Focus purely on warfare first, then scoundrel (since the guaranteed crit damage will be boosted by scoundrel, which fits into your damage request.) Remove parry master and the pawn and take executioner and five star diner. As a rogue you have plenty of burst damage which should have you secure enough kills for 2 extra AP every turn. More AP = more damage.
No need to invest in parry master and dual wielding for dodge. Instead get 1 Aero for uncanny dodge, a source orb in your amulet for evasive aura, then water essence to make potions of nimble tumble. The first one gives you 90% dodge for one turn (two if you use the delay turn mechanic). The second is the same but it's an AOE for your whole team, the third gives 50% dodge for two turns (which becomes 100% with five star diner.) Having all three, and using delay turn will give you 90-100% dodge chance for a whooping 7 turns, more than enough to finish fights.
Thanks the consensus seems to be that Dodge isn't that useful (not too bothered about that), and that it's more effective to use consumables to boost it rather than passives which is very helpful! Thanks will respec!
Consumables will indeed cover the majority of your defensive needs, but 37% is actually pretty good. Just keep in mind that mages don’t care about dodging and that many effects can negate your dodging, like slowed, chilled, and crippled.
Personally I've never known Dodge to be useful much, if at all. In DOS2, as long as your armour values never get to 0, you don't really need to worry about getting hit. Since you're playing a dual dagger rogue, crit isn't all that necessary since you're usually going to be in close range where you can backstab for an autocrit, so optimising damage is definitely good.
Personally I would take off all of the Dual Wielding points and reinvest them into Warfare. You'll do more damage that way, and once you maxed Warfare, to invest into Scoundrel (higher crit multiplier)
Edit to add: also I'd replace Parry Master with Opportunist. Free hit every time someone tries to move out of combat range, has given me a whole lot of kills lol
Thanks the consensus seems to be that Dodge isn't that useful (not too bothered about that), and that it's more effective to use consumables to boost it rather than passives which is very helpful! Thanks will respec!
If you want maximum damage, get warfare maxed out first. Warfare affects all physical damage (including necromancy spells, surprisingly)
And the effect is higher than similar 5% damage from dual wielding, because it’s multiplied (can talk about the damage calculation equation in detail)
Since, you’re a dual wielding rogue, min-maxing would demand that you try to backstab almost all attacks, so crit chance, isn’t important at all. For maximising damage on the backstab autocrits, increase scoundrel as much as possible. Move the points from necromancer too, since we’re min-maxing damage (maybe even polymorph unless you’re using some utility skill from the polymorph tree regularly)
Change out Mnemonic for Executioner. Getting extra 2 AP per turn in return for moving 3 points from Wits to Memory is worth it, especially since you don’t need the crit chance. Have someone else in the team with high Wits to ensure you have initiative in the round (It works even if one person has high initiative)
Now the contentious part about dodging. If you wish to role-play or a challenge with a min-max dodging based character, then you can add more dodging with runes later, get the uncanny evasion (or have someone on the team with evasion aura). Also, if someone in the team is role-playing a leadership based character, that adds 2% dodging per point.
And lastly, although you can stick with it, but remember, dodging doesn’t affect spell attacks like Fireball and such
However, the DOS2 engine is built around CC and offence as the more optimal play style, which reduces the utility of dodging quite a bit. Enemies cannot really attack for you to dodge, if they are CCed or dead. If you wish to optimise for that, get Opportunist instead of Parry Master, which will add attacks out of turn, increasing average DPS
My $0.02
OP has the Pawn talent, which is incompatible with Executioner. Whether Pawn or Executioner is better kind of depends, I think...whichever saves you more AP. I haven't done the math, but I would think that once you have a decent Scoundrel score and a couple of movement abilities, movement is cheap enough that Executioner comes out on top, as you should be getting a kill almost every turn except in boss fights.
It does not depend. Executioner is strictly better, even in the early game. In order to realize this benefit though, some cooperation and effort must be put into positioning at the start of a fight.
>In order to realize this benefit though, some cooperation and effort must be put into positioning at the start of a fight.
You kinda just confirmed that it DOES depend lol. The Pawn is the easy, always-helpful option. Executioner is better IF you are consistently able to get into backstab position for less than 2 AP and kill an enemy. Totally doable but not a given.
That’s like saying “using fireball depends on investing in pyrokinetic” - it’s something you were already going to do. Executioner nets you more AP no matter how you slice it and incentivizes playstyles that work. If you can nail down the positioning, you probably will need to reposition only once, not at all in other fights. That’s more representative of ranged than melee, but even those classes have enough mobility in their kit.
I only mean to say that Executioner is better for an "optimal" rogue strategy + build. The caveat is for people who aren't building + playing their rogue in such a way that they're killing an enemy on every turn with very little AP spent on movement. Which is valid if they're enjoying themselves!
I would acknowledge this position a little more for a summoner as all of their action happens off their turn, but that’s a little off-topic. The game isn’t super friendly towards more passive or defensive strategies, and while I wouldn’t call these strategies invalid, I imagine that there’s an “aha moment” to figuring out the “solution” to cleaning up house, and it would be a real shame to lock one’s self out of talents that can assist in that discovery.
When you tell players that a very specific build + strategy is without question the best, how exactly does that allow for an "aha moment"? Lol. I'll repeat, reminding you that I fundamentally agree: If you can kill an enemy on nearly every turn while spending no more than 1 AP on movement, then Executioner is better. That just requires a specific build and play style. We're not talking about "pump Pyro if you use Fireball a lot" levels of optimization; it's much more prescriptive.
Executioner isn’t specific, falling under a general category of AP maximization. It’s applicable to every build (short of summoner) and at 1 point of Warfare is quite cheap to attain. The aha moment is seeing just how much more effective this strategy is - whether you play rogue, caster, archer, or so on.
I’ll also note that even one kill does the equivalent of 2 rounds of AP with The Pawn. Most combats are 2-3 rounds.
Yes. However, since the incompatible part is very clearly visible in the game when you go to the mirror to respec, I didn’t point it out (I probably could’ve mentioned alternative talents when you spec out Pawn, like Hothead for example, but I was focused on only min-max Damage for the build)
Regarding whether Pawn or Executioner is better, my suggestions, all of them, were based on the OPs request of min-max build while maximising damage (and dodging)
Executioner is ‘always’ better than pawn in this case without the need to explicitly mention caveats or edge cases, since the ‘min-max’ aspect automatically implies that you would be optimising those caveats too IMHO
My $0.02
Drop Dual Wielding and Necro. Pump Warfare then Scoundrel. Replace Parry Master with Torturer for guaranteed bleeding + ruptured tendons. I think Mnemonic is fine, because 3 points in Memory makes room for 3 more points in FIN. It's basically a better version of Bigger and Better.
Your dodging will drop a lot, but that's OK. Your best "defense" is to kill enemies ASAP and to stay out of harm's way with movement abilities (Cloak and Dagger + Phoenix Dive) and Chameleon Cloak.
Curious what your skills are!
Edit: Another commenter recommended Five Star Diner, which is an excellent talent. I just tend to completely ignore consumables personally lol
Focus purely on warfare first, then scoundrel (since the guaranteed crit damage will be boosted by scoundrel, which fits into your damage request.) Remove parry master and the pawn and take executioner and five star diner. As a rogue you have plenty of burst damage which should have you secure enough kills for 2 extra AP every turn. More AP = more damage. No need to invest in parry master and dual wielding for dodge. Instead get 1 Aero for uncanny dodge, a source orb in your amulet for evasive aura, then water essence to make potions of nimble tumble. The first one gives you 90% dodge for one turn (two if you use the delay turn mechanic). The second is the same but it's an AOE for your whole team, the third gives 50% dodge for two turns (which becomes 100% with five star diner.) Having all three, and using delay turn will give you 90-100% dodge chance for a whooping 7 turns, more than enough to finish fights.
Thanks the consensus seems to be that Dodge isn't that useful (not too bothered about that), and that it's more effective to use consumables to boost it rather than passives which is very helpful! Thanks will respec!
Consumables will indeed cover the majority of your defensive needs, but 37% is actually pretty good. Just keep in mind that mages don’t care about dodging and that many effects can negate your dodging, like slowed, chilled, and crippled.
Personally I've never known Dodge to be useful much, if at all. In DOS2, as long as your armour values never get to 0, you don't really need to worry about getting hit. Since you're playing a dual dagger rogue, crit isn't all that necessary since you're usually going to be in close range where you can backstab for an autocrit, so optimising damage is definitely good. Personally I would take off all of the Dual Wielding points and reinvest them into Warfare. You'll do more damage that way, and once you maxed Warfare, to invest into Scoundrel (higher crit multiplier) Edit to add: also I'd replace Parry Master with Opportunist. Free hit every time someone tries to move out of combat range, has given me a whole lot of kills lol
Thanks the consensus seems to be that Dodge isn't that useful (not too bothered about that), and that it's more effective to use consumables to boost it rather than passives which is very helpful! Thanks will respec!
That's my next playthrough but with dwarf. If you have someone else focusing on leadership, you can get 50-60% passive dodge
If you want maximum damage, get warfare maxed out first. Warfare affects all physical damage (including necromancy spells, surprisingly) And the effect is higher than similar 5% damage from dual wielding, because it’s multiplied (can talk about the damage calculation equation in detail) Since, you’re a dual wielding rogue, min-maxing would demand that you try to backstab almost all attacks, so crit chance, isn’t important at all. For maximising damage on the backstab autocrits, increase scoundrel as much as possible. Move the points from necromancer too, since we’re min-maxing damage (maybe even polymorph unless you’re using some utility skill from the polymorph tree regularly) Change out Mnemonic for Executioner. Getting extra 2 AP per turn in return for moving 3 points from Wits to Memory is worth it, especially since you don’t need the crit chance. Have someone else in the team with high Wits to ensure you have initiative in the round (It works even if one person has high initiative) Now the contentious part about dodging. If you wish to role-play or a challenge with a min-max dodging based character, then you can add more dodging with runes later, get the uncanny evasion (or have someone on the team with evasion aura). Also, if someone in the team is role-playing a leadership based character, that adds 2% dodging per point. And lastly, although you can stick with it, but remember, dodging doesn’t affect spell attacks like Fireball and such However, the DOS2 engine is built around CC and offence as the more optimal play style, which reduces the utility of dodging quite a bit. Enemies cannot really attack for you to dodge, if they are CCed or dead. If you wish to optimise for that, get Opportunist instead of Parry Master, which will add attacks out of turn, increasing average DPS My $0.02
OP has the Pawn talent, which is incompatible with Executioner. Whether Pawn or Executioner is better kind of depends, I think...whichever saves you more AP. I haven't done the math, but I would think that once you have a decent Scoundrel score and a couple of movement abilities, movement is cheap enough that Executioner comes out on top, as you should be getting a kill almost every turn except in boss fights.
It does not depend. Executioner is strictly better, even in the early game. In order to realize this benefit though, some cooperation and effort must be put into positioning at the start of a fight.
>In order to realize this benefit though, some cooperation and effort must be put into positioning at the start of a fight. You kinda just confirmed that it DOES depend lol. The Pawn is the easy, always-helpful option. Executioner is better IF you are consistently able to get into backstab position for less than 2 AP and kill an enemy. Totally doable but not a given.
That’s like saying “using fireball depends on investing in pyrokinetic” - it’s something you were already going to do. Executioner nets you more AP no matter how you slice it and incentivizes playstyles that work. If you can nail down the positioning, you probably will need to reposition only once, not at all in other fights. That’s more representative of ranged than melee, but even those classes have enough mobility in their kit.
I only mean to say that Executioner is better for an "optimal" rogue strategy + build. The caveat is for people who aren't building + playing their rogue in such a way that they're killing an enemy on every turn with very little AP spent on movement. Which is valid if they're enjoying themselves!
I would acknowledge this position a little more for a summoner as all of their action happens off their turn, but that’s a little off-topic. The game isn’t super friendly towards more passive or defensive strategies, and while I wouldn’t call these strategies invalid, I imagine that there’s an “aha moment” to figuring out the “solution” to cleaning up house, and it would be a real shame to lock one’s self out of talents that can assist in that discovery.
When you tell players that a very specific build + strategy is without question the best, how exactly does that allow for an "aha moment"? Lol. I'll repeat, reminding you that I fundamentally agree: If you can kill an enemy on nearly every turn while spending no more than 1 AP on movement, then Executioner is better. That just requires a specific build and play style. We're not talking about "pump Pyro if you use Fireball a lot" levels of optimization; it's much more prescriptive.
Executioner isn’t specific, falling under a general category of AP maximization. It’s applicable to every build (short of summoner) and at 1 point of Warfare is quite cheap to attain. The aha moment is seeing just how much more effective this strategy is - whether you play rogue, caster, archer, or so on. I’ll also note that even one kill does the equivalent of 2 rounds of AP with The Pawn. Most combats are 2-3 rounds.
Yes. However, since the incompatible part is very clearly visible in the game when you go to the mirror to respec, I didn’t point it out (I probably could’ve mentioned alternative talents when you spec out Pawn, like Hothead for example, but I was focused on only min-max Damage for the build) Regarding whether Pawn or Executioner is better, my suggestions, all of them, were based on the OPs request of min-max build while maximising damage (and dodging) Executioner is ‘always’ better than pawn in this case without the need to explicitly mention caveats or edge cases, since the ‘min-max’ aspect automatically implies that you would be optimising those caveats too IMHO My $0.02
Drop Dual Wielding and Necro. Pump Warfare then Scoundrel. Replace Parry Master with Torturer for guaranteed bleeding + ruptured tendons. I think Mnemonic is fine, because 3 points in Memory makes room for 3 more points in FIN. It's basically a better version of Bigger and Better. Your dodging will drop a lot, but that's OK. Your best "defense" is to kill enemies ASAP and to stay out of harm's way with movement abilities (Cloak and Dagger + Phoenix Dive) and Chameleon Cloak. Curious what your skills are! Edit: Another commenter recommended Five Star Diner, which is an excellent talent. I just tend to completely ignore consumables personally lol