NWN2: Irritating features of NWN2, general

The cut scene The most irritating feature of NWN2 is the cut-scene, several of which have pretensions toward grandiosity. The point is that a cut-scene should not begin before the player arrives within the detection range possessed by the opponent. A logical strategy is to send scouts to determine enemy strength and disposition before committing the bulk of the forces. In NWN 2, in certain encounters, the mere presence of the scout in an area moves all members of the party into the area, setting off the clash. This happens even if the members are invisible, and invisibility spells are even stripped off in at least some cases.

Unintelligent spellcasting AI. The artificial intelligence has not yet figured out to check whether a character has had a certain protective spell cast on it before proceeding to cast it again. So, even though Qara is hasted, she will cast haste again, wasting precious time.  The player should be able to give the AI basic instructions on how to handle a battle, e.g., “beware of physical and elemental damage.” In the battle in the King of Shadows’s Palace, an experiment was done with Ammon. He was led into the first chamber and instructed to attack the enemy in overkill spellcasting mode. He repeatedly used Devour Magic, learning nothing from the fact that it had no effect. He cycled back and forth between Retributive Invisibility, Devour Magic and Eldritch Blast to destroy the Skeletal Archers and Dread Wraiths. He did refrain from using other spells available to him that might have healed rather than harmed injured shadow creatures.

Overkill in number of rooms. It gets so booooring!  In the NWN trilogy, one could skip certain rooms if they seemed to be unimportant to the main quest, then return when the player was more experienced to reap the treasure. In most parts of NWN2, however, it’s necessary to eliminate all opponents in an area to guard against a surprise attack by countless opponents. This requirement may arise because some companions, especially Khelgar, have such poor Hide skills that any combat draws everyone in the area, but the result is the same. In fact, only Bishop and Neeshka have adequate Hide skills for simple movement, and neither is a strong enough fighter to get one through a serious attack.

Overkill in surprise attacks. There are two places in the game in which surprise attacks are a serious nuisance. The first is in trying to exit the orc tunnels and the second is in the palace of the King of Shadows. In the former, orcs appear from nowhere, and for no apparent reason. In the latter, even after one has cleared a room, if one tries to rest, one may be attacked at least as many as five times. This just gets tedious. Indeed, the final scene is a gluttony of overkill, as the player is forced to kill some companions, some blade golems, Garius, and the King of Shadows—three times.

Spell stripping. Granted, spells have lifetimes. But the number of spells that are stripped at a cut scene is alarming. Haste cast from the short Sword of Quickness, which seems to have an anomalously long lifetime, seems to survive, as do other long-acting spells. But often medium term spells are stripped upon walking through a door. The cut scene should count for two or three rounds, but not four hours. 

Spell contagion. Some spells jump from the player to other players. Haste cast from the Sword of Quickness, for example, is actually Mass Haste. Unfortunately, the contagion is unpredictable. Especially in scenes where there are ca. 10 associates, getting full coverage is difficult.

 Using traps. It’s predictable where in the game trap handling skills will be necessary. Therefore, it makes sense to have Neeshka develop high skills on handling traps (e.g., robbing a home, e.g., entering the lair of Ammon Jerro). If the player has some additional points to spare, he can use them for Search, the talent that identifies traps, while leaving the Disable Traps and Open Locks points to Neeshka. Unfortunately, high trap handling skills do not translate straightforwardly into skills for setting traps. While the player was able to recover most kinds of traps without incidence, Neeshka was unable to set even average traps with similar skill points. It ought to be easier to set a trap than to disable it.  Figuring out crafting.  Crafting is one of the great new features about this game. Unfortunately, it’s unbelievably complicated. It’s hard to grant crafting feats appropriately, since they require predicting what crafting recipes will be discovered. The instructions “any armor” don’t mean “any armor.” Name brand armors, like Rogue Links or Enkidu’s, are apparently immune to improvement by crafting.  It appears to be necessary to remove a weapon from the hand before poisoning it. A mace (or at least the Bone Phoenix) cannot be poisoned, even though it is both a bludgeoning and piercing weapon. Building the bridge in West Harbor is a crafting skill. All of these points are obtuse, not at all obvious to the gamer.  

Update, 6/28/07, suggested in part by Archonsg. Experience points. All players gain experience points whether they participate in the travels or not and independent of whether they get killed or not. This provides a disincentive to including all the companions in the journeys and especially to preventing companions from getting killed. Similarly, why are companions excluded from participating in defense of Crossroad Keep? This would be a logical activity for them while the player is traveling.

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