SacredPath_82

so, I'm stuck with the question of what traits to put on my slith priest. He'll be the second character and therefore secondary tank, but also the only priest. The party consists of a Nephil fighter, Slith priest, and two human mages. Divinely Touched, Elite Warrior and Pure Spirit all make sense. DT and EW would be better on a tank, but I guess that raising his priest skill all the way without PS will eat up all his skill points. Also, due to the fact that racial weapon bonuses count towards battle disciplines, humans have now become totally useless in theory. I still take em, but it's such a gross imbalance that you really have to wonder why this made it past the beta.

Originally Posted By: Earth2025 Having 2 healers and 2 hasters is nice at some points. true, though with 3+ casters in the party I find I never use any potions/scrolls. Which is a bit of a waste since they don't sell for much, and the ability actually is super powerful (compare this to DnD where using scrolls is more of a hassle than it's worth).

Originally Posted By: Love the cosine, hate the sin. Dodge penalties would be largely meaningless anyway. After the first couple of chapters everything can hit you unless your character is so heavily optimized for dodging that it can't do anything else. By the endgame even that won't stop you from getting pummeled. —Alorael, who at least finds this accurate. Nobody ever survived a melee by being jumpy. Not repeatedly, anyway. I can't agree there. In A4, dodging was useful on my tank until the end. You do have to specialize in it though. And you can still have a good offense. Elite Warrior naturally pumps your Blademaster skill, plus it also pumps Parry, so you don't have to rely on dodging alone. I would suggest raising Parry even more after buying ranks in it, since you will open it up naturally on a dodge tank (because you will raise Defense and Dex). With the best armor + shield + parry, you don't have to rely on dodge alone. And with high Dex + Defense + Luck + Gymnastics + Enduring Armor + Arcane Shield + Fast On Feet, you will still dodge a few blows until the end of the game (at least, that was true in A4). I found dodging to be especially nice against magic attacks, since they will flat out devastate you on Torment. edit: also, just a few points in Quick Action and Quick Strike helped to boost this guy's offense A LOT. That should be even more true for A5 with the Batte Disciplines working on double hits from Quick Action.

Originally Posted By: Turtle Without being too spoilerish, there's a conflict between playing as Anama and playing as a Darkside loyalist. actually I expected that, the Anama being goody two-shoes and all. But I thought I might get by as a turn coat. Is there a point where you definitely have to decide between the two?

So there's no additional penalty on AP if you wear heavy armor (as long as you have the carrying capacity)? In that case, I don't expect it to impose a dodge penalty either. And there I was thinking the Fast On Feet Nephil tank finally was going down.

thx, btw by pro-Empire I of course meant Darkside (as opposed to Avernum). Screwed up on factions there.

So, I'm enjoying my way around A5. Finished the demo area and stumbled across the interesting choice to sell out Shanker for better standing with the Empire or help her for magics. Since I'm not entirely happy with my party and I'm not planning on replaying the game 5 times, I think I'm gonna play through with a party of Anama's (Empire,evil) and after that with a party of mages (Avernum,good). So my question is, is this the right setup? Are there significant rewards for mages on the Empire side that I'll be missing out on? Non-spoilerish answers appreciated but not necessary

The description says have armor can slow you down, and I think I remember as much from the early games. Now does anyone have some data/ experience on this? Also, does encumbrance from armor (if it exists) incur a penalty on your dodge bonus?

Originally Posted By: Randomizer In Avernum 5, Divine Touch is very useful because Blademaster reduces fatigue for battle disciplines. true. Also, I give all my mages some combat ability in A5, for battle disciplines. That's why I stopped making Priest/Mages in A5

Originally Posted By: Earth2025 I wouldn't put Nat. Mage and Pure Spirit to same char since even Pure Spirit or Nat. Mage learns both sides of spells well enough (and those last levels of Mage or Priest aren't that needed due those spells are very rarely if at all used), Div. Touched could be better. If you want to pump both schools, NM and PS are definitely handy. It'll save you a load of skill points. A difference would be maybe if you want to be a mage but also want to get Priest skill no higher than ~8 (or whatever you need for mass healing/curing). DT on a pure mage is somewhat wasted I think, at least in a 4 person party. Sure, the magery bonus is nice, but neither blademaster nor sharpshooter nor the damage resistance are that great for him

Originally Posted By: Nioca So instead of taking a small hit to experience, you're taking a... larger hit to experience plus a hit to skill points to acheive the same effect? as for taking a hit to experience points... I guess he will be a bit higher in level, maybe by 2, at the end of the game than i.e. the Slith. Of course he can decrease overall XP the party gets by a very, very small bit. But it's nowhere near enough to make any difference. As for skill points, nothing wasted there because I would pump those skills all the same on a Nephil. The only difference is that in the end, the Nephil's Gymnastics skill would be ~4 points higher. No big deal.

Originally Posted By: Thuryl Nephilim do get Gymnastics -- the dodge bonus isn't worth much, but it does mean they act first in combat a lot more often. I'm not sure that's worth a 10% experience penalty on its own, though. the XP penalty doesn't bother me anymore, the dodge bonus is very small, and as for acting first, my Human tank raises Dex, Quick Action, Quick Strike, and has the Fast on Feet trait. That should make up for one or two points less in Gymnastics.

Originally Posted By: Thuryl My A4 party was one human swordsman, two Nephil archer/priests and one human mage/priest/thief. I guess replacing the swordsman with a Slith pole fighter wouldn't make the party significantly worse, though. In fact, there isn't much reason not to make everyone a Nephil or Slith if they're going to be using bows or polearms at all. Exactly. While the tank can at least benefit some from being a Nephil, there really is no point in making a Nephil dedicated mage. Spells like Fire Bolt will stay useful until very late and come at almost no spell point cost. edit: lol, now after reading up I know why my XP penalty idea didn't work. It's the single highest level in the party that counts, not overall level (like in DnD). Of course, that's just outright silly. There's no reason why you would do that except to prevent people from accumulating crazy XP on one character with a 4 person party. OTOH, as things are now, you could remove the XP penalty traits from the game altogether.

Originally Posted By: Thuryl Something definitely changed between A3 and A4 in the experience system, though. In A3 and BoA, it was a perfectly viable strategy to take negative traits for the experience bonuses, and you actually would end up gaining levels significantly faster as a result. The scaling became much sharper in A4 and A5, making negative traits substantially less beneficial. well, one difference was how high the XP gains from negative traits were. Brittle Bones alone gave +30, and Brittle Bones + Sickness Prone was teh [censored]. Ok, so you convinced me that negative traits aren't worth anything in A4. Now tear me apart, you mighty beasts. As for the perfect A4 party, it's safe to say that: 1. Human, Fast On Feet + Elite Warrior, Tank with melee weapons, bows, concentrating on the dodge skills as well as parry/riposte, blade master, and maybe some hardiness strewn in 2. Slith, Elite Warrior + Pure Spirit or Divinely Touched secondary tank and secondary priest, I prefer PS because after raising Pri to 6 at creation, with only minor investment after that, you will get access to a lot of spells 3. Nephil, Fast on Feet + Natural Mage using bows, mage spells, also investing/training in QA and melee to open up QS, which has delicious results on an FoF Nephil. Raising his dodge traits will help him, and NM allows for ludicrous amounts of armor on him 4. Human, Pure Spirit + Natural Mage Main Priest and pure spell caster, he concentrates on both schools, as well as Tool Use. - is the perfect party. Though it could be argued if you shouldn't drop the Human Tank altogether and go with 3. Apart from that, this lineup is rock solid.

Originally Posted By: Thuryl Originally Posted By: SacredPath_82 Also I have a feeling that the level gains due to bonuses are still underestimated. If you have a party where three chars have each, say, a penalty of 50% and more, and one char has a bonus of +15%, that should result in a very noticable increase in levels for that guy. It'll make a difference, but the difference will probably be only about 5 levels by the end of the game. Maybe less. Crapsakes. Still, even one level might make a difference as far as Lethal Blow is concerned. I mean... why got penalties nerfed so grossly? And I don't mean the scalable experience system (it's great), I mean the fact that the penalties give such low bonuses.

thanks for the feedback! Originally Posted By: Salable truth, not salacity 2. Interesting build, but be aware that on higher difficulties you can't avoid getting hit. You're much better off leaving Defense, Gymnastics, and Dexterity alone and piling on armor. And yes, training nothing but bows works fine. True that neglecting damage resistance altogether would be a bad idea (that was a bit exaggerated). But what do you mean piling on armor? Naturally, he would be wearing armor + shield. That doesn't lower the chance to dodge, does it? Quote: 3. Experience penalties are much better than experience bonuses. Because the experience you get scales with your level, bonuses and penalties have lower effects than the listed percentages. Much lower, in fact. The benefits of Elite Warrior + Divinely Touched are a lot bigger for a fighter than the few extra levels you get for leaving them out. Basically, all the XP bonus does is steal levels from your other characters. Since this char will raise the medium group level, the party as a whole will receive fewer XP, which will hit the penalty characters most. Still, the idea was only to raise this char's level for more HP from Endurance and maybe for Lethal Blow. Quote: 4. Anatomy is too expensive for its benefits, and Sluggish is still terrible. Otherwise it's a reasonable build. I take it the damage output is not comparable to the old Assassination skill? I only unlocked it once and played around with it, but that was on a char that was already hitting very hard, so I couldn't judge it. Originally Posted By: Thuryl Originally Posted By: Salable truth, not salacity Are you sure that Fast on Feet and Sluggish have exactly opposite effects? I've never used the latter, but I suspect that it might have a higher chance to remove AP than Fast on Feet has to add AP. The results would really be a three AP range, and randomness isn't exactly desirable. They don't cancel. Sluggish ALWAYS lowers your AP every round, I believe, and Fast on Feet only raises it sometimes I see. So the question is mostly academic, but still... seems like you could trade one AP now and then (since sometimes FOF will kick in) for a certain dodge bonus. Still would be interesting to know how large that one is Also I have a feeling that the level gains due to bonuses are still underestimated. If you have a party where three chars have each, say, a penalty of 50% and more, and one char has a bonus of +15%, that should result in a very noticable increase in levels for that guy.

Originally Posted By: Earth2025 3rd would also benefit from EW. No doubt EW would boost her well, for the extra Blade Master and even more for the damage reduction from Parry, true. OTOH, my idea was to level up fast, which enables her to profit immensly from a high Endurance. That's why I suggest slapping both Weak-minded and Sluggish on her; she doesn't need to move/attack a lot, and no low Int fighter can resist a mind spell anyways. Also, faster level ups would result in more skill points. Both options are good I think, it would need some testing to see which works out better. Otherwise, it's a roleplaying thing edit: to boost her offense you could also do the following... raise Blademaster, then raise Int all the way to Anatomy, raise Anatomy all the way to Lethal Blow. Then keep pumping that. If you've taken both negative traits, pumping quick strike could cancel out the AP penalty you received. Raising your Int for Anatomy could cancel out the mind resistance penalty. So all that's left would be a 15% Xp bonus. Since you need to be a higher level to land a lethal blow, this could or could not have a visible impact. Sounds worth testing. edit2: btw... taking both Fast On Feet and Sluggish should, in theory, cancel each other out, except for the dodge bonus you get from Fast On Feet, at only a -2 Xp penalty. Question is if that bonus really is sizable though.

Originally Posted By: Randomizer If you need anatomy to kill a goblin, then there is something definitely wrong with your character. Don't judge my characters until you've read my respective thread and even then don't judge too harshly Just sayin', you could be as high as Level 16 when you encounter your first Swamp Goblin. If your character is i.e. a third slot support cleric with minimal offense and a melee weapon, and he wants to kill the darn goblin in one hit, then yes anatomy could help. But actually, I just mentioned goblins for completeness.

After toying around with all the Avernum games for quite some time, I think I've come to some good conclusions about character builds. Basically, I think despite the flexible system, I think the game is more fun (AND more effective) if you specialize to some degree. My latest inspirations are from playing A4, but these builds are viable in all Avernum games with maybe some minor changes. In most Avernum games, I have found that you should either get a healthy XP Bonus, or else the XP Penalty can be as high as it will. Something in between isn't as efficient. Even if this should help only the noobs, I'm interested in all feedback. Here are the results : TANKS 1. The Whirling Pole Dancer (pun intended) Race: Slith Traits: Elite Warrior This guy is a whirling dervish of destruction, and he uses his favorite weapon for both offense and defense. Basically, this build revolves around parry, blademaster and riposte. A good parry skill can make you virtually invulnerable in melee early in the game. Plus, it's the easiest (I think) special skill to unlock. You can even do that at character creation without losing too many points. Optionally, you can go with a high Dex + Defense first, then buy some ranks in parry, THEN put points into it. The charm of this build is that it relies on Riposte for offense. Naturally, your tank will get hit VERY often every round, and (in theory) you can riposte on every single attack you receive. And those high strength/skill ripostes with a polearm do hurt That's especially handy with those pesky enemies with high parry/riposte skill themselves. Just stand in front of them and wrack them with javelins, then when it's their turn feed them some of their own medicine! 2. Battlefield Sniper Race: Nephil Traits: Fast On Feet and/or Deadeye This guy is an interesting crossbreed between an archer and a fighter, but able to duke it out in the frontlines. Firing a bow is now not as cheap (AP wise) as it used to be, but it's become even nicer in A4+ for overcoming Parry. Naturally, bow and sharpshooter are great for this guy, though... being a Nephil with a high Dex and maybe the Deadeye trait, you could even try to not train Bow in the beginning at all until you can buy some ranks in it That's not recommended for beginners though. This guy relies on the Dex,Luck,Gymnastics (to which he gets a bonus) routine to avoid getting hit at all if possible. Since you can also use bows in melee, there's the question if you wanna train in melee weapons at all... though I would recommend it, since it also opens up Quick Strike (which stacks with Fast On Feet for delicious results). Still, this guy focuses more on archery and defense than melee damage. A great and versatile tank. 3. The Knight Champion Race: Human Traits: Weakminded (and maybe Sluggish) This woman is a walking tin can, nuff said. She doesn't mind being slapped around quite a bit (don't ask for contacts). In fact, she doesn't dodge blows at all, Preferring to just stand there letting enemies defoil her armor while she mightily and skilfully cleaves their skulls. This build focuses on Endurance and hardiness (stop laughing) for defense. In fact, I found this to work quite well even on Torment. The fact that she levels up quickly along with high Endurance will give her great hit points, and with the heaviest armor + shield + protective spells + healing she will get through anything. Give her some defense if it doesn't work well enough for you, it's not wasted since that will stack with the 'Enduring' spells later on. For offense, she should have enough skill points to level up Strength, Melee, Blademaster and Quick Action. Quick Strike can help her attacking more often or offsetting the AP penalty (if you chose Sluggish). A stylish character with a different twist. 4. The Paladin Race: Human Traits: Divinely Touched (and maybe Sluggish) The only build in this category that can also cast spells, this character is immensely versatile. It's still skill focused enough to work well in a 4 person party though. This character works basically like the Knight build above. He will have fewer skill points since he also raises Int and Priest Spells though, so I wouldn't take the Quick Action/ Quick Strike route with him. Instead, he can learn Anatomy to do some extra damage. I wouldn't invest into archery skills either, he has his hands full casting spells and fighting. More categories are pending

Originally Posted By: Thuryl Anatomy only works with melee attacks; it doesn't affect bows or thrown weapons. It's not really a great skill, especially since the Intelligence prerequisite is a waste of skill points for a fighter. I believe that nephilim, sliths and vahnatai all count as humanoid. I agree on it being wasted on a fighter, though maybe not on a fighting pries/mage. Depends on what creatures are meant by humanoids, though. The description mentions giants, and I take that to mean ogres as well. Goblins maybe too.

I'm wondering, does Anatomy work with Bows? Also, what monsters are considered humanoids (except humans and giants ) ?