Solasta: Crown of the Magister

Droigan said:

I haven't played, but added it to my wishlist. But remember watching someone who played it when it first released. Made an analogy which was basically that BG3 is like D&D built upon the foundation of the Divinity gameplay. Looks great, but the D&D aspect is toned down to fit the "masses". The foundation is a "game" with D&D added to it.

While Solasta is more akin to D&D as the foundation and the game is added on top of it.

Granted I've only played some of BG3, and while not knowing that much of D&D, I feel I can start it up and play it. Solasta looks like a game where knowing D&D is much more beneficial than in BG3. Probably why so many of the reviews of the EA version of Solasta reference that it's very "D&D". A game where knowledge of mechanics enable you to make builds that are broken in terms of power, while not knowing them will make it near impossible to progress by making bad choices in terms of character builds. I expect BG3 to be way more lenient/balanced in that regard, even on the hardest settings.

At a 92% rating currently, I doubt it's a pile of shit, but I certainly think its in your face use of the D&D ruleset makes it more niche compared to games with the funds to hide much of it under the hood so to speak. I'm looking forward to the game, but also expect that I will have a hard time with it.

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eh, there aren't really many "traps" in 5e, which is what solasta is based on. there are a couple of spells that really aren't worth much, the base ranger class is weak comparitively, but you can play a ranger in 5e and still be an effective part of your team. obviously you can pick some oddball feats that just don't match your character at all (wizard taking the slasher feat, which gives you some added benefits when you do slashing damage) but you'd have to go out of your way to purposely TRY to screw up your character like that.

there obviously are certain skills/spells/subclasses that outperform others but the divide isn't so wide that anything else is worthless.

Does this reset on the full release in a couple of weeks? Or could one start now and just continue on? Don't wanna play it more than once.

was anyone here a backer?

I didn't know this, but it's coming to Gamepass day 1 (May 27th). In case anyone has that and was planning on getting this.

Hateyou said:

The word race is licensed?

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Nah that's a conscious decision by them. Rules there using are 5E SRD

I'm waiting for the snowflake shitstorm when the fragile-Y chromosome types see 'pronouns' in character generation.

Going through the first part of the game again its far more polished than before with lots of nice touches. Reliance on light even for darkvision types is still a titch annoying especially in situations where there's no easily lit sconces nearby. I don't have misty step or levitate so there's a few places I just can't get to quite yet either.

The one big mystery is why my cleric can't cast spells when he's using a mace and shield. I suspect that this was a side perk to the deity I didn't pick but now everytime he picks up a shield he auto-equips it and I have to remember to take it out of his hand or switch to his crossbow pre-set when I want to cast.

Qhue said:

The one big mystery is why my cleric can't cast spells when he's using a mace and shield. I suspect that this was a side perk to the deity I didn't pick but now everytime he picks up a shield he auto-equips it and I have to remember to take it out of his hand or switch to his crossbow pre-set when I want to cast.

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That's standard 5E, you can't cast spells with somatic components without a free hand, and many cleric spells require you to use their holy symbol as a material component. That rule gets largely ignored because it's annoying though, 'The holy symbol is on the shield' is one generally accepted 'hack'.

I do like that they have all sorts of Holy Symbol options. My cleric has a holy symbol cloak as he wears his lawman's badge around his neck. Shame that Sorcerer isn't done yet. I ended up going Cleric-Heal, Wizard-Nuke, Rogue-Thief and Ranger-Sharpshooter.

Qhue said:

I'm waiting for the snowflake shitstorm when the fragile-Y chromosome types see 'pronouns' in character generation.

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Almost seems like the developers are just trolling everyone with the combination of male/female instead of "body type" nonsense but still letting the mentally ill cultists pick their pronouns... and then the achievement for creating a Paladin is labeled "Deus Vult".

Qhue said:

The one big mystery is why my cleric can't cast spells when he's using a mace and shield. I suspect that this was a side perk to the deity I didn't pick but now everytime he picks up a shield he auto-equips it and I have to remember to take it out of his hand or switch to his crossbow pre-set when I want to cast.

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If you don't want to completely disable somatic components, just ditch the xbow on your cleric and make the alternate weapon set empty hand + shield. At least that way you aren't ending the round with a useless xbow and no shield equipped when you get attacked.

As for the first part, it's not deity but domain that affects it. Battle cleric is able to cast spells with weapon and shield equipped, don't think any of the others can.


Put off playing this until it was complete (or at least out of EA), so I just went with what's probably the most cookie-cutter party based on what I've read of class balance: Tirmar Paladin, Battle Cleric, Shock Arcanist Wizard, and Shadow Tamer Ranger. Hopefully choosing Scavenger difficulty for a first playthrough doesn't end up being a mistake.

Edit: the game seems a bit buggy and unoptimized still, despite being 'released'. Stuff like not being able to keep more than one javelin should have been a really obvious bug for QA to find. Load times seem ridiculously long even when installed to a very fast SSD. Seeing some people on reddit still running into game-breaking bugs with quest dialogues even though they were in the Known Issues list from a few months back.

yeah. also, got it via Gamepass yesterday.

Sorc is being added? druid? I did notice, Charisma tooltip outright says, "best for paladins, sorcerers". but, no sorc in game.
the Sylvan wizard has a bunch of druid spell options.

Noticed the female voices are 2 females and one male.. male voices seem to be 3 males? may be race based? may need to look closer. perhaps it was just the female elf that had the male voice option for a female.

does seem a bit rough overall. not unplayable. but not as polished as divinity.
Like when adjusting body type slider. the camera is focused on the head, and you can't even see what you are adjusting. its tiny things like that, here and there.

DnD shield rules are shit. only +2ac. and yeah, can't cast somatic spells. it's so stupid.
I ran paladin and cleric. so hitting that shit x2 atm.
yeah, battle clerics can use their weapons as a holy symbol.

holy symbols, and componant pouches having an actual item, and being slotted in various spots is neat.
Char creation tooltip says, slight of hand is not used in the main campaign. so, I suppose, stealing either is not possible?

being able to cast light on items. I have not tested the scope of this. can I cast it on an arrow and fire it? cast on a rock and throw?