Larian Studios Forums Divinity - Original Sin Divinity Original Sin - Beta My thoughts on 1.0.59 (nitpicks and fix requests)

I've decided to collect a bunch of my own feedback into one large post. I'll add more posts as I progress and think of more things to add. These are in no particular order or priority.

I'm sure that a lot of these are on the list already.

1. [Persistent Bug] Jake's Dog - Source Hunter dialogue
STILL, STILL, Jake's dog, the "Maybe he's trying to tell us something thing STILL happens only AFTER you dig up his grave. This does not seem like something that is hard to fix. It's a matter of putting a one-time trigger in the graveyard, and attaching the dialogue to that instead of opening Jake's coffin.


2. [Persistent Bug] Source Hunter Dialogue
For some dumb reason, the way text is layered on the screen is to have the Dialogue, the important stuff that's one time and really important to know, that appears at the BACK, BEHIND all of the "AP points preserved" and "XP points" information. The Source Hunter dialogue should always be on top.


3. [Annoyance] Real-time "low health" popup
Too many times, the "helpful" popup that warns that your health is low happens in real-time when you walk over a surface, which actively interferes with your attempts to heal, usually guaranteeing a death.


4. [Immersion] "Source Hunter's Manual" needed
It's important that we get a "Source Hunter's Manual" in the player's inventory at the start of the game, something to give them much-needed context for who exactly the Source Hunters are, why they exist, what the Source is exactly, what the signs of it are.

Giving context is a vital part of storytelling.

• Divinity 1 had a character with no history, but it had Aleroth which introduced the world and context through characters, books, and conversations.
• Beyond Divinity had the opening cutscene and dialogue with the Death Knight which explained all you needed to know right away.
• Divinity 2 placed you in the role of a Dragon Slayer, but it had Farglow to give you context for what a Dragon Slayer's mission was and why they were doing it.
• Original Sin has an opening movie and then you're dumped on the beach with orders to investigate. You're told you're Source Hunters, but the start of the game provides very little context for what that means, why you're doing it, or even what the source is.

A persistent burning patch in an inn is a sign of the Source, but it looks just like any other burning patch. A bloody dagger is apparently evidence of someone killed by Source, even though we're told the Source is magic. The Source Hunters make declarations of things and the player doesn't know why. Context.

A Source Hunter's manual is a simple way to give context without bogging the player down with NPC explanations. It's there to read if they want to understand.


5. [Design/Storytelling][Immersion] Star Stone teleports party away before they're done
Okay, while it does make some sense for the Star Stone to immediately teleport the players away, it's quite annoying and interferes with the story - you are interrupted and whisked away in the middle of doing something else (either investigating the crime scene, or treating Evelyn's patients).

It is also really odd, because it forces your characters to talk about something else relating to the OLD scene they were just in, as if they hadn't suddenly been zapped to a strange place. That's immersion-breaking. I do not like it.

You also lose the thread of the scene, so you're not pointed in the direction of "we should check out the body" and Evelyn doesn't comment that the star stone suddenly lost potency. That stuff is lost and forgotten because you are whisked away before you were finished in that scene.

I would prefer that the teleport not happen until after you either leave the King Crab Inn, or until after you and your partner/Madora talk about the events in Thelyron's clinic.


6. [Incomplete Quest] Bertia can't be paid off
There's still no option to give Bertia the money Roberts gave the S.H.'s to pay for the sheep. She just runs off to Aureus right away, no option to give her gold (or not).


7. [Feature] Testing of AI Personalities?
I am getting a bit worried about the AI personalities. That's something I really, really want in the game, and even if they're in the next patch, there's not going to be a lot of time to test those.

Honestly, if they're not in the game on June 20th, I don't think I'll play the game until they're patched in.


8. [Pacing] Tutorial Dungeon lacks climax
The tutorial dungeon lacks a climax. After the door which requires two pressure switches to open, it's just a short walk with nothing but a few bone piles and vases. It just ends unceremoniously.

My suggestion is to add in Ragequin the mummified skeleton's boss, at the end. He auto-initiates dialogue, and you can either try to fight ("1. Ready your weapon") or talk your way out ( "2. You should let us go peacefully."), and this serves as a Dialogue Options tutorial, which teaches you about persuading people to solve some quests without killing, and how situation bonuses work.

If you flop the check, it's a miniboss fight and thus a fitting climax to the dungeon. (Same XP whether you fight or not, but no additional XP if you talk him down and THEN fight and kill him.)


9. [Performance] Hiccup in opening movie
There's some strange performance problem in the opening movie. It plays fine until a certain point (about when you climb up on deck), then it freezes for a half second or so and continues, and then freezes again for a half second (near the start of the captain's dialogue). This has happened every time since the opening movie was added. It's as if it's loading something behind the scenes, which seems odd - if it needs to load things, it should do it either before the opening movie starts, or after it (when there already is a loading screen).


10. [Missing] No start-of-game Autosaves
There are no autosave points at the start of the game and on entering the tutorial. There should be.


11. [Feature] More formation options needed
We need two more formation options: The first is the "f瑞ollow exactly in the leader's footsteps" one from Baldur's Gate 2, as someone suggested in the UI thread. The second one is a "spread out option to get your group to not cluster up so closely (prime targets for AoE spells and arrows).

I found the need for that second one first-hand when I engaged the undead clustered around the Scarecrow and was hit by a poisoncloud arrow that killed half my characters basically before they could react. I don't mind getting poisoned or dying, but the annoying thing is that there is no formation option to spread your party out to deal with that better. The best I could think of is to split everyone off from the chain and move them individually to attack from different directions.


12. [Design] Two-Handed weapons lack options
Why are there no 2H Crushing damage weapons? That makes zero sense at all. If there are going to be enemies in the game which have resistances to Crushing/Piercing/Slashing, then there shouldn't be melee weapons missing those types. Fine, 2H crushing damage can have lower base damage like other crushing weapons, but to have the type just plain completely missing is bizarre.

Additionally, there is the problem that piercing damage weapons are dexterity based but the warrior skills are STR-based, and there are no DEX-based skills for spears. That discourages the use of Spears.


13. [Design] Item-based Health Bonuses worthless
HP bonuses on items seem worthless. I have not seen any HP bonuses on items exceed 15. That's basically nothing, as enemy damage rapidly exceeds the effect of the small bonus.

Star stones should teleport the players away to Homestead only when one of the Source Hunters actually - touch them. tke them into their "hands".


Changing Formations or selecting another character - should not move the whole team the second you choose one or select a character. The team should move into a formation or change formation ONLY AFTER the player clicks somewhere to move.

This will prevent the team getting killed by deadly surfaces or mines just by trying to take formation or moving around just because i selected a different character.


- Resurecting characters should be teleported away from any dangerous surfaces automatically.

- It would be nice to have some kind of Source hunters Manual or History book to read if we want.
Wait... THAT could serve as our actual Journal!

Source hunter manual!

Where the info about Source Hunters would be just a section of the book.

I agree with all of those, Hiver.



Yes, this would help especially with the Evelyn encounter, although less so with the crime scene, because the tendency would be to pick it up before leaving, meaning you'd miss the post-exit dialogue. Nevertheless, it's a good idea.


14. [Annoyance] Immediate rotation of formations



Agreed.


15. [Design] Resurrection just gets you insta-killed again.



Agreed as well, although I'd go farther and agree with the other idea I heard, which resurrection lets you pick the spot within 15m where the guy is resurrected.

I am okay with an XP penalty for dead characters, and I am okay with Resurrecting leaving you at low HP (I think), but way too often, resurrecting my characters just ends up getting them killed before I can even get to their turn. Dangerous surfaces are especially bad for that. If you could select the destination, you could bring them back as far as possible to try and keep them alive. That comes with the built-in downside of them needing to heal and move back to range of the fight, so it doesn't seem unbalanced either.


16. [Balance] Archers get Poison Cloud arrows in West Cyseal?
Okay, this is a bit too much. Poisoncloud Arrows are an instant kill on full-health level 3 characters with 6 (maybe even 7 CON). If the initial impact doesn't kill them, they die instantly on their turn before they get to do anything. And the arrow is an AoE, so unless you instantly spread out your team on your first turn, you can end up with two or more dead characters without being able to do anything about it.

This seems a tad harsh for the "starter zone" of West Cyseal. Maybe at least for that bit, restrict the enemies in that area to single-target arrows, and only after that let them have AoE arrows.


17. [Design] Status effects get double hits/saves in the first round
I've mentioned this before, but there's a flaw with the timing of status effects:

[Enemy A][Bob][Stan][Enemy B]

Enemy A casts a Poison Arrow onto Stan. Stan immediately takes poison damage and fails his save against poison. When Stan's turn comes up, Stan fails his save and takes a second hit of poison damage before he can do anything. That's two hits in one turn. It should not happen.

Bob casts Silence on Enemy B, who fails his save and is Muted. When Enemy B's turn comes up, he first gets another roll against Silence and can pass it, letting him use skills in that same turn. That should not happen.

I heard an idea to change how that works to use the D&D system so that effects hit once and saves happen on the CASTER's turn. Meaning that in this example, Stan failed his save when he was attacked, leaving him poisoned, but when Stan's turn comes up again, he is still poisoned, but he does not take any damage because it already happened once that turn.

Enemy B does not get a saving throw the first round, when his turn comes up. He remains Muted, and gets a saving throw only when BOB's turn comes up in the next round. Thus, there's no double-dipping for damage and saving throws.


18. [Design] DoT effects happen before healing spell effects
If I'm under the effect of a heal and a Damage-over-Time effect, I'd like the healing effect to happen BEFORE the DoT effect, please.


19. [World] Empty spot at (X:73, y:79)
A small thing, but there's a little clearing at (X:73, y:79) which has nothing of interest. No corpses, enemies, chests, or even ingredients to harvest. It doesn't have to be a fight, but even a harvesting point would help (and no, the single Stardrop doesn't count).

Personally though, I'd like an ambush chest. It seems clear, but when you approach it, enemies pop up from underground. This is after the scarecrow trap, so players will likely be on their guard.


20. [Bug] Archers can shoot through smoke clouds
I think that there's an issue with this, because my warrior can't use crushing fist because the enemy is behind a cloud, but it can shoot just fine. (I forgot if it was targeting the warrior or someone else, though). Is this working as intended?


EDIT:


21. [Design] Poisoned character exiting Poison Cloud takes poison damage
This seems dumb. A character who is already poisoned, is inside a poison cloud, and walks to leave the poison cloud takes poison damage when leaving the poison cloud. Not cool.

Yesterday i finished the Black Cove, got the Star Stone from Pontius and nothing happened until i took it and actually used it.

So, as addition to the idea about it above, it would be even better if you would have to not only take it "into your own hands - inventory" but if you would need to do the same thing to get teleported to Homestead for the first time.

Take it and then actually try to use it.

This can be very easily presented to the players by companions or other Source hunter urging you to try and use it.

"Oh, would you look at that... its, its like its alive. Cmonn, try to use it - lets see what it does!"
"Are... are you sure?"
"Of course! Whats the worst it can happen? Do it!"

(something about source can be thrown in too)


What i dont find very convincing in the case of Evelyn is how blandly she accepts or doesnt even ask anything about your obvious teleportation and disappearance, once you come back.

I understand that devs wanted to make sure players find this and get to the Homestead so they created two situations where this happens, but i think only checking the place of the murder can be enough. Especially if Scarlet or Roderick or companions repeatedly remind the player about it - through dialogue text blurbs.

If devs really want to keep the situation with Evelyn - i suggest they only adjust the narrative a little bit - by making it as if the time stopped while you are away in the Homestead - which is at the END of the Time - right?

That would require player team being teleported right back into the exact place where they left from, either the room in the inn or next to Evelyn in dr. Thelyron house.

Which should not be difficult to do.
After that the player could use the stone to teleport around as you can do now.



15. [Design] Resurrection just gets you insta-killed again.

Good idea to enable players to decide where the character will be resurrected. The already existing animation and effects of the Teleport spell can be used for this easily. And devs can just change the color to make it look clearly different.



16. [Balance] Archers get Poison Cloud arrows in West Cyseal?

I have to say i didnt have a single character die from this, but maybe i was just lucky with the saving throws or something?

My group would take the initial hit but i would easily move everyone affected away from the cloud in the next turn, without them taking additional damage.

Also, it tends to happen in the second enemy turn so during the first one i would always spread my characters - although usually two or three would get clouded in most cases.


***

Agreed on all the rest.


- edit -

Almost forgot.

Source Hunter Manual + new design of the journal as a book, that was already mentioned in UI wishlist thread.

The game practically already has that.



This only misses different sections as bookmarks.
But it would be nice to use this kind of a "book with page turning" design for it.

Quest journal, Source Hunters manual itself, recipes and maybe a map. ... maybe put the skill and spell lists here too?

- just an idea...-

I disagree with this, while yes this is annoying, it also forces you to take important tactical decisions:
1: do I wait a few turns for the spot to disappear and then resurrect
2: maybe I should cast that rain spell to get rid of the fire before attempting to resurrect
3: mmmh, or should I delay the turn of my chars with the healing and/or resurrect spell so I can heal the resurrected char much quicker/in the same turn
4: Oh crap, I know that enemy has a fire/earth/... AoE attack, I have to remember to cast my support spells accordingly and heal my chars quicker to account for some of the possible AoE dmg in the future
...

I think this adds a great extra challenge to the combat and forces you to prepare for a fight (potions/resurrect scroll/...) and to think and adapt while you are in the fight itself.

Im convinced there is a bug regarding burning damage as well, although im not sure of the specifics. The burning mechanic seems very tempermental to begin with.

I've had characters die several times because during real time, they start taking burning damage, and instead of taking it every ~2 seconds, they take burning tics rapidly every ~0.5 seconds and this lasts until they die. Its impossible to heal through, and it doesn't go away after 2 or 3 'rounds'.

I fought the lighthouse ghoul, and he instagibbed himself in a similar fashion. He used the teleport attack over a patch of fire, and killed himself almost instantly to burn damage procs.

All that you wrote about is pointless because most of those repeating insta-deaths occur not because of bad decisions, but because of stupid formations AI that gets characters into hazardous surfaces that cannot removed, namely lava. This needs to be fixed by moving ressurection spot out of the hazardous surfaces.

Ah, true that might be the case in those instances. Even though, I think they then should upgrade the AI or allow to teleport a dead body (like already suggested). I don't think the resurrect skill itself needs fixing.

The Teleportation spell can move a body, and a dead character linked to one that uses a teleporter pyramid will move, as well.

This kinda makes sense, unlike the pyramids, but what if you don't have that spell? I think this whole thing is still too annoying to be left as it is. I hope there will be some sort of fix addressing this issure.

Btw, another suggestion - make resurrected character invulnerable to damage for a brief amount of time to get out of the hazardous surface. How about that?

When i suggested that functionality for resurrect spell i was thinking only about such events that happen outside of combat. In combat it could be seen as somewhat unfair advantage.... although, it does have high AP cost and you do resurrect with low HP anyway. (unless you have that specific talent to come back at full health)


I didnt know teleport can move a body too. That should be enough, if it works outside of combat.
It should be pointed out somehow, maybe?

I thought teleport works only in combat...and only on the actually live or functioning NPCs or enemies (undead). So i haven't even thought about using it to move a dead character away from a deadly surface before trying to resurrect.

Having to use first the teleport and then resurrect - while in combat - would be a good balance i think, considering that enemies dont use resurrect spells at all.


...


Well, there is the fact that not all players/builds will have the Teleport spells, right? But as far as combat is concerned - its their own fault if they dont. (although with hybrid builds and four characters it isnt that likely)

Outside of it i guess you can use the pyramids... to move everyone away, and so move the dead character out of some surface if you cannot remove that surface in any other way.


The thing is that initially that whole deal with resurrecting a character right back into the fire so he immediately dies looks totally nonsensical.

Maybe its our fault for not exploring all the possibilities, true... but the initial gut reaction to it (outside of combat), especially when it happens several times in a row is that it just looks ridiculous.

Which is why it gets mentioned very often.

That's a reasonable perspective, but on-the-spot resurrection is about more than AoE spells.

1: The game encourages you to resurrect ASAP because of the XP penalty for dead characters, and faffing about delaying a few turns trying not to kill enemies will generally end up getting more guys killed.

2: You don't always have the means to disperse particular AoE elements. Additionally, that doesn't solve the problem of on-the-spot resurrection making your new character vulnerable to attacks from anything - melee and ranged attackers as well, not just spells.

3: That's a reasonable tactic to try, it might help, I can try... but resurrecting already means probably having to save up AP for a turn and not healing yourself with some item, which could get you killed. I can try experimenting with this and seeing how effective it is, though.

4: Currently some of the damage is so high that you can be one-shot killed from full health. There's no way to prepare for that.


I don't mind the XP penalty and resurrecting at partial health, but while resurrecting is encouraged by the XP penalty, it often seems somewhat useless as the character is just one-shot immediately before they can act.



Is that new in this patch? I should check. I know that it was not working last patch. That would certainly help with this complaint if it's working now.

Only outside of combat - i would hope.

If that happens during combat it would be very unbalancing. - could be limited to one turn duration but even so...

It is working this version. I didn't try in 1.0.30, since it was possible to just use stairs or the waypoints to move a body (in 1.0.59 trying that just breaks the link between the dead character and the one teleporting).

err... i did use a waypoint in this last version, to go to the city to buy a resurrect scroll to revive Roderick who died in some usual manner, not from any dangerous surface - and he teleported into the city with us.

Do you recall if you were using the Rift Travel button or the waypoints directly? I'm pretty sure I tried both... I created a fire surface to walk a character over, so maybe that made a difference?

I do agree, something seems off. It is playable as is, but as you say it seems some un-explained happening occur. Like massive spikes of quick burn damage. If that is wanted, then the damage #'s should be lowered. I can get into big battles and in a few turns the baddies just explode without clear reason.

I confirmed this. I tried to get Jahan to cast Bitter Cold on an archer past a smoke cloud, but he could not see to target the archer. The archer had no problems shooting Jahan, though.




It seems that you take damage for every AP you move on a damage surface, which I guess makes sense. Maybe the problem is how much damage fire and poison do in the current version. It's a bit much.


*****

RE: Resurrection -

You can indeed teleport Party member corpses now, so hooray and thank you Larian. That does help a bit, as does delaying your turn to resurrect at the end, because your party tends to be able to act faster than the enemy, so there's often a chance to do something about that.

I'll be sure to keep fully stocked on Teleport scrolls. Larian will have to decide if Resurrection needs any other changes.


*****

22. [Design] Battlemages should start with both sword and staff
Since the point of Battlemages getting Staff of Magus is to let them have flexibility - they can either go for melee or ranged magic, they should probably also start with a staff as well as a sword. There is a precedent for that, as Rangers, Shadowblades, Rogues (and maybe Wayfarers?) all start out with Bow and Knife. Worst case, players will sell the thing they don't want for a paltry sum of gold.

EDIT: I suppose it doesn't matter too much, as there's an "always there" staff in a crate after the bridge and before the harbour.


23. [Design] Dialogue log radius is too large
You can hear dialogue from a very long way off, even through walls. In places where there are 5 or more conversations happening at once like Cyseal market, this can make the dialogue very confusing


24. [Logging] No one needs a log entry about Kelvania's shopping list
No one needs a log entry about Kelvania's shopping list


25. [Balancing] More Talents Needed
This has been an issue for a while in some form or another since the game started, but the change to lock-out a lot of Talents has just highlighted it even further. The game needs more Talents. Even in the last patch, a lot of them were not appealing for any particular build, I tended to just sit on my talent points. Now I fear I'll still do that, but it'll be worse because there are some that I have no way to even get.


27. [Dialogue] Repetitive dialogue in Jahan/S.H. conversation
When Jahan expresses concern about the Teleporter pyramids, you can choose to say they are fine. The first response is "Don't look a gift horse in the mouth?" and the one agreeing with that is "Don't look a gift horse in the mouth, eyes, and ears" which seems a little repetitive. Maybe tweak that a little? "Not just the mouth, but the eyes and ears as well." would still continue the metaphor, but without repeating the whole thing.


28. [Suggestion] Hireling Merchant where it's hard to miss
I don't actually know if there are still going to be generic hirelings, or just companions, but since party members are essentially required for fighting, it should be easy to find them.

If there is going to be a Hireling Merchant in Cyseal where you can pick up new guys, my suggestion is to place him in the fountain plaza, where you enter Cyseal for the first time. That would make him easier to spot for new players.


29. [Suggestion] Asking NPC's about Rumours hints at Companions
This is another way to help. Madora is easy to find, Jahan less so. When you ask an NPC about rumours, one thing in the pool could be mentioning that they heard about a third Source Hunter in town over at the King Crab, or that they heard about a Demon Hunter who has holed up in the mayor's library.

To avoid having to write a bunch of checks "have you met them, are they in fact in the party right now", they could be worded in such a way to suggest that this NPC hasn't met them him/herself. This should only apply to Companions actually in town, not found in the wilderness, of course.

I think i actually used the waypoint. The one in the east and then traveled to the north waypoint in the city. But im not 100% certain since i really didnt pay too much attention... it could be the rift. But the body traveled to the city with us. Ill check. ill let one character die and try it.


- edit -


Ok, this is how it works now:

I did the Braccus fight and Madora was left dead at the end.

I used the pyramid to exit through the blue barrier, (didnt have the proper pendant or a key) and she appeared with us in the next room. I went up to the church - she remained bellow.

I ran to the East Waypoint and ported to the city. She did not appear in the city. I tried rift traveling from waypoint to waypoint but she also would not appear.

But, since at the end of the fight i get the Star stone and the notification to travel to Homestead - i tried that.

Her body does appear in the homestead.
And when i travel back after that, she appears at all waypoints, both when i use Rift travel and just waypoints themselves.
(she is not connected by chain anymore but her body teleports all the same)

So its probably a bug.

After she goes back to her spot in the market, you can talk to her again and pay her off.

More-or-less makes sense: she's too pissed off at first to wait and talk. Paying her off after she's talked to Aureus still doesn't keep Roberts out of the nick, but life's like that sometimes.