Kaylon

Yes, you go to the companion portraits in your game directory (Pillars of Eternity\PillarsOfEternity_Data\data\art\gui\portraits) and copy her portraits into the player/female folder.

The chanter... He can unlock Stormcaller, has ranged attack speed chant and can use other support chants from the back at the same time.

I have Bittercut and Resolution. I might go get Purgatory, but I want to finish getting Durgan steel first. But can't a dual wielder with 2 top-end weapons do the same - or at least in a similar time frame usually? The best is to try it and judge by yourself...

Redeemer is a very strong vs vessels even without leveling. There are many resistant vessels (animats, eyeless, undead, ...) which can be killed in 2-3hits with it.

Well, Massuk Hunting Bow has better range/dmg than wands/scepters and will outperform many bows because of the dual damage. Until you get the Engwithan Sceper, the Stormcaller or Persistence it's a very good option.

Many paladin's abilities are redundant if you start thinking like that, but Righteous Soul protects against many afflictions, some of them not covered by priest's defenses...

That's way too many talent points to deal with this problem though. I already have Aegis of Loyalty, will get Sacred Immolation, and then Righteous Soul on top of that? I want him to do some DPS, too! I don't know what abilities your paladin has, but Righteous Soul is one of the best he has...

A paladin with Hermit's Hat and Righteous Soul is basically immune to all mind control effects. You have also a few items with Defiance/Loyal enchantments which can be further comboed with the Snowcap drug...

Scale has only 25% penalty to pierce and combined with the enchantment it's not such a big deal in the end. I always keep it on Eder for RP reasons and also because it looks cool and he can have no recovery penalty with it.

Personally I always give it to the druid for its unique ability to restore shapeshift.

You can customize your party formation and put the ranged characters far behind your melee... And yes, you should set everything on aggressive...

If you pick only passive abilities the AI will just spam Torment's Reach which is all you need in a lazy party...

What did your ultimate line-up turn out to be? And what would you choose if you could build the whole party from scratch and not use in-game companions? My lazy team with pre-made companions is paladin (MC), Eder, Maneha, Kana, Palegina, Zahua which is very low maintenance and requires minimal resting. With only custom companions a party of 6 tank paladins is my ultimate lazy party. Many people would argue that 6 chanters are better because of their AoE dmg, but chanters are too vulnerable to cc and are very squishy (they have caster end/hp). Stacking 6 of anything is no fun though. What if there is a restriction of no more than 2 per class? 2 paladins, 2 monks, 1barb, 1 chanter

For Wounding shot you have: LV15: 116-101=15 (your lvl) for the main attack and 111-101=10 (your lvl - 5) for the effect LV16: 120-104=16 (your lvl) for the main attack and 125-104=21 (your lvl + accurate WS - 5) for the effect For Envenomed Strike you have: LV15: 116-101=15 (your lvl) for the main attack and 111-101=10 (your lvl - 5) for the effect LV16: 120-104=16 (your lvl) for the main attack and 115-104=11 (your lvl - 5) for the effect It seems Marksman is applied only to the main attack, while the effect is unaffected by it. PS. I don't know if the other abilities (Distant Advantage, Vicious Aim) affecting only the ranged accuracy work the same way, but you could see, in theory, up to 20 difference in accuracy between the shot and the effect.

What did your ultimate line-up turn out to be? And what would you choose if you could build the whole party from scratch and not use in-game companions? My lazy team with pre-made companions is paladin (MC), Eder, Maneha, Kana, Palegina, Zahua which is very low maintenance and requires minimal resting. With only custom companions a party of 6 tank paladins is my ultimate lazy party. Many people would argue that 6 chanters are better because of their AoE dmg, but chanters are too vulnerable to cc and are very squishy (they have caster end/hp).

There are monsters immune to slash? Dayyaam. I guess I really need back-up weapons. But doesn't that also mean I need to get a talent that enables quick switching - since I am not smart enough to memorize all resistances? There are not many monsters immune to slash, you don't have to pick Quick Switch just for that...

With Ancient Memory, Veteran's Recovery and the best armor for the entire party the Ch.1 is not very hard even on potd...

Wounding Shot isn't so nice with a blunderbuss because the dot damage is calculated after the DR... Also a blunderbuss with powder burns means you have to be in the front line (powder burns damages also allies). A pistol with high int has a wide enough area at max range and allows to position yourself on a side and avoid hitting your party.

Immunities were introduced in WM1, thus the Alpine was always the same. In vanilla PoE the paladin was able to solo the Adra just with food (no scrolls, potions or figurines), however WM1 introduced many nerfs/changes to defenses which made those encounters harder to tank.

For the race I would consider 3 races: coastal aumaua (for the resistance to stun/prone), the pale elf (for the fire/cold resistances) or the wild orlan (for the defensive buff triggered by attacks against will - ie bosses with fear auras). For stats I would start with max mig/resolve. The other stats are less important if you don't play on PoTD. If you want to min/max you can start with low dex/int and high con/per. If you ignore the exhortations which are pretty weak you don't need int until lv13 when you get Sacred Immolation (at this point you can lower your constitution and increase your intellect). For talents: Flames of Devotion (use it with arquebuses/arbalests at the beginning of the fight to pull and deal heavy damage), Weapon and Shield Style, Zealous Focus, Deep Faith, Sworn Enemy, Superior Deflection, Righteous Soul, Bear's Fortitude, Lay on Hands, Snake's Reflexes, Reviving Exhortation, Scion of Flame, Sacred Immolation, Weapon Focus,... For items: Worn Buckler/Little Savior, Drawn in Spring, Cloak of Comfort, Ring of Deflection & Protection, plate armor/Ryiona's Breastplate, Gauntlets of Accuracy, Boots of Stability, Girdle of Eoten Constitution/Looped Rope, Garodh's Chorus/Maegfolc Skull. This build can tank anything, is able to revive a companion once per encounter and will ensure that your party is very hard to kill.

Nice job. There was another issue with the rogue I forgot about - while invisible, you can't use any abilities/talents to attack, just the auto-attack. It's possible to fix this?

Drawn is Spring is the best dps 1h weapon in the game - it's as simple as that. And you can reach 0% recovery while dual wielding with any weapon if: - you have the Gauntlets of Swiftness - your weapons are durgan enchanted - your armor has 0% recovery (ie cloth or durgan enchanted robes) Having also a speed enchantment on the weapon allows wearing heavier armor. Fast weapons generally suck because they do very little damage vs high DR enemies. Drawn in Spring is an exception because a big chunk of its damage is raw and can't be reduced...

Yes, it's possible to build a party like that and there's even an achievement for it. At low/mid level you can use a combination of pets/summons to avoid taking damage and use potions of Infuse with Vital Essence from time to time. Once you reach lvl15 you can build your party around Defensive Harmony and become invincible...

It seems Withdraw makes the character "disappear" from the battlefield. If you can't prevent the combat from ending it's possible, at least, to make withdraw last for its full duration and not end at the same time with the combat? PS. Regarding the "fizzling" there's something happening with the scrolls too...

You can't get the boots here (unless it was changed with the last patch). The earliest spot is in Dyrford Ruins (you can go there just after killing Maerwald) and can be obtained without fight with high enough stealth & mechanics.