Shai Hulud

If we only care about buffs and debuffs.... Wizards have very good debuff spells (jernaugh's equalizing burst, miasma of dull-mindedness, Arkemyr's wondrous torment, even chill fog) though wizard accuracy tends to be worse than ciphers. Wizards have topnotch self-buffs (everything in llengrath grimoire, arcane veil, etc) but basically no party buffs. Also have decent CC spells Priests have very good debuffs (whole condemnation tree and woedica writs) and buffs, plus healing. Devotions for the faithful, Champion's Boon, Minor Intercession, Shining Beacon, Minor Avatar, etc. Landing debuffs is fairly hard, though easier than wizard if you have up devotions for the faithful. Not much hard CC. Druids have a few good debuff spells. Rusted Armor is good. Nature's Mark. Have good party buffs particularly moonwell and nature's balm which can stack a lot of healing and defenses. Natures Bounty is very good though clunky to use as you need empty quick slots. Have decent CC with Tornado, embrace of the earth talon, calling the world's maw. Accuracy is poor compared to ciphers. Ciphers get +10 accuracy on most debuff spells, anything targeting will benefits from the empty soul. You also want borrowed instinct up always which gives +20 accuracy and +20 all defenses. Usually want psychovampiric shield up for melee ciphers, raises your resolve and debuffs enemy resolve. Body Attunement is okay but targets fortitude. Secret Horrors is very good cheap area debuff (sicken+frighten), phantom foes is enormous aoe flanked debuff, very useful if you have a tactician. Doesnt stack with other sources of flanking. Lots of great self+ally or ally buffs like echoing shield, pain block, tactical meld. L8 spell Defensive Mindweb is one of the strongest buffs in the game. Time Parasite very strong buff/debuff. Ancestor's Memory on-demand brilliant. Also great CC with mental binding, whispers of treason, ringleader etc. You didn't list chanters but they also have tons of buffs, debuffs, and CC. The Thunder rolled and at the sound of his voice, and the lover cried out are all great CC (stun / paralyze / charm). Many chants debuff enemies in various ways. Some unique buffs like sure handed ila chant also. Long duration AOE buffs like each kill fed his fury, set to their purpose, and the great self buff their champion braved the horde alone. And of course ciphers and chanters have the advantage of being able to keep casting things over long fights. Blood mage can do this too though may need a lot of healing. It should be noted that casting pure debuff spells isn't always the best tactic since they can take a while to cast and may not stay up long, and time spent casting debuffs is time you could be doing something else. But there are definitely situations where the right debuff makes things much easier. Like ciphers echoing shield removes all concentration stacks immediately (+ long duration aoe resolute). Ciphers have a lot of mixed buff/debuff also. Personally for buffs and debuffs I'd rank them like this: cipher > priest > chanter > wizard > druid Though it really depends what you're trying to do. Like if we care about self-buffing to make oneself tanky, then wizards move higher up. Plus wizards have a ton of versatility with damage spells, cc, and summoning as well. And wizards have some amazing debuffs, just not much in the party buff area... IMO every party should have a blood mage, a chanter, and a cipher. Multiclassing makes it easier to fit things since you can for example have a spiritualist and not lose out on much compared to dedicated chanter and cipher. And thaumaturge is quite competitive with blood mage + priest. Multiclassing can also help increase accuracy for casters. If you stick Ranger, cipher, or fighter onto a caster class like wizard, druid, priest, chanter, you can gain a lot of accuracy at the cost of a couple spell tiers and slower progression. Also keep in mind if you have characters with morningstar, club, or flail modals you can greatly debuff (-25 for 10s, modified by INT) fortitude, will, and reflex. And unlike spells there is no separate roll, as long as the attack at least grazes vs deflection then the debuff sticks. Also it is irresistible since its straight stat debuff instead of an affliction. The Morningstar will breaker also debuffs will (-3 per hit stacks to -15), but Sara sichr you can get earlier. --- Also your cipher spells that single target fortitude may miss a lot, but most of your good spells target will and they shouldn't be outright missing that often even with the deadly deadfire mod. You may not be stacking enough boons and stats. If you're playing on max difficulty with extra scaling mods every little bit helps. Not sure whether all these boons (see link) apply to the whole party but like nature's resolve is +10 accuracy. Nearly all your characters should have 18 to 20 base PER also. Anyway with a cipher you really need to keep up borrowed instinct, which should be pretty easy except in some rare cases where you fight one strong enemy (dorudugan). If borrowed instinct won't hit your main target, look for a secondary one. You get the +20 accuracy +20 all defenses regardless who you target. So like fighting sigilmaster auranic, her will is super high so hitting her with borrowed instinct can be difficult. Instead you target one of her henchmen. On POTD upscaled they have like 85 and 95 will. Should at least graze, but you can make it even easier by debuffing target will first, normally with psychovampiric shield and/or smacking them with a club. PVS not only grants you steadfast, it debuffs the target by 20 will (-10 resolve). So you have +10 from natures resolve, +10 from the empty soul, +25 from a club hit, +20 from PVS, and another +20 from borrowed instinct, and borrowed instinct also debuffs 8 INT and 8 PER for another +16 vs will. The Helm of the white void gives another +10 on anything that causes afflictions. If you have echoing horror that can help as well as it frequently frightens nearby enemies on kill Sometimes you'll just graze a secondary target, in this case you can cast borrowed instinct again until you hit (ideally crit). It has a fairly long duration with high INT even on a hit though. Another trick is you then cast a charm spell like puppet master. This has multiple purposes, first it keeps your team from attacking the enemy you're draining (when he dies, borrowed instinct effect dies), and it also indirectly increases the duration of borrowed instinct. When I soloed auranic with a transcendent this was my tactic to keep up borrowed instinct, killed the sigil first, then auranic, then the henchman so I had up borrowed instinct constantly No rest guide (can also install no forced rests mod) https://forums.obsidian.net/topic/101300-guide-permanent-bonuses-approach-for-a-no-rest-run/

Tier 9 spells rather meh IMO though the Tier 8s are quite strong

Are you in a party or is this solo? If in a party your cipher will mostly be occupied casting buffs (including self-buffs) and occasional CC. For solo yeah soul blade is mostly about using soul annihilation though I always keep up psychovampiric shield and borrowed instinct and occasionally use mental binding or big debuffs like secret horrors. Forbidden fist attacks do so much damage you can usually fill focus in 3 hits. You still cast spells but the majority of focus should be spent on soul annihilation since it so damaging. It's the overall strongest most versatile build I've found that doesn't rely on overpowered mechanics like extending potions of final stand with wall of draining. Chanters are pretty versatile you can definitively have two especially if multiclassed. Your herald can punch things and use the good offensive invocations while a backline troubadour / psion can spend invocations on summons (animated weapons are really really good) and party buffs like set to their purpose. Also might want them running different chants. I really like the "many lives pass by" chant, one could use that and the other "sure handed ila". Most useful chants IMO. But if you want a high DPS and spellcasting cipher a devoted/cipher or devoted/ascendant is hard to beat. Or a sharpshooter / ascendant. You get a ton of accuracy bonuses with either. The devoted would do a bit more dps but seers also get pets (bears and boars are the best) which you can buff with pain block and echoing shield making them decent tanks. Pure cipher is also really good in parties, mostly because of defensive mindweb and reaping knives. If you have at least one character with high deflection, another with high fortitude, another high reflex, and another high will, defensive mindweb makes your whole party tanks, and reaping knives bring in focus really fast. Personally I find the cipher damage spells kinda underwhelming compared to weapons in most situations, since deflection is usually lower than other defenses and you get more accuracy bonus on weapons (though empty soul does give +10 vs will), although you do have some really good CC spells. The charm spells and mental binding mostly. Oh another cool thing about soul blade is you can stack the focus gain you get from killing things. You can do this with a hierophant's wall of draining or more easily strand of favor and cabalists gambeson at the end of fights. Admittedly cheesy yes but I did an ultimate run with a hierophant like this and it was a lot of fun, eventually you start combat with like 15k focus and can just mass zerg things with citzal's spirit lance which distributes soul annihilation and builds focus crazy fast. Also the seekers fang becomes stupidly strong if you stack focus like this. One hit will do like 600 damage upfront and thousands over time. My preference with ciphers is definitely soul blades though in a party a devoted/ascendant or sharpshooter/ascendant would be pretty nice. Essence Interrupter all the way I'd pick stats something like 13/9/13/20/18/3 for melee, for ranged similar but can dump con more and dont need might as much, probably more like 11/6/18/20/18/3. If you go forbidden fist the stat spread looks very different, more like 14/7/3/18/13/20 Lots of items that stack ranged accuracy, damage and penetration also. Ring of the marksman, sky dragon wurm or harley, blackblade hood / thaos headdress, claim and refusal, high harbinger robe, gauntlets of accuracy, ring of prosperitys fortune, etc

FF / soul blade is pretty interesting but requires community patch for FF attacks to build focus. It can work as a ranged build with instruments of pain, stacks a lot of accuracy, weapon penetration, defenses, and healing from FF attacks. Well, ranged-ish, instruments of pain gives a range of like 4.8, usually enough to hide behind dichotomous soul summons if need be. I haven't used Deadly Deadfire but I'm guessing weapons still scale better than spells. Ranged ciphers can stack tons of accuracy, particularly seers and psyblades. The Hunting Bow Essence Interrupter would be my go-to, sick bow available very early, secondary Aamina's Legacy. With pierce/shock at mythic it has enough penetration since few enemies have high AR vs both, and summoning fodder on crit is just lovely. Can multiclass devoted for some +accuracy with disciplined strikes, conqueror stance, and weapon mastery (+20, and some hit to crit). Stacks with borrowed instinct and psychovampric shield. And devoted gives +2PEN and more hit to crit, on top of +1 from hammering thoughts. Take monastic unarmed training, the devoted bonus also applies to fists if you come up against something where pierce/shock/slash won't do it. Devoted also adds a lot of survivability with unbending and rapid recovery. Hierophant blood mage / soul blade is lot of fun too, not ranged, but using soul annihilation through citzal's spirit lance is just fantastic. Also have to mention psion/troubadour if you like summoning things, though you could also make a troubadour/cipher and stick a bow in his hands.

It is possible to beat all megabosses without interrupts. The only boss where interrupts become sort of necessary is Hauani O Whe, though there are other ways. If I can easily interrupt things with high accuracy and energized or interrupting blows, YAY, but I don't think you need to go out of your way to time interrupts on things.

You can remove his buffs with arcane dampener, concussive tranquilizer and the like if needed, also buff your own accuracy. Minoletta's Minor Missiles would indeed underpen but the great thing about the spell is the missiles are *guaranteed* hits and each one ticks combusting wounds. If you have one or more blood mages they can easily restore minoletta's minor missiles and keep casting it while maintaining combusting wounds. The damage really piles up when the messenger has a couple dozen ticks of combusting wounds. Each tick does 4 burn vs fortitude per 6s, not counting +damage effects like from might, kuaru's ring, griffin's blade etc. The combusting wounds do target fortitude but if you have 20 of them going off every 6s enough are going to graze and hit to do serious damage. I've killed the messenger before doing literally nothing but casting combusting wounds + minoletta's minor missiles (besides defensive spells), with solo blood mage, I was at most L16 but I think 14 or 15. I was finding it hard to outdamage his healing from Oblivion's Call but once I got a decent number of combusting wounds stacks from spamming missiles, he melted away. Well eldritch aim or some other perception inspiration is +5, devotions for the faithful is +10. Think that's about it for wizard and priest. Merciless Gaze I guess. Ciphers, rangers, and fighters can stack a lot of accuracy making hierophants, geomancers, and battlemages really good in this fight. Nothing wrong with chugging some potions of perfect aim though, particularly to get combusting wounds to hit. That plus eldritch aim and you'll at least graze most of the time. There are also items for stacking ranged accuracy though. Like Sky Dragon Wurm will give your whole party +3 accuracy against distant enemies. Boras gives +5 spell accuracy. Various +PER items, the Horns of the Bleak Mother give +10 accuracy vs beasts and +1PER. Honestly not sure if Messenger is considered a beast since he's a lich dragon. He could be a vessel, I can't remember. But if he's a vessel Charm of Bones gives +5 accuracy. Don't cast with more than a small shield, also. If you can get the nature's resolve buff from Tikiwara Island that's +10 accuracy as well. Konstanten's Boon and Aenely's Boon give bonus perception. Probably some stuff I'm forgetting. This battle is definitely possible at L16 but you'll have a much better time with a few more levels.

That party will probably work but having a chanter (troubadour) and especially a cipher would make things easier on you for megabosses. Like maybe monk/cipher/troubadour/blood mage/(priest or druid). You probably don't want to build around megabosses though as that's just a small part of the game and you can always recruit adventurers specifically for those encounters. You don't really need brilliant for most classes. Chanter does gives a brilliance like effect but it is pretty expensive at 7 phrases. Still, with a troubadour that's like 21 seconds with brisk recitation so you could make it work. Ciphers can hand out single target brilliant for 12s (modified by INT), so a cipher with maxed INT could hand out about 24s of brilliance, a bit longer if single class, which would restore 4 resources for 70 focus. If you make the cipher a DPS monster like a devoted/cipher (hunting bow) or ranger/cipher you can get 70 focus in like one hit (though SC is good too for defensive mindweb and reaping knives). Hierophant (blood mage / cipher) is also really good. And forbidden fist / soul blade is extremely good but forbidden fist only generates focus if you have the community patch from nexus mods, which I'd recommend anyway. In vanilla the forbidden fist ability isn't considered a weapon attack and doesn't generate focus. If you want to defeat all the megabosses it is easier if you have a cipher since they can kill Hauni O Whe with disintegration while if you don't have a cipher you have to be able to stop merges. It is very doable with a full party, easiest way is likely to give everyone arbalests and crossbows with the modals to interrupt the oozes. For megabosses anything that can regenerate resources tends to be strong. So monks, chanters, ciphers, blood mages, tactician (if you can proc brilliant tactician, which is easier solo I think). But even something like a ranger is quite strong with generic attacks as long as you can keep them from being damaged too much. Just give them a hunting bow like Essence Interrupter and with hunting bow modal they do massive damage. Of the classes you listed priests and druids will have harder times in megaboss fights since they can't regenerate spells by themselves, but if you have a chanter casting "His Heart Did Fill With The Light Of The Dawn" and a cipher handing out "Ancestor's Memory" you should be able to maintain resources. SC ciphers are really good in parties in Deadfire also because Defensive Mindweb is insanely good, and you can hand reaping knives to a monk or other melee char to generate focus even faster. Another option for resource regeneration is the mod "potions of enlightenment" which adds a fairly expensive potion you can purchase in certain shops (or create, with vithrack brains main ingredient) that gives +1 resource / 30s for the rest of the fight. You can find this mod standalone or as part of @Elric Galad's Balance Polishing Mod. You might also consider the Balance Polishing Mod for its own sake, particularly the buffs package, as it makes the chanter's brilliant-like ability a little better and gives resource regeneration options to most single classes that didn't already have them (fighters get resource chance on being hit, rogues on making crits, paladins when an ally falls, rangers when their animal companion is hitting enemies (using bonded fury ability). Summons are also improved quite a bit. The balance polishing mod also has a nerf package but you don't have to install that part. https://www.nexusmods.com/pillarsofeternity2/mods/335 (community patch) https://www.nexusmods.com/pillarsofeternity2/mods/438 (balance polishing mod - needs community patch) ----- Should add if you don't have room in the party for both a chanter and a cipher a chanter/cipher is quite good, you can still cast "Ancestor's Memory" as a cipher while sending out endless summons and buffs as a troubadour. Troubadour/psion works well if the character doesn't do much direct fighting but troubadour/generic cipher is also excellent.

Messenger is pretty tough to beat unless you throw lots of fire spells on him. In particular combusting wounds + anything that procs combusting wounds will chew him up. I've soloed him at L16 or so, basically kept up combusting wounds and then cast things like minoletta's minor missiles (each cast gets like 7 procs) and pulse spells like chill fog (frost damage doesn't do much but each pulse stacks combusting wounds). If you have a druid infestation of maggots procs combusting wounds a lot, though targeting fortitude may be hard to hit in that particular fight. Still you're going to have an easier time fighting him at L20, simply since you'll have better accuracy and defenses making everything easier. Don't know much about fighting Furrante but being human I'd guess he's vulnerable to stuff like slicken, mental binding, other CC etc.

Wizards are going to be stronger IMO in both games, particularly blood mages in Deadfire. That said you can easily complete both games with either party. You can actually do fine with party companions (hiravias and tekehu as druids, or aloth as wizard) Tekehu also plays well as a multiclass druid/chanter, and kana is a decent chanter in poe1. It is pretty hard to mess up wizards since you can cast from grimoires and respec anyway. Aloth has decent wizard stats for an NPC. Also I think Deadfire is considerably harder than POE1, at least if you're going farther than the main story into DLC content and whatnot. If I were you playing on Hard and wanting to play druids id just go with hiravias and tekehu. They're both fun companions and their stat spread is decent enough.

Yeah you can add the food to your inventory and manually rest but it removes the per-rest bonuses like prostitute boon, rikuhu, amira, ngati shrine blessings, magran's blessing, nature's resolve, dawnstar blessing, alchemic brawn, alchemic wits, alchemic guile, luminous adra potion, adratic glow, sigil wardstones, etc. So you'd have to console all those in if you wanted to test out a different food that way keeping other variables the same. It is easier to console in the status effects from food, usually there are 3 to 5 of them. It just looks messy because it doesn't give the correct icon and lists the effects separately under "status effect name error" Normally I have a ton of per rest boons by the time I'm fighting anything serious as I usually try to do the game with just one or two rests at the beginning (and the forced rest in ondra's mortar). Theres probably a better way to add food bonus like maybe a separate command I have not found with find, I've just been using applystatuseffect player[tab] food_mohora_wraps_SE_might for example then two more for the recovery time and hostile effect duration bonus, which gives the bonuses correctly but then you have to manually remove previous food bonuses and it doesn't show up clean in the character sheet

Crappy thing about ghost heart is you won't be able to summon the spiritual ally though while the pet is summoned.

Is setattribute different from attributescore? If I want to set my dexterity to 3 for example I use "attributescore player[tab] dexterity 3" And yeah removeability and removestatuseffect are useful. Opencharactercreation removes most abilities (some exceptions like ranger animal companion abilities) but it doesn't remove status effects like boons or food. Usually this is good so you don't have to reenter all the per rest bonuses, but sometimes you want different food bonuses for different builds. One thing I havent figured out is a clean way to apply said food bonuses. I can add the individual status effects for the food but they don't show up as an icon and say "name status error" in the character sheet. I can also add the food as an ability and click on it to apply status effects but the icon is an X for some reason

That's a good guideline for what that build is trying to do (cast lots of spells), but you should deviate significantly for a battlemage (see below) Yeah this is the most annoying aspect of turn-based, but you can use standard actions and then switch grimoires. Memorize a few critical spells (chill fog, slicken, wall of draining), and the rest can be planned. To avoid wasting a round switch grimoires after using standard actions like mule kick or a standard weapon attack. Can also use ABD to heal / get resources / switch grimoires. You can cast wall of draining while invisible but you can't blood sacrifice without losing it so keep that in mind. Not true regarding wall of draining. You get more benefit if enemies have stuff to drain but you do get some even if they don't. Just line up the walls so they hit as many enemies as possible. Have to say if wall of draining is a let down you're not using it right Try wearing the cap of the laughingstock. It gives -10 deflection and immunity to resolve to anyone in the aura, which is 2.5m and modified by intelligence, so with decent INT it's pretty large, the same size as an INT modified fireball (probably around 5m radius). The "village fool" effect is both a buff (immunity to resolve afflictions) and debuff (-10 deflection), but it is irresistable and shows up as a buff on enemies, meaning you can drain it, and since it has no duration you can always drain it. In a party the village fool effect would also apply to nearby party members, gimping their deflection, but solo there is no downside as the aura only applies to you if you have some kind of clone wearing the cap (mirror image, phantoms), which you may want in fights where you need resolve immunity, so in those just keep up mirrored image or a phantom. It's one of the deck of many things items. So these are roughly what I'd pick per level as a high level respec. (While leveling up I'd take Vigorous Defense at 10 but once you get Llengrath's Safeguard and Wall of Draining, it isn't needed anymore since you can proc the safeguard and extend with wall of draining and the effects don't stack). L1: Disciplined Barrage / Chill Fog L2: Knock Down L3: Slicken L4: Fighter Stances / Two-Handed Style L5: Confident Aim L6: Weapon and Shield Style L7: Disciplined Strikes / Bear's Fortitude L8: Mule Kick L9: Rapid Recovery L10: Charge / Secrets of Rime L11: Weapon Specialization L12: Bull's Will or Elemental +1PEN of choice L13: Unbending / Uncanny Luck L14: Conqueror Stance L15: Armored Grace L16: Improved Critical / Tough L17: Farcasting or Elemental +1PEN of choice L18: Pull of Eora or Elemental +1PEN of choice L19: Unbending Shield / Wall of Draining L20: Weapon Mastery Weapons: Club, Pike, Rapier, Quarterstaff, Morningstar, Flail or whatever weapon of choice. Mostly you use Kapana Taga (or Squid's Grasp) for flanking immunity until buffs are up, then Citzal's Spirit Lance. For enemies immune or resistant to piercing, Concelhaut's Parasitic Quarterstaff is actually rather good, or any of a number of sabres (or fists even, though you'd need to take Monastic Unarmed Training) Only spells I'd consider must takes are Chill Fog, Slicken, and Wall of Draining. These are the most important spells for you to have immediate access to with this build (for the brilliant procs, interrupts, and extension), for others you can plan grimoire switches. I also like Pull of Eora for how it groups enemies for hitting them with the lance or wall of draining, but it isn't a must-take. Important spells from Llengrath's Martial Masteries: Infuse, Spirit Shield, Deleterious Alacrity of Motion, Llengrath's Displaced Image, Ironskin, Arcane Reflection, Llengrath's Safeguard, Citzal's Spirit Lance Arkemyr's Grimoire: Arcane Veil, Arkemyr's Brilliant Departure, Essential Phantom, Call to Slumber Ninagauth's Teachings: Ninagauth's Shadowflame, Death Ring, Ninagauth's Freezing Pillar Ironclasped Grimoire: Concelhaut's Crushing Doom, Gaze of the Adragan, Concelhaut's Draining Touch (for giving to phantoms), Concelhaut's Draining Missiles Might as well list some items, though some depend on the situation Head: Cap of the Laughingstock most fights, sometimes Rekvu's Fractured Casque Neck: Charm of Bones, Strand of Favor, Precognition Body: Devil of Caroc BP with Devil's Due Rings: Entonia Signet Ring + Ring of Prosperity's Fortune (ring of minor protection if poor) Feet: Footprints of Ahu Taka Cape: - Giftbearer's Cloth mostly, alternatively Cape of the Falling Star Hands: Firethrower's Gloves or Gauntlets of Accuracy mainly, Left Hand of the Obscured and Gatecrashers also good for melee Waist: Upright Captain's Belt for immunity to Pull of Eora (alternatively take Hold the Line and wear Undying Burden) Pet: Pes or Abraham early, Retina later for +1 flanking and +5 accuracy, or Ooblit for +1 round beneficial effects Weapons:Kapana Taga + Lethandria's Devotion, Kapana Taga + Outworn Buckler (use copy function on weapon), you get Kapana Taga from boarding or sinking The Heaving Harlot, a ship that patrols near The Black Isles. Squid's Grasp is a decent substitute, possibly better due to attempted parley, though I'm not really sure how the bonus action speed translates in turn based vs RTWP.

Dorudugan at L16 is probably impossible. You'll definitely need wall of draining and probably potion of final stand as well. Unbending won't do you much good against one really strong enemy like Dorudugan because your healing on the first few rounds is lower and you'll get killed. Even with potion of final stand dorudugan is going to be very very challenging solo because he heals himself faster than you can damage him unless you've procced a high damage conduit crit from deltro's cage helm. Once you get wall of draining you only need to cast unbending once. If you recast it the effect doesn't stack, what happens is you just refresh the duration. Unbending stacks with itself every time you're hit. You'll see in the character sheet it will say something like "unbending (x10): X health over Y rounds" but it actually applies X health every round. Spells should apply to unbending but some abilities don't proc correctly so maybe some don't. I'm away from home so can't check spell interaction atm. In general though, you won't get much healing if you aren't being hit. Also without wall of draining unbending stacks will reset at the end of the ability's duration. You naturally get healing fastest in fights with lots of weak enemies hitting you a lot. In fights where that can't happen, try kiting out one enemy using traps, then let him hit you to build up unbending, and just keep extending it with wall of draining, then once you have decent number of stacks run into combat. Nearly every fight has at least one weak enemy you could kite to do this, but if not, just blood sacrifice to near death, drink a potion of final stand, and throw a wall of draining. Of course you need to be L19+ for that so... When soloing potd upscaled it is usually best to avoid difficult combat until you are high level. You may need to complete some more quests, easy bounties, or just sail around...I'm usually L19 or l20 by the time I've done ashen maw, even with eothas trial constraints, and you can do this avoiding most combat. Check ultimate runs for pathing, they are usually pretty similar, though you have more freedom with eothas off. There are lots of quests you can complete without combat, like motare o kozi, poko kahara (except the very end), symbols of death, Crookspur, etc. Stealth is your friend. When you do get wall of draining at L19 I think you'll find everything really falling into place. Also solo runs are easier if you avoid rests and stack buffs. There are other threads with guides on no rest runs, the most important things to pick up are the dawnstar's blessing in Port maje which gives you +50% healing, and nature's resolve buff on tikiwara Island (+2 res, +10 accuracy). Here is a good guide on no rest runs. You can console in buffs if you missed them. In general you do this with "applystatuseffect player[press tab] [nameofeffect]". You can find the names (for example dawnstar blessing) with "findgamedata dawnstar" or "findgamedata boon". You may get a big list as a result but they have the statuseffectgamedata type. You should easily have room for mule kick. You don't need to memorize spells at all but I'd suggest memorizing wall of draining since it isn't in ninagauth/arkemyr/llengrath/ironclasped. Maybe if you tell me what fighter and wizard abilities you've taken I can give my opinion which ones you don't really need. It's really useful for easy aoe interrupts, even if you mostly prefer casting spells. -- Also yes while you are lower level SC blood mage is going to be better mostly because you get wall of draining a lot faster. But in potd solo runs you typically want to level up a lot before doing hard combat anyway, and it isn't hard to reach l19 just questing and sailing around, so by the time you're doing difficult content (megabosses, DLC etc.) you should be max level either way.

Seers are also very strong in melee. Stalker/soul blade Melee seer is a crit machine, I like weapons with on-crit effects like sungrazer or grave calling with vessels. Kapana Taga is decent to debuff will. Cast Pain Block and Echoing Shield on pet, so your role is striker while pet tanks. Bear and boar are good choices. I prefer boar as it has a bit more HP and regen but bear has better armor. Though really I prefer generic Ranger / soul blade so in those fights you need to keep more distance and use bows you don't get bonded grief. I go into more detail on a seer build in this thread. I think in retrospect I'd change stat spread slightly though, probably more like 13/9/15/20/18/3. Ranger side doesn't need high INT but cipher side benefits a lot.

I used to do that a lot, and it has some value in that you learn how builds work as they level in different encounters... Ultimately though I think the best way to test builds is make a save at any point after you get your ship, and use console command OpenCharacterCreation Follow with addexperience 190000 to get l20, can do lots of stuff from there. The "find" command is useful, it shows you console commands and their parameters. "Findgamedata" is also very useful, it finds names corresponding to items (giveitem) or status effects (applystatuseffect) or abilities (addability) etc.

Yeah in non FF builds I tend to have dex in 13 to 18 range and often dump resolve, but forbidden fist attack does such massive damage compared to weapons, and generates wounds, and heals you, and enfeebles enemies, so for FF builds you want to attack as fast as you can without attacking faster than curse duration. I was kind of surprised you could actually completely dump dex and still attack once per 2s in robes. With devil of caroc bp probably more like 2.4s, maybe bit less with Abraham as pet. Lightning strikes / swift flurry plus dual wield plus two weapon fighting is equivalent to roughly 25 points of dexterity, so you don't suffer much as long as dual wielding, especially if you have some of the passive +dex boons and berath champion stats. You should try tweaking dex and int with the console as the exact optimal values depend on your armor, other equipment, and whether certain abilities have been used. The display value for forbidden curse is going to be way off, doesn't factor in resolve and lone wolf, so you have to pause right after using ability (make sure clarity of agony or enlightened agony is up also to further reduce curse), check character sheet for the actual duration, then compare with attack + recovery for FF ability (with swift flurry and two weapon style active), ideally this value will be the same or .1s longer than the curse time. And in case you didn't know, console is accessed using ' key (grave), then type iroll20s, enter, then "attributescore player[press TAB to compete] dexterity 3" for example (without quotes, and pressing tab completes commands or names of the player which isn't always obvious). Iroll20s disables achievements but only if you save that file and continue from there, if you just invoke it to test things and then reload it won't affect achievements.

Yes in CP you get two weapon and dual wielding if actually dual wielding or using tuotilo. In vanilla FF isn't considered a weapon so it doesn't get any weapon bonuses. But fists never get one handed bonus. The +accuracy from transcendent suffering compensates though. BTW @Lapinouple personally I dont like godlike for this, their stat bonuses are bad and it prevents some very good helmets. The helm of the white void is particularly good since it gives +10 accuracy on forbidden fist attacks but rekvu's fractured casque is also super useful in some hard fights (like dorudugan). I think hearth orlan is the best, +2 perception is awesome, +1 resolve is great, and we don't max might so the -1 might doesn't matter. Resistsnce to resolve afflictions is also nice. Humans are also a good choice for stats plus fighting spirit. Dwarves are okay so you can dump dex to 2. My stats are basically max res, max per, 10 to 13 int, completely dump dex, 6 to 8 con, put rest in might. And this is optimized for light armors or DOC BP. With heavier armors you can increase dex to attack a bit faster or increase INT (i tend to go latter route). I find personally 13 INT is sweetspot if you can get resolve to 35 and have solitary wanderer ring + clarity/enlightened agony

I tend to dump dex because even with max resolve and ring of the solitary wanderer and strand of favor, plus enlightened agony, the curse lasts around 2s, which is about how long it takes to make an attack with an effective dex around 9 or 10 + lightning strikes + two weapom style. So with amira's blessing (+2) alchemic guile (+2) Rabyuna (+1) and berath (+2) that puts you in the 9 to 10 window. If anything I sometimes still attack too fast and have to use small shield modal. But these stats are with community patch which you should really install for a lot of reasons. Without CP the forbidden fist attacks take more like 2.9s with dumped INT because you don't get dual wield or two weapon bonuses. You can get away with INT up to 13 if you have the items I mentioned plus enlightened agony which increases INT to 18 but also greatly reduces hostile effect duration. I have my script set up to keep up swift flurry (cast on losing dex inspiration), keep up enlightened agony, and only use forbidden fist if smart. Sometimes you don't have enough wounds so I also add a block to use forbidden fist if not smart but it has a 3s recovery time so the curse won't build up. Dagger for +10 melee deflection? FF monk is a bit monotonous if you just spam FF but you should also summon dichotomous souls and use instruments of pain behind them. Enduring dance also very useful if you can keep from getting hit too much. FF/soul blade is really good because the soul blade side makes it less monotonous. SC monk also very good, you get resonant touch and whispers on the wind.

If my pet is afflicted by something bad enough to warrant spending 1 bond he's usually dead shortly after I mean I guess I can see how that's an issue at 0 bond (albeit a minor one IMO), though to me that just seems more reason to make it cost 1 so it isn't spammable. And however you determine bond regeneration, whether complex or not, can't you just state in the description "This should on average return X bond over Y seconds" to simplify for the end user? Doesn't seem any more opaque to me than "15% on hit" or whatever (definitely less confusing than BPM Wall of Flashing Steel description). In vanilla Bonded Fury has this same effect of instantly removing pet afflictions at 1 bond but nobody said that was powerful, it seemed a pretty weak ability honestly. This aspect is minor compared to the bond regen. Is there no solution that doesn't break scripts, aside from cooldowns? I imagine Bonded Fury is even called in the standard ranger scripts (I haven't actually checked, can't atm). I don't know why but even with sufficiently long cooldown on the scripted ability, the ranger just sits there trying to cast it over and over. Like I can tell him to cast when the dex inspiration runs out, which happens after the ability ends (like 67s on my test ranger) and after the first cast she still keeps trying to cast it but can't since it's greyed out and it just hangs the AI completely. I acknowledge your point (At 0 bond anyway) but I think breaking AI is a worse side effect than easy removal of pet afflictions. That's interesting about deadly surprise and takedown.

It really isn't that complex. Did you give the animal companions dual wielding so they attack roughly the same? I mean the equation depends on enemy deflection, but I looked at Dorudugan previously and found what values you'd need for positive bond return, and if you want to return 1 bond per 60s or 2 or 3 or whatever it isn't hard to solve for the X% resource return. I don't see Bonded Fury as an ability solely to get back resources. It's a pretty decent long duration buff on the animal companion. And if it costs 0 and returns on average (for example) 2 bond or costs 1 bond and returns on average 3 bond, the only difference in the implementation of the latter is you have to pay enough attention to not let yourself get to 0. Honestly cooldowns in Deadfire are a bad mechanic, particularly on abilities where you don't benefit from casting repeatedly (like bonded fury). It's fine on passives like Divine Retribution but on active abilities...not a fan. Breaking scripts seems like a pretty serious side effect to me. Lots of people use them, and cooldowns on buffs are especially bad since these are the easiest thing to script (compared to say holy radiance, which I'd want to cast manually anyway). But if you do go that way with the cooldowns, I'll just edit out the cooldown from the gamedata file since scripting is mandatory with magran's challenge, and even without scripting makes the game less tedious. Are the pet talents tagged as beast? I never noticed if they were, though would make sense I guess, and Empowering Instinct would indeed be pretty good. Don't use Binding Roots much personally. I mean, probably a *little* too strong overall in 2.5, though I had to have Hardy + Bonded + Shadowed up basically always and the boar was still killed several times in Dorudugan fight. My sense of the class being too strong is mostly about resource management being a little too easy. Heal Companion healing stacking with Shadowed Hunters is also a lot. In the previous version of BPM there weren't enough resources to have even heal up all the time. Still, I don't think 2.5 ranger is stronger than a spiritualist or SC monk or transcendent or ravager or a dozen other builds, and pretty similar to like a devoted/ranger or savage (in previous BPM). It doesn't seem broken, just needs some fine tuning maybe. Didn't get a chance to test Vengeful Grief really, I always ressed the pet when he went down. 48% is a pretty huge speed buff though. Basically...I wouldn't overcorrect in this hotfix based on the very limited testing window so far. Though the Divine Retribution on knockdown thing sounds pretty busted I'd like to test the ranger in some other fights, like maybe SSS content, which is challenging but not to the extent of megabosses. It is downloading on my parents' computer, which I *think* will run it, but the internet is SLOW so I won't know for several hours minimum.

That monk combo looks crazy lol. Carry seekers of the flame in other hand and you've got a game breaking build. How do you get the roughests to all stand where you want them? Like you can console in enemies at exact points? I usually test things "in the wild" which doesn't always work as well since it isn't controlled

I only had time to test about an hour and only the single class ranger. I am visiting relatives, hopefully their computer can handle POE2 and I can test more stuff later. I just fought Dorudugan and SC ranger can solo Dorudugan (with Abydon challenge off anyway) now. That in itself doesn't mean it's overpowered as I can solo Dorudugan with about 15 other builds (that I've tried). But...Bonded Fury IMO should not cost 0 given how good it is. With a potion of enlightenment and super high INT (27 or something) I was able to sustain Hardy Companion on animal health < 90%, recast every 32 s, Shadowed Hunters to keep intuitive up, and of course Bonded Fury. The 60s cooldown is not really necessary because you don't gain anything out of casting it repeatedly, do you? And the duration is over 60s with high INT. Even if the companion dies and you revive him, the buffs are still up (though counting down), so I'm not sure what the purpose of the cooldown is. I need to test some simpler encounters to see if they are too easy now. I think it is probably okay, though Bonded Fury should probably cost 1 bond as I didn't even struggle to keep up these buffs. I thought I'd need to use the invisibility part of Shadowed Hunters to hide and refresh a couple bond with potions of enlightenment but I only needed to do that twice. Dorudugan went down after about 40m. More later. -- I really don't like the cooldown mechanic. It seems mostly pointless unless you have pretty low INT i guess, but I feel like making it cost 1 bond is a better solution (adjust resource proc to 20% to 30% if necessary). The scripting engine doesn't know how to handle cooldowns. It just keeps trying to cast the ability when it's in cooldown even if I put in a 60s delay between casts. Basically it breaks any script that uses it. How would you get 30+ INT with a ranger? I had pretty much every buff (alchemical wits cauldron prostitute effigy etc), plus a +2 INT necklace and the INT was 27 I think. Could get to 30 with suboptimal pet, ring, and helmet choices. I guess in a party a chanter can cast set to their purpose. Okay, answered my own question. High INT is also rewarded if ability costs 1 bond, plus you still get longer heal companion, shadowed hunters, stunning shots, etc. IMO it is a cleaner solution to make bonded fury cost 1 bond and adjust proc rate as necessary. Gives more risk/reward if you have to use a bond to activate and keep your pet alive to get resources back. Or I guess you could keep 0 bond and lower proc rate to like 10% though I don't like that as much... Yet another alternative is make other abilities cost more but this is more complicated figuring out which ones to adjust, plus this would basically force use of bonded fury. Haven't had chance to test more yet, just thought would elaborate on the cooldown.

(I posted this days ago but it didn't actually post, but I was able to recover the post by refreshing and it was saved) Yeah, there doesn't seem to be much role-playing reason a martial would want super high intelligence and not care about might as much. The game is really not very intuitive sometimes. In POE1 (and POE2 to lesser extent) for barbarians, by far the most important stat was intelligence because it increased the size of the carnage field and extended duration of crit effects in that carnage field. But it made no sense thematically to be rolling these illiterate barbarians with 19 or 20 intelligence. Bug, unintended behavior, not really sure. Once you recognize it it isn't that big a deal, on enemies you just have to wait for unbending trunk to run out or else use arcane dampener or similar ability. Hmm, I dunno, I feel like @Boeroeris the guy to ask about that. I can partly address this. One off the top of my head is Red Flag Flying on the Mahora Tanga spear, it has some crazy interactions with high crit builds when carrying other on-crit equipment like Gatecrashers gloves or especially dual-wielding something (like sungrazer's on-crit stun), it will proc dozens of times and potentially crash the game so I don't mess with it. Another is the Pain Link ability, it reads that 25% of damage applied to the caster is redirected as raw damage to the attacker, but Pain Link is kinda bugged (in a bad way), it only procs on the first hit of an attack. Like an enemy casts a fireball, it hits someone else in your party and then hits your pain linked guy, it won't proc. Also won't proc if it kills whatever it's cast on. Oh, forbidden fist attack sounds like a weapon attack but it's treated as an ability, so it doesn't get bonuses from weapon abilities like two-weapon-style and using it doesn't proc focus gain for cipher multiclasses. This is fixed with the community patch. Some of the descriptions are slightly misleading but most of the abilities work how you'd think. I actually can't think of anything else that serious but my knowledge is far from encyclopedic. I mean there are various exploits, most well-known is probably Strand of Favor and Cabalist's Gambeson Arcane Extension, which says gives +10% benefiical effect duration, but what it doesn't say is this applies to CURRENT EFFECTS as well as new ones, so if you proc a nice effect, like the healing from Darkest Before Dawn or the Conduit damage from Deltro's Cage Helm, you can rapidly unequip/re-equip Strand of Favor and/or Cabalist's Cambeson and extend the effects to infinite durations. Also Blade Cascade from Scordeo's Edge eliminates recovery from EVERYTHING, and can be extended infinitely. I have a list of these types of exploits that I've used in an ultimate run, near the bottom of the build guide link below. It isn't exhaustive but it's most of the good ones, you can also check the Community Patch at nexus mods which is a really nice mod, it may list some corrections, and the Balance Polishing Mod (BPM) addresses mostly exploits but it does fix a number of things that don't work how they should like Unbending and certain summons not getting their weapons scaling correctly. Also a great mod, though I think overall it increases the difficulty quite a bit if you install the whole thing (nerfs+buffs). I wouldn't advocate using these exploits below unless you're trying to do something particularly difficult like soling upscaled POTD or magran's fire challenges. They can be a lot of fun but reduce challenge dramatically https://forums.obsidian.net/topic/131345-build-guide-the-soul-devourer-multiclass-blood-mage-soul-blade-optimal-for-potd-solo/ Yeah WOTEP sounds and looks cool but unfortunately the base damage is way lower than any other sword, I guess because of the cone. It is good in some situations but monks get huge bonuses on fists from transcendent suffering. But I mean if you're not playing solo upscaled POTD you don't need to pick things optimally, you can mostly pick things how you want as long as you don't make huge mistakes in the build. And you're making me feel old, I was in college when WOW came out. My youth nostalgia is from Baldur's gate (and even older games). As it should be I don't know much about the blunderbuss weapons, never used that one Serafen gives you because I don't think I've ever completed his quest. But if Boeroer says it's good it is probably good. For me the main thing about SC monk is they get massive, massive accuracy, damage, and penetration scaling from Transcendent Suffering (the fist skill). Unlike weapons it scales with their power level, so multiclass monk's fists aren't quite as good (though still pretty dang good). Also the razer's edge can get them +10 accuracy, resonant touch is really, really good, and imagined pain generates tons of wounds. Dichotomous Soul is a great summon and The Long Pain gives ranged fist attacks. And the crown of SC monk is whispers on the wind combined with Ajamuut's Stalking Cloak, you can zip around stunning the battlefield with that combo. It is particularly nuts when combined with a flail called Keeper of the Flame and Eder's armor upgraded with Veteran's Maneuver. The flail has a fire AOE attack that targets friend and foe, but it targets reflex, and veteran's maneuver makes you immune to reflex (until hit a few times anyway), so with this combination every whisper on the wind procs imagined pain repeatedly and you can keep spamming the ability. Forbidden fist monks are particularly good for martials, especially with the community patch, but they require a pretty detailed stat spread to keep the curse from building up. Basically you want max resolve, intelligence no higher than 13, and dexterity 2 or 3. And you have to wear certain items like ring of the solitary wanderer and anything that pumps resolve. If the curse builds up you die, usually, but with the right stat spread you can just spam forbidden fist attack which is stupid strong and HEALS you. I've never played a furyshaper but assuming they play similarly to other barbarians that should be pretty fun. You're welcome. I too usually like paladins in RPGs but to me they feel like one of the weaker classes in Deadfire, at least single-classed. There are some very good multiclass combinations (votary for one, arcanist for another), and the Balance Polishing Mod I mentioned before improves them quite a bit and Elric is working on improving them further soon. Hard to go wrong with monks in Deadfire, probably the strongest class in the game overall. Blood mage is arguably stronger but a lot more technical in how to play them effectively. Chanters and ciphers also are quite strong, particularly certain multiclasses like psion/troubadour if you want to be a summoning god. The thing that keeps me coming back for more with Deadfire is the staggering number of multiclass and subclass combinations. Adds a ton of replayability.

So I just recorded a video with Nvidia Shadowplay of me blind soloing the trial of the naga in turn based mode with tactician/blood mage. It was 51 minutes long because I'm bad at turn based, and when I go to upload the video, it is black. The sound is there but no video. Which is rather irritating. You're just going to have to trust me that invisibility procs brilliant tactician. But Berath's Challenge has to be on, and even then in turn-based it doesn't proc immediately. I was going to review the video to get an exact delay but can't do that now. I'm pretty sure it is 4 rounds though. So your potion of invisibility likely doesn't proc it because your alchemy isn't high enough for the effect to last that long. Arkemyr's Brilliant Departure lasts long enough, though you get way more mileage if you throw down a wall of draining the round before you use ABD. Then you skip 4 rounds, and you get 2 resources back on the first round and 1 every round after. It's less tedious in RTWP because you don't have to sit there and wait for the enemy to do nothing, you just run away and a little while later you get brilliant. Actually I'm not even sure there's a wait in RTWP.... There are some additional caveats, like you can't be damaging the enemy or have enacted abilities that CAN damage the enemy. This includes things as innocuous as a flame shield even if it isn't hurting the enemy at the moment. My experience with flame shield is you still proc one round of brilliant to restore 2 resources but then you lose the invisibility. Same is true if there's a DOT or a pulse spell like chill fog going off while you're invisible. What I think's going on, and this makes sense why this only works with Berath, is the game gives you 4 rounds of invisibility before assuming you've "fled" and normally the battle ends. With Berath on, after those 4 rounds the battle doesn't end, and for some weird esoteric reason all enemies are considered flanked at that point as long as you're invisible. You don't need to spam ABD like with an assassin though. I only used it twice in the trial of the naga fight, and didn't really need to use it the second, was just restoring my resources because I had Woedica on. It's good to use after the first time your resources are depleted, but by that point you should have a LOT of buffs and passive healing from Unbending. I was getting a couple hundred in healing per round by the first use of ABD, and 3/4 through the fight was healing more every round than I had in health. I could have used a potion of final stand and made it super easy mode, but reptilian blood is sort of limited, can probably make like 30 I'd guess? Maybe more, not sure, never really used them. You definitely want them for megabosses. Some people consider the trial of the naga fight very difficult but I think you have enough other tools you don't need it. Also in turn based pay attention to when enemies are about to cast spells or use abilities because that's an easy free mule kick. You don't seem to get the discipline back when you just interrupt a melee attack, even if it says "interrupt" in the log. Seems like it has to be an active ability or spell. Charge is also useful as a movement ability and interrupts on hit, though is kind of expensive at 2 discipline and you just get back 1 on successful interrupt I think. But it hard stuns, so still a good ability. Chill Fog is of course a great way to proc brilliant on smaller groups of enemies but sometimes you run into big groups where you'll need to stack several of them or they might be resistant to perception afflictions (one of the more rare resistances but it's out there). Also enemies weak to perception afflictions like one of the naga types in SSS get blinded by mule kicks which is pretty awesome. I mass blinded several of them since I was using citzal's spirit lance. And carry around squid's grasp or kapana taga so you don't get flanked in the beginning of fights, then summon citzal's spirit lance when you have enough buffs up and resources restores that you don't really care if you get shaken/confused. Confused is easy to get rid of with Infuse Vital Essence. Shaken is a little harder but you can wear the cap of the laughingstock which is really good for a blood mage anyway (helps with wall of draining, it's counted towards something to drain on enemies because it's part buff part debuff), and/or upgrade to unbending shield instead of unbending trunk. Unbending shield gives resolute which is nice. And you get so many stacks of unbending I don't think the extra 8% in unbending trunk is worth losing resolute. ----- And to answer your earlier post, wall of draining is probably better than salvation of time as a spell when you have only 1 or 2 of them to cast, but wall of draining is not better than FREE salvation of time. When you permanently steal a spell it is free to cast, forever. Definitely an abusive mechanic but fun. The way to steal a spell is kind of complicated. You need a grimoire with minor or major grimoire imprint (don't memorize it). Aloths' grimoire has minor imprint, easiest one to get. Arkemyr's Illuminating Discoveries and Jernaugh's Careful Calamities are two of the unique spellbooks that have Major Imprint. Anway you cast minor/major imprint from the grimoire against an enemy spellcaster. It rolls vs fortitude so it can be hard to hit, but a graze counts. The best way to do it is kite individual spellcasters and then you go imprint imprint / blood sacrifice to get them back, heal as necessary, repeat. When you get a spell you want just switch grimoires and it's now permanently in your grimoire if you didn't already have it memorized. So if you steal arcane veil for instance it just shows up in your level 2 casts and costs nothing to cast it. If you steal priest or druid spells they show up on the quick item bar and you do eventually run out of space, so you can steal as many wizard spells as you want but only like 12ish druid and priest spells before the bar goes off the end of the screen. Taking minor grimoire imprints is fun IMO, Escape (priests of skaen have it) lets you zip around the battlefield. Major imprints are pretty gamebreaking when you have endless casts of salvation of time, barring death's door, and various damaging wizard spells. Although, because in turn based blood sacrifice is a free action, and most of the wizard spells you want to imprint are "free" casts, there isn't nearly as much of a difference as in RTWP. In turn based you effectively have infinite wizard spells as long as the blood sacrifice doesn't kill you, which it can't if you've used and extended a potion of final stand. I minor imprint a bunch of spells in the biakara and beina encounters but it is pretty tedious getting them sometimes because the spell you get is chosen randomly from their spell list, so you could have to cast 50 times to get a spell you're looking for. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8jyHx0W3zSM&list=PLkOCqAbkQHxwTJyCKvA_31wYyPWK_87VY&index=13 Oh and Disciplined Strikes >> Tactical Barrage in like 90% of cases IMO, mostly because 25% hit to crit is really strong on top of aware, and intelligence buffs aren't hard to find even if acute is. The wizard has Infuse with vital essence which has crazy long duration fit + smart, so in this case you definitely want strikes. --------- One more thing, with practice I'm finding you don't even really need ABD in many fights. Nearly every enemy can be interrupted (one major exception, Dorudugan...) and with tactician interrupt restores discipline. You have to interrupt an ability or spell, standard weapon attacks don't count. So obviously there's mule kick which returns 1 making it free, but many wizard spells proc interrupts reliably. AOEs like Slicken are especially good. Chill Fog interrupts on crits, not as reliable, but has the benefit of sometimes proccing Brilliant Tactician as well. And Concelhaut's Crushing Doom is almost guaranteed to proc multiple interrupts. So you can blood sacrifice on the wizard side, using your insane healing from unbending (or potions of final stand) to restore tons of spells, and as long as you're casting spells like slicken, chill fog, CCD, and throwing an occasional wall of draining you're nearly invulnerable and renewing fighter resources pretty fast. Mule Kick and Charge are the only ones you'd really need to use anyway, and they cost 1 and 2 so it is pretty easy to use mule kick for most of your attacks once you figure out how to keep the interrupts up on the wizard side. The more I practice with tactician/blood mage the less I use ABD. It's good to use near the beginning of a fight when you've put up all your buffs and missing a lot of resources and don't have ton of unbending yet, but after that you'd rarely need it. I see it more as a panic button, for those times when you do manage to get near death without a potion of final stand, can ABD to escape and not only restore resources but fully heal you from unbending. And you might want to chew svef. Gives resistance to intellect, perception, and resolve afflictions as well as a perception boost, which makes you immune to the worst aspects of tactical dilemma when you get flanked (when not immune to flanking from weapon) since confuse and shaken are tier 1 afflictions they get bumped down to nothing. To avoid the drug crash just use it in a fight with tons of enemies, and once you're basically unkillable just keep laying down walls of draining to extend the effect. It is pretty easy to get it to practically permanent duration. You can stack other drugs too but you have to be careful to watch for arcane dampeners, since there is a bug where arcane dampener correctly removes the drug bonus and correctly causes a drug crash, but incorrectly leaves the drug crash once arcane dampener ends and the drug effect resumes. You should be watching for arcane dampener anyway since it removes all your buffs. But it is easy to spot in turn based if someone is casting it, and in that case just go mule kick them. Alternatively, wild orlan gives resistance to resolve afflictions (good race choice for stats also), and devil of caroc breastplate with mechanical mind gives resistance to intellect (also really good armor regardless). Take devil's due on DOCBP.