Boeroer

It's kind of a game development studio.

That's a combo I showed right after release and I used it with a solo Geomancer+Willbreaker. My suggestion wouldn't change a thing about that particular "cheese". The phantom gets all your items, including summoned ones - and durations are attached to your character, not the summoned weapon. So those durations don't get translated to the phantom. It keeps the weapons it came with until it dies or disappears. The downside is that Essential Phantom has none of your abilities. It hits single targets hard with Draining Touch but it's still a very unoptimized melee summon. Also I would rate Spirit Lance on a Phantom even higher. Or Kalakoth's Minor Blights (burn - doesn't cycle on a Phantom) with Ring of Focused Flame and Magran's Favor in offhand - and Ring of the Marksman. Anyway - my suggestion would mean that a character who doesn't want to use the phantom cheese still gets acceptable value out of casting Draining Touch. Because when you use it as it is intended it's just too bad. Even if you use it (as I did) as an Assassin/Bloodmage with Backstab from invisibility. And that's the most effective use I can think of. Does good dmg then but still not that much more as you could do with Cromoprismatic Staff or Dragon's Dowry. And only once. And you spend a whole spell use... Like Kalakoth's Sunless Grasp which we also buffed in the Community Patch because it was so bad compared to most other spells of that power level. Seriously: who uses Draining Touch (besides phantom cheese) on their wizards? I bet nobody...

2) 4 wounds is not measly for a Forbidden Fist. Keep in mind that a FF only gets wounds from expiring afflictions (and other harmful effects). Combine that with 3 INT and suddenly it's a waste. Why would you want to spend 4 wounds, suffer -4 INT and -8% lash if you don't need the longer range? I think I personally wouldn't even take the Long Pain and Instruments of Pain but use Flagellanth's Path to close gaps to enemies (shouldn't break Stoic Steel). Costs no wounds. 3) no, it doesn't. Speed and recovery bonuses don't stack additively though but multiplicatively. So 20% and 20% are not 40%. But rather 36%. And so on. The more you add the less the absolute impact of each of these. That's what makes high value speed buffs like Streetfighter's so valuable. 4) Of course you can have too much ACC. As soon as you can crit with a 1-roll. 5) won't stack

Yes, but Enduring Dance is paid by mortification, has no fixed duration and gives you +1 wound and +3 ACC immediately (not after 3 secs). Which is all nice to have right at the start of the battle. I think it's always worth taking even if you get hit a lot in general. But that's only my personal preference.

As I said - I'm not 100% sure but I think that the description is not entirely correct and the ability indeed only works with melee weapons. Also I think that either in the class description or in the ability description it says melee but not in the other. So - a bit messy with the descriptions as usual. But also here I'm not 100% sure anymore. Has been some time since I tried Steel Garrotte.

I'm not the author, but maybe I can still answer your questions: 1) Why dumped INT: it's in the build description. To shorten the Forbidden Fist Curse. He doesn't use Scordeo's Egde. 2) why would you waste wounds for an ability as long as there are enemies' in normal melee range? With dumped INT it would also last not very long if you cast it right at the start of battle (no bonus from Turning Wheel yet). So - better to only cast it when you really need it and when you are around 10 wounds. By the way: Instruments of Pain gives your weapons *6 range. They are still melee weapons. So every melee ability like Cleaving Stance's Full Attack and also Swift Flurry should still work with the higher ranges (unless there is a hard range cap in the code). 3) if you check your attack speed/recovery speed the usual way and both effects are listed then they stack. 4) Exalted Endurance also gives you +1 AR on top of the healing. Since he's "abusing" the small shield modal and thus has +15 ACC often enough (maybe it doesn't stack with Zealous Focus ACC bonus) I think the bonus AR and healing is better. Especially if you only have 3 CON. 5) He needs the +1 PL to scale his fists (including Forbidden Fist) to post-mythic quality. Fists scale with Power Level. And of course it gives the usual benefits for active dmg abilities like 5% multiplicative dmg, more PEN and ACC. Thus, a Monk profits twofold from power levels. Fists scale and abilities scale. Better than +10 ACC for affliction attacks, especially if you can just nudge your power level over the edge for a last fist scaling that you couldn't get otherwise. My question would be: no Enduring Dance?

Yes. In the code. In this case in some JSON files. But that's not necessarily visible in the game. Inthe game often enough an ability will tell you that it's a melee ability. Sometimes it even says it only works with weapons (like crit conversion of Berserker Frenzy or Steel Garrotte's draining). But in other cases like with Forbidden Fist or Soul Annihilation there is no info whether the ability itself is considered a melee weapon attack or just a melee attack. You can't see it. So either you test that stuff out or you take a look into the code.

If I'm not mistaken the Steel Garrotte passive only works with melee weapons.

I would also like to buff Concelhaut's Draining Touch. Currently it disappears after the first successful hit/crit. Which is way too weak. Why would you spend a spell use for that? My suggestion would be to either give it a number of hits before it disappears or a rel. short duration. It is a powerful weapon after all, but only one hit? Nah...

I don't think that is how Draining Touch with Swift Flurry will work. It's a summoned weapon that usually disappears after a successful hit or crit (not graze). So I guess it either disappears after the Swift Flurry hit roll - or it doesn't (immediately) and will only disappear after the last hit roll.

Oh plenty. Cutthroat Cosmo is pretty good though m Have a look: https://pillarsofeternity.gamepedia.com/Pillars_of_Eternity_II:_Deadfire_pets

There is no list. And the "tags" are mostly internal. You have to test.

I did an Arcane Knight with Concelhaut's Parasitic Staff as main weapon. It was fun but in general I have to say that the draining is a bit underwhelming. Wizards have a lot of spells for applying afflictions. E.g. Chillfog. But their weapon dmg isn't too high even with FoD. Maye a Steel Garrotte/Trickster would be one of the best combos. It has plenty of affliction causing stuff, high defenses, Riposte and high weapon dmg (and thus higher draining). And it has Persistent Distraction which means auto-drain basically.

You can count on it that it's not intentional.

Cutthroat Cosmo only provides reduced recovery penalty from armor - for the main player. And +5% additive gun damage for the party. Otto Starcat provides +1 Fire Power Level for the main player and +5% AoE damage for the party. The reduced recovery penalty from Cosmo is pretty strong though. If the gun damage is of any use: no idea.

2) - good point about kith meat. Note to self: fix Soul Annihilation not triggering Cleaving Stance's Full Attack on kill.

Unfortunately Forbidden Fist doesn't gain wounds from self damage. And Berserker Frenzy would only give you one wound once it expires. Every other Monk besides Shattered Pillar and FF would get a ton of wounds from Berserker Frenzy. So in my opinion Berserker/FF or Shattered Pillar are inferior to other combos. As Powerotti said: Enervating Blows works totally fine. Combine with Spirit Frenzy. My personal preference for a Berserker/Monk is (as I maybe already said) a Morning Star (Willbreaker most of the time). Other weapons that proc effects that count as melee weapon attacks (and thus should proc Swift Flurry and HBD) and that come to my mind: - Grave Calling's Chilling Grave (Chillfog). Every hit of the Chillfog counts as melee weapon damage. - Engoliero do Espirs' Blade Feast (Ghostblades): same. Both feels very cheesy though. I wonder what happens if you proc SF/HBD with Concelhaut's Draining Touch.

Hi, the best way for a first playthrough is - in my opinion - to go with the official companions. If You pick them up one by one in the "natural" order you will quickly have a Wizard (Aloth), a Fighter (Edér), a Priest (Durance) and a Chanter (Kana Rua). From there on you can pick up a Paladin (Pallegina), a Ranger (Sagani), a Druid (Hiravias) or a Cipher (Grieving Mother). In the DLCs you can pick up a Rogue (Devil of Caroc), a Monk (Zahua) and a Barbarian (Maneha). Since Wizards and especially Priests are among the most powerful classes on PoE (at least once you leveled a bit - the early game is a bit rough with them) it's great that you can get them so early. If you want to play in a party without having a class twice I would suggest Monk, Rogue or Barbarian as main character. But actually it doesn't matter much. Even two Priests in one party are great. Good early game abilities/talents: Wizard: Chillfog (damage and great debuff/CC), Concelhaut's Parasitic Staff (great weapon damage and spares you a lot of spell uses) Priest: Inspiring Radiance (stacks with everything), later Devotions for the Faithful. Buffs accuracy of your party by 30 (combined) while it debuffs the enemy. Fighter: Knockdown (good single target CC with decent damage). Chanter: Phantom summon (it is insanely strong in the early game but takes some time to build up. Can be a life saver though). The general rule in every encounter is: Buff your party's accuracy (ACC), then debuff the enemies' defenses with your raised ACC (often includes CC/hard CC), then deal damage. You will waste a lot of damage potential via spells or abilities if you just blindly attack the enemies as soon as you see them. If you follow this simple pattern "buff-debuff-damage" you will get a lot more mileage out of your abilities/spells. Nothing is more annoying than to miss with an expensive spell.

If you take a Beguiler you don't need to use a weapon. His focus "refund" with Deception spells is so high that you can generate lots of focus while casting CC spells and also use enough damaging spells in between. You can use a bow of course for the times when there are only few enemies left (=less focus refund via Deception spells). A Beguiler can even multiclass with a caster like Wizard (Miasma is a great spell to cast before using Deception spells and anything that targets Will). Since Beguilers don't depends on weapon damage that much this is a valid option. Psion also works with this combo. Stats look fine. Edit: oh my I was in the PoE1 forum. Sorry - forget what I was saying - until you play Deadfire. For PoE stats also look fine. War bow or hunting bow are both viable for generating focus. You might run into problems when facing very high DR targets. Maybe bring a firearm for those, even if your ACC will suffer. Do not use Penetrating Shot. Switch weapons instead.

For Flames of Devotion Magran's Favor + Sun and Moon (offhand) is one of the best setups. Not only because of the +4 Fire Power Level which means +20% base (multiplicative) dmg. But also because FoD is a Full Attack that omits the main hand's recovery. So you can use Bleeding Cuts with the axe without suffering the recovery malus of Bleeding Cuts and use the fast recovery of the flail. That leads to a substantial damage increase (Bleeding Cuts stacks with itself). Also you will have three chances for applying sickened instead of two (since Sun and Moon hits twice). Combine with Ring of Focused Flame and Scion of Flame for +10 ACC (on top of the +10 FoD already gets) and +1 PEN. Can't say if this is the best combo (that depends on so many things like build, party and enemy) but it surely is a good one. Maybe that axe + flail is not everybody's favorite aesthetic option though.

Sounds like a glitch.

Didn't test that. Scordeo's Edge however is one of the best weapons for Swift Flurry/Heartbeat Drumming nonetheless because of "Adaptive".

Helwalker/Berserker is doable but it surely is a very delicate combo.

That is correct. You will only see it happen more often in a given time (because you do more attack rolls in that time), but the increase of dps (percentage wise) should be the same. I think Berserker/Monk has great synergy since the Berserker Frenzy generates a ton of wounds while not breaking Enduring Dance. But as I said: something like Monk/Soulblade is also very nice. Shadowdancer also works well in general and also with Swift Flurry/Heartbeat Drumming. You just have to use you mobility and focus on low defense targets like casters and so on.

Everything that is tagged as melee weapon attack will work. This excludes stuff like Forbidden Fist - that is a melee attack but it is not considered to be a melee weapon attack (doesn't generate focus either). Whispers of the Endless Paths used to NOT trigger it with its AoE - but tehre have been some implementation changes so maybe it's worth another test. However, those additional attacks are never AoE attacks likethe original one. Just the individual attack rolls on that target get repeated. Best way to trigger Swift Flurry (and Heartbeat Drumming) ist to stack ACC and crit conversion like there is no tomorrow. For example early game: One Handed Rapier (later Rännig's Wrath) with modal on (--> +20+12+4+5 = +41 ACC, +15% hit-to-crit conversion). Also nice combo as Monk/Soulblade to make sure your Soul Ahnihilation does (almost) never miss. Also increasing the number of hit rolls is a good way: Sun and Moon rolls twice per attack, Clear Out rolls against a lot of foes if you aim it well and so on. Another very good way is to use a Morning Star, Enervating Blows and multiclass with a Berserker (for Spirit Frenzy's stagger effect, Brute Force, Barbaric Blow and Blood Slaughter) - because you will lower enemies fortitude by 45 points with Body Blows modal (-25), weakened (-10) and staggered (-10). This is a virtual raise of you ACC by 45 points (against fortitude). Endunring Dance can give you up to +12 ACC. At the same time the Berserker has a lot of crit conversions (Frenzy, Barbaric Blow and Bloody Slaughter). One/two-shotting enemies with low fortitude is a common thing with this setup.