Larian Studios Forums Divinity II The Dragon Knight Saga / Flames of Vengeance (English) Divinity II - The Dragon Knight Saga Mindreading

Mindreading costs XP, this is painful because level is the only determinate of your combat powers, with an enemy several levels below being unable to hurt you, and vice versa.
This is a real shame because most mind reading targets provide fun dialog rather then actual rewards, very very few minds are worth reading.

Is there a mod that makes mind reading free? if not, is there a list of worthwhile targets for mind reading? it is a real pain to quicksave and reload before and after each mind read (or to miss out on it altogether)

It is an even bigger shame that mind reading isn't a skill you level up independently of anything else, so that to mind read the tough targets you have to first mind read a lot of easier ones...

Until you get to the expansion, mind reading does not have a major impact on leveling as the higher your level the less XP enemies give. Thus, if you do all the mind reading on the front end it will have little to no impact on you level.

if i do all the mind reading up front, i get stuck in level 1 for a very, very long time due to a massive XP debt. And enemies become tougher and tougher to face as they level up while I remain level 1.

While being lower level make you gain more XP and thus there is a catch up factor, in the end you will still be a few levels behind by the end of the game, which is painful and really totally unnecessary.

Wait till you are about level 6-7 before reading minds.
Then the xp loss doesn't matter much, and after level 10 it amounts to nothing

Most of the broken valley mindreads are very cheap anyway.

Thanks for the advice... is there a list of who, specifically, is worth mind reading?
that is, who gives me skill points to mind read.

Not sure how it is felt around here about linking so I wont, but there is a Divinity 2 guide at gamepressure.com that has a list kind of what you are asking about under 'secrets'

i found it, i also found another guide that is more specific...
unfortunately they are for the original ego draconis, and not updated for dragon knight saga. so some of their recommendations are wrong.

This is from my guide I've been writing it's not finished yet but here's what I've got so far

Mind Reads Bonus & Penaltys

Farglow

Edmund = Learn the location of the key 2 unlock the treasure chest by the house 2 the left of the bridge (on the side where u meet Morgana), Penalty = 1 exp (Mindread 1 point)
Gerald = new dialoge option that gets him 2 lower his prices, Penalty = 3 exp (Mindread 1 point)

Broken Vally

Village

Quincy = +1 Status Point, Penalty = 400 exp (Mindread 1 point) Note: you only get the status point when he is in the guard tower b4 you kill the goblins
Martis = The location & password 2 the bandit camp without having 2 do the quest 2 free him, Penalty = 1050 exp (Mindread 1 point)
Merchant Lamotte = He lowers his Prices, Penalty = 133 exp (Mindread 1 point)
Arnold = The location of a belt, Penalty = 40 exp (Mindread 1 point)
Derk = He lowers his prices & u discover the location of his cellar key, Penalty = 133 exp (Mindread 1 point)
Winthrop = learn the location of a mace, Penalty = 40 exp (Mindread 1 point)
Linda = the location of her coin purse, Penalty = 40 exp (Mindread 1 point)
Miller Upton = the location of his key 2 the gate that leads 2 the basement, Penalty = 40 exp (Mindread 1 point) Note: The key is their wether u mind read him or not but 1st time playing it's good 2 find the location as it leads 2 a Quest
Abanayabar = The Password 2 Buad's storage, Penalty = 200 exp (Mindread 1 point)
Richard = Learn that the goblin Hearts u bring him are worth more in Aleroth, Penalty = 400 exp (Mindread 1 point)
Tim = He Lowers his Prices & u learn he's hidden some gold in a bush by the chapel, Penalty = 40 exp (Mindread 1 point)
Locke's Cart = The Password 2 open it, Penalty = 120 exp (Mindread 1 point)
Arben Ghost = The location of his lost Sheild, Penalty = 400 exp (Mindread 1 point)
Brave Sir Robin = The Password to his storage, Penalty = 400 exp ( Mindread 1 point)
Locke = He lowers his prices, Penalty =

Broken Valley

Talana = Learn about Talana's lost Cleaver, Penalty = 400 exp


Lovis Tower

Lovis = He opens one of the treasure chest's next to his throne, Penalty =

Have'nt got 2 lovis to put how much exp you get debted with yet

I thought the same as you, for me xp is the most important reward. But mindreading is only expensive the first levels. After the first zone, killing 1 single enemy gives you over 1000xp. And mindreading costs are about
useless: ~100xp
profitable: ~1400xp
very profitable: ~2400-3000xp


So even the most expensive ones just cost 2-3 enemy kills. And the useless ones don't cost anything noticeable.

Put points in Mindreading Talent...Later you can reset...I read the mind of every living thing ingame ironic I know every NPC xD but I like it :P and I always have the level cap to any zone,Like in Halls of Echoes,the level cap is 35 I enter at 36-37 with all the Mindreadings.

mind reading talent only cuts 5% per point... its worthless.
I actually did mindread everyone and max out my mind read talent my first playthrough (of ego draconis, not dragon knight saga), total waste.

And one enemy might give out 1000XP later on, but there is a limited amount of enemies in the game.

You could say the same if mindreading would cost 10xp and 1 enemy would give 1000000xp I think my point is still valid, the cost compared to what you get at later levels, is pretty small :P

Edit: I read this morning that on FoV there are 2 zones whith monsters that respawn, so xp is not limited there.

What I did here was I used the training arena in Farglow to get my XP up to 99, then I mind-read everyone worthwhile in Broken Valley. I had to solve the drunken patrons in the bar quest to get some more people, but I avoided levelling up. Then I went and killed off goblins and such. That maximixed the experience I got from killing enemies.

There's more than enough enemies in the game that mind-reading won't impact your level noticeably. If you're really concerned, quicksave before mind-reading someone and load afterwards. There are also various jewelry pieces with +Mind Read, put those on.

I also mind-read most people in FoV, and at one point I had an experience debt of over 278,000. As I turned in quests and entered combat, it vanished fast, enemies at about my level were over 4000 experience each.

It's a good rule of thumb to always mind-read non-humans.



Alternatively, you can also mind-read a girl to find out that Gerald likes to read, which gives you a new option to give him your quest item book you start with. It also costs 3 exp, though.



This works, but it's probably better to do that the normal way because you get experience and items - including



Note: The belt is pretty terrible. It gives 0.06 Mana Regneration.

Buy or find midread jewelry early in the game when it's cheapest. Eqquip it when you want to mindread. Maybe I'm a bit anal, but I put on 5 mindread jewels to bring the XP cost down, then take it off. It's a bit slow going sometimes, but worth it when the cost is 2000 XP or so later in the game.

On getting XP: Try to get goblin hearts early in the game and turn them in for points. On the one hand, you level up faster, downside is, higher your level, lower the XP you get from later kills. I think it helps at the beginning if you are new to DKII, though.

I personally took my Mindread skill to 5 and mindread almost every single creature i had the option to mindread in DKS (ED part). The xp require to read a mind is very insignificant from half the game to end. As for the start of DKS its pretty useless usually heh. Today i started FoV and the first couple mindread was 11,500 xp per... OUTCH lol i might save and reload a few times i think for FoV mindreads :p (altho if there is respawning monsters like some imply i might mindread more)

Don't worry the most of the areas in FOV have respawning enemys so you can easyley make back the exp

That's only mostly true. If you get Mind Reading to level 15 through skill points or equipment (or a combination of both), Mind Reading becomes completely free.

Quite right. A total of fifteen skillpoints is a lot of course, but you get many skillbooks in FoV and the difference between 0 vs. 15000 XP mindreads is quite tangible, don't you think?