Pillars of Eternity Video Interview, Class Preview and Tips

Chances are that, at this point, you’ve made up your mind on whether to play Pillars of Eternity or not, and you might also have already decided to keep yourself away from further info on the title. Still, enough coverage was published in the last couple of days that we’d be remiss not to mention it.

Firstly, fiction writer and Twitch streamer Gregory “Arvan Eleron” Wilson interviewed on stream the project lead on the title, J.E. Sawyer, and took the opportunity to ask him several questions concerning the overall philosophy and the particulars of the game:

We follow with an “exclusive class preview” from MMORPG.com, divided in two parts (part 1 and part 2). It offers a basic overview of the game’s classes and some of their abilities, so, while it might not exactly be breaking news, it’s still valuable. A snippet:

THE CHANTER:
Chanters are historians and storytellers, their memories saturated with generations of oral tradition. The distinguishing power of chanters is their ability to continually chant magical phrases that have a wide variety of effects. Chanters can combine phrases in a variety of ways to suit their needs, adding and removing individual elements as they see fit. They are also capable of casting powerful spells, called invocations, after they have spoken enough phrases in battle.

Special Abilities Sample:

Ancient Memory Chanters are beloved, in a way, by the soul fragments to whom they speak. In addition to gaining the benefits of individual phrases, as long as the chanter is chanting, he or she and all allies within range benefit from constant Endurance recovery. Because chants do not occur out of combat and are temporarily suspended by roars, the benefits of Ancient Memory are likewise suspended for that time.

Chants – When using phrases, chanters always do so in the context of chants, which are sequences of phrases. Chanting is interrupted if the chanter is knocked unconscious or Charmed, Dominated, Paralyzed, Petrified, or Stunned. When the chanter loses these conditions, he or she will automatically resume chanting. A Charmed or Dominated chanter resumes chanting immediately, but the effects now apply to their new team.

Invocations – Invocations are powerful phrases chanters can use to summon a variety of effects. They can only be used after three phrases have been spoken. After an invocation has been used, the chanter’s current chant will not reactivate for several seconds (and the phrase count is reset, no matter what it was previously).

And we conclude with 10 tips from Prima Games, the authors of the game’s official strategy guide. These are mostly aimed at newcomers and will presumably stay online for a while, but the actual physical strategy guide is apparently only getting one printing:

8. Hit or Miss: All characters have four primary defenses against specific types of attacks: Deflection (physical attack), Fortitude (body attacks like poison or disease), Reflex (area of effect attacks), and Will (mental attacks). These defenses are based on the characters’ attributes, level, items, and other effects. Accuracy is compared to the appropriate defenses when an attack is made. If Accuracy is below the target’s defense, the attack suffers a penalty and it is more likely to result in a Miss. Likewise, if Accuracy is above the target’s defense, the attack is more likely to result in a Crit. The important factor is to recognizing what types of attacks work well on each opponent!