Musings on Party compositions

[Kira]

I've explored different party compositions and this post summarizes my impressions. Feel free to agree / disagree / debate / ignore. 😉

I. Party Size

You do get exposed to different party sizes in the early game, and have an achievement tied to finishing with 3 adventurers, however most of the time you'll have access to a party of six adventurers.

I personally found that a 3-5 character strong party is not significantly weaker than a 6-strong party in terms of general offensive potential, driven mainly by Opportunity often being the limiting factor.

However, defensively a smaller party size starts to show especially when ambushed. If you get one or two of your characters knocked out before you even have a turn, it makes a huge difference whether you started out with 3 or 6 characters.

Another major benefit of larger parties is the ability to include more contingency abilities like Prime Summoning, Archer's Beat, Peace and Prosperity, that are really nice to have in certain specific situations but would be difficult to justify carrying in a smaller party due to the lower number of options available to deal with general enemies.

II. Archetypes

I found that the most important Archetype to include is the Rogue. Ideally a party of 1-3 characters wants to have one Rogue, and a party of 4+ characters benefits a lot from having two thanks to Infiltrator allowing you to always start fully concealed. If your whole party is hiding at the start of combat, no combatant can use any targeted abilities. This means that even if you're ambushed, the worst the enemies can do on turn 1 is buff / summon, and cannot directly hurt any of your adventurers. This is a huge advantage especially on harder difficulties (dare I say, perma-death game...). The Rogue also guarantees First Strike in almost every fight: there are a handful of scripted fights where the fight is triggered either right after a map loading or at the end of a long dialogue that prevents you from using Hide in Shadows for the start of the fight, but in all other cases you can just sneak up to the enemies and attack them, often even being able to circle around to get a formation flip.

In terms of the other Archetypes I feel that they each add something unique, so the most fun parties will try to diversify as much as possible, obviously the Bard has a handful of broken abilities that allow you to break the game by certain infinite or near infinite combos or bypassing certain enemy traits like Resilience. In terms of damage I think everyone has top tier options, with Fighter being a bit better in single-target damage, Bard having arguably the best AoE with Falkentyne's Fury and Practitioner kind of being able to do everything, with the caveat that their first turn is usually less spectacular. (Rogue plays like a Fighter in this sense, though there are some supporting combat builds using Thug for example.)

In a 6-character party most players will double up on two archetypes and have one each of the other two, I did try all combinations...

Doubling Rogue

Being able to start every fight fully concealed is probably the most important of all the bonuses. This gives you an extra turn if you had First Strike or prevents the enemy from hurting you too much when you don't. In a spare turn, your Practitioners can Meditate, your Fighters can enter Stances, your Bards can use songs like Spellsong and Lyric of Legends, and the Rogues can put up Poison without risk of getting hurt or Razor Strops. Make sure each character has meaningful ways to spend opportunity on Buffing and you'll find the party to be significantly stronger than without the double rogues.

Doubling Fighter

Fighters do decent direct damage or are nice tanks, so there's a strong argument to doubling them regardless of whether you want to have similar builds for both or you might have different builds, for example a Guardian in heavy armor focusing on tanking and a Paladin focusing on direct damage. Two Taunts can be also very good do control the fight.

Doubling Bard

Double bard offers a nice spell point boost with two Minstrels and some decent options in terms of which songs you can keep in Mastery slots, which can benefit Practitioners and any Paladins/Clerics you might have (as well as the Bards themselves). You also have the option to slot in some songs like The Archer's Beat that are rarely very useful.

Doubling Practitioner

I especially like doubling up the Practitioner because there are so many diverse builds available within the archetype. You can easily have an Archmage (focusing on Strength) and a Sorcerer (focusing on Intelligence) for example and use different spells and even a different approach to meditation if you will. There are also a lot of additional contingency skills you can slot, from Summoning through supporting spells (healing for a Sage) all the way to the occasional stab for a dagger mage.

I also played around a bit with excluding some Archetypes, or tripling up on some others, in terms of exclusions the one that hurt me the most was Rogue, it felt like a real chore to do certain areas without stealth; I was surprised how little the absence of a Practitioner or Bard impacted my play, Fighter was a bit worse due to Taunt being one of my most used skills in normal fights. I did miss Levitate from the Practitioner and Sanctuary Score from the Bard, and I also felt that the main thing to crack with non-standard parties is spellcasting enemies who start with spell points. A Magician and Conjurer working together can make quick work of the enemies spellcasting ability, there are also some specific items that can help, but in a well-balanced party combining Draining Vorpal Plating with a Dragon Breath and then a targeted attack for example can drain dozens of spell points from a group of enemy spell-casters.

III. Cultures

It makes a tangible difference (especially early on) whether you have at least one Trow. I did play-throughs without Trow but they are just a nice little bonus to have, almost any build that has the option to deal non-trivial damage can benefit from this culture. I had Rogues, but I also had a Bard and a Fighter and a Practitioner and they all worked well (I especially liked how my bard got one opportunity point and one spell point on kills).

I think having at least one Einarr can also help in the longer fights. In most fights their bonus won't amount to much (maybe one or two stacks of bonus if you play smart), but in the longer fights they can trivialize later rounds when the rest of the adventurers would start to run the risk of getting fatigued. Any archetype can work for the Einarr, I played mostly Rogues and Practitioners but I also had a Bard and a Fighter and they were both very powerful (in fact, the Fighter has the potential to be really OP thanks to how Guardian triggers).

I really appreciate the Fichti special, I secretly consider it to be the most important cultural bonus in the game, if you don't have a better idea in terms of which culture you want to use, especially when talking about someone who can wear medium armor, I'd risk saying that for the party as a whole, the Fichti will almost always be the best choice, just by virtue of how useful it is to stay alive a bit longer in a fight. Also, having multiple Fichti in the same party makes sense, because each Fichti can trigger their special each fight. The only limitation is builds that have low Constitution don't benefit as much from the bonus as others, because even though you cannot get knocked out from protecting an ally, you can get reduced to 1 Constitution, which means even a stiff wind will knock you out at that point. I played Fichti mostly as Fighters or Bards and I had one (medium armor wearing) Rogue.

Elves, Baedish, Outlanders and Dwarves are nice to have for their bonuses and/or roleplaying reasons, they each offer something specifically for the character, although a well-positioned sturdy Dwarf can often also help against knockback as long as he is the direct single target of the ability. I feel these individual bonuses are overall less impactful than the party bonuses offered by the other cultures, but they are fun and give you a lot of options for diverse builds.

[Shneekey]

Practitioners rarely use Opportunity, which is another reason why they are good at doubling. Their damage output is based on their SP, generally speaking, not tied to Opportunity. And a reason why doubling up on Practitioners is a solid choice, since they don't drain Opportunity like a Fighter or Rogue might.

However, double-rogue seems like a really bad idea, because your proposed system simply doesn't work, or rather the stealth system in general seems to not work particularly well because I've had my rogue, first turn, stropping (so not breaking stealth) get targeted and hit. So... I dunno.

Doubling Bard doesn't generally seem like a good idea to me either. Most of what a Bard does is party augmentation, and there's only so much you can do for your team. I'd much rather have another Fighter or Practitioner on the team that can dish out major damage. Falks is generally sub-par damage unless it comes with a rider from a puzzle weapon (such as poison or flame), and there's only one weapon I'm familiar with that a Bard can equip that has the level three burning effect.

Doubling up on Fighters seems like a no-brainer. They tank, and they do damage, what's not to like? Honestly, I'm seriously tempted to try making a party of three fighters and one of each other class. The only problem would be getting everyone decked out in Masterwork Ancient Plate and get the weapons up and going.

Fichti racial trait only works *once* per battle, which makes it much less useful than it might otherwise appear. Einarr needs to be constantly hammered to get much use out of their ability, by which time you've hopefully already ended the fight.

Dwarves make excellent front-liners because of their immunity to being pushed around. Elves do get more INT, but that's rarely going to be a deciding factor. Outlander's immunity to most damaging status effects is critical in keeping people from dying, and should be the default option if you don't have a specific plan for anyone's racial bonus. Baedish's ability is a newbie-trap, it sounds awesome... but it's really only 3 effective levels. Not horrible, I suppose, but not really as good as it sounds on paper. Having a single Trow in your party is really nice for an opportunity point refund. Having multiple is a waste, as the ability can only trigger once per turn per party, not per individual.

Also, something I've discovered that can be fun. You know those Apprentice Gloves you get when you help Alduin defeat the boss at the bottom of his tower? Anyone can equip them, not just Practitioners. It adds a Shocking Grasp as a fifth skill. And you know what? Skills that augment damage, like Strop or Veteran? Apply to it. So consider a rogue with the Apprentice Gloves, and a Stropping Strap. He can now apply that bonus damage to the entire line, instead of just single target. In fact, it can be a very good option for an archer rogue, because that way you can do AoE damage either vertical or horizontal. Tossing it on a Paladin with Veteran can also be amusing. Since you enjoy Einarr, try putting it on one, since Shocking Grasp's damage is based on Strength. Given that it's an AoE you can use every turn for the cost of opportunity, seems like a good deal.

[Kira]

Originally posted by Shneekey:

Practitioners rarely use Opportunity, which is another reason why they are good at doubling. Their damage output is based on their SP, generally speaking, not tied to Opportunity. And a reason why doubling up on Practitioners is a solid choice, since they don't drain Opportunity like a Fighter or Rogue might.

That's a good point, you could take a well-functioning 5-character party and add a Practitioner to it, who just stands there and collects 1-2 spell points each turn, until they have enough to fire off some nice spell. Or benefit from their boots essentially for free if a Fighter anyway has "To Me" up.

However, double-rogue seems like a really bad idea, because your proposed system simply doesn't work, or rather the stealth system in general seems to not work particularly well because I've had my rogue, first turn, stropping (so not breaking stealth) get targeted and hit. So... I dunno.

So how stealth works in combat, is it prevents a stealthed character from being *targeted*. It doesn't prevent them from taking damage from attacks.

What this means is, for example, if you have a rogue in your front row, who is stealthed, but there is another character standing behind the rogue, who is not stealthed, then any attack that would hit the first enemy in a straight line (like typical melee attacks) will be usable by the enemies if they could hit the character in the back row... and in this case, it would actually be the rogue who will take the damage, because they are in the way. They are not the target of the attack, but they still get stuck.

Something similar will happen if you have an attack that hits multiple enemies. Let's say an enemy uses Sweeping Slash or some similar attack that hits the three tiles in front of it (so the one directly in front of it and the two adjacent tiles). If at least one of the three tiles targeted has a visible adventurer, the attack can be used, but then even the concealed adventurers will take damage, because now that the attack is used, they are also hit by it.

If you have two characters standing right behind each-other and they are both stealthed, then neither can be attacked with standard melee attacks that would hit in a straight line, because the attack cannot be used in the column due to no visible targets.

One additional gimmick of the stealth system is that if there are no visible targets at all, then abilities requiring a visible target cannot be used at all.

What this means, for example, is it you have two rows of three adventurers each, with the middle adventurer being a Rogue with the Infiltrator skill, so the whole party starts stealthed, then the enemies simply cannot use any attacks for as long as all the characters are hidden. If at least one character becomes visible, then the enemies will move and attack (if possible) normally, targeting that one visible character, but of course hitting any concealed characters who would be either in the way or would fall into an AoE attack's impacted area.

A side effect is that even the player can't use targeted abilities as long as all characters are hidden. So I often attack with one rogue on the first turn, just to have a visible target so I can use my own buffs, and then Hide in Shadows with the rogue to make sure the enemies have no visible targets during their turn.

I used this setup several times (in fact, in my current party there are three Rogues 😁).

Doubling Bard doesn't generally seem like a good idea to me either. Most of what a Bard does is party augmentation, and there's only so much you can do for your team. I'd much rather have another Fighter or Practitioner on the team that can dish out major damage. Falks is generally sub-par damage unless it comes with a rider from a puzzle weapon (such as poison or flame), and there's only one weapon I'm familiar with that a Bard can equip that has the level three burning effect.

Yeah Blazing Antler is very hard to pass by, it's just so insane with Falkentyne's Fury. I'd say against groups of enemies no other character build even comes close to the damage potential of a Bard using this combination. Against bosses it's obviously less powerful and also against enemies who are immune to burning.

That said, I think if you double on Rogue, you can probably get away with having a single bard, because the main selling point of the double bard setup for me is the two Spell Points you give everyone with two Minstrels. So I'd say, if you don't double Rogue, and you have to fight already in the first turn, then two bards is probably something to consider just by virtue of how impactful turn 1 spell points are for Practitioners and Clerics.

Fichti racial trait only works *once* per battle, which makes it much less useful than it might otherwise appear. Einarr needs to be constantly hammered to get much use out of their ability, by which time you've hopefully already ended the fight.

If you never ever get knocked out, then Fichti bonus doesn't do anything. If you get knocked out all the time, then it will also have limited usefulness because it might prevent one KO per Fichti in the party but not more. I think if your party is sort of good enough to almost never have any KOs, a few Fichti help you to turn that "almost never" into a solid "never". I'd say it's mainly certain boss fights and ambushes that are risky, and I've never regretted having Fichti in my party.

Also, something I've discovered that can be fun. You know those Apprentice Gloves you get when you help Alduin defeat the boss at the bottom of his tower? Anyone can equip them, not just Practitioners. It adds a Shocking Grasp as a fifth skill. And you know what? Skills that augment damage, like Strop or Veteran? Apply to it. So consider a rogue with the Apprentice Gloves, and a Stropping Strap. He can now apply that bonus damage to the entire line, instead of just single target. In fact, it can be a very good option for an archer rogue, because that way you can do AoE damage either vertical or horizontal. Tossing it on a Paladin with Veteran can also be amusing. Since you enjoy Einarr, try putting it on one, since Shocking Grasp's damage is based on Strength. Given that it's an AoE you can use every turn for the cost of opportunity, seems like a good deal.

True, I also often give the Apprentice Gloves to a Rogue, because of this. I don't typically give it to a Bard or Fighter just because of the Tankard and Battle Standard / War Horn are so important. I do sometimes give it to a Practitioner if I don't want to use a Feather Charm and really want to use all regular mastery slots for item / skill abilities, but given how Practitioners can just slot in the regular version of the skill without using a Trinket, and how unfortunately, you cannot have the same skill twice, so if you select Shocking Grasp as a regular mastery skill, and equip the Apprentice Gloves, you'll still only be able to use the attack once.

[Shneekey]

I tend to avoid abusing To Me, so the battle standard is less important for me. I'm aware of the infinite turn exploit, which is why I generally avoid it, just like I generally avoid Cavorting with only a couple of exceptions (I figure Haernhold is designed explicitly for abuse of the skill, so I permit myself to use it there). Generally, I put a Compass of MACO for the extra +2 AC on my fighters in the early game. You can get two of them, one from each of the paired vendors in Wellbottom. War Horn has uses with a Paladin, using Warhorn to spread his Chant stance to allies for more SP generation. It's especially useful for casters, less useful for a Bard because the stance blocks any other channeled ability a Bard might wish to use, and not useful at all for a Rogue since they don't have any abilities that key off of SP.

[Kira]

Originally posted by Shneekey:

I tend to avoid abusing To Me, so the battle standard is less important for me. I'm aware of the infinite turn exploit, which is why I generally avoid it, just like I generally avoid Cavorting with only a couple of exceptions (I figure Haernhold is designed explicitly for abuse of the skill, so I permit myself to use it there).

I no longer avoid the battle standard since I realized that the infinite loop exploit only really needs Rhyme of Duotime, and it's perfectly doable without the Battle Standard. To Me in itself is not that abusable, being able to move mostly for free is best when the party formation is disrupted by an enemy using knockback, otherwise I think it's a nice bonus, but not broken.

In my current game I avoid Rhyme of Duotime, Song of Compulsory Cavorting and the Grand Troubadour, just to keep things fresh. I also tried to see how far can I go without Wayland's Watch. I'm more than halfway through Haernhold on Legendary and didn't need to respec a bard to learn WW yet, having one Bard wield the Strifespear was enough so far.

Current party is three Rogues, two Bards and a Fighter (no clerics or practitioners).

[zifnab_dr]

Great write up. Thanks for this! I'm looking at coming back and doing a playthrough again after many years. You mentioned a "a well-balanced party" Wondering in your eyes what this might be for you? I went through some old posts, but didnt find anything that stood out to me for what you might like. Thanks!

[Kira]

Originally posted by zifnab_dr:

Great write up. Thanks for this! I'm looking at coming back and doing a playthrough again after many years. You mentioned a "a well-balanced party" Wondering in your eyes what this might be for you? I went through some old posts, but didnt find anything that stood out to me for what you might like. Thanks!

Well, this original post was more or less about that exact thing... :D

I'd say, try to have at least one of each Archetype because they can each do something unique. If you have 6 characters, double up on two different archetypes so you have one character from two archetypes each and two-two characters from the other two archetypes. Have at least one Cleric with Change Fate who is either a plate-wearing fighter or a Dwarf to handle stun.

In terms of cultures, I recommend having one Trow (refreshing opportunity is a very useful perk), one Einarr (with at least some damage-dealing ability to carry you through the long fights), and depending on your choice for your de-stunner you might want a Dwarf (or in any case Dwarves are fairly versatile). Sprinkle the remaining characters upon preference between Baedish or Fichti (my preferences) or Outlander and Elf if you prefer.

Have some answer to enemies with high Armor. This can be anything from a greatsword-wielding fighter with Sundering Smash through any number of Acidic or Rending elven weapons or even just going ham on Mental damage (Rogue and Sorcerer are great at this, but everyone has Mental Damage skills) or statuses like Burning, Poison or Bleeding.

Have some answer to enemy spellcasters who start with Spell Points. Whether Vorpal Plating Draining one someone to empty them or stun or staying hidden... You get the picture.

Have at least one dedicated damage dealer using a multi-hit attack like Storm of Blades or Dragon Breath. These rack up damage quite fast. Have a finisher - either a Rogue or Practitioner I's say but arguably a Fighter can work too - who finishes off low-health enemies. It's great to have someone be ready to deal AoE damage, whether an Archmage or a Bard or someone just throwing a bunch of Caltrops.

Crafting is not necessary but it's fun especially doubling up on potion strength, boosting spell points at the start of the battle goes a long way.

Skills giving permanent Opportunity (Fighter, Bard) or spell points at the start of combat (Bard, Practitioner) are very strong.

If you learn to master stealth, the game will be half as difficult as normally. Maybe even less.

[zifnab_dr]

This is excellent info!! Thank you so much. I'm hoping to play tonight but if memory serves me from years ago, I think I have to play a while before I can make my own custom characters. I'm looking around to see if their is a site that lists all the skills and talent trees so I can read up on it and refresh the old brain. I think I briefly remembering that when I played last, it was all the Named classes the end of the tree branches that made me go.. hrm.. and question my decisions! too much min\max in my head at the time!

I'm going to try Hard but dont want to hate life later, so I was planning for the Party of 6, I was thinking about doing:
1. two Dwarf Fighters in the front so they can't get moved protecting the back line. (or Dwarf and Fichti)
2. A Bard of course, not sure on the tree yet
3. A Trow Rogue
4. Einarr Practitioner
5. Guessing another Practitioner?

[Kira]

Originally posted by zifnab_dr:

I'm going to try Hard but dont want to hate life later, so I was planning for the Party of 6, I was thinking about doing:
1. two Dwarf Fighters in the front so they can't get moved protecting the back line. (or Dwarf and Fichti)
2. A Bard of course, not sure on the tree yet
3. A Trow Rogue
4. Einarr Practitioner
5. Guessing another Practitioner?

If your front row is stable, you can take heat off you back row, which makes Fichti a surprisingly good choice for a Practitioner. Anyone wearing Medium armor (available for all but the practitioner) is a good candidate to be Fichti just because of the high Constitution. I don't think you can go wrong with Fichti, though you might see a slightly less optimal outcome with a frontline heavy-armor wearing Fichti, if Guardian and Fichti trigger at the same time you might get knocked out. It probably won't matter on Hard difficulty.

Luckily most of the characters you envision are available in the game, between Wringneck and Sir Grady you have two options for Trow Rogue, Dalgliesh and El Cid are Dwarf Fighters, Lioslaith and Brian the Fist are Fichti Fighters, you even have Merlin as an Einarr Practitioner, so you have a lot of options to start using your preferred party bit by bit already early on. This also helps you see how they work together, and let you choose their skills and masteries optimally.

Of course you can always just create a custom party either bit by bit, or after unlocking all of the free party slots (after the forest). This lets you customize the party completely to your taste.

[zelanius.forcys]

I bought this game years ago and recently only started playing it. I love the ability to create your own party, even if it does require Mercenary Tokens. Having said that, these are all very interesting read which really helps me consider the party for my next run.

Just to throw in my two cents, I am tempted to try a 2 Bard, 2 Practitioner, and 2 Rogue formation. Fighter's great, but not my favourite, and I usually only run at most 1. The Bards can boost SP while being somewhat versatile. I would get Infiltrator on the Rogues asap, and position them in the middle of the party. In the first round, I would avoid offensive abilities (mostly) and setup channeling abilities. One Rogue build I tried was an Einarr full sniper with Cleric (mostly for the passives), allowing me to setup Rain of Arrows on the first row while staying hidden. Having the Rogues one in front of the other in the middle of the party means the whole party starts the battle in stealth and I could take 1 round just to setup whatever I want as long as it does not break stealth.

I would go the following:
1 Baed Bard - skill points to get all the skills needed for crafting and non-combat support
1 Fichti Bard - likely the one to wear medium armour
1 Trow Rogue - mostly focused on scrapper skills and Coldcock for guaranteed stun, along with opportunity management
1 Einarr Rogue/Monk - built for archery with some Cleric skills + Censor
1 Baed Practitioner - the skill points really help to get Archmage, focused on Intelligence. An Elf is useful too, but in the long run, I prefer Baed to get more skills. Uses Arcane abilities like Arcane Barrage and Mangar's Mind Jab as main spells.
1 Einarr Practitioner/Sage - Strength based build with Warstrike and Sceptre Touch being their bread and butter

The only reason I am apprehensive about this is that I end up with too many party members competing for Elven Armour, and a Fighter using Ancestral Plate Armor is helpful. I would swap out a Bard for a Fighter, and make the Fighter a Trow while the scrapper Rogue a Fichti using Officer's Mail Armour instead. Strength Practitioner should get Quick Thinking so Meditate does not need Channeling and the Intelligence could consider this or Inner Peace. Also, I just like more skill points, but it is not strictly necessary (in one of my run, I managed to get to level 29 just a few fights before the final battle, with most of my build being done a few levels before and just throwing skills into stats), so a Baed can probably be swapped out for other Cultures.

Weapons will focus on damage using weapons with boons like Acidic, Virulent, Blazing, etc., although by endgame, I would usually end up with Dwarven Weapons because they are that good. The Poison Kiss is especially powerful, being a one-handed long bow, allowing for a short bow on the other hand, like Downfall, and is the main reason for me to go full archer.

First round of combat goes: Bard switching with Rogue and start Spellsong, both Practitioner use Mediate, and for Strength, use Warstrike as a Channeling ability. Archer Rogue use Rain of Arrows (and Censor if a Monk). All these will not break stealth and setup your 2nd round nicely. If you have a Fighter, adding Lumbering Strike also helps. This essentially means that before even taking a single damage, you already dealt a huge amount of damage to the enemy party. I would hold off on Warstrike, though, against single bosses, and switch over to Sceptre Touch (I tested this on Yadis on Legendary difficulty with 3 party members formation - Bard, Rogue, Practitioner - and it worked wonders as it does true damage boosted by Strength).

[Kira]

Originally posted by zelanius.forcys:

I bought this game years ago and recently only started playing it. I love the ability to create your own party, even if it does require Mercenary Tokens. Having said that, these are all very interesting read which really helps me consider the party for my next run.

Just to throw in my two cents, I am tempted to try a 2 Bard, 2 Practitioner, and 2 Rogue formation. Fighter's great, but not my favourite, and I usually only run at most 1. The Bards can boost SP while being somewhat versatile. I would get Infiltrator on the Rogues asap, and position them in the middle of the party. In the first round, I would avoid offensive abilities (mostly) and setup channeling abilities. One Rogue build I tried was an Einarr full sniper with Cleric (mostly for the passives), allowing me to setup Rain of Arrows on the first row while staying hidden. Having the Rogues one in front of the other in the middle of the party means the whole party starts the battle in stealth and I could take 1 round just to setup whatever I want as long as it does not break stealth.

I think this is a splendid idea! Double Infiltrator and double Minstrel will make all your spell-casters (practitioners, monks, paladins) significantly more powerful.

I played OG last, and I was surprised to find that Chant was a targeted ability that was not usable in full-stealth, but I think this was fixed for DC.

You mentioned whether it would make sense to add a Fighter, I would say that I absolutely love Fighters, on the one hand Veteran and Vanguard are really solid skills, great for versatility in terms of which weapons you wield and a decent damage boost, on the other hand the heavy armor angle and Guardian are very important for some parties (not so much for full-stealth parties though), but the main selling point for me is Taunt, because that works on every enemy including Redcap, golems, all the nasty bosses and mid-bosses who are immune to Levitate can still be Taunted. Halving armor for a turn is icing on the cake, pulling an enemy into reach of your Dragon Breath or making them trigger Bleeding is just pure joy.

That said, for your setup the main benefit would be Taunt during bossfights as I don't imagine most fights will be long with your planned setup, I think you'll take very little damage if any at all in most fights (despite Legendary difficulty which I assume you'll be playing on).

I would go the following:
1 Baed Bard - skill points to get all the skills needed for crafting and non-combat support
1 Fichti Bard - likely the one to wear medium armour
1 Trow Rogue - mostly focused on scrapper skills and Coldcock for guaranteed stun, along with opportunity management
1 Einarr Rogue/Monk - built for archery with some Cleric skills + Censor
1 Baed Practitioner - the skill points really help to get Archmage, focused on Intelligence. An Elf is useful too, but in the long run, I prefer Baed to get more skills. Uses Arcane abilities like Arcane Barrage and Mangar's Mind Jab as main spells.
1 Einarr Practitioner/Sage - Strength based build with Warstrike and Sceptre Touch being their bread and butter

The only reason I am apprehensive about this is that I end up with too many party members competing for Elven Armour, and a Fighter using Ancestral Plate Armor is helpful. I would swap out a Bard for a Fighter, and make the Fighter a Trow while the scrapper Rogue a Fichti using Officer's Mail Armour instead. Strength Practitioner should get Quick Thinking so Meditate does not need Channeling and the Intelligence could consider this or Inner Peace. Also, I just like more skill points, but it is not strictly necessary (in one of my run, I managed to get to level 29 just a few fights before the final battle, with most of my build being done a few levels before and just throwing skills into stats), so a Baed can probably be swapped out for other Cultures.

If I were to squeeze in a Fighter, I would also consider dropping one of the Practitioners instead of dropping that second bard. Two spell points on turn 1 is very strong, although if you have a freebie turn you can activate Chant and similar skills to gain that second point for things like Change Fate.

Now, for your choice of cultures, I think you are making excellent choices, I would mostly make changes for cosmetic reasons... Like, given Melody and Fiona the Harper, I'm typically looking for non-Baedish bards, just for flavor. If you don't have a Paladin, I would make one of the Clerics a Dwarf just to have that combination of Stun Immunity + Change Fate, to make me not worry of inopportune stuns. Though given your full-stealth turn one, you are not likely to get any stuns to begin with.

I would probably wear Medium Armor with most of my Rogues and Bards just because that gives better Constitution and better Intelligence at slightly lower Strength bonus (in my opinion, the only thing Elven Armor does really well is the spell point bonus on the high-end helm and the opportunity reduction on the boots... But for a scrapper type rogue I would always pick Berserker boots and medium armor because you can reduce cooldowns as you move and some of your attacks let you move so you can dish out a ton of stabs to many different enemies this way). So from your initial roster I would only give Elven Armor to the Trow Monk, and let every other non-practitioner wear Medium Armor.

If you don't mind using a pre-generated character, Crux has a very interesting interaction with any Einarr you might have in your party due to the burning special ability. You know, when there's a small chance that he will set on fire a character he swaps places with. This is a special weakened burn stack only doing 2 damage, but it triggers the Einarr bonus, so if you move around a lot, swap places with some of your Einarrs, you can get a few stacks of the strength boost in the process... I really like how fast the Baedish Archmage develops, but if you'll have two Einarrs, Crux is probably worth considering despite having the Outlander bonus.

Weapons will focus on damage using weapons with boons like Acidic, Virulent, Blazing, etc., although by endgame, I would usually end up with Dwarven Weapons because they are that good. The Poison Kiss is especially powerful, being a one-handed long bow, allowing for a short bow on the other hand, like Downfall, and is the main reason for me to go full archer.

First round of combat goes: Bard switching with Rogue and start Spellsong, both Practitioner use Mediate, and for Strength, use Warstrike as a Channeling ability. Archer Rogue use Rain of Arrows (and Censor if a Monk). All these will not break stealth and setup your 2nd round nicely. If you have a Fighter, adding Lumbering Strike also helps. This essentially means that before even taking a single damage, you already dealt a huge amount of damage to the enemy party. I would hold off on Warstrike, though, against single bosses, and switch over to Sceptre Touch (I tested this on Yadis on Legendary difficulty with 3 party members formation - Bard, Rogue, Practitioner - and it worked wonders as it does true damage boosted by Strength).

It is really interesting how rarely I use Dwarven weapons on my final party despite the massive stat bonuses on them... I almost always go for Elven instead for the abilities like Acidic, Sacred, Honed... Certain Judgement, The Peeler, and some other notable exceptions exist. I like your use of Warstrike and Lumbering Strike. Archers are great for the flexible damage, though Poison Kiss is found so late that you will sadly only be able to use it in a handful of fights - or depending on where you start exploring the Barrow, possibly only the final fight. Still good, but doesn't have too long to shine.

I think you don't really need advice, so I'm posting this mainly to entertain myself musing about this setup... Interestingly I just reinstalled BT4DC and I started to plan out an all-Fighter party, if I have the time (maybe a few months from now) I might give it a go, I'm curious how it will pan out.

I hope you will have a blast with your re-play, do keep us posted on how things go!

[zelanius.forcys]

I would probably wear Medium Armor with most of my Rogues and Bards just because that gives better Constitution and better Intelligence at slightly lower Strength bonus (in my opinion, the only thing Elven Armor does really well is the spell point bonus on the high-end helm and the opportunity reduction on the boots... But for a scrapper type rogue I would always pick Berserker boots and medium armor because you can reduce cooldowns as you move and some of your attacks let you move so you can dish out a ton of stabs to many different enemies this way). So from your initial roster I would only give Elven Armor to the Trow Monk, and let every other non-practitioner wear Medium Armor.

Not really sure why, but Constitution has never been a big factor for me when building my party. I have a more aggressive playstyle and tend towards higher Strength for most of my builds. Another concern I have is that a few capstone skills are locked behind the Light Armour tree for Rogues and Heavy Armour tree for Fighters, requiring more skill point investments if I go Medium Armour.

If you don't mind using a pre-generated character, Crux has a very interesting interaction with any Einarr you might have in your party due to the burning special ability. You know, when there's a small chance that he will set on fire a character he swaps places with. This is a special weakened burn stack only doing 2 damage, but it triggers the Einarr bonus, so if you move around a lot, swap places with some of your Einarrs, you can get a few stacks of the strength boost in the process... I really like how fast the Baedish Archmage develops, but if you'll have two Einarrs, Crux is probably worth considering despite having the Outlander bonus.

I actually quite like the pre-gens for the most part, and I do like Crux's abilities. I was just thinking that replacing him with a Baed for the extra skill points might be useful for an Intelligence based caster, especially if I want higher SP and Intelligence from the Meditation skill tree. As for variety of Cultures, I actually like the idea of an Outlander Bard.

It is really interesting how rarely I use Dwarven weapons on my final party despite the massive stat bonuses on them... I almost always go for Elven instead for the abilities like Acidic, Sacred, Honed... Certain Judgement, The Peeler, and some other notable exceptions exist. I like your use of Warstrike and Lumbering Strike. Archers are great for the flexible damage, though Poison Kiss is found so late that you will sadly only be able to use it in a handful of fights - or depending on where you start exploring the Barrow, possibly only the final fight. Still good, but doesn't have too long to shine.

Poison Kiss being found late is actually a consideration I have when I was trying to decide between a Fighter and a Rogue, but ultimately went Rogue for the full-stealth build, especially with the boosted damage in stealth. Fighter has Vanguard, which should make long bow + short bow combo feasible. I would imagine an archer build with this weapon combination (assuming non-Elven weapon) to be able to rapid fire Loose Arrow, limited only by opportunity (in a way similar to a Practitioner firing off Arcane Barrages but limited by SP).

Having said that, I do like the boons that come with Elven puzzle weapons, but their stats tend to be a bit too subpar. I find boons that improve damage dealing to be far more useful than crowd control as the percentages are usually too low to be useful for me. Other than that, Dwarven weapons usually not only have the passives from normal weapon of the same type, but additional effects (e.g., The Vital Spark has Regeneration on top of Tactical Retreat). To incflict Stun, I prefer the Hide in Shadows+Coldcock+Blackjack combo over any Elven weapons.

I hope you will have a blast with your re-play, do keep us posted on how things go!

Thank you! I am on my third run now, and is playing on Legendary difficult from start to finish for the first time. Things are mostly smooth sailing for now with mostly pre-gen characters (I replaced Melody with an Outlander Bard though). I am just before the Mangar's boss fight when posting this and, surprisingly, not using any Cleric skills right now (I have 2 Fatherite Relics just sitting in my inventory). I am also trying to catalogue as much of the game as I can (e.g., location of unique weapons, list of encounters). Maybe I will post it as a guide once I am 80-90% done.

[Kira]

Originally posted by zelanius.forcys:

Not really sure why, but Constitution has never been a big factor for me when building my party. I have a more aggressive playstyle and tend towards higher Strength for most of my builds. Another concern I have is that a few capstone skills are locked behind the Light Armour tree for Rogues and Heavy Armour tree for Fighters, requiring more skill point investments if I go Medium Armour.

Master Crafted Elven Cuirass adds +40 Constitution, +2 Intelligence and +10 Strength
Master Crafted Officer's Mail Cuirass adds +74 Constitution, +5 Intelligence and +7 Strength.

By choosing the medium armor, you sacrifice +3 Strength to gain +3 Intelligence and +34 Constitution...

To put it this way, even if you prefer to use Light Armor for the capstone skills or for any other benefit, by investing 3 Skill points you can earn +34 Constitution by picking this suit of armor.

Now, the helmet is less clear-cut because of the spell point bonus.

Master Crafted Elven Helm adds +25 Constitution, +4 Spell Points, +6 Intelligence and +9 Strength.
Master Crafted Officer's Mail Helm adds +39 Constitution, +10 Intelligence and +5 Strength.

So here the Elven Helm has the +4 Spell Points and +4 Strength advantage over the Officer's Mail Helm's +14 Constitution and +4 Intelligence, I slightly favor the Officer's Mail Helm in general, however for builds that need more spell points, the Elven Helm feels optimal. As the only slots that effectively give spell points are the helm slot and the weapon slot, if the build locks the weapon slots into wielding stuff that doesn't give spell points (I'm looking at you Antler), the helm slot is often the only way to remedy the situation. Now, in all fairness, there are alternatives (Jester's Cap for a bard, Silver Circlet and Cordesmania come to mind), but +4 SP feels very impactful.

I would imagine an archer build with this weapon combination (assuming non-Elven weapon) to be able to rapid fire Loose Arrow, limited only by opportunity (in a way similar to a Practitioner firing off Arcane Barrages but limited by SP).

I'll have an archer in my Fighter party so I can try. I think cooldown won't go below 1 but it would be cool if it would...

Having said that, I do like the boons that come with Elven puzzle weapons, but their stats tend to be a bit too subpar. I find boons that improve damage dealing to be far more useful than crowd control as the percentages are usually too low to be useful for me. Other than that, Dwarven weapons usually not only have the passives from normal weapon of the same type, but additional effects (e.g., The Vital Spark has Regeneration on top of Tactical Retreat). To incflict Stun, I prefer the Hide in Shadows+Coldcock+Blackjack combo over any Elven weapons.

Yeah the stats are much lower. I mean it's a tradeoff. Acidic is very strong, I often try to have it on any damage dealer who hits multiple times just because it's so good. Sacred is quite broken if you're into that sort of thing. Electrifying is nice early on, I did have it once or twice for the end game, always on a blunt wielder so blunt crit maxed, with an electrifying weapon or offhand, getting to a very decent stun rate with the critical's 25% and the (up to) 60% from Electrifying getting to a very reliable stun rate on top of the guaranteed push from Foe Dropper for example.

But yeah Coldcock + Blackjack is the best way to reliably stun anyone, it's so good that you can totally base a build on just this one ability (and some cooldown management via Berserker Boots for example).

Thank you! I am on my third run now, and is playing on Legendary difficult from start to finish for the first time. Things are mostly smooth sailing for now with mostly pre-gen characters (I replaced Melody with an Outlander Bard though). I am just before the Mangar's boss fight when posting this and, surprisingly, not using any Cleric skills right now (I have 2 Fatherite Relics just sitting in my inventory). I am also trying to catalogue as much of the game as I can (e.g., location of unique weapons, list of encounters). Maybe I will post it as a guide once I am 80-90% done.

Nice! Have fun, can't wait to read more about your experiences!

[zelanius.forcys]

Originally posted by Kira:

Master Crafted Elven Cuirass adds +40 Constitution, +2 Intelligence and +10 Strength
Master Crafted Officer's Mail Cuirass adds +74 Constitution, +5 Intelligence and +7 Strength.

By choosing the medium armor, you sacrifice +3 Strength to gain +3 Intelligence and +34 Constitution...

To put it this way, even if you prefer to use Light Armor for the capstone skills or for any other benefit, by investing 3 Skill points you can earn +34 Constitution by picking this suit of armor.

Yes, I do agree on that. It is just that, for me, it boils down to investing 3 more Skill points into defense or focus on offensive skills. I have tried to build a couple of characters using Medium armour, and I cam see why it is worth it. In my attempt to run a 3-member party for the last stretch, I had an archer Monk who went Medium armour, and is quite durable because of that. I would even argue for Medium amour over Heavy for a tank build.

I might just prefer the capstone skills probably because I just have an obsession with stat boost from Guardian and Shadow, which is why I am so apprehensive about Medium armour, but that is something I need to overcome.

Now, the helmet is less clear-cut because of the spell point bonus.

Master Crafted Elven Helm adds +25 Constitution, +4 Spell Points, +6 Intelligence and +9 Strength.
Master Crafted Officer's Mail Helm adds +39 Constitution, +10 Intelligence and +5 Strength.

So here the Elven Helm has the +4 Spell Points and +4 Strength advantage over the Officer's Mail Helm's +14 Constitution and +4 Intelligence, I slightly favor the Officer's Mail Helm in general, however for builds that need more spell points, the Elven Helm feels optimal. As the only slots that effectively give spell points are the helm slot and the weapon slot, if the build locks the weapon slots into wielding stuff that doesn't give spell points (I'm looking at you Antler), the helm slot is often the only way to remedy the situation. Now, in all fairness, there are alternatives (Jester's Cap for a bard, Silver Circlet and Cordesmania come to mind), but +4 SP feels very impactful.

Yes, indeed. In fact, I think this might be one of the ways to make a Monk or Paladin a bit more viable. Granted, Resurrection is the only skill on the Cleric's skill tree that uses an obscene amount of SP, so Elven Helm might still be inferior in this regards (especially since the Cleric can get 6 SP just from 4 skills).

Yeah the stats are much lower. I mean it's a tradeoff. Acidic is very strong, I often try to have it on any damage dealer who hits multiple times just because it's so good. Sacred is quite broken if you're into that sort of thing. Electrifying is nice early on, I did have it once or twice for the end game, always on a blunt wielder so blunt crit maxed, with an electrifying weapon or offhand, getting to a very decent stun rate with the critical's 25% and the (up to) 60% from Electrifying getting to a very reliable stun rate on top of the guaranteed push from Foe Dropper for example.

Yes, it is indeed a tradeoff. But given how powerful Acidic is, I would stick to using Gaufroi's Wand, for example, on my Strength-based Practitioner. In my last run, I built a Strength-based Einarr Practitioner/Sage with Meditate (+ Quick Thinking), Warstrike, Spectre Touch, and Arcane Barrage. I might swap out either Arcane Barrage or Warstrike for Flesh Restore from the Cleric skill tree during boss fights, but that was the general setup. Despite being boosted by Intelligence, I have Arcane Barrage on all Practitioners due to it's Rapid Fire ability, so I can rend multiple times or stack Melting in quick succession. Add on Conjuror's Mark, I would Arcane Barrage + physical attack, rinse and repeat, especially early on in the battle when Melting is still on the lower end to maximize damage, since Cojuror's Mark does not stack.

Acidic is one of the few boons I think is worth the stats tradeoff, alongside possibly Honed (huh, this makes me want to try a Sower of Seed + Gaufroi's Wand Practitioner build especially with Soul Leech and Greater Soul Leech skills). Blazing and Virulent are also great unless facing Dauntless enemies, while Electrifying is definitely useful early on when stats from equipment is still low to mid-range and crowd control is more important with less party members.

But yeah Coldcock + Blackjack is the best way to reliably stun anyone, it's so good that you can totally base a build on just this one ability (and some cooldown management via Berserker Boots for example).

I think this might be another good reason to go 2 Bards, between being living batteries by alternating Lyric of Legends and Spellsong, as well as using Rhyme of Duotime to manage cooldown, they can just focus on those and spend Skill points on passive abilities or other support skills like crafting.

Nice! Have fun, can't wait to read more about your experiences!

Thanks again! It is a holiday where I am from today as of the time of this writing, and I intend to finish up as much as I can (so far, I have reached The Isle of Stronsea and have all merchants available in Wyre), especially getting sufficiently deep into Haernhold to grab as much high end gear as possible.

[zelanius.forcys]

Well, I just wanted to report that, the 2 Rogue, 2 Bard, 2 Practitioner combination works! I managed to clear Haernhold before fighting Lagoth Zanta at level 26 with all battles fought on Legendary (and I even got started at around 19-20 on the Dwarven Ancestor fight). I did have to rely a bit on Troubadour's passive and Cavorting, but all in all, the bosses were far easier for the most part (probably because there was only 1 target most of the time).

Essentially, the strategy boils down to (and you can probably see why this is great against bosses but not mobs):
1. While in full stealth, start building up SP on the Practitioners. Censor on the Einarr Strength-based who is a Sage with all the Cleric passives, plus Quick Thinking Meditate so the channeling will not conflict, while the Intelligence base use Inner Peace Meditate. Sorcerer's Slippers and Spellsong help too.
2. For the setup, I went with Father's Rage plus a generic wand on my Strength Sage, along with Slinking Assault, Arcane Barrage, Spectre Touch and Meditate while holding the Censor trinket, plus Apprentice's Sandals (Sorcerer's Slippers are probably better though). My Intelligence Practitioner is almost similar but had Sower of Seeds and Gaufroi's Wand, and swap out Censor with Feathered Charm in case I need to move someone in the party. I used Crux for the Intelligence Practitioner.
4. On one of my Bards, I quickly get a higher drunk stack to prepare for Rhyme of Duotime with the Shofar passive. This Bard is also my melee Bard with Storm of Blades and an Arming Sword (I used The Peeler when I managed to get it). I used Fiona for this purpose as her skills are already geared in this direction. If you have on Elven Boots for Lunge, it helps. This Bard also has Wayland's Watch. The last song could be anything, but I used Falkentyne's Fury for a bit of added damage.
5. My second Bard was just a living battery of Spellsong, Lyric of Legends, plus Song of Compulsory Cavorting. He used a Lute of Compulsory Cavorting. and had Red Boots on for repositioning shenanigans, although this should also work with Padded Armor Boots. He also equipped the Spectre Snare which helped to deal Mental damage and trigger Conjuror's Mark for extra damage.
6. If a boss is susceptible to stun, one of my Rogues will take care of it with Hide in Shadows + Coldcock + Blackjack combo. I used Wringneck for this. They also have the Draught of Power or greater version depending on the fight. My other Rogue was acting as a floater, either dealing damage or supporting SP with Elixir of Focus (or the greater version). I used Sybale for this. Elven Boots help here.
7. I always stun the boss (if I can) to stall and generate more SP, and get my party into position. Usually, by the 3rd turn, I am ready, so on the 2nd round, I will use Lyric of Legends. Depending on whether I can stun the boss, I will choose the amount of channeling accordingly.
8. Once I get to the round I need to, I move my Strength Sage in place and pile on Draught of Power as well as Elixir of Focus (or greater versions of them) and use Spectre Touch. Then, with at least 7 drunk stack, I use Rhyme of Duotime. With Father's Rage at Tier 3, I would occasionally steal SP from the boss. Slinking Assault and Arcane Barrage once I run low helps to boost it back up a bit, plus after Rhyme of Duotime, I can use another Elixir of Focus if needed.
9. Once the Strength Sage is done, my Intelligence Practitioner will start rapid firing Arcane Barrage. This will remove armour and add Melt stack. I usually managed to stack Melt up to 60-70 damage in some of the battles. Crux had 20+ Max SP, and with Soul Leech, he is partially self-generating on SP. If Sower of Seeds's boon kicks in, even better. Shiv or Slinking Assault adds to the Melt stack as well.
10. When the Intelligence Practitioner exhaust all but 1 SP (in case I need to move someone out of the way), I bring in the melee Bard and swing away for 3 hits with each Storm of Blade. The bulk of the damage is coming from Melt. I do keep an eye out on Opportunity and try to avoid using it fully, and I do want to get out of the boss's way if I can. I use Wayland's Watch to reduce the damage the boss will plus Spectre Snare's ability, Baylor's Spell Bind, too get the boss Rooted, do before ending my turn (plus any Meditate and Spellsong if I have the Opportunity or SP to spare).
11. Total damage ranges from 1,200 to 3,000 damage: Strength Sage - usually ~270 per cast of Spectre Touch, for 3 casting, but with right support get go to 5 or even 6; Intelligence Practitioner - usually average 20 per cast of Arcane Barrage with Archmage passive (it usually starts closer to 30+ at max SP before dwindling down) for between 25-30 casting unless the enemy is resistant to mental damage; melee Bard - usually ~200 per Storm of Blade, at least 2, but up to 4 sometimes.
12. This is all before counting other damage like from Coldcock, Mean Drunk, etc. After defeating King Gaerwyn, I swap out Father's Rage for The Black Thirst (Spell Thief passive as well plus Veteran passive and much better stats). This boosts the damage of my Spectre Touch to closer to 450 per cast with all the passives like Archmage, Veteran, etc. I did not get Dual-Wield in Bladecasting, so could not use Father's Rage in my offhand. With this setup, Enraged Redcap was still a bit daunting, but not really difficult. I lost Sybale as I used her to tank hits, which restored ~1,800 Constitution to it, but with my setup, the damage was quickly inflicted, especially since it the Redcaps are defensively weaker.

EDIT: My Rogue and Bards were all competing for Elven Armor. I would have made Wringneck wear Medium Armor, but got a bit too lazy to respec him. However, given the playstyle, my characters were mostly One-hit Wonders, who either survive the battle with full Constitution or die.

EDIT 2: The enemy is not going to be defeated after the initial onslaught. However, as long as at least 2 of the DPS stays alive, it should be fine. It really depends on the situation. If there is regenerating armour, the Intelligence Practitioner should ideally stay alive. If anything, try to keep the Sage alive due to how damaging Spectre Touch is, but if he falls, it is not entirely unsalvageable as long as the enemy has only ~1,000 health to go and depending on what defenses they have. The melee Bard should stay alive though, since you do want the Rhyme of Duotime. You probably only need a round to set the whole thing up, since the main issue was getting the Bard with enough drunk stack.

[Kira]

Originally posted by zelanius.forcys:

Well, I just wanted to report that, the 2 Rogue, 2 Bard, 2 Practitioner combination works! I managed to clear Haernhold before fighting Lagoth Zanta at level 26 with all battles fought on Legendary (and I even got started at around 19-20 on the Dwarven Ancestor fight). I did have to rely a bit on Troubadour's passive and Cavorting, but all in all, the bosses were far easier for the most part (probably because there was only 1 target most of the time).

Sounds great ! I was certain the setup would work well and I'm glad you had fun playing it !

For your next play-through I recommend completely ditching all Bards, to have more fun with Fighters and the other archetypes... 😄