New player build: Dodge and fiery crit

[BLM]

Hello all, 

I've been loving Trese brothers games and reading this forum for a while but this is my first post, nice to meet you

I bought HoS almost as soon as it went out, but stopped playing it when I reached level 3 with my first group... I got dazed by all the build options and paralyzed by the fear of doing it wrong. After a loooong time, I eventually got into the game again and just defeated the shaman in Oskahold in normal. Just as I feared, my build sucks and I'm going to start again, but I'd like to get your opinion on my build idea before doing something stupid again. I have always liked the "glass cannon" type of build, and I'm trying to get something that would be original, brutal, but still viable on the long run. I'm planning to play on normal for this first playthrough bis.

The idea of the build is to take care of defense through AP stripping, Accuracy reduction and dodge. Offense will be based on maximizing crit, reducing resistance and adding fire damage, while developing AoE capacities. Here are my very broad ideas: 

Vraes the dodgy berserker: 
Vraes will by dodging through dodge and deal lot of damage with berserker rage, which reduces all defense skills except dodge. He will use burst of speed (for dodge), natural mastery (for dodge) and Berserker Rage (for the rest). I intend in developing Juggernaut to get as many crit opportunities by turn and giving him two light blades and pump his dext up, for... dodge. Isn't this a bit too many talents ?

Kjartan the igniter: 
Kjartan will be in charge of increasing the the overall party's crit chances with Burning blades and immolation. Meteoric shockwave will reduce ennemies' accuracy to enable dodgy Vraes to dodge a bit more.

Kyera, the responsible one: 
Among all those fine fellows fully tuned for offense, Kyera will try to keep everyone alive. Warder's shield will increase dodge and Ethereal Anguish will decrease opponents' accuracy and AP. I'll raise Myshana's tears as I suppose I will be needing it a lot. Kyera will have high constitution and tanking gear to be used as off tank while she curses, buffs and heals. I was thinking of giving her a staff as they rely on dexterity, have better parry and bonus stats than hammers and that I have enough resources in the team to do the bashing for her anyway.

Tamilin, the fire thrower: 
Tamilin will contribute to the party's defense by further stripping AP with torrents of steel, while increasing overall offensive capacities by reducing resistance to make the most of burning blades. I will raise deadly intuition for the crit, with probably a bit of blacknight for increased mobility.

The way I imagine the build in action would be to disable enemies through EA and ToS, with an added MS in for the most dangerous one. Then I would kill them fast with fiery crits and hope I can dodge their few hits. Strong enemies should go down fast while I will have a bit of AoE capacities for groups with ToS and Immo.

And now my questions:  
- Does this make sense at all, or am I just going to get hacked thin without any real tank ?
- If yes, in which order should I raise the talents to be more or less efficient early game ?
- Should I use choking ash ? With my previous build I couldn't hit anything that hadn't been ashed before, but I hope that NM and DI combined with the lowered dodge from ToS and EA can compensate. As for armor, the plan is to overcome it with crits and magic damage.
- Should I use Silent Stalker ? The guaranteed crit in first round and accuracy curse fit perfectly with the build, but since I will be raising mostly throwing weapons I am afraid of not being able to hit anything with a bow.
- Does it make sense to have Vraes dual wield light weapons and Kyera tank with a staff ? I don't see anyone on this forum who seems to consider as an option.
- Eventually, is there one of the 4 other characters that would bring a lot to this build ? I have the feeling I'm trying to turn Vraes into a Kincaid, but I want to discover his dark past...


Ah, just being able to write such a long post on builds is the proof that the game is great... Thank you !

[En1gma]

Welcome to the forum, BLM!!

The group looks fairly solid, and for Normal you should do fine.
-Vraes will not be as effective a tank as you want him to be with this build, though he will deal good amounts of damage. Consider sword and shield, as Berserk Rage doesn't touch gear stats.
-Ash yes. For this build I would go Ash 5 for the 9-block, and work on Immolation alongside it. Once this is all set them I would get Burning Blades going. Ash will increase damage more than BB in the early levels.
-Silent Stalker is useful, but if you want to be throwing nukes, raise Deadly Intuition and put a point into Ranged Onslaught. All that beside Torrent of Steel and you'll be cranking out some major damage.
-Vraes can wield 2 light blades, and some people use them to great effect, but for this, again I would go with a sword and shield. Kyera will never be a tank. OK, she can tank in Episode 3, but only if you give her the best shield, all the armor and HP gear, and make sure she's never truly in danger.
-Selen would provide early AoE in the form of the almighty Pinning Shot, and is a far more capable tank than either Tamilin or Kyera. Fyona would also be interesting because she can tank fairly well, and has the crazy powerful Strickening, bringing a new level of elemental pain.

Welcome again to the forum, and great first post!!

[wascalwywabbit]

You can max 4 and 1/2 talents by max lvl 64... So choose wisely.

Your plan is workable, (depends partly on difficulty) but personally I use Kjartan more offensively. MS taks ap, but PfS give defense (armor and elemental res) passively. If you're just hitting with MS first round it can be quite effective to add to the party's effective dodge and armor tho due to it's dmg reduction as well, whether that's better than simply killing an extra target or more by raising his offensive skill instead is situational. I prefer speeding the combat, and gain defense thru enemy death.

SS is ok, but expensive at higher lvls... I stick to lower levels on any game I want some efficiency from.

Your essentials are: Defense/hp to survive a round, acc enough to hit regularly, dmg enough to overcome soak. Choking ash is nice because it helps the latter two, EA helps the former two, ToS is a bit of all three in one . If you win stealth that makes it easier for the rest of your defense to be put into effect if it needs ap to use, as -ap, dmg and acc stripping does... Also Sly look 4, or spirit sight 7 allow you to find all the enemies withing potential range before the enemy turn on a stealth win... Pure dodge/soak/hp defense does not need ap for defense, but that usually ends with spending the ap to heal instead, super high dodge and soak excepted. If you max dodge gear, dodge talents, dex and primary weapon skill you can sometimes get away with not stripping enemy offense [acc/dmg/ap] for example, to focus on offense instead.

Besides crit, res and armor removal, using high ap/sp/dmg weapon and talent combos, or +dmg gears, are often effective at overcoming soak, at the expense of some versatility of attack patterns, and sometimes efficiency suffers too.

Except for some currently unused or underused talents, skills and attributes being in part or whole a waste of points, most build weaknesses can now be overcome with the gear additions now in the game.

As long as you build for the three essentials of 1 round D, acc and dmg enough to over come soak, the particular route you use to get there might be more of less efficient, but those three things will get you there, as long as you're not using sp faster than you can ever replace it.

For res cursing, Vincent, Fyona and Tam are the A team. For ranged and party crits, Kjartan and Tam are #1 (Kincaid can have the range, but Vraes hits harder, so it's a toss up for them imo). For armor stripping Kjartan and Selen are tops. For dmg cursing Kincaid, Vincent [barely], Fyona and Selen is most potent. Ap stripping Kincaid, Vincent, Kyera and Tam can remove the most per turn (Though you don't ever need that much by a long shot imo) etc. I could go on, but...

[BLM]

Thank you very much for the great inputs. I'm thinking about keeping more or less the same build but replacing Kyera by Fyona to get a real tank and increase damage output with strickening. Anyway I am annoyed by Kyera self righteousness and charity,I'm an aid worker IRL,I get enough self righteousness all day long.

Any advice on how she would fit in ? And wouldn't loosing EA a'd warden's shield hurt my defense too much ? A'd does it make sense to have strickening if all my elemental damage comes from Immo and BB ?

thanks again !

Thanks !

[bookworm21]

BLM

I never did use burning blades as I don't use enough -res curses to make it worthwhile on characters that aren't already doing fire damage through gear etc, but using strickening would have made that a more attractive choice for me

RE Fyona:

She has a buff 'Shield of Cortias' which is virtually identical to 'Warders Shield', and if you are stacking elemental dmg strickening will go far towards overcoming enemy resistances and ensuring it connects.

I personally have Fyona in my group due to the insane damage of 2H hammers, which lets me use vraes as a parry-machine using SoC from Fyona combined with Phalanx Shield. The auto-block % for ranged attacks is super good, especially in early ep1 act2 where the enemies change dramatically. If you haven't got this far, potential minor spoilers ahead?

SPOILER: Click to show

Tons of long range, decently damaging archers.

[wascalwywabbit]

SoC is better parry, worse dodge, similar with reckoning [-dmg, -parry and -ap] vs EA [-dodge, -acc -ap]. Basically you're trading ranged superiority for melee, and you get extra soak potential with Fyona. SoC and WS are pretty comparable, but righteous fever is more broadly effective than piety ward for soak. EA is superior for aiding D than reckoning, and EA is a starter vs Recks lvl 18+, but with reck you get to do dmg too at the expense of range [maybe AoE] and certainty of hitting.

Don't forget that zealous strikes is holy dmg to pair with ToS and strickening, and its acc bonus allows you to hit with basic attacks and lvl 1 hammer blow more. Combine strickening, ZS and Reck for massive damage potential in melee - you can potentially do all 3 in one round. Between strickening and reckoning you may be able to forego CA for Kjartan since those will nerf dodge and parry respectively, along with ToS -dodge it may be enough for acc, maybe more than enough with sufficient acc boosting gear and stats.

You do upto 6 types of damage, physical, 4 elements and holy. The enemy has the same afaik except holy is unholy. The more you can reliably get above soak [armor/tough] and res [all 5 magical] the better your base/avg damage will tend to be. The higher each type goes above soak, the more ap spent per attack up to 4 (You CAN do 6ap dual wield, but crit dmg % stops going higher at 4ap afaik), and the higher crit dmg% the higher your top end dmg will be, and the higher the crit hit rate the more often you'll reach near the top end.

You can over curse armor and specific res to do up to double dmg for each type, phys and magical. E.g. if you over curse armor to -10 that would be the first ten phys dmg done per hit get doubled to 20, the rest is added normally. Likewise if you curse specific earth, lightning, fire, ice and holy to -6 and normal res to 0 the first 6 dmg of each magical type gets doubled to 12, for a total of upto 60 magical dmg, plus whatever rolled more than 6 added normally.

I'm pretty sure that's how it was explained to me any how...

There's a decent amount of magical dmg gear drops and story items that you'll surely be able to do more than just BB's fire and ZS/Reckoning's holy dmg between ToS and strickening if you want.

[matrim]

I think Fyona is the better choice for your comp (I am extremely biased by the way, don't like Kyera compared to Fyona). SoC will help balance your defense against melee monsters (you want to be able to reliably dodge melee attacks, there are melee mobs that hit REALLY hard later in the game and getting hit by them is just not an option) while Strickening will boost your offense. To top it off it stacks wonderfully with ToS. I have played Tam+Fyona combo and let me tell you the -res is very potent. With these 2 working together you will want to up burning blades to get that sweet, sweet double fire damage on EVERY attack. The lose of EA should not be noticeable once you are are levelled a bit (EA is very strong early and remains strong throughout the game but other talents catch up in potency later, ToS getting -2 AP is one such talent), I use reckoning for spot -AP when -2 AP will just not cut it (deathkin and some other mobs that you have yet to meet). I have not tried Kjartan with this combo yet (just love Vincent) but CA will be essential early. He makes Ch 1 a cakewalk and early game includes some of the most intense moments IMO (before your team can start gelling really well) but later on if you find that accuracy is not an issue you might want to consider a respec to another talent (immolation or a defense talent). -armour works as wascalwywabbit described except I think it takes -2 armour to get a single damage increase on your physical attacks (the display is simplified in game, so the -armor you see is the damage added). I am also unsure if it works as a doubling like -All Res, instead just adding a flat amount of damage to all your attacks (where as -All Resist relies on the damage you do, so -12 ice resist needs you to do 12 ice damage to get the full doubling but -12 armour adds 12 damage to your attack regardless of how much damage you do, I might be wrong here though as its hard to test because incidentally physical damage almost always exceeds -armour values). This game has a way of being extremely satisfying once your team starts to come together, I wish you luck against the coming tide!

[phaze]

I have actually started a similar party with vraes, Fyona, tamilin, and Kjartan. Overall plan is to get strickening and elemental damage going late game with strickening and ToS pumping area damage while vraes plays tank and cleanup with berserk and juggernaut.

I chose Kjartan as not having the ability to strip parry made the game a chore as battles are slow due to misses. Plus BB pumps the crit levels to crazy heights. I really struggle with Vincent and not having Selen or Kincaid to curse enemies.

I really miss Kyera and EA to control enemy damage. ToS is spotty to use due to the range issue. Ranged damage still hurts a lot. Phalanx is good but not as reliable. Especially since this party takes time for strickening to mature as I went SoC first.

In red hill keep and loot drops are slowing me down. Very poor findings of dodge and parry gear. I'm still using vraes starting gauntlets. So it goes sometimes.

The potential for late game damage is huge, just gotta get there into episode 2 and 3.

[fallen]

Sept 1, 2016 16:57:42 GMT -5 BLM said:

Hello all, 

I've been loving Trese brothers games and reading this forum for a while but this is my first post, nice to meet you

I bought HoS almost as soon as it went out, but stopped playing it when I reached level 3 with my first group... I got dazed by all the build options and paralyzed by the fear of doing it wrong. After a loooong time, I eventually got into the game again and just defeated the shaman in Oskahold in normal. Just as I feared, my build sucks and I'm going to start again, but I'd like to get your opinion on my build idea before doing something stupid again. I have always liked the "glass cannon" type of build, and I'm trying to get something that would be original, brutal, but still viable on the long run. I'm planning to play on normal for this first playthrough bis.

The idea of the build is to take care of defense through AP stripping, Accuracy reduction and dodge. Offense will be based on maximizing crit, reducing resistance and adding fire damage, while developing AoE capacities. Here are my very broad ideas: 

BLM - welcome to the forum and awesome first post. Great group build, I think you'll do well with it. Make sure to tailor your gear to either double down on your strengths (more +Fire) or cover your weaknesses.

One thing I always recommend is to do a quick AP count for your characters and make sure you aren't investing in too many Talents. As an example, with Kjartan you've got Burning Blades (a Buff, applied before combat with Auto-Buff ... so counts as 0 AP), Immolation (3 AP attack) and Meteroic Shockwave (3 AP). So, with a 7 AP turn, you'll be able to do one Immolation and one Shockwave. Things to consider from this fact -- investing in another 3 AP curse (like Choking Ash) probably means you're spreading yourself too thing -- you can't do them all in a turn. Also, it will be good to increase the Shockwave AoE as quickly as you can to match Immolation, which would allow you to hit the same clump, or at least maximize your target count with the 2 Talents you'll use once a turn. This also is a great setup for later adding Firestorm (4 AP).

[BLM]

Thank you so much for all your inputs. I've started my game and looked a bit into how to level up my party, and this raises new questions: 

Vraes: I'll put one point in NM and two in burst of speed as soon as possible, but the two other talents I want to raise (BR and Juggernaut) come much later. I can't spend no points until level 12. I'll probably raise crushing blow as it would fit better with the build on the long run, but i'm afraid i'm going to miss some accuracy in the beginning.

Kjartan: I'll try to go without CA at the beginning, raising alternatively BB and immo. I'll also try to see if I can tank enough without MS, but in any case it would be kept for hard hitting opponents and not cast systematically.

Fyona: Shield of Cortias and HS will be raised alternatively, with reckoning later and a few points in Battlefield devotion along the way. I'm hesitating between consecrated defense and Zealous strikes. She is the tank of the group, but ZS seems to synergize so well with the rest of the build that it is very tempting.

Tamilin: I'll raise ToS and DI alternatively for ever. Since I will raise throw i'm not sure if Ranged onslaught would be so useful, i'm afraid i would not have the skill to hit reliably with it.

Does all of this seem to make sense ?

When looking at the build now I have to say I'm not so sure anymore. I have almost no defense and accuracy will be a problem early.  I will keep you posted on how it works.

[En1gma]

Vraes is tricky if you aren't spending his points when you get them. If you find that he needs more in NM or to start a defensive talent, then just do it and look to Respec him later in the game.

If you aren't using Ash, then I would consider Savage Sweep to keep accuracy, but again this will deal less damage because you aren't dropping enemy armor. I would reconsider Ash, but it's your group

Fyona looks good, but I would work to keep Strickening and group elemental damage levels about the same. Over cursing res is powerful, you just need to have the elemental damage output to make it worth it. Consider stopping it once it reaches its 9-block for maximum coverage, finishing SoC, then going back to Strickening.

Tamilin will be grateful for that point in Onslaught. Strickening drops Dodge, Ash will eventually if you use it, and Deadly Intuition adds plenty of ranged accuracy. You will hit consistently with it on normal, trust me.

[fallen]

BLM - I think the tweaks you've made are great, and I'd be excited to see your group's experience without Ash. It is such a dominantly powerful Talent, but if you pile on the Holy Strickening + Torrent of Steel + Burning Blades ... I think you should have a winning setup.

Be sure to spend your Attributes / Skills to dovetail with your weaknesses. If you aren't taking an Accuracy-buffed attack for Vraes, than be sure to focus solely on his weapon skill, for example.

[BLM]

So, a very quick update. I will post my team's stats in a day or two, when the builds takes its shape a little bit (and when i'm not at work like now). I'm now level 7 and I am retaking Oskahold's farmhall.

The real challenge has not yet started, and several key talents of the build are not yet unlocked or high enough to synergize correctly so it's a bit early to give any feedback. As of now accuracy is indeed a problem on rats or beetles, but no difficulties with Ratkins. I will see if a few points on NM for Vraes and Deadly Intuition for Tam are enough, otherwise I will probably need to raise Choking Ash indeed. However, the damage output of group really compensate for accuracy, and I'm punching through ennemies' first lines without any trouble. My kill per turn count is probably double the one of my first build: ToS, strickening, BB and +fire gear together are really powerful, even if I don't even have the crits raising talents yet. I can't wait.

Defense is sort of ok, Fyona is pretty good at it and can take most hits without really noticing. Vraes dodges often, but takes a beating when a hit gets through as he's equipped with +fire damage, +crit and +dodge gear and has low constitution. Until now, I almost never had to heal or drink a potion mid-combat, but I can quickly see the balance shifting as I progress. I'm a bit hesitating between getting battlefield devotion 2 or investing the two points in SC. In any way i'll have to pay more attention to defense during the two next level up.

In general the build is fun to play, a glass cannon as I intended it, with big damage numbers popping over everyone's head all the time (lots of excitement: AH YES !! OH NO !!). Dual wielding Vraes with Burst of Speed is very cool, I like the flexibility of having +2MP, 3AP attacks and then 1AP attacks, it's great at hacking through archers at the back. Same for Tam, 2AP long range combined with 1AP short range attacks bring flexibilty and ToS has an incredible Damage/SP/AP ratio when everything is cursed properly. Kjartan is great against clustered ennemies, and Fyona definitely fits much better in the build than Kyera would. Being able to tank and curse at melee range is great, and strickening is very potent.

Ok, I was planning this post to be much shorter. I'll edit it later to post my stats when I have access to the game.

[BLM]

Hello guys,



I wanted to update you on my build now that it had time to mature a bit. My group is currently level 17, and I'm getting close to the end of episode 2. Here are my talents:



Vraes: 
Natural Mastery 2 ; Burst of Speed 3; Berserk Rage 5
7 Strength; 11 dexterity; 6 constitution; 5 will; 4 intelligence; 3 knowledge
16 blades; 1 leadership; 3 lore

Vraes rocks, his 20% crit, +2MP and very high dodge allow him to leap on ennemy backliners and hack them to pieces, it will get only better with Juggernaut. With crits above 250 damage and 4 attacks/turn, he can also take down any dangerous opponent before they can do anything. Natural mastery is probably one point too high, but the rest of the stats are fine.
I might increase a bit constitution and intelligence, but I don't feel it's absolutely necessary. Future talent points will go to juggernaut and BR.

Kjartan:

Immolation 5 ; Burning Blade 6
3 Strength; 4 dexterity; 4 constitution; 7 will; 9 intelligence; 9 knowledge

13 sorcery; 3 conjuring; 2 lore


It is difficult to fully measure the impact of Burning Blade, however Immolation is very efficient against clustered enemies, especially after HS and ToS. Still a bit low in damage compared to Vraes and Tam, but he does manage to soften ennemy frontliners enough so that the rest of the group can finish them off easily, and he can kill a group of debuffed archer on his own within a turn with a bit of luck.  
I'll keep intelligence and knowledge on par while maxing sorcery. After putting a point or two in Firestorm i'll keep increasing BB. Immo is starting to become a bit expensive, so i'm trying to find better sp drain stuff to compensate. As Vraes and Tam have quite good accuracy and damage output, I am actually not missing CA anymore.

Fyona: 
Holy strickening 5; Consecrated defense 1; Shield of Cortias 5
5 Strength; 4 dexterity; 12 constitution; 5 will; 6 intelligence; 4 knowledge

9 hammers; 5 invocation; 3 leadership; 3 lore

I am a bit disappointed of Fyona. She is not a great tank at all and cannot defend herself from archers. She fares better in melee thanks to a lot of +parry gear and 1 point in well invested in CD. Usually she does not even have to tank that much because she cannot keep pace with Vraes and Tam, so she spends most of her time casting HS and quaffing potions from the back. HS is super efficient though.
I don't know if raising dexterity would help her tank better or if I should stick to almost only constitution. She's a bit low in mana, but +sp drain gear wouldn't help since she hardly ever hits anything. The next talent points will go to reckoning and probably in a bit more of HS. I'm hesitating in raising further SC as it is offset by BR on Vraes, so I might be better off raising consecrated defense instead.

Tamilin: 
Torrents of steel 5; Deadly Intuition 3; Blacknight 2
5 Strength; 13 dexterity; 5 constitution; 4 will; 5 intelligence; 4 knowledge

14 thrown; 3 lore; 3 Security; 3 stealth, 3 bow

While she was mostly a (very good) debuffer at first, Tam is really turning into a dangerous attacker as well. Very mobile and flexible with 1AP AoE, she is able to finish anything that is still standing after Vraes and Kjartan. Even on her own, she is completely able to take down a group of baddies in a single turn if they were HS before. I think that with increased crits and fire damage, she could actually go beyond Vraes' damage output.
I will keep raising deadly intuition, dexterity and thrown. I might increase blacknight to get one more MP. ToS is starting to be a bit expensive, I'm also looking for +sp drain equiment.

Overall, the group is working very good. I have had only 3 deaths so far and all of them were due to (very) stupid mistakes rather than my team not being able to face some specific situations. The biggest trouble is facing lots of scattered archers as the group is very short ranged: ToS and HS, the base of the build, have only 3 range while my AoE are limited to 2x2 areas.

During a typical fight, I would debuff the frontliners and cut them to small roasted pieces. In the second or third turn, I let Vraes and Tam go for the archers and mages at back while Fyona keeps busy what is left from the melee opponents. The trick is to keep Vraes in a position to tank ranged opponents whil Fyona takes on her all the melee ones. Tam is staying in the middle in order to debuff everyone and finish off the injured. Obviously Kjartan stays behind Fyona and aims for the biggest groups. This is all very fun to play, with a lot of movement and repositioning.

Now my main questions are how to turn Fyona into a better tank, as right now her potion consumption is quite worrying. I'm also thinking of buying a boost-in to replace Kjartan by Vincent, who seems to complement the group well with his debuffs and to be more fun to play than "immo immo one step ; immo immo one step...". However I am afraid of missing the combined +11% crits of BB and Immo, which are a real boon for Vraes and Tam.

What do you think ?

[En1gma]

The way you've built Fyona, she will not be a viable tank at this time. You've built her as a solid debuffer/support character, but not a front line fighter. BUT THAT'S OK! With that very solid base, she will be able to build up to tank with the best of them.

She needs to go STRAIGHT to Shield of Cortias 10. No more Consecrated Defense, 1 level is sufficient for now. Make sure she gets the bulk of the good armor gear. A good Parry item and a shield (she has a shield equipped, right?! Can't try to tank with her yet without one) will give her enough melee defense, and the armor gear will lessen the damage she does take, especially from archers. Don't touch Dex. Con is good for her, as toughness and HP are her forte for the time being. Every point she gets in Hammers will help with both accuracy and defense, so super important for her.

KJ should either give Burning Blades a rest and finish out Immolation, or go all in on BB to complete the group's offensive buff.

Archers are only going to get worse for you, so consider Silent Stalker to lower their accuracy, otherwise target them first to take them down before they start dealing serious damage.

Great looking group so far, and don't give up on Fyona just yet-- she builds slowly, but IMO is the most powerful end game character out of the 8.