Alesia_BH

Aotha, Hearth Orlan Rogue: Caed Nua Aotha's assault on Caed Nua went smoothly, save for a misclick error resulting from my BG experience. As my earlier teaser post implied, the spirit battles in Caed Nua were trivial. We bunch together, we ran Zealous Accuracy and we cast Consecrated Ground + Armor of Faith + Blessing. I believe my teaser post had mentioned Curse of Blackened Sight, but, in truth, that was on the wish list: Aloth's un-respected book (personal restriction) still did not include that spell. No matter: it wasn't needed the spirits posed no threat at all. You'll note that we targeted the shadows first, rather that the phantoms. I'm sure Jaheiras Witness cringed at the sight of that, but, actually, the shadows are more of a nuisance than the phantoms in party play. The phantoms can stun, true, but against a party, they can't stay alive long enough to finish off a tank, and they can reach anything other than tanks, since they can't teleport or use ranged weapons. The shadows, in contrast, use ranged attacks, allowing them to reach sheltered squishies, who can fall quickly. They can also teleport, limiting repositioning flexibility for your potential flankers. I'd rather fight phantoms than shadows- at least with a party All done now. Next, the spiders. Simple deflection wall, backed with Consecrated Ground. We skipped the low level priest spells here because we were trying to complete the quest without resting. (In general, I'm still trying to find the the optimal balance between preparedness and plausible resting. Like Serg, I prefer not to leave quests to purchase camping equipment: it's an immersion breaker and it's also unbalancing in party play. I don't believe Aotha was ever endangered, on account of my rest limitations, but some battles were made more difficult. I'll highlight those times if and when I notice them) Finally, Maerwald. Aside from a knockout, caused by a misclick, Maerwald went quietly. We took the standard approach of vacating the room. We then attempted a unbuffed insta-kill via a ranged volley (something that usually works on lower difficult levels) as an experiment. As it turned out, the Maerwald's PotD deflection bonus was enough to keep him alive. My intention, at this point, was to send Eder forward to engage the blights. I clicked on his sprite circlet, as was always my practice in BG. The trouble is that that frequently does not work in PoE: clicking on the sprite circle will, often, fail to select a new character, leaving the previously selected character active (Does anyone else have that problem? It happens to me all the time). And so instead of sending Eder, I sent Aloth. I didn't realize my mistake until Aloth was in engagement range. He was dropped almost immediately. Fortunately, Maerwald was very nearly dead by then. All he needed was a nudge from, um, himself. No further damage was taken here, save a few endurance point in the melee finish of the blights. Aotha's posts are now critically behind her progress (she's on the Burial Isle, actually). I'll try to catch up today so she can finish up tonight. Best, A.

Aotha, Hearth Orlan Rogue: Minor Quests in and Around Guilded Vale While Aotha's crew was never endangered in the early game, they did take their share of lumps and bumps as I adjusted to PotD. True threats were non-existent. Knockouts were, however, common. Sadly, the character who suffered most was our former PC, turned companion NPC, Ashoka, Kind Wayfarer Paladin. Has a character ever suffered more at the hands of an inept pilot? I ask you. Having observed the loss of Aur to the large group of spiders in the Eothasian temple, I chose to employ a strategy that left one and only one of our team members imperiled. Guess who? That's right, our beleaguered heroine, Ashoka. Ashoka was tasked with luring the spider to our predetermined safe engagement point, the doorway on the south end of the room. Caught in a web, Ashoka fell, predictably. Her sacrifice was not in vain, however: the rest of the crew prevailed with ease. Moving on to the skuldrs, Ashoka, helped Eder form a wall, despite a sprained ankle. Happily, she stayed on her feet and the skuldrs fell without incident. On level 2, we learned that our spirit fighting tactics were on point, if not perfect. We suffered no knockouts at the hands of shades or spectres. Our black ooze fighting tactics, in contrast, leave room for improvement. Charging blindly with a low con L2 recruit in the lead is, unsurprisingly, less than ideal. The final oozy engagement of the quest was a success, although, the party did take its lump upon first approach. Aloth and Durance both fell to an opening spit salvo. In the end, however, Aloth's Fan of Flames won the day. The recovery of Ranga's potion went smoother. By now,I was starting to internalize the need to buff in each and every semi-major engagement on PotD. This lesson was driven home when Eder found himself imperiled due to my decision to withhold Prayer Against Infirmity. I was slightly anxious heading into the quest's focal battle, the xaurip encounter, but Aotha and her team handled it capably, despite a fiery surprise. When Aloth joined us, he had some questionable spell choices. I decided not to respect him, however, since respecting NPCs has always felt icky to me. In need of AoE damage, we decided to tap L2 via Rolling Flame, operating under the assumption that bounce backs wouldn't be an issue in a large, open, outdoor area. Imagine my surprise when I saw this: our Rolling Flame returned. Happily, both of them missed us. In the end, Zealous Accuracy + Armor of Faith + Blessing + Consecrated Ground, with a little help from Prayer Against Fear, proved sufficient. We won without serious injury. Finally, the sporelings.Zealous Accuracy + Armor of Faith + Blessing + Consecrated Ground once again. I'll post on Caed Nua soon. Best, A.

@Enuhal. Do you have any interest in trying a solo run? It could be fun to see another, perhaps with a different class.

This would happen if the other knocked out characters were still in proximity to the lurker. If part of the team falls, and the rest of the team leaves the engagement area, then combat will end, for the entire team, seemingly, however, any fallen members who remain in proximity to enemies will stay down until the enemy in question goes away somehow- either by death or movement. So, if part of your crew fell near the lurker's spawn point, and Eder fell away from it (which is, if I'm not mistaken, what happened), then upon disengagement, one would expect Eder to awaken, but not the others. Eder would awaken once the enemy walked back to his spawn point. The others, however, would still be in the lurkers proximity, keeping them down.

Great post, Jaherias Witness! Very informative. I hope to see more like it! Best, A.

Fantastic work, Enuhal! Congratulations! Your run gives our young thread a legitimately impressive PoE achievement: a completionist, PotD, Expert Mode, No Reload (Trial of Iron Mode). It was a pleasure to read. I look forward to re-reading it now that I understand the mechanics better. Please do message Serg with the details for our Hall of Heroes. And note well everyone: our emerging Hall is now online! There is a link on page 1 of this thread, in the second post, just after the challenge introduction. Congratulation once again, Enuhal! Best, A.

It's on PotD. (Good catch. That was a typo. I had cut and pasted the intro from Ashoka's run and neglected to edit the difficulty entry. Fixed now.)

Aotha, Hearth Orlan Rogue: Caravan Camp to Guilded Vale In the interest of getting Aotha upto date, I'm going to cover her early adventures quickly. You can expect more detail later on. So! Caravan camp. I hadn't intended to cover Caravan Camp, really. But after reviewing the screen shots, it became apparent that they provided a stripped down context within which to display the fundamentals of Aotha's tactics. Aotha is a lightly armored, melee, crit build rogue who uses precise positioning to insure safety. She opens at a distance, with a slow, heavy damage ranged weapon and then, as the battle field evolves, selects a safe location from which to attack hand to hand, using a range 1.8m melee weapon. With a Perception of 21, it didn't take Aotha long to score her first ranged crit. Chunkilicious! We're in the ruins now. Calisca has closed. Aotha has fired her first bolt and has taken position directly behind Calisca. You'll see a lot of this, going forward Variation on the same theme here, but this time -with Aotha out of Crippiling Strikes- she is taking a position directly behind her enemy, flanking her foe and triggering Sneak Attacks. Flanking is, incidentally, my favorite means of triggering Sneak Attacks. Virtually anything can be flanked and the duration is indefinite. Just one last hurdle before we reach Guilded Vale: the lonely outlaw. Believe it or not, I was nervous about this, seeing as how I've never tried PotD before and didn't know how the enemy bonuses would play out in practice. Foruntately, her simple strategy (shoot heavy, then close) proved upto the challenge. Weapon Focus: Soldier, recently acquired, increased her odds of landing in melee. No damage here. Upon arriving in Guilded Vale, Aotha sought to build a party. She recruited Aloth and Eder and an oddly familiar elf, who she met at the Black Hound. Perhaps they knew each other in a past life? Or perhaps they ran across one another in the White that Wends? We added Durance next, and then proceeded to our first quests: 1) recovery of the fine arbalest in Esternwood; 2) recovery of Fulvano's gloves; 3) the liberation of Tenfrith. First, the arbalest. Aotha has teamed up with Ashoka here, flanking from a safe distance Next, the gloves. We used Armor of Faith and Blessing here Finally, Tenfrith. Armor of Faith + Blessing once again. Aotha spent more time ranged fighting than she should have in this fight, but can you blame her for wanting to play with her new toy? Opening Finish Our next stop was Caed Nua, seeking Kana. We stopped to kill a troll along the way. Once again, Aotha is flanking at range 1.8m. With the crew assembled, Aotha took on her first minor quest: Ferry Flotsam. Our next post will cover A Mother's Plea and Burried Secrets Best, A.

Ok, everyone! Meet our new heroine: Aotha the Hearth Orlan Rogue Game Version: 3.7.0.1318 with White March I & II Difficulty: PotD Settings: Maim Before Death: On; Injuries: On; Expert Mode: OFF Mods: None Character Description: As a Hearth Orlan with a furry face, Aotha, has struggled to find acceptance in Orlan society. And where, exactly, does an Orlan who can't find solace among her people go? Few kith embrace them. Preferring solitude to scorn, Aotha set off for the White that Wends in her mid teens. Living in the wilds, she has become, keen, perceptive- sharp as a razors edge. She maybe loved by none, but none doubt her skill with bow and blade. She is destined to be known, destined to be respected, destined to be a hero, but also destined to be alone. Gaming Notes: Having by now completed NRs on Normal and Hard (both out of challenge), I now feel ready to attempt my first run on PotD. I, for one, am nervously optimistic. Aotha has potential, and my skill set is by now balanced to the challenge of PotD. Success is not assured, but it does seem possible. We'll see how it goes! Best, A.

I'm really enjoying your run so far, Semiticgod! it's fun to watch another PoE newcomer run a PotD rogue broadly similar to mine. I think what I'll do is put coverage of Ashoka's run-on hold, skip over Alikae, and start covering Aotha. She's still early enough in her adventure that she could qualify for the Hall, I think. In the alternative, we can, I suppose, make a one time exception, in light of the fact that the rule was newly initiated. I'll get too it ASAP!

My first character, Ashoka, had a Resolve of 16. The logic there was as follows: 1) She was my first character, and to ease the learning process I wanted her to have no glaring defensive weaknesses, so I balanced her stats across the Fort, Reflex, Will pairings. That left the choice between Int and Resolve 2) She was going to be tanking and running Zealous Endurance (while Pallegina handled Zealous Accuracy) with Zealous Endurance being most important to frontliners, whom she would be in close proximity too 3) She was not going to be using scrolls or potions extensively and her abilities were going to be mostly duration independent 4) On RP grounds, Resolve made more sense than Int for her Considering all of the above, I ended up with a Resolve of 16 and an Int of 10. Her Fort pairing was Might 16, Con 10. Her Reflex pairing was Dex 10 and Perception 16 I think the thing to keep in mind in any and all stat discussions is that context matters- even setting aside RP considerations. One of the beautiful things about the character creation system in PoE is that it affords the opportunity to sculpt a wide variety of characters from the raw materials of class. I, personally, find it unwise to talk about the best stats for a "rogue" in general. I'd want more details before rendering a judgement. What type of rogue? Melee? Ranged? Specialized DPS? Well rounded? Is the character solo? If the character is partying, who is the character traveling with and what role will the character play in the party? There are tendencies that correlate with class, true, but even within each class there is enough variation to compel consideration of the details. Nonetheless, I do agree that Resolve is, generally speaking, less important than other stats. Best, A.

It depends on your build. If your intention is to use potions to buttress defenses and scrolls to provide AoE offense -the specific context I was referring to- then Int becomes relatively important, via both duration and AoE. If you character is a specialized single target DPS machine, then Int is less important- even counterproductive, in some respects, in light of the considerations Jaheiras Witness raised. You haven't said so explicitly, but I suspect you're building a DPS rogue, in which case Int is of less value. And to be clear, in the general case, min-maxing, I'd rank Perception, Might and Dex above Int for a rogue. I'd value Int over Resolve. Best, A. Btw, another thing to consider is the extended duration on afflictions, and thus the additional Sneak Attacks enjoyed by Int rogues.

@Semiticgod. A tip on jumping the learning curve. There are by now a lot of clues in this thread on how to thrive in PotD. Aotha is succeeding because I've been assembling them into game plans for each battle. Let's take Caed Nua, for example: The pieces in this case were: 1) Serg and Enuhal's heavy emphasis on ranged fighting and accuracy; 2) Jaheiras Witness's use of cornering; 3) Enuhal's recommendation of Concencrated Ground; 4) Jaherias Witness's use of Come, Come Softly Winds of Death; 5) Hulk'O'Saurus's use of Concelhaults Corrosive Siphon and Blindness spells. And so we have this: A) Zealous Accuracy + Inspiring Radiance, with a protected back backline of Aloth, Durance, and Aotha, a pike rogue with a perception of 21; B) A pre-scouted corner position; C) Concerated Ground active; D) Come, Come Soft Winds of Death active; E) Curse of Blackened Sight and Concelhaults. The spirits had zero chance of success and I really truly figured none of this out on my own: I just read, assimilated ideas, and put them together. Best, A. Btw, we fought the courtyard battle here (same method):

Yuppers. Aotha rocks. Yuppers again! That's Alena, priest of Wael, collagist and performance artist. She's basically an Eoran Dadaist. She's become my preferred Durance replacement. She travelled with Alikae, too.

Btw, this is Aotha. She's doing well, as you can see: no knockouts, 15/1 damage dealt to damage taken ratio, party damage leader (by far), playing on PotD.

On rogues and Intellect. Intellect is helpful if you intend to use potions and scrolls. Potions and scrolls are an excellent way to round out a rogue, adding defense and AoE offense. I'd rather have a longer duration on my large bonus potion buffs, for example, than take a small bonus through Resolve. (If you're curious about Aotha's stats, I'll remind you that I don't min-max. I pick a portrait first and then I assign stats in a manner fitting the portrait, while also keeping plausibility in mind, in light of the story. Character cohesion is more valuable to me than power optimization. Aotha is 11, 10, 13, 21, 13, 10)

With the exception of BG1 runs, I don't believe we ever had a case of a run being entered and posted after completion. The closest case that I'm aware of was my halfling barbarian, Arkona, whose BG2 entry post didn't occur until after she had completed three chapter 2 quests. I felt bad about that and considered withholding her from consideration. I'll await the opinions others before entering my vote, for the challenge, in the general case, however, I am going to decline to set a precedent with Alikae. I'll share Alikae's run, if people would like to see it, but I'm disinclined to grant her entry on our lists. Best, A.

Noted. But that's sort of the point. You'll be forced to work with what you're given, flaws and all, and that, in turn, will require you to get the mechanics down. But, sure: If it doesn't sound fun, then totally pass!

Question everyone: What do we think about runs like Alikae's -runs that were completed and then posted only after completion? Upon reflection, I think that they should not qualify for the Hall of Heroes/Honorable Mention lists. It's far more fun to follow an active run, as it is happening, then to following one that has already ended, and where the ending is known. It's kind of like watching a replay of a sporting event after you've already checked the score. I think we should require players to submit their entry posts at the very beginning of their runs. We should also encourage them to keep progress reports upto date. What does everyone else think? Best, A.

It's not that PotD isn't harder than Hard, but, rather, that my game knowledge is scaling faster than the difficulty increases, mostly because I've been reading Enuhal, Jaherias Witness and Serg. So, my most difficult play through was my first on Easy, followed by my first on Normal, followed by my first on Hard, followed by my first on PotD. In retrospect, I feel I could have made the jump straight from Normal to PotD and that that would have aided my advancement as a player. If you're not feeling PotD now, why don't you do this: run on Hard and consider using an unoptimized party, based on the in game NPCs, to force you to get your positioning and mechanics down. Best, A. Btw, for the your reference, my full play history is: 1) Easy (many reloads); 2) Normal (2 reloads); 3) Normal (No Reloads); 4) Hard (1 reload); 5) Hard (No Reloads); 6) PotD (No Reloads as of Level 6)

I agree with Serg. Graveyard records should be at the player's discretion

I know! I do think this calls for celebration. This is our first completed run in a new challenge- one that has kind-a-sorta taken off in a very short time, despite the low traffic on these forums. It's a big moment for Semiticgod, of course, but also for the challenge and the community. Congrats, Semiticgod! And thank you so much for sharing! If there are any lurkers out there, now would be a great time to introduce yourselves, and offer congrats for our first success! Best, A.

It could be interesting. I've been making a point of sticking with the games' NPCs, with minor adjustments, since I prefer to work within those limitations, but there's nothing wrong with custom parties. If you'd like to try it, feel free. I do think you should up the difficulty, possibly to PotD. Setting aside the final battle, I didn't notice that much of a difference between normal and hard, honestly. And once I understood those differences, they became unproblematic. So far, PotD has been surprisingly straightforward. It has forced me to focus on accuracy and positioning more: that's it. Knowing what I know now, I probably would have gone from my normal NR straight to PotD. Best, A.

Implements can work, although, averaging across all enemy types, the elite bows will offer superior damage, as I understand. I, too, appreciate the flexible damage types of implements, although piercing immune enemies are generally unthreatening, at least to a party with varied weapons. The one implement that I'm inclined to signal out is Gyrd Haewanes Stenes, specifically for priests. Priests can get a +10 bonus to accuracy with certain weapon types, based on their deity. None get bonuses with hunting bows, sadly. With soul bound weapons, like GHS, however, the weapon type no longer matters: if you take the ability, you'll get the +10 with the soul bound weapon, even if the type doesn't match (my understanding is that this is intended behavior). So, in Alikae's run, we had a priest of Wael named Alena. Alena took Incomprehensible Revelation and Weapon Focus: Noble. She soul bound GHS, which has excellent accuracy bonuses on it's own, without need for enchantments. The result was an impressive accuracy for a priest. This is unbuffed at L8: (GWS is available early, with no risk and virtually no effort)

I'm not an expert -I only have a little more experience than you- but this is the impression I'm under: 1) Averaging across all enemy types, bows offer the best ranged DPS. Persistence is the best, some say. 2) Firearms have their uses, nonetheless: A) They penetrate Arcane Veils; B) They get over the top of DR; C) They're superior when you're looking to one shot a dangerous, low endurance enemy, such as a mage; D) Some have useful abilities, like the marking enchantment on St Gram's Spark; E) They're a good choice for warriors who open with a ranged volley and then close in melee, since reload time becomes irrelevant. I'm sure someone more experienced could add. Best, A. Btw, I'm not sure I understand your point regarding weapon switching. Can you clarify? At the beginning of combat, the gun is always loaded. You shoot. You switch, holstering the empty weapon. If you switch back, you still have to reload, with a full timer. Where is the time saving, exactly? Do you mean equipping two firearms and switching between them? Shoot one, switch to the other, and shoot that one? That would be fair. There's nothing wrong with carrying two distinct loaded guns, emptying them, and then reloading them one at a time. (An island aumaua with quick switching could be a cool gunfighter, I guess)