Hi guys

Just finishing my first playthrough for EA, and while I'm really excited about the potential I can see, so far am just finding the combat a bit bland compared to BG2 or DOS1/2.

The main issues as I see them (which others have raised before):

- At least at the current level cap, it doesn't really feel like different character classes feel very different. You have a general division between spellcasters and melee, both of which will just spam their 1-2 different attacks round after round. I seem to remember DOS2 did a great job of making melee fighters feel interesting by giving them a wide variety different attack types that could cause different status effects. At the moment I can't really say there's any meaningful different between how I play a wizard character or a cleric, especially since all classes can pretty much use all items.
Potential fix: Give different classes more different unique abilities that really highlight their unique role in the party.
- Even worse, I can't say that the different fights really call for much creativity in how I set up and deploy my abilities/attacks. Just spamming those same standard attacks and then mixing in the odd shove/push seems to cover me in most cases. The Goblin camp fight was a huge chore in this regard - at level 4 I never felt remotely in danger, it was just a boring grind of low-level mobs.
Potential fix: A bit more variety in abilities between enemies where possible, or else adding a few more different types of enemies in groups.
- The frequent missing is a definite issue, and I'm struggling to come to grips with why I'm finding it so much frustrating here than in other similar games. I fully understand why this makes sense in the context of 5e rules, but from a gameplay enjoyment perspective it's a definite negative.
Potential fix: Tricky one! When trying to balance higher hit % and HP bloat I would probably rather have higher HP and higher hit rates than the other way around. I've seen others complain about what is already a relatively bloated HP context, but don't see any other solution. I think that more combat animations could be quite helpful as someone else pointed out.

Some positive points (not really related to the combat):

- Game looks great already, though am playing on Stadia so definitely noticing some issues. The underdark is really something to behold!
- The quests have been quite fun overall and I do feel like I'm given a variety of interesting choices on how to approach many of them.
- The fast travel system works for me, I really enjoy not having to spend so much time covering the same ground again and again.

Anyway just my two cents, will keep playing and looking forward to seeing how this evolves!

Last edited by Zenese; 20/01/21 11:40 AM.