Boeroer

I had that since forever every time I pick Ocean Folk human. Literally every time - right from the start of the game. I think it has no effects except the buggy description. So I'm 99% sure it has neither to do with your imprintcheesomatics nor with fampyrs.

Once played a Berserker/Wizard with just that basic idea. Wearing this: The beard was a glitch which is now patched out. I think I ended up using the other dancer's outfit though with the leather leggins an sleeves. And the Scorched Cloak of course. Because it looked more metal of course. By the way: Berserker/Wizard with that setup has an easy time casting Combusting Wounds on himself. It's not gamechanging but fun. I wonder how (confused) Shining Beacon with a Berserker/Priest would be...

Acute Rash is just the most convenient to get imo.

It's been quite some time and I didn't do this fight often solo (and never with a Wizard) but I'd say buff up with defensive stuff + Alacrity and then use Persistence (hunting bow), Drawn in Spring (Dagger) or Tidefall (Great Swords). Since the raw DoT of those gets calculated before DR it can reach good heights even if the primary DMG gets eaten up by DR a lot. Drawn in Spring with Little Savior + Blaidh Golan (or some other Preservation item) would be my first approach because iirc those guess can knock you down a lot. Better be untouchable if that happens. Also with a durganized Little Savior + Drawn in Spring + Alacrity you will be quite fast hitting. If that didn't work I would try kiting with Alacrity + Persistence. Arcane Assault is not doing that much, but it's raw dmg and targets their weakest defense. I know their fortitude is enormous, but Ninagauth's Death Ray? Wall of Many Colors might be helpful...?

I guess they are not added to the player object's action bar with the usual denominator. You also can't remove Fireballs from Necklace with the usual command "RemoveAbility <char_name> Fireball" for example. 🤷‍♂️ I would be surprised though if retraining wouldn't remove the spells as soon as they wandered into your "normal" repertoire (out of the action bar).

All abilities that do an attack roll you can use from stealth (rule of thumb). Note that pulsing spells don't make as much sense to cast from stealth in most cases because only the first pulse will get the Assassinate bonus and it will also break invisibility with every pulse. Also the Assassin/Wizard's strength isn't always the damaging spell but also to cast a very potent hard CC from stealth/invisibility with high ACC and then follow up with damage (can use invisibility in between ofc.). With Ninagauth's Shadowflame you have both at the same time - so that's a popular spell among most Assassin/Wizard players as an opener. As a Bloodmage you can become invisible unlimited times per encounter in theory which I would prefer over Evoker's passive. Although an empowered Evoker spells from stealth can be very effective, too. Since you can restart combat at will most of times and also can use Brilliant + Wall of Draining the limited spells are not that much of an issue.

Cool!

Somebody who fights enemies who use healing abilities infinite times (e.g. Torkar or paladins like Rathun Fanatics etc.). Gouging Strike will just prevent that combat ends - but will not be able to kill those enemies because its damage is not high enough to overcome the healing. And if barely can kill them it will take forever. Also Brand Enemy is an auto-hit - which makes killing totally overleveled enemies a piece of cake. One handed Lover's Embrace with a Gouging Strike from stealth (=extremely high ACC) followed by Brand Enemy (auto-hit): you applied 3 endless DoTs in a heartbeat and are left with 0 recovery. Time to vanish... You can kill anything at even low levels as long as you can retreat. I use this build to have a solo character who can quickly obtain all sorts of items for export. There's nothing better for this imo because not many other builds can kill certain enemies that early in the game. I prefer Goldpact over Bleak Walker because with a good armor (usually Devil of Caroc for the additional Guile/Zeal) and Gilded Enmity I can easily stay visible after the initial attack from stealth and shrug off attacks. In the meantime I will apply Brand Enemy to several enemies who could potentially heal my main target (remember: Brand Enemy is an auto-hit and has fast cast/no recovery). This occupies them with healing themselves or each other and lets them forget to heal my main target. Since Brand Enemy only costs 1 Zeal you can apply it to a lot of enemies very quickly - then vanish. Indeed. And that is enough even for enemies who heal a lot. I didn't meet an enemy who outhealed this combination. Yes, the high burst damage is also there from lvl 1 on and is especially nice in the beginning of the game before any endless DoTs are available.

That an Assassin is best combined with a caster. Assassin/Paladin is a nice endless DoT combo though - one of the easiest ways to solo the game without using unintended mechanics.

That's a rather short-sighted argument. As if every encounter would go the way one wants. Also: If I could have invisibility without any drawbacks - why not use it (I mean besides cheese aversion of course)? Then the party doesn't have "to defend him while he decimates his enemies" but can just do the same: decimate enemies.

I reckon a fun spell to steal would be Shadowing Beyond from a Priest of Skaen. Unlimited uses, instant cast, no recovery, no much impact of lacking Power Level either. I also tried Thrust of Tattered Veil - just because having a 100% interrupt at hand that has 0.5 casting time could be nice. With Blade Cascade it becomes an interrupting machine gun which can't miss, hehe. Too bad it's only pierce dmg. But still fun and useful.

That, my prosopagnostic friend, is a woman.

That's correct. But as you can see in @Raven Darkholme's video all you need is the right enemy Priest with Salvation of Time (+ Barring Death's Door maybe). Did anybody try what happens to those "abilities" when you export that character? Can you use premade characters for an Ultimate run?

Yes, like that. Except I use it all the time as a precaution, not only when threatened.

**** - too bad this comes to light so late. It would have been fun to read Josh's reaction to an ultimate run with this trick. 😄

Stalker/Goldpact can tank better than Stalker/Priest (cheesy stuff like Barring Death's Door + Salvation of Time aside). I pesonally like Stalker/Bloodmage better because you can tank well while you'll have a good summon (Essential + Substancial Phantom) and an Animal Companion and lots of spell uses. But Stalker/Goldpact requires a lot less fuzz and can be quite effective with very little use of Zeal. AR and defenses will be great. Accuracy, too. Also Paladin can heal the Animal Companion and make it sturdy without casting lenghty spells. Revive it even. I think it's a good combo for solo.

No Death Ring from invisibility on near death enemies? I find the instakill-feature quite nice at times.

Huh? Since when? For me they only did that if they got destroyed. I didn't use a lot of Rage for active abilities. Only Blood Storm (then you don't need that much Rage because it prolongs with kills) and wards. Sometimes HoF at the start of a fight to apply Bledding Cuts to a whole group of enemies at once. I didn't do Megabosses. They just stink. For the rest it was fun. Of course I was only half serious: Barbarian in general really isn't that great for solo. Furyshaper isn't supergood either - but the Blood Ward mechanic makes it viable and lots of fun imo. One of the few combos where it's actually viable (in most fights) to jump right into the crowd and swing your weapon around like a madman. In a party Blood Ward can obviously be totally bonkers (hello Plague of Insects and stuff).

I didn't try that - but it's likely. By the way: you can also steal spells from your hireling's grimoires (which they haven't learned). That includes unique spells like Zandethus's Draconic Fury etc. For that you need to be a SC Wizard though because only then you can cast Major Grimoire Imprint and not only Minor GI.

Taste of the Hunt - excellent spell to steal for a Berserker/Wizard. The non-scaling isn't good for the attack roll but the weapon quality helps. And the raw dmg and healing are great to have. Healing 40+ health with every hit just so while doing around 20 raw per tick is still great. And now you can have Firebrand as non-druid, too. The duration is quite long anyways so the lack of PL doesn't hurt either. Edit: also just being able to spam Thrust of Tattered Veils at any time for the 100% interrupt (cause auto-hit) is quite nice. Stacking Chillfogs like there's no tomorrow... It's all quite fun I must say. I use some Priest or Druid heals to stay alive while spamming all those wizard nukes with Tenacious for free.

It's true that the non-existent PL is a bit offputting. But there are some spells where it doesn't matter that much (e.g. summons and summoned weapons - maybe I can steal spiritual weapons as well...?). With a fellow Priest/Druid/Wizard hireling you can exactly determine which spell you want to steal (with the help of confusion). You just only learn that one with the hireling... Edit: I just tried Consecrated Ground - I never realized that it stacks. Since you can spam it like crazy (when stolen) it provides immense healing even if it doesn't scale with PL. Cool...

Oh my God I just made a Berserker/Wizard and stole Blessed Harvest from Xoti. Hello and welcome Willbreaker + Spirit Frenzy + some con affliction + Bloody Slaugther + Blessed Harvest! *boom*

Ohhhhhhhhh 🤯

Indeed. It's fun - although I did struggle a bit without cheese and consumables (which I usually avoid) in the late game. With scrolls though... 😄

I don't know which spells can be stolen from enemy druids/priests/wizards - but after some testing it seems the choice is rather limited since I often ended up with the same old spells - or I had bad luck. Anyway: the ability to cast spells non-stop is extremely tempting. Maybe I will try a spell stealing Berserker/Evoker and try to spam lower level stolen nukes in combination with Blood Thirst. Or something else that gives me high casting speed and short/no recovery... Streetfighter/Evoker with mortars maybe? Or should I shoot Scordeo's Trophy with Wall of Draining and collect an absurd amount of recovery bonus before start spamming? 🤔