Cipher ranged build

[Any_ILL]

Hello everyone,

 

I'm a "new" players of Pillars of Eternity (backers, I have started a game before for a few hours but never got time to finish it) that wants to seriously invest in the game now.

 

The character I want to build is a Death Godlike Cipher. She's a scientist from the Living Land with high intelligence and perception above everything. So I went for something like this:

 

Might:               14

Constitution:     6

Dexterity:          14

Perception:       18

Intellect:            18

Resolve:           8

 

I am still undecided about a few things: first the dump stats, is it better in 2.0 to dump in con or resolve? RP speaking low but not too low resolve and very low con seems more logical, but what about gameplay, is it better to be able to take more damage or to be able not to be interrupted while casting. Does 8 resolve make any difference from 6 in term of not being interrupted?

And perception. I want to use Gun (or Blunderbuss, since apparently it's not the same thing/edit: Oh there are arquebuses too? What about that) cause... Might as well use the latest tech, I find it cool. What's the best option of the two with high perception? Furthermore, does going up to 18 open me more options than lowering to 16 (dialogue speaking for example, that's probably the most important part for me) or should I lower to 16 to balance it with 16 might?

 

I'm also kind of confused by the ability numbers, I don't see how  they scale. Does they only scale with base stats? So the only way to ever increase your ability powers is to get items with bonus on these stats (which will barely increase the power by a dozen percent)? How does it all work, and without the scaling, how can I know which ability will dish the best damage long term? Do the ability always have the same relative damage to one another? I'm very tempted by the Eyestrike/Soul shock combination at level one (powerful debuff + easy damage), why did I read that it was a poor damage spell later on?

 

I've tried to read information on the net and some on the sticky but I'm still not entirely clear (especially since it's harder to find post patch infos). Oh and I intend to play on hard difficulty, not Path of the damn.

Edited September 2, 2015 by Any_ILL

[Blave]

Don't drop your Con to 6. You'll drop dead WAY more often than you want to.

 

You can find decent class-guides on youtube: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL4UqltmSKaEeCbgMY7nx2U0kngJ77wwhX

 

There's been about one new guide every day since 2.0/WM release and so far every one of them sounds reasonable (from what I can tell). Cipher was actually the first, but you can check out the others if you want, so you know how to build your companions effectively.

 

Personally, I'm playing a ranged Cipher right now. I went with 18 Int, 15 Might and Perception, rest all 10s. I chose Wood Elf for race because the +5 Accuracy against ranged enemies is awesome (and also applies to your powers). I'm using bows, which are faster, but even for guns, you probably don't need such a high Dex. The slow thing about guns is not the attack speed, but the reload speed, which is completely unaffected by dex. Dex 10 will be more than enough.

 

Guns are both better and worse than bows for a cipher. You get focus based on the amount of damage you inflict and guns deal LOTS of damage, resulting in high focus gain. However, you only get focus IF you hit. A few misses/grazes in succession will severely hamper your focus gain. Bows are faster and while a single hit won't give you quite as much focus, a single miss will also not prevent you from gaining focus for like 5 seconds. Also bows don't have the inherent Accuracy penalty of guns and.

 

Guns can work fine, mind you, and I'm not saying bows are better. Just givuing you my reasoning for going bows.

Edited September 2, 2015 by Blave

[Any_ILL]

Guns really seem to fit my character's personnality both statistically and psychologically, which means I probably shouldn't lower my perception if I want to avoid disastrous miss and stay consistent. Thanks for the information on gun reloading, that's exactly the kind of thing I needed to know. How does this new stat spread looks:

 

16
8
10
18
18
8

 

or should I go 10 con for 6 resolve? What's the reasoning behind taking a hit being more important than avoiding interruptions?

 

I'm going to look at the guide you linked me, in the meantime if anyone has any insight into the choice of the type of gun (normal gun? Blunderbuss? Arquebuse? I am partial to arquebuse myself...), what you think of this stat spread in hard difficutly or how ability damage scales, tell me!

Edited September 2, 2015 by Any_ILL

[Blave]

Stat spread looks fine and more balanced than the first attempt. Con 8 is ok, but you might need to keep a close eye on your endurance/health. Still, it should work fine for a ranged character. Same goes for resolve 8. Keep your distance and you're unlikely to be interupted often. I would avoid power with short-ish range, though, just to be save.

 

Can't really help with the gun choices. Never really compared them. I'd say just use the best one you can find. Avoid picking a weapon focus until you've decided. There's lots of other talents to take early (Biting Whip, Gunner, Draining Whip, Marksman, Gallant's Focus) that will take you to level 10 before you need to make a final decision. Worst case, you can still simply respec later.

 

Abilities scale only with your attributes. A damaging ability will deal the same damage at level 1 as it will at level 10, unless you boost your might with items in the meantime. There's also the +20% elemental damage talents, you could take, but personally I find the damaging powers of the cipher to be too spread out damage type-wise. Many also deal physical damage, which you can't boost at all.

 

Ciphers in general aren't that great at dealing damage with their powers. They are better at debuffing and crowd control. Pick up a few damage powers, but rely on your gun most of the time. It's pretty easy to hit (and crit) a foe that's blind and paralyzed for big damage. Soul whip with the biting whip upgrade grants a nice +40% bonus to your weapon attacks, so make use of that!

Edited September 2, 2015 by Blave

[Any_ILL]

Thanks a lot for the very useful post! You're right about guns, I can just pick them thematically without committing and I'll figure out by myself wich one I like best. I guess the only problem would be whether or not I take the penetrating talent because it's 10 time better with Blunderbuss but then again I can push that one back. I will consider range and cast speed as a factor when picking spell since I'm still considered very squishy.

 

Thanks everyone for the advices, I guess I'm going to start now!

[Wolken3156]

Ciphers in general aren't that great at dealing damage with their powers. They are better at debuffing and crowd control. Pick up a few damage powers, but rely on your gun most of the time. It's pretty easy to hit (and crit) a foe that's blind and paralyzed for big damage. Soul whip with the biting whip upgrade grants a nice +40% bonus to your weapon attacks, so make use of that!

That's not entirely true, since Ciphers are the class with Antipathetic Field and Ectopsychic Echo. Both powers deal absurd amounts damage, with the only downside being their reliance on careful positioning (Especially Antipathetic Field). The best way to deal with that though is to have your Cipher in stealth mode and position him while the rest of your party hold the enemies in place.

[Blave]

Well yes, they do have those two pretty good damage abilities. The positioning can be a pain, though, and I'm not sure I'd risk running all over the place with con 8. I also said they aren't good at dealing damage with their powers in general because everything besides those two beams is mostly subpar as far as damage goes.

 

Anyway, the video guide I linked expains this very tactic, among other things, so I considered it covered.

Edited September 2, 2015 by Blave

[Psychevore]

[Ymarsakar]

I'll cover the firearm differences and the resolve question.

 

Getting interrupted can be an issue, there are food buffs to minimize that. So dropping 2 points in con and resolve is pretty balanced. Every 1 point of concentration is like 1% extra to miss for someone trying to interrupt you. Generally pulling range and using CC solves that issue, since only some enemies like to target the backline.

 

 

For firearms, it's generally split by focus. The cipher generally only has one weapon focus group, that would be Ruffian, probably most popular, due to the blunderbuss/pistol/sabre combo. The arquebus, the pre rifle firearm, is in the soldier group. All of them have very long reloads, and have accuracy minuses on the weapon itself. The blunderbuss, however, has six projectiles, so missing generally isn't the issue compared to the arquebus or pistol which only fires one bullet (and if it misses, it does no damage at all). It's when you graze and thus do less damage than a hit. One way to get around that is by buffing your cipher's accuracy with paladin auras or priest buffs. Or by debuffing the enemy's deflection using a number of spells from druid or wizard level 1s, or the cipher's paralysis level 2 power.

 

Dexterity actually helps a lot with ranged builds, even blunderbuss builds. The difference between 10 dex and 18 dex is that the blunderbuss takes 14 seconds between each attack vs 9-10s with 18 dex. That's without the reload talent. Recovery speed or the armor, determines the gap before you can take another action, when you attack. So dex makes your attack shorter, hit faster, and helps with the reload animation a bit I think.

 

Recently, I've dropped a few points from the 18 int cipher I had, and made it into a 16-17 cipher. The intelligence duration doesn't help with a lot of cipher abilities as much as shooting faster and getting more focus from dex, I thought.

 

The nice thing about how they designed Pillars is that you aren't locked into one weapon. If you want to try all the guns on the cipher, you can do that. The weapon focus talent just gives you six more accuracy with certain types. Generally the blunderbuss build gets the "special" gun from that one quest. People who played in the beta showed it off. It's a very good weapon.

 

The trick with using the cipher's most damaging level 1 and 2 powers, is the positioning of the initial aggro pull or tank position. The tank needs to pull the enemies away from the main party, at a 90 degree angle, so that the main party ends up flanking the main group of enemies. This, depending on terrain and how many enemies there are, allows the party to put a line of fire across the entire enemy formation, hitting numerous people. Also good for wizard and druid cone attacks. This was very difficult to use without boots of speed or speed buffs, but now stealth is individual based, not party based. Should be a cinch to do now.

Edited September 2, 2015 by Ymarsakar

[Any_ILL]

I was thinking of Ducanale (just saw the stat on a wiki and oh my does this look powerful) or Pliambo per Casitas (the debuff sounds awesome) as an arquebuse, I really like the idea of a scientist with arquebuse and it seems like the arquebuse would be less hurt by low dext. I agree that dropping 2 points in intell would allow me a more decent dext but I really can't RP wise. In any case I've made my char and I don't think you can respec your attributes right? If you can I may drop 2 points from either con or res cause there's really nothing else I can sacrifice (I'm pretty sure than lowering might for dex does not result in a damage/focus boost with these kind of weapons...)

[Ymarsakar]

The player character can re spec at merchants for a gold cost, which can change the attributes. 2 points isn't going to make much difference one way or another, due to food. I wouldn't pay the respec cost just for 2 attribute points.

 

Dialogue wise, most conversation options open at 15 or 16. Sometimes they want 18. Generally resolve and might have some options which require high stats, which factor into item buffs and passives and food too to fit the requirements.

 

Dexterity doesn't have a lot of options, very different from Planescape Torment where thief roleplay centered around dexterity, as well as the thief class abilities. INT of 16 generally triggers a lot of options, with a +2 optional with food or the +2 int helm.

 

Constitution is used in some of the athletic adventure text games. Perception and resolve is used a lot to solve quests dialogue wise. INT, I remember, did some of that as well but not as much.

 

Role play in this game isn't based so much on stats as what you do in the game, which factions you like, who you kill and how you deal with quest objectives. But there's definitely a lot of animancy mysteries and science for your character to dive into, story wise. Be sure to check out aloth, pallegina, and so on, they tend to have very strong views on animancy (science).

 

Take some time to experiment with stuff in Pillars of Eternity. The stats aren't that important and it won't break your game either way. If you do want to change it later, you can. Heck I ran through Path of the Damned using the npcs. The items are more important, getting good loot drops and enchants on weapons. That and a good tactically balanced party that suits your play style.

Edited September 3, 2015 by Ymarsakar

[Nobear]

I'm using bows, which are faster, but even for guns, you probably don't need such a high Dex. The slow thing about guns is not the attack speed, but the reload speed, which is completely unaffected by dex. Dex 10 will be more than enough.

 

This part is inaccurate. Dex affects Action Speed, not Attack Speed. That means any action, whether it's a melee or ranged auto attack, a spell or power, or even using a consumable item like a potion or scroll. A cipher does have some good Fast powers that seem to be fast enough even if you lower your Dex to 10 or below, but this will very significantly slow down any Average or Slow powers.

 

I am also under the strong impression that Action Speed (and, by extension, Dex), applies to all phases of a gunner's shooting as well. Maybe someone very knowledgeable, like Pedroelm, could confirm or refute this.

 

I was thinking of Ducanale (just saw the stat on a wiki and oh my does this look powerful) or Pliambo per Casitas (the debuff sounds awesome) as an arquebuse, I really like the idea of a scientist with arquebuse and it seems like the arquebuse would be less hurt by low dext. I agree that dropping 2 points in intell would allow me a more decent dext but I really can't RP wise. In any case I've made my char and I don't think you can respec your attributes right? If you can I may drop 2 points from either con or res cause there's really nothing else I can sacrifice (I'm pretty sure than lowering might for dex does not result in a damage/focus boost with these kind of weapons...)

 

Dulcanale is definitely a great gun. I chose the Ruffian focus for my cipher so she could use Dulcanale against high-DR targets, and Scon Mica's Roar (a great blunderbuss) against low-DR targets.

 

You should know that the wiki is painfully outdated (and was long before the expansion came out). It is not a reliable source for seeing the current stats on weapons, powers, or really anything. I also have not yet played the expansion, so IDK what sexy new weapons might be good for a cipher from that content. In any case, you can always respec. I'm a fan of Ruffian because it includes two types of guns, but you could always try Soldier for arquebuses to compare.

 

You are right that Penetrating Shot is much more needed for a Blunderbuss than for any other type of gun. In some cases it may be a DPS loss for other guns (especially vs low-DR targets), but I have not done the math to be more specific in where this breakpoint would lie.

 

Dialogue wise, most conversation options open at 15 or 16. Sometimes they want 18. Generally resolve and might have some options which require high stats, which factor into item buffs and passives and food too to fit the requirements.

 

There are a few stat checks as high as 19 pre-expansion. IDK if there are any higher than that now, but I'd like to know this. No stat checks are below 11, though, so having a dumped stat vs having 10 in that stat will make zero difference in checks, whether for dialogue or scripted events.

 

If you really want to have a stat as low as possible and still pass checks (even though you could alternately respec to pass that check and then respec back), there are four buff source types that apply out of combat: items, food, inn resting bonuses, and one more which I won't reveal because you might consider it a spoiler, but it'll be available for most (but not all) of the game starting early in Act 2. Multiple instances of each source type will suppress each other and, if some are higher or lower, only the highest will be active (e.g. if you eat the same food twice, or wear two items that boost the same stat). However, all four source types will stack with each other. Each will grant about 2 to a stat, give or take a point, so that can boost you roughly 8 to the stat whose check you want to pass. There are also a few talents you can learn throughout your adventures that give you a point in a particular stat permanently (usually along with another bonus), but these are rare and you won't be able to boost all of your stats this way.

 

Edit: I almost forgot. If you'd like my thoughts on balancing survivability on a ranged cipher, here is a post with a summary of these thoughts. My more detailed explanations on page one may be a bit long and tedious to read, and they include a bit of speculation about the expansion which is now public knowledge. But I would still be inclined to dump Res before Con.

 

For survivability, check out the priest spell Suppress Affliction, also granted by a ring you might find randomly on your adventures, which is immensely helpful to counter some of the worst ongoing partywide debuffs and damage over time effects.

Edited September 3, 2015 by Nobear

[Ymarsakar]

Nobears you can test the dexterity thing yourself.

 

Use the console iroll20s

 

AttributeScore player Dexterity 17

 

AddAbility player

 

tln_penetrating_shot_talent

 

tln_gunner

 

RemoveTalent charname ability/talent

 

The companions for charname would go something like this Companion_Aloth(Clone)

 

Out of combat reloads are instant in many instances, so becareful of that.

Edited September 3, 2015 by Ymarsakar

[Springwight]

There is nothing I like more than firing my Blunderbuss and seeing that focus jump from 10 to almost 100. That said, sometimes it doesn't jump that high, but those moments are pretty cool 

[Boeroer]

Dex definitely influences attack speed, recovery and reloading.

[mph]

In WM there's an item called Ryona's Vambraces which, among other goodies, has an "Precision: +3 DR Bypass" effect. This effect stacks with Rending, so a Cipher using That Certain Blunderbuss + DR bypassing Talent + said Vambraces ends up with 15 DR bypass. So there's that...

Edited September 5, 2015 by mph

[Skie Nightfall]

My 1.06 cipher had:

Might:               15

Constitution:     6

Dexterity:          15

Perception:       12

Intellect:            18

Resolve:           12

 

This might not be as good for 2.0 though after the changes.
I preferred using a bow. You could start with a big gunblast sure, but in my game the speed of the bow gave me more focus than just using guns. The bow Persistence simply had amazing damage and speed

[Wolken3156]

The big change is you would want Perception very high now since you'll want your powers to Crit often. Personally I'd rather dump Resolve than Constitution. You can always use Spirit Shield potions to make up for the penalty in Concentration.

 

As for weapons, bows attack a lot faster and have no reload time but deal less overall damage. Guns or more specifically, the Blunderbuss, deal more damage but suffer from reload times. Personally I prefer hitting hard, since Powers mostly complement the Cipher's weapons, so I prefer guns. Bows are for those who would rather have steady Focus generation instead.

Edited September 5, 2015 by Wolken3156

[Ymarsakar]

The base damage and the focus gain over time may be about the same. The difference with the blunderbuss is that it can be used tactically to target only enemies that have cc on them, in combination with paralysis or various other people's cc.

 

That makes the gameplay significantly different when playing that cipher vs the constant focus regen ciphers with their steady but average attacks.

 

Blunderbuss also gets a huge benefit from lead spitter or the roar gun.

 

When an enemy gets cc ed and the cipher hits it with blunderbuss with DR pen talent on, the rogue hits it with some other bs dps talents, and then some magic user casts attacks against reflex, it's pretty much over for that enemy, even if it has hundreds of hitpoints. Very good for tactical level party tricks.

 

Focus gain used to be per hit, I think, but now they just made it a base % of the damage you do, including retaliations and/or lashes. But not any focus gain from spells far as I know. To get it to gain focus the old way, you need blacsonn and the carow food buff.

 

In full plate, blunderbuss triggers every 12s on average 10-12 dex. 14+ s at 3dex, about 9-10s at 18 dex.

 

The NPC stats were originally designed with perception giving accuracy, then they removed it because people were min maxing accuracy and deflection over might. Now they have added it back, since they have had more time to tweak the mechanics, giving us back the old accuracy bonus from per. Which makes some of the dps npc stats make a lot more sense.

Edited September 5, 2015 by Ymarsakar

[Any_ILL]

@Nobear: Thanks a lot for the detailed answers. I like your point about Ruffian allowing to switch between two types of gun depending on the enemy, that's very consistent with my character. I'll probably have another of my party taking the role of Arquebusier, most likely the priest, he seems to like them and if I find that debuffing arquebus (and if the stat are more or less what I thought they would be) that will help the damage of my main character.

I also succumbed to the sirens of min/maxing, dropped 2 con (at 6 now, I really need not to get attacked but then again it's only hard not PotD) and 5 Res:

 

Might:               16

Constitution:     6

Dexterity:          16

Perception:       18

Intellect:            20

Resolve:           3

 

and the dex does make all the difference in the world. Even if enemies spot me, there is no way shadow can teleport before I paralize them, I can chain Mental Binding and a gunshot pretty smoothly, whisper is also a lot safer and faster.

The resolve is a little low RP-wise; I mean my char is not a hero nor someone who has strong convictions, she seems pretty similar to [ACT 1 SPOILER] that animancer in Raedric's dungeons [END SPOILER] but not as inclined to do horrible thing and risk an uprising of the population but she's still very much into solving all these mysteries and 3 resolve sounds pretty low for anyone that would even consider doing the main quest. I'll survive the inconsistencies I guess ^^

[Nobear]

@Nobear: Thanks a lot for the detailed answers. I like your point about Ruffian allowing to switch between two types of gun depending on the enemy, that's very consistent with my character. I'll probably have another of my party taking the role of Arquebusier, most likely the priest, he seems to like them and if I find that debuffing arquebus (and if the stat are more or less what I thought they would be) that will help the damage of my main character.

I also succumbed to the sirens of min/maxing, dropped 2 con (at 6 now, I really need not to get attacked but then again it's only hard not PotD) and 5 Res:

 

Might:               16

Constitution:     6

Dexterity:          16

Perception:       18

Intellect:            20

Resolve:           3

 

and the dex does make all the difference in the world. Even if enemies spot me, there is no way shadow can teleport before I paralize them, I can chain Mental Binding and a gunshot pretty smoothly, whisper is also a lot safer and faster.

The resolve is a little low RP-wise; I mean my char is not a hero nor someone who has strong convictions, she seems pretty similar to [ACT 1 SPOILER] that animancer in Raedric's dungeons [END SPOILER] but not as inclined to do horrible thing and risk an uprising of the population but she's still very much into solving all these mysteries and 3 resolve sounds pretty low for anyone that would even consider doing the main quest. I'll survive the inconsistencies I guess ^^

 

 

I'm glad you found some of that useful. IIRC the Pliambo per Casitas wiki entry happens to be accurate, and Durance would be a good candidate for it, especially if you can spare the talent point. Personally I found it hard to justify doing that pre-2.0, because there are so many good priest talents for Interdiction and Holy Radiance. I could have dropped Aggrandizing Radiance for the +10 arquebus accuracy, though. I still had Inspiring Radiance, which is the important talent to have for Holy Radiance. Thing is, once his low level spells become spammable (starting at level 9), there are just so many buffs you might want to cast before he fires a single shot. But, especially for that Marking effect, you could certainly make a case for still getting a shot off somewhere.

 

That stat spread looks good for a ranged cipher in a party on Hard. Have fun!

[lameover]

Might:               16

Constitution:     6

Dexterity:          16

Perception:       18

Intellect:            20

Resolve:           3

Those 16 MIG and DEX and lowered CON are bad.

But Respec can help you

 

Ranged Cipher

Wood Elf.

18(19) as much damage as we can get.

10(9, we can earn item with +2MIG +1CON in Defiance Bay)

10

19

18 we need our debuffs lasts longer

3 we are ranged. We don't need RES.

 

OK. You need great might & perception to deal your physical damage, thus regaining focus, and your powers are useless without INT. Prioritize Per over Dex as that gives lots of accuracy to your controlling powers.

 

With low CON you can be nuked by enemy's AOE spell on Hard and PoTD, but for Normal i think dumping CON for DEX could work.

 

Weapon:Blunderbuss. On early levels you can use war bow or pistol.

Early levels - shoot, then use powers, then shoot again.

7+ level with blunderbuss use powers, shoot, use powers.

 

A good trick that you can pre cast Pain Link and Ectopsyhic Echo out of combat, regain default focus then engage.

Edited September 6, 2015 by lameover

[Nobear]

 

Might:               16

Constitution:     6

Dexterity:          16

Perception:       18

Intellect:            20

Resolve:           3

Those 16 MIG and DEX and lowered CON are bad.

But Respec can help you

 

Ranged Cipher

Wood Elf.

18(19) as much damage as we can get.

10(9, we can earn item with +2MIG +1CON in Defiance Bay)

10

19

18 we need our debuffs lasts longer

3 we are ranged. We don't need RES.

 

OK. You need great might & perception to deal your physical damage, thus regaining focus, and your powers are useless without INT. Prioritize Per over Dex as that gives lots of accuracy to your controlling powers.

 

With low CON you can be nuked by enemy's AOE spell on Hard and PoTD, but for Normal i think dumping CON for DEX could work.

 

Weapon:Blunderbuss. On early levels you can use war bow or pistol.

Early levels - shoot, then use powers, then shoot again.

7+ level with blunderbuss use powers, shoot, use powers.

 

A good trick that you can pre cast Pain Link and Ectopsyhic Echo out of combat, regain default focus then engage.

 

Eh either stat spread could work. It is, after all, Hard and not PoTD, and as you said he can always respec if he wants to tweak something.

 

You may have been the same person I first heard you could pre-cast Pain Link from. I still did not know about Ectopsychic Echo until just now. My personal favorite to pre-cast is Tactical Meld. Stack that accuracy as high as it can go, and all your other shots, powers, and focus gain become that much more effective.

[lameover]

I still did not know about Ectopsychic Echo until just now. My personal favorite to pre-cast is Tactical Meld. Stack that accuracy as high as it can go, and all your other shots, powers, and focus gain become that much more effective.

You can pre-cast Tactical Meld, then Pain Link, then Echo. Focus regains in 1sec.

Try it on your party

[Any_ILL]

 

Might:               16

Constitution:     6

Dexterity:          16

Perception:       18

Intellect:            20

Resolve:           3

Those 16 MIG and DEX and lowered CON are bad.

But Respec can help you

 

Ranged Cipher

Wood Elf.

18(19) as much damage as we can get.

10(9, we can earn item with +2MIG +1CON in Defiance Bay)

10

19

18 we need our debuffs lasts longer

3 we are ranged. We don't need RES.

 

OK. You need great might & perception to deal your physical damage, thus regaining focus, and your powers are useless without INT. Prioritize Per over Dex as that gives lots of accuracy to your controlling powers.

 

With low CON you can be nuked by enemy's AOE spell on Hard and PoTD, but for Normal i think dumping CON for DEX could work.

 

Weapon:Blunderbuss. On early levels you can use war bow or pistol.

Early levels - shoot, then use powers, then shoot again.

7+ level with blunderbuss use powers, shoot, use powers.

 

A good trick that you can pre cast Pain Link and Ectopsyhic Echo out of combat, regain default focus then engage.

 

 

Now I've tried dex at 16, I don't think I'll lower (or not much) it's really comfortable to use. And the multiplicative nature of might and dex makes it more optimal dps-wise and focus-generation wise until DR enters the picture (but if I'm not mistaken about how DR works, if favors attack speed more than it favors additional damage). I know might is better for power damage but dex makes it so much safer and easier to cast.

As for AoE, well I'm rarely at the same spot as my party and engage a little later with Ectopsychic Echo, but even if they do nuke me with AoE, well that's all the more damage everyone else will not receive ^^. I can take a loading here and there for additional comfort when I don't get nuked.

I do know about the pre-cast but I'm lvl 5, so I can't do it before next level I would guess (it's 2.5 focus per level right?) since I would need 20 starting focus. I intend to take advantage of that!

I will keep your advice in mind in case the experience gets worse later on though!

Edited September 6, 2015 by Any_ILL