For The King II - Chapter 2 - Master Guide

This is a step by step guide to completing Chapter 2 (The Primordial Oak) on Master Difficulty.

Chapter 2 Introduction

Chapter 2 - The Primordial Oak

As this is a Master Guide for Chapter 2, it is expected that the player has all the characters and Traits unlocked, all the Grand Sanctums and plenty of Loadout items unlocked.

Mission Challenge - Chapter 2 is a race against time. Movement efficiency is key. The map is large and expects the player(s) to make full use of Landboats for team movement.

Typical Problems - Chapter 2 on Master Difficulty presents several problems.

The Oak Tree Chaos is rapid. In order to extend the amount of time players have to gain Xp for levels and grind for better gear loot, you MUST remove Chaos at every opportunity. This means finding every Catapult around each of the Siege towns as you move from one to the next.

Scourges increase by 2 levels after each scourge is defeated. The first scourge will be level 1. The 2nd will be level 3. The 3rd will be level 5 and so on. As the party will be hard pressed to gain Xp and loot due to the requirement to speed through the mission, it is highly recommended to enter the Primordial Oak without fighting the level 5 Scourge. Once they get to level 5 they’re extremely deadly. Therefore, you’re racing against the Scourge activation just as much as you’re racing against the Chaos. In fact, often it is the Scourge activation that is more pressing.

Gaining Xp and loot is challenging as you MUST keep moving. The best way to gain Xp and loot while traveling as a team in your Landboat is to attack level 3 and level 4 enemies along the road paths as you move from one Siege town to the next. Once you reach level 3, these combats will become easier and easier as you move.

The most difficult part of this mission is surviving through the first siege town (Sanctuary Moon). If you can survive that first siege town, you have a great chance of winning the mission. Much of the guide below is focused on helping you survive this first siege town.

Party Composition

You are free to pick the team composition you feel most comfortable with, though certain character classes are likely to be more valuable than others for this mission on Master Difficulty. Let's first talk about the roles you want to try to include for your team.

Roles:
Tank
You’re going to want some way to absorb enemy damage (or avoid it). You can create either a ‘sponge’ who absorbs the enemy attacks or an ‘evader’ who dodges enemy attacks.

The Sponge - For a sponge tank, it is usually good to go with a high vitality character. The sponge is going for high armor levels for both physical and magical attacks and will ‘frontline’ with a shield. High speed is a benefit as it will allow this character to Taunt enemies before they attack your party. A Friar, Stablehand, or Hobo is a good choice for this role, though you can choose any class you prefer as long as they are stacked with the most armor you can find while also using a one-handed weapon and shield. As this character will ideally use a shield and use a one-handed weapon, you have the option of Traits to help benefit this sponge tank. Lucky trait opens up the possibility of using a Toy Warhammer as the one-handed weapon, which if found can be a massive boon. Nimble offers an extra secondary action which can allow this sponge tank to get in front of a hurt teammate quickly. Gifted boosts the stats for the Sponge to increase speed and vitality. This also opens up the Strength stat to be viable for the Friar.

The Evader - For a dodging evader, you’re stacking them with as much evasion gear as possible to get evasion percentage above 50% and ideally much much higher. The issue with evasion tanks is that the armor that provides evasion is usually low with physical armor and magic resist. Therefore, until you’ve increased the evasion to at least 50%, this character will have a hard time fulfilling the Tank role (especially during the early stages of the mission).

In general we recommend you try to build both! Allow the sponge tank to carry you through the early stages of the mission and transition to the evader once they’re set up properly (high evasion with shield to taunt).

Recommended traits: Lucky, Nimble, Gifted, Eager.

AOE Attacker
It is very important to eliminate large groups of enemies quickly. The best AOE damage dealers use Magic weapons often in the Intelligence or Talent stats. It is highly recommended to have at least 2 characters that can deal AOE magic damage. Good choices are Scholar, Herbalist, Alchemist, Minstrel, or Hobo. It is also possible to run Awareness characters for AOE damage as well, which opens up many options for character class choices. In general we recommend Intelligence characters as there are several very powerful Staves as well as amazing Tomes available.

Recommended traits: Deep Thinker, Navigator

Landmark finder
The map for Chapter 2 is huge and you MUST find the Catapults to reduce chaos as well as locate Scourge Haunts, Statues, Sanctums, and even Alluring Pools to help with map movement. This mission was designed with the Pathfinder in mind, and we do recommend trying to fit this character into your team for this mission. A Pathfinder isn’t a requirement for this mission, it just comes in handy. Ideally you should try to accumulate Find Distance items and when moving across the map during any character’s round, give that character those Find Distance items during their turn. This requires micro-management of items, trading them from one character to the next, so this may not be for everyone.

Healer
What team wouldn’t benefit from a Party Healer? Is the Herbalist required for this mission? Well no, but it sure helps a great deal. An Herbalist can double as an AOE magic attacker and can also use Awareness Bows quite effectively. (Tip - Herbalists should always be given a back-up bow to deal physical damage to high magic resist enemies). There really isn’t any good reason to NOT include an Herbalist in your team composition for a Master Difficulty game unless you’re looking to challenge yourself more than the difficulty already does.

Party Recommendations

Here are some suggestions for teams to tackle Chapter 2 on Master:

Friar/Hobo, Scholar/Alchemist/Friar, Pathfinder, Herbalist - Plenty of Intelligence character options here. If you get several good AOE magic weapons, this team can exploit them. Try to build the Pathfinder for an evasion tank build. Consider the Lucky trait for Pathfinder, or Navigator trait. All scrolls are useful especially Vision, Teleport and Portal scrolls. Scholar’s Find Scroll ability is quite useful.

Hobo, Friar, Pathfinder/Stablehand, Herbalist - Hobo can use the Friar’s starting shield, freeing the Friar to start with a Dark Tome from the Loadout for the AOE role.

Blacksmith/Farmer, Scholar/Alchemist, Pathfinder/Stablehand, Herbalist - A Blacksmith is slow but Steadfast works well for a sponge tank. Farmer has good strength and vitality and Scarecrow is a nice addition. Stablehand can be built for sponge or evasion as desired.

Stablehand, Scholar/Alchemist, Pathfinder, Herbalist - This team doesn’t start with a character carrying a shield, so you may want to consider an early purchase from a Town market or bring one from the Loadout..

My preferred team: Friar / Scholar / Pathfinder / Herbalist

Loadout Selections

For the loadout selections as each character is limited to 3 loadout points, it is recommended to take the following:

Shocked Bow - 3pts
$40 gold - 3pts
$40 gold - 3pts
$25 gold - 2pts
Lockpick - 1pt

You need to save $30 for a Teleport Scroll and Portal Scroll to be purchased at the Monastery. The extra gold will allow you to buy all the Godsbeard from Sunspear Grove plus a couple of other items you like.

The Shocked Bow can be used by the Herbalist, Pathfinder, or any other character that has good starting Awareness.

Chapter 2 Game Pathing

1) At the beginning of Chapter 2, before moving, have your first character in the party collect all the gold and buy every Godsbeard from the starting town (Sunspear Grove). Then, you’ll need $30 unspent gold to purchase a Portal Scroll and a Teleport Scroll. The Monastery sells both. Sunspear Grove also sells a Teleport Scroll, so you can choose to purchase it either from that town or from the Monastery. With your excess gold purchase whatever you like.

2) Next, check the sidequests from Sunspear Grove looking to uncover either a Sanctum or Statue. Ideally the Sanctum, but if not offered, take the one for the Statue.

3) Then, walk that starting character to the Monastery (First main quest objective). Use Focus for movement to ensure reaching the Monastery on that first turn. Once there, spend the unspent gold for a Portal Scroll and Teleport Scroll.

4) Your remaining three characters will split up and head for the remaining main quest objectives starting with Porter’s Landport. This unlocks the Farmland & Workshop locations. Each character is searching a different part of the biome while reaching each of these main quest objective locations. You want to try to find the hidden mini-dungeon during this search of the biome. Splitting up the party to look for it will speed this up. Once the Farmland and Workshop have been visited, the Imp Camp will spawn.

5) Continue searching the biome for the mini-dungeon. Once the mini-dungeon is found, enter it, pulling the party together. (Just make sure to have also accepted the Sanctum/Statue before entering the mini-dungeon).

6) After exiting the mini-dungeon, use the Portal Scroll purchased from the Monastery to quickly get the party to the Imp Camp. If needed, drop a Tinder Pouch for heals and focus restoration before engaging the Imp Camp. You will need focus as the Imps are evasive requiring perfect attack rolls to hit them.

7) After defeating the Imp Camp, use your Teleport Scroll purchased from the Monastery to teleport to the Landport (or walk there if within range). Reaching the Landport will pull the entire party to that location and allow everyone to embark on the Landboat it provides. This saves lots of time.

8) Using the Landboat, head back to Sunspear Grove. Pool all the party’s gold and hire the Merc from the town. With leftover gold, buy any Godsbeard present and anything else you like.

9) Start toward the first Catapult keeping an eye out for any easy kills along the way. You want to get 5v1 or 5v2 fights while you have your Merc helping you out. Killing these enemies will gain you more gold which you should pool to the character who hired the Merc. You’ll want $45 gold to rehire the Merc when it expires (assuming the Merc doesn’t die). Ideally you want this Merc with you when you fight the first Siege town (Sanctuary Moon).

10) As you approach Sanctuary Moon, search the area around it looking for the hidden Catapult plus a Sanctum, Statue, Alluring Pool and Scourge Haunt. Ideally you should start your fight with the siege town before any scourge activates. Only the Catapult is a MUST FIND! Certainly finding the Sanctum is helpful, but if time is not on your side, don’t waste too much time looking for everything. (Note: The Catapult and Alluring Pool are always within a 5-hex radius of the town).

11) We recommend you use the Catapult found around Sanctuary Moon to remove a scourge (-1 Scourge). Using the Catapult to delay the scourge gives you more time to level up your team and acquire more gear before you eventually fight a scourge. You should allow the scourge to activate first, then use the Catapult to ‘delay’ it. This allows you to know the location of the Scourge Haunt and choose to deal with it later as needed.

12) If you can survive Sanctuary Moon, you should be in good shape to win the mission. Sanctuary Moon will offer a town side quest. It is your choice if you want to take the Remove Chaos side quest, but this quest choice is better taken from the 2nd siege town when your team is better equipped. We recommend taking a safer side-quest like one that has you deliver a letter to a Sanctum or Statue.

13) As you move to the other two siege towns, kill single enemies along the road to continue to gain Xp, gold and gear. If the Scourge Haunt you allowed to activate appeared near one of these other siege towns, we recommend heading to the ‘other one’ away from the Scourge Haunt that previously activated because the next one on your timeline will spawn someplace else. Ideally you pick the siege town closer to where this next scourge will appear.

14) If you survive the second siege town, you should be in great shape to win the mission. Make sure to find every Catapult in the 5-hex radius around each siege town. Plus, you can choose at least one town side-quest to reduce chaos to help provide time.

15) You should be targeting completing the mission after 30 rounds having cleared 2 Scourge Haunts. You want to enter the Primordial Oak before the 3rd scourge activates. If necessary, use Portal or Teleport Scrolls to get one party member to the Primordial Oak if you’re short on time. You should be fine entering the tree with a party at level 4 or 5.

16) If you manage to find a staff or wand that provides Party Protection, it is highly recommended to buy it for the Primordial Oak. This is just a lucky chance, but these party protection weapons are reasonably common and will help you when fighting high-health enemies in the Primordial Oak (ie. Trolls).

[JGJoestar]

Pathing was super helpful. Thanks for the tip! Now I get to play as those lousy goblins :)