ToME: the Tales of Maj'Eyal

My experience is still just with the early game as I pave middle earth with the bodies of dead low level characters, but it seems like Archers do a crapton of damage AND scale fast, while Arcane Blades struggle on both accounts plus have weak combat longevity? Have I just not figured out Arcane Blades yet?

I'm in the same boat, having just re-found tome... the number of sub-10 characters littering the way is quite frightening - no wonder there are so many bears in those woods, plenty of carrion.

I've had the most luck with archers and berserkers, I tried doing an arcane blade for a while and it really does seem a bit slow to start out. Archers are straight off pretty great and berserkers... gods they are fun.

Anyways I hope you're having as much fun dying constantly as I am
(lvl18 berserker is as far as i've gotten, should have avoided those elven ruins in hindsight)

I haven't really figured out Arcane Blades myself. Or, Shadow Blades for that matter.

I've found most ranged characters, such as archers and mages, to be really strong early on.
I don't know about archers if they wear heavy and massive armors, but most of these have to play extremely carefully later on in order to avoid being 1-shotted by bosses.
At least, that's what I've seen, though I've never gotten past The Master, myself (and started the actual plot... ).

Arcane blades change a lot once you get a ring of mana, because then you can cast Sense all the time.

But even still ... I played one for a bit, but had an awful lot of trouble with monsters that could stun. A melee character without shield wall (high defense boost, stun immunity) seems very tough. Maybe if I'd found some armour of stability it would have helped..