MasterCipher

Boeroer, your wand idea is actually pretty close to what I'm doing now, except my MC Cipher is using the duel fire/pierce damage type rod with combusting wounds proc because I'm not running a wizard and 20% damage from scion of flames is nice. With swift gloves and time parasite recovery fps was 3fps last time I checked with penetrating shot (which also boosts mind lance - it works on mind blades too but I passed on that one). My chanter uses golden gaze and my coordinating attacks amuaua darcozzi paladin uses the marking wand after alpha FOD switching through arbalest and arquabus. The pally carries forgemaster gloves to FOD vs pierce immune. Ciphers are brutally efficient controllers, so I prefer wood elf for sticking ranged afflictions. Attirbutes in order of priority: DEX, INT, MIG, PER. For tempo fights where I want a burst of upfront focus: alacrity followed by 2 shots of twinsting before switching to wand. Because Cipher can do so many different things well, it's best to outsource some of them. For example, let chanter proc or invoke DR reduction rather than blow 40 focus on a single target DR reduction.

Why is high INT bad for DOTs ? Does it reduce the damage per tick? I haven't tested if enduring flames stacks, but I don't understand how high INT would make stacking wounding worse.

Has anyone tried a GoldPact with firebrand gloves? Secondary weapon: Tidefall. Single target damage seems like it would be severe for FOD alpha. Enduring flames is a 50% DOT (lash I think) over 10 a base of seconds (most likely adjusted by INT ). I think the Bleak Walker talent is a 25% lash Boreal Dwarf, I haven't thought through the talent order, but I'd replace lesser frenzy with the 20% versus wilder talent if deciding to wear frenzy proc plate armor. Mig 21 Dex 14 weapon focus greatsword Con 4 Int 18 crit aura Per 18 Res 3 intense flames 2 hand style lesser frenzy scion of flame enduring flames app sneak

One thing I like about this game, is there is rarely a best for every situation or play style. Another versatile option worthy of consideration: http://pillarsofeternity.gamepedia.com/The_Hours_of_St._Rumbalt Annihilation on a 2 hander (.5 is only on weapon base damage, but rogues crit a lot) 2 damage types Highest theoretical single hit potential weapon for a rogue Prone on crit (more creatures are immune now compared to early days, but still helps with survivability and deathblows) Available early Off-topic: Rogues are single target DPS beasts, but this and most games favor AoE damage. I would love to see mobs and encounters with AoE avoidance or mitigation to counter-balance.

Death godlike for a full party is worthwhile because you have 1 extra INT for your AoE radius. You benefit from the +15% damage against NPCs under 25% health more as a caster with high base damage and damage over time attacks more than melee classes limited by the lower base damage of weapons. For the purpose of damage, you can't wear the 4 MIG helm but you can wear 3 MIG gear and someone else in the party with higher accuracy can wear the 10% crit helm. The racial holds its own, but mainly INT is such a boss stat for Wiz - and you get both at lvl 1.

The idea of giving allies +10 to hit against all mobs hit by carnage seems to good to be true. I'm currently using vile loner and loving AoE disorient, but this is an actual affliction I can see applied to enemies.

Ciphers are easier early on but mid to late game wizards are higher on the power curve and very high impact spells you can chain cast in an encounter without having to build focus. There's a Steam achievement but no actual mechanic limiting how often you return to stronghold/inn/camp. Can't say I've found a need to abuse that in group play since blast talent builds are so good (ranged carnage on steroids when you cast blights), but it's there if you're concerned about per/rest Also, +10% spell damage gloves are significant for wizards (more so than the melee version for melee builds), but they don't apply to ciphers because their abilities don't count as spells. Lastly, you can simultaneously wear a +10% ranged damage neck for blast.

6 person group: I've tried pally (still awesome as support) and fighter tanks, but prefer barb. I chose aumua for the +20 defense vs prone/stun, Mig 20 Dex 3 Con 18 Int 19 Per 15 Res 3. Savage defiance and chanter with passive heal was plenty before shod in faith. Vile loner lance still at level 6, just got stalwart. Will eventually add a stun weap for duel wield. Negative deflection when frenzied; the AI loves him. Plate armor + woodskin (later form of delegman) + armor of faith + belt that reduces crit damage by 27%. Carnage is effectively a utility aura for status effects like disorient and stun on top of the passive sicken aura.

Could add hat with simpleton effect to bring INT down to 1 for the fd backstabber. For the curious, liberating exhortation and suppress affliction don't work. Rogues are good (deathblows scrolls/items is awesome), but without early fd stand-up and earlier access to fd, I still have a hard time picking over other AoE DPS classes because there aren't enough hard single target dps encounters and the AoE DPS classes also bring utility to the party.

If 2 different party members hit the same enemy with affected by combusting wounds, will the enemy take 10 damage over 5 seconds? If the same character hits the same enemy affected by combusting wounds 2 times, will the enemy take 10 damage over 5 seconds?

I like taking outlander's frenzy on wizard and spell mastery with minor blights and essential phantom. Cast minor blights before essential phantom. If my wizard hits the same target 3 times with blast fun and my my phantom also hits 3 times, how does combusting wounds stack (hoping it does) ?

Does envenomed strike propagate to essential and substantial phantoms. . . ? For that matter, does lesser wounding shot and outlander's frenzy? Envenomed strike will probably work with Ranger's powder burns, similar to wounding shot, where you get the normal weapon attack attack the powder burn flame cone and driving flight at the same plus envenomed strike on the the primary target (envenomed wouldn't apply to enemies inside the cone AoE and probably not the bounce target). This gives you 5 very strong shots in an encounter. I wonder if it's worth switching to swift aim during the reloads.

The math is not straightforward. DEX does affect recovery, but it's a coefficent applied to whatever recovery still remains after other more impactful modifiers like armor and weapon "haste". You can get away with skipping DEX on a lot of weapon focused builds - I'm in the process of dropping it from my fighter and paladin. Just be mindful of non weapon actions that will suffer like drinking potions, using scrolls, etc.

If you don't mind micro play style, rogues are fine frontline. Enemy AI will pick on your rogue because he has lower deflection than your tank, but if rogue picks on the enemies that are prone, stunned, or paralyzed they don't hit back. Rogues have superb accuracy and unmatched damage modifiers which allow them to deal reliable, very high single target DPS. They can also deal unusually high ranged and AoE damage via scrolls and items that cast spells.

You're right about adept evasion. I swapped it for escape (+10 deflection +25 reflex 1/encounter and useful for resetting encounters) People have already completed TCS on Barbarian, but I haven't seen a Rogue yet. **Correction: I found some successful Rogue speedruns on youtube.** Low PER is compensated by 100% reactive stuck (-20 deflection), +8 reckless assault, and 20% hit to crit conversion and let's you take CON. Riposte lets you trigger knockdown. You don't have the health to endlessly tank entire encounters, so you need to disable even if it's 10-23.5% reactive. Goal is to pick off as many targets as you can before using shadowstep to evacuate and return to encounter with initial_enemies - number_you_killed. Reflex attackers, like casters are a high priority, so you stealth as close as you can to them first. Like most TCS, you're going to need to use consumables.

v3.02.10008 WM2 Rogue Godlike, fire Ruatai Dissident MIG 18 DEX 4 CON 19 INT 19 PER 3 RES 15 TALENTS shadowy beyond veteran's recovery superior deflection deflecting assault cautious attack vicious blows weapon focus soldier vulnerable attack ABILITIES reckless assault dirty fighting escape riposte deathblows crippling strike weakening strike SKILLS Stealth 7 (background +1) Athletics 0 (Lyrinia brothel +1) Lore 7 (background +1) Mechanics 3 (class +2)(gloves of the mechanic +2)(stronghold rest +3)(Gefjk brothel +1)(rite of mechanics +3) Surivival 7 (skaen quest talent +1) Slot Item R The Hours of St. Rumbalt L Hand n/a Armor Elryn's Jacket Head N/A Neck Cloak of Comfort Hands Siegebreaker Gauntlets Waist Binding Rope Ring 1 Ring of Deflection Ring 2 Gwyn's Band of Union Feet 4 Shod-in-Faith scrolls: ray of fire, binding web, paralysis, immunities as needed potion: flame shield, +deflection, regen stat food Rationale: Shadowy Beyond with no backstab!? This is a tool for skipping encounters are exiting encounters after you've killed an enemy or two if you are unable to survive the entire encounter. You may have to rest a lot, but that's typical of TCS. Build takes advantage of full attacks having 0 recovery via riposte and full attack abilities. Since this build will be stunned/proned/paralyzed, need a way to continue damage, hence the fire shield. Has the ability to apply 2 afflictions for deathblows. Greatsword is duel damage type for all situations. Untested, especially where acquiring the listed gear is concerned. Have only soloed past Maerwald, but the build concept is sound. Concept can be modified for a full party setup. No retaliate, so riposte accounts for the porcupine part of the name.

This makes for an interesting prospect: a weapon centric character could dump recovery reducing talents/items and load up on per encounter full attack abilities and have a lot of room for other talents and items.

spd_coef = AttackSpeedMultiplier + DW + TWFighting + MeleeAttackSpeedMultiplier(VulnAttack) + ArmorSpeedFactor Is the DW value for a single weapon 0, and is it the same for 2 handed weapons? Is the DW value for a and weapon+shield also 0?

Thank your for the quick reply! I had to stare at this for awhile, but the math makes sense to me now.

Could use some help double checking my math. Goal is 0 weapon recovery without much going over much. Base recovery is the part I'm least certain on. attack speed: the unlabored blade, durganized saber, outlander's frenzy armor: durganized padded melee speed: vulnerable attack two weapon: duel wield talent dex: 21 weapon "haste" = (1.2*1.15*1.25) - 0.05 - 0.2 + 0.2 + 0.33 = 1.005 weapon recovery = baseRecovery - haste = 1 - 1.005 = -0.005 rounded up to 0 since there's no benefit for negative value.

Excellent info Boerer. You just saved me a lot of time. Thank you.

Damage shields are normally pretty low damage, but Was thinking of a heavy armored rogue with retaliate bp + helm + shield + flame potion for a total of 4 damage shields . . . + deathblows, vulnerable attack, high MIG, high CON !, high PER, 3 DR bypass gloves, 1 DR bypass from robot rogue swim in blood pool. Oh yeah, and combusting wounds. Alternatively, a barb if carnage synergizes, or at the very least the raw damage reactive they eventually. Here's me being lazy again and not testing yet, but does anyone know if deathblows or carnage work with retaliate?

If you want to minimize getting hit in the face reach weapons vs stuck targets are fun because they can't hit you back. Also, tall grass knocks enemies prone on a crit, so you can knock them down before they are close enough to hit you. On the flip side, I hate it when my fighter moves in to use knockdown and I get poked by a skeleton pike before I'm in range. Ciphers are one of the most versatile classes and there are many good/viable options, so follow your play-style.

That's really good to know. -34% modifier is >>> than losing 34% off the total. -67% is suprisingly bad that pet would be better than druid. I got too many grazes/misses to realize the high damage potential of a gish druid.

I keep tweaking my 6 party am going to squeeze in more stats instead clone the 4 INT ring for 20% duration and 24% AoE. Spellblade-esque rogue is going to take more Lore to deathblows ray of fire and barrage of missiles. With the +3 lore ritual scroll, can cast maelstrom . . .