No Rest For the Pro--Suggestions?

[globalCooldown]

 

See that achievement there?

I wanna get it.

And in a month or two, I'm going to be livestreaming my attempt to get it.

I'm already keeping notes on one playthrough I'm doing, trying to figure out my path through the game. It's tricky to figure out a game plan when you can only rest a certain number of times!

So, anyone want to give me suggestions? Example: builds, paths to take, what quests to do vs what to ignore?

 

Thoughts thus far:

• High Athletics will be useful, so I won't have to rest as much.
• Talking my way out of fights to save my party's Health will be useful. To that end, I may want to invest in high Resolve, since Resolve is used a lot in dialogue checks.
• GOLDROT CHEW. If I'm reading the tooltip for it correctly, it decreases your fatigue. Which means, it holds off that exhaustion debuff.
• Wound Binding and Field Triage will probably be a lot more useful than normal.
• Priests, Druids, and Wizards are going to be less useful than normal in early game, since they can't rest to refresh spells.
• Consumables that increase max Health will be valuable; I'll probably have to power through some adventuring with the Exhaustion debuff no matter how well I do. On the same note, gear that increases Constitution will also be valuable.
• If I want to change my party, I'm going to have to do it by recruiting some schmuck at the tavern and cheesing it that way. Going back to Caed Nua means travel time, and travel time means fatigue, and fatigue leads to Exhaustion.
• I may be able to complete sidequests that happen to be in my way. Every piece of exp is valuable when you're avoiding combat like the plague, but I won't be able to go out of my way to get that exp, because...of combat.
• I think it's possible to do this on Easy?
• Strongest candidates for my Watcher's class right now are Ranger (for pets, who don't run out of endurance) and Cipler (for ludicrous amounts of cc).

 

• Cilant Lis and Valewood, I can fart around in; if I manage my items and my lone Watcher well, I should be able to at least take out the bandit camp and rescue the cook. As long as I don't rest until I get to Gilded Vale, I'm good.
• HAVE to rest in Gilded Vale to advance the plot. Maybe try to nonviolently solve the Windmill quest before resting at the inn?
• Act 2, I should probably knock out Heritage Hill and the Sanitarium before even thinking about going for Cliaban Rilag.
• Probably don't want to side with Dozens, since one of their quests involves a dungeon crawl outside the Defiance Bay area.
• Probably not doing Hylea's appeasement quest, as that involves a journey to her temple. Berath's involves two big fights, one of which is outside of Twin Elms anyway, and Galawain's involves a dungeon crawl. Rymrgand's, however, can be completed with stealth and dialogue!

 

And as for companion quests:

• Aloth: If I bring him along for the Temple of Woedica, he'll give me his quest, and I can then go immediately to the Sanitarium to complete it and advance the story. The problem is getting through the Catacombs to the Temple, AND the Sanitarium itself, without being able to refresh his spells. (He's going back to Caed Nua to watch paint dry after that, though.)
• Eder: Depends entirely on if I can get my hands on the records in the short, short time I will be in Defiance Bay. We can't threaten the records keeper, remember; we want to avoid fights! Once we get the records, though, the rest of the quest is conveniently located beside the main plot.
• Durance: His quest advances when you rest with him in your party. Which means his quest is dependent on something I want to avoid doing. Plus, his spells refresh on rest, so keeping him in the party will handicap me.
• Kana: Endless Paths? Ain't nobody got time for that.
• Sagani: Can be completed nonviolently, but her final quest marker is aaaaaaall the way in the Northweald--a location I will be avoiding entirely, since I won't be chilling with Hylea.
• Pallegina: The only problem will be getting her into my party. Once she's there, everything she needs to do is nonviolent and right in the path of the main questline.
• Hiravias: Everything he needs for his quest is conveniently located in Twin Elms and Burial Isle. As long as I can avoid a fight with the Dude at the end, I should be able to do this! The only problem is, his spells are once per rest...which may or may not be such a big issue so close to endgame. Definitely doing this if I hit level 9 and get per-encounter spells; otherwise it's the Aloth problem all over again, because once I'm on Burial Isle, there is no way I'm not going down that Pit.
• Grieving Mother: Her quest is dependent on resting while she's in the party, sadly. Might get some progress on it, at least; she's a cipher, so I see no reason not to keep her around.
• Zahua & Devil of Caroc: Hahahahahaha you actually think I'll have time to go to the White March. That's funny.

Edited September 3, 2015 by globalCooldown

[Mechalibur]

You have to beat Thaos to get the achievement.

 

I would maybe plan out your 10 rests, with 1 or 2 emergency rests in case anything goes wrong, then keep a separate save file after each rest you take. Try and get as much exp as possible before your first rest; it may require having a bit of mechanics to disable all the traps in the starter dungeon. But I'd resolve any non-combat quests, and explore all the houses and the bear cave (but probably not fight the bear ) for a bit of explore exp. I don't know if it's worth it taking Aloth along just for his personal quest; it's only a little bit of exp, and he'd probably slow you down compared to a non-caster tavern adventurer. Since you won't have reliable access to blessing, a paladin with zealous aura could be useful.

 

Ranger with an antelope or bear pet could be a decent choice for the Watcher. Pets have unlimited health, so they can take as much hits as they want before sleeping. Hell, maybe a full ranger party could work

[Ymarsakar]

Are you able to do this run on Easy mode? Because then you can just ignore the fatigue, use a bunch of ciphers, rogues, rangers, paladins, etc who don't have so many per rest abilities, and just play the game without resting.

 

Health pools can be dealt with using extremely high deflection and cc. So ciphers might be the solution to that. They're the only class other than monks that can just CC people left and right the longer the fight becomes.

 

One early tactic I used before 1.04 was the kiting trick. So not sure if it works now or not.

 

The paladin or chanter with their permanent movement buffs are needed, and then you just pull the enemy while hitting them with some kind of slow or debuff cc. And then continuously move away from them until you pull a single enemy away because of distance limits. Sometimes they will head back to their area, breaking combat, but so long as you hit them again before you exit combat, they won't regen endurance and will die eventually. This allows you to kill extremely high damage hitting enemies like ogres or lurkers without taking health damage.

 

Everyone, even the tank, will need a ranged weapon, however. And in situations where you need to tank normally, then the tactics are normal.

Edited September 3, 2015 by Ymarsakar

[globalCooldown]

I do know that it's possible to get the achievement on Easy, at least in theory. It says nothing about difficulty, after all!

When it comes to buffs, I prefer "fire and forget" over "scramble to cast at the start of combat"; paladins and chanters are right up my alley. I don't think not having reliable priest access will hurt me that much. As for paladin, not sure if I should duck out of the way to get Pallegina, make a custom paladin from an order that approves of nonviolent solutions (Kind Wayfarers?), or both. Upshot to Pallegina is, her personal quest can be settled on the way to more important things.

Really am on the fence about bringing Aloth along just for the personal quest; on the one hand, every drop of exp is precious, but on the other, he IS kind of gimped without access to rests.

Speaking of companion quests that are on the way, can Hiravias' personal quest be settled nonviolently? Normally I let him insult the Dude into a fight, because it satisfies my infantile sense of humor.

So far, it looks like either going Cipher for cc or Ranger for pet-tank.

And a good point about exploration exp! I shall be sure to duck my head into every place that won't get me in a fight.

[Ymarsakar]

The wizard does have some talents that are per encounter, but to get dps out of him you would need double take on the blast talents. Might be useful in the beginning since you are dps limited party wise (aoe has a lot of dps), but later on you'll probably have to drop him.

 

In PoTD Pillars 1.0, I picked up Aloth, I picked up Eder, I went straight to Caed Nua. Kana was like 1 level above me. Then with that group, I cleared out Caed Nua or at least most of it, so I could bypass it and get the other companions. Because I wanted to get them before they leveled up.

 

It's very difficult to clear out the spirits in top Caed Nua without using that kiting trick. No good weapons, no equipment, horrible wizard spells, I just pulled them one by one and focus fired them with everyone's arbalests or ranged weapons. Eventually they all died. Well there were some groups I couldn't take on, but they were easily bypassed with stealth or fog of war. The spiders and paladins in the dungeon, I pulled the spiders to the paladins, had them weaken each other, and then used a door way to bottleneck what was left and cleaned them up.

 

I picked up Pallegina late, but only because I didn't know where she was. Hiravias and the hunter was easier to find, including durance. Once I found them, it was easier. But you'll probably need to create some custom characters, if you can't get through Watcher of Caed Nua quest.

Edited September 3, 2015 by Ymarsakar

[Springwight]

You should buy tons of Wizards (or another favorite caster) and put them in cold storage. They gain XP even while they don't do anything. Then whenever a Wizard runs out, just pop in to the fridge and take out a replacement.

Edited September 3, 2015 by Springwight

[KDubya]

If you send a companion back to your stronghold do they rest while there? As in you have Aloth, use up his spells and then send him to the stronghold for someone else and then swap at some later time?

 

I'd think that people with a lot of per encounter abilities would be best. Here is my theorycraft team:

 

1.) Main Paladin Kind Wayfarer for the heal on kill. Go for on kill effects and use a reach weapon, get accuracy aura

2.) Pellegrina give her shield, deflection talents and the armor increasing aura

3a.) Monk in heavy armor with shield on switch when you need to tank.

3b) Eder in heavy armor, shield and sabre

4.) Sagani for ranged damage and the re-usable, expendable Ituumak, who with two paladins with two lay on hands should survive more often then not.

5.) Grieving Mother - ciphers get all per encounter stuff

6a.) Rotating NPC - grab the NPCs to do their quests and then change for the next

6b.) Ranger for another disposable tank who does not get tired or suffer health attrition. Every fight the pet is ready to die again without complaint.

6c.) Cipher for more per encounter greatness.

 

On any level below PotD it should be do-able. take athletics on everyone, don't dump con. Try and have the ranger pets take the beatings.

[globalCooldown]

Well, thanks for all the ideas to play with! I really think I'm leaning toward a Ranger PC (Kind Wayfarer pally's heal on kill sounds nice, but I'm supposed to be -avoiding- combat). Definitely keeping around Pallegina for buffs, Sagani for Itumaak, and Grieving Mother for CC.

Once I get some money to my name, I *may* look into buying a fridge to stuff a steady stream of wizards into (link goes to tvtropes).