Notes on the Storyline/Game play
* Your PC starts in West Harbor; small, non-descript hamlet
* Several years ago West Harbor was caught in the middle of a massive battle between a entity known as the "King of Shadows" and an unknown opposing force. Your hamlet was almost decimated and would have been if not for a third player in the battle who seemed to come from no where and destroyed both the King of Shadows and his attackers.
* Since this third entity did not leave any survivors no one really knows many of the details about the whole event.
* Story starts when several strangers come to your village looking for something. It is implied it may have something to do with the defeated King of Shadows.
* You start out as a typical commoner. No one really pays much attention to you; you are no more or less special then anyone else in the village and the NPCs react as such.
* You need to build your reputation to become/be considered a 'hero'. They do not give any real specifics in the article on how you do so but they state it will not be due to repetitive 'rescue the cat' or 'fed-ex' type quests.
* Your PC can be any standard race, subrace or class.
* New Base class the 'Warlock' will be introduced in NWN2.
* The article states the Warlock is a excellent offensive magic caster class.
* As we were already told Strongholds are in, but they are more then "window dressing". They will serve as the PCs base of operations and will be important to the main story.
* You can hire NPCs to staff your stronghold and gain benefits from such. The example given is you can hire a Scholar to research new spells while you are away on a quest.
* Companions who join you will you have their own motivation, interests and depending on your actions may open up side quests for you... or tick them off and have them up and leave. They will work similar to KotOR2 and it's influence system.
Technical Notes
* Views can be classic overhead or 3rd person view.
* Dialog is now handled via a close-up with dialog choices. But a option exists to use the classic 'word bubble' style.
* Toolset will include tutorials.
* New conversation editor allows you to now view all variables.
* New toolset allows creating cinematic cut-scenes to recording action in pre-set areas.
* There will be creatures in the toolset that are not used in the OC.
* Most environmental effects can be edited via the toolset. Such as cloud cover, sky color and wind direction.
* The DM client will change little.
* While not set, the max player cap is once again mentioned at ~64
