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I think most people saying Paladins are bad aren't playing it as a support class and comparing it to martial classes as a damage dealer or tank, in which case it does compare unfavorably. From my time in PoE, Pallengia or a Merc/PC Paladin bring a lot of support in the form of the auras, various exhortations, lay on hands, and Sacred Immolation. Outside of FoD it's certainly not as flashy and won't top damage or crowd control, but does have a good use and the boost to defenses help out a lot in the long-term. The worst class in PoE is Rogue, which gets beaten out by Cipher and Ranger as a striker and can't really do anything else to make up for it.

If you think it's fun play it, if you don't then just use the world state.

How would Deadfire play on a handheld?

That should be cleared up int the description for Elfs. I don't think Priests need another subclass, as is most bases are covered by the various faiths and Ondra seems to overlap somewhat with Wael. I agree with this, iirc in PoE you could move between them and it was nice. I'd prefer that myself, but I understand why it was implemented that way due to the bonus attribute that comes from background. Gonna have some problems there bucko.

I assume so given that the dialogue options have disposition tags.

My gf is hungover and spent the day reading in bed so I did the productive thing and watched a lot of movies between posting stuff on my phone.

That's unrealistic, a maga chud wouldn't be talking to a girl, let alone have one in his home.

None if I can avoid it.

I think they didn't because Meadow Humans and Wood Elves already exist, and for whatever reason they wanted to avoid similar first descriptors for races.

I'd move Skald up to mid tier because it's the only caster with .5 sec casts and some of those spells are really good.

I agree with most. I've been particularly thinking about MaxQuest's recommendations for casts lately, so thanks for pointing to the thread where this beauty was posted.

Solely concerning afflictions, I think the strongest positive and negative should apply(lower tier bonuses/afflictions get suppressed) and the end result should be the sum of both. So if you were to use Frenzy(Berserker) and Tactical Barrage, Instead of Acute(tier +2) completely suppressing Confused(tier -1) it would be downgraded to Smart(tier +1) Another example would be a Blind(tier -3) and Acute(tier +2) resulting in a Distracted(tier -1) affliction instead of being Blind.

Completely agree, should have three tiers that go from Resistant to ??? to Immune and allow staking at least from talents/abilities/racials.

Yeah, everything about the weapon should be shown on the proficiency selection, that it isn't now is bad design.

The belt is fairly soon in the game, assuming you've got PX 4. It is soulbound and you will have to bind it to your Cipher to use it, but it is very good. House Doemenel is an important faction in Defiance Bay, along with the Dozens and the Crucible Knights. There is an exclusive quest with each faction that gives a talent as a reward, but on acceptance of the quest you're barred from the other factions quest. House Doemenel are a crime family and their talent gives bonus crit damage, Crucibile Knights are a militia from the Dyrwood revolution who are very respected and are now pseudo-nobility and their Talent gives a boost to your Armor, The Dozens are a milita/mercenary company formed after the recent war who can be bad and their talent gives an accuracy bonus when attacking the same enemy as an ally. It's up to you who you side with and while the talents are nice I don't think any are really essential for a build to be good, especially on normal.

Monks are good with any weapon and works great on the frontline. PoE Barbarians actually benefit a lot from being smart as intellect affects duration and AoE which a lot of Barbarian abilities feature. Paladins are pretty cool and their abilities are more magical, however they lag as DPS outside of FoD (which only has 2 uses per encounter) and Sacred Immolation (which comes late). Paladins are great leaders and their Passive support abilities are very good for teamwork.

You miss out on +1 might, +5% endurance, +1 attribute, and some minor benefit. You get 1 perception, some minor benefit, and don't lose a companion. I agree that there should be a balance between "good" and "evil" bonuses, but I don't think the disparity in PoE is huge. A bigger issue in PoE is parity of Faction talents, with CK and HD being pretty good and D being comparatively worse.

I haven't cast many direct damage spells because they're so bad. Even with that being true none of the martial classes will bother with empowering an ability because they'd get a lot more mileage out of more uses. Hell, no caster would empower a debuff spell when they can cast it again if the malus(es) won't be upgraded.

I agree, stacking should happen and the rules definitely need to be more consistent. Power level based abilities need to happen because as of now empower doesn't do much and you're better off using it to replenish your resources than on an ability.

Mechanically Cipher hits a lot of your preferences, but Barbarian is pretty fun if you want to run into melee and hit stuff. Monk is also a good option and more magical, you can use greatswords with it as well. Paladin is a pretty good choice but outside of Flames of Devotion and Sacred Immolation you'll be less of a damage dealer and more as a support leader. Anything works, just pick what skills, talents, race, etc. you like if you're playing on normal or below.

Devilman Crybaby. I have no idea what the hell I just watched, but I like it.

I've got a Cipher I hope to make a Beguiler or Soulblade/Vanilla or Assassin Mindhunter. Then I have my half-finished my Chanter and will port as a caster/caster multiclass if they ever fix casters in Deadfire. Finally I like the Spellsword concept, but I'm torn between doing a Barbarian or Paladin(Bleak Walker) for PoE. All are more RP than optimized.

It's too complicated to post.

They seem to be, except for dual wielding one of the implements. Barbarian, Fighter, Monk, and Rogue have abilities that strongly favor melee, all Paladins abilities work for melee, and a lot of ranger abilities can be used in melee. Without factoring in casters, all the martial classes can be competent in melee with the exception of the sharpshooter subclass of Ranger. Casters have Druids focused on shifting, Skalds, and Soulblades, but from what I've been able to those function better as supplements to a melee class. Wizards and Priests can summon great melee weapons, but that takes too long and they can be pulverized before getting the spell off, even if they are able to summon one they'd probably want to multiclass because neither has particularly good melee abilities.

In Hard combat lasts a little longer but casters consistently get pulverized and their spells aren't much use due to the long casts. I liked MaxQuest's recommendation a while back on casting speed and adopting that alone would go a long way to making casters more useful. It's also worth noting that melee/caster or caster/caster multiclasses aren't talked about much because they're underwhelming. Soulblade has a powerful ability with Soul Annihilation and Wizards have some good buffs that are a .5 sec cast but beyond that there's nothing much gained and in comparison you get a lot more out of the melee/melee multiclasses like Devoted/Berserker or BleakWalker/Rogue.