Mechalibur

Mages just do massively more damage than archers. Most fights are against an abundance of enemies, and archers only being able to target a single enemy at a time puts them at a pretty significant disadvantage to the AoE potential of a wizard or even priest. They make good dodge tanks (except in CS where the accuracy floor is 10% and not against cold, poisons, or acid attacks which use endurance for dodge chance), but in terms of damage they're nowhere close to the potential of a mage. Maybe in Ruined World they can beat a mage in single target damage since the armor growth was lowered in a patch to be closer to elemental defenses for enemies, but in all the other games, they don't come anywhere close to the amount of damage a wizard can output. Sniper is mostly irrelevant by the end-game since it doesn't stack well with haste, which, if you're playing on Torment, should pretty much always be up anyway. While it takes a little longer to get there, mages also have access to adrenaline rush and 2 mages casting 3 lightning sprays (or flameburst/arcane blow if you're feeling like spending more energy) each will neutralize most encounters on Torment. In my experience warriors eventually get to much higher damage than archers by the end game when you get a Flaming Sword. The amount of damage it does compared to other weapons is significantly higher due to the added elemental damage, which in the first 2 games, enemies will have much lower elemental resists than armor. Of course, archers will still have the advantage of survivability (except vs ice/acid/poison) and range, which is useful for taking out enemy mages/priests. In short, I really wouldn't consider archers overpowered, although they're perfectly fine (even if I'm less inclined to use them as tanks in CS due to the accuracy floor).

Every dungeon has an associated quest in it, so you are going to be getting xp regardless.

I just went through the power core solo since it got annoying keeping everyone topped off. Even on torment, it wasn't too difficult; the monsters there are pretty tame.

Roamers aren't Fyoras. A Create Roamer canister will boost Roamer level.

If an item boosts creation "Intelligence," it's actually just boosting their magic skill. You can confirm by checking their stats before and after equipping the item. It has nothing to do with control level.

Comprehensive indeed, nice job! I would like to add, though, Queen's Wish is probably one of Spiderweb's easiest games on Torment, so this level of optimization isn't necessary to win (Not that you claimed otherwise! Just want to clarify). While I used a pretty similar early game strategy, by the late game, it was pretty easy for melee characters to survive and spam whirlwind to finish most encounters. Between high evasion, stunned enemies, and mindstolen chump blockers, they were pretty much at 0 risk of dying, which is why I still think Whirlwind is one of the strongest abilities in this game. I also used Shockwave a lot, and never really ran into any survivability issues as a result. Two of my characters knew the spell, so double casting it often resulted in the vast majority of enemies being stunned, leaving them as easy picking for the encounter. The only other ability rating I'd quibble with is Bludgeon Senseless - I never used it much since it lets enemies double dip on resisting it (they can resist confusion, as well as the status effects confusion can cause). If they have low mental resist, I'd much rather use mindsteal instead - same reason I don't care much for Silence. Edit: Bit of a late edit, but I also think Fool's Shoot is 100% worth the downside. The damage is noticeably higher in addition to adding a stack of bleed on each hit. The confusion effect has a small chance of triggering and even then has to beat the character's mental resist AND the resist of whatever effect it tries to inflict. I've used it through 2 playthroughs on Torment and never came into a situation where it actually caused any trouble.

Yeah, a succession conflict as a result of her death would be a pretty interesting way to handle the third game.

At the end of the video it shows a more clear description of the 3 fort specializations. The Diplomacy focus is especially interesting as it mentions improving relationships with the locals and making them more likely to assist you. Might be similar to investing in the leadership skill in Geneforge.

Yeah, if they have 15% evasion then it's definitely likely that the rolls aren't done separately. Thanks for double checking. The 15% vs 10% difference in hit rate is likely just data variance like Slarty said. It looks like the statistical significance test you did was measuring whether or not deadeye runes had any effect, not whether the 5% higher-than-expected hit rate is statistically significant or not. And even then, remember than p < .05 means there's less than a 5% chance the data difference are due to random chance - not that there's 0 chance of the data being anomalous.

You can right click an enemy to see their evasion. If you were against an enemy with 0 evasion, the numbers you ended up with would be inconclusive for proving single rolls. That's why I'm asking.

I think the lack of consensus wasn't so much "do deadeye runes help with evasion" but rather "is evasion rolled separately from hit chance?" (like how it is in Mutagen). For example, if you have 85% percent natural hit, and the enemy has 10% evasion, is your chance to hit 75%, or a 76.5% chance (.85 x .9). In both cases, a Deadeye rune will help with your overall hit rate, but there is still a distinction. Did you check the evasion of the monsters your were hitting? That could help us determine which case is true.

I get the feeling that poor ol' Mom isn't getting out of the series alive, unfortunately. We'll have to wait and see, though!

Kickstarter confirms it will be the same character. Additionally, Spiderweb Software added this comment to the kickstarter: "When you enter the code, Queen's Wish 2 will tell you what actions are being carried forward."

I love reading stuff like this. I'm glad he's standing behind his decision with the dungeon clearing - the ability to go nova with your casters and then get all their energy back in town made them feel pretty crazy compared to warriors in Avernum.

The Kickstarter for Queen's Wish 2 officially launched: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/spiderwebsoftware/queens-wish-2-the-tormentor/ Between the project description and the blog post Jeff made, we have some new information about the game: You're playing the same character in Queen's Wish 1. This is a first for any game by Spiderweb Software. Queen Sharyn's illness seems to be public knowledge now, and Haven is in a panic. The game will take place in a region called the "Rokaj" where your father is from. I don't believe the first game ever mentioned your character's father, so it looks like we'll finally get some more information about him. You will actually have the option to betray Haven. Core gameplay seems to be the same - you command a squad of soldiers and rebuild forts in the region. There's an interesting screenshot where you pick a "dedication" for your fort, either diplomacy, military, or knowledge. No idea what it means, but you may actually have to make decisions about your forts instead of just taking all the upgrades in every fort. You can still abuse your butler. Dungeons still require you to beat the boss before the enemies de-spawn. The exp system is being re-designed. It sounds like Jeff wants exp to feel more rewarding instead of only being given out when you clear a dungeon. The game will have 12 more abilities than the first Queen's Wish did. He wants to make sure that every ability feels useful, even in the late game. I'm looking forward to it! Let me know if I missed anything important.

It's true that there are a few enemies that give more xp than their level would indicate (like the spectral vlish), but they're pretty rare in my experience.

That's what's supposed to happen. Keep going.

Yep, and the description makes me think it's going to be the same character, although I suppose there's always the possibility of this taking place in the future and you're playing as some other Haven royal.

Jeff updated his blog which has some information on the sequel to Queen's Wish: https://bottomfeeder.substack.com/p/how-i-findstealgrind-out-my-game Not a whole lot of info, but we know the game will be called "Queen's Wish: The Tormentor." Here's the description: "You are the bored prince of a mighty Empire. One of your client states has been neglected for many years and is on the edge of rebellion. You must go there, investigate the problems, and decide how to fix them and what the fate of this land will be." The land it takes place in is called The Rokaj (or The Ro for short), which will have 5 provinces. From the description, it once again looks like we'll be playing Haven Royalty, although it's not quite confirmed if it will be the same protagonist as the first game.

I haven't played Guardian since the change to the HP formula, but it should now theoretically be easier for them to tank for their creations. Shaper sort of plays the opposite way where their creations need to take hits for them. Last time I played guardian, I had a bunch of fights where I'd get maybe 1 or 2 hits in and every other turn would be spent casting a healing spell trying to stay alive while my creations did all the work 😛

Check your journal - do you actually have the control rod in your special items list? If so, you should be able to de-activate the 4 power spirals surrounding the Geneforge, then you can interact with it to destroy it.

Same map? I figured QW2 would be in a completely different part of the world, especially with how the ending mentions you never see Sacramentum again.

We'll probably be able to see what dialogue options are changed from the script folders. It might not be easy to tie it back to the action in QW1, but we should at least be able to see what all the potential dialogues are.

I get the feeling it will be easier to work backward to figure out what they mean once QW2 comes out. ...Although I get the feeling some of the codes may end up doing nothing. It's very possible Spiderweb wanted to capture a number of variables just in case, but may not actually find a use for them during development.

Character stats/equipment don't seem to affect the ending code you get, so it's probably just transferring your character's history, which may be referenced in the sequel (although I'm not sure how consequential it will be considering you very explicitly are stated to never see Sacramentum again). I do believe it will be the same character however, just starting at level 1 again. Although with Queen's Wish having strict level scaling, it's not like it would matter if you didn't.