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KickStarter Knights of the Chalice 2 Thread - Augury of Chaos

Whisper

Arcane
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Phoenix is +50% to energy spells. Magic missile is force spell (not cold/fire/elec/sonic/acid).

How do you do the transformation into elemental/lich/celestial/wathever?

250 000 gold and 20 000 xp, also star crystal.


Probably enough star crystals for 6 (unless you craft with them), xp is ok, but 250 000 gold x 6...
is there enough gold for all 6 wizard party? Talking about core rules, where leveling costs gold.
 

Whisper

Arcane
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I'm about to start KotC2.
The hardest difficulty setting is the one closest to the core rules.
But skimming through the thread, it seems the general consensus is that the game is pretty hard.
What is the main source of difficulty - extra enemies, attrition or just the reduced/slower character power growth?

Reduced/slower character power growth AND gold costs for leveling up. You have enough gold but you cant buy everything you want from stores, need to choose.
 
Last edited:

NJClaw

OoOoOoOoOoh
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Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture
I'm about to start KotC2.
The hardest difficulty setting is the one closest to the core rules.
But skimming through the thread, it seems the general consensus is that the game is pretty hard.
What is the main source of difficulty - extra enemies, attrition or just the reduced/slower character power growth?
I don't know if it's just me, but the main source of difficulty seems to be the "normal/reduced initiative rolls of enemies" option. Everything else is obviously nice (more ability points, more feats), but even with the hardest rules you can build some pretty powerful characters. Being able to always go first with your casters is an invaluable advantage, to the point that that option on its own would justify the existence of different difficulty modes. To me, the gold cost of levelling-up is more of a nuisance and a psychological burden than anything else, but getting rid of it allows you to experiment more freely with vendors' inventories, and I think that's a good thing. The "Normal/maximum hit point bonus on level-up" and "recover X% of hit points after each encounter" help a lot in going through the levels without worrying too much about getting stuck on a long series of fights with not enough HP. I guess that the "provide additional campfires for the party to rest" does a similar thing but in a better way since it also recovers spells, but I haven't tried it because the balance that Pierre struck in the original distribution of rests seems perfect to me (at least in the first 3 chapters). I haven't tried the "reduce encounter difficulty with negative levels" yet.
 

Trash Player

Scholar
Joined
Jun 13, 2015
Messages
440
Why go 6 red wizards instead of 6 warlocks?

Warlock seems like wizard+psionice combined in one. Has less power points and lacks specialisation, but has more spells, right? Am i missing something.
The elephant in the room. Hybrid casters are traps if one expects a "2-in-1-deal". It is not. They are almost always at least a bit less than a pure counterpart on any given turn.
So more a versatility for power deal bar some exceptions. They are fine for an easier module or clutches or specific builds, just don't expect too much.
 

Whisper

Arcane
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Feb 29, 2012
Messages
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I'm about to start KotC2.
The hardest difficulty setting is the one closest to the core rules.
But skimming through the thread, it seems the general consensus is that the game is pretty hard.
What is the main source of difficulty - extra enemies, attrition or just the reduced/slower character power growth?
I don't know if it's just me, but the main source of difficulty seems to be the "normal/reduced initiative rolls of enemies" option. Everything else is obviously nice (more ability points, more feats), but even with the hardest rules you can build some pretty powerful characters. Being able to always go first with your casters is an invaluable advantage, to the point that that option on its own would justify the existence of different difficulty modes. To me, the gold cost of levelling-up is more of a nuisance and a psychological burden than anything else, but getting rid of it allows you to experiment more freely with vendors' inventories, and I think that's a good thing. The "Normal/maximum hit point bonus on level-up" and "recover X% of hit points after each encounter" help a lot in going through the levels without worrying too much about getting stuck on a long series of fights with not enough HP. I guess that the "provide additional campfires for the party to rest" does a similar thing but in a better way since it also recovers spells, but I haven't tried it because the balance that Pierre struck in the original distribution of rests seems perfect to me (at least in the first 3 chapters). I haven't tried the "reduce encounter difficulty with negative levels" yet.

You do not even have enough gold to level full party before you reach Moon crypt. Even if you keep gold and do not buy anything. It gets better after crypt, you can level but you really can need make choices what to buy.
 

Darth Canoli

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Perched on a tree
What i think is missing is... how to tell it? Example: when you have a druid in party the game allows you to find healing herbs, right? Would it be possible to somehow divide this druid-only ability on say 2 levels. As a result with level 1 you would be able to only find weaker (and less costly) herbs. With the higher level - all the herbs. Same with other skills, that was just an example.
Can it be done somehow?

Maybe through new feats, you could explain your idea to Pierre through email and see what he makes of it.


If I didn't bring a divine caster am I gonna have any ways to deal with death outside of the finchbury water fountain? I'm about 5-6 hours in and wondering if I need to replay a long fight because my dog shit 15movespeed, 42hp-at-level-6 DK died.

DK need some movement, because he needs to be near the enemies you want to debuff.
Boots of striding helps or rather make your DK a Centaur...


Unfortunately the case with fights vs high level casters.

My suggestion to Pierre to give groups a mere chance against the Spider Queen without the RNG fest was to make it so she spends her first round buffing up.

Her first move being to cast Prismatic void, whilst perfectly intelligent, is also a little bullshit as unless you manage to beat her initiative then she is always going to kill most (if not all) of the party in a single round.
Yeah though Spray and Wall are both legit from source material.

Void is just Pierre making most of level 9 wizard casting obsolete.

The worst think about the prismatic cone is the permeable wall in front of the Spider Queen, So you think you're protected ... You're not!
So, the solution is to prepare, prebuff and take position before the Queen arrives, put a silence cloud on the Queen's alcove, 2 fighters behind her with true sight against the wall and a shitload of buffs and protection.


I don't remember owning anyone here, but it is Fluent, as far as I know.

Well, if I owned him, I'd gracefully give him to you.
 

Iluvcheezcake

Prophet
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Le Balkans
True, that works as well, but you need to spread your stats for warlocks to be efficient between int, wis and cha, which lowers your dex and con. Also you do not get bonus feat each 5th level and no raven familiar (+2 initiative).
As a wizard (stygian human) you can start the game with str 6 /dex 18/ con17/ int 20 / wis 8/ cha 8.
With these stats and the initiative feats you usually start every combat first (all 6 chars rofl) and by the time enemy gets to act usually they are cced or dead.
High dex gives more initiative.
High int gives more spell slots and a better DC.
High constition gives you 9 hp per lvl which is super beefy for a caster.

Low str, wis and cha will ruin your saves, but hey, best defense is a good offense anyway.

Only thing that can put a dent in your plan is enemy getting a suprise round (thats where high constitution comes into play, you have the hp to bear the brunt of it) and spell resistance, but 2x spell pen feats, spells that ignore SR like empowered maximised ice lance (with true strike cast as move action beforehand for a sure hit), 6 TIMES, will wreck anything.

Another important fact is the magic missile spell. It might not seem like much, but a red wiz at lvl 5 can dish out empowered magic missiles, which with all the feats do 4-7dmg each (and when empowered 6-10) and are long range. At lvl 13 you fire off 7 of them. On lvl 15 you can transform and get 50% more force dmg which further upps the damage. Its a awesome spell that is great for bursting down tough foes.
You do not need money since wizards are not gated behind gear (it is nice, tho).

If everything else fails, you still have the prismatic spells heheheheh

6 warlocks does sound interesting tho...

Interesting read.
Yes, warlock has less feats and even less spells (not much less, check "Help" in-game). Also less power-points, like 2 times less which is still Ok. Also, 3 stats (Int, Wis, Cha) to max, but i think you can skip one of them if you use wiz or psi spells that do not need saving throw. Like true strike, having high Int or low Int does nothing for such spell.

Some things:

All stats add to saves, so you cant really "lose" saves to some low stat. Unless you have low amount of stats total (races get different amount of stat points), but difference is not much.

You cant empower+maximise at same time, you need to choose (emp max magic missile you wrote).

Phoenix is +50% to energy spells. Magic missile is force spell (not cold/fire/elec/sonic/acid).

High con gives +9 hp per level? Not really, depends on roll. Most of times you wont get +9 even with 17 con.

Did you finish chapter 3? You get very limited in resting. You can probably pull it up, but need prepare from start.

True, the amount of spells/pp on warlock to me is not a problem, actually i was thinking about deciding which part is for buffs, utility & no save spells and which for nuking (ie going max int and decent charisma, and dmg with wizard spells, but keeping psionic stuff for buffs and utility).

I play on archmage diff with max hp on lvl up, my OCD does not like it when hp roll per level is not max.

Good point about the energy vs force, totally mixed it up.
I finished the game with 6 red wizard
s back when the game was released, on 1.02. version or somesuch, do my memory is a bit fuzzy atm, was sure you can emp/maximize spells at the same time.
Back then i struggled up until the goblin arena, after that it was a breeze.

Playing it again to see what changed and new content like Finchbury.
 

felipepepe

Codex's Heretic
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Has anyone even found Ice Devil Fizzarmelech in the tutorial module? It's mentioned in the achievements, but I explored everywhere, tried the three endings and the fake gems, but didn't see any mention of where this devil is...
 

Whisper

Arcane
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Feb 29, 2012
Messages
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Good point about the energy vs force, totally mixed it up.
I finished the game with 6 red wizard
s back when the game was released, on 1.02. version or somesuch, do my memory is a bit fuzzy atm, was sure you can emp/maximize spells at the same time.
Back then i struggled up until the goblin arena, after that it was a breeze.

Playing it again to see what changed and new content like Finchbury.


How did you manage high sewers with few resting spots (4 of them)?
How are resting spots after high sewers? Also limited or can rest as often as want?
 

Iluvcheezcake

Prophet
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Le Balkans
Stupidly high dps through empowered aoe spells and emp mm for single targets. Also bought all the consumables and scrolls but didnt use any till high sewers (astralagus, spell scrolls etc, summons..)
 

Dorateen

Arcane
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Aug 30, 2012
Messages
4,365
Location
The Crystal Mist Mountains
Aren't the difficulty settings adaptive? Meaning if a player starts out with a reasonable configuration, and then runs into a seemingly impossible encounter, the settings could be adjusted mid-game to get past a roadblock. Likewise, if a player starts to feel the experience is too easy, the various settings can be calibrated to create more challenge. There is an abundance of options available now, and new players should not feel locked into their choices.

On a side note, someone uploaded a screenshot from Hearkenwold to the steam gallery. I love how they made their own Curse of the Azure Bonds style tokens for player characters, to fit the Gold Box aesthetic.

10AA843FAD8C4619598DB39EF1527B41D3624E50
 

Whisper

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Feb 29, 2012
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How to recruit Barbarian in tavern? Who appear after resting once.

You need Paladin/Champion in party? Any other way?
 

Darth Canoli

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Perched on a tree
How to recruit Barbarian in tavern? Who appear after resting once.

You need Paladin/Champion in party? Any other way?

Samouraï works as well and there's an option to pay him 500 gold.
I think there is another option but I'm not sure it's legit, I found out later some difficulty settings had been scrambled and I had the extra class skills checked, not sure when it happened and if it was on back then.
 

Serus

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Small but great planet of Potatohole
How to recruit Barbarian in tavern? Who appear after resting once.

You need Paladin/Champion in party? Any other way?
You mean Jorad or whatever? The half-giant barbarian. He was there for me from the start. From what i saw the 500 gold (=Diplomacy) option doesn't work. He "rejects flattery" or something like that. Only "word of honour" + 1:1 combat works. Champion/Paladin/Samurai on very hard. On normal and hard classes get one additional skill so the Cleric also can do it.
 

Whisper

Arcane
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Joined
Feb 29, 2012
Messages
4,357
How to recruit Barbarian in tavern? Who appear after resting once.

You need Paladin/Champion in party? Any other way?
You mean Jorad or whatever? The half-giant barbarian. He was there for me from the start. From what i saw the 500 gold (=Diplomacy) option doesn't work. He "rejects flattery" or something like that. Only "word of honour" + 1:1 combat works. Champion/Paladin/Samurai on very hard. On normal and hard classes get one additional skill so the Cleric also can do it.

Yes, Jorad. Cant get him with cleric... and he does not take money.
 

Whisper

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Messages
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To me, the gold cost of levelling-up is more of a nuisance and a psychological burden than anything else, but getting rid of it allows you to experiment more freely with vendors' inventories, and I think that's a good thing.

Started another run and just checked, even at low level gold costs matter.
From lvl 3 to 4 it costs almost same as +2 item from merchant (3400 gold). This is just for 1 character.
Later it gets like 15k per level per character.
 

Trash Player

Scholar
Joined
Jun 13, 2015
Messages
440
Yep, it costs 1150*x gold to level up to x+1 level. That is 218.5k for each toon, 1311k for party of 6.
It is not spare change, more like half of the profit.
 

NJClaw

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Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture
To me, the gold cost of levelling-up is more of a nuisance and a psychological burden than anything else, but getting rid of it allows you to experiment more freely with vendors' inventories, and I think that's a good thing.

Started another run and just checked, even at low level gold costs matter.
From lvl 3 to 4 it costs almost same as +2 item from merchant (3400 gold). This is just for 1 character.
Later it gets like 15k per level per character.
Keep in mind that I basically don't spend any money at vendors unless I know I will use what I'm buying for the rest of the playthrough. The last time I played I think I bought 3 items in total and then sinked everything I had into high-level scrolls. At low levels sometimes you might find yourself unable to level up a character as soon as possible, but I'm still used to leveling up only when absolutely necessary. In the second half of the game, I never have problems leveling up characters whenever I need to.
 

Whisper

Arcane
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Joined
Feb 29, 2012
Messages
4,357
To me, the gold cost of levelling-up is more of a nuisance and a psychological burden than anything else, but getting rid of it allows you to experiment more freely with vendors' inventories, and I think that's a good thing.

Started another run and just checked, even at low level gold costs matter.
From lvl 3 to 4 it costs almost same as +2 item from merchant (3400 gold). This is just for 1 character.
Later it gets like 15k per level per character.
Keep in mind that I basically don't spend any money at vendors unless I know I will use what I'm buying for the rest of the playthrough. The last time I played I think I bought 3 items in total and then sinked everything I had into high-level scrolls. At low levels sometimes you might find yourself unable to level up a character as soon as possible, but I'm still used to leveling up only when absolutely necessary. In the second half of the game, I never have problems leveling up characters whenever I need to.

You only bought 3 items because you did not want to buy more items? Which could be helpful in part of game.
Or because you spend most of gold on leveling up?
 

Cryomancer

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I did the ascension as an white wizard(conjuration) but got disappointed as my portrait and sprite din't changed. I really miss M&M VIII where becoming a lich changes your portrait. But that ability is quite powerful.
 

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