Boeroer

I got it even earlier with a solo Assassin/Goldpact Knight. But it's kind of a timing puzzle and requires the (ab)use of Bounding Boots to stay clear of all the mobs. The easiest way would be to export a character from another savegame who already has the staff - and then import that character as hireling into your new game.

I mean... It's rel. high raw damage in a big AoE. No resistances, no immunities and a defense which is the one you can debuff the most (servus Club + Miasma) an usually isn't the highest one to begin with. it's certainly not OP - but now that I know that it works on your own vessels/spirits it's certainly less meh than before.

Another way is to use the Belt of Magran's Chosen with multihit-weapons so a Flame Blight appears sooner or later (the more hit rolls the sooner). This blight will be hostile so AI will immediately target it with Screaming Souls (may result in raw friendly fire!). You cannot do "vessel OR spirit" conditions with the AI but you can combine several negated AND conditions (not kith AND not pirmordial AND not wilder AND not beast) which leaves only vessels and spirits to cast Screaming Souls on. This works somehow - but I don't like that you can't automatically target an ally.

No you can't.

I was already thinking about a Wizard/Cipher because of the Will defense and Miasma oDM (and the phantom). But yeah: lots of steps to cast before you can fially use Screaming Souls. Better to let somebody else do the "summon vessel or spirit" and "casting Miasma" parts. I found out because I'm currently testing an SC Psion for my AI-improved, all-SC run and I already have an SC Chanter (and that SC Berserker with Twin Eels in my testing session who makes great use of the skeletons). Seems nice to be able to add some big raw dmg AoE to that at some point. But my original plan was to just spam mind control per AI. At some point the Psion generates focus a lot faster than I can spend it with Whisper of Treason or Puppet Master. And it's both very effective and easy to script. I guess you can't order the AI to cast Screaming Souls on a friendly vessel, can you?

The combination of Helwalker/Bellower makes sense as well. The high MIG works very well with the higher base damage due to increased power levels. Also with +10 INT you can achieve complete overlap of phrases without being a Troubadour. Dichotomous Soul cannot be used at the same time as other summons. Only exception: the skeletons from the phrase "Many Lives Pass By". They don't count towards the summoning limit. It can still be useful because if you don't have enough phrases for chanter summons you might have enough wounds for monk summons. So the summon uptime might be higher.

Afaik Blights are spirits, too. Essential Phantom could also be one. Didn't test that.

It's cool but simple. Gilded Enmity just replaces (or overlays, don't know) all the materials on the 3d models with a golden one - which is very easy to do. It doesn't matter what character model and which item models are currently visible. Else it would have been extremely complicated to implement the effect for all armor/headgear/cape/character model combinations. So - a lot of time wasn't needed.

Ah! Yes, you do!

Spells in this case: Wizards', Druids' and Priests' spells, Chanters' invoctions as well as Ciphers' focus-fed powers. Everything else you can use while shifted. You can def. use Gilded Enmity while shifted. Gilded Enmity + Spiritshift Bear gives you enormous AR with 0 recovery penalty. Great mix of offense and sturdyness. Gilded Enmity + Spiritshift Cat lacks 2 AR but lets you attack a lot faster. You can stack Eternal Devotion with Wildstrike which will give you good dmg output. Also the Spiritshift Boar of the shifter class is implemented with a little quirk which lets the raw DoT which is attached to the tusk attacks last a lot longer than with the normal (non-shifter) spiritshift and makes it very good in combination with high INT and against tough enemies.

Hello! It may be that this is already widely known but I never read about it, so here it comes: You can cast Screaming Souls on vessels only right? This limits its overall usefulness. But not if you have a chanter because you can cast it on your own skeletons. High raw damage in a big AoE - and all you need is one teeny skeleton. It won't even get harmed, that poor thing.

Ranger/Cipher with Frostseeker becomes really good as soon as you get Borrowed Instincts. There's no other class combo that gains as much accuracy - and that's great for using Frostseeker. Also: Driving Flight.

Yes, to use scrolls.

I think that depends on whether you want to kill the Megabosses or not. The rest should be possible if you don't rely on your resource pool too much (because you have no reliable way to refill it besides an empower point). But with enough arcana most things are possible.

Äh wat? Anyway - if you don't like it because of certain issues but don't like the solutions to those issues either then I guess there's nothing we can do and it's best to play something else.

One could argue that you could drop RES and deflection items entirely and invest in the other attributes and items in order to raise the non-deflection defenses more - since deflection can be brought to similar heights just by using those two items. But of course you'd have to play with a quite unbalanced defensive setup for the majority of the game. I mean the Mask is from FS and Wall of Draining also comes rather late for multiclasses. Don't think it's worth it. I was looking at it from a "look how high my defenses can go" point of view - not from a practical one.

Probably "Jäger der Jäger" which would be the literal translation. That's kind of worse, hehe. It's very difficult to translate "Hunter of Hunters" close to the original without it sounding weird in German. They should have translated it as "Jägermeister".

Blunderbusses have a modal called Powder Burns. That's a cone-shaped, secondary attack that deals low fire damage with low penetration. It's a nice addon but not really viable as alternative source of dmg once you meet pierce immune foes. Also that modal will distract you when you fire. There is a special set of blunderbusses though that deals pierce/slash damage which are called mortars. They are blunderbusses but instead of 4 projectiles they basically fire grenades that do AoE dmg. When you dual wield pistols or bbusses then both weapons will reload and shoot. If you use Full Attacks you only have to reload once but two weapon will fire still. If you use auto attacks you will reload, shoot with the main hand, then reload shoot with the offhand and so on. The way better Rogue subclass for blunderbusses + Powder Burns is Streetfighter, not Assassin. Blunderbusses are not good for Assassins for several reasons while they are the absolute best pick for Streetfighters (that is because the distraction you suffer from using the modal counts as being flanked). But generally speaking you can use dusk blunderbusses with an Assassin. The better pick would be an arquebus though.

But that's good. Why didn't you use Dance of Death/Enduring Dance and/or Mortification of the Soul for wounds then?

Sorry, I meant to write "used to NOT stack with Arcane Veil but Mirrored Images". It stacks with everything but Arcane Veil afaik. Yes, Giftbearer's Cloth is very good later on when nasty afflictions are common or Arcane Dampeners can really ruin your day.

Did you play Helwalker until Duality of Mortal Presence (INT) and Stunning Surge were available?

You mean Lord Darryn's Voulge. Vatnir maybe isn't an example of extraordinary valor, but his story will make you understand why he is who he is. Usually players will pity him instead of holding a grudge after they had a deeper conversation. Anyway - his subclass is mechanically more interesting because it has plenty of non-fire spells. Usually Priests' damaging spells are themed around fire (except maybe Breath who has some alternatives as well). Thematically I find it interesting because .

If you are looking for raised defenses and damage reduction alike then have a look at Cadhu Scalth. High AR with higher attack speed at the same time can be achieved with the Reckless Brigandine. High defenses and decent AR with Magnera's Chain. Another way to boost non-deflection defenses a lot would be Giftbearer's Cloth with maxed History (that collides with Cadhu Scalth though). I would also recommend Gauntlets of Greater Reliability. Nobody else seems to recommend those bit I think they are extremely good when soloing - especially against the really tough enemies. They stack (not additively though) with food and weapons which have the same effect. Last Word's enchantment collides a bit with the -8 ACC of large shields, but I think it's ok with 19 base PER. Another good weapon for tanking is Bardatto's Luxury I think. Dagger modal stacks with Refreshing Defense (and the Paladin passives of course). Also Marux Amanth is bindable to a Paladin. It can be very useful against bosses and is a good slashing weapon overall. Gladiator's Blade is nice if you are looking to raise your defenses further and still deal okay damage (it has an enchantment that raises deflection when used with a shield but also +10% damage and - more importantly - +1 PEN). I don't have much in-game experience with a Crusader though (except maybe with Great Swords on which I did some hours of testing to show it can deal good dmg).

If you use the Mask of the Weyc and the Cape of Magnificent Escape and combine it with Wall of Draining you could add +100 (or +80, depends) to your deflection (Mask used to not stack with Arcane Veil but Mirrored Images) iirc. For the Cape-Escape-bonus of +50 (which used to stack with everything but the original Escape) you need to become bloodied first - but no poblem for a Bloodmage I guess. I did that late game with my Steel Garrote/Bloodmage with WotEP/Offensive Parry because I lacked a shield obviously.

I don't know if this was patched out after my last post about this or if I only had a rare glitch. Anyway: I am about to finish a playthrough where I made excessive use of Essence Interrupter and had 0 problems anymore.