17 réponses à ce sujet

[Marvin_Arnold]

I played a sword-and-shield warrior, and combat was a pain.

I put most of my points into Strength (31), Dexterity (30), and Willpower (27), as well as Constitution (17) as I had learnt from DA:O, and special attacks worked quite well (with Warmonger, Templar and Reaver), but once I ran out of stamina, my basic attacks were just pathetic!

While my rogue and mage companions whirled around me killing scores of foes, I was stuck with hacking away a hundred times (well, almost!) at one stupid mercenary or thug or shade, (with the same animation and sound effect to boot), like HACK! HACK! HACK! BOOM! BANG! AARGH! DIE ALREADY, STUPID!!!!!, with ridiculously low damage, and by the time I'd got rid of that one, my companions had already cleared the rest of the horde off... (I'm exaggerating a bit, bit that's how it felt!)

Is sword-and-shield just underpowered (and should I've sticked to 2H), or are the combat mechanics that different from DA:O, or am I missing something crucial??

Thanks for advice...

[mr_afk]

Firstly, there's no point for a warrior (or mage) to ever pump dexterity unless they've already maxed strength (or magic).
Increasing your base damage should be the paramount concern as it increases the general damage you do for both your auto-attacks and abilities. (It also increases your attack-rating (so you don't glance) and your actual critical damage, so when you crit you crit-harder). If you're interested in a crit-build, instead of increasing dexterity you should aim at getting the right equipment.

The second thing to consider is not pumping constitution at all. Your build doesn't have too much of a problem in this regards, but warriors have a greater durability than other classes so can afford to pump zero constitution; Pre-buff (equip +attribute gear) to meet constitution requirements if necessary. This means that you could have a few points extra to put into strength.

Unless you are a berserker, willpower shouldn't be necessary. With decent dps (and massacre) you should be killing enemies all the time, meaning you have a pretty solid stamina regen. If you are a berserker consider pumping strength till you have ~100% attack against normals and putting the rest into willpower as willpower gives 0.25 (33%) more base damage. Since you're not a berserker you shouldn't be putting so many points into willpower - that's your main problem I think. If you kill more people you'll get more stamina back which will sort your stamina problems. (also it means your abilities have even more bang for buck).


Finally, the last thing to consider is your abilities. Vanguard (might+cleave) will do wonders for your damage, and an upgraded sword and shield weapon tree is the best warrior spike damage available.
Your ability setup will be largely determine how well your party synergises.
Consider getting a rogue (e.g. Varric) to fatiguing fog clustered groups of enemies and pinning shot elites, setting up disorients for hawke to use. You might also consider getting your party to use any staggers you setup.


Because S&S is actually more powerful than 2H if you do it right- just orientate your stats a little more towards dps and you'll be fine. I've got a S&S crit reaver (templar) setup written somewhere, so I'll go find that if you're interested. Most my vids are pre-patch though.

[mr_afk]

Found it:

Here's the general setup I use for non-berserker S&S warriors:
http://biowarefans.c...talent-builder/

- The general idea is that hawke should be specced to be the highest damage dealer in the party.
- This (and bravado) draws threat such that all the enemies try to attack hawke, clustering them.
- Simply by using might, cleave, sacrificial frenzy and bravery you should get up to +200% damage, depending on how injured you are and how many enemies surround you. Crit gear works well here because paired with bravery you can get pretty high crit chance and damage.
- Simply using spike damage talents (assault/scatter) will completely destroy most of the cluster around you. However, the main advantage about the S&S tree is its CCCs. So have Varric/Rogue set to fatiguing fog clustered enemies.
- This disorients and slows the group of enemies as well as obscuring hawke (+50% defence). This means that hawke won't be receiving as much damage and is in the ideal spot to deal damage.
- Using assault or scatter against disoriented enemies is basically an instant kill. Just for fun it is possible to work in an walking bomb setup.
- On hard you won't even need to get spirit warding runes. In any case, just get one of your mages to walking bomb one of the disoriented (elite) enemies such that when you scatter the group you also deal walking bomb damage to any enemies you missed.

- Your companions should be mostly chosen and set to provide ranged CCCs and dps. This prevents them drawing as much threat which allows you to focus solely on their damage (no constitution etc) and reduces the need for hawke to babysit them.

Your mages should be focusing on
+ dropping aoes on groups of enemies (firestorm and tempest)
+ crowd controlling and brittling enemies via winter's grasp and petrify
+ performing disorient CCCs (stone fist and spirit bolt (and maybe walking bomb))
+ performing stagger CCCs (chain lightning and crushing prison)
+ buffing party (heroic aura=must, elemental weapons, arcane shield=less necessary, and haste if it's not bugged/hawke doesn't have too much magic resistance)
+ have a high dps increased by using staves corresponding to elemental weaknesses

Your rogues should
+ provide brand against elites for hawke and the mages to beat on (+25% crit chance)
+ provide disorient against elites via pinning shot
+ provide disorient against clusters via fatiguing fog and confusion
+ provide brittle CCCs (against elites) via archer's lance
+ provide threat management if necessary (armistice and goad)
+ have a high dps via abilities such as Bianca's song&Well oiled (Varric's marksman spec), speed (specialist), and blindside (scoundrel)


The end goal is for your companions providing the crowd control and damage that allows your party to receive not very much damage but deal heaps. Hawkes role is to simply draw threat and kill things.
Together this setup allows a 'glassy' no-con Hawke to 'tank' enemies- if by tank you mean drawing threat then killing them.

ideally hawke should be full strength with no points into willpower or constitution because that reduces damage output. once you hit 100 strength you should move to dexterity, especially if you follow a crit-build equipment-wise.

And yeah, you won't have a whole lot of stamina so getting the right positioning when using your scatter/assaults is a must. Generally speaking you can fit in a cleave+sacrificial frenzy before an assault - the group of enemies you kill will completely recharge your stamina allowing you to run around and scatter another group or just use cleave again.


Basically you should focus on getting your S&S tree and vanguard tree firstly. If you use elemental weapons (desdemona's and edge of night) that should be all you need to completely wipe everything.
Get your reaver tree filled once you hit level 7. While the patch has nerfed blood frenzy considerably you still can get a reasonable damage boost from it- and there's nothing more satisfying than taking their damage and beating them with it.
Potentially you could get bravery earlier but I would usually get it only after you get the reaver speed boost on kill passive.
Once you fill out all the recommended abilities in that builder I linked you can probably move to templar or whatever take your fancy. Berserker is a little tougher to use due to the amount of sustains you will have on.

In terms of equipment, you'll want the etched ring of the twins (or graven ring if you have legacy), the puzzle ring of the black fox, four fingered eddies lucky amulet, and the seven deadly cinch. As most of this gear is act 2 or 3 for the first two acts you'll probably stick with the silverite belt and the poisonwood locket (if you use nature).

Modifié par mr_afk, 14 novembre 2011 - 02:06 .

[Marvin_Arnold]

mr_afk, thank you very much for all this information!

I also noticed that assault and scatter worked well, but once my stamina was depleted, it turned into these frustrating hacking orgies that I described... seems I wasn't that bad on party effects and buffs, but my warrior build was seriously off...

I was acting under the assumption that the build system was more or less the same in DA2 as in DA:O... (My first character in DA:O was a DW DEX elf warrior... ah, THOSE days are gone...)

OK, as I've now seen on DA wiki, the build system in DA2 is completely different from DA:O.

In DA:O, both DEX and STR contributed 0.5 attack per point, (and were both needed for S&S talents) whereas in DA2 DEX is indeed irrelevant for Warriors as STR is irrelevant for Rogues... And, as I see, defense is now controlled by CUN, and no longer by DEX...

Oh well... glad we had that talk, will help me a lot for my next playthrough...

Modifié par Marvin_Arnold, 14 novembre 2011 - 04:26 .

[Arthur Cousland]

Attributes are different in DA2. Most notably, cunning boosts defense, not dexterity (as mentioned). Also, having a high armor score is more important than high defense, as special attacks never miss.

Do you have access to the Black Emporium? Maker's Sigh potions are your friend, and help prevent the need to restart due to character build issues.  I also use the Mirror of Transformation quite frequently.

Modifié par Arthur Cousland, 14 novembre 2011 - 05:06 .

[mr_afk]

No problems.
And, well.. they aren't completely irrelevant (if you're into 'meta-gaming' or whatever).
besides the way that the base attribute (str/dex/mag) increases base damage for each class, there's secondary effects to each attribute;

strength - fortitude (prevents force effects - relatively unnecessary post patch)
dex - 1% critical chance (useful once you have maxed out your base attribute)
magic - 1% magic resistance (not useful)
cun - 1% critical damage and an amount of defence (only really useful for rogues - moving to dex is generally better than cunning)
will - 5 mana/stamina (pretty unnecessary for all classes besides berserkers)
con - 5 hp (also unnecessary if you maintain adequate crowd control/prioritise targets, and reavers benefit from low health anyway)


While this does mean that the focus is now a lot more about focusing on the base attribute (and thus increasing base damage), increasing critical chance and damage (from gear as well) is still useful towards maximising damage. Additionally, getting +%elemental bonuses from using cross-class equipment (e.g. robe-wearing archers/elemental warriors) can require an investment magic.

[cihimi]

clang clang clang <scatter> clang clang clang <smite> clang clang clang

[cJohnOne]

Did you try Battlemaster? I always get Rally and Second Wind.

I usually go 2 Strength 1 Constitution for Warriors until Con. is 30 then I get willpower and Strength. I want Strength to have 90% attack which I'm usally below.

I tried a high Dex. S&S Warrior it worked better than I expected.  Dex. increases Crit. chance.  You have to use fadeshear because it doesn't have requiremants. I can't optimize my equipment being a bad player.

Modifié par cJohnOne, 14 novembre 2011 - 08:13 .

[Marvin_Arnold]

Ah yes, the secondary attributes - I think I had quite a high critical chance with my dex score...
(30+1 DEX would put it at 71%, I think...)


Nah, I don't need Maker's Sigh - I've already finished playthrough no. 1 with my weird build - couldn't get past Hard that way (and I only switched from Normal to Hard in Act 3 because I didn't feel like reloading all the time...), but I got through it...

(However, I DID use the Mirror of Transformation once after Act 1 to make Hawke a few years older (moved Complexion 1 notch to the right), but that was it. (these are the details I pay attention to...)


Yes, CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG fits it better - most annoying sound (for me at least) in the game...

(Actually, for me it was more like CLANG CLANG AAARG! (critical hit) CLANG AAARG! CLANG CLANG...)

Modifié par Marvin_Arnold, 15 novembre 2011 - 12:06 .

[Marvin_Arnold]

[double post]

Modifié par Marvin_Arnold, 15 novembre 2011 - 12:04 .

[Malanek]

Marvin_Arnold wrote...
I also noticed that assault and scatter worked well, but once my stamina was depleted, it turned into these frustrating hacking orgies that I described... seems I wasn't that bad on party effects and buffs, but my warrior build was seriously off...

Warriors regenerate stamina by killing things. (Rogues regenerate by simply hitting things, Mages regenerate constantly). Because of this it is often better to target things that have already been damaged. There are also a couple of talents that trigger when the warrior makes a kill to make this even more important.

[SirSponge]

Weapons question: How long is it feasable to use Desdemona's Blade, while using the Poisonwood Locket, and The Deep Green?

[Arthur Cousland]

As mentioned, second wind and bolster are very useful for warriors, especially during boss fights, since warriors need to be killing things to regenerate stamina. My warriors+warrior companions all have second wind fully upgraded.

[Davillo]

How do you play on nightmare with no points in constitution? I don't use healing specs here too

[mr_afk]

@SirSponge - Desdemona's only really works up to the end of act 2 unless you're doing a low level run. Even then it's probably better to stick to the act 3 weapons - Electricity works just as well as nature against most things (besides qunari). You could probably use it, but you'll be hacking at things for longer than necessary.

The poisonwood locket (and the deep green) will only be useful for act 2.. if you do a crit-build (i.e. most optimised damage-wise) you'll find better equipment elsewhere. Even non-crit elemental builds will benefit more from amulets such as smite etc.


@Davillo - it's an acquired art.
haha I don't think i've ever pumped constitution for anything other than a blood mage hawke - and even then I had this nasty tendency to kill myself via casting. Even my companions (besides merrill) don't get any constitution. That part requires a little more party synergy and has more risks though.

But the general theory (which becomes semi-instinct after a while) is to prioritise your targets such that any enemies which can deal damage to you no longer can. (Kill off assassins, mages, archers, elites, in that order). This is done by the mixture of crowd control and spike damage/focus fire such that they don't get the chance to escape. Once they're dead, the little plebs running around can be killed pretty easily without receiving any/much damage.

This means that putting points into constitution can actually make it harder, as it becomes tougher to kill off any elites. For example, an assassin can wreck havoc if you don't kill it off. The response can either to make your party more durable so you can take more stabs or to make your party more deadly and just kill it before it can do anything.
Due to the stealthing/potion chugging that the more annoying enemies like to do, mixing in some crowd control/destealthing is almost necessary to speed things up.

So like that famous saying, the best defence is a good offence (More damage = Less damage received)


There are safety buffers though. I generally have anders with an emergency heal ready and sometimes a barrier from merrill etc. Barriers are pretty great, especially for reavers (you get an invincible blood frenzied wrecking machine at ~10% health).
Manually dodging attacks is a useful damage mitigation technique if you're really struggling.
But yeah, all those shouldn't be necessary/always relied on. It's quite easy to solo nightmare, so no healers etc. Potions are sometimes necessary though.


Anyway, just try it. Perhaps you'll be surprised.

Modifié par mr_afk, 15 novembre 2011 - 07:53 .

[Davillo]

yea I do all that but I always get rogues and mages constitution to like 18 by the end game and the warriors to like 30 more or less I don' think I really suffer on damage that much I still own things really fast.

[Malanek]

Neofelis Nebulosa wrote...
Rule#2:
Invest more points in constitution than dexterity. You have the shield for additional defense and armor, those few points you can divert from the class' primary attributes are better served going to where you get the most return from.

Rule#3:
As a shield&sword warrior, don't fuzz about defense, get +armor gear instead. Unless you'd be wasting precious points into dexterity, you'd get no significant return at all.

When keeping to those three roles as basic principle, your shield&sword warrior will be a potent warmachine. Maximum constitution along with maximum armor/damage-resistance means you can take a lot of punishment, even against heavy hitters such as bosses.

Dexterity does not boost defence, it boosts crit chance, cunning boosts defence. I don't think it is worth it outside a two-handed stagger build but it isn't realluy any worse than con on for a S+S warrior. Your armour is good, you need more strength more than you need health. Some willpower is OK, but remember, doing more damage actually regenerates you stamina (by kills).

Modifié par Malanek999, 15 novembre 2011 - 11:55 .