Best Heroes, and party composition

[madocs]

I am level 9 in my current run.

Ignoring morality and religion,
Which heroes are the best? You put a lot of effort into the early knights, but wonder if you should focus on certain ones more. Will they be replaced later?

I read something that said the heroes gained later in the game are better than the ones gained earlier. Is that Correct?

And it leads me to my next question: How do people like to run their parties? Which is the most fun, or the most OP?

I run with:
1) Mordred or a Sage or a champion
2) Champion
3) Vanguard (or marksman)
4) Arcanist (If sage replaces Mordred, I was then thinking of using another #3)

What are your thoughts on composition?
Especially with thoughts towards end game?

I am trying to figure out who to kill and who to leave in my party, and who I should focus on.

(I have gone christian rightful, but made Merlin rightful instead of old faith in editing the heroes config... mainly because I like the arcanist class)

[holy-death]

Messaggio originale di MJ:

Why Faerie Knight over Lancelot? Two reasons. First and most important, his basic attack is 3AP vs Lancelot at 4AP. This is huge. Second, he has built in teleport allowing you to use that accessory slot for something else. Lancelot would need the TP accessory to be as effective and even then, im not sure he is. Yes Lancelot has Inspire but thats a one time AP boost and its a net loss of AP for him to use it (no free use unlike Sages).

I have much shorter answer - Lancelot is a weak Champion, because he has no Rage to regain APs from kills and feed his killing spree. Faerie Knight can be used as Arcanist with stronger melee skills, but he won't replace a proper Champion for the same reason as Lancelot.

Messaggio originale di Jag:

I may replace Kay with Faerie Knight. I just don't know if he can bring near the same kind of damage. Kay is just too squishy. Plus he gets a moral penalty with any vitality damage. I can deal with vitality loss, just not stacking moral penalties.

Your Defender should be focusing damage while Champion goes in for the kill. Even if you do get hit Vengeance and Rage combo should allow you to replenish your health (assuming you don't have armour gain per kill items). If your choice is between Faerie Knight, Lancelot and Kay I'd say keep Kay. Or get a Champion with Defensive Stance (or its equivalent), if you want someone who can soak damage later in the campaign. I would still recommend having a Defender though.

[Jag]

Messaggio originale di MJ:

]
Your Defender should be focusing damage while Champion goes in for the kill. Even if you do get hit Vengeance and Rage combo should allow you to replenish your health (assuming you don't have armour gain per kill items). If your choice is between Faerie Knight, Lancelot and Kay I'd say keep Kay. Or get a Champion with Defensive Stance (or its equivalent), if you want someone who can soak damage later in the campaign. I would still recommend having a Defender though.

My Defender (Mordred) does soak damage well, but doesn't do the raw damage that Kay can do with a rage infused Power Attack and Death Strike. Maybe I should give Kay the skill that reduces Armor damage by 20%.

[Tom Cormie]

I'm not looking for the strongest party anymore, but the most interesting and one that includes role-playing. In My last playthrough (Rightful/Christian) I adapted my team to the current mission.

- Against the lost: Percival, White Knight, and two support/DPS like Guinevere, Merlin.
- Against the Old Faith (e.g. Morgana, Bedivere) with only Christian characters (Percival, White Knight, Dindraine, Balin).
- Against the Tyrants (e.g. Black Knight, Red Knight) with only Rightful characters (Lancelot, Guinevere, Geraint, Mordred). Unfortunately I didn't have four skilled rightful characters, so Mordred joined the party.

Now I'm playing the same, only on Rightful/Old Faith playthrough. Classic/Very Hard. I have 12 knights and everyone has a task.

- Sir Ector just sits in the tower, collecting dust, and goes to the Fourth Treasure of the Tuatha Dé Danann event.
- If Guinevere or Boudicea rests, injured or build loyality at an event, Tristan and Isolde go to fight. Always together.
- I don't want to do it, but because of the Old Faith run, I have to kill the White Knight and Sir Galahad. The executors: Mordred, Merlin, Tristan, Isolde.
- If the opponent is Picts, then I build a team around Sir Bors, if the enemy is a seelie/unseelie, then the Faerie Knight goes to battle.

For me, it's so varied and challenging. I think this will be my last playthrough for a while. Including early access, I have over 1000 hours of playtime. I have played the Rightful/Old faith/Christian path several times from normal to very hard, almost any difficulty. (Except the very hard/roguelite mode) Time to try Expedition: Rome, or the Path to Madness DLC for Disciples Liberation. I will come back later when there is new content.

[Silt]

From the time I got Merlin, my party pretty much stayed as Modred, Balin(who got like 3 missions he took off on without a choice), Ector, and Merlin. Balin with a ring that gave teleport, items that gave extra AP/move AP, combined with jump had him slaughtering 3-5 enemies a turn. Ector and Merlin with + burning damage items stacking burning on mobs with a staff that after 8 spells were cast would instantly apply all remaining burn damage....that usually insta-fried multiple mobs. Modred was there to stun and chain lightning. He was a great meat shield the rare times something managed to get close enough to melee him but usually nothing got close enough to even hit him unless it was an encounter that had a ton of enemies in a very close space from the start.

[treahnurb]

My run to go gang:
Mordred
Kay/Lancelot
Iwein
Merlin

in case Iwein or Merlin is in the hospital, Morgana goes in.

I feel pretty good with those. Merlin is INSANELY strong imo. I don't think the other Arcanists can compare to him...

[Dredd]

Kay,
Isolde
Guinevere
Morgana

My A team

[tm0Lif3]

I tried Isolde. I'm not sure why she is preferred. Maybe i'm still early. The problem with 1-Handed weapons probably because of vanguard balancing? As 1-Handed weapons are shared across Defender, Sage and Vanguard they are balanced to Vanguard as the hit twice. Hence single attack 1-Handed weapons are low. There's cooldown for icelance too and against picts i tried the damage isn't good at all. Maybe due to picts block i supposed.

Anyway my personal favorite is:
Kay... most powerful champion undeniable.
Guinivere.. bless, inspire, teleport, freeze.
Tegyr.. probably best vanguard except Boudicea comes late and hard to get her loyalty up.

Not sure about Morgana.. but late game i find Galahad.. but it seems Percivale is similar to Galahad. So my pick probably goes to Percivale. Encouragement and Guard. Flaming Strike is a plus.

[madocs]

I know people love Kay, but to be honest, I just like an arcanist, mordred, vanguard, and sage... usually guinivere, Tegyr or Ba??, and merlin

[kirill-busidow]

Messaggio originale di madocs:

I know people love Kay, but to be honest, I just like an arcanist, mordred, vanguard, and sage... usually guinivere, Tegyr or Ba??, and merlin

Mordred is really not good for optimal party. You should not take dmg so no need for tank, you can just control/kill faster. And mordred dmg is meh, like 10% of vanguard.

[fEEdEr]

A team should be defined by its carry charachter .
Team 1:
Merlin Morgan Guinevere and Faerie knight
Merlin for aoe burn instant kill, others to hit single weaker targets.
Doesn't work well with champions since champions need the kills for their passive.
Key item: Instant burn Item for Merlin

Team 2:
Any vanguard with high loyalty, Guinevere,
Morgause/Defender/Arcanist thats not Merlin(pick 2 from 3),
vanguard carry team.
Key item :none
When the rng really is not on our side and you didn't get blink item and teleport ring for the champion.

Team 3:
Any champion except Lancelot(best with defensive stance), Guinevere, Isolde, Anyone with good cc(Morgause/Morgan or even a defender)
Kay is usually my first kick , worst champion in the game imo.
Key items: Teleport ring and blink axe(forgot the name it teleports you to the next enemy on kill).

PS: all played on very hard.

Wait we have marksman as a class? lol

[Galdred]

Messaggio originale di kbiz:

Messaggio originale di MJ:

I started messing around a bit with different lineups.

Me too. By the way, you have a way with words, MJ. It's always better to finesse it. Certainly more fun.

...

The Faerie Knight is like Guinevere and Boudicea. They are great static damage dealers. Very helpful.

Power in this game mainly comes from four variables:

1.) Exponential damage growth - champions
2.) Expedited cooldowns - sages, skills
3.) AP per turn - champions and sages combined, plus items
4.) AP regeneration - skills, kills, and items

The thing is you can't just maximize one variable. There are always trade-offs. The power comes from the combination of variables.

It's also important to distinguish between what is fun and what is objective. Personally, when I talk about party composition, I talk about it objectively. I'm not looking to diminish anyone's fun or sh!t on anyone's favorite knight. There are lots of fun, effective strategies. But certain knights are superior, certain classes are superior, and certain parties are superior.

Since I've been here, I think I've heard every single knight mentioned in someone's A-Team. That's the sign of a great game.

I know it is an old thread, but how would you spec Mordred to be useful as he is mandatory in a lot of missions? Which essences are good to use on him?

[Vathek1]

Messaggio originale di Galdred:

I know it is an old thread, but how would you spec Mordred to be useful as he is mandatory in a lot of missions? Which essences are good to use on him?

I gave Mordred the % chance of double-damage essence, and a couple of the %bonus damage against certain enemy types (Lost, Picts, etc.) essences as well.

A teleport ring will make Mordred even more mobile, and I'd recommend speccing into thunderbolt, chain lightning, flurry, shield bash, and the passive which reduces the AP burden of heavy armour. Don't sleep on bleeding damage either--in the early game, it isn't very useful, as most of your enemies are The Lost, and the undead do not bleed (despite the proclamations of Lady Dindraine, Sir Ector, and Sir Percival about the future exsanguination of sinners, heh.)

But once you start facing Picts, Sidhe, and Formorians as your primary foes, the extra bleeding damage can help shorten fights.

Note that you can use shield bash to safely disengage from melee with an enemy and not suffer opportunity attacks.

[SunDriedSheet]

Messaggio originale di Galdred:

I know it is an old thread, but how would you spec Mordred to be useful as he is mandatory in a lot of missions? Which essences are good to use on him?

Depends what difficulty you play. On normal I don't think it matters like at all. You can go with passive damage boosts and lighting abilities for extra damage, because why not? It's cool and all good.
But on hard and especially very hard you need a plan or else you will suffer and die.
Mordred is an OK tank, I would recommend making him a good tank because you will need 1 that can hold the lane for a moment.
Don't waste your points and resources on making him a better fighter. He's a terrible fighter at higher difficulties plus most of the unique items you may obtain for him will be increasing his tankiness. So instead of making him a capable tank, you'd turn him into a bad fighter and bad tank. And you don't want that.
Mages and especially vanguards are insanely good damage dealers and you need to make sure they can do all the damage while not being bothered or threatened.

[Galdred]

Messaggio originale di 654681631:

Messaggio originale di Galdred:

I know it is an old thread, but how would you spec Mordred to be useful as he is mandatory in a lot of missions? Which essences are good to use on him?

Depends what difficulty you play. On normal I don't think it matters like at all. You can go with passive damage boosts and lighting abilities for extra damage, because why not? It's cool and all good.
But on hard and especially very hard you need a plan or else you will suffer and die.
Mordred is an OK tank, I would recommend making him a good tank because you will need 1 that can hold the lane for a moment.
Don't waste your points and resources on making him a better fighter. He's a terrible fighter at higher difficulties plus most of the unique items you may obtain for him will be increasing his tankiness. So instead of making him a capable tank, you'd turn him into a bad fighter and bad tank. And you don't want that.
Mages and especially vanguards are insanely good damage dealers and you need to make sure they can do all the damage while not being bothered or threatened.

I am playing Very Hard indeed, but I read that he cannot get the taunt skill at all. So how can I make him tank? It looks like opponents will go out of their way to hit anyone else most of the time.

[holy-death]

Messaggio originale di Galdred:

I am playing Very Hard indeed, but I read that he cannot get the taunt skill at all. So how can I make him tank? It looks like opponents will go out of their way to hit anyone else most of the time.

Parking your Defender in front of everybody else usually gets enemies to target him.