Pillars Of Eternity Options

[Lopov]

Are Endless Paths of Od Nua completely optional or must you fight through some levels? They must be really tough, if even Xaurips are challenging.

--

Aryan made it to Gilded Vale and got acquainted with Raedric's law. After such warm welcome, he doesn't intend to stay in Gilded Vale for too long. He went on a walk before sleep and descended down the stairs leading to the collapsed Temple of Eothas, which I haven't noticed until now. He picked up a quest there but will see to it the next day.

[SubRosa]

You only have to do the dungeon of Caed Nua, and about half of the first level of Od Nua proper. The rest is all optional.

You haven't been in the ruined temple before? Aryan better get some help from Eder and Aloth, or hire some Adventurers. That's not a place to tackle alone!

[haute ecole rider]

Reloaded the game. Got further against that Forest Lurker but still got killed. Trying to figure out the strategies in this game and Sage Rose's posts have been helpful, but I still feel like I have much to learn!

Thanks for the heads up on Cael Nua - sounds like a place for lots of saves (like after each battle!).

[Lopov]

SubRosa, do you by chance know a console command to remove items, specifically quest items?

After completing the Buried Secrets quest in the Temple of Eothas, I'm stuck with Bones of dead priests, because Aryan finished a conversation with Wirtan and didn't give him the bones. After the conversation the quest was completed and bones are now a permanent quest item. Apparently they can be given to magistrate in Gilded Vale but only if you don't talk to Wirtan first. I know that bones are located in stash and don't take up space in my inventory but it gets on my nerves that I can't get rid of them. I tried various commands like removeitem, takeitem, deleteitem but to no avail.

[SubRosa]

Reloaded the game. Got further against that Forest Lurker but still got killed. Trying to figure out the strategies in this game and Sage Rose's posts have been helpful, but I still feel like I have much to learn!

Thanks for the heads up on Cael Nua - sounds like a place for lots of saves (like after each battle!).

I found the best way for dealing with Forest Trolls and their Forest Lurker big brothers is with archery. Most notably lead off with Wounding Shot to hobble the target. That cuts their movement way down, and gives you more time to pepper it with missiles.

The other thing is that every member of your team needs a missile weapon, including the melee tanks. What I did was give Persephone and Darryl (my tanks) each an Arbalest. It has a long range and does a lot of damage. The glacial reload speed doesn't matter for them, since they are normally only going to get off one shot before going into melee anyway. But against a single, hobbled troll or lurker they can often get off two shots.

Your other characters need missiles as well. Your Wizard should have a wand, scepter, or rod. I find I like the wands, because they have a fast attack speed. Make sure you take the Blast & Penetrating Blast Talents for them. Between that and their Arcane Assault they always have a medium or short range attack. Your Priest can use either a bow or wand. I have Sofie using a wand, and find that works well for her. Finally your Ranger or ranged Rogue should have either a Hunting or War Bow of course.

I always sneak around with the entire party. Give everyone at least one point in it. Then when I find the baddies I deploy for battle at the edge of missile range, make sure I switch everyone to ranged weapons, and have everyone open up on a single target. That often kills it right off. If not, they should be hobbled and taking continuous fire from your archer, wizard, and priest as they limp near. If they survive to meet your line, have one tank engage them head on and lead with a Knockdown. Have the other tank or your Priest circle completely behind them. That gives them the Flanked debuff, which lowers their defense (and makes it easier for you to hit).

SubRosa, do you by chance know a console command to remove items, specifically quest items?

After completing the Buried Secrets quest in the Temple of Eothas, I'm stuck with Bones of dead priests, because Aryan finished a conversation with Wirtan and didn't give him the bones. After the conversation the quest was completed and bones are now a permanent quest item. Apparently they can be given to magistrate in Gilded Vale but only if you don't talk to Wirtan first. I know that bones are located in stash and don't take up space in my inventory but it gets on my nerves that I can't get rid of them. I tried various commands like removeitem, takeitem, deleteitem but to no avail.

I have had success with RemoveItem. I think I used it like this:
RemoveItem Player misc_item 1

Just be sure you have the right name for the character, use the FindCharacter command to make sure and the right name for the item. Even the player character is not always Player. I have had it come up as something else. You should be able to find the item names in PillarsOfEternity_Data\assetbundles\prefabs\objectbundle

You could also try taking the remains to the guy first talked to when you entered Gilded Vale. I think his name is Urgeat. This guide says you can give the remains to him, though I have never tried it.

This post has been edited by SubRosa: Sep 11 2015, 09:56 PM

[Lopov]

I found the correct code, it's quest_item_sack_bones. I tested it by using the command additem quest_item_sack_bones 1 and it works - I get another set of bones in my inventory. However, the removeitem command doesn't get recognized, even if I insert player (or the reference of the player) in the command line. Can you please test it in your game and see if it works with this same item? I get the response "No command or script 'RemoveItem' accepting 2 parameters exist.

[SubRosa]

I am not having any luck with it now. I even tried using RemoveTalent, which works on both talents and abilities. It might be something that changed with the White March expansion. Or I might have been thinking of removing abilities or talents.

This post has been edited by SubRosa: Sep 11 2015, 09:14 PM

[Lopov]

Thanks anyway. I'll wait for the save editor to be updated at Nexus, then I'll manually delete bones.

--

Aryan teamed up with Durance and they were on a way to Caed Nua, crossing the Black Meadow, when they found supplies, intended for the blacksmith from Gilded Vale. They backtracked to return the smith's shipment and rented a room at the Black Hound Inn, planning to journey east to Caed Nua in the morning.

Aryan fights a shadow

Forest Battle

Lurker dies

Aryan rushes to the combat while Durance stays behind and fights with his spells. He only joins the fight directly when Aryan does most of the work.

[SubRosa]

Aryan is taking on the world with just one companion? He definitely has cajones! I'd go with a much bigger party.

The team now has an undead cat for a mascot

Taking on a Drake

There's more than one Drake, but Serana has a Ray of Fire!

Serana burns them down (and Persephone and Darryl too!)

Here is a short (2 min) video I made showing the Deadwalkers in a typical battle. Make sure you set it to play back at 1080p, otherwise it just looks all blurry.

You can see how I pick a choke point in the cave to fight, and start out with everyone concentrating their missile attack on one target, a Flame Blight at the lower left. Sadly it survived, because I forgot that it is immune to piercing attacks (which means arrows). But it still suffers the debuffs from archery powers, notably the Hobbled effect from Lucia's Wounding Shot. That at least slowed it down and kept it out of the fight for a while.

Then Persephone and Darryl switch to their melee weapons and step up to block off the tunnel. Lucia switches her target to the on coming Xaurip, with the hopes of Hobbling the nearest one and slowing it down as well. Finally Serana and Sofie continue working on the slowed Flame Blight with their wands.

After a few moments I noticed the Xaurips had an archer that was taking potshots at me. So he became Lucia's sole concern. Since Serana and Sofie have shorter range attacks, I used them to support Persephone and Darryl by attacking the enemy front liners they were engaged with. That gave me a 2-1 advantage at the point of contact.

I find ganging up on the bad guys works really well in this game. I try to use Persephone and Darryl to block off the enemy horde at a bottleneck like a doorway. Then I will usually leave one of them to fight on their own, while the rest of the party all gangs up on the baddie the other has engaged. That way I get a 4 on 1 at that spot. They tend to go down pretty quickly that way. Of course that can be rough on the one tank going it alone, and sometimes they get 3 or more baddies on them. But that is why they are the tanks, and have over 800 health. When things start going bad for them I have Sofie switch from ranged attacks to healing buffs.

This post has been edited by SubRosa: Sep 12 2015, 07:04 PM

[Lopov]

Aryan is taking on the world with just one companion? He definitely has cajones! I'd go with a much bigger party.

I buffed both of them with the console, so they can manage on their own. I prefer smaller parties myself.

An undead cat looks familiar - did team Deadwalker by chance found her in Raedric's dungeons?

I've never met a live drake yet, only their remains scattered over Black Meadow. I assume that bigger drakes a.k.a. dragons inhabit Eora as well.

So that's how Ray of Fire looks like. Aryan keeps this scroll for a special occasion.

[Acadian]

SubRosa, love the little black cat familiar! So it looks like Serana still has a bit of a friendly fire problem - this time it's fire instead of ice spikes in the back?

[SubRosa]

Aryan is taking on the world with just one companion? He definitely has cajones! I'd go with a much bigger party.

I buffed both of them with the console, so they can manage on their own. I prefer smaller parties myself.

An undead cat looks familiar - did team Deadwalker by chance found her in Raedric's dungeons?

I've never met a live drake yet, only their remains scattered over Black Meadow. I assume that bigger drakes a.k.a. dragons inhabit Eora as well.

So that's how Ray of Fire looks like. Aryan keeps this scroll for a special occasion.

Ray of Fire is very effective. But it damages any friendly who gets caught in the ray as well. So you have to be really careful about where you use it.

I have run into regular drakes, and really a really big one in Searing Falls. As I understand it, there are dragons as well. Including an Adra Dragon, which sounds really dangerous. But I have not encountered one yet.

That is indeed the black cat from Raedric's dungeons. I thought he'd be perfect for the Deadwalkers.

SubRosa, love the little black cat familiar! So it looks like Serana still has a bit of a friendly fire problem - this time it's fire instead of ice spikes in the back?

There are a lot more fire than ice spells in Pillars, so just like you said, now Serana is shooting us in the back with flames instead of ice spikes!

[Colonel Mustard]

Eyyyy!

*Finger guns into thread*

I've just been reading through all of the thread as I'm quite interested in getting a copy of Pillars, and I had a couple of questions about the game:

1: Is combat turn-based/can it be turn based? I quite like isometric games in a old-skool Fallout/Baldur's Gate vein, but I much prefer isometric combat to be turn-based rather than in real-time, as I tend to find managing multiple characters in real-time combat to be a confusing, overly-difficult mess. I find turn-based stuff way more enjoyable.
2: Is the inventory complicated? I tend to end up carrying loads of excess stuff when I play RPGs and frankly I hate that. I always end up just getting confused and tired out of trying to sort things out and deal with merchants.
3: How cheesy do you have to be to make a gunslinger build? Flintlock firearms are cool as hell. I want them. I want them all.

Yeah, those were my main questions. Cheers in advance, everyone!

*Finger guns out of thread*

[SubRosa]

It is real time combat. But you can pause the game whenever you want and issue orders to each of your characters. Then unpause, watch what happens for a few moments, then pause again to issue new orders. So it isn't like the original Warcraft games where you have to scramble like mad to click on every one of your units. You have all the time you want to think, change weapons, consider spells, and order your characters around.

The inventory is relatively simple. There is no weight to items. Each character has a small inventory of about twenty items that they can carry directly on them. There is also a Stash which you can put things directly into which has an unlimited capacity. The Stash is sorted into several groups based on weapons, armor, alchemy, and so on. So what I do is keep all the stuff I might want to use in my character inventories. Everything I want to sell goes into my Stash. Then when I get to a merchant I just dump my Stash on them, except the alchemy, which I keep for enchanting.

Guns aren't available to start with. I found a Pistol somewhere in Act I. At the end of Act I you meet a recruitable companion who has an Arquebus. Now that I am in Act II I am finally coming upon Araqubuses and Blunderbusses for sale. Of course you can use the Additem console command to get them any time you want. However, all firearms are really slow to reload. So in practice they are only good for the first shot. After that you need to switch to another weapon for the rest of the fight.

This post has been edited by SubRosa: Sep 13 2015, 04:57 PM

[haute ecole rider]

This looks like one of Persephone's old pals

Speaking of whom, I had an idea, and started Persephone over. Tonight I reached the first town in the game, and was able to hire two Adventurers at the inn. Unlike the Companions, who are NPCs that are fully-fleshed out, with backstories, custom portraits, quests, and so on, Adventurers are basically blank slates that you can hire to join you. Each is a specific level, and the higher level ones naturally cost more. Once you hire them, you go into the character creation for them, just like you did with your PC. This is nice in that it allows you to create them exactly how you want them. So you can do this to fill a specific role on your team.

The downside is that the hired Adventurers are always several levels behind you. But I found a way to get around that. The following console command will bring them up to the level you specify, and wont' change your PC's experience if you are already the same level:

AddExperienceToLevel {Level}

So now Persephone has been joined by Darryl (on the left), and Serana (on the right)

So I'm trying to figure out a way to customize the portraits for two NPC's but reading this am I right in understanding that this can't be done for the named companions such as Aloth and Edér? Drat! I have custom portraits for those two! Now I'll have to think of something else!

[SubRosa]

If you could find where the game keeps the companion's portraits and what their file names are you could replace them with your custom pics.

Found it. All of the companion's pics are in your Pillars of Eternity\PillarsofEternity_Data\Art\Gui\Portraits\Companion folder.

[haute ecole rider]

YES!! Found it, thanks!

*scurries off to make cosmetic changes*

Okay! Here ya go!

This post has been edited by haute ecole rider: Sep 15 2015, 12:59 AM

[SubRosa]

It's Elrond! And is that James Bond beside him? I cannot put a name to the Asian girl, but I am sure I have seen her before.

[haute ecole rider]

Yup! And Yup - my favorite JB.

SeJin (my PC) is inspired by the character Kim Sun Hwa from the K-Drama IRIS. She is played by Kim Seo Yeon, one of my favorite actresses ever.

[Lopov]

Now if someone says that they aren't similar...

...I was itching for a new character, so I created Mitya, a paladin belonging to Order of Kind Wayfarers. The portrait is custom but with plenty of character options I could more or less recreate him in the game.

Paladins differ in quite some aspects from other games, namely they belong to several different orders and not all are good, some are brutal and evil. All paladins are rather zealous but their alignment can shift from good to evil and everything in between.