Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire

Games
1305

I finished it, and then started another play through. The 2nd play-through is mostly to see what real differences an evil path takes. So far, It still seems the same. I do not think the choices I make really matter at all, but Ill see for sure when I get to the end game summary.

I must say the game isn’t a good game, but it isn’t a bad game.

Combat is boring. I have been doing the same thing since the early levels, the exact same tactics. The magic squad basically CCs everyone, and the warriors just murder all the confused, terrified, blinded, weakened, enemies. Combat is also super-easy, even though I do have full level-scaling turned on, and only to scale upwards.

Ship combat sucks. Sometimes I bored, sometimes, i gun enemies down. It just depends on my mood.

The real issue is that it is just a marginal game in many respects. I didn’t like the keep upgrading in the last game, it was just a money pit with no real benefit. The ship is pretty much the same thing, only you have to use it to travel around.

The final plot has a huge gaping hole, perhaps someone can explain:

Plot Hole

Ok, we learn that ancient kith built this great machine, the wheel, which pumps souls to the in-between and some of these ancients became gods. Eothas is going to break the wheel in an attempt to free the mortals of the god. Everyone, including Eothas says that when the in-between runs out of souls, life will end because any new kith will no longer have souls. The kith will have to rebuild the machine on their own terms before this happens.

Ok, now the problem:
How did anyone get born to begin with, before the wheel was ever invented? How did kith civilization even form, let alone advance far enough before the in-between ran out of souls? In other words, the entire premise of what will happen if the kith do not build a new machine, is total bullshit.

1306

I finished this one last night. In summary I loved it… my favorite isometric RPG since Baldur’s Gate 2. I never finished the first Pillars of Eternity but always went back to it over the years and made the most progress right before part 2 came out.

I very much enjoyed the world building. I was able to grok the four distinct factions and their motivations, and I thought the way NPCs were tied to each faction was well done. I am now encouraged to roll up new characters to align to each faction and play through the game based on those allegiances. I enjoyed the main story and thought it took a novel approach to the dynamic between deities and their followers.

The character design and story were wonderful. I wish some of the character quests were a bit longer, but it was nice catching up with old friends and making new ones. Maia came on a bit strong at the start, but I thought her story was interesting even though I wasn’t able to play it out all the way since I was eager to get to the end of my first playthrough. I also thought the voices were great in this setting…Spanish/Italian, African, Polynesian, with a smattering of American southern were all welcome changes to the typical English accents I’m used to in this genre. I also liked the narrator, though I think that puts me in the minority opinion.

The art was wonderful. The new character art and animation is the best there is in the genre, and the same goes to the background art. The background animations combined with the new lighting system makes this a beautiful world to go adventuring. Combat felt especially gritty and kinetic thanks, in large part, to the art and animation.

The real champion, for me, was the soundtrack. Oh my goodness, what a rich and varied set of tunes I was treated to. Every bit of music was perfect for the setting, from crawling around ancient and mysterious tunes to wandering around an endless capital city. The sea tunes were also really great and I found myself singing them while doing chores around the house. The music in combat was great and helped draw me in… the beating drums combined with the animation made me really want to get into lots of fights. My favorite music, however, was the tavern pieces. I loved how they you could hear them muffled on the second floor of the tavern, and how they came u[p during ship combat. I can’t get over how much I loved this music, well done Justin Bell.

I think a significant part in the enjoyment of the game is how much I’m willing to put into it. For example, I finished my first run-through without doing much with my ship, but the game gives me the option to go whole hog and kit out my vessel to my heart’s content. It’s there if I want it, but I can ignore it if I choose to do so. I can certainly understand that people may be put off by this, but I find that this suits my taste in how I play these kinds of games. This also applies to character leveling; I can click though willy-nilly in choosing talents and come out of it okay, but I can also take the time to learn the combat system and the attribute/skills system, and then play at a higher difficulty level with this knowledge. If I want to get the most enjoyment or sense of accomplishment out of the game, I’m going to have to learn the systems and lock everything together.

I have a bunch of ideas for my next run but will probably wait for the June patch before diving back in. Well done Obsidian!

1307

Nope, can’t explain it, it’s dumb.

It’s similar to what bugged me about the PoE1 plot - there are no gods, except there totally are. A terrible plot point that’s reinforced in the opening seconds of PoE2, where your thousand-year-old girlfriend says, again, there are no gods, and then literally two seconds later you’re talking to one. WTF?

1308

I think the idea of this line is, “What makes a god really a god?”

Are gods real if we created them? Or is being a super-powerful, near omniscient being sufficient to be considered a ‘god’?

This, based purely on the first game, anyway. Given many of us grew up with Faerun gods, the vast majority of which were indeed mortals raised to godhood, the philosophical implications are perhaps less apparent (or not even troubling). For anyone with more of an Abrahamic/monotheistc/deist picture of ‘god’, there’s more of a concern here. But that split is also detailed in the game - different characters have dissimilar reactions to this ‘revelation’.

1309
1310

I started on veteran then restarted on POTD and think I’m almost done with my 1st complete playthrough, level 17 and going around exploring the map before heading to the endgame. I like the art and setting, and I like the new implementation of RTwP. Of course most of the fights are currently too easy, but I’m currently having a lot of trouble with the fampyrs on the NE of the map, does anyone have suggestions for that?

1311

There is at least one food you can make that provides an INT resistance, but I can’t remember what food it is. I think it’s fairly high end, but you could shop around for the required ingredients and make some of that.

1312

thanks, tonight I’ll give that a try.

1313

yep a better diet worked, I used the pre-order “captain’s banquet.” thanks for the tip!

1314

According to Sawyer there was dialogue with Important Person that went into it, but they cut it because they felt there was too much of the cutscene stuff.

1315

Several more new builds since I can’t put this damn game down (and have yet to finish it with my first toon, my votary):

–a Cleric named Elric (should’ve gone Geralt), a pale elf wielding a great word who’s a fighter/priest (unbroken/berath). Uses drugs, wields Whispers of the Endless Paths. Took the worst starter option, no returning companions, which made the early area a bit harder, but I play in Mob stance so lots of free AoE attacks with that great sword.

–a Witch (barb/berserk + cipher/soul blade) wielding battle axes and clubs who dumps all that focus into Soul Annihilation for brutal damage on single targets.

1316

Do you find combat engaging? I stopped my second play-through because the combat was so repetitive. I was using the same combos I had been using since level 4. I felt the same way about that Tyranny game. I wonder if I do not like these kinds of RPGs anymore, or if there is some kind of change to the game design that I do not like.

1317

I think a part of the problem is that combat is very common in this game, and many of the fights are…well easy and needless.

Less so than in PoE1 I think, but it’s still there, and I’m not sure how that can be resolved.

1318

It depends. Overall I think combat is too easy in Deadfire, the game isn’t very well balanced with all its mechnical changes made to its systems. For example, I beat the water dragon with my Crusader and that toon, tanking the mob, was at full health when it died. That shouldn’t happen even on lower difficulty levels.

That said, I feel like the game is a great fantasy RPG build simulator more than a great RPG at this point. I think I enjoy making new characters, thinking over synergies for various new builds, than I do the game itself. It’s telling that I’ve yet to finish it with my first character (the votary). Yet some builds are less fun, such as the Witch or Holy Slayer, because they end up feeling too much like one-trick ponies (building focus and dumping it via soul annihilation or coming out of stealth with flames of devotion attacks, repeat several thousand times until reaching 20th level).

Hopefully Josh and his team can really shape it up over the next few months. If you remember, POE1’s balance wasn’t so great either at launch, and the game didn’t really shine until the first White March DLC was released. Which reminds me of another issue I have with Deadfire: too few companions. I’m on my 8th toon, one of which was my Elric cleric build who went with the worst import option (all companions from POE1 dead), which left him with Xoti, Serafen, Tekehu and Maia. None of which compare to Eder, Grieving Mother, Durance, or even Aloth.

1319

They are addressing that with the first major patch, coming this week I believe. Veteran and PotD are getting a huge balance pass and should be much more challenging across the board, and they are going to start showing a static level for quests/encounters, instead of the skull system they have now.

1320

Look’s like the beta of that patch is out now, if anyone wants to give it a try. I hear veteran and Path of the Damned are a lot harder, but not all areas are covered yet in the beta. I imagine completed patch in the next few days.

1321

It’s interesting to hear the take on combat as being too easy or uninteresting or too often. For me, combat is so secondary to the story and setting that I don’t mind anything about it, whether easy or not, and I certainly don’t mind the frequency which feels just right for me. And I’m still on my first character, 63 hours in.

On the other hand, I’ve been spending so much time doing side quests and bounties that I don’t feel connected to the main story anymore. I don’t remember this happening in PoE1. Somehow, despite all the side events that happen in that game, the main story was mystery enough that I felt I could come upon some bit of info or clue anywhere in the game. In the Deadfire, I know (seemingly) that nothing will happen in the main story until I continue the chase (i.e. sail my ship to the northeast to a particular island); everything else is just extra adventuring.

Not that I mind that much. It’s a game I will come back to multiple times for full plays, just like PoE1. But damn, I wish things weren’t so freaking expensive. I’ve not been buying much of anything as a result and I hate that I’ll never see/use the vast majority of special items, let alone ships and upgrades.

1322

Well, my Evoker stumbled upon something very nifty that I’d managed to overlook. Grimoires can have stats, but those are listed right under its title when it’s ‘opened’ to see what spells are contained. There’s one named the Grimoire of Vaporous Wizardry sold in the Dark Crucible store (Arkemyr’s shop) that gives one additional spell cast per level. The downside is any damage taken is an automatic interrupt.

1323

That’s the one and only grimoire with an extra bonus though. Some of them have unique spells though.

1324

The game is mechanically deep enough that there is tons of different stuff you can do to make yourself a murdergod, but yeah, it’s balanced way too easy right now.

On POTD you get combat where you have to actually engage with the system (aka figure out who targets what with what skill targeting X defense to actually survive) up to around level 9-10. Then it’s cakewake (unless you overshoot the levels too much) with the exception of a few specific encounters i.e. the two vampire islands which are still easily doable with preparation (e.g. food, items to minimize the charms)

Wish they did more with this