Boeroer

Well, you would only use Blood Sacrifice once you run out of spell uses I assume. And then you'd turn visible soon anyway. The drawback of the Bloodmage and the Assassin (receiving more damage) doesn't matter much when you're invisible a lot. The other drawback (no Empower) isn't really one for most players because they don't use Empower in the first place. But another wizard subclass like for example Illusionist (or no subclass) also would work of course. You can use Empower once per fight to regain spell uses without breaking invisibility.

That depends a bit on how you operate with this build and what the rest of the party does. If you keep getting attacked frequently you need thicker armor. Your deflection is bad which leads to crits (enemy's PEN*1.5) - so you cannot have too much AR when getting attacked all the time. Even Patinated Plate would be okay then. If you're comfortable with a more "mobile" playstyle or your party (mainly your tank and disablers) is doing a fine job controlling the enemy and you can avoid getting attacked a lot then you could do with a lot less AR (obviously). I chose DoC Breastplate because it has some healing capability, counters confused and offered good enough protection for me. I was quite happy with that balance of mediocre AR and mediocre recovery penalty. So I personally would pick medium armor again. Keep in mind that once you get Blood Thirst the recovery penalty of armor - while still there - becomes less of a hinderance because Blood Thirst just skips recovery on kill. You said you don't mean specific armor, but here are some examples of unique ones I would consider (besides Devi of Caroc's Breastplate): The Bloody Links - it has nice synergies with getting bloodied - either becoming more sturdy (+2 AR) or more speedy. Fleshmender - the added AR is nice against occasional hits from enemies and the reduced crit damage is nice, too. Cool when not getting atttacked too much. Nomad's Brigandie - can make you immune to disengagement attacks which is very helpful for running from enemy to enemy unhindered by engagement. Also nice that it can get up your melee deflection by 10. This is good if you are experiencing more melee resistance since it's rel. thick (and slow). Reckless Brigandine - also nice synergies with losing health. Good AR, especially when losig health - while being faster than normal Brigandines. The look is not to everybody's taste... Magnera's Chain - the added defenses are really good and it's not too slow. Casita Samelia's Legacy - if you are using the Berath's Blessing "Infamous Captain" and want to invest in Intimidate more than my build suggests then this is a good armor to counter your bad deflection (and gain bonus Will while getting hurt, too). Patinated Plate - if you get attacked quite a lot and have problems staying alive. Bronze Juggernaut + Thick Skinned + Hardy makes for a very solid AR value Swift Hunter's Garb - if you feel not that threatened by melee foes, the crit-to-hit conversion is helpful and -15% damage while being flanked can be great in situations where you actually get surrounded (One Stands Alone makes it so that at least 3 enemies are needed to flank you). There are more suitable pieces of armor but I only mentioned the ones which one can access relatively early.

Sure! You'll get wounds well enough from drugs and normal damage you receive I would think.

Druid with Cat Form + Wizard with Wall of Draining is a nice speedy casting setup. Blood Mage aside you gain great casting speed - and a lot of spell uses (4/encounter per 7 tiers = 28 casts vs. 2/encounter per 9 tiers = 18 casts) and a nice spell collection. Here's a cool Livegiver/Blood Mage combo (with video from a fight at Splintered Reef): The downsides: later access to some great spells and zero access to great PL8+9 spells such as Missile Salvo and Great Maelstrom. I think both are great. I don't think there's a definitive answer to the question "which is [considered] stronger?".

Hm, since you'll have lots of AoE dmg potential, you might want to "form" enemy clusters. Or in other words get as many enemies in a certain spot. And I think some sort of Fighter who helps the Herald with engagement and forms a good front line that isn't rushed easily isn't a bad idea. So Battle Mage still sounds solid to me. You can even use Spirit Lance + Essential Phantom to get another front liner with AoE capability who stands in the way of enemies. Also Spirit Lance + Clear Out just wrecks houses. Unbending + Wall of Draining is a bit like god mode. Maybe something completely different would be a Stalker/Devoted with dual hatchets (and a Bear). Fists as backup. Max religion skill. Two more bodies for the front line. Use Xoti's Sickle and Vion-Ceth. Cast Binding Roots on the enemies you want to hit (unlocks Vion-Ceth's Wood Bane enchantment,+30% dmg) and profit from Xoti's Sickle's increasing bonus dmg and speed once you killed an enemy. Should be plenty sturdy for an offtank, grant engagement and an additional big body (Bear), have great acc and deal nice weapon dmg. And adds some CC with Binding Roots, too.

Really weird. Well - back to copying meme gifs into my Dropbox and linking them there.

Wizard + Scordeo's Trophy is nice because you can pick the universal recovery bonus enchantment of the pistol (-5% for all recovery, not -10% for the melee one) and prolong the individual stacks with Wall of Draining. Then you'll get super short recovery for everything including spells. But since you plan to use Blade Cascade + SoT anyway maybe it's redundant. And since your plan is to shoot and then jump into melee (and not cast around) it's also not really fitting. Although Alacrity is nice for free movement without any engagement. Ranger is good with Scordeo's Trophy to build up the recovery bonus asap because of Driving Flight. Only takes half the shots then (if there's at least two enemies involved). And pistol modal + Gunner is faster than just pistol modal. I think for switching between ranged an melee quickly some cheap mobility ability would be great - like Rogue's Escape or Ranger's Evasive Roll. Ranger again. How does Ghost Heart/Soulblade sound? Highest accuracy potential (Ranger stuff + Borrowed Instincts), great melee dmg with Soul Annihilation, mobility, Driving Flight, no Bonded Grief to care for when zipping around on the battlefield... Shoot the pistol, load up focus and recovery bonus, move in, deal Soul Annihilation damage, maybe profit from Blade Cascade and then move out, shoot the pistol etc. Another idea would be to use Ghost Heart/Black Jacket and not use both Scordeo's in one weapon set but instead use two separate ones: weapon set 1: one handed Scordeo's Trophy + modal + one handed style. Weapon set 2: one handed Scordeo's Edge + one handed style. Switching costs no recovery with Black Jacket passive + Quick Switch. Result is more acc for the pistol yet great speed due to modal (and Gunner). And then way better accuracy for the sabre once melee starts. With all the stacks of recovery bonus from the shots: dual wielding speed shouldn't make such a big difference... and once Blade Cascade procs dual wielding is of no use anyway (more like a disadvantage then).

Those are just URLs from some animated gif site (instead of dropbox links which I normally use for images) and you are only seeing the alt-text. But why? The forum usually embeds the images on its own once you post a direct image link.

Versteh' ich nich. I see this:

I'd like to have a 1/encounter pulling effect. A reverse "Clean Sweep" if you will (a Dirty Sweep hehe). Or like "Into the Fray" but in an AoE. All enemies in a circular AoE (which are not missed) get pulled towards the user (and maybe gain +3 engagement for x seconds if I'm feeling greedy). I wished my main tank had such an ability. 1/encounter would be enough.

Concerning the Herald (Pallegina?) and not using Paladin abilities/zeal much before: Consider taking Brand Enemy. It is a very fast cast with 0 recovery. You can spend a bunch of Zeal right at the start of battle and just give every enemy (the ones where it makes sense) a neverending burning DoT effect. It can be scripted easily, too - so AI can take care of that for you if you want. Since it's an auto-hit even a short-sighted Herald with a helmet made of concrete would have no trouble landing it. You could also try to use Inspired Beacon. It's not an auto-hit - but the +40% damage taken by enemies who get hit by it are cool when you have AoE damage dealing in the party. This is not as easy to script in an effective way, but still doable. Since you need engagement it should be a Shieldbearer imo. With 2 tank(ish) chars both can be individually less "tanky", so you have more options. For example I had a great (low micro) time with a Streetfighter/Unbroken (could be Edér) which I themed towards a Gladiator: Gladiator's Sword (it's great for a tank in general but also gets +1 PEN which is great for offense) & Bronlar's Phalanx. Devil of Caroc Breastplate with Abraham (Edér+ a Berath's Blessing can have a pet) and Armored Grace is very fast with good AR (later I used the Contender's Armor and Helm bc. Gladiator theme). Death's Maw grants some damage resistance. Human for its passive at 50% health, Undying Burden adds to Bronlar's Phalanx nicely. Use Escape to move while under Large Shield modal etc. Since it's a tank it will get flanked constantly (not much to do on your part) and then actually do great weapon dps without much micro. Once you get some engagement abilities/gear you can also use Mob Stance to increase attack speed even further and add more damage. I use regular Edér as a Swashbuckler single tank for my parties all the time and it works fine defensively. With a Streetfighter you tank noting away from that but add a lot more low-micro damage output.

Imo a main tank (und thus the party) profits a lot from engagement slots. Neither Paladin nor Chanter help you gain those, so it's mostly up to gear. A shield already gives you +1 engagement (besides the nice defensive features). Usually Herald tanks use Ancient Memory + Exalted Endurance (and later Mercy and Kindness) to passively heal themselves and the party members near them. A fitting item that adds even more passive "aura" healing is Lethandria's Devotion. For the standard passive healing Herald tank that would be my pick. Then a weapon with additional engagement (spear + modal, Kapana Taga or Shattered Vengeance) maybe. If you were using a Steel Garrote/Troubadour with Ancient Memory+Old Siec then WotEP with Offensive Parry could make sense because the Steel Garrote passive and Old Siec do stack. So Offensive Parries would heal you up. But tanking spells and ranged attacks is still hard that way. Maybe if your Battlemage offtank will support with the tanking a lot it can work. A thematically nice Herald with a good coherent item collection is imo: Huana (Island Aumaua), Mataru-style Shieldbearer/Troubadour with Reckless Brigandine (+1 bonus engagement, up to +2 bonus AR, bonus speed per engaged target), Kapana Taga (+2 bonus engagement, immunity to flanked) and Cadhu Scalth (+2 engagement due to Shieldbearer, damage resistance, deflection bonus, needs investment in athletics and metaphysics). This looks like a proper Huana Warrior and it's a strong tanking setup with 5 engagement slots just from gear. For a helmet it's difficult to find something visually fitting but imo Horns of the Break Mother looks cool with it (also provides resistance to RES affliction). Or you can pick any helmet like Death's Maw or so and then just hide its visuals (eye symbol button in the inventory UI). But that's just what I like because it provides plenty engagement slots while also looking cool and coherent imo. Also chance to play a Huana. Another cool shield for a Herald is the tower shield from Crookspur imo. It allows for a totally different visual/thematical approach. The Assassin gets +25 accuracy from stealth and invisibility. This an universal acc buff, so it also works for spells. Opening the fight with a +25 acc disable can be immensely impactful. Never mind the bonus crit damage etc., that's not important. It's the +25 accuracy. It stacks with every other accuracy buff. You can pretty easily turn a whole encounter sleeping with Call to Slumber and buy your party plenty of preparing time that way. If you want to use this synergy in mid fight just use either Shadowing Beyond or Smoke Veil. Can also make nice use of the Assassin Slippers. And of course the Assassin/Wizard combo is also able to deal good damage via spells. Ninagauth's Shadowflame is a great opening spell for an Assassin/Wizard. This alone makes the Assassin/Wizard a great at debuffing/cc. What makes him even better later on: once you get Arkemyr's Grimoire you'll have access to the spell Arkemyr's Brilliant Departure. It turns you invisible for a long time. And the best thing about this invisibility is that it doesn't break as long as you don't deal damage (also no self damage). But almost all disabling spells don't deal damage. So you can stay invisible and save and cast devastating debuffing/cc/disable spells with 25 bonus acc all the time. And if it runs out you can cast a final high damage spell, then maybe regain some spells with Blood Sacrifice and turn invisible again with Brilliant Departure. If you get hurt from Blood Sacrifice and are wearing Effigy's Husk you can spread Skaen's Resentment (prevent healing aura) while standing near enemies while invisible. It still works. If want to go total disabling overkill you pick up the great sword Effort, enchant it with Hemorrhaging and start wearing Ajamuut's Stalking Cloak. It stuns enemies with weapon attack made from invisibility or stealth. Hemorrhaging procs its sicken/hobble effects on spells also(!) and that effect counts as weapon attack - but does no damage. So it doesn't lift the invisibility of Brilliant Departure. But it triggers the stun from Ajamuut's Stalking Cloak. This stun can again trigger Hemorrhaging - and a loop of stun-sicken/hobble-stun-etc. can occur that takes enemies completely out of the action. Works best with pulsing cc spells like Slicken, Binding Web and Pull of Eora. Efort is also a nice pick for the Essential Phantom of a wizard (together with Effigy's Husk) because it can do a Full Attack to all enemies in range when the phantom dies. Which is a nice side effect of the sword (and the robe) in the hands of a wizard. I'd lean towards a Livegiver or Ancient Druid I think. But anything goes really. Some high-priority single target hunter (ranged Scout, Monk, Soulblade etc.) would work, too. Or an Ascendant/Arcane Archer with Frostseeker? Great against single targets but mobs, too.

1. If you think WotEP in a Herald is cool then you can use it. From a mechanical standpoint I think it doesn't offer much for such a multiclass - unless you are building an offensive minded Steel Garrote/Skald with WotEP's Offensive Parry or something like that. Iirc Offensive Parry can grant phrases on crit for a Skald - and the cone attack can help to raise the chance for a crit against multiple enemies, too. 4. I assume your battle mage is supposed to deal damage mostly. In that case you'd seem to lack CC/debuffing/disabling options. A specialized wizard, cipher or druid could be nice. You already have a wizard so maybe you don't want that class a second time (although Assassin/Blood Mage would be an excellent pick for that role). A SC Druid could do CC but also add more healing on demand which might be helpful. Livegivers don't really have a big drawback and can help with anything besides healing. If Cipher sounds better I'd recommend a Psion or Beguiler. Their action economy is a lot better for the role of debuffer/controller/disabler than a regular Cipher's. Maybe multiclassed with Monk (since you don't have any and Monks provide bonus INT and accuracy and so on). Lingering Echoes + 10 INT leads to really impressive durations. 5. If your herald isn't the main tank: a main tank.

I did miss the opportunity the video gave me to explain how it's pronounced in German and also how it came to be. Its supposed to sound like this: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/g2g1zvgb08qbxsipe7fes/boeroer_sound.mp3?rlkey=o6pd77oyefp13ji5qaxuy25fs&st=876k23xn&dl=1 But since that's close to impossible to pronounce for anybody who didn't grow up with or learned "Umlaute" such as ö (it's originally Börör - in the earlier days of the Internet umlauts were a no-no). I'm fine with whatever people come up with. It isn't a proper word anyway: It came to be during a LAN-Party (I believe we were playing Diablo II at the time) and I accidentally belched really loud when I actually wanted to shout some warning or smth. at somebody... oops. Somebody then tried to convert that sound into text in the game chat and wrote "what was that Börör?" or something along the lines. Everybody was laughing because when your read it out loud (in German) it sounded nothing like a/the belch at all. Somebody said it sounded more like the last name of some old dutch or buren dude. "Like 'Horst Börör' hahaha!". Anyway it then stuck as a nickname - but luckily not in real life (phew) but only for online/gaming use. Had that until I turned 16... Because your actual name is Ricel Dlaag!

I'm wearing varifocals...

Exactly. Brisk Recitation for maximum phrase point generation. This build is about the invocations mostly, not the effect of the phrases. The Pindown Poet build is the opposite: there it's more about the phrases and less about the invocations. But that may be a bit different for you. Which phrases are good with the Ceaseless Siren depends a bit on what your party composition is. For example: for a party that doesn't have many resistances and not too great defenses it can be very good to pick the 3 resistance chants and sing them with Brisk Recitation. Switch to the one that fits the current enemies (for example if you get frightened/terrified or weakened a lot you'd switch to the phrase "One Dozen Stood" with Brisk Recitation - which would convert terrified-->frightened with the first hit and 3 secs later turn frightened-->shaken and then 3 sec later shaken-->nothing). Very good setup to get your party affliction-free withouzt fuzz. I personally didn't want to spend any ability points for special phrases - except for Many Lives later - but instead I wanted to use the points somewhere else. But it can make sense to pick some phrases if the party lacks something: The Long Night's Drink is a good debuffing phrase, Ancient Memory can be great for a party that leacks healing - or Mercy & Kindness if you use Pain Block a lot (it's a great single target healing spell imo). Yes, partly. Usually at level-up I pick something - and if I don't end up using it I will retrain and remove it. Amplified Wave was such an ability. How I played the Ceaseless Siren in my case (versatile CC and summons, not that much damage dealing) I rarely had use for Amplified Wave. Other party members filled the role of damage dealing way better - and Amplified Wave doesn't provide long-lasting CC. When lots of my enemies are already mind controlled, paralyzed and/or engaged by summons etc. already I rarely saw the need for Amplified Wave. To me it's often better to keep the disables up and do strong CC - while my party members do the damaging part (who were way better at it in this case). Soul Shock and Disintegrate where there to still have options for AoE or single target damage should I need it. And yes, I think Soul Shock's damage/focus cost ratio is pretty good (and shock dmg is a nice alternative dmg type). I could also spare an ability point that way. But if you feel you could profit from using Amplified Wave I would pick it. It's a nice spell in general. Sometimes it just doesn't fit though like in my case. This only becomes apparent when you play imo. Hard to predict what works best. Luckily there's retraining - so a bit of experimenting comes with little risk.

Hi, Critical hits with timed hostile effects (including afflictions but also DoT effects etc.) will cause +25% duration. Overpenetration does nothing for duration. If the spell has an attack roll (accuracy vs. defense) it can critically hit (there are some minor exceptions, e.g. Carnage which can never crit, only hit). CC spells with no damage still do an attack roll - so they can critically hit (+25% duration). If the spell has a PEN-value it can overpenetrate. Should be only spells that deal non-raw damage. Raw damage spells have no PEN value and thus cannot under- or overpenetrate. Many spells that have multiple effects and will have more than one attack roll: one for the damage, one for the affliction. In case of Venombloom (Druid spell) for example: AoE: 8-12 Raw | Accuracy vs. Deflection per 3.0 sec (first attack roll for damage - can crit, but no PEN bc. raw dmg) If successful: Weakened for 8.0 sec | Accuracy vs. Fortitude per 3.0 sec (second attack roll for weaken - can crit, but no PEN bc. no damage) Target: Frightened for 8.0 sec | Accuracy vs. Will (third attack roll for frighten - can crit, but no PEN bc. no damage) Overpenetration: no effect on duration. Crits: +25% duration - usually those abilities like Crippling Strike also do two separate attack rolls: one for the damage and if that at least grazes, a second one for the affliction component. You can see that in the description of the ability. It will say something like Target: Full Attack (that's the normal weapon attack you do, your weapon accuracy vs. enemies' deflection) If successful: Hobbled for 15.0 sec | Accuracy vs. Fortitude If the ability has PEN value it's for the damage part. Crippling Strike uses the PEN of your weapons and has an additional +2 PEN. THis value doesn't matter for the hobbling roll. Sometimes the affliction component does no attack roll but is an auto-hit (no graze, no crit). That is the case with Shadow Step's paralyze effect (Rogue's upgrade for Escape). But this is very rare. Usually it's two separate rolls: one for the damage and one for the affliction (or whatever additional effect a weapon ability might provide)

Thank you. But I'm not the only one - you're all still here, answering, helping, sharing weird ideas, offering free & cool mods and so on. Great community really, especially all you guys of the enduring inner circle.

Huha, I updated the post with a video link. Also here:

Hello, updated the post with a video link. You can also find it here:

Hey, I added the video link to the post. You can also find it here:

"Dicksite"