Divinity Bullshittery - Preproduction scrubbing #3 (Patreon)

Good afternoon all. Another update. With a TL;DR first:

• I've spent a couple of weeks reviewing livestream footage for Divinity 2. Trying to determine if there are enough gags for a bullshittery episode.
• I feel the answer is yes. And will start cutting one together to see how it plays.

This preproduction phase has proved very useful. I've tagged dozens of little moments across many of the livestreams. This gameplay chapter sees the party explore the small town of Driftwood, with its small Magister guard presence. Before eventually seeking out Sourcerers (in hiding) throughout the surrounding countryside, in order to learn more about our special Source abilities.

Each 'Sourcerer trainer' usually has their own little side-gig or fetch quest, not really important for the main plot. But usually fairly interesting to follow

Then after each one, the party typically has a private audience with their specific deity in the "Hall of Echoes" dimension. With there being about 3 of these before the chapter ends.

I've found that the comedic moments are scattered all over the place (in both combat and in dialogue). But I've picked out two specific encounters where they are tightly clustered.  I'd like to focus the edit around the following:

• 1.) A meeting with a demonic entity called "The Advocate" on a fleshy island that used to be an academy for the training of Demon Hunters.
• 2.) A specific Sourcerer called "Ryker" who has taken over a graveyard. Feasting on the source of those entombed there.

I'll try to place additional funny moments around these two scene. Likely without their original context, since their associated fights (likely) don't need to be setup.

But there's also one meeting with the gods that I need to include. Even though it's going to drag the comedic energy down. Therefore I'll try to keep it relatively concise.

• 3.) The second meeting with the player specific god. In which they learn the ability "Source Vampirism"

This meeting is so important, because it not only sets up an important plot point - that the gods are parasites on Rivellon. But from a comedic perspective, it means the party start to eat the hostile (and innocent) NPC's around us.

Frequently amusing moments include racing to finish conversations before another party member eats the speaker. Or bickering amongst ourselves to decide who gets to eat some important boss. And the silly realisation that we, ostensibly the replacements for this pantheon of gods - are ZF. Therefore Rivellons future is likely to be nothing less than a shit-show. With constant jokes about my murder-hobo'ing, Quebec's pickpocketing and Digby setting fire to...everything.

Party cohesion is far better in Chapter II. Particularly the later streams.  As despite the playthrough being very "murder-hobo'ey", we are now staying together as a party of 4, rather than scattering off into every direction like we were in Fort Joy.

We're clearly playing as a cooperative game, as opposed to an MMO.

That is going to be something of a headache for keyframing however. As it does mean that multiple speakers will be on screen at any one moment. But I knew that going in.

I'll just need to be tight with the cut.

So the plan right now is to try to put together a draft cut and see whether it's funny enough to escalate to full keyframing. I'll let you know how that went in a week? Might even have a draft by then.