combat is kicking my butt

[bigfatdan]

I really love this game but I just can't wrap my head around the combat.  Pause, unpause, autopause, ai attack.  I'm going to keep working at it and I hope I can get the hang of things.  Any suggestions to make things a bit clearer?  Thanks.

[DragonKingReborn]

Had the same experience as I was starting out, and I'm still wiping every now and then.

 

My only advice - as a total NON-expert - is smash enemy casters as fast as possible with 5 of the team, allowing Eder (if you're using him) to occupy the biggest melee hitter.

 

It's working for me.

 

Other than that - spend a bit of time reading the ability descriptions.  It made a big difference to me when I realised that just because it looks (or sounds) impressive, doesn't mean it is doing a hell of a lot.  Finding what spells/abilities work well for you will take a bit of time and experimentation.  All part of the fun, though!

[Mechalibur]

Here are a few pieces of advice that helped me roll through most encounters fairly easily.

 

You'll want at least 1 or 2 high deflection characters holding the line so that your backline characters are safe. Talents like hold the line, and the fighter ability Defender Stance help keep more enemies occupied. Once most of the enemies are occupied, you can have the melee heavy hitters move in (barbarians and rogues, for example) and go for enemy spellcasters, or flank the main mob. When flanking, enemies get -10 defense

 

Crowd control effects are amazing, especially the following: prone, stun, paralyze, petrify. Before casting these, you can use accuracy boosting abilities like bless or eldritch aim to increase your chance to hit. The reason these are so good are because not only does it leave the enemy unable to attack, but it lowers their defenses so that you can do more damage, or stack further crowd control on top of them. If you see an enemy with low will defense, confuse, charm, and dominate are all extremely powerful.

 

Go ahead and turn AI on. I'd recommend setting everyone's attack behavior to "Defensive." This will make them attack nearby enemies (so you don't have to keep ordering them to do it), but not seek out far away enemies. If you don't want to control them as much, go ahead and set class behavior as well, and they'll use their per encounter abilities too.

 

Make sure to take advantage of food buffs, which last for a while. Ale is a great choice early on, as damage reduction does wonders for early enemies. Also rent out the nicer rooms at inns to give yourself a nice bonus before starting combat.

 

What class is your main character? I could probably give some class specific advice if you'd like.

Edited September 1, 2015 by Mechalibur

[bigfatdan]

Thanks for the advice!  I think the main problem is I've gotten used to mmos so I keep expecting my team to go to work without me.  I did a little better last night.  It looks like it's just going to take some more practice.  Appreciate the help!

[abaris]

Thanks for the advice!  I think the main problem is I've gotten used to mmos so I keep expecting my team to go to work without me.  I did a little better last night.  It looks like it's just going to take some more practice.  Appreciate the help!

 

Since you can't help being on 2.0, you can make your team help you - within reason. The new AI system is pretty good, provided you read carefully what every character is doing when certain options are checked.

 

I'm still experimenting with that, but to test it out, I even let the AI fight the easier battles. Just to see what happens and if the chosen parameters are actually doing their job.

[macadam]

The update made everything a little harder because the enemy AI now throws all their best spells at you first thing, I've played for months and I'm readjusting still. As others have mentioned, positioning should be done manually, and to add to the tip regarding foods, do make use of scrolls, too (after boosting accuracy), esp. the scroll of paralysation. Also play with the auto-pause options a bit, as that will automatically pace the fight and will keep you from getting overwhelmed. Good luck!

Edited September 1, 2015 by macadam

[Failion]

From my experience mid late game fights are difficult because your lower con guys have not reached that hp sweet spot yet. Dragon fights you need a specific strategy or that dragon will make your heroes look like beat up cheap whores no matter what. The worst boss fights in the game because you either murder them real fast or they instant gib you. I wonder if they decided to go turn based route if the combat system would be better or not.

[Tennisgolfboll]

Here are a few pieces of advice that helped me roll through most encounters fairly easily.

 

You'll want at least 1 or 2 high deflection characters holding the line so that your backline characters are safe. Talents like hold the line, and the fighter ability Defender Stance help keep more enemies occupied. Once most of the enemies are occupied, you can have the melee heavy hitters move in (barbarians and rogues, for example) and go for enemy spellcasters, or flank the main mob. When flanking, enemies get -10 defense

 

Crowd control effects are amazing, especially the following: prone, stun, paralyze, petrify. Before casting these, you can use accuracy boosting abilities like bless or eldritch aim to increase your chance to hit. The reason these are so good are because not only does it leave the enemy unable to attack, but it lowers their defenses so that you can do more damage, or stack further crowd control on top of them. If you see an enemy with low will defense, confuse, charm, and dominate are all extremely powerful.

 

Go ahead and turn AI on. I'd recommend setting everyone's attack behavior to "Defensive." This will make them attack nearby enemies (so you don't have to keep ordering them to do it), but not seek out far away enemies. If you don't want to control them as much, go ahead and set class behavior as well, and they'll use their per encounter abilities too.

 

Make sure to take advantage of food buffs, which last for a while. Ale is a great choice early on, as damage reduction does wonders for early enemies. Also rent out the nicer rooms at inns to give yourself a nice bonus before starting combat.

 

What class is your main character? I could probably give some class specific advice if you'd like.

Your dragon strategy was nice in the other thread but the advice put people on ai for their classes i cant just be silent about.

 

Eder will knock down the wrong enemy etc.

 

 

Dont use those scripts if you wanna be effective

[Mechalibur]

Yeah, he often will. If you're going to be micromanaging all of your party members, you should definitely have all class behaviors on off. If you mostly want to control a single character, though, the AI should be decent enough to get by on normal.

[abaris]

Yeah, he often will. If you're going to be micromanaging all of your party members, you should definitely have all class behaviors on off. If you mostly want to control a single character, though, the AI should be decent enough to get by on normal.

 

The spellcasters are the problem if it comes to AI. If you set their behavior to use per rest abilities, it is as I suspected several months ago. They empty their arsenals on every trash mob. So you have to micromanage them, if you don't want to rest after every fight.

[daver]

When I find myself getting my butt kicked frequently, I try to explore new areas by keeping to one edge of the map. It's a tactic I used in the Baulders Gate & Icewind Dale games, also Infinity engine games. It eliminates the number of directions enemies can attack from, giving you a slight edge if you're low level. It's not always possible, more useful in unexplored outdoor areas. Also having your highest stealth character scout ahead. Positioning is critical, you can't just charge through a map. I love it.