[CLASS BUILD] Schemer's Needler (roguelike Skaen priest)

[Boeroer]

This build emulates a Priest/Rogue multiclass and works pretty well with all partymembers who target fortitude and/or will defenses a lot (barbs, monks, ciphers). It is also viable for a solo game. It combines the priest's superb (self-)buffing abilities with a decent melee performance. Keep in mind that I never focus solely on power, but also on style. So it might be that there's room for optimization concerning equipment, dps, cc, whatever. I just wanted to deliver a complete package that not only satisfies the powergamer, but also the roleplayer and the Karl Lagerfeld inside of us.

 

Normally I try to craft builds that you can also use with the official companions - this is none of them. Durance Durance doesn't say a prayer now, he saves it for the playthrough after...

 

Instead, I strongly recommend that this build will be used by the main character since it's quite evil and can profit from all the talents that you can get if you're cruel.

 

Normally I don't recommend enchanting to superb gear when I do builds - but since this one is supposed to be the main char I used all the dragon stuff for it. You don't need to do that of course.

 

Parts of this build were discussed a lot in this forum. Most ideas are not originally mine - I just put them toghether, mixed in some style aspects, used this build in a playthrough and wrote this text. So thanks for all the great ideas guys! 

 

This char is an evil priest of Skaen. The idea is that he's sort of a torturer/inquisitor/assassin kind of guy on behalf of Skaen. 

 

Here's what I put together (!=essential, r=recommended):

 

===================================

Schemer's Needler

===================================

Difficulty: PotD

--------------------------------------------------------------

Class: Priest

--------------------------------------------------------------

Race: Hearth Orlan®

--------------------------------------------------------------

Background: Deadfire Archipelago - Mercenary

--------------------------------------------------------------

Stats:

MIG: 13

CON: 10

DEX: 15 (r or higher)

PER: 17 (! or higher)

INT: 15

RES: 8

--------------------------------------------------------------

Skills: Stealth/Lore/Athletics (nothing special, max Mechanics if you like)

--------------------------------------------------------------

Abilities/Talents (!=essential, r=recommended):

Minor Threat

Holy Radiance

Flick of the Wrist ®

Blooded Hunter

Song of the Heavens

Dungeon Delver ®

Gift from the Machine®

Dozens Luck

The Merciless Hand ®

Skaen's Boon (of course )

Effigy's Resentment: Sagani ®

Prey on the Weak (!)

Apprentice's Sneak Attack (!)

Weapon Focus Ruffian (!)

Vulnerable Attack ®

Interdiction (!)

Painful Interdiction (!)

Two Weapon Style ®

 

---------------------------------------------------------------

 

Items (* = additional echantments by me; ! = essential, r = recommended):

 

Weapon set 1: Azureith's Stiletto ® (Durgan Refined*, Shocking Lash*, Superb*), Exceptional Stiletto (Durgan Refined*, Shocking Lash*, Kith-Slaying*)

Weapon set 2: Bleak Fang ® (Durgan Refined*, Superb*), Misery's End (Durgan Refined*, Superb*) OR

 

Blesca's Labour & Dîal Ewn Dibita OR a mix of that - for example a club and a stiletto - although that looks a bit weird.

 

Boots: Glanfathan Stalking Boots

 

Head: Dunryd Demon OR Footpad's Hood OR Helmet of Darksee OR Azalin's Helmet ®

 

Armor: Scales of the Raven ® (Pierce-Proofed*, Durgan Reinforced*, Superb*)

 

Neck: Finreah's Grace

 

Belt: Coil of Resourcefulness ®

 

Rings: Ring of Protection, Ring of Deflection

 

Hands: Gauntlets of Accuracy

 

Quick slots: healing potions, summons, scrolls

 

---------------------------------------------------------------

 

Where to start?

 

With this setup you can stack +20 accuracy for your stilettos and +21 for your clubs. That's because Prey on the Weak gives you +10 with stilettos/clubs, Weapon Focus Ruffian another +6 and finally Flick of the Wrist will add +4 on top of that, but only for stilettos. The clubs have an inherent +5 bonus though. On top of that you have blessing and all the other spells for further buffing your accuracy. Since you start with 20 base accuracy only, +10 from Prey on the Weak is not as much as it sounds, but it puts you on a level with rogues, fighters and so on at the cost of a talent.

 

Prey on the Weak also gives you a baby sneak attack that stacks with Apprentice's Sneak Attack. Together you get +35% damage bonus if the target has one of the known afflictions. That's not superpowerful, but not bad. We can stack sneak attack damage bonus further by putting on Glanfathan Stalking Boots (+10%) and using vicious weapons (+20%) which leaves us at +45/+65% sneak attack damage bonus. That's better. Ok, we now surely want to cause an affliction to apply that damage bonus. We'll come to that later.

 

Stilettos have low base damage, but are fast and have an inherent DR bypass of 3. Add Vuln. Attack and you will have 8 points of DR bypass. DR bypass really shines if you hit fast. Luckily stilettos are fast. Boost that further with Two Weapon Style and items that give a bonus to DEX, for example Finreah's Grace (+3). If you ever find them, Gauntlets of Swift Action would be great - I never ever found them though. 

 

Another thing about stilettos is that there are two of them in the game that have a very nice spell striking enchantment. Jolting Touch (Azureith's Stiletto) and Touch of Rot (Bleak Fang) are pretty powerful and will be cast if you crit a foe. I put Azureith's in the first weapon slot, together with a generic stiletto, until Jolting Touch triggers. I do that at the beginning of the encounter because I want to hit the mobs as soon as possible with Jolting Touch when there's plenty of them. Then I switch to weapon set 2 (because a discharged Azureith's is not so great) where I have Bleak Fang and Misery's End. The latter is vicious, Bleak Fang not only triggers Touch of Rot, but also has the rending enchantment, which leads to a DR bypass of 11, which is awesome. Because I use the Coil of Reourcefulness, not only our traps (and maybe seals?) have +15 ACC, but also our weapon switching costs less time. It's not as fast as quick switch, but nearly. With this item we spare a talent point.

 

You can also put both spell striking stilettos into weapon set 1 and wait till both spells triggered before you switch to Misery's End and Dîal Ewn Dibita for dual visciousness. If you want draining, put Blesca's Labour and Oidreacht in weapon slot two and leech endurance (also nice). I also can imagine that Nightshroud is cool. 10% chance to cause Blind and 15% chance to cast Barbs of Condemnation per hit is nothing to sneeze at - especially if you hit fast. I just did not test if Prey on the Weak also applies to soulbound weapons (Flick of the Wrist does). If I can confirm that I will update this build and put Nightshroud in. It totally fits the theme of the character. Another option would be The Grey Sleeper with Two Handed Style.

 

I had luck and found some Gauntlets of Accuracy. Very useful for this build because of the following:

 

So, you want not only to do sneak attacks, you also want to crit a lot because of the spell strikings. That's why I chose a Hearth Orlan. If you want you can team up with the Dozens and get the Mob Justice talent for +4 ACC when attacking the same target as a teammate. If you plan to use Blesca's Labour that's maybe better than doin' it with the Doemenels: the Coordinating enchantment of Labour and Mob Justice stack for +8 ACC (+29 altogether). Anyway, I chose the Doemenels: if I'm going to crit a lot in order to trigger spell strikings, I might also cause more crit damage on top of that. Adding Dungeon Delver and Azalin's Helmet give us +0.5 crit damage bonus altogether. Nice! Just too bad we don't have a weapon with annihilation for another +0.5. But maybe that's for another build.

Ok, the melee part is finished and quite solid. The burst damage at the beginning is great, the rest is not "roguelike" but good. That's convenient if you did spend a lot of your spells and don't want to or can't rest. You will still do good damage with your weapons. It's also good for soloing.

Now, how do we cause afflictions for our sneak attacks? That's why I took Painful Interdiction. Every encounter starts with you casting Interdiction on your foes. It's not only fast and has a huge aoe, but it also applies the Weakened status which triggers sneak attacks. Too bad it doesn't last forever (buff the duration with Dunryd Demon or other +INT items if you like), but it's a nice starter and also is great for any teammate who targets will or fortitude. If you have a barb in your party I strongly recommend using Threatening Presence. With a cipher use Secret Horros. Sickened and Weakend stacks to a devastating debuff of will/fortitude defenses (-34/-42). This is the only valid use case for Barbarian's Brute Force. Here it really shines! Your barb will be a crit-monster (also carnage-crits) after you cast Painful Interdiction because his Threatening Presence stacks with the Interdiction. Same with the monk's Force of Anguish and Torment's Reach: they will crit a lot. Your cipher's Amplified Waves will hit like trucks and prone for looong time. You see - I'm a huge fan of Painful Interdiction and would also recommend Empowered Interdiction (+10 ACC), but we're short of talent points. Actually I don't recommend Empowered Interdiction because the bonus ACC only works for the daze roll, not the weakening part. Painful Interdiction also fits the whole style of this char. Skaen's Followers have no problem with torturing (just look at the temple under Dyrford Village), so an ability that causes pain is perfect for them.

 

The rest of the priest spells are as always. If you play solo you can self buff yourself into oblivion. This was one of the few characters that could do the bounty quests all alone without usage of scrolls/potions/summons and so on - because the priest's buffs are so awesome and in this case work well together with his melee prowess.

 

Ok, nothing too fancy and cheesy this time - but he was great fun. I wish you the same thing!  

 

Edited February 15, 2021 by Boeroer

[AndreaColombo]

Durance Durance doesn't say a prayer now, he saves it for the playthrough after...

 

I see what you did there.

[Boeroer]

[Harpagornis]

I loved playing a Gnome Cleric/Thief in BG. Buff yourself up and backstab the hell out of the enemies.

Boeroer this build definitely catched me. Will have to try it after my TCS-Druid-Run!

Edited November 22, 2015 by Harpagornis

[Vorad]

Nice build especially for soloing! Hopefully we can see more interesting clubs on next part of white march. Just a quick notice regarding "Empowered Interdiction" the +10 works only for the daze part of the spell and not for the weaken. I used to run it a lot on my priest and a few days ago I noticed it doesn't work as I thought it would so I have dropped it.

[Raven Darkholme]

This really looks like a solo build I'd wanna try.

[Boeroer]

Thanks guys!

[Boeroer]

Nice build especially for soloing! Hopefully we can see more interesting clubs on next part of white march. Just a quick notice regarding "Empowered Interdiction" the +10 works only for the daze part of the spell and not for the weaken. I used to run it a lot on my priest and a few days ago I noticed it doesn't work as I thought it would so I have dropped it.

Very good to know. Thanks a lot!

[L4wlight]

 

Effigy's Resentment: Sagani ®

Stopped here. *joking* Evil you.

 

But it fits into the Skaen theme. ^^

[Boeroer]

If you want her to be in your party you should keep her of course. Sacrifice Kana instead.

Edited November 24, 2015 by Boeroer

[Boeroer]

I found out (and read in the technical discussion forum) that Flick of the Wrist gets suppressed by Prey on the Weak. It's a filed bug now and will likely be fixed, but at the moment it doesn't work. I never noticed this when I was playing this priest build. Maybe this bug only occurred recently, maybe the +4 ACC weren't noticable at all in the first place (after you get 90+ ACC, you don't really feel the difference any more). I just wanted you to know that at the moment you don't have to spend hours on a game named "Orlan's Head Save & Reload Mayhem".

Edited December 10, 2015 by Boeroer

[Boeroer]

Flick of the Wrist works with Prey on the Weak in 3.0. 

[Lipschitz]

Hello! Long time lurker, first time commentator here.

Love your builds, Boeroer. I have to say. Amazing stuff!

Doing my first full real playthrough of the game right now (I'm a bit of a Noob so will probably only go for Normal or Hard for now), but seriously considering this build for my main (Scheemers Needler).

A couple of questions though.

1, I can't seem to match your stat allocation, I always end up with 12 Int (Missing 3 total points), am I missing something here?

2, Does this build still work with the latest patch? Any new items I should possibly be aware of or new enchants etc? New quests that give talents?

3, Where did you get your gorgeous bearded dark-skinned Orlan portrait you use as an avatar?

Thanks! You're the best.

[Boeroer]

Thanks a lot.

 

1.: Sometimes I forget that I've had a resting bonus from Caed Nua when pinning down the stats at the end of the game. This happened here as well, I'm sorry. Nobody found out yet. 15 PER is also ok. Or 16 PER and 15 DEX and so on - what you like. It doesn't matter that much after some levels.

2.: I think it would still work. If you find better items you should use those of course. Soulbound items alsways use the weapons focus of xour choice, so it's easy to use them and replace your old weapons with them.

3.: I made it myself with The Gimp. Used the red haired orlan from the official portraits as a starting point.

 

p.s.: Ouh... "the best"? Nobody called me that before. Nice! 

Edited February 29, 2016 by Boeroer

[ottffsse]

The way I have my dual wield skaen priest survive and thrive in the front lines now is by putting pallegina's defiant breastplate on him and giving him shod in faith (he is ideally positioned for it since he is always just between my front line and back ranks usually), blesca's labor and olgreich stiletto or whatever it's called but you get it in od nua level 1. Both weapons have draining property. As for helm probably he carries many scars helm.

[Boeroer]

Why Palleginas Breastplate? It gives you +50% DR when your health (not endurance) drops below 25%. I find this to be quite underwhelming most of the time. 

[Dorftek]

Love this idea Boerer. Priest is one of few classes haven't really tinkered with yet, I'll give this a try for sure

[Blunderboss]

I was thinking to roll an evil party of stealthy and shady characters ( PoTD ) focusing more on melee ( 4 meele and 2 ranged ) , and i was wondering if i could fit both a melee rogue and skaen priest into it .

Would there be enough items for both considering i use sabres on rogue and stilletos on priest , im more worried about other equipment like helmets gloves and boots i dont want to gimp one of them , i dont mind to do some meta gaming and minmax if needed .

Also cant decide which one should be pc , rogue would beneift more from watcher only talents and abilities but then skaen priest would probably end up very weak , also i am thinking to follow deceiptive cruel agressive and clever dispositions, which pc rogue or priest ( both melee ) would have better suited stats for dialogue checks ?

Edited March 10, 2016 by Blunderboss

[Boeroer]

If you also want to take a Bleak Walker into your evil party (and who doesn't want to do that?) I would recommend making him the PC because of Faith and Conviction and the ideal stat spread for dialogues. And there are two quests which are related to Bleak Walkers - I think you get special dialogue lines if you're one, too. But that's just my taste I guess.

 

Concerning items: there are so many good items now that I really can't decide what to wear and what not. So I don't think you will have a problem with item shortage.

 

A priest will never be weak just because he isn't the MC. The later the game the more he will cast and the less he will attack in melee. Those few PC talents don't make a huge difference. But of course - +0.3 crit damage multiplier is nice. But a priest is OK without it. A rogue may cry though.

[Blunderboss]

hehe i was thinking to have a paladin tank , but im not sure if i want another pc paladin , does faith and conviction scale on companions ? Havent played since before White March expansion and a lot seems to have changed for better . Last time i had paladin main character it was pretty boring as he mostly did the tanking and buffing ( Darcozzi ) and wasnt in action much , well not as much as other characters , i like the low maintenance part of paladin tank but not for main character , also paladin im thinking about for my party would be tank and buffer ( maybe a bit of healing but not kind wayfarers obviously ) so not sure if bleak walkers will give any benefit as he wont do much killing cant really decide on paladin order here , and i could opt in for any out of these 3 bleak walkers goldpact or darcozzi

[Braven]

If you want to truly have an evil character, kill off the entire caravan in the prologue (I recommend killing off your fighter companion first while she is still in your party and fighting at a choke point)    Some funny things happen.  Also, it is a quick way to get a "Cruel" reputation bump.

Edited March 10, 2016 by Braven

[Boeroer]

And it's really, really hard in PoTD if you're not a monk, ranger or wizard.

[Boeroer]

hehe i was thinking to have a paladin tank , but im not sure if i want another pc paladin , does faith and conviction scale on companions ? Havent played since before White March expansion and a lot seems to have changed for better . Last time i had paladin main character it was pretty boring as he mostly did the tanking and buffing ( Darcozzi ) and wasnt in action much , well not as much as other characters , i like the low maintenance part of paladin tank but not for main character , also paladin im thinking about for my party would be tank and buffer ( maybe a bit of healing but not kind wayfarers obviously ) so not sure if bleak walkers will give any benefit as he wont do much killing cant really decide on paladin order here , and i could opt in for any out of these 3 bleak walkers goldpact or darcozzi

Faith and Conviction on companions/hirelings now scales with level. It's ok.

 

Well, I use to give my MC paladins four weapon slots, three guns and a shield setup and Quick Switch. That way they do some nice, serious burst damage with FoD shots and can tank and support like ever. That's a lot of micromanagement - a bit too much for my taste. But it's so effective.

Edited March 10, 2016 by Boeroer

[Braven]

And it's really, really hard in PoTD if you're not a monk, ranger or wizard.

 

True, and the deflection nerf for paladin probably didn't help them out any here and I only ever tried on normal (which wasn't too hard; I don't think I even used a potion). Priests are pretty weak at level 1, so I imagine it would not be a pleasant experience.  There are chokes where you can fight them one at a time.  The only worthy opponents is the caravan leader and the rogue.

Edited March 10, 2016 by Braven

[Blunderboss]

 

hehe i was thinking to have a paladin tank , but im not sure if i want another pc paladin , does faith and conviction scale on companions ? Havent played since before White March expansion and a lot seems to have changed for better . Last time i had paladin main character it was pretty boring as he mostly did the tanking and buffing ( Darcozzi ) and wasnt in action much , well not as much as other characters , i like the low maintenance part of paladin tank but not for main character , also paladin im thinking about for my party would be tank and buffer ( maybe a bit of healing but not kind wayfarers obviously ) so not sure if bleak walkers will give any benefit as he wont do much killing cant really decide on paladin order here , and i could opt in for any out of these 3 bleak walkers goldpact or darcozzi

 

Faith and Conviction on companions/hirelings now scales with level. It's ok.

 

Well, I use to give my MC paladins four weapon slots, three guns and a shield setup and Quick Switch. That way they do some nice, serious burst damage with FoD shots and can tank and support like ever. That's a lot of micromanagement - a bit too much for my taste. But it's so effective.

I am already going with quickswitch on another character , so thats not an option , would non MC paladin using 1h+shield have enough killing power to finish of low hp enemies ( death godlike maybe , how bad is no helm penalty for a tank ) ? Then i could probably go bleak walker to fit my party style . I am planing on using two tanks fighter main tank and paladin , also two melees a rogue and a skaen priest ( i was thinking to start more as normal priest and transition into melee after defiance bay) and two ranged characters .