Boeroer

I'm on a 2012 laptop and it takes roughly 30 secs for me to load savegames. Transitions maybe half the time.

Lovely. That will work. Just keep in mind: you will be superslow when it comes to anything other than singing phrases. So yes, you can totally forget about weapon damage and concentrate on positioning yourself perfectly well or blocking paths of enemies who want to reach your backline and so on. Some people even take Hold the line and pick up a guarding weapon (+2 engagement slots). That way you can stop up to 3 enemies who want to run past you - briefly, but better than nothing. Getting engaged stops movement and that can buy time for you. Other pick weapons with spell bindings so that they can cast a spell here and there. I did this with the following (old) build: https://forums.obsidian.net/topic/83491-class-build-the-drakes-ambassador-searing-mesmerizing-chanter-tank/ What you can also do to make your game a bit more "active" is to get a weapon with marking (sword Shame or Glory, spear Cladhaliath) and flank enemies for one of your melee dps guys. He will then get the equivalent of +20 ACC (-10 deflection from flanking, +10 ACC from marking). That would be single ally support mostly but it may be more insteresting than just standing around. But standing around is not a problem - because you combine support (AoE passive healing), tankyness (great regeneration, high DR and decent deflection/reflex) with very high passive AoE damage from lvl 9 on. Lvl 1 - 8 are a bit less exciting of course. Soft Winds doesn't do as much damage. But it's nice to speed up the phrase counter a bit and to cast some invocations here and there (you can totally stop doing this when you have Dragon Thrashed - casting invocations will disrupt your singing and thus stop your damage-dealing).

We talked about those weird DoTs a couple of months ago. I just looked it up again and according to Kaylon: So you will not have to worry about SA with gimped INT. High INT is also not too bad with Runner's Wounding Shot and/or Tidefall. Because it's all raw damage the DR is no issue and thus the longer timespan where the DoT is applied over more and smaller ticks is not a problem. The overall raw damage stays the same, it just takes a bit longer to apply it completely (few seconds). You don't lose overall damage - you just lose a bit of dps (damage per second). So enemies die a few seconds later - that's the worst thing that will happen. Longer wounding duration can also have benefits - for example if you try to time Cleasing Flame + wounding on the same target or when you have a pet with Predator's Sense in the party.

Yes, good spread for that. But dual Bittercut is a bit of a waste for a chanter to be honest. No synergy with Spirit of Decay whatsoever. But if this is your whish I can't stop you. If you're going to use the Mith Fyr phrase then take a look at "The Flames of Faîr Rhîan". It's a sabre that gives you 3 Fireballs per Rest. Because Mith Fyr also puts lashes on spells - it's powerful because of that.

And because you know that you don't test them out...?

Ah, ok. For a second I thought that you thought that you have to kill them in order to get their gear. Can't say how many times I smacked Durance to death because he was offending me with his gargling "Come to pray at the statue!"-nonsense.

In Path of the Damned difficulty, encounters have many more enemies. Enemies also get +15 Accuracy and +15 to all Defenses. They can use abilities/spells on PotD which they don't use on lower difficulty levels. Afaik DR is not changed.

I think this decision will lead to less patches. I really want to try a Shapeshifter/Shattered Pillar with Wildstrike Burn and Turning Wheel. >+100% burning lash on those claws/tusks/horns seems to be... awesomest? Also Lightning Strikes on top I guess...

Only with the initial hit I think, but not with the following ticks, no. But this is a quite old nerf.

Your MIG score is awful for a phrase-based chanter with dumped DEX. Raise your MIG to the max if you can, lower RES and CON to 10, it's fine. DEX can be completely dumped. Get a plate armor, hatchet + shield, weapon & shield style, wait till lvl 9, then only put one single phrase of "The Dragon Thrashed" into your songbook and let your jaw drop... just forget your weapons. You also want to take Ancient Memory, Beloved Spirits and Veteran's Recovery. Then you want to get a Belt of Bountiful Healing and survial min 8 in order to get the +40% healing bonus that will work for all three of those regeneration effects. Then look out for an item with Overseeing (Celebrant's Gloves, some rings) and search for the amulet Voice of the Mountaintop (in Dyrford Village). You will cover a huge AoE with continous burn and slash damage while you are very sturdy. By the way: the "Come, Soft Winds" phrase also stacks with itself (like Dragon Thrashed). You can use it until lvl 9 to deal some AoE damage. You only need to place one phrase of it into your songbook. Because phrases have linger time they will overlap and the damage will stack. With lots of MIG and INT even Soft Winds will do ok damage. Remember it's raw damage and it's AoE, it's not too bad. In the meanwhile tank around, heal your chaps passively via Ancient Memory adn Beloved Spirits (same AoE as your chant) and occasionally drop a phantom, cast "White Worms" or "Killers Froze Stiff" from time to time. White Worms can be insanely powerful if you pile up bodies at a chokepoint. Turn off gib-effects in the options menu so that bodies don't explode. It's silly anyway. Corpses can be used over and over again as long as you don't leave the map or reload. This way Lord Raedric is always a one-shot for me. Just don't wear headphones when using White Worms on a huge pile of corpses...

Yes, why not take them into the party, take their gear and then park them in the stronghold?

It's ok if you can deal more than 10 damage per hit via Rooting Pain or retaliation (like Battle Forged) and stand in a crowd. But all in all I think it's quite lame. And a lot of hassle, too.

Runner's Wounding Shot does work with melee weapons.

The tooltip when hovering over them. I always completely ignore that nonsense.

Make a really stupid Goldpact paladin with Runner's Wounding, Tidefall and Enduring Flames. Might work quite well...

Yes. That's one of those weird DoTs where more INT is not good.

If you never encountered an ogre before I presume that you didn't go into the Endless Paths?

When I got the game I played once on normal, canceled that run and started PotD. I had not gathered half as much knowledge as you did (actually I didn't know anything about the mechanics) and it was still doable. Some fights were really tough, but you can always come back later. First time Thaos and Adra Dragon were real challenges for my though, which was fun.

Starts at lvl 4 with 10% and then adds 10% every 3 levels. At lvl 16 your phrases will only take 50% of the original time to finish. Linger time is not affected of course.

Those will give you a nice boost.

You don't necessarily need it. I played all kinds of parties, even 6 rogues with no hard CC and ACC buffs at all and it's all doable. It's just nice to have, that's all.

Not broken. They just nerfed CW so that DoTs don't trigger it on each tick. Also, there are only some DoTs where less INT means higher dps. Most of them work like "more INT = more damage". And the damage increase via INT is multiplicative.

Also, everybody who can lower DR can profit from those two flails with the 10% burning lash. Chanter, even wizard (dual flail + Alacrity + Expose ). Cipher with Body Attunement seems to be the perfect candidate for Starcaller + Unforgiven. Gaun's Share isn't too bad for a barbarian, at least in early game. He grazes a lot because of his mediocre ACC base and Carnage's ACC malus - and the AoE draining is quite nice that early. Also, with Savage Attack, One Stands Alone and Blooded he has some dmg bonuses, for the 10% lashes, too. Also, a low PER fighter with a large shield and Confident Aim comes to mind. Generally they are not bad for the use with a large shield. -8 ACC is hefty and the 30% conversion will help.

What? Weird! Never realized that. That's neat. Another multiclass combo for Deadfire. Did you ever test Spark tSotR with chanter's Mith Fyr?

Do you need a Marking weapon for PotD? No. It's just nice to have one.