Aoslare

No, there is no other place to undergo the test or upgrade the bracelet. (Rather annoyingly. Boats, boats, boats...)

Well, there is a slowing enhancement, which is essentially the same thing as stunning (melee attack, Glaahk or Stunning Blade stunning, not Stun spell stunning). I think it's from the blue crystal (Runed something). The Stunning Blade is ABSOLUTELY BRUTAL if you are only fighting a single enemy. My melee agent used it to dice up golems and other highly resistant enemies. The Stunning Blade will get you 2 stuns regularly with good Quick Action and melee stats, whereas the enhancement will only get you 1, and not even 1 every attack. I think the regeneration enhancement fits it better -- if you don't have to pause for healing, that's 2 extra stuns you get in, which is huge even if you are hasted and attacking 3 times per round. However, against multiple regular strength enemies you are much better off with the raw damage power of the Claymore. The Stunning Blade would also be extremely effective for a Guardian supported by Glaahks. Actually -- that sounds like a fun theme, eh Delicious Vlish? The Glaahkmeister.

I suppose exitzone is fair play? Waiting for those ornks to cross zones takes forever...

It seems like bless and shielding have a ceiling as to how strong the effect is, although they (and speed) certainly last longer with better skill. By halfway through the game a guardian will be nearly as capable as an agent at buffing.

All of them work both ways, except for regeneration. Steel spines on a sword do extra damage the same way that fire cold and acid enhancements do, except the damage is physical. I think it does slightly more damage, but I haven't tested much.

>What do the "Strikes faster" and "Dodges blows" enchantments do (from >Tiny Orb of Mist)? One improves your Quickness skill and another reduces the damage from blows slightly. And what, if anything, does the "Regeneration" >enchantment do on armor? I think this was bugged and didn't do anything, but will have a clear effect in 1.0.2. Forget what it was, though.

indeed. I think I got confused by the redundant "no battle magic." in that case, all you're really doing is running a guardian with weaker skills.

The Reviving Crystal, btw, is probably the best weapon enhancement for any character, since none of the others are defensive, and the extra damage from the other enhancements will likely make little difference for a character who hasn't put many points into sword skills. Incidentally, has anyone experimented with the elemental blades (well, the Acid and Ice ones, since the Fire one didn't get tagged with the fire effect, presumably a bug)? Are they very effective, and at all worth considering over the Guardian Claymore?

Yes, has anyone figured out what in the world determines if you can enhance a particular piece of equipment? I can't find any pattern and it seems to be completely arbitrary (except that I think all completely nonmagical equipment cna be enhanced).

I'll still argue that melee-focused Agents are no harder than melee-focused Guardians, if not easier. Daze is really useful and more than makes up for the reduced HP supply and the lower QA and Parry scores.

I want to say no ripostes, but not being able to pump parry could be a hassle. *shrug* Use your best judgment. Khoth has a good point. I suppose a true purist would not kill anything before getting spines!

Lately there's been discussion of less typical offensive focuses, like missile weapons. Here's my challenge, if any of you are crazy enough to take it on. Run a character where your ONLY source of damage is STEEL SPINE enhancements. Details: * Before spines are available, you can kill things however you like. * Enemies that either do not have melee attacks (turrets, spawners, etc.) or will almost never use them (artila) can be dispatched by other means, as well. * Dominate (and other dominating effects) are NOT okay, as that defeats the purpose of the challenge. * Creations and NPCs are not in spirit, either (except as pacifist meatshields) (And no pyroroamer meatshields, kamikaze bombers are not pacifists) A Guardian is obviously best suited to this challenge, though you're free to use the other classes. You'll want to pump Endurance a lot, as well as Healing Craft, and probably some Blessing Magic. You'll also need Strength and Luck, for their stun resistance. You'll need a LOT of stun resistance, so pull out those Glaahk Shields and Impervious Bands! You'll also want to be careful what equipment you use your spines on, since they are in limited supply. Have, um, fun!

Any Guardian or Agent who puts skill points into Healing Craft is nuts. There are something like five different spellbooks/quest rewards/etc that increase Healing Craft in G3. Agents, additionally, will have more than enough spell power for healing thanks to Spellcraft. You're right, though, that Augmentation and Essence Armor are more effective for the G. Actually, that's a good point. High level Gs can get ridiculous HP reserves. On Torment that really doesn't tip the scales so much, but it's still something in their favor.

The lack of male agents is a little funny. Beyond the pic, I think every single NPC agent in the games has been female. Shaping isn't a weakness of the agent, it just isn't a strength. But there's no point in having shaping be a primary offense for either A or G, since shaping will be many times more effective in the hands of a Shaper. Thus it's really only worth considering shaping as a support skill here, and as a support skill it's frankly less useful than daze is.

I was looking at the initial stats for the different classes this morning, and realized that... well, there are some imbalances. This affects the Shaper very little, since he has more of a different play style, and shaping is less of a "splash color" skill than magic or melee for the Guardian and Agent. The Guardian and Agent are surprisingly interchangeable, though, so I'm going to compare them here. Basically, there are three sorts of stats differences among the classes. 1. HP, Spell Energy, and Essence - conveniently, G and A have equal essence. A has a lot more spell energy, G has a little more HP. Negligible differences unless you rely on battle magic, but the G would never do that anyway. 2. Cost in skill points to increase skills - in G1, this was huge: it would always cost A twice as much as G to increase Quick Action, for example, even when the rate of actual skill increased declined at 10 or 20 points. In G2 and G3, when the rate of increase declines (because you have to spend more points to increase the ability), the advantage of the superior class also decreases. So after the first few times you increase a skill, the advantage of the class that's "strong" in that skill drops to a fairly constant level. For strong vs. normal, this is very little. Thus, a G who puts any number of points into Missile Weapons will always have either 1 or 2 more levels in the skill than an A who puts the same number of points in. (I did the math out.) On the other hand, an A putting points into battle magic will always have earned (not counting base points in the skill) 4 or 5 levels more than the G (this stabilizes once you've put about 10 skill points into the skill). 3. Initial "bonus" points. These are often more significant, since they don't make further points cost extra, and some skills have a lot of them. G and A - AT A GLANCE Taking both #2 and #3 into account, if a G and an A both train equally in the same useful combat skills, one will have an advantage: Strength - Guardian +1 Dexterity - Agent +2 Melee Weapons - Guardian + 2-3 Missile Weapons - Guardian + 1-2 Quick Action - Guardian + 4-5 Parry - Guardian + 5-6 Battle, Mental Magic - Agent + 6-7 Blessing Magic - Agent + 5-6 Spellcraft - Agent + 2-3 Additionally, as mentioned earlier, the Agent gets better Spell Energy while the Guardian has an HP advantage. We already knew the G isn't a real magic-user. But what does this mean for melee and missile attacks? MISSILE WEAPONS: With profuse apologies to Delicious Vlish, it looks like Agents are better missile attackers. Those 2 bonus points of dexterity are a better deal than 1-2 levels of missile weapon skill, especially considering that dex also lets you dodge attacks. And if you focus on missile attacks, most of the other G bonuses aren't very useful. Then it's a question of whether you'd rather have minor shaping ability or better bless/haste/daze support. I know my preference ...of course, this just goes to show the weakness of missiles, since Agents can pump battle magic/spellcraft just as effectively as missile weapons/dex. MELEE WEAPONS: The G gets some very nice bonuses here. However, there is one big reason to still consider the A as a melee attacker: Daze. It will take the G a whopping 18 skill points just to get to 4 levels of mental magic! Keeping daze strong enough to be really viable is thus not a great option for the G. For the A, it's no problem at all, and the A will have little problem getting skills like QA to respectable levels, especially with equipment bonuses. Melee combat, which often doesn't allow you the corner-ducking, door-shuffling tactics favored by Tormented agents, is MUCH less dangerous if you keep your enemies dazed. Once again, it may be simpler to just run a battle magic agent, since spellcraft does double duty; melee has perks, though. Regeneration is great, and less attack spells means you have more energy and essence to use on daze. Any thoughts?

I just replayed Darkstone mine, and the reagent in the SW by the monstrosity is Purified Essence, not Unmelting Ice.

My "enchancements" thread has disappeared, I guess. But some of them are quite useful. Regeneration I've mentioned. Steel spines are REALLY powerful on armor, for a guardian. Their effect is CUMULATIVE and NEVER MISSES, and all it takes is two or three spined pieces of equipment to start doing several times the damage, from spines, that you take from an enemy hit. Really the only other enhancement to consider for armor is the Golden Crystal, which gives 5% resistance to everything. Use 5 or 6 of them and that's a hefty damage reduction. A lot of enemies late in the game have powerful breath attacks, so that's really useful. "Curse power" on weapons delivers a light curse with every non-Quick Action hit. On armor, it gives you a +5% bonus to-hit (not sure if that's just with melee weapons, or with anything).

I never got any results from Speed (perhaps it ups Quick Action?) or from regeneration on armor. Regeneration on a melee weapon heals you every time you hit an enemy! (Not Quick Action hits, though.) It's around 15-20 HP of healing (or was by the time I tried it, anyway), so if you do three melee attacks in a round, that's a lot of HP.

I strongly, strongly recommend the Regeneration enchancement for your melee weapon of choice. A hasted guardian or agent with AP boosts can heal a decent chunk of damage every turn, in addition to killing something. Combine with Daze, and keep a few Healing Pods on hand for emergencies, and you shouldn't have any problems at all.

I'm not sure you can get them anywhere else. I haven't, anyway. Unfortunately, the scripts don't contain any information on either initial item locations or item drops -- although you can find quest item rewards. There is a drop_item command, but it is only used with thorn bushes.

Oops, my bad. You're right... you're thinking of the Putrefied Gauntlets. (8% armor, str -2, dex -2, 20% resist acid, +4 spellcraft) I don't know how my first sweep missed them...

No, but given that there are several items that boost shaping skill, it really is a waste -- you are spending 6 skill points just to have Thahd meatshields an island or two early, even though there's absolutely no need for them that early. Daze is so ridiculously powerful in G3, and essence pods are so plentiful, that it should carry you through much of the game.

On second thought, please ignore everything I say in this thread I've never actually finished a game as a shaper -- half or two-thirds of the way through I finally get fed up of taking care of my creations and just go play as an agent.

Are you sure about this? There are no gloves listed in the scripts that give +4 spellcraft.

Yeah, but not all 8 of those points are useful. In particular, the Int isn't that great for most creations.