Braven

I just discovered that Maneha's hide armor has a +25% healing modifier. 10% more than the belt, though it means a downgrade in armor, so probably not actually worth it long term.... but an interesting option. Faster attack speed right away and now outlander's frenzy talent can be used (even though it is not really that great of a talent).

The Key one didn't make the cut for this topic? That one is my favorite from a style perspective.

I thought he was a paladin... What about Legolas as the cipher? There is no such a thing as a non-magical elf in Middle-Earth. Ok, there may be, but still, someone has to be their cipher! Well, he did kill half of Sauron's army single handedly with his bow, which would have generated an awful lot of focus to power defensive web...

So they are god-likes? Makes sense. Balrog must be a fire-godlike. Sauron is probably a death-godlike.

And then, everybody is wizard tank? How else do you think they defeated the armies of Sauron against all odds? Aragorn is actually a cipher spamming defensive web the whole time. He is obviously not a real ranger, I mean really, where is his animal companion?? The only time things went wrong is after Gandalf left... poor Boromir.

Human is great, if you want a non-weird race. They benefit from a higher Intellect and lower Con stats. Really, race doesn't have much of an impact so I suggest picking the one you like the look of the best. As for being powerful, I actually think the "conversation" stats (perception, intelligence, resolve) are generally the best stats long term anyways if you can survive act 1; I think many people place too much weight into the physical stats, because characters seem weak (and are kind of weak) at the start of the game before they unlock more abilities. The exception is Dexterity. I recommend keeping that high as it is more fun to not watch your character stand around doing nothing while they wait for their recovery bar to slowly refill. That all changes half way through the game and then you don't even really notice the low might or con. If you go with a low might and high dex, I recommend getting the "vulnerable attack" talent. It will help your effectiveness a bunch, if you mainly use melee weapons and works best with a low MIGHT score. I agree with others those three stats work a little better with a rogue than a monk, but I think a monk would do just fine, if played to it's stats strengths. With a monk, I would focus on abilities that disable your enemies instead of just do raw damage, if you go with high intelligence. Monk is easier for new or casual players since they are naturally hardy; rogues take a lot of babysitting to keep alive. You don't "have" to generate maximum wounds to be effective. After all, if you are rarely getting wounds, you are obviously doing well, so how is that a bad thing? The conversation stats are best for characters that like to "disable" their enemies with abilities instead of just dealing huge amounts of damage. A style I think is more enjoyable if you like to be more tactical, and also one that matches the more traditional role of a rogue or monk - a class that uses their wits instead of brute force. Something sadly lost in many modern action-RPGs.

I agree that it is kind of evil to place a high level encounter in a much lower level area in a spot where you are likely to accidently run into them. Why not tuck them in a cave, at least? I guess it does add a bit of realism and an unexpected surprise. Naturally, you wouldn't have a world "carved up" into level-specific regions if this were a real, fantasy world. I think the worst is if you are playing an Iron Man game and don't have total knowledge of the game. You could just walk into your death for no reason against enemies that have no place in the plot.

I think I usually find at least one in Act 2, but it might be available earlier. I think I got one in the catacombs under Defiance Bay before. An easy area for figurines to clear out. It is a great way to get Tidefall even earlier since that requires a mechanical skill of 10 to locate. If save and reloading is not considered cheating, you could just keep trying until you eventually found one. You could also check and see if the scroll seller at the stronghold sells them. I don't remember what he sells.

I always found those as random loot. I am not sure that they can be crafted or bought. If studying one of those random loot calendar day charts is not considered cheating, you could do that to obtain one. Just need to rest your character until the correct day of the month. Also, don't forget about the cheese of abusing retraining at inns. Even though you can't go past level 1, you could change your stat distribution or, more importantly, the chants and invocations you know to best handle a specific situation. At least I assume you can retrain at level 1; I have always been at least level 2 before reaching the inn. Also, there is a +2 lore background. That could be a way to cast even higher level spells. Chanter would start out with 4 lore with a possible lore of at least 11 with buffs. I think that is enough to cast every scroll in the game, unless they added higher level ones in the expansion.

I think I am convinced that chanter is the best. The ability to cheese by endlessly summoning the phantom invocation (which has high accuracy), or one of the other level one invocations, during a single battle seems too good to pass up. The trick is just to get the AI stuck on something, or run around in circles, or hide behind a door or wall and you should be able to kill almost anything. Who knows, maybe the death chant can travel through walls and closed doors. The cheese is just too good to pass up. You could even push might down to 3 if you want. It doesn't matter, because eventually you will kill them since DR can only block up to 80% of damage; it will just take a little longer but the idea is that you put your self in a location where you can't get hit. Probably better to get the INT, DEX, PER, and CON just in case you get hit while positioning. Also, chanter is thematically the best for Noober. He sure likes to talk, as I recall. This is the profession I best envision him taking.

I found a +4 stat apparel item for every stat except int. They all use different slots so you can equip them all in a single character if you want. And some soulbound weapons have stat boosts that stack with apparel stat boosts. There a +4 Int ring (Gwyn's Band of Union). I hope to find it, as I think that is the most important stat for an item boost. Has a couple other useful enchantments too. I like how the Engagement Ring has an "instill doubt" enchantment. Maybe it is a cursed, breakup-inducing ring.

Yeah, I noticed a lot of fuzzy math too with torments reach and turning wheel, which is partly why I abandoned my monk. Maybe it has gotten a little better since then. The shod in faith boots are also still a little buggy, or at least the UI is. I get some strange healing numbers sometimes in the log. Bugs of Eternity is a better name for the game, but I still love it anyways. Also, I bet there are lots of games with bad math; they just don't show you enough information about how it works so that you know there is a bug.

With hundreds of trips back to the free inn (to save money), and the figurine you can buy in the first village, I think you could get to Act 2 with any class in which many more figurines become available; most without any fighting at all required. To get the one in the locked chest, you could gather a plus lore item (one easy to get under stronghold), the +2 mechanics glove, the +2 strong hold rest bonus, and the scroll of +3 mechanics. If you have a year to spend slowing grinding away enemies (and waiting for a lucky string of crits) and running back to the free inn, I think you could eventually win the game. For race, maybe the wood elf would be best for ranged accuracy. I don't think you want a godlike because you would lose the ability to wear the hats with status immunities. Also, maybe it would be better to use a class that starts with +2 lore. That would make scrolls more accessible, since you can get to +4 with an item and then be able to cast a lot of immunity spells. You could even get to +6 with the stronghold bonus and enchantment. Chanter could be good for that since you can eventually kill anything with that death chant and phantom summon as long as you can bug the AI into not attacking you, which should be possible with positioning. For that class, you want max intelligence and kill Aloth for his armor. Side Note: If you want to be a "true" solo, you can also just kill the entire prologue encampment by yourself, thus never having the fighter companion (well, I guess you would have her for a few seconds until you murder her) (Strategy Tip: This is a great way to get a quick "cruel" reputation point as a bleak walker paladin, or as a priest, not to mention more cruelty later due to additional, funny conversation options you open up with gilded vale villagers, bragging about having murdered everyone)

For stats, I suggest max everything (Perception the most) and leave Con and Resolve at 3, Int can be 15 in case he wants to cast a level zero scroll or something. It is not like he can actually close into melee anyways and his defenses / health will quickly become meaningless. His best chance is to keep accuracy as high as possible so he doesn't reach the point where it is impossible to land a grazing hit. Dex is good for attacking quicker so he can run away.

Why not buy a custom NPC from a tavern, test it out after leveling it up, and then reloading?It is not easy to measure duration precisely because the game doesn't show any sort of wound expiration timer like every other ability in the game. It would be something like a frame by frame analysis. Also, I give good odds that there are bugs a plenty that will alter those times in unexpected ways under certain circumstances. For example, maybe spelltongue will extend wound duration indefinately.

Is exploiting known bugs acceptable? Bugs of Eternity must have something completely game breaking to exploit.

True, you could just send wolfie in to die over and over again. If you can draw them out, after they kill wolfie, I think they wander back and the pet can be revived. Whittle them slowly away. He could also draw them into giant piles of traps. Though, that would cost a lot of gold so you would need to slaughter some helpless villagers to fund your adventure. Also the accuracy would be so bad they they would probably always miss. Highest accuracy pet might be best to avoid a 100% miss situation. Or maybe the one that roars.

Race and class don't matter since you would just need to avoid every fight anyways. I guess rogue for the stealth and + stealth rogue item (whole faction can be done without fighting for 10,000 gold). Also, figurines to fight for you for unavoidable fights. Also, hit/run with a cross bow and a giant pile of traps. I am assuming this is not triple crown solo.

Dying boar is probably a better for a high CON character (maybe a high regeneration monk, who needs more sources of regeneration and can handle being under 33% endurance), but I might try it out and see if it is viable. Human also benefits from dropping under 50% early since fighting spirit duration is over 30 seconds and provides a decent buff. For this build, I think it is too dangerous; a strong hit can knock you out and then endurance regeneration doesn't matter, though the Unbroken ability will provide one mulligan. Another great synergy for Dying boar is weapons with an enchantment that kicks in under 50% endurance. I think the "valiant" enchantment provides something like +10 accuracy and +25% damage. Another thought I had is using a robe or padded armor instead of plate after level 15. Yes, the DR is much worse, but that helps Triggered Immunity fire off sooner, particularly with weaker encounters, and makes it easier to get a passive 0% recovery speed without frenzy or potions. There is one that provides a deflection boost on crit in The White March village and I think a padded armor with retaliation. I know there is the a great speed boosting padded armor, but I don't like that it is once/rest (and it is kind of buggy - doesn't always show up in the item power menu when equipped unless I save/reload). Could be fun with the new soul bound weapons or vent picks. Best strategy is probably to have two sets of equipment; one for easy/normal encounters and one for boss encounters which rely on the speed potion. One problem with fighter is that he gets much weaker once his per/encounter abilities are used up so ending the fight earlier may be preferable to more survivability which will run out when constant recovery duration eventually ends. More damage might be preferable to more healing at some point because of this. Ideally, it is best if the battle is pretty much wrapped up when the ability durations expire.

Specifically I am interested in locks without keys, and even more importantly, secrets. At least with locks, I can backtrack with a hireling, but I wouldn't know where to look for the secret (without cheating). It will be difficult getting enough mechanics and (desired) 14 survival with one character by level 16.

I am currently focused on my fighter character build, but I do want to experiment with monk after And see exactly what influences wound duration. Maybe monk version of glass tsunami since they benefit even more from endurance regeneration.

Seems strange that it would be multiplicative instead of additive, but I will still take advantage of it. Do additive bonuses and negatives always apply after the multiplication? Are all other bonuses always additive? Seems like it is not too hard to get passive (or almost passive) max speed without per rest abilities or consumables. Proposed Combination for Fighter: two speed weapons with Durgan (90%) + two weapon fighting (20%) + armored grace (20%) + Sanguine frenzy or Outlander Frenzy (25-33%) + swift action gloves (15%) - vulnerable attack (20%) - plate penalty (50%) = 100-108% Non-plate version (could be better for triggered immunity activation and does not rely on frenzy activation): switch out Sanguine for the robe with the on-crit mirrored images enchantment. The lower armor rating makes up for the lost frenzy.

Chanter is insane - that is sick. Do I understand right that the troll belt does not stack with the Scars armor? If so, I agree with cloak+bountiful healing. Then again, the difference between these combinations is quite small. I am already pulling over 20 per tick, from constant recovery alone with no belt and a 40% level 2 survival bonus.

Yeah, it is clearly better with a party, I think. By not having weapon-specific talents, your character can safely switch weapons whenever you find a better one. For example, that speed flail could be used against enemies weak to crush damage. Also, this build does not particularly benefit from crit attacks anyways, so accuracy talents are not vital.

If a player is against retraining late game to pick a different weapon focus/specialization/master for late game weapon, just avoiding those for other talents instead might be a good alternative. For example with our INT, aspirants mark is sometimes better than weapon focus anyways. -8 deflect vs +6 accuracy. Is it a fast cast? Interrupting blows would also be great option instead. I did find out that gallant focus does not stack with disciplined barrage.