Judicator

Unless I'm mistaken Perception is everyone's dump stat right now.

Seems strange that they made the only NPC member of the mandatory big guy race into a chanter.

Fighter is fine as a tank but Paladin is optimal IMO. Fighters are better damage but they won't have Paladin level defenses. Why do you say Paladins are the optimal tanks? Fighters and paladins start with the same base endurance/health and deflection and fighters get a bunch of abilities like guardian stance, defender, vigerous defense and so on that do wonders for its and its party's ability to shrug off damage. Probably because of the save bonuses?

Fighter is fine as a tank but Paladin is optimal IMO. Fighters are better damage but they won't have Paladin level defenses. Hm, then I guess I'll go with a Paladin tank with weapon focus knight for the battle axe and longsword, and I'll let Eder wield the 2h weapons. Too bad there's no barbarian npc.

Hatchet and Large Shield for pure tank is what I used. 2h for damage - or I've actually had a ranged Paladin just to give +6 accuracy to my casters. I'm thinking of having a fighter as the main tank and a paladin with a greatsword for melee damage. Or is the paladin better suited to tanking due to his abilities?

Which would you say works better for a Paladin, sword and board or 2H?

2h and very AoE focused. Depends on how you build him, but provided you get the hang of positioning, he should wear clothes. That's clothes, by the way, not to be confused with robes. Clothes have no recovery time penalty, but robes do, for incredibly unclear reasons. Either that, or be naked. If being naked or a barbarian wearing simple clothes offends your sensibilities something fierce, go with whatever is the lowest that you feel comfortable in without being ashamed (such as Leather). So would he need dex or is it irrelevant? I'm thinking of pumping MGT, CON, and INT.

In my OP I make it clear that I am talking about the godlike from a purely mechanical perspective. As they are right now they just don't feel very godlike to me.

On a semi-related note, what kind of armor should a Barbarian wear? I'm assuming light armor and decent DEX so he can squeeze out as many attacks as possible?

Simply wearing heavy armor makes you slow as hell. At that point it wouldn't matter much how faster your attack speed is as the recovery time between attacks is huge and unaffected by DEX. So, I shouldn't bother with Dex if I want to build a defensive Paladin or Fighter? Seems counter-intuitive. I remember reading that Dex affected accuracy but I suppose they changed that.

Anyone can wear armor and yes, DEX's value is directly tied to whether or not you're using armor. The less armor you have, the more often you attack. The more you attack the more you gain from the boost in attack speed. Doesn't DEX also affect accuracy? Nope. So I guess that means offenisive characters are going to need to pump the hell of out of Dex for action speed, while tanks are going to have moderate Dex. Tanks need no Dex. In general, it's easy to avoid penalties in PoE and often you may not even want to dump stats below 10, because you might just not want the penalties, but if one wants to, Dex is definitely something you can just throw out the window completely as a Tank. But wouldn't that make you slow as hell? I know a tank's main role is to, well, tank but you'd think they still need to deal some decent damage to keep the enemy locked down?

Anyone can wear armor and yes, DEX's value is directly tied to whether or not you're using armor. The less armor you have, the more often you attack. The more you attack the more you gain from the boost in attack speed. Doesn't DEX also affect accuracy? Nope. So I guess that means offenisive characters are going to need to pump the hell of out of Dex for action speed, while tanks are going to have moderate Dex.

In one of the threads I mentioned some ideas regarding rebalancing Godlikes, and I completely agree with this. They should get a +1 that all Godlikes get, +1 based on their parent race, and +1 based on what kind of Godlike they are. I don't think any racial power alone will be able to make up for lost Attributes. Indeed. As it stands a human, aumaua, or dwarf are going to outperform Death and Fire godlike, which makes zero sense to me as these guys are supposed to be touched by death and war gods, yet the common races are better dealing damage then they are.

Anyone can wear armor and yes, DEX's value is directly tied to whether or not you're using armor. The less armor you have, the more often you attack. The more you attack the more you gain from the boost in attack speed. Doesn't DEX also affect accuracy? Or am I wrong? Because if it doesn't you can just slap on heavy armor on a tank char and pump STR and CON without caring too much for DEX.

Well, that's good to hear. I guess we won't find out until we play the final version.

What I don't get is why they all get the same stat bonuses. You'd think that a godlike associated with a nature god would get different bonuses from one associated with a war diety. And I still think they should get their parent race's stat bonuses on top of that. It would have balanced out things nicely with the lack of helmets.

Obviously playing a godlike character will have some kind of effect on the story and how NPCs react to you, but from a pure gameplay perspective they seem rather weak. They loose the ability to use helmets just for some racial ability which isn't much better than the abilities the other races get, and they only get +1 to dex and res. It would make some kind of sense if they get that + whatever stat bonuses their parent race gets, but instead it replaces them. This means a godlike dwarf would actually be weaker than a regular one, and that makes them feel very un-godlike to me. I'm not the only one who feels they're gimped, right?

This is disappointing, I was really looking forward to playing a paladin for my first playthrough, but I guess Fighter or Barbarian might be it instead.

I assume items in the beta aren't the good stuff though.

If what I read is true then Death godlike do extra damage when their target is >15% Stamina, Fire godlike do fire damage to their attackers when they're at low health, and Moon godlike release healing moonbeams when they drop bellow 75, 50, and 25% health. I don't remember what the Nature ones have. Only the Moon godlike's passive ability sounds any good, and I don't think it's worth losing a helmet.

I'm pretty sure that's the point though? Godlike isn't meant to be "godlike" in terms of power... Well, maybe, but at this point they seem gimped instead. For example why would anyone make a godlike warrior when humans, aumauas, and dwarfs have superior stats AND can wear helmets?

Even if helmets aren't that great godlike would still only be as good as other races instead of being God-like.

So, from what I understand from those who have played the beta, godlike get +1 to Int and Dex and a passive ability based on the subtype, but they can't wear helmets. Now I was under the impression that godlike get +1 to int and Dex plus whatever stat bonuses their base race grants normally. So a human godlike would get +1 to Intellect and Dexterity in addition to the +1 humans get to Might and Resolve. From what I've read on the internet, however godlike only get the bonus to Dex and Int. That seems a little gimped to me, because you lose the ability to wear helmets only for a minor passive ability.

That happened to me once. Also, Anomen's not a paladin and he's not a wimp. He is a **** though.

Good update as always. I like the way these 3 classes are shaping up. But are they the only ones meant to be on the front lines? I was under the impression that Paladins were front liners as well as leaders.