What games are you playing now?

Originally Posted by Pongo
Beat Yxonomei on my second attempt. Did the EE lower the difficulty level, or have all those years of playing Infinity Engine games finally paid off….? My monk was the surprising hero of the battle, getting a -9 AC through items/potions and soloing the boss whilst my party fought the followers.

I love Icewind Dale. I absolutely love it. There must be a nostalgia factor at work here but nothing makes me as happy as an Infinity Engine game.

Ah, man. I love the game, too. Yxonomei was ridiculously hard for us. Crazy that your Monk solo'd her, too. I forget how we finally did it. Using every single trick in the book and then some, I recall.

Originally Posted by Pongo
Beat Yxonomei on my second attempt. Did the EE lower the difficulty level, or have all those years of playing Infinity Engine games finally paid off….? My monk was the surprising hero of the battle, getting a -9 AC through items/potions and soloing the boss whilst my party fought the followers.

I love Icewind Dale. I absolutely love it. There must be a nostalgia factor at work here but nothing makes me as happy as an Infinity Engine game.

Nice! What other classes were in your party?

EDIT: Reading Fluent's reply… you SOLOED IT???

I think Stinking Cloud helped us a lot in that fight. Cast a cloud, draw the followers through it, focus all +2/+3 enchanted arrows on Yxunomei, etc.. Also, kill the shamans (I think they're shamans?) that spawn in a triangle in the room before the throne room when the battle starts, as they are problematic little buggers.

Originally Posted by Fluent
No, you're more the backhanded insult type.

No, I don't insult people. People get insulted when faced with honest statements. There's a difference

To me, being honest is almost always the most respectful way you can possibly interact.

I know most of the world doesn't agree with that - but then again, I'm not a big fan of what most people do to each other.

Hmm, okay. I'd be interested to see your layout for something like Gothic, then. Or a typical RPG that has a bunch of hotkeys, at least 10, and then keys for everything from inventory to map to character sheet and the like.

I can't really show it to you. Gothic doesn't need much in the way of hotkeys - as the interface is pretty decent. I'd probably just bind the inventory key and a few others.

That doesn't sound particularly intuitive or like great control, though. But the Steam Controller also has unlimited Action Set switching. One button press and the entire controller is re-mapped.

Why are we talking about Steam controllers now?

I'm talking about mouse/keyboard versus touch screen.

That said, you can switch bindings easily using the proper software - but I've yet to play a game where an entire keyboard + mouse didn't suffice with a single set.

I use a capacitative pen and it works great. But yes, you can implement all types of shortcuts and rebinds on a keyboard and mouse, but that doesn't change the fact that I'd rather just click the character's portrait with the pen when I want to see their inventory, or click the Mage spells book when I want, etc., and feel that's a very easy, simple way to control the game. Maybe even an improved way, dare I say.

I'm not trying to change anything about what you want to click.

Hmm. I usually use a tablet controller for games like that, including emulators, or when I'm streaming something like Enderal/Skyrim to the tablet. 3D games like that on a touchscreen are not really ideal. Doable, but not ideal.

At least we agree on that part of touch screen inadequacy then

A large variety? So far I've played a dozen+ RPGs, some first-person dungeon-crawlers, isometric roguelikes, games like Heroes of Might & Magic 3, etc., on a touchscreen just fine. But of course, every game is unique unto itself and it depends on the game itself. I wouldn't want to control NBA 2K or Madden with a touchscreen.

I've played more than a hundred tablet games - and the vast majority would have been significantly improved with proper mouse/keyboard controls.

I just don't find that to be the case, but to each their own. If there is something inferior per game, I think it makes it up with things like comfort level in your surroundings, the mobility factor and so on. And since the games I personally play don't need perfectly optimal conditions, i.e. I'm not playing competitively or professionally, comfort factor goes a long way.

Again, I'm sure you think so. I find myself unable to argue the value of comfortable surroundings - as I tend to prefer a very immersive gaming experience - where the most important part of the surroundings is that they don't disturb me or my experience

Originally Posted by purpleblob
Nice! What other classes were in your party?

EDIT: Reading Fluent's reply… you SOLOED IT???

No, the monk had help! I have a beserker, an undead hunter, monk, fighter/thief, mage and cleric.

My winning tactic was that the fighter thief stayed back to help with the enemies that spawn behind you; the monk charged headlong at Yxonomei and soaked up all the attacks with a -9 AC; the beserker and the undead hunter teamed up to hack the shaman to death; cleric went the other way to soak attacks; mage threw summons and speed spells around.

My first (failed) tactic, which worked last time I played it, was to summon loads of creatures into the hallway, gather my party in one of the side rooms, and then trigger the encounter and draw the enemies into traps. Major fail this time round - they swarmed through my summons and wiped me out in about a minute!

Nice, Ponga! Oh yeah, we summoned everything we had and then some, too. lol. That was a big tactic for us in that fight, to keep the summons alive and make sure to re-summon when they were defeated.

Nice suggestion about pen Fluent, I never thought of about it.

I have windows tablet so got any cheap suggestion for pen pls?

Originally Posted by lostforever
Nice suggestion about pen Fluent, I never thought of about it.

I have windows tablet so got any cheap suggestion for pen pls?

Give me a sec, I'll look. Mine was included with my tablet.

Originally Posted by Fluent
Nice, Ponga! Oh yeah, we summoned everything we had and then some, too. lol. That was a big tactic for us in that fight, to keep the summons alive and make sure to re-summon when they were defeated.

I think that was pretty much my winning tactic too lol.

Originally Posted by lostforever
Nice suggestion about pen Fluent, I never thought of about it.

I have windows tablet so got any cheap suggestion for pen pls?

I'd give this one a shot.

https://www.amazon.com/AmazonBasics-…lus+tablet+pen

AmazonBasics makes great quality stuff, and that has a nice, thin point. Doubles as an ink pen, too, which is pretty funny.

Get yourself some nice microfiber cloth, too, if you don't have any. Amazing for making the tablet screens look new again.

Would also suggest a simple leather/whatever case that doubles as a stand. Mine is a leather case that you can fold the back of and it creates a triangle stand. It's very useful.

Originally Posted by Fluent
I'd give this one a shot.

https://www.amazon.com/AmazonBasics-…lus+tablet+pen

AmazonBasics makes great quality stuff, and that has a nice, thin point. Doubles as an ink pen, too, which is pretty funny.

Get yourself some nice microfiber cloth, too, if you don't have any. Amazing for making the tablet screens look new again.

Would also suggest a simple leather/whatever case that doubles as a stand. Mine is a leather case that you can fold the back of and it creates a triangle stand. It's very useful.

Thanks Fluent.

However amazon UK does not have the same model. Does the one below will do? But it doesn't look like pen?

https://www.amazon.co.uk/AmazonBasic…rds=Stylus+Pen

Originally Posted by lostforever
Thanks Fluent.

However amazon UK does not have the same model. Does the one below will do? But it doesn't look like pen?

https://www.amazon.co.uk/AmazonBasic…rds=Stylus+Pen

The fat, bulbous tip ones work, I have a few of them, but after using the pen-style type I greatly prefer that. Too bad the Shield stylus doesn't work with other tablets or I'd highly recommend getting one of those.

This one is a bit thinner and also well-reviewed:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Universal-C…tablet+windows

So I'd probably go with that one over the AmazonBasics one in this case.

Start a new thread if you want to continue talking about tablets.

Getting back on topic… I tried playing Ravenloft: Strahd's Possession yesterday.

Unfortunately, that didn't last long. I really wanted to like it, but the combat is terrible, and there's way too much of it.

It's a shame because it seems like a good game otherwise. The music is great in an old-school way, and it has tons of atmosphere. They made a poor decision to go with real-time combat though. There's little strategy involved, and you basically just click on enemies until they're dead or you're overwhelmed.

To make the matter worse, enemies seem to be infinite, and they respawn at an insufferable rate.

Yeah I bought the Ravenloft games on gog recently. Moving around felt slow and weird and combat was poor. I didn't get far in, so I've never been sure if I gave it enough of a chance before quitting. I might browse some LPs at some point to see whether it's worth going back and investing the time in it. Certainly some folk around here really like it. But yeah my initial impression was the same as yours.

On my PC I restarted Pillars of Eternity the other day (after reading Jeff Vogel's blog) and am having fun replaying the same areas I've replayed about a dozen times before getting to less-played spots

On my iPad I've had a hankering for some hidden object puzzle-adventure type games, so am playing 'Letters From Nowhere' 1 & 2 … fun little games, nearly done with the first one, might jump to a different series rather than the 2nd one … and will then be done for the year with those games

Nearly finished WD2.
When I do, I'll write in "finished thread", the game deserves a few words.
But here I'll just say… Silly Ubisoft. They had GTA killer in their hand and completely missed the opportunity with atrocious "business" decisions.

Originally Posted by Pongo
Yeah I bought the Ravenloft games on gog recently. Moving around felt slow and weird and combat was poor. I didn't get far in, so I've never been sure if I gave it enough of a chance before quitting. I might browse some LPs at some point to see whether it's worth going back and investing the time in it. Certainly some folk around here really like it. But yeah my initial impression was the same as yours.

There was a recent thread on rpgcodex, where a couple of people described their experiences playing through Ravenloft: Strahd's Possession and both came to the conclusion that the bad outweighed the good. It's an interesting read if you want a better insight into what the game is like.

I found the Dark Sun games much more re-playable than I did the Strahd game. I did finish the vampire one, but that was the third time I played it and doubt I ever will again. The Dark Sun games I totally see myself playing again at some point in the future.

Level 9 Caed Nua…love fighting all the trash mobs every 30 sec.

I hear you Bobo, that was miserable as fuck.
Anyway I picked up Heroes 3 for the n time. Impossible player diff + impossible map diff + this map. Also chose one of the worst towns statistically (Inferno), first week was rough, now in month2 I'm slowly exterminating computers with Dimension Door/Town Portal. Huge map, been almost a week in rl