New player: Having a miserable time choosing a build (need one that has a guide).

[Malrats]

Hello!

I've been researching classes and builds and such for two days now and still haven't landed on anything.

I'm not going to be playing on any hard difficulty, so it likely doesn't even matter, but I still want to feel powerful and have fun. I'm hoping for something that's like...the coolest build possible without really having any tedious setup for fights. I guess I can deal with a buff or two if it's really necessary (So maybe Sage? But I can't find an actual guide for how to build it). I want to be able to control my character (and let companions just do what they do on AI), walk in and fight the enemies, not really worry about being too squishy and dying, but would also really like to do a lot of damage (AoE sounds extra good). I like to look cool so I traditionally go for classes who will wear armor and wield melee weapons, though I'm flexible with that.

This may not even be a build that exists for all I know, but if someone can help me find something as well as link a guide that shows everything from character creation to skills to take at each level to equipment to use, I'd really, really appreciate it. I'm so lost in these types of games without guides like that but once I have them I have a lot more fun and can generally relax and focus.

I know that I'm overthinking it and it drives me crazy, too, but that's anxiety for you. Even in video games! Ugh.

Anyway, thanks a ton for anyone who can help me find a build.

Edit: Worth mentioning: I play on console, so I don't have access to any mods. Anything that requires community patches, etc is unfortunately out of the question for me.

Edited April 12, 2022 by Malrats
Clarification of platform

[summatsupeer]

As you want to be self reliant i'd suggest something with self healing:

• Fighter
• Paladin
• Druid
• Priest
• Chanter does to but its minor compared to others

AOE Damage using Melee weapons would need an AOE weapon like Whispers of the Endless Paths but beware some like Wahai Pōraga doe AOE to friend or foe.

Druids and Priest can do a bit of everything, buff, debuff, heal, AOE Damage etc but its mostly active abilities you'd have to manage.  Druid has some of the strongest AOE spells and can shift into animal form to give you some melee if thats something that interests you.  But if you want to look cool in armour probably not?

One of the simplest yet strong melee builds is a Cipher (Soul Blade) multi-classed with either Fighter (Devoted) or Paladin (any subclass that you like really). You get Raw Damage from Cipher (can setup AI to use the soul blade ability automatically) whilst the Fighter/Paladin brings defense and self buffing/heals.  Only thing is it lacks AOE unless you use Cipher spells which isn't recommended for Soul Blades but nothing stopping you.

[Not So Clever Hound]

For what you want Sage or Battlemage would be indeed powerhouses but most Wizard's AoEs come with friendly fire so you'd have to manage a bit the companions, the placement etc.

Here is how I understand your specs:

• very powerful early-on and throughout, with a strong late-game plan
• melee/caster hybrid
• flex on looks/equipment
• not too squishy
• access to high damage AoE
• party friendly no matter the party comp/behavior
• easy automation + cool hands-on gameplay

Then your "ideal build" IMO is a Cantor (Monk/Chanter). I had built one here for Solo hardest difficulty that can be super easily tweaked for relax party play.

There is flex in race, subclass, abilities, stats, gear, etc. Overall it would be incredibly hard to build it in a way that cannot absolutely steamroll every encounter on low difficulty.  

 

EDIT: if you want another flavor, this one is great and more detailed:

 

Edited April 12, 2022 by Not So Clever Hound

[Exanos]

The most fun build i've ever played was a monk/druid (shifter). Very powerfull from start to end with a lot of way to play (you can do it all : tank, healer, buffer, melee dps, range dps, spell dps) :

- You are very capable in melee (shifted or not) : 6 differents forms (human, bear, boar, stag, cat, wolf) each looking good. Very adaptable.

- You are a very nice spellcaster : druids can do AOE damage, single target damage, heal, buffs... and Monk can boost it (Speed/Might/Pen boost, Bonus Int for duration/AOE and even more bonus Might if you go hellwalker subclass).

[NotDumbEnough]

If you want something simple and decisive a single class Chanter (Bellower, Troubadour or Skald) is fine. Literally all you do is cast a spell once every 20-40 seconds, all the rest of the time you're just auto attacking which gives you room to manage other members of the party.

The previous suggestions here involve more micromanagement for the player character and/or metagaming.

[dgray62]

I love monks, chanters and druids, so I second the above recommendations. But you might also consider a single class forbidden fist monk, which is very powerful and durable from beginning to end of the game, and is god-like once you get Whisper of the Winds. If you search for "forbidden fist" in this forum you'll find nice discussions of how to build a FF monk. However, for an even easier game I'd recommend @Powerotti's forbidden fist/steel garrote build, which is extremely sturdy, powerful and easy to play. If you want melee only it is my top recommendation. But if you like melee caster hybrids then a cantor or ascetic multi class would be great fun.

Edited April 12, 2022 by dgray62
additional information added

[Malrats]

Thank you for the suggestions, everyone. 

I’ll definitely have to take some time to sift through this. I don’t want anything where I can damage my allies so I’ll have to rule those out. The rest are definitely worth looking into, I think.

[Malrats]

9 hours ago, Not So Clever Hound said:

For what you want Sage or Battlemage would be indeed powerhouses but most Wizard's AoEs come with friendly fire so you'd have to manage a bit the companions, the placement etc.

Here is how I understand your specs:

• very powerful early-on and throughout, with a strong late-game plan
• melee/caster hybrid
• flex on looks/equipment
• not too squishy
• access to high damage AoE
• party friendly no matter the party comp/behavior
• easy automation + cool hands-on gameplay

Then your "ideal build" IMO is a Cantor (Monk/Chanter). I had built one here for Solo hardest difficulty that can be super easily tweaked for relax party play.

There is flex in race, subclass, abilities, stats, gear, etc. Overall it would be incredibly hard to build it in a way that cannot absolutely steamroll every encounter on low difficulty.  

 

EDIT: if you want another flavor, this one is great and more detailed:

 

I have a question about the Wizard spell warning: From what I've looked into, Sage seems to be more about fighting melee with Monk abilities and the Wizard multiclass is for buffs and the Spirit Lance that the build revolves around. Maybe I'm wrong about that since I don't know much about the game, but is there anything in that build that would be damaging my allies? So far from what I read, you're not taking any Wizard AoEs. Unless the AoE of Spirt Lance damages allies.

As far as the two builds you linked, they sound really cool! Sadly I play on console and they both mentioned requiring a community patch to make sense/play correctly. But thank you for the suggestions and links!

[Malrats]

6 hours ago, NotDumbEnough said:

If you want something simple and decisive a single class Chanter (Bellower, Troubadour or Skald) is fine. Literally all you do is cast a spell once every 20-40 seconds, all the rest of the time you're just auto attacking which gives you room to manage other members of the party.

The previous suggestions here involve more micromanagement for the player character and/or metagaming.

I may actually try this out. But is there maybe a multiclass that would go well with Chanter to make it ever so slightly more offensive? I know I read some things about them having summons, if I'm not mistaken, but maybe if I paired Chanter with something that has some offensive abilities it could still be simple to play but do a bit more damage? Just a thought, still desperately trying to figure out what to play.

I'm 100% with you on the micromanagement and metagaming--I just can't handle it, not to the extent that so many of these really great builds seem to require.

[dgray62]

I love playing Cantors; the Wind Path cantor linked above is a fine build. You'll attack mainly with monk fists, which are arguably the best weapons in the game, and since you'll crit a lot, skald is a natural match, @Jaydchose helwalker for the nice boost to STR, which will boost your damage output. On the other hand, forbidden fist, the choice in @Not So Clever Hound's build, is my favorite subclass. I don't think that you need to worry about mods. Community Patch modded the FF ability to be a weapon attack, which would be important if you went with skald. But if you follow the build and go with troubadour, this won't really matter. And as the build indicates, it doesn't require much micro; you can actually set up the AI to run the character pretty easily. Also, since FF is much sturdier, you won't need to micromanage to keep the character from being overwhelmed, as you would with a helwalker.

But there are other options as well. Barbarians and paladins pair well with chanters as well. The former will give you more hit to crits (if you go with berserker) and action speed and pair well with skalds. Paladins make the chanter much sturdier, and can pair nicely with any chanter subclass.

[Malrats]

43 minutes ago, dgray62 said:

I love playing Cantors; the Wind Path cantor linked above is a fine build. You'll attack mainly with monk fists, which are arguably the best weapons in the game, and since you'll crit a lot, skald is a natural match, @Jaydchose helwalker for the nice boost to STR, which will boost your damage output. On the other hand, forbidden fist, the choice in @Not So Clever Hound's build, is my favorite subclass. I don't think that you need to worry about mods. Community Patch modded the FF ability to be a weapon attack, which would be important if you went with skald. But if you follow the build and go with troubadour, this won't really matter. And as the build indicates, it doesn't require much micro; you can actually set up the AI to run the character pretty easily. Also, since FF is much sturdier, you won't need to micromanage to keep the character from being overwhelmed, as you would with a helwalker.

But there are other options as well. Barbarians and paladins pair well with chanters as well. The former will give you more hit to crits (if you go with berserker) and action speed and pair well with skalds. Paladins make the chanter much sturdier, and can pair nicely with any chanter subclass.

Thank you. I was actually thinking of trying Paladin/Chanter but haven't been able to find a build for it yet. A couple of videos that made my head spin but that's really it. Otherwise I'm just going to go with the Monk/Wizard and be extra careful with using AoEs. But I do like the idea of the Herald, so I think I can safely say I'm narrowed down to one of these two. It's just a matter of finding a build for Herald--there's one for Sage on FextraLife as well as one on these forums. Not sure why I'm having such a tough time finding Herald.

If you or anyone else knows of one that they could link me it would be most appreciated!

[Not So Clever Hound]

8 hours ago, Malrats said:

From what I've looked into, Sage seems to be more about fighting melee with Monk abilities and the Wizard multiclass is for buffs and the Spirit Lance that the build revolves around.

You're right, it can be the main flavor of a Sage build but even this Sage won't spend 100% of their time buffing and poking things with Spirit Lance. In many cases you'll want to do more than that, opportunistically or out of necessity (e.g. it takes time to get Spirit Lance). You'll have plenty of awesome nukes as a wizard, but you'll just have to be a bit more careful about targeting with some of them (spell description is usually helpful - when it says "hurt everyone" or "hurt enemies"). It's still awesome and super viable for party play anyway - it's a top-tier multiclass. And you'll also get some party-friendly nukes. It's just that on the other had of the spectrum, Chanter almost only has party friendly nukes. So it's even more straight forward to play IMO.

3 hours ago, Malrats said:

If you or anyone else knows of one that they could link me it would be most appreciated!

The old ones on the Build Board still seem very serviceable even on 5.0. You can build Herald in many different ways but considering your specs, I see 2 primary builds;

More offensive Caster/Melee Flavor: Skald/Paladin or More Caster Focused: Troubadour/Paladin. In either case the Paladin subclass choice is very flexible depending on the "morality" you'd like to have in game. In other words, even for the melee flavor you don't have to take an "evil" class like Woedica or Bleak Walker to be very effective. Kind Wayfarers or Goldpact are excellent too. Anything is fine really.

Skald/Paladin can alternate between casting offensive invocations (Her Tears, Her Revenge, Killer Froze Stiff, Thunder Rolled, The lover cried, Eld Nary..) and critfarming with Flames of Devotion + 2 weapons (Sun&Moon + Tuotilo's Palm + Ring of Focused Flames is a nice, balanced combo for that) to damage single targets and get Phrases back. Occasionally summon stuff. Chanting and Paladin Aura can provide a lot of sweet utility to the build and everyone around: healing, debuffing enemies, boosting accuracy/damage... your taste really).

Troubadour/Paladin will wield weapon & (medium/large) shield and alternate between summoning, offensive invocation and using Paladin abilities as they please to heal friendlies and damage/debuff badies. This one can be a healing machine that still causes a ton of damage via summons and unleashing powerful nukes. Will also give the same awesome passive utility with chants and aura.

If you really need a detailed breakdown, particularly for early game, we can probably give you some guidance. You want max Intelligence, Some Mig, Some Dex, Con flat, Per is less key in lower difficulties but still nice, flat or slightly boosted Res.

Edited April 13, 2022 by Not So Clever Hound

[Malrats]

6 minutes ago, Not So Clever Hound said:

You're right, it can be the main flavor of a Sage build but even this Sage won't spend 100% of their time buffing and poking things with Spirit Lance. In many cases you'll want to do more than that, opportunistically or out of necessity (e.g. it takes time to get Spirit Lance). You'll have plenty of awesome nukes as a wizard, but you'll just have to be a bit more careful about targeting with some of them (spell description is usually helpful - when it says "hurt everyone" or "hurt enemies"). It's still awesome and super viable for party play anyway - it's a top-tier multiclass. And you'll also get some party-friendly nukes. It's just that on the other had of the spectrum, Chanter almost only has party friendly nukes. So it's even more straight forward to play IMO.

The old ones on the Build Board seem still seem very serviceable even on 5.0. You can build Herald in many different ways but considering your specs, I see 2 primary builds;

More offensive Caster/Melee Flavor: Skald/Paladin or More Caster Focused: Troubadour/Paladin. In either case the Paladin subclass choice is very flexible depending on the "morality" you'd like to have in game. In other words, even for the melee flavor you don't have to take an "evil" class like Woedica or Bleak Walker to be very effective. Kind Wayfarers or Goldpact are excellent too. Anything is fine really.

Skald/Paladin can alternate between casting offensive invocations (Her Tears, Her Revenge, Killer Froze Stiff, Thunder Rolled, The lover cried, Eld Nary..) and critfarming with Flames of Devotion + 2 weapons (Sun&Moon + Tuotilo's Palm + Ring of Focused Flames is a nice, balanced combo for that) to damage single targets and get Phrases back. Occasionally summon stuff. Chanting and Paladin Aura can provide a lot of sweet utility to the build and everyone around: healing, debuffing enemies, boosting accuracy/damage... your taste really).

Troubadour/Paladin will wield weapon & (medium/large) shield and alternate between summoning, offensive invocation and using Paladin abilities as they please to heal friendlies and damage/debuff badies. This one can be a healing machine that still causes a ton of damage via summons and unleashing powerful nukes. Will also give the same awesome passive utility with chants and aura.

If you really need a detailed breakdown, particularly for early game, we can probably give you some guidance. You want max Intelligence, Some Mig, Some Dex, Con flat, Per is less key in lower difficulties but still nice, flat or slightly boosted Res.

Detailed breakdowns are always welcome! In the meantime, I made something myself based on two of the builds in the megathread here, primarily revolving around the "Sir Sit a Lot" build (it sounded really funny and lazy and I'm intrigued) but since that doesn't say much of what abilities to take, I also used the "Herald / War Caller aka "Sword Singer"" guide.

I went with:

Goldpact Knights/Troubadour, Pale Elf, Old Vailia - Aristocrat

Might 16, Con 6, Dex 15, Per 18, Int 19, Res 4. (After bonuses. I don't have any Blessings.)

Sword and Rapier for weapon proficiency.

Paladin ability that I took was Flames of Devotion, Chanter I took Soft Winds of Death and If Their Bones.

That's all I have so far. Oh, and I'm on Story difficulty.

[dgray62]

If you're going the troubadour route you'd probably be better off with a weapon and shield to be sturdier. Probably the best weapon set up for a more caster oriented herald is Sasha's singing scimitar, for the 1/encounter empowered invocation and the action speed aura, and the Lethandria's Devotion shield, for the nice healing and defensive aura. This set up will buff you, your summons and companions. If you go the skald route you'd want to dual wield or wield sun & moon single handedly, to maximize crits.

However, anything is fine on story difficulty. You'd want the sword and board for the higher difficulty levels tho.