Shai Hulud

Moonbow? What is that? (edit-nvm found it on previous page) So they're on the roof outside Aeldys' quarters? Is this just during Blow the Man Down or are they still there later? I usually go to Deadlight right away for Bow the Man Down from Maje and don't have Minor Grimoire Imprint yet. Tangaloa Island is pretty far out of the way also unless I go there right after Maje but again no Minor Grimoire Imprint yet unfortunately. Could go there between Dorudugan and Beast of Winter but that is pretty late in game. Hmm. Good to know about the Berathian priests on Huana ships. I thought the only source of those spells was Ysyr and that encounter is kinda rough. Thanks! Well you can save and it quits the game, then you can load. It would look kinda save-scummy though and that's a weird spot to end a session if I were to record them. You can't *reload* but yes can save/load or else you'd have to do the whole thing in one sitting. Might be against the spirit of the challenge, IDK.

I'm working on a blood mage summoning build for potential BPM ultimate run and am wondering what the doubles share with the caster, particularly if they share stats? Was considering running with stats like MIG/CON/DEX/PER/INT/WIS 3/15/19/19/19/3, but... do summoned duplicates share stats with the caster? I mean is it going to have my god-awful might and resolve? Or do they get generic stats?

I wrote a long reply to this like an hour ago and it looked like it posted but I can see now it's gone. This forum freaking hates me. I'm surprised I can even post today frankly, because for the past couple weeks every time but once I got an error saying the boards were down when they clearly weren't. I don't remember the contents as I started to ramble, but yeah there should be other skaenites out there though I'd be surprised if they're slavers since that is antithetical to lore (but maybe, because skaen is "evil" and slavers are evil). Fort Deadlight makes more sense... And I recall seeing Crushing Doom several times, but not who had it besides Katrenn. That spell is both funny and annoying to see if you're using Arcane Reflection, because the enemy AI is stupid and they always cast the spell anyway and end up killing themselves before I can steal their spells. I had to make an altered version of my script for fights where I wanted to steal spells because they kept dying too fast. Just installed community patch and BPM and all that. Realized after I can't actually do an Ultimate run because it disables mods. But I can individually select all the trials and whatnot. Do you use the buffs and the nerfs or just nerfs? Also this weird potion that seems pretty powerful. Like a mini-brilliant that can't be removed through afflictions. ------ Ah man, I just saw Withdraw was nerfed. Well, nerfed / buffed. Its duration isn't affected by intelligence in BPM? Why? That is so completely arbitrary. The base duration was extended from 20 to 30 but my INT is usually so high this is a nerf for me, and a rather pointless one. The key spells for my imaginary build are Shadowing Beyond and Withdraw. Having to cast them a ton is annoying. Shadowing Beyond has duration of 15s. One could make an argument for dumping INT for a modified duration of 10 now so Withdraw is easy to time as 2 shadowing beyonds. Or a modified INT of 30, so withdraw is exactly two shadowing beyonds. I can't script withdraw casts so having the timing easy to remember is actually important. Hmm. Either dump it or max it. Weird. I guess summons also benefit from maxed INT. Need to look at various summon durations...

I usually dump resolve because it seems to do less than the other stats you want, and eventually it becomes relatively useless besides contributing to will. In general though relying on high stats so you can take a hit is riskier than ensuring you don't take any hits. It is better to just avoid combat until I have shadowing beyond. Obviously I have to survive that combat but it's one on one and I'd be level 16 by then. Still might be risky casting grimoire imprint and blood sacrifice over and over while Beina hits me. With bad luck it can take dozens of casts before you get the spell you need. It would be safer and easier to do that encounter at a lower level and just steal escape and withdraw. Escape has no recovery so you can zip away from enemies over and over while passive healing kicks in. It's easier to get escape than shadowing beyond because minor grimoire imprint demands less health for a level 4 spell, and it only searches spell slots 1 to 3, and she has 6 such spells, so 1 in 6 chance per cast. To get shadowing beyond is 1 in 14 per cast. Problem is I'm not sure who else I can grab Shadowing Beyond from if I kill her for Escape. The Fampyr Priests are Skaen but they're pretty rough if I don't already have Shadowing Beyond. I think I just have to delay that encounter until I'm L16+. But reaching L16 in ultimate without combat is difficult... I'm usually L13 when I do that encounter, if I go straight from Neketaka to Hasongo to Beina. And I like that route because the shamans on Hasongo only have two spells, Nature's Balm and The Moon's Light IIRC. Both very handy in a pinch. But I suppose I could stealth my way through Maje => Sandswept => Deadlight => Neketaka => Dunnage => Crookspur => Hasongo => Beina but I think that puts me around L15 not L16. Hmm. Really unfortunate Poko Kahara has a forced fight at the end, because I think that would do it. It's not a super hard fight normally but IDK in BPM. Eothas challenge keeps me from doing anything too circuitous. Ah well, maybe I'll start a thread asking about that. Don't mean to hijack yours. Need to be L16 for Beina or else find another Priest of Skaen I can fight with just withdraw + escape. Or maybe I can do some minor fights without stolen spells, but the stats are spread so I kinda suck at fighting. Some scrolls of Moonwell are probably enough for fights I can kite like Beina, but like the Poko Kahara fight IDK, this build would not be very tanky... If you make Resolve 18 to tank some early fights, what are you dumping? High INT seems most important for less frequent withdraw casts and longer durations of shadowing beyond. I guess if you're tanky enough you don't really need high perception but it makes stealing spells take a lot longer. You do steal on grazes so don't really need it super high unless you want to steal from harder enemies but the spell targets fortitude so it does miss a lot. Can't dump CON too much or blood sacrifice will kill us. Don't need max DEX but we don't want recovery times super high. Might is the only really safe dump stat unfortunately... I don't need resolve for hostile effect reduction. Outworn buckler can clear afflictions pretty fast, unless that was nerfed. Didn't see anything about it in BPM notes though. Also can heal with Lethandria so the loss of passive healing buffs from SOF is not that bad. It's mainly the recovery time. For some reason you have to wait several seconds after hitting someone with your stick before you can hit them again. In Infinity Engine games you started out like that but your attacks per round increased as you leveled up. Fighter / X chars could get 4 to 5 attacks per round unhasted. Mages could cast AND attack each round. In POE2 that doesn't really happen. You can get some minor temporary buffs that reduce recovery time, mainly by increasing dexterity, but it is pretty static unfortunately. I mean there's deleterious and relentless strikes but they're relatively minor buffs compared to their POE predecessors. For the most part you are attacking at the same speed at level 1 as level 20.

Yeah I can get around all the Magran's Fire challenges even with the nerfs except for Vela. With the recovery time it makes directly attacking problematic. Blood mage is a must because you need infinite withdraw casts. So there's pure blood mage and blood mage / X hybrids. The escape and Shadowing Beyond spells are both super useful because they have no recovery, so you can zip across the battlefield and cast withdraw. Shadowing Beyond is obviously better because we're also invisible...can also steal Arkemyr's Brilliant Departure but it has a 4.5 second recovery so Shadowing Beyond is much better. Ah, pure blood mage could do it. Probably what you were thinking of... Pure blood mage, once you steal Shadowing Beyond we can cast from invisibility, yes? Defensive spells and summons, anyway, right? So you level up out of combat until Beina is upscaled to have Shadowing Beyond. You can lure her out one on one and steal a lot of fantastic spells from her and her priests who are a different subtype. Her priests have Withdraw and she has Escape and should have Shadowing Beyond upscaled. Anyway, after that you just cast summons while invisible and time the withdraw cycles so you're never recovering from anything when she comes out. Cast stolen Essential Phantom or Watery Double, Spiritual Ally etc., and you just hide, cast summons if not near the end of a withdraw cycle, and repop withdraw immediately every 20 + INT modifier seconds. You'd want to maximize INT for longer spell duration. Max PER so grimoire imprint hits. CON is good at first, then only slightly matters. RES good at first, then doesn't matter. High DEX is less tedious but not strictly necessary. MIG doesn't matter at all. Guess I'd do something like 3 / 13 / 19 / 19 / 19 / 5, or a more balanced 3 / 12 / 15 / 19 / 19 / 10, wood elf, old vailia. Hmm. I want to try this now. Would be pretty tedious and every bit as cheesy as anything in vanilla though. Kind of ironic BPM made blood mage even more dominant. Quite a few class combinations can do the ultimate in vanilla. I think in BPM it's just blood mage and maybe blood mage / X. Theoretically we could do basically the same thing casting out of Arkemyr's Grimoire as a bloodmage / x, and use blood sacrifice to get back Arkemyr's Brilliant Departure, but ABD has a 4.5 second recovery so not as good a spell. ---------- Thanks, I didn't really think about the backstory in POE1 with the Soul Devourer, but we can assume the watcher was a little evil already having sacrificed a buddy to become more powerful and then came back in POE2 with a broken soul and insatiable bloodlust, needing to slaughter everything in sight to steal their soul energy and grow more powerful. It really is a great build for a neutral or chaotic evil type run. ---------- Regarding Bleakrock Shrine you don't have to save scum, I actually "rested" there during my ultimate run. Just have religion 15 and high diplomacy (don't remember, probably 12+), do NOT look around with the survival check, and the slavers will always appear assuming you haven't been to Crookspur yet. Not sure what happens if you've already wiped out the slavers at Crookspurr. The shrine that requires save scumming is Teo Ramunga on Neketaka Island. I haven't figured it out but it has something to do with time of day. It isn't random. It either always works or it never works, so merely reloading won't help, you'd have to reload and then waste some time and come back. And the other resolve shrine always forces a rest, so don't do the one on Poko Kahara.

To be fair lawful neutral paladins don't murder the natives and become pirates. They just don't. If your guy is chaotic evil, sure. Maybe even neutral evil. Could argue a Bleak Walker might do it, but even Bleak Walkers are only cruel and ruthless as a means to complete contracts, so, probably a stretch for them as well. Bleak Walkers are lawful evil I think. But I don't really care about role-playing, just was pointing out the inherent subjectivity of what is considered "cheese" and why I don't find the concept useful. There are exploits (things the devs probably didn't intend but conform to the mechanics, like say wall of draining and salvation of time interaction), and there are bugs (Strand of Favor behavior), but I don't necessarily have a problem with even bugs unless they trivialize combat. Your Armored Arcanist may not be lore-friendly but he doesn't use and bugs or even exploits, and that's pretty impressive. Watched the Oracle fight and on fast mode it actually isn't quite as bad as I was expecting, but...fighting on fast mode is suicidal in iron runs (unless your script is absolutely foolproof) especially with Vela. This fight would take 25 minutes in slow mode, longer with Magran's Fires challenges on. And there are much longer fights than this. You don't actually use the weapons much so they'd probably be fine but your shield would break in nearly every fight and the armor in most of them. Maybe you could stock up on generic Legendary Plate Mail, and if it breaks late enough in the fights it might still be possible. But...build not meant for iron probably, and definitely not meant for Ultimate. The challenge was meant to be near-impossible and with BPM may actually be impossible. I'm just thinking out loud because I'm attracted to impossible challenges. Very cool build and Thee God-Emperor of Tanks.

Eh? You get more loot sinking ships than boarding? That isn't right I don't think...unless it is specifically for the "vegeance ships"? I've done tons of ship encounters and in general you get way more loot from boarding. Can you expand on "abuse Arcana"? I must have missed something. Most of the exploits I used in my Ultimate run I figured out for myself (though I'm sure were already well-known), which personally I find fun. I didn't notice anything weird about arcana... Yeah Messenger is ridiculous, not only does he have stupid high HP but in general he heals faster than you can damage him without hacking recovery (and even then it is hard solo). I'd be interested in seeing how you tackled that fight...(*cough, record something, *cough) This game should have a fallen paladin mechanic, or some kind of alignment system, because this guy is for real a serial killer and a pirate with a "righteous soul" and "virtuous triumph".

lol a tiny bit of cheese, perma draining touch hand is the cheesiest thing ever, and worse, it is boring cheese. Better to steal a fun spell. I like escape but I guess that wouldn't help this guy much since his deflection is already god tier, but it would let you move around without losing The Wall (I think). Taste of the Hunt. It is like having draining touch but much better as it targets deflection and heals more. Still boring though. ---- And while we're talking about cheese, isn't it kind of cheesy for a PALADIN to murder tons of innocent civilians and pirate his way across Deadfire just to power-game a cool shield?

I tried to post this ages ago but I got error messages every time I tried to post. For some reason I can post again and I saved the wall of text so bam -------- I assumed you had to board Whenena Eel's Kiss because that's usually how the ship loot works right? Thanks for clarifying. Not sure I'm following you about "inversions". I assume you mean reduction in things (like recovery time, or in this case damage taken) is lessened the more you have. Like if you have a ton of recovery reduction (say 90%) it takes another 20ish stacks of Scordeo's Trophy to get to 91%. So since enemies mostly under-pen at -75%, an extra 5 to 10% is probably calculated more like 1 or 2 percent I guess? Still I'd be more worried about the enemies that don't underpen. Unless they all do. I don't have much experience with super tanky builds like this. I don't want to be invulnerable I just want to make combat bearable. I never use Wall of Draining for whatever that's worth. There's the post-combat ritual of cycling Strand of Favor for 10 seconds in some builds but if it reduces combat time from an hour to a few minutes I think it's fine. For me, I'd rather see mods that ramped up difficulty, enemy AI etc. vs. nerfing everything so the only way to win is to make yourself better at the stand-there-and-sponge-HP-strat than the enemies. And, not a criticism (since I know you didn't intend this as a Magran's Fires build) but this guy will lose his armor and weapons in nearly every fight with Magran's Fire challenges on, and sinking a bunch of ships is probably near impossible. Boarding is only safe way to do ship combat with Wael and it's still super dangerous. I guess what I'm trying to say is I feel like Deadfire is fundamentally flawed by its grindy combat. That flaw could be eliminated through cheese via Scordeo, but with BPM it's back to fights taking ages and not complex fights with complex strategies, just LONG fights because your enemies have a pool of 5000+ HP, while you do maybe 60 damage every 6 seconds, and a few simple scripting blocks can handle everything. I mean this guy doesn't even move, right? Because of The Wall? From a metagaming perspective it is very impressive you made a build that can still win in BPM without "cheese", but it just looks so boring. Was hoping to see some vids, maybe it isn't as bad as I'm imagining. And thanks again for answering all my questions so thoroughly, I always enjoy your threads/posts. I looked through the BPM list. Some of the changes look okay but pretty minor effect. I like fixing Arcane Dampener. But so much is nerfed I don't think most Magran's Fires challenges will even be possible. Might make the game better for parties but I don't usually play with one. Lot of it looks like just removing anything that's effective to meet challenges that were intended to be near impossible (e.g. Ultimate). I think you could still do it with a build like this one but it would *require* grimoire imprint. You just don't have enough withdraw scrolls or resources to protect Vela in a fight that takes 10 minutes, much less 30. Would still be easy to lose Vela because without reducing recovery time she can come out of withdraw while you have a 4 second recovery from something, and damn, your run has ended. Would have to time her withdraws. If it could be scripted it might be possible but I can't figure out how to script anything around Vela. I know the mod is not meant for Ultimate but I can't seem to go back to regular play. Got used to the challenge of babysitting Vela and everything else. It's kind of fun. ------- @Yellow-eye four I was thinking the same thing regarding the fire godlike. Well, not so much necessarily death godlike, though that would be cool. Just there are a lot of good helmets that would help here, like Blackened Plate Helm's +1 Engagement works with Kapana Taga, or my favorite the Cap of the Laughingstock gives you a +10 accuracy vs deflection, though I guess this guy doesn't normally target deflection. Champion's Helm also gives a decent action speed buff, Rekvu's Fractured Casque could be useful as the downside of an injury is completely gone since this guy doesn't move (just walk over a caltrops trap that gives wrenched knee). Could maybe even use Deltro's Cage Helm, in theory blood sacrifice should extend the duration but...nope, doesn't. Well, could script in something to alternate with blood sacrifice to damage yourself, like minoletta's minor missiles, just needs to be done once per 20 seconds or whatever. IDK how it would work in practice, maybe not that well, but I've just never been a fan of godlikes because you can't alter your helm to suit the situation. But it does work with the tankiest tank of all time thing.

And I've been wanting to add a pic of what the build looks like in-combat, so I'm taking advantage of this possibly brief moment where I can actually post. This is with scripted buffs procced. And I realized Llengrath's Safeguard does very little for this build. The defenses don't stack with borrowed instinct, and the armor doesn't stack with ironskin, so its sole purpose is the emergency AOE attack. Its duration is WAY longer than Borrowed Instinct, though, particularly when it doesn't crit, so still worth the cast in some battles but I probably should take it out of the script. And if anyone wanted to see the script I can put that up too, though it would take a lot of screenshots so I'd probably need to upload the script itself.

I tried responding the day of your comment but I haven't been able to post in the forum for weeks. Always get an error message. Been testing once a day or so. Maybe it'll work this time. ----------- I was formerly using the mod but it gave me some bad habits and it isn't really necessary if you know where the forced rests are. There's only one forced rest that you can't avoid (when you land on Ukaizo) so pack a lunch and you'll be fine. I forgot about that forced rest in my playthrough and nearly died there because the mods are turned off for the ultimate and that was the only one I'd been using. In SSS you have to do Slayer's Path or you get a forced rest. That's the other major one. The changeling fight on Slayer's path can be annoying on iron runs so that's also a consideration, but I figured out how to do it consistently without vela getting killed. You MUST start in sneak and invisible (I think), else the cipher rushes Vela, you'll be forced to defend her there, and she'll die pretty often when the ranger and/or rogue target her. So instead start from stealth and you circle around to get Vela behind you and kill the enemies which tend to target Vela over you, mainly the ranger and rogue, after that you're fine. Also for rests, avoid plagued ships, storms, etc., don't do the quest Dirty Laundry (you lose your bonuses for some unknown reason), don't rest at shrines besides exactly Bleackrock Shrine once or the Teo Ramunga shrine once. You get interrupted during the "pray and rest" so you don't actually rest, and you get the resolve / con +2 blessing. They don't stack though, they seem to remove each other. I managed to get all three (bleakrock, teo ramunga, and amira encounter) exactly once, but I haven't figured out how to reproduce it. I figured you had to do them in a certain order but I'm pretty sure I've tried every combination. I'd just skip Teo Ramunga. That one sometimes forces a rest also depending on what time it is when you get there. Bleakrock never forces one if it's your first attempt to pray and rest. Teo Ramunga you have to be interrupted by some aumaua but unlike the slavers at Bleakrock they don't always show up and I'm not sure what their hours are. Might be worth the forced rest in SSS to do Seeker's Path with this build because the sword you get (Seeker's Fang) is absolutely ridiculous if you bind it as a cipher. Spider's Patience does "raw damage per 1 second on scoring crit (damage scales with cipher's current focus)". Since our focus is stupid high you end up doing several thousand damage per strike, about 500 to 600 in the first tick. I didn't take it because I didn't want to lose rest bonuses and Abydon's challenge was on so using weapons is kind of annoying, but in SSS you can get all the top tier foods in the champion's stand so it might be worth it especially if you don't have on Abydon. But...I prefer Citzal's Lance. By the time you have procced conduit you do about 200 damage per hit per target, far far more when using soul annihilation, so while its single target damage is lower than Spider's Patience, it handles groups better and is still plenty strong. Spider's Patience would be better for bosses but they generally aren't a problem regardless.

Wow that's a tanky tank! How are the defenses that high? That has to be in-combat with all buffs procced I guess? Do you have any videos of this build? Really cool to see you're still making awesome builds. Congrats on making a cheese-free build that's viable, though I'm guessing it's an absolute grindfest. Killing enemies with Draining Missiles (a 7 second cast targeting FORT) must take ages. Also how the heck do you get Akola's Apex Ward with this? Don't you have to like tank your reputation really early and then board a high level ship and solo your way through it, again, really early? IDK I've never tried it, but I haven't been able to tank my rep at all with most factions period. When I killed the queen it didn't even tank it. I had 5 with the dawnstars despite slaughtering everyone in their temple. Why not Undying Burden instead of Eoten Con? -1CON for extra damage resistance, which should be pretty significant since you're usually bloodied (always 5+% if I understand the mechanics)? The extra Second Wind is just gravy. +2 fortitude is nice but your fort is pretty high, would be even higher with bear cub... Where do you get boots of the white? I've never found them and it doesn't say in the wiki. Also, are freeze attacks common enough to justify using the boots much in your opinion, vs. something like Boots of Stability or something with movement utility like Rakahn Field Boots or Bounding? I don't think you have any way to move around the battlefield quickly...but I guess that's maybe not an issue since solo without Vela. And don't take this is a criticism, it's aimed at the mod, but if a mod reduces the most viable classes into grindy tanks, why use it? Just the challenge? I think high recovery time is one of the worst aspects of Deadfire. If you compare how the game plays to its predecessor or older RTWP games, it is SLOW. AS. HELL. So much so that I couldn't play it when it came it out. I didn't start to enjoy it until I cheesed out recovery and sped up the fights. It's interesting, but sometimes exploits or even bugs can make a game better, IMO. I still haven't tried the mod. Maybe when I get really bored. Running through DOS2 again. Is there a list somewhere of what BPM nerfs exactly? LIke you seem to imply grimoire imprints still work which is probably the most broken thing in the game, and I'm including SOF and SOTP. Probably won't be able to post this so this is all an exercise in futility. Haven't been able to post in my thread for days. Roll for 20...go!

Hmm that's clearly a bug but I wasn't aware of it. Was wild mage an enhanced edition add? I dont really remember it back in the day. Mage/thief and fighter/mage/thief are pretty ridiculous because for example you can cast mislead and park yourself in another room while your image backstabs over and over and the true seeing doesn't work iirc because you're out of range. Or sorcerer / wizard with project inage gives you a copy of the spellbook so you can cast however many project images you have worth of spellbooks. Lots of fun cheesy stuff like that but I've forgotten a lot. I like ranger/cleric because in the original at least he incorrectly got access to both druid and cleric tables so you get iron skins (yay!), insect plague and all the cleric goodies like DUHM. Like a fighter/mage/cleric but better in every way except I dont think rangers get grand mastery in unmodded game. Really want to play it again but I've been wasting too much time playing video games lately. My day job (playing poker, being generous calling it a job) let's me just take weeks off when I feel like it to, say, do an ultimate run in poe2, but it is a double edge sword of temptation. Also gotta remember the huge list of mods I use. I prefer the original with tons of mods over "enhanced edition" which is basically original with the graphics mods. I'm going to do it next time I take a break from work. Think I'll do it without scripts. Maybe even use a party! Korgan, Vicky, Edwin, Jan, Mazzy. For some reason the evil characters are best in class, except Mazzy, but she has no problem with the evil characters unlike the other goodie goodies. Imoen is better than Jan but Jan is hilariously insane so he is a must. Sir Anomen if he passes his test is really good but he gets in fights with everyone. Kinda wish POE did that. Would love seeing Maia and Tekehu or Serafen and Aloth kill each other instead of just bicker.

Regarding extending potions I meant could you extend them past the battle and make them permanent... I seem to recall a video by raven darkholme where he said something like when an effect reaches 20000 seconds it becomes permanent. Of course that would take forever with wall of draining but if you spam salvation of time 20k seconds wouldn't take more than a minute or two. Yeah you're right about upscaled armor and fort etc. Deflection is almost always lowest stat, still don't understand why they changed resolve to give 1 deflection and perception 1 accuracy vs 2 in the original. Means on upscale POTD the easiest thing to do is usually to beat things to death because your nuke spells miss, graze, and underpen a ton. Tried fighting the messenger at l14 or so and with BM it was impossible. He healed faster than I could damage him even with eliminating recovery 97%. Eventually I figured out to hit him with combusting wounds and spam minoletta's minor missiles and that shredded him, but lot of fights are like that where I just can't do damage very fast. Part of why hierophant is so good is the +20 acc from borrowed instinct means fewer grazes, plus hammering thoughts is universal +1 pen. Makes a big difference especially since the cipher buff / debuff spells are super fast casts compared to e.g. expose vulnerability. Plus with soul blade you can just zerg things with raw damage. I've replayed BG2 so many times. Many thousands of hours. I got bored and started messing with the scripting engine, wrote a near universal script that could solo every encounter. Didnt test it for all classes but it worked for about a dozen runs (tweaking the script while playing). You can script chars to switch from ranged to melee based on distance and prioritize enemies based on thousands of conditions. Rather complex really. Lost the script unfortunately when my last PC died. Haven't played the game in maybe six years though, maybe its been long enough Id enjoy just playing it. I always wanna do something broken like kensai/mage, sorcerer, fighter/mage/thief or ranger/cleric though. Never did a wild mage. I bought tyranny and tried to get into it but am 2 for 2 in abandoning the run. The plot didn't grab me and the mechanics seem kind of weird. Probably play it eventually. Crossing fingers this actually posts, wrote it on my phone while playing poker.

Yeah I just hit 16. Mostly looking to steal wizard uniques and priest spells I havent used like woedica writs. Takes a long time to steal spells sadly. Especially with major Grimoire imprint, because it not only steals 4 to 7 spells but apparently 1 to 3 also so you're looking for a specific spell you might have to cast dozens of times. I think ill like my hierophant build better. Even if I become unkillable with blood mage my offense seems relatively slow and weak. Escape (aka poor man's shadowing beyond) works well enough with high defenses. With borrowed instinct and robust I have fortitude like 220, will 230. The build is almost invincible, provided you keep the spells you need up, which isn't too hard with a script. I had no problems in combat after L13 or so, by L20 (earlier) can autopilot every fight. Except maybe guardian of ukaizo because I didn't rest and have only done it twice, but probably that one is fine just need to refine script for boss battles to zerg the guardian rather than go after the mooks... L16 blood mage is taking a lot longer in fights. Dying also but I've yet to grab the broken stuff. Will be harder to script too. If you spam shadowing beyond will enemies still cast arcane dampener? And can you extend potion effects indefinitely? Might be amusing to stack everything and play God mode for a bit. I haven't tried the balance mod. I can't help but play games at hardest setting and I wonder with nerfs if it is even doable without every fight being a grind fest. I generally dislike nerfs in single player games unless something is game breaking. SOF or SOTP for example make a borderline impossible challenge just hard. And if I can perma extend brilliant vs waiting ages for a fire blight to 1% spawn and then 1% proc brilliant to set up wall of draining etc, i won't want to bash my head in. Hmm... Probably just replay DOS2 when I get bored with the blood mage. That game is better in most ways, but it is a bit less challenging. Already did a solo tactician honor run (witch). Maybe BG2. It's been a while. BG3 coming out soon but doesn't feel like BG imo... Not many good rpgs these days is there? Pillars, divinity, pathfinder...that's pretty much it. And I'm totally rambling. Need sleep.

Unclear because I didn't have party members, but I didn't see the chant on Vela, while I did see it listed in my effects, so...my guess is I receive the benefits of the chant but am not saying the chant myself. In this case it gives like +20% crush damage or something (I did check at one point attacking an NPC and looking at the +damage modifiers and IIRC it was 20. ISH) Doesn't look like an aura that does crushing, just passively applies extra damage with crushing weapons and spells like minoletta's minor missiles. Kind of limited but I did it completely by accident, didn't actually use ringleader much. I'm guessing you can steal any chant an enemy is using (of the form does X for Y sec) if you flip them and kill them last, but I haven't really tested it yet. ---EDIT: To be clear I believe you steal the *effect* of the chant not the chant itself. Theoretically we can also steal the effects of certain invocations like "The Bridesman Slew Thirty" for +5 might/con/resolve, but you'd need a chanter to cast it on you, and since solo we can't directly control dominated enemies you just have to luck into their AI doing something beneficial... @Not So Clever HoundThanks, first guy looks pretty beefy. You don't even have Scordeo's procced there do you? Kinda a one-trick pony I'm guessing though? Not that there's anything wrong with that if it's a really good trick. My guy's trick is to explode groups of enemies with soul annihilation. I'm messing around with a pure blood mage at the moment. Been done a lot but I want to see what I can do with major grimoire imprint. Maybe steal Arkemyr's brilliant departure, writs of sorcery, writs of war, etc. Though the character is probably invulnerable already as soon as you find a priest with barring death's door. Might be too boring idk.

I try to script everything but I've never scripted summons as a mage. Not sure in what situation you'd want to cast the phantom. I have some ideas but I'm not certain it will work how you want. If you want the phantom up at all times could just do a cooldown with the duration of the spell (or duration of blackbow) and cast it when you have concentration, targeted at enemy by greatest number of enemies. Another way to check if you have a summoned weapon, assuming you normally use a melee weapon would be have two blocks like this block 1:Self: Has Summoned Weapon (not) => action: self, caedelbald's blackbow, cooldown (lesser of blackbow, phantom) block 2: Self: ranged weapon equipped and target: engaging or engaged by self, action: essential phantom, enemy, prioritize by greatest number of enemies, cooldown (lesser of blackbow, phantom) This way it casts blackbow and then immediately casts essential phantom, should keep both up at least until the phantom is killed. If you don't want to stick the phantom in the thick of things you can use least engagers. You can isolate blocks to execute when the phantom is up with target: is summoned AND target: is spirit AND target: has summoned weapon (target type ally) This block should (I think) auto cast essential phantom if the phantom is knocked out, but it won't cast the first one so you'd need multiple blocks target: is summoned AND target: is spirit AND target: has summoned weapon AND target: is unconscious, action: essential phantom Scripting would be so much better with an OR button...sorry if this is confusing.

I wish the scripting weren't so clunky. Never could figure out how to script anything with Vela. Tried casting withdraw on ally at various intervals but she isn't tagged as an ally I guess... What do you automate with forbidden fist? I haven't played monks much in POE2...or at all really. Forbidden Fist seemed kinda complicated. I can't think of what I'd be expiring for wounds besides like Hylea's Talons. ---- Oh and random thing I discovered during this run, you can steal enemy chants when their alliance is flipped. I accidentally stole something called "Crunch the bones" 26 minutes in to Video 24 when I used Ringleader on an Eoten at Bekarna's Observatory. Does + ?% crushing damage for ? seconds (thanks Wael!) but apparently I extended it forever because I saw it later when I was trying to proc Conduit. I wonder if it works on human chanters...quite a few easy ship fights with enemy chanters where you could steal a lot of cool stuff. Also some bounties. Chants like "At the sight of their comrades their hearts grew bold" would be really useful, +10 fort / will. Hmm. I want to start another run. But what class...

[BUILD GUIDE] - The Soul Devourer (5.0) Class - Blood Mage / Soul Blade (Hierophant) Concept - Mass drain focus with Citzal's Spirit Lance and use soul annihilation for mass slaughter. This build has extremely high defenses thanks to equipment, various wizard defense spells, and the amazing cipher spell Borrowed Instinct. We also have spectacular accuracy and crit nearly every hit. Use Pull of Eora to group enemies so we can maximally build focus and annihilate souls. Slaughter kith, wilders, monsters, and...destructibles, to drain their souls and build max focus. This build works with any alignment but is particularly suited for EVIL playthroughs as you're rewarded for slaughtering everything for their souls and their spells. I even killed a temple full of Dawnstars. But not the younglings... POTD - YES SOLO - YES, in fact this build can handle the Ultimate challenge (link below). Companions - Not necessary but would work well in any party as a striker / off-tank. ----------- Why play this class? I was inspired towards soul blade builds after watching Sarcastic Sarcophagae's ultimate run using a soul blade / ranger, and I started thinking about whether we really needed the ranger part, and no, you don't, though ranger makes it easier to proc focus gain since you can kill the pet over and over. I wanted to create a god-like character that felt like a kensai/mage from Baldur's Gate 2. Capable of single-handedly blitzkrieging large groups of enemies. Despite being a blood mage multiclass, we use very few offensive spells. This is very much a melee build and ideal for a no-rest run. ----------- RACE: Coastal Aumaua for might resistance. Wild Orlan, wood elf, mountain dwarf, and human are also decent choices, but really you can use any race besides maybe godlikes, since the helmet we use is important. BACKGROUND: Old Vailia - Artist (mechanics/history/insight) Effigy's Resentment: Maneha (+1 MIG is not quite as good as +1 INT, but we get +5 resistance to might afflictions which is great) STATS MIG - 13 base, 19 final (+2 Auamaua, +1 Gift from Machine, +1 Maneha, +2 Alchemic Brawn, + items and +5 from tenacious/energized) CON - 9 base, 13 final (+2 Alchemic Brawn, +2 Konstanten's Boon, plus items and +5 from Infuse or Robust) DEX - 14 base, 18 final (+2 Alchemic Guile, +2 Amira's Blessing, plus items and +5 from Deleterious) PER - 18 base, 22 final (+2 Alchemic Guile, +1 Konstanten's Boon, +1 Savage Cunning, plus items and +5 from Eldritch Aim) INT - 18 base, 22 final (+1 Old Vailia, +2 Alchemic Wits, +1 Konstanten's Boon, +1 Cauldron's Shard, plus items and +5 from Infuse or Brilliant) RES - 3 base, 9 final (+2 Alchemic Wits, +2 Nature's Resolve, +2 Rikuhu's Blessing, plus items and +5 from Pyschovampiric Shield) It is easy for us to proc inspirations for everything but might (but that can be done too). In battle the stats are typically something like 26/20/24/28/29/14 --------------- To cheese or not to cheese? This build will work fine in parties and likely solo on lower difficulties without using "cheese" strategies. But the cheese is so good. Don't you want to ascend to godhood? Cabalist's Gambeson and Strand of Favor are used to extend many buffs, most important of which is the soul blade's max focus buff. For every melee kill you get +10 max focus for IDK, something like 60 seconds, but we can extend that and end up with 15000+ focus by late game, which translates to starting battles with something like 3500 focus! This lets us zerg dangerous enemies when needed, or whenever we feel like it. In addition, blood mage's minor grimoire imprint can STEAL SPELLS, permanently. This is super useful in general but especially for solo, trial of iron runs, and ESPECIALLY ultimate runs. We can steal spells like Escape, Withdraw, Nature's Balm (Robust!), Halt, and even watershaper spells like Ondra's Whip and a party friendly Chill Fog! Any spell that's level 3 or lower, and an enemy has it, we can steal it. It works like this. DO NOT memorize Minor Grimoire Imprint. Carry a grimoire with Minor Grimoire Imprint. Easiest to get is Aloth's grimoire. Cast minor grimoire imprint on the enemy. If it hits (vs fortitude), a random level 1 to 3 spell the caster knows is stolen and shows up in your quick bar. Most enemies know 2 spells per level, but a few like Eamund the Fox know more (has ten L1 to L3 spells). We can make the theft PERMANENT by swapping to another grimoire and back after we steal it. In this way you can get every level 1 to 3 wizard spell for free (wizard spells don't show up in the quick bar), provided it isn't learned already, plus any level 1 to 3 priest or druid spells you'd want, such as Barbs of Condemnation, Divine Mark, Pillar of Faith, Nature's Mark, etc. etc. But don't steal TOO MANY, not sure what happens when the quick bar extends to the edge of the screen. The spells I stole on my ultimate run were these: every wizard spell I could (because no renewable resources, and just because), withdraw, restore, nature's balm, the moon's light, chill fog (watershaper version), Ondra's whip, Escape, Barbs of Condemnation, and Halt. You can get most of these (minus the wizard spells) from two encounters: Beina, who is a priest of skaen and has other priests in her party, and the watershaper Biakara. These encounters are relatively easy even for solo, and you can watch me do them in Video 13. ------------------- FOOD: Hylea's Bounty! You can get it at the start of the game if you pledged to Hylea in POE1 (everything good import has it). So we can immediately have +2 to all skills which is SUPER helpful in the early game, and the entire game really. It's also GREAT for combat. We get +25% max health, which allows us to dump CON a bit, and even better, +10 to ALL defenses. This is by far the best food in the game for this build. If you have to rest later, I guess I'd go with Captain's Banquet or Shark's Soup for the immunities mainly, but the combat buffs are also excellent. You'll be squishier without Hylea's Bounty buffs though, and skill checks are tougher, and more important you lose your per-rest buffs like Dawnstar's Blessing, so try to avoid resting! ------------------- SKILLS: In the early game, stealth is most important active, then mechanics. Later we want some athletics. With a luminous Adra potion, Hylea's bounty, and the various unguents, plus training, your BASE for every skill should be 7 with no points in it. For passives, early we want lots of diplomacy and a little survival. Once you get the GiftBearer's Cloth, pump history as much as you can. For a solo run I wouldn't take it past 12 points invested (which with other bonuses gave me 20 history and +15 to defenses). My late-game skill investment was something like Arcana 3, Athletics 7, mechanics 9, diplomacy 5, history 12, survival 3. Diplomacy and survival can be boosted with items to around 15 which is enough to pass most checks. ------------------- ABILITIES I went through most of the game without taking a single wizard spell, because you can get almost everything you need from Llengrath's Martial Mysteries and Aloth's Grimoire, but eventually I took Pull of Eora because it is really good and I have one or two ability choices that are somewhat free. Here is my suggestion for what to take leveling up as you go. Grab pull of eora at L10 to L12 or do what I did and cast from grimoire and take it late. 1 - Eldritch Aim and Tenuous Grasp (EA is hard to find as stealable spell plus it is just great, TG is a .5s cast but take whatever cipher side) 2 - Iron Will (!)- +15 to will. Will is probably the most important defense on a solo run and iron will STACKS with bull's will! 3 - Lingering Echoes - your cipher spells lasting longer is pretty nice, but mostly we take this because there's nothing better to take 4 - Psychovampiric Shield (!) and TwoHanded - PVS effectively gives +10 accuracy vs the enemy and gives us Steadfast, and a .5s cast! 5 - Draining Whip (!) - Once you build tons of focus you might want to switch to Biting Whip, but I stuck with draining whole game. 6 - Mental Binding - this one is a bit free, Phantom Foes also a good choice but doesn't stack other flank debuffs like Chill Fog 7 - Hammering Thoughts (!) and Bear's Fortitude (!) - HT +1 weapon penetration is amazing, and our fortitude is a bit low 8 - Secret Horrors - really good debuff over huge area, especially for minor grimoire imprint, and a .5s cast 9 - Weapon and Shield Style - before summoning weapons we want a shield for the bonus deflection, so why not get reflex and more deflection? 10 - Body Attunement and Bull's Will - nothing great on cipher side, but BA is situationally useful vs enemies with high AR 11 - Secrets of Rime - for chill fog 12 - Heart of the Storm - becomes relevant when we proc Lord Darryn's Voulge and Conduit (or take pull of eora and this at 19) 13 - Borrowed Instinct (!!) and Tough - the build starts to become very powerful now we have Borrowed Instinct and Citzal's Spirit Lance 14 - Uncanny Luck - hit to crit always welcome, could also take Rapid Casting or Farcasting, we eventually take all 15 - Rapid Casting - get the buffs up faster 16 - The Empty Soul (!) and Improved Critical (!) - TES +10 ACC vs will with the cipher spells we really need to hit (PVS and BI) 17 - Martial Caster - Summon that weapon a little faster 18 - Farcasting - moderately useful, +20% range on most spells (doesn't apply to escape sadly) 19 - Echoing Horror (!) and Pull of Eora - EH is like a perma-frighten and POE means no more grimoire swapping 20 - Psychic Backlash - Kind of free, could sub Recall Agony, Phantom Foes, Ringleader, Arms Bearer, or a wizard spell MODALS Club (!), Quarterstaff (!), Medium Shield (!), Small Shield (!), Pike, Rapier, Morningstar (last two don't really matter, and pike modal not that great) None of these are super important besides maybe quarterstaff since we use summoned weapons, but the small shield and medium shield especially are nice to reduce damage before we summon the weapon. Club kinda useful early to reduce will. GOD POWER Mien of Death's Herald or Ire of Death's Herald (give Intuitive and Energized respectively). For Mien be diplomatic in god conversations and for ire be aggressive. Intuitive is the only Tier 3 we can't otherwise get, but it isn't *that* much better than aware. Energized is much better than Tenacious for the interrupts which hit your primary and secondary lance targets. But...we can get Energized through other means. In a no rest run these abilities can be used once, so you want to extend them and not lose them. Can wear Effigy's Husk to keep Energized, though you sacrifice some armor and reflex/will compared to Magnera's Chain. It is better vs enemies that use lots of might afflctions though. I took Ire of Death's Herald, and...I forgot to use it. --------------- EQUIPMENT WE WEAR Head - Cap of the Laughingstock - effectively +10 accuracy, and if we use mirror's image or essential phantom we get immunity to resolve (and -10 deflection) Neck - Protective Eothasian Charm - mostly for the proc, but if worn the healing is doubled from might and dawnstar's blessing Body - Magnera's Chain, Effigy's Husk - MC has +10 fort/will/ref, and Effigy's Husk immunity to might. Early game wear Devil of Caroc BP. Rings - Ring of Minor Protection + Entonia Signet Ring pre-escape, then ROMP + Prosperity's Fortune, then ROMPx2 (they stack!) Feet - Boots of Stealth early, then Bounding Boots or Boots of Stability (with two copies of Bounding Boots, you can use Leap 2x per ENCOUNTER, then put it back in stash between battles and swap back to get Leap back) Cape - Cloak of Greater Protection early, then Cape of the Falling Star, then The GiftBearer's Cloth. Hands - Killer's Gloves early, then Gatecrashers, then Firethrower's Gloves, then Left Hand of the Obscured or Onepahau's Strength (or Killer's Gloves again) Waist - Undying Burden then Upright Captain's Belt so we're unaffected by Pull of Eora Pet - Pes early (+10%dmg, 5% hit to crit), Bear Cub later (+8 fort, 5% hit to crit), Ooblit even later (+3s duration beneficial effects) Weapons - You don't actually use the weapons much, but their passive buffs can be useful before summoning. Squid's Grasp in slot 1 and 3 (copy), Lethandria's Devotion in slot 1, Outworn Buckler and some other weapon in Slot 2, Xoti's Lantern in slot 3 (if Skaen challenge) The important thing with the shields is if you get hit by something nasty (not likely with all the inspirations but happens occasionally), you can clear it by rapidly swapping slots 1 and 2. Can clear even faster with 2x outworn buckler, but I like Lethandria / Outworn for healing passive and because Lethandria is a better fighting shield. Every switch you're healed 2 points and clear 6% off the duration. This can be scripted so you clear an arcane dampener in a couple seconds (or no time if you can pause). On Squid's Grasp you want Broken Curse and Attempted Parley, this provides a huge action speed buff when you're threatended by 3+ enemies which happens a lot solo, and it applies to spells! On Lethandria take Sheltering Light and Captivating Crystal. On Outworn Buckler take Timeless Perseverence and Symbol of Courage. Grimoires - LLengrath's Martial Mysteries (or Katrenn's), Aloth's. These are the main two. Jernaugh's Careful Calamities is useful for the spell Jernaugh's Equalizing Burst which is a good opener, also Ninagauth's Shadowflame from Ninagauth's Teachings, but normally we open with Pull of Eora. Might want to hold onto Arkemyr's Illuminating Discoveries or Celestial Grimoire for Arkemyr's Brilliant Departure, but I never needed to use it. Escape is not quite as good but a much faster cast. ----------------- EQUIPMENT FOR PROCS - this is stuff we equip only if we want to proc some effect, either temporarily or to extend indefinitely, we extend with first Cabalist's Gambeson, then Cabalist's Gambeson plus Strand of Favor. Takes 10 to 20 seconds to extend something to near infinity, depending where you are it affects how fast you can cycle armor and necklace. The sea is usually the fastest place. Thief's Putty / Ungent of Animalism / Blessed Incense / Oil of Allure / Arcanist's Balm (!!!!) - proc these right after getting Cabalist's Gambeson for +2 to all skills Antidote - permanent immunity to poison attacks Amra (!!!!) - Tempered Fury gives FRENZY without the deflection penalty! Incredible. Protective Eothasian Charm's Darkest Before Dawn (!!!!) - gives +10 health per 3s, -25% damage taken (decreases conduit effect unfortunately) Deltro's Cage Helm (!!!!) - can TRIPLE your damage output if you crit yourself wearing the right equipment at high level with Chain Lightning or even better, Scrolls of Great Maelstrom. Note the scrolls are very dangerous to Vela and yourself so not recommended for iron run, but with max Arcana they do insane damage and you can get +220% lightning damage, which applies not only to melee but spells. Ideally you'll have all of these when you proc Conduit - Chromoprismatic QS's Elemental Induction buff, Improved Critical, Heart of the Storm (make sure you overpen, kill yourself for System Shock if needed), Griffin's Blade (Hound's Courage), +2MIG gloves or Left Hand of the Obscured (arcana for scroll, strength for spells), Kuaru's Ring, Chameleon's Touch, Sash of Judgment, High Harbinger's Robes or Furrante's Breastplate or Deltro's Cage, Sandals of the Water Lily (make it easier to crit yourself). Milx for hit to crit conversion with spells. I crit myself with Chain Lightning in video 28, right before I fight Dorudugan and Huani o Whe. Chromoprismatic Quarterstaff (!!!) - Elemental Induction gives +15% damage which applies to everything including SA, Entropy Shield reduces damage by about 8% Devil of Caroc's BP (!) - 2 health per 3 seconds is okay, but it adds up. If worn this increases to 4. Grove's Kin from Nature's Embrace (!!) - gives Woodskin. We could just steal woodskin and cast it, but perma-woodskin is cool too. Less / Least Unstable Coil (!!) - +15% Action Speed. I proc this during the Maerwald fight because that's when I get it usually and he's a spirit. Lord Darryn's Voulge (!!!) - gives Lightning Strikes - quick, +15% action speed, +15% damage as shock with weapons Outworn Buckler (!!) - would have more ! as this can proc Courageous, but we are already immune to interrupts from insanely high concentration Rannig's Wrath (!!) - Redoublement gives +10 deflection, which is part of why we can dump resolve Resounding Call (!!) - Call to Arms procs Tenacious when destroying a destructible. Slayer's Claw can upgrade this to Energized by swapping weapons. Robes of the Weyc - +1 AR against your chosen type Sanguine Great Sword (!!!) - Proc Blood Gift, then Greater Blood Gift. They STACK for +20 health per 6 seconds, much more if you have the item equipped Scordeo's Trophy (!!!) - can be used early game to greatly reduce recovery with Opening Barrage Scordeo's Edge (!!!!) - can ELIMINATE recovery with Blade Cascade. Can stack accuracy +20 every time you save. Insane. Not necessary to stack accuracy this much but makes things easier. Serpent Crown (!!!) - +10 accuracy that applies to spells not just weapons! Shadow Form (!!!!) (Slipper of the Assassin) - use to steal things with ease, and to start nearly every encounter from stealth (invisible). You don't need to actually wear the boots in combat, after the first proc, switch to the boots you want to wear then extend it and you'll still be invisible. Shea's War Staff (!) - 15% hit to crit with weapons is nice, though by the time you get this you have Scordeo's Edge Slayer's Claw (!!!!) - can bump up any might inspiration to Energized simply by cycling weapons Shroud of the Phantasm (!!!!!) - proc brilliant. It is easy to proc if you have stolen something like Minoletta's Minor Missiles and Restore. Just alternate Missiles and restore. They're .2s casts with speed bonuses, so you can fire off 100 missiles in no time. Wall of Flame also good, but we can't steal it. Make sure to remove clothes when proccing this if you have Abydon's Challenge on. Unstable Soul Essence - an explosive that heals you roughly 6 health per 6 seconds. Okay. Heals much more if you have high explosives. Wahai Poroga (!!!) - At Blade's Reach reduces melee damage by 20% and counterattack returns damage as raw DOT. Combined with Blood Mage healing, we have passive healing around 10(BM) + 20(DBD) + 20(SGS) + 6(USE) + 4(DOCBP) = 60 health per 6 seconds. Add robust for 40 more, add the moon's light for 32 more. Normally my script doesn't proc The Moon's Light but Robust is usually up, so that's 100 or 132 health per 6 seconds, about 16 or 22 health per second. Plus we are hard to hit, so basically unkillable. -------- OTHER BUFFS Nature's Resolve - +10 accuracy, +2 resolve, best per-rest buff in the game Dawnstar's Blessing - +50% healing, +2 religion - I know I just said NR was the best, but THIS is the best per-rest one time buff. Or 2nd best IDK. Alchemist's Wits/Brawn/Guile - +2 to all stats, per rest Cauldon Shard - +1 to chosen stat, I took INT, permanent I think Konstanten's Boon - best prostitute boon IMO, gives +2 CON, +1 PER, +1INT Savage Cunning - +1 PER, +2 survival, permanent Rikuhu's Blessing - +2 RES, get from the shrine on Crookspur Island, takes religion 15, choose to rest you get interrupted, with high diplomacy you get the boon Amira's Blessing - +2 DEX, this is a random proc while traveling Neketaka. When you get the burning house, go in, flee the house, be nice to the old lady Ngati's Blessing - +2 CON, get from Teo Ramunga on Neketaka Island. I skipped this one since it is out of the way and it removes Rikuhu and vice versa. They also remove Amira so try to get that later (just don't do too much unnecessary map travelling in Neketaka and it should proc Amira later). Once I managed to get all three but I can't figure out how to reproduce it. ------- DRUGS SAY NO TO DRUGS But seriously, if you don't want to rest and you get hit by even one arcane dampener your drugs will cause a drug crash, even though when the dampener ends the drug effects return. You can actually stack every drug with saves and loads, and if you have every drug benefit plus the crashes, the benefits still slightly outweigh the crashes (except whiteleaf, don't take whiteleaf, the crash effects are awful). So it still may be worth it. BUT you lose mostly perception, and perception is one of the most important stats so I just didn't mess with drugs. I was only hit with one, maybe two arcane dampeners so it would have been fine if I'd used them but you don't need them and it eliminates worry about that risen mage getting lucky and rolling a 100 vs your insanely high will defense... ------- MY ULTIMATE RUN First 20 or so videos are very boring, please don't watch them. It's just me sneaking around, questing, and proccing things. Not a lot of combat. Gets more interesting after that. I tried to script as much of the fighting as possible, but the POE2 engine is pretty limited compared to say Baldur's Gate, where I once wrote a 3000+ line script capable of handling every battle solo on insane with all the mods (God I'm a nerd). This script has just 33 blocks, and basically we try to keep up inspirations at all time, start battles with defensive buffs, summon citzal's spirit lance or sometimes concelhaut's staff, then use psychovampiric shield, borrowed instinct, and secret horrors for buffs/debuffs, cast pull of eora and chill fog on groups, then move in for the slaughter, healing ourself with restore and the moon's light as necessary, and using escape to zip around the battlefield while exploding things. One relevant note about my pathing. It was not well planned. I should not have gone to Sandswept immediately for the slight XP boost, it cost me later and delayed acquistion of both Shroud of the Phantasm and Lord Darryn's Voulge. I had to get to the Sanguine Harvest island on the 16th (has to be the 16th) for several reasons. You can get the sword, which has really nice healing passives. And you can get the sword again. And again, and again. After a day of repeating that encounter I emerged quite possibly the richest adventurer in Eora, and I drained a few hundred souls for focus in the meantime, so as Korgan would say. "Sigh...a good day". https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLkOCqAbkQHxwTJyCKvA_31wYyPWK_87VY

Thanks! Might be a few days before I post a build thread (unless I have time today), going to see family for a bit on friday

Thanks for pointing this out. I discovered the copy function by accident but yeah it is not well documented. I used it for squid's grasp mostly. I did lethandria's devotion and outworn buckler for two reasons, first because that was my default fighting shield when I remembered to switch from my default exploring shield (xoti), and second so I'd be healed while clearing the effect. I guess removing the effect faster could be even better as it restores my passive healing faster, but IDK if worth it in my case as the shield outworn buckler is otherwise not that good. Lethandria comes superb, has the healing passive + crit damage reduction, and good upgrades in combat. I like lustrous crystal because getting dominated is very very bad, and sheltering light for the defense buff. Though knowing this game it doesn't actually give ME the defense buff unless I have some kind of duplicate up. Also the passive for medium shield (block) is better than the passive for small shield (binding block) IMO. Once I had 3 weapon slots I'd typically use squid's grasp + lethandria in slot 1 (default fighting), various weapon + outworn buckler in slot 2 (upgraded with symbol of courage and timeless perseverance), squid's grasp + xoti's lantern in slot 3 (which I'd use while exploring). The alternate weapon was just some other form of damage or something I was trying to proc, e.g. resounding call. I could have used an ability for the extra weapon set. I did have one extra point in the build that was kinda free. If I had 4 weapon sets I'd default to xoti's lantern, lethandria, and 2x outworn buckler.

Thanks. I'll post a complete build later once youtube has finished processing the videos. Blood mage / soul blade utilizing strand of favor and cabalist's gambeson to stack focus (among many other buffs). Use Citzal's Spirit Lance for 90% of encounters, didn't memorize a single wizard spell for most of the game, eventually memorized pull of eora because it works so well at grouping enemies so the lance can get all of them. Starting stats were like 15/10/14/18/18/3, island amaua for the might resistance though wild orlan is also a good choice. Cipher spells used are mostly psychovampiric shield, borrowed instinct, secret horrors, and soul annihilation. Used minor grimoire imprint to steal various spells. Stole any wizard spell I could but the important ones were priest: (withdraw, escape, halt, and restore) and druid (nature's balm). Important equipment: Magnera's Chain (+10 fort/reflex/will), Effigy's Husk (might immunity), ring of minor protection and prosperity's fortune (later 2x ring of minor protection), protective eothasian charm, giftbearer's cloth, bounding boots or boots of stability depending on encounter, upright captain's belt, cap of the laughingstock, squid's grasp / xoti's lantern normally used in combat before summoned weapon, weapon set 1 and 2 need lethandria's devotion and outworn buckler. This allows you to break any affliction besides dominate/charm by scripting rapid weapon switch (most important for arcane dampener). Shroud of the Phantasm to proc brilliant (though actually not necessary, can just blood sacrifice like every 10 seconds and 3 to 4 times on combat end), outworn buckler can also proc courageous but it isn't super important since we have near infinite concentration. Resounding Call for tenacious (upped later to energized with Slayer's Claw). Amra and Lord Darryn's Voulge for speed buffs. Rannig's Wrath for +10 deflection. Deltro's Cage Helm for Conduit (wearing right equipment this gives +150 to 220 or so % shock damage depending how lucky you are with the roll when chain lightning yourself). Scordeo's Trophy early to reduce recovery, later Scordeo's Edge, though you don't really need it. Sanguine Great Sword for healing. Lots of other minor equipment buffs. I did Belranga pre-SOTP, and Concelhaut, cave grub, watershaper dragon, magma dragon, Dorudugan and HOW pre-Scordeo's Edge (also arkemyr). But I took anything that made me more powerful. This is a build that starts sorta weak but the more things you kill, the more spells you steal, and the more buffs you proc the more powerful it gets, and that applies all the way to the end, so once I got Citzal's I generally ran TOWARDS combat, I did lots of random ship encounters etc., and devoured the souls of kith and monsters everywhere. Grimoires: Llengrath's Martial Mysteries. Aloth's Grimoire (for minor imprint). Sometimes I open with a Ninagauth's Shadowflame or Jernaugh's Equalizing burst but that is really all that's needed. Pets: pes early on (+10% melee dmg, 5% hit to crit), bear cub once you can get him (+8 fort, 5% melee dmg), even later Ooblit (+3 sec duration all beneficial effects). Ooblit isn't really necessary but reduces how often I have to cast certain spells and abilities (escape mostly). It's a no-rest build and I got as many buffs as I could: nature's resolve, alchemic guile/brawn/wits, cauldron shard, konstantens boon, savage cunning, hylea's bounty is best food as you can take it immediately and I think it remains the best for huge health boost, +2 all skills, +10 all defenses. Con and especially resolve are not that important because we have huge passive healing and can enormously buff defenses with borrowed instinct, psychovampiric shield, various stolen spells and various items. Main danger to the build is certain spells like arcane dampener, though that can be cleared in a couple seconds. Form of the Helpless Beast is pretty bad. That could potentially end the run if you're hit when vela pops out of withdraw. Can actually still fight pretty effectively as the pig if she is safe because of the high attack rate, interrupts, and lightning damage. Other afflictions like paralyze don't really matter because they hardly ever hit since we have renewable inspirations up constantly for every stat besides might which is a little harder to proc, and even if you get hit with a 20 second paralyze or something you can clear it in same manner as dampener. It is a very powerful build once it comes together around level 13 to 14. Lot of micromanagement with SOF for max effectiveness, though for party runs it would do fine without any of the SOF buffs. Can rip through bosses and waves of mooks alike. Citzal's Spirit lance procs focus from both the primary target and secondary hits, so you build focus really quickly, and soul annihilation hits everyone the lance hits. If I were running this in a party without SOF micromanagement I would just script the char to use soul annihilation every time focus > 90 and you're threatened by more than 1 enemy, with like a 6 second cooldown. Soul annihilation was one of the things I couldn't script because the game limits the cipher resource cap to 90 in the scripting GUI, so if I want to use soul annihilation if and only if I have 1000+ focus, well, no way to do it except manually, and unfortunately with wael you're guessing at your current focus. I basically just zerged things with SA if they seemed high threat. Unfortunately SA does not generate more concentration or raise the max focus cap so you need to swap killing mooks normally with using SA on more dangerous things. By late game in my parallel, non-iron, non-wael run I had like 15000 max focus, and you start combat with I think 1/3 of that. Or maybe 1/5...IDK, it's a lot I was inspired toward soul blade builds from watching SarcasticSarcophagae's ultimate run where he does a soul blade / ranger, but I didn't really like the ranger aspect. I think this build is stronger but that one is easier to build focus since you can just kill your pet over and over and don't need to seek battles. But I like seeking battles. And I wanted to make a character that felt like an unstoppable kensai/mage from Baldur's Gate (or a kensai/mage/cleric...), and this is as close as I could get with POE2. Also wanted to script as much of the fighting as possible. Most encounters can be handled entirely by the script. It gets confused by things like Sigilmaster Auranic's obelisks, and you have to manually cast withdraw and soul annihilation but it can otherwise autopilot. Hmm. Went into much more detail than I'd intended. Gotta save something for a build thread lol

Just finished my ultimate run. Nearly wiped in Ukaizo of all places because I forgot about the auto-rest and rushed into battle, quickly got smacked with some nasty debuffs and injuries, etc. Lost my resolve inspiration despite wearing Cap of the Laughingstock + Mirror Image up, also... Will be a while before youtube finishes processing the videos. Also don't know if anyone cares about ultimate runs anymore, but I just recently got into this game and I wanted to do it and I did it.

Just in case Cap of the Laughing Stock only worked with summons or duplicates, I altered my script to keep up mirror image at all times. I STILL lost my courageous inspiration in the fight with Guardian of Ukaizo. Pretty sure wasn't from the auto rest because brilliant/energized were still up and in general time-based buffs I've extended to near infinity through cheese survive rests. Also in the video I cast psychovampiric shield but "steadfast" didn't pop up, meaning another buff was already up when cast. Think it was an attack called "Corrosive Strike" which happens at 1:26:15 and also kills Energized and Aware. I didn't see the red --Courageous-- but the next time I cast psychovampiric shield at 1:26:39 it did say "steadfast" so I had no resolve up and never saw a red --steadfast-- either. The script I wrote also keeps up psychovampiric shield at all times. I screwed up that battle pretty badly. Closest I came in the run to dying. Only did that fight once before, because on the parallel run I forgot I had "no forced rests" mod up and the battle seemed easy, so I didn't bother practicing it. So I started with my stats lower than they were normally, no dawnstar's blessing etc or any other rest buff (didn't realize I'd been forced to rest until already started the fight), decided to let the script handle the fight and it focused mostly on the adra animats and just let the guardian attack me. Normally my defenses and healing are so high it doesn't really matter. Also should have worn Effigy's Husk. Wore Magnera's Chain which is my default because of the +10 fort/will (and reflex, but who cares about reflex). So losing Energized was bad for multiple reasons, no longer interrupted the Guardian and lost the +2 pen so was underpenetrating. Had no source of might in my hands. The "Obliterate Essence" attack apparently hits several times, and although one missed and I resisted one I still got maimed (and proned, I think). Anyway. I eventually prevailed. Got hit with an arcane dampener during trivial fight with RDC though. Only one that hit me the whole run I think lol. My script cleared it pretty fast so was fine. Have lethandria's devotion in slot 1, outworn buckler in slot 2, squid's grasp and xoti's lantern in slot 3, script auto shuffles slot 1 and slot 2 if I lose all my inspirations at once and have no summoned weapon (which generally only happens from arcane dampener). Would have been pretty nasty to lose an ultimate run on Ukaizo... Pretty long run by comparison to most, 47 hours and 75 in-game days. I went out of my way to kill things and do quests I didn't have to, didn't take the best pathing etc. Youtube still processing videos. Guess I'll submit it to Obsidian when that finishes (assuming they still veryify ultimate runs), then post a build guide. Will be my first, you've done what, like 100? lol. Was pretty fun but kinda stressful. The worst part about an ultimate run is probably having to video everything. Worst Magran's fire challenge is Wael. Definitely Wael. I mean not the hardest but the most annoying. Can't tell how much money you have, your defenses etc., makes combat log very hard to read doing ? damage and combined with Magran almost impossible. Hardest trial is Hylea, though after you get used to taking care of Vela it isn't that bad. Woedica/Eothas combination also pretty bad, and combined with Hylea really limits class selection. EDIT: Figured out where I lost courageous, was in the Fonferrus encounter. Lucia Rivan has some kind of aura that isn't shown in the combat log but when she walked toward me I saw the red --courageous--. I didn't notice it at the time because I was busy casting withdraw on Vela. I didn't have mirror image up yet. Lucia immediately charged me. My buff routine is pretty fast (.2 second casts, like third cast) but wasn't fast enough here. So pretty sure Cap of the Laughingstock does not apply the deflection debuff or resolve immunity unless you have some kind of duplicate up (which includes mirror image). Should maybe move mirror image to be first thing to cast, before deleterious. At least for that encounter. Alternatively if I could figure out how to script casting withdraw on vela this wouldn't happen either, but I have to do it manually which is not very efficient. I've tried casting withdraw on ally but she isn't considered an ally apparently... AND the reason I didn't see STEADFAST when I cast psychovampiric shield in the Guardian encounter was because it missed, which is rather rare, but I had just lost nature's resolve, konstanten's boon, alchemic guile, etc.. I tried casting psychovampiric shield any time I don't have a resolve inspiration with no cooldown but sometimes it targets destructibles repeatedly and other weird behavior, plus rapidly draining focus (not that this matters this late in the game), so I put in a delay between casts. Oh well, one mystery solved. Still pretty sure Effigy's Husk does not always work but it didn't fail me in this run.

Really? It says "all in 2.5m radius" that doesn't include the wearer? Stupid description...I've been wearing it the whole game, coming up on DLC material. I did notice mirror image applied the deflection debuff to myself, I assume it would also do the immunity to resolve? Maybe that's why sometimes it seems to work and sometimes not, must have had mirror image up when it worked... What about Effigy's Husk with the might immunity? I've definitely lost might inspirations while wearing it, though it is fairly uncommon. I think it gets procced from attacks that do multiple debuffs, but not sure. Combat log is next to useless when you can't pause and everything has a ? by it. @boeroer Man I didn't know you could import characters with items...how is a new player supposed to know about this stuff?