Jojobobo

Azo is bent on continuing his experiments anyway, I think as long as you don't dob him in it doesn't make so much of a difference to him continuing his research along the lines he already was.

I think something that's fairly noteworthy is Reviving Exhortation is a per encounter ability, that's a pretty strong thing to have (seeing as most other revival options either take some time to set up - Chanters - or they're per rest - Priests). I think things like Zealous Endurance is pretty neat too, it's a fairly strong benefit that's in constant effect. Overall, I'm very happy with how Paladins play.

I think Hearth Harvest is pretty good, hatchets give +5 Deflection anyway and it's also rending to bypass some DR - very nice for a tank. You can find it just before act II in NW Woodend Plains. For my current character I'm considering upgrading it to superb and using it all game. A note on The Disappointer - the "Terrible" enchantment is actually of the line "Fine/Exceptional/Superb"; because of this you can use it as a means of getting a fine pistol very early game (it's not hard to obtain ingredients for a fine enchantment) which completely erases the drawbacks of the terrible enchantment. Besides, if you have a Wood Elf or someone with WF: Ruffian it's still decent even with Terrible very early game.

A suggestion I would like to see implemented is double speed also usable in combat. I'm currently trying to solo PotD with a more tanky Paladin (able to take a lot of punishment, but dishing it out takes time) and some of my battles on normal speed can take around 10 minutes to resolve when all I'm looking at is my pally slapping the other guy around and occasionally healing. I really can't see any reason they didn't have this in in the first instance. But yeah, I think maybe removing in auto-leveling is a good idea. In my non-solo playthrough I got to Pallegina much sooner than I would have done naturally just so she didn't learn Field Triage.

I'm soloing PotD with a Paladin a lot like yours (Con 12, Res and Per 18, the rest 10s on character creation). Honestly, I've found them great at tanking - give them a large shield and the shield Talent (also make sure to follow their favoured dispositions) and you should be more than tanky enough. In terms of engagement worries, if you have someone else you can use on your front line I wouldn't worry about it. If you don't maybe consider Hold the Line as others have mentioned, there's also the warhammer Shatterstar one of the outdoors Copperlane vendors sells which is Fine and has +1 engagement - but even then it's not a big deal. Honestly I would favour slightly more DPS on your Paladin and use them to flank enemies Eder engages.

More intelligent disengagement from tanks would be good (I have seen enemies ocasionally disengage, but it's not often), however on the other hand no one asked the OP to min-max like that or to even run a fighter - the latter definitely making things more interesting. I'm currently soloing on PotD and I'm finding the combat perfectly fine.

Again, much thanks.

Okay cool thanks. What about the exhortations? Lay on Hands is classed as "single ally" target like many on the exhortations but works just as well on the Paladin too.

Do the Kind Wayfarers' Talents affect the Paladin also or just your allies? I was curious as the Zealous abilities affect everyone so I didn't know if it would be the same or not for these abilities.

I found the bear to be a huge let down on hard, even with Resilient Companion. I wasn't expecting the same kind of resilience as a fighter, but a modicum of tankiness would have been nice. Now that I'm playing PotD, I can't see myself ever using a PC ranger.

I made sure to get to Pallegina early this time so she doesn't learn it too (well, not "early", but certainly before doing a lot of the Defiance Bay quests like I did last time). I don't need both her and Kana knowing it!

You can pause any time you want and cancel actions. Going onto another enemy after downing one is much more intuitive (even if you have to cancel that action) than having to coordinate them after every downed enemy - there would be vastly more people complaining your party was brain dead for not going onto another target after downing someone than vice versa because the micromanagement would sky rocket. It's called real time with pause for a reason. The slow time button, which I use on significant fights, also greaty stops this probelm.

Is there actually a way? I've tried to delete them but had no joy - I've settled for editing old notes.

I don't see why this should be done. Early level spells like Fan of Flames and Slicken are still very powerful at high levels, per encounter would trivialise combat a great deal.

I'm still not understanding the complaint here, for me using Arcane Assault I realised it didn't track enemies the first time I used it. When a fight starts, most of the time your front liners and the enemy are going to run towards each other and engage in the middle, making it trivial to predict where to use Arcane Assault. Even if the enemy does something slightly unexpected, the reasonable AoE of Arcane Assault (at least combined with Aloth's Armour and some Int boosting equipment) means that you're not really punished for not predicting precisely where the enemy is in the first place. You can also just wait until them have engaged if you want to be 100% sure you're going to hit, granted you're then not whacking out spells as fast as you could have been but most encounters you're not going to be using a spell anyway.

I usually re-roll until I understand the mechanics enough to make a reasonably optimised character and I've found a difficulty setting I like, which has been four times so far (finally settling on expert PotD and a Cipher because I'm lame). The important thing is to quickly push past the opening area of the game you've done so many times so you can get to the meatier stuff which actually interests you.

Or you could just anticipate where the enemy is going to move and cast the spell there?

What kind of parties do people run around on when they say it's "too easy"? I don't use custom adventurers, and so far that makes at least the initial bit of the game a reasonable difficulty on PotD (maybe not so much later when everyone has leveled up and you have ridiculous equipment). I think if you do things like hire a full party from the off, then it's a lot easier throughout.

For me and the tougher encounters there, I used traps. Both Durance and my main character could lay them, set one a piece and start slapping down Fan of Flames. With a bit of luck you take a few out that way making the fight a bit more manageable - but yeah I know the feeling of finding them a bit overwhelming of PotD.

I think a problem with your build, unless you go with a reach weapon as people have suggested, is that you're going to get interrupted a hell of a lot with that low Resolve; because of this you won't be able to get too thick into the fray and therefore can't make use of the Barbarians best ability - One Stands Alone. A successful Barbarian I was running on hard is below - with the rationale behind my choices in parentheses: Coastal Aumaua - The Living Lands (I was really after just maxing Might here, and the racial isn't dreadful, but obviously the cheesier races like Moon Godlike are better) Might 21, Con 3, Dex 18 Per 3, Int 18, Res 15 (Max might = max damage, max dex = max attack speed, max int = large Carnage AoE and Frenzy duration, middling Res = reasonable concentration, min Per = who cares too much about interrupt or deflection on a Barbarian. Min con is probably the most shocking choice, but honestly even without activating Frenzy my barbarian's con wasn't far off Eder's - with Frenzy it's more than good enough). Abilities - 1 = Frenzy, 3 = Blooded, 5 = Brute Force, 7 = Bloodlust, 9 = One Stands Alone, 11 = Heart of Fury (this build was all about damage and DPS, not fear de-buffs or tanking. Let a dedicated healer worry about your endurance and a dedicated de-buffer worry about de-buffing). Talents - 2 Barbaric Blow, 4 - Accurate Carnage, 6 - Two Weapon Style, 8 - Greater Frenzy, 10 - Weapon Focus of choice or whatever, 12 - Vulnerable Attack or whatever (really just looking again for DPS and the last two at DR reduction, though Vulnerable Attack decreases attack speed it is modal so really you can pick and choose when you do or don't think it's necessary). This guy was vastly my main damage dealer and was taking out close to 50% of my enemies and making most mobs a breeze (it's great how you can target the big monster of the group and watch the little ones fall at your feet too). Give him low DR high recovery armor and something with Second Chance (there's a ring with Second Chance you can get in Defiance Bay, Gwisk Glas if possible later on) and watch the damage rack up. In the end I got bored of Hard because of this and now am trying PotD with a different class for fun, but it was definitely very good at taking stuff out. I'm sure everyone will bemoan my low con, but from experience you really really don't need it.

Am I the only one who thinks fighting in a choke-point or doorway would be what happened in a dungeon? It's precisely what people would do in the same real life situation. And sure maybe they could have given more rooms multiple doorways, but that's the thing about doorways in underground dungeon rooms - in terms of realism people have to dig through the solid rock to make them. The only real issue I think is that ranged characters, unless using some AoE spells, don't hit your own guys when shooting behind them. Having said that, I don't really mind too much - combat is much more varied even with choke-points than most games, and choke-points despite what people say aren't ubiquitous. Lastly, as people said, you don't have to use them - talents like Hold the Line or weapons with +1 engagement make it easy enough for even fighter-less teams to tie up the enemy. I don't think this is something that needs patching at all - it's the kind of thing that can be much more easily worked into the expansion (with expansions usually having natural inclines in combat difficulty from situations like this anyway).

I think it should be definitely nerfed, I'm having an easier time with a Cipher on PotD than I did with several other classes on Hard. I guess maybe the devs thought that their general squishiness would offset their high power, but with one or two tanks thats not such a large issue. Their range of powers with that initial focus allow them to multitask superbly well early fight giving you a strong house edge, then Biting Whip means that out-damage a lot of classes in a single shot too mid-fight and then you easily have access to a lot of focus again. Not to say I'm not loving playing one, but part of the reason I'm having my first serious PotD run with a Cipher is so I could break myself in with an "easy" high difficulty run.

I think racism is a bit of an easy contrivance in fantasy RPGs, it's simple with some IPs to add in racism and think it adds depth and some shock factor (The Witcher and Arcanum both had smatterings of that). Cultural prejudices require much more effort to work in as they need more of a backstory rather than the effortless "I don't like him because he's big/small/has pointy ears etc." so I think PoE is better for it and not every culture would have the same opinion of every race.

I'm level 8 and I've still not finished the first act, and I've still got more to do before act II as far as I'm aware. Don't get me wrong I'm enjoying the power, but I probably won't feel so happy when I hit the cap very early on.

I have to admit I got locked into the Crucible Knights when I would have rather sided with the thief house for my current character. I didn't realise they were mutually exclusive, and a lot of it seems dependent on what order you visit the various districts of Defiance Bay - which you shouldn't be punished for.