Moneo

Well, I admit I was too rigid in that sentence

As I said, monk's fists are fast and heavy-hitting 1h weapon. That's incredibly good by itself. Monk's abilities are abilities, so they get +1 acc per level, which is good after you level up your char. I take on-hit/on-crit effects on weapons like something rather underwhelming in most cases. Hit with your weapons and deal damage, and let the spellcasters to bother about disables. For me, that's the best way to go. Fists not only cannot be durganized, but also should not be durganized. So you spare those precious durgan ingots for other purposes. And you still have your pretty sturdy and heavy-hitting melee warrior. You can't durganize all weapons and all armors for your chars if you go full-party. Just roll a coastal aumaua with 21 Mig / 16 Con / 18 Dex / 3 Int and let him punch your enemies. Set AI behaviour to "Offensive", and he'll be using his abilities automatically from time to time, it's handy and not so much micro as it is discussed here. In practice, such a character will be inflicting a decent load of damage and debuffing a bit, meanwhile being very tanky. The aforementioned mechanics of having fast and simultaneously heavy-hitting weapon for rising up your DPS works here very well, just max out your Mig. This monk crushes his enemies with just his bare fists and does this pretty well, what else to desire? If you give him some weapons, this would only weaken him - or your party. Of course, if you are going solo or running a party of spellcasters, for example, then things can be different, and you may pick a good weapon for your monk (but, for me, a fighter is better suited for weapons than a monk). So, if you want to use DW blades in your party, roll a fighter, a rogue, a barb or even a cipher. If you want to have a melee warrior in your party and spare weapons and durgan ingots, roll a monk.

Yeah, but a figher armed with Reaping Knives who is just standing amidst the massacre and meticulously cutting into pieces toughest foes, even the dragons, is, perhaps, less fun, but a very helpful stuff.

BTW, if you are running a monk, there is no reason to use other weapon than his fists, except for those cases when you are fighting crush-immunes. Monk's fists are just incredibly awesome. It's a fast 1h weapon which deals 10-15 base damage with a bonus from the Transcendent Suffering. Speaking about 1h melee weapons, I'd rate them in such an order: 1. Druid's claws (esp. cat's) 1.5. Druid's teeth (esp. boar's) 2. Monk's fists 3. Reaping Knives 4. Arguably, sabres 5. Everything else

Well, if you are running a cipher, then consider its two awesome high-level abilities: Defensive Mindweb and Reaping Knives. To use the first one effectively, you need a tankadin (that's IMO the best choice here). For the second one, I'd recommend you using a good DW melee fighter for synergy. A rogue deals the best damage, but is a quite fragile char. An offensive-oriented fighter can deal a decent amount of damage and also is very tanky. It's the most reliable source of damage considering fighter's passive abilities, which also affect the Reaping Knives. A barb is a good AoE melee damager and can be also good with the Knives, although I personally prefer a 2H barb. A monk could seem to be a good subject for the Reaping Knives, but he is pretty devastative with his bare fists, whereas none of monk's abilities benefit the Knives. There is one more good aim for this ability: another melee DW cipher, it's a bit tricky, but they say it's a quite strong combo. BTW I've never tried this. Also, running a priest is a good idea. The priest is arguably the strongest class in the game. Don't overlook its Painful Interdiction. A Fire Priest build described on this forum is pretty awesome, I like to run such a priest with minor tweaks added to the build.

@ Braven Exactly, the drop-off because of DR growth isn't exponential, it's just linear. That's why PoE DR mechanics (according to what exact DR your foes have in practice, not in theorycrafting) favors slow and heavy-hitting twohanders, at least with a barb. But base damage boni have additive returns, and boosting attack speed has multiplicative returns. That's a bit sophisticated, 'cause pumping up Dex has diminishing returns with attack speed, but raising up the exact attack speed leads to accordingly exact linear growth of DPS. Thus, certain classes like rogue and cat-formed druid, which can collect quite a number of boni to their damage and therefore mitigate high DR, can favor fast-hitting weapons in order to boost their DPS. Also, for such classes, the more hits means the more crits and further boost to DPS.

Wow, I haven't paid attention to such a great ability of a Boar form of druid. Now I have even two ideas: first, replacing the fighter with a blasting wizard, second, replacing him with a spirit-shifting druid. And, perhaps, transforming the barb into DW build, in order to grant him the Reaping Knives.

I second Boeroer, diversity is a great thing in PoE. Powergaming is my favorite approach to such RPGs. Some time ago, I enjoyed powerplaying in Icewind Dale II. But in IWD2, I designed a power party consisted of 5(!) dark elves and 1 deep gnome. Whereas in PoE, there are no weak and strong races, all of them are well-balanced and suited for different roles and various approaches. Same thing is with the classes. In DnD, classes differ in their power, and a monk, for example, is rather underwhelming. In PoE, you can beat the game solo with almost every class (I doubt about the fighter, but I suppose, everything is possible). Here you can build a definitely power party consisting of different races and different classes, and that's a great experience. Of course, PoE mechanics is not ideal and somewhat weird (mighty spellcasters, intellectual barbarians), but nothing is ideal.

Yes, having several offensive casters like wizards and druids provides you a lot of burst DPS in battles. But my party is very offensive-oriented as well. I prefer to rely on weapon, not spell damage, because when your casters run out of spells, you need to rest. And weapon damage is literally endless. There is no problem in resting often even on PotD, because camping supplies are cheap as dirt. But this means you must return and buy them, and this leads to staring at these boring loading screens a lot. Though v. 3.06 is better optimized, loading time on my computer is still quite long, so this leads just to wasting your real time. Thus I composed a party which can move from one battle to another with little need in resting. It's also quite tanky, and tankishness is nescessary to keep your guys' health pool on a decent level, because on PotD you need to rest rather on low health than on running out of per-rest abilities. (That's why I favor Zealous Endurance over other auras).

@mosspit I don't question your skills or experience But after you've passed so much, you should understand that your current party is... let's say, not well-balanced. I wrote about team RPG combat roles in some other thread... Your party lacks a good buffer and healer, that's right. But it seems to me, that you are not looking for easy ways and are ready to suffer and overbear. And are ready for having enough patience through a boring gameplay. If you want a cool synergy and a funny gameplay, just build your party around power-gaming core, such as pally-priest-wizard. What about your current party, I've already shared my experiece with barb, how to make him tanky and dealing a huge load of damage. Alas, I have very short experience with rogue and druid. Your wizard, on the other side, is the most versatile char in your squad, so you can make him a tank or even a melee DD, if you want. It depends on your palystyle, what do you prefer, and the exact circumstances of the battle.

Well, playing PoE solo is not a matter of "skill" IMO. I think it's a matter of iron ass, red eyes and endless patience. Tactically it's based on luring and kiting. And C. LE, for example, in his guide gives an advise as sophisticated as totally stupid. He mentions, that monsters in PoE have their own health as long as endurance. Normally, this doesn't matter, 'cause when you knock out all of your foes in encounter, they are automatically dead. But when you are facing a tough foe solo, you can use such a tactics: kite your enemy and harm it, sooner or later it'll run out of health and die no matter how thick he is. I suppose I don't need to tell you, how silly and dull this is, killing foes in PoE via extinguishing their health. So, solo playthroughs are IMO boring and tedious. That's why I prefer going full-party and powerplaying. But nevertheless, *jedem das seine*.

@mosspit I suppose you are worrying too much because of the fact you are running your team without a priest. Man, this game is beatable solo with every class you are using atm, and you have 4-man squad. So, everything is passable. The downside of going without a priest is that you don't have some buffs (like bless or dire blessing) and don't have some nice per-encounter debuffs like painful interdiction. But I suppose you can cope with it. The most powerful and useful priest spells, the "Prayer against XX" ones, are accessible via scrolls, so that's OK. A druid can substitute a priest with heals and buffs to some extent. Don't worry about your barbarian. It's OK, that he is a bit fragile during the beginning of the game. Build high mig / high int barbarian, give him Tidefall+Sanguine Plate+Shod-in-faith+Berserker's belt, and since mid game, he'll be very tanky. Most of the time I don't even see how much health my barb has, 'cause he spends his time in frenzy, and he doesn't fall, that are his foes who fall .

I don't play on ToI and Expert, but keep this option turned on. It's realistic IMO and makes me to take care of my characters and don't let them go down. Even though, my variant of a barbarian, a Tidefall/Shod-in-faith/Sanguine plate one, is very tanky and sturdy since mid-game. He can be a little fragile during the beginning, but after he's packed in the artifacts, he's almost unkillable and isn't knocked out even on occasion. In order to train Ydwen's Redeemer and collect 5 resurrections, I strip my barb off and send him to tank an enemy with autoattack option "Passive". Then I resurrect him 5 times with scrolls. There is no other way to collect resurrections, normally he doesn't fall in battles So, Vengeful Defeat is totally useless talent for me. Again, a barb IMO is a genocide machine, just keep him standing straight and swinging his weapon, and all foes around will die earlier than they get even an opportunity to knock him out. My barb in-game is called Attila, yeah, the Scourge of God one, that's an appropriate nickname for such a butcher.

Well, for the ciphers, having plus-minus just 1 point of the focus can be quite a difference, depending on the fact, is this amount of focus sufficient for a required cast or not. Though a 10% fire lash on a flail adds a little, as you figured, even then for the cipher, every little bit helps. That's what I wanted to say, the cipher is the class which benefits the most from such a 10% lash, it's not in the terms of bare damage numbers, but tactical-wise. For other classes benefits are marginal because of low damage numbers, that's true.

The bad thing about Vengeful Defeat is that your character becomes injured after falling unconscious. I suppose, you cannot turn the injuries off on ToI. So, relying on Vengeful Defeats is not a good idea during playthrough on higher difficulties, just don't let the foes bring your characters down.

Well, your calculations are precise, but as I said, that's not for "constant stream of focus", just for emergency cases on occasion. The warbow is the weapon which gives my cipher reliable focus generations, Borresaine, then Rain. But there are some battles when I find my team surronded by enemies, like the one at the White Forge. Enemy AI for some reason likes to concentrate fire at my cipher. In that cases, being surrounded, he switches to 1h+shield, this helps him not to fall down. And what weapon to give him? Of course, a hatchet is a choise defensive-wise, but offensive-wise the best choice here is a flail, which shares WF: Adventurer with the warbows. And the best choice for the flail here is Unforgiven. Of course I don't state that Unforgiven is the strongest 1h weapon, although it's quite strong (any weapon with the "speed" enchant isn't weak). I just describe a case, where it could be useful. And yes, I use my cipher buffed with Aefyllath chant (actually, Sure-Handed+Aefyllath, as I described in another thread), but I have just never used Sparks, thanks for the advise!

I have Unforgiven as an emergency weapon on my ranged cipher. When he is surrounded by enemies and oppressed, he can switch from a warbow to the Unforgiven+shield combo and continue hitting and getting the focus. WF: Adventurer also helps. For the cipher, every bit of damage is valuable, 'cause with this class, you either have enough focus to cast the desired power, or need to make yet another hit with your weapon.

That's a decent party, of course. If you are so eager to take a chanter, you can do this with no problem, there is no more or less "intelligent" choices in PoE. This game is beatable solo with every class you mentioned, and you have even four characters. So everything is viable with due approach. But a chanter is quite passive in gameplay, and thus more boring. Wizard+cipher combination is very strong tactically and urge you to be active during the battles with reasonable amount of micromanagement, you can choose different strategic approaches and have a lot of fun. But man, this are you who is playing and you who makes decisions. When you are composing your party, don't start making decisions from the classes. Start from the combat roles. Team RPGs have several standart roles or archetypes of characters, these are: a tank, a damage dealer, a healer, a buffer, a debuffer, a CC-er. You should distribute these roles among your party members. When picking a class, decide, which role this character would play. Don't try to make all-around person, let him specialize and shine in one or two roles. In a decent, balanced party all of the roles should be covered. Anything else is less important according to game mechanics and exists just for your fun.

Oh, yes, it seems, I've been mistaken in my calculations with different types of lashes and different DRs of enemies. PoE mechanics is so damn sophisticated.

I'd recommended dropping a chanter and picking up a wizard. IMO the Dragon Thrashed is overestimated. In really tough battles it doesn't add so much, and trash encounters are something you can cope with having a little problem. What can a chanter do well, is to boost your party, and the more powerful paty is, the more the chanter adds. I run without a wizard, but my party is optimized for dealing tremendous damage with weapons, so almost everything dies quickly. In a smaller party, wizard's CCs, debuffs and damage become more weighty. I suppose that you'll have quite a number of situations of emergency when you'll need to stop enemy hordes quickly, so, a wizard would be handy. Wizard is a very versatile class, he is able to play different roles depending on situation, and in smaller parties this is more important. Also, a tanky chanter is rather boring, meanwhile a wizard adds a lot of fun.

Well, frankily saying, I've never rolled a melee cipher But yeah, for this team, a 1h+shield cipher, not DW, would go. This would normalize your focus generation and add some tankyishness. I don't think that Res would add here much, you might dump it and get a normal high mig/int/per cipher. Or just take max mig/max int/10 everything else build. Pick a human, he would be beaten roughly anyway, and human's racial ability should be triggered quite often, it's great for a cipher. On ranged cipher. Yes, it's viable to rush through PotD with a ranged cipher and without wizard, I've described such a team in my topic, but that's full-party. A ranged cipher is quite squishy, while a wizard can be very tanky using his spells. Moreover, monster AI tends to focus fire on the cipher, so when you are running a squishy ranged one, you need to have heavy melee hitters in your team or other means to protect him. In 4-man team, such a cipher would die too often, it's too vulnerable.

A pally, a wizard and a priest compose the core of your team, so you have a tank, a buffer/healer, a debuffer/cc/magical DD, and this is a pretty decent and, in my opinion, viable team. I'd suggested adding a physical damager to your team. A fighter, a barb or a rogue would go, though the latter is quite squishy. But a good idea is to add a melee DW cipher. He performs as a good damager, and furhermore, he has his cool powers, so he'd be less squishy than a rogue and more helpful for the team than fighter or barb. After all, a cipher is a great PoE novelty and a very interesting RPG idea. One needs to have a totally perverted imagination to invent such a filthy sadistic abomination, who inflicts physical pain just in order to torture his victims also mentally. Looking at this Chikatilo moron, you can only think "I definitely need such a cruel guy in my butcher squad!"

@Boeroer: I've done some tests. First, the "Dragon Thrashed" in-game description is a bit vague. It says like "13 slash, 13 fire dmg for 3 sec", but practically it turns into like "59 slash dmg over 11 sec" + "59 fire dmg over 11 sec". A weird game mechanics, okay. I agree, that's considerable amount of damage, yes. Then, Aefyllath: 1. It takes 25% of all damage done, not only direct weapon's (i.e. 25% of weapon's + weapon's lash damage). So, if you have a burn lashed weapon and Scion of Flame talent, then with Aefyllath you'll inflict roughly 70% of direct weapon's additional fire damage. That's why a barbarian with fire lashed Tidefall and Scion of Flame talent is a real cheese. 2. It DOES generate cipher's focus. Yes, baby, yes. 3. It doesn't add damage to the Reaping Knives. A pity Perhaps, it's a bug? Even so, I don't think, it would be yet corrected... 4. I don't have a wizard in my current team, so IDK whether the chant adds damage to Blast attacks. I'm too lazy atm to generate him via cheats, sorry, guys. Thus, while the Dragon Thrased adds a decent amount of direct damage, the Sure-Handed + Aefyllath combo is more tactical one. Assuming this, you can't compare theese two with only mere numbers. I like to start the battle with Sure-Handed song, it hastens your cipher and priest, that means faster priest's buffs in the crucial first seconds of the battle. Don't forget that +%% to attack speed has additive returns until 0 recovery. This combo at least empoweres your cipher, but that's not all, a barbarian, too, not to mention already aforementioned Sacred Immolation. Since I don't run a wizard, I rely heavily on cipher's powers, so boosting the cipher is rather important for my team.

Yes, it's quite obvious to see, how much the Dragon Thrashed adds to chanter's damage. But what exactly do Sure-Handed Ila and Aefyllath add to party's power is much less apparent. And it depends on the party, of course. If you run a party with 3 or 4 heavy hitting ranged units, you can suggest picking a low Mig / high Res tanky chanter and use a mix of Sure-Handed with a 1st level chant, this combo would boost your party drastically anyway.

I see your point, but again, a "power party" is, for me, a party with high innate damaging potential in order to eliminate the stuff quickly. And a good thing is to have this potential before level 9 as well. What can a chanter add to this party, is a good boost to it's DPS. So please don't compare Dragon Thrashed to Aefyllath, compare the first one to Sure-Handed Ila + Aefyllath. Sure-Handed boosts all your ranged attackers, not to mention that it hastens some spellcastings (several priest's buffs, cipher's powers, it helps a blasting wizard to hit and interrupt etc). It's a great combo, I'd taken it for the only reason that it empoweres my cipher. Of course, there is a small gap between one Sure-Handed lingering expires and the second one starts, but we can cope with it. And this combo helps the chanter to stack his chants a bit faster in comparison to single Dragon Thrashed chant. Second, on a barbarian. I think, a DW barb is an interesting, but somewhat a "fun" build. He can do a lot of useful stuff, but consider one thing: the goal of the battle is not to interrupt, to debuff etc, the goal is to kill the enemies. A DW barb would go unless there were two totally OP 2H weapons: Tidefall and that Redeemer. A 2h-barb hits slow, but hard and can deal enough damage by hit to overcome enemy's DR. The 2H talent adds even more damage. Then, there is Blood Thirst ability: it adds rather little for a fast hitting DW barb, but it quite boosts a 2H barb shod in Sanguine Plate (+ Bloody Slaughter talent, hehe). This barb just kills, and the more he kills, the more he kills. Pick a Boreal Dwarf, give him a lashed Tidefall with "Slaying Beasts" enchant and switch to the Redeemer when needed (+ there is the Bartender's Ring). Thus, most types of the nastiest enemies will be covered by innate abilities and weapons. You describe a cool and powerful combo, but realize, that you need to make one or two casts, then position your barb precisely and activate his ability. For me, it's a lot of micromanagement. A 2H barb with Tidefall can do the same things just by autoattacking. And when he activates HoF... well, he makes less hits than a DW one, but again he hits hard. That's why I can't go PoE without this cool guy. Seriously, without him I feel a strong lack of damage, foes die too slowly and hit me too hard. Yes, it's a very simple and perhaps a "noob" build, but it's too damn effective. Perhaps, you haven't read my first message. Personally, I favor parties which consist of 6 different classes. And parties like "6 chars of one class" are just dull and boring.