Gniel

What qualifies as a light weapon?

And the written version of their guides: https://fextralife.com/5-turn-based-builds-for-pillars-of-eternity-2-deadfire/

The builds FextraLife presents are: 1) Psyblade Tank (Blackjacket/Cypher) - Tank 2) Forbidden Fist Votary (Monk/Paladin) - DPS, Disabler, Martial 3) Berserker Warlock (Barbarian/Wizard) - DPS Martial 4) Skirmishing Scout (Ranger/Rogue) - DPS Hybrid 5) Elemental Shifter (Helwalker/Shifter) - DPS Hybrid, Tank

After some time thinking about it I really don't think these are even close to the strongest builds possible in TBM. The most powerful builds are IMO, still hold overs from RTwP. Helwalker/Ascendant, blunderbus shenanigans, etc.

Fextralife just published a youtube video on five of the strongest turn-based builds. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TYEBAhMAxf0

IMO, the caster classes benefit most from brilliant. I've run an extremely successful Cleric (Tactician/Priest of Eothis) multiple times. Getting multiple heals of the same level as a battle goes on is very helpful. The only problem is brilliant from tactician isn't especially reliable, even running a cypher in your party; I'm not sure why. The same idea should work for any class that has class level restricted abilities (Wizard, Priest, Druid). These classes have a limited number of uses of their skills per class level, thus there can be more benefit from getting those charges back. It randomly selects a class level of what you've used per recharge, but it can usually be manipulated easily enough. I'm not sure how well Chanter works with brilliant, but their resource is considered very valuable even though it automatically recharges. Just be careful about pairing Tactician with a melee class that doesn't have an solution for being flanked. It's a hefty penalty for the chess playing warrior.

How does power level effect conjured weapons? Increased damage, summon duration, penetration?

Yeah, it's not 100%, it might be 30% of the time, but it still does trigger a disengagement on occasion, while always applying one of the strongest disables in the game. How triggering the disengagement might work, the Terrify grazes leaving a very short duration. While coming out of terrify the AI decides to change targets/activity and runs away. The engagement is restablished as soon as the terrify is over and triggers on the moving enemy.

I just finished a run on Veteran with a Trickster/Fighter tank. I had four Magran's Fires challenges going, including Wael's challenge which hides most all numbers which prevents me from determining exactly how strong this build is, but suffice to say that I consider it to be one of the best tanks I've ever tried. The idea is to dump resolve and lower deflection in order to make him a juicy target for AI. Compensate with higher constitution, armor, damage mitigation skills, and a good healer at his back. You also make a lot of use of the fighters [get over here] skill to have at least two enemies engaged at once. After you have multiple enemies engaged you cast Rymgrand's Horrifying Vissage (a tier 3 resolve affliction) which terrifies enemies in melee range. They stop attacking you and sometimes even run away procing the warrior's enhanced attack of opportunity. It benefits from rogue's persistent distraction, riposte, and damage enhancing passives. Thus it becomes a tank, disabler, DPS hybrid, which does a great job at the tanking role. I'm thinking about writing a build guide, but only after I test it on PotD and without expert mode or Wael's challenge.

FYI, you left the ] in the link. Removing this trailing character gives the intended URL.

I've now completed all of Magran's Fires. I did it 3 runs, I think, and all on Veteran. Run 1: Eothes + Magran The was actually my first time to beat the game. The timer takes away a lot from the game, but it also helped me learn how to speed run the game and huge advantage that doing the main story first thru Magran's Teeth (Act 3 I think). This influenced how I played the next two runs a great deal. Run 2: Berath + Skaen + Galawain + Ondra + Woedica Woedica's and Ondra's are annoying. I barely noticed Galawain. Berath was difficult but I figured out a team comp that worked until I got resurrect. Also, speed running the main story allowed me to be over leveled for much other content. Run 3 (Nuclear fallout): Abydon + Rymrgand + Helyea + Wael Equipment decay without being able to see how much funds you have was annoying as hell. I started with 55k via Berath's Blessings. I still ran out of money without upgrading my unique weapons until the end of the game. I had around 900 spoiled food items at the games end. This version was so annoying I speed ran it more than the others and beat the game at lvl 15. Hylea was also very annoying in herself as I made the mistake of running a melee Watcher. Hylea follows around the watcher, thus keeping her at a safe distance from the battle is a thing in itself. If you do Hylea main a ranged hero. So I think I really enjoyed having the fires available as an option. I feel like Eothes was the only one that taught me much of anything about the game. I also spent more care paying attention the my AI programming with Magran's challenge. I was quite disappointment that there wasn't a final challenge unlocked after completing all the other challenges. There might have been some teasers on Twitter about this, so maybe it's coming. I started on a triple crown run, but failed fighting the bats in the cave. I guess I'm not ready for a triple crown and am doing a PotD, Upscaling all, Iron mode. I'm only leaving out expert mode as I find this to be a very important aspect of trying my first run of PotD.

I tend to max perception for all characters that do anything offensive, plus I also like to use active skills with bonus accuracy, so I think I miss a lot less than others. TB really highlights how much missing costs you in combat. Also, at the beginning of the game you have much fewer abilities to mitigate misses.

I just had this problem. I got the final kill of the battle from a chill fog tick, then the story never progressed after combat ended. I reloaded the auto-save then finished the battle with a weapon kill and the story progressed without issue.

I finished the RTwP Magran challenge on veteran difficulty so I'm going to give TB a try again on PotD. There should be a lot fewer trivial fights, at least until much later in the game. I think I prefer "wih"'s solution, binding end turn to a mouse button. The game already was putting my default action speed at 5/5, so it was zipping straight thru enemy turns. My concern though was not with how long a fight took, but how many fights there were between quest progression, especially trash mob fights. A good fight feels great, for example the middle of the dig-site before you free the animancers. I'm planning on having at least a couple of simple right clickers in my party so I can run thru right clicking trash mobs down quickly once it comes to that. Thanks for the tip, I'm going to give it a try! Between your tip and increasing the difficulty to PotD I think I'll enjoy another shot a full run in TB. It'll be first try at PotD though... Good point. I noticed I was restarting a good amount of fights in my Eothis challenge because I was playing against the clock. Fewer reloads does make for a faster total game experience.

The double post was an accident. This was my first post of my account and I didn't read the part where the post was awaiting approval of a moderator so I assumed the post was somehow lost and re-posted. Magran's challenge is the opposite of TB, it's interesting switching between the two.