Boeroer

Two Handers do more base damage and that helps against thick armor. They are as slow or fast as the heavier one handed weapons (hammers, swords, spears etc.). But those you can dual wield which will give you a 50% recovery bonus. So basically yes: you will have a lot faster recovery with your weapons if you are dual wielding and thus thick armor won't feel as slow as long as you are using your weapons. Flames of Devotion is a Full Attack and thus you will hit twice with it if you are dual wielding. Offhand will hit first, then main hand will follow without recovery in between. Recovery will start only after the second strike. Generally speaking I would say dual wielding will be better with FoD against most enemies. But two handers aren't that far behind - especially if you are taking into account that some of the best unique weapons are in fact two handers (see Tidefall for example). I think dual Bitttercut might be the optimal melee weapon setup for a Bleak Walker as @Desmodeus said. Also because Bittercut has two damage types (corrode/slash) which is a big advantage over normal sabres (which only do slash damage).

Monk. My favorite class when I started PoE was Barbarian and I still like it - but he more I played the more often my favorite class changed: from Barb to Wizard to Druid to Priest to Monk I believe. Monk took me some time to get into but I think it's the best and most fun to play martial class in PoE. I especially liked this build (Witch Doctor) because once you get the Long Pain it's like you are playing a walking fist-shooting machine gun. One other build I had most fun with is maybe this: One that did very well from a powergaming perspective as well as from a role-playing perspective (including dialogue options etc.) was this:

Iirc Goldpact's DoT will have lower dps the more INT you have. Because the overall damage will be the same no matter the INT - it just gets spread out over a longer timespan. Same thing with the wounding enchantment on Tidefall (and other wounding weapons) the way. If you go with Goldpact and lowish INT you might as well use Tidefall (and high MIG) and also pick Runner's Wounding Shot as additional attack ability to use after FoD. You can indeed make a Paladin with 3 INT and get away with it. There are several abilites/talents that are not influeced by INT or even profit from low INT. For a quick inspiration here's a "dumb" Paladin build I made five years ago (I think it was one of my first builds here) :

I think that was just done to give players as many romance options as possible with the companions they had.

You guys argue as if this was a thing that really happened and not a story that several designers/directors puzzled together over the course of two game development cycles. It's quite hard to mantain coherence when multiple writers add stuff to one fictional world. And "one Josh to bring them all and in the darkness bind them" might not be enough.

Shadowing Beyond is better in TB mode because it's a free action. Meaning you can turn invisible and attack in the same round. It's more expensive though. Dual pistols is not the best pick for an Assassin/Bleak Walker by the way. At least if you want to get the most out of the Assassinate bonus. That's because the first pistol shot will lift the invisibility and the next one doesn't get any assassination bonus then. Arquebus is pretty good. That is if you're not using pistols for RP or aesthetic reasons - then just go with it. There are some cool pistols in the game no doubt.

Hah! Good catch! I didn't know that this is possible. I guess in this case it is possible because the conversion from graze to hit is an effect on the character and the hit to crit effect is attached to the enemy. Makes sense now that I think a bit more about it. The conversion on the enemy works for everyone who does an attack roll against them - the game logic doesn't check whether those attacks were already converted or not. At least that's what I guess. Anyway: good to know. It's crazy how you can play this rel. old game for thousands of hours and read a ton of stuff here in the forums and elsewhere - and yet something new pops up every now and then.

Wizards don't have that many DoTs. I suppose you mean pulsing spells like Chillfog and such? We need to differentiate between two types of "damage over time" effects: One type that only does one attack roll max (might even be auto-hit like Deep Wounds) and then "ticks" away the damage (most often every 3 secs) without any further attack roll. That's stuff like Plague of Insects, Dragon Thrashed, Disintegrate etc. Those get referred as "DoT" in these forum mostly. Those don't count towards the "damage done" stat. Spells like Chillfog, Wicked Briars, walls and beams on the other hand do an attack roll with every "pulse" while they are active. So it can be a miss/graze/hit/crit with every new pulse. We often call them "pulsing spells" here to set them apart from DoTs. Of course: this is also damage over time strictly speaking - but because they work quite differently it's best not to confuse both types and avoid to use the same terminology. Those pulsing effects do count towards the "damage done" stat.

Yes, but then it can be used by everybody and doesn't need to be summoned anymore.

Indeed. You can't convert from miss to graze and then further to hit for example. High ACC is more reliable, but there can be situations where you can only hit and never crit with your ACC for example - in those cases conversions are very good. Best imo is miss-to-graze conversion. There are only few (see Willbreaker or Boreal Dwarf).

Bosses (like Dragons and stuff) will be doable. Megabosses: I don't think so. The initial cave is not repersentative because a lot of builds unfold only later while some start already strong. I don't find it to be very difficult though. Peaks are Gorecci Street and the Engwithan Digsite (that early in the game).

Instead of removing an ability: can one just "hide" an ability from the tree?

Persistence's wounding is a DoT effect. DoT effects don't count towards "damage done" in the char sheet. Animal Companion's damage has the same problem by the way (I mean it doesn't count - not that it's a DoT). Since the wounding is a big part of Persistence's damage advantage (the other one is unlocking Predator's Sense all the time which also doesn't count) it's no wonder the Ranger using it has less damage on his sheet. PoE is sloppy in that regard unfortunately.

Yes, correct. But you'll get more damage, ACC and PEN out of Great Maelstrom and your other shock spells - and you'll only have very limit casts of that. And besides that you'll have good protection. Doesn't make much sense if you are always in the back row and don't use shock spell much of course.

Why is Stormcaller's damage damn high? It has 10-15 base damage like any other hunting bow and it lacks a lash. What's good about it is its -6 shock DR on hit and the fact that it itself causes shock damage - nice synergy. Also dual damage: cool. Returning Storm triggers on 10% of hits. So not really nonstop. But of course with Twinned Shots and Driving Flight it triggers every third shot (if there are enough enemies to receive the Driving Flight hits). But yes: if you are asking whether you should go for Hunting Bows or Crossbows I would alsways say Hunting Bows. Persistence comes so early and has the potential best single target dps of all ranged weapons due to wounding, Stormcaller is awesome, too and comes earlier than Twing Sting. But if you ask me if Twin Sting is good: it is very good. 18-26 base damage with twice the attack rate as a normal crossbow, chance to trigger a big raw damage spell, some raw dmg per hit, frighten on kill... It's really good. I wouldn't want to build around it thoug because it comes way too late to be a lot of fun. And the crossbows or arbalests before that are not too exiting. Not bad, but nothing I get excited about.

It is good against low defense targets and bad against high defense ones. Whether it's the better pick for a certain chartacter on PotD is difficult to determine and it evenchanges from enemy to enemy. It surely is big fun when it triggers (and you know I favor fun over number crunching) - but I still would say that overall Lightning Strikes is the better pick if you're not dedicated to raise ACC and crit conversion and don't want to take on low defense enemies primarily. If you want to do that AND wear Sun & Moon then I would say Swift Flurry is the better pick. By the way: non-main-hand attacks that trigger Swift Flurry and/or Heartbeat Drumming will always trigger main-hand-attacks. That means you should always wear Sun & Moon in the main hand to maximize the chance for crit chances. Funnily enough the bash AND the Fire Shield attacks of Magran's Blessing will trigger main hand attacks then. That means if some enemy hits you and our Fire Shield crits them (and trigger Swift FLurry or HBD) you will instantly attack with Sun & Moon, probably setting off a crit chain. It's not really for OP's Monk/Streetfighter - but it is a cool way to combine damage with tankyness on a Monk or Monk multiclass. It may be that the retaliation attacks from Tuotilo's Palm do the same - didn't test those.

Druids are good healers and Tekehu is not an exception - but more importantly: the bonus spells he gets as Watershaper are always foe-only. That means foe-only Chillfog etc. - which is very good. At high levels not much beats Great Maelstrom - especially if you pimp your Power Levels with stuff like Deltro's Cage (+2), Lord Darryn's Voulge (+3) or Sun & Moon + Magran's Favor (+4) or Chromoprismatic Staff (+3) or Watershaper's Focus (+2), Otto Starcat (+1), Prestige (+1) and so on and so forth. If you use Fassina you will not have access to Missile Salvo, Meteor Shower, Freezng Rake or Wilting Wind. So at PL 8/9 you won't have a good AoE nuke. Tekehu can fill that gap easily. You can also go and use dual mortars with him an then cast Avenging Storm at PL8 which is great fun (zap-zap-zap). This route works even better if you make him a SC Stormspeaker (because he gets Avenging Storm then as well but also Sure handed Ila which is nice with mortars since all reloading weapons profit twice from the -20% recovery time bonus). One thing though: Mith Fyr gets quenched on Tekehu because of his racial ability (all fire effects get removed). It will work on all party members but not on him. Found out the hard - or moist - way. I like Druids because of their great versatility. They can heal, buff, debuff, CC, summon and deal damage. Often two of those (CC+dmg or healing+buff) with one and the same spell.

Shattered Pillar is good if you install the Community Patch (it simply removes the max wound counter of 5 and sets it back up to 10 - like all other Monk subclasses). If you don't do that it's the weakest monk subclass imo.

Hah - never experienced that with a trap. That's indeed funny.

Imo Mindstalker is more fun than SC Rogue or SC Cipher*. If you have the Community Patch then Sneak Attack, Deathblows and Biting Whip are a great damaging combo (Draining Whip is still good). And if you haven't the CP (Biting Whip is rather meh then) then Sneak Attack, Deathblows and Draining Whip leads to very fast focus gain. )* Unless you give her some AoE weapon - those work with Shared Nightmare and you can get a really big AoE once your focus nears its maximum - and in combination with Time Siphon that can lead to good AoE dps with those weapons and is fun. Another reason for me to go SC CIpher is when I have a damaging caster in the party. Those can struggle with PEN on PotD difficulty and Driving Echoes is a real blessing for them. SC Rogue is only cool imo if you want to build around Gambit and/or Vanishing Strikes. But I prefer certain subclasses for that and not vanilla Rogues.

You don't need that much RES (unless you want it for scripted scenes/attribute checks in dialogue). You can leave MIG at 10 - Rogues already get high damage bonuses and don't really need much Might. Intellect 4 would be way too low for my taste. Swift Flurry or Lightning Strikes will be over very soon even with Tuning Wheel activated. Also stuff like Arterial Strike, Ring the Bell (it's good!) and Toxic Strike as well as Stunning Surge will be very short-lived which is not great imo. You also won't need CON 18. Instead make sure you get healing from party members a lot. With sufficient healing you can lower CON a lot. Whether you want to pick Lightning Strikes or Swift Flurry depends on the difficulty (on PotD enemies' defenses are higher -> less crits), the weapon (best pick: Sun & Moon), your accuracy (the higher the better) any hit/crit conversion (dito). Once you get Heartbeat Drumming Swift FLurry can be really good because each of those can proc the other - which leads to crit-chains a lot more often than with Swift Flurry alone. Before getting Heartbeat Drumming I would say that Lightning Strikes is strictly better with most builds. You can retrain once you get Heartbet Drumming and swtich to Swift Flurry if you want.

The Returning Storm on Stormcaller only hits a single enemy once. It's not as impactful as Twin Sting's Plague of Insects which covers a big AoE.

You will have problems in the early game - but later on it will not be that bad anymore. But it also depends on the weapons. If you use blunderbusses + Powder Burns it will be a lot worse than if you use Daggers (e.g. Pukestabber which is very fast - with the use of alcohol). Because blunderbusses have an inherent ACC malus AND Powder Burns will distract you - which will cause -5 PER on top. Daggers however come with +5 ACC.

I never had problems with Konstanten. Was fun with SSS. I ran him as Barbarian/Skald with a Morning Star and focused on fortitude debuffing - he was very useful. Also he and Fassina can have a romance if you have both in the party - which is the only romance I find bearable to watching unfold in this game.

1. only unstealth the tank if possible --> buff ACC -->debuff enemies' defenses/buff your party's defenses --> deal damage. Use interrupts! The fight at the digsitre is a lot easier if you bought the Essence Interrupter. 2. Heralds have great utility, support and can soak a ton of damage - but I find them lacking as main tanks because they can't hold enemies very well*. Wizards or Arcane Knights (Paladin/Wizard): same. I personally prefer something with Fighter, preferably Unbroken. I like Unbroken/Trickster a lot, but stuff like Unbroken/Shieldbearer also works well. I also like Barbarian/Paladin variants as main tanks (+3 engagement via shout). 3. Still not important in general (depends a bit on the class - see Nalpasca/Alchemy) - stealth can be very useful for solo runs though. 4. All companions and sidekicks are viable for PotD. Fassina isn't bad per se. It's just so that many players don't like the Conjurer subclass. It is a bit underpowered because summons don't scale with Power Level but with character level and the conjured familiar uses up the slot for a summon - meaning you can either have the familiar or another summon öike the Essential Phantom. Not both at the same time. Besides that there are some other conjuring spells like Necrotic Lance etc. that do scale well with Power Level. A Wizard/Chanter like Fassina can turn into an interrupt-monster at higher levels: the "Champion" invocation gives you energized which interrupts enemies with every crit (no matter if from spells etc.). And with Wall of Draining you can have that inspiration for a really long time. Every pulsing spell you cast (Chillfog, Wall of Draining itself, Freezing Pillar, Malignant Cloud etc) as well as your offensive chants (those which do am attack roll vs. enemies) has a chance to interrupt all enemies in the AoE. That can be very good. )*Heralds can tank very well if they use summons to hold the enemies back.