Boeroer

Arcane Knight is a good solo combination. But I would strongly advise to pick Bloodmage (wasn't a thing in 2018, it's a rel. new subclass) - because as solo char you will be always short of spell uses, especially in the early game. Bloodmage solves this with Blood Sacrifice. Paladins can get back Zeal by killing foes (Virtuous Triumph). I would also not recommend Bleak Walker because a bit more spike damage from FoD doesn't make a lot of difference when going solo. Something like Steel Garrote (draining health via melee weapon damage) or Goldpact (high AR) is much more effective for a solo Arcane Knight. I agree that it's best to sneak around Gorecci Str. and the central digsite. You can do the skeletal warriors in the catacombs of the arena but it's also quite tough. Once reaching Neketaka - as AeonsLegend suggests - it all becomes much more relaxed (if you don't force yourself into fights with overleveled enemies). The only thing that really screws an Arcane Knight is Arcane Dampener. So watch out for enemy casters trying to cast that. Interrupt (e.g. FoD + Arbalest/Crossbow + modal or cast Thrust of Tattered Veil) or kill them before they can finish the cast. Else all your selfbuffs and healing will be gone for a long time - you will not be able to refresh them as long as Arcane Dampener is active.

Isn't the raw lash from the fighter branch (and only when he's alone)? Paladins get hostile effects suspension on kill from Slayer's Claw afaik. But for a Forbidden Fist that might actually be even better? I mean if suspension of hostile effects gives you wounds (does it?).

Persistent Distraction is indeed a passive so that might explain why its deflection malus stacks with any other deflection malus in the first place (which normally - when looking at active effects that should not be the case). Persistent Distraction is one of the few passives that use afflictions - maybe it just slipped through the net. With other passives (for example Reflexive Mirror) they made sure it wouldn't stack with the same effect from actives (in case of Reflexive Mirror: it doesn't stack with Mirrored Images or other active deflection bonuses). Also Confounding Blind's deflection malus doesn't stack with the deflection malus from the Blind/Flanked effects since usually both are active affects (applied by actuve abilites). Bring Low is a "passive" weapon effect (you don't trigger an ability from the action bar yourself) and those should stack with everything afaik. Another example for obscure stacking rules. It's a lot better than in PoE but still not very clear.

That's a good idea I think.

It's a nice game and I'm happy that it did well. But I have to say it's not a game that I personally enjoy very much. Sometimes I back or buy games although I know I'll most likely never play them (or only look into them for a few hours). Just because I like the approach or the idea.

That would be my apporach as well: make less "bombastic" games (Full VO, ridiculously elaborate VFX, localisation for xyz and whatnot) with a small but dedicated team, concentrate on the worldbuilding, the story, the companions (less the relations and reaction systems and all that difficult stuff but rather their character development) and nice abilities. Keep the engine and the underlying mechanics (they are nice, maybe cut down the exceptions), graphics are absolutely fine as they are. I'd even like simpler ones (not that D:OS comicy-style though). Indeed Josh is currently working on a small project with 4-5 team members. It's some non-violent game so I presume it's not a classic CRPG but maybe something more along the lines of Disco Elysium or such, but who knows. Josh said that it's a good time for smaller projects now because Microsoft wants to have a broad and diverse portfolio for the Game Pass. They found out that lots of people try out much more games outside their "niche" when they can try them for free (not really, but basically). So Microsoft encourages smaller projects as well. This may be a chance for a PoE3 with a smaller team. At least I hope so. This niche may be small, but the players in it are also quite loyal and invested once they like something. They need to do better ports for consoles though. I won't ever play such games on any console, but the bigger sales market makes it easier to justify producing such games in the future. Josh also said he'd love to make a Pillars of Eternity Tactics game. Feargus wants to make Skyrim on Eora. So I'd would be very surprised if we won't see more of that IP in the future. Heck, I'd even buy Slay the Spire on Eora. Card Deck builders are rel. easy to make, can be released on all platforms and usually sell very well.

The number was deduced by people who took the returns, researched the fig terms and finally said it's not exact but gives a fair approximation. As I said that was some time ago. I didn't dive into the details. It was confirmed by several Obsidian devs, most notably Josh Sawyer, that Deadfire sold way worse than PoE. And PoE sold somewhere around 1 million copies at that time iirc. That doesn't sound like 700k at all. It was also said that Deadfire wasn't a financial desaster but very disappointing. If you assume a certain budget (let's say double the fig campaign's amount) and assume 200K copies then it may have covered the expenses. But of course then you have gained nothing for budgeting your next game. Tyranny was a similar story. It hurts. Both are not bad games in the slightest. It just seems the niches were too small. Which is unfortunate because it's exactly my niche.

Of course raw dmg. Then you can hit yourself with Killing Bolt first.

There is no general rule.

Yes, it stacks with everything.

By the way: Barbarian/Rogue is the perfect class for me when it comes to sneaking and pickpocketing. Leap is so convenient in certain situations because you can use it out of combat and can simply leap over people and obstacles to reach places without getting detected - or to immensely "shorten" the way through detection circles. You land right besides the chest/guy and only then the circle starts filling. You can sneak nearly everywhere. For example I entered the Brass Citadel's Powerhouse from the balcony although usually you can only get there from the inside. Looted the place, went back outside and jumped down again. It's a lot of fun if you are playing it the "sneaky" way. And if you screw up there's Smoke Veil or Shadowing Beyond. Also Marauder gets nice skill bonuses - e.g. +2 to Stealth.

Just keep in mind that unlike Deadfire, item effects in PoE don't stack unless it's an effect on a weapon. Ilfan Byrngar's Solace will stack with Bliadh Golan, but Belt of the Stelgaer does not. Looped Rope would be a viable addition to Blaidh Golan.

It did not.

It's possible to pickpocket the helm from her with Sleight of Hand 7. She's also wearing the Deltro's Cage plate armor. You can only get that if you kill her though.

The number is calculated from the Fig investment returns that were paid to investors of the campaign. Since the rules of fig shares are transparent you can deduce the revenue. If you then assume an average price you're under 200K copies. However, that was some time ago and before it came out on consoles.

I don't know anything about rounds. But with Wall of Draining on mutiple enemies I can buff it from its base duration (12 sec or so) to over 200 seconds. INT does apply as well. If you wear the Cap of the Laughingstock with another party member then enemies always have a buff on them that you can drain from.

Best Crowd Control comes with Wizard in my opinion. They have some really good tools in their belt for controlling crowds entirely. I like to combine Pull of Eora and Binding Web. Usually this pulls most (if ot all) enemies together so that the follwing nuking is easy. I like to use Chillfog(s) + Combusting Wounds then. Other party members can contribute to Combusting Wounds as well (e.g. Xoti with Wicked Briars or so). I personally like single class Wizards (because the good spells come way earlier) but a Monk/Wizard is also very good at CC/dmg if you give him an AoE weapon (e.g. Watershaper' Focus with Blast or Hand Mortar or Fire in the Hole - or both) and use Stunning Surge. This results in an AoE stun which often costs nothing (if only one of the AoE hit rolls does a critical hit). Combine it with spells. All AoE sizes profit from Duality of Mortal Presence (+10 INT), durations of CC effects as well. Also Thunderous Blows gives you +2 PEN with spells which is great. And if you are a Helwalker Monk then your spells also get +30% dmg from the MIG bonus. The damage, the PEN, the AoE sizes and the durations are better than a SC Wizard's - also the accuracy due to Dance of Death - the only disadvantages are that your Power Level will be lower (influcences PEN, ACC and base dmg - but you more than compensate for that), that you get the good spells later and that you can't reach the spells at Power Level 8 and 9. Druids are also good crowd controllers + damage dealers. Most of their spells have CC aspects as well as damage aspects which is convenient. Ciphers are also good, especially their charming/dominating abilities are great. Still - overall I prefer Wizards for that role. Bloodmage is very conventient because you can regain spell uses. With a Wizard/Tactician you can also regain spell uses, but besides that you gain rel. little from the multiclass in terms of CC and dmg. In my opinion a Sage does this job better than a Battlemage.

Yes, it's pretty awesome for a caster. But I mean... if you want to really buff up your spell dmg then nothing beats Deltro's Cage Helmet on a Wizard. You can easily hit yourself with a Chain Lightning first (it jumps to the nearest enemy afterwards so it's not even 100% wasted just on you) and then you'll get a shocking lash equal to the shock dmg you received. So if you suffered 80 shock dmg you'll get a 80%(!) shocking lash on all dmg you cause, including spells. After (or before) casting that Chain Lightning I like to use Wall of Draining to prolong the lash's duration (or use a Priest with SoT). You can even stack it with Blightheart - or even better use Engoliero (which also gets the lash for all dmg it causes). It's a bit of a hassle to set it up (in RtwP at least) - but it's so powerful that it's totally worth it in harder fights. Of course it's also possible to use it with any other char if you have a reliable source of shock dmg (like a fellow wizard or Stormspeaker with Crackling Bolt/Chain Lightning or a shifted Fury or any guy with Essence Interrupter).

You want to seriously tell me that you are readig slower in your mind than a narrator who reads the text out loud? Full VO is completely overrated. There are plenty of indie games that don't have the slightest VO whatsoever but sold better than Deadfire. I personally would make the next game without localisation and VO but make it very mod-friendly so that fans can make their own localisation and VO if they want to. Maybe even build my own hub for such mods so that you can install them right from the game. The quality of most VOs will not be that great than if professionals did it, but the localisations will not be worse. This allows for a smaller team and less investment overall. That way the odds of a PoE3 happening would be higher.

The Girdle of Mortal Protection is good against very high dmg crits (dragon wingslams for example) but against lower dmg crits a blunting belt is better (if it matches the dmg type).

You can often pickpocket keys from merchants which spares you the lockpicking. Also you can reverse-pickpocket explosives and poison.

Well technically you can use the whole party to sneak up onto the victim, but you'll never know which party member will attempt to pickpocket then (presumably the dude with the highest pickpocket skill) - maybe it's that one party member who already screwed the stealth. Also the pathfinding is difficult with all party members. You want to take the shortest route to the victim and that's often impossible if the party is trampling on each other's feet. Way easier to mange if you are only steering one party member during the attempt. You can pickpocket as long as the circle isn't completely red. Generally speaking: if the circle is fully red you are screwed. If there's even a fraction of the circle not red you are good to go. If it's yellow: easy peasy. Hostile victims will already start looking for you and move towards the noise you make as soon as the cicle turns from yellow to red - so I guess pickpocketing them would be a real challenge (never tried I have to say). Neutral victims don't care if the circle becomes red - as long as it's not fully red. I think if bystanders detect you you are also "detected" and can't pickpocket. You can use spells on the ground to lure hostile npcs and guarding npcs (shield + eye symbol over their heads) towards a place and sneak up behind them. This doesn't work for most neutral npcs like merchants. You need Sparkcrackers for those. They will run towards the source of noice you can sneak up behind them. Running victims have a much smaller hearing circle than victims that stand still. So it's easier to pickpocket moving targets - if you can predict theor movement. Also read here:

Then you'll miss some of his sarcastic yet funny banter though. Or miss Edér making fun of him.

If your stealth value is not high enough you will be detected before you can reach them (circle completely fills red). Some people have better detection skills than others. Also they can use their hearing (circle indicator) and vision (cone). So better sneak up from behind. Start sneaking when your dotted circle is not filled at all (yellow or even red). Then take the shortest route to the target. Don't run zigzag or something. If you have Bounding Boots you might be able to jump right besides the target (out of combat, but pause right after jumping) and pickpocket. It worked in the past but maybe that got fixed. Usually it's not hard to do if you have a decent stealth skill. Unless you try to pickpocket overleveled or very perceptive people. Only use one guy to sneak up, not the whole party. Park them somewhere.

Once you unlock some of those BB points you can immediately use them in a new playthrough.