Kingsman

I've presented the OP with raw facts. I refer to the point I made where the carnage ability of the barbarian (which is basically it's only talent worth mentioning) does not work effectively for the reason I pointed out: the extra damage distributed via carnage is distributed in a spread out way across multiple enemies that does not bring down enemies individually quickly,unlike the rogue who does the opposite. This will result in the barbarian getting attacked by all surrounding enemies until they eventually die from the spread out carnage attacks. A rogue who concentrates on individual enemies will take those enemies down quickly therefore leaving less enemies to attack back. The effectiveness of carnage is even greater reduced on POTD where enemies have higher damage reduction and of course carnage is made at reduced damage already. You can roll a barb and try to rely on the riduclodsly low proc rates of stunning weapons (10% on a hit or a crit that does not proc on a miss or a graze so more like 6% of the time) or you can roll a caster who can do the exact same thing from a distance at 100% effectiveness. I so wish this game had an pvp arena where I could prove this once and for all.

^^^^^^ Carnage can do a lot of damage per hit but it is spread out over multiple enemies unlike the rogues sneak attacks, deathblows, crits that concentrates on one enemy. The advantage of this for the rogue is that as he takes people out individually that leaves less people to hit the rogue back where as the barbarian will still be surrounded by all enemies untill he brings them all down at roughly the same time. And I do take offence at your misguided attempt at you trying to discredit me. How do you no that I have limited experience? If you like barbarians and someone takes a swipe at them why don't you just say your piece and not personally attack people. Oh sorry IMO !,, **** And OP, barbarians have overwhelmingly been found to be weak class in general by a large amount of users on this forum. Just google the relevant words to confirm this on the obsidian forums and you will confirm this.

What difficulty are you playing on? On any difficulty other then POTD you can play any class and min max them basically however you want and you will beat the game very easily once you figure out how to play the game. On POTD a barbarian will require an incredible amount of micro just to survive. You will need a priest constantly buffing him or you will need scrolls or potions getting used frequently. A lot of you talent selections on level up will also have to be "survival " based at the cost of offensive talents. When I play POTD I have two dedicated tanks with shields (usually a fighter and a paladin). By doing this, having two tanks, it makes playing POTD soooooooo much easier. My party dies far less, I don't have to buff the hell out of every fight just to get across the line and battles are over far quicker. So that leaves four other places to fill in my party and barbarians do not play any of those roles effectively compared to wizards, rangers, rogues, Druids , ciphers . You will handicap yourself if you select a barbarian. They are human meat shields that deal mediocre damage compared to most classes in the game. I do not see the point in rolling them. The unlabored blade high accuracy build on a barbarian I viable because of the firebug proc but by that time you get that up and running the game will be almost over and you will have casters who can cast spells to the effect of firebug safely from a distance anyway.

Forgot about that guns have a negative crit factored in. How does wounding work? Does wounding stack DOT of the entire amount of damage done? Eg if you did 100 total damage that included lash, sneak attack would you do 25 DOT?

I'm playing pillars one last time on POTD before I officially hang up my gloves in anticipation for tyranny to come out. I'm not the decided yet on my 6 man party composition. Can you guys help me out with what you think are really interesting builds to play? What builds have you had a lot of fun with and why? Why where they fun. Tell me your secrets......

Get a rogue to level 16. Enchant an arquebus up to legendary with a lash with relevant lash boosting talent. Then in stealth mode backstab, sneak attack, deathblow an enemy and you probably have your answer.

These all do fire damage Divine mark Searing seal Shining beacon (must be a bug if scion isn't working) Pillar of holy fire Storm of holy fire Hand of wale and woe Symbol of magran

That's definitely not my experience. It totally depends on the type of build and party composition (if any). You must notice it when on spell casters especially. Try it, roll a caster with 9 perception and take note of how many of your spells miss or graze and then try a caster with 20 perception. There is a noticeable difference here and I just don't believe that you haven't noticed . Perception is especially important for a wizard on POTD as his crowd control spells are depended heavily on accuracy. Of coarse I no how to buff and debufff. Buffing a caster who already has high perc is better then low perc obvisouly

A backstab-oriented rogue is perfectly viable, not sure why you would recommend against it. One of the best things about this game is that there are generally a lot of different ways of building any class of character, you hardly need to stick to a specific path (besides, if you take backstab you're still going to be sneak attacking and probably deathblowing anyway, it's like they're mutually exclusive). Maybe *you* want your rogue to avoid getting too much in the thick of things, maybe others do. Besides, talents like Escape and Shadowing Beyond aren't just useful for getting out of a sticky situation; they're also useful as offensive tools, allowing you to manoeuver across the battlefield and (say) get rid of an obnoxious mage. With Backstab the Shadowing Beyond just gets an extra "+150% damage on your next two attacks against target enemy" (on top of any Sneak Attack/Deathblows it may already be facilitating, of course). You will have to sacrifice some of your potential to effectively crit, sneak attack or land deathblows if you want to go down the path of building a backstab rogue. You will need the backstab talent and probably at least 2 other talents to help set up the backstab like shadowing beyond. You will also probably put a lot of skill points into stealth at the cost of athletics, survival and lore. If your select backstab you would be stupid to not select other talents to help you set up the backstabs. Just selecting 1 talent would not be worth it as your backstabbing potential is extremely limited. So yes you would need to spend at least 3 talents to effectively backstab. Using the 2 critical hit talents to increase crits to 20% is in my opinion better then sneak attacks and deathblows because a rogue has naturally high accuracy and with the Addison of these talents will crit most of the time even on POTD. Your rogue will dish put far more damage with sneak attacks and deathblows compared to what he can do with backstab. Sneaks and deathblows are useful throughout an entire fight remember unlike backstab that predominantly most useful at the start of a fight if entered in stealth mode or when you break engagement and re- enter from invis. No brainer IMO

As for the Sanguine Plate, yes I think it is worth to consider (and I'm glad you brought it up and I'd like to hear your opinion about it too) and I have to admit that I totally forgot about the new Sanguine Plate's Helm, but there are two things about it, that I don't like: 1) the look on a druid (okay this is rather subjective) 2) the casting speed in plate armor. The latter is not even that bad, because (I only tested it shortly once) most of the time you get hit by a critical hit very fast, so you profit from the frenzy proc for the obligatory pre-cast phase too. But then there are times when you cast some more preparational stuff, leaving you with very little frenzy uptime for the spiritshift phase. With Outlander's Frenzy you have more control over the whole thing and you can use it right before spiritshifting and jump into the frey right after. In the end, it could be a matter of play style, taste and party composition. I really have to test it some more. Maybe I'll add an alternative equipment entry, if I'm pleased with the results. As for the soulbound sceptre: I tend to use this on my support priest or on my wizard, but yes it can of course be a thing, especially if you have a party that is not that strong in the AoE damage department, which extends the combat duration a bit. In my last playthrough the fights were rarely ever long enough and the duration of Spiritshift with 22 INT is most of the time sufficient. Also getting the sceptre to proc is not exactly a reliable thing. Edit: Have you read about the whole Taste of the Hunt matter? It is really strong now. :D With 9 perception and 3 res you would get owned on POTD what difficulty did you test this build on? Perception is the most important stat (after intelligence) to raise on POTD because enemies have higher defences. Dumping res on POTD is doable but you would find the game far easier if you left it at 10 beacuse you would die a lot less.

Nope. Go fire for priest. Not trying to be rude but you should have been able to recognise this yourself due to the large amount of fire spells and hardly no storm spells in the preists repertoire.

Great run down from obviously an expert who knows his (her) stuff. But..... I would not recommend building a rogue based on backstabs. You will have far more powerful abilities to choose from at level up that do not involve, plainly, the backstab talent or talents that make you invisible. If you are rolling a rogue, build the rogue to concentrate on critical hits, sneak attacks and deathblows. Don't bother with backstabs, escapes, invis ect....You want to avoid getting in the position to have to escape, turn invis in the first place and a priest or a cipher will be able to buff you out of this problem effectively, especially on any difficulty other the n POTD. Rogues on POTD are not that good IMHO because of there poor survivability but on all over difficulties they are walking gods who will out damage your entire party combined.

Yeah I reckon the most powerful six person party would be 2x fighters built to be tanks 2x rangers 2x wizards

It depends which difficulty he is playing on. If he is playing on hard he should raise intelligence and dexterity. If he is playing on POTD he should raise intelligence and perception as the bad guys have increased stats and that extra perception helps. No stats should be dumped on POTD either.

I really dont know... Which better and why? Bittercut or Drawn of Spring? Bittercut is very sweet for my Bleak Walker and i have spirit of decay + corrosive lash. The base dps is higher by the Bittercut AND its slash/corrosive dmp type, DoS is ONLY slash... hmmm.. Bittercut would be better on higher damage reduction targets, drawn in spring on low damage reduction targets. If you are playing on POTD most enemies have increased damage reduction so bittercut would definitely be best on POTD

Ok. Someone takes there pillars of eternity seriously.

Frontline rogue is possible. I have played a rogue as my main almost every play through I have played. You will slowly start building up your defences as the game goes on and there are a few really good buffs from ciphers and priests that make rogues survivable. What I am 100% certain on and this is really good advice especially if your new: having two dedicated tanks on POTD (e,g fighters or paladins), makes POTD wayyyyyyyyy easier. This does not stop you from having a rogue as well though.

I finally got one off my ciphers to a high enough level where I was able to try defensive mindweb out. Holy ****e this spell kicks arse. You can make all your caterers tanks. Execute it after casting minor avatar and your be protected from basically all attacks (on will especially if your priest has high intelligence) Best defensive spell in the game...... By a LOoooooooooooong shot. Great spell to, very creative. Awesome spell. Raw power.

There was word of the 3.03 patch coming out a couple of weeks ago. Steam still has not updated it. Does anyone else have it on steam yet? I must say all these patches, expansions ect really have affected the quality of the game. I remember when I didn't want to play pillars untill all the WM expansions came out. Now I don't want to play the game untill this 3.03 patch is out. Obsidian, for pillars 2 I hope you employ more people and attempt to rectify these bugs during development instead of doing it concurrently with the games release.

Yeah not many games these days are good enough for me to be able to sit down for 140 hours.

Yeah I usually play a rogue as my main, pump mechanics and walk around in stealth mode. Though I haven't really found any significant hidden areas. Only little bits and pieces.

Baldurs gate 1 and 2 had a few secret areas and ect around the place. Pillars seems to have none. Anyone found any?

Unless you choose not to. It's not that difficult a concept, really. There's also a console with all sorts of cheat codes, are you using that as well then? Haven't looked into it. But storms is right in front of my face

More content especially in the main city. Pillars 1 was very lacking in depth without the expansions

That's in itself not a reason to stop playing Druids altogether though. You can also simply not use Relentless Storm when playing a Druid. As if that's going to happen. If it's there you will use it.