Boeroer

You shouldn't attack foes who have a lot more levels than you. Lvl 6 against 100 deflection is very hard to overcome. I'd had very good experiences with a tanky Hiravias with Weapon & Shield Style. Just don't go in first. He had no problems whatsoever to tank two or three enemies until his spells came out - and then he didn't have to tank anything any more. Lvl 5 against Feral Druids is also way too early. And honestly: what building did happen until lvl 5? Does he even have Returning Storm yet? Maybe I would have taken Weapon & Shield and Cautious Attack and put on a Ring of Deflection to balance out the lower (but not too low) starting deflection of fighters and such (20 instead of 30). After that his deflection should be as high as that of a fighter - plus he has tons of spells. Aspirant's Mark can make the early PotD game a lot easier. It's like a Spell Mastery of a weaker Nature's Mark and helps a lot when you want to target deflection and reflexes.

Nope.

Ah, good to know - thanks. Could have guessed that because in the combat log you can see that Soul Whip gets activated once an encounter starts.

He can achieve higher permanent defenses than a fighter (plus the Outworn Buckler I mentioned), has aweseome (self) healing abilities, can shrug off debuffs and can have an aura that gives him (and others) a DR bonus - so yes.

High PER / high DEX crit-rogue with The Hours of St. Rumbalt is lots of fun! Edit: same with barb by the way. I think even a fighter could be fun with it. You don't even need to take Knockdown, Disciplined Barrage will be perfect for that build. And with Armored Grace and a bit of Durgan Steel you will be quite fast while wearing plate.

Blame my kids: 4, 2, under 1 year old. They wake up quite early and love to jump up, scream and run around once they open their eyes. Ok, the little one only screams... The damage from soul whip works like the damage bonus from Sneak Attack, Savage Attack, high MIG and so on. It just adds +20% or +40% onto your basic weapon damage. YOu can't see it's doings directly in the combat log (just like with sneak attack). YOu can just observe that you do much higher damage than without. You could test that like so: hit the same target a couple of times with and without Soul Whip on. Soul Whip turns off once you reach maximum focus. I can't recall if the bonus damage is displayed on the character sheet when you look at your weapons' damage - like it does when you have Savage Attack activated. Maybe it does not because it's a circumstancial bonus like Sneak Attack (affliction or not / focus full or not).

You can do it from stealth - if the party members attack first and place afflictions. Why is 1 INT good? Can't remember. Because of the prone part of Feign Death? But wouldn't the duration of the invisibility phase suffer also? Wouldn't Blaidh Golan (-50% prone duration) or Belt of the Stelgaer (-33%) be better?

What lash? Recall Agony or what do you mean? Soul Whip is not a lash. Reaping Knives do raw damage directly...

I don't think so - but I never tried. Good question!

Two Weapon Style is for the Spiritshift form where you have dual claws. Novice's Suffering only works with fists, not the claws and stuff of spiritshifted druids. It's intended because the combination would be too powerful.

At the start of the game the impact of high PER is much bigger than at higher levels. Of course you see a big difference when you roll a fresh caster. Because his crappy ACC gets nearly doubled. But at lvl 8 you can't see a huge difference anymore just by observing a few hit rolls. It's because PER gives you a flat bonus to ACC, but MIG or CON or INT give you bonuses which are percentage based.

Also good to know for paladins: the Outworn Buckler you can buy in Gilded Vale is one of the best shields in the game, given how early you can get it. It's paladin-only. It is one of the reasons I like paladins.

*wipes tears*

Ah, right, I forgot some spells. I seldomly use anything else for damage than Shining Beacon, so... Shining Beacon doesn't work because all the elemental booster talents like Scion of FLame don't work with damge over time, only direct damage. It's stupid, but it's not a bug. It was reported long ago and the devs don't do anything about it, so I guess it's intended or to difficult to fix. Shining Beacon has DoT and therefore doesn't work. The rest you mentioned does work with Scion of Flame. Brilliant Radiance also works I guess (but not the burn damage against vessels, it's also DoT). But it'S damage is so low that it doesn't matter. So if you plan to use Divine Mark and Pillar of Holy Fire a lot, than Scion of Flame ist worth the investment. I seldomly use those because Shining Beacon is just so awesome - especially together with Cleansing Flame (which also doesn't work with Scion of Flame). So maybe that illustrates better why I consider Scion of Flame to be a bit of a waste for my priests.

Keep in mind that if you didn't choose any invocation of your highest level (maybe because you think they are too bad and you chose one from a lower level instead) your phrase counter will be stuck at that lower level and will not go up. So, for example: if you could choose an invocation that requires 7 phrases but instead choose another invocation that only uses 6 phrases, your phrase counter will not go up to 7, even if your char level is high enough. It will be stuck at 6. It's stupid, but that's how it is...

I you don't like micromanagement and resting a lot (we're the same here) but still want to play a monk (I love them) then I would recommend the Witch Doctor I made. That build requires way less resting because it also works as a ranged character (as well as melee flanker/occasional offtank). Once you feel you get hit too much, retreat and cast THe Long Pain and kill everything from afar. It'S one of the most powerful monks (dps wise) that I know. Nice Paladin builds are "Darcozzi Forward Observer" who focuses on raising the ACC of his allies into the skies and the Kind Wayfarer Damaging Healbot. That one uses on-kill effects and special order related talents to heal like crazy. They both can be very tanky - although the Healbot needs a bit of oomph in order to steal kills for his healing. THe only things that help agaisnt low health are high defenses or Wound Binding. But a potion of Infuse with Vital Essence is also not bad: sip it before you go waltk into melee combat - the first 50 health you lose will not be substracted from your (unbuffed) health bar.

Yeah that was me, shadowing beyond...

That was the first rogue I ever played: a Hours of St. Rumbalt crit build. It was very nice. One really good thing about it is that you can trigger Deathblows just by flanking (flanked + prone). So I didn't take many of those special attack abilities which cause afflictions - only Blinding Strike. I didn't take Backstab though. Back then we didn't have individual stealth and it was kind of a suicide mission for a rogue to go in first to get a Backstab. But we also didn't have immunities to prone.

It depends. I can imagine that a solo rogue can be played very effectively with backstab. When solo you might want to take high Stealth and Shadowing Beyond anyways. Does anybody know if Finishing Blow works with Backstab so that the dmg modifiers add up?

You'd have to try out. Normally I always cry a bit when my paladins don't have small shields , but in this case it could be worth it. I also think Scared Immolation gets +12 ACC when you fight one-handed. So... could be that the fight is over so quickly that it might be better to not use a shield. Also depends on the rest of your party I guess. But normally you're better off with a shield. It's very difficult to raise deflection into such heights that you don't get hit at all in PoTD. You will get more grazes instead of hits, and that's what every guy with retaliation wants: to get barely scratched and then retaliate. It's way better for your health. And since you might want to max MIG and INT and also PER and can't afford to dump CON you can't raise RS to max anyway I assume.

Most of the time I do Dragon Thrashed only - together with as much MIG and INT I can get, a Ring of Overseeing plus Voice of the Mountaintop (the +10% and +20% AoE buffs stack whith that from INT). The damage is just too good and the size of the AoE is ridiculously big. If you want more invocations and still do chant damage then a good combination at higher levels is taking The Dragon Thrashed + multiple Come Sweet Winds (so that those fill the linger time). At level 16 COme Sweet Winds only takes 2 seconds to chant! An example of how powerful the combination of multiple fast chanting phrases plus one slow, powerful one can be: http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/86968-class-build-chillfog-cool-soothing-chanter-tank/?hl=chillfog

Does it stack with a Potion of Flame Shield? If not, I wouldn't take it. If it does, then I would test a full retaliation Fire Godlike Darcozzi Paladin tank who is a Potion of Flame Shield addict. Scion of Flame works with Battle Forged and the potion, so I assume it also works with Fires of Darcozzi Palace (edit: sorry, you already wrote it does, nice). It also works with Sacred Immolation and Flames of Devotion. Use the sabre "Flames of Fair Rhian" from the Endless Paths, wear the Amulet of Summer Solstice, a Ring of Searing Flames and put on the Sun-Touched Mail and you will be a really nice fire paladin. You will have 3 Combusting Wounds and 3 Fireballs plus 6 Sunbeams per rest, even 6 Fireballs if you later put Taluntain's Staff into your second weapon slot. Once you get surrounded use that potion and use Fires of Darcozzi Palace. Once you hit 50% endurance Battle Forged will also kick in. Add Sacred Immolation and nothing will attack you in melee morethan a few seconds. A lot of interrupts (5 retaliations with Battle-Forged, 4 without) and also good retaliation damage plus Sacred Immolation. Sounds really nice. Might as well work good enough without Battle Forged - that 50% endurance is annoying and you don't want to go there all the time. When you use Combusting Wounds on your surroundings foes who attack you will get up to 6 CW instances, each doing 100 base damage over time against 0 DR (5 per tick against 1/4 burn DR for 20 secs, MIG and INT bonuses work, stacks). This should be a great mob tanker!

That's why I mentioned Wall of Flames. The wall spells generate a ton of hits in a short time - many more than those periodically triggered spells like Chillfog and even Sacred Immolation. And you want low burn DR anyways with Wall of Flames because it's damage is so low. So Expose Vulnerabilites will be good together with CW (and Wall spells). Does anybody know if Ryona's Vembraces work with Wall of Flames? Or Effigy's Resentment: Devil of Caroc?

Hello again, Wall of Flames! Chillfog and Malignant Cloud, you're welcome, too... Ectopsychic Echo should also work, but targets die in seconds anyways. That means that the Backlash Beldam can have a rivival: up to four different retaliations with Pain Link and Recall Agony means a lot of hits for enemies every time you get hit. Please tell me CW works with Pain Link and Recall Agony...?

Cool - report how it works for you. I didn't take the "retaliation road". I tried it but the loss of Full Attacks with Torment's Reach and the whimpy retaliation damage weren't worth it - or so I felt. Maybe I was wrong.