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The spell is grayed out and refuses to work. I tried resting, stripping him of his equipment, kicking him out the party and hiring him back, but so far nothing has worked for me. I'm afraid saving the game after the last fight has mad that condition permanent and the only other save game I've got is about 10 hours less than the recent one. That sucks big time! Is there any way to fix this?

I've been testing a lot of combinations lately and i gotta say... this combo ends the fight in a few secs even in hard mode. Here are the reasons and a detailed guide: Class Overview Priests Priests give melee characters huge buffs. I'm not even going to talk about the spells here, as you probably noticed priest has the best buff spells in the game. Especially one buff i noticed is.. the accuracy bonus talent on holy radiance (1/encounter) The funny thing with this ability is you can cast it outside the combat and start the fight with an accuracy bonus for 15+seconds and cast it once more during the combat. As far as i know you cannot cast other buff spells outside the combat! This alone will give you +5 accuracy on all your party for pretty much the whole fight, and accuracy is probably the most important thing in this game: it lets you hit the opponents and crit if you roll high. Monks Monks have huge dps with swift strikes ability + two weapon talent +weapon focus talent + high dexterity. But another reason why monk is op is you can send the dangerous targets away and knock em down with 'force of anguish' ability. The target will stay out of combat for 10+ seconds! He's basically dead. This is not only effective but it's insanely fun. The most fun class i've played in the game so far. Later they also get stunning hits, which also adds more to the crowd control potential of the class, which is why i prefer monks over let's say... rogues. All the crowd control abilities will reduce the enemies' overall damage output and keep your frontline safe and sound. Barbarians Barbarians currently have the best total melee dps output in the game. Here are the reasons why: First: Frenzy. It gives you a very large attack speed bonus, might(more percentage based damage bonus) and constitution (+6 on each when upgraded, 6 might means %18 more damage.) Let's say you have a barbarian with 18 starting might, you'll have 24 might once you activate the frenzy, without any other buffs or gear, this gives you %42 damage bonus in total. Your attacks will easily bypass the DR of the enemy. Second: Brute Force/threatening presence passive ability combo. As you might have noticed, barbarians start the game with average accuracy. (-10 less accuracy than the best value) But wait till you hear these: This combo increases your accuracy against most enemies in the game, since they often have a weaker fortitude than deflection. ( you can check the bestiary, especially all sorts of casters, shades, phantoms - really annoying creatures- creatures that are similar to rogues with high reflexes and generally physically weak built enemies have lower fortitude ) Also threatening presence lowers their fortitude by 20. That is 20 more accuracy in most cases guys... OP. Also keep in mind that fortitude debuff will allow your monk to disable opponents properly, since monk ability checks are made against fortitude. Third: Blooded passive ability. It increases your damage by a HUGE amount once your hp is below %50. There's no bigger increase to damage in this game. Once you go below %50 hp, the fight will probably end. Fourth: Carnage. This gives you a PERCENTAGE based aoe damage on your attacks. You might want to focus on that percentage part, because this means damage is not static (the information in prima guide is wrong). You can test it if you want, most of the time it deals about %60 percent of the primary attack. Which means it'll also bypass damage reduction of the enemy in most cases. Increase your int a little bit (something between 12-14 works best) to gain more advantage from the aoe. Fifth: Barbaric Blow. It depends on chance but this ability may sometimes crit(%30 hits are converted into crits), and it is a full attack (means if you are dual wielding, you hit with both weapons), it has both a +crit damage multiplier and +damage bonus. It'll kill most enemies if it crits. What makes this worth picking is that it is a talent (will not interfere with your ability progression) and it is per encounter! All these points mentioned above makes barbarian a better dps than rogues, as rogues need to backstab/sneak attack to increase their damage output, and a simple difference is rogues can't deal aoe damage with their hits. Tactics First of all, you'll need a tank for this to work. Either paladins or fighters work well, but you might want to pick a +engagement bonus talent for paladin. I prefer fighters since they get defender and endurance regen for free. Send him to engage first with defender mode (+2 engagement limit, many defensive bonuses when upgraded including the awesome +15 deflection bonus). Then send in your monk and try to tank one enemy with him for wounds. You can also get the talent 'mortification of the soul' to get wounds and start swift strike and disabling right away. Then send your barbarian in, activate rage and start slaughtering. Try to take down the most dangerous enemy first, for example if an enemy has blind spell (creatures like shadows) it'll mess up your frontline. Take him down fast. Always cast holy radiance with your priest before the fight, as mentioned above. Then start buffing your party, especially your front line. Most of the time in hard difficulty you won't even need the buffs, just use them for tough fights. Cast holy radiance once more if the fight lasts long. Stats Abilities, talents and gear are more important in this game than stats but there's no reason to go for a high defensive stat on a melee dps. Therefore, arrange the stats on both your monk and barbarian towards an offensive play. That is high might and dexterity, medium constitution and intelligence, low perception and resolve. Intelligence will give you bonuses on the duration of your abilities, constitution will keep you alive. Trust me on this they do not need to be tanky, since a single tank works well in this game and we'll increase the defensive stats of monk and barbarian with equipment. In %100 of time if your monk and barbarian keeps dies it's due to a positioning mistake and not because of their stats. That being said, you might want to make your monk just a little bit more defensive than the barbarian (+1 or +2 on perception and/or resolve), because he needs wounds to use his abilities and also barbarians have a little more hp/endurance. Skills It's kind of obvious if you know about the fatigue mechanics but, have at least 2 points on athletics on all your melee characters, and even on the casters too. Trust me you do not want to have the fatigue debuff. Take mechanic skill either on your main character or someone else. These two skills are the most important ones in the game. Gear Tank Armor: Obviously, have your tank wear all the defensive items and increase his defenses as much as you can. Always wear a shield and enchant it if you can. It is really important that he stays alive for first few rounds, which is not that difficult. Monk Armor: Give your monk a light or no armor. There are really good light armors that only have %15 recovery debuff. (check the armor 'Vengiatta Rugia on prima guide for example, wow!) Enchant his armor. Enchanting the armor on your monk should be your first priority. You can also wear plain clothes (no attack speed penalty at all!) and still enchant it for DR and stat bonuses. Isn't that sweet? Weapon: Go for two weapon fighting. Use your fists early game but you might want to switch later on to a weapon of your choice, because you can enchant weapons but not fists. Get the weapon focus peasant for an accuracy bonus(hatchet, spear, quarter staff, hunting bow, unarmed) or something else if you don't care about unarmed. Hatchets give deflection bonus and staves have reach bonus so you can use the doorway tactic with staves. (attacking from behind while your tank blocks all the enemies in a doorway, or a narrow corridor). Accuracy is important, keep that in mind. Barbarian Armor: Give him either light or medium armor and enchant it. (an example: check 'saint's war' in prima guide, it gives you second chance, perfectly synergizes with barbarian class) Weapon: Use two weapons or a two handed weapon. Get the talent that suits your choice. Two weapons will probably have better dps overall since you get interrupted with slow attacks a lot, but two handed weapons deal more damage per hit, making your aoe attacks more effective against enemies with damage reduction. Estocs might be a good choice for two handed, since they give DR penetration, really important for hard fights. Two handed swords will also work. Take the weapon focus for your desired weapons, again, accuracy is really important. Here's an important note: If you are a good tactician and you can have your barbarian attack without getting interrupted by the enemy, GO FOR TWO HANDED WEAPONS! You'll bypass the enemy DR more effectively and it is the only thing that keeps them alive! Yes you can penetrate that huge dragon's thick scales too! LOL Supporting Spells I will not go into detail in this section, but spells that augment the fortitude, deflection and accuracy are really helpful. For example the blind spell in this game is really overpowered because it lowers both deflection and accuracy of the targets by a large amount, making them vulnerable to your attacks and it keeps your party alive due to the accuracy debuff. There are two blind spells on wizard in levels 1 and 2. The level one spell attacks fortitude and level 2 spell attacks will, so it won't miss if you cast the right one. (tough melee creatures have low will while weaker ones such as casters have low fortitude). Also spells that debuff the enemy's damage reduction are huge. The only thing that keeps the monsters alive are defenses and damage reduction, and once you get passed those the fight ends in a blink. Another good debuff is 'sickened' or anything that lowers fortitude. It'll allow your barbarian to hit and crit easily since he attacks the enemy's fortitude if it's lower (considering you have the talent 'Brute Force', I really suggest getting it on your barbarian!). Lowering fortitude will also allow those great disable abilities on your monk and fighter to work properly.

Seven Nights She Waited While the White Winds Wept says it's foe damage but it clearly hits my entire party.also the priest spell Prayer Against Treachery doesn't seem to work on a target thats's already dominated.

Had a party member who was paralyzed. I cast Suppress Affliction on him He no longer showed as paralyzed on mouse-over. Instead he showed as being affected by Suppress Affliciton (all good so far). But he still couldn't move or attack. This lasted until Suppress Affliction wore off (and possibly until after the suppressed paralyzation wore off too) Suppress Affliction says that it negates all hostile effects for the duration of the spell, so it should have negated the paralysis.

This spell claims that it "Grants a bonus to resist any attack containing the Dazed or Confused afflictions. If those afflictions are already on the target, their durations are reduced." However when I used it in a fight against the Vithracki bounty, it did not target my confused party members because they were not considered allies due to being confused.

So I have been playing a devout cleric of Eothas. Sadly, it didn't work out too well. If you are unaware, priests have access to a special talent according to their deity that grants a hefty +10 accuracy bonus to two categories of weapons, plus a minor daily spell. It's too good to pass up. Problem is, for priests of Eothas these two weapons are the flail and the morning star. I get it, Eothas' symbol is a sun and stars. Somebody obviously put quite a bit of thought into this. This setup, however, means that any priest of Eothas is restricted to only ever deal crushing damage with his weapons. None of the other priests have this particular problem (mace/greatsword, sword/arquebus, stiletto/club) except for Wael followers, who are doomed to use quarterstaves and rods. I was wondering about that but then I read on the wiki that morning stars used to be crush/pierce instead of simply having a higher interrupt chance. In fact, the item description still refers to it having this property, which is quite confusing. This leads to my second problem. How good are flails? I don't know. So far I have lead two characters to Caed Nua and I have yet to see a single flail. As far as I know, they are as mythical as unicorns. For some reason certain weapons are exceedingly rare in the Eastern Reach. I can accept certain weapons such as guns to be rare, or exotic weapons that do not belong in the region but I have yet to see any flail, sabre, estoc, arquebus or blunderbuss that were not in the hands of a companion. Call me entitled, but I feel like I should be able to purchase any basic weapon at the blacksmith in Gilded Vale. When the rest of my party are all armed to the teeth with Fine weapons while I don't even have access to a basic version I'm supposedly really good with then something is amiss. Right now Hope Eternal is simply not a very good talent, if not an outright trap. All the other deity talents are strictly superior, except for Wael. Nobody ever cares about Wael, though. Pictured: The morning star's misleading description. Turns out, dank spores possess a colossal crush resistance which is how I found out about this issue. I had to use a Fine greatsword in the end, much to the chagrin of my god. Eothas did not die for this.

Hi guys I just got Durance the priest. Not bad at all, lots of good spells. I just dont understand the alignment thing. His Holy Radiance is affected by my main characters reputation? If I mostly choose to use Benevolent\Diplomatic conversation options, his Holy Radiance effect will get weaker? (Since Magranians are Clever\Aggressive). Another thing, what are those "vessels" which receive burn damage from the Holy Radiance? Thanks!

uh... It's barely affect the gaming experience, that when I was reading the combat records, in the page where shows you which companion got most crit hits, the strongest enemy defeated, damage taken...etc. I noticed Durance, for some reason, sent most hits in my team, who mainly do buffs like holy radiance then shoots his pistol, which has a very slow hit rates. While my player character has two more hours in combat, sent 35x hits, Durance had sent 13xx hits out. So uh... does the game count buffs on companions hits? Kinda weird.

What class you think does the best buffs and why? Chanter, pally or priest? - I like the chanter, but don't like summons - Pally would be too busy tanking - If I make a priest it's to heal from afar. Thoughts?

Everyone would agree that rebuffing is the tedious most process one could experience in an rpg. Instead beginning the encounter with a pause and buff selection, why not preselect several buffs (really a few) during the rest that will be active until you rest again? Maybe sacrificing the spell slots or at some other penalty, but rebuffing should be eliminated! Only if it's a short strong lifesaving buff like arcane weil, but not common blessing and other tedious stuff.

Update by Josh Sawyer, Project Director For our third class update, we will be covering chanters and priests. Along with paladins (covered in Update 56), these classes provide parties with their core support bonuses and healing effects. Different games refer to these types of characters using different terms -- usually "leader" or "support" -- but at their core, they excel when they are providing assistance to their teammates. The benefits they provide to the group often outstrip the contributions of individual party members in the final tally, but their abilities must be used carefully to maximize their impact. Our next update will be from Adam Brennecke. He has some great graphical enhancements to share that we hope you'll enjoy. After that, our final class update will be on The Front Line: fighters and barbarians. All three of the leader classes have a balanced suite of offensive abilities and though there is overlap in the effects of their various support abilities, they differ significantly in how they are used. Paladins utilize persistent auras to provide strong bonuses to allies in their immediate vicinity and limited-use single-target commands to grant powerful buffs to individual teammates. Chanters' phrases create a rotating cycle of bonuses that shift over the course of combat, building up energy until they can utter powerful invocations. Priests are traditional casters, relying on large area of effect bonuses mixed with small area offensive spells to direct combat from afar. Kana Rua, a chanter. Chanters are storytellers and repositories of ancient lore from myriad cultural traditions. They use these stories and legends to stir the memories of the dreaming lost souls and soul fragments that surround them. The spirits respond by creating magical effects, essentially playing their part in the recreation of the legends. In this way, chanters act as directors of supernatural actors playing out momentary plays for the chanter's benefit. Due to their heavy focus on folktales and storytelling, they have an inherent bonus to Lore. As explorers of many lost and forgotten vaults dating back to Eora's antiquity, chanters also have a bonus to Mechanics, helping them bypass tricky locks and traps. To use their special kind of magic, chanters link together individual short phrases from different legends to create longer chants. The phrases have distinctive, thematically-appropriate effects that are of low power but can be applied while the chanter is engaged in other combat activities. As one phrase ends and another begins, the effects of the first phrase will linger, allowing multiple phrases to overlap with each other. Through the clever overlapping of phrases, chanters can grant their allies a sizable stack of minor bonuses. But chanters aren't entirely about their passive phrases and chants. With each phrase that passes, chanters gain greater control over the spirits assisting them. When enough control is gained, chanters can direct them to perform a single powerful spell called an invocation. Invocations are often support-oriented, but some contain powerful offensive effects. Invocations are so powerful that they disrupt a chanter's chants, disabling their effects for several seconds until the chanter can recover. While Eora's wizards are known for their "colorful" spell names, chanters' phrases are far more loquacious, often incorporating the entire spoken text of the phrase. Sample chants: Blessed Was Wengridh, Quickest of His Tribe - Movement rate and Reflexes increased for allies in the area of effect. Thick Grew Their Tongues, Stumbling O'er Words - Enemy Concentration is reduced. (Will) The Fox from the Farmer Did Run and Leap - Enemy Disengagement Attacks have reduced Accuracy. The Silver Knights' Shields Broke Both Arrow and Blade - Increases the Deflection of allies in the area of effect. At the Sight of their Comrades, their Hearts Grew Bold - Increases the Fortitude and Will of allies in the area of effect. Sample invocations: Not Felled by Axe, Nor Broken by Storm - Increases allied Slash and Shock Damage Threshold. If their Bones Sleep Still Under that Hill, None Can Say - Summons three skeletons. The Thunder Rolled like Waves on Black Seas - Stuns and pushes enemies in the area of effect. (Fortitude) The Lover Cried out to the Beloved, "I am Yours!" - Charm effect on all enemies in the area of effect. (Will) Rise Again, Rise Again, Scions of Adon! - Revives unconscious allies and heals a small amount of Stamina in a large area. This has no effect on characters who have already been Maimed or Killed in combat. The Brideman Slew Thirty 'Fore they Crossed Half the Hall - Increases the Might, Constitution, and Resolve of allies in the area of effect. In addition to their chants and invocations, chanters' close association with the Lost gives them one final, passive power: Ancient Memory. This ability activates whenever the chanter is in combat and grants low-level Stamina regeneration to all nearby allies. It is not as strong as a fighter's Constant Recovery or a priest's Holy Radiance, but can affect even faraway allies at all times. Cadegund, a priest. Priests are devoted followers of one or more deities, though almost all have a primary dedication to a single god above all others. They are well-versed in philosophy, myths, and legends, giving them an inherent bonus to the Lore skill. Additionally, the requirements of their faith often involve traveling long distances in difficult circumstances, giving them an inherent bonus to Athletics. In the world of Eora, priests do not gain power directly from their deity, but from their belief in the deity and the tenets of their religion. Paladins share a similar source of power, but differ from priests in the intensity and nuance of their beliefs. Paladins' faith is single-minded, extremely passionate, and held above all other concerns. The faith of priests is more philosophical, open to criticism (both their own and from others), and malleable from individual to individual. While paladins are ever-burning wellsprings of spiritual energy, priests gather energy into their own souls and release it through the use of specific prayers. These prayers form the common spells priests use in battle, ranging from healing magic and divine attacks to a variety of blessings and curses. Compared to wizards, priests have access to a smaller number of spells overall but do not need to prepare those spells in a grimoire. And while priests do have offensive spells, they are smaller in area and generally weaker in power than similar effects available to wizards and druids. Here are a few: Restore Minor Stamina - Part of a series of progressively powerful Stamina-healing spells. Restores Stamina to all allies in the area. Armor of Faith - All allies in the area gain bonus Damage Threshold. Withdraw - Caster or ally is momentarily phased out (cannot act, cannot be targeted) and regenerates Stamina. Divine Terror - All enemies in the area are Frightened for the duration (Will). Consecrated Ground - Creates a long-lasting circle of Stamina regeneration on the ground for allies. Divine Mark - Blasts the target with Burn damage and reduces their Deflection for a short duration (Will). Holy Power - Allies' Might and Resolve are increased. Pillar of Faith - Does Crush damage to the target (Reflex) and knocks enemies Prone (Fortitude) in a small area (Foe Only). Prayer Against Restraint - Part of a series of spells that ward against afflictions. Grants a bonus to resist any attack containing the Hobbled or Stuck afflictions. If those afflictions are already on the target, their durations are reduced by 10 seconds (Hobbled) or 5 seconds (Stuck) respectively. Watchful Presence - All affected allies gain an effect on them that will last until the end of combat or until triggered. When any affected character drops below 20% Stamina, Watchful Presence will heal a significant amount of Stamina on the character. Triumph of the Crusaders - Allies gain a bonus that restores Stamina every time they defeat an opponent. The ally must strike the "finishing" blow to gain the benefit. Revive the Fallen - Revives and restores a modest amount of Stamina to unconscious allies in a small area. This has no effect on characters who have already been Maimed or Killed in combat. Salvation of Time - Extends the duration of all beneficial effects on allies. Crowns for the Faithful - Increases the Perception, Intellect, and Resolve of all allies in the area. Cleansing Flame - Hurls a ball of holy fire at an enemy. It does continuous Burn damage to the target and reduces the duration of beneficial effects (Reflex). After a few seconds, the Cleansing Flame leaps to another enemy within 3m and repeats the process again, ultimately affecting up to three targets. If no valid targets are in range when a leap occurs, the spell expires. In addition to their spells, all priests have two inherent abilities: Interdiction and Holy Radiance. Interdiction is a fast-acting Dazed effect that the priest can apply to a group of enemies. It does not have a long duration, but can be valuable in gaining a quick advantage. Holy Radiance regenerates Stamina for all allies in close proximity to the priest. Additionally, any vessels (spirits bound into unliving matter like dead flesh, copper, or bronze) hit by the effect take Burn damage and are Frightened if the radiance overcomes their Will. The power of both Holy Radiance and the paladin's Faith and Conviction abilities can be modified by their behavior and the reputations they develop from the choices they make. When players make a paladin or priest character, they select an order or deity, respectively. Each choice highlights two types of behavior that are celebrated and two types of behavior that are condemned. For priests and paladins played as the main character, their Holy Radiance and Faith and Conviction power will shift based on their behavior. Reinforcing their deity's or order's preferred behavior will gradually increase their power, while playing against type will cause a small diminishment in their power. These changes are not dramatic, but reflect a measure of dissonance between the character's stated faith and how they choose to conduct themselves. A few paladin orders: The Shieldbearers of St. Elcga - An order of Aedyran holy warriors who emphasize kindness and diplomacy over cruelty and aggression. The Shieldbearers were founded in honor of an elven noble who helped unite the Aedyr and Kulklin kingdoms after a long war. Kind Wayfarers - Knights-errant who assist troubled travelers and celebrate love, condemning deception and malice even when dealing with their enemies. The Kind Wayfarers are a diverse group of people and can be found all over the known world. Bleak Walkers - Soldiers dedicated to conducting warfare mercilessly and with extreme brutality in order to bring a swift end to conflicts. Known for their unyielding, terrible nature, most nobles will only call on them as a last resort. Some of the deities priests can select: Eothas - Presumed dead by many, Eothas is (or was) the god of renewal and light. His followers exemplify honesty and benevolence in their interactions with others. In the Dyrwood, Eothasians are often victims of prejudice due to the aftermath of The Saint's War, in which the Eothasian peasant known as St. Waidwen led a holy war into Norwaech. Magran - A goddess of fire and warfare, Magran is celebrated by many Dyrwoodans for her priests' assistance in The Saint's War. Already known for their use of firearms, the priests collaborated to develop the "Godhammer" bomb that destroyed St. Waidwen at Evon Dewr Bridge. Statues of Magran can be found all over the Dyrwood and Magranites are popularly known for their boldness and quick wits. Berath - The god (or goddess) of the dead takes many forms in different cultures, but their names are widely invoked by most people at one time or another. Theologians see Berath as the guardian of all gateways, including the gates of life, death, and rebirth that all mortals must pass through. Common folk fear the priesthood of Berath but respect them for their level-headedness and unflinching resolve in the face of endless death and suffering. The Leaders of the Band are a powerful trio of classes for players who choose to focus on bolstering their allies. Each class has its own style of providing benefits and we hope you enjoy experimenting with their varied mechanics. That's all for this week. Let us know what you think of the chanter and priest in the forum. As always, thanks for reading.

Hey I what to know 1 thing. What do you thing about Priest that are devoted to "Mystical magic gods" ... It allways has weird to me that they can use fillplates and only have "some" of mistical spells. What about priest/wizard crossovers.. So masters of spells, with no abilitis in fight and hp points. The first that will die in a 1-20 lvl and the most powerfull in 30lvl beyond .. what do you think about adding possibility of playing this type of chars (useing both devine and mistical spells) ?

Hello, friends. The elves have been hard at work on Project Eternity, and we would like to show you our fine goods. This is a long update, but we wanted to give you more information than usual since it's the end of the year and we will be in our elfhomes for the next few weeks. First, I'd like to talk about what we've been doing with the engine and second, I'd like to talk about some of the design work we've been doing. Resolution and Scaling - We want to run the game at various resolutions and scale properly. We've been talking about our target resolutions and looking at the best way to implement scaling. If you've played any of the Infinity Engine games lately, you may have noticed that running at high resolutions can make the game look like an RTS. Though it's nice to be able to scale up and see more of the environment, at a certain point dungeons start looking like ant farms. That's what happens when you take a game designed for 640x480 and run it at more than double the resolution. It is now the year 2012, so we're looking at supporting a range of resolutions that runs from modest laptops to Macs with crazy Retina displays. To do this, we're going to render the game out at a target high resolution and a target low resolution. Currently, we're looking at a base resolution of 1280x720. A large number of laptops run at this resolution or its slightly bigger brother, 1366x768. It's not quite twice the resolution of the original games (640x480) due to the 16:9 aspect ratio, but pretty close. We believe that this base resolution will scale well up to 1920x1080, which would be roughly equivalent to going from 640x480 to 1024x768. In the old IE games, this gave you a slightly larger view of the world, but didn't get too crazy. For our higher resolution, we are likely going to render out to a ~2560x1440 screen size, as we did with our environment during the Kickstarter campaign. We will likely downsample these to run at 1920x1080. With resolutions above "mere" Retina displays, we will zoom out, which should allow the backgrounds to scale into outer space (close enough, anyway). Movement and Combat Feel - We've been working on implementing all of the basics of party selection, movement, and combat. This includes working on personal space, ally and enemy pathing, friendly "bumping" during movement, ranges of melee attacks, attack timing and delays, target selection, and response time. A lot of work goes into making these elements feel good and feel "IE-ish" (while excluding the IE-ish things we didn't like). We’ve also been building block-in weapon meshes and putting them in the game to see how they look in terms of scale. This has gone well, but we're still working on proportions. Some thin weapons, like stilettos, rapiers, and estocs, can be very difficult to discern, especially at lower resolutions. Their thicker cousins, daggers, swords, and greatswords, need to be "beefed up" a small amount to help distinguish them. Even though we need to make a few slight adjustments, our overall approach of making weapons with realistic... ish proportions is working well and feels similar to the characters and weapons found in Baldur's Gate and Icewind Dale. Along with implementing the visuals of the weapons, we're experimenting with weapon statistics and mechanics. Weapons are currently classified as slashing, piercing, or crushing, which is a pretty common division of types. We're not currently using damage types vs. armor types in Project Eternity, but the damage types all have properties that suggest a certain type of usage. Slashing weapons do the most damage when compared to their counterparts from other categories. E.g., if you compare a greatsword to an estoc to a maul, the greatsword does the most damage. When targets have little to no armor, slashing weapons are the ideal choice. Piercing weapons negate a fixed amount of Damage Threshold, which is the primary way in which armor reduces damage. Though they don't do as much damage as slashing or crushing weapons, their ability to ignore even moderately heavy armor means that it is superior to other weapons in those circumstances. While armor can negate a large amount of damage, there's always a small amount that gets through. Crushing weapons do much more through armor, which makes them the best choice when dealing with very heavily armored targets. So far, this works well on paper, scales well, and seems to hold up in the game, but it is very "mathy" and not necessarily intuitive because you can't always guess a target's Damage Threshold simply by looking at them (as opposed to armor types, which are usually visually apparent). We will continue to experiment with this to see how it feels in the long run. Our goals are to provide tactical challenges to the player and give them to feedback and tools to adapt and overcome when they're in a difficult spot. UI Design - Tim and I have been talking about our user interfaces recently. We want to make sure that we improve the functionality of the original designs without completely losing the feeling of those interfaces. One thing we want to avoid is making the UI too "minimalist". We don't want it to feel bloated, of course, but we also recognize that the IE games had "solid" interfaces. They looked like they were made of materials -- wood, stone, and metal -- and had substance to them. When you look at the interfaces for the IE games, they help immerse you in each setting. We'd like to do the same for Project Eternity. Functionally, we're using Icewind Dale II as our starting point. We've been looking at inventory recently. Tim and I have designed a system that uses three types of gear storage: equipment, top of pack (this name may change!), and stash. Equipment is what your characters are currently using and have ready to use. This includes weapon sets that you can swap between during combat. "Top of pack" is a finite amount of gear that you can access outside of combat for a variety of purposes: replenishing consumables, checking out a shiny new sword you picked up a while back, etc. The top of pack cannot be accessed during combat, but is present as a strategic pool of items that you can access while exploring. The stash is where all of the "other stuff" goes: things you aren't using, items you want to sell, and various doo-dads you'll be looking at later. When you find gear, you have the option of placing it wherever you'd like as long as there's room for it. You can use it immediately, put it in your top of pack, or just chuck it in the stash. Once an object is in the stash, you can access it at camps, your home, and similar locations. We've created this division of inventory space to add strategy to your gear loadout decisions instead of having a weight limit, while also allowing flexibility for backup equipment. Most importantly, it doesn't prevent you from doing what adventurers love to do most: loot everything they find that isn't bolted down. Core Four Class Design and Advancement - We want our classes to feel familiar but flexible, so we've designed our "core four" (fighter, priest, rogue, wizard) to reflect traditional D&D roles and allow you to build outside of them. In our current design, each of the classes starts with two active use or modal abilities and one passive bonus. Fighter Defender (Mode) - In the Defender mode, fighters' melee attack rates decrease while their melee defenses increase. This is a particularly useful mode to enter when a fighter is blocking a route of attack to protect other party members. Surge - This active ability allows fighters to rapidly regenerate Stamina for a short period of time. Melee Accuracy - Fighters have inherent skill with melee weapons that is reflected by a small accuracy bonus. Priest 1st Level Priest Spells - Priests gain access to all 1st level priest spells. Priests can cast a fixed number of 1st level spells before they must rest to recover their uses. They can cast any combination of different spells up to the per-rest limit. As priests gain levels, their 1st level spells will eventually become per-encounter resources. Recovery - The Recovery ability regenerates a modest amount of Stamina for allies (including the priest, if in range) in a Medium-sized area at Short range. Sacred Circle - All allies standing within a Small area around the priest gain Accuracy bonus. This bonus does not include the priest unless there are no conscious allies in range, in which case it applies to the priest. Rogue Escape - The rogue may hop a short distance away and all hostiles lose him or her as a direct target for 3 seconds. After the 3 seconds are up, enemies can target the rogue normally. Reversal - Reversal prepares the rogue for the next melee attack against him or her. When it hits, the rogue takes reduced damage and instantly rolls to the opposite side of the target and executes a powerful melee attack. This will even allow rogues to move past enemies that are fully blocking a path. Sneak Attack - This damage bonus applies whenever the rogue "flanks" an enemy or when the rogue is hidden from an enemy. Flanking means that the rogue is within a short distance of the target and on the "opposite" side of that enemy from an adjacent ally. Wizard 1st Level Wizard Spells - Wizards can access all 1st level wizard spells immediately. Unlike other wizard spell levels, the wizard does not need to find scrolls or grimoires to use any 1st level spells. Wizards can cast a fixed number of 1st level spells before they must rest to recover their uses. They can cast any combination of different spells up to the per-rest limit. As wizards gain levels, their 1st level spells will eventually become per-encounter resources. Blast - When wizards use any implement (i.e. a wand, rod, or scepter), they generate a Blast on the target. The Blast does a modest amount of damage to all enemies in a Small area around the target (excluding the target). Familiar - All wizards can summon and dismiss familiars. Familiars are mobile "totems" for the wizard, providing defensive bonuses to allies near them and inflicting defensive penalties to enemies near them. Players can also access the master's spell list through the familiar, though casting a spell through the familiar still requires the master to physically cast it; it's simply targeted from the familiar. Familiars are weak and fragile. If a familiar is killed, the wizard takes damage and is unable to summon his or her familiar until he or she rests again. As players advance their characters, they have the ability to choose class-specific abilities and more class-neutral talents (more like perks or feats) to customize their character capabilities. If you want to keep your fighters very low maintenance, there are a large number of passive fighter abilities and combat-oriented talents that you can buy. If you'd like to make a fighter that's much more "active-use" (more like a 4E fighter), you can choose to buy more modal and active abilities. Similarly, while all wizards gain additional spells, you can use talents to boost a wizard's damage with implement weapons and Blasts, making them more useful when you're not having them chain-cast a series of limited-use spells. The same also applies to skills, which are used for a variety of non-combat purposes. All classes start out with bonuses in the skills that their classes most commonly use, but players can choose to reinforce or play against that top. If you want to make a paladin who delights in picking locks, you can do that and get a lot of utility out of the skill -- though the character will never be quite as good as a rogue who specializes in it. We hope that these approaches use the strengths of a "role-ready" class system while allowing players a large amount of helpful flexibility in how they develop characters over a (hopefully) long and fruitful adventuring career. That's all for this week, and this year! We'll be back in January with more details on what we're up to and where we're going in the months to come. Thanks for reading! Update from Josh Sawyer

Paladin - Male Priest - Female Wizard or Sorceror - Male Witch or Sorceress - Female Barbarian - Male Amazon - Female Now, these would be the same in skill set and such, but it could imply lore into the classes. Meaning you could have a frenzied Male Barbarian throwing spears like an Amazon. Likewise, having a strong Female Amazon that you play like a close combat Barbarian. Barbazon Mainly about Barbarians, but I see them as stemming from some sort of Barbaric culture (bandits and vikings). Orcs are an excellent example at a "civilized" strand of Barbarians in my opinion. "Stronghold" in Heroes of Might & Magic as well. An established Barbarian society. I've always viewed the women of these tribal Barbarian settlements as something less masculine, namely something more akin to Amazon. The hunters of the strong and proud male dominated Lion pack. Unisex, but: Barbarian Fighter or Soldier? The rest of the classes feel to me pretty unisex. Fighter doesn't really say "Male/Female" about it, but it could be a part of the aforementioned Barbaric culture. Unless "Fighter" gets a different title, such as "Squire" or "Soldier" or whatever else is fitting the role of the Fighter in the world. About Squire: I absolutely love the feature in the original Final Fantasy for the NES, when you meet Bahamut for the very first time and it's "Oh snap". Then you do a long quest for the Rat's Tail, which you then return and you become "Knighted" (Fighter becomes Knight). Can Factions help you grow in status among the people? Or hide from their sight? What's the difference between the Barbarian and the Fighter and what is it that makes the Fighter a Fighter and the Barbarian a Barbarian? Wizitch Wizard and Witch, to me, feel pretty granted as is. A female "Wizard" does, however, sound a bit odd. The skillset wouldn't differ between the two, only their titles. And whenever "Class" is mentioned it accounts gender as well in dialogue? So the result becomes "Witch" instead of "Wizard" if you have a female "Wizard". The same goes for Barbarian/Amazon, they would both have the same tools as the other in terms of character building. Palaest Paladin and Priest, would not be the same skillset (A Paladin is a Paladin, a Priest is a Priest), but only female can be Priest and only male can be Paladin. I'd like to advocate for dialogue options if you create a female Paladin, meaning it wouldn't be "off limits" at character creation, but lore-wise for your own party it could be something interesting. With few male Priests in the world, having one in your party is like having a Paladin "defect" perhaps. Trash, in their "Glorious" eyes, even if you can woop their ass right on the spot. Of course, reputation should play a big part too. Thoughts?

Copy+Paste from here. Felt it needed its own topic. "In the current design"

in the recent interview at gamebanshee.com i read that "Healing magic of any sort is extraordinarily rare" and resurrection is non-existent. but isn't this one of the main functions of the priest class?

Flagellants were mentioned in Shadenauts' post in the Monk topic; I think they're an interesting concept - what if they were one of the classes of PE? Here's a few ideas : 1) Overview So, who are we dealing with exactly? Using Warhammer as a point of reference : In other words, flagellants in Warhammer are usually simple people who have, figuratively speaking, gazed into the abyss, but the abyss gazed into them - and their minds simply snapped. It could've been a supernatural event, or a personal loss. Sanity was then replaced with fanaticism - this renders them utterly fearless and nigh unstoppable. They have little regard for themselves. 2) Combat role and ability proposals - Flagellants would fight in a frenzy, making them equally dangerous to foes and friends alike. - Their conviction grants them supernatural strength and makes them immune to psychological effects (there's simply nothing left in the world that could scare them anymore). - Highly resistant to magic, especially psionics. - Through practice of self-mutilation they can empower themselves even further, but at the cost of their health (think blood magic). - Martyrdom - protecting their companions with their own bodies. 3) Implementation - Having one as a companion seems feasible - with a flagellant being a subset of a priest or monk class. - New class (or a subset of a priest or monk class), available to the player - unlikely, but possible with some changes. 4) Companion Interacting with those crazed individuals opens up some interesting opportunities. First - having them fight by your side is a big gamble - the risk is certainly high, but so is the reward. Perhaps the player will help them exorcise their horrors once and for all (which would allow them to control their frenzy) ? Or maybe send them even further down the spiral of insanity (that'd increase their combat prowess but render them even more dangerous to their friends) ? Also, who wouldn't want to have a Malkavian in their party? 5) Concept art example What are your thoughts?