Divinity: Original Sin 2 update 3.0.15.252 rejigs attributes system

Pretty significant changes are afoot in the Early Access build of Divinity: Original Sin 2, which has been updated today to version 3.0.15.252. As usual, there’s a jovial Larian video outlining much of what the update brings (see below).

The main changes are to the game’s attribute point systems. You can hear about those from around 8:30 onwards in the video, where Larian discuss how (for example) a point in Strength now gives a boost to physical armour. Memory slots are now automatically given every two levels, and weapon types come with an automatic, default skill. Single handed weapons get ‘Sucker Punch’, which can knock foes to the floor.

Other improvements on the way for Divinity: Original Sin 2 are full impact animations in combat (the fighters will actually hit one another now), and hand-placed, unique weapons (or other items) to discover. The former aren’t all in place yet, but early work on those animations should be present in the patch. Likewise, a few special items (around seven or so) should now be dotted around the Early Access map.

Video, and full patch notes, follow.

Improvements

• Improved player feedback when switching to inactive characters during combat
• Improved player feedback it’s not possible to perform certain actions
• Improved UI sound events
• Physical armor and Magic armor now have hit effects
• Improved path visualizations in combat
• Improved clickable area of listed savegames
• Improved and redesigned the bottom bar interface.
• Added option to switch between hotbars (up to five)
• Chat toggle is now on the bottom bar
• Improved lighting and visuals in Blood Rose cave
• Improved visualisation of move preview
• Improved following behavior when leader of party is in combat
• Improved targetting preview when casting teleport skills (out of sight is now properly greyed out)
• Tweaked and added several effects
• Updated several animations that were not finished yet

Additions

• Added new tornado effect and fixed tornado atmosphere settings
• Added preview for attacks with multiple projectiles
• Added blinking and progress bar in windows (when game is minimized)
• Players now get directly assigned a free slot in the arena lobby upon joining
• Teams are automatically assigned for AI’s in the arena lobby
• Added combat log entries for source vampirism
• Added more logging stats for balancing reasons
• Ifan’s recruitment dialog now recognizes and allows Drudanae

Balancing and design changesPrimary Attributes overhaul

• Strength now provides 5% damage bonus and 2% Physical Armour bonus per point-
• Finesse now provides 5% damage bonus and 1% Dodging per point
• Intelligence now provides 5% damage bonus and 2% Magic Armour bonus per point
• Characters now have a base amount of vitality that grows with levels.
• Constitution now provides 7% vitality bonus.
• Characters now start with 3 Memory Slots and receive 1 free Memory Slot every 2 levels.
• Memory attribute now provides 1 Memory Slot per point
• Wits now provides 1% Critical Chance and 1 Initiative per point.
• Vitality, armour and damage numbers start from lower values, but grow faster each level.

Changes to combat abilities

• Combat abilities now give larger bonuses per point and are capped at 10 points.
• Previous Defence abilities were removed.
• New Defence ability: Pain Reflection. Allows you to reflect 10% of incoming damage back onto attackers per point
• Leadership is now a combat ability in Defence category. Allies in 5m range receive 5% Dodging and 5% All Res per point

Changes to talents

• Re-enabled Elemental Affinity talent (Reduces AP cost of skills when standing in surface of corresponding element. Does not apply to skills with AP cost smaller or equal to 1)
• Added new memory talent: Mnemonic. (adds 3 Memory)
• Changed human talent to give bartering instead of leadership

Changes to weapons

• Earth wands were replaced with Poison wands that receive bonus damage from Geomancer ability.
• Buffed armor on shields
• Gave shields a free skill that recovers their armor
• Gave two-handed melee weapons a free skill that unlocks a heavy attack that costs 3AP
• Receive a free skill when dual-wielding melee weapons that unlocks a heavy attack that costs 3AP
• Free skill for fighting with single melee weapon and empty offhand: 1AP attack that Knocks Down
• Attacking with single-handed weapon now costs 2AP (with or without shield)
• When dual-wielding, damage of the offhand weapon is halved.
• Added free movement if you move less than one meter before attacking
• Weapon attacks receive swoosh effects depending on main combat ability
• Inquisitor preset now wields a staff and starts with melee skills. (N.B. using Crippling Blow while wielding a staff will use the base elemental damage of the staff and receive bonus from INT since staff is and INT weapon).
• Witch and Wizard start with wands
• Replaced Sawtooth Knife with Vault in the list of starting Scoundrel skills to increase early game mobility.
• Ranger now has Haste instead of Piercing Shot as starting skill

Misc

• Increased difficulty for fights level 4 and above. Humanoid enemies now have new skills and engage in combat more aggressively.
• Fixed several issues with AI of ranged enemies.
• Targetted source skills can never miss. (E.g. Mortal Blow)
• Enemy Rage now lasts two turns
• Griff now sells weapons
• Petrified characters are now immune to Burning
• Reduced AP penalty from Slow.
• You no longer lose invisibility due to blessed smoke
• Rogues should now be able to pickpocket in arena
• Increased levels NPCs that help you in the last fight
• Cursed oil now has a chance of setting Necrofire instead of Burning
• Crocodiles now have magic armor and a stronger bite
• Buffed Radeka the blood witch and her minions
• Increased damage from Viscous Voidling death explosions
• Buffed purged dragon stats and gave him Hail Attack
• Tweaked loot drops so that you cannot get two weapons or shields from the same source
• Manually placed several weapons throughout the start of Fort Joy
• Burning and Regenerate statuses now replace eachother
• Petrified status now gives immunity to necrofire and holy fire
• Improved closest possible position when using Multistrike skills
• Hail strike skillbook now can be found from level one and healing ritual from level 4
• You can now knockdown turtles
• Improved enemy NPC treasure table drop chance from 1 in 5 to 1 in 3
• Haste now costs 0 AP and removes slowed and crippled status
• Clear-minded provides more Wits (gives Critical chance and Initiative)
• Fixed items being in stuck state when frozen or petrified
• Fixed “Walk it off” talent
• Assigned colors to unique weapons and NPC weapons
• Fixed incorrect pricing for certain weapons
• Blinding radiance does not affects neutral NPC’s anymore
• Characters with zombie talent do not get damaged anymore when using a bed
• Ending combat now correctly heals NPC’s with Decaying Touch status
• Fixed being allowed to learn skills from a skillbook when skill is already known from wearing an item
• Fixed enemy NPC’s from regaining AP incorrectly after setting a status on them
• Hasted and slowed now also modify starting AP, so you will start combat with one more AP if you are hasted
• Set correct loot for barrels
• Enemy immunity skills should now make them immune to both damage and statuses

Bug Fixes

• Fixed several crashes
• Fixed hiding helmet causing bald characters
• Fixed charm skill fumbling too much
• Fixed client player being stuck in options menu when server reloads
• Fixed client player(s) issues if host loads single player savegame
• Fixed not being able to select eighth profile
• Fixed “Your Turn” staying on screen after combat
• Fixed NPC alignment issues
• Fixed controls settings being applied to different profiles on the same machine
• Fixed arena npc’s having low stats after first starting a campaign in explorer mode
• Fixed being able to talk to characters behind closed doors
• Fixed being able to learn skills by getting 1 point in them from items. You now need at least one base point of a skill school to be able to learn spells
• Fixed corpse explosion on using source vampirism
• Fixed armor values displayed incorrectly after loading in combat
• Fixed surface tooltips for certain surface combinations
• Fixed momentarily seeing an empty level when accepting invitation from arena lobby
• Fixed characters receiving fire damage after blessing a fire surface
• Fixed invisible rogues being followed by the camera, indicating their position
• Fixed being able to target enemies in sneaking (arena)
• Fixed overlapping tooltips (range indication and surface information)
• Fixed incorrect message when savethrowing out of a status
• Fixed issue with base vitality being calculated incorrectly on enemies
• Fixed Map not updating upon selection of a lobby in the lobby browser
• Fixed not getting error message when not connected to Community/Platform server
• Fixed spamming immune text when forcing application of a status
• Fixed Surrender button being available in campaign mode / not being available in arena mode in certain cases
• Fixed crash when putting something inside the Unusually Large Orange
• Fixed crash related to creation of surfaces
• Fixed issue being unable to unlearn skill from memorized skills
• Fixed HP amounts for items with very low HP
• Fixed Funny Meat not dropping
• Fixed physics for orange container
• Fixed Staff of Magus being present in skill list when selecting inquisitor class
• Fixed skills getting added to the skillbar twice
• Fixed infinite combat loop when several combats are joined together
• Fixed getting stuck when picking up an item while sneaking
• Fixed issue with guard button being enabled correctly
• Fixed “can’t reach” issue when trying to talk to someone that is not visually blocked
• Fixed being able to start the game without selecting any skills
• Fixed crash related to dashing through a campfire
• Fixed characters not being able to perform attack of opportunity during first turn of combat
• Fixed Multistrike skills landing on characters outside of weapon range
• Fixed setting warm on items when dousing them to avoid spamming of statuses
• Fixed Human female portrait aligmnent going wrong sometimes
• Fixed Attack of Opportunity triggering on multistrike and rush skills
• Fixed Players being able to start an arena match when host is spectator
• Fixed crash when client leaves arena lobby while game is starting
• Fixed starting dialog for illusion dungeon statue
• Fixed Accuracy boost from gear not being applied correctly
• Fixed vitality tooltip when your CON is below 10
• Fixed Battering ram skillbook being unsellable
• Fixed being able to target self with Source Vampirism
• Fixed Attack of Opportunity not triggering for NPC’s that are running away from characters
• Fixed tooltips for skills that restore hp and armor (they now take into account bonuses from abilities)
• Fixed inconsistent tooltip size formatting
• Stop party from doing formation when sneaking or going invisible
• Fixed issue that having more than one partymember could cause getting double or triple XP reward for party
• Fixed black or grey loading screen when switching party member right before loading a savegame
• Fixed duplicate recipes in crafting interface
• Fixed “can’t see” message when targetting yourself
• Fixed pickpocketted items going missing sometimes
• Fixed being able to wear a bucket on your head for all races
• Fixed Exter’s dialog after Gareth dies to Magisters
• Fixed blocked dialog after winning arena under fort joy but dying right after

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