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You're welcome. I know you're probably going for a more self-sufficient way of activating heating up on your Streetfighter by multiclassing with a Black Jacket and using a blunderbuss, but may I suggest an alternative, party-dependent setup for a Streetfighter? It still relies upon using a blunderbuss, but instead of equipping a blunderbuss directly on your Streetfighter and using the Powder Burns modal, you equip Serafen's Hand Mortar on another party member and take its Blinding Smoke upgrade. Blinding Smoke adds a Disorienting effect to its auto-attacks which fires out in a cone and affects allies and enemies alike. By merely positioning your Streetfighter in between your Hand Mortar-user and enemies, you can reliably keep Heating Up activated on your Streetfighter. The Blinding Smoke attack also targets Will and works on grazes which is very beneficial for a Streetfighter that would want to keep their other defenses like Deflection high in order to counteract the Flanked status that comes with Disoriented. Another nice facet about the Blinding Smoke effect is that it is an attack that does no damage so it won't take away charges of spells like Mirrored Image. You would still wanted to deal with the fact that Disoriented is a nastier T2 Perception Affliction that adds on a 50% recovery penalty which is counter-synergistic to the Streetfighter's recovery bonus. Luckily, a very easy way to deal with this is to upgrade Eder's starting Saints War Armor which gives Perception Resistance and will downgrade Disoriented to a more manageable Distracted perception affliction. These two pieces of gear are available fairly early, though it may take you some time to gather the necessary materials to upgrade them. You'd also be stuck with using Hand Mortar on another party member to enable your Streetfighter's bonus, but I find that a party member with high-ish Intellect can reliably keep the duration of Blinding Smoke active on the Streetfighter while alternating between attacks with another, dual-wielded weapon, like Fire in the Hole to pair with it, or firing off the occasional spell -- a dual mortar setup is pretty nice setup for a lot of builds so you don't exactly have to twist my arm for me to want use it, personally. Granted, another downside is the opportunity cost of not being able to take the alternative Point Blank shot enchantment on Hand Mortar for the extra damage. Yet another issue that you'd have to overcome is protecting your other frontliners besides the Streetfighter who are standing in front of the Hand Mortar-user so that they don't suffer Blinding Smoke's effects. Fortunately, the Captain's Banquet food bonus can give you Perception Immunity, but be prepared to shuck quite a lot of oysters depending on the number of front-line party members you have. I know this may all seem like a chore, but it's honestly my favorite, relatively painless way of getting a Streetfighter to work, especially when I want the Streetfighter to be able to use weapons other than a blunderbuss with Powder Burns. This party setup would also free you up to multiclass your Streetfighter with something else besides a Black Jacket, since you seem a little disappointed by needing to dedicate several slots for blunderbusses to do the Powder Burns swap and the lack of being able to use your Fighter side's Disciplined Barrage. Instead, you can multiclass your Streetfighter with another class that has higher, non-Perception Inspiration accuracy buffs and defenses to counteract the Flanked and Distracted status. Cipher is a nice option, for example, for the Borrowed Instinct's big boost of accuracy and defenses. Paladin is another good option for the accuracy or armor aura, the accuracy bonus while using Flames of Devotion, and the Clear Head passive ability which gives you Perception Resistance, allowing you to then use a different armor than the Saint's War Armor. It also sounds like you're leaning more towards the Black Jacket side in your original Streetfighter / Black Jacket post. I have some suggestions on Black Jackets too if you'd like.

That is worth pointing out: both priest and rogue sides learn duplicated AT 4-7 powers so can use them with different class resource pools (I was just being lazy and not wanting to list them out twice in my abilities section). I do like reserving my AT6 priest spellcasts for Salvation of Time to extend my buffs in case they are about to wear off since my priest spellcasts have to do double duty for defensive buffs, leaving me no extra room to recast them if necessary. But for a lot of combat encounters, a single casting of a buff is often enough and you can more freely cast Arkemyr's Wonderous Torment, which as you point out is a really nice spell to use on bosses. It's a good empowering candidate to start the ball rolling and breaking through a boss's high defenses, allowing you to hopefully land subsequent afflictions and other debuffs. I do dislike the fact that it only splits after the original effect expires on the first target, which means you functionally treat it as single-target spell since high duration boosts that you would normally want on a debuff renders its jumps moot. I would almost take an even lesser effect on the splits if it was able to jump to two additional targets immediately, or just wish that it would also jump upon death of the original target but I'm not sure how hard that would be to program.

I went ahead and further tested the two separate blunderbusses scenario (fired first blunderbuss with Powder Burns modal to activate heating up, instant swapped via Black Jacket + Quick Switch to another blunderbuss as the reload animation started on the first blunderbuss, fired the second blunderbuss to restart the timer on Powder Burns, and then swapped back to the first blunderbuss). Unfortunately, even though the tooltip on the weapon reload time states it is getting the heating up bonus, the first reload on that first blunderbuss you use to activate Powder Burns will always require the full, unmodified time to reload. Swapping back and forth from another weapon to your second blunderbuss, however, will bypass that so one method you can do to get around the unavoidable, slower first reload is to keep a second blunderbuss (since it will continue profiting from heating up) in your weapon slot and only swap to that one to refresh Powder Burns while considering your first blunderbuss "dead" after it's done its job and activated heating up on you. This was all tested on the vanilla game, by the way.

I remember testing this exact multiclass and weapon setup myself and it was as @thelee describes where the first blunderbuss shot that activates Powder Burns doesn't get the streetfighter's heating up recovery bonus unfortunately. If you switch to another blunderbuss in a different slot, it will profit from it however (as long as the previous Powder Burns effect is still active). I don't remember testing if firing your first blunderbuss to activate Powder Burns, then switching to another blunderbuss in a different slot to skip reload and firing it to reactivate Powder Burns, and then switching back to your first blunderbuss will then give you the recovery bonus when you resume reloading it. I don't know if the game is sophisticated enough to "remember" the original, unmodified reloading time or if Black Jacket instant swapping and reactivating Powder Burns in between would then grant you the recovery bonus but that sounds like it's worth testing.

(This was posted on another forum for Deadfire but thought I would share it here as well) Alvesa was born to minor Vailian nobility who've spent generations wandering Eora in hopes of restoring the prestige and wealth lost in the fall of Grand Vailia. A genteel disdain for any labor or trade seen as beneath their former station, however, has made it difficult for the family to improve their lot in life. While other expatriates from Old Vailia found success in profitable business ventures with the Republics or blighting the trade lanes with the Príncipi sen Patrena, Alvesa's family continued to drift from port to port, clinging to their faded pedigree and dwindling family fortune. Young Alvesa did not inherit her family's delusions for a bygone past and instead took this lesson to heart: “Accept no truth but your own.” Eschewing materialistic concerns, Alvesa turned towards the spiritual and became initiated in the mysteries of Wael whose domain of revelation appealed to a poor, itinerant child unmoored by the earthly attachments of her family. Not content to scour only libraries or temples for knowledge, Alvesa would also explore the back alleys and slum of the cities where her quick wit granted her access to the kind of illicit and disreputable dealings that her family never would've deigned to dirty their hands with. Undeterred by even the revelation of her patron god's true origins, Alvesa continues to seek out truth by uncovering the many mysteries of Eora. As someone who loves making a lot of crit-focused builds, I really appreciate Priests as an invaluable source of accuracy with their party-wide buffing spells. Because of that particular emphasis, I also tend to not want to multiclass them too often as I don't want to delay their access to these crucial spells. By a similar token, I also find action economy an issue with Priest multiclasses as they need to devote a lot of their time getting out their buffing spells before they can perform any other function. One of my personal white whales for a Priest multiclass has been finding a combination that not only justifies their slower ability progression from multiclassing but also overcomes the possible dilution of effectiveness by tacking on an ill-suited role to the Priest's kit. I believe this rather unorthodox Priest of Wael/Trickster build solves these issues by using several techniques and pieces of gear that allows them to not only get out their buffing spells in a timely manner but also lets them serve as a capable frontline fighter, profiting directly from their own buffs, and a disabler par excellence who can become a veritable gorgon able to turn their enemies to stone and keep them locked down for much of the encounter. Character Creation Class: Zealot (Priest of Wael + Rogue Trickster) Race: Ocean Folk | Culture: Old Vailia | Background: Dissident Other than the multiclass selection, these elements can change depending on your roleplaying preferences. Besides the thematic considerations, the Intellect and Stealth bonuses from my character creation choices also happen to suit the build mechanically. Attributes 10 Might | 3 Constitution | 18 Dexterity | 18 Perception | 19 Intellect | 10 Resolve This attribute distribution is fairly unusual and will probably seem controversial for a build that will also function as a frontline melee striker. The low Might is slightly counteracted by spells and supplementary damage buffs, though it should be accepted that this build won't be much of a healer unfortunately. The low Resolve score is similarly mitigated by the plethora of defensive spells available to this build. However, there is simply no getting around the liability of the low Constitution score, and some care and compromises must be taken with this build due to their low health. (If you play with the Berath's Blessings attributes bonus, I would definitely sink the extra points into repairing the Constitution score and slightly raising Might or Resolve for an overall smoother experience). The high Dexterity, Perception, and Intellect is in service of efficiently getting out spells and maximizing action economy and the efficacy of their crowd control ability. Skills Active: Stealth Passive: Bluff Stealth should be pumped exclusively because it will help action economy, which I will get into later, and also increase melee damage. You have more leeway with the passive skill choice. Keep in mind that Priests of Wael have Shady as one of their favored dispositions, and Bluff often acts as a corresponding skillcheck for a lot of Shady dialogue options in the game. However, you don't necessarily need a high Bluff in order to max out the Shady disposition, and disposition bonuses for Priests in Deadfire only affects the healing potency of Holy Radiance spell (and this build won't be doing a lot of healing) and the damage potency of your summoned spirit weapon, which this build won't be using at all. In short, feel free to let roleplay dictate your passive skill choice – I actually chose a mix of Streetwise and Bluff for this playthrough because it matched my character's background. Weapon Sets 1. Stalker's Patience + The Eye of Wael 2. Variable Equipment Devil of Caroc Breastplate, Whitewitch Mask, Charm of Bones, Cloak of the Theocrat, Gauntlets of Accuracy, Ring of Overseeing, Ring of Prosperity's Fortune, Girdle of Eoten Constitution, Footprints of Ahu Taka Abilities – (bolded are auto-learned abilities) 1: Arcane Veil, Arkemyr's Dazzling Lights | Suppress Affliction, Interdiction, Escape, Defensive Roll, Fast Runner 2: Ionic Projection, Mirrored Image | Two Weapon Style, Weapon and Shield Style, Dirty Fighting 3: Mirrored Image, Ryngrim's Repulsive Visage | Dire Blessing, Combat Focus, Riposte, Bear's Fortitude, Snake's Reflex, Bull's Will 4: Llengrath's Displaced Image | Devotions for the Faithful, Adept Evasion, Persistent Distraction 5: Confusion | Champion's Boon, Tough, Farcasting, Rapid Casting, Uncanny Luck, Deep Wounds 6: Arkemyr's Wonderous Torment | Salvation of Time, Improved Critical, Spell Resistance 7: Gaze of the Adragan | Deathblows Strategy You may be wondering why this multiclass chooses Priest of Wael and Trickster as their subclasses, given that they offer seemingly redundant access to automatically learned Illusion-keyworded abilities at every ability tier. This is a deliberate choice as it enables the build to A) not have to invest in active abilities as much and instead put those ability points into passives that amplify their strengths and fortify their weaknesses and B) have two resource pools to draw from to use these powerful, cross-class abilities. The endgame, centerpiece ability is Gaze of the Adragan which this build will be able to cast multiple times as both a spell and as a Rogue ability that costs 2 Guile per use. With bonuses that give additional points to the Rogue resource pool such as The Devil of Caroc Breastplate and the Adratic Glow bonus you get from paying for a dip into the Luminous Bathhouse's pool, this build is able to cast Gaze of the Adragan a whopping total of SEVEN times every encounter when using up all its Guile and AT7 Priest spellcast. This build also maximizes the duration of every cast of Gaze of the Adragan by every means possible, including A) power level bonus from the Illusion-keyworded gear Whitewitch Mask and the The Eye of Wael, B) high accuracy enabling crits which gives a bonus to duration on debuff spells, and C) high native Intellect further boosted by items such as the Charm of Bones and Cloak of the Theocrat. Furthermore, Gaze of the Adragan when used as a Rogue ability is technically an AT6 ability (though Tricksters still only get access to it at AT7) which means that it gets additional, native PL scaling for a slightly longer duration compared to the Priest version – this is actually very beneficial as the bulk of this build's Gaze of the Adragan usage will be from its Rogue side (though this does mean that they don't benefit from Rapid Casting, which is a small downside). Before going any further, I should explain why Gaze of the Adragan is such a good ability/spell that's worth specializing a build around. It's most noteworthy feature is that it applies Petrified, a Dexterity Affliction that is functionally identical to Paralyzed but technically counts as a tier higher than Paralyzed which is already at the highest Tier 3. This means that even enemies who have Dexterity Resistance (such as the common Wood Elf among kith enemies) will only be able to downgrade Petrified to Paralyzed, thereby still suffering the identical effects of being completely locked down. This doesn't make Gaze of the Adragan's Petrified effect the be-all and end-all of all crowd control abilities because there are still enemies with outright Dexterity Immunity or Body Immunity who can nullify it, but it does make it just a little more effective among the other hard crowd control Afflictions. Petrified/Paralyzed also grants a hefty hit-to-crit conversion against afflicted enemies, a feature that this build will also exploit to maximum effect. The way this build manages action economy issues as a spellcaster hybrid that needs to get out several lengthy buffs before moving onto any other action is mainly through Stealth. While in Stealth mode, actions get a -85% recovery reduction bonus which allows for a speedy follow up action. What might be unclear is that non-hostile abilities do not break stealth mode, meaning classes such as Priests with multiple non-hostile, party buffing spells can cast several in a row while benefiting from the drastically reduced recovery time. By investing heavily into Stealth and placing them further back into the formation so that enemies don't inadvertently bump into them, this build will be able to cast the requisite Devotions for the Faithful and Dire Blessing spells at the start of combat to boost their overall accuracy without being slowed down too much (do note that Devotions for the Faithful has a hostile, enemy debuffing component to it so you should be careful not to also hit any enemies with it lest it break you out of Stealth mode). After casting these spells, this build still has an AT3 and AT4 spellcast to use on Mirrored Image or Llengrath's Displaced Image, which should be used separately as the other wears off since their deflection bonus won't stack concurrently; this is both an action and resource economy save as it uses Priest spellcasts to activate defenses, saving Guile to be used for Gaze of the Adragan, and they are instant cast spells. The build also has double castings of Salvation of Time to further extend any of its buffs as needed. While it's not an Illusion-keyworded spell, the PL1 Arcane Veil eventually gets up to a decent duration with power level scaling, giving the build yet another fallback defensive spell to have in a pinch. Once accuracy has been pumped up, defenses boosted, and enemies locked down, this build is able to join the fray to great effect thanks to their dual-wielded Stalker's Patience and The Eye of Wael loadout. While a dual-wielded ranged and melee configuration may be suboptimal on a class like Rogue with Full Attack abilities in normal circumstances, this is less of a concern on this build where all Guile is being spent on Gaze of the Adragan anyway. In fact, the split weapon types is actually ideal in this situation as it means only the spear will attack when in melee distance and the scepter will only attack while at range. Dual-wielding a melee and ranged weapon at the same time like this is a useful technique when you want to profit from the Two Weapon Style passive and have a weapon with an effect that you want to maximize the chance of proccing, and this is true with both weapons. In the case of Stalker's Patience, it has an incredible enchantment that gives it a chance to instantly recover on crits, which means this build's high accuracy and crit conversion turns into a high volume of potentially chainable, instant-recovered attacks. With Rogue bonus damage modifiers like Sneak Attack, Deep Wounds, Deathblows, and the spear's enchantment that grants a damage bonus that scales to the build's synergistically high Stealth score, this weapon is optimized to dish out a lot punishment in a small window of time, delivering devastating coup de graces against their helpless foes before Gaze of the Adragan wears off, whereupon they will cast it again and continue preying on their enemies. The same principle applies to The Eye of Wael, which isn't just an inert statstick that amplifies spells for this build but a decent ranged weapon in its own right. If the Priest of Wael/Trickster is out of spells, or their defensive and accuracy buffs wear off, or they're facing pierce-immune enemies, or it's just too dangerous to go toe-to-toe with a boss, they can fade back to range and blast things with their scepter. The Eye of Wael delivers slash/blunt damage to diversify the spear's pierce damage and will benefit from the increased action speed of Two Weapon Style while attacking solely with the scepter at range. Like Stalker's Patience, The Eye of Wael has a chance to proc effects including debuffing Illusion spells and random Afflictions, making it so that build can still profit from Deathblows/Sneak Attack and debuff enemies even after they've run out of spells. It even has a chance to make you semi-invisible – though it's not a true invisibility that works with effects like Assassinate or Backstab, it does prevent enemies from attacking you and serves as a nice defensive effect. In tandem, I think this weapon set is a neat package that fits the craftiness and ingenuity of a Priest of Wael/Trickster character. This build so far has focused mainly on the endgame with a setup that doesn't come online until AT7/Level 19 for a multiclass, which may seem shortsighted. The cool thing about this build though is that its access to free spells and abilities at different ability tiers and via different resource pools allows it to continually take on different iterations and change up its configuration as it levels up. So for the early game at AT1, you will notice that I place a lot of stock in abilities that apply Dazed or allows you to break free of engagement; this build was played on POTD difficulty with all upscaling, and I developed a healthy respect for being able to displace and get out of danger in the early game when this build is at its weakest. However, as soon as AT2 is reached, this build can start to more comfortably stand on the frontlines as it will be able to use its Guile to cast Mirrored Image for a hefty, repeatable deflection bonus. I also take Weapon and Shield Style and opt to wear a small shield like the Outworn Buckler which doesn't come with an accuracy penalty. You can wear a medium or large shield if you find you need even more deflection, however I wouldn't take any bashing shield as it will take away attacks from Stalker's Patience and be an overall reduction in DPS (and you can of course respec out of Weapon and Shield Style later in the final form of this build). AT3 is where it gets interesting because you then get access to Ryngrim's Repulsive Visage, an aura that Terrifies foes. This gives you a short-range hard CC effect where your high accuracy now becomes part of your defense, disabling enemies all around you and making it a very decent stand-in Rogue ability to spend your Guile on until you unlock Gaze of the Adragan later. The spear's modal ability and shield setup actually remains a relevant loadout with Ryngrim's Repulsive Visage as it provides additional engagement to help you farm disengagement attacks when enemies try to flee from your aura. You can supplement this later on with Persistent Distraction and Champion's Boon (though do note that the later's Might Inspiration doesn't stack with the Might coming from Devotions for the Faithful) for even more engagement slots. Another school of thought is to equip a morning star for its modal effect that drops enemies Fortitude by -25 since the Terrify aura targets Fortitude. This is more if you want to go all-in on with using Ryngrim's Repulsive Visage as your main form of defense, but I think it makes your more vulnerable against ranged/backline enemies since the Terrify aura will only reach immediately surrounding enemies and I actually think Stalker's Patience and its instant-recover will end up out DPSing even the two-handed morning star, especially when it has its negative damage modal active. Another setup that you can use before the endgame is going ranged with a rod weapon; I really like Rod of the Deep Hunter on a Rogue multiclass, especially one with high Intellect, because the AoE effect added by the Blast modal and its stacking deflection debuff can lead to some juicy hits. With a more dedicated ranged setup, you can wear lighter armor, respec into Two-Handed Style, and use your Guile more for active Rogue attack abilities rather than frontline defenses. Yet another option available to this build is going with the previous suggestion but using the Spiritual Weapon spell to summon Priests of Wael's unique scaling Rod weapon, which also has Blast and a scaling Shock lash – if you've maxed out your Shady and Clever dispositions at that point, it could be a very effective delivery system for AoE damage. As you can see, you have a lot of interesting ways of transforming yourself to tackle challenges at different stages of the game, sort of mimicking the shifting visage of this build's patron god, which I think is very thematically fitting for a Priest of Wael/Trickster.

Conversions can only change the attack result to next category once so you can't have Llengrath's Displaced Image convert a hit into a graze and then have that graze get turned into a miss by Adept Evasion, unfortunately. Since you mentioned you were worried about having too many spells needing to be cast, I just wanted to point out that Mirrored Image and Llengrath's Displaced Image are instant cast and have no recovery time so they at least won't be taking up too much of your casting time. I also wanted to point out that the +30 Deflection from Mirrored Image doesn't stack with the +10 Deflection from Llengrath's Displaced Image. If you have both running at the same time, you would only get +30 Deflection from Mirrored Image and and the reflex and hit-to-graze conversion from Llengrath's Displaced Image. Though if you keep getting hit and were down to just 1 Mirrored Image copy, then LDI's +10 Deflection would start kicking in. However, if you can get your Deflection to the point that you are untouchable (which really depends on game difficulty and how high you can stack Deflection with other bonuses), then Mirrored Image may be all you need and LDI would become redundant (other than the reflex bonus which is nice). So in that circumstance you could skip out on LDI if you wanted to save yourself some Guile. Sorry, I play mostly vanilla so I didn't realize that BPM changed Persistent Distraction. In that case, for your Deathblows activator, you might want to grab Secret Horrors. Frightened is a great status, and Secret Horrors also causes Sickened so you have two afflictions that activate Deathblows and target different attributes in case you come across enemies with Perception resistance and immunity. Secret Horrors is relatively cheap for its Focus cost considering it is an AoE with two afflictions, with Frightened having particularly nice synergy for a high Deflection build like discussed earlier. I realize that this might not be all that helpful to you since you're already trying to fit other abilities into your build, but it's something to consider.

Yeah I think you would still want to have some Dexterity as a Riposte Rogue, assuming you're going for a damage role and not one that is purely tanking. Even though Riposte is independent of your recovery bar, it doesn't quite supplant the need for Dexterity on a striker Rogue for me, at least for the purpose of making non-Riposte, normal attacks which I think would remain the main form of damage. Like I mentioned in an earlier post, Riposte is just too variable (chance-based, relies on the presence of melee enemies, their attack rate, etc.) to be a consistent form of damage across all the different combat encounters you come across in the game. Just as an extreme example, if you were to make a Riposte Rogue with multiple sources of Riposte-like gear such as Tuotilo's Palm and Champion's Helm who dumped Dexterity and ignored standard attacking but pumped Deflection high enough to make enemies reliably miss their attacks, I think you would be disappointed by their damage output once you find yourself in situations like encounters that are light on melee combatants. I think it's probably better to treat Riposte as incidental, bonus damage rather than as a principal means of damage if dealing damage is an important element of your build. But if you were to build a hypothetical Riposte Rogue, for subclass I think the Trickster makes sense as a baseline for the +30 Deflection from Mirrored Image. Then you multiclass that with a class that boosts Defense (even though you might think of Deflection as a subset of Defense, they are technically different stats and would stack if you have one active ability that states it boosts Defenses specifically and combine it with another active that says Deflection). So you could look at multiclassing Trickster with a Paladin for their Faith and Conviction/Deep Faith passive defense, Fighter for their Vigorous Defense, or Cipher for Borrowed Instinct (and Psychovampiric Shield as a further stackable bonus due to being classified as an Inspiration). Lowering enemy accuracy would help with making them more likely to miss and trigger Riposte, so abilities like Paladn's Glorious Beacon, Cipher's Eyestrike, and Trickster's own Persistent Distraction and Blinding Strike would have extra synergy. And of course, you need sufficient accuracy yourself to land the Riposte attack so abilities like Fighter's Disciplined Barrage and Cipher's Borrowed Instinct could be pertinent. Here I go breaking my promise not to bring up WotEP any more, but the calculus for all of the above changes for me if wielding Whispers of the Endless Paths. By simply having a 100% chance to proc an attack roll from misses, I'd feel more comfortable maybe sacrificing some Dexterity and relying on Offensive Parry more as a legitimate damage source. While it would have the same issues as Riposte in those non-deal situations, it would at least have better consistency in the situations where counterattacking is applicable. The Trickster/Soul Blade combo from the OP in particular is nice because Offensive Parry would be passively generating Focus which could then be used for delivering Soul Annihilation in an AoE for burst damage to make up for the lowered attack rate if you took less Dexterity (though it's been a while since I used Soul Annihilation with Whispers of the Endless Paths and I vaguely recall the Soul Annihilation damage not quite being distributed equally to all enemies in WotEP's attack cone or some other quirky irregularity). And if I have a more consistent form of counterattack with WotEP, I might not need Riposte at all any more which frees me up to choose another class instead of Trickster for my source of high Deflection, such as Priest of Wael or Wizard who both also get access to Mirrored Image. That opens up some more cool multiclass possibilities, but it's getting way off topic so I apologize for the digression.

Fair correction, I've been trying to give an even-keeled impression of Whispers of the Endless, and a 100 percent chance to hit would make it seem better than it actually is. But since it's outside of SenSx's build concept and RP, which I totally respect, I promise to stop bringing it up!

The problem with factoring Riposte into your DPS and maybe substituting it for Dexterity is that it is highly variable. Because it is a chance-based trigger off specifically melee attacks, it's effectiveness is going to depend on things like the composition of enemy types in an encounter, enemy attack rate, positioning, getting the enemy AI to focus you, the prevalence of disabling and crowd controlling abilities in your party that might interfere with enemy melee attacks, etc. You can control some of those factors but it's not going to be 100 percent efficient in every encounter. The reason why I like Whispers of the Endless Paths when going the tanky, counter attacking route is because at least Offensive Parry has a 100% chance to hit on enemy misses, making it a bit more dependable, and its AoE standard attack can be thought of as a way of maintaining DPS through multihit rather than attack rate if you decide to sacrifice some Dexterity. But SenSx isn't using WotEP due to RP, which is fair and understandable, so I'll stop bringing it up since it's irrelevant I think the default Might is okay since the build isn't using any damage spells and it has some nice weapon damage modifiers like Sneak Attack, Deathblows, Soul Whip, and Soul Annihilation, and good critical hit potential from max Perception and Borrowed Instinct to make up for it. But a related concern may be low Fortitude from going with default Might and Constitution which can leave you vulnerable to stuff like Knock Down. If you find yourself getting bullied too often on the front lines, you could take Bear's Fortitude instead of Bull's Will that's already in the build. Luckily, the +20 to all defenses from Borrowed Instinct will help even out some of your weaknesses later on.

Between the two, I would actually take Psychovampiric Shield over Adept Evasion. They're not directly comparable but if they're competing for the same space, I think Psychovampiric Shield would suit your build better now that you have settled on the more tanky approach. Adept Evasion is actually pretty nice and helpful on a tank, especially if you combine it with Weapon and Shield Style and use the large shield modal to make enemy Reflex attacks virtually inconsequential against you. However, I believe you are looking at dual wielding rather than using a shield. Since you are planning to max out your Perception and Dexterity anyway, your Reflex defense will already be fairly strong without the graze to miss conversion from Adept Evasion (though it is nice to have). It boils down to: Adept Evasion would diversify your defense by protecting you against Reflex-targeting effects like AoE spells, while Psychovampiric Shield would heighten your Deflection and help you get to the point of being untouchable against weapon attacks. Of the listed passive abilities that you're thinking of getting rid of, I would definitely drop Echoing Horror for some space for Psychovampiric Shield and/or Adept Evasion. I agree with you that the Frightened status effect is nice, especially on a tanky build like yours. By preventing enemies from using their hostile abilities with Frightened, you force them into making standard attacks with their weapons instead which you can avoid with your high Deflection or punish with Riposte (though be aware that enemies can still do non-hostile actions like heal and buff while Frightened). However, I find that the kill requirement on Echoing Horror makes it less responsive and reliable. I would actually replace it with Secret Horrors so I have a form of Frightened that I can cast at will. Of course, they aren't directly comparable since Secret Horrors is a spell that has to be cast while Echoing Horror is a passive, and you might not want to have this character have yet another spell they need to be casting all the time. You can always have another party member casting it for you, though. I do want to bring up the point that you should consider your choices for your build in the context of your party. Just like how you earlier decided to invest in Resolve over Intellect to move closer back to your original concept, you should consider letting your other party members handle some of the duties so you can focus on what specifically helps your character become the untouchable rogue like you intend. Borrowed Instinct and Psychovampiric Shield are good examples of the spells you want to be casting because they are "transfer" type spells that debuff an enemy while buffing you as the caster with defensive buffs that specifically match your intended goal. Persistent Distraction is a good example of a passive that you want to be taking because it lowers enemy accuracy which helps you trigger Riposte, gives you +1 Engagement, and passively enables Sneak Attack and Deathblows on the enemies you engage. However, casting things like Secret Horrors or Eyestrike might not be as good of a use of your time. While they would certainly benefit you as a Rogue who profits off Afflictions, they compete for action time you could instead spend on attacking and use up Focus that you could instead be using for Soul Annihilation. It might just be better to let a party member Druid cast Venombloom or a Wizard cast Chillfog to get the same effects on enemies while your main character focuses on what they do best. Similarly, you could cast Gaze of the Adragan yourself as a Trickster, or you could save the Guile on your actual attack abilities and let your Wizard cast it, who may have better Intellect and can do a better job at casting it. While it's nice to be self-sufficient, you can let your party handle some redundant duties and specialize more into what your build is trying to do. Just something to consider.

That's a tricky dilemma. For me at least, high Resolve and Deflection stacking wouldn't be as attractive on this build without Whispers of the Endless Paths turning it into weapon damage. If it were me, I would actually go back to your original plan of default Resolve and no Psychovampiric Shield. The way I personally look at Trickster is that it allows me to play "greedy" where I can play a frontline character who doesn't necessarily have to invest in defenses to the same degree as other builds because I have Mirrored Image. Mirrored Image isn't the perfect defense (only boosts Deflection, can be dispelled, max bonus is progressively lowered after being hit, and is only available roughly after the starting island for a multiclass), but I think it is still good enough until you get Borrowed Instinct. At the point you'll have fairly solid defense from those stacked abilities for minimal investment. My personal bias is I don't like pumping Resolve so high on a character that isn't going to a main tank. However, you did want to make an untouchable rogue in which case it might make more sense for you to invest even further in Resolve. As far as Intellect, it can be quite valuable for buffing and debuffing duration. For your purposes, you can think of it as both a resource economy attribute, stretching out the value of your Guile per ability usage, and also as an action economy resource since the longer your durations last, the less time you have to spend recasting or reapplying your buffs and debuffs and the more time you can spend on attacking. I think it's going to boil down to whether you want to emphasize tanking or debuffing and figuring out what your build is mainly about. Regarding riposte, different gear and abilities that have counterattack don't quite stack like you may be thinking, but instead are separate instances that may independently trigger their counterattack. So multiple sources of riposte can have a chance to each trigger off of the same miss. From the testing thread I linked earlier, it may interest you to know that Tuotilo's Palm has a counterattack that generates Focus. As a bashing shield, it also counts as an offhand weapon for Two Weapon Fighting purposes, and can simultaneously take the Weapon and Shield Style passive. It may be a nice early option to boost your Deflection if you find Mirrored Image not enough before you get Borrowed Instinct.

I remember now I recently tested some weapon and shields effects for Focus generation in this thread which might be helpful for alternative gear ideas if using Whispers of the Endless Paths doesn't appeal to you.

I think it is totally fine to have a simplified build like this if it's doing everything you want it to do. In fact, the reason why I made my suggestions is because I think they would align with the stated goals in your original post and offer some refinements for that kind of build. I think Psychovampiric Shield is worth taking if you can fit it into your build because it is a Resolve inspiration that's stackable with your other sources of Deflection bonus, and every point of Deflection that you can stack really matters if you want to become truly untouchable. Whispers of the Endless Path's Offensive Parry would then give you the easy counterattacks you were looking for, and more consistently compared to just Riposte's 30% chance (I believe the Community patch buffs Riposte up a little, though). I know you were concerned about not having the Guile to be able to use some of the other cool Trickster abilities, which I completely understand. However, with a Whispers of the Endless Path build, paralyzing or terrifying enemies would be counterproductive because you want enemies to be attacking you to trigger Offensive Parry so you wouldn't really be missing out by not using those Trickster abilities. Using your Guile to only keep up Mirrored Image might feel less bad now that you can think of it as doing double duty because your defense will become offense WotEP. The damage you do with Offensive Parry also generates Focus so you can keep up Borrowed Instinct, Psychovampiric Shield, and use Soul Annihilation more frequently. The points you are already putting into Intellect for spell duration can also be thought of as a damage contributor with a WotEP build as it will increase the AoE size of its attack cone and hopefully hit more enemies with every swing. I don't want to push the idea of a WotEP build too hard on you or oversell it because it does have its issues for this particular multiclass. I think you would need to reassign some attribute points into Resolve and then dedicate some equipment slots for gear with Deflection bonus, which you might not want to do. The fact that Borrowed Instinct becomes available kind of late is also a valid concern, especially when you compare it to other multiclass setups like a Paladin/Trickster for instance, who can max out their Faith and Conviction/Deep Faith defensive bonus relatively early depending on their disposition. A multiclassed cipher WotEP build can eventually get their Deflection up to decent numbers thanks to their spells but it's not going to be as soon as some others.

One thing to keep in mind about the Watcher ability is that it is per-rest so you'll need to do a lot of resting if you want to incorporate it as a mainstay of your build. Brilliance is nice and all, but I don't think it's necessary to rest after each combat to have it ready for the next encounter or that you should be so worried about running out of resources. The nice thing about your multiclass choice is that even though you may run out of Guile, your Rogue class is still providing nice passive benefit from Persistent Distraction enabling Sneak Attack and Deathblows, and you have a fairly spammable attack ability in the form of Soul Annihilation. A Cipher active ability you might find useful is Psychovampiric Shield. It gives you a Resolve inspiration which will stack with Mirrored Image and Borrowed Instinct. Since you're also intending to go for high defenses and counterattacks, you may want to consider Whispers of the Endless Paths. You already have good Deflection potential with the aforementioned three spells and Offensive Parry would give you more counterattack chances to go along with Riposte. It may require you to move some attribute points into Resolve and equip supplementing +Deflection gear to make it more consistent, depending on your game difficulty level. Borrowed Instinct is also only available at level 13 as a multiclass, so it comes together slower compared to some other tanky builds that use Whispers of the Endless Path. On the other hand, your build also debuffs enemy accuracy with Eyestrike/Persistent Distraction to partly make up for that until you get the big defense boost from Borrowed Instinct.

This doesn't line up at all with in-game numbers or actual use case. If we look at single class priest vs. paladins with base duration to keep things simple: At PL 5 when Priests first get access to BDD, they have one cast that gives death warding for 8.0 seconds total. At the same PL, Paladins have 7 Zeal which gives them a total of 28.0 seconds of death warding. Priest later reach equilibrium with paladins as they gain two casts of BDD and later Salvation of Time, but at max level a single-class Paladin get 11 Zeal for a total of 44 seconds of death warding while Priests get a total of 36 seconds of death warding with their two casts of BDD and SoT. So why is paladin considered niche and no way replaces a priest for your BDD consideration, when they get access to death warding from the get-go and eclipse priest at max level? The above isn't even accounting for the extra duration power scaling that Lay on Hands get as a PL1 ability.

I do agree with other posters that you need to consider subclasses as part of your analysis because they can make a meaningful distinction. As others have said, it's not just an extra ability here or there. Some subclasses like Trickster Rogue get a whole suite of extra abilities that allows them to flex into roles like tank or crowd controller. Some subclasses significantly change the way they operate; Psion was brought up already but Beguiler is another transformative subclass for Cipher because they can bypass the normal weapon damage-to-Focus paradigm and operate as pure caster (most of the time) due to their subclass ability to gain Focus from Deception spells. Your analysis of paladin is a telling example to me. What about classes like paladin or priest where there is no "baseline" class and you must choose a patron god or paladin order as your subclass? Do those subclass bonuses just go out the window? Here's a great example. You seem to esteem Barring Death's Door very highly yet dismiss paladin in the same breath. What about Shieldbearers of St. Elcga who get an identical death warding effect to their Lay on Hands ability? If we're just solely looking at death warding capability, I would consider the Shieldbearer superior because they have access to it as early as level 1, which means it gets power level scaling of its duration, and it only costs 1 Zeal, which means they can keep the death ward effect for an overall greater length of time than a priest, even when factoring in two casts of Barring Death's Door and Salvation of Time. I'm not even that high on BDD myself, but just going of the merits of your own criteria and what you think is important for your tier list, this should hopefully show you the gaps in your analysis by not taking subclasses into account.

This is off-topic, but I wanted to share a very interesting interaction I ran into during my tests with Grave Calling. While attacking a Many Lives skeleton summon to trigger Chillfogs from Grave Calling, I happened to have another Chanter nearby who was using the Mith Fyr chant. I noticed that a skeleton affected by the Mith Fyr chant was completely invulnerable to weapon damage from Grave Calling; the combat log would state that the attack was cancelled out even if the hit landed. This is due to the interaction between Mith Fyr's Fire keyword and Grave Calling's Frost keyword, and them being counters to each other. This got me wondering, though, if it would be somehow possible to cheese this and render the party invulnerable to weapon attacks by forcing a keyword onto enemy attacks and then applying a counter keyword to the party. My first thought was to cast Moonwell on the party, which is Water keyworded. I'm sure many people have noticed how it not only heals but also nullifies incoming damage from Fire spells. Now, the tricky part was finding a way of applying a Fire keyword onto enemies because it couldn't just be a direct Fire damage spell which would just harm the target, but rather some kind of buff or effect that would make the Fire keyword "stick" onto enemies. I first tried a Berserker/Chanter to see if I could deliberately Confuse myself with Berserker Frenzy and perhaps apply Mith Fyr to enemies that way. Unfortunately, the positive chant effect of Mith Fyr didn't get applied to enemies even while the caster was confused. I next tried it with a Paladin/Berserker, again using Berserker Frenzy to Confuse myself and using Paladin's Shared Flames attack. Sure enough, I was able to grant Shared Flames to enemies while confused and put them under the effect of the Fire keyword. However, when enemies with Shared Flames attacked my party who were under the effect of Moonwell, their damage still went through. I think I figured out why Mith Fyr/Grave Calling counters each other out while Shared Flames/Moonwell doesn't, and it has to do with Grave Calling and how its elemental damage and keyword is coded. Though it appears to be an elemental lash similar to Shared Flames, Grave Calling's freeze lash is inherent to the weapon which makes even its auto-attacks Frost keyworded. It's probably why it and other elemental weapons like Thundercrack Pistol, which has a similar Shock lash, are able to be used by Arcane Archers without suffering the subclass penalty when auto-attacking. So you'll see Moonwell countering Fire keyworded abilities, but it's not going to be able to counter auto-attacks like my cheese idea unless you were somehow able to grant enemies inherently Fire keyworded weapons. If only spells like Firebrand weren't self-targeted! Just thought I'd share this cheese idea for keyword counters in the hopes someone more clever than me can figure out a way to make it work.

I did some more testing with Grave Calling, and the behavior I mentioned above with Skald Phrase generation was consistent across repeated attempts. To be fair, it may have been too much to expect uncapped Skald Phrase generation, on top of Grave Calling's already powerful ability to create multiple Chillfogs that can also generate Focus on Ciphers. I also added St. Drogga's Skull and Keeper of the Flame to the list of tested gear in the OP. While I was at it, I also tested some of the armors that do retribution damage like Kahako Nihi and the High Harbiner's Robes. I wasn't really expecting them to generate Focus or Skald Phrases but wanted to see on the off chance if there was some weird implementation where the game considers it a weapon attack. Unfortunately, they don't generate either Focus or Phrases, as you would predict. I can confirm that Offensive Parry will generate both Focus and Skald Phrases. I think a Soul Blade/Skald like my test character, who wanted to gain "free" and passive class resources this way from counter attacks, would actually be a fairly decent fit for Whispers of the Endless Paths. You have the +20 Accuracy/Defenses from Borrowed Instincts, which you can stack with your multiple sources of Perception and Resolve Inspirations, plus engagement slots from Tactical Meld. While you wouldn't be able to stack your deflection as high as some of the other dedicated WotEP builds, you have various abilities to debuff enemy accuracy and deflection to partly make up for it. Additionally, you have some nice synergies like penetration boosts from Hammering Thoughts and Their Champion Braved, which you can combine with enemy armor debuffs like Body Attunement or Hel Hyraf, enemy under-penetration potential with the aforementioned Body Attunement granting you armor and WotEP inflicting Daze, and the ability to direct Soul Annihilation in an AoE cone with the weapon.

So the Chillfogs from Grave Calling are very unusual for Skald phrase generation. I believe it is actually only 1 phrase possible per instance of Chillfog. What I observed at least was that you can potentially gain a Skald phrase from only the initial pulse. Subsequent pulses from the same Chillfog don't appear to be able to generate further phrases. This does make it less exciting as a resource generator for Skalds compared to a Cipher who can get a lot of Focus this way. I'll test this more thoroughly later, or maybe someone else can corroborate these findings with their own testing in the meantime.

I've been refining a Soul Blade/Skald build and decided to test an assortment of weapon and shields that have retaliation, counter-attacks, or AoE damage procs to see which of these can generate Focus for Ciphers or Phrases for Skalds (50% chance to generate a Phrase with melee critical hits). Here are some of the results: Grave Calling – Chilling Grave generates Focus and Phrases Akola's Apex Ward – Shark Teeth Counter does not generate Focus or Phrases Tuotilo's Palm – Outward Spikes generates Focus and Phrases Wintertide Bulkwark – Frostbitten Palisades does not generate Focus or Phrases Magran's Blessing – Fire Shield generates Focus and Phrases (only when the Fire Shield is active, of course) Eager Blade – Bounding Strikes + Kaul's Retort generate Focus but do not appear to generate Phrases. I only saw a Phrase generated if the initial weapon hit that procced Bounding Strikes also crit, and I never saw Kaul's Retort generate a Phrase after proccing a couple dozen crits with it. May require more testing or code delving. Engoliero do Espirs – Cruel Blade generates Focus but does not appear to generate Phrases. Again, I only saw it generate a Phrase if the weapon hit that procced Ghost Blades also crit. Whispers of the Endless Path – Offensive Parry generates Focus and Phrases Voidwheel – Necrotic Heart generates Focus. It may or may not generate Phrases since the Necrotic Lance is conditional on a weapon crit anyway. Karaboru – Bloody Momentum generates Focus. It may or may not generate Phrases since Bloody Momentum is conditional on a weapon crit anyway. Chromoprismatic Quarterstaff – Soul Storm generates Focus and Phrases St. Drogga's Skull – Flames of Retribution generates Focus. It does not appear to generate Phrases – the only time I saw a Phrase generated was if the initial weapon hit also crit. Keeper of the Flame – Magran's Wrath does not generate Focus. It does not appear to generate Phrases – the only time I saw a Phrase generated was if the initial weapon hit also crit. Some more observations: It appears there is a hardcoded limit of only 1 Phrase that can be gained per attack with the Skald subclass bonus. Even when critting multiple targets with an AoE auto-attacking weapon like Whispers of the Endless Path or layering multiple Chillfogs with Grave Calling, I never saw the Phrase count jump up by more than 1 Phrase at a time. For testing methodology, I turned off chanting entirely on my Skald/Soul Blade test character so the only way to generate Phrases was through weapon critical hits during testing. It was really hard to determine whether weapons that procced AoE damage from crits provided any Skald Phrase generation because I wasn't sure if the initial weapon crit was what created the Phrase and not crits with the AoE. If they do count, they may assist with providing more hit rolls for Skald's 50% chance to trigger. With the 1 Phrase hard limit and the conditional based on weapon crits, I can't say definitively, just based on observation, whether the weapon AoEs trigger Skald phrases.

Very cool and funny implementation! I love the image of repeatedly pointing your Thundercrack Pistol at enemies who are too scared to do anything except freeze and raise their hands in the air every time you swap to it. I know you say you can turn off the AI script at a certain point once you've locked down enemies long enough with the Thundercrack Pistol's debuff, but I was wondering what would be the best build for this strategy if you wanted to keep the AI script on and just have a character who only stands around and continuously swap weapons like we joked about in the other thread? Obviously it would need to be at least a Chanter to get the benefit of SSS's recovery reduction. One idea is to go with the Skald subclass, only because selecting the highest costing non-offensive invocation available will increase your maximum Phrase capacity +1, which does help the scaling of SSS's recovery reduction. It's a small bonus and maybe not necessary, I admit. I think the better idea is is to go with the Troubadour subclass and stack Intellect as high as possible so you can have the effects of multiple chants going at once or you can turn on Brisk Recitation and get faster hits with the offensive chants or more skeletons with Many Lives. I think a tank role makes the most sense in that case to get more value out of a character that can't actively attack. A couple of quirks does make tanking complicated in this scenario if you're constantly swapping weapons, unfortunately. First, when you switch weapon sets, engagement briefly deactivates and it takes a second after switching before engagement reacquires targets. If you're switching weapon sets constantly, it might not give your engagement slots enough time to latch onto enemies. Secondly, you can only activate self-buffs when you're not in recovery, so you'll have to depend on passive bonuses since you'll be stuck in recovery from constant weapon swapping. So I guess you can have Whispers of the Endless Paths in the other weapon slot to swap over and hopefully trigger counterattacks and combine that with Rogue and Riposte for more passive attack opportunities, or maybe Paladin for the passive deflection bonus. I think multiclassing with a Black Jacket might still be a good idea here because they can still activate their self-buffs like Refreshing Defense and Unbending Trunk thanks to their subclass bonus and Quick Switch allowing them to bypass swap recovery. Of course, if you didn't care about the spirit of a purely passive build and allowed buffing in between or before turning the AI script for weapon swapping, you have a lot more possibilities such as Trickster Rogue abilities like Mirrored Image to buff WotEP and Ryngrim's Repulsive Visage for a fear aura when standing around enemies.

Now I'm picturing something like a Bard from Icewind Dale standing around only playing bardsong, except it's a POE Chanter who buffs his party by constantly juggling his weapon sets like a jester

I ran a quick test of both of your ideas. It looks like Modwyr's Eager Lover enchantment doesn't work, unfortunately. I suspect it is because the Eager Lover action speed buff is a persistent effect that is applied directly to the character (you see the Eager Lover stacks showing up next to the character portrait which stay on the user even after switching off Modwyr). If instead Modwyr's action speed bonus was tied to the weapon itself, I think it would let you infinitely reapply it with Black Jacket weapon swapping like the case with Squid's Grasp. However, Sasha's Singing Scimitar does work like this. Not only that, but the Companion's Prelude upgrade works on the whole party like you speculated! So a Black Jacket / Chanter with this weapon can infinitely reduce recovery for your entire team by pausing and repeatedly weapon swapping. That's a pretty insane feature for that particular multiclass!

I don't know why this didn't occur to me originally but I just re-tested it and it works exactly the way @Constentin Lévine speculated. You can pause after an action and then keep switching back and forth to Squid's Grasp and it will progressively decrease your recovery bar every time you swap back. You can keep doing it until recovery becomes close to 0s (the bar moves less and less each time but it is technically possible to reduce it down to like 0.0001 millisecond). Honestly, I only figured to swap to Squid's Grasp once when I first tested this and was pretty happy when it worked the one time. The fact that it can recursively reduce recovery is pretty crazy! Sorry, maybe "refreshes" is the wrong word when talking about Magistrate's Cudgel and Black Jacket quick swapping. To be more precise, when the Deliberations buff wears off, you can just swap back to Magistrate's Cudgel and endlessly reactivate the buff by re-engaging an enemy. Like I said previously, the Deliberations buff will persist even after you switch to a different weapon set. One noteworthy thing is that the +1 Penetration from the Deliberations buff is a universal bonus, meaning it can also apply to spells! This and a couple of other spellcasting supplementing weapons like @thelee's choice of Lance of the Midwood Stag in the OP makes Black Jacket a pretty interesting subclass choice for spellcasting multiclasses aside from the more obvious choice of Tactician.

Black Jackets are really fun to play around with and have a lot of interesting combos. I sometimes think even 4 slots isn't enough to do everything I want with them. A few suggestions and ideas: Bronlar's Phalanx - I know you've already got Tactical Barrage, but I like the fact that this shield gives you a free Intellect inspiration and can at least save you 1 point of Discipline. As a Black Jacket, you can also take its stronger Stand Firm upgrade for the added deflection, armor, and health regen and not have to worry about the immobilization downside since you can freely switch out of it at will. The scaling deflection bonus and regen helps make up for low resolve and the subclass's weaker Fighter recovery. Granted, the health regen is conditional and not party wide like Lethandria's Devotion, but it could still be a nice alternative shield choice if you don't want to indulge in the Lethandria's Devotion swap cheese. Magistrate's Cudgel - soulbinding it to a Fighter makes this a nice buffing tool when paired with a shield or an offhand weapon with engagement, giving you either +1 AR, +1 pen, or minus 20% recovery. The nice thing is that these buff persists even when you swap to a different weapon set, and you can swap back whenever you want to refresh it. Squid's Grasp - I tested this a while back and found that the plus 20% action speed from the Attempted Parley will also reduce in progress recovery. In other words, you can swap over to this weapon whenever you've just performed an action and it will cut down on its recovery time (provided you are surrounded by 3 enemies - the Flanking immunity you get with this weapon helps mitigate some of the danger). It depends on your tolerance with micromanagement, but it could be a worthwhile addition to your arsenal especially on a spellcasting multiclass like this to speed up some of the slower spells.