What a bumpy road!

[D'amarr from Darshiva]

First time I've not quit the game upon arriving at the bandits camp in the "big swamp", which isn't so big as its name suggests. It looks more like a stinking abandoned surface mining pit.

Still had to force myself again to continue playing.

Where the Gothic series introduces you to an interesting story, a few allied NPCs and gives you a worthwhile goal, Risen fails early in my view. Do I care about Sara? Nah, but let's do some role-playing and help her. And what does she do? Or to put it differently, what does the game do? Upon arriving at a house with blood stains at the backside, she wants to stay there. D'oh! No options. Not even after returning to her later except for a few more XP and a potion. Meanwhile, I know she will move on as a story/chapter driven event. For the atmosphere, that still sucks. I would have suggested she becomes a dancer.

Then to the swamp camp once more. Not much happening there. Not many people to talk to. And the game gets slightly confused, if talking too much before completing quests. You either get bits of responses that refer to something you haven't worked on yet. Or you face silence and need to run around - well, it's called running, but isn't really fast - in search of any new options you may get. Enter Sam, who floods you with input several times. And still you are stuck with journal quest entries you cannot close for unknown reasons. You cannot know that they will close later when you get more conversation choices after completing other quests. Quite a confusing mess!

Eventually, I saw myself forced to leave the camp and explore a bit, hunting animals and other beasts, because I've run out of money once again and started suffering from claustrophobia. That damn swamp!

And those meta-gaming requirements! Quite obviously, player wonders how long to save LP as not to invest into something that is unimportant for the early quests to complete? And if investing too much into skills that create income, fighting in the arena would get much more difficult and take a lot more time or require player to use protection scrolls of unknown benefit. Only with knowledge from previous playthroughs one can make such decisions. Else the save and reload trial-and-error testing dance becomes necessary.

Eventually, after a lot more running around, I got the option to challenge Brogar. Fingers crossed that the game will get more interesting now.

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1257821988

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1257822761

[D'amarr from Darshiva]

Originally posted by Dohi64:

oh yeah, overlooked the balcony part. sneaking is a single-point skill, you can or you can't do it, if you wear the ring, you don't need to spend lp on it, if you spent lp on it, you don't need the ring, but I'm sure you know that too.

Not doing any meta-gaming and not following guides or walkthroughs, I couldn't foresee whether and where to find that ring. So, yes, I've learned the skill much earlier and ignored the ring when I found it.

It's similar with Nelson's Ring. Only meta-gamers will know about that ring.

Originally posted by Dohi64:

and yes, placing the head aggroes konrad, but you can just jump out the balcony without fighting anyone,

Didn't work. The guards attacked me. Maybe I could have fled far enough, but I was afraid of repercussions and reloaded.

Originally posted by Dohi64:

and if you don't go back to him (there's really no need anyway), nothing will happen, quest complete, bonus xp and scroll for sleeping with olga (I think), etc.

Olga is completely unrelated to this quest and can be booked earlier already. Screenshot in post #5.

When Weasel refers to Sonya's place, there is nothing left to talk about with Sonya, so I simply used the free bed in one of the rooms.

[Dohi64]

yeah, you can do many things in whichever order you want, it mostly doesn't matter, but if you don't book olga earlier, it follows the cow head quest nicely. and if you run far enough, the guards give up chase.

[D'amarr from Darshiva]

Letting Konrad, the townswoman and guards spot you defeats the purpose of sneaking in and placing the cow head on the bed before Konrad will go to bed. I mean, instead I could simply visit him in his shop and show him the cow head, and the effect would be the same.

It should be possible to sneak in and place the cow head in his bed unseen. For that to be possible, the NPCs need to leave the next room at least for a short time. Whether it has ever been possible or is still possible, dunno - and I'm not willing to spend hours waiting on the balcony observing the townswoman. Maybe there's only a very short window during day hours when the townswoman leaves the room. Maybe, maybe not. She has only checked the chest. In the evening, Konrad joins her. And when it's too late, once I found him lying in bed. Would have been funny to put the cow head into the bed nevertheless. Didn't work.

There's a reason why modern games advertize NPCs that follow schedules and day and night cycles. In Harbour Town, many NPCs don't. Edgar, the smith, for example, seems to be working 24/7.

[D'amarr from Darshiva]

Chapter 2.

New spawns in plenty of locations including some black wolves as another variation of a normal wolf. Hmmm. And it seems the various moths gained a 4th attack.

Finally received a first two teleportation stones. And a 3rd one from Scordo. Why the heck did Scordo not offer one earlier? Only now I could ask him about a faster way to Harbour Town. D'oh!

More slow running around in search of graves. And a little bit of exploration, which isn't rewarding. After fighting a bunch of skeletons and a skeleton lord and climbed down the coast, the game decided to punish me for that:

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1265049627

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1265050292

[D'amarr from Darshiva]

Sigh - whose idea was it to throw skeletons at the player in narrow caves, where collision with cave walls make you stuck too easily? It leads to cheesy tactics, such as moving backwards to a choke point, where the AI gets confused, and only one can attack you.

Combat is still poor and tedious. Perhaps I need higher sword skill. No idea without prior knowledge. It's always the same overly defensive lurking, watching enemy's attack pattern and trying to land some hits.

On the positive side, the west coast looks kinda nice:

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1265922089
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1265922402

But then they throw an Ashbeast at you.

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1265923030

[D'amarr from Darshiva]

Increasing sword fighting skill to 6+1 makes a difference, but enemies with random jump attacks still break through parry and shield block. That makes combat extremely tedious. And I avoid Ashbeasts like the plague. They one-hit kill me.

The east coast is so lala. The same enemies everywhere including packs of wolves. Five and more. I've met Hendrik, who talked about a "Gyrger", described him as some dangerous beast, but stayed vague at the same time. I took the risk and led him to the lair. Dozens of gnomes, and finally some green abomination that didn't survive a few hits with some sharp b-astard sword. D'oh!

Apropos sharp b-astard sword - it's from Oscar, who suddenly had new items in stock. Why? On change of chapter? I could have used such a weapon much earlier.

The quest with Rufo, the trail dog (wolf?), didn't turn out as planned. I've been to all the places before, so no ambush or anything like that. Uneventful following, barking, uhm well.

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1266615700
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1266618222
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1266631548

[Dohi64]

ashbeasts are late-game enemies and are much easier to deal with when you get the charged attack (sword 9, but with axes it's level 2 or something).

respawns, certain mechanics (like teleport stones, higher level skills) and vendor inventory changes are triggered by advancing the story and reaching a new chapter, though there are a few other cases (as you'll soon find out) that change things as well.

and of course if you kill and explore everything, certain quests will be uneventful, though there are a few that spawn extra enemies as you go.

[D'amarr from Darshiva]

Ashbeasts aren't much of a problem anymore with a better sword that does more damage.

The eastern temple quest is kinda nice.

Strength trainers stopping at 100 destroys it completely. I've got 35 LP unused now and cannot raise STR anymore after I've used more than a dozen permanent strength bonus potions.

Combat is such a chore in this game, I cannot motivate myself any longer. I think I understand what the developers wanted to create, but it doesn't work for me.

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1267336084
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1267335704
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1267337053
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1267337308

[Dohi64]

yeah, you should've saved str plants for alchemy/permanent potions to use after you train to 100. and combat in risen 2 is a lot worse.

[D'amarr from Darshiva]

As I didn't notice any increase in LP costs for +5 STR, I stopped spending LP on STR around STR 65 or so and learned Alchemy 3 instead. I've managed to get to STR 140, but combat is such a chore - and chapter 4 starts with generic fetch quests that are not tempting enough.

[Dohi64]

you should've noticed it because mana is the only thing that costs the same every time (1 lp). if you explore thoroughly, you can easily find all 20 hero's crowns to make 20 +5 str potions with alchemy 3, plus you can find one somewhere and get one from the don in chapter 4 if you picked his side, and there are more than 20 of the permanent str plants (can't remember the name), that should add another 5 or so points too, plus there are rings and amulets to increase it as well, the best is +15, I think.

and if you explored and killed most things previously, chapter 4 is basically a few new dungeons to get the armor pieces and weapon, some are longer, there's a more puzzly one and one literally takes 2 minutes, then a boss fight and you're done.