Boeroer

I once did a playthrough with six rogues on PotD 2.01. At first it was ok, but it started to get really tedious in Galvino's Workshop and kept on being that in the Battery and so on. The Lagufaeths where a real pain in the a then. I got stunlocked all the time and had to use a lot of summons so that all the paralyzing and stunning was focused on them before I could even try to go into melee fight. The main problem is not that you are squishy - you can build some of your rogues sturdy enough so that they form a good front line. I even had a riposte build (low DEX, maxed RES, with shield, fat armor, retaliation and maxed deflection bonus against disengagement attacks and boots of speed) who ran around the mobs in circles and it worked. But this was the only kind of good and reliable CC that I had. It worked as CC because some of the enemies would chase the rogue forever while he would run past other enemies to force diseng. attacks. The Sap ability wasn't within reach and although I had focused on weapons with prone or stun capabilities they did not prove to be a reliable source of disabling against tough buggers. You just don't have enough AoE for all the foes on PoTD - there will always be two or three that you can't control and the will annoy you big time. I did work around that with scrolls of paralysis and so on. That works quite well as you can guess because a rogues with high ACC and good INT (to buff the prone/stun durations from weapons) is great for using scrolls - but its... I don't know... just scrolls. Feels weird that you are so dependent on them. I like them as a bonus - but if a build or even a party doesn't work without them it doesn't feel right for me. Maybe taking Enigma's Charm and getting some mind-control items like Munacra Arret would have been a good idea - or still is. So I think a paladin and a cipher frontliner would definitely improve such an alpha strike party. I know it ruins the idea of a pure rogue party though. But pallies and ciphers also can do lots of damage with alpha strikes (paladin: FoD, cipher: Soul Whip + Runner's Wounding Shot if you like) and while the paladin can do things like healing, revive, buffing and be really sturdy the cipher can greatly improve the CC capability. One mind controlled foe alone that you turn at the start of the fight can make things so much easier. The mob will attack (and probably CC) him first and you can pick your targets without stress. Mental Binding is great for a alpha strike party, too. As long as they are stuck they can't swarm you. I also like to use mind wave as an alpha strike when the mobs start to move towards your party because they automatically will run in a formation that's perfect for the cone AoE. A weapon that does prone or stun on crit together with Tactical Meld (can be cast before combat for zero focus loss) and Borrowed instinct is also great. +40 ACC is like a guarantee for crits. A paladin with Zealous Charge and Boots of Speed is also a great tractor for the cipher's Ectopsychic Echo by the way. Ok, that' my mustard*. )* = my two cents, german idiom

Oooh yeah! *intonates the yellow song*

Sure... ...what's a Gutz?

Oh... I don't know exactly. I don't even know if they are better at any point - just not bad anymore. But it's true that you lack means of DR bypass and +attack speed mods in the early game. Stilettos are an exception.

Sounds fun. Maybe you will encounter some problems when facing enemies that have ranged disables and damage and are tough - like Lagufaeth and Ogre Druids. These are the meanest enemies for a group that has no fast disables. Of course you can always use a scroll of paralysis then.

If you dump it, you will be critted to death - if you raise it, you will receive not enough wounds... walking a tightrope. Most of the time It's around 10 for my monks.

That's really nice. So first Call to Slumber and then Slicken.

Good that we've cleared that up.

So I tested a melee Spellsword wizard with Spelltongue to see if he can hit fast enough to steal sufficient durations for his buffs so that they never run out during combat. Thanks to Alacrity and maxed DEX he can! If you power up all your buffs (last one should be C's Martial Power) and then start to hit very quickly (durgan refined Spelltongue and durgan refined small shield) your buffs will be prolonged until the end of the fight - as long as you don't have to run around a lot or get disabled. Maybe this was the intention of the blade in the first place. This may also work with other classes if they can stack a bit of attack speed and are able to constantly hit or crit .

Only recently I encountered this bug. I am playing a wizard at the moment and doing the Nalrend bounty. Several times I had to reload because my wizard was just stuck and couldn't do anything. When all Ogres were dead combat wouldn't stop.

I also did a monk build with Rapier and Dagger and it's damage is good. You will have higher attack speed and less damage per hit. It's right that that's a problem with high DR foes since most of the time you only apply the MIN damage that will go through the armor no matter how thick it is. You have to make good use of any DR reductions that you can get. For example the cipher has a power named Body Attunement that steals -7 DR on one target, the wizard has Expose Vulnerabilities that does -5 DR in a huge AoE and so on. These things can stack. The faster your attack rate is, the more you profit from DR bypass. It's like a flat +x bonus to each of your attacks, not %-based. So the faster the better. There ale also some of those fast weapons that have inherent -3DR bypass like all stilettos (Bleak Fang has even -6), a unique rapier (Sword of Daenysis) and maybe others, can't remember. So in order to make fast/small weapons work, you need to become as fast as possible and at the same time stack as much DR bypass as possible. Then they are superior to slow, hard hitting weapons. And there is another advantage: constantly interrupting a single target (or even AoE with a barb) is easier and better with fast hits. There's also a rapier that has a very high interrupt timer (Mosquito, 0.75 instead of 0.35 like other rapiers). A barb can use that rapier (durgan refined) with a small shield (also durgan refined) to interrupt-lock a whole bunch of enemies. Another small/fast weapon I really like is Drawn in Spring. It has the wounding enchantment which is awesome if you have high MIG and INT. I think few people realise that this enchantment is influencend by both stats. You can't guess it because the description says that it only does 25% damage over 5 secs and that's it. Crits also prolong the duration of the wounding. Like Tidefall, this weapon is great for builds with high MIG and INT like chanters, fighters, barbs, paladins and so on sometimes have. And you can put a lash on top of that so that you will cause more than +95% with weapon enchantments alone (25% wounding, 25% lash, 45% superb). I just did a test with a barb and Spelltongue + Mosquito because I wanted to test if Fighting Spirit gets prolonged by Spelltongue. I couldn't manage to get unter 50% endurance because my barb was hitting so fast with Gauntlets of Swift Action (+15%), Dual Weapon Style (20%), Spelltongues time siphon (+15%) and Frenzy (+33%) that all the Ogres where interrupted all the time and Mosquito, besides causing long interrupts, leeched lots of endurance via carnage-draining. At first I thought he doesn't do a lot of damage because there where only number like 5 to 8 popping out of the ogres' heads, but they died rather quicky because I was so lightning fast. I think it would have taken more time if I've had a two hander because then they are not interrupted so often and will knock me down. If I'm on the ground I can't attack... So as you can see I kinda like small/fast weapons.

Ach, I thank you - a very neat bug report! I'm always happy if somebody else posts bug reports. I can't tell why but I really have an aversion for posting those.

If you meant my post: Conchita Wurst

With Hunting Bows you can stunlock by the way

Thanks. Yes, the technical support section is the right place. They have some guidelines (pinned at the top) how to report an issue. Best to link a savegame of yours if it's available.

Hellooo Conchita!

p.s.: I did a quick sketch to illustrate what I meant: red dots: enemies in range of HoF initial attack red circle: HoF AoE grey dots: possible targets of carnage if carnage is centered on the enemies that get hit bei initial HoF full attacks grey circles: carnage AoE

So, I did a quick test and made a barbarian with 4 weapon sets and 8 sabres. Each set had a different elemental lash so that I could easily see which set was used when executing Heart of Fury. Turns out that only the active weapon set is used. I had burning lash on my first set, then freezing and so on. The combat log only showed hits with my burning weapons - but a lot of them. Luckily I landed 10 crits (on 5 Ogres) witth Heart of Fury. That should result in 40 hits/crits altogether with carnage, or not (best case)? 10 full attack hits * 4 times carnage = 40 hits. I didn't count the hits in the combat log, but it looked like that. This was a very lucky hit and even then it didn't reach 100 or even 160 hits. So I suppose it really is a bug that the enemy barb scored so many hits. And of course it's a bug that the wurm was counted as a target. But it'S very difficult to tell because HoF attacks all enemies in a huge area and each hit causes carnage - What I don't know is where the centre of tha carnage are is. What I mean is that if you attack the center of a group and you will hit let's say 4 enemies with the HoF AoE, it may be that the carnage area of the hits that you land at the edge of the HoF AoE stretches out beyond the initial HoF AoE. Do you unterstand what I mean? So in THeory you would carnage-hit many more enemies than the initial 4 (if there are more of them standing around these 4).

I never heard nor read about that. Attacking with the other weapon sets also? Sounds really weird. What is your source of information, Kaylon? Edit: not that I'm saying it isn't right - is just sounds so... don't know... yeah, weird. If that's intended I'm rolling an arms-bearer-island-aumaua-vengeful-defeat-dual-wielding-barb with lots of sabres. I will call him Shiva - or Doctor Octopus. Edit 2: now that I read the description again it seems that Kaylon got his information from the game itself. It says "each equipped weapon" - I never interpreted it this way, but now...

Remember that you get +20 ACC for the FoD shots. I'd say your PER is sufficient.

Every hit from Heart of Fury triggers carnage. Every additional foe lets the number of hits grow exponentially. That can stack up to great numbers - but 162 hits sounds a bit... over the top. I have to think about this and do some tests myself before I can give a clear answer. I know the ability is very powerful - that's why it's only 1/rest.

I like the "structure" of enchantments and that you can put on your own improvements to a weapon. It would have been even better if you had a smithey in the stronghold which you could upgrade and so on - but I won't complain. It would just be nice if there were more unique or special enchantments on unique weapons. They don't have to be super overpowered though - just different. We have some in the game: Stormcaller's DR reduction for example. Or the "Herald" and "Harbinger" enchantment on shields. I really like that sort of enchantments that are truly special so that you might want to build a char or even a whole party around it.

His name is "Naroc the Prophet". The bounty has the same name. I can't remember which class he was. But I always had the impression that this bounty was easier than most others.

I also like it a lot. +2 move speed makes you faster than 99% of the enemies. If you retreat they will quickly realize that they can't get you and stop chasing you. It's also great for doing things the AI likes to do: rushing squishies. The good thing is: the AI is even worse than us players when this happens. Zealous Focus is also very nice - especially in the early game. Later on 6 ACC and stuff are not superimportant anymore - but at the beginning it's really great. And that's the hardest part of the game. The correspondig talent is very weak though. Zealous Endurance is good throughout the whole game. I always wanted to build a fighter/paladin double team with Zealos Endurance and see how high you can push the crit-to-hit and hit-to-graze conversions with abilities and items. I think the devs did a great job on these three auras. If you ask three people there will be four opinions about this topic. Best thing is to use three paladins and have all three auras at the same time. Take Coordinated Attacks and Inspiring Triumph. Then use Outworn Bucker, Little Savior and Redfield for +13 defense on top of their FaC bonuses. They should be nearly unstoppable. edit: darn - now I want to do that.

Paladin is good in combination with guns and sword & board. You just have to watch out for your Weapon Focus choice. Weapon Focus gives tou more accuracy. Accuracy is an important thing in PoE's combat. Arquebus and pistol are not in the same group. That's ok if you don't want to take a Weapon Focus anyway. Since your shots with Flames of Devotion get a +20 accuracy bonus it's OK to spare a talent point and don't take a weapon focus. Dropping resolve and constitution is not advised if you want to take part in melee fights. That's only OK if you stay away from melee combat. edit: Also, if you want to play a paladin for rp reasons, I wouldn't drop resolve because it opens up a lot of special dialogue options if it's high. Only the main character's stats will be taken into account for dialogue options by the way.