Endurance woes

Hello, could you please explain the endurance? Yes, I understand how it works, what I don't get is how to calculate it on-the-fly.

- Do characters lose endurance in battle only upon being hit?
- Is it always a fixed amount of endurance lost from any monster\person's hit or different?
- Does being hit by sword or magic loses you the same amount of endurance?
- Do all characters lose the same amount of endurance on hit or is it class-dependent?
- Can I see the numbers somewhere as the battle goes on?

So far all battles feel completely random, as I cannot calculate and predict what's going on as the battle is taking place. Health would be so much better and transparent.

I think of it as having two health bars. The vertical bar on the left is the "classic" hit points (health) bar that's just what you would expect from a classic game (except that every character has QUITE a lot of them). There's also the endurance which is a lot more like the modern health bars, meaning it actually recharges back to full after the battle finishes. As your endurance goes down, a red color covers the character portrait. When the character takes damage it takes off endurance and hit points.

When a character starts to get very low on hit points, you'll notice that endurance can't recharge completely back. It seems that endurance can never be greater than hit points. If endurance goes down to 0 then the character is 'knocked out' but will get back up after the battle is done (or if certain powers are used). If hit points go down to 0 then the character is dead and turns into a pile of loot - forever gone if you don't re-load a save.

Most healing acts on the temporary endurance, not on the permanent hit points. All the ones that do return HP only return a small number of them. (Part of the difficulty settings cover how many camp site items you can carry so letting you heal HP would screw that up.)

Thanks, but I understand this, I just don't understand how to deal with endurance. As it is, let's take for example a room full of skulldrs (+skulldr king) in eothas' temple. My characters get knocked out real fast and the whole party "dies" regardless of almost full health bars. It's frustrating, because I do NOT understand how to make them last longer and take more hits. Yes, athletics are upgraded for all characters, yet this isn't enough.

This almost makes me hate the game at the moment, at least playing feels unpleasant and absurd. Why can't a damn fighter class character take more than a few hits? There's such a crowd of foes in that room that killing everyone without being hit is impossible! So what's the deal, how am I supposed to do that? Other characters have it even worse and get knocked out faster, or so it seems. I'm freally frustrated.

P.S. It almost feels like I'm playing BG with all characters having meager 20HP per battle.

If you're struggling with a particular area, it probably makes sense to go elsewhere for awhile to gain more experience and then return when you've leveled some more.
Although I remember clearing the Eothas temple early even without Edar. (Rogue, Fighter, Mage…)

Perhaps make sure you have a Priest or endurance regenerating buff of some description for your party. Drinking potions just before combat starts can also help. Conservative strategies such as scouting ahead as well with rangers/rogues and drawing 1-2 enemies back to choke-points to make fights more manageable is also advisable.
Fighters also eventually have some of the best deflection/defense adding abilities in the game (defender comes to mind) which if used well, should enable you to survive for longer.

Also, Baldur's Gate starts at level 1. Sometimes mages can start out with less than 8 hp.

I'm strugging below the keep now. There are just too many enemies. A crowd of xaurips would be fine, if not for a couple of wyrms shooting fire at the party, to boot.

I'm kind of stuck. No idea how to proceed. Going somewhere else is an option, of course, Wooded Plains is open.

I'll try to rest and play again, but to be honest, I'm disappointed with the game. Not so much with combat, but more with the writing. It's so bland and boring. Not only dialogues, but everything. There are no interesting events in the game. The last RPG I played was Trails in the Sky and oh boy, was it a hundred times more interesting! Even combat, although easy, was more exciting.

You are still playing on PotD? If so, maybe you should take Arhu's advice and lower level of difficulty until you are comfortable with tactics? Game should be challenging but it shouldn't be frustrating and you sound frustrated…
As for making your team last longer… In addition to what Pessimeister have said, use food before fight and potions during it. Have you managed to recruit Durance? If not, hire (or create) priest at the inn. Priest buffs are life savers in combat.
And it's of course a matter of taste but the writing in PoE, while not great, isn't bad. I think that you are simply frustrated by the difficulty level that you have picked.

I don't understand why you're trying to play it on the hardest difficulty on your first playthrough.

Wouldn't it make more sense to just lower the difficulty instead of complaining that it's too hard?

Eder - Can I pet him? Can I pet him?
Sagain - It's your hand…
Eder - I'm gonna pet him!

later

Sagani - How's the hand?
Eder - Turning purple. Might have to cut it off.
Sagani - I warned you not to pet him.
Eder - If I'm not supposed to pet him why is he so soft?

Bad writing my foot!

I played on hard, too, and to be honest didn't notice much difference from PoTD. I find the same encounters difficult on both difficulties, and in a pretty much equal way! And the same ones are easy. So I'm baffled. I think that I fail to undertand how to beat huge crowds rushing the party: the game wants me to beat them extremely quickly (until endurance runs out), which is what I fail to do.

I don't really know what my problem is.

What I notice is that spells seem too weak on both hard and potd and they don't last nearly enough time even despite values like Int20.

Example. There's priest spell "Halt" in Durance's spell list. It lasts like 2 seconds of real-time, I swear. My party can't kill the held individual quickly enough. And meanwhile about 5 other enemies are rushing the party… So I just don't use this spell, because I consider it bad tactics, something AoE is better against a huge crowd. With single-target spells and\or party is targeting one enemy they're getting beaten by others and get knocked out.

And all spells are like this. Too weak and not long lasting enough. I think melee weapons do much more damage. What's my problem?

And wizard damage spells… I don't see them doing any decent damage at all. Same for cipher's. Spells like charm and dominate are useful against small enemy groups, but against 6-7 enemies? I can't deal with such a crowd. Also at some point I almost entirely stopped using cipher's "whisper of treason", because it just doesn't last long enough to matter and takes too much valuable time to recast it.

Range attacks with bows? They do like 1-3 damage, seriously, I don't even bother with bows. Yeah there are maybe better bows, but my party has no money to buy them.

If anyone here can tell me what I'm doing wrong I'd be very grateful. I really want to enjoy this game.

P.S. And I really think that writing is mediocre. It's not because of being frustrated with difficulty. I get the same feel from it like I got from Bound by Flame. As if the same people wrote this.

But that may be due to having played Trails in the Sky before this game, its writing and characters were amazing, setting was detailed and names easy to remember (unlike Ruatiau and whatever unpronouncable words PoE throws around!), various events were coming together to reveal the plot behind the scenes and I kept wondering how everything would be solved. PoE is so simple in comparison. I think I only enjoy it because it has some sense of BG-nostalgia, yet BG's quests were more exciting.

For larger groups you need 2 tanks. I have Eder with sword and shield and, with the Defender ability and Hold the Line talent, he can hold 4 enemies. Pallegina with 2h sword can hold one or two. ALL members of my party have ranged weapons in their second slots.
It all depends on the level but now my PC cypher has 3 blunderbusses, Grieving Mother 2, Sagani has bow and the rest have arquebuses.
Once I detect the enemy (and find what the group consist of) I withdraw to a convenient point, set a normal trap plus one of Durance's spell traps. I then send Eder forward (now with Boots of Speed) to aggro the enemy and drag them over the traps to the rest of my group.
Have you set the game to pause when combat starts?
Once the game pauses Durance casts Armor of Faith on the tanks and Circle of Protection on the whole party. With particularly difficult mob (and if you have the ability) it's also the time to do your summons.
When enemy arrives I fire all the ranged weapons on the target of choice (which, usually, kills or mortally wounds it). Tanks switch to melee weapons and my cypher casts Mental Binding on the most dangerous enemy.
And then you have to improvise depending on the circumstances.

Be aware that some mobs (like shades and spectres) can teleport so be prepared for that eventuality.

Thanks that's really helpful, I hope I can develop better tactics than those I'm using.

Remember about food (and beer for the tanks) before fight and potions during it. Also, at levelling up, get your tanks Survival skill up so the consumables last longer. For tanks only Athletics and Survival skills are important. You don't need to up their Stealth to more than 3.
And use Eder's Clear Out and Knockback abilities. They do come handy!
Remember also that your wizard can learn spells he doesn't know from captured grimoires.

And, finally, drakes… couple of well aimed Winter Wind spells (and a Blizzard if necessary) from your druid should do the trick.

Elel, who have you got in your party? A lot of folks go diving right into that dungeon with just the wizard, the fighter, and their main character - and promptly get creamed. You might want to explore the wilderness areas a little or hire some help in the bar. Also, a single level of experience can really make a pretty big difference.

Zloth, I'm underleveled for that dungeon for sure, you're right. I've yet to travel to the city and have only met three of companions. But I have crowd-control issues with various other battles, too, so I could use crowd tactics info.

What class is your PC Elel?

A 5th level cipher, fire godlike. 18 might\dex, 20 int, 10 res, 9 con and 3 per. I'm thinking of replaying with a moon godlike for its endurance restoration waves.

Aloth, Eder, Durance and Kana are in the party. Noone else met.

To give you an idea of general war potential of the party: my cipher's mace does something like 5-17 damage, and Aloth's necrotic lance spell just landed a whopping 11! Now, don't you love magic that produces such amazing damage to foes?

Ok, try this… since Kana can chant while tanking use him as an off tank with heavy armor and either 2h sword or sword and shield (see which one works better) and any protection/deflection ring you can spare.
Make a custom druid at the inn. Druids have great damage/CC spells.
Aloth - use Slicken as one of his 1st level spells. It's not as good at later levels but at the early ones it's very useful.
Necrotic Lance - its base damage is 35-45 so, if you are doing 11, means you are using it on the wrong enemy. Always read Bestiary. It might not have all the info you need at first but it will make your life SO much easier!
And one more thing - when exploring (above ground or under) always use scouting mode. Remember that you can combine scouting mode with the fast mode.

Oh and beware… this 3 in perception will hunt you throughout the whole game! It will not affect your fighting capability but a LOT of scripted dialogue options are perception based and only PC skill levels count in most of those dialogues.
IMO (and my PC is also a cipher) cipher certainly doesn't need 18 in dex. 11 would be plenty enough. And up con to 10. You get penalties at 9.

Did anyone actually explain endurance/health yet? If not, here goes:

Endurance is basically health in this game. When it's down, the character gets knocked unconscious. Health simply indicates when a person is actually about to permanently die, after which they can't even be brought back to life. Endurance is regenerated between each fight (and with spells, potions etc), but health is only regenerated by resting. Health is there to ensure that you can't go on forever without resting, and the same goes for the limited camping supplies.

Also, I completely agree regarding two tanks: I basically found it mandatory on higher difficulties. I went with a Fighter + Paladin the first time and Fighter + Monk the second, and they both work out well, though the former combination is probably a bit more solid.