Loss of Prot. from Critical in BG2EE 2.5 Options

[tongtian]

Hi, everyone. I'm not sure whether anyone noticed that ioun stones no longer provide prot. from critical anymore in BG2EE 2.5. That might be a huge problem for RB/Kensai/Monk since they can potentially be one-shot by enemies like golems.

I heard that the IA forged items doesn't have this issue, though you can only have Indigo Ioun Stone for warriors. I haven't tested it yet but this means you cannot have more than one warriors in this category if you don't want to be critical hit.

Edit: Tested it carefully again, my RB still get crit hit by my protagonist when wearing pale green ioun stone.

This post has been edited by tongtian: Dec 10 2018, 09:28 PM

[bulian]

I agree that riskbreakers are overpowered and need adjusted but I would rather approach it by taking out some power from their kit. There is so much damage output with enemies, in particular golems or skeleton grandlords, that not having critical hit protection would make playing a RB extremely challenging since inevitably they become front line fighters, and randomly taking 100 damage hits on core isn't necessarily fun. Kensais seem to be played more as two handed weapon users which at least allows a smart player to utilize proper positioning where the kensai shouldn't be the primary targets.

Personally I think the innate improved haste is what pushes them over the top - I've yet to try a monk, but they also have this ability. Maybe its OK on monks since they have cannot otherwise be hasted.

Let's look at a party I posted here a couple years ago - vagrant PC/Neera/2x riskbreaker/Jaheira/ranger->cleric. That party contains 5 very good fighters, 3 skinned characters, 1.5 healers, and only 1 buff/debuff arcane caster. The only reason it is possible to get by with so little arcane casting is because starting at ~850k experience (RB level 11, sorceror level 12), the party has effectively 4 castings of improved haste, which allows for a ridiculous number of attacks per round and makes many of the Ch 3 fights very easy. In Chapter 6, the party has 6 innate improved haste castings, a character with permanent improved haste, and another half dozen or so castings of the spell.

If we compare the same party with Valygar and Mazzy, Ch3 fights are significantly more difficult because of having fewer improved haste castings. In fact, one may opt for a berserker/mage or Nalia instead of a primary fighter in order to allow for more improved haste uptime. This is still a very strong party, but there is significantly less damage output due to a) not having riskbreakers, and having a much weaker late-game fighter in its place.
To compare the hypothetical parties:
Vagrant/Neera/Riskbreaker/Riskbreaker/Jaheira/R->C
Vagrant/Neera/Valygar/Mazzy/Jaheira/R->C - 5 very good fighters but not enough buffing power
Vagrant/Neera/Valygar (or Mazzy)/B->M/Jaheira/R->C - 4 very good fighters, 1 OK fighter, 4 skinned characters, 1.5 healers. Still very strong but much weaker than the first party

The critical hit range and risk decrement ability are also extremely powerful so that could be another place where adjustments could be made. Fully healing, damaging(8d10), and pushing back all surrounding enemies is quite strong. Push back with a smaller damage (4d10) output and partial heal (100 hp?) would still be quite strong. Probably I wouldn't change the critical hit range at the moment.

I really like the Chain Breaker Stance ability - its quite powerful but short duration, and granting improved haste with that ability might make sense.

So to summarize, my proposed changes to the riskbreaker kit are the following:
- Change "Improved Haste" to haste granted at level 5 and 11
- Reduce Risk Decrement heal to 100 hp and damage to 4d10
- Add "Improved Haste" to "Chain Breaker Stance" at level 17 and 23