Hi all,
I have some skill related questions.
I recently had a brief read of the following article:
http://ddowiki.com/page/Skill_usefulness
1) There are a few things that are not clear to me. It appears that some skills use the total modifier and some use only the ranks. Is there a guide for that? Example: Haggle? does your charisma play any roll? Having 0 ranks but high charisma is the same with the reverse?
2) Also some skills are not rolled and only your modifier is taken in account. Example: Spot/Search.
3) It is noted that Jump caps in +40. Is there a guide of where skills cap, or when the score is high enough?
4) [most important question for me]: How is Nothing is Hidden work. The text says:
Nothing Is Hidden: Your senses are so acute that you no longer need to spend time searching for the obvious. You will automatically perform a Search check to locate traps and secret doors when you are in range to Spot them, although this Search check occurs at a -12/-8/-4 penalty.
The skill usefulness says: Spot (Wis): Spot allows to detect traps and secret doors as well as sneaking enemies. However as the location of traps are usually fixed, Spot becomes much less useful if someone in your group can just remember/spoil those locations, and hidden enemies are rarely an issue as they reveal themselves on attack. Yet Spot can be helpful for new players or inexperienced groups, or if you run a Quest with random trap placement. With Update 19 Elves and Drows can spend points on the Enhancement Nothing Is Hidden that allows them to perform Search checks automatically using their Spot skill to find traps and hidden doors. Taking this Enhancement renders Search useless if you have Spot skill at least 4 points above Search.
I'm playing a multi class character and to be honest it would be great if I could only place ranks in either spot or search and not both. So I would like to know which of the two to boost and if the enchantment actually is good or not. Well when u are in a party it is going to be good; people seem impatient to wait for u to search...
5) What do you think about using the following skills for a Rogue/Wizard: I have very low cha (8), so I didn't choose any charisma based skills. But if the score doesn't matter and only the ranks play a role, I might choose one among diplomacy, bluff, haggle :-P for the passive uses mainly. I'm considering Use Magic Device but again low cha doesn't make it very useful. For healing I use Potions :-P
Balance (any +here that is the magical number u need? By the way I rarely been successfully tripped so I feel I'm ok for now)
Concentration (I placed some ranks but I'm thinking of removing them, I do have quicken and in a few levels I should be able to spam use it by reducing its cost)
Disable Device (I try to keep it as high as possible)
Hide (so and so, I now have invisibility)
Jump (target for a +10 without enchantments and a +30 from jump spell , o yeah baby I can fly! For now my jump is +20 and I can jump to the ships just outside the harbor)
Listen (I think of dropping it, does it have any practical use?)
Move Silently (so and so, I feel that the monsters auto hear me)
Open Lock (I try to keep it as high as possible)
Search (I try to keep it as high as possible)
Spellcraft (MAXED with only class ranks)
Spot (I try to keep it as high as possible)
Swim (4 ranks from the start... I think I even added a few more later, it seems unnecessary though)
Tumble (4 ranks from the start... I think I even added a few more later, it seems unnecessary though)
Something like this would make more sense I think:
Balance
Hide
Move Silently
Swim
Tumble
Listen
+1 (UMD? Bluff? Diplomacy?)
4 ranks from 1st level rogue
Disable Device
Open Locks
Search or Spot (depending how the enchantment works)
6 ranks from 1st, 3rd level rogue
+ more or less maxed with cross-class ranks
Spellcraft MAXED
Some of the points that are spared will be distributed among: move silently, listen, concentration (but I think makes no sense, as this is an all full or not at all skill).
Finally, some feat questions
6) Combat Casting and Mobile Spellcasting, does it worth it?
7) Single Weapon Fighting vs Two-weapon Fighting? which u thing is better?
Thank you for your patience and help.
ps: All these questions are because I'm a bit frustrated with my character. I made the mistake and took to early the 2nd rogue level :-(. So I have decided to use my +0 wooden heart in order to tune a bit the character. I'm 9th now and I started having difficulty in finding traps. I believe it is marginal right now because swapping my equipment I can find them but then I do not have a high enough spot to detect the existence... If I could invest only to 1 of the 2 with a good item problem is solved (at least for now).
ps2: will the heart automatically reset my enchantment trees?
ps3: by the way from what I understood it will take a long time until I get to reach the 32 point character. Thus I do not see any other reason to keep my heart of wood. (Any counter arguments on that?)