Wolken3156

They probably should've named the stat Wisdom or Determination or something. High Intelligence Barbarians is just silly.

If your tanks are properly built, they can mitigate most damage done to them, to the point they never need any healing, especially in the lower difficulties. I find I'm bringing a Priest around for the buffs more than healing in all honesty. Also, you have the Fighter's Endurance regen and the Chanter's AoE Endurance regen. You really don't need healer with that kind of setup =/

Paladins are more of a support orientated tank. They have really high overall defenses with Faith and Conviction and they can support the group with their Zealous Auras and Lay on Hands. Shieldbearers of St. Elcga are the most notable since they have a talent that also adds a Deflection bonus on top of the Endurance regen from Lay on Hands. Later on, they'll get Exhortations which can provide some handy buffs to your other members, especially if you're running two tanks. Fighters on the other hand... well they can tank and never die but they lack any of the support options Paladins have. They can knock enemies prone and pull distant enemies towards them though. Generally, if you're looking for a straight up tank, Fighter is the way to go. If you're looking for a tank that can support the party with buffs, Paladin is the way to go (Or Chanter, but that's another story all together). As for DPSing... they're honestly both outclassed by... the DPS classes. Paladins are definitely better than Fighters in this area though. Intense Flames and either Enduring Flames (Goldpact Paladin talent) or Remember Rakhan Field (Bleakwalker Talent) makes Flames of Devotion ridiculously powerful. You'll want an Estoc for this though, since it really bites if you miss with it.

At least the tanks are somewhat balanced. Chanter, Fighter and Paladin (Haven't tried monk) all have their strong points and are all perfectly viable. Chanter does have a slight edge but its not noticeable enough unless you build parties around that edge (*cough* *cough* All gun party).

Fire Godlike Paladin - Tank and semi-buffer, with Shielding Flames and her Auras. Moon Godlike Chanter - Off-tank who mainly helps hold off enemies while singing various tunes to support the group. Wood Elf Rogue - DPS, generally uses Arbalests and deal some stupid high damage. Wood Elf Cipher - DPS, and the main character. Guns and psychic powers. Very cookie cutter, but so powerful, how could I not? Coastal Auamua Wizard - Crowd Controller. Generally sticks to debilitating for most fights. Boreal Dwarf Priest - Healer and buffer. Most of his damage is from his gun otherwise. I'll probably swap out the Wizard with a Druid, though spamming Arcane Torrent is decent on fodder in early game.

They buffed Curse of Blackened Sight and nerfed Mind Blades, so its not all bad. On the other hand, Druids are completely untouched. I'd say they want everyone to play as Druids =/

Chanter Sure-Handed Ila Nocked Her Arrows with Speed - Godsend for ranged parties The Silver Knights' Shields Broke Both Arrow and Blade - Easy deflection bonus for the tanks. One of the reasons Chanters make the best tanks. Aefyllath Ues Mith Fyr - Decent damage buff If Their Bones Sleep Under that Hill, None Can Say - Summons not one, but three skellies! Its plenty useful, for damage and as distractions. Gernise Slew the Beast, but Soon Faced Its Kin - Upgrade to the skellies. Mostly used for damage though since they're ranged. Gernisc's Beast Lit the Night with his Breath - The 2 Ogres are probably better, but this summons a Drake! Awesome am i rite? Cipher Mind Blades - Very strong AoE damage, especially for a 2nd-level power. Mental Binding - Paralyze is infinitely useful. Puppet Master - Dominate is very handy when up against large groups. Mind Lance - This spell deals a ton of damage. Pain Block - Great buff to toss up on one of your tanks. Disintegration - This spell... is just annihilation on one target. The amount damage it deals is insane. Amplified Wave - One of the best AoE spells by far. Deals impressive damage and knocks enemies Prone. Amazing. Druid Sunbeam - Pretty much an upgraded version of the Wiz's Chill Fog. Nature's Mark - Deflection debuff? Yes please. Blizzard - This deals some very impressive damage for a 2nd-level spell Returning Storm - Very powerful spell. Overwhelming Wave - Welcome back Crushing Wave. Glad to see you're still ridiculously good. Relentless Storm - Upgrade to Returning Storm. Pretty much the best damage spell. Reason enough to grab Heart of Storm for your Druid. Priest Armor of Faith - Deflection bonus? Oh yes. Divine Mark - Deflection debuff is very nice. Holy Power - Damage buff. The Resolve buff is also nice for the tanks. Dire Blessing - AoE critical buff? Oh YES. Shining Beacon - Defense debuff on enemies. Very nice to have. Shields for the Faithful - Anther deflection buff, always useful. Wizard Chill Fog - Its not as good as Sunbeam, but its still an AoE blind spell. On the other hand, this spell has no friendly fire attached to it. Fan of Flames - This deals a ridiculous amount of damage for a 1st-level spell. Use it, love it. Slicken - AoE Prone on a 1st-level, is both hilarious and extremely effective. Fetid Caress - Again, paralyze is really good. Noxious Burst - Deals more damage than Fireball (Unless you have Scion of Flame) and has Sickened attached to it. Pretty clear winner here. Confusion - Great way to break up enemy groups if you need to recover. Chain Lightning - Super powered Mind Blades basically. Easily the Wizard's best damage spell. Gaze of Adragan - AoE Petrify. AoE Petrify.

Blunderbuss is generally the weapon of choice since each hit it deals with restore your Focus, usually more than the amount of Focus you spend to cast. There's a few ways to get around the reloading time, the Gunner talent will cut down the reload time by 20%. There is also a Chant that can lower reloading time as well (Its name escapes me). Finally, you can equip multiple guns and switch around them, reloading them after each battle. You'll probably want the Quick Switch Talent for it.

Ciphers are undoubtedly the best DPS. They're ranged, they can deal colossal AoE damage and they even have some crowd controlling utility on top of that! Melee Rogue is probably the highest raw single target DPS in the game, but as mentioned, in POTD one wrong move will murder them. They're damn fine in ranged though at least, being the best Arbalist users. With the right setup, every shot they fire will be a crit, its almost terrifying. Reach weapons are another option, Pikes IIRC, share the same Weapon Focus Talent as Arbalists, so you can even run both melee and ranged. Barbarians have AoE damage which gives them a slight edge over melee rogues, but they do come with similar draw backs. One wrong move will probably kill your Barbarian. On off-side, if he does live and Blooded activates, his damage will be incredible.

Dexterity only affects your Reflex score and your Action Speed. Action Speed does shorten the casting times for spells, so it is fairly important to have. Having higher DEX makes slower and harder hitting weapons much more desirable to use as well.

This is only theorycrafting but anyway; OK so lets get serious here, rods are pretty underwhelming compared to guns. Their single target damage isn't that great and even though Blast can penetrate DR, its damage is not as impressive as Carnage or any of your AoE spells or any other AoE something. So yes, I'm thinking, Wizard with a Gun. I mean lets get serious, in one hand a blunderbuss, in another a grimoire. Badass, am i rite? Since Guns do way more damage than sissy wands, it'll probably help the Wizard's damage output somewhat. Well the other thing is, that also frees up 2 talent slots, which can probably go into much more useful talents like Scion of Flame or Marksman. Any thoughts though?

In the case of 1st and 2nd level spells... that is likely because they do become per encounter once you reach level 9. But for 3rd level and higher? No way. Spamming those would be really make the game too easy. Death Ring and or Adragan's Gaze already end encounters with just one cast. Spamming those would just be ridiculous.

I use a Boreal Dwarf for my Priest. Normally I go with: Mig - 20 Con - 10 Dex - 17 Per - 6 Int - 19 Res - 6 Having him stick in the rear with guns. Per and Res are actually not very important. Priests get mauled pretty easily in melee. You actually do want a decent Dex stat though since it'll affect your cast times.

You can fix his spell selection but you can never fix his attributes. His horrible Might stat, really drags him back.

To be fair, if Druids and Wizards could use their most powerful spells with reckless abandon, every other class would feel weaker in comparison, even including Ciphers. Why poke things with a sword when you can just spam Fireball over and over, knowing you'll get them all back in the next fight?

Pretty sure all Hard does is change the enemy formations, it doesn't boost the stats of any of the enemies like POTD does. Fighting Shades at 2nd-level in the Temple of Eloth is fun at least.

Disagree as I don't think Bloodied is worth taking at all. The majority of encounters on Hard/POTD my glasscannon Barb will never be under 50% endurance and if he is, I want him healed asap. Maybe it could work if you're stacking Con, but you'll be giving up better dps stats to do that. While Bloodied is very situational, it is a 50% damage boost. That kind of damage is just... colossal, its too hard to pass up. If it does proc, whatever the Barb is fighting will die very quickly anyway, on Hard difficulty anyway (Its probably overkill on lower difficulties). I haven't tried POTD myself yet, but it wouldn't surprise me if it is less useful there.

Personally I wouldn't say Wizard is underpowered but rather Ciphers are overpowered, they make Druids look bad too. That said, Wizards are just late bloomers. Starting at 9th-level you'll be able to cast 1st-level spells every encounter, which means you can spam Slicken. Its hilarious how effective it is. The 5th and 6th levels spells are absurdly powerful. AoE Petrify? Yes please.

Human is probably the best race actually, since their trait synergies perfectly with Bloodied. What you have is fine, just make sure he attacks the same target as your tank. If he steals threat during early game, he will most likely die. It becomes less of an issue as you get better gear later on at least.

At certain levels you can unlock Talents to gain an extra cast for specific levels. There's also a few items you can equip that also boost the number of casts you get per day. Also once you reach a certain level, 1st and 2nd level spells will become per encounter instead of per day. This also applies to Druids and Priests.

Avoid getting caught in melee, Wizard's have a low pool of resistances and HP and will die very quickly in melee unless you use a build specialized towards it. If you're alone, its best to get to the Gilded Vale ASAP and hire a meatshield of some kind. You can use either Edér or create your own at the inn. While Arcane Torrent is a nice throwaway AoE attack, you must be careful using it as you have to be dangerously close to enemies to fire it. As for 1st level spells, personally I think the best picks are Eldritch Aim, Fan of Flames and Slicken. Slicken is pretty good at stopping enemies in their tracks, especially for a 1st level spell. Fan of Flames is surprisingly powerful and works wonders on enemies with low fire resistance. Eldritch Aim is IMHO, a musthave since the accuracy boost it gives is universally useful throughout your Wizard's career. There's nothing more annoying than seeing your Merciless Gaze aumgented Expose Vulnerabilities miss on a large group.

You can augment a Wizard's AoE with Eldritch Aim and Merciless Gaze, the latter alone makes the Wizard's AoE standout more from the Druid's. Disregarding potions of course, a Druid can get the same effect otherwise.

The temple is nothing compared to the Lighthouse later in the game... which also has Shades, Shadows and Phantoms, but in much greater numbers. At any rate, magic is usually the way to go with them. Prayer against Fear is very handy since Spectres and Phantoms can cause characters to become Frightened. If you have a Cipher, Mental Binding works wonders on them since Paralyse also disables their DR. Without it, they tend to drop fairly quickly.