Boeroer

Nay, that's your animal companion. The pet is stuff like Concelhaut's Skull. THey can't left behind and they don't die. So if they disturb the gloves you will never see the solitary buff I guess. 🤷‍♂️ You can of course unequip them. Although Concelhaut's Skull is very good and summons in general are very useful when soloing - don't know if that's worth it for the solitary buff. Afaik all those things (summons, pet and animal companion) cancel the effect of the gloves. Pet may have gotten fixed, but I doubt it. You could test without any pet and with leaving the animal companion far behind.

For a Spartan vibe I'd use Bronlar's Phalanx (and Gladiator Sword - which is rather good for a tankish, high deflection build actually). If you pick spears: there's one that has pierce/slash which can be your backup weapon: Kahua Hozi - 8 ACC isn't too bad since disengagement attacks have higehr ACC (+10 +20 if I'm not mistaken) and Unbroken kan have Disciplined Strikes (+5 PER/graze to hit/hit to crit) and Dirty Fighting (hit to crit) which results in a nice 32.5% hit-to-crit conversion. If combined with Confident Aim you also get a great graze-to-hit conversion. I never had problems with the lower accuracy. Also because with Persistent Distraction you lowers all engaged enemies' deflection by 10 through flanked anyway and automatically. Also Kapana Taga helped me since it gives you +4 ACC per engaged target which is of course very nice. The effects of "the Wall" in combination with party nukers and with ranged enemmies is just too good to pass for me. From the top of my head I can only come up with "One Dozen Stood" armor with the great "Dont let him Through!" and the "Stall for Time" enchantments - which is kind of redundant with Overbearing Guard - but still. Don't really remember - I know the burn damage from Keeper of the Flame is causing friendly fire. But I never had problems with Sungrazer. I tanked as the only tank with only enemies around me - so the AoE never really reached my party in the first place - and the combo of the Wall + Adept Evasion most problaby wouldn't let me notice if I hit myself. But I think it's foe-only. Did a quick test with a Shadowdancer + Sungrazer yesterday evening and noticed no friendly fire with Sungrazer. The reason I don't use it regularly is that actually the whole kaboom becomes rather annoying (visually) after some time. Can't see anything... Same when I used Grave Calling + Chilling Grave and the paralyze against vessels: too many VFX...

It is very nice in a party. I did nearly the same setup you listed but used Kapana Taga (so I could get +2 more engagement and have dual dmg) and a large Shield (Cadhu Scalth - lowers all damage via Metaphysics, alöso looks great with Reckless Brigandine) + modal "the Wall". Because in combo with Adept Evasion you can shower your own Unbroken/Trickster with AoE spells that target Reflex and he will almost never get a scratch while the enemies die. You can use Escape and Charge to move anyways. I also used Riposte since Vigorous Defense stacks with Mirrored Image so they miss a lot (not good in Turn Based mode though). Hold the Line + Kapana Taga + Shield + Reckless Brigandine + Persistent Distraction would give an Unbroken 7 engagement slots without Defender Stance if I'm not mistaken. I think 5 or 6 is most reasonable - more is not worth it. So I wouldn't pick Hold the Line then. A spear with modal like Stalker's Patience is a great alternative (does more dmg than Kapana due to raw DoT and only has 1 less engagment slots). Then Hold the Line could be good. Sungrazer can also be nice. If you are surrounded and get attacked a lot Riposte may quickly trigger one of the AoEs of Sungrazer which get all the Sneak Attack bonuses etc. Same thing with the disengagment attacks. I used White Witch Mask for most of the game (can spare you a but of Guile and boosts the Trickster's Illusions and looks good withthe Brigandine) and later the Champion's Helm. With Armored Grace, Abraham pet and Reckless Brigandine you get pretty good speed for a fat Brigandine setup. The terrify/disengagement effect does no work 100% of times. But often enough to be quite effective.

That is late(ish) game stuff. I prefer to judge a class combo on the early game as well - if a new player is asking. And Helwalker's increased damage received + Blood Sacrifice is accessible right from the start which can lead to some nasty surprises. Of course: if you already know some stuff then it's no big deal. It's just so that such experiences can be pretty frustrating for a new player. Thus I recommend Arcane Knight. Instruments of Pain is very good since all it does is to multiply your weapon's base reach with 6. A pike has 1.8 meters reach so you get a melee reach of 10.8 meters. This allows you to switch targets way more quickly without engaging and moving around which can raise your damage output considerably. It also prevents you from getting attacked too much. You can still use all melee abilites. So: no-brainer. Yesterday evening I did compare the two variants again in-game (also with Draining Touch and again my favorite combo with Swift Flurry/Stunning Surge atm: Sungrazer + Sun&Moon). Not at max level though because then the effect of Swift Flurry is of course way better when you are overleveled. Sage can totally wreck weaker mobs and is super fun in those crowded encounters. But you have to watch out (without potion shenanigans). Several CRE_Tigers may overwhelm him quickly if you make a mistake. Arcane Knight also does a good job with mob damage but is slower - but at the same time is very sturdy. If placed against 6 or more CRE_Tigers he has a rel. easy time surviving. He also has an easier time against tougher foes. The +20 ACC on FoD and Brand Enemy do help a lot here. I wouldn't pick Sworn Rival with a Lance user I think - since he will hit several enemies most of the time anyway and you maybe don't want to spend your time applying Sworn Rival to all enemies you want to hit. So instead I would pick Brand Enemy for the hard-to-hit foes and give them the Death Sentence (Brand Enemy is an auto-hit). Anyhow: I'd say it depends on the role in the party. If you need another sturdy body who also does good dmg and CC (also spell dmg due to burning lash from Eternal Devotion and potentially Blightheart) but can also heal and support then Arcane Knight. If you want to mop the floor with mobs (pun intended), be less sturdy for bigger parts of the game but have more offensive potential and have lots of fun when Swift Flurry procs then Sage. Needs more fiddling. I like both combos a lot (with diverse subclasses). By the way: a gamebreaking combo with Sage is to use Scordeo's Edge with Blade Cascade and Adaptive + Draining Wall. Once you have enough duration of Blade Cascade you can summon the Lance and attack with 0 recovery and +20 ACC. It's some micro though. I totally recommend the Community Patch. Not only does it fix Forbidden Fist and several other weird things (like Backstab and proper keyword distributionfor Priests etc .) but it also has unique icons for all passives which makes leveling up way easier in the eyes and brain. Whoha... who may have drawn all those icons... It is a conservative mod which means it doesn't induce powerful munchkin stuff. It fixes some stuff and it merely enhances the balancing and buffs stuff that is too weak and nerfs stuff that is gamebreakingly strong. But only moderately. I'd say it makes a great Deadfire even better. Without Munchkin vibes. But you can also switch on/and off individual parts of the "patch" and only use what you want from it. See my sig for download. I would also highly recommend the Enhanced UI mod. I have nothing to do with it but it's superb - especially for new players. It doesn't alter the mechanics but only adds some very handy UI infos to popups and tooltips. I wouldn't want to miss it.

It's not intended that they regain their charges via stashing but an oversight. So it's a little bit cheesy.

Did you use a pet or summons?

Yeah - Draining Touch with Miasma and Swift Flurry is indeed cool - but it is out I guess because OP wants to use Spirit Lance mainly. Corrosive Siphon + Blood Sacrifice is not specific to Sage. Every Bloodmage can do it. However Corrosive Siphon with a Helwalker is very good. But Blood Sacrifice with a Helwalker is bad. It's tricky as I said. But yes: can be lots of fun. I think Arcane Knight is a lot more forgiving though. Hard to kill even in the early game and good synergies and damage. Inspiring Triumph (stacks with everything) + Wall of Draining + Virtuous Triumph with Spirit Lance + Eternal Devotion is pretty great as well. You'll usually get enough refund to not run out of Zeal too early if you are the main damage dealer. And I just love the Ring + FoD. +20 ACC attacks are great. Another nice alternative to Bleak Walker is Steel Garotte by the way: draining life with Spirit Lance (and also on the early game with Parasitic Staff) is very cool as a Bloodmage. I generally think that Sage needs a bit more knowledge to really shine. Maybe after a restart...

Those defenses are not exceptionally high (he's not using maxed out defensive gear). You can't even see some of the bonuses because they are circumstancial (e.g. Nomad's Brigandine gives a deflection bonus against ranged- or melee-only attacks - depends on the enchantment - which are not listed here). Reflex is higher due to Weapon & Shield Style (and maybe some more points in DEX/PER). Since he's a Wizard he can cast self buffs - and he also uses per-rest bonuses and consumables. I can't remember if it was a SC Wizard or not, but some defensive buffs do stack. For example Wizard's defense buffs do stack with Vigorous Defense (Fighter) - except Llengrath's Safeguard's - which leads to very high defenses in general. Also Paladin's passives stack with Wizard's defense buffs. You can reach defenses over 200 if you want to. His elemental AR is high because he's a Pale Elf.

Who said you are supposed to enchant every weapon/armor to the max? Most of the time you will have to make a choice. You can also use Soulbound items which upgrae themselves. Or summoned weapon - or fists. That gives you more room.

Underpenetration (-25/50/75% dmg) is a severe damage malus. If you also can't reliably hit but only graze (-50% dmg) then you will be having a really hard time. Also because those numbers turn out to be much more severe because there is some special doulbe-inversion-shenanigans going on under the hood when your dmg is calculated (check out the combat log to see how devastating underpenetration and grazing is for your dmg output). So avoid it at all cost. As soon as your PEN equals enemies AR you're good. Overpenetration is nothing you shoul strife for. It's only 30% additive dmg and most of times nothing worth investing into. Just make sure you have lots of ACC and PEN to overcome defenses and AR. In case of Huani: here you could use a one-handed club (targets deflection) to lower Will, then use Misma (targets Will) to lower Will further (with club and Miasma it should be quite low now) and then use Shining Beacon with Ring of Focused Flame (targets Will with +10 ACC and is doing good enough penetrating burn damage) - just an example. Look at the Megabosses like they were puzzles how to crack them open. Brute force (I don't mean the Barbarian ability ) will not be very successful...

Sages can be pretty fun with Spirit Lance. Mostly because Forge of Anguish lets every enemy in the AoE fly away and get interrupted and because Stunning Surge nearly always refunds if you manage to hit several enemies at once with the Lance. The Forbidden Fist ability is not a weapon ability. That means it wouldn't use the Lance. It has its own base damage and will profit from Transcendent Suffering. So basically it's like using your fist (but it doesn't work with Swift Flurry and Heartbeat Drumming because it isn't considered a weapon attack). Lance's AoE does not work with Swift Flurry. If you don't take Shattered Pillar (quite weak subclass to be honest) or Forbidden Fist you can generate wounds with Alacrity which will not end Enduring Dance. Combined with Nalpazca (not that much micro with the drugs) you will have a constant stream of wounds all the time. Helwalker's MIG will help with spell damage of course. Arcane Knights can be sturdy as hell while dishing out good damage because the Paladin's defensive passives stack with the wizard buffs and Flames of Devotion works with Spirit Lance. You can wear the Ring of Focused Flames and get +10 Accuracy not only for your fire spells but also FoD. Bleak Walkers can even take Scion of Flame and Spirit of Decay and get +1+1=2 PEN for their FoD attacks (also the AoE with Lance). Another nice aspect of an Arcane Knight is that Eternal Devotion also applies its lash to your spells. You can also use Blightheart at the start of combat (before summoning Lance): it gives you a Corrosive lash for all your spells. Combined with Eternal Devotion this boosts your spell damage considerably. Then after casting and summoning Lance you can waltz in. You don't even have to switch weapons for that (because summoning). Of course Lay in Hands (and also Exalted Endurance) is great for a Bloodmage. Also Concelhaut's Corrosive Siphon is great in that case (+1 PEN from Spirit of Decay, great healing for Blood Sacrifice). Conjurer + Chanter summons is not a great synergy. General rule is: you can only have one summoned creature at all times. This includes the Conjurer's Familiar. So you can't have the Familiar and the Phantom or Chanter summons at the same time. Only exception: Many Lives Pass By (Chanter phrase) will automatically summon skeletons every few secs that don't count towards this limit. So I wouldn't pick Conjurer. In general I don't think Chanter/Wizard lancer is a particularly awesome combo, but maybe others have different experiences. Skald doesn't get phrases from Lance's AoE crits. Only intitial hit rolls that crit do count. Another nice combo is Fighter/Wizard because Vigorous Defense stacks with the Wizard's buffs and Mule Kick with Lance is fun as well as Clear Out with Lance is like an explosion: every AoE hit of Clear Out will produce a Lance-AoE. Rogue/Wizard can apply stuff like Crippling Strike and Deep Wounds in an AoE with the Lance. I personally like Arcane Knight best. It's a no-stress mix of good defense and offense and has some nice synergies. Helwalker and Nalpasca Sage is also nice but a bit more tricky.

I think it was too good in PoE and it's too weak in Deadfire. Charmed and Dominated can have a big effect on combat though. I never use Confusion abilities.

My general approach for a martial Priest would be to not pick too many priest spells per Power Level (you can mostly cast two per PL anyway and get one auto per PL) but those you want to use in almost every fight. Rest goes to passives and good fighter (or monk or whatver the second class is) actives. This takes away some flexibility but makes the combo more effective in most situations. My choice (which is influenced by power a but also the theme) would be: Touch of Rot (auto), Blessing (if not 2nd class Fighter who already gets Disciplined Strikes, then either Restore, Interdiction or Holy Power - depends on what the other party members are/have) Holy Meditation (auto), Spiritual Weapon (or if Karabörü is always in use and you don't plan to use the Spiritual Great Sword then Iconic Projection) Spreading Plague (auto), Consecrated Ground Divine Terror (auto), Devotions for the Faithful (it's just too good) Rot Skulls (auto), Barring Death's Door, Revive the Fallen (here three spells per PL is fine with me because I'd never use Rot Skulls as a melee Priest anyway and Revive the Fallen is situational) Salvation of Time (auto), Minor Intercession Rusted Armor (auto), Minor Avatar, Resurrection (Rusted Armor and Resurrection are rather situational, so it's ok for me to have three on this PL)

It's only additive and can be countered rather effectively with underpenetration (if your armor is +1/+2+3 points higher than enemies' PEN). The dmg malus from underpenetration is actually a lot stronger than additive dmg bonuses due to double inversion of maluses. And Priests have some healing as well. Here the MIG does help. But yes: best not to stack 10 wounds when you get overwhelmed. Use them for Blade Turning instead or so. Devoted/Berath will be sturdier than Helwalker/Berath. I say Devoted since the OP seems to want to use Great Sword mainly and that's good with Devoted. Also Fighter gets Unbroken at some point which is also cool with Berath (like a self-reviving Priest of Berath - or Tangaloa if Huana I guess).

Yes, the Helwalker's MIG boost (+1 MIG per wound) does stack with everything since it's a passive ability. The +1 INT per wound from Duality does not stack with INT inspirations because that's an active ability (all modals are actives - and it's also on the left side of the ability tree).

Is that PotD? Because I often find that Swift Flurry/Heartbeat Drumming don't work very well in those encounters where it matters most. Vs. "trash mobs" they are golden of course. Particular reason for Barbarian and not Fighter? I mean Disciplined Strikes + Mob Stance. Should be even easier to chain-crit with Swift Flurry/HBD I would presume? On the other hand a Berserker + Barbaric Blow and Bloody Slaughter may also be crittin' a ton. But you'd need DoC Breastplate or Lobster in your belly. By the way: do you know if Static Charge/Thunder hits proc Avenging Storm?

Yes, I can imagine a Helwalker/Priest of Berath not only fits thematically but Karabörü with Swift Flurry/Heartbeat Drumming could actually be a nice combo (never tried). By the way: Whispers of the Endless Paths "Offensive Parry" works with Swift Flurry/Heartbeat Drumming as well.

Nice idea. I would suggest Fighter multiclass because Mob Stance works a bit like Reckless Brigandine (mechanics are a bit different). Defender Stance would also work. Pick Abraham as pet and use Armored Grace and you will be good in terms of attack speed. With Karabörü you want to take Disciplines Strikes I guess (because of the crit conversion) but Tactical Barrage is also nice for your spells. The summoned Great Sword is also nice by the way. Its corrosove lash is quite strong and scales with your "correct" dispositions (if they match Berath's preferred dispositions). Clear Out is a nice combo with Karabörü since every crit in the cone can lead to a Karabörü-cone attack as well. Another option is Whispers of the Endless Paths. It is quite crazy with Clear Out (because lots of hits due to AoE*AoE mechanic). What looks quite well with Reckless Brigandine is the Whitewitch Mask. It's also quite handy once you get overwhelmed (triggers Repulsive Visage then). The other headgear (besides gear from the Seeker, Slayer, Survivor DLC) that looks nice with the Brigandine you can't get because you would have to kill the Queen to get it. So I think the only good looking headpiece (with the Brigandine) is the mask.

I honestly have no idea about the sales numbers. I would love a PoE3 pretty much though.

Spirit Lance is one of the best weapons in the game. Not only has it increased base damage (25 average) which is a huge plus, but it also comes superb (meaning the already high base damage gets a +45% boost alongside the ACC of +12) and on top of it all it also has the speed enchantment which is - along with wounding - the best dps enchantment there is. If you also take Savage Attack and Two Handed Style you can do serious damage while being super fast (with Alacrity). We Toki and stuff only prone/stun on crit. Their base dmg is way lower. And it's not easy to reliably crit a dragon when solo on PotD as a wizard. So yeah: a solo wizard who goes into melee should use his summoned weapons imo, mainly Spirit Lance (which is also a great mob killer).

I really hope it gets better for you console players. The game itself is too good to get trashed because all of those quirks on console.

Okay - now I assume it's our turn where we guess what you wanted to express with posting that picture? My first shot: you made a mod that contains all those new ship models. Very nice.

You mustn't follow a build in every detail. Deadfire is a well balanced game where usually it's totally fine to just follow the general direction of a build idea (here: Stunning Surge and later Whispers of the Wind + Resonant Touch with big AoE mortars) but use some personal flavor (be it from items, race, attributes etc.) I gave a rel. detailed build description and you should be able to do a mortar monk with that info that is fun. Race doesn't matter much. For example I used a Coastal Aumaua with Rauatai background because I planned to join the Rauatai faction (which I did). Don't even remember the profession background. If you want to use a helmet like Heaven's Cacophony you can't use a godlike, but generally speaking monks are good with Nature Godlikes because the +1 Power Level from Wellspring of Life is great for fists and Whispers of the Wind. You can still use Avenging Storm from scrolls then. In that case you would pick a background with more Arcana. And so on. Just grasp the general idea that makes a build fun and powerful and then make it your own. Don't follow everything me or others say about builds blindly. It's more fun to get started and then invest a bit of creativity yourself. If you really want a kind-of-min-maxed guideline then I would tell you: Race: Nature Godlike Background: some culture/profession where you get +1 INT and +1 Arcana Attributes: MIG 18, CON 03 (attention: squishy in early game), DEX 16, PER 18, INT 20, RES 03 Skills: Arcana (for Avenging Storm Scrolls) The risky glass-cannon approach is fun for me because I like the challenge to have maxed offensive output but have to look out for the guy . E.g. I would never board enemy ships until later in the game because 3 CON and low deflection and AR means you get focus-fired by gunners and die right on the spot in the early(ish) game. If that's not fun for somebody else I suggest thicker armor, more CON and less DEX and MIG. Also WotW is easily interruptible. So stay stealthed until you cast it or get an item that gives you concentration (Upright Captain's Belt for example like I posted above or even Rekvu's Fractured Casque). Bit I really advise everybody to not follow build ideas blindly but adapt them to your own needs and likings. They won't suffer much if you alter things (that are not the quintessence of the build - like taking away the mortars would be).

It is not Confuse that's broken (works as intended, but is way weaker than in PoE), it's Perplexing Sap that's not working with this sort of Confusion as it might have been intended. Too late to fix this now - no matter if two years or twenty: Obsidian stopped patching Deadfire months ago so this will stay forever in the original game. Anyways: don't use it, it's bad. The whole Sap branch is rather bad. Confusion has its merits of you fight against casters, especially ones who like to shower you with foe-only AoE spells (like Shining Beacon or so) or shower their guys with AoE healing. Then all spells turn into friendly fire (for the enemies). Besides that it's not very useful. Confused enemies don't switch targets. But secondary effects (AoE, projectile jumps etc.) will hit friends. Same as enemies' AoE healing will hit you.

Then you coul use stuff like Herald tanks (with Exalted Endurance + Ancient Memory), Fighter tank with Defender Stance to bind foes and keep them busy, healing Druid with AI set to heal on low health and stuff like that. Pallegina + Edér + Tekēhu can do this. Also ranged builds like Scouts (e.g. with arquebus, namely the Red Hand) work well with AI scripts - see Maia. Nearly all single target ranged builds do (because it's easy for AI to determine a good target based on your rules and you don't have to move them much). A buffing/anti-affliction bot also works pretty much hands-free. Like a Priest who buffs with Blessing and Devotions right at the start of combat and then uses healing and counter-buffs (to remove afflictions) once the trigger fires (e.g. companion's health is too low, companion suffers from affliction and so on). Can be done by Xoti. I never tried to build an AI-navigated "squishy-rusher" - e.g. a Rogue who teleports ("escapes") to a wizard, slays him and then teleports to the next one while avoiding getting attacked too much. Should work though. Might get knocked out every now and then. Maybe a multiclass with an auto-revive or Edér's armor (second chance) would be good on that. There are multiple ways to build chars that are good with AI or don't need much micro in general (see fighter tank). Then make one heavy micro char (usually main char) to mainly steer through the adventure. Often offensive casters are very micro-heavy because they want to place and time their spells perfectly well and AI is bad with that. This one (like most monks) requires micromanagement because you want to place the shots (with AoE) perfectly well (choose the right target to shoot). Usually AI does a poor job with those decisions ad I said above. I used it as my MC and was one of the most fun experiences so far (also because laughs and giggles from MC and Konstanten - I tell you: it's really contagious and makes you smile, if not laugh).