It's a game where your first playthrough you should treat like a tutorial to yourself. I personally loved the game and played through it with different backgrounds over and over again as the entire game changes completely depending on your choices.
It is very star dependent so playing a hybrid character is not recommended for first few playthroughs.
I would say to focus on role-playing as a talker or fighter and stick to it. Don't try and do everything in one game as that isn't possible nor the point of the game.
If you liked the demo then you're likely to enjoy the rest of the game as it plays similarly. The only changes really are that it opens up quite a lot.
It is an excellent game, be prepared to invest quite some time into it to learn exactly what works and what does not. I would completely agree with Pladio, that if you enjoyed the demo, you'll likely be thrilled with the full game. What you've learned by playing the demo will serve you well!!
Character creation is defining a role and its main strength, then the game is a challenge to match well the role. One aspect of this approach that I disliked a lot, is many stuff you could try do won't work because it's not fitting the role you created.
The diversity in one play is weak, and becomes quite good only through metaplay from replaying the game multiple time with very different roles at creation.
It's a very bizarre experience, in my opinion quite overrated for its real gameplay value too railroaded for one role, and very weird because of the amount of possibilities you see but closed to a specific character.
But I don't know anything else similar, thankfully, so this makes it worth a play or even better some plays. Myself, for now, I gave up finish one of the multiple plays started.
I really enjoyed it too, though I wouldn't recommend it for everyone.
I'd say the setting and lore of the world (post-apoc Roman civilization), the combat (turn-based goodness) and the excellent quest design are the highlights. It is also very replayable, as each background basically has their own specific storyline.
It's rather linear though and does not have much in terms of exploration. And as Pladio mentioned, it is indeed very stat heavy, and I usually found myself always keeping some skill points in reserve in case I needed them to pass a check.
I went with an Assassin with high dodge and dagger and had a blast. I am still planning on running through it as a Lorekeeper to (hopefully) get more of the lore.
EDIT: Here's the old impression thread in case you're interested. Lots of spoilers in there though.
Oh. I forgot to mention one thing that I think this game truly excels at.
The feeling of progression and getting stronger with a combat oriented character is immense. Every but of armour matters. Every skill point matters. A weapon upgrade makes a huge difference.
Im thinking of starting a new game now as an assassin maybe...
Yeah, if you liked the demo, I'm sure you'd enjoy the game. Pladio's advice is very important.
Where ppl go wrong with AOD is thinking you can succeed at everything (in one playthrough). If you try to spread out your skill points making a jack of all trades character you won't be good at anything and probably die a lot. Just think what type of character you want to play and stick to it. And use common sense. If you choose to play a thief, specialize in some skills you'd expect thieves to use.
Common criticism of AOD is that it "encourages save scumming" because you can just reload and spend points when you fail a skill check. While that criticism has some truth to it, it's possible to resist save scumming if you just accept that your character will not be able to do everything…. just play it the first time with the goal of trying to survive until the end.
There's some secrets / endings that are a bit tricky to uncover and may require consulting a walkthrough but save those for later playthroughs.
One tip about building characters that I don't think counts as a spoiler but I'll put in tags anyway:
the etiquette skill is almost completely useless. Unless I've missed something, it's only used a couple of times at most (and most of those few occasions are on the quests specific to one background). Most of the other skills can potentially be used a good amount of times, at least if you pick a background where it makes sense that it will come up…
Yeah, if you liked the demo, I'm sure you'd enjoy the game. Pladio's advice is very important.
Where ppl go wrong with AOD is thinking you can succeed at everything (in one playthrough). If you try to spread out your skill points making a jack of all trades character you won't be good at anything and probably die a lot. Just think what type of character you want to play and stick to it. And use common sense. If you choose to play a thief, specialize in some skills you'd expect thieves to use.
Common criticism of AOD is that it "encourages save scumming" because you can just reload and spend points when you fail a skill check. While that criticism has some truth to it, it's possible to resist save scumming if you just accept that your character will not be able to do everything…. just play it the first time with the goal of trying to survive until the end.
There's some secrets / endings that are a bit tricky to uncover and may require consulting a walkthrough but save those for later playthroughs.
One tip about building characters that I don't think counts as a spoiler but I'll put in tags anyway:
the etiquette skill is almost completely useless. Unless I've missed something, it's only used a couple of times at most (and most of those few occasions are on the quests specific to one background). Most of the other skills can potentially be used a good amount of times, at least if you pick a background where it makes sense that it will come up…
It certainly is an underused skill compared to some others, but if you play as a talkative person, it can be of use. Many checks for persuasion/streetwise also take that skill into account when speaking to certain people.
Since skill upgrades cost more each level, it can be a way to get through some checks.
For example, if you need a total of 12 Streetwise + ThisSkill, then if you have 6 of ThisSkill and 6 of Streetwise, that would cost fewer skill points than 8 in Streetwise and 4 in ThisSkill.
However, I do not think there is even one check in the game that needs it to be higher than 5 on its own, so I would not level it up past that unless you think you need 12 and have just enough points to level up ThisSkill.
The highest combined one I know of is 14 which is with Streetwise.
This would mean you would need at least 4 points in ThisSkill and 10 points in Streetwise. This may be quite difficult compared to 6 & 8 or 7 & 7 points each respectively.
If keep in reserve level up resources (skills, attributes, more) is a classic way to compensate lack of ability to predict future in RpG and no respec, use those resources for one skill check is also a classic way to screw up a build.
