Elric Galad

Hehe I'm just starting a new PotD playthrough with almost them party, except no cipher and a second chanter. In my opinion it's totally viable, but you may need more tankiness. Your party doesn't have to be only made of squishies and tank. A simple priest with leather armor and shield can help holding the line : small shield does not cause any malus to spellcasting. Early game, spells are limited ressource so casting speed is not so critical ; late game, durgan steel will negate a big part of armor malus. Furthermore, be sure to pick form of the Delemgan as Druid Spell Mastery for lvl 4. Fast cast party wide 8DR against physical attack will greatly help your survivability. Combo with binding web is great.

By the way, I've done other interesting tests with following conclusions : - Kalakoth blasting blast has apparently returned. Each single hit of summoned Kalakoth minor blast triggers blast. As Kalakoth has an AoE, each hit in the AoE triggers a separate blast, so each ennemy in a pack can recieve multi-blast (as well as potential interrupts). So now, it's like a baby version of Heart of Fury. I thought this one had been patched. EDIT : Apparently, I imagined it was patched. So it works, and it is most likely the best way to get interrupt. - Apprentice's Sneak Attack applies to each Kalakoth hits in the original AoE, but not to blast hits. - Apprentice's Sneak Attack applies to each Citzal Spirit Lance hits in the Citzal's AoE. (Citzal's is described as "blast" in the flavour text, but it is appently a totally different effect.)

Mmmn, I just said that I don't know about monk's clones. Maybe they're different.

Confident aim does work on every spell, as deathblows. The wording on the tooltip is not so cryptic about it. Preservation from items usually DON'T stack. However, enchantments from weapons and shield do stack with everything. That's the reason why you see Little Savior preservation stacking. But thank you for your finds.

Bonus damages used to be additive. Annihilation on crit meant +50% damages. Spirit of Decay should have meant +20% damages. This has been the case since the beginning of PoE. OR there are hidden rules or modified stuff.

Did Damage modifiers get changed by the same guy that designed attack speed ?

So to answer my own questions : None of the above boost your clones. Clones does not get the passive from their original character. Basically, clones have their own stats which seems to be pretty high : My Substancial Phantom had an accuracy of 111 and 30 interrupt, and his Minoletta's missiles did more damage than Aloth's (and his rather bad Might). These values were not changed by Weapon Focus and Interrupting blows. He didn't get constant recovery. I can't be sure about Electrical Damage talent, but I think it didn't apply. I got the impression that Blast applies, but the AoE of the Phantoms are not blast but some Built-In Electrical Attack with an AoE. So they probably only benefit from non-weapon items. I have no idea about monk's clones working the same or not. It worths noticing that lvl 4 Essential Phantom has DIFFERENT values than Lvl 7 Substancial one, with only 90 Accuracy and 12 Interrupt. So it's not only about spells. In conclusion, Phantoms are pretty solid summons with good stats, but don't mind them when you're choosing your talents.

I my opinion, if your party include a wizard you should suggest not taking Tanglefoot as Spell mastery. With Delemgan form active, Binding Web basically becomes Foe-only which is the only Tanglefoot only defect. And Sunbeam is such an excellent alternate choice ! I noticed about form of the Delemgan last week. I think it wasn't noticed initially because the only online description (WMII Data miner topic) is about its 3.0 version which was "only" 5 DR buff, and because its description is a mix of too many things to be quickly understood. Furthermore, druids have so many good 4th level spells that people probably were not too eager to find alternate choice when Form of the Delemgan was released. If Form of the Delemgan has been a 7th level spell, more people would have been aware of it (sad but true). I would rank it the 3rd best party buff of the game after Crown and Devotion of the Faithful.

Melee ranger are a good choice as ranger is a very good class. Basically you loose twinned arrows and driving flights which are truly awesome skills. You win defensive bond (which is IMHO only interesting with melee ranger), and probably better stunlock with stunning shots because of better attack speed of some melee weapons, especially when dual wielding. Superior damages from melee attacks compensate for the loss of double attacks, but you loose ranged flexibility. I find melee ranger overall suboptimal, but it has a few perk where it is superior.

Is this even possible? Just use your "magic savegame trick" and you won't have any problems.

Chanter's phrase is a DoT. DoT are now the only exception. It is not good, but at least there are not so many subcases like for stacking/non stacking effect.

Sure, I'll try to do a bit of testing today. Yesterday I focused on testing salvation of time combos and it worked perfectly with arcane veil ) Yes spirit of decay was for the high level clone's necrotic lance. Of course, it isn't worth it but it may be a minor reason to think about a Ice/Corrode moor wizard main reason would be the lvl 8 black bow. This bow attacks WILL instead of deflection which can be very useful against some ennemies. Thank you for the tip about electrical damages. I was indeed wondering about it too since I just remembered the clones did electrical damages. Unfortunately you're right about wizard missing electrical spells. Maybe a 4 elements wizard could be fun ? Just to have the best possible wall of many colours

Binding web and form of the delemgan can be a sick combo by the way (immunity to stuck) especially considering bonus to kiting from form of the Delemgan.

Hey, I'm planning a less focused version of this build, and I'm specifocally wondering about talents appliczble to summoned cloned. Do the following works (blast works for sure): - penetrating blast - penetrating shots - weapon focus (it may depends on which one unless clones weapons are universal) - dangerous implements - interrupting blows - corrode damage talents - various defensive talents like superior deflection Bonus question : is it the same for Monk clones ?

Tested it. Salvation of time does add 10s to the invisibility from feign death, which could have been insane if invisibility didn't break for some reasons after a few strikes (backstab applied). Still not found application for the "ultimate" rogue ability. Now I discover that Int increases the duration when your rogue is disabled. Just a bit more lame...

Thanks for this nice build ! Nice armor choice btw ^^ I would be very curious about novice (and trandcendant) suffering multiplied by anything but crit. Maybe the damage modifier stacking additively has been replaced by new (undocumented) rules ? Quality modifier for weapons seam to have been integrated to base damage on the tooltip. I wonder if it true...

Which reduces the interest of bittercut + spirit of decay... At least stormcaller apply an electrical DR debuff so you'll usually apply electrical damages.

I personnally don't like to minimize stat beyond 10, sometimes 8 or a few 6. However, resolve is rather easy to dump. The main risk is concentration, but a priest with holy meditation or Crown of the faithful will solve your need. -35% hp is harsh. You have way to work around, but I doubt it worth the trouble.

Don't forget the soulbound scepter. It gives +3 Resolve which is cumulative with other items because it is a weapon. You'll have to play a caster protagonist for it by the way. Only drawback is tat you can't use it with +2 Con sword to pass a certain spore check. Steadfast is another option for +1 resolve.

I start wondering if priest spell Salvation of time work with feign death persisting invisibility. So with 16s + Int of invisibility (renewable by your priest buddy) +150% damages from backstqb (plus usual sneak attack, deathblow, reckless assault), rogue would have access to PoE godmode...

Did you boosted your accuracy for this fight ? I didn't have a priest, and I had also limited CC capabilities. Most of my CC spell weren't very successful. That might be the reason why I had so many troubles.

Runner's shot working with backstab would be the very definition of sniping. 80% lash on a +150% damages (+others) attack would not be a joke.

Just thinking : has anyone ever tried to create a party revolving around short duration buff and priest spell Salvation of Time ? It revolves around the same principles except effect extension comes from an AoE spell so you can use short duration effects from any class. Of course, Salvation of time is a limited ressource, so it would be nice mostly for boss fights. But for me it has potential to be a gamechanger with some infamous abilities like triggered immunity, hardened veil, inspiring radiance and well... good old humans.

My own experience : Adra Dragon is still annoying because of her breath and the risk to be petrified by her Adragan girlband. If you properly apply paralyzis to her and CC the stone damsels, the fight will not be very hard. But there is a failure risk. Alpine is easy if you have a wizard. Buff accuracy, petrify him and it will not be very hard. Thaos always gives me headache due to Mind Control spells and cleansing flames. But he is not that hard to defeat. Concelhaut was a joke with a barbarian armed with hallowed redeemer. His minions are a bit annoying but once you killed a few of the most dangerous ones (void seer, animated wand), the fight becomes easy. Llengrath... I didn't have any problem. I Paralyzed the dragons, I used defensive mindweb... then it seemed that my endurance never went down. Radiant spore was not that hard. I killed the mushroom dudes, then aimed it. From this point, provided you can survive a bit the tentacle sniping, it will be easy. Kraken is easy, sky dragon is not very hard (but don't underestimated her as I did. She's upscaled now.) Magran faithfuls are crazy annoying. Priest and druids will blast you while healing like crazy. Blast them quick. All groups with high level monks should never been underestimated. They go for casters like Bouh goes for the eyes. With Iron wheel, clarity of agony, flagellant path and Force of Anguish, they are incredibly hard to stop. The fight with the new abbey of the fallen moon deserve a special mention. Finally, scaled Brynlod party win the cup. Hardest fight in the game for me. These guys just have too much defenses. Next time, I'll bring a priest for Devotion of the faithful.

Just checked what form of the Delemgan actually did. +8 to all physical DR (and 2 elemental ones : electrical and corrosive. It doesn't overlap with Pale Elf resist ) ). Stacking with Armor of faith/Zealous Endurance... And couple of other goodies : +1 speed, bonus against disengagement attack, immunity against immobilization (which can lead to sick combination with binding web). It is fast casting with a nice AoE. This spell is crazy. I would have preferred it as a lvl 7 spell ! At least on level 8, avenging storm looks good. But for level 7 is really lacking non-weird spell. Nature's bounty is a pain to use, and overlap with many priest buff, except for the speed part. Elemental resist only lasts 10s. Call of the primordial, at least, will provide some okayish meat shield. They seem to have many more HP than Blights. Oozes are not very good attackers but they have sides effects like paralyzis, immobilization and even petrify on death for ice ones. So either you have a priest and you may cast ooze, THEN buff your whole groopze with devotion of the faithfull and some accuracy stuff. Or you dont' have priest and Nature's bounty suddenly looks OK because of Might and Perception bonus. Nothing great but at least next time, I will know how to use these 7 level slots.