Pathfinder Wrath of the Righteous is the best CRPG ever
Pathfinder Wrath of the Righteous is the best CRPG ever
Got back into Wrath after completing Baldur's gate 3 and this absolutely slaps harder than BG3. The Pathfinder system is far superior to DnD 5E and the sheer scale of the story is incredible.
The Evil Lich path is the best Evil Path I've ever played. Dark Urge is like loony toons in front of how evil I can be as a Lich which is also the best Undead/Necromancer playthrough I've ever had in any game. And you can be even MORE evil in other Mythic Paths like Swarm.
The mythic paths is the best system in a CRPG ever. The game feels wildly different depending on your Mythic Path. I've not played all of them yet but the amount itself is very good.
The combat is very good. I still have no idea how it ultimately works and while I like the feeling of uncertainty and freshness, many people might not like it. It's definitely far more complicated than 5E. The sheer amounts of Classes, Subclasses and abilities is also unparalleled. The easy switch between Turn based and realtime combat is pretty good when fighting hordes of trash mobs. I prefer Turn based myself but Realtime is very useful time to time.
You can definitely make mistakes with character creation and it's also more 'difficult' to respec characters compared to BG3 since they can only be respecced from the level they met you at.
The story is amazing. Imo it's better than the story of Baldur's gate 3. The characters are not as developed as Origin Characters in BG3 however which is somewhat of a downside. Also there is no full VA so reading is required and the writing is pretty good imo so it won't bore you.
The game definitely has pacing problems at multiple points through out the story. Enemy padding also gets really really bad by the end.
If you liked Baldur's gate 3 or any other CRPG, play this because it's superior.
I would entirely agree with this if I wasn't playing Rogue Trader right now, and I think Owlcat have outdone themselves. I am enjoying RT more than even Wrath of the Righteous, which was already one of the best CRPGs I have played.
I enjoyed what I played of Rogue Trader, but ended up running into a bug that always froze the game during a certain boss fight, which basically killed my playthrough. This was awhile ago though, so Owlcat might have already patched it.
I hear you on that. I haven't had a crashing bug that stopped me completely, but I've never had a game crash as much as Rogue Trader does. But, in some way I almost appreciate that because it stops me from playing a bit. It's the type of game I could really get sucked into and the crash pulls me out and lets me to other things with my 'me' time of the day. But maybe it just shouldn't crash and I should have more self discipline haha
I love RT because the 40K lore is so good but combat is more fun in Wrath. The story is also more purposeful in Wrath compared to RT.
Definitely have to turn on fast animations for combat in RT because so many character's turns are just recasting buffs. Also I do miss the "real time" combat setting from Wrath when you knew you could just bulldoze something and didn't want to have to do a full turn based thing.
If only that wasn't based on pathfinder it would be best crpg ever. Well, incredible amount of bugs and severe lack of QoL in certain places also stink.
I am happy that, for the most part, the computer handles the Pathfinder crunch, but I agree it is a bit much. I even have GM'd Shadowrun tables for like a decade now and find Pathfinder to be too much crunch haha
Yeah but can you have your boobs and willy out
Next Pathfinder game's gonna have a very high bar to clear
I don't share the enthusiasm.
The worldbuilding of PF is better than that of D&D, which allows for writing that is somewhat better than usual, but the writing is still kind of trapped by stuff like the class and alignment systems. And, of course, there are some moments of ludonarrative dissonance.
Also, Wenduag romance makes no sense as most characters.
I do not have an in-depth familiarity with the lich plotline, but, from what I gather, it contains a mandatory moment of out-of-character stupidity on the part of the main character.The combat is on the D&D 3.5e chassis, and you don't get the freedom of, for example, shoving or picking up and throwing entities and things like what BG3 allows you to do. Your choices are largely concentrated in the decisions you make for your builds, and not in how you actually approach encounters.
On the other hand, WotR absolutely does offer a challenge over, say, BG3. It is a lot less trivial to get through the former than through the latter.
I also do like quite a few of the WotR companions more than BG3's Wyll and Halsin.I do agree that WotR does deserve consideration if one liked BG3, especially if one wants more depth and variety when it comes to builds.
I would also like to mention that I had more fun with Pillars of Eternity 2. I think it has much better writing than what D&D and PF games can offer in general, and I do like PoE2's focus on colonialism specifically. I also like PoE mechanics much more than D&D/PF mechanics.
Yeah I forgot to mention but BG3 has really good environmental reactivity. Your position and environment can be huge advantage/disadvantages in BG3 while it doesn't really matter as much in Wrath.
I also like PoE mechanics much more than D&D/PF mechanics.
PoE chanter is probably the best "bard" class I've seen in any CRPG.
The whole mechanic of cobbling together different chants from various in-universe myths was both a really fun spin on the class and an interesting way to introduce players to the cultures of the setting.
Gernisc Slew the Beast, but Soon Faced Its Kin
...And their screams reached The HeavensOh, But Knock Not on the Door of Urdel and Gurdel ...For They Do Enjoy Stomping Your Head
The Long Night's Drink Birthed the Revenge of Morning
Shatter Their Shackles, Cast off Their Chains ...The Prisoners Turned on Their Captors
Gernisc Slew the Beast, but Soon Faced Its Kin
...And their screams reached The HeavensOh, But Knock Not on the Door of Urdel and Gurdel ...For They Do Enjoy Stomping Your Head
The Long Night's Drink Birthed the Revenge of Morning
Shatter Their Shackles, Cast off Their Chains ...The Prisoners Turned on Their Captors
The Pathfinder system is far superior to DnD 5E and the sheer scale of the story is incredible.
Pathfinder really is the best form of D&D and it's not even close. I always thought 5e sucked but getting into Pathfinder made me realize exactly how much and in exactly what ways.
my partner and i only ever played up to 3.5 so i've always wanted to check out Pathfinder since it's basically 3.5 but better (or so i've heard)
There are too many cRPGs and too little time, ugh. WotR has been on my list for such a long time, working full-time has shrunk my play time immeasurably. I miss that about college, even if I can afford games better now.
Does it have co op?
Owlcat's follow-up, Rogue Trader, does have co-op. It's Warhammer rather than Pathfinder, so your mileage may vary on how that different setting hits you. But it has a lot of the same great writing.
Nope
Owlcat games slap in general. Kingmaker, WotR, and Rogue Trader were all fun as hell.
I used to play a lot of CRPGs, but after playing BG3 so much they all feel kinda lacklustre and janky in comparison. I wasn't that much of a fan of kingmaker, but I know a lot of people say this one's a lot better so I might try it out at some point. I'm a total nerd for trying out different builds, so all the class options and stuff definitely interest me.
Kingmaker was good, but WotR smooths over some of the rough edges (you can rotate the camera now!) and has a much more interesting setting and plotline than Kingmaker. Whereas Kingmaker felt like a couple of adventures slapped together with only the adventurer->baron->king advancement and that one fey spirit tying it together, WotR has everything go back into your crusade against the demons and advance on the Worldwound. Then there's the mythic path system which, as jackmarxist pointed out, make the plot feel much different between playthroughs.
I heard there's mods that you can use to automate your buff set-ups too, which sounds like a life-saver, because jesus christ i hate spending multiple minutes manually casting all my buffs on everyone before a fight.
I happened to make a mod for this ages ago: https://github.com/SleeplessOne1917/WOTRDamageBreakdown
Unfortunately, I don't think it works with the current version of the game. I really need to update it at some point.
I can't quite pin it down, but maybe the BG3 characters felt a bit "glossy" compared to Owlcat's? Or perhaps it's a side effect of voice acting making complex conversations drag, and lose a lot of the descriptive depth that text allows - not that they did a bad job of it!
I didn't really like any of the characters in WotR or BG3, but in WotR they felt more interesting - ah! Part of it was definitely that all the BG3 characters were like a parody of inappropriate backstories, "You would know me as Fuckslayer the Legendary Badass, Level 1", "I'm actually an Archmage, but I got knocked out in a cutscene and all my XP fell out of my pockets".
BG3 Origin Characters feel more like a bunch of people playing DnD. Pathfinder characters are more like real people in Golarion with actual experiences and you get different companions at different levels signifying this fact.
Although I definitely prefer Astarion over all characters in Wrath I just love him so much. Although I don't think a century old Vampire or a literal legendary Wizard or a Cleric of Shar should start at Level 1.
should start at Level 1
Or a noble scion runaway. Or a person with years of experience fighting in the Blood War.
On the other hand, the same applies to an experienced paladin, or experienced scouts/combatants of the people who have been forced to live in dangerous underground, or a noble scion with a history of serial killings, etc.
I think the BG3 companions and their storylines are extremely standard but are elevated to greatness by the visuals and amazing voice acting. In contrast, while having much lower production values, some WotR companions are about really interesting and fresh feeling themes, or at the very least are funny as hell. Some of them are dogshit, though.
Added to my wishlist to one day toss on my cRPG pile that I am amassing since every time I wanna play one I buy a new one and realize I suck at them all over again.
I don't think there's a single one of these games that I've played that I've not at some point turned to very easy and just breezed through the combat. There's just too much of it and all of it is just too clunky, too much inventory management, too much hot bar management.
Honestly I like the Demon a bit better for evilness, Lich is very good and thematic but that makes it a bit boring since you are locked into caster which again, makes thematic sense but I kind of would've liked a Dead Knight version as well, Demon has quite a bit going for it when you reach the abyss.
Swarm just sucks as a path the only one that's worse is japester (trickster).
As for the game itself I dislike stuff like the whole crusade mechanic that just adds more stuff to do which makes going for different mythic playthroughs painful it didn't need it and I'd prefer if they cut down on a lot of this stuff since the different mythic paths are excellent.
As for the game itself I dislike stuff like the whole crusade mechanic that just adds more stuff to do
Owlcat has the worst little subgame things lol. Fortunately, you can turn them off, but you miss out on some items
I also really disliked the crusade mechanic and was happy in Rogue Trader it was just the slightly annoying ship battles as the mini-game of choice. Not nearly as frustrating and a time sink and feels more connected to your character, since it's your character's ship, than just sending some troops around while your party does the real shit.
The trickster story might suck but those mythic powers fuckin rule.every caster gets completely normal spell metamagic and every martial gets improved improved improved critical improved. It's also a great on ramp onto legend path cause you can keep those abilities as long as you don't reapec.
I'm gonna be honest. I like PF2E more than DND 5e, but I like BG3 / Larian more than Owlcat games. Too many QoL things like complete respec, fully voiced cutscenes. Honestly probably BG3 being a bit more simple (and I'm playing a 5e campaign) helps a lot. I just don't have time to play games like I used to. Harder games are time sinks for me that I increasingly don't have. I know Owlcat games have insanely detailed difficulty adjustment systems.
I enjoyed BG3 for a while but I got too bored and tired of even more illithids to complete the game, especially after I read what there was left to do, which was pretty much 'OOPS! ALL ILLITHIDS!'.I don't care about Full VA but the reactivity of the world of BG3 is so good. The environments are also far superior.
I wish I could get into Wrath more. I've tried twice now and bounced off. I legit think I can't get into the characters enough due to them just being avatar pics and fairly undetailed map models. The ole Bioware cut scene style of BG3 likely kept me going there.
Then CRPGs are not really for you since most are like this. Even Disco Elysium is like this except that the map is far smaller and more detailed.
Probably true, don't get far in a lot of them. That's still an interesting example, because it doesn't bother me in DE (but I still have trouble getting far into it, I'm 99% sure it's because it has time management elements). I also couldn't think of the right words in my last comment, it was specifically character models. It could just be I find the character models incongruent in Wrath but not in Disco, or maybe something more broad? Less interesting characters (which is admittedly a high bar)? A lack of curiosity in anything going on in the Wrath setting?
I really liked the part of the Azata path where I found the demonic slave market and could free all the slaves (I figured fighting over it might get most of them killed, so paid for them), then the game was like "btw, wanna kill all those slavers?" And I killed the shit out of them and took all my money back.
Also being an inquisitor on the Azata path meant my entire party could share my teamwork feats, which was literally all of the teamwork feats.
I couldn't get into BG3 having played KM/WotR. I absolutely love experimenting with different builds and exploring all the quirks of the system, I never beat either of them because I love restarting with new character ideas. I actually didn't love the extra buffs you get in WotR because I enjoy the early/low power levels more. I also like some of the limitations of KM since I get a little overwhelmed with choices in WotR. Most of my time has actually been spent on KM's Tenebrous Depths DLC where I solo the random dungeon with permadeath to turn the game into a rougelike, which gives me the opportunity to try out so many builds.
I'm a pen-and-paper veteran, and the system is really interesting to me but generally in person I don't want to go crazy with rules exploits, so these games are really fun because I don't have to worry about that, and the system is full of weird quirks.
Both games are fantastic, and WotR definitely has some QoL improvements.
If you liked Baldur's gate 3 or any other CRPG, play this because it's superior.
I will, thank you
I didn’t realize Pathfinder put out video games. Does it actually use the Pathfinder system?
Oh yes. 1E, to be exact. There are some tweaks, but it's closer to RAW than BG3 is to D&D 5E RAW. This is a double edged sword, as PF 1E is insanely complex if you aren't really familiar with it, so while you can make some crazy powerful builds if you know what you're doing, it's also much easier to totally ruin your character than it is in BG3. The game will happily let you make absolutely terrible choices with basically no warning, and the first act in particular can be hard.
Wrath does not put you into insanely hard encounters though and you can generally get around everything with some planning. Kingmaker on the other hand does not give a fuck about you. My game got ruined during the encounter with the Tree Girl where my Wizard had to take on a ton of high level enemies alone and this was so early game that my Caster absolutely sucked and there was no way I could win this encounter with my build.
Wizards of the Coast are serial assholes that keep trying to force people to pay subscriptions and otherwise wring as much money out of them as possible, so I am pleased Paizo is doing well, including in CRPG treatments.
WotC's antics literally caused a falling out with Larian (Larian was also tired of the 5e system).
Definitely understandable.
I really wish WOTC would just fuck off into bankruptcy like TSR did; very similar asshole decisions from the very top, except with higher tech ways to rip people off.
My favorite memory of the two Pathfinder games, and I mean this unironically, is doing that infamous quest in Kingmaker right near the start where you have to fight swarms. Level 1 combat against enemies immune to weapon damage – you have to actually consider your options and possibly accept turning down the difficulty. That interplay of character options and enemy immunities is, in my opinion, the core gameplay of CRPGs.
Wrath is so fucking crunchy I love it, it took a long time to get used to its many systems but there is so much build variety and the voiced characters, while still limited imo by the flat tropes of fantasy, had some surprisingly good moments.
Bg3 does not allow me to make a Sensei Monk front liner who does not attack but stacks dodge ac while buffing the party with bard songs, bg3 does not allow a sneak attacking ray caster who snipes people with ice beams, bg3 does not allow for anything as interesting as the constitution-based Kineticist caster.
Also at the end of the day Wotr is FUCKING LONG, while that is intimidating it means that if it clicks with you, you have a seriously HUGE epic of a campaign to enjoy
I found it rather janky and just couldn't get into it despite really wanting another crpg to play. The camera controls and party movement just really felt awful for me. I'm also not super familiar with pathfinder and the last exposure I had with it I was playing Kingmaker which wasn't a bad game, but also I sorta didn't find it the most enjoyable thing. I bounced off WotR in the tutorial. Compared to BG3 where the combat encounters were still basic through the tutorial on the nautiloid they were peppered in enough for me to grow accustomed to the combat while also giving me space, in the start of WotR you're running down some caves with bugs attacking you every 50 feet or so and even then the combat felt like it had no weight. After the caves, the idea that there's a maze waiting for me and it's probably full of more lackluster combat encounters but it's also a maze just made me peace out.
It's not really a maze though since it's pretty straightforward. The real combat starts from the maze since you'll start facing actual variety of enemies from then instead of bugs.
Also Wrath is far better than Kingmaker. I never finished Kingmaker but Wrath gets better the more you play it especially when you start feeling the power trip from Act 3.
I enjoyed WotR, but didn’t finish it. I found it a bit repetitive, loads of trash fights and just overall longwinded. I was really enjoying the story and after quite a few hours of combat I found the actual gameplay a chore that just got in the way of enjoying more story! It doesn’t help that after finding the buffs and debuffs and strats that worked I found it very rinse and repeat. Not a particularly stimulating experience as by the end my main decision point was just deciding whether or not to break out some of the spicier spells abilities for this particular encounter or to save them for later. I feel like it should be more than that, as pathfinder has so much complexity, but the situational “frog based attack that does more damage to homesick enemies who are also dehydrated” spell is less useful than the “makes enemies take more fire damage”+”fireball” combo, and sure sometimes you find yourself in an area of enemies that are “immune to fire” and that’s annoying for the first encounter, but you just adjust your spells to “the same but with ice” and continue unaffected.
I was really enjoying WotR but sometime in the third act it started to feel like a bit of a slog and I haven't returned to it yet. I really didn't enjoy the homm style tactical battles and resource logistics management thing.
No, i liked it at first but i felt the party characters to be boring and uninteresting in a way that was supposed to be good but they tried too hard and result was opposite. This is dealbreaker to me in RPG so i didn't played very far.
I also don't like pathfinder.
