TheMetaphysician

Yes, those are mutually exclusive.

Here's a question that was asked on another thread, and no one answered: can you use the console to add subclasses to characters without them? (obviously, that's relevant for the in-game companions, but should be testable on a hired merc.) Anybody tried it, or willing to try it?

Here's a question: if a character has an inspiration AND a resistance to afflictions on the same stat, what happens when a first-level affliction on that stat is cast? Is the inspiration still removed, or does the affliction resistance protect the inspiration? For example, if a character has both Steadfast and a resistance to Resolve afflictions, would landing a Shaken on the character remove the Steadfast buff or not?

I would like to know the answer to this as well. Anybody know? Tried it with a beta merc, maybe?

Boy, I sure hope they don't nerf this too badly before I get a chance to play (or worse, in the middle of a playthrough). I love paladins, and I love the fact that there are so many good uses for paladins in this game, it seems.

Resolve doesn't give you Concentration like in PoE 1. You get concentration from spells and talents. For example each class can take the talent "Combat Focus" to get concentration on the start of the battle: concentration.jpg Thanks for all that info! especially the screenshots of the summon stats and commentary on them. What power level is that Combat Focus ability on?

Even if Res doesn't give concentration directly, would it help by increasing deflection and thus lowering the number of hits? In other words, do enemy abilities typically only interrupt on crit, or only interrupt on hit/crit? I literally just saw a youtube video mentioning that passive concentration ability; can paladins get it?

No, sadly not. It's just the usual burning lash of Shared Flames. But still: Mith Fyr + Shared Flames is great for summons' damage while you can stack Ancient Memory and Zealous Endurance (Robust AoE regeneration at later levels). Paladin/Beckoner is a great combo. I like to use a pike to lower enemies defelction and send all skeletons onto one target. In theory this should be great with Combusting Wounds. But at the moment it seems to do nothing? As soon as I saw this combo I decided I wanted to play it -- I was a paladin in the first game. For RP reasons, though, I'll be a Shieldbearer. And I have some questions for you about how it plays. As a Shieldbearer, I like being a tank, and so I thought I'd grab a large shield w/modal, shield style, a spear w/modal, and so get 3 engagement slots. I envisage battles going like this (unless I'm pulling the enemies to me with a scout): run up to the nearest guy, engage, activate shield/spear modals, then start the summoning/shared flames cycle you've described on this character elsewhere. I'm worried about two things that I wanted to ask you about: (1) How high is the danger of my summoning spells being interrupted? I'll have absurdly high defenses; will that prevent interrupts enough? (Should I boost Resolve to help with that?) (2) When you start casting the summoning spells, do you lose your engagements? I don't have the beta, so I don't know.

Thanks for testing it! Unless you got unlucky, looks like it doesn't work with shield. I'll be interested if anyone sees anything different.

Does the hit-to-crit conversion of one-handed weapon style apply when you have shield in the off hand, like it did in PoE 1? I know the 12-point accuracy boost doesn't apply (which isn't connected to the one-handed style ability choice), but does the ability itself?

Yeah, there's a paladin passive, Mental Fortress, that gives you resistance to intellect afflictions -- so the "confused" will be negated entirely. You can't get it until power level 4, which in a multiclass character is level 10. And there's a "holy slayer" (bleakwalker/assassin) build on youtube that looks really strong that I've seen linked a few times on these forums. You should check that out. Those are the two I've seen discussed so far on the forums. Edit: found the link to the holy slayer video:

Ok, great. Thanks for answering my questions. The paladin aura and so on are just +5 accuracy; is devotions still +20? Also, does the paladin accuracy aura stack with the fighter accuracy-boosting stance?

How important is the priest's devotions of the faithful? (by the way, what is the accuracy buff on that?) I kinda want to skip a priest and use chanters and paladins as support characters; will that be as optimal as using a priest?

A question for those who have played the beta: what things do you have to do different (either in character- or party-building or tactically) on PotD? (Other than just doing everything "better," as it were.) in PoE 1 you had to stack accuracy; is that true in Deadfire? (That would seem to make a Priest necessary, or close to it.) Anything else?

So...any druid/chanter synergy ideas?

Has anybody tried to build a druid/chanter? I'm trying to figure out how to build Takehu as one. Of course it doesn't help that we don't know what his special subclasses do. The problems is that I'm not seeing a ton of synergy; there are major opportunity cost problems if you have both druid spells and chanter invocations, because there just isn't enough time to cast all those spells. So perhaps it is best to focus on chants? I was thinking of casting the storm spells, then shift and use an offensive chant (soft winds, the weakening chant) when I wade into things; and then have lots of healing (ancient memory, lots of healing spells) from both classes to fall back on when I want to play more of a support role. What do you guys think? Is shifting good even if I'm not playing a shifter?

One thing that isn't clear from the wiki: can Shieldbearers get Flames of Devotion? I know they start with Lay on Hands; can they choose Flames on level up?

I agree. It makes going against my character for powerful gear a genuinely agonizing choice -- which is how it should be! It makes the role-playing part fun.

I haven't completed it either... I'm not sure what it is. I was enjoying it but i got to a point and whenever I boot up the game I play for about 5 minutes and can't bring myself to carry on. I've noticed that games have a certain kind of momentum. I've discovered I pretty much need to finish a game all in one continuous time period. If I stop for a while and try to come back, I've lost the immersion and the enthusiasm.

I pretty much always wait a while after a game releases to play it, if I can stand the suspense. With all the great post-release support that the best games get now, that means I'm playing a better game, and often if I wait long enough it will be cheaper. (That won't apply here, since I'm a backer.) For PoE, I'm more interested in the balance changes than bugfixes. I hate having my character build get nerfed in the middle of a playthrough (haven't had much luck turning off updates on Steam), and I usually only play through even games I love twice or so (time constraints). So I'll probably wait a while to play it. I'm ashamed to admit I haven't finished WM pt. 2 yet, so I have to finish that up.

Do you set triggering conditions for Rhyngrym's Repulsing Visage, or do you leave that one for manual control?

By the time POE 1 was tuned, enemies would run to your squishy backliners and ignore your tanks, so it was best to build a party with 6 characters who were all durable and could all deal damage. What is the enemy AI like in this game? Is a low-damaging tank character still pretty useless to the party, or do the AI attack such characters? How easy is it to protect your squishies?

I have the same dilemma!

Yeah, the only real hard counter for buffs are things like Arcane Dampener that explicitly remove inspirations. So you want that in your list, but at the bottom. Why at the bottom?

One of the features of this game I'm most excited about is the Dragon Age Origins-style customizable AI. When I played DAO, I spent hours writing routines, testing them, and reading about them. So I figured we needed a thread to gather in one place people's ideas for tactics and tricks with the customizable AI routines! I'm interested in any and all of the following (and more besides!): (a) general rules of thumb to follow, (b) easy mistakes to make when writing AI routines, © tricks that are specific to particular classes, abilities/spells, or combinations, (d) whole routines for characters or even party-wide strategies, (e) basic quality-of-life (rather than tactical) tricks, (f) discussions of which classes or character types lend themselves to control through AI routines and which need more micromanaging, (g) funny stuff -- AI routines gone wrong!