Kaigen42

I agree with Ineth. Enchanting Larder Door with the Fine quality is basically free in the grand scheme of things, so might as well do that early for the extra deflection until you find something better.

@Achilles How useful Interrupting Blows will be will depend on how they fix it, as a 15% multiplier is going to be marginal, while a +15 integer will be significant. Personally, I'd put money on it being an integer bonus. I think the relevant comparison is to accuracy, which also operates on a d100 roll against a defense in the high double-digits. +15 sounds high in that context, but unlike accuracy, interrupt rolls don't benefit from level or class-based bonuses, so it evens out in the long run. Regardless, I think most builds theoretically have room for Interrupting Blows, as few builds have 6 "must-have" talents, but the issue will be how soon you can afford to take it. Defensive builds will probably want Hold the Line and Weapon & Shield Style at the very least before they can fit it in, and offensive builds will have a hard time fitting it in amidst all of the accuracy and damage-boosting talents available. Personally, I won't have any trouble fitting them into caster builds, because I'm not terribly enamored of bonus spell slot or elemental damage feats. Priests get a number of lovely talents, but they likely won't be delivering many Interrupting spells/attacks to begin with, so they can safely skip it. Now you folks have me thinking about how I'd do a party optimized for interrupts. Since I don't like doubling up on classes, I'd start with a skeleton of Barbarian, Chanter, Druid, and Wizard. Give the Barbarian a morning star, and give the Chanter Shatterstar, since it's a Guarding one-handed weapon with a boosted interrupt time equal to morning stars. Blasting implement build for the Wizard. Then I'd add an arbalest-wielding Ranger to the group, since arbalests and crossbows have the best interrupts of ranged weapons, and Swift Aim helps reduce the reload time. Plus, Driving Flight means you can tag two enemies per shot, and you can take the Lion animal companion for Frightening Roar, which lessens the need to have your Barbarian or Chanter provide the Frightened debuff. The sixth slot I'm not sure about. If it doesn't look like the Chanter and Barbarian (plus Lion) are enough to hold the front, you could add in another tanky character, probably a Monk or a Fighter. Or you could toss in a Priest for buffing and additional heals. Since crits have a better chance to interrupt than hits, and hits have a better chance to interrupt than grazes, I'd run a mixture of Wood Elves and Hearth Orlans, both of which handily get Perception bonuses. If you add in a second shield user, Flails might be the way to go for that graze->hit conversion (not to mention that you get a couple of good flails early on). Edit: @cctobias You seem to be looking at this as an "either or" situation, whereas we see it as a "yes, also" situation. Mental Binding is awesome, but you can only paralyze one enemy at a time. So if you have a Cipher and a couple of melee attackers in your party that have boosted interrupt chances (I'm assuming you aren't running a party of Cipher, Cipher, Cipher, Wizard, Wizard, Priest), those melee attackers can effectively debuff their attacker's attack speed so they take less damage while your Cipher is paralyzing those spellcasters standing in the back. It's something that's more effective against some enemies than others, but it's also a low-investment strategy.

@cctobias I think the appeal of Interrupt is that it is something that happens in addition to doing damage, as opposed to instead of doing something else. If my Cipher is applying CC with Mental Binding, that happens instead of setting up Ectopsychic Echo. If my Wizard is casting Slicken for hard CC, that's happening instead of using Chill Fog (which only provides soft CC) or Fan of Flames. Whereas a class that spends most of its time autoattacking (or casting damage spells) can apply Interrupts while doing what it normally does. And a Fighter who only gets two Knockdowns can still keep applying Interrupts once they've used those up. I do think that it's likely to be something that gets a lot more useful if it's spread across your party rather then focused on one person. At the moment it looks like a lot of Interrupt stuff isn't working to begin with, so the ability to optimize a given character for it is pretty limited anyway. It's mostly a question of how much it costs you to move a few more points into Perception and switch to a weapon that's better for interrupting, and whether the few buff/debuffs that actually have an impact on it are useful enough apart from that. Once they fix Interrupting Blows, you'll add in the factor of whether a given character spends enough time attacking and can spare a talent for it. I know my Druid already gets some good use out of Insect Swarm and Plague of Insects, so if the Concentration debuff part of that starts working, even better.

Every time I try to use a Chanter tank, I get to Caed Nua and they get ripped to shreds by Phantoms. One of these days I need to just grit my teeth and bear with it so I can see how they are once they hit their stride.

You are free to say anything you like. It just I am getting frustrated. I play the game to my best abilities, trying different builds and tactics, then I come here to read depredatory remarks about my play style. Perhaps depredatory remarks should be made towards devs who put it in the game in the first place? But who has balls for that .. Plenty of derogatory comments have been made towards the devs. Have you read the stronghold thread in this forum? Look, in this game virtually all the damage bonuses that aren't DR reductions are multipliers applied to the base damage of the weapon. These are generally in the 15-50% range. The best melee weapons do 14-20 damage per hit. That makes OSA the equivalent of a 100% damage boost if you're using a two-handed weapon, or even more if you're dual-wielding. So people are looking at an ability that's at least twice as good as any other damage boost in the game and saying "That's probably an oversight that will be fixed when the devs get the chance to do a balance pass." If you want to use it, go for it. More power to you. Go whole hog and gib everything with your dual-wielding Barbarian. I might do it myself in my next playthrough to live it up a bit. But we're not going to get anywhere in a discussion comparing classes if OSA is on the table, because it obviously overshadows anything else and is more than likely going to go away.

I'm not saying less micromanaging is an advantage of the Paladin over the Fighter, I'm saying that if you don't micromanage, then they are more or less even in terms of tanking. I fully admit that the Fighter has more potential, but I don't think they have enough potential to reward micromanaging them. I get what I need out of them, which is holding enemy attention and not dying, and that frees me up to squeeze everything I can get out of my casters and DPS. As far as whether there's any point in giving them a weapon at all, I feel you on that. My current run has a 2 Might Paladin and a 19 Might Fighter. The Fighter has twice the total damage done of the Paladin, but only a quarter of the damage done of my actual DPS characters, and an eighth of the damage my Cipher has done. Tank damage just does not matter in this game. So you're left with the Fighter having a few short duration CC abilities and extra engagements, the Paladin having an aura and some single-target support, and both of them are great at not dying. So while, yes, the Fighter is a better class than the Paladin, if they're tanking, the difference is negligible. Now, if I wanted to run a tank that would benefit from micromanagement, I'd take a Monk (and I might do just that on my next playthrough).

Which is why I think a Paladin really has to resist the urge to be a generalist and specialize if you want to get anywhere. If you want to get the support effects from killing enemies, make a light armor wearing pike wielder and go full dps stats/talents. You'll need it just to compete with the dedicated dps in your party for those kills. If you want a tanky paladin, forget about getting kills; picking up all the talents you need to be tanky means you aren't going to have any left to pick up damage or accuracy with. There are plenty of support options for the Paladin that don't involve finishing off enemies that you can capitalize on instead. If you're wearing brigandine/plate, no amount of Dex is going to mitigate that 50% penalty. If you're not wearing heavy armor, what are you doing tanking?

My playstyle involves sending my tanks in to hold the enemy and then forgetting they exist until they need to reposition. In that context, the Paladin and the Fighter are virtually identical, except that the Paladin provides a party buff and the Fighter has extra engagement. Could I get more performance from my Fighter if I micro'd him a bit? Sure, but I get much more performance by spending that attention on my Cipher or Druid. As it is, I occasionally pop Vigorous Defense on the Fighter if he's taking too much heat, or have the Paladin toss Lay on Hands or a Reinforcing Exhortation on a back-liner taking damage from an archer. Sometimes I like to use Into the Fray just to watch it fail spectacularly because the Fighter is too far away (forcing him to move and break engagements) or because the enemy nicks a hit-box on it's way to the Fighter and breaks free.

What difficulty are you planning on playing on? Cipher's squishyness is a big issue on PotD difficulty level, where enemies hit hard and have high accuracy. The main thing to watch out for is that enemies will turn to attack your Cipher when they engage in melee, because they don't have to break engagement with your tank to turn and whack you in the head. Ideally, then, you want to either engage enemies with reach, being careful in situations with larger enemies or big groups that swarm past your tanks, or else only engage enemies that have been paralyzed/stunned so they can't do anything. You'll probably also need to use at least light armor so that you can take a few more hits. The reason people tend towards ranged Cipher builds is twofold: 1) You don't have to worry as much about their fragility, and 2) The Blunderbuss is a great focus-generating weapon. I toyed around with a Ruffian Weapon Focused Cipher build that would open with a blunderbuss blast and then switch to dual-wielding stilettos. I decided it was impractical for PotD, but could be fun on a lower difficulty level. Constitution and Perception are definitely your dump stats. At level 10, a point of Constitution is worth maybe 4 Endurance out of ~130. Not enough to save you if you're taking heat. Likewise, the Interrupt effect from Perception is meaningless because a Cipher has much better methods of preventing the enemy from doing anything.

Personally, I like pumping Intellect on Paladins because if you get it high enough, your aura will in fact cover your entire party (it also improves Lay on Hands and some of the Exhortations). At any rate, I'd be inclined to drop Con and Dex a little bit to get your other stats up higher. I used to be inclined to dump Might and pump Con, but after seeing how little it does for a Paladin's overall Endurance, I'd say go ahead and pump Might. Action speed isn't very useful on a Paladin either, as you'll already be swinging slowly from wearing heavy armor. Options directly unlocked by your order choice are pretty few and far between. I think I remember seeing maybe 2 for Kind Wayfarers/Bleak Walkers, one of the rest. Pick whichever one fits how you want to play the character, as most of the order talents are marginal, and you want to get your Faith and Conviction bonus up quickly. It's not very hard to max out ~4 dispositions, so don't feel like you'll be limited to your favored options (though still stay away from the disfavored).

Shame or Glory is one of the rewards for the Crucible Knights quest "Winds of Steel."

Note for interrupting tankers: I just noticed in my current game that Shatterstar, the +1 engagement war hammer you can buy from Igrun in Copperlane, has the same stronger interrupt rating as morning stars. As though your high Perception tank needed another reason to grab that as soon as you hit Defiance Bay.

How would it be overpowered to provide an ability that already exists within the game as a talent? Because an ability that's limited to items can only be used by some characters, while an ability that's a talent can be used by everyone. Consider also in the case of retaliation that it's limited to a handful of items, none of which are easily available until the mid-to-late game (one of which I believe you have to already have won the hardest fight in the game to get).

Guns provide better damage, but there's a significant recovery period after each shot during which you cannot use abilities/cast spells. This may delay your spellcasting, causing complications if you need to get a spell off quickly. Whether that's an issue depends on your play style. You could always keep an implement in one slot and a gun in the other. Use the implement while casting and switch to the gun when it looks like you don't need to sling spells any more. Marksman should benefit both equally.

The Paladin's Zealous Focus aura applies to spells, though you'd probably need a Paladin with high Intellect to make the aura stretch far enough to cover your spellcasters.

I like bows on a ranged rogue, primarily because you're relying on debuffs to get your sneak attack damage, and so I like to squeeze more attacks into that window of opportunity. I would still take war bows over hunting bows for better armor penetration, though. Plus, if you're a Hearth Orlan, you can get extra mileage out of those extra crits by picking up Borresaine early on in Copperlane, which stuns on crits. For talents, pick up Weapon Focus, Marksman, and Penetrating Shots, Vicious Fighting, and Devastating Blow. That'll give you accuracy, DR, damage, and a huge hit-to-crit conversion rate. If you want a panic button, slip in Shadowing Beyond somewhere. Ability choice is pretty straightforward for a ranged rogue. Just make sure you pick up Dirty Fighting and Finishing Blow.

Not that much of a tradeoff, actually. The +5 to all defenses includes deflection, making the shield effectively +13, only 3 points behind a large shield, and you can enchant it to be fine/exceptional/superb in order to keep up high quality shields. Plus, as a small shield, it doesn't have an accuracy penalty, which is nice if you're leveraging Flames of Devotion. Personally, I really like Lay on Hands. Even with minimal Might, the damage healed is still significant for the first five or six levels, and a high Intellect gives you more ticks of healing to make up for the lower per tick value. In that stage of the game, even my Fighter tank sometimes encounters levels of hate that overwhelm his defenses and endurance, so the extra bump is handy to keep people alive. I like playing a Shieldbearer and taking the Shielding Touch talent to add the deflection bonus for even more damage mitigation.

I like that idea, it's basically what I suggested but I had the payment in quests while you have it in gold, but I'm not sure why the cost should increase with uses or why the uses should be limited to one time only. I suppose, theoretically, a player could respec their party so it's always tailor made for every major encounter, but that would cost a ton, even without increasing costs, for marginal benifits and I imagine it's a corner case. More likely, if a player respecs it's because they want to try something new, that might or might not work, or to correct a percived problem in their original build, which may or may not create new problems. I'd further argue that either of those two uses is liable to result in serial respecs, but those resecs aren't terribly different from the originall and should not be punished any more than the original. I like the idea of adding some type of retraining option to the game, not just for correcting mistakes or improving NPC's (Bear Fortitude? Really?), but because the game currently has several talents which are very useful in the difficult early stages of the game, but which rapidly lose utility once you have your feet under you. It'd be nice to be able to retrain those options rather than being stuck with them.

I've tried using a Chanter as an off tank a couple of times, but I got frustrated at how fragile they are in the early game. Personally, I like having a Paladin as an off-tank. I'm going to disagree with the idea that you *need* a Priest. Between the Druid and the Chanter you've got some good buffing going on already, so I don't necessarily think you need a Priest to round out the group (and I wouldn't want to use one as an off-tank). That said, a Priest buffing a party full of ranged DPS is a sight to behold.

Paladins are good tanks with high defenses (provided the Paladin is the PC), but their support abilities aren't exactly great. This means they suffer in comparison to Fighters, who make better pure tanks, and Barbarians and Monks, who have better developed hybrid abilities. I tried rolling a DPS Paladin to take along with my current group and haven't been particularly impressed so far, but my main tanking Paladin has been quite satisfactory.

I noticed that too. Rapid Recovery isn't normally a talent I'd pick for a Fighter, but I'll take it if it comes with a free Weapon Focus, even if the weapon selections there aren't exactly ideal either.

I only have experience with the first two levels of Druid spells, but my favorites are: 1st Dancing Bolts is a nice, party friendly AoE, which is handy on Hard/PotD for those fights with large numbers of melee enemies which quickly devolve into chaos. Nature's Vigor is a great healing spell, but it has a tiny AoE radiating from the Druid, so even with a maxed Intellect, your Druid needs to be right up next to whoever you want it to help. Sunbeam is not party friendly and has a smaller AoE, but it does great damage and blinds. If you've got a well-defined front line, you can often hit two or three enemies with it safely. Winter Wind is hard to use, since it's a party-unfriendly cone, but it does a lot of damage and the push effect is great for buying your ranged DPS more time to soften up enemies before they can engage. Try positioning your Druid between and just behind your tanks, and have a Wizard ready to mess with the enemies that are now bunched up and away from your party. 2nd Blizzard does good damage with a DoT effect and an attack rate penalty. Party unfriendly, so try to position it so your tanks are on the edge and holding the enemy in the AoE. Insect Swarm doesn't do great damage for a 2nd level spell, but the concentration penalty is great for enabling interrupts, and it's party friendly. Woodskin is a good party buff against the right enemies. Pay attention to what kind of damage you're taking, as it only applies to certain types. As far as synergies and strategies go, one thing to note is that even in the first two spell levels Druids can inflict any type of damage, so if you identify a weakness in a monster, you have a means of exploiting it. Since you have a couple of good freezing spells early which become encounter spells at high levels, Secrets of the Rime isn't a bad option for an early talent pick. As an added bonus, it increases your Freeze DR as well, which is handy against Shadows and Shades. On the other hand, there are hardly any freeze damage spells above level 2 for the Druid to use, so it's not a talent that will help you leverage your most powerful spells later on. If you want something that will boost your high level spells, Scion of Flame (to boost Sunbeam) or Heart of the Storm (for Dancing Bolts) might be better options.

My 2 cents: Play an Orlan Paladin Tank. Building a tank lets you max Perception, Intellect, and Resolve, which gives you the most conversation options. Orlan are a great tanking race and get a few extra conversation options with a couple of the companions (more than I've seen for other races, at least). And Paladins are better as the PC than they are as a recruited adventurer because that's the only way they can improve their Faith and Conviction bonus to defenses by building the right dispositions (turn on the helper option to show disposition increases in conversation if you haven't already). You can pick whichever Paladin Order fits the way you want to roleplay, as none of their order specific talents are that amazing for a tank. If you're having trouble deciding, Darcozzi or Kind Wayfarers are probably the easiest to pump dispositions up quickly (Passionate options seem to be everywhere), while Shieldbearers can get a nice boost to Lay on Hands for when someone is taking a little too much heat. The one downside to this build is that you don't have a lot of active abilities, so you'll probably end up pointing it at the enemies and then micro-managing the other party members (which might not be a bad thing if you want to avoid feeling overwhelmed). If, on the other hand, you're more interested in an active playstyle then conversation options, Ciphers, Rogues, and Monks all support more micromanaging and investment without overwhelming you with choices like casters tend to. In fact, a Cipher and a Rogue make a great pair if you feel like making an extra adventurer when you get to the first inn. Cipher does great damage and provides the necessary CC to help a Rogue do even more damage, and both can be effective in melee or ranged. Monks can be built for damage or tanking, and their tanking style is more active than the other tanks, as it involves throwing out CC attacks as you take damage. They're a little squishy in the early game, but once they get a few levels they start throwing around proning attacks and stuns with regularity.

For what it's worth, I'm running a PotD game right now with a Paladin and a Monk as my tanks. It took the Monk a few levels to hit his stride, but now that he's got some actual CC he's beginning to shine. My PC Paladin has nice tanky defense numbers but not much else to do, so I can point her at the enemy and mostly forget about her after using Lay on Hands. The Fighter's extra engagements are handy, especially against the large groups PotD throws at you, but you can do fine with other tanks if you use good tactics. Positioning, use of terrain, CC, and good targeting discipline can all keep your squishies safe when you don't have enough green lines to snare all the enemies.