Pillars of Eternity beta!

[Slaunyeh]

So the backers beta for Pillars of Eternity is here, and I am way more excited than I have any right to be. Anyone else playing the beta?

[Nullpunkt]

Are you under some kind of NDA or can you tell us non-betas (does that make us gammas?) a little about your experience?

[Slaunyeh]

There is no NDA, we're encouraged to share everything we feel like. So I will!

Right now, my experience is sitting at work itching to call it an early day. :)

[Nullpunkt]

Oh boy, that must be terrible! I am already on edge for the game to be released, I can only imagine how you must feel...

Anyway, tell us all about once you run out of pizza and soft drinks and can ALT+TAB out of it for a minute ;-)

[Alex Martin]

I look forward to hearing about it as well. The look of the game just takes me back to the Baldur's Gate/Icewind Dale days in terms of who's making it and the style of the game.

If it has a spell wheel (ala TOEE), then it would be CRPG perfection.

[Slaunyeh]

It's too early to talk about mechanics, but the game does feel very much like the spiritual successor to Baldur's Gate that I was pining for.

The current round of beta is set from level 5 to 8, and take place in a small town in the wilderness. It's void of any main plot stuff, as to avoid spoiling the story for any beta testers (I have no words for how much I appreciate this. :p)

So far, I feel there maybe isn't a lot of information available in chargen, so it's hard to make fully informed choices. What I don't know is whether this is a quirk of the beta, a deliberate design decision, or the consequence of a design where there really aren't any "wrong choices" (this I'll believe when I see it.)

I've not really gotten to any significant combat yet, but I got the sense it works fairly similar to the traditional games of the genre. Magic appears to be using a classic D&D-esque vancian system, but I haven't figured out how to memorize spells yet, so I'm not sure. :)

[Slaunyeh]

Also, I just got et by a lion. o.O

In unrelated news, there's a Trial of Iron mode where you only have one save game that gets deleted if the main character dies.

...I don't think I trust Obsidian enough to only ever have one save game. ;)

[Nullpunkt]

Sounds good so far! Though I wonder how they can debug the main plot-related quests without having a rather large number of people actually play them. Is this more like a technology beta?

[Slaunyeh]

Nullpunkt wrote:

Sounds good so far! Though I wonder how they can debug the main plot-related quests without having a rather large number of people actually play them. Is this more like a technology beta?

Well, yeah. Sorta. It's not so much a "catch bugs" beta as it is a "give feedback on the system" beta. This includes the layout of quests and conversations that, presumably, will also be applicable to the main story (or any story not part of this small snippet of the game world.)

[ShadowFighter88]

Slaunyeh wrote:

Magic appears to be using a classic D&D-esque vancian system, but I haven't figured out how to memorize spells yet, so I'm not sure. :)

Open the character's inventory and right-click their Grimoire. Spells actually seem to work more like the Arcanist's spellcasting; select and prepare spells like a wizard but then cast them like a sorcerer.

The beta feels good, although one bug that caught me early on robbed two of my companions (a Wizard and Priest) of their weapons and the Wizard's Grimoire. Found a blunderbuss for one of them to use, but a Wizard can't cast spells without his grimoire. Managed to get around it by un-equipping the items that disappeared and then re-equipping them after a few level transitions.

It certainly feels very promising for the full game, though.

[Slaunyeh]

ShadowFighter88 wrote:

Slaunyeh wrote:

Magic appears to be using a classic D&D-esque vancian system, but I haven't figured out how to memorize spells yet, so I'm not sure. :)

Open the character's inventory and right-click their Grimoire. Spells actually seem to work more like the Arcanist's spellcasting; select and prepare spells like a wizard but then cast them like a sorcerer.

Oh. I would never have found that on my own. :D

[Feros]

Downloading it right now. Probably won't have time to play tonight or tomorrow, but I am really looking forward to Thursday evening! :)

[ShadowFighter88]

Slaunyeh wrote:

ShadowFighter88 wrote:

Slaunyeh wrote:

Magic appears to be using a classic D&D-esque vancian system, but I haven't figured out how to memorize spells yet, so I'm not sure. :)

Open the character's inventory and right-click their Grimoire. Spells actually seem to work more like the Arcanist's spellcasting; select and prepare spells like a wizard but then cast them like a sorcerer.

Oh. I would never have found that on my own. :D

Found it half by accident. Figured that right-clicking on an inventory item would get you more information and I was right; brings up a more detailed item description but doing it on a grimoire gives you access to what spells it has.

[Redneckdevil]

So far having a blast. I looks and sounds great and the character creation is quite enjoyable. Combat is a bit tough right now and there are a few bugs ive come across (its beta) but overall have been having a blast.
u start off in a 5 man group-ur character and the a rogue/wizard/priest/warrior. So far i think the most damage my party has seen and has gotten them close to dying the damage from the wizards wand hitting the enemy and allies alike.

But yeah, u know when u look back and u wish u could that feeling u had when u first played baldurs gate or morrowind or some great rpg u spent countless hours on? Yeah go ahead and be ready to experience that feeling again

[Werthead]

RPS on the first half-hour of PILLARS OF ETERNITY.

They are under an embargo, so it's hard to parse their thoughts so far:

Quote:

I’m not able to tell you at this point if THE GAME IS REALLY GOOD or not. So you’ll just have to continue not knowing if IT’S DEFINITELY WORTH GETTING for a couple more days.