Vorad

I run both pallie and chanter tanks full max res, int, might and average con, especially at lategame it works perfectly fine, yes you won't do much damage with your weapons but your auras/buffs aoe make up for it.

SoF doesn't work as others have said already but Secrets of Rime does work with the aoe damage freeze incantation. At least that's what I get from testing currently 2.01

Spam slicken/slumber with your wizards especially slumber's duration for me is a way better advantage than the petrification which might be more intense as debuff but for only 5 seconds it's not enough, on top of it spam your aoe duration damage rinse and repeat, e.g: 1 wizard slicken the other wizard slumber at the same time you attack on 2 different saving throws most probably at least one of them will succeed after that you can use 1 wizard to debuff DR while the other casts miasma, then you can spam your aoe damage duration spells because in the long run they cause more total damage, also 1 priest is more than enough you could replace your other priest with a druid for more debuffs and more aoe or you could employ a cipher for more direct damage his aoe prone is ok as well. Both Priest and druid have their own aoe/cc/nukes you could combine all these and with micro management cast all spells from your caster exactly the same time with constant mircoing through manual pausing. Your paladin has aoe damage aura as well and even if he's defensive it hits ok so keep it active. When opponents are prone then you fighter and paladin provided they have 10 lore could spam maelstorm scrolls. You can also use the summoning items to form your tactical battle through body blocking with your summonings.

I think I used slumber against them and it worked, can't remember accurately now but to me it appeared as if they become immune to cc if you try to cc them for a second time, the first slumber that I cast on them iirc landed properly. It was almost 2 weeks ago though (still patch 2.01 however). Indeed for me as well that was the hardest fight on of the new expansion, on the other hand the "white dragon" was laughable even at scaled up levels... I haven't tried Adra dragon after new patch although I don't think it will change much especially since we get an even higher boost to accuracy with perception now, cc will be even easier than before. (without cc and with decreased deflect killing Adra that's another story) Perhaps there could be implemented diminishing effects on cc... just food for thought.

Nah I've had this issue back with vanilla version, I had 2 Hiro's mantel and 2 Mebec's morningstar from azzuro. Also those gloves of +1 Dex ... three times.

You can also take advantage of what some might consider an exploit, but it's been the case and has never been fixed... Heodan (the rogue merchant at the beginning of the game) pays dramatically more for your items than any other merchant will. Depending on your difficulty setting and personal preferences, you could sell everything you collect just before you loot the waterskin (even Caliscia's and your armor; the weapons you're using are probably still going to mean more to you if you don't sell them). And then there's... oops, I forgot how to do spoiler tags lol. Working as intended Perhaps you start with maximum reputation for Heodan.

That's pretty much all about it! Whoever lands the cc first wins and in order to achieve that one needs max dex, int, per. 3 vs 18 con doesn't matter if the wizard gets knocked prone,paralyzed etc and no saving throws can save you from that either the only way to deal with the problem is by striking first, from a better tactical position in stealth mode one can cast slicken/slumber while the frontline is busy engaging the enemy openly.

The problem with AI is they really are at the mercy of your party. Usually if you send 1-2 tanks to engage then the opponents blob around them that makes them easy prey for the aoe cc/nuke that will rain down from the rest of the party. Throw in 3 points in stealth for better positioning and a single slicken can win you any encounter.

You do need more copper than you'll probably have at that point though.... If you loot all the starting area + the village and sell the stuff then you have enough money to build a full party at the inn. I have employed this tactic many times and sold every loot appart from eder's armor, everything else is subpar and you can sell it.

The fights are ok-ish even at potd, the problem is just like in every other rpg or in dnd the spellcasters lategame are dominating. With a high rank party 10+ and 3-4 spellcasters in there none of the encounters in game even at potd pose a serious challenge. So in that case if a player doesn't like that it's an rpg after all you can choose to create a more minimalistic party with less spellcasting and less power gaming. 2 fighters, 1 chanter, 1 rogue, 1 druid, 1 hunter for example or 1 fighter + 1 paladin. You still get some cc/buffing but nothing as crazy as wizards + priests + ciphers combined (although druid is not half bad either).

Hey I got those nice boots of +1 constitution those are really awsome since not only you get a +2 on your fortitude but you also get some minor health that could save you from lethal damage as well... now those are the true booby prize! aaaaand you get them early game! HA!

On my wizard(elf) I'm maxing Perception, Dexterity, Intellect, minimizing Constitution and Resolve while the remaining goes to Might, for a backliner focused on aoe cc/nuke the build is viable in potd, personally I think if you pick the aoe cc role just maxing Perception and balancing the rest should be fine but for both nuke and aoe cc this build is really good, haven't had the slight issue not even in the early game where glasscannon builds suffer. In lategame the build is just a beast, provided that your frontline tanks will buy you the neccessary 1-2 seconds early fight to get in proper position.

I really enjoy this game even after many and many hours and playthroughs, the devs have done a wonderful job to give us back some of those really wonderful moments of Baldur's Gate and infinity engine. There is one thing however that bogs me really and that is the "mechanical" way food/drinking is implemented. Although we can use potions and scrolls in quiqckbars for fast access and rightly so because you only use these items when the timing is right and you need to have several 4-6 option, food on the other hand is supposed to be a more "long term" buff so we don't need to waste our quickbars on that. However if we compare it to resting which is just a single click away... keeping your entire party well fed is a bit of a "tedious" task. Usually one has to feed each character at least 4 different meals + 1 drink now multiply that by 6 repeat after the buffs are gone and then you begin to notice the cumbersome and tedious pattern. I don't know how easy it would be to implement now a different approach to feeding the party but an idea that crossed my mind was the following(which I suspect could be implemented in a similar way to the durgan steel enchantment). So I was wondering what if there could be introduced a new item lets call it "dinning tent" for the sake of it. Therefore it presumes that after you have cooked, your party will raise a "dining tent" so they can all feast together. You could have a functionality similar to the enchant option for this new item and instead of enchantment materials(durgan steel) it would require cooking materials. Therefore you can now load your desired meals into it and "enchant" craft as many of these as you'd like. When you feel like feeding your party you could use the "dining tent" exactly in the same fashion that one uses the skill scrolls which cover through aoe your entire group however instead of a +3 mechanics you would get the bonuses you "enchanted" the tent with. To push this idea even further perhaps there wouldn't be a need to implement a new item to begin with, perhaps just through the cooking panel one could add more functionality, more recipes that would require pre-cooked meals, to prepare even bigger/better meals. For example one could add a new recipe lets just call it "banquet" for now, which would require 6 x [chicken, sweetpie, caserole, farmers spread, ale ] + coin etc and after you craft this "banquet" from the already existing mechanism you would get a consumable item that could have an aoe of say 4m and some duration relevant to the meals you included. Or perhaps we could mix the two ideas and come up with another item "cooking pane" in which we could mix ingredients of our choosing and it would produce meals depending on those ingredients their quality etc without any hard prescript-ed meals, a random factor could be included as well for some interesting results... Therefore with a single click you can feed your entire party without actually having to click them one by one multiple times for every meal/drink. Thank you for the great work guys and thank you for the attention!

It scales based on your level so if you choose to scale the opponents upwards then you need to pick "high level".

Yes it's not such a big problem, since I have 4 casters (2 wizards, 1 druid, 1 priest) the aoe cc/nuke is really nice. Plus with a big health pool and a shield + upgrades + pallie talents/bonuses reflex is not a big issue. I am running around with food bonus + rest bonus + measured restraint so the low Dex,Per are counter-weighted back to normal-ish. I don't mind so much about Dex because I'm using a fast weapon anyway but I care more about perception. Sadly although I meant the paladin for defense purpose mostly I still need high might for racial(Moon) + 13th level aura(really nice) + alpha strikes. Perception would help even further with the alpha strikes or if I chose to give her a "knockdown" belt(which I'd really like), however I can't seem to find the extra points. I am also giving the pallie the new cloak from white march +2 perception + 2 enemies needed to flank so in the end I get an extra 5 points(Towers rest + cloak) perception bonus + 5 accuracy from rapier which mitigates the negative effect on accuracy a bit.(There are also some foods which increase perception a bit further) An idea could be to drop might and constitution and even intellect by 2-3 points, and bump perception that way. That wouldn't hurt so much I suppose however at a closer look say a more balanced base might 14, constitution 14, intellect 17, perception 10 to me at least seems a bit lackluster. As if trying to achieve too much with too little one of the reasons why in the end I opted with min/maxing instead. All in all I still hit the opponents rather frequently add in there some "miasma" from wizard and everything seems fine. However it is worth noticing that even for potd there is no need for min/max the frontline if you have a highly aoe/cc oriented(min/maxed) party on the backline.

I had same problem a few weeks ago in the end after some really useful insight from the community here I decided to go for a Darcozzi instead because the heals from Wayfarer are lackluster in endgame and the +10 deflection from Shieldbearer although it stacks(it's ok-ish) with the rest usually you need to aoe cc your opponents and that's the best defense for your entire party. So I picked Darcozzi for the accuracy buff which stacks and now my wizzard has usually 99 if not 100% chanse to throw my oponents prone through either slicken or slumber. Moon Goodlike Darcozzi Paladin: Mig. 17 Con. 16 Dex. 4(3 + 1 racial) Per. 3 Int. 19(18 + 1 racial) Res. 19(18 + 1 Aedyr) You could go 18 might, 15 constitution, playing arround +/- 1 point, I just wanted a round number on bonus endurance . So the main purpose of this pallie is defense, holding the line until the opponents fall exactly in the needed spot( preferably blobing around my front-line) so I can aoe cc and then nuke them with my casters all together. The high Int means my aura and aoe buffs(from buckler) get applied to my entire party easily. I also use a defensive chanter in my front-line.

After personally having used them both, I like Measured Restraint a bit better because your attacks are more frequent and more accurate which in the end gives you more hits landing on target so less chance for them breaking engagement in any case you should be using aoe cc from your casters as soon as the front-line is in place. There is as mentioned also Sheathed in Autumn but it's a bit slower than Measured Restraint. Mainly the reason why these 3 weapons are considered good for "tanking" or defensive fighters if people don't like the term is because they give you +1 engagement slot so you don't have to spend a talent point in hold the line. Hatchets are nice overall but it's 5 deflection vs +1 engagement and I think most of us would agree that on a defensive front-liner the extra engagement would pay off most of times loosing 5 deflection overall it's not that much of a deal.

Slicken is nice as well.

Mostly I go for hand weapon + shield so yes I aim for Might around 13 including buffs from food and enchantments( which would mean a base 8-9 Might ). The main purpose being a tank that can "hold the line" and provide some support too. (Wouldn't it be fun if we could also use spells like enlarge person? ) Which 1 handers do you guys generally use on Pallie, so far I have been playing around with gaun's share and shatterstar, both have their merits. Would you recommend I pick a weapon focus skill or is Flames of Devotion more than enough?

They should stack, but I'm afraid 2.01 broke the "Speed" enchantment again. I'm still on 2.0 so I might be able to test it this weekend (though likely you'll have found out by yourself by that time.) I didn't manage to test it when at 2.0, I might downgrade (not sure) but right now after trial and error in 2.01 I am 99.99% positive that the speed buffs by frenzy or weapon don't really seem to work at all let alone stack, sadly. Thank you for the effort though, I really appreciate it.

Fair points guys thanks for help. Oh by the way yes the party is meant for Potd. I haven't yet made up my mind however on weapon focus, there is the option to just go mace(Noble), flail + estoc(there are several good flails for several purposes and there are two decent estocs although I might go for Drake's bell -8 DR since the Endless Paths Estoc with 4 casters in party won't seem to benefit me much), or warhammer(Shatterstar) + (Greatsword(Tidefall). Due to the fact my pallie is wearing full plate the slower weapons don't seem very interesting to me at the moment, mostly I was considering flail as main weapon and estoc as starter/finisher coupled with flames of devotion. Also the order skills all of them seem subpar in lategame perhaps the +10 deflection from shieldbearer > wayfarer? The rest are complete waste. Also does anyone know if frenzy + attack speed from weapon do actually stack? I am running simulations manually vs npc and it seems to me these speed buffs/bonuses are broken. I know there are some issues with frenzy generally speaking now with 2.01 but don't know weather the attack speed is meant to stack. Thanks all.

Hey all, I wanted to ask( since I can't seem to find it) if the Attack Speed bonus from Frenzy stacks with the Attack Speed bonus from weapons. I am asking because based on the buffs/debuffs regarding spells only the highest count. On the other hand the same bonus from different items(weapon + armor) again based on theory should stack. I was planing on making a Paladin Kind-Wayfarer tank(Moon Goodlike) in this case I need: High Constitution, Perception, Resolve, average Might, Dexterity, Intellect. It's hard to balance the stats on the Paladin since she's not only a tank but also a support character and because of Wayfarer background she should be able to dish out some damage especially in order to get the finishing blow so I had to minimax and dump some of the stats alltoghether. The stats I have considered: Mig. 10 : 8(+ 2 gloves) Con. 19 : 18(+1 gloves) Dex. 6 : 3(+2 belt, +1 race) Per. 18: 16(+2 ench) Int. 15 : 12(+2 neck, +1 race) Res. 20 : 18(+1 Neck, +1 Aedyr) With food those bonuses can get an extra 2 points boost, I was thinking of running Sanguine Plate + Unforgiven + Outworn buckler. I'd like to know people's opinion especially Paladin players on the matter. Should I drop a few points of Per and Con and increase Dex, Mig base to 10 perhaps or even 12? I though that a total value of 13-15 Mig and 14-15 Dex especially when it comes to 1handed weapons is ok. In that case assuming that I aim for a 15 Mig, 15 Dex given the +3 bonus one can find from drops(items endgame) and a 2 bonus from food then would it be sufficient to aim for a 9-10 base Mig and Dex? The main reason for me building a Paladin is the changes on fighter, and also because I am bored of fighter main-tank, I would like to be able to tank with Paladin during all stages of the game but also since he provides some nice support to the group I would like to be able and exploit that. At the moment because of Int and boots her Zealous Aura has 5.7m radius and it's enough for my wood elf casters although I believe I could even drop the aura to 4m and it would still be enough to get double bonus. So far the only viable choices that I see are Wayfarer and Shieldbarer. The party consist of 2 wizards(main + add), 1 druid, 1 cleric (all maxed on offensive stats), 1 chanter(full defensive), 1 tank(used to be full defensive Fighter). I could go with the Shieldbearer but I was thinking that maybe there is a way to get the Wayfarer's offensive potential without much loss. If I keep the above stats I am at - 18% Attack Speed, if however Frenzy + Unforgiven stack(which I can't seem to discern) then I could get a bonus of 33 + 25 = 58% giving me a total of 40% Attack Speed. Also I was considering of getting at some point(lvl 7+) Adventurer + Vulnerable Attack for armor penetrating attacks with flail or heavier armor penetration with Estoc, is this better than just going with Noble talent for mace only? What do you think? Thanks in advance. PS: Could go with base stats: Mig. 9 Con. 17 Dex. 10(9 + 1 race) Int. 8(7 + 1 race) Per. 15 Res. 19(18 + 1 Aedyr)

I'm afraid it doesn't, you can easily check it with a rapier, it doesn't work.

I don't know of a way to do this legit but if second chanse on heavy armor is what you are looking for then the Vampire lord in Enless Path drops a full plate with second wind on it. Also you could buy the ring from the docks which has second chanse in it. Hope this somehow helps.

At level 9 and 11 ( and I guess at every odd level after that when an expansion will be made) your spells become per encounter so a level 9 wizard can spam all he wants his level 1 spells ect. (One of the many reasons why casters are considered OP at the endgame) edit: ^^ beat me to it!