Larian Studios Forums Divinity II The Dragon Knight Saga / Flames of Vengeance (English) Divinity II - Flames of Vengeance Thoughts

Kind of disappointed about Rhodes ---- (could have been an interesting reconciliation)

I know it would have killed balancing but I so wanted to burn out ground troops while a dragon.

The dragon flights were great fun.

Wish I could use dragon form to scout rather then drop in on a whole nest of enemies.

EDIT: Probably not meant this way (or, was it? ) but this could be taken in a different, humor endowed way:
Belegar upon defeating you: know one beats master trumps apprentice (master Trump's apprentice - I wonder when "you're fired!" comes up and what Belegar does?)



Thanks Larian.

EDIT: Curse those black market types! My warrior bought the sword of Abraxos for 51,000 G+ and it just disappeared! How dare they rip me off (so I killed them all)!

Still, she was turned into a novelty coat stand! I'd hoped to see her return properly at some point; maybe if they do a Divinity 3. Not sure what's the roadmap now that OS2 is done (though I suspect an expansion and/or EE will happen first). Anyway, they can sometimes be quite ruthless with characters, and besides which, Rhodes is unquestionably a zealot, which is the reason everything got a bit messed up for the protagonist in the first place. I think the chances of reconciliation were always zero.

There were a few times I managed to roast people/goblins/whatevs while being a dragon but I'm not sure if that was a glitch. Some of them shot back at me too, the swines!

Yeah, I was able to roast (was it George?) on the island - nobody defeats <insert name> and he jumped up and hacked at me.

Hey, in the zombie Jake area under Madame Eve's, do you suppose that zombie Michael is supposed to be zombie (like in the famous album) Michael Jackson? That voice makes it more clear to me.

Oh God, I just about asphyxiated myself laughing when Prince Michael appeared, especially when I heard his voice.

I guess I should type these as I go - such small things tend to be forgotten and are, really, unimportant but (and many will be from ED) ----

1. Did anyone notice that when you get the bandit camp porter to leave for a good drunk with Rimmer's Rum, the two bandits who want to leave don't give you their weapons? I could've taken a cheap ax but I think that was random.

2. In the village, the answer to the merchant/Keane controversy should be simple - shoot a rabbit and give it to the merchant - after all, it's not really clear who the aggrieved party is.

3. OK, when exactly does Talana die and the other voice take over. After all, the owner of the other voice couldn't have made my character a dragon knight.

EDIT: 4. Darn nobles! Promised to buy me drinks at the Black Boar but did they? Noooo!

Don't know the answers to your questions, but given the powers of the owner of the other voice, I'm assuming that may indeed be the case: I'm guessing Talana may have died before you even reached her.

I thought of that but, if you mind read her (Talana or the spoiler), she regrets losing her ax. The voice is in a hurry, always nagging me - just doesn't seem to be in character.

I suppose another possibility is that it could be both of them, "the other person" entwining their thoughts with Talana's, learning, influencing and eventually extinguishing, but without a clear cut-off point where it definitely stops being Talana and starts being The Other.

Raze might have a better idea, he tends to notice things and I tend to... well, not.

Edit: though it always occurred to me that when you meet The Other, it's their voice that you heard right from the beginning. Did she and Talana really sound so similar? Okay, I know there weren't many VAs involved, but they could've still made them sound different, at least when you meet The Other in person. I think that's why I assumed that Talana had already died before you found her.

I'll have to listen closer next time - I was thinking the crawling Talana had a deeper voice then the in-the-head voice. Probably my imagination, though.

EDIT: 5. Just wondering - if you free the spirits in Maxos' temple by destroying the sole stone, do you have to also fight Lovis in the Hall of Echos?

EDIT: 6. This one is for Vometia (since you are a native speaker and I believe you use this voice): what the heck is the "country girl" voice saying when she has reached 100/100 in carrying capacity and something else is being attempted to be picked up? I can make out "My backpack" but the rest I'm not able to understand.

Looks like edits don't trigger any visual way of knowing a change was made so I did this (see above) .

Dunno and can't remember respectively.

My games PC is sleeping at the moment but I'll try it out tomorrow. I don't recall her saying anything I couldn't understand so hopefully this won't be the one exception!

OK, how about an opinion question (this came from the fountain in Stone's FF - where different buds yield different results)? Which is better:

1. 4 stat points
2. 1 skill point
3. 5000 EP?

God, now that really is testing my memory; I can't even remember what I got out of the fountain and thought it was a sword or something. I do remember it being upset for some reason and feeling sorry for it. But the distribution of experience or skills or whatevs is definitely Raze's territory, I've always been a bit chaotic and "hope for the best" with my progress, which to be honest hasn't served me well.

My games PC is back online again (needed to replace the CPU cooler) so I'll see if I can coax that mystery comment out of Ms Dormer a bit later.

I didn't feel like experimenting with so many possibilities so I cheated - http://divinity.wikia.com/wiki/Stone%27s_fortress_greenery

3) I always assumed it was Talana up to and including the dream scene, and not Talana after that.

5) No.

6) My backpack is full as it is.

Don't take experience; there are respawning opponents you can use if you want XP (limited places in the D2:ED section, multiple in FoV [that are stronger and give more XP]). Either the skill point or 4 stat points would be fine, depending on what your character most needs at the time. I took the skill point, since after level 15 I stopped distributing stat points (at first because I didn't have an obvious need to boost a particular stat, so was holding them in reserve, and then later to keep things interesting [was already playing on nightmare]).

I'm still going to go with Talana's dying spirit intermingled with Thingy's, starting off as one of them and gradually becoming the other as one died and the other's influence became more dominant. Either that or my other theory that it was always Talana all along, though that admittedly doesn't properly or convincingly address the dragon memories and morphing thing. But either way, I still think that Talana was effectively possessed by her right from the outset.

And boo, you've pre-empted my albeit rather tardy attempt to decipher her accent! Which is a fairly neutral Black Country one so it doesn't really take a lot of deciphering. Actually I did like the amount of Brummie (and thereabouts) accents ED had. And I'm still entertained by that guy you encounter in OS2's Nameless Isle who refers to you as "yow".

3) continued: I purposely haven't said what I thought to not influence potential replies and because I haven't really decided. What I note is that Talana say's "let me show you" prior to the in-dragon experience making me think it's still Talana up to that point. I first thought there was a voice difference during that experience though - The voice seems more polished then my perception of Talana's - so I was thinking perhaps the voice took over at that point. With Talana in great pain and dying I'm sure the voice actress was playing that angle and that may be all my perceived difference was.

5) continued: In the one where my transfer to FV froze, I tried destroying the soul stone although I'm not sure if I told Lovis (but he was a no-show). I once tried not giving it to him and he attacked me (but I reverted to a prior save) - that is what made me think he might be there in the first place.

Raze said: "I took the skill point, since after level 15 I stopped distributing stat points (at first because I didn't have an obvious need to boost a particular stat, so was holding them in reserve, and then later to keep things interesting [was already playing on nightmare])."

- now that's really disturbing. I play on what is usually called "normal" and have difficulty issues. Well, I never said I was a particularly skillful game player.

Vometia said: "I'm still going to go with Talana's dying spirit intermingled with Thingy's, starting off as one of them and gradually becoming the other as one died and the other's influence became more dominant. Either that or my other theory that it was always Talana all along, though that admittedly doesn't properly or convincingly address the dragon memories and morphing thing. But either way, I still think that Talana was effectively possessed by her right from the outset."

Somewhere it was said that Talana was a lord on par with Oribis and Lovis so I would assume her mind was too developed for a penetration but, then again, Talana was dying so, who knows? Not being in the business I don't know but I assume not a lot of attention is paid to this sort of interpretation detail and that may ne for the better since it allows game players to use their imagination. I would not have thought about the dual mind possibility with Talana - it's intriguing.

It is difficult! Before I'd read a handy guide I often struggled even on the easy difficulties. I think I played on normal last time through but that's about as difficult as I can go. I still suspect Ego Draconis (before its revamp into DKS) probably holds the record for me dying the most often.

I wasn't aware of Talana's reputation, though as a dragon knight I figure it speaks for itself, but my thinking was indeed that she was already significantly weakened, enough to have her will and wits hijacked; but the clarity of that thinking is perhaps debatable as I'm not sure how I'd reconcile my other theory that she was already dead with being able to take on her dragon powers, though that is with the assumption that there actually was something and it wasn't just another ruse by the other person. But it's hard to say if the writing and concept were even that in-depth, sometimes they are, sometimes not...

A bit more info: just noticed during my attempts at completing the transfer to FV that Lucian tells me that it was X, not Talana and that X took the guise of Talana and it was she who showed you a vision of the future. Appears Talana was never there (perhaps, in taking the guise of Talana the ability to create a dragon knight went with it or, in my book more likely, Talana reached your mind while falling to the ground as a dragon, died on impact, and X had a needed lucky break).

That sounds plausible. I suspect Talana's body was there (there is uncertainty, with that explanation in mind, but I think it was) but I don't think Talana's spirit ever was. Or if she was, it really was her dying moments and just enough for The Other One to take advantage of the situation and get a nice angle on her manipulation of your character, as you say. Indeed the whole thing may have been engineered by her right from the time you were at Farglow and the dragon was spotted in Broken Valley, knowing that Rhode was reckless enough to embark on the mission with a half-trained, unready dragon slayer in her stead, which is exactly what she needed. Did the dragon ever exist? Was its presence coerced or forced by The Other? We certainly now she's very powerful so either possibility is, well, a possibility.

Seems like I joined the forum just about the right time, because many of the questions discussed here are precisely what I've been asking myself for years ;) .

The main one being: Is Damian actually dead now?
Because essentially, everything you do in Ego Draconis is commit one giant mistake, and then everything you do in Flames of Vengeance is rectifying that mistake - in other words, you don't accomplish anything. That is, unless the thing about the soulbond between Ygerna and Damian is true: Reviving her may not have killed Damian at the end of Ego Draconis. But if their souls are merged, then you killing Ygerna at the end of FoV should by proxy also kill Damian.

However, it's strange then that we don't even get to see a short cutscene of him dying... :/

And if Damian isn't dead, then we truly haven't accomplished anything. We would have been better off just delivering the coup de grace to Talana when we first met her at Bellegar's shrine - which, even more ironically, was our original task as a dragonslayer!

The reason I'm a little obsessed about the mechanical replay value of DKS (like getting maximum value out of all the quests etc.), is partly because the story-wise replay value is equal to zero: Nothing you do has any influence on any of the major plot points of the game. And while that by itself is true for many games, in DKS it's especially annoying because: All the time you're re-playing Ego Draconis, you effectively know you're doing something horribly stupid. And all the time while playing FoV, you know you're just cleaning up your own mess and won't even get to fight Damian at the end.

Also, I don't see how the ending of Ego Draconis was necessary in the first place - not even to help selling FoV. They could just as well have stuck to the "Damian dies, Ygerna lives" premise. After all, you only fight Ygerna in FoV anyway, right? So it would have sufficed to tell the player: "Well, you've dealt with one problem (Damian), but now you've got another one (Ygerna)!"
Somehow implying that Ygerna was even worse than Damian, and that the player should have seen it coming. After all, she was the one who initiated Damian into the Black Ring, so it makes sense for her to be more powerful, and also more "evil", while Damian just turned evil by falling in love with her.

Doesn't that even sound much more plausible than Ygerna somehow orchestrating all this despite being... you know... dead?

I don't see how it was necessary to make the player feel like a complete fool just for having enjoyed the game so far?

It really just seems like a plot twist for plot twist's sake, which smacks you in the face the first time you play, but at the cost of depreciating the replay experience severely.

I dunno, I guess it depends on one's perspective. In terms of it making a huge difference to Rivellon... well yeah, it kinda failed. Other than turning Broken Valley into Even More Broken Valley and Rhode into a novelty coat stand, nothing was accomplished.

But as a personal voyage of self-discovery as well as excitement, adventure and really wild things, it was certainly worthwhile. So for my character it was all terribly important. And from an RP perspective not bad either, since I usually imagine my character as someone who goes around inadvertently causing utter chaos.

If Damien died (I don't know either - guess I'll have to play OS II (I think that occurred afterwards) - there's a ready made new villain - the mage under the academy that you may have not released. It was said somewhere that if he was released, we'd just have a second Damien. He wouldn't have the chaos spirit in him (although I suppose by the stroke of a pen that could be changed) but is ready made to carry on the theme and could be easily released. After all, Lucian was "dead".

OS2 happened before. I can never remember the timeline as I think there may still be some uncertainty but it's in the region of 50 years prior to D2. There are some gnarly continuity errors, apparently, though it's hard for me to comment especially well as I've never completely finished OS2 (as with the Zeppelin escort, I have a general hatred of overblown fights at the end and couldn't be bothered). But we shall see. A lot was made of the possible retcon thing especially with Lucian but then again there's already an enormous retcon with Lucian from my perspective in that he's a guy: mine was female in DD.

Perhaps all will be revealed in Divinity 3, which will hopefully be their next venture. And hopefully again in third-person mode, or at least given the choice: I think their current engine is certainly capable of it, anyway.

Damian is still alive. It was said after D2:DC was released that there would be another game to finish off the story arc of DD, BD and D2:DC.

Ah, good to know, thanks!

7. This is more of a bug but, it's irritating that in the heat of a battle, if you say, have a bow drawn and accidentally hit "rush attack" that your bow disintegrates.

8. Is it just me or does our five-degrees scholar of an alchemist have trouble brewing mana potions ? (I'm not really sure how that works but I suspect the problem is that I didn't give him any formulas other then for the weakest one).

9. I read that Kenneth is better for archers but, I really didn't see any differences in the possible "prophesy" choices other then the ways things can be upgraded and a few other minor things like "Allen Brew". Heck, I won't take Wesson simply to avoid the Raze battle. Am I missing something?

7: The bow doesn't disintegrate, your character simply switches to their melee weapon and attacks afterwards.

8: Perhaps Barbatos lost all his recipes when the crew got shipwrecked? Alan doesn't know how to do anything, but even if he did, since he apparently just was brought to Sentinel Island right away, he probably didn't get the chance to take anything with him.

9: That's not a good reason to pick Radcliffe in my opinion, since I'd advise for doing all the flying fortresses anyway. Radcliffe only has a single quest, even if it allows you to expand the platform twice, you gain less experience that way. Plus, you have to go through the entire Orobas Fjords before you can even attempt it.

With Kenneth however, I see even less of a reason. I mostly see people advising for wizards to pick him, but the amount of experience you lose by having to give him the book called "The Demon Wars" just isn't worth it. For reference: If you have Hermosa, she only wants Kali's sword, which is pretty terrible at that point in the game anyway, so the book remains for you to read. In Ego Draconis, you gained as many as 5 skill points from it; in DKS, they made it slightly less powerful, but I think you still get 3 skill points.

Since your trainer doesn't actually increase your skill level, but only raises the maximum level possible, unless one relies on very specific skills and needs these on a high level already during Ego Draconis, I can't see how a case for Kenneth can be made. Once the player reaches Flames of Vengeance, there are further trainers in town anyway, who can train those skills your platform trainer doesn't have access to.

7. Incorrect. The bow disintegrates and the hero attacks with fists.

8. Allen just grates on my nerves (as does Igor).

9. Perhaps, but the Raze battle is BS - no enjoyment.

10. Yeah, really. Hermoza seems to me the best of those too but the difference really is minimal.

The bow disintegration thing may be deliberate: I mean that is perhaps what would be expected if you invoked that sort of skill while wielding something breakable...

@caninelegion: Perhaps we are not talking about the same thing? I don't have all the English skill names present, since I play the game in German, but I've watched a couple of English Let's Plays.

I was referring to the Warrior skill where you automatically quickly approach your enemy to hit him with a melee weapon. If I do that and have my bow selected, my character switches to the two-handed sword or two single-handed weapons (whatever is on the first of the three weapon fields), and continues to fight with those. I do not lose my bow, I can simply reselect it by pressing F2 (since I always have my bow on the second weapon field).



I'd say that's true for most of the difficult encounters in DKS . I also don't get particular enjoyment from having to face the Killer Bunny, or Amdusias (since he has explosive arrows), or having to seal the portals in Aleroth, or facing Sassan in the Hall of Echoes (since she can one-hit you if you're playing on Nightmare), or the final fight of Ego Draconis. But that just means it feels even better when it finally works out!

With Raze, I think I remember that it works quite well if you stun him with a stunning arrow, so that he can't run into one of his healing machines once his health gets low; and then you have to pummel him down before he recovers from being stunned. Some enemies are immune to being stunned though, I'm not sure anymore whether that applies to him.

Vometia: I think it's because one cannot drop anything - to drop is to destroy in this game (literally).

I've tried everything with him - even had advise from Raze (not the general ) but it just was too frustrating. I haven't even finished a game since the first one due to the zeppelin escort mission. It's more luck then skill. Same as General Raze. Apparently he can be be beat if you do everything just right, almost zero tolerance, and are lucky with knockdowns, and build your creature just for his fight. I like a good fight - I do enjoy the others you mentioned - but I like to win by thinking rather then twitching. I also avoid the task with the moving platforms that results in a chest with random loot for much the same reasoning.

7. There are 3 weapon sets you can switch between, in the inventory or using the hotkeys F1, F2 and F3 (by default).

8. You need to provide the alchemy formula to both alchemists, other than the ingredient free, level 5 stat potions Barbatos can make, or Allan's extra strong resistance potions.

9. Both trainers teach the same sills, to the same levels; their 'specialties' just determine the price of upgrades.


Any fights that are difficult generally can be dealt with by upgrading equipment or skills, adjusting approach, or doing another area first and coming back at an appropriate level.
Amdusias is level 15; fighting him at lower than level 15 (so without access to the level 15 tier skills) is more challenging than at 15, and being higher than 15 makes the fight easy.
In DKS you need to hit both levers to disable the regeneration chambers to defeat General Raze. Being stunned will not prevent him from reaching the chambers (there were various techniques in the original release that could make the fight trivial, like just blocking access to the chambers, so to fix that, he basically cheats [teleports directly to the chamber in the middle of a Thousand Strikes move, etc]).

You shouldn't get killed in one hit even on nightnare; that sounds like a bug: Ba'al. The Impossible foe?).


After taking over the battle tower you have a chest there to send things to (just sending alchemy and enchantment ingredients there should give you plenty of room in the inventory).

I usually kept quest related books (even if they were just added for info or atmosphere), but sold ones that show up in randomly generated loot, etc (like the different 'History of' book series). If you check the consumable section of your inventory, you may have a stat/skill book there you can use to fee up some space. Any required books should be in the quest item section of your inventory, though there are a couple books which you can read yourself to get a bonus or give to someone to complete a quest. In any case, after you've read a book you can sell or destroy it (as long as it is not marked as a quest item, in which case it doesn't count towards your inventory limit).

If you have any creature parts you only need to keep the best of each type. I kept a list of my current top part stats handy so I could sell any lesser versions before talking to the necromancer (and working on the creature), so I wouldn't clutter up the part list when any new pieces I had with me were added. In DKS/D2:DC creature parts can also get added to the necromancer's list from any merchant's inventory, if you sell or buy anything in that section of the inventory (and maybe just switching to it).
You can get rid of potion and enchantment formula by talking to the alchemist and enchanter (any left in your inventory after going into the alchemy or enchantment functions will be duplicates, and can be sold).

Alchemy plants and enchantment gems and minerals are easy to acquire after getting the battle tower, so you can get rid of any you are not going to use. Keep malachite gems, since there is a limited supply in the game, and ginseng (etc) for healing potions, but if you have multiple stacks of the same item, you can safely get rid of the extra stacks. Iron, whisperwood and fatfern are fairly common, for example; you can make more money with the latter two if you make level 1 or 2 Full Resistance or Dexterity potions, and sell the potions rather than just the ingredients.

If you have any equipment that you are hanging onto because it might be good once you get higher level enchantments or better charms, by the time you do you will most likely also have found equipment with better base stats (my first game in the original release of D2:ED I hung onto lots of stuff I ended up just selling later).

There is a skill to boost inventory space, if you have the points to spare. You can unlearn all your skills after getting the battle tower, and get those points back once you have access to the chest there to store things. I maxed this still in my first game, and didn't learn it at all in my second.

Okay, then I had it slightly misconstrued: You can stun Raze while his HP are sufficiently high enough not to trigger the healing cutscene yet. Then, while he is stunned, you pull both levers to switch off the engine. Now you have him at the lowest possible HP with the machine switched off - and then you have to be fast enough pummeling him down to 0.

The most difficult part IIRC is actually moving across the room fast enough to switch off both levers at once. Sometimes you can use the living armours to have a target for charge attack, and use that to get to the other lever quickly. Otherwise, you'll have to jump over their heads, which costs you valuable time.

About Sassan: Well, she hit me with that wizard skill that does multiple direct hits ("magisches Trommelfeuer", don't know what it's called in English), so technically it was not "one-hitting", but it was a single skill use - and since that skill hits you directly, you cannot evade it like you can with a fireball or magic missile.

Anyone know if (or how to tell if) the platforms are at full strength in FoV? This is when one creates a character in FoV, not starting in ED.

Well, I am about to go into the escort battle with the character Raze saved out of the ashes of my not being able to transfer from ED to FoV. I was wrong in some other posts - read that one doesn't have (nor really need) dragon armor but, I finally paid attention and it is all there. I freed Berhlyn (sp) this time just to see what happens. Never expected Willy ---- . Anyway, this'll be my last playthrough although I may still try to finish the two remaining escort battles that I have saved. The final boss fight I found quite difficult - it'll be interesting to see if I become frustrated with both her and our Mr B there. If that rhyming mage really cared, he'd be there helping me.

I have to wonder why those silly champions don't hold back until I cleared the path, though.

I also wonder, why was Bellegar imprisoned? He was apparently part of the winning side but yet, he had to be freed (was it OS 1?).

--- and why didn't they just kill berhlyn so many years ago. Well, wouldn't have made such a good story then.

In the hints, one of them says to take body parts from your enemies. I have never seen a way to do that unless it means via loot bags but, they rarely match what was killed. Did I miss something or was this something that got dropped from the design?

With a new character within FoV - if Allen is you herbalist, he cannot make "Allen brew". Pitty.

Definitely found various body parts for my creature: I'm assuming it was just an allusion to that sort of thing. Though I think I just randomly found them here and there rather than on corpses of things I'd just killed, I don't remember now...

That's exactly how I found them - makes me think there were plans at some point to actually harvest them, though.

It's possible: I mean there was definitely stuff that was scaled back and I certainly don't know the half of it. I think I'm particularly sad that the area around Aleroth was supposed to be explorable and I definitely have a bit of a "more is more" attitude when it comes to exploration, but on the other hand I think the slightly claustrophobic feel of the city worked well for FoV: my usual analogy is it's a bit like Morrowind's Tribunal in that regard, only better, IMHO.

The gaming world is no different then life - most ideas seem to have to be pared back once reality sets in. Some of the things I had planned in the past and what the final results were after putting the plans to action ---

I've been wondering why the shrine in the tower no longer works - it's bwoke, as my formerly dead friend told me. I think I may have figured out why. Belegar sends you to the plane of H* after each clue is found. If the shrine worked, one could go to the tower then use the shrine to go elsewhere and avoid these fights which would bend the story and possibly break the game. Makes sense to me (then again, I thought arthritis was an evil demon until last week)

Check the ingredient costs, compared to the alchemy/enchantment costs listed in the Dragon Knight Saga FAQ/Guide, to see if the battle tower platforms are upgraded.
However, you can also just use the corresponding functions from the NPCs in Aleroth (trainers in the ministry building, enchanter in the Phoenix Inn, etc).

If the shrine in the battle tower worked, you would be able to return to the previous regions in the game, which would mean they would have to change, and there is no point doing that much work if there is no game content there, etc. Also, storywise the siege of Aleroth is a little less dire if you can leave whenever you wish.
You are right that teleporting out of the Plane of Hypnerotomachia could break quest triggers, and the expected flow of the game. That could be blocked in other ways, but making the battle tower essentially a dead end (where you always return to the same location) is an easy fix, while still keeping access to the coffer, etc.

Don't have anything useful to add, but it warms my heart to read all those nice toughts on one of my favorite games of all time. It's nice to read, that it is still played after nine years .