How does Save Scumming compare to Kingmaker?

[[OTS]EchoZenLogos]

Hey folks.

I really wanted to get into Pathfinder: Kingmaker, and played about 15 hours of it a while ago before giving up. I love the Pathfinder system, having used it on and off for years, and mechanically Kingmaker was doing just about everything right.

Except one thing: it basically made save scumming a requirement.

What I mean is that the game would put you in situations where you could suddenly be fighting enemies that are literally impossible to defeat from a low level, without warning.

It did this in two particular cases.

Once when I rested at a random camp near a bunch of Kobolds and the like - I get attacked by a floating skull monster that has nearly 40 AC and basically can mass fear and kill my party with me having 0 chance of hitting it. The fact that you can get such an unbeatable enemy that early on with no warning is really immersion-breaking.

Another time I continued south thinking that was the way forward, and suddenly encountered random mountain lions that could attack like 3-4 times in a row when I still only could attack once and could massacre me. They didn't look like special variant mountain lions or anything - just regular mountain lions, but apparently they were very high level.

That second one made me quit the game entirely, though I might try again sometime, because my nearest save was very far back at that point.

---

All of that aside, how does Wrath of the Righteous compare? Does it also put you into situations which a real-life game master never would - putting impossible enemies against you with no warning or options to avoid the fight (except in very rare cases where it makes sense in-lore)? Does it require you to basically save constantly and save-scum in order to just be able to progress?

I enjoy RPGs like this for their immersion and role-playing aspects, and being forced into situations which are clearly unfair despite doing everything right in-game is the opposite of immersive. So I wanted to ask if anyone has opinions on if this game does it better, because otherwise it looks like a perfect RPG for me.

[Mravenrocks]

While I really like PF:KM and I finished the game 3 times , WotR has less of those situations.

There are 2:
-Optional bosses. A lot of areas have 100% optional very strong bosses, if you ignore them and only follow the main quest you won't have to fight crazy power spike enemies.

-Once the world map opens up to you during Act 3. There's a good lore reason why some areas have random demons that are much more powerful than you, but as long as you ignore those areas at first and follow the main quest, you can go there later when you are at a higher level.

[[OTS]EchoZenLogos]

Originally posted by Mravenrocks:

While I really like PF:KM and I finished the game 3 times , WotR has less of those situations.

There are 2:
-Optional bosses. A lot of areas have 100% optional very strong bosses, if you ignore them and only follow the main quest you won't have to fight crazy power spike enemies.

-Once the world map opens up to you during Act 3. There's a good lore reason why some areas have random demons that are much more powerful than you, but as long as you ignore those areas at first and follow the main quest, you can go there later when you are at a higher level.

Thank you for the reply. I don't mind optional strong bosses or coming across very powerful enemies in certain areas, by any means. What I mind is the game having such encounters be completely unpredictable and unavoidable unless you read a guide to avoid it or weren't paying any attention to the world at large. I'm fine with it happening here and there, but when I had it happen merely by going slightly off the path into random mountains in Kingmaker (after traveling really far to get there looking for the bandit camp) that was enough to make me honestly rage quit. I don't tend to rage quit.

Do you think that it would be worth me just jumping into Wrath of the Righteous, given that I enjoyed Kingmaker but simply was frustrated by that kind of thing?

[Mravenrocks]

The game has 6 acts and the only act where you can find those kind of "random difficulty fights" are in act 3 if you stop following the main quest and try to explore areas with mythic demons first.

So I think the game is worth getting, but I'm biased since WotR was the best game of the year for me.

[canuck250]

Originally posted by OTSEchoZenLogos:

Do you think that it would be worth me just jumping into Wrath of the Righteous, given that I enjoyed Kingmaker but simply was frustrated by that kind of thing?

PF is a better game overall but you will run into multiple things that are brutal like that. In the prologue there is a large water elemental, most ppl cheese it to beat it. Then there are a few hard fights in the first big area you can explore, they are a bit hidden but still you can run into them without knowing.

So if that is a major game breaker, you might hate wotr also then. If you do play, make sure you always have a high stealth unit in the camp slot. They do the random battle skill check, in act 3 you can get some super brutal almost non beatable (party dependant) ambushes.

[jsaving]

Kingmaker and Wrath come from the same studio and are broadly similar in terms of fairness and difficulty. If you genuinely see your Kingmaker experience as one where you were "doing everything right in-game" but were forced to save-scum because the game's encounters are "unfair," then you will very likely see Wrath the same way and might be better-off with visually similar alternatives like Deadfire that offer smoother run-throughs. Good luck!

[canuck250]

I will say tho, I don't feel like learning the game is save scumming. So running into that water elemental and dying, isn't a save scum. Reloading to pass a skill check or force a favourable outcome is. You def do not need to save scum but you def need to quick save often in case something bad happens.

[[OTS]EchoZenLogos]

Originally posted by canuck250:

I will say tho, I don't feel like learning the game is save scumming. So running into that water elemental and dying, isn't a save scum. Reloading to pass a skill check or force a favourable outcome is. You def do not need to save scum but you def need to quick save often in case something bad happens.

I don't mind reloading due to getting unlucky or such, at least to a degree.

I mainly just don't want to have to reload because of actually impossible situations.

Anyway, I'll maybe hold off for the time being but consider trying Kingmaker again (or picking up this on a sale) once I have played some of the other RPGs I have some more.

[[Tact]]

Why do you consider the Will-o-Wisp to be an immersion breaking encounter?

[[OTS]EchoZenLogos]

Originally posted by Tact:

Why do you consider the Will-o-Wisp to be an immersion breaking encounter?

Because it is impossible to defeat at that point in the story unless you knew of it in advance, more or less, and there's no warning of it showing up or way to avoid it that I know of.

It breaks my immersion when an RPG forces you to load a save just to be able to progress. Because ultimately, I want my choices to matter and to be able to figure out what to do through my own wits and actions. If I have to reload a save because of something like an instant death I couldn't have foreseen, that simply serves as a strict reminder that I am merely playing a video game - not a role-playing game. If I reload because of my own mistakes or because of simple very bad luck (like an enemy getting a large number of critical hits back to back) then that's not something I mind as much.

As a general rule, in a game like this, I look at: what would a good dungeon or game master have done to balance the game, and does the game take similar steps?

Would a good DM let a party get wiped out because they decided to go to sleep at a random camp at a low level? No, because they realize that would cause outrage and you wouldn't have people showing up to the next session when you are forced to start anew.

Obviously a game like this can't work in the same way of course, but it can at least take certain steps. Like ensuring high-level enemies aren't in low level areas, or if they are they can be avoided if players pay attention, or if you end up getting close to them you can use things like persuasion or simply flee rather than fight, or so on.

[Deo]

Originally posted by OTSEchoZenLogos:

Does it also put you into situations which a real-life game master never would - putting impossible enemies against you with no warning or options to avoid the fight (except in very rare cases where it makes sense in-lore)? Does it require you to basically save constantly and save-scum in order to just be able to progress?

Yes and yes. 99% of the fights in game are - your party placed in front of the enemies, or it's an ambush. Swarms of 27 lvl jumping at you from the coffins etc.
Very few fights you can see from a far and be ready for. Save constantly.
I gave the game negative review only because of the encounter design.

But in the end, it's just another game-knowledge check - like many others in both Kingmaker and Wotr.

Also I don't even remember any annoying ambushes in Kingmaker, except ones in House at the Edge of Time when Wild Hunts/Ghosts ambushes your party. If you remember those ambushes - that's what most of the Wotr fights are like.

In the end Wotr still worth it's money 100% (and DLCs too, especially Midnight Isles) but the game could be better.
Just get yourself a habit to make new (not rewriting old) manual save every 30 min.

[fox5s]

They have built in dedicated Save Scumming buttons, F5 and F8. It's up to you whether to use them or not. Are there situations that require it? Ehh... that depends on a LOT of variable. Mostly no but Save Scumming can make things a lot easier.

The particularly egregious ones are prob skill checks. There are entire areas and quests you can be locked out of for failing a skill check not to mention the EXP you gain from them. However, they at least show up in the combat log so you can see when you fail them unlike Kingmaker.

Originally posted by OTSEchoZenLogos:

Once when I rested at a random camp near a bunch of Kobolds and the like - I get attacked by a floating skull monster that has nearly 40 AC and basically can mass fear and kill my party with me having 0 chance of hitting it. The fact that you can get such an unbeatable enemy that early on with no warning is really immersion-breaking.

This is not a defense of that area and I actually agree with you. However, that encounter was shmuck bait through and through. But, it points to a larger problem that affects both games.

Owlcat is a massive ♥♥♥♥ of a DM, when judged by tabletop standards, that pulls some of the laziest, yet dirtiest tricks that would get them a punch in the mouth or an empty table if they pulled them on an actual tabletop group. Those tricks include, but are not limited to, Massive stat bloat for no reason (not even limited to base stats as there are random jobber skeletons you will run into that have 10 more Natural Armor than they should for no discernible reason), stacking multiple templates worth more than the sum of their CR (hello Undead Fiendish Fey of Kingmaker), adding buffs or abilities to things for no logical reason other than to screw over the player (most of the endgame enemies in WotR having Mind Blank, a level 8 arcane only buff, on them with no logical access to any caster of sufficient level to have used it on them for the express purpose of not allowing them to be trivialized by intelligent play).

With all that said, Owlcat also provides you will all the tools necessary to overcome their dickery. This is actually the reason I like WotR more because of the expanded options (or tools) provided by the massive amount of classes, archtypes, and Mythic Paths they made available.

[canuck250]

You have to remember, a ton of different people play wotr. Ranging from RP to full sweat min max. A human dm can tailor the game to their players at the table. A video game can not do that, so they put in harder fights for challenges, then they have difficulty settings to make it easier. Most of those 'bs fights' do not have to be done right away and you can come back after gaining some levels.

You are the dm and the player, you control the fun. The game puts in harder challenges for the people that want them, then you have the power to soften them or ignore them.

[[Tact]]

Originally posted by OTSEchoZenLogos:

Because ... there's no warning of it showing up or way to avoid it that I know of.
...
As a general rule, in a game like this, I look at: what would a good dungeon or game master have done to balance the game, and does the game take similar steps?

Would a good DM let a party get wiped out because they decided to go to sleep at a random camp at a low level? No...

Yeah you're right a DM probably wouldn't do that at a low level. But, on the flip side a good DM would also probably punish you for sleeping in a camp filled with freshly dead bodies that have mysterious burns on them! Which should have been an indication that something was amiss. So sort of a give and take on that one, imo.

Like you said, video games are always going to be played differently than real games, and will be less reactive and tailored. In the case of the Will-O-Wisp in particular I felt like the clear indication to me was to come back later with more experience. So it didn't really bother me much, personally. But that's just my view on it.

I don't know what level you are, but a couple of spells can negate his attacks and then you just have to deal with his AC.

Personally I would look at the combat encounters in this game as being more like combat puzzles to be solved. There is a lot of combat in this game and it can be very tough.

But I also have no problem with quicksaving/loading all the time so maybe I'm just weird lol.

[Ishan451]

Originally posted by OTSEchoZenLogos:

How does Save Scumming compare to Kingmaker?

Well... the problem is sitting in front of the PC, so i would say Save Scumming is as much or as little a problem as Kingmaker was. If you are prone to save scum, you will save scum.

[azaris]

It's not as bad as in Kingmaker. There are no noob trap encounters where the game baits you to sleep in the middle of charred corpses like it's perfectly safe. You can still get ambushed on the world map by mythic demons teleporting in the middle of your unbuffed party if you forget to assign camping roles. If you play Azata or Aeon paths, the game will throw you in an impossibly hard (if you're not prepared for it) boss fight out of nowhere and you WILL wipe the first time you get to it. But that happens very late in the game. And there are ambush fights where you get hit by AoE effects and get attacked from the rear etc. Just your standard "cRPG designers hate their players" stuff.