RtrnofdMax

Yes, I have completed the three parts. I can even ask the son about an invite, but he says that's up to dad. Dad won't talk until I do the deed.

I have been working on a low kill/pacifist solo run through the game. If you care about some of the details, there are excellent posts here and here. There are spoilers there, just so you know. Since I can't spoil in this forum, despite it seeming like the best place, I will keep my question vague. Why can you reach the Champion level of reputation with at least one of the factions and yet you still have to complete their non-story quests? It seems to me that if you are really held in such high regard, they should waive that requirement and satisfy your request. Or as another option, completing the 4 quests I did for the Doemenels should reward less rep so that you don't achieve Champion until after the quest I chose not to complete. It just breaks my immersion a bit to have a reputation system, but to put it aside in favor of doing fixed quests.

Temple of Skaen on the 9th of the month. It still works with personal pacifism, if not party pacifism. It has always been my theory during this run to keep my character's hands clean, while letting other get them as dirty as they want. Scrolls of confusion may work if I am in a longer battle, but they're still combat only. As an aside, I am kind of mad about the programming around getting an invitation. If you "kill" the merchant, "kill" koflcgwhatever, get the diamond and help the squad out in Dyrford, you sit at Champion (Overwhelmingly Positive) status. That should be enough, without having to kill Wenfield. But they force you to do so (I didn't), to progress that storyline. Either give less rep for other quests so you can't make Champion without that quest, or make that an alternate route to an invite.

I'm still working on this, just not playing too regularly. I got to Elm's Reach just now. Most of this is covered by your walkthrough, but a few things stood out to me. Getting Boots of Speed makes Cliaban Rialag trivial. I could only muster 11 stealth being a Cipher, but it didn't matter with +4 speed from boots and breakfast. I did get spotted by the Menpwygra before the spore room, but a quick TG and that was done. I was all concerned about the spore room, but I never dinged red on detection all the way to the stairs. Could of been way worse without the boots but I'm not gonna try it again. I was level 9 when I got to CB despite the guide saying it's a max of 8. I did complete a few quests that you didn't like Engwithan Scepter, rescuing the cook, and two bounties. I also accepted all quests and got them progressed to just before combat. One that stands out is the one with Cail the Silent. Just entering his cave gives almost 500 xp. I also got some small xp rewards from things that died to TG. I was able to kill Sly Cyrdel and the Lurker thing with just TG. Basically, hit the boss with TG, throw up a wall of summons, but don't let them attack. Then repeat TG. Those two in particular have a large strong groups of guys, so there is plenty of DPS. I had to use a fig to draw them away to get the head, but that's still credit for me without a KB. I was able to use the Shades to kill the 5 skeletons in Heritage Hill, so, while a bit cheap, I didn't gain any personal kills. I'm still at 3 now and see now reason why that number will rise before I beat Thaos. Really hoping a statue lands a KB so I can finish with like 5. If I recall, I am at around 50 party kills so still a pacifist in my own way.

You're totally right. By the way, I got past The Man Who Waits and The Wailing Banshee on my Cipher tonight and still at 3 personal kills. The former required a couple castings of Mental Binding and then a lot of running. The latter wasn't anything Cipher specific. Just 10 stealth, figurines and some Farmer's breakfast for speed. The detect radius on Phantoms is huge.

I was looking at your skill suggestions and I noticed an omission. Since it is possible to save the prisoner in NoonFrost, you should get a boon from her called Blooded Hunter which will give you +1 stealth (and +1 slash/pierce DT). This should make it so you don't have to choose between the mechanics or the stealth rest bonus unless you want 13 stealth. I did have a question: Does the +2 lore bonus from the Glanfathan Andraswen stack with the +3 lore bonus from a scroll, or does the scroll supersede it?

It works, but only in combat. Otherwise it would be super annoying when moving your party in formation. Boots of speed are annoying for this reason because they increase speed in and out of combat. For a Barbarian, I don't see the value, unless you plan on having them get to the back ranks of the enemy formation. This probably isn't a good idea since Barbs are good for melee AoE and want to fight against (if not on) the front line. Fast Runner is great for builds that require running away, and in that scenario you should find that enemies that previously always caught you will now trail behind you in a straight line race.

I have found many of these to be a day off just in playing tonight. I opened the chest in the Temple of Woedica on day 15 and got the cloak from day 14. I later went to Raedric's hold and found boots of stealth, gloves of manipulation and the blunting belt on day 18 when all of those are listed for day 17. I am happy about my haul, and it seems like you have each set of days gear correct, but the day is off one. I am playing solo PotD.

Do you have this sort of breakdown for all of the items?

Pretty cool. While my Cipher is using the stealth hood (due to not need Munacra Arret), I need one of the scrolls. Pretty sure I am on day 15.

Ok, I have found some success. I got downstairs at Caed Nua by confusing a Phantom, running by and getting in the corner. Combat ended but conversation didn't start. I reloaded my save and she talked to me. I was able to take down Maerwald through a progression of steps: 1) Sneak past the beetles to the looters. 2) TG a looter on the left, which pulls the middle looters to him, and aggros the right looters on you. 3) Run back past the beetles dragging the looters into them. 4) Stand by the stairs until combat ends. This works to thin out the looters by the secret door into Maerwald's room. 5) Sneak back past the reset beetles and to the secret door in the looter room. You will be spotted if you only have 4 stealth (like I did), but as soon as the door opens, you cut to Maerwald. 6) Having autopause on combat here works well. As soon as combat begins, step back towards the looter room to get LOS and a pull on the remaining looters. Then take a beeline towards the previously locked door. Never stop moving or you will take a lot of damage. I barely made it out after taking a crippling blow xbow bolt and an autoattack from Maerwald. At this point the looters, blights and Maerwald duke it out. The looters were no match for Maerwald, but two of his blights did go down. 7) Step back just inside the door to regain Maerwald's attention. Run back towards the beetle room. Try to time it so that you can draw the attention of the beetles just as Maerwald leashes and starts his slow walk back into the room. Get just past the fog of war and wait out the fight. 9) If there are any blights left over (I had one Flame), you will need to draw them out and have either the beetles or the spiders (either group) kill it to end combat. Here are my stats to this point. Well over the rogue minimum party kills, but still at 3 personal kills. I think the Cipher can do this, but it's pretty darn hard. It's also RNG based, because if you miss a TG, and have nowhere to run, you have to reload a save.

It is a bit confusing, but usually saves space over listing every single DR possible. There is a good list similar to what you made here.

Shades and Shadows only have less damage reduction vs fire. Since Corrode is unlisted, that means that means that is reduced by 8 for a shadow. DRs are only listed separately if they are greater than or less than the base DR. Fire/Burn is the best element for Shades and Shadows.

Shades and Shadows are weak to fire. Corrode is a good middle ground since so many enemies are strong against fire, but you should at least have fire listed next to them.

I'm running the GOG version, so no Steam achievements. Just doing this to see if it can be done. I agree that no fewer than 12 enemies have to die. I am hoping that I can keep the character's kills to less than that number, but I am allowing for the party kill number to exceed that. For example, in my first try last night, Heodan killed the leader and I got the other 3, so that equals the 4 minimum total kills for that encounter, yet leaves my personal kill count at less than 4. Fast forward to the bears, the only way I could see doing it with a Cipher was with friendly fire and confusion thinning the ranks. With two dead, I am now above the party minimum with 6 kills, but my personal record is still just 3. If I could keep Heodan alive a bit longer, I might even get that 3 down to something less. I also tried a Priest for a bit and got the 4 down, but encountered a bug. Since you can't get the 2 stealth to get past the middle group after feeding Calisca to the bottom two, I decided to try getting Calisca to pull the bottom two to the the middle three and then back down over the bridge. With a Bridandine and a shield, she was able to survive long enough to do so, but the middle three came for my priest and broke me out of Withdraw somehow. I tried again but triggered the last group rather than just hiding in a corner. It worked and Heodan and I were able to make short work of those guys. But the cut scene wouldn't trigger. I also tried triggering the middle group at the last second by stealthing around the top and then triggering the conversation. If I fed Heodan to both groups, I could get past the horses and only be pursued by the middle three. A withdraw would usually (not always) reset the middle three. At which point, I could walk back to the arch by the horses and pull just two of the final 4 (usually the leader and one hunter). Problem here was that without Heodan I just got murdered by the leader. I am using your 14,10,16,4,16,18 array.

I tried this again last night. Confusion does work well to get you out of combat, but it will increment your party kill count. It does not increment your personal kill count though. I was able to talk to the guy in the bear cave by confusing one baby bear, running and letting the others kill it. Then repeated with the other baby bear. At which point, I could approach the soul in stealth. After the convo, I confused the big bear and just ran towards the exit. Combat ended and I was good. So at that point I had 6 party kills, but only 3 personal kills. I am going to keep going and see how low I can keep the personal kill count, while completing some quests that would have been impossible (for killing or for non-rogues). I know that, technically, you could party up and have your main never kill anything, but that's not the point. I am thinking that it may be possible to have as few as 7-12 personal kills depending on how many of the Glanfathans and Statues you kill. I'll keep you posted.

Too bad you can't dual-wield implements. I get why pistols are two-handed, but not really why wands are. Especially, when you can wield your wizard grimoire even when holding a staff or other two-handed weapon.

This is what Raven suggested in the pacifist thread for a Cipher. One at a time has to be the way to do it with your build too.

Sacrificing a scripted NPC to the Blood Pool in the Temple of Skaen outside of Dyrford will give the following bonuses: Aloth: +1 Int, +5 Reflex. Eder: +1 Mgt, +5 Deflection. Durance: +1 Con, +5% Max Stamina. Grieving Mother: +1 Resolve, +5 Resist Affliction. Hiravias: +1 Dex, +1 Damage Threshold. Sagani: +1 Perception, +2 Bonus Accuracy on same enemy. Kana: +1 Int, +5 Resist Affliction. Pallegina: +1 Resolve, +1 Damage Threshold. You have to have Cruel 1 or 2 to get the option. There is a good list here of talents you can get as part of the story.

Yes, but I played solo Cipher though, and if say you are fighting one creature and you charm it, then combat ends and so does the charm effect, putting you back in combat. You see this very clearly when Thaos dominates you and you run solo, the effect ends almost immediately if you do not have summons up. So what you're saying is that a Cipher can't go for a low kill run because they won't be able to avoid combats with charm and dominate? I had hoped that I could just sneak up to a group, charm one and run by while they beat on each other.

I gave this my own try with a Cipher last night, and it went very poorly. Like couldn't kill the 4 guys poorly. I think, in hindsight, that I was myopic about the minimum level of offense I would need. I dumped Might and Con, and had straight 18s on the rest. Problem is, once Heodan went down (which was quickly), I had no offense. What's more, none of the guys would engage my main, they just beat on Heodan. I chose Whisper of Treason and Eyebite since they seemed appropriately non-violent. I think I will drop Per to 14 and up Might to 7 like the OP, and take a more damaging power with Whisper of Treason.

I wonder then if she was somehow related to either the assassin or possessed guard in the backstory for the ring. Or maybe the Ducess. Got another one for you: Pliambo per Casitàs.

Has there been anything written about what the unique item names mean in the PoE world? Some of the names seem similar to words in real world languages, but not quite. For example: Munacra Arret - This is a head slot item that looks like a monocle. Arret means stop in French. Munacra is gibberish as far as I can tell but maybe has some relation to monocle. Pensiavi mes Rèi - This is a +3 might ring. Pensiavi makes me think (quite literally) of thinking or thoughts. Mes means my in French. Rei makes me think of king from the spanish rey or french roi. Anyone have any insight on the subject? The in-game item descriptions don't help give much context.

Also, if you do manage to have him show up over the course of overland travel, you can reload before you traveled to get the exact item you want. Then again, if you're willing to do that, you might as well console yourself the item.

No gauntlets on my playthrough. 2x boots and 2x broad belt.