How to easily get all characters to level 20?

[pmchem]

At the end of my first non-DLC playthrough, I have 3-4 sidekicks that are still in the level 15-18 range.  Most of my party is level 20.  But, is there a simple way to farm xp to get the remaining guys up to level 20?

How about everyone else, did you all get every companion and sidekick up to level 20 without trouble (before DLCs)?

[Boeroer]

Besides Neketake quests and the main plot, ship combat (which is mostly bounty hunting) is a very fast and easy way to collect lots of XP, valuable items and cash. You can do it very early because your captain skills have zilch to do with your character level. After a few sunken ships you will outrank most other ship captains and crew.

[pmchem]

5 minutes ago, Boeroer said:

Besides Neketake quests and the main plot, ship combat (which is mostly bounty hunting) is a very fast and easy way to collect lots of XP, valuable items and cash. You can do it very early because your captain skills have zilch to do with your character level. After a few sunken ships you will outrank most other ship captains and crew.

hmm, let's assume I'm already in endgame because that's how I'm testing things.  I've done all the bounties and almost every non-recurring fixed sea event.  I thought maybe ship combat would be the thing to do, so I boarded an enemy ship.  But they're all kith, so my under-leveled sidekicks didn't get any XP.  Ship-vs-ship cannon combat has the same no XP result.

So, later in the game, I'm still not sure how to have sidekicks catch up in levels?

[Boeroer]

If you already did all the content and your companions are not lvl 20 yet I'm afraid they won't get there. I mean if you do the expnsions now they totally will. Beast of Winter is totally fine with lvl 14+.

[pmchem]

Guess I'll carefully plan things out for playthrough #2.

If I delay having a companion join my party, like, not asking pallegina or konstantin to join until I'm level 17, what level will they be when they do join?  Also level 17?  If so, that seems like a way you could essentially get "free xp" for them.

Is it possible to "miss out" or "lose" any companions/sidekicks by delaying their joining (apart from very endgame after siding with a faction, of course)?

Edited May 5, 2019 by pmchem

[Boeroer]

Once they join they will have your Watcher's level. So if you don't want to bring them along until some point anyway it's smarter (in regards to XP gain) to pick them up later.

I don't know if you can miss a companion if you wait too long. Don't think so but I didn't try to "break" the system in that regard.
But there are certain companions that you might only be able to pik up in a certain situation that you can't avoid (Edér, Aloth, Serafen maybe?). If you reject them they will be gone. Although some of them might have an option that tells them that youÄll come back later. But as I said: I didn't test that companion recruitment stuff a lot so I'm not sure.

[omgFIREBALLS]

Can't really "farm" experience anywhere, but if it's your first playthrough there's bound to be quests you haven't found. You could post a screenshot of your quest log.

(Maybe I misunderstood you and you meant you're just deliberately avoiding DLC's for the first time rather than playing Deadfire for the first time...)

Edited May 6, 2019 by omgFIREBALLS

[Elric Galad]

Aren't ennemy ships respawning since 4.0.0 ?

 

[Boeroer]

Just generic ones. No "named" captains.

[Elric Galad]

I never really paid attention to experience I gained from ship combat.
So it basically means "infinite gold", but not "infinite xp" ?

[Boeroer]

You also get some XP I think (didn't really bother to sink those "Expert Vaillian Captains" and such).

[pmchem]

In the infinite generic ship combat actions, you can rank up your captain skills and your crew's skills, but your party characters do not gain traditional XP for class level ups.

[Gromnir]

On 5/5/2019 at 11:28 AM, pmchem said:

At the end of my first non-DLC playthrough, I have 3-4 sidekicks that are still in the level 15-18 range.  Most of my party is level 20.  But, is there a simple way to farm xp to get the remaining guys up to level 20?

How about everyone else, did you all get every companion and sidekick up to level 20 without trouble (before DLCs)?

not ez, but am suspecting you got more experience opportunities remaining, even if you do not realize. we got a level 20 contemplative (hit level 20 awhile back) who has done 0 dlc. rekke would seem to be our lowest level joinable-- never level'd him. never bothered with any sidekicks and they is all level 18... though the dwarf is a sneeze away from level 19. now admitted, we didn't add any o' the sidekicks 'til after we completed the ship bounties, but even so, that means they entered our party at level 11-12.

we haven't done nemnok, splintered reef, the fampyr cave, the final mapping quest, bekarna's folly, and any quest which requires completion o' ashen maw... seeing as we ain't yet started ashen maw.

would be a drag, and not ez by any stretch, but am betting you will be able to add a level or so to joinables if you uncover those quests and tasks you mighta' somehow missed.

alternative, am s'posing if you rushed to add sidekicks and then never had 'em in your party to gain xp, you could be out of xp opportunities... though am having a hard time imagining a five level gap with no xp options remaining.

why not a game editor? is no doubt gonna be quickest and likely easiest way to get all joinables to level 20. we have 0 experience with such, but am understanding there is at least a couple game editor options for deadfire. why spend hours attempting to achieve what could be accomplished in minutes?

HA! Good Fun!

ps your conundrum does reveal a worst-case scenario we had not considered. we knew npcs not in party languished insofar as xp were concerned, but had no idea a five level handicap were possible. all the more reason for us to add companions and sidekicks only after all the bounties is completed. were already our typical approach, but based on your experience, the xp penalty for non-active companions is a bit more severe than we had assumed.

Edited May 6, 2019 by Gromnir

[pmchem]

hah, nice reply.   Yes, there is some game content still available (and all 3 DLCs) and it is a right-before-endgame-area save (which I also beat the game with).  I'm not actually continuing this game; it was really a question for a future playthrough.  Then it struck me, if I wanted to level up those lagging sidekicks, I wasn't sure of a quick and easy way to do it.

To anyone reading this, don't worry about it too much, I think that it is likely all your characters will turn out just fine.

In my playthrough #2 I am just going to delay on recruiting a few npcs until I've done a bunch of non-combat quests after arriving at Neketaka.

[bringingyouthefuture]

I could be totally wrong, but I thought if you didn't have the members join your actual party right away (recruit them but don't put them in your party), they wouldn't bounce to your level until you actually put them in your party - again could be wrong.  The only drawback is ship combat, that is why I ended up just leveling them, it suck to have all the level 1 NPCs on your ship wiped out in battle since they are forced to fight no matter what.  Again, I could be totally remembering it wrong ...

[Gromnir]

18 hours ago, bringingyouthefuture said:

I could be totally wrong, but I thought if you didn't have the members join your actual party right away (recruit them but don't put them in your party), they wouldn't bounce to your level until you actually put them in your party - again could be wrong.  The only drawback is ship combat, that is why I ended up just leveling them, it suck to have all the level 1 NPCs on your ship wiped out in battle since they are forced to fight no matter what.  Again, I could be totally remembering it wrong ...

even if your recollection were accurate, it would be yet another argument in favor o' doing ship combat as 'posed to boarding actions. party ordinary levels is a complete non-factor in resolving ship combat.

and we may say with certainty that recruited sidekicks who is not added to the party proper after joining your roster will fail to "bounce" to the watcher's level the first time they is added to the party and level'd, if such leveling occurs remote from whence they is recruited. tried this just yesterday in response to the genesis poster's query.  as we noted, 'bove, we recruited sidekicks at 'bout level 11-12 range... perhaps a bit later for rekke. our watcher is level 20 and the sidekicks we level tested were all level 18, with the dwarf extreme close to level 19.

am an obsessive game-saver, so we could check to see how sidekick xp languishes if is something folks is genuine interested in discovering. at the very least, during this more recent run, we kept a save everytime we level'd in the game, other than tutorial portion.  as we noted already, after recruiting, we never level'd any o' the sidekicks-- they are all technical level 1 'ccording to our ship's roster... 'til we level 'em 'course.

is difficult to imagine a more tedious exercise, but perhaps we will check sidekick levels at recruitment (or close) and then perhaps level 15 and level 20. am knowing we checked at level 20 already, but such were level 20 after considerable additional gaming.

"screw your courage to the sticking place, and we'll not fail." 

give us a bit.

HA! Good Fun!

ps we may only do this experiment with sidekicks as such were the joinables we never bothered to level... evar. if regular companions have a slight different xp progression, we will have no way o' gauging accurate.

pps *sigh*seems we were more cautious with sidekick recruitment for the character we were running in january 'cause none o' the sidekicks were recruited into our crew previous to level 16... which is interesting in itself as 4 additional Gromnir levels resulted in 2 sidekick leveling opportunities.  will nevertheless look to see what happened 'tween level 16 and 20.

have a couple earlier characters, but we retained far fewer saves for such. 

ppps ok. so at some point between level 16 and 17 we recruited all sidekicks and never level'd any. we used our level 16 save (immediate save 'pon attaining level 16)  and then added konstantine and level'd him. sure enough he were within a thousand xp o' our watcher character and were also level 16.

as we said, somewhere betwixt 16 and 17 we recruited all sidekicks, but at our level 18 save, konstantine were beginning to fall behind-- were level 17.5.  at our level 20 save, konstantine were level 18.5.

Edited May 8, 2019 by Gromnir
update

[Purudaya]

If you're willing to use a mod, the unity console over at the Deadfire Nexus will let you level up your companions without disabling any achievements. I don't really consider it cheating to bring a few sidekicks up to party level if you were otherwise willing to farm for it anyway. 

[bringingyouthefuture]

@Gromnir you are most likely correct, it could have been that way in POE1 perhaps, and when I tested in POE2 it wasn't, and the whole ship combat thing I noticed while testing.  Thanks for checking it out!!!

[pmchem]

Just out of curiousity, what level do you all usually recruit Tekehu, Maia and Pallegina at?

[Gromnir]

7 hours ago, pmchem said:

Just out of curiousity, what level do you all usually recruit Tekehu, Maia and Pallegina at?

10-12... typical 11ish.  am doing all the ship bounties and eradication o' named captains before we meet the queen in nekataka.

HA! Good Fun!

[Boeroer]

Same

[pmchem]

Interesting.  It's been a year, but I think I recruited the post-Maje companions (and sidekicks) as soon as I could in my first playthrough.  That would've probably been level 6-7ish for most of them.  That would've given them more time to 'fall behind' in levels.

I'll delay picking them up until at least level 10 in this run.  PotD, though, and some ship boarding combat is hard without extra helpers!  I'm worried about my ship crew dying during large boarding fights.

[Gromnir]

2 hours ago, pmchem said:

Interesting.  It's been a year, but I think I recruited the post-Maje companions (and sidekicks) as soon as I could in my first playthrough.  That would've probably been level 6-7ish for most of them.  That would've given them more time to 'fall behind' in levels.

I'll delay picking them up until at least level 10 in this run.  PotD, though, and some ship boarding combat is hard without extra helpers!  I'm worried about my ship crew dying during large boarding fights.

don't do ship boarding, not for potd and not at low levels. ship combat mechanics is complete separate from poe combat mechanics. a 7th level player character who is a master captain with best ship upgrades and 4* cannoneers is a match for any ship in the deadfire. same player is doomed in a majority o' boarding actions, so don't do boarding actions.

save boarding for when you have level'd a bit. now that deadfire ships respawn, you will have plenty o' boarding action opportunities once you are appropriate geared and level'd.

for a potd run, we recommend exhausting the ship bounty opportunities at lowest level possible and before recruiting any additional party members. doing as we suggest is borderline exploitive given the early game xp and 1007 rewards ship bounties provide.

HA! Good Fun!