Pathfinder: Kingmaker

[Dharus]

I haven't tried to run from a fight yet. Has anyone else? I don't mind the challenge of the RNGs but being able to run away is important like in Darkest Dungeon.

[Crice]

You can't run. They chase ya all over the map.

[Vllad]

You can run as long as you have the mobility. They do get shots of opportunity. I just wouldn't do it when close to death. This mission with the Fey is nothing but running so... you aren't meant to to just beat every thing down.

[Vllad]

So I lost again last night, another collapse due to a war with a neighbor. I think one of my problems is (besides the high difficulty level and being a noob) I am adventuring with my advisers.

This time I saved up 2k in gold and created an entire party of mercenaries right from level 1. This way once I get to my own kingdom I have an adventuring party and an adviser party.

[Crice]

You can run as long as you have the mobility. They do get shots of opportunity. I just wouldn't do it when close to death. This mission with the Fey is nothing but running so... you aren't meant to to just beat every thing down.

I could never leave the map when I tried to run, but now that I think about it I had one companion dead.

[Arsilon]

I seem to have hit a wall, unable to really kill any of the boss creatures that would let me advance. I have been using auto-leveling so don't have some of the spells I wish I had access to by default. I'll have to see if they are available via scroll perhaps. I can't get past the champion skeleton room in Sycamore Depths or the guard beast at Elk Temple. My tanks seem to die too quickly (even with defensive buff on) and my ranged attacks miss and/or do such little damage. I've done most of the side quests so am already level 3; in theory I should be able to get past these with a full party by now. Haven't figured out what I"m doing wrong yet.

I'm playing on Normal difficulty even so can only imagine how insane hard mode actually is.

[Slamz]

I was able to beat that stuff just last night at level 3. They crushed me at level 2. I'm playing on challenging which is one up for normal.

A couple things I did different the second time around:
Load up my tank physically and magically. Spent a pile of cash on a +1 full plate armor for her that Oleg had for sale. She also has a bracer of armor and a ring of protection and a cloak of something or another. I then buff her with shield of faith and mage armor. And then have her play in defensive stance most of the time. And then I set the dwarf cleric to mostly just load up on heals and he fights beside her with one of those team defensive abilities (which she has too) and just starts throwing heals the moment she takes hits. I have the bard back her up with cure light wounds too. (I could probably swap the bard for a dedicated healer but she's also my rogue for traps and such.) In a pinch she can drink heal potions.

Things usually go well enough then. If the tank goes down I pretty much have to reload because all my defense was right there but it made the room full of skeletons and the elk temple doable.

I think if I start over again I'm going to try to plan the party better:
Dedicated tank
Dedicated healer
Dedicated buffer (mainly for the tank)
Dedicated debuffer
Dedicated DPS x2

"Dedicated debuffer" maybe being a necro wizard? Usually my debuffs all get resisted but if I specialized I could probably get past that.

I could also see getting two tanks. The skeleton room was a little tricky because someone ends up off tanking.

My first play attempt I was trying to do more of a party of generalists but I think to really beat a lot of these encounters on the harder difficulties you need specialists. My party of generalists whiffed way too much and just got crushed by incoming damage. Second time around I made my character be a balls to the wall evocation wizard but still waffled a bit with the rest of the party. By level 3 I knew more what I wanted though and took that level up to make them more team oriented and more specialized. (i.e., picking up the dwarf cleric and changing his memorized list to pretty much just all heals)

Tempted to try the Vllad plan and start over again and get a party of mercenaries. Apparently you can custom design them? It's too expensive at level 3 though.

[Vllad]

 I have been using auto-leveling so don't have some of the spells I wish I had access to by default.  

There is your problem right there. 

You can't have the AI choosing your spells, distributing your allocation points and adding your feats. You are begging to be destroyed. Your tanks probably all have feats that don't conjoin and your healers don't have enough healing power. 

Here are some recommendations:

*Pay close attention to your melee's conjoining feats. They get big bonuses to things if they are flanking each other or their targets. However they all have to share the same feats for it to apply with a few exceptions. I highly recommend Precision, direct damage and/or defense. 

*Make sure the weapons that characters have equipped that they actually have that weapon specialized. If you want to reduce missing, characters should only be swinging weapons they specialize in. Specializing in Martial weapons is not enough. You have to specialize in a very specific weapon. i.e., Great Sword, Bastard Sword, Hammer, etc. This takes multiple feats but worth it. 

*Make sure your healers get Conjuring Spell Focus. Yes, healing spells are Conjuring NOT Devine. 

*Tanks should carry a shield and wear heavy armor, they also need feats that support that. Shield makes a huge difference. Optimal tanks are clerics and paladins

*You need multiple healers, one doesn't cut it

*Make sure you are learning your spells before you rest, this is D&D and people forget that you have to pre-plan your spell use. If you want 3 heals, you have to memorize 3 heals. 

*Range fire guys need Point Blank Shot and they need to specialize in a specific bow before they start hitting regularly

*Combat casting feat and the feat that reduces armor impact to casting makes your caster A LOT more survivable


It could very well be your group mix, you should have enough characters that you find the right mix for your party. If it doesn't work go switch someone else out. I can assure you that the AI already FUBARed your characters, I don't even need to see them. If you use the vanilla party they are already not built optimally. I ended up using mercenaries for my party members in other games but they are ungoddfully expensive. 

So after my last loss when I restarted, I just ran through the starting portion and saved up 2k without leveling my character past level 1. Basically that is the opening shit plus a little big of Oleg's Outpost and the surrounding area. Then I took my cash and custom made 4 characters. When you buy a merc they start at the level you are currently on. On level 1 you can buy a merc for $500 gold. They start 2k exp behind you but in the long run that doesn't matter. This is how you build an adventuring party optimally. 

Finally, don't let the AI level your shit.

[Vllad]

The party I went with is:

I play a Plate Beserker (Beserkers just do too much DPS not to) and plate keeps them alive
I use Amiri (the only pre-built PC that is somewhat built correctly)
My tank is a cleric that uses a big shield and wears plate
A bard/archaelogist which is part Bard part Rogue, Bards heal, the Rogue part of her sneaks, they make good bow users.
A Druid, pets are big in this game with off tanking and Druids heal and does good direct damage, Druids are also big with AOE snares, good for keeping the mass fights down to a minimum
A Nature Sorcerer, that gave me a second pet and more DD spells since a Sorcerer is an innate caster

That gives me 2 pets, 3 healers and MOST importantly, it gives me 3 guys in the front line that I can conjoin feats with. Those conjoined feats are no joke.

I was tempted to just go 4 Beserkers a Cleric and a Paladin.

P.S.

I did use a Mastodon as a pet, it was great, but it was so loud all the time that I just couldn't play the game with it. So much so that I re-rolled that Druid just so I didn't have to listen to its loud stomping.

[Zouji]

I will get the game when it is on sale for $5 or $10.

[Slamz]

I was tempted to just go 4 Beserkers a Cleric and a Paladin.

EQ2 theory: 6 Paladins!

Although there's no real taunting in D&D. (and you'd have to get through all the traps the hard way...)


I guess the real thing with this game is if you don't understand the ruleset for whatever edition of D&D this is, you are going to be made to learn the ruleset. Failure to learn the ruleset down to a reasonably detailed level results in death by failure to create adequate characters.

P.S. my first playthrough I gave my guy the feat where he keeps fighting even after reaching negative HP. Seemed like a cool idea at the time. This is a terrible idea because it results in enemies just focusing him until he's dead-dead. Without that feat he can USUALLY just fall over unconscious and enemies will switch targets and then if I win the fight all the unconscious people get back up.

[Slamz]

I didn't know what you were talking about with "Death's Door" and now I see it's just a thing that's turned off if you play in challenging mode. I might try challenging rules but leave on death's door purely to eliminate frustration.

With no death's door, you're forced to run every battle basically with no unlucky rolls.

With death's door, you can weather some shitty rolls as long as you ultimately win the fight. And then go rest at Olegs.

[Vllad]

I was tempted to just go 4 Beserkers a Cleric and a Paladin.

EQ2 theory: 6 Paladins!

Although there's no real taunting in D&D. (and you'd have to get through all the traps the hard way...)

I learned that you can build a Beserker with a high dex and just put points into Trickery. You don't actually need a rogue to do traps and chest, they just get some bonuses to it. 

Deaths Door really is a toss up. It can make some encounters easier but it is also way to get a character permanently killed however.

[Crice]

Has anyone gained a second land to control and manage yet? (not that any of us want another one). I think I will start over again and make my own party....

[Diggles]

The few videos you linked I tried were long messes. Here is decent quick review by Angry Joe staff
https://youtu.be/Qoglf4xFPGk

At $40 and extremely buggy, I'd put it on a Xmas list and wait for considerable sale first and give it time to fix issues.

[Vllad]

The few videos you linked I tried were long messes.  Here is decent quick review by Angry Joe staff
https://youtu.be/Qoglf4xFPGk

At $40 and extremely buggy, I'd put it on a Xmas list and wait for considerable sale first and give it time to fix issues.

That was a whinny review. The game is tough but like I said up top people who like typical RPG's aren't going to like this game so I am not surprised.

[Crice]

I am glad people are enjoying this game. In regards to bugs. I haven't seen anything as bad as what we experienced in Conan or LIF.

[Skelas]

Fanatical and Greenmangaming have been dropping sales on this, Fanatical had it for around 30 bucks, and greenman has it for 35 bucks right now.  I might pull the trigger if they do 30 bucks again, looks interesting and I like a little self flagellation every now and then.

[Vllad]

Has anyone gained a second land to control and manage yet? (not that any of us want another one). I think I will start over again and make my own party....

I have been getting killed before I reach that point. I understand the concept of building the bigger kingdom but I haven't been able to generate enough BP to start flushing out the other regions. Typically when I start in the direction I start pissing off the other Kingdoms and invoke some responses. That asshole from the East invaded me and I didn't have enough Military in my kingdom to stop him so I got over run. It was a pretty cool fight though.

[Slamz]

So it turns out that if you buy mercenaries at level 1 (do not click the button to level yourself up to 2) you only need about 1000 gold for a full team. It says you need 500 gold but only charges something like 150. I'm not sure if the bug is that it isn't displaying the right value or if it's not charging the right value.

I wonder if that's true for higher levels too.

[Vllad]

So it turns out that if you buy mercenaries at level 1 (do not click the button to level yourself up to 2) you only need about 1000 gold for a full team. It says you need 500 gold but only charges something like 150. I'm not sure if the bug is that it isn't displaying the right value or if it's not charging the right value.

I wonder if that's true for higher levels too.

I actually got charged 12k for one at level 5.

I guess get your merc's while you can!

I hope there isn't some detriment down the road but in general I think Merc's are the way to go. I am now leveling up my other characters to better suit my Kingdom rather than Adventuring.

[Slamz]

I think it might be a really bad idea to play with an all merc group. Some encounters change.

When you encounter the techtonic dudes for the kidnap quest they don't bother talking or give you a chance to surrender. They just kill you. In fact, short of switching the game to super-easiest-mode you probably can't progress beyond that. You must need at least 1 normal storyline character in your group for the game to proceed normally.

I have a suspicion you weren't intended to think of making an all merc group at level 1 and you're really only supposed to afford 1 or 2 of them. Maybe go ahead and make a bunch but only bring 1 or 2 along to fill a gap.

[Vllad]

I think it might be a really bad idea to play with an all merc group. Some encounters change.

When you encounter the techtonic dudes for the kidnap quest they don't bother talking or give you a chance to surrender. They just kill you. 

Hah...

I always keep my Barbarian with me. That explains why they took her. 

With my Merc group I came close to killing those tech guys. I agree Merc's are there to supplement your base group and allow yourself some freedom. Not to totally take over but the mechanic is still nice to have.

[Crice]

I just completed the Witches Swamp place. I gave up collecting her herbs and killed her and the scarecrow. I went back to my kingdom and am now managing random tasks.

[Slamz]

The good news about picking up early mercs is they do level with everyone else while sitting at Olegs so it's nice if you want to have a few extra options to swap in and out depending on what you need. Hmm, I didn't see if there was a button to save them as a template but that would make it easy if you wanted to restart with a different main and quickly bring in your old merc designs...

I'm touring with the storyline fighter and the barbarian and 3 mercs now. It made me pick up the barbarian when I went to kill the boar -- she was waiting there and it made me kick someone out to make room for her. (I could have gone to Olegs to swap them back in but just left the party like that.)

Running all merc also limits you til you get them to level 2 because you just can't do much with a party of level 1s, especially if your main is not a melee.


I haven't played AD&D since 2nd edition, which didn't have sorcerers. Interesting idea but I like wizards better. You gain flexibility in terms of how you cast from your spell list but the incredible loss of overall utility doesn't seem worth it. Maybe I'll feel different in a few levels but sorcs just seem like wizards for lazy people.