Larian Studios Forums Divinity: Original Sin 2 Divinity - Original Sin 2 - Suggestions and Feedback Hotfix 3.0.33.118 - Economy now suck

The cost reduction was way too much.
Like... not just reduced a little, reduced to the point that now the economy is simply non-existent. You can just buy whatever the hell you want, including unique weapons and armors.
This also makes the Bartering skill completely useless since you don't have to manage your gold at all.

I can now buy 4 books for the price of what was 1 before and still have some gold left.
Before, I could already buy all the books I needed in a respectable timeframe. Now? I have almost all my skills at LEVEL TWO.

Unless your characters basically only use about 8 skills each, and steal constantly, I have no clue how you are able to not struggle with getting skill books and gear at the same time at least a little bit.

For parties that don't use thievery, bartering and crafting is definitely incredibly useful.

Getting skill books and gear at the same time was easy. Keeping everything decked out was not possible.
That's why the economy was good before the hotfix.

Now you can get all of your skills at level 2 and be decked out at level 3 and stay decked out on all of your gear minus the rares you'll find here and there.

The game lost the feel of being a prisoner scrounging for scraps.
It's great to know people are enjoying the complete lack of economy and getting everything they want, but I for one do not enjoy being able to buy a skill book because I looted 3 random crates.

With the hotfix, the game went from "You actually has to learn how to manage and make money" to "Just picking up gold = buy everything outside all unique items"

The item you can sell went down by like 33-50% in sale price (like everything else) but skillbook dropped to its pre-changes value or even lower.

Before the hotfix, attempting to steal the skillbook was actually worth it because when you steal, the value drop to the base price so in this case, stealing one book and a few cash is a much better way to save money.

Now, you can buy 3 books and steal back all the gold in one go.

Yeah I just did a run through I finished with a ton of rare items and loaded with skills the final fight wasn't even a challenge. I killed Alexander and his people before the drillworm appeared.

Was like that all the way thru really.

Was a stomping.

Sorry, but I do not want it like it was before the hotfix.
Before the hotfix, you needed to use all kinds of (I would call it exploits) to get what you want. Like steal from everybody or kill merchants to get your things back and have one char with max steal and another with max barter and so on.

I guess, most people who complain that the game is too easy are the ones who have played through the alpha 100 times. I think games should be designed around a new players, and those will not know all tricks to get max money or max exp. Classic mode is the normal difficulty after all, there will be harder difficulty levels in the final game and I do not care if they tripple the prizes for items and the number of enemies in the highest difficulty level (because I will not play it, at least not the first time).

So it feels a bit strange to me, that some people exploit every mechanic the game has and they know how to get max exp and money and then they complain that the game is too easy in normal mode. But I guess that is the purpose of an alpha. Players find all kinds of exploits and the devs fix them before the game is released. I just made a suggestion how to change merchants in another thread.

I agree, I don't want the game's difficulty to be defined by one's knowledge of exploits and preparedness to use them. I prefer a straightforward approach and simply don't enjoy gaming the system: it detracts from what I feel is the purpose of playing the game. I also don't want to feel trapped into feeling like I must engage in theft and murder to stand a chance of progressing as it's just bad RP.

At this point, exploit is more of a "You don't play the way I do" eventhough it has been in the game for ages despite being extremely easy to remove.

"You stack initiative? that's an exploit"
"You kill a merchant? That's an exploit"
"You shoot before waiting for the combat to start? exploit!"
"You... BUFFED BEFORE BATTLING?! Exploit!"

These methods are there because they are there and logical, and would even be more effective if they are even more logical and let us rob the whole store after killing the merchant. As mentioned that it has been around since Div 1, there's no reason to believe this is an exploit anymore.

This kind of "Pick a few gold and buyout a store -> easy win from super gear" shouldn't be around even on normal mode. The whole "Everything is so cheap" should be a part of explorer mode instead where you can RP all you want with crazy build but when the classical mode pretty much states on the desc that "This mode is for people who want harder battle with a lot of strategy and planning", then it should be as described.

"You stack initiative? that's an exploit"

-> That is build decision.


"You kill a merchant? That's an exploit"

-> That is hardly something you would do in real, and if soon there would be hardly anyone left to trade with you. The exploit here is, that there are hardly any drawbacks.


"You shoot before waiting for the combat to start? exploit!"

-> This is just tactics, and will be 'punished' with delay on the second turn, if attacking from sneaking after the first attack. Exploit would be keeping the leader trapped in talk, while killing is team.


"You... BUFFED BEFORE BATTLING?! Exploit!"

-> Buffing before first strike is tactic aswell, but I don't like the fact that you can get your whole team 'rested' buffed just by one click using a bedroll, but for me its less an exploit and more a design flaw. Using other buffs normally means, they last less longer, because time runs faster outside of battle.

The trade off to killing merchants is the loss of merchant, like how killing Griff camp early pretty much screw your build until you get to the seeker camp.

The reason we feel like it has little to no consequences is because half of the merchant NPCs will end up dying so you might as well be the one to kill them. If you start killing merchants in seeker camp as well, then that is something to consider but before this hotfix, the seeker camp is the location where you actually start losing tons of money because of how expensive purple/unique gears are compared to what you loot. Shamefully, because Act 1 ended right after that point, you never get to see your 10k gold stash run dry from buying level 10 gears.

One of the issues with D:OS2 so far, Act 1 has more merchants than I think the whole D:OS1 had. At least more than double the amount Cyseal offered. All those traders in the prison and the island as whole also kind of break the immersion of being on a isolated island far from the 'civilisation'.

Actually I've always wondered why most merchants are selling out in the open since I'd prefer the Magisters to keep a tighter reign on trading(one can never rule out a prisoner revolt) as even physical weapons can do some real damage.

And I feel the trading of important items should be done far away from their eyes like in the Arena, outside of the camp, etc.

I do agree there're too many merchants. There should be far less to emphasise the lack of resources. After all, scarcity is the main rule in a prison and not excess.

I won't mind tons of merchants because they want people to be able to build freely at the start of the game but they should stop sharing the same pricing guideline.

For example, Skillbook should be way more expensive in Fort joy (scacity) so freedom and power will come with actual price but when you leave them and arrive at the seeker camp, then the price should drop back to normal. This will also make those skillbook you pick up at certain place way more impactful until you get to leave Fort Joy.

ATM, the only differences between Fort Joy and Seeker camp markets are some unique blue/purple gears available (since green stuffs are part of the inventory reset and scale with level) and the Gold/Attitude ratio jumping from 1-3 to 30 each. It's like they are all part of the same merchant guild or something.

I totally agree to that.
Pre buffing, stat distribution and attacking somebody first is fine. Killing people to sell stuff several times and being rested before every fight not so much.

I also agree that it feels strange that every second prisoner on this island is a merchant.
From a role playing point of view, it would make sense if we meet somebody in the wilderness who sells random things that are stranded on the beach or traded with other prisoners. (a few random skill books from several schools, some random equipment and some items for every day life like food, drinks and tools). There might be a hidden black market where you can buy useful things for a really high prize.
Most normal prisoners should have very little things, and if they have something useful they are unwilling to give it to you unless you do something for them.

Hmmm for the black market, hmmm... the thing is: Larian just redid the economy.

How about: a hidden market(not necessarily a black market) but the twist is you need to win their trust to gain access or to lower the prices? Like: procuring certain items or killing some monsters?

'Cos the prices shouldn't be so high such that if you're down on luck(it all comes down to RNG and if you've got Lucky Charm), you can't even buy a single skillbook or a weapon.

And boy, that'd suck for all those newbies who don't understand some of the stats.

I agree with the OP. I made it to level 7 pre-hotfix and stopped at that point because I could afford all the skillbooks and fights became trivial. Haven't killed a single merchant btw. Cleared the whole Fort Joy without buying a single skill and was playing on classic. Also didn't use buffing before a fight and never opened with a preemptive strike. Moreover I didn't even change companion starting classes.
I enjoyed plaing this patch more than I did any of the previous ones because the game finally felt challenging and I had to actually think about what I was doing. I get that this kind of scarcity is too much for most people to enjoy but Larian, please, do keep pre-hotfix prices on Tactician because it was an awesome challenge.
Actually I love the idea of different economy systems for different difficulties, because AI and the number of enemies clearly aren't the only things affecting difficulty.

I didnt test the game after the patch, but i think its ok if the comunity aproves it, since you have to remember:

Exploits... now that's a good one.

1. I don't kill merchants unless it's the path I get from dialogs and Roleplaying (Such as killing the Warfare merchant because I'm the Red Prince and I slap him across the snout).

2. The only fight I actually used Snipe in stealth has been against Dallis and that is absolutely understandable (also not an exploit)

3. Stealing is part of the game and not an exploit and I've barely ever used it myself besides the occasional "Oooh I want that armor on the table".

4. The only time I've buffed myself before a fight was, again, against Dallis. A fight that requires knowledge of the game to beat because without knowledge of the game, you wouldn't even know the fight existed in the first place.

5. I don't murder innocent NPC for XP, gold or items. I don't even kill the Silent Monks. I actually play the goody two shoes characters and can never stick to an evil path for very long.

6. I've even missed many hidden chests in my previous playthroughs that I only find now and still didn't lack gold or XP from doing the most probable thing I would have done has a new player.

Don't call me an exploiter.
The game is too easy for me because I study, work and play in a logic driven environment where mathematics, physics and logic are king and I find myself solving problems like the one brought by this kind of game more easily and in a shorter timeframe than the average player.

I could probably finish Act 1 with the economy before the hotfix while all my characters are stark naked with nothing more than their starter weapon and still not use any of those "exploits" like you people call them. No buffing pre-fight, no engaging fights with a snipe, no stealing, no killing innocents, etc. Just using what I find in crates, excluding equipment, and the skill books I buy with the gold I find. I won't even sell the crap I find to vendor (Because that's probably an exploit too). I'll just buy using the gold found.

See, that's the big difference here. It's not too easy because of exploits. It's too easy because everyone is different.

And a "Normal" difficulty still ISN'T "Easy".

Sorry, I do not want to insult anyone
I just want to say 2 things:

- I am not the best player in the world and I found classic mode quite hard sometimes. All the time I see people who say "The game is too easy, please make it harder." Not just for D:OS2, but in the forums of almost every CRPG. I have finished tons of RPGs (IE games, some fallouts and much more. But usually not on the highest difficulty level) so I am not the worst player in the world either. At the moment I play in explorer mode and I admit that this is really easy, even though I managed to get my chars killed sometimes.

- It looks like D:OS2 has several mechanics that can be used to make the game easier than intended. You did a great job finding them. Now its up to the devs if they "fix" them or not.

Edit: On tactician mode (or however the highest difficulty will be called) the devs can go up with difficulty as much as they want, because most likely I will never play it)

Baldur's Gate 1 & 2 (Enhanced version added the Legacy of Bhaal difficulty) did difficulty settings the right way.

A near impossible (Legacy of Bhaal) difficulty for the 0.00001%.
An insane difficulty for those who wants to get punished for any mistake they do.
A hard difficulty for the veterans who enjoy min-maxing.
A core rules difficulty for the veterans who wants a challenge.
A normal difficulty for those who like it hard but not unforgiving.
An easy difficulty for those who just want to play the game without too much challenge.
A story mode for those who just want to play for the story without stress.

Baldur's Gate 1 & 2 difficulties: http://i.imgur.com/t6nXOK8.jpg

Good luck doing Insane or Legacy of Bhaal in Baldur's Gate 2 without a Kensai/Mage dual-classed character.

Then you also have Pillars of Eternity which did difficulties the right way, albeit with fewer options than Baldur's Gate.

Easy for those who wants to play the game without too much challenge.
Normal for those who wants to play the game with a bit of challenge.
Hard for those who wants to play the game with a lot of challenge.
Path of the Damned for the truly insane.

Pillars of Eternity difficulties:
http://www.gamerevolution.com/images/misc/Difficulty.jpg

In Pillars of Eternity, there is even an achievement for finishing the game in Pillars of Eternity with Expert Mode (Less helping features but more notably, no telegraphs for abilities (No circle showing the range of your ability or the area of effect it has)), Trial of Iron (Only one save file that gets deleted if your character dies) and without taking any companion in your party.
And yes, some people manage to do it by min-maxing, abusing every single overpowered thing they could use, murdering as many things as they could for extra XP, gold and items as well as stacking consumables.