ToME: the Tales of Maj'Eyal

I wanted to unlock the yeek race in b20 so i did a new character, trying out a fun arcane blade following the idea of playing mainly with normal attacks (http://forums.te4.org/viewtopic.php?f=49&t=24255 about my shield berzerkers). I had a very simple idea: i would go cornac race and i would try to make a build around a talent tree i would get from an escort with this extra talent.
I run into a alchemist in trollmire and had the luck that the exit was just 2 trolls and 2 wolves away. So i was choosing staff combat. Generic point were needed somewhere else first levels so i ignoerd staves for 10 levels. I was leveling in the maze where i could line up enemies and use a level 5 flame (i.e. it's a beam). Also no risc to loose escorts while i was still building up an offense for the character.
I now managed to unlock yeeks at level 25 without dying. I have to play this character very carefully because arcane blades are new to me, it is not the way they seem to be designed, i do a magic/dexterity approach, ...

So one problem is that staff combat is doing less damage than other two-handed weapons. I try to avoid this by trying to make a critical hit build, precise strikes (dexterity), building up some cunning (for evasion), ...
Another disadvantage is that staves have nothing to add on a hit, there is nothing like 20 darkness,20 light damage on a weapon, so i need a better chance to cast a flame spell on a hit: again dexterity is the needed stat.

So a lot of disadvantages, but there is also some fun:
You play like a golf player: a skeleton hmm, ash 3 or dragonbone 5, ash staff with fire damage or dragonbone with acid, ... and there are a lot of damage types to choose from.
Rush is recharching and an archer still hitting you: watch out archer, my staff can shoot.

Currently the character runs around with 7 sustains and none is from an escort quest, as i said i am new to arcane blades and i wonder how i could defend the character with just premonition and a wild rune.

I love crazy fun builds !

Level35 now, still never died,except orc ambush which i just finished.

Problems i have:
Flame: I have a more than 50% chance to trigger it on a hit. It is around 40% the damage i do. So at flame immunes i do significantly less damage.
Mana: I have 10 sustained combat arts. In the heat of battle and running out of mana because of automatic casted flames i may loose half of them.
Damage types: Staff combat is doing very low damage if you are not prepared to the damage resists in an area. My only dragon-bone staff yet is a darkness one, so i do hard versus most undeads. I hope for a good blue dragon bone staff with fire damage, fire damage boost and spell power.
Hand surgery: I prefer to play characters which can do their job to 90%+ with just normal attacks. After 20 combat rounds and a 50% chance for flame i am normally on low mana. So i need manasurge a lot. I think my shield berzerkers were easier to play.

Advantages:
A dexterity and staff based arcane blade has a good spellpower.
You can do staff shots while pinned.
The daze attack from staff combat can be used to use infusions, daze is only broken if you attack. So it is a nice addon to the weapon combat arts.

What i would change at a restart:
Developing the lightning tree together with the fire tree earlier in the game. Currently i have to start with lightning at level 36... Save a talent point for 4th infusion: a second mana-surge. I have no mana for probability travel anyway and teleporting i can do with a staff.

What i would like in the wiki:
A list of areas and which damage type would be best in these areas. So i can put the best 2 staves in my weapon slots.

Summary:
A funny character, who has a drawback: it's kill speed. I failed to kill all enemies in time at the save the girl quest. Doubt that i can get moon rings (i lack the second mana surge infusion). I surely will give it a retry at one of the next beta's. A staff fighter obviously needs good staves. A mage just has to look for spellpower, spell crits but the staff fighting arcane blade also has to look for a fitting damage type and a high weapon power. So in my experience from 10 staves i would use for a mage, only 1 is good enough for a staff wielding arcane blade.
I managed to unlocked skeleton, yeek, chronomancer. tempest, ... with this character. I will try a yeek summoner now to unlock psionics, wonder if they can be played with mainly normal attacks. No experience with this class.

With the limited time i can play i plan to play builds away from mainstream, like my bards in tome2: slowing song and tidal waves as a yavanna follower.

Almost nobody can save Melinda in 20b. The new spellcaster AI makes the casters retreat from your furious onslaught, and by the time you catch them, it's too late. So, that's not a problem with your character build.

I am currently trying a staff paladin. Are paladin spells affected by spellpower? Which stat (if there is any) is affecting staff defense? I plan to play a sort of Battle-mage, with a staff used mainly for riposting while doing most damage with spells.
I got a thief and an alchemist escort first 8 levels, so i will unlock staff mastery at level 10. Anyone played something similiar so far?

Does riposte work with a staff?

The spells and things do scale with spellpower. Will be interesting to see how your build turns out.

Try the Staff of Destruction, even though it has low power, the (+150% Magic) multiplier more than makes up for it.

The problem with playing a reposte build while using a staff is that you'll be hit much more often than if you were to use a 1hander + shield - even with staff defense.

All talents - if the stat required is Magic - scales off of spellpower. Thus, all of the Sun Paladins [magic] matters talents will function better with a staff.

If you REALLY want to raise your spell damage - go with the last chant [the +light damage] and find Star and a good shield - you'll end up with about +33[?]% light damage - but if you go Star Moon - you'll get about +43[?]% light damage! Even with +30 spellpower, you'll be kinda hardpressed to back out of having all your spell talents and your physical talents [ala Weapon of Light] from being boosted so nicely.

The character is a sort of family character, whoever has some time plays a bit:
It is named Lumena (Lumen = Light). Riposte is working fine without a shield, the divine guardian tree needs a shield, so no automatic healing for this character.

http://te4.org/characters/3263/tome/204 ... 1cc000edf0

At level 10 so far, pushing strength to 22 quickly for massive armours and some modifying, then points were put in magic, 1 in dexterity and 2 in cunning (for a knife, then replaced by scalpel), jump from level5-8: boss fight

Level 1: 3STR, Shield Pummel 1, Weapon Combat 1, Weapon of Light 2
Level 2: 3STR, Weapons Mastery 1, Quick Recovery 1
Level 3: 1STR, 2MAG, Massive Armour Training 1, Weapon of Light 3
Level 4: 3MAG, Riposte 1, Healing Light 1
Level 5: 3MAG, Weapon of Light 5
Level 8: 9MAG, Chant of Fortitude 4, Riposte 2, Fast metabolism 1, Sun Flare 1
Level 9: 2MAG, 1DEX, Chant of Fortitude 5, Martyrdom 1
Level10: 1MAG, 2CUN, Sun Flare3

Trying to walk the staff combat line now: Generic points into staff combat , while class points are used to raise Riposte and Precise Strikes for more strikes and better hit chance and. Level20 was Sandworm queen.

Level11: 2Mag, 1DEX, Riposte 3, Channel Staff 1
Level12: 3DEX, Staff Mastery 1, Sun Flare 4
Level13: 3MAG, Defensive Posture 1, Sun Flare 5
Level14: 1MAG, 2DEX, Precise Strikes 1, Defensive Posture 2
Level15: 3DEX, Precise Strikes 2, Riposte 4
Level16: 3MAG, Precise Strikes 3, Defensive Posture 3
Level17: 1MAG, 2DEX, Riposte 5, Defensive Posture 4
Level18: 2MAG, 1DEX, Precise Strikes 4, Defensive Posture 5
Level20: 2MAG, 7DEX, Health 1, Blunt Thrust 1, Precise Strikes 5, Rush 2, Perfect Strike 1
Level21: 2MAG, 1DEX, Blinding Speed 1, Bathe in Light 1
Level22: 1MAG, 2DEX, Barrier 1, Firebeam 1
Level23: 2MAG, 1DEX, Providence 1, Sunburst 1
Level24: 1MAG, 2DEX, Staff Mastery 2, Spell Shield 1
Level25: 1MAG, 2DEX, Wave of Power 1, Crusade 1
Level26: 2MAG, 1DEX, Healing Light 2, Rush 3
Level27: 1MAG, 2DEX, Healing Light 3, Rush 4
Level28: 2MAG, 1DEX, Healing Light 4, Rush 5
Level29: 3DEX, Chant of Foritude 1, Sunburst 2
Level30: 3DEX, Sunburst 4
Level31: 3DEX, Chant of Resistance 1, Sunburst 5

I hope to find a chronomancer dragonbone-staff of warding (light). The chronomancer attribute will gibe movement speed, while warding gives a nice defense boost. The light damage of the staff could be boosted with the chant which boosts light damage.