brindle88
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Posts posted by brindle88
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The only real problem with the pet now is that unless its an antelope, its defenses are fairly low when it comes to eating spells or ailments. The Wolf is pretty badass, but if he gets dominated he can be more dangerous than even the enemies you're fighting!
Melee Rogues still do more damage but compared to a Ranger they require a lot more micromanagement, though it is very rewarding seeing a Rogue kickass so I wouldn't dismiss them for that. Ranged Rogues though are completely outclassed since Rangers have better ranged damage overall and also even provide more utility thanks to the pet. Hell, Ranged Rogues even pale to a Cipher, who doesn't deal as much damage as the Rogue (Against a single target anyway), but has a wide assortment of powers to help support their group.
Also, that post said Rangers had the highest sustained damage not spike damage. Which is very true since a Rangers damage is going to consistently the same throughout an entire fight, as they don't need to readjust based on certain situations like other classes, they just stand back and go pew pew! The Rogue's DPS deviates frequently due to movement and positioning requirements.
After all my play throughs on POTD I have only really found three game breaking talents/ synergies (in order)
- the ciphers amplified wave: how the fk this has not been nerfed I have no idea. You press a button and everyone falls to the ground. If you had two ciphers in your team you could do this twice for the ones that failed there saves. It really is a god like power. If you look at all the spells in bg2 there is nothing as powerful as this. Btw please don't nerf this obsidian.
- a melee rogue, dual wield pergatory and resolution, gambions padded armour (that gives haste), rot finger gloves (to straight away put afflictions on the entire mob so sneak attack and DEATHBLOWS are activated), select talents that increase accuracy as much as possible, max perception, select talents that will maximise sneak attacks and deathblows and crits. If you build a rogue like this you WILL break the game. I've tried it , I've done it it is impossible for anyone to argue this.
- the Druids spell relentless storm
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I will give you my account number then.
What do you think the most over powered build in the game I so wise one?
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Sacred Immolation alone puts a paladin in front of every fighter DPS build. At least in PotD where you have plenty of mobs. The good thing about a DPS paladin are the on-kill-effects that can be great. A fighter doesn't have this. Aoe heals and deflection buffa on kill are great if you combine this with Sacred Immolation and FoD. A fighter can be built to be a very good dps guy also, against single targets he's doing more damage, and with the durgan refined Sanguine Plate with Pilferer's Grip and Armored Grace he will have max armor without recovery penalty which is supercool. But he's not contributing so much to the party like the pally does. Whatever - the only problem here is that brindle loves his clichee fighters and rogues and will argue till doomsday to convince you that DPS pallies and tanky rogues are inferior. All I can say is that after countless of PotD playthroughs I still discover nice and powerful builds and party compositions that are not straightforward.
I don't love my cliché fighter, I found fighters quite boring but I reckon they do more dps then a paladin. And I still think they do.
I do dearly love my dps rogue and I would bet my life savings It can build the strongest build in the game.
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With a base 10 intellect the aura covers 4 meters which is plenty big enough to cover all the melee on the team. With your "minimum 16 intellect" you'd have 5.44 meters. Its bigger but I have 6 stat points that I placed in Might to have +18% damage and heals.
Tanky Rogues are great. maybe your squishy Rogue can do more damage but when you get KO'd your not doing much. A tanky Rogue will out damage a DPS Fighter AND have better defenses.
Back to DPS Paladins -
1.) Base intellect (10) gets you a 4 meter aura that is enough to cover your entire melee frontline
2.) Faith and Conviction gets you huge bonuses to your defense and deflection. This lets you shrug off many enemy CC attacks and lets you skip a shield and use big two handers without sacrificing your deflection.
3.) A high Might score will increase all your heals, weapon damage and Sacred Immolation. So you can still serve the group with big LoH heals.
4.) Doing bigger damage with weapons will discourage enemies from dis-engaging you, thus letting you 'tank' the enemy better.
5.) Flame of Devotion alpha strike with a high might and an arquebus does a lot of damage with a huge accuracy.
6.) Sacred Immolation is a great ability that lasts pretty much the whole battle, is centered on you and follows you around, does good damage to all enemies around you and heals your team. Having a high Might score will greatly enhance this, as will Scion of Flames. It even keeps working when you are paralyzed. Once you get this the Paladin is a powerhouse.
7.) A Paladin that does damage is fun. Who wants a non-offensive aura bot that is effective only because the AI is not smart enough to ignore?
8.) Any Paladin brings more to the team than any Fighter possibly can.
ok ill give it a try my next play through, I hope your right,
I wont be playing again until WMP2 though
Keep in mind I never said paladins where crap, I said I think they where fun to play. It is also clear that intelligence buffs nearly all the paladins abilities. It is also clear the dispel magic the paladin uses is terrible as it does not remove the charm/ stun afflictions (bizarrely)
Aslo sacred immolation is not available until nearly the end of the game.
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With a 10 intellect my aura covers the entire frontline melee which is most of my team, which is all I need. Definitely not worthless. The heals are all affected by Might as well as intellect so the duration is lower but they are stronger.
I did not include any damage analysis from FoD since it is only for two attacks, it is nice for those two attacks though.
Vulnerable attack does more damage per second once the enemy DR is above five, test it out yourself. It is a set and forget ability.
What talents are you taking that increase your damage beyond the ones I used for the Fighter? What is your Fighter build?
How well does your low con, low deflection, low defenses work out for you on PotD?
Prior to Sacred immolation a Fighter will out damage a Paladin, while a Paladin will have much higher defenses and deflection. Also the benefit to a team is much greater with a Paladin.
If all you want is a single target damager that has some survivability you'd be better with a tanky Rogue rather than an offensive Fighter.
Tanky Rogue
Might 13
Con 10
Dex 18
Per 15
Int 4 - minimum with food and a +2 item to keep a target permanently prone with We toki
Res 18
Talent weapon and shield, savage attack, deep wounds, reckless assault, the two hit>crits, Evasion, vulnerable attack, superior deflection, lesser reckless penalty, deathblows
Damage = +9% might, +20% savage, +20% reckless = +49% w/o sneak, +99% w/sneak, +149% w/deathblows all with +20% hit>crit
defenses with large shield - +3 Fortitude, + 35 Reflex (+13 + 6 + 16), +2 Will, + 32 deflection (+8 -8 +6 + 5 +5 +16)
The tanky Rogue can handle all the mechanics and is durable enough to flank to set up its own sneak attacks w/o needing to babysit. With a little help from the team it can frequently get deathblows.
And rogues are a completely different issue, again you would never build a tanky rogue, you would be wasting the rogues strong points just like you have wasted the paladins strong points by trying to build a dps paladin that it is inferior to both rogues and fighters
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With a 10 intellect my aura covers the entire frontline melee which is most of my team, which is all I need. Definitely not worthless. The heals are all affected by Might as well as intellect so the duration is lower but they are stronger.
I did not include any damage analysis from FoD since it is only for two attacks, it is nice for those two attacks though.
Vulnerable attack does more damage per second once the enemy DR is above five, test it out yourself. It is a set and forget ability.
What talents are you taking that increase your damage beyond the ones I used for the Fighter? What is your Fighter build?
How well does your low con, low deflection, low defenses work out for you on PotD?
Prior to Sacred immolation a Fighter will out damage a Paladin, while a Paladin will have much higher defenses and deflection. Also the benefit to a team is much greater with a Paladin.
If all you want is a single target damager that has some survivability you'd be better with a tanky Rogue rather than an offensive Fighter.
Tanky Rogue
Might 13
Con 10
Dex 18
Per 15
Int 4 - minimum with food and a +2 item to keep a target permanently prone with We toki
Res 18
Talent weapon and shield, savage attack, deep wounds, reckless assault, the two hit>crits, Evasion, vulnerable attack, superior deflection, lesser reckless penalty, deathblows
Damage = +9% might, +20% savage, +20% reckless = +49% w/o sneak, +99% w/sneak, +149% w/deathblows all with +20% hit>crit
defenses with large shield - +3 Fortitude, + 35 Reflex (+13 + 6 + 16), +2 Will, + 32 deflection (+8 -8 +6 + 5 +5 +16)
The tanky Rogue can handle all the mechanics and is durable enough to flank to set up its own sneak attacks w/o needing to babysit. With a little help from the team it can frequently get deathblows.
I didn't seem to have any issues with survivability on any classes on path of the dammed. My rules where that I used 2 tanks and maxed there resolve and the never lowered constitution below 8 for ANY class including my tanks, casters, rogues ect. I dumped resolve for spell casters and rangers.
My tanks never had shields, I used 2 fighters one specialised in greatsword, the other estoc. I did this to punch through damage reduction. All stats where maxed to increase dps with the fighters (after pumping resolve) and all talents selected upon level up where aimed to increase dps. I tried doing this with paladins but it is not correct to say they can get anywhere near the dps of a fighter. I also strongly disagree that you can have a low intelligence for a paladin to work properly.
Your auro would Definatley not cover your entire melee party with 10 intelligence, you can increase it by up to 50% by increasing int? you would have to have both your tanks right next to each other for this to work! that is bad positioning! you would get flanked and your casters will be killed.
At the end of the day the game is not really that challenging even on POTD. If you have a cipher and once you get amplified wave you basically beat the game as soon as you get it anyway.
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Why must a Paladin have high Resolve? They can easily do without if you're building for DPS instead of defense.
There are 3 answers to this question
1. Why on earth would you build a paladin with low resolve? He is front line, he is melee, he is your tank. You will just be wasting ability points on other attributes that will not enhance the paladins strengths. You will build a weak paladin (especially on POTD)
2. A dps fighter will wipe the floor with a paladin, they can dump int and they have access to abilities to choose from at level up greatly increase dps. Alll melee classes will out dps a paladin. If you wanted a dps tank build a fighter
3. So the paladins strengths are tanking and buffs, you should build to enhance these qualities.
Fighters are pretty much trash, bad abilities and do nothing to help the team.
Your DPS fighter will probably have something like this:
Might 18
Con 10
Dex 15
Per 15
Int 3
Res 17 - to balance out the low will from dumped intellect
Talents - Weapon spec, focus, mastery, confident aim, vigorous defense, armored grace, sundering blow, two handed style, savage attack, and vulnerable attack.
Damage will be +24% Might, +15% spec, +10% mastery, +20% savage attack +13.5% Confident aim (+20 minimum, plus the graze to hit roughly equal to 13.5%), +15% two handed style = +97.5% with +15 -20 +16 = +11% speed increase
Defenses will be +8 Fortitude, +10 Reflex, and +0 Will, +7 deflection. All increased by +20 for like 10 seconds when Vigorous defense is activated.
A Paladin (using my PotD Kind Wayfarer)
Might 18
Con 10
Dex 10
Per 15
Int 10
Res 15
Talents - weapon focus, savage attack, vulnerable attack, flames of devotion, Lay on Hands, accuracy aura, sacred immolation, liberating exhortation, reinforcing exhortation, strange mercies, deep faith, scion of flames, two handed style.
Damage will be +24% might, +15% two handed style, +20% savage attack = +59% damage at -20% speed plus the AoE burn from Sacred Immolation
defenses will be +35 Fortitude (+8 +27), +37 Reflex (+10 +27), +32 Will (+5 +27), +18 (+5 +13) deflection
team benefits of accuracy aura, lay on hands, liberating and reinforcing exhortations and AoE heal from Sacred Immolation
The Fighter swings 31% faster and 38.5% harder against one target. Unit damage would be 1.11*1.97 = 2.19
Paladin would be 0.8*1.59 = 1.272 weapon + 1.44 (scion of flames and Might) Sacred Immolation for 2.71. Each additional target would further the gap.
With Sacred Immolation (base damage same as two handed weapon) the Paladin will out damage against just one enemy, and be much more defensive and help the team.
No reason to even bother comparing a Monk to a Fighter, they are not even in the same league. If there were PvP Monks would be banned. A single summoned Twin could give a Fighter a hard fight, two would woop his ass, two plus the Monk himself could hold the Fighter down and sodomize him
That's quite an analysis.
I would not build a fighter like that, I would not pick vigorous defence, sundering blow or vulnerable attack ( why the hell would you pick this when you already will punch through damage reduction). So that leaves a big heap of other talents available to increase dps and deflection.Perception should Be maxed con should be lowered.
On your paladin:
- you have low intelligence, you have nerfed all your abilities. Intelligence needs to be minimum of 16. You will need to take these points from might, therefore you may as well not even put any points into might as an extra 2 will not be relevant.
- your accuracy aura will be so small it will only affect your paladin, so it's not really an aura.
- out of all your talent selections you have picked for the paladin, you have selected 5 that a fighter can pick anyway.
- the exhortations are useless, they do not work on charm, confused stunned.
- that flaming sword talent is only for use twice.
- sacred immolation is only available at the very end of the game
If the exhortations worked properly eg they really did act as a dispel magic and remove charm and paralysed related affects paladins would actually work. They care currently a second rate fighter/ priest.
But still fun to play like is said, but Definately not a power build
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Why must a Paladin have high Resolve? They can easily do without if you're building for DPS instead of defense.
There are 3 answers to this question
1. Why on earth would you build a paladin with low resolve? He is front line, he is melee, he is your tank. You will just be wasting ability points on other attributes that will not enhance the paladins strengths. You will build a weak paladin (especially on POTD)
2. A dps fighter will wipe the floor with a paladin, they can dump int and they have access to abilities to choose from at level up greatly increase dps. Alll melee classes will out dps a paladin. If you wanted a dps tank build a fighter
3. So the paladins strengths are tanking and buffs, you should build to enhance these qualities.
Fighters are pretty much trash, bad abilities and do nothing to help the team.
Your DPS fighter will probably have something like this:
Might 18
Con 10
Dex 15
Per 15
Int 3
Res 17 - to balance out the low will from dumped intellect
Talents - Weapon spec, focus, mastery, confident aim, vigorous defense, armored grace, sundering blow, two handed style, savage attack, and vulnerable attack.
Damage will be +24% Might, +15% spec, +10% mastery, +20% savage attack +13.5% Confident aim (+20 minimum, plus the graze to hit roughly equal to 13.5%), +15% two handed style = +97.5% with +15 -20 +16 = +11% speed increase
Defenses will be +8 Fortitude, +10 Reflex, and +0 Will, +7 deflection. All increased by +20 for like 10 seconds when Vigorous defense is activated.
A Paladin (using my PotD Kind Wayfarer)
Might 18
Con 10
Dex 10
Per 15
Int 10
Res 15
Talents - weapon focus, savage attack, vulnerable attack, flames of devotion, Lay on Hands, accuracy aura, sacred immolation, liberating exhortation, reinforcing exhortation, strange mercies, deep faith, scion of flames, two handed style.
Damage will be +24% might, +15% two handed style, +20% savage attack = +59% damage at -20% speed plus the AoE burn from Sacred Immolation
defenses will be +35 Fortitude (+8 +27), +37 Reflex (+10 +27), +32 Will (+5 +27), +18 (+5 +13) deflection
team benefits of accuracy aura, lay on hands, liberating and reinforcing exhortations and AoE heal from Sacred Immolation
The Fighter swings 31% faster and 38.5% harder against one target. Unit damage would be 1.11*1.97 = 2.19
Paladin would be 0.8*1.59 = 1.272 weapon + 1.44 (scion of flames and Might) Sacred Immolation for 2.71. Each additional target would further the gap.
With Sacred Immolation (base damage same as two handed weapon) the Paladin will out damage against just one enemy, and be much more defensive and help the team.
No reason to even bother comparing a Monk to a Fighter, they are not even in the same league. If there were PvP Monks would be banned. A single summoned Twin could give a Fighter a hard fight, two would woop his ass, two plus the Monk himself could hold the Fighter down and sodomize him
That's quite an analysis.
I would not build a fighter like that, I would not pick vigorous defence, sundering blow or vulnerable attack ( why the hell would you pick this when you already will punch through damage reduction). So that leaves a big heap of other talents available to increase dps and deflection.Perception should Be maxed con should be lowered.
On your paladin:
- you have low intelligence, you have nerfed all your abilities. Intelligence needs to be minimum of 16. You will need to take these points from might, therefore you may as well not even put any points into might as an extra 2 will not be relevant.
- your accuracy aura will be so small it will only affect your paladin, so it's not really an aura.
- out of all your talent selections you have picked for the paladin, you have selected 5 that a fighter can pick anyway.
- the exhortations are useless, they do not work on charm, confused stunned.
- that flaming sword talent is only for use twice.
- sacred immolation is only available at the very end of the game
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Why must a Paladin have high Resolve? They can easily do without if you're building for DPS instead of defense.
There are 3 answers to this question
1. Why on earth would you build a paladin with low resolve? He is front line, he is melee, he is your tank. You will just be wasting ability points on other attributes that will not enhance the paladins strengths. You will build a weak paladin (especially on POTD)
2. A dps fighter will wipe the floor with a paladin, they can dump int and they have access to abilities to choose from at level up greatly increase dps. Alll melee classes will out dps a paladin. If you wanted a dps tank build a fighter
3. So the paladins strengths are tanking and buffs, you should build to enhance these qualities.
Faith and conviction defeats the need for max resolve allowing dps stats. Unless you're building a pure tank there is no need.
Sworn enemy (20% damage and 15 acc) negates the advantage of specialization and mastery. Sure it's only 3 uses and single target but that's enough for the important fights each rest. Critical focus and confident aim probably cancel each other out. Zealous auras add something as well.
Throw in the other abilities and it's just flavor. For me, exhortations and lay on hands are very specific tactical skills which add a lot of utility to the Paladin. Fighter skills just arent as interesting to me.
Yes but the opportunity cost of selecting all these talents on a paladin that enhances deflection and dps is the cost of not being able to select the talents that they where built for. Paladins have a huge range of buffs, debufffs to choose from and foregoing them to attempt to create a second rate fighter is not effective.
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If we make a sequel, we will likely be hitting higher levels with commensurately more powerful items. PoE was targeting a power growth curve that's in between the original BG (capped out before L10) and IWD (about L15). Holy Avengers and Vorpal Swords are among the best of the best weapons and seem like they're more appropriate for the upper teens (which BG2 goes in to). That's why Pale Justice (from IWD) isn't really as powerful as a HA.
I disagree with your assessment of the soulbound weapons. I think the Greenstone Staff and Grey Sleeper could be better, but I think Nightshroud, St. Ydwen's Redeemer, and Stormcaller (especially) are all pretty strong.
The Ability and Talent system would likely be revised in a sequel. I know there are a bunch of Talents that aren't appealing. I've tried to tune Abilities and Talents up in circumstances where people give specific criticism. E.g. many of the paladin Abilities and ranger Talents got tuned way up in the last patch. Fighter abilities are being tuned up in 2.03 (now in beta).
The approach to balance will be similar. We do continue to improve enemy AI and abilities in new expansion areas (e.g. Crägholdt) and will continue to improve base game AI in future patches.
Playing pillars for me was the equivalent of not being able to put a good book down, reading it from cover to cover. By far the best game I have played since bg2.
You guys made something great and you have the opportunity to make something legendary with pillars 2 (if you make it haha).
Bg2 had that awe inspiring startling originality with the right mix of a lot off features. I'm sure pillars 2 will be better.
If I could throw in my 2 cents worth I would just say: balancing in a way that takes the fun out of combat eg creating mediocre talents and low powered magic items is not the only way to do it. You can create more challenging circumstances while still giving the players the feeling of raw power and fulfilment, which is what the original D&D was all about remember? Gaining levels and becoming master of the universe.
Having said that congrats on the game and well done. I have just downloaded sword coast legends it is not even in the same league as pillars of eternity, pillars is on another level, a far better game.
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Why must a Paladin have high Resolve? They can easily do without if you're building for DPS instead of defense.
There are 3 answers to this question
1. Why on earth would you build a paladin with low resolve? He is front line, he is melee, he is your tank. You will just be wasting ability points on other attributes that will not enhance the paladins strengths. You will build a weak paladin (especially on POTD)
2. A dps fighter will wipe the floor with a paladin, they can dump int and they have access to abilities to choose from at level up greatly increase dps. Alll melee classes will out dps a paladin. If you wanted a dps tank build a fighter
3. So the paladins strengths are tanking and buffs, you should build to enhance these qualities.
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How can a ranger match the dps of a cipher or rogue?Most dps is the ranger.
If you are high level, I suggest using paladin and chanter as tanks. Fighter, monk and barbarian are tankier but they lack the versatility of paladin and chanter.
In my opinion, a good party should have 2 front line tankers, 2 second line casters equipped with hatchet and shield (wizard sucks so use a priest and a druid here) 2 3rd line damage dealers with 3 con and 3 res ( 2 ciphers would be good. lots of cc and huge damage output)
I should have been more specific. I was basing it from the limited class list. If we're talking about all classes, then Highest sustained DPS is the ranger, because of the passive bonuses on the pet and other stuff. Of course if you lose the pet, and don't have stun locks on the ranger weapons, well, it isn't that high of a dps output.
Ciphers have two spells, echo and antipathetic that have the highest Damage Per Second of any class, other than maybe some barbarian aoes or Fire aoe healing powers from the paladin. But those two spells are single cast abilities and may only hit like 1 to a few more people, if your position is good. So ciphers are good spike dps, but sustainable is left up to their weapon auto attack usually.
The Ranger's dps and cc only gets better at higher levels. But the cipher and rogues have more front loaded dps. You see them at earlier levels and they can also dish them out earlier in a fight.
The other bonus for ranger dps is that because they can hit out so far, they can afford to wear zero armor. Which helps their recovery, as they have no recovery time, other than base duration on weapon rof. This isn't noticeable in short fights, which is why I say ranger sustained dps is higher.
A rogue melee has to position themselves and a rogue ranged type is still pretty close to the action. So a ranged rogue wouldn't work the same way because some of their talents really really need the melee dual weapon hits to dish out the pain. There will also be times when the enemy doesn't qualify for a sneak attack, although that is mitigated by critical build rogues. For the ranger, it can keep a target stun locked all the time with stun hit talent at high level.
So to directly address your question, a ranger can equal a cipher and a rogue's dps when the ranger applies that dps equally, over a sustained period of time, to all enemies on screen. There's no huge jagged waves going up or down in the dps chart due to rogue or cipher abilities. There's usually little to zero dps lost from moving around. Being a ranged user, the ranger can also focus fire to make the best use of dps against weakened targets. So if anyone is stunned or cced, they can get hit by the ranger for more damage, whereas other people may reach that target only when the cc wears off. There's also driving flight + twinned arrows, but I'm more thinking of builds lower level than that.
For the priest, I only cast iconic or repulsing see if the situation needed it. But when I did, they changed the field tactically, so it was very noticeable.
A ranger Definately not is capable of doing more dps then a rogue. This is a ridiculous comment and complete nonsense.
A rogue vs a ranger will-
- activated invisible untill it gets up close to it, therefore the ranger won't even be able to see it let alone hit it,
- blinding strike, the ranger is blind, sneak attack bonus, plus high chance of crit
- crippling strike, DEATHBLOWS activated, high chance of crit
Ranger dead
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They need to be moderately high to mostly avoid being critically hit (70+), very high to be grazed more than hit (90+), and extremely high to be missed more often than grazed (120+?).
Oh, and you'll need to add 20-30 points onto each of those if you happen to be fighting a dragon...
On POTD you basically need to be a dragon to avoid being hit by trash mobs (130 in most saves) or disable enemies before they can do anything to you by charming, knocking them down or stunning them (this is reliable on all difficulties).
Versus dragons in POTD you need to use every resting bonus, brothel bonus, food and potion buff you can get... and I suppose it's not a bad idea to do this in Hard mode if you're having problems.
Dragon Breath attacks Reflex, Wing Slam attacks Fortitude.
I have wiped the floor with all the dragons on path of the dammed without any resting bonuses, food bonuses, potions or scrolls or by using any cheese tactics. I found them incredibly easy to kill. I just depends on how much you understand your capabilities and the enemies AI.
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The problem with a dps paladin is that you generally can't min max your stats effectively enough to be able to punch through the damage reduction of enemies (which is about 12 on average) because for a paladin to work you need high intelligence and high resolve.
Due to the this, if you are using a 1 handed weapon with a Sheild with low, might, dex, perc you will probably hit your opponents quite slowly and inaccurately for very low damage, probably about around 15 damage every hit.............a complete waste of time.
So if you want to punch through the damage reduction you will have to use the 2 handed weapons, and even this will not be very effective as you will still have the low stats as described above.
Now compare this to a fighter with a two handed weapon with maxed, might, dex, perception and armoured grace.
There is no such thing as a dps paladin, but having said that I have really enjoyed playing them due to the versatility with there strong points ( which does not include doing damage).
They genuinely are quite an interesting and fun class to play.
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Now,
All of us forgotten realms and baldurs gate veterans got a taste of the RAW POWER that spell triggers and contingencies gave to Mages.
These abilities are a tremendous amount of fun and when they worked you actually got an adrenaline hit from sitting at your computer screen.
What are people's thoughts of obsidian intruding these powers for Mages?
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Wizards have the best selection and overall repertoire of spells. Concaulhaults hammer (or whatever it's called)l petrify, the stunning frost fireball spell, slicked, chill fog, haste, blights, fireball ( very fast cast speed), ........lots os stun, dominate, charm spells ...............
The cipher has the most powerful spell in the game: amplified wave. The ciphers ectosychic echo, the chain reduce attack speed and the chain confusion are also extremely powerful
The druid has the second most powerful spell in the game: relentless storm. The other powerful spell the druid has is the petrify claw spell. The rest of the Druids spells are quite balanced.
Priests I feel are not necessary and have no over powered spells compared to the above casters
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I have finished the game twice, on hard and on path of the dammed.
This is by far the best game i have played since baldurs gate 2.
In saying that obsidian have created something great but they had the opportunity to create something legendary and they slightly missed that mark.
Areas that need work are:
- better story line, the whole soul BS was a bit cheesy
- more exiting talents to choose from at level up
- more and more powerful magic items to gain
- enchanting should be eradicated to give magic items a more " unique" and special effect
- the stronghold should be a bastion of power, you should be The Lord of your lands. It is effectively a useless money sinking pit. There should be adventures tied to it other effects.
- there needs to be more boss type battles
- and most importantly you should be able to become the master of the universe, just like we did in bg2
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Off course they are.
Sword coast legends was a,disgrace
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Advantage of the barb: normal aoe damage and relatively weak aoe cc plus being more sturdy. A barb gains great benefits from shod-in-faith boots because he seldomly runs out of health - while a rogue will go down all the time because he will run out of health. Witout health all healing is of no use. Shod-in-faith work best with low deflection barbs (and monks).
Advantage of the rogue: very high single damage and relatively weak single CC.
As I said: 6 rogues are a pain in the ass. They are great damage dealers and finishers when a single enemy is cc'd and that's what they are good at while the barb is for attacking groups of enemies. Both are great but you can't say one is generally Vetter. It depends how you play the game.
Ok let's break it down barb vs rogue, both with shod boots and remember that a rogue can min max more then a barb so con is not a dump stat for my rogue so my rogues are quite sturdy, I leave con at 8.
My rogue has pergatory, resolution, dual weild, merciless hand, dungeon delver, and another item that adds another 10% crit. I have maximised perception and I have selected all the talents that involve maximising crits, sneak attacks, DEATHBLOWS,
Attack sequence:
- blinding strike (your are blind) + % sneak attack damage, high chance of crit possibly up to another 200% damage
- crippling strike, you are now blind, crippled and DEATHBLOWS are activated, AND another high chance of crit with another 200% plus damage.
- if you are not dead by now I will activate invisibility, drink a potion of major endurance and repeat the above process.
Keep in mind you will be getting critter about 30-40% of the time. With a barb critting about 10- 15% of the time.
There is no comparison here
I would actually be far more concerned about my above mentioned rogue vs a fighter with a two handed weapon, high deflection, blunting belt, all the two handed weapon specialisations that increase damage and accuracy that only the fighters have access to, armoured grace and a highly enchanted plate armour.
I think in this situation, it would come down to luck who would win, in this scenario I would probably start off with the two spell striking stilettos, jolting touch and the plague one then once they have activated I would switch to sabres. Doing this I think the rogue would win.
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Advantage of the barb: normal aoe damage and relatively weak aoe cc plus being more sturdy. A barb gains great benefits from shod-in-faith boots because he seldomly runs out of health - while a rogue will go down all the time because he will run out of health. Witout health all healing is of no use. Shod-in-faith work best with low deflection barbs (and monks).
Advantage of the rogue: very high single damage and relatively weak single CC.
As I said: 6 rogues are a pain in the ass. They are great damage dealers and finishers when a single enemy is cc'd and that's what they are good at while the barb is for attacking groups of enemies. Both are great but you can't say one is generally Vetter. It depends how you play the game.
Ok let's break it down barb vs rogue, both with shod boots and remember that a rogue can min max more then a barb so con is not a dump stat for my rogue so my rogues are quite sturdy, I leave con at 8.
My rogue has pergatory, resolution, dual weild, merciless hand, dungeon delver, and another item that adds another 10% crit. I have maximised perception and I have selected all the talents that involve maximising crits, sneak attacks, DEATHBLOWS,
Attack sequence:
- blinding strike (your are blind) + % sneak attack damage, high chance of crit possibly up to another 200% damage
- crippling strike, you are now blind, crippled and DEATHBLOWS are activated, AND another high chance of crit with another 200% plus damage.
- if you are not dead by now I will activate invisibility, drink a potion of major endurance and repeat the above process.
Keep in mind you will be getting critter about 30-40% of the time. With a barb critting about 10- 15% of the time.
There is no comparison here
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This thread has resulted in an amazing amount of interest and attention in a short amount of time. Hundreds of replies, thousands of views, lots of meaningful discussion
I would love to see a comment from an obsidian producer (perhaps sawyer) in regards to his thoughts on this topic.
I am sending a note to a mod to request that sawyer makes a comment on his thoughts on the main issues discussed in this thread. I would love for sawyer to perhaps suggest his thoughts on:
- will we be getting more powerful magic items in pillars of eternity 2
- will be be getting more exciting talents to choose from
- will the balancing issue be approached differently, eg perhaps balancing in a. Way that doses not make combat more boring
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Dual-wield durgan-enhanced weapons, wear durgan-reinforced hide armor, start with 18 dex + 3 from item + 3 from resting bonus in Caed Nua + 2 from Rauatai Sweet Pie, and sip a potion of Deleterious Alacrity of Motion. Voilà - no recovery. (of course also take the Two Weapon Fighting talent.)
This can be done by rogues and fighters as well obviously so it's not exclusive to barbarians and there is is still a recovery time you have just reduced it.
And if you added the fighters ability armoured grace to this which is getting buffed to 20% in the next patch, you would elevate this to a whole new level.
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Dual-wield durgan-enhanced weapons, wear durgan-reinforced hide armor, start with 18 dex + 3 from item + 3 from resting bonus in Caed Nua + 2 from Rauatai Sweet Pie, and sip a potion of Deleterious Alacrity of Motion. Voilà - no recovery. (of course also take the Two Weapon Fighting talent.)
This can be done by rogues and fighters as well obviously so it's not exclusive to barbarians and there is is still a recovery time you have just reduced it.
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^ Chanters have the issue of building up chants really slow. Other than that, they're not a class I'm particularly keen on, but that boils down to personal taste.
Just tried to build a Barbarian—there's a pretty nice synergy between Threatening Presence, Brute Force, and Apprentice's Sneak Attack. Barbaric Blow is pretty neat and of course Dragon Leap is cool. Other than that, I can get him to attack with no recovery time while dual-wielding battle axes with Vulnerable Attack. That's A LOT of DPS, especially if we factor in (accurate) Carnage and the ability to stun-lock enemies with We Toki. Deflection and Will are low but there's a Priest for that
plus Edge of Reason regenerates Endurance so ... yeah, I wouldn't say Barbarians are weak.How do you get your barbarian to attack with no recovery time? Not possible
DPS Paladin
in Pillars of Eternity: Characters Builds, Strategies & the Unity Engine (Spoiler Warning!)
Posted
I can't believe these other posters where arguing with me that a paladin will deal more dps then a fighter. It was like having an argument with someone that they where trying to convince me the sky is pink not blue.