Teioh_White

Yeah, I agree with pets not dying all that often for me in PotD. If the fox is dropping, it's normally towards the end. Though I do always use 3 melee's up front with it, so it's rarely being swarmed. The only times it goes down for a long period of time is if I failed to micro and the AI decided to position it so the pet is tanking most the mobs, or during the longer, harder fights. Pet also makes a great target for Pld's once a battle Revive, as it doesn't matter how often it dies, since infinite health. It does do good damage, but I am curious exactly how much, just if we wanted to compare raw dps. Unbuffed/linked level 14 fox has 97 Acc, and I'd assume it's 'weapon' is a slow one, and has 15 dex for a decent +15% speed. I guess the big question to test is if the Companions damage comes from a high base damage, or a high mod. If high base, makes the talents boosting pet damage very important, and group mod buffs like Blessing and Devotion get increased value. The opposite is true if it's just a high natural mod. I do really like rangers though, for giving that extra body up front while still able to quickly choose targets if needed. And the stun they give is great, especially later with 4 arrows an attack with Twinned, as it's a real stun, not a weapon stun. Meaning it'll give the team +30 acc on the target, so essentially +40 for the pet. And Stormcaller can proc more stuns on top of that to really make the ranger great for 'buffing' the party and being the spotter for the team.

Alright, this has to be trolling, you're missing the point so widely and reasoning so poorly, it can't be serious. We're talking about 35 acc? So we're basing how good a class is on what classes do on level 3 in the Eothas Temple? A very brief time of the game? When clearly my entire post was about Act 3+? As I mentioned it didn't apply in Act 1? And Act 2 is a sidequest fest to gear and level everyone up? (It'd be 41 acc, and you're likely getting another +10 from a flank, by the way, even with base Perception. 31 on the Carnage.) And everyone struggles with that on level 3. Figher? +5 acc and 7% graze-> isn't a massive game changer, especially considering what an extremely brief portion of the game this is. And just to re-iterate how silly this comment is, attempting to argue against the ability to easily activate on-crit properties by bringing up a portion of the game where there are no on-crit weapons is just...it's not good. What Accuarcy/Hitpoint/Deflection distinction? You mean the +-10 max at the start? It's not a large deal, and matters less and less as the game goes on. As I said, meaningful distinction; by level 12, if no one's using class talents and has same gear/stat spread/talent choice, we'd barely notice the difference with how much acc we pile on through gear/growth/buffs/debuffs as the game goes on. Compare Barb to Fighter and Rogue? (These classes also suck compared to the casters, by the way, and yes, it's a problem we can't compare the martial classes to the casters....though I don't think you grasped it's not just Barbs.) Alright, we'll run down what those classes do compared to a Barb. We'll say the Barb is 10 Might, 10 Con, 18 Dex, 18 Per, 17 Int, 3 Res (If wanting to use Barb as a tank, obviously trade More Per/some Int for Res, but so would the other classes to a lesser degree if you wanted to use them for that). Rogue is +1.2 damage mod, +13 acc, +10% crit, and well say a +0.3 mod from might due to not needing Int. That's pretty much the entirety of worthwhile traits being a Rogue brings to the table. Also has 50% less HP, for what it's worth. (The rest of the class talents are negligible.) Oh, and rogues? To get that that 1.0 mod? Need two debuffs on the mob, so if talking Rogue, we're talking debuffing the mob. (which is smart, everyone should do it every fight). What's a Fighter doing over a Barb? +0.25 Mod, +13% Speed, +10 Deflection, and again, +0.3mod from might. Also 25% less health. The rest of fighter's abilites are either useless per rests, negligible single target per encounters, worthless per encounter buffs, stances with penalties, and niche passives. Figther really gets the short end of the stick, and I've no clue how anyone thinks it has something over another class. What's a Barb getting in exchange for not having those advantages? 20 sec of +0.12 mod +20% speed per enc, +2 DR, and of course, a 2.25m Aoe attacks at -0.35mod damage. Also has a self only Lay on Hands and a +0.2 mod if using as a tank, and a somewhat sketchy 13% speed boost talent we'll just ignore, as it's inconsistently there. (but not just rendered useless, like Fighters Confidant aim, for what it's worth). It seems Barbs doing just fine by that standard, but lets just try some numbers for fun to be sure. We'll just look at the damage output, to bias it a bit against the utility a Barb brings to a fight compared to a Fighter and Rogue (which is hard to weight precisely). Let's use some of the stronger damage weapon set in the game, Dual Sabers, and do it on level 12, no Durgon Steel (in-game wise, this is about the point all the bounties are done and about 2/3rd through Act 3, with entire Endless Paths and WM to go). And since it's damage we care about, we'll toss in Merciless Hand (or just assuming later Durgon Steel), so a rogue will settle at an average about 4.0 mod(1.0(base)+0.2(Reckless)+0.2(Savage)+1.0(Death)+0.3(Might)+0.85(crits)+0.45(Superb), which on 80 deflection mobs ends up about 96 average damage with 2xlash before DR(x1.25) a swing. And as I mentioned, really, most mobs are more in the 57-73 Deflection range, so will really be higher than that due to more crits.(Level 12 Rogue acc would be about 136= 63(base)+6(focus)+12(weapon)+8(Reckless)+10(Per)+5(a blessing)+30(mob needs two debuffs for Sneak attack) -5(Savage). So, about 60% crit rate, and converting an additional 8% with rogue talent. A fighter? It ends up at a 128 Acc under Sneak attack conditions (which you have to include if talking Rogue), so crits coming 50% of the time, with 50% hits, giving an average final mod of 3.0, so counting the speed boost about 81 a swing pre DR (x1.41) A Barbarian? Main hit under Death Blow conditions has 123 Acc, so only 40% crits. Post crit average mod is only 2.3, so 55 damage pre DR(x.1.25) Looks a lot worse, right? But that's where Carnage comes in, giving AoE 118 acc attacks, losing about .5 mod between carnage penalty and less crits (30%), so 1.8 mod. So 43 damage, pre DR(x1.25). Rogue is besting fighter's damage comfortably, so we'll compare it to that. One target, clearly Barb is blown away, which it should, as single target melee range damage is rogues Niche. Lets move into Barb's niche, and let the AoE work, say two extra targets. Now the mobs need a DR of 18 for the Rogue to break even in damage. (Which is a lot less mobs than you'd think) Add a 4th mob? 23 DR, which pretty much just makes Barb bad for clearing a room for of Animats. So...Barb does damage just fine, and for most classes, the only thing making it any squisher is just minus 10 Deflection (Of course, it still has at least a 25% health advantage over of all but the monk). And these numbers just favor Barb more the higher you push the acc and mod. And I was conservative here, this isn't including RNG hands of accuarcy, ranger stuns, food or inn bonuses, priest buffs, potion use, rage, teamates with acc weapons, etc. And this is entirely ignoring that all those mobs are also getting interrupted to slow damage, and if using a stun build, likely getting stunned. Which is very, very easy to do. (Yes, I play on PotD. By act 3, most mobs deflection is debuffed into the 10-30 range at best). I don't see anything wrong with Barb compared to the non-casters, unless your idea of the game comes from solo Act 1 fun times.

A good reason not to dump Int on a Pld is so you don't have to use the Boots, or especially the Ring. The ring is generously +2 Int, when instead you could put a +3 stat ring there that also gives saves, or a Deflection/Protection ring. Boots aren't quite as bad...unless you've actually found enough Boots of Speed, in which case, definitely don't want to waste a boot slot for 3~ Int. Also, not caring about Pld buffing anyone else with their Aura shows....questionable reasoning. Rangers of course should dump Int, as should Fighters. Rogues as well, a big boon of all 3 of those classes is the ability dump Int. Monk's can get away with as well, as pretty much only Swift Strikes wants it, and it's a judgement call if 3.5 seconds of Swift Strikes is worth +7 acc. (Not really an open-shut case like the first 3). I can't see dumping it on a Chanter at all, and same issues apply to the ring and neck for them; i.e., instead of wearing ring, take 2 points from some other stat, and get +2 int, and you'll have better results than wearing the ring. In addition to removing the ability to hit the entire team with buffs, or enemy with debuffs, also would reduce the chanter to just one full time chant, or having a gap with a buff down, which is a bit of loss. (it'll drop Flame Lash song from 14.5sec to 11 sec in length). No clue what you mean by Chants not needing Int duration; it directly increases Chant linger length. And sure, the summons have set duration, but the very nice para is a standard debuff, and will be one of the 4 invocations used in the game, knocking it from 8.7m+16sec to 3.7m+6sec duration. (Actually was one of more used one, as invocations come slower as you go higher, making it by the time I reach 5-6, the fight is too close to over to be worth a summon, so it's better to just 16 sec CC the remaining at 4 stacks. The 3 stack Phantom is my second most used, basically a long term dot+cc on a single mob, but generally too many mobs for single target stuff to be useful later on in a normal fight). But casters not being able to dump stats? I dump Resolve on every single ranged character, works out great. The only thing it matters a smidge on is ranged attacks, and the only time I ever noticed that being an issue was in the Skaen Temple, oddly enough. Really, casters can also dump Con more, as Health isn't as big a concern, as unlike the front-liners, they won't get much wear and tear in the course of a normal battle, only taking damage when stuff goes wrong.

I'll just repeat myself a bit; Pretty silly for anyone to think Barbs are a bad class. A bit limited in what they do, sure, but they're amazing at what they do, i.e. mow down packs of trash at melee range. And a large part of the combat in this game is mowing down packs of trash at melee range. I'd rather remove any other melee from my frontline than the Barb, just as they do so much good work in such a frequent part of the game. Of course, if folks think they're bad because they're trying to compare them to wizards, of course they are. Everything is lackluster compared to a wizard, and the other 2 casters + Cipher change are on the same curve. It's kinda funny how that strength pretty much entirely comes from Carnage as well. It's really only class abilites that create any meaningful distinction between classes in this game, due to everyone having same general talent pools, stat choices, gear selection, and stat growth. The rest of Barb's class talents are somewhat unfocused and negligible, but Carnage alone is so amazing it carries the rest. Sorta like the anti-fighter, who gets absolutely no help from their core talent, but gets a nice +.25 mod and 13% speed boost. (okay, it isn't that great. poor fighter). An easy enough 2.15 mod + aoe 1.5 mod adds up to a lot of damage on the incredible amount of trash in this game, even compared to a rogues 3.35. And that's not even taking into account the slowing of all incoming damage from the interrupts and stun. I'm really confused on how folks think it's some great task to crit things on PotD. Act 1? Sure, part of why it's the best part of the game. Act 2? It's just a bunch of tedious side quests that vomit gear and xp, letting classes safely nest and come out all overpowered for Act 3. And once in Act 3 and on to Act 4? It's no issue at all. Very few things outside the rare boss mobs break 80 deflection, the majority hang around the 60's. By 14, an unbuffed Barb sits around 90 acc, so Carnage swings at 85. Toss in one of the 3 blessings, and a single debuff from a caster, and wee, 30% crit rate. Add Durgon/Dire + another debuff (even just a flank)? Up to 50%, that can be set up every fight with minimal cost. And that's just the tougher things like Banshees, the majority of mobs are much easier to hit than that. And for the hard mobs, you'll always have someone hammering them with the Roar, giving them -30 to all defenses on top, so even those aren't impossible to crit.

I wouldn't say any weapon is best for a class, really, more based on what you want to do with the class. (Except Ranger, where clearly, it's Stormcaller all the way). I'll just list out what I normally use weapons that could be considered 'best' for practical builds. Also note, you'll need 3-6 weapons for the party, so even if one weapon in the list stands a bit above the others, you'll likely have room for both. Dual Wield: Damage Purgatory + Resolution- Dual Sabers for high damage trait +crit enchant, which is 3rd best damage enchant, and space to be made Superb. Spelltongue + March Steel - 33% more base attacks than above, then boosted by 12.5%. Low base damage makes high damage mods +DR pen a necessity Monk Fist + Monk Fist - Fast weapon speed, but slow weapon damage combination makes up for lack of lash or enchantments. Control Rimecutter + We-Toki - Prone on crit, Speed to give 7% more damage/faster prone, inherent crit trait is one of the better weapon traits, and can be SuperLashed. Strike Hard + Godansthunyr - +5 acc to all attacking target, speed for faster stun/damage. Not as good as the above pair, as can't be SuperLashed, damage choice isn't as useful a weapon trait, and Stun on crit is actually a fake stun, and does nothing but CC the mob, with no stat penalty, while prone on crit is a real prone for +10 acc. Cladhaliath + Vile Loner's Lance - +5 acc to all attacking target, stun on crit, +10 acc to a friend or +4 acc +.25m for user. Spear +5 acc Trait is very nice for stun weapons as well. No speed mod, and can't SuperLash Cladhalith, are this pairs downside. Unforgiven + Shatterstar - 33% more swings to stun is pretty huge, and also 5% further boost through speed mod are the upside. Down side is low base damage, worthless weapon trait, no additional acc boost, and inability to SuperLash Shatter star. Two Hand: Not quite the clear dichotomy between damage and control here, as most of the great weapons do a little of both, or support. Damage/Support, but no Control Tidefall - Wounding is decent here, as slower swing lets it get minimize wasted dot time, making it 15%~ or so post mod boost. Draining has limited use, but not worthless. Can be given SuperLash. Choice of Damage remains lacklaster weapon trait. Blade of the Endless Paths - 13% post mod boost from speed, +10 acc to one ally on nearest target, and +5 post mod damage on top with very nice Estoc trait. Inability to SuperLash limits it from breaking out, and limiting it more to builds trying to take advantage of the marking effect. Llarawen's Stick - 13% post mod boost form speed, and Reach trait lets one shed armor for me attacks. Only 2hander with Speed+Superlash gives it a definite edge in damage over the rest. Control Hours of St. Rumbalt - Prone on Crit is still amazing, and crit enchant is still good, with room to SuperLash. Damage choice remains a somewhat meh trait. Basically the 2hand version of Rime+Toki. Tall Grass - Prone on Crit is great, 5% more Crits plays well into the plan, and Reach is a great trait lets one drop some plate for more damage to make up for lack of dmg enchants. Mabec's Morning Star - Stun on Crit is still nice, and Morning Star trait of stronger interrupts is great, as only need a hit for those. Best used in builds/party situations where crits won't be as likely. Sadly can't be SuperLashed. Ranged: Depending on how many ranged folks in party, or if using sub weapons for opening strikes, there might not be enough 'best' ranged weapons to go around for a party make up. Any old Arquebus/Arbalest enchanted up can fill in wholes, or course. Damage The Rain of Godagh Field - Warbow for higher base damage with speed enchant and can be SuperLashed. Simple and deadly effective. Lead Spitter - Rending is a massive boost for Blunderbuss, and penetrating shot is amazing. The speed penalty is lessened considerably by how much reload is of the attack equation, and unlike the other reloading weapons who only get +5 added to high base damage, Blunderbuss gets +30. Can also be SuperLashed. Stormcaller - Amazing weapon, chance of extra damage procs, plus 6 DR penetration on a fast weapon. Downside is no Lash, but damage can be boosted with Heart of the Storm talent to compensate. Control Puitente med Principi - Fast speed, knocks down on crit. Not much damage here, but lets a caster help a stun plan after tossing out the buffs/debuffs. Rod of Pale Shades - Slow Speed, Stun on crit, +5 acc to all attacking target. Lesser stat effect and slower speed brings it down, but bonus team acc is nice. Support Lenas Er - Rending is a nice dmg boost on fast weapons, and it gives team wide +5 acc, as well as being SuperLashed. Lowbase damage and only one damage mod prevents it from being a high damage weapon on its own. Cgadob's Hazel - Marking, to give a caster/damage focused ranged a 10 acc boost, and fast attack speed to keep up with updating new targets. Not much damage to add to party though. Pliambo per Casitas - +5 group wide acc on target, additional +10 to a heavy ranged unit, as well as high damage associated with Arquebus. Downside is slow attack speed can make it hard to keep up on every target when team is mowing through enemies. Scon Mica's Roar - Subtly one of the best weapons in the game. Gives +30(!) acc to the entire team on the target, and gives a partial boost to itself on the opening shot, as well. Downside is same as above, long shoot times limits it's use in high target situations, but on anything with substantial, this will let the team tear it down. Pretty much if using any of the above as part of team/build playing to its strengths, any of this will do as a classes 'best' weapon, at least I've found.

Thanks for the list, Sensuki. I'd never heard of four of those. I especially love the Dark Sun setting, so looking forward to a game set in there. As for Dota, it's great if you love it. Endless entertainment, which doesn't look to be going anywhere. My best friend has quite literally become addicted to it, and I tried really hard to like it and played with him for 6 months. Didn't matter how hard I tried though, I just do not care, at all, for the gameplay of Moba's. (an aside, don't really talk to my friend anymore outside sparse texts, as he literally spends 70+ hours a week in Dota)

The main issue I have with that is Blind is a pretty easy debuff to toss on mobs as is, so it's normally unnecessary. All Druid, Wizard, and Cipher have a level 1 blind spell, so by the time Nightshroud is an option, perma blind for the team is in play, perma blind on whatever the group is burning down is a go. Now, if not playing with any of those 3 classes, it's value goes up quite a bit, as no one else really has effective every fight blinds, and Blind is a really nice debuff.

I don't think I've cleared that fight without a little cheese. Normally, that mans I'm tapping into OP lore skill with Moonwells and Revive scrolls, but another good way is to just have the team back by the door and pull them into the doorway, limiting who the mobs can hit while setting them up for nice AoE.

Speed enchant on a 2hander will be about 13% post Mod+DR damage. Rending on a 2hander is 3 damage/.175 mod. The break even point is about 24 damage final damage per hit, which a 2hander be breaking with relative ease, though it's a bit close due to neither having a Lash. A conservative mod at endgame for 2hand is about 2.3 on 2hand base average of 17, so adding in Rending an Estoc is starting out at about 45. So, I'd say on targets below 20 DR, Endless Paths is better. And likely a smidge higher as well, as it saves you a dragon eye, and gets the somewhat hard to calculate boost of marking. (Which varies in effective damage added based on your team set up.) And the more buffs/debuffs you include will push it even further in the Endless Blades favor, of course, making it a pretty narrow market for Drakes Bell.

My druids I spend 4 feats on the shift, with Wild+G.Wild+Focus+Two weapon fighting. Savage attack is annoying to click on and off, and V.attack isn't much of a dps increase as Spirit shift hits close to the 50 damage a hit to make it a draw. After that, I always take Heart of the Storm, as Druid has nice lightning spells. The last two spots are chosen from either Fire or Ice, depending on what level 1 spell you prefer to spam, and a bonus level 1 spell. I do Ice myself, as Winter Wind is decent damage and can semi CC by itself. Sunbeam spam is also nice though, smaller radius, but easier to aim, and can blind. Once per encounters are dropped, I'll just pick both Fire and Ice boosts though.

Just out of curiosity, what games released in the last 5-6 years have catered to your prefrences? I've got a lot of issues with PoE myself, even lots of the same ones you have (insufficent interface, poor use of micro, very underwhelming story), but I still play it largely because of how underwhelming it's competition in the field has been. If something's out there I'm missing that's really good, I want in on that. I've got some hopes that PoE 2 benefits from the experience of PoE and doesn't just get a remix of the combat system, and gets more attention paid to it than what backers gave (I'd also prefer backer stuff not bleed over in-game, but that ships sailed). Wouldn't hurt if they could actually get MCA to write it, either.

What the hell is rest spamming? You mean resting very now and then at an inn or camping? You make it sound like its a sacrificial sin It's official everyone wizards suck because you have to rest That's a pretty big reading comprehension fail right there, considering I said the exact opposite. Wizards lock down a battlefield currently, no matter one's approach to resting. As for getting those on-crit weaposnt o work, If using a Priest and a Wizard/Cipher/Druid, it's pretty trivial to get down into high crit range, even for carnage hits with its -10 acc. Everyone gets +13/18 acc from weapon+focus, depending on Savage Attack, plus another 5~ from one of the 3 blessing effects. Add in 5 from Gauntlets, 2 from a perception enchantment, and we're at 25 free acc over the base. Add in +20 acc from a caster tossing a blind with a level 1 spell, and a priest tossing in a Blessing, and suddenly we're in the 50% crit range with minimal cost and effort. And the Stuns don't need to crit, as they'll get reapplied so fast, and it won't outright miss very often on a status effect. Works for everyone, no need for the 15 seconds of power to start off every fight, that costs 2 +X Barbs in talents, and only applies to the barbs. And can pile Flanking/Stuck/Para/Prone/Petrify onto the blind as well to really work the formula if needed, as well.

^ That's pretty much it, unless you're rest spamming (or a Wizard) total battlefield control isn't feasible every fight. And that's where the barb comes in, essentially tossing out 35~ damage interrupting+stunning 2.15m ~ aoe every round, forever and ever. Actually goes very well with those above caster moves, as the caster can spend one spell slot to open a fight and CC a bunch of things, then the rolling wave of stunlock cleans everything up.

Pretty silly for anyone to think Barbs are a bad class. A bit limited in what they do, sure, but they're amazing at what they do, i.e. mow down packs of trash at melee range. And a large part of the combat in this game is mowing down packs of trash at melee range. I'd rather remove any other melee from my frontline than the Barb, just as they do so much good work in such a frequent part of the game. It's kinda funny how that strength pretty much entirely comes from Carnage as well. The rest of Barb's class talents are somewhat unfocused and negligible, but Carnage alone is so amazing it carries the rest. Sorta like the anti-fighter, who gets absolutely no help from their core talent, but gets a nice +.25 mod and 13% speed boost. (okay, it isn't that great. poor fighter). A 1.95 mod + aoe 1.3 mod adds up to a lot of damage on the incredible amount of trash in this game, even compared to a rogues 3.25. And that's not even taking into account the slowing of all incoming damage from the interrupts and stun. That said, a Brute Force based approach isn't necessary at all for a Barb to work right, nor even ideal. All those on-crit stun weapons are great for all classes, not just Barb, and they don't work the Fort formula. And neither do Barbs need to work the Fort formula, as it's so easy to work the deflection formula, which all martial classes will benefit from. Granted, I haven't played 2.03 yet, so I don't know if the old plan of '4 dudes with stun weapons up front, some dude blinds them, stun lock everything to death' plan is a no go against mobs due to immunities. Now attacking a reflex score would be the bees knees for some melee talent, as that generally gets the same deflection hit, with a bonus on top.

Well, Wizards are clearly the best class, no real question there. Druids and Clerics are great as well, but don't have the same number of obviously overpowered spells as the Wizard. Ciphers are extremely powerful as well, if going strictly by what's in the game. Unlike the Casters however, whose class is just set up to be powerful, Cipher is mostly balanced outside of a few hilarious cheesy powers. Don't select those powers, and it's an interesting and balanced class. Ranger/Rogue/Barbarian/Chanter/Monk/Paladin are pretty well balanced, and wouldn't say one's better than the other. They all just do different things well, and get roughly the same value to a team, which is what you want balance to be. Fighter's pretty much the only class in need of an increase in power, which it looks like 2.03 will be supplying.

I normally do Slow mode with no pausing, except for one auto pause at the start of combat.

Flat out immunity for some mobs isn't exactly the solution I'd prefer, but it'll be better than what we have right now. Good to see this stuff run over on Something Awful first, though.

It's difficult to do in semi-open world that IE games have. Something like Wizardly style dungeon crawlers, it's easy to do. You enter whatever the dungeon/level is at full strength, and you have to clear it with minimal or no replenishing resources, making management essential. If it's not going to happen, can just hit 'restart level', and it'll start over right before one enters the dungeon/level. IE style core gameplay mechanics can work in such a system, but they're all a little too 'loose' in the worlds at the moment to have such clear demarcations on what a 'level' would be. PoE for example, the endless dungeons could easily work in such a system, but wandering around Defiance Bay for that horrible sidequest-fest first half of Act 2? Bit of a non starter, considering how amorphous it is. A per encounter system like BW did in Dragon Age 1-2 works better in the semi-open world state of IE games. The only modern RPG I can think of that really does 'levels' was Shadowrun and the Souls series. And Shadowrun has never really tried to flex it's gameplay at all, and the Souls games veer too far off from IE to have many useful parallels. As for an issue with casters lower level spells getting weaker as mobs get tougher, it's a non issue as Caster's, 1. get new spells, as good or better at current level than old ones were at those. 2, still have their old spells, and while not as strong as they were, are still useful, and can be used in larger amounts to get the same effect on a fight as a newer spell...which gives them more staying power than they had at the start, 3. caster's are far from helpless in this game even when not casting, this isn't BG with a gimped THACO and terrible equipment choices and 4. part of the balance of the caster; it's trade off for being better than the others at time has to come from being lesser at other moments. Otherwise the game should just identify that Wizards will make the game considerably less challenging. (I think it was....Nox or something? That did a similar thing, but hard Fighter as the easy class). Or just scrap the system; plenty of systems for having good gameplay, and it's not so much important which one Devs pick, just to execute it well.

For my Pld's, I use Cladhalíath(great damage and +9 acc) or Shatterstar (50% stun opportunity, bleh damage) if they're both not being used by someone else, and the team works the deflection formula as part of it's plan. Otherwise, I go with Strike Hard to give the rest of the team +5 acc on the tanks target, along with it's solid enough damage from speed. Spelltounge's also nice, though I like to pair it with a Dual Wielder, since it's the rare (only?) weapon that affects both hands. Draining mods in general are underwhelming, and guard mods are more of a convenience than anything.

Yeah...again, that's the point. IE games had no restriction on resting, but their combat system is designed around the idea that resting is some limited resource. It's not supposed to be full heal after every fight. In reality, the player can do that with ease. The only restriction is any limitation the player puts on themselves....which is bad game design. And yes, Pillars, clearly based on those IE games, understood this. So it put in some very token restrictions on resting. But that's all it really is, token, and it's still largely up to the player how many fights will be in a 'day'. And if the Devs have no idea how many fights are supposed to be in a 'day', in a system where resources are doled out on a per day basis, it'll lead to untuned content, as they can't have a clue what the player is doing. There are solutions to this, of course, but as I said, no IE game, Pillars included, has made more than a token effort towards it.

Personally hate crafting most of the time, and pretty much in all those games you mentioned. Stuff like DA:I and NWN 2, crafting completely removes the concept of loot as a reward mechanism for fights/quests/exploration/money. I mean, sure, you can still have a crafting system on the level of those games and not ruin those aspects of the game, I've just not seen one implemented yet that does so. Not that I hate a crafting system, always nice to have more facets to a game. It just seems hard for devs to balance it between A. useless and easily ignored and B. completely takes over the game, sucking the life out of other facets. So, I like crafting, but want it implemented in a way that doesn't kill over other aspects of the game. As for the crafting in this game, it's alright, but so little choice it hardly feels like 'crafting'. Basically just choose what color you want a weapon to glow, and lets you upgrade old weapons to hang with new ones, if the old one had a decent enchantment on it, that is.

That's...pretty much my exact point, that IE games let you have unlimited rests. IE games are based around Vancian casting, which is a per rest system. This includes all the old ones. It's not like old IE games didn't have spell slots, per rest items, health, and fatigue and all that jazz based around per day. However, absolutely nothing was done to prevent rest spamming. It doesn't change the fact that the entire system was based on a per rest system, they just left it up to the player exactly how long an interval that's supposed to be, as little as every fight if they so wished. As was mentioned, it's always been sloppy design foisting that on the players. Pillars attempts to put some very slight limits on resting, as it understands IE games are balanced around resting, but it's just one of minor convenience, nothing substantial.

I completely agree with this. IE games are based and balanced around a resting system, but not IE game to date I've played has ever actually attempted to put any real limitations on resting. Which I agree, is incredibly sloppy, basically leaving the player to try to balance it themselves, which isn't something the Dev's should be foisting off on the player.

Hmm...that's strange, the only difference between Slicken and Call to Slumber is Call to Slumber is Foe only, 2.5x the length, and attacks Will. Beyond that, they have the same range and accuracy, and Reflex is an easier save to lower compared to will. They both produce the same effect, prone, so it's not like the mobs have Stability as an inherent passive. (Do any mobs have things like this? Would be a good idea to add such passives for more variety if not.) I can't really say why you'd have success with one, but not with the other. I myself often burn one Slumber in a fights one step up from trash (I went over above how per encounters let you get much more value out of higher level spell slots), as it buys the time to get the fight locked down entirely with per encounters. I .E, Slumber, Chill Fog for slow and reflex save hit, Slicken, aoe spam x2, repeat to win. The reason the tactic is less effective in White March is the enemies have some pulls that come in more spread out groups like the Brood Mother. Even 26 Int spells are missing a number of mobs in those fights, but not really because any inherent make up of the mobs. Not that it's every fight, even in WM it's still a small portion of the fights set up like that. If one doesn't mind adding cheese to cheese, can pull back to a choke point to accomplish a similar goal on the few fights that do. As for the arguments that trash fights are lame, and per encounters just let us push past them, that's sorta exactly why this discussion exists. I don't think anyone's terribly happy with trash encounters. Per encounters have a minimal impact on the 'tough' fights, unless you're going with very strict rest restrictions that don't always let a fresh rest right before them (I think found-supplies-only has maybe 30 rests max pre WM). They do have a huge impact on trash fights, and sadly, at this point, those style of fights are here to stay. I get the desire to just blow through trash, but right now, Casters get a huge leg up in that regard, as well as a huge leg up in the real fights. And that's the balance issue per encounters create: is it okay for casters to curb stomp the trash, and be the best in the 'real' fights?

It is pretty nice, on easy mode with the AI, the combat should largely just resolve itself, if that's not someone's cup of tea. Still shudder at playing back in 1.X, having to pause after every single kill to order dorks to attack dorks, unless it was the rare time 'select all, attack dork' was what I wanted to do. And manually reload 4 different weapon slots. That was fun too. As for me, I seek out the fights, as that's what I'm here for. The fight itself is my reward, the gear or whatever, meh, don't really care how I get, so long as I get to fiddle with it.