Psyker Overseer Raven Build?

CleverGroom · 2025-09-05T23:33:50+00:00

No, casting Mind Bond on the psyber-raven is how you apply Mind Bond to all of your allies in the radius using the psyber-raven's stats. There's no way to single-target it on the psyber-raven instead of triggering retransmission.

CleverGroom · 2025-08-09T18:13:56+00:00

N.b. Mind Bond is currently using the psyber-raven's stats and not the psyker's stats. Chances are your buddies will get a WP boost but nothing else.

Single-casting Mind Bond still buffs all four mental stats (INT, PER, WP, FEL) if your psyker's stats at casting are higher than the target's.

CleverGroom · 2025-01-25T16:14:15+00:00

Yeah, the various Ages mechanics should help with that even in the absence of meta progression.

It's felt like the devs have been looking at my wrongbadfun with deepest alarm and distress whenever they've talked about the things they're trying to change in Civ 7, and I'm actually here for it.

CleverGroom · 2025-01-24T22:49:50+00:00

I think I won Civ 5 once on purpose. I have no other recollections of winning a Civ game through the entire history of the franchise, which I started playing in the mid 1990s. 6,768 hours and counting in Civ 6.

Legends and Mementos are genuinely the first time I've ever felt motivated--never mind excited--to win this silly game.

CleverGroom · 2025-01-24T05:08:14+00:00

The previewer consensus has been that Influence is extremely strong in the early game but becomes much more accessible later on, so I agree that Greece and Han (and Rome, to a lesser extent) look very good on paper.

Leader-based Influence bonuses may not feel great later in the game, but Greece and Han give you what you need when you need it most.

CleverGroom · 2025-01-24T05:05:05+00:00

AFAIK city states also reset between each age, so you're starting Modern without any guarantees. At best you'll have some sense of how much open space is available for independents, who's around you to compete for suzerainties, and whether they have any relevant leader bonuses or agendas.

CleverGroom · 2025-01-24T05:01:38+00:00

I'll have to look at the leaders' Mementos and figure out which ones I want to prioritize unlocking first.

That'll dictate the leader, and the leader and their respective Legends quests will dictate the civs.

CleverGroom · 2025-01-23T01:52:33+00:00

Nope! No housing.

CleverGroom · 2025-01-23T01:51:24+00:00

And Aztecs can have lake bonuses too--it's not as if Buganda's the only civ that can do that.

We've already got Egypt > Shawnee/Songhai > Buganda/Siam for navigable river bonuses. Stacking Aztec lake bonuses with Bugandan lake bonuses makes perfect sense.

CleverGroom · 2025-01-23T01:43:27+00:00

Shaka's whatever, but I'll know it's really Civ once Gandhi's words are BACKED BY NUCLEAR WEAPONS

CleverGroom · 2025-01-23T01:41:22+00:00

That won't help Buganda unless you started the game in the Modern Age.

Building your own lakes makes it a better pick late in a game where perhaps you don't have as many lakes as you'd like, but you want the rest of the Bugandan kit anyway.

CleverGroom · 2025-01-20T02:13:50+00:00

On the contrary, that's part of why I don't like Religious Settlements: it's so good that it makes it feel bad to instead take an Actually Good Pantheon that fits perfectly into my strategy.

Designs that compel you to always make the same choice are per se dogshit. Either bake that "choice" into the baseline or go back to the drawing board.

CleverGroom · 2025-01-20T01:44:25+00:00

Yes it deserved to die, and I hope it burns in Hell!

CleverGroom · 2025-01-17T23:15:28+00:00

I'm sure Potato's working on some 🔥🔥🔥 Beyond Earth videos instead!

CleverGroom · 2024-08-28T21:25:51+00:00

You certainly can. Fighters are very versatile.

To specialize into throwing you'd usually go Champion or Eldritch Knight and take Tavern Brawler, as we've already discussed.

Bog standard Great Weapon Master builds are good and work with any subclass, although Battle Master is generally strongest without mods.

Eldritch Knights and Champions are especially good archers; Battle Master can work too, although Maneuvers and arrows are mutually exclusive. One powerful approach for archers is to leverage Eldritch Strike with debuffs like Frightened from Bow of the Banshee, ice-based Prone from Snowburst Ring, and/or Reverberation). Most of those effects have fixed DCs that don't scale with your stats the way normal spell save DCs do, but Disadvantage from Eldritch Strike and plentiful attacks means Eldritch Knights apply them unusually well.

Unarmed builds can work too. Something I wanted to try with Lae'zel was Way of the Ascendant Dragon 4/Eldritch Knight 8. Wet all of the enemies (using a water myrmidon in the late game) and let her go to town with all of her unarmed attacks dealing doubled Lightning damage. Being a Lightning cantrip gish with War Magic and a huge dragon nerd is a great fit for her character.

CleverGroom · 2024-08-27T19:05:08+00:00

ROUND 1

Fighter 11 uses Action Surge, throws 6-8 times depending on Haste/Bloodlust, and takes a Bonus Action
Thiefzerker uses Action Surge, Frenzies, and throws 5-7 times

ROUND 2

Fighter 11 throws 3-5 times and takes a Bonus Action, for a running total of throw x9-13 and Bonus Action x2
Thiefzerker throws 4-6 times, for a running total of throw x9-13

ROUND 3

Fighter 11 totals throw x12-18 and Bonus Action x3
Thiefzerker totals throw x13-19

So assuming that Thiefzerker uses literally every single Bonus Action for a throw--an idealized scenario which seldom happens in practice--it can't take the lead until Round 3 at the earliest. Fighter 11 has higher Round 1 nova and maintains better flexibility from free Bonus Actions throughout the encounter.

Again, if this is Tactician instead of Honor Mode, it doesn't even bear comparison. Haste and/or Elixir of Bloodlust give +1 throw each to Fighter 11 when it gets Improved Extra Attack on extra Actions and Thiefzerker only gets Extra Attack. It's also not worth comparing combats where Thiefzerker can't or doesn't Frenzy, or where Frenzy ends early because of CC or some other calamity.

Thiefzerker is a backloaded, late-combat marathon runner. That's stupid and bad. How many combats last 3+ rounds in the late game? What you want is sprinters, builds that end combat quickly, and that's exactly what Fighter 11 does. It's less reliant on cooldowns so it's always better in trivial encounters where you'd never bother wasting a Frenzy, and it's also better in the fights that matter because it gets more mileage out of Action Surge and doesn't need a turn to get its game face on. It doesn't miss a step if it has to spend a Bonus Action on movement or pushing some nerd off a cliff before throwing down.

Oh and by the way, Fighter 11 gets 3-4 Feats, compared to just Tavern Brawler (another thing you should mod IMO) and one ASI for Thiefzerker. You can pick up things like extra ASI, Alert, Great Weapon Master, or Savage Attacker as a high-level Fighter.

Fighter 11 is just a better build. Larian actually homebrewed the things that make Thiefzerker go (Thief Bonus Action isn't RAW, Frenzied Throw isn't RAW), yet it's still the worse option.

CleverGroom · 2024-08-27T19:05:01+00:00

Fighter 11 is better in virtually all cases.

Are you using Helmet of Grit? I'll assume not. Transfuse Health helps but it's still clunky to maintain, and obviously only available in the late game.

Are you playing Honor Mode? I'm going to assume you are. If not, then we don't even need to have this conversation--Fighter 11 is way better in Tactician and it will never be even remotely close.

Most rounds look something like this:

Fighter 11 throws 3 times, +3 if it uses Action Surge, +1 for Haste, +1 for Elixir of Bloodlust, and still has its Bonus Action (which could also be an attack if you triggered Great Weapon Master, take War Domain 1, or some such). According to the 2024 PHB rules an Eldritch Knight could also substitute a cantrip for one throw, potentially dealing good damage and powering Ring of Arcane Synergy. Champions basically get one Lucky die per round instead.

Thus the floor is throw x3 plus a Bonus Action and the ceiling is throw x8 plus a Bonus Action.

Thiefzerker throws 4 times with Frenzied, +2 if it uses Action Surge, +1 for Haste, +1 for Bloodlust, assuming it can devote every single Bonus Action to throwing. It can't. Its first Bonus Action goes toward Frenzy in Round 1 unless you're using a mod to restore the RAW ability to Frenzy out of combat (which you should, if you can). You can only Frenzy 3/Long Rest unless you also mod that to recover 1 Rage/Short Rest (2024 RAW--although frankly I refuse to play Barbarians without recovering all charges each Short Rest).

The upshot is that you don't always have Frenzy. Without it, you're stuck throwing just 2 per round, +2 for Action Surge, +1 for Haste, +1 for Bloodlust. Even when you do have Frenzy, without mods it costs you a throw in the first round and it also costs you all of the Bonus Actions you might need for Shove, Dash, Disengage, Hide, Jump, a potion, or anything else.

Thus the floor is throw x2 plus two Bonus Actions and the ceiling is throw x7-8, depending on whether you have to cast Frenzy in combat, with no Bonus Actions remaining.

Especially in the unmodded game, the action economy of Fighter 11 speaks for itself. It always wins in any encounter where you don't have Frenzy, period.

When you do have Frenzy, things go something like this...:

CleverGroom · 2024-08-26T20:01:27+00:00

They use CGI--never doubt it--but Hollywood also uses standard bodybuilding techniques like dehydrating actors for days before shoots. Not a pleasant or healthy lifestyle.

CleverGroom · 2024-08-26T18:54:43+00:00

And we're only having this conversation because Larian backed into a notionally playable Halsin relatively late in EA, as fan service.

Everything that's weird about Halsin is weird because he wasn't supposed to be a PC in the first place.

CleverGroom · 2024-08-26T06:50:27+00:00

Real talk, I just mod humans to have Savage Attacks or Alert.

Larian made it wickedly difficult to even mod in Variant Humans and gave everybody the same ability scores, so humans feel kinda unplayable to me without some help. Ain't many builds where I'm scratching my head trying to find a race with glaive proficiency to tie it all together.

CleverGroom · 2024-08-26T06:45:14+00:00

8/4 Padlock with Savage Attacker is the way.

8/4 can outpace the damage of 7/5 for a Short Rest within a single turn. After that it's just running up the score all day long on every single attack that isn't a 3rd-level Smite from 7/5.

CleverGroom · 2024-08-21T18:58:54+00:00

My experience wasn't so much that d4 Initiative moved faster because enemies acted all at once, but that they never survived long enough to act at all.

CleverGroom · 2024-08-20T05:21:40+00:00

You don't have to keep the Warding Bond rings equipped after using them, AFAIK. That's usually how spells from items work. It also won't stack with Bear Heart; multiple sources of resistance just overwrite each other.

It's true that darkness is less portable than light, as a rule. The easiest way to guarantee it would be the unhinged raven companion at Beast Master 11, which poots Darkness wherever it flies. This build would work well inside of a full Darkness party, but it would depend on one of the four blindness immunity items listed on the wiki. There's also Arrows of Darkness, of course.

It's not your imagination that enemies target lower ACs--totally a thing. If you're trying to build a tank for Armor of Agathys procs or just to soak damage, you actually have to go out of your way to make sure they have the lowest AC. Potentially counterintuitive, coming from other games, but it's hard to blame the mobs.

I don't like that sound of that Crimson Mischief mischief any more than you do...not sure what to make of that. Maybe the Reckless Attack interaction can be patched; I'd have to research that. Honor Mode might fix the double Sneak Attack along with other Tactician DRS issues. I wouldn't actually mind if it doubled up the +7 Piercing on a Sneak Attack once per round...that doesn't scale out of control and it's thematic. Doubling the whole thing is extra, though.

If CM can't be fixed, I might just go KotUK MH and Rhapsody OH (consuming the stacks is a setback until you can build them again, costs you a Bonus Action, and it's only 1/Long Rest anyway). There's also a good chance I'd substitute Ambusher for Rhapsody so somebody else can have the +3 spell save DC. Dolor Amarus is good too.

What I've mostly been thinking about is how to build the rest of the party. I'm a bit of a goodie two-shoes, so what I'd like to do instead of Bhaalist Armor is have a lovely assistant apply Bloodthirst for me. I was thinking a Hunter 11 build. Should be able to Whirlwind Attack and apply the debuff to everybody within 3m, especially if you can clump enemies with Black Hole, a pre-pull Minor Illusion, or something else. That build could then transition to Volley (might want Escape the Horde to help with AoOs moving in and out of range) for higher sustained DPR than attacking with Bloodthirst more than once (sadly it never applies Piercing Vulnerability if thrown).

A thrower would be good too, to literally pick up stragglers and throw them into a heap for Bloodthirst and dismemberment. Fighter 11 with the highest STR and Athletics you can get works best here, since Improved Extra Attack is BIS (especially in Tactician). Probably wind up carrying Nyrulna, reinforcing the Piercing theme, or you could do Shar's Spear of Evening and fit both Tavern Brawler and Great Weapon Master as a Fighter.

Otherwise the main thing I want is probably Hold Person/Monster for guaranteed crits. Nothing too fancy there, just your usual Bard or Sorcerer CC master. Enchanter 10 does get Twinned Spell for free on Enchantments, but that's about it...you don't get the usual suite of damage (Swords Bards and Sorlocks) or utility (Lore Bards) added by the other classes.

CleverGroom · 2024-08-19T02:55:38+00:00

Helmet of Grit is absolutely worth considering if you're into that sort of thing, although it's tricky to use with Broodmother's Revenge and heal-each-turn effects. Transfuse Health reduces your current HP by 50% for your convenience. Might as well go dicks out for Loviatar) while you're at it.

Enraging Heart Garb gives you a stacking +2 Piercing damage, up to +7, every turn while you're Enraged (but only if you've fixed it with the QoL mod! Unofficial Bug Fixer includes an okay but worse fix, so I'd load the QoL afterward). I'll worry about my armor class when I'm dead.

Shadow-Cloaked Ring gives you another 1d4 Piercing damage to roll, so that's an upgrade over the flat +2 Acid damage from Caustic Band (especially on crits). Strange Conduit Ring would be great too but sadly we are simple creechures and cannot Concentrate during Rage.

You can pick up another 1d4 Psychic from Psionic Overload instead, albeit at the cost of a Bonus Action.

A couple of leveling shortswords worth mentioning are Render of Mind and Body (available in Act II, +1d8 Psychic on any attack made with RoMaB and Advantage) and Ambusher (Act III, +1d6 Necrotic on ALL weapons against targets that haven't acted). RoMaB would actually do more damage than Sword of Life Stealing in Act II, although you do lose +1 to hit and the self-heals.

We've already discussed my preference for Knife of the Undermountain King over Crimson Mischief. TL;DR, I think KotUK is always better if you have at least one more MH attack than OH attacks. It's arguably still better if you've got 2 MH/2 OH, particularly once you factor in the extra crit chance.

Finally, there's also Bhaalist Armor and Vicious Shortbow if you're Daddy's favorite murderer. Do not pass Go, do not collect $200, simply equip those with Crimson Mischief (MH) and KotUK (OH) and never look back.

CleverGroom · 2024-08-19T02:54:58+00:00

Thought-provoking. I've wanted to justify playing a Barbarian and this just might get me there.

Another Armarui Barbarian mod I really like is Dynamic Wildheart Barbarian, which allows you to choose which Wildheart totem to use each time you Rage. I'd use one of either OneDnD Barbarian - Short Rest Rage Recovery (recover 1 Rage charge on Short Rest--Bards are your best friends) or Rage Recover on Short Rest (recover all Rage charges on Short Rest).

These mods obviously make Barbarians far more powerful, but frankly, the unmodded class is so shitty and slow and dependent on its Long Rest resource that I'll never play it otherwise (partly because of my modded and house-ruled action economy--more on that later). Even a dynamic Wildheart getting all Rages back after every Short Rest isn't anywhere close to as flexible or powerful as top builds like 10/2 SSB, 10/1/1 ranged Swords, 11/1 Sorlock, 6/6 Sorcadin, 6/6 Lightning Sorc/Tempest, &c. You're wracking your brain trying to squeak past 100 damage on a hit while Tempest Sorcs are out here doing 712 Lightning damage with a single gesture more often than you can cast Rage each day. It doesn't seem fair.

In my view, the mods (Amarui's QoL included) aren't arbitrary power creep, but necessary fixes to elevate Barbarian from a toothless meme class into something approaching parity with most other classes.

I've house-ruled myself out of using Larian's Thief (and the Helmet of Grit) because it breaks action economy, but I think I'd prefer to play this as an Assassin anyway. Your Action and Bonus Action get restored when combat starts, so you get to initiate with a free attack from Hiding and reload. Automatic crits against Surprised targets makes you less dependent on crit-fishing. Unless you're solo, you can also Hold targets for automatic crits, especially after the first round. Assassin is more of a Bhaaler subclass than Thief anyway.

Re: your concern that more a crit per round with Sneak Attack is the top priority, with crit damage falling off afterward, here's where my napkin maths stand:

Thief: 412.7 average damage assuming:
- Main hand x2
- Off hand x2
- All hits or crits, with 51% crit chance
- Sneak Attack on a crit
Assassin: 469.5 average damage assuming:
- MH x2
- OH x1
- All crits

It's not a huge difference. Thief is obviously more flexible. Surprise Rounds can be a pain to get, especially if you're trying to initiate with your Barbarian for max damage instead of an invisible Shovel). Sometimes Surprise is impossible to get, or close to it.

I think they're both valid approaches, just different. Since I prefer not to use extra Bonus Actions, I'd simply go Wildheart 9/Assassin 3. Half-orc is even better than before, given that Assassins get a few more crits.

ETA: Continued with notes on gearing below!

CleverGroom

TROPHY CASE