Boeroer

It's still cool cool with the Deep Wounds.

It's not that great though. But it looks really nice. I still don't get it why we can't loot the nice plate armors from Deathguards.

You have two Rimecutters? That's great. Then just enchant them with durgan steel and there's your 0 recovery with thick armor plus Vulnerable Attack. I like the Coat of Ill Payment because it looks nice and has Retaliation. If you buy or craft some potions of Flame shield you can do some serious damage with Retaliation while hacking away with Rimecutters like a whirlwind. You should also consider taking Heart of Fury. It can turn tough encounters (bounties for example) into easy ones if you unleash it when you're surrounded by a lot of enemies.

Have a look for inspiration (you don't need to use that mind control thing) - that worked like a charm on PotD: Drake's Ambassador Also works good with Kana. However, because you have a Druid AND you want a tank, you could also try this: Batsh!t Crazy One of my favorite tank builds. Also works with Hiravias. I played both recently in 3.01 with WMII with great success. Here's an unusual ranger offtank/healer/dps who worked really well in 2.03 - I think it's still viable in 3.01: Riptide Quite powerful, but no pure tank. But a good mixture of sturdyness and damage. Heals your party all the time. New in 3.0: Stunning Shots also works in melee now. It's even better than before. All those build need relatively low micromanagement (because I don't like that). By the way: The Dragon Thrashed also triggers Predator's Sense. And the Sure-Handed-Ila chant lets rangers shoot even faster. So chanter and ranger usualy make a good team.

An Island Aumaua Bleak Walker with the Executioner's Hood, Wayfarers Hide, Redfield and that persecuting, bloody club would look so awesome.

You can do that of course and against enemies who deal a lot of damage per hit that's ok. So against Ogres, Dragons and the like it's good to have a lot of DR. But if your DR is already very high then stacking even more of it won't help you a lot against normal and numerous enemies. If the damage of an attack is lower than your DR a MIN portion of damage will go through. Doesn't really matter if you have 30 DR or 25 against an attack that's supposed to deal 20 damage. More deflection or other defenses on the other hand can totally avoid that damage. So your defenses should always be your number one priority, DR comes after that. For example I used Hiravias as a tank in my last playthrough and it really made no noticeable difference in terms of survivability if I put him into Blaidh Golan (hide) or Argwe's Adra (plate), both crush proofed and with a blunting belt. He just got a lot slower with the plate. Vigorous Defense on that breastplate is so much better than just a few points of DR.

If you want a good tank with good damage then you should use the chanter. Only take defensive talents and pick the chant "The Dragon Trashed". Deals lots of damage while standing around or even when prone.

If you have Edge of Reason and We Toki I would recommend using those on Maneha. AoE prone plus AoE draining is nice. If you have two Rimecutters you can acutally attack with 0 recovery while wearing plate or brigandine. That's one of the best melee dps setups there is. And it looks good, too.

Oh - this will be so great on a rogue with Deep Wounds: Overwhelming Wave does crush damage and therefore will apply Deep Wounds. Stun + crush damage + raw damage = supersweet!

I wonder: Does anybody know if the on-kill-effect of Steadfast (Crowns for the Faithful 25% on kill - with a rogue for example) also triggers if you don't kill the target with Steadfast itself? For example if you're dual wielding Steadfast and the Unlabored Blade and you kill a foe with that dagger. Will the on-kill-effect still work?

I also started WM2 with maxed out official companions and it's just a joke. Ouuh - dangerous Eyeless on PoTD - lots of them, what a threat! *Bam-bam-all-dead-in-seconds* there you go! It's way too easy - I will stop this playthrough and start another one where I will go to WM2 before I enter Act III. Because ActIII is boring anyway - so no big loss.

It's definetly thick enough for a front liner on PoTD. Atm Pallegina wears it and she never has any problems with endurance loss whatsoever. You can always combine it with a blunting belt if you feel the need. But if you always have to wear plate even at higher levels then maybe your deflection is too low. In my opion plate armor is best for front liners who can't wear shields (or don't want to).

Wow that's great. I didn't even put it on because I thought it will always stun my buddies.

That is the main problem. One's legs look really spindly with that armor. Why is that? To make it really hilarious, put it on an orlan and then also put on the Maegfolc Skull. Then use Badgradr's Barricade and mix it with Nightshroud. Maybe that gives you a sickening aura like Threatening Presence? Let's call it "Instant Eye Cancer".

Spiritshift gets superpowerful if you combine it with Avenging Storm in higher levels. Basically you take Outlander'S Frenzy, Wildstrike Shock, Greater Wildstrike Shock, Heart of the Storm, Two Weapon Style, Weapn Focus Peasant and Vulnerable Attack. The animal form is not so important. If you want fast hits (great with Avenging Storm) take cat form. If you want cool looks take stag. The stag carnage is very potent but it's only 1/rest. You basically cast Returning Storm, Relentless Storm, Avenging Storm and Outlander's Frenzy and then shift. Your hits will deal massive damage and your foes will be stunned all the time because of the storms (your melee hits will also stun) - more than a rogue's with Deathblows* - and you will be superfast. However - it takes a lot of times to cast all that spells. In my experience half of the fights are over before you are finished with all the casting. - and it's a lot of micromanagement. But without doubt ist's one of the best melee dps builds. Hits/crits up to 160 damage and more with nearly no recovery and 10 DR bypass. Most Ogres die within two hits. It doesn't last very long - but you can always retreat and cast. What I like better it this approach (one of my favorite builds because it's so simple and effective): Batsh!t Crazy No babysitting, very tanky (totally front line approved), very effective and also works like a charm with Hiravias. It's basically a tank that also dishes out lots of CC and damage. I love it when superdefensive builds can also deal good damage and/or CC. It makes fights a bit longer but at the same time makes the game supereasy and fluent. )* no discussions please - I had that with nemesis on these forums. I was in favour for the rogue. My arguments were utterly destroyed when I playtestet his build suggestions.

ROFL - for some reason I read "doesn't work". Sorry for the confusion! Thanks again for the testing!

I have to admit I never use it because it needs lots of micro.

Confuse scrolls is a good advice. It's a pity you can't use scrolls out of combat though. Does Ring of Changing Heart still work out of combat as opener? Or Munacra Arret? Or Spirit Spiral? You could also try if Enigma's Charm works for you. Can't remember if Andragans are immune to charm/dominate - but since they can be confused I guess not. A confuse/charm/dominate out of stealth or invisibility makes most encounters much easier.

Another possibility: Gauntlets of Swift Action. Will add another 1.15 multiplier so that you can wear plate and only have one speed enchanted weapon. The speed weapons that work with dual wielding and are in the same Weapon Focus group are: Weapon Focus Noble: Spelltongue, Sword of Daenysis, March Steel Dagger Weapon Focus Peasant: Danulya (spear), Reghar Konneck (hatchet) You can combine any one handed speed weapon with the (also speedy) Unlabored Blade because it's universal. And you can duplicate any non soulbound speed weapon with the Helwax Mold. Dual Strike Hard would look nice. My choice for this fragile yet sturdy fighter would be Sword of Daenysis or Spelltongue + Unlabored Blade I guess. Firebug should proc pretty often with that high attack speed. You should test if Triggered Immunity gets prolongued by Spelltongue.

Yeah - the quest is very short and boring.

No, unfortunately not. I once got Hiro's Mantle... 4 times in one playthrough. And Gwath Somethingeck - that golden superb medium shield. I think 3 times.

I really like Druids at the moment. Especially if you leave all the shapeshifting aside and build them as (light) tanks. They have good base deflection and don't have any important class talents (if you don't want to use spiritshift). So you can take all the defensive talents without looking back. Their defenses will reach very high numbers and they become very tanky while still being able to cast fast. My normal encounter goes like: Nature's Mark - Returning Storm - Relentless Storm - finish. And I never go down. That's the best part. And it's one of the few caster variants that works with very little micromanagement. I really hate this buffing at the beginning of every encounter that you have to do with your wizard - although it's powerful.

But doesn't the Wave also hit your team members?

Thanks again! Hmm... that's not logical. Why do the others work and this not? Maybe it has something to do with that console-magic? I always experience weird stuff when I try to add/remove talents or abilities via console.

Two Weapon Style will speed you up and Weapon Focus Peasant will boost your ACC by +6. Two Handed Style does nothing for fists. Well - maybe if you grab your left fist with your right fist and then... naa! Doesn't work! The cone of Torment's Reach is also shorter. The debuff is quite unimportant. Same with Rooting pain: the AoE will be smaller. And Swift Strikes don't last long. All in all I'd say it's not a good idea to dump INT on a monk if you don't plan to play a specialized build. You can build every class to work with dumped INT by the way. There are always abilities and spells that don't depend on INT. I even did a 3-INT-Paladin build and it was good: The Dull Runner