Beta 20 is out...

[PowerWyrm]

And another huge changelist...

However, I've seen a couple things that are puzzling me:

1) Antimagic will forever prevent the use of spells, corruptions, runes, divine talents and arcane powered items

So which class will be able to use the skills? I can't see melee characters playing the whole game without a Phase Door or Teleportation rune... In this case, maybe add a "Leap" talent to fighting techniques.

2) Undeads can not use Infusions

This means you only can play classes that come with healing spells, right? Unless they get racial healing...

[PowerWyrm]

Anyway I'm gonna restart a Mindslayer... the one I tried in b19 was fun to play, and it seems the class got massively rebalanced in b20.

[Sirrocco]

Undead do get access to shielding runes, so that helps - especially since shielding runes take no time to activate. There is also gear out there that can give increased HP regen speeds - and there are a lot more classes with decent HP recovery skills than you might think.

I've played melee characters who don't use phase door or teleportation. Sure, you need some form of rapid movement in order to catch your enemy, but pretty much every melee class has that to begin with. Also, there may well be items powered by non-arcane sources that provide fast movement activations.

[ohioastro]

The change to the infusions does basically rule out non-healer classes for undead. I've been running a ghoul berserker, formerly a fun combination. I can't see how it will be viable at higher levels with no burst healing capability. It could work for a magic class (but then why the undead specials)? At minimum I'd drastically lower the EXP bonus, since no access to healing is a massive, massive hit to the power of those classes.

Otherwise a lot of the changes in this version seem very solid.

[yufra]

The changes to anti-magic and undead not being able to use infusion appear to be the first wave in greater integration of the nature vs. arcane tension into the game. There are rumors of additional inscriptions etc, so don't despair of the undead/anti-magic in the long-term.

[Mithril]

You cannot use the Rod of Recall if going the anti-magic path. Cannot see me ever going down that path again as long as that limitation remains.

[Canderel]

You cannot use the Rod of Recall if going the anti-magic path. Cannot see me ever going down that path again as long as that limitation remains.

Is that confirmed, or assumed?

[ohioastro]

I don't see the viability of undead+antimagic at all with the current setup (no runes or inscriptions), and the number of classes where an undead makes sense (even leaving aside massive exp penalties) is....well, I can't think of any. You gain some immunities - which can be obtained other ways - and lose healing. The stats don't especially help spellcasters. I don't see the niche now.

[Marcotte]

You cannot use the Rod of Recall if going the anti-magic path. Cannot see me ever going down that path again as long as that limitation remains.

Is that confirmed, or assumed?

I can confirm that, at least in beta 20, I cannot use the Rod of Recall after learning anti-magic. That is due to the Rod being powered by both "arcane" and "unknown" forces.

[PowerWyrm]

The change to the infusions does basically rule out non-healer classes for undead. I've been running a ghoul berserker, formerly a fun combination. I can't see how it will be viable at higher levels with no burst healing capability. It could work for a magic class (but then why the undead specials)? At minimum I'd drastically lower the EXP bonus, since no access to healing is a massive, massive hit to the power of those classes.

Otherwise a lot of the changes in this version seem very solid.

Berserker is one of the only classes you can actually play with undead. Their "Bloodbath" tree will largely compensate the lack of regen infusions (I don't reallyt remember using infusions with my last berserker). And as Yufra said, this is only the first step in rebalancing the undead race.

[PowerWyrm]

You cannot use the Rod of Recall if going the anti-magic path. Cannot see me ever going down that path again as long as that limitation remains.

Is that confirmed, or assumed?

I can confirm that, at least in beta 20, I cannot use the Rod of Recall after learning anti-magic. That is due to the Rod being powered by both "arcane" and "unknown" forces.

This is indeed a problem. Isn't there one or two quest dungeons that have no exit?

[kazak]

Not sure whether this is off-topic or not...

Is it intended for this beta to load savefiles from the previous beta? My old saves load normally, but my understanding is that this typically should not be the case. New saves load normally as well, btw.

[Grey]

It is not intended and may indeed be dangerous to do so. Various errors can occur, so I'd recommend you stick to using the previous betas for older characters.