Topic: Gamer thread

[Noble Korhedron]

Foundation update for No Man's Sky released today. I'll play it tonight and we'll see how it is.

Some indictment for a game that it's first major update has to be called 'Foundation', eh?

[Warlord]

To be fair, it is sci fi, so 'foundation' could mean something else.

[patsy02]

I'm surprised that the devs can afford to pay their employees after all the refunds.

[Cannonofdoom]

It's pretty good. I always liked NMS anyway, but this update has really expanded on the number of things you can DO.


Here's a summary of most of the changes.
https://youtu.be/1ID8Hn0k4Wo

[Demonslayer]

Buy it. It's a classic.

Seconded! I actually finished baldur's gate 2 a couple of days ago, great game up until the Throne of Bhaal expansion, which I felt was a bit predictable and, honestly, swapped interesting storytelling for combat challenges. Also no fun when you're using the Time Stop + Imprisonment combo to deal with difficult encounters, and suddenly bosses are free to move during your timestop and immune to Imprisonment.

Also the final boss is a battle of attrition, with no opportunity to rest and recover spells, which is REALLY annoying when you've got 4 spellcasters in your party...

[rufus sparkfire]

Seconded! I actually finished baldur's gate 2 a couple of days ago, great game up until the Throne of Bhaal expansion, which I felt was a bit predictable

I absolutely hated the obvious villain who pretends to be helping you, that the game never allows you to be suspicious of.

Also the final boss is a battle of attrition, with no opportunity to rest and recover spells, which is REALLY annoying when you've got 4 spellcasters in your party...

You just keep casting 'wish' until you get the 'rest and re-memorise spells' option! Though I think you need super-high wisdom to make it appear.

[Brad]

It's pretty good. I always liked NMS anyway, but this update has really expanded on the number of things you can DO.


Here's a summary of most of the changes.
https://youtu.be/1ID8Hn0k4Wo

Base-building in a game whose over-arching goal is to make your way through an entire galaxy.  Oooooookay.

I actually didn't mind the game either.  Downloaded the update this morning, but haven't played it yet.

[Demonslayer]

I hadn't taught Wish to my pc sorcerer, since its not a spell you use happily and often. Instead I had him learn Time Stop, Imprisonment and Spell Trap. Great spells throughout Shadow of Amn. The plan was to find a scroll of wish and teach it to one of my three mages (Neera, Imoen or Aerie), but even when I had the scroll none of them could learn 9th lvl spells (Int was too low, I guess?).

Requiring a single spell to beat a mandatory enemy is kind of stupid!

[rufus sparkfire]

I hadn't taught Wish to my pc sorcerer, since its not a spell you use happily and often. Instead I had him learn Time Stop, Imprisonment and Spell Trap. Great spells throughout Shadow of Amn. The plan was to find a scroll of wish and teach it to one of my three mages (Neera, Imoen or Aerie), but even when I had the scroll none of them could learn 9th lvl spells (Int was too low, I guess?).

Requiring a single spell to beat a mandatory enemy is kind of stupid!

You could have been a wild mage, and cast wish from level one spell slots with reckless dweomer!

Hmm, I didn't think the Int restriction on spell levels was actually implemented in the game? It wasn't in my version, anyway.

You don't need wish, it just makes things easier! Or you can just have a load of fightery types with improved whirlwind and the stupidly-overpowered +6 weapons and bash everything to death!

[Noble Korhedron]

I hadn't taught Wish to my pc sorcerer, since its not a spell you use happily and often. Instead I had him learn Time Stop, Imprisonment and Spell Trap. Great spells throughout Shadow of Amn. The plan was to find a scroll of wish and teach it to one of my three mages (Neera, Imoen or Aerie), but even when I had the scroll none of them could learn 9th lvl spells (Int was too low, I guess?).

Requiring a single spell to beat a mandatory enemy is kind of stupid!

You could have been a wild mage, and cast wish from level one spell slots with reckless dweomer!

Hmm, I didn't think the Int restriction on spell levels was actually implemented in the game? It wasn't in my version, anyway.

You don't need wish, it just makes things easier! Or you can just have a load of fightery types with improved whirlwind and the stupidly-overpowered +6 weapons and bash everything to death!

What system is Baldur's Gate 2(is this 'Dark Alliance'...?) based on? D&D 4th Ed.?

[rufus sparkfire]

It was mostly based on D&D 2nd edition, but with a few things taken from 3rd.

It's not dark alliance - I think that was more of an action rpg for consoles.

[Noble Korhedron]

It was mostly based on D&D 2nd edition, but with a few things taken from 3rd.

It's not dark alliance - I think that was more of an action rpg for consoles.

I thought I saw 'Baldur's Gate 2: DA', in GAME or GameStop at one point, for P.C....

[Demonslayer]

Baldurs gate: Dark Alliance and Baldur's gate: dark alliance 2 were both console-only games released in 2001/ 2004, based on 3rd edition d&d rules.

It only has three character option (human arvher, elf sofcerer, dwarf fighter) to choose from. I don't know you can get NPC companions like in the original game, but it did have co-op. Also it was a ljnear game, with only a few side quests.

[Brad]

The original Darksiders just got a remaster.

[Athiuen]

I hadn't taught Wish to my pc sorcerer, since its not a spell you use happily and often. Instead I had him learn Time Stop, Imprisonment and Spell Trap. Great spells throughout Shadow of Amn. The plan was to find a scroll of wish and teach it to one of my three mages (Neera, Imoen or Aerie), but even when I had the scroll none of them could learn 9th lvl spells (Int was too low, I guess?).

Requiring a single spell to beat a mandatory enemy is kind of stupid!

Need 10 Int+x to cast x level spells.  So you need 19 Int to cast level 9 spells.

[rufus sparkfire]

Need 10 Int+x to cast x level spells.  So you need 19 Int to cast level 9 spells.

I know it says that in the manual, but it definitely wasn't the case in my game!

[Cannonofdoom]

It's pretty good. I always liked NMS anyway, but this update has really expanded on the number of things you can DO.


Here's a summary of most of the changes.
https://youtu.be/1ID8Hn0k4Wo

Base-building in a game whose over-arching goal is to make your way through an entire galaxy.  Oooooookay.

I actually didn't mind the game either.  Downloaded the update this morning, but haven't played it yet.

Your base comes with a magic portal which lets you warp to it from any starbase in the universe. 

The base building is surprisingly good.

[Warlord]

That sounds dumb.

[Demonslayer]

Good planning on the game designer's end to include so many Mage NPCs who don't have that kind of INT, then... Edwin's 18, Neera's and Imoen's is 17, and Aerie and Jan both have 16.

Is there some intelligence boosting item out there that I missed?

[BAWTRM]

That sounds dumb.

I get it from a gameplay perspective, but as an in-universe thing it's completely ridiculous. Interstellar starships have about zero use in a universe where you have the tech to warp from one place to another with no range restrictions. Maybe you need a Starship to build the 'portal' on the other end?

[rufus sparkfire]

Good planning on the game designer's end to include so many Mage NPCs who don't have that kind of INT, then... Edwin's 18, Neera's and Imoen's is 17, and Aerie and Jan both have 16.

Is there some intelligence boosting item out there that I missed?

There is an ioun stone, and the machine of Lum the mad (in watcher's keep).

Seriously though, I played this game several times and all of those NPCs could cast L9 spells once they hit the correct level (18 in the mage class, I think). Are you playing the 'enhanced' version or something?

[Athiuen]

I was wrong.

According to http://baldursgate.wikia.com/wiki/Mage you can cast 1 level 9 spell with 18 intelligence.

Also: "Specialist mages gain one extra spellslot for each level, but this comes at the cost of not being able to cast spell from certain schools."

So Edwin (18 Int) at level 18 should have 2 level 9 spells but can't cast evocation as he's a conjurer.

Also at Epic levels you gain access to "lvl 10" spells.

[rufus sparkfire]

Aha! And look!

Note: Mages in Baldur's Gate II: Throne of Bhaal whose intelligence is lower than 18 can in fact learn lvl 9 mage spells and can use the lvl 10 spell abilties.

I wonder why it didn't work for Demonslayer? 

[Demonslayer]

Weird. They (Neera, Aerie and Imoen) could cast the special abilities they learned after lvl 20 or so (summon planetar, energy blades, greater alacricity etc) but  whenever I had them right-click a scroll, there was no option to "write magic" for any lvl 9 spell (wish, time stop and Imprisonment, if I recall correctly).

I did have the enhanced edition, though.

[patsy02]

Stackin' cops