Divinity Divinity: Original Sin - Enhanced Edition

[Cadmus]

Now that I'm finally getting around to playing this, there are a few things I find aggravating, mainly to do with skills and character creation:

• Charisma is by all accounts fairly useless aside from a very few notable exceptions.
• Lucky Charm, when maxed out, gives you a sub-10% chance to find an additional mundane or slightly magical item or a bit of extra gold in chests, and some additional Offense Rating. Wow-ee, I'm jerking my cock just thinking about all that extra swag.
• Bartering is relatively skippable due to lol economy, although perhaps that's for the best, because fuck Bartering.
• Lockpicking is relatively skippable thanks to bashing, although there again, perhaps that's preferable to mechanically forcing Lockpicking to be the only means of accessing locked stuff.
• Newbie trap in the form of only two set companions which might be near-carbon copies of the characters you've already created.
• Newbie trap in the form of having absolutely no idea what spell schools can ultimately do for you unless you check a wiki, an understandable trap but fairly annoying.
• Crafting skills easily shunted off onto some hireling, or so I've read.
• If you're making a Rogue, your customization options are extremely limited, especially if you're not skipping Lockpicking and/or Pickpocketing.
• Sword-and-board not nearly tanky enough to justify far shittier damage, or so I've read, ESPECIALLY since it calls for an additional skill.
• Hybridization severely weakens a character, limiting viable customization choices.
• Instakill traps essentially forcing a reload. Some people don't mind this; I don't mind it if some clue is available giving at least subtle warning. Orc mourning on the beach, I'm looking at you.
• I read they nerfed summons in that enemies now rarely target them, thus rendering summons near-useless since their offense typically sucks ass. Anyone care to weigh in on that?

None of that's particularly game-breaking, and near-useless skills/dump stats, imbalances, borked economy, etc. are cRPG standards, so that's fine. I think I'm going to at least wait until they release the companions update, though. Hopefully it's not too far away now.

Agree with the skills but I think it sounds a little more dramatic than it is. I haven't played the newest patches so dunno about that, but high perception helps with the traps a lot.
The newbie traps....they are not newbie traps, the characters you get have like lvl 3, you can do anything you want with them. Spell schools are pretty traditionally not completely explained beforehand.

Hybridization - that's a lie imo. Dunno where you got that from, I'm swimming in skill points and on a whim I can learn a new magic school or whatever with all my characters. The system perfectly supports hybridization, even actually makes it the superior choice. My tank learned witchcraft and air magic for example.

Dunno about sword and board cuz I dont have it, but I imagine they are tanky enough since my non board broad is practically immortal.

Why is there about 10 imps in my homestead called names like Jaesun and other codexian posters. They are unnerving, observing my behavior even in my games?? Criticizing my RPG skills and following me around to see if I deserve a dumbfuck tag or what? Harassing me with goatsie and rick rolls? fuck off this game is making an emotional wreck out of me.

 

[Mangoose]

Just gonna answer the stuff I disagree (or half agree) with, I agree with the rest.

Charisma is by all accounts fairly useless aside from a very few notable exceptions.

I've avoided some amount of fights with it. And you do get XP rewarded for a Charisma "win," though I think it's less rewarding than an actual fight (but don't quote me on that).

Lockpicking is relatively skippable thanks to bashing, although there again, perhaps that's preferable to mechanically forcing Lockpicking to be the only means of accessing locked stuff.

Mostly true, but it is useful when stealthing.

If you're making a Rogue, your customization options are extremely limited, especially if you're not skipping Lockpicking and/or Pickpocketing.

Hm, define Rogue. Lockpicking, Pickpocketing, and Sneaking are not tied to any Attributes or Skills. You can make your Elementalist or Man-At-Arms guy any combination of lockpicking, pickpocketing, and sneaking. As for detecting traps, that requires Perception, which is about equally useful for every type of character except a Marksman, who really needs it.

Sword-and-board not nearly tanky enough to justify far shittier damage, or so I've read, ESPECIALLY since it calls for an additional skill.

Hm, I think the trade-off is balanced. I have a two handed Man-At-Arms and a S&S man-at-arms. They're both useful. The nice thing about the Shield Specialist is that it is a flat bonus. In other words, if your shield blocks 30%, and you have Shield level 2, it's 30%+10% = 40% block chance. So it scales differently than a weapon ability. On the other hand weapon abilities increase by 10% per level (shield is 5%/level). Anyways the different scaling methods make it hard to compare as the effect of shield ability depends on the actual shield itself (e.g. a Shield that has 5% blocking with your ability giving 10% = 3x as much blocking whereas a shield with 40% + 10% blocking from ability = 1.25x as much blocking, lol).

I guess since I'm near the end I can do some rudimentary math. I think my best shield is something like 35% block chance. I didn't max out my weapon ability on my 2hand warrior, or my shield ability on my S&S guy, but let's just assume we did for easy math's sake. So with max ability (6), shield blocking = 35% + 30% which is an increase by factor of around 1.5x. Weapon ability is straightforward, max 6 points = 60%, so it would be a factor of 1.6x. So kinda even. That's also not taking into account that equipment can increase ability level too...

near-useless skills/dump stats, imbalances, borked economy, etc. are cRPG standards, so that's fine.

Disagree. I don't think the imbalances and economy are fine, lol. Among other issues.

 

[Mangoose]

Hybridization - that's a lie imo. Dunno where you got that from, I'm swimming in skill points and on a whim I can learn a new magic school or whatever with all my characters. The system perfectly supports hybridization, even actually makes it the superior choice. My tank learned witchcraft and air magic for example.

You can hybridize but you are pretty limited. Using your example, yes, you can add Witchcraft and Air Magic to your tank, but if you give him skills that have are chance-based on Intelligence, then you'd have to add Intelligence to your tank, which then weakens you as a tank because you need Strength for heavy armor, Constitution for HP of course, and even Dexterity is helpful because it increases defense rating.

I think there are only a couple types of hybrids that actually work (well). One is Scoundrel/Marksman, since both depend on Dexterity. Another is any combination of the Elemental abilities and Witchcraft since they all depend on Intelligence. Lastly you can splash 1 or 2 points into an Ability, and pick certain Skills from those Ability "schools" that are useful no matter what your Attribute or Ability level is. For example, skills like Teleport, Tactical Retreat, Cloak and Dagger. Terrain affecting spells, too, because I think they always work (like casting a stunning spell onto a puddle). Basically, skills that don't have a chance to "fizzle."

 

[Haba]

It is perfectly viable to make Men at Arms, Scoundrel or Marksman hybrids. But you'll only be cherry-picking certain useful traits, not building 50/50 hybrid.

 

[Cadmus]

I suppose that making a 50/50 hybrid would really require you to plan ahead with the attribute points, ok. I thought that the system where you can get 1 lvl in each skill to learn any chosen ability with a malus if the lvl is too high really supports hybrid characters. Especially as most of the attributes are useful for AP and you always want to take them.

Spoiler

I just had a cool moment. I'm in the phantom forest and there's death knights and there was this big ass death lord who teleported my mage into a pit of lava. However, my mighty Madora fully buffed with all the damage spells I could get, 1-shot him with flurry. It was so satisfying!

 

[Aeschylus]

• Sword-and-board not nearly tanky enough to justify far shittier damage, or so I've read, ESPECIALLY since it calls for an additional skill.
• Hybridization severely weakens a character, limiting viable customization choices.
• Instakill traps essentially forcing a reload. Some people don't mind this; I don't mind it if some clue is available giving at least subtle warning. Orc mourning on the beach, I'm looking at you.

These three are sort of incorrect, though the rest I basically agree with.
A well built Sword-and-board is basically invincible by the end, even after the patch. They honestly don't lag behind that much in damage either.
Hybridization does not weaken you at all -- you get tons of skill points through levelling, and extra skill points via books in your homestead. It's entirely possible to max out 3-4 skills and still have points left over.
There's only one instance of an actual insta-kill trap in the game, and that is part of a sorta-puzzle in an optional area. Anything else can be disarmed or survived via high resistances/spells (even lava).

 

[RK47]

About Hybrids:
Since INT 8 is necessary to equip the sarongs, might as well pump it up to 8 and enjoy Level 1 Buff spells as a side bonus.
You'd be surprised how effective a simple Rain is at setting up chain combo.
Think about this way - there is no saving throw vs Rain. You get wet when a rain is cast.
So the trick is to have 8 INT Warrior making it rain at start and leave the Chill (Wet+Chill=Freeze) and Blitz Bolt (Wet+Lightning=Stun) to Wizards with High INT.
It's better than dealing damage and CC is one of the strongest options available in the game - effective from start till end game.
Also - 1 pt in Witchcraft for Oath coupled with AOE attack ability is pretty effective.
1 Point in Geomancy gives you a Spider pet to eat attacks, midnight oil to slow & start a fire, and Fortify to block 50% physical attacks.
1 Point in Aeromancer gives you an easy teleport to deal damage and relocate dangerous enemies from 15m range. Drop a dangerous enemy into a pool of lava, or electrified puddle of water for CC soup at no saving throw.

So, tell me again how going hybrid weakens your character.

 

[Pope Amole II]

Actually, the best part of splashing into intelligence (I think splashing is the correct term, not hybrydization) is that sarongs can give you a bonus to both willpower and bodybuilding. Which is important, especially in the lone wolf mode. Of course, making everyone a minor caster is nice, but, in the hands of experienced player, that's gonna be pretty overpowered - the game's challenge was not meant to handle that.

Sword and board is crap in the game, though, but that's mostly because all STR-based 1-handed weapons are kinda crappy - they deal, like, 2 times less damage than the properly crafted 2-handed axe while costing just 1 ap less to use and having zero reach. Where shields actually shine is in combination with rogues - a shielded rogue is one of the strongest archetypes of the game. In the late game, rogues already outperform (or, at the very least, mirror) warriors in terms of damage and with shield we're giving them much better survivability. I've seen 42% blocking chance elven shields coming with the requirements of only 12 strength, which is, like, 8 natural+2 tormented soul+2 str belt.

Which you may even put to use by splashing into man-at-arms also - from what I understand, nullify resistance is an autosuccess spell (as well as the divine light), as long as you have 100% chance to cast it, monsters can't resist it. Nullify is hands down the best warrior skill and, at 3 man at arms, you can cast it for 7 ap - that's ok. Besides, since it has kinda short duration, you're never against having an extra one in your party. And, of course, having a shield means having an extra slot for enchantments - late game shields give a pretty solid +2/+3 to the constitution and some solid resistances.

Mages may also profit from heaving a shield - they're as squishy as rogues, even squishier as enemies auto-hit them, and shield do a lot in that department. It's just that the shields don't really decrease rogue's combat efficiency whereas with mages you lose +intelligence from your staff and, also, you're a really ability point starved class (unlike rogue) so you don't have much to spread around. Still, that's a great option for a lone wolf mage - even an early 20% blocking changes the things significantly and lone wolves, with their crazy hp pools, benefit greatly from having the shield in their left hand.

 

[Blaine]

So, tell me again how going hybrid weakens your character.

Why so belligerent? I mentioned character creation for a reason. The spell combo gimmick, cherry-picking one-point wonder abilities, and metagame knowledge such as having enough INT for sarongs—none of which new players will likely be familiar with—isn't really a slam-dunk argument in favor of hybridization. Each weapon type essentially hogs two skills—one for damage, one for the related abilities—and most either use separate primary attributes, or are redundant. For a rogue expert in both daggers and bows, you'd need to pump four skills and precious little else (doable, but why?). For a warrior who can proficiently use both a sword and a crossbow, you'd need four skills and two main attributes.

Mages do get the most variety, very easily handling two schools from a pool of five choices, likely with Willpower and two other skills of choice. Unlike Dexterity- and Strength-based abilities, you only need the one skill per school, not two of them.

Sword-and-board is perhaps the most restrictive. You're going to want the sword skill, shield skill, Man-At-Arms skill, Armor Proficiency, and Bodybuilding. Two-handed gets a little breathing room due to not having a shield. Rogue is also fairly restrictive unless you're willing to drop Lockpick and/or Pickpocket, which is certainly doable, so various Ranger/Rogue combos are viable.

Breathing room for leveling up one extra skill (one more point at creation, and about eight or nine extra points on the way to level 20, regardless of Lone Wolf) would help quite a bit in not feeling so restricted. I'm sure it gets better later on, especially if you don't mind not maxing any of your skills, since that hogs a lot of points.

 

[Cadmus]

Dunno about armor proficiency and bodybuilding. I have like 1 or 0 in armor proficiency on madora lvl 19 and bodybuilding I mostly get from gear/leadership.
Armor proficiency is not important imo. You also save lots and lots of points on skills when you get some gear with bonuses and I think most of the skills are capped at 5 or 6 so you dont need to invest all the points into them if you get some gear with a bonus (and mostly likely you will)

 

[Pope Amole II]

and metagame knowledge such as having enough INT for sarongs—none of which new players will likely be familiar with

But dude, that's not the problem of D:OS - that's the problem of the entire RPG genre and it's one of the hardest (nigh impossible, even) to fix. There are very few games in the codexian top-70 that don't feature this downside and most that do simply don't have much of character building - like the Betrayal at Krondor, for example. Or maybe Morrowind where you're going to become an omnipotent demigod anyways. Everywhere else, lethally fucking up your build over the course of your first playthrough (and maybe even the second-third one, depending on the complexity) is the name of the game.


Armor proficienct sucks, btw, even for the warriors - you may put first two points as they are cheap, but the armor increase is really insignificant and movement problems are easily solved through either enchanted rings/boots (which can start giving you +1 extra meter of movement rather quickly) and teleport or semi-teleport skills.

 

[Blaine]

Cadmus
Well see, there you go. As a relatively new player to the game, I have no way of knowing any of that without asking people who are already experienced with the game... and getting some spoilers in the bargain, but nothing too problematic.

But dude, that's not the problem of D:OS - that's the problem of the entire RPG genre and it's one of the hardest (nigh impossible, even) to fix.

I know. Like I said:

None of that's particularly game-breaking, and near-useless skills/dump stats, imbalances, borked economy, etc. are cRPG standards, so that's fine.

I mean, Fallout and Fallout 2 would be in the garbage on fire right now if newbie traps and wonky character building were gamebreaking.

Having said that though, I don't typically hem and haw nearly as much as I have with D:OS when trying to decide what characters to create and how.

 

[Cadmus]

Cadmus
Well see, there you go. As a relatively new player to the game, I have no way of knowing any of that without asking people who are already experienced with the game... and getting some spoilers in the bargain, but nothing too problematic.

But dude, that's not the problem of D:OS - that's the problem of the entire RPG genre and it's one of the hardest (nigh impossible, even) to fix.

I know. Like I said:

None of that's particularly game-breaking, and near-useless skills/dump stats, imbalances, borked economy, etc. are cRPG standards, so that's fine.

I mean, Fallout and Fallout 2 would be in the garbage on fire right now if newbie traps and wonky character building were gamebreaking.

Having said that though, I don't typically hem and haw nearly as much as I have with D:OS when trying to decide what characters to create and how.

I think that practically all of your worries are not actually important in the game and you don't need to worry about that stuff. The useless attributes - that's the RPG (kinda sad) standard. However, I've read what some people managed to do with some weird skill allocation, like lucky charm and it seems there might be a little more to it than meets the eye. Maybe just a little bit.

What's important is that the game gets too easy, imo.
And I thought anyone who considers multiclassing/hybrid character, firstly does some research on how the game supports it or at least plays it for a while first, so for those people that's not a newbie trap.

 

[;]

Re. Offloading crafting to hirelings - this has a tradeoff now b.c. they no longer auto level when picked up from the HoH.
Re. Summons nerf - it made things too easy the way it was before, to the point of trivializing encounters and thus being a boring tactic. In particular vs. Elemental attacks where they get healed instead and the AI has no clue... meanwhile even if the AI doesn't focus fire on them, their melee attacks add up over 5 turns, they have elemental immunities, provide a flanking bonus, create a surface when they die, apply status effects with their attacks, and even help to create chokepoints in some situations... that's good enough in my book.

 

[Mangoose]

So, tell me again how going hybrid weakens your character.

metagame knowledge such as having enough INT for sarongs—none of which new players will likely be familiar with

So what? You can respec in the middle of the game with all the knowledge that you've gained. Which you should. And even if you don't respec, you will have multiple ways to trade points between skills, talents, and abilities. Suck it up and learn.

Sword-and-board is perhaps the most restrictive. You're going to want the sword skill, shield skill, Man-At-Arms skill, Armor Proficiency, and Bodybuilding. Two-handed gets a little breathing room due to not having a shield.

Several nopes.

(A)I use dagger and board with my Scoundrel. I still need some Strength (I have like 10.. maybe 8-9 with gear that gives me +1-2) for a good shield, but I don't need as much Strength as a guy in full heavy armor. In fact, keep in mind that Dexterity gives defense rating, which is quite useful. I don't need the best blocking. I have above average blocking, not as good as my Man-At-Arms, but in combination with high dexterity and the above average blocking and also the Sidestep skill I cause missed attacks just about as much as my S&S. Will I take more damage when I'm hit than the guy in heavy armor? Definitely. But I'm still a Scoundrel, and a still damn good Scoundrel (and a damn good Marksman too) because I barely spent any points in Strength, and I had plenty of Ability points to almost max out both Scoundrel and Marksman, along with literally 1 point in every other school, lol.
(B) Secondly, Bodybuilding and Willpower are equally useful for all characters. Stop thinking in your stupid little box of classes. However you customize your characters, you will face Bodybuilding saves: Charmed, Cursed, Fear, Frozen, Mute, Petrified, Slowed and Stunned. and Willpower saves : Bleeding,Blinded,Burning, Crippled, Diseased, Drunk,Infectious Disease, Knocked Down and Weak.

Do you want your Man-At-Arms to focus only on Bodybuilding and avoid Willpower so that he runs around bleeding, blinded, burning, crippled, diseased, infected, knocked down, and weak?

(C) Why does your S&S tanky Man-At-Arms need sword skill? Why does every character need to do damage? Why don't you have your mage put a pool of water down, Air Shield your S&S man, cast a stunning spell onto said puddle of water, jump your S&S man in front into the puddle and then watch as all the enemies run at him and stun themselves into oblivion.

Or even simpler, use him to get enemies lined up nicely, then Piercing Ice and freeze 2-4 enemies at once. Then wail on them with your 2hander, or your Scoundrel, or whoever.

Rogue is also fairly restrictive unless you're willing to drop Lockpick and/or Pickpocket

You are not required to be a Rogue (Scoundrel) to be a Lockpicker or a Pickpocketer. You can fucking make your Man-At-Arms or Mage a lockpicker or pickpocketer. Because sneaking, nor the aforementioned abilities, do not depend on any attributes.

Breathing room for leveling up one extra skill (one more point at creation, and about eight or nine extra points on the way to level 20, regardless of Lone Wolf) would help quite a bit in not feeling so restricted. I'm sure it gets better later on, especially if you don't mind not maxing any of your skills, since that hogs a lot of points.

You get a cumulative total of 49 Ability Points from 1 to 20. That lets you max at least 2 Abilities, or 3, depending on which ones. You also can trade 1 talent point for 5 Ability Points as many times as you want. And yYou're right, you don't have to max your abilities. You only have two reasons to max your abilities: Save ~2 AP on the highest level skills available in your ability, or get a talent that requires 5 points in that skill.[/QUOTE]

 

[Mangoose]

Having said that though, I don't typically hem and haw nearly as much as I have with D:OS when trying to decide what characters to create and how.

Dude, you don't need to. Just make whatever characters and play. Tactics do matter a lot in this game because of terrain effects and teleportation and shit like that, which are easy to do with any build except the crappiest. I have only one mage, and he puts equal points in all four elements. His intelligence kinda sucks, because I put a shit load of points into Speed so that he could cast like 3-4 spells in one turn, so that I could create whatever spell combo I want ASAP. Best build ever? Hardly. Probably gimped. But it works, because D:OS combat isn't about maxing all your stats to become a god (though you do want high Bodybuilding and Willpower on all your characters probably), but to pick the right skills (to create the combos/tricks/tactics you want) and have sufficient ability levels and attribute levels to support those skills.

Not to mention, again, equipment also gives points to Attributes and Abilities, and sometimes even enables you to use a Skill you didn't purchase. Actually I have Madora wearing armor that has a chance to Freeze enemies when they attack her. Fucking hilarious.

And no, actually I'm not sure if this is the type of tactics that I like. I still like a more balanced, less silly, a bit more straightforward without simplifying it... Actually I don't know how to describe it but a turn based tactical RPG would be best like JA2 or SS1/2. Or D&D with modifications (not Sawyer's modifications). However, D:OS does take tactics, just in a different away. I am quite fond of the terrain and elemental interaction system... They just need to balance everything and change the cooldown system to something else.

 

[Blaine]

Suck it up and learn.

Let's clear the air here, Tourette's guy: The game's not too hard (just the opposite), I'm not complaining, I'm not asking for advice... I'm simply calling it like I see it. The feedback is enlightening and appreciated, but I really don't understand why some of you are getting so defensive. If I were here to shit on the game, boy, you'd know it immediately. In my first post, I mentioned that this is standard cRPG fare and far from deal-breaking.

Have the shenanigans of Roguey and other D:OS haters made some of your assholes tender? Don't take it out me, you fucking pricks.

No kidding: Once you learn which skills are worthless or marginal, what to put one point in and how to cherry-pick, what to max out and why, once you're familiar with all the good tricks and combos, then the stuff I mentioned no longer matters to you. Thing is, none of you shitheads have actually described true hybrid characters (in the sense of concept if nothing else), but rather cherry-picked and/or min-maxed characters that exploit knowledge of what's good and what isn't.

You are not required to be a Rogue (Scoundrel) to be a Lockpicker or a Pickpocketer.

Yes, I know. You can zero out everything and build a character from scratch. If I'm making two characters though, and one of them is a rogue-type character, and I drop Pickpocket and Lockpick from it (OR simply don't choose them, calm the fuck down!), chances are I'm not putting those skills on my other character, either. This is all for simplicity's sake here, assuming I in fact wanted a more-or-less stock Rogue.

 

[Roguey]

Regarding hirelings, I loved how so many people went through the five stages of grief with that fix. The death of the swiss army knife party.

 

[VentilatorOfDoom]

Thing is, none of you shitheads have actually described true hybrid characters (in the sense of concept if nothing else), but rather cherry-picked and/or min-maxed characters that exploit knowledge of what's good and what isn't.

I played a game with 2 lone wolf characters. One of them was to do the elite DEEPS, so he had to be a backstabbing scoundrel. The other one therefor needed to be the mage. However, she also needed to be the primary target for the enemy because the scoundrel would sneak and avoid being targetted all the time. That's why I made her Sword & Board Man-At-Arms. In the beginning I would raise STR to about 9. With bonuses to STR from equipment she was able to equip heavy armor and use swords. Then I maxed INT. Her role was to take a beating and set up the conditions for the rogue to do maximum DPS. (nullify resistances, inspiration, mass slow, knockdowns etc) Is this hybrid enough?

 

[Mangoose]

The feedback is enlightening and appreciated, but I really don't understand why some of you are getting so defensive.

I'm not being defensive. I told you I agreed with like 75% of your points. I'm being offensive because you're being retarded in your other points.

Have the shenanigans of Roguey and other D:OS haters made some of your assholes tender? Don't take it out me, you fucking pricks.

If you make stupid statements then you get a foot up your ass. I'm not even talking about whether DOS is good or bad. I'm just looking at your completely wrong statements and correcting them. And again, the points I did not address were the ones that I believed you were correct on.

I don't know why you'd think a DOS lover anyway. My whole point is that about 1/3 of the issues you point out are wrong (and I wasn't belligerent in my first reply to you anyway), and that you don't even know what the real issues of the game are except for hearsay.

Thing is, none of you shitheads have actually described true hybrid characters (in the sense of concept if nothing else), but rather cherry-picked and/or min-maxed characters that exploit knowledge of what's good and what isn't.

Thing is, I agreed with you on that in a previous post, shithead: http://www.rpgcodex.net/forums/inde...line-is-happening.92612/page-255#post-3469589

This is all for simplicity's sake here, assuming I in fact wanted a more-or-less stock Rogue.[/QUOTE
Why? You do realize that it's not the game restricting you, it's yourself restricting you, right? You can put Lockpicking on one character and Sneaking and Pickpocketing on another. That way your Rogue can still be slightly Roguey and maybe you'll have another omg HYBRID ROUGE.

I mean I don't blame you for restricting yourself, as I do the same thing - my main character definitely is my Charisma master and also my Perceptive trap finder (of course, that's for practicality's sake). But the game gives you many options to make your character and you have no necessity to make a stock Rogue. Actually the game does kinda force my main character to be a Charisma/Perception master because she's always in front. So screw you, the game limits me more than it limits you :p

Anyways, while the game does not allow for many 50/50 hybrids, I realized it does allow for moderate customization within "archetypes." For example a Scoundrel focused character needs Dexterity, sure, but then he has many options after that... Constitution for Vitality and for saving up AP, Speed for starting with more AP and getting more AP per turn, Perception for starting with more AP and more crit chance... Actually a Scoundrel/Mage hybrid would work because Dexterity would improve your offense and defense, and then you just drop points into Intelligence. And then Speed, or something. Harder for a Man-At-Arms, because Strength does help you get heavier armor, you don't have the Scoundrel's options to GTFO.

Incidentally I respecced my main into a Two-handed Man-At-Arms/Mage. Mostly just splashes, though, so that I can make myself immune to Stun/Burning/Frozen/Poison depending on who I'm facing. And of course Teleport. And.. Death Punch.

 

[Mangoose]

Thing is, none of you shitheads have actually described true hybrid characters (in the sense of concept if nothing else), but rather cherry-picked and/or min-maxed characters that exploit knowledge of what's good and what isn't.

I played a game with 2 lone wolf characters. One of them was to do the elite DEEPS, so he had to be a backstabbing scoundrel. The other one therefor needed to be the mage. However, she also needed to be the primary target for the enemy because the scoundrel would sneak and avoid being targetted all the time. That's why I made here Sword & Board Man-At-Arms. In the beginning I would raise STR to about 9. With bonuses to STR from equipment she was able to equip heavy armor and use swords. Then I maxed INT. Her role was to take a beating and set up the conditions for the rogue to do maximum DPS. (nullify resistances, inspiration, mass slow, knockdowns etc) Is this hybrid enough?

Isn't that a bit easier for you because Lone Wolf is still rather OP? Or is it the Lone Wolf + Glass Cannon combo that is OP?

 

[VentilatorOfDoom]

I think it was Lone Wolf+Glass cannon. Didn't take glass cannon. But Lone Wolf is pretty good without glass cannon too.

 

[circ]

The RPS combat style is really boring me gaiz, I'm sorry. I'm not seeing any imagination used in the spells or talents you get - although strangely the man-at-arms specials show some. But I'll keep trucking I guess as I don't have anything else to play at the moment.

The henchmen are also horrible. A level 20 wizard - with lots of points in scoundrel skills? Why? And not a single magic school maxed. I think one wizard with know-it-all, which is huge - except that wizard is a battlemage that I remember . Wizards with points in charisma? Again, why? I made my own henchman but then the game said I can't do multiplayer because I'm using mods. And it also bugged out on the henchman choices, so I guess that plan is out of the picture. I haven't done lone wolf yet because I like a big party, but I'm really seeing the appeal.

 

[Blaine]

If you make stupid statements then you get a foot up your ass.

There's a difference between stupidity and the entirely understandable ignorance that comes from not having played the game for very long yet. Your lame and impotent "foot up my ass" is pretty much just you acting like an autist because you think someone's being mean to your game on the Internet.

Thing is, I agreed with you on that in a previous post, shithead: http://www.rpgcodex.net/forums/inde...line-is-happening.92612/page-255#post-3469589

Yes, so why are you now going on and on about the metagame, cherry-picking, and min-maxing? Just talking to yourself, or...?

 

[Pope Amole II]

The henchmen are also horrible.

The majority of them are horrible. There are some really sweet ones. Mostly on 1st level, though:

- The god-tier one is Cain. Starts at first level with bodybuilding 5 - meaning he has 10 ability points more than your average npc would have. His talents are so-so, especially after the nerf (what a rush & leech), but, as npcs can't trade talents for ability points and there are only a handful of useful late-game talents, it's not a big deal.

- Second god-tier is Elessa. At lvl 7, she has a maxed out witchcraft and good levels of other abilities, the only bad thing there is sneak, so with it she has 15 extra points, without it - 12. She also has 1 crappy talent (pack mule) and 1 mediocre (walk it off, though for the mage it's more or less decent), but, once again, henchmen have the surplus of them so who cares.

- Next good one is Nerea. At lvl 1 she has 3 extra ability points, nice talents, nice attributes spread.

- Zalazzar is in the same league as Nerea, just different magic schools.

Well, just 4 in the end. But Cain and Elessa are really strong. And I hated both Madora & the demonhunter guy anyways so I'd rather have someone who can keep their mouths shut.