Boeroer

I'm sure that could be done. Best solution would be to just lift that stupid editing restriction though.

I only use the Enhanced UI mod - so none that alters the game mechanics. I am participating in the upcoming Community Patch though - since now all hope is lost that Obsidian themselves will adress some issues that I think could be done better (such as Backstab, several passives, Arcane Archer's imbue spell scaling and so on). It will also introduce unique icons for all passive abilites (purely cosmetic) and also trinkets for Priests and Druids since they suffer from "spell choice railroading" syndrome - unlike the Wizard who has his grimoires (which are trinkets as well). I wouldn't say that any subclass is "pretty bad". There are some that could use a slight buff - like Shattered Pillar which got nerfed a bit too much or Mage Slayer which never got buffed enough.

So, if we are doing trinkets: what can I do? Write down exemplary trinkets as inspirations so we can run polls on them? Do some icons for trinkets? Writing descriptions? If somebody points me to where I can learn everything I need to know about Deadfire modding (fast) I would also be willing to implement them - if that makes any sense from a cost-benefit ratio perspective. I mean I am a software engineer - I just had no motivation to dive into Deadfire modding so far...

I just compared Warlock with Tempest. I like Warlock a lot because of the synergies you describe above (spells triggering Blood Thirst etc.). But actually a Tempest is even better. I thought (and maybe that was the case earlier) that DoTs don't work with Blood Thirst. But now they do. DoTs will indeed trigger Bloodthirst and usually the DoTs and Pulsing spells of a Druid are a) foe only and b) sometimes have a ridiculously big AoE - like Plague of Insects. And because of Spiritshift you can stay at 0 recovery penalty while having great AR without having to cast any self buff. This means it's a lot faster and easier to target nearly all enemies with some DoTs - while your friends will not get harmed. This ensures you get a lot more "accidential" kills via big DoTs while you can attack them at the same time. You can even steal kills from your party members if a DoT finishes off an enemy whom your Rogue buddy was hammering at. And that means Blood Thirst triggers and triggers and triggers...

Can confirm now that DoTs do reliably trigger Blood Thirst. Awesome!

By the way: I just found out that Amra's AoE procs Avenging Storm... just as a random info for SC Druids. PS: especially in tandem with "Entropy"... hahaha

Huh? I didn't realize you quit Obsidian roughly a year ago. What class is Josh?

Apart from that: what does "best" mean anyway? I think that is highly dependend on your preferences as a player and also dependend on you party composition. Best != highest (potential) dps. If you drop dead too soon your average dps drops rather significantly. If you can only hit single targets you won't keep up with somebody wo can hit several enemies at once and so on. It all depends. That's why I usually don't respond very quickly to such vague questions - because there is no definitive "best" of anything basic in Deadfire. Maybe when you solo (but even then it highly depends on the player), but surely not with a party. Once it is more clear what OP really wants it's much easier to give meaningful tips. Often enough there's a question like "what's the best X" and people start givig tips - but then OP comes around and says "Yeah cool cool cool cool - but I want my X to be a bit more Y you know because of Z" - and I'm like "why not mentioning that in the first place?"

Yes, nothing changed basically.

sure - if you're not solo. First of all you don't need to be in the midst of anything as long as you don't pile up engagement slots like crazy. Usually you'll have 1 from Persistent Distraction and that's it. That means you can get flanked quite easily. Or stand where somebody else fires Powder Burns (using a Pale Elf usually leads to hefty underpenetration). edit: That doesn't work at all. Same Pale Elf can be build with a Perception resistance and dance in your Wizard's Chillfog for example. Your Cipher/Berseker buddy can cast Phantom Foes. You can use a Chanter's Whisps to shoot at you (auto-distract). And so on - there are quite a few ways to trigger "Heating Up" at will - if you have a party.

Well the Streetfighter has the same additive bonuses as any other rogue even when not bloodied AND flanked. Getting flanked is fairly easy - and then you benefit from ridiculous attack speed and increased Sneak Attack damage. If you now wanted to also get +100% crit damage then you'd have to be bloodied. But it's the class with the highest additive dmg bonuses and one of the fastest hitters even without being bloodied. Just get flanked and your dps explodes already.

Never forget Reaping Knives on SC Ascendant (if playing with a party)! This plus Time Siphon means very high attack speed and nearly always full focus, ascending you. Also very potent with Soul Blade. Just imagine you buddy fighter generating tons of focus for you with his Clear Out while you can concentrate on spamming those speed spells. I would go SC - also the best passives (Shared Nightmare and so on *drool*). But it is true that a multiclass is more effective in the early to mid game due to faster focus generation.

Nice. Unfortunately I can't add this to the build list because the update of the forum software has put a restiction on editing: if youe post is older than 8 days you can't edit it anymore. Thus, I can't update the build list. If you want to change that you might want to leave a post in the thread here: I already asked twice but nothing changed.

I would argue that Streetfighter/Priest of Berath hits like a truck on kerosine. However - unless we know what "no sneak attack builds" means we put this on hold... Other very potent 2H-builds include Citzal's Spirit Lance. Shadowdancer, Holy Slayer and Mindstalker are all candidates for very high to highest melee weapon dps - but once again: "no sneak attack builds". What does that mean? No sneaking around and attacking from stealth/doing backstabs? Or no use of Rogues in general because they come with the Sneak Attack passive? No rogue builds that can have very high melee dps are SC Soulblade (Time Siphon + Reaping Knives allows for non-stop spamming Soul Annihilation with minimal recovery), Ranger/Soulblade can be very good (if you emphasize on Takedown Combo - but very micro-heavy). If we are looking at high levels then I would say the non-rogue class with the highest melee dps potential will be single class Monk due to Resonant Touch. Use Keeper of the Flame + Sun & Moon and Swift Flurry. Generally what generates high dps is: a) high additive bonuses combined with b) high lashes (which are multiplicative) combined with c) high attack speed This usually means we are talking about Streetfighter (since he combines the highest additive dmg bonuses AND one of the best speedup modifiers in one class) with anything that can have a lash or works like one (multiplicative dmg bonus) which means Monk (Lightning Strikes/Swift Flurry + Turning Wheel), Paladin (FoD and Eternal Devotion), Druid (Wildstrike and Boar form), Chanter (Mith Fyr), even Wizard (Spirit Lance + Zandethu's Draconic Fury), Soul Blade (Soul Annihilation profits from additive dmg bonuses in a multiplicative way like a lash) and Priest with Spiritual Weapons.

@Jayd: Very nice rundown. I would love to put this into the build list - but I cannot because the new forum update prevents edits for posts that are older than 8 days... :puke: Few questions: I believe(d) Blood Thirst/Bloodlust don't get triggered on DoT-kills. Is that wrong (would be happy)? do Carnage hits proc Avenging Storm (from scroll or helmet)? Afaik they do not since they are not treated as weapon attacks (mechanically/in code) does Carnage of the Stag's Spiritshift form proc Avenging Storm? Same as Barb's Carnage but who knows? Barbaric Smash + Bloody Slaughter: what do you mean by "increased base damage"? The 50% dmg bonus? I guess you mean something like "50% damage based on weapon base damage" (yeah, sounds awful I know ) and not that the weapon base damage gets increased (which it doesn't)? Then some comments: Afaik Blood Thirst will not influence your recovery of the killing blow itself but only the next recovery. However, if you kill an enemy with Relentless Storm/Nature's Terror/etc. right before you hit another one with your claws then you will get 0 recovery for the claw attack and - if you kill with that - also for the next action. Thus, the combination of lingering spells like Chillfog/Rel. Storm/Symbol of <whomever> + melee attacks + Blood Thirst can be truly devastating - I mean for the enemy. That makes the combo Caster/Barbarian a great thing - naturally including Druid/Barb. I would argue that Berserker/Shifter is an awesome combo. What Druids lack for their spells and martial attacks usually is PEN. At least on PotD - for the rest of the difficulties it doesn't matter that much. A Berserker's Frenzy not only damages yourself (which is unfortunate) but also gives you Tenacious with means +2 PEN on top of the MIG. It also gives you +2 AR by the way which will stack with a Bear form's armor (+2 on top of the already good stats) and Barb's other stuff like Thick Skinned. This AR overbundance, combined with the healing capabilites (prevents going down from Frenzy's self damage) and the increased dps through PEN, makes a Berserker/Shifter a great combo. You are right though that being confused is a fat no-no. And that you have to work around it. That means some micro. But I think it's totally worth it. Confusion is especially bad with spells like Relentless Storm etc. which will hit yourself (can be used with Deltro's Helm though!) and your friends. However - if you wear an item like Devil of Caroc's Breastplate you will be immune to confusion - as long as you trigger Frenzy only when not shifted OR stop the shift shortly to allow the resistance to remove the confusion. Same with Modwyr... TSo actually you can play around with that: if you want to be confused - for example in order to hit yourself with a Storm spell to trigger the Deltro's Helm bonus - you can frenzy while shifted, after you cast Relentless Storm some time before. You will get hit immediately and receive the bonus, switch back which instantly removes the confusion, heal a bit in the process, maybe cast another spell and and then shift again. Win-win but microish - but also intersting from a tactical perspective. If you simply want to get rid of the confusion for good just eat Luminous Lobster during all rests or take a chunk of Svef. Anyway: great work!

Yes. They are in the post.

I actually never said that the auto-attacks that follow Eternal Devotion will be counted as elemental. Or at least I didn't mean to say that. They never did work that way. Adding a lash doesn't turn weapon attacks into elemental attacks (ask Druid's Wildstrike: same thing). They need a keyword. Only the initial attack of "Eternal Devotion" is keyworded with burn. The following attacks will only have a lash and that does not automatically mean they count as elemental attacks. So it is correct and confirmed that you get -5 ACC as long as you don't use a weapon which itself is keyworded properly. However: the lash of Eternal Devotion adds to the imbue spell damage(!) That is pretty important and was the point I was trying to make. Sorry if I caused confusion on that part. So: with Eternal Devotion itself (the attack ability) you don't suffer the -5 ACC. With auto-attacks, even lashed ones, you will suffer (as long as you are not using an elemental weapon as Frostseeker etc.).

I made up my mind for b). Implement non-subclass restrictive trinkets for Priests and Druids. Those will have some bonus spells (like Grimoires) that broaden your portfolio. This may include new spiritual weapons. AND/OR they add some other features (like PL bonus, Lesser Sneak or whatever) which fit the theme of the trinket and can give a twist. I already "brainstormed" that Shifter trinket that would turn Spiritshift into a modal for example. What do you think? Edit: oh, and I don't want to go for "Magran's x" and "Skean's Y" as trinket names by the way. This is just a minor detail, but I think it would be more interesting to use themes that are build around saints (like St. Rumbalt) and relics and stuff. So for example instead of Skean's Shard it could be "Slaves Worry Stone" and be themed around despair and oppression and give the according spells and feats. Instead of "Abydon's Armory" it would be "St. Durwell's Rivet" or something. Just to make things more interesting and lore-ish. There are several saints mentioned in books and items. Also one could pay tributes to certain chars from PoE this way. Imagine "Scorched Piece of Cloth" which is actually a part of Durance's Robe - which gives you some Punishment spells and a spiritual weapon "Durance's Staff". Or "the Apprentice's Honing Stone" which is from the girl in WM who build the Unlabored Blade. It would be themed around Abydon's and say some words about the girl in it's description. Stuff like that. Just brainstorming here...

Skaen's Sneak Attack in PoE only worked with weapons, but I get your point. I don't think 1) and 2) contradict each other by the way. We could totally combine both: give some additional spells that fit the theme of the trinket to expand the spell pool AND add some nice "special features" like you described. To use the example of Skaen's Shard: a) get a few Condemnation/Punishment spells and b) add Sneak Attack Bonus to spells. And as my examples show I'm totally for that. To make Priests and Druids more versatile and end the spell choice "railroading" at level up AND at the same time give some nice build options and twists. It may be right that making special trinkets for a subclass that have only upsides is the same as making no trinkets but just adding the upsides to the subclass. I think this idea rose up because I wanted to bring back the old PoE Priest weapons (Magran = Arquebus and so on). So we could do the following: a) make the alternative Spiritual Weapons native abilities - no trinket involved (@AndreaColombo suggested it already) - and develop trinkets like I said above. Ones that add spells that fit the trinket theme and adds another fitting "twist". You can also see those in the examples I quoted above. This has to be easy enough though else it's not moddable. b) make the trinkets with the spiritual weapons non subclass restrictive. That means every Priest could use Magran's Arquebus or Berath's Mace etc. Solution a) would be cleaner. Keep in mind that your dispositions influence the power of the spiritual weapon. So it's loosely tied to subclass dispositions anyway. However: solution b) opens up more options. For example you could use Magran's Arquebus without drawback as non-magranite Priest if you managed to not collect contradicting dispositions. AND it would allow for spiritual weapons of deities that are not in the game (hello Abydon's Spiritual Hammer...). Now we have to decide which route to go...

Some random thoughts about trinkets from this thread - some weeks ago. Maybe already forgotten. Those would be additional ones that could complement the special-subclass-trinkets we discussed above. Just to make some themed builds that are not tied to subclasses too rigidly.

I guess that's why Obsidian didn't bother. I just think it super unbalanced that ciphers get 10 focus, Paladins et al. get 1 Zeal and Wizard/Druid/Chanter get 1 spell use per spell tier (wtf?). I personally would change Brilliant to +5 INT and +3 to all PL (upgrade from Acute which does +1 PL). Problem solved, still great buff and not much work. But I can already hear the lament.

@Phenomenum: Wait, before I vote: I thought the duration that SoT adds is not affected by neither INT nor Power Level? Has that changed? I don't think so... If not: why nerf it in the first place? The SoT+Brilliant cheese is not caused by SoT, it's caused by Brilliant. Next you'd have to nerf Wall of Draining... If you want to nerf something it's Brilliant. Just make it a bit slower for spell replenishment (12 secs instead of 6) so that you can't chain SoT anymore. Remember that Brilliant replenishes only 1 resource (like Discipline) per 6 seconds but 1 spell use for ALL spell levels. This is not fair at all AND is the problem that causes the SoT/WoD/Brilliant cheese.

I did. If you make a dedicated trinket for every Priest subclass and not make it swappable this will lead to a situation where a Priest of Magran always stays with this trinket. Wasn't our motivation to invent trinkets that the Priest (and Druid) always picks the same spells and doesn't have the flexibility that a Wizard has? He will then again not use Prayers/Litanies and otehr spells which are more situational and so on. I thought giving several (different) trinkets that provide some bonus spells that you can cast and which are swappable would solve this exact problem. Why complicated? If the bonus spells just get added to your spell portfolio (like Grimoirs do it) you don't get access to those spells unless you have the right Power Level. So if there's a PL 8 spell on the trinket but you are PL 6 you can't cast it (yet). I don't want to add the spells as 1/encounter abilites because it causes problems. I'd like them to be like grimoires "light" with fewer spells (because priests (and druid) already get bonus spells at level up) and other nice bonuses like we write above.. Yes, but those are a) crap and b) not class specific. The intentional idea with trinkets was that every class gets special ones. As I said I would keep it smiple and maybe only do ones that alter passives or so. Like +10% to Sneak Attack or stuff like that. Obviously this has very low priority... Concerning auto-casts: ok. I find the idea nice but it may be a bit too good.

By the way I would have no problem with basic, non-swappable trinkets for every class. If we keep it real simple and don't devide by subclasses (e.g. trinket for Fighters just improves one single ability like raise Armored Grace from 25% to 30% or just gives +1 discipline or adds a single passive) then I think it wouldn't be too much work... They don't need modals, just an icon and short description. Maybe I would make them all about altering passives as the general approach?

@Phenomenum: I don't know if I want to follow a too rigid pattern with the priests' trinkets. Your examples are cool - but you already see upcoming problems due to the structural uniformity: e.g. you can't immediately find fitting auto-casts for every subclass. Which is a minor problem of course, but still... Since trinkets can be very different in shape and effect I think we should emphasize on that. I'm totally in for giving each Priest subclass a special trinket though. One that contains the additional spiritual weapon. But maybe they don't need to all follow the same pattern? One the other hand it's much easier to actually finish this stuff if we follow such a rigid pattern you suggested. Use it as a guideline. And as you said: it's better to do something than to endlessly speak about it and not knowing what we want to do actually. So maybe we take this as a good starting point and see where it's going. Nobody will stop use from adding more (and more "unique" or "weird") trinkets later (like relics from the church's saints or something like univeral prayerbook that only contains prayers/litanies) or to change the behaviour of the initial ones after actual playtesting. So - cool. Let's see what my take on this would be: First of all I would like to be able to switch those trinkets from Quick Slots like you can with grimoires. Did you plan to make them "fixed" or non-swappable during encounter? Most spells you suggested so far are nice. What about PL 8 and 9 stuff for SC priests? I feel we should at least include one spell of 8 or 9 per trinket. But I would add the bonus spells like a grimoire does it: you add the spell to your actual portfolio but you don't gain a spell use. So no 1/encounter stuff. Because I guss those also wouldn't scale with PL, right? Since cast from items and not cast from character. However, a trinket may add a spell use to spell tiers - for example if the bonus spells are a PL 2 spell and a PL 5 spell the trinket could grant one additional spell use of PL 2 and one of PL 5. Then you are not as "locked" into using those exact spells in every encounter. I mean IF you want to allow a bonus spell use in the first place. Wizards only get this through the whole spell tier board from Grimoire of Vaporous Wizardry - and it's OP basically. Rymrgand: spiritual weapon: I'd vote for a two handed battle axe. He seems to be all about axes - his minotaurs have them and so on. bonus spells: Iconic Projection (healing is not Rymrgand's favorite domain), Winter Wind (PL 1), Hailstorm (PL 4) auto cast: maybe "Entropy" on knock out? I fits so beautifully and you don't need to create a foe-only version of Freezing Pillar. auto-cast alternative: when receiving crit in combat: retaliate with Kalakoth's Sunless Grasp or Fetid Caress (1/encounter)? Gaun: spiritual weapon: a scythe (weapon proficiency pollaxe). I fear there's no model for this (maybe there are Roparu who have scythes)? But it would be so good for reaping and all... Lord Darryn's Voulge would maybe the closest that we have when it comes to "scythish" blades. auto-cast: Watchful Presence a the start of combat? or instead give higher light radius even without a lantern or St. Drogga's Skull? Woedica: spiritual weapon: Executioner's sword (use the model of Naga Great Swords which looks fitting, weapon proficiency Great Sword). spiritual weapon alternative: scepter (I mean rulership and queen and all that) auto-cast: Searing Seal when bloodied (burned queen) (1/encounter)? Wael: auto-cast: is Shadowing Beyond that easy? Where/how do you place the target? I would suggest Smoke Veil. Skaen: spiritual weapon: no additional - Skaen already got his two PoE-weapons (stiletto and club). What he lost was his Lesser Sneak Attack (+20%). I would give him that as passive - but non-scaling. spiritual weapon alternative: whip ("today my master chokes on his own whip"). Or chain. Weapon proficiency flail. Unfortunately we don't have whip models. But maybe one can turn flail heads invisible? Would look cool maybe? Berath: spiritual weapon: single mace in main hand. Dual wielded mace is kind of weird and also if somebody wants to play a "Pallid Knight" sort of priest mace and shield make more sense. Makes room for some cool summoned/non summoned weapon setups. auto-cast: Finger of Death on knockout would be so cool. Wouldn't even be very powerful since it's unlikely that the enemy is near death as well. But if he is... Barring Death's Door seems to be too good? It comes with Nemnok's Cloak as well. auto-cast: Reviving Exhortation on knockout on self (possible)? 1/encounter. Refuses to stay dead like several Death Guards have done (in PoE as well as in Deadfire).