Well, more than that for tactician you cannot change the difficulty once you start so I'm stuck with it unless I start again. So, that's why I don't have a choice but to keep going or start the whole game again.
Anyway I was moaning far too prematurely as it turns out there was loads of stuff I could do both small scale and epic.
Had sex with a lizard and also managed to beat
in a pretty epic fight. My team performed amazingly so I guess we are back in business. My squad is Red Prince as a pure fighter, Beast is a polymorphing ranger, Ifan as a fighter/cleric and my character as the mage. It's a bit more of a sausage-fest than I would normally like but the female party members kind of annoyed me in this game.
Ah OK, I didn't know the game locks you into Tactician. I have severe alt-itis, so I constantly start over, but I can understand not wanting to do that just to change the difficulty.
My party set-up constantly changes because of the alt-itis. But I usually go for a mixture of melee (2H), archery, one rogue and some support magic. In my current playthrough I have Lohse as a Summoner and she is surprisingly capable. I never used summoning before because at low levels the summoned incarnate is so weak. But once you pour a few points into summoning and learn both infusions, it becomes really strong. I love that the incarnate changes depending on the surface you summon it on and how it has the Opportunist talent.
I also had no idea you can have multiple totems.
Just bought this game a few days ago, having a lot of fun with it so far. At least story-wise. I'm in Fort Joy now.
But there are a few things I'm wondering and it would be cool to read some tips:
- How important is the choice of a party in the beginning? I chose Ifan, the rogue, red prince and the dwarf as a party.
- I'm getting my ass handed to me in combat... I've beat a few enemies but, for example, the three crocodiles are just destroying me. It feels like I'm extremely underpowered. Maybe I need to buy some gear for my other party members? They're running around in rags, so...
- If I need to buy gear: who sells it?
- Why can't I see vendors / etc on the map? I only see the yellow blips on the mini-map, but once I zoom in they disappear.
- Can you RUN in this game? Movement speed is kinda slow.
I'm mostly looking for tips for the combat because I think I'm gonna lose a lot of time.
Thanks guys!
- You can change party members whenever you want on the first island. After that the choice is final, but the game warns you about it beforehand so don't worry about missing the point of no return.
- You basically want to avoid combat as long as possible in Fort Joy. Try to do as many quests and explore as many areas as you can (since it rewards you exploration bonus xp), which should get you to level 3 without ever drawing your weapon. After that you should be able to tackle every encounter in Fort Joy (although some will remain challenging).
- It is generally not a good idea to spend too much money on gear in the beginning. Money is scarce and you are probably better off buying skill books so you can learn more combat abilities. Luckily the crocodiles drop a piece of gear which lets you teleport characters and objects around. The beginning of the game kind of revolves around using this as much as possible to get access to hidden chests and the like. Trust me when I say there are a lot of them around Fort Joy. I have escaped the place two dozen times by now and I am still discovering new things.
- Everyone, really. The lizard inside the elf cave sells the most gear. But again, try not to spend too much money on it. I usually just buy all the cheap shoes, shirts, pants and gloves (a couple of gold each) just to get a few points of armor before jumping into combat. As for skill books: there are several inmates selling them. Try to make it a habit to trade with everyone you come across just to see if they sell something useful. Trading doesn't interrupt dialogue, so there is no reason not to do it.
- Yeah the map is kind of barebones, although you can add markers yourself. You can have multiple of them and give them custom titles, so they may help.
- Sadly not, although you can select and warp to waypoints from anywhere on the map. This saves some time on backtracking at least.
A few combat tips:
- Focus on one type of damage. It is possible to do a mixed physical/magic party, but it is very hard in the beginning. I personally find it much easier to let everyone deal physical damage and only use magic as support. Once you get to Act II, you can respec freely and infinitely, so you can always switch to a mixed party when you feel you got a solid handle on the combat.
- Try to position your party members before combat. Ranged characters (either bow/crossbow or mages) benefit greatly from high ground as this will greatly increase their range, their damage (in case of Rangers/Wayfarers) and generally keeps them safe from enemies for at least a few turns.
- Have at least one character with the Battering Ram and Battle Stomp. These skills inflict knockdown on enemies that are stripped of their physical armor, forcing them to skip a turn. I cannot overstate how important this is. They require a melee weapon, so your rogue can use them as well if you give them one point of Warfare.
- Rogues do the most damage when backstabbing, so use Backlash on cooldown and otherwise position them manually behind enemies. Talents like The Pawn (the first few meters of movement don't cost an active point) and Duck Duck Goose (lets them avoid attacks of opportunity) are useful for them.
- Speaking of which, always make sure your melee characters have the Opportunist talent. This gives them a free attack as enemies move past them (the aforementioned attack of opportunity). And enemies move around a lot. It's free real estate! đź‘‹
- The game usually autosaves before fights, so don't hesitate to reload when things go south. In fact, it is a valid strategy to use your first attempt to scout the battlefield and look what your options are in terms of terrain and positioning. The game really likes to screw you over with enemies moving first and using the environment against you. But once you know what the game does, you can make preparations and start the fight on
your terms.
As for the crocodiles: I recorded a fight to show how I deal with them. No editing, about 6 minutes long:
Custom Character - Elf - Wayfarer
Red Prince - Inquisitor - bought Battle Stomp for him from the lizard in the elf cave
Beast - Shadowblade - actually gimped him by forgetting to equip him with a second dagger, so his damage was on the low side.
Lohse - Summoner - outfitted with a wand and shield. The wand is actually suboptimal because it deals magical damage (while the rest of the party is physical) but it lets her stay at range and keep a shield equiped for additional armor.
In general I always put my archer on the wooden platform and move in the other three party members seperately, pulling them into combat one by one. This is important, because if they weren't unchained they would all enter combat together and you have to waste more active points on walking around.
The only thing that went wrong in this fight was one of the crocodiles oiling Beast. I had hoped they would go after Lohse, since she doesn't need to move anyway. But it all worked out in the end.
Lastly, note how I make sure Red Prince doesn't use more than 2 active points when moving around, so he can still use either Battering Ram or Battle Stomp afterwards. When in doubt, just activate the skill and look at their range before determining how far you need to move.
