Boeroer

Thanks a lot. 1.: Sometimes I forget that I've had a resting bonus from Caed Nua when pinning down the stats at the end of the game. This happened here as well, I'm sorry. Nobody found out yet. 15 PER is also ok. Or 16 PER and 15 DEX and so on - what you like. It doesn't matter that much after some levels. 2.: I think it would still work. If you find better items you should use those of course. Soulbound items alsways use the weapons focus of xour choice, so it's easy to use them and replace your old weapons with them. 3.: I made it myself with The Gimp. Used the red haired orlan from the official portraits as a starting point. p.s.: Ouh... "the best"? Nobody called me that before. Nice!

Erm - good question and hard to know. I think it will be equally easy, if not easier. And it's pretty easy as it is so far (ACT III).

If monks also had strong healing abilities they would be outright OP. And you can always use scrolls and potions (using ones that deliver healing over time instead of a healing burst is better because you can drink them at the beginning of a fight.). By the way: High MIG and INT + Iron Wheel + Veteran's Recovery + Regneration item + Belt of Bountiful Healing + Survival Bonus: Healing Multiplier = nice effect on a monk. With Shod-in-Faith even better - but that's obvious.

10 CON & 03 RES will work fine if you don't send him right into the center of the mob. You can play around with DR to see how much you need for your playstyle. I always used to put this one in plate. That lowers dps a bit but I don't have to babysit him a lot then. There are nice helmets in WMII or with the new Stronghold Quest. But I still don't know a helmet that is as good as Silver Tide. Especially with high MIG and INT. p.s.: If you plan to bring a priest, a cipher and a barb I recommend Threatening Presence + Brute Force + Painful Interdiction. Threatening Presence (Sickened) + Painful Interdiction (Weakened) stacks and lowers fortitude (more than 40) and will defenses (more than 30) in a big AoE (of course only if the enemy is not immune). And one is passive and the other is 1/encounter. That's a big debuff for such little investment. Your Brute Force will produce a lot of crits (if it's not Ogres and stuff you're after) and the low will is great for lots of the cipher's powers like all mind control spells and stuff.

So, resetting the area does not work for the blood pool?

If you love greatswords then I would recommend a barbarian dps offtank with Tidefall and Shod-in-Faith boots with max MIG and INT and good PER and DEX, low RES. Before you get Tidefall/Shod-in-Faith he will go down quickly, but after that he's very sturdy and will heal for big amounts of endurance in a huge AoE while dealing good damage in a huge carnage area and apply wounding DoT via carnage. It's a low micro build that is fun. You can also put on all items that do something when you get a crit or hit. This will trigger a lot. You can even make him a moon godlike. He will do a lot of healing when he gets focused so maybe your paladin and priest will have more time for casting buffs and stuff. And most important for you: he's no interrupt barb. Another great offtank dps guy: Riptide Still works in 3.01

Hi! 1.: Sure, you can do that. 2.: No, that's ok. Potion of Flame Shield will be enough (hope it still generates focus post 2.03). 3.: After you have two retaliations it's not very important. Casting speed is not very fast of course. It helps to have friends who help with concentration and/or RES buffs. 4.: That really depends on your party and type of enemy. Against fast hitting enemies who don't deal a lot of damage per hit it's best to rush in and get grazed a lot. Against Ogres (fewer hits but lots of damage per hit) I wouldn't do that. If you have a paladin with Reinforcing Exhortation and Zealous Endurance or a priest with defelction and DR buffs you can do way more tanking even against nastier foes. The new Psychovampiric Shield is also very good for this build and for tankin. Back in 2.03 it gave you way less deflection. Now it's great and I would say: cast Psychovampiric Shield and then rush in! Basically you want to get grazed as much as possible and at the same time get stack as much DR as possible. That way you will generate a lot of focus while your endurance won't suffer too much.

Why is that sad? Sounds kind of cute.

I love it because it works with AoE spells.

Technical Support Forum. Three rows beneath this forum. You can find it. There's a bug with some items at the moment where spell holding items will not only apply to enemies but also on self at the same time. Stormcaller's Returning Storm for example not only hits the enemy but also the ranger (in this case without damage). Maybe those two bugs are related.

"The Roly Poly"

And your Fighting Spirit will be triggered sooner with low CON.

With Sura's Supper Plate? Then it doesn't work with retaliation items. There should have been three thunders: 1 from being hit (that's the normal behaviour of Avenging Storm - it also retaliates) and one for each retaliation. If there's only one then it means the retaliation items didn't trigger it.

Cool, thanks!

Sorry for the typos. Had a glass of (bad) red wine.

By the way I did a fighter build that tried to abuse self healing in 2.03: The Engineer Thematically different - but the self healing part might be interesting. Edit: Pallegina's Breastplate or He Carries Many Scars might be good items for your build: if health drops below 25%, your DR will suddenly be +50%.

Sure it stacks.

While those Glittering Gloves are quite nice - Gauntlets of Swift Action are still better when it comes to DPS. Dazing doesn't count for sneak attacks. If you flank - and also use the ability to distract while you flank - you're good. Put the Glittering Gloves on a barb - dazing with carnage seems to be a good idea.

You're giving away a bit dps: use Gauntlets of Swift Action instead of Gauntlets of Accuracy. Put durgan steel on your sabres. Use Outlander's Frenzy and Two Weapon Style. Put durgan steel on your robe. You will get: 1.25*1.15*1.15*1.15 + 0.2 = 2.1 attack speed mod instead of 1. 2 means zero recovery. So you even have a buffer of 0.1 - you are too fast. With Vulnerable Attack you will have 1.9 attack speed mod - close to zero recovery with 5 DR bypass. Should give you tons of DPS because you're superfast. If you want to boost crit damage take Bloody Slaughter and as MC take the talents "Merciless Hand" and Dungeon Delver and put on Azalin's Helmet. Taht should give you a crit damage modifier of 1.5+0.5+0.3+0.3+0.1+0.1 = *2.8 (*3.3 against enemies with low endurance). However - with dumped INT the frenzy will only last a short amount of time. That's not good. Maybe you want to pump survival instead and use Potions of Power or Potions of Alacrity. Those are both quite cheap to get. If you decide to raise INT I also recommend Aspirant's Mark. Great cross class talent for a rogue. helps to crit even more - rogues high ACC makes it easy to hit with it.

I don't like mail armor too much because: - it's only good against slash damage - weak against the others damage types - while havein a fairly hefty recovery penalty

That's because monks are awesome.

Isn't it so that Field Triage works in combat and Wound Binding doesn't? But Wound Binding gives you more health? Can't remember - never used it.

Chanter's Ancient Memory and Beloved Spirits also stack with this by the way.

Cloak of the Tireless Defender plus Trollhide Belt (or a regenerating armor) stack with Constant & Rapid recovery. Add a Belt of Bountiful Healing and Survival: Bonus Healing Factor and you are nigh unkillable But I would recommend higher MIG because this means more healing.

Could you also make a test with a ranger and the Golden Gaze in the same way, but with Dangerous Implement? I would really like to see how that works out. It's difficult to measure because you never know when Exp. Vulnerabilities gets triggered and it would be way more effective with Driving Flight - but still.