Silvaren

EDIT: I'm not sure if it wasn't fixed already, but Second Wind from Athletics causes damage instead of healing to the character while Battle-Forged ability (fire godlike racial) is active.

@thelee I got my Steam Deck today. I didn't have time to getting acustom to controlls, but it's working pretty good and the game can be operated via touch screen in the same manner as android/IOS ports of Infinity Engine games. Enabling AI scripts for party would greatly improve flow of the combat. Sorry for dishwasher in the background. Steam Deck isn't that loud! I will test most of my cRPG library and put some footage - all Baldur's Gate, Icewind Dale, Pathfinder, Tyranny, Fallouts, Torment: Tides of Numenera, Wasteland 2 & 3, Knights of the Chalice, Gold Box series, Avernum, Age of Decadence, ToEE, NWN and more.

https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2022-03-07-pillars-of-eternity-2-deadfire-no-longer-coming-to-nintendo-switch So Steam Deck (or similar hardware) will be only way to play Deadfire on the go.

Initially my Steam Deck delivery was planned for February, now it says Q2. Since it was delayed 2 months I will probably get my deck in april. I bought it mostly for playing both Pillars of Eternity games. My friend programmer played both PoE on Linux without any issue, I checked Proton DB too. Even Pathfinder games should be playable. One of youtube channel is posting gameplay footage from many games. He showed Baldur's Gate 3, Divinity: Original Sin II and will check Pillars for sure. I heard those haptic touchpads are pretty good for strategic games even RTS, so isometric RPG shouldn't be a problem while playing on the go. I even bought PoE1 on Nintendo Switch recently but I was too busy to check that port. I heard terrible things about bugs, but maybe it's better now, even if publisher won't release more patches.

Hi Is there any way to extract 2D icons from the game? I want to make a guide on my blog and dedicate it mostly for PoE1, PoE2 and Avowed in the future. It would look better with icons players are familiar with. I downloaded package of PoE1 icons from Nexus. I guess I could get most of the icons from official wiki.

As always I'm late for the party. I was playing other games since 2019 instead of focus on the series I really like the most in recent years. Anyway, I think now it's time to try my luck with SC Chanter but it can be hard without Withdraw. @Raven DarkholmeVictor, I'm watching your current playthrough with several challenges. Did you give up on Ultimate? ;< How about you,@Boeroer? I remember you mentioned that you prefer playing with party and you won't be aiming at Ultimate. Maybe something changed? There are still 2 places on the Roll of Honor iirc.

Why you argue realism in flanking mechanism while all weapon swings are made without any footwork, without constant moving forward or backward? I would say this is unrealistic and it looks like that in almost every cRPG (Kingdome Come Deliverance probably made it more realistic?)! Flanking was designed that way to fit rest of the systems in the game. It adds another tactical layer to the combat. It just works. You can't efficiently react to all enemies surrounding single character. If all of them are engaged in melee combat the one who is flanked can't efficiently react to ranged attacks either or incoming spells. It seems logical for me and realistic. Even if your low level character is flanking legendary hero - "nec Hercules contra plures". Flanking has it own set of abilities and talents which provide characters with for example better defense against flanking attempts, like One Stands Alone. There are tools to boost your acc and twist RNG for your advantage.

Iirc it was changed to initial state when it worked without any limits.

It affects only melee weapons.

It works with any melee or ranged attack with any weapon. You can score sneak attacks with summoned weapons. Most builds use this talent. Spells can hit for over 100 damage (even those from lower levels, like Blast of Frost). Some are even more damaging: Delayed Fireball, Kalakoth's Freezing Rake, Wilting Wind can easily deal 160 or so. Some spells do damage and status effect, like awesome Ninagauth's Shadow Flame - it's basically 4th level ice-ball which paralize affected targets. Wall of Many Colors is great. All of Minoletta's Missile spells do great damage (those even benefit from rogue's Death Blows and Deep Wounds, so rogue can cast them from scrolls with great effectiveness). All ray spells work well with Combusting Wounds. Remember that yellow part of the AoE circle from Int bonus won't damage friendly target. Some practice and targeting won't be the problem.

1. Damage spells can be very good if you build your character with high enough Might, combine it with Braces of Spiritual Power (+10% spell damage). With DAoM you can quickly deal huge amount of damage. Scion of Flame, Secret of the Rime and other elemental talents will boost elemental damage for another 20%. Remember that spells can get another +50% damage from cricital hits if you stack some Acc bonuses (you gain + 3 on every level after lvl 1 and additional +1 Acc per level while using spells and inheret spell's Acc bonus from specific spell). Merciless Hand (+30% crit damage), Gift from the Machine (+1 Might) and Dungeon Delver (another +10% crit damage) will give you another damage boost. You can add another 20% damage with talents like Beast Slayer but they work only against certain type of enemies. So you can deal high damage (remember that most spells have high base damage which are multiplied by sum of damage modfiers and crit works as another additive damage modifier - with story talents listed above you will deal +90% damage on crit instead of +50%). You can use Penetrating Shot or Vulnerable Attack + Ryona's Vambraces for 8 DR bypass while using spells I listed in this topic, so it will indirectly boost your damage from spells: Blast and Penetrating Blast are awesome with Gyrd Haewanes Stenes, Puitente med Principi - those weapons will dominate or prone enemies in the blast radious - every enemy proc such effects separatelly. It will works the same with Golden Gaze and its Expose Vulnerabilities enchantment. Golden Gaze shoot 2 projectiles, each cause separated Blast so it will deal damage from the Blast twice and every enemy in the radious will have 5% chance to proc Expose Vulnerabilities. It works similar with Kalakoth's Minor Blights - its AoE attack will deal damage from elements and every target in the AoE will cause individual Blast. Blast works really well with Combusting Wounds (DoT) combined with Expose Vulnerabilities. Summoned weapons are great - those have the highest base damage from all weapons (Firebrand, Concelhaut's Parasitic Quarterstaff, Citzal's Spirit Lance) - they deal 20-30 base damage so they gain huge additional damage from all modifiers. Citzal's Spirit Lance deals additional splash damage, similar to Blast and it works well with Combusting Wounds and Expose Vulnerabilities. You can boost your Accuracy via Zelous Foucs/Blessing + Devotions for the Faithful + Inspiring Radiance or skip the first part and use Eldritch Aim, Merciless Gaze, DAoM, Devotions of the Faithful and Inspiring Radiance. You will stack +45 Acc for your attacks. Summoned weapons work with any weapon focus talent.

Maybe it would be better to just create new list with builds developed since final patch? Both PoE 1 and PoE 2 lists are outdated in some parts. I mean - these lists are still there for refference.

This game is designed that everything will work (at least on normal and high difficulty). You can play 6 chanters with the Dragon Trashed... Unstoppable until someone will use domination on one of them. Then the dragon will trash and burn through the team - but you can change chants before that. You can mix strategies and use different chants and invocations to boost defense of entire party and incapacitate enemies by fear, paralyze and deal huge amount of damage through invocations.

Cool idea about that monk-wizard! Put on Stag Helm and use Binding Web + Ryngrim's Repulsive VIsage and he could go into the fray. That's why both PoE games are awesome. There are so many posibilities. I have updated first post. Btw. Your Cauterizer's trick about killing summoned skeletons for triggering Blood Thirst works with paladin's Inspiring Triumph

Chanters! I knew I had forgotten something! I will test invocations tomorrow. I will check Wrath of the Five Suns too but I wouldn't be surprised if it won't benefit from Penetrating Shot. Eg. Minoletta's Precisely Piercing Burst has inherent 10 DR Bypass and don't gain addiiotnal 5 from DR bypassing talents. I will check Grimoire Slam too - anyone use that? I remember first gameplay demo of PoE at Gamescom (iirc). It was set in Cliaban Rilag and Josh showed Grimoire Slam for the first time and I thinked - wow, that's pretty cool move! Now? Meh. My knowledge is rusty too. I didn't play Pillars last year. I have only 800h in both games combined. I'm digging up old posts from the forum and compile something like ultimate guide with all that hidden secrets and things which the game doesn't explain. I'm half way through (and I would like to make separated guide for each class). Meanwhile I will catch up on Deadfire and compile second guide.

It's sad irony that Josh Sawyer repeats during nearly every panel (at GDC, Digital Dragons etc.) that as a game director or designer he has to make a game which players want. A game that players will like and play - not the game what he would exactly like to make or play - unless he buy 2 milions copies of that game. He said that so many times! He laughed of it. Whenever someone ask him eg. why he made Sawyer's balancing mod for New Vegas and not incorporated it into base game as deffault. He said it changes what he thinks could work better but not for broader audience. So he shaped Deadfire mostly upon feedback from PoE 1 players. With some exceptions ofcourse - like Obsidian managment forcing full VO very late during development process. The only one thing he made of his own vision was took the action to exotic part of the world. Deadfire setting is less familiar (but many players I know didn't even see a difference about PoE 1 beeing more renaissance world than medieval ). What I observed while reading polish forums - people in my country didn't like Deadfire from one of two reasons. 1. "Pirate" setting (I would say it's more about explore and colonisation than pirate stuff). Seriously, even die hard fans of first PoE (like professional journalist/reviewers) were displeased by tone and atmosphere of exotic world. 2. "Divinity: Original Sin II is better than Pillars!" - It's the second argument. I finished first game and I was borred to death. I started D:OS 2 two times and both times I abandoned at the end of Act II. Maybe some day I will force myself to start over for the third time and finish it, but I doubt it. These games has very simple ruleset and repetitive combat. But Divinity OS 2 sold 5 millions copies? Maybe it's me who just don't enjoy it, maybe it's good game. Imo it's great pseudo-hardcore cRPG for casuals with full 3D graphics, console release and coop - so it's popular & awesome & fun for people who probably never played something more complex than AAA RPG. You know - like "Witcher 3 is the best RPG ever made", repeated by people who never play RPG (or only most popular AAA RPG). So many people are saying about new standards set by Witcher 3. When I think about standards in RPG, I think of Fallout in 1997. But maybe it's just me. What I mean exactly - PoE II Deadfire is niche game. I would say that Pathfinder: Kingmaker is more popular thanks to the p&p RPG build upon displeased fans of D&D 3.5 when 4th Edition hit the stores. It's very popular RPG, so it's computer adaptation - basically the first one - is huge for many fans and players arround the world. Both D:OS 2 and Kingmaker are less niche games than Pillars. I observed even third reason - but it was on polish forums back in 2015 when first Pillars came out. Many players didn't like first game as much as Baldur's Gate II. Most of them didn't play BG II since 2000. Rest of them are members of the church of the one true game and its name is BG II and nothing can be better even if it's better in some way. They just don't want anything new. It is the same situation with Heroes of Might & Magic. People who started with the third game in the series and never played first or the second or any of the newer instalment will despise anything what isn't HoMM III. Even if some gameplay changes in IV, V, VI and VII are for the better. Even if HoMM III used blurred sprites from M&M VII (or was it MM VIII?) and has nothing similar with artstyle of first two HoMM games. /sorry for bad english EDIT: So PoE was designed for fans of the Infinity Engine Games and most of them don't want anything new. Afaik there is big group of people on RPG Codex (I don't visit that place) and few different forums I actually read who just don't like RTwP because it's SH!T! They use phrases like: "Good RPG, RTwP - pick one". They took hate for RTwP to another level.

I did some test to verify old data because I'm writing guide for Pillars of Eternity (but it's in my native language). I will share results of optional means for increasing spells damage (via DR bypass talents): PENETRATING SHOT Chanter: Seven Nights She Waited While the White Winds Wept (3), So Singt thy Biting Winds o' Eld Nary (4) Cipher: Mind Blades (2), Mind Lance (4) Druid: Stag's Horn (3), Overwhelming Wave (4), Firebug (5), Avenging Storm (8), Tornado (8) Priest: none Wizard: Minoletta’s Minor Missiles (1), Thrust of Tattered Veils (1), Necrotic Lance (2), Rolling Flame (2), Crackling Bolt (3), Minoletta's Bounding Missiles (3), Minoletta's Concussive Missiles (4), Chain Lightning (6), Tayn's Chaotic Orb (7), Kalakoth's Freezing Rake (8), Minoletta's Piercing Sigil (8) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Pallegina: Wrath of the Five Suns Talents: Prestidigitator's Missiles VULNERABLE ATTACK Cipher: Amplified Thrust (2) Druid: Sunlance (5) Priest: Barbs of Condemnation (1), Divine Mark (2), Pillar of Faith (3) Wizard: Jolting Touch (1), Kalakoth's Sunless Grasp (1), Flame Shield (4), Concelhaut's Crushing Doom (7) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Abilities: Grimoire Slam

And then undead Raedric can kill you and get back both swords

I've seen this topic some time ago and it looks like Penetrating Shot affects some cipher's powers and wizard's spells. I will test if this is still valid. Probably only a part of it. If Crackling Bolt is affected by Penetrating Shot it's shame that Iconic Projection isn't. I guess it's because fixed damage vs 25% DR.

I did some tests of all priest's spells with Penetrating Shot and Vulnerable Attack. Barbs of Condemnation, Divine Mark, Pillar of Faith benefit from Vulnerable Attack. These spells are good as debuffs so I would skip Vulnerable Attack and use different source of damage like Shining Beacon.

You mean Iconic Projection? Its damage has to overcome only 1/4 of DR (all spells which deal fixed number of damage do that) so it's pretty good option. Shining Beacon is DoT effect - those don't work with Scion of Flame, Secrets of Rime etc and don't gain bonuses from slayer talents too. Shining Beacon is great damage spell though. It's stacking with itself, so you can cast it several times in a row. Cleansing Flame will twice the damage from DoT effects. Enemies will melt quickly. Cleansing Flame has to overcome only 1/4 DR too, thanks to fixed damage. Best option to scale spell damage: incrase your Might. Penetrating Shot talent will overcome 5 DR so it is 5 more damage most of the time - it affects spells which hit only one target (can do splash damage near the target) and spells which hit in the line (eg. Crackling Bolt, so I guess Iconic Projection qualify too). Best part of Penetrating Shot is that recovery malus doesn't affect your recovery while casting spells, only base weapon strikes. You can use Vulnerable attack for spells like Divine Mark in the same way - it will decrease enemy's DR too for such spell. I've read that Glanfathan Stalking Boots and similar items increase spell damage too, but I didn't checked it. You have to flank the target by 2 party members or cast cipher power - Phantom Foes to activate damage bonus.

I often wait until my priest will cast all buffs and while waiting for oponents and setting up ground (placing Chilling Fog) some characters can use arquebuses for initial salvo. It depends mostly on the distance. Sometimes is better to use selfbuffs, figurine and summon some help or use any different items like potion, scroll or spell granted by equipment.

On lower levels accuracy can be your biggest problem. Inspiring Radiance talent will allow your priest buff acc in every fight. Blessing spells and later Devotion of the Faithful will stack with Inspiring Radiance. You also gain +3 acc per level and additional +1 acc per level while using abilities or spells. Rogue has many active abilities working as full attack, so most of the time dual wielding is the best option unless you know how to reduce recovery to 0 or you prefer to use basic attacks with some passive bonuses.

Dirty fighting has 10% chance to convert hit into crit. If you use only Azureith's Stileto without any offhand weapon or shield you should get +12 ACC (better crit chance) and with One-Handed Weapon talent another hit to crit convertion. Jolting Touch should be triggered pretty easily but only once per encounter.

There are different types of DOTs in different way afected by Int for eg. but in case of Wounding Shot and Runner's Wounding Shot - these stack. They are better with high damage range weapons. Details about DOT: