This is a Pathfinder game after a big patch, so really some sort of bug is a high possibility.
So Iām wondering, for those of you who are familiar with this game, has it yet reached a point of stability where you would recommend it? If so, given my past issues with the hidden timers and undisclosed difficulty spikes in Kingmaker, would you still recommend it?
And if you do recommend it, what are some good choices of starting character to give me some options to handle what the game throws at me without easily falling into a party development cul de sac? I donāt need absolute best min/max tips, just some āif you avoid X, your life will be easierā of āif you make sure to cover Y, the game will be more enjoyableā type tips.
TLDR: Iām super interested in this game but also super on-the-fence and currently in a waiting mode. Are we there yet?
The hidden timer stuff is pretty minimal as far as Iāve played (up to the ch2 - 3 break, more or less, a couple times ;) ). Really thereās one fight youāll get sucked into that can (apparently) be rough if youāre underleveled, but Iāve always crushed it pretty handily.
The early game definitely favors a melee PC, IMO, just from the party members that are available to you. I canāt speak to later acts. But really any halfway competent melee type should be fine.
You really donāt have to screw around with multiclassing the companions if you donāt actively enjoy it. Theyāre all (that Iāve met) set up to level pure and be perfectly solid. No real newb traps like Amiri and her Sword of Endless Whiffing in Kingmaker.
Difficulty spikes are real, and stupid. Definitely more āgotchasā in the rules, like incorporeal creatures and piles (and piles and PILES) of damage/condition immunities to work around, and crazy fucking stupid high saves and spell resistances on monsters.
Mayyyyyybe? I intentionally set it down a few weeks ago, but others in the thread speak highly of the big recent patch that I havenāt played yet.
Thanks for the feedback. I shall await further feedback.
Iāve had tons of stability issues with Kingmaker, which initially seemed to carry over to WotR, but at some patch point the game stabilized for me and Iāve had one crash in teh last three weeks (with 135 hours in the game since its launch).
The timers are nothing like Kingmaker, but the puzzles unfortunately are quite similar. They suck. But the gameās been out long enough that theyāre now easily looked up.
Starting builds like the barbarian, fighter, etc., are good ones to start out with. Just any vanilla melee class really. It leaves the only real build complexity down to just feat choices.
The big 1.1 patch came out a week ago and they havenāt yet released the patch to fix all the shit that it broke, so, Iād wait a bit.
Iām not quite as annoyed as Adam seems to be but the spikes are my only real knock against the game. I donāt feel that there are many gotchas as the majority of them feel natural challenges for a well rounded adventuring party. I even sort of like the idea of facing demons who are known for having spell resistance and status immunities because it helps keep the martial characters relevant for longer. The saves, AC, and AB on some of the monsters, on the other hand, are crazy. I understand why Owlcat wanted to do some stat inflation in a CRPG versus a PnP game with a DM but I feel they over did it. Itās a mixed bag that mostly works for me on Daring.
Iām a little annoyed ;)
My beef is that (at least on Core, Iām sure itās even dumber on Unfair or whatever) certain fights boil down to ādo you have the one thing this enemy is weak (or at least susceptible) to?ā
In general I think the content in Wrath underscores how dumb and broken d20 to-hit rolls are. Thereās not much middle ground between āenemies need to roll 20, lol, facerollā and āliterally optimally built tanks get one-shotted.ā
A good DM would get around this in tabletop, because the big demon wouldnāt always focus every attack on the character who happened to be closest to it when combat started. Or any number of other ways that a good game master makes fights interesting and fun for the party, because theyāre not a computer running hilariously barebones enemy scripts.
But, well, here we are. Thereās still a lot to enjoy in Wrath, for sure ā Iāve spent a ton of time with it and had some really enjoyable experiences ā but the slavish devotion to Pathfinder is as much curse at is it blessing.
Completely agree. Itās a rules system problem compounded by poor design at times.
I havenāt really been seeing much of this rule system problem playing on my easy difficulty, until this week. I had one huge battle against a big bad and multiple waves of minions that completely wiped my party (hard to do on this difficulty near end game) but when I retried it, without doing anything substantially different, I had my entire party barely even touched by a single hp of damage. Going from one extreme to the other was a bit surprising as I at least expected to have to tough it out and squeak in a win.
To answer the question @Sharpe had about whether itās worth jumping into now or waiting, Iād suggest a wait unless you literally have nothing else to do. The game is an absolute blast to play, even with the oddities and constant glitches added and removed by patches, and Iām certainly going to play again after a bit of a break. I think the chances of game-breaking bugs have been lowered substantially but if you are sensitive to a bunch of possible annoyances cropping up, you are likely better off with a bit more time. Once you see patches spaced out a bit more and glaring bugs mostly all fixed, youāll be good to go.
I still think whatever code theyāve re-used from Kingmaker for producing die rolls is broken because I constantly see 1s. Iāve seen them 3x in a row, when all I need to hit is a 2 or 3.
1 in 400 or 1 in 8000 events happen fairly often when youāre talking about tens (or more) of thousands of events. Add in the human brainās bias to notice them (and the fact that itās screwing you over right now).
This is a classic example of the preconditions for perception bias to make you think things are worse than they are. You probably donāt notice all the 4s you rolled 3X in a row when you only need 2s or 3s b/c thatās irrelevant. But the 1s, man, the 1s those suck, right? So you notice them.
I mean I understand that computer RNGs are not ātrulyā random in but Iāve observed perception bias amongst myself and others SO MUCH that now Iām pretty skeptical of any claims of RNG bias, feeling that human error, specifically perception bias, is way more likely unless there is something very specific that makes a software error likely.
No, their RNG system is streaky as shit. Lann is a good measure of this because of how may attacks he gets. I have seen countless times with 6 attacks and I need like a 5 or greater and out of 6 attacks he may hit once. My main is also an archer and I see the same thing. It happens a lot.
Bad random number generators are not just about picking the same number in a row, but also about picking nearby values in a row. Sure its possible with a random number generator to roll under a 5, 5 or 6 times in a row. I do not know the probabilities, but in a given game I am thinking this crappy streak happens far more than it should. I dunno, lets me make a guess based on my memories of statistics.
Any value on a d20 is a 5% chance. So a roll of 1 to 4 should be a 20% chance to happen. 0.2 to the 5th power = 0.000032 or 0.032% chance of happening. So if Lann has 5 shots in a row under 5, out of 100 sets of attacks, this should happen 3.2 times. It seems to happen way more often than that.
About Kingmaker.
Honestly, as @Sharpe mentioned, human error and perception bias are much more likely to be the issue here, than actually dice rolls.
To test a random generators quality, you need a cubic test, not a 2d picture test. Basically you generate a 3d cube where like 10% or more of the pixels are randomly turned on. Then rotate the cube and see if there is anything resembling a pattern. Many terrible RNG will look fine on a 2d plane, but will show obvious problems in a 3d cube.
Also the standard c library and MS implementation of the random number generators for Visual C are notoriously bad.
But it really doesnāt matter. It is what it is.
Exactly this. Itās not bias on my part, at least I donāt think it is. Iāve seen Lann need a 15 or higher to hit and with 6 attacks he doesnāt tat-tat-tat those hits in. Iāve certainly never seen 3x 20s come in.after `280 hours with these two games. But 1s when all I need is a 2 or higher to hit? All the time.
Thereās a battery of tests for randomness, plug the numbers in.
Collecting them might be a pain, though.
They now have a survey up (Steam link) asking all about what you like/dislike and what you want to see in the game. They clearly state this will affect future decisions, so have at it folk!
Iām still mopping up before end-game so I couldnāt answer all questions, but this kind of engagement is good to see and itās open to everyone.
Thanks KC I am getting better at it. I am not sure the pre-made npcs are all that good ā¦