Not So Clever Hound

Should be Primordials I think. My mistake, you're right . Blights = spirits. I don't know about the Duplicates (Dichotomous Soul, Essential/Substantial Phantom). Cool find @Boeroer. It seems that those poor skeleton minions are going through quite an ordeal in a typical Boeroer playthrough .

That's fair, thanks for the feedback anyway! Agree with your other points. I was already only on 8 RES then +2 with BB and then more along the way with the No Rest goodies. I was also using Hands of Light for the Interrupt immunity so as to use the Vaporous Grimoire in acceptable safety without Rekvu's Fractured Casque + Wound.

It's particularly effective if you follow up with a Fireball

Actually you know, I thought about this more and I wonder if we have an interesting case here. I'd like to share some more thoughts: Defenses are always considered as having increasing returns in Deadfire when you choose to invest in them. So from that perspective, it's hard to argue against the logic of adding the Mask to this toon's panoply as you suggested . However, this toon is already able to reach Non-Veil Piercing Deflection of 232 once fully buffed... now of course going from 232 to 272 is a huge numerical bump but I'm not sure that actually the incremental effect on the game would be that crazy... Because 232 is so high already. On the other hand, the Acina's Tricorn hat is really nice because it adds to my already great ACC, although sadly Shootist doesn't help landing Wall of Draining (wall spells are so funky), it is a significant driver of my offensive potential. In that very particular case, the cost of losing +5 ACC might be higher than the benefit of getting +40 DEF. (??) Now this is still Upscaled PotD, so I might be thinking that and in 5 min a random group of enemies might get a couple of very lucky strikes and hand me over my b*tt. Anyway, curious to hear anyone's thoughts on this.

Thanks! Mask stacks with Mirrored Images and with Wizard Double but not Arcane Veil, I just tested. Since I'm using Wizard's Double above, I will have a total of 272 Deflection against Non-Veil Piercing attacks with it. Now who besides a very pissed-off Belranga can sport an ACC of 198+? Right now I'm using Acina's Tricorn for Shootist +ACC on spells (it can't be all about defense I guess ). I forgot about the Magnificent Escape Cape indeed! I really like the +17 All Def except Deflection that I get from the Giftbearer Cloth, as non-Deflection defense become increasingly important late game. My goal was just to see if/how I could get to 220+ on all defenses .

NOTE: Deflection against Non-Veil Piercing attacks is actually at 232, it doesn't show as it is conditional, same for Divine Purpose adding another +20 defense against MIG, DEX and RES Afflictions. Also the conditional -15 defense of Blood Mage doesn't show here of course. Also of course, all enemies are permanently bathing in several layers of Chill Fogs that Blind and debuff their ACC by -15. Hello, I'm Bobby the Goldpact/Blood Mage and I firmly believe that the best defense is defense. Of course, I also think that the best offense is offense. Anyway, here I am with all my defenses over 220 thanks to a careful mix of item/ability selection, stacking buffs prolonged via Wall of Draining as well as some nice No-Rest goodies. (No Strand of Favor trick involved at all). Having the lowest defenses at 221 means that in order to get 1% chance of Grazing this toon, an enemy needs to have an accuracy of 147 (147+100-221=26 [Graze]). Any ACC below that level cannot breach his defenses with an Attack Roll (of course things like Minoletta's Minor Missiles, Thrust of Tattered Veils or Brand Enemy can still hit since they don't require an Attack Roll). On paper, this should make more than 99% of enemies in the game irrelevant. Not bad! Now, the funny thing about Upscaled PotD is that I can still find non-Megaboss foes that do manage to Graze him from time to time! Even then, with a constant regen of 60HP/3sec and 19+ AR, this toon is pretty safe. The funniest thing is that so far I never had to reload a single fight in the game playing Solo, EXCEPT... fighting Soul Mirrors. Their defenses are too high because they copy my toon AND have Upscaling AND PotD bonuses on top... and they have Blood Mage + Lethandria's Devotion constant regen, plus a ridiculous AR stacking with Stoic Steel... I actually have to switch to unarmed when the mirror is created (i.e. without sword & broad), then switch back to sword & broad if I want a chance to defeat them. Anyway, I thought I'd share for all you min-maxers out there .

And of course, I'm really glad you had fun with it and thanks for the feedback!

It is indeed a build that really comes to fruition once you get a few more levels under your belt (level 13: relentless storm is to me where the build flips to god mode in many fights). Then a few more levels, Freezing Pillar and of course WoD. Well, if you briefly swap Grimoires you can cast Concelhaut's Crushing Doom, which is one of the best single target ability in the game - and incidently very useful against Neriscyrlas. IIRC I did her the same way I did with my SC Blood Mage playthroughs. Used the pledged souls bonuses, also used a lot of interrupts to prevent annoying casts like Lllengrath Safeguard - again, Crushing Doom is great, you also have Thrust of Tattered Veils for autointerrupt, Expose Vulnerabilities is also nice with Crushing Doom - and it will also interrupt on hit. Relentless Storm will help too of course, then of course all the ticking spells that can still overwhelm at some point such a huge health pool. I might have stayed in Kith form if her will was too high for WoD, or I might have briefly used a grimoire with Miasma of Dull Mindedness to drop her will and get plenty of nice WoD hits. But it's also true that WoD isn't great against single target fights, high Will or not. But single targets can be owned in other ways!

I laughed out loud . Concelhaut really messed up - instead of going through horrible mutilations and intricate rituals to become a lich, he could have just looked for a barrel and cast some simple level one « transfer my soul » spell on it.

That is game breaking, figuratively and literally .

This sounds insane. Not nearly as good as Grave Calling, but without the total GPU rampage right? I'll have to give it a try, but first I want to see how far I can push defenses on my current Arcane Knight playthrough . Thanks for sharing!

Sorry again if this is widely known - I'm having all kinds of epiphany during my current playthrough . I just discovered that if you cast Gilded Enmity/Sworn Enemy/Sworn Rival as a Goldpact Knight outside of combat on say, a barrel, you will get the +4 AR bonus and it will stay with you "for free", also when you start your next encounter. This can be quite helpful in early levels, like at the Maje Digsite which includes, mind you, several barrels. Late game if you stack this with the Stoic Steel stealth trick, you could start a battle with (I think) +7AR without having spent a single resource. Not game breaking, but knowing how you can sometimes get hammered with volleys of the hardest hitting ranged attacks at the beginning of certain encounters, each point of AR over the enemy PEN can knock off like 25% DMG. So, it can be the difference between taking 100% DMG and only 25%! EDIT: now at the end of every encounter, I will try to think about casting Sworn Enemy on the last dying foe just before the encounter finishes, in order to be all gold-plated and ready for the next fight! That part doesn't seem to work.

Though if the OP is looking to RP a robed Monk that uses agility instead of armor/shield to dodge weapon attacks... that's not really the game for that. There is no such thing as a Lawful Good Monk Robe that adds Dodge bonus to your already high Dex/Wisdom or whatever in Deadfire. You're going to need some armor.

Good idea but yeah, exactly. Too high reflexes for my low level wizard to hurt him faster than HP regen in non-combat mode. Still managed to do it with a level 20 Blood Mage/Assassin - but that defeats the purpose! His script still triggers, it is not bypassed. EDIT: but I'm pretty sure you could use this trick to soften/kill Dessiral's bounties: Katrenn, Torkar etc. The Torkar encounter can be brutal, if you can kill or soften him or some of his powder monkeys or whatever before initiating combat, all the better. I'll try when I get there in my current playthrough.

Maybe this is already well-known, but I just discovered this: casting Wall of Flame on neutral NPCs results in them taking damage without ever turning hostile. If the spell is recast enough times that one NPC dies, then the survivors will turn hostile. A couple more notes: I've tested this first on the Spindle Man, an Ogre and a Crystal Eater Spiderling. Casting WoF repeatedly did not initiate combat, until the Spiderling died from WoF. Then the entire crew went hostile, with the Spindle Man and the Ogre already being in dire straits. Then I did more testing with Biakara Bekarna and Llengrath in the Temple of Revelations (don't ask me why). Then I found the following: Other Wall spells: WoD doesn't do anything as long as you don't do something else to initiate combat. Wall of Many Colors turns NPCs hostile after a little while, not sure why (I intially guessed it was because of the Dominate component that would trigger/reset alliances but Petrify also seems to work the same way. Maybe the hostility triggers when an Affliction happens). I didn't try Wall of Force but I suspect it would be the same as WoF - EDIT: unless the Hobbled component does the same as for WoMC! Will try and test later. EDIT2: Wall of Force is even different, it is actually like Wall of Draining, it only targets foes so it doesn't work on neutral targets. Interestingly, WoF intiates combat the second it is cast in the Temple of Revelation situation, even though everybody remains neutral until one is dead. If no one dies or if no other offensive action is taken, the game is stuck in combat forever, everybody remaining neutral. Again, WoF did not initiate combat with the Spindle Man or Ernezzo for example -just when one is dead. This little trick has limited uses, but it can help outright kill or heavily soften one or several NPC(s) currently neutral. Well, they have to be in some kind of line . Conclusion: I knew Wall spells were funky, but now they're even funkier. PS: I am using the Community Patch, I'm not yet using @Elric Galad's BPM.

Yeah going back to Ad&d 2e games can be brutal in that regard but it’s like a « Madeleine de Proust ». Unmistakable taste of old times past . Ah, burning everything to a crisp in IWD with a Dragon Disciple bathing in his own incendiary clouds. Fun times. No worries about pathfinding and the lack of AoO then .

So I just did a bit of testing and while Persistent Distraction doesn't work with WotEP Riposte in that situation, of course you can set up all enemies with Distracted using Smoke/Pernicious Cloud, which will make all your attacks including Ripostes benefit from Sneak Attack/Deathblows. With a Streetfighter/Monk the result is quite impressive, maybe for overall survivability Trickster/Monk is better. I don't think the Monk class matters much but a high RES FF could be nice (high Deflection to trigger Riposte also without the Disengagement trick).

Nope. Besides Terrify, I don't think there are consistent ways to compel the enemy to disengage (sometimes they do out of sheer stupidity just like party companion AI). If you want to take advantage of the Disengagement mechanic, it's better to do it in reverse (courtesy of @Boeroer): Use an item like Nomad Brigandine that has immunity to Disengagement attack Equip WotEP with Offensive Parry Get engaged by many enemies and then make small moves to disengage Enemy disengagement attacks will auto-miss, which will proc the Offensive Parry riposte from WotEP This effect can stack with the Rogue's Riposte talent and crits will benefit from the Monk's Swift Flurry/Heartbeat Drumming What I'm not sure about is whether the Riposte can still benefit from Persistent Distraction, knowing that the riposte happens when you've just disengaged... (so enemies maybe aren't Distracted anymore) EDIT: it doesn't work, see post below.

Yeah, self contained resource regen with Druid is very hard to achieve. After Ashen Maw, you could also make sure that your Wit of Death Herald gets upgraded to Brilliant (through God dialogues). That gives you a fairly long use once per day without cheesing duration. You could also have of course a Cipher and a Priest in your party for the combo Ancestor's Memory + Salvation of Time. Last thought: if you solo, a Rogue /Druid can get some kind of resource regen by resetting the fight . But that doesn't work 100% of encounters.

Nope, it's not squishy. AFIK it's solo-viable.

Nice pic but I think the best use of this weapon is with a Devoted/Berserker as @Kaylon wrote. I can dig up his short build layout if you're interested. Incidently, a properly built Devoted/Berserker can also kick b*tts with Monastic Unarmed Training... and still be Devoted to Pollaxes.

@Boeroer, forever the:

In order, IMHO: Forbidden Fist/Steel Garrote - look at @Powerotti and @dgray62 and other's posts. Outstanding, top-tier synergy. Nalpazca or FF/Devoted or Unbroken: Forbidden Fist/Unbroken is the most tanky because you will want to max out RES and with Tuotilo's Palm = . Helwalker/Blood Mage: the "Diva Tank" who takes their sweet time to come to fruition and requires a lot of love and attention. But it's a winner. OK it's also not exactly a Tank, at high enough level it's more a "Hold my beer" type of OP combo. Of course, pure Monk any subclass can carry an entire team at high level, but that's not about being a Tank. EDIT: and also of course, all the good stuff @Boeroer just wrote .

I really don't know about that, speaking for myself as much as I've dealt with the big FS encounters left and right, doing this DLC on a ToI run would stress the living crap out of me. I was thinking about how I would approach a Win-or-Die party run with a Crusader and I thought that an all-Pally crew could actually be interesting. Has anyone ever done it? I was thinking: Goldpact/Unbroken Goldpact/Troubadour Goldpact/Ascendant or Soulblade Goldpact/Priest of Berath Goldpact/Blood Mage On paper, this group could be both devastating and almost unkillable with the right abilities. It would require a ton of micro in big fights. But it would have multiple nasty tricks up its sleeve depending on the enemy roster and battlefield layout, while also having several layers of "oh sh*t!" panic buttons if anything goes sideways. Damn... should I make my current Arcane Knight solo run a party run..?