Baldur's Gate : The Sword Coast Chronicles : NWN2 Persistent World

A lvl30 shifter Druid has the following amongst others (when shifted and without having to spent a fortune on equipment)
- High AC
- High DC spells
- Damage into 30s
- 30/adamantine damage reduction
- 15/- damage reduction to anything
- Critical immunity and other immunities
- Regeneration from spells
- A tone of hit points
- i will not add anything about umd
- ah its spot/listen becomes average when shifted and moves slowly

To beat that, yes it can be done, it happened, but you need a Build that does a lot of damage (not crit Damage), wards (Deathward for moonbolt that cripples STR builds, Wards to raise Saves, Mirror images, mantles - this means a lot of umd stuff), Nothing short of Epic weapons ( an adamantine weapon to bypass premonition would be great), a tone of healing kits/potions and a LOT of luck. The best way i can see it happen is hide, attack, run away and hide, lick your wounds, pray and start all over again.

I dont see many builds - other than a well built FS with EDM and expose weakness - being able to do that or have the gold to do that. Dont be suprised that after warlocks, a raise in druids build take place especially after posts like this

EDIT: Of course everybuild can be done by another or a more experienced player. The point for this post is the best PvM and PvE build, and in my view a pure druid is not only because it is up there strong but because it doesnt require to spents millions in equipment and consumables

EDIT2: Mrieder i just thought your next build... A halfing druid that when you piss it, it shifts to a dragon... Hilarious

*up in the shadows the clicking of mandibles can be heard*

Does it really sound like laughter?

Meanwhile elsewhere an elven maid nimbly slide through the tall grass in the pale light offered by a full moon.


Most things can be countered by something else, some nice surprises are available presently and others await approval before they will make certain builds slightly less powerful. If used properly. Most things...

the balance of power in PvP in my opinion is as follows: 1 magi (wizards, sorcerers,bard) 2 Divine (cleric, favored soul) 3 rogue-assassins 4 fighters

Druids? Please, any Fighter/Frenzied Berserker variation takes them down with UMD and potions of Heal.

A couple of months late but what the hell... We are talking about builds that are good in PvP and PvM. A druid is good at both - i see only FSs doing better than druids - without needing to spend much gold on equipment, wand and other consumables.

But ye a fighter/FB can beat it

mrieder79 wrote:"Best" is defined as "will win in the most number of circumstances".

I was thinking a Druid27/Shadowdancer3. You have spellcasting, dragon shape, spotting, HIPS (with camoflage and spells to enhance). This covers a wide number of situations and possibilities.

RP builds. Always win.

Seymor wrote:The best pvp builds are

DC-based Red Wizard -- Follows the same logic as the spirit shaman pvp build, get high DC's so that nothing can resist then just one hit. The advantage is wizards can quicken a spell breach and therefore get their spell off through a spell mantle earlier, they then can quicken bigby's which saves another 3 seconds. Basically, wizards win in 6 seconds due to quicken.

Oh, I worked a bit on the highest DC's possible on the server and found that Red Wizard cheese is involved in getting a DC 45 Dominate Monster -- I believe the highest DC on the server.

Conjuration focused, DC-based Spirit Shaman 27/Dragonslayer 3 -- Can throw out ~DC 44 Reflex save or Stun Storm of Vengeance all day long. Druids can reach the same DC but lacks the revive and has harder access to UMD. Can use Drow as Charisma race, which is better than grey orcs for druids due to spell resistance. There is very little that can survive a disjunction followed by a storm of vengeance. HiPS doesn't help, spell mantle doesn't help, etc.

The best pvm builds are

Lowest Level (1-3):
Charisma based Human Cleric with Sacred Purification

Low Level (4-10):
Crossbow sniper Dex-based hin

Mid Level (11-20):
Bear Warrior Barbarians
Dwarven Defender Fighters

High Levels (21-27):
EDM Bard/Blackguard/Dread Pirate
Favored Soul/Blackguards
Weapon Master/FB/Fighter/Rogue
Bard/Dread Pirate/FB/Fighter

Max Levels (27-30):
Dragonshaped Druids

My 30 warlock has beaten most of these builds...just sayin

If you wanted both, I would go for Druid, Cleric, or FS - Nothing has the lasting power of a divine caster. Cleric spells seem to have the least amount of 'breachable' spells - getting hit by a breach on my druid meant sad times.

In PvP all three classes can handle there own quite easily; even better if you're prepared. Prepared is the operative word though; it's why so many high levels carry around a minimum of 10 wands.

Pure PvP I would give a prepared mage the upperhand vs a divine - but this requires being prepared and not having spells out for PvM. It's a toss up, but if you wanted both, a mage does not have the longevity of a divine class, or the ability to heal in PvM. I can't imagine anyone gulping heal potions left and right all day.

I think any Hide in Plain Sight build is in second place behind divine casters for a PvP & PvM standing. Easy to toy with the game engine, can pop out of sight when in trouble, and can deal a lot of damage quickly when coming out of hiding (due to dropping your opponents AC due to flat footed). I never died on my first HIPS build - only down side is you will get hit in PvM, you will be injured. While you can use healing kits while stealthing, they get tedious to carry.

So there are hard and soft counters to all PvP - being prepared for your weaknesses is key. If you want an easy PvP and PvM though - divine is your pathway to easy sauce. Not sure I would want to give up 3 levels for shadow dancing on a druid though and miss out on the improved dragon forms.

What would be considered a "PVP" warlock build? Aside from simply having a high UMD, the conlocks/blasters/divine shield having CHA locks all seem pretty similar to me.

A warlock with HiPS would be considered the perfect PvP build - or so I've been told.

Remember on this server, that means your character will need a minimum Dex of 19 by the time they want to pick their first Shadow Dancer level

I've beaten a lot of hipsing wizards and warlock with my fighter, they never scared me that much.

What scared me was druids. Not because they deal damage, but because they're so hard to take down it's incredible.

If you ask me in both scenarios pvp and pve it's about the player first. Depending on your personality and play style will determine how easy or difficult an experience you will have. Certain players are more prone to casters, others melee and others hybrid builds. If you play a class or character that is opposed to how you think, act, game.... You will have a higher probability of being dissatisfied with your progress and results.

This is why every class has been brought up as OP or under powered by various players. So obviously not everyone can be correct on what is too powerful and too weak. So it is just an obvious matter of perspective. It's a very personal and bias decision on how you choose a class and race to play.

Pvp is also more about skill and experience just like pve. Players good at pve study the maps, mark locations they can profit from and take tons of notes, they build a circuit on places to go and where not to go. Pvpers study opponents, builds, and player habits/psychology to gain advantages over their opponents it is more than just focusing on the ultimate build. There isn't one, it's all about what YOU are good at...

I could give any player a ludicrously OP character build and twinked gear, but if they don't know how to play the class or have no experience in arena fighting they will get pwnd by someone who does. This is why I see some of the most absurd OP pvp builds get tossed by pure bards lol!!!!!!!

Masters of pve would know where to go and not to go for their character, likewise a true pvper would know what his build can take and what it can't too which opponents, unless they assume their opponent is a noob.

V says how it is. Word up.

TheVoid wrote:Pvpers study opponents, builds, and player habits/psychology to gain advantages over their opponents it is more than just focusing on the ultimate build. There isn't one, it's all about what YOU are good at...

Every single build has an efficient counter. With that I dont mean a build that is only useful against a particular build, but a build that is good in general. I agree with thevoid above, but if we sidestep his objection and say that the players are of equal standing skillwise, or both builds are A.I controlled with good scripts, we would still need to consider the metagame to find the best build.

Like, if everyone on this server believed druids was the best pvp choice, and made one, the best pvp build would obviously become one that handily defeats druids while still being efficient elsewhere. Thus, alot of different builds can be the "king". However, since so many people here believe in the invincibility of spellcasting characters, I believe that the best pvp build around currently is one that excels against them, specifically the glass cannons like 6 sorc, 10 asoc, 8 am, 6 bm. Why? because most powerbuilds here seems to be spellcasters, or lesser glasscannons (like fb twohanders) so it would easily defeat these. Of course a build like that has good efficient counters, but they rule the metagame because few people play those counters well.

Regards,

/Karond

I say overall with the rp out system wizard/nukes have the best advantage, a wizard only has to cast one spell then run away buff up and your dead

50 ac/ 50% concelment / 50% conceled mirror image = really hard to hit

wizard generally win vs druids cause of mords

fb will do well, but the pvp out kind of limits the encounter, unless you get in first

I would say pvp & pvm build would be druid, though very boring to play, and the rp is meh in my opinion..

fb are very costly, due to heavy use on heal kits/scrolls/potions

my opinion

pvp wise
1.wizard (kilable if they are not fast)
2.druid( very annoying to fight)
3.favored soul (high hp can outlast other builds) self heal
4.fb (hit first)
5. rouge/assassin(hit first)
6. paladin vs evil opponent (very few players play evil, esp those geared to pvp)
7. warlocks (tough attack rips alot apart but generally have low ac/protections) hit first)