Quiconque

Are you sure about this? With regular buffs, not the Enduring Armor type stuff?

One thing that's different in N:R from more recent, non-remake Spiderweb games -- the world is much more open. Once you get past the ruined hall, you aren't really guided to the easier stuff -- in fact there often isn't any direct indication that a particular area is going to be more or less trouble. At the same time, there is less variation in difficulty between different areas -- a lot of places you can go have some easy encounters and some harder ones. C'est la vie. If an encounter is a killer, and you're not at a high level, leave and come back later. Beast Ceremony isn't anything special, it's just some basic buffs IIRC. And no, multiple layers of the same buff (from whatever source) have no additional effect. For armor, you mostly have it right, but N:R has a few unique wrinkles. The percent of damage that each piece of armor blocks varies a little bit from one hit to the next; the stated percentage is a good guide, but in particular it varies massively according to your Armor Use skill. So if you have extremely low Armor Use, you won't block as much as you expect. (As a side note, I don't think multiple layers of the same Shield or Bless buff have had additive effects to anything besides duration, in any SW game in decades... since Exile I think, unless I'm forgetting some wrinkle of the early Avernums)

I usually do Torment but for N:R I think I gave in and dialed down to Tough. The mechanics are unusually well-balanced, and that means that using good builds doesn't make Torment feel like Normal after the first half hour, as it does in some other SW games. Torment's doable for sure, but at a certain point I'd rather just not have to reload so much.

Not so much in the non-aligned ending. http://spiderwebforums.ipbhost.com/topic/22188-geneforge-2-ending-chart/

Huh, really? Are you sure? Well, you can always withdraw from his faction by killing him, which I highly recommend both for the Unaligned ending and, frankly, in general.

To withdraw from a faction, you just talk to the faction leader.

I believe difficulty level is saved with your saved game. You need to change that setting while you are playing, not at the main menu -- there it only affects new games. IIRC.

The problems you ran into with Vlish were probably the result of having them at low levels. At low levels, the flat bonuses creations get matter more, which helps some creations. (And basically everything will miss a lot if it is lower level than what it's attacking -- there is nearly zero adjustment to hit rate for specific creations and their attacks.) At high levels (and it takes very little time to reach those if you pump Shaping skill right away), those flat bonuses (for stuff like HP and Energy) are massively dwarfed by the formulaic bonuses all entities get -- while attack die size, elements, ancillary effects all still matter a lot. That's where Vlish shine, and their low cost means you can make them early (and make a lot of them early) to maximize their level gaining opportunities. Truly OP creations in those games. Anyway, that's academic and doesn't help you now, Snowwhite. You do have a lot of Essence at this point so I suggest, as Nim basically said, picking up some creations that have a higher base level. Gazers would be ideal for you, especially since you do have some points in Magic Shaping. Note that if you want to stay Unaligned (which I fully support -- best ending ever), you CAN temporarily join a faction to reap its rewards such as training, then immediately withdraw from it.

I have to disagree on a few key points: 1. Guardians are extremely sub-par in G3 -- all melee damage was nerfed significantly in G3, and Parry (which was OP in G2) was also nerfed. Easily the worst class in that game, and not a great option in G4 or G5 either. Still playable, obviously, but yeah. 2. In both G2 and G3, the strategy that moves Shapers from "very good" to "OP" is picking the best cheap creation (generally Vlish), pumping the relevant Shaping skill (Magic Shaping), and making a full party of them early, and keeping them alive, so they gain lots of free levels. Lots of Intelligence is not the key in those games.

Variants of this situation seem to be showing up a lot, that is, "I have been relying solely on autosave and now doing so has backed me into a corner." I know it's probably not what Jeff intended autosave to be used for. But if that's how it's being used by this many people, maybe it makes sense to design around it, and have two different autosaves, one that is solely zone-based and one that triggers more frequently.

I don't mind the blocky aspects. What I have a more visceral reaction to is the setup where three regions/countries occupy spiral out from a central region/country, so that they touch nothing else. In theory that could be OK, but in the context of other releases, it just seems so clear that this is going to be yet another contrived way of explaining linear gameplay. (Something else which can be OK, but is a lot better when it doesn't feel contrived.)

That is a weird map...

If it's the walkthrough linked here, that's for the original game, not Nethergate: Resurrection. The bulk of it still applies but there were a number of changes.

Specifically, each point in the basic weapon and spell skills all increase your effective "ability level" by 1 point each when you attack. You also get points directly from Str/Dex/Int (depending on attack type), from your experience level, and (in the case of weapon attacks) from your weapon's item level. Ability level directly determines damage/healing dealt (it determines the number of dice rolled, basically, which is where the vast majority of damage comes from) and sometimes increases status durations very slightly. Early on this makes a big difference. When you are at a high level with a high attack stat, the difference is much smaller. Spellcraft and similar skills instead increase damage, duration, etc. by a percent. This is also subject to diminishing returns, but not to the same degree. Depending on the percentage amount, this is may be a slightly better bonus (especially late game).

I don't think the second level does anything different from the first, does it?

This really is the way things are done here -- Triumph wasn't being "passive aggressive," he was letting you know for the future. I'm not sure there is a more direct way to do that than just to say it... Your post is definitely relevant to the thread, in terms of subject matter! The problems with posting in threads that are this old are more about context: outside topics relevant to the original conversation (such as the features of current Spiderweb games, plans for remakes, the game industry in general, etc.) have often changed dramatically; because most threads don't cover a span of so many years, once the thread has been resurrected, most readers are unlikely to realize so many years have gone past, and confusion and misunderstandings ensue. This really does happen. In fairness, most topic necros are FAR LESS relevant, and have far less substance, than yours. Maybe if they were all like yours, we wouldn't discourage topic necros so much. But most of them are awful... and so we do. Bottom line though, there's not really any down-side to simply making a new topic and linking to the old one. It's clearer for many readers, and it doesn't cost the person making the post more than maybe 10 seconds. I hope that explanation makes sense. Also, just a reminder for everyone, let's give each other the benefit of the doubt. It's hard to read emotions in forum posts. And on that note, yup, definitely time for this thread to end.

Those graphics...

http://spiderwebforums.ipbhost.com/topic/9629-the-challenge-to-end-all-challenges/?tab=comments#comment-105901

Um, it wasn't. The Mac version came first. The iOS version came much, much later. iPads literally did not exist until a few years after A4 was released. (And it sure has never been designed for a tiny, original iPhone screen.) I'm sympathetic to your interface woes, but it sounds like what you really want is a game that doesn't require using either a mouse/trackpad or a touchscreen. Lots of those exist, but it's a very, very different design choice from how Spiderweb operates. You're not asking for a small tweak, you're asking for a redesign that affects basically everything. AEFTP: Your complaint about Haste seems to boil down to: "Why isn't this spell stronger and better suited to my needs?" Haste isn't good enough for your party, and you don't have enough haste potions for the stronger Battle Fury effect. The reality is that even level 1 Haste is already a pretty strong effect. It's haphazard, sure -- but that doesn't make it weak. Battle Fury, OTOH, is frequently described as being "brokenly overpowered" by a lot of folks on this board. "Hard" difficulty can actually be somewhat hard if you don't take advantage of the game's mechanics. If Haste doesn't feel good enough, and you find yourself getting stuck later, consider turning the difficulty down at that point. No point in making the game harder if you won't have fun that way!

Literally, if a spawner is involved.

TURRETS: THE GAME

Download links to your own stuff are certainly allowed. (I can imagine specific download links that might not be allowed, but that would be because of the content, not because of the fact that they are links to a file.)

RPG != RTS at all

Geneforge != Diablo 3 at all