Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous

Malor wrote:

The difficulty level used to be insane; they detuned it a bit to be merely extremely difficult, and only after massive player complaints. Every time your game ends prematurely, someone at that company does a little happy dance.

This is very true.
I both love and hate the game for that.

I hate the fact that most of the quests are small contained areas and then every now and then they toss a giant insanely obnoxious place you have to explore into the mix. Gotten to the end of the Other World part and i have reached the point where the game is turning me off.

Yeah I lost steam in the final arc. It's big and it's tough to boot. Maybe I'll go back and finish it, maybe I won't. Lots of fun to be had though.

In the end I went with a knife master rogue - I didn’t really see any fighter / wizard builds that really appealed - but not sure that’s really necessary given your companions at the start. I seem to be very light in the ranged combat / magic department.

If you look up some of the builds for Olivia, she can be just devastating. You can talent her to get extra crit damage on spells, not just physical attacks. Her cantrips are scary, never mind her limited spells. Being able to throw a fireball that also crits everyone it hits can get stupidly overpowered. But you need that kind of OP build to prosper.

Systems I hate in games:

‘To Hit’ mechanics where you spend more time missing than hitting in the early stages, hidden behind a complex mathematical model that you need a PhD in so as not to end up with a build that’s completely broken and can’t hit a damn thing.

I’m having THAC0 flashbacks. I’ve also restarted as those pre-built companion builds are not good.

I’m fully aware a lot of D&D based games suffer from this but boy does Pathfinder make it very nakedly obvious what’s happening.

I really hate hit rating in some/most games. The XCOM games are basically unplayable imo.
Never bothered me in Pathfinder or similar games. Maybe because you have so many options on how to deal with it, and if you miss you can always just attack again. Doesn't feel as punishing as in turn-based games.

Some tips:
-Make sure you have a class with fighter tier BAB (base attack bonus). That is the problem with dual or triple classes, your BAB suffers and may not show its true problem until higher levels where stats get ridiculous.
-Ranged touch attacks do not use armor to determine hit% (many of the wizard style cantrips are ranged touch attacks)
-Pretty sure you can at least partially respec companions
-knife master rogue or any rogue for that matter get a big boost at level 3 with finesse training which allows you to use dex for damage rolls in addition to hit%
-pets can help here too; they can soak up hits at the very least, they can trip and get attacks of opportunity
-flank, flank, flank and bottle neck enemies
-every character comes with a ranged weapon in the alt slot, use them at the start of the battle and you are much more flexible with no more than 2 in melee range (your ranged can focus on what is being tanked or a pesky back row caster)
-race (the right one) can be a big deal for a class just starting out

Yeah you can respec companion class levels (barring their first level??) but you can't reallocate their stats.

The Ranger companion is powerful, as is his pet. With the longbow Metal Eater (?) he and his pet can outdps a lot of builds.

There's a knife master companion who is a sneak attack machine that can match the Ranger (easily outstripping the Barbarian if not attacking a boss with high defence).

Beyond those two companions, the starting Fighter companion (assuming you save her) is amazingly tanky once geared up.

It only costs gold to respec so you can do it pretty freely later on (to a limit as the costs scale with each respec).

Shadout wrote:

I really hate hit rating in some/most games. The XCOM games are basically unplayable imo.
Never bothered me in Pathfinder or similar games. Maybe because you have so many options on how to deal with it, and if you miss you can always just attack again. Doesn't feel as punishing as in turn-based games.

Not that I'm trying to defe........... no, I'm really trying to defend XCOM: XCOM's "to hit" mechanics are plan, simple and right there in front of you when you try to take a shot. It'll say, "xx% to hit". That's all there is to it. That most people translate that into "70%+ will hit all the time" is their problem, not XCOMs. Even a 95% chance will miss one time in 20, and there are a lot of shots in XCOM.

This Pathfinder game's "to HIT" mechanics are hidden behind multiple different stats depending on abilities, weapon proficiencies, AC and a load of other variables. I've got to be honest I'm finding quite confusing a way, lets say, that I didn't for Pillars of Eternity.

However, I'm sort of enjoying it now I've got a better idea of what I am doing. That said given everyone the ability to make sneak attacks seems somewhat over powered. Especially from ranged.

This Pathfinder game's "to HIT" mechanics are hidden behind multiple different stats depending on abilities, weapon proficiencies, AC and a load of other variables. I've got to be honest I'm finding quite confusing a way, lets say, that I didn't for Pillars of Eternity.

That is Pathfinder in a nutshell. If you are in to that, it is addicting fun. If you aren't, you can still work your way through the game at least once with minimal struggle after you restart 2 or more times.

Ok now the game is a Kingdom Managment game. I....... what?

Any tips?

turn the kingdom difficulty to easy but don't put it on automatic. make sure you are floating 100 or so resources to deal with random events.

This game has one of the oddest narrative structures I think I've ever come across.

So now I've completed the "second" main quest (deal with the Trolls) I'm now just meandering around, doing a little Kingdom Management here and there and clearing up what side quests I have. Nothing further about the main quests has cropped up. I've actually had to look up what is supposed to happen next - basically wait as far as I can tell - before I can get on and do something that feels constructive, or doesn't involve spending all my "building points" researching curses (and even then I'm not sure that's what I'm supposed to be doing.

I don't think I seen or played a more faithful tabletop conversion of a D&D type game. Which is probably why I'm struggling with it a little now. I feel like I've got a DM who's totally inflexible and will only let me progress at their pace and in their timeframe. It's not exactly "fun".

I don't know how much further I'm going to get with this but we'll see. There's definitely a lot in it, and I can see why the people who love it really love it, but it's not doing it for me right at the moment. Far too much busy work involved, not enough story or character development.

What's funny is that I found the actual tabletop version of Pathfinder Kingmaker to be a terrible adventure path to play.

I am surprised there is no news on the Pathfinder Wrath of the Righteous sequel. (not really a sequel but the second pathfinder game from Owlcat Games)

fangblackbone wrote:

I am surprised there is no news on the Pathfinder Wrath of the Righteous sequel. (not really a sequel but the second pathfinder game from Owlcat Games)

the second phase of the closed alpha is in progress right now. 3 acts being tested

Nice! Thank you.
Beneath the Stolen Lands is built in this time around, right?

Still pretty buggy, and I haven't had a chance to spend much time in it, but the bones of kingmaker were a good foundation so it's much further along than it otherwise might be

The strategic overmap is basically where you ensure you don't tarry with clearing that hill thing and episodes or you get heavily penalised. Beyond that, towns create merchants and side quests plus quick teleport / travel points. I didn't really care for it, actually.

I began this a couple weeks ago after finishing Shadowrun Hong Kong but thanks to this thread my enthusiasm has completely dropped out. Guess I'll start up Deadfire instead!

The rogue like endless dungeon DLC, Beneath the Stolen Lands, is the saving grace for those who struggle with the campaign. And also a great how to build a character playground to get lost in.

Sorbicol wrote:

This game has one of the oddest narrative structures I think I've ever come across.

So now I've completed the "second" main quest (deal with the Trolls) I'm now just meandering around, doing a little Kingdom Management here and there and clearing up what side quests I have. Nothing further about the main quests has cropped up. I've actually had to look up what is supposed to happen next - basically wait as far as I can tell - before I can get on and do something that feels constructive, or doesn't involve spending all my "building points" researching curses (and even then I'm not sure that's what I'm supposed to be doing.

Thank heaven for that. I thought it was just me and something I'd done (or not done) before being put in charge. I really want to love this game, but it feels like they've put too many ingredients in and the end result is not what you want. As other posters have mentioned, my desire to load it up is not as strong as it could be.

That most people translate that into "70%+ will hit all the time" is their problem, not XCOMs.

FWIW, I'm pretty sure that the hit percent you were shown wasn't always accurate. I was using a mod or a setting that gave you real random numbers each time, and I saw multiple occurrences where reloading after missing a 90% shot would keep missing, sometimes five or six times in a row. That should absolutely happen sometimes, but missing the same 90% shot twice in a row should happen only one time in a hundred. Three times is 1/1000, four times is 1/10000, and so forth. I saw it happen way more than that.

It was pretty apparent, with savescumming, that the percentages displayed were not the percentages that actually got used. Just from observation, my guess was that the displayed number was typically 10% high, and sometimes 20%.

An alternate explanation is that the PRNG wasn't being correctly re-seeded by the mod I was using. But I normally got quite different results if I went back a couple turns, so I felt that it was working.

Malor wrote:
That most people translate that into "70%+ will hit all the time" is their problem, not XCOMs.

FWIW, I'm pretty sure that the hit percent you were shown wasn't always accurate. I was using a mod or a setting that gave you real random numbers each time, and I saw multiple occurrences where reloading after missing a 90% shot would keep missing, sometimes five or six times in a row. That should absolutely happen sometimes, but missing the same 90% shot twice in a row should happen only one time in a hundred. Three times is 1/1000, four times is 1/10000, and so forth. I saw it happen way more than that.

It was pretty apparent, with savescumming, that the percentages displayed were not the percentages that actually got used. Just from observation, my guess was that the displayed number was typically 10% high, and sometimes 20%.

An alternate explanation is that the PRNG wasn't being correctly re-seeded by the mod I was using. But I normally got quite different results if I went back a couple turns, so I felt that it was working.

I'd read the opposite, that the game tells you lower than real, telling you 20% when the math is actually 50/50 ,to discourage you from taking shots that 'feel' like a good chance but actually aren't because humans such at making those judgements.

Finally getting into this, just made it to the Rushlight Tournament with only 500K gold to spend, I’ve heard there’s lots of goodies to buy so I hope that’s enough for what I want. I’ve spent quite a lot on my kingdom though, so the trade off is that I have all kingdom stats to 6 and I’m bringing in 110 BP a week. I’ve researched all but four curses and my characters just hit 14, so hopefully that’s decent for where I’m at. I’ve done every side and companion quest, but there are still several areas I haven’t visited yet. I’m trying to hold off on those until I’m leveled enough to handle anything. The designers love to throw in a super high level monster here and there, just to rip my party a new one.

Overall this has to be one of the greatest, and at times most frustrating, CRPGs I’ve ever played. I’ll definitely pick up the sequel, no question there.

Wrath of the Righteous comes out this Thursday! I have already pre-ordered so I am waiting for my key

The campaign looks much more interesting and developed. There is no kingdom management. They've opted for a crusade system which looks like a simplified HoMM. The good news is it seems to come way later in the campaign so you aren't futzing with it all through the campaign.

It doesn't look like the rogue like BtSL random dungeon is implemented at launch but will be in the first season DLC. The season pass looks worthwhile but I am not spending $100 for the bundle. I will wait for the inevitable sale...

If you were overwhelmed by all the class choices, you are in luck. There is probably twice as many with several new classes and new archetypes for existing ones. There are also a handful of new prestige classes to boot.

New spell lists, hexes, mounts and mounted combat, companions, it never ends ;P

Yep, super hyped.

Time for another bug-infested rage-inducing 100 hour game
Hopefully not.

From what I've heard, there are still bugs but seemingly nothing game breaking or show/campaign stopping. There are some expectations for bugs with all of the classes, archetypes, feats and spells. I don't think there is any other game that tops it. Perhaps Path of Exile's passive tree rivals it ;P

The Kingdom Management in Kingmaker was lifted straight out of the tabletop Adventure Path. The crusade system, I believe, was similarly part of the Wrath of the Righteous AP as well, though I could be mistaken. I know that WotR was the AP to sell the Mythic rulebook, but most of the APs have at least one subsystem included as well. I'll dig up my old books out of curiosity and see.

I had no idea this existed until I read about it in the POE 2 thread. Tagging this to come back to later as it sounds like the perfect game for me.