Weapon suggestions for my 6x fighter party

[omgFIREBALLS]

never mind, forum ate my post...

Edited November 6, 2022 by omgFIREBALLS

[Boeroer]

Edit: For whatever brainrotting reason I posted the following lines under the impression I was giving advice for Deadfire, not PoE. But maybe it's still helpful for somebody. Some players do want to play Deadfire after PoE, so...  

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Anyway, I'm in the mood to share a combo of weapons that I like  and which would work with a party of Fighters/something.

• Morning Star - Saru Sichr if there's a Fighter/Monk with Swift Flurry (double chance to proc), else Willbreaker, esp. if it's a Fighter/Wizard (Phantom + char can stack twice the Will debuff on one enemy), Devoted is a good pick for Morning Star because it has good starting PEN and dual damage. Lowring Fortitude with the modal.
  • defenses debuffed: Fortitude -25, Will -3 on hit (up to -30 with a Phantom)
• Blade of the Endless Paths (esp. for a Fighter/Wizard). The Marking enchantment is great in general and you can stack it twice on an enemy with he help of a phantom, vaporizing the enemy's deflection.
  • defenses debuffed: Deflection -4 on crit (up to -40 with a Phantom)
  • alternatively WotEP if you want to use it with Clear Out a lot
• Sun & Moon - good for Fighter/Soulblade, Fighter/Skald, Fighter/Monk, Fighter/Priest, Fighter/Paladin... lowering Reflex with the modal (-25).
• Kapana Taga - great for getting engagement without using Defender Stance and lowering Will with the modal (-25). A Fighter/Wizard can summon Draining Touch and a Phantom and then use the club and Miasma to lower the Will of the enemy to basically nothing and then let the phantom crit all the time (because Draining Touch targets Will instead of Deflection). Has dual damage, so backup weapon not desperately needed.
• Ngati's Tush - works best (in this case where you want a Fighter) with Berath's Blessing for the skill points and either Fighter/Druid or a Fighter/Ranger - because they get the highest Survival bonus - but also very good on a Fighter/Troubadour in combination with Spirit Frenzy and The Long Night's Drink. You want to enchant it with Hunter of Hunters and max out Survival (so best to make this you main char). The aura is auto-lowering enemies' non-deflection defenses by 10 (at 20 Survival), the modal lowers deflecion by 10 on hit, Spirit Frenzy lowers Fortitude by 10 on any hit (including chants), The Long Night's Drink lowers Fortitude by another 10. Use Ben Fidel's Neck as main invocation, then follow up with stuff like Killers Froze stiff or so. This Howler alone can lower enemies' defenses by DEF:-20, REF:-20+, FOR:-40+, WIL:-20+ without using an active ability (besides chant + frenzy). 

With this weapon combo in the party you can lower almost any enemies' defenses into the ground since the debuffs stack with each other and most stuff you can add via spells and other abilities. Add some ACC buffs and usually tough nuts become very easy. Only thing you need is some survivability - because grinding down the enemies defenses of a boss with multiple hits/crits (Willbreaker, Blade otP) will take some time. 

Except Ngati's Tusk those weapons can be aquired fairly easy/early. I just use another pike before that. The all can use the modal for -10 deflection.

Sometimes I add the Cap of the Laughingstock to the wearer of Ngati's Tusk so that he also has an -10-Deflection aura. But it prevents frighten/terrify to work so don't use it all the time.  

Edited November 6, 2022 by Boeroer

[omgFIREBALLS]

Mods weren't fast enough to delete my post as per my request, so you spent all that time suggesting weapons for the wrong game but thank you! I'd revive the topic and elaborate on my dilemma (for Pillars ONE), but I don't want to fight the forum.

[Boeroer]

Haha, I also only now noticed that I was posting in the PoE subforum, not the Deadfire one. A well - maybe somebody else reads this and finds it helpful or inspiring.

I could write about PoE weapons for a 6-Fighter party for PoE as well though...

Btw.: 6 Fighters, all with Charge, make the first few seconds of the encounter really entertaining.  

 

 

Edited November 6, 2022 by Boeroer

[omgFIREBALLS]

Then you need to know that the Watcher has conversationalist stats (so terrible mig/dex) and the whole party likes to just pop Vigorous Defense, Disciplined Strikes and then Charge. PotD, ToI. No durgan steel, sky dragon eyes or helwax mold committed yet.

[Boeroer]

If the Watcher has good PER and takes stuff like Weapon Focus then I think I would use one of the prone-/stun-on-crit weapons so he adds some CC to his weapon attacks. The following two-handed variants can be aquired fairly early:

• The Temperacl (Great Sword, prone on crit)
• The Hours of St. Rumbalt (Great Sword, prone on crit)
• Tall Grass (Pike, prone on crit)

The one-handed ones all come later. I think overall I would prefer the Hours oSR because it has dual damage and does +50% dmg on crit which is cool with a char who has high PER but low MIG. The Temperacl could be a substitute until you get to the Hours oSR. Tall Grass is also nice bc. of the higher crit chance and the reach (which might be important if one goes for lots of melee fighters for sure) - the only thing which might be annoying is the pierce-only damage. But you could use a backup weapon of course. Like the aforementioned Temperacl (Great Sword nd Pike share the same weapon focus).

I think I would give one Fighter a Firebrand setup (Belt of the Royal Deadfire Cannoneer, Forgemaster Gloves) because it rules until you get Durgan Steel - and it stays great as backup weapon throughout the whole game. 

I also like Tidefall a lot. High MIG kind of mandatory though. But it's potentially the best melee dps option.

Generally Charge is better with a dual wielding setup (Full Attack at the target destination). So I would also look into that. Dual war hammers are a good pick imo.  

A really good auto-attacks dps setup is Sword of Daenysis + March Steel Dagger (maybe later Drawn in Spring if you like) because those come early and the double speed enchantment makes it quite easy to reach 0 recovery early in the game - which rocks. Somewhat calls for a vaillian character though imo with that "duelist" setup.  

I reckon you might want at least one guy with a shield to take the main tank position?    

[omgFIREBALLS]

Forgive ugly reply, but forum eats all lines beyond the first. Shields (and ranged weapons) are banned. If I don't want to charge in right away, I use figurines to tank. All fighters have Knock Down and Clear Out, so prone-on-crit isn't very exciting. I see no full attack on Charge. As my chargers (except Watcher) have high might (because bigger Charge), I fancy using two-handers as much as possible. I have Tidefall and BotEP, intending to dupe the latter. Summoning a Firebrand doesn't let me do the instant charge. Watcher has dual war hammers (or will have - Godansthunyr and Strike Hard). I also realized since my initial post got eaten, you're not aware but my party is level 13-14 now, so I'm hoping to keep the weapons rather superb at this point. After upgrading the stunhammer there are 2 more eyes, which I thought to use on the attack speed staff from EP. Even if I do that, I'd need another, and the good options are too close to the endgame (WM2). So I thought of some DW solution for the last, maybe with TUB (I know WM2, but at least early WM2). Anyway, like I said, high might because big Charges (also taking every +25% damage to creature type talent because of this), so I'm thinking I should try to stick to twohanders? Do like the Daenysis/Dagger combo idea though, as that sounds disruptive if nothing else. Could do that with extra interrupt talent.

[Fionavar]

9 hours ago, omgFIREBALLS said:

never mind, forum ate my post...

Hi there, as you have time can you pls PM what has happened so we can explore this further.

[Boeroer]

1 hour ago, omgFIREBALLS said:

I see no full attack on Charge.

It's a "hidden" Full Attack at the target enemy on top(!) of the crush damage Charge does in the first place. That makes it extremely effective against that one target enemy - and nice against the ones in the line of fire, too. The Full Attack is not mentioned in the description but it should be there. And of course a Full Attack is better with a dual weapon setup - and the crush damage doesn't rely on any weapon stats (it's works more like spell damage). Imo that's not a reason to abandon two handers - you can't use Charge too often anyways - but it might be a reason to contemplate about one or two dual wielders. 

1 hour ago, omgFIREBALLS said:

All fighters have Knock Down and Clear Out, so prone-on-crit isn't very exciting.

I think with BotEP (which means a source of Marking/+10 ACC on another teammate) an auto-prone weapon is quite exciting. There's no immunity to prone and with high INT and decent recovery you can perma-prone enemies if you team up with the bearer of the BotEP. And you can spare the Knockdowns for the times when the auto-prone doesn't occur.

 

 

[omgFIREBALLS]

Does a full attack like this trigger weapon effects too?

BTW, that prone tactic seems to require a bit more structure than my kill-or-be-killed fights can end up as being, if they are going to last long enough that I actually need to think of what and when I knock down. Especially as overwriting Prone seems to have weird results, with a double-Prone mob getting to take action. Also, oozes and blights are immune to it, for the record

Edited November 6, 2022 by omgFIREBALLS

[Boeroer]

8 hours ago, omgFIREBALLS said:

Does a full attack like this trigger weapon effects too? 

It should. I didn't test Charge too much back in the day (used it mostly on a dual sabre Eder and tried some things out before committing) and it was some years ago - but Riposte, Carnage etc. are similar "no animation" attacks and they do trigger weapon effects.

8 hours ago, omgFIREBALLS said:

Also, oozes and blights are immune to it, for the record 

Afaik they just don't have an obvious animation (oozes just going a bit flat like they do before they attack) but still suffer from the short-term cc effect? But maybe I'm misremembering. I also don't recall if some tough nuts of the expansions are maybe immune to prone (eyeing at the Eyeless mostly, höhö) but atm nothing sprung to mind.

I had the most success against bosses with a combination of charm (Munacra Arret, Spirit Spiral) and Prone. Only one dragon of the bog variant is immune to charm iirc. Often enough both effects were on a fighter since fighters come with a great universal accuracy. So maybe that's an option, too? I can imagine a character with Munacra Arret and Rapier + Dagger gives very strong and fitting vaillian and aristocratic vibes.

Edited November 7, 2022 by Boeroer

[Chaospread]

Quote

Also, oozes and blights are immune to it, for the record

Yes, but not to Stunned
 

Quote

Only one dragon of the bog variant is immune to charm iirc

Yes, but not to Dominated

[Boeroer]

On 11/15/2022 at 4:15 PM, Chaospread said:

Yes, but not to Dominated

Right, but the Domination from the Ring of Changing Heart has no ACC bonus like the charm of Spirit Spiral/Munacra Arret has.  

Edited November 20, 2022 by Boeroer

[Chaospread]

On 11/20/2022 at 11:55 AM, Boeroer said:

Right, but the Domination from the Ring of Changing Heart has no ACC bonus like the charm of Spirit Spiral/Munacra Arret has.  

Indeed, but in lack of charme and confusion, we have this, and for ALL classes

Edited November 24, 2022 by Chaospread

[Chaospread]

I don't know why my post are often cut and I can't Quote in a proper way... sorry.

Edited November 24, 2022 by Chaospread

[Chaospread]

Another thing to consider: dominate can be cast outside combat, at the opposite of Charme (castable only in combat).