Boeroer

Yeah - we'll have to wait and see it they are worth it. Currently Cleaving Stance and Disciplined Strikes are so good with Spirit Lance that they have to be really, really good to give that up right from the start. That the Blackbow comes so late/is not accessible for multiclass is a shame for every wizard/ranger aka wannabe arcane archer out there. Since it scales now it would have been nice to put it into a lower spell level. I disliked how late it comes in PoE already. When you want to play an arcane archer you have to play with a normal bow for 90% of the game. I mean Persistence + Alacrity + Martial Power is fun, but obviously inferior to lots of other things you can do as a wizard. Also I always wanted to see what happens when Blackbow meets Driving Flight.

Best track of PoE is the music that plays when you enter Caed Nua for the first time, especially when you meet Maerwald. If I want to name games with great soundtracks (that I played), it's FTL and Hotline Miami. But that music would be a tad weird in Deadfire (except maybe in the Furnicula bar on the BiB island ).

Priest of Berath gets Rot Skulls at higher levels. Also lets you wield the evil soulbound dagger from the beta. Also: vessels in the lower left of Russetwood who worship Berath - "Champion of Berath" Raedric (vessel). So Berath seems to have no problems with necromancy - just with people who prolong their lifespan unnaturally. If a god has problems with vessels it seems to be Eothas (St. Ydwen's Redeemer...). But whatever... As Helig of Thein and others teach us: animancy is science but necromancy is magic. No idea where the difference is, but wizards seem to fit best thematically (see Concelhaut + apprentices). Beckoner/Wizard with skeletons, Soft Winds of Death, later maybe Mith Fyr or Ancient Memory or the phrase that sickens (or weakens?), Concelhaut's spells (including staff), Kalakoth's Sunless Grasp (although ****ty), Thrust of Tattered Veils, Necrotic(!) Lance, Noxious Burst, Malignant Cloud and so on. Alternative: Beckoner/Bleak Walker. Also lets you wield the soulbound dagger if I'm not mistaken and gives you Shared Flames and Zealous Auras which stacks with Mith Fyr for a great effect on the summons. Other Alternative: Priest of Skaen. Revenge from the grave and all that.

The wizard has awesome self buffs, I'd concentrate on those besides the summoned weapons. Also Rhyngrym's Repulsive Visage is a great spell for melee wizards. Some illusion spells are great self buffs (Mirrored Image for example), that's a resaon why I would use a vanilla wizard and NOT a Conjurer (looses access to illusions). The fighter has Disciplined Barrage which gets upgraded to Disciplined Strikes. That's a must-have. Another must-have is MobStance/Cleavin Stance. It's very powerful with Spirit Lance. Confident AIm will stack with Disciplnied Strikes for 75% graze-to-hit conversion. I'd also take Two-Handed Style. Mule Kick is very nice with Spirit Lance as well (ALL enemies in the AoE get kicked into the air) - but it competes with Disciplined Strikes for Discipline (fighter resource pool). Armored Graze is also great if you plan to wear thicker armor. Best synergy is Cleaving Stance with Spirit Lance: once you kill an enemy you'll execute an attack to all adjacent enemies. Since Spirit Lance does AoE-attacks and Cleaving Stance cascades, this often leads to a one-shot for whole groups of enemies once you killed your first enemy. Also the massive conversion of grazes to hits and hits to crits works extremely well with the AoE of the Spirit Lance.

Yes, due to the new attack speed formula, attack speed bonuses have diminishing returns. Quite the opposite to PoE where they had increasing returns. But in Deadfire it also affects attack animation!

They add up. An Unbroken with a shield, a spear and Defender Stance can engage more enemies (in theory) than fit around him.

As I already said: I think Intuitive is too strong. I mean think about it: if a target is paralyzed you get 50% hit to crit and some minor nicknacks. But if you're intuitive, you get a stat bonus, 50% graze to hit AND 50% hit to crit? Every idiot can kill a paralyzed target with a chopstick. No need for intuition...

But when taking Rooting Pain you DO get wounds from getting hit as a Shattered Pillar - kind of. Getting wounds from dealing damage is a lot more effective than getting wounds from taking damage. There has to be a drawback. Not necessarily -5 max wounds, but something. Maybe 7 wounds would be ok. Torment's Reach via Mortification is a big no for me, too. I like to use both Swift Strikes and Stunning Blows so far. Skyward kick will most likely be paid with it, too (was per encounter in PoE, like Stunning Blows). So no room for Torment's Reach there, competing for the scarce, non-refillable resource Mortification. I'd have no problems if Swift Strikes would work with wounds instead of Mortification though.

By the way: where's Sonic? Somebody needs to tell OP he's gonna get toasted for criticizing.

It's in. Everybody gets it automatically.

Since summoned weapons scale with character level and not Power Level I'd say it's always beneficial to multiclass with a melee class such as Streetfighter, Devoted or Unbroken, Barbarian, Monk, Paladin, Stalker, Soulblade, Skald. Wizard/Fighter and Wizard/Monk felt best for me. But Wizard/Skald was also fun. Especially with Citzal's Spirit Lance + Killers Froze Stiff (lance added via console). Of course we don't know which high level summoned weapons might wait for a single class wizard which a multiclass wizard can't get (like Llengrath's Warding Staff or so).

-more playable priest subclasses (Galawain, Abydon, Ondra, Rymrgand...) - more playable paladin orders (Fellows of St. Waidwen Martyr, Steel Garrote...)

Since there are no bonuses for piling wounds 5 is enough for a Shattered Pillar. I mean he even gets wounds when Rooting Pain hits and with every hit he lands, be it Force of Anguish or Torment's Reach. When enemies are disabled he can still get wounds by hitting them. A normal monk will get none if the enemies are not attacking him.

Very nice and helpful criticism. I agree.

I said Beguiler/Trickster was good, not crazy good. First you cause Hobbled in an AoE with Blast, then you can cast Eyestrike and gain focus from that. Enemies full of afflictions with no focus loss. That was a very useful addition to the party. Why is Skald in low tier? You gain 50% hit to crit conversion with Killers Froze Stiff. If you attack paralyzed targets you can build phrases easily. And Killers only costs 2 points for the Skald (who starts with 2 points into the fight). Multiclass Skald with fighter and gain 75% hit-to-crit conversion plus Cleaving Stance... Streetfighter can trigger flanked via powder burns. Open fight with a blunderbuss shot and voilà.

Two Handed Style should give +15% (or even +20%) and +1 PEN - or two handers should have higher PEN per se. More force = more penetration. More penetration translates to additional damage without raisig the dmg modifier.

Push attacks don't lead to disengagement attacks. Only willfully leaving the engagement triggers it. Even frightened or terrified targets who leave you will not get punished (anymore - was the case in beta1).

Yeah but that's due to the bug that attack speed mods also reduce reloading time in beta4 while armor penalty doesn't.

The only thing that made 2-handers awesome in PoE (without drinking potions of DaoM the whole day) - known as "Blood Thirst" - was taken away and converted into that not very useful upgrade of Barbaric Blow.

Thanks for testing! And now the question is: will any npc ever use a Great Abjuration scroll against your skeletons? Would be a nice twist in an encounter though...

When comparing abilites with each other one has to be aware of the advantages of passives over actives. For example Constant Recovery is a passive while Exhalted Endurance is an active ability. A passive will stack with everything (won't get suppressed) while the robust regeneration may get supressed by other active healing effects. I'm only assuming this (did not test this case yet) - but given the general stacking rules of Deadfire this may happen. THat can be a reason why the bonuses of passives are generally lower than those of active abilities. Also (in this case), the Robust inspiration will get removed by an appropriate affliction. Constant Recovery will not get cancelled by anything. Weapon & Shield Style gives you +6 deflection (and even more reflex) while it forces you to wear a shield (loosing dps) - while Superior Deflection stacks with it and has no drawbacks. But I agree that +4 is laughable. Why nerf it from 5 to 4 in the first place? It's like somebody said "Whooha look at that! +5? Let's stomp this overpowered thingy down to 4, that will balance things out a bit and teach it a lesson, show it some modesty!". Escalating resource costs: yeah totally! They make the same mistake again they did with cipher and chanter in PoE and which they fixed in Deadfire - just to introduce the same flaw with the ability trees. Those are higer level abilites for a reason. It's a higher level, you had to do work to get there. It's ok if they are more powerful than tier-1 stuff. No need to increase the resource cost a lot. I mean active low level abilites should still stay viable, but the ratio is pretty harsh sometimes. I mean 2 compared to 1 is double the cost. Maybe the resource pools need to be more granular. Mage Slayer: I agree to that, too.

Hm... maybe I was too near when summoning (it's labeled "loud") and that's why stealth was broken? I only tested once and it was a while ago when I was also testing explosives from stealth. Good to know you can get around that.

Oh no! One of two per-thread uses of "Wall of Text" has been wasted.

On the fragments and the diminishing of souls: Josh also said that souls can grow a lot more powerful over time (see the Watcher level up). So the fracturing only puts those back a bit. If you factor this in it may even be that there is a balance or even a growth of global essence and no diminishing.

I tried to come up with a squaring to get a real (though negative) isle joke but came up short. You mean something like "Imaginary Island Illegiti-Mates"?