patronkus

Agree, even the Survivor SSS fights are doable without it, maybe just use some scrolls or potions to compensate. Megabosses are totally different story. I avoid the megabosses as they are just not fun to fight legitimately and boring if cheesed.

The Forgotten Sanctum fight? I did find many of those challenging but mostly because if you let any of the casters get off a Missile Salvo it is just game over. The Salvo also lagged my game a lot so that made it extra hard. That fight specifically is very troublesome as you are locked in and surrounded. IIRC you can get some of the automatons to aid you in battle and those helped greatly.

I agree, I started up a new run with a Beguiler cipher and I think its the way to go over ascendant. You have constant debuffing of high tier afflictions (10 Focus for Blind, 20 for Paralyze/Immobilise, all of which refund Focus) and if you have an excess of Focus then you can start throwing out some Pain Blocks or Silent Screams. Has been working super well so far and I've stopped trying to crank damage out of the cipher like a Monk or Barbarian and let them help those 2 classes excel at dealing damage.

I should've specified I am not using the nerf package as I was unsure of the OP combo's available in the game. I see now why you decided to make the nerfs you did in the BPM mod. I think even still nerfed most fights are beatable without requiring Brilliant. Maybe what I did not articulate well enough in my post is that I before thought Brilliant was a necessity (maybe from watching too many Solo Deadfire runs) and thus overvalued in when many fights would've been easier if I just had my cipher cast offensive spells instead of buffing for 4 casts with Brilliant. My rogue build was actually inspired by the Kaylon video, not sure why it didn't work so well but maybe I just micro managed it poorly.

Uh I didn't find the Oracle super troublesome though it was tough, I think maybe I had so much trouble with Neriscyrlas since my party was dealing a lot of cold damage and not much fire damage.

Keen to see it!

So I returned to the game after hearing about the CP, BPM and Enhanced UI Mods which improved quality of life and the overall experience after not touching it since release. I recently finished this playthrough and loved it but I had some strategy thouhts I'd like to cast into the In-Between. My party was all SC characters (didn't wanna MC because I know i'd get lost in the sauce of MCing) and this worked out well (probably helped by the BPM mod). My Watcher was a Helwalker Monk, I had a Mercenary Ascendant Cipher and for most of the playthrough I used Serafen and Vatnir (or Xoti). My 5th changed a lot, initially it was Ydwin who was going for a Gambit build but that underperformed IMO, switched to Pallegina and that was OK for the Exhortations and swapped her out to try Teheku, Fassina and some others. SC Barb and Monk are dumb powerful as I am sure most people already know. Monk just wins and destroys everyone with a renewable resource which is highly desirable in POE 2. Barb can recover resources however doesn't always need to due to features like Blood Thirst, Blood Lust and Barbaric Retalliation just pumping hard. I messed up for most of my playthrough though as I gave serafen Willbreaker to apply Body Blows and -Will to help the Cipher out but in hindsight I should've done Battleaxes for Bleeding Cut which is stupid powerful with HoF. I went Driving Roar initially which was good but swapped to Dazing Shout after making Serafen my main tank which still worked well. Even though Driving Roar has higher base damage Dazing Shout is a circle AOE meaning you'll probably hit more targets and get effective more damage. Cipher was really the central focus of my party for most of the run, the idea was Ascend with Kitchen Stove, prolong it with Salvation of Time and pump Amplified Wave to kill foes. This was actually quite underwhelming, even though I gave the Cipher absolutely everything to do more damage (Harbinger robes, Ring of Prosperous Fortune, Kuara Prize etc) they were still outclassed by the Barb, Priest and Monk damage wise. I ended up switching the Ciphers focus to buffing with Brilliant and Robust and Debuffing with the numerous Cipher spells for afflictions. I was very focused on achieving the Brilliant Inspiration on as many of the party as possible, mainly the priest for SoT, but I think I tunnel visioned onto that and it was maybe overkill. For most fights Brilliant, while nice, just isn't necessary when using a full party. Moreover giving Brilliant to classes like Paladin, Monk or Barbarian doesn't give them that much. Brilliant for a Barb gives an extra Barbaric Smash, Brilliant for a Priest gives an extra Symbol and these things are definitely not created equal. In hindsight, I probably should've just given out Brilliant to my casters, Robust to my Melees and then gotten into blaster or debuff mode. Also, while Brilliant is handy for extended fights, any character with high enough Arcana can continue being effective with scrolls of Plague of Insects or Gaze of the Adragan or whatever. Paladin SC just didn't really do much. Without Voidward Sacred Immolation is a really hard sell and even with the ring it didn't feel that impactful. Exalted Endurance though is incredibly powerful, the +1 Armor Rating is stupid good and the passive healing on top of Lay on Hands is so good. In hindsight I think I overvalued the Hardy inspiration for +2 AR and should've held onto the Zeal for Lay on Hands. My idea was use the Exhortation on everyone and recover the Zeal with Brilliant from the Cipher but the rate of recovery isn't fast enough and you run out and have nothing to do. Rogue was pretty underwhelming. The idea of using Gambit to ensure criticals and get big damage just didn't work out consistenly enough to be strong. I might've played it wrong or mismanaged it but it didn't wow me. I used Tekehu for a bit and he was OK. The idea was to lay down Chill Fog and Ninagauth Freezing Pillar as death fields which also debuff the party can run through freely. Chill Fog has horrible PEN so does no damage but the Blind is very good and Freezing Pillar does OK damage but nothing to write home about IMO. Tekehu was quite overshadowed by Vatnir and his Symbol of Rymrgand which blasted damage unbelievably hard. After siding with the Huana Pallegina left and I took Fassina with me to Forgotten Sanctum. I ran her with the Caedabald Blackbow, Essential Phantom setup which was neat but not insane. The damage is mediocre but the intermittent Terrifies are super good. The duration is short though and IMO is overshadowed by Ryngrims Enervating Terror. I tried out an Illusionist setup on Aloth, using Enervating Terror, Gaze of the Adragan, Confusion etc and that was really good. Being able to mass CC with party friendly AOEs is so strong. In contrast to Tekehu, who did mild damage and provided mild CC, Aloth just hard CCd entire fights with this setup. It also helped there are lots of Illusion PL improvements available though and Aloths base stats are much better than Tekehus. In hindsight of my playstyle I think going for my next playthrough I am going to chill out on making sure everyone has certain inspirations. Most fights just don't require everyone to be Robust, Nimble, Brilliant etc and it's better on an action economy scale to not spent so much time spamming inspirations and just get to doing actual stuff abilities. I think next playthrough I'll mess around with some subclasses like Beguiler or Forbidden Fist but we shall see. I don't think anything I've written here is new to anybody or novel in any way, just wanted to express these thoughts and see if anyone else has similar conclusions or experiences or advice.

In my last playthrough the only lone boss style fight that gave me a problem was Neriscyrlas. I walked into it hoping my Ascendant Cipher + SoT Priest could handle it but man was I wrong. The dragon is quite a foe and put up significant resistance. I didn't have nearly as much trouble with any other boss fight (Menzaggo, Beast of Winter, Jaderfelas, etc) as I did with her. The water dragon gave me a bit of strife but I still beat it in one shot so I am just curious if there are any other major battles like this that have a really tough single foe.

Title. If you dominate/charm a foe, and they die while charmed/dominated, does this proc Paladins Divine Retribution restoring Zeal?

I think Haunting Chains from Cipher could use some love. For a PL 9 spell to be 1 target Terrified for 90 Focus while Ryngrims Enervating Terror is PL 5 and AOE and applies Weakened makes Haunting Chains look exceedingly lame in comparison. I think if it it worked like Mind Plague and bounced that'd help it out or had some subsequent lesser effect around the target like Ringleader would be good (maybe up Hobble to Immobilise for thise so the main target is Terrified and Immobilised and surrounding foes are Frightened and Hobbled).

Was just doing a playthrough and sided with the Huana which prompted Pallegina to leave my party (stole all my sick ****ing items too like Magran Favor). To replace her I grabbed Fassina and I have to say she did have lots to say during the DLC which was a welcome surprise. Fassina also pretty strong with Caedbalds Blackbow and made pretty easy work of the sanctum.

The Whale of a Wand procs Charm on spell hits. Unsure if this works with DOT spells like Priest Symbols or Plague of Insects but either way its a potent effect. Are there any other items that proc on similar condiitons?

While I appreciate the +15 HP on Kills, I think Blood Surge as you have it currently is better for general play outside of abusing Chanter skeleton summons. While an interesting and unique combination, it feels a touch gimmicky and I don't know how I feel about a PL 9 feature being only really strong off a gimmick requiring either multiclassing or bringing a Chanter in the party.

Am playing through it now serendipitously. For my current run I am using all single classes, CP mod and balance polish mod. My current party is Helwaker Monk (Watcher), Priest (Vatnir), Ascendant (Mercenary), Barbarian (Serafen) and Druid (Teheku). The last slot has changed a lot and is likely gonna change again tbh but so far its worked well. SC monk can just autopilot murder everything with like 0 investment. Super not reliant on gear as fists carry hard and they just autopilot murder everyone. My top Damage dealer so far even with greater gear investment into the Cipher. Doesn't synergise with anyone in the party like the other 4 characters tho but still works cause of how strong it is. Priest is there for Salvation of Time and Barring Deaths Door. Salvation is meant to combo with Ascendant Cipher to extend the ascended state primarily but has other functions too. Barbarian is our main tank. Prior I had Pallegina and Serafen but found Palegina didn't do much besides some inspirations and passive healing so replace her. The big question on the replacement was can Serafen do the tanking alone and the answer is sort of. In most fights, ye he can and its because of Barb HP and having high armor. The reason we want Barb to tank is because of Barbaric Retalliation, Body Blows and Willbreaker. Currently Serafen is rocking Blackened Plate Armor for -1 Armor for enemies, Willbreaker for -3 to -15 will malus on hit, Body Blows for -25 Fortitude on hit and Dazing Shout for AOE crush and Daze (-10 more Fort btw). Run him in, everyone groups up and starts critting him, he hits back and roars applying -35 fortitude, which because of Brute Force helps him hit with Willbreaker reducing Will. It can be hard to keep him alive but Barring Deaths Door can fix that from either the priest or Nemnoks Cloak to keep him alive. The damage is pretty pumping too, Serafen is my 2nd highest damage dealer. Close in 3rd for damage is the Ascendant Cipher. Armed to the teeth in Harbinger Robes, Ring of Properous Fortune etc he is ready to blast damage with amplified wave. This is why we want Serafen applying that -35 fortitude. Once ascended, Time Parasite goes out (thanks Willbreaker for the will reductions) and Brilliant Inspirations start coming out. After everyone is Brilliant, Amplified Wave spam for full screen 100+ damage Crush nukes is the order of the day and its glorious. Even if the damage is lagging, the interruption from the prone is so nice and the Brilliant Inspiration really is essential. Shared Nightmare makes it so every AOE is gigantic and if you wanna get tricky with Mental Binding for mass immobilise that works awesome too. Cipher is super versatile, can sling Robust, Brilliant, +8 Pen and other crazy potent stuff, overall super strong, backbone of the party tbh. Of course the Cipher combos with priest for Brilliant into Salvation of time for looping buff durations. I wasn't really sure what to do with slot 5, prior I had a rogue that was OK but the damage was lower than everyone else and they didn't bring anything unique. Ended up bringing a Druid since I heard that casters were good SC and make good use of Briliant too. Teheku is appealing as all his spells are Foe Only allowing Serafen to stand in Chill Fog without getting blinded and maximising its effect chance with the -35 Fort. It's OK either requires some tuning or he might get switched for somene else. I highly reccomend this Barb setup for konstanten and probably go single class on Fassina because druid spells at low level aren't that amazing it seems. Ydwen will pump as rogue cipher or even just cipher. Highly reccomend a Priest to pull you out of a tight spot too.

What ways are there to make Driving Roar more powerful on a Barbarian? Currently my Barb has Driving Roar spam as their main attack and it is good but I am curious if there are ways to get more out of it since it has no Keywords tied to it. Furthermore, does it beat out Barbaric Retalliation or not really? Finally, my Barb is dual wielding sabres rn (seraphen btw) but the Roar is just an ability not an attack or anything so doesn't benefit off the dual wield, are there any weapons like 2 handers to make them stronger?

Interesting, does it require a specific setup or upgrade to achieve this? Furthermore, I thought the balance polishing mod nerfs only came into effect if you installed the nerfs module?

Trying out single class rogue for the first time, want some advice regarding their higher level abilities. Enduring Shadows seems good for the Swift Inspiration so you can ignore engagement and have your rogue on autopilot without getting chewed by disengagement attacks but the 2 big draws appear to be Gambit and Vanishing Strike. Gambit is a Full Attack that rewards 2 Guile per crit of the attack. This means with high enough crit chance you can have 0 net expenditure of guile per Gambit. Vanishing Strike turns you invisible allowing benefit from Assassin passive and Backstab. Both seem really good, unsure how any items and stuff interact with either ability but it seems like its a one or the other type thing because I don't think you'll have the actions or guile to use both frequently.

Thanks for the advice, side note loved your old POE videos. Why at the end of your sequence here do you continue to shoot with the Red Hand? I've been using it and so far found it a little underwhelming with regard to building focus.

Oh, I think maybe the community patch or something changes this? I recal most of the weapon modals were usually + recovery for some weak bonus

Returning to the game after not playing since release. I installed the community patch and some of the balance polishing to help with the experience and its been fun so far. For my own sanity I decided to ban multiclassing for this run and do all single classes. As such, my part is Watcher (Monk, Helwalker), Serafen (Barbarian), Ydwin (Rogue), Mercenary (Cipher, Ascendant), Pallegina (Paladin) So far, its been going good, I like having Pallegina to keep everyone alive while the Monk, Barb and Rogue do the killing. The cipher is the most micro intensive but once they get into ascendance they just spam the PL 6 wave attack and win. One thing that has been confusing though is what items to run with and actually work well with my classes. Monk is easy, fists auto scale so they are chilling but the Barb, Rogue and Cipher are a bit up in the air. I originally wanted Pallegina to wield a 2 hander but its just way better to do S+B too. For the Barb and Rogue its just both dual sabres. The proficiency seems real good, -12 deflection on Barb is whatever since they got so much HP and for the Rogue its been manageable and worth the tradeoff IMO. Cipher I have rocking the Kitchen Stove so they can do the nova and instantly be in ascendance which has worked good so far but after that initial ascendance getting another in has been real tough. Overall I am just not super sure what weapons and armor I should be looking out for. I feel like I should stick to ranged for the cipher but idk if blunderbusses are the way to go. What one handed weapons are good for the Rogue and Barbarian so they can get the most of their full attack abilities?