Can you pre-position before all encounters?

[Closer of Doors]

I've been playing in a co-op campaign (not quite out of Act I yet), but it's on hold at the moment, so I've been thinking of starting a solo campaign.

For people who have done a full playthrough, are there encounters where you cannot position your party members beforehand? I'm planning a stealth build which doesn't really have to fear damage except AoEs targeting nearby allies on turn 1. The obvious solution is to spread out party members before triggering any combat or dialogue (just in case). Is that possible?

On another note, are there any combat encounters that also feature traps?

[アンジェル]

Originally posted by Reaper:

Can you pre-position before all encounters?
I've been playing in a co-op campaign (not quite out of Act I yet), but it's on hold at the moment, so I've been thinking of starting a solo campaign.

For people who have done a full playthrough, are there encounters where you cannot position your party members beforehand? I'm planning a stealth build which doesn't really have to fear damage except AoEs targeting nearby allies on turn 1. The obvious solution is to spread out party members before triggering any combat or dialogue (just in case). Is that possible?

On another note, are there any combat encounters that also feature traps?

It depends on how you play. If you keep your group ungrouped you can position everyone except for the talker. And traps... more or less.

[Non-binary Tiddies]

If you can sneak pasted the conversation trigger with invisibility (not always possible), you can skip dialogue. Otherwise, while one person is talking, click the switch character button in the lower left hand area of the screen to select someone not in the conversation, ungroup your party, and position everyone besides your speaker

[GayBeard]

Not all of them, there are a couple that lock everyone into dialogue before. There are not that many of them, but they exist. Without spoiling, its mostly pretty important boss fights.

Depends on what you consider a trap. Most encounters have destructable surfaces or stractures and oilbarrels that can explode if that counts, then most fights do. As for straight up having traps you can disarm with a trap toolkit I can only think of one fight near the end - and there is an achievment for winning that fight without triggering traps.

[Flan]

There's some where the game really really really wants you to talk to someone but even then if you break the party up and then just start the dialog with one guy you can then move the others into place. The only time would be battles that start after a major cutscene style thing which are almost no existent.

[Closer of Doors]

All right, then, are there encounters where both can occur? That is, the party is forcibly grouped by a cutscene AND there are traps (the conventional kind that trigger by contact)?

[id795078477]

You can and you should. Always send your toughest character to "trigger the fight". The "make the party move into the obvious trap and position themselves at a huge disadvantage because the dialogue is required to start a fight" will feel fresh .. exactly once. After that it's annoying and is blatantly shoe-horned.

So you just ungroup, position 3 of your characters to the best places where you'll wreck havoc on the enemies from above - ideally, destroying the ladders or blocking pathways with barrels for particularly difficult fights and then "talk" with your most survivable character.

Oh - and also don't forget that you can "jump in" to shorten the distance if the scene is triggered automatically. This way you can cut those 5-8 meters (or more) so that you'll be ready to strike first and strike fast.

[Ironwu]

If your party is Surprised, there is no pre-positioning for that. There are also some encounters where you will not be able to pre-position even if you surprise them (although you can use your movement skills to somewhat change positioning at the potential cost of an action).

[Ironwu]

Originally posted by Reaper:

All right, then, are there encounters where both can occur? That is, the party is forcibly grouped by a cutscene AND there are traps (the conventional kind that trigger by contact)?

Yes. If you move to far, to fast and trigger a trap and a cutscene at the same time, you will come out of the cutscene on the triggered trap.

In unfamiliar territory you want to move slow to give your entire party time to detect hidden things. If you don't want to do that, keep your finger on the RT Mouse Button so you can cancel the move the instant you hear an announcement!

Good Luck!

[Closer of Doors]

Looks like I'll be building my party with alert to make sure my party always gets the chance to reposition themselves out of AoE range of my character before the enemy's first round of actions, then. With the right ability scores, feats, and magic items it should be doable. Thank you all.