Proper way to fight a shield-bearing enemy?

[OZA]

Currently fighting the ex-champion Kadmos. I realize I have no idea how to fight shield-bearing enemies.

Character:
Dagger: 2
Hammer: 7
Dodge: 6
Critical Strike: 2

Character also has stock Mercenary atributes:
Strength: 8
Dexterity: 8
Constitution: 8
Perception: 6
Intelligence : 5
Charisma: 5

Named Robert for Robert Baratheon. Get' em Bobby B! Ayyy yoo!

Everything else combat-wise is stock for a mercenary. I'm using an (Iron) 1-h Mallet in main-hand and a (Steel) 1-h Jambia (dagger) in off-hand. Only reason I use the dagger is so I can make a quick 2AP swipe if I have any left over AP, though I'm not sure if it would me more worth it to just go to a 2H hammer. That's not the point of my thread though.

My normal process for fighting is, to get about two aimed hits on the legs to stop their ability to dodge, then finish them off with normal or fast strikes. With shiel-bearing enemies, they almost always block any shot, and a shot at the legs would be wasted at them regardless since they do not dodge.

So what is the best course of action? What I've been doing is aiming for the head and praying that it hits. When it does hit, it does a lot of damage. Should I be aiming for the arms instead to wear them down? I see this reduces their chance to hit and also has a chance to disarm, but I don't see that it has a chance to reduce their chance to block, which is what I would like to do.

Really I have no idea what the best strategy is, I'm just doing what I think is best. Any recommendations?

[OZA]

Also, this guy is REALLY hard to fight. He can attack from two tiles away, and I can only attack from one. When I get in his range he gets a free attack which shoves me back, so 90% of my turns go like this:

Move to attack
Get auto-attacked and shoved back
Close distance again
Get auto-attacked and shoved back
Have enough AP left over to do naught

[Goral]

You can try hitting torso but hitting arms and then going for the head might also be a good idea. You could also use a net to decrease the chance of him blocking your attack. Could you upload your save so that we could try it out(by we I mean me but I'm sure there would be others interested in it)? It's always fun to fight a challenging opponent in AoD.

[OZA]

I do have one net leftover, though I never found them to be that much help to be honest.

Originally posted by Goral:

You can try hitting torso but hitting arms and then going for the head might also be a good idea. You could also use a net to decrease the chance of him blocking your attack. Could you upload your save so that we could try it out(by we I mean me but I'm sure there would be others interested in it)? It's always fun to fight a challenging opponent in AoD.

Sure, I would love to upload my save! Give me a minute to find it. What hosting service do you recommend to upload? If there was a integrated Steam version I feel I'd know of it.

EDIT:

Here is the auto-save from the start of combat. http://wikisend.com/download/299700/Robert1467761482_auto_combat.sav

After doing some Googling WikiSend was the first site I found that didn't seem shady, nor required registration to upload or download.

[Goral]

I forgot that a hammer guy can't hit torso. Anyway, with your build it's extremely difficult, your THC is way too low. Head aimed attacks won't work since you only have 8% chance so the only chance is to go for his arms with a poisoned hammer (although I'm not sure if poison works with hammers after so many patches, it used to anyway) and many nets (bolas are even better but they're very rare so you might save them for tougher opponents). Or just get better first and improve your THC. You've waisted 5 points in daggers and probably put too many SP into Civil skills with as low intelligence and charisma as you have. You went hybrid which is the hardest thing to do.

Here's my save not long after I arrived in Maadoran: {LINK REMOVED}http://www.mediafire.com/download/5bxk28qhd53q25o/Gormongous1467566352_auto_combat.sav

As you can see I have very high dodge and spear skills and I defeated Kadmos on my first try. But to be honest, normally I would wait until I fought the guy with trident from the arena so that I could defeat Kadmos with his own weapon (interruption attack) or just buy trident earlier or make it myself. With your current stats you will have to waste many nets and reload too much IMO. WIth poison hit and run strategy you could also probably win but you have alchemy at 1 (with 5 SP you can go to level 2 and make poison yourself) so you will deal only minimal damage. If you had access to the temple you could buy good poison there but you probably haven't dealt with Heron yet.
Anyway, you have to be prepared that you won't win all fights and will have to skip some because you've spent too many points into civil skills.

If you want a killing machine just go with pure fighter build, i.e. 10/10/8/4/4/4 or something like my 8/8/6/6/8/4 spear build. Axes are most powerful but every weapon is great with the right build.

[OZA]

"Trident"?

Also, many, perhaps half or slightly less than half of my civic points were "free". As in they came from coversation or events and I spent no points on them. And the rest, I almost all of the rest, I had no choice but to put points in to progress the story.

Any recommendations on how to raise my THC?

[Goral]

http://ageofdecadence.gamepedia.com/Trident

Well, the only way is to put more points into hammer so you might try to fight some arena opponents first or do some more quests in general before you take Kadmos on. There are some trainers available that can increase your stats (in Caer-Tor for example, hammer is taught by Aziz in Teron but you have to be a 40 Thieves member to get his training) but I don't think you have acess to them at the moment.

Try poison when you fight and invest 5 points in alchemy. There are plenty of Kadura leaves which you extract poison from so you might use it in every fight and you shouldn't run out (and later you can extract it from poisonous creatures).

Kadmos is a very challenging opponent so do some easier fights first.

Edit:
And you should always have a hammer weapon with better THC bonus, there are spiked clubs or small hammers that could be more suited for that opponent than your mallet. Go to merchants and ask if they have something special and they should present you with some very good hammers/spiked clubs (which are reliant on hammer skill).

[Aged Swine]

My first general advice for combat against shield-bearers is: never use quick attacks, unless their armor and shield is already dented to zero protection.

If their helmet is not too good, try aiming for the head, or arterial strike (which also strikes head). Otherwise, torso (if you can) or plain power attack if you can't. Your hit chances will look bad, but remember: what you see seems to be the "pure hit" chance! That is, chance to completely bypass the shield. The rest is split between "glanced off the shield harmlessly" and partial hit, where shield+armor blocks PART of the damage. The latter should happen often enough, so with power / aimed strikes, you'll deal damage consistently (even if it won't be very high).

Quick attacks, on the other hand, are just too weak and would always get blocked completely, unless you score a crit. So, your leftover-AP dagger attacks are probably a total waste against armored shield-bearers.

In any case, Kadmos is pretty tough...

[OZA]

@Goral

I've taken your advise and rerolled. I've put even less optional points in civic skills, with almost all of them being free points from events and conversations compared to the maybe 70/30 split from last roll. I've switched to a 2H War hammer (Iron). While it's THC is no better than it's 1H counterpart I've hit some synergy with it and am dispatching foes with much greater efficiency. Also helps that I increased my DEX to 10 so I can still take at least two swings a turn even with the added weapon weight. Lastly, going to look into the poison you mentioned, seems a very viable option. Thanks.

@Kirinyale

Hammers can't aim at torso; only legs, arms, and head. Aside from those three options I have Fast, Regular, Power, Knockdown, Swing, Cleave, Double Tap, and Whirldwind. I've been trying Power attacks in addition to the Targeted: Head I was already doing, and it's working pretty well. Unfortauntely though, because of the 7AP cost of each, I only have enough AP left over for a fast attack afterwards (5AP).

Unfortauntely my character seems to be allergic to spear-wielders. I've been trying the combat option to quest where I am to investigate the Aurulian (?) camp, even though I have enough Lore to do the non-combat option. I can go the entire fight dodging every strike, every missle, but as soon as the Roman Velite looking dude with the wolf's head helmet and spear comes up he seems to have about a 80%+ hit chance on me, sometimes getting me 3-4 times in a single turn; and on a character with the bare minumum for armor this kills me.

[Aged Swine]

Originally posted by SHAMEFUR DISPRAY!:

Hammers can't aim at torso

But, as far as I remember, they have a "natural" armor-denting passive? In that case, power attacks should be good too. Though I admit that I didn't play with hammers much.

Originally posted by SHAMEFUR DISPRAY!:

Unfortauntely though, because of the 7AP cost of each, I only have enough AP left over for a fast attack afterwards (5AP).

Well, low AP is probably a big issue for any build. Unless you have high alchemy to compensate it with neurostimulants, of course...

Originally posted by SHAMEFUR DISPRAY!:

Unfortauntely my character seems to be allergic to spear-wielders.

Spear-wielders are especially tough for melee fighters because of their countering passive that makes you step back and waste tons of AP. Actually, the best reason to fight Kadmos in the first place is to get his unique spear (one-handed with two-cell reach), which is the only weapon you'll ever need if you are a spearman/blocker. :)

Well, if everything else fails - choke him with a bola and you'll get at least 2 rounds of block-free attacks (2.5 if you had more AP). I don't see any shame in spending one (or even two) on a tough opponent, and Kadmos IS tough. Yes, bolas are limited, but they are not THAT rare, as long as you don't use them in every other fight.

[Belisarius]

I actually prefer fighting enemies who use shields.

Just use normal attacks. Most of the time when they put their shield up, it doesn't fully block (glance). Meaning you'll still do a few points of damage.

The hardest people in the arena are the dogers, because they have a better chance of avoiding all damage.