Best Boon and Flaw in your opinions?

[Ittrix]

I'm not really trying to min/max per say, but I'm curious what everyone's opinions are.

Specifically, the 'choose your destiny' stuff at the start.

Your Companions...
... are used to long walks (less fatigue)
... are cunning fighters (more experience)
... show incredible resilience (more health)
... are excellent at slap games (more crit damage)
... are quick leaners (more profession experience)

and

If they had a flaw, it would be...
... a somewhat meek appearance (-1 carry weight per party member)
... eternal dissatisfaction (-1 happiness per rest)
... an uncommon bout of bad luck (-3% crit chance)
... a very hard time getting up (10% default chance to get ambushed)
... a serious lack of self confidence (-1 willpower)

I'll be referring to them as 'boons' and 'flaws' since there's no real name for them.

For boons,
Quick Learners / Cunning Fighters seem like perks that help you progress faster, which would be nice but not great for endgame or even midgame. Incredible Resilience seems good for early game... and long walks / slap games seem the best imo.

For flaws... I'm not really sure. Willpower is unclear to me, and eternal dissatisfaction may be manageable late game so I'm betting one of those would be the 'best'.

[Poseidon]

I don't think any of them are game-breakingly bad or good. It just depends on how you envision your troop and your strategy for that play-through. If I build a merc team intent on robbery and dodging guards maybe I'm ok to give up Quick Learners since i'll be seeing so much combat XP. On the other hand if I plan on a more "merchant & trader" based game, where my XP accumulation will be way slower I might think differently. And same for the rest of the starting stats. I tried one game taking Eternal Dissatisfacton and never had a happiness issue. Too many other ways to get those +++'s.

[Ittrix]

They're all pretty close-ish, yeah. There's definitely some that pull out more than others in the long run though. I remember picking the vulnerable to ambushes for my first playthrough and I just got jumped all the time while resting.

[Poseidon]

I've never taken the vulnerable to ambushes one. Can't stand it when ambushes happen in the game as it not only ruins your rest, it affects what you were making in camp. I try to only now rest in towns (100% safe) or on roads if I absolutely have to. In town rest the best by far though. BTW does anyone actually rest in inns? Expensive with no troop benefit that I can see. Devs would have to sweeten this option majorly before I would choose it over the free in town camp.

[Ittrix]

Exactly why I hated it.

As for inns, not often, but I sometimes do. If I'm behind on wages and can't immediately cough up the inn lets me skip paying them for awhile longer. Helpful if I'm doing trade runs and know I'll be coming into major moolah soon. Also with the ambush schtick inns let me skip that, so... that's pretty nice.
I wouldn't mind a larger advantage. Happiness boon? Rested buff that reduces incoming fatigue? Meal included that you get to eat the next time you rest when away?

[Stardustfire]

you spare food for the rest and can delay payment. what more you want from an inn rest? 5 magic weapons on top?

[Ittrix]

Originally posted by Stardustfire:

you spare food for the rest and can delay payment. what more you want from an inn rest? 5 magic weapons on top?

I mean, considering what a camp is capable of doing in most situations inns aren't gonna be your first pick.

Between saving some food n delaying payment versus...
quintupling the value of my meats, restoring happiness and turning excess into fame, generating fame, healing injuries, getting free armor repair items, converting alcohol honey and leather, laundering items, befriending prisoners, triggering companion events for experience/buffs/traits, gaining bonus willpower, getting antiquities, lowering the weight of my meats, gaining experience, and gaining a variety of buffs from the food I eat...
I think I'm gonna choose the camp.

[Locklave]

Originally posted by Stardustfire:

you spare food for the rest and can delay payment. what more you want from an inn rest? 5 magic weapons on top?

You have money to blow on the inn to but not money to pay your troops? It just makes the money problem worse.

Inns do nothing you couldn't already do better. Adding an expense to delay an expense lol. Where is the benefit in this exactly?

Repairing in town is cost effective, saves material. Healing in town is useful at times, generally due to lack of planning but still useful. Inns are costly with no upside.

[Kruppe]

Originally posted by Ittrix:

I'm not really trying to min/max per say, but I'm curious what everyone's opinions are.
For boons,
Quick Learners / Cunning Fighters seem like perks that help you progress faster, which would be nice but not great for endgame or even midgame. Incredible Resilience seems good for early game... and long walks / slap games seem the best imo.

For flaws... I'm not really sure. Willpower is unclear to me, and eternal dissatisfaction may be manageable late game so I'm betting one of those would be the 'best'.

As the negative traits go - the best one to take is Drunkard - as you can self heal from that - I'm not aware of any other negative traits that you can 'lose over time'...

Willpower is critical to getting 'galvanization' which leads to having the enemies 'flee quicker' - it is also helpful in 'abandoned villages'... It's also the only stat that varies with all the basic recruits - excluding how their traits impact their stats...

Hope that helps and makes sense?

[BedlamBetty]

good at slap games for the 10% buff to crit dmg is a great way to go.
Dropping your carrying capacity by 1 per unit as your debuff really doesn't affect you much, since the vast majority of your cc will come from ponies anyway

As for starting traits, bloodthirsty and strong on a dps strength focused character ( spear and the berserk build for axes) or bloodthirsty and nimble on a dps dex focused character (rangers, archers)
Tanks: thickskinned and strong (one hand sword and one hand maces)

[Ittrix]

Originally posted by Kruppe:

Originally posted by Ittrix:

I'm not really trying to min/max per say, but I'm curious what everyone's opinions are.
For boons,
Quick Learners / Cunning Fighters seem like perks that help you progress faster, which would be nice but not great for endgame or even midgame. Incredible Resilience seems good for early game... and long walks / slap games seem the best imo.

For flaws... I'm not really sure. Willpower is unclear to me, and eternal dissatisfaction may be manageable late game so I'm betting one of those would be the 'best'.

Willpower is critical to getting 'galvanization' which leads to having the enemies 'flee quicker' - it is also helpful in 'abandoned villages'... It's also the only stat that varies with all the basic recruits - excluding how their traits impact their stats...

I actually meant at the start of the game when you're picking what your troop is / isn't good at.

I mean, I know willpower ultimately ends up with the galvanizing and fleeing mechanics, I'm just not sure how much the willpower flaw takes away and how much that'd really change things.

I'm currently in the same predicament with my horses, actually. I don't like having them in combat, so I make 'em work ponies. I know raising constitution will help them carry more stuff, but I've also thought about dumping willpower into them. I'm not sure if their willpower will do anything if they aren't on the field, and I'm unsure if it *did* do anything if it'd be helpful.

[Kruppe]

Originally posted by Ittrix:

Originally posted by Kruppe:

Willpower is critical to getting 'galvanization' which leads to having the enemies 'flee quicker' - it is also helpful in 'abandoned villages'... It's also the only stat that varies with all the basic recruits - excluding how their traits impact their stats...

I actually meant at the start of the game when you're picking what your troop is / isn't good at.

I mean, I know willpower ultimately ends up with the galvanizing and fleeing mechanics, I'm just not sure how much the willpower flaw takes away and how much that'd really change things.

I'm currently in the same predicament with my horses, actually. I don't like having them in combat, so I make 'em work ponies. I know raising constitution will help them carry more stuff, but I've also thought about dumping willpower into them. I'm not sure if their willpower will do anything if they aren't on the field, and I'm unsure if it *did* do anything if it'd be helpful.

At the start of the game is what i was referring to when speaking about 'drunkard' as the best negative trait to add - sorry if that wasn't more clear.

Wasn't sure what you were referring to about willpower so i simply offered the 'bog standard' info there :)

as for horses - adding willpower adds no benefit at all to your "pack" ponies as they'll not appear during battles (so far) - constitution remains the best -

if you use attack ponies - then yes willpower will add some value as it'll slightly increase crit hit too

[rompier02]

Hi. Best one I ever got was megalomaniac ......on a bear. Yeah bear wants to be an officer. The other one was volunteer on an Alpha. Best laugh ever.

[Stray952]

Originally posted by Ittrix:

I'm not really trying to min/max per say, but I'm curious what everyone's opinions are.
For boons,
Quick Learners / Cunning Fighters seem like perks that help you progress faster, which would be nice but not great for endgame or even midgame. Incredible Resilience seems good for early game... and long walks / slap games seem the best imo.

I never pick experience buffs. If you get bonuses that make you better in combat, you can just fight more often, with less damage, and get way more experience.

The big thing is your party composition.

If you're going mostly DEX builds pick Slap Games. Remember DEX gives you crit chance, but not crit dmg, and STR gives you crit dmg but not crit chance. So you can put more levels into DEX and still equivalent of 2.5 levels of crit DMG.

Likewise, STR based characters don't really need a boot to Crit DMG, if you even want to fool around with crits. However, keep in mind that CON is cheaper than other stats. You get 3 to 1 CON for melee class choices and 2 to 1 CON for professions. However, you only get 2 points for any stat per level. So if take Resilient and Brawny, you have a continuous 10% + 5% bonus to your CON as it goes up from Armor and levels.

Then you can spend the points you get for leveling in other stats. You literally get more points that way.

For debuffs I usually take EXP or weight. The big thing is just to avoid Unlucky and the willpower debuff. These are serious blows to any class.

You need 12 willpower to survive your first knock in combat... so you're going to end up sinking levels into that either way. And dropping 2 of your starting 3 crit chance... is just like... might as well forget that crit is a game function.

[Kruppe]

hmmm; critical hit is a significant function of attack in this game - it has the single greatest amount of potential attacking impact

there really is no point on taking any other debuff than "drunkard" as it is the ONLY debuff you can self-heal... so taking EXP or weight as a debuff is stoopid.......

[Ittrix]

Originally posted by Stray952:

If you're going mostly DEX builds pick Slap Games. Remember DEX gives you crit chance, but not crit dmg, and STR gives you crit dmg but not crit chance. So you can put more levels into DEX and still equivalent of 2.5 levels of crit DMG.

I actually never invest into strength or dex, weird as it sounds. The bonus is small-ish compared to what your weapons give you. Take a level 5 steel Seoux that you crafted properly. That gives 19 dex for your ranger at level 5. They'll have 14-15 (don't recall exactly) dex at base value at that point too. So, 34 dex not counting any professions bonuses or traits they happen to have.

A level 5 ranger would have 4 attribute points to spend- 5 with a title. 1.3x the dex and 3% crit chance just doesn't appeal to me as much as +10 movement or +10% crit chance and damage.

I tend to invest enough willpower to resist death once, 12-ish movement except for classes that I specifically want to run halfway across the map to engage an annoying leader or enemy, and then the rest gets dumped in crit. May need to start including constitution for my tonks though...

I do wish they'd buff dex/strength boost tho