Dr. Hieronymous Alloy

I honestly couldn't read that review because it was crazy long but this is what 99% of the negative reviews I see of this game forget; people compare it against their idealized memories of the best parts of 4 or 5 different games that were, at the time, big-budget AAA titles, and forget that this is a first game in a series, it had a lot of groundwork to lay and a lot of systems to develop, and it had to do so on a tight budget. In D&D terms, this was First Edition; in video game terms, this was BG 1, not BG 2. It's got some flaws but for what it is and within its limitations it is excellent.

Definitely wish I had gotten in at the physical reward tier on the kickstarter. This game was everything I hoped it would be. The story is very good if not quite up to PS:T or Deus Ex levels; the gameplay is very good and the design is significantly improved on the old D&D system. The improvements in design more than make up for the (relative and minimal) shortfalls in story.

Yeah, there really aren't any obvious game-breakers left at this point; the game mostly works. There are a few stealth bugs that can disrupt things in non-obvious ways but the game is definitely worth playing as it is.

Really, someone needs to go through this thread and put all the information on the wiki: http://pillarsofeternity.gamepedia.com/Pillars_of_Eternity_Wiki

Great, thanks, good to know. Does Might bump the damage too?

Ok, a few more responses and thoughts. Thanks everyone for the feedback. Since I can't edit the initial post any more I may turn this all into a Steam guide if I get around to it. Yeah, these are good points. The reason I recommend biting whip first is that I've found that when I take draining whip early on, I tend to top out my focus meter, so a lot of the extra focus from draining whip is just wasted; until you get a few levels your total focus has a fairly low ceiling and you really don't need to generate that much to be effective. Conversely, extra damage is always good. To an extent it's a moot issue because really you should be taking both talents with this build; it's not either/or it's both/and. Yes but then you have to be an elf and who wants that (More seriously, yeah, Wood Elf is probably the best pick, I just couldn't remember what their racial stats were when I was responding to that post). Honestly no matter what I pick I tend to just use Soul Shock for damage. WIth this build you're going to be playing on a team with a tank and the tank is going to be gathering up all the enemy targets so it's really hard for anything else to beat SS in terms of efficiency and ease of use. There are rare situations where a beam or Detonate or whatever will be more effective but usually SS is your bomb and later choices for damage powers are just "pick whatever you feel is fun." Oh god that firearms mod is ludicrous, is that the one that lets you dual weild the blunderbuss? At that point it seems like you're not even playing the same game. Right, right. There's a minor issue with combat ending and losing buffs, but my real objection to Ringleader is more aesthetic -- it's so random that it messes up my nicely organized positioning and that annoys me. It probably is the best power at that level I just don't like it. ARe you 100% sure? I've never been able to confirm that, but I'd like to think you're right. Ciphers have per-encounter abilities? But yeah the point of this build isn't to do the most damage with a blunderbuss, it's to do the most damage as a cipher, by using the blunderbuss for quick focus generation. If all you wanted was to maximize single-target blunderbuss damage you'd probably go ranged rogue. Even with Island Aumaua and 4 blunderbusses, assuming everything works out, it is 120 damage. This is not comparable to the amount of damage cipher can put out using focus from just 1 blunderbuss shot. Besides, if it's not solo, why not both? Although my wiz usually had better things to do than Combusting Wounds. Yeah, that probably is a build I should have mentioned in the initial post (picking Island Aumau and swapping out Gunner for the extra weapon slot talent) but it won't let me go back and edit it in. I never liked it though just because it feels like an awful lot of micromanagement for what's ultimately limited benefit -- as above, the goal is to use the blunderbuss to generate focus, not to just maximize blunderbuss damage -- and there are only so many good blunderbusses in the game. There's only one Lead Spitter.

The order is clear but could you show how much points you personally placed in all attributes? I generally go human for rp reasons and that isn't optimal, but for human it would be 19 might, 18 Dex, 19 int, including the culture bonus. Another option would be to pick aumau and go 20/might, 18 Dex, 19 int. The idea is that this is a classic "glass cannon" style build. Con drops to 3. You can drop all remaining points into either per or res but red is probably the better choice mechanically.

For level 5 I go BOTH Tactical meld and Borrowed instinct, they stack and +40 accuracy is hard to pass by (esp since you land borrowed instinct reliably after meld and it destroys enemy will save). I usually pass detonate since I don't find it all that great, but you can skip ring leader too I think as mind plague you get a bit later is overall more effective. It's not like blunderbuss is even the best weapon for building up focus, it just gives the best burst. Bow is very effective too. And I don't think env strike works at all. Yeah, exactly -- the "concept" of this build is just alpha strike with blunderbuss then cast a lot, repeat, the idea being to maximize casting time. I did take both tactical meld and borrowed instinct on one run and yeah it's a great combo but that left me having to choose between ringleader and detonate for the third power. Ringleader is so effective it almost feels like cheating / broken, so I don't use it, but in a guide, I didn't want to recommend against taking it I've also seen some graphs arguing that there are diminishing returns on damage for increasing accuracy much past +15 over target's deflection, but there are some bosses with very very high deflection, so perhaps situationally useful. The other counterargument would be the same one against self-buffs generally -- if you're spending your initial few combat moves casting self-buffs that's time you aren't being offensive and thus you're giving the enemy free attacks. You're right though that meld + instinct can be a really powerful combination.

It'd be strange if they changed the Whip talents like that because they're a weapon lash effect and that's the point of lash effects? They've already significantly nerfed the blunderbuss for this build (in Beta, it had eight projectiles, not six, and the projectiles also did more damage each) so I think it unlikely that they'll change it further. Like I said, this build isn't new, it's been the standard ranged cipher build through most of beta (partly because Leadspitter existed in the beta). If anything it's already been nerfed significantly. I think overall it's in a good place right now, it's a fun build with a lot of oomph but one with definite limitations. I think a more likely "nerf" would be improvements to Constitution and Perception for ranged characters -- if either of those happen it'll be a lot harder to justify stacking Int/Dex/Might so high. As to Envenomed Strike if you'll read my post closely I recommend against taking it. It's not supposed to stack, the testing I've done says it doesn't stack (you can tell by mousing over the target, even if combat log says otherwise). Some people maintain adamantly that the damage does stack but if they're right, it's a bug, and it shouldn't, so yeah, I would not recommend taking it.

Yeah, Tenuous Grasp is potentially useful but it's competing against so many other good powers; really just about everything at level 1 is useful. The reason I recommend the three I do is more for tactical versatility -- it's not that the other powers are bad choices, it's more that you can get versions of them at other levels where there's less competition for your slots. On the other hand, Mental Wave and Eyestrike are both AoE's with duration effects, so really take advantage of your high Int, while Soul Shock does solid damage, casts fast, and is really really effective support for your frontline tanks. Plus, all three of those effects are pretty unique -- you don't get anything else that replicates them at higher levels, so picking those three gives you the most tactical versatility. I agree that Borrowed Instinct is a good power but you have to *hit* with it, whereas you don't with Tactical Meld, so for late game fights and bosses (where you really need the accuracy bonus) Meld seems the better choice. For a melee cipher that needs the Deflection bonus Borrowed is probably the better choice. You can go with Draining Whip as an early game pick sure but I've personally found that I prefer Biting Whip. Partly because the damage boost makes a big difference early on (esp. since you do gain some additional focus from the extra damage), partly because if I take Draining Whip first, I tend to spend a lot of time attacking and not casting (whether with bow or melee) and I also tend to top out my focus meter (which is bad, because it's inefficient). If you were going to go the hunting bow route initially, I'd suggest taking biting whip at 2nd, draining whip at 4th, and *then* picking up Ruffian skill set at 6th level and switching to blunderbuss. But level six is actually a fair ways into the game and that's a lot of levels to spend not blowing things away with a gun. =( I guess from what you're saying you could just not use the blunderbuss at all and go hunting bow / hatchet with Peasant specialization, and that might be a good build but I haven't playtested it. On paper it's decent but I've found I never actually use it because in any situation where I would want to use it, spending that focus to just keep dropping more Mental Bindings instead seems the better choice. Plus, I've never 100% figured out how DoTs work with bonus duration from Int and bonus damage from Might; it seemed like it might not be getting the full bonus to damage from Might and that's a big part of this build. Yeah, it's a good choice but personally I'd recommend it more for a melee build.

EDIT EDIT EDIT: If google sent you to this guide because you were looking for a cipher build, this post is badly outdated. Go to my updated version later in this thread: https://forums.obsidian.net/topic/78109-class-build-blunderbuss-cipher-hardpotd-difficulty/?p=1890840 Alternatively, check out the finalized version over on Steam here: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=871584933 I see lots of people talking about how powerful Ciphers can be and they're generally correct. I realize most people will be aware of most of this and it's just general basic knowledge for vet players but I didn't see a writeup on this forum and i did see some bad advice getting tossed around like it was gospel (i.e., people advising two handed style). This is a standard Cipher build that will work on Hard or PotD. It's designed to be back-line ranged crowd control and damage, not to mix it up in melee. It's based on a couple of hundred hours of gameplay, about half of which was in the backer beta. Race: really any choice is good here but you want a race with bonuses to Dexterity, Intelligence, and Might. Wood Elf probably has the best racial bonus since you'll be at range a lot of the time, and the Wood Elf racial bonus helps your accuracy, which is very important for this build since you're using guns which have an inherent accuracy penalty. Aumau is a good choice also just to max Might out. Human's a decent choice also but not optimal. You probably want Old Vailian background for the Intelligence bonus, but again Might and Dex are good choices too. Stats: Maximize Might, Intelligence, and Dexterity, in that order. Minimize out Constitution and Perception. Put the remaining points into Resolve (mostly for dialogue checks, but also for casting in combat). Talents: Start with Biting Whip to boost your damage at level 2. At level 4 get Ruffian skill set, as at this point the accuracy boost will do more for your focus gain than anything else will (by then you should be able to get a pistol or even blunderbuss if you rush Act II; use stilettos for your melee option). At level 6 get Draining Whip and by then make sure you're using a blunderbuss (Draining Whip will give you focus for each pellet). At level 8, get Penetrating Shot, but only switch it on vs. opponents with high DR. Level 10 and 12 are more flexible: your best choices are probably Gunner and Marksman. Points of contention: Some reports are that some high-level spells & powers benefit from Marksman but I haven't been able to confirm either way; either way it does help with the blunderbuss and that's critical, but perhaps less critical than the refire speed boost from Gunner. Some guides recommend two-handed style but that doesn't help your blunderbuss (it's just for melee weapons). Skills: Probably want to take lore to at least 10 to use scrolls and for dialogue checks, but going Mechanics instead is a viable choice. Items: You can wear "heavier" armors like leather or even breastplate/chain in the early game but ideally you want to keep your armor as light as possible, padded at the most, to take advantage of your fast casting speed. Hat: wear a duelist's hat, it looks coolest. Tactics: The idea with this build is that you're pumping and dumping your focus as fast as possible. The pistol and blunderbuss are to get lots of focus fast, then you cast as many things as you can and dump your focus out, then attack again (possibly switching to melee). Most fights you'll want to open with Mental Binding, unless you think you can one-shot an enemy, in which case go ahead and open with the blunderbuss. Generally though it's better to open with Mental Binding because the paralyze will lower your targets' Deflection, making them easier to hit/crit against, and casting your powers first will make you less likely to top out your Focus meter. Avoid getting into melee combat if possible because you'll drop like a rock if engaged, but that's what Mental Binding is for. If you can't get out of melee, don't be afraid to switch away from the blunderbuss to dual stilettos, you will gain a lot of focus that way and do a lot of damage but you can't tank at all so don't try unless you have no other choice. Powers: Generally speaking you want powers that cast fast so you can take advantage of your high Dexterity, powers with big AoE's to take advantage of your Int, and powers with damage to use your Might. Crowd control and debuff powers are going to benefit especially from your high Int. Level 1: There are four good level one powers. Soul Shock, Mind Wave, Eyestrike, and Whisper of Treason. Pick 3. Mind Wave seems a little bugged sometimes and the prone effect doesn't always last as long as it should, but when it works it's great, especially because it casts fast. Soul Shock is likely going to be your bread and butter for DPS throughout the game. Eyestrike is good vs. single targets where you need a debuff. Whisper of Treason is effective BUT less useful as a charm compared to later options, takes a long time to cast, and is competing against the other three really good level 1 powers. level 2: Mental Binding is the must-pick and is what you're going to open most fights with. Past that, Mental Blades is still a decent choice even post-nerf, but is more situational now; use it vs. enemies weak to slashing or when you need to hit around corners. Third pick is a tougher call. Phantom Foes is probably the worst single debuff in the entire power library (total effect is just -10 deflection) but it does seem to stack better than other powers do, and is great if you have a rogue on the team. Amplified Thrust is theoretically useful but it's single target piercing damage and your gun does that better. Psychovampiric Shield is theoretically useful but takes too long to cast imho to be really useful. Recall Agony might be theoretically useful against single big targets but you don't fight many of those and if you did you'd be using Mental Binding instead anyway. ultimately you may want to go back and pick whichever one of the four level 1 powers that you didn't get previously. Level 3: Puppet Master is the better choice over Whisper of Treason, if only because if you do want to charm someone, you want them to be combat-effective, and because there's nothing else worth picking at this level anyway apart from Ectopsychic Echo. Ectopsychic Echo is actually really effective if you position yourself carefully, but harder to use with this build than with a melee cipher. The other choices are ehh but Secret Horrors isn't a bad pick overall. Level 4: Body Attunement, Pain Block, and Mind Lance are all effective choices. Silent Scream isn't bad either. Level 5: Detonate, Tactical Meld, Ringleader. Ringleader is crazy good but you tend to get into situations where the whole enemy team is charmed and then the combat ends and what do you? Tactical Meld is useful and you need accuracy with this build (especially on potd). Detonate is nice single target damage if your gun isn't enough. Level 6: Amplified Wave is lolgood and will literally take up the entire screen with maxed Int. The other two are also decent but why use them when Amplified Wave exists? Bugs to be aware of: Currently (unless they fixed this in the last patch?) there's a bug that will make the int bonus to radius for Cipher powers go away and not show up. Fortunately there's an easy workaround -- right click the power first to bring up its description. You'll need to do that every time you reload the game; you can tell if you have the bug because if you do the added bonus radius won't show. Envenomed Strike *looks* like it procs on every separate Blunderbuss projectile, but according to developer comments in beta the DoT effect is not *supposed* to stack with itself, and in fact shouldn't be doing so; if it is, it's a bug. Also from developer comments the very high radius your powers get from your Int bonus may be a bug /design flaw; since Int adds 3% to the radius of your power's AoE, not 3% area, you're in effect getting, what is it, pi * r ^ 2 additional area for your powers for every point of int? So if they fix that stacking Int will be less attractive (though still probably a good choice).

They also had more freedom to design the Cipher. Because this game was a deliberate homage to the IE games, the IE core classes like Wizard, Fighter, etc., couldn't stray to far from the classic design -- and hence are stuck about 15 years in the past in terms of game design, using per-rest instead of per-encounter, etc. Part of the reason Ciphers are "better" is that they're just designed better. The points-per-encounter + do-damage-for-more-mana concept is just more fun to play that the straight up classical "X number of spells per rest" D&D wizard because you get to use your cool buttons more and don't have to worry about conserving your juice.

I agree with this. Right now they get (at the start of combat) 10 focus + 5 per level. It is clearly too much. Maybe 5 starting focus per odd-level would be a good amount. Then they should also change the greater focus talent to apply to starting focus, making it potentially useful instead of useless. Some other cipher changes desperately needed: -Ectopsychic Echo should have its damage cut at least in half. Duration should probably be reduced as well. Average total damage should be well below soul ignition since it can hit many enemies and it targets reflex. -Mental Binding should probably have average casting time. Ectopsychic Echo deals a lot of damage, but it is tricky to use. I see it as a high risk high reward spell. Halving its damage would mean it would be worse than antipathetic field and largely mitigated by DT. No good. It can use a nerf, but not this big. Soul Igntion actually needs a buff, it's crap atm. Mental binding clearly needs a nerf, but I kinda like its niche as an emergency CC, ciphers don't have any other "oh ****" buttons. So I'd say just remove the stuck aoe on it so it doesn't freeze groups in their tracks. It would still be a good single target spell, but not as strong. And I still don't see a need for starting focus change, balance the spells instead. On a side note, I think it's ridiculous that fighters start combat with 2 or even 3 knockdowns. They should start it with 1 and gain access to the 2nd one after 15 seconds. I would suggest taking the stuck aoe off mental binding and adding it to phantom foes.

Better hostile AI that was programmed to use the various Push, relocate, and AoE abilities intelligently would do a lot to address this issue. Not much else would without causing all kinds of nasty secondary effects.

I seem to have the issue, though on testing, my Paladin's aura seems to be larger than the entirety of the game maps -- I can have my party on the opposite side of Dyrford and it'll copy over. Here's an output log attached. Unfortunately it seems my save file is too big to attach. edit: nevermind I'm not allowed to upload that kind of file? Hrm. Well, not sure how to send you the savegame(s). It definitely looks like one of those growing with repeated saves bug -- earlier saves of mine the Paladin's aura is very small, closer to what I remember in beta, later saves it encompasses the whole map. output_log.txt

Kinda agreed with this idea instead of dropping it to 0. Perhaps roughly enough to cast half the level of their maximum level powers eg. A cipher with who has max level 4 powers should be able to cast their level 2 powers with the starting focus in their "tank". That said I have not really explored the focus gain of a non-blunderbuss Ciphers to really make a proper estimate of what their focus gain rate is like... Non-blunderbuss ciphers can gain focus pretty quickly too though it's more challenging especially for melee. Over time, the blunderbuss is probably slightly less efficient actually, it's just that it's bursty which is very convenient because it allows you to switch back to casting after one alpha strike.

Oh, the Cipher is my favorite class. It's just that from level 9-12 or so it's so powerful it trivializes the content. Amplified Wave is ridiculonk, and chain casting Mental Binding isn't much different. To be fair a lot of classes have this issue, Gaze of the Adragan trivializes the endboss, etc. The *main* issue is that other casting classes need more per-encounter utility. But it wouldn't hurt to make ciphers have a *slightly* slower start, just so they couldn't always open every fight with their biggest whammy. They sortof have the inverse problem from Chanters. Just like the fight is always over before Chanters get to use an Invocation, most fights are usually over before high-level Ciphers need to attack with a weapon. Just like Chanters should probably start combat with a couple phrases "in the tank," at least at higher level, Ciphers should probably start with slightly less focus "in the tank" (at least unless they take the "Greater Focus" talent, which conversely should do more than it does; it sucks now). VVV But I do like them! I just want playing them to be a little more challenging at the top end. If I didn't like them at all I wouldn't play them and wouldn't have any opinion! VV

I'd say just tweak Ciphers' starting focus down a bit so that they always start with slightly less than they need to cast their top-level power, rather than slightly less than they need to cast it twice. Otherwise leave gain, costs, etc. the same.

oh, yeah, I threw these up on SA but I guess i should post them here. I'll link the source images also. Online TCGs are a surprisingly good source of images. http://imgur.com/a/pgQS0/all

If you think PoE beats BG1 in regards itemization; well, you must be on crack. Which boots in PoE are as cool and memorable as, "Paws of the Cheetah"? Which Robes are as epic as, "Robe of the evil Magi"? Which wand is as over the top epic as, "Wand of Monster Summoning"? Which gloves in PoE compete with, "Gauntlets of Dexterity"? The itemization in PoE is very bland compared to that. Hah, I *think* you're agreeing with me and actually being pretty damn funny but this being the interwebs I can never be 100% sure on sarcasm What I like about PoE's itemization is that there are a number of items that have unique properties and due to the flexibilty of the enchanting system you can choose to build a whole character around something like Gaun's Share or Azureith's Stiletto. There's a *lot* of room to develop and expand it but with any luck at all there will be a lot of expansions!

I can't tell you what the stacking rules ARE but I can tell you what they are SUPPOSED to be. Links below are to crossposts I've made on this forum, original source is Josh Sawyer on SA forum. http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/70158-do-weapon-focus-bonuses-stack/?p=1572903 http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/70763-do-afflictions-stack-on-enemies/ So if you're stacking Afflictions like Frightened, Confused, Paralyzed, etc., you're generally only going to get the largest debuff from any one condition, because generally they're all gonna be active/modal. Note that this means some abilities are a lot less useful than they seem on paper. The one exception to these stacking rules seems to be Flanked, which for some reason seems to stack with everything regardless (possibly because it counts as "passive" rather than "active/modal").

Yeah I didn't really enjoy it. Combat/encounters are boring, exploration and itemization sucks and I was really disappointed with the story/writing too Given the amount of time and effort you'd invested in the game pre-release, wouldn't almost any game we could have gotten be a disappointment? I mean, I just played through BG 1 before playing Pillars and in every respect this game blows it away -- and I'm including writing, encounter design, itemization, etc. Yes, BG 2 had some more sophisticated encounters, more layered writing, and more varied itemization, but the dev team for BG 2 also didn't have to develop an engine from scratch and could thus afford to put more man hours into those things. I expect we'll see things like encounter design, itemization improvements, etc. in the expansions (just like the best part of New Vegas was in the expansions). Not because they're deliberately making us pay extra for the good stuff or anything but just because you have to cook the steak before you can make the gravy. This game is engine, framework, and setting exposition. It's designed to start a franchise. The things it doesn't have -- and whose absence you're citing as flaws -- are, for the most part, things that by design and necessity have to come later in the franchise. Don't get me wrong the game has some significant flaws (wait, the only thing keeping me from Act III is literally the weather? How did some of these bugs make release?) but a lot of the criticism seems like it's holding this game to an impossibly high standard that neglects the realities of game development.

There's moving grass in a number of places. That stuff isn't completely cut it's just not present everywhere because yeah budget restraints. There are tides in Ondra's Gift.

Did you back at the level for the pet? It was a reward for a specific tier, not all backers get it.

Ugh. So *this* is why. I thought they'd just retuned it or something.