---
title: 'Pillars Of Eternity 2: Deadfire - The Re-Review'
source: 'https://youtube.com/watch?v=UoYT1a9K37s'
video_id: 'UoYT1a9K37s'
date: 2026-06-28
duration_sec: 0
---

# Pillars Of Eternity 2: Deadfire - The Re-Review

> Source: [Pillars Of Eternity 2: Deadfire - The Re-Review](https://youtube.com/watch?v=UoYT1a9K37s)

## Summary

Mortem re-reviews Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire, a game that has grown on him over years of play. He highlights its deep lore, refined mechanics, and the extraordinary 'Ultimate' challenge he completed. While acknowledging a short main story and some technical issues, he praises the world-building, itemization, and faction politics as standout features.

### Key Points

- **Re-review motivation** [0:08] — Mortem revisits Deadfire due to improved video quality and completing the 'Ultimate' challenge, the 15th person to do so.
- **Game's appeal** [1:16] — Deadfire is not his all-time favorite CRPG but sits in top 5-10 due to its lore and world, despite other games having better mechanics or story.
- **Technical state** [2:51] — Main issue is stuttering, especially with long save files; worse on consoles. Occasional game-breaking bugs reported but not experienced.
- **Difficulty options** [3:30] — Base game is easy; post-release added mega bosses and Magran's Fires (optional challenges). The Ultimate combines all challenges for extreme difficulty.
- **Magran's Fires examples** [4:47] — Athyst Challenge (time limit), Barath Challenge (combat never ends), Hilish Challenge (protect Vela). These create unique synergies and difficulty.
- **Turn-based vs RTwP** [6:40] — Turn-based is poorly implemented; RTwP is preferred. Pillars 1 now has better turn-based mode, but Deadfire's cannot be toggled mid-playthrough.
- **World state import** [7:48] — Players can import save, use presets, or manually create a history from the main menu. Key choices like which god you sided with carry over.
- **Character creation** [10:06] — Multiclassing is a major addition; each combination gets a unique class name. Subclasses and ability trees offer deep customization.
- **Story length** [15:24] — Main story is very short (only four quests), but the lore is deep. The plot involves chasing god Athys who breaks the reincarnation cycle.
- **Lore: gods and reincarnation** [17:51] — Gods were manufactured by the Engwithans; the Wheel (reincarnation) is now dependent on machinery. Athys destroys it, leaving a cliffhanger.
- **Progression and itemization** [24:47] — Power levels keep lower-tier abilities relevant. Itemization shines with unique enchantments like the Red Hand's 'Double Tap' that can two-shot bosses.
- **Ship and exploration** [29:57] — Ship management includes crew morale, upgrades, and naval battles (improved post-launch). Exploration reveals many islands to name and discover.
- **Factions** [35:38] — Four factions (Huana, Rauatai, Vailian Trading Company, Principi) with nuanced colonial politics. Each has quests and companion ties; no moral high ground.
- **Companions** [42:40] — Companions are hit-or-miss; some have minimal interaction. Sidekicks get more depth in DLCs. Recommended companions per quest help maximize dialogue.
- **Combat system** [48:37] — RTwP with deep AI customization. Key improvements: retargeting spells, empower abilities, and item synergies (e.g., Barring Death's Door + Salvation of Time).
- **DLCs** [55:22] — Seeker Slayer Survivor (arena) is weakest; Beast of Winter (Rymrgand lore) is favorite; Forbidden Sanctum (Wael and Titans) is enjoyable.
- **Steam Deck** [58:10] — Game is playable but lacks controller support; text size is small. Requires manual control configuration.
- **Positives and negatives** [58:39] — Positives: deep lore, mechanical depth, improvements over original. Negatives: short main story, cliffhanger ending, pathfinding issues, uneven companion involvement.

## Transcript

What's going on everybody? Mortem here.
This time bringing you my re-review of
Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire, which
is a video I've been wanting to get
around to for a while because of two
reasons really. One, the quality of my
original video, which was done before
this was my full-time job all the way
back in early 2021, as this is one of
those games I've been playing basically
since it launched. and got 100% of the
achievements long before I started doing
this full-time. And I'd like to think
that somewhere in the meantime, I've
gotten slightly less terrible at making
videos. However, that's not the only
reason I wanted to take another look at
this via a video. The other reason, of
course, being, as I'm sure many people
at this point are aware, at least my
regular viewers anyway, last year in
2025, I completed the ultimate, which is
an extraordinarily difficult challenge
associated with Deadfire that I was the
15th person to officially complete. That
is because again it is extraordinarily
difficult and at the time of my original
review I had not done that though I did
talk a little bit about it there and
both of those reasons combined were a
pretty good reason to make a thinly
veiled excuse to play through the game
again and talk a little bit about it and
so let's do exactly that. Now Pillars of
Eternity 2: Deadfire is an interesting
game in the sense that I've never really
considered it like my be all end all
favorite of CRPGs. However, it's always
kind of bounced around my top five to
top 10 depending on my mood. The reason
for that is while I enjoy the game for
what it is, I do think there are CRPGs
that do more mechanically, that do more
story-wise and even gameplaywise. Even
though I do think there is more depth to
Pillars as a series than people give it
credit for, the main draw for me has
always been the lore and the world,
which is why I made a bunch of videos
about that in particular over the years,
as it's by far the thing I was the most
invested in. And yet at the same time,
coming from the original game, I think
Pillars 2 does a lot of leg work in
terms of making the system uh just flow
a lot better, a lot of more refined
elements to it, like just something as
simple as being able to retarget a spell
you've already started casting, even
more control over your companion AI, and
just a million little details that can
go unnoticed if you don't play the game
a ton. But as the fact that this video
is coming out so much later, even just
that original video might tell you,
Pillars of Eternity 2 is a game that's a
bit of a slow burn. It comes at you over
time the more you uh take time to think
about it and absorb the story, even come
back to it, play it again, come at
things at a different angle and that
kind of thing. It's just a game that has
grown on me over the years even though
I've always liked it. And a lot of that
is again just down to those details that
you might not necessarily appreciate on
a first playthrough, but that really
start to shine on replays especially.
And so let's get on with the rest of the
review and talk about all of it.
Starting with first, of course, the
technical state. How's this game
running? I can report that this game is
basically in the exact state that it was
in when I left it last, which is that
the main issue you're likely to run into
is some stuttering, especially the
longer your save file runs on. I've
heard it is much worse over on consoles.
I've never played it on console, PC
channel after all. And I have on
occasion seen people mentioning other
problems like the occasional
game-breaking bug or something, but
again, the only issue I've experienced
personally and by far the largest
reported one is the stutters that pop
up, especially in again the later parts
of the game. And so, let's move on to
difficulty. If you've watched a lot of
my videos over the years, you may well
have heard me refer to Pillars of
Eternity to Dead Fire as both the
easiest and hardest CRPG depending on
your mood. But when the game first
released, it was just easy. Some of that
is because with uh relatively minimal
knowledge, you can set up a decent AI in
order to control your companions in the
game's real time with pause combat. And
then even on the higher difficulties,
you can actually let it autoplay for the
most part. and then there wasn't a ton
of challenge to be had. And so taking in
some of that feedback over the time this
game was receiving active patches, they
added quite a bit of difficulty both in
the form of things like mega bosses and
optional challenges known as Magrron's
fires, which is where the ultimate
challenge actually springs from. that
was added post-release of course because
while you do have your standard
difficulty options basically story
through the super hard mode which is
supposed to be path of the damned but
doesn't wind up being that difficult
like I mentioned you also have a bunch
of extra options like of course an iron
man save file or expert mode which turns
off some of the helper features etc you
also have the optional Mrron's fires
that were added fires are special
challenges that alter the way some of
the game mechanics work in order to make
for a more challenging experience
overall. Now, I'm not going to go
through every one of these. I have
videos where I have done that. Uh
specifically talking about the ultimate
challenge because the ultimate challenge
is in fact to play with all of these on
at the same time, which makes the game
not literally impossible obviously, but
extremely difficult. Just to throw a few
out there so you kind of get a gist of
what I'm talking about. Some of the more
impactful ones are the Athyst Challenge,
which gives you a strict deadline to
beat the game by as time is passing
while you're playing. Barath challenge,
the god of death's trial for you, if you
will, is to make sure that combat does
not end when it is started and you have
to finish it, which combined with the
Iron Man mode is obviously not great.
However, that actually opens up some
interesting combos that make that mode
possible. And so, while that might seem
like a detriment at first, it actually
is the ultimate thing that makes certain
runs possible because most of the time
in combat, a lot of your buffs and stuff
are per encounter. So when combat ends,
that stuff just falls off, which means
you can't carry it from fight to fight.
And then you can use that new mechanic
of combat not dropping via this
challenge to actually do some stuff you
cannot do otherwise. And then of course
the most difficult one by far is Hilish
challenge, which gives you uh the orphan
from the first game that you could
potentially take into the second game,
Vela. And she follows you around and if
she dies, you lose and she dies to
basically everything. So again, there's
just all those optional challenges to
make it more difficult. However, there
are some options to make replays more
interesting even beyond that in the form
of Barath's blessings. Basically, every
achievement for Deadfire is associated
with a currency that you can then spend
on bonuses to your next playthrough.
This can be things like starting with
the entire map revealed, extra starting
cash, extra starting stats, and just all
sorts of stuff to make replays a little
bit of a smoother experience. I think
that is fun overall, and it basically
functions as the game's new game plus,
if you want to think of it that way.
Now, while not strictly speaking a
difficulty option, another thing you
have to pick right at the beginning of
the game is actually turnbased or real
time with pause. Now, I'm going to be
real with you. Turn-based in Deadfire is
not great. In fact, I would go so in
fact, I would go so far as to say for me
it's kind of unplayable. I really don't
like it. Now, they did uh do an
interesting thing, which is that they
added turnbased mode to Pillars of
Eternity 1 not all that long ago,
earlier this year from the time of this
recording, actually, where they
addressed a lot of the criticism that
turn-based mode received in Deadfire in
that earlier game. So, in a weird twist
of fate, the original game actually has
a better turn-based mode now than the
second one does. However, another change
there is while in the first game now you
can toggle it in a playthrough, you
can't do that here without using uh
console commands in order to do it. And
you don't want to do that cuz it comes
with the potential of corrupting your
save file. This is because of the ways
that uh turnbased mode can change how
certain things are calculated and some
of that stuff works. And so you pick it
at the start of a playthrough and that's
just what you're going to have to do for
the rest of that playthrough unless you
want to risk that save file corruption.
Moving on a little bit though. Next up,
let's talk about the world state. So,
Pillars of Eternity 2: Dead Fire is a
direct sequel from the original game. As
far as the story is concerned, you play
the same character from that original
game, the Watcher of Cad Noa. And so,
the game handles this in a couple of
interesting ways. You can pick a preset
history, which is basically a rough
approximation of six different ways you
could have played through the original
game. that being making every mistake
possible, doing everything pretty well,
kind of being more judicious about it,
etc. Now, the other option is, of
course, to import your save file from
the original game. If you've played
through it and have an in-game save
file, you can just use that as your
history. However, there is a third
option that is a little more obscure.
I've noticed that a lot of people tend
to miss it, which is just that you can
make your own history. And what this
means is that you can actually go to the
main menu of Deadfire and go into the
options there and there will be an
option to effectively create a pillars
one save file that gets added to the
menu there as a history meaning that you
can just select it. So this means if you
have specific choices and you know what
they affect and you want to carry them
forward into Deadfire, you can
absolutely do so without playing through
the first game. So, in that way, you can
just jump straight into the second one
and the stuff you want to see if that's
something you're trying to do. Though, I
certainly would recommend playing the
first game at least once. Now, in case
you're wondering about what gets carried
forward, there's a lot of different
stuff. So, I would say that some of the
more impactful things are basically
which god you decided to side with and
if you actually followed through on that
deal. So, in the original game, in order
to get to the end game, you need to make
a deal with one of the gods. You have a
few different options there and you can
also break that deal once you get to the
actual endgame. Who you sided with and
if you kept your end of the bargain is
one of the more impactful choices you
can make as it carries forward into the
next game. But there's also all sorts of
stuff that gets referenced mostly in
passing and dialogue here and there. And
of course whether or not you kept the
companions alive. They can absolutely
die in the original game and they could
not be carried forward into the second
one. And so if one of the companions
that would normally be in the second
game didn't survive your first game save
file, then they are just gone. So keep
that in mind as you approach this game,
I suppose. But then one of my favorite
parts of all of Pillars of Eternity 2 is
its character creation. So let's talk a
little bit about it. This is probably
when you'll notice that they made some
big changes from the system in the
original game to the second one. And
that is most immediately felt by the
fact that you can multiclass in this
one. This is also a decision you have to
make as soon as you start with that
character because it affects progression
in a really integral way. For instance,
if you multiclass, you will never get
the last two tiers of abilities from
either of the individual classes that
your multiclass is made of. However,
each individual class has also been
given subclasses. And one of my favorite
little well-known details is that the
game will actually give you a unique
class name based on every possible
combination of multiclassing you could
do, which is just a really fun little
thing. Even beyond that stuff that's
more immediately obvious, they also made
a lot of changes to how leveling up
works in general. For starters, you can
preview the ability trees now, which is
nice. But essentially, every level
you're going to get either one or two
abilities to put into those ability
trees. And while some things like
passives overlap and multiclassing often
forces you to choose between one tree or
another per level as you uh sometimes
only get one point and then other levels
you'll get two or have to pick between
or be able to put one into both etc.
That's just a little bit different from
how pillars one handled things. But
realistically the fun here is of course
in the builds you can make. And while
yes, some of these classes are
technically speaking a little better
than others based on potential build
combos, balancing, all that usual stuff,
I'll say this. If you're not playing on
the highest difficulty with some of
Mrron's fires enabled, it's really not
that big of a deal. And I would
recommend you play the thing that sounds
the most fun to you. With Cipher and
Chanter really being the kind of things
that are unique to the Pillars games in
particular, the rest being more or less
what you would expect them to be in
other fantasy titles. Chanters work by
building up their chants every so often
in real time with pause or per turn and
turnbased. And once they've chanted
enough phrases, which have their own
individual effects, they can then spend
those chanted phrases on abilities that
they can cast in a sort of variation of
a bard, but they're much more fun than
that if you get into them. Cipher is all
about mental and soul energy, which
matches the watcher nature of your
character very well, and we'll get to
that in a moment. and they have a bunch
of very unique abilities that play off
of like positioning and targeting in
ways that can be uh fun to mess around
with. Now, from here, rather than get
too in-depth for a video like this, I
instead want to give you a few of my
favorites. Now, some of the stuff I love
the most isn't even like mechanically
superior to a lot of other things.
They're just really fun. Like, one of my
favorite multiclasses is druid and
ranger, which is called a beastmaster.
And then with Druid, you can lean into
their shape-shifting and then of course
have your uh ranger pet from being a
ranger. And that's like a really fun
combo that has a sort of natural synergy
to it, especially for the ranger
abilities that require your pet to be in
a certain proximity, which the
shape-shifting leans into. And then even
then, you can still fall back on the
druids like AoE's and control spells.
For the ultimate, a really popular uh
way to do that is blood mage and priest
of SCE. Now, I want to mention this in
particular because this combo works
specifically because of some of the
challenges that are enabled, which is
the other side of things. The minmaxing
is there if you want it to be, and it is
possible to build a character around
certain mechanics you want to take
advantage of. Blood mage is able to uh
basically spend their health in order to
recoup class resources, which in
combination with a buff called
brilliant, which helps you do the same
thing. And the priest of Skain's uh
uncanny ability to get the spells you
need at the exact levels you need them
by default makes for an incredibly
potent combo where combat doesn't end
until you win. And with Vodica's
challenge, recouping your class
resources is much more difficult as it
becomes per rest as opposed to most of
it being per encounter. But then to give
you yet another option, uh one of the
ways I the way I approached this most
recent playthrough, I played a death
godlike. Godlikes are basically people
who have been blessed with the
appearance of the gods, which manifests
as what is often referred to as a chime
inside of them, but also gives them the
outward appearance of the god they are
blessed by, let's call it. So, this
death godlike has a connection to Barth,
the god of death, cycles, doorways, etc.
And so, through the first game, you're
going to inevitably meet that god as
part of the main story. And while I
wanted to play through as a cipher, I
figured I would rope that into the
details of the second game where I
decided that after meeting Barth
accepting her deal to get to the endgame
of the original game, she also decided
to grant you the power of a priest of
Barth as the priest in this game of
course worship their associated gods
with this one having a slightly more
complicated relationship with Barth. And
so that was a fun sort of role-play
centered multiclass that is also pretty
fun to play because priest is a great
class to multiclass other stuff with
because it has a ton of support and
utility abilities that pair well with
just about anything. But there's ways to
add flavor and roleplay to all of that
stuff. And hopefully those examples kind
of gave you an idea of what's possible
because from there I do want to go ahead
and move on and talk a little bit about
the story. The story is one of the
things in Deadfire that gets the most
flak, and that is mainly because it is
very, very short. In fact, in total,
it's technically only like four quests.
And while you're unlikely to do it on a
first playthrough, you can easily burn
through it in a few hours. But let's
talk a little bit about it. So, in this
game, you play as the Watcher of Cadua,
no matter what character you choose to
create. The watcher of Cadua is called
such because they are a watcher, which
is someone who can see into the beyond
and talk to and interact with the souls
of the dead, opening up possibilities to
them that are simply not something every
random person can do. Watchers are
relatively rare, and they tend to go
crazy from what they've seen, which is a
big subject of the original game. Now,
the Catnua part is because Cat Noa is
your stronghold in the original game,
which gets unceremoniously destroyed by
a giant Audra statue. Audra being the
conduit through which souls pass into
the beyond from the mortal realm. Now,
this statue, as it turns out, happens to
be inhabited by the god Athys, long
thought dead, after having been
destroyed once he manifested in a
physical form via St. Widwin in events
that preceded even the first game. So,
him not only suddenly coming back, but
then animating this Audra statue and
marching off to the distance while also
killing you by destroying your
stronghold in the process gives you a
pretty strong reason to want to track
the guy down, which is exactly what the
goddess Barth orders you to do, which is
how you become the herald of Barth as
far as this game is concerned. And
that's basically the main plot. You
chase Athys around the Deadfire
Archipelago that he is marching through.
At first, after you are attacked, right
as the game starts, and you come back to
life after being sent back by Barth, you
track him down at the Anguan dig site
nearby and get your ship up and running
again before you can start sailing the
dead fire. From there, you go meet the
major players in the main city,
Nekotaka. You then go to Hango and do
the same thing, talk to Athyst. Then you
go to a place called Ashen M, and talk
to Athyst again. And then you find a way
through a big storm to the endgame of
Ukiso. And that is the entirety of the
main story. And while in theory uh the
last leg of it getting past Andre's
mortar is supposed to see you
interacting with one of the factions
which is technically side content to get
away past that giant storm that's
actually really easy to do in a couple
of different ways and doesn't take long
at all. And so what you have is a story
that is very short with yet gigantic
implications for the lore of the world
which I'm going to get into. So, like I
said, I love the lore of this world. And
one of the things that really wrote me
in about it was the way uh reincarnation
and cycles work here. While I have not
been light with spoilers thus far, I'm
about to get into super heavy spoilers
here. You see, the big reveal of the
original game was basically that the
gods were manufactured. They are real in
the sense that they are present. You can
talk to them. They are very powerful and
they are unquestionably gods. However,
they are not natural. They were made by
a civilization known as the ingithans.
They did this as a result of uh getting
into anamancy which is the study of
souls in this world. And they studied it
to a point where they eventually started
seeking out their own creators. That
age-old question of how did we get here?
And unfortunately for theans, what they
found was nothing. If there was a
creator or a deity, it seemingly had
long since left. And they were left
alone in the universe and decided then
that they would become the gods. and
threw a whole lot of nonsense at Ukiso,
the ancient ancestral homeland of the
Hana civilization, which are the main
controllers of the Deadfire Archipelago,
even to the day of this game, is where
they did that. The machinery that turned
the Ingens into these deities is housed
at Ukiso. It's also where the machinery
that took control of a natural process
known as the wheel or reincarnation
occurred. So, a few big lore topics
there right away. The wheel was a
natural process by which souls were
recycled more or less through the
reincarnation process. This wasn't
perfect and was prone to errors and
could cause things like holloworn, which
are people born without souls, and a
number of other soul maladies that are
expressed throughout the games where
that process could go wrong. And while
they still happen even in the time of
the gods, it was apparently much worse
before they took power. Combine that
with a bunch of civilizations all trying
to worship deities they had made up and
doing terrible atrocious things in their
name. The Inguithans basically wanted to
use their ascension to godhood as a way
to force all of the civilizations in the
world of Aora to march forward, become
stronger and better themselves, and of
course do so under their own banners.
However, this leads to a few other
things. Uh, one, the gods themselves
aren't individual people. Each
individual deity is actually made up of
who knows how many thousands of
ingithans who were each selected for
kind of their rough personality traits
because the deities that they wound up
making took the place of legends and
myths of deities that kind of were
already around in their time. So they
basically just took on the mantle of
some things people around had already
believed in and chose to make it real
while squashing the rumors of things
that did not fit into their pantheon.
Now they accomplish that by again taking
control of the wheel. This natural
process of reincarnation and forcing it
into an unnatural but more efficient
process which cut down on the number of
soul maladies and gave it direction
which is what allowed them to ascend to
godhood like this. But this came with a
bit of a catch. You see all these uh
untold thousands of years later, that
machinery has controlled that process
for so long that that process can no
longer function without that machinery.
Meaning that if someone were to say
destroy it, the process would be broken,
which is a problem because the gods feed
off of the energy from the reincarnation
cycle. As souls enter the beyond and get
reincarnated, it produces the energy
that the gods need to survive and of
course then provides souls for future
generations of the mortals that inhabit
the world of Aora in a sort of mutually
beneficial situation. The thing is
Athyus as the god of rebirth, light,
dawn, etc. kind of hates this and he
wants to do something about it, which is
what he was trying to do when he was
killed in the version of him that was
St. Widwin. and again those events that
preceded the first game. And the second
time around, he decides to take a more
direct approach of taking this giant
Audra statue to march to Ukiso where
this machinery is and destroy it to stop
the process of reincarnation. And that
happens no matter what you do. You
cannot stop it, but you can have some
effects on the outcomes, which then
leads to the game's various endings
based on both how you got there and how
you influenced Athys along the way. But
the reincarnation cycle getting broken
is the ending that happens no matter
what. And you're left with this big
cliffhanger then that while a lot of
souls are already in the process of
being reincarnated and that will
continue. There's basically a generation
or two before that process stops
completely at which point the deities
will die because they won't have any
sustenance via the energy coming through
the wheel and every single person born
after that will be born without a soul
which basically means holloworn. And so
a solution will have to be found. And
you may be asking, why would the god of
light and rebirth choose to do that? And
the simple answer is that he was tired
of living that lie. He wants mortals and
the gods themselves to either find a way
forward together or to die together as
opposed to being trapped in this endless
cycle of them trying to manufacture some
idealized society that the deities
themselves can't even readily agree
upon. Now, as fun as that is, that's
really only scratching the surface of
the lore. There's a lot of really cool
stuff there. Uh, there is the added lore
of Avou, which came out that has huge
implications because even more spoilers
for Avowed here. A crux of a vowed is
that a naturalb born god is discovered,
Sapidol. It turns out that while there
were apparently no deities around when
the Angans sought them out, it turns out
that it wasn't impossible or anything
because in Avou we find one that was
born that way only for the pantheon to
immediately attack it which then leads
to the events of a vowed itself. And
that is to say nothing of Yzua. So Yzua
is a thing that is kind of briefly
mentioned in a couple of the games, but
a lot of it comes from Deadfire in
particular because a sidekick you can
get Re is from there. It's a continent
on the other side of the world, blocked
by Andra's mortar. Andra's mortar is the
giant storm that protects Kaiso from
discovery prior to this game. It also
made travel to the other side of the
world seemingly impossible, which is
where Yzua was. And Yzua is a world
where they worshiped a single deity that
seems to be probably another naturalb
born god situation. But that's just
speculation and we don't really know
because again, it's just kind of a thing
that pops up. So, in theory, if they
were to ever make A Pillars 3, which
seems exceedingly unlikely all things
considered at this point, they have a
lot of stuff to work with, and I would
love to see a conclusion to it. Because,
if you couldn't tell by this very long
rambling, I'm pretty invested in the
story, and I would love to see what
comes of that conflict and how a problem
like that gets solved and again, how all
that stuff gets approached. And it's
incredibly interesting to me at the very
least, which is one of the reasons I've
loved this game so much and made all
those lore videos about it. But let's go
ahead and move on a little bit to
progression. So, progression is
interesting because again, like I
mentioned, they did change a little bit
of it from one to two, introducing
things like power levels, uh, making
gear and itemization much more
interesting. There's your ship that
you'll be using to sail around. The way
crafting and resting bonuses work, and
just all these other modifiers and
things that you could potentially turn
on via Magnires, which can affect
progression. So, all of that is probably
worth a quick mention. The simplest
being levels, of course, though. As you
kill things, complete quests, etc., you
will be leveling up. As you level up,
you will get access to higher tiers of
abilities up until the max level of
level 20. Now, the thing is, every tier
of ability that you go up, which is
roughly every couple of levels, you also
increase your power level. As your power
level goes up, all of your abilities
increase in strength. This is how they
keep lower tier abilities relevant
throughout the entire game. And that
applies to every single class. You can
also in combat even uh affect this a
little bit farther by using the new
empower ability. Empowering basically
allows you to cast a spell or ability at
a higher power level than it would
normally have. And there's a couple
other ways to affect that as well, but
it's definitely something to keep in
mind. Now, where I think uh progression
in Deadfire really, really shines is
actually itemization, the gear that
you'll be picking up and using. And this
is because by default, any character can
basically use any type of equipment.
Now, when it comes to weapons, you can
uh become proficient in them. You gain
proficiencies every I think it's like
four or so levels as your character
levels up, but all that really does is
allow you to use the special ability
associated with that weapon, which isn't
always useful and not even really
necessary all the time. Now, the catch
there is uh the heavier stuff you wear,
in particular, your armor increases your
recovery time, which means you act
slower in uh real time with pause. And
then the rest of it is just items that
have various effects that you can make
use of. And so I figured I would give
you a couple of examples of my
favorites. My favorite item in the
entirety of Dead Fire isn't even that
good, but it's a archabus called the Red
Hand. You get this in the capital of
Nekotaka, specifically in the black
market known as Delver's Row. This is
basically just a two-handed gun that is
really cool to me because of an
enchantment. You can enchant unique uh
weapons and armor with extra abilities
and increase their overall usefulness.
This enchanting mechanic can be used to
give the red hand an ability called
double tap. Double tap is an enchantment
that means if you hit any vessel type
enemy twice in a row with the red hand,
it immediately dies. And that can be
used on bosses and basically just
anything you can get two consecutive
hits on. As the name would imply, it
also lets you shoot twice per attack.
Combine that with a ranger who actually
gets an ability to also shoot twice as
well, and you're off to the races. But
there are straight up bosses you can
instantly uh not literally one shot, but
I suppose two shot with this rifle. And
it's just one example of the way
itemization is approached here where you
can use it to do some really fun stuff
in specific situations because that
specific item can trivialize a couple of
really difficult fights against that one
specific enemy type. But that's just the
tip of the iceberg. In order to complete
the ultimate, as at least the way I did
it, you make use of a buff called
brilliant. Brilliant is a rare in the
sense that there's not a lot of things
that give it to you. Buff that basically
allows you to restore class resources.
There is a cloak that allows you to put
brilliant on yourself that you can find
in Bikarnner's Observatory by basically
hitting yourself and as long as you give
yourself a way to survive that like say
the priest spell barring death door
which makes you unkillable for a set
time and then combining that with
another priest spell called salvation of
time which increases the length of the
buffs that are on you right now. like
say barring death's door and the
brilliant inspiration or buff that
allows you to again restore class
resources meaning you can continually
cast the spells allowing you to make
that cycle you can set up a situation
where your character in combat is
literally unkillable thanks to these
spells and unless the enemy has a way of
removing them you cannot die which is
one of the ways thanks to Barth's
challenge as part of the ultimate not
dropping combat you can get through some
of the encounters that would otherwise
not be possible but to not spend too
long on it. Basically, when it comes to
itemization and how you can approach
combat, there's actually so much depth
there if you go and look for it and you
can just find all these little ways to
interact with those systems in really
unique ways that are just so much fun.
And again, that is one of the parts of
this game that I've just come to
appreciate more and more over the years.
And that's not even all of it. Uh,
another bit of progression is pets. Uh,
only you can equip a pet by default, but
one of the Barrett's blessings actually
lets you give it to a deer as well. And
pets will give you a partywide effect.
And you can find tons of pets throughout
the game. And there was an update that
added this thing called the creature uh
the critter cleaver, I think it is, that
lets you make custom pets by sacrificing
the pets you have found to it to get the
exact combination of a pet you want
following you around and the effect you
actually want it to give you. And then
there is your ship, of course. We are
sailing around the Dead Fire after all,
and you do actually have to do that via
a ship. Now, I will say you do
technically need to keep your ship
stocked with food and water, but that is
uh trivially easy if you are not using
the Magrins fire that makes your food
and stuff rot. That is actually, I
think, one of the small balancing things
that the base game could have changed.
It's actually so easy to do that in the
base game that I think it kind of
removes the point of it being there at
all because there's just no friction at
all. you'll find more than enough food
more than likely to keep everyone fed
and made sure they're drinking as well
as you move your ship along. But in
Nekataka, you will find a shipyard, the
docks there, where you can buy new ships
to upgrade to. And then you can actually
upgrade those ships via parts and
things, as well as hire sailors and
stuff to man it, which is important for
ship combat, but we'll talk about that
here in the next section. Upgrading and
maintaining a ship is a big part of it.
And if you want to get through Andra's
mortar on your own, one of the two ways
you can do that is by upgrading your
ship to the the best hull and sails.
There are a couple of unique ships as
well that you'll only get through
certain quests as part of the story sort
of. Then there is crafting and resting.
You can put to use all of the junk you
are picking up, which you can pick up
everything. There's no weight limit or
anything to some use by crafting
scrolls, potions, food, meals, etc. And
when you rest, you can use those meals
to give you buffs. And do not
underestimate how useful that is. Some
of those buffs are crazy. But that's the
bulk of what you're looking at
progression-wise, which brings me then
to the gameplay and world section. So,
Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire uses a
world map system where when you are not
in a given location, you'll be traveling
around the world via uh land or sea. At
sea, you'll of course be using your
given ship in order to sail around. You
can have random encounters and stuff
that deal with that as well that take
the place of text events. While you are
typically traveling on land, though a
couple places at sea as well, you will
find locations and these are typically
speaking either a text event or a
physical place you can actually explore,
which is most of like the cities and hub
areas. Of course, the text events are
relatively basic. Sometimes they'll lead
to fights or you can use your non-combat
skills as a way around the given
situation and pick up loot and stuff
from those also. Now, the first part of
the game structurally sees you trapped
on an island trying to get your ship
back up and running after you get
attacked by pirates at the beginning of
the story. This area called Port Maj is
really the only part of the story that
you are hemmed in. Uh because once you
get that done and you get your ship, you
can basically go wherever you want as
long as you have the level to do so.
Now, there is scaling if you want there
to be in the game's options. You can uh
scale just the main story up. You can
scale or scale down everything to your
character's level to try to make it more
challenging. But basically, once you
leave Port Mage, technically speaking,
you can go wherever you want. And that
actually does make things a little more
interesting than people give it credit
for because as you may remember, I said
the main story was short, and it is.
However, the game of Deadfire is like
90% side content. You can technically
beat the game while seeing very little
of what the game actually has to offer,
and exploration plays a really big role
in that. One of my favorite mechanics
there is that some of the islands that
you will find are technically unexplored
and you can go there and see what's
what. There's usually like a dungeon or
place to explore a sort of like main
event if you will and once you get that
done and exit, you'll actually be able
to name that island. And there's a bunch
of those. There's quests surrounding it
to sort of send you to them. And I
really really love that. And then
there's of course Nekotaka, the main
city, which is made up of several
different hub areas you can travel
between. Each individual port has port
services you can make use of. Basically
a supply store if you just want to stop
in and buy supplies before you move on
to where you're actually going, that
kind of thing. And there's a lot of just
like wonderful little details there. In
fact, to give you one, your crew, if
their morale is high, if you're not
feeding and watering them basically,
they will uh eventually drop morale and
potentially mutiny. But if their morale
is high, they will potentially sing sea
shanties. And the sea shanties actually
have varying uh voices and stuff that
will sing them based on the makeup of
your crew. And again, just wonderful
little bits of detail. However, I want
to talk about naval battles and then I
want to talk about some of the bigger
stuff uh politicalwise as far as the
game is concerned. Anyway, now on the
naval battles, they changed this after
the game released. When the game
initially released, when you came across
another ship or you got attacked by
another ship, you could enter into a
naval battle or a ship combat.
Basically, this was initially done
purely through a text event. The text
event wasn't a lot of fun, and in my
opinion, it still isn't. And so, what
people would do, and myself included,
was basically get the fastest ship you
could, which is the Voyager. fully
upgrade it. And then when you enter the
naval combat text battle, you just full
speed ahead as fast as you can to the
other ship, which would be before they
got a chance to attack and you would
board because boarding them brings you
to an actual combat situation that is
much easier to win and frankly a whole
lot faster to win. Post launch when
everyone was doing this because it was
just the easier thing to do. They did
change this to where now when you
encounter another ship this way you get
the popup that you're seeing on screen
where you have the choice to either
engage in that text event immediately
board them or try to surrender or flee.
Surrendering sees you taking a morale
hit and losing supplies but you know not
necessarily uh dying to a battle you
cannot win. And then fleeing gives you a
chance of avoiding the encounter
entirely. And so that in particular is a
little easier these days. But from here,
I want to talk about the factions. One
of the things I find really, really
interesting about Deadfire is the way
the colonialism and the political
situation around the archipelago is set
up. Because while there are independent
routes through the game, it's actually
kind of split up between four different
factions otherwise. The natives, the
Hana, the two uh factions trying to set
up outposts here, Rouatai, as well as
the Veian Trading Company. And then of
course your pirate faction, the
Principy. Now, this is set up in such a
way that a lot of these characters are
at odds with each other, of course, and
they're all trying to politically
maneuver and gain leverage over the
others. And when you dig into that and
do all of the quests, it's really,
really interesting. And you can work for
all of them up until their very last bit
of questing right before the end of the
game where you do have to commit to one
of them fully. But you may or may not
lose companions based on what you choose
to do there. You know, who's following
you. You get companions from the
factions. They'll leave you if you do
this, that, or the other. So, you may
want to go the independent route just
because of that. But more on that in a
moment. Let's start with the Hana. The
Hana are the natives, a tribal society
still using a cast system that thanks to
their expansion into a city like
Nekotaka, is fraying at the seams and no
longer working because their lowest
cast, the Roaru, feed off the scraps of
others, which has turned into kind of a
literal rotting pile of food in the
slums known as the Gullet. So, the Hana
are struggling with the growth they've
seen, and they're also struggling
against these factions that have come in
to basically stake their claim to the
Dead Fire for one reason or another. But
while the Hana have seemingly grown a
little more tolerant of people coming to
the Dead Fire, they have a bit of an ace
up their sleeve in terms of defense, and
that is actually the water shapers.
Because while Rowatai has their big
cannons and well-made ships and honestly
a bit higher tech than everyone else,
it's very difficult to fight an enemy
that can literally take the water out
from under your ship and just sink it
entirely, causing waves, etc. Because
water shapers are basically Avatar the
Last Air Bender in the sense that they
can control and move water or shape it
if you will as they please. This is
shown via the water shapers guild.
However, if you dig a little deeper, you
learn why the Hana have started to allow
outsiders in. It's because their power
is waning. You see, the Hana were
charged uh anciently with a covenant to
the goddess of the oceans, Ingati as she
is called here, or Andra as she is known
elsewhere. But as the Hana started to
seed ground to outsiders for one reason
or another, that covenant weakens,
making their water shaping weaker. But
it was of course a slow battle. There
was however a water shaper named Periqi
who got some help from a dragon that she
later betrayed and then trapped that
dragon, binding the water shaping to
draw on the dragon's power as their
power from Andra waned. And this has
caused the slow decline of the water
shapers along with uh the outsiders
coming further into the deadfire to just
weaken over time. And so the water
shapers are really kind of a pale
imitation of what they used to be. And
so the Hana are trapped in this vicious
cycle of needing the water shapers to
defend themselves, but also knowing that
the water shapers are losing their power
and that's not a fight they can win
forever. And so they're basically trying
to play diplomat and set themselves up
for success that way in an effort to
continue to control their own territory,
losing the battle by attrition
basically. Then you have the Rouatai.
The Rowatai's interest in the dead fire
is actually to do with Andra's mortar.
Raouatai is an area that is racked by
constant storms, much like the exact
storms of Andra's mortar, in fact. And
so Rouatai wants to come here, study
that, and see if there's a way to stop
it, basically, so they can actually
prosper. They're also, uh, thanks to the
harsh way they have been living, all
about their military might, cooperation,
and triumph in the face of adversity.
This doesn't make them particularly nice
people. However, one of their
representatives at Sura will literally
take into account your character's
disposition. So, as you talk to people,
you gain a reputation more or less or a
disposition based on your responses.
This can be things like shady or stoic,
cruel, that kind of thing. And Atsura
will frame his responses and how he
tries to get you to do things based on
your character's disposition. So, he has
a bunch of varying dialogue based on how
he thinks he needs to talk to you in
order to get you to do the thing you
want to do, which I thought was an
interesting approach to a character like
that because he's very clearly not
somebody who's got uh the best of
intentions, especially when the
assassinations come to light. But they
are, whether you like it or not, a lot
more stable than the others for sure.
They're trying to build and focusing on
tech and doing a lot more technological
advancements than a lot of the others
are. And that's why they rely on the
strength of their cannons after all.
Then you've got the Veian Trading
Company. Basically, the people using
anamancy to try to further their own
ends. Anamanscy being the science that
was much discussed in the original game
that has only advanced since then. The
study of souls basically. And they use
this to invent tech to solve their
problems. And in order to do that, they
need luminous Audra. Luminous Audra is
unique to the dead fire, a very powerful
form of again the conduits through which
souls pass to the beyond. And so their
interest in the dead fire is trying to
harvest as much of that Audra to advance
their anammancy as possible. And this
leads to exciting new discoveries. And
then last but not least, there are
pirates. And I feel like I probably
shouldn't need to explain their
motivation, but in case it wasn't
obvious, they're obviously after that
booty and some treasure from what I
understand. Now, the princip are
actually a little more interesting than
uh just being pirates as well because
they are often times people's last
resort. They can certainly get up to
shady things. They are also not at one
with themselves. They are divided
between the new bloods and the old
bloods who have very different ways of
looking at things. But in some ways, you
could kind of consider them a necessary
evil because they are one of the only
people willing to do something about the
starving Roaru from the Hana's lowest
cast. That is to say, you know, help
them. But obviously, they're not exactly
doing it out of the kindness of their
hearts either. But depending on which
faction you're dealing with, they are
more than happy to undercut all sorts of
different laws as you would expect from
pirates. Some of them are slavers, some
of them are anti-slavery. They're kind
of all over the place, but trusting any
of them completely would be a
questionable decision. And for me at
least, I really love how each of those
factions is represented in a way that
feels uh plausible, let's say. Like each
of these factions and their motivation
seems realistic. They all have uh
different qualities to them. Some of
them are doing some good things. Usually
that's coupled with them also doing some
terrible thing. And so if you're looking
for like a moral high ground here, there
really isn't one. It's just kind of
shades of gray and which questionable
thing you're okay with them doing or
none of them because you can go the
independent route if you want. But that
back and forth is really compelling and
each of them has their own quest line
and many of them are associated with
companions. So before we start talking
combat, let's talk a little bit about
companions. Companions are for the most
part representatives of a faction. A
couple of them are returning from the
original game. Adir and Aloth as well as
Palagena. And then we also get some new
ones as well via Teahu. Now, truth be
told, uh, companions are a little hit or
miss for me. I think actually this might
be the last game Obsidian did with
romance. So, there is romance in here if
you want it that you can't romance
everybody. But, the I guess you could
call it a problem is that a lot of these
companions outside of what are clearly
meant to be the main ones don't get a
lot of interaction. uh so much so that
they uh post launch actually had to add
a recommended companion by quest you
could undertake. So you could try to get
the most out of them. But if you fail to
do that, there are some of these
companions who might barely say anything
along your journey. And that's
complicated a little farther by the fact
that there's your actual companions and
then there are sidekicks. Sidekicks are
characters that are kind of in between a
hired mercenary and a full-blown
companion and they really only have
interactions in a couple of quests. The
thing is, companions don't feel that
much better than side quests in that
regard, depending on, you know, what
quest you're doing with them in your
party. But for the most part, try to do
the faction quest with that faction
companion, and you'll be mostly better
off. Now, Aloth and Adar return from the
first game. They're mostly the same.
Aloth is dealing with the fallout of the
Leen Key from the first game. Adear is
trying to reconcile his sort of belief
in Athys with what is happening here.
And that's actually kind of more
interesting that might initially sound.
He has a more grounded feel to him.
You've got Maya, the sister of Korua
from the first game. She is a
representative of Rouatai and gets up to
some shady stuff in the name of progress
for Rouatai. And she has to struggle
with the realities of doing what is
needed to impose order here, at least as
far as Rowati sees it, which is
difficult for her. Uh, Palagena makes
her return. Palagena is in fact a member
of the Veian trading company. Palagena
is most interesting for reasons that
have nothing to do with the BTC as it
were because she is also a godlike or
something of a former godlike in some
ways because at an early age she had her
chime sort of severed. The thing that
makes a person a godlike and so as a
result she is not a full godlike the way
you would think of the rest of them
which is why she looks the way she does.
and she has a side quest that kind of
like leans into the nature of godlikes
and stuff that is super interesting. So,
there's that. And then there is Sarapin.
Saraphin represents the principy. He is
an Orland cipher usually. And he's all
right. To be honest with you, he's a
little run-of-the-mill for me. Um, his
character is very, I would say, on the
nose in terms of where they go with his
story and stuff. It's actually really
easy to miss his companion quest because
even in the Prince of Eye quest lines, I
feel like he doesn't have that much to
say. So, he's always felt a little
underwhelming to me. Uh, one of the
better ones, however, is Teahu, the Hana
representative. He is a water shaper,
and more importantly, he is a marine
godlike. That is important lore-wise
because it confirms that gods can in
fact make multiple types of godlike, and
teu is special in that regard. There's
only one of him. There are a lot of moon
godlike, and they are also associated
with the goddess Andra, but Andra made
teu very, very specifically. She
considers him like her son, and it's a
very different situation, and that's
important for another lore reason, which
I may or may not bother to explain. I'll
see how I feel. But he's lived a cushy
life. The Hana see him as this
incredibly good omen, and they've done
basically everything they can to make
his life very easy. And as such, he's a
bit of an artist and sees water shaping
as art, which is very different from how
other water shapers see it. And where
they struggle, he's a natural. He's a
fun one to have around. His main story
is about him trying to reconcile who he
is with who the Hana are and how to move
forward and of course Andra's role in
all that and how she sees him and wants
him to grow. Interesting guy overall.
But then last but not least for the
actual companions, we have Jod. Jod is a
priestess of Gone, which is one of the
aspects of Aithusy. She sees gathering
up lost souls and guiding them uh to
their rebirth, if you will, as her role
in her priesthood. how she does that,
how she feels about it, how she goes
about it, and whether or not it drives
her absolutely bananas is the nature of
her particular story, which is pretty
interesting overall. As someone who's
tied really closely to Aithis, she gets
a ton of interactions, as you would
expect, and as a priest, she's super
useful because of her support abilities.
So, I usually keep her around for that.
Everyone else is a sidekick. Now, what's
curious about sidekicks is pre-DLC, they
did not have hardly any interactions.
They had a couple of things here and
there, but the DLC's actually added a
bunch of interactions for these
sidekicks which actually makes them feel
a little more impactful. Like Vatir, for
instance, is a sidekick that was added
by Beast of Winter and he's like one of
the main focuses of that DLC. So, he
gets a ton of interactions there. And
while that's a late game thing, and so
he doesn't get a lot of play elsewhere,
he's neat in that regard. And combined
with him being a godlike of Rimmerrand,
which he's the only one we've ever seen
in the game, and that's pretty neat.
There's also Rek, which I've already
mentioned. He gives you all that lore on
Yzua. Constantine, a dwarf you can pick
up in Nekotaka, gets a bunch of
interactions in the Seeker Slayer
Survivor DLC. Facina and Aloth actually
both get a bunch of interactions in the
Forbidden Sanctum DLC. And Yiddwin, uh,
the cipher you can also pick up in
Nekotaga get some interactions and some
unique ones even in Beast of Winter,
which open up some, uh, let's say less
than nice options for you. So, they have
a lot of companions with varying levels
of, I would say, interactivity with the
player. Some of them feel a little
underwhelming as a result of that, but
there are some pretty good interactions
there if you go out of your way to make
sure you're cycling through companions
and you have the right one at the right
time, which can be a little much. From
there, though, I finally want to move on
a bit to combat. So, let's talk about
combat. You've almost certainly seen
some of it playing in the background
here up to this point. As mentioned,
combat is either a turn-based or real
time with pause-based affair. I vastly
prefer real time with pause. I don't
feel like turnbased is implemented super
well in Deadfire, but if you're playing
on normal, you'll probably be fine, but
real time with pause is my go-to here.
One of the main things you need to know
straight away are then the AI setups.
So, something you can do that we've
actually seen in previous games like
Final Fantasy 12 or Dragon Age Origins
is you have this system of conditionals
that you can set up in order to
customize a character's AI and that is
how they will act when you are not
controlling them, provided you have it
turned on. You can get super super
granular with this. So much so that you
can basically set up characters to
automate themselves entirely. I've been
playing this game enough over the years
that I actually have a custom AI setup
for basically every character that you
can play. And so, while occasionally I
might give them directions, for the most
part, they're free to kind of do their
thing, which then lets me focus a little
more on what my main character is doing,
but you can also do the same thing for
your main character if you want.
However, you also don't have to do that.
Like, you can get in there and control
characters yourself if you want. Like
for instance, when you're playing solo,
like for my ultimate run, I only really
automated like one thing, and that's
because I was actively involved in
controlling and making sure everything
happened as I needed it to. And you're
only controlling one character there, so
it makes sense to do that. The only
thing you really need to automate in
that situation was the casts on
Salvation of Time so you don't
accidentally die. Now, I've already
mentioned a couple of these things, but
some improvements that they've made on
the combat system from the original game
are things like the ability to retarget
a spell or the empower abilities. So, in
the original, if you cast a spell and
like people moved or whatever and you
wanted to retarget it, you couldn't do
that. But here, you can. You can just
click on the retargeting button and move
the spell where you actually want it to
go based on where things have moved to
or how things have played out, etc.,
which is a nice little thing. Empower
allows you to cast a spell or ability at
a higher power level than you normally
would be able to when you hopefully need
that little bit of extra oomph, and you
can do that so many times per rest. you
don't even need to use empower that
often, but there are situations where it
is very useful and there are some items
from the DLC in particular that lean
into that. So, there's certainly that,
but let's talk a little bit about the
basics from there. So, real time with
pause mode is in large part determined
by things like your recovery time. Based
on how heavy your character is and some
of your stats and your attributes and
how you've distributed them, you have a
base recovery time. So recovery time is
simply how long you have to wait in
between actions to take another action.
Ideally, the lower the better. But if
you have something like a low dexterity
or you have heavy armor on or you're
using a slower weapon like a two-hander,
it can take a little while in between
attacks and whatnot and you obviously
want to minimize that. There are class
features that can help with this like
fighters can mitigate some of the
recovery time from heavier armor as an
example. And it's just something you
need to keep in mind because ideally you
want to take as many actions as possible
so the enemy can't do as much and you
can interrupt what they are doing. Now,
in order to hit the enemy, it's
basically accuracy versus one of their
four defenses. Most everything you do is
going to target one of a character's
four defenses. Things like fortitude or
will. And almost everything you do has a
baseline accuracy based on your stats as
well. And obviously, you just want to be
more accurate than their defense is.
There are also other aspects to this
like penetration and armor rating and
some finer details that are mostly
pretty self-explanatory like the higher
your armor, the less damage you're going
to take from physical attacks, stuff
like that. The power level thing that I
mentioned, but for the most part, it's a
relatively straightforward system that I
don't feel like is super difficult to
get your head around. Really, most of
the fun for combat for me comes with
itemization and the things you can do.
As I've also already mentioned, there's
stuff like the red hand, which lets you
just twoshot various enemies, even
bosses included, which is really fun.
There's the stuff you can do with
Barring Death Door and Salvation of
Time. There is a actually there's a bug
with an item called I think it's strand
of favor, which lets you like
indefinitely stack like durations of
effects and things, which is also kind
of fun. And so while combat can be this
really simple thing that you just get
good equipment and automate it with,
there's also this deeper layer if you
choose to go looking for it, especially
on higher difficulties where you find
like all these like little interactions
and things you might not necessarily
think about and how they can benefit
you. But then of course there's how that
functions normally and then there's how
that functions during like say Barath's
combat challenge where combat doesn't
end until those enemies die. Under
normal circumstances, however, combat
ends when you get far enough away from
an enemy. And early game on higher
difficulties, this is actually really
useful because something you can do is
just kite enemies away from where they
start and some of them usually won't
make it. And so you can kind of separate
groups of enemies to make them a little
more manageable just as a matter of like
slightly more divide and conquer, if you
will. If you don't like the companions
or the classes or abilities they have on
offer, you can go either respspec them
or just hire mercenaries that you can
make on your own and add them to your
party even though they won't necessarily
have any interactions. You can also use
items from your pockets to do things
like summon in creatures or set traps,
which leans into stealth a little more.
So outside of all of that, uh you also
have active and passive skills where you
can do all sorts of stuff with them
really, but like something you can do,
for example, is set traps for enemies to
walk into and potentially damage them
that way. Stealth is present. I don't
like combat stealth personally, but
non-combat stealth is super easy to take
advantage of because of the way line of
sight works. Stealing things via stealth
is extraordinarily easy. Probably a
little too easy to be honest. But if you
want to like say pickpocket characters,
you're going to want a high stealth and
slide of hand. And you can do all of
that. And those are things you can do to
initiate combat from stealth. And you
can even uh use stealth and item called
spark crackers to redirect enemies and
cause them to investigate things, which
is another way you can approach things
via like divide and conquer strategies,
if you will. And so, uh, strangely
enough, I guess the main point I want to
get across in the combat section is
really just that I think Deadfire is a
rare game that actually embodies the
saying of easy to learn, hard to master.
There is nothing particularly
complicated about Deadfire's combat, but
there is so much depth there if you go
looking for it. And as you probably
know, if you watch a lot of my CRPG
videos, I love some mechanical depth.
And short of just like going class by
class and talking about individual
things or effects, I think that's
probably the best broad overview I could
give you without getting a little too
bogged down in the details. So, next up,
we're going to talk DLC. Dead Fire
ultimately got three DLC. One I don't
like very much and two that I think are
very cool. So, the one I don't like is
Seeker Slayer Survivor. This is a
basically arena DLC where you can take
on various combat challenges via an
island called Kazuari and its arena, the
Crucible. The story here is all right,
but the main thing here is just combat
challenges in the form of various arena
fights. They're okay. Ironically, I
think they're easier to do in the
Ultimate than they are to fight
normally, which is kind of funny, but I
don't know. This one just never really
spoke to me. I will say next, uh, Beast
of Winter is my favorite. I love this. I
think Rimmerand is just like a really
cool god and character, and this DLC
focuses on him a lot. You get an
invitation to a place called
Harbingers's Watch, which is an ice flow
that has been expanding lately, and
you'd like to find out why after getting
a mysterious invitation from who turns
out to be Vatir, a sidekick and
recruitable character that you can take
through this DLC. Because at the heart
of this DLC is a dragon that is escaping
through a portal to the beyond known as
the white void, the realm of Rimmergand,
the god of entropy and oblivion, which
is why this ice flow is expanding. And
it's just a really cool DLC that focuses
in on some really great lore like around
St. Widwin and the old Hana
civilization. It's also got some really
cool fights and there's some unique
interactions. And while this is not like
canon in any sense of the word, it also
provides a potential solution for what
to do about the watcher, especially in
the face of like all the reincarnation
stuff that happens. If there's ever a
Pillars 3, I have no idea if we'll still
be playing the Watcher of Cadua, but
they have sort of built themselves in a
little off-ramp here via Beast of Winter
if they choose to take it, that is. But
I love this DLC. It's again my favorite
personally. I just thought it was very
cool. And then there is Forbidden
Sanctum. Forbidden Sanctum deals with
Whale and the Titans. You see, when the
gods manufactured themselves into gods,
at one point they made the Titans,
bodies they could walk around the world
of Aora with, they eventually decided
this was a bad idea and abandoned it.
But the bodies can still be found. And
that's kind of what's at the heart of
the Forbidden Sanctum DLC. The body of
Whale, the god of mystery. At the same
time, you get to interact with the hand
occult, which makes it its job to try to
make things obscure and unknown. And so,
you can get all this lore that's like
slightly wrong and of questionable use.
As Whale seeks to distribute
disinformation about all sorts of stuff,
you get to involve yourself in the
Council of Arch Magi. And there's also
some really cool fights and some really
unique set pieces that are here as well.
So, Forbidden Sanctum is cool and an
enjoyable experience, worth experiencing
if you like the rest of the game, of
course. That however finally brings us
to the Steam Deck section before we
start wrapping this up. Uh, just in case
you were curious, this game is
considered playable on the Steam Deck,
and that is due to the text size and the
lack of controller support. I will say
the lack of controller support is a
little strange, as this game is
available on consoles, but does not have
controller support via Steam for some
reason. As a result, you'll need to
configure the controls on the Steam Deck
if you want to do that. But if you're
willing to jump through those hoops, it
plays fine there, just so you are aware.
But that brings me to the positives and
negatives and then my conclusion. So, on
the positive side of things, if you
couldn't tell, I just love the world of
Aora. The lore of this place and like
the back and forth and the situation
between the gods, the mortals, the messy
nuance that goes into the themes of
colonization that saturate every game in
this series. And while I absolutely
understand that some of the presentation
is a little dry and not for everybody,
for me, I love this stuff. It's
actually, I would go so far as to say,
one of those instances in which I love
the lore even more than I love the game
itself, even though the game is pretty
fun. The other side of it, though, is
really just like the depth beyond the
surface level. Like, if you choose to
dig in, there's just so much interesting
stuff to discover, so many little
details and little things that this game
gets right. And that if you go searching
for them, I think they stick with you.
And it's just one of those games that
over time has even grown on me more and
more thanks to all these little things
you can discover and ways to play and
mastery over individual systems and
going back and trying like a different
playthrough with this individual
combination of things, that kind of
stuff. I think it also just makes a ton
of improvements that make it a more
playable game than the original. Even if
I understand the people who prefer the
tone and everything from the first game,
there are nonetheless some negatives.
Obviously, this isn't my favorite CRPG
that I've talked about over the years,
and that's for a variety of different
reasons. Uh, one of which is the very,
very short main story. A little too
short, to be honest with you. 90% of the
game, I would say, is really more side
content than main story. But the flip
side of that as well is that you get
this cliffhanger ending that
unfortunately I don't know that we're
ever going to see a resolution to. It's
been 8 years since this game launched,
and uh, it's not looking good, all
things considered. If you've been
watching the news, as far as the
industry is concerned, my hopes are not
high for A Pillars 3. And you have like
this incredibly interesting thing that
would be the obvious focus of Pillars 3,
and I just don't know if we're ever
going to get it, and it drives me crazy,
and I don't love that. Another uh
honestly kind of nitpicky negative is
the pathfinding can be rough. Uh on the
world map, especially, sometimes you uh
will be traveling and then your ship
will just stop. Even if you set course
for somewhere via the menu or even just
clicking on it, the ship is just like,
"Actually, no thanks." and it just
completely stops and then you got to go
in and make it move again. And that can
happen on regular maps as well.
Sometimes characters just become
unresponsive and don't want to go
anywhere. That can certainly be very
frustrating. There's that stuff with the
companions I mentioned where it really
feels like they should have more
involvement than they do and they again
tried to help that out a little bit with
the uh recommended companions for
quests. you get the most interactions,
but even then it kind of feels like
they're not chiming in as much as they
should. Especially when you're often
bringing like the direct competition via
faction representatives into enemy
headquarters and sometimes they'll
comment on that, but there are other
times where you're like, I really feel
like you should be saying something and
they just don't. They will eventually
leave if you commit to like other
factions and stuff, but even then it
just feels like a little off in places,
which isn't helped along by the fact
that uh your main companions really only
have one quest and only a couple of
those quests are even substantial. Like
Sarapins, for instance, is super short.
But ultimately, that brings me to my
conclusion, which I realize might come
as an astounding shock to some of you,
but generally, yes, I obviously
recommend this game. In fact, I think
there are very few games I have beaten
as thoroughly as Dead Fire. It's not a
perfect game by any means, but it's got
just a ton of fantastic details. I think
it's a huge improvement over the
original in all the ways that matter to
me personally. And while it certainly
has its shortcomings, I by and large
think it's an incredible game set in an
incredibly interesting world. And I
think it would be a really big shame if
we didn't see any more games set in the
world of Aora. But even if we don't, I
still hope people wind up playing uh
Pillars One, Pillars 2, even Avowed and
appreciating what this world was all
about. Appreciating all the tiny little
details that I think often go unnoticed,
like the fact that all the enemies
technically drop different types of
currency that the game helpfully sorts
out into the single currency that you
actually use on the trading screens, for
example, just as a way to help
differentiate their various cultures
that I talked about. But I suppose I
will close with this. As I'm sure many
people watching this are aware, Pillars
of Eternity 1 and 2 have never been my
favorite CRPG. I've been pretty upfront
about that. Gameplaywise, I have
certainly played better and more
interesting games that I honestly think
if we ever do see Aillars 3, it would
need to do something to try to contend
with in the hopes that it actually sold
well. But one thing that has forever
stuck with me after playing these games
and why I made so many lore videos about
it and why I'm making this video and why
I talk about them every chance I get is
that there is something truly special
about the world of Aora that I think is
worth continuing and worth building on.
I don't know what the future of this
franchise holds. Pillars 3 seems less
likely by the day. A vowed 2 seems
possible, but I got to be honest with
you, I just don't know how well that
would do financially. But what I do know
is that the world of Aora is one of a
handful of games where the setting and
the world building has sort of
transcended just what it is in video
games to me. And so if you wind up
playing this or any of the Pillars games
or a vowed even and any of that speaks
to you even half as much as I've enjoyed
the world, then I would certainly love
to hear about it. But I do think that's
where we're going to wrap up this
particular video. If you enjoyed all of
that rambling, by all means like,
comment, subscribe. all that YouTube
jazz. On the off chance anything happens
with The Pillars universe in the future,
I will certainly be covering it.
Otherwise though, I typically just
review games. But regardless of any of
that, truly just thank you so much for
watching. I really do appreciate it. May
you wander in wisdom and have an amazing
day.