Boeroer

You are comparing AoE to single target dmg though. Marauder with Amra will have two parallel AoE effects going. And dual pistols is a rather weak weapon setup to begin with.

Oops. I forgot that my parents in law will be visiting us over the weekend. So I will most likely not be finished on Monday...

Early game will be very hard since this is the part where the low deflection is most noticable.

Maybe it's 30/24 now? Maybe I will test later... By the way: last time I checked Whispers of the Endless Paths and Spirit Lance generated wounds with their AoE dmg. Whispers otEP works well with INT bonuses like from Turning Wheel or Enlightened Clarity because the cone will grow. The cone attacks do not proc Swift Flurry or Heartbeat Drumming though. But WotEP has its own speed boost that stacks with Swift Strikes.

@Phenomenum & @MaxQuest: polishing mod? It truly was and still is annoying.

@Phenomenum and @MaxQuest: maybe this is also a case for the Polishing mod? Since it won't get fixed - but seems to be easy to fix?

Noice. Will this become part of the Deadfire Polishing Mod(s)?

It depends on how many instances of TS you can stack. It jumps and every jump will cause a stack. So make sure you cast it on tight groups so that it can jump often. Also bonus PL increases jumps. The weapon shouldn't influence how high you can stack it. Maybe it was just a coincidence or you thought Red Hand wasn't sped up much because it skips one reload anyway?

He can use a shield and buff himself up no problem. The starting deflection is low but you can make it work. The biggest problem though is if you get hit by Arcane Dampener and such. Suddenly you are stripped of your whole tankyness. That being said: some high level stuff is very nice for "tanking". For example Cloak of Death. Also Minoletta's Piercing Sigil.

Use a dagger as backup. Also +5 ACC and has slash dmg.

That's not only in Turn Based mode. That's the dmg penalty in general for Full Attacks. Patch dates back to last year.

Mostly bug fixes.

No you are not. At least that's the impression you get when you read the devs' comments. Read Josh's tweets and you'll get a (fuzzy) impression. It sounds as if exploiting bugs will get you diqualified. But they will not tell you why they disqualify you. So better play it save than wasting lots of hours.

Icons for Fighter, Barb, Monk, Rogue and Paladin subclasses finished. Cipher and Druid next...

If you want a tank on whom you can cast friendly fire AoE spells like Fireball and stuff without hesitating I would recommend Swashbuckler. It's actually more tanky in this case because Adept Evasion + Refreshing Defense + The Wall is very good against anything that's targeting Reflex. All grazes (and that's most rolls against you) turn to misses - and occasional hits or crits don't do that much damage due to The Wall. At the same time you can deal more dmg AND perma-debuff your surroundings passively with Persistent Distraction + 5 engagement slots. Swashbuckler tank is my favorite. Usually it's Unbroken/Trickster but Edér also does well enough.

CombatPet? Sound like the Conjurer's Familiar.

@thelee: for Vela you could carry around that medium shield with the healing aura. Forgot the name. Lathandria's whatever or something.

How can you recruit her in a forced solo run?

That strategy was used by nearly all PoE ultimate challengers so far.

Loading times are indeed significantly longer now. I'm on an SSD and so far they were very short for me. They are still not tediously long but it's noticable.

Versus Evil in this case. Afaik they don't work with Paradox on Deadfire. But I read somewhere (Aarik on Twitter or Discord I believe) that Versus Evil is doing the port.

Obviously. Since the patch is out and all that...

As I already said: Forbidden Curse last for a very short time if you build accordingly. Around 1.3 secs without Crucible and kind of instantly with it. You can just keep attacking with FF or alternate between it and WotW. Don't know if this is enough to kill the Oozes though. But usually the "new" FF has no trouble gaining wounds. Maybe even Hylea's Talons do work: the DoT will be very, very short and once it ends it gives you a wound. Maybe there are other ways to reliably "afflict" you with something? I besides the stuff that HOW puts on you. Maybe symbiote doesn't give you a wound when it expires because it has no finite duration. Can't one use Efficient Anguish to prevent them from merging? And what Jayd said. FF works with Instruments of Pain indeed.

I know it changed at some point. I did test it some time ago but to my embarrassment I can't remember the outcome of that test anymore.

A Shattered Pillar gets 1 wound from 25 dmg iirc. So if you deal 50 dmg you should get 2 wounds. If you deal over 25 dmg with the additional attack but don't get an additional wound it doesn't work.