Observation on party members after 100%ing the game

[Dezmonik]

After taking some time to digest my thoughts, I've thought of a couple of places that the party system could use improvement.

Firstly, actually finding them. There's only three party members you're guaranteed to run into, and of those only Papineau is guaranteed to join you with no fuss. Unless you're playing easy however, you'll only get him after going through the entirety of the sewer and parking garage and at that point the game is practically over. The only thing you can do with him at that point is take him to finish up stuff you missed. Even more puzzling is that he has dialogue with events and people that you can only see if you recruit him on Easy because they happen before you can get him in Normal. The other two guaranteed to exist characters, Joel and Leigh, are essentially secret characters so I don't feel like its fair to count them as guaranteed. Party members add a lot of flavor as well as sand down the difficulty of early game, yet you usually just get them to assist with the already easier end game. My solution to this is to guaranteed a party member in the first three days. Make it so that Dan, Hellen, or the punks are a guaranteed knock after prompting the player to go back to the apartment after, say, opening the stairwell door with keys or something. Maybe just move Papineau to his easy mode location permanently, or possibly stick him in the ladies room which requires herbicide to get in. Also, add more roaches to earlier apartments so you can get Roaches sooner, because the only way I've ever gotten Roaches is by speed running the game and getting all the roaches in the basement ASAP.

Secondly, it can be incredibly difficult to change party members partway through the game. I recruit Ernest with only four days left, and he starts at level 2. My party is around level 15. He's effectively unusable except as an item thrower. I would appreciate either scaling new party members to the rest of the team, or creating a way of quickly leveling them up with drops or some sort of apartment mechanic.

[Arvay6]

Imo all party members should gain xp even if you're not using them. It's a fairly base-line RPG mechanic now so people not in use don't fall to the wayside.

[SFF]

While I do think having the door-based party members randomized each playthrough is interesting, it definitely wouldn't hurt if there was a way to control when they show up or even give them pre-set spawn locations like Papinou, Leigh and Joel.

It would also help if there was an indicator as to how many days you have before there's a chance the door party members will mutate.

[girl who kisses girls]

...am I missing something with Papineau? People say you gotta go to the sewers first to get hm on Normal, but I'm playing on Normal (yes, I'm sure; I don't have autosaves or save-anywhere) and he was just hanging out in the men's restroom on the ground floor. Joined me right away, too. He's been extremely helpful.

[Night Sparrow]

I think Papinau spawns in men's restroom in if your party is not full? idk that's how he spawned for me too

[Turkeyham]

Yeah I've gotten good at avoiding all fights along with blitzing to the ground floor on the first day and he's in the men's room both times so far.

I heard he leaves after a few days though so maybe that's why people think difficulty is involved?

[girl who kisses girls]

The theory on him leaving is it's when you trigger the bus crash then let him sit there a bit. Makes sense, at that point monsters start crawling all over. I'd wager it coincides with the landlord's apartment event becoming available.

[CURTIS GODWIN IS A PIMP]

I wouldn't be shocked if it's just per-playthrough RNG meant to help further differentiate multiple playthroughs. I was fortunate to have him in the earlier location in my playthrough because I was having TERRIBLE luck finding my third and fourth party members(after lucking into Leigh right off the bat)

[Turkeyham]

Originally posted by girl who kisses girls:

The theory on him leaving is it's when you trigger the bus crash then let him sit there a bit. Makes sense, at that point monsters start crawling all over. I'd wager it coincides with the landlord's apartment event becoming available.

That could be it because the two times I made it down there I checked the men's bathroom first. May start a run and save before heading down there to see if that's the trigger or not.

[Turkeyham]

Originally posted by Turkeyham:

Originally posted by girl who kisses girls:

The theory on him leaving is it's when you trigger the bus crash then let him sit there a bit. Makes sense, at that point monsters start crawling all over. I'd wager it coincides with the landlord's apartment event becoming available.

That could be it because the two times I made it down there I checked the men's bathroom first. May start a run and save before heading down there to see if that's the trigger or not.

Alright so I did a quick run to the ground floor and he's there both before and after the bus crash. BUT! I then decided to sleep and allow the landlord's door to open to which I then found him dead on the floor of the bathroom(Nestor wasn't there). So still no idea what makes him relocate other than amount of days passed I guess.

[abraham_linkedin]

I think party members starting at lv.1 is fine, the combat is not very difficult anyway. It kind of works thematically where you have to decide whether it's worth it to help/invite people, and also prevents strong people like Helen automatically steamrolling everything if you get them late.
Though on the other hand it might make more sense if you got the weaker party members first, so they have space to grow, and the stronger ones later in the game.