Advices on class for a new player

[Gorrath]

Hello,

 

I just bought the game and made a few google searches to find some infos about which classes are currently the best but most of the threads I find are old threads talking about the broken Cypher, but it seems like there's been a bunch of patchs since then.

 

Anyone could give me some pros/cons of the current classes?

 

Or give me a link to some builds that are based on the most recent patches?

 

Thanks for your help

[DreamWayfarer]

Welcome, and I hope you enjoy the game.

While I can't post links because I am posting from my smartphone, you shouldn't have much trouble looking for builds in this subforum, like KDbuya's Lady of Pain(original post may be outdated, look further in the thread), AndreaColombo's Juggernaut Monk and anything by Boeroer, the restless builder.

 

As for the classes, most are viable and quite effective even if not built perfectly, and min-maxing is unnecessary if playing with a full party. The fun is making the classes work outside of their intended roles.

 

Also, some quicky tips:

 

Don't use the MMO tatic of zero-damage tanks, as mobs will just run past them. Try to have at least three chars that can form a frontline or no frail characters or a lot of control abilities so your backline won't die. Or maybe just build a full melee team.

 

Chanters, the bard equivalent in PoEt, get more useful the highter the difficulty since they need time to build up power, but are always useful since they passively buff your party while tanking or dealing damage.

 

Wizards are generaly better as controllers than pure damage dealers, unless you make them use self-buffs and whack heads with conjured weapons.

 

Barbarians are generaly poor tanks, despite their big endurance pool.

 

Many Ranger skills work with melee weapons, and while their pets are poor tanks, they can be good damage dealers.

 

Monks are awesome.

 

NPC paladins(and priests) don't get the defence(or healing radius) bonus for choosing dialogue options related to their order's ideology. Otherwise, Paladins are awesome.

 

There is much more, but I leave that to more experienced folks.

 

 

EDIT: Ciphers: they still have some overpowered skills, but are a generaly balanced class if you don't pick them.

Edited December 29, 2015 by DreamWayfarer

[Mocker22]

Wayfarer made some good general points about party-building.

 

BTW, Andrea = Lady of Pain, and KDbuya is Juggernaut monk. Might make looking easier.

 

In my opinion most classes can be very powerful, although Chanters are a bit underpowered. They can do some cool stuff but feel horribly slow and boring to play for me personally. If you have any classes that sound very interesting start with that. You can find builds that will be powerful for them all.

 

For your first 1-2 playthrough's I would enjoy whatever class and companions speak to you and then start to worry about powerful builds and hirelings for Path of the Damned. Focus on learning as much as you can about the different spells available. A well played wizard, or a lot of priest buffs can be a total game changer.

 

Also, it is KEY to have balance in a group. While pure melee, or pure caster groups, etc are viable and can be fun, at this point I think you should find balance.

[PrimeJunta]

Look for posts by @Boeroer and @Torm51. They've got tons of highly effective builds, ranging from the sensible (Darcozzi Forward Observer) to absurd (barbarian raging away with a magic rapier which steals status effects to make its Rage, Defiance, plus any other buffs you want to stack on it to last through the entire fight).

 

My personal take? All of the classes are good, and build optimisation isn't ultra-critical (although it most definitely makes a difference). Tactics matter more: how to keep your squishies from getting squished, how to get through enemy defences. And for that, crowd control is king.

[Boeroer]

I agree that knowledge about the combat mechanics and a solid tactic is way more powerful than any build. And a good party composition is more important than a single build.

 

I would always choose the class or build that provides the most fun for me. For example I love the barb because of his carnage AoE ability and what you can do with it in combination with items, abilities and so on. But I also like monks, paladins, rangers and ciphers a lot. That doesn't mean the oher classes are bad - I just don't enjoy them as much. That changes over time. At the beginning I hated paladins and rangers for example. Can't say why. 

 

Some classes can be very diverse when it comes to builds (barb, monk, rogue, fighter, paladin), others a little less (ranger, cipher, priest) and chanter, wizard and druid are the most difficult to "twist" (at least for me) because they have few individual talents and their abilities are mainly their spells.

 

If you don't like to micromanage every char then I don't recommend too many casters. You might want to use Chanters, Paladins and Fighters because they are useful even when you don't give them orders all the time. Other classes can be build into good "drones" as well (ranger, monk, sturdy rogue, barb). Then spice that with one or two powerful casters that you can focus your micromanagement on. For example a priest and a cipher or a wizard and a druid. That's how I do it most of the time. I find heavy micromanagement to be tedious.

 

If you love micromanagement and power then the casters might be your thing. They all are capable of controlling crowds and doing lots of AoE damage. Wizards, priests and ciphers can be good frontliners as long as they have spells left - even the druid with his Spiritshift can go melee (but in my opinion the duration of that ability is waaay too short, at least for PotD). A melee cipher for example does awesome weapon damage and is still able to cast powerful CC and DPS spells. You can build him to be sturdy.

Edited December 29, 2015 by Boeroer

[HawkSoft]

I found a paladin to be a good learning character, they play somewhat like clerics (decent all-rounders) from the old Balders Gate games rather than being holier-than-thou types.

 

Boeroer talks about party composition being more important than character builds, I agree, even on normal you need to adjust your tactics and possibly load-outs to suit you party. However I think that almost any mixed class party CAN be viable on normal with suitable tactics.

 

Don't be ashamed of playing a few scenes on easy until you get the hand of things, my first two parties got wiped out early in the story.

[PrimeJunta]

Yeah. IME tactics are where it's at. I've experimented with a whole bunch of parties, from traditional to themed to single-class only, and all of them work, you just have to find the right way to play them. The really weird ones usually end up being laughably easy most of the time, and then hitting a brick wall of difficulty when first encountering something they can't deal with (but usually there are consumables that will get that job done).

 

(Case in point: the all-ranger party. Select-all plus auto-attack will turn almost everything into a bloody paste really quickly, but when they first encounter ogre druids... owie.)

Edited December 29, 2015 by PrimeJunta

[Gorrath]

Thanks for all the advices.

 

I know good tactics is important but what happens to me sometimes is that after playing for a while, you keep reading stuff and end up learning that you could have made a better build for your character. When this happens, even if I'm doing ok with my current character, I get pissed cuz I know he could have been better. Since I don't usually make a second playtrough, I like having the most optimized toon on my first and only playthrough.

[Boeroer]

What I forgot: Don't be put off if you think that the beginning of the game is difficult. It's the hardest part actually - if you can make it to Act II you're good. 

[Mocker22]

Gorrath what type of class do you normally play, or want to play in PoE, so we can suggest a build. Do you want super high dmg output, if so from what type of char. Do you like spellcasting, etc. This is definitely a game that does not have one clear cut omgwtfpwnt class.

[HawkSoft]

I know good tactics is important but what happens to me sometimes is that after playing for a while, you keep reading stuff and end up learning that you could have made a better build for your character. When this happens, even if I'm doing ok with my current character, I get pissed cuz I know he could have been better. Since I don't usually make a second playtrough, I like having the most optimized toon on my first and only playthrough.

In my opinion PoE is worth more than one play-through, there's so much to explore and do. Plus it takes time for all the lore to sink in and make the setting come to life.

 

If you are expecting to run with an optimised party I think you might be better off playing a more mechanistic game or one where the story is less important.

My current choices in those categories are Torchlight 2 and Icewind Dale.

 

I don't believe there is such a thing as an optimised character or party build in PoE, my advice is to award yourself a *game off* and play on normal making intuitive decisions based on the story rather than on numerical analysis of the system.

 

 

You can still come back to the game and do an *optimised* run later, once you have finished experiencing the story…

[Benedictous]

"Chanter" said NO ONE lol

[Benedictous]

Gorrath what type of class do you normally play, or want to play in PoE, so we can suggest a build. Do you want super high dmg output, if so from what type of char. Do you like spellcasting, etc. This is definitely a game that does not have one clear cut omgwtfpwnt class.

Except Wizards. Wizards are gods

[Boeroer]

^ Not for everyone. If you want to rest after each encounter, they are very powerful - like priest and druids, too.

I hate to rest a lot - so they seem to be quite ungodly to me. I have to admit that lvl 9 solves this problem.

 

I like chanters. Easy to play and low mainteneance. They perform better on PotD because all fights tend to last longer. And as soon as you can get "The Dragon Slashed, the Dragon Wailed" they turn into great damage dealers. 6 of them is actually a very strong party.

Edited December 30, 2015 by Boeroer