Vincent the Sorcerer

[johndramey]

So, I've been busy and silent for a while and get an email in my inbox letting me know that HoS hit the shelves, so to speak. Couldn't stop myself, zipped over to the play store and downloaded it ASAP. Of course I laid down the money for the first chapter and the IAP sorcerer class and wanted to know who here has gotten Vincent? He's an absolute beast, fits my play style so much more than old scraggly beard.

If I could ask, where you guys basing the Sorcerer off of a spell-blade? He has blades and can cast really awesome spells, so I figured that's what you guys were going for. I have been using him as my skirmisher, sitting him off to the side of Kyera and Vraes and zipping him in to deal finishing blows on weakened enemies or zapping them with his spells.

To those of you that have purchased him and played around with him a bit, how are you using him? I am totally in love with the class, and have been building him as a total glass cannon. I switched his blade with Tamilin's Long Knife so now he has a 1 AP melee attack that deals relatively decent damage. Tossed some quilted armor and banded bracers on him so he has the most armor on my team at the moment. Still takes mean damage when hit due to his low toughness, but the armor ups his survive-ability a bit and allows him to sit on the front lines.

Now all I need is some kind of swash buckler to replace the Thief and I'll have my all-melee-all-the-time party set up just how I want it.

[Officer Genious]

I love Vincent as well (his art is awesome too!), but in my case I can't even use him to flank without eating arrows or becoming someone's punchingbag. Oddly, the healer does a better job of being a finisher/flanker than Vincent, but whatever, I still wub him. <3

Generally, I use Vincent to punish enemies grouping together-- this happens quite a bit with melee fighters, and LOTS when everyone is swarming Vraes the Outlander. The fact that I can cast lightening over and over makes Vincent pretty damn evil, and though I still shoot with her the Thief is feeling a bit underwhelming in comparison.

Maybe I should try 2 spellcasters? Mwahahahahhaaa...

[fallen]

johndramey - I can see both the Rogue and the Paladin in your future.

[johndramey]

Oh you can't tease me like that, fallen. I'm enjoying blasting through the prologue again, so I imagine I'll be running through again and again as you guys release more characters

[beuns]

johndramey - I use Vincent exactly as you do. The first time I run the game with him, I get to his talent list and goes "oh wow ! So great ! AoE and melee in one man !" He always get near Kyera and punish every group of enemies and as far as I have play, Vraes get light on killing (I mean he's lot less the only killer in the group ).
Vincent is awesome !

[Deleted]

You have no idea how tempting it would be to drop a pic of Minsc into the portrait folder for the Outlander. GO FOR THE EYES BOO!

[beuns]

Dec 9, 2013 23:14:35 GMT -5 dayan said:

You have no idea how tempting it would be to drop a pic of Minsc into the portrait folder for the Outlander. GO FOR THE EYES BOO!

Oh yes it is !



To derail this thread a bit : do you know that there's a Baldur's Gate 2 enhanced edition that's available on Steam which includes the 2 add-ons and some better graphics for the cut-scenes ?

[johndramey]

beuns - Yup, saw that in the Steam store and have been tempted to start it up again. Hard to resist, must. save. money.

Back to Vincent! I've added two awesomely synergistic skill to him. Charged Speed (for extra skirmishing abilty) and Storm Strike (for boosting his damage capability). Now I can pop his Charged speed during combat, benefit from the extra 2 AP (currently level 2), run behind enemy lines, and nail enemies with Storm Strike 2s for (8-17)+8 damage with +4 accuracy. Allows Vincent to chew through grouped enemy archers or handle 1-2 heavies with just minimal support from his buddies.

I've totally adjusted my play style to fit with Vincent. Kyera, originally a front line tank in my builds, has become my ranged support character. I gave her Holy Retribution and sit her behind the lines either cursing enemies or, if a particularly scary enemy approaches, nailing them for 16-41 Holy damage (Holy Retribution level 2). I focused more on combat with my thief as well, giving her Aimed shot level 3. That way scary enemies can eat up to ((10-17)+12 x 3) + ((16-41) x 2) for a grand total of 98-169 damage. That's before factoring in Vincent and Vraes! Of course, soak and missing eats away at some of that damage, but it is a pretty impressive number for a party of level 4-5 characters!

[Lesleyr]

Far prefer Vincent and his light blade to Scraggly Beard. Start the attack round with him hammering anybody grouped or if none, enemy heavyweights. If none of those then to frigid air any lurking archers. Outlander takes point and the others assist for maximum number of kills. What is dead doesn't shoot back.

[johndramey]

Glad to hear I'm not the only one loving Vincent.

I've further cemented his role as a skirmisher, I am pumping Charged Speed and putting most of his skill points into Blades now. I've given him a short sword from the Oskahold blacksmith and he has become an archer killing machine. My general strategy goes as follows;

1) Combat starts, move Vraes up ahead to locate enemies and pop Stone Skin
2) Move Kyera abreast of Tamilin, use them to soften any heavy enemies for future Vraes disposal.
3) Pop charged speed on Vincent
4) Use his +3 (atm) move AP to book it towards any outlying archers or concentrations of archers
5) Dispose of archers
6) Use Vraes as a slowly moving forklift of doom, I've equipped him with a 2 bladed spear which eats 3AP per swing but regularly does 50+ damage.

Really, if every IAP character is as fun as Vincent I'm never going to need another app again.

[algesan]

I consider Vince a waste of my coin, except as motivation for the Brothers to get more classes and content out quicker.

Okay, I'm going to give Vince another chance then, but...getting out of Nightmare startup might prove an issue. The biggest problem with Vince is that he is actually a damage dealer that fits closer to the Thief's job than the "scraggly beard", who is the party's main debuffer. In fact, my "fix" would be to give the Wizard his "thief" spells at start and replace the Thief with Vince.

Everyone level one, only starter items and with no chance to rest up for levels = no extended skills = PITA to fight through the escape to the tunnels in Nightmare. The two times I tried to send Vince out as a flying antiarcher skirmisher...toasted after not being able to hit hard or fast enough to put them down quickly. Now, having run almost all of the way through normal just to get a feel for the game, I'd say Vince would be great as you listed him and mostly the way I'd like to run him in Normal (seriously, I don't waste mana on direct magic attacks much after I level, it is better saved for buff/debuff work so the sword & bow can do some serious killing without burning up all their mana). Low on HP & mana, out of potions and several fights at least before camp isn't great.

Right now, without some of the other classes around, you lose your prime debuffer that enables serious sword & bow damage for a guy who is fun, but doesn't seem to cover the gap at low level.

[fallen]

algesan - I too find myself missing Kjartan at times; the characters are very different. Vincent is a huge ball of fun in my opinion and changes the whole group dynamic.

Nightmare is a PITA on purpose You asked for it! I've found training up on lower difficulty levels to be really valuable, as in most of our games.

[algesan]

fallen - Heh, swapping weapons was the ticket actually. Vince went from luzer to decent enough damage dealer at the opening and has just gotten better. I also swapped the Outsider to using the "Sweeping Attack" for bonus to hit instead of big damage.

"Unfortunately", now I'm going to have to run another game of Nightmare with the Wiz to compare debuffer to third damage dealer. Poor me...

[fallen]

algesan - I exalted you for suffering through +1

[johndramey]

Dec 15, 2013 5:15:19 GMT -5 algesan said:

I consider Vince a waste of my coin, except as motivation for the Brothers to get more classes and content out quicker.

Okay, I'm going to give Vince another chance then, but...getting out of Nightmare startup might prove an issue. The biggest problem with Vince is that he is actually a damage dealer that fits closer to the Thief's job than the "scraggly beard", who is the party's main debuffer. In fact, my "fix" would be to give the Wizard his "thief" spells at start and replace the Thief with Vince.

Everyone level one, only starter items and with no chance to rest up for levels = no extended skills = PITA to fight through the escape to the tunnels in Nightmare. The two times I tried to send Vince out as a flying antiarcher skirmisher...toasted after not being able to hit hard or fast enough to put them down quickly. Now, having run almost all of the way through normal just to get a feel for the game, I'd say Vince would be great as you listed him and mostly the way I'd like to run him in Normal (seriously, I don't waste mana on direct magic attacks much after I level, it is better saved for buff/debuff work so the sword & bow can do some serious killing without burning up all their mana). Low on HP & mana, out of potions and several fights at least before camp isn't great.

Right now, without some of the other classes around, you lose your prime debuffer that enables serious sword & bow damage for a guy who is fun, but doesn't seem to cover the gap at low level.

I can see where you are going with this, but I honestly had no real problems getting through the prologue with him. He definitely requires a certain play style though, and he doesn't lend himself well to the support role that Khartjan fills. My main tips for using him would be to remember that he is lightly armored, you need to be able to get him out and back or be prepared to suffer the consequences. I tend to keep him in reserve and only use him to finish off wounded enemies until he gets a couple levels under his belt and is properly equipped. If you send him out without the good skills (namely Charged Speed and some kind of melee talent) you are basically asking to get steam-rolled.

Vince's debuffs are also perfectly viable, but just have a different focus. Vince is really the ultimate supporter, he isn't too much to be reckoned with by himself but when coupled with a competent damage dealer he becomes a force multiplier. I like to think of him as my team's LMG; in modern warfare the LMG isn't so much about killing a bunch of dudes, it's more about denying area to the enemy and harassing the hell out of them. Vince's debuffs reduce accuracy substantially for the prime assholes you'll engage (ranged enemies) and debilitate the damage dealing of most every enemy out there. He doesn't make them easier to hit for your team, he just makes them ineffective. I use his debuffs primarily against hard targets like the Giant Rats and the Deathkin or against concentrations of Archers. Once their debuffed you can usually just ignore them and focus on killing everything else for a while, they will be much less likely to hit you and, if they do, deal significantly reduced damage.

I'm not trying to say you are playing wrong, you aren't at all. I think Vince is just a radically different magic user. He isn't as melee capable as Vraes, and he's not as magic capable as Khartjan. What he is, though, is an amazing support character. Vince + Vraes = a whole hell of a lot of melee death. Vince + Tamilin = a whole hell of a lot of ranged death.

I haven't really gone into the promise I see for Vince as a ranged support character, but just imagine combining his low damage, wide AoE attacks with Tamilin's aimed shot. Softening up large groups of enemies with Vince and finishing them off with Tamilin working from the back, Kyera working from the middle, and Vraes slaughtering up front.

Really, he's a tricky bugger to use correctly, but I personally like him a lot more than Khartjan. (Not saying Khartjan is bad at all)