sterrius

The problem in POD is that most enemys will have enough accuracy to Critical hit your monk. Getting a 100 dmg fireball in the head will kill you no matter how much CON your monk have. Also Shades with 82 deflection and paladins with 54 deflection will make you monk sweat to get good hits. Critical hits is a dream until later in the game when you finally get tons of buffs to counter the POD bonus! deflection and saves in POD is a top priority if you dont want to be one shot by a mage, priest or troll. I find most tanks without shields in POD to lack enough deflection to keep in the frontline and dont die from grazehits. Reason i go for 2 warriors full tank instead of normal warrior + 1 dps meele class to off tank. But lets try to get this right. In POD you dont want to have bad saves. Go for! Might 10 Con 15 Dex 10 Per 17 Int 10 Res 17 Race: Pale Elf, Wild Orlean or something that buff you DT or Defenses for something. You can get dmg from other sources. You are already the fastest class to atack so you dont need DEX, but you also dont want to go below 10 and nerf your saves. Deflection is priority or you will not survive no matter how you build it. Once you start to survive you can bother yourself with dmg and fancy kung fu. I even recommend Pallegina Armor (Breastplate DR10 and more DT below 25% health). If you plan to get hit i dont recommend doing it without DT to soak up the dmg. They will hit you, they even hit my 100Deflection warrior on act1 so its very very normal to die by a sward of graze wounds and hits on POD. And i recommend 1 full warrior to at least take the heavy hitters from your monk and let him tank the small frys, and you will find tons of them to deal with.

From what i got and im going. Main char -> I spend on lore, athetics and survival more or less even but with a focus on lore. This unlock conversation skills. My other chars i got one for each skill. The fact is unless you're a rogue or chyper its not worth going mechanics on your main char. You will spend tons of points to get it to lv10. SO better go for lore instead as 10 points should be enough for all checks and lv5 scrolls. You get 66 points in skill the entire game. (6 each lv from 2 to 12). To get from 0 to 12 you need 78 points. from 1 to 12 = 66 From 2 to 12 = 55 If you spend 6 points in athetics (0 to 3) you have 60 Lets say i have lore and survival 0. I can get both to lv7 and still have 4 points left! To bad this game dont have a talent to give more skill points. Some classes can surely use one or two talents without much problems.

Cant go wrong with a fighter. As he need perception and resolve he unlock tons of conversations too without gimping himself. Later as you get more knowledge of the game you try other classes.

Also remember the fact the achivement exist don´t mean its 100% possible. They dont actually made one char and finished the game alone to test if it was possible! Games like this they just hope someone will find a way. Players are know to do incredible things that no one even thinked about while the game was in development. Never underestimate millions of people trying the same thing. (Definition of insanity? ) Also i remember BG1 to Throne of Bhall solo was not easy and needed tons of hours, planning and things could get wrong. (tons and tons of reloads). And now they are asking you to do it in iron man mode. Well, good luck with that .

Barbarian is not a off tank. The HP he gets is to get out of the fight IF something starts to hit him. (Or kill the enemy if he is already half way there). Also he needs some DT. He actually have HP to make DT worth the speed reduction. (I use leather). Try it with 2 warriors (or 1 warrior +1 paladin) to tank everything and barbarian as a DPS/Last resort tank. Also try to get something to make him heal himself or disengage if needed. Don´t try to make him tank. He have the worst deflection of all classes making it too vulnerable to critical hits. (that will make your dt useless in a long fight). my 2handed sword barbarian only lost to my ranger because he need to wait the fighters to go first and the enemys to lock on the fighters. Also he needs to walk, this is enough for the ranger to shoot 1 to 3 times. Once he starts his damage is bigger than anything my other classes can do, even more with rage. Might for a warrior is kind of interesting. I have two warriors so if one is not tanking i change for a two hand and it make a difference for them. Also very high lvs you maybe will try to go for some offensive talents and give your warrior some damage as they need very few accuracy buffs to hit something, even using a shield. But i agree at the start of the game you want to go tank and this is kind of bad surprise for people that wanted some kind of tank hybrid. But warriors are never damage dealers in D&D too (And most other pen and paper rpgs). If you go D&D 3.5 with a shield + Sword its very hard for a warrior to have good damage after the first levels as the talents that keep you doing damage need to be dumped for the defensive ones. On 4.0 is even worse as the fighter need to choose from lv1 being a tank with no damage or a two handed off tank with some damage. (No epic damage here). Don´t played D&D 5.0 but hardly it left this mentality. The classes have roles and secondary roles. Cant leave much from this rule if you got for a D&D style RPG. Why do people keep saying this? You can only have 1 summon active at a time... you can never have an army. Well, unless you take a group of 6 Chanters. Because you can re-use the summon spell as soon your summon is dead or low life. So you can spam skeletons for all eternity and any meeele enemy will never touch you. And oh i would love to see a group of 6 chanters with skeletons. Would remember me Evil Dead! Will even name one ASH Willians

For the 3 difficults (Easy -normal - hard) you dont need to change anything on the companions. Even if you get all with only 10 stats they are still more than enough to finish a game on hard. The problem was never if the character is good or bad to finish the game. It is if the character is good enough to keep up with the main char. Not to be just meatshield with the only function to take damage and buff you main char. They need their time to shine and "save the battle" too. On 1.0 they where far from it. Now with 1.3 they are almost there in my sight. Maybe fixing the initial talents of some of them will fix it for good as attributes lose its importance as you get levels, About them being able to go a POD run. Im doing it right now with them, just barely! They now have enough for you to go a companion rush and get everyone before lv4. So i was able to "save" grieving mother from getting both whip talents. Pallegine unfortunaly even getting her at lv3, she starts at lv4 so she will have 1 extra lay on hands no matter what you do.

Not so much, most Companions in Baldurs Gate 1 and 2 got some very fine stats on the main stats they needed. Never going below 15 on the main stat and usually having also +1 to two high stats. In fact it was very easy to see a companion of BG to shadow the main character and fight with him in anything you wanted your main char to be. The worst companion you could get int he BG saga is Quayle with only 67 points. But he was the exception, in fact i dont think BG1 and 2 have another companion below 77 points in stats. Most orbit around 80-90 with even some passing. (Saverok got 95) You would also find a lot of Min-Max companions ( Edwin with its INT 18 (mage) and a item that gived him 1 extra slot (Making him a int 20 mage) or Kivan of BG1 with Dex 17 and Strenght 18/17 for a ranger making him a monster with a bow). AD&D Recommended 75 points. (Somewhere in the master´s guide) Minsc was a monster even by Min-Max standarts. And it was the most memorable character of the franchise. (75 points) Strength: 18/93 Dexterity: 16 Constitution: 16 Intelligence: 8 Wisdom: 6 Charisma: 9 Jaheira a Fighter/Druid (88 points) Strength: 15 Dexterity: 17 Constitution: 17 Intelligence: 10 Wisdom: 14 Charisma: 15 The only attribute she was bad was int. That have no purpose for her. 14 is her lowest stat going for a absurd 88 Points build! (I played AD&D and the Book Recommended 75). Aerie (82 ) Strength: 10 Dexterity: 17 Constitution: 9 Intelligence: 16 Wisdom: 16 Charisma: 14 Korgan, (76) Strength: 18/77 Dexterity: 15 Constitution: 19 Intelligence: 12 Wisdom: 9 Charisma: 7 Viconia (84) Strength: 10 Dexterity: 19 Constitution: 8 Intelligence: 16 Wisdom: 18 Charisma: 14 You can get from this that they where strong, very strong, most with above 75 points. (Well, most did 80-90 points build to play BG2 and get the conversations). And to represent the uber min-max settings and strongest companion in the saga. Saverok He is even smart enough to debate with mages while he is breaking their skulls. Saverok (95) Class: Fighter Alignment: Chaotic Evil Strength: 18/00 Dexterity: 17 Constitution: 18 Intelligence: 17 Wisdom: 10 Charisma: 15 And BG2 Companions are the classic and most remembered ones.

Hmmm... Anyone want to do a quick "collect all the characters as fast as possible" run? Sounds like the stat fixes didn't apply retroactively as intended. If they are still fubar'd I'll probably slap a mod together to fix this saturday, I think I've got a working method to pull apart and put back together the asset files without fussin about with the materials nonsense. Would like to see suggested stat blocks for each from more experienced players; I know my way around unity and modding/file manipulation, but I have less than 10 hours in PoE right now. (Not for lack of trying, just haven't had the free time yet). Guidelines should be as follows to avoid min/maxiness: -No more than one 18+ score before race bonuses. (This does not mean everyone should have an 18) -No score over 20 after race bonuses -No scores lower than 10 -No change in total attribute scores. -Ideally it shouldn't be a set of scores that shoehorns them into a specific build This should give us viable characters without min/maxing. About the "Recommended stats" for everyone! One simple way of doing it is going D&D4.0 or 5.0 character creation With fixed pré-builds. They have 77 points! (1 companion have 78) . Usually those builds come with a Strong Attribute and one Very Weak Attribute. Example of balanced builds. (All have 77 points) 18 - 16 - 14 - 12 - 10 - 7 16- 14 - 13 - 13 - 11 - 10 16- 16 - 14 - 12 - 10 - 9 17 - 16 - 15 - 10 - 10 - 9 16 - 15 - 14 - 11 - 11 -10 15 - 14 - 14 - 13 - 12 - 9 Usually you will want 1 Primary attribute to be the strongest. The one that will define that character (Example for Aloth would be INT), - Two to Three Secondary Attributes that will not fall much behind. One at least should be in one recommended attribute. (For Aloth would be Might) - Now 1 to two attributes should give him a problem, to not make him perfect. In this case sacrificing his DEX should be ok giving a low value or even below 10 value. The rest is just filler for a mage like aloth not really impacting his gameplay but giving him roleplay. I would finish him like this! Aloth My example build! Mig: 15 Con: 10 Dex: 9 Per: 14 Int 17 Res: 12 The way i see aloth (dont did his full history yet) is a Mage INT 17 represent his intelligence and study, like any mage. His might with 15 represent his strenght of spirit to keep going in a hard to master job. His dex is crap because he have little time to improve his physical form, he is training to cast spells, not run a marathon. Perception is high because his intelligence make him see what most can´t see. Resolve just above average, he is no leader, but can give a important advice here and there. This is just a example of how i would build those characters. The problem is i dont have the full history of some, for example, Aloth. And this can make me make mistakes. And its my opinion, just one opinion in the middle of millions. Obsidian have acess to the creators of those characters, they know better than anyone their history and how they must be.

My conversational build It Works with everyclass as long you dont go Tank! Recommended going ranged for safe purposes. 15 - 3 CON - 15 - 15 - 15 - 15 With items you can go to 17 in everything. This should give you enough for 90% of the conversations in the game. For the other 10% go fo food or rest. Just save often and reload if you find a conversation that need 18, 19 or 20. The only problem with this build is very low fortitude and low Health and Endurance. But you can fix both as you get items.

from what i can get. Pallegina, the druid, durance have some attributes changed. But its just one to three points. Nothing that will really change anything.

i Agree. I kind of miss a option to hover the mouse above the stat i want to see and see everything like you would in a Pen and Paper character sheet. Too many passives, buffs and debuffs working and you don´t have a clue if its really there or not.

My opinion. Only Played Path of the Damned. Ranger - The problem with the ranger is not the ranger itself. It have solid DPS (with so many buffs to ranged i would say the biggest single target DPS), and option to go Atack Speed for Heavy hiting guns and bows or DT penetration + Interruption + damage if you go bows. Very solid and dont even need the chanter to be OP if you Min-max. About the pets.! The problem is the pets don´t do damage! So if you go one of the 3 offensive ones. (Stag, Wolf or boar) you have a squishy pet that can be one shot by most enemys and do no damage. If you go bear, Lion or Antelope you are fine. They have more HP, the lion even have a spell and the bear have DT. In the end the pet was never meant to be a super DPS machine, but i agree for now the pet for damage is useless even if you go for talents. But the pet have tons of uses. I use my pet to protect my ranged chars, being a "free" tank. Use it to flank after everyone is fighting and the first AOE Spells go off. In the case my tanks drop he is a Last chance i get giving me some seconds to shoot a little more. Yes, the debuff is anoying but you just dont need to send you pet to suicife charges and he is fine. Fighter -> He is fine and useful. He can go Solid Crit-DPS or tank! Barbarian -> Also a very solid class, he can Dual Wield or go Two hand and you find no lack of damage if you make him with tons of Might and Dex! (And low armor, use you con to take hits). Chyper -> just need a little fix on focus and he is fine. No problem with the spell but with all much he can spam while the other casters you will cry if you use 2 top Circle spells. Chanter -> Also solid class. While the summons are not very strong they can be spammed in crazy speeds giving yourself a army. The ranged buff is the best but far from being the only good chant he have. Wizard/Druid/Priest -> No complains. All have strenghts and weakness. Paladin -> dont liked it. Fighters tank better, Full DPS classes do more damage and Buff classes Buff better! He can do everything, master of none, usually i love this type of class but usually you can get good in one route if you sacrifice the others. Here you will not get good and stay a regular tank/dps/support; Dont get me wrong, he can still work on POD Difficulty and still have its uses, but if you want damage you dont need a paladin, if you want accuracy or DT buff you go for another priest and get yourself also a lot of other buffs, debuffs and options. About being a tank. If the enemy can get trough his deflection he can´t stay for too long unless he rely heavily on heals.