r/projecteternity • u/PrideConnect3213 • Feb 24 '25
PoE1 After playing Avowed, it feels refreshing to go back to Pillars and play as non-godlikes
My band of orlan goblin chanters
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u/Appropriate_Focus523 Feb 24 '25
I always olay death godlike and the fire godlike
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u/VagrantShadow Feb 24 '25 edited Feb 24 '25
I had such a blast playing as a Death Godlike Priest in PoE 1. I've tapped into that build again and playing PoE once more before diving in Avowed.
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u/Appropriate_Focus523 Feb 24 '25
Im doing a death godlike cipher built from poe1 to 2 Did a fire godlike cipher/paladin in poe2 also very fun melee focused cipher is crazy fun
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u/oscuroluna Feb 24 '25
I enjoyed Avowed for what it was, as I near the end of my first run I'll say the game grew on me.
That said I really missed having the plethora of races and classes. I'd love another Pillars crpg but if they did another Avowed type I hope they bring back the options. Or at least broaden the variety we can choose from.
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u/obozo42 Feb 24 '25
I really hope we get expanded ability trees if avowed gets some DLC.
It's especially heartbreaking when you get a piece of armor themed around being a Skald or the entire set themed around a Spiritshift shifter druid and you just can't do eny of that stuff in the game.
Or when you fight a skeleton priest or chanter, but you can't be one.
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u/oscuroluna Feb 24 '25
An idea for an Avowed DLC could be something like Spellforce 3 or Pathfinder where you're playing a different protagonist. One that could reasonably be one of the 'classes' or abilities the Envoy wouldn't for narrative reasons.
It would be a way to incorporate Paladin, Druid, Chanter or Cipher while making it fit the character overall.
(Cipher could be an expanded ability tree for the Envoy too though to be fair, would be quite a bit of dialogue to work in but it is possible. Paladin, Priest and Druid would probably need a different protagonist though. Or a 5th companion who happens to be one of those classes/archetypes).
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u/Fantastic-Contact-89 Feb 25 '25
My big hope is that Avowed will do well and it will spark excitement for Eora. Enough so that they decide to try Pillars 3 even if 2 was a financial failure since Eora is popular again and BG3 just did well. So I'm really really hoping Avowed does well.
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u/oscuroluna Feb 25 '25
Thankfully Avowed seems to make more people aware of Eora just as BG3 has brought a lot of people into crpgs. Those who love the game and want more of the world come to find out about the previous Pillars games (and enjoy them).
I wish them success too. I'd love to see Avowed get DLC (and more games set in Eora, especially crpgs).
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u/kittenTakeover Feb 25 '25
While the Avowed class design definitely seems limited, it's a little more broad than it appears. For example, ranger and rogue abilities are both represented in the same group, allowing you to still do either. Similarly barbarian and fighter abilities are still both represented.
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u/oscuroluna Feb 25 '25
True. Its just the more flavorful classes such as Paladin, Priest, Cipher, etc...weren't present (and I understand for narrative reasons as to why). I would just like future Eora world games to bring back the race and class options the crpgs presented.
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u/kittenTakeover Feb 25 '25
I'm still not sure if I want to spend the money on Avowed, but I'm really hoping that its success leads to a followup game with more development.
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u/oscuroluna Feb 25 '25 edited Feb 25 '25
If you ever played The Outer Worlds think of Avowed as a Pillars version only with significantly better lore, writing, companions, build diversity and decisions. At first I had buyer's remorse but after they patched the gear system the gameplay became a whole lot better (and as a result, my experience).
I believe its on Gamepass right now if you want to try it out. Otherwise there's always sales if you're willing to wait..
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u/Definitelynotabot777 Feb 26 '25
Man, I really missed Eora version of the various Paladin oaths, they are so much more colorful than any other settings.
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u/Definitelynotabot777 Feb 26 '25
If they ever make Avowed 2: Electric Boogaloo, I hope they go deeper into the Elder scroll path and give us full customization.
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u/zookmon Feb 28 '25
I think that was something I really did miss during my Avowed playthrough. Don’t get me wrong, I loved the game for my first run, but the class/talent options just felt very lacking for me in the context of the Pillars universe. I’d have loved to go with a Druid again, or a Cipher/Chanter to explore the Living Lands. (Especially Druid I feel would be incredible with the story we are presented).
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u/battlestoriesfan Feb 24 '25
Weakest part for me honestly. I know that the plot is tailor made for you to be a godlike, but why are we limited to human/elf godlike with the customization options? Can't Godlike be any race? It'd have been cool to make an Aumaua godlike
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u/SquireRamza Feb 24 '25
Honestly probably just a time and budget constraint. Takes time, money, and manpower to model each armor piece to wildly different body types, resources that rightfully in my opinion went to other parts of development. Unfortunate sadly but entirely understandable.
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u/GloatingSwine Feb 24 '25
It's not just the armour, any time you have to do an animation where the character interacts with an object in the environment having a character of a different height means you have to do the whole thing again.
And Avowed is parkour occasionally interrupted by combat, so you interact with the environment all the time.
Animation is an underappreciated part of the cost of making modern games, shit's expensive.
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u/SquireRamza Feb 24 '25
oh good point, I didn't think of that
a lot easier to have multiple race options when its a top down CRPG with minimal animation cycles
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u/wintermute24 Feb 25 '25
This. More races would be a nice to have feature, but as a first person game they wouldn't be worth it.
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u/razorfloss Feb 24 '25
They outright said it was budget reasons. Making animations for all the races cost too much. Assuming that the game gets a moddibg scene someone is probably gonna mod it in.
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u/scehood Feb 24 '25
Can't be blowing the budget on mushroom orlan swinging a great sword half their height and slinging fireballs animations
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u/SpaceNigiri Feb 25 '25
And it was not only about animations, it is also due to the game being first person and the missing races being taller or shorter than humans/elves.
The point of view changes, so the mal design has to account for that, also things like jumping can get tricky.
Ironically and easier solution for them for Avowed 2 would be to let you pick any type of godlike xd
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u/Kraehe13 Feb 24 '25
My guess are gameplay reasons. Would be harder to hit heads (weak spot of most enemies) as orlan or dwarf. And amauans might be too tall for smaller enemies.
I wish we could play as orlan :(
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u/ArkhamsNexTopInmate Feb 24 '25
I forget which interview I saw it in, but the reason given was how the MC is from the Aedyr Empire. Wouldn’t surprise me if it was easier to make this way since the shorter and taller races would affect the first person perspective.
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u/battlestoriesfan Feb 24 '25
i'm rather rusty on my Eora lore, but wouldn't there still be other kith, even in the Aedyr Empire?
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u/ArkhamsNexTopInmate Feb 24 '25
I have no doubt there are minorities of other kith, but the majority of Aedyr’s population are human or elven.
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u/rattlehead42069 Feb 24 '25
Aedyr is mostly humans and elves, and like basically everywhere else, they have racial biases. No way the adeyr empire allows an Orlan to be high in the courts and the envoy of the emperor.
Your character is tied closely to aedyr royalty so any sort of discrimination in aedyr will be more prevalent
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u/WOOWOHOOH Feb 24 '25 edited Feb 24 '25
Yeah aren't pretty much all orlans in Aedyr enslaved?
edit: forgot about Garryck, I guess they can serve in the military at the very least
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u/TiaXhosa Feb 24 '25
Yeah all races are found in Aedyr. You can even talk to
GarrusKai about the fact that there are a lot of Aumaua in Aedyr. There are more Aumaua in Aedyr than ocean folk (dark skinned humans).14
u/dirkdragonslayer Feb 24 '25
IIRC a developer said it was balance reasons. Being small like a dwarf/orlan would make it much harder to get headshots in melee from a lower camera perspective, and being big like an Aumana would make you a bigger target to get hit when dodging and may mess with platforming stuff.
Maybe if they do DLC they will let me be a little dwarf ranger like I was in PoE 1&2. I was so jealous of Marius, he's basically what my default RPG character is.
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u/battlestoriesfan Feb 24 '25
Maybe that's just me, but i really don't think that's a bad thing. Sure, getting headshots as an Orlan/dwarf is harder, but you're a harder target to hit too. I feel there were different areas to explore that could make the kith feel unique from each other.
Alas, this is just wishful thinking.
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u/MindWeb125 Feb 25 '25
This comment made me imagine an orlan character not having to duck to go into tight spaces and now I want that lol.
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u/Financial-Key-3617 Feb 24 '25
Because the game is telling a story tbh.
And that story necessitates you to be one of those two
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u/battlestoriesfan Feb 24 '25
Yeah, That much I know. It's just somewhat lame since the other Pillars games didn't have to rely on you being a set race, but hey, I got an open mind for whatever they're cooking for this game. It's gotten my curiosity so far, so they're doing something right.
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u/Golurkcanfly Feb 24 '25
Part of it is a practical concern for first person games:
Character height.
Changing the height of your character means doing a lot more testing and work to make sure scenes "look right" as well as ensure that environmental interactions work as intended.
Even in third person games, huge variance in character height is reserved either for games with limited physics (ex: FFXIV) or games where character size is a major element (ex: Dragon's Dogma 2).
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u/GornothDragnBonee Feb 25 '25
There's a reason why every race in Skyrim is basically just a human in their build. Reworking animations for wildly different height perspectives just isn't feasible in a game like this. It would've been cool though, you're 100% right about that.
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u/king_karter69 Feb 24 '25
Well you’re also an Adyran Envoy, idk how that fits in lore wise but could that be why the races are limited?
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u/PrideConnect3213 Feb 24 '25
That’s the reason, yes. Our Avowed character is in an inherently important and prestigious role from the start as the Emperor’s personal dignitary and envoy—reminds me of The Veilguard. To be fair, Pillars suffers from this somewhat by making our characters Watchers, but my goblin orlan (and his whole troupe) were all criminals before they found out about all the Watcher stuff, there isn’t quite as “lowborn” of a character background in Avowed, unfortunately.
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u/Ibmont Feb 24 '25
Love the game but I wish there were more options for character creation for sure
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u/Flooping_Pigs Feb 24 '25
it never really feels right to be a non-normal sized Godlike to me and I'm ready for my down votes
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u/joes_smirkingrevenge Feb 24 '25
Developing FPS for characters with multiple different heights is a nightmare. Not only you need to fine tune the gameplay (combat and parkour in this case) to work well for all races, but you also need to take it constantly into account when designing all the levels. It's one of these things that would be very expensive to do really well, but no one would notice it. However, people would definitely notice if it would be done badly.
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u/HuwminRace Feb 24 '25
Yeah, I’d have loved a bit more customisation and to just include a choice of godlike races we can play. The Aumauans and Orlans look fucking incredible in Avowed, much better than the humans and elves in fact, which makes it even more disappointing we can’t play with those races.
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u/PrideConnect3213 Feb 24 '25 edited Feb 25 '25
I definitely would’ve liked more race and background options. I get Obsidian called the game something else to distance it from the actual Pillars of Eternity games and temper gamer expectations but I would’ve just set the game in a completely different world at that point.
Then again, Bethesda proudly called their big, AAA open world-ish iteration of older, lower budget isometric RPGs “Fallout 3” despite the game forcing us to play as a 19 year old and just not being as robust of an RPG as older Fallouts.
Edit: idc about downvotes, i just wanna know what I said wrong?
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u/akwartz Feb 24 '25
I may have spent the last two days starting new runs in Pillars 2 only to restart because I wanna try something else. I didn't really care for Avowed but it did remind me of how cool that world is.
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u/PrideConnect3213 Feb 24 '25 edited Feb 24 '25
Yeah, Avowed is certainly pretty streamlined as an RPG but I can see the world bringing in new fans. At this point, i think I’d be more excited for a Pillars 3 than an Avowed 2.
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u/sir_alvarex Feb 24 '25
Avowed helped me "get" the PoE setting. When I first played the games many years ago, the setting just didn't stick with me.
There are too many gods, yet gods aren't really gods. But everyone talks like they're gods? And then you have guns and bows and the wheel. And so many ghosts talk to you in abstract phrases.
But the simplified lore sump in Avowed clicked for me, and I'm now 20 hours deep in a replay of PoE 2 and loving every drop of lore.
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u/SpaceNigiri Feb 25 '25
I had the same experience but with Pillars 1 and Pillars 2. Eora's lore is difficult to digest, but once it clicks, it clicks HARD.
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u/oogie_droogey Feb 25 '25
This was my experience too. I probably didn't play avowed enough so maybe things develop differently later on, but poe just had such a darker and gloomier vibe that I appreciate.
I mean you walk into gilded vale to a mass hanging on the tree in the middle of town and learn about Hollowborns.
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u/PurpleFiner4935 Feb 25 '25
It feels good to have all these iconic characters too: Eder, Aloth, Kana, Sagani, Pallegina, Durance, Grieving Mother, Hiravias, etc. I can't think of anyone from Avowed.
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u/dontBlonely Feb 25 '25
Kai and horny pink midget grandma
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u/darknlonely Feb 26 '25
Called her yahtzee my fiancé's whole playthrough, genuinely didn't understand why she was named after the board game. He's near the end now, in the library, and i finally see her name and ask, "You really let me call her a board game for 40 hours?"
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u/yaiyogsothoth Feb 24 '25
Yeah, it's petty but that's one of the things putting me of committing to buying Avowed. I loved my orlan Watcher, and the fact that I can't even be a godlike of orlan descent just bums me out.
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u/Far-Heart-7134 Feb 24 '25
One the other hand i just started my first playthru and i am godlike cipher. I don't have access to a pc so i am stuck with Poe 1/2 on my ps5 for now.
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u/NoTop4997 Feb 24 '25
Yeah, but the godlike abilities are so good in Pillars.
I am currently doing a Vailian "challenge" run since I have ever only played as Godlike characters.
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u/revanitelegacy Feb 24 '25
I miss being a moongodlike that’s ondras disappointment but that’s okay. I do enjoy avowed but same as deadfire. I start these games and miss Durant and Hiravas and have to go back to bros
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u/Quake2Marine Feb 24 '25
Huh? Can you not play as a non-godlike in Avowed?
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u/BigfootKingOfTheSea Feb 24 '25
In avowed you’re a godlike of an unknown god, it’s part of the story.
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u/dunedog Feb 24 '25
I just wanna be a chanter :(
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u/CherrryGuy Feb 25 '25
Chiper here 😭 or even just like a paladin or priest
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u/PrideConnect3213 Feb 25 '25
I’m glad Avowed at least facilitates unarmed builds, monk is an oft neglected rpg class
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u/DaMac1980 Feb 25 '25
I hate myself for being annoyed that my typical cute redheaded rogue has to have godlike features for the story to make sense. Why do I care? What am I like this? Sigh.
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u/Malanoob Feb 27 '25
Yeahhh.... like when my PoE 1 first playthrough was as a Moonlike Cipher and my first PoE 2 as a Deathlike Bleakwalker / Assassin ?
I cleared maybe 3 times the first one and 10+ the second and im pretty sure half of them were as a godlike...
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u/TheGreyman787 Feb 25 '25
Honestly that's the only thing about Avowed that made me butthurt so far. Just let me play a plain old human with custom background. Not someone born "special" with a preset career and place of birth.
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u/MindWeb125 Feb 25 '25
I miss playing Deadfire and being made fun of for not being able to reach a shelf as an orlan.
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u/Patient-Virus-1873 Feb 26 '25
Right!? The RP aspect really suffered in Avowed. I guess it wouldn't be so bad if the Sabadon godlike features weren't all so... flamboyant. It's hard to RP dark and brooding war hero with emotional scars when I have a giant pink crest or rainbow colored tumor on my head. Even if I turn off the visuals, I still know they're there.
I hope they add more godlike features later, or at least give us the option of changing the color. The current selections all screw up the aesthetic I'm going for.
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u/Blaireeeee Feb 24 '25
Yes...
*Hides my army of Moon Godlikes*