Pathfinder vs. Divinity 2 vs. Pillars 2

[Yosharian]

Also for me in many aspects it is superior to Baldur's Gate. Except Magic system, companions and main quest/villain, I guess.

So the most important parts, then

 

[Yosharian]

"Josh Sawyer just hates Wizards" has almost 3 times more vote than "Would try "Specialist" Wizard now, besides the Evoker"

Only evoker and universalist wizards are played on PoE2.

Completely agree, Wizard sub-classes in Deadfire are a fucking JOKE.

 

[JohnSmith24601]

Did Josh Sawyer really go SJW? I thought he was a good old timer. What happened?

 

[JohnSmith24601]

One thing which BG1/2 did right is that the best bows had a lot of STR requirement. I tried to practice with a 180 lbf longbow IRL and thrust me. After the third shot, i was only "half drawing"...

Surprised you even made it to the 3rd shot before getting tired. That's pretty good, dude!

 

[Haplo]

"Josh Sawyer just hates Wizards" has almost 3 times more vote than "Would try "Specialist" Wizard now, besides the Evoker"

Only evoker and universalist wizards are played on PoE2.

Completely agree, Wizard sub-classes in Deadfire are a fucking JOKE.

Evoker spec actually involves very painful tradeoffs in Deadfire. Looses acces to the likes of Wall of Draining, Freezing Pillar, Chill Fog, Combusting Wounds, Bitter Mooring, Corrosive Siphon, Slicken, Citzal's Lance - some of the best wizard spells. Also summons. Personally I'd not pick it.

But that poll must have been done before Blood Mages were added into the game...

 

[Yosharian]

Weird, I miss precisely zero of those spells

Slicken is fairly good early game I suppose

 

[Haplo]

That IS weird.

Wall of Draining - considered one of the OP mage tools. Endlessly extends durations of ALL beneficial effects, not just your self buffs. Some more exploitative tactics include endless Barring the Death's Door for immortality, endless Brilliant for constant spell recovery, Battlemages can enjoy endless Unbending for nearly-unkillable status and constant Concentration generation, some items have short lived effects that activate on combat start that now can last forever... like that Weyc mask with +50 Deflection; or the simplest eternally lasting heal-over-time effects.

Freezing Pillar - Pretty much best damage spell before PL IX.

Chill Fog - Level 1 aoe pulsing damage AND pulsing Blind Affliction (each time it connects the Blind lasts a loooong while - several pulses long infact). Immensely strong for a level 1 spell. At low level, won me countless fights. Actually using Assassinate my Spellblade nearly cleared many encounters just with that, initial strike from stealth with boosted Pen was enough to kill some low level non-frost resistant enemies with a Crit on its opening pulse (or make them near dead and die soon afterwards).
A reliable aoe Blind remains useful throughout the game - great against ranged attackers/casters - now they have to come near, it reduces Deflection and AR via autoflanking enemies, lowers Accuracy, lowers their Reflex save AND doubles action Recovery time.

Combusting Wounds - again, one of the best sources of damage for regular mages against non-fire resistant enemies. Once you hit them with CW, each damage tick will cause progressively increasing damage. Hit them with fast ticking spells (rays, walls, also chillfog), have other characters hit them also (maybe with multihit weapons, like blunderbusses) and be amazed how fast the damage racks up. Isn't so hot in Turn Based mode, though.

Bitter Mooring - Very solid damage against ~3 enemies in a line + immobilize. Not spectacular, but above average (and again, nice combo with CW).

Corrosive Siphon - Decent damage output and potentially very strong drain/heal vs multiple enemies (that lasts several ticks!). Its particularly good for a Blood Mage. Less important if you rely on external healing I guess.

Citzal's Lance - well, that aoe summoned reach weapon is more for battlemages/gishes. But it IS very good for them. Particularly with Fighter's Clear Out (aoe x aoe) or a monk's Stunning Surge (stuns in aoe, good chance to recover resources) and Instruments of Pain (gains long range). Also not bad for Rogue DOTs in aoe.

 

[TemplarGR]

DOS2: It has good graphics, sound, and general production values. It is cheesy, sometimes cute, most of the time insulting our intelligence and cringe-inducing, it is like a game meant to be played by 10 year olds. Perhaps it is indeed made for 10 year olds, (or designed by adults with the brains of 10 year olds). The combat system is trash and there is no reason for it to be turn based since there is no strategy involved in it, it would be better designed as a diablo-clone. Also i don't understand why the game features a rpg-type character and combat system since apparently the way to play the game is just to interact with the barrels that are carefully placed in every combat zone. The game is meant to be cheesed, and that is never a compliment for a game pretending to be tactical. "Oh look Sven is so smart and 6500000 IQ, you can use electric attack on water and it is super effective! like pokeman in the 90s!" All these pretentius bullshit in the gameplay mean that a game with content barely worth 10-20 hours of playtime gets exploded to 100-120 hours of playtime, looks nice on the cover and on the Steam page, right? I mean CRPGs are only worthwhile if they can claim they have bazillions of playtime, right? I can't stand this game, or the philosophy behind it, and since these morons got financially rewarded and critically acclaimed (thank you shills), you can rest assured BG3 is going to be shit, there is no saving it.

Pillars of Eternity 2: The art of making a quality soul-less piece of shit (or a great example of how spergs design games). Everything in this game is good, the graphics are literally awesome, music is nice, everything is nice, the combat system is balanced, the class system is cool, there are tons of content. Every single piece of this product is really well made. Yet the sum of the parts is lower, because the game has no soul. There is no heart in there. And that is why it failed. It is a product meant to fill quotas, not a role playing game. It is the literal opposite of Icewind Dale, Sawyer's best game. Icewind Dale was never a better product than Baldur's Gate 1 or 2. It wasn't a better product than Diablo II either. But it was the best damn DnD dungeon crawl experience you could get. The most authentic atmosphere, the most authentic feeling, the most heart involved. That is why i can replay Icewind Dale today but i am bored to tears with the superior product named PoE2.

Pathfinder Bugmaker: This game is the polar opposite of PoE 2, and i get the feeling that is why Codexers love it (well, this and the fact that this forum is filled with ruskie shills). No matter how you compare it with the other two, it is worse in terms of quality. Less content, lower production values, imbalanced to the core, bugs gallore. As a product, PK fails in comparison. But there is heart in there somewhere. You can clearly notice that the people who made this trash product were lovers of the IE era. You can feel it in your bones, if you grew up with those games. So you can ignore all the GARBAGE quality of this game because it is the only product of the "kickstarter nostalgia porn" era that is actually fit for purpose, it is actually a way to relive your childhood under a modern game. The only other game that made me feel this way about the 90s era was Two Point Hospital.

 

[NJClaw]

Pathfinder Bugmaker:

Oh, I see, you're one of those. That explains the

Here, let me help you: the trend is Poncefinder: Cuckmaker. No need to thanks.

 

[Cryomancer]

Josh Sawyer just HATES wizards as any balance cultist. That option on the poll is not PoE exclusive. The games that he worked :

• Icewind Dale -> Good scrolls are extremely hard to find and a lot of monsters with high magical resistance. I never soloed IWD as a Mage, but IWD:EE as a Sorcerer can be soloed only if you pick melee based spells. At least the "nerf" of magicians in that game is by making harder to find scrolls and having monsters resistant to magic, not due butchering the rules; is the unique game of him with satisfying spellcasting.
• Neverwinter Nights 2 -> They destroyed most arcane classes. When i played unmodded, i had a hell of a torment and was using most my companions. Without spell fixes and warlock reworked, playing as any arcane caster means that you will spend most of your time making weapons for the martial guys and playing the martial guys on your party. P&P mods fixes it and make playing as a arcane caster more interesting.
• Fallout: New Vegas -> No magic and despite Sawyer hating magic, firearms on this game are the greatest of all RPG's that i saw. While on FL3 you can only use "Shotgun shell"(as if every shell is the same), on new vegas you can use flechette, buckshot, slugs, dragon breath(...), anti materiel rifles can use armor piercing, explosive and incendiary rounds and so on. You can also aim with firearms and etc.
• Pillars of Eternity -> Despite having magic and firearms, both are extremely lackluster. Heavy crossbows, arquebusiers, etc; has few feet of range and spells are always a very lackluster version of the typical D&D spell. Malignant Cloud is just a extremely nerfed version of Cloudkill. In the first game, you not only had far less powerful spells but also had ultra limited casts per rest and limited resting. 2 casts per rest of 3.5e cloudkill is completely different than 2 casts of Malignant Cloud. It got changes on second game, so now spellpower is a important variable and the ultra nerfed spells are per encounter, BUT the lack of necromancy, conjuration being restricted to few offensive low duration spells and weapons, lack of OHK spells, etc; makes the spell casting on PoE 1/2 extremely lackluster.

 

[TemplarGR]

Josh Sawyer just HATES wizards as any balance cultist. That option on the poll is not PoE exclusive. The games that he worked :

• Icewind Dale -> Good scrolls are extremely hard to find and a lot of monsters with high magical resistance. I never soloed IWD as a Mage, but IWD:EE as a Sorcerer can be soloed only if you pick melee based spells. At least the "nerf" of magicians in that game is by making harder to find scrolls and having monsters resistant to magic, not due butchering the rules; is the unique game of him with satisfying spellcasting.
• Neverwinter Nights 2 -> They destroyed most arcane classes. When i played unmodded, i had a hell of a torment and was using most my companions. Without spell fixes and warlock reworked, playing as any arcane caster means that you will spend most of your time making weapons for the martial guys and playing the martial guys on your party. P&P mods fixes it and make playing as a arcane caster more interesting.
• Fallout: New Vegas -> No magic and despite Sawyer hating magic, firearms on this game are the greatest of all RPG's that i saw. While on FL3 you can only use "Shotgun shell"(as if every shell is the same), on new vegas you can use flechette, buckshot, slugs, dragon breath(...), anti materiel rifles can use armor piercing, explosive and incendiary rounds and so on. You can also aim with firearms and etc.
• Pillars of Eternity -> Despite having magic and firearms, both are extremely lackluster. Heavy crossbows, arquebusiers, etc; has few feet of range and spells are always a very lackluster version of the typical D&D spell. Malignant Cloud is just a extremely nerfed version of Cloudkill. In the first game, you not only had far less powerful spells but also had ultra limited casts per rest and limited resting. 2 casts per rest of 3.5e cloudkill is completely different than 2 casts of Malignant Cloud. It got changes on second game, so now spellpower is a important variable and the ultra nerfed spells are per encounter, BUT the lack of necromancy, conjuration being restricted to few offensive low duration spells and weapons, lack of OHK spells, etc; makes the spell casting on PoE 1/2 extremely lackluster.

Yeah, but Sawyer is correct on this. Many games are spoiled by overpowered magic. For example look at the Divinity Original Sin games. You can't play those as you would play most RPGs. You just have to cheese through them with magic. Every single battlefield becomes chaos with AoE effects and shit, because DOS is essentially Magicka 1 and 2 for spergs (tm). Even BG2 suffered from overpowered Magic at later levels. Playing through BG2 is a chore because after apart from some early trash mobs, every single motherfucker you meet insta-throws some seals up your ass and it gets boring. Mages ruined BG2 for me. The whole magic system in DnD 2ed was badly designed (for video games), mages are weaklings early level but extremely powerful late level, and since BG2 was not the tabletop game but had you reach late levels and brought tons of enemies so as to have "content", it becomes shit at the end.

Balance makes character builds porn more enjoyable, the world more believable, and typically it makes battles more enjoyable and tactical as well. PoE 1 and 2 weren't mediocre because of balance, actually balance was one of the good things about those games.

 

[NJClaw]

Josh Sawyer just HATES wizards as any balance cultist. That option on the poll is not PoE exclusive. The games that he worked :

• Icewind Dale -> Good scrolls are extremely hard to find and a lot of monsters with high magical resistance. I never soloed IWD as a Mage, but IWD:EE as a Sorcerer can be soloed only if you pick melee based spells. At least the "nerf" of magicians in that game is by making harder to find scrolls and having monsters resistant to magic, not due butchering the rules; is the unique game of him with satisfying spellcasting.
• Neverwinter Nights 2 -> They destroyed most arcane classes. When i played unmodded, i had a hell of a torment and was using most my companions. Without spell fixes and warlock reworked, playing as any arcane caster means that you will spend most of your time making weapons for the martial guys and playing the martial guys on your party. P&P mods fixes it and make playing as a arcane caster more interesting.
• Fallout: New Vegas -> No magic and despite Sawyer hating magic, firearms on this game are the greatest of all RPG's that i saw. While on FL3 you can only use "Shotgun shell"(as if every shell is the same), on new vegas you can use flechette, buckshot, slugs, dragon breath(...), anti materiel rifles can use armor piercing, explosive and incendiary rounds and so on. You can also aim with firearms and etc.
• Pillars of Eternity -> Despite having magic and firearms, both are extremely lackluster. Heavy crossbows, arquebusiers, etc; has few feet of range and spells are always a very lackluster version of the typical D&D spell. Malignant Cloud is just a extremely nerfed version of Cloudkill. In the first game, you not only had far less powerful spells but also had ultra limited casts per rest and limited resting. 2 casts per rest of 3.5e cloudkill is completely different than 2 casts of Malignant Cloud. It got changes on second game, so now spellpower is a important variable and the ultra nerfed spells are per encounter, BUT the lack of necromancy, conjuration being restricted to few offensive low duration spells and weapons, lack of OHK spells, etc; makes the spell casting on PoE 1/2 extremely lackluster.

Yeah, but Sawyer is correct on this. Many games are spoiled by overpowered magic. For example look at the Divinity Original Sin games. You can't play those as you would play most RPGs. You just have to cheese through them with magic. Every single battlefield becomes chaos with AoE effects and shit, because DOS is essentially Magicka 1 and 2 for spergs (tm). Even BG2 suffered from overpowered Magic at later levels. Playing through BG2 is a chore because after apart from some early trash mobs, every single motherfucker you meet insta-throws some seals up your ass and it gets boring. Mages ruined BG2 for me. The whole magic system in DnD 2ed was badly designed (for video games), mages are weaklings early level but extremely powerful late level, and since BG2 was not the tabletop game but had you reach late levels and brought tons of enemies so as to have "content", it becomes shit at the end.

Balance makes character builds porn more enjoyable, the world more believable, and typically it makes battles more enjoyable and tactical as well. PoE 1 and 2 weren't mediocre because of balance, actually balance was one of the good things about those games.

Did with find S0rcererV1ct0r's nemesis?

 

[Sharpedge]

Josh Sawyer just HATES wizards as any balance cultist. That option on the poll is not PoE exclusive. The games that he worked :

• Icewind Dale -> Good scrolls are extremely hard to find and a lot of monsters with high magical resistance. I never soloed IWD as a Mage, but IWD:EE as a Sorcerer can be soloed only if you pick melee based spells. At least the "nerf" of magicians in that game is by making harder to find scrolls and having monsters resistant to magic, not due butchering the rules; is the unique game of him with satisfying spellcasting.
• Neverwinter Nights 2 -> They destroyed most arcane classes. When i played unmodded, i had a hell of a torment and was using most my companions. Without spell fixes and warlock reworked, playing as any arcane caster means that you will spend most of your time making weapons for the martial guys and playing the martial guys on your party. P&P mods fixes it and make playing as a arcane caster more interesting.
• Fallout: New Vegas -> No magic and despite Sawyer hating magic, firearms on this game are the greatest of all RPG's that i saw. While on FL3 you can only use "Shotgun shell"(as if every shell is the same), on new vegas you can use flechette, buckshot, slugs, dragon breath(...), anti materiel rifles can use armor piercing, explosive and incendiary rounds and so on. You can also aim with firearms and etc.
• Pillars of Eternity -> Despite having magic and firearms, both are extremely lackluster. Heavy crossbows, arquebusiers, etc; has few feet of range and spells are always a very lackluster version of the typical D&D spell. Malignant Cloud is just a extremely nerfed version of Cloudkill. In the first game, you not only had far less powerful spells but also had ultra limited casts per rest and limited resting. 2 casts per rest of 3.5e cloudkill is completely different than 2 casts of Malignant Cloud. It got changes on second game, so now spellpower is a important variable and the ultra nerfed spells are per encounter, BUT the lack of necromancy, conjuration being restricted to few offensive low duration spells and weapons, lack of OHK spells, etc; makes the spell casting on PoE 1/2 extremely lackluster.

Yeah, but Sawyer is correct on this. Many games are spoiled by overpowered magic. For example look at the Divinity Original Sin games. You can't play those as you would play most RPGs. You just have to cheese through them with magic. Every single battlefield becomes chaos with AoE effects and shit, because DOS is essentially Magicka 1 and 2 for spergs (tm).

Sure looks like you need to cheese through everything with magic. You do realize DOS 2 was a game where physical > elemental right and the most overpowered builds were the ones which relied on warfare. Using DOS 2 as an example of a game where you "have to cheese through with magic" is quite frankly hilarious because if you want to make the game even remotely challenging you have to do pure magic playthroughs and ban lots of the more powerful magic skills on top of that, because if you play physical at all (or use the poweful magic skills) the game is just a cakewalk.

 

[Cryomancer]

Yeah, but Sawyer is correct on this

Only balancefags praise him.

For example look at the Divinity Original Sin games. You can't play those as you would play most RPGs. You just have to cheese through them with magic.

DOS 1/2 is extremely lackluster due the balance. Cooldowns, bows with 13m range, item fever and one summon limit makes spellcasting EXTREMELY lackluster.

Even BG2 suffered from overpowered Magic at later levels. Playing through BG2 is a chore because after apart from some early trash mobs, every single motherfucker you meet insta-throws some seals up your ass and it gets boring. (...)

D&D 2e has one of the greatest spells ever.

And where are the mods nerfing mages? With NWN2, people re wrote almost all spells and invocations to make then more like P&P. If you wanna ultra nerfed casters, you can mod the game.

Balance makes character builds porn more enjoyable, the world more believable, and typically it makes battles more enjoyable and tactical as well. PoE 1 and 2 weren't mediocre because of balance, actually balance was one of the good things about those games.

Yep; Nothing more believable than a archer which trained his entire life with a bow unable to hit a enemy at 14m, nothing more believable than firearms with 15m range on Hellgate London. Hellgate has way better and more believable gunplay than fallout new vegas because i can't compete with a sniper with anti materiel rifle + explosive rounds and stealth kit at open field, while on hellgate london, fast swinging blades are the optional way to play. And every wizard being evoker or universalist is also perfectly balanced. /sarcasm

Almost all RPG's on top 101 best RPG of all time are unbalanced https://rpgcodex.net/article.php?id=11193

Everyone discuss till this day which is the best specialization for BG2. Hell, people can't even decide between fireball VS skull trap. People discuss a lot about the lore of BG1/2, exactly because BG2 is a masterpiece and the spells mechanic wise reflect then lore wise. There are nothing more boring than having enemy necromancers able to reanimate hordes of undeads while your party necromancer can only summon one(nwn2). Nothing more boring than all amazing spells like cloudkill and black tentacles being worthless due Sawyerism.

----------------------------------

On Dark Sun Shattered Lands, preserver spells are extremely weak and finding a magical scroll insanely hard. Do i have a problem with that? NO. In that setting, the way that magic works makes perfectly sense. Paper is rare and expensive and magicians are hated. My unique critique is the lv cap = 9. You need to multiclass in that game...

because if you play physical at all (or use the poweful magic skills) the game is just a cakewalk.

The concept of balance that balancefags love

 

[Sharpedge]

DOS 1/2 is extremely lackluster due the balance. Cooldowns, bows with 13m range, item fever and one summon limit makes spellcasting EXTREMELY lackluster.

You can repeat this as much as you like, the game (D:OS 2) is not balanced. The distance you can fire a bow is also not 13m, it depends on the elevation difference between you and the enemy.

 

[JohnSmith24601]

Pathfinder Bugmaker:

Oh, I see, you're one of those. That explains the

Here, let me help you: the trend is Poncefinder: Cuckmaker. No need to thanks.

Hahaha! Truth be told, they probably should've released the game like a year later. The state in which it was released was a major embarrassment. However, the game is a lot better now, and it's even better with mods.

 

[JohnSmith24601]

Yeah, obsessive balance is generally a bad thing. If every build is equally powerful at all times, why would I even bother making a build? The traditional formula of the weak starting wizard is a tried and true fun mechanic. It actually makes sense that a wizard apprentice who can only cast a fucking rainbow to distract enemies is weaker than a fighter in plate mail holding a tower shield. And it gives you a real sense of accomplishment after finally suffering for many levels, you get fireballs and shit.

 

[Sweeper]

the story department

Fuck the story department.

Pathfinder and Divinity OS2 are good games, Pillars of Eternity (first one) isn't. Deadfire is nice, but not up to DOS2&PFKM,

You're actually only right about one game in that quote.
PFKM is fucking amazing.
D:OS2 is shit.
PoE is also shit, but I'd still rate it higher than D:OS2.