Keeping POTD challenging

[Seerdecker]

In my current game, I made a custom party of 1 paladin (tank) and 3 ciphers. I figured that the ciphers would synergize well together. My plan was to use them for crowd control and slowly kill off the enemy.

 

At level 5, I just got my hands on Ectopsychic Echo and I realize that my plan was very flawed. Not only do ciphers excel in crowd control, they also deal immense amounts of damage if played tactically. My conclusion is that one cipher alone is overpowered, much less three of them.

 

Looking at the skillset, I find that's it's difficult to play a cipher if I skip the OP skills (Mental Binding, both beam spells, all mind-control spells, all accuracy-boosting skills, Amplified Wave). I could play them as pure rangers, but that's pretty boring.

 

I decided to restart the game without using hirelings and without using retaliation items to keep things interesting. My main will be a rogue, which I feel is not overpowered if Shadowing Beyond is not used. I plan on recruiting Aloth, Eder, Durance, Kana and Pallegina. Those characters have a diverse skillet so I'm hoping it will lead to interesting and diverse tactics.

 

From what I've read, the game keeps getting easier as it progresses. My question is, will the late game still be challenging with this setup? Should I consider some additional restrictions? I'm not interested in the triple-crown challenges, it's too hard/frustrating for me.

 

Thanks for any tip!