Monday's P2 Heroes of Steel - What's Your Group Like?

[fallen]

We were so interested by the post made by eldur of his group's setup, that we'd love others to share! Here is the example with which I am enamored. The little tactics section at the end rocks! If you don't feel like posting every stat, please post some highlights at least for every character!

Nov 4, 2013 11:33:02 GMT -5 eldur said:

I believe that I've finished phase 2. (The multiple thank you toast was triggered, the monsters were all defeated and the map areas uncovered)
Outlander Level 8:
468 HP, 104 SP
4 Dex, 10 Con, 7 Str, 5 Will, 3 Int, 4 Know
4 Blades, 3 Hammers, 3 Polearms, 4 Leader, 4 Lore
3 Dodge, 2 Resist, 12 Tough
Talents: Phalax 2, Stone Skin 3, Crushing 2,

Thief Level 8:
194 HP, 140 SP
10 Dex, 5 Con, 5 Str, 4 Will, 4 Int, 4 Know
1 Blades, 7 Bows, 2 Lore, 3 Security, 5 Stealth
10 Dodge, 3 Resist, 3 Tough
Talents: Farsight 2, Deadly Intuition 1, Aimed Shot 2, Blacknight 2

Wizard 8:
128 HP, 228 SP
4 Dex, 4 Con, 3 Str, 7 Will, 7 Int, 7 Know
2 Polearms, 5 Sorc, 6 Conjure, 2 Lore
4 Dodge, 7 Resist, 2 Tough
Talents: Firebolt 3, Choking Ash 4, Pureflame Shield 1

Cleric 8:
178 HP, 332 SP
3 Dex, 5 Con, 4 Str, 4 Will, 10 Int, 6 Know
2 Hammer, 2 Polearm, 3 Invoc, 3 Conjure, 8 Lore
2 Dodge, 4 Resist, 3 Tough
Talents: Myshana 4, Sacrifice 2, Ethereal 1


General Tactics:

Thief scouts with Blacknight.

Once in combat, find a choke hold and place a buffed Outlander up front as tank.
The party order for combat behind him is Thief(archer), Wizard(fireball/curse), Cleric(heal/sacrifice)

Once the outlander is buffed, the wizard will curse anyone that can hit him and the party will dps the enemy down. I use empowered attacks unless I miss 4-5 attacks in a row, or I do little to no damage with the attacks. If it's an enemy that I can't hit, I turtle into buff/debuff mode and just use normal attacks.


Thanks again!

[johndramey]

I'm game!

First, I'll post my party's skills/stats/equipment, then I'll post up my general ideas for this party and what I was thinking about while putting it together. For the record, I'm not finished yet. All my characters are level 5 and I'm just moving to the second level of the mine.

Cleric
Dex 3 / Con 7 / Str 4
Wil 4 / Int 6 / Kno 6
Skills
Hammer 3 / Polearms 2 / Invocations 3 / Conjuration 6 / Lore 2
Talents
Warder's Shield (level 2) / Ethereal Anguish (level 2)
Equipment
Warden's Truncheon / Wooden Shield / Quilted Armor

Outlander
Dex 4 /Con 6 / Str 8
Wil 5 / Int 4 / Kno 3
Skills
Blades 3 / Hammers 3 / Polearms 6 / Leadership 2 / Lore 2
Talents
Phalanx Shield (level 3)
Equipment
Hunter's Barb / Wooden Shield / Quilted Armor

Thief
Dex 7 /Con 5 / Str 5
Wil 4 / Int 5 / Kno 4
Skills
Blades 1 / Bow 4 / Lore 2 / Security 3 / Stealth 6
Talents
Blacknight (level 1) / Farsight (level 2) / Aimed Shot (level 2)
Equipment
Hilted Dagger / Yew Bow / Reinforced Garb / Bracers of the Wolf

Wizard
Dex 4 /Con 4 / Str 3
Wil 7 / Int 6 / Kno 6
Skills
Polearms 2 / Sorcery 6 / Conjuration 3 / Lore 2
Talents
Firebolt (level 2) / Choking Sands (level 2) / Pureflame Shield (level 2)
Equipment
Walking Staff / Initiate's Robes / Sage's Band

On to my thinking for each build.

For the Cleric I was thinking of building a defensive tank. Someone that can sit up on the front lines and support the Outlander with her abilities while still maintaining some offensive abilities. I use her mostly as a Warder's Shield dispenser, and her level one smiting blow helps her land killing blows on weakened enemies. Ethereal Anguish is held back for very scary enemies (I'm looking at you, Deathkin!), and she'll heal when necessary.

The Outlander, on the other hand, is an offensive tank. I bumped his strength and offensive skills with just a slight effort on defensive abilities. The level 3 Phalanx Shield adds relatively nice amounts of Parry and Dodge, so I pop it pretty much every fight. I pretty much use his Crushing blow (still level 1) all the time, and plan on pumping it up a level as well as putting his next attribute point into Intelligence for some extra SP.

Wizard is my death machine. I sit him behind the Outlander and the Cleric and let him go to town. His current build is quite SP hungry, but I keep him well supplied with spirit juice. In return he keeps me supplied with corpses! He's mostly geared around knocking enemies out using the Firebolt, but will later branch into the more heavy duty attack spells. Choking Sands and Pureflame Shield are held back for when a heavy fight is on, and then they come our to play.

The Thief is my slow burn character at the moment. I'm hoping to buff her bow later, and focus on trying a crit build with her. Currently I'm boosting her stealth and equipping her with as much stealth gear as possible. My plan is to use her as a scout and harasser now, and later when her build starts coming together a little more I plan on using her against targets of opportunity.

Generally my engagements focus around whittling the enemy down while I let them close in on the front lines. My squad will be arranged with the Outlander/Cleric up front and the Wizard/Thief in the rear. The Thief and Wizard will concentrate on any hero enemies first, followed by ranged enemies, then lastly going for any melee combatants. Outlander will focus on taking out the healthiest and strongest enemies around, with the Cleric playing clean up and taking out the weakest enemies around.

[fallen]

johndramey - double exalt for the awesome data! Thanks. This helps so much as we fine tune balancing the game, talents, and monsters! Especially the sections on how you intended the group to work as you made your decisions.

... I think the more people that post their groups, the more SP cost will go down

[absimiliard]

Nov 5, 2013 15:35:51 GMT -5 fallen said:

... I think the more people that post their groups, the more SP cost will go down

LOL!!!!!

-abs

[rabidbite]

My Brutal and Nightmare teams are:


Outlander lvl .... oh wait ... that team ran into a Deathkin.

My OTHER team in Brutal has stats of ....

Oh .. right ... another Deathkin.

Let me look for a team that's doing peachy.

(long silence)

Um .... I'll have to get back to you....





rabid

[evmaker]

Hearing the talk about Deathkin kind of makes me glad I started my first playthrough in this phase on Easy, since the Deathkins that I've encountered hit for about the same amount as the normal ratkin warriors.

Now that said, I apologize as I don't have access to the game at the moment for exact stats and skills, but essentially I have built along the lines of:

Outlander increasing his strength and swords, with some amounts into constitution. Talents increasing his crushing strike a couple points and phalanx shield the rest.

Cleric increasing intelligence and some constitution, and I think knowledge (the one that boosts tears) with some points in the one that improves anguish. Talents a few levels in tears (like wizard below, enough to heal without feeling like I am blowing through my spirit for my current level), rest split between warderns shield and anguish.

Thief increasing dexterity, and stealth/bows. Talents a point or two in farsight, traps and pick lock, with rest split between black night and aimed shot.

Wizard increasing intelligence and the ones boosting fireball and ash. Talents as high as I can keep fireball and not feel like it burns right through the spirit level I have at the current time, with the rest split between pureflame and ash.

Tactics my outlander I have built as a bruiser, he gets in and smacks things down and has enough other abilities to help him survive as a tank, so at the first sign of trouble or an encounter starts he goes first in unless I have in front defending a bottleneck.

Cleric is mainly there to heal, but also with enough health/shield that she can stand by the outlander to soak up some of the hits so he isn't the only one taking damage while providing some damage herself.

Thief is my scout, if I think theres any chance of an enemy hiding around a corner I will un-glom and scout ahead with her after arranging the others in a good defensive position/formation, otherwise she'll be behind the outlander/cleric peppering enemies from afar.

That said, I really like the idea of the "stealth" rogue, sneaking around scouting, slipping up behind an enemy and 'backstabbing' them per se, so in another playthrough I think I'll be building them with torrent of steel instead to try that out (especially since damage wise with a bow she still feels considerably behind all the others, and torrent has been commented as being very good damage).

Wizard will debuff when needed, but primarily he sits back and melts whatever gets within his line of sight behind the outlander/cleric.

[johndramey]

Nov 5, 2013 15:35:51 GMT -5 fallen said:

johndramey - double exalt for the awesome data! Thanks. This helps so much as we fine tune balancing the game, talents, and monsters! Especially the sections on how you intended the group to work as you made your decisions.

... I think the more people that post their groups, the more SP cost will go down

Glad I could help! To me, half the fun of these games is planning and executing a team strategy. I don't know why, but I don't get the same thrill out of CK runner parties as I do with High Fantasy parties. Something about the total uniqueness of the classes makes it so much more fun for me.

If I may ask, what is your opinion of my desired build? Possible in your eyes, or something that might run into some problems as the game progresses?

[beuns]

Here is what my group looks like at the end of the final battle on easy :

OUTLANDER 

HP 356 SP 100
Dex 4 Con 9 Str 7
Will 5 Int 3 Kno 3
Dodge 3 Resistance 2 Toughness 11
Blades 8 Hammers 3 Polearm 3 Leadership 1 Lore 2
Crushing Blow 2
Stone Skin 3 
Savage sweep 1
Phalanx Shield 2

I mainly used him to occupy enemies and dragging them to were he was. Killing them was a bonus but he was merly a beacon.

WIZARD

HP 120 SP 230
Dex 4 Con 4 Str 3
Will 7 Int 8 Kno 5
Dodge 4 Resistance 7 Toughness 2
Polearm 2 Sorcery 7 Conjuring 3 Lore 2
Firebolt 3
Chocking Grasp 2
Pure Flame Shield 2
Burning Blades 1

At first I used him to kill weaker enemies but as his Firebolt get stronger he became my main killer. I hit almost at each shot and do huge amount of damages.

CLERIC

HP 195 SP 238
Dex 3 Con 6 Str 5
Will 4 Int 7 Kno 6
Dodge 2 Resistance 4 Toughness 4
Hammers 5 Polearms 2 Invocation 3 Lore 4
Smiting Blow 2
Myshana's Tears 3
Etheral Anguish 1
Holy retribution 2

She was my most verstile character, i use her both in front line to prevent enemies from getting to my thief and wizard and to heal my outlander or finish off wounded enemies.

THIEF

HP 194 SP 146
Dex 9 Con 5 Str 5
Will 4 Int 4 Kno 4
Dodge 9 Resistance 3 Toughness 3
Blades 1 Bows 6 Lore 2 Security 3 Stealth 5
Disarm 2
Pick lock 1
Farsight 3
Aimed Shot 2
Deadly Intuition 1

She was both my scout and my main ranged attacker as I mostly used her basic attack to kill weak enemies from the begining.

As a tactic I mostly get the outlander in front line hitting anything that comes or running toward enemies (I learned the hard way that running to opponents was not really a good tactic when I fall into some ambush that left my group barely alive). While my outlander was holding enemies at a point I threw them all I have from a distance and having my cleric mostly healing and striking from time to time (BTW, do someone knows how to use holy retribution ? each time I tried it kept saying "you cannot use this talent"...).

[fallen]

Awesome thanks for the post, this is great info. Sounds like a great game on Easy. Can you post your character levels?

Holy Retribution is a ranged attack talent ... did you increase its power to 1? Otherwise, you don't have enough levels in it.

[beuns]

Nov 14, 2013 12:55:31 GMT -5 fallen said:

Awesome thanks for the post, this is great info. Sounds like a great game on Easy. Can you post your character levels?

Holy Retribution is a ranged attack talent ... did you increase its power to 1? Otherwise, you don't have enough levels in it.

They were level 7 except the thief who was 8.

I did put 2 level in holy retribution but when I clicked on it (from  the talent list) then clicked an enemy, nothing happens. Does it have a short range (I don't remember seeing range in the description) ?

[fallen]

beuns - probably something fixed since the v1.0.5 release. I will test to make sure it works here before we push the update.

[beuns]

Great ! Thanks

[John Robinson]

Darn I thought I was in this thread, and accidentally posted in Buffs vs damage