Stronghold Adventure Quests Question :)

[TheMac]

I just bought both POE and POE II with the largest bundle during the Steam sale, and I'm currently playing POE. I'm starting to gather a party and I'm wondering how the Stronghold quests work, specifically in terms of how you send characters on them.

In POE II you can dismiss a character, but they're always available if you want to sort or change them out. I'm not seeing that feature (not so far) in POE and it leads me to think that my max party of six characters is who I would be sending out to perform the adventures.

For example, if I have a party of six, then I'd send out two characters and I'd have to face the next area and next set of monsters with only my party of four (two are out on adventure), as opposed to creating a party of five more (total of six) at an Inn, and using the companion characters to send out on the Stronghold adventures. Is this correct?

What happens if you don't allow a companion character, such as Eldar to join your party. Can you add him in later if you choose, like you can in POE II? Thanks!

[blue_eyed_boy]

Stronghold quests only become available once you have made substantial upgrades to the keep, by which time you should have acquired enough companions to have at least one spare. You can only assign one companion to a stronghold quest (they are purely text-based missions, and all you have to do is choose who to send on them). The base game gives you 8 'story' companions and any companions not in your party will wait at the stronghold and can be sent out on stronghold quests. Custom companions work exactly the same way - you can make as many as you like, and any not in your party will remain at the stronghold until you want to use them. You usually need to be at the stronghold to swap party members in and out. Three additional story companions become available in The White March.

I'm not sure what happens in every case if you choose not to take a character into your party - it may depend on your dialogue choices. Generally speaking, I think they remain where they are, so you can pick them up at any time. But be careful with Durance - if you tell him to get lost, he may disappear for good.

[TheMac]

Originally posted by blue_eyed_boy:

Stronghold quests only become available once you have made substantial upgrades to the keep, by which time you should have acquired enough companions to have at least one spare. You can only assign one companion to a stronghold quest (they are purely text-based missions, and all you have to do is choose who to send on them). The base game gives you 8 'story' companions and any companions not in your party will wait at the stronghold and can be sent out on stronghold quests. Custom companions work exactly the same way - you can make as many as you like, and any not in your party will remain at the stronghold until you want to use them. You usually need to be at the stronghold to swap party members in and out. Three additional story companions become available in The White March.

I'm not sure what happens in every case if you choose not to take a character into your party - it may depend on your dialogue choices. Generally speaking, I think they remain where they are, so you can pick them up at any time. But be careful with Durance - if you tell him to get lost, he may disappear for good.

Thank you very much for the detailed answer! I think I have a good idea now. It will be a while before I have the stronghold upgraded, though I won't worry about where my extra companions will be. I'll simply accept all companions so I'll have the same options in POE II. :)