I didn’t find anything interesting. Might be the difficulty difference.
Also not sure I like the reduction in party size. Why? My first beta play through was with a paladin, which worked really well, but then I started a 2nd with a cipher, and I’m missing the two tanks up front. Merc rogue can’t act as a 2nd tank, so this feels restrictive when it comes to playing a non-tank unless your build is a rogue/cleric/wizard and you can pick up 2 tankish companions (or 1 and hire a merc, which isn’t as fun).
I know (played PoE 1), but in its current form the dagger is as far from ‘very interesting’ as it gets. Most soulbounds in PoE remained very generic even in their final form, and the proc chances on those that had them were so low that they were hardly a factor. None of the equipment felt truly unique - exceptional yes, raw stats on them were insane (and procs were a bonus on top), but the game really lacked items like Shield of Balduran (reflects beholder rays) or Mace of Disruption for example.
Yeah, I think it might be a problem. I used to be very much in favor of a smaller party, but once they implemented rudimentary AI in PoE and I got a little more familiar with the systems the party of 6 felt just right. The only issue was a combination of levels (chokepoints) and engagement system (mostly thanks to relatively poor pathfinding) which sometimes made it hard to fully utilize your melee characters. But an argument could be made here that this forces tactical decision when it comes to weapon loadouts, since you could put 2h weapons with good reach on your second line.
Not to mention all the wasted roleplaying opportunities that a bigger party brings.
To be fair, I was only showing off the dagger to let him know Soulbound items must not only show up late in the game, as I found one in the beta. I gave plenty of examples of interesting items before that in the same post.
Also to be fair to the game, this slice of gameplay is A) in beta still, and not representative of how you will come to this content in the full version and B) even so, pretty low level so you aren’t going to find tons of crazy stuff.
Here is maybe a better representative to a weapon I found that I feel is every bit as good as the kind of noteworthy items one could find in BG2.
There was a great little backstory for the weapon as well, but i didn’t think to screen capture it. But it provides a unique bonus to deflection against melee weapons, provides the game’s equivalent stats as a “+2 weapon” in BG/IWD, and provides immunity to Tanglefoot attacks. In a nice twist, this is found as treasure being guarded by some spriggans and tanglefoot creatures. EDIT - Also, it’s unfit for the vailain republic, whatever that means?
In the end I think it’s a bit premature to talk about the game’s itemization but for me, the handful of magical weapons and items I did find were plenty cool.
It is premature, but since I didn’t find anything cool I just expressed that I hope itemization is better in the sequel.
I did find that hatchet on my 2nd complete play through (gave up on the cipher, created a dwarf barb) and put it to good use.
Nothing wrong with that, but make sure you are expressing your opinions in the backer beta forum - that’s the entire point of the beta access, after all!
I love pretty much everything about PoE1 and all I’ve heard about PoE2, but the hatchet=defensive weapon has got to be my primary nitpick. It just goes against my years of extensive studies into medieval weapons via immersive electronic simulation.
It’s a magic axe! :)
Yeah, swords should really be the defensive weapons since… that’s what they’re best at.
Axes are nearly useless in defense due to the balance in comparison.
Uses this as an excuse to post Matt Easton:
Complete digression, but does this mean that Dwarves with axes is an inherently wrong trope?
I mean Dwarves are supposed to be defensive orientated, right, and Dwarves = axe users.
Bearing in mind this particular trope begins with Tolkien (Dwarves, axes) also I don’t recall the Hobbit or LOTR mentioning Dwarves being particularly defensive. Oakenshield, and by extension other Dwarves, were mentioned as being utterly resolute fighters, backed up by the situation at the battle of the 5 armies where the fellowship Dwarves were prepared to take on everyone else :).
Hmmm…
0900: the game changes as soon as you bring in a shield :).
@ShivaX thankyou very very much for posting that link. I’ve subscribed, and am learning so much :).
8 year old me would never have left his computer…had he had one at the time, and had youtube existed…
Well if the dwarves are using shields, axes would be fine. Or big long axes or the like.
Then again, dwarves and axes has never made sense. They live underground, what the hell are they chopping with axes? Cave trees? Hammers and picks make more sense really. Maybe a spear for tight corridors and tunnels.
And Matt Easton is a great dude to watch. There are hundreds of hours of stuff on that channel, he’s awesome.
I always assumed axes evolved from pickaxes, which would be prevalent in a mining society. Also I thought they were were mountain people, living on and below the mountains, so plenty of axe use above :).
And there are plenty of hammers :).
Dwarves are (to me) more defensive because they have the best steel and from that, the best armor. Nothing to do with what weapon they use.
OK, three play throughs now and now soulbound dagger. Where is that damn thing hidden?
Just saw this. Fun! Back in the day it saddened me that the Infinity Engine games, great though they were, retreated on that score.
Is it confirmed that feature made it in?
Oh, dunno - just going off first post in the thread.
Have the devs said anything about PoE2 addressing the issues people had with PoE1? I Kickstarted the first one but even on easy difficulty I had real trouble with the game and I felt I had to go do research on how to build my characters.
The post release balance updates were huge improvements to Pillars, in case you haven’t tried it since much past launch.