Boeroer

Yes, I meant stacking +1 PEN from Scion of Flame and +1 PEN from Spirit of Decay on Flames of Devotion attacks. The Bleak Walker's FoD is keyworded with fire AND corrode - and thus profits from both passives. And it works. I tried it once as a "Templar" concept (only that the Priest wouldn't be an actual Priest but a Druid - a Priest of Galawain if you will) but didn't really play it out. I can't think of any other ability at the moment that does one attack roll which is tagged with two keywords - but for all the abilites that have this the PEN would stack.

True, the per-encounter "AoE attack" of the stag in the unmodded game is very bad. It's the best form in an unmodded game pick imo (Boar as Shifter is also good, but only if you actually stay in boar form and fight with it). If you don't want to fight shifted then Lord Darryn's Voulge and a Morning Star as backup are good picks.

Skaen's Shadowig Beyond is a copy of the original, unpatched Rogue ability of the same name. This means that it will break on DoT ticks unfortunately while the Rogue's version will not (anymore - after patching). But you can totally use it to get the Assassinate ACC, PEN and crit-dmg bonus for direct damage spells and the ACC bonus for DoTs. Seals are hazard spells. Harards are handled as separate entities (in some ways a bit like summons if you will). They do not profit from assasinate etc. Walls and Seals (and traps) do work that way. Unless you meant Sigil spells - they work just fine with assassinate - but as all pulsing spells only the first pulse will profit.

Yes, Berserker/Ancient Exactly what I did. I didn't do that because I used the Stag form and the Community Patch to get dual Carnage (33% raw dmg from Barb + 25% dmg from Stag). Both are nice, BUT: if you summon a Furyshaper's Ward you cannot summon Ancient's summons like Sporelings anymore. I mean you can, but they will replace the ward - which most lieky is not what you want. And the Sporelings are very good imo (especially in combination with Wild Growth). Yes On the Barb's side? Don't think so. Mageslayer makes no sense and Corpse Eater, while thematically a cool pick in combination with an Ancient, is implemented so awkwardly that it's mechanically inferior to vanilla Barb imo. On the Druid's side there's Fury (here I would suggest using Lord Darryn's Voulge), Lifegiver (good with Furyshaper, can't summon anyways) and there's always the Shifter.

I assume you bought the game before you experienced those things?

You would max MIG. There's not much else you can do - except adding Brand Enemy on top of those two with a Paladin. Although that wouldn't hve done much against that dragon...

All attacks from Firebrand count as burn attacks. Scion of Flame and Ring of Focused Flame both work with it. Maybe scrolls?

If you use mainly Imbue:Web and Imbue:Eora you won't have PEN issues and they are fantastic as opening barrage. They will pull most enemies together, render them helpless and perfectly positioned for your Magran nukes. Don't know if you knew it already but Driving Flight AND jumping weapons like Watershaper's Focus will stack their jumps. And imbue spells trigger with every jump. So that would be 3 Binding Web Instances + 3 Pull of Eora Instances - from stealth this will take only very few secs to apply.

Exactly! Yes, no "Clone". Don't know why, maybe it has something to to with instancing the game objects, but whatever. You can look up the names of the spells to remove in the wiki: https://pillarsofeternity.fandom.com/wiki/Fan_of_Flames_(Priest_of_Magran) https://pillarsofeternity.fandom.com/wiki/Spiritual_Weapon_(Priest_of_Magran) OR - maybe that's the best option if I think about it: don't bother with removin the spells manually but after using SetSubclass and adding the Magran_Deity just go to an inn and retrain, that should be the cleanest solution and less hassle on a game console with a gamepad and so on. That should automatically remove everything and let you level up from 1 to 4 again - I think even the lvl-1 bonus spell.

If you would bring a cipher with Driving Echoes this would be a non-issue. An alternative is indeed the Community Patch. It has nice unique passive icons, too. First time @theleedoing a ninja on me, damn!

Forbidden Fist wants high Resolve in order to keept the duration of any hostile effects extremely short. RES also contributes to deflection which the Wizard has an enormous potential for. And since stacking defenses gives increasing returns this is a nice synergy already. Use Tuotilo's Palm and you'll be tanky as hell. And if you mostly use Forbidden Fist attacks or other primary attacks (Force of Anguish, Torment's Reach, Skyward Kick) you won't lose any dps from the use of the shield but still get get dual wielding recovery speed. Then Sages are very potent in general. Mostly because the combination of either AoE weapon such as Spirit Lance + Stunning Surge, Efficient Anguish etc. is very good, but also because Wall of Draining prolongs all buffs on you, including Swift Flurry, Thunderous Blows, Clarity of Agony (great for a Forbidden Fist), Crucicle of Suffering (also great for a forbidden fist) and whatnot. Also the Wizard has some spells which have friendly fire - which usually are bad to step into, but as Forbidden Fist can give you wounds and healing galore. For example be resistant to DEX affclictions (like from being a wood elf or wearng an item with DEX resistance) and step into your own Binding Webs. You will get hobbled for very short amount of times and every time a hobble wears off you will get healing and a wound. Finally the Forbidden Fist attack enfeebles, which causes +50% duration of hostile effects on the enemy. This includes stuff like Fetid Caress (very strong single target disable in combination with Turning Wheel's +10 INT, which is +30% duration, and enfeebling with +50%). Add some power levels and land a crit - and the enemy might be paralyzed for over half a minute.

Dual wielding with a Kind Wayfarer does twice the healing with FoD compared to a Kind Wayfarer with only one weapon. It's not a big problem, it's just not optimal. As I said, Steel Garrote Paladin/Bloodmage would be a superb synergy with Whispers of the Endless Paths. With a Devoted you can use an Estoc if you accept that a backup weapon will have -10 ACC (not that big of a deal after the early game imo) or if you pick up Monastic Unarmed Training and use your fists against pierce immune foes. Everbody is automatically proficient with fists so a Devoted won't get -10 ACC with them. Pierce resistance (which is just high armor vs. pierce) is not a big problem for a Devoted/Wizard because not only has an Estoc vey high base PEN already an the Devoted adds, but also the Wizard has Expose Vulnerabilities and the Devoted has Penetrating Strike. I don't remember many "resistant" enemies that can withstand that. Pierce immune enemies don't skulk around every corner, but they are more common than most other xyz-immune foes because often skeletons and constructs are immune to pierce. Hence the fallback to fists or a Morning Star for example. Kaylon's suggestion with Soulblade is also very nice - also with Whispers of the Endless Paths. Offensive Parry will generate focus while you parry and the cone attack will apply the raw dmg of the Soul Annihilation attacks to all enemies in the cone (the amount of raw dmg will vary between enemies though). Ciphers get Borrowed Instincts at some point which leads to high ACC but also high defenses which stack with Paladin's defensive passives AND singular deflection buffs (for example from a Priest) which is perfect for Offensive Parry.

You can change a hireling's class like so: setClasslevel Companion_P_<name_of_the_hireling> Priest 1 true If your hireling already is a Priest (would recommend to hire as a Priest) you can switch the subclass to Rymrgand like so: setSubclass Companion_P_<name_of_the_hireling> Priest LAX02_Priest_Rymrgand Also make sure that your Priest gets the fitting starting passive ability for this subclass. In Priest's cases it's just a hollow ability that lets you see it on the ability sheet and check their bonus spells and description of the subclass. But still - without there might be problems. So here we go: AddAbility Companion_P_<name> LAX02_Rymrgand_Deity What most likely threw you off was the LAX02 (that's a zero, not the letter O). That's the internal name of the Beast of Winter DLC which introduced the Priest of Rymrgand subclass. All hirelings start with "Companion_P_" and then the name you gave them. I actually don't know how spaces and special chars will get represented (will somwhow work, I just never tried and have no savegame with such a dude) so maybe for now stick to a plain old name without fancy stuff. A Priest subclass will get a special bonus spell at level 1. You will have that of the original subclass - but not the one from Rymrgand. So you need to remove the old one and add the one from Rymrgand (example: Berath --> Rymrgand): removeAbility Companion_P_<name> Touch_of_Rot_Berath AddAbility Companion_P_<name> LAX02_Rymrgand_Touch_Of_Rot And that should be it. Hope it works (it should, it does on Desktops - but I have no exp. with the game ond any gaming console).

Yes, that's a pit we all fall into. Self-contained builds are just more appealing due to the planning and tinkering which might result in some cool synergies amd then seeing that stuff in action. That's not necessarily more potent in a party-based game because of inter-character synergies (solo is a different story ofc.), but for most of us it's just more fun and feels more rewarding. And imo playing a game is all about having fun - so we're doing everything right, right?

Don't know if you meant the Offensive Parry with "attacks in an AoE, too" but I wanted to point out that Offensive Parry is not a Full Attack (with cone and all) but a single target weapon attack with its own stats. It also causes dazed when it hits. This option is very nice for a Steel Garrote/Bloodmage because it's easy for them to reach very high deflection and at the same time drain health from all the parries (Steel Garrote passive) - which can fuel your Bloodmage spells (Blood Sacrifice). Imo it's a very cool concept. Playing a Steel Garrote can be challenging though - I mean dialogue-wise because of the dispositions. Kind Wayfarer also works. Two Hander with White Flames' healing is suboptimal - but it will do. A very solid build is always Paladin/Chanter. If going Kind Wayfarer I think Troubadour fits best. I'd use Exalted Endurance (Paladin) + Ancient Memory (Chanter) for nice and strong passive healing for me and my allies, stack Eternal Devotion + Aefyllath Mith Fyr for nice melee damage on my part (or use Shared Flames' for more dmg support - but range is meh). Heal on the spot with Lay on Hands and White Flames, use Invocations to either call summons, damage in an AoE of buff you and your party. Eternal Endurance's lash also works with invocations and spells. So it will put some additional burn damage to offensive, damaging abilities which is cool for either Arcana Knight or Herald. An often overlooked combo imo is Paladin/Stalker. It has very good passive AR and deflection, an additional body (Animal Companion) and very high potential accuracy (+10 from FoD, +10 from Ring of Focused Flames, +10 from Stalker's Link, up to +20 from Hunter's Claw...). Also you can revive and heal your Animal Companion multiple times. The Great Sword Effort fits nicely because its DoT will unlock Predator's Sense. A Crusader is often labeled boring, but I found if you pick mostly offensive abilities and let the defensive passives plus a few actives just work it's a pretty solid off-tank/damage hybrid than can be fun to play. Damage per hit can be pretty high if you employ Inspired Beacon and all the other little dmg bonuses (Sworn Enemy, FoD, Weapon Spec + Mastery, Two Handed Style and so on - even using the Great Sword modal can make sense if you combine Ring of Focused Flame, Disciplined Strikes and FoD for high ACC strikes). Penetration with Devoted and maybe even Scion of Flame (+1 PEN for FoD) is also nice. Tried some hours with Voidwheel and it was pretty cool. A weapon option that I wouldn't toss aside and which also looks a bit like a Great Sword is Esrocs, especially Blade of the Endless Paths (if you pick that then there will be no Whispers of the Endless Paths). It not only debuffs enemies' defenses but also lifts you ACC during the fight. This is especially nice with an Arcane Knight because the Essential Phantom (Wizard spell) will also get your items and that way you can stack twice the deflection debuff on an enemy which can be very good against tough boss enemies.

It depends. There are builds that use some cool synergies between Wizard and Druid. Mostly it's about combining self buffs and healing with Wall of Draining. Also you can use Spiritshift forever with the help of Wall of Draining. Even building a cool melee Sorcerer monster is possible with a Bloodmage/Shifter Boar (Shifter Boar has an extended DoT duration on the tusks which does tremendous DoT + stuff like Zandethu's Draconic Fury, Citzal's Martial Power, Wildstrike and so on + Wall of Draining). If it's more about general casting and the non-late parts of the game: If you have only one spot left for a caster and want to cover all sorts of spells like for damage, self buffs, CC and healing (and also some melee and summons) it can be good. Very versatile. This is especial useful in runs with little to no knowledge about what's coming to you. If you have more free slots in the party, then a single class Wizard + a single class Druid is often the better option than... let's say 2 Sorcerers. Mostly because a) you'll get to the good spells earlier due to SC power level progression and b) because you will reach the highest Power Levels 8 and 9 - and some of those spells that await you there are just fantastically powerful (Great Maelstrom, Meteor Shower or Missile Salvo, Avenging Storm with some tricks...) Another point is that if you have two specialized casters (wizard + druid) - instead of one who is more of a jack of all trades (sorcerer) + some other party member - your action economy will be a lot better. Just because two caster can cast two impactful spells at the same time, while the sorcerer has to cast them one after the other with recovery in between. Casting speed is crucial most of times. Obviously this last point is completely moot when going solo. Advantages of a Sorcerer over a single class caster ate that there will be more spells to cast. They will have lesser impact due to lower PL and later access, but there will be more of them. Also, most likely you will be more flexible. When using Bloodmage the Druid part can heal, which fuels more Wizard spells. Tl;dr: specialized Sorcerer builds can be very cool, generalized Sorcerer builds are not great, but not bad either (imo).

If you are not engaged then there will be no disengagement attack. Evasive Roll will make you immune to engagement for a few secs so you will not suffer disengagement attacks when you leave during that time. Movement abilities like Escape, Leap, Evasive Fire, Flagellant's Path etc.) never trigger disengagement attacks. It's basically moving without "officially" moving and cancels all engagement for a short while.

The good thing with Barbarian/Streetfighter is that you can use Smoke Veil or Shadowing Beyond if you feel you are about to go down. Also a pet that lowers armor recovery penalty and heals on kill (Abraham) will help. Streetfighter can still use Riposte even if it's less likely to trigger due to the frenzy/flanked combo. Blood Thirsty is of course icing of the speedcake. Stalwart Defiance can help a lot. I wouldn't pick Berserker because it's just annoying to manage the health of a Streetfighter without being able to see it. The dmg output is really good with a Berserker/Streetfighter and he goes into bloodied status all by himself - but you can't simply stop it and as I said it's hard to manage your health. Furyshaper is cool imo.

That highest attack speed you would get from a Barbarian/Streetfighter. Frenzy + Bloodlust + Dual Wielding + Two Weapon Style + Heating Up Barb also offers Blood Frenzy which adds a raw DoT that stacks with Deep Wounds and thus adds to the idea of "1000 wounds". Besides that the dmg bonuses of both classes stack nicely, too.

Yeah. It also works with Clear Out of course - but Clean Sweep is a lot easier for catching a lot of enemies. Heart of Fury with very high INT is also cool because a) Barb can also add Staggered and b) has Leap which makes it very easy to go to the ideal spot for unleashing HoF+Body Blows. Too bad it's so expensive... Whispers of the Wind is another option and doesn't need foes cuddling in a tight spot. But I have to say: WotW with a Morning Star feels like a sacrilege.

Shadowing Beyond is too expensive, but it doesn't break on DoTs anymore (was fixed with a patch). The Priest of Skaen uses a copy of the original Shadowing Beyond. That version still breaks on DoTs unfortunately. I agree that one should use Smoke Veil instead. Earlier and less expensive.

That is not the case when you put a DoT effect on the enemy. Usually combat won't end until the DoT runs out or the enemy dies. So it's totally safe to attack in melee (e.g. with Lover's Embrace) with Gouging Strike for example and then use Smoke Veil and just walk away, out of sight. It is less hassle to use a ranged weapon though.

What makes hunting bow's PEN issues go away very early is Essence Interrupter which does pierce/shock. I don't remember a single enemy who has high pierce AR AND high shock AR. Anything that has high ACC bonuses (Monk, Ranger, Cipher) is great with a hunting bow because the -10 ACC loss isn't even noticable. Fighter is also cool, but I don't like that only Penetrating Strike works with ranged (two handed) weapons.

Some of the enemies that have high fortitude also have resistances to CON and/or MIG afflictions so you are left with the Morning Star. There is no immunity to Body Blows. THat's why I like to combine Gauntlets of Greater Reliability and Willbreaker's "Make them Flinch" in combo with some miss-to-graze food. That way you can "Body Blow" any enemy rel. reliably no matter how bad your ACC is. By the way: A wizard is nice as partner for a DoT-Druid because Ryngrim's Enervating Terror lowers Fortitude via Weakened but targets Will(!). And Will is so easy to debuff for a Wizard (hello Miasma of Dull-Mindedness + a club). I once brought an SC Black Jacket just to be able to lower fort and will with Morning Star/FlailClub in an AoE with Clean Sweep (because the AoE is rather big for a weapon attack).

Rogue can solo almost all encounters in the game. Only Megabosses and Water Dragon and SSS fights are complicated (because not enough space to retreat so combat can stop). For invisibility shenanigans I prefer Assassin bc. the ACC bonus is great. I played Assassin/Bleak Walker (to combine Gouging Strike, Brand Enemy and Lover's Enbrace "endless" damage over time effects) and it's rel. easy to win almost anything by just sneak to an enemy (Bounding Boots help a ton to reach any enemy undetected), apply some DoTs, turn invisible, retreat out of sight and wait until the enemy's dead. But you can also rush in as let's say a Streetfighter, become flanked, dish out incredible dmg until you are nearly dead and then just vanish and retreat until you're back in business again.