Dragon's Dogma

Some random, some not, some have a short list of possible items and randomly pick from the list.

If I didn't have to restart the game from the begining due to the freeze on eye color pick (not just purple, lightblue kills the game too) I probably wouldn't be able to notice it.

I'm still at early part, running forward-back checking people… Wtf is with those quests that appear sporadically and are not available instantly?! And why contracts on tables also aren't all available but new ones appear later on the same table?
I wouldn't care much if there were no bloody respawns between areas, but this is rediculous.

A question, is the bird nest useable somehow? I can't hit it, can't use it (E) and can't pick it op (F)?

It must be system specific, I picked blue eyes and haven't had in issue in 95 hours.

Contracts on tables!? You mean notice board quests?? You can only have a few from each board. (Maybe five of them?) When you finish one, another shows up until the board runs out. Advancing the main quest can put more quests on the boards, too.

Notice board quests are all just little quests that, IMHO, aren't really worth pursuing much. Just grab all you can and most will solve themselves. If you get tired of the other quests, maybe go do a few notice board quests.

You can hit nests. They are pretty little, though, and you can't target them so it isn't that easy. (And the reward sure wasn't much in the nests I broke.)

Originally Posted by sakichop
It must be system specific, I picked blue eyes and haven't had in issue in 95 hours.

Blue perhaps, grayblue, not. I doubt it's system specific but I just can't be arsed to restart for the third time and screenshot exact color that will freeze your game.

Originally Posted by Zloth
Notice board quests are all just little quests that, IMHO, aren't really worth pursuing much.

Not in my case. Some of those give crapload of $ as reward.
And you know that I'm that player type who wants to turn every stone and complete everything possible. And I don't like halfbaked cakes in RL either.

Originally Posted by joxer
Blue perhaps, grayblue, not. I doubt it's system specific but I just can't be arsed to restart for the third time and screenshot exact color that will freeze your game.

Not in my case. Some of those give crapload of $ as reward.
And you know that I'm that player type who wants to turn every stone and complete everything possible. And I don't like halfbaked cakes in RL either.

Eh, Joxer don't forget to do Fournival escort quest last ( ignore the dutchess)…you're in for a surprise.

I did the first escort sidequest in the starting village (some girl trader), but then found three new ones on the board. And I took one. That one shows a part of the map I haven't been to yet, so I went there.
Met hydra and some dragon along the way. On my low level, both are unkillable. Pawns even comment something like "we don't do no damage!". Hydra I can run past and avoid, dragon, can't as it blocks the passage and sees me from a mile then rushes towards my party. So had to revert back to an hour, maybe even more old checkpoint.

I bet all escort quests are equally horrible and am planning to do them all last, not just some duchess.

Honestly people, what is so impressive in this game? The more I play, the more things I find it becomes more annoying instead of being fun.
Another thing I noticed in the meantime is that save won't save at least you inventory in the game, upon reverting you'll be back to the checkpoint without any loot you got between the save and checkpoint. Wtf?

Oh and I found the teleport back stone. The one that is not oneuse. At least I can fasttravel between the starting village and the capital now instead of running back and forth and grind over the same old mobs all day long.

Another question - the party?
One of party members seems should be a healer (a mage in this game) in every case while the rest can be mixed randomly even all the same classes will work. Am I right?
And why in offline game items you give to secondary pawns are considered gifts?

Originally Posted by joxer
I bet all escort quests are equally horrible and am planning to do them all last, not just some duchess.

Honestly people, what is so impressive in this game? The more I play, the more things I find it becomes more annoying instead of being fun.
Another thing I noticed in the meantime is that save won't save at least you inventory in the game, upon reverting you'll be back to the checkpoint without any loot you got between the save and checkpoint. Wtf?

Capcom paid Brumbek exorbitant amount of $ to promote it, so everyone had too high expectations.
Seriously, think this as 3d person Diablo…everything is in service in combat.

Diable? It's not. It's the best singleplayer WoW. Kill 100 rabbits to get, dunno, something irrelevant in the long run.

Yes, combat against (mini)bosses does feel a bit refreshing and is probably a reason why I didn't ditch the game after a few hours. But grinds over everspawned trashmobs just because there has to be a filler to stall the game progress is disgusting. Also is it just me or some mobs if not all - scale if not levels then their resistances/damage? I've been towards which' hut for the second time due to mentioned escort board mission and bandits seemed harder to kill this time. I hated Oblivion.

Originally Posted by joxer
Diable? It's not. It's the best singleplayer WoW. Kill 100 rabbits to get, dunno, something irrelevant in the long run.

Yes, combat against (mini)bosses does feel a bit refreshing and is probably a reason why I didn't ditch the game after a few hours. But grinds over everspawned trashmobs just because there has to be a filler to stall the game progress is disgusting. Also is it just me or some mobs if not all - scale if not levels then their resistances/damage? I've been towards which' hut for the second time due to mentioned escort board mission and bandits seemed harder to kill this time. I hated Oblivion.

Well Joxer, I warned you that you wouldn't like it but you just had to see for yourself.

Skip optional escort missions in the beginning if you see them leading you far off. If you just follow the game in a logical progression, i.e. Doing all the little side quest in one area before venturing off you should easily be able to handle what ever comes your way. I'm level 35 and haven't died once or had any need to reload a save. The game is rather easy.

Early on the only thing that should give you trouble are bosses so just ignore them. You can run from all of them even the dragon rather easily ( except scripted ones), you may lose a pawn or 2 though since they're dumb.

Bosses are just typically big HP sponges with multiple health bars but are usually easy as well do to poor AI. If you get low on health just run behind a rock or really a little ways away and it will attack your pawns and then you can heal yourself your your Mage will come running to heal you. All bosses have weak spots and your pawns should tell you where to hit them. Even the dragon is easy, I fought it around level 30. It took me an hour because it has so many hit points and it's hard to damage even when hitting the weak spot, but I never got close to dying because it's easy so easy to dodge or circle.

The game is all about the combat. Story is light (at least what I've seen) exploration is there but useless as I haven't found a weapon or armor better than what I could buy and upgrade at gran Soren. Unfortunately decisions like limiting you to 6 usable skills at a time and having to go to specific nPC's to switch skills, endless mobs, poor enemy and pawn AI taint the combat experience and it only gets worse the longer you play because you seem to greatly out level the enemies.

The game does have a certain charm to it and I enjoy the pawn system, fighting bosses initially is very cool when climbing them and what not. Combat is also very cool initially. For the first 20-30 hours (for me at least) I thought the game was excellent. Unfortunately all the flaws that were initially ignorable start to wear on you and take their toll.

I'm level 35 and I'm not sure how much I have left. I've explored most of the main map and part of bitterblack. I'm at a point now where I need to gather evidence for a trial which is more backtracking I'd guess. I haven't played in 2-3 weeks and I'm not sure that I will get back to it at all.

Thanks for the input.
I don't think the game is excellent but rather slightly above mediocre at least early. Can't judge the whole of it based on such short time - I'm not Gamespot/IGN employee. Will play more, so far it doesn't look like NWN where after a while I just couldn't imagine playing it to the end, but that can still change.

Yeah, it was too grindy for me to finish, but I got dozens of hours of fun before moving on to Oblivion. Same with DA:I. I'm getting to the point where it is rare for me to finish a game.

DA:I cannot be the same, ever.
The trick is to put difficulty on easy while Hinterlands (all of those) to instakill or at least fastkill annoying filler then put it on hard while in actual story areas where mobs aren't godlike and won't respawn. Remember that dragons don't respawn so do it on hard! Bears do respawn. Endlessly. God I wish there was newbornchild difficulty because of that crap.

But this way you'll definetly finish the game. Sadly seems in Dragon Dogma you can't strategize like this.

OMG the rabbit quest! It was a loooooong time before I finished that one. Every time I went back to the home town I killed a few. There's some in an early room on Bitterblack, too, along with some deer (which also has a hunt quest). It's definitely much better to keep that one around and use it as an excuse to kill rabbits. And deer. Or did I finish that deer quest? Who cares!! Muuuhahahaaa!

Yeah, a mage in every party for sure. You might be OK without one with some very late game items that slowly regenerate but that's a long, long way off.

Not sure what you're asking with respect to gifts. If you're offline, I wouldn't give the pawn anything. Heck, if you're close to some deep water, just pick up the pawn and chuck him/her into the brine. If you want to impersonate Trump saying "You're fired!" then so much the better.

I'm playing the game off line.
Stopped buying anything on secondary pawns. Now I just recruit new ones after a few levels.
I do upgrades on the main pawn.