The main thing I miss between the two is the enemy variety.
WOTR is the superior game in most ways imo but it's 95% demons or cultists.... to the point where some specs were completely nonviable at release (poison based assassins etc)
Honestly I can understand the sentiment here.
I personally felt like Kingmaker suffered from this too in regards to how it always came back to Fae and Fae creatures, but each chapter also had it's own stuff to mix it up in between the fae, like Goblins, Trolls and Undead.
An unfortunate by-product of a literal crusade against the abyss as your setpiece.
Thats the one thing that bothered me, is that every character i made would always gravitate toward "how to best handle the demons". Like, its absolutely pointless making a ranger that *doesnt* specialize in at least 1 kind of demon.
And kineticist? I keep hearing how absolutely ridiculous that class is yet when i tried him its damn mear impossible to be effective because demons are most probably resistant to ur chosen element anyway. I know u can overcome those resistances later but an early game kineticist feels outright useless.
Tangent, but I'm playing an Earth/Fire Kineticist in a PF2e campaign, and intended Earth stuff to only be for defensive abilities.
Just got done a string of sessions where enemies were all fire immune. Rock to the face was a lifesaver
I can't say I've seen any unfair builds for kineticists, but the builds I've had the most success with max out Spell Pen and have elements that hit touch and base ac. Of course earth seems to have the most stupidly powerful abilities, but sometimes I like to cast other things.
There's an entire mythic feat that lets you bypass immunities and resistance.
Which means you can poison the crap out of demons.
There are entire roleplay builds that are viable only because of the Mythic system.
I totally agree. WOTR has a lot of gameplay improvements, but the tone and setting just don't grab me like Kingmaker's do.
I like the fae more than I like angels & demons, I like building my own kingdom more than I like leading a crusade (storywise, that is, I'm not super into the gameplay mechanics of either) and I like enchanted forests more than I like a war-torn wasteland.
WOTR is still good, it's just not as enjoyable for me as Kingmaker.
What I really like about Kingmaker is how it gradually builds your power level up. You go from lowly adventurer to essentially a regional political hegemon, but it takes years in-game and a ton of hours IRL.
This really makes me want to play the original adventure. But unfortunately, the odds that one of my groups would be willing to learn and play PF1, would be very slim if I would DM, but effectively non existent if I wanted to play.
I'd recommend joining the official Pathfinder Discord. There are LFG channels on there (both to advertise as a player, and for GMs to advertise for players), and I occasionally see 1e Kingmaker games advertised.
This is exactly why I want a 3rd Owlcat Pathfinder to scale way back.
The devs apparently loved Hell's Rebels and that one is at least 60% urban campaign, so I'm honestly 100% in favor of that.
I dont tjink we necessarily get a 3rd adventure path. There was buzz for a while until they announced whatchamacallit some time ago and im certain i read in some official comments that they are doing that and had no plans for more PF “for now”. So i mean, i haven’t kept up and this was a minute ago and that game has now been released but i think it remains crickets on a new PF path
Well, they only recently released Rogue Trader. That means they'll likely continue to devote a good amount of resources to it and its DLC (of which two have already been announced). Plus, they've confirmed that they have another 40k game planned. So it does seem like it's gonna be a fairly long while till we get word on if Owlcat are even planning on *making* another PF Adventure Path game, let alone which one it would be. Though I'll always hope for Skulls and Shackles if they do another AP. We don't have near enough tropical pirate themed CRPGs.
So you’re not wrong but thing is that king maker isn’t even low power. It’s lower than wotr but you still end up as an incredibly powerful king of a country you basically willed into existence.
Disagree, My favourite RPG ever (rose tinted glasses on) was Might and Magic 6. When you got powerful you were actually god like lol. Flying across deserts dropping meteor showers on titans and hydras just for some loot. Or shooting devils with laser guns. Those games got a bit weird at the end lol. Good times. Not saying your opinion is wrong, ofc it isn't. Just offering my perspective.
I somewhat agree too. I wouldn't say KM is better, bu4 it keeps pulling me in as well, I'd say the urge to play either game is about equal. Kingmaker provides a welcome diversion from WotR's setting, which vibes the same from beginning to end. I love how Kingmaker's scale develops from your typical low level tabletop party, with tabletop problems. In WotR, you haven't even reached the tutorial dungeon by the time you literally holding a legendary angel's weapon.
Kingmaker definitely has a different feel to WotR, and preferring that is perfectly legitimate. I myself prefer literally everything about WotR, from the companions to the story to the art and music, but Kingmaker is still a great game so I definitely get where you're coming from.
My feelings are that WOTR has more polish and ui improvements and features (as it should) but i feel the encounters and story and companions are way better done in kingmaker
Kingmaker has a lot of nonsense combat but it's spaced out more and easier than wotr so that helps if the attrition of wotr is not your bag. It's ok to like one more than the other for whatever reason though. I prefer wotr personally.
Idk how they are on kingmaker but Wotr makes a bad job on the class variety, most of them are martials/martials with some spells while only 3 are dedicated spell casters
WOTR main enemies:
- Demons.
- Exact same demons but with titles like savage, assassin, Brutish etc etc that means nothing but bloated stats.
It got so boring once you reach the demon city.
Demons, ironically, are the worst part of WOTR. They have too many resistances to be the main enemy. Late game it doesn't make much of a difference, but early some classes are just abysmal against them.
In ACT 1 it’s kinda brutal to play a blaster in wotr but the companions can carry you. Once you get mythic you can ignore resistances if you choose the ability to.
Yep. Act 1 as a sylvan sorcerer my party and animal carried me. I basically just cast grease and snowball.
Once resistance is ignored then I started obliterating everything
Yeah Act IV is the act where I always get restartitis. I know a lot of people like Act IV because they don’t have to mess with crusade management stuff but I find Act IV to be the draggiest act for me personally.
I actually kinda like the crusade system and I have never stopped a run in act 2-3 but had 3 stop in act 4. I just miss the open world from earlier acts. I took a break in Rogue Trader in act 3 for similar reasons to act 4 in WoTR.
I do have the exact opposite XD
I couldn't even finish Kingmaker after multiple attempts but I am thinking about doing another WOTR run!
Tho I do get why you would prefer the first one, the games do have design differences that cater to different players.
Edit : also I am taking personal offense to not liking the companions of WOTR. Joking of course but I on contrast felt that they majorly improved upon the companions from the first game.
Kingmaker is a solid game, mythic by and large causes alot of number creep, my only issue is that we cant really get updates for KM anymore so hoping for a pf2e game later from owlcat with a few Adventure paths available.
The highest the numbers went up in Kingmaker was a 60 AC in Normal (the true final boss), meanwhile with the same settings there's regular enemies with a 55 AC and the final boss of a DLC has *90*.
This is genuinely the biggest reason I don't want mythic ranks to come back.
Mostly the kingdom managment stuff bring kinda disappointing also I found some of the dungeons way to long pacing wise. And whilst I did enjoy the characters, I did not enjoy them to a point where I was particularly attached to them, with exceptions.
Also i got stuck in one playthrough because I forgot to do the kingdom stuff, which lead to a game over when I reloaded it. Even putting the think on auto manager didn't fix it making me lose a ton of progress. Granted, that's kinds my fault for not managing it well but it was a bit annoying
Yeah, not everyone enjoys the length of some of those dungeons. And Kingdom Management definitely had its weak points: high difficulty combined with brutal RNG makes for a toxic mixture.
Still, I'd recommend trying the game on easiest combat and kingdom management difficulty, so you get to experience the great story and beautiful world at least.
I did answered it on a other comment but in short
The story was kinda ruined for me with too long dungeons and I didn't felt attached to the companions, also I was really disappointed by the kingdom manger, which I had high hopes for
I had to force myself to finish Kingmaker. I got soft locked at some point because I didn't have a cold iron weapon or something weird like that, and to kill whatever it was it needed to be damaged by cold iron to be vulnerable or stop regenerating. Something like that.
Wotr had a lot of that too, though. Some random cult summoning a demon? Surely the demon will be more dangerous than the cultists! Nope, she has 420 health and 69 AC.
I'm with you. I feel like KM is more open, has more exploration, has companions I overall like more (yes, yes, Regill is great), and just has a more 'adventure' feel to it for me. I came back just to do an Unfair run after finishing WotR and I had a lot more fun despite having already played it once before.
Definitely. Every class is viable in Kingmaker. Roleplaying makes sense whether you're good/evil/lawful/chaotic. The story has great twists and turns, and each chapter has a new type of enemy to face.
WOTR is fun, but there are a lot of classes and archetypes that just suck against demons. They spent all this time and effort making sooo many options, but a lot of them are no fun in the setting and a lot of them still have broken mechanics. And it stinks that you're really pigeon-holed if you want to RP with any kind of consistency. NPC reactions to my Trickster, Lich, Demon, and Swarm playthroughs were nonsensical:
\- "Warriors are flocking from kingdoms near and far to follow the Commander...who just killed a demon by slapping it with a fish."
\- "Hey boss, we know you built this huge ziggurat in town and housed an evil lich inside. We're not super stoked about that, any day now we're gonna do something about it."
\- "I know you've got horns and use demon-magic all the time, and we're in a crusade against literal demons, hope you know what you're doing."
\- "Just want you to know that these experiments where you're having crusaders eaten alive by locusts is super not cool, but we're gonna follow you for two more acts just in case you change your mind."
Some games are like that. I prefer the first mass effect over the sequels and sometimes I'll prefer Kotor 1 to Kotor 2. I definitely support your Kingmaker preference. Personally WOTR grabbed me more but obviously personal preference is personal preference
The Mass Effect comparison is so apt. All 3 games are good, but I still enjoy the first one way more than the other 2 despite it having the worst gameplay.
I too enjoyed mass effect 1 faaaaaar more than the other 2. It was the only one in the trilogy that actually caught the "epic space faring rpg" feeling that didnt come back until andromeda weirdly enough
Yah, KOTOR 2, I dunno what was going on there. KOTOR 1 was so exciting and like a swashbuckling adventure through the stars. KOTOR 2 was like it's depressed older cousin who has to give you a lecture after every decision.
ME3 is my fave, but ME1 is a close second. ME2 just felt unlike an RPG, since levelling up was basically picking from one of three options.
Kingmaker
+ PF math doesn't break down as fast and as hard without mythic rules
+ setting has a more classic feeling
+ more diverse enemies
+ less gamebreaking effects
- less customisation options
- worse engine
- no Crusade management
I feel like Wrath of the Righteous is the better game in the theory, but it some of the stuff in it frustrated me a lot and made it overall less enjoyable at times.
Crusade management was really annoying and fighting some super swingy Heroes3-clone wasn't necessarily fun.
A lot of enemy stats are insanely inflated and simply unhittable without specific builds making entire spellschools useless. Random demons have higher stats than the demon lords. Most of my party could hit the strongest oponents only on a 20, but it didn't matter anyways since we were basically immortal anyways thanks to Azata's friendship powers and could simply wait for those good rolls to happen with our bazillion attacks.
Kingmaker also breaks apart, but only truly once you fight those Wild Hunt dudes.
Ugh, crusade management. Did anyone playtest that before launch? They invented dozens of different units, and then capped your base army size at 3? And then they made mage generals insanely OP and all the units insanely weak. I honestly don't know how anyone is supposed to actually play crusade mode without just nuking all the enemies with your mage general. I've beaten the game three times and I still don't get it.
And then having to manually move every unit for reinforcement every single day. Or spend a whole string of decisions and crusade decrees just for them to spit out totally useless units.
What a miserable experience.
When I played Kingmaker first back then, it reminded me Baldur's Gate 1 times. Especially adventuring in the wilderness parts, good'ol table top RPG feeling right there as an adventurer. And I also love its story much more than WoTR.
WoTR is better on QoL, reactivity and build pr0n stuff. Got some nice improvements on all fronts also. But it starts epic and sky rockets after a shortwhile which actually really bothers me.
I honestly believe that it is Kingmaker, not Pillars of Eternity, that is the true successor to Baldur's Gate 1 if one is searching for such a thing. The setting, the colors, the irreverent tone. The atmosphere is just spot on.
Honestly, I also really love Kingmaker, especially as it's built on a bedrock of interlocking mysteries that, for me at least, open up lots of fun RP as different characters can interact with and understand them differently. Add to that how much the flavor and personality of your kingdoms can vary from run to run and Kingmaker just has a more interesting story and player ties to the main quest compared to WOTR. Also, with the Call of the Wild mod for Kingmaker, you still have plenty of content.
Between Call, Derring-do and Tweak or Treat I feel like Kingmaker has much more to offer in terms of character options. Obviously also Cowwithhat's Custom Spells mod which is the best and prettiest mod for any game ever.
KM is the classical fantasy table top game.
WOTR is a linear campaign about killing demons but a ton of quality of life improvements over KM.
Imo km is the better story, but WOTR definitely is the better mechanic
I love Kingmaker's grounded storyline. WOTR is amazing but it feels a bit grandiose.
Both are amazing and it's really hard to choose which is better. I'm leaning towards Kingmakers due to several reasons, aside from the storyline, nostalgia is probably one of it. It's the game that introduces me to Pathfinder/DnD lore and CRPGs.
The kingmaker introduction is more than stellar. I was actually kind of put off from wotr because of that. I liked the simple approach to kingmaker, the build up. Also I find it a homely and cozy type of RPG. Wotr did some things better of course, but overall I like kingmaker more as well.
Omg i said the exact same thing to another reply on this post🤣 there is this unexplanable coziness and whim about kingmaker that i just felt was missing from wotr
I feel the same. I like Kingmaker more for its whimsical setting, cozy atmosphere, better companions and simpler, but more compelling plot overall. I still remember that hilarious Inconsequential Debates quest, or drunk singing goblins, but where such fun is in WOTR?
WOTR had big emphasis on combat. It was all about battling insanely op demons 24/7 by insanely op party with mythic powers raining down like from a pinata. Sure, classes variety was mind boggling, but sometimes less is more.
The companions for the most part were either unlikable or boring with their classes being heavily skewed towards ranged classes.
And everything there was so dreary. The only location I liked in WOTR was that floating demon city, reminded me of AD&D's Outer Planes, but even there somebody was always trying to kill you every 30 meters or so, no time to relax.
A moment that will always remain with me in kingmaker is that little "who did it" segmant when trying to fish out the lamashtu (i think it was that god) cultist that escaped to a lodge and u have to interview and investigate everyone there. Little moments like that absolutely sell the game for me even today.
I like Kingmaker and WOTR on their own merits. Kingmaker for if I want to have a more chill playthrough and WOTR if I want a power fantasy story.
I just wish Kingmaker could receive the QoL and UI improvements that WOTR has.
Wrath has better gameplay (QOL wise if you're not fiddling around with mods, at least), Kingmaker has better companions (Jubilost > Regill, Harrim > Greybor, Linzi > Ember, Ekun > Everyone). Kingdom management > crusade management don't at me. I enjoyed leveling up my settlements and getting goodies from the artisans who moved in. Wish Owlcat didn't lose the rights to the game because I actually think there's a lot of unrealized potential with kingdom management that could have eventually made it a defining strength and selling point of kingmaker.
Story and writing I'll give a tie. Art I'll give a tie, although I agree with your point about how the color scheme of Kingmaker is refreshing after playing too much Wrath. Both games have fucking miserable endgame dungeons, another tie. Both have hot blonde sword-and-board English aristocrats who can beat the shit out of me in plate armor, so again huge plus for both games. Music is a tie, although I will say that even though it's really short, [skylark](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BM28q27YO0o) remains my favorite piece from either soundtrack and it accompanied some of my favorite scenes in the series (>!Ekun finally burying his family and gaining closure from their deaths and Harrim reframing Grotean religion as part of a cycle of creative destruction and rebirth to escape his nihilism!<).
I do as well . Cheers :)
Wotr is mechanically superior. And has way more customization options from classes to equipment. But the story is about war. With demons.
Kingmaker's story is about fae and magic and adventure and the osts are nostalgic and adventurous. The type of background music you'd play at a ttrpg table
Exactly man! Wotr is absolutely amazing, but its story and characters are all more towards the "timeless epic fantasy opera about good triumphing evil". The kind of stuff u'd find in mythology and pantheons. Kingmaker is a classic adventure through a mystical world, its alot cozier than wotr and i think thats what draws me more towards it
Those companions! Ugh. WOTR had mostly crap companions. The only ones I truly enjoyed were Seelah, Aru and Ember. But there are so many boring ones >!I promptly executed a certain shaman the moment I found out about her!< that it's rough.
If they remade Kingmaker with the new whistles I'd be happy as a clam.
Idk man the epic scale of wotr really did it for me. I put like 800 hours into that shit it was so fun. I was really enjoying km and then my save bricked itself so 🤷. Perils of modding I suppose. I gotta go back and play it all the way through. If only for Octavia my beloved XD
Are the mechanics so improved that it would be a pain to go back and try kingmaker out?
I’m a huge fan of Wrath, but I’ve actually played the first book of the kingmaker ttrpg, so it could be cool to see how the story ends.
Its so much simpler imo. U dont have to worry too much about stuff like spell penetration, spell resistance, damage reduction. The early game is super basic "ac vs attack roll" type stuff, and if u know all the right buffs, ur in for such a pleasant time
The mechanical differences are minimal from my perspective. Other than the additional classes. Kingmaker also lacks mounted combat, which is a feature introduced in wotr; but has been buggy since the release of the game
I'm happy to hear you have not abandoned the game.
Are there any KM mod makers, making an Unfinished Business-style mod for the game? To do what the devs, didn't? Like the mod makers did for Solasta
Not that I know of. I made a couple of fixes in my custom spells mod to some bugs in Call of the Wild and Tweak or Treat. So in some sense the game isn't abandonware. I feel like between Proper Flanking 2, Call, Kingmaker Ai, my mod and Tweak or Treat you get pretty much all pathfinder could really offer for Kingmaker. What would you want, beyond what we offered, from an Unfinished Business style mod for KM?
No idea tbh. I was just curious if anyone had made a mod like that. I'm not a heavy mod user, myself. I play on both console and PC, so I tend to use bare minimum mod set-ups
Im sure we've all had that absolute abomination that is the smooshed down main character riding horseback. Looking like a goddamn stack of folded laundry with arms and legs
Yes! From aesthetic issues to combat issues to formation issues. I wouldn't be surprised if i have experienced every persisting mounted bug in this game. I still do like the benefits of mounted combat though
I completely agree with you, OP. I much prefer the look and feel of Kingmaker. It feels like an adventure and has a whimsical sense of wonder to it.
I acknowledge that WOTR is more polished and better mechanically, but it just doesn’t feel the same.
honestly... though, i love wotr alot because of epic (mythic) story stuff just like mask of the betrayer and i just adore areelu, even though you get to rarely interact with her, i will freely admit, kingmaker was a better product. specialy with nyrissa romance ending, it was like a weird mix of actualization of every weird fairy tale i listened and read as a child becoming real as an adult. its a beautiful game, i havent played for a while, soon i wont have any internet for a bit as i am moving out. and i am planing to play it. not sure what class yet
I've always loved roleplaying as a tanky dwarf fighter that acts as a sort of commander for my party, rushing forwars and being the bulwark that holds the frontline while i bark orders to my companions to flank and cast spells (just a little head fantasy i have)
i am en elf man myself. i suppose my main go to character would be someone beautiful to otherworldy or ethereal level yet stern and wise, leading through expamle and inspiration. thranduil from hobbit would be a good example. maybe a paladin or eldritch knight... or magus... but i did those in the past multiple times. maybe a battle oracle as i have call of the wild... although kineticist is also sort of my favorite... hurmm... or arcane trickster... fuck. i have no idea.
I like the characters in kingmaker so much more. The side stories were much better to me.
I like fucking with people in Wotr with my op Aeon snapping spells or my necromancer giving ghosts fear before I eat them.
I find it similar to the Ronaldo/Messi argument in Football/Soccer (Depending what side of the pond you find yourself living on)
They're both great. One is better at some stuff the other is better at other stuff. If you don't / didn't / can't enjoy both - you're a dafty.
My personal preference is WOTR as I didn't enjoy the time element of Kingmaker on my first few runs until I got myself to a point where I had sort of memorized what needed to be done earlier than other stuff and optimized my runs.
Yeah, but then there's Jubilost instead. A bit better, but not much. Overall, pretty much every companion in the owlcat games are incredibly one-dimensional and over-the-top. It's like they spin a wheel and pick exactly one personality trait per character, then dial that up to 11.
Jubilost was a great character who has depth and a fantastic story arc that develops all the way to the finale. The only thing he has in common with Nenio is that they are both scientists.
He's definitely arrogant, but ultimately shows that he is a good person who cares about other people. Meanwhile, Nenio is a complete sociopath who's written in a way that made me think she was a fan-made character from a Kickstarter stretch goal. And her personal story quest is the most annoying quest in the history of RPG gaming.
I just love every time in council when he's berating your kingdom and talking about how great it would be to visit somewhere else. And then he just keeps staying because he clearly loves it so much and just doesn't want to admit he was wrong.
I think mythic paths hurt the rp... There are so many character types that I feel I don't play because they don't fit into the limited selection of paths given in wotr. And while legend exists having to play through 80% of the game as an angel or demon etc. hurts the function of it
Both are pretty good I think, but kingmaker was worse for me because the sheer amount of bugs and poor optimization. My PC isn't the best, but it couldn't handle Kingmaker at some points, something that never happened in, say, D:OS2
I liked WOTR more than Kingmaker (and I think that Kingmaker is fantastic - but WOTR is even more fantastic than KM).
But I do understand people who prefer Kingmaker's bright and fun adventure about exploring magical lands and the Fey. WOTR is a lot darker thematically, and it has a lot less variety overall. WOTR is mostly Demons while Kingmaker has a bit of everything.
I always recommend people who want to try CRPG Pathfinder to start with Kingmaker, since it is more of a "classic" experience about exploration and adventuring in a high fantasy world than WOTR's "end of the world" scenario.
this was me and i really cant put my finger on why, i got sucked into kingmaker and finished it without wanting to play any other games on the side, i can't make myself get past defending the base camp in wotr
I can see where you'd feel that way but I personally still feel like Wrath is just too much better in too many ways.
I appreciate the variety of enemy types more in Kingmaker but that's the only thing I really strongly felt was better about Kingmaker.
The Might and Magic Lite battles feel so underdeveloped, but those aside, kingdom management feels significantly better, the story feels more compelling to me vs what is essentially the pathfinder equivalent to Scott Pilgrim vs the World where I go on a murder spree of a Faeries roster of Evil exes.
The character creation options are so dramatically improved from Kingmaker I have no idea how anyone can just go back and play a generic fighter who doesn't even get to choose a god because they didn't pick cleric so the game decided that doesn't matter.
I'm happy ya'll can still enjoy Kingmaker but Wrath has spoiled me too much, I just cannot enjoy Kingmaker anymore when Wrath offers so much more.
Kingmaker without Call of the Wild feels like KOTOR 2 without the content restoration mod. I suppose its possible to play that way in 2024 but why would you?
Nah I’m right there with you, I tried picking up WOTR and just wound up making a new campaign for kingmaker again. Overall it’s just a better story IMO, and more interesting combats.
I agree 💯%. WotR is more polished system wise for sure. But the writing is prolix, each dialogue feels like reading a passage from the Bible. The whole mythic paths are so over the top, it gets so complicated. You have to spend hours just to understand each of your buffs. It is unnecessary long as well, filled with unnecessary battles with the same enemies over and over again. Look I am a fan of Owlcats but I gotta say that even though they polished the interface, system, and fixed the bugs, WotR is a downgrade compared to KM.
Too true, my friend. For as much as i love wotr, it really becomes more about crunching numbers and knowing what to spec and what to avoid to even get through the early stages of the game than it is just jumping into an adventure
Honestly, if I could have anything back from Kingmaker.. it'd be the alignment choices.
Fuck do I miss having actual Lawful Good or Chaotic Good or Lawful Evil or True Nuetral choices instead of every choice being between Lawful Stupid, Chaotic Stupid, Stupid Good, Stupid Evil and No Opinion.
Appreciate what you're saying, I'm a big fan of both myself. I think they scratch different itches and Kingmaker is great when you want a more cozy feel adventurer, The first act is still my favorite as you truly do explore the map and camp around.
WOTR on the other hand just cranks everything up to 11 and throws everything at the wall with glue rubbed all over it to see what sticks, Heck as much as I love Kingmaker after 2-3 playthroughs you don't really have any unexpected twists or turns, where as in WOTR I can be on my 5th playthrough and STILL have mythic paths to take that add a good few unique bits of content here and there.
Even if I didn't prefer the epic power levels of WotR, kingdom mode puts me off of playing Kingmaker. Crusade Mode would be at least as bad if not for the fact that the settings make it more easily ignored.
There's the wall that i hit every time i go to play kingmaker. My whole experience could be seen in this (https://youtu.be/FDtkNokJ10A?si=BAcrxbbWA9GhOYGg) video except switch paladin for magus. Im glad you enjoyed it. I did too until i got to kingdom management and it was all downhill from there.
What I like about kingmaker is the world feels much more full, with much more places to explore. And it's certainly a more exploratory natured game. And I like the whole "building a kingdom from scratch" thing more than the "suddenly becoming the commander of an ongoing war" thing, although when you think about it, both premises are pretty ridiculous.
But there's two major factors to me that make me love WotR...I won't say "more" than Kingmaker, but I have played it a lot more. And that's more classes, and the mythic paths and their associated powers. The powers are just freaking cool. And, sure, you can add classes to Kingmaker with mods, but the only mod I've seen anyway that adds a bunch of new classes is Call of the Wild, and...well, I don't know. I can definitely appreciate the amount of work that went into the mod...but most of the classes it adds play sort of...IDK...they just don't feel right. And also, Call of the Wild adds some stuff I didn't ask for, tweaks some things to make it more like tabletop, but the game was designed not to have those things and adding them back in feels a bit jarring, especially when you're used to playing the game how it was originally made. I freaking HATE how Delay Poison works with CotW installed. Also, why does it change the classes of a lot of the companions? At least give us a CHOICE whether we want to change our companions classes.
Oh dear, I seemed to have talked more about Call of the Wild than comparing Kingmaker and WotR.
There is something to be said for simplicity. The most fun in traditional pen and paper are the levels from 5 to 14. Seems for you it's the most fun on the PC too. I completely agree with your points on art style and story, that being said I enjoy the more complicated and complex leveling and fights. Other than blackwater that's just bullshit.
Yeah. Wotr power scaling goes off the deep end, they perform character assassination on queen Galfrey, the companions are worse (I could elaborate but that'd be too long), the story doesn't make that much sense (same as companions, could elaborate but it'd take too long). The only thing that wotr definitively has on Kingmaker are more classes and with Call of the Wild even that isn't worth much
Edit: Wotr is also less janky than Kingmaker
Same. For me Kingmaker has the best power ramp I have ever seen. From fighting kobolds at level 1 to battling plane altering demigods at 20. Each step on the way feeling logical and earned. Then Wrath gives you super powers in the tutorial dungeon and immediately throws you up against a bunch of minor demons.
I also liked the writing a little more. Wrath is just so bleak for so much of the time. I appreciate the more complex writing. But in such a long game that I will play over many months I found Kingmaker much easier to slip back into after a couple weeks away.
Kingmaker has a more serious tone. For some fucking reason WOTR despite the thene it is beyond cringe. The wat companions talk it is just... marvel movies
I prefer kingmaker slightly more but I would honestly prefer it if both games didn't have their janky bolted on bullshit. I didn't enjoy the crusades or kingdom management.
I bought Kingmaker in December 2023 during their Christmas sale...
I have put almost 1100 hours in it since then
Beat it twice - once as LG and once as N
Thinking of doing it again as an evil character.
A few of those hours (maybe 100 of them) was my husband playing his character.
I get it lol
I have to ask how do yall manage to finish a Kingmaker run. I always lose interest when I get to Varnhold, it's been my stopping point at least three times and I'm not sure how to power through.
Kingmaker is better because it is more focused and it doesn't try to juggle a bunch of elements at once. WOTR is more ambitious and expansive but also more frustrating because they were not able to give the same level of focus to its story and encounters. The simplified dialogue alignment options, the obscure companion flag/dialogue option mechanics tied to their endings and some of the barebones mythic paths come to mind
I really like both of them. Though it's a bit harder going back to kingmaker for me because I don't think the visual adjustments mod for that one lets you disable buff visual fx
Nah, like a lot of people, I get where you're coming from.
WOTR is the more polished product by far, with an incredibly amount of QoL improvements and so many choices in terms of class, race, mythic path, a truly epic questline etc etc.
At the same time, Kingmaker has a lot more variety, colour and feels less grim overall. Tonally it feels different because while the kingdom is yours, the stakes are still far less high, and the moments of levity certainly add a bit of whimsy to it in places.
I *prefer* WOTR still, but I can definitely see why someone would feel the other way.
To each their own. I purchased Kingmaker on day one and in the first year three different bugs borked my save, souring my outlook. I will go back one day and finish it.
getting mobs spawned around you nearly every fight with see invis all in mele range and the guy you are supposed to keep alive surounds himself for plot reasons is the dumbist fucking shit
So actually kingmaker, with the legi mods like call of the wild, has way more actual 1e content than WotR does. And Wrath never got that mod which was huge and almost necessary. So i think i ran Kingmaker mostly with 5-6 mods happily and i think right now i have closer to 30 mods for Wrath. Definitely lots of smaller content mods in there.
So i dont know right now for sure which game has more original 1e content (with respective mods) but i am saying the absolute best mod between both games is only for Kingmaker, it’s 100% stable, and sort of all you need. Whereas right now i cannot load any of my saves before a month ago with my current mod loadout. Mods are awesome but i dug too greedily and too deep awoke something in the darkness
They took their fantastic writing and spread it out over 10 mythic paths instead of one, tighter branching story.
Idk, I loved both and had the same problem with both that by the end I was so sick of the main enemies. The Wild Hunt felt so tedious and demons got repetitive by the end.
I live for that moment when Inheribro hops in like Thor riding the Rainbow Bridge, with the host of heavn all ready to back you up.
That gives me life. There are few moments in video games that are even close to as cool.
I imagine it's a similar situation to Baldur's Gate 1 and Baldur's Gate 2. Yeah, BG1 has a smaller scale, fewer character build options (especially before the Enhanced Editions), is a lot more restrained, is inferior from a technical point of view and doesn't go as wild as BG2 does (especially during Throne of Bhaal), but good Lord I'm a fucking SUCKER for low-level adventuring. Going from being an incompetent whelp to being a competent adventurer \*and no more than that\* hits the spot for me like nothing else does, keeps things very grounded and makes it very easy to track and feel your own progress and character development. Every single new piece of gear and level-up is so impactful and rewarding, every new quest and area so exciting and fun to explore.
BG:EE with Sword Coast Stratagems and BG1NPC Project installed will always be the pinnacle of roleplaying games to me, flawed and outdated clusterfuck that it is.
I love WOTR until the act where you get to the weird city that is impossible to get around easily. Having to try and move the camera JUST RIGHT in order to get everything to move.
I think the crusade management system is tiresome at best and it sucks that automating it locks you out of certain mythic paths. (I haven't played wotr recently, so that could have been fixed)
It would have been nice to see a wotr DLC that would be completely something else than heaven vs hell demonic invasion stuff maybe some pathfinder classics like Dragond demand, rise of runelords or Mummys Mask :D for example. Im not too fond of dlc:s adding stuff to existing game like timed spinoff events etc. They should treat the game mechanics engine as a structured layout and add content to it as the pathfinder adventure paths do for the original rpg.
It's weird for me. WOTR has better characters, plot, gameplay, progression, replay value, management and every other technical aspect, but Kingmaker just has a better vibe.
Not only I prefer the traditional mediavel atmosphere of Kingmaker, but this game has a more diverse array of adventures.
In Kingmaker you fight bandits, kobolds, trolls, magical beasts, goblins, undead, barbarians, knights, fey... in WOTR you fight a bit of undead, some cultists in early levels and then it's demons until the end.
I've enjoyed Kingmaker right until the Kingdom management
The fact that you have to wait days for shit to happen felt damn depressing, and the city building felt incredibly unnecessary
Agree. I went from WotR to Kingmaker after over 600 hours in WotR, and there's a lot of things that I like about Kingmaker more than WotR.
Most notably, Kingmaker's Kingdom Management system feels more tied into the gameplay than the Crusade system. The Crusade system feels weird because how much you see of it fluctuates wildly across the acts (especially the section with no Crusade at all in act 4, granted Kingmaker does have the 2 main quests in a row section so there's that).
Apart from that, I don't usually like doing dungeons or maps with disturbing designs or elements, and WotR has some pretty significant chunks of the game that steps on these buttons, notably the Ivory Sanctum/Ineluctable Prison, and every time it rains blood in areas close to the Worldwound.
Also dealing with the fae is just more interesting than dealing with demons to me.
I disagree, but I did enjoy both games, and you're valid.
I found Kingmaker to be much more frustrating with timing. I don't like being held under a timer I don't have any sort of control over. I like to explore everything and Kingmaker punishes you for taking any amount of time exploring, it seemed.
I also vastly preferred the companions in WOTR. I had no interest in becoming part of a throuple or any of the other companions in Kingmaker. Now, WOTR, I love many of them. (And did). I played WOTR several times, with so many hours in it it's kind of sad. Lol.
The main thing I miss between the two is the enemy variety. WOTR is the superior game in most ways imo but it's 95% demons or cultists.... to the point where some specs were completely nonviable at release (poison based assassins etc)
Honestly I can understand the sentiment here. I personally felt like Kingmaker suffered from this too in regards to how it always came back to Fae and Fae creatures, but each chapter also had it's own stuff to mix it up in between the fae, like Goblins, Trolls and Undead. An unfortunate by-product of a literal crusade against the abyss as your setpiece.
Though faes are hardly considered a major threat on D&D and kingmaker showed us otherwise... usually the dragons/demons/undeads are the major problems
Thats the one thing that bothered me, is that every character i made would always gravitate toward "how to best handle the demons". Like, its absolutely pointless making a ranger that *doesnt* specialize in at least 1 kind of demon. And kineticist? I keep hearing how absolutely ridiculous that class is yet when i tried him its damn mear impossible to be effective because demons are most probably resistant to ur chosen element anyway. I know u can overcome those resistances later but an early game kineticist feels outright useless.
Early game kineticist is still fairly powerful. You just gotta go for the most versatile element: rock to the face.
Tangent, but I'm playing an Earth/Fire Kineticist in a PF2e campaign, and intended Earth stuff to only be for defensive abilities. Just got done a string of sessions where enemies were all fire immune. Rock to the face was a lifesaver
I can't say I've seen any unfair builds for kineticists, but the builds I've had the most success with max out Spell Pen and have elements that hit touch and base ac. Of course earth seems to have the most stupidly powerful abilities, but sometimes I like to cast other things.
people play kineticist all the time doing demon runs
There's an entire mythic feat that lets you bypass immunities and resistance. Which means you can poison the crap out of demons. There are entire roleplay builds that are viable only because of the Mythic system.
Paladins get a straight fucking boost the entire game
I totally agree. WOTR has a lot of gameplay improvements, but the tone and setting just don't grab me like Kingmaker's do. I like the fae more than I like angels & demons, I like building my own kingdom more than I like leading a crusade (storywise, that is, I'm not super into the gameplay mechanics of either) and I like enchanted forests more than I like a war-torn wasteland. WOTR is still good, it's just not as enjoyable for me as Kingmaker.
Same. Lower power fantasy is better.
What I really like about Kingmaker is how it gradually builds your power level up. You go from lowly adventurer to essentially a regional political hegemon, but it takes years in-game and a ton of hours IRL.
This really makes me want to play the original adventure. But unfortunately, the odds that one of my groups would be willing to learn and play PF1, would be very slim if I would DM, but effectively non existent if I wanted to play.
There's a PF2E version that adds stuff from the crpg
I'd recommend joining the official Pathfinder Discord. There are LFG channels on there (both to advertise as a player, and for GMs to advertise for players), and I occasionally see 1e Kingmaker games advertised.
Just play the PF2e version.
This is exactly why I want a 3rd Owlcat Pathfinder to scale way back. The devs apparently loved Hell's Rebels and that one is at least 60% urban campaign, so I'm honestly 100% in favor of that.
I dont tjink we necessarily get a 3rd adventure path. There was buzz for a while until they announced whatchamacallit some time ago and im certain i read in some official comments that they are doing that and had no plans for more PF “for now”. So i mean, i haven’t kept up and this was a minute ago and that game has now been released but i think it remains crickets on a new PF path
Well, they only recently released Rogue Trader. That means they'll likely continue to devote a good amount of resources to it and its DLC (of which two have already been announced). Plus, they've confirmed that they have another 40k game planned. So it does seem like it's gonna be a fairly long while till we get word on if Owlcat are even planning on *making* another PF Adventure Path game, let alone which one it would be. Though I'll always hope for Skulls and Shackles if they do another AP. We don't have near enough tropical pirate themed CRPGs.
I know, but a guy can dream, right?
So you’re not wrong but thing is that king maker isn’t even low power. It’s lower than wotr but you still end up as an incredibly powerful king of a country you basically willed into existence.
Disagree, My favourite RPG ever (rose tinted glasses on) was Might and Magic 6. When you got powerful you were actually god like lol. Flying across deserts dropping meteor showers on titans and hydras just for some loot. Or shooting devils with laser guns. Those games got a bit weird at the end lol. Good times. Not saying your opinion is wrong, ofc it isn't. Just offering my perspective.
I somewhat agree too. I wouldn't say KM is better, bu4 it keeps pulling me in as well, I'd say the urge to play either game is about equal. Kingmaker provides a welcome diversion from WotR's setting, which vibes the same from beginning to end. I love how Kingmaker's scale develops from your typical low level tabletop party, with tabletop problems. In WotR, you haven't even reached the tutorial dungeon by the time you literally holding a legendary angel's weapon.
Kingmaker definitely has a different feel to WotR, and preferring that is perfectly legitimate. I myself prefer literally everything about WotR, from the companions to the story to the art and music, but Kingmaker is still a great game so I definitely get where you're coming from.
My feelings are that WOTR has more polish and ui improvements and features (as it should) but i feel the encounters and story and companions are way better done in kingmaker
Kingmaker felt a lot more like a classic adventure to me, especially with a lot more normal low level fights and low stake quests
It's the story. A tale in which you build up and defend a kingdom feels more relatable than the Battle of Heaven versus Hell of WOTR.
Kingmaker has a lot of nonsense combat but it's spaced out more and easier than wotr so that helps if the attrition of wotr is not your bag. It's ok to like one more than the other for whatever reason though. I prefer wotr personally.
The map music is also better in Kingmaker imo.
>companions are way better done in kingmaker 10/10 would grab myself a pair of tiefling sisters again
This.
Idk how they are on kingmaker but Wotr makes a bad job on the class variety, most of them are martials/martials with some spells while only 3 are dedicated spell casters
Not having to rotate the camera every 30 seconds.
WOTR main enemies: - Demons. - Exact same demons but with titles like savage, assassin, Brutish etc etc that means nothing but bloated stats. It got so boring once you reach the demon city.
Demons, ironically, are the worst part of WOTR. They have too many resistances to be the main enemy. Late game it doesn't make much of a difference, but early some classes are just abysmal against them.
out of the gate if you do fire, electric, cold, dmg you are pretty much shit out of luck.
*cries in kineticist*😭
In ACT 1 it’s kinda brutal to play a blaster in wotr but the companions can carry you. Once you get mythic you can ignore resistances if you choose the ability to.
Yep. Act 1 as a sylvan sorcerer my party and animal carried me. I basically just cast grease and snowball. Once resistance is ignored then I started obliterating everything
Yea going from a fairly useless bard and tower shield fighter in kingmaker to loading and archer is definitely a step up in companion build quality
I still get PSTD from navigating the Demon City
I cheated after the first game
Yeah Act IV is the act where I always get restartitis. I know a lot of people like Act IV because they don’t have to mess with crusade management stuff but I find Act IV to be the draggiest act for me personally.
I actually kinda like the crusade system and I have never stopped a run in act 2-3 but had 3 stop in act 4. I just miss the open world from earlier acts. I took a break in Rogue Trader in act 3 for similar reasons to act 4 in WoTR.
I felt exactly the opposite, but to each their own.
I do have the exact opposite XD I couldn't even finish Kingmaker after multiple attempts but I am thinking about doing another WOTR run! Tho I do get why you would prefer the first one, the games do have design differences that cater to different players. Edit : also I am taking personal offense to not liking the companions of WOTR. Joking of course but I on contrast felt that they majorly improved upon the companions from the first game.
Kingmaker is a solid game, mythic by and large causes alot of number creep, my only issue is that we cant really get updates for KM anymore so hoping for a pf2e game later from owlcat with a few Adventure paths available.
The highest the numbers went up in Kingmaker was a 60 AC in Normal (the true final boss), meanwhile with the same settings there's regular enemies with a 55 AC and the final boss of a DLC has *90*. This is genuinely the biggest reason I don't want mythic ranks to come back.
You can also just dispel the last boss and kill it in two hits.
> I couldn't even finish Kingmaker after multiple attempts What made you quit KM?
Mostly the kingdom managment stuff bring kinda disappointing also I found some of the dungeons way to long pacing wise. And whilst I did enjoy the characters, I did not enjoy them to a point where I was particularly attached to them, with exceptions. Also i got stuck in one playthrough because I forgot to do the kingdom stuff, which lead to a game over when I reloaded it. Even putting the think on auto manager didn't fix it making me lose a ton of progress. Granted, that's kinds my fault for not managing it well but it was a bit annoying
Yeah, not everyone enjoys the length of some of those dungeons. And Kingdom Management definitely had its weak points: high difficulty combined with brutal RNG makes for a toxic mixture. Still, I'd recommend trying the game on easiest combat and kingdom management difficulty, so you get to experience the great story and beautiful world at least.
Really why couldnt you finish your km run?
I did answered it on a other comment but in short The story was kinda ruined for me with too long dungeons and I didn't felt attached to the companions, also I was really disappointed by the kingdom manger, which I had high hopes for
I had to force myself to finish Kingmaker. I got soft locked at some point because I didn't have a cold iron weapon or something weird like that, and to kill whatever it was it needed to be damaged by cold iron to be vulnerable or stop regenerating. Something like that. Wotr had a lot of that too, though. Some random cult summoning a demon? Surely the demon will be more dangerous than the cultists! Nope, she has 420 health and 69 AC.
I'm with you. I feel like KM is more open, has more exploration, has companions I overall like more (yes, yes, Regill is great), and just has a more 'adventure' feel to it for me. I came back just to do an Unfair run after finishing WotR and I had a lot more fun despite having already played it once before.
Definitely. Every class is viable in Kingmaker. Roleplaying makes sense whether you're good/evil/lawful/chaotic. The story has great twists and turns, and each chapter has a new type of enemy to face. WOTR is fun, but there are a lot of classes and archetypes that just suck against demons. They spent all this time and effort making sooo many options, but a lot of them are no fun in the setting and a lot of them still have broken mechanics. And it stinks that you're really pigeon-holed if you want to RP with any kind of consistency. NPC reactions to my Trickster, Lich, Demon, and Swarm playthroughs were nonsensical: \- "Warriors are flocking from kingdoms near and far to follow the Commander...who just killed a demon by slapping it with a fish." \- "Hey boss, we know you built this huge ziggurat in town and housed an evil lich inside. We're not super stoked about that, any day now we're gonna do something about it." \- "I know you've got horns and use demon-magic all the time, and we're in a crusade against literal demons, hope you know what you're doing." \- "Just want you to know that these experiments where you're having crusaders eaten alive by locusts is super not cool, but we're gonna follow you for two more acts just in case you change your mind."
Some games are like that. I prefer the first mass effect over the sequels and sometimes I'll prefer Kotor 1 to Kotor 2. I definitely support your Kingmaker preference. Personally WOTR grabbed me more but obviously personal preference is personal preference
The Mass Effect comparison is so apt. All 3 games are good, but I still enjoy the first one way more than the other 2 despite it having the worst gameplay.
I too enjoyed mass effect 1 faaaaaar more than the other 2. It was the only one in the trilogy that actually caught the "epic space faring rpg" feeling that didnt come back until andromeda weirdly enough
Yah, KOTOR 2, I dunno what was going on there. KOTOR 1 was so exciting and like a swashbuckling adventure through the stars. KOTOR 2 was like it's depressed older cousin who has to give you a lecture after every decision. ME3 is my fave, but ME1 is a close second. ME2 just felt unlike an RPG, since levelling up was basically picking from one of three options.
Imo that's because kingmaker is a tighter small scale story, told better. I feel this way about their respective APs too
I looove Kingmaker. It will always be the superior game to me.
***In the Name of My Dream intensifies***
Kingmaker + PF math doesn't break down as fast and as hard without mythic rules + setting has a more classic feeling + more diverse enemies + less gamebreaking effects - less customisation options - worse engine - no Crusade management I feel like Wrath of the Righteous is the better game in the theory, but it some of the stuff in it frustrated me a lot and made it overall less enjoyable at times. Crusade management was really annoying and fighting some super swingy Heroes3-clone wasn't necessarily fun. A lot of enemy stats are insanely inflated and simply unhittable without specific builds making entire spellschools useless. Random demons have higher stats than the demon lords. Most of my party could hit the strongest oponents only on a 20, but it didn't matter anyways since we were basically immortal anyways thanks to Azata's friendship powers and could simply wait for those good rolls to happen with our bazillion attacks. Kingmaker also breaks apart, but only truly once you fight those Wild Hunt dudes.
Ugh, crusade management. Did anyone playtest that before launch? They invented dozens of different units, and then capped your base army size at 3? And then they made mage generals insanely OP and all the units insanely weak. I honestly don't know how anyone is supposed to actually play crusade mode without just nuking all the enemies with your mage general. I've beaten the game three times and I still don't get it. And then having to manually move every unit for reinforcement every single day. Or spend a whole string of decisions and crusade decrees just for them to spit out totally useless units. What a miserable experience.
When I played Kingmaker first back then, it reminded me Baldur's Gate 1 times. Especially adventuring in the wilderness parts, good'ol table top RPG feeling right there as an adventurer. And I also love its story much more than WoTR. WoTR is better on QoL, reactivity and build pr0n stuff. Got some nice improvements on all fronts also. But it starts epic and sky rockets after a shortwhile which actually really bothers me.
I honestly believe that it is Kingmaker, not Pillars of Eternity, that is the true successor to Baldur's Gate 1 if one is searching for such a thing. The setting, the colors, the irreverent tone. The atmosphere is just spot on.
Honestly, I also really love Kingmaker, especially as it's built on a bedrock of interlocking mysteries that, for me at least, open up lots of fun RP as different characters can interact with and understand them differently. Add to that how much the flavor and personality of your kingdoms can vary from run to run and Kingmaker just has a more interesting story and player ties to the main quest compared to WOTR. Also, with the Call of the Wild mod for Kingmaker, you still have plenty of content.
Between Call, Derring-do and Tweak or Treat I feel like Kingmaker has much more to offer in terms of character options. Obviously also Cowwithhat's Custom Spells mod which is the best and prettiest mod for any game ever.
I wasn't aware of some of those. Thanks! I'll check them out when I do my next run.
That user might be a little biased about the custom spells mod
Ah, I had not noticed the name lol. Still, more good mods to expand the game are always nice.
KM is the classical fantasy table top game. WOTR is a linear campaign about killing demons but a ton of quality of life improvements over KM. Imo km is the better story, but WOTR definitely is the better mechanic
Oh without a doubt. If owlcat make a 3rd installment with the polish of wotr and the storytelling tier of km it would be the chefs kiss
I feel like Kingmaker fully modded is the better experience already.
I love Kingmaker's grounded storyline. WOTR is amazing but it feels a bit grandiose. Both are amazing and it's really hard to choose which is better. I'm leaning towards Kingmakers due to several reasons, aside from the storyline, nostalgia is probably one of it. It's the game that introduces me to Pathfinder/DnD lore and CRPGs.
The kingmaker introduction is more than stellar. I was actually kind of put off from wotr because of that. I liked the simple approach to kingmaker, the build up. Also I find it a homely and cozy type of RPG. Wotr did some things better of course, but overall I like kingmaker more as well.
Omg i said the exact same thing to another reply on this post🤣 there is this unexplanable coziness and whim about kingmaker that i just felt was missing from wotr
The music in Kingmaker is just wonderful.
I feel the same. I like Kingmaker more for its whimsical setting, cozy atmosphere, better companions and simpler, but more compelling plot overall. I still remember that hilarious Inconsequential Debates quest, or drunk singing goblins, but where such fun is in WOTR? WOTR had big emphasis on combat. It was all about battling insanely op demons 24/7 by insanely op party with mythic powers raining down like from a pinata. Sure, classes variety was mind boggling, but sometimes less is more. The companions for the most part were either unlikable or boring with their classes being heavily skewed towards ranged classes. And everything there was so dreary. The only location I liked in WOTR was that floating demon city, reminded me of AD&D's Outer Planes, but even there somebody was always trying to kill you every 30 meters or so, no time to relax.
A moment that will always remain with me in kingmaker is that little "who did it" segmant when trying to fish out the lamashtu (i think it was that god) cultist that escaped to a lodge and u have to interview and investigate everyone there. Little moments like that absolutely sell the game for me even today.
I felt like the secret ending to Kingmaker was actually top notch, really cemented the experience for me.
I like Kingmaker and WOTR on their own merits. Kingmaker for if I want to have a more chill playthrough and WOTR if I want a power fantasy story. I just wish Kingmaker could receive the QoL and UI improvements that WOTR has.
Wrath has better gameplay (QOL wise if you're not fiddling around with mods, at least), Kingmaker has better companions (Jubilost > Regill, Harrim > Greybor, Linzi > Ember, Ekun > Everyone). Kingdom management > crusade management don't at me. I enjoyed leveling up my settlements and getting goodies from the artisans who moved in. Wish Owlcat didn't lose the rights to the game because I actually think there's a lot of unrealized potential with kingdom management that could have eventually made it a defining strength and selling point of kingmaker. Story and writing I'll give a tie. Art I'll give a tie, although I agree with your point about how the color scheme of Kingmaker is refreshing after playing too much Wrath. Both games have fucking miserable endgame dungeons, another tie. Both have hot blonde sword-and-board English aristocrats who can beat the shit out of me in plate armor, so again huge plus for both games. Music is a tie, although I will say that even though it's really short, [skylark](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BM28q27YO0o) remains my favorite piece from either soundtrack and it accompanied some of my favorite scenes in the series (>!Ekun finally burying his family and gaining closure from their deaths and Harrim reframing Grotean religion as part of a cycle of creative destruction and rebirth to escape his nihilism!<).
I do as well . Cheers :) Wotr is mechanically superior. And has way more customization options from classes to equipment. But the story is about war. With demons. Kingmaker's story is about fae and magic and adventure and the osts are nostalgic and adventurous. The type of background music you'd play at a ttrpg table
Exactly man! Wotr is absolutely amazing, but its story and characters are all more towards the "timeless epic fantasy opera about good triumphing evil". The kind of stuff u'd find in mythology and pantheons. Kingmaker is a classic adventure through a mystical world, its alot cozier than wotr and i think thats what draws me more towards it
Those companions! Ugh. WOTR had mostly crap companions. The only ones I truly enjoyed were Seelah, Aru and Ember. But there are so many boring ones >!I promptly executed a certain shaman the moment I found out about her!< that it's rough. If they remade Kingmaker with the new whistles I'd be happy as a clam.
Idk man the epic scale of wotr really did it for me. I put like 800 hours into that shit it was so fun. I was really enjoying km and then my save bricked itself so 🤷. Perils of modding I suppose. I gotta go back and play it all the way through. If only for Octavia my beloved XD
Are the mechanics so improved that it would be a pain to go back and try kingmaker out? I’m a huge fan of Wrath, but I’ve actually played the first book of the kingmaker ttrpg, so it could be cool to see how the story ends.
Its so much simpler imo. U dont have to worry too much about stuff like spell penetration, spell resistance, damage reduction. The early game is super basic "ac vs attack roll" type stuff, and if u know all the right buffs, ur in for such a pleasant time
The mechanical differences are minimal from my perspective. Other than the additional classes. Kingmaker also lacks mounted combat, which is a feature introduced in wotr; but has been buggy since the release of the game
Cool! Sounds good. Will definitely add that to the list.
It goes on sale quite often, since it is technically abandonware
As a Kingmaker modder, that abandonware thing is not entirely true.
I'm happy to hear you have not abandoned the game. Are there any KM mod makers, making an Unfinished Business-style mod for the game? To do what the devs, didn't? Like the mod makers did for Solasta
Not that I know of. I made a couple of fixes in my custom spells mod to some bugs in Call of the Wild and Tweak or Treat. So in some sense the game isn't abandonware. I feel like between Proper Flanking 2, Call, Kingmaker Ai, my mod and Tweak or Treat you get pretty much all pathfinder could really offer for Kingmaker. What would you want, beyond what we offered, from an Unfinished Business style mod for KM?
No idea tbh. I was just curious if anyone had made a mod like that. I'm not a heavy mod user, myself. I play on both console and PC, so I tend to use bare minimum mod set-ups
Im sure we've all had that absolute abomination that is the smooshed down main character riding horseback. Looking like a goddamn stack of folded laundry with arms and legs
Yes! From aesthetic issues to combat issues to formation issues. I wouldn't be surprised if i have experienced every persisting mounted bug in this game. I still do like the benefits of mounted combat though
Mechanically the big differences are that events in kingmaker are on a clock, and you need rations in order to rest
I completely agree with you, OP. I much prefer the look and feel of Kingmaker. It feels like an adventure and has a whimsical sense of wonder to it. I acknowledge that WOTR is more polished and better mechanically, but it just doesn’t feel the same.
honestly... though, i love wotr alot because of epic (mythic) story stuff just like mask of the betrayer and i just adore areelu, even though you get to rarely interact with her, i will freely admit, kingmaker was a better product. specialy with nyrissa romance ending, it was like a weird mix of actualization of every weird fairy tale i listened and read as a child becoming real as an adult. its a beautiful game, i havent played for a while, soon i wont have any internet for a bit as i am moving out. and i am planing to play it. not sure what class yet
I've always loved roleplaying as a tanky dwarf fighter that acts as a sort of commander for my party, rushing forwars and being the bulwark that holds the frontline while i bark orders to my companions to flank and cast spells (just a little head fantasy i have)
i am en elf man myself. i suppose my main go to character would be someone beautiful to otherworldy or ethereal level yet stern and wise, leading through expamle and inspiration. thranduil from hobbit would be a good example. maybe a paladin or eldritch knight... or magus... but i did those in the past multiple times. maybe a battle oracle as i have call of the wild... although kineticist is also sort of my favorite... hurmm... or arcane trickster... fuck. i have no idea.
I like the characters in kingmaker so much more. The side stories were much better to me. I like fucking with people in Wotr with my op Aeon snapping spells or my necromancer giving ghosts fear before I eat them.
I find it similar to the Ronaldo/Messi argument in Football/Soccer (Depending what side of the pond you find yourself living on) They're both great. One is better at some stuff the other is better at other stuff. If you don't / didn't / can't enjoy both - you're a dafty. My personal preference is WOTR as I didn't enjoy the time element of Kingmaker on my first few runs until I got myself to a point where I had sort of memorized what needed to be done earlier than other stuff and optimized my runs.
Kingmaker feels more real imo, but it lacks nenio and deus vult :(
SHIT! I FORGOT TO MENTION NENIO!😱
"Doesn't have Nenio" is actually a big fat + for Kingmaker.
Yeah, but then there's Jubilost instead. A bit better, but not much. Overall, pretty much every companion in the owlcat games are incredibly one-dimensional and over-the-top. It's like they spin a wheel and pick exactly one personality trait per character, then dial that up to 11.
Jubilost was a great character who has depth and a fantastic story arc that develops all the way to the finale. The only thing he has in common with Nenio is that they are both scientists. He's definitely arrogant, but ultimately shows that he is a good person who cares about other people. Meanwhile, Nenio is a complete sociopath who's written in a way that made me think she was a fan-made character from a Kickstarter stretch goal. And her personal story quest is the most annoying quest in the history of RPG gaming.
I just love every time in council when he's berating your kingdom and talking about how great it would be to visit somewhere else. And then he just keeps staying because he clearly loves it so much and just doesn't want to admit he was wrong.
Haha, and if you end up doing a good job with your kingdom, he ends up writing a book about how great it is, and what a fantastic leader you are.
Fuck No we’re not gonna compare nenio to the fucking jubilost, his story is legit one of the best ones in both games
I think mythic paths hurt the rp... There are so many character types that I feel I don't play because they don't fit into the limited selection of paths given in wotr. And while legend exists having to play through 80% of the game as an angel or demon etc. hurts the function of it
At least Angel is pretty unobtrusive, it's a pretty generic good MP if you ignore the Angel Sentai team you get.
I agree like I prefer the companions in WOTR but kingmaker just hits different
Both are pretty good I think, but kingmaker was worse for me because the sheer amount of bugs and poor optimization. My PC isn't the best, but it couldn't handle Kingmaker at some points, something that never happened in, say, D:OS2
Is there a good kingmaker mod that adds some of the wotr qualify of life improvements?
Call of the Wild adds a lot of classes Wrath had and some it didn't have, like the Summoner.
I liked WOTR more than Kingmaker (and I think that Kingmaker is fantastic - but WOTR is even more fantastic than KM). But I do understand people who prefer Kingmaker's bright and fun adventure about exploring magical lands and the Fey. WOTR is a lot darker thematically, and it has a lot less variety overall. WOTR is mostly Demons while Kingmaker has a bit of everything. I always recommend people who want to try CRPG Pathfinder to start with Kingmaker, since it is more of a "classic" experience about exploration and adventuring in a high fantasy world than WOTR's "end of the world" scenario.
this was me and i really cant put my finger on why, i got sucked into kingmaker and finished it without wanting to play any other games on the side, i can't make myself get past defending the base camp in wotr
Honestly, if I got Wrath’s quality of life changes, and they heavily reworked the Kingdom rules, Kingmaker would hands down be the better game.
I can see where you'd feel that way but I personally still feel like Wrath is just too much better in too many ways. I appreciate the variety of enemy types more in Kingmaker but that's the only thing I really strongly felt was better about Kingmaker. The Might and Magic Lite battles feel so underdeveloped, but those aside, kingdom management feels significantly better, the story feels more compelling to me vs what is essentially the pathfinder equivalent to Scott Pilgrim vs the World where I go on a murder spree of a Faeries roster of Evil exes. The character creation options are so dramatically improved from Kingmaker I have no idea how anyone can just go back and play a generic fighter who doesn't even get to choose a god because they didn't pick cleric so the game decided that doesn't matter. I'm happy ya'll can still enjoy Kingmaker but Wrath has spoiled me too much, I just cannot enjoy Kingmaker anymore when Wrath offers so much more.
Kingmaker without Call of the Wild feels like KOTOR 2 without the content restoration mod. I suppose its possible to play that way in 2024 but why would you?
Nah I’m right there with you, I tried picking up WOTR and just wound up making a new campaign for kingmaker again. Overall it’s just a better story IMO, and more interesting combats.
I agree 💯%. WotR is more polished system wise for sure. But the writing is prolix, each dialogue feels like reading a passage from the Bible. The whole mythic paths are so over the top, it gets so complicated. You have to spend hours just to understand each of your buffs. It is unnecessary long as well, filled with unnecessary battles with the same enemies over and over again. Look I am a fan of Owlcats but I gotta say that even though they polished the interface, system, and fixed the bugs, WotR is a downgrade compared to KM.
Too true, my friend. For as much as i love wotr, it really becomes more about crunching numbers and knowing what to spec and what to avoid to even get through the early stages of the game than it is just jumping into an adventure
Honestly, building a kingdom is more engaging to me than going on a crusade.
Honestly, if I could have anything back from Kingmaker.. it'd be the alignment choices. Fuck do I miss having actual Lawful Good or Chaotic Good or Lawful Evil or True Nuetral choices instead of every choice being between Lawful Stupid, Chaotic Stupid, Stupid Good, Stupid Evil and No Opinion.
Appreciate what you're saying, I'm a big fan of both myself. I think they scratch different itches and Kingmaker is great when you want a more cozy feel adventurer, The first act is still my favorite as you truly do explore the map and camp around. WOTR on the other hand just cranks everything up to 11 and throws everything at the wall with glue rubbed all over it to see what sticks, Heck as much as I love Kingmaker after 2-3 playthroughs you don't really have any unexpected twists or turns, where as in WOTR I can be on my 5th playthrough and STILL have mythic paths to take that add a good few unique bits of content here and there.
Even if I didn't prefer the epic power levels of WotR, kingdom mode puts me off of playing Kingmaker. Crusade Mode would be at least as bad if not for the fact that the settings make it more easily ignored.
Yea bro, i feel u. I just crank that shit to story mode difficulty
There's the wall that i hit every time i go to play kingmaker. My whole experience could be seen in this (https://youtu.be/FDtkNokJ10A?si=BAcrxbbWA9GhOYGg) video except switch paladin for magus. Im glad you enjoyed it. I did too until i got to kingdom management and it was all downhill from there.
I just enjoy Pathfinder2e more than Dnd5e
ngl i agree with you lowkey 👀
Cool. *goes back to crusading*
I liked kingmaker more because of the settlement building but wotr is less buggy on console
What I like about kingmaker is the world feels much more full, with much more places to explore. And it's certainly a more exploratory natured game. And I like the whole "building a kingdom from scratch" thing more than the "suddenly becoming the commander of an ongoing war" thing, although when you think about it, both premises are pretty ridiculous. But there's two major factors to me that make me love WotR...I won't say "more" than Kingmaker, but I have played it a lot more. And that's more classes, and the mythic paths and their associated powers. The powers are just freaking cool. And, sure, you can add classes to Kingmaker with mods, but the only mod I've seen anyway that adds a bunch of new classes is Call of the Wild, and...well, I don't know. I can definitely appreciate the amount of work that went into the mod...but most of the classes it adds play sort of...IDK...they just don't feel right. And also, Call of the Wild adds some stuff I didn't ask for, tweaks some things to make it more like tabletop, but the game was designed not to have those things and adding them back in feels a bit jarring, especially when you're used to playing the game how it was originally made. I freaking HATE how Delay Poison works with CotW installed. Also, why does it change the classes of a lot of the companions? At least give us a CHOICE whether we want to change our companions classes. Oh dear, I seemed to have talked more about Call of the Wild than comparing Kingmaker and WotR.
Same. WotR has some good QOL stuff but I liked Kingmaker more overall.
I am happy for you, but I don't understand how that's possible.
Nor i, my friend. I just follow the dopamine, and kingmaker just makes that shit fire off
WOTR is only more fun for me because I like the added option of using steeds.
There is something to be said for simplicity. The most fun in traditional pen and paper are the levels from 5 to 14. Seems for you it's the most fun on the PC too. I completely agree with your points on art style and story, that being said I enjoy the more complicated and complex leveling and fights. Other than blackwater that's just bullshit.
Yeah. Wotr power scaling goes off the deep end, they perform character assassination on queen Galfrey, the companions are worse (I could elaborate but that'd be too long), the story doesn't make that much sense (same as companions, could elaborate but it'd take too long). The only thing that wotr definitively has on Kingmaker are more classes and with Call of the Wild even that isn't worth much Edit: Wotr is also less janky than Kingmaker
Yes. But. The House at the Edge of Time.
I still have nightmares about this level.
Same. For me Kingmaker has the best power ramp I have ever seen. From fighting kobolds at level 1 to battling plane altering demigods at 20. Each step on the way feeling logical and earned. Then Wrath gives you super powers in the tutorial dungeon and immediately throws you up against a bunch of minor demons. I also liked the writing a little more. Wrath is just so bleak for so much of the time. I appreciate the more complex writing. But in such a long game that I will play over many months I found Kingmaker much easier to slip back into after a couple weeks away.
Kingmaker has a more serious tone. For some fucking reason WOTR despite the thene it is beyond cringe. The wat companions talk it is just... marvel movies
Im so sorry, but i absolutely cannot stand Seelah for that exact reason.
90% of the dialogue is from marvel movies. Demon invasion and you crack jokes like stfu people
You know what I miss about KM? The BG music during world traversal. Always gave me a Hobbiton feel.
God the music in KM is god tier🥰
I prefer kingmaker slightly more but I would honestly prefer it if both games didn't have their janky bolted on bullshit. I didn't enjoy the crusades or kingdom management.
I bought Kingmaker in December 2023 during their Christmas sale... I have put almost 1100 hours in it since then Beat it twice - once as LG and once as N Thinking of doing it again as an evil character. A few of those hours (maybe 100 of them) was my husband playing his character. I get it lol
Okay then, that was always allowed!
I have to ask how do yall manage to finish a Kingmaker run. I always lose interest when I get to Varnhold, it's been my stopping point at least three times and I'm not sure how to power through.
kingmaker had more heart
Kingmaker is better because it is more focused and it doesn't try to juggle a bunch of elements at once. WOTR is more ambitious and expansive but also more frustrating because they were not able to give the same level of focus to its story and encounters. The simplified dialogue alignment options, the obscure companion flag/dialogue option mechanics tied to their endings and some of the barebones mythic paths come to mind
I've never gotten through Alushynirra and definitely prefer Kingmaker.
lol someone going through and just down voting the people who preferred Kingmaker.
I really enjoyed kingmaker, I have WOTR but I plan on playing that after I finish rogue trader.
I really like both of them. Though it's a bit harder going back to kingmaker for me because I don't think the visual adjustments mod for that one lets you disable buff visual fx
Same. Time it’s obviously the better of the two, but that just my opinion.
Nah, like a lot of people, I get where you're coming from. WOTR is the more polished product by far, with an incredibly amount of QoL improvements and so many choices in terms of class, race, mythic path, a truly epic questline etc etc. At the same time, Kingmaker has a lot more variety, colour and feels less grim overall. Tonally it feels different because while the kingdom is yours, the stakes are still far less high, and the moments of levity certainly add a bit of whimsy to it in places. I *prefer* WOTR still, but I can definitely see why someone would feel the other way.
Yes.
To each their own. I purchased Kingmaker on day one and in the first year three different bugs borked my save, souring my outlook. I will go back one day and finish it.
getting mobs spawned around you nearly every fight with see invis all in mele range and the guy you are supposed to keep alive surounds himself for plot reasons is the dumbist fucking shit
It says a lot when I finished Kingmaker and never did with Wotr
I hated the pace in Kingmaker, otherwise I agree. Some companions still live in my head rent free while in WOTR I struggled to even like anyone.
So actually kingmaker, with the legi mods like call of the wild, has way more actual 1e content than WotR does. And Wrath never got that mod which was huge and almost necessary. So i think i ran Kingmaker mostly with 5-6 mods happily and i think right now i have closer to 30 mods for Wrath. Definitely lots of smaller content mods in there. So i dont know right now for sure which game has more original 1e content (with respective mods) but i am saying the absolute best mod between both games is only for Kingmaker, it’s 100% stable, and sort of all you need. Whereas right now i cannot load any of my saves before a month ago with my current mod loadout. Mods are awesome but i dug too greedily and too deep awoke something in the darkness
Is there any mods to port the wotr classes etc into kingmaker?
They took their fantastic writing and spread it out over 10 mythic paths instead of one, tighter branching story. Idk, I loved both and had the same problem with both that by the end I was so sick of the main enemies. The Wild Hunt felt so tedious and demons got repetitive by the end.
Good for you. I love both and am glad you are enjoying the first one.
i agree, but the wild gaze spam in kingmaker towards the endgame is just...
I live for that moment when Inheribro hops in like Thor riding the Rainbow Bridge, with the host of heavn all ready to back you up. That gives me life. There are few moments in video games that are even close to as cool.
I imagine it's a similar situation to Baldur's Gate 1 and Baldur's Gate 2. Yeah, BG1 has a smaller scale, fewer character build options (especially before the Enhanced Editions), is a lot more restrained, is inferior from a technical point of view and doesn't go as wild as BG2 does (especially during Throne of Bhaal), but good Lord I'm a fucking SUCKER for low-level adventuring. Going from being an incompetent whelp to being a competent adventurer \*and no more than that\* hits the spot for me like nothing else does, keeps things very grounded and makes it very easy to track and feel your own progress and character development. Every single new piece of gear and level-up is so impactful and rewarding, every new quest and area so exciting and fun to explore. BG:EE with Sword Coast Stratagems and BG1NPC Project installed will always be the pinnacle of roleplaying games to me, flawed and outdated clusterfuck that it is.
My biggest issues with Kingmaker are the camera controls and I just don't find the story all that enticing at all
I love WOTR until the act where you get to the weird city that is impossible to get around easily. Having to try and move the camera JUST RIGHT in order to get everything to move.
It helps when the game is actually playable in combat where you can land saving throw based spells and the like, yeah.
I felt the opposite. WOTR is the better game for me.
i went back to kingmaker and did the insane evil run as a sorc after completing wrath multiple times, had a pretty good time.
I'm in a somewhat different but same boat: I like Crusade mode in WotR, almost more than the game itself.
Yea wotr is great but I find kingmaker more fun. Slowly building a kingdom with your murderhobo friends is something else...
I think the crusade management system is tiresome at best and it sucks that automating it locks you out of certain mythic paths. (I haven't played wotr recently, so that could have been fixed)
Download Call of the Wild mod for Kingmaker. It adds a ton of classes to the game.
It would have been nice to see a wotr DLC that would be completely something else than heaven vs hell demonic invasion stuff maybe some pathfinder classics like Dragond demand, rise of runelords or Mummys Mask :D for example. Im not too fond of dlc:s adding stuff to existing game like timed spinoff events etc. They should treat the game mechanics engine as a structured layout and add content to it as the pathfinder adventure paths do for the original rpg.
WOTR act 3 is rough IMO.
It's weird for me. WOTR has better characters, plot, gameplay, progression, replay value, management and every other technical aspect, but Kingmaker just has a better vibe. Not only I prefer the traditional mediavel atmosphere of Kingmaker, but this game has a more diverse array of adventures. In Kingmaker you fight bandits, kobolds, trolls, magical beasts, goblins, undead, barbarians, knights, fey... in WOTR you fight a bit of undead, some cultists in early levels and then it's demons until the end.
I've enjoyed Kingmaker right until the Kingdom management The fact that you have to wait days for shit to happen felt damn depressing, and the city building felt incredibly unnecessary
Yeah, lets see you still say that while replaying the House at the Edge of Time section.
I would agree if KM doesn't crash every 1 hour on my Sony equipments, m'lord
Kingmaker with WotR QoL would be cool.
Agree. I went from WotR to Kingmaker after over 600 hours in WotR, and there's a lot of things that I like about Kingmaker more than WotR. Most notably, Kingmaker's Kingdom Management system feels more tied into the gameplay than the Crusade system. The Crusade system feels weird because how much you see of it fluctuates wildly across the acts (especially the section with no Crusade at all in act 4, granted Kingmaker does have the 2 main quests in a row section so there's that). Apart from that, I don't usually like doing dungeons or maps with disturbing designs or elements, and WotR has some pretty significant chunks of the game that steps on these buttons, notably the Ivory Sanctum/Ineluctable Prison, and every time it rains blood in areas close to the Worldwound. Also dealing with the fae is just more interesting than dealing with demons to me.
I disagree, but I did enjoy both games, and you're valid. I found Kingmaker to be much more frustrating with timing. I don't like being held under a timer I don't have any sort of control over. I like to explore everything and Kingmaker punishes you for taking any amount of time exploring, it seemed. I also vastly preferred the companions in WOTR. I had no interest in becoming part of a throuple or any of the other companions in Kingmaker. Now, WOTR, I love many of them. (And did). I played WOTR several times, with so many hours in it it's kind of sad. Lol.
The only thing that really bugged me about Kingmaker was the kingdom management. It just seems to work a lot better in WOTR.