About the enhanced edition - sadly, most of the community seems to be hyped for it and fully swallows the promises (((Beamdog))) gives, and falls for the meme of not-early-access and "continuous support". It's sad to see a game I like getting fucked like that, and it's even sadder not to see anyone oppose it, but I doubt things will change any time soon. Maybe if (((beamdog))) kicks the bucket eventually, fingers crossed.
What are the upsides of that so called enhanced edition, what does it bring to the table?
>improved toolset
I think it's one and only merit this re-release can take pride from. Plenty of modders said that the toolset now works faster and it's more efficient. Whether the changes are worth it it's not for me to tell, although seeing how much has been done in the "old" toolset for the past 15 years it can't be said it's unusable.
>graphical improvements
Purely meme-tier. Pic related is diamond edition with some overrides and CEP stuff and it looks rather decent. EE does nothing to make the game look any better, apart of things like depth of field, some shaders, absolutely ridiculous color contrast and models (whole two of them, male and female) that are nothing to write home about. Community-made models fit the general theme much better than what (((Beamdog))) made.
>performance
Mixed bag. PW's forums are filled with bug complaints brought solely by EE, steam reviews say stuff doesn't work for plenty of people. As someone above has already asked - was the performance an issue to begin with? No, not really, maybe if you use Winblows 10. But why not use an older OS to play games? I do that myself, and just switch if an older title acts up on 7. NWN had no issues on Win7 in my experience.
>playerbase
nwnlist.com says that the game has about 400 active players tops these days. Most evenings it hovers around 350 and gets down to 200 during less active hours. Scry shows EE servers too (Ravenloft says it's EE) and I haven't noticed any huge swarm of new players anywhere. Sinfar, the infamous erp server, might be an exception, but I'll write about it below.
>lack of compatibility
Obviously, the jewry would never bring themselves to allow the Diamond Edition playerbase to play together with EE's. Instead, they force everyone to buy their low-energy re-release, no matter if you have the original or not. In their forums they explain it as a "lack of technical possibility".
O rly?
The developer of Sinfar, Mavrixio, "somehow" managed to make his server compatible with both Diamond and Enhanced version, and the users of both can play together at the same time. So you say that a modder can do something that a bunch of professional developers that ask real money for their work cannot? I call bullshit. Pure marketing and PR speak, and gullible people swallow it, treating these hacks as gurus, thinking it's a god's gift that the game they played got a re-release. A half-assed one.
Does it warrant the price? For me it doesn't. If I'm going to buy it at all, I'll wait till it's -50% off and when these gullible people will finish doing the paid beta-testing for me. Now it's basically early access, have fun with that.
Sadly, there's not that many places to play anymore. The game is worth it, roleplay brings unforgettable experience if done right, with people that truly care and give a damn about it. I'd gladly see more of it, but where? There's Sinfar, where literally anything goes, and the rumor is that it has reasonable players, they just have to be found among low energy social players and literal degenerates with their fetishes. Sinfar's server and features it has can be rented for a fee and I heard that custom servers are being developed, so those interested can keep an eye out. Anything else…? No idea, I'm open to suggestions, though indeed what we have now is nothing compared to the old days…