PotD Solo Build Guide - Herlad / War Caller aka "Sword Singer"

[Haplok]

 

Beacon = dps loss. That sungrazer video is hilarious, shows how broken monk is combined with any dps builds

 

Triggering ineed but without that full burn damage build it wouldn't do as much dmg as it does on video.

 

Too many things trigger on abilities they should not :D

 

 

Yeah. On the other hand they had to go and nerf Carnage to the ground, which used to carry all on-hit/on-crit effects, which was my main reason for choosing Barbarian in PoE1.

[Morielen]

Hey Voltron, I'm playing with this build and so far I love it! Thank you very much. But since I'm playing with a party, I can't use skeletons very effectively. It feels like overkill in terms of party member numbers and most of the time the enemy dies before I even got a chance to summon the skeletons. What would you change in this build for those who play with a party? I'm talking about the whole build and not just the skeletons.

[Voltron]

Hey Voltron, I'm playing with this build and so far I love it! Thank you very much. But since I'm playing with a party, I can't use skeletons very effectively. It feels like overkill in terms of party member numbers and most of the time the enemy dies before I even got a chance to summon the skeletons. What would you change in this build for those who play with a party? I'm talking about the whole build and not just the skeletons.

 

Glad you enjoy build! Which one you went? Herald or War Caller? 

 

If you don't find summons useful for your game- I would take And Hel Hyraf at Level 1 for AOE armor nerf and on Level III I would chose either Rejoice My Comrades for being also a better party healer now, upgrade to Hel Hyraf for longer Armor debuff or if you have some rangers in your party using firearms you can go for Chant Sure Handed to make them shoot faster.

 

Rest should work really. Later you could take upgrade to Rejoice for Revive on allies or for example.

Edited May 25, 2018 by Voltron

[Morielen]

 

Hey Voltron, I'm playing with this build and so far I love it! Thank you very much. But since I'm playing with a party, I can't use skeletons very effectively. It feels like overkill in terms of party member numbers and most of the time the enemy dies before I even got a chance to summon the skeletons. What would you change in this build for those who play with a party? I'm talking about the whole build and not just the skeletons.

 

Glad you enjoy build! Which one you went? Herald or War Caller? 

 

If you don't find summons useful for your game- I would take And Hel Hyraf at Level 1 for AOE armor nerf and on Level III I would chose either Rejoice My Comrades for being also a better party healer now, upgrade to Hel Hyraf for longer Armor debuff or if you have some rangers in your party using firearms you can go for Chant Sure Handed to make them shoot faster.

 

Rest should work really. Later you could take upgrade to Rejoice for Revive on allies or for example.

 

I went with the herald. It's great for a sword singer rp just like you said. I will definitely try the war caller as well though. Thank you for your advice. I thought Hel-Hyraf would work better in my situation too. I checked your votary build too. It looks very unique and amazing! Love your work.

[Voltron]

 

 

Hey Voltron, I'm playing with this build and so far I love it! Thank you very much. But since I'm playing with a party, I can't use skeletons very effectively. It feels like overkill in terms of party member numbers and most of the time the enemy dies before I even got a chance to summon the skeletons. What would you change in this build for those who play with a party? I'm talking about the whole build and not just the skeletons.

 

Glad you enjoy build! Which one you went? Herald or War Caller? 

 

If you don't find summons useful for your game- I would take And Hel Hyraf at Level 1 for AOE armor nerf and on Level III I would chose either Rejoice My Comrades for being also a better party healer now, upgrade to Hel Hyraf for longer Armor debuff or if you have some rangers in your party using firearms you can go for Chant Sure Handed to make them shoot faster.

 

Rest should work really. Later you could take upgrade to Rejoice for Revive on allies or for example.

 

I went with the herald. It's great for a sword singer rp just like you said. I will definitely try the war caller as well though. Thank you for your advice. I thought Hel-Hyraf would work better in my situation too. I checked your votary build too. It looks very unique and amazing! Love your work.

 

 

Thanks! Yeah, burn baby burn is amazing, but it depends on how early you can solo for Magran Favor and sungrazen (and Sun and Moon is just bought from vendor) to start having real fun.

[Ganrich]

So, my next playthrough is a Herald.  I am leaning toward a combination of Fire damage and healing.  So, KW/Troubadour.  I have a few questions as I haven't messed with Pally in a while. 

 

1) will I spread myself too thin to try to be an off healer or passive healer mixed with Fire damage?  Basically, I want Sacred Immolation, Chanter heal invocation upgraded for burn Damage, Mith Fyr, Dragon's Thrashed, couple healing chants (Old Siec, AM, and/or Mercy), Scion of Flame, LoH, Reviving Exhortation, etc.  The concept is Healing through Fire, but mostly fire.  I will likely have either Pallegina, Xoti, or Tekehu to also heal. 

 

2)  Is Brand Enemy worth losing the refund on Sworn Rival?  I am just thinking that late game with Brilliant inspiration that refund will become less useful, and since you lose a talent point to respec (bug) I would want to be sure.  Or have they fixed this bug?

 

3)  Does Shared Flames stack with Mith Fyr?  If not should I go with Eternal Devotion?

 

Any recommendations would be helpful.  Like I said, I haven't messed with Paladin much since beta.  I don't know what has, if anything, changed. 

[Voltron]

So, my next playthrough is a Herald.  I am leaning toward a combination of Fire damage and healing.  So, KW/Troubadour.  I have a few questions as I haven't messed with Pally in a while. 

 

1) will I spread myself too thin to try to be an off healer or passive healer mixed with Fire damage?  Basically, I want Sacred Immolation, Chanter heal invocation upgraded for burn Damage, Mith Fyr, Dragon's Thrashed, couple healing chants (Old Siec, AM, and/or Mercy), Scion of Flame, LoH, Reviving Exhortation, etc.  The concept is Healing through Fire, but mostly fire.  I will likely have either Pallegina, Xoti, or Tekehu to also heal. 

 

2)  Is Brand Enemy worth losing the refund on Sworn Rival?  I am just thinking that late game with Brilliant inspiration that refund will become less useful, and since you lose a talent point to respec (bug) I would want to be sure.  Or have they fixed this bug?

 

3)  Does Shared Flames stack with Mith Fyr?  If not should I go with Eternal Devotion?

 

Any recommendations would be helpful.  Like I said, I haven't messed with Paladin much since beta.  I don't know what has, if anything, changed. 

 

Hey,

 

1) You will have to sacrifice some stuff I took but it should be fine. However worth to note:

- Dragon's Thrashed is trash and totally not worth getting. It suck- period

- Old Siec is also weak. Better to run Ancient Memory + healing gear + healing passive talent + Mercy for healing (and can be run in brisk  or with Linger + Mercy for super boost)

- Scion of Flame will only be worth if you will also use Magran Favor + Pet that gives +1 Fire PL. Sion alone is not worth, only when you stack it.

Rest are good abilities you mentioned.

 

2) It's not. Paladin can get his resources back only at Level VI on kill or if you combine him with Chanter  - Level VII. Then you have two sources of getting Zeal back- on kills + VII Brilliant. However till Level VI you are quite tin on resources and sworn enemy is god send as you pretty much free casting it for 0 cost. It's too good to skip imo.

 

3) Shared Flames will stack with Mith Fyr if you want to boost your party.

Edited May 25, 2018 by Voltron

[Ganrich]

Yeah, I am planning it out, and Dragon's Thrashed is already out of the build.  I knew it wasn't great, but I wasn't sure there was anything better.  There is.  There is a lot of better choices.

I was definitely planning to stack some PL, and had my eye on Magran's Favor too.  Also, I haven't had a great build for Sungrazer yet.  So, this one will likely be it. 

 

Old Siec worked well with my Street Fighter/Troubadour, but that attack speed plus sneak attack bonus from Flanked/Bloodied pumped it up I am sure.  It was ticking for more than AM, and almost as frequently.  When your constantly hitting for 70-100 damage every couple seconds then that 12% is pretty good.  When you aren't... well, yeah.  Probably just a very build dependent Phrase.  That makes sense. 

 

I figured the pally side was a bit lacking on resources until late game.  I wasn't sure if the damage numbers from Brand Enemy made up for it.  Cool.  Good to know.  Being low on Resources until late game was something the SF/Troub suffered as well. 

 

I feel Eternal Devotion might still be the better grab for this if I pick up Scion of Flame.  It isn't like PotD is hard enough atm that something suboptimal like that would matter.   It would still come later in the build in order to take advantage of Mith Fyr. 

 

Thanks.

[Voltron]

 

I feel Eternal Devotion might still be the better grab for this if I pick up Scion of Flame.  It isn't like PotD is hard enough atm that something suboptimal like that would matter.   It would still come later in the build in order to take advantage of Mith Fyr. 

 

Thanks.

If you paly to hit more dmg yourself, Eternal is better. Mith Fyr will provide decent bonus. You can kind of mimick my Burn Baby Burn build with it though of course it will lack Helwalker Turning Wheel + Might stacks damage but your burn damage should still be quite high.

 

If you feel like PotD is too easy, I recommend difficulty mod. Definitely verified a lot of previously solo-viable builds for me: https://www.nexusmods.com/pillarsofeternity2/mods/43

 

It really makes difference, at least for solo powerbuilds. Dunno how it will work with party.

[Ganrich]

Yeah, I am probably going to look at the difficulty mod on my next playthrough.

 

One more question.  Have you tried using Her Courage Thick as Steel, with Brisk Recitation modal on, during sacred Immolation to curb some of the self inflicted damage?  That is 10pts of damage every 3 seconds that you don't take.  In theory anyway. 

[Voltron]

Yeah, I am probably going to look at the difficulty mod on my next playthrough.

 

One more question.  Have you tried using Her Courage Thick as Steel, with Brisk Recitation modal on, during sacred Immolation to curb some of the self inflicted damage?  That is 10pts of damage every 3 seconds that you don't take.  In theory anyway. 

 

It could work well for party but not that much on yourself since on yourself you can stack Soft Wind + Ancient Memory with Troubadour Linger and it heals all the time instead of absorbing 10 dmg per 3 seconds. On solo it's not imo good as it's better to stack Silver Knight +10 Deflection plus Mith Fyr or Ancient Memory + Mith Fyr.

However with Brisk Mode it should work quite well on party, though I still think it's imo better to linger for party Silver Knight and Mith Fyr and switch to Brisk Ancient + spamming healing invocation than running Her Courage all the time.

 

You will have to test that for party as I just theorycraft here. For solo I would not take her courage myself.

Edited May 26, 2018 by Voltron

[Ganrich]

I was really just thinking about late game.  Start with BR off with Mith Fyr/AM on.  Toss some Sworn Rival out, cast Set to Their Purpose, Cast The Brideman Slew (upgraded), switch BR on and switch to Her Courage, Inspired Beacon, Sacred Immolation, spam Rejoice heal with burn upgrade, and spam FoD.  With the heals from Rejoice and FoD I think AM/Soft Winds might be  pointless.  Silver Knight might be a better all around pick vs Her Courage though.  The idea was to soften the Blow of the Sacred Immolation damage to myself with Her Courage and try to out heal it with while doing extra burn damage with Rejoice and FoD.

 

Of course if I keep BR off, pick up Mercy phrase, and use Mercy/Silver Knight combo, I would probably out heal Sacred Immolation's self damage anyway.  I also wouldn't have to toggle BR that way. 

 

Basically, the idea is in the late game to turn my character into a walking ball of fire that heals. 

[Voltron]

I was really just thinking about late game.  Start with BR off with Mith Fyr/AM on.  Toss some Sworn Rival out, cast Set to Their Purpose, Cast The Brideman Slew (upgraded), switch BR on and switch to Her Courage, Inspired Beacon, Sacred Immolation, spam Rejoice heal with burn upgrade, and spam FoD.  With the heals from Rejoice and FoD I think AM/Soft Winds might be  pointless.  Silver Knight might be a better all around pick vs Her Courage though.  The idea was to soften the Blow of the Sacred Immolation damage to myself with Her Courage and try to out heal it with while doing extra burn damage with Rejoice and FoD.

 

Of course if I keep BR off, pick up Mercy phrase, and use Mercy/Silver Knight combo, I would probably out heal Sacred Immolation's self damage anyway.  I also wouldn't have to toggle BR that way. 

 

Basically, the idea is in the late game to turn my character into a walking ball of fire that heals. 

 

Silver Knight is definitely better all around pick vs Her Courage. +10 Deflection is actually big in this game.

 

I don't think any heal will keep you up with Sacred Immolation. The way it scales it can deal to you 190 crit damage per tick....

[Luvsucklonewolf]

Hi Voltron! I really love your builds, sword singer and burn baby burn ! I wonder which one provide more dps , I guess the burn baby ?

I am now play the burn baby but I still miss the flashy spells and AOE damage of a wizard.(I did not have the flail yet). Can you suggest any fun and most dps wizard plusxxx multiclass?

[Delekii]

 

I was really just thinking about late game.  Start with BR off with Mith Fyr/AM on.  Toss some Sworn Rival out, cast Set to Their Purpose, Cast The Brideman Slew (upgraded), switch BR on and switch to Her Courage, Inspired Beacon, Sacred Immolation, spam Rejoice heal with burn upgrade, and spam FoD.  With the heals from Rejoice and FoD I think AM/Soft Winds might be  pointless.  Silver Knight might be a better all around pick vs Her Courage though.  The idea was to soften the Blow of the Sacred Immolation damage to myself with Her Courage and try to out heal it with while doing extra burn damage with Rejoice and FoD.

 

Of course if I keep BR off, pick up Mercy phrase, and use Mercy/Silver Knight combo, I would probably out heal Sacred Immolation's self damage anyway.  I also wouldn't have to toggle BR that way. 

 

Basically, the idea is in the late game to turn my character into a walking ball of fire that heals. 

 

Silver Knight is definitely better all around pick vs Her Courage. +10 Deflection is actually big in this game.

 

I don't think any heal will keep you up with Sacred Immolation. The way it scales it can deal to you 190 crit damage per tick....

 

 

This isn't necessarily true (the first line); 10 deflection is big but its impact may not be depending on where you start. Characters with low starting deflection won't gain as much absolute damage reduction from it, while the shield is essentially flat DR.

 

10 deflection is never going to be a bad thing, but it's definitely possible for it to be worse than 10 shield/3 seconds (or 6 seconds) for non-tanky characters. There are cases where the shield will just be numerically better, but even where the deflection is better on average, the shield is lower variance. 

 

Frankly though, there are very few cases where I'd use either of them. 

Edited May 28, 2018 by Delekii

[Tommy1984]

Here an update for my solo run as a Warcaller:

As mentioned before I choose Devoted/Troubadour spezialized in Swords for a solo PotD run with full upscaling. As weapons I use Modwyr and Kapana Tanga, which are nice because these cover all physiscal damage types - so you don't have to deal with damage immunities.

Instead of Charge I use mostly Penetrating Strike. Charge can be stronger for bigger groups, but it also needs more micromanagement. As I'm a lazy gamer, I just create AI settings for my character and watch the show Penetrating Strike is still a really good ability as it is a Full Attack with bonus damage/penetration for only 1 ressource cost - very much like Flames of Devotion, but powered with AoE from Mob Stance ... it ends bigger fights nearly as fast as Charge and separate single enemies faster than Charge.

Compared to my first solo game as a tanky Summoner Herald, the class felt more squishy ... but only until I started using Unbending + Mercy and Kindness. Healing 100% of all damage is just insane. After this you can drop healing on equipment and abilities like Vigorous Defense. I replaced my healing pet with the pet, which gives bonus damage and interrrupt on hit. I'm undecided if i also want to replace Devil of Caroc Breastplate with Swift Hunter's Garb or Miscreant's Leathers for even more speed.

As I'm playing full solo your recommended helmet Fair Favor is not an option (companion quest reward). At the moment I use the Blackened Plate Helm, but I don't know if this is the best option.

So far this class is really strong. I will give another update after I finished all content.

Edited May 28, 2018 by Tommy1984

[Voltron]

Hi Voltron! I really love your builds, sword singer and burn baby burn ! I wonder which one provide more dps , I guess the burn baby ?

I am now play the burn baby but I still miss the flashy spells and AOE damage of a wizard.(I did not have the flail yet). Can you suggest any fun and most dps wizard plusxxx multiclass?

Burn Baby Burn definitely outdps Sword Singer build, but it relies heavy on gear (Magran Favor + Sun and Moon and Sungrazer), while Sword Singer shined just from multiclass combo.

 

For Wizard imo best would be Figher/Wizard or Helwalker/Wizard due to Wizard crazy Deflection boosting spells so if build well you won't get hit a lot as Helwalker monk so you can keep your crazy boosted dmg. Get hit enough at the beginning of fight to get 10 wounds and then pop deflection spells and go to town. Fighter or Paladin with Wizard defense spells would be just untouchable.

 

Though I just don't like wizards in general so I didn't do much solo attempts with him, so don't take my words as 100% true.

[Ilyan]

Hi Voltron. I want to play in a team, as tank. Still unsure Herald or war caller. Do you think you need athletics in a team as a herald? I'd like to spend my points in alchemy but... I'd like your advice

 

Edit: also, which of the two is in your mind... more fun? in a team I mean, as main tank (still hesitate between Pallegina, paladin/fighter or Eder Fighter/Rogue to tank with me, probably Eder so I have a complete offensive team. Tekehu as main heal as Druid/chanter. Maia Rua (multi or no I don't know) and Aloth as single class wiz)

Edited May 30, 2018 by Ilyan

[Clerith]

~5 athletics is nice for everybody, for a useful extra heal early to passing all the athletics checks in events. Especilly for a front liner early.

 

Fun is always subjective, anything with a Charge-like skill is fun to play imo, it just feels so snappy in this game, looks visually good too.

Edited May 30, 2018 by Clerith

[Voltron]

Hi Voltron. I want to play in a team, as tank. Still unsure Herald or war caller. Do you think you need athletics in a team as a herald? I'd like to spend my points in alchemy but... I'd like your advice

 

Edit: also, which of the two is in your mind... more fun? in a team I mean, as main tank (still hesitate between Pallegina, paladin/fighter or Eder Fighter/Rogue to tank with me, probably Eder so I have a complete offensive team. Tekehu as main heal as Druid/chanter. Maia Rua (multi or no I don't know) and Aloth as single class wiz)

 

If you will have team behind and especially a healer Fighter is more fun mid-end game with charge, while Herland is more single target burst and secondary healer.

In team scenario both will be great main or offtanks.

 

Atheltics on 5 is always nice and I honestly don't see any other useful skill for them.

[Ilyan]

Thank you both. Still unsure about what class but you gave me some ideas. I intended to raise athletics at 5 to 7 with trainer, so that's good. For a main, I think either Arcana (15+) or Alchmy can be good. Drugs are great IMO (in game of course! :D)

[Voltron]

Thank you both. Still unsure about what class but you gave me some ideas. I intended to raise athletics at 5 to 7 with trainer, so that's good. For a main, I think either Arcana (15+) or Alchmy can be good. Drugs are great IMO (in game of course! :D)

 

I am curious- Arcana for what excactly? With high athetics you can at least for example use unique shield you get from Old City that scales +Deflection with Athletics.

 

Arcana is good for for example Spearcaster a unique Arbalest.

[Clerith]

Yeah, the last thing your power build melee dps is going to do is use scrolls in combat.

 

The best skills for combat are alchemy (if you use potions and drugs frequently) and athletics (for an instant massive heal on demand). There are a few unique gears that scale with a skill that can bring something like Metaphysics and History on the map, but those are exclusively for using said specific items.

Edited May 31, 2018 by Clerith

[demien87]

Votron, any changes to this build due to 1.1 patch?

[Clerith]

Yes, considering they deleted the Brilliant inspiration from the game.

 

DW is still probably going to be better than 2h even with Charge turned into a primary attack. You just do less damage wih Fighter stuff and need to find a new Invocation to use. Gearing for max Discipline should be good (Devil of Caroc armor, gloves of discipline, reap the whirlwind talent).