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[Eire Icon]

I'm midway through my third playthrough as a Warrior (Roge and Mage completed) and my next playthrough will then be my first attempt at Nightmare on the Dragon Age Series.

I know there are fundemental differences on Nightmare such as friendly fire so I'm wondering do you vetrans radically change your strategies and tactics before embarking on a nightmare playthrough. Does you squad and spell/ability selection change ?

Discuss good people, discuss

[theangryllama]

Unless your really good with managing your party tactics your pretty much forced into the 1 warrior 3 ranged type party due to the massive friendly fire on even a warriors loud sneezes and the necessary reliance on CCC and non FF spells. Leaves you with merril, anders, varric and aveline/fenris with your hawke replacing one of those depending on what you are playing.
That and the stupid assassins have made me do my other playthroughs on hard personally to see the dialogue and reactions of other characters and try different builds cause i am certainly not good enough at managing my party

[brazen_nl]

If you've already done 2 playthroughs, I'd say go straight for NM. Warrior is by far the easiest to get into NM. And you can always change the difficulty if you really can't get past something. Later, when you feel more comfortable, reload that save and get it done on NM proper.

There's good guides on the forums to get you started and hold your hand through all the tactics.

I would go with a 2H build for your warrior, and then if you want to replay NM as a DW rogue, use Aveline as a SnS warrior so you get to enjoy both types.

[brazen_nl]

Oh, what I neglected to say was, NM or DA2 starts out a lot more difficult than NM on DAO. The whole Prologue is a dang kite fest ...

[Apathy1989]

I've played on nightmare as all classes and these are the basic tactics and points to know:

1. Assassins steal potions when they backstab, making them a top priority to kill quickly before you find yourself with no ability to heal.

2. Friendly fire applies for full force, but since normal enemies will have thousands of HP while you have 200-300, its best to avoid friendly fire in all cases. Only way you can bear friendly fire is to reach 100% resistence to an elemental type and only use that. However you will still get knockdowns, and freezing from ice spells.

3. If not interested in that, just use primal school to avoid friendly fire.

4. Use a single warrior to avoid killing eachother with sword swings, and skills like mighty blow which will kill eachother.

5. Cross class combos are mandatory, especially for taking out assassins. Mages using petrify and chain lightning, warriors using mighty blow and staggering, etc


My best playthrough was as a 2H vanguard warrior, varric running goad and general damage dealing, merrill hexing, completing/opening combos, anders healing and buffing.

[Eire Icon]

Some nice advice there thanks. Would you say Anders is a priority member of your group for a newbie on Nightmare?

[Joy Divison]

1. For your warrior companions, pick and use talents that don't cause FF. Instead of scythe, Fenris should take control - cleave - claymore. Fenris should have mighty blow (with the CCC upgrade) which you should use manually vs. dangerous frozen enemies.

2. For rogue companions, Isabella is going to be very frustrating bc/ she dies too quickly. I use Varric and avoid stuff like hail of arrows in favor of ones that maximize his auto-attacks.

3. For mages, if you aren't one yourself, you will want Anders and the creation tree. I just use him as a healer/buffer mostly bc/ I am lazy and he is good at it, but getting the AI to efficiently switch between his two modes is very difficult and I don't like to micro my companions.

4. I always take Merrill. You will want someone to hex dangerous enemies, dispel buffs and enemy casters, and chain lightning staggers and if you give Anders greater heal and greater haste, he won;t have those talents until late in the game.

5. You will probably have to have decent AI tactics if you don;t want to pause the game every 5 seconds. In general I have my companions support each other (e.g. Varric will use pinning shot vs enemy attacking Merrill, Merrill will horror an enemy attacking Varric) and this works reasonably well enough.

6. Assassins are by far the most dangerous opponents. When they unstealth, everyone should focus fire on them, using talents which incapacitate them (stuns, knockdowns) and CCC will kill them.

7. I have found offense >>> defense. With the long heal cooldowns and the fact attacks by mobs knock you down, killing them quick is much more efficient than trying to grind and outlast them.

[naughty99]

Eire Icon wrote...

Some nice advice there thanks. Would you say Anders is a priority member of your group for a newbie on Nightmare?

During my first playthrough (NM, rogue hawke), Anders was invaluable because of his group revive spell, which works even if the dead party members are all the way on the other side of the map. Also he has access to all the Primal and Elemental CCC spells.

Merril is essential as well because she can cast upgraded Hex of Torment (essential for rogue hawke to be able to get highest Assassinate crits). She also has access to all the Primal and Elemental CCC spells and she is a blood mage.

If you are playing rogue or warrior, Bethany is kind of useless because she has no revive and no Primal CCC spells.

I haven't found any NM party composition where Isabela can stay alive more than a few minutes while actually contributing to the battle. (And I don't use any tactics, I micromanage and control every party member.) I want to try to use her Below the Waterline talent (debuffs enemy damage resistance -50%), which seems like it would be really helpful for bosses if combined with Mark of Death, Hex of Torment and Death Cloud.

I prefer Fenris over Aveline as my tank because he deals lots of AoE damage and moves around the battlefield a lot faster than Aveline. I don't even need to use Taunt much because he can keep aggro on himself by attacking everyone. with rogue Hawke, I just need to plan carefully to keep out of Fenris's way when switching to daggers. (I use both bow and daggers frequently.)

If your Hawke is a mage, I believe Gravitic Ring is the most important talent for success in NM. You retreat everyone to a choke point and cast Gravitic Ring in the chokepoint. This allows you to whittle Assassins and elites down to size without getting swarmed.

Haven't played as a warrior yet. 

Modifié par naughty99, 11 avril 2011 - 05:39 .

[mr_afk]

1. what nobody has mentioned yet is how ridiculously annoying knock-backs become. i don't the problem isn't restricted to nightmare but for rogues and mages (pre-unshakable) even critters (esp. shades) can become pretty dangerous. it's also pretty sucky when an archer/venomous spider attacks you as well, knocking you back or leaving you wiping your face or whatever. This means that a tank (especially for the earlier levels) becomes pretty essential unless you enjoy lots of kiting/reloading if you make a mistake. This of course isn't quite as relevant for a warrior.
2. Buffs and debuffs are amazing on any difficulty, but on nightmare they're pretty much the only reason i survive. Anders on semi-permanent haste makes a huge difference - and bosses etc die a lot faster when hexed apart.
3. Either remove aoe damage abilities/any 2 hander abilities from tactics (and micro) or have really amazingly complex tactics so your mage doesn't fireball you and fenris doesn't one-shot you. Friendly fire is the most annoying way to die. On that note, be careful with winter's grasp - despite the description been single target it has a slight aoe meaning that it can one-shot your allies if you're not careful. One of the best aoe spells in terms of avoiding friendly fire would be the lightning ones - you can chain lighting and tempest without any worries of zapping your allies
4.I can't think of any more on the top of my head, but yeah, check out the guides out there. They're pretty interesting and explain possible tactics that work quite well. If you haven't seen them already, there are several exploits/unrestricted-weapons which allow some very effective (and amusing) builds. E.g. I'm currently playing a rogue with a mage-staff haha

[naughty99]

mr_afk wrote...
a tank (especially for the earlier levels) becomes pretty essential unless you enjoy lots of kiting/reloading if you make a mistake.

Absolutely agree that a tank is essential, although sadly in my case there is still lots of dying, lots of reloading and lots of kiting, even with a tank and after getting Unshakeable for my mage or the knockback ring for my rogue. Maybe it will be different once I am able to get two or three party members with knockback immunity items/talents.

Modifié par naughty99, 12 avril 2011 - 04:23 .

[mr_afk]

naughty99 wrote...

mr_afk wrote...
a tank (especially for the earlier levels) becomes pretty essential unless you enjoy lots of kiting/reloading if you make a mistake.

Absolutely agree that a tank is essential, although in my case there is still lots of dying, lots of reloading and lots of kiting, even with a tank and after getting Unshakeable for my mage or the knockback ring for my rogue. Maybe it will be different once I am able to get two or three party members with knockback immunity items/talents.

Haha the fun part is trying to build a tank which can dps - AND somehow manage to protect everyone from the magical spawning enemies who appear behind and on top of your ranged companions.

After Anders gets better at healing people I think you can get away with not using a full-time tank (aveline) and replace her with something with better dps. If you kill the enemies fast enough they don't get close enough to start with the knock-backs haha

Modifié par mr_afk, 11 avril 2011 - 05:56 .

[naughty99]

 In my experience, even at lower levels Fenris worked much better as a tank than Aveline, because 

• he can kill mobs quicker with larger AoE swings (Giant's Reach and other 2H talents)
• Sunder works better to create many STAGGERED enemies to set up Chain Lightning combos for your mages
• he moves around the battlefield so quickly (esp. with abilities like Scythe and Battle Tempo).
• IMO Aveline's talents that provide higher defense make her much slower and less useful as a tank 

Modifié par naughty99, 11 avril 2011 - 06:09 .

[mr_afk]

naughty99 wrote...

 In my experience, even at lower levels Fenris worked much better as a tank than Aveline, because 

• he can kill mobs quicker with larger AoE swings (Giant's Reach and other 2H talents)
• Sunder works better to create many STAGGERED enemies to set up Chain Lightning combos for your mages
• he moves around the battlefield so quickly (esp. with abilities like Scythe and Battle Tempo).
• IMO Aveline's talents that provide higher defense make her much slower and less useful as a tank 

I don't know...have you ever left aveline in a doorway? Nothing gets through. Fenris is more likely to chase after the enemies flowing through then smash your companions in the face. (I really dislike Fenris haha)
What's important when using Aveline is to not use shield defence (it sorta sucks) and upgrade to cleave as fast as possible. What results eventually is a decent dps (especially if you use elemental weapons such as desmondas or even fadeshear), reliable staggers when needed (shield bash), and a generally less painful friendly fire experience.
Admittedly I haven't had much luck with scatter yet, but due to the smaller aoe swings she generally doesn't butcher my mages/archers when i'm not watching. Her special tree is an odd one, i still haven't completely figured it out but if it works like it should she can effectively protect your weakest companion (bodyguard), get knockback immunity without any items and be generally more durable than fenris. 

My faviourite 'tank' would probably be warrior hawke designed as a dps build. Sticking your sword into something does wonders for drawing threat and unlike fenris, hawke can generally cope with larger numbers of enemies

Modifié par mr_afk, 11 avril 2011 - 06:25 .

[naughty99]

I suppose it's a bit different because I micro and control all the party members (don't use tactics), so I've never had any problems with Fenris chasing the wrong enemies.

I usually try to keep the squishies far back, with Fenris in a chokepoint. Fenris certainly dies faster than Aveline, but he also kills mobs a lot faster IMO. There is a late Act 1 unique maul, Oath Breaker, that provides +23% healing - really helps with the dying part.

I started my first playthrough using Aveline exclusively as my tank and then I switched to Fenris when I watched some NM tutorial videos and saw how much faster 2H warriors can clean up mobs. Using Fenris as your tank is to some extent comparable to using a 2H warrior Hawke as your tank.

For anyone trying NM for the first time I have one more suggestion - in Act 1 before leaving for the Deep Roads, make sure you get enough electricity warding runes to fill your rune slots and companion rune slots.

This is very helpful to reduce the time it takes to beat the Ancient Rock Wraith, because party members without this can get electric stun-locked by the smaller profanes. 

Modifié par naughty99, 11 avril 2011 - 06:38 .

[Apathy1989]

mr_afk wrote...
I don't know...have you ever left aveline in a doorway? Nothing gets through. Fenris is more likely to chase after the enemies flowing through then smash your companions in the face. (I really dislike Fenris haha)
What's important when using Aveline is to not use shield defence (it sorta sucks) and upgrade to cleave as fast as possible. What results eventually is a decent dps (especially if you use elemental weapons such as desmondas or even fadeshear), reliable staggers when needed (shield bash), and a generally less painful friendly fire experience.
Admittedly I haven't had much luck with scatter yet, but due to the smaller aoe swings she generally doesn't butcher my mages/archers when i'm not watching. Her special tree is an odd one, i still haven't completely figured it out but if it works like it should she can effectively protect your weakest companion (bodyguard), get knockback immunity without any items and be generally more durable than fenris. 

My faviourite 'tank' would probably be warrior hawke designed as a dps build. Sticking your sword into something does wonders for drawing threat and unlike fenris, hawke can generally cope with larger numbers of enemies

Avaline is great running bodyguard if you play a rogue, she will transfer a good portion of the damage you take to her. Only problem on nightmare is that she will often take too much damage for heals to recharge.

Respeccing her for vanguard can work well, but makes fights more sensitive and better off using fenris. I prefer having her running defensive backbone, with battlemaster skills for permanently running rally (refuelling the mages). Also use scatter for exploiting crowds of disorientated enemies from the flasks varric will throw.

Modifié par Apathy1989, 11 avril 2011 - 07:22 .

[Apathy1989]

damn doublepost

Modifié par Apathy1989, 11 avril 2011 - 07:22 .

[mr_afk]

Apathy1989 wrote...

Avaline is great running bodyguard if you play a rogue, she will transfer a good portion of the damage you take to her. Only problem on nightmare is that she will often take too much damage for heals to recharge.

Respeccing her for vanguard can work well, but makes fights more sensitive and better off using fenris. I prefer having her running defensive backbone, with battlemaster skills for permanently running rally (refuelling the mages). Also use scatter for exploiting crowds of disorientated enemies from the flasks varric will throw.

With anders on steroids there's no such thing as too much damage for heals to recharge!
The idea behind increasing Avelines dps is not only to help speed along fights - From my experience it seems that causing damage is the best means to draw threat (better than taunt etc anyway). A defensive Aveline (esp. if she's using shield defence..eurgh) will do crap all damage and therefore not draw away the unwanted attention from my two real damage dealers and healer/buffer.
With merrill's massive mana/blood pool due to blood magic and ander's massive mana pool (because i didn't give him much magic) there isn't that much need for any mana regen really.

But i know what you mean, and i would generally prefer a 2h warrior as a tank than s&s. It's only that fenris has an annoying habit of killing all my companions instead of protecting them - if it wasn't for that, his stagger ability and attackspeed+crit damage would be pretty nice. And what i meant by problems with scatter was the whole 'disoriented enemies run towards happy rogues and mages - everyone gets scattered by aveline'. haha, though that's still not as bad as anything fenris does.

[Joy Divison]

I have found that aveline is better at surviving and Fenris is better at killing. In some encounters, one will work better than the other.

When you fight big dragons, you'd rather have Aveline to just survive and eat damage than Fenris dying and turning the fight into a kite-fest.

Against a bunch of mobs, you'd rather have Fenris who will help eliminate them before they are too many and they then stun-lock your rogue and mages.

In general I find Fenris is usually more useful because most fights do not have a dangerous melee boss and he is better at creating more staggered enemies for you to explosive strike or chain lightning.

[Elhanan]

While I am unable to handle NM any longer myself, I have noted that AoE attacks seem to strip away Stealth from Assassins (eg; Bursting Shot). Perhaps a NM Jedi would like to confirm....

Modifié par Elhanan, 12 avril 2011 - 03:33 .

[brazen_nl]

When you get the first rune slot, Ave and Fen can survive an upgraded Firestorm just fine, don't be afraid of it. Or load up a shield with runes, but I can't remember when you have access to them.

[Running_Blind]

Elhanan wrote...

While I am unable to handle NM any longer myself, I have noted that AoE attacks seem to strip away Stealth from Assassins (eg; Bursting Shot). Perhaps a NM Jedi would like to confirm....

It has to hit them with enough force (unintentional pun) to trigger an effect.

As for keeping Izy alive, I've found she works well when working with a warrior with the upgraded Battle Synergy. Because the warrior will be taking half her threat, if they're attacking the same target her threat will never be higher than the warrior's. Obviously it works better if you're the one controlling the warrior, as you can reposition yourself to not kill Izzy with one of your talents.

Modifié par Running_Blind, 12 avril 2011 - 08:56 .

[Morocius]

Friendly fire really hurts if you're not carefull, you can use runes for resistance but skills like walking bomb and mighty blow can still insta gib a team mate if you aren't carefull.

Assassins can take 40-50% health of your tank with a backstab, so a con investment on all characters could be wise. They also steal potions so if you use them frequently you might want to keep a few extra.

Immumities, you might have to swap staves on your mages for them to do damage, so don't immediatly sell old staves.

Some prefer Aveline others prefer Fenris both are perfectly viable for any encounter, the vision of beter depends mostly if you want a wider marigin of error, or a faster kill.

Modifié par Morocius, 12 avril 2011 - 10:35 .

[turian councilor Knockout]

1. Clear companions tactic and spells slots and manually choose spells for example.
2. Makes sure to have a real tank like Aveline around since talents like shield defense mitigates damage a lot.
3. Don't stand still with the character your enemy targets, very important against some elite bosses.
4. Have good quality gear (enchanted is useful since any offensive and defensive rune even if it only have 4 points will make a difference in the long run).
5. Having three ranged and one melee characters in the party can make some boss fights much easier.

Modifié par turian councilor Knockout, 12 avril 2011 - 10:48 .

[sonsonthebia07]

I manually use all of the characters and only put abilities in tactics that are simple and single targetting such as Pinning Shot and Spirit Bolt. It might be better to try to use them to set up CCC on the tactics screen, but I haven't bothered much with the tactics screen other than removing all AOE and such.

I've never played on the easier difficulties but I doubt I'd change anything at all if friendly fire wasn't on.

The best advice I can give for nightmare is to know when to retreat back and also when to kite (I do all the time - bottlenecking is my #1 strat unfortunately - pull 'em into a single passageway and hold them at a doorway), and to end assassins asap if you do not have a way to nullify them (i.e. Aveline + stonewall).



Oh one more thing to throw in - if you are rolling with a 2h warrior, TAKE OFF ANY ACTIVATED ABILITY like Mighty Blow, etc. from the tactics screen. I realized after about halfway through the game on my first run that the reason Isabela was dropping in every fight because she was getting one-shotted by Hawke every time when she was anywhere near him.

Modifié par sonsonthebia07, 12 avril 2011 - 11:18 .

[Lumikki]

Compared to hard and lower, nightmare difficulty is little bit different. Not so much as enemy behaviors or so much more health. Sure enemies are little bit stronger, but that's not the major diffrences when playing nightmare.

Friendly Fire cause that some skills are harder to use, so you don't kill your own companions. This cause some side effects, like what kind of class build you goup have and what skills they have. Also using custom tactics for automatic actions on your companions are totally different than lower difficulties. You can't really define cast fireball when clustered, because that could kill you own companions. So, tactics is more like safe to use automaticly and all others are manual use.

Now depending how much micro-management you want to do or are you little lazy, this can affect alot of skills what you choose for companions. If you are more lazy, you keep you dangerous skills on your self and your companions are more support with safer skills. Other way is control every aspect in every battle. What means plan everyting what you do manually. This is very slow way to handle combat, alot of pause and decissions and jumping between charcaters, but also you can use more dangerous spells from all you characters.

Now the other major aspect change is resitances. Meaning some enemies are totally immune to some elements, like example cold. So casting cold spells agaist them has no affect at all. This means you need to know what to use agaist enemies as knowing they weakness. This can be little bit annoying sometimes when some enemies have double immunity. So, carry diffrent weapons, staffs and have different kind of spells in your use. Example Qunari have fire and eletric immunity. Meaning you just lost all fire and eletric based AoE's spells agaist them.

In general, playing in nightmare is pain in ass. I enjoy alot more playing in hard, where firendly fire and immunities aren't issue. This allows more freedom to skill selection and better use of custom automatic tactics for companions. Simple saying more fun. How ever, if you look the challenge then nightmare difficulty is good for it.

Also there is little more knock backs than before, but it's not really much issue, you got allready taste that little bit in hard difficulty. Now if you are weaker range attacker, you need to avoid been hit by any enemy. This means running away, going behind corners or what ever. Archers will knock back and interrupt you spell casting. Melees will knock back you. If two melee knock back weaker character agaist wall, you are pretty much dead, because you are never able to do any action.

Modifié par Lumikki, 12 avril 2011 - 12:37 .