Odd Hermit

I think this would be a quality of life change instead of having to swap around to determine what order you should do things in. Cuts down unnecessary menu micromanagement.

My thoughts thus far: Blood Mage is something I will be trying out with Paladin, will probably be my MC for next playthrough since Paladin is still way better as MC than custom. Bellower sounds like a great idea but the mechanics don't accomplish what it's going for at all. As is I see no reason to use it. You want to use your +PL on a good invocation, but you just dumped your phrases to get that+PL ??? I think their chants should be more potent as well if the range is going to be so severely reduced. I'm liking the idea of an Ancient/Tactician as an alternative to Chanter for summoning. Previously the Chanter was the only class that could adequately fill the fodder spam role. Arcane Archer seems to have potential but I'm just not interested in rangers in PoE still. Psion sounds nice in theory but the focus gen #s are much too low to bother trying. Debonair seems super gimmicky and you get adequate charm without the limitations and penalties elsewhere. The penalties just outweigh the benefits too heavily here. Have no interest in the others.

Tbf pala/chanter with Eld Nary is not even close to single class chanter with the upgraded Eld Nary. It is still better than summons tho, since summons lack Pen. Eld Nary is strong but it has big drawbacks - long cast time, targets fortitude and is rather expensive. The best solo build for me is the Darcozzi/Skald spamming Thrice Was She Wronged - a rather effective and cheap AoE spell. Deltro's Cage/Black Plate for armor, Sun and Moon with modal to debuff reflex between casts, the medium shield with health regen, ring of greater regeneration, etc... Basically unkillable with endless AoE attacks and able to deal with any encounter without abusing consumables, kiting or splitting enemies right from the beginning. Why Darcozzi specifically? The flame shield seems rather weak compared to Goldpact's armor bonus.

Wondering if this is unique to the rogue, since I've been considering trying a cheesy party of multiclasses that can all escape combat, for coordinated ambush -> disappear tactics. I could just play all rogue multiclasses - and I'm quite sure it'd be powerful - but it would be nice to take NPCs that aren't rogues. Edit: Habits... meant to post this in the deadfire builds forum

I find it's helpful to create a few custom characters for 250gp right as you reach Gilded Vale and hit level 2. I avoid as much unnecessary XP along the way as possible and dodge Aloth so I can pick him up at level 3+. Custom characters can handle various tasks at your stronghold, and are nice in a pinch for certain areas where some classes are more useful than usual - having two priests for some encounters is amazing especially early on. I usually have a custom priest and cipher.. For act 1 it's nice to have a druid as well, shapeshift wrecks act 1 enemies hard, plus you can charm animals and heal in a pinch. The companion's stats become less of a problem later on though(itemization and food and spell buffs and etc.), they're all serviceable for PotD.

Most things won't stack so if you have, say, a ring and a cloak with +2 Might and +1Might you get +2 Might instead of +3, and on your character page it will show (suppressed) which means you're wearing items that buff the same thing and the higher effect overwrites if they're not equal(in which case you still get only one of the two item's buff). Personally I think the best gear is stuff you can get early that lasts through the game, there's lots of crazy late game gear but what makes the biggest difference for me is Quality of Life throughout not how decked out I am at the end. Stuff that boosts multiple stats at once lets you wear more interesting stuff without losing too much attribute wise, like you could wear Rotfinger Gloves instead of Siegebreakers and still get +Resolve from something else.

I have a quick question that doesn't deserve its own thread: Does envenomed strike apply to all enemies hit with stag's carnage? I've always liked the look of the Stag, but usually go Cat for damage. If envenomed strike were AoEed with stag it'd be enough to make it worth it.

I think dual wielding should be reconsidered and the off hand weapon should matter more. A penalty to accuracy and deflection for wielding 2x large/heavy weapons. Lighter weapons would reduce that but of course do less damage with full attacks. Currently you can do something like double sabre or mace and be hardly impacted by what seems like it should be a rather complicated and unwieldy fighting style.

I never finished White March Pt. 2 and I've never played a Rogue aside from briefly using Devil of Caroc. Rogues seem like the hands down weakest class in PoE 1, and it's even more noticeable after Deadfire in which ... while currently much easier and imbalanced ... Rogue multiclasses were amazing for me. I want to take a Rogue / Paladin build in Deadfire, continuing from a Rogue in PoE, but am tempted to just do another Paladin for PoE. Another Paladin sounds boring though(unless I can find something weird to do with one), so I'm trying to figure out what the hell to do with Rogue class in PoE 1. They do good damage, but so do much sturdier classes. They don't seem best at anything, but at the same time aren't versatile either. ??? They can go invisible, which seems really great... for solo play. I could find some utility for this in a party but mostly for making easy fights easier - which having any class that has AoE instead of a Rogue would do better anyway. All I can think of is item usage, since some of their talents affect scrolls and such and seem potentially cheesy. But it seems a Chanter is still more suited to this role(you can chant while doing item stuff) while being a stronger class overall. I think I might rather have 2x Chanters than 1 Chanter and 1 Rogue in a party. A case can be made that the Rogue is a more "for fun" class than a powerhouse, but I'm not sure it has enough active abilities to really offer that either. Can anyone sell me on the rogue's potential or is this class just pointless masochism?

The large shield modal and high pierce armor rating might help you out for the boat fights. They are super firearm heavy so you can almost always expect most enemies to be using pierce damage ranged weapons. I should've used large shields more especially in the early game, you can just swap to your main weapons after the opening volley.

Wizard is still by far the most fun class IMO, the arcane spell selection is just a versatile, powerful, and fun toolkit with many synergies to find. They have less redundancy than most other classes. I played a Troubador/Trickster going for the "Bard" feel, but I think Chanter design has serious issues - for one using respec to move talents from redundant summons to passives is clearly optimal. It's powerful, but the nature of phrases -> invocations is still such that you spam one ability, and have 1-2 passive chants going all the time, so the majority of the Chanter selection sees no use whatsoever due to opportunity costs plus it's a pain currently to micromanage chants due to modal switching being clunky.

This reminds me of mustard jelly vs. lich in Baldur's Gate II hahaha.

Generally, find kith and kill kith. Monsters drop junk, kith drop gear. If you're an immoral sort of character you can also steal tons of stuff in Neketaka. I went with a goody two shoes character and didn't steal anything but I did unlock things for exp and had a peek inside, and left some solid stuff behind. My next playthrough will be substantially more piratey I think, with more cheese because I'm going to build a hired adventurer party. I didn't get a lot out of the party banter this game. Eder/Xoti/Pallegina/Maia was my party, perhaps I missed out by not picking certain others but it wasn't as interesting as in PoE1.

No definitely not. Wael for the wizard illusion spells is the best choice for any priest / melee multiclass, and I'd never bother with a pure priest with the state of the class at the moment. I just take Xoti as Monk/Priest 'cause her unique items are good and the execute spell she gets is decent enough.

No, caster + cipher is generally a bad combination because ciphers fuel their resource through weapon attacks and not spells. The Cipher part of the class ends up not doing much for you if you're spending your time spell slinging and not building focus and using powers. Combat only takes so much time and you won't have enough to make enough use of weapon attacks, spells, and Cipher powers. Druids have some melee buff spells and shapeshifting but it's hardly bringing you comparable benefits as Rogue, Fighter, Paladin,Ranger, or Barbarian all of which improve your weapon attacks much more substantially with strong passives and abilities that count as weapon attacks.