Yeah I thought this - seems there's no way to recover their non-grey life, even though you can yourself..

Thought so. It's cool because they're kind of your countdown timer to make sure you don't overstretch yourself. Anynoe lost a pawn yet? It was emotional.

My main pawn is on flashing red health, and I'm in the middle of nowhere right now. Took 2 night cycles to get where I got and there are poisonous swamps and snow harpies everywhere! Was trying to find the ancient quarry then realised I was in completely the wrong place...

40 minutes of progress lost because I slipped off a cliff. Jesus christ, have they missed the last decade of game design?

Try again, go a different way, have a 10 minute battle with a Cyclops ended because I get grabbed and my party just stand around buffing and healing each other instead of releasing me.

I desperately want to play this amazing game that Nick, Curtis, Zelda and Moose are playing but I appear to have been sent a buggy, broken, tedious game instead and it is a real shame.

I'm guessing they use primary more but who knows what the ratio is.

Also just noticed that it never rains in Gransys  Wonder how all that grass stays so green.

Just trying out some of the Mystic Knight shield and weapon enchantments. They are very fucking cool!

Tempy wrote:

40 minutes of progress lost because I slipped off a cliff. Jesus christ, have they missed the last decade of game design? Try again, go a different way, have a 10 minute battle with a Cyclops ended because I get grabbed and my party just stand around buffing and healing each other instead of releasing me. I desperately want to play this amazing game that Nick, Curtis, Zelda and Moose are playing but I appear to have been sent a buggy, broken, tedious game instead and it is a real shame.

Definitely my biggest bugbear with the game.  Restarted my initial character because of just such a problem.

We were on an escort mission into an area we'd not yet explored.  It was hard going as we probably weren't quite leveled up as far as we needed to be.  It got to the stage that I was saving after every fight because we were just scraping through.

Eventually one of the lion/goat/snake men ambushed and absolutely destroyed us.  Not such a problem, since I'd saved 5 minutes back.  However, when I reloaded, it seemed to be right in the middle of a wolf pack spawn point and we were swamped straight away.  Worse we were in range of some bandits, who came over and overwhelmed us.  

After a number of tries it was painfully obvious that we were hopelessly outgunned to I tried legging it back to town.  It worked to an extent.  Both our hired pawns died but the bloke we were escorting survived... Only he now wouldn't stop following us it around!  Even after changing quests.  Couldn't work out how to get him to piss off and he was giving me the shits, figured it would be easier to just start over since I'd only logged a couple of hours.

Seriously though, the check pointing is dishearteningly brutal, and if the manual saving is as unreliable as that experience, I'm fairly cagey about using it too often.

Must say thou, I'm having a great time with my new character, taking things a bit slower, ensuring I'm as prepared as possible, avoiding taking on escort missions to places I've yet to visit. 

It's a very pretty game during the day, and night is miserable enough that I avoid it at all costs and plan my missions around it.  Good place to adventure in.

Aside from the saving my only other real reservation is with the sheer amount of pissweak minions that dog you at every turn.  "Wolves hunt in fucking packs"!  Giving me the shits.

I lasted five minutes before heading to bed last night - asleep by 10.30! All that anticipation and then I was just too damn tired. (I swear that's never happened before darling!)

Was about to hire Tempy's pawn and all... Maybe tomorrow night!

Another 3am session last night. I revisited far off places i'd found with actual objectives this time. Made em far less daunting cause i'd seen em before. Also found a top notch vendor in the Quarry, and finally got my main character looking the part. I'm finding it quite easy though. I have absolutely no trouble taking on mobs, ogres, chimeras. They fall all the same. Had a cameo appearance from the Griffin, but he fucked off after taking a bit of damage.

What team is everyone using? I have myself who's a straight up Fighter, my main pawn who is 100% support Mage, a hired Ranger for one-shotting annoying Harpies and the like, and another Fighter, who is brilliant at being bait by bashing his shield, he's also fond of climbing up the bigger enemies, which with me on as well, roots em to the spot. Overall a fast and effective killing squad.

Me and my pawn are Level 33.
My hired help are both 28.

I'm a mystic knight, my main pawn is a fighter, and I have hired a ranger and a mage. And yeah most of the big monsters fall easily now! Especially Cyclops, if you manage to get the armour off quickly.

The Lone Warrior.

I love all the random pawns wandering round Gran Soren. The other night i saw the 8 foot galoot that is Churro, banging on someone's door in the wee hours of the morning. Booty call maybe? lol! 

Right. Anyone who has just picked it up - ENHANCE YO SHIT. Makes a world of difference and is fairly cheap. Also, any meat left in your inventory will go sour and sell for more. Why? Who knows.

Gone back to Fighter to unlock Rank 7 (cheers Nick) although I'm finding the counters fairly liberal.

Ogres are still bastards but they fall pretty swiftly, Cyclops guys are a walk in the park now. Worst are high level Bandit archers who can take me to critical health in one charged arrow, the gits.

It has finally clicked, but what a fucking ordeal the first few hours are.

Will do Zumumum. 

I also found a Warrior Weapon in a chest on the cliffs overlooking the sea near where you enter the plains containing Gran Soren that is worth 136k Gold!

Horee shit. Was escorting Mercedes through the Quarry, got ambushed by about 10 Hobgoblins and then a Dragon showed up and noshed her down. Arsecakes. Upgrade Tusk Strike which unlocked on the Mystic Knight to Antler Strike on the Fighter and use that to lay dudes flat, finishing them off with the downward strike.

BOOYA.

Reading the Gamefaq boards it appears that there are bosses and events in game that are linked to how OTHER players performed in them. Amaze!