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Necro'ing to say that this build was as fun as advertised. Thanks for the work to build and share it. I completed a BPM Triple Crown - kill all the things - run and the poet carried the group! I swapped out chanter for Fury Shaper barbarian, which was slightly less fast (if my math is correct), but equally fun. I found myself not messing much with the imbues because of expert mode, but it ran on auto-pilot for the most part, which is another kind of bonus. @Aestus and @thelee talk about this in their class tier list conversation, but having a strong build that can run well without much micro, is great in RTWP party play, where there is a finite limit to player micro capacity. Great for Megabosses - somewhat trivializes HoW and Belranga, who can be interrupted.

A non-democratic government can clearly be legitimate, in the sense of being legal in the context of that nation's judicial system. The validity of their claims to be a democracy is another matter; no I don't believe Venezuela is a democracy any longer. They're what I dub a "mockracy" -- pretending to be a democracy for propaganda purposes.

The sad thing is, Volourn at his worst was never as bad as BruceVC at his best: at least Volourn was always exactly how he presented himself. I can appreciate that sort of sincerity, even if his behavior was generally kind of awful and usually not worth engaging with: he had real thoughts and beliefs, even some ones that didn't seem to follow what maybe anyone else in the world thinks, and he wasn't afraid to share them...and that's much better than all the "oh won't you please poop directly into my mouth" takes that BruceVC has always had.

There is an attack roll. Most likely you only fought vessels who have weak deflection so far. Two consecutive hits doesn't mean you're not allowed to miss in between. You can hit, miss and hit again and Double Tap still destroys the vessel. The thing with the Red Hand's Double Tap is: only works against enemies of lower level than you. And it only works against vessels. It's awesome in general, but that are its limitations - which means you cannot rely on it 100% as backup weapon. If you meet vessels who are of equal or higher level it will not destroy them. If you meet pierce immune, non-vessel enemies (some blights for example) it will also not help you. It also gives you -10 accuracy because you are devoted to pistols. But if it works for you so far then that's great of course. Still I would try to get Eccea's Arcane Blaster at some point. There's a scripted interaction on the way there you need to pass with some skill checks. If you did that successfully you can catch Eccea (the foe who carries the pistol) while she's alone, guarding the entrance to a cave. There it's not too difficult to kill her and loot the pistol. Return later for the rest of her party (it's quite a challenging fight). Then you'll have an excellent backup weapon for all sorts of enemies. No one is immune to raw damage and you'll have a pistol with no accuracy drawback. It also has a very good second modal that adds elemental damage on top.

Devoted with pistol is a bit difficult because there is only one pistol that doesn't do pierce damage. So if you face enemies who are immune to pierce damage you are a bit screwed(you'll have to eat a -10 accuracy malus if you want to use any other type of weapon or pick Monastic Unarmed Training for fists). The pistol that does raw damage (Eccea's Arcane Blaster) is not easy to get early. But I would try now. Critical hits do PEN *1.5 automatically. I don't recall if Penetrating Crit does add +2 before the 1.5 multiplier or after. Before would be better of course. If it doesn't display the bonus at all it's maybe bugged? Since crits already do PEN*1.5 (which is more than enough, especially on a Devoted), I never bothered with Penetrating Crits but chose the +25% damage variant instead.

There are three viable paladin builds for solo: paladin/troubadour, paladin/blood mage and paladin/forbidden fist (technically the priest works too, but any class works with the priest and the paladin isn't the optimal choice). There are no specific builds because they follow some simple principles - stack defenses, armor and healing. For the herald you can also see the solo videos on YT for items/stats/abilities/skills. The paladin comes with increased passive defenses (Faith and Conviction), armor and healing (Exalted Endurance, Stoic Steel), while the other class adds more healing and especially pets (which combined with Bardatto's Luxury ability will add basically another 2AR). Some key items are Magnera's Chain (which allows to achieve high resists against all damage types on top of for/will buffs), Lethandria's Devotion (main shield giving more healing and defenses), Wintertide Bulwark (backup shield used for the deflection buff which stays the entire fight even when you switch to another shield), Cadhu Scalth (backup shield used for increased deflection, damage reduction and modal). For weapons - Bardatto's Luxury, Modwyr and Animancer's Energy Blade. Another key element to these builds is stacking resting bonuses. For example, the herald can achieve over 170 in all defenses, 19+AR and heal 40+hp every 3s, which makes him virtually unkillable.

Arcane Archer/Ascendant with Frostseeker/Essence Interrupter is very fun and versatile. Pale elf mystic of course with bear pet bodyguard... Once you can use scrolls of Avenging Storm and Imbue:Eora you will feel almost like cheating. If you equip a companion with items with "Reflect against Spells" (Mirrorback, Collar of Eothas' Light, Cabalist's Gambeson) you can also reflect Ancestor's Memory on yourself if you repeatedly cast it on him. For companions Eder, Aloth, Pallegina and Xoti are solid choices.

Essence Interrupter of course - for the shock damage and the range mostly. Amaliorra or Eccea Arcane Blaster are also viable but require a penetration buff and you have to be closer to Dorudugan...

I think Helwalker/Priest of Berath is a nice combo. Monk's/Helwalker's abilities increase melee as well as casting capabilities. You can add two further lashes (shock and burn) as well as up to +15 MIG and +2 PEN to the Spiritual Great Sword, have +10 INT for huge AoEs and long durations and so on.

Assassin/tactician using Eccea's Arcane Blaster works very well for solo, just as with an arquebus.

This build wasn't intended for solo play, but I guess trying it wouldn't hurt. Merciless Hand just gives a bit more crit damage which isn't very helpful in the really difficult fights (in which you won't crit a lot in the first place) - so I personally would go for Second Skin. At least that will give you some value in every fight.