MaxQuest

I'll split your question OP in two: Ascendant is better. Ascendant is better. The thing is, that in Deadfire: - with specific weapons / party composition, you can max focus really fast - unlike in PoE1 the need to open the fight with a cc-power is lower, so you can afford spending the first 3-6s for building focus these combined, result in ascendant having higher PL and better power spamability over other ciphers for most of the time. Also have to note that ciphers in PoE1 and ciphers in Deadfire feel very different. Because: - cc effects are weaker - cc effects are harder to apply - cc effects are less needed because you can decrease incoming damage by up to x4, via high AR. Plus there is no hard-cap on how much you can heal. Not to mention that since ex-vancian spellcasters can cast right away without worrying about spell conservation, it became harder to compete with them. So if a cipher wants to out-dps them (or martial/martial multi-classers), he literally has to chain-spam his powers. And ascendant at least can do that. The Red Hand is great choice. But a little note about "Double-Tap" upgrade: it's better to avoid it on cipher, because the second consecutive hit on vessel destroys it before dealing damage, meaning that shot won't generate any focus.

Err... why is it misleading? When you are creating a char the description of Shattered Pillar says that he only gets wounds from melee non-abiliy attacks. And that his wound threshold is +200% I believe. In this case I think the description (at char creation) is ok. In my understanding "melee weapon damage inflicted" is "melee weapon damage inflicted" Auto-attacks, primary-attacks and full-attacks with melee weapons, all deal "melee weapon damage". So if some of these don't generate wounds, I consider tooltip as misleading (because I don't see it mentioning "with x-attacks only") I also find it strange that Shattered Pillar - a monk focused on dealing melee damage, has to avoid using a large selection of physical abilities. Rogue/pillar doesn't generate wounds from Crippling Strike? Pff For balance purpose I find it ok, if wounds can't be generated from abilities/passives that cost wounds to activate. But all other abilities that deal damage (and have melee weapons as their damage source) imho should be generating them for shattered pillar monk.

Aaand tooltip is misleading again: Btw, just to clarify: "any active ability" or "any active ability that consumes wounds"?

I have 3 RES on those characters. Actually I have dumped RES on absolutely all characters in Deadfire v1.0+ so far. Resolve is useful for builds that go for maxing deflection in order to become almost unhittable by majority of phys attacks. But I personally find that there are other more time-efficient approaches (for a 5-man party at least). Plus there is still stuff that hits other 3 defenses. As for RES being marked as recommended stat... it's probably as Boeroer mentioned a remain from beta 3 when RES was increasing spell dmg and healing done.

Because... it depends. For example I have a lifegiver with 3 PER in party. He doesn't ever cast anything hostile. Or another (milder) example: do have a damage-dealing priest on whom I have 14 PER. I don't max it because other stats because I need maxed MIG and INT on him, plus will have other party members lowering enemy resolve. I think the main spellcasters on whom PER is absolutely vital and should be maxed most of the time - are the cc-focused ones.

Wounding is a DoT with "Fixed" damage. Intellect doesn't affect total damage dealt, but it still affects duration. So the greater INT you have - the lower dps wounding DoT will have. And viceversa. So the answer is C. P.S. Wounding damage is affected by might. P.P.S. You might also want to check this post about DoTs.

These are awesome! So you go with an extremely Tanky party with lots of healing? Who is doing your damage? The damage is dealt a bit by the wayfarer/skald, but mostly by the last two team members My 4th party member is a helwalker of Berath. The main selling point is Shining Beacon and Cleansing Flames that deal massive damage when MIG, INT and PL are high enough. But before she gets access to those spells: - I let her auto-attack from distance with Keybreaker Scepter in mainhand and Tuotilo's Palm in offhand (you still benefit from dual-wielding, but attack only with main-hand while at range). Lightning Strikes and Dance of Death are always on. - also there are a few spells at her disposal: rank 1: Touch of Rot / Restore / Suppress Afflictions; rank 2: Iconic Projection; rank 3: Consecrated Grounds (which is quite effective when you have 30 MIG) Note: going for helwalker of Wael is also an option. The reason I've chose Berath was to check Touch of Rot and Rot Skulls. And my 5th party member is my MC - an ascendant streetfighter - my main dps'er. Atm the party is level 8, and she is responsible for 60% of total damage done. Mostly it is: open up from stealth -> max focus in 1-2 full attacks, and nonstop spam Soul Shock (if can hit 4+ targets) or Mind Blades (otherwise). Later, the routine will shift towards: Devastating Blow into Amplified Wave ad infinitum ^^ P.S. As for tankiness - yeap, that's a quite high-AR party. In PoE1 my preferred way was to go for high-dps/high-cc team. In Deadfire through I don't find that as effective as AR-sturdiness. Being permanently underpenetrated reduces incoming damage by x4 and makes the impact of healing that much stronger. Additionally, terrifying or frighting + dazing is usually enough; and there is little incentive for hard cc \

Iirc majority of weapon effects (like stunning and overbearing) have their duration affected by INT. Although in case of Disorienting and Persecuting I'm not sure. Here's the list of their duration in dependency to hit quality at 10 INT: Desiccating (Captain Viccilos Anger)(on hit) : roll vs Fort | duration: 0 on miss; 3.0s on graze; 6.0s on hit; 9.0s on crit Disorienting (The Vile Loners Lance)(on hit) : auto-applied | duration: constant 5.0s Interfering (Lost Thayns Reach)(on hit) : auto-applied | duration: 5.0s on hit; 7.5s on crit Overbearing (We-Toki)(on crit) : roll vs Fort | duration: 0 on miss; 1.5s on graze; 3.0s on hit; 4.5s on crit Persecuting (St. Wygelts Cudgel)(on hit) : auto-applied | duration: constant 6.0s Stunning (Starcaller)(on crit) : roll vs Fort | duration: 0 on miss; 1.0s on graze; 2.0s on hit; 3.0s on crit Stunning (Godansthunyr)(on crit) : roll vs Fort | duration: 0 on miss; 1.0s on graze; 2.0s on hit; 3.0s on crit Wounding (Drawn in Spring) : auto-appliedProperty effects:- Desiccating: inflicts minor fatigue (-10% max. endurance, -10 accuracy) - Disorienting: inflicts -5 all defenses - Interfering: inflicts -5 accuracy - Persecuting: drains 5 resolve from the target and you gain +5 Deflection - Overbearing: chance to prone - Stunning: chance to stun - Wounding: +25% raw damage inflicted over time * Have to note that prior to 3.04 there was a bug, where stunning effects were getting duration as if they crit. Here is the related bug report. P.S. You might find this thread of use.

This. Also it's kinda time to streamline the character respec. Going 20 times through [ability selection -> skill selection -> ~ proficiency selection] is not ok. I would salute a point-buy system, where you can invest all ability points on ability screen at once.

Am really curious on why. Isn't it: if you add an item to a vendor, it just appears in his selling selection. And you actually need to add some extra condition to prevent it from being added to the list, that would check if main character was created before 2.0 or not. How does this actually work?..

I've tried and liked the following custom companions: Goldpact/Lifegiver (18/18/16/3/20/3) - this one is tanky (with superb AR and decent defenses) and has lots and lots of heals. He's my main-tank that makes sure no one dies. Plus carries defensive and healing scrolls. (I was also considering a shieldbearer of wael, but that would require modding since the combo is locked) Unbroken/Wizard (3/17/18/19/18/3) focused on cc - rymrgand vissage, charge, mule kick, and attacking with cudgel (or Shattered Vengeance with modal on). Basically a disruption machine. His role is to prevent enemies from using their abilities effectively. Wayfarer/Skald (17/9/15/19/15/3) - Rännig's Wrath rapier (with modal on) in main hand, and Lovers Embrace / Pukestabber dagger in off hand, spaming Shared Flames and mostly 2-phrase-costed invocations (Thunder Rolled / Killers Froze). His role is to off-tank, off-heal and off-cc. At some point, was considering to take a trickster/skald instead, but atm I find wayfarer/skald versatility to have a larger impact in my high-AR party (and do appreciate White Flames, Shared Flames, 2nd aura and emergency LoH/Liberating Exhortation).

"My timezone brings all the boys to the yard,And they're like, Its better than yours, Damn right its better than yours"

That's why I added "depending on implementation") With PoE we never know for sure how some of the stuff works until we test it ^^

Some abilities are better with specific style. Tbh... I'm ok with this. If a monk wants to spam primary attacks (like Torment's Reach) he might prioritize 2H. If he wants to spam full-attacks - DW is usually the way. In case of Stunning Surge, he has the following options from cost-refund perspective: - DW - which has x2 the chance to refund the resource cost when compared to mundane 2H - 1H - and benefit from +12 acc and 20% hit-to-crit conversion (this can lead to higher chance-to-crit than during DW) - unusual 2H - which depending on implementation can go through attack resolution multiple times, e.g: Whispers of the Endless Paths (which attacks in a cone), Three Bells Through, also it wouldn't hurt to check the interaction with Rods with modal on / The Red Hand / and Frostseeker. Feeling kinda torn apart between two point of views on these. From one pov, these are effects that even other hand benefits from, while they are in effect. From another, these are not some passive bonuses, and require to be actively inflicted. And they cannot be inflicted while you are performing an attack with another weapon. There is a following example that is not going out from my head: Btw, offtopic, but really do like that Cudgel on a cc battlemage (with dumped MIG, maxed PER/DEX/INT). Charge, Knockdown, Visage, hit/stun with Cudgel, insta-kill lower-level enemies.

Thank you for the list) Have you checked if these apply to spells? If the effect is attached to character and not weapon, there is a high chance it will be working with them... Must note also that lashes applying to both weapons doesn't look as intended to me (unless the tooltip is explicit about it) Do you refer to Stunning Surge and Gambit because they can refund resources? If so, the first will be fixed in v2.0: "Stunning Surge will no longer refund its cost twice if dual wielding and both attacks crit.". And I guess Gambit shall be adjusted in the same manner. Regarding Confounding Blind: it has a deflection malus cap of -30, and iirc is achievable with just 1 blunderbuss shot. As for Gouging Strike: I have yet to try it) I don't see any Full Attacks from abilities.gamedatabundle to contain any related properties (e.g. Flames of Devotion) So modding (via json) is highly unlikely. But I think it should be possible via dll modding (the way IEMod in PoE1 was doing it).

When deciding which (slow or fast) weapon to put into mainhand/offhand, I also look at: - full-attack ability cost - character's role If it's cost is low (let's say 1 zeal) and it can be spammed, it's wise to go with MH_slow + OH_fast. If it's cost is high (let's say 4 rage) and you want to inflict max possible damage: MH_slow + OH_slow. If the character's role is not to deal damage, but to cc instead (and he's not using a shield): MH_fast + OH_fast. (think of a skald who full-attacks with MH_rapier + OH_dagger with rapier modal on) That's the thing ^^ Since it is an increase to base damage, there is no need to take into account any damage coefficients) Great Sword before: (18+24)/2 * f(c1+c2+c3+...+cn) Great Sword after: 24 * f(c1+c2+c3+...+cn)

They do sound accurate) Especially 1, 2 and 5. Here are a few notes regarding points 3, 4 and 6: They indeed get two chances. But there are some situations when having double-chance... is still less. For example you have by 15 higher accuracy than enemy defense and: > you make a Full Attack while dual-wielding: - chance to crit on mainhand: 16% - chance to crit on offhand: 16% - So the chance to crit at least once during FA is: 29.44% > you make a Full Attack while wielding 1H weapon: (with built-in +12 acc bonus and +20% hit-to-crit conversion from 1h-style): - chance to crit on mainhand: (16 + 12 + 0.20 * 50) / 100 = 38% From auto-attack perspective: > dw increases your attack rate > 2h has higher base damage > 1h has higher accuracy (misses less, crits more) Full-attacks aside, this should be fairly balanced. Yeah there are weapon bonuses that are attached to directly to character, if they are related to stats, engagement_limit, power_level and so on. But there aren't that many weapons that have such bonuses. And even less weapons that are also good from dps perspective. Solitude from Acolyte's Frostbite True Independence from Modwyr +2 fire PL from Magran's Favor +15 all Defences against Plant attacks from Vion-ceth +5 Resolve for 10 sec per kill from Last Word and +20% action speed/dmg with Daggers while drunk from Pukestabber Are there any other weapons whose bonuses apply to character himself? Afaik majority of bonuses are weapon related and apply only to their respective hand. And if a weapon lists +pen, +acc, +speed bonus (something that is a property of weapon class) but applies to both hands, is most likely a bug, like in the case with Harpooning from Mahora Tanga (which was already fixed). #5 is in my opinion the main reason that makes dual-wielding that good. Full-Attacks while DW greatly increase the attack rate. Not to mention that not needing to reload main-hand firearm ever, or having a rapier with modal on without any downside is really sweet. I remember advocating the same solution ^^ here Was also calculating the steady dps during backers beta for auto-attacks, primary-attacks and full-attacks: link The conclusion to which I arrived was that Full Attacks with a non-dw setup require a 11%-35% damage boost in order to compete. Making Full Attacks roll max damage, will have the following consequences: - Estoc/Pollaxe/Morning Star: 14-22 -> 22 => +22% increase - Great Sword/Pike/Quarterstaff: 18-24 -> 24 => +14% increase - Arbalest: 17-25 -> 25 => +19% increase - Hunting Bow: 14-24 -> 24 => +26% increase Easy Full-Attack: roll max damage. If you are dual-wielding: hit with both weapons instead.

Hmm, I actually don't see it as being more powerful due to DR->AR change. In PoE1 if a character would inflict 100 post-DR damage, Recall Agony will deal 30 dmg. In Deadfire if a character would inflict 100 post-AR damge, Recall Agony will deal 30 dmg. (provided that RA caster had 10 MIG) So, same thing, no? I actually found Recall Agony less useful in Deadfire so far, because I didn't met really sturdy bosses vs which I would need it. It's biggest use is in party with limited burst dps vs really high-hp bosses, vs which you can risk running out of spells/resources if the team composition lacks steady dps. Exactly. Since gaining focus is currently not a problem (not to mention that there is little incentive to take other subclasses over ascendant), cipher casts most efficient powers without looking much at their cost. And here a question arises: do I - increase the damage 1 target takes by 30% (for 15s) - which accounts for like 300 dmg if the target has 1k hp; or 60 dmg if the target has 200 hp - cast Amplified Wave and deal 80-100 damage to everyone in AoE - or try to apply Disintegration (which can deal 240 - 1000+ dmg depending on stats and hit/crit) Iirc casting Recall Agony on a target already affected by it was overwriting the previous effect if the new instance had longer duration. But it's better to retest this.

It's damage is not seen in the log, but there should be red numbers popping above enemy head.I haven't tested the spell in Deadfire. But guess it works the same as in PoE1. Basically it checks every 3s how much damage the target has taken during this 3s period, and inflicts 30% of the amount as direct damage. Because it's direct - it doesn't appear in the log and doesn't trigger various onHit effects. In PoE1, Recall Agony was working with DoTs (at least in v3.0.+ you could see Disintegration ticking for 40,12,40,12 and so on). And RA coefficient was also affected by Might. @arkane83, in PoE1 Recall Agony wasn't triggering Combusting Wounds, but the damage from Combusting Wounds (once they were fixed) was taken into account by Recall Agony.

Tbh I'd like to be able to enable Berath Blessings, Berath Challenge and Magran Challenge at the same time. Thanks for workaround)

It depends on the lore and the world. Your topic, and Oswald, reminded me of elves in "Labyrinths of Echo" universe. Their lives were long, very long. But... their organisms had zero resistance vs alchool addiction. It was enough for an elf to taste it just once (benevolently or not), and he would rapidly transform into a drunkard. Try to imagine hundred of years of hungover. Once a wise and prideful nation has transformed into wandering and permanently innabriate alchoolics.

Yeap. Feeling the same way. We have cannonballs, chainshot and grapeshot. But, I do use only cannonballs, because in Deadfire I haven't been in the situation when alternatives are better. That said, I have played other games where naval combat was balanced. Specifically I had probably 600h+ in the corsair games developed by Akella studio. It was more than 10 years ago, but I still remember, how great the naval combat was. Not to mention that if you were using only one type of ammo, you were dead. > you had to use chainshot - if the enemy ship was faster than yours and a much stronger crew (which was often); and you didn't want to risk getting boarded and killed. - if the enemy ship was faster but you wanted to capture it - you also had to use chainshot. - if the enemy ship was jibing and firing non-stop; and you wanted to reduce it's maneurebility and sit in their dead zone. - there was also a tactic when fighting 1 vs 3-4 enemy ships. You could chainshot the slowest/sturdiest/weak-firepower ship, sail around it in circles and use it as a partial cover vs his allies. Otherwise would could grapeshot the fastest enemy, full sail away, and annihilate them one by one from distance. > you had to use grapeshot - if you wanted to board the enemy ship and reduce your casualties from deck-to-deck combat. Officers and crew could get killed. But you didn't want to lose experienced officers with selected/tuned percs, nor disciplined crew members with high morale. - in case of a very few unique ships (like Flying Dutchman), you had a hard time even simply approaching for boarding. You had to heavily reduce their crew (in addition to sails), in order to make the ship a sitting duck, and not risk a fatal cannon shot when closing distance.

Melee martial classes often do have cross synergy. Take a fighter/rogue, and sneak attack bonus is applied even if he uses knockdown. Take a rogue/barbarian, and carnage is apllied even when he uses rogue strikes. While caster classes usually lack this. As no1fanboy mentioned, this is partially due to lack of unique and impactful casting passives. And another reason is isolated subclass percs. For example: - a conjurer/druid is not better with firebrand than any other wizard/druid. - a shifter doesn't get a spiritshift bonus from being specialized transmuter. - a beguiler/illusionist cannot cast illusion spells farther than a regular wizard. - a lifegiver/priest heals with priest spells the same as let's say assassin/priest. - a priest of Magran doesn't benefit from master degree in evocation. - a multi-classed ascendant doesn't get a free spell usage with vancian spells when reaching max-focus. and so on.

Not only that, but also the selection of forbidden schools. I mean it would be great if we could choose which two schools to ban ourselves. For example I would gladly take Illusionist in my current party, and ban evocation and conjuration schools, because: - I want a few of those enchanting spells - am not going to cast evocation stuff because the character has 3-MIG and is specced for cc not damage

Tbh will have to test it myself in order to answer this) And most likely will have time only on weekend.