masterty66

Yep, I'm running a Priest of Wael/Assassin right now. It's quite fun. I stealth in, shoot with two blunderbusses (or back stab with two weapons), and then I use escape to get out of there. If I can't easily get out, I also have arcane veil and eventually other Wael buffs to make sure I don't immediately die after the opening move.

The one thing I'd say to this is on POTD at least going early is nice for sure but it's not like you can always immediately capitalize on it since usually you need to debuff enemies first before you can apply effects and that will take rounds to do whether you go early or no. It's not like Original Sin (part one at least) where if you had high initiative you could immediately CC an important enemy. Here that's inherently hard to do unless you luck into an enemy that has a really weak defense. But on POTD most don't.

This is actually what I ended up going with, albeit with Wael instead of Skaen. Using two blunderbusses so far. The stealth alpha strikes are still quite nice in turn based mode. The squishiness of the Assassin is somewhat compensated for (at least so far) via Arcane Veil, which is a free cast spell. Combats for me usually involve opening with a stealth attack before casting arcane veil and getting the hell out of there until Eder can get in and pin enemies down. Main weakness is ranged attackers. Escaping melees with escape is trivial enough. Later on I'll be able to restealth too. But veil piercing attacks just murder this character. I don't know of a great way around that either since switching weapons takes a round. In theory you could grab the tower shield and use the modal if you're about to get dunked on by Gunners but I don't know if you can get that off in time in turn based. Maybe the Wael buffs will compensate enough for this later on though.

Can't you make additional attacks per round if you have enough initiative?

I hadn't thought about these drawbacks but generally in my experience you need the heals early on in a fight to help you stabilize. So you wanna shift early and have the huge PL bonus. Then once you shift back you still have the PL bonus from the staff until you summon the rod so I guess the post shift PL penalty isn't as bad then? There's probably an optimal way to manage all of this though but imo generally early on in a fight is when you're taking the most damage and so you want those massive heal over times on early. Later on in a fight you should be in a stable position (unless facing a boss or something similar) and so you don't care as much about losing the PL then. Interesting dilemma though for sure.

I played it to level 16 or so in the past while. That was the one I'm tabling in favor of turn based mode. It's as good a Healbot as you'd expect. A typical combat for me was transfer into Cat form, toss on Moonwell, Nature's Balm, etc and then after that either start buffing (Devotions, etc) or toss around damage spells like Shining Beacon and Storm spells. And then from there if combat was still going I'd usually summon the Wael Rod and snipe for the rest of combat, healing where necessary. It's actually not that bad offensively since you'll have high might anyways for healing but that also helps damage. One really nice boost for it is the penalty to healing post shift does NOT apply to Priest healing spells since most (all?) of those are tagged as Restoration. So even though your Druid heals take a hit when you shift back into normal form you can still burst out lots of healing with your Priest spells. But yes definitely use the Spine of Thicket Green. That is built for this multiclass combo. So good for it.

What about a Wael/Lifegiver? They seemed primed but optimal healing. They're good. I was just playing one. However I'm tabling that run because I want to do the new turn based mode and that forces a restart. However I still wanna actually complete my Wael playthrough so I figured rather than do another Wael/Lifegiver I'd do a Wael/x just not sure what the x is yet. But I think Gromnir's advice about not making my Priest the party's buffbot is a sound one. Xoti and whats his face from Beast of Winter can enjoy that duty.

Yeah just can't quite decide. Your Streetfighter build sounds appealing, but so too does a Shaman.

These all sound pretty good. Decisions decisions..

A lot of times I build him as a Fighter/Rogue and use dual sabers on him and focus on abilities like Gouging Strike, Hobble, and so on. He does beastly damage that way but is very fragile. If I was going more tank based I'd probably do what Boeroer did.

Like the topic says, I'm prepping a playthrough for Deadfire. I was currently doing a Lifegiver/Wael multiclass but with the upcoming turn based release I want to restart. I'll be playing a Priest of Wael I imported into Deadfire. Since I'm restarting, I figured I might as well try something different than the Universalist I was just playing. Difficulty will of course be potd with upscaling. So the only requirement I guess would be that Priest of Wael will be half the multi class. The other will be...whatever sounds fun .

Miasma Of Dull Mindedness is definitely an underrated spell. I get a lot of mileage out of that early on.

I really like the idea of this. I was initially resistant even though I liked Original Sin a lot but thinking about it more it makes sense to do turn based. For me, I pause a lot as it is. I do it so much that even RTWP essentially becomes nearly turn based for me. So why not slow that down further? I think this will make for more enjoyable gameplay for me because I will be more likely to actually use all of my abilities in combat and pay closer attention to the penetration system. With RTWP I get lazy and sometimes there's so many buttons to push that I forget to do stuff. Turn based will be a huge win I think. Really looking forward to it.

I'm doing a Priest/Druid right now and it's nice. Doing Wael/Lifegiver. I can Spiritshift and give my party superpowered regeneration via Druid spells. When that wears off, I can still contribute value with regular Priest healing spells. The Priest spells are not affected by the Lifegiver post Spiritshift malus as that penalty applies only to Rejuvenation spells, and most (all?) Priest spells are tagged as Restoration. It's a very good heal bot. Not quite as effective at buffing as a pure Priest, but it can keep party members on their feet all day, especially with the Spine Of Thicket Green. The damage isn't that bad either. Once you grab your core heal spells you can branch out and grab a few damage spells if you want. Things like Touch of Rot, Shining Beacon, etc can give you some dps options once you've finished casting your regen spells. That said this guy is a healer so most of his time is spent providing direct heals or heal over time spells. I've invested less time taking the Priest buffing spells (apart from Devotions) since I can bring Xoti for that. And also because this guy only has so many actions in a round. Anyways it's a fun little build. Amazing heal bot. I have beat the game with a pure Priest of Eothas as well though and pure Priests are plenty strong.

Just started this and got through the prologue. It's pretty nice. Heals great of course but also has some dps with touch of rot which is nice early.

Also Barring Deaths door, Resurrection, etc. Suppress Affliction. Holy Radiance is still very nice as well as an oh **** button.

That sounds pretty interesting. My Herald was nigh unkillable and provided solid healing as well. This universalist will be less unkillable but should provide nigh unmatched healing. Hmm good idea. Hadn't considered taking a back up weapon set for when to dps but that makes sense. And yeah taking cat form for sure.

I'm about to start one. I'm importing it from poe1, and it's a Pale Elf Priest of Wael. I was thinking of going Lifegiver with the Druid half and then making it a heal bot and using the Spine of Thicket Green. Has anyone done such a build? Any special things I should consider? Difficulty will be potd. I've beaten the game plus the original 2 DLC before. My most recent run was a Herald.

I don't think this is true. Outside of Port Maje, Deadfire is easier than its predecessor, even the original PoE's later areas. As well, PoE is always rewarding players for more efficient combat. Because of health decay and per rest abilities, the upper limit for maximum efficiency in the original game is extremely high. In Deadfire, once you're avoiding knockdowns in fights... that's literally it, you've hit the upper limit of the combat's difficulty. I'm not saying Poe2 is harder, but Poe1 is very easy if you know what you're doing, and health loss is not very relevant with the amount of rest supplies they throw at you even on Potd.

I think people are looking with rosy eyes on Poe1's difficulty. That game also stops being hard around maybe level 9 even on Potd. Or did anyone truly have problems with the game when having access to Ninagauth's Shadow Flame, Devotions of the Faithful, Gaze of the Adragan, Lightning Storm, etc? Fact is, once you get access to the powerful Priest/Wizard/Druid spells in Poe1 that game becomes a cake walk even on Potd. Not to mention Cipher's with Amplified Wave, Puppet Master, etc. The only way Poe1 is hard is if you neglect to take casters. And spells being per rest doesn't even limit you much because most dungeons give you a resting supply or two and that on top of the two you already have. For example Durgan's Battery has a lot of tough encounters but you get one rest supply on the top level, two on the second, and two on the third. More than enough to spam your top spells to heart's content.

Awesome. I'll give it a shot. Going 16/16/16 might/dex/con. Probably won't stat dump anything except maybe Res to 8 for 18 int perhaps. Think I'll go Boreal Dwarf as well since Dwarf Boar Druid fits the theme. I suppose Moon Godlike is probably the most optimal choice but everyone does those. The +accuracy bonus Boreal get should be nice too. (does it apply in Spiritshift form?. Useful I guess even if not.)

I'm interested in the Hog Druid myself. About to do a playthrough and never mained a Druid. How do spec that feller out?

There's certainly nothing wrong with that approach, and honestly most of his builds will still work even if you don't min max the attributes. The barb build in question would still be pretty good with non minmaxed dex, it'd just be a little bit worse at everything. But by high levels and with the gear you find in POE that just doesn't matter much. Like driving a chevy instead of a mercedes. Both will still get you where you need to go effectively, one's just a bit more streamlined.

Boerer's Golden Dragon is a terrific PC for this purpose. He talks well thanks to high resolve/perception and he's an excellent tank who is extremely difficult to kill once he gets a few levels under his belt. Even in the early going I found the build quite survivable on potd once he got a large shield + shield talent. Eventually you start doing good damage with him too thanks to heart of fury. It's been a nice change for me as I tend to focus more on all-offense type builds. This one has actually been the easiest run I've had yet I think though. I didn't properly appreciate before just how nice high deflection is. Once you get around 100 deflection plus 80+ other defenses you're real hard to kill. And like I said the dps is still nice too thanks to hof. Prior to level 11 you're more of just a pure tank though admittedly (though will contribute some dps thanks to carnage) but after that you're a god.

Yes but he still believes in Magran's teachings so it makes sense that he can continue wielding Priestly power. if you read the Priest class description though it makes clear that Priests dont channel the God's power but their own through their belief systems.