NWN2: Why the hate?

[Newwby]

I was a longtime Neverwinter Nights fan - it vied for 'first dungeons and dragons experience' in my life. I didn't try the older CRPG games until I was older.

My computer couldn't run the sequel, NWN2, when it was released. I bought it in 2007 but ran the same pitiful computer I bought circa-2002 until some time in late 2011. So I was exposed to a great deal of user opinion before I got to form my own.

The main complaint that was raised was the same complaint that I'd heard thrown at the original NWN - the lack of party play and the lack of dungeons and dragons strategy feel.

Well, I've been playing it a lot again lately and I honestly don't understand why it gets all the hate. With the strategy mode from MotB(Mask of the Betrayer expansion), the party building from SoZ(Shadows of Zehir expansion) and a combination of AI mods, the game quickly becomes a modern Baldurs Gate. It's fantastic to play - with the still-active community and plethora of well built modules I can't imagine a D&D game I could log more hours in to.

What are your opinions on D&D video game conversions and how they weigh up compared to the actual tabletop game? Particularly NWN2 but especially drawing attention to differences between it and the original NWN, or the differences between more recent D&D RPG's and the older Baldur's Gate/Icewind Dale games.

[Darth Mario]

Most of the hate for NWN2 that I heard came before the expansion packs hit, and the general opinion after was "yeah, now it's a pretty good game."

[Sajiri]

Personally I really liked NWN2, although there were some things I thought had issues (I may be misremembering, I tried playing again recently but my save got corrupted). I'm pretty sure it bothered me how close you had to be to enemies to see/engage them, made playing sneaky or ranged awkward.

Although the biggest bother to me was that the game seemed unfinished in some ways. Such as Bishop not having a full romance when he clearly was meant to, and Casavir not every really expanding on his past when he keeps bringing it up that he'll tell you 'later'

[Tengu_temp]

The two biggest strengths of NWN1 were the custom content creation tool and the persistent world online play. NWN2 made both much more awkward and more of a pain in the butt to use, thus missing the point of what made NWN1 so good in the first place.

[Tavar]

The main complaint that was raised was the same complaint that I'd heard thrown at the original NWN - the lack of party play and the lack of dungeons and dragons strategy feel.

Well, I've been playing it a lot again lately and I honestly don't understand why it gets all the hate. With the strategy mode from MotB(Mask of the Betrayer expansion), the party building from SoZ(Shadows of Zehir expansion) and a combination of AI mods, the game quickly becomes a modern Baldurs Gate. It's fantastic to play - with the still-active community and plethora of well built modules I can't imagine a D&D game I could log more hours in to.

As said, most of the critism is directed towards the initial game/basic game without mods.

There's also the fact that the base game was buggy as hell, and was a horrible resource hog. The first set are solved by the expansions, but you have to pay to get those, so for the early adopters they weren't possible. And the latter, well, they were mitigated to some degree, but from my understanding they never went away.

There's also stuff like, while the first campaign had it's good parts, there were also some pretty bad parts, and worse those bad parts largely encompassed the latter parts of the game. In all, while additions later on may have fixed things, I can't really drum up the interest to reinstall the game, much less buy more stuff for the game.

[tonberrian]

I think my biggest issues with NWN 2 is the friggin' inventory being worse than in NWN1. NWN 1 had a not great, but at least servicible inventory system. NWN2... didn't.

[Cybren]

it was released with less functionality than NWN1 in terms of gameplay options AND a vastly worse multiplayer experience (it took something like half a decade for NWN2 to get an autodownloader for modules, thereby ensuring it would have something like no multiplayer community)

it was buggy and had really bad performance at launch. It's still buggy and it's still a system hog despite being kinda bland looking.

It was a really rushed development, a lot of the sound effects were reused from NWN1. actually, a lot of the content in general was reused from NWN1, including things like the scripts for spells and feats, meaning despite claiming to be using 3.5 rules, it had a bunch of holdovers from 3.0

the games rules engine is really flawed and not properly implemented from D&D. From the top of my head: bonuses are typed wrong (the games 'armor bonus' is actually what 3.5 calls armor enhancement bonus. So, bracers of armor or the mage armor spell stack with the nonmagical portion of a suit of armor)

the toolset, while more powerful than NWN1s, was a lot less user friendly and shipped with no documentation so there were tons of new builders that couldn't figure out how to do basic things like move the camera without a community made tutorial

the inventory system as mentioned was atrocious. NWN1 used the old diablo style Lootris, with multiple screens so space, while limited, wasn't too limited (like most D&D parties). NWN2 decided to just make every inventory item take up one inventory slot. You'd think this would be a plus so you can store more things but all it does is make all the objects in your inventory look the same so it takes twice to ten times as long to sort. And never press the "auto sort" button. Ever.

it was missing just a lot of quality-of-life features that NWN1 had at launch. (like a usable camera, or the ability to bind two weapons to the same quickbar slot for dual wielding)

the story was generic and all the characters were awful. the plot has some really arbitrary moral choice sequences. My favorite example of the bad writing is when, in order to gain access to a portion of neverwinter under lockdown, you have to either join the thieves guild or the town guard. The stakes haven't even been established yet so your character has no real reason to be this desperate, but either way, since the game is forcing you, once you pick and do the associated sidequests, the lockdown ENDS ANYWAY

Also Mask of the Betrayer is really really really overrated and you should't play it.

[JadedDM]

I always thought the hate toward NWN2 was from the plot doors and the awful ending.

[Woot Spitum]

Personally, I found that NWN2 didn't capture my imagination the the original did. That, plus the atrocious influence system getting in the way party formation (not to mention making every conversation with party members a tedious game of how do I avoid alienating all my henchmen) took a lot of the fun out of the game. Mask of Betrayer had interesting companoins and a much more interesting setting, but tacked on a stupid soul feeding resource management system that made the game less fun to play. Most of the other common complaints (graphics, bugs etc.) have been covered by other posters, so I won't go into them, but the in general, the game was more difficult to play from a technical standpoint. The original NWN wasn't perfect, but it had a lot less things getting in the way of fun.

[Morty]

In no particular order:

- Terrible, awkward controls.
- Even more terrible and awkward camera.
- Shoddy UI.
- Awful combat engine.
- The story is uninteresting at best and tooth-achingly stupid at worst.
- The NPCs are even worse.
- Bugs.
- Painfully user-unfriendly editor, which removes the main draw of the first game.

Mask of the Betrayer has a very good story - but it takes place on epic levels which, combined with NWN2's atrocious engine, makes combat an absolute chore. Especially if you decided to play a spellcaster - have fun dealing with three ginormous spell lists at minimum, since you only get one non-spellcasting companion. It really deserves a better engine and a better ruleset.

[Tengu_temp]

The single-player campaign is not the main draw of either of the NWN games. I mean, the campaign of the original NWN is absolutely atrocious, while NWN2 is at least decent in this regard, but decent is as good as it's going to get. This is a game you play for the brilliant player-made mods*, and for the multiplayer persistent worlds - they're like a combination of a mini-MMO and an actual tabletop game, with a DM and everything! I have good memories playing and running adventures on the official NWN1 Polish server, many years ago.

* - I especially liked the Penultima and Penultima Rerolled campaigns, by Stefan Gagne of Sailor Nothing fame.

[Remmirath]

My main problem with NWN 2 is the camera, although there are a few different things that bother me about the camera. I find it very hard to control it properly without bumping into things all the time, and I had to keep a secondary mouse hidden in a drawer of my desk while playing for all the times that cutscenes changed the zoom of the camera so I could get it back to the zoom level I prefer (I don't have a mouse wheel, not having managed to find a left-handed or ambidextrous trackball that has a mouse wheel and isn't huge). None of the more tactical sorts of cameras give me a view I like for that sort of thing, either.

Other than that, the default campaign felt rather on rails in some spots and the ending was one of the worse endings I've seen in a game, but I'd say that all in all it wasn't any better or worse than NWN's default campaign. I haven't yet managed to get past my loathing of the camera enough to play Mask of the Betrayer, even though I have it installed, so maybe I'll like that better. I don't know. Last time I tried to play Storm of Zehir I also suffered so many bugs it was quite literally unplayable (got to the overhead map, couldn't enter anything from it), but that was to do with my last video card and sometime I'll give it another chance.

The rather questionable looking face selection for some species is also a bit of a problem, though a far more minor one. Same was true of NWN, perhaps more so, but at least there you still had portraits. I also quite detest the pointbuy system (and especially the dreadfully sparse pointbuy found there), but NWN had that also.


What are your opinions on D&D video game conversions and how they weigh up compared to the actual tabletop game? Particularly NWN2 but especially drawing attention to differences between it and the original NWN, or the differences between more recent D&D RPG's and the older Baldur's Gate/Icewind Dale games.

Temple of Elemental Evil is probably the best for direct conversion. It even implements a wide variety of rules that are quite annoying to have. It also lets you roll stats instead of forcing the pointbuy, which is always nice. I'd say both NWN games are about as faithful or unfaithful of conversions. None of them stack up favourably against tabletop gaming, because you'll never have the level of NPC and world reactivity in a computer game which you would in a tabletop game. Also, with the exception of some dedicated servers and such, you won't get the house rules which tailor the game to fit each group.

I strongly prefer Baldur's Gate and Icewind Dale. No camera worries, rolling stats (or at least a one for one pointbuy in the case of IW II), and I actually think that 2nd edition rules work better for computer games than 3rd edition rules do. I also like the isometric style better, and having portraits. The only thing that is really better about the NWN games is the toolset and campaigns, and I don't make much use of that, because honestly when I feel like writing a campaign I'll find some people to play with face to face instead of making it into a module.

[bobthe6th]

I tried NWN 2 after slamming through NWN... and man is that camera irritating. Really the fan made mods are the good stuff... been playing through Connan the barbarian, the full storyline as a campaign. It is pretty much amazing.

[warty goblin]

It actually took me a while to realize I didn't hate real time with pause RPG combat systems. I just hated Neverwinter Nights 2. Can't really think of a thing the game did right. Well, the trial/investigation was OK, but trial sequences in RPGs are hardly a rarity, and the Witcher's investigation blows NWN 2's out of the water.

But other than that? Dear lord no. The camera should not work like that. The controls should not work like that. If I have to turn the AI off to get it to not commit suicide constantly, something has gone terribly wrong. Particularly since I do not want to manage four different schmucks with that interface. Way too many tiny little buttons for way too many stupid, meaningless options.

Yeah I get it, the tabletop has those options too, but this isn't the tabletop. Had I wanted the tabletop game, I would have strolled into Barnes & Noble and bought the tabletop game. Instead I wandered into Gamestop and bought a videogame. So it should work as a videogame. Diablo without modification makes a crappy tabletop game. D&D without modification makes a crappy videogame.

[Closet_Skeleton]

Pretty much all my thoughts on NWN2 have been already said by the other posters. I started the original campaign up to the point where you reach Neverwinter and didn't have any interest in continuing. I tried Mask of the Betrayer and gave up at the first Inn. With the campaigns I just couldn't bring myself to continue with something that wasn't very fun.

Since pretty much the whole CRPG genre has points that just aren't fun and you just have to slog through, NWN2 must be pretty sub par if a moderate CRPG fan can't deal with it. I suspect that most of the guys who get to the ending must have been pretty tough hardcore RPG fans.

What really made me give up was the unusable toolset, which had also been the main draw for NWN for me. The fact that NWN's community continued to be pretty strong and couldn't jump to NWN2 easily is probably what really hurt the game. NWN2 needed expansions to get playable, NWN had one of the best patching support a game has ever had and didn't need it as much anyway.

Did NWN2 have better traps and secret doors than NWN? That was always what I saw as the Aurora Engine's major flaw as a dungeon crawl game.

For some stupid reason the flame effects in NWN2 really annoyed me because they looked too much like the Infinity Engine ones. It made me feel like NWN2 was trying too hard to be an Infinity Engine sequel and falling, while NWN was in many ways worse than the older Infinity Engine games but was at least trying to be its own thing and take the genre in new directions rather than just appeal to old fans.




The main complaint that was raised was the same complaint that I'd heard thrown at the original NWN - the lack of party play and the lack of dungeons and dragons strategy feel.


NWN2 had way more party play than NWN, even in the un-expanded release version. But the way it made me try and control the party and the player at the same time I just found frustrating. It felt more like they were trying to fix that complaint about NWN but had no understanding of why NWN did things the way it did. Mask of the Betrayer just made it feel worse and again, turned it into a bad Infinity Engine successor rather than a improved Aurora Engine successor (like KotOR and Mass Effect which didn't have great gameplay built improved on the Aurora Engine rather than ruining it).

[Yora]

NWN2 is the only game that ever manged to insult me. It insults my intelligence and my age, and the entire fantasy genre.

Kelgar, the Chaotic Good dwarf who murders some dumb kids because they made fun of his beard and then begged for their life when they realized he was about to get violent.
Neeshka, who steals from people just for fun and gets all types of criminals to want to murder the party because of it.
Qara, who causes mass destruction because she's an emo-teen sorcerer.
And when grobnar came dancing and singing about, that was the final straw and I just quit and never touched the game again.

It's not just terrible, this game is offensive.

- Bugs.
- Painfully user-unfriendly editor, which removes the main draw of the first game.
Which ultimately killed it for me. I had been part of the staff of a big NWN online server for some years and we were really excited about doing something new with NWN2. But with that software, it simply wasn't worse the suffering.

[Morty]

I never really got into multiplayer or serious module-making in NWN1, but I had plenty of fun tinkering and fiddling with the editor, creating my own 'module'. It wasn't really thought through, had no real plot and I wouldn't inflict it on anyone, but, you know, not the point. I enjoyed fiddling with scripts and other elements, then seeing them actually work like I wanted them to. Creating complicated objects, events and the like was difficult, but making simple things was easy, and I downloaded a handy program to help me with the more fancy scripts. The NWN2 editor was not only hard to grasp and use, but also kept crashing.

There are some pretty decent modules for NWN2, though, so looks like some people managed to muscle their way through the editor.

[Tengu_temp]

Kelgar, the Chaotic Good dwarf who murders some dumb kids because they made fun of his beard and then begged for their life when they realized he was about to get violent.
Neeshka, who steals from people just for fun and gets all types of criminals to want to murder the party because of it.
Qara, who causes mass destruction because she's an emo-teen sorcerer.
And when grobnar came dancing and singing about, that was the final straw and I just quit and never touched the game again.


There's also Bishop, who is the mandatory evil "bad boy" party member, only without any of the wit or roguish charm they usually have. He's just a thug. No idea why he's so popular.

All the party members in NWN2 vanilla campaign are either extremely annoying or extremely generic and boring, with the single exception of Sand. Sand is awesome.

[Morty]

I sort of liked Ammon Jerro. He wasn't spectacular as far as 'evil out of necessity' types go, but he wasn't bad. Plus he was a warlock, meaning he was a whole lot easier to deal with than the regular spellcasters.

[Tavar]

Neeshka, Sand, Ammo Gerro, and Ammo's niece were my favorites/most tolerable party members. Kelgar was just kinda there(though I don't remember any tale about murdering people, just beating up in a bar-brawl). The others were pretty annoying.

[Tengu_temp]

I hated Neeshka for being a chaotic stupid thief who steals for no reason, even from allies and/or in situations where the thievery is easily discovered. Still not as bad as Qara, though. Is there anyone who liked Qara?

[Ohiohi]

Think about BG2 companions... They have a background story, all of them have positive traits that make you love them and want to do all their side quests...
NWN1 is good, you don't have to plan the battle for 6 party members but just for you while your henchman use some intelligence in fight, and this means you can focus on your PC.
NWN2 is awful at this. Little companions stories, no henchmen side quests. You are bound to a lot of plot choices like aiding khelgar and neeskha and travel with them in the first part of the game... MotB gives epic levels a sense. You deal with powerful foes, gods, planes and magic, so it's Epic, with capital "E". But companions' AI is horrible. I found safiya using often a maximixed disintegrate against a "near death" gnoll. F*****g idiot.
SoZ let you create 4 PCs, and it's good(you don't have the big problem of choosing only one PC to play with, I'm always unsettled in that choice), but the world map is AWFUL.

I ask forgiveness for my bad english :thog:

[Morty]

I hated Neeshka for being a chaotic stupid thief who steals for no reason, even from allies and/or in situations where the thievery is easily discovered. Still not as bad as Qara, though. Is there anyone who liked Qara?

It was fun to see Sand explain to her why she's an idiot, so she wasn't completely useless.

[Ohiohi]

It was fun to see Sand explain to her why she's an idiot, so she wasn't completely useless.

You read my mind. Before I thought that. You're not just a psychic - you're a FUTURE psychic! :elan:

[Tavar]

I hated Neeshka for being a chaotic stupid thief who steals for no reason, even from allies and/or in situations where the thievery is easily discovered.

Perhaps it's the fact that I never did finish the OG, or maybe it's just that I haven't played it for years, but I honestly don't remember this. When does she steal from the party? Hell, when does she take any independent action? The most I remember is getting you involved with a former compatriot, but that's hardly that bad.

[Tengu_temp]

Perhaps it's the fact that I never did finish the OG, or maybe it's just that I haven't played it for years, but I honestly don't remember this. When does she steal from the party? Hell, when does she take any independent action? The most I remember is getting you involved with a former compatriot, but that's hardly that bad.

Oh, she doesn't steal from the party - if she did, I'd find a way to make her suffer for it, NPC invincibility or not. But she steals from people who are friendly to you, and to your detriment.

Best example: at one point, you are tasked with guarding a cart with weapons by a friendly NPC, and promised a good reward. Neesha, of course, wants to steal the stuff, and calls you crazy if you don't let her! Nevermind that the NPC would immediately find out the weapons are missing and figure out it was you - instead of a reward and a grateful new ally, you have someone pissed off at you.

[Eldariel]

I never played the game with Companion AI on after the first battles. As soon as I have NPCs with Magic (even before then but especially after then), so basically after Elanee, the AI is just so goshdarned retarded and pulls all enemies that it's more or less unplayable. Made the going slow but I guess just pausing every few seconds and giving orders works, if not really the way I'd want it to.

Played through NWN2 and MotB with the worst interface ever (and then the Witcher reuses it, thanks for the crashes!) and came to the conclusion the game was only half-finished when released and it shows. Also, MotB was better but still painful and the selling point of NWN, custom content creation, was also lost. As everyone said already, NWN2 just kinda did everything wrong. Most of the NPCs were dumb, the story was dumb and illogical, playing Engineer in Castle was kinda okay but still unfulfilling (coulda been much more) and the whole was just stupid (having to manually restrict your resting to get any kind of challenge to the game? Cool.). Also, the game was Easy. I don't think I ever wiped.

[Tavar]

Oh, she doesn't steal from the party - if she did, I'd find a way to make her suffer for it, NPC invincibility or not. But she steals from people who are friendly to you, and to your detriment.

Best example: at one point, you are tasked with guarding a cart with weapons by a friendly NPC, and promised a good reward. Neesha, of course, wants to steal the stuff, and calls you crazy if you don't let her! Nevermind that the NPC would immediately find out the weapons are missing and figure out it was you - instead of a reward and a grateful new ally, you have someone pissed off at you.
Still not seeing any stealing going on unless you allow it.

And to me, that's more of the "she's a thief, and is going to approach every opportunity as a thief".

[Psyren]

In addition to the bad OC, horribly optimized engine and plethora of bugs, the difficulty of multiplayer and the editor hurt this title a lot. That was NWN's primary strength, to the point that people often hacked their PWs to use 3.5 rules rather than 3.0.

Now that the average computer is powerful enough to muscle through the game and the whole thing is up on GoG though, it's certainly worth a revisit. I repurchased all of it, but I have a large gaming backlog to get through first.

However, this Baldur's Gate total conversion mod (http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2013/06/06/mad-mod-recreates-baldurs-gate-in-neverwinter-nights-2/) (which also updates it to 3.5 rules, IIRC) is probably going to be first on my list to play once I pick NWN2 up again.

There's an Icewind Dale conversion out there somewhere too.

[Tvtyrant]

I found it insanely infuriating that buffs would disappear during cutscenes.

[Starbuck_II]

I found it insanely infuriating that buffs would disappear during cutscenes.

This very much.
I found Bards the best class for the main game. The save/lose spells, wearing armor, and buffing song made my character awesome.

They are a few main character only battles where save or lose help considerably.

[Tengu_temp]

Still not seeing any stealing going on unless you allow it.

And to me, that's more of the "she's a thief, and is going to approach every opportunity as a thief".

Well, if you don't allow the stealing she's gonna berate you and you'll lose loyalty points with her. So still annoying.

Being a thief is one thing, being a short-sighted, kleptomaniac moron is another.

[tonberrian]

I thought the stealing thing in the city from the cart was specifically that nobody did know what exactly all what was in there. It was ordered by the theives, not the militia. It's not like the militia had an itemized list of what all was there.

[Closet_Skeleton]

Still not seeing any stealing going on unless you allow it.

And to me, that's more of the "she's a thief, and is going to approach every opportunity as a thief".

That makes her a kleptomaniac and a horrible stereotype.

'Thief' characters can be very varied. Just look at the three you get in Baldur's Gate II, neither Imoen, Jan Jansen, Yoshimo or Nalia will just go around stealing everything no matter the situation and they all have distinctly different motivations. They're characters first and thief's second and they only became thieves because of their motivations, that annoying Tiefling is thief first third and second and has no character outside of her race/class combo.

If she was actually represented as someone with a mental illness and that was thoroughly explored she might be an interesting character, but from what I saw she was just 'look at how cute and wacky this nutcase is, you're going to find her endearing aren't you? Aren't you?!'

[Eldariel]

This very much.
I found Bards the best class for the main game. The save/lose spells, wearing armor, and buffing song made my character awesome.

They are a few main character only battles where save or lose help considerably.

Heh, I just played a Druid. 3.0 HP-from-Wildshape = 3 free stat = good mentals and thus good skills all-around, and they get Sleep for early game, save-or-lose/dies later on, great long duration buffs that you really want in your party, companion & there's the Monk-dip for MotB-viable AC (though using few items gets buggy when you Wildshape). Of course, this just comes from the "When in doubt, play a Druid".

[Morty]

I briefly considered replaying NWN2 somehow when I heard there was a mod that adds the Tome of Battle material. Of course, I'd sold my copy a while before, and then I was told by a friend who'd tried it that it's really buggy, so I didn't bother trying to get another. A shame, since playing a warrior type who can do more than full attack and abuse Combat Expertise might have been interesting.

[Calemyr]

Original Campaign:
+ Loved Sand
+ Enjoyed Khelgar (never saw any non-standard-adventurer muderousness in him, he just struck me as a soccer/football hooligan in a setting that never had soccer/football)
+ Thought the way they handled the niece was interesting, especially regarding that fifth character slot - makes her feel like a free companion rather than a burden.
+ Ammon Jerro is pretty darn awesome in voice and appearance. His 'becoming a demon to slay the Devil' mentality was handled pretty nicely.
+ With patches the game became pretty playable.
+ The finale was pretty darn awesome - screw the party limit, EVERYONE is coming to this party, and you better hope you treated them right.
+ The use of epithet feats (I think that's the name) was quite clever.
+ The silver sword looked and felt very cool.

- The game was virtually unplayable for the first month or so. Patches drastically improved the performance, but that first month was so horrible it often eclipses everything else in peoples' memory.
- Characters were pretty generic. Tiefling rogue, elven wizard, dwarven fighter? There was just an awful lot of it that was just cliche. At least the dwarf's rivalry was with the tiefling this time instead of the elf - although the elf seemed to have a rivalry with anything that took breath.
- The niece was a brilliant idea done incompletely. If you were really teaching and sculpting her into an adventurer, you should have had some say in how leveled. Instead she just becomes a fairly substandard fighter.
- The finale was wonderful, but the ending? 'Rocks fall. Everyone dies."? Really? Even Mask of the Betrayer doesn't ease that sting.
- The silver sword looks great and feels great, but doesn't apply to any perk. Sure a sorcerer can use it as easily as a fighter, but a longsword kensai should be able to legendary weapon into... well... a weapon of mass destruction. I modded the game so that it counted as a "light" longsword (dual wielding without extra penalties), but that's just me.
- Some of the characters (Bishop and that Gith cleric) were completely bland and unmemorable.
- Auto-leveling was atrocious. I tended to stick to early party members because the ones that joined later were so stupidly set up it wasn't even funny.

Mask of the Betrayer:
+ The Sprit Eater was a great idea. (How it was handled is a negative, though.)
+ The dual-nature (light vs shadow) setting was well done and fascinating. Not a new idea, of course, but still well done.
+ Crafting on the go (and crafting derived from Spirit Eating) was a nice touch.
+ Characters were pretty good, particularly Okku and One-Of-Many. The Thayan mage also deserved note for having such a difficult combination of motivations.
+ The Wall of the Faithless is an interesting concept, especially for a campaign focus.

- Gan was largely forgettable and Dove was rather obnoxious.
- I dislike it when main character don't speak intelligibly, making One-Of-Many less than preferable. Pity, because he's a rather interesting character.
- As interesting as the Wall of the Faithless could have been, it wasn't used well here. A god says it needs to be there, so you just protect it, despite finding the soul of a potential friend/enemy rotting within it. Very little choice or discussion regarding it.
- The Spirit Eater mechanic is obnoxious and broken to the point of being irrelevant. The alignment modifiers to using the Spirit Eater tend to dictate actions instead of role-playing and Satiate is basically the "Ignore this feature" button.

Storm of Zehir
+ The introduction of economics and trade to the game (albeit a very dumbed down version) is a welcome edition.
+ Having the option to have four PCs is really pretty cool. Most of the time you're forced to be the jack-of-all-trades sort of hero, now you can diversify.
+ The situational dialogue is REALLY cool. My lawful good paladin has different response options than my chaotic neutral rogue. I like that. Gets infinitely cooler that the cohorts often have completely unique dialogue options, such as the druid seeing through an ogre mage's illusions or the halfling swashbucker calling a guard out on an obvious extortion racket.
+ Surprisingly interesting cohorts. More often than not I find myself using one PC just to use as many cohorts as possible, much to my detriment.
+ Generally useless skills end up getting much better use in this expansion, either being applied to interactable objects or altering over-world travel.
+ Not a very personal quest. Sounds like it should be a detriment, but that's really kind of a nice change of pace. You're nothing special - no divine heritage, no sliver of metal in your chest, no brainwashed super-villain, just a handful of survivors of a ship-wreck, trying to make the best of a bad situation.
+ Interesting new prestige classes. Doomguard really kinda breaks the first two campaigns in half by making you a god of undead slaying. (And there's an awful lot of undead in all three campaigns.)

- Very buggy and incomplete. Bugs block certain resolution paths for quests. Spells expire quickly on the over-world, some items simply do not work.
- Cohorts are incredibly stupidly built. Seriously. INCREDIBLY stupid. I cannot count the times I've tried to change their builds, but somehow the game ignores the changes I make. They are still interesting, but they're more of a handicap than an effective party most often. (The druid is an exception. That guy is illegally good.)
- Using the trading system well renders money a non-issue after a while. Seriously, there is no way to spend the outrageous amount of cash you can rake in by setting up a good trade network.
- Obvious villain is obvious. Want to recognize potential Yuanti? Search out someone with suspiciously sibilant syllables.

[Tavar]

Well, if you don't allow the stealing she's gonna berate you and you'll lose loyalty points with her. So still annoying.

Being a thief is one thing, being a short-sighted, kleptomaniac moron is another.

Actually, can you be any more specific about when this happened? I honestly don't remember something like this. The closest thing I can remember was the mission in the docks regarding weapon smuggling, which has a bit different context.

Also, people keep using the word Kleptomaniac. I don't think it means what you think it means...

[Weiser_Cain]

I try out character builds in nwn2 all the time, that said, it made me not like Obsidian.

It was just nwn with a 'meh' graphics upgrade but with fewer armor parts that the first game, and fewer possible levels and I think fewer class combination possibilities.

[Tengu_temp]

Actually, can you be any more specific about when this happened? I honestly don't remember something like this. The closest thing I can remember was the mission in the docks regarding weapon smuggling, which has a bit different context.

Wish I could, but it's been ages since I played this game and I don't remember such details anymore. Only my dislike of Neeshka (and most other characters in that campaign) remains.

[Flickerdart]

I found whoever populated the party to have a very poor understanding of how 3.5 works.

Neeshka is rubbish against all of the crit-immune enemies which make up something like 50% of everything in the game, including the large area full of undead you find right after meeting her. Khelgar rocks faces until he becomes a Monk and sucks as a reward for a quest series. Elanee has a crap companion and adopts crap shapes whenever she has a chance. Paladins lose their horse and get nothing back. You get the cleric so late in the game that it doesn't matter, so you have to sit and spam the 5-second Rest after fights to heal.

[Closet_Skeleton]

Also, people keep using the word Kleptomaniac. I don't think it means what you think it means...

How so?

Kleptomania means an irrational impulse to steal. How is someone who steals stuff no matter the situation not a kleptomaniac?

Its a pretty simple concept, its not like anyone was saying Schizophrenia when they meant DID.

[Morty]

Neeshka is rubbish against all of the crit-immune enemies which make up something like 50% of everything in the game, including the large area full of undead you find right after meeting her.

It's even worse if you play a rogue yourself. The endgame is basically a gigantic 'SCREW YOU' sign to all rogues.

[Marnath]

The rail-driven plot and terrible controls I handled. The part I really hated is that all of the companions are mandatory. You simply must stand there and listen to the gnome tell idiotic stories from sun-up to sun-down, and you can be reluctant to bring him. But eventually you get to a dialogue screen with four options, and they're all a version of "Yes you can come." :smallfurious:

No matter how vigilantly LG you are or how awesome your soldiers are, you cannot send Bishop away and he betrays you no matter how ludicrous it is to expect him to be allowed near the gate mechanism. I had, I think, 650 LG soldiers at my command and this guy I would have never allowed to stay in my keep cuts the chain. NO. That did not happen.

[Tavar]

How so?

Kleptomania means an irrational impulse to steal. How is someone who steals stuff no matter the situation not a kleptomaniac?

Its a pretty simple concept, its not like anyone was saying Schizophrenia when they meant DID.
Because she doesn't actually steal stuff. She suggests it, but it isn't due to poor impulse control, it's due to a different outlook. I mean, lets say it was a NPC asking you to guard a wagon. For her, this would be work without reward(monetary or not), because no one is going to trust her anyways. Similarly, when she suggests taking the weapons from the shipment you are trying to confiscate for the guards, it's because she knows she would never be on their good side, it would be easy to hide the weapons gained, and it would be a direct boon for the party.

[Tengu_temp]

I wonder do people distrust Neeshka because she's a tiefling, or because she's a horrible oldschool AD&D thief stereotype.


You get the cleric so late in the game that it doesn't matter, so you have to sit and spam the 5-second Rest after fights to heal.

Actually, this one might've been on purpose. It's the game telling the player "hey look, clerics are not the only class with healing spells".

[Calemyr]

Actually, this one might've been on purpose. It's the game telling the player "hey look, clerics are not the only class with healing spells".

True. You get a druid very early on, who was my primary healer when I played.

[Eldariel]

Actually, this one might've been on purpose. It's the game telling the player "hey look, clerics are not the only class with healing spells".

You gotta play the whole early game without anyone capable of healing unless you're one yourself tho; first two companions being Fighter and Rogue, respectively. You only get Elanee when you're leave Merdelain.

And while the game does support creation of CLW Wands, actually getting those requires the feat and the spell so it's not much of an option early on. This makes actually playing through the game without abusing the ridiculous resting rules fairly challenging (well, mostly the early game - I even had trouble on a Druid even tho Druid is a healer and does a superb job soloing).

[Psyren]

You gotta play the whole early game without anyone capable of healing unless you're one yourself tho; first two companions being Fighter and Rogue, respectively. You only get Elanee when you're leave Merdelain.

This isn't so weird when you think about it though. Consider DA:O - if you're not a mage or don't grab Heal, you have a pretty long stretch before you can go recruit Wynne.

I'd say its less about the game saying "Other healing classes exist" and more about it saying "Hey you! Yes you! Go buy potions!"

[warty goblin]

This isn't so weird when you think about it though. Consider DA:O - if you're not a mage or don't grab Heal, you have a pretty long stretch before you can go recruit Wynne.

I'd say its less about the game saying "Other healing classes exist" and more about it saying "Hey you! Yes you! Go buy potions!"

Has there been more than three occasions in the history of cRPGs where health potions have crossed the border into 'interesting mechanic?'

[Hyena]

Never needed healing in game. HP don't matter, when you are untouchable.

[Eldariel]

This isn't so weird when you think about it though. Consider DA:O - if you're not a mage or don't grab Heal, you have a pretty long stretch before you can go recruit Wynne.

I'd say its less about the game saying "Other healing classes exist" and more about it saying "Hey you! Yes you! Go buy potions!"

IIRC, it's not that easy in NWN2. At least from what I remember, potions weren't terribly efficient at counteracting the damage you're taking and I ran out by the end of the bandit camp. I guess the game kinda just assumed you rest after every mini skirmish in the middle of an enemy camp/cave/whatever. Of course, the game also basically has completely static enemies, so I guess the game just assumes the player to want zero verisimilitude. Because that makes for a good RPG.

[Psyren]

Has there been more than three occasions in the history of cRPGs where health potions have crossed the border into 'interesting mechanic?'

They're not, but few healing spells are interesting either. The interesting part comes when you pull a last minute save or frantically rattle off a series of single-target heals to get a group back up to snuff after a big hit, and both methods can accomplish that.

After decades of RPG innovation, the biggest change we've gotten to healing is putting a cooldown on it in some games. That's not really the potions' fault though.


IIRC, it's not that easy in NWN2. At least from what I remember, potions weren't terribly efficient at counteracting the damage you're taking and I ran out by the end of the bandit camp. I guess the game kinda just assumed you rest after every mini skirmish in the middle of an enemy camp/cave/whatever. Of course, the game also basically has completely static enemies, so I guess the game just assumes the player to want zero verisimilitude. Because that makes for a good RPG.

You want shattered verisimilitude, try DA2 :smalltongue: I'm finally getting around to beating it and man, I had to basically amputate my suspension of disbelief for this one. We heal to full after every single combat... templars stare me full in the face with my obviously magic staff and mage robes with Anders and Merrill at my side and tell me to watch out for those dastardly apostates... we hold perfectly civil conversations with the townsfolk while covered in enough blood and gore to make a dragon queasy etc.

As for those mages selling robes and staffs outside the Circle, who exactly are they expecting to buy that stuff? I thought it was an elaborate trap at first."Mage says what?" "What?" "Get him!"

[Tavar]

I wonder do people distrust Neeshka because she's a tiefling, or because she's a horrible oldschool AD&D thief stereotype.
There are several mentions ti how untrustworthy she is from people who have no idea who she is. Hell, the first time you meet her she's being attacked because of her race. Her backstory too mentions that everyone is suspicious of her. Hell, she is shocked that you stAnd up for her. She doesn't trust people, and for seemingly a good reason.


Has there been more than three occasions in the history of cRPGs where health potions have crossed the border into 'interesting mechanic?'
Are there that many? The closest instance I can think of would be Path of exile, which is a arpg, in which potions recharge as you kill stuff.

[warty goblin]

Are there that many? The closest instance I can think of would be Path of exile, which is a arpg, in which potions recharge as you kill stuff.
I rather liked health potions in the Witcher, which could be drunk in the middle of a fight, only increased health regen, and took rather a lot of time to chug down. Which is to say it was a real tactical choice, as opposed to just smashing the spacebar as soon as the hitpoints got down below 25%.

The other two options I left open are for games I've forgotten about, and games I haven't played. Insurance, ya'know.

[Eldariel]

I rather liked health potions in the Witcher, which could be drunk in the middle of a fight, only increased health regen, and took rather a lot of time to chug down. Which is to say it was a real tactical choice, as opposed to just smashing the spacebar as soon as the hitpoints got down below 25%.

Not to mention it all worked with the toxicity-system of the game which limited the amount of potions you could have on you at any point or they'd adversely affect your combat ability (and eventually kill you).

[Closet_Skeleton]

I rather liked health potions in the Witcher, which could be drunk in the middle of a fight, only increased health regen, and took rather a lot of time to chug down. Which is to say it was a real tactical choice, as opposed to just smashing the spacebar as soon as the hitpoints got down below 25%.

The Witcher does have potions that just heal some health rather than give regen, you just get them later and if you drink four in a row you die anyway unless you take another potion that cancels out all your buffs.

Good job you also have an invincibility spell that doesn't let you attack or move but does allow potion drinking.

A lot of games have a distinction between healing and regeneration potions. Potions just tend to be kind of dull.

[Eldariel]

The Witcher does have potions that just heal some health rather than give regen, you just get them later and if you drink four in a row you die anyway unless you take another potion that cancels out all your buffs.

Even just drinking two of them puts you in the toxic zone, especially if you're using any other potions and that hampers your combat ability quite significantly; while possible to use, they're not really practical as the advantages of actual combat potions tend to outweigh the advantages the instant heal provides (though one as a backup that you might use as a last resort is not a bad idea).

[Tavar]

I rather liked health potions in the Witcher, which could be drunk in the middle of a fight, only increased health regen, and took rather a lot of time to chug down. Which is to say it was a real tactical choice, as opposed to just smashing the spacebar as soon as the hitpoints got down below 25%.

The other two options I left open are for games I've forgotten about, and games I haven't played. Insurance, ya'know.
Same deal with PoE fir the most part. Potions give health over time, though there are types that essentially give health instantly, but those usually give much less health overall and/or have fewer charges.

[bobthe6th]

I mean on the basis of resting constantly... as a caster in NWN I had to rest as often as possible, just to keep in spells.

Also the one thing I like about NWN2 is that you control the party... makes a caster minion worth something. In NWN a caster minion would cast at odd times or just try to stab people.

[Morty]

Yes, now I remember the problems with healing in NWN2. The healing and HP system in D&D 3e is terrible enough on its own, and when you add to it a completely different pacing and lack of a cleric through most of a game, we end up with fun times.

As for healing potions, I can't remember any games in which they'd be remotely interesting other than Witcher and Path of Exile. Of Orcs and Men deserves mention because the designers were brave enough to completely remove them, much like in the Witcher. And the game is much better for it.

[Kesnit]

I was going to post a rebuttal to a lot of people's complaints about the game. Then I realized that most of the fixes are because of mods.

I will take everyone's word that he default AI is bad. It's been so long since I played without TonyK's AI (http://nwvault.ign.com/View.php?view=NWN2HakpaksOriginal.Detail&id=141) fix that I don't remember! I think that mod also allows round-by-round pausing, to give a more turn-based feel to combat. Although to the credit of NWN2, apparently NWN1 had crappy AI at first.

There are multiple mods out there that allow players to multi-class the NPC's. Also, you can use the console (no mod required) to remove all their XP, then give it back and level them up the way you want.

I know nothing about PW's, since I didn't play on them for either NWN1 or 2.

The Spirit Eater mechanic was horrid, and is a major reason why I have never gotten around to finishing MotB, even though I have started it many times - even using console commands to adjust hunger levels. The alignment shifts were patched out.

I have no interest in SoZ and only bought it because I knew mods I used would eventually require it.

[Psyren]

That's another reason NWN2 is worth picking up again - because the GoG version includes all the patches/add-ons built in, has been standardized for everyone and has an up-to-date community on their forums, getting mods that work with it is a lot easier than it was before when some people were running the incomplete version or running MotB without SoZ etc.

If you didn't get it during the sales though you missed out.

[Eldariel]

I mean on the basis of resting constantly... as a caster in NWN I had to rest as often as possible, just to keep in spells.

Well, that comes down to spell-efficient play and resting when it is possible. NWN2 more or less expects you to rest at all the times when it should, by all rights, be completely impossible (to the tune of: "Hey, that room next to us is full of thieves; let's sleep here and restore our spells & health, maybe they won't notice!" - and to the infinite chagrin of every player ever, the enemy will invariably fail to give a single **** or move significantly)

[Psyren]

Well, it's not like the game is forcing you to rest - you can ramp up the difficulty by clearing an entire dungeon with no breather if you want, or even allow yourself just one rest halfway through (pretend you're in a rope trick.)

[Eldariel]

Well, it's not like the game is forcing you to rest - you can ramp up the difficulty by clearing an entire dungeon with no breather if you want, or even allow yourself just one rest halfway through (pretend you're in a rope trick.)

Yeah, I did that. Like I said tho, the start of the game was basically impossible, even with a Druid. Once I got to midgame and got multiple casters it became manageable but early game I think I had to rest few times in the middle of a dungeon.

[Closet_Skeleton]

Regards to constantly resting, my brother used to play Baldur's Gate that way anyway, much to my pain whenever I watched him. But I couldn't really complain since he owned it so I could only play it if he let me.

The sense that characters might ever get exhausted is sadly lacking from a lot of media recently, not just games.


I mean on the basis of resting constantly... as a caster in NWN I had to rest as often as possible, just to keep in spells.


The balance is shot to hell if you can use your highest level spells every fight, but on the other hand there are so many more encounters they cut your XP from them to compensate so keeping with the PNP amount of spell slots was probably a mistake.


Although to the credit of NWN2, apparently NWN1 had crappy AI at first.

NWN was a multiplayer game, it didn't need AI companions and really limited your ability to have them.

[tyckspoon]

The balance is shot to hell if you can use your highest level spells every fight, but on the other hand there are so many more encounters they cut your XP from them to compensate so keeping with the PNP amount of spell slots was probably a mistake.


Most of those encounters are significantly under-level, and can pretty easily be handled by loading your party with melee-types and just letting them loose. The AI can handle 'run up to things and beat them with sticks' fairly well and only sometimes needs to be prodded to make sure they're all beating up the same target.

(The death-cult Monk in NWN1 was my favorite companion for that reason. All the other AI allies had some special abilities they would insist on blowing at the first opportunity and then were nigh-useless afterword.. little murderous monk, tho? Just runs around beating the crap out of everything in his path. No problems.)

[Morty]

On the other hand, as a low-level caster you're going to need to rest very often unless you want to run around with no spells. I remember that playing a wizard in NWN1 involved letting my henchmen, familiar and summoned animals do all the heavy lifting quite often. NWN2 isn't quite as bad, due to having a full party. Still, both games show that the 3e D&D spell system does not fare well when taken out of its context.

[Eldariel]

On the other hand, as a low-level caster you're going to need to rest very often unless you want to run around with no spells. I remember that playing a wizard in NWN1 involved letting my henchmen, familiar and summoned animals do all the heavy lifting quite often. NWN2 isn't quite as bad, due to having a full party. Still, both games show that the 3e D&D spell system does not fare well when taken out of its context.

Idk, I find it works quite well but you just must be prepared for the eternal D&D wisdom of "don't use spells unless absolutely necessary".

[Aotrs Commander]

Idk, I find it works quite well but you just must be prepared for the eternal D&D wisdom of "don't use spells unless absolutely necessary".

On the other hand, 95% of the whole entire point of playing a wizard in a visual-based medium like NWN/NWN2 is to see the shiny, shiny spell effects...!

[warty goblin]

On the other hand, 95% of the whole entire point of playing a wizard in a visual-based medium like NWN/NWN2 is to see the shiny, shiny spell effects...!

Which are inevitably hidden somewhere beneath NWN 2's sixty billion tiny spell icons.

[Eldariel]

On the other hand, 95% of the whole entire point of playing a wizard in a visual-based medium like NWN/NWN2 is to see the shiny, shiny spell effects...!

Myst: Neverwinter Nights?

[warty goblin]

Myst: Neverwinter Nights?

I've always thought a fusion of RPG and adventure game could be fun. Removing 80% of the combat should trim out most of the unnecessary filler fights, and leave room for interesting puzzles requiring clever use of magic to overcome. It would also allow for a spell list more interesting than the damage spell with a red particle effect, the damage spell with a blue particle effect, and the enormous list of boring but mandatory buffing spells you have to pause every three minutes to recast.

[Zubrowka74]

To this game's defense, it is the only one to my knowledge that implemented 3.x rules as thouroughly as it did. ToEE has nice, turn-based mechanics but caps at 10th level without any PrCs and limited options. Likewise, DDO doesn't have everything. Neverwinter is 4e. The older games (Baldur's gate et al, even last year's "Enhanced edition") are 2e.

I think the whole soundscape, including NPC speech, is what made it better than games like ES: Obliveon. While the party members didn't have stellar backstories, I think it was the character development that got me.

Too bad about the crappy online gameplay. I really really enjoyed that with NWN1.

[warty goblin]

To this game's defense, it is the only one to my knowledge that implemented 3.x rules as thouroughly as it did. ToEE has nice, turn-based mechanics but caps at 10th level without any PrCs and limited options. Likewise, DDO doesn't have everything. Neverwinter is 4e. The older games (Baldur's gate et al, even last year's "Enhanced edition") are 2e.


I think the more pertinent question is whether 3.5 rules make for a particularly good videogame in the first place. So far as I can tell, they don't. At least in my experience, videogames work well with relatively smaller numbers of more distinct abilities, not gobs of highly similar ones. Too many damn buttons.

[Ailurus]

I think the more pertinent question is whether 3.5 rules make for a particularly good videogame in the first place. So far as I can tell, they don't. At least in my experience, videogames work well with relatively smaller numbers of more distinct abilities, not gobs of highly similar ones. Too many damn buttons.

I agree with you that 3.5e rules aren't a great starting point for video game design. However, NWN2 was pretty clearly marketed as being built on 3.5e rules. And, they did cut out a LOT of spells, abilities, feats, minor rules, etc. in the name of simplicity, which actually did catch them a good amount of flak from people who complained about the changes.

Just look at Kaedrin's PRC pack (http://nwn2customcontent.wikidot.com/) which adds "3 base classes, 46 prestige classes, 123 spells, 93 feats, and 13 domains" alone. While simplicity in game design is good, when you base a game on something like 3.5e and its dozens of splatbooks, most people prefer more options, not less.

[Zubrowka74]

Even without the mods, between the base game and the official expansions, you have a number of class/Prcs I have not seen elsewhere.

[Ailurus]

Even without the mods, between the base game and the official expansions, you have a number of class/Prcs I have not seen elsewhere.

Everything in base NWN2 (with the exception of the 2 plot PRCs [Neverwinter 9 and Shadowthief]) were from either Core or the Complete series. Mask of the Betrayer, Arcane Scholar was a custom PRC (as far as I know) but everything else was Core or Completes. Storm of Zehir, Doomguide was a conversion from 3.0, Hellfire Warlock was from one of the Fiendish codices, everything else was from Core or the Completes.

So, something like 85-90% of the classes and PRCs came from 4 books (maybe 5 - don't think they used Complete Adventurer, but I'm not 100% sure). Compare to the 80+ splatbooks and countless amounts of homebrew used in 3.5.

[Zubrowka74]

Everything in base NWN2 (with the exception of the 2 plot PRCs [Neverwinter 9 and Shadowthief]) were from either Core or the Complete series. Mask of the Betrayer, Arcane Scholar was a custom PRC (as far as I know) but everything else was Core or Completes. Storm of Zehir, Doomguide was a conversion from 3.0, Hellfire Warlock was from one of the Fiendish codices, everything else was from Core or the Completes.

So, something like 85-90% of the classes and PRCs came from 4 books (maybe 5 - don't think they used Complete Adventurer, but I'm not 100% sure). Compare to the 80+ splatbooks and countless amounts of homebrew used in 3.5.

Like I said, without the mods. Kaedrin's adds a lot of stuff.

EDIT: I've even seen mentioned a ToB mod somewhere.

[Eldariel]

Like I said, without the mods. Kaedrin's adds a lot of stuff.

EDIT: I've even seen mentioned a ToB mod somewhere.

Buggy as hell. Want it done right, play NWN1 (same goes for basically everything else; NWN1 engine is just infinitely superior to NWN2).


I've always thought a fusion of RPG and adventure game could be fun. Removing 80% of the combat should trim out most of the unnecessary filler fights, and leave room for interesting puzzles requiring clever use of magic to overcome. It would also allow for a spell list more interesting than the damage spell with a red particle effect, the damage spell with a blue particle effect, and the enormous list of boring but mandatory buffing spells you have to pause every three minutes to recast.

Myst is hardly more than a movie with minimal interaction TBH. But yeah, I feel an RPG with less combat and more everything else (especially puzzles) could certainly have a market, especially if it were a bit more dynamic.

Honestly though, what I'd want the most out of the genre is another Baldur's Gate-quality anything but I guess that hasn't really happened before or since.

[Closet_Skeleton]

Honestly though, what I'd want the most out of the genre is another Baldur's Gate-quality anything but I guess that hasn't really happened before or since.

The only Bioware games I compare favourably to Baldur's Gate 2 are Mass Effect and Jade Empire. Not because they're in any way as good (absolutely non in JE's case), but because they're different enough to be harder to compare. NWN was a big departure in a lot of ways from Baldur's Gate but just not enough to escape the 'dumbed down' comparisons, to use an incorrect term (I'm sleepy, sorry).

The commander's quarters scene at the end of the Shadowbroker DLC is the only time I'd say that Mass Effect was definitively better than anything in Baldur's Gate. Pity having T'soni for 1 scene in ME2 turned out to be a lot more interesting than having her for the whole of ME3.

[Weiser_Cain]

What I want is a game that isn't all about combat, where the companions are really interesting and deep, the npcs shouldn't be slouches either.

Just give us two fully realized cities and some small hamlets at the edge of two kingdoms in conflict and let us loose to explore and dungeon crawl and make friends and enemies.

It could be half the size of skyrim and it'd still be a masterpiece.

...of course it wouldn't have to be dnd next whatever that is, it could be for Pathfinder.

[Tavar]

Even without the mods, between the base game and the official expansions, you have a number of class/Prcs I have not seen elsewhere.

The main issue is that several of those are false choices, or are barely different than other classes. If you have a thousand classes, but they all play exactly the same, then you can't really claim the variety that the number would imply. NWN 2 isn't that bad, but it doesn't feel too far off.

[Choyrt]

My issue that honestly stopped me dead in my tracks was the clunky UI and terrible performance. The story compelled me, but the game's faults wore me thin.

I do need to revisit it if the addons fixed the UI issues.

[Starbuck_II]

I agree with you that 3.5e rules aren't a great starting point for video game design. However, NWN2 was pretty clearly marketed as being built on 3.5e rules. And, they did cut out a LOT of spells, abilities, feats, minor rules, etc. in the name of simplicity, which actually did catch them a good amount of flak from people who complained about the changes.

Just look at Kaedrin's PRC pack (http://nwn2customcontent.wikidot.com/) which adds "3 base classes, 46 prestige classes, 123 spells, 93 feats, and 13 domains" alone. While simplicity in game design is good, when you base a game on something like 3.5e and its dozens of splatbooks, most people prefer more options, not less.

Scout uses sneak attack ability not Skirmish.
Ninja gets invisibility for 3 rd instead of improved invisibility for 1 rd (which is a nerf when you TWF or get more than 1 attk/rd).

But Hexblade was improved.

[Provengreil]

Didn't read the whole thread, but my personal opinion on why people might hate comes from 5 points:

1. Horrible optimization. it doesn't look THAT good: what's going on behind the screen to slow things down or wreck my computer like that?
2. The endless first act probably has something to do about it. Wave after wave after stupid, unreasonably tough wave of thieves that know exactly who you are, and voluntarily attack you anyway. then you go clean out 2 orc stronghold, then its right back to the houses without any recognition. it just got so dumb.
3. Sections felt unfinished. Not just the ending itself, but character development arcs, even some of the sidequests, just wasn't very well polished.
4. Loot was not enough to equip an 11 person party.
5. Go through 4 loading screens just to change party members? why?

2 and 3 were solved on the expansions, and 4 is heavily campaign dependent, but these were the worst parts to me.

[Weiser_Cain]

Here's one I forgot about, each expansion pretty much starts you over. Your companions are gone, your place in the world gone.