Haplok

Yeah, its quite peculiar how the various stealth/invisibility effects have been implemented differently. In Turn Based at least, Shadowing Beyond is win for me, despite its high cost and limited uses - as its a Free action, meaning you can buff to the teeth with various Free action spells, recover all used slots with Free action Blood Sacrifice, reposition & vanish with Shadowing Beyond AND still get to cast an offensive spell during the same round.

Chill Fog is not a DOT. Its a persistent, ticking aoe effect. With a separate attack roll on each tick. So no surprises there. DOTs include stuff like Disintegration, Soul Ignition, Necrotic Lance, Concelhaut's Corrosive Siphon (absolutely awesome for a BM), Corrosive Skin, Cloak of Death, Shining Beacon, Cleansing Flame, a lot of the druid stuff.

Dealayed Fireball generally triggered before regaining control over my caster. I've found it very difficult to use well. But Inspired Beacon was indeed great in Turn Based. It would often last 2-3 rounds, so its not too difficult to take advantage of it.

Yes, very viable. They may take time to cast... but its not like you can do more then one action per round anyway. And if you're an Assassin you're safe during most casts due to stealth. Also Shadowflame I've mostly used as combat opener, so then the cast time is moot. Beyond the opening round, enemies tend to engage party members (or stay back if ranged/caster), so again, targetting isn't THAT difficult. Plus rays are really good nukes in turn based (most has only 3 ticks... and actually if you position yourself well, the 1st tick may even not break stealth - to keep the Assassinate bonus and stealth safety for the 2nd tick!) - and you target those at a specific enemy (plus others along the way), so enemy movement doesn't cause misses with that (at least vs primary target). Regarding CC effects... those 1 rounds are before you consider stuff like Power Level, Int and... crits. In practice most short effects last 2-3 rounds (Shadowflame Paralyze lasts 1-3 rounds).

IMO you should absolutely max Con as an Assasin/Bloodmage. One thing is that it will help with Blood Sacrifice. But there's more. You should probably be human and nearly always at least Blooded - with Fighting Spirit. So more Con - more safety. But wait, there's even more. IF you're serious about nuking, you kinda need Deltro's Cage helmet. You'll want to hit yourself with Chain Lightning. And you'll want it to HURT. You want to crit yourself with the Assasinate 50% crit damage bonus, regular 25% crit damage bonus, 30% Overpenetration bonus. This can mean being hit for like 130 damage - and you still need to survive (and get a sweet 130% lash for your spells). For that purpose, avoid buffing Reflex. Consider Reflex debuffs. And you still want a HP buffer to still use Blood Sacrifice. Having more then 10-12 Might is not worth it IMO. Not that much damage impact AND you do increase self-inflicted damage from sacrifice. Arkemyr's Departure is probably cool and all. Particularly if you want to focus on debuffs, rather the direct damage. But not so great for action economy in Turn Based. You need a whole round to cast it. Meanwhile Shadowing Beyond is instant and you can start casting another spell immediately. Also using Arkemyr's Grimoir means you're not taking advantage of Ningauth's Teachings, and that's a fantastic grimoire for an Assassin Bloodmage nuker. Note Death Ray is absolutely fantastic in Turn Based mode and one of the staple spells I've kept using till the very end. And opening combat with Shadowflame with +25 Accuracy is often an "I win" button.

While not as... self-sufficient as a BDD Priest, I propose you have a look at an Assassin/Bloodmage. One issue with the Priest, is that the Turn Based action economy is not great for dual-casters IMO. You cast either a wizard spell or a priest spell in a given round. +25 Accuracy from Assassinate is nothing too sneeze at, also for CC. For nuking additional +4 PEN and +50% Critical damage is quite devastating.

When boasting high Accuracy/Crit conversion, I greatly prefer Swift Flurry. Even if its not great ALWAYS, the fact that you can annihilate many enemies in fraction of the time I'd normally take you - and move to engage another - cannot be overstated.

Well, SSS isn't easy, but like Boeroer wrote, you can get 4 Culmination Stones as you progress. Plus Porokoa's Eye. And some sweet equipment - I'm particularly fond of the Seeker's Fang rapier for Ciphers. Though Slayer's Claw isn't shabby either (they are mutually exclusive). And a really nice belt when you like to Empower spells.

Well, I really like that aspect of SSS, which lets me upgrade multiple items to Legendary for free.

I've found Combusting Wounds pretty useless in Turn Based mode. MAYBE its possible to work to make it work. But I think its damn hard. Consider this: ray-type and wall type spells tick EVERY second in real time, rapidly racking Combustion ticks. But in Turn Based 6 of those ticks are compressed into one bigger tick every round. And you get 3 ticks total (for 10 second spells), instead of 11 ticks... I guess instant multiattack effects would be better, like Minoletta's various missiles, (dual) blunderbuss multishots and such. But I don't think its really worth the hassle.

Stealth 7 is not bad. Particularly if you can buff it with items (Night market religion amulet, Stealth boots, Obsidian Wurm pet). But what you actually need is high Mechanics (Party synergy bonuses are important for early success and can buff with Thief's Putty and there are also those Mechanics gloves). Not sure, but maybe the checks are higher then on game launch? It seemed that way to me. Most merchants will let you pick the locks on their chests as long as you don't take their contents. So unlock and only then try to divert attention with another character. Sparkcrackers are good for that. Your stealth guy should then move into stealing position under stealth. In some cases the Bounding Boots with Leap can be used. Using them will alert NPCs, but if you pause the game just as you land next to the chest, you might be able to grab its content before they "wake up" to your presence.

Yeah, Woodskin is excellent - given that my characters used to fall victim to focused rogue/ranger gunfire most often.

Its not that far. But yeah, it can be risky early if you don't know what you're doing. I tend to go after sea bounties early and get some good cannons & train the crew, probably buy a Dhow. So its less risky then. And, like Boeroer wrote, you need a pretty high combined Mechanics score nowadays.

Speaking of stealing, there is a very sweet armor (in fact, strongest defensive armor) at the merchant located on the slaver island beach.

Besides Eder Swashbuckler, also Maia Scout, Fassina Sorcerer and Pallegina Herald.

Well, my Eder successfully used Gipon Prudensco leather in Turn Based (plus Tuotilo's Palm to avoid Accuracy penalty, get another mini-riposte chance and have the small shield modal for +15 ACC after a melee miss). High Deflection helped rack the Riposte attacks. Then again my main was a Bloodmage/Assassin that had a lot of alpha strike/CC potential. Having most of the enemy forces initially paralyzed for 1-3 rounds when combat starts is huge...

...Puppet Master - due to range.

I think most enemies use less hard CC then players. Also, not very likely if you open with like paralysing Shadowflame from stealth. Or well, even reduce the enemy sight range with Chillfog.

You'd really have a much easier early game with a Bloodmage...

On PC Riposte was working fine for me. In fact, with the Community Patch, in Turn Based it was much stronger then it ever was in Real Time. One of the very few ways to build an effective martial character for Turn Based. Conversely, my advice is to use the heaviest armor, use the slowest weapons and slowest modal weapon/shield abilities for maximum impact and protection. IF you REALLY want, you could designate 1 character as interrupter who could go lighter and try to interrupt important enemy actions. But as I wrote before, I've found that very tricky: to properly interrupt you need to execute the action between enemy start of cast and spell/ability resolve. Well, but you cannot control the turn order, so that you land in the time window after the enemy starts but before he finishes. Spell-based hard CC with lasting effects are mostly Cast actions, so again, cannot be pulled off before the enemies charge you. Better to wait untill they've arrived (maybe setting tank in position first) and only then properly aim the aoe CC.

Not only. Also when the enemy is ragdolled or... dies.

My understanding is that Red Hand might have behaved differently on the initial release of the Turn Based mode.

Only Single Class characters get those, though. And before (if) they are available, I think a wizard has a significantly more instant direct damage potential. As well as more varied tools in his belt (most notably and frequently mentioned Wall of Draining, but also the like of Citzal's Lance, the bread & butter Combusting Wounds - although probably not very good in TB, Chilling Fog and others).

I don't have much experience with Druids. Mainly played a bit with Fassina Sorcerer. They are not bad, but particularly when multiclassed I think they lack the direct oomph a bit. They seem to focus more on Damage Over Time effects and debuffs.

Well, there is no Recovery in Turn Based mode. Come to think of it, Firearms have no Recovery in Deadfire in general. Only Reload. And using Red Hand was the only instance when I was able to make 2 actions in the same round (although the 2nd near the end of the round). Sadly Blade Cascade or Recovery cancelling bows did not seem to allow for this.