Antharion

crpgnut · July 18, 2015

Anybody else playing this? This is a simple game but I'm having quite a bit of fun with it. It's old school, at least in difficulty. You level slowly, you need food to rest, you can be killed in 4 or 5 hits. Gear is expensive and money is hard to come by, etc.

Party of four and I'd suggest that even your mages take up some archery or a weapon. You're going to want to save spell points for the harder battles as you'll have to rest often and you might run out of food if you rest too much.

There really isn't much strategy. It is very hard to form a battle line as the terrain is generally open. I'm having a ton of fun with it. Think Eschalon or the early Exile games or Avernum without skills.

Hastar · July 18, 2015

Great game so far. Got my party to lvl 7. Played way too long yesterday and that is always a good sign. Items and gold seem just right for now. Always trying to save every gold piece. Leveling up characters is perfect. You have to make hard decisions. Dungeon design seems just right for this type of game.

The biggest endorsement that I can give is that I stopped playing Witcher 3 yesterday to play Antharion. Really happy I gave them $75 at kickstarter. Money well spent and I can not say that about every project I have backed.

I posted this in another thread. I am loving the game so far. That a good tip on the mages and weapons.

sakichop · July 18, 2015

I'm looking forward to trying this. I'm PCless at the moment. Upgrading and moving it to new cases and watercooling loops, then upgrade my sons with some of my old parts. I'm playing bloodborne while the PC's down.

I backed it and was starting to think it would be vaporware, so I'm glad to see it released.

Sacred_Path · July 18, 2015

I love it. Playing with a party of hybrids right now, trying to make "evil" choices. It's great to see some C&C in such an indie game, better done than Eschalon or Spiderweb games IMO. I'm gonna replay it afterwards with a party of professionals.

fadedc · July 19, 2015

I decided to give it a try. I had fun for a few hours, but it's starting to feel really repetitive now. It may be just a little too simple for me. I like the difficulty, but every fight feels kind of the same, and as others have said there is no real strategy in combat, you just bump into your enemy until one of you is dead. At least fights are short.

Sacred_Path · July 19, 2015

The fun lies not in the combat mechanics but in party building. As others have noted things are expensive so deciding on which character to upgrade is half the battle. If you like that layer of strategy more than turn based tactics, this game will very much suit you. If not play TOEE or an Infinity Engine game, maybe

The continuous thrill of exploration and unlocking quests drives me forward in this game. If there's one thing I don't like, it's probably trainers - but I'm not sure if you'll ever amass enough gold to trivialize skill gain.

fadedc · July 19, 2015

I do like the fact that gold is valuable and that there are always things to buy. I'm just not sure that's enough to keep me playing. I don't necessarily need deep turn based tactics (although it's nice), but I need something a little more than just hitting attack over and over until the enemy is dead.

Hastar · July 19, 2015

My party is lvl 14 now and still having a real fun time with it. Exploring and building your party is what this game is about. Cool magic items in game and I also like the spells. Combat is not great but it is not bad and I have used some strategy with the web spell and keeping my mages away from the front line.

So far I would say a solid 8/10 but I am a sucker for turn based rpg's. Still playing it more then Witcher 3 atm

crpgnut · July 20, 2015

I keep restarting, trying to find what suits me the best. I've finally settled on a party and I'm about level 6 and I've done the first level of the codex dungeon. I went back up for supplies and I've got to decide whether to go down to level 2 or perhaps take out the bandits blocking the road. I'll probably do level 2 and then see where I stand.

Even though I have 30 in lore and foraging, I haven't found any secret doors outside of the first dungeon. Has anyone else found secret walls in the beginning areas?

Sacred_Path · July 20, 2015

I've found another one in one of the mines with 0 lore. 30 Lore seems a bit much for a skill that doesn't really pay of at the beginning. Can't comment on foraging, I had a forager in my party but that was before the patch.

My current party:

Orc tank (one handed/defense)
Human fighter/ mage (two handed/grey magic/defense)
Felmur archer (archery/lockpicking)
Undead priest (white magic/barter)

Training in alchemy at some point seems like a given considering you find a lot of ingredients and they don't sell for much.

crpgnut · July 21, 2015

You might not have to train alchemy at all to use it though. If you can find items that raise your alchemy from 5 to 10, that will allow you to make weak mana and healing potions. With the limit on alchemy ingredients, you may not need over 10 alchemy for a long, long time. Those low level potions are great for extending an adventure before needing to rest.

I've restarted again and this time I'm focused on the non-combat skills. I started a game with a 25 skill forager, a 25 skill lockpicker, and 25 skill barterer and a 25 skill black mage to handle combat. Basically, everyone is a sponge in front of the mage. Even with the default level 5 skill in melee and bows, you have about a 65-70% of hitting a same level critter. As I level, I'm putting points into the melee skills, but having a level 25 barter from the beginning saves a lot of gold. I'm also adding in pickpocket as fast as I can, so I can start robbing all the townspeople. Fun!

Sacred_Path · July 21, 2015

crpgnut said:
Even with the default level 5 skill in melee and bows, you have about a 65-70% of hitting a same level critter.

Which is why I find archers are great builds. Since you only really depend on Dex, which raises your damage and incidentally your chance to hit, you don't really need much weapon skill and are free to concentrate on non-combat skills.

edit: btw, is there any way to get your stuff identified apart from the lore skill? I sure hope so. I'm carrying around sets of armor and two handed weapons waiting to be identified.

crpgnut · July 21, 2015

Yes, take them to the magic lady in the first village. Her building is to the party's just past the bridge as you enter town from the prison. Other villages have magic merchants too, so you identify at any of these, iirc.

Archer builds are also expensive though. It costs 1 gp every single time you attack, except for arrows you find. You'll find enough in the wild to make one archer fairly cheap. Two or more archers gets expensive fast.

Hastar · July 21, 2015

Yes the magic shops in cities will identify your items. Not expensive only like 37 gold per item.

Hastar · July 21, 2015

Later on in some dungeons in the swamp area around lvl 13 creatures I needed a 50 lore to get in some secret doors.

crpgnut · July 21, 2015

HiddenX owns this game. I hope he starts figuring out the stats behind melee, archer, mage combat etc. I always get a kick out of those who can figure out the math behind the combat

Ooh, good to know about the lore. I'm giving lore to the mage and will start buying lore every other level.

crpgnut · July 21, 2015

Here are some of my general strategies, feel free to add your own:

Gray magicians can polymorph. Magic using creatures resist it sometimes, so use polymorph on archers. It takes them out of combat for a couple rounds, letting your fighters kill the melee types and then close on the piggies. Also the pigs will sometime wander into melee range while under the spell

Get flame pillar as soon as possible. It doesn't cost that much more than the single target firebolt and it covers 9 squares. I use firebolt until the creatures line up against my melee guys, then I fry a whole line in one cast. With 30 in BM, you'll be doing 20 points of damage to each creature.

Get a sextant and then write down the coordinates of chests/doors/etc. that you want to come back to.

Unrestigered · July 21, 2015

This game has a lot of annoying factors to me, but I am enjoying it and want to go back and play more, so there is something that keeps pulling me back. I think it is worth the price tag not on sale. There is a lot of meat on this game, but it is different meat than I like. Combat is very basic, and I dislike the train for gold improvement system.

I've been leveling up like a maniac just pick-pocketing people (and saving and reloading a million times). I dislike how you have to be right on top of something to see if it is searchable or if it is a secret door. Once I discover a secret door give me a message or let me find it again by mouse-over when my party is not near it. It is kind of like first person crpg mechanics in a isometric view game. It doesn't seem to fit well.

HiddenX · July 21, 2015

I own the game, but at my current game finishing rate I'll play this game in 2020...

crpgnut · July 21, 2015

Hastar said:
Later on in some dungeons in the swamp area around lvl 13 creatures I needed a 50 lore to get in some secret doors.

Do you see the doors with less than 50, but get a notice that it requires X amount of lore to open?

Antharion

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