Nobear

So what I'm gathering from this is: a) We don't fully understand the effects (if any) of whether a tank engages an enemy on the enemy AI, but it appears to make little or no difference, at least in most cases. b) An increased engagement limit WILL raise the number of enemies surrounding a tank required to give him the Flanked affliction, regardless of whether he's attacking, incapacitated, or performing some other action. Therefore, Hold the Line and the Guarding weapon property are at least marginally useful in reducing the percentage of cases where the tank receives a 10 Deflection penalty. c) PCs can hit enemies with disengagement attacks just like enemies can hit PCs with them. Therefore, IF an enemy leaves a tank mid-fight for whatever reason (even though this seems to be a very rare occurrence in practice), the tank will hit him with a disengagement attack if and only if it is one of the enemies he is engaging, meaning he can't be incapacitated or performing a non-attack action for this to happen. d) b and c are independent (meaning you can avoid being Flanked even if your engagement toward enemies is broken), and a-c are the full extent of known effects of engagement. Do I have a solid and accurate understanding of these mechanics? If I do, Hold the Line has two benefits: the situational benefit of a greater likelihood of inflicting a disengagement attack in the rare event that en enemy actually disengages while the tank's engagement is not broken (or will this just never happen?), and an increase, regardless of whether the tank has engagement, in the percentage of cases that he avoids the Flanked debuff. Is this all correct? PS I do recall two examples of an enemy leaving my tank to hit someone else. The first was in the opening caravan map, when the tank would get engagement first, but the enemy would love to break engagement to attack Heodan instead. Maybe this would be more common if I were playing with melee DPS, but I'm playing with two tanks and four ranged. The second example is when a Phantom paralyzes a tank (which would have broken engagement), then goes off to fight someone else. I have not noticed this happening when tanks are just knocked Prone, or when they stop attacking to do something like cast an Exhortation, only in the case of paralysis by a Phantom. My tanks can be knocked prone and enemies will still hit them. They will still serve the role of holding the enemies away from my ranged. Of course, the priest spell Withdraw also causes enemies to find another target, but I'm pretty sure this is fully intended.

Hm I just refreshed my memory about disengagement attacks. I guess I really haven't been paying attention to whether I can hit an enemy with one if he runs away. Is this all you mean about the effect of engagement you're losing if you're incapacitated or doing an action other than attacking?

the ie mod is 3rd party and has resulted in some quirks in the past. am understanding why some folks might avoid the ie mod, but it is good that you bring the mod up as an alternative, 'cause baring a developer option, it may be the only alternative available short o' restarting the game. Right. Thanks Andrea, I'm aware of the mod. I was trying to pinpoint why I wanted to avoid the mod (or any mod), and I admit it may be a bit irrational, but part of it is what Gromnir mentioned. If there are bugs or issues with the main game, at least it's supported and the developers can address those issues. As is, I keep restarting even though I'm aware of the mod. Funny enough, I'm still enjoying Act 1 and Defiance Bay LOL. Part of it is that it just sits much better with me to do everything legit. I think this game appeals to people with certain OCD tendencies . So, knowing me, if they didn't include a respec I'd probably restart rather than install the mod. It's not like restarting once more would make the most tremendous difference to me in the long run, I'd just prefer the legit respec solution if they can pull it off.

So what effect does it have if, say, you are prone? Does it affect the enemy AI, or does it make you flanked or what? I am taking the talent to avoid the 10 Deflection debuff from flanked. Am I getting the flanked debuff anyway, even against one enemy if I am incapacitated or doing an action other than attacking them?

Thanks for sharing the link about respec, Gromnir.

For the most part I like the changes I see, both gameplay and content wise. That said, I strongly second what Gromnir and others have said, that a respec option would mean a lot to me in light of it all. Consider that, once the code has been made, it could hopefully be reused (even if it has to be modified) for future expansions. Thanks.

Well, if it's coming with the expansion, that would be a logical time to give a free respec if they do that. After all, they're totally changing abilities and talents, so it would only be fair. But, aside from this concern of mine, I do like some of the changes and content they have shown.

Yeah, the duration of Repulsing Seal is so long, I haven't even used the others . I'm a CC kinda guy (with good ranged DPS in my party), but maybe I'll try the others for fun. So hazards all get an inherent accuracy boost then? That's why my Repulsing Seal does its job so reliably even with only +6 Accuracy in my party so far?

Thanks for clarifying. I think the OP was confused about this too, from his other thread.

Wait, was this something I missed in the patch notes, or was it fixed silently? How are you sure of this? Hey, it'd be great if I didn't feel I had to restart yet again to make Durance my mechanic. You are sure this would no longer improve his Seals, like people have talked about before?

I experimented at a save file I have where I can make a level 5 adventurer. Well, I didn't see the trap talents mentioned on the Wiki, so either they require higher level or they were removed. I read somewhere else that they were removed, so that's probably the case. Oh well, so much for my super mechanic priest idea, but it's not a big deal since there are so many good priest talents anyway. I still like the idea of making him the mechanics guy so his Seals are more accurate. I will find out soon enough whether this actually works, and also whether you can lay down regular traps in combat like you can with Seals, to give him something to do possibly more effective than auto-attack in the early game after buffing if no heals are needed. Might as well try to put the traps he finds to use if I can!

What do you mean that Hold the Line doesn't work if you don't attack? How do you know that? And is it that the talent is bugged, or is it something about how engagement works in general? I haven't been counting enemies, but it seems to me that even on PoTD, you probably have a large % of fights where there are no more than five enemies around your tank. If you take a fighter with Defender and Hold the Line and give him a weapon with Guarding, he will have 10 more Deflection in a significantly higher % of situations than he would otherwise, no? I don't know if this is the only benefit, but 10 Deflection is nothing to sneeze at. So what's this about it not working if you don't attack? Not trying to attack, but to understand. I want to have strong tanks with no wasted talents.

Do you mean Per Encounter? I think they are Per Encounter, meaning you can cast up to 4 (base) from rank 1 or rank 2 per encounter. At Will would mean you can cast them an unlimited number of times per encounter. Still, this seems like it would be enough, though I haven't gotten there yet.

I agree with both these statements about diplomacy. I was just worried that the developers might have viewed it as a weak or pushover quality, like just being nice or unobtrusive to no real effect. Maybe their view is somewhat in line with mine after all. Thank you for the clarification on that.

It's even worse than having to wait longer, you might get an opposite disposition point than you have to waste a talent to get rid of the negative effects on your F + C. Well I do regularly check my dispositions to make sure I don't have a negative one. But isn't the highest rank possible a 3? If I've already hit 3 in Honest before the end of Act 1, is there really a serious possibility that I might not get Diplomatic to 3 by, say, the end of Act 2?

Keep in mind there is a Cipher story companion you can pick up on your travels, and you can hire adventurers very early on which are just as customizable as your main, their only weakness being that they start at most a level below your main. However, if you hire them early, they are cheaper and the level difference will shrink since each level requires more XP than the last. There are a couple of other gameplay considerations for choosing your main. One is that only the attributes and skills of your main affect what dialogue options are available, so you might want to consider dialogue as well as combat. The "mental" attributes are more common in dialogue checks and tend to make the most difference in your options. Specifically, I've read that they go in this order of importance overall: Resolve, then Int, then Perception. I've also read that Lore is the most common/useful skill check in dialogues. The other consideration is that paladins and priests, specifically, each have one ability affected by making dialogue choices that align with the favored and disfavored dispositions of their chosen god or order. For paladins, it's their defenses that improve this way. Again, this mechanic is only in effect if its your main character. So, if you're going to have a paladin or priest in your party, you will have this gameplay benefit of making it your main, and you can still easily get other allies who are awesome in the ways you've laid out. Up to you though. I know there can be that special attachment to your main. Your main does uniquely have access to additional talents you can unlock throughout the game. Personally, with these gameplay considerations in mind, I've chosen my main to be a paladin tank, and I still have a cipher in my group. A paladin tank can be built with attributes that make him great at tanking, support, AND dialogue. Mine is a Moon Godlike with base attributes of 10/14/4/18/14/18. There are, of course, many valid schools of thought on what's optimal given how you want to play, and of course you might have RP considerations, but I hope that info helps!

I didn't take LoH because the range is too small IMHO, so it causes this problem unless you are using it on yourself or another front-liner. Exhortations have a longer range, and I haven't had this problem with them. I prefer to take Exhortations but not LoH. That's a good compromise that will leave you with just the right amount of good talent options. PS Into the Fray seemed nice for Eder as a tank, until I got it on one of my runs and was hugely disappointed, also because of its small range. The only times I found it would be nice to bring an enemy closer, it was out of range of the ability.

I think this would be a good idea, if the highest attribute/skill in the party was checked in dialogue instead of just the player's. I don't know though, if there should be something you have to do to make sure a character is "paying attention" when you want them to chime in, kind of like how you can select a character to pass a scripted event check. I'm not sure how this would work in dialogue, though. I guess you could choose to ask other characters for their opinion to see if it unlocks more dialogue options. This would probably be a lot of work to implement though. It would be simpler, if less immersive or interactive, to just have dialogue options automatically take into account the highest party attribute/skill.

Why would you use the weapon summons, though? If we're comparing Attributes, we're obviously comparing them from an optimization standpoint, and from that point of view, you shouldn't be doing anything other than long-to-mid-range DPS. No Wizard should ever get into the thick of it. A better argument for Dex is probably Clothing Wizards (because for some reason Robes does not count as Clothing) built around the Blast Talent and Implements. I loathe to build a character around mere auto-attack, but Wizards can actually do really respectable damage with it. I still say that Int is way, way, way better because it boosts core functionality and the key feature(s) of the Wizard, though. And considering that we've got a limited amount of points to work with, once we've taken Intellect, it's really between Strength Might and Dexterity. And then Strength Might wins because it's better for blasting and spellcasting. 9 times out of 10, Dexterity should be considered a tertiary attribute at best. Luckily, Wizards are free to dump Resolve and Perception fairly freely. I know Aloth's stats make him best for CC, but I have a cipher and priest (repulsing seal) for CC and I'm building Aloth for Minor Blights. Yes it would work better with a custom with higher Might and Dex, but I like the companions for RP, and he still does a ton of damage with Minor Blights. In some fights he still CCs with Slicken, and then does decent damage with Penetrating Blast, and he'll get even better at both auto attacking and Minor Blights the more wand talents he gets. It could be killer on a custom Wizard, but this game is easy enough and I like that banter that the companions do :D.

I'm not sure, I'm guessing. I know I could turn the giveaways on even though I'd prefer not to, and that's what I just might do until I get +3 Diplomatic. Good to know about "I see," it seems common when it's not the one you're trying to get . Now that's disappointing. You can see my idea of what Diplomatic should be in the OP, but it especially makes no sense in relation to a Shieldbearer (or to any actual diplomat who's trying to, you know, accomplish something). A Shieldbearer shouldn't be a yes-man, he should play an active role in achieving his goals, such as averting conflict through... actual diplomacy. What I call someone who just tells people what they want to hear is a coward. They are afraid to express their views for fear of offending people. A real diplomat has to make his views known if he wants to achieve anything, but present them in a way likely to be well-received. This should not be the opposite of honest. Deceptive should be the opposite of honest, and diplomacy itself should be morally neutral, so it is up to the individual diplomat whether to be more honest or more deceptive. If Diplomatic is the opposite of Honest in this game, how does it make sense for a Shieldbearer paladin to favor both? In real life it could work, but in this game... argh lol, well good to know how it works in-game, that's what I asked for so thank you.

First, I haven't played much with traps except a Fireball trap that I set at a door to a tough fight with Shades and Shadows in the Temple of Eothas, which triggered and really turned the tide. I had attempted that fight several times prior to trying the trap, and it made all the difference. So are others still having the same issues with traps with the latest 1.0.6 version? I tried another Fireball trap in a more open space on the same level, again with Shades and Shadows, and it didn't hit many enemies and didn't do much. Second, I only recently learned that priest Seals are considered Traps, and I didn't fully believe it until I read this thread. Well, that raises some interesting possibilities in my mind. Though Durance isn't optimized for mechanics, maybe I can make him my mechanic and this would boost his Seals accuracy too? Though priests are talent-starved what with all the Interdiction talents and Inspiring Radiance, maybe it would make sense to get Powerful Traps and/or Accurate Traps, assuming they also work with Seals. Repulsing Seal is just so good with such a long duration even as is, you could knock out enemies for a pretty long fight with 40% longer duration. And would that add or multiply with Int and Might? Lastly, and I know I can easily test this, but I'm going to bed and will check this tomorrow: can traps be set in combat, just like seals can? That'd be cool to give Durance something to do with the traps he finds in the early game, after he buffs and if nobody needs healing. Some might do more than auto attacking with his gun would, and would probably be guaranteed to at least trigger if he placed them right on an enemy's head. You'd think... Anyway, I know I'm reviving an old thread but I figure that's better than creating a duplicate. I look forward to hearing thoughts and feedback!

Thanks Gromnir and MadDemiurg for explanations and justifications for Monk and Barbarian. These classes make a bit more sense to me now from a perspective that's not just RP. I don't know if I'll ever play one, but I'd say I'm more likely to now.

You only need to click once on the formation you're using when this bug happens, for it to recognize the new party member.

I know there have been other threads about dialogue options that affect various reputations, but most of them are old and/or focus on other reputations, like Clever. IMHO Clever is easy to identify if you just listen to Eder (whose humor I generally like BTW; I find it usually not ROFL, but a nice grin-inducing dry humor often amplified by the other characters' bad reactions to it). Anyway, let me get to the point of this thread: Diplomatic. For greater immersion and getting to apply some basic deductive reasoning (Which choice best fits the model?) I have the options to show the affected reputations turned off in-game. However, it is my impression that the Diplomatic choices are particularly far from how I'd envision that character trait. It seems that the developers consider Diplomatic to basically mean you're a yes-man and a pushover, saying you agree with things even if you don't. Correct me if I'm wrong, because clearly my understanding isn't as good as it could be seeing as, with my Shieldbearer paladin, I gained 3 Honesty early on and still only have 1 Diplomatic in Defiance Bay. (spoiler) Let me give you an example of an in-game situation and how I'd respond in real life to craft what I'd consider a diplomatic response. Let's take Nedyn, when you first talk to her to start Theorems of Pandgram, and she tells you about her research on souls. The options my character sees are to tell her it sounds like necromancy (clearly not diplomatic any way you look at it), to say it sounds dangerous (relatively diplomatic compared to the first, but diplomatic is still not the word that would come to mind), and "I see." To me, an "I see" response could be seen as either a lazy version of diplomatic, or as stoic. What does the game generally consider it? Here's the response I would craft instead, in accordance with my view of an intelligent diplomat who happens to disagree: "I can see the great benefit of research aimed to save or improve future lives. However, do you ever worry that we may end up paying too high a price?" This would aim to accomplish several things, which, in my view, serve a diplomat's chief purpose: to achieve desired results with people by selecting, based on nuances of a situation, from a set of tools which generally fall under the umbrella of "social intelligence." First, I am attempting to make Nedyn feel understood by pointing out something we can agree on, which would ideally help lower her defenses. Then, I am framing my point of contention not as an opposing opinion which would likely make her defensive, but as a question, further softened by using the word "we" instead of "you," so she doesn't feel personally attacked. In rhetorical analysis, this is similar to an invitational or Rogerian argument. In my view, other traits like Honest and Deceptive are just possible tools for a diplomat to use to get the desired results with people. It's possible to be diplomatic while staying honest, if the diplomat's values factor in highly, though this will somewhat limit her options. Deception could be a useful tool, but will likely backfire if the diplomat is caught in a lie. What are your thoughts, and can someone attempt to describe a generalizable model for identifying the kinds of responses the game considers Diplomatic, so that I can raise my Shieldbearer's Diplomatic reputation without giving away every dialogue option case by case? Thanks in advance!

I also posted about it in this thread: http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/80252-106-mac-gog-custom-formations-get-bugged/ A developer responded saying it has been entered to be fixed.