JPDunks4

I am 47 and trying to mainline the campaign right now. Act 3 has been long. The enemies scaling I think could have been handled better but hasn't been a big issue for me yet. You def do lose some of the natural feeling of progression though.

You can switch at any time, go to the Tyrael Statue in the main city. Whoever is hosting will drag the other player to their world I believe, so it'll be that persons difficulty.

If anyone wants to add me, JPDunks4#1414 is my BNet

My Druid changed a lot as I experimented with different skills I'd get through +1 items. I've ended up Basic Skill - Claw Core Skill - Pulverize Defensive Skill - I was using Blood Howl to have an extra heal, but recently switched to Earthen Bulwark cause of a Legendary item I got drop. Companion Skills - I went Ravens here initially so I'd have something that can be cast at Range and do decent damage. I then got a +1 for Poison Creeper, and ended up loving at that also played, so I am running both Companions. Wrath Skills - Hurricane as it has pretty good range, can throw it on while dashing in and out of combat. Between Ravens, Poison Creeper, and Hurricane all doing good AOE damage, I can set all 3 off while protected by Earthen Bulwark to get in close and pulverize while they are all weakened and getting damaged. Also will stun them occasionally. It's been working decently well so far. I never look at Build Guides as I enjoy trying to come up with stuff on my own so I have no idea what the go to is for Druid. I've pivoted my build a few times due to the items I've had drop with different perks on them. I currently am not using an Ultimate cause 2 Companions. *Also make sure to do the Druid story stuff to unlock your Class Perks, the Spirit Boons. Very helpful.

I'm assuming your playing World Tier 1? If you're having that much of an issue, your build is just bad. The game is definitely much harder for Melee based characters, because it is very difficult to dodge the Bosses when you need to get close, and then there's so many AOE attacks bosses put down near them, just getting close to hit them is a pain. You may want to use a different class with more range to start to get more comfortable with the game. What Lvl Barb are you? I feel like once you hit Lvl 20 you should be able to start getting some synergized builds. When I first played the beta as a Barbarian I struggled quite a bit early on with boss fights. It forced me to respec my skill tree pretty early and rethink some thing about survivability. After making some tweaks I was much better off. I do agree with you though regarding the Scaling. I was telling Tomcat and ARZ in a Discord call, its my one small complaint. In Diablo 2, if you were struggling, you coud just grind it out and get more powerful. If you got powerful and went back to earlier areas, you really felt the progression because you'd be dominant. You don't get quite the same feeling in Diablo 4, but if you get some good Legendary Gear that synergizes with your build, as well as just leveling up to unlock some new skills, it still does feel really really good. Just do more tinkering and trial and error if your current strategy isn't working out too well. Also don't forget to upgrade your Potion, and Level up the Region for bonus skill points.

They tweeted that the issues have been resolved. I just got right in.

I think its having some server issues. Even when I got to the character select it was just a never ending loading screen. Probably getting absolutely slammed right now.

The Melee Classes def need more attention to detail on your build and survivability. Druid def has some nice skills though to help with that.

I'm a Lvl 34 Druid now. Have died maybe 4 or 5 times so far. Absolutely loving everything about it.

I don't know much about FF14, but knowing it's an MMO I was always curious why people would think that's success would translate to a single player FF. Most of the people I know that are into MMOs are not the least bit interested in a big single player title. The stories also have nothing to do with each other, right? I still think this games gonna sell fine though. I've seen hints on Twitter of people I assume are playing it and they all seem to be obsessed with it.

Those previous games, like Recore and Phantom Dust, was prior to the bigger investment Microsoft gave to gaming. It's clear in that 2014-2017 Microsoft seemed to have Xbox running on pennies. Late 2017 is when Phil got promoted within MS and started reporting directly to Satya Nadella. Xbox had only owned Arkane and Bethesda for about 3 months before they closed E3 with it. I wonder if its a case where they asked Zenimax for some trailers and Pete Hines oversold Redfall a bit to them. He seemed very high on it when it was announced. I'm sure we will get some insight into what went wrong, but if it was due to funding being pulled or not having what they needed, wouldn't be a great look.

Phil didnt have no time to play test Redfall, he was addicted to something else 233 hours worth

And as for the interview itself, I've seen a lot say his tone and some statements were made specifically for Regulators. Highlighting they are in 3rd and can't compete with Nintendo or Sony.

I dont think Phil is in any trouble yet. Managing an acquisition is probably not easy, especially during a pandemic when you aren't even really allowed to visit studios in person. You always risk Xbox coming in, being too hands on and then possibly upsetting existing teams. Xbox stayed hands off of Bethesda and pretty much all the studios they bought according to most. Probably too hands off. Every game released under the Xbox Game Studios banner since 2020 has basically been well received at launch. Even Metacritic, as flawed as their scoring systems are, gave Xbox Game Studios Publisher of the year in 2021. So this notion that Xbox just releases bad games is made in somewhat bad faith. They have failed in the AAA space to have consistency, but AAA games take time to make and just about every one of Xbox's 1st party studios have released games in recent years. Turn 10, Ninja Theory, Compulsion and Undead Labs are the 4 teams that haven't released anything for the longest amount of time, Rare has at least continued to update SoT which has been pretty successful. All those teams were also very small indie type studios (other than Turn 10) that were asked to grow their teams, most moved and built new studio space, are making bigger more ambitious projects, in the middle of a pandemic. It seems quite a bit different than an already established big studios moving on from one project to another, especially if its a sequel. Most all their other studios have released games in the last 2-3 years, they just haven't been Xbox exclusives. So I can't imagine Redfalls fail is going to threaten Phils job alone, unless the Activision Blizzard merger was something he spearheaded and pushed for, and if it ultimately falls apart, his head goes with it.

Wonder if that could be what happened, because I don't understand how the AI behaving like this made it through any QA checks at all. As soon as you see how bad the AI is, it'd become priority number 1 to fix it before you even worry about any other aspect of the game.

Should have been a $40/$50 Game Pass game.

Played little more this morning and still feel largely the same. It's a 6.5 game that still can be enjoyable. I still am enjoying the exploration of the world. The world design itself is well done. The combat is the let down, and mainly because the AI is just piss poor. The only AI script so far is charge straight at you. It just doesn't work in a shooter. Need some to get cover, flank, ect. It should have been a $40/$50 game, no way this should have been $70.

I agree. Arkane tried something new and just missed. Maybe their previous games never were big successes financially, so they did something they though is more attractive to a larger audience. I have read that the 2nd half of the game is much better than the first, so maybe it does improve as enemy variety and abilities get more diverse.

Played like an hour or so. Biggest issue that stands out to me is the AI. I'd say the scores are pretty accurate so far, as I'd probably be around a 6-7 right now as well. I've only played Dishonored so far from Arkane, and the AI wasn't very good in that either, but if you played a mostly stealthy style of agmeplay, it may not have stood out that much. It stands out really badly here when you're shooting at enemies that are just standing there not really doing anything. Not shooting back, not getting into cover, just standing around. The Vampires so far seem to have maybe 1 move set, just a lunging forward attack which can be sidestepped pretty easily. Just really really bare bones AI that doesn't make the combat encounters very interesting. I am playing on the Harder difficulty, and only at the very beginning so I'm sure Vampires probably get more abilities as you go on, but just not a great first impression in terms of enemy AI. I will say though, if you go into this game to play it like a Far Cry or a more action oriented game, it's going to be very disappointing. If you go into it looking for an Arkane game, with more of a focus on exploration and taking the world in, I think one will enjoy it more. I have found the exploration to be fun enough so far, especially with the more open world approach and larger areas to scavenge.

The big reason this is an issue for me is we already had a game that had this promise to patch in features post launch, and that was Halo. Coop is coming after launch. It took a year, and ultimately was indicative of much larger issues with the games content pipeline and how ready it was. I can play games at 30fps fine, I enjoyed Gotham Knights. But for an Xbox 1st party title, next gen only, with the ability to supposedly take advantage of all the new tech in the box, it feels like they are releasing the game unfinished. Especially when your marketing was focused on being the most powerful console.

Redfall is going to launch with only Quality Mode on console. Saying an update will release after with a Performance mode. 4k30fps on Series X 1440p30fps on Series S Completely unacceptable for an Xbox 1st party game, and an embarrassment to Xbox. They were beating the drum on how this generation would be more about feel and games being 60fps. To have a 1st party title launch without a 60fps option after what is technically a year delay is laughable. If they can't release games that are "done" after all these delays, I'd say it maybe time to be more transparent about what the issues are, or start holding more at Xbox Leadership accountable. Phil Spencer has been in charge for awhile now, and while I think he's made some amazing decisions, there are still way too many baffling issues at Xbox to just completely ignore.

Don't think you have much of a choice.

I played Diablo 3 on the hardest difficulty it allowed, as I do all games. It's been a long time so I don't recall the options, but D3s initial playthrough was way too easy. Pretty sure it's a very common complaint too.

Oh ya I can't speak to the easier tier. For me, if the combat is too easy and mindless, it ruins these kind of games cause then your build really doesn't matter, because everything works. I loved playing Diablo 2 back in the day and struggling in new areas, then you level up and get a certain skill, or get that one piece of gear to drop that makes that new area finally feasible. Diablo 3's campaign was missing that. I'm hoping the entirety of D4 has that feeling again.

What Tier did you start on, the easier or harder one? What level did you stop at? How many Dungeons did you clear? When I say difficult I don't mean the open world areas are difficult, just some of the Boss fights. Clearing out those Strongholds or whatever they are, a few of the bosses I had to respec and try different builds as a Barb until I managed to clear them. Also may depend on build. I only tried one build with the Druid so far really, went Werewolf for the starting skill, Bear ground pound as the 2nd skill, the heal as the 3rd, Ravens 4th, Hurricane 5th. Once I got hurricane I started wrecking the mobs way quicker.