Larian Studios Forums Divinity: Original Sin 2 Divinity - Original Sin 2 - Suggestions and Feedback Magic Skills Balance/ Scoundrel being too strong?

Been through 3 runs of the early access as an int build and finesse build and I have to say my finesse run was the easiest and quickest run so far.

Some context:

Both runs ended up with finesse/int being around 30 respectively and I ended up going with Memory as my secondary stat with my skill points being 1 each for most of the skills except summoning (lul) and huntsman. Both runs were solo runs.

My experience so far:

With my Int Build:
I went scoundrel and lightning for adrenaline and stuns early on. I had a lot of trouble killing anything that wasn't trash mobs early on. I picked up geomancer/necro for more cc and combos. I couldn't clear some of the fights like the Flenser in the fort without cheesing him. (I covered the entire map in blood pools and electrified it... It was fun to watch but so tedious...). Pretty much did the same thing for the High Judge. I picked up pyromancy/polymorph once I got out of Fort Joy and things really got much better then. My dps shot up a lot and I no longer had to cc stuff as much. The rest of the run essentially went like this adrenaline/flesh of sacrifice -> teleport->impale -> fireball-> acid/fire skills that were cheap to cast->skin graft repeat and then chameleon skin to repeat the whole process from safety...The fight aboard the lady of vengeance was pretty easy but took the whole duration

With my finesse build:
I picked up scoundrel and polymorph for chameleon from the start. Essentially, the entire run was a cake walk... Each round, I gibbed one opponent and chameleoned away to wait for my cooldown resets. When I unlocked skin graft /teleport and warfare, I could kill 2 magic mobs in the first round or cc/severely damage 2 physical mobs. By the 2nd round I could cc 4-5 mobs with my warfare skills... Alexander got instagibbed in 1 round. The fight aboard the lady of vengeance ended in the first round without my origin skill being used... (Turns out all you had to do was teleport to the mast->teleport onto their ship and instagib the mage all in 1 round.)

Essentially, what I concluded was:

1. Mage took 2-3 rounds to kill something while my scoundrel took 1 round with significantly less effort and planning on my part. The dps disparity was pretty huge given the same circumstances.

2. My early game mage was horrid. Certain skill trees did too little damage and IMO not enough information was being conveyed early on/during skill selection to show that and it felt really bad trying to learn stuff blindly.

3. My finesse run on the other hand was smooth sailing from start to finish, zero planning required. Every boss fight was a guaranteed success no matter the level.

4. The scoundrel tree alone dealt massive damage/ gave utility in the form of adrenaline and teleports.

5.Warfare gave as much utility as all my magic skills combined... 3 ccs in 1 tree. Battle Stomp/ Cripple/ Battering Ram. 2 teleports ( phoenix dives/ Battering Ram). AOEs ( whirlwind/ blitz). Enrage was meh...(2 ap was just too much especially given the fact scoundrels had backstab). My finesse build had the same level of CC and greater damage compared to my mage with just 2 skill trees. Plus the fact that the elements surface system did not get in the way due to my spells, made life a lot easier...

6. Polymorph is a must pick skill tree . Skin graft / Chameleon are just too good. Being able to gain armour is pretty nice too( Heart of Steel).

7. Elements combo system felt really unwieldy at times. Fire+poison+oil is pretty much your only dps option but that conflicts with frozen as a form of cc and lightning did not have much in the way of aoe ccs at range without a pool of water/blood. Plus using fire essentially meant you will be stuck with a cloud of smoke later on which could be useful at times but a hindrance most of the time since it blocked you from dpsing effectively.

In short, mage felt weak in comparison to scoundrel/backstab builds.

While my experience was of a solo run, a full party run would not have made much difference imo. A full party of scoundrels would have just insta gibbed 4 ppl instead of 1 in the first round... A full party of mages would have to plan and coordinate positioning/ combos in order to achieve the same thing and this would only be possible later on in the game. A mix of builds would not make much sense outside of RPing reasons since the combat system involves breaking down armour before any form of status effects could actually take place, and who needs survivability when you can kill most of the mobs in 1 round.

Yeah, no. I agree with this. Not to mention the Time Warp bug with Adrenaline. Infinite AP on the strongest class in the game, anyone? Finesse skills scale WAY too much and WAY too fast. This is probably due to the base values being ungodly high.

As an example of this: When you go back to save everyone on the ship in the tutorial zone, just pass your turn and watch the NPCs. Sebbi will instantly oneshot 3 of the 4 bugs, and the other 4 NPCs have to gang up just to kill the last one. The damage disparity is absurd.

Speaking of the tutorial zone, I intentionally triggered combat with most of the magisters on broad, including those in the common room and the murder scene. All the companions join the battle. Guess who did most of the damage? Sebille.

Now I have changed her preset class to shadowblade, because I don't want her default build is disgusting.

Throwing knives is one of my favorite skills, but it definitely needs a slight nerf. I believe halving the damage, while lowering the AP cost to 1 would do the trick. This would make throwing knives a optional skill for rogues who want some range, instead of being the core skill.

On the other hand, backlash needs to cost more 2AP instead of 1. The movement itself is already worth 1AP, not to mention the huge damage attached to it.

And they really need to nerf flesh sacrifice. Give it a real cost. The -1 constitution is nothing when you have armors to protect you.
How about temporarily reduce your maximum armor by 50% for, like, 3 turns?

Lastly, backstab talent might need a slight adjustment. Right now, the game play is put your rogue behind enemy (which is ridiculously easy due to backlash skill), then backstab that dude to death. It is simple yet so effective that it makes the other options seem useless.

Suggestion for new backstab
1. Limited to one backstab per turn. You stab someone in the back, that dude should turn around and face you, instead of keep exposing his back to you.
2. Instead of doing critical damage, change it to 150% of original damage.
3. Allows backstab to crit by crit chance. This is a compensation for the nerf. This also means that all those crit chance you get from Wits won't be wasted. If you stack the crit chance high enough, you can expect >200% damage on your backstab.


To sum up:
Throwing knives should cost 1AP and deal less damage
Backlash should cost 2AP
Flesh sacrifice needs a meaningful cost
Backstab might need some adjustment.

In this vein the reason the fight in the sewer with fletch or whatever his name is was difficult is he can pretty much one shot most non tank chars if you don't cheese the fight in some major way with prior knowledge.

In the previous patch I ran Sebille as a Scoundrel + Aerothurge. I only took Aero for the positioning abilities, Teleport, Netherswap, Favourable Wind. She was quite strong, definitely more powerful than my 2H Polymorpher.



Yeah, this seems fair I guess.




Hmm. The real powerful part of it is the +1 AP. What if it kept the +1 AP, but it cost 1 AP to cast, for a net gain of 0 AP? So it's just a damage boost?




1. No one can move when it's not their turn. That should be a consistent rule.
2,3. So a Backstab does 150% damage by default, but has a chance to crit based on your critical chance? ...Yeah, that could work.


In the past, I have suggested lowering the base damage of daggers, and removing the Back-Stabber Talent, making that an inherent property of daggers/knives. That would reduce the power of daggers and allow Rogues to take a different starting Talent besides Back-Stabber, which they are forced into without a choice right now. Maybe also reduce the critical multiplier from Scoundrel a bit as well.




You mean Flenserville. Yeah, for that one, I placed my squishy characters farther back in the room, and walked up with only my tanks. Close enough to get dragged in, too far to be the first attacked.

After he striped my Tank's armor and took him down to half heal with 1-2 attacks, I killed him quickly in like one turn. I think that fight is okay. He's a boss, and his gimmick is massive damage, but he doesn't have the defenses to take much punishment in return.

I believe the enemy turns around and faces the attacker if the attack misses?
I remember enemies doing this, at least on previous patch.

thats the worst thing ever for rogues in DOS EE i always got a value point in ranger just so i had access to avoid opportunist talent which prevented that.

I don't know daggers seem to do piss poor damage if you attack any were but the back (at least in classic mode).

If you nerf flesh sacrifice it will make other builds gimped the ap allows me to use battering ram to get a slow knight close enough to be of use and the damage to get the armor down which is always really high. How about not being able to use Adrenalin rush on same turn as flesh sacrifice or maybe take heavy bleed damage if you do on same turn as you have just but your self.

I agree that backlash needs to be 2 ap as it moves and damages and that throwing knives should be changed to 2 knifes instead of 3 and make them pierce armor but with lower damage.

I've had similar experiences as OP and there's a lot of good ideas here. My thoughts on this are that the Finesse builds seem balanced until you get access to Flenser's daggers. Getting daggers that I've used @ level 8 when I'm level 3-4 seems out of balance. Your mage build could have been diluted as you had points in 6 different areas (aero, scoundrel, geo, necro, pyro, poly) whereas you only mentioned having scoundrel/poly/warfare on your finesse build. From personal viewpoint I'm fine with dagger builds being able to gib an enemy (especially mage) on a turn, however they have to get close to do their dmg and therefore are more at risk of being killed themselves. I've expecting nerfs to some of the Poly classes personally, and I'm also expecting tactician mode to give enemies more tools to expose invisible players so we can't hide turn after turn waiting for cds.
Also if your Finesse build was your second time through it would definitely be easier and quicker with the prior knowledge of all the fights you were coming up. I'm happy to read this, I enjoy solo builds/stories a lot.

The weakness to Finesse builds is how stupidly squishy you are. If a decently powerful enemy happens to go before your rogue AND targets them, they are likely to fall flat on the ground and die. The class needs nerfs, but I don't want to see them get the Rage Warrior treatment where they become worthless. If anything, going through and reworking how some of the armor applies stats and giving VERY slight nerfs to the Finesse build might work out better.

Let me explain myself:
+ Heavy armor should provide an even larger penalty to initiative and movement. Too often can I just slap an entire platemail set on my Sebbi and watch her clean house WITH the stats if a tank WHILE going first.
+ Leather should rarely to NEVER give health or constitution. Leather is the armor of finesse and dexterity classes, not tanks.
+ Cloth should never give Str or Dex. This goes without saying. And yet I still see it.

I would think some specific builds could enjoy some Dex Cloth or Int Plate or whatever. "White" quality armor I'm fine with as is, but I'd like to see more variance in MA/PA on the gear and or restrictions if it's very good (right now 11 is about the max needed for anything). Right now if I see a lot of phys dmg enemies I just swap out to more plate, more magic casters I put on more cloth. I expect to see some high MA plate or high PA cloth in the final build, it makes it more flexible to me. Min/Maxing or RPing you may still want that pure leather rogue. There's tank and magic rogues out there though that need other stats more than finesse.

Yes, but those aren't the builds that are breaking the game right now. It's the pure Finesse, Tanky rogues. Carapace is a GREAT example of a tank DPS item. It gives a massive amount of armor and finesse for whatever level it generates at. I got one for level 8 that gave 70ish physical armor, 40ish magical armor and 4 finesse. With no drawbacks. That's insane.

I guess I haven't paid enough attention to some of the drops, are there any cloth/plate to compare it too? Like is there was a 120/70 plate to compare to? If they just raise attribute requirements would solve it? Like 15 str to wear, doesn't exclude anybody from wearing but they have to make a conscious effort to wear plate.

That's the problem. There isn't any comparable gear. It's also mail and has ODDLY high stats for a BLUE.

Its not that int builds are bad, its that staffs are bad because Staff of Mangus has a 1 turn cooldown. Imo the skill should have no cooldown but have a minimum range then give staffs a weaker physical/magic melee attack. You can deal a ton of damage as int without skills atm is DW Fire/Poison wands to trigger explosions and double dots every attack. I been soloing quickly as an int just fine and the only reason been having problems is due to Far Out Man being bugged so my 2m skills are not the 4m range I am used to.

What would be nice if there was a decent unique Int Weapon to find in the overworld somewhere, the Turtle claw is just a level 3 Poison wand and the only other one is a very expensive vendor item. That would go a long way to smooth things out as there are like 6+ unique melee weapons before even leaving fort joy.

I entered my battles pre blessed and with a high enough finesse, I had a decent chance of dodging at least 1 or 2 attacks which pretty much guaranteed my rogue's survival. Plus the biggest contributor to a character's survival outside of stealth seems to be armor/magical armor so wearing the right gear is enough to counter any first turn issues in my opinion. IMO finesse builds on top being highest dps is also the tankiest since dodging an attack or 2 especially in a tough fight does a lot more than any other defensive bonus from the other stats.

I feel that the best way to nerf rogue slightly is to either add in backstab immunity for certain monsters or to reduce the amount of armor damage daggers/knives do. Also, reduce the damage of knives like one of the posters said.

The fact you can backstab certain monsters seem weird to me. Backstabbing that giant worm boss is kinda strange considering how its body is. Without backstab, a major portion of the rogue's dps is gone especially in critical fights. They are however still able to clear up the trash mobs easily which is still a good reason to bring them.

Armor penetration should be factored in as well. Daggers honestly should not deal as much armor damage as lets say a mace or a giant axe. An armor damage debuff would nerf the damage of rogue while being logical imo. It also sort of fits the image of rogue being an assassin that goes after weak points.

With regards to mage vs rogue, I just feel that mage's biggest issue is that breaking through magic armor takes a lot more investment compared to a rogue who can finish most mobs in a few skills. Most of the time when you break through the target's magical armor, the fight is pretty much half way done and it is just a matter of cleaning up. As a result, mages just seem to be the kind of character where if you are doing great, it is great, if not, it is mediocre. I feel the best way to counter this is to allow dots/soft ccs such as chilled to work even with magical armor on. This also has the slight effect of nerfing stealth since these dots prevent stealth.

PS. the way bosses regenerate armor especially magical armor after they break out of ccs is just not fun for me. Magic's entire arsenal pretty much depends on statuses and cc so exactly how do you expect me to enjoy the class when magical armor blocks most of the effects and using some of these effects just punishes me... Just seems like continuous punishment and not enough rewards.

Magic is poorly designed in DOS2. Nobody will deny that. Magic is SO focused on the CC aspect that they seem to forget magic should ALSO do damage. If not for the abusive Oil/Fire or poison/fire damage combos, killing people with magic would take laughably longer than just burning through or Overpowering the armor off a target.

Magic just needs to do more damage across the board. AoE Carnage means nothing when half the spells in the game remove dots or restore armor ESPECIALLY when half the bloody human mobs have shields they spam like junkies.

To illustrate this point: I don't even bother going into Int for my spells anymore. Pure Int mages are never going to outdamage a Finesse rogue. If I feel I need more damage, I'll bring two rogues. I've just slapped shields and heavy armor onto my mages, if I even bring any, and turn them into CC machines.

But, there is honestly a huge flaw with having Armor and Magic armor on enemies. Why? At least half your party will be one type, and the other half will be the other. Your damage is so far from optimized it's a little stupid. Why not just run 4 melee with the Warfare tree, which can knockdown a LINE of enemies WHILE clearing environmental hazards AND it will NEVER hurt your allies. And you can cripple. And charge. And AoE damage. While having 4ish teleports.
-OR-
You could run 4 mages, have every fight be a life-or-death situation as you calculate the best way to use your spells without screwing over your teammate's fields and setups.

Magic is just not worth it. If you want magic to be ENJOYABLE, make it WORTH it. A fireball is a massive explosion of flame. Make it apply blind when it hits water. Or make it knockdown at the center. Have those be physical checks. This way mages aren't trying to strip magical armor JUST to be useful while the rogues are one-button slaughtering everything. No matter how we nerf melee into the GROUND, Magic will NEVER mesh well with a party setting. The number of times I have unwittingly screwed over my party because of one poorly placed spell that leads to save scumming because I threw my ally into the middle of a field of fire and smoke is higher than I would like to admit. Magic creates fields. Fields create problems. And problems are not something you want to waste your teammate's time with when they have to navigate a sea of poison/ice/fire/electrified garbage/etc.

OR we can all just play Melee, never worry about a hazard and oneshot the enemy.

Was there actually once a time, where you had to say something nice about Divinity Original Sin 2. Because since i'm here and saw your Posts, there was only negativity and hatred. Maybe i simply hit the wrong posts, could be possible as well.

And no, i won't deny it, because denying would imply that your "Opinion" is an "Fact", which someone don't want to accept. However your Opinion is simply only that; your Opinion.

Magic in Divinity Original Sin (plus 2) is actually one of my Main-Appeals of the Game(so the quite opposite opinion which you try to force on us). I love to play Magic-Builds, and not only Geo&Pyro-Kombo. My actual Main is an Paladin-Style so Fighter Combined with Hydrosoph plus Aeorothurg, and he is so fun to play. For one you can Heal, for other you can Freeze, also Blind and Stun. You blame Fire for make most Damage, but Aero and Hydro focus on CC. News for you, most Proper RPGs handle it like that. If all of this would be focused on simply make it Damage, than there wouldn't be any need for Elemental(-Diversity) at all. And if you imply it doesn't make damage at all, than you clearly do something wrong...

And that Rogue's are so strong, tells more about Rogue then about Mages, because if i consider one class as way to overpowered, its Rogue...

Fluffington does raise a point I agree with though. That is why bother bringing a mix of builds when you can run 4 melees. I do not think nerfing rogue will fix it either because the system is flawed because in MOST cases, stun=knocked down=frozen in the best case scenarios. In reality, I would say knock down is better than the magic alternatives. But the point is magic and physical trees perform very similar functions when it comes to CC (the only reason to ever bring a mage now) and physical skills does it so much better with critical in built in it too... When you add in the fact that both trees have separate armors to deal with, it just does not make much sense to gimp yourself by bringing a different kind of dps just to perform the exact same role without any additional benefits.

I enjoyed my magic runs more than my rogue run. I started playing this game because of the combo system but the way the armor system is handled and the OPness of melee/rogue in general makes my run that much more disappointing. Being fun to play is nice and all but I do not particularly enjoying gimping myself so arbitrarily just because the skills aren't balanced well enough on a systemic level. If you think it is only just a matter of rogue being too strong, just consider this:

Magic cannot crit
Magic has to deal with resistances
Magic has to deal with itself...
Certain Magic skills don't even target the right armor ( I am looking at you necromancy)...

Magic has to be able to deal status effects through magical armor in some form or have utility that is specific to magic.Like magic armor debuffs, silences, dispels, more varied status effects like weakens etc. Decay is a great spell but it relies on physical armor... The % chances of it penetrating magical armor should be reliant on intelligence or skill level so some form of investment is required.

I'm feeling like they could just double the PA and/or increase the initiative of enemies and it would help balance out some things. It's hard to pass endgame judgement on first act samples but I know in my gaming experiences there's been a lot of times that melee shines early and as the game gets harder the magic classes start to become more powerful (Diablo I is one of my favorite examples).
I thought that Necro was sorta designed to be a magic caster that works well in melee heavy groups, I would definitely like more physical damage spells for all the classes though (Landslide/Rock Throw - Geo, Melt/Rust/Crush Armor - Hydro/Pyro/Aero). The best thing about this game imo is the variety that you can experience. I just hope they make harder difficulties brutal so that you can't just backlash/cloak your way to victory.