some talent. The limit on scrolls is also similarly immersion-breaking. I understand what its meant to achieve, I just don't think they went about it the right way.

I'm now 60 hours in, busy in Twin Elms. Still enjoying it, but not as much...

 

[zahratustra]

I agree that potions could have been handled better boo. I just disagree with Archangel's opinion that they are useless.

And, btw, there are talents which can be used to make your characters less vulnerable to afflictions. In "Defensive" tab there is one called Mental Fortress and another called Body Control. But yeah, Suppress Affliction is the best of the lot.

I'm in Dyrford Village and still having fun

EDIT - I wonder about replayability of PoE… Right now I can't see myself going through it again just for the banter of the couple of different companions… But hey, there are a couple of expansions on the horizon so I will, most likely, have go after both of them are out.

 

[ChienAboyeur]

My objection to potions is simply: it's makes no sense from a game playing perspective not to be able to drink them except in combat. It's clearly a contrived game balance mechanic and I don't like it. They could have simply limited how many potions you can drink - or have toxicity like the witcher or insist you can only have 1 or 2 potions effects at any one time, perhaps improved via some talent. The limit on scrolls is also similarly immersion-breaking. I understand what its meant to achieve, I just don't think they went about it the right way.

At the moment, they are in the same state as Jagged Alliance: Back in action was. The game features a combat system that enables to set up fights balanced versus a level. They know how to match enemy to a party made of level one, two, three etc fights.

The system, though, is not balanced vs the environment. They've left aside all the other parameters like encumbrance, access to items etc

As they've not touched any of that, the absence of pre buffing is not surprising.

The fight system, at the moment, is balanced to support one fight at the time, as it might be expected in games like Street Fighter.Fights have all the same starting conditions. In this type of games, the environment has no influence, fighters usually start with the same starting conditions (full health etc)
It is not balanced to support variations in starting parameters due to an access to the environment.

Encumbrance could have meant slower characters etc
They have not touched this kind of balancing.

 

[Kordanor]

Question is however whether this is a bad thing.

Imho it works pretty good as it is. A different approach may have overcomplicated it.
While certain things are limited, it works better than an open system which is not balanced at all.
Let's take Skyrim for example. While being a good game, it has a horrible balancing as it has multiple (but pretty simple) systems which make you into a god if you use them to your advantage. So after half the game it becomes a sight-seeing tour.

 

[ChienAboyeur]

It simply does not work, so it is probably a bad thing.

First, it goes against the invited gameplay: players are called for gathering information, yet the translation of the information gathering into advantages is limited: gear up appropriately, prepare the belt etc
One of the Witcher games had a reverse issue: you could use potions before fights but there was no opportunity to know your enemy before the fight. The information gathering was non existent and rely on playing the game first.

Second, the game was not supposed to be a collection of arena fights but a succession of fights fought with different starting conditions, with the starting conditions influenced things like performances in the previous fights, the relationship to the environment etc

The player is nowhere near to balance the resources vs a series of fights, the only thing they must do is balancing vs one fight at a time.

Loot and its weight: no influence on the fight, potions, scrolls, useless to save them for a fight that might come later etc Con as a bank of health, useless. Increasing the number of spells a wizard can get (when levelling up) useless etc

At the moment, many features have been turned meaningless.

The developper is hardly to be blamed here, they had to deal with players pressuring them to degenerate their product as players did not like real time with pause products. The developpers had to face maffia behaviour, it led them to release a product with a weak, inappropriate interface to support real time gameplay while they were forced to cater to the needs of "ugoigo" players by providing them with a sub system to emulate the functioning of this type of games.

When people prevent you from getting your priorities right, it gives things like PoE fight experience.

 

[DArtagnan]

I agree that they got their priorities screwed up. They should have gone TB instead of RTwP

 

[Carnifex]

I also would have preferred turn based combat, but I can make what is there work for me.

 

[ChienAboyeur]

I agree that they got their priorities screwed up. They should have gone TB instead of RTwP

Or players interested into "ugoigo" games could have got their priorities right: avoid playing games that are not for them, leading them to pressure the developper into turning the product into what it was not supposed to be.
Haters are gonna hate, though.

 

[DArtagnan]

Or players interested into "ugoigo" games could have got their priorities right: avoid playing games that are not for them, leading them to pressure the developper into turning the product into what it was not supposed to be.
Haters are gonna hate, though.

RTwP isn't a game, it's a combat system. Games with subpar combat systems can be great

 

[ChienAboyeur]

"UgoIgo" games might be great but they cant be real time with pause games.
Hard to understand for the all subjective crowd.

 

[DArtagnan]

"UgoIgo" games might be great but they cant be real time with pause games.
Hard to understand for the all subjective crowd.

Actually, PoE is a TB game released with a RTwP system, which is the problem

 

[Thrasher]

At least it has a tone of auto-pause options. Without those I'd be cursing and playing on easy mode....

 

[Kordanor]

At least it has a tone of auto-pause options. Without those I'd be cursing and playing on easy mode….

Which however not work 100% perfectly.
My fighter had a shield which triggered an ability, so it triggered autopause for ability each time the ability was used, which was like each couple of seconds (bash).

I also don't like that it's not really synchronous with the display of the abilities they are using. Sometimes when you are giving an order, it is not queued up visible, instead you still see the sword attack icon. Then sometimes you get the "ability is finished" message and autopause, but the ability already was finished before. But was not removed from the display. Or I think I had it with aloth that I got the autopause but I wasnt able to cast his second standard ability as the first one was still blocked out.

Most of this could have been solved by making an action queue visible and adjust the autopause to this action queue.

 

[Thrasher]

I haven't had any these problems recently, since I don't queue actions. That's the trick to make the system predictable and reliable.

 

[Kordanor]

Well, I am also not queing actions in terms of 3 different actions in a row.
But whenever you give one of your dudes an order, you basically queue an action.

Most notably are instant abilities. You click on them and then what. Nothing happens. You can only assume that they are queued up somewhere.
Also if your dudes are prone. The current action in the visible action view is empty. But there are still actions in your "queue".

 

[Thrasher]

Uh, no. They execute immediately if they aren't doing anything else. Waving their arms or whatever counts for long spell windups, for example. Similarly, for slow weapons. The fact that some actions take some time to complete, doesn't mean they are queued up, waiting to execute. They just take some time WHILE they execute to completion.

Now, if you put stuff in the queue then freaky stuff happens. That's been my experience. Pause on completion and only issue new orders then. Only continuance of basic attacks against the same target don't need to be managed this way.

BTW, this is also the closest way to approximate turn-based combat in this engine.