mikeprichard

After level 30, you continue to gain the "automatic" stat increases with each level up, but only get the "manual" stat increases and the 2 skill points once every 5 levels (35, 40, etc.). Also, you no longer get any additional traits after level 30.

Nice - thanks, Lilith.

Munchkiny/slightly lazy question (I haven't yet reached the Great Cave/Scree Pits): I'd like to add only 7 points to Spellcraft from level-up points, get the 8th point from the drake, and buy 2 more points from Solberg for 10 total. Is this possible? Or does the drake's point count as one of the "bought" points (which would allow me to then buy only 1 more point from Solberg)?

That stuff's deadly.

Making a dedicated priest with points to spare for TU/AL, then giving your mages 8 Priest skill each (for Mass Heals) might make sense. It's working great for me so far.

Great - so I can capture more "junk" enemies through slot #10, then start again for reals with the ones I plan to keep. Cheers!

EDIT: It seems to be capped at 8 enemies, not 10 - unless I'm somehow limited in slots due to my mages' levels only being 22.

Rookie question - is there a limit to the number of souls you can have in your prism? Also, is it possible to remove already captured souls from the list? I started capturing everything I could find, thinking I'd collect every Pokem- I mean monster in the game, but now that I'm at 5 random monsters including the default goblin, I started thinking I should be more selective if there's some kind of limit (making sure I can still have room for things like Haakai and Eyebeasts later on).

You can actually get up to 10(+4) Hardiness... which is nice.

Wow, I didn't notice that mental resistance bonus - I was also wondering what "Total Consciousness" really did (beyond adding a line of text to the little blurb when you die and need to reload).

I do see your point. Still, I've decided to skip the XP traits in favor of some endurance/recovery/swordmage traits, as I've started (with my level 18 party) stockpiling wisdom crystal herbs now to more than compensate XP-wise at the end game. (Especially compared to A:EFTP, this is surprisingly easy to do with the patch NW of Formello, including the graymold/mandrake - and it only takes a couple crystals per character to beat out those two whole traits, if the traits really do only give you about half a level extra at endgame. And I haven't even started farming the Moldy Cave yet; with that, it'll be almost too easy.)

Thanks Slarty.

OK, that's what I thought - thanks again, folks.

And last question (really) on the +10% crit chance from equipped longbows - does equipping a longbow also increase your magic spell critical rate by 10% (apparently it does so for melee/pole attacks)? It seems like it does, which again would seem to be a very useful "bug."

Interesting. Especially considering how relatively easy it is to farm wisdom crystal ingredients toward the late-mid-game, those 8 XP traits seem a pretty poor investment IMO. They're not complete junk; they just don't seem to be a clear "must-have."

That's what I thought, but thanks for the confirmation, Lilith. Any idea about the cost difference between the yew bow and cavewood longbow? My only guess is the costs are simply skewed due to the difference in materials, but the cavewood longbow is nevertheless better/stronger than the yew bow in combat as indicated in the tooltips.

About bows - I noticed a yew bow is much more valuable (something like 500-700 coins) than a cavewood longbow (130 coins), even though the cavewood longbow does vastly more damage and also has the +10% crit compared to the yew bow. Is this an oversight on Jeff's part, or does the yew bow have some practical advantage over the cavewood longbow (or "standard" bows vs. longbows in general) that I'm not considering?

And on the crit rate - I forget whether the +10% crit chance is additive or multiplicative with other bonuses; which is it? (I.e. does an existing crit rate of 10% with a longbow added give a total crit rate of 20%? Or does it become only a total crit rate of 10% + .1(10%) = 11%?) Thanks!

True, something to be said about getting access to the Hardiness/Poles trainers as early as Draco and Silvar. I still tend to pump Melee for no particularly good reason, and I've also been spreading my money and skill points around elsewhere in the early/mid-game anyway, but poles would be the fastest way to max Hardiness and get your 15 points for AR on your magic users.

Good point, but I like to stick shielding knives and shields on my casters. I guess since I'm almost never using them to melee attack, though, poles would be OK too.

Juan Carlo - as Lilith mentioned, your magic users should try to plan for 10 Hardiness anyway, so you can try something like this in their combat skill trees, where the "+X" indicate purchased training (see also my character builds in the fourth post of this thread). It's an investment, but it will get you to 15 discipline points without having to rely on items, and allow for max Hardiness as well.

8+2 Melee

+1 Poles

+2 Bows

+2 Thrown

10+2 Hardiness

Although I'm only about 1/3 through my first (and probably final) playthrough, I agree 110% with the OP so far. While I'm also having a great time (as expected), I can't shake the feeling these remakes are in fact "soulless repackaging(s) of... old cash cow(s) to exploit a loyal fanbase and also appeal to a wider audience on Steam for a quick buck" - especially when Jeff's basically admitted as much in his interviews/blog posts. The issue, as you pointed out, is the almost complete lack of intent to try to "improve"/expand/something the original games with the remakes beyond the (welcome) interface updates. What's more, the combat (as discussed in other threads) is starting to slip into stale and repetitive HP-bloated slogs, not helped by the weak melee/ranged vs. magic balance and unimaginative treatment of armor/resistances. It's still not "bad," and still much better than Avadon IMO (hard level caps you reach 2/3 through the game, almost exclusively bland trash mob combat, vanilla setting... meh), but it's somewhat disappointing to a player like me who's been enjoying Spiderweb games since the '90s to witness this gradual decline in quality and innovation.

That said - I've been away from the game for over 10 minutes, and am starting to feel withdrawal pangs, so signing off here. Cheers.

Yeah, I noticed that spot (pre-orb) and was wondering why it wasn't mentioned in the list. Good to know that's what's over there.

Slarty - woah, I forgot that's how that works... again, I'll take that as a bug that I'll be happy to take advantage of. As for whether crits actually pierce armor/resists or simply add flat damage, it seems to be the latter, but I'm not sure.

Hobo Elf - magic being vastly overpowered (and not too difficult to manage SP-wise, especially with a few points of First Aid thrown in) in A2:CS and in the Avernums in general compared to melee/pole/ranged is definitely the consensus. I'm running one DW tank, one priest, and two mage-priests, and finding the mages dominate in terms of damage. Torment players have even reported a 2-priest/2-mage (i.e. no dedicated melee/ranged character) party being perhaps "optimal," and I'm not surprised.

Ah, OK. Sounds like he made quite a few last-minute changes.

To confirm: if I have a longbow (+10% crit chance) equipped, but then attack with a sword/polearm/spell(?), is my sword/polearm/spell attack boosted by the longbow's +10% crit? If so, sounds like a bug (but probably a useful bug for those annoying late-game 90% armor enemies).

It's definitely +2 melee, if that's the question - have the gloves equipped on my fighter right now.

Mass Heal should probably be moved down the list next to Minor Summon - it looks like you need Magi Clearance (in order to talk to Ostoth to learn the tablet's secret) to learn/access both spells. My party with 13 AL and 2 VL, but no access to the magi area, can't understand it - assuming it's the book just to the SE of Motrax near his "bed."