JerekKruger

So I've learnt Yeah, the resting bonus allowed me, Eder and Aloth to beat the Valewood bears and the bonus vs spirits was very handy in Caed Nua.

I'm coming round to this point of view I think, especially since I really can't afford to be having characters doing little or no damage on PotD.

Agreed. Until I started running Pallegina as a pseudo fire mage I don't think I'd ever worn mail or scale beyond the very early game. I probably "shouldn't" wear breastplates but I think they look great so tend to anyway. Yeah, for me Sagani and Hiravias tend to wear hide or leather. Luckily there are some decent examples of both, but I'm sure they'd be better in something with lower recovery. It's the same for Sagani and guns: a lot of her dialogue talks about her using a bow and it just seems wrong to equipe her with a gun or even a crossbow, so I stick with bows all the way. Luckily Stormcaller eventually happens and everything works out, but still... No that's how I play too, I just have an allergy to taking on speed penalties. I only wear White Crest once I've got the White March Boots of Speed for this reason. It's purely psychological, I don't think a movement penalty is bad really, I just don't like them.

To be honest, I don't disagree. Personally I'd prefer plate to simply have a steeper recovery penalty, either 55% or 60%, but a -1 movement could work too (and could be offset by the talent if you wanted). I just got distracted is all

Well, it's going well so far. I ended up going with an Island Aumaua since I feel Pale Elves look a bit weird wielding Great Swords (they're too slight). I also dropped Intellect and Perception by a point each and raised Constitution to 10 as KDubya suggested. I just finished clearing Caed Nua and killed Maerwald with a level 3 party and only one rest. By the end my party was pretty beat up though. Also PotD really is a step up from Hard, I got wiped by the group of boars on Magran's Fork of all places

A. Up until the late Middle Ages/Renaissance yes. The Italians and Germans (and later other European countries) started to develop techniques to "mass" produce plate and allow it to be equipped to more and more soldiers. Given the level of technology in PoE I'd say that it represents something similar to this level of technology. B. No that's fair. I doubt anyone used the term "distributing weight" back then. C. Once again, by the late Middle Ages you start to see a development of professional soldiery. Partly it's mercenaries and partly you start to see nations realising that training and equipping the non-Knightly classes well turns out to be a rather useful thing to do. D. Oh sure, but similarly knights (or at least most knights) would have done the same. The lesson that practising whilst wearing armour would have been learnt and passed on from father to son over the years. E. Well I'd expect that someone wearing plate will run a slower 100m sprint that if they weren't wearing it, but the actual sort of running you do in combat isn't generally all out sprinting (even in a charge) since the ground is unlikely to be even and you want a certain level of cautiousness when charging angry enemies with pointy things. The one situation I can see it making a difference would be during an all out rout, but it's surprising to see from history that pursuers in routs were usually not that eager (they were probably tired, they couldn't afford to abandon formation the way the fleeing enemy could and they were probably happier taking it easy and letting the enemy flee).

Certainly nothing barring a incredibly lucky shot from a 1000lb+ draw weight arbalest was going to actually punch through plate (I'm not even sure about that one to be honest) before firearms appear, but blunt weapons like maces and war hammers could transfer a lot of force through plate and cause injuries to the flesh beneath, and spiked weapons like the spike on a war hammer could dent plate sufficiently to cause damage too, though in both cases this is primarily targeted towards the head of the opponent. But yeah, swords became more and more specialised towards thrusting and less about cutting as plate improved, culminating in swords like the estoc which are basically long spikes. That doesn't mean you wouldn't take swings still (well perhaps not with an estoc) because hitting someone in the head well with a 2kg iron bar is going to daze them even through a helmet, perhaps giving you the opportunity to stab them through a joint etc., but yeah you aren't doing so with the intention of actually cutting through the armour because that was basically impossible. As for jousting armour, you're probably right about weight and rigidity being advantageous in jousting, but I think they were also specialised to give maximum protection against potentially injury during jousting. Frog helms like you see in PoE were essentially only used for jousting, and if you think about it you can see why.

Oh yeah, definitely. That's exactly how I do it to be honest, although thinking about it it might also be worthwhile to level it in Galvino's Workshop too. I think, out of the five WM 1 soulbound weapons I only rate Stormcaller and the Redeemer as decent, and the Redeemer primarily because of the proc. The Greenstone staff sees nearly no use in most my playthroughs, though I usually equip it on Hiravias since it seems fitting, and I only use the Grey Sleeper on Eder until I get a better weapon for him. I might try to make use of Nightshroud on my current playthrough, since I intend to use Devil, but I'm not sure it really compares to other options for her.

I think against your average vessel you'll do better (or at least as well) with a good non-soulbound two-hander. Where the Redeemer really shines is against really tough vessels. You activate destroy vessels against an Eyeless One and it's a pretty huge help, you activate it against a Battery Defender and meh, who cares.

Well it depends on exactly what you mean by designed. Certainly no one ran the calculations to optimise it perfectly, but a process of trial and error improved the designs slowly but surely so that late medieval plate was surprisingly cleverly designed. Don't forget that this was something designed to protect people from death and, until the very latest periods where plate was fielded, primarily to protect the lives or rich people. That gives a good reason for your artisans to design the absolutely best plate they can in order to secure the lucrative business of selling this stuff to the nobility. But even before that people were aware of the importance of distributing weight to some extent. Generally when wearing a mail shirt or hauberk a warrior would wear a thick leather belt tightly around their waist and allow the mail to sag over it, taking the weight off their shoulders and putting it onto their hips thus making it far less tiring to fight in. Generally speaking when it comes to situations where peoples' lives are on the line technology improves pretty fast. You can find any number of videos of people wearing reproduction plate and running, doing cartwheels and other acrobatic things on YouTube. People tend to overestimate the weight of a full plate harness: they'd typically weigh no more than 25kg (about 55lbs), often less (particularly for suits designed for fighting on foot) and this would be distributed over the whole body both by design and necessity as you pointed out above. Of course going for long periods of time wearing 25kg of gear would be tiring, but the evidence is that over shorter periods of time it doesn't limit mobility much at all. Now of course, the only people wearing plate would have been professional soldiers of some sort, so whilst not necessarily Might 18+ characters it's probably fair to assume they were of above average strength and endurance and had trained wearing their armour. As a side note, plate worn for jousting tournaments was much thicker and heavier. You might wonder why you wouldn't want the absolute best protection in battle but the answer is simply that it has to be a compromise. This heavy jousting armour probably did slow the wearer, and it definitely reduced vision, two things that a battlefield soldier couldn't afford. Actual field plate would be thinner in less important areas, focussing it's protection on the head, neck and torso. It also made heavy use of cleverly designed slanted surfaces which made it very hard to strike a square blow against the plate, and naturally angled in such ways to direct blows away from vital areas. It was actually really clever stuff. Partly certainly, but the body armour, weapon, spare ammunition, grenades, small med kits etc. all add up to a surprising amount of weight.

From the point of view of plot involvement the Cipher certainly has more than most. I think perhaps a Priest may also have a fair amount, though I've never played through as one.

Wow, that's impressive. I think my first play through was about 100 hours but I reloaded a lot to tailor my dialogue options appropriately to my character (sometimes I'd pick an option, then the response would suggest I'd clearly read the option wrong) and try out different endings for various quests.

It's not about criticising the game too much, it's about the way in which you criticise it. It's hyperbolic and often based on false statements about what is or isn't possible. I agree that the difficulty balancing in PoE is not great (bad even) and I agree that WM 1&2 made things worse, but to say it's the "worst ever" is just rubbish. The difficulty balancing in BG 1 was terrible: if you followed the story and headed straight to the Nashkel mines then mages and rogues could be one shotted (depending on the difficulty setting you were playing, in such a way as to disallow rezzing) and even sturdy fighters could be two shotted; but if you spent time doing every single annoying fetch and carry subquest between the Friendly Arm Inn and Nashkel, particularly if you did this with a small party, the mines (and indeed the rest of the game) would be a complete walkover. It was still a good game. Also I challenge anyone to say, with honesty, that BG 2 without spellcasters is fine in a way that PoE isn't. It's definitely doable, but then so is PoE solo on PotD with a non-spellcaster class, but it's significantly harder than playing through with a mage and priest or three.

Actually, whilst obviously heavy, plate isn't particularly slowing in real life since it's designed to distribute its weight well to minimise the effect. The main difference is that someone wearing plate will fatigue more quickly, not that they'll be much slower. Interesting side fact, the weight of kit modern US soldiers carry in combat is quite a bit heavier that a typical plate harness.

Honestly there aren't really any wrong choices in this regard so I'd suggest going with whatever class appeals the most. Rogues and Barbarians are a little weaker, but outside of Paths of the Damned this shouldn't really matter. I guess perhaps you should avoid being a Priest or Paladin if you want total freedom in dialogue (those classes have mechanics tired to certain dialogue choices) but this is not that important so if those classes appeal don't feel obliged to avoid them. If you have some idea what you want your main character to do (melee damage dealer, tank, ranged damage dealer etc.) Let us know and we could suggest off that. If all else fails, I can suggest that monks rock.

Come on, using anything but your fists is cheesing. Nature didn't give you weapons and armour so you shouldn't need them. Punch the dragon to death (not if you're a Monk, being a Monk is cheesing).

You make a good argument, but since your post starts with the [DECEPTIVE] I know you're lying so I can't believe you

Level 3 is the ogres yeah. It's the damn ogre druids that are a pain, particularly when there's more than one at once.

Yeah, Raedric can be tough. At the very least I'd pick up Kana before facing him, ideally pick up the sixth companion you meet (not sure if you've got them yet so don't want to spoil, but you get them soon after passing through Caed Nua). Also unless you feel the need for role-play reasons, agree to help him initially, then set yourself up better around his throne before talking to him again and attacking. The primary targets should be his priests and mages but make sure someone (Eder probably) tanks Raedric whilst you do this.

I get the feeling that Od Nua was meant to be split roughly as 1-5 doable at the end of Act I, 6-10 doable at the end of Act II, and 11-15 doable in Act 3, though this is only a very rough guideline. As mentioned, level 3 is very rough if you do it early on, it remains a little rough even with some levels under your belt.

Of course there can, in exactly the same way as reading a novel can be immersive. It's just a case of letting your imagination take over.

@Tennisgolfboll Moon Godlikes are indeed very powerful, but that's why I avoid them (well that and aesthetics). Thanks for the other suggestions, I might indeed invest in some defensive talents. What I can't work out is whether Deep Faith is worth it or not. @Ichthyic yeah, Rumbalt is a nice weapon. Probably better against weaker enemies. I can use both and switch them out where appropriate.

See to my mind the big reveal really isn't that big a deal:

Thanks for the feedback KDubya. I am fairly certain that as of 3.02 they do, though none of their portraits do of course. I think the strategy I've seen is to sacrifice Ituumak at the start of the battle to use it, though this does get Sagani her sadness malus. Yeah, I think I shall. I just didn't have much of an idea how reliably a Paladin could get finishing blows on PotD without micromanaging. Huh, I'd always assumed it was good. I assume it's supressed by Dire Blessing though which is a lot better. I rarely take Arms Bearer as it seems a waste, but the more I think about it and the more builds I see with it, the more I realise it's really not.

Huh, I didn't know that. I ought to learn the various buff suppressions to avoid that sort of thing. Thanks for telling me.