Haplok

Well, get Eccea's Arcane Blaster and use Raw damage? Also the blunderbuss mortars attack Reflex, which should translate into decent crit chances. Crit gives +50% Penetration. Otherwise... Patience. Its not like they can do a lot of damage to an average level party, so it just takes time.

Like the previous poster wrote, an Ascendant can cast any power many times when Ascended. On my Transcendent Cipher/Monk Ascension lasts about 30 seconds. Priest with Salvation of Time can increase that by another 20+10 seconds. So a full minute during which you can spam any Cipher power an unlimited amount of times (actually time and action economy are the only limits). Note that with the right weapons and proper setup you can usually easily Ascend in one attack (such as weapon ability use - Kitchen Stove Thunderous Report is particularly good). And once Ascension ends, you can reenter it almost instantly (for example using Amiras Wing Wilting Wind).

Well Soul Annihilation is a Primary attack, so you always attack with the main hand weapon. But Tuotilo's Palm, as a bashing shield, counts for dual-wielding and improves your Recovery. With Sun and Moon each attack hits twice, the first head delivers SA, the other generates a little Focus, so your next attack can also be an SA. One of the posters here was claiming that its actually the most effective way to deal damage as a Soulblade (and be tanky too). You attack pretty fast that way. Personally I'm not a fan, the individual SA strikes are pretty weak and you're constantly in low/no Focus zone (so its difficult to cast without changing your gear/tactics). Also feels like you're kinda wasting Rogue's potential by not taking advantage of his active abilities. Plus I like big numbers

Actually at high levels Toxic Strike is very much worth it if you go for DoTs and have high Int. It is NOT 2 damage/3 seconds. Each following tick does progressively more damage and with decent duration (high Int), it does sick damage after a few ticks. It really cannot be compared with Gouging Strike, they are not on the same level at all (although Gouging Strike has the advantage of not expiring). Particularly nice if you can apply it in an aoe, with some mortars, blights, rod blast, WotEP, Wahai Poraga or Spirit Lance.

Those are some nice weapons. But when spamming Rogue abilities, I like high base damage weapons, like sabers - Grave Calling for example. Gives more Focus with each attack too. Of course some swear by Sun & Moon and Tuotilo's Palm shield combo, which allows to spam SA with every attack (but at low Focus).

You can use different ones and trigger Powder Burns / Streetfighter bonuses. But only those 2 have the aoe effect, dual damage type and Reflex save instead of Deflection. And only the quest one can be upgraded with extra bounce. In case you're open to that, you can get the second one rather fast, even without any fighting (well, when you're leaving the final quest location, a combat is likely). Just go to Deadlight tavern rooms with Serafen, then to the Bathhouse then to Sayuka harbor. Bam! Quest completed.

Well, in this case I wouldn't say its a case of "underdog" or "mediocrity". Just a different emphasis. A Mindstalker Ascendant kinda feels redundant in the damage department. The Rogue part may make hims Ascend really fast but then what? His damage spells will often feel underpowered compared to what he could do using weapons. And that rogue side doesn't really support his spellcasting (except Streetfighter Recovery reduction, but then you're also debuffing your Accuracy). Meanwhile a Seer's Accuracy will greatly help both classes. The Animal Companion will be his trusty offtank support, as well as useful anchor for Ectopsychic Echo (awesome power!). And he can even Pain Block it, to make it quite durable. Also Transcendant will support both sides, but again, that's just emphasis on different aspects.

Chanters lost the (aoe) Brilliant inspiration. Nowadays the Ciphers have single target Brilliant on PL VII. I don't know who is best. I know that a Herald is a very nice support character. Always make my Pallegina into one. If you have other Paladins, your mileage may vary.

Perhaps a Soulblade/Trickster Mindstalker? Tanky enough to be a solid offtank, has good damage output with Soul Annihilation + Sneak Attack + Rogue Abilities and A LOT of nasty tricks in his sleeve.

Grave Calling D Tier? When I thought I have seen everything... For me its clearly an "S" weapon.

Can't a Ranger/Rogue ultimately do more due to Driving Flight? Well, Sharpshooter/Streetfighter with dual mortars or dual regular BB (for single targets) is my favorite (short) ranged character. That's A LOT of 'splosions.

I don't think it does.

Stunning Surge does. And can go aoe with dual blunderbusses for example. Or get a big Accuracy boost (due to fist scaling, particularly on a pure monk) with dual Long Pain attack. Then there are aoe Whispers of the Wind... (which also work with aoe mortars...)

Blunderbuss Streetfighter / Ascendant is pretty awesome speed and damage output wise... but has even lower Accuracy. Not the best combo to reliably land CC IMO. Then the Helwalker Transcendant, the force multiplier, completes the Triumvirate: Average Accuracy, Average physical damage but More damage for Cipher spells and much longer effect durations (including Ascension, as well as stuff like Mental Binding, Stunning Surge). But Seer is certainly very viable IMO. Everyone can prefer a different one of those 3 Ascendant multiclasses (or even go for yet another combo).

Ciphers are awesome! But yeah, that Perception seems way too low for my taste. I always max it, on pretty much all character (except pure support). Might be okay for lower difficulties though.

NO FLAMES OF DEVOTION, WTF? It's way more then 10% damage, it's 20% multiplicative bonus (so it'll also magnify damage from soulwhip). But I can see you may prefer to simply spam SA instead. I find the ability selection a bit weird. Secret Horrors comes awfully late. Soul Ignition would be kinda weak on a Soulblade, I think. No Mental Binding? Amplified Wave? The latter is expensive, but its the best aoe option a Cipher has... and arguably more useful for a SoulBlade then Disintegrate, as a single-target he can just SA. Plus you're missing an ability slot at level 7.

Hm... I don't understand the question. I can unfold the AoE hit rolls, sure - but I don't know if that is what you mean. It is indeed what I meant... and what I've been missing A LOT all the time I've been playing Deadfire!

What exactlt are you talking about? "Flawed comparison"? I think you didn't understand what I was trying to say. I was just comparing two seperate effects that give you higher attack speed while paying for that with lower defenses. Sneak Attack is not part of the Streetfighter's Heating Up as Carnage or Bloodlust is not part of Frenzy. Frenzy as a standalone ability was depicted as bad - while nobody says that about Heating Up. So I compared those two distinct abilites and showed that Frenzy is at least as good as Heating Up (leaving aside that you are even slower if you're not heated up). Where is the flaw in that comparison? I meant its flawed, because it disregards the rest of abilities (and damage potential) the classes bring to the table. But also on the fundamental level, in this comparison you've missed half of what "Heating Up" does: sneak attack might not be exclusive to Streetfighters, but a +50% sneak bonus is exclusive for the "Heating Up" effect. Particularly early on, that is HUGE (since you get it from level 1 and can trigger reliably in like every fight).

Single target he cannot. And yes, I think Helwalker is necessary if you want to even be in the same ballpark.

In terms of easiness and simplicity definitely Battlemage wins out. IMO its okay for power gaming too, though probably the other options offer higher damage output. But for me its awesome to finally have a wizard I don't have to babysit and who does well on his own.

Hm, you're right. It is a bit misleading as you see 50%, hit for 50 and would expect to do 25 damage Carnage... but it will be more like 10.

50% bonus damage? Or 50% of base weapon damage? As that's quite a difference.

Wow, you can expand aoe hit info??

Well, I can't believe such a flawed comparison came from you, Boeroer. Even in it's basic form, you've missed Heating Up +50% Sneak damage. Then there is also On the Edge for +100% crit damage. But okay, the conditions get steep here. When we look at the wider context though, a Streetfighter is a subclass of Rogue, meaning he'll also passively get +30-110% Sneak attack (+50% SF), as well as much better and/or cheaper active abilities. Except HoF, but that's late game and a bit expensive. So yeah, if we put active abilities aside, it's more like +35% damage for Barbarian (Frenzy, One Stands Alone) vs +160% damage for Streetfighter (at max level). It's simplified, doesn't take into consideration Berserker's Pen or AR bonuses, crit bonuses, Blood Frenzy, rogue Deep Wounds and a few other rogue things. But that's more or less the gist.

It used to be true, I think you could even kill them with spells. But now I think you need to actually deliver the killing blow with Grave Calling. I think it could make sense to kill the first skelly under Confusion and quickly switch to Modwyr (or eliminate Confusion otherwise), as the rest of your skellies melt in the fog. That way only the first one would be dangerous to you, the remaining ones could be foe only... I think?