KDubya

Also you don't have to use a shield. You can spec for damage, use either a big two hander or dual wield and still be tanky enough to stand in the front and keep the enemy at bay. All this while still making the entire team better via healing, auras, and buffs. Kind Wayfarers don't need special micro to get a few kills per battle, unless you are AoE nuking everything everytime, in which case you probably don't need the healing. Paladins are All Stars, in basketball they'd be the guys getting triple-doubles every game.

Oh my sweet summer child... Not saying that violence is a good solution but just that it is a solution. I do not consider violence, in and of itself, as evil. It is just another tool in the tool box. A really blunt instrument but still just a tool. What problem does violence not solve? From global hunger and over-population to global warming, from shoplifting to insurrection, they can all be solved through the application of violence. Only violence can bring about peace during a war, while having a ceasefire almost always results in further conflict or at least extending the conflict.

Back in 2.03 I thought Strange Mercies was good at level 2 and was still better than nothing at high levels. That was when it did not scale with level. Now at level 14 my Kind Wayfarer heals like 170 endurance with LoH and like 105 endurance in an AoE with Strange Mercies. It is really strong now. It would be hard to choose something other than a Kind Wayfarer just based on how good Strange Mercies is.

How do you consider Devil of Caroc to be Evil? People came and slaughtered her entire village and family by burning their homes down and killing whomever fled the flames. She survived and brought justice to the guilty. I see no evil in what she did. She did not go and slaughter the entire village of everyone who slaughtered hers, she just meted out justice to the guilty ones. I could see Grieving Mother as evil for her actions and manipulation of people. Mind control seems pretty evil to me. There's an event in Stronghold. An animancer comes to me seeking help. I have the option to consult with my team. The options are to send the Devil to the guy's lab, kill him and destroy his work, the other is to send the double personality Elf to destroy his work but not kill him. I chose to send the Devil and, I may remember incorrectly here, she said "With pleasure!". I believe there are small clues around that show likes killing/hurting people. When I heard her story I said "Oh man, not another she's not evil, she was just abused and is seeking retribution character". But seeing her in that event + some small other flavour text led me to believe she's the only evil companion we get. Sure, you might argue that she's insane (that is referenced at least to times by NPCs) but still, she's definitely neutral evil (if you remember the alignment from Baldur's Gate). I would have loved to have a Bleak Walkers paladin or a slaver as a companion since those are part of the lore and would have added a bit to the replayability. I'd consider her to be pragmatic, not evil, Also consider that she is trapped in a metal shell due to an animancer, the opportunity to kill one is another opportunity for revenge. Violence is a solution to most if not all problems. If you apply enough violence the conditions that are the cause of the problem get fixed. I agree that a Bleak Walker would have made an interesting companion.

I'm actually glad that the Monk Aggressive AI only uses Swift Strikes and Torment's Reach. Those two I want active and spammed. I've also seen the AI summon the Twins as well if you get up to eight wounds. Force of Anguish and Flagellent's Path are both more situational and require either targeting for Flagellant's or a decision to even use it for FoA. In a trash mob I'd rather get two Torment's than one FoA, if it is a boss I'd rather the FoA. I can much better make that call than the AI.

In my limited playtime with Overbearing (no dedicated testing, just anecdotal observation and recollection), if an enemy disengages from your Fighter he is most likely getting put on his ass unless he has a really good Fortitude. The thing is most enemies won't disengage from a Fighter built for damage who also has Overbearing and maybe a few +engagement abilities or weapons. If you made some sort of low damage "Annoying Man" build that the enemy had no fear of, it'd probably proc more as they'd run past your non-threatening Fighter. Using a Reach weapon would be good as it would allow you to engage over a larger area. With the large (not sure of specific) boost to accuracy from a disengagement attack, you could propbably replicate the effect with the use of Tall Grass which prones on crit. A lot of the enemies who really like to go after your weaker members such as enemy Barbarians and Monks also have abilities that break engagement , thus defeating the entire strategy. I think that the Overbearing Talent should be combined with Defender instead of being two separate abilities.

An 18 Might will do more damage but percentage wise it is not as big of a difference. In comes down to priorities, if you want 10 Constitution, 18 Dexterity, 18 Perception, 4 Intellect, and 18 Resolve you have none left for Might and will have 10. To balance your Will Save you need a 16 Resolve if you take Intellect down to 4. You could put two points somewhere other than Resolve. In your example the top guy has -18 to his will save, +16 to his Fortitude and +36 to Reflex, the bottom guy has -2 Will, +0 Fortitude and +38 Reflex. having a big negative to one of the defenses is a bad idea many times. With the stats spread I used you have +4 Will, +0 Reflex and +32 Reflex. For Race I'd choose what you enjoy. From a mechancs standpoint - Island Aumaua are nice due to the extra weapon slot, Boreal Dwarves have a nice Acc boost, Pale elves have nice elemental DR, Orlans get a nice hit>crit. I don't personally like Godlikes.

I've run parties with no casters on PotD and found it to be fun. 1.) MC Kind Wayfarer Paladin - 2 HS 2.) Pellagrina - Estoc 3.) Zahua - fists Juggernaut 4.) Kana - Pike 5.) Devil of Caroc - We Toki & Shield 6) Maneha - Spelltongue & Unlabored Blade Another time I had 1.) MC Juggernaut Monk fists 2.) Zahua Juggernaut TideFall 3.( Devil of Caroc - Sabre & Shield 4.) Kana - weapon & shield 5.) Pellagrina - Estoc 6.) Sagani - Stormcaller Both groups had hardly any/ maybe none per rest abilities, only stopped when health loss became a threat to perma death. You need different tactics but you can overcome situations without casters and in a pinch there are always items with spells and scrolls. Another plus is that the teams did not have anyone squishy except for Sagani. No one needed protecting and most had group wide benefits.

You want to be careful of dumping both Intellect and Resolve due to the huge penalty to your Will defense. You don't want your glass cannon super damaging ranged attacker being the first guy charmed every fight If I dump one stat I'll pump the other at a 1:1 to keep the defense even. For Rogues I like to dump Intellect to a four and max out Resolve. Rogues don't have much for duration based or area abilities so the low intellect does not hamper much. A four Intellect is just enough with +2 from food, +2 item and Dexterity 16+ to be able to perma-prone someone with We Toki while wearing Leather Armor and no speed enhancing. The high Resolve gives you good intimidating type dialogues and more deflection. Might on a Rogue can be left at ten with little affect on your damage. Dexterity, and Perception are better investments to really push the envelope for getting criticals. Rangers can also do well with a dumped Intellect, but they suffer more for it. If you will be going with Stormcaller I would not dump intellect, it also hampers Stunning Shots. A fully ranged Ranger could do well with dumping Resolve and pumping Intellect for the longer stun durations and increase for Stormcaller lightning storm. Thanks for advice, hmm im to green for it how it is for rogue to not upgrade might to much and still have huge dmg? Is there not such big difference for rogue in terms of might between 10 and 18? Could You post or link some kind of build for rogue and full ranged Ranger? Because im quite confused and im maybe missing something:) Regards A Rogue will have normal attack +100%, Sneak attack +50%, deathblows +100%, Superb weapon +45% = +295% damage with 10 Might and +319% damage with 18 Might. Since you have so many damage adders the effect from Might is minimized. Monks have the opposite - they have very few damage % adders so Might is hugely helpful for them.

You want to be careful of dumping both Intellect and Resolve due to the huge penalty to your Will defense. You don't want your glass cannon super damaging ranged attacker being the first guy charmed every fight If I dump one stat I'll pump the other at a 1:1 to keep the defense even. For Rogues I like to dump Intellect to a four and max out Resolve. Rogues don't have much for duration based or area abilities so the low intellect does not hamper much. A four Intellect is just enough with +2 from food, +2 item and Dexterity 16+ to be able to perma-prone someone with We Toki while wearing Leather Armor and no speed enhancing. The high Resolve gives you good intimidating type dialogues and more deflection. Might on a Rogue can be left at ten with little affect on your damage. Dexterity, and Perception are better investments to really push the envelope for getting criticals. Rangers can also do well with a dumped Intellect, but they suffer more for it. If you will be going with Stormcaller I would not dump intellect, it also hampers Stunning Shots. A fully ranged Ranger could do well with dumping Resolve and pumping Intellect for the longer stun durations and increase for Stormcaller lightning storm.

If you have Gunner and the Chanter speed chant the crossbow starts looking much better and is definitely cooler than using a bow. For the Unlabored Blade Maneha can get great use out of it with Carnage, lots of hits and lots of procs. With a Monk you could pair it with March Steel Dagger for two speed weapons, or Drawn in Spring for some big damage.

I frequently run five melee guys with Sagani with a bow and no casters on PotD and it works fine. Instead of standing in the doorway either rush in and engage in the middle of the room or entice the enemy to come through the door where you have your guys in a semi-circle and it will be 5 vs 2 or 3

Torment's reach is Zahua's starting ability and it is a full attack so it does best with dual wielding by far. Two handed weapons are not the strong point of a Zahua build. You can make a good two handed weapon using Monk but you'd probably skip Torment's Reach and instead concentrate on Force of Anguish and Turning Wheel. You can drop Zahua and use him in WM II in his quest. I'd retrain him into a Juggernaut when you get the money. A Monk will outperform a Fighter in pretty much any situation. We must have different styles as I find Sagani great on PotD from when I first get her until I get her Stormcaller and she becomes a force of nature.

You need to build him better, Zahua is a beast and can easily lead your party in damage. Give him plate mail, use fists with dual spears on switch, take Peasant weapons, dual wield, Vulnerable Attack, Swift Strikes, Lightning Strikes, Turning Wheel (or Stunning Blow) the ability that lets you toggle between defense and deflection, Savage Attack, the ability that gets you +10 defense when an effect expires, Apprentice Sneak Attack, Flagellant's Path, the Twins summoning. Monks are monsters, set to Aggressive with defensive auto attacks and he will spend his wounds spamming Torment's Reach.

What would be cool is if you get Itumaak ten or so wounds that Sagani makes some sort of comment to you to stop getting her dog hurt Or Itumaak stops taking orders from you to attack and instead runs and hides.

The problem is no one has ever added the class builds to the sticky post.

I got Maneha and set her up with Spelltongue and the Unlabored Blade. I have both Frenzy (=33% attack speed) and Bloodlust (+20% attack speed when kill two). The character screen does not say "suppressed" and it list both effects next to the character icon. I also have "Mourning Gloves" which add 10% attack speed on kill and it also shows on the character portrait. Do all three stack giving +33 + 20 + 10= +63% attack speed? None of the weapons have Durgan Steel but one has speed and the other steals 15% attack speed. I'm also using Vulnerable Attack while wearing Maneha's armor (-25% recovery) and I don't see any recovery bar after attacking. If they all stack is it 1.33 frenzy*1.2 bloodlust *1.1 mourning gloves * 1.2 speed * 1.15 spelltongue = 2.42 + 0.2 dual wield = 2.62 - 0.2 vulnerable - 1.25 armor = 1.17 for zero recovery I just tried with heavy brigandine armor and still no recovery bar. I also took blood thirst for zero recovery after a kill - I think this is wasted as this set up looks to be zero recovery after two kills. With Spelltongue extending durations she has a never ending Frenzy, Savage Defiance and Mourning gloves. It is like crazy powerful. I remember testing a Monk's Swift Strikes with Frenzy and Swift Strikes always got suppressed.

How do you consider Devil of Caroc to be Evil? People came and slaughtered her entire village and family by burning their homes down and killing whomever fled the flames. She survived and brought justice to the guilty. I see no evil in what she did. She did not go and slaughter the entire village of everyone who slaughtered hers, she just meted out justice to the guilty ones. I could see Grieving Mother as evil for her actions and manipulation of people. Mind control seems pretty evil to me.

With the AI set to Aggressive a monk will activate Swift Strikes, spam Torment's Reach and even cast the Twins if you get a huge spike of wounds. It is really "fire and forget". Your cone aligning will not be optimal and you will need to manually activate Flagellant's Path but other than that it does a good job on its own. Torment's Reach spam is a huge burst of damage. I'm not sure about the speed at which you can activate it but with pause on activation you can bang them out at what seems like no delay. A full attack with a +50% crush lash, +25% lightning lash (Lightning Strikes) that also applies to a cone AoE plus a Might debuff is a godly ability. For my next version of Juggernaut I'm looking at increasing intellect for better AoE from Torment's Reach, probably at the expense of Resolve. Probably dropping Turning Wheel for either Stunning Blows or Force of Anguish.

You can easily get by with 14 base Constitution. There are sacrifices that you can make to get +1 con and +5% health, +2 from food is easy as is +2 or 3 from an item. That'd get you to 19 or 20. If you use Outlander's Frenzy you get another +3 con. Since the new change to wound duration, I think it was like base ten seconds before and now it seems to be 30 seconds, I've been thinking of dropping a few points from Resolve and place them in Intellect. I need to experiment and see how the lower concentration ends up as far as getting interrupted too much. I definitely would not drop Might, it is one of the few ways to add damage for a Monk.

Why take Cautious Attack????? +8 deflection with -20% attack speed is a bad deal. better to take Superior Deflection for +5 deflection and no malus. Another +3 deflection is not worth -20% attack speed. If you are fast enough it is better to take Vulnerable Attack as it will add +5 damage per attack, much better when you are fast. I'd look at dual Rimecutters which you can sometimes just buy and save the wax. If you had only one speed weapon, both Durgan and frenzy you'd get (1.15*1.15*1.2*1.25)+0.2 = 2.18 you could use Durgan scale mail or leather or if you added Armored Grace you could go with plate. One speed would be easy to get, two in the same group is harder. Also Armored Grace will help you from level seven onwards, fully durganed up gear will not happen till near the end.

Dumping intellect also makes your wounds expire faster. If you are going to try and get a lot of use out of Turning wheel or Iron Wheel you'd want some intellect to keep the wounds active. I'd like more intellect but I find a 10 base works fine. It is easy with food and one item to get another +4 intellect to bring it up to a 14. I might even try for a 12 intellect and a 8 resolve. With buffs that'd get you to 16. All depends on how concentration and being interrupted works out. I'd swap them 1:1 to keep the will save neutral. What sort of build and stats are you using for your Monk?

Your plan will work fine as you have it. The only observation I have is that Might has a large effect on Monks due to the game mechanics. As you level up you get flat damage adds, you have multiple lashes (Torment's Reach, Lightning Strikes, Turning Wheel, maybe a Chanter as well) which all multiply base damage, and you have limited access to any % damage adders other than Might (Savage Attack can get you +20% for -5 acc, Apprentice Sneak Attack for a situational +15%) A Monk will have at best +35% damage so a mere 15 Might will take you from 135% - 150% which is an 11% increase. Compare that to a Rogue who'll be at (150% deathblow +20%Reckless + 20% Savage +45% Superb weapon = 335% Adding in 15 Might gets you to 350% which is an 4.4% increase. The above 11% damage gets multiplied by all the individual lashes which compounds the effect of having a high Might. For attack speed you will have +20% from two weapon and +25% from Swift Strikes. Faster weak attacks suffer greatly from DR.

I would not bother with pumping Resolve to be better in melee, better to put those points in something else. Psychovampiric shield is a +25 deflection boost, if you need more than that you can use a small shield. Melee does more damage per second than ranged, you will generate focus quickly with a melee cipher. with your Soul Whips you will have +40% damage adder, only a Rogue with Sneak Attack will hit harder I'd either go with reach weapons, quarterstaff or pike, and stay behind your melee guys for added protection or go with weapon and small shield. There are some really nice small shields. Try and use the lightest armor that you can, the padded armor with retaliation would be great. Use the power that transfers 7 DR and you are as good as plate but faster. If your powers will generally be used for crowd control instead of damage you can drop Might to 10. This'd free up points for intellect, dex and perception. Something like: Might - 10 - you will still have +40% damage from Soul Whips Con - 10 - in melee you will get hit so you want some hit points Dexterity - 16 - faster attacks and spell casting. You will generate focus quickly so you'll want to be able to blast it off as quickly as you can Perception - 16 - you want to hit and crit as often as you can, especially with CC powers Intellect - 16 - longer duration of buffs which is what will keep you alive Resolve - 10 - more would be nice but you run out of points Using the SpellTongue rapier and a small shield can get you some interesting abilities. You use a lot of buffs and SpellTongue will extend them while also boosting your attack speed. Between the retaliation small shield and the ranged reflection one you can handle whatever comes your way. You could use a combination of the Flanking power (secret horror or whatever it is), Psychovampiric shield and the DR transfer one. I think that is two 20 focus and a 40. Attacking in between casts should set you up quickly with a -10 deflection in a big AoE to your enemies, +25 deflection to you and some debuff to one target and a 7 DR transfer from a target to you. From then on you are pretty well protected have increased accuracy and can quickly generate focus to power up some of the big ticket ones.

For a melee wizard I'd concentrate on using the summoned weapons, two handed and reach. The spells use whatever weapon focus you have. I'd go Peasant for Quarterstaff - the one with the speed enchant is great - or go for Soldier and use Pikes - also lets you start with an arbalest or arquebus shot. Boreal Dwarf Might 21 - more damage and one of the only ways to do more damage with spells Con 10 Dex 10 Per 14 - some accuracy and interrupt Int 13 - some increased area and duration Res 10 - you don't want to dump and get interrupted Talents - Soldier - +6 accuracy - two handed style - 15% more damage - Savage Attack - 20% more damage - Veil - a good escape button - hardened Veil - a better escape button Spirit of Decay - I like the corrosive spells but anything will work Master spells one - Concelhats staff - your go to melee weapon two - Infuse with essence - +50 endurance to act as a health battery three - alacrity - +50% action speed is crazy good The reach weapons let you stay in the second row and avoid some damage. You will hit like a truck. You still have all your wizard spells as needed. Minor fights you'll be able to clear just with your three mastered spells and hardly ever need to rest.