Bad DM

[TTV/EldritchVibeX]

That's how I feel playing this game most of the time, as a player who either has an inexperienced or juvenile DM that just keeps throwing ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ long / difficult encounters at their players as if it was a competition. Had that feeling at the battle of Drezen, when you get to the pit of bodies and ghoul, after ghoul, after ghoul keeps coming at you, then some demon teleports on you. Despite that and the bugs I'm enjoying the game, but damn.

[Mithrals]

I love this DM, he understand i like to make powerful chars.
He doesn't pull any punches, but has also given me the tools i need to manage if I look carefully.
It's the best kind of DM there is.

[Entaris]

The problem with this game is it DEMANDS that you know how to twink out and mcguffin your character into an unkillable death machine in order to play on what it considers "Core" level.

I can tell you these are NOT the stats written in the module this adventure stems from.

And then if you turn the difficulty down AT ALL, the game goes "Aww, I sowwy you a widdle baby ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥. Okay, I won't put the big bad scawy monstews in the game no mow, so I can get done telling my story." And you just walk through everything so long as your party has a pulse.

Just like Kingmaker. Just a disappointment.

[Mithrals]

Originally posted by Entaris:

The problem with this game is it DEMANDS that you know how to twink out and mcguffin your character into an unkillable death machine in order to play on what it considers "Core" level.

I can tell you these are NOT the stats written in the module this adventure stems from.

And then if you turn the difficulty down AT ALL, the game goes "Aww, I sowwy you a widdle baby ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥. Okay, I won't put the big bad scawy monstews in the game no mow, so I can get done telling my story." And you just walk through everything so long as your party has a pulse.

Just like Kingmaker. Just a disappointment.

I dont understandy you consider this a problem. you can adjust so many things in the difficulty setting, im sure if you fiddle with it you can find your sweet spot.
its not like there are only 2 options.

[Samhain34]

Originally posted by Mithrals:

I love this DM, he understand i like to make powerful chars.
He doesn't pull any punches, but has also given me the tools i need to manage if I look carefully.
It's the best kind of DM there is.

THIS. Rolls in the open and lets the dice fall where they may. Everybody please stop complaining about how difficult the game is if you're playing above normal, smh.

[Comuse]

Originally posted by Mithrals:

I dont understandy you consider this a problem. you can adjust so many things in the difficulty setting, im sure if you fiddle with it you can find your sweet spot.
its not like there are only 2 options.

the default difficulty should be in line with the actual pathfinder game, slightly buffed up to account for the extra 2 party members. we shouldn't be fighting cr 20 creatures at level 10 (or 8, if you avoid side content before drezen).

the hordes are a different problem that is about fundamental game design, they aren't dming a game of pathfinder when they throw 2 dozen ghouls a you. that is something that only happens because BG made rtwp the expected gameplay format, it is something to mulch and wear you down on your way to having a real encounter.

[Lazerus Artificial]

I too think that the encounters are kinda...boring. Its always just "use your full party to deal with it".
I mean, stealth and slayer work a lot better now than in Kingmaker, thats atleast something. It still has no use though...
So...restarted as Blood Kineticist now. Too bad that there are still just the 4 Elements.

[AzureTheGamerKobold]

The thing is... Core actually doesn't increase the creature stats... so i'm confused why everyone seems to think that is the Core issue. All Core does is turn on crits and other features like characters needing rez scrolls and the like. It increases the size of some encounters, but it doesn't adjust the actual stats of the monsters. So the difference between Normal and Core isn't as big as people think it is. So the actual issue is still that some encounters are just not balanced for your average player. Yes if you munchkin the ever living crap out of your character sure, you'll do fine. Make an instinctual barb with 100 AC, and you will fly through the game no problems.

The problem is that most players aren't going to do that and yet the devs seem to assume they do... and i honestly tried to avoid it but, its looking like i will have to do just that in order to get through some fights. Which in my opinion is poor balance...

Again most of us on core haven't increased creature stats at all, so this is the " base " creature stats... which means the Plagued Smilodons are a " normal " enemy--- normal my blue ass!

[Kasa]

I have my game set to core with extra options turned on, which means AI will use all their skills and spells to kill me. (I love the wizards that turn invisible and spam summon monster and haste)

I used a respect mod to alter my allies stats so that are all 25 point buy ( a lot of them had 32 points), so the only concession I made was changing their class from what it was to what I need. Something I could accomplished with mercs, and I don't think I'm particularly skilled nor am I finding it particularly hard.

I have 1 person Mutliclass 1 level in scale monk and the rest in tank Paladin to act as the tank (max charisma and dex) and 1 person go full duel wielding slayer for flanking.
2 ranged dps (fighter archer, and blast sorcerer), with the cleric using a reach weapon acting as buffer with a leopard animal companion (boon companion + animal domain)
And 1 wizard Thessalonian Specialist to act as crowd control and second buffer.

Core difficulty is NOT the games intended difficulty, it's the level for people who have a decently good grasp on pathfinder. Normal mode is for people who don't want to spend hours looking over spreadsheets to find strong class/feat/skill combinations for combat.

[NixAhmose]

Yeah, as a experienced dm myself, some of the encounters in this game are super bad. It feels like the game is actively trying to ♥♥♥♥ with you by either sending an ungodly number of enemies after you or just spawning enemies right on top of you.
Like it was cute the first time they lazily just have 8 spiders and a ash giant spot right on top of my party even though the party wasn't ambushed, but seeing them constantly spawn enemies right behind or on top of you in Drezin is so ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ annoying. Spawning two vrocks right on top of my party and use an aoe ability that infects them with spores and a stun locks them does not make the game feel challenging in an interesting way, it feels like frustrating difficulty just for the sake of being difficult, and they do this multiple ties during the Drezin fight and there's no reasonable way to counter this. Like if this was real Pathfinder, you would have been able to roll a perception check to spot them before hand in order to either shoot at them or get prepared for them, but here though they just spawn right on top of you and you just have to hope that your casters get a higher initiative before they're stun-locked to death.

[doto]

Originally posted by Mithrals:

I love this DM, he understand i like to make powerful chars.
He doesn't pull any punches, but has also given me the tools i need to manage if I look carefully.
It's the best kind of DM there is.

No, this DM is upset you managed to wipe the encounter they spent 5 weeks on so they throw two lichs, an orcus with ten undead ancient red dragons at you because they remembered an npc said he saw a shadow 20 sessions ago and "you should of paid attention".

[AzureTheGamerKobold]

Originally posted by Kasa:

I have my game set to core with extra options turned on, which means AI will use all their skills and spells to kill me. (I love the wizards that turn invisible and spam summon monster and haste)

I used a respect mod to alter my allies stats so that are all 25 point buy ( a lot of them had 32 points), so the only concession I made was changing their class from what it was to what I need. Something I could accomplished with mercs, and I don't think I'm particularly skilled nor am I finding it particularly hard.

I have 1 person Mutliclass 1 level in scale monk and the rest in tank Paladin to act as the tank (max charisma and dex) and 1 person go full duel wielding slayer for flanking.
2 ranged dps (fighter archer, and blast sorcerer), with the cleric using a reach weapon acting as buffer with a leopard animal companion (boon companion + animal domain)
And 1 wizard Thessalonian Specialist to act as crowd control and second buffer.

Core difficulty is NOT the games intended difficulty, it's the level for people who have a decently good grasp on pathfinder. Normal mode is for people who don't want to spend hours looking over spreadsheets to find strong class/feat/skill combinations for combat.

So you made a munchkin tank, that's kind of the point people are making. if you don't abuse certain class combos the game can feel nearly impossible which shouldn't be the case.

[NixAhmose]

Originally posted by AzureTheGamerKobold:

The thing is... Core actually doesn't increase the creature stats... so i'm confused why everyone seems to think that is the Core issue. All Core does is turn on crits and other features like characters needing rez scrolls and the like. It increases the size of some encounters, but it doesn't adjust the actual stats of the monsters. So the difference between Normal and Core isn't as big as people think it is. So the actual issue is still that some encounters are just not balanced for your average player. Yes if you munchkin the ever living crap out of your character sure, you'll do fine. Make an instinctual barb with 100 AC, and you will fly through the game no problems.

The problem is that most players aren't going to do that and yet the devs seem to assume they do... and i honestly tried to avoid it but, its looking like i will have to do just that in order to get through some fights. Which in my opinion is poor balance...

Again most of us on core haven't increased creature stats at all, so this is the " base " creature stats... which means the Plagued Smilodons are a " normal " enemy--- normal my blue ass!

Honestly, I don't even mind the enemy stats that much. Sometimes they're really bs but I can get past hard stats to beat. My issue is how they actually arrange encounters and sometimes resorts to really cheap ways of handling difficulty like spawning a bunch of enemies right on top of you. I think it should be common courtesy that in a game a game where action economy and positioning are incredibly valuable to winning combat encounters, you should never design encounters where enemies spawn right on top of the party unless they failed some kind of check or made a bad dialogue choice, especially when said enemies have the ability to cast stun locking aoes. It just feels like crap when an enemy spawns right next to your squishy casters and then stunlocks most of your party.

[doto]

Originally posted by NixAhmose:

Yeah, as a experienced dm myself, some of the encounters in this game are super bad. It feels like the game is actively trying to ♥♥♥♥ with you by either sending an ungodly number of enemies after you or just spawning enemies right on top of you.
Like it was cute the first time they lazily just have 8 spiders and a ash giant spot right on top of my party even though the party wasn't ambushed, but seeing them constantly spawn enemies right behind or on top of you in Drezin is so ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ annoying. Spawning two vrocks right on top of my party and use an aoe ability that infects them with spores and a stun locks them does not make the game feel challenging in an interesting way, it feels like frustrating difficulty just for the sake of being difficult, and they do this multiple ties during the Drezin fight and there's no reasonable way to counter this. Like if this was real Pathfinder, you would have been able to roll a perception check to spot them before hand in order to either shoot at them or get prepared for them, but here though they just spawn right on top of you and you just have to hope that your casters get a higher initiative before they're stun-locked to death.

full hearted agree. a lot of these counters are absolutely crap and poorly designed to keep frustration front and center for difficulty sake. even in that encounter you mention, they monster closet you to the right even though it's been shown you've pushed and secured that portion of the city.

btw, the npcs that come w/ with the battering ram you are immortal. you can just go far right and fight the monster closet first, then deal with the vrocks as theyll be tanked by the immortal npcs. you can do that for both of those events.

[Kasa]

A 1 level dip into monk then going the rest of the way in 1 class is hardly munchkin.
Pathfinder and D&D 3.5 relay heavily on multi-classing, generally the only classes the benefit from going singularly 1 class would be casters.

I simply looked at the classes and say "Hey, paladins add charisma to their saves or look there is a monk that adds their charisma to their AC It would make a good class combination!"

This is like saying taking levels in rogue and wizard to qualify for arcane trickster, or a level in fighter then going rogue to use more armor and weapons.

Not to mention as I said and you chose to ignore, that is in CORE difficulty the level that's ABOVE DARING.
I'm sure if I was playing normal or daring I could play any way with varying degrees of difficulty.

Edit*
I just looked at what I actually set my settings to and I'm actually on a level between core and hard.

[RocketMan]

Originally posted by Mithrals:

I love this DM, he understand i like to make powerful chars.
He doesn't pull any punches, but has also given me the tools i need to manage if I look carefully.
It's the best kind of DM there is.

Only issue in my eyes is he'll just throw a whammy at you with no warning.

Where's the gradual difficulty increase? It's all random. Will this encounter be easy as pie? Will this one be an instant party wipe? Will this army wipe out mine? Or will I steamroll it like I usually do.