Larian Studios Forums Divinity 2 - Ego Draconis (English) Help/Tips/Tricks Looking for Character help...

Bought this game the day it came out, and really enjoyed it (sort of :)), until I regained my Battle Tower. Now, the game seems to have just jumped a huge leap in difficulty, and I am finding my enthusiam for the game quickly fading. Before the tower, some battles were tough, but the majority were managable. Yet at this point in the game, even mobs that are at my level possess such great numbers that I have no chance unless I want to down 20 potions.

My intent was to build a hybrid battle mage, who would be primarily melee but could also throw out a spell or two. I think I messed him up, stats wise, and thus crippled myself. I am going to post his current stats at the end, but I have come here to ask for advice from more experienced players before I restart the game with a fresh slate. I do not want to quit this game, because the storyline and the writing do have me intrigued, but the difficulty is annoying me to no end. And, just to lay out as a measuring stick, I am also a day one purchaser and completer of Demon's Souls, which I am fidning easier than this game at the moment.

And to clarify, this game is hard, to me, because of not only the mobs high threat level, but also the fact that this game seems to lack any reliable means of defense or evasion for my character, unlike Demon's Souls.

Here are my stats:

Level 20
Vit-27
Spi-27
Str-22
Dex-4 (this was a big mistake on my part...did it for an equipment req)
Int-18

Skils:
Fireball-7
Mana Efficiency-3
Magic Blast-4 (plannign to drop this in lieu of Fireball, which is AOE)
Mana Leech-1
Destruction-2
Firewall-2
Healing-2
Defensive Posture-2 (picked this up to try and make the mobs easier, but I have not found it that useful)
Reflect-1
Lockpick-3 (think this was a waste too...the skills are better spent elsewhere)

I must say, I wish the makers of this game had allowed us to have 2 or 3 skill points per level, but oh well.

Thanks to anyone who responds.

so your using sword and spells ? try bow & spells works good for me...

i would suggest if trying bow & spell go more int and alot less on other stats, use sidestep to avoid fireballs and get ranger stealth with explosive arrows + fireball should really soften up the mob grps somewhat

I dont think what you are building anything as you claim above. I talk bout your skill distribution 1st. Your skills are more mage oriented than warrior. If you really into building a char primarily focus on melee, you will 1st need to focus on your weapon mastery, which is your primary damage output. Skill like reflect is useless when you doing mosquitoes bite alike damage on your opponent. Defensive posture in my opinion is useless. Battle rage is worth invest a level, as level 1 battle rage only reduce 4 melee defensive but raise 20% damage. Lock pick is not useless, as majority will max it in the early days to prevent unpickable locks, as chests did hold quite amount of goods before you gain access to legendary gears merchant. You can always unlearn it later during end game to gain back that 5 skill points. If you really primarily melee, bleed is a worthy skill to learn, same as regenerate, as you most likely need to soaked up damage as warrior. Just keep 1 or 2 magic spells and it should be enough. You dont actually need destruction since your main damage aint from magic but weapon damage. My warrior only had lvl 2 firewall, which also hardly needed it. If you find it hard in the early days in fjords, invest some points in summon demon, a few points will be enough. And dont forget your necromantic creature as well, its very useful utility in the game, unless you build your char strong enough, then you can ditch it out. I prefer my creature to act as spell caster when I into melee, and found that its quite good combination. I can dash into groups of skeletons mob in depleted mine that are around level 24 ,25, where my warrior is only level 20, 21 without the needs of spamming potions. Thousand strike is also good skill in my opinions. I kill the final boss the divine with just 1 thousand strike A point or 2 in potion mastery will help increase potion efficiency and will help you survive a lot. Potions is a more reliable utility when compare to healing skill.

Now on your stats, are those raw numbers without adding in additional stats from equipment? If so I suggest you stop on vit and spi. You can easily find legendary accessories such as rings, necklace that add high hp or mp amount. My warrior at lvl35 had 800hp and 490+mp, with only 50 vit and 20 spi (total up with stats from gears, default value I didnt check). 1 vit or spi only add 7 hp or mp. You can find legendary accessories which capable to add 150+ to 200+ hp or mp. The 3 stats, str, dex and int is more important. Your str is basically too low for melee damage, same goes to int. Dex is important if you decide to go for critical. Even not aiming for critical type, it can raise your range defense as well. Also I not sure whether you had mind read during broken valley and sentinel island time to gain additional skills and stats points or not. If you decide on more melee oriented, invest more into str. If you capable to get gears which add alot str, then you can start distribute to other stats such as int and dex. Each stats max out at 100 points with gears stats added. So plan before you add stats points as stats points cant be reset like skill points.

3rd is your gear, since it didnt mention anything on them, I really no idea how you gear up. If I remember correctly, my warrior had all 3 type of defensive close to around 40% when 1st entering fjords. Since you already obtain the battle tower, you should start altering your gears through enchantments, and charms. My hint for you is to gain access to aleroth asap, which will benefit you alot.

I would have to agree w/ you that this game can, at times, be over difficult. I'm currently playing it w/ the difficulty set on max, but I've still heard ppl complain about difficulty even when the game is set on easy. However, I did eventually find a steady way of staying one step of head of the enemies w/ the way my character build is going now. I focused on a ranger/mage type build, w/ my main focus on ranger. I very rarely die anymore unless I try and fight stuff that's why above my lvl, i.e. 5~ lvls above my own. I'm currently 23 and my base stats are:

VIT: 22 (353 HP; large boosts come from my current gear)
SPI: 16 (302 MP: large boosts come from my current gear)
STR: 37 (I wanted to have a high resist to melee damage and high rate of HP recovery; .64%/second)
DEX: 28 (Obviously due to focusing on RNG and for higher crit hit damage)
INT: 26 (I wanted to have a basic resist to magic and medium rate of MP recovery; .46%/second)

As for my skills, I'll start w/ the Dragon Slayer Table:

Mindread: 2
Wisdom: 3
Lockpick: 4 (I have found ALLOT of great equipment in locked chests and once I find lvl 5 chests, I'll max this out but fully delvl it once I start endgame stuff)

Ranger Table:

Ranger Strength: 1 (It comes from a piece of equipment)
Potion Efficiency: 1
Exploding Arrows: 4
Way of the Ranger: 2

Warrior Table:

Reflect: 3 (One is natural and two come from a piece of equipment)

Mage Table:

Mana Efficiency: 5
Destruction: 1 (Just started w/ this stat, will most likely take it higher still)
Firewall: 4

Priest:

Summon Undead: 1 (It comes from a piece of equipment)
Hide in Shadows: 1 (It can be great to get in close and kill a whole group of enemies before they even know what's happening)
Charm: 3 (It's always nice to have multiple team mates)
Blind: 3 (This helps greatly if there's an enemy in the crowd causing you probs and you don't wanna focus on it yet)
Summon Demon: 2 (It's in game description says it all, but to add to it, this killing machine can easily tank a whole group of enemies on its own for quite some time)

Now, I'll explain why this set up works so well for me and why I don't think I'd change it:

I'll start off by saying, it's great to have a skill that's cool down is only 5 seconds, does in excess of 1,000 damage to a group of enemies if it crit hits and ~600 when it doesn't, and only costs 20 MP w/ lvl 5 Mana Efficiency. I'm of course referring to Exploding Arrows; to do the damage I was just talking about, you would need to be in Way of the Ranger mode. So, for 90 seconds (most battles are over by then for me anyways) you get to take out huge crowds of enemies and the ones that can actual make it towards you will have Firewall waiting to do 500~ damage to them while still getting filled full of arrows (which btw, do 100~ normal in Way of the Ranger, and well over 200~ during crits) and blown to hell w/ Exploding Arrows. And, as if that wasn't enough to handle crowd control, there's always the trusty Demon that can easily group enemies together and hold them while you hit em w/ Exploding Arrows. And then there's of course the fact that w/ lvl 3 Charm you can Charm enemies (up to 2 at once can be held) pretty much indefinitely (at lvl 3, they can be held for 35 seconds and recharge is only 20 seconds) for only 45 MP per cast (90 w/ out Mana Efficiency). Also, w/ Blind lvl 3, once you Blind something, its gunna be out of the game until you want it dead; it will be unable to do anything for 100 seconds and the recast is only 90 seconds. And if all that wasn't enough, there's still you trusty Creature that can easily hold multiple groups of enemies on its own if you have it set up w/ a good torso/legs combo and also dish out insane damage at the same time (I personally have it set up for Mage, but I'll be changing it to a melee very soon to see of that works out; it's amazing in Mage mode atm tho).

So, there ya have it, I went from almost always dying at least once before I was able to figure out how to take on a group of enemies, to absolutely dominating the battlefield w/ AoE's and mass crowd control abilities. Hopefully this will give you some idea for how you may wanna change up your build, but of course, you should find your own play style that works best for you, but I can certainly tell you that if you get at least one of these: Exploding Arrows/Firewall/Charm/Demon, you will more-than-likely not be disappointed. And if you combine em w/ points in Mana Efficiency, you will most likely never run out of MP before a fight is over (assuming you start the fight w/ full MP of course >.> lol).