Boeroer

Sure They do No, they do raw damage which bypasses armor completely. What would they need penetration for? This means they can never underpenetrate (which is a serious damage malus) but they also cannot overpeneterate (which is "only" a 30% additive dmg bonus - underpenetration is much more severe since it's multiplicative). Nothing in regard to the damage type. Animancer's Blade can only be enchanted with quality though (no special enchantments besides the starting ones). Eccea's Arcane Blaster can get additonal elemental damage - but it doesn't change the raw dmg type of the iitial shot - it's just an addon of elemental dmg on top of that raw dmg. The other enchantments also don't do anything to the damage type. Classes or class combos with bad to mediocre weapon penetration - if you play Path of the Damned. On the lower difficulties it doesn't matter that much because the armor of enemies is weaker. Besides that they are not most suitable for a special class but rather great against special enemies with very high armor. Animancer's Blade has lower base damage than a regular sabre but is faster so the overall dps is comparable to a normal sabre - but the lack of further enchantments make it an inferior pick against enemies with normal to low armor - I mean compared to other unique sabres. Eccea's Arcane Blaster is a great pistol for any pistolero build because its enchantments are great (except "Bullet Time" which doesn't work properly, so don't pick that). I used it with good success on several characters, among them a single class Kind Wayfarer (together with Scrodeo's Trophy), a Wizard/Ranger (also together with Scordeo's Trophy), a Beguiler/Sharpshooter (single handed with the modal and One handed style), SC Priest (Xoti, more than once) and more (I cannot remember all of them). Watch out - if you use a Rogue then know that there's a problem with Deep Wounds: it requires a weapon with pierce, slash or crush damage to get triggered. Both weapons don't deal that type of damage but raw damage. Deep Wounds doesn't recognize raw damage so would be completely wasted if you mainly used on one of those weapons. So I'd say just spare that ability point and take something else. Instead of or in addition to using those weapons you can also use abiities that deal raw damage. Like the Rogue's Arterial Strike, Gouging Strike and Ring the Bell. If you combine all three of those on a Steelclad construct for example it will die very quickly. Or you can use a Druid with Swarm of Insects + Infestation of Maggots and stuff like that. But something like Eccea's Arcane Blaster is indeed great against that sort of enemies. Animancer's Blade comes pretty late so I wouldn't plan a whole character build around it. But one can make a beeline for the Blaster and the fight where you cn loot it from also isn't difficult because it's just one mid-level wizard you have to take out (and you can start the fight from stealth).

Yes, absolutely. For example: just because of better action economy I sometimes think really hard about bringing two priests - so that I can get out a party-wide PER inspiration and Devotions for the Faithful (or any buff really) in less than half the time. Also why I like to have Priest and Druid in the same party and not use a Priest/Druid. Casting Devotions at the same time as Moonwell at the start of battle is way better than doing it one after the other. Class builds are often "self contained" so they can do some synergistic things one their own, which is cool - but in terms of action economy it's almost always better to achieve that synergy with different party members. That's also why good solo chars aren't necessarily very good in parties compared to a well composed party - an vice versa.

That last part doesn't work, as Okkes already pointed out. But your idea goes into the right direction. You just need another weapon that (re)generates focus while executing Soul Annihilation. That weapon is Sun & Moon. Since it has two separate attack rolls with its two flail heads: Soul Annihilation will spend the focus for raw damage on the first attack roll - the second attack roll will already generate focus again. You will not have a ton - but usually enough to use Soul Annihilation again. That way you can spam Soul Annihilation all the time (primary attack) and skip the low dmg shield bash - but have dual wielding speed. However - it is best to use a Soulblade/Rogue to make sure that the second flail head does enough dmg per hit to get enough focus for Soul Annihilation again. But Monk with Tuning Wheel could be good enough, too - I didn't try that. But Sun & Moon is also an excellent weapon for Swift Flurry because of the double attack roll which increases the chance to proc Swift Flurry significantly.

Primary attack only means only the spear is used. Yet you keep the bonus of dual wielding for the times Mercy Strike doesn't proc. If you use auto attacks or Full Attacks you would be right though. If you look at the combat log you will see that Swift Flurry/HBD attacks will get executed BEFORE the initial attack that triggered them in the first place. It seems that internally the initial attack is resolved and it get determined whether Swift Flurry and HBD will proc (recursively if they proc themselves) and after everthing's calculated the bonus attacks get executed first and the initial attack last. Last comes Carnage (if you have that). That way push effects (or knockup-effects) cause zero problems with Swift Flurry/HBD but will push enemies into the Carnage area. One reason why I love to use Efficient Anguish with a Barbarian/Monk. The "Red FLag Flying" DoT enchantment on Mohara Tanga (that can proc itself on crit and can cause attack roll chains even without Swift Flurry/HBD) works the same by the way: additional attacks execute first, initial attack last. That is correct. Unless you run into crowds and push them all away one after the other (doable an fun, but then Enduring Dance is less of a reliable option). You'll need Instruments of Pain to pick off singular foes and still be able to profit from the recovery skip with Force of Anguish. An alternative is to use Evasive Roll to follow the pushed enemy instantly. It has no recovery so you can do push-roll-push in very quick succession if Mercy Strike triggers. But it will cost some Bond (1 per Evasive Roll). But it can be a good way to separate an enemy from the crowd very quickly A Nalpasca with Enduring Dance has very good passive wound generation so it's easier to use Instruments of Pain + Efficient Anguish non-stop later on. You can use Hylea's Talons to generate more wounds through self damage (or hostile effect if FF)). The self damage doesn't harm Enduring Dance - it doesn't count. If you don't want that sort of micromanagement and frequently use auto-attacks then one-handed style (or a normal, non-bashing shield) would be better. Or... you could use a ranged weapon in the offhand for dual wielding speed but only spear usage (in melee). In this case a Monk/Streetfigher or Ranger/Streetfighter could be fun with a blunderbuss in the offhand and the spear in the main hand. Fire the blunderbuss towards some enemy at range, get -50% recovery time and +50% sneak attack for the spear against a melee enemy. I didn't try this but it could be fun. Easiest solution is to go one-handed I guess. I did that for a whole playthrough with a Ranger/Monk with Mohara Tanga and it works absolutlely well for crits - actually too well because the game kept crashing against normal enemies (endless crit chains will result in some overflow and shut down the game).

Yeah okay. For solo one could also argue that Priest can have higher acc.

Yes, the accuracy of Ranger/Monk is only second to Ranger/Cipher. Enduring Dance can already be very useful if you don't try to tank several enemies and if you can reliably disable opponents so you don't get hit a lot (see Force of Anguish and Stunning Surge). Once you use Instruments of Pain it's a non-issue and the second best individual active accuracy buff any class has after Cipher's Borrowed Instincts. Besides that the main point was that Swift Flurry and Heartbeat Drumming offer multiple additional chances to proc the recovery skip of Mercy Strike which significantly improves the odds over any other class combo. I tried a lot of combinations with Mercy Strike and this was simply the best. Ofc. the skipped recovery also leads to a faster repetition of Swift Flurry/HBD procs which in turn triggers Mercy Strike more often in a given time and so on... --- By the way: the best way for me to utilize this was to use Stalker's Patience not one-handed with One Handed Style (although that's def. a viable option) but instead to mainly use Efficient Anguish with Stalker's Patience and Tuotilo's Palm as the primary weapon setup. That way you'll get the speed bonus for dual wielding and Two-Weapon Style (and all the defensive benefits ofc.) but will only do attack rolls with the spear - to maximize the chances for Mercy Strike. For Stunnig Surge you'll still have a proper Full Attack with two weapons - which is helpful for the Mortification refund. With Enervating Blows and Stunning Surge you can drop enemies fortitude so the hit quality of Efficient Anguish will improve. You will not have the +12 ACC of course. At the beginning of the game one-handed usage has more impact - but at some point and against the usual non-boss enemies I found the raises attack speed and defenses to be more useful than the added accuracy (which is plenty after a while). Ofc. Tutilo's Palm becomes even more interesting if you pick a Forbidden Fist as Monk subclass - because your FF attack will profit from the shield's ACC/dmg enchantments for unarmed attacks even if you carry the spear in the main hand. --- Stalker/Fighter will also have its benefits, no doubt. I also tried Berserker/Helwalker, Stalker/Berserker, Stalker/Streetfighter, Stalker/Assassin, Assassin/FF, Stalker/Bleak Walker, Stalker/Soulblade and even Bleak Walker/Devoted - maybe some others I don't remember. I think besides Ranger/Monk I enjoyed Stalker/Assassin quite a bit - more bc. of thematic reasons though. Assassin/FF was planned for something else entirely - but I started to have a lot of fun with an Arterial Strike from stealth and a follow-up Efficient Anguish: enemies would get up again and try to chase me but quickly die from the DoT of Arterial Strike and the DoT of Stalker's Patience. I didn't carry on with this though. Also Mercy Strike is kind of wasteed here until you get Instruments of Pain - because the enemies are pushed away all the time so the skipped recovery doesn't help you as much (unless you have Instruments of Pain). I later tried to evolve that lil' synergy with Llengrath's Warding Staff + Arterial Strike + Phantom and play Arterial-Strike-Tennis - but the staff comes too late for my liking. Force of Anguish is the better tool imo.

Indeed. Very short ranged, but still ranged. This also means it works with Driving Flight which makes Rager an appealing multiclass. The poison DoT doesn't suffer any dmg malus like the initial, direct dmg does with projectile jumps. No - but imo Eternal Devotion lasts a pretty long time for a 1-point ability. The Bleak Walker's FoD attack is keyworded with fire and acid and thus also gets +1 PEN from Scion of Flame and also Spirit of Decay. It has nothing to do with the lashes themselves. The ability attack or the weapon itself must have been keyworded with the fitting elemental words in order to protif from such PEN abilities (and also from PL boosts such as Otto Starcat pet or ACC boosts such as from the Ring of Focused Flame). Putting simply a lash on attack does nothing in that regard. So subsequent attacks after the FoD attacks will all have a burning lash, but they will not work with Scion of Flame unless you use a weapon that is keyworded with fire (not Cobra Strike) or use a fire spell. By the way: Eternal Devotion of the Bleak Walker only gives you the burning lash for some time as buff. The Black Flames' corrosive lash only gets applied to the initial FoD-Attack itself. The following lash buff of Eternal Devotion is burn-only - like with any other Paladin. So your spells will have burning lash only, not corrosive. You can get a corrosive lash on spells only with the help of Blightheart (bound to Wizard class). Iirc Cobra Strike doesn't have the acid keyword itself. Meaning auto-attacks with it will not profit from Spirit of Decay - but I am not 100% sure. I'm pretty confident that the DoT it does is keyworded with "poison" - which means that certain enemies will be immune (mostly undead and constructs, but also some Naga stc.). So all in all you will get +10 ACC from the Ring, +1 PEN from Scion oF, +1 PEN from Spirit oD when you execute FoD (Bleak Walker) - but none of that if you auto-attack just with the burnung lash of Eternal Devotion on you (unless Cobra Strike is keyworded acid, then +1 PEN - as I said: not sure). If the poison DoT is keyworded with poison (again: I'm pretty confident that it is) then it will work with the Mask of the Grotto Deep's PL bonus. For me this would be a must-have iem - not necessarily for the mechanics but 100% bc. of thematic reasons. Same that all Arcane Knights have. Can't think of anything special. Just thought that pairing Brand Enemy with Cobra Strike's DoT should work well. By the way: the poison DoT doesn't stack like Bleeding Cuts or Deep Wounds do. But new hits will prolong the duration. But in general dps-wise it is benefical to hit multiple enemies one after the other with the DoT instead of focusing on a single one. Also AoE-attacks with it would be great. But nothing comes to my mind except Driving Flight as a kind-of AoE (not really, but you know what I mean). Due to the high base dmg Streetfighter would be better than Assassin (unfortunately, theme-wise). Assassinate or Backstab only work during invisibility/stealth - and that will break as soon as you hit with the first cobra strike. Streetfighter's bonuses apply as soon as you are either flanked or bloodied. Both can be achieved fairly reliably if you use some movement abilities (Escape into crowds) and/or self damage (see Blood Sacrifice). A spellblade will never be as sturdy as an arcane knight. But you can always use invisibility or Escape to get away - for a damage dealer that's acceptable imo. A Bloodmage/Streetfigher will do considerably more damage than an Arcane Knight. Downside would be that he will be more squishy. Pick your poison (pun intended again ). You could go a more safe route with a Spellblade and take Trickster instead of Streetfighter or Assassin. :shrug My pick would be Streetfighter. Or maybe either Arcane Archer or Stalker.

Stalker/Monk with Swift Flurry and Heartbeat Drumming is great. ACC of Ranger and Monk sides will stack nicely (only beat by Ranger/Cipher) - and every proc of Swift Flurry and/or Heartbeat Drumming can proc the skipping of recovery. So with every crit the chance of actually receiving 0 recovery is much higher. Imo this is the best class combo for Stalker's Patience. Subclass of the Monk depends a bit I guess. All of them will work. FF grants a nice alternative dmg type without the need of an actual other weapon, Helwalker has the higher MIG and therefore also higher fortitude, once you use Instruments of Pain and poke from range the Nalpasca + Enduring Dance has great "passive" wound generation and so on. I personally used the Stalker/Nalpasca variant and it was good - but only because I played the other subclasses a lot before that and wanted some change.

Relentlessly indeed. I had to have a lil' surgery last weekend (hernia) and before getting shipped to the anesthetist's table the nurse asked me some questions. When she came to the point "regular medication" she said: "Ah well, you are young, I guess you don't have to pop pills regularly?" Me:

There is no hard cap. This article is still up to date afaik: https://pillarsofeternity.fandom.com/wiki/Explosives Since the skill governs PEN and ACC I would (at least on PotD) either not use it at all or go all-in (sort of).

it's a mystery...

Uh... I was very sure but now you are giving me doubts.

Dance of Death caps at +12 accuracy. Cipher's Borrowed Instinct shouls also be nice (+20 ACC). Do you know if the Helm of the White Void/Rymrgand's Influence does add +10 ACC to grenades that cause an affliction?

I guess that statement does contain the assessment of all the unique arquesbuses, arbalests and crossbows. And indeed the unique crossbows come late and/or are not accessible if you take the "wrong" route with the factions. You have to be pro Furrante to get Fleetbreaker. It is a nice weapon... I don't know why they did that, but it sucks if you want to play with a crossbow and do not like Furrante and what he wants from you. If you don't care about that then Fleetbreaker is a good weapon choice imo. With Sure-Handed Ila it will be pretty fast to reload, you can add a fire lash with Mith Fyr which works well with the Sneak Attack dmg bonus and so on. Yes, best summons are the Ancient Instruments of Death (animated Pike + Warbow + Great Sword).

Imo the best build for dual mortars is a single class Monk. Everthing else comes second, although Streetfighter has a great synergy with Powder Burns + Heating Up. So naturally my second pick would be Monk/Streetfighter. Mirke can do both - so instead of using a voiceless hireling I would recommend to give her a shot (pun intended) - she can be SC Monk as well as Monk/Streetfighter. She doesn't have the perfect statline - but she's always drunk so that makes up for it. Berserker is bad for your party with all that AoE unless you get rid of the confusion. Then ok. If you have a Chanter in the party with Many Lives skeletons then that confusion can be turned into something very good, see below. Barb in general works but isn't the optimal class for it imo. I value mortars over normal blunderbusses in general so I will cocentrade on good builds with those and leave the multipellet-blunderbusses to other commenters (see Combusting Wounds+pellets or Kitchen Stove's THunderous Report for massive focus gain). Following list is in no particular order, althoug most likely the best ones/most fun ones will come to my mind sooner. SC Monk, main reasons: AoE*(AoE hand mortar + 2*AoE Fire in the Hole +2*AoE Powder Burns) with Whispers of the Wind, in combination with: Resonant Touch - if the mob's not dead after WotW alone it will be after Resonant Touch (those two points are so incredibly powerful that it's really hard to beat) Stunning Surge: almost always a crit against multiple enemies, hence no cost. Long stun in a big AoE bc. of Duality oMP (INT) huge AoE bc. of Duality of Mortal Presence +2 PEN bc. Thunderous Blows Summons that help to deter enemies Ajamuut's Stalking Cloak works with Whispers of the Wind (invisibility doesn't break: all enemies stunned on the fly) Monk/Streetfigher: always heated up (-50% reload, +50% Sneak Attack dmg) lots of Full Attacks + afflictions in an AoE with Crippling Strike, Blinding Strike, Stunning Surge and so on huge AoE like SC Monk +2 PEN Summons SC Assassin or SC Streetfighter: Gambit with dual mortars is very good against multiple enemies. Its damage scales internally with Guile refund per crit - it is capped at 4 but while executing the "internal guile counter flows over and you get dmg bonuses up to 200-300% until the refund cap is applied. Also lots of crits bc. of multiple hit rolls and thus often full refund. Vanishing Strikes + AoE: works with Assassinate and Backstab(!) - Escape into the crowd, turn invisible with 1 Vanishing Strike (its invisibility never breaks until duration runs out) and follow up with Gambit and deal AoE Assasinate+Backstabs with mortars. Devastating AoE dmg. Also works with Ajamuut's Stalking Cloak. Streetfighter/Arcane Archer: more ACC Driving Flight + all the Rogue's Strikes = more AoE dmg and more debuffing and raw DoTs and stuff Imbue Shots' effects get triggered thrice(!) bc. of Fire in the Hole's jump + Driving Flight. So for example 3 Fireball procs from one imbue shot with Fire in the Hole. Or three Pull of Eora with one imbue shot. You get the idea. Wounding SHot doesn't work with AoE - Concussive Tranquilizer does. SC Stormspeaker (Tekehu) double reload bonus from Sure-Handed Ila (-20% from recovery bonus AND -20% from reload bonus) Watch out: Mith Fyr doesn't work on Thekehu (gets cleared periodically by his Wavewalker passive)! Avenging Storm invocation: the lightning triggers from every AoE hit (including jumps) and also the Blinding Smoke effect of Hand Mortar which procs an AoE cone from every mortar crit(!) --> thunderstorm of lightning strikes SC Druid: Avenging Storm mayhem like above basically but limited to 2/encounter and no Sure-Handed Ila. SC Barbarian: Heart of Fury and Barbaric Retaliation both work with Hand Mortars (and AoE). Works great in combo with spamming Dazing Shout in between. Blood Surge can get you Rage back pretty nicely. Before that it's a bit lame though. Frenzy helps, Bloodlust and Bloody Slaughter, too. But Blood Thirst doesn't work which is a shame. Berserkers can stay confused and blow up inside mobs - if there are Many Lives Skeletons that run towards the enemies of the Berserker automatically he can kill them "accidentiually" and get lots and lots of kill procs for Bloodlust, Blood Surge and heal on kill (pets or Thriumph of the Crusaders). Makes him early unkillable - but you cannot go near him with party members. Furyshaper can use Blood Ward and profit a lot from Barbaric Retaliation doing AoE dmg to fill up his health gradually all the time. When big chunks of healing is needed trigger HEart of Fury. SC Arcane Archer: Whirling Strikes will work if you put a melee weapon in one hand and leave Fire in the Hole in the other. You will get AoE(melee)+AoE Powder Burns + AoE*(AoE FitH + AoEFitH jump + AoE Driving Flight) with it which not only does tremendous AoE dmg right on but also puts that nasty DoT on everybody. Before that a bit lame except the already described imbue-jumps mechanic which is very good. Hunter's Claw etc. does work with mortar also if you keep that melee weapon in the main hand. You'll get multiple stacks of Hunter's Fang/Claw etc. with a single shot. Streetfighter/Fighter besides the known Streetfighter stuff, fighters get Penetrating Strike for great PEN and Tactical Barrage for more AoE Clear Out works with the mortars if you put a melee weapon in the offhand to unlock the use of the ability but execue it with the mortar. The result is AoE Powder Burns +AoE*(AoE FitH + AoE FitH jump) and violent pushes of all enemies in al directions like bowling pins. SC Fighter: Clear the Path or Clean Sweep are both very good with the setup above. Before that pretty lame Berserker/Troubadour: Ancient Brittle Bones and Many Lives Skeletons killed by your mortar AoE does stuff for you (mostly healing on kill which counters your self damage - Blood Thirst doesn't work though). Sure-Handed Ila + Mith Fyr summons galore Most fun above all I had with the SC Monk, in my case Helwalker. Here's an impression: But I guess Mirke as Monk/Streetfigter could also be mad fun.

Yes - you could also use a mobility ability to move even though you're officially stuck. Stuff like Escape, Evasive Roll, Charge, Leap (also from Bounding Boots) and so on will enable you to change position.

It may be that Griffin's Blade only affects the recovery of that weapon itself and not the pistol reload, but I'm not 100% sure. In the party a Chanter with Sure-Handed Ila can provide -20% recovery AND(!) -20% reloading speed for all reloading weapons. Both apply to those which makes reloading so much faster. So if your party has some reloading weapons it is very benefical to add said chanter. Not initially. It's just so that reloading weapons have a floor when it comes to reloading time - they can't be accellerated any more as soon as they hit hat floor. I guess it has something to do with the animation not being able to be played any faster. So you can stack pretty much anything on your list no problem. Nothing supresses each other if I read correctly. It may just hit that floor at some point and you have to find out when that is. With enough stacks of Scordeo's Trophy you will def. hit that floor at some point. No, action speed and recovery buffs have linear returns, not diminishing. What you described above is linear. So - mathematically it is worth to stack as many speed/recovery buffs as you can. The only dimishing thing is the floor that reeloading weapons will hit at some point - but that's outside of the actual recovery/reload maths. Don't think so - but it also doesn't really matter. Resulting reloading time will be the same no matter in which order they get processed. No matter the reloading bonuses etc. the red hand will always be better in dps than other arquebuses because it profits from those reloading buffs just the same as the other reloading weapons and on top gets two shots for one reload (which doesn't take longer than a normal arquebus to reload). If it's better than a pistol build depends on other factors as well. For example the bonus of Scordeo's Trophy applikes to all actions you take so it can improve the character in other ways than just shooting. Again, no diminishing returns. But imo a hybrid melee/ranged setup ist almost always inferior to a dual ranged or dual melee setup on a scout (or almost any class combo hoestly). You will hamper your Full Attacks (only one weapon will hit) - and the only valuable thing you get is: you will attack with one weapon alone while still getting the dual wielding speed bonus. If it's about wanting to restrict the attacks to Scordeo's only in order to stack the speed buff as fast as possible, then imo single pistol + modal is as fast as a dual wielding setup and has comparable accuracy and on top you can have a lil crit conversion from one handed style (scordeo's can have higher crit dmg). You could also add Eccea's Arcane Blaster as second pistol and profit from the raw dmg and the elemental dmg and also use Full Attacks (Crippling Strike, Wounding Shot and so on) to the fullest effect. Eccea's Arcane Blaster does really good damage with the right enchantments (not Bullet time - it doesn't work for example). But then stacking the Scordeo's buff will take a lil bit longer.

The Forbidden Fist wound trait has a serious quirk (also with CP since this was not known when the CP was done): As soon as you downgrade an affliction with a resistance it doesn't give you wounds once it expires. So as a general rule: resistances on FF Monks are bad. Better to catch all afflictions unresisted, no matter how severe - but make sure it only last a very, very short time. You can do that by countering via receiving an inspiration - or via "-x%" or "-y of secs hostile effect duration" effects like Clarity of Agony, items, lots of RES and so on. That way ou get all the wounds but don't suffer the debuff for too long. Not passive resistances and no chanter phrases with resistance etc. I suspect you resisted/downgraded the "stuck" from Binding Web to hobbled in the hope to only suffer a mild affliction and get wounds for that, am I on the right track with my guesswork? That wouldn't work well because the downgraded stuck->hobbled wouldn't give you wounds unfortunately. Maybe in the future this can be fixed with CP, no real idea if it's possible to fix though. Sounds more like a hard-coded mechanic that's hard to mod. Luckily the Tangefoot only comes with hobbled - so that should be a nice source of very short-lived afflictions that grant you some wounds. Best for this singular trick would be to go low on INT and max on RES and -hostile duration effects. But going low on INT also hurts several other good abilites of the Druid so maybe a more balanced stat line is better overall for such a character. This one little synergy of Tanglefoot and FF doesn't make a great build alone I'm afraid.

This also works without the CP. The Forbidden Fist attack scales like Transcendent Suffering with or without the Community Patch. The only difference ist: without CP the Forbidden Fist attack gets treated as a melee "spell", the main drawback is that it wouldn't generate focus that way nor work with Swift Flurry, Heartbeat Drumming, Enervating Blows (redundant since enfeeble, but still), Turning Wheel (I think) etc. The Community Patch just changes the type of attack from melee spell attack to melee weapon attack (as it should have been in the first place - twas likey just an oversight from the devs). The scaling from Power Level etc. is untouched. The Druid side of this idea isn't even touched since the Druid has no special sauce that would only work with CP's FOrbidden Fist implementation. So for this partial build idea it doesn't really matter if CP is installed or not. The only thing you wouldn't be able to do is use stuff like Swift Flurry. But a Druid/FF isn't an ACC monster in the first place so going for Lightning Strikes (I believe that does work with FF attack even without CP) is the reasonable route anyways. Still would consider the Community Patch. It doesn't fundamentally change mechanics and doesn't make them cringy powergamey. Imo it doesn't impact the "feel" or experience of the vanilla game even if you played it the first time. It's just the better version of the game. I'm also not very fond of modding games right away and most mods are kind of over the top generally - this one is not imo. It actually improves balancing in a nin-intrusive, enjoyable and sensible way. Little improvements here and there, removing things that don't make sense, fixing lil bugs and oversights that were ackowledged but couldn't get fixed during the patch cycles of the game. Nerfing too wild stuff here and there so that it works as intended without nerfing it so much it isn't fun anymore... Besides that you can turn on/off any singular change of the mod indivudually if you don't like them. I also do that with two or three options (for example I deactivate the little Avenging Storm and Resonant Touch nerfs because I find the original behavior more fun). Then you'd also get unique icons for every passive ability. That alone would make me install it because I find it annoying that upon level-up you have to mouseover the passives to know what hey are since they all share the limited set of icons. And I don't say that because I drew all those new icons. But of course: if you want to enjoy the first run unmodded that's obviously fine with me, too.

She can be a Herald. That alone makes her a great option for most parties. Tankyness, support and (passive) healing as well as some spike damage. Her subclass options are a bit unexciting though and not worth taking imo. But then just spare those ability points and put them somewhere else. Paladins have plenty of good abilities to pick from - so that shouldn't cause headaches. While her subclass isn't too nice her godlike race is pretty good I think. Getting two resistances (INT, PER) right away is useful, you can spare 2 ability points for the paladin passives which do the same that way.

Yes, they will have additional +15% dmg, +4 ACC and +1 PEN. Besides that of course all abilities will also profit from the added PLs. I didn't mean to spiritshift. I meant to hold the Lance of the Midwood Stag in my hands to get the +2 PL - which scales Transcendent Suffering up one step - but still be able to use the FF attack which does scale with Transcendent Suffering. So the Lance would indeed be a stat stick only that gives my FF attack +15% dmg, +4 ACC and +1 PEN. I just picked Druid for the most convenient unlock of the enchantment (you need to have a plant or beast effect on you). Woodskin and later Form of the Delemgan. It's also nice to gain wounds from your own Tanglefoot (also unlocks the enchantment - it's a hostile plant effect - but a plant effect on you nonetheless). The Lance also looks nice with a Nature Godlike and fits the druidic theme...

Hi, you're welcome. You mean in general? Not really. I think my (currently) favourite melee class combo is Berserker/Helwalker with the Saru Sichr Morning Star. But if you ask me if I like Brute over Crusader then yes. Main reason is that I really like Barbarians (and Monks) and at the same time I'm not a huge fan of fighters and also paladins. It's not because of power or anything, it's just a matter of taste. If you combine Body Blows (-25), Spirit Frenzy (-10) and then some CON affliction from the party (also -10 - e.g. a sicken from Secret Horrors) you will lower enemies' fortitude by 45 points. There are not many enemies that have 45 points fortitude over deflection. And if they do then usually their deflection is pretty low to begin with and you can attack that instead. So: no loss. But I would say that in over 90% of cases Brute Force gives me an advantage. Often a big one since often enough enemies raise their deflection with buffs (like enemy Wizards) - but seldomly they raise their fortitude as much. It's extremely easy to kill a Rogue who's under the effect of Escape (+50 deflection) if you can just target his fortitude. But a Crusader can do the same debuffing with a Morning Star and the help of party members and then use Knockdown to target fortitude - or use FoD with +20 ACC against deflection - which is lower. Not as convenient as Brute Force, but still nice to be able to choose.

The reason why I thought about Conjurer etc. was to get to +6 PL, Tactical Barrage: +1 Stone of Power: +1 Conjurer: +1 Wellspring of Life: +1 Lord of the Forest: +2 But I tested the Lance and as I feared the Lord of the Forest effect (+2 PL) disappears as soon as you switch to another weapon set. So I personally would just use Tactical Barrage, Wellspring of Life and 2 Stones of Power to conveniently get to +3 in every fight. But the Lance gave me an idea for a Druid/Forbidden Fist.

Unless you have one or two very special builds (where Wahai Poraga's friendly fire can be used to your advantage) it's just crap unfortunately.

See the other thread.