25 réponses à ce sujet

[Lord_Saulot]

So I've had this game since a little while after launch (basically since my preordered game arrived), but I have never really done much with archery, except where companions started out built in that direction.  I want to make a main character archer using the Dalish Elf Origin.  I'll probably play this character through Origins and Awakening.

So I was curious about a few things:

1) Rogue or Warrior?  One thing I like about Rogue is that I have a autonomy when it comes to lockpicking - I don't have to rely on any other party member to be able to open chests.  I also think the Ranger spec would work for the character I have envisioned mentally.  On the other hand, I didn't think the Rogue backstab related stuff worked for archers.

2) What stats?  I mean there is Dex, Cunning, and Strength on my mind.  Obviously Cunning isn't an issue if I choose Warrior, but it is for a Rogue.  Also, the Master Archer talent would allow for using Heavy Armor, which would mean a significant strength investment.

3) What specializations?  I mentioned that Ranger fits what I want to do with a Rogue, but I'm not sure yet whether I will go Rogue.  What specs, for Rogue or Warrior, are good for supporting archer type characters.

4) Skill and Talent recommendations?  Do poisons work with bows?  What talents are useful other than the archery tree itself?

[Elhanan]

1 - I prefer Rogue, for the reason you mention and the added skills.

2 - As I enjoy heavy armor, I take 38 STR and skip the Lethality tier.

3 - Have not used Ranger or Bard, and use Duelist most often; good for DW and Archers.

4 - Skills: Coersion, Combat Training, Survival, and maybe a pinch of Stealing or Poison. Note" Poisons do not work with arrows, but the bombs are reportedly great.

Talents: Dirty Fighting tier for 3, Stealth 4, Duelist 4, Deft Hands 4 are recommended.

[Lord_Saulot]

Thanks for the suggestions! I appreciate it.

They do raise a couple questions for me though:
1) If you skip Lethality, do you still put some points into Cunning for Coercion, Deft Hands, and Stealth? How much Cunning does it take to make those effective?
2) One of the talents you mention is "dirty fighting tier for 3". Third tier in that line is Coup de Grace, right? Does that work with the bow?
3) I like the Duelist suggestion - do all the abilities work with the bow or just some?

Modifié par Lord_Saulot, 17 juillet 2010 - 09:28 .

[Liliandra Nadiar]

1)Without Lethality, you should focus on Str/Dex. Lethality makes your Cun score take the place of Str in damage calculations. Otherwise, you need 22-30 to make full use of the Deft Hands/Stealth lines. I believe it was decided that 30 Cun and Deft Hands 3 would open all locks/disarm traps in the game. Not too sure on that though.

2) It doesn't. Aside from Dirty Fighting, the whole line benefits backstabbers only. Couldn't say why Elhanan recommended it for an Archer build.

3) All but Pinpoint striking work without any problems. Pinpoint can work on archers, but you need to switch to a melee weapon first to activate it.

[Lord_Saulot]

Liliandra, thanks for the responses!

[cJohnOne]

Combat Movement is good with bows if you like to flank.

[Lord_Saulot]

Cool - I'll try that.

[Liliandra Nadiar]

cJohnOne wrote...

Combat Movement is good with bows if you like to flank.

How so? Maybe I just don't understand the ability fully, but I thought it just increased the arc a stabber needed to get into to make backstabs. Nothing about how it works with/for bow attacks. Doesn't make moving in battle an easier (would be nice if it did *shakes fist at various rooting attacks*) and bows can't backstab so.... *shrug* Don't see how it's good for archers in any way beyond a stepping stone to Feign Death.

[Ayanu]

If you actually do the high str thing, leave cunning and deft hands alone and make another rogue do it. Such a waste to have 30 cunning + 4 deft hands AND have high str

[DWSmiley]

Liliandra Nadiar wrote...

cJohnOne wrote...

Combat Movement is good with bows if you like to flank.

How so? Maybe I just don't understand the ability fully, but I thought it just increased the arc a stabber needed to get into to make backstabs. Nothing about how it works with/for bow attacks. Doesn't make moving in battle an easier (would be nice if it did *shakes fist at various rooting attacks*) and bows can't backstab so.... *shrug* Don't see how it's good for archers in any way beyond a stepping stone to Feign Death.

You can't backstab with a bow but you can get the flanking bonus - up to +20 attack with combat movement.

[Elhanan]

First, I am not a genuine min/max Player, as I do not attempt (nor care) of crunching all the numbers to see if DW mundane daggers in the off-hand is better than utilizing a magical shield. That said with tongue bleeding in cheek, I still pump Cunning to ca.30 in order to open any lock/trap while having a STR of 38 and Deft Hands 4. I have also used Massive armor on an archer, and placed a rapid aim item to boost speed; not optimal but fun and very durable.



Next, even though I play an archer, as a Player am not great at kiting, so I find myself in more melee confrontations than others. Plus I enjoy watching the Finishing move animations. Thus, I boost my ability to stand toe-to-toe/claw/locomotive appendage with the opposition. I prefer versatility over perceived perfection of scores. Thus, Coup is a fine talent and helps my build, while the 4th one is not worth the invested interest. Others mileage may vary.



Finally, Duelist Att/ Def bonuses apply to archers as well as melee. Pinpoint Strike is costly to use, but will allow for several Crit hits against a target in melee. Skip it if you wish.

[Saelihnne]

Rogue. Max out traps, poison and stealth. Max out Ranger and use the spider in boss fights if needed. Use fire arrows, ice arrows and keep crossbolt on you, enhanced bolts for dragon fights and end game. Use your AOE shot , scattershot with fire arrows often, it makes a huge difference. Use stealth and set multiple traps. Win.

Modifié par Saelihnne, 18 juillet 2010 - 02:34 .

[Lord_Saulot]

Thank you everyone! I'm going to go with Ranger/Duelist and use the suggestions people have made.



Any thoughts on the Awakening specializations if I take this character that far? Suggestions for a third?

[Liliandra Nadiar]

Legionnaire has some excellent options for a non-backstabber rogue. Including a spell effect resist power. If you don't use too many active talents there's another in the line that lets you direct damage to stamina first. The +10 Con/Str from the first tier choice is very helpful in survivability in a sustained, close fight.



Shadow is more utility oriented. Shadow form helps keep hostility off you, though shadow striking will be useless, decoy and pandemonium I've never really used much in my one Awakening rogue run.



And of course, you always have the option of going Bard instead of either.

[Time4Tiddy]

I actually disagree with Ranger/Duelist as ideal. I find Ranger sucks up so much stamina that you can only use Arrow of Slaying at the start of each battle instead of a few times. Unless you are planning to solo, the pets are only so-so. I prefer taking Bard to level 3 to get the + to crit chance, attack, and damage - much more beneficial in the long run. Bard/Duelist is VERY effective.



Important notes on Archers - Haste spell and Swift Salves actually slow your rate of fire due to animations, so do not use them. All the rapid aim gear stacks, so you will want to collect as much of that as you can - so you can sit in Aim mode without significantly decreasing rate of fire. You can (and should) get to a point where every single arrow is a crit using Aim and crit chance gear.



I highly recommend getting Lethality and only going Str to 20 for the best leather armors. An archer shouldn't be sitting in melee anyway. Cunning will help with lockpicking, traps, and all your persuade rolls. Of the rogue skills, combat movement is good because it increases flanking - firing an arrow into the flanked area is not a backstab, but does have increased damage and increased crit chance. The other two talents in that line are useless. Skip Evasion as well - 15% dodge chance sound good, but in practice you get a lengthy animation that interrupts your rate of fire and reduces your dps.



My tactic as an archer was using a rogue, stealthing in to disarm their traps and lay a bunch of my own, while my party was held in position. Then backing off, use Arrow of Slaying on any mage and then all the other mobs rush in to the traps while you pick them off. Slowing traps like Grease are great for this. Scattershot is awesome for keeping mobs in an aoe. By the time the mobs get caught up to you, your stealth should be off c/d, you can pop back into stealth and they'll engage the rest of your party, now you'll be behind them and can get your flanking bonus.

[Time4Tiddy]

Sorry for long post, but wanted to share my justification for Song of Courage (Bard level 3) paired with high Cunning build.

Song of Courage gives:

(3+0.1*[Cunn-10]) attack, (2+0.05*[Cunn-10]) damage and (3+0.1*[Cunn-10])% critical chance

An endgame rogue archer could easily have 50+ Cunning, making the damage and crit bonuses amazing.

[Elhanan]

As a Rogue, I need to try Lil and that third Song. But as a Mage, I prefer leaving her on the first. And I have never tried a Bard, as that last Song leaves me cold. I also do not like Ranger, and would skip all the pets were I to use it.

And I tend to agree that all the other Talents besides Lethality are ill advised, so I simply avoid them all by using high STR. Using heavy armor will aid in surviving Grab, Overwhelm, and like tactics which start during the Origins and continue thru the entire game to the end. While it is cool that light armors and Lethality are available options, I dislike the numerous death reloads due to spiders, dogs, Ogres, and dragons. While archers may not draw much attention in initially due to the lighter wear, many seem to notice when triple digit dmg is sent their way.

Related Recommendation: Have Force Shield available as protection for such occasions.

Modifié par Elhanan, 18 juillet 2010 - 08:51 .

[Siven80]

Lockpicking all chest = cunning 40 and deft hands3 (cunning modifer - cunning score -10), or cunning 30 and deft hands 4.



For an archer i tend to get cunning to 40 which includes any bonuses from items, and put the rest into dex. At 40 cunning a bards song of courage will give 6 att, 3.5dmg and 6 crit chance and the high Dex score will improve the attack rating better than more cunning for an archer, as attack is what archers need most imo. Whereas it take another 10 cunning to gain 1 attack, 0.5dmg and 1 crit from the song, dex gives 0.5dmg and 1 attack per point (i think been a while since i played).

Song of courage is a great talent even for archers, but for an archer it has a limit imo.

The Aim talent is fantasic for an archer too. Especially after you have several ranged crit items as it doubles the cit chance and improves dmg, attack and armor pen ratings.



Ranger spec i dont like. For the simple fact that the pet takes too much stamina for your already stam starved archer who will be using SoCourage and Aim sustains. I typically choose Assasin for its crit and dmg bonus for just choosing the spec and 1 point only in mark of death.

Rest if points into stealth.



Arrow of slaying is good to take out white mages at the start of the fight, but other than that i find only shattering shot as the only other "good" ranged shot.

Above is what i typically do with Leliana, although in the next playthrough im going to do what i did in her DLC. Start out with a few bow shots then into melee when they get close. Dont need many talents other than dual wield line and most rogue base talents really. Was fun.

[soteria]

I actually disagree with Ranger/Duelist as ideal. I find Ranger sucks up so much stamina that you can only use Arrow of Slaying at the start of each battle instead of a few times. Unless you are planning to solo, the pets are only so-so. I prefer taking Bard to level 3 to get the + to crit chance, attack, and damage - much more beneficial in the long run. Bard/Duelist is VERY effective.

Depending on your group, Ranger could easily outdamage Bard--with Master Ranger, pets are doing ~40 damage and have additional utility. If we assume a rogue with 70 cunning, song of courage grants 9 attack, 5 damage, and 9% crit chance. If we also assume one mage is in the group, there's no way those bonuses are going to outdo a ranger pet in pure damage. In fact, you probably need at least three dual-wielding characters in the group for song of courage to keep up with a ranger pet. The only thing song of courage is there for is to increase damage, and it does it worse than the spider, even with very high cunning.

[Lord_Saulot]

Just to be clear - Ranger was part of my character concept, and is the main reason I'm doing this character as a Rogue.

[cJohnOne]

Ah, Elhanan are you taking points out of dexterity? That sounds controversial. And you say it's a successful build. Amazing!

[soteria]

Just to be clear - Ranger was part of my character concept, and is the main reason I'm doing this character as a Rogue.

In that case, yes, I would go Ranger/Duelist. Bard is already dealing less damage than the ranger, and also has an expensive sustain to maintain. Bard requires cunning to be really effective, and an archer needs dexterity for attack or you'll be missing a lot. Duelist also helps because of the cheap sustain for +10 attack, and the final ability can be activated with a melee weapon in hand.

[Lord_Saulot]

soteria wrote...

Just to be clear - Ranger was part of my character concept, and is the main reason I'm doing this character as a Rogue.

In that case, yes, I would go Ranger/Duelist. Bard is already dealing less damage than the ranger, and also has an expensive sustain to maintain. Bard requires cunning to be really effective, and an archer needs dexterity for attack or you'll be missing a lot. Duelist also helps because of the cheap sustain for +10 attack, and the final ability can be activated with a melee weapon in hand.

Yeah, I think I'm pretty set on Ranger/Duelist right now.  I'm leaving my options open for the third specialization, and will probably decided on that later, when I'm further along.

[Elhanan]

cJohnOne wrote...

Ah, Elhanan are you taking points out of dexterity? That sounds controversial. And you say it's a successful build. Amazing!

I do not know if I neglect DEX at all. It may not be as high as those that focus on DEX/CUNNING builds, but it is viable. As STR and DEX apply sim effects in Attack, this may be the reason that a lower score works.

My usual gear is Evons & Wade's combo, Far Song, and the usual rings, belt, and amulet.

[cJohnOne]

Yeah, I didn't get it that you could use Strength instead of Dex. for Attack. Well I knew that but a bowman seems like a high Dex. for me. So you're dex. is above 34 somewhere?