So Itumaak... in the end game, Rangers and thoughts for my next run.

[Torm51]

Brought out Sagani to finish her quest and I speced her for max pet damage and...holy crap.  Itumaak is hitting for about 94 on average and critting for 130+.  Sagani herself also hits hard obviously.  This might go into my Goldpact Knight play through....Keep those dangerous enemies dotted while Itumaak eats them.  Quick Switch Arbalest with Enduring Flames + Dawn in Spring while in melee?  Maybe spec Reviving Exhortation as I have doubts about Itumaak in melee and eating Wing slams and Tale Swipes...  You could go Tidefall and do two Dots in one swing...  That could be really good against Dragons (all the raw dots going out..fire damage sucks against most of them except the Alpine).  Lots of raw damage going out with high ACC.  Well I guess if you gave the ranger Wounding Shot and the hunting bow with the wounding enchant you would not even need Enduring Flames as a dot would always be up.

Edited September 25, 2017 by Torm51

[draego]

Nice. And non of that is captured in the rangers stats so most players that have played once or just a little bit think rangers cant hit hard but the combination is good as long as you dont mind micro which i dont. one run i have going is dual wield melee ranger with drawn in spring but tidefall would be great to. keep those dots up.  The wolf animal can do a little more damage also. They start with higher base damage i think.  (Thanks Boeroer)

Edited September 25, 2017 by draego

[Boeroer]

Itumaak has the same base damage advantage a wolf has (+2). So the damage is comparable. Another nice alternative is the stag because it has mini-carnage once per encounter.

 

Currently Sagani is in my party with Persistence and focus on pet damage (char lvl 8 ). So Itumaak nearly always has Predator's Sense enabled and also Merciless Companion because of Wounding Shot. Vicious Companion, too, of course. He's not the king of dps in general because he hits rather slowly, but boy is he great against enemies with very high DR like Adra Animats and stuff like that. Sometimes it's like "kill-bite - run to the next enemy - kill-bite" and so on.

 

Also, he's a super-tank with Triumph of the Crusaders as long as he manages to kill stuff. That lingering spell heals him completely every time he kills an enemy. And since he has no health he can't die as long as he gets healed. I see some problems with this mechanics in Deadfire...

Edited September 25, 2017 by Boeroer

[JFutral]

This is one of the reasons I love Rangers. Built properly it really is like having a second melee fighter (or 7th for a full party). And then with the right gear and other means of collaborative attacks, I usually have everyone target the same enemy and they go down pretty quickly. (I say "everyone" but I haven't played a full 6 member party in a while.)

 

Joe

[scythesong]

The thing about animal companions is that they have scaling enemy damage reduction ignore, so by late game they can do massive damage against heavily armored opponents. This is offset by their relative squishiness, but there are ways to help with that.

[mosspit]

Yeah I tried Sagani/Itumaak for an entire playthrough with Itumaak as a dps wolf and Sagani was a tank/support. It is pretty awesome, wolf type also has the added advantage of having the fastest atk spd of all other pets based on a breakdown table posted by a vet in these forums.

 

My personal experience is 70-90 dmg per hit post DR at endgame which is not bad considering that it is pretty darn easy to build. Just pickup all the pet dmg talents. Resilient Companion has level scaling too. Will it get downed if completely surrounded? Yes, which is similar to any other non-tank characters. But it can still handle a couple engagement on its own.

 

The best thing is a lot of pets level pickups are talents and not class-specific skills (at least from how I remembered). So you can still enjoy things like Twinned Arrows and Driving Flight without eating into the effectiveness of the pet.