KDubya

I've had good luck on PotD with Kana using heavy armor and a pike with an arquebus alpha shot. With the rest of the team being 1-2 Monks and 1-2 Paladins, Devil w/ sabre & shield and Sagani or Grieving Mother with Stormcaller. With a melee heavy party his fire lash chant with the terrify enemy woven in makes for a nice group buff. I tend to have five sturdy guys on the frontline with one ranged soft target. Using the Thayn's Reach pike it debuffs enemies to further help the team. I'm happy with him poking and debuffing someone while adding a 25% fire lash to the whole team. Anything I get from an invocation is just gravy. When it gets tough being able to hit a huge cone for a ten second paralyze is great. Summoning two Ogres and having them team up with 2-4 Monk twins is just hilarious, all of which benefit from the chants and the Paladin auras. Looking forward to the new 3.0 chanter.

I also would like to be able to change the level one pick. Pellagrinna is stuck with FoD. It's a nice ability but LoH is hands down better. You can remedy it at level five but if she stared with LoH you could skip FoD and take a more supportive ability. Zahua is stuck with Tormen't Reach. Again it is a great ability but it synergizes best with dual wielding due to its full attack. This hinders the builds in case you wanted to go weapon and shield or two handed, they still work but they are not optimized. Swift Strikes followed with Force of Anguish would lend itself to an awesome weapon and shield tank with really long knockdowns that are spammable. Kana has been cited by others, phantom is just hands down better than skeletons. These are the three that come to mind when I think about having the freedom of making the level one ability pick.

I've had success with a team with Pellagrina and my own Paladin where I only had a 10 intellect base, 14 or 15 with some food and an item. I also had an 18 might so the duration of LoH and Sacred Immolation was shorter but the effect was bigger. The exhortations last pretty long at base so you don't need to extend if you have something you'd rather raise than intellect. A base intellect also benefits if the party is primarily melee based as everyone will be closer together and will all fit inside the smaller aura diameter. You don't have to max Intellect to be viable. I would not dump it or anything else on a Paladin though.

I like balanced stats now with pretty much every class, especially with a Monk. Dumping intellect has some really bad side effects on the durations of all your buffs, the area of your AoE attacks like Torment's Reach and maybe the duration of your wounds (not sure, never tested). A great buff like lightning strikes adding +25% lightning lash and a +25% attack speed buff gets hammered if you drop intellect and go from a 10 second duration to something closer to five seconds. As others have pointed out getting wounds on PotD is not an issue. Avoiding excessive crits is always a good idea, you'll still activate Sanguine and Shod in Faith in the first few seconds of every fight. Another boon is you can buff a 10 resolve via expensive dragon food, items and stronghold resting bonus to a 19 which is enough to talk the Alpine Dragon down if you want to. Lower than a ten leaves you short of the threshold.

A Monk's fists attack at fast weapon speed but does average weapon damage, basically they attack as fast as a rapier/dagger/stiletto and do damage like a battle axe or sword/spear. They also auto upgrade as you level up. A superb, durgan enchanted weapon with a damage lash and/or a speed boost will out pace a plain fist but those weapons are quite rare. Until that god tier weapon is obtained you can run the entire game on PotD just using fists.

Just wanted to throw out there that Monks have pretty good AoE damage from Torment's Reach and from Flagellant's Path. Torment's is a cone shaped AoE that adds +50% crushing damage as a full attack. If you are dual wielding it basically does 300% damage ( your right hand +50% and your left hand +50%). It also debuffs might by -2. Unlike Carnage their is not any penalty to attack or reduced damage in the AoE. Flagellant's Path is a line AoE attack with like 10 meter range (I think, might be 8 meters), 2 meter width and a defense debuff to all targets. Instead of a squishy barbarian you can go with a studly Monk and have your AoE melee damager.

Whenever I use Devil I never take the typical rogue escape type abilities, I play her more as a damaging fighter type.. Weapon and Shield style, a good sabre and she can survive on PotD in melee combat. I have her start in the second row, start with a pistol shot and then run around and flank the frontline. Unlike a typical rogue she can stand in the fray and doesn't need to run away if engaged. A Paladin makes everything better, especially Devil. A Reinforcing Exhortation will get you +25 deflection for like 25 seconds and a Paladin gets two of them. This bonus +25 deflection is what gets Devil into the 100+ range where the incoming damage is mitigated by a preponderance of grazes instead of hits. Having a Paladin run the Zealous Endurance aura for extra DR and additional hit>graze conversions also greatly enhances the teams survival in melee. With this sort of set up you'll kill the enemy slower but your team will take a lot less damage in doing so. Durgan Steel is what you get after White March pt 1 after you clear Durgan's Battery. It can be used to enchant your items and generally adds to attack rate depending on what you use it on.

I like to have one of my frontliners be the trap finder as they are the ones closest to the traps. That way you marching formation is your trap finding formation is your fighting formation. No need to have a soft target like Aloth lead the march to find the trap and then run back behind the frontline before combat starts. Even a fighter/paladin/monk/barb can be the mechanic master at least up to mechanic level 11 or so. Past that costs too many points and you need everyone to have 3 0r 4 athletics and the same with stealth. For high end traps you need to have a rogue, the cost savings are just too big to ignore. As others have said start with hard. Next play through you'll be using PotD.

The IE mod on Nexus allowed you to change to and from PotD on the fly. I'd assume that it is updated to be compatible to the latest version by now. I haven't used it since 2.0 came out, only needed it for re-spec and that is in the game now.

The low intellect will stunt the duration of the DoT effect that you can take as a Goldpact that adds +50% to your FoD. It will also greatly reduce both the area and duration of Sacred Immolation. It will also greatly diminish your LoH and all of your exhortations. I find having base 10 intellect is enough when coupled with a high Might, I've never tried going with a 3. What difficulty level?

Were interrupts an issue with the really low resolve? I'd expect that you'd get interrupted a lot with a slow two hander. Are there any other weapons with wounding besides TideFall and the hunting bow Persistence? Dual wielding would open up lots of cool weapon effects like marking, vicious and the like. A custom enchanted clad-something spear would work nice with the double team aspect of the pet. I'd be tempted to flip the intellect and the resolve and go 3 and 17. The wounding property gets refreshed on hit so there will always be a DoT effect, no need for the Wounding Shot and Marked Prey lasts a really long time anyway. A 3 intellect would probably have it last long enough and you'd gain the hard ass dialogue options, +42 concentration and +14 deflection. Too bad we can't add this and your other twenty some odd builds into some sort of sticky post index.

I'm with Torm51 on the not dump anything. I'd keep a baseline of 10 for all stats. For damage dealing dual sabres are good as are two handed weapons. Something like: Might 18 Con 10 Dex 15 Per 15 Int 10 Res 10 Kind Wayfarer for Strange Mercies or the one that gets the 50% DoT effect on FoD - I think its Goldpact Dual wielding and Ruffian with an Island Aumaua would let you FoD alpha with a pistol or blunderbuss, switch to on crit spell effect stillettos with FoD to maybe get two spells activated and then swap to dual sabres to kill whatever remains. Stick to heavy plate for the DR.

I think PoE would have been a better more balanced game if they had all casters follow a system similar to the Cipher, instead of having some classes based upon per rest spells. They had a blank slate and were not tied to the legacy of Vancian AD&D. Instead they fall into the same traps that plagued the IE games - a sleeping bag being the most powerful item in the world combined with god-mode Gandolph. I would have preferred a system where the different classes are differentiated by what their powers do and how they generate focus to fuel them. Ciphers - a hybrid mage/fighter where physical damage fuels focus that can be used for mental style spells. What they have now works well. Wizard - focus generated by casting spells, maybe some sort of set up spell that returns focus faster or gives bonus focus for stacking spells. Spells would be based around the elements, maybe reward specialization. maybe something where you'd need to build up focus by casting something basic that would let you go nova if you built up enough or you could expend it earlier on a lesser spell. Basically something new and refreshing like the Cipher but have it powered by casting itself. Keep weapons in the hands of ciphers, have wizards cast stuff. Druid - have wereform attacks generate focus for spells that are cast while in wereform. I'd make a wereform the cornerstone of the Druid instead of something to do with trash mobs and at low level. Priests - have something where different deities generate focus differently? Not sure how you could set up something more interactive than the current rest based system.

My PotD parties tend to have 3 or 4 high defense Monks and Paladins as the core of the team. Between the 30+ DR and the high defenses they are not a big threat. My one caster or ranger will probably be KO'd if they get grabbed but the team does just fine. Even a defensive spec'd Devil with sabre and shield will hang pretty good for a while. I think it is more a team configuration issue. I personally like the upped challenge with the spirits on the lower level of the battery.

Re-roll as a Monk Jokes aside you already have weapon focus soldier which includes Great Swords, so unless you want to re-spec just stick with them. Great swords have some of the best weapons in the game, you can also use pikes or warhammers for when you want to use a shield. Starting with an arbalest or an arquebus (both also in soldier focus) is a great alpha strike. Estocs will do more damage due to the 5 DR bypass but are limited to only piercing damage instead of the great sword having slash/pierce to bypass any immunities encountered. The difference is further muddled with having the two best ranged alpha strike weapons being in the same group as the great sword. You can't go wrong with either Adventurer or Soldier. Your build looks fine. If you want some more info on Fighters check out the Lady of Pain build by AndreaColumbo http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/80748-buildpreview-lady-of-pain/ in the strategy section, lots of great info there.

Intellect affects the duration of your regen. A 3 intellect lasts something like 58 seconds and a 10 gets something like 90 seconds. In my opinion the effect is pretty lackluster to start with so a reduced duration of a weak ability is not much of a penalty. For a good ability like Vigorous defense a dumped 3 intellect still gets like 12 seconds I think. It is less than the standard 20 seconds but if you place the 7 dumped stat points in resolve to balance out the Will defense you'd be ahead by 7 deflection all the time and behind by 13 for the eight seconds difference in the buff duration. A fair trade off in my eyes.

Engagement has nothing to do with being flanked. The key thing to remember is do not move out of melee unless all nearby targets are prone, stunned or something of the sort. If people are running past your frontline get a bigger frontline, instead of two use three or four. Also if you have three or four melee guys standing shoulder to shoulder you cut down on the chance of being flanked, think of it like an offensive line in football and your caster as the quarterback. Fampyrs are hard. Either try and get better defenses like Paladins can get, CC them before they charm you, focus fire and kill them quickly or just be prepared to take some casualties.

I started a thread a month or two ago asking for someone to update the class build index but got silence. Every guide there is based on pre 2.0 information and have a lot of erroneous information. They are still interesting to read but for a new comer they will get the wrong information. Not sure if the moderators can update the sticky posts. Maybe we need some Sensuki troll wars in here or some Luzarious "that's a man's face!!!" social commentary to get their attention The frequently listed Steam Guide has some great info but some of the builds just seem like they min max beyond what is necessary, pretty much every build there has one or two stats dumped to a three and most look to be godlikes. This put players into the mindset that you need to min max for success which then expands to the belief that the story companions are worthless because they are not min maxed. All the builds you listed - Lady of Pain, Backlash, Fulmineo and Juggernaut - all have normal stat ranges and aren't min maxed moon godlikes by default. I like these builds because they combine focused stats with talents, equipment and tactics to achieve a desired gameplay. The whole is stronger than the sum of their parts. These concepts can then be expanded into other build concepts with great results. My Juggernaut build was influenced strongly by the Lady of Pain, and lately Boeroer has been putting up some truly interesting and unique builds that find new approaches to the game.

Can't you respec her and/or doesn't the option to assign her talents allow you to choose Lay on Hands instead of Flames of Devotion? You can't change her level one pick, you will always have FoD at level one. I skip the revive as it is rare that someone gets Ko'd where I'd want them to get back up other than in a dragon fight. I find carrying a few scrolls better than using an ability for the rez. Zahua has the same issue with Torment's Reach at level one. For some builds like going for two handed weapons it'd be better to skip Torment's Reach, replace with Swift Strikes and have room to take Force of Anguish. Those two are the only ones who I'd like to have had the option of taking the other level one ability pick.

Nice build and really nice concept. What about changing Lesser Wounds for Interrupting Blows and/or using the "Mosquito" rapier that has the super high 1 second (same as a Morningstar) interrupt? I've always found lesser wounds to be worthless.

I know it works for Monks, I am not sure for Druids. An easy way to test is to save your game, then go to an inn hire two druids and give one of them two weapon style. Since shapeshift requires combat you need to turn of the AI for your team, start a fight in the tavern and have your two druids shapeshift. Then pause the game and have your two druids attack one of your tanky characters. If the two druids attack in sync then you know that the two weapon style is not working, if the druid with two weapon style attacks faster then you know that it does work.

Hmm....at which difficulty level though? I guess if you have enough fighters you can CC by fanning them out against multiple opponents, but wouldn't you need at least a priest, chanter, or cipher to counter enemy CC? Otherwise I'd think you'd be reloading a lot in White March. On PotD my team in White March scaled up difficulty was PC Juggernaut Monk, Zahua (speced for Tidefall), Pellagrinna (Estocs), Devil of Caroc (Sabre and Shield), Kana (Pike) and Sagani (stormcaller). No mage, no priest, no problem. The monks and the paladin had good enough defenses to either avoid the enemy CC or be grazed but were tough enough to take the beating and then come back and win the fight. The best CC effect is death and the multi-monk team had a lot of damage output. Except for Sagani everyone was in heavy armor so lots of DR and most had a pretty high con as well for a lot of endurance.

What about just bum rush into the room and kill them all as they come at you? It works for me.

Like everyone has said you can have anyone learn the mechanics skill, especially at low levels. To get to skill level 11+ you want to start looking for a Rogue due to the huge skill point savings they get due to the potential "free" starting skill level of three at creation, a savings of at least the highest skill level of mechanics you will take and possibly the sum of the highest two levels. Several of my PotD runs have dropped Aloth around level nine or so and then continued on without any casters. I find it too easy if I keep casters on a full six man team, especially a Wizard. I might try going four man teams with a Wizard and see if the reduced team size lets a Wizard to not blow the game up.

A Fighter can dump intellect and have a stronger build. A Paladin and a Monk who dumps intellect will have a different build, not necessarily stronger and in many ways weaker.