Zares

So I played when the game was released, had short breakes, last time I played when they released Turn Based mode. For some reason I liked multiclasses and also hated them. That was meh especially on my Barbarian, upgrades were so spread out, I had to lvl up a lot, and some of them were unreachable for MC. I liked MC on Wizard (I like an idea of Battlemage) and on Druid, but was always curious if they'd be good SC too, as there are more powerful spells, and my favorite spells would be reachable sooner. I came back because I saw a lot of interesting mods showed up when I was away. Mostly Vetern PotD Enemies, Community Patch and Deadfire Balance Polishing Mod with nerfs. Back then I didn't like broken stuff, cheesing, and super high difficulty with Deadly Deadfire. These three mods made me want to play again, the polishing mod says they made SC more interesting. So with that in mind, what classes could be still interesting to play as a single class? And what classes should still be recommended to be multiclassed? I want to have at least 2 companions in my party and maybe 1 side kick, as I didn't check them out yet. I always liked Eder, already got him, and he's Rogue. I'm thinking Aloth/Fassina and Konstanten/Serafen. Was also going to take Maia, but I don't like her subclass, I mean I want my ranged character to use Bow/Crossbow, not a fan of firearms in this game to be honest, maybe in another run. I'd really like to try SC Barbarian, so that's a must. What about the rest? What's still not recommended to go SC? Asking in general, not current run. Back to my current run: MC: Templar ([off?]Tank/Support hybrid) M15, C15, D15, P14, I16, R15 - I picked +2 to attributes from Berath's Blessings to have more flexibility in building MC and more space for companions. Going Tank (+1 Engagement with Shield from Shieldbearers) with abilities to heal (Lay of Hand/Eothas Priest spells from Priest Subclasses Rebalanced mod). Picked Fire Godlike (I know, no helmets) for RP reasons, and because it was buffed in the Polishing mod. Eder: Rogue - I usually played Eder as a tank, want to try something different and go DPS. Konstanten/Serafen: Barbarian - I really want to try it. Aloth/Fassina: Wizard or Loremaster. Or just create a custom character, not sure. Another ranged DPS as the frontline would be already crowded a little? I like Ranger but not sure if I want to take care of their pet in this run. I always avoided Cipher, as I played it too much in PoE1, but maybe it's time to try it out in Deadfire. I like the idea of melee Cipher (Soul Blade I think?) but... I think I need a ranged dps. Suggestions are welcomed! Can skip Barb for another run if I could get another interesting melee for this run instead. I have never played Monk, melee Cipher, SC Fighter, DPS Chanter. Can also suggest some compositions and/or character ideas for another run. I'd like to maybe RP some Aggressive or Cruel in the next run. Maybe Bleakwalker Paladin and/or corpseating Barb. I also haven't played Rational/Stoic, that's an option too. There's no much flexibility when I'd like to try some companions... I know there is Unity Console, but I remember I had troubles to make it working, even with that updated script file. I remember I had to manually edit something and remove things, and I can't find it now. It'd be nice if you could provide instructions. I'm using Subjectively Better Companion Starting Stats mod instead for now. I can edit attributes in Notepad (do I need to start a new game after changes?), but it'd be hard to change classes as they're not named easily, and by looking into for example Eder Paladin file from PoE2 Deadfire Tweaks mod there's a lot more to add in order to make it work. Modlist I'm using now (you can recommend more): Binary Opposed Dispositions Clever vs. Rational Binary Opposed Dispositions - Stoic vs. Clever Binary Opposed Dispositions - Classic Values Companion Aloth Tactician(Deadfire Tweaks) POE2 Deadfire Tweaks - Companion Eder Templar POE2 Deadfire Tweaks - Companion Maia Gunhawk POE2 Deadfire Tweaks - Companion Rekke Fighter POE2 Deadfire Tweaks - Companion Serafen Mindstalker Xoti Devoted - Gaun Priest Trinkets Loading Screen Restoration Paper Trinkets Spoils of Caed Nua FG Soulbound Upgrade FG Party Item Upgrades Better Crew DeadlyDeadfire4 TT1 Unique Items (is actually TT2 Unique Items but the metadata wasn't updated) More Soulbond Items The Funnening - Skill Items The Funnening - Afflictions & Inspirations More AI Conditions manystrings (Deck of Many Strings) Out With the Modals Deadfire Penetration Mod Per Encounter Abilities Per Encounter Items Veteran PotD Enemies Rymrgand's Complete Food Challenge More Interesting Consumables UWTDYR - Unique Weapon Type Diversity Rebalance Dramatic Burned Book of Law Aloth Romance Extension Slaying with Aloth Winter with Aloth Wizarding with Aloth agreeablealoth Port Maje Ending Fix Everyone's Two Cents Community Patch - Basic Community Patch - Extra Community Patch - Icons Community Patch - Keywords Community Patch - Typos Balance Polishing Mod - Buffs Balance Polishing Mod - Nerfs Balance Polishing Mod - SummonRebalance Wizard Changes Enhanced User Interface Priest of Rymrgand and Hidden Classes Priest Subclasses Rebalanced Background Unlocked Background Tweaks CC More Colors

I know that fixing bugs is probably more important than tuning PotD, but I'd like to know at least, if they're going to tune it in the nearest future or not. I still haven't bought Season Pass yet and I think I won't until PotD becomes challenging Even -15% discount won't change my mind atm

@Shadenuat, you are right. Too high XP gain is a real problem. And it'll be probably even worse after a big DLC, because there will be more quests and more XP for completing them. Next thing that makes the game too easy is too high accuracy gain per lvl (+3/lvl). Baldur The Difficulty-Fixin' Pig-Buddy mod fixes it, by adding a flat +10 accuracy bonus (so early game is playable without maxing Perception) and applying -2 accuracy per lvl (so we gain +1 accuracy per lvl instead of +3/lvl) - this fixes 90%+ accuracy at 20 lvl. But like I said before - mods shouldn't be a solution, vanilla game should be challenging enough on the hardest difficulty.

Bump, because splitting bug hasn't been fixed in 1.1.

I don't want to hurt anyone's feelings or sth, because someone finds x difficulty too hard, but... I don't understand people who complain about PotD to be too hard or Dark Souls isometric style, lol. There are still lower difficulties, just for people like you. But vets or people who look for a real challenge want hard difficulty to be... hard and challenging, not just normal. And I'm not even a cRPG vet. PoEI was my first cRPG game and while midgame on veteran difficulty I decided to start a new game on PotD because it was too easy for me on the lower difficulty. Now, PoEII PotD 1.1 still feels quite easy even with -28% exp module from Deadly Deadfire mod. I think I'll just enable another modules (higher scaling, more hp for enemies), if the game is still not challenging enough. But mods are not a good solution for "fixing" the game. PoEII should be balanced and have difficulties for: people who are interested in story (Story difficulty); casual gamers (Relaxed, Normal); people who look for a challenge (Veteran); veterans and people who look for a real challenge (PotD). If items, classes, encounters (enemies' composition, positioning, not stats) are balanced, so maybe some kind of slider for PotD would be a good idea? I mean slider, where you could adjust level scaling of enemies, max hp, etc. Or next PotD levels PotD I, PotD II, PotD III... with fixed scaling (+1 Armor / 3 levels & +1 Penetration / 2 levels). Everyone would be happy, because apparently 5 difficulty levels are not enough.

You don't have a tank (companions never will be a good tanks) I started with off-tank MC Paladin (with illusion spells, so I have +50 Deflection)/Priest equipped with Quaterstaff and with its Defensive Strike (+20 Deflection) weapon ability. Both helped a lot when I needed more defense. Then I hired a custom adventurer and made him a pure tank Fighter/Chanter (with bonuses to armor rating when using a shield and summoning 6 skeletons). They tank very well. Then needed more dmg so I made offensive healing druid/ranger, then Aloth joined (Battlemage, defensive spells and summoning weapons) and finally pure dmg Wizard Evoker (but can heal well using scrolls because of high Might). I've just finished first island with -28% exp mod and thinking of enabling more difficulty mods (whole Deadly Deadfire). For me, PotD is very important to be challenging. To that point, that if it won't be hard enough, I won't buy DLCs IMO Veteran difficulty should be very hard and PotD should be almost impossible to beat. If someone wants it less difficult, then lower the difficulty or build a better team with pure tank(s) and synergies and try to avoid joining too many companions - I think they are too weak for PotD difficulty, too bad that we can't just build them (choose subclass, abilities and spells/passives) like a custom char just after they joined us. I couldn't finish PoE1 PotD with companions without changing theirs abilities, especially Aloth was very weak.

Maybe devs should get inspired by Deadly Deadfire mod and make some changes similar to these from mod. Not changing the vanilla game, because there are some mods that do that is not a solution, because I know people (including my friends) that hate mods and they say that games should be played without them. Here is mod's description: