Hello,
I am currently on my first playthrough and have a few questions I could not find any answers to. I decided to play a paladin as main character and also play with the companions you meet throughout the game to enjoy the stories. So I don't want to min-max but still be effective. I have chosen hard difficulty for now.
I watched a few paladin videos and liked this one very much: Pillars of Eternity: White March 2 - Tanky Paladin Build
It is basically a Fire Godlike paladin that focuses on tanking and providing buffs and heals for his allies. The first problem I have is that I don't want to go below 10 with any attribute. Yet there are 4 attributes useful for it. For now I thought I focus go a little higher with Resolve because to increase my defenses and also because it is used in dialogues. I tried to even out the rest. This is what I came up with now:
Might: 14
Constitution: 14
Dexterity: 10
Perception: 10
Intellect: 14
Resolve: 16
I took might for better healing. Many older guides state that Constitution is worthless even for tanks but it seems that it got buffed and +20% Endurance and Health seem to be pretty good. Then I took Intellect for a greater AoE range and buff duration and Resolve for Deflection.
What do you think about this distribution? Whether it is good surely depends on the talents I have chosen, so this is what I will go for from level 1 to 14. I am not sure yet what to take for 15 and 16 and on some abilities on the way.
1: Lay on Hands (heal)
2: Shielding Touch (buff)
3: Zealous Endurance (AoE buff)
4: Weapon and Shield Style
5: Flames of Devotion
6: Shielding Flames (AoE buff)
7: Reviving Exhortation
8: Cautious Attack
9: Reinforcing Exhortation (buff)
10: Greater Lay on Hands
11: Hastening Exhortation
12: Superior Deflection
13: Sacred Immolation (AoE heal and damage)
14: Scion of Flame
What do you guys think about it?
I am not sure about Hastening Exhortation. Is the speed buff a good damage increase for a melee in case I want to nuke a target quickly? If not, what could I get instead?
Scion of Flame seems to be nice as it increases the damage of Battle-Forged, Flames of Devotion and Sacred Immolation.
What should I pick for level 15 and 16? There is a lot of stuff that sounds good.
Aegis of Loyality: I did read that with that talent Sacred Immolation removes Charmed, Confused and Dominated effects from your allies as well. Are those debuffs often applied? Is this working as intended?
Depive the Unworthy sounds pretty powerful against bosses. Abjuration seems just as situational.
But Righteous Soul and Deep Faith look nice as well to further increase my defenses.
How useful is Behold the Martyr? Usually when a party member dies I guess it is better to just revive him or her. As my paladin is pretty tough I and I should be able to do that with Reviving Exhortation.
The last thing are the skills. Athletics, Lore and Survival sound interesting for my paladin. Are the Survival bonuses worth it? And how much should I put into Athletics? It seems to be useful for dialog options. And the heal I get might be useful for when I use Sacred Immolation because it does a little damage to me as well. But is it potent enough or just a waste?
Lore seems nice to get a little more options because I am able to use some scrolls as well. How would you guys distribute the skill points?
And one of my party members needs mechanics to spot and disarm traps and to open locks. As I only can discover traps and hidden things when in scouting mode should the party member that has Mechanics skilled also have a high Perception? I thought of skilling it either with Aloth or Edér as I get those two companions first and I will most likely keep them in my party. How high should mechanics be?
Thanks for helping me out
Thanks for the tips regarding abilities and talents. So I see the attack speed malus from Cautious Attacks is rather controversial. I heard that 120 Deflection is a value I should aim at on Hard difficulty. I guess I will first pick the deflection talents that don't have any negative effects and see how far I can get to that value only with those. Depending on how squishy I am I will take either take more defensive talents or supportive ones from those I am not sure of. Regarding skills I got to 5 Athletics easy because I had 2 points there as class bonus. The healing bonus of Second Wind seems to be nice for now. I wonder whether it can keep up with my Endurance on higher levels. Right now it heals me for around 58%. Considering I can use it for myself after I cast Sacred Immolation and can save Lay On Hands for companions that got into trouble. Does Second Wind scale with Might as well? Perhaps I just raise Athletics so far that I can negate the damage I got when I used Sacred Immolation. For now I aim at 8 Survival to get to the level 2 healing bonus. After that I was thinking to raise Lore a bit to be able to use supportive spells from scrolls. 8 points in Lore were already recommended to be able to use level 4 scrolls. Are there any scrolls of higher levels that are useful as well? Lore seems to be a really good skills to put points into.