Few Questions

[Kinsume]

So to kind of setup my current situation, I've been playing the game on Torment and its my first run through the game. Currently my party is level 10 with my main guy and the original 3 Haven troops. Initially I built my main guy and one of the Haven troops as sword/shield tanks, had 1 priest support and 1 mage caster. After a couple of levels I noticed how many enemies cleaved so I stuck with just my main guy tanking, the secondary tank is still equipped to tank but uses a bow in the backline. He is mostly there incase enemies get by my frontline. Essentially my strategy is just to plop my guy in as small of a choke point as possible then have my other units pelt enemies with their bows. All of them have tier 2 of the first healing ability, and 2 of them are capable of casting summons to block holes or mitigate damage. Outside of that occasionally my 2 guys specced for stunning have to use thei abilities but overall I haven't really had to use anything else. I completely specc'd my mage out of damaging abilities, and the only reason he even has terror and weakness level 1 are for pre-reqs to get up to construct. I never use any healing other than the 1st rank heal. Every fight is just a tank and spank for me so far, minus 1 or 2 exceptions. Drop Haven's Blessing, the priest's rank 4 blessing/haste combo then pelt the enemies/heal my tank as needed.

 

Now on to my questions...

 

1. Do the game's encounters get more difficult or is this going to be my experience throughout the game? Like will I eventually need to focus more on crowd control abilitles or will my current tactics pretty much get the job done?

 

2. It seems to me like the game is trying to have me do sections at a time. The center first, then I cleared an area in the swap until I got to the bridge where the enemies were higher level, so I went to the south and did all of their initial stuff until I ran into the same issue. I'm about to go to the forest now and do their initial area, but I'm assuming the game intentionally does that? Should I be able to fully clear one area without doing the others or am I doing it correctly?

 

3. For the stacking buffs, I noticed how Haste specifies that it will not stack but blessing says it does. So if I were to cast Haven's Blessing on the main guy then Inspiring Cry on my other 3 guys would it give me damage bonuses for all 4 blessings?

 

4. Is there a way to see exactly how many buildings I need for certain equipment? I currently have 3 forts built with smithies for example and I still can't access tier 2 weapons. 

 

Overall the game has been a blast.

[TriRodent]

About to run out the door, but a quick answer to two.

 

Imagine the map with three circles, Ft Haven and surrounding areas. Next circle out would encompass the first forts in each of the three areas. The final and biggest circle would be the areas with the last forts.

 

Things get progressively more difficult as you move out in the circles. Doing everything you can in one circle before moving out to the next one isn't a bad strategy. In other words, don't plan on doing everything in the Vol before ever venturing into the swamps.

[Owenmoz]

What tri rodent said. Also other factions have cultural traits that may be of use. I find the ahriel the most disappointing in their race specific skills and the ukat the most useful. Vol is really good but i'd rather have  25% as effective skills for the whole party rather than that strong for a single person.  

Edit: so you probably wanna build ur first fort in all provinces before getting serious.

Edited September 14, 2019 by Owenmoz

[Randomizer]

1. The games gets harder the farther you get from Fort Haven, but most of the time you can use the same tactics. Several areas have boss fights where you can have an easier time with different tactics because you can't take advantage of terrain.

 

For instance in Murkhala's Hidden Prince fight you are surrounded with no way to retreat to use terrain. There you want to use area attacks to kill monsters and concentrate damage on the most wounded ones to eliminate foes.

 

2. On torment difficulty you want to switch lands to keep the fights at your party level. Just a level more can make the difference between a hard time and doing a dungeon without having to use consumable scrolls. Shadow Mine is an example.

 

3. Blessings stack up to 5 active at a time, until the endgame you don't want to do that because you burn through energy too quickly. Just 2 will be enough for most fights with lots of foes. Haste and slow don't give extra speed, but if you are fighting a foe that keeps casting slow on your party, having more will give you levels that can keep you from being slowed. 

 

Also if you use slow or bludgeon senseless which has a slow effect, then you can slow monsters so they have a chance of missing a turn.

 

4. See here for the number of stores to get an item and ones that can only be found or bought.

[Kinsume]

That is good information to know, thanks. As far as the stacking haste goes, that does make sense. Currently I'm just trying to optimize my guy's skill points however. For example everyone in my party has 2nd level of that indiividual haste buff, but noone has ever actually cast it. I'm thinking moving those points into curing or 1 curing/1 teleport would probably be better spent. Currently the party is level 12 and I've just  gotten my 3 archers that arcane blade that gives 20% critical paired with the 5% critical rune giving them all 30%. It is a massacre lol. I just can't figure out how offensive spells, or even wands/staffs can compare to the bow on torment. Sure aoe damage is nice, but since it hurts your guys too half of the time you can't even use it due to spacing, not to mention trying to maintain energy through a dungeon while tossing fireballs around isn't easy.

[Randomizer]

It takes some practice to use magic area effects, but outdoor encounters and the early rounds of boss fights it can reduce monster health dramatically. Although Jeff hated me referring to fireball as pest remover and weaken its damage after saying two castings on normal difficulty would remove almost all the  monsters.

 

In later fights, I would have the first character to act cast buffs so the damage for all the others would go up. If the fight lasted beyond its duration I could have the support character cast another.

 

Wands/staves are for monsters that have lower armor and especially evasions to magic. You don't see them really until the endgame. Runeward and bladeward monsters are a good hint to what to expect.

[TriRodent]

Re: casting buffs.  I almost always used my prince/ess for that before a (big/boss) fight started (outdoor excepted). With two levels of Haven's Blessing (?), you're getting 13 (? away from the computer at the moment) rounds of speed and blessing. As most fights are shorter than that it's worth casting right outside of combat range so he can get right into the fight (and everyone else is buffed going into it too).

 

Along a somewhat similar vein, outside doors, have everyone stack up in the 2x2 box directly in front of it, go into combat and open the door, you'll still have a point to attack (with a bow or magic as monsters don't tend to be right next to the door).