30 réponses à ce sujet

[keesio74]

Hello all,
I'm thinking of a play through on Hard with Aveline, Merrill and Isabela. So what class and skills should Hawke be to best fit into such a team?

Thanks!

[SuicidalBaby]

since you have a rogue and warrior I would go with mage.
For companion tactics and builds, try the compendium link in my signature.
The Isabela build is quite efficient and hands free.
Avaline can be a little more of a menace to enemies since you are not on NM, so I would suggest a full tactics build toward stagger, vanguard, and battlemaster with just the southern end of her personal tree for the immunities and damage reduction.

Your Hawke will move toward Creation/Force with Primal for the CCC. 
Probably pick up Winter's Grasp and Cone of Cold at some point.

Merril will do well as something of an Arch mage. A little of everything and she can go a long way. 
Maybe make use of her Spirit tree for Walking bomb.

Modifié par SuicidialBaby, 24 mars 2012 - 07:13 .

[cJohnOne]

Mage,or Bowman Rogue. Probably Mage. How come no one asks for build advise. That would be nice.

Modifié par cJohnOne, 24 mars 2012 - 07:00 .

[keesio74]

Thanks for the feedback guys. I ended up playing a 2H warrior. I'm struggling a bit because with that config, I have no healer. A big time DA:O player and on my first play through on DA2, the combat changes are a pain!

[SuicidalBaby]

Bethany is capable of healing...

I would also suggest you set all tactics on your characters to use a health poultice at <25%
Bethany's Heal can be set to ally <50%.
ally: <50%: Heal will also heal the caster should they require healing.

something akin to:
self: hp <50%: use: Healing Poultice
ally: hp <50%: Heal

So the caster will use a potion before using the cast on themselves.

[glitter_guld]

Are you sure a second mage will be good here. The team already has one. What it does not have is an assassin rogue for quick boss and mage killing in the beginning of every fight. Isabella is not exactly good for it.

IE Isabella will help Aveline, Mage will AoE and the main char will kill bosses.

Modifié par glitter_guld, 25 mars 2012 - 08:30 .

[SuicidalBaby]

Said she lacked healing.  Bethany and Anders can heal, Merril can not.  Switching them should not be a stretch, where as picking a different PC class and starting over is a stretch.

It doesn't really matter what is taken on a difficulty below Nightmare.
General needs should be filled, i.e. healing, after that it does not matter.

Clearly the group is not optimized with 2 warriors in the party.  IMO this should be changed.

With a pc 2h warrior you will want 2 mages so that you can set up a more consistant Brittle cross class combo(ccc)
If it is a pc 1h warrior, you could easily go any combination of support classes as long as you have a mage that can heal/buff/haste.

Merril fits best in just about any party unless she is the only mage. 
Fit her in a party that has another mage in it to heal.

-------------------------------

Keesio, If you care to; click the warrior guide link in my signature to see how a warrior group will look when optimized.  you can alter your approach to it in small ways and still succeed.

Modifié par SuicidialBaby, 25 mars 2012 - 08:55 .

[glitter_guld]

For a PC warrior it is clearly better to have 2 mages and a thief, so maybe Aveline should stay at home.

[Gilthas89]

I agree with the mage, and I also agree with the healer/support based mage. Either that or an extremely heavy hitting warrior and use Aveline to protect your flank and Isabella to back stab enemies with Merril casting AoE spells. But I only played my first playthrough on casual (I play most games on easy so I can take it slow and easy, I'm not a very competetive player who plays to say 'I beat it in _____ time on hard' just my personality) so maby its different on hard. But I'm fairly certain that would work on casual.

[keesio74]

Bethany is capable of healing...
.

From what I've read (spoilers), I won't have access to her for much longer...

[keesio74]

glitter_guld wrote...

For a PC warrior it is clearly better to have 2 mages and a thief, so maybe Aveline should stay at home.

I was hoping to use to try my all female NPC Aveline/Merrill/Isabela combo. But everyone seems convinced that i need healing...

[keesio74]

so maby its different on hard. But I'm fairly certain that would work on casual.

yeah. hard is quite a jump in difficulty. I also have one other restriction that I put on myself that increases the difficulty. I do not permit anyone in my party to go down during combat. If they do, I consider it a "death" and reload the game. This makes it all the more annoying not to have healing

[DarkAmaranth1966]

I would do an archer rogue on Hawke, give Merrill the healing tree and, make her a ranged subborter. max Izzy's f/r tree asap and, of course tank with Avaline. Otherwise you only have Merrill for ranged and, she isn't that good at it, a good archer is a big help and with that team, it would work best if it's Hawke.

[glitter_guld]

Keesio, you can live without mage healing on hard difficulty just fine. SuicidialBaby is a bit of perfectionist, I think. There are 2 types of healing potions already in Act 1. With 2 fighters you will kill things pretty fast, so it will compensate for the lack of a healer. Please, play with the team you like the most.

In addition, Isabella and Aveline have most hilarious banter after Aveline's marriage with Donnic.

[glitter_guld]

PS. To make things a lot easier you might want to invest in Isabella's invisibility tree and manually control her to kill opponent bosses and mages quickly.

Modifié par glitter_guld, 26 mars 2012 - 02:05 .

[SuicidalBaby]

Otherwise you only have Merrill for ranged and, she isn't that good at it

that made me giggle, thanks.

[glitter_guld]

SuicidialBaby, how do you usually heal Merrill, manually or by script?

[SuicidalBaby]

Something you should know about me is that I only play Nightmare, so everything I design or suggest is capable of performing on any difficulty.  Once you introduce Friendly Fire the only thing that should change is the make up of the group to avoid conflictions with paticular spells/abilities.

Typically if I am running a non Mage PC, Anders will take care of all healing outside of poultices as I never leave home without my Abomination.

Merrill with Blood Magic will have tactics like this:
1: self: hp: <50%: deactivate: Blood of the First
2: self: hp: <25%: Health Poultice

and Anders like this:
self: hp <50%: deactivate: Vengeance
self: hp <50%: use: Healing/Elfroot Poultice*
ally: hp <50%: Heal

But if you have Anders in a Panacea build you could run something akin to:
(keep in mind that Jump to Tactic: X will jump to the number minus 1.  So you have to adjust for it)

1. self: hp: <50%: deactivate: Vengeance
2: self: hp: <50%: Health Poultice
3. ally: hp <50%: Heal
4. ally: hp: <50%: jump to tactic 17
5. self: any: deactivate: Panacea
6. enemy: STAGGERED: Chain Lightning
7. self: at least 1 enemy is alive: Haste
8. enemy: clustered with 2 enemies: Glyph of Paralysis
9. self: mana <75%: activate: Heroic Aura
10. self: hp: >75%: activate: Vengeance
11. self: mana: >50%: skip tactics
12. self: hp: >75%: Martyr
13. self: mana: <10%: use Lyrium Poultice
14. enemy: target of Hawke: Attack
15. self: any: skip tactics
16. self: any: deactivate: Vengeance - *actual jump destination*
17. self: any: deactivate: Heroic Aura
18. ally: hp: <50%: activate: Panacea
19. ally: status: dead: Regroup
20. ally: hp: <50%: Aid Allies

which is this build:

Respec asap
1. Chain Lightning
2. Rock Armor
3. Chain Reaction
4. Heal
5. Greater Heal
6. Heroic Aura
7. Valiant Aura
8. Glyph of Paralysis
9. Glyph of Binding
10. Haste
11. Great Haste
12. Panacea
13. Aid Allies
14. Regroup - Vengeance acquired during Dissent
15. Martyr
16. Swift Justice
17. Blood of my Enemy
18. Wrath
+19. Direct Damage or Walking Bomb set

NOTE: manual activation of Rock Armor

This build is a bit of overkill because of Martry's ability to reduce cooldowns. No one is going to die by attrition ever, leaving Regroup to only be needed when someone happens to be assasinated.

Martyr is controlled by a second version of skip tactics. In this paticular instance Anders sits at 45% consumed mana before the fight starts. This set will allow him to join the fray with out the random wasteful firing of Martyr at the start of an encounter.

The jump will keep Anders in a perpertual Heal state until everyone is above 50% health.

Typically Anders will maintain a majority of the healing even when I am using a PC Mage. I will always have at least a standard Heal on my Mage in case it is needed. After the recent patch though, I do not even bother with Anders Panacea anymore as the control from a Force Mage is enough to preempt any considerable damage from just about any encounter.

On any difficulty under Nightmare I would generally suggest going for Walking Bomb with a Disorient CCC from Pinning Shot as soon as possible.  This combo, with an upgraded Taunt+Bellow, is incredibly powerful.  Especially if your rogue is Pushing Scoundrel Tree with Armistice/Goad.
__________________________________________
On a previous subject note: I would take a Back-to-Back + Invisible Friend over anything in the stealth tree as it allows movement and stealth in 1 ability. Another way to control Isabela and increase her suriviability would be to apply a control feature that keeps her attacking targets that are only attacking party members. This will reduce her incoming damage as well as maintain a bodyguard for all of your mages as well as keep Blindside, 120% damage, working 100% of the time.

Isabela:

self: hp <25%: Health Poultice
enemy: attacking Isabela: use current condition for next tactic
Avaline: any: Back-to-back
enemy: STAGGERED: use current condition for next tactic
enemy: elite or higher: Explosive Strike
enemy: elite or higher: Twin Fangs
enemy: normal or higher: Twin Fangs
enemy: attacking Hawke: Backstab
enemy: attacking Anders: Backstab
Isabela: being attacked by melee or ranged: use current condition for next tactic
Aveline: any: Goad
self: surrounded by 4 enemies: All Hands on Deck
Anders: being attacked by melee: Armistice
Hawke: being attacked by melee: Armistice
self: stamina: <10%: Stamina Draught
enemy: attacking Anders: Attack
enemy: attacking Hawke: Attack
enemy: attacking Avaline: Attack

------------------------------------------------------
If you have any further questions regarding tactics I would suggest you take the time to digest my Tactics Guide , which is linked in my signature, as a good majority of questions regarding the subject are answered there.  Please do not hesitate to post in it as I will answer any questions posted to the best of my ability.

Modifié par SuicidialBaby, 26 mars 2012 - 04:07 .

[glitter_guld]

Thank you very much. Your guides are always Very helpful.

[SuicidalBaby]

You're welcome.  Just ask anytime.

Hopefully my grammar was not too atrocious.

Modifié par SuicidialBaby, 26 mars 2012 - 03:31 .

[keesio74]

Thanks for all the feedbacks! I'm going to try and gut it through with 2H hawke with the rest of the girls. I am getting by but it is rough - lots of pausing and mirco-mgnt. The slow health pot cooldown is making things a big pain. I also have been forced to do a lot of running in battle (some kiting). Hate to do that but have no choice.

@suidical - your guides rock! thanks

[Gilthas89]

when you're fighting Arishok (end of act 2) run around the pillars when your waiting for a heal. He will charge at you if you're in the open and knock you over. But if you're running around the pillars he will charge into the pillar and get stuck until his ability ends and by then you should have healed. Thats what I did with my mage. stunlocking him also helps a bit. though people call stunlocking cheap, it works.

[SuicidalBaby]

I think you're in the wrong thread Gilthas.

[keesio74]

So far so good playing on hard once I got used to the game. Ran into the infamous Ancient Rock Wraith though and got KO'ed. Had it down to 25% health so not bad for a first try. My problem is that I have no healing spells and I run out of health pots. I could tough it out but those summoned profanes mess it up as they harass merrill and varric and eventually merrill gets KO'ed (I quit the game when one member gets KO'ed).

[SuicidalBaby]

focus fire till he triggers the lightning storm.
control all. focus fire the critters before returning to the arw. then release "control all" so tactics will fire.

use your firestorm on the arw while you kill the babies.

i have hold movement on the whole time. aggressive behavior.
split the group during rock n roll phase so you only have to move 1 person while the rest attack. use pillars to block his rolling attack.  if you get lucky it will get stuck on the pillars.

profane are weak to cold and spirit.  you picked up a spirit staff in the deep roads

Modifié par SuicidialBaby, 30 mars 2012 - 03:16 .