Manty5

Barbarian, Cipher, Priest. Cipher has huge amounts of control plus some of the best single-target spells in the game. The AOE confuse simply is not replaceable as far as turning the enemies' numbers against them. Priest has knockdown CC from traps plus much-needed buffs, heals and most importantly, condition immunities. With only 3 members, you CAN NOT afford to have one of them CC'd. Barb with apprentice sneak attack profits from AOE flanking from phantom foes, and later on can feed the cipher more focus then they can realistically spend with reaping knives. Weaken (from painful interdiction) and sicken(from barb) are the major affflictions that reduce BOTH fort and will. In POTD you're never going to get fort low enough for brutal, but the will debuff is very nice for the cipher as well as the fort helping the knockdown level 1 power.

Yes, they are. Dagger, scimitar and sword all belong to different weapon groups, so if you intend to use them specifically, one of them HAS to be soulbound. So you have to give up EITHER lifesteal OR your preferred weapon setup. That was the problem I was trying to help with. Mea culpa on the wounding/draining difference. Thanks for the assist, Boereer.

Well, it says he's the most famous ONE ON ONE fighter, not the best at surviving damage nor the best AOE fighter, so I'd kind of discount warrior or barbarian for that reason. Lifesteal weapons can become really awesome at 1 int, since the healing happens quickly instead of a lame DOT, so a combination of Drawn in Spring and the Ultimate Hat of Alluring Perfection can drop your 3 int minimum to 1 int. would be a great endgame combination. Make sure to take a wizard with Infuse with Vital essence so your health doesn't go kaput... if you cast it at the very end of combat you keep the health bonus. However, that requires the Noble weapon focus, so you only have Rapiers and Maces as picks for the other hand. Even soulbound can't help you, since the two one-handed ones is another dagger and a mace... although the mace, Nightshroud, has a chance to blind and a chance for finishing blow, which would match his propensity for creating weaknesses. Bad thing is you can't duganize a soulbound weapon, good thing is that taking the deathblows talent is often lame because it's 2/rest. However, if you were willing to make the opposite choice: Make the mainhand weapon the vampiric one, then you go with Purgatory (lifesteal AND annihilation!!!) and the unlabored blade in the offhand. Your early game choice would be the combination of March Steel Dagger and the Sword of Daenysis(since they are both noble focus), because they both have speed multipliers and you can compensate with vulnerable attack. For your Gambit idea, I'd go with either a monk or blasting wizard with the quarterstaff/pike spells. The monk would be a scroll caster as needed, because turning wheel increases scroll damage, and scroll use would mimic his ability to throw charged cards at the enemy. For the monk, I'd go with a long pain build (int/str helps the scrolls too!) as I'm not a big fan of reach weapons on a class that needs to take damage to function. Although his staff is iconic, Gambit also has notable hand-to-hand skills. The wizard's stat setup for blasting isn't all that different from a reach weapon wizard's stats and the staff/pike spells are level 1 and 5, which don't really interfere with the spell levels for a good blast wizard. The downside is choosing which of the two (ranged or melee) to allocate perks to.

I didn't forget that... I never knew it in the first place. Seems odd that 1h bonus would affect chants but not spells. Does the hit to crit conversion from the one-handed talent also affect offensive chants? In fact, I was just now trying a new run and figuring out how I wanted to outfit Kana this time. Wonder which one-handed weapon would be best to keep him alive?

Also, I'd think chanter would be the last class you'd want 1-handed (without shield) on. If a chanter wants to DPS, it's better to use his songs to do it.

Thanks for letting me know. I was just trusting the main post in The Engineer build. So a paladin scroll-user would be mostly doing it for the on-kill procs, so that you don't have to move to the enemy you're about to kill.

I've been looking through the build archives, and some of the builds favor offensive scroll use: Like The Engineer using Sunder and Scon Mica's Roar to debuff the enemy before a barrage of missiles, or the Wizard's Apprentice to use a thief's hit to crit conversion and deathblows to amp the damage. But against a target that you haven't stacked 2 deathblow-qualifying debuffs on, wouldn't a Paladin do even better? You'd have to get someone else to drop the DR like a cipher, but a paladin applying Sworn enemy and FoD'd Scon Mica's Roar would practically guarantee every pellet at least hits, giving you the full -30 debuff to all defenses, on top of the +20 accuracy Sworn enemy already gives. Following that up with a missile scroll barrage would be a critfest. So while a scroll-thief would probably do better DPS-wise on a single target, a paladin would be comparable damage AND get all the other nice party-based things that paladins bring to the table. Or maybe there's a problem with this idea that I don't know about. For example, would a paladin's high INT extend the disorienting effect or not?

* A Bleak Walker literally has to be Cruel and Aggressive whenever possible to rack up his Faith and Conviction talent. The Bittercut(s) in the official build's weapon choice section aren't two-handed, but dual wield absolutely works better with heavy armor and more importantly, Bittercut is primarily corrode damage. That fits the roleplay wonderfully. If you wanted to wield Bittercut in one hand and Purgatory in the other, you'd have a draining weapon too. * Dark Cipher. You can get a very antipaladin-ish feel by paralyzing your enemies(level 2 power) and slicing them up for power. You can spam Whisper of Treason to turn enemies against one another, and enslaving the living is an interesting change from raising the dead. For even more fun, have your chanter start up a "dragon thrashed" chant before you start spamming treason so that they're burning to death while killing your enemies.

Thanks so much. Someone was asking about a ranged cipher in the reddit forums, and I was going to direct them here... but when I realized that I had no clue how the build was supposed to be dealing AOE blind, I thought I'd ask first. Just so I can relay this info to the other person, what's the earliest you can get it? It's listed as a WM2 weapon.

I was reading "The Gunslinger" build for chanters and it kept repeatedly mentioning the Silver Flash blunderbuss having AOE. Not being a fan of guns, I've never tried a blunderbuss, but everything I've read about it says that it has multiple projectiles, not multiple targets. How does this work? Am I missing a talent (I know there's an AOE talent for guns, but I thought it was ranger-only), piece of equipment, etc? I'm asking in the main thread instead of the build thread because the game's so old that there's no guarantee the author even checks the boards anymore, and I suspect that whatever I'm missing, it's just a stupid lack of basic knowledge on my part. So how do you make a blunderbuss hit multiple targets as a chanter, and does INT affect the spread?

I'm curious: Where did you get your healing from? Potions can flub the animation, and Pallagina and the ciphers are the only ones with healing spells at all. Also, Borerer: What kind of stat spread would you recommend for a flaming greatsword Cipher? I plan to use Amuna for 2 reasons: Knockdown resist and because you can make him look like Darth Maul with the right head and black skin. Not sure what hood I'd use that would be both useful and complete the look. And since I'd plan on 3 weapons (SYRedeemer for special cases, Firebrand for most cases, both of them don't care what weapon focus I get, eventually going to a 3rd weapon for fire resistant enemies and eventually being my main weapon, what should that weapon be? Estoc? HoStRumbolt? I'd like to corrode lash it because you mentioned i lashs grant focus.. Finally... and I know I'm asking a lot... what does the cross-class paladin aura stack with? Accurate Carnage? Having a sickening barbarian and a painful interdiction priest seems like the ultimate partners for a will-targeting cipher, not to mention that phantom foes would be nuts with a barb too.

Thank you very much Firebrand with Soul Whip/Biting Whip/Savage Attack/Scion of Flame and Merciless Hand usually crits for over 100 damage. Use Mental Binding (that will make sure you crit often) and get ridiculous amounts of focus. Firebrand, unlike fists, loves damage bonuses. It can have no lash, but its base damage is so high that it more than makes up for this. With durgan steel, more than superb quality and a lash other great swords can be better options. For example the Hours of St. Rumbalt. However, even in the late game Firebrand is viable. You can stick to it and spare resources like Durgan Steel and dragon/kraken eyes for other party members. Also, Time Parasite with Firebrand is epic... If you are interested I can elaborate. Thank you so much! I thought I was on to something, but your explanation is way beyond my meager knowledge level. You don't have to go into detail, but would a high-PER cipher be able to dish out enough AOE interrupts from spell crits to matter?

> What are the advantages of going unarmed over using a weapon, either dual-wield or 2H? We're assuming that you have the White March expansion and therefore access to Novice's suffering, which is a cross-class skill that give your fists nearly monklike levels of damage. Monk fists are fast (especially with dual-wielding talent), accurate, blunt(least resisted physical damage type), and upgrade automatically when you level so that your MC never falls behind on the damage curve. The only disadvantage is that you can't apply durgan steel enhancements to your fists (going Full Wolverine on your opponents would be hilarious, though!) Ciphers are all about speed. Speed in casting, speed in dealing physical damage, speed speed speed. There are only a few non-fast-cast spells I'd take as a DD Cipher, and one of those is Silent Scream. Whisper of Treason, beat with fists until 40 or 50 focus, then scream, treason if needed, beat with fists, repeat. Awesome. Another great idea is to Pain Link Maneha if she's getting focused. Then she hits everyone nearby when he hits someone, AND hits everyone nearby when she takes damage. When she's had enough fun for the day doing that, Pain Block to slow the damage considerably. Of course, you can do that with Eder or Pallegina(Or Kana, if you chose him) if one of them is getting swarmed instead.

If you whispers of treason something before hitting it, that's -25 deflection right there and the guy you're whacking won't hit you back. Have you considered going with fists using Novice's suffering? Since monklike fists hit fast and hard, and are further enhanced by whip, you could generate a lot of focus if you flip an enemy before using him as your personal focus battery. Since Fists and Hunting Bows are both peasant weapons, times where you MUST hang back or MUST NOT use blunt damage are covered, too. You can respec pretty cheaply to change from two-handed to dual wield. It's a lot easier for dual-wielders to reach the magical no-recovery limit, even with heavier armor. Ideas for party members: Ciphers have two defenses they must contend against: 1. Deflection, so they can deal their physical damage to get focus. Deflection isn't as important, as we can get that by attacking charmed or flanked enemies and it's usually trivial to debuff deflection AND because of how grazes and crits work with Novice's suffering, a graze is actually nearly as damaging as a hit or a crit. 2. Will, because most of your powers target the enemy's will save. It's a LOT harder to debuff will, and almost every condition that does, ALSO debuffs Fortitude. So picking party members that can inflict and take advantage of sicken and weaken make you more effective. Weaken has double the debuff of sicken and is far harder to land, the best one being a priest's Painful Interdiction since that's a per-encounter ability. You can get free unlimited sickens from having a barbarian in the party, and Plague of insects is a highly powerful (and mid-level) druid spell that sickens in addition to its other excellent effects. So right from the beginning, Durance, Hiravias and if you bought the White March expansion, Maneha the Manhandler seem to form part of a core. Since Melee cipher, Barbarian, Druid and Priest gives you two physical DD's, 2 squishies and no tanks (although Maneha isn't exactly fragile), I'd say your AOE, buffing and CC needs are being adequately handled and now you need at least one tank and maybe an off-tank. Eder as control tank and either Kana or Pallegina as off-tank seem fit to fill those roles, and they can be built offensively as well. I personally would build Eder as a engagement king, using the talent that lets him knock down people breaking his engagement. Since both flanking if he holds 'em and knockdown if he doesn't both allow for sneak attacks, consider apprentice sneak attack for both yourself and Pallegina. Give her Zealous endurance (the defensive aura) and give Maneha Gallant's focus (because it's superior in almost every way to Accurate Carnage, you're not wasting a talent). I'm actually theorycrafting a build right now for Pallegina that would make her able to deal really serious damage to a single-target so long as it's not fire-immune... using The forgemaster's fingers to summon an annihilating fire greatsword, Outlander's frenzy to pump STR and attack speed, someone else to land a hobbled, stuck or blinded condition on the victim, then chaining Wrath of the Five Suns (sworn enemy also causes fire projectiles), Flames of Devotion, Runner's wounding shot, and then another Flames of Devotion. Scion of Flame, Apprentice sneak attack, two-handed fighting all increasing the damage. I'm just wondering if the speed bonuses from Outlander's frenzy and Vielo Vidòrio stack?

AssignPaladinOrder charname orderName isn't working out for you? Oh, and how are you re-assigning race and background to the story chars? I looked through the list of commands twice, I must be blind.

Ah, a Kind Wayfarer Greatsword paladin with two rifles strapped to her back for when something, somewhere must absolutly die right now from a flaming bullet of devotion. But a barb shouldn't have much need for a ranged weapon. A REACH weapon, sure. But not a ranged one. Try replacing those flails with a quarterstaff. That way you still have a way to damage versus those weak to blunt, and you have a way to reach people you want to hurt. Talents are too scarce to waste them on an edge case like being able to only hit with a range weapon.

The reason they scale badly is because their primary ability isn't really improved by equipment, except possibly might and int buffs. So unlike a cipher who gains more focus when she gets an exceptional weapon and therefore casts more, when a chanter gets an exceptional weapon he... hits his one target a bit harder. That's pretty much it. "Their hearts grew bold" does the exact same thing on a level 1 nubby bar singer than on a fully geared level 12 voice-from-the-deeps, with the exception that maxxing int makes it last a bit longer. That just isn't enough compared to other classes. Even the chanter abilities don't improve the chants nor the invocations very much. EDIT: I'm actually a fan of the fact that your're forced to choose between "low-level chants but high level invocations" and "Powerful Chants but infrequent invocations". I think that's a beautiful design decision that's marred by implementation issues... so I'm not a fan of any "solution" that just makes one of those more viable at the expense of the other. Also remember that the low-maintainance nature of the class can be turned into an advantage: You wouldn't want your barbarian reciting scrolls, because he needs to be hitting things already. But Paladins and Chanters? They should be reciting scrolls when you need them to. Kind Wayfarers even covert scroll kills into healing. Maybe that's where improvements could be focused, but I'm sure I can't of a way to do so.

> And what about a talent that would make the ranger STRONGER when the pet dies ? Actually, there's a mod for that. Check the Nexus.

Well, I see you aren't paying the least bit of attention, since what I suggested wasn't an AC, but an ability that looked like one. Good talk, though.

Kind Wayfarers and annihilation weapons Approve of patch 1.6.

In all honesty, the only real choice I want for the AC is to not have one, and have the option to have better abilities on the Ranger him/herself. The AC's are nothing but a pain in the posterior to me. Others may like them. I don't. I guess that I don't like dragging Lassie around, waiting for him to get nuked on the front lines or having him sitting at my feet like a good obedient AC and doing next to nothing but taking up space. Would you like them better if they were more took the form of an ability rather than an actual battlefield presence, and were visually represented like a pet? I think it'd be really awesome to have a falcon AC that you could occasionally sic on enemies, doing some damage over time with random chances for a blind or hobble during the attack. Rest of the time he perches on your shoulder. But that'd require a big mechanics change and is proably unrealistic.

Deleterious Alacrity of Motion applies to spell casting as well as physical attacks, right? Also, "no wrong choices" is going way too far. Someone's having difficulty with the concept of oppurtunity cost. Not to mention Grimorie size limits.

Isn't it funny that the earliest caster to bloom is the last one you get?

That's certainly the cheapest option. However, you might not have that much money at the start of the game... later, your pockets overflow with gold. Hiring early is the best way to keep their levels close: If you can't do that, at least do hiring RIGHT after a level-up, because you can only hire up to your level -1. Finally, if you feel that strongly about the character optimization, recall that you can use the console to alter stats and even abilities (including racial talents), but not things like race or background. I'd rather alter Eder's stats than not have him trading bawdy tales with Hiravias. I prefer using 4 pre-written companions and 2 custom. Believe me, at hard difficulty and below the power you get from just two optimized characters is more than enough to carry the rest... and you might be suprised how good the rest actually are. Talents and abilities are MORE important than stats, and ever since 1.05 you can turn off the auto-levelling, letting you choose most of the character development without the need to rush companion gathering. Remember, Companions join at about the same level that you are when you recruit them, so there's less of a rush to get them. Paladins make great PC's, since without IEmod only the main character gets full bonsues to Faith And Conviction. So do rogues, monks, and barbarians, since no companion has those specialties. Also consider that you get interesting conversation options for high stats, so you might plan a playthrough playing as a tank (one set of stats) and another as a DPS (the other ones).

However, racials STACK with gear and spells, whereas gear doesn't stack with gear, spells don't stack with spells, and some things are hard enough to find, much less stack. Like accuracy. Distant advantage isn't a game changer, but it doesn't need to be to be better than most of the racials for any caster.