Tier system for classes.

[Celerity, Executor of Impunity]

Sparked by both my work in modding this game and a discussion that made a different game look much more sophisicated than it actually was.

Arcane Soldier: B-. This class has exactly one good skill, with the rest of him being a hybrid between a weaker Soldier and a Mage whose spell progression and spell ability costs are so delayed that they are non factors in his ability set and power level. Fortunately, that one skill is really good (if you understand its unique mechanics, and the enemy takes damage from fire).

Barbarian: C+. Unparelled at auto attack direct damage. Unfortunately that's not really that relevant in the game. Neither is direct damage itself. He also does fairly well with weapon statuses, but not the greatest.

Bard: A-. An unparelled support character. Out of combat the Bard offers various item related abilities saving you a lot of money and giving you more items indirectly. In combat the Bard offers group buffs, enemy debuffs, and support abilities.

Cleric: A+. The only class I'd consider "necessary". Yes, you "can" go without them. You'll also spend so much on life and condition cures it's not worth it. The class itself is balanced (except Mass Regen, which makes the game a rofflestomp fest), just this ability set is always useful in all situations except those you are easily winning anyways.

Divine Summoner: D-. Also only has one good skill. The difference is the other skills quit scaling well before the end of the game, and the one good skill just gives you more money and items, meaning Mercantilism does it better and comes on classes that also do something else. Also, you're reliant on AI (albeit fairly good AI).

Explorer: B. Mandatory, but I'm ranking Gaulen anyways. His support abilities are extremely strong and necessary in some areas, but focused on well... exploration instead of combat. His combat abilities are somewhat lacking, particularly against poison immune enemies (and there's a lot of those). He does act as a force multiplier like the Bard, but in a much less direct way via gathering large numbers of stat buffing herbs.

Mage: C-. Very useful early in the game and quickly drops off later, unlike most games with both melee and magic. The mage's mid and especially high level abilities have very high costs for what they do, meanwhile a physical attack will deal at least almost as much damage without running the user out of mana in a few shots. Energy isn't really a useful solution when it gives 2 mana each and spells past level 20 cost 60-320 mana. The only unique functionality they offer is AoE and a few support abilities, but the AoEs are very weak.

Paladin: C-. This class is mainly held back by the fact it's a hybrid in a game that requires focus on the character level. Like Arcane Soldier it gets delayed progression on spells, unlike it healing still does something. Aura of Protection is a fairly good skill, though you can get it at lower levels through items.

Soldier: A. Also very useful early in the game, but unlike the Mage doesn't drop off as sharply later. An unparalled melee combatant with a range of special attacks. He only doesn't get the highest rating because he is still largely based on direct damage.

Thief: C. The Thief gets this ranking purely for Shurikens, the best source of bleed as well as traps and locks. It's quite lacking otherwise. That should give an idea how good Shurikens are, particularly during the first half of the game. All three of these abilities become less useful later on though.

Now you can make all these classes work, even Divine Summoner. Just there is a very significant gap between the best and the worst.

[dannyaic]

I've read through the tier list and I had a couple of questions. You mention the AS's flame strike skill and it's speical mechanics, what are those exactly? And is the exploration skill worth it to get on Gaulen? Also, how do you compensatre for the soldier's lack of pp? seems counterintuivtive to give him EN and meditation is very expensive for him.

[Celerity, Executor of Impunity]

Logically you'd think if you want a skill better you increase its level right? That just makes it super cost inefficient and not very much better. Instead you raise your weapon skill and Agility, and those increase the amount of fire damage you do well beyond the listed low value. Frost Strike does the same thing, but with no DoT component it does significantly less damage overall and single target crowd control doesn't have much of a niche.

Exploration is the one that improves vision radius? I usually don't bother.

As for Soldier mana, early on mana is everything, particularly damage so you take advantage of the fact mana pots are cheap and sneak in some timed rest (immediately hit awaken, you will rest for 2-3 hours and get partial recovery accordingly) if several characters are low on resources. I don't bother giving him things that specifically raise mana beyond the +life/mana and +mana affixes occasionally and later on he only needs mana for Wounding Strike as Powerful Strike won't add that much damage anymore. And even that just makes most late game enemies have a dead turn sometimes curing wounds when it is needed at all.

[iAndy]

I've definitely changed my opinion on the mage after playing late game (finished the game on veteran last night). I like them a lot more now.

The annoying part without a mage was those lich/necromancers who would summon and go hide behind their summons. I never died to them, but it would take so long and use up a lot of resources to finish a 1 or 2 groups of them. I played my mage group again and took them down much faster. I also used the cleric Ray of the Gods for them to make the fights shorter, but it was a huge mana hog and wouldn't help much on the groups with 4-5 liches.

[Celerity, Executor of Impunity]

That would be the enemy with very high resist everything except divine and physical?

[iAndy]

Mainly the mage would take out the front guys (vampires etc) so the liches would stay at the front. Ray of the Gods I would use directly on the liches.

[Ludic]

Detailed thoughts after finishing the game on Hardcore Ironman:

- The Speed stat is excellent. Level it up every level for every character of every class. From what I can tell it seems to work something like this:
The slowest character (either yours or the enemy's) will take 10 seconds to act. Higher speed has an effect relative to that character, and can get you as fast as about 5 seconds per action before higher Speed starts to have diminishing returns. Different weapon types further alter this in a way that's really not well-communicated in-game.

Enemy Speed advances, so you'll want to keep investing in it to keep ahead. That said, you might not want to focus *all* your Speed boosts from herbs and such into one character (especially after you get done with the Arena of Sorrentia and no longer have any particular need for a "favorite" who is stronger than the rest of the party).

If you've got 5 second turns to an enemy's 10 second turns, and you only have a low 2 second stun, 3 soldiers will still be able to fully lock down an enemy (because they'll get six seconds of stuns every 5 seconds).

- Combat Initiative is also good. It seems that with a high enough combat initiative you can potentially get quite a few turns before an enemy can even move. That's right, you don't just go first, you get to go multiple times before Team Monster does.

- Party I used was Gaulen up front with an axe, 3 Soldiers with hammers/flails, a Mage, and a Cleric. This team was overwhelmingly powerful at all points in the game, to the point that it made me wonder why the game is billed as difficult. There was a lot to like about the game, but a hardcore tactical challenge and a proper difficulty curve weren't part of that for me. I found it to be generally relaxing rather than intense on Hardcore Ironman.

It seems to me like the difficulty, such as it is, is balled up in the ability to choose "trap options" which will weaken your party, and that players who don't take the good options (such as investing in Speed) may struggle more. Also, more of the depth seems to be strategic rather than tactical (e.g. character building / long term resource management decisions rather than in-combat decisions).

- If you get an advantage, you snowball like crazy. Basically, if you can deal with one challenge efficiently, you are rewarded with permanent power advantages, which in turn let you deal with other challenges even more efficiently. In other words, if you have an easy time with one part of the game, everything else becomes even easier. If your party starts strong, you can kill the ogre, purple mushrooms, and 8-soldier encounters very early, and then it's basically smooth sailing from there. My Soldier/Mage/Cleric team never fell off; in fact, the exact opposite occurred. They picked up steam and rolled over everything the game could throw at them faster and faster.

- As a result, the game gets far easier as your progress... pretty much the opposite of what I'd consider a proper difficulty curve. The only part of the game that can be described as difficult at all is the early game, and even that is mostly a product of a newbie's lack of understanding of the tools the game hands the player and the underlying formulas that determine the precise value of terms like "action modifier" or "combat initiative." If you know what you're doing, you can breeze right through the early game even on Hardcore Ironman.

- This also means that "weak now for power later" options are unnecessary. I'm talking about things like Learning or delaying picking mushrooms until you have Herbalism 30. Late game enemies simply don't scale as fast as you even without such things (especially since mid/late game demons, wyrms, and titans drop a boatload of permanent stat gain items). Get your power now and every encounter will be a cakewalk.

- Soldiers are very strong and complement each other. I took 3. Boost Speed and Strength every level-up. The skills you want are Tactics, Maces, Powerful Strike, Wounding Strike, and when you have spare points Weapon Master and Bodybuilding. Tactics means they can get multiple turns before the enemy (or anyone on your team without Tactics) can attack. Powerful Strike means they'll do 100-300 damage per hit for much of the game. Wounding Strike means you can completely cripple the enemy's ability to act. Last but not least, flails can stunlock just about anything. Upgrade to hammers/flails from maces as soon as possible. I took the Agility god at character creation to facilitate this.

- I felt Bleed Strike was generally less valuable because of a few things. Namely, that with my team enemy offensive potential drops swiftly as the fight carries on, either because members of the group got focused down with a string of unmissable Powerful Strikes (or just strong autoattacks), or because Wounds cripple the enemy's ability to retaliate. By the time Bleed stacks accumulate enough to deal more damage than Powerful Strike, the enemy would often either be dead or unable to damage the party faster than the cleric makes them Regenerate.

- I didn't put any points in Stunning Strike either. I already had flails.

- On the virtues of stunning: First, enemies who are stunned cannot dodge, which should smooth over any problems people are having with the RNG causing frequent misses. Second, if you are optimizing your speed and have 3 hammer/flail wielders you can lock down any single foe (except, say, Odendros which are immune to stuns) so that they can never get a turn.

So, if you are fighting a lone foe? Free encounter. If you are fighting a group encounter where there's just one or two actual damage dealers and the rest are the little harmless Askarys? Free encounter. If there's two or more unusually strong enemies with high enough stun resistance that they might actually get turns? Focus down one quickly with Powerful Strike or disable it with Wounding Strike, then stunlock the other one. Any damage they did before you disabled their offensive capability will tick away from Regeneration. The few enemies that are immune to stunning aren't immune to wounding, and are slow and do low damage anyways.

- Give your EN/PP bonuses from mushrooms and liquids and stuff to your Soldiers so that they'll have plenty of PP to spam their abilities whenever you need them. Cleric doesn't need them (they're mana efficient and with your Soldiers' ability to cripple enemy offensive potential they can spend much of their in-combat time praying to restore the PP they used to set up Regeneration at the start of a fight... or that they spent healing wounds outside of combat). Mage might care a bit about boosting EN late game if you want to get some extra Infernos in before you start energy-stealing, but by that point your Soldiers will already have >100PP.

- I took a Mage, too. Boost Con on all of your early level ups. Sparks does a lot of damage to early enemies (which are probably the most threatening enemies in the game). Blizzard is just lovely utility against the "8-soldiers" encounters and other cases where you're up against many enemies. It also kills bees. Cursed Hounds are relatively weak against Cold too. Inferno is okay for clearing out hordes later on. Oh, they also can take Perception and the like to save utility points on Gaulen. End of Flames and Incinerate Air are also convenient to have one point in to get rid of flames/ice/webs. You really don't need to get that many spells; many of them are just a waste of points (comet shower, lightning damage spells, etc), so you'll have points to spare for other stuff.

- Clerics are really strong. Boost Con on all of your early level ups. Regeneration is one of the best spells (at least with the team I had). Throw that up and just recharge with Divine Prayer and you'll find that you come out of most fights with more PP and hp than you went in with. You can break locks and then just use Cure Wounds to fix everything, then use Divine Prayer to recharge your PP without even resting, because your Soldiers and Mage will be so effective at locking down fights. Only put enough points in Cure Wounds and Mend Bleeding so that it removes however many stacks of the status effect enemies are actually dishing out to you at the time (one point is good for a long time). You don't need to level up Regeneration as fast as you possibly can either if you want to be more PP-efficient (by the time you get Mass Regeneration PP will be a non-issue).

Once you get Mass Regeneration, the game is over (if it wasn't already). Nothing can even come close to outpacing that 20-60 hp per turn on a speedy team (not even that Titanic guard in front of the Temple of Valvet). And by the time it runs out, you'll have recovered the PP with Divine Prayer.

- Everyone should max the Immunity skill just like everyone should be taking Speed at every level up. It's pretty easy to make a character entirely immune to one element by the time you get to level 30. By level 40 I was making characters immune to all elements. Anyways, being immune to just one of your choice on even one character obviates a lot of challenges, because a number of areas threaten you with elemental damage... and no random encounters at all. You only need to have one person suit up for immunity, then run right through, then rest for 1 day to heal everyone to full before you kill Ovengel / the mausoleum guardian / the tower guardian / whatever. So, don't sell all of the resistance items you find; they may come in handy later.

- Food is abundant, and buying it is completely optional. There are some, what, 9 food plants around the Velegarn map? Plus the Cereal Grains that you can stockpile for a rainy day (or rather, sunny, as the case may be in Pernitia). Doesn't take long to just make a circle of the map and refill your food. Later areas in the game let you refill from the environment even faster. That said, you can totally afford to spend your money on food and travel crystals once the snowball gets rolling, just to speed things up.

- I never needed lockpicks. I just broke every lock, and still had enough food to clear every dungeon in one run (no need to backtrack to town), simply because you take so little attrition in combat (often, less than none, since your Cleric regenerates PP with prayer every combat round). The Cleric can simply cure off any Wounds or damage you take from breaking locks.

[Ludic]

As for the Bard vs Mage discussion:

I haven't done a full playthrough with a Bard, but on paper I'm having a hard time seeing what this guy has to offer my team.

Let's look at the numbers, shall we?

Utility? Well, Bard has Mercantilism, and Mage has Incinerate Air and End of Flames. A Bard getting Mercantilism, Object Identification, and Perception to full spends 83 skill points. A Mage getting Incinerate Air, End of Flames, Perception, and Object Identification to full (well, level 1 for Incinerate Air and End of Flames since you only need one rank in those) spends 78 skill points. The mage also doesn't need to invest many skill points in spells because there are only a few you should care about. If you skip Object Identification the comparison works out even more favorably for the Mage, since they spend only 37 skill points for their utility (vs 62 for the Bard).

So, basically you have to go and say that being able to make webs, ice, and flames disappear forever is less valuable than saving Gaulen the Explorer a few skill points on Mercantilism. I'm not sure I buy that this is important, given that Gaulen isn't really starved for points (you don't need Exploration and Hunting and stuff).

So what else does the Bard have to offer? What about stats?

PP Gain per level: On Hardcore Ironman, Bard has 1.4 per level, Mage has 2.275 per level. That means a mage gets 62.5% more PP. The Mage also has a skill that can regenerate PP, and the Bard doesn't. The Mage gets enough PP naturally that you can just dump their level up points on Constitution, and spend your Energy herbs and such on your Soldiers.

Bards gain more hp/level than mages, but this isn't equally valuable. 1 Energy gets you 2 PP. 1 Constitution gets you 4 hp. The Bard's hp gain advantage isn't double the Mage's PP gain advantage (it's about the same).

In fact, let's say that the Bard and Mage invested in stats on level ups so that their hp/pp gain is as similar as possible. So, every 3 levels, Mage gets Con twice, and EN once. Bard gets Con once, and En twice. Result?

Mage: 11.675 hp per 3 levels. 8.825 pp per 3 levels. (Advantage: +1.375hp/level, +0.625pp/level)
Bard: 10.3 hp per 3 levels. 8.2 pp per 3 levels.

Okay, so maybe stats isn't where the Bard action is at. Maybe it's in their skills?

Damage? No, certainly not in the early game. Song of Rage needs you to hit some 25 times to match up with the damage of a Blizzard spell against 8 soldiers, and has none of the CC effect. Sparks is just wiping the floor with early enemies, too, dishing out 22-38 damage by level 5 (more against the guys in Sporia Forest). Inferno dishes out meaningful damage against hordes even if they have some resistance. Brittle Armor is like a Song of Clumsiness that can't be resisted and stacks with itself.

Action modifier? Cmon, it's +15 at max level. Soldiers advance attack rating really fast (and get up to like 300 late game) and stunned enemies don't dodge.

Song of Clumsiness? Looks like Brittle Armor that can be resisted.

Clearing out weak enemies with Requiem? I mean, I can do that with Inferno and the Bard can't recharge the PP cost in 50-100PP chunks. Plus, the Inferno will take a chunk out of the beefier enemies too. Also, aren't the undead that are so common later in the game just immune to it?

Song of Awakening? Why aren't you investing in Immunity? If you're getting put to sleep you're doing it wrong.

Song of Speech? I can't remember Silence ever mattering during my entire playthrough.

I guess the one thing they have is the ability to boost combat speed, but you should already be outspeeding enemies and shutting down their offensive potential before they can act, and you have to wait all the way to level 26 before you get Song of Haste. Also, does this negate the decreasing returns factor on Speed advantages? If not, what's the point?

What is it exactly that is supposed to make Bards great?

[Celerity, Executor of Impunity]

I believe I have made it very clear I do not want you in this thread. However, as you insist on both disrespecting me by ignoring my desires, and disrespecting this community by continually spreading false information mixed with enough quoted true information so that it seems legitimate, I will now break this down for you.

Mercentalism is -34% cost. On everything. All the time. Forever. It's also +34% sell value on everything. All the time. Ever. And that is additive, so instead of getting 30% you get 64%. I won't calculate exactly how many hundreds of thousands of gold that is but rest assured it is more than the small number of item casts required for End of Flames and Incinerate Air. Although, given your propensity for regarding punish mechanics as rewarding, I'm surprised you do not merely run through the hazards and derp rest off the damage. You apparently do it for traps and locks, and those are more harmful.

"But I could just take it on Gaulen!" At the expense of more skill points on the character with the tightest skill point demand. Incidently, 31 skill points costs more than the hundreds of thousands of gold you save. Likewise, Object Identification is cheapest on the Bard, and if you don't take it at all not only do you get less than half from every sale, all the time, ever, but you get a nice little identify tax eating more of your now meager income (this is probably how that silliness with Golot Divine Summoners started).

"But what about Perception!" Actually, quite a few classes get it as a 1 point skill. I never take it on a Mage, as it's actually the Cleric with fewest demands on skill points and the marginal extra experience actually helps semi even her with the rest of the group long term as your combat characters usually do get ahead on experience.

You also did not mention Brittle Armor, which is a utility skill that the Mage has that has some actual merit. Bards certainly don't get it, I don't remember if Arcane Soldiers do but if so it's so late it barely matters.

So that's out of combat stuff. How about in combat?

Mages do indeed get 0.875 additional mana per level, or about 50-60 mana over the course of the game assuming you finish in the 60s. This lets him cast exactly one spell that was level appropriate at level 24, and is now outpaced by one melee basic attack (and matched by a caster bard's arrow). Congratulations. Bards, meanwhile get the most efficient effects on the game. Let's review.

Song of Courage: +15 Action modifier, 8 mana. Completely irrelevant later, early on this prevents your damage/statuses from being reduced by defense in nearly all situations and also increases your accuracy. This lasts 1 minute, so it does more damage over its duration than even many Mage high level spells.

Song of Stunning: Long stun duration, 12 mana. Look at your Soldier, then back at me, then back at your Soldier, then back at me. Your Soldier is not me, but if he were he could stun everything on the screen like me. I'm on a Moatauro.

Seriously, this makes your silly little mace thing look absolutely impotent, as during the parts of the game where it's relevant it's not only affecting every enemy on the screen with a high success rate but it's practically lasting an entire round. Later enemies will of course be higher level (resists stun from all sources) and have higher stun resist (same) and higher mental resist (only hurts the song) but at that point it doesn't matter anymore.

Song of Rage: +12 Strength, 1 minute, 18 mana. So that is at least 6 full combat rounds in which each character does 8.4 extra damage per attack, or at least 300 damage overall. I sometimes skip this, but it still trivially outperforms mage spells as a mage would need at least 60 mana for the same effect (so much for that minor mana edge).

Song of Victory: Effects of all buffs, 120 mana. The Bard kind of loses his mana efficiency here. I say kind of because it is still all buffs for a single action. All buffs including Courage, Rage, Spirit, and Haste. Spirit is just some evasion, which is whatever. Haste is +36% combat speed on all characters. Yes, let's give the entire party 36% more actions. That ability ALONE would make the Bard make the Mage's damage look like a joke. I'd spend 120 mana on that and not feel like I got decieved or shortchanged at all.

Song of Clumsiness: I don't use this, but comparing it with Brittle Armor is laughable because Brittle Armor is single target and this is AoE.

The increased life of the Bard is indeed irrelevant as all characters of all classes will have 500+ life endgame, and anything over 300 is plenty.

And once you cast your spells, what do you do? Well the Mage either slows the group down with constant resting just for him, burns mana potions so he can look useful, or has dead turns with mana steal making his overall damage actually less if he casts spells than if he just poked things with his staff (Mage spells are that mana inefficient). The Bard, meanwhile shoots things in the face for damage/wounds slightly lower than a Meteor for 0 mana. Assuming caster Bard, a combat focused one just flat out gets free Meteor bolts because higher Strength..

[Ludic]

Originally posted by Celerity:

I believe I have made it very clear I do not want you in this thread. However, as you insist on both disrespecting me by ignoring my desires

Wow, okay. Thankfully, this isn't your forum, it's here for everyone, and other people are allowed to have opinions on strategy and tiers too.

spreading false information

You have yet to point out a single statement I've made that is false. By contrast, every time you have made a specific claim (instead of just general vague mudslinging) about what was supposedly "false information," it's been disproved, with video evidence and timestamps. For example, when you pretended that I hadn't killed Ovengel, and I uploaded a video proving otherwise. Have the maturity to admit you made a mistake (presumably, not understanding that it's possible to beat Ovengel without getting the 4 princes achievement, since you don't have to do him fourth) and move on.

Also, I don't see why you insist on such an adversarial, dogmatic tone with anybody that doesn't quite agree with you. It's absolutely unnecessary. This can and should be a friendly discussion.

Originally posted by Celerity:

Although, given your propensity for regarding punish mechanics as rewarding, I'm surprised you do not merely run through the hazards and derp rest off the damage. You apparently do it for traps and locks, and those are more harmful.

You keep using this straw man argument, claiming that I must have been "derp resting" or wasting time backtracking to get more food. This isn't the case. Throughout the game, even early on, I was clearing dungeons in one trip. Here's an example: Nengorth's castle, the earliest location with lots of locks to break, on Hardcore Ironman:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S865Ja6WdTI

100% cleared (e.g. all random encounters used up, etc) in one trip, no backtracking or anything required. Notice how I generally just cure off the damage/wounds from breaking locks instead of resting, and that the Cleric simply recharges with Prayer in combat.

The later you get in the game, the less resources you spend breaking locks or running over traps, too. By the late game, curing wounds costs only a small fraction of your PP, and many traps are just resisted entirely.

It's not that "punish mechanics are rewarding." It's that these factors are not as threatening as you seem to think they are, and can be managed with strategies other than the one you used.

To try to put it another way, it's like if the Cleric had an "open lock" utility spell that just cost however much mana it takes to cure away the consequences of breaking locks.

Mercentalism is -34% cost. On everything. All the time. Forever.

Well, if by "-34% all the time" you mean after level 35, when the game is basically already won and money rains from the skies (I had a few hundred thousand gold at the end of the game and didn't really feel there was anything for me to do with it). And if by "on everything" you mean "on items." But, yeah, I got it on Gaulen.

"But I could just take it on Gaulen!" At the expense of more skill points on the character with the tightest skill point demand.

I had enough skill points to max every skill I wanted on him. I didn't feel I needed things like Hunting or Exploration. What exactly is it that he needs and can't afford?

You say he has such a tight skill point demand, but I'm not seeing the numbers. I'm open minded to the idea that the Bard is better than the Mage. I just want to see the evidence.

Song of Courage: +15 Action modifier, 8 mana. Completely irrelevant later, early on this prevents your damage/statuses from being reduced by defense in nearly all situations and also increases your accuracy. This lasts 1 minute, so it does more damage over its duration than even many Mage high level spells.

How are you calculating that figure? Again, I like numbers. How are you measuring the damage output here?

I mean, if you want to talk about a +15 action modifier doing more damage over its duration than high level Mage spells, that sounds like a fairly outrageous claim to me when Inferno dishes out a base of 544-896 instantaneous damage and 272-448 damage per tick against a full pack. If you have a combat that goes for 5 ticks, that's 1864-3096 damage. If you have a combat that goes for 10 ticks, that's 3144-5256 damage

Let's even take a less optimal case. Let's say you only have 6 enemies, and they resist 40% of the Inferno's damage, and they're durable buggers (like the big black and purple demons) and you expect to be hitting them for a while... say 10 tics. That's 1440-2391 damage. It tends to take 2 actions to regain more mana than it cost to cast Inferno with Energy Absorption. If a Bard is autoattacking for 3 actions, that's... how much damage did you say your bard was doing with crossbow attacks? 70?

Song of Stunning: Long stun duration, 12 mana. Look at your Soldier, then back at me, then back at your Soldier, then back at me. Your Soldier is not me, but if he were he could stun everything on the screen like me. I'm on a Moatauro.

Song of Stunning costs mana and is subject to mental resistance. It also isn't coming simultaneously with large amounts of direct damage or wounding, nor does the Bard have Tactics. The comparison is rather hyperbolic.

Seriously, this makes your silly little mace thing look absolutely impotent

If it was so "absolutely impotent," I probably wouldn't have breezed through Hardcore Ironman, clearing just about every dungeon in one run, and never dying. Really, the hyperbole is unnecessary, and unconvincing. If you want to convince me, you'd have to provide me with actual numbers showing that one option is better, not just jokes about being on a Motauro and belittling insults.

Also, what you don't seem to understand is that the hammer/flail Soldiers isn't just about individual stuns, nor is the fact that there are stun resistant enemies something that shoots down the strategy.

If you get your stuns mostly resisted, they still slow down the enemy enough to lock them down (see the 2 second stun example), all while you're simultaneously plugging away for considerable damage or stacking wounds.

The Soldier autoattacks also don't require any mana, so if you have an enemy team fully locked down you have no resource consumption. Moreover, the soldiers get to act several times before enemies can move at all thanks to Tactics. This often means you can eliminate an enemy, lock down the rest by the time they would actually get turns, and not spend any hp or pp on the fight (and gain some back, because the Cleric will be using Prayer).

The end result is that many combats have less than zero attrition. You actually gain back health and PP with most random encounters, like you were picking up angry health/mana kits.

Song of Rage: +12 Strength, 1 minute, 18 mana. So that is at least 6 full combat rounds in which each character does 8.4 extra damage per attack, or at least 300 damage overall. I sometimes skip this, but it still trivially outperforms mage spells as a mage would need at least 60 mana for the same effect (so much for that minor mana edge).

Okay, cool, now you're giving me actual math to address! :)

8.4*6*6 is indeed 300 damage. A few points related to this:

1) It assumes the most generous possible case: all 6 party members are constantly auto-attacking and hitting and there is no overflow damage or damage lost to armor, which is fine I guess.

2) The damage is gradual. I want my fight to be won before 6 rounds pass. Either the enemy are dead, or they're Wounded or otherwise locked down so that killing them slightly faster doesn't actually matter anymore (from a pure resource management standpoint it's not even helpful, since an extra round or two is more time for, say, a Cleric to regenerate while enemies can't do anything). This is fairly similar to my sentiments on Bleed Strike.

3) "60 mana for the same effect." If we're going to assume the optimal case for the Song of Rage, let's assume the optimal case for a Mage spell as well. Blizzard against 8 soldiers. Clearly a practical example, since they're the most challenging early game fight and Blizzard comes online at around that time. Blizzard deals 176-304 cold damage *instantly* and will freeze 2.66 of them, meaningfully decreasing the initial offensive capability of a Challenging (or whatever it is) encounter at its most dangerous point (when all 8 enemies are alive).

For 60 mana, that's 352-608 damage and 5.72 freezes for 6-10 seconds, accomplished in two turns rather than 6. That's not the same effect at all, it's superior.

Yes, let's give the entire party 36% more actions.

Does Song of Haste ignore the diminishing returns on combat speed?

Song of Clumsiness: I don't use this, but comparing it with Brittle Armor is laughable because Brittle Armor is single target and this is AoE.

Reducing defense is less relevant for clearing hordes (you use Inferno or Blizzard for that), and AoE or not it can be resisted and doesn't get stacked. I only care about reducing defense if I'm going to be sitting there clicking on a Titan for a while and want it to go faster.

The Bard, meanwhile shoots things in the face for damage/wounds slightly lower than a Meteor for 0 mana. Assuming caster Bard, a combat focused one just flat out gets free Meteor bolts because higher Strength..

About how much damage does a Bard do at various levels / with various equipment?

Going by what you said on a previous page, a bard built for autoattacks deals ~70 damage. Not sure what stats and equipment are producing that outcome, but whatever. So, in 2 turns, a mage can expect to recharge 100-200 pp if there's a decent target for Energy Absorption around. This means that if you're in full sustainability mode (e.g. no using potions, no using up pp that you're not getting back for free), you can cast a spell like Inferno once per 3 rounds.

If your bard is doing 70 damage with autoattacks, he's doing only 210 damage every 3 rounds. A 100-200pp Mage spell does more than that.

If your bard is doing more than just autoattacks, he's eventually going to need to rest. The Mage doesn't need to rest during the entire dungeon after getting Energy Absorption.

[ZiN]

Very good info on this thread, thanks for all participants, especially Celerity and LudicSavant. It's interesting that very different party builds and playstyles are viable and also enjoyable. In this regard, the game somewhat stays true (although not 100%) to the old-school roots of this genre.

I'm still playing on veteran (with the default team), but reading this thread gave me a good base for building a team, for the hardcore playthrough.

Since almost everyone agrees, that Cleric is top-tier, how about multiple clerics in a team? Redundant? Probably, as Celerity said, this isn't about "class stacking", even though It works, with soldiers and to a lesser extent, mages, as mentioned.

[Celerity, Executor of Impunity]

Well what do Clerics do? They heal. How much healing do you need? Answer: Generally less than one Cleric's worth (you have a lot of dead turns for Divine Prayer, and unlike the Mage that doesn't hurt you as you're still casting all the spells you need).

So you could do it, but the extra Clerics aren't really adding anything.

Originally posted by LudicSavant:

Wow, okay. Thankfully, this isn't your forum, it's here for everyone, and other people are allowed to have opinions on strategy and tiers too.

You have yet to point out a single statement I've made that is false. By contrast, every time you have made a specific claim (instead of just general vague mudslinging) about what was supposedly "false information," it's been disproved, with video evidence and timestamps. For example, when you pretended that I hadn't killed Ovengel, and I uploaded a video proving otherwise. Have the maturity to admit you made a mistake (presumably, not understanding that it's possible to beat Ovengel without getting the 4 princes achievement, since you don't have to do him fourth) and move on.

Also, I don't see why you insist on such an adversarial, dogmatic tone with anybody that doesn't quite agree with you. It's absolutely unnecessary. This can and should be a friendly discussion.

Sure. What isn't allowed though is pursuing your long duration harassment, which is also why I have no patience left for you and your constant dodges.

Well, if by "-34% all the time" you mean after level 35, when the game is basically already won and money rains from the skies (I had a few hundred thousand gold at the end of the game and didn't really feel there was anything for me to do with it). And if by "on everything" you mean "on items." But, yeah, I got it on Gaulen.

And before that it's a lesser gain, but it still saves more gold than you'd spend on the requisite extra skill points, and still saves more gold than you'd spend on the... what, 6 times you need End of Flames or Incinerate Air pre level 35? Most of which are in a sidequest anyways? Nabros doesn't count because you get 3 freebies and only need 2.

I had enough skill points to max every skill I wanted on him. I didn't feel I needed things like Hunting or Exploration. What exactly is it that he needs and can't afford?

You say he has such a tight skill point demand, but I'm not seeing the numbers. I'm open minded to the idea that the Bard is better than the Mage. I just want to see the evidence.

Axes, Envenomed Strike, Herbs, Terrains, immunity. That's the basics. It's also already more than you get. If you skip the combat stuff, see previous comments.

How are you calculating that figure? Again, I like numbers. How are you measuring the damage output here?

You hit the enemy and observe the result. You do not make disingenous claims such as...

I mean, if you want to talk about a +15 action modifier doing more damage over its duration than high level Mage spells, that sounds like a fairly outrageous claim to me when Inferno dishes out a base of 544-896 instantaneous damage and 272-448 damage per tick against a full pack. If you have a combat that goes for 5 ticks, that's 1864-3096 damage. If you have a combat that goes for 10 ticks, that's 3144-5256 damage

Where you automatically assume there are 10 enemies, on the field, all the time when anyone who had actually played the game knows that you very rarely encounter 10 enemies at all, and never encounter 10 relevant enemies at once. You also do not encounter 0 resistance at the point where you are casting endgame spells as typical endgame resistance is around 50%.

Those actually familiar with the game know that any encounter in which Inferno is available has 1-3 enemies with it (or 1-3 enemies + some filler that does nothing). And that combined with the aforementioned fire resist just makes Inferno laughable.

Song of Stunning costs mana and is subject to mental resistance. It also isn't coming simultaneously with large amounts of direct damage or wounding, nor does the Bard have Tactics. The comparison is rather hyperbolic.

If it were hyperbolic it would be no different than what you are doing. But in any case you're assuming Powerful/Wounding Strike spam, which also costs mana. It just uses it far less efficiently so you conviently forget that part.

At the levels at which Song of Stunning is relevant, most enemies have 0 Mental Resist. A few have negative, a few have about 20. Neither are very significant as those aren't enemies you'd cast it on anyways. Mindless undead are immune, skeletons also hit for nothing. Whatever.

So while the Soldier is doing "large amounts of direct damage" (that is something like a 3 hit kill on one of the 10 trash mobs you are always putting on your screen) and stunning one for a few seconds, the Bard is denying 8-9 of them their entire action for the entire round. And then the other 5 characters are getting free hits on them (which incidently is more damage, especially if you use real damage classes). Also, the Bard is still going first, so whatever.

Until I realized just what I was missing with Arcane Soldier I wasn't aware just how impotent Soldier damage actually was. Sure for 12 mana he can hit for 70 or something at the levels at which it's relevant. And then for 4 mana the Arcane Soldier hits for 70, and then 39 the next round, and then 38 and so on. And while the Soldier can only do that about twice before needing a mana potion or rest, the Arcane Soldier can hit every enemy in range with it, they'll die 1-2 rounds later even if no one else attacks them, and then he can do the same thing in another fight before needing a recharge. The only reason that class didn't get a rank A is because Burning Strike is his one good skill and I can't give the best ranking for such an overcentralized class no matter how good that one trick actually is. Worth noting: His other unique skill is Frost Strike, which is basically Powerful Strike + Mace stun for half the mana cost off a higher mana pool and it's barely worth using (mostly because single target crowd control has little niche and Burn and Freeze cancel each other out).

I clipped out a large portion of you just ignoring everything I saw then spamming walls of text back as I know that is what you do.

3) "60 mana for the same effect." If we're going to assume the optimal case for the Song of Rage, let's assume the optimal case for a Mage spell as well. Blizzard against 8 soldiers. Clearly a practical example, since they're the most challenging early game fight and Blizzard comes online at around that time. Blizzard deals 176-304 cold damage *instantly* and will freeze 2.66 of them, meaningfully decreasing the initial offensive capability of a Challenging (or whatever it is) encounter at its most dangerous point (when all 8 enemies are alive).

You've already been doing that. More importantly, you just lied horrifically about statistics yet again. You can reach level 10 before dealing with the big guard groups. At that point you have a level 1 Blizzard, not a level 5. As such it does not deal 22-38 damage each, it does like 9-15 or something pathetic. So 12 damage vs 55-130 life enemies. Tickle percent. It also has a 30% chance of freezing for 2-3 seconds (compared with Song of Stunning hiting the Archers and Guards 90% and the Weapon Masters about 75%, and stunning them for 8 seconds aka an entire round). Also, these enemies do single digit damage each, so you don't actually need crowd control in any form.

Does Song of Haste ignore the diminishing returns on combat speed?

You haven't even figured out the combat mechanics yet. It's not a "diminishing return" at all.

Cut out more disingenous remarks about AoE. Try harder.

[Tycrus1]

Originally posted by Celerity:

I believe I have made it very clear I do not want you in this thread. However, as you insist on both disrespecting me by ignoring my desires, and disrespecting this community by continually spreading false information mixed with enough quoted true information so that it seems legitimate, I will now break this down for you.

Well this is a free forum and i cant see where you can block user from this thread no matter if your right or not. But this kind of behavior is typical for you... Even if you disagree with LudicSavant doesnt mean you can dismiss him here. 2nd if i read your comments you are the one being impolite and harassing him. Disrespect? Ignoring you? Narcissistic behavior is one trait i couldnt never stand ... If you want others respect first of all you should start to respect them as well! I dont see where he disrespected the community with his idea how to play the game but thats just one of your silly ideas to justify your cause. If anyone is disrespectful it would be you celerity and i dont know why you are making such a mud fight out of it. I respect your work as a moder but i cant respect you as a person!

[Celerity, Executor of Impunity]

Oh Tycrus, why am I not surprised?

For those who missed it, Tycrus is someone who takes everything literally, and so he regarded my trolling as a serious insult without saying anything about it instead of recognizing that I was treating him more like a little brother. He then did the one thing he should know better about - telling me a very obvious, blatant lie and when he got punished for it he retroactively decided he hated me, threw a tantrum, and ran off.

He's always been the follower sort, more just repeating what others say without actually understanding and agreeing with it and still parrots me without context or understanding even now after his breakdown. Now though, he follows whatever side is against me despite not actually knowing Ludic or being aware of the extensive history that made me simply have no interest in hearing another word from him. Nor is he aware that I am more interested in productive and accurate discussions focusing on the mechanical effectiveness of various classes than this Derpest Drama, though I will always happily deconstruct people when they are being idiots.

Somewhat on subject, you Tycrus have a weak grasp on game mechanics as well, as you have extensively demonstrated. You also have a poor understanding of words as even near the end you were reading "Plan your route instead of running around randomly and wasting buff timers" as "Never use the run button and continue walking about randomly and somehow waste buff timers even more". While you haven't offered any advice yet, making large numbers of obvious mistakes does disqualify you from doing so.

And you can try countering by claiming I'm being narcassistic or whatever, but the simple fact of the matter is I barely posted anything at all on this forum until I had a good understanding of the game. I'm not saying "You have sub 250 hours, get off my board" or anything like that, just don't teach when you should still be learning. I have a set of standards for everyone, starting with myself, and so I've already taken my own advice.

It does amuse me though that you would support his Derpest "Tactics", considering all you have said before. Just blind hatred from a tester he lost his privileges after getting literally over one thousand hours of entertainment for free from me that was almost custom designed for him. Move along.

[Tycrus1]

Well i wont deny your statement about the game play but your ignoring the fact about the respect you want apparently! But i am not into another of your little mud fights just saying what was on my mind about your current mud fight. I never said that his tactics were right if you would read it closely i just said his idea how to play the game but ok take it that way i dont mind. I got your mods for free? Interesting i didnt gift you around 30 Dollar over steam ? Well i am not salty over anything i just had enough of your behavior and this thread proofed it to me even more that your a horrible person. By the way if you would be so kind to remove my twitch account from your mod thread that would be awesome.

[Celerity, Executor of Impunity]

His idea involves stacking one class and spamming one ability set. I know that sounds familiar, so think about it.

His posts have been useful in the sense that that's the sort of one dimensional tactics I must ensure don't work so that the game can have actual tactics but that's about it. And I got that point after the third time I received a rapid fire series of messages about mace spam, so...