[CLASS BUILD] The Anvil, the most tough monk around

[Smelyansky]

There's no earlier save game to come back to? I'd advise against it. It's a nice bonus, but it's not game breaking. Keep playing, you'll need to figure things out anyway if you intend to try the ultimate achievement later on. Restarting the whole game does not appear useful to me because of a single minor ability.

No, I'm already doing this solo run toward ultimate haha. But yeah I'll keep playing then

[Smelyansky]

Sorry for yet another post here. Would it be okay to go Knights instead of the crit passive? 2 dr vs .3 crit. Wouldn't the DR make me harder to kill which means more bite backs?

[Dr <3]

With iron will you will sit with a +10 dr bonus all the time, you don't really need the +2. i think that the droemel talent is by far the better.

Sorry for no answer before, but the beta of poe 2 is out, gotta some work to do

[Smelyansky]

With iron will you will sit with a +10 dr bonus all the time, you don't really need the +2. i think that the droemel talent is by far the better.

Sorry for no answer before, but the beta of poe 2 is out, gotta some work to do

Awesome, thank you. I hope this build can work in the poe 2!

[Smelyansky]

Sorry for another post by me, but where exactly can I buy flame shield potions?

[r2d23]

You need to craft them.

[Smelyansky]

If my goal is the Ultimate, should I upscale the content when I start White March?

[r2d23]

No, upscaling is not needed for the achievement. Only if you want the extra challenge.

[Smelyansky]

Thanks a lot. What level should I start doing Bounties? I tried the Dweller but he destorys me. Want to do the Bounties so that I can eventually get access to Coat of Ill payment.

[Dr <3]

Coat of ill payment is not a priority. Go act 3 and grab blood testament gloves, bonus talents, ecc. No need to rush the bounties. Usa a plate in the meantime ( es: sanguine plate)

[Archaven]

Can i ask why Dex of 4? Won't it be that he's not going to hit anything?

[Dr <3]

Can i ask why Dex of 4? Won't it be that he's not going to hit anything?

- dex 4 because torment reach is a full attack ad is easily spammable, moreover retaliation doesn't care about attack speed at all. The only problem is the slower animation drinking potion, nothing else

- we also need a dump stat for pump cons & str to the top. Also all other attributes have higher priority than dex

[Archaven]

 

Can i ask why Dex of 4? Won't it be that he's not going to hit anything?

- dex 4 because torment reach is a full attack ad is easily spammable, moreover retaliation doesn't care about attack speed at all. The only problem is the slower animation drinking potion, nothing else

- we also need a dump stat for pump cons & str to the top. Also all other attributes have higher priority than dex

 

 

was wondering with a dex of 4, would the casting animation of torment's reach or other abilities really slow? most monks build are retaliation builds. are there ones that relies on high dex? is the only optimal way to play as a monk is a retaliation build?

[Dr <3]

No, monk is super strong in many ways. If you want to go full dps, high migh, dex & per coupled with bonus lashes do wonders. Or using long pain from the distance. You can have an idea looking at "the wich doctor" or "monksterlash" build from the always good Boerer.

 

Yes, with 4 dex animation is a bit slower but using full attacks all time you will not be gimped too much. Anyway is also a matter of taste: you can also go with an higher dex lowering some other stat, but my idea was focusing on max const and max might, so i had to took some stat point somewhere.

 

This build is in many ways not optimal, it was only optimizad by my personal taste for a solo run, and turned out to be quite powerful.

[bigwillystyle]

Well Dr <3 haven't played in a while.  But I loaded things up to try out the new DLC items, and I have to say the belt is great on the Anvil.  Fireshield basically on demand instead of with a potion?  And subject to INT?  It's like candy on Christmas.  

[Dr <3]

Yes an op item on an op build

[Dorftek]

He was just a poor fire godlike slave from the far Ratatuai lands, since one day something new happened... His boss beated him a bit too much, and his body started to glow like fused iron! His boss panicked and started to hit him even harder, and in a few seconds he was completely carbonized. So he ran away seeking his own liberty, and decided that killing while being hit will became his main business in life.

 

Picture2.gif

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The ANVIL (beacause he got beaten like that)

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Difficulty: PotD v. 3.05 (solo or party)

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Class: Monk

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Race: Fire Godlike

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Background: Ratatuai - Slave (!)

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Stats: (base)

MIG: 18 (+1 from gift of the machine) --> 19

CON: 18 (+ 1 ratatuai, +1 Rymgrand boon, +4 iron circle, +2 yen wisper sword, + 3 caed nua resting bonus, +2 food, ev +1 from durance in the pool) --> up to 32

DEX: 4

PER: 15

INT: 15

RES: 7 (+1 weapon, +2 armour)

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Skills:

Stealth 3 (0 base; +1 monk, +1 blooded hunter, +1 dungeon delver)

Athl. 9 (3 base, +1 monk, +1 slave, +2 long march boots, +2 caed nua resting bonus),

Lore 0,

Mech. 9 (8 base, +1 dungeon delver, + 2 with mechanical gloves on demand),

Surv. 12 (9 base, +1 slave + 1 monk, +1 Rymgrand boon , +2 on demand with sanguine plate)

 

note: slave is an important background,since with this array + story talents we can reach:

11 mechanichs when need (so we can discover all the march steel lingots and disarm nearly all traps)

14 survival befor resting (so we have access to healing mod + 60%)

higher atletism as possible (good free heal every fight, expecially when combined with +60% healing resting bonus)

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Talents (a=auto, r=recommended, !=important)

Veteran recovery (!) --> absolutely the first thing to pick

Vulnerable attack (!) --> absolutely the second thing to pick, since the only retaliation we have in the beginning is battle forged, and the damage in the eraly levels is so wimpy that gets all eaten by armours, without this talent

Scion of flame (!)

Gallant focus

Cautios attack

Bear fortitude

Apprentice sneak attack

Body control / wound binding / whatever

 

+ story talents : dungeon delver (!), merciless hand, rymgrand boon (!), gift machine (!), blooded hunter, heaven song, eventually trow durance in the pool ®

Abilities

Transcendent Suffering 4 (a)

Battle forged (a)

Torment's Reach (!)

Turning wheel (!)

Soul mirror

Rooting pain (!)

Duality mortal prsence

Crucible of suffering

Iron wheel (!)

Weakening blows / Flagellant path

Second Whind (a)

 

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Items (!=important, r=recommended):

 

Weapon set 1: Yen wispers sword + Steadfast (or doubled Yen whisper with helwax mold if playing with party)

Weapon Set 2: Fists OR double torch for fun

 

Boots: Shood of faith / long march boots

 

Head: n/a

 

Armor: Plate --> Sanguine plate --> Coat of ill Payment (!) or Ryona Brestplate in super late game

 

Neck: protection mantle (+9 to all defs) or Hiros mantle if wearing Ryona brastplate

 

Belt: Girdle of mortal protection (!) / Looped rope (vs booses) / Binding rope (if not solo)

 

Rings: at start: ring of sering flames (!), ring of protection-deflection, late game : Iron circle (!) + ring of deflection/protection OR still ring of sering flames;

 

Hands: Blood Testment ® or Ryona vambraces or gauntlets of accuracy

 

Quick slots: Potion of flame shield (!); potion of healing, potion of infuse vital essence (if you want to skip resting)

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Hi again!

This is my personal spinoff guide of the valiant monksterslash by Boeroer!

 

The guide is based on my solo run, but can work greatly also in a party, in the case a priest or a paladin for emergency heal will be your best friends.

 

The plan is to compress as much constitution and defence to obtain a very sturdy char that kills by retaliation effects.

From lvl 4 it is actually unbelievably strong, and see enemies burning to death while trying to kill you make me laugh more than it should.

At max lvl we can reach about 600 hp (or anyway more than 500 when not fully buffed), that means that at HALF LIFE we STILL HAVE between 300 and 250 hp, wich is the value of a "normal" tank hp (and usually in the middle of the combat we will also have between 30 and 40 DR). This, paired with monk's natural boosted defences and our healing effects (veteran recovery and shood of faith) boosted by the rest bonus make you very hard to kill.

Actually the boots of long march are better than shood of faith, since we need to reach half life to activate battle forged and start kicking ass, and the shood can "overheal" you and be less beneficial than though.

Dex is at minimum since we will have unlimited wounds to spam torment reach all day long, which is a full attack.

 

 

Our "retaliations":

- battle forged : this is the strongest one. At max lvl we have 32 base dmg (41 with our strenght). Adding the mods from scion of flame, turning wheel lash, testament gloves lash you can reach about 100 dmg every time you get hit, about 130 if you manage to crit.

WORK WITH : turning weel, blood testament gloves, vulnerable attack, weakening strykes (apply weaken),

DOESN'T WORK WITH: apprentice sneack attack ( so sad ) , savage attack

- Item retaliation (coat of ill payment/ Hiros mantle)

WORK WITH: turning weel, blood testament gloves, vulnerable attack, weakening strykes (apply weaken), apprentice sneack attack

DOESN'T WORK WITH: savage attack

- flame shield (potion)

WORK WITH: turning weel, blood testament gloves, vulnerable attack, weakening strykes (apply weaken), apprentice sneack attack

DOESN'T WORK WITH: savage attack

- rooting pain : 12-19 dmg in aoe every time i got 10 dmg? very strong! But consider that in late lvl the huge armor on every enemy

WORK WITH: n.a.

DOESN'T WORK WITH: turning weel, blood testament gloves, vulnerable attack, weakening strykes (apply weaken), apprentice sneack attack, savage attack

 

(note : At the beginning of the game you can also use sura supper plate to add another retaliation effect that stacks with all the others.)

 

At the end of the game (lvl 16) the relative accuracy are:

- battle forged : 100 accuracy vs deflection (burn dmg)

- item retaliation : 84 accuracy vs deflection (pierce dmg)

- flame shield : 110 accuracy vs reflex (burn dmg)

- rooting pain : 100 accuracy vs fortitude (crush dmg)

 

 

Some notes:

- weakening stikes apply weaken quite often. This is good for us, since it means +15% dmg for our normal strikes and most of our retaliation (too bad it didn't work for battle forged). Moreover it helps a bit with landing rooting pain hits (since it hits fortutude).

- our atletism + healing multiplier heals for more than 100 hp, so is like to have a free big violet potion every combat (ctually with +60% heal modifier big violet potion heals us for about 160 hp)

- we can reach in combat between 30 and 40 DR, so the girdle of mortal protection do a great job for us, since he take care of the spike of dmg that can fly high over our DR.

 

 

EDITS:

 

1) Some loot in the beginning

At the start of the game we need to grab asap the following items:

- Rymgrand mantle : gilded vale tavern, day 2 --> thank to this we can kill all the shadows and spectres in the main all simply by our retaliation (if we are at least lvl 4 and have vulnerable attack). Really, see shadows and spectres dying while you are permastunned is hilarous.

- Gloves of manipulation : Roedric keep in the chest of the bedroom, day 4 --> when soloing mechanics is never high enough

- Ring of sering flames : Roedric keep in the hidden stash near the cell of the guy you have to free, day 4 --> see next point

 

2) About Ring of Sering Flames

This items is super strong with this build, and need a dedicated space.

Combusting wounds gets triggered by : standard attacks, targets caught in the cone of torment reach (!), targets caught in the AoE of rooting pain (!), target hit by our retaliations (items [up to 2 if you use also sura supper plate], battle forged, flame shield).

So as you can see you can easily just run in the middle of the fight, get completely surrounded, cast combusting wounds and watch people burning to death. It is strong from the beginning to the end of the game, because as the game progress we can stack up more and more retaliation effect, multiplying the triggers. And you can find during your run 3 or 4 of these, so you will never run out of the spell (you can change an "empty" ring with a full one before a fight).

Actually you can even substitute weakening blows with flagellant path to teleport yourself just in the middle of the fight to ease the process.

The only "problem" is that the spell targets endurance (usually the most high defense around), so against very tough targets is better to cast it AFTER pumping our accuracy (eldrich aim potion or similar effects)

 

3) Rooting pain DO NOT "transport" effect like weakening ecc to more enemies

 

 

 

Q&A

 

Boeroer:

You didn't say anything about Combusting Wounds + Rooting Pain (you have the Ring of Searing Flames). In theory it should be pretty powerful. If you catch 10 wounds that would mean 10 parallel CW DoTs in an AoE. Or doesn't Rooting Pain trigger CW? Would be too bad...

 

Did you ever experience that Rooting Pain's AoE accidentally "transports" effects like prone or weakening in an AoE?

 

updated

This is really cool thank u for sharing!

[Dr <3]

No, actually is only very hot!

[RonSonite]

Heya!

 

I have to say that I'm not that experienced in the game (mechanics etc.) but I would really like to do a solo run now.

 

Do you recommend your build for me?

 

Or are there other solo builds around which would be better for me?

 

Thanks so far man!

 

Edit: How difficult is it to reach the items on day 4?

Edited December 5, 2017 by RonSonite

[Dr <3]

Is a good build, if you want to try a solo you can start with this, a chanter based on high defenses and sweet winds/dragon trashed or a wizard with conjured weapon chillfog early.

 

Is not difficult to reach the item by day 4. Just don't slay the caravan and take calisca and heoden with you for the prologue. Rest the 1 time when you reach valevood. Here you can save the cook and go asap to gilded vale. In gilded vale go to the tavern, go upstair and check the first armchair: if rymgrand cloack : ok. If something else, reload, go downstair, sleep 1 night (take the +1 mech bonus) go back. Do the mill quest and kill moon goodlike at the temple for the plate. Now you are lvl 3. Go to roedric hold without do useless fights. Climb the wall. Sleep another time to get rid of the fatigue effect. You should still have the +1 mech bonus ( you need 4 or 5 mech total). Hide yorself, buff with all the food you have, take the attention of the first guard going to north ( you can't sneack past this one). Run back to the wall and kill the guard ( this is the only real fight you have to do). After kill the guard sneak past the patrolling archer and reach the temple. Swich armor with a priest robe. Sneak to nedmar. Take the "quest" to free giacco. Now search on the floor to the bishop/paladin chief and say them you are new here, so you can go back upstair without changing armor again. Go downstair x2 via kichen. Take the lower corridor, disable traps, barricade yourself in the door and kill the undeads. Free Giacco. Go to nedmar again. Save. Now go downstair to roedric via nedmar key corridor. Go straight to roedric room. Search for teaps, open the cask. If glowes of manipulation : ok. If not: reload and sleep 1 day nedmar. Repeat until you find the right gloves ( should be on day 4). On same day go back to the cellar, in 1 prison cell there is hidden stash with a ring of searing flames.

 

Now you have all you need for start the game.

[Dreamsickle]

Hello!

 

I recently purchased the Hero Edition of Pillars of Eternity on Steam and I'm really interested in this build.  Reading through the guide I'm confused as several of the skills and talents listed don't appear when leveling up my character; do I need the White March expansions?

 

Could you list the abilities and talents in order of level?

 

EDIT:  I'm just confused as the guide mentions talents like Apprentice's Sneak Attack, Veteran Recovery and Vulnerable Attack.  None of which I see as a possible choice when choosing abilities and talents upon leveling.

 

 

Thanks!

Edited December 26, 2017 by Dreamsickle

[Dr <3]

Apprentice sneak attack and veteran recovery are "cross class talents" introduced in white march. Vulnerable attack should be aviable from lvl 4 lvl up ( not from lvl 2). Is in the first label of talents. For poe 1 the build should work also without the first two talents, just make sure to buy the shood in faith boots from crucible knight merchant and have some potions.

[Dreamsickle]

Thanks for the tip!  I will buy the boots, but right now I'm struggling with the phantasms in Caed Nua so I can't even get to Defiance Bay.  They stun-lock me until I die even with Bear's Fortitude and it appears the problem isn't even endurance, it's health.  I run out of health before I run out of endurance. 

 

I'm level 4 and have the Gloves of Manipulation, Rymrgand's Mantle, Ring of Searing Flames, Plate armor, Minor Ring of Deflection, Blunting Belt and Whispers of Yenwood.  Should I put a shield on just for the extra DR?

[Dr <3]

If you search previous comments i described exactly how to do it

[Dreamsickle]

On "The Forgotten" fight; how do you get the melees separated from the casters?  I always seem to get 2 of the melees to split but not the other two, which means the 2 casters kill me without effort. 

 

Perhaps its a fight meant for a level higher than 6?