Boeroer

If you want pieces flying around on critcal deathblows you have to look into the game options menu. There's a "gib" select box that has to be checked. But iirc it is on by default. Since the companions start one level above custom hirelings (the ones which you can compose yourself) they are usually not just dying and useless. Imo the game is a lot better with them than without them, at the very least for the first complete playthrough. Builds from the build list usually work for the companions, too - unless there's a specific character race involved which the build is based on (like fire godlike or so). I would recommend to bring a Priest (official companion named Durance). Priests are the most impactful class for a party because their support abilities are so strong. Paladins or Fighters will never be the most potent DPS option (same as in the old BG games etc.) but they can be among the most solid and reliable ones because it is usually difficult to kill then even if they are not build to be tanks. When it comes to melee dps, generally speaking: in this game dual wielding will have an edge over two handed - and that will be better than single weapon. There are of course lots of exceptions, it depends on the type of enemy and build and unique weapon etc. and there's no truly crucial difference, but if one aims for maximal melee dps then dual wielding is the way to go for Paladin or Fighter. A Paladin who wishes to focus on damage dealing should invest into his flames of devotion ability to be able to deliver two impactful strikes during an encounter. Later the ability Sacred Immolation will provide a ton of damage. Fighter has the good Knockdown ability and later the very good Charge ability. Don't sleep on Charge, it can take out weak but dangerous enemies like casters in the back rows very quickly because it does a "hidden" full attack (meaning both weapons strike) at the target on top of its crushing damage that it officially does. The game rewards stacking attack speed bonuses. As dual wielder you can rel. easily reach low recovery time. This is very important for weapon dps. Dexterity gives you speed and so does dual wielding and some talents and abilities but also some items. Speed is not only important for DPS but also to avoid getting interrupted (that sucks) and also to be more responsive/reactive. It can be very frustrating if you cannot drink a healing potion and die because you have to recover from a swing for ages. Accuracy is one of the most, if not the most important stat to have for an offensive character. Besides bringing a Priest who can boost the party's accuracy you want to make sure your dps fighter or paladin has good (or even maxed out) accuracy. First and easiest thing to do is to have good Perception. Then weapon quality provides accuracy among other benefits. A weapon with bonus accuracy is better than one with bonus damage (weapon quality provides both, but there is stuff like "accurate I-III and "damaging I-III" on some weapons). Damage per hit is not as important as damage per second (and attack speed itself) - but it plays an important role when you are against heavily armored enemies. High damage per hit makes it easier to overcome thick armor (more dmg gets through). There's a point where very fast attacks with lower dmg per hit get mostly eaten up by armor and a slow but hefty strike wins the day. So don't neglect dmg per hit altogether. All damage bonuses like from weapon quality or from abilities and also the Might stat raise the dmg per hit. In theory the best weapon dps will come from maxed DEX, PER and MIG and then the fitting abilities and weapons of course while having as little recovery as possible. But of course putting all your points into those that will make you more squishy. And knocked out chars do no dps. So it's a balance. The easier the difficulty setting the more 'glass-cannonish" you guy can be. In general it's very difficult for a melee char to not get attacked. But if you can keep the number of enemies who are attacking you low (for example by flanking an already engaged enemy rather than running inti the fray) you can stay alive much longer. Having said that, Fighter and Paladin are reasonably sturdy compared to most other classes even when going full dps mode. Way easier to stay alive than with Barbarian and Rogue. Rangers by the way don't have to be passive and only shoot bows etc. In PoE they make viable melee combatants - who come with their animal companion which can also be a good melee damage dealer (especially the part of high "damage per hit" against though armor can be done very well by an animal companion, when leveled properly they hit slowly - but like trucks). Rangers don't have the most fancy melee special attacks, but they can be faster bc. of a modal they can pick (see the importance of speed) and they are most accurate - while they come in a pair rather than alone which is already an advantage. Unlike BG games they have no spells besides a lil' tanglefoot thing that you don't need to pick - but are mostly about striking. The best rangers still use bows I'd say, but melee is a viable and fun option, too. I did some build in the build list named "Riptide..." - it's a two-handed melee ranger that was fun to play (but too squishy for a beginner though I think).

Watery double is great. The whole subclass is great imo despite the loss of (the other) summons. One thing about Thekehu: he will periodically cancel/clear all fire effects on him. While that's cool in most cases it also means that he clears beneficial fire effects on him - such as Mith Fyr from a fellow chanter.

Best beginner classes are Paladin, Fighter, Ranger and Monk. All of them have good starting values, are front loaded and aren't squishy. I personally like the Monk class best but it has the most "complicated" mechanics of those four. The easiest to start with might be the fighter. Barbarian is another favorite of mine but it's incredibly squishy in the early game due to the abysmal deflection defense - while hitting a barn door at best. It needs some levels to get going (and become lots of fun) and thus isn't great for beginners imo.

Guess it's time to pick it up again and finally get to those 6k hours...

Eh what?

She couldn't get the Paladin's defensive passives as high as a main player Paladin - and there was the health + endurance mechanic: health was finite and mostly unhealable - and endurance was tied to health (couldn't have more endurance than remaining health), so you couldn't outheal damage endlessly as you can in Deadfire. In Deadfire you can be tanky as hell as long as you can heal the incoming damage.

Yes, better than Orges. The Dragon Thrashed is not as good as it was in PoE. In Deadfire it's pretty weak on its own - compared to other chants of somewhat similar tiers. One can still make use of it if you can stack it in the party with several other sources of long lasting (AoE) damage over time effects (like for example Barbarian's Blood Storm or Druid's damage over time spells or so).

It should. Immunity to a melee attack usually is implemented as a 100%-to-miss conversion which can trigger riposte. I didn't test it with the armor though. But Riposte only triggers on a lowish percentage of misses (20% iirc) and the enchantment only gives a 5% chance. So overall it's 1/5th of 1 out of 20 attacks (or 1%). So I think this feature combo is absolutely negligible.

He's carrying a unique leather armor named Miscreant's Leather which is not bad - but it's not one of the items I put on my party in most runs (at least not for long).

Make Pallegina a Herald with Zealous Endurance + Ancient Memory as aura+chant, aim for the Blackened Plate and enchant it with the healing aura, get Lethandria's Devotion as shield and enchant it with Sheltering Light and maybe use Bardatto's Luxury as main weapon or a spear for more engagement if you need it and you'll have a sturdy tank who can passively heal herself and the party and also support actively with invocations, exortations and Lay on Hands. Later even dealing noticable damage becomes an option with Sacred Immolation (watch out for the self damage).

Single class or Bellower/Helwalker I guess. Some high level stuff like Eld Nary's Curse is very potent with a lot of bonus Power Levels. Also single class can take more of the empower passives which work pretty well with the 1/encounter Empower that Sasha's Singing Scimitar provides. Helwalker adds MIG, INT, cheap PEN (Thunderous Blows) and ACC ((Enduring) Dance of Death) and also has a theoretically unless unlimited supply of resources (wounds). It's a great multiclass addition for any caster imo. Also Monk/Chanter can be pretty good in melee bc. of Turning Wheel + Myth Fir + Lightning Strikes giving lots of lashes for little investment. Adds versatility...

This is why my dual pistol SC Kind Wayfarer with two weapon style AND rushed reload was so useful despite the ACC drop: crazy good responsiveness because the reloading was already very fast - but if even that was not fast enough I could just cancel the reloading process and react instantly. That and the party healing was done on the fly via White Flames while shooting...

It depends on your party. If you have (or planing to have) party members who use a lot of summons (like a Beckoner with Ancient Brittle Bones, Troubadour with the phrase Many Lives Pass By or an Ancient with Sporelings for example) then going Single Class Paladin can be very potent. The reason is that the ability "Divine Retribution" will give +2 Zeal on a summon's death, too. The best case is a Troubadour with Many Lives Pass By, sung with Brisk Recitation. Those skeletons pop out every 3 secs and die as quickly (because weak as wet tissue paper) so you'll basically get +2 Zeal every 3 seconds if the fight is rough and the skeletons die quickly. So you can provide exortations and Lay on Hands and whatnot all the time. If that's not the case then Herald. It has great "self-contained" synergy and is both very tanky and very supportive - not only actively but also passively (with chants + zealous auras combined) and also has summons, which are a very powerful in general.

I'd also go Troubadour. Troubadour is about speedy invocations (or phrase overlap) while Bellower is about fewer invocations but with more oomph. One fun part of the Bellower is that you can stack the Power Levels from the phrase count with the Power Levels from Empower (1/encounter with Sasha's Singing Scimitar). You cannot have that fun experience when multiclassing with Bloodmage. Also keep in mind that the Bellower's chant AoE is severely smaller than the Troubadour's.

Yes, that's also very fun as Howler with Bloodlust. But he only has 10 base INT and that leads to a pretty small Her-Revenge cone - which is a little frustrating imo.

Yes, your observation is correct. Power Levels improve the accuracy: +1 per added Power Level. If you cast Killers with a Bellower - and let's say get +5 PL from his current phrase count - you'll have +5 accuracy. Your attack roll (d100 + accuracy - enemy's will defense) will determine the quality of the hit (miss, graze, hit or crit). It has nothing to do with penetration though. That's only a thing when dealing damage (vs. armor) is involved. Your Killers invocation will also have longer duration because of the added power levels by the way.

Hi, I almost always build Edér as my party's swashbuckler "offensive debuffing" tank somewhat like this (this is just an unordered list and maybe I even put too many abilities there): (would be better with an Unbroken/Streetfighter instead of Edér but also works with him) large shield + modal* - the goal is to use Cadhu Scalth Luminous Harmony and max Athletics and Metaphysics* (if it's too weird for you to raise Metaphysics on a doofus such as Edér I'd go for Bronlar's Phalanx instead). engagement slots: 1 club + modal - the goal is to use Kapana Taga with its enchantments Champion's Relic and Unblockable. Before that I use Shattered Vengeance. engagement slots: 3 brigandine - the goal is to use Reckless Brigande with its enchantment Into the Breach. engagement slots: 4 Upright Captain's Belt - for the immunity to push & pull effects Escape (important to be able to move even when the large shield modal is active) Weapon & Shield Style* Mob Stance - at the beginning, before upgrading the stance and before getting the engagement gear I'll use Defender Stance though. Hold the Line. engagement slots: 5 - that's enough White Witch mask - this is one of the few helmets that matches the style of Kapana Taga+Cadhu Scalth+Reckless Brigandine and that's the only reason I pick this. Later the Champion's Helmet from SSS is the top choice. Could pick any other good headger and just hide the helmet if it looks bad. Tactical Barrage (because Edér's INT is low and his durations so short otherwise) Determination Entonia Signet Ring deflection gear Refreshing Defense Riposte Confident Aim Superior Deflection Armored Grace Adept Evasion* Persistent Distraction Deep Wounds Slippery Mind Deathblows if there's still room I'd use stuff like Bear's Fortitude and stuff a pet like Abraham One goal is to make him a tank that needs almost no attention (except at the start of the encounter) but can still contribute besides tanking via "passive" debuffing and dealing (some) damage. Edér will be almost invulnerable to AoE attacks (see shield modal + Cadhu Scalth + Adept Evasion) so you can use him to tank & bind a lot of enemies and then shower them with all the friendly-fire AoE stuff your party has to offer without affecting Edér much (if at all). Even Pull of Eora has no effect on him if you give him the Upright Captain's Belt. I usually approach the enemies with Edér as the only visible party member, hit shield modal, Tactical Barrage and Refreshing Defense, "escape" into the mob's center and then let him do his thing rel. unattended. And while all the enemies concentrate on him I will buff the party's ACC and then start bombarding the enemies around him with debuffs/CC and then damage. This way you can make sure that he will always engage up to 5 enemies right away. Those 5 engagements makes him quite fast for a guy in a Brigandine (Mob Stance, Reckless Brigandine) which adds to the speed advantage he gets from Abraham and Armored Grace. He will have up to +25 melee accuracy by his own (Tactical Barrage + Kapana Taga's enchantment Unblockable) which makes it easy for him to hit enemies with the club - which lowers their Will by 25. On top of that he will flank and distract the engaged enemies just by engaging them which also debuffs their defenses and also their armor (there's no defense against Persistant Distraction). Ripostes also will apply the effect of the club modal by the way. Works every time for me. He isn't sturdy enough to facetank megabosses this way - but anything else he will handle fine as long as he has support from the party every now and then. He could be made more defensively of course and I guess you wouldn't really notice in terms of offensive prowess of your party overall - because his damage-dealing is nice for a tank - but it isn't enormous. But I think he's more interesting this way. And advantage is that if he should be the last man standing he can end the fight on his own. Superdefensive tanks sometimes struggle to deal enough damage to finish an encounter on their own (in a reasonable amount of time).

Morning Star has crush and pierce damage (uses the most advantageous against the enemy armor automatically) and also very good base Penetration of 9. So you seldomly need a backup weapon. Also the debuffing effect of Body Blows always works, even if the enemies are totally immune to the Morning Star's damage. But in the rare cases you might need a backup weapon I would pick one that does slash damage since that is the one the Morning Star doesn't cover. Also it should be a two-handed weapon because you will most likely pick Two-Handed Style at some point. For me personally that leaves Great Sword and Pollaxe. I woul pick Pollaxe because you can get Lord Darryn's Voulge (a soulbound Pollaxe) quire early if you wish. It has slash and shock(!) damage instead of crush so it's a perfect altenative to the Morning Star. And there are several enemies who are especially vulnerable to shock damage. Also the Soulbound makes the weapon scale and enchant without any resources (money, special gems and stuff) wich is great for a backup weapon. And finally the Voulge is a great weapon for a Barbarian in itself because its special additional lightning damage works with Carnage. It doesn't have the double hit feature for more crits though and no cool debuff effect like Body Blows. The Howler Konstanten is not only doing okay in melee for himself - he's also a great debuffer for the party because lots of spells and other abilities target enemies' fortitude (see several good Cipher, Druid and Wizard spells for example) and Konstanten can help your party land more of those more reliably. The only thing at which a Howler isn't so good at is raising his own accuracy. The Brute Force/fortitude debuffing cycle does help a lot - but having a Priest with Blessing and Devotions is very helpful for Konstanten to hit and crit more early in the fight and start having more impact right away. Merry Christmas to you, too! And to my other fellow forum members as well. Yay! Cooking some venison goulash for the whole family while I type basically... hope it tastes somewhat decent.

Hi, I like to use him as Howler (Debuffer) with a Morning Star because the synergies of both classes plus the weapon modal are great: Spirit Frenzy (Barbarian) applies the Staggered affliction (-5 MIG, cannot engage) to ALL hit rolls from the Barbarian. This includes chants, Carnage hits and of course all weapon hits. Stagger lowers Fortitude by 10 points (-5 MIG directly leads to -10 fortitude because every point of MIG grants 2 points of fortitude defense) Th Long Night's Drink (phrase, Chanter) applies the Sickened affliction (-5 CON, -25% healing received) to all enemies in th chant AoE that don't get missed. If this chant hits it also applies Staggered via Spirit Frenzy. -5 CON directly leads to -10 Fortitude which stacks with Body Blows' (see below) and Staggered's Fortitude debuff. Enemies' fortitude can now be dropped by 45 points. Body Blows (Morning Star modal) lowers enemies' fortitude by 25. If you hit with the weapon you aill also apply Staggered via Spirit Frenzy (if not already staggered). All those effects stack so that the enemies' Fortitude can be lowered by 45(!) points without any fuss: just hit them with the Morning Star, the rest is done on the fly (and in an AoE) without you having to actively do anything. Brute Force (Barbarian passive) targets Fortitude if it's lower than deflection. There are few enemies which have 45 higher fortitude than deflection - so you almost always have it easier to hit or crit enemies. Use the Morning Star "Saru Sichr": It is optainable quite early and has a "hidden" feature. Its poison damage-over-time effect does a spearate hit roll every time you strike. This hit roll targets fortitude and it can crit. So with this weapon you have two chances for a weapon crit with just one swing. That increases the chance to get a phrase point for the Skald. You can alternatively use the Morning Star "Will Breaker" later because it also debuffs Will defense on hit - but is doesn't have that neat "double hit roll" which leads to more phrase generation. Konstanten's INT is only 10 which isn't ideal for his AoEs and durations as a debuffer so I make sure to give him +INT gear. On top of that a Skald has very cheap "Her Revenge" invocation which stays great through the game. In combination with Blood Thirst you can really wreck mobs with this. You can later use "The CHampion" invocation to become energized and interrupt with all crits (from chants etc. too). So if you crit with the chant and this triggers the Spirit Frenzy's stagger (which might crit) you can interruot twice with one chant's hit roll for example. This can mess enemy casters up pretty badly. Konstanten has a funny laugh when he crits. So the more he crits the more often you will hear his infectuous laughter. It is paired very well with the noble voice for a male player character - because that voice also does have a laught that fits Konstanten's. I once had a moble-voiced Monk who crit a lot and Konstanten as Howler and I was laughing a lot in front of my PC when those two did a lot of crits in some mob fights. The Dragon summon is nice as a tank - but IMo it's not worth going SC Skald. Eld Nary's Curse though might be a reason: it's pretty cheap for a Skald and the upgrade is noticably more powerful than the base version.

You might have triggered the "hide headgear" option in the UI.

For a Forbidden Fist I actually prefer to not use fists as standard weapon, because you will have your Forbidden Fist attack anyway (crush damage and scales like your Monk fists) while your weapon can have an alternative type of damage - which makes you more versatile when it comes to PEN vs. AR. And you might profit from some universal enchantment or modal of the weapon - for example I like to use a Dagger + modal with a Forbidden Fist: as long as I mainly use the Forbidden Fist attack there is no drawback (dmg malus only applies to dagger attacks) while the +10 melee deflection still applies. Could also be a spear (+engagement) or a hatchet (+deflection)...

Hi and welcome! Yes, that's it. Not only weapons but every damaging ability (spells etc.) must compare its PEN vs. the respective AR. Fortunately there a many ways to buff your PEN and/or debuff your enemies' AR. And then there's raw damage which just ignores PEN completely (but cannot deal bonus overpenetration damage like attacks with a PEN vs AR check can if the PEN is way higher than AR). Me personally: not much (in a party). I will have a standard chant and then one or two other chants for special situations. Like resistance chants when I know I will meet enemies who dish out a lot of annoying afflictions. Solo it's different because you need to be more versatile. My general approach is: buff accuracy debuff defenses/do CC deal damage Buffing accuracy can also mean that I attack with a debuff/CC spell from stealth with an Assassin/Wizard (+25 ACC) or something like that. On the higher difficulties CC or debuffing is absolutely not pointless. There it's often a lot less effective to start the fights with direct damage. Both very good. Psion/Troubadour is better for the really tough fights that last very long. I'd generally say it's better overall but it also depends whether you like to play wizard or chanter more. The Wizard has the advantages of nice defensive buffs so that the danger of getting your focus generation stopped is lower than with the Troubadour. Unless the Troubadour uses a lot of summons for distraction... You don't need to use a weapon at all for attacking - so best to use some kind of stat stick. Psion in general works very well with hatchet + small shield or dagger&modal + small shield imo. The Goldpact's Swown Enemy ability is nice once you spiritshift (bonus PL for Rejuvenation healings, good melee dmg). You'll have the very thick armor of the bear form (with no recovery malus) and on top you get the Gilded Enmity's +4 AR which makes you very hard to kill while being able to cast and fight quite fast. But other Paladin subclasses also work. Imo Berserker/Streetfighter with dual daggers (Lover's Embrace + Pukestabber) with all the speedup gear is mad fun - also because it's a dance on a razor's edge. Very good dps and fun, but also goes down very quickly if you don't pay attention. With a good healer it's manageable, just don't use that character to jump into the fray. Better to deal with single foes like casters and so on (using mobility abilities like Escape and Leap). Durable melee fighters are plenty. SC Forbidden Fist can be one for example.

That depends on what software you are using to downsize. But most of times, when downsizing a picture, there's some option to keep the ratio - like a lock symbol for example or a chain link or whatever. Here's what it looks like in my Gimp (sorry, UI is German):

Yes, I played a Shattered Pillar/Soulblade with Whispers of the Endless Paths (and Offensive Parry). I used the Community Patch here as well because the Shattered Pillar got nerfed too badly in the vanilla game (only generates wounds with auto-attacks AND the max wound count is limited to 5 instead of 10). Community Patch brings the max wound count back to 10 - and that's much more balanced with the other monk subclasses. It's cool to charge both wounds and focus with the same attacks. In my case it was also cool that Offensive Parry generates both focus and wounds, too. And Soul Annihilation works well with the cone of WotEP (which profits from the huge INT increase of Turning Wheel).

Alternating Forbidden Fist and Soul Annihilation only works with the Community Patch (mod) though. Without it the Forbidden Fist attack will not generate any focus unfortunately. With the CP you'll have indeed two very good individual attack options - and on top of their overall quality they both are fueled by refreshing resources which is aweseome, too.