ToME: the Tales of Maj'Eyal

(this is my first post in this section i believe)
so, i have made a few builds on with adventurer, that seemd grand in theory, but in effect were trash
arcane reaver - seems good... its not.
aegis palading - it seems that heals comming from passive do not trigger the shield, which means i weapon of light dong give me that bonus.
arcane slayer - at some point i started putting mind slayer talents for the bonus stats. and stat hoarding begins.

now i have a build that has killed the master.
i present you, THE ARCANE BRAWLER.

class trees:
pugilism - for combo points and multi-hit
finishing moves - cause why not?
tactical - for the counters (also, the 3rd talent increase crits)
arcane combat - for the damage that brawler SEEMS to be lacking (i know, i am just bad and brawler is awesome and stuff.)
fire - (element of choice) comes with arcane combat
enhancements - didn't know what else, and the stamina on hit seemed perfect for super fast hitting class.

generic tress:
unarmed combat - (is all you need at the start)
ghouls racial - cause the leap and stats and retch.

later i acquired the generic weapon and armour training from the last hope.
also, i got thuggery for the crits, but that was a mistake, for the same reason that fiery hands is a good thing.
and the next time i play (same charcter, not died yet) i will get vile life asap.

the build so far is awesome. with i can easly cast 3 flames with a spinning backhand, and trigger arcane destruction a few with the flurry of fists. spinning backhand, butterfly kick, and ghoulish leap seams like enough mobility sofar, and with biting gale rune i can prevent enemies from escaping or contributing to the fight. with biting gale rune, heat beam and acid wave, i can rid of any de-buff that comes my way.
i was also thinking about spending a category for reshape, but with no weapons it seems stupid.

how do you think i can improve my arcane brawler?

Magical Combat definitely pairs well with unarmed skills due to the multi-hit attacks. The main complaint I have for unarmed Adventurers is that you need to spend a cat point to unlock your weapon mastery, whereas every other build except bow/sling can just pay gold to unlock their mastery.

Spell/Stone is generally considered the best damage line to support Magical Combat, but other things can definitely work. The downside of Fire is that some of the damage is over time, while procs work best as front-loaded damage. You might want to try Spell/Air if you don't want to do Stone; Lightning does good damage and can hit multiple enemies in a line, like Flame does, and deals all its damage instantly.

I'm not sure Ghoul is the best race choice unless you're using something to bring your global speed up to 100+%. Proc builds rely heavily on attack speed for their damage. I would rather play a different race and just gain defenses/mobility by unlocking strong categories. Shalore or Cornac are usually the best options, although others can work well with specific builds.

It seems like your build lacks healing/defense and you don't have many generic categories. I would consider Spell/Aegis and/or Celestial/Light. Light in particular is good for undead because it gives two things you generally lack: healing and condition removal.

Spell/Enhancement is pretty nice, but I don't think I'd want to unlock it on an Adventurer. The problem is that it doesn't have many good skills. I would generally only want to invest in the first and maybe third skills, and neither is really earth-shattering. The stamina gain is nice, but it's likely not enough to sustain continuous attack spam. Compare to Celestial/Combat, in which every skill is strong.

I would consider taking Unarmed Discipline over Finishing Moves. Combination Kick is probably the overall best use of combo points, and you lose the points when you do a finisher anyway.

I use a Mindslayer category on every build because TK wield is amazing and the Mindslayer skills are good in their own right. Psionic/Absorption is usually the best option, but Psionic/Augmented Mobility is also good. I generally wouldn't take Psionic/Finer Energy Manipulation on an unarmed build because you can't reshape your gloves; however, the first skill is still decent as a minor heal + physical cleanse.

Since you're already investing in Dex for unarmed, Techniques/Battle Tactics is really nice for getting extra attacks and increased move speed between fights.

1: As adventurer i have to unlock all trees anyway, so thats not a problem.

2: lvl5 flame seems to do flat damage, rather than burn. so it becomes a no concert once i lvl it up.

3: tree-wise, seems just really good, and i dont know any other tree that would work in its place early.
as for speed, well, brawler hits multiple targets or multiple times, so as for me it doesn't seem to be an issue, unless i leap into the ring of angry mages... that was a mistake.

4: always take BiL... always. i was thinking that it wouldn't be a problem since i have retch if needed to heal. Problem became apparent when i was escorting Melinda, and she survived the first fight with 30hp...

5: as far as i have gone i never had "too many class points" so i only spent into fiery hands, and then temporarily unlocked shocking hands. well, it wasn't great, but it was enough to last. i also had some item that increased stamina regen.

6: in my vanilla brawler run i got the combinaion kick to get the tempest, but i tihnk i have not actually used it.
and if i get that tree, i will surely get the throws.

7: in my past attempts at other builds, i tryed to get the reshape or psi-fighting, but this build had no points spend on willpower sofar, so i decided to avoid it this time. also, as mentioned above no weapon, makes reshape a bit weak, and i don't think i can reshape gauntlets. i was thinking about augmented mobility before i got thuggery, but it takes willpower to lvl get.

8: battle tatics... ah yes, i got the greater weapon focus on gauntless, and have to say its a nice talnet.

Thanks for the help with the arcane brawler.

1. It does matter, though. A build that uses swords or daggers can unlock Combat Training for 50gp to get their mastery. Staff and mindstar builds can unlock their mastery for 500gp. For unarmed, you need to actually spend a category point because you can't buy it anywhere. That's not to say unarmed is bad, but losing a category on an Adventurer really hurts.

2. Flame does most of its damage up front, but it does do part of it over 3 turns. You won't be doing the damage you see on the tooltip during the first turn, whereas you will with Lightning or Earthen Missiles. It's up to you though. If you like Fire, go for it. Also, Fire has some nice nukes if you want to cast spells in addition to attacking in melee.

3. Brawler does hit multiple times, but that's only with attack skills. You're going to be doing a lot of bump attacks between your skills in the longer fights, so having 80% speed is lowering your overall damage significantly. If you like Ghoul so be it, but it's hard for me to believe it's an ideal race for this kind of build.

7. Once you have the TK slot, you can wield a gem to get +stats to meet skill and item requirements. You shouldn't need to put any points in Willpower.

1: i was sure you mean that its not unlocked from the start? should have checked seemed strange... assuming things will only cause trouble.

2: i am not a "win on madness rogue-like pro" i took fire cause it seem like doing more damage than lightning, a can be unlocked instantly, unlike stone. my new shaloren brawler however is waiting for the stone.

3: i know most of the basics, but i am still not very experienced with this game. so far i have only won once, with a sun paladin ghoul (which seemed kind of op). and as for other races i cant seem to find a good use for their talents.
shaloren however has a bonus to speed AND to crits, aswell as scales with dex or magic.

7: i agree. but does augmented mobility give you a T-K slot? no skill in that tree interac't with it, so i don't think it would.
if i take FEM i may make a use of a reshape with a TK wielded weapon... more hits and crits...

Certainly an arcane brawler can be a very good build, when we consider it as the offensive portion of a build. When paired with Stone it is possibly one of the most damaging combinations in the game.

I was able to hit for 80,000 damage with a combination kick on my Madness tuned Stone arcane brawler. I consider that good damage.

But Effigy is right that brawling in general is a tough choice as an adventurer since you basically really want to take the brawling genric. On the plus side the brawling generic line has multiple quite nice skills in it. The extra speed when a projectile is shot at you is great, IMO, the extra stats are pretty nice and the damage reducing power is also pretty nice when paired with other things.

So its by no means a no-go. But it does require some extra thought/efficiency. You need to be careful about how many generic lines you take so you don't run out of points but also you want to make sure you really leverage the entire line so you are "wasting" the cat point.

Anyway arcane brawler is doable and is very very powerful when done right. Stone is much better than any other option though. Of course as with any adventurer is extremely easy to be substantially sub-optimal, so Your Mileage May Vary.

Putting a point in any talent from any of the Mindslayer-specific categories will unlock Telekinetic Grasp and Beyond the Flesh. You could even just take 1/5 Realign from Psionic/Finer Energy Manipulations if you wanted. I wouldn't really recommend investing in Reshape Weapon/Armor though. The benefit is just too low for unarmed builds. Realign is quite strong with multiple points since it can remove up to 3 physical effects and heal at the same time.

Radon26 wrote:1: i was sure you mean that its not unlocked from the start? should have checked seemed strange... assuming things will only cause trouble.

2: i am not a "win on madness rogue-like pro" i took fire cause it seem like doing more damage than lightning, a can be unlocked instantly, unlike stone. my new shaloren brawler however is waiting for the stone.

3: i know most of the basics, but i am still not very experienced with this game. so far i have only won once, with a sun paladin ghoul (which seemed kind of op). and as for other races i cant seem to find a good use for their talents.
shaloren however has a bonus to speed AND to crits, aswell as scales with dex or magic.

7: i agree. but does augmented mobility give you a T-K slot? no skill in that tree interac't with it, so i don't think it would.
if i take FEM i may make a use of a reshape with a TK wielded weapon... more hits and crits...

You really want to use stone. I know it feels bad to wait, I know it seems like the other ones should at least be in striking distance etc, but they aren't. Stone is worlds better for multiple reasons.

Here is what you do, make sure your character can "see" zigur by starting you character with no mana bar when you zone out to main map the first time. Goto Zigur and buy a mindblast torque.

The mindblast torque will be enough to get you to level 10 on Normal or Nightmare. Unlock Stone, then start cruising for some monster bruising.

Its true that this makes the first 10 levels kind of Meh as you don't even use magic combat, but its worth it. Really it is.

In the end the mindblast torque is like having had flame or lightning in that it gives you a magic-ish beam attack and you don't need to waste a cat point to get it and you don't need to have those lines vastly worse magic combat triggered spells.

I just won quite recently with an arcane brawler build (adventurer normal). And uhh... His name is Jeff? Doesn't quite have the same ring to it.

I unlocked cunning/shadow magic, arcane combat, pugilism, fire (just a preference) and for generics I went with combat training, unarmed mastery, and conditioning. First cat point went into unarmed discipline, next got an inscription, then a spells/enhancement, another inscription, got cauterize for one prodigy (maybe not the best, but It was really all I could get), and then flexible combat. There's probably a thing or two I'm missing in there, but that was the gist of it.

Link: http://te4.org/characters/120913/tome/b ... 3575951b08

Micbran wrote:I just won quite recently with an arcane brawler build (adventurer normal). And uhh... His name is Jeff? Doesn't quite have the same ring to it.

I unlocked cunning/shadow magic, arcane combat, pugilism, fire (just a preference) and for generics I went with combat training, unarmed mastery, and conditioning. First cat point went into unarmed discipline, next got an inscription, then a spells/enhancement, another inscription, got cauterize for one prodigy (maybe not the best, but It was really all I could get), and then flexible combat. There's probably a thing or two I'm missing in there, but that was the gist of it.

Link: http://te4.org/characters/120913/tome/b ... 3575951b08

One thing I would caution people about making an arcane bralwer is Shadow magic is not as amazing as it may seem at first. That isn't to say its a bad choice or don't take it. If you want shadowstep its great. But the SP boost specifically may sound synergistic but it really wind up giving relatively little spellpower when you do the math. Similarly you are probably not boosting darkness damage and are instead going phys/fire/lightning etc.

In the end, unless you specifically intend to make real use of Shadowstep, there are actually better options.

Again its not a bad choice per se, I just want to put it out there since it initially seems like slam dunk really good synergy but its actually nothing amazing (Shadowstep is an amazing talent for what it is, but you can get by without it with movements infusions). So its something to be careful about.

cctobias wrote:

Micbran wrote:I just won quite recently with an arcane brawler build (adventurer normal). And uhh... His name is Jeff? Doesn't quite have the same ring to it.

I unlocked cunning/shadow magic, arcane combat, pugilism, fire (just a preference) and for generics I went with combat training, unarmed mastery, and conditioning. First cat point went into unarmed discipline, next got an inscription, then a spells/enhancement, another inscription, got cauterize for one prodigy (maybe not the best, but It was really all I could get), and then flexible combat. There's probably a thing or two I'm missing in there, but that was the gist of it.

Link: http://te4.org/characters/120913/tome/b ... 3575951b08

One thing I would caution people about making an arcane bralwer is Shadow magic is not as amazing as it may seem at first. That isn't to say its a bad choice or don't take it. If you want shadowstep its great. But the SP boost specifically may sound synergistic but it really wind up giving relatively little spellpower when you do the math. Similarly you are probably not boosting darkness damage and are instead going phys/fire/lightning etc.

In the end, unless you specifically intend to make real use of Shadowstep, there are actually better options.

Again its not a bad choice per se, I just want to put it out there since it initially seems like slam dunk really good synergy but its actually nothing amazing (Shadowstep is an amazing talent for what it is, but you can get by without it with movements infusions). So its something to be careful about.

If you're talking about the limited usefulness of shadow combat, then yes, I do agree that shadow magic isn't really that great. But I don't often use movement infusions for some reason and instead prefer to stack regen infusions, status clear and shields. So shadowstep was quite nice.

And for all future arcane brawlers who use shadow magic, I would suggest disabling shadow combat ~level 15. Its damage is sub-par after a certain point.

Micbran wrote:

cctobias wrote:

Micbran wrote:I just won quite recently with an arcane brawler build (adventurer normal). And uhh... His name is Jeff? Doesn't quite have the same ring to it.

I unlocked cunning/shadow magic, arcane combat, pugilism, fire (just a preference) and for generics I went with combat training, unarmed mastery, and conditioning. First cat point went into unarmed discipline, next got an inscription, then a spells/enhancement, another inscription, got cauterize for one prodigy (maybe not the best, but It was really all I could get), and then flexible combat. There's probably a thing or two I'm missing in there, but that was the gist of it.

Link: http://te4.org/characters/120913/tome/b ... 3575951b08

One thing I would caution people about making an arcane bralwer is Shadow magic is not as amazing as it may seem at first. That isn't to say its a bad choice or don't take it. If you want shadowstep its great. But the SP boost specifically may sound synergistic but it really wind up giving relatively little spellpower when you do the math. Similarly you are probably not boosting darkness damage and are instead going phys/fire/lightning etc.

In the end, unless you specifically intend to make real use of Shadowstep, there are actually better options.

Again its not a bad choice per se, I just want to put it out there since it initially seems like slam dunk really good synergy but its actually nothing amazing (Shadowstep is an amazing talent for what it is, but you can get by without it with movements infusions). So its something to be careful about.

If you're talking about the limited usefulness of shadow combat, then yes, I do agree that shadow magic isn't really that great. But I don't often use movement infusions for some reason and instead prefer to stack regen infusions, status clear and shields. So shadowstep was quite nice.

And for all future arcane brawlers who use shadow magic, I would suggest disabling shadow combat ~level 15. Its damage is sub-par after a certain point.

Everything except Shadowstep is essentially not that amazing although it may appear that way. Shadow cunning being layered on top of your other spellpower boosts winds up rather minimal due to the stepdowns on power. Shadow Combat is subpar and not worth the mana as you have said. Shadow feed is initially nice but once you get some mana on spell crit and decent crit rate its superfluous.

Now for my money Shadowstep is the best skill of its type and shadow cunning and shadow feed still have some use, so its an ok line. But the things like extra sp for an non-mage and the additional scaling on cunning seem like they fit a magic combat build well but really don't you wind up only a few power point ahead due to shadow cunning since you are likely to be in the 4 or 5 points to 1 point step down range anyway, that could be a high estimation , I suppose, since that can be gear dependent. If you find yourself in the 3 point step down range maybe shadow cunning starts feeling pretty nice.