I dont understand why mindreading is panned. I am just beginning and I have already learned a lot of info about the various characters and gotten a few good laughs too, not to mention immersion in the game world and background story.
I guess if you just want to get on with killing stuff and are not interested in story then fine...sort of play it as a hack and slash; seems like a shame to reduce the game to that - power level and then complain the game is too easy.

Mindreading the activity is great (although much more could have been done with it). But spending skill points in the Mindreading skill is not a great use of them.

So I finally started spending SP on Firewall...I've got to say this is one heck of a useful magic to have. Right now My magic consist of Firewall( when surrounded by enemies it just KILLS) and Magic Blast to annihilate anyone I don't feel like swinging a gigantic sword at.

I do have one question, at what point would you suggest I use my " unlearn all skills" option? I have Five invested in Wisdom that I would like to place somewhere else. After retrieving the sigil from Broken Valley perhaps?

Within reason, you should unlearn all skills whenever you want to make at least moderate changes. You don't want to try making frequent changes, but as long as you have a good idea of how you want to adjust your character build, and are either pretty sure you will not need to make additional changes or you don't have the spare skill points to easily put off reskilling, go ahead.

The cost to unlearn skills doubles each time you do so, but as gold is relatively easy to come by you don't have to worry too much about that the first couple times. I reskilled right after getting the battle tower, and then again before heading to the hall of echoes, with enough gold left over I could have done so a third time (or forth, with a bit of malachite ore / diamond farming).

or you can just save and try skills

I reskilled twice. Once before turning in a bunch of quests in Orobas Fjords, I maxed out Wisdom to get extra levels. After I had done that, I respecced back to a normal build.

I don't recommend doing that by the way, extra levels just make the game too boring.

Yes, there's a chance. It depends on many factors (thought I'm not a math person, so I'm not even going there!), such as your character level, assignment of skills, whether or not you use your creature/pet and how you have it made.

After two play-throughs (ending on "easy" difficulty), I ended as a mostly melee character, dual wielding, with my summoned demon (I HIGHLY recommend investing points in summon demon-- it does a lot of damage)with many of my stat points in vitality and strength.

By the second play-through, I had learned (from experience) how to make a great warrior, but utilizing some mage skills. Firewall is extremely useful for a melee fighter as it starts 'instant' and continuous damage while wailing away on the bad guys, combined with a powerful creature build, and about 3 skill points in summon demon, and maxed on summon mastery, a lot of points in whirlwind were also beneficial. Used hardly any potions in the last battle. I also had points in regeneration, bleed, and a lot of points in reflect.

A chance? Definitely-- just have fun playing. Make lots of different saves, especially before assigning skill points-- if something isn't to your liking, just go back a bit or use your platform trainer. Make the best use of armor/jewelry/weapons and enchantments. I tend to use the latter to boost areas where I don't want to spend points-- but that's just my personal preference.

Have a blast playing this wonderful game!

~~CierraShore

Time zones are like time travel, so lets just pretend I'm not posting this at an absurd hour. So far, I've only experimented with duel wield and 2H sword warrior/mage's. I have to characters built up to the point to where they've conquered all of Orobas Fjords...

I'm starting a Ranger now...but I want the ultimate ranger, I want to know the essentials. Should I also carry a sword? If so single or 2h? Is STR unimportant with this role? Should I still have points invested in Jump Attack? Whirlwind?

Thanks!

If you go for Ranger, keep always a sword or other melee weapon with you! Some enemies are fast running to you or you trigger a spot in a small place and 3 skeletons with axes attack you!

I prefer a 2 handed sword. I keep 1 shield, but I didn't use it much!

I play a ranger (+ use frequently magic spells like Magic Blast) and love it
Ranger Stealth (passive) is a great skill, I find!
I have also 2 pears of earrings, each with 1 Skill:
one with Stun Arrows and one with Battle Rage.

What I meant more was advice on how to spend stat points. What attributes are most important to upgrade for a successful ranger.

I just started a ranger, and I'm finding it hard on choosing what skills to hot key. I usually reserve two for potions and the rest for skills.

Also it seems you don't get really useful ranger skills until level 15.

I'm completely out of my element when it comes to this style...but I got an itch for using one because of the Robin Hood movie!

SO LET ME GET THIS STRAIGHT.... THE ARCH F*CKING MAGE SET HAS MORE MELEE ATTACK DAMAGE THEN MAGIC, know I may not be the one working as a developer but to me a MAGE SET SHOULD BE MAGIC F*CKING ORIENTATED Can this please be confirmed or denied as I have yet to find the weapon.
THANKS!!!

For the archmage warhammer I have 50-62 melee damage, 15-18 magic damage, with a bonus +26 magic damage with the full set equipped. Perhaps Larian figured anything that got close enough for melee combat was either weak or resistant to magic, so could use some extra conventional damage. Maybe they figured a high intelligence character would end up with a more balanced damage that way.

If you are duel wielding, put the warhammer in your off hand, or use a different weapon (there is not a huge drop in set bonuses with one less piece: 1 less armour rating, or 2 less HP/MP).

Ya I just got it today and I must say the ArchMage set is really BAD.

Mage is by far the STRONGEST OFFENSIVE CLASS imo. Level 10 Magic Missle is hitting 500 each missle with 4 missles per cast.
Definatly A CLASS WORTH PLAYING ONCE!!!

Is this really important enough to justify the extreme mana cost? (I'd rather not waste points on Mana Efficiency.)

I didn't bother with Thousand Strikes at all (playing a strength based duel wielding warrior), though did max Mana Efficiency (more to help with summoning the creature early to mid game). One point in Mana Leech may work just as well, which I also did later in the game, when I had skill points to spare (I didn't have a problem running out of mana, just figured it might come in handy at some point).

I actually only now (after returning to Broken Valley from Sentinel Island to finish up old quests) discovered the enchanter and finished the quest to get a creature. I've played the whole game thus far (level 18) without these things (and without any points in a weapon proficiency) and didn't realize it! At least I never really had any problems without them.

I also took the point in Mana Leech after I saw how much Healing cost. Yikes, I almost never used mana at all until I got that skill! But now even when I use Healing, I have nearly a full mana bar after a fight, so no problem there.

Well, my warrior eventually was able to use it while only spending 3 points into Spirit and none in Mana Efficiency. It does a huge amount of damage, but if you use a lot of mana-using abilities, that might not be worth it.

IMO thousand cuts isn't worth it.

Without any points in spirit but a lot of +mana on the gear I found, I had about 300 mana, and since thousand cuts costs 242 for rank one...

Maybe I could see it being useful if you had points in spirit and mana effeciency, but otherwise it's not worth it having to chug a mana potion every 15 seconds.

But then again I'm a newb and only went through the game just once. Just what I think.

I have to admit, once I was around level 30 and felt comfortable spending a point on it (I had about a million unused points) and enough mana to use it, I really enjoyed TC and found it very useful, especially in boss fights. Was it necessary? Not really, but it was fun and powerful, and combined with Mana Leech, mana was not an issue. I'd recommend getting it a little later in the game, probably earlier than I did though, maybe level 20 or so.

This is a very informative thread. One question about creatures you summon. If you summon demon is the damage they do magic damage or melee damage? If it is melee damage do you get bonuses based on your strength or the summoned creature strength or no bonus at all? If you summon undead (casts fireballs,) do you get a bonus based on your intelligence or the creature's intelligence or no bonus at all?