Custom party perception on potd.

[Absolum]

Hi all,

I'm building a full custom party and trying to figure out the base perception i should aim for a confortable playthrough, i was about to go 12 base perception for everyone and get the +3 perception from Caed Nua bonus rest, my team will be heavy CC oriented and damage output.

Will 15 perception enough along with buffs/CC or should i need higher perception ?

In case you're wondering my team will be : 1 fighter tank/dps, 1 barbarian dw aoe cc, 1 shapeshifting druid, 1 priest (usual buffer/healer build), 1 cipher (ranged blunderbuss CC) and 1 wizard (CC/dps).

[Boeroer]

Hello, it depends on your difficulty setting. On PotD I would go for higher PER - or put more focus on accuracy. On lower difficulties lowish PER is not a problem. For my answer I assume it's PotD:

Barbs have rel. bad base accuracy, especially early on with Carnage. Since Carnage has so much potential with "special sauce on hit/crit- weapons I would give Barbs higher PER in general. Carnage's accuracy will scale with char level - and at some points its ACC will outmatch your accuracy of the normal auto-attack, but until then it's nice to not miss all the time which is frustrating. 

Fighters are fine with a bit lower PER imo because they get sufficient boosts out of their class and abilities.

A spiritshifting Druid usually needs several high attributes - so while I would say Spiritshift benefits from high PER (because Druids don't have good accuracy by themselves) maybe 12 base is sufficient if buffed by the Priest properly (Blessing + Devotions). 

Ciphers have access to Borrowed Instincts which is a great ACC boost. Takes some time though. But I think with support from Priest it's okay until yaou get there.

Same with the Wizard.

Instead of Fighter tank/dps I would use a Monk. It already is tank/dps/cc all in one class. Fighters are good in the early game but fall off at some point imo. I firmly believe Monks are the best martial class in PoE. But of course that's also a matter of taste.
An good alternative tank for CC/dps can be a Darcozzi Paladin who uses Inspiring Liberation, a marking weapon and Coordinated Attacks. Such a Paladin is very sturdy and doesn't do a lot of dmg himself, but he can buff a party member's accuracy by a stackable +30ACC which leads to an easy time against boss enemies and other tough nuts. At the same time a Paladin can provide additional healing with Lay on Hands and can substitute Priest's Blessing with Zealous Focus which spares a Priest cast. 

Both Monk and Darcozzi Paladin lack multiple engagement slots though. So if your tanking idea is developed on engagement in order to stop and bind enemies then the fighter is best.  

Priests are excellent buffers and later good damage dealers via spells, but they are not the best healers - Druids are imo. So I wouldn't use my Druid for shapeshifting alone but also provide healing to the party to give the Priest more action time for buffing. Spiritshift is pretty short anyway, so there's time for alternative actions like casting a healing-over-time spell like Moonwell before rushing into melee combat for example.  

 

When looking at "heavy CC oriented and damage output" my first instinct would be to dump RES (except on tank) and CON (except on Barb and maybe Druid a lot melee) max DEX, PER, INT and put the rest into MIG. 

 

[limaxophobiacq]

For perception I think the only class of those that really demands more than 12 (as long as you have the Priest accuracy buffing) is the barbarian, who is also able to make better use of the interrupt bonus than anyone else.

I will respectfully disagree with Boeroer a bit here on Fighter vs Monk. Fights in late game PoE are very explosive and the comparative speed of a fighter with instant activation accuracy and defence buffs (and Charge for mobility) vs having to take wounds as a monk is a big plus for the fighter, my experience with monks in a full party is a lot of the time they don't get to do much because your party has CCd all the enemies. I would suggest a high-dex/high int dual-wielding fighter with light armor after the very early game (plate is great at low levels but by 7 it falls of a lot, padded then upgrade to scale when you get durgan enhancement since fighters can get durgan scale down to 0 recovery penalty with Armored Grace). The fighter class is tanky enough in itself thanks to high base defence + Vigorous Defence  to make up for the lighter armor and no shield. 

Due to their accuracy high-int fighters are also amazing when it comes to using offensive item abilities and scrolls (with a bit of lore).

If there's one thing I'd question it's the druid shapeshifting focus, the level 4 & 5 druid spells are so good that by level 9 the spiritshift just doesn't look that great compared to casting with a hatchet + small shield doing both more damage and being more survivable in harder fights.

[Absolum]

Thanks both of you, well, i tweaked a bit my team, and planning now to go with 1 paladin tank and 1 chanter tank as frontliners (sacred immolation + dragon trashed) and keep the same dps/cc backlane as mentionned.

I noticed that damages were required on tanks to keep aggro (fighters keep losing aggro despite having good damages but no AOE), so i though using 2 tanks that can deal decent AOE damage would be a good option (unfortunately those abilities come later).

I also went on 3 CON/RES on DPS/CC char', basically all my backlane has dumped CON/RES, it's perfectly managable on POTD just the early game which can be a bit tricky, sometimes my wizard get one shoted from a necrotic lance.

My tanks stats are the following : 18/10/3/14/18/14, having 10 con on paladin/chanter is a bit annoying early on regarding their health/rest.

[Chaospread]

Hello, for tank Paladin you can increase engagment with talent and/or weapons/items.

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A spiritshifting Druid usually needs several high attributes - so while I would say Spiritshift benefits from high PER (because Druids don't have good accuracy by themselves) maybe 12 base is sufficient if buffed by the Priest properly (Blessing + Devotions). 

Not totally agree with that. At medium high level a Spiritishift druid has good melee bonus with spiritshift weapons and very good bonus with spells, he doesn't need high PER in my opinion, but, at low levels, he is pretty a dead weight, but it can be used anyway for buff/debuff/healing.

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When looking at "heavy CC oriented and damage output" my first instinct would be to dump RES (except on tank) and CON (except on Barb and maybe Druid a lot melee) max DEX, PER, INT and put the rest into MIG. 

I'd max MIG and the rest on PER. For example, +3 on PER don't change so much in attack resolution, graze, hit and crit are the sames more or less, but +9% damage every attack is better, imho.

For Fighter I take sword and shiled, but you choosed Paladin and Chanter, good pick in my opinion.

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I also went on 3 CON/RES on DPS/CC char', basically all my backlane has dumped CON/RES, it's perfectly managable on POTD just the early game which can be a bit tricky, sometimes my wizard get one shoted from a necrotic lance.

I agree with these stats for backline

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My tanks stats are the following : 18/10/3/14/18/14, having 10 con on paladin/chanter is a bit annoying early on regarding their health/rest.

I'd swap RES or PER with CON indeed, better PER imho, tanks don't need more than 10 and 14 CON are better, else at high level (in a party).

Have fun!