[CLASS BUILD] The Unstoppable Wave (Siege Breaker Fighter)

[Elric Galad]

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The Unstoppable Wave

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Difficulty: PotD v. 3.05

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Class: Fighter

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Race: Coastal Aumaua

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Background: Deadfire Archipelago - Aristocrat

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Stats:

MIG: 16

CON: 10

DEX: 12

PER: 16

INT: 14

RES: 10

Note: I'm not a min-maxer, and I didn't count special talents for a main character.

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Skills:

7+ Survival ®

10+ Lore (!)

A bit of stealth and athletics are always good to have.

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

Two Weapon Style (!)

Vulnerable Attack ®

Superior Deflection

Bonus Knockdown (!)

Weapon Focus : Ruffian ®

Weapon Mastery : Ruffian ®

Apprentice's Sneak Attack

Spirit of Decay ®

 

Abilities

Constant Recovery (a)

Knockdown (!)

Confident Aim ®

Disciplined Barrage (!)

Armored Grace ®

Weapon Specialization : Ruffian ®

Unbroken

Charge (!)

Triggered Immunity

 

Note: Unbroken and Triggered Immunity are mostly there because I like feeling invincible. This might be too much defense, and they are unecessary for this build.

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Items (*=additional echantments; (!)=important, ®=recommended):

 

Weapon set 1: Bittercut x2 (*Legendary, Corrosive Lash, Durgan Reinforced, Duplicated with Helwax Mold) ®

Weapon Set 2: Abydon's Hammer (!)

 

Boots: Boots of Speed (!)

 

Head: White Crest's Helm

 

Armor: White Crest (*Superb, Durgan Reinforced, PER+2, Crush-Proofed) (!)

 

Neck: Swaddling Sheet (!)

 

Belt: Looped Rope

 

Ring 1: Pensiavi Mes Rèi

Ring 2: Ring of Protection

 

Hands: Siege Breakers ®

 

Quick slots: Scroll(s) of Maelstrom, Scroll(s) Paralysis/Confusion ®, Potion(s) of Major recovery, Potion(s) of Deleterious Alacrity of Motion

 

 

Abilities from items with regular set (feel free to change between battle to get even more per rest casts):

 

Per Encouter:

 

1x Ring of the Ancient Forge

1x Abydon's Labor

1x Overwhelming Wave (triggered on crit, Foe Only)

 

Per Rest:

 

1x Dancing Bolt

4x Vile Thorn (fast cast)

1x Recall Agony

2x Infestation of Maggots (fast cast)

1x Clear Out

1x Overwhelming Wave

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Principle

 

Good Old Fighter...

The plainest of all classes... It does not mean the lamest.

However, it's not that easy to build around them.

 

I had the idea of this build when I realized there was a huge potential with one of fighter's 1st level ability: Disciplined Barrage.

 

Disciplined barrage is an instant +20 accuracy for limited but significant time (15s +Int modifier for something like 20+s)

No other class has something similar that high.

You can get up to +15 from consumables, but that makes a lots of consumables if you want to use this every battle. And that is still not +20 and it is not instant cast.

 

My thought was: What can one do with +20 accuracy and a naturally high basis ?

And my answer was: About everything !!! Accuracy works for damages, and works even better for crowd control.

 

The problem was: A fighter has a limited number of active abilities, and they are usually not comparable with High level spells (apart for charge and its crapload of damages). But it is possible to add them through items and scrolls.

 

 

Item Choices

 

So, accuracy works for CC and damages, so what about picking the best CC and damages spells from items ? Overwhelming Wave from both White Crest and Swaddling Sheet drew my attention. So that was the basis of the build. These waves are quite powerful. Sure, White Crest is only once per rest, but when you start a bounty battle with a “Disciplined Wave” in their faces, you're pretty happy to have it. Swaddling Sheet's wave is uncontrollable, but does not cost casting time, and often works with pretty satisfying and fun effects (especially with that +20 accuracy).

 

I also liked the idea of the wave. It really fitted the fighter's gameplay, with charge and Knockdown, running into the fray and crushing anything. Coastal Aumaua fitted this theme quite well by the way.

 

Duplicated Bittercut was my choice for dual wielding. In addition to be a popular choice for DPS, these 2 Bittercuts also bring some additional castings, which was nice for this build based on item's abilities. Plus Wave -> Water -> Acid and Wave -> Sea -> Pirate -> Sabers, so it fitted nicely with the theme.

 

Abydon's Hammer is not in this build as a weapon. Abydon's Hammer is here for Ring of The Ancient Forge. 1x per encounter mass stun with +20 Accuracy pretty much wins the fight by itself once you have it.

 

Siege Breakers were another good choice for even more Crowd Control. +4 Resolve brings various benefits including half of the Deflection from a regular deflection bracer, a bit of Concentration, and Will Defense. This is decent raw power, but Siege Breakers are of course in this build because of the Clear Out casting.

 

Boots of speed were necessary to compensate for White Crest movement penalty ; mobility is always nice anyway. Apart for this, the other items are pretty much just passive boosts. I thought that I already had enough abilities, and I didn't found something reallly appealing for the other slots. And yes, I find diving wave a bit weak, especially when you have already 3x Full Attack Knockdowns...

 

Consumables are another way of getting interesting abilities. Some good endgame choices for scrolls are scroll of maelstorm and paralysis, to cover the damages and CC aspects. Apart for them, some potions of deleterious alacrity of motions help for important battle, as you won't have sanguine plate to auto-cast frenzy for you.

 

 

Gameplay

 

This character is made to take the initiative, and to quickly “break” the battle. That's why I call him a siege breaker.

 

In my current experience, 20s of disciplined barrage might not be enough to last for the whole battle, but it is often enough to WIN it. 20s are enough to kill the most dangerous foes, encapacitate several others and deal a lots of damages. Instant cast is INCREDIBLY convenient when you try to get the initiative at the beginning of a fight, so it fits very well with this strategy.

 

The most intersting openers are Overwhelming Wave from White Crest or Ring of the Ancient Forge from Abydon's Hammer. You will often hit or crit, and you'll pretty automatically graze even in PotD. Fighter's incredible toughness is also a very convenient for optimal positionning as you don't really fear standing in the front. In my latest fight Concelhaut himself didn't have enough time to recover from stun before getting killed and most of his party shared the same fate.

 

Disciplined Barrage + Knockdown is a very interesting combo that you can access very early game and repeat on every fight. Knockdown is a full attack, and you get 2 rolls also for the prone part. This was my main reason to choose dual wielding. Very few ennemies can avoid being prone with 2 rolls at +20 acc. You are also likely to crit, causing around 10s Prone with decent Int. This is probably the best guarantee of single target Crowd Control in the whole game, even if it is not the longest.

 

This fighter gets great potential for assassinating any dangerous ennemy in the back row when Charge finally shows up. Charge is combined with a (full) attack on the main target. That deals a lots of Single Target damages in addition to AoE from Charge. It is also 3 separate attacks on the target, which means 3 interrupt rolls. This build has a high Perception, mostly for accuracy, but the bonus to interrupt also results in pretty much guaranteed interrupt on Charge. This might not sound that awesome, but this means you're likely to recover and Knockdown a caster before he got enough time to react. And due to fighter's durability, you're not likely to get killed even if isolated in the back row. Due to this combination, this Fighter is able to act as the perfect assassin, except for the stealth part of course...

 

These abilities will be your bread and butter(cut) for minor encounters. On major ones, you'll have a lot of item abilities at your disposal, especially when consumables are included. So this build is quite versatile. Infestation of Maggots deal a lot of DoT (now that it is not bugged anymore... maggots... bugged... got it ? Got it ?) and fast casting Vile Thorn can deal a fairly good amount of AoE. Clear Out acts as a Backup AoE CC once your powerful openers have been used.

 

Fighter's single target DPS and physical damages resistance are very high, so you'll have a quite decent team member even after all these abilities have been used.

 

I have almost finish the game in PotD so now I can confirm this character was nice as a MC. The “Charge Assassination” part was really what really fun to use, and having all these ennemies stunned by your waves was quite enjoyable. My MC Fighter is above my barbarian for damages and close to my dragon trasher chanter for kills. This might be because of MC's slight bonuses and additional micromanagement. But it was efficient for sure.

 

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Various side notes :

 

- Vulnerable attacks also work with Charge.

 

- I picked up Disciplined Barrage and Knockdown early and Weapon Focus (and the likes) quite late. That enables you to choose whatever single handed weapons you find for dual wielding, which is very convenient. For example, Ravenwing isn't an awesome endgame weapon, but is really strong and easy to get early on.

 

- Fan of flames scrolls are of course your early game joker. Hello Caed Nua !

 

- Clear Out should be nice with this build, except I don't like it (per rest are ok for items, but I don't like them as abilities. Totally subjective...).

Edited February 24, 2017 by Elric Galad

[TheMetaphysician]

Very, very cool build. I love the use of the White Crest Armor, which I always want to use but just can't justify.

 

You could replace the dual Bittercuts with Hours of St. Rumbalt (and the 2-weapon skils with 2-handed skills). You'd lose the Bittercut casting abilities (Vile Thorns/Infestation of Maggots) and the double rolls for knockdown, in exchange for an on-crit knockdown, which also seems to fit the theme just fine. But other than that, it would seem to play the same, wouldn't it?

 

I think I'm going to try this out on Eder on my current run, to pair with my Counselor Ploi-type MC paladin (with Coordinated Attacks and a marking weapon to give Eder +20 accuracy).

 

Edit: I was trying to think of other spellbind items that would work with this, and I thought of the charm items, munacra zrret, ring of changing heart, spirit spiral. You can pull the same combo with disciplined barrage as boerer and jojobo pull with sworn enemy. Wouldn' t fit the theme as well tho.

Edited February 23, 2017 by TheMetaphysician

[Elric Galad]

These are alternative possibilities that would certainly work, and I considered them for this build.

 

However, there are also reasons why I made other choices.

 

First, about single target Crowd Control. Most of the time, you'll find yourself in front of 2 possibilities: either you're in front of a very high priority target that you really want to CC and Full Attack knockdown will do the job better than anything. 3 knockdowns per encounter are enough for this task IMHO.

 

Or you're in front of a "normal" ennemy for which CC is only a nice-to-have. And then I can live without additional CC. The abilities suggested above are cool, but I think they will slow the pace of my fighter based on fast impact.

 

It is certainly a good idea to have these items in your inventory by the way.

 

Hour of St Rumbalt deserves a mention. Even if the CC it provides is less reliable IMHO than the one from full attack KD, Anhilating is always a good idea with a high accuracy build.

 

 

I also wanted to pick items that had good passive bonuses as well as interesting abilities. That is why I picked Bittecuts. They are casting items, bit their DPS is among the best ones for weapons.

 

Ring of changing heart was in direct concurrence with Siegebreakers for Resolve bonus, and I preferred Siegebreakers.

 

Finally, I considered Nidhen's Finger because of its activable Mindlance and bonus to CON. It would replace Swaddling Sheet for the case you want to better control activated effects.

Edited February 24, 2017 by Elric Galad