POTD Tips Please

[Mocker22]

Hey there guys, I am hoping for some good points on making POTD a little easier for me, especially early game like level 6-7. So far I've been having issues with landing CC quick enough and agro seems to jump around a lot. Especially in a fight where it is easy to get surrounded like the ship v ship battles, my squishies seem to just get targeted and dropped. Not to big a fan of how many firearms you see in Deadfire compared to PoE1....that opening salvo is wrecking my team.

 

All in all POTD feels drastically harder to me than in POE1. Any advice on tactics, builds, etc, that have worked well for people would be appreciated.

 

Thanks, Mock

[dam]

Currently running a solo POTD Chanter/Paladin bloke with Level Scaling (only upwards) for all enemies, not having a single problem.

 

 

Would you please elaborate ?

What's your party layout ?

What are the stats and items you're using ?

[aweigh0101]

Eat food items that boost Perception so that your team misses less, and also boost (via food or whatever) Constitution so that they can take more hits.

Remember to craft scrolls and to use them liberally.

Wear heavy armor.

Use the AI customization to set the If Health < 75% use Second Wind on everybody.

Use your Empower every single combat, and then rest and recover it. Don't be afraid to just open every single battle with everybody doing an Empowered ability. The best offense is the early one.

Remember to use Poisons.

Edited May 19, 2018 by aweigh0101

[Phyriel]

Or roll a shattered pillar or a wizard;p

 

About aggro, enemies tend to target chars with lowest deflection, you can cheese around it by equiping biggest shield possible on your damage dealer at start of combat while unequiping shields on your tanks. Sure this way your tanks will suffer alpha strikes more but they are still probably gonna survive as they wear heavier armor, got more hp and higher defenses. Once alpha strikes are done you can switch to your dps set on your damage dealers and to shields/whatever setup you're running on your tanks. By the time enemies will understand what happened you'll probably down some of them and squeeze through otherwise tight encounter. 

 

But by all means listen to first advice first (wizard = arcane veil + chillfog = easy life early game, if you roll nature godlike wizard even easier with infuse with vital essence, if you roll blessings of bereth *achievement points thingy* then grab gloves for +2 evocation spells power level from vendor that spawns in port maje and disregard what I said about chillfog and just blast everything with missiles spells, evocation nukes). With monk... shattered pillar + devoted build him for hit to crit conversion and flurry strikes + rooting pain + cleaving stance. Single class shattered pillar is probably even more powerful but not as easy early game as multiclassed.

Edited May 19, 2018 by Phyriel

[Mazama]

Hire adventurers and recruit sidekicks and companions to help during ship battles.

 

Use empowered abilities, since that mechanic benefits spell casters the most.

 

Give everyone a few points of athletics and stealth.

 

Invest in alchemy. Consumables are cheap and powerful.

 

Create chokepoints. Use summons as a distraction.

[Edolamberto]

Or roll a shattered pillar or a wizard;p

 

About aggro, enemies tend to target chars with lowest deflection, you can cheese around it by equiping biggest shield possible on your damage dealer at start of combat while unequiping shields on your tanks. Sure this way your tanks will suffer alpha strikes more but they are still probably gonna survive as they wear heavier armor, got more hp and higher defenses. Once alpha strikes are done you can switch to your dps set on your damage dealers and to shields/whatever setup you're running on your tanks. By the time enemies will understand what happened you'll probably down some of them and squeeze through otherwise tight encounter.

 

But by all means listen to first advice first (wizard = arcane veil + chillfog = easy life early game, if you roll nature godlike wizard even easier with infuse with vital essence, if you roll blessings of bereth *achievement points thingy* then grab gloves for +2 evocation spells power level from vendor that spawns in port maje and disregard what I said about chillfog and just blast everything with missiles spells, evocation nukes). With monk... shattered pillar + devoted build him for hit to crit conversion and flurry strikes + rooting pain + cleaving stance. Single class shattered pillar is probably even more powerful but not as easy early game as multiclassed.

enemy target character with less deflection? Source? Someone told me aggro works around armor not deflection

[KDubya]

You don't need to abuse rest to do well on PotD, I rest if someone has two injuries.

 

Use your own gunline to start, an opening volley from stealth can drop the first guy.

 

My team is Shattered Pillar Monk, Serafen witch, Aloth fighter/wizard, Eder Swashbuckler and Xoti priest. The opening salvo is pretty harsh and tends to shoot my Monk. Now at level seven he will live with a sliver of health and then can get a second wind, at lower levels he tended to just  get killed.

 

Avoid Pirate ships. Every time I come up on one they have double my hull, sails and guns so duking it out is a losing proposition. If I run away I take a big morale hit for fleeing a weaker (??) enemy and if I fight it out on the decks I'm outnumbered and out gunned. I'm going to save up for a Galleon (I think that'd be the best gunboat) and then get my revenge.

 

Finally don't be afraid to leave an area and come back in a level or two. Levels make a huge difference in whether or not you can take an encounter.

[Mazama]

My team is Shattered Pillar Monk, Serafen witch, Aloth fighter/wizard, Eder Swashbuckler and Xoti priest. The opening salvo is pretty harsh and tends to shoot my Monk. Now at level seven he will live with a sliver of health and then can get a second wind, at lower levels he tended to just  get killed.

 

I had the exact same party set up for my 1st playthrough. Enemy crews were usually distracted by the army of chanters and rangers on my ship, so my monk was rarely in danger. The only downside is having to put them in your party once in awhile to level them up.

[marc5477]

 

Or roll a shattered pillar or a wizard;p

 

About aggro, enemies tend to target chars with lowest deflection, you can cheese around it by equiping biggest shield possible on your damage dealer at start of combat while unequiping shields on your tanks. Sure this way your tanks will suffer alpha strikes more but they are still probably gonna survive as they wear heavier armor, got more hp and higher defenses. Once alpha strikes are done you can switch to your dps set on your damage dealers and to shields/whatever setup you're running on your tanks. By the time enemies will understand what happened you'll probably down some of them and squeeze through otherwise tight encounter.

 

But by all means listen to first advice first (wizard = arcane veil + chillfog = easy life early game, if you roll nature godlike wizard even easier with infuse with vital essence, if you roll blessings of bereth *achievement points thingy* then grab gloves for +2 evocation spells power level from vendor that spawns in port maje and disregard what I said about chillfog and just blast everything with missiles spells, evocation nukes). With monk... shattered pillar + devoted build him for hit to crit conversion and flurry strikes + rooting pain + cleaving stance. Single class shattered pillar is probably even more powerful but not as easy early game as multiclassed.

enemy target character with less deflection? Source? Someone told me aggro works around armor not deflection

 

Its absolutely not true. I have played all my time in PotD and this is not the case. In ship battles, my 2 front liners are always the people targeted by ranged. The enemies that cross will go after the back line but only because I cannot possibly block everyone. Rogues especially seem to like go after softer characters but everyone else targets who ever is closer. Engaged rogues also stop running around with exception to those nasty xurip plaguebastards or whatever they are called. They go invis, can walk through anything, and go straight for the low defense folks. 

 

 

[marc5477]

Hey there guys, I am hoping for some good points on making POTD a little easier for me, especially early game like level 6-7. So far I've been having issues with landing CC quick enough and agro seems to jump around a lot. Especially in a fight where it is easy to get surrounded like the ship v ship battles, my squishies seem to just get targeted and dropped. Not to big a fan of how many firearms you see in Deadfire compared to PoE1....that opening salvo is wrecking my team.

 

All in all POTD feels drastically harder to me than in POE1. Any advice on tactics, builds, etc, that have worked well for people would be appreciated.

 

Thanks, Mock

Its hard to help if we dont know your team makeup. Do you have any tanks? Did you try moving the squishies as soon as battle begins? Can you equip the squishies with heavier armor and/or shields?

 

At your level, most enemies will be higher level so you need to play more defensively. You simply dont have the hit points to survive yet. At around level 8 or 9 it wont be a problem.

[Edolamberto]

 

 

Or roll a shattered pillar or a wizard;p

 

About aggro, enemies tend to target chars with lowest deflection, you can cheese around it by equiping biggest shield possible on your damage dealer at start of combat while unequiping shields on your tanks. Sure this way your tanks will suffer alpha strikes more but they are still probably gonna survive as they wear heavier armor, got more hp and higher defenses. Once alpha strikes are done you can switch to your dps set on your damage dealers and to shields/whatever setup you're running on your tanks. By the time enemies will understand what happened you'll probably down some of them and squeeze through otherwise tight encounter.

 

But by all means listen to first advice first (wizard = arcane veil + chillfog = easy life early game, if you roll nature godlike wizard even easier with infuse with vital essence, if you roll blessings of bereth *achievement points thingy* then grab gloves for +2 evocation spells power level from vendor that spawns in port maje and disregard what I said about chillfog and just blast everything with missiles spells, evocation nukes). With monk... shattered pillar + devoted build him for hit to crit conversion and flurry strikes + rooting pain + cleaving stance. Single class shattered pillar is probably even more powerful but not as easy early game as multiclassed.

enemy target character with less deflection? Source? Someone told me aggro works around armor not deflection

 

Its absolutely not true. I have played all my time in PotD and this is not the case. In ship battles, my 2 front liners are always the people targeted by ranged. The enemies that cross will go after the back line but only because I cannot possibly block everyone. Rogues especially seem to like go after softer characters but everyone else targets who ever is closer. Engaged rogues also stop running around with exception to those nasty xurip plaguebastards or whatever they are called. They go invis, can walk through anything, and go straight for the low defense folks. 

 

 

 

that's my experience too.. only rogue and those plague*** jump on my backline, the others if engaged stay with the frontline