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I got my Federal tax return today. That was fast, we didnt even submit it until 3 Mar! I should go buy a couple of bicycles for my wife and I to ride over the spring and summer. Of course the IL state refund will probably take a while longer.

Heh. You always beat me to it with the Solasta updates! Yeah a great update. I don't care at all about MP, but so many others do, and if that is what gets them into this wonderful game then that's a plus for all fans of the game. And all the other new bits that come with the new DLC are great too. I didn't think the backgrounds feature TA added to the game would have much of an impact, but it is in reality a very nice feature that actually impacts your playthrough. So having nine new backgrounds is great. My only disappointment is that we are still stuck at level 12 max. But given how far they went to tell us from the very beginning that MP was just not gonna' happen, and then they spring this surprise on us, I'm very optimistic now that at some point we will get an expansion to level 20.

When it comes to the Assassin subclass I just try to keep in mind that an Assassin without any stealth or invisibility is still like a regular Rogue - but only a tiny bit more squishy (it's really not that much). So there's really no need to feverishly focus on strikes from stealth or invisibilty - if this gets screwed up the character is still a full Rogue. Of course it can be especially effective and fun to pull off some impactful actions from invisibility/stealth - but also sometimes it gets repetitive and then I just skip that stuff - like in easier encounters - and spare the invisibility for emergencies or so. By the way: why I prefer to use the Assassin as an ACC-boost to CC/debuff-spellcasting instead of alpha-strike-weapon-damage-dealer™ is that later in the game the health pools are so bloated that a weapon attack with +50% crit damage doesn't have that much impact anmore compared to just a regular weapon attack - but a reliably applied disable or even mind control will still be very impactful. In the early game however those hefty weapon attacks from stealth and invisibility do really have their merits.

I can sympathize with your point, as I rarely find myself picking abilities from the stealthy sneaky backstabby side of Rogue ability tree. To be honest, I would tend to think that the issue is a bit deeper than the subclass, so I would try to qualify the issue before actually looking for a proprer solution. Various points below : 1 - I think the issue is also about backstab. A normal Rogue should be able to use Backstab with enough benefits. An Assassin Subclass should emphasize it, not being the only only to be able to use this. 2 - All 3 Rogue Invisibility abilities are concerned : Smoke Veil, Shadow Step (including enduring shadow) and Vanishing Strike. I'm currently pretty satisfied with their relative balance. Shadow Step costs twice, but also provide Teleport, Deflection buff and Instant recovery. I think this is a fine improvement over Smoke Veil. Make Smoke Veil instant-recovery and picking Shadow Step would be meh compared to a more flexible combo of Escape + Smoke Veil. 3 - Probably the "deepest" question : should backstabby Asassination really be about DPS ? It would be a bit redundant with Strikes then. And it won't really help the Rogue vibe. Shadow Step allows mobility to strike where it hurts. Smoke Veil allows repositioning too (moving while recovering sort of save time since you're still getting half of your recovery speed while doing something else). Then, if not, what it should be about ? Damages Spike ? Piercing AR / High Defenses ? Is it enough ? (no definitive answer to this question) 4 - Weapon vs Spells : it's nice to have Assassin bonus synergize with spells. But it sort of synergizes better than with weapon. Sure, Backstab helps a bit. One possible change I have in mind it to have Assassin passive and Backtstab applies for fixed 1s after Invisibility is broken (like I did for Lion Sprint), for better interaction with Multi-Hit attacks and Full Attacks. It might not address the whole issue, but I think it would be a rather safe step. Edit : Maybe not for Backstab. CP variant would provide dire results with Blunderbuss and it provides a fixed (so fair for all weapons) bonus anyway.

Why certainly Bruce, just for you a nice, big, png.

What a strange way to look at the events of history, of course their are bad guys in almost every conflict. The NAZI were the bad guys in WW2 and Russia are the bad guys here They decided to recreate the borders of a sovereign country and then invaded that country. Yes they the bad guys and we should be able call them out

From former Telltale devs: It can't possibly be worse than what Kurtzman Goldsman & Co. have done with Star Trek.

I also find Concelhaut's Corrosive Siphon pretty useful for an Assassin/Blooldmage as a way to come out of invisibility which a high ACC spell that ofen heals you up while you use Blood Sacrifice.

I'm sure @KP wants Blue Velvethas nothing to worry here.

Well you're right that didnt make me feel better! Personally even if i never get 1/4 of the way through the game i wont regret the purchase. I like supporting these types of games... even if this specific one is way above my head.

I find it hilarious that after decades of backing their regional rival, including threatening direct intervention over Bangladesh, less directly with Kashmir and nukes the US expects anything from India apart from direct quid pro quo, at all*. It's quite clear that the US does not regard India as a 'friend', for as much as that designation means anything in realpolitik, but just as a country that is useful as it also doesn't like China. It's like you're supposed to forget anything and everything in recent history as soon as it becomes convenient for the US. I'd also have to say that for all his faults Trump's bromance diplomacy worked a lot better than Biden's pontificating on people like MbS or Modi. Who would have thought powerful people don't respond well to being lectured by people they see as their equals? *Not as funny as Britain expecting anything, but still.

2 British Iranian prisoners freed today. Quite possibly another sign that the nuJCPOA is moving closer. Though by the purest of pure coincidences, Britain also recently paid back the 400 million quid they stole from Iran for tanks Britain never delivered. These were parallel events though, and completely unrelated. Much like that Iranian tanker seized off Gibraltar being coincidentally released when the Iranians nabbed a british tanker in the Straits of Hormuz.

Forbidden Fist wants maxed Resolve. Might doesn't need to be high. INT can also be rel. mediocre. High Perception is benefical. High DEX as well. I wouldn't drop CON below 10. A multiclass Forbidden Fist gets wounds from up to four sources: hostile effects that end. So high RES helps to keep all hostile effects short, including the curse your own Forbidde Fist ability puts on you. With a lot of RES it will be very short. You can combine that with Clarity of Agony and some items to shorten hostile effects even further. Also hostile effects that run out will heal you. Mortification of the Soul. Also works fpr Forbidden Fist Monks. (Enduring) Dance of Death. It works - but for a Monk who's going melee all the time it's not that useful because it ends if you get hit (7 times) Parting Sorrow: if an enemy disengages you get a wound. This also happens when the enemy you engaged dies (the game seems to count dying as unwillingly disengaging ) Most important is 1. The most common way to work with this is using the Forbidden Fist attack a lot but keep the curse supershort. High Resolve also leads to high deflection. That stacks with the defense buffs of Tuotilo's Palm and stuff from Fighter like Vigorous Defenses and makes you hard to kill. Yes. And the small shield modal as well as Devoted's Disciplined Strikes (+5 PER, 25% hits to crits conversion) can also help with that.

I'm pretty sure it was just a gross miscalculation

is unlikely to make you feel better, but even if you are a math savant, you could face considerable consternation. good math for levels up to eight will as often as not result in bad math as you progress. also, to avoid player generation and development pitfalls you need know pathfinder and owlcat quirks. example: erastil is not a popular pnp deity choice 'mongst powergamer 'cause the deity's domain powers and spells his clerics have access to is kinda meh. in fact, the wotr community domain's guarded hearth, which is a near no-brainer choice, is the domain power o' the pnp home subdomain o' community... a subdomain which is considered weaker than community 'cause the cleric o' erastil would be needing give up the unity domain power to avail themselves o' the home sub-domain... and is likely the previous example sounds like gibberish to anybody not over-invested in pathfinder. regardless, know math and know pathfinder ain't enough 'cause owlcat adds their own twist. is a whole lotta ways to play wotr and be effective and even powerful with difficulty set to core and even hard. unfortunate, is also way too many opportunities for a player to ruin a character or party by choosing wrong at level-up. owlcat's approach with stat bloat is rewarding a powergamer approach and punishing the casual gamer who don't know wotr and pathfinder minutiae. curious enough, is a considerable % o' owlcat fans who defend the developer's approach and sales do not appear to have suffered overmuch, so expecting a sea change is not a reasonable gamble. HA! Good Fun!

i think veteran would be a smoother experience. the big thing is that, in addition to buffing enemies further, PotD also changes the mix of enemies in an encounter, which can be significantly harder than simple adjustments to stats. both of the parties should be viable, though i would lean towards the "solid roles" party as a fire-and-forget approach (herald and paladins in general are pretty tanky and easy to AI script)

A well built darcozzi/troubadour is basically immortal and can also rez fallen companions if needed. I would add to your party a forbidden fist monk who is also nearly immortal and by the end can beat any encounter by himself. An ascendant/ghostheart with Frostseeker is also great and can clear the field very fast with his bow/spells and later can provide Brilliant to the entire party. An assassin/bloodmage is also very powerful and once he obtains the invisibility spell can also solve encounter by himself. A devoted/trickster with sabres is a very solid damage dealer and can trigger disengagement attacks with Ryngrim's Repulsive Visage. Another alternative is a soulblade/trickster who can deal high single target dps with Sun and Moon + Tuotilo's Palm and also great AoE damage from the back of your tanks with Whispers of the Endless Paths (and he can also buff your other cipher). Anyway all these characters, if well built, don't require end game items to be strong and can roll over most encounters just on AI. The only one who requires more micro is the bloodmage/assassin.

Yes I think their is always a risk Putin may object to Ukraine joining the EU but thats something the Russian gaslighting has not focused on, its always been about NATO And at the moment their are EU countries not part of NATO so its going to be hard for the Russian propaganda machinery to really use that as excuse for further warmongering?

Can they though? I wonder. Joining the EU strongly links their economies together and creates a de facto motivation for mutual defense. The Ukraine will be required to uphold certain government principles, which are likely abhorrent to Putin. He wants to control his neighbors, and that will be lacking with the Ukraine in the EU.

Their own.

I tried that with Vanishing Strike on a single class Assassin, and I think the raw damage bonus only applies to the first projectile. It does not give extra damage for all 4 pellets. I think a 1 second grace period would be very nice as spells are very janky with the Assassin bonus right now, and it is strange to have full attacks be disfavored on rogues. The other problem, I think, with Assassins is that on PotD enemies are much harder to just one-shot from invisibility. Maybe tone down their offensive bonus and instead give them some sort of healing while in invisibility so that they're also more useful in longer fights?

if this is what you expect for path of the damned (esp if incl upscaling), you're in for an extremely rough ride even the extremely powerful builds are likely going to be something you have to manage manually a lot to pull off instead of hoping AI scripts will take care of it for you, at least until very late game (where certain spells/abilities or items become available).

if you don't know what to do, it's very very hard to go wrong with pallegina as a herald. tekehu's subclass is a little weird, konstanten has weird stats and uses a skald, fassina combines it with a wizard, vatnir combines it with a priest the latter two require a bit more care. a herald, on the other hand, is very easy to be powerful and resilient.

so black geyser will come out soon really hope it doesn't use the same ancient engine poe does

That's the whole reason I'm interested. It's essentially the same processor but with waaaaaay more cache. Lisa Su is obviously going to talk up the increase in cache like it's a revolutionary advance, which is probably bollocks. I'm curious to see how much difference roughly 65 MB of extra cache makes. Whenever we've had increases in cache before they've generally been small (e.g. 10 MB to 12 MB) and accompanied by other changes (e.g. process node, DDR generation, etc.), so it was tough to get a feel for how much difference the cache increase made. Now we have a nearly 200% increase in cache with basically no other changes. This is a unique opportunity to see how much difference cache really makes.

I personally like him better as Fighter/Rogue with a Cadhu Scalth and Kapana Taga. Because later on he can "passively" apply distracted to all engaged enemies (and you can engage a lot with Guardian Stance + Persisantent Distraction + Chadhu Sclath and Kapana Taga: up to 7 engaged enemies) and more importantly he becomes almost impervious to AoE damaging attacks with the combo of large shield modal, Cadhu Scalth enchantment and Adept Evasion (turn 100% grazes to misses for reflex-based rolls). And also Slippery Mind has its uses. Also important: Escape can be used to move around quickly and it allows Edér to move around even if the large shield modal is active (which makes you stuck and doesn't allow walking). Riposte is a nice addition for a high-deflection character, too. I also use the club modal - so if I can lower enemies' Will by 25 just by doing a Riposte that's cool and requires no action.

Three commanders including 1 general near Kharkiv were snipered IIRC the reports.

Lithuanian and Latvian language belong to Baltic language group, there are just us two in that group, Estonian is from Finno-Ugric group, very different. As for similarity, well, it's a bit weird. There are some Latvian words similar to ours, some that look similar but have different meanings, and I can more or less get the meaning when reading Latvian, but not when I hear someone speaking Latvian. Really cannot say anything about similar dialects as I am not a linguist and it's difficult to compare one's mother tongue with any foreign languages. I'd personally say Finnish, but that's probably just because I'm partial to their diphthongs.

Yes, what @dgray62said. I think @Jrllo you mixed up Corrosive Siphon with Draining Touch. An alternative to Corrosive Siphon could be Concelhaut's Draining Missiles I guess? I didn't use that a lot though so I can't be sure. At least it's one of the few spells of the wizard that heals. C's Draining Touch with Grimoire switching is an option for the approach @Kaylon mentioned. The other would be C's Parasitic Staff. It's also not a terrible idea to stack some regeneration gear like Rings of Greater Regeneration, Three Trolls Stiched, Fleshmender and/or Trollhide Belt. Since you can get target by party members' heals while invisible, healing up yourself "passively" while casting spells does help.

I realize the OP probably made his decision regarding the Transcendant, but still I want to share my experience. I played an Ascendant/Helwalker, close to melee, and it worked marvelously. I used Grave Calling saber a lot, killing skellies summoned by Pallegina, which both Blinded, Paralyzed, damaged enemies and gave Focus (with Kitchen Stove blunderbuss offhand for Thunderous Report instant max Focus and Ascension, huge damage and Daze opening - and faster attack speed in melee from dual-wielding). Later on moved to Seeker's Fang rapier with its Spider's Flurry and mini-disintegrations. Used Flagellant's Path to zig-zag trough the battlefield, often one-flurry killing squishies. Was super fun. Ascendant can spam spells, which is particularly helpful with high levels ones, like Disintegration. And Ascendant's high Focus ceiling was also nice for Seeker's Fang damage scaling. Plus Ascendant gets bonus damage when Ascended (therefore almost always). I really had a lot of fun with that character. A FF would have less damage from might, but also be MUCH more durable. And +50% duration of hostile effects PLUS enemies unable to heal AT ALL is just awesome!

Zelensky has been dropping hints to it for a while. Made no difference to Putin as he shot down peace talks on 'insufficient progress' . Besides NATO there will also be the EU and entire political future of Ukraine. And there is always the problem that Ukraine will still expect security guarantees elsewhere, even if it's hard to imagine who would provide them.

Slightly better documented Ukrainian strike on Kherson Airport today. Certainly started a nice big fire.

China's soaring COVID infections fuel concern about cost of containment I wonder if the CCP is still welding sick people into their living quarters? Hopefully not.

Corrosive siphon doesn't require grimoire switching. You just cast it, and heal while the opponents are drained. What you need it for is Conselhaut's Draining Touch. That spell summons a weapon that only lasts for one attack. BUT, if you do not learn it, but cast it from a grimoire, and then switch grimoires before you attack, you'll have one of the best weapons in the game for the rest of the encounter. If you're going to use this, it doesn't matter what you have in your main hand since that weapon will disappear, but your offhand weapon remains. You can have a shield for extra defense, or use a club with the modal on, to debuff will, which will help you land your draining touch attacks. As for sage subclasses, I'm a fan of FF since there's a nice synergy between the classes. Both benefit from lowish MIG, high CON and high RES. The extra healing from the FF curse expiring also helps you as a blood mage. And weakened from the draining touch will soften up foes so you can land enfeebled with the FF attack. Alternating between the draining touch and FF attacks is devastating, especially when you crit, and proc extra draining touch attacks. This would be a more tanky melee oriented sage. On the other hand, if you want attack with Citzal's, you'd be better off I think attacking from a distance (far with instruments of pain!) with a glass canon helwalker, with maxed out MIG and dumped RES.

That Ukraine would have to give in on NATO membership has been mentioned by many people (myself included) for weeks. The same for getting back the Crimea.

What did I tell you folks?

For it is written… “He that is without sin among you, let him throw the first hand grenade” Meh, just kidding. Little comfort, but nobody lives forever. Fairly sure the people of Iran are ready to move on from the ayatollahs. Gradually as they keel over from age or abruptly as people are just fed up with unnecessary hardship

Even worse, I got the news from my father who probably got it from facebook. I spik gud English.

aoe scales, but nothing like poe1. https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/pc/227477-pillars-of-eternity-ii-deadfire/faqs/76599/races early on, this is crazy good, like a huge fraction of your party health, but by end-game even your squishies might easily have like 250-300 health and your moon healing only got up to like maybe 15-18 health from PL+might scaling. it's not nothing; i would not consider it completely obsoleted, but it does suffer in the comparison to some helms out there. that being said, moon godlike gets a +1 PL bonus from the heart-chime amulet, and bonus PL is hard to come by. CP takes a bit of a different tack; for me, the whole purpose of the fire godlike is the bonus +2 fire AR and the <50% health +1 AR, and that scales with you the entire game, provided you're using it on a class who's gonna have decent AR. IMO when i discovered that helm of the white wind applies +10 accuracy to so many things (on top of some additional minor enchantment) it has really hurt the meta for godlikes. it's real hard to compare against such a huge accuracy swing that is so generally useful. they've all become very niche racial bonuses now. nature godlike is def one of those victims. early on I would consider it S-tier, but now I think it's mostly useful if you want to be a monk or a monastic unarmed training build (real hard to get generic stacking PL to boost fist quality otherwise), or if you already have reserved the helm for someone else (in which case I think +1 PL is pretty decent, in contrast to constentin).

but it was before US went into war. thats why I am saying before. You are looking for semantics the point still same. USA gave or traded weapons with all sides of conflict BEFORE they became part of it

The blood mage has unlimited access to invisibility and spells and all that combined with assassin's bonuses (acc, pen and crit dmg) allows you to be a very powerful caster, like @Boeroer explained. However you can't spam spells without serious healing and for that you have to mix draining spells or use draining weapons. The melee part is self sustainable much more easily. You summon a draining weapon, attack from invisibility and finish your target before the other enemies can react which will replenish your lost health at the same time, then become invisible again, recover your spells, etc. You can switch easily between the two modes without any drawback and have a purely offensive build. However, until you obtain Arkhemir's Brilliant Departure you have to use a more conservative way of playing. Use wizard's buffs to increase your survivability and go melee and when you draw the aggro use Smoke Veil to escape and launch a few spells, etc...

Nope, they will have their frost/fire fists - but those are nice as well. They will have the spiritshift armor though which is pretty great, especially if you summon them when in bear form (+2 AR). Then they have 0 recovery penalty (like in all forms) but very high armor with no weakness (universal value against all dmg types). One of the best armors in the game imo. I looked into that a bit more a while ago because I played a Bear Druid/Wizard during some testng sessions and what I really liked was that my Essential Phantom was pretty awesome with high AR but 0 recovery penalty, Draining Touch in the main hand and a bear claw in the offhand. Didn't go down easily and dealt great damage (for a summon). Dichotomous Soul cast from Bear form seldomly died before their (rel. short) summoning duration was over but caused enough ruckus offensively.

One special feature of the Assassin/Wizard (or Bloodmage to be more specific) is the spell "Arkemyr's Brilliant Departure" (found in two unique grimoires) which makes you invisible for quite a long time (compared to other invisibility effects). And a Bloodmage can cast this over and over again bc. of the build-in spell replenishment that is Blood Sacrifice. But even more importatantly: Arkemy'r Brilliant Departure doesn't break as long as you don't deal damage! Assassins get +25 ACC when invisible - so casting CC from invisibility with +25 ACC while being untargetable is pretty awesome. At the same time Wall of Draining will prolong the invisibility just fine. So in theory you can stay invisible during most fights and debuff and disable enemies like crazy before deciding to drop a nuke on them if you wish. Add some cool items that debuff enemies passively like Cap of the Laughingstock (-10 deflection aura) and Effigy's Husk (prevent healing aura when bloodied - easy to achieve by using Blood Sacrifice) or Blackened Plate (-1 AR) or Ngati's Tusk (Hunter of Hunters lowers enemies defenses) from absolute safety. Combine with Helm of the White Void to give all your afflicition based spells +10 ACC and so on... I like being a human because when bloodied you get even more accuracy. I just use Blood Sacrifice to lower myself to bloodied while a party member buffs me with additional stuff, then cast Wall of Draining and then do the invisibility-debuff thing with monstrous accuracy. It's a very impactful character right away, too because the +25 ACC from stealth, combined with a powerful CC spell can decide combat right away in the early game. And if you want to go totally crazy you can try to use the Great Sword Effort with the enchantment "Hemorrhaging". This enchantment doesn't deal damage (see Arkemy'r Brilliant Departure) but hobbles or sickens - but it counts as weapon attack and procs off of ALL your crits, spells included. Combine with some pulsing spell like Binding Web and wear Ajamuut's Stalking Cloak. It stuns on weapon attacks from invisibility. You cast Binding Web from invisibility, it will do some crits which will proc Hemorrhaging, those will proc the stun from the cloak, that might crit and proc Hemorhhaging again - and so on and so forth. Often this combo will produce endless stun-cycles on enemies. You can also use weapons and ABD and deal big strikes from invisibility - but I always found it more impactful and rewarding to actually skip the damaging part and use the ACC for debuffing and disables. The guy can still deal great weapon damage if needed - it's a Rogue after all.

The monk is very dependent on crits for his dps and is more sturdy (especially the FF). The rogue delivers high dps against all enemies, but is a little more squishy (however the trickster has a few tools to increase his survivability). Both are good, but the monk helps more the caster part of the cipher (speed, might, penetration, intellect). If you want to use lighter armor then a solution is to use 2h weapons with increased range and stay behind your tanks. Another strong melee/caster combo is assassin/blood mage, but it's a different style of play.

You can spam SA, but need not do so. I tend use focus at the beginning to cast powers to debuff foes, like Phantom Foes, as well as buffs like Borrowed Instincts; I tend to use SA more later once this is done. You'll want to keep an eye on your focus, as you'll lose your nice damage boost if you max out. When your focus is full, either cast a power or use SA.

The Beguiler has excellent focus generation which is not dependent on weapon damage (but can still have that, too) and is great with Mind Control - while the Soulblade is the better melee Cipher. So if it's about melee dmg I would pick the Soulblade.

Another weapon that works well with a monk/soulblade is WotEP. You can alternate easily between Stunning Surge and Soul Annihilation. With your high accuracy and deflection debuffs (Cap of the Laughingstock, Phantom Foes) you can easily crit and trigger other AoE attacks with Swift Flurry/Heartbeat Drumming.