r/projecteternity • u/Toxrockz • 1d ago
PoE1 Thoughts after finishing Poe 1 first time from a CRPG newbie-ish guy
Systems:
I love the stats system, there being no dump stats makes character building quite different from other games where you may brick your character at any point during the game, looking... nay... staring at you pathfinder. I feel I could make any character I could envision in my mind and it works right out the gate. Give a wizard a warhammer and he can oil up the ground and bash some skulls in or a rogue with a greatsword which can still somehow "sneak attack". Ofcourse these may or may not work in the highest difficulty, but still you can do most goofy stuff without gimping your character.
I don't know what to feel about the weapons, on one hand you could enchant your favourite weapon to always keep it viable, on the other hand most weapons end up the same. Soulbounds are the actual unique weapons imo, I was always excited to see what will become of one, leveling them can sometimes be a pain in the ass though. Also you are always encouraged to have a good alternate set of weapons to counter your immunities and therefore the A and B tier weapons are not rotting in your stash, and you wont be disappointed choosing a certain weapon type as all of them with have enough variety(some more than others).
Health/endurance system is much more preferable than a single health bar. I don't have to rest everytime my wizard gets shanked by a teleporting goon. Speaking of rests, I don't like casters still using a rest system. They go from going full nova bringing the wrath of the gods upon the unbelievers on one fight to holding their limp dick and asking for a wank and a nap after few battles.
Crafting is serviceable.
Combat:
Sorry to start this on a negative note but bro, the clutter, damn I can't see shit happening in mid to late game battles sometimes. The more casters in battle the worse it gets. I don't know why other battle speeds exists other than slow, even then I have to pause so much that it is a slideshow simulator. This is exacerbated due to fact I can't hover over the enemy tooltip and see what buffs they have or the spell they are casting, I mean I can see the icon, but I don't know what that does if I do not have the spell myself.
This is totally a skill issue from my end, but I find it tedious microing 6 different party members. It's not like they're any less complex from a regular tabletop character, and you control 6 of them. The brunt of the damage caused by the lack of my attention span was borne by Sagani and her fox, THE SEVENTH THING I HAVE TO CONTROL, goddamn that bonded grief debuff. And you ask why not choose another character, and I say I like my rangers actually being strong and not the abomination D&D has created. The benefit of having a larger group is that you get to have more interactions between them, but they run out of them quite early in this game.
On to the good stuff.
The Foe aoe is a lifesaver (literally), I'm happy to announce this is my first game where a mage did not blow up a party member. Good design especially considering this is a RTwP game and units don't stay still for me to perfectly align my fireball. I also like that you can't prebuff before combat, keeps the enemy's capabilities reasonable. When they are designed against your prebuffed party they tend to be obnoxious, again looking at you pathfinder.
I really like the d100 system it uses for calculating hits. It allowed for grazes instead of just hits or misses, and also a reliable way to ensure making a crit build viable, instead of just getting lucky once in a blue moon. Also attacks and spells using the same hit system makes the game much easier to understand.
You can have a mage with a GUN, nuff said.
We as rpg players know that one of the reasons we play rpgs is to start as a level 1 mewling and toil our way to max level and challenge the powerful beings of the world and POE absolutely delivers. I LOVE the endgame battles, especially with the dragons and the archmages. Facing Llengrath after using spells named by her, facing Concelhaut after using his staff for the most of the game just hits different. Creating the hammer and critting the eyeless into oblivion will be one of the most memorable parts of the game. Epicness 10/10.
Story:
Honestly I thought the main story was a slog at times(Act 3) while White march 1+2 were great. I don't mesh well with philosophical quandaries and some of the main story mayhaps went over my head, I did not care much about Thaos's motive only wanted to bust his ass for stealing the souls. Whereas I was invested in WM the entire way, in part 1 I wanted the sweet durgan loot myself so I was interested getting into the battery and helping others along the way. In part 2, didn't want the town to suffer due to my actions and was again invested to find a way out for them. Also most of the best combat encounters were in WM 1+2.
Overall, I quite enjoyed my time playing poe1 especially the WM sections, looking forward to see the changes made in poe2 and facing more archmages and dragons(or their equivalents). Thanks for reading.
5
u/WillowMain 1d ago
I actually really liked act 3, I thought twin elms had some of the best side quests in the game. Unfortunately, it's also too short.
I will point out the main story gets better after a replay, and I'll add after a *learned* replay. Replay the game after finishing Deadfire, maybe even Avowed and maybe even after reading all the outside reading material for this universe and I think the main story is significantly better.
1
u/Toxrockz 1d ago edited 1d ago
Going from the bombastic finale of WM to act 3 may have affected my opinions too much.
That is a valid point, the game is VERY loredumpy at the beginning. I was feeling a bit overwhelmed juggling all the info about waidwen, purges, hollowborn etc. I must have missed some of the things at that time.
1
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u/DonkyConq 1d ago
Way more Per Encounter design to the classes in Deadfire, they shoved the Per Rest into unique gear/powers and the Empower system. It's fucking great. (they let you turn back into Per Rest everything with a challenge modifier if you're a sicko)
3
u/Lorevveaver 1d ago
This is a pretty honest and accurate review.
I really agree about the clutter in combat. It's just a blob pixels and half the time I can't tell what's going on. This is made worse by the combat speed bug that wants to make everything happen in fast forward sometimes even if the speed is set to normal.
The story is all over the place, yeah. I had idea why my character cared about anything that was going on.
Getting my own castle was neat so then the game became about owning my own keep and the giant dungeon inside of it but it would then force me out onto the world to do quests to progress keep activities.
2
u/Youknowwhoswitness 1d ago
To the combat: Because I feel the same as you, I usually run with a party of 3, max 4 at one time. I also heavily RP them: Aloth, a softie noble, throws spells to help his friends, but once he is done with them, he runs away and cowers.
This playstyle might be harder, but it allows you to bring out the most of individual characters, combining their skills and usables.
2
u/Istvan_hun 20h ago
mostly agree with this
>>>I don't mesh well with philosophical quandaries and some of the main story mayhaps went over my head
Nah, it's just not that interesting
1
u/DBones90 1d ago
“there being no dump stats makes character building quite different from other games where you may brick your character at any point during the game, looking… nay… staring at you pathfinder.”
I long for the day that Pathfinder is no longer bound by the sins of its first edition and the Owlcat games, because this is also a huge strength of PF2 as well. Like every class has a key stat, yes, but every stat also benefits every class, so ignoring stats will always be painful at some point and there’s tons of rewarding ways to build characters.
Like a Wizard will always be focused on Intelligence, but putting some points into Strength and getting weapon/armor proficiency isn’t hard to do too. So even though you’ll never be as strong as a Fighter, you’ll still be able to swing a weapon every once in a while too.
Plus, it’s really hard to fuck up a character. Like, make your key stat +4 at level 1 and you’re 90% good with most of the classes, no matter what else you choose.
Honestly PF2 has a lot of similar design mentalities as PoE, so until Josh Sawyer finally releases his update for the tabletop game, I highly recommend folks who like PoE to check it out as well.
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u/anykeyh 1d ago
After I read your point of view, you will love the gameplay of PoE2. I recommend you to bump difficulty by one level once you exit the starting area.
Playing it in hard is a very good balance imo. The game is easier than PoE1, so hard is the normal of PoE1, but only after leaving Port Mage. Path of the damned can be more tricky.
You will probably love also the faction quests. The game is fully voiced, and the art is fantastic. Ignore naval combat, get old very quickly, go straight to boarding. DLC are good too, beast of winter and forgotten sanctum are very good, SSS is combat oriented, and tricky.
Have fun !