Welcome back, if you post your details in the format requested here forums.cormyrdalelands.com/index.php?board=110 that will help them get your chars moved over for you.
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#2
General Discussion / Constructing a CD Class Tier List
Jan 22, 2019, 05:40 PMI saw this thread and starting think who would be an S rank, who would be A rank and if I could get away with putting Bella as B rank just because of the lettering, then I found out you were all talking classes and I was disappointed.
#3
Off Topic / Pathfinder: Kingmaker
Dec 13, 2018, 02:41 PMSo, I am about 70% of the way through it, and the short version is, if you liked the Baldurs gate style games, or Pillars of Eternity you will enjoy it but it is not without flaws.
The Setting, Pathfinder much like the Pillars of Eternity games both draws heavily from and suffers because of its DnD (Especially Forgotten realms) influences. Your mind can not help but look for connections that are not there, stories that never happened in this world and as such it will sometimes feel like putting on an old pair of slippers that have a small rock just under the Bridge of your foot. Most of the time you wont notice it, but when you do it will feel like a much bigger annoyance than it actually is.
The Story. It is based I am told on a PnP module of the same name and in my opinion they have done a really good job of transfering it to a CRPG, you will see lots of people complaining of "Difficulty spikes" and having to "save scum"... Mostly these people never played a proper old school CRPG, where the loading screen literally told you "Save early, save often" they didnt pay attention to the small visual clues that indicate a difficult optional challenge / Side quest is ahead. Over all the Story is enjoyable but it does have moments that cause you to bang your head against a wall.
Speaking of banging your head against a wall.
The "kingmaker" side of it is woefully underexplained and obtuse, it is possible to royally fuck up your game by fudging this to the point that unless you turn off the possibility in the difficulty menu, your game can and will end in fire. However, this does allow for one of the BEST difficulty managers of any game ever to shine, you can literally tune ANY Element of the game, finding combat just a tad too harsh, just lower the crit damge modifier of enemies by 0.1 there are also a LOT of overall difficulty levels.
The characters. Initially I thought the companions introduced were cookie cutter and bland, but as the game goes on they show a decent level of depth, while none as as Memorable as Minsc, Jahiera or the Mass Effect Crew they do a good job of delivering their stories, motivations and goals and inject enough personality into them that you will have a couple that you refuse to ever leave town without.
Plot twists, while a few of them are cool, so far I have yet to hit a moment that made me go "Oh wow".
So over all I would say it is a solid RPG, from a new studio with a good future ahead of them, with Obsidian potentially getting Microshafted in the near future (and yes I appreciate the irony of ME making that statement) Owlcat may well carve out a nice enough little niche for them selves.
Ruleset, I am not familiar with Pathfinder at all, but it is close enough to DnD 3.5 that the transition was easy, however, be prepared to read a lot of tooltips if you are new to the system like I was before it sinks in. PS Group feats can be OP AF if you use them right.
If you enjoy old school CRPGs with concessions in presentation to the modern but not to the core gameplay then give it a whirl. I bought it on launch day at full price, and I have not been disappointed. Had it not been for the new Assassins creed basically stealing me in a way few games ever have I Would have put even more time into Kingmaker.
Overall I rate this game, 7.77777 @belladonna's out of 10
The Setting, Pathfinder much like the Pillars of Eternity games both draws heavily from and suffers because of its DnD (Especially Forgotten realms) influences. Your mind can not help but look for connections that are not there, stories that never happened in this world and as such it will sometimes feel like putting on an old pair of slippers that have a small rock just under the Bridge of your foot. Most of the time you wont notice it, but when you do it will feel like a much bigger annoyance than it actually is.
The Story. It is based I am told on a PnP module of the same name and in my opinion they have done a really good job of transfering it to a CRPG, you will see lots of people complaining of "Difficulty spikes" and having to "save scum"... Mostly these people never played a proper old school CRPG, where the loading screen literally told you "Save early, save often" they didnt pay attention to the small visual clues that indicate a difficult optional challenge / Side quest is ahead. Over all the Story is enjoyable but it does have moments that cause you to bang your head against a wall.
Speaking of banging your head against a wall.
The "kingmaker" side of it is woefully underexplained and obtuse, it is possible to royally fuck up your game by fudging this to the point that unless you turn off the possibility in the difficulty menu, your game can and will end in fire. However, this does allow for one of the BEST difficulty managers of any game ever to shine, you can literally tune ANY Element of the game, finding combat just a tad too harsh, just lower the crit damge modifier of enemies by 0.1 there are also a LOT of overall difficulty levels.
The characters. Initially I thought the companions introduced were cookie cutter and bland, but as the game goes on they show a decent level of depth, while none as as Memorable as Minsc, Jahiera or the Mass Effect Crew they do a good job of delivering their stories, motivations and goals and inject enough personality into them that you will have a couple that you refuse to ever leave town without.
Plot twists, while a few of them are cool, so far I have yet to hit a moment that made me go "Oh wow".
So over all I would say it is a solid RPG, from a new studio with a good future ahead of them, with Obsidian potentially getting Microshafted in the near future (and yes I appreciate the irony of ME making that statement) Owlcat may well carve out a nice enough little niche for them selves.
Ruleset, I am not familiar with Pathfinder at all, but it is close enough to DnD 3.5 that the transition was easy, however, be prepared to read a lot of tooltips if you are new to the system like I was before it sinks in. PS Group feats can be OP AF if you use them right.
If you enjoy old school CRPGs with concessions in presentation to the modern but not to the core gameplay then give it a whirl. I bought it on launch day at full price, and I have not been disappointed. Had it not been for the new Assassins creed basically stealing me in a way few games ever have I Would have put even more time into Kingmaker.
Overall I rate this game, 7.77777 @belladonna's out of 10
#4
General Discussion / Let the Dwarves Loose! (Interest Check)
Dec 04, 2017, 09:02 PM #5
General Discussion / Let the Dwarves Loose! (Interest Check)
Dec 04, 2017, 09:01 PM
#6
General Discussion / Beamdog Announces Neverwinter Nights: Enhanced Edition
Nov 21, 2017, 05:16 PMFrom the FAQ
Will the server browser work again?
Yes, the server browser has been rewritten so you can once again find servers for multiplayer. At this time the original NWN restrictions apply: The server host must be reachable at the external UDP address and port advertised through your NAT firewall.
Will 1.69 clients be able to connect to NWN:EE servers?
No. While save games and modules created in older versions of Neverwinter Nights are usable in Neverwinter Nights: Enhanced Edition, NWN 1.69 players won't be able to connect to NWN:EE servers. Like all previous patches, we change the networking model continuously to allow us to implement new features and fix bugs. You will need the same NWN:EE client version to connect to an NWN:EE server.
Jason Knipe: The graphics engine has been updated so that everything runs through GLSL shaders, including the toolset. The shaders reproduce the old hardware T&L functionality from the original NWN, and were not meant to add detail or fidelity that did not exist in the original. However, this means that you can create and apply your own custom shaders in the game which opens up a wide variety of graphical possibilities.
Bernhard Stöckner: We've done a thorough security audit of the codebase, removing all known exploits and crash issues in the process. We have also addressed a great many engine, game and rules problems, as well as improved server performance significantly.
On the big feature front, we have done work as well. In addition to things mentioned elsewhere, you can expect to see a collection of new scripting commands and ini configuration flags, hak loading before character creation, area instancing, and much more as the beta will progress and bring in feedback.
Last, but not least, we've approached the NWNX developers and are actively helping them with a clean and complete rewrite of the codebase to the new release, so that the majority of server transitions will go as smooth as possible. Future patches will receive the same loving attention!
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Graphically, other than the UI scaling, it looks nothing more than an ENB mod, there certainly wont be a massive jump in fidelity but if it gets a decent level of community support the cell shading functionality will make for some interesting possibilities for community created content to look really nice and crisp
I am hyped, but lets set expectations, Beamdog are just very committed modders in terms of what they can actually do, I do not get the impression they are reverse engineering the combat system for example, however there was one bit what was VERY interesting and I think Fire Wraith might be happy with, (Haks loading before character creation).
Will the server browser work again?
Yes, the server browser has been rewritten so you can once again find servers for multiplayer. At this time the original NWN restrictions apply: The server host must be reachable at the external UDP address and port advertised through your NAT firewall.
Will 1.69 clients be able to connect to NWN:EE servers?
No. While save games and modules created in older versions of Neverwinter Nights are usable in Neverwinter Nights: Enhanced Edition, NWN 1.69 players won't be able to connect to NWN:EE servers. Like all previous patches, we change the networking model continuously to allow us to implement new features and fix bugs. You will need the same NWN:EE client version to connect to an NWN:EE server.
Jason Knipe: The graphics engine has been updated so that everything runs through GLSL shaders, including the toolset. The shaders reproduce the old hardware T&L functionality from the original NWN, and were not meant to add detail or fidelity that did not exist in the original. However, this means that you can create and apply your own custom shaders in the game which opens up a wide variety of graphical possibilities.
Bernhard Stöckner: We've done a thorough security audit of the codebase, removing all known exploits and crash issues in the process. We have also addressed a great many engine, game and rules problems, as well as improved server performance significantly.
On the big feature front, we have done work as well. In addition to things mentioned elsewhere, you can expect to see a collection of new scripting commands and ini configuration flags, hak loading before character creation, area instancing, and much more as the beta will progress and bring in feedback.
Last, but not least, we've approached the NWNX developers and are actively helping them with a clean and complete rewrite of the codebase to the new release, so that the majority of server transitions will go as smooth as possible. Future patches will receive the same loving attention!
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Graphically, other than the UI scaling, it looks nothing more than an ENB mod, there certainly wont be a massive jump in fidelity but if it gets a decent level of community support the cell shading functionality will make for some interesting possibilities for community created content to look really nice and crisp
I am hyped, but lets set expectations, Beamdog are just very committed modders in terms of what they can actually do, I do not get the impression they are reverse engineering the combat system for example, however there was one bit what was VERY interesting and I think Fire Wraith might be happy with, (Haks loading before character creation).
#7
Off Topic / Well wishes and abundances of joy to future mama (again)
May 19, 2017, 05:02 PMWe need to have whip round and get her a T.V. she is starting to breed like a Tentazione.
#8
ServerQuestions / Smite Evil!
Aug 13, 2016, 09:19 PM
~BR
This, once you have extra smiting it is basically about making it "better" until you get great smiting,
Unless you go "Champion of X"
#9
Player Announcements / Stuff That Went Down, Voss, and Moving Forward
Jul 31, 2016, 01:11 PMSo, I have had literally 0 experience of either side of this discussion. Maybe I missed it cos for the last year or so I havent been able to play much who knows.
I will say this, NWN servers are goldfish bowls made out of magnifying glasses. You will get all kinds of people here, from the hugely overly sensitive Tumblr types to the massive dickweasel 4chan types. Because of the fishbowl nature you have to treat playing here like you would working in an office in some ways. You dont have to like everyone you work with, you do however have to remain civil with them, that is a given, that is basic stuff, I only mention it because I am going to lean on the office analogy quite heavily, but first I need to bring another one in.
The second is the snowflake effect that happens on the internet, everyone is the star of their own little drama in nwn and part of the mindset for being able to do that requires that people put a little bit of them selves into it. So what does this have to do with anything, well what it means is between the Goldfish bowl magnifying everything that comes into it, and the fact that people are invested on an emotional level here, their attachment to their avatar or their OOC personal even is multiplied beyond what it would be to say a PnP character. So this means when people are emotionally invested but they are exploring and expressing that through a medium that removes oral communication cues, and removes body language cues, leaving only text, as a result that text is read in to a LOT harder.
So, essentially if I read this right, and again, I am not part of any events that happened before that I know of. You went to the office party, had a dump on the photocopier, called the bosses wife a whore and told your colleagues to go fuck them selves, smashed a few PCs and then flipped them off as you left for home. Now you start by saying you want to repair any damage that was done, well, you are going to have to do a better job of owning it mate.
Firstly Don't try and give "mitigation" in an apology, when you mitigate an apology you take away from its effectiveness. No one that you have to apologise to cares about the reasons behind your actions or mitigating factors AT THIS STAGE. If you know you fucked up and you want to try and repair that then start by showing that, without caveats because when you caveat it, what you are saying is "Im sorry, but I dont want you to blame me" no, if you have to apologise then you are to blame, suck it up for now. Yes there are three sides to every story but at this stage you are the one who is coming forward so don't half bake it, because then it just looks like you either dont mean it, or you are trying to bait people into "Taking their share" which is not the way to do it, go all in, look back and realise that you made mistakes and lern from it but also understand that when you mess up, mitigating factors only matter in determining the extent of any penalties that result from the actions.
Secondly, once you own it fully own it and not just say you do but actually decide that you do, then you can start rebuilding. Portioning out blame or giving your self a safety net not only takes away from the power of an apology but it also stops you from being able to learn and grow from the experience. Until you honestly sit there and look at it not from the perspective of "What lead me to this" But "How can I get past this" you wont be able to. The power in an apology is that it shows people you understand that what you did was detrimental to them, yes, it leaves you vulnerable because you have to be for it to have any effect, you are in essence taking a part of you and rebuilding it after all. So stop trying to mitigate it, I dont know what transpired, I am sure from your point of view there is a whole other side to it, there are factors and people that pushed you to it, but you are the one seeking some measure of forgiveness and eventual reciprocity on your efforts.
People add background information to give their statements of apology or argument more gravitas when its not needed, your personal situation is your own, I am glad its getting better, but it neither excuses nor validates anything, its the same for everyone, we all have our perceptions and those are our reality.
Finally, understand that an apology only has the power the peoples its offered to let it have. Some people wont accept it, you wont be able to rebuild friendships with people all the time, all you can do in those scenarios is live and let live, you dont have to be friends with everyone here, but you do have to be able to co-exist. Your focus needs to be on showing that, dont try too hard, just let it come in its own time.
Some people will keep you at arms length, accept that, others may try and give you a hand, accept that too. In time, if you actually take my advice and genuinely own your mistakes, you will find other people will at the very least gain an amount of civil respect for you, and though they wont forget, or in some cases even forgive past mistakes, they will move on.
Finally, for everyone, this is a game, its not the hunger games, there is no life or death prize, Dont put too much emotion into it even if it is your escape from the reality, keep a bit of perspective on life when you log in and log out.
Like I said, I wasnt involved in the Original dramas, so I have no opinion on that, this is just a bit of advice to try and help you get past it.
Own your mistakes, without reservation, celebrate your success' in just the same way.
Now if you will excuse me, I am normally known for shit posting and trolling people, so I am going to go get back to that.
I will say this, NWN servers are goldfish bowls made out of magnifying glasses. You will get all kinds of people here, from the hugely overly sensitive Tumblr types to the massive dickweasel 4chan types. Because of the fishbowl nature you have to treat playing here like you would working in an office in some ways. You dont have to like everyone you work with, you do however have to remain civil with them, that is a given, that is basic stuff, I only mention it because I am going to lean on the office analogy quite heavily, but first I need to bring another one in.
The second is the snowflake effect that happens on the internet, everyone is the star of their own little drama in nwn and part of the mindset for being able to do that requires that people put a little bit of them selves into it. So what does this have to do with anything, well what it means is between the Goldfish bowl magnifying everything that comes into it, and the fact that people are invested on an emotional level here, their attachment to their avatar or their OOC personal even is multiplied beyond what it would be to say a PnP character. So this means when people are emotionally invested but they are exploring and expressing that through a medium that removes oral communication cues, and removes body language cues, leaving only text, as a result that text is read in to a LOT harder.
So, essentially if I read this right, and again, I am not part of any events that happened before that I know of. You went to the office party, had a dump on the photocopier, called the bosses wife a whore and told your colleagues to go fuck them selves, smashed a few PCs and then flipped them off as you left for home. Now you start by saying you want to repair any damage that was done, well, you are going to have to do a better job of owning it mate.
Firstly Don't try and give "mitigation" in an apology, when you mitigate an apology you take away from its effectiveness. No one that you have to apologise to cares about the reasons behind your actions or mitigating factors AT THIS STAGE. If you know you fucked up and you want to try and repair that then start by showing that, without caveats because when you caveat it, what you are saying is "Im sorry, but I dont want you to blame me" no, if you have to apologise then you are to blame, suck it up for now. Yes there are three sides to every story but at this stage you are the one who is coming forward so don't half bake it, because then it just looks like you either dont mean it, or you are trying to bait people into "Taking their share" which is not the way to do it, go all in, look back and realise that you made mistakes and lern from it but also understand that when you mess up, mitigating factors only matter in determining the extent of any penalties that result from the actions.
Secondly, once you own it fully own it and not just say you do but actually decide that you do, then you can start rebuilding. Portioning out blame or giving your self a safety net not only takes away from the power of an apology but it also stops you from being able to learn and grow from the experience. Until you honestly sit there and look at it not from the perspective of "What lead me to this" But "How can I get past this" you wont be able to. The power in an apology is that it shows people you understand that what you did was detrimental to them, yes, it leaves you vulnerable because you have to be for it to have any effect, you are in essence taking a part of you and rebuilding it after all. So stop trying to mitigate it, I dont know what transpired, I am sure from your point of view there is a whole other side to it, there are factors and people that pushed you to it, but you are the one seeking some measure of forgiveness and eventual reciprocity on your efforts.
People add background information to give their statements of apology or argument more gravitas when its not needed, your personal situation is your own, I am glad its getting better, but it neither excuses nor validates anything, its the same for everyone, we all have our perceptions and those are our reality.
Finally, understand that an apology only has the power the peoples its offered to let it have. Some people wont accept it, you wont be able to rebuild friendships with people all the time, all you can do in those scenarios is live and let live, you dont have to be friends with everyone here, but you do have to be able to co-exist. Your focus needs to be on showing that, dont try too hard, just let it come in its own time.
Some people will keep you at arms length, accept that, others may try and give you a hand, accept that too. In time, if you actually take my advice and genuinely own your mistakes, you will find other people will at the very least gain an amount of civil respect for you, and though they wont forget, or in some cases even forgive past mistakes, they will move on.
Finally, for everyone, this is a game, its not the hunger games, there is no life or death prize, Dont put too much emotion into it even if it is your escape from the reality, keep a bit of perspective on life when you log in and log out.
Like I said, I wasnt involved in the Original dramas, so I have no opinion on that, this is just a bit of advice to try and help you get past it.
Own your mistakes, without reservation, celebrate your success' in just the same way.
Now if you will excuse me, I am normally known for shit posting and trolling people, so I am going to go get back to that.
#10
General Discussion / Thank you for Positive DM experience (Not for aDM Feedback!)
Jul 29, 2016, 11:26 PM@scint and Edge
Was really nice to finally be a part of that storyline, and it was very cool and interesting, thanks.
Was really nice to finally be a part of that storyline, and it was very cool and interesting, thanks.
#11
General Discussion / Thank you for the positive RP experience.
Jul 29, 2016, 11:25 PM
#12
Suggestions Archive / Barbarians Still Need Help (An Analysis)
Jul 28, 2016, 07:30 PM
I agree with you that levels should be an afterthought, but lets be realistic and avoid the nosebleeds that come with perching on top of that particular moral mountain.
Human nature is thus, if you place a challenge infront of some one they will do one of 3 things
They will run away from it, go around it or they will run at it.
That is unfortunately a fact, levels matter because they gate content, and when you put that there you make the levels matter. Levels also matter because there is a point to them, they are an approximation of power based on a system that measures literal experience. So when you have a manifestation of power in a multiplayer environment the next thing people seek is a balance to it. That is either in the form of "Everyone should be equally good" or "Everyone should have their niche".
Where CD manages to stop its self from becoming like an MMO is that most people understand that "Good enough, is good enough" if your build allows you to express your character and participate in content then people are happy, most will find a niche for any character. Sure, you might have to wait a couple more levels before you can run Gnolls or Giants with people, but equally if you are high enough level its group based anyway. So its not game breaking if some classes are not as powerful as their peers.
However, lets not kid our selves, people want to explore, and adventure and feel like they are contributing mechanically to their group. Brushing off discussions of balance by saying "Well it shouldnt matter its all about the stories" Should be accompanied by removing every area except the towns and player houses. Because why bother having dungeons? Because its part of the setting, part of the fun, so yeah, theres no need to go all wow happy with balancing characters. But I would respectfully (and believe it or not, this is respectful because I admire the vision you all have for this server and the way you stick to it) suggest that the purist RP overview in this case does not address the core point. The core point being Barbarian as a class lacks tools when compared to the Fighter, I wouldnt compare it to the Paladin because of the RP restrictions around them, but in direct comparison to the fighter, its less effective at everything.
Barbarians simply dont measure up to the other Front line fighter classes unless they multi class. Now lets not make barbs op, but if they can be given a bit of flavour and pushed into a more "useful" spot within a group that too is great.
Anyway, honestly I am rambling, I dont really have an opinion on the proposed changes, I just personally find it a little harsh when mechanics discussions are shut down with the "Its all about the RP". Yes, RP is important, but this is also a video game expression of that. Its ok to treat it as such from time to time.
#13
Off Topic / Pokemon GO
Jul 27, 2016, 09:41 PM"What the fuck is this outside it keeps wanting me to go to?"
#14
Off Topic / Pokemon GO
Jul 26, 2016, 09:08 PM
And yeah, those are everywhere, along with Spearows and Weedles here, other things elsewhere.
Try this site out - it helps a fair bit for me. pokevision.com/
*Sigh*