Pillars of Eternity II - Review
 

PCGamer Radio checked out Pillars of Eternity II - Deadfire:

More information.

It's a rave: "This is an incredible story, incredible RPG, and it is huge"

But he likes the turn-based combat better than the RTwP: "So much more focused and strategized"

I think saying it's an incredible story is a bit of an overstatement, but it's still a good story. To me, the only downfall of PoE2 was RtWP, and they fixed that.

Christ can't there be one news-bit on the watch were someone doesn't complain about RTwP? Guess I'll have to step up my campaign against Turn-based RPGs then.

https://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/duty_calls.png

The day every RPG goes TB again is the day I quit gaming.:p

I'm actually playing through PoE2 right now in turn-based mode, and I definitely prefer that to the RTwP in the original PoE. It's much easier for me to keep track of what's going on. Combat has a tactical flavor, where in the original PoE it felt more like managing a set of cooldown timers.

RTwP combat isn't a deal-breaker for me, but I'm enjoying the gradual return of turn-based combat in the wake of XCOM.

Sorry @Couchpotato, I have my opinions, and you shall endure them.

No hard feelings though, I respect your inferior taste. :p

We need a TB option so the people who can't handle RTwP can enjoy these games too. ;)

Personally, I beat the game in PotD difficulty in both settings. Only difference is that in one setting there was a point around halfway through the game when I started autopiloting by selecting all the party and clicking enemies one by one till they died. In the other setting I felt combat was meaningful and engaging and I had fun til the end despite having already beaten the game before. You can guess which is which. :smug:

A great game in-spite of them adding the mind-bendingly dull and tedious TB combat mode :P

Pillars of Eternal copy/paste islands. Regardless of playmode.

Btw, isn't it bad taste to use the WTF gimmick? Considering that was TotalBiscuit's, who died just recently?

Yeah that used to be TotalBiscuit's signature review trademark. He's been dead for almost two years now. Guess some YouTuber is trying to be like him I guess.:S

I spent 220 hours with PoE2 while bulk of that time was spent on 2 playtroughs, one in RTwP and one TB and finished neither yet. In TB I enjoyed combat much more, but it couldnt improve other shortcomings, most visible being lacking ruleset and totally uninspiring main plot.

Although Im more fond of TB combat, I spent over 300 hours with vanilla Kingmaker and finished it in one breath. For me the main question is not TB or RtWP, but implementation of ruleset and quality of execution.

That's the same side I swing as I don't follow there can only be one debate. While I favor Action combat over TB it really depends on the game, and how it's implemented.

Doubt we'll see another Pillar's of Eternity game anyway as as sales flopped for part two, and obsidian is hiring for a modern unannounced Microsoft funded RPG.

Turn-based only probably wouldn't have saved the franchise either.

Are the megabosses easier in TB mode?
I beat all of the megabosses on the second highest difficulty but I had to cheese my way through them.

In general, they are about the same I'd say, but I found Dorudugan (The giant golem) is harder in TB because of his bomb detonation mechanic. In Path of the Damned at least, those bombs one-shot your party members, and here's the tricky part. While in real-time he spreads the bombs and they detonate in a certain time and all you have to do is pause and move all your characters simultaneously out of the danger, in TB those bombs sometimes are spred out and detonated before some of your members actually had a chance to act in between, leading to inevitable deaths, that in a tough and long fight as it is, ends up beating you through attrition, because your characters hit final death after 3 "knockouts" and can't be brought back anymore.

In the end you learn to manipulate a bit the turn order to try to guarantee that all your members can move in between the time the bombs are laid out and the time they detonate, together with some widespread fanning out so with luck some of the members won't have to move at all makes the fight doable, but it's never a guarantee that it will work. It makes it into a highly strategical and at times frustrating fight. To me it is by far the toughest encounter in the whole game, as it took me a good amount tries to get it down while for example, I got the Sigilmaster down on the first try, and the others within the first five attempts, give or take, which were mostly to get familiar with their mechanics and combat phases.

I also thought the TB mode in PoE was vastly superior.

The problem was that the game was still designed like a RTwP game, meaning endless trash encounters that simply don't warrant the possibilities given to you by TB.
Those encounters you can just auto-pilot through in RTwP, but in TB, they take a very long time despite offering no challenge at all, even on the highest difficulty.

Really just highlights what a crappy design trash encounters are.

I find a few trash encounters in a game fun, since they make me feel powerful. It is faster in rtwp of course, but even in tb I think it's alright. The problem to me, is if there are too many.

I agree. There's nothing wrong with lesser encounters. Not every encounter can be against some epic foe.

In reality, it just highlights one of the drawbacks of TB combat. Combat simply takes too long for some people. I got burned out on Divinty: OS because of the combat despite really liking most other aspects of the game. Every encounter was…just…so….fucking…..long. I hear D:OS II is even worse in that way, and I've seen a lot of people say they quit because of it.

I think it's matter of whether you're having fun with it or not. I never had a problem with something fun I already paid for lasting longer, especially if I can choose my pace and time to consume those hours of fun. It'd be different if I was chained to the computer playing without sleeping or eating til the game is completed.

I guess I get the concept, since I always get bored of Bethesda games because of how long they are and how redundant combat gets, topped by the fact that dungeons get repopped and as a completionist it annoys the hell out of me that I can't 100% the game, but there's no respawns in games like Pillars of Eternity or Original Sin, so to me it's hard to understand how something that someone hand placed there with their hard work to provide loot, experience and fun can be boring as long as you're getting loot, experience and fun out of it.

Plus honestly, in Original Sin at least for me most fights were over in the first couple turns, just mater of setting up a couple of nice combos.

Turn-based finally. Kidnapping the developers families and threatening them to be burned at the stake - good witch-burney medieval-style - apparently had its effect. UI is nicely designed and that blonde "shopkeeper" girl character is really well made, as are the 3D maps. This looks to be a nice game, so I have to try it out. Let's see, how it supports low resolutions and IS IT good enough for me to HACK THE FCKNG FONTS? And Make them BIG..

So regards graphics, 3D characters, UI, I respect the developers, they did an amazing job. Only if the developers earn my respect.. Only games that are good enough.. receive my Big Font MOD blessings.

Regarding trash encounters, could you not toggle turn-based on and off? I never bothered trying TB after quitting towards the end of the normal, real-time game.

Kingmaker turn-based mod allowed you to toggle the combat mode on and off, even mid-combat.

Ugh, I still need to play the first one. Every time I do I get sidetracked. Ghost of Tsushima is the guilty party this time.

While I really enjoy TB combat I’m one of the people JDR13 mentioned that didn’t finish DOS 1 or 2 despite really liking them. The fights were just too long and I ran out of steam about midway. I actually like the approach the POE took in letting you slow down the combat to half speed. I do wish they had more speed options beyond just 1/2 though.

Oddly enough the older I get the more I move toward action combat over RTWP or TB. Seems like it should be the other way around.

I haven't tried it, but I think last I looked you had to choose one way or the other for a new game. I'd assumed that was to allow for a change of encounter design between modes, to address the problems folks have been discussing.

That's a pretty elegant solution to that problem. Never tried it, but if I ever replay these games, I might try!

About the bolded part: The fun diminishes quickly for me if the fights become predictable. Unfortunately a lot of fights in DOS 1 and 2 become predictable, so they become a chore even if they end reasonably fast.

I think if the story had been better I wouldn't have felt the same way.

There are console commands to switch between the modes mid-game: "SetTacticalMode RoundBased" and "SetTacticalMode Disabled".

I feel similarly. I do think that for me it actually has more to do with how long the game is, and not the style of combat itself. And the quality of the story. Few games feel new and challenging more than in the beginning, so if the game is long I lose steam after a while.

Cool! That's informative, thanks a lot! :)

I think a lot of it has to do with pacing and shape of the gameplay and narrative development, working in tandem. For me, it's quite rare to experience that done really well.

I've enjoyed what I've played of Pillars of Eternity 1, but often the combat was a clusterfuck of special effects and creatures getting in each other's way. I almost always put it in slow mode (unless it's a complete walkover).
With a system that allows stuff like explicit engagement/disengagement, concentric area effect circles, and other tactical features, RTWP doesn't seem the best suited.

That's good to know.
I like the idea of walking through easy encounters in real-time, and slowing down to TB where it's warranted (or for more interesting fights). I'm surprised they didn't include an easily accessible toggle.

Yeah, I agree. And the older I get, the more I have experienced it done well, and therefore notice more when it's not done so well.

Don't feel bad as I never finished PoE 1&2 or OS 1&2 yet either. I always get pulled away by other games, or get sick of the story/combat of each game. Have to try again.:(

Spoke too soon. This game keeps close to the Wretched Trainwreck "Quality" of Pillows of Trashpit I., is ridiculously convoluted, BORING walls of text, SHT writing, boring stupid narration, boring and lame cutscenes and LONG LOADING TIMES. WTF?????! Even just getting to the first FCKN combat scene was agonizing..

REFUNDED!!

A V O I D W A R E !!

Brimming with pointless rage, spewing bile constantly, but also afraid of the words shit and fuck.

We are all waiting for the game he's working on to release so we can give our opinions about it. ;)

Waiting a while before I try this again. Got bored from wandering the sea map trying to fill in the blank spots. A few of the encounters were pretty fun though, and I'd like to try those in turn-based mode.

Low hanging fruit still tastes good, I suppose. ;)

Have you ever been diagnosed with any mental and/or social disorders?

@JFarrell71 and @JDR13

I'm not sure if it's mercy, but I think he's the one here who has been expressing beliefs in conspiracy theories (NWO)?

That rarely is the sign of someone with balanced opinions.

Edit: Yeah, it is amusing how some people think it is better to write curse words half obfuscated, as if it somehow becomes less bad.

What your not a fan of wrestling.:p
I'm being sarcastic for reference, and couldn't resist sorry.