Blackguards and You - Basic tips and tricks for those who struggle

[Asuzu]

I lately see a lot of "the game is too difficult" posts.
Let me share some of the experience over my 10+ playthroughs to maybe help you guys out.
BEWARE of huge SPOILERS alert along this post.

General tips

- Save your AP and spend it very carefully to be able to grab most juicy stuff when it is available. Generally as a rule - never spend AP unless there is some goal to reach - like some good skill you want to get to, and you need to tailor your stats to be able to grab it.

- Save all your early gold, you have several big purchases incoming. There is quite powerful equipment sold in the first town you visit, namely Kuslikan Lamellar armor and good 1h and 2h weapons, try to save up some gold to grab weapons first, they cost around 15-20g, then go for the armor - if you spend carefully, and sell all Tomes you find (after using them on your Mages) you can buy full armor even before heading to Lizardfolk fighting in the end of Act 1.


Class specific tips - Warriors


- Please remember, that warriors are always a gear-dependent class in any game. Which means, they scale better with every piece of gear you put on them, unlike magic classes.
The dwarf is a very valuable team member, able to tank or plow through nearly anything as his gear gets better. In this regard, "Battlefield of Wobran" is a very important early quest in second town you visit to give you very good early game gear for your warriors. You get the quest from the beggar. Make sure to open all crates *during* the fight, basically I have 1 guy running around opening crates, while the other guy tanks the enemies.

- Many people seem to miss this, but you can change your weapons allocation in weapon skills tab, dragging the slider from defense to offense (between shield and sword icons), I usually drag into full offense to have the best attack skill - dead enemies cannot attack, right?

- From the very game beginning aim to level Willpower and then Body Control talents to 8 each for your warriors - this will drastically reduce the amount of negative effects like wounds and knockdowns for your warriors and is what allows them to keep going. Otherwise your warriors will get wounded/crippled/knocked over and dead with every enemy crit and even basic attacks and this is why they get owned, so Willpower to 8 followed with Body Control to 8 must be your very first investment for warriors no matter what

- You have "Power attack" skill with Warriors by default, it gives you a huge damage boost early game, always use it except a few hard to hit enemies (like dwarves in "Dwarf games"). Drag it from the "Attack" skill wheel icons to your skill bar and get used to always attack using it, I have mine bound to "1".

- As a progression plan for your warriors - pick a weapon skill and stick to it until skill level 16, with an "Armor wearing" training skill on the way for 300 AP. After this, start tailoring your stats for the chosen weapon tree - going for "Hammer blow" for 2-handers or maces/axes, or going for "Death blow" for fencing/swords/spears. These 2 trees require completely different approach to char building, first is focused on Strength while second focused on Agility.

- "Hammer blow" vs "Death blow" for me hammer is a clear winner with insane amount of triple damage often resulting in 1-shots. I prefer my enemy dead instead of wounding/crippling him and dragging fights. Most enemies have around 30-50 health which is very in favour of hammer blowing with a good 2-hander. Basically hammering warrior can blow through enemy team in no time with a good support behind his back.

- After reaching your desired "Blow" :) you can focus on getting Weaponmaster, which requires 16 weapon skill in 3 weapons, or go for something else you have on your mind.

- Dodge vs Parry, dodge is a clear winner since parry is limited per turn, also you forfeit your parry with a Hammer Blow. Which is why shields are bad, really (more on this below).

- 1 handed +shield vs 2-handed weapons - I honestly think shields need more love, right now all they do is give you a bit more parry and a chance to drop ranged attacks, having a good 2-hander and doing more damage with your power attacks or hammer blows is just so much better as it is now.

- I tried Dual weilding and did not like it overall, doing less damage than a spear attack... Maybe someone else had better experience with it.


Class specific tips - Mages


- Mages are starting quite weak, and moving on to become a very strong healers/single damage dealers/debuffers

- On the upside, wounds almost mean nothing to caster Mages - the parry/dodge/attack penalties which mean a doom for warrior, mean pretty much nothing to a spellcasting focused Mage, you should still aim to grab that 8 Willpower and 8 Body Control somewhere along the way, but after your first important picks

- The most important spells in your repertoire is single target "Fire burst" and "Healing", aim to have those level 8 first, this will give you 99% hit chance single target damage and heals.
Mage can basically solo Wood Trolls with a rank 2 fire burst.

- The point of spells is that enemies have static lowish HP pools, and very few of them resist magic, so doing 8 damage with fire burst in start of the game seems low, but doing 20-30 damage with it in late game is insane.

- Your development plan should be rolling around getting fire burst and healing to skill level 8 and then save all the AP to grab the Astral Regeneration, which is 600 AP and requires 15 Charisma to get it, so raise Charisma then save for the regen talent.

- Staves are extremely useful now with added astral regen, basically resulting in your mage being much more useful overall and going out of mana much less. Set your staff to full defense in weapon skills tab so your Mage can parry an occasional attack time to time.

- Some prefer to train mages for ranged weapons, honestly I didn't found this to be useful since you stretch too wide and is not good at anything. Overall, your protagonist and Zurbaran are much better off as a pure spellcasters, while Aurelia can be a very good With/Archer right from the start as you get her.

- Make sure you have at least 1 Mage aiming for late game debuffing, when enemies start to dodge everything and rip through your team in no time. Last level debuff spells affect WHOLE field and autohit all enemies, so you need a very good and focused mage doing that.

- You can also make a fun Mage/Fighter hybrid, using power attacks in melee with an occasional fire blast thrown in, Blackguards allows for crazy character builds. If you equip the Mage with heavy armor, you forfeit your mana regen and your spells have bad chances to hit, but you get much more versatile fighter on the board.

Class specific tips - Ranger


- Rangers have very similar shot as a "Power attack", make sure to drag it to your skill bar and use it by default unless enemy is very low HP and you are sure to kill it

- Overall, I find the range management very annoying (4-10 hexes for penalties) and my Rangers are focused on buffing/debuffing instead, having very powerful early game spells "Fast as Lightning" and "Lightning find you". But if you catch a grasp of it, it is very easy to manage really and keep the good range for best attack ratio/damage. Overall Rangers are doing same damage as early warriors with a power attack.

- Basically level "Fast s lighting" all the way to top (it has very high failure chances, so you need to invest hard on it from the go, with level 4 being the best and allowing you to buff your whole team)

- Give Naurim a good weapon, cast "Fast as Lightning" on him and send him berserking. He can easily tank 4-5 enemies this way. Level 3 fast as lightning gives you a second action even, so you can attack twice, if hitting hard enough that means 2 Power shots or Hammer blows on enemy team and is quite a game changer. Please note, since last patch different levels of "Fast as lightning" spell buff dont stack anymore :( It was fun white it lasted.

- I never tried to build a dagger Ranger, maybe someone else has experience with it :)


This is it for now, gear up, skill up and think your turns through :)
Have fun!

[imminence]

Nice :)

Just one question: To equip a mage with heavy respectively metal armour would disable all spells, too, right? I can't see the advantage then, because I cannot change armour during a fight.

[sanshi]

@imminence - it is possible this has been changed in one of the recent patches I've not checked lately, but you could use spells whilst wearing metal armour but your AP will not regenerate - once it's used up no spells. As I'm sure you know but for others, unless you unequip your metal armour on spell users you cannot use potions or have AP restored in an Inn.

@Asuzu - nice post :)

[Asuzu]

Originally posted by imminence:

Nice :)

Just one question: To equip a mage with heavy respectively metal armour would disable all spells, too, right? I can't see the advantage then, because I cannot change armour during a fight.

As sanshi said, you can equip a Mage with heavy armor and still cast spells, you loose the mana regen and your spells have high failure rates, but it is possible to work around that.

Overall, pure caster mages are very good support, and the only reason to experiment with this is for your own character if you are trying to build a very specific Mage/Fighter or Mage/Archer

[imminence]

Yeah, meanwhile I tried it and it is exactly like Asuzu wrote: Spellcasting possible, but high failure rate.

I guess, I was too much thinking about other TDE-games, in which spellcasting is not possible when a mage has metal armour and / or a metal shield equipped.

[s | voxx]

Nice post, I was thinking about making one of these.

Right now, the Witch/Ranger build for Aurelia is doing wonders for my team. She is easily the most valuable party member at the moment. Just a little tip for those who didn't main a Ranger.

As to your tips on AP, this is very true in the early game, but opens up a bit later on. You can flesh your players out fairly quickly and then spend AP in a more experimental manner thoughout later chapter 2 and all of chapter 3 (at least in my case, I don't know if I'm screwing myself for chapter 4).

I also hoarde all my money, and haven't found much to buy yet. The sidequests can be very rewarding in terms of gear.

[studmuffin]

really good post m8..i totally forgot about the start village where that good armor and weapons are.i got past all the lizards anyways through other means.i was stuck in the 1st arena on the 2nd fight like a few.i have been so close to beating them but one of them outheals the damage..but i have an idea for that when i start playing it again.

[Talrosh]

Nice information, seems like good class tips. I was wondering about something else however. Im at the end of chapter 1(morbal done). As soon as i move to chapter 2 I can't go back. Is their antyhing i should get or do before leaving like:

- Buying certain equipment (for example Kuslikan Lamellar armor)
- Spellbook "The Power of Shadows" from Vhelman
- Learn something fromt he trainers
- Unfinished quests: (Sulaak's Greatest Treasure, Pilgrim Paths)

Oh and where can i see what the setbonus is?

[wizard1200]

Most powerful support spells in the game:

Move as the Lightning III: Gives the target another action.
Duplicatus Double Vision III: Reduces the attack chance of the enemy to 45 %.

[JayXan]

Add random encounters - Problem solved.

[s | voxx]

Originally posted by Talrosh:

Nice information, seems like good class tips. I was wondering about something else however. Im at the end of chapter 1(morbal done). As soon as i move to chapter 2 I can't go back. Is their antyhing i should get or do before leaving like:

- Buying certain equipment (for example Kuslikan Lamellar armor)
- Spellbook "The Power of Shadows" from Vhelman
- Learn something fromt he trainers
- Unfinished quests: (Sulaak's Greatest Treasure, Pilgrim Paths)

Oh and where can i see what the setbonus is?

If you complete a set, you get +1 AR which means -1 damage to any damage done to you. It's very simple, and I'm not sure sets are worth all the hassle. I think this may change in future patches, or at least be made more clear.

The 2 unifinished quests resolve in chapter 3. I don't think there is anything exclusive to trainers in chapter 1 and I was also wondering about the armor....

[Asuzu]

As supersixty said, armor set bonuses right now are horrible, -1 damage from damage done to you is nothing to write home about. So, just go with the most effective defenses, or the style choice (always important). Mind you, heavier armor implies more penalties to dodge/attack/parry.

The top important things in Chapter 1 I would say are:
- Kuslikan Lamellar Armor in Neetha
- Neethan axe in Neetha (best 2-handed weapon in the game right now hands down, crazy damage stats and doing Infantry damage on top of that, which is the least resisted. Give it to Naurim and watch him mow down armies of Lizards in no time)
- Learn Armor wearing 2 for warriors in Drol
- Learn Astral Regen 2 for mages in village after Drol (the one you go for Niam quest)
- Leather helmet in the village you do the Dreamweed fight to complete Leather Armor set, very good for Mages and Rangers as it does not hinder spellcasting
- full Brigandine set in Morthal for those who didn't get the Kuslikan (although some set pieces, like pants, are better replaced for better resistances)
- Longbow in Morthal for archers

Act2:
- Warriors learn Shield fighting 2 for those who go with the shield from the first trrainer (Diamantes)
- Great Slavedeath 2-handed sword for 2h sword lovers from gladiator shops (although I still recommend to level 2h blunt weapons on all warriors for Infantry weapons)
- Second trainer (Mengbilla) can teach you Dodge up to level 2 which is awesome for arena fights in Mengbilla
- Bosparan Bronze plate for warriors in Mengbilla arena shop (very good stats, close to Kuslikan and less restrictive)

[Talrosh]

Nice info! Would you mind explaining why one should learn those at the trainer. Is it because they are that good so get em early or will future trainer not have that special ability available?

What about Spellbook "The Power of Shadows" from Vhelman 300g?

[Dev]

Something you may have missed: greatswords have extra range, just like spears, and do sick damage to boot. I haven't seen any 2 handed mace/axe weapons do this.

Also the talent that reduces all spellcosts by 1 is almost just as good as astral regen 2 but attainable with much less early AP investment. I like rushing to healing balm 13 for wound cure + that talent. You get it much easier than +2 charisma and 600 points for astral 2.

[Talrosh]

Tried the greatswords but I don't have the extra range. Build:2013-12-10 rev.32073

[Dev]

It is def. in that build, Talrosh. I am not talking about two handed swords in general, I'm specifically talking about "Greatsword". When you click on it you will see an effect called "distance". It is the only non-spear I've seen that has the extra range. Hits for same damage as the large slavedeath too.