No obvious time pressure in act one? You have Druids performing a ritual that will seal off The Grove, goblins have found at the Grove and are going to attack soon, and yeah you have a tadpole in your head that everyone is saying that you need to get out as soon as possible before you turn into a mind flayer. Even those who say that it is not acting normal will tell you that you could still at any moment. Add to that that Zorru saw Gith just recently and they ain't gonna logically wait around all week for you and Halsin was kidnapped and the goblins aren't gonna keep him alive forever and the cult is searching for you...
Sorry. I have to disagree when you say that the story is not time-sensitive. In fact one of the biggest things I have a problem with is that the story seems very time-sensitive. Everything about the story is you have to hurry before the tadpole takes you over, The Druids kick everybody out, the Goblins attack, Etc. Your party members even nag you a lot about getting your butt moving. Besides reminding you a lot about the tadpole Lae'zel also reminds you a lot that you need to find the Gith creche. Then, once you find out about Gale's condition you feel even more like you have to race against the clock before he explodes.
But then, the game designers make it so that you have unlimited rest. That doesn't make sense with the story then you should be able to just end day all the time. It is like The Druids are going to take 2 weeks or something to finish the ritual and everyone else is just waiting around for you to do what you need to do. So go ahead and take your time, that is what it seems to me that the designers have done. The game says hurry hurry hurry but the game designers say take your time it's okay. On top of that the game designers encourage you to rest a lot in order to get all the dialogues. It just makes no sense to me.
Totally agree with this.
There are a lot of inconsistencies between writing and game design. GM4 gave very good exemples related to the rest mechanic but it's something that is in many aspects of the game.
