KDubya

What will be bad is Fighters on level up to second level (and third level as a multiclass) will have a choice of taking the other active skill not taken at creation OR taking one of the weapon styles that will also be available via using a 'free' proficiency pick. Considering how poor Knockdown is, being forced to either take that or 'waste' the ability pick on a style that you could get for free later is a poor choice. Even if Knockdown were improved its still a bad deal as special resources are limited and if you never intend on using knockdown why should you be stuck with only that as a choice?

At the moment I do the following: If i have a Rogue he maxes Stealth with one point in Athletics One guy gets 16 Perception and maxes Mechanics with one point in Athletics Everyone else goes heavy on Athletics As far as pick pocketing goes I find it easier to go through their pockets when they are dead The heal from Athletics with a maxed out Might basically becomes a second life, its probably too good as is. If people want more skill points what about having some sort of bonus skill points be available as a weapon proficiency pick to go along with the general talents that they are adding there?

The change seems fine but the current system was working as well. Without rest restrictions what difference does it make? If you are playing Iron Man Mode you'll rest anytime anyone gets injured. If not you can just quicksave before the next encounter and press on as long as no one is at three injuries as that would be idiotic. If you win the encounter keep going, if you lose just re-load and rest. With unlimited money and unlimited carrying capacity it'll be easy enough to have a fully stocked Chuckwagon full of food available. PotD is easy enough tha extra boosts from super food is not going to be required so having an endless supply of hardtack will serve you just as well.

With spells not having any multipliers besides the new Resolve it doesn't really matter whether its additive of multiplicative, you will want as high a Resolve as you can get in order to do as much damage with spells as possible. Strength being additive would actually help hybrids such as a Cipher as they have one of the biggest damage adders with Biting Whip. They could leave Strength at base 10 and still do great damage via Soul Whip and spend points on Resolve so that their Cipher powers would hit hard. Melee monsters such as the Witch Berserker/Soul Blade would still be melee monsters with an additive system, they just wouldn't be breaking the damage scale as they currently can between a 21 Might that gets increased to 26 via berserk and then multiplying a list of damage adders like Biting Whip, One Stands Alone, Bloodied and enchantment.

In the case of your Lady of Pain: In the multiplicative system you are going with a Helwalker/Devoted in order to really maximize the Might gaining up to another +10 from wounds. If the system went back to additive would you still want a Helwalker or would a Soul Blade become the top contender due to Biting Whip? Which would make for a more interesting build?

Not sure I'd be in favor of punishing casting a CC with a longer cast time. No one likes trying for a long time to cast a spell while trying to avoid being interrupted. With Ciphers I look first at cast time, if its not 3 seconds it needs to be really good or just really cool like Mind Blades to get a pick. With direct competition for ability picks, especially with a multi-class, there is just no room for a slow cast power. It gets even worse once you start wearing armor. Lots of powers have a cast time + recovery time that is essentially the same as the affliction time. Who is getting paralyzed, you or the target?

This would also apply to the new Resolve which will be for spells. For the math challenged: Multiplicative means that the damage total gets multiplied by the Might value. Example you hit for 10 damage and have +100% from Sneak attack, soul whip and an enchantment, your Might is 26 which is +48%. Your 10 damage gets increased by 100% to 20 and then multiplied by 1.48 (your Might) for a total of 30 damage done. Additive means that your Might damage gets summed up with everything else. Same example as above has your base 10 being increased by 148% for a total of 25 damage. To get to the same damage you'd need Might to be 43 instead of 26. PoE was additive. The implications of an Additive system is that Might becomes less important the more modifiers that you have. Sneak attack adding +50% makes the 3% per point from Might not so important. This leads to character designs that leave Might at base and using those points elsewhere. Characters with few damage modifiers like Spell Casters (I believe only Might, soon to be Resolve, actually affects spell damage) need as high of a Might as they can as its the only increase available. A Multiplicative system makes it so that the more damage modifiers that you have the more you want to have Might as it multiplies a larger number. Here the Rogue with his +50% sneak attack want to have as large of a Might as he can as it will pay off. This makes character design concentrate on raising Might as much as possible if you want to do even more damage. I believe that an Additive system lends to more interesting character build decisions as maxing Might is not the answer to everything like it is now. Points not added to Might can be used on dexterity or perception or in increasing your defenses. Perhaps Might, if we revert back to an Additive system, needs to be increased to 4% or even 5% per point to raise its relative value and make it a harder decision. At 3% anyone with sneak attack or soul whip is better putting the points elsewhere.

The easy solution to hard CC grazing is to have a graze drop one level of affliction. A paralyze that grazes becomes an immobilized becomes a hobbled and so on. I'm curious as to what will replace grazes for Fighters who had a few abilities like Disciplined Strikes and Confident Aim that were all about Grazing.

Another possible solution for Cipher, other than the obvious "don't change the current Might" would be to greatly increase the focus gain from Draining Whip. You take Biting Whip to hit harder and incidentally gain more focus. You take Draining Whip to gain more focus. In the current system more Might = more damage = more focus > cast damaging spell which is magnified by Might. New system more Might = more damage = more focus > cast damaging spell which is magnified by your average Resolve ​ > cast debuff which is increased by your above average Intellect. People who want damage primarily from weapons can go this route, probably most multi-class. Proposed new Draining Whip >>>>> average Might = average damage > Draining Whip = more focus >damaging spell which is magnified by your maxed Resolve, or go with a debuff as above. People who want to do damage mainly via cipher powers can go this route. Or keep Might and Resolve balanced and do either just not as good as a specialist.

If you want Graze and Disciplined Strikes that badly just multi-class with a Fighter.

Hey did you forget something ? For example Disciplined Strike and Confident Aim? And don't forget Sneak Attack is a conditional bonus. Your comparison is unfair because you ignored accuracy, a fighter with Disciplined Strike will outdamage rogue for sure. The Fighter spent two ability points the Rogue spent none. I also did not include backstab or deep wounds or crippling strike or .... Sneak attack is pretty damn easy to keep up at all times by flanking or have your cipher cast Phantom Foes. If you are using a Rogue and not keeping sneak attack up at all times then perhaps you should use a different class. Or just roll up a Rogue/Cipher and also get Biting Whip in on the action and cast your own Phantom Foes at start.

Rods take two hands to use, but they do get that tasty AoE damage.

At creation a rogue gets 'Sneak Attack' which adds +50% damage to attacks. Fighters can spend an ability point to take a style and later another ability point on specialization for +15% damage. So a Rogue with a Great Sword sneak attacks for +50% and a Fighter with two abilities gets +30%. Advantage Rogue A Rogue dual wielding stilettos in light armor with a 10 dex attacks 0.5 sec with a 0.6 sec recovery with a +50% damage boost. A Fighter with two weapon style in light armor and 10 dex attacks 0.5 and 0.4 recovery. So in 9.9 seconds the Rogue gets nine attacks at +50% damage and the Fighter gets eleven attacks. Advantage Rogue Rogues who attack a sneak attackable target will out damage a Fighter. So how are Rogues gimped in this? If you want Rogues to outdamage Fighters when Sneak attacking (which they do) AND out damage a Fighter in a straight up fight I'd have to call foul on that. The lore sounds like the army books in Warhammer. Over at Total War Warhammer there's always someone quoting an army book as to why <insert race> should have the baddest and bestest regardless of game balance.

Then you fall back into the Blunderbuss being the default Cipher weapon dilemma that PoE had during a few patch cycles.

The armors from PoE were designed for use in a DR (damage reduction) system instead of a DT (Damage Threshold) system which is what Deadfire has. The armors have been moved into three tiers where they are relatively equal across the tier Light Tier Base Protection 5Hide gets -2 slash and -2 corrode Leather gets -2 crush and -2 freeze Padded gets -2 pierce and -2 burn Medium Tier Base Protection 7Breastplate gets -2 slash and -2 shock Mail gets -2 crush and -2 freeze Scale gets -2 pierce and -2 corrode Heavy Tier Base Protection 9Brigandine gets -4 pierce and -4 corrode Plate gets -4 crush and -4 shock ​Burn good against paddedShock Great against Plate Good against Breastplate Freeze Good against Mail Good against Leather Corrode Good against Brigandine Good against Scale Good against Hide ​Penetration on Wizard Spells Burn spells have 7 penetration Corrode spells have 5 penetration with Necrotic lance at 9 penetration Freeze spells have 5 penetration on AoE and 7 penetration on touch and ray Shock spells have 7 on touch and 9 on Crackling Bolt ​Observations on current system As armor quality increases there is no corresponding increase in spell penetration. Fine Weapons match Fine Armor but nothing like this exists for spells. The bonus from spell power lags behind the armor curve. Burn is only good against light and mundane medium armor. Heavy armor stops it completely. Freeze AoE is only good on mundane light armor with leather suffering until Superb quality. heavy armor stops it completely. Corrode is only good against mundane light for AoE with Plate stopping even necrotic Lance once past mundane quality. Shock is good against most with Crackling Bolt trumping all except upgraded Brigandine. ​Questions Should Plate armor protect as well as it does against spells? Or any armor for that matter? Should Power Level have a bigger effect on Penetration? Should Wizards get a passive 'spell penetration' ability that they can choose in lieu of a spell?

My personal opinion is that you should have Resolve affect affliction durations sort of like the Intellect stat handles durations but on enemy spells instead of on your own. I'm not a programmer but it seems easy to implement. When you cast a spell have its duration be base x (your Intellect modifier - targets Resolve modifier) Simple, elegant and does not fundamentally change how classes are built. The biggest threat to killing your characters is being stunned/paralyzed or something like that which results in you then being hit really hard and really easily. Something that reduces the time that you are exposed to these types of afflictions would be useful for any sort of tank type. A glass cannon build who dumped this stat would be hammered by any sort of affliction. What's not to like? P.S. You could add interrupts and Concentration into this as well but that might make it too important.

Darcozzi is just terrible subclass, u can for sure do better with other subclasses. I wanted a supporting guy as this was a henchman not the main. I wanted Lay on Hands so Bleak Walker is out (-30% on healing makes it a poor choice) My team was going to be dropping Phantom Foes on the enemy at start so everyone would be attacking flanked guys (sneak attack) so Kind Wayfarers are out (penalty on damage to sneak attackable) I wanted to have an aura so Goldpact was out That leaves Shieldbearers and Darcozzi and I preferred Darcozzi as I did not care about a +1 engagement with a shield and might want to cast Lay on Hands on myself.

The inherent attack speed buff from dual wielding of -50% has been in the game the whole time, as has the +12 accuracy from single wielding (which applies to pistols and other ranged one handers as well). All Fighter get with two weapon style is -50 + - 20 for a -70% attack speed (actually just recovery speed but ...). Everyone else gets -50%. The difference is not that big of a deal One handed style has to be the worst ability in the game. With it you change 10% of misses to grazes. AT equal deflection and accuracy you miss 15% so 10% of that is 1.5% which become a graze which does -50% damage so the net gain on average is a wopping 0.075% damage increase which is commonly referred to as a rounding error

In PoE the more damage adds you had the less you needed Might. As you stated that meant Rogues and Ciphers could be really effective with a base 10 Might and utilize the stats elsewhere. Deadfire now has Might (and I'd assume Resolve will be the same) as multiplicative. This means that the more damage adds that you have the more you want to have Might. This way you multiply a bigger number to get an even bigger number.

Whichever stat controls buff duration, currently that is Intellect, is never going to be a dump stat as just about every class has some really cool self buffs that you'd not want to dump. That said I'd much prefer switching Intellect and Resolve in the new proposed system. Then my melee guys who don't cast offensive spells can have a high resolve and be somewhat stupid rather than be borderline geniuses and Timid.

I've used a Sharpshooter/Beguiler using Dual Scepters to great effect on PotD Beta. Casting a Phantom Foes at the start of combat gets 'flanked' on all enemies for -10 deflection and gets you past the beguiler problem with attacking non-sneak attack targets. The 4m range of the Scepters means that the increased penetration from Sharpshooter is always on, plus they are dual damage types and Wounding Shot is a Full Attack so dual wielding counts both weapons. Also scepters do not have an 'in melee' malus like many ranged weapons. Lots of synergy. You can have a bow in the other slot for longer range fire. Low maintenance, good damage and lots of debuff/CC actions available. Plus you get a guided missile called a pet that bounces back up from death fresh as can be.

An interesting build I had was a Darcozzi/Priest of Wael Templar. The Priest of Wael gets Arcane Veil and Mirrored Image for massive quick casted defensive buffs. Plus they get access to the rest of the Priest spells and Paladin abilities. For any sort of tanky, durable damage dealer, adding paladin to a Monk, Barbarian, Fighter, Cipher, Rogue or Wizard just can't be beat. Deep Faith lets you dual wield with better deflection than a sword and board fighter.

Agreed, and the solution isn't to put a plaster on each of the new problems as they raise their head, the solution is to keep Might as it is and find a different way of buffing Resolve. Maybe Resolve could like decrease affliction durations per stat point above 10 and increase the duration below 10. I think I saw that suggested somewhere and I don't recall any complaints. This would make Resolve useful but not required and painful to dump. All current classes and builds are just as viable as they are now. Then you can look at any specific shortcoming such as pure casters and address their specific issues.

What then happens in the case of a multiclass Cipher or even a pure Cipher who pumps both Might and Resolve? This idiotic stat change is just going to make a whole series of cascading problems.

Fighters will need Resolve to make their Constant Recovery good, while currently that was covered by Might and Intellect for the duration Everyone needs Intellect (maybe not Rogues?) to have a good duration on their buffs. I think most of the complaints for roleplaying reasons of Might controlling spell damage could have been alleviated if in the dialogues there were two entries for Might. One could have you intimidate via picking up the table at the bar while another option could have been for you to conjure up a fireball to pass from hand to hand or something like that. Scripted scenes could have for the same Might a choice of you picking up a heavy door or you blasting it with a spell. i think having Might stay as it is and having Resolve affect the duration of afflictions would work out a lot better. Everyone might not want to pump Resolve but you'd be punished for dumping it.