In the 14 hours since that post, I beat the game and got to the secret level at the end. The game isn't that short, but it is that good. Spoiler Holy crap.
I'm surprised; I thought for sure everyone here had played, or at least heard of this game. It's considered the best indie title ever made. Anyways, if you liked it, check out Spelunky, also a game with a tiny character exploring giant caves with an array of tools and weaponry, only this time based more on treasure and exploration, and less on arcade combat. And not Japanese.
Probably because I'm not very good at keeping my guys healed up, but I have struggled mightily with my non-mage character. I'm sure I'll play through again before the expansion hits, will probably try your first party set throughout.
There is one thing I should mention. During the especially difficult battles (i.e. any battle against a dragon), I found myself having to control Wynne to control the healing, while I let my other characters do their thing. Leilana usually stood back and used arrow skills that hinder movement and defense, while my main character and tank would get up close and beat the snot out of the enemy. Those are really the only times I had to control Wynne to control and keep up the healing, so I DO recommend that. Also keep in mind that if your tank CAN'T deal damage, it can cause problems with them keeping the enemy's attention. My recommendation is to build Alistair with all the shield skills, and focus on his strength and dexterity so that when he does hit, he can hit hard enough to keep the enemies focused on him. Avoid using skills that reduce threat to your tank. Meanwhile, build your main damage dealer so that they attack for less per hit, but attack significantly faster. This worked wonders with my Rogue, who I could work around to the back of people and backstab the bejesus out of them, while Alistair kept them focused in the other direction. Alistair would hit for a lot of damage, but he was significantly slower. Meanwhile, my Rogue would hit a guy 3 times in the time it took Alistair to hit him once, and do way more damage. I honestly think the only times I had problems where when my tank (be it Shale or Alistair) failed to keep the enemy's attention from the main damage dealer, who couldn't take the punishment. I have the distinct impression that when I do play through the game as a mage, I am going to have absolutely no problems destroying everyone. The general thinking seems to be that playing as a mage makes the game significantly easier.
As most of you have said about DA:O having the mage class is a ton easier. I restarted the game with a mage instead of a rogue and have pretty good success unless I'm fighting really spread out enemies (causing my area spells to be less effective), or a few really powerful one's (causing everyone to die within 2 minutes of the battle). I use the my main for the area and healing, Morrigran for direct magic and heals sometimes, a rogue for quick hits, and Alistair as my tank. Gotta get them more specialized in their class though to be good. I kinda want to do what D26 did with two rogues, a tank and a dedicated healer, see how that works out. Anyone know if you can respec your characters at any time during the game? Also, I picked up that blood magic skill during the fade scene with the kid, anyone have any experience with that?
For re-specializing your characters, you can't. Once you've spent skill and stat points, they are gone. That doesn't mean that you can't change your build mid-stream or adjust it to meet your needs, though. You can also look into the other characters and change their builds. Screw up Alistair? Switch your tank to Shale, Oghren, or Sten. Screw up Leliana? Switch it to Zevran. Wynne get too offensive for you? Is it too late to make Morrigan your healer? That was one thing I made it a point to do throughout both my times playing through. I built each character differently. When Alistair was my tank, I built Sten as my two-handed powerhouse, and Shale was built as a middle-of-the-road character who could off-tank for especially difficult fights, leaving more room for my Rogue to run around the field backstabbing people who were focusing on Shale and Alistair. I made Leliana a pure archer, while focusing on making Zevran a two-handed assassin built that was basically a clone of the Main Character, so I could have two guys running around backstabbing everyone. Morrigan was built as my damaging mage (that I never used), while Wynne was built as my healer. This gave me a lot of leeway to think of strategies for harder fights. Having trouble getting around to backstab them? Send in Sten, who can beat them to death from the front. Issues with Leliana not being effective from a range? Bring in Morrigan, who can also be a ranged killer. Alistair not able to completely hold threat, thus meaning my main character is getting slaughtered? Bring in Shale as my 4th character, to attract attention away from the MC along WITH Alistair, allowing my MC to run around backstabbing til his little rouge heart's content. Side note: I never, ever used the dog. Never saw much point, really.
My main character in DA:O was a mage, which made things quite a bit easier. And then I picked up the Arcane Warrior specialty, and pretty much everything became a piece of cake up until the end boss. My mage turned into my main tank, when I had all of the sustained abilities turned on he hardly ever even got hit, and could still hit surprisingly hard in melee. Definitely worth checking out.
When I went through the first time some of the skills were still bugged. I had an arcane warrior/spirit healer spec. So along with all the sustained spells and class abilities I had shimmering shield and whatever the spirit healers aoe regen spell is. The bug was those are supposed to drain mana per second, but once you reached zero mana they didn't turn off. So yeah, once I got those spells working with haste and all the other sustained I was untouchable. Easy mode.
So I don't know how many of you are interested in Star Trek Online, but the open beta started today. Lucky for me, I apparently still have an active account on file planet so I was able to get a beta key without pre-ordering the game. I'll be jumping in and testing it out as soon as I get home.
Looking for funny videos on MW2, I came across this dude on youtube who is absolutely insane. This must be fake or some sort of acting, because no one is this crazy. He's got dozens of videos complaining about campers in the game, and for some reason feels like running and throwing his body into trees and knocking them down helps his cause. I'm dying laughing at these. The super-soldier video was my favourite.
Here is a video that might satisfy your baiting skills. I love how he calls the Claymore a "Cream pie." Although nothing does beat someone going ape shit when things aren't going their way. I've tried a few things from this video. They work pretty damn well if you practice.
If you have 10 dollars to your name and want some mindless killin' goodness, you can do no better than Battlefield 1943. I got it for something like $10.79, including tax off the playstation store on Christmas morn, and I've been logging hours ever since. It helps that I played the shit out of 1942 for a solid year, but this game deserves a buy from any self respecting FPS multiplayer fan. I don't think it could be simpler. Everyone who I've introduced to it instantly loves it and can at least work out the basic controls and even score a few kills on their first round. Much easier than Call of Duty where a casual FPS player just might pop an eye vessel because the amount of fail they're enduring. There are three classes, three main weapons (I'm usually a rifleman because those M1's are accurate as hell and rifle grenades just rock), and three vehicles; jeeps, tanks, and planes. Enough to keep you occupied for days on end as you master each class. For whatever reason, kills feel so satisfying in this game that you want to try all the different ways out. There's just 3 maps but they're all fun. From what I've seen of it (Battlefield:Bad Company demo, 1943), the Frostbite engine is a damn technical marvel. It's smooth as hell, and while the graphics aren't as polished as some new releases, the effects are beautiful and the environments are 90% destructible. It's so awesome to blow the shit out of the top of the lighthouse on Guadalcanal in a Corsair and have it stay that way for the rest of the round. Oh, and it also has one of the best sound engines I've ever heard in a game. You'll get your 10 dollars worth alright. Best bargain since I bought The Orange Box.
Wow, the berserk and death animations in Assassin's Creed 2 with the hidden blade are worth the 60 bucks. I am afflicting civilians who get in my way with epileptic seizures and an embarrassing death.
Ok, in Dragon Age, did I miss something or have I just not gone far along enough to get Shale? I downloaded him but I can't seem to find him to actually join me.
I spend way too much time each week in the airport and on airplanes. Im getting tired of the standard watching movies and reading, so I'm thinking about breaking down and getting either a PSP or DS. Anyone have any thoughts about what system is better? As a hardcore fan of Zelda, Mario, metroid, etc I'm really leaning toward the DS.
the DS Lite is incredibly useful if you want Pirate Bay editions of games, and its backcompatibility with the gameboy advance is great.
Check the lower leftish area of your map for a gold map marker. Traveling there will begin the quest to find him. If you can't find that on your map be sure that you have the DLC installed. You can do that by going to the menu screen of the game and clicking on that menu. Hope this helps.