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Post by skalpadda on Aug 22, 2023 8:25:08 GMT
There are definitely a few places in acts 2 and 3 that desperately need an optimisation pass. It runs just fine on my pretty old PC 99% of the time, but there are spots where it suddenly chugs to a crawl for seemingly no reason.
I probably wouldn't have Astarion with me if I didn't need his sleight of hand skills (he hates my do-goodin' ways), but he does have one of the more interesting stories so far and a lot of interactions in dialogue. He's a single target monster as a thief with two shortswords: Good mobility, two bonus offhand attacks, and I gave him rings that deal some bonus damage with every attack and found gloves that let him add his attack modifier to offhand attack damage. Don't even bother trying to set up sneak attacks most of the time because he shreds anyway. And he somehow has 20AC.
I have started using Karlach's ability to rage-throw people into other people more. It sends them prone which gives Astarion free sneak attacks, or you can group enemies up for AoE's, or I'll have my PC jump on their heads in owlbear form. Much better than the damage from throwing alone. Apparently the Tavern Brawler feat is brokenly good, but I've just given her more points in strength so she hits more and can throw heavier people.
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Post by Wrongshui on Aug 22, 2023 10:12:10 GMT
In act 1 there's a trident that will return to you when thrown, that coupled with tavern brawler and enraged throw will last you awhile.
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askew
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Post by askew on Aug 22, 2023 12:32:43 GMT
Piss. Encountered Laz’ael but wandered too far looking for a way to release them and the quest got marked as completed 😫
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askew
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Posts: 6,802
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Post by askew on Aug 22, 2023 16:07:42 GMT
Anyway to see the Narrator's dialogue? Met with Nettie and the narrator was saying something just as the cut-scene started.
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Post by skalpadda on Aug 22, 2023 16:29:32 GMT
She shows up in the dialogue archive for me, sometimes under her own name in the list, or her remarks are added to the dialogue of the character I was talking to. Can be accessed via the journal (J). No idea if everything she says gets added there though.
A whole companion getting deleted without warning for something silly like walking slightly too far away is the sort of thing I'd quickload for btw. I'll live with my decisions and bad rolls, but losing a companion with a massive quest chain is a bit much.
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askew
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Post by askew on Aug 22, 2023 18:16:32 GMT
Yikes. Got beaten by a big boss spider.
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Post by salaman on Aug 23, 2023 10:37:28 GMT
Yikes. Got beaten by a big boss spider. God that dungeon was annoying, with those beasts teleporting all over the place. I did OK until I got to the boss spider. It wiped my party 2 or 3 times. I left it until I gained a level and did OK then. |
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Post by salaman on Aug 23, 2023 10:40:06 GMT
So I started Act 2 via elevator into the shadowlands. Ran into a first big fight, survived, then was told a safe spot was marked on my map and to be careful. Then within about 10 seconds, my whole party dropped unconscious from the curse or something?
it was late, I decided to call it a night and try again later.
The game always finds some way to keep you on your toes. |
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askew
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Post by askew on Aug 23, 2023 10:47:39 GMT
Yikes. Got beaten by a big boss spider. God that dungeon was annoying, with those beasts teleporting all over the place. I did OK until I got to the boss spider. It wiped my party 2 or 3 times. I left it until I gained a level and did OK then. I thought I was being clever burning the webs from underneath it and causing damage as it fell. Then it phased up and knocked out my group in one attack before its children finished the job  |
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Post by salaman on Aug 23, 2023 10:58:23 GMT
God that dungeon was annoying, with those beasts teleporting all over the place. I did OK until I got to the boss spider. It wiped my party 2 or 3 times. I left it until I gained a level and did OK then. I thought I was being clever burning the webs from underneath it and causing damage as it fell. Then it phased up and knocked out my group in one attack before its children finished the job :D My first attempt, it phased around and hatched 2 or 3 separate batches of spider eggs, which meant i got overwhelmed with the tiny spiders. The second attempt, I snuck across one of the web bridges with special anti-web boots on, stayed hidden and started the fight by chucking a molotov onto a cluster of spider eggs, which worked relatively well but i still got my ass whooped. On my final encounter I had 1 party member sneak off below to dispatch the eggs there and one on top again to chuck a molotov (fire potion or whatever it's called?) Thanks to being a level higher, I managed to overpower the boss and the other 2 spiders more easily. I do enjoy figuring out how to survive an encounter that initially seems impossible with the tools available (gear, abilities, spells, potion, etc.). I'm sorry I missed out on a big fight because I took too many long rests before returning to it. I had the idea of dropping magic dampening leafs throughout the area to stop the enemy from using spells and turning themselves invisible. Maybe next play through I'll get to try if that works. :-) |
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Post by Wrongshui on Aug 23, 2023 11:06:38 GMT
You can just punt it down the hole.
You don't even lose the loot since it's corpse will be in the Underdark.
There's a few boss mobs you can can punt down holes/defenestrate.
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MolarAm🔵
Full Member
Bad at games
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Post by MolarAm🔵 on Aug 23, 2023 11:49:29 GMT
That's what I did to one of the bosses in the goblin camp. Turn 1, force push into bottomless pit, done. I missed out on his loot, but you get so much loot in this game that one warhammer isn't going to make much difference.
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ekz
New Member
O_o
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Post by ekz on Aug 23, 2023 12:21:51 GMT
So I started Act 2 via elevator into the shadowlands. Ran into a first big fight, survived, then was told a safe spot was marked on my map and to be careful. Then within about 10 seconds, my whole party dropped unconscious from the curse or something?
it was late, I decided to call it a night and try again later.
The game always finds some way to keep you on your toes. Equip a light source |
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zephro
Junior Member
Posts: 3,007
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Post by zephro on Aug 23, 2023 13:28:51 GMT
I did really enjoy shoving baddies into the underdark. I managed to scrape through a boss fight, then crossing a bridge limping out their lieutenant comes in screaming at me. So just just shoved her off the bridge to their doom.
Glorious.
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Post by Destria on Aug 23, 2023 13:47:18 GMT
You can just punt it down the hole. You don't even lose the loot since it's corpse will be in the Underdark. There's a few boss mobs you can can punt down holes/defenestrate. Oh, that I did not know. I admit I save-scummed a fight after I accidentally punted a boss into a pit and I was interested to see what their loot was. |
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Post by salaman on Aug 23, 2023 14:21:17 GMT
So I started Act 2 via elevator into the shadowlands. Ran into a first big fight, survived, then was told a safe spot was marked on my map and to be careful. Then within about 10 seconds, my whole party dropped unconscious from the curse or something?
it was late, I decided to call it a night and try again later.
The game always finds some way to keep you on your toes. Equip a light source One of my party members had a light work cast on them (it their weapon actually). I thought that would have done the trick. I think everyone has a torch in their inventory. I'll go in torch in hand next time. |
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f00b_inc
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Post by f00b_inc on Aug 23, 2023 14:26:40 GMT
I think I am completely under-utilising all of my magic users and have simplified my approach to including the melee ladies and hitting everyone over the head. It was working quite well until the swamp! I suppose I ought to figure out some decent way to spec out Gale/Shadowheart as presumably I should be making better use of buff/debuff spells...
I am still in act 1 and feel the performance has degraded since I started. I imagine the Steam Deck will struggle to cope with more demanding/less optimised future acts.
I think it's brilliant though - every time I wander somewhere the rabbit hole keeps going down somewhere new!
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askew
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Post by askew on Aug 23, 2023 14:52:50 GMT
I'm enjoying my Shadowheart 'main' and her facial expressions as Astarion, Gale, and Wyll mansplain to her. Need to get in the habit of resting though.
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Post by salaman on Aug 23, 2023 14:58:49 GMT
I'm enjoying my Shadowheart 'main' and her facial expressions as Astarion, Gale, and Wyll mansplain to her. Need to get in the habit of resting though. I need to get in the habit of not spamming my most powerful spell in every fight. They typically need a long rest to reset the spell slots, so I have to long rest a lot (and thereby remove useful stuff like effects from elixirs I drank). |
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Post by skalpadda on Aug 23, 2023 15:38:20 GMT
Meanwhile I'm in act 3 and just drank an elixir for the first time. Also just realised my Longstrider spell takes no spellslot, can be cast on multiple people and lasts until long rest, so everyone in my party could have had an extra +3m movement speed the entire game. I really should have paid more attention and read those lvl 1 spells way back then...
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Garfy
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Posts: 385
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Post by Garfy on Aug 23, 2023 16:22:20 GMT
Just met a lovely innkeeper in act 2 and had a most pleasant drink and a chat with him.
This game just keeps on delivering
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zephro
Junior Member
Posts: 3,007
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Post by zephro on Aug 23, 2023 18:03:28 GMT
One of my party members had a light work cast on them (it their weapon actually). I thought that would have done the trick. I think everyone has a torch in their inventory. I'll go in torch in hand next time. It does work. However this happened after my first fight, everyone sheathed their weapons. I think because it triggers dialogue with an NPC and people always put their weapons away to chat shit. |
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Frog
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Post by Frog on Aug 23, 2023 19:57:11 GMT
Shadowhearts questline is quite something.
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zephro
Junior Member
Posts: 3,007
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Post by zephro on Aug 23, 2023 20:26:40 GMT
Finished it now. So firstly it's a towering achievement. But the ending needs some work, just some fucking epilogue dialogue of what people did next, something. It's also bugged, half my party including my romance option said absolutely nothing, which you can trigger them to say by doing something entirely different with another companion. Sigh.
It's not Mass Effect 3 bad, where you'd need to re-write the whole game. Just patch some new dialogue in and make the actual ending scenes all play.
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Post by salaman on Aug 24, 2023 11:30:06 GMT
Pfff what a night last night. So I started Act II. I made it to the last light inn and spoke with Isolde. Then This winged Mf-er drops in, wanting to take Isolde with him. You have the option of fighting him or going along with it. So for shits and giggles, I decided to help kidnap Isolde to the moonlight tower.
My main reasoning was "Oh, I wonder if this shortcuts me straight to that tower, saving me a trek through the shadowlands.
So I fight everyone in the inn, with the help of some winged horrors. I knock Isolde out cold and then the winged bastard just leaves with her, leaving me and my party behind in the inn.
Without Isolde's protection, everyone except my party and the lady in charge gets turned and I have to fight off a shitload of those harpers, which I managed.
I then decided to reload my game and help Isolde. She still gets kidnapped and I still end up fighting all the shadow-cursed harpers but this time I narrowly lose the fight, with a party wipe just as there were only 2 enemies at half health left. :-/
So now I'm not sure what to do in my next session. Continue with my 'I helped out the baddies' playthrough, Or just reload and do the whole 2 fights all over again. It also doesn't help that I was meant to sleep at the inn but bumped into Isolde first, so almost all of my spellslots are used and stuff. |
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Post by Chopsen on Aug 24, 2023 12:55:33 GMT
You can still go to your camp and do a long rest to replenish your spell slots. Imo I'd go with the first option there. Purely because that's not what I did so want to find out how it pans out for you  |
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Post by skalpadda on Aug 24, 2023 13:10:37 GMT
I won that fight almost by accident (good initiative rolls and some lucky crits) and it's fascinating to read how differently it plays out if it goes the other way. Also, ACT 2 ENDING SPOILER I imagine the storming of Moonrise Tower could get *really* hard if you don't have the Harpers and haven't culled the Absolutists you can beforehand. But maybe that also plays out very differently if you're alone. |
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Post by salaman on Aug 24, 2023 14:38:47 GMT
You can still go to your camp and do a long rest to replenish your spell slots. Imo I'd go with the first option there. Purely because that's not what I did so want to find out how it pans out for you :) No, I was mid dialogue when I thought "Hmmm. Not sure what to choose. I'll hit quicksave and decide then." So now, I load the game mid dialogue, which starts a fight either way. When the Fight ends with Isolde's kidnapping, it goes into another dialogue and another fight. I don't think there's any option to go to camp in between. I think I'll stick to my current savegame and see what gives. I'll let you know what happens. |
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Post by Wrongshui on Aug 24, 2023 15:29:51 GMT
Incase you don't know, you can normally take control of people in your party not in the conversation and position them better before going back to the conversation to start the fight.
Not always though.
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Garfy
New Member
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Post by Garfy on Aug 24, 2023 16:23:13 GMT
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