[1.0.0] Xesah - Dwarf Stone Warden - First Winner

[AIAndy]

http://te4.org/characters/16263/tome/fb ... c00d9364db

Finally got my first win (after the character before this one, a mindslayer, died at the last battle).
For the most part stone wardens are quite balanced. Strong on the defensive part but also some good offensive abilities. But with two specific prodigies they are overpowered at the end. That are Spectral Shield so your shields block all damage types and Eternal Guard so your block stays up for most of the time. If you get two shields from the merchant with those prodigies and use block whenever you can, you reduce (nearly?) all incoming damage by around 650 and trigger counterstrike all the time. That means most enemies can't hurt you at all. Even Atamathon only hurts you with his single strong attack and you can heal back up until it comes again (so no need to flee even in that fight).

Some thoughts about Stone Warden builds:
You need to get strength, magic and will right from the start and max them at the end. Strength is needed to wear the shields and armor you need as stone warden, Magic is needed for the strongest offensive abilities and Will is needed for quite some other abilities (although I am not entirely sure if it is worth it to max it).
Spell/Eldritch Shield is the most powerful tree for Stone Wardens. Eldritch Blow has a very high multiplier so with a critting counterstrike you can do over 5k damage in the end and stunning enemies for quite some turns is always useful. Eldritch Fury can do a lot of damage as well and Eldritch Slam is one of the most powerful AoE abilities in the game (although the cooldown is long).
Spell/Earth is of questionable use beyond one point to sustain a weak Stone Skin. You usually don't want to keep enemies away from you so a knockback attack is bad and you always have your vines to keep them at a distance if you desire so. So maybe Stone Wall for emergencies but I did not bother to put in 3 points to get it.
I took Spell/Eldritch Stone but for a 12 turns cd AoE with a not too large cone it is a high investment to put in a category point and up to 20 skill points. It can apply a lot of debuffs on enemies though.
Spell/Deeprock is a category I took toward the end and it is considerably better than I expected. The skills you can use in Deeprock form scale quite well and the cooldown of volcanic rock is not the 20 turns the help text claims but instead something around 4 turns or so so you can put up quite some volcanoes until the form ends. Interesting is that for every skill point you invest here, the talent level of the ability actually increases by 2.
Wild-gift/Earthen Power contains the key skills that make wardens special. Stoneshield should be maxed at once as it powers your shields. The rest does not need maxing at once but you should get a point in every one of those. Eldritch Stone is a one hit wonder that ceases all mana problems as it converts all the equilibrium you have accumulated to mana. Something is weird about it though as using it as a shield in high damage situations sometimes ends with you having high to very high equilibrium instead of equilibrium being reset to low after it ends.
Wild-gift/Earth Vines is very useful once you can tank well (so you can stand still). The vines need some time to catch everyone (worth it to put in more points than one later) but then you can use one point in Rockwalk and Rockswallow to move around the battlefield and get enemies to you (no real need for more than one point in those as you need vines to use them which is no guarantee if you want them for the healing or damaging).
Wild-gift/Dwarven Nature has two one point wonders with Elemental Split and Power Core. They make the early game quite easy as the stone half shields you and takes the damage instead. I assume that more points in that tree together with Nature's Balance (to use it twice in a row) can be used well as major offense but I chose not to in this run.
Technique/Combat Training has the usual generic point sinks with Thick Skin (might be somewhat late as you won't take constitution except on equipment until very late), Armour Training (you start with three points already) and Combat Accuracy (you need that more than other melee chars as you won't take dexterity so max it fast).
Race/Dwarf has the usual generic sink with Power is Money but you might also put in more points in Resilience of the Dwarves than usual with the extra effect it has from Stone Fortress (although even maxed it still has 25 turn cd so it is questionable).
Wild-gift/Call of the Wild has the mandatory 1 point in meditation to get your equilibrium down until you get Eldritch Stone and Nature's Touch as heal (not a lot of points needed here either). Nature's Balance is questionable unless you use it specifically for Elemental Split as you have very few active wild-gift abilities.
I highly recommend getting Spell/Stone Alchemy as you have surplus generic points and it is quite useful. Extract Gems makes you rich to get a lot of items from the unique merchant and Imbue Item is always useful. Gem Portal is a one point wonder for escaping. I did not get Stone Touch but it might be very useful in combination with Eldritch Blow to deal more than 30% damage.