Boeroer

You mean shareholders. Excecutives will only get a meager bonus.

Miscreant's Leathers is good. I guess Gipon Prudensco with "Fight Another Day" would be good as well.

Yes. Usually a Druid is a better healer than a Priest anyway. Except Furies of course. But maybe you shouldn't restrict Tekēhu to healing. As a Watershaper he has amazing foe-only water/frost spells like foe-only Chillfog and so on. That's what makes his subclass so good. But yes - he can also heal pretty well.

Sure - a self-build ascandant will be better than Serafen as SC Cipher. But that's the case with other companions as well. Most paladin orders seem to be better than Brotherhood of the Five Suns, especially for a Herald build. Then you'd also take Troubadour instead of Pallegina's vanilla Chanter option. Unbroken/Trickster or /Streetfighter would be so much better for Edér and so on. But that's not the point in this case. The relevant question (with ragard to companion builds) is if Serafen can be played as Wild Mind Cipher and if it's any good. And sure he can and yes it's good enough if you know what his subclass is about and how you can circumvent the shortcomings. It's not useless nor is it particularly bad for a companio build if you look at it objectively. It is just not very likable for most players because of the randomness. You cannot minmax randomness as effectively as you can minmax deterministic stuff.

As I already said in some other thread: if your MC is a damage dealer and you give him the noble male voice and then also bring Konstanten you are in for some laughs. Both voices have similar tonality - and both have an infectious laugh. Especially if they land crits. Konstanten is hilarious but the noble is close behind. I played Konstanten as Barb/Skald and used a Morning Star with Clear Out - so the crits were plentyful. My MC was a Mortar Monk. It was all like Barry White and his long lost brother doing "hohoho", "hahahaha" and "teheeehehe". I was smiling constantly because of that.

Wild Mind def. has more upsides than downsides. Given that subclasses are designed so that they are kind of balanced when it comes to pros and cons I'd say Wild Mind is on the "better than balanced" side. It's just so that most players hate random effects. A reason why pets like Nebula or items that grant a random effect or ven spells who do that are not popular even if they are more powerful than other stuff on average. And one Miscast of Wild Mind burns itself into the brains of every player who didn't see that coming while all the good stuff will be forgotten soon. You can get: +5 PL for that cast (awesome) cast a power twice for free (like Evoker passive, awesome) get full focus (awesome) apply Blinded, Dominated, Enfeebled, Paralyzed, Stunned or Terrified on the target (good, those are all tier 3) gain an Empower Point (ok, nothing to write home about though) -3 PL for that cast (meh, not too bad) set enemy invisible for 15 seconds (this can range from "Eh I don't care" to "Oh my goodness why is Neriscyrlas invisible?") Push everything away from target (doesn't matter most of times) apply Brilliant, Courageous, Energized, Intuitive, Robust or Swift to enemy (not nice but no big problem most of times if it's not a mean boss) remove Empower Point (meh, I don't care much) And then the Miscast which is a self-centered shock AOE that does 3x current dmg and targets Will. This is neither entirely good nor entirely bad. Since it's friendly fire it can hit allies and foes. You can play it so that you will wipe the enemy and not your party. Or just put him a little bit to the side (radius is 2.5) and nothing happens (except Serafen may damage himself). And if you take this into account the subclass can actually be quite fun to play. Just note that a miscast happens very rarely and nearly always when you have less than full focus (if current focu is low then it's no big deal at all). Use Deltro's Cage Helmet as I said, strengthen your will defense and get some more shock AR. Funnily enough it's more easy to raise your Will defense as a Witch than as a SC Cipher. If you hate the randomness in the first place then of course you will not be happy with this subclass.

And loot destruction with Essence Interrupter.

Hehe, never read that quote before. Well the Dyrwood is kind of medieval - a bit "rednecks in the dark times". Witch hunting included and so on. Homophobic tendencies would also fit there I guess. But maybe that would have been too much for poor Dyrwood's reputation. They are already orlan-, animancy-, eothas- and xenophobic. On the plus side: slavery is forbidden. So it's not all confederate stuff, höhöhö.

You can always use Takedown Combo with a direct dmg attack as well. Also a Seer is an accuracy beast: all the Ranger stuff + Borrowed Instincts... phew. And it's handy that a Seer always has an ally to cast stuff on that only works on allies (like Ectopsychic Echo or Amplified Wave and so on).

Most are pretty straightforward. Edér: Fighter/Rogue distraction tank with Cadhu Scalth (+modal), Kapana Taga, Reckless Brigandine, Hold the Line, Helm of the Champion, Entonia Signet, +Protection and +Deflection gear, Persistent Distraction, Armored Grace, Adept Evasion, Riposte, Mob Stance, Refreshing Defense, Deathblows, Unbending (and so on). Basically like an Unbroken/Trickster but without the goodies of both classes. Still works very well. Goal is to have a sticky tank with 5 engagement slots without using Defender Stance. The items help a lot in that regard. Also works with Defender Stance if you want other gear and more defensive capabilities. Anyway you only need enough staying power to bind lots of enemies to you at the start of combat. You distract all of them automatically (very nice passive auto-debuff with no "saving throw"). You will still deliver decent melee dmg but at the same time be nearly impervious to ranged and AoE dmg (shield modal + Adept Evasion). Because of that you can get hit by your teammates' AoE spells (e.g. your Wizard's) and don't care much. Usually your bound enemies do care though and die. Tekēhu: SC Watershaper with Deltro's Cage + Lord Darryn's Voulge as "stat stick". Or same with him as Watershaper/Stormspeaker. Pallegina: Herald tank. High defenses and passive healing. Fat armor, Lethandria's Devotion, Sasha's Singing Scimitar (Shopcking Prelude + Refreshing Finale: use empowered White Worms and later empwered Eld Nary), Blackened Plate Armor with "Life in Death", Exalted Endurance + Ancient Memory and so on. Keep near your allies. Maia Rua: Scout with focus on arquebus. All the stuff that increases arquebus dps: Gunner, Marksman, Driving Flight, Stalker's Link, Marked for the Hunt, Deathblows, Accurate Wounding Shot, Arterial Strike, Blinding Strike, maybe Pierce the Bell against the really high AR foes (it has +5 PEN). And so on. Maybe not Toxic Strike since her INT is pretty low. Use the Red Hand or Dragon's Dowry. Dragon's Dowry is one of the best weapon for backstabbing: sneak up to a target, use Arterial Strike to "backstab" and immediately retreat with either Escape or Evasive Roll (usually Evasive Roll is better since you need more Guile than Bond in an encounter). If you use Escape and enchanted her armor with "Return Fire" and also pick Superior Camouflage it's not uncommon to trigger Return Fire's crit conversion often. If you don't want to backstab then just stick to the Red Hand and fire away. Aloth: SC Wizard - nothing special. Grimoire of Vaporous Wizardry, Rekvu's Fractured Casque. Injure yourself with Necrotic Lance in between fights so you always carry an Acute Rash injury (it's a very minor debuff but you gain immunity to interrupts and +1 spall casts per spell tier). Either go for Chromprismatic Staff as stat stick (Power Level bonuses) or Blightheart (+10% corrosive lash for spells is great) or Griffin's Blade + a small shield for more staying power and a bit increased spell dmg. Or use Magran's Favor + Sun & Moon for your fire spells. SC Wizard "The Terror": use Effigy's Husk + Whitewhitch Mask + Eye of Wael (=+3 PL to illusions) and aim for Illusion spells like Miasma + Curse of Blackend Sight, Repulsive Visage and Enervating Terror, Gaze of the Adragan, Wall of Many Colors, Kalakoth's Freezing Rake. You can use a club + modal to lower Will by 25 on a single target if you wish. Best in this case might be Shattered Vengeance with "Coordinated Escape". Very strong debuffer (lower Will to the ground with Misama and then terrify the heck out of everybody) but also later a strong damage dealer with Freezing Rake. Use Concelhaut's Draining Touch + Essential Phantom for this trick: the Draining TOuch will not go away on a Phantom after a succesful hit, so it can keep hitting the enemy with it, It does very high corrode damge. Especially since it targets will and not deflection. You are a strong strong will debuffer: see the synergy? The Phantom will hit enemies like a truck because it frequently crits with Draining Touch. It will heal itself in the process (draining) and apply weakened to the target. If it drops below 50% health it will also cast Repulsive Visage because of the mask. If it dies it will trigger the Husk's raw AoE attack on death. If you use Shroud of the Phantasm you can do all that times 6 (six Phantoms) - but of course only 1/rest. If you use Arkemy'r Grimoire there's an Illusion spell names "Arkemyr's Brilliant Departure" which makes you invisible and doesn't break if you only cast CC on enemies (no damage though). That means that you can cast for example a Miasma on a crowd without becoming visible. It's like CC god mode a bit. Also Wall spells (Wall of Many Colors but also Wall of Flames) will not end the invisibility because they are hazards (their own game character entity) which will not be connected to you dealing damage. Xoti: SC Priest- Very straightforward - just works. Use her lantern - it's great for that. User her as main support/secondary healer and kind of offtank. SC Monk. As melee Monk use her fists mostly and aim for Whispers of the Wind + Resonant Touch and make her the main damage dealer in order to get something out of her subclass. As mid-ranged SC Monk: use Serafen's two Hand Mortars and go gunmonk. This is very strong with Stunning Surge, Flagellanth's Path and Whispers of the Wind/Resonant Touch. Use Lightning Strikes, Duality of mortal Presence (INT) - no need to pick Turning Wheel since it's melee only. Pick everything that gives you ACC, PEN and INT (AoE size): Enduring Dance, Thunderous Blows, Razor's Edge, Ring of Overseeing, Ring of the Marksman, Aloth's Armor, Heaven's Cacophony and so on. Start fights with Enduring Dance and then fire away with Stunning Surge. Use wounds for Thunderous Blows in between, later for Whispers of the Wind and Resonant Touch as well. Stunning Surge will ost nothing if it crits only once in the AoE and you will even get back Mortification from her class passive if you kill (which happens a lot if she's the main AoE damage dealer). She works great with a single-target-focused Maia Rua: Maia picks off the dangerous single targets, Xoti wrecks the mobs. This woirks very well with a stiyk tank Edér and Aloth using Pull of Eora to cramp as many mobs a possible into a tight space. Also Aloth can use Dazzling Lights to lure enemies from stealth into a tight spot where Edér then egages and Aloth casts Pull of Eora. If you use Pull of Eora much gie Edér an item that makes him immune to push/pull effects (like the Horns of the Aurochs or the Upright Captain' Belt - very good in this case). In all monk cases go for Precognition as amulet and Stalking Cloak for the back. Whispers of the Wind makes you invisible so you will stun every enemiy you hit with it. Serafen (I like him if that isn't obvious): Witch with Willbreaker and White Witch Mask, use Blooded - works very well with the Mask. Use Spirit Frenzy/Tornado to apply Staggered (-10 Fortitude) and Secret Horrors to apply SIckened (another -10 Fortitude). Cast Borrowed Instincts a lot (+20 ACC besides other stuff) and hit enemies with the modal "Body Blows" on (-25 Fortitude) - then using Soul Ignition/Disintegrate and other fortitude based stuff on them. Your accuracy will virtually be +65(!). Use Brute Force to target fortitude instead of deflection if it's lower (often is with the Morning Star + Sprit Frenzy + Secret Horrors). The Morning Star also lowers Will (-3 per hit) which is great for most other cipher powers that don't target fortitude. Also use Psychovampiric Shield to lower enemies Will by -20 and Deflection by 10. Use Whisper of Treason and/or Puppet Master, too. Although you are a melee guy you should use these because they are very strong. Don't hit your charmed enemies - else they flip back. Let them fight for you instead. Skill your Will into the sky (Iron Will +15 & Bull's Will +10) and use the highest shock AR gear you can find (so.. NOT plate armor). When casting, don't be too near to your allies in case you miscast (can wipe your friends). Use Deltro's Cage Helmet to profit from the miscast (if you survive). Witch with Lord Darryn's Voulge, Deltro's Cage - mostly applying Static Charges with Carnage and using Soul Shock on your tank. SC Barb, aiming for Driving Roar with Blood Thirst, Bloodlust, Spirit Frenzy, Acina's Tricorn, Lance of the Midwood Stag (Lord of the Forest). Let a fellow druid cast Woodskin or Form of the Delemgan on you right at the start of battle. Or count on the weapon's enchant,ment to give you Woodskin at some point. In this case it can be good to also wear Nature's Embrace. Gain +2 PL and attack from second row with Spirit Frenzy + Carnage and use the yell/roar to deliver dmg and apply Shaken, Daze and Staggered as AoE CC until you get Driving Roar. At that point just be your party's best ranged damage dealer with incredible dmg output for just 1 Rage per cast. Also pick Improved Critical etc. Against crush-immune or resistant enemies either use your Lance or pick Instrument of Boundless Rage. Use two Necklaces of Fireballs: one in the stach and one on your neck. Before getting Driving Roar cast up tp 8 Fireballs per encounter (trigger Staggered with Spirit Frenzy, Blooded also works and so do Frenzy and Bloodlust/Blood Thirst for casting speed) after encounter stack the empty necklace with the full one in the stash - tada: both have 8 charges again. If you like fire attacks a lot you can also go Magran's Favor (+ Bleeding Cuts) + Sun & Moon + Instruments of Boundless Rage + Necklace of Fireballs + Spirit Tornado + Dragon Leap + Barbaric Shout + Barbaric Retaliation + Blunting Belt + Patinated Plate (Bronze Juggernaut + Constant Reboud) + Death's Maw + Stalwart Defiance + Thick Skinned + Blooded + One Stands Alone + Heart of Fury + Barbaric Smash + Blood Surge + Blood Thirst + Bloodlust (hope that all fits into one char Can't remember the exact portfolio). Maybe also use Three Trolls Stiched or Nemnok's Cloak. Ragged Cloak for more retaliation damage. Jump into the midst of the enemy and let them hit you. With dazing and such high AR they won't do much damage but crit you a lot, triggering Barbaric Retaliation with Bleeding Cuts and self heal from Sun & Moon. If you're too low on hralth use Stalwart Defiance. All the while cast Fireballs from the Necklace or use Instrument of Boundless Rage or simply Barbaric Smash. All your fire based attacks will have +4 Power Level during daytime. Suicide Bomb - SC Barb: use Effigy's Husk, Effort, Shroud of the Phantasm in hard fights, else Mantle of the Seven Bolts, Vengeful Defeat, Heart of Fury, Pather's Leap, Blooded, Accurate Carnage, Blood Storm and so on. Jump into enemies and start hacking away. You want to be very fast but not too fragile. Should you go down: Deal tremendous AoE damage from Effort (Full AoE Attack), Husk (Raw AoE attack), Vengeful Defeat (Full AoE attack) and Mantle (Shock AoE attack) to everything around you. Get revived by a Paladin, Priest, Druid or Chanter and try again. Very good on itself but not if you don't like resting. In tight encounters use the Shroud to summon 6 copies of you which have low health and do the same on death as you: EXPLODE! . Nothing except fat bosses might survive this if your timing/position is good... If you want you can copy the Ring of Reset from the Deck of Many Things. You can do that without the console if you export a custom character with the ring (use a lvl-1-adventurerer with only the ring - to avoid hich recruitment costs). Hire him then in the other game in a tavern and take the Ring. Now you have two. They can form a stack in the stash. If one is emoty stack it with the other one and it will be recharged. This way you can go down 3 times in an encounter (trigger AoW dmg) and get back up right again without taking an injury. It's cheesy - but if you like that build idea but hate resting this might be your thing. It's a lot of fun. By the way: Ring of Reset doesn't work on Phantoms... (see Aloth). Well... some might not be that straightforward now that I read all this again...

CanGraze is a relict from the times right after release (or beta?) where we had only miss and hit and crit for normal attacks and only certain ones could graze. This was changed to the ols mechanics like in PoE (sort of).

I guess. Didn't test but it would make sense. Important thing is that two (or more) of them form a stack in your stash. Afaik you can also get two Dragon Pendants. A Dragon Pendant has "Call the Clutch" which summons a drake and wurms 1/rest. You should be able to use it 1/encounter then. Ah and watch out: the stacking doesn't happen in your char's personal inventory. Only in the stash!

Ok, one partcicular broken item to build around is Grave Calling (sabre). It has an enchantent named "Chilling Grave". If you kill a vessel with the weapon you will spawn a foe-only Chillfog. If this Chillfog kills more vessels they will also produce a Chillfog each. That particular Chillfog profits from Grave Calling's enchantments (like legendary PEN, dmg bonus etc.). Best thing is that it also works if you kill your own summoned vessels. Now imagine a Berserker/Beckoner who can summon 6 weak skeletons (vessels) which split into 2 more skeletons after death - for a total of 18 skeletons. The Berserker Frenzy confuses you, so if you attack and kill one of your Skeletons it will proc a Chillfog that will immediately kill the other skeletons which will all produce a Chillfog, killing the following split-skeletons who will also generate a Chillfog. So, with a single attack the Berserker/Beckoner can create 18 parallel Chillfogs and trigger Blood Thirst by the way, too. He then switches to Modwyr to end confusion and turn the Chillfogs into foe-only. Encounter will most likely be over after a few pulses of 18 Chillfogs... Hand Mortar has the enchantment "Blinding Smoke". It is a rel. big non-damaging cone attack that hits other enemies if you crit an enemy. Fire in the Hole has a jump which includes the AoE. Both together on a Druid with Avenging Storm: Mayhem. Because Blinding Smoke triggers Avenging Storm and all AoE hits (including jumps) do as well. You can also skip the Druid and use Heaven's Cacophony - but its Avenging Storm is only 1/rest. You can also use it als Stormspeaker (Tekehu) who also gets Avenging Storm at PL 8 as Chanter. Cool with Sure-Handed Ila. Necklace of Fireballs has 8 charges. That means you can use it 8 times and then it's trash. But wait. If you find two of them (there are even more, I currently have 3) then you will have 8 Fireballs per encounter on any character you like. Just leave the one amulat in the stash. Cast with the other. Then, after the encounter, put the emptly one onto the full one. They wull form a stack in the stash (one icon with a little "2" in the lower right corner). Onc you seperate them both will have 8 charges again. Tadaaa! Use on Berserkers, Helwalkers - whatever. Make a fire caster without picking a caster class. Sme works with Stone of Power by the way (which usually is +1 Power Level once per rest - if you have two of them you can make it 1/encouter the same way).

No. But disarming traps and picking locks will give you XP.

Effigy's Husk: you can play a Barbarian and pick Vengeful Defeat (Full Attack in an AoE on KO) as well as wielding Effort (Great Sword, Full Attack in an AoE on KO) and wear the Mantle of the Seven Bolts (Shock AoE on KO). Your knockout will be quite devastating...You can do the same with a Wizard - but instead of going KO by yourself you summon an Essential Phantom and let it die for you. You can also add the Shroud of Phantasm and summon 6 copies of yourself (also as Barbarian) which have very low health and die quickly, killing everything around you. It's only 1/rest though. There are lots of items you can build around. Maybe too many to post them all into one thread.

Construct the same statement but with women (or people of color etc.) and you can see how nonsensical that statement is. Would you favor a fantasy setting where women can only choose to pick the handmaiden or midwife class? Because if women in medival fantasy settings could pick any class and if that would be totally normal in that setting - wouldn't that be a spit in the face of the actual struggles women went through back then? Well, let me put it this way: ROFL NO! To which extend is there a point to have? The only spit in the face that might occur when you depict a setting in which certain minorities are treated as equal is the self-perceived spit in the face of those who don't want that minority to be treated equal. Ask gay people if they think that medieval fantasy settings in which gay people are accepted do spit in the face of the actual struggles of past gay people.

If you are looking for more talks in the DLCs you should bring Konstanten to SSS, Ydwin to BoW and Fassina to FS. They do get more lines there than the usual companion.

Then you should maybe give him a chance. The overconfidence is a bit of a facade.

Would help to narrow it down a bit. Like what are your preferred classes or roles (supporter, dmg dealer, healer, tank etc.) or melee or ranged or caster and so on. Just out of the blue with no requirements one could name hundreds of basic builds that are good.

That is because internally - after the initial hit which dumps all the focus into raw dmg and sets it to 0 every following of the AoE hit rolls generates focus back (which then gets transformed into raw dmg for the next roll). At the end of the execution the focus is capped down to 0 again. Same mechanics as with Gambit (if used with AoE weapons): the dmg bonus Gambit gets from accumulated Guile will climb into astronomical heights "internally" if you land a lot of crits - I could get to +250% and more (look at dmg numbers in combat log). But at the end the reclaimed Guile will be capped back to 4.

Tekēhu is good if you get past the initial phase. You should do the Gullet with him - it gives him more depth and shows him being more serious, benevolent and caring. He is a good boy. And as I said his subclasses are good, especially the druid one is one of the best. I my opinion the best of all companions' subclasses. If you generally loathe flamboyance or are even anti LGBT then I guess you will never like him though. Serafen's Wild Mind subclass is very unpredictable and that is something that most RPG players don't like. Most of his negative sideffects when casting powers are not too bad and are easily balanced out (and more) by the potential good side effects. But "Miscast" can actually wipe your whole group. It deals 3x actual focus as shock damage in a pretty big AoE around Serafen. At level 20 this can mean over 750 shock damage per attack roll. Of course this rarely happens. But when it happens to players they usually are so annoyed that they declare the subclass as "useless" (forgetting all the times Serafen got a +5 PL boost while casting ;)). But... actually you can use Miscast to your advantage (although it's fiddly). If you just give Serafen a lot of Will defense (Miscast targets Will) and AR (especially shock AR - a druid might help - Mantle of the Seven Bolts also helps) and place him near enemies and not near your party members he can sometimes wipe the whole enemy mob with a miscast and survive. So for example you could try to tank with him as a Witch (Barb/Wild Mind) and use the barb yell for +engagement and dazing while casting powers in the hope of a Miscast. With Deltro's Cage + Helmet you can benefit from the Miscast in two ways: either turn on Shock Shield in order to get healed by the shock damage instead of getting toasted - or getting toasted and receiving a huge shocking lash for your next attack rolls from the Helmet. Or it simply misses because of your high WIll defense. Note that a Witch can get +15 Will from the cipher passive "Iron Will" AND +10 from "Bull's Will" (generic from barb). They do stack. Add some items with Will or +all defenses. Maybe eat fitting food. Raise RES and INT... Even if he goes down from that Miscast - several enemies will do so as well. Give him an item with Second Chance or revive him: easy. Just accept that he might die from time to time while killing everything around him. It's not a bad thing then. Several items can add more AoE dmg when he goes down (Skaen Robe, Mantle of the Seven Bolts, Effort Great Sword etc.). You can play with this. It can be fun. So... "useless" is - as always in these forums- a lot of hyperbole.

Under Want a tankier version? down below at the end of the post there's another spoiler tag which contains alternative stats ("stats" as a more brad term - not "attributes" like MIG, INT, RES and so on). I think that is the "stat array" he meant. In there is a different set of items, including Argwe's Adra plate armor and the fitting Helmet which gives you +3 RES. If you want even more RES just raise RES to 18 instead of 15 and drop three other attributes further (like DEX, PER and CON for example).

direct link without the fancy preview 'cause that sucks Click on "Reveal Hidden Content" tag to open up the stat scores unter the caption Attribute scores

Oh, I forgot: another good weapon for SA (but not for Backstabs and Assassinate) is Sun & Moon. Since it has two flail heads the first one will hit and apply the raw dmg of SA, but the second flail head will hit right after and already regenerate focus for you. With some levels behind the belt (esp. Draining Whip - so that one flail head at least generates 10+ focus) you can spam SA without pause. Make sure targes have afflictions though because SA's raw damage profits from Sneak Attack and Deathblows as well. As I said Sun & Moon ist not the ideal backstabbing weapon though: since its two flail heads have reduced base damage (to balance out the two attack rolls) the bonus you get from Backstab and Assassinate is quite whimpy. The second flail head will already lack the bonus because stealth/insisibility will break right after the first flail head hitting.