Why people say constitution is useless ?

[Zwiebelchen]

Con would be more useful if:

 

-- it helped reduce recovery penalty on armor.  It'd be worth taking some on heavy armor wearers to help recover some of their lowered DPS, and having moderate CON and light to medium armor could become a good option for second-line DPS, instead of dumping CON and wearing no armor.

 

-- it was used, either alone or in combination with Might, for dialog options that involve physical intimidation.

 

This. Idea has been floating around since late backer beta and I still think it's the best solution:

 

On top of the endurance/health bonus, simply reduce the recovery penalty of armors by 4% each point (over 10). Obviously, this can not reduce the recovery penalty below zero, so it isn't redundant with dexterity, which increases speed regardless of armor (at a lower rate).

 

So, a character with 14 CON would have a reduced recovery penalty of 16%, allowing them to wear 3 DR robes without a penalty (-15%).

A character with 17 CON would have a reduced recovery penalty of 28%, allowing them to wear medium armor without a noticable penalty (-30%).

In order to wear the heaviest armor in the game without penalty (-50%), people would require 22-23 CON.

 

 

So what are the benefits of this?

- it makes medium armor more interesting, especially for DPSers

- dexterity is still superior when it comes to raw damage output as dexterity boosts all the times, not just recovery and works regardless of armor choice

- buff food and resting bonuses with +CON would be way more interesting

- still allows people to dump CON if they feel like it (no added recovery below 10 ... only endurance and health loss).

 

 

I really like that idea: the tankier you want to be, the more you naturally want CON.

 

The only problem is that it still gives you no reason to use it if you don't want to wear heavy armor. What if it simply reduced recovery time? I guess that kind of steps on Dexterity's feet a bit, but it's a logical thing to do with an endurance-based attribute.

 

 

Imho, that isn't a real problem. CON should never feel mandatory to your build. Yes, for people who wear no armor, CON is still as useless as ever... but isn't that kind of the desired behaviour? The "classic" glass cannon builds are meant to be fragile, aka low CON. And if you happen to get some; be happy: you can now get some free DR by equipping robes instead of running naked! 

Edited April 9, 2015 by Zwiebelchen

[Mungri]

Well I recently dropped my Arbalest paladins to 10 con, and they still don't need that much.

 

If you use a class with high base health / endurance in the backline then you can drop con, though I'm not sure of going down to 3.

 

I used 18 might / 10 con / 12 dex / 10 per / 18 int / 10 res currently on ranged paladins (using two for their buffs), it seems now that 18 / 8 / 18 / 8 / 18 / 8 would be more ideal for them.

[Daemonjax]

 

Min/Maxing in this game is overrated. Due to the reverse difficulty curve of the game (game starts out incredibly hard, then gets progressively easier as you reach higher levels), you can do just fine in PotD with non-min/maxed chars. I tried it.

 

While difficulty makes min/max more or less important, I agree that it isn't a necessity. Though this game probably have 2 extreme types of gamers with the majority somewhere in between: those who care mostly about the story and not so much about combat, and those who care far more about the challenge of combat. So for those who combat is a significantly higher focus  than the RP experience, it makes sense to min/max stats and chars.

 

While I prefer to have characters with slightly flawed stats (don't mind the companion stats whatsoever) since they make them more interesting and realistic in my mind. I'm still on my first playthrough with an orlan melee rogue whose stats I assigned before I had a proper grasp on how the system worked, she's kinda flawed but still fun to play since it's a challenge sometimes to make things work around those flaws. 

 

 

Eh, then there's people like me who care about both.  I don't think I'm all that rare... In the original Fallout games, it was pretty popular to build a smooth talking gunslinger that was both effective in combat and had access to most dialogue options -- including being able to talk the big bad at the end to kill itself.

 

So, for me anyways, I like to try and optimize for a particular playthrough experience... sometimes that means building the most effective death machine possible, but not always.  Still requires optimization.  

 

The fact that this game allows such extreme min-maxing is a (albeit small) mistake in my book.  Lowest possible stat should be either 7 or 8 before racial modifiers not 3, but whatever.

[DrBrian]

You want your incoming damage reduction to be as high as possible on a tank, so maxing any stat that increases Deflection and Reflex is great, will is ok, and fortitude is not required. So Constitution loses out as being only able to increase your max hp and the most useless defense, compared to other defensive stats. Though naturally might is completely unnecessary on a tank. (Funny how that works from a roleplaying perspective eh? Tanks who can barely lift a pencil)

Might is not strenght though here. It is the ability of your character to make the best use of the tools at his disposal to inflict damages, was it a weapon or a spell. So technically might is more representating of skill than strenght.

I'll add dexterity would have been better named as nimbleness, considering it is how fast your character act rather than how precise he is.

Edited April 9, 2015 by DrBrian

[SlackerBacker]

I have my human Wizard with 21 CON at lvl 7, gave him a dope shield, a dope weapon, a dope robe and not only can he hold the line on his own with 130 endurance and 70 deflection... he can also cast on himself that lvl 3 spell Llengrath's Displaced Image that makes him EXTREMELY hard to be hit by the enemy. Is like those buffs from BG mirror image and what not, all combined in 1 spell.

 

My best tank? Wizard. hands down, up and around. Far better than standing on the back just doing auto-attack.

 

My Wizard tank has so many defenses when buffed up that enemies outright ignore him allowing him to cast as many spells as he wants while on the front line or surrounded when there are not chokepoints to take advantage of. And if you feeling ****y, cast on yourself :

 

Concelhaut's Parasitic Staff – Creates a quarterstaff, with a bonus chance to hit and gives the wizard endurance with each successful strike

 

Deleterious Alacrity of Motion – The wizard will attack faster

 

Enjoy your tanking Wizard.

[SlackerBacker]

Can't say co-cky in these forums? (????)

 

Censorship is out of hand and far deep into the realm of stupidity when you enforced this kind of silliness.

[Zwiebelchen]

I have my human Wizard with 21 CON at lvl 7, gave him a dope shield, a dope weapon, a dope robe and not only can he hold the line on his own with 130 endurance and 70 deflection... he can also cast on himself that lvl 3 spell Llengrath's Displaced Image that makes him EXTREMELY hard to be hit by the enemy. Is like those buffs from BG mirror image and what not, all combined in 1 spell.

 

My best tank? Wizard. hands down, up and around. Far better than standing on the back just doing auto-attack.

 

My Wizard tank has so many defenses when buffed up that enemies outright ignore him allowing him to cast as many spells as he wants while on the front line or surrounded when there are not chokepoints to take advantage of. And if you feeling ****y, cast on yourself :

 

Concelhaut's Parasitic Staff – Creates a quarterstaff, with a bonus chance to hit and gives the wizard endurance with each successful strike

 

Deleterious Alacrity of Motion – The wizard will attack faster

 

Enjoy your tanking Wizard.

 

You sacrifice lots offensive potential for this, though. Getting to 21 CON is not trivial and comes at a huge cost.

[SlackerBacker]

 

I have my human Wizard with 21 CON at lvl 7, gave him a dope shield, a dope weapon, a dope robe and not only can he hold the line on his own with 130 endurance and 70 deflection... he can also cast on himself that lvl 3 spell Llengrath's Displaced Image that makes him EXTREMELY hard to be hit by the enemy. Is like those buffs from BG mirror image and what not, all combined in 1 spell.

 

My best tank? Wizard. hands down, up and around. Far better than standing on the back just doing auto-attack.

 

My Wizard tank has so many defenses when buffed up that enemies outright ignore him allowing him to cast as many spells as he wants while on the front line or surrounded when there are not chokepoints to take advantage of. And if you feeling ****y, cast on yourself :

 

Concelhaut's Parasitic Staff – Creates a quarterstaff, with a bonus chance to hit and gives the wizard endurance with each successful strike

 

Deleterious Alacrity of Motion – The wizard will attack faster

 

Enjoy your tanking Wizard.

 

You sacrifice lots offensive potential for this, though. Getting to 21 CON is not trivial and comes at a huge cost.

 

 

What do you mean? http://i.imgur.com/erC68ol.jpg 

[Zwiebelchen]

 

 

I have my human Wizard with 21 CON at lvl 7, gave him a dope shield, a dope weapon, a dope robe and not only can he hold the line on his own with 130 endurance and 70 deflection... he can also cast on himself that lvl 3 spell Llengrath's Displaced Image that makes him EXTREMELY hard to be hit by the enemy. Is like those buffs from BG mirror image and what not, all combined in 1 spell.

 

My best tank? Wizard. hands down, up and around. Far better than standing on the back just doing auto-attack.

 

My Wizard tank has so many defenses when buffed up that enemies outright ignore him allowing him to cast as many spells as he wants while on the front line or surrounded when there are not chokepoints to take advantage of. And if you feeling ****y, cast on yourself :

 

Concelhaut's Parasitic Staff – Creates a quarterstaff, with a bonus chance to hit and gives the wizard endurance with each successful strike

 

Deleterious Alacrity of Motion – The wizard will attack faster

 

Enjoy your tanking Wizard.

 

You sacrifice lots offensive potential for this, though. Getting to 21 CON is not trivial and comes at a huge cost.

 

 

What do you mean? http://i.imgur.com/erC68ol.jpg 

 

 

+24% action speed from dex?

Edited April 9, 2015 by Zwiebelchen

[SlackerBacker]

 

 

 

I have my human Wizard with 21 CON at lvl 7, gave him a dope shield, a dope weapon, a dope robe and not only can he hold the line on his own with 130 endurance and 70 deflection... he can also cast on himself that lvl 3 spell Llengrath's Displaced Image that makes him EXTREMELY hard to be hit by the enemy. Is like those buffs from BG mirror image and what not, all combined in 1 spell.

 

My best tank? Wizard. hands down, up and around. Far better than standing on the back just doing auto-attack.

 

My Wizard tank has so many defenses when buffed up that enemies outright ignore him allowing him to cast as many spells as he wants while on the front line or surrounded when there are not chokepoints to take advantage of. And if you feeling ****y, cast on yourself :

 

Concelhaut's Parasitic Staff – Creates a quarterstaff, with a bonus chance to hit and gives the wizard endurance with each successful strike

 

Deleterious Alacrity of Motion – The wizard will attack faster

 

Enjoy your tanking Wizard.

 

You sacrifice lots offensive potential for this, though. Getting to 21 CON is not trivial and comes at a huge cost.

 

 

What do you mean? http://i.imgur.com/erC68ol.jpg 

 

 

+24% action speed from dex?

 

 

Can't say my wizard misses that 24%, barely uses couple spells at hardest encounters. Tanky wizard with a robe is quite fast for any encounter and extremely, extremely durable.

[Zwiebelchen]

The problem is mostly that all your defenses are temporary. Rest spamming is not an option for some.

[SlackerBacker]

The problem is mostly that all your defenses are temporary. Rest spamming is not an option for some.

 

Oh no, they are static. The only spell you need to boost your deflection is Llengrath's Displaced Image and you only use it on hardest encounters, by level 7 a Wizard can cast it 6 times and each time lasts 63 seconds with 18 int.

 

I think resting once every 6 hard encounters is quite reasonable, I wouldn't consider it spamming. I'm loving playing on Hard difficulty with just 2 resting supplies.

[Isi1dur]

Generally speaking the attribute system in this game needs a complete overhaul, Sawyer went out of his way trying to reinvent the wheel and came up short.

[Zwiebelchen]

 

The problem is mostly that all your defenses are temporary. Rest spamming is not an option for some.

 

Oh no, they are static. The only spell you need to boost your deflection is Llengrath's Displaced Image and you only use it on hardest encounters, by level 7 a Wizard can cast it 6 times and each time lasts 63 seconds with 18 int.

 

I think resting once every 6 hard encounters is quite reasonable, I wouldn't consider it spamming. I'm loving playing on Hard difficulty with just 2 resting supplies.

 

 

Yeah, this works on hard, but on PotD (if it weren't for the ****ed up lategame balancing), you are pretty much screwed with that 73 deflection.

Plus, I am almost perfectly sure that stacking RES and PER would give you a much better tank wizard build than that weird CON build you have. Considering all that CON only adds 36% extra endurance and that the same amount of RES would net you not only +11 deflection, but also extra will saves you lack (fortitude sucks) and concentration.

 

 

But ... yeah; I'm definitely gonna try a tank wizard build in my next playthrough, using the spells you mentioned. But I'll probably rather stack PER and RES instead of CON.

Edited April 9, 2015 by Zwiebelchen

[Mungri]

People trying to buff deflection / tank on a wizard are doing it wrong.

 

Max might, dex, int on those, put the rest wherever.

[Zwiebelchen]

People trying to buff deflection / tank on a wizard are doing it wrong.

 

Max might, dex, int on those, put the rest wherever.

 

"People doing stuff for fun are doing it wrong."

[johnmr531]

 

Here is a thought. A lot of you are saying constitution is worthless mainly because classes that need it already have an endurance bonus which helps them vs. the squishier classes.

 

So a way to make constitution more useful would be to not give other classes differing amounts of endurance.

Lets say all classes start with a flat amount of endurance it could be 0 it could be 10 it could be 100 it doesn't really matter as long as its NOT ENOUGH for melee in particular.

 

The endurance you get is then fully based off your constitution so something like

endurance = level * constitution points. 

or maybe even

endurance = level * constitution points * someSmallMultiplier. 

 

This would force melee classes like fighters, paladins, monks to spend more because having  3 points of constitution would suck and they wouldn't be able to perform their task.

 

Where as having very little constitution for wizards wouldn't matter as much.

 

That would be terrible and would really hamper any sort of fighter who wanted to do any damage.

 

Currently a fighter needs high resolve and perception in order to get a good deflection, cause interruptions and defend against interruptions via concentration. To do decent damage you need a high dexterity and might. This leaves intelligence  and/or constitution as dump stats to fund the stats that you think are more worthy. Dropping intelligence drastically reduces your durations but is a fair trade off. Dropping constitution to high single digits, 7-9, is a calculated risk, you'll have less endurance but you can survive by being either having more  deflection or doing more damage faster.

 

Your proposal would force fighters to pump up constitution or else be dropped as fast as a wizard without the benefit of staying safely in the rear. The only place to get the points would be from dex and might, the two stats that increase your damage. This would force fighters into being only damage sponges. The effect on glass cannon casters would be negligible or even give them a boost depending on the default starting endurance level.

 

The ranged classes already have a big advantage in the game, no reason to nerf fighters who try to do decent damage while still being able to survive in melee.

 

The proposal of having constitution reduce armor penalties would be interesting if it was comparable to the speed increase from dexterity. A fighter could then drop dexterity in favor of constitution to maintain a balanced tanking/dps or drop the tanky stats in order to go as fast as possible. This would open up many options for builds.

 

 

But Isn't that the point? If you want a heavy hitting fighter get an avg constitution of 10 or so, if you want a tank that soaks damage like a sponge pump it up to 20 and risk not being able to spread your points into other stats to do stats.... seems balanced

You could always play with the numbers to bump up the base constitution so its not so unforgiving, but I Believe something along these lines would be useful. Plus it kinda makes since a high constitution character will have lots of health vs one that has little.

 

 

endurance = level * constitution points * someSmallMultiplier. 

 

Maybe wizard someSmallMultiplier = 1.0

A rogue  someSmallMultiplier =1.5

Fighter  someSmallMultiplier = 2.0

 

This way the more hardy classes will be more hardy because they will get more endurance/health per point of constitution.

Edited April 10, 2015 by johnmr531

[Parsong]

 

Can't say my wizard misses that 24%, barely uses couple spells at hardest encounters. Tanky wizard with a robe is quite fast for any encounter and extremely, extremely durable.

 

 

 

Man, wizard tank must be a chore with per rest spells and low hp/end for the class.  

 

A barb,rogue,fighter,chanter,paladin make better tanks.

Edited April 10, 2015 by Parsong

[Mungri]

And they dont regenerate. 

[Zwiebelchen]

And they dont regenerate. 

 

Monks and paladins don't regerate either.

[aimlessgun]

Well you certainly don't want to dump CON on your tank considering at theres at least one fight which may one shot a low CON fighter even at lvl 12 in nice gear. And before lategame there are a few enemies where you can take a huge amount of burst damage that can kill a tank out of nowhere, such as ogres. 

 

Also if you care about not resting as much, it helps with HP attrition, useful for say a monk. 

[Molcho]

I love how people keep talking down wizard tanks when they obviously haven't tried them out themselves. 

 

They work even on PotD after you've bridged the hard early game part. There are people who have actually made it work and some people still insist that it doesn't.

 

It's quite hilarious, really. 

[Sleazebag]

Wizard tanks work pretty well, do try one before smack talking them. 

 

As for constitution, it needs an increase to the percentage and probably something else that it modifies. Right now the effect is too minimal. 

[MaxDamage]

Deflection wizard is just sitting there under alacrity spilling magic everywhere godmode on. No idea what you are talking about. 170 deflection anyone? lolz every serious fight becomes a cakewalk 210 deflection disengagement. That Adra dragon and the final boss cant hit it?

Edited April 11, 2015 by MaxDamage

[smurph]

At Might 4 you shouldn't be able to wear heavy armour or lift a decent weapon. Tsk. I hope they add that sort of mechanism.

 

This whole Might being both physical and mental strength and Intel being AoE on everything is also pretty horrible imo. How do you play a dumb Barbarian who cleaves everything in sight?

They went to the trouble of renaming strength to might.  I was surprised it never dawned on them to rename intelligence to intuition (for example)

It would help considerably with people who are a little peeved (myself included) with genius barbarians.