How to build a melee cipher with Modwyr

[MLGretard]

Hi, I'd like to build an melee cipher with Modwyr, but i have some questions

Singleclass or multiclass?

What about subclass?

How to distribute attributes?

What to take in the second hand?

[Boeroer]

I'd say a melee Cipher is more interesting as a multiclass.

Subclass totally depends (on playstyle, multiclass combo and role in the party). They are all nice in their own ways. Psion is not well-suited for melee though.

An often used subclass for melee is Soulblade. This is best paired with rogue in my opinion. For example Soulblade/Streetfighter. Soulblade/Assassin is also nice. 

If you want to stick to swords then Soulblade/Devoted or Ascendant/Devoted can also be good. Devoted's +2 PEN stacks with the Cipher's +1 PEN passive.

Ascendant/Helwalker can also be a great combo. Or Berserker/Beguiler or Berserker/Ascendant. Since Modwyr makes you immune to Intellect afflictions you can counter Berserker's confusion with it.

Even Paladin/Soulblade can be great. 

I personally like Berserker/Ascendant because while ascended you'll have higher attack speed and 0 recovery on kill (Blood Thirst) for your casts (as well as +3 PEN due to Berserker Frenzy + Cipher passive).

[Madscientist]

some questions about barbarien/cipher:

- Does carnage generate focus?

- Does blood thirst remove only recovery for the attack that killed the enemy? I am confused by the "for 10 seconds" part in the description. 10 seconds (plus int bonus and maybe power level) without recovery sounds extremely powerful.

- Does brute force work for all attacks against deflection, including spells?

- Do the frenzy upgrades (bleed on crit, staggered on hit) work with spells? If yes, does it work for spells that do not deal damage?

If the usual berserker problems (self damage + low defense in melee) plus casting in melee range does not kill or interrupt you, berserker/ascendent looks good.

 

Off topic:

While writing this I came up with a different question: Does self inflicted damage (berserker frenzy, sacred immolation, maybe something else) generate wounds for monks?

[UltimaLuminaire]

Madscientist, I like how you ask those questions after Boeroer said they'd be unable to access the game for a week.

 

Carnage does not generate focus. This was a specific design choice the team was transparent about since the kickstarter/fig campaign. Focus will still fill fast with Draining Whip, so take that. You can also still generate focus off of certain blast effects, like from a rod modal.

Blood Thirst applies to the next attack made within 10 sec. This is applied for each hand, so if you have a weapon in each hand, the 0 recovery will affect both before Blood Thirst is removed.

Brute Force will apply to all attacks that target Deflection. There are very few spells that target Deflection, so I'm not sure what you're trying to do here.

Frenzy upgrades will not work on spells. At least, not with Fireball. They will work with summoned weapons. Frenzy upgrades will also work on vocal canon PL 9 roar/shout abilities, which is where they will shine the most.

Edited February 26, 2020 by UltimaLuminaire
Clarification

[Madscientist]

Thanks for your answer.

I don´t want to get answers NOW and I do not care who gives me an answer as long as its correct.

When I read interesting stuff in the forums I realize that there are many other things I do not know. I guess that many other players do not know this as well and it would be helpful for them, so I ask. I am a scientist and thats science: There is a question, somebody finds an answer and this answer produces tons of new questions.

[Kaylon]

Ascendant/barbarian is also my choice and you can pair Modwyr with Watcher's Blade for very fast focus generation/kills. However the berserker is hard to keep alive because the cipher doesn't provide any self healing and I don't recommend it. The ascendant will benefit from all the speed bonuses (Eager Lover + Frenzy + Bloodlust + Blood Thirst) to cast lots of spells very fast while ascended. Make sure to max Athletics and get the Undying Burden belt for 2 free insta heals per fight and Abraham pet for Health on kill and armor recovery reduction.

For attributes max might (it helps with damage and healing), constitution at 10 (a few points to survive one more hit is not worth it), dex at 10 (a few points will make very little difference with all your speed buffs), resolve can be left at 10 or lower and the rest of points can be spread between perception and intellect.

[Haplok]

1 hour ago, Madscientist said:

 

While writing this I came up with a different question: Does self inflicted damage (berserker frenzy, sacred immolation, maybe something else) generate wounds for monks?

Sure it does. Check a Monk's "Mortification of the Soul" ability btw.

Can also get you killed real quick if you happen to be a Helwalker. 

 

Also I'm not sure about Frenzy upgrade effects not affecting spells. I believe they used to, at least.

Edited February 26, 2020 by Haplok

[falchen]

Blood frenzy doesn't, spirit frenzy does - afaik.

[Boeroer]

I think last status is that Blood Frenzy and Spirit Frenzy both work with spells - but it may be that Blood Frenzy is more "picky"? I can't remember which spells of my last Barb/Druid I used for this but I got Blood Frenzy with some damaging spells (I guess Relentless Storm). And it triggered Blood Thirst, too.

Since Carnage can't crit Blood Frenzy doesn't work with it. 

Afair Blood Frenzy didn't use to work with spells - but nowadays it does. Spirit Frenzy always worked as long as I can remember.

I really seem to start forgetting details since I haven't played Deadfire for some time. So maybe test it first before committing.

 

[UltimaLuminaire]

No but before I made my post I really did go into my game, load a save, and threw a fireball while in Spirit Tornado rage. None of the enemies were staggered.

[Boeroer]

Hm... I would maybe try again.

This always worked before. Don't know about Fireball specifically - but most spells I used with it did stagger the enemies. I played Warlocks, Witches, Tempests and Howlers with Spirit Frenzy (and a Morning Star) only for that reason.

Maybe the enemies were resistant to might afflictions?

I mean this might have changed with some late patch - but this is the first time I read about it.

Or maybe it's just Fireball - that would be weird.

[UltimaLuminaire]

It was just humans after boarding a ship to battle. Pistoleers, fighters, weather mages, and a rogue or two. I'll use the console this time and dig around to see if I can figure out why it isn't working for me.

UPDATE: Tried again with multiple spells. Thrust of Tattered Veils, Web, the fire ray, Fireball (again), but Staggered did not apply with Spirit Tornado. I was still able to apply Stagger via weapon attacks and Carnage regardless of which upgrade. Roars and Shouts also did not work with Spirit Tornado, so that was a bad call on my part to give that info off hand. I think this is an issue with Spirit Tornado and not Spirit Frenzy. No matter what spell I used, whether it be from the wizard class, a scroll, or an item, the Spirit Tornado would never apply Stagger. Only thing that worked normally were weapon attacks. I did confirm that Spirit Frenzy still applies Stagger with all attack spells regardless of whether they did damage or not (ie Pull of Eora). This is without any mods on other than the community mods, and then tested again without community  mods.

This also explains why I've never seen Spirit Tornado inflict both Terrify and Stagger even though, if things were consistent like with Spirit Frenzy, applying both afflictions should be the case. There seems to be something wrong with Spirit Tornado itself. I'll investigate the files.

UPDATE 2: I'm having trouble finding the cause. The issue is not the status effect entry for stagger on hit or crit. All of entries are identical save for the attack component. Surprisingly, Spirit Frenzy has an attack component that targets yourself. I'm not sure if this does anything since the attack doesn't do anything, but it's the only thing that stands out when comparing it to Spirit Tornado. Spirit Tornado has a AoE attack entry. The major difference between the two, other than the damage and Terrify effect ID, is that Spirit Frenzy has "Require****Object": "true" while Spirit Tornado is "Require****Object": "false". I'll need to mod and test things but not right now. I have to be somewhere in 2 hours. At the very least, from my other mods, changing Spirit Tornado's AoE attack to "Require****Object": "true" did not allow me to Stagger enemies with spells, shouts, or roars.

@Elric Galad @Phenomenum Any insight?

Edited February 27, 2020 by UltimaLuminaire
Clarification and addendum

[Boeroer]

Oh... very interesting. Thanks for the intensified testing.

So the problem seems to be Spirit Tornado.

Thinking about this more I come to the conclusion that because I often didn't pick Spirit Tornado but kept Spirit Frenzy (because as non-melee char I didn't think the AoE was worth the ability point) this problem may have been there for a longer time without me noticing it...

Is the same happening maybe happening with Blood Frenzy/Blood Storm?

[UltimaLuminaire]

@Boeroer @Elric Galad @Phenomenum @Grape_You_In_The_Mouth

No time to test Blood for now, but I went and inserted the seemingly nonsense Spirit Frenzy attack component that only targets self into the status effect IDs for Spirit Tornado and lo and behold, stagger works on everything. Madness.

Edited February 27, 2020 by UltimaLuminaire
Typo

[Phenomenum]

@UltimaLuminaire It's a mistake in "Spirit_Tornado_SE_AttacksCauseStagger" status effect.

Spirit Frenzy has a similar status effect named "Spirit_Frenzy_SE_AttacksCauseStagger" and the difference between them in AttackFilter section:

                    "AttackFilter": {
                        "KeywordsIDs": [],
                        "KeywordLogic": "Or",
                        "Race": "None",
                        "IsKith": "false",
                        "HealthPercentage": 0,
                        "HealthOperator": "EqualTo",
                        "Range": "None",
                        "ClassTypeID": "00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000",
                        "Source": "None", this means status effect can be applied from all sources - weapon and spells
                        "DefendedBy": "None",
                        "Empowered": "false",
                        "Disengagement": "false",
                        "Stealthed": "false",
                        "UseStealthLinger": "false",
                        "PowerLevel": 0,
                        "PowerLevelOperator": "EqualTo",
                        "ChanceToApply": 1,
                        "AttackHostility": "Default",
                        "TargetType": "None"
                    },

In Spirit Tornado SE we can see this:

                    "AttackFilter": {
                        "KeywordsIDs": [],
                        "KeywordLogic": "Or",
                        "Race": "None",
                        "IsKith": "false",
                        "HealthPercentage": 0,
                        "HealthOperator": "EqualTo",
                        "Range": "None",
                        "ClassTypeID": "00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000",
                        "Source": "Weapon", this means status effect can be applied only with weapon attacks
                        "DefendedBy": "None",
                        "Empowered": "false",
                        "Disengagement": "false",
                        "Stealthed": "false",
                        "UseStealthLinger": "false",
                        "PowerLevel": 0,
                        "PowerLevelOperator": "EqualTo",
                        "ChanceToApply": 1,
                        "AttackHostility": "Default",
                        "TargetType": "None"
                    },

So it's a clear oversight and should be corrected. I've added this into my "To do" list.

Edited February 27, 2020 by Phenomenum

[Elric Galad]

On 2/27/2020 at 1:38 PM, Boeroer said:

Is the same happening maybe happening with Blood Frenzy/Blood Storm?

Both have 

"Source": "None",

 

So Both should be working fine.