24 replies to this topic

[Ace Attorney]

My inquisitor is the Main Tank. What build would be best for Bull that works well for the AI as DSP and backup tank?

[godlike13]

I don't find that the AI uses Reaver very well. So for him i took the first skill in Reaver and the one that increases his damage after a kill, but then mostly went into the Battle Master and 2HW tree. With some in Vanguard for some guard generation. 

[Ace Attorney]

Well that's sad.

[godlike13]

Eeh, its not too bad. Battle Master makes for a decent party member with its horns. And u can still give him the two passives on the right in the Reaver tree, plus the Focus skill. So he still does good damage. 

[Zhijn]

I maxed Reaver on Bull and mix the 2h/BM, and while he hit like a truck he also swallowed thouse potions like there was no tomorrow, and he died anyway for the most part. Not the best skill tree for an AI to handle on its own..

 

Tho might try again with +3 Guard on Hit. Hopefully he can stay alive bit longer against, i dunno, bears and other aoe hitting stuff. xd

[GuyNice]

There are other threads about this, but if your 2-handed warriors (AI) have trouble surviving, pick up Block and Slash+ and Combat Roll and set those to preferred, along with War Cry (guard generation/armor buff).

 

Beyond that, I agree about taking Horn of Valor and generally just going for Rampage and the passives from Reaver. Sadly the AI doesn't know how to use that spec, so if you dont wanna control Bull yourself you're better off skipping the rest of the tree. 

[zeypher]

For bull do not give him dragon rage, infact only go upto devour and no skill upgrades in reaver. set his ai to never use ring of pain, and get 2 handed aoe skils.

[kotli]

The thing to remember is don't give the AI any powers that have a negative effect since the AI is dumb and will spam that skill.

[Gaz83]

He's much too squishy unless you babysit him, and yet far too cool to leave back at base. So, what to do? Well, you could control him instead of your main... but then you're kind of missing the point. How about using the tactical battle system exclusively, so you can keep an eye (no pun intended, Mr Snazzy Patch) on the big chap? That would work, but it really isn't to everyone's taste. So a workable solution? Re-Spec!

 

In my opinion, Two Handed Weapon users are nowhere near as potent as they were in previous entries in the series... or at least when controlled by the computer. Good DPS but easy to kill? That's what rogues are for. A Reaver who focuses on Battlemaster and Sword & Shield is the perfect compromise, effortlessly blending both defence and offence. The Iron Bull fits the role perfectly.

 

Hell, you don't even need to put that many points into his specialization tree. Devour is hardly vital for a heavy hitting tank, and giving the computer access to Dragon Rage is akin to shooting yourself in the foot with a bazooka. You might take out those closest to you, but it ultimately doesn't matter if you are just as dead as they are. Just take Ring Of Pain and the awesome passives. This leaves plenty of skills points for allotment elsewhere in the build, buffing both defence and guard.

 

Good times. 

[Bombadyl]

Contrary to some here, I've found him to be a very viable and tough critter.  I bumped up his heath, gave him a little bit of guard and set him with full Reaver spec just shy of Dragon, added some Vanguard and he is a monster.  Where I find him most useful was mid-game when his health was bottoming out and his damage went through the roof.  Granted it is a companion you have to pay mind to, but I never really saw him as squishy other than in the early stages.   During a a long battle against the likes of say a high dragon, he was posting some insane damage but he was the first character I crafted a weapon for using fade touched attributes of something like 10-20% heal on kill to his ax. 

 

Aggro management is not nearly as easy here as it was in DAO and often my tank just didn't cut it, which is why I bounced between a tank and 2H, but another option is Sera or Varris since ranged characters seem far more viable here than previous installments.

[q5tyhj]

I agree that the AI doesn't use the Reaver skills well. Which is unfortunate, because Bull was probably my favorite party member (pretty much always bring him along), but my Inquisitor was a Knight-Enchanter (couldn't complete Rift Mage specialization quest, Venatori Spellbinders refused to drop the 3rd tome, appears to be a bug) which the AI also doesn't handle very well. I found that I had to constantly shuttle back and forth between the two so that the AI didn't have very long to screw things up for either one. I'll probably do an Archer or a Tank for my next playthough so that I can kind of let my Inquisitor be on his own and control Iron Bull during much of the combat. 

[Gaz83]

It doesn't help that default Bull is a drug fiend. Seriously, the guy abuses potions like they're going out of style.

 

Tough battle? Taken a few heavy hits? Tough. The big guy chugged most of your supply while you were off picking flowers. 

 

Sort of serves you right. Ignore the Elfroot and craft yourself a mace. Nobody likes a hippy. 

[Bombadyl]

I agree that the AI doesn't use the Reaver skills well. Which is unfortunate, because Bull was probably my favorite party member (pretty much always bring him along), but my Inquisitor was a Knight-Enchanter (couldn't complete Rift Mage specialization quest, Venatori Spellbinders refused to drop the 3rd tome, appears to be a bug) which the AI also doesn't handle very well. I found that I had to constantly shuttle back and forth between the two so that the AI didn't have very long to screw things up for either one. I'll probably do an Archer or a Tank for my next playthough so that I can kind of let my Inquisitor be on his own and control Iron Bull during much of the combat. 

 

Bummer, that sucks about the KE bug, but yeah, I tend to bring Bull along on most of my runs because I find him kind of like one of my army or hunting buddies, with some juvenile adult humor, but also serious when he needs to be.  Some of the dialog between him and Blackwell on the Storm Coast, talking about their favorite way to kills things cracked me up to no end... Internet gold dialog right there.  

 

I'm running an archer artificer, that when combined with one mage, Sera, and either Cass or Varris (as a full ranged party mid-late game is not only viable it does insane damage and is a great party make up not requiring a tank)  but it got too easy, so I put Bull back in just to hear different banter.

 

It may be due to running a range oriented party, as by the time my mele characters reach a target, it is already near dead, so Bull doesn't get into too much trouble, although like I said, there have been some longer battles that he eventually fell, but lasted for the most part of 20 minutes racking up huge numbers, but he is definitely one that requires proper speccing. (although that is probably the case with all characters to some extent)

[q5tyhj]

Bummer, that sucks about the KE bug, but yeah, I tend to bring Bull along on most of my runs because I find him kind of like one of my army or hunting buddies, with some juvenile adult humor, but also serious when he needs to be.  Some of the dialog between him and Blackwell on the Storm Coast, talking about their favorite way to kills things cracked me up to no end... Internet gold dialog right there.  

Honestly, some of Iron Bull's cutscenes or comments are my favorite parts of the game so far (him asking you to beat him with a stick as a "training exercise", him telling Cassandra as your LI to not treat you like a sex object, him sounding like an 8 year old boy on Christmas morning the first time you fight a dragon). 

[Gaz83]

My Wife upon seeing the statistics screen:

 

"Irn Bru? Is he Scottish?"

 

See, that's the downside to having a fetish for girls in glasses. 

[Nic Mercy]

One thing I found that helped make Bull shine was setting the ai's priority to "preferred" for Devour and giving him the +20% healing belt and the 5 guard on hit on his armor and 1% heal per hit on his weapon. He does lots of damage and maintains his own health this way. He's never at full hp but always more than half... and that's kinda the way you want a Reaver to be to capitalize on their passives.

[Biotic Flash Kick]

bench warmer and drinking buddy 

[sch1986]

I haven't played him as 2H warrior on nightmare but on any other difficulty Bull is pretty sustainable if you build out his armor that focuses on +80 (or whatever amount) to maximum health. Give him a weapon that adds +3 guard on hit and he's pretty much unkillable. Every once in awhile he'll need a health potion but nowhere near like he does if you don't build up just total hit points.

It might detract a little from his DPS but it's worth it to be able to bring him along. He's always been my main tank. (I like Cassandra and Blackwall but I'd rather save their spots for more, IMO, fun companions).

EDIT: in nightmare I spec him SnS and he's totally fine. No extra tweaking or tactical cam needed, but I've yet to play a tank myself.

[Fullmetall21]

I haven't played him as 2H warrior on nightmare but on any other difficulty Bull is pretty sustainable if you build out his armor that focuses on +80 (or whatever amount) to maximum health. Give him a weapon that adds +3 guard on hit and he's pretty much unkillable. Every once in awhile he'll need a health potion but nowhere near like he does if you don't build up just total hit points.

It might detract a little from his DPS but it's worth it to be able to bring him along. He's always been my main tank. (I like Cassandra and Blackwall but I'd rather save their spots for more, IMO, fun companions).

EDIT: in nightmare I spec him SnS and he's totally fine. No extra tweaking or tactical cam needed, but I've yet to play a tank myself.

 

I found that the best way to play with the Bull if you don't want to babysit much is to get the whole Reaver tree except the upgrades and Dragon's Rage, go deep in the Battlemaster tree and the 2H tree (right side plus Block and Slash) and use him as a buffer/debuffer. Of course having specific mastercraft bonuses help like heal on hit and guard on hit.

 

As SnS while he is decent in matters of performance he is nowhere near Cassandra in AoE situations or Blackwall in boss situations. BUT he has the best banter with every other companion (along with Sera) so if you are more interested in fun conversations just make him SnS and bring him everywhere.

[Dovakiin_N7]

I can't stand Iron Bull.

First his voice actor is (or sounds like ) of James Vega.

Second, he looks and acts too human.

[Inverse_Twilight]

The best thing you can do to help Bull not be a 'glass cannon' is to make him a sword/shield warrior. I am playing as a mage and using Bull as a hybrid tank/damager and he does good damage and survives longer than Cass most fights. I also made him armour that gives lots of constitution and gave him the superb constitution amulet and a belt of health. 

 

For his Reaver tree, I took everything and used the new toggle upgrades for Devour and Dragon Rage. 

[Lethania]

I can't stand Iron Bull.

First his voice actor is (or sounds like ) of James Vega.

Second, he looks and acts too human.

That is because he is Tho I find him different enough to not associate the two!

 

The fem Inquisitor however. Took me over 20 hours to stop hearing Samantha Traynor (who I really didn't like when I played Mass Effect). That was harder to get over than Freddy Prince Jr.

[stop_him]

As AI, I don't find Bull very useful. I make him a vanilla board and sword tank.

[Cyberpunk]

Just accept that he'll be a potion hog and bring him along for lore reasons. I gave him +5 guard per hit and also gave him +1% life steal. But even with that he's still squishy. So the only other option I have is to respec him to sword + shield. Otherwise just bring him along. The game is easy enough you won't need the potions. 

[JiaJM98]

I like using Bull (full reaver spec) with a barrier amulet. This keeps him alive, usually, while his damage shoots over the roof because he hardly has any health most of the time.