damagai

For passive skills, while there are a few really high checks, the vast majority of checks are 10 or below. Between your 4 companions, you can give the Watcher +5 to all skills by having 11 skill points divided between the 4 other members of your team for each skill. In order to provide the most maximums, you want to distribute them in a 7/4 pattern, where one person has 7 points and the remaining 3 members have 4 points total (7/2/1/1 gives you the highest minimum, but I'm not sure that's ever relevant). Distributing skills in this way gives your Watcher +5 on all of their checks, and makes sure that at least one companion has a minimum of +11 for every skill for CYOA checks. You are then free to distribute points on your Watcher for even higher checks or to take advantage of gear that scales with skills. Personally, unless I'm aiming to use a particular piece of gear, I like to distribute the skills evenly, netting out at another +3 at the end. Adding in Skill training, I have 9 baseline in all skills with Party Assist, and can use Inns, gear, pets or consumables to boost it higher in the rare occasion that that is insufficient to make a check. Active skills are a different beast altogether.

Good morning! From my actions in a previous game my Watcher has the talent "Effigy's Resentment: Devil of Caroc" which states to improve Dex and Penetration by 1 point each. The Dex seems to be applying correctly; however, the Penetration bonus is grey when hovered over (stating Conditional) and I have been unable to figure out what condition needs to be met for it to apply. Attached a screenshot. Thank you!

I actually think Black Jacket is really good, in a party anyway. Certain modals are really powerful. Being able to quickly debuff an enemy's Fort and Will is great, and there's no excuse with a BJ on not overpenning constantly. In a party Constant Recovery isn't as useful as solo since you'll likely get healing spillover from your other companions. Really the worst part about it is how micro-intensive it is.

Minor issue - was setting up weapon slots to take advantage of blunderbuss modal with Streetfighter and was disappointed to see no blunderbusses for sale in Maje. Tried cloning the one I had to the other slot and was surprised to see I could switch to it and fire without reloading as if it was a separate gun.