Is first-playthrough with Devoted worth the risk?

[Ciphys]

I was thinking of making my first playthrough on veteran difficulty with either a:

a) Paladin(BW) + Cipher(Soul blade)

b) Paladin(BW) + Fighter(Devoted)

c) Cipher(Soul blade) + Fighter(Devoted)

But it occurred to me that taking Devoted for an initial play-through seems incredibly risky, since we have no idea about what kind of immunities (or just very high resistances) some enemies could have, OR what weapons are available. 

Sure, taking one of the weapons with dual damage could probably reduce the possible headache, but that saber damage is just so juicy. 

Worst case would probably end up with my character whipping out her non-monk fists for some silly brawling. 

 

Thoughts? 

[Mack]

If it comes to that you can equip a different weapon and take the -10 accuracy in that fight, if necessary finding some other way to boost accuracy. The way I think about it, Devoteds will benefit from the +2 penetration and +25% crit damage very often, and feel the weapon limitation only sometimes, while other subclasses will suffer the effect of their malus in every single fight.  

Edited April 28, 2018 by Mack

[Ciphys]

Hmm that is a good point. Perhaps backing it up with one of the weapon types that boost accuracy (to minimize the penalty) but also deal damage that is not of the slash kind, such as rapiers or spears(both which can also be dual wielded). 

[malchiorita]

If it comes to that you can equip a different weapon and take the -10 accuracy in that fight, if necessary finding some other way to boost accuracy. The way I think about it, Devoteds will benefit from the +2 penetration and +25% crit damage very often, and feel the weapon limitation only sometimes, while other subclasses will suffer the effect of their malus in every single fight.

Yeah, that's a flaw in the class design btw imho. Most of us will go with their weapon of choice anyway so giving a very good bonus for a malus you probabky will never notice is quite unbalanced if you ask me. The only risk is on the first playthrough there could be an imba weapon you want to use that is not of the chosen type... But you could Google the weapon list beforehand anyway

[jaganntha]

or you could go to a innerkeep and change the specs, if you want to use other weapon you find...

[LampStaple]

Being a devoted sword/greatsword fighter alleviates a lot of that risk

[KaiG]

I'm going Devoted just because my pirate character almost exclusively uses sabres for RP reasons anyway. Maybe she'll miss a pistol shot or two, but the vast majority of the time it'll be sabres at dawn.

[Mack]

Being a devoted sword/greatsword fighter alleviates a lot of that risk

The big question for me is whether a dual damage weapon with a 7 base penetration is more or less likely (statistically across the game) to do overpen on criticals than a single damage, 8 penetration weapon. Maybe that will only be answered by experience but it does seem plausible. 

[Boeroer]

For your first playthrough as a Devoted you can't go too wrong whith picking a weapon with dual damage I think.

[Ascaloth]

A Devoted going Sabers would probably be less risky than most choices, because we already know of at least two unique Sabers that seem pretty good;

 

For the early game, there's St. Drogga's Skull from the preorder bonus. And for the endgame, there's a Legendary-quality Grave Calling.

 

Also IIRC, the Devoted proficiency applies to fists as well, so you can just go unarmed for your second weapon slot, and just switch to beating down anything that's immune to Slash. Does anyone know if a Fighter can take Unarmed Monastic Training?

[Boeroer]

Yes, he can. It's total trash nonetheless.

 

Monastic Unarmed Training doen't give a flat dmg bonus like in PoE but now increases unarmed dmg. by %. TOo bad the base damage of fists doesn't get increased so you end up with a whopping +20% damage bonus on a weapon that has like 5 base damage. Whooohooo! Not...

 

This needs a bit of tweaking. Either raise the base damage of fists when picking Monastic UT (like Transc. Suffer. does for monks) or give a flat dmg bonus that scales like in PoE.

 

I this isn't done the ability is just a wasted spot in the tree.

 

So unless you are not a Devoted/Monk the fist proficiency will not be very useful for you.

[Ascaloth]

Yes, he can. It's total trash nonetheless.

 

Monastic Unarmed Training doen't give a flat dmg bonus like in PoE but now increases unarmed dmg. by %. TOo bad the base damage of fists doesn't get increased so you end up with a whopping +20% damage bonus on a weapon that has like 5 base damage. Whooohooo! Not...

 

This needs a bit of tweaking. Either raise the base damage of fists when picking Monastic UT (like Transc. Suffer. does for monks) or give a flat dmg bonus that scales like in PoE.

 

I this isn't done the ability is just a wasted spot in the tree.

 

So unless you are not a Devoted/Monk the fist proficiency will not be very useful for you.

 

Oof. There goes my backup plan for those occasions. I guess the only alternative left is to hope for a dev tweak, or otherwise that there's a Bittercut equivalent in Deadfire.

[KDubya]

Just pick Sabres and have a single rapier, club or spear in the other slot. You'll have -10 accuracy + 5 accuracy + 12 accuracy for a total of +7 accuracy on the rare occasions that you find a slash immune.

 

I'd go Paladin/Soul Blade anyway  

[dunehunter]

I was thinking of making my first playthrough on veteran difficulty with either a:

a) Paladin(BW) + Cipher(Soul blade)

b) Paladin(BW) + Fighter(Devoted)

c) Cipher(Soul blade) + Fighter(Devoted)

 

But it occurred to me that taking Devoted for an initial play-through seems incredibly risky, since we have no idea about what kind of immunities (or just very high resistances) some enemies could have, OR what weapons are available. 

 

Sure, taking one of the weapons with dual damage could probably reduce the possible headache, but that saber damage is just so juicy. 

 

Worst case would probably end up with my character whipping out her non-monk fists for some silly brawling. 

 

Thoughts? 

 

If you go fighter/cipher, you are already 10(15) accuracy ahead of single class ciphers because Discipline Strike + Stance, so even with unproficient weapons you will have same accuracy as a normal cipher, so that's not so bad right?

[gGeorg]

or you could go to a innerkeep and change the specs, if you want to use other weapon you find...

Ultimate solution to a general hedache.

For few coins, you could be devoted to any superb weapon you find/craft.

[Creative]

 

or you could go to a innerkeep and change the specs, if you want to use other weapon you find...

Ultimate solution to a general hedache.

For few coins, you could be devoted to any superb weapon you find/craft.

 

Are you saying I could for example go Paladin/Fighter(devoted) for greatswords, but if I come across someother badass two handed I can just find an inn and go change my proficiency to the new weapon? I didn't think that would be possible. What's the drawback to respeccing? How expensive is it? Is there a limit or does it take a lot of effort? I'd say it doesn't feel quite right doing so unless there's not some big 'cost' attached to it. Or am I missing something?

 

Do we know for sure that that's possible in PoE2?

Edited April 29, 2018 by Creative

[Frog Man]

Only reason I wouldn’t do a devoted for my FIRST play through is that i don’t want to be locked to a weapon type with some many lovely weapons to discover. I want to mix and match and try out different stuff. I’d save the devoteds for later, POTD optimized meta gaming runs!

 

But to each his/her own

[Madscientist]

PoE1 had several unique weapons for every type and the penalty for using a different weapon is only 10acc.

I think it is not such a great risk to play as devoted for the first time.

It is not BG1+2. Did anyone play a paladin there in the first playthrough and really regretted later NOT taking greatsword profiency?

[dunehunter]

PoE1 had several unique weapons for every type and the penalty for using a different weapon is only 10acc.

I think it is not such a great risk to play as devoted for the first time.

It is not BG1+2. Did anyone play a paladin there in the first playthrough and really regretted later NOT taking greatsword profiency?

 

Yeah I picked sword/shield for my 1st paladin run in BG2, very regret of it

[Creative]

Only reason I wouldn’t do a devoted for my FIRST play through is that i don’t want to be locked to a weapon type with some many lovely weapons to discover. I want to mix and match and try out different stuff. I’d save the devoteds for later, POTD optimized meta gaming runs!

 

But to each his/her own

But if it's possible to respec, is that actually an issue?

[Ciphys]

Thank you guys for the inputs. After considering that I perhaps want to experiment and test out some different weapons, I am thinking of going for the inquisitor(Bleak Walker/Soul blade) for my initial run. Cipher will probably add some nice flavour dialogue at that. 

I just hope they don't lock every good Cipher ability behind the level 8-9 powerlevel, which multiclasses cant obtain D:. Though I guess soulblade is just as happy pouring all the focus into soul annihilation. 

[Frog Man]

 

Only reason I wouldn’t do a devoted for my FIRST play through is that i don’t want to be locked to a weapon type with some many lovely weapons to discover. I want to mix and match and try out different stuff. I’d save the devoteds for later, POTD optimized meta gaming runs!

 

But to each his/her own

But if it's possible to respec, is that actually an issue?

Respeccing every time I find a new cool weapon. Sounds awesome ....

[Creative]

 

 

Only reason I wouldn’t do a devoted for my FIRST play through is that i don’t want to be locked to a weapon type with some many lovely weapons to discover. I want to mix and match and try out different stuff. I’d save the devoteds for later, POTD optimized meta gaming runs!

 

But to each his/her own

But if it's possible to respec, is that actually an issue?

Respeccing every time I find a new cool weapon. Sounds awesome ....

 

I'm still after confirmation whether it's possible to change your specialisation for a devoted fighter by respeccing. Cause if it's actually true, doesn't it completely nullify all downsides to going Devoted? Unless repseccing is a huge pain in the arse or comes at a high cost, why wouldn't you just respec when you come across another good weapon everytime? I'm not seeing what the downside is yet.

Edited April 29, 2018 by Creative

[KaiG]

In PoE it wasn't possible to respec your companions' level 1 ability choices. Maybe it's the shame for the protagonist this time? If you can't respec your subclass (I don't know if you can, but I'd guess you can't), maybe you can't change your subclass-related weapon choice.

Edited April 30, 2018 by KaiG

[Ganrich]

Even if you can respec uour devoted weapon there will likely always be enemies in an area or dungeon that have high resistance to it. If encounter design is solid, that is. So, since you cant respec mid-combat... There will likely always be enemies you will be less optimal against. Maybe not every encounter, but here and there throughout a series of encounters.