Boeroer

Who most definitely is the love child of Durance and Furrante...

If you have picked Weapon Focus already I would use Justice (Raedric's great sword). It has a "hidden" 10% crushing lash on top of its 25% crushing lash, both generate extra focus. But since lashes have to overcome 1/4 of (in this case crush) DR, the 10% lash can have a hard time penetrating. Against low DR foes it works well though and gives a bit of extra damage and extra focus, which is cool.

As @omgFIREBALLS already said: the fight is winnable without any DLC content. If you wait too long it might even feel too easy. Single target damage dealers like Rogues, Fighters, Paladins (unless they already have Sacred Immolation), Rangers etc. are not as useful in this battle because there will be so many enemies and targeting single enemies isn't as effective as targeting many. Although they can use spellbinding gear and scrolls of course. A high accuracy Fighter with good INT and MIG, equipped with Rotfinger Gloves for example is nice. Should you have a Rogue with Deathblows and high Lore then make sure a bunch of enemies suffers two afflictions that unlock Deathblows and then use a damaging AoE scroll (non-DoT) or spellbinding (Taluntain's Staff for Fireballs for example) with him: Deathblows will grant +100% dmg to those spells. AoE is king here, so bringing Wizard (Chillfog, Walls, Combusting Wounds, Kalakoth's Minor Blights + Blast/Citzal's Spirit Lance), Priest (Shining Beacon), Chanter (Dragon Thrashed), Druid (Relentless Storm, Overbearing Wave) and Cipher (see below) are good. Especially Ciphers can shine here because there's so many weak enemies to farm focus from - and then turning it into AoE CC and damage. Ring Leader or Amplified Wave are excellent tools in this fight (if you already have access to them). Monks with Torment's Reach and high INT as well as an Overseeing item are also very effective since it's easy to hit a lot of enemies at once. And it's also easy to get wounds... Barbarians can have good effect with an overbearing or stunning weapon and high INT - and if they already have Blood Thirst it should be a field day for them due to the many weaker enemies which will allow to proc Bloodlust and Blood Thirst often. If you have Heart of Fury already then combine it with a Wizard's Combusting Wounds and a dual weapon setup.

Disengagement triggering from repositioning inside enemies' threat range is also a problem in RTwP. It's a coin toss whether you get hit by a disengagement attack when you just circle the enemy or not (while basically touching them all the time). Like when you only want to get into flanking position. Currently it seems to be implemeted in a way that the distance of movement away from the enemy is significantly less than standard melee range. And this is (I guess) due to some problems that would occur if it was done in a different way: 1. It would require Disengagement Attacks to have a higher reach than normal melee distance. Maybe this would introduce additional problems (can't say). 2. You could move very freely inside enemies' melee range if they had a reach weapon. 3. When using melee ranges instead of some fixed "disengagement distance" you might also open Pandora's Box with reach weapons vs. disengagement again (which we had in the first beta over 10 years ago) where enemies just passing guys with reach weapons (within a distance between normal melee range and reach weapon range) got obliterated by Disengagement Attacks. But this would also mean that engagement itself is connected to melee range (which it currently is not - you'll notice that reach weapon also only engage at close distance, not at their reach distance). So using a fixed distance (not standard melee range) to determine whether a disengagement happend or not is good imo. But maybe that distance needs to be extended a little bit: still slightly less than standard melee range (in order to allow disengagement attacks to actually connect) but not so close that they get triggered while basically brushing the enemy. It also seems that the calculations which determine whether a disengagement happend or not are done with the center of characters' hit boxes/sprites/circles instead of with the edges. But that's just my assumption. Maybe a change there could help as well. That's a lot of "maybes" from me, heh... I think figuring out the perfect sweet spot was - and still is - very tricky. That's what you get when you use free motion/movement with high granularity instead of hexagonal or square tiles for movement.

No, that's only the second option I described with Force of Anguish. That one is def. about disabling. But the first one with Torment's Reach is one of the best melee damage dealers in the game. Torment's Reach is devastating against singular foes (the one for you target) because it has a 50% crushing lash (lashes are multiplicative damage bonuses, mich more potent than a 50% additive bonus such as Sneak Attack) AND it damages the enemies behind the initial one in a cone. It's also a Full Attack, meaning it gets executed with both weapons, one after the other. The cone procs twice then, too. Combine the lash of Torment's Reach with more lashes (Turning Wheel, Lightning Strikes, elemental lash in both weapons) and some additive damage bonuses (Might, weapon quality, Savage Attack, Apprentice's Sneak Attack for example) and you have one the most damaging, repeatable single target weapon attacks in the game. And on top it also wrecks more enemies in a cone. I like to use high INT because then it is way easier to catch additional enemies in the cone. That way I get most out of the 1 wound I spend. --- You can also build a strong ranged damage dealer with the Long Pain fists. At some point you will deal the damage of an arquebus per hit - but with very short recovery. --- A third way is to use a Fire Godlike and stack as many lashes that work with the burn retaliation of Fire God likes as you can (Turning Wheel, Blood Testament gloves etc.). It can reach over 100dmg with the lashes every time you get hit (if under 50% endurance). This goes on top of the usual melee damage with Torment's Reach then. I made a build around that idea: https://forums.obsidian.net/topic/87846-class-build-monksterlasher-elemental-lashing-retaliating-offensive-tank/

In PoE1 I generally like to optimize them for Torment's Reach (lots of INT and a dual weapon setup). It is very cheap and causes a truckload of damage. I like sabres with this but any heavy one hander setup is nice. But a focus on Force of Anguish is also nice (also high INT to prolong the already long-lasting prone). A single War Club of the Mataru can be very good because it's fast and has extremely high accuracy (+38 if fully leveled and used as single weapon). If you cause a crit, the prone effect of Force of Anguish will last even longer (+50%). Combined with high INT this becomes a very powerful CC tool. You just need to make sure that you gain enough wounds since FoA is pretty expensive in PoE1. You can also use a two handed weapon instead. Less accuracy but more dmg per hit. Llawran's Stick (quarterstaff) is nice bc. of reach and speed. Tidefall is very nice because while the enemy flies away and lays prone it still gets damaged from the DoT.

For the main character my favorite class is probably Monk. But I also like Barbarian and Druid a lot. Wizard is also cool... My personal ranking (not in terms of power but of enjoyment) for main character class might be: 1. Monk 2. Barbarian, Druid 3. Wizard 4. Priest, Chanter 5. Ranger, Paladin 6. Fighter, Rogue, Cipher I started a new turn based run with a melee Ranger (+Wolf) a few days ago.

I don't know. Nobody as far as I can tell.

Due to the way Deadfire processes damage maluses, in order to balance out a -75% dmg malus you'd need about +300% damage bonuses. I'm pretty sure you can't cobble that together consistently even as a Streetfighter. So I'd say it does somewhat matter. Though not enough to not be able to beat Dorudugan apparently.

I usually don't give wounding weapons to ciphers: the Wounding doesn't generate focus and for some reason that feels like a waste to me then (which is a bit silly because it still deals a lot of damage anyway). For the sake of efficiency I guess (and peace of mind) I prefer to give speed weapons to Ciphers - since that is nearly equally as good as Wounding (dps-wise) but it also generates more focus. This is especially important to me before casting Time Parasite (doesn't take as long to collect the needed focus I mean). For example I really like to use Blade of the Endless Paths with a Cipher on Time Parasite (I also like Marking as an enchantment in general, I think it's awesome). Or just the good old Llawran's Stick which you can get so early. With Durance's staff as backup (with the alternative burn dmg for when you encounter crush-immune foes) I think this is a pretty nice weapon setup for a melee Cipher. Reach allows for a bit more safety, too. A bit of Durgan Steel, a cast of Time Parasite: 0 recovery with dat smacky staff. The only gripe I have with that setup is the somewhat silly attack animation of quarterstaffs (sometimes looks like the char is swinging a sledgehammer onto an imaginary post in the ground or something). --- Btw. speaking of Marking: a Darcozzi Paladin with Shame or Glory + Cladhaliath + Coordinated Attacks + Inspiring Exhortation can be a really good wingman for a melee Cipher - one who can remove the struggles in boss fights: Inspiring Liberation (+10 acc), dual weapon Marking (+20 acc), Coordinated Attacks (+10 acc) and Zealous Focus (+6 acc) combined with Tactical Meld on the Cipher's side (+20 acc) lead to a whooping +66 accuracy boost for the Cipher. This lets him get decent focus against even the most defensive enemies... This can also work at range with a Darcozzi with St. Garam's Spark or Pliambo per Casitas and a ranged Cipher. You just put them close to each other to ensure the Paladin buffs the Cipher (and not some other party member standing near to the Paladin, attacking the same target). Then ofc. only one marking weapon applies (+56 acc). Dual wielding Shame or Glory + Cladhaliath is the only way to get two Marking stacks. Marking from two separate party members on a third one won't stack (although Marking stacks with anything else).

One of the best Cipher spells in fights with lots of enemies is def. Amplified Wave. It's a fast cast, causes 8 sec prone (base) and deals good damage (38.5 base) at the same time in a pretty big AoE (4m base radius from the ally you cast it on, usually the tank).

edit: sorry, weird double post

Oh, nice.

I think the biggest mistake of players who try Ciphers is that they use the damaging powers first and foremost. But imo that's the worst way to spend your focus. CC, especially the disabling kind, has much more impact than dealing damage. The most impactful CC effect is mind control (in PoE: confused, charmed, dominated) because it not only "disables" an enemy but even turns it into an ally. It's like disabling an enemy and calling forth a summon at the same time. If you can have both (cc + damage with one spell) that's great, too. But simply turning focus into plain damage is not (there are exceptions such as Disintegrate). Instead of dealing damage with a weapon in order to deal further damage with a spell you might as well continue to deal damage with the weapon (and get more focus). Why switch from weapon to spell if the outcome is basically the same? I am not a big fan of the Cipher's mechanic (weapon damage fuels spells) because the action economy is pretty bad and the focus generation suffers if you fight very strong enemies (when you need the focus most). They are the opposite of per-rest casters: cannot do much in easier fights (if you don't want to rest all the time) but really shine if the tough fights (when they can spam all those impactful spells without waiting for resources to build up). When retaliation still worked for generating focus it was the perfect solution for the action economy problem. Unfortunately the devs nerfed that: retaliation doesn't generate focus anymore.

I hope I don't come across nearly half as assy as most of the eoran counterparts do...