KickStarter Lords of Xulima

[I'm Big Into Anal]

So I'm starting the game with this party:

Front Row:
Arcane Soldier : sword
Gaulen :
Thief : sword

Back Row:
Mage: polearms
Bard: polearms
Cleric: polearms

Anything specific I should have in mind ? Arcane soldier has been improved after the latest patches, hasn't he? Any general tips ?

back row is fine - youll find that you wont invest any weapon skills with the cleric and mage because theyll be too busy pwning n00bs and saving your front rows ass with protection and healing spells.

your bard is an interesting character; i pumped points into crossbows and bows [ebony bows wound] for mine early on until STUN became available [around level 6-7? cant remember] and then furiously began dumping my other attribute [besides speed, which i put into every member of my party every level gained no exceptions] points into power points [mana] so i could cast stun spells aplenty

front row is fine too; thief w/shurikens, despite what others may say, are pretty much mandatory for tough fights with high HP enemies; reason is that at my level 13 thief with 13 points in shurikens can hit for around 50-60 damage for the initial hit and then around 40-50 bleeding PER TURN after that. they are boss killers and HP bloat destroyers pure and simple; dont waste them on trash mobs because they are pretty rare early game.

wounding is great and all but youll get that from gaulen if you train him in axes; plus he has a skill that you can get later on [level 11-12ish] that adds poison to all attacks as well.

i use gaulen and thief as non-combat skill dumps and the back row is invested in combat skills

mage is a powerhouse; put points into everything he has and dont waste any skill points on a weapon; put it all into your spells. once your mage gets HAMMER OF THE DESTROYER you can wound with impunity.

bard is useful because you can afford to build a weapon skill up because lets face it, youre just treading water with the bard until STUN and then the fun begins. i trained my bard in crossbows and bows because you cant get to the enemies back row with polearms and shes good for polishing off wankers in the back row who are lingering on say 3-4 health and you dont want to waste precious mage power points [mana] sending 48 damage to take care of a straggler.

doesnt matter anyway, by the time STUN becomes available all your bard will be doing is stunning until her power points run out and by that time hopefully she efficiently helps mop up stragglers with the rest of the party.

cleric is pretty much mandatory for any party; especially on veteran and above. hes boring though until he gets LIGHT RAY [level 8-9ish], which is a high power point cost divine damage spell. divine damage is great because no one is immune to it.

the only thing id change is your arcane soldier [although your party is fine like i said]. i rolled the exact same party as you until level 6-7 then rerolled another party with a barbarian.

barbarian only uses 1 skillpoint to level up every weapon skill so youre sorted in that respect plus the prick never dies; get his armour skill up to wear anything and enough bling to keep him happy and your cleric dont need to worry him unless he gets wounded in tough battles.

 

[Monkeyfinger]

dabruz and kabruz are immune to divine damage IIRC

 

[I'm Big Into Anal]

woops i havent reached there; im still level 13

i stand corrected

 

[Deitti]

Regarding party composition, what is the status on Mages anyway? Some say they are great, atleast at early game and others say they are pointless due to having too costly spells lategame. Are the spells still too costly currently? Dragging around a character that's gonna be useless half the time doesn't sound too great.

What about Arcane Soldier, are they usable atleast currently? If so, what's the best way to use them?

 

[I'm Big Into Anal]

not enough power points for the mage is a player controlled mechanic and not the fault of the game itself in that regard. you have choices to where you put your attribute points; i chose for my mage EN and SP at every level no exceptions; clothing and jewellery buffs take care of evrything else.

helps if you have a bard in your party too but there should ne no excuse for casting high level spells as a mage; after all, thats your job

 

[Snorkack]

Regarding party composition, what is the status on Mages anyway? Some say they are great, atleast at early game and others say they are pointless due to having too costly spells lategame. Are the spells still too costly currently? Dragging around a character that's gonna be useless half the time doesn't sound too great.

What about Arcane Soldier, are they usable atleast currently? If so, what's the best way to use them?

Mages are amazing. And the only source of AoE Damage for most of the game. And yes, the pp costs skyrocket indeed. But unlike many other games this one requires you to buy and make use of potions.
I don't like AS that much. Mainly because they can only use swords when on the frontline.

 

[SarcasticUndertones]

Mages are amazing. And the only source of AoE Damage for most of the game. And yes, the pp costs skyrocket indeed. But unlike many other games this one requires you to buy and make use of potions.

Yeah, it seems that taking time out from a combat round to quaff potions is part of the strategy.. there were a few times the trade off between 'just one more hit' and "I better down this quick" caused me to think for a sec.

 

[valcik]

Mages rocks very hard! They'll suck up magenergy from their opponents on higher levels, don't worry about it.

 

[roshan]

What does the codex think about the Learning skill ? The guide in steam forums says it's pretty much mandatory for all characters, but isn't it better for skill-heavy characters, like Gaulen or a bard or a thief, to skip it and have increased skillpoints instead ?

It's almost completely useless, and really unfun to pump that skill when you could be pumping something more interesting or useful, and my characters with vastly different learning levels (I think I maxed it with my cleric, but other characters had only 10 points or so) ended up within 2-3 levels of each other, so what a waste.

That guide is really a piece of shit, it also recommended pumping CON for clerics instead of energy which is utterly stupid.

 

[Jaesun]

That guide is really a piece of shit, it also recommended pumping CON for clerics instead of energy which is utterly stupid.

Dead Clerics can't cast spells.....

 

[ghostdog]

Thanks for the info bros ! I changed the arcane soldier with a simple soldier and I'm about to start getting my ass kicked in veteran.

 

[I'm Big Into Anal]

 

[I_am_Ian]

What does the codex think about the Learning skill ? The guide in steam forums says it's pretty much mandatory for all characters, but isn't it better for skill-heavy characters, like Gaulen or a bard or a thief, to skip it and have increased skillpoints instead ?

It's almost completely useless, and really unfun to pump that skill when you could be pumping something more interesting or useful, and my characters with vastly different learning levels (I think I maxed it with my cleric, but other characters had only 10 points or so) ended up within 2-3 levels of each other, so what a waste.

That guide is really a piece of shit, it also recommended pumping CON for clerics instead of energy which is utterly stupid.

Pope Amole II

 

[roshan]

Dead Clerics can't cast spells.....

Slippery slope fallacy detected.

And I have already explained this before:

Most of the cleric's high level spells are game changers and single castings are enough to turn battles around. High HP is practically useless because high level healing and regeneration spells are really powerful and will be what keeps your party alive, not bloated base HP. A maxed out mass regeneration heals your party members 60 HP per turn, and if we assume it lasts each character 20 turns (I am totally guessing here, I don't have any idea how long it lasts, depends on the character's speed) your cleric is trading 120 pp for 7200 HP across the party. So PP or HP? Choice is quite obvious.

Quaffing potions is totally a waste of a turn and it's better for your cleric to spend that turn mass regenerating or mass healing the party, or divine healing someone on the verge of death. Level 3 divine healing trades you 68 pp for 300-500 HP (I never increased beyond this since it's basically a full heal already), level 5 mass heal trades you 80 pp for up to 900 hp across the party.

PP is also a much more rare and valuable resource. Consider that a point of energy only gives you 2 pp whereas a point in con gives you 4 hp. Or that equivalent potions of the same level give half as much pp.

TLDR: HP is cheap. PP is valuable and should be hoarded. PP can be converted into huge amounts of HP through spells whereas HP cannot be converted into PP. Quaffing PP potions wastes turns which could be used for healing HP instead. Guide is stupid, don't believe.

68 pp casted as divine healing will heal your caster around 400 HP. 80 pp casted as mass heal will heal all your party members an average of 120 hp.

 

[Pope Amole II]

Pope Amole II

You can just compare our street cred, man. I have a load of guides that most people find helpful and a couple of awesome LPs and what has he done in his 11 years on the codex? Nerds absolutely love this "oh, I have a special understanding of things and you're all dumbfucks" position, only generally they have zero proofs to that. Apart from their loud yapping.

It's easy to disprove, though. My late game lvl 60+ cleric, who was putting every of her points into con, had ~400 hp and ~400 pp. If she were putting them into en, she would have lost 240 HP and gained 520 PP. So we're talking about losing 60% of her health to gain a bit more than 25% extra mana. Cool trade. Not to mention that all that "divine healing around 400 hp", as you can see, is total bullshit as your cleric, if you don't pump con, won't ever have those hp (unless we're talking normal but normal is easy shit in this game).

Now, I wasn't giving that cleric any of the +con increases from liquids & stuff, but it's not like you can allow to do that - your frontline needs that shit as they, especially during the early levels, have absolutely zero space to invest into con at level ups. My late game soldier, for example, was only marginally tankier than the cleric because of that - don't recal precisely, but she had at max a hundred more HPs than she did.

 

[miles teg]

I'm using that "shitty" steam guide, I'm at level 15 now and I'm doing great, so I think it's not so shitty as people say here.

The only thing I regret is to have chosen bleeding as main damage rather than wounds. My three front lines (thief, barb and soldier) are all using swords and next playthrough I'm going to use axes for sure.

 

[Snorkack]

Pope Amole II

You can just compare our street cred, man. I have a load of guides that most people find helpful and a couple of awesome LPs and what has he done in his 11 years on the codex? Nerds absolutely love this "oh, I have a special understanding of things and you're all dumbfucks" position, only generally they have zero proofs to that. Apart from their loud yapping.

It's easy to disprove, though. My late game lvl 60+ cleric, who was putting every of her points into con, had ~400 hp and ~400 pp. If she were putting them into en, she would have lost 240 HP and gained 520 PP. So we're talking about losing 60% of her health to gain a bit more than 25% extra mana. Cool trade. Not to mention that all that "divine healing around 400 hp", as you can see, is total bullshit as your cleric, if you don't pump con, won't ever have those hp (unless we're talking normal but normal is easy shit in this game).

Now, I wasn't giving that cleric any of the +con increases from liquids & stuff, but it's not like you can allow to do that - your frontline needs that shit as they, especially during the early levels, have absolutely zero space to invest into con at level ups. My late game soldier, for example, was only marginally tankier than the cleric because of that - don't recal precisely, but she had at max a hundred more HPs than she did.

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=343637903
Is this your guide? Nice job bro, lots of insight to be found there!
Just noticed one thing tho:

Frontline:
Thief
Paladin – axes or maces
Barbarian or Soldier – same as the pala

Only staffs or maces for pally.

 

[Pope Amole II]

Only staffs or maces for pally.

Yeah, edited that out. I try to double-check everything but there are always the blind spots, you know.

 

[I_am_Ian]

I know you're a reliable source I was just interested in hearing counter points to roshan's. It helps other readers like myself have a better grasp of the game mechanics.

 

[roshan]

For reference, I played the game on old school veteran.

My point is that if your cleric can spam powerful healing spells (instead of wasting turns quaffing mana potions) then no one in your party will even need ridiculous amounts of HP. My front line characters for reference have 432, 487 and 466 HP at the end game, and guess what, they didn't need a single bloody point more. Survived and in fact raped every titan battle and also the final battle with not a single person dropping dead and that was thanks to mass regeneration and other healing spells cast by the cleric.

What is even the point of getting to level 60? Most of my characters had spare levels at the end game and I couldn't even bother to level them up because it wasn't even worth the effort (ended up from 48-51, this is without grinding any of the end game areas, castles, temples etc.). Gimping your characters for most of the game and having a generally unpleasant experience because half your natural skillpoints are being dumped into learning, and then pumping CON only to end up with useless and unnecessary level and HP bloat in the end game... And then being low on cash always because you have to keep buying skillpoints for everyone to compensate for those points wasted on learning.

And then players are bitching about how things turn "grindy" later on, well, guess what, you partially created that situation in the first place through bloat. This game is really incredible in how organic it is, even small conscious decisions regarding what to pump on your cleric seems to have a ripple effect that alters the rest of the experience.

Well, whatever, YMMV.

 

[Serus]

I dont remember "having a generally unpleasant experience" during my play - but you obviously know better what other people's experiences are.

In other news - you CAN level up learning and still level all your crucial skills. You miss the secondary skills mostly or put a little less points for in some utility skills but the crucial skills are still upgraded every level up for most characters. You don't have only 4 skill points per level as you suggest, with all the additional training, the amulet and additional skills from quests/potions/etc... you get 5~6 points/level on average, Learning only takes 2 x 30 levels but you get some of those points back thanks to aditional levels. I'd say at a cost of less than 40 skill points in total you buy yourself several additional levels. Is it a good trade ? I dunno, dependes on how you look at it.
I honestly don't see what can be a better investment than learning for classes that do not require a lot of skill points. The soldier class is an extreme exemple. My soldier level 35 at Veteran difficulty has 28/30 in learning (2 left to max) and i don't see any alternative skills to put those points. Bodybuilding ? He already is the tankiest in the party by far, pointless. Weapon Master ? I already have a few points there and im adding more every level now. Tactics ? Meh, i have a few points already and it is enough. Meditation - some why not but i will add them after level 37. Are you willing to give up several additional levels for what exactly in this case ?
Other classes are more starved for skill points of curse and in a few extreme cases (especially Gaulen as 1st liner and/or without other party memebers to take care of some of his utility skills) not taking learning is probably the optimum choice. In other words, it isn't as clearly cut as both of you try to make it. Both choices (learning or no learning) have advantages and disadvantages.

and then being low on cash always because you have to keep buying skillpoints for everyone to compensate for those points wasted on learning

Good one, i guess the veteran difficulty party in mid 30s with two levels left to max learning with ~125 000 in gold and with all the equipment and consumables needed is low on cash. :D

And then players are bitching about how things turn "grindy" later on, well, guess what, you partially created that situation in the first place through bloat

And all this because your spellcasters will have ~100 mana more but ~200+ hp less than the people bitching about "grindy" in end game, fascinating... <Spock>

 

[ghostdog]

I'll probably go with learning only with my soldier and mage. Both of them don't seem to need need too many skill points for their main abilities and all of the utility skills can be divided between my thief, bard and gaulen.

So I've finished everything in the first village except for that damn Ogre and those annoying mushroom fields. And that mage tower, since it seems I haven't found the key yet. Both the ogre and the fields seem unbeatable (I try to cross the fields outside of the enemy's awareness, but they always attack me at some point) Which means I should probably head to the next area and leave that for later, right ?

 

[Jaesun]

So I've finished everything in the first village except for that damn Ogre and those annoying mushroom fields. And that mage tower, since it seems I haven't found the key yet. Both the ogre and the fields seem unbeatable (I try to cross the fields outside of the enemy's awareness, but they always attack me at some point) Which means I should probably head to the next area and leave that for later, right ?

This is the single shittiest part of the game, and YES there IS a way through. You should have also gotten some hints as to where at least start to enter. But there is a way through.

Thankfully after that fucking shitty part, the rest of the games area design is not bad.

 

[Snorkack]

So I've finished everything in the first village except for that damn Ogre and those annoying mushroom fields. And that mage tower, since it seems I haven't found the key yet. Both the ogre and the fields seem unbeatable (I try to cross the fields outside of the enemy's awareness, but they always attack me at some point) Which means I should probably head to the next area and leave that for later, right ?

Nah, youre supposed to get through the mushroom field. when you hover over the enemy, you see their attack radius. It's possible to navigate, albeit cumbersome. But you'll get there!

 

[roshan]

I dont remember "having a generally unpleasant experience" during my play - but you obviously know better what other people's experiences are.

In other news - you CAN level up learning and still level all your crucial skills. You miss the secondary skills mostly or put a little less points for in some utility skills but the crucial skills are still upgraded every level up for most characters. You don't have only 4 skill points per level as you suggest, with all the additional training, the amulet and additional skills from quests/potions/etc... you get 5~6 points/level on average, Learning only takes 2 x 30 levels but you get some of those points back thanks to aditional levels. I'd say at a cost of less than 40 skill points in total you buy yourself several additional levels. Is it a good trade ? I dunno, dependes on how you look at it.

I honestly don't see what can be a better investment than learning for classes that do not require a lot of skill points. The soldier class is an extreme exemple. My soldier level 35 at Veteran difficulty has 28/30 in learning (2 left to max) and i don't see any alternative skills to put those points.

Let's see, if you got five of those levels due to your investment in learning, that got you 10 stat points. But I wonder about the usefulness of those stat points. For example my soldier has +86 to stats due to her equipment alone. That's forty three levels worth of stat points, and from equipment alone. End game across the board stat points boosts for slaying the titans, herbs, wells and pools - stat points are so abundant, I wonder why one would need to grind or bloat levels to get a relatively marginal number of stat points.

Bodybuilding ? He already is the tankiest in the party by far, pointless. Weapon Master ? I already have a few points there and im adding more every level now. Tactics ? Meh, i have a few points already and it is enough. Meditation - some why not but i will add them after level 37. Are you willing to give up several additional levels for what exactly in this case ?

This is my turn order against the final boss:

I'm not sure what tactics does but it seems my Barbarian (the first one in the order) and Soldier (fourth) have a really big advantage over everyone else, most likely due to the tactics skill. Oh shit, someone wrote in an internet guide that you should just put a few points in tactics and then ignore it, and therefore it must be gospel so that is exactly what you did.

Since this stuff is pretty random, here's a second try at initiating combat with the boss:

Again, the barbarian and soldier have a fairly large advantage over anyone else.

Other classes are more starved for skill points of curse and in a few extreme cases (especially Gaulen as 1st liner and/or without other party memebers to take care of some of his utility skills) not taking learning is probably the optimum choice. In other words, it isn't as clearly cut as both of you try to make it. Both choices (learning or no learning) have advantages and disadvantages.

I will certainly agree that it is not a clear cut issue. But if it isn't, then you must agree that a guide that strongly recommends maxing out learning at the cost of 60 skill points (half your natural gain across thirty levels, which is basically most of the game) merely to crunch out a few additional but useless levels in the end is flawed, if not completely illogical.

Good one, i guess the veteran difficulty party in mid 30s with two levels left to max learning with ~125 000 in gold and with all the equipment and consumables needed is low on cash. :D

If you have so much extra gold you might as well buy some skill points with it.

And all this because your spellcasters will have ~100 mana more but ~200+ hp less than the people bitching about "grindy" in end game, fascinating... <Spock>

Ripple effects. Since my cleric had more PP than necessary I used a lot of the in game PP buffs on my rogue, soldier and Gaulen and ended up being able to spam powerful strike, envenomed strike, bloody strike and quick strike with relative impunity and therefore combat wasn't as grindy as it would have been otherwise.