PhroX

I find an interesting build for my MC that I've not played before. Then I add Eder as he's my bro. Then I pick 3 more companions/sidekicks that I haven't used in my most recent playthrough, so as to keep up variety, that somewhat fill in key roles. And, then I just play from there.

I've been having a lot of fun with a barbarian/shifter on my current playthrough (on PotD). Sure, you can't cast while shifted, but there's nothing stopping you from opening the fight with some Heal- and Damage-over-time spells, then shifting and leaping into the fray, where the barbarian passives really help support both your offense and defense while in beast form. Then, with the multiple uses of shapeshift, it's not too much of a hit if you have to drop out prematurely in order to cast a spell or two (plus you get the heal). If you do, I'd definitely second the recommendation to get the Community Patch for the stag carnage buff. It really rounds out the flexibility of the shifter forms - cat for single target damage, stag for AoE, bear for toughness, boar for the healing and DoT and wolf for...something. Not really sure what it's good for (the knockdown is nice against casters but it's only one use)....

Great selection of spice here, just what I was looking for. Thanks guys

I've gotten that urge to play Deadfire again, and I'm going with a SC Blood Mage as my MC. In terms of the general build and effectiveness of the character, I feel I know where I'm taking the character (Casting powerful spells is good. Not running out of powerful spells to cast is better. Having access to all the powerful spells without spending points thanks to grimoires is even better), but half the fun of Deadfire is those clever (and sometimes broken) interactions between abilities and/or items that aren't immediately obvious. So has anyone got some ideas for cool hidden tricks that a wizard can pull off? My party is going to be Swashbuckler Eder (because he's Eder), Herald Pallegina (because I love having someone who keeps my party healed just by standing there), Monk Xoti (because, to my shame, I've never actually tried a SC monk before) and probably Mindstalker Ydwin for the last slot, because I always like having a cipher along and don't feel like bringing Serafen for once. Oh, and I'm only on Veteran difficulty as I'm somewhat of a scrub but not a total one....

Thanks for the info guys. Think I'll keep it simple and just go for a single class Lifegiver for this run, but the multiclass suggestions do sound fun and I'll add them to the list of things I want to play on a future playthrough. Of course, said list is already too long.... Now just to decide on my party....

Planning on starting a new playthrough of Deadfire soon, and I'm leaning towards playing as a Druid. Despite being my favourite class in the first game, I've not really done much with them in this one barring a mainly AI controlled Tekehu who came along on one of my runs. So I thought I'd see if anyone here has any advice on builds or spell/item interactions which stand out for the class. I probably want to build a more caster-centric character, so that rules out Shifter, but I'm not committed to or against any of the other subclasses - Fury is the one I'm least interested in as I'd kinda like to keep the option to heal open, but if there's some particularly interesting stuff you can do with one, I'd consider it. For the same reason, I'm leaning towards going single class, but I'd certainly be open to ideas for multi-class options that fit a spellslinger druid. Oh, and I'm (only?) playing on hard difficulty - never managed to make the leap up to PotD in either game - so things don't have to be perfectly optimised, just reasonably effective and, most importantly, interesting to play.

I really hope we get a wand. They let us dual wield them in Deadfire, then only gave us one unique.

You can get a second hand mortar by following Serafen's personal quest.

Actually thinking about ME2, it has another thing in relation this aspect of the game/story integration I really liked - for most of the game, when something important is happening that the story is saying is happening now (e.g. collector attacks on colonies), you have to go and deal with it now. And then, as you don't have an immediate lead on what to do next with regards the main plot, you are free to do what you want while your boss does off-screen research into the Collectors. After a certain amount of time (represented by a number of missions - which can be whatever missions you want), another major event happens that you have to deal with immediately. It gives a nice mix of giving the player freedom to make decisions as to what they do, while also making it seem that things in the universe happen without your direct input, and I love that there are significant sections of the game where you don't have a clear direction from the main plot outside of a vague "make your squad better" goal, as it makes sense for you to be doing your own thing during those times. Deadfire's story could really have done with this latter aspect.

I wouldn't want a hard time cap with game loss as failure on the main quest, that's getting into unfun territory, but I would like there to be some impact on how things play out if I ignore the main story when it is implying that I should be hurrying. Maybe different post game outcomes, or certain characters dying or something like that. A good example would be Mass Effect 2, with the bit where your crew get abducted - the longer you go without rescuing them, the more that die. It doesn't break your game or anything, but its definitely a bad thing, especially if you're fond of the characters and it makes the game feel more realistic, that your choices do really have consequences, that you can't just wander around ignoring what the story is telling you. Overall, I just really want my decision to not pursue the main quest to be recognised in the game as I find it somewhat immersion breaking that nothing happens despite me spending months sailing aimlessly around.

Deadfire is far from the only game to do it, but the disconnect between the story heavily encouraging you to rush after Eothas, and the gameplay heavily encouraging you to ignore the story and go exploring is particularly egregious here. It really felt to me that Deadfire is two very different games - one story driven game about chasing down a god, and one open world game about being a pirate - stuck together without any real thought as to how to properly integrate them. That's not to say I haven't been enjoying it, on the contrary, I had a lot of fun on my first playthrough and intend to do several more runs, but having such an obvious disconnect between what the story is telling me and what the game is telling me really hurts the immersion. At the very least, there should be some consequences to ignoring the main plot in order to go explore desert islands - my choices in the game should matter and yet a decision of this level, which, given what is going on according to the story, probably outweighs any of those the game actually tracks, is ignored. Part of the problem is that you always have a really good lead on where to go with the main quest. If you had to actually go looking around for information in order to track down Eothas, it might make more sense to go exploring in the hope of finding clues, but as it is, you really should be chasing after him ASAP.

While I don't think rangers are bad, I don't really see what you gain from going single class with them instead of mulitclassing. Pets scale with CL instead of PL and the high level abilities aren't amazing, so why not pick up another class?

I'm a good way into the game, and I've got a whole pile of unique weapons covering almost every type (and multiples of the swords....). Except wands. Haven't seen a single unique one yet, let a lone the pair I want for for a proper dual wielding wandslinger. Any suggestions where I should be looking?

Chill Fog alone make me want to have a wizard from level 1.

I've been running Xoti as a monk and she's been pretty effective. Though that might just be that monks are really good....

Spells you select while levelling up are yours permanently - you always have access to them and they have no connection to a grimoire. If you switch grimoire, or even don't use one at all, you still have these spells. Spells in a grimoire are only available while you have the grimoire equipped - once you unequip it, or switch to another grimoire, you lose access to those spells. There's no way to permanently add spells from a grimoire to your spell list. You can never change the spells in a grimoire - they're pre-set.

Unbroken was my first thought - fighter stances + shield gives you the extra engagements to keep enemies near you and plus the Unbroken's extra survivability to keep alive when under attack from said enemies, while the Streetfighter gives you extra damage to make up for the fact you're using sword and shield. Definitely a combo I want to try at some point, though there's a pretty long list of those, so I dunno when I'll get round to it....

Well, my PC is a cipher, so I'm playing him as a pure barbarian. So far, he seems to do the job of hitting things - which is what you want a barbarian for - pretty well even if his stats probably aren't perfect.

Yeah, this is a great QoL change. Always moving at half speed to ensure I spotted traps was annoying. Although I can tell it's going to be really frustrating if I ever go back and play poE1 again....

I've put in half-a-dozen hours so far and I'm thoroughly enjoying it.

Nothing fancy, but I sure as hell ain't wasting time cooking tonight, so I'll grab a Chinese takeaway on the way home from work.

Well, I've already changed my mind since I last posted in this thread - now I'm planning on importing my druid from Pillars 1 as a lifegiver, and I'll multiclass her with ranger (pure class), as I feel she really should have an animal companion. Which I think is going to be my final decision - this was the first character I finished the first game with so it's appropriate to start Deadfire with her. Though, on the other hand, I do want to play a pure wizard....

I'm not completely decided yet, but I'm leaning towards importing my Priest of Wael first. Planning on multiclassing her with a melee character, probably fighter.

I enjoyed the XCOM 2 timers once I'd installed the mod that stopped them ticking while you were concealed. As well as making a lot of sense - why is there a time limit if they don't know you're there? - it seemed to me to give the best of both worlds: there's as much time as you like to carefully prepare to fight, but once you've engaged the enemy, there's an active pressure to not just sit there and overwatch.

I'm not taking any time off work, but I'll pretty certainly be sitting down on Tuesday evening to play some Deadfire. Dunno how much sleep I'll be getting that night....