Hints, Tips and Tricks for Blackguards (Spoilers will be tagged and hidden)

[Poison]

*NEWLY ADDED: If you are having trouble targeting a character, or a square to move to it, you can move the camera position via the scroll wheel, to a top down view, and several different overside angles, to help you with your targetting. It seems a hugely frustrating thing for a lot of players, and I know it took me personally 30 hours to discover it by accident.

*Warriors should head for Two Handed Bashing Weapons off the start, and Neethan Axe, available on first blacksmith. Head to Weapon Skill 14 before spending points anywhere else.

***I want to reiterate this, as one of the common complaints is that the game is RNG dependent, and people miss a lot. Accuracy depends on your weapon skill, and you can get your weapon skill to 12 while still in the prison, 5 seconds into the game. Put points in your weapon skill before you do anything else, or prepare to miss a lot, and be frustrated.

*Hammer Blow and Triple Shot are the most damaging abilities in the game. Hammer Blow is better under most circumstances. Triple Shot gets a giant benefit from poison, as it fires 3 times, so if you use a 6-11 damage poison, you get 18-33 extra damage out of it on Triple Shot. Dual Wield is the best ability, damage wise, in the very early game, before there is a trainer for Hammer Blow and Triple Shot.

*Melee Fighters need Body Control 8 and Willpower 8 by the end of Chapter 1, aim for 13 and 13 by the end of chapter 3, and by Chapter 4, 18 and 18 isnt a terrible idea.

*Ranged Fighters need Master Archer, Dodge 3, and Triple Shot. Arrow Storm is a waste of AP, Melee weapons are a waste, you can leave willpower at 8, you don't get hit often, if you are using your melees well. Get Bows to 16 ASAP.

*Spellcasters should prioritize the following spells: Move as the Lightning(18), Clarum Purum(18), Balm of Healing(13), Hawkeye Marksmanship(13), Standfast Catlike(18), Corpofesso Aching Limbs(18), Fastness of Body(13). Ignifaxius Burst of Flame can be skilled to 8, for when you have nothing else to do but spend 7 AP on 8 damage =P

*The above is for optimization only, the game is not so hard that you cannot win if you spend a ton of points in fireball, its just not optimal =)

*Str 18 is great for extra damage. Sliders on the Weapon talent screen should be all the way to the right. Agility is also excellent for melee fighters, adding to Speed, Initiative, attack parry and dodge.

*Dodge 1 and 2 are great on everyone. Ranged, melee, and casters inclusively, and only cost 400-500 AP + agility 12. Get them on everyone eventually.

*Act 1 quest, Battlefield of Wobran gives a pile of weapons/armor/items/money, and is obtained by paying the beggar in Wobran. Its really worth it.

*Every talent has buffs you gain as you skill up in them. Body Control resists knockdowns, Willpower resists wounds, Perception grants initiative and ranged combat bonuses, Streetwise grants speed, cleverness and agility in town/city setting fights, Survival gives the same buffs as Streetwise, but for outfoors fights. Animal Lore gives +crit and hit% for your attacks, Warcraft gives hit % and allows weapon swaps to be free.

*Weapon Swaps cost 1 turn to use unless you have *Warcraft 18*, at which point they use a portion of your speed for the turn. This is important. Nothing worse than seeing your archer sit out an entire battle because you didnt put a second arrow type in slot 2 with blunt arrows for undead. Or your dual wield/spear fighter (You werent listening to the above tips!) with no blunt weapons!

* Sets of 3 arena fights seem tougher than they are if you keep the last enemy alive while your healers regen their Astral points. Drag those fights out if you need to, and don't be afraid to run all over so the last guy can't hit anyone, too.

* If you absolutely must use a spear, the Kor Spear quest provides a pretty good one. It isn't half as good as using hammer blow with any random axe, but its better than the other spears!

*In the late game, you should be buffing your entire team with Move as Lighting 4 and Standfast Catlike 4 Available from Ninive, in Chapter 3, while debuffing the entire enemy team with Corpofesso. The buffs and debuffs both are huge for making hard fights easy.

*Mage Development: Worth AP from the Special Abilities tab: Astral Regen I, II, III, and Astral Mastery. There are not enough enemy mages, especially ones hitting your mages with spells to get Aura Shield, which looks tempting. Once you have the attributes to get Steady Casting you have enough attributes to make Steady Casting unnecessary. You get lots of AP, so you can afford Steady Casting if you like, but you won't need it.

*Several really good Mage items come in act 3 of the game, including an obsidian dagger that gives Astral regen +3, allowing you to regen around 7 Astral Points per turn. This makes high end spellcasting much better later in the game. There is a Staff granting +1 Charisma Astral Regen +2 also. So dagger and staff are both weapons you'll want to skill up slightly(and probably set slider all the way on defensive

*Lamellar Armor, purchasable in Neetha is about the best armor in the game, you can afford it right around the end of Act I, depending on quest choices.

*Dual Wield Point Spending: Rush to Weapon 16. I am now using Daggers, and Poison. Poison is so amazing when you are hitting twice a turn. Get a poison doing 2-12 damage, slap it on your weapon, and watch the carnage. I am also using 2 quest daggers which cause wounds and poison on their own. Good stuff. It isn't hammer blow, but its pretty good. I have warcraft 18 for weapon swaps, and I swap to a TH Sword that does Magic Damage for Skels/etc. I don't have Hammer blow yet, but I'm guessing at some point in Chapter 4 I'll have the AP for it.

*Ranged/Mage combo build: Try out your Triple Shotting MC, or Aurelia, with Ecliptifactus Shadow Force. Now you have 2, or if both MC and Aurelia are Shadowing, *4* Triple Shotters. The Shadow is just as good a shot as you are. (You could also do this with a warrior, using the Shadow as another Hammer blow). Shadow Force is brutal on a mostly Non-Spellcaster.

More as I think of them.

[Neunmalklug]

thx for your suggestions. ill start new game now with act5.
could you pls tell me where i can learn standfast catlike? i was end a4 last time and didnt have it. i also missed 1 or 2 pieces of the kor spear, a list would be awsome.

[eldercom]

I'd not pump willpower\body control that high. With 8 in those and 18 in corresponding attributes you're just immune to everything.
Also survival\streetwise at lvl 0 is good for everyone as it's +1 speed for only 40+40 astral points.

When selecting a weapon pay attention to its damage type. Infantry damage is nearly irresistable.

Don't use too heavy armour. Every 1 encumdrance gives you -1 to dodge. -1 to attack at every even encumrance and -1 to parry at any odd. Encumbrance of 5 isn't worth any possible resistance, armor rating or bonus to attributes

It seems that the only way to learn standfast is to create a mage and pick it from the start

[Neunmalklug]

which armors you guys recommend? the ultra heavy plate armor you get from arena has insane stats, but the encumbrance is bad. i have 3 fighters, and use kusluk, the light plate (from morbal prophet) and the heavy plate.

[LeftPaw]

+1 for STICKY this.

[Egro]

1 hand bashing and a shield is way better for me. The shield will give you better defend and attack if you learn the right skill. Heavy armor is fine as long as you have the skill that let you wear them with less weight, you need to wear it to have those bonus otherwise unuse heavy armors are only deathweight. Bashing weapon + Shield + Heavy armor and you have a juggernaut on your hand. Many may agure that they can't evade with that setup and there are many enemies that can posion. That is when useful buff that increase evade rate, debuff that decrease enemies stats come to play. 2 juggernaut on the field and the enemies can't do a jack squat. XD
other characters should only have light armor to decrease weight and they should only act as support. Acher with triple shot, and let your mage drop a cloud that create ball of lightlings every turn behind the enemy line then you can wach the galaxy burn from the safe distance...

well work for me any way. :D

[Cutlass Jack]

Here's a pair of tips people may find useful...

Talents:
In Expert mode, its worth it to spend the 40 points to unlock any Talent you think your character may want to use, even if you don't spend any starting points to develop it. Finding trainers for these takes awhile during gameplay, especially Streetwise.

Dual Wield:
Finding a Dual Wield trainer takes a bit too, so its worth the investment to grab that during creation if its something you were hoping to do. That said, attacking with both weapons is done like a special attack. Which means extra weapon does not factor into the damage other special attacks like Feint or Hammer Blow.

But on the positive side, you only get hit with the dual wield penalty when actually performing a dual attack. This can be an advantage if you find a one handed weapon you want the magical bonuses for, but don't care about actually attacking with it. For example, if you found a dagger with Astral Regen on it, you could equip it in your offhand for that, without penalizing your regular attacks. So the Dual Wield ability isn't needed in that case.

[Cat]

Are there any other spells I should learn at the start that can't be attained any other way?

[Poison]

You can learn Standfast Catlike in Chapter 3 or Chapter 4, I have it on both Zurburan and Aurelia in my last playthrough. My current playthrough is just starting Chapter 2, I'll update the tips at that time.

[Poison]

Originally posted by commdt:

I'd not pump willpower\body control that high. With 8 in those and 18 in corresponding attributes you're just immune to everything.
Also survival\streetwise at lvl 0 is good for everyone as it's +1 speed for only 40+40 astral points.

You don't have to, although 8 willpower on your fighters will get you wounded but it isn't like you dont have a TON of Adventure Points in Chapter 4 to throw around, especially if you are following the above hints, and not wasting any.

Originally posted by quote=commdt:

When selecting a weapon pay attention to its damage type. Infantry damage is nearly irresistable.

This is a really good point, and the reason the Neethan Axe is so good, and the reason the Kor Spear is also the best spear. (Even though we recommend avoiding spears, even on Takate.

Originally posted by quote=commdt:

Don't use too heavy armour. Every 1 encumdrance gives you -1 to dodge. -1 to attack at every even encumrance and -1 to parry at any odd. Encumbrance of 5 isn't worth any possible resistance, armor rating or bonus to attributes

The encumbrance can be reduced by Armor Use 3, (reduces 3 encumbrance) but again, this is good advice.

Originally posted by quote=commdt:

It seems that the only way to learn standfast is to create a mage and pick it from the start

Standfast is learnable from a trainer in either chapter 3 or 4, possibly from the Druid in Chapter 3 I just checked my save, but all my mages already have it, so I can't tell who taught it to us =)

[f.mcgraw]

"*Weapon Swaps cost 1 turn to use unless you have *Warcraft 18*, at which point they use a portion of your speed for the turn. This is important. Nothing worse than seeing your archer sit out an entire battle because you didnt put a second bow in slot 2 with blunt arrows for undead. Or your dual wield/spear fighter (You werent listening to the above tips!) with no blunt weapons!"

A small tweak for that one:
You can actually place *the same bow* with a different arrow type in another weapon slot. Saves some weight.

[Poison]

Thanks, F, I'll update that tip

[Poison]

Added the scroll wheel camera note at the top, I recommend the devs add the note prominently to the tutorial next patch, seems to be frustrating a ton of players.

[eldercom]

Originally posted by Poison:

Standfast is learnable from a trainer in either chapter 3 or 4, possibly from the Druid in Chapter 3 I just checked my save, but all my mages already have it, so I can't tell who taught it to us =)

That mage from courtesan quest, the Druid, Telemache and the Elf all don't have this spell :\

[Poison]

I'm in chapter 3 in my current playthrough, but havent come across it yet, I'll update the note when I find it.

[Poison]

Standfast Catlike is available from Ninive in Chapter 3, the Elven Ranger. She also teaches Hawkeye Marksmanship.