Has anyone else bought Titan Quest?

[roguebanshee]

In a month, this game will be history.
-A

Well, I was only able to find one store in town that was carrying it out of 8 or so. And since the price tag wasn't exactly favourable I skipped buying it, the demo didn't grab me that much.

[DeeBye]

I captured a gameplay video of me killing the final boss in Normal difficulty. It's very easy to do cheesy "item runs" if you get enough +movement gear and just run by everything. Enemies have a limited aggro range and stop following after awhile.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xELM62DYTHg
(sorry for the quality - I encoded this from a 800MB file down to 8MB, and YouTube compressed it even further)

My build is something like this, but I know I might be off by a bit on some of the exact values. The guy I summoned at the beginning is a Liche King, and he's pretty much unkillable. The other skill I used is Heart of Oak, which adds +96% Life and +10% Total Speed. At the top of Mount Olympus, I hit a Mastery Shrine (increases skill level) and a Battle Marker (massive increased attack speed), before summoning an Outsider. Then I just smacked the crap out of Typhon using a combination of Ternion attack and my Outsider.

A Soothsayer build like this is probably the most overpowered one currently, and I wouldn't be surprised to see it nerfed in a future patch.

[Munkay]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xELM62DYTHg
(sorry for the quality - I encoded this from a 800MB file down to 8MB, and YouTube compressed it even further)

Thanks for the video DeeBye, I really am excited about this game. I was (I think) the first to post the game a few years ago when it was still pre-alpha. I have no qualms about it being a Diablo clone, and in fact looks like a hoot to play - though an entirely different direction, I loved playing through Fate from WildTangent.

The setting of the game is another big draw for me, one of my majors in college is Ancient Greek. A game (even loosely) based on ancient history is quite fitting to my tastes.

BUT unfortunately I don't currently have the computer to run it, nor the time to invest in a new game.

I'm rather surprised there isn't more interest for this game, but so is life. Thanks again for the video DeeBye, I appreciate it even if it does make me envious.

Cheers,

Munk

[DeeBye]

The setting of the game is another big draw for me, one of my majors in college is Ancient Greek. A game (even loosely) based on ancient history is quite fitting to my tastes.

The setting of Titan Quest is a nice diversion for the genre. It isn't just ancient Greece though, even if the main storyline centres around the Greek mythology. You travel to places like Egypt and the Orient as well.

I'm rather surprised there isn't more interest for this game, but so is life. Thanks again for the video DeeBye, I appreciate it even if it does make me envious.

Unfortunately, the demo of Titan Quest is a piss-poor representation of the game as a whole. People seem to be turned off of it before they even give it a chance. I kinda wish they hadn't released a demo, or at least expanded it to include more of the features. I'm not saying that Titan Quest is the equal of D2 in terms of addictive gameplay, but I'm having a fun with it for now. It's held my attention for longer than I first anticipated.

[Ashock]

I captured a gameplay video of me killing the final boss in Normal difficulty. It's very easy to do cheesy "item runs" if you get enough +movement gear and just run by everything. Enemies have a limited aggro range and stop following after awhile.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xELM62DYTHg
(sorry for the quality - I encoded this from a 800MB file down to 8MB, and YouTube compressed it even further)

My build is something like this, but I know I might be off by a bit on some of the exact values. The guy I summoned at the beginning is a Liche King, and he's pretty much unkillable. The other skill I used is Heart of Oak, which adds +96% Life and +10% Total Speed. At the top of Mount Olympus, I hit a Mastery Shrine (increases skill level) and a Battle Marker (massive increased attack speed), before summoning an Outsider. Then I just smacked the crap out of Typhon using a combination of Ternion attack and my Outsider.

A Soothsayer build like this is probably the most overpowered one currently, and I wouldn't be surprised to see it nerfed in a future patch.

One of the things that I found about the game from the Demo is that it was too easy. Looking at the vid, I see that it is true in the full game too. It took you what, literally 3 seconds to kill the Final Boss? Mobs almost did not touch you as you ran through a wall of them? Hmm, I'm very happy that there was a Demo available.


-A

[Nerdy Danae]

how do i set a darn avatar on this board? i'd like to put up a picture

[Griselda]

how do i set a darn avatar on this board? i'd like to put up a picture

Hi,

Nice to meet you! There are a lot of links up on the top of each forum page. One of them will take you to your control panel, where you can add your avatar. Others will help you learn some things about our expectations here, so that you will be able to make the most out of your time here. I highly recommend that you look through all of them, at least to see what's there.

[DeeBye]

One of the things that I found about the game from the Demo is that it was too easy. Looking at the vid, I see that it is true in the full game too. It took you what, literally 3 seconds to kill the Final Boss? Mobs almost did not touch you as you ran through a wall of them? Hmm, I'm very happy that there was a Demo available.

You've got to realise that this was done on normal difficulty, while my character is well into epic difficulty. Those mobs that I was casually breezing past were killing me like crazy the first time I attempted it. The final boss was cake compared to the mobs I had to fight through. I WAS kind of dissappointed at how easy Typhon was, though I think that had more to do with the build I am using. He just eats slow-moving enemies for dinner.

The video I posted is akin to doing a Baal run in normal difficulty D2 using a lvl 65 Hammerdin.

Epic difficulty is nowhere near as easy. The dropped gear and summoned pets scale up a lot, but resistance penalties and enemy strength/toughness kills my character pretty quickly if I'm not careful. Packs of enemy archers are particularly painful and can kill me in a single volley before I even have time to react. The aggro distance also seems to have been greatly enlarged. On the plus side, item drops are great. Every item found in Epic difficulty is loads better than anything found in normal, other than some of the magical/set/uniques. Doing cheesy End Boss runs in normal difficulty isn't even worthwhile because better loot can be found just by playing through Epic at a normal pace.

[Maitre]

I gave in. I bought a game at full retail price. I had a five day business trip with no access to the company network and nothing to do in the evenings. Forgive me bargin bin gods, if ye be.

While I can't vouch for item quality in Epic yet, I can say that I'm finding the game highly enjoyable. The map is a bit long (like fighting your way through the swamps of Act 3 in D2, but in almost every zone), and the tileset is not very deep (seems like I've seen that tree before, and those rocks, but where???), but the action is at a steady pace with some interesting story.

Rather than a mage type like DeeBye, I'm playing a Ranger (imagine a D2 amazon crossed with a druid), so I'm running around trapping things with my nets, and then firing away at them bow and arrow style while my pet wolves pile on damage. The thing that makes the skill decisions challenging is that any new skill takes multiple tier points to make active, so you have to be very selective about the skills you intend to use. {caution, skill discussion to follow} This is my current set-up (at level 19, first area in Egypt). The goal is to use my net and wolves to keep monsters away from me, and let me pick them off at range. I tried using the monster lure skill but the lure wouldn't pick up agro from anything big, so I bought that one back. I still end up surrounded by beg enough packs of baddies, but I'm doing enough damage to keep myself alive with some life-leach built into my bow. However, Where to go with points in the future? Do i want the Nature Briar ward skill to keep the hard hitters away, or do I load up in Hunting to get scatter shot and volley at the top of the tree?

[roguebanshee]

Finally found the game at a slightly more sane price and it fit in with me having to move and lacking internet for a while. I just ran into a slight problem with the full game not wanting to run on my laptop without the latest patch.

I've been playing a Druid (Nature/Storm, level 17 and running around in Knossos) with focus on the Wolves and Nymph, Regrowth with Dissemination is great to help keep them (and yourself) alive. I tried Briar Ward for a while but it didn't fit my style, the recharge is 4 times as long as the duration so it won't keep you completely under cover. Mostly that style consists of going near a bunch of monsters and letting my pets masscre them while I help keep their health good and toss in a bit of damage.

I'm personally going for 32 in both my masteries because I want both Refresh, Nature's Wrath (Nymph ability), Chain Lightning and Eye of the Storm (Wisp ability). I am taking things slower on the Storm side than the Nature side currently, mostly because I want to improve the skills I keep instead of stuff I'll respec out later on.

[Maitre]

Finally found the game at a slightly more sane price and it fit in with me having to move and lacking internet for a while. I just ran into a slight problem with the full game not wanting to run on my laptop without the latest patch.

I actually had the same problem on the install. I had to install from the CD, and use task manager to see the error window that popped up behind the black loading screen, then get the 1.08 patch, then the 1.11 patch, and then when it still had issues I had to track down DirectX. A bit annoying if you ask me, but it eventually got sorted out.

I'm kind of pissed about briar ward as well. The duration of the spell is about right for the length of fights (unless it's a boss type, and then the life is too low), but the timer is about 3x too long. Is the Nymph any good? Maybe I'll just try to use pets to pile on the damage and use a stop&pop strategy. Hmmm...

[roguebanshee]

Is the Nymph any good? Maybe I'll just try to use pets to pile on the damage and use a stop&pop strategy. Hmmm...

I like the Nymph except for her tendency to attack anything within her range if she isn't already attacking, though the wolves often do the same they have a smaller aggro radius. I've had to run and regroup a couple of times because of that, especially during some boss fights. If only the pet control was a bit better.

The first upgrade for the Nymph is really good, let's you tank for a short while when she screws up. And do take note that I'm saying when and not if. Getting her and her upgrade before Eqypt would probably be a good idea as Greece is more forgiving, but she will still help out with ok ranged damage and an additional meatshield for the monsters to chew on.

A neat trick you can use is to resummon all your pets if you find a Shrine of Mastery. They'll keep their new level when the shrine wears off and though I'm not certain it seems their support skills also keep the boost.

At level 24 I've died 3 times, two because the Nymph aggroed something and I got boxed in by a bunch of high damage monsters. The third (actually the first) was before I got the Nymph, I misjudged the group I was facing and forgot about healing potions. I have on the other hand taken out more groups of large Nymph-aggro (Nymph attacking one group and wolves another...) than I've died to, how the pets have fared is another matter.

[Maitre]

The first upgrade for the Nymph is really good, let's you tank for a short while when she screws up. And do take note that I'm saying when and not if. Getting her and her upgrade before Eqypt would probably be a good idea as Greece is more forgiving, but she will still help out with ok ranged damage and an additional meatshield for the monsters to chew on.

I'm also around lvl 24 at the moment, but I went with nature as my secondary mastery, so I'm still six points away from opening the nymph tier. On the other hand, I'm working my way up from Memphis to Thebes and I haven't found Egypt that difficult yet, but I think that's because I've been pretty lucky with drops so far. I'm wearing four blues (ring, amulet, arms, and torso) and green helm and bow. Regardless, I've got two levels al least before I can get to the nymph, and I've got other skills to worry about befroe then. The question is, how many points do I have to put into the wolves until I can get three of them?

[roguebanshee]

The question is, how many points do I have to put into the wolves until I can get three of them?

You're still limited to 2 wolves at 15 skill, but skill adders may let you get a third.

I just got the Wisp (level 24 Storm summon) earlier today, it reacts more or less the opposite way of the Nature summons. Though it is a ranged caster it seems prefer to hold fire until it gets attacked or is in melee distance. On the other hand, I've only seen it take damage from a trap and I did test it against the final boss in Egypt (who didn't want to focus on the Wisp:().

[DeeBye]

I just got the Wisp (level 24 Storm summon) earlier today, it reacts more or less the opposite way of the Nature summons. Though it is a ranged caster it seems prefer to hold fire until it gets attacked or is in melee distance. On the other hand, I've only seen it take damage from a trap and I did test it against the final boss in Egypt (who didn't want to focus on the Wisp:().

The Wisp is only useful for its Eye of the Storm ability to boost iceghtning damage. On its own, it's a lousy offensive summon.

[roguebanshee]

The Wisp is only useful for its Eye of the Storm ability to boost iceghtning damage. On its own, it's a lousy offensive summon.

Sure seems that way. You can't even order it to attack stuff that isn't already fighting, it'll just hover a bit in the air. And the Wisp absolutely doesn't like mages, low health and no resistances until Eye (which claims it's an allround Elemental damage buff in addition to a lot of other things).

With the items I've been finding lately I should have picked a War/Def instead, 5 or so different blue melee weapons and 3-4 shields. I do have a few decent caster items, but those seem more geared for Spirit and Earth than Nature or Storm. In fact, I could make a very nasty staff blaster with Earth Enchantment, Ternion Attack, the latest green staff I found (fire damage staff with two fire damage mods) and my +elemental/fire damage & IAS equipment.

I can get ~200 (listed) average DPS with Heart of Oak as my only attack/damage skill and my current equipment, the staff is not yet modded. I only lack some way of getting that to be AoE...

[Malakar]

So far I'm liking the game better than D2, though I've just started.

The absence of PlugY kind of sucks, but maybe it'll get an app like that eventually. Or maybe the Devs will patch in (or expand in) a good stash.

I'm trying a Soothsayer out, the Ternion attack and pets + heal seems cool. I like the fact that I actually have to heal my pets; unlike D2's pets where they either survived or died and had to be resummoned (which could be really lame for revives/skels).

The boss encounters definitely keep me on my toes more than D2's encounters, which is a good thing. I haven't died yet though, but have come close. It seems the devs did a good job on managing bosses damage/health, in contrast to the D2 wimps/1-hits (other than the very sparse act bosses).

In general the drops seem to be much better than D2's, which I like. I don't like feeling like an organic Meph Bot just to get some good drops.:)

But I'm just finishing Greece... so these are just my first impressions.

[DeeBye]

The absence of PlugY kind of sucks, but maybe it'll get an app like that eventually. Or maybe the Devs will patch in (or expand in) a good stash.

Yay!:)

Trade items between your characters or store the items offline in your private vault.

Features
--------
- View the inventory of all your characters using in-game graphics
- Re-arrange the inventory of all your characters
- Move items from one character to another
- Move items from your character into a vault, freeing up valuable inventory space
- Create an unlimited number of vaults with any name you want. All vaults are stored in My Documents\My Games\Titan Quest\TQVaultData
- Combine potion stacks by dropping them onto each other
- Split potion stacks apart.
- Extract relics from items so you can use them in a different item, or use a different relic with your item
- Displays item names using the game language settings
- Makes backups of all files before modifying them. If you encounter any errors, you can find the backups in My Documents\My Games\Titan Quest\TQVaultData\Backup
- Package also includes TQVaultMon, a utility to prevent Titan Quest from detecting the inventory modifications.

edit:

The boss encounters definitely keep me on my toes more than D2's encounters, which is a good thing. I haven't died yet though, but have come close. It seems the devs did a good job on managing bosses damage/health, in contrast to the D2 wimps/1-hits (other than the very sparse act bosses).

Just wait until you get to Epic and Legendary difficulties. New bosses spawn in some locations, and they are HARD!

[roguebanshee]

Just wait until you get to Epic and Legendary difficulties. New bosses spawn in some locations, and they are HARD!

Epic Manticore: 2 shot a fully upgraded Core Dweller (we're talking 10-12k Health and decent armor/resists here) with his breath. That one surprised me a bit since CD had been able to tank anything until that point for my Conjurer (Earth/Spirit).

You are, however, given ample warning about the various high damage attacks that a boss will use, most have very distinct and somewhat lengthy animations compared to normal attacks. And pink rays should always be dodged.

Fully upgraded Ternion Attack (with Arcane Lore) should be hit repeatedly with a nerf stick. High damage, fast, cheap AoE spam. Increasing cost or reducing damage may be needed.

Refresh may need a longer recharge to be balanced, it currently has a 5-6 sec recharge which can allow for some very overpowering combinations (mainly with Ancestral Horn, Summon Outsider and Collosus Form) that have been otherwise balanced with a long recharge. -Recharge items can achieve a similar effect, so they may need to be re-balanced too.

Otherwise my main gripe with the game is that some areas seem to have been added just to pad the length of the game.

[Alram]

I want to try out the demo. I registered at file planet. There is a 31 minute queue before the download starts. I am not going to buy a file planet subscription. Where else can I go to download the demo?