Larian Studios Forums Divinity: Original Sin 2 Divinity - Original Sin 2 - General Initiative and Skipped Turn

So I am playing the game and I get to that kid who is locked up in the Arx sewers. I have my Sebil with 70+ initiative(high crit, arbalest summoner). I free the kid; he has some nice background, he transforms and the battle begins. On the top row I notice that Sebil is first. But the game skips her turn entirely(She does no get a move this entire first round, at all!) and then that mage nastily nukes my party(because he has to say that he likes it 'dramatic').

What, in heaven's sake, is that design about?!

Sure, I will probably reload from a point 5 minutes early and booby trap the whole place with good positioning of the party, because the way that this battle works, I am incentivised to cheat, because, otherwise, the enemy is given unfair, and quite puzzling, an unreasonable advantage. Sebil is heavily invested in initiative and is prohibitively punished for it.

It is very perplexing to think about that design choice.

Can we discuss, please?

Why do you assume that it is a design choice when it is far more likely a bug?

It's a pretty gamebreaking bug IF it is a bug, and has not been patched despite there being what, 4 patches now?

I played and beat this game 2-3 patches ago, haven't touched it yet until it gets fixed, but if this "problem" is still here like OP claims, either Larian is terrible at patching huge bugs like completely removing your turn in a turn based game where each turn counts or it's a design choice.

I can't tell you what it is, I had so many bugs during my playthrough with a SO that we didn't even know which was intentional or what was a bug. (I looked on wiki and apparently we missed huge parts and sections in quest bc NPCs didn't show up where they were supposed too, and other quest stuff breaking, lolwut).

I hope it's a bug. Small mistakes are not unlikely in big projects like this.

If there was any other explanation, like a momentous surge of source and/or a really powerful opponent, then I wouldn't mind the extra challenge. But the way it happens is just so matter of fact. I have got some screenshots as well, if you want to see. I just don't know how to upload them on this forum.

Why do you think it is a bug? Some battles are scripted (like the Doctor for example).

I found this one terribly hard first playthrough and had to run away but second time (when I was badly overlevelled) it was trivial.

Seems more like trying to fight someone at the wrong level to me in which case (like elsewhere) buggering off and coming back later seems a decent strategy.

This always happens with some bosses (that godwoken, Vibeka the witch, etc) It is scripted that they act always first, and if some character has highter iniciative than him skips turn.

Sometimes the enemies are blatant cheaters that way. I do not mind much, i prefer that to one-shot bosses without them even move.

Me too. I even prefer the round-robin initiative system as otherwise you could just go first and kill them which would be dull.

+1000

Why don't they put 1000 iniative on boss instead of scripting... whatever they are scripting, causing countless problems ? I don't understand.

Anyhow the iniative system is far from perfect and it would benefit from a rework of some kind imo.

Because that way the boss will be first in all turns, not only the first one. You can outpace the boss in turn 2 and beyond after he made his move.
And as I said, I find no problem in bosses being... you know... bosses. I even prefer some of them being more like Hannag or Alice

How ? is there a way to play before an infinite amount of initiative ?

If you have more initiative than the boss, you can act before him in turn 2 and beyond, he is only scripted to force act-first in the 1st turn (Just dowload the editor and take a look at the encounter script)

One of the flaws of the Ai is that the enemies do not have initiative buffs or apply initiative debuffs, so you have lots of ways to outpace enemies: Peace of mind, food, equipment, raise wits like hell, use rest before fight, etc

I would prefer it if scripted encounters just gave bosses impossibly high amounts of initiative, because as it currently stands, if you have more initiative then the enemy, it puts you last rather than second (which it would do if the enemy had more initiative then you). It is pretty silly going last with the highest initiative.

Also, it is quite possible to accidentally out initiative every monster in the game, especially in lone wolf. Even if you invest all your stats in your damage stat and then dump the rest into wits for crit chance, in A4 there are quite a few pieces of gear that give excessively large amounts of initiative (5+ on a single piece) and the enemy with the highest initiative in the game, has an initiative of 68. It is quite possible to get your turn skipped as a result of this.

you think you can have more than infinite ? lol

whatever...

You misread my previous post, read again



if you gave the boss infinite initiative he always be first. But if you give him a force script to be first and then normal initiative he only be first in the 1st turn and then the rules apply normally, so you can outpace him as any other enemy. That is the way it is made now and it is a solution far more elegant and logical that the brute-force-approach solution you proposed.

Why would you want the boss to be outpaceable from the second turn ? didn't you say you liked tough bosses like Alicescon ? Well ... actually the script solution works ... if it was designed to be like that, but i think it's awfully complicated for such a simple task. And it's buggy. Hence this thread...

I dont like tough bosses made giving them high numbers so you can only overpower them, I like bosses you can outwit. It is easy to do a tough boss: High Hp, Inmunities to all, one hit kills, infinite initiative... Just give them high numbers, the easy, braindead and lazy solution.

If you made a boss who always go first no matter what in all turns because he has infinite initiative, you are making the player throw away any iniciative tactics for this fight he developed, because there is no way you can outrun the boss. If you make it difficult but achievable, the player can use more types of strategies to defeat the boss. You can win using different skills or characters, or change your tactics in other playthrough. Options. That kind of things do the fights richer, IMHO.
Make hard bosses and give the player several solutions, make him think strategies to overcome the boss´ tactics, that is the tricky part, but rewarding when you do it well, like Hannag, Alice...