Your Neeshka has a tail??! Mine doesn't have a tail, and that was kinda annoying considering it's one of the Tieflings' most notable characteristics! Was that using a 3rd party hak or something?
Xessive, my Neeshka always had a tail even when the game was unpatched. I never tried a hack. It is very dynamically done... swings around a lot and stuff.
Prettier than I remember it being, though. I wasn't too impressed with some of the other screens I looked at. These seem better
Yes I was surprised by that when I started the game. It looked better than the gamespot screenies, and it looks fairly sharp on an LCD.
Does it still play like NWN? Because I simply could not get into that game. You fight one creature, throw some spells at it, it dies...now you're hurt (no health regen) and cant use those spells until you rest...which you cant do because theres a monster *somewhere* in the area you're in.
This plays a lot like Baldur's Gate 2 or Planescape:T.
I love this game so much that if I had the money I'd send a copy of this to you and Que. I really want to haha.
The roleplaying depth is fantastic. You can talk to all your party members and each has their own storyline etc. You can talk to them at any time, but to progress with them means you have to do their side quests which are mostly fantastic. But to get to their side quests you have to get further in dialog with them by gaining their trust so that they will talk about the things they were unwilling to about before. How does that work? Well there will be tons of situations where you and your party members will be involved in conversation with some NPC, and you can chose conversation options that please certain party members so it increases your influence with them. You can do that without comprising your own character or his goals since you will likely be of the same alignment as your party member.
I am only in ACT II, but have already unlocked most of my party member's stories through smart party picking. I know I am more likely to gain favor with my party members in situations they are familiar with. So if I have a quest that takes me in the wild life, I take the druid. If I am in the city, I take along the party members who are natives of the city as they are more likely to meet acquaintance which would mean more conversation choices and stuff.
The game plays a lot like Baldur's Gate II in terms of combat. My gut feeling is that Que may like this more than NWN1 and Idol will love this game, purely because of the depth in combat. But I am confused because Que says he hates parties in RPGs, yet said he enjoyed BG2, PS:T etc.
Does it still play like NWN? Because I simply could not get into that game. You fight one creature, throw some spells at it, it dies...now you're hurt (no health regen) and cant use those spells until you rest...which you cant do because theres a monster *somewhere* in the area you're in
In NWN2, if you turn off all your party member's AI Behavior, you can do all the controlling of your party members like you could in BG2.
I know how you felt. It was lonely in NWN1, especially with a companion who wasn't complete without some great hacks. I still loved it, but love this more.
In NWN2, I wouldn't turn AI down to minimum. I let them use their feats automatically (skills like power strike, knock down etc). I also them defend themselves and let them heal themselves with any potions they have, since I don't want to baby sit them. But I don't allow them to use any of their magic at all. The reason is that it takes away from the fun, and the AI isn't very adept at using magic. I don't blame the developers since there are too many spells and counter spells.
As shown in the sceenie at the end I have equipped every party member with a ranged weapon as well as a melee weapon. When you are fighting in an area where elevation is an advantage, it is useful to swap to ranged attacks while letting one tank (melee units with heavy defense) warrior go in.
Now idol you will have party members who can heal you and stuff.
But yes, magic adds a lot of depth to the game.
Firstly you go to the spell book of every party member and hot key their feats and spells. You have 120 hot key options. Then if you encounter a low level party of evil doers, you send you mage up front who blasts a fire ball in the center making an instant kill. Or you can cast a spell that rains acid, or meteors or ice. This is very satisfying as it wipes out the lower level enemy units and makes you feel powerful. It is a lot like BG2 in that sense.
You could always cast spells that slow the enemy party. You can entangle them with magic roots, or slow them by using a grease spell. You can fire a spell that confuses them all and they start attacking each other haha. The point of those spells is to pick them off with ranged weapons.
Interaction with party members is done by holding right click on them. This is how you start conversations etc. If during or before combat you wish to issue commands, that's how you do it. If you want to give a general command, like asking everyone to hold while you let one person venture forth you select that one person and then right click on them so they broadcast a command.
Once you get past the first few hours, each random encounter involves fighting a party with a decent mage. To beat a mage is a bit like chess. You have to balance focusing on him with focusing on his tanks (melee units with heavy defense). So you let your party focus on the other units while you use your mage to focus on the other mage.
The other mage can finish the battle with a few well aimed spells, as can you. And chances are that he is full of magical defenses. Much like the sims you can load up commands.
Before any battle you should have your mage/druid cast some magical defenses on themselves and the rest of the party. But yes, the other mage will be beefed up just like you.
The first thing you try to do is to break his magical defenses so that you can hurt him. You can either use a 'breach magical defenses' spell that is only focused on the mage and breaks every barrier, or you use a 'dispel magic' spell that affects everything in a targeted radius. While the dispel magic spell is weaker, it will dispel everyone's magical defenses. So if the opponent has cast magical defenses on his party members, they will be broken.
Next you can use a fire arrow spell and hope that kills him. But if that doesn't, he could kill you at his next opportunity.
If a mage is hit while casting a spell there is a concentration check. If that fails then the spell fails. However you can wear equipment that improves your concentration, and you can invest in that skill when you level up to offset the concentration check to the point where it is a non issue.
Just like you the other mage has concentration checks. So if you fire a spell that hurts him every round he will be unable to cast a spell. An acid arrow is such a spell as it eats away at a target's armor every round and hurts them, affecting concentration. The other option is to have your archer fire arrows constantly at a mage to disrupt their concentration every round. There are two advantages to that. First is that you are hurting them, and the second is that you are affecting their concentration.
So yes, I talked a lot, but there is plenty of strategic depth in this, and certainly a lot more strategy than most RTS games out there. There is quite a bit of roleplaying depth as well.
Also you should try to pick your party by the situation. If you are fighting the undead then a Paladin is useful because he casts natural spells that easily kill or hurt the undead. If you are in the wild, use a druid who can use the surrounding animals to help. Druids and rangers and thieves have useful tracking skills. The tracking skill is like the 'heart beat detector' in Rainbow Six, and functions much like a satellite reading. By tracking footsteps your ranger (which is what I am), or druid/thief will be able to tell when you are going to encounter an enemy group. This works indoors and outdoors. When you are using the tracking feat, enemy units show up on your map giving you a distinct advantage. You can use this to plan your attacks. You can either send a mage to use a fireball spell at the unsuspecting group, or send a thief hidden in the shadows to do some backstabbing goodness.
The main storyline is interesting, yet resorting to some cliches. And while many performance issues have been answered, the game is still heavy on lower systems.
This final screenie demonstrates how I've utilized the hot keys. Again if I had the greens I'd certainly send this game to you guys hehe.
