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Hi guys, I started playing this game in the last couple weeks and I'm currently on Reaper's Coast picking up far too many quests ;)

I'm playing on the 'classic' difficulty which is plenty hard enough for me at this point (read: res.scroll(s) after tough fights).

My 4 party set up is borrowed heavily from Fextralife suggestions:

(1) Me - Louse - 'Frost Paladin' build.
2 handed
- My job is to create an ice rink for enemies to slip + decent healing)

(2) Red Prince - 'Eternal Knight' build.
2 handed
- Hopefully hard to kill with Living armor + Vampiric Hunger.

(3) Ifan - going for 'Ranger' build (with summons)
crossbow
- Heavy hitter + distraction with the incarnate

(4) Fane - 'Terramancer' build (Geo/Necro)
wand + shield
- His job is to use geo & necro dmg. spells, as well as buffs.

Although fun so far, I'm thinking the Terramancer idea (especially geo damage spells) are not great since I have 2 melee guys in the thick of it and it's often difficult to even use the impalement or worm tremor skills without hurting my own team.
Or, are there better geo.dmg skills I should use instead?

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More important role of the geomancer will be later on to replenish armor.

Use skills with friendly fire like impalement as opening skills, before your melees are in close range.

With 3 physical damage dealers the mancer will be more of a support char anyway. Perhaps learn him hydro to for skills who replenish magical armor for example.

Geo does not work that well alone, without any kind of fire source to make stuff explode, though fire is risky for your melee guys on the other hand.

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the problem with necromancer in this game is that it deals physical damage, so it doesn't really work well with any other magic school and is more its own thing. it's still a good idea to have spells like mosquito swarm and infect (because sometimes physical damage is the way to go in a fight) but dedicating a character to necromancy and geomancy isn't very optimal because both do different kinds of damage

like the above poster said, geo works best with pyro because geo spells create oil surfaces that you can ignite with fire spells. geo works best both in armor restoration (primarily the fortify spell) as well as slowing enemies through armor, which is one of the few CC effects that pierces armor on characters that aren't floating. geo spells are actually great for raw damage (its final source spell is one of the best one shot spells in the game and you can instantly end fights with it), but by itself you may find yourself underwhelmed, especially against enemies with earth and poison resistances

this is why most magic characters split their combat skill points between two schools that deal the same kind of damage (magic damage, that is) and why you'll most commonly find characters split both aerotheurge and hydrosophist (good for stunning and freezing), and geo and pyro (great for raw damage)

remember that positioning in fights is huge, and it's always possible to just hit enemies with the edge of an impalement or fossile strike so as to not hurt your own team

Last edited by miaasma; 21/08/18 01:20 AM.
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Thanks for the feedback.

Yes, I've found the Mosquito Swarm and Infect skills are really powerful.

You mentioned freezing enemies.
What's a reliable combo, or skills to use for trying to freeze?

On my main Warfare/Hydro character, I've used Rain+Global Cooling, to try to make them slip. But I don't think I've frozen anyone yet.

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I'd love to keep the Geo going, since Fortify gets a bonus from intelligence and Earthquake skill seems really useful.
I could change Necro to Pyro as well - see how that goes.

-----------------------------------------

How many 'Memory' slots do you guys usually have?
There seem like so many good skills, hard to choose!

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You need to destroy all magic armor to be able to freeze them. Most effects need the specific armor to be destroyed first, before they can be applied.

After Act 1 you will be able to respec as much as you like, sou you can always adjust your memory points, if you need more.

The big issue with skills like Earth Quake: They deal magic damage, but the knockdown effect checks with physical armor. Can work with a mainly physical team, tough teach all melees battlestomp and battering ram is an easier way to keep them down.

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for freezing enemies, i'd recommend the rain spell to give enemies the "wet" status; this makes them take more damage from water and air spells, and a wet enemy who has had their magic armor depleted can be frozen (freezing an enemy requires applying either the "wet" or "chilled" status first, then using an ice spell like global cooling or winter blast). stunning an enemy, similar to freezing, requires applying either "wet" or "shocked" status to an enemy without magic armor, then using a lightning spell like electric discharge or dazing bolt; the easiest way this is done is using the rain spell before using damage spells. as Kalrakh mentioned, hard CC like freeze and stun can only be applied when the enemy has lost all their magic armor, just like knockdown and atrophy can only be applied when the enemy has lost all their physical armor.

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Winter blast or how it is called probably still the strongest spells, because it hit several times, applying chill by itself. But yes, making them wet first surely will make it easier.

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yeah, winter blast is the hydro spell of choice because its aoe is sizable, its damage scales well and it is one of few spells that does not do friendly fire

it's not uncommon in the later portion of the game to use rain on one or two clumped enemies, then use winter blast and have all of their armor disappear along with them freezing because of how good it is. even better if it crits

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Originally Posted by miaasma
yeah, winter blast is the hydro spell of choice because its aoe is sizable, its damage scales well and it is one of few spells that does not do friendly fire

it's not uncommon in the later portion of the game to use rain on one or two clumped enemies, then use winter blast and have all of their armor disappear along with them freezing because of how good it is. even better if it crits


One combo I really want to try is Rain + Global Cooling + Ice Breaker. Total cost: 3 AP. The only problem is that the cooldown on Rain is a ridiculous 6 turns while the cooldowns on the other two are 3 turns. I guess I could always give Rain to more characters through, so I can have a second one on demand. And there's scrolls, too. All I need is water essence and herring.

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Yes exactly! It sounds silly maybe, but I want to start relying on all three skill "variants": memorized, scrolls and potions (the latter is not a skill, but a buff, but it can act as a nice placeholder for some skills like Fortify). So on tough fights I'd have scrolls handy that act as cooldown indifferent backup skills.
Almost gamebreaking would be e.g. Death Wish. Scrolls also scale up to the caster's respective attributes (e.g.int) and abilities (e.g. geo). I need to test it a bit but I think even elemental affinity, as a talent, affects sroll usage.
Plus that would give a purpose to all that senseless hoarding.

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Originally Posted by Stabbey
Originally Posted by miaasma
yeah, winter blast is the hydro spell of choice because its aoe is sizable, its damage scales well and it is one of few spells that does not do friendly fire

it's not uncommon in the later portion of the game to use rain on one or two clumped enemies, then use winter blast and have all of their armor disappear along with them freezing because of how good it is. even better if it crits


One combo I really want to try is Rain + Global Cooling + Ice Breaker. Total cost: 3 AP. The only problem is that the cooldown on Rain is a ridiculous 6 turns while the cooldowns on the other two are 3 turns. I guess I could always give Rain to more characters through, so I can have a second one on demand. And there's scrolls, too. All I need is water essence and herring.

why have i not thought of giving rain to more than one character? i've fought that blackpits voidling fight how many times now?

i even make a point of giving multiple characters a level in hydro for magic shell

honestly my brain sometimes


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