Having a hard time with Shield Maiden's Agony quest

[Schizophriend]

So the quest to unlock Shield Maiden's mark requires you play stage 3 in Agony Mode. So far, I've unlocked all the marks except for Norseman and Shield Maiden. Somehow, I struggle a lot with the Shield Maiden's quest.

Maybe it's just my itemization or my selection of abilities, but it seems like I just can't deal with the enemies here. Her rather weak, low-range main weapon makes it really hard to hit and kill all the enemies in stage 3, since a few of them move in weird ways.
Some enemies just walk past you, like those knights, especially their elite versions which take ages to kill. Other enemies take ages to reach you, like those Gargoyles, constantly flying huge circles around you. These enemies constantly drain your Agony while you desperately chase after them, trying to kill them all. That horse-rider near the beginning of the run is also a nightmare to deal with as the Shield Maiden.

It takes about 12 minutes until I finally make it to Agony 1, then it goes relatively normal, and after some more minutes it starts becoming really tough again. I just keep walking left and right to catch all the enemies that try to run past me.


Maybe the way I should tackle this is to sprint for all the abilities at the upper and lower edge of the bridge, so I can rely more on ability damage? I just feel like her main attack is pretty underwhelming.



I also don't understand why she, a fully-armored warrior, starts with 0 defense while a character like the Archer starts with 5 defence for example. She's weirdly squishy for a character that looks like it should be the main tank of the group.

[Darth Zed]

she's a block tank, not a defense tank. hence the shield part of her name.

you cant ever really go wrong with just focusing on abilities for characters with underwhelming main weapons, my personal go-to ones are both lightning ones plus ring thrower and trasnfix.

[towly]

here is what you do : pick what ever gear you wish : include echoing band among that gear

pick what ever mark you wish, you said you think she is squishy, so lets say for this example pick the swordsman mark

first skill you pick needles get to needles lvl 3 evolve it with one of the 2 both are great
second skill pick rings
get both needles and rings to lvl 6 evo both skills fully
3rd skill even so it is overkill, get either radiant auro or transfix

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3032477699

or you can be lame and pick flamestrike and do it the ultra boring way

[Ulyaoth]

Hi,
you may want to try this:
https://steamcommunity.com/app/2218750/discussions/0/3816292540668453975/

Since her main Synergy is "Melee" try to utilize this.
Start off with Ring Blades/Flame Strike, use Ring Blades/Flame Strike as 2nd and pick Golem or Spirit Warriors as 3d. Her Mace paired with Echoung Band will cary you hard.

Since Forgotten Viaduct is out of balance currently, try to avoid damage and a tankier build.

Good Luck,
Cheers!

[Russ]

A trivial way to get any of the achievements is to just use the mark of the warlock, and create a summons build, out of anybody. The imp/skeleton summoning rings, alongside the gloves that boost summoning stats are enough to trivialize getting to agony 3 with anybody anywhere. I found this out when I ended up clearing the warlock agony achievement and his don't attack for 20 minutes achievement at the same time.

A fun and even more broken thing about the spirit warriors is that they block enemy movement, and don't move. Double tap on the warlock's +spawns (summons) traits, and you end up with 6 spirit warriors that you can just sit inside of, basically invincible outside of the occasional boss with ranged attacks. Add golem/orbs for increased brokenness.

[Ulyaoth]

Originally posted by Russell:

A fun and even more broken thing about the spirit warriors is that they block enemy movement, and don't move. Double tap on the warlock's +spawns (summons) traits, and you end up with 6 spirit warriors that you can just sit inside of, basically invincible outside of the occasional boss with ranged attacks. Add golem/orbs for increased brokenness.

This got fixed with the latest update, because it was unintentional.

[Russ]

Originally posted by Ulyaoth:

This got fixed with the latest update, because it was unintentional.

Hahah, that's good to hear. They made it pretty silly. That said, the build will still work just fine though. The real butchery oddly enough comes from your little army of what ends up being like 20 skeletons and imps. I really underestimated those rings (+glove) before trying it out.

Then in later game orbs also just get ridiculous with all the summoning buffs.

[Ulyaoth]

Originally posted by Russell:

Indeed. It gives you the perfect setup.
Imps for close combat, skeletons for further away.
Orbs covering the whole screen, warriors and golem for the lolz.