pawlo16

Nice guide overall. One thing I was surprised not to see mentioned is Moon Godlike. Silver Tide is extremely strong in party play: it gives several automatic heals per encounter, affects nearby allies as well, and is especially valuable on tanks or fragile melee characters who are expected to take damage anyway. For many frontline builds it feels much stronger than the other godlike racials, and the fact that the healing benefits the whole party makes it more than just a personal defensive bonus. The lack of a helmet slot is a real downside, of course, but I think Moon Godlike still deserves a separate mention because of how much survivability Silver Tide can add to difficult PotD fights.

Interesting build, and I definitely like the idea of turning a Priest into a proper melee character once the important casting is done. Tidefall and Abydon’s Hammer also make the whole concept much more fun than simply parking a Priest in the backline with a ranged weapon. However, I’m not fully convinced by the attribute spread from the point of view of pure combat efficiency. PER 14 seems somewhat unnecessary to me on a Priest. Priests already have very strong Accuracy support from their own spells, and many of their important offensive spells are not exactly struggling to land once the usual buffs are active. I would rather move some of those points elsewhere. DEX, on the other hand, feels much more important. A Priest has a huge number of useful spells to cast during difficult fights, and very often the limiting factor is simply how quickly you can get all those buffs, debuffs, heals and offensive spells out. Because of that, I would personally prefer to push DEX as high as possible. That is also why I think St. Gangrene probably gives up some overall combat efficiency compared to a more conventional Priest build. The melee part is genuinely useful and much more entertaining, but every investment into making the Priest a better greatsword user competes with making him a faster and more efficient caster. So to me the main appeal of the build is not that it is stronger than a standard Priest, but that it remains a fully functional Priest while also giving you something fun and effective to do after the important spells have been cast. And, admittedly, using Tidefall and later swinging Abydon’s Hammer around on a tiny Priest is extremely appealing. :)