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I used the vanilla version. My mod also did a pull-effect - I didn't really use it myself, it was more like a little practice session. I think @Noqnor @Elric Galaddid a version where the additional hits meet the description properly (3). I think with the vanilla version 2 additional target can get hit, not only 1 - despite the description saying 3. One has to pay attention to the way wahai poraga delivers its attacks: it seems to do it counterclockwise. So if you face two or three enemies I would attack the last one in the row from a "counterclockwise perspective" if you know what I mean. Else the skeletons might not get attacked and the benefits of killing them quickly might not occur. Then, if you want to use Soul Annihilation I would target the first enemy in the row so that raw dmg gets applied to all of them and nothing is "waisted" on skeletons. The upside of the Chanter/Soulwhip is that it works at early levels (as soon as you get the weapon). Barbarian with Blood Thirst is stronger imo (esp. in combination with Interrupting Blows), but Bloods Thirst is late game material for a MC Barb unfortunately.

I don't quite understand. I sounds as if you missed that you can turn off the AI that is steering your character and companions and give all orders yourself, but I'm not sure. Are you playing with Turn Based Mode or Real Time with Pause?

Yes, I adressed Chanter/Fighter and Cleaving Stance as the main synergy in the opening post (only briefly I admit). I'm a bit sad that the Paladin's "on kill" passives don't work in this case. Inspired Defenses (100% uptime) and Inspiring Triumph (new Zeal all the time) would have been great - and Heralds are good to begin with. It's interesting though that this class is the only one where the devs seem to have been paying attention to this "profit from killing your own summons" trick. They did miss Divine Retribution at PL9 - but it's not obtainable for a multiclass character.

Awesome @SChin! You're the best. Thanks a lot - and have a great #CurryThursday tomorrow!

@The Guildmaster hello? No ideas? @SChinmaybe? Or@Shyla?

It would apply the raw dmg to the enemy and up to two skeletons and give you some healing. I don't see anything out of the ordinary with that combo.

Hehe - another plus is that the AoE size of Wahai Poraga is fixed. Konstanten's lowish INT often bothers me - at least this weapon doesn't care.

Okay, against tougher foes the crit chains don't occur that easily anymore. Still I see several additional attacks due to Swift Flurry/HBD which surely helps.

Another hint that the attacks are somewhat separate actions comes from Torment's Reach/Raised Torment: unlike all other AoE weapos, Raised Torment+cone triggers for every one of the attack rolls of Wahai Poraga! This is pretty cool... Funnily enough Wounding Shot (Ranger) refuses to work with the secondary attacks - as it does with all other AoE weapons (resp. their additional attack rolls). Shattered Pillar gains wounds from auto-attack dmg done to the skeletons - which is great. And somehow I also always "regain" 1 wound even when I use an attack ability like Skyward Kick for example. This is werid: It costs 3 wounds, I execute it, 3 wounds get substracted - but then I gain 1 back as soon as the whirling attack is done. Huh??? Also Rooting Pain might trigger frm that wound so I guess I'm not imagining this. Also Swift Flurry/HBD seem to trigger a whole whirl action again? Because I find it extremely(!) easy to produce AoE-crit-chains with Wahai Poraga. The Skeletons help to produce easy crits due to their abysmal defenses I suspect.

It seems that unlike other AoE weapons, the 3 potential hits of Wahai Poraga per swing count as seperate actions. This makes it possible for a Skald to gain more than 1 phrase per swing. With a weapon such as WotEP it doesn't work (Skald gets max 1 phrase from a swing even if it crits mutliple times) - but I'm pretty sure I saw more than that during my tests with Wahai Poraga + Skald. It's not that easy to determine because the Skald is also singing phrases which generate points in between. But I saw jumps from 1 to 4 in an instant often enough so I guess my assumption is correct. Maybe needs more testing to be 100% sure. This would also explain why Barbaric Smash doesn't refund if a secondary target dies and why Stunning Surge doesn't seem to refund if you crit secondary targets. Didn't try Gambit but I suspect it won't refund on secondary crits, too. Not motivated to test that though because Gambit can't be used with Chanter/Rogue in the first place - and I was looking for "self-contained" synergies. On the other hand: stuff like the stun of Stunning Surge does get applied to the secondary targets just fine. Maybe secondary attacks are not entirely separated actions after all...

Yes, indeed. Unfortunately Wahai Poraga has low base dmg and the dmg bonuses of Chanter/Fighter aren't too high so it's not as devastating as it sounds. Also the description of Wahai Poraga is wrong: it doesn't hit "3 additonal" targets as advertised but only 2 (3 including the initial target). So the number of skeletons getting hit is only 2 at max. And because you seldomly one-shot even your whimpy Many-Lives skeletons with that low dmg per hit you won't see a lot of that. But nevertheless Cleaving Stance offers a lot of "free" additional attacks against the initial target - which suddenly makes the weapon very viable. Without such tricks its dmg output is just bad. But the enchantments are pretty good for a non-shield tank though - so using a fighter to build an "offensive tank" might be a nice idea. Add some cool Huana gear that goes into the same direction (Reckless Brigandine mostly, stacks with the mob stance effect) and you might get a cool Huana Warcaller. If Wahai Poraga did attack the number of targets it claims it does then this would be even more interesting for sure.

Hello! Chanter/Soulblade (the big red button) The chanter can summon multiple skeletons (first with Ancient Brittle Bones and later with Many Lives Pass By) The Soulblade gains +10 max focus and concentration from killing an enemy (or ally, doesn't matter) Usually Ciphers don't generate focus from hitting friedly characters Wahai Poraga acts like a "confused" AoE weapon If you accidentially hit your Skeletons with it s AoE you will generate focus (all Ciphers except Psion)! If you kill your Skeletons with its AoE you will gain +10 max focus and concentration (Soulblade passive)! Echoing Horrors will get triggered every time you kill a Skeleton ( Frighten a bystanding enemy on kill - it's a passive...) If you use Soul Annihilation with it it will apply the full raw damage to the initial target (and some more to the additional ones). So against tough singular foes that usually make generating focus difficult you can harvest focus and also max focus and concentration from your skeletons while hitting the enemy You can collect a huge amount of focus that way and then dump it all into one Soul Annihilation that destroys the tough enemy Skalds can get phrases from crits against skeletons - I used a Troubadour though (faster Many-Lives-skellies) Chanter/Priest (the undying) cast Triumph of the Crusaders use Ancient Brittle Bones and/or Many Lives Pass By attack with Wahai Poraga and gain lots of health every time a skeleton goes down combine with health-on-kill pets for additional healing Chanter/Barbarian (the obvious choice) no need to be a confused Berserker use skellies every AoE-hit of Wahai Poraga triggers Carnage (foe only) accidentially killed Skeletons trigger Bloodlust and Blood Thirst (hack away without much recovery) Blood Storm (additional Frenzy duration on kill) makes it easy to uphold Frenzy endlessly Barbaric Smash: AoE-kills when using Barbaric Smash will not refund the Rage cost. The initial target has to die (booh!) Chanter/Sister of the Reaping Moon (the well of wouds) killing a skeleton grants 3 wounds Chanter/Fighter (clever cleaver) killing a skeleton triggers Cleaving Stance (attacking the enemy again because Cleaving Stance chooses the next enemy as initial target, not a skeleton) What doesn't work: Paladin's Inspiring Triumph and Virtuous Triumph won't trigger (too bad). That's all I found out so far.

Thanks to you, too. You are most welcome. Have fun!

Hello! In my opinion beginners should bring a Priest. They are just too impactful to pass, especially in the early game where you might hit some walls. They add more accuracy (via Priest buffs) which is very useful. Their healing is useful, too. One of the best talents of the Priest is "Inspiring Radiance" which turns the 1-per-encounter Holy Radiance of the Priest into a short +10-ACC buff which stacks with everything. Early in the game this makes a big difference - and even later its ability to stack with other ACC buffs makes it keep its usefulness. Most experienced players might agree that the Priest is the most potent class of Pillars of Eternity if you don't play solo but with a party. In general all "per-rest"-casters (Wizard, Druid, Priest) are the most potent classes after the early game. They mean a bit more micromanagement though - I mean as soon as you let them cast spells. Chanters are good, but in the lower difficulties they are also pretty slow. They are much better for Path of the Damned difficulty where fights take a lot longer - in my opinion. Once you get to level 9 though 3 Chanters will absolutely wreck everything because they will have access to "The Dragon Thrashed" - and that is incredibly powerful. By the way: offensive chants get an accuracy bonus of +12 if you only use a single one-handed weapon in your main hand. It's a little bug - normally only your weapon attacks should get +12 ACC from one-handed usage. But for some reason offensive chants do as well. Keep that in mind if your affensive chants do miss you enemies a lot. Paladins are good tanks - but 3 of them is maybe overkill on the tanky side. A Fighter can also be a good tank, has more engagement slots - and most importantly has better starting values (accuracy, deflection etc.) so the early game becomes more easy with a Fighter. Maybe I would switch one Paladin for one Fighter. Fighters are also low on micromanagement. The most potent powers Chiphers have are ones that can be used for Mind Control (charm, dominate). The powers you mentioned are good as well - but you will have the most success if you also employ charms and dominations (see Whisper of Treason, Puppet Master etc.). If you combine Mind Control with the Chanters' summons you'll have a much easier time later in the game when there's more and beefier enemies. Skills: Survival is very good because it grants you all-stacking accuracy vs. all sorts non-kith enemies. And accuracy is extremely important. Attribute points aren't very crucial - but for everything with an Area of Effect (AoE) INT is very useful because its effects on the AoE size scale very well with high INT numbers. Since it's the radius of hte AOE that gets boosted the actual area scales exponentially with INT. DEX is a very useful stat in general. DEX is the only thing that no only lowers your recovery or reload times but also the animation/action times. All other speed effects only affect the recovery or reloading times. Only DEX makes your actions faster, too. PER is very useful for the early game but not so much later on. CON is generally viewed as dump stat. If you have high defenses (Paladin, Fighter etc.) you won't get hit too often so you don't need very high CON/endurance/health - and if you are not in the frontline you won't get hit a lot even with low defenses so you also don't need a lot of CON. However - CON affects the Fortitude defense which gets tested a lot in the later game - so you don't want to dump it either for tanks imo (you cn, but then you need to raise your Fortitude defense otherwise). This isn't so crucial anymore if you have a Priest - because a Priest has prayers that make you immune to a variety of hostile effects. RES raises deflection. All defenses have increasing returns: every additional point of defense has more impact than the one before that. Since deflection is the most attacked defenses it can make sense to maximize RES on tanks who also wear shields and already have high deflection (see Paladins and Fighter). It also helps to prevent interrupts which can be nasty. A RES-3 character, if attacked by a bunch of enemies, might get interrupt-locked and die without being able to do anything. This won't happen to a character with high RES. MIG is not as impactful on damage-dealing as one might think - at least for weapon attacks. For damaging spells it can be important (because not much else raises spell damage) and it's also very good for your healing powers. But in general I wouldn't put too much focus on it. Cheers!

Hello @The Guildmaster! How do I deactivate 2-factor auth when I cannot access my athenticator app? Or how do I add another device/authenticator? I can use recovery codes to log in, but I cannot use them for disabling 2-factor auth - or to add new devices. For that I need a code from the authenticator... which is not accessible for me atm. My phone broke down and I set up a new one. I'm in a situation now where I only can use recovery codes to log in - since Obsidian doesn't let me remove or add 2-factor-auth options. Any ideas?

"Mother Sharp Rock" please

Hm, I had no such problems - and I did durganize Spelltongue with that build. I did this with game version 2.0, so pre 3. And @Raven Darkholmeplayed it past 3.06 iirc and didn't report anything like that. I'm pretty sure he durganized the weapon, but it may be best to ask him directly (basically done with tagging ;)).

But then you could just as well pick a Barbarian with no subclass. All the advantages and disadvantages of the Berserker are tied to Frenzy. If a Berserker doesn't pick Frenzy he's exactly like a vanilla Barbarian.

Actually, with high CON and a bit of DR as described above, I use it 100% of times (vanilla version) at lvl 20 still. True, but don't forget that besides the Confusion you will always have concealed health which is a serious drawback for all unexperienced players, too. As I said I'm totally fine with the self damage personally - but I think it scales too steeply for "normal" players. Starting higher and scaling less aggressively might not be a bad suggestion I think.

What do you mean? The Berserker's self damage from Blood Frenzy is not different from the Spirit Frenzy or non-upgraded Frenzy self damage. The Berserker's Frenzy base damage is actually fine imo (most players don't have a probem with it in the early game) - it just scales steeply which is very noticably at higher levels. This is fine if you raise CON and don't drop it. Then your health pool can grow in a somewhat similar fashion as the self damage rises. I did so with my latest Helwalker/Berserker build where I even maxed CON. Even with the "synergy" of Berserker's self damage + Helwalker's <=50% damage bonus (which grants you tons and tons of wounds) I had almost zero problems with knocking myself out. I didn't even pick Savage Defiance. But I used Voidward Ring and Death's Maw to get some Damage Reduction. I'm sure that helped, too. Anyway I was pretty surprised myself that the build was so relatively sturdy. With a pet that heals on kill (see Abraham for example) and a somewhat decent healer in the party this can become a no-problem imo. But maybe the scaling could be a bit less aggressive. After all it is pretty steep and climbs more quickly than the average Barb's health pool can keep up. You have to relaly know your stuff in order to not getting frustrated at higher levels. Maybe a passive that lowers the self damage could be introduced or something like that. Making it an option...? A bit like Fighter's upgraded Constant Recovery passive.

You can take a look at the following, more detailed build. It uses the same principle of stacked "marking" but instead of a Darcozzi it's a Shieldbearer. That's only because of the theme, you can simply use a Darcozzi instead. In addition it adds some mind control capabilities later which can come in handy. It has enough info I think so that you can deduce your own "Marking Paladin" build: Then there is the follow-up to this Forward Observer idea (by somebody else) which uses a ranged marking weapon instead of a melee one: I'm sure there's also usable info in there. One last thing: Marking (+10ACC) stacks with Coordinated Attacks (+10ACC), both stack with Inspiring Liberation (Darcozzi talent, +10ACC) - +30 all-stackable accuracy overall. Meaning they will all stack with the usual accuracy buffs (see Zealous Focus or some Priest buffs like Blessing and/or Devotions for the Faithful for example). That is superb accuracy support for one of your teammates. But two marking weapons, wielded by different people, will not stack their accuracy benefits on a teammember (but they can be used to support two different team members or each other). I'd say usually one "marking character" in the party is enough - otherwise it becomes a micromanagement mess imo. There is one setup where you can stack two marking weapons and their acc bonus on the same person though: if you dual wield Shame or Glory (sword - you need to pick the right faction in Defiance Bay!) with Cladhaliath (spear - has to be enchanted in a scripted process properly, follow the link for the correct options) you can stack both Marking enchantments on one teammember. All other marking weapons are two-handed ones. If you use that sword and spear you can still add Coordinated Attacks etc. on top like before. This can lead to +40 all-stackable accuracy for one teammember which is the equivalent of 13 additional character levels (in terms of accuracy)! +30 or even +40 ACC is very useful against tough singular foes (like bosses such as dragons etc.) because it makes landing disables a lot easier which cancel the offensive threat and usually also debuff the enemy.

Hi! Given that you're new to the game I will assume you're playing with a full party and most likely with the official companions? I would recommend that since they add a lot of flavor to the game. One upside of the Psion/Troubadour is its great versatility. It can do support, debuffing, CC (I count summons as CC mostly) and deal damage - even healing and reviving. Whatever you need. And then its resources never run out - which is its best selling point imo. What you find fun to play might depend on your preferences and also your party composition. If you're playing solo your build needs to look differently than the one that is supposed to go with a party.I'm not a super big fan of summons in general (because of the usually very long casting time and the added micromanagement and the additional bodies crowding my space). So in my first run with a Psion/Troubadour with a party of official companions I went with a combo of CC+damage and used Killers Frozen Stiff + Soul Shock most of the time. Both are cheap so you can cast non-stop almost and still have enough resources for the occasional big spell - but in another run I tried to combine summoning with massive mind control and build the party around that. For example I had a Swashbuckler tank with Riposte and a club+modal as well as an Assassin/Wizard who would prep. the enemies with Miasma of Dull Mindedness for my Whisper of Treason, Puppet Master or Ringleader. Combining summons with mind control is very impactful and almost too effective. You basically create a small army for you while reducing the number of enemies. Beware enemies that are immune to intellect afflictions though - mind control is not working with them. But summons always do work. I don't know a situation where they won't help. That's why I avoid them sometimes... I can also totally see a build that completely focuses on summons, support and healing that wouldn't need any accuracy at all. That's just some examples of different approaches for a Psion/Troubadour. For a party run I personally like to go with a small shield and some defensive abilities. This takes heat away from you because enemy AI is looking for weaknesses such as low deflection, low health, low armor and so on. If your party can present something more squishy then you are rel. safe from getting attacked so much that it hurts your focus generation (Psions stop generating focus if they get damaged). At the same time a small shield doesn't hurt your offensive casting at all. Main weapon doesn't matter much but I liked the Gladiator Sword because it gives you extra +5 deflection with a shield - and since it doesn't get used much in melee it's offensive limitations don't matter. Later stuff like Sasha's Singing Scimitar might be what you are looking for. A lot later it might be the Weyc's Wand and so on... What all my Psion/Troubadours had so far is a ton of INT and lots of PER. Especially the cone-shaped invocations profit from high INT enormously because their AoE will grow on a way that you don't have to get too close in oder to make them impactful. Killers Froze Stiff for example has a great base AoE already which grows a lot with lots of INT. If you then combine Lingerig Echoes with the longer durations bc. of high INT you get quite long CC effects, too. And of course your summons will last longer etc. I like high PER in a party with official companions because none of them has very high PER - but you need that to discover difficult traps and secrets. In addition it helps with hitting stuff (accuracy) which is always good for somebody who does CC or deals damage. For a pure summons/support build you wouldn't need PER though. Here high MIG (healing) and DEX (casting time) would be better. High DEX is always good by the way. Makes everything feel more smooth, especially casting. Cheers and good fun hopefully!

HOW is real. easy with Disintegrate. If it dies while Disintegrate is active it will not split and the fight is over. Doru can be done with endless summons, even if it takes ages. Maybe Troubadour/Psion is the way to go, but I haven't tried BPM for such things so I can't be sure. But a Troubadour/Psion can also use an Arbalest+modal or Crossbow+modal with good speed (thanks to Sure-Handed Ila's double reduction for reloading weapons) and that would help against merging, too (if the Disintegrate fails for example).

Then you haven't understood how to "properly abuse" Bounding Boots. If you cancel the leap action before landing, it won't deplete a per/rest use - but you will still land at the target location (without the noise and the dazing effect) and have 0 recovery. This makes solo runs a lot easier because you can sneak everywhere without any points in stealth and cover a lot of ground in an instant. You can loot all containers even if guards stand next to them because if you jump in from stealth the detection will only start once you truly land. But if you cancel in the air (while the target circle is already showing up at the destination) and immediately clock on the container you can loot without getting detected. There's also enough time to jump back out again (unless you toich the guard, that will break stealth immediately). It also allows to flee from all sorts of problems at any time, even of you are stuck or otherwise can't run away (disengagement, blocked path etc.). Very useful to reach the backline, kill some threats, jump to another high prio target and so on. Unlimited tikes per encounter. Is is less reliable in Ultimate runs because you cannot pause the game which help a lot with the timing (when to cancel). But even with the slowest combat setting one can manage with some practice (without pause). But it's def. a lot more hassle so I guess that's why it isn't that popular. Anyway, for me cheese is to use something to your advantage which the developers clearly didn't foresee and intend. True Love's Kiss, Gouging Strike and Brand Enemy all work as designed and thus cannot be considered cheese. They can be very potent with the right setup and in the right situations, but at least you buy that potency with a lot of idle time. Same with sending summons from a save space. Takes forever but will surely lead to success (unless the enemy needs some special treatment: see Huani OW for example). Stuff like prolonging buffs indefinitely with Strand of Favor etc. - that's extremely cheesy in my book. Stealing free spells with Grimoire Imprint: also extr. cheesy. Using Bounding Boots as I described: cheesy, but not as wild as the stuff above. Endless DoTs: not cheesy. Just imbalanced if solo and combined with invisibility. A very long duration (that would suffice for any encounter with a full party but run out in very long solo fights) instead of and endless one might have been better. Bit it's still is no abuse of an unintended effect. With the same line of argumentation I would also say that Salvation of Time + Brilliant or Blood Mage + Wall of Draining are not really cheese. Just like endless DoTs and endless summons they are just too imbalanced for some situations (mostly solo runs imo).

For a normal party run I consider the Devil of Caroc Breastplate to be way, way more important than any temporary consumable effect - and if you like to play a generally benevolent person - like most players do - you can't go wrong with the benevolent pre-set background imo. PS: DoC Breastplate + Helm of the Falcon --> one of the best looking combos imo - and also one of the best combos in terms of protection vs. attack speed (with a two handed weapon).