Pathfinder: Kingmaker - Enhanced Edition Feature Overview, Open Beta Available
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The new and improved Enhanced Edition of Owlcat Games' Pathfinder: Kingmaker will be going live in early June. And if you're interested in all the new content and features the Enhanced Edition will introduce to this already massive cRPG, you can now check out this developers' diary on Steam. Have a look:
Dear Pathfinders! We decided to revive the beautiful Dev Diary genre, which means that something really big and cool is coming! And you already know perfectly well what it is – in the nearest future we will release the epic Enhanced Edition of “Pathfinder: Kingmaker”. Numerous features shall be added to the game, which we’ve been working on during the last months. Yes, that’s right – while you’re sleeping, the devs are not only fixing bugs and making DLCs, but also carefully gathering all your feedback (both that which you left during the surveys, and also from all the forums, threads, comment sections and boards). We’ve been everywhere, trying to learn what we need to do so that PF: KM may become even better for you. We’ve analyzed all the feedback and added everything we could. Now, in these Diaries, we are going to tell you what we came up with. So, let’s jump right into it!
Hack of all trades
Sometimes, you just can’t decide whether you want a character who is good at dealing with traps, or if you want a good damage dealer.
And in some cases, even if you choose to go down the damage route, you can’t decide if you want to wield a bow, two daggers or a two-handed axe.
Well, there is an answer to all this: the Slayer.
The slayer takes lots of skill points, sneak attack and talents of a rogue, battle capabilities of a ranger, adds his own unique abilities, all to become one of the best martial universalists in Pathfinder.
His unique ability, Study Target, allows him to spend some time to study the enemy, learning his weak points, and make more effective attacks against the target. If you don’t want to spend time - that’s okay, as the first time you deal sneak attack damage to the target, you study it automatically. Easy, right?
All of these features make him a great asset for dealing with enemies of all types (including the mechanical ones), but sometimes you want something a bit different.
His archetypes change some of the abilities to give you different flavored opportunities.
The Vanguard is a master of tactics who can share his own battle prowess with his teammates, allowing them to use his teamwork feats.
The Deliverer is the slayer in service of a God who excels at eliminating heretics while refusing to die in the process.
The Spawn Slayer is the best choice for killing big enemies - the bigger, the better.
So, pick a slayer, and he’ll overcome any hurdle you meet on your journey!
At least, while it doesn’t require fancy magic...
Become a Swordlord
You can't hide an awl in a sack, especially if your awl is a sword. As you may already know, we are introducing a new prestige class to the game, one that just should be here – the Swordlord. This class seems like the most logical choice for the game, as the Swordlords have an active role in the main plot. It’s the Swordlords’ leader Jamandi Aldori’s mansion where the prologue of the game takes place. And after that, the Aldori Swordlords act as one of the main political forces and a neighbor of your newly established barony, which you should reckon with. The Aldori Swordlords is a society of the strongest warriors, who dedicated themselves to the mastering the art of the sword. What makes this class special?
The prestige class has four main mechanical features. Firstly, a Swordlord specializes in fighting with a dueling sword held in one hand while the other remains free. This combat style grants him an opportunity to add 1,5 Dexterity bonus to damage just like a strong character adds 1,5 Strength bonus to damage with two-handed weapons. This is huge, as there are nearly no other ways to get such a feature.
The second feature is the skillful intimidation. When a Swordlord makes a critical hit or performs some combat maneuvers, he or she can demoralize the opponent, not requiring any extra action for that. This intimidation is much more potent than a usual one. Also, it negates some of the opponent's bonuses (for example, Morale bonuses).
The third feature – when an opponent makes a successful attack, a Swordlord can adapt to the opponent’s combat style and receive a bonus to the AC by making a successful perception roll.
Last but not least, the Swordlords are better at defending. Using a dueling sword, they can reduce the damage from a critical hit to that of a normal one. Also, they get less penalties for Fighting Defensively and Combat Expertise.
Off With the Hat!
We know that not all of you liked the basic class outfits. Some don’t want their character to be carrying their backpack permanently, the others don’t like how the Inquisitor’s hat looks. There have already been mods made by independent authors that allow players to hide some parts of the outfit, but actually the task is more tricky than it seems. The truth is that the game initially didn’t include such an opportunity at the deep technical level.This means that implementing such a function could lead to some unexpected bugs and unpleasant breakage of the characters’ visual appearance, so we needed some time to make everything properly. Now this option will be available in the game officially, so that you may turn off some of the visual elements to make your character look the way you want him or her to look.
Gotta Catch ‘em All
One of the important aspects of the game that adds color and opens up the world for the player is the Storyteller and his tales. This is one of those features that may be more interesting to players who prefer the lore to the fights. However, the difficulty is that in order to listen to one of his stories, you first need to bring the wise old elf all the pieces of the ancient artifact in question. You can also keep some of the restored artifacts for yourself, to get some advantages and bonuses for your adventure. The pieces can be lying literally anywhere, and far too many players found it too difficult to collect them all. We decided to make the goal a bit more reachable. Now, while searching for the required fragments you won’t need to try to remember everything or write things down on a piece of paper. From now on, you will be able to see the name of the location where the item was found right in that item’s description tooltip. Moreover, this feature will be added to all the items, so, if need be, you would always be able to look where the item was found or which vendor sold it to you.
The Teamwork
In Enhanced Edition, you will also find some new useful interface elements, which may help you plan and balance your party during level up. If you are one of those players who take builds seriously, carefully distribute the points and spend time to maintain your party, you will definitely like this addition. Now, while picking up new skills, spells or features during level up, you will always see a tooltip, which would give you a hint on which team members already have this skill, spell, common or team feature. Previously, you needed to remember all this, search the spellbook, and now this information would just pop-up before your eyes.
Unexpected Doomsday
Don’t you forget your companions! If you won’t address their quests and needs for too long a time, they could just be offended. Or it would be simply too late to solve the problem.
New reminders for the companion quests that can be failed soon would be added to the game. This function was already presented for the main quests, to remind the player about serious issues, that need your immediate attention. Now you will also see how your companions’ mood, whose quests you are ignoring, is going down. The reminder will come to you as a kingdom event which happens when just a third of the time given to complete the quest is left. If it popped up – means it’s time to hurry up! Don’t neglect them, for the failure of a companion quest can affect the whole story. By the way, just as in a real life, the quest starts when a companion comes to you with a problem (a relevant kingdom event), not when you pick the quest.
We shall also add new, more transparent reminders for the main quests’ timers. Two months before the failure of the main quest you will see a countdown in your journal, with a message that will clearly tell you that the time is running out.
We hope this will make the game more comfortable to play, and now you won’t miss any important events.
What Will Tomorrow Bring?
In this Diary we’ve only started to introduce you to new and interesting features, which you waited for, which you asked for and which, as we hope, will make the game more comfortable and more fun. But this is far from everything we’ve got! Soon we will start an open beta, so you will be able to try out some of the new features and options. More tasty features are to come, so wait for more new diaries and please tell us in comments – which features are you expecting?
Yours faithfully,
Owlcats.
And if that sounds like something up your alley, and you're interested in helping the developers test the new features, you can also participate in an open beta for the Enhanced Edition. Here's the first part of the preliminary changelog. And here's the second part.
