My Party build

[Xavier Blackthorn]

Having finished the game, I just wanted to post my Party and PC build, and add some comments.  

I had great difficulty settling on a Primary Character (PC).  Partially due to the Might attribute being a desired attribute across all classes. Traditionally I've always built a wizard/mage class, but to start with, this class is SUPER weak.  So I started playing other classes.  Tried a Ranger, a Cipher, a Priest and finally a Chanter.  I got quite away through the first Act with a Ranger with a bear, but I always came back to the feeling that I was missing out on a lot of conversation options, due to low Perception, Intelligence and Resolve.  

In the end, I decided I'd break the rules, and build a PC that had no might.  This way, I could invest in high Intelligence, Perception and Resolve.  No, this still didn't give me ALL the conversation options I wanted, but it certainly gave me most of them.  Of course I had to choose carefully which class I believed would be LEAST affected by lack of might.  A melee toon was of course not an option.  As were Wizards, Ciphers, Druids and possibly Rangers. Rangers don't DO an awful lot of damage anyway, but still.   In the end, I settled on a Chanter.  But this Chanter was ranged.  With a Arquebus.  Which made up for *some* of the lack of might due to it's raw damage output. (I was annoyed to find that Might affects the rifle and pistol - as if the damage output of these guns reflected how hard you pulled the trigger or something!)  The Chanter can still Chant, (and I'm don't *think* the Chants were affected by might - I could be wrong here).  And the Chanter could still summon very useful allies - again supposedly without the use of Might.  To make my Chanter more useful, I made her the Mechanic, so she was the one finding all the traps and loot etc.

 

I finished the game, including beating the Master Below, with her, Eder, Aloth, Durance, Pallegina and another custom Wizard.  Although I regularly swapped the custom Wizard for a Cipher - either Grieving Mother, or a custom Cipher (because GM stat's were pretty poor), because I thought the Cipher was a really interesting class.   Using the boots of stealth on my Chanter with the gun, with the Cipher casting the 'Flanked' skill, gave some decent damage results for my Chanter with a lack of Might.

[AndreaColombo]

While it is true that Might is desirable on every class, the same is true for almost every stat. Sure, there will be classes (or better, character builds) that benefit more from some stats and less from others, but in this game it's hard to go wrong (this was one of the design goals.)

 

For example, it is not true that melee is out of the question without pumping Might. You may want not to dump it, but an average Might score can still do pretty decent damage when using a two-hander with Savage Attack and Vulnerable Attack, especially if you have good Dexterity and/or use Deleterious Alacrity of Motion.

 

Paladins make great "conversation" PCs as they are quite good at tanking, and Resolve (which is the stat that unlocks the most dialog options) is a tank stat. As well, Intelligence broadens their auras' AoE, and Perception can make up for the Accuracy loss they incur when using a shield.

 

I have to disagree Wizards are weak; quite the opposite: They are the strongest class in the game even without min/maxing (Aloth can wreak some serious havoc, and he's got jack-of-all-trades stats with an unimpressive Might score.) Of course if you want your Wizard to be optimized, you'll have to go low on Constitution and Resolve, and you need the latter for conversation options if that's something you're after (personally, I've never played a high-Resolve PC.)

Edited October 25, 2015 by AndreaColombo

[Xavier Blackthorn]

Oh - I totally agree that even a third of the way through the game, a Wizard (or two in my case) really start to shine - and by the end - indispensible.  If I started the game again, I'd play a Wizard, without Might to start with knowing I could boost might to a certain extent with items in-game.  My first time through was kinda frustrating tho.  Still - I was happy with how my Chanter worked out.

[Boeroer]

All the caster classes that switch from spell-per-rest to spell-per-encounter at lvl 9 are a little more tricky to use at the beginning because of their low stats like deflection, accuracy and endurance and the lack of many spells - and the tendency to spare them until that superhard encounter that might wait around the corner. But once you get more spells because you get access to higher tier it becomes easier. Not just because you have more powerful spells, but because you have more spells to cast until you have to rest. Then, at lvl 9, it all becomes a spell spam fest. And the wizard is best in this regard because his lvl 1 spells are awesome while priest's and druid's are just OK.

[Wolken3156]

Oh - I totally agree that even a third of the way through the game, a Wizard (or two in my case) really start to shine - and by the end - indispensible.  If I started the game again, I'd play a Wizard, without Might to start with knowing I could boost might to a certain extent with items in-game.  My first time through was kinda frustrating tho.  Still - I was happy with how my Chanter worked out.

Might is actually very important for a Wizard since their best spells are damage-over-time, and you need a good Might score to allow them to bypass damage reduction. Unless you're more focused on crowd control instead of damage in which case you could leave Might at its base (Or maybe even dump it). Resolve can always be dumped without any repercussions which will give you extra points to play around with. Wizards have both Spirit Shield and Arcane Veil to get around the Concentration and Deflection loss from having low Resolve.

 

As for Chanter, I actually really love them as they make excellent support characters. I often run with one as one of my primary tanks, just need to be careful with Invocations though, since they break engagement. As a damage dealer though, they have a really rough competition, as every other class boasts much better damage dealing tools than the Chanter.

 

All the caster classes that switch from spell-per-rest to spell-per-encounter at lvl 9 are a little more tricky to use at the beginning because of their low stats like deflection, accuracy and endurance and the lack of many spells - and the tendency to spare them until that superhard encounter that might wait around the corner. But once you get more spells because you get access to higher tier it becomes easier. Not just because you have more powerful spells, but because you have more spells to cast until you have to rest. Then, at lvl 9, it all becomes a spell spam fest. And the wizard is best in this regard because his lvl 1 spells are awesome while priest's and druid's are just OK.

 

Saving spells is actually a bad habit IMO. Against a single enemy, sure you probably don't need to cast anything. But if there's at least 4 or more enemies, casting at least 1 spell to ease and quicken a fight is often a good idea. If there's 6 enemies or more, you may even want to go nova on them since massive groups generally equate to a rough fight anyway. Otherwise you're just under-utilizing your caster and might be better off bringing a Barbarian or something. If you're resting to recover health and your caster haven't used most of their spells yet (At least before they become per encounter), you're doing it wrong.

Edited October 27, 2015 by Wolken3156

[Boeroer]

Didn't say it was smart.

[rheingold]

Melee rogues don't need might. Not saying that it doesn't benefit them - of course it does, just that you can have a rogue with 10 might without really impacting on their effectiveness. Means you can comfortably take 2 out of perception, resolve and intelligence  (+ dex obviously). And that's without dropping any stat below 10. Still rogues are not everyone's cup of tea, I enjoy them but they are micro management intensive - and fragile. Though if you put them in heavy armour they can at least take a few blows with falling over.

[Boeroer]

When you're dual wielding the recovery penalty of heavy armors isn't so bad anyways - in absolute frame numbers. That's because the basic recovery time is way shorter than it would be if you use two handed weapons. So there's a good tradeoff when you dress your dual wielding rogue in plate. Not so if you're using two handed weapons. But anyways you can durgan refine your armor and put on Pilferer's Grip. That drops the penalty from +50% to +19%. You will have good protection, can get into melee earlier and you'll have lesser knockouts while being only slightly slower. That would result in more dps most of the time I think.

Edited October 29, 2015 by Boeroer

[AndreaColombo]

But anyways you can durgan refine your armor and put on Pilferer's Grip. That drops the penalty from +50% to +19%.

 

Unless I'm missing the obvious, that should bring it down to +25% (-15% from Durgan, -10% from Pilferer's Grip.)

[Boeroer]

In my memory Pilferer's Grip did -16%. But since I'm an old fart it's possible that my memory doesn't serve me right.

 

Just looked it up: it's -10%. Sorry for the wrong numbers. But still a good item.

[aweigh0101]

if you guys were rolling a crew of 4 martials and 2 casters (my preferred setup, just because more than 2 casters makes the game too easy) which unique armors would you equip on the two squishies?

i usually roll with Durance sporting Osric's Family Breastplate for the second chance and the second caster being GM with eder's scale mail, again for the second chance.

i prefer durance in the second chance breastplate because his priest spells usually force him to approach the mosh pit, whereas GM can get away with less. If there was a second chance armor lower than eder's scale mail that's what i'd use on her.

i'd love to hear what you guys use tho.

[AndreaColombo]

^ How do you get to wear that armor? I thought it was impossible.

 

Recently I like to have Raiment of Wael's Eyes on my Wizard, and Golden Scales on my Priest (looks awesome with Scath Gwannek and Sheathed in Autumn.)

 

GM looks groovy with Autumn Fire and Sabra Marie.

Edited October 30, 2015 by AndreaColombo

[Boeroer]

You just don't give the breastplate back to Osric (it's a dialogue option). It's the same thing with the March Steel Dagger.

[AndreaColombo]

Would you happen to know whether that particular dialog option has specific stat requirements? I usually play low-Resolve characters and I'm sure I've never seen it. That breastplate is rather good looking and the aesthetics bitch in me would totally want to toy with it.

Edited October 30, 2015 by AndreaColombo

[Parasol_Syndicate]

I've successfully done it with stuff I've read on other forums.

 

The easy way is to initiate hostility with Penhem BEFORE he starts talking.

Then tell Osric you had to kill some people to get it.

 

It's apparently possible to do it through conversation, but is tricky as hell.  

Edited October 30, 2015 by Parasol_Syndicate

[KDubya]

if you guys were rolling a crew of 4 martials and 2 casters (my preferred setup, just because more than 2 casters makes the game too easy) which unique armors would you equip on the two squishies?

 

i usually roll with Durance sporting Osric's Family Breastplate for the second chance and the second caster being GM with eder's scale mail, again for the second chance.

 

i prefer durance in the second chance breastplate because his priest spells usually force him to approach the mosh pit, whereas GM can get away with less. If there was a second chance armor lower than eder's scale mail that's what i'd use on her.

 

i'd love to hear what you guys use tho.

 

 

I like to use Aloth's leather armor for the larger AoE. Free's up equipment slots for something better than overseeing.

 

I find Second Chance on a squishy character usually just results in the character being KO'd again quickly or even killed forever if they jump back up maimed.

[Boeroer]

I don't think you have to have high resolve. I just think they put in this option in one of the later patches. But my last main char had RES 15 so maybe I'm mistaken.

The downside will be that Osric will be very angry if you tell him that you don't give it back and I think that you can't buy stuff in the dozen's shop then. But that's just guesswork because I always gave him his breastplate.

Edited October 31, 2015 by Boeroer

[aweigh0101]

there aren't really any worthwhile "end-game" items worth buying at the dozens HQ IMO, so i always kill Penhelm, then refuse to give it back to osric (there are no stat checks IIRC if you decide to just attack him); in fact i ALWAYS make it a point to massacre dozens HQ for xp/loot since there is literally no consequences for doing it other than obviously not being able to buy from them or get their special perk.

in case you're wondering you even get Cloudpiercer bow to boot lol

I always massacre the doemenels HQ as well, for exactly the same reasons, BUT unlike with the dozens i do make sure to complete their 1st quest so i can buy finneah's grace cloak from their merchant before commencing the slaughter. if you're following the story path and you do this stuff in the same time-frame as when you first reach defiance bay then killing the doemenels bosses will yield the very earliest EXCEPTIONAL piece of armor you can possibly get, an exceptional leather armor. it's quite a while before you get more exceptional pieces "for free" like that hehe.

you can get a guaranteed helm of antler (The helm that gives +1 dexterity) super early by killing a druid backer NPC standing alone in the copperlane district, right in-between the southern pathway that connects the March Steel Dagger little boy and the Goose Inn. unlike almost every other NPC in the district this guy doesn't give rep loss AND it seems Obsidian did this intentionally cos he's actually kind of hard to kill if you do it as soon as you reach defiance bay. he's p. high level.

slaughtering the knights doesn't yield anything good though, like, at all, just trash loot

Edited October 31, 2015 by aweigh0101

[AndreaColombo]

There really should be consequences for wanton murder, though. It was there in BG and BGII; it just seems ridiculous that you can just murder everyone around and nobody cares or even notices.

 

From a story perspective, killing one or more of the most influential groups in Defiance Bay should have massive reactivity consequences.

[aweigh0101]

i'm actually playing through BG1: EE literally right now and PoE's reactivity is way better than BG1's from that sort of stuff is waaay better. Although obsidian did have almost 20 years to "get it better" hah.

aside from reputation drops, which don't affect ANYTHING important in the game besides locking you out of eder's quest in defiance bay (the historian won't give you the archives) i can't think of anything really bad or any important content you'd lose from wanton murder. besides losing access to shopkeepers of course.

but then the enchantment system would make up for the loss of access to shopkeepers as you can just enchant your own junk. it would be great if party members left, cities closed their doors to you, you became a wanted criminal, etc, all sorts of things that were done in earlier CRPG's like fallout, the BG's, arcanum, and tons of others.

sorry, i think we've officially gotten off-topic from party builds lol

speaking of party builds, the more i think about it the more i realize that in their attempts to make all classes balanced they ended up making them all pretty much the same. any time there's talk about a good build it's mostly realized via gear or spells or stat distribution, or a combination of those three aspects, but not necessarily from their innate class abilities.

i think the most unique class is really the chanter, he's the only one really that can do stuff no other class can without need of gear or stats. cool stuff like stacking winds of death, hobbling via frost rime traps, buffing and debuffing, etc. they just need to do something about the long waiting times. all the other classes is stuff we've already seen before in other CRPG's if you think about it.

[AndreaColombo]

aside from reputation drops, which don't affect ANYTHING important in the game besides locking you out of eder's quest in defiance bay (the historian won't give you the archives) i can't think of anything really bad or any important content you'd lose from wanton murder. besides losing access to shopkeepers of course.

 

Indeed, that's precisely the problem. I'm not saying PoE has worse reactivity than BG; that would be blatantly false. All I'm saying is BG punished wanton murder. If you tried that, guards would spawn continuously and eventually overwhelm you; everyone would become hostile in the area, thus closing you out of any quests; everybody would react negatively to your abysmal reputation.

 

In PoE you can just walk in the Doemenels' estate, kill everybody, and that's it. Nobody even notices they're gone and keep talking as though the Doemenels still were a thing.

[Nobear]

if you guys were rolling a crew of 4 martials and 2 casters (my preferred setup, just because more than 2 casters makes the game too easy) which unique armors would you equip on the two squishies?

 

i usually roll with Durance sporting Osric's Family Breastplate for the second chance and the second caster being GM with eder's scale mail, again for the second chance.

 

i prefer durance in the second chance breastplate because his priest spells usually force him to approach the mosh pit, whereas GM can get away with less. If there was a second chance armor lower than eder's scale mail that's what i'd use on her.

 

i'd love to hear what you guys use tho.

 

Gwisk Glas is a robe that comes with Second Chance, Superb and +2 Might. It's really nice-looking too, almost too nice for Durance but that's what I gave him in my pre-2.0 PoTD play through.

[mosspit]

Gwisk Glas is indeed nicely designed. Green robes with dragon motifs... wonder if they were fashioned after China Emperor robes.

 

I really like the Wayfarer's Hide from WM1. Assuming one starts WM1 content around act2, Wayfarer's is likely the earliest Superb armour one can get. Being light armour (25%) they are suitable on casters or offtanks... They look really good on a Monk Fire Godlike imo.

Edited November 1, 2015 by mosspit

[Renal Bloodscalp]

i'm actually playing through BG1: EE literally right now and PoE's reactivity is way better than BG1's from that sort of stuff is waaay better. Although obsidian did have almost 20 years to "get it better" hah.

 

aside from reputation drops, which don't affect ANYTHING important in the game besides locking you out of eder's quest in defiance bay (the historian won't give you the archives) i can't think of anything really bad or any important content you'd lose from wanton murder. besides losing access to shopkeepers of course.

 

but then the enchantment system would make up for the loss of access to shopkeepers as you can just enchant your own junk. it would be great if party members left, cities closed their doors to you, you became a wanted criminal, etc, all sorts of things that were done in earlier CRPG's like fallout, the BG's, arcanum, and tons of others.

 

sorry, i think we've officially gotten off-topic from party builds lol

 

speaking of party builds, the more i think about it the more i realize that in their attempts to make all classes balanced they ended up making them all pretty much the same. any time there's talk about a good build it's mostly realized via gear or spells or stat distribution, or a combination of those three aspects, but not necessarily from their innate class abilities.

 

i think the most unique class is really the chanter, he's the only one really that can do stuff no other class can without need of gear or stats. cool stuff like stacking winds of death, hobbling via frost rime traps, buffing and debuffing, etc. they just need to do something about the long waiting times. all the other classes is stuff we've already seen before in other CRPG's if you think about it.

maybe a separate thread is needed then to discuss reputations.  it's my only knock on the game that Defiance Bay doesn't seem alive because there isn't a lot of effect/change to be had on it.  Athkatla could be shaped based on several decisions over the course of the game.

 

I'm not sure the chanter is 'more' unique than the cipher.  the chanter, to me, seems to have bard songs that, when played, unlock the spells available to the class.  It certainly plays different (and better!) than previous implementations of Bards (BG/IWD/NN).

 

The cipher doesn't really match up with another class/build in other CRPGs i've played.

 

All in all, I'm really enjoying the game.  It's got a lot of depth; dissecting the weave of the game has been fun.