MadDemiurg

Mad, I was less concerned about its prone ability than the fact that it's an excellent pike and ciphers do occasionally need to recharge their focus. And there will be times in battles when it may be more advantageous for a backline cipher to put aside its ranged weapon, and use a pike to support the front liners, while working to recharge that focus pool. Speaking of Tactical Meld, is that power really worth taking and using? I guess that I've tended to take more offensive nuking powers or those that charm/paralyze/whatever the enemy. Also, it seems like a lot of focus points to spend to simply charge up the cipher for physical combat.... focus points that you'll just have to turn around and re-earn while under the Tac Meld. I will admit that there are other good pikes around that can be worth enhancing. But there don't seem to be nearly enough decent quarterstaffs. There are only two that are ok. Wend Walker, which is excellent, but you get very late. And Llawran's Stick, which you get early in the Endless paths. But the Stick is flawed because it's only mod is "Speed", which currently doesn't work, so right now, it's effectively no better than a generic Fine Qstaff. Tac meld can be cast out of combat so it's essentially free. I always assumed it's a bug, but seeing how they've changed stuff like Wild Leech but left Meld alone maybe it's intentional after all. +20 accuracy also applies to spells, so it's not only physical combat. As for cipher's focus gain - overall dps increase from +10% hit to crit is rather minimal, so it's not better than a plain enchanted pike tbh (it also has less room for damage dealing enchantments). So while you can use it for a cipher, I'd rather give it to rogue/barb if you have one. +20% attack speed quarterstaff will be a better cipher weapon for sure once the speed mod is fixed.

Who said barb is a frotliner though ?. With max might/dex/int build many seem to prefer he's just as squishy as any dpser. It's a pretty good rogue weapon too since rogues crit often, but they lack the aoe knockdown capability it brings with barb. For cipher it isn't much different from any other pike/quarterstaff tbh (ciphers can crit often too with mental binding and tactical meld, but knocking down paralyzed targets is kinda pointless).

Autumn's Decay stacks just fine in the newest beta. Well, another bug out of many then. DoTs should not stack. If it does spam away then if you don't mind using this.

Got some time for my priest playthrough. It is possible to complete Parable of Wael quite easily with 0 kills, or more like "with 0 kills" by pulling trolls and prgwas on the right of the thieves to kill the thieves. That enables you to get a nice +2 stealth/+1 perception hat allowing not to bother with cheesing the RNG for stealth boots with non Rogue classes + get some exp and nice loot. I used withdraw for the pull but unless you do both Pacifist & TCS it should be manageable with any class with some reloads.

Yeah, "never existed" was probably a bad wording, as I perhaps it did exist in some early version (or perhaps not). The 1.06 nerf clearly didn't happen though.

I was only commenting on supposed 1.06 nerf which didn't happen (for 1.05 it works the same, easy to test by switching to the original branch). I also remember testing mechanics in 1.04 and it didn't impact accuracy in any way, but I'm not sure if accuracy values were the same overall. As for any nerfs in 1.03 or in beta or mesozoic era as I said I'm not sure as I didn't test how it worked back then.

Won't say ciphers are the best non rest class either (if there's such a thing at all since everyone runs out of health). Tanks are quite OP with the current hit mechanics and even though any class can be built to tank some are better at it. Monks resource system is better suited for times when you're in trouble - and that's when you need it most. They fall behind casters in power scaling at higher levels though. Ciphers are probably the best dps/cc class with no per rest abilities - but since most other classes that fall into this category are point and click and require very little micro it is only fair imo.

For me on a freshly created 1.06 lvl3 human priest (0 mechanics): Iconic projection: 44 accuracy Repulsing seal: 85 accuracy As for nerfs in previous builds, I dunno, never paid attention to it in earlier versions. +56 accuracy (iconic projection has +15) seems plenty to me, and as far as I can tell this is the same as in 1.05.

People, you argue about a nerf that didn't happen of a feature that never existed. Seal spells never benefited from mechanics. All "hazard aoe" type spells like seals and walls have increased accuracy, not related to mechanics in any way. In 1.06 my elven priest with no buffs has 85 accuracy with iconic projection and 126 with searing seal... As for 6 priest challenge... I suggest renaming into "6 priest no challenge".

Not necessarily a bad thing right now. That's only for DoTs that do x% weapon damage. Other DoTs, Envenomed strikes included, work normally.

For barb you also should consider on hit effects. For example, tall grass pike has prone on crit and 10% hit to crit meaning that 10% hits will cause an aoe knockdown.

No, I explicitly mentioned it in my post if you reread it again paying more attention . It does stack with miasma but not with weakened. An yeah, it's a good way to soften will of low reflex high will&fort creatures.

I don't agree with the nerfs suggested by the original poster but tbh the comment above is rather clueless. Fighters and paladins do not hit more frequently "because they can focus attributes on fewer things" because no attribute contributes to hit chance in any way. Cipher also will deal more damage that fighter or paladin with any weapon because soul whip.

It doesn't - easy to test yourself. It seems to benefit from 40% whip damage bonus however. Also if cipher gets his hands on the fire shield spell - mantle of wreathing flames - it does generate focus. Pretty weird overall.

Priest: Fire: Shining beacon Cold: Iconic projection (L2) Lightning: Warding seal (L3), Spark the souls of the righteous (L6) There may be other you've missed, but these were the most apparent

Also 1 thing I forgot to mention - disorienting weapons apply -all defenses on hit which stacks up to 3? times. Haven't tested if it stacks with -all defenses spells, probably not. However this is an option to reduce any save attacking deflection, albeit single target one (unless barb) and it requires a disorienting weapon. This makes getting around various high defenses even easier.

Yeah, and these debuffs all need to beat some save (almost never deflection and quite often fort) to work. There are large area fort and will debuffs as well. Ryngrim's enervating terror and Devotions of the faithful would be two good examples. I'm not saying that Will and Fort are easier, but it's pretty close overall for Will and say Deflection. Max debuffs for various defences are: Deflection: Paralysed/Petrified (-40) + Miasma of dull mindedness (-20) = -60 Reflex: Paralysed/Petrified (-40 -dex*2) + Miasma of dull mindedness (-20) = -60 - dex * 2 so say -80 on 10 dex creature Will: Weakened(-20) + Miasma of dull mindedness (-40) = -60 Fort: Weakened (-28) + Devotions (-20, overrides -2 Might from weakened) = -44 (and spells that do -all defenses, but these apply to everything) Spells that debuff deflection can target all saves, although rarely deflection itself (think stag's horn is the one exception, but it's quite weak in 1.05) Same for spells that debuff reflex Most spells that reduce will attack will or fort, with some exceptions like arkemyr's dazzling lights (-14 will) that attacks reflex Spells that reduce fort all attack will or fort I think So overall things you can't do (or that are quit limited): Debuff fort vs reflex/deflection Debuff will vs deflection Debuff will vs reflex (limited) Debuff reflex vs deflection (very limited) Debuff deflection vs deflection (very limited) Debuffs that are easy to land because of increased accuracy of hazard spells: Wizard - hobbled, - reflex - wall of force Cleric - prone, -reflex -deflection - repulsing seal Cleric - blind, -reflex, -deflection - searing seal Druid - weaken, -will - fortitude - wall of thorns Chanter - hobbled, - reflex - rime and frost Also cheese/bug - rotfinger gloves debuff fort, will and reflex with no save allowed. Vs most mobs in the game this leaves enough options to debuff any save tbh. Reflex can be pushed the most, then will&deflection, then fort.

But what if...your wizard is charmed or dominated? Lul That's the point. Wiz can reflect it back with (minor) arcane reflection.

Accuracy penalty from shields does apply to spells. However you can use light shields that have no accuracy penalty. Not sure about Cautious attack penalty as I've never bothered to test it, but it's kinda bad for a wizard anyway because it's suppressed by displaced image.

Deflection is not the best defence to target. It may be the "best on average" since only a few enemies have absurdly high deflection. However if you look through the bestiary deflection is almost always the 2nd weakest defence of the mob, meaning that theres almost always one defence that is easier to target (but it varies). So if you adapt your spells per enemy it actually might be the worst defence to target. Also, reflex reducing afflictions are much more powerful than deflection reducing ones (since paralyse/petrify set dex to 0, which is a huge reflex penalty). You've also missed the best will (and a good deflection/reflex) debuff - miasma of dull mindedness. It needs to hit vs will first, but you only need to graze with it.

Well, blunderbuss has an accuracy malus and hit chances in the spreadsheet are fairly optimistic for PotD, at least if you're not always shooting paralyzed targets. You can see that higher deflection hurts BB more by entering an accuracy malus. Also, with superb weapons and rending WB seems to actually do more damage without penetrating shot on average. But yeah, it's pretty close overall. And I wasn't looking at particular weapons, just weapon types in general. Speaking of BB's, one of the things that annoys me about them is that the game just won't tell you how much damage you did. Over the character, it displays how much each of the 6 (?) pellets did, but those numbers tend to overwrite each other and not be readable. And in the combat window, all it says is "X grazes, Y hits, Z crits". I wish that it'd append "for XX damage" to that grazes/hits/crits message, because it is annoying to not have a clear message telling you how much damage you REALLY did with your BB shot. /end mini-rant. You can click on the log entry and it will expand showing how much damage each shot did.

Well, blunderbuss has an accuracy malus and hit chances in the spreadsheet are fairly optimistic for PotD, at least if you're not always shooting paralyzed targets. You can see that higher deflection hurts BB more by entering an accuracy malus. Also, with superb weapons and rending WB seems to actually do more damage without penetrating shot on average. But yeah, it's pretty close overall. And I wasn't looking at particular weapons, just weapon types in general.

I wouldn't go for 16 Con personally but overall it looks fine. 2 Dex means you went dwarf? Outside of RP it's probably not the best race, even though it allows to dump dex the most.

Some back-of-the-napkin math I did after 1.05 suggests that pistol/blunderbuss does more damage than the war bow even accounting for attack rate, provided you have the Gunner talent. That said, the starting focus nerf on Ciphers makes Greater Focus a much more tempting option (especially early), and a gun-using Cipher will have difficulty fitting that into their build, which is a good argument for using the war bow. Well, if this spreadsheet is correct gunner is not enough to pull firearms ahead in terms of dps. You'll need smth like swift aim for it.

Peasant also has spears which is a decent damage weapon. Chanters have deflection and hitpoints contrary to cipher? They only have 5 deflection over cipher and exactly same health. If not taking actual stat build into account, survivability difference is negligible. OTOH chanters have NO damage boosting talents so they are bound to be subpar damage dealers with any weapon. They are better off as tanks imo, Wizards can go without focus but as I said but soldier/adventurer are not bad picks overall. As for druids, extra spells are very valuable imo because they have nothing like seal of faith/rings of wizardry. +20% elemental damage is pretty good too, so we're in disagreement again. WF is way more situational since past level 9 you rarely have time to even fire a weapon. Tank talents are good for anyone and W+S style is a nobrainer option for caster survivability as it does not interfere with casting in any way.