omgFIREBALLS

Gift from the Machine. If you're going to play no-rest you could consider dealing with the souls according to Hylea's wishes to get her supreme food. Well, you could consider it either way.

Poko Kohara. To the northwest there's a well. You can send a character down the rope to grab a sack of gems. The sack will slip or something and some gems will fall out. You can try to save them, but even failing that you'll get 3x Velune and 1x Emerald if memory serves. For going down the rope you need to pass an athletics check, don't know the requirement. For saving the extra gems I believe you need 12+ dex. Yeah I know this is super specific but hey it's the only emerald I can remember :D maybe Captain Henqua's treasure? Talk to a bounty hunter at the Radiant Court in Dunnage. Her marks will each carry a piece of a treasure map, and the treasure definitely has gems in it. Can't recall which. Also in southern Serpent's Crown (or whatever the top district of Neketaka is) there's a vendor specialized in gems and jewelry.

Llengrath bonus would have been such a no-brainer (same with Song of the Heavens). At least for Gift from the Machine and Effigy's Resentment you need to brand your character with a decent bit of darkness.

NEMNOK NOT GRACE US WITH GLORIOUS PRESENCE. STUPID PEEPER DECIDE. IF STUPID PEEPER STILL HAVE HAT.

**** with the factions doth indeed get serious after that.

Yeah, can confirm, just happened to me with Brand Enemy.

FIRST WE VOTE IF IMPORTANT IMPS ARMY IS DEMOCRACY.

NO FEATHER IN HAT BECAUSE SODDING BURGER THINKS ALL FEATHER IS GULL AND EAT.

IT HAS HAT. IT RULES US. BUT WHY RULER IMP NO TELL NAME. SHOULD MAYBE CALL STUPID PEEPER.

USELESS THING GET OWN NECKLACE. TAKE FROM GROUNDMEAT. NOT FROM OTHER IMP.

PIMP IMP GOOD IDEA. LIKE NEMNOK. WEAR NECKLACE.

As for the sound, this how I believe it works. Loud (use) means the radius around your character where mobs might hear you use the skill is decently large. Quiet (impact) means the radius around your target where mobs might hear you use the skill is small (or doesn't even exist).

UGLY STINKBALL HAVE WINGS. FLY OVER WATER. USE AS TOILET.

You'll always get X mechanics the cheapest way by tunneling the skill on a single character, indeed due to DR on Party Assist. 8 from party gives 5 through PA, no matter how those 8 points are distributed across the party. However, if you have others take mechanics it means you can reach X skill faster which can be really useful if you plan to steal your way to the goodies and get an early power boost. Also frees up points on the mechanics guy. From a powergaming PoV it seems the only real argument for even spreads on the passive skills is the possibility of interactions where 1) Party Assist is disabled 2) Everyone needs to have x skill or bad things happen I do believe I've seen a case or two of the Watcher's skill alone counting, but that's about it. With actives it's a different matter, for example I doubt Party Assist will amplify the effects of a potion (Alchemy) or scroll (Arcana). And as has been mentioned, if you want to sneak around, you're only as silent as your loudest party member ;p

It adds 5 deflection even with 0 Intimidate. That's like wearing a shield.

VISIT BATHHOUSE? ALL SEE ARKEMYR NAKED. EH.

Burial sites are my favorite locations to search for wardstones for no rest run. I'm not sure other places have them. And yeah, I've found some minor magical items there as well.

Reputation seems pretty borked. I can slaughter one floor of the VTC HQ and then on the other people are like oh hey, what up. Gellarde. At least they're not automatically hostile.

Also OP stated they invested primarily/solely in Athletics, Mechanics and History. If it isn't spelled out I can explain it. - Mechanics at the very least because trap injuries will screw this tactic over hardcore - Athletics for deflection bonus on a certain unique shield scaling with the stat - History for saving throws bonus on a certain unique cloak scaling with the stat These scaling items and probably all other such were nerfed with the patch, so that's further reduced defenses.

Mostly because it pretty much couldn't happen by accident. YMMV, I suppose. Not sure I get you but there are accidents here. - OP shouldn't have Path of the Damned buff, seems clear to me that this is simply intended for mobs on PotD. Bug. - It's probably also a bug that OP has Good Food, Better Friends along with a food buff. Nobody so far has been able to reproduce it. So remove 20 defenses due to those. Then if OP rested they would lose 10 from losing Hylea's bounty and some minor defenses from the pool buff and Nature's Resolve. All in all you could attribute 10-15 defense to the no rest shenanigans. The rest is either from bugs or methods available also to non-insomniacs.

Raise your Sword of a Thousand Truths if you ever take this. What's that, you don't own a Sword of a Thousand Truths? That's alright, because you weren't going to raise it anyway. Nobody was. If it let you use Empower twice in a fight though. Then we'd be talking.

It's stupid, but throwing all your per rest at every remotely challenging encounter and resting with water or hardtack afterwards is about as dumb.

I can't swear this holds true for the flame naga in Nemnok's lair, but the ones for the Flamewalker Vessali bounty have 0 fire armor. And more importantly, FIRE DAMAGE HEALS THEM, so it's probably not in their interest to reduce the damage. Look for Child of Flame in the combat log when you deal fire damage to them. ^^

DEFINITE GROUNDMEAT SPY. ONLY IMP INTERJECTION IS EH. KILL GROUNDMEAT.