Most effective way to use party assist?

[Cylion]

I was wondering what the best way to use party assist while preserving a large variety of dialog options. For example, for my current character, I can split my skill points between 2 passive skillsets without a problem. However, party assist is not 1:1 ratio. Let's say my own character focus on diplomacy and history. That get's two skills covered. But is it wise to split the points for my companions as well? For example Eder with intimidate and streetwise vs Eder with a single focus. With will unlock more speech options? What is the max party assist I can get if I split the points between 2 skills vs when I focus on only one? Let's say I have 0 streetwise, how much do I get from Eder when I split vs when I don't? Any information is welcome, however, the main question is: Should I split my skill points on companions or should I focus on 1 skill for the largest variety speech options?

[Hybridsalmon]

Wouldn't recommend focusing on one. It'll be a pain if you switch to a different companion(unless custom made). You'll need to be sure that companion has the same skills as the one you switched it out for. The only benefit for focusing would be that you can pass certain companion-individual-skillcheck. Otherwise It doesn't matter if you put 4 points in 1 companion, or 2 points each on 2 companions. 

Mechanics is an exception though, unless you don't care about locked chests. One companion should focus completely on that(till I think 13).

[mazeltov]

Party Assist pools the points from all assistors (i.e the characters not actively making the check). For dialogues, the MC usually makes checks assisted by the other party members, so the strategy I'm using for a second playthrough is to pick four or so main skills to focus on in dialogues and have each party member bump one of those skills up to 11 or so by the mid game, yielding +5 PA to the MC in dialogues. Then I spread the MC's points around among the chosen skills. There are lots of ways to manipulate individual checks with gear, resting bonuses, pets, etc. Plus training for each skill, all of which goes onto the MC.

 

Another strategy is to dip into your character bench and level additional dialogue passives on them, with the intention of subbing them in during key conversations. A little gamey, but whatever.

[damagai]

I was wondering what the best way to use party assist while preserving a large variety of dialog options. For example, for my current character, I can split my skill points between 2 passive skillsets without a problem. However, party assist is not 1:1 ratio. Let's say my own character focus on diplomacy and history. That get's two skills covered. But is it wise to split the points for my companions as well? For example Eder with intimidate and streetwise vs Eder with a single focus. With will unlock more speech options? What is the max party assist I can get if I split the points between 2 skills vs when I focus on only one? Let's say I have 0 streetwise, how much do I get from Eder when I split vs when I don't? Any information is welcome, however, the main question is: Should I split my skill points on companions or should I focus on 1 skill for the largest variety speech options?

 

For passive skills, while there are a few really high checks, the vast majority of checks are 10 or below. Between your 4 companions, you can give the Watcher +5 to all skills by having 11 skill points divided between the 4 other members of your team for each skill. In order to provide the most maximums, you want to distribute them in a 7/4 pattern, where one person has 7 points and the remaining 3 members have 4 points total (7/2/1/1 gives you the highest minimum, but I'm not sure that's ever relevant). Distributing skills in this way gives your Watcher +5 on all of their checks, and makes sure that at least one companion has a minimum of +11 for every skill for CYOA checks. You are then free to distribute points on your Watcher for even higher checks or to take advantage of gear that scales with skills. Personally, unless I'm aiming to use a particular piece of gear, I like to distribute the skills evenly, netting out at another +3 at the end. Adding in Skill training, I have 9 baseline in all skills with Party Assist, and can use Inns, gear, pets or consumables to boost it higher in the rare occasion that that is insufficient to make a check.

 

Active skills are a different beast altogether.

[Purudaya]

I've found it helpful to focus on 2-3 passives and 1-2 actives for your main character, then have a few characters each boost 1-2 of the skills you want to use most.

For example, my rogue distributed points evenly between mechanics, stealth, bluff, insight, and streetwise. I then made sure that Serafen focused exclusively on bluff and streetwise and Maia focused exclusively on insight and mechanics, resulting in solid party stats for all four.

One tip you might want to keep in mind, though - if you are planning on using athletics or stealth to pass skill checks, make sure that everyone in your party has 1 point in athletics and stealth. Attempts to sneak (again, in dialogue/vignette checks) will fail if one character has 0 stealth and a character with 0 athletics will often get injured in a party-wide athletics check.