Larian Studios Forums Divinity: Original Sin 2 Divinity - Original Sin 2 - General Feed Back on patch v3.0.15.252

I loved all the changes to how stats work. Memory in its current state feels amazing, I actually started using source skills a couple times, and had at least 1 on every character, and this was the most fun I had in all my playthroughs. Recover armor is amazing, and the new weapon abilities are really interesting and fun to use, but a couple of them could really use some buffs (staff and dual wield daggers in particular). Also very happy to see walk in the shadows is no longer a source skill, which made my rouge feel a bit more useful. I did have the issue of not being able to lock pick anything for a while because Ifan starts with sneaking instead of thievery, and civic points aren't given very often. I hope that, that idea of being able to customize what skills, stats, ect. your party members start with right before you get them makes it into the next patch.

Difficulty throughout the campaign was a lot more consistent, but I did feel like the last encounter was a little bit too easy (Alexander and the Void Worm could use a bit more health), and the crocodile encounter was a little bit too hard (remove the fossil strike ranged attack from them, and put more emphasis on the warfare skills they could use like whirlwind, cripple, and battering ram).

I do feel like there needs to be a few level one encounters as I was constantly underleved until I exited Fort Joy (the only reason I got back on curve is because I went back to the prison after I had already found a means of escape). You could have the trigger for these encounters starting to appear at the start of the map after you have encountered Alexander and Dalis, or after recruiting your first party member. I feel like the game in its current state requires you to do every single sidequest in order to be prepared for you to leave the prison (if you try to resolve most conflicts without violence), which I personally find to be a bad design decision.

Bugs or issues I encountered:
- Lore Master for characters doesn’t work for players, but does work for shop keepers.

- If you accidentally hit Delorus with healing ritual during the battle where you try to save him, he becomes hostile automatically, regardless if you left the prison or not.

- Super happy to see Migo and Yarrow don’t become hostile once you escape if you resolved their situation peacefully, but sadly Emmie and the other dogs will still become hostile after attacking the magisters that have the key to the fort and unlock the door, which also doesn’t make any sense. They didn’t care about all other magisters I killed.

- Couldn’t talk to Eddie for the lock pick no matter how close I got to the door. You have to lock pick the door to get it, or be thrown into prison in order to talk to him for the pick.

- Grammar error when talking with Gratiana “Thank her for her tale, and for trying to life a good life”

-If you have Slane the Dragon take care of the shrikers, the seekers just walk past you, and don't come with you to help fight Alexander.

Changes/Fixes to the story I would like to see:
- A few dialogue options to comfort Mody after you set Withermoore free (or if you absorbed his soul), and some options to mock or belittle him for some particularly nasty characters would be a nice touch. Not being able to say anything to him at all to him after the fact leaves this quest without a proper resolution imo.

- Dialogue options to tell Stingtail that Griff has been killed, and to also return the drudane to him.

- Dialogue option to get Butter to join you during the fight with Griff if someone in the party has romanced her.

- Option to talk to the seekers about the Magister spying on them from a atop nearby rock if you discover him, and tell them that Alexander already knows they are coming. From there you could have the option to tell them that you can handle Alexander on your own and have them wait it out, or have them join you anyway.

- When talking to Feder after you have cured her of her pig curse remove the “who are you” it makes literally no sense considering I was standing right next to her when she was cured, and that I was the one to tell her to stand in the pond. Add a few dialogue options to ask how she is re-adapting to human life, and what Braccus Rex was like, and things of that nature. This is another quest line that doesn't feel like it has a proper ending.

- Not an actual story issue, but I really hope to see more of Magister Jace Locke in the full game. I really want to romance him for my male mage main character.

- Dialogue option to get Emmie to return to Buddy after you have killed all the magisters around fort joy. This quest just doesn’t feel like it has resolution in its current state.

Changes/Fixes I’d like to see to abilities and progression:
- Something that would really help more sneaky and thief like characters is every time you opened a locked chest, gate, door, etc. You get exp based on how difficult the lock was, this would also help with how leveling early on is difficult due to the lack of encounters. This was a mechanic in Kotor 1 & 2 and Pillars of Eternity that I really liked

- Leadership’s small 5 meter range makes it not worth taking. Dumping points in pain reflect or literally anything else is a far superior option in its current state. One solution to this issue could be to increase the range from 5 to a static 10, or have the range increase by 1 or 2 meters from a base 5 meters for every point you invest.

- Staff of magus feels really weak (and visually boring) in comparison to the other weapon abilities. I’d like to see this ability be replaced with the elemental havoc spell of the element type your staff is. The elemental havoc spells have really cool animations, and it would be nice if players had access to them this way.

- The dual wield weapon ability feels really weak for 3 action points (even when you use it with backstab). Either have it do about 20-30% more damage, ignore armor when used to backstab, or have it inflict cripple when used to backstab.

- Make the wand special ability a non-offensive spell from each tree. Fire wands could have haste, water wands have healing ritual, poison could have fortify, and electrify could have favorable wind.

- Hail Strike feels really weak for 3 action points. Keeping the skill as it functions currently, but make it 2 ap instead of 3 would make it a bit better.

Loving the stats revamp, and I can't wait for the next patch, and kickstarter update. You guys have done amazing job listening to feedback, and making a wonderful experience.

Good feedback. I definitely agree with you that it feels like you need to do every sidequest in the prison. That makes them less "sidequests" and more "mandatory main quests". I am pretty early on though, so I haven't tried much else.

I am not entirely ready to say it's like that for sure, as I am only level 2 and am still trying some things.




Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the entirely of the Butter "romance" about three lines long? Truly, a love for the ages, that is.

That and her dairy that you can read after you kill her (which is actually kind of sad). I'm assuming the Butter romance will get fleshed out more in future updates.

Finally this thread.
I have yet to play the new build extensively, so I'm genuinely interested in any feedback from other people, but I'll start pointing the first thing I noticed starting a new game:

- The problem with some "racial traits" still favoring some classes over others (i.e. Lizards getting a +2 int, which pushes them as casters, or dwarfs getting +2 str which pushes them as pure melee) has not been addressed. despise a lot of users here pointing why that wasn't a particularly good idea.

I personally felt this issue was mitigated a little bit by how most primary stats have secondary effects to them. I actually put a few points into int for The Red Prince despite him being the primary melee tank of the party just for a few more hits of magic armor.

Just finished my playthrough under the most recent patch, and wanted to throw out some thoughts here too.

What's the deal with magisters using Source Skills? I harped a bit in another thread about skeletons throwing these around a bit too liberally for my liking, but in the final fight I found this really confusing. These guys cull Sourcerers from their own ranks, how come I'm getting Mortal Blow'd and Chain Lightened by magisters? If there's no story element to explain this, it seems like a significant plot hole and cheapens the whole feeling of being a Sourcerer.

There's another thread about some missing bug with bows (and maybe other ranged weapons). I'm pretty sure this is real and not just griping about bad luck, based on my experience. I'm not sure what triggers it, but sometimes ranged characters can't stop missing for long stretches, across multiple combats with different enemies, even with 80%+ chances to hit. I saw this happen 10+ times in a row, multiple times, which stastically is wildly unlikely.

The protection value for the armor you find seems low compared to the strength of enemy attacks. It feels very difficult to protect yourself from some enemy abilities that can practically be 'I win' buttons for the AI, like chain lightning.

Backstab rogues seem very strong. Most of the damage from my whole team came from a dual wielding rogue with backstab. Nothing else I found could do enough damage to reliably grind through the high enemy armor values you start encountering once you beging fighting magisters, but the flip side is combat felt pretty one dimensional as my team just tried to keep everyone CC'd so my rogue could actually do damage. I don't know if this means other damage oriented strategies should get a bump or backstab rogues are a bit OP, but it definitely stands out from the pack.

Some of the source skills definitely seem more impressive than others. Infectious Flame and Chain Lightning are impressive, really changing the tide of battle. Mortal Blow is a solid role player. Acid Spores, Electric Fence, and Infection all seem pretty underwhelming. Heck, Infection could be a 3-4 AP non-source skill and would probably be reasonable.

I used bless on the prepetually sarcastic rat to try and cure him. It just killed him for some reason. Seemed weird.

Once you rescue Gareth, if you talk to him back at the hideout, you can wind up in a conversation where you can tell him you have a weapon that can handle the shriekers, or that he should move his camp now, and you have no option to tell him to hold off. This is troublesome if you have other quests you wanted to do in the hideout before everyone clears off.

Alright, that's all I have right now.

Honestly, playing after the patch felt... Weird. The earlygame felt brutally difficult compared to before. This probably has to do with weapons being nerfed through the floor. Where I could originally clear the voidlings with smart play in one turn, now it takes 3-4. It took me over an HOUR to get to level 2. The game felt REALLY slowed down in the beginning, and that's the exact opposite of what you want to do in an RPG. You quickly feed the player levels in order to let feel like they're actually getting somewhere. Disgaea did this extremely well. It gave you 4-7 levels (Depending on the title) and access to early grinding zones all within the tutorials.

My opinion might be in the minority here... But it felt at the right speed before.

I agree, the early game is agonizingly slow. I am several hours in and I still am not quite at level 3. It really, really does not help at all that there are only two(2) always-hostile combat encounters combined for levels 1 and 2, and the rest of the early game is opening barrels/sacks/crates (when 80% of them are empty) and talking to people.

"Feeding levels" to the player is absolutely the opposite of what you should do in a cRPG. If you like Diablo or any other mindless action-RPG then yes, absolutely. In a game in which you develop a story and make connections with the NPCs, leveling after 1 hr is even too fast.

It's amazing how that rule of yours is both excessively vague and overly specific at the same time.

Never mind what the actual situation or story is, if you reach level 2 in an hour or less, that is too fast (and presumably, that means the game must be a mindless action RPG).

I can prove you wrong immediately with Trails in the Sky FC. I just went from New Game to leveling up in 46 minutes without skipping cutscenes or speeding through dialogue, just following the main quest. And no one who's played it could argue that it's a mindless action-RPG or a game which is story-light or doesn't let you forge connections with NPC's.

How fast you level up literally has no connection to the story or quality of the story. None at all.

The patch is really odd for sure..

I find melee to be a weird place right now, I use Red Prince as my tank and I run double mage and ranger with Sebille and I have tried Ben, but I don't like close quarters combat as any real damage from mage is AoE and gets my melee guys killed, so really it doesn't feel like there is a good reason to even use a melee character as they just get slaughtered so fast, sword n board doesnt do enough damage and sadly rarely can tank enough to matter anyways, 2H doesn't seem that strong and it keeps misisng a lot which i see is another complaint here about this patch and hit rates.

Gold generation is also a hot topic, requires far too much strategy to even get enough to gear a single character in a decent ring or two. I don't mind it TOO much since I understand what to do, but for the new players it'll be hell that could get them to rage quit.

Another hot topic is of course armors, enemies have 10 times more than you could ever have at that point and it is completely unfair. I have managed to get Red Prince up to nearly 100 with a lucky find or two of heavy armor, but luck shouldn't be that involved with being able to stand a chance.

The croc fight is also complete bullshit and we all know it, they have too much damage and too much utility, a party doing it at level needs serious strats or serious luck to beat them. They open with fossil strike which chunks the character or the party by near half before your turn, teleport onto you, ram your dps down or worse horrific scream and just chomp them to death before you even get a turn. THIS is something that will seriously make new players blow a fuse and this is all on default normal mode.

To go with the gold problem, books and gear are too expensive while money isn't plentiful enough, you have to choose or steal from the npcs to hope to get both, gold just really needs adjusting.

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Leveling is indeed an awful problem unless you know the ins and outs of the area already like most of us EA players will, even if they change it we'll adapt faster than the new buyers.

Some tips, if you want them, don't mistake these for approval of Larian's design choices though, I just want to put these out there so others can know of them.

The biggest Experience boost you are going to get early game is saving Stingtail from Silence, once you deliver the orange to Griff you can attack Silence back at Stingtail's camp and defeat her, which rewards 1000 experience, and if you talk to Stingtail afterwards (assuming he survived and you didn't piss him off by hitting him during the battle) he will reward you with 600 experience more.

So for doing everything there you get about 840 for returning the oranges, 840 for releasing Amyro, 1,000 for killing Silence and 600 for speaking to Stingtail afterwards, which will get you Lv. 1 to 2 and like 20% into 3.

Now obviously most players won't even realize this is possible and that is why it shouldn't be worth so much I think as if you miss fighting Silence and speaking to Stingtail thats a crap ton of experience you just waste and are going to have a really hard time getting that early on.

Other things you can do to get experience is kill all the Silent Monks, they are worth about 200 each and go down pretty easily and since it seems they have no story ramifications there is no point in not killing them. Same for the two magisters harassing Han, you don't really seem to need to let them live, even if you know who they really are, they award good experience and one has two REALLY good shields that would cost you almost 300g to buy from an NPC.

I think Larian needs to balance out more the consequences of killing, because right now you should kill everything and everyone you can, there is no reason not to. Exception on a few NPCs of course, obviously don't kill the Seekers or Gareth, don't kill Zam..Zal..the undead vendor, don't kill Paladin Cork, but everyone else can die if you've got the gear and skill books you wanted. Hell, killing griff and his gang after selling stuff to him rewards you as you get all the stuff back to sell to another npc. Basically before Act 1 is over you should genocide the island to get maximum reward.

I would hope there is ramifications later down the line after Act 1 if you decide to slaughter the island, but right now it doesn't sound likely. Especially since if you don't know about the killing Silence bit you end up killing Griff's gang anyways since there is no peaceful resolution built into dialogue, again unless you don't mind letting Stingtail die, but if you can save the vendors and get experience why would you let any of them die.

In general, I find the combat more difficult, though there's a bit of a weird curve. I found level 1-2 pretty tough, but by 3-4, I beat a bunch of fights (including taking on a bunch of magisters) really quite easily. But I have to say I'm finding the void dragon and the Radeka fights really hard to where I can't beat them, though I suppose I'm underleveled. But I'm glad I'm having a tough time and I feel like I have to level up and get better gear to beat them. And it's not necessarily just a numbers gain, but a matter of strategy and gaining the proper skills to deal with them.

So overall, combat difficulty feels pretty solid for classical difficulty. But if Tactical difficulty is markedly harder, it's going to be quite something.

I do have a general issue, where combat can feel really chaotic with the elements constantly causing explosions and stun clouds and smoke and cursed surfaces and crazy stuff. Obviously this is part of the appeal of the combat, but sometimes it feels excessive, and I wonder "wait, why am I stunned all of the sudden?" Part of the difficulty is acclimating to the interactions, but sometimes I wonder if a few indications of how an attack will effect a situation wouldn't hurt too much. There can be so much going on that it's hard to see that tiny pool of blood connecting to the water that will end up stunning my tank. Sometimes, even if I see the blood, it's hard to tell if the enemy is close enough to it that air damage will electrify the blood.

In short, maybe the readability of the battlefield could use some work. I dunno. Just some impressions.

I actually found the Level 2 Voidwoken Turtles (party level 1) to be harder that the Level 3 Saltwater Crocodiles (party level 2) because the Turtles like to spread cursed surfaces. Of course I might have be a bit prejudiced since I had a fire mage main character and they spread oil all over the place.

I really don't like the AoE Fear on the Crocodiles, though. Unless you've geared your party with magic armor AND have some of it left, that can be devastating. My first attempt at the crocs I had 1 dead and one at 1 HP while my team was in okay shape. Then Horrific Scream happened and my party was wiped without me getting another chance to act.

I like that skillbooks are reduced in price, they are far more affordable now, and I was able to pick up a few of them before getting inside the fort.

I do think that experience is tighter than it should be. I missed out on some by failing to intervene with Elohdi immediately, and another quest by not playing with the child in the grotto (I'm a lizard mage, what do I know about the games of human children?). I'm trying to figure out where I can scrape up enough to reach level 3. Most enemy encounters are level 3 or 4 and quite difficult.

I almost reached level 3 after finishing the Arena, but I'm still a little short, and I'm not sure what quests are still remaining in the prison for someone who didn't pick Pet Pal at the start (can't pick it now as the second Talent point is level 4). Maybe I have yet to help Gawin? If I have, I might want to fight some Silent Monks to get the needed XP. They have been toned down in XP a lot, which I approve of, as they were too easy to dispatch before and thus worth too much XP for their difficulty.

If you have patience, an observing eye and a slight sense of strategy than combat isn't that difficult, but it is hard to imagine that many players will have that. It kind of feels like they are really pushing for each mode to really separate the skill differences in players.

I haven't played any easy mode yet so I have no idea about the differences and we can only speculate on tactician mode at this point.

If things remain as are I can see players seeking lots of resources for each and every fight as they are quite hard, resources meaning guides not in-game items. Especially, as you mentioned Bard, seeing a puddle of blood and a pool of water connecting in the slightest causing the whole battlefield to become an electrified floor. Battle readability does need improvement for sure.

Even in DoSEE i never really used barrels, but now it feels like I might NEED to so I can get on an even playing field with some fights, like the void/skeleton ambush, wow that is difficult and I haven't beat it yet.

I'm a bit torn on this topic.

On one side I tend to agree with you that "feeding levels to the players" is DEFINITELY NOT the way to go and something I generally really don't like in RPGs. I like when every single level up is a struggle and feels an important achievement.
I'm also definitely not a fan of games showering the players with items. That fits hack'n slash far more than proper RPGs.
Hell, I typically enjoy the early hours when getting ANYTHING to fill empty slots feels like an accomplishment already.

That said, I think that statement shouldn't be taken at face value but read as a symptom of a problem.
The introductory part does indeed lack a bit of sparkle, because while I may have some problem to point a specific flaw and consequent solution, at the moment it fails to hook me with the same effectiveness of the early hours of D:OS1.

First, I have the feeling that the game now is much harder than before. I quit playing after some fights because getting killed all the time is not really fun.
I will try again on easy mode and if I die there too all the time, I might complain.
So far I could beat all my Larian games (DD, D2, D:OS1) on normal without big problems.

I think I have read somewhere that before the part we see comes a tutorial area where you are on the ship and then there is that explosion.
The tutorial dungeon of D:OS1 was very nice to show you how puzzles, traps and environment effects work. Without playing D:OS1 before, I would have really big problems in D:OS2 now.

I'm finding even easy mode to be troublesome at times; although approaching it using the "maybe come back later" thing I did with D:OS seems to have averted much of the aggravation.

I still rate Ego Draconis as one of the hardest games I've played and it was only after reading a fairly thorough guide to character progression, armour and other stuff that I felt I was comfortable with it. I'm aware I'm not the only one, and indeed DKS actually eased off the difficulty quite a lot!

The voidwoken turtles have never given my Level 1 party any trouble, on Classic Mode too. I always have Red Prince with me there and I've never lost an encounter with them. Just knock 'em down and kill 'em, I usually set a huge fire somewhere and just fight on its outskirts.

Ohh the game is definitely tougher then before but that is certainly a good thing.

Now not ALL encounters are well balanced mind you (though quite a few have been fixed up) and you cannot just make your characters anyway you'd like and expect to win (as you need... certain... combinations)... and not all abilities are good... but still it works.

However it does a few things SO FAR that DOS1 didn't
1) It has tough fights without cheapness such as endless immunity, self-destructing enemies spawning in the middle of your group, or enemies suddenly surrounding you from nowhere... Or a boss that heals to full constantly.
-Not that all fights are... fair... Stupid frogs!
2) Your fighters and stuff aren't as caught up on your wizards as they were in the first game.
3) Fights don't amount to a first turn CC fight
4) You don't break the game over your knee just by not being a moron... such as AP inflation.

I played on Tactics mode in DOS1 because I was so used to the game that it was getting a bit boring. Yet I noticed that it only made the first few fights tougher... I still powered out of control and eventually became too tough for the normal game.

Divinity Original Sin 2 on Classic is tougher then DOS1 Tactition mode.

It's definitely harder now than it used to be, but I don't think it's too hard. Every time there is a hard encounter, it can be solved with good strategy. I think that's exactly the way this sort of game should be. The only exception I'd make is for the crocodile fight - they do have a bit too many skills. For a lot of people, that will be the first real fight in the game, it shouldn't be that hard that early in the game. The other fights are fine.

That aside, I feel like staffs need some kind of buff. I don't see any reason to use them over wands right now. If you want more defense, wand + shield is amazing. If you want more damage, wand dual-wield is great. Staffs need to have some kind of niche to be useful, right now wands are better at everything. Maybe give them some kind of buff to spell damage?