whimper

I'm running a solo PotD Berserker/Devoted right now, using a slightly different stat spread than 1TTFFSSE recommended: Mig: Max Con: Flat Dex: High Per: High Int: Max Res: Flat My reasons: --I kept Might and Intellect high to (1) maximize Carnage damage (since Might is one of the few things that influences Carnage damage) and area of effect, and (2) to maximize healing from Unbending and Constant Recovery (increasing both duration and magnitude of the healing they provide). As Boerer noted, a high Might increases the Frenzy damage. But since Unbending returns damage dealt (and the Voidward ring helps to minimize it in the meantime), the increase in damage just increases how much Unbending returns. It's been working well so far, anyway. --I've kept Constitution and Resolve flat and relied on stacking armor instead for defense (though I try to keep all of my defenses decent). This is a decent way to go (IMHO) because this class combination is pretty friendly to high armor rating builds. (The Barbarian's Thick Skinned ability offers a nice passive AR-boost, and (given the testing done by other people on this board) it appears that the benefits of the Fighter's Armored Grace ability depend on how heavy your armor is, with the heaviest armors getting the most recover reduction from this ability, giving you an incentive to wear heavy armor.) --Perception is pretty great, so it could be that Perception should be even higher. But the Berserker already has a number of hit-to-crit boosters, making Perception increases less valuable from the point of "percentage increase to expected damage" than it would be for most builds. (I.e., many builds get a large chunk of their expected damage from low-probability crits. And the 1% increases from Perception boosts can increase the magnitude of that probability substantially, because that probability is so low. So the resulting increase in expected damage from boosting Perception, percentage-wise, is relatively high. Whereas if you already have a very high chance of getting crits for other reasons (Berserker Frenzy, Barbaric Blow, Bloody Slaughter, Disciplined Strikes) then Perception increases don't increase crit chances by as much, proportionally speaking.) __________ Anyway, it's been working pretty well so far!

EDIT: As Boeroer helpfully points out below, this does not appear to be a bug. Developers, please ignore! __________ The Village Fool condition, gotten from wearing the Cap of the Laughingstock (from the Deck of Many Things), doesn't impose the deflection penalty of the Village Fool condition on the character wearing the cap (though it does impose the deflection penalty of the Village Fool condition on those around the character). I don't mind this (it makes the Cap of the Laughingstock an amazingly good item), but it's presumably a bug.

Wait, what? I thought from the wiki description it was -10 deflection *to self* ... it is to enemies? Yep, it’s not to self, but to enemies and allies, if u are soloing it’s enemy only then. There is another item that grant u Dex Immune, but that item also reduce your deflection by 10. That’s why I think cap of laughingstock has almost no penalty and grant you double bonus is OP. This is almost certainly a bug, though, no? I.e., the description of the Village Fool condition is that anyone who has it gets a -10 to deflection and is immune to resolve conditions. And in combat, you and those near you will get the Village Fool condition. But for some reason while everyone around you has their deflection go down (as looking at your attacks against them reveals), your deflection doesn't go down... Still, until they fix it, it's pretty amazing!

Description: After buying (from the Deck of Many Things) and equipping the Cape of the Falling Star, quitting the game, and then re-opening the game, the game will now crash whenever I try to open my inventory. Steps to Reproduce the Issue: Open the save file attached below. Try to open the inventory. Saved Game file and Player log: Can be found in this dropbox folder. System Specs: Model Name: MacBook Pro Model Identifier: MacBookPro11,1 System Version: macOS 10.13.6 (17G65) Processor Name: Intel Core i5 Processor Speed: 2.6 GHz Number of Processors: 1 Total Number of Cores: 2 L2 Cache (per Core): 256 KB L3 Cache: 3 MB Memory: 16 GB Boot ROM Version: MBP111.0146.B00 SMC Version (system): 2.16f68 Comment: (I think this is the same problem posted in this thread, but I was unsure as to whether I should just add to that thread, or create a separate one.)

Sadly, my last post was too optimistic -- when I returned to the game, I'm again unable to open my inventory without crashing the game after having bought the Cape of the Falling Star. --Description: After buying (from the Deck of Many Things) and equipping the Cape of the Falling Star, and then returning to the game (re-opening the game later on), the game crashes whenever I try to open my inventory. To reproduce the problem, open the attached file, and attempt to open the inventory: the game will then freeze. --Saved Game file and Player log: See this dropbox folder. --System Specs: Model Name: MacBook Pro Model Identifier: MacBookPro11,1 Processor Name: Intel Core i5 Processor Speed: 2.6 GHz Number of Processors: 1 Total Number of Cores: 2 L2 Cache (per Core): 256 KB L3 Cache: 3 MB Memory: 16 GB Boot ROM Version: MBP111.0146.B00 SMC Version (system): 2.16f68

Build name: the jumping fortress This was pretty much exactly what my Stop-N-Go build does -- it stacks standing-still effects to make it incredibly tanky, and then uses Evasion to teleport around without losing them...

I’m experiencing a similar bug (game crashes when I open inventory), and it also happened after I bought something at the deck of many things (the cape of the falling star). Reloaded before that and bug stopped. Bought the cape again, and no crashes so far. So maybe a sporadic bug?

I was inspired by some of the discussion to try out s solo PotD run that’s very close to this, and it’s been a blast so far. So I think you’ll have a lot of fun! One question: why were you thinking of picking monastic training with your lvl 2 slot? You’ll be starting with a pollaxe, which already can do bludgeoning damage (and more of it). It’s true that the Voulge doesn’t do bludgeoning, but you can run with the Voulge in one weapon slot, and another pollaxe in the other slot... That’s what’s I’ve been doing, anyway, and it’s been working pretty well for me!

The -5 sec hostile duration only happens once u trigger agony, and the -50% hostile duration is calculated multiply not additively. So I don’t think u gonna immune to all afflictions. I haven’t tested frenzy but I guess it works the same way as SI.Hrmm, I just tested it, and it doesn’t decrease the damage from frenzy according to the information that shows up on your character sheet. Is that information reliable? (It’s obviously hard to check directly, since your health is obscured...)

Wow. Never even occurred to me that the Lone Wolf ring, or clarity of agony, would help with that. Nice find!

Ah, so the item description must be wrong. Good to know!

Unfortunately, I think your doubts about Serafin’s efficacy are well-founded... Some fun dialog, though.

The necklace is “Neriscrylas’ Hope”. The description of the necklace says it stacks 0 times, though. Is that right? If so, it seems a little underwhelming... :/

This is one of the reasons I really like the animacer’s energy blade in this fight — it ignores all armor, so you can ignore safeguard entirely.

One other factor to consider is what kind of micromanaging you enjoy, and what kind of micromanaging you find irritating. In a full party game, I tend to get irritated by the kind of constant micro the wizard requires in order to avoid friendly fire. So in non-solo games, I prefer priests and druids over wizards, because I find them a lot more fun. But if you enjoy that kind of micromanaging, then the wizard is a great choice for a nuker!

You’re doing a good job of selling this berserker/devoted combo. As a rule, I don’t like playing berserkers. But now I kinda of want to try this combo out!

Nice! A useful reference sheet.

Ah, right. Thanks!

Was the final option you were considering a no-subclass Barbarian, or a Berserker?

Out of curiosity, what necklace were you referring to?

For a solo run, I’d go for Holy Slayer, since you really want the tankiness. If you’re playing with a party, either is fine. I wouldn’t worry about the Holy Slayer not being offensive enough, though. As Dorftek said, the Holy Slayer is still pretty amazing for single target DPS, with unlimited Sworn Enemy and Persistent Distraction for free Deathblows you’re already doing very well. Add active abilities like Flames of Devotion and Crippling Strike, and then Streetfighter passives on top of that, and you can really mow things down.

Ah, good to know. EDIT: And regarding the original question, make sure you have Duality of Moral Presence set to Intellect; that'll give you another substantial boost to your will save.

It targets Will, so doing things to boost your will save (changing gear, using drugs and consumables that boost intellect or resolve) is also worthwhile. (I *think* Arcane Reflection should work on it too. If so, casting it via scrolls, or using the corresponding potions, should also help.) Aside from that, I’ll echo Teclis23’s advice: take a pot shot at one of them, then run down the stairs to draw one small group of them at a time. That makes this fight much more manageable.

Surprisingly I found playing solo often times "easier" than with full party. The fact that you can stack best equipment on 1 char and don't have to worry about managing squishies in ur party makes it easy. The way AI clumps up close to your main char allowing you to utilize choke points, corners and hit them all with spells like corrosive siphon, chillfog while only getting hit by few of them in return is prime example of that. That being said solo chars tend to be over the top tanky with a lot of sustain and just enough damage to cut through. Nothing rocket science about playing solo. I used to think playing solo is some bigger achievement than with pt but tbh it's not. I feel its bigger achievement to do fights underleveled with squishy chars or just one designated tank and without best in slot gear for each char. That pretty much matches my experience, actually. The easiest way to do a solo PotD run, in my experience, is to have a character who is both (1) very tanky and (2) mainly relies on passives or unlimited resources. (So Paladin multiclasses are a great here because they make you very tanky, and multiclasses with Rogues, Monks and Chanters are great because they either have lots of passives and/or can be built to rely on unlimited resources.) The kind of solo PotD run baldurs_gate_2 is doing, using a Marauder, strikes me as much more difficult (and impressive), because it doesn't easily satisfy either of these two desiderata. And that makes boss fights like this one much harder to pull off.

I’ve done (what I think are) completionist runs, and have never found them. My best guess is that they’re a random drop at certain locations, and so something you have to be lucky to find.