Vasvary5050

Any suggestions for best shield options for monk for fist + shield? Badgradr's Barricade? Sura's Supper Plate?

Yep, I just completed his quest and he became Anitlei. Spoiler Warning:

Lol, I know Grieving Mother is veiling who she is, but after dozens of fights where she is blasting the crap out of enemies with her abilities, I figured the party would realise she is a cipher rather than some strange lady just following us around. And then Eder made me realise that its literally only me that can see her, when he says when we ask Grieving Mother to help with his quest: "Look I appreciate the initiative, but I don't think there is much chance that this nice stranger lady happens to be a cipher." Did he not wonder at the psychic howls and occasional disintegrations of enemies.

Thanks Chaosspread for the list of vendors. Managed to get a healthy supply for now. With regard to Monk, I agree with both you and Boeroer. I've been using Zahua, spec'd as tank, and at least at this stage in Pillars, he feels like a better tank than Eder with more disables per encounter. The only thing I'm disappointed about is that there hasn't been much story/dialogue engagement from him. That said, I haven't yet finished WM so maybe there will be more before I finish.

Hi folks. My POTD run is now into Whitemarch (currently level 11). One issue I am having is that I'm struggling to upgrade some of my gear to exceptional as I've not found many Vithrack Brains or Rubies. Is there a good vendor to buy these from or place to farm them? Also, to mix things up a bit, I'm thinking of taking Zahua into the party whilst in WM as I've never used him before. Do you think in Pillars 1 a Monk can be a decent tank? He has decent Con and Res, and I was thinking with Stunning Blow, Duality, Iron Wheel, veteran's recovery and hold the line, he could probably be okay in this role. Maybe Weapon and Shield style as well and have him use a shield. I've used a multiclass Monk in Deadfire but never played a monk in Pillars 1, or a single-class monk in either, so I'm not sure how strong it will.

Replying to Boeroer: Skald does look interesting. I do enjoy fantasy that blends with Lovecraftian horror, though one has to be in the mood for it. Can be a bit depressing to get attached to characters that you know will probably end up going totally insane and/or being doomed. Replying to thelee: I do find Pillars 1 and Deadfire to be very re-playable in a way that somehow BG3 hasn't (for me) replicated. I think I prefer the RTWP style combat in Pillars/Deadfire to BG3, and I also prefer the dual-classing in Deadfire to the multi-classing in BG3 (mathematically more options in BG3, but I find the strongest builds in BG3 tend to be most levels in one class with a shallow dip into one or two other classes, whereas I enjoy the more balanced dual-classing in Deadfire). With BG3 I tend to end up running 4 quite similar builds to the previous runs (albeit I might have changed which companion is the fighter or the bard or whatever this time compared to last time). If I'm going to play BG3 again I really will need to start using modded classes I think. But the actual characters in BG3 are very engaging (watching the interactions in BG3 is a bit like watching a movie). I have bought Avowed, but my progress is slow. Its nice to see Eora from a first person perspective, and to see some new post-Deadfire lore, and I enjoy the combat a lot (dual-wielding pistols with magic feels good), but its not the same as Pillars 1 and Deadfire. I'm sure I'll complete it but I don't think it will be one that I return to repeatedly. That said, even if Pillars 3 is a pipe dream, I would enjoy seeing the world of Eora expanded in other formats. Family D&D sounds great. I'm a bit envious. I miss the old days of playing D&D but I don't know anyone near me that still plays any tabletop RPGs anymore.

Hi folks. As someone who returns to Eora every couple of years for another run of Pillars of Eternity or Deadfire (having completed both games and their DLCs multiple times), I find myself once again deep in another PoE 1 playthrough. I'm not yet a Pillars veteran like a lot of posters here, but I'm an enthusiast of Eora and the genre generally. My curiosity led me to wonder what other fans, especially long-time veterans, are playing these days. In particular, I’m interested in games that share similarities with Pillars in terms of lore, gameplay, or both, as these are the aspects that keep drawing me back to these titles. Over the years, I’ve enjoyed a variety of CRPGs, including the original Baldur’s Gate and Icewind Dale games, the two Pathfinder titles, and several turn-based RPGs like BG3. While many of these have been great experiences, the two Pillars games remain the only ones I return to for just one more run. So, I’d love to hear from others: what are you playing now or recently? What games do you consider spiritually or mechanically similar to PoE 1 and Deadfire?

Hi Boeroer. In previous post you said: "Against high DR foes it's not a bad idea to bring a backup pistol (same weapon focus)." Been thinking about this a bit for ranged cipher. My issue with blunderbuss and pistol is that (a) once fired they both take a long time to reload, and (b) I like to have to have my characters carrying 2 weapons covering at least 2 or 3 damage types (e.g. war bow and wand), and blunderbuss isn't so great if there aren't any obvious targets with low DR in the fight. I could take the talent that gives me an extra weapon slot so I could get blunderbuss, pistol and something else, I guess. I'm not sure. At level 9 (my level at moment), cipher only has 4 talents, and 2 of those go on draining and biting whip, which doesn't leave a lot of spare talents for this kind of building. ... I guess my question is, what talents would you go for on a cipher using a blunderbuss?

Thanks Boeroer and Chaosspread. I'll probably head to WM about level 9. I decided to run both ciphers on the backline (I benched Segani to make a spot for GM), and to be honest, it feels great. Very smooth and good fun (ciphers are my favourite class!). That said, I may re-spec GM to use Lead Spitter as I just picked that up. I've never had a huge amount of success with blunderbusses but I would like to make them work.

So as it says in the title, can 2 ciphers work effectively in the same team in Pillars 1 (on POTD)? Just to clarify, I don't mean socially can they get on I have been using a custom cipher companion from the moment I arrived in Gilded Vale, and they are performing great (great damage and good support). But I've never had Grieving Mother in my party and this time I want to bring her along to see if she has any good story narrative, without getting rid of my original cipher. The thing is, GM's stats spread strikes me as a bit meh for a cipher (too much con and res and not enough perception), and I'm not sure how best to make effective use of 2 ciphers at the same time. I guess both on the back line, one focused on damage dealing, and the other on CC, is one way to go? Any suggestions? As a side question, my party is currently level 8. What's a good level for Cragholdt Bluffs and The White March? I've done those areas on previous run but that was not POTD (and I remember bits of it being fairly rough even without it being on POTD). And I don't remember what level I went to TWM previously (probably about level 8/9).

Thanks Boeroer! I'm glad you corrected my mis-understanding about Sure-Handed Ila (and attack speed in general). I'm sure I used to know this, but prior to this run, it had a while since I last played Deadfire, and even longer since I last played Pillars 1, and the knowledge (especially the nuances) tends to leak out of my mind in between each playthrough. This chant has now increased in importance (by a lot) for my party! I'll be using it more often I think. I find it difficult to judge Come Soft Winds of Death because it doesn't seem to record the damage from it in the personal records page for the character (as I think we discussed elsewhere in another post), and it only shows the damage and roll details in the combat log if its hitting a small number of enemies, which often isn't the case. As soon as it hits lots of enemies (usually the case), it summarises the information to the number of grazes, hits and crits. I think its doing decent-ish damage, but its hard to be sure.

Thanks Jaryn and Boeroer! I think I'll continue to use Kana as a sort of multi-function Swiss army knife. For some fights, especially in big open areas, I'll have him wearing the heavy armour and hatchet, and being the 3rd member of the front-line (I have Eder and MC Kind Wayfarer as my permanent front-line). For other fights, where paralysis and petrification attacks are a problem, or where I can force fights to be in botte-necks and doorways, I'll have him change into his light armour and give him a ranged weapon (at the moment I've given him St. Garam's Spark as I'm more interested in him giving +10 accuracy to my cipher or ranger than using a higher DPS weapon himself). I don't have dragon thrashed yet, but Kana has useful chants for both the back or front line so it feels like he can be easily moved to a different role without having to re-spec him, and whilst he is not min-maxed for optimal damage dealing in either role, I'm more interested in him providing good support than damage dealing in any case. (I don't have dragon-thrashed yet, but I like these: Sure-Handed Ila, Lo Their Endless Host, and Come Soft Winds of Death, and the Shatter my Shackles invocation has been a life-saver). Quick question about St Garam's Spark (and marking weapons in general): Is there anyway to know who the +10 accuracy buff will be applied to? Is it the nearest ally to the person firing the marking weapon that is targeting the same enemy that it is applied to, or is it a random ally targeting the same target? And how/when is it applied? I presume the accuracy buff starts to apply after the person firing the marked weapon fires (but I presume it doesn't need to hit)? Or is just the aiming itself that is relevant (e.g., if I swap targets with the character firing the marking weapon, will the ally accuracy buff then be applied to an ally firing at the new target even before I actually fire St Garam's Spark, or will it still be the old target until the marking weapon is fired again)? Phew, so many possible permutations. By the way, I did swap Kana out for a short while for Hiravias. I was stunned by how quickly he can rip through enemies when shifted so I thought I'd focus on making him a shifter first and a caster second rather than the other way around as I originally planned. And he's great. He does a LOT of damage. But he is also squishy as heck, and sometimes get curb stomped really fast. Ended up swapping him back out for Kana. The fights take a bit longer, but there is something about having Kana in the party that makes the party endure through the longer fights that I notice more when he is missing than when he is there.

Quick questions about 3 specific chanter chants: 1) With Sure-Handed Ila, I presume this benefits crossbow and gun users much more than bows and implements, as I presume guns and crossbows gets a +20% bonus to their attack animation and their reload time, and the reload time is a long stretch of time so 20% of that is significant, whereas the attack animation for bows is rather short (and in the case of all ranged weapon types, it doesn't effect the recovery time). So my question is, is it worth using this phrase if you are only using bows and implements for ranged weapons? 2) With Lo, Their Endless Host, what is its base duration when it hits (i.e. for normal hit, not graze or crit, with 0 intelligence bonus), and how often during the phrase's duration and linger does it roll for hit (is it rolling to hit every 3 seconds?) 3) With Come Soft Winds of Death: How is the damage calculated. For example, with Kana, it currently says in the spell description: "-2.4 endurance per 3 seconds". However, in a fight I'm in at this moment, I just got a crit against Flame Blight and in the log is says: "-8.2 endurance over 7.4 seconds", and also a graze against a spectre, and it says: "-6 endurance over 4.6 seconds". Interestingly, -6 endurance over 4.6 seconds is more damage per second for the graze (6 / 4.6 = 1.43 dps) than the crit which did 8.2 over 7.4 seconds (8.2 / 7.4 = 1.11 dps). And on a subsequent tick, a normal hit is -7.1 over 6 seconds (7.1 / 6 = 1.2)!? And as with "Lo, Their Endless Host", I'm not sure how often it rolls for hit, and how this relates to the duration and linger. I presume it can't just be rolling to hit at the beginning of the chant duration, as that would make the linger pointless, and the duration of the damage doesn't seem to have any relationship to the duration of the chant or the linger. I could ask similar questions for other chants but I'm thinking clearing up the above will help my general understanding of chant phrases as well as specifically the 3 chants above.

Hi Jaryn. I'm currently playing Pillars 1 (POTD), currently in act 2 at level 7, and I have Kana as part of my main squad. With chanters (in both Pillars 1 and Deadfire), I tend to gravitate towards making them a heavily armoured off-tank or emergency tank because, as I understand it (*), their class specific abilities - i.e. their chants and invocations - are essentially not impacted by them wearing the heaviest armour with the steepest recovery time penalties, because chants just happen passively in the background at the same pace regardless of armour, and the recovery time on invocations is shorter than the time required to complete 3 or more phrases. Armour of course effects their weapon recovery time, so wearing light armour will increase their base weapon DPS, but it seems to me that of all the classes, chanters are the one least negatively impacted by wearing heavy armour. So I tend to give Kana heavy armour, and have him stand next to my tank (I used to have him carry a large shield and hatchet for max deflection until it was pointed out to me that the shield mallus does affect accuracy for chants, and that - for reasons - chanters do benefit from the +12 bonus of one-handed only weapon on their chants (and maybe invocations?) The exception to using Kana as an off-tank is when I'm fighting monsters that can pump out a lot of paralysis, at which point I do put him at the back with a ranged weapon so that he can easily hit the entire party with shatter their shackles after 4 phrases, and not get paralysed himself before doing so. But that's more an exception than the rule, and in these cases I should swap him into light armour (and when I don't its because I'm being lazy or forgetful). Seeing your build with Kana using an Arbalest (a weapon type I have sadly neglected) and light armour, I'm now wondering if maybe my approach to using chanters is wrong, and whether I should put him on the backline all the time in light armour. I'm genuinely not sure. (*) I deliberately said as a "I understand it" as I am not a Pillars expert, and I don't want any of the above to come across as me disagreeing with you. It's just thinking out loud about your build suggestion and wondering whether I should build my Kana differently to how I've done so. (I've completed Deadfire a few times including on POTD, but this is my first time playing Pillars 1 on POTD, and its quite different to Deadfire on POTD).

Thanks Boeroer for these tips. DoTs not being recorded certainly makes it a bit trickier to judge who is contributing what damage. I did start looking more closely at the combat log seeing as Itumaak's damage is not recorded in the character's records, and I was pleasantly surprised to see the little fox does decent damage. Itumaak also makes a decent little scout (can stealth and doesn't trigger traps). Yeah, I didn't realise that Searing Falls was so tough and not really intended for level 6s (I'm too used to the skulls from playing Deadfire to give a bit of advance warning about which areas and enemies are going to be tough to deal with at my level). I'm focusing on finishing Defiance Bay now and will go back to Searing Falls later.