A-EftP - Bad design of fights startup

[Vent]

I'm more and more bored by those fights startup where a bunch of enemies jump on you and are 8/10 to simply attack you. Either you are clearly stronger and anyway the fight will be a boring crap. Either most chance you get a member death without to have been able to do anything.

 

Yeah it's mainly encounters in outdoor but also I just get that too in patrick tower and no way you could guess it.

 

It's not poor design it's zero design.

[Aoslare]

I'm not sure what you're taking issue with. Is the problem that you don't like it when the enemy gets to act first?

[Soul of Wit]

• get to hit first

• can't buff first, because it's outdoors

• enemies have a high to-hit chance

 

The overall strategy is to do two things:

 

1. Always equip your best "lasting" buffs when outdoors. For example, once I hit Ft. Emerald, I would "rest" near the emerald to get Cloak of the Arcane, and I would also have the Priest cast Ward of Steel. The latter can fend off a lot of physical/acid damage.

2. Don't wander in areas where the enemies can take out a character before you get a turn. Often, you can avoid wandering packs. Unfortunately, they sometimes chase you from the area.

[Kreador]

Earlier, you can also get Cloak of the Arcane from the spring across the river and east of Formello (must get a boat in Fort Draco to get there). That one seems to be limited somehow in how often you can use it, but I'm not sure what the limiting factor is. Someone who knows might say.

[Soul of Wit]

Originally Posted By: Kreador

Earlier, you can also get Cloak of the Arcane from the spring across the river and east of Formello (must get a boat in Fort Draco to get there). That one seems to be limited somehow in how often you can use it, but I'm not sure what the limiting factor is. Someone who knows might say.

True, although the Ft.Emerald source seems more conveniently located. I don't recall boating back to the spring too many times, but I used the emerald many times.

As for the recharge delay, I guess the spring must work the way refilling basins do. I tend to think of springs as unlimited. I suppose some springs might be able to be drunk dry and then slowly refill.

[Vent]

Thanks for the tips but the point is still the same, very bad design.

 

Those poorly designed fights from outdoor encounters seem come from Avernum but I got the feeling that it's in fact a lot worse. The big difference is coming from:

• More spread initiative, only few enemies react faster than your PC.
• More spread location, many won't reach your PC before second round.
• Probably less long range in general.

To be clear, it was a point to improve in Avernum but AEFTP make it quite worse.

 

No, outdoor encounters can be designed much better than that:

• Outdoor doesn't show all details, so have a stupid empty arena isn't a requirement, use some structures could help a lot make the design of those fights less weird.
• There's no need to have all enemies at once jumping on you instantly. Even without using spawning, use in design groups more spread on the area, generating more or less two waves or a short stream.
• There's really something to fix with initiative mechanism and class management of the party to not have in so many fights, at least in Hard, some basic all enemies act then all party members act.
• How about let the player cast outdoor spells and identify better an outdoor group with a look at command? It would be one more tool to make those outdoor fights feel less stupid.

 

EDIT:

But in fact what exhausted my patience with those type of fights wasn't an outdoor encounter but the fight in Patrick's Tower with rather similar startup.

[blackwight]

Are the Avernite soldiers attacking you? You may have stolen something or attacked a villager.

 

As far as I know, people shouldn't attack you on the ground floor of Patrick's Tower.

[Randomizer]

He's referring to the fight on the lower level of Patrick's Tower.

 

There is an option in the settings to have the party go in order of dexterity and quick action instead of party order.

[Vent]

Originally Posted By: Randomizer

He's referring to the fight on the lower level of Patrick's Tower.

There is an option in the settings to have the party go in order of dexterity and quick action instead of party order.

Well I concentrated the class progression on what advise most threads, so dex in my party is low anyway. But start invest in DEX is clearly not the solution in general in this game.

[Scaala]

To me, most of the outdoor encounters in this game feel like ambushes. Your first contact is when they're right on top of you and you have no time to prepare for the fight. If the monsters are faster than you, it makes perfect sense that you're screwed.

 

That's great when its supposed to be an ambush - but it's really puzzling the rest of the time, thematically speaking. You can see the enemy coming most of the time. It seems like the majority of fights would begin at least one full movement distance apart.

 

I can understand if its difficult with the engine, but I'd wish for more variety, as well.

 

I see how you can compensate for it with the warding spells - but that seems like a meta-game solution. I guess there isn't anything wrong with that, but it feels funky to me.

[*i]

I suspect much of this falls back to legacy issues that could have been corrected without too much trouble. Combat was different back in the days of Exile and earlier Avernum games. First, your party always went first if memory served. Also, it would not be very often where the monsters would swarm your party with such high and rapid damage where any of your characters would actually die. In other words damage dealt versus HP was a bit lower back then.

 

Nowadays, it is not difficult at all for monsters of slightly higher stats to take out an unprepared party. Unfortunately, the inability to use magic outdoors anymore exacerbates the problem.

[Scaala]

If I remember right, healing was also lower in comparison to hit points back then. A character at his last HP might require two or three strong heal spells to get back to full.

 

I wonder how different things would be if all HP in the game were doubled or tripled, while damage remained the same. (Referring to both party and monsters.)

[Kreador]

I haven't gone back to the spring to see if it refilled its ability to give you Cloak of the Arcane. I did realize there's a third place to get it, along with Ward of Elements, but it's not a place you're going to wander into very early in the game.

[Vent]

Ok I changed the game options to disable the roster order for the actions order. I know it's not cool to not control finely the turns order but for initiative it's a crap option.

 

Since I removed that crap option it's all different. Knowing that my sorceress has a bit additional dex and my second warrior too, and I could jungle with items with dex and quick action to more or less order as I want.

 

So now for most encounters a warrior and the sorceress act first and that change all, it opens some strong options like daze or even have the sorceress act first cast haste level 3 and then the 2 warrior get the initiative right after and I could position them the best.

 

If few times there's monsters acting before it's just one special not the whole mass.

That is fun, not the crap of looking 8/10 monsters bashing to front warrior or sometimes the second after some knockback.