Pathfinder Pathfinder: Kingmaker - Enhanced Plus Edition - now with turn-based combat

[Desiderius]

You can only be cool on Ironman, even on non Unfair difficulty.

100 % agree with you.

Not all of us are stuck in seventh grade. It’s cool to try out new builds and make them work together. Unfair is still a decent bar for that if you keep reloads and rests to a minimum.

 

[Desiderius]

So people start playing Ironman for a proper character building and combat experience.

I tried to play ironman and I really enjoyed it. However, in Ironman you will eventually die, and you will need to replay the first chapters over and over again. It is ok first few times, and the first two chapters are the best. But after the sixth death I just remember the first chapter by heart. You also burn out and lose interest to the game.

Well of course I am not claiming that you should only play Ironman, my post was for couple of guys here that still keep playing the game, and keep making new characters of Unfair and boasting how they are cool.
You can only be cool on Ironman, even on non Unfair difficulty.

I’m not boasting. You’re dismissing and I’m enjoying and seeing the results. For some reason this pains you so much that you need to proclaim the game too easy.

 

[Desiderius]

I have a hard time imaging flimsy witcher with 10 CON in the melee.

You get free CON by midgame. One Aid spell gives you as many HP as 4 CON anyway. I wouldnt dump it - 12 is a convenient number for warding off traveling fatigue - but it’s not a major thing.

 

[Desiderius]

All boggarts have a shitty will save. They are also humanoids so Hold Person and Hideous Laughter do a wonders against them. Low level boggarts in 2 locations next to Oleg's post vulnerable to Daze cantrip of all things.

Yes, but I was lower levelled and had to rely on Grease for the most part. Which worked well enough for the other 10 encounters of one shotting raging barbarians, until they decided to throw in an even bigger HP sponge with reach attacks.

Why fight him at low level?

 

[Delterius]

All boggarts have a shitty will save. They are also humanoids so Hold Person and Hideous Laughter do a wonders against them. Low level boggarts in 2 locations next to Oleg's post vulnerable to Daze cantrip of all things.

Yes, but I was lower levelled and had to rely on Grease for the most part. Which worked well enough for the other 10 encounters of one shotting raging barbarians, until they decided to throw in an even bigger HP sponge with reach attacks.

Why fight him at low level?

well I didn't, ended up coming back after the stag lord

 

[Delterius]

good lord why

 

[Damned Registrations]

Why fight him at low level?

Why fight anything in this game? The xp rewards on pretty much anything except quests and traps are a total joke.

I do agree that devs boosted enemies a bit but that is also because you got 6 guys in this game when in PnP modules are balanced for 4 man parties.

You say that as though it's anywhere close to a PnP module. The very first quest you're offered after you have any agency at all in the game would just easily crush your party even if you bought every flask available. Basically all the storyline shit is faceroll difficulty with high rewards and the second you step off the path everything gets +6 levels and gives the same xp. I suspect after they did the required stuff they realized you can't balance content for both people clearing everything and people ignoring everything so they made all the extra stuff unrewarding so as to not throw off the balance too much.

Also, they may give you 6 party members, but unless they're all mercs, they're pretty shit. Most of them have terrible stats and worship retarded gods with retarded domains, and they get locked out of the best class they could have had for their stats by starting with a gimped variation of it. Or Amiri and her fucking ball and chain of a 'weapon'.

On the other side of the equation you can rest for arbitrarily long periods of time whenever and wherever you want without consequences and get a full round of charges from your melee members off on almost every fight in the game because nothing aggros on you on LOS.

 

[ArchAngel]

That amiri is not much different than many pnp players that use power attack with low level characters even when you explain to them that normal hit will kill and he is just lowering his hit chance.
I played pnp with many different people and only about 25% actually care about doing well in tactical combat as a group. Others either do whatever or do stuff like cast shield on himself on first round of combat even when they are behind 3 melee guys and nobody will touch him.
Companions in this game represent perfectly average d&d/pathfinder players.

 

[VentilatorOfDoom]

I disagree that the companions are shit, with the exception of Amiri and possibly Harrim, altho at least Harrim can be a druid with a strong pet.
For the rest I always hear this or that companion is useless but I just don't see it.
What's the problem with Jubilost or 32point buy optimized magic negro ranger? Valerie cha monk 1->bard -> DD , put the level 4 point into CHA and she has CHA16 just like Linzi, get +4 STR from DD, +2 STR and +2CHA from her quest. She's a better Bard than Linzi.
Make Jaethal a cleric, selective channel, spam negative energy AoE, summern skelingtons, equip this cloak for necromancy spells. Nok-Nok rogue 8/vivi 12 is absolutely OK for most of the game (tho shit will saves hurt a bit come endgame). The kinetic sisters are OP as fuck if you build them right, especially the fire one. The orc is a powerful char but I don't like the micro required.
On unfair it's helpful to enlist 1 dedicated conjurer (elf chick being a caster level behind and not having the focus feats just doesn't cut it early on) and 1 guy who can tank, i.e. high AC/mirror image, can be the main char or another merc.

 

[Cryomancer]

disagree that the companions are shit, with the exception of Amiri and possibly Harrim, altho at least Harrim can be a druid with a strong pet.
For the rest I always hear this or that companion is useless but I just don't see it.
What's the problem with Jubilost or 32point buy optimized magic negro ranger? Valerie cha monk 1->bard -> DD , put the level 4 point into CHA and she has CHA16 just like Linzi, get +4 STR from DD, +2 STR and +2CHA from her quest. She's a better Bard than Linzi.
Make Jaethal a cleric, selective channel, spam negative energy AoE, summern skelingtons, equip this cloak for necromancy spells. Nok-Nok rogue 8/vivi 12 is absolutely OK for most of the game (tho shit will saves hurt a bit come endgame). The kinetic sisters are OP as fuck if you build them right, especially the fire one. The orc is a powerful char but I don't like the micro required.

Well said. When people mention "shit", IMO they are saying "companions doesn't have 82 AC and above deity stats", i only played with an custom made Druid since there are no druid companions in the game and an custom made kineticist with deadly earth because some times i wanna kill things faster.

 

[Damned Registrations]

I disagree that the companions are shit, with the exception of Amiri and possibly Harrim, altho at least Harrim can be a druid with a strong pet.
For the rest I always hear this or that companion is useless but I just don't see it.
What's the problem with Jubilost or 32point buy optimized magic negro ranger? Valerie cha monk 1->bard -> DD , put the level 4 point into CHA and she has CHA16 just like Linzi, get +4 STR from DD, +2 STR and +2CHA from her quest. She's a better Bard than Linzi.
Make Jaethal a cleric, selective channel, spam negative energy AoE, summern skelingtons, equip this cloak for necromancy spells. Nok-Nok rogue 8/vivi 12 is absolutely OK for most of the game (tho shit will saves hurt a bit come endgame). The kinetic sisters are OP as fuck if you build them right, especially the fire one. The orc is a powerful char but I don't like the micro required.
On unfair it's helpful to enlist 1 dedicated conjurer (elf chick being a caster level behind and not having the focus feats just doesn't cut it early on) and 1 guy who can tank, i.e. high AC/mirror image, can be the main char or another merc.

Ok to be fair the companions you find later are all pretty decent. Not that it matters because at that point you're rolling in wealth like a party twice your level would have. The starting ones are all shit though. WTF am I going to do with a Valerie that is fighter 1 monk 1 bard 3 with 14 cha and no dex? I don't need them to be perfectly optimized gods but for fucks sake don't give me a bunch of characters with literally nothing exceptional about them. You could throw in a fighter with 12 across the board with the first feat being skill focus use magic device and he'd be about as useful as any of the starting members. I got better characters out of literally randomly generating them in Incursion.

Literally every suggestion you made was 'ignore their first class entirely and use them like a character with -1 level and mediocre stats, it isn't a big deal at level 20.' Yeah no shit. You don't start the game at level 20 though. There's a difference between optimal play and being the guy who took a level of sorceror and then wizard for the rest of his career with 16 str.

 

[Delterius]

just give valerie dazzling funky dance

 

[Sergiu64]

Ok to be fair the companions you find later are all pretty decent. Not that it matters because at that point you're rolling in wealth like a party twice your level would have. The starting ones are all shit though. WTF am I going to do with a Valerie that is fighter 1 monk 1 bard 3 with 14 cha and no dex? I don't need them to be perfectly optimized gods but for fucks sake don't give me a bunch of characters with literally nothing exceptional about them. You could throw in a fighter with 12 across the board with the first feat being skill focus use magic device and he'd be about as useful as any of the starting members. I got better characters out of literally randomly generating them in Incursion.

Literally every suggestion you made was 'ignore their first class entirely and use them like a character with -1 level and mediocre stats, it isn't a big deal at level 20.' Yeah no shit. You don't start the game at level 20 though. There's a difference between optimal play and being the guy who took a level of sorceror and then wizard for the rest of his career with 16 str.

But that's the thing though: because they're only level 1 you have all that much more time to "fix" them. Valerie can remain a Tower Shield Specialist. And she's one of the few characters that can pick up that all powerful 1 level monk dip. Hell - she can go 1 fighter/19 monk. She can try to be Sorcerer and Bard too. Yes you start at level 1 - but you're level 2 by the time you're at Oleg's - 1 fighter/1 monk is probably already better than 2 fighter to be honest with you due to crane style and flurry of blows. The characters I have the most trouble with are ones like Tristian who's already lvl 3 by the time you get him - he's pretty much stuck being cleric in a game that already has Harrim and Jaethal (who's probably better as a Cleric rather than an Inquisitor).

 

[razvedchiki]

Im experiencing some serious sttuter,i have a i5 9300h and a 1660ti.
Before the ee release it was almost gone.

 

[Damned Registrations]

I generally prefer my clerics to have a domain that fixes shit rolls so I can effectively take 10 instead of having my trickery check fail because I rolled a 2. Or the Travel so they don't cut our party's speed by a third. Or both, because I'm a terrible munchkin for wanting to move at basic human movement speed and open chests without saving and reloading the game. Harrim, Valerie, and Jaethal all can't do any of that shit. Jaethal can't even heal the fucking party, or get healed if you have a real cleric like Tristian who can at least heal the party up and isn't permanently slowed.

Is there some bug I'm not aware of regarding Monk AC bonus? How the fuck is that tiny AC bonus going to be a good tradeoff for not having armor or shield? Especially on a character with shit dex?

 

[Daidre]

There are +8 Bracers of Armor and +5 Dodge AC robe for LG monks in the game. Also +8 to all physical/mental stat items. So 8 + 5 =13 + AC bonus from dex and wis/cha is always higher than even a best mithral full plate +5 (AC 14 max dex bonus 3).

 

[panda]

There are +8 Bracers of Armor and +5 Dodge AC robe for LG monks in the game. Also +8 to all physical/mental stat items. So 8 + 5 =13 + AC bonus from dex and wis/cha is always higher than even a best mithral full plate +5 (AC 14 max dex bonus 3).

How the fuck is that tiny AC bonus going to be a good tradeoff for not having armor or shield? Especially on a character with shit dex?

 

[volklore]

Define shit dex ? Dex can be buffed to pretty high levels with +8 stat belts ring of circumstances, alchemist masterpiece potion, even without going crazy on dex in character creation. Ring of circumstances also allow you to buff wisdom and the master potion will also buff wisdom as well. There is also the fact that dodge AC counts is taken into account for touch AC whereas armor doesn't. TSS does get a class ability that ads their tower shield AC to touch AC but for non TSS, all of that sweet armor AC and shield AC is negated by ranged touch attacks that late game enemies like wild hunt love to use.

Tbh the monk dip is inferior to a properly armor fighter with crane style and tower shield for quite a long time. It just gets a lot from late game items/buffs which makes even STR focused char that start with very moderate dex reach really high AC late without armor.
But TSS will do very good too, hell even Valerie does good on unfair.

 

[panda]

12 and lower is shit, 14 bad, 16 mediocre, 18 good.
Though I agree that monk level is practically irresistable temptation for MC unless you want to play with incompatible aligment or pure caster. Even Str chars will have enough AC indeed.

But for mercs/companions your should remove the ring, Bokken's potion, possibly mirror image amulet. So the picture will be very different.
And shield point still stands. E.g. for mentioned Valerie it can go up to +10/13 touch AC mid/late game iirc which is quite sick bonus.

 

[volklore]

AH yes, for mercs/companions not built around DEX i agree, there is no reason to take a monk dip unless you want quick access to crane feats.

 

[Sergiu64]

Funny thing is - Valerie's personal quest fight with that paladin that gives her the scar is much harder with her original build rather then if you turn her into a monk. The guy sunders her armor and takes away all that sweet armor ac. Of course winning that fight is not required and no one else does it - so the tower shield specialist can work too. I just... don't like tower shields I guess.

12 and lower is shit, 14 bad, 16 mediocre, 18 good.

I mean... that's a difference of 3 AC between "Shit" and "good". So depending on how over the top the build is - it might not make any difference.

 

[panda]

12 and lower is shit, 14 bad, 16 mediocre, 18 good.

I mean... that's a difference of 3 AC between "Shit" and "good". So depending on how over the top the build is - it might not make any difference.

It is close, but don't forget another +2 from lvl up bonuses which you won't receive on Str build.

And if we talk about touch AC i prefer to cast reduce person on Dex characters instead of Legendary proportions, that is another 4. So, overall +9(+11 if you are dirty vivi dipper) - quite a difference i'd say.

 

[ArchAngel]

Or you can go with Val Fighter 1/Kinetic Knight 19 and she will both be an awesome tank and do lots of damage and her attack with be a touch attack. And Con is her greatest stat and Con is main stat for KK.

Edit: also you can have defensive fighting on all the time when using your touch attack weapon because you cannot miss with it vs 90% of enemies.

 

[Damned Registrations]

TIL everyone plays the game at level 20 from the very start with endgame items. Explains why those spiders are so easy. Just cast Sirocco on them noob.

 

[ArchAngel]

TIL everyone plays the game at level 20 from the very start with endgame items. Explains why those spiders are so easy. Just cast Sirocco on them noob.

With KK you don't need endgame items or high levels. Class works well as soon as you get your touch attack weapon.