And I also don't really like the mechanic of less enemy characters = more attack turns. I haven't wrapped my head around it yet, and keep killing people.
I actually find that mechanic really fascinating, as it requires tactics much different than most TBSes. Trying to focus fire down units one at a time counterintuitively works against you, as it means the remaining unharmed enemies can just act more frequently. Instead, you actually want to spend your early turns crippling (but not killing) as many enemies as you can, such that the AI is forced to spend turns on units that can no longer materially affect the battle. It took me at least a few hours to realize this approach was necessary, and I was really impressed that the designers managed to implement a mechanic that changes the accepted paradigm of such an entrenched genre.
Played about five hours so far and I'm really enjoying it. I do have one major complaint though; why is every map just a flat open rectangle? For a game that draws so much inspiration from titles like FFT and FE you'd expect to see some variation in terms of environmental obstacles and terrain differences. As an example, here are some maps from early chapters of FE: Awakening:
The differences between these and the maps in TBS kind of go without saying. Obviously the battles are much smaller in scale in TBS than in FE but I still don't understand why every map is just a flat open rectangle. I feel like this has to be a conscious design decision but I'm not sure what the advantage to it is.
Anyway, I don't want it to sound like I'm not enjoying the game, I'm actually having a lot of fun with it and can't wait to get back and play some more, I just feel like the battle system is missing one of my favorite aspects of SRPG's.
- Characters (in this case characters you use) can randomly die without any sort of foreshadowing or warning out of combat. I find this unacceptable, but I realize it's part of the CYOA design. Which is fine, do your thing. But give me manual saves so I can go back and say no fuck you, I like that guy and want him to stay in my party. I would also have less of an issue if it didn't seem so random, or maybe the characters were developed more so that when an issue with that character did come up I know "this person is a pyromaniac, don't let her do anything with fire"
If you want to try manually backing up saves, you should be able to back up the "C:\Users\ Username \AppData\Roaming\TheBannerSaga\Local Store\save\saga1" directory and restore it if something randomly happens that you are not happy with.
Of course I suppose it's the equivalent of backing up a save in a roguelike (I am not yet sure how random deaths in The Banner Saga are since I -still- haven't started it), but of course it's your choice and that's fine.
I just finished up last night. really enjoyed my time with it. Took me about ~10 hours to complete it. have some gripes though:
1. different camera angles would help. when units bunch up, it can get frustrating when trying to click on units.
2. enemy variety was a little disappointing. Wolves or vultures would have been pretty cool.
3. Story can get confusing. Still can't recall some of the characters' names by the end.
4. They could have done the subtitles a bit differently. could have definitely used a bit more real estate.
Other than that, the game was fantastic. I loved the different take on the combat, the art is gorgeous, and the Oregon Trail-esque gameplay was cool. Decisions here seemed a lot more meaningful than what you generally see in other titles.
Just finished. Loved it overall and can't wait for the sequels.
My issues with it:
1) I would've liked some more combat variety--namely a wider variety of enemies, and different maps/terrain to navigate.
2) Some minor tweaks to combat would be nice--I'd love different camera angles, and the highlighting mentioned in earlier posts would be a welcome change. (I'd really like to be able to reposition slightly if I moved without performing an attack, or something when I screw up my movement, but not a big deal.)
3) [End story]
It ended rather abruptly. "Congratulations, you've lost someone killing an evil boss creature (er...tricked an importal monster into thinking it's dead the end!" I'd've liked a little more of an ending since we're going to be waiting a while for the story to continue.
I just arrived the tower, and thank god this isn't real life
I can't keep anyone alive and all my favorite party members die.
Also I seem to be quite bad at combat, I can't end a battle with them all alive.
I was also avoiding combat in one sequence because I thought my party memebers weren't well rested, then I saw they were all recovered from combat.
I thought I had to rest at camp for them to recover?
I just arrived the tower, and thank god this isn't real life
I can't keep anyone alive and all my favorite party members die.
Also I seem to be quite bad at combat, I can't end a battle with them all alive.
I was also avoiding combat in one sequence because I thought my party memebers weren't well rested, then I saw they were all recovered from combat.
I thought I had to rest at camp for them to recover?
I just arrived the tower, and thank god this isn't real life
I can't keep anyone alive and all my favorite party members die.
Also I seem to be quite bad at combat, I can't end a battle with them all alive.
I was also avoiding combat in one sequence because I thought my party memebers weren't well rested, then I saw they were all recovered from combat.
I thought I had to rest at camp for them to recover?
I just arrived the tower, and thank god this isn't real life
I can't keep anyone alive and all my favorite party members die.
Also I seem to be quite bad at combat, I can't end a battle with them all alive.
I was also avoiding combat in one sequence because I thought my party memebers weren't well rested, then I saw they were all recovered from combat.
I thought I had to rest at camp for them to recover?
I hear reknown gets very rare later in the game, so you might want to attack them at every single opportunity you can. otherwise you're going to have to choose between upgrading your dudes, or supplies. (i'm already at that point and I'm a little after you)
And then the LORD David Bowie saith to his Son, Jonny Depp: 'Go, and spread my image amongst the cosmos. For every living thing is in anguish and only the LIGHT shall give them reprieve.'
After reading a lot of negativity about the story-dialogue, I actually like what I've seen so far. I've been playing Shadowrun lately, and this has a similar way of illuminating the world that seems pretty interesting. The music is brilliant, and the animation's really immersive. All I can ask for at the moment is a way to cancel a move, I've actually restarted matches just to move to a different spot, this shouldn't be that hard to implement.
Pretty good overall, one of the few strategy RPGs I've ever enjoyed - I think that's mostly because it didn't beat you over the head with constant combat. Ending question -
does Alette die no matter what choices you make?
Few things:
1) They really need to allow you to go back and cancel your movement. A lot of times I moved my guy and he'd be out of range, and there's no way to go back and move somewhere else.
2) The visuals are nice, but they need to have more variations on the characters' expressions, etc. Seems we get one mostly static image of every character for all situations. Kind of bland.
3) The whole supply thing - was there any real point in it? I kept struggling feeding my people for the entire second half of the game, but in the end, did it really matter? In retrospect I shouldn't have wasted any renown on restocking supplies...
Played about five hours so far and I'm really enjoying it. I do have one major complaint though; why is every map just a flat open rectangle? For a game that draws so much inspiration from titles like FFT and FE you'd expect to see some variation in terms of environmental obstacles and terrain differences. As an example, here are some maps from early chapters of FE: Awakening:
The differences between these and the maps in TBS kind of go without saying. Obviously the battles are much smaller in scale in TBS than in FE but I still don't understand why every map is just a flat open rectangle. I feel like this has to be a conscious design decision but I'm not sure what the advantage to it is.
Anyway, I don't want it to sound like I'm not enjoying the game, I'm actually having a lot of fun with it and can't wait to get back and play some more, I just feel like the battle system is missing one of my favorite aspects of SRPG's.
I agree with this, but it's still a good, challenging SRPG despite it. Elevation and other things definitely would have helped and made the combat feel more dynamic and force a need to adapt to terrain (it may have also made archers completely broken). I suspect that it's just something that comes along with the budget as well as making a competitive mode for the game.
I had a few gripes with it though. One being that characters tended to die sort of arbitrairly, or at least with very little foreshadowing. Paired with a continous save system left me scratching my head at times. I also got a bit miffed when one of my characters which was pretty much the lynchpin in my combat setup died out of the blue .
Bellower battle is ruining me. Three times now and I still don't know what kind of strategy I should use on this bastard. First battle just got slaughtered early on. Second time around wasn't much better despite taking Bellower down to 0/4 but I didn't have any Willpower left and got wiped out with only Allette and Rook left. Third time was much better prepared, all but one member was taken down in the first fight. Took out Bellower with the silver arrow, but then got royally messed up on the second battle since Bellower attacks after every time it's attacked and despite removing it's armor the stonesinger beefed his STR up to like 26 and no one stood a chance.
Bellower battle is ruining me. Three times now and I still don't know what kind of strategy I should use on this bastard. First battle just got slaughtered early on. Second time around wasn't much better despite taking Bellower down to 0/4 but I didn't have any Willpower left and got wiped out with only Allette and Rook left. Third time was much better prepared, all but one member was taken down in the first fight. Took out Bellower with the silver arrow, but then got royally messed up on the second battle since Bellower attacks after every time it's attacked and despite removing it's armor the stonesinger beefed his STR up to like 26 and no one stood a chance.
I had to jump back to a previous save to sort this out, since you kinda can get screwed by the character deaths.
So what I did;
Two giants with high armour break, plus the item that allows +2 armour break. (Krumr and Mogr)
Rook and Allette with the silver arrow.
Two more giants with high armour.
I let Bellower come to me. However you potentially have to kill three of the Dregde, to make sure Bellower has a path to you. Ignore the slingers and let them to work away. Take down as much of Bellowers armour as you can, since you don't actually have to take it all away, just enough to kill him with the silver arrow. Really you'll need all your guys to attack within the same round to take down his armour.
For the second fight, it was mostly the same process of letting him come to me. If you can, surround them and start breaking his armour. Your guys should be able to take 2-3 hits so him getting extra attacks shouldn't be too much of issue. You will lose people during the fight, so it's best to surround so he'll focus on one person. I kept Rook out of the surround, since I need him to the all strenght damage.
Even though this has been discussed in the posts above, I'll put in spoiler tags just in case:
The first time I fought Bellower was very frustrating since I didn't realize you needed 1 Willpower to shoot the silver arrow. Also, at the time I wasn't entirely sure if the objective was just to kill Bellower, or all the units on the map as it has been the case in all the previous battles. Yes, the story does specifically tell you that the dredge will stop fighting once you take care of Bellower, but it wouldn't be the first time game mechanics contradict the story, so I took what I thought was the safe route and killed all the enemies before finishing up Bellower, using up all of my willpower in the process in a pretty long fight, only to realize that once I broke his armor just enough to be able to use the silver arrow that I couldn't shoot it anymore. Very frustrating.
So I restarted the fight and just decided to cheese my way through it. 3 archers, rook for mark and the rest tank units with high armor/armor break and just let the enemies come to me. Armor break any enemies that come close, then mark them and let the archers take care of dpsing them down. It worked pretty well in both fights. In the second one, Bellower eventually pushed through and killed my tank units, but by that time he had almost no armor so my archers easily took care of him.
Overall I really liked the game, The work put on the story and universe is very impressive and lays the foundation for the next games to be just as good if not better. I spent a lot of time just opening up the map and reading through the text for each region/town or admiring the fantastic art. The godstones in particular, which also served as a nice change of pace triggering some interesting events from time to time. Kudos to whoever came up with this idea.
The combat mechanics are definitely interesting but this is probably where I have the most complaints about the game. There's a certain lack of variety in objectives, maps and units. The UI also feels a bit clunky sometimes, and lacks some information that should be readily at your disposal (being able to highlight the movement grid for enemy units before placing yours for example, or keeping it highlighted for a particular unit at all times). A cancel your move option before validating your turn would've been pretty good too but that could very well be a design choice, in a game where you only get one shot at making decisions that do matter (well more than most other games at least). I wasn't exactly satisfied with was the travel/supplies mechanic either. An estimate of how long the route from one location to another should be available or hinted at through the story or dialogue. Else, choosing between buying up supplies, items or leveling up your character just becomes a matter of trial and error.
On the positive side, strength counting as both HP and damage was actually a very refreshing mechanic and offered a very fun take on what is a very classical turn based combat system. I think the different abilites were nice, and offered for a few synergies between units. Sadly, the game isn't long enough to motivate you to really think about how you should use your team as best as possible but I guess the people that are really interested in the tactical aspect can always check the f2p game.
I should also probably add that as a person that has generally a very difficult time to make choices even in real life, this was a very hard game to play for me. Especially since you don't know much on the characters you are with, and thus can't always expect what their reaction will be. I still don't know how to feel about this, A character dying because you made the wrong dialogue choice doesn't really bother me that much, I think what does bother me a little bit though is that since there are no hints on how they could possibly react, the choice you make is often a coin flip, and that is not necessarily fun, or interesting per se. In that regard, it feels more like a book than a video game.
All in all, I really enjoyed the game, I very much recommend it.
Without being spoilery if possible, are the character deaths avoidable in some sense if you learn the probabilities or what dialogue choices do?
I'm kind of okay with the idea of roguelikes, permadeath, etc., but a big difference there may be that if you die in a roguelike, you can go "Oh that was my fault, I should have known not to try for one more room on that dungeon level when I had low health" or "Oh that was my fault, I shouldn't have offered to let my FTL crew member go down to a station since it's nearly always a bad outcome".
If dialogue is truly the sort of "Your character was randomly chosen to die with no warning or foreshadowing or explanation" thing that some people make it out to be, I could see how that would be frustrating especially if a battle strategy depends on it. =P
Without being spoilery if possible, are the character deaths avoidable in some sense if you learn the probabilities or what dialogue choices do?
I'm kind of okay with the idea of roguelikes, permadeath, etc., but a big difference there may be that if you die in a roguelike, you can go "Oh that was my fault, I should have known not to try for one more room on that dungeon level when I had low health" or "Oh that was my fault, I shouldn't have offered to let my FTL crew member go down to a station since it's nearly always a bad outcome".
If dialogue is truly the sort of "Your character was randomly chosen to die with no warning or foreshadowing or explanation" thing that some people make it out to be, I could see how that would be frustrating especially if a battle strategy depends on it. =P
I think it's closer to FTL, but unlike it, or roguelikes in general, you won't be replaying this game every few hours, going for new runs and trying to improve, thus slowly learning the game "choice" mechanics, and what tends to be good or bad. In fact, the game discourages you from restarting over and over since the story continues even when you lose battles. So you won't be going "I shouldn't do this because it's often always a bad outcome". Instead, it's more as if you're continously encountering new events that you won't necessarily know how to react to, as there are minimal hints to what the right, or rather the least worst option is.
Most battles seem to be fairly easy on normal difficulty though, so losing units you relied on doesn't seem to be that big of a deal, it does encourage you to try out other units, or strategies, which sometimes can be good. Sadly, like I said in my previous post, the game isn't long enough to let you really try out new builds and tactics, and the combat does feel a bit of a chore after a few hours due to the lack of variety in maps and objectives.
You can also miss out on recruiting new characters if you chose the wrong dialogue option.
I think it's closer to FTL, but unlike it, or roguelikes in general, you won't be replaying this game every few hours, going for new runs and trying to improve, thus slowly learning the game "choice" mechanics, and what tends to be good or bad. In fact, the game discourages you from restarting over and over since the story continues even when you lose battles. So you won't be going "I shouldn't do this because it's often always a bad outcome". Instead, it's more as if you're continously encountering new events that you won't necessarily know how to react to, as there are minimal hints to what the right, or rather the least worst option is.
Most battles seem to be fairly easy on normal difficulty though, so losing units you relied on doesn't seem to be that big of a deal, it does encourage you to try out other units, or strategies, which sometimes can be good. Sadly, like I said in my previous post, the game isn't long enough to let you really try out new builds and tactics, and the combat does feel a bit of a chore after a few hours due to the lack of variety in maps and objectives.
Difficulty spike is a complete understatement. I get the impression the boss is only kill-able in Hard mode provided you either have a wealth of fore knowledge and / or made most, if not all, the "correct" decisions along the way, considering how renown basically just evaporates into nothingness the moment a character / characters you've invested in dies, or in some cases, just disappear without any reason. The game straddles a very fine line between fun and frustrating and often times is just flat out frustrating.
I agree, the game feels more like a roguelike-like (for lack of a better phrase) masquerading as an RPG at times. I'm sort of getting tired of all these "punishment for nothing" kind of games. Emergent gameplay sure but it just feels so, so cheap at the best of times.
Yes, last year they said it will come to consoles, but I can't find any recent news about it. Sorry, but I prefer gaming from my easy chair with my big screen, so I'll wait if I have to even though this looks amazing.
I started the game, and just left the first camp and saw my first journey.
Art is beautiful. But am I supposed to be this confused by the story so far? They keep talking about all of these places and people, and I have no clue what's going on. It's like I walked in on a conversation and you have no idea what they are talking about.
I started the game, and just left the first camp and saw my first journey.
Art is beautiful. But am I supposed to be this confused by the story so far? They keep talking about all of these places and people, and I have no clue what's going on. It's like I walked in on a conversation and you have no idea what they are talking about.
Well, you'll get used to the names eventually. It's a style of story telling, I like it better than having long introductory passages for each main character and I think it works well in video games. It's a bit more daunting in this game since the names are different than what we are used to. After all this is not the most popular setting for a video game right now,
Just beat it, i loved it.
Really really great game all over, i want more despite not being a fan of the genre (BTW, is Fire Emblem similar to this? Do you guys think i would like it having enjoyed this one?).
One question about the ending:
i chose Alette to shoot the silver arrow, and eventually she died between the two final battles. Would Rook have taken her place if i had chosen him instead of his daughter?
Just beat it, i loved it.
Really really great game all over, i want more despite not being a fan of the genre (BTW, is Fire Emblem similar to this? Do you guys think i would like it having enjoyed this one?).
One question about the ending:
i chose Alette to shoot the silver arrow, and eventually she died between the two final battles. Would Rook have taken her place if i had chosen him instead of his daughter?
Fire Emblem (on average) is similar with arguably far better and deeper combat mechanics but a weaker story. There's no emphasis on choices and events during your journey, instead it follows a more classic and linear progression through a single player campaign. You can lose characters you've invested a lot in just the same though through combat. There's also a far bigger emphasis on dialogue and the relationships between the different characters.
It doesn't hurt to give it a try, Awakening is a great game that a lot of people around here love and for a good reason. If you don't have access to a 3ds, you can try out previous games on the numerous platforms they've been released on. They're mostly good.
As far as your question is concerned,
Rook dies if he is the one to shoot the silver arrow. Personally, I gave it to Alette too
Fire Emblem (on average) is similar with arguably far better and deeper combat mechanics but a weaker story. There's no emphasis on choices and events during your journey, instead it follows a more classic and linear progression through a single player campaign. You can lose characters you've invested a lot in just the same though through combat. There's also a far bigger emphasis on dialogue and the relationships between the different characters.
It doesn't hurt to give it a try, Awakening is a great game that a lot of people around here love and for a good reason. If you don't have access to a 3ds, you can try out previous games on the numerous platforms they've been released on. They're mostly good.
As far as your question is concerned,
Rook dies if he is the one to shoot the silver arrow. Personally, I gave it to Alette too
Thanks buddy.
I do have a 3DS, i might give it a shot.
I'm just kinda worried the conbat system might be too deep for a n00b like me, but i guess there's nothing like trying.
The only drawback is that judging from pictures and trailers i'm not feeling that much the Fire Emblem universe, while for example this one instantly clicked with me (and i remember being fascinated by screeens of Ogre Battle 3 back in the N64 times).
Thank you for the reply to the ending question as well, good to know (but i'm still happy with my choice).
Thanks buddy.
I do have a 3DS, i might give it a shot.
I'm just kinda worried the conbat system might be too deep for a n00b like me, but i guess there's nothing like trying.
The only drawback is that judging from pictures and trailers i'm not feeling that much the Fire Emblem universe, while for example this one instantly clicked with me (and i remember being fascinated by screeens of Ogre Battle 3 back in the N64 times).
Thank you for the reply to the ending question as well, good to know (but i'm still happy with my choice).
FEs combat system is really easy to get ahold of, it's rock-paper-scissors. If it's too intimidating, awakening has an option where your characters will only be out of the rest of the battle, not the game. Definitely worth checking out!
Thanks buddy.
The only drawback is that judging from pictures and trailers i'm not feeling that much the Fire Emblem universe, while for example this one instantly clicked with me (and i remember being fascinated by screeens of Ogre Battle 3 back in the N64 times).
Funny you mention that because I did edit out a small paragraph from my last reply where I was basially saying that the Viking setting of the Banner Saga is probably one of its main draws for many people, unlike fire emblem which features a bit more of a generic medieval world.
FEs combat system is really easy to get ahold of, it's rock-paper-scissors. If it's too intimidating, awakening has an option where your characters will only be out of the rest of the battle, not the game. Definitely worth checking out!
Any tips for the final boss? He's killing me. I also got an injured man and terrible morale, but no option to rest unless I reload from before entering the last city. Gah.
Well I hope this game is still beatable. Towards the end there was a part where the story basically said that you can wait or keep moving. Well I kept waiting, for some 60-70 days and now I have no one in my caravan. Kind of broke the dialogue because characters keep referring to unknown people in the caravan etc. when in fact there's no one in the caravan but the main characters.
Well I hope this game is still beatable. Towards the end there was a part where the story basically said that you can wait or keep moving. Well I kept waiting, for some 60-70 days and now I have no one in my caravan. Kind of broke the dialogue because characters keep referring to unknown people in the caravan etc. when in fact there's no one in the caravan but the main characters.
Any tips for the final boss? He's killing me. I also got an injured man and terrible morale, but no option to rest unless I reload from before entering the last city. Gah.
Finally done with the game, I annihilated the final boss.
I had Ivar with 6 armor damage, Alette and the sniper lady both at rank 5 and the Mender with an item that regenerates willpower. Infinite 4 damage zapping.
I'm also really happy with how my choices turned out, I guess I'm not going to replay it anytime soon.
Only Fasolt and Rook died. I guess it's a miracle.
Btw, was there anything else after the credits? My game crashed in the middle of them and I don't want to repeat the last part again.
Also I checked and my name is not there, I'm kind of disappointed. I'll shoot Stoic an email tomorrow...
Anyway, this game is GOTY material for me. The rest of the year better deliver on its promises, this has been one hell of a start.
Any tips for the final boss? He's killing me. I also got an injured man and terrible morale, but no option to rest unless I reload from before entering the last city. Gah.
Attack ONLY the boss, targeting just his armor. Remember that as soon as his armor value goes beyond the damage of the bearer of the silver arrow - be it Rook or Alette - you can strike with the special attack and kill him.
Be aware he doesn't need to be at 1/0 in armor, nor he doesn't need to be hurt in the damage/health.
After that there's battle two, and again... just go all over him , not caring about the other guys. If you do things right and you have a little luck, he'll be dead in 3/4 turns.
Just beat it, I definitely think this could be a very early GOTY contender. Loved it. My only complaints would be the lack of subtitles and that it ended a bit suddenly, everything else was pretty good. That art man, that art.
Attack ONLY the boss, targeting just his armor. Remember that as soon as his armor value goes beyond the damage of the bearer of the silver arrow - be it Rook or Alette - you can strike with the special attack and kill him.
Be aware he doesn't need to be at 1/0 in armor, nor he doesn't need to be hurt in the damage/health.
After that there's battle two, and again... just go all over him , not caring about the other guys. If you do things right and you have a little luck, he'll be dead in 3/4 turns.
I fought with the boss for about 3 hours on hard, and this is definitely the best tactic. There isn't much point attacking anybody else, just get his agro and keep hitting him.
the end!" I'd've liked a little more of an ending since we're going to be waiting a while for the story to continue.