Ymarsakar

If you are hitting the cap, why can't you use all the wound abilities then? You shouldn't be running out of wounds if you are capped up all the time. Does that mean you have never tested a monk with lesser wounds vs the same level monk without lesser wounds?

The pet is already a large part of the ranger dps, irregardless of what weapons style a ranger uses. In fact that's probably the only way to get the highest damage per second, is to have the pet keep hitting, along with the passive buffs to it. In solo I can see how a ranger dual wield plus pet can be very powerful. But in a party, ranged ranger provides more tactical flexibility and probably dps as well. Not generally front loaded dps like arquebus alphas, but tactical dps, hitting people that you can't reach normally with arquebuses or your melee characters, stunning them or just interrupting them. <B>But as for the -50% recovery, remember that sanguine plate gives a speed boost of 33% when crit, which is every fight because of such low deflection.</b> That's a good point, since -50% recovery is equal to about 30-33% attack speed.

Easy is like story mode, you will face less enemies and the ones you do face, you can just walk through them. Boss fights and mini bounties might still be an issue, since their difficulties are designed to be a spike up from normal run enemies. http://pillarsofeternity.gamepedia.com/Hiravias Hiravias is the out of whack joker in the party, so instead of being a short person people make fun of, he's like the life of the party instead for being weird. Eder is very personable but his later quest stuff and comments doesn't make him stand out as much. He doesn't comment on things as it relates to his backstory, so he doesn't role play it as much as Pallegina or Grieving Mother would. Patel's companions, Sagani and Aloth I thought were the most interesting, with Durance and Grieving Mother having been written by Chris, to be the more darker, surreal companion stories. Unfortunately the ranger class was pretty broken in 1.0 Pillars build, and was easily the worst of all classes. Now it's one of the better top tier dps classes, with a mini tank too. That just means I didn't have a chance to go through much of Sagani's story when I first played the game. Role playing wise, Eder's dialogue offers the most backstory on the Saint's War and is pretty much the face of Dyrwood's Eothasian counter parts. Whereas Durance is the other side of the story, the purges and the inquisition in the Dyrwood. He's not your normal healing and kindly priest archetype. The fact that they don't conflict much... is probably due to their writers having written them in isolation before game mechanics had been flattened. The cross banter has a little bit of it, but Durance is nasty to most everyone. Lore wise, Sagani and Aloth presents more views of other cultures besides the Dyrwood and Hiravias was written to be the face of the Dyrwood's elven and Glanfathan barbarian cultures. Hiravias is very "in character". Aloth doesn't exactly have a character he portrays, because of his other issue. Sagani is like the outsider looking in on Dyrwood, sort of like the main actually. Grieving Mother is the human tie in and face for the birth deficiencies. Basically if you like certain parts of the story and world Obsidian built, you might want to get the companion that ties you in more personally to it. Although much of it is available in the lore books at the wiki (reading them is easier than reading the small text in game). I preferred Planescape Torment's companion development. In there, the quest givers or villains you were facing, weren't merely people outside your party... they were your party in some cases. So because there wasn't a lot of choice for party, people usually stuck to the same mix, minus 1 or 2 change ups. In Obsidian's case, Josh Sawyer tells people to write quests assuming the player killed everyone like a psycho, including the companions. Were as in Planescape Torment, the companions really felt like companions, in war, and in peace. In health and in agony. Their combat and game mechanics were designed to be special, to make them stand out, and to make them easily recognizable as "that character". Nobody overlapped Morte or Fall from Grace in terms of their class or special abilities. Obsidian chose the right route by cutting down on the companions to choose from, vs NW2. But they are still rather "conservative" in this sense, of not trying to give too direct and linear a critical story. Accommodating a solo play through story wise, does tend to have detrimental effects on companion mechanics. Sacrifices have to be made.

You don't need to follow everything by word, but it's a better explanation of the basic mechanics than can be covered here in text that isn't the Wall of China size. He also has youtube videos detailing more why certain abilities are chosen at what level. <B>I just wish they didn't give Wood Elves such an obvious advantage for any ranged class as I'd never roll a wood elf </b> Don't underestimate the Orlans hit to crit conversion. It's was one of the better dps abilities at build 1.0 even and still is. The amaua build with multiple switching guns is also pretty neat, for micro builds. A lot of the dialogue options are more flavor and shortcuts. I often do a quest without taking the high resolve shortcut, because it is just more interesting and role play like. Notably the brothel quest. If the steam guide didn't explain why certain stats are taken, then check out the youtube videos. The explanation should be there. I used the build videos as a foundation to test my own builds in combination with those ideas, to come up with a fun and satisfactory mix that is suitable for my play style.

Have you tried lesser wounds if you are running out of the wound resource?

Large shields reduce the accuracy of wizard spells, so if the ability is counted like that, it would get debuffed.

Good thing to be a solid rogue in real life, you only need 1000-10000 man hours of practice and or experience. 300 something odd hours logged into Pillars for the OP writer, not counting uploading videos and planning/thinking about the mechanics, is already close!

It is random and it isn't shown as a math formula in the log as the hit rolls are. It only shows up as the difference in damage per hit. Which is easy to notice if you do something like, say, keep hitting something with high dr so all your damages are in minimums. I usually encountered it because I actually check the six or previously 10, attack rolls for the blunderbuss to check the damage on them.

It should be working in 2.0 White March They were talking about attack speed bonuses from everything not stacking. Good news is that 2.02 patch seemed to have fixed a lot of issues that 2.01 broke. If you want to find out for sure, find an inn and aggro the civilians. Then have the person wearing the frenzy armor take enough hits (from entangle for example) that it procs. Then count the seconds between attacks, preferably with larger weapons as it is more noticeable. Then compare vs the attack speed when it is off.

<B>At level nine starting White March it gave me the option of upgrading the White March encounters.</b> Yea, that's the high level content. I only used that to test my party builds against the wildling fish parties. I wonder if they have a way to play the high level content and get the npcs while at lower level. Maybe if I artificially raise my party level up, and then just de level my experience after finding the companions, it might work. Finding Zahua is pretty funny, although I read that some review articles spoiled that one. It's like article authors can't comment on a product or review it without talking about the plot.

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=416939844 For build details of classes and some explanations. The melee cipher can be interesting, although you need the fire godlike to really get focus when attacked. But it plays more like a rogue than anything else and doesn't have a lot of the tactical flexibility of the ranged cipher. Obsidian designed the wizard with the idea of the gith fighter or the muscle wizard in mind. Full plate, retaliation, fire godlike cipher with dual sabers can still kick out a substantial amount of dps for focus, while still doing some off tanking.

Cipher is definitely one of the more finicky classes to micro and deal with, which is harder on you Torm if you get a high level cipher without going up through the level first to see how basic abilities work. Generally like the chanter, the cipher makes good use of low level abilities even at later game. Less focus means you can cast it more, so it becomes a tactical decision whether to use amplified or the aoe confusion spells over more reliable, dps, cc spells that cost less focus. For most pulls against equal or lower level monsters, 6 or below in numbers, mental paralysis plus gun will be an easy tactic to use and will suffice for most of them. This is why I set auto attack to defensive, because the cipher should ideally save their alpha until after the cc hits, theirs or somebody else's. The paladin then fires the arquebus along with my other arquebus users, which can be enough to kill an enemy with 200 hp. For larger fights, you will want to figure out how to position yourself so that antipathetic rays and echo rays will get you the most damage, enemies in line of your fire. Generally I tried with a chanter as main tank puller and cast two echo rays on him, then had the chanter run around and turn the enemies facing the party, so they get hit Mind lance is also a quick cast at higher focus, for a damage spell that behaves like the lightning bolt, and at 20+ might can do about 90-100 damage on a crit. Mind wave costs 10 focus and prones people, so treat that as a lesser version of slicken. Painblock, higher focus spell, is a longer duration version of lay on hands, heals for less but prevents more damage with the DR. Save that for emergencies or if the paladin cannot cast a lay on hands. Generally for tougher fights, using the cc on the cipher is only to buy more time until you use your other party to turn the odds around. In tougher fights, the sheer dps of echo and antipathetic wave will break the enemy. Paladins cannot even heal through that kind of damage. All you have to do is to Hold Position and prevent the cipher from dying. Antipathetic ray has six procs of 20-25 damage corrosive + the beam damage buff from anti. Echo can hit or crit to 40-60 damage easily at 20+ might, it has 10 procs of foe only beams. Thus I use the mental paralysis + gun alpha trick against enemies with high hp or who are dangerous tactically speaking. I use the ray for when I need two rogue's worth of damage on the enemy, because everybody on the other side is dangerous and the numbers are too high to handle. The cipher has a number of different cc or crowd control. The charm/domination school and the paralysis aoe stuck spell. Plus some more aoe stuff at higher focus like amplified wave, which deals damage and prones people in a fireball aoe effect. What makes the cipher interesting for me is that I get to pick different spells and only use them when I think there is a tactical need for them. They can get pretty boring with the mental paralysis + gun trick if that is all you ever use. The charm is a low focus spell, 10, but is more useful than it seems. It debuffs the enemy so they can't kill our enemies, but makes them take more damage from their former allies. And it also allows for manual focus fire from the party on the charmed enemy, as their defenses are debuffed. If you charm an enemy chanter, you get their buffs. If you charm a spellcaster, they start casting spells or just take a lot of damage getting interrupted. Since GM's low might score affects focus gain over a long battle, she is mostly a cc cipher and dps only if you use echo and anti rays. Her per and relatively high int, allows her to make better use of mental paralysis and charm. Which are pretty much the stock tools of the cipher at all levels. The 2.0 AI did a pretty good job of casting charm at the beginning of fights, if you have the ai class set to crowd control. But the AI's choice of the cipher's other abilities aren't necessarily optimum. For one thing, they don't know when to cast the spell vs when to keep getting focus. There's a timing for when cc is needed. In big long fights, I sometimes notice my cipher has 100+ focus left unused. That is when it is time to use the high focus abilities and dump it out, like a monk uses up wounds. But that's usually right as the fight ends. This usually happens because I was being conservative with the use of my focus, keeping some in reserve for emergencies and I just kept doing damage with my blunderbuss. It can hit for 50-150 damage in total. With 18 dex and reload trait, light to no armor, it can fire maybe every 6-7 seconds. Might be even faster, haven't checked specifically. Another funny trick with cipher is that many of the spells are fast cast, and you want to pick those first if they are any good. Because fast cast spells means you spend less time recovery, which means more time getting dps on target and focus back. Mind wave, mind lance, amplified thrust, can all be interesting and very annoying to enemies. I got hit by mind wave one time when my party was grouped together, proned everyone except one person, and then the enemy was surrounding me with his melee chargers. The heavy hitters were the rogue, ranger, and cipher, as designed by Obsidian. Most people notice the rogue's damage. The ranger loses a significant chunk of dps if the pet dies or basically starts doing nothing. But the cipher's dps is only auto attack + the whip effect... if you don't ever cast the damage spells.

You don't have per encounter spells at level 8, so you don't lose per encounter spells at level 9. What is lost is level 1 spells being rest. What I'm talking about is a rebalance to the system. How many spells do you want your wizard to cast per encounter, gk at level 13? 12 + the rings? How many battles last that long?

Ranger for ranged dps. Easier micro, more dps since the farther away you are the less armor you can wear without dying. Also pet blocks enemies, so one more way to keep them at ranged.

Force of anguish is pretty good if you have space for it. Two wounds and it often knocks melee blockers out of your way, allowing you to just zip around. More mobility.

<B>That's just incoherent. I level up, and suddenly I can't nova as effectively? What?</b> So it doesn't make sense because of the math, is that it. A wizard with level 3 per encounter spells has 4+4+4 active abilities per encounter. This means many builds don't even use the higher level spells and focus more on cast times to dump those free abilities on the enemy. 2+2+1 will not give as much benefit per encounter, but between rests it will still be much higher damage totals than some wizard that runs out of spells every 4 casts per level. It's the difference between a paladin having 5 per rest use of lay on hands vs 2 per encounter use of lay on hands. Or even the difference between the old paladin's one per encounter use and now two per encounter use.

GM is not built for blunderbuss. You have to use the pistol, like St Spark at least. Blunderbuss needs high might to penetrate DR and high accuracy, but normally the acc is taken care of by mental paralysis. Draining and biting whip are the two must haves for the cipher, plus the amulet or the White march upgraded amulet for ciphers, plus blacsonn and the other food buff for harder fights. Persistence short bow is probably one of the better weapons for an early cipher. I don't use the out of combat buffs on the cipher at all, it's too annoying to rotate through. The damage on the 25% aura is also unpredictable at times. If I use out of combat, it's the damage spell, echo. Persistence has about the same damage as a warbow, but faster rof, but slightly less accuracy. I set GM's resolve to 3 +1 +1 and put the rest into dex and might. To do good damage with the pistol, you need the gunner reload trait and a relatively high dex. Wearing no or light armor will also help. Generally with ciphers they are microed to auto attack to self or defense only, and with no class ai on at all. You pick out a target that has low will and then mentally paralyze them, the cipher will then attack them while they are debuffed. This is how you can run cc and still apply good damage. Without a wizard or priest, you are going to be hurting. The cipher is not a versatile casting class, it cannot debuff or cc the way wizards can at higher levels. It's much closer to the chanter or other dps classes. It needs some time to get focus up, and while you can buy time with mental paralysis, you won't have enough focus to cast other spells like the 6-10x beam spells which do most of your damage aside from auto attacks against paralyzed enemies. Ideally the wizard casts miasma debuff and the cipher casts will attack spells. I wouldn't take the +10 focus. That's for easier fights, not harder ones.

I was up against some of those greater rain blights that are immune to pierce. Given my cipher and my ranged were all using arquebuses and borresaine, that caused a minor issue when 4/6 people in the party got downed, ciphers couldn't regain focus, and I had to run and kite the entire enemy away, then work on them piece mean 1 by 1. Aloth in full plate was one of the last ones standing there and contributed most of the dps with the blights. The downed people were in sight of the enemy once they rubber banded back, but two got up and that was enough to isolate the remainder once their endurance regened out of combat. Playing as a slightly under level party makes such tactics more necessary, vs the brute force approach of charging. Generally the issue with cutscenes is that it breaks my custom formations. It puts number 1 and 2 in the party first, instead of them being in the back. Since 1 and 2 were the ciphers, that caused some funny issues.

The druid aoe heals are rather hard to use. They seem to need to be cast before you take damage, as in before your main tanks move away from your formation. By tank I mean anybody with high deflection and high DR plate that is. But one or two paladins fills in the priest slot quite well in my experience at level 8-10. The game is far less micro if I use only one caster and 1-2 ciphers. The cipher's aoe cc makes managing larger fights easier and can prevent incoming damage just long enough for the paladin to do his work. Two cipher's chain casting recall agony, mental paralysis, and various other stuff, makes for an interesting offensive tactic every time with 3 arquebus alphas. Shod in faith is a pretty important item for solo, small parties, or parties that need reliable healing. It is now 2 per encounter, like lay on hands. But well, you can just shoot the guy with entangle and set it off before a fight, but that's rather cheesy and I don't use it intentionally.

Torm, did the game move your party in as a cutscene and thus prevent you from pulling? Because that's a great way for the enemy to setup a full party aoe cc on you before you can do anything about it. The wizard's buff makes him a clutch tank at times, given the spell reflection and what not. Although I don't know how many abilities it works on.

Per encounter doesn't need to be removed. The number of spell casts should be reduced once it becomes per encounter.

DPS from Aoe, yeah. It's not really comparable to a rogue though, since they do their dps in different ways. Damage across many enemies vs damage against one enemy. Barbarians are definitely less squishy due to the higher endurance. If you use paladins, they can save a lot of squishy classes via lay on hands and exhortations. The thing about barbarian is that because the carnage is a melee aoe, the dps goes up the more enemies you have there and the more debuffed they are. Selecting a good weapon will determine much of your dps on the barbarian.

What happened to ALoth's essential phantom?

I like using 16-18 dex on the wizard since it allows the blight aoe dps to do very well and gives faster cast time on the aoes. Being in full plate, I normally use the wizard in the arquebus firing line and only use the spells when absolutely necessary. Say, more than 3 enemies are on screen. A might of 12 and a perception of 16 is generally good enough to cover some of the cc spells and adds a little bit to the dps spells. Generally I don't need the wizard to do much straight dps or total damage, since two ciphers, a monk, and/or a paladin would normally handle that.

Soulbound upgrades sounds way too close to the World of Warcraft legendary weapons. Sentient and intelligent weapons, self aware, that you can play around with and converse with, that is I think closer to the BG2 and Planescape Torment environment. I got an idea. Why not reforge the Caed Nua steward into some kind of weapon, so you can get voice overs when you activate the weapon and select some custom upgrades, like the stronghold has custom bonuses depending what you build. The quests they had for that spear in the ruins, the one you craft with your soul, was better content for legendary weapons I thought. But they should be adjustable, with little to no cost, from a dialogue screen.