Nobear

Doesn't Resolution convert grazes to hits? Durgan steel also converts grazes to hits. Lastly, I don't believe grazes converted to hits can ever crit. So that particular combination would not increase crit chance at all, would it? It would, just not by converting grazes to hits to crits. If you roll a graze, it'd then roll a chance to be converted to a hit, and stop there. If you roll a hit (before conversion), it'd then roll a chance to convert that hit to a crit.

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.

I'm glad you're enjoying the game. Now, you can often find answers to related (or sometimes the same) questions by searching/browsing these forums. Here is, in fact, someone else who asked for melee/ranged rogue advice the same day you did. I hope you find some of the suggestions there helpful. I don't mean to be critical, just to point out the resources that are at your disposal here. Also, rangers got buffed more than most classes did in 2.0, so they went from being in a place most players considered weak, to a place many players consider to make them a valuable team member. These days, I really don't think there's a clear winner between a ranger and rogue. They can both fulfill similar roles. Especially below PoTD, you might find them pretty well balanced with respect to each other, and you should play whichever you enjoy more. Edit: A cipher is a bit harder to compare a rogue to. I personally find it hard to imagine doing without a cipher because I like their abilities so much and find them unique. I love their combination of damage and CC with their own personal twist. Wizards can CC well too, but if you spec Aloth as mostly a Minor Blights build (as I saw you considering in another thread), he can still throw down a Slicken or something here and there, but a cipher may end up being the more reliable CC in your party if you want Aloth to focus on his Minor Blights. I would personally make the choice between the rogue and ranger, and keep the cipher either way. That's my take. Cheers!

I think rheingold's advice is reasonable, I'd just like to elaborate on what he said about rogues not requiring high might. It helps to understand the rationale behind that thinking, which is that all damage bonuses in PoE are additive, not multiplicative, including Might and even crit bonuses. In other games, a crit might really do 1.5X or 2X damage, but in PoE, it will just add 50% (or 100% with certain weapon types). So if you had 10 Might and no other bonuses at all (which is literally impossible with a rogue, as long as you qualify for Sneak Attack), a crit would do 1.5X damage, and might would raise your damage as much as you'd assume it would. However, as you add 50% (Sneak Attack) + 100% (Deathblows) + 15-45% (weapon quality enchant) + 25% (Blinding or Crippling Strike) + possibly other sources like talents or crit "multipliers" that are actually additive, Might becomes an increasingly small % of your total damage. That's why, while Might will still do something for a rogue, you could end up better off leaving Might and Int at 10 and putting more in Per and/or Dex instead. That is true, even if you are against dropping stats below 10 for RP reasons.

Do the twinned arrows always both attack the same target or not? If they do, then it is 75%. There are four cases, represented with A and B denoting a successfully applied effect with one or the other arrow: 1) AB 2) Ax 3) xB 4) xx It is the same type of problem that you have to determine the chances of a dominant trait being passed on by two parents having one copy each of the allele (50% chance per parent, since genes come in pairs). The child has a 75% chance of inheriting the trait, because the only way for him not to inherit it is for neither parent to pass it on. A Mendel square to calculate odds of a "dominant" effect (you only need one copy of it) being "passed on" from "parents" (the arrows) to "child" (the poor enemy)... a little unorthodox, but it works .

Unless you are playing with Expert mode, there's an interface option to show dispositions in dialogue choices. This can ruin the immersion for some gamers, but if you don't mind, it will let you know what the "best" choice is for your order in dialogues. My advice is to keep another save every so often, or at least cycle between three or so saves, and check your character sheet frequently, to make sure you don't have a negative disposition. If you get one, you could just reload, and sometimes from the last autosave is enough. Edit: Keep in mind Faith and Conviction bonuses won't be added in either your character or inventory screen, until after combat starts (within about a second after).

+5/10/10/10. That's from +3X2 for having the max bonus that counts toward Faith and Conviction -1 from the disfavored.

That's a good point and suggestion to consider. That said, it has a few tradeoffs: 1) The obvious auras not reaching everyone 2) Ranges on some spells/abilities even for ranged classes requiring them to waste time running forward if they weren't a bit closer to begin with 3) Range on most buff and heal spells not covering everyone As a compromise, I have my custom formation with Aloth and Grieving Mother furthest back (but not at the very back, so the aura will still cover them with maxed Int), and Durance and Hiravias one row in front of them. This still leaves quite a bit of space between my PC paladin tank + Eder, and the ranged. This allowed very controlled fights outside a small % pre-2.0, but I should note that I haven't tested it post-2.0 yet, and I know there have been AI improvements that could potentially reduce the % of fights that remain easily controlled this way. Another thing worth mentioning, about aura size, is that there is a pair of boots from a Dyrford Village merchant that increase paladin aura size by 20%, which might allow for a more spread-out formation and/or a few points less of Int, while still covering your whole formation.

You're referring to Strange Mercy being overrated I assume. I basically agree. For the OP, what it comes down to is that it requires the paladin to be the one to land the killing blow. For a tank, this would require careful micromanagement, certain offensive talents, and well-timed ability uses to pull off reliably. Compare this with just having the Moon Godlike passive ability, which triggers exactly when it's most beneficial without any need for thought. Some consider it OP.

Ravenwing really is that awesome considering how early in the game you can get it. I'm sure plenty of two-handers will eventually out-damage it though, especially after enchants. Though I haven't played any two-handed melee weapon user past Act 1, I am basing this off the fact that other one-handers can eventually outdo Ravenwing, such as Cladhaliath. When you say you've looked through the two-handers in the game, are you using the Wiki or what? Are you factoring in enchants? Expansion weapons including Soulbound ones? I ask because I'd be really surprised if one of the popular two-handers like, say, a properly enchanted Tall Grass, St. Rumbalt, or Tidefall, couldn't out-damage Ravenwing. But if Ravenwing happens to be more damaging than the two-handers you've come across by the time you get it, I say have fun with it until you get something clearly better.

Welcome! First, there have been a number of recent threads started by other new players that were looking for similar advice about paladins. Among them, there's this one and that one, which are both about the current state of things post-2.0 (the big patch with the types of changes you're referring to). The type of stat spread you mentioned would work well. If you check out those threads, you'll see a lot of different opinions. Personally, I'd prefer to max Res (mostly for deflection, concentration, and dialogue options) and Int (to be as sure as possible that my auras will cover my entire custom formation, to have long buffs, and dialogue options). There are a pair of boots you can buy from a merchant in Act 2 that increase your aura range by 20%, but my preference is to be free to wear something even better. I'd dump Dex personally, because as a tank you just won't get much mileage out of attacking faster, compared to the benefit it would grant to a DPS-focused character. I'd rank Mig higher than Dex, because it makes your heals stronger too, and any Per Encounter or Per Rest abilities that you wouldn't be able to do more times per encounter no matter how much Dex you had. Con has also become more important post-2.0, since tanks are squishier in general (because, among other things, you can't get as much deflection but enemies usually have more accuracy, due to the Per change as well as some item and talent nerfs). I'd personally keep Per at 10, both so my Reflex score wasn't completely terrible, and because scrolls and a couple of good abilities do benefit from accuracy. To summarize the above paragraph, I don't have the game loaded up, but I'd have min Dex/10 Per/max Int/max Res, and whatever was left probably to Str more than Con. As long as you ended up with at least 10 Con, you'd be pretty fine this way. Edit: Basically, in that first thread I linked, the first person who replied quoted a build that dumped both Dex and Per. As Torn and others noted, that build's biggest weakness would be low Reflex. I'd take that build and bring down Con and/or Mig to have 10 Per. Now, whether you have 18 Str/10 Con, 14/14, or 10/18... you could make a case for any such variant that had at least 10 Con. What difficulty are you planning to play, and will you try to go with a full party of six or not?

Thanks, I forgot to mention that autopause option. Yes, that's yet another good thing to know about so you can avoid having multiple mechanics, and put those points in something better for those other characters (like Lore). As for the secrets, you say some of them appear outside of scout mode now. Do some still require scouting?

The attack speed bonus doesn't double just because there are twice as many weapons. Yes, it affects both weapons. If it only affected one weapon, it'd work out, on average, more like if it were a 10% bonus. So, in fact, attack speed buffs are equally good whether you have one weapon or two.

Righteous Soul is extremely valuable for any paladin. I would definitely rank it higher than Deep Faith. Sure, Deep Faith is more widely applicable, but it's a drop in the bucket in comparison. The various types of mind control are widely considered the most annoying/difficult aspects of this game. While a minority of all fights feature them, and many of these can successfully be controlled by CCing the enemy before they can CC you, there will almost certainly be times where you will be very glad if your paladin does get mind controlled but only briefly and can come right back into the action. If you are looking for alternate talents you could drop for Righteous Soul, if you do decide to drop Strange Mercy for Sword and Shepherd and be less concerned about landing the killing blow, keep in mind that you could also safely drop Bloody Slaughter. Bloody Slaughter is not a very big boost to DPS overall, since it applies to such a small endurance range, so is only really worth a talent point if you're trying to trigger on-kill effects. And if you decide not to focus on on-kill effects, you could drop Inspiring Triumph as well. Of course, at this point, your play style would be significantly affected. In the end, especially since you're not playing PoTD, go whichever route you enjoy more. Cheers!

Or you could have Mechanics only on a front row character. Or you could switch between two formations if your mechanic is normally in the back row, one formation with him in front instead, for scouting dungeons without leaving the rest of your party too far behind. There are multiple ways to overcome this problem.

Mechanics has two effects on traps: it determines which traps you can disarm, and it improves accuracy with the ones you set. There is no direct damage/effect scaling, but the +accuracy indirectly increases the average effects simply by shifting the miss/graze/hit/crit table. I've been reading for a long time (since way before 2.0) that seals were changed from traps to hazards in some patch, and haven't been affected by Mechanics since. To be fair, I can't be 100% sure this is true, I just know I've read it a whole lot, so for all I know I could just be spreading very popular misinformation .

To be clear for everyone reading this, the accuracy malus from any shield larger than a small shield affects spells as well. What Ymarsakar describes is ok, however, if his Wizard is only casting self buffs and then auto attacking with a conjured weapon. This causes him to temporarily lose the deflection bonus (and accuracy malus, and any enchants) of the shield, but the conjured weapons are very strong so, if built for it, this can work well. So the purpose of the shield for him is simply to raise his deflection while he is self-buffing before conjuring the weapon.

Those recommendations were thought up, as everything else was, by game designers. It reflects their vision, which doesn't always translate perfectly into how things actually work out once the whole game is programmed and put together. If you want to play the game according to how the designers originally envisioned things, nobody is stopping you, but then why ask advice from players who have actually experienced how things work out in practice? Some posters, like KDubya and jsaving, have outlined very good rationales to your question based on how things actually work. First, no need for the all caps. People are trying to be helpful here. Second, anything that works for the hardest difficulty will also work for lower difficulties. That is why posters have been mentioning their experience with PoTD. It's not because they haven't been listening to you, it's because it shows an even higher level of certainty that their advice will work for you in any difficulty. Third, as others have mentioned, since not even PoTD requires min-maxing, it follows that lower difficulties don't either. Therefore, "do whatever makes you happy" is honestly about the best advice anyone could give you for the non-PoTD difficulty you intend to play on. If you still desire advice, there is plenty you can soak up that's already been written for you on this thread, as long as you're not resistant, and realize that advice for harder difficulties certainly won't lead you wrong in lower difficulties.

In some patch long before 2.0, priest seals were changed from traps to hazards, so they haven't benefited from Mechanics for quite a while.

Welcome! A few people have asked similar questions lately. This thread is recent and discusses cipher builds for 2.0 and TWM (The White March). This is a summary of my thoughts on cipher stats for 2.0/TWM. For a ranger, I'd probably max Mig/Dex/Per, but unlike cipher, rangers don't need Int so much. I might even dump Int and put the leftover points in Con/Res. This is unless Wounding Shot has been changed so its DPS remains constant instead of going down with more Int. Does anyone know if Wounding Shot (and other DoTs) finally have constant DPS as a function of Int, instead of constant total damage? In any case, ciphers remain strong and popular. They were OP in early game versions, but got tuned to a more reasonable (but still powerful) level long before 2.0. Not much has changed for them in 2.0, aside from Perception granting Accuracy and thus being more valuable for all ranged classes. For ciphers, bows vs guns is mostly a matter of personal preference. The first thread I linked goes into more detail, but the short answer is you can be strong whichever weapon type you choose, as long as your talents reflect this choice (e.g. appropriate weapon focus, Gunner for guns obviously, Penetrating Shot for Blunderbuss or Hunting Bow). Rangers were generally considered relatively weak before, but compared to ciphers, they got significantly improved in 2.0. Not only are their pets stronger and scale better, but they also got a new modal that shoots two arrows instead of one (which cannot be used with guns). While I haven't done the math to see if there's a clear winner in weapon types for hunters now, my money would be on bows probably pulling ahead in overall DPS due to this new modal compared to the other two modals. Wounding Shot would do more DPS with guns, but that's only two shots per encounter, and I'd be surprised if it was enough to make up for not being able to shoot twice, even for relatively short encounters. Keep in mind, the above paragraph about rangers is largely speculative, as I have not actually tested the changes myself, I only know that they look good on paper. I'm more familiar with ciphers in general, so I'll defer to whomever has actually played rangers in 2.0.

Wow, whaddya know? Times, they are a-changin . To the OP: Personally, I'd probably have 10 Mig, still 10+ Con but maybe not that high, dumped Dex, maxed Int, 10 Per, and maxed Res. OFC, though I played 1.0.6 pretty extensively including beating PoTD, I still haven't played much in 2.0, so my thoughts may or may not change. My thinking on the maxed Int vs 10 Per: for Int, I value both long buffs and large auras, I want to be free to wear boots other than the aura-increasing ones, and I want to be sure my aura covers everyone in the custom formation I prefer, whether things get bunched up or spread out due to the nature of the fight. The 10 Per would be because FoD has a built-in +20 Accuracy anyway, and I see my paladin as mostly a tank/support. YMMV. Alas, I do not have a definite answer to your main question about whether attack speed on weapons and frenzy stack. Edit: Oh, I almost forgot: have you considered Darkozzi? Their Inspiring Liberation talent is very popular. You can use Liberating Exhortation (whether or not the ally has an affliction to be liberated from) to give them +10 Accuracy, and it stacks, so you can apply it twice to the same ally. The flame shield on FoD is not as raved about, I haven't tried it and IDK if it's good enough to justify a talent point for, but I figured it was worth mentioning anyway.

Yeah, and then there's Con. I'd be tempted to go with 10 Con and 10 Res for soloing, but then I'd have to make some significant DPS or area sacrifices. I wonder if Int can be safely dropped to 10 for soloing. Would range of Carnage be less important for soloing than for a party, since enemies will bunch around you to an even greater degree, or would it still make a significant difference for hitting 2nd row enemies?

lol I kept a save just before every level-up, so I'd have to replay as little as possible if I wanted to take a different spell/ability/talent. Of course now there's a respec feature, but the good news is I still kept a save from just before leveling to 12 :D.

You don't get interrupted too much with dumped Res? Just curious. I wonder what my stats should look like if I were going to try soloing one on PoTD...

You're welcome, but keep in mind, neither of us have tested this racial ability specifically to be 100% sure. In any case, have fun and good luck!