Enhancement effects and YOU!

[azrael4h]

This is a lengthy, overly wordy post to generally detail the effect the NGE (for better or worse) will have immediately on my characters come the day it's released to live.

This isn't a doom post, maybe a Dr Doom post. Curse you Reed Richards! I'm not rage quitting, you can't have my stuff (ok, the outdated stuff I might toss your way once I replace it), and the only character I have in danger of deletion is my Bladeforged (I never have liked Paladins, but we'll see what happens).

At any rate, post your thoughts as well on what happens to those characters you care about.

1 – Half-Elven Fighter – LR: Yes, loses some feats
Possibly I'll experiment with a pajama Kensai build, since I'll have a LR20 and no real reason to use it (I still have the older, free LR). I had no plans beyond farming Shroud, so the ED being wiped stuff doesn't affect her; she never got very much into LD. The only thing she is losing is Half-Elven Dilettante, like all Half-Elves. The racials are just too expensive, and it's impossible to invest that much into the tree and not gimp yourself elsewhere. However, her UMD is close to Heal scrolls now, so most likely there's no lasting effect.

2 + 3 – Elven Wizard – LR: Yes, loses some feats
This one loses very little comparatively. Elven Arcanum will be too expensive to get to, like all racial trees they're basically worthless now. But I'll gain two feats from Toughness being gimped and Mental Toughness no longer being a pre-req. So fitting in Spell pen feats just got easier. This goes for both my Test Wizard and my real one, a TR.

Originally, I was going to use the LR20 to swap my TR Wizard back to Sorcerer, since I don't find Wizard all that fun, but since Sorcerer has been gimped beyond repair, there's no point. I think both still have their original free LRs, so the LR20 will remain in reserve.

4 – Half-Orc Druid – LR: No
Again, this one loses very little; I only went Half-Orc because I paid for the stupid race, and bloody well I'm going to run at least one. She has a wasted feat, but as she is bound to my guild's static TR group, she's been stuck at 8 with one member having internet issues. So there's little need to LR. I can use the feat swap to ditch Toughness, which is now useless, for something (not sure what yet).

5 – Half-Elven Monk – LR: Yes, regular LR is I still have it though
This one gains more than loses, only losing easy access to Heal Scrolls via Dilettante, and some healing amp from racials. The bigger issue is feats; Cleric dilettante is worthless due to the cost, and Monks are more ap tight than ever, the dodge feats value went down because I've got so much dodge from enhancements, and toughness is now worthless. So not only am I gaining a bunch of feats, I don't even know what to do with them.

6 – Half-Elven Artificer – LR: No
This one is just at level 3, a recent impulse TR. She's so low level that I'm not worried about changing anything, and Artificers have so many feats anyway that I don't care about Toughness being worthless.

7 – Elven Ranger – LR: Yes, so many feat slots opened.
AA, like all Rangers on live, she's feat-tight due to excessive feat pre-reqs. Beyond that, I don't know what I'm doing with her, as she's my gimp. Maybe change her to a Bard?

8 – Half-Elven Druid – LR: Yes
Currently a Wolf-form melee/healer, the build falls way short in Epics, due to poor dps and slow casting cooldowns. I'm thinking of Lring her into a cleric, to try out Divine Disciple or maybe Warpriest. This will be a later LR.

9 - Warforged Artificer – LR: No
Standard machine gunner/support. Kinda under-geared right now, but the build should survive the transition. I have enough spare feats so I'm not worried about toughness.

10 – Bladeforged Paladin – LR: No, can't anyway
Currently a mule. I may grind out Coin Lord and House K favor, and use a spare portable hole to expand it's muling capabilities. Don't really care enough to bother with this one.

There are other characters, but these are the ones I have on Khyber, that (save the Bladeforged) I actually play. All-in-all, most are gaining at least a few feat slots, with only a couple being seriously hurt. The LR20's will actually largely be excessive for the most part, with only my Fighter (might try out a different build concept) and Test Druid (Might try out a different class entirely, just to say I did) looking at an extended class change. Maybe my Ranger. Though I may change my Ranger to Cleric instead, as we need divines in the guild at that level range. Then again, we only have two, including my Druid, at the higher end as well. Hmm....

[Maelodic]

I only have two characters I care about at the moment:

1: Drow LightBlade (14 FvS/6 Monk)
This guy is getting a massive buff. Access to the final stances as well as drow poison stance and DEX mod to damage makes for a nasty, impossible to kill, horribly amazing little devil. I'll be updating my LightBlade post when things go live, and all the of the sudden it's a terrifying build that will dominate most content.

2: Zero Melee Artificer (18 Arti/2 Monk)
This guy is getting an interesting boost, in that he gets an extra two feats and gets some buffs to his bastard swording, though the AP cost of the dragonmarks may make him really difficult to build.

3. Monk
I'm making an Henshin mystic after this with the Anti-Dark finisher. This gives me everything I was trying to accomplish with LightBlade only with a superior weapon animation (quarterstaves OP), the ability to go halfling, and getting the full 30% speed boost from Monk. Woo!

[elvesunited]

Based off what I've read which may be out of date:
1) Elven Ranger 18 / Rogue 1 / Monk 1 ( Tempest ) LR: Yes but not right away

Retired character who will be getting a boost from the enhancement change. Considerably more damage though some confusion over what qualifies as a light weapon as far as tempest in concerned. ( Does Rapier? ) Personally I think it would be right down weird if its not. I'm considering dumping Rogue, as his thief skills aren't competitive with rogues or artificers. And Monk as better armor makes the wisdom armor bonus moot. Will LR to make Str a dump stat and get rid of Weapon Finnese. Which leaves the option of going pure ranger or putting 2 levels in Fighter. Most points go to tempest. Some go to elf. At least 12 go to Deepwood Stalker. ( for exposed strike ) Strong chance he'll go back to retirement because even with better damage he remains an incredibly fragile melee character.

2) Drow Artificer 18 / Monk 2 distance DPS LR : No, but maybe later

Doing less damage and taking a hit point hit ( most chars are ), but I'm going to try to tough it out anyway. Not getting much in terms of anything new ( that I care about anyway ) although losing the movement penalty while charging will be nice. Will invest heavily in Battle Engineer ( Tier 5 ) and Arcanotechnician. But barely anything in Drow.

3) Half-elf Paladin 18 / Fighter 2 defender of sybersis tank LR: No

Now going for Sacred defender. This character uses Divine Might a lot and it will take 11 point investment in Knights of Chalice to get it. But I'm unsure if its worth it now given it will add 7-8 Str instead of +6 damage. Losing Sovereign Host full heal once every 10 minutes. Nothing I can do about that. I will gain the ability to cast Ressurrect spells. Most the points will go into sacred defender. What's left will go into Half-elf, and possible a few Kensei or Stalwart Defender trees.

4) Elven Cleric 18 / Ranger 2 Arcane Archer / Radiant servant LR: Yes

And bring the pain! The days of double full prestige are over. Tough choices will need to be made for this archer/healbot. I think I'll go Tier 5 in Arcane Archer as the Healer tree looks weak. And some in Elf as well since I got to get Grace and Arcane Archer out of it. On the plus side Arcane Archer no longer seems to require as many feats and strength can now be designated as a dump stat. I'm not sure this is actually a doable build now but I'll try.

[BDog77]

Note for above, you will get the Unyielding Sovreignity (sp?), it will just come as a free feat (level 6, iirc?) instead of an enhancement.

[elvesunited]

Note for above, you will get the Unyielding Sovreignity (sp?), it will just come as a free feat (level 6, iirc?) instead of an enhancement.

Thanks for the info.

If they're adding new free feats to the classes. It will pretty much guarantee that most characters will have to LR even if they don't plan to make any substantial changes.

[Manasdirge]

I only have two characters I care about at the moment:

1: Drow LightBlade (14 FvS/6 Monk)
This guy is getting a massive buff. Access to the final stances as well as drow poison stance and DEX mod to damage makes for a nasty, impossible to kill, horribly amazing little devil. I'll be updating my LightBlade post when things go live, and all the of the sudden it's a terrifying build that will dominate most content.

with 14FVS lvls, how can you keep your BAB at 20+, spells?,what if a big nasty beholder is ravaging you? and if you're using celestia, you can't use DEX to modify dmg from ninja Core 2, because cele dont have slash/pierce dmg type, so you have to use the petty STR for dmg, and maybe have fun with EH or lower, but definitely not Dominating EE.

[azrael4h]

Thanks for the info.

If they're adding new free feats to the classes. It will pretty much guarantee that most characters will have to LR even if they don't plan to make any substantial changes.

Not just feats, all casters now have a skill tax. Druids, Clerics, and Favored Souls have the skill tax of Spellcraft and Heal, WF Arcanes and Artificers get Repair and Spellcraft as their tax, Bards, Heal (most Bards already max Perform, which boosts Sonic spells), and Paladins and Rangers get taxed by Heal.

So every blue-bar will have to LR or else. I had forgotten about that in my original post.

[elvesunited]

Not just feats, all casters now have a skill tax. Druids, Clerics, and Favored Souls have the skill tax of Spellcraft and Heal, WF Arcanes and Artificers get Repair and Spellcraft as their tax, Bards, Heal (most Bards already max Perform, which boosts Sonic spells), and Paladins and Rangers get taxed by Heal.

So every blue-bar will have to LR or else. I had forgotten about that in my original post.

I had heard about the new spellcraft skill and looked it up. Supposedly from what I read it is not slated to be released with U19.

How exactly does a skill tax work?

I would hope that they increase skill points per level for characters for any new skills requirements. Because a lot of characters barely have any skill points as it is.

[Grosbeak07]

I had heard about the new spellcraft skill and looked it up. Supposedly from what I read it is not slated to be released with U19.

How exactly does a skill tax work?

I would hope that they increase skill points per level for characters for any new skills requirements. Because a lot of characters barely have any skill points as it is.

It most certainly is in Update 19.

A skill tax is when a class is forced to take a skill out of their main stat. Since Spellcraft is based on INT and Clerics, Druids, FVS all more Wisdom based.