Is it worthwhile to cast damage spells as a multi-class caster?

[Lampros]

It seems like they hit for crap. I am not doing much damage with Cipher spells as Cipher/Ranger and Druid spells as Druid/Chanter. Or is there a way to boost the damage I am over-looking?

[AndreaColombo]

IMO Cipher/Ranger is not about offensive casting. It's about buffing/debuffing and hitting hard either ranged or melee.

Druid/Chanter is all about healing and support; I wouldn't use it to cast offensively.

SC casters area always going to have an edge on offensive casting because of the higher PL.

[Boeroer]

You really have to look at the Penetration. Casters' biggest nemesis is underpenetration. 

I'm having lots of fun with my Troubadour/Psion offensive non-stop caster. I didn't use Soul Shock a lot before but with this class combo it's one of my favorite spells atm.

[Powerotti]

57 minutes ago, AndreaColombo said:

Cipher/Ranger is not about offensive casting.

Takedown combo/disintegration crit, because of highest potential acc multiclass, is pretty offensive

Arcane archer/ascendant with watershaper focus can cast triple pull of eora, to instantly immobilize group of enemies and ascend (with high chance to trigger ondra's wrath multiple times)

 

[Lampros]

1 hour ago, AndreaColombo said:

IMO Cipher/Ranger is not about offensive casting. It's about buffing/debuffing and hitting hard either ranged or melee.

Druid/Chanter is all about healing and support; I wouldn't use it to cast offensively.

SC casters area always going to have an edge on offensive casting because of the higher PL.

So Wizards are the only genuine nukers in this game then?

[Boeroer]

Takedown Combo/Disintegrate indeed is hot fuzz. Especially if you cast Psychovampiric Shield first (or a wizard drops Miasma). 

Had a melee Stalker/Soulblade with a Morning Star and while Takedown Combo/Soul Annihilation is also great, TDC/Disintegrate is just better. Especially when the enemy is charmed before - because Disintegrate doesn't trigger a backflip of alliance like normal hits would do.

[Boeroer]

Just now, Lampros said:

So Wizards are the only genuine nukers in this game then?

No. Priests and Druids can be awesome nukers, too. Chanters as well (check out a Bellower with Eld Nary's Curse). 

SC Ciphers can be the best friend of a nuker: Driving Echoes is very good to have on an offensive caster. 

[Lampros]

5 minutes ago, Boeroer said:

No. Priests and Druids can be awesome nukers, too. Chanters as well (check out a Bellower with Eld Nary's Curse). 

SC Ciphers can be the best friend of a nuker: Driving Echoes is very good to have on an offensive caster. 

What are the main Priest and Druid multi-class nukes? I can't get their PL 8 or 9 spells. (I do know about Eld Nary's for the Chanter; apparently it is very strong for turn-based.)

[thelee]

9 minutes ago, Lampros said:

What are the main Priest and Druid multi-class nukes? I can't get their PL 8 or 9 spells. (I do know about Eld Nary's for the Chanter; apparently it is very strong for turn-based.)

priest -> pillar of holy fire, cleansing flame, storm of holy fire, shining beacon. they all start coming mid-late game. divine mark and pillar of faith and warding seal can work in a pinch early on, but priests are definitely late bloomers.

 

druid -> pretty much each DoT they have is extremely efficient damage, starting right away at tier one with touch of rot - they just take time to work their magic. their non-DoTs are less effective than wizard (or even really priest IMO), but they generally ride along with some neat debuffs that make up for it (returning/relentless storm, blizzard, embrace the earth talon). dancing bolts and burst of summer flame are exceptions and i find them a bit underwhelming (though dancing bolts has a huge party-friendly radius), similaly talon's reach (though the latter is helped by all the easy ways druids have to boost beasts PL).

 

chanter as bellower also is extremely good with the lightning bolts invocation, the one that sends frost damage out in multiple directions (especially if you position it in a way taht one enemy gets hit by multiple bolts), and the corpse explosion one. a troubadour and skald can also do well with them, just from phrase generation efficiency perspective. (unfortunately, the frost invocation is pretty much useless for an entire DLC, but when you first unlock it, you pretty much carry the entire party for a while, such is the sheer damage you can output especially with bellower +PL)

Edited November 6, 2020 by thelee

[AndreaColombo]

Tekehu is also an excellent nuker with all Water/Frost keyworded spells, plenty of which are foe-only (in his case) and he gets bonus PL from his starting weapon.

Edited November 6, 2020 by AndreaColombo

[Lampros]

2 minutes ago, thelee said:

priest -> pillar of holy fire, cleansing flame, storm of holy fire, shining beacon. they all start coming mid-late game. divine mark and pillar of faith and warding seal can work in a pinch early on, but priests are definitely late bloomers.

 

druid -> pretty much each DoT they have is extremely efficient damage, starting right away at tier one with touch of rot - they just take time to work their magic. their non-DoTs are less effective than wizard (or even really priest IMO), but they generally ride along with some neat debuffs that make up for it (returning/relentless storm, blizzard, embrace the earth talon). dancing bolts and burst of summer flame are exceptions and i find them a bit underwhelming (though dancing bolts has a huge party-friendly radius), similaly talon's reach (though the latter is helped by all the easy ways druids have to boost beasts PL).

 

On Priests: I tried those spells on PoE 1, and I found them underwhelming. On my current run, my Priest/Paladin is strictly buffer and melee, but I will try to incorporate those spells and see if I like them any better.

On Druid: I guess my problem is that I am really hesitant to use AoE DoTs that are not Foe-only, because I tend to run a heavily melee party. So I only slot Foe-only spells, and they've been underwhelming from a pure damage perspective - albeit they've been quite good from a CC perspective.

[Lampros]

1 minute ago, AndreaColombo said:

Tekehu is also an excellent nuker with all Water/Frost keyworded spells, plenty of which are foe-only (in his case) and he gets bonus PL from his starting weapon.

Damn, we should be able to access his sub-class

[AndreaColombo]

4 minutes ago, Lampros said:

Damn, we should be able to access his sub-class

I'm pretty sure there's a mod that lets you do that.

Personally I'm glad you can't in the unmodded game. Giving players access to that subclass would cheapen Tekehu by making him less unique.

[thelee]

4 minutes ago, Lampros said:

On Priests: I tried those spells on PoE 1, and I found them underwhelming. On my current run, my Priest/Paladin is strictly buffer and melee, but I will try to incorporate those spells and see if I like them any better.

in poe1, cleansing flame suffered enormously from a jump bug and the fact that it was very hard to actually land it on enemies, but if none of those problems surfaced its ugly head it would absolutely shred. i found it almost comically unfair how eagerly lagufeth broodmothers use them on your own party. in deadfire, it is both less good than poe1 and also better. the stats are worse (doesn't synergize with dots, doesn't cleanse as well) but it's easier to land and the jump is absolutely reliable.

the other spells though, honestly i'm surprised you found them underwhelming. they turned the priest into a fierce fire dps monster.

6 minutes ago, Lampros said:

On Druid: I guess my problem is that I am really hesitant to use AoE DoTs that are not Foe-only, because I tend to run a heavily melee party. So I only slot Foe-only spells, and they've been underwhelming from a pure damage perspective - albeit they've been quite good from a CC perspective.

yeah, there's your problem  there are some great foe-only dots (all the insect ones), but you'd be leaving quite a bit on the table.

[Lampros]

1 minute ago, AndreaColombo said:

I'm pretty sure there's a mod that lets you do that.

Personally I'm glad you can't in the unmodded game. Giving players access to that subclass would cheapen Tekehu by making him less unique.

I don't use official companions though. And thanks for the mod reference - I will look for it!

[Boeroer]

You can give the Watershaper subclass to any druid via console. Example if you want to turn a Fury hireling into a Watershaper:

iroll20s
setSubclass Companion<hireling_dude> Druid Druid_Watershaper
removeAbility Companion<hireling_dude> Fury
addAbility Companion<hireling_dude> Watershaper

In order to keep a savegame untagged with "cheated" you can use the Unity Console.

[Elric Galad]

Ciphers aren't great nukers but Disintigrate is arguably the highest damaging single target spell of the game. The fact that it does raw damages is very MC friendly : no PEN problem in this case.

Rangers have several single target Acc buff to help it land. Ciphers also have the best Single Target CC, so ranger/Cipher is great.

[thelee]

40 minutes ago, Boeroer said:

SC Ciphers can be the best friend of a nuker: Driving Echoes is very good to have on an offensive caster. 

+1 to this.

I sorely under-appreciated driving echoes until a couple runs past when I (for once) single-classed a cipher. Once I started using it, I just didn't stop - it really solves all sorts of dps ills. (even when you're not underpenetrating, it can give you such a huge boost that you start overpenetrating, which is a really efficient damage boost for spells)

Edited November 6, 2020 by thelee

[dgray62]

4 hours ago, thelee said:

 i found it almost comically unfair how eagerly lagufeth broodmothers use them on your own party.

Yes, Lagufeth Broodmothers absolutely shredded my party the first time I made the mistake of waltzing around Longwatch Falls with a lvl 7 party! Learning how to deal with them was one of the biggest challenges of White March, IMO.

[Lampros]

5 hours ago, Boeroer said:

You really have to look at the Penetration. Casters' biggest nemesis is underpenetration. 

I'm having lots of fun with my Troubadour/Psion offensive non-stop caster. I didn't use Soul Shock a lot before but with this class combo it's one of my favorite spells atm.

Okay, I just checked the Priest spells and a lot of them have a measly 7 Penetration? Even if I get spell Penetration food, I will get, like 9? And elemental Penetration skill will get 1 more to make it 10. Just pathetic

[Boeroer]

Keep in mind that Power Level scaling will add more PEN. Priests can cast Champion's Boon on themselves for +2 PEN. 

Use stuff like Expose Vulnerabilities (-2 AR) or Hel-Hyraf (-2 AR) (they don't stack) in oder to soften up enemies' AR.  

If you hit critically you'll have +50% (multiplicative) PEN, too.

 

 

 

 

[thelee]

10 minutes ago, Boeroer said:

Keep in mind that Power Level scaling will add more PEN.

in addition, the listed PEN understates it because spells/abilities that are higher up get an innate "ability level" bonus that is more generous than PL scaling, +.5 PEN per ability tier (and +2 accuracy per ability tier)

 

a tier five PEN 7 spell will inherently start off at PEN 9 and +4 accuracy. innate PEN 7 is not great, but keep in mind that a higher PEN is not necessarily better because the game is balanced such that higher PEN spells tend to do lower damage (iirc many cipher/druid spells off the top of my head are PEN 9+ and low damage).

 

btw, champion's boon is A+ precisely for the +2 PEN that you can toss around to anyone who needs it (whereas monk limits their tenacious to themselves). it's useful on almost anyone you want to deal damage with on PotD.

Edited November 6, 2020 by thelee

[Boeroer]

Right. The descriptions are again misleading. I understand why there are base values for every ability (internally they all start at lvl 1 basically I guess) but it's absolutely not understandable why the base data gets displayed in the ability description at lvl x and not the actual scaled values. I mean both the level scaling @thelee mentioned and the character's basic Power Level scaling, too. Forget temporary PLs and such - but when looking at the character sheet and the abilities the descriptions should list the values they actually have at your current level. When leveling up the abilities should display which values everything would have at +1 char level so you could make an informed decision. 

Anyway: Priests and Druids have great nuking spells and the PEN is not an issue compared to wizards. What might be an issue for nuking priests are fire-immune or -resistant.

[Tetsu]

Another combo (Polishing Mod needed):

Hunter/Cipher:

Fractured Volition inflicts Enfeebled (+50% duration)

Takedown combo + Disintegration Crit (200+ accuracy) + Enfeebled = 3000+ damage

SC Ascendant can reach about 8000 damage in 45 sec with:

All the combo bellow (without Takedown combo) + Soul Ignition  + Death of 1000 Cuts + Antiphatetic Field

I would like yo make a solo build of it but I don't know how to survive.

 

[Elric Galad]

Fractured Volition inflicting Enfeeble is only with Balance Polishing mod though