1.6 Cursed Ghoul

[Delmuir]

It was a dodgy start as you have I had useful way of healing but once I acquired retch at level 8, it was a cakewalk until Lake Nur when I ran into an Oozing Horror AND a Worm that Walks at the same damn time. It went about as well as one would anticipate. Four deaths to the Worm and one to the Horror, though that was only because I was running from the Worm.

Only made it to level 15 but some things are worth noting. Cursed is essentially the same in that it's a rough start but it snowballs into a powerhouse. However, the new Predator category is a pretty decent low-investment category. It would be nice if it justified a bit more of an investment but as it stands, 5-7 points in total are enough. Basically, it keeps track of how many kills you make of every enemy type and grants a little bonus to accuracy and armor penetration. You could probably get away with just the first skill but it's worth 3 points for the rest of the category.

The new third skill in the Gloom category now just does damage per action and when combined with Predator's Miasma and some retch, enemies get whittled down in a hurry. I don't know if it can trigger multiple times per turn because it does say "per action" and not "per turn" but I'll find out next game. The point is that you can layer damage over time pretty effectively.

I suspect that a Dwarf or an Ogre or Thalore yet again, would make a much better Cursed than a Ghoul as that lack of healing is rough.

All in all it's probably the easiest class to play as it's almost entirely passive skills and bump-attacks.

[Delmuir]

Another Cursed Ghoul... yep, it's pretty rock-solid on Normal difficulty. He's in his low 30's right now and is pretty much indestructible. I say this with confidence because I'm not optimizing gear or really playing with any strategy at all or even really paying attention. I'm just sloppily running through the game without any problems whatsoever.

Mobility isn't an issue, and neither is defense but you become ridiculously durable so long as you get Cursed Aura "Shrouds." So, pretty standard Cursed stuff.

The aggregate damage over time (DoT) from Miasma and the 3rd Gloom skill combined the 4th Cursed Aura skill and sometimes Retch and so on... yeah, you can actually chip away pretty nicely

The Predator category is nice but not worth a big investment because of diminishing returns. The Gloom is also nice but not really worth a big investment. You don't have the mindpower for it, which is ironic in a sense. A lot of skills offer accuracy and so you hit pretty darn consistently. What I'd like to see is a synergy between Gloom an Predator such as a bonus to mindpower gloom skills based on the Predator bonuses and if the enemy is in the Miasma, or something like that.

The ultimate effect of the new Cursed is that it's kind of hard to find a place to put points because the diminishing returns are brutal on most skills. The nerfing of Harass Prey sort of irritates me but it's tolerable, I guess.

[Delmuir]

Third attempt, all killed by a rare Dread with Temporal Warden talents... the same damn enemy type.

The Temporal Warden and Paradox Mage talent sets are brutal...

Ghoul Cursed is not a great build but it is a workable one. The Cursed itself lacks the willpower to make use of its Gloom effect. Not entirely sure what to do about that but...

EDIT: 1.67 seems to have fixed some balance issues and so I'll probably make another run at this.