Kaigen42

Alternate build: Piker Hand Pallegina Tall Grass for midline support. Pallegina's base Might isn't great, but Tall Grass lets her smack enemies for prone effects while still wearing light armor/clothes. Abilities: Flames of Devotion, Zealous Focus/Charge, Sworn Enemy, Inspiring Triumph* Talents: Weapon Focus: Soldier, Two-handed Style, Savage Attack, Intense Flames, Critical Focus*, Bloody Slaughter* Critical Focus is optional; it increases her ability to prone, but you might not find Zealous Focus useful in your party. Zealous Charge is a good alternate, as this build helps Pallegina avoid engagements and help set up Ectopsychic Echo similarly to the Fast Running Tank. Bloody Slaughter + Intense Flames gives you the best possible odds for landing a last hit to trigger Inspiring Triumph; if it doesn't kill the enemy, the hit->crit conversion will at least boost your odds of proning them. If you don't put much stock in Inspiring Triumph, you can easily drop it. Gear: Tall Grass is the centerpiece here. In the other weapon slot, you can put an Arquebus for an opening shot, or something like Tidefall as an alternate close-range weapon. I've been having Pallegina run around in enchanted Vailian Clothes, but there's lots of good unique robes and padded armor if you want more DR. If you really need Tall Grass on another party member, you can get a similar effect from Lost Thayn's Reach, or switch weapon focus to Peasant and use Wend Walker for a stronger lash.

I think there's two things going on here. The first is that people measure performance in different ways and part of that is "How much trouble do I have to go through to defeat all of the trash encounters on this map?" PoE has lots and lots of trash encounters, and being able to clear those with a minimum of fuss feels better than having to queue up a bunch of shift-clicked spells every time the combat music starts. It's a different standard than "How easy are the harder fights in the game to defeat with this group?", but it has its place (especially since you're likely cheesing the hell out of the Adra Dragon anyway). The other thing is that while the Cipher doesn't shine as brightly as the full casters in the toughest fights, it's still perfectly serviceable. Most boss fights in this game tend to have a lot of trash around that can be cleared out efficiently with the assistance of a Cipher, and you always have Mental Binding as a fallback, considering it's pretty reliable even against tough enemies.

Multi-Druid encounters are the bane of my existence, because if you don't manage to lock them all down you're going to lose a big chunk of health off of your whole party more often than not. It sounds like having at least one Wizard would really help this group out, as spells like Slicken are really important for dealing with big groups of annoying enemies, especially since Scrolls of Paralysis have been bumped to a higher Lore level and weakened.

A problem in the developers' execution of their ideas, perhaps, but not necessarily a problem for the player. I think by happy accident the Cipher has fallen into a role where it alternates between single target DPS and area DPS that requires precise positioning in a way that makes them interesting to play. They're like the one class that's well served by staying mobile on the battlefield right now, which is an interesting change of pace from the usual static nature of combat positioning. The developers could try to bring them back in line with their original intention by curtailing the Cipher's area effects, but they might be better served by refining the Cipher for the role it's fallen into.

@Elerond I hesitate to characterize Ciphers as single target DPS casters, as some of their most damaging powers, e.g. Antipathetic Field, Ectopsychic Echo, Mind Lance, etc., are AoE, just more limited AoE than what Druids and Wizards tend to use. The question is less "Can Ciphers be as good at crowd control as Druids or Wizards?" than "Does the Cipher's flexibility bring something to the party that another caster would not?" @Ineth I think the developers are aiming to have the Cipher in a position where it is not a "caster who occasionally fires a gun" as it was before, and not a "single target DPS who occasionally uses powers" as Wolken3156 characterizes it, but a hybrid who splits their time evenly between the two activities. That's a difficult target to hit, and while I think this patch brought them closer, I'm not convinced they're quite there yet.

Yeah, KDubya raises some good points about the limitations of focusing on interrupts. The elephant in the room is that once you hit level 9 your Wizard can spam Slicken (and up the ante with Confusion or Call to Slumber if necessary), so at that point more minor forms of CC like interrupts become fairly insignificant. That said, the parts of the game that you have to get through before you hit level 9 are generally the hardest, so if interrupts can help you with that early stage, it might be worth delaying some of your damage talents to be more effective against ogres and lurkers and the like. The other thing is that I've already shifted my focus from "What is the most effective?" to "What fun ideas can I get away with?" for this game, so playing around with interesting subsystems like interrupts is a good way to keep engaged.

Something that just occurred to me: if you want an interrupting Ranger, why not go melee? Swift Aim works on melee attacks and stacks with two-weapon style, giving the Ranger a faster unbuffed attack speed than anyone else for more interrupts. If you use Mosquito in one hand, you have an accurate Draining weapon with a boosted interrupt rating, and Weapon Focus Noble gives you your choice of Daggers, Rapiers, or Maces for the other hand. Depending on where you are in the game, Ravenwing, Aattuuk, Drawn in Spring, and Vierna's Leaves are all nice options (if they ever fix the Speed mod, the Sword of Daenysis might take the prize). And like any other Ranger, you can easily afford to dump Int in order to pump up Perception.

At level 9 you should be able to do it pretty comfortably. You could probably manage at level 7 by going in fresh and pulling out all the stops.

@Achilles: Thank you for clarifying, that's what I was trying to get at, but I wasn't very clear. @b0rsuk: I guess my question is, if you want to optimize a ranged character for inhibiting the enemy, why not just use an Arbalest? Particularly on a Ranger, who can easily mitigate the reload time and pump accuracy high enough for more critical hits. I think a Ranger is a good addition to a party built around interrupts, but I'm not sure the Hunting Bow is the way to be most effective in that role. Not to mention that once you get Stunning Arrows, your ability to interrupt hardly matters anyway.

I found one in the tomb leading to the assembly in the catacombs. It was the first one ever. Didn't even know something like that existed, since normally I only find the usual junk in masses. A random drop, then. Do you by any chance remember what in-game day in looted it on? Be sure to clarify whether you're talking about the day that shows up on the saved game or the calendar date.

Certainly ranged interrupts aren't worthless, and interrupts are something that get more effective the more your party is good at inflicting them. The contribution of a ranged character, however, is going to be proportionally small compared to a melee attacker thanks to the lower interrupt ratings relative to attack speed. Remember also that interrupts never cancel an effect, they only delay it, so a ranged interrupt at the right moment might buy you an extra half-second, but that will not necessarily allow you to prevent the attack from occurring. A Ranger using a Hunting Bow is probably one of the better ways a ranged DPS character can contribute to interrupts (especially if you add in Driving Flight), but the trade-off in damage may not be worth it, especially once you consider that they can inflict stronger status effects like prone or stun with the right weapon.

As an aside, I find the fact that we never got a proper turn-based CRPG with the 4e system (and probably never will at this rate) to be one of the biggest missed opportunities in CRPGs. Slightly more on topic, maybe the changes to Cipher focus will make the focus-boosting amulets slightly more attractive options. Has anyone found a guaranteed spot to pick up a Talisman of the Unconquerable?

A good interrupt build is probably a dual-wielder, as dual-wielding slightly outperforms most two-handed weapons. Optionally you can use morning stars or unique weapons with boosted interrupt rates like Mosquito, Shatterstar, and The Vile Loner's Lance, but that might mean sacrificing the benefits of other weapons. It's a pity Mabec's Morning Star is so RNG dependent to get, as that could be a fun one for a two-hander. Barbarians, melee Rogues, and Fighters all have abilities that can indirectly make them better interrupters, but might have difficulty making room for Perception. Paladins can make other characters better interrupters through Zealous Focus and Hastening Exhortation, but don't have much to help themselves. Ranged weapons are pretty marginal for interrupts, as their values are low relative to their rates of fire compared to melee weapons, Wizard implement builds being an exception due to their ability to hit multiple targets with each attack. There are plenty of spells that can make good sources of interruptions, though.

@koski The problem with programming the AI to actually disengage is that as it currently stands, it's very difficult (if not impossible) to make a tank that is both very durable and very dangerous. They would either need to boost tank damage high enough to be threatening, which would make dps specialists marginal as you could have someone doing similar damage with better survivability, or else give tanks tools to punish disengagements in other ways ala 4e D&D, which would require them to program an AI intelligent enough to assess the various penalties they might take for disengaging vs. the tactical advantage of hitting a more vulnerable target. All of which might end up with a properly built tank having disengagement attacks so nasty that it's never a good idea to disengage, leaving us back where we started.

Yeah, "best weapon" discussions really need to happen in the context of itemization to have any meaning. That said, weapon focus ruffian covers stilettos and clubs in addition to sabers, so you still have some excellent weapon options for Eder even if another character is hogging the only good sabers.

It also depends on playstyle. If you use spells freely and rest after every few fights, then your tanks only need to be durable enough to survive. Their health is unlikely to be a limiting factor in that scenario. If you use spells sparingly and try to cram in as many fights between rests as possible, then keeping your tanks from taking even small amounts of damage can have an impact on how often you rest.

Because even with high deflection, you will still get grazed a lot, which will whittle you down if you don't have the DR to mitigate it.

It's a one off.

Attributes ala D&D require such a huge level of abstraction to begin with that I don't think it's worth worrying about. Particularly if your main objection is that they violate your closely held stereotypes.

Paladin's Faith and Conviction only scales up to 6 points, so +11/+22/+22/+22 (not including Deep Fath). Nobody seems to consider the effect of Reputation on Holy Radiance worth considering. None of the reputation stuff works for a non-PC anyway.

Very similar to the PotD party I'm running right now, just replace the Barbarian with a Cipher who is ranged focused along with the Ranger. Keep a few scrolls of paralysis handy for the fights where you really need AoE CC, and you're golden.

Sucinum's got it right, if you side with the Doemenels in the Warehouse Quest, they'll give you a quest to talk to Abrecan, who will send you to retrieve the letter from the thieves, unlocking the option to get it nonviolently (though they'll still start a fight if you say the wrong thing). I don't think you can get this path if you go the neutral route in the warehouse quest i.e. take your payment and leave, but you can probably let the Doemenels do most of the killing to still keep your number of kills down.

You don't have to kill the guys in the Thieves' Hideout in Copperlane to get the letter back; with the right conversation options ("If Doemenel didn't send me, how did I know you were here?" always works for me) they will surrender the letter peacefully.

One thing that worked well for me: Drop Pallegina down to light armor (or clothes) and have her use a Pike (preferably Tall Grass if you can afford it). She won't be a phenomenal damage dealer by any stretch of the imagination, but it'll be a big improvement on heavy armor and a shield, and she at least has more potential than Kana when it comes to dealing damage with a weapon. Even better, give her an Arquebus and have her open with a Flames of Devotion-powered shot before switching to the Pike. She starts with Intense Flames, and an Arquebus shot with a 75% burning lash added on provides a decent damage spike.

It really depends on a lot of things, such as how quickly you burn through spells, how much you travel, and how rapidly you lose health. My current group is fine at 3 or 4 Athletics, but I have a two-handed fighter that takes damage at a steady rate, so there's not a whole lot of time between rests. If nobody takes much damage in your party thanks to good tanking and ranged characters, and if you are parsimonious with spells, I suppose you could go higher, but I think you'd be better off with more Lore, Survival, or Stealth. Of course, there's really not much in the game limiting you from resting a lot, so if you don't mind doing that you could probably leave it at 2 just to reduce the combat fatigue.