Dobri

I agree with the decision to take Battle aura with damage reflection. I was doing some tests, and I didn't see the Repair mod working in combat. If it's just a HP regen boost, then damage reflection is by far the better pick, since you can always wait till you're full HP again. For all I understand, the TG is all about sturdiness and every mod or skill that is consistent with this idea will just make him better. As for concentration, I'll go with your recommendation. On paper the TG does look good with 2 buffs up, especially one that boosts his offensive capabilities. EDIT: He is indeed better with the 2 buffs - T-Shroud and Battle aura. After powerleveling a TG to try it out (and deleting him afterwards), the results surpassed my expectations. BAsed on that I changed the build I formerly proposed.

Actually I don't like the EP skill just because of the magic finding and the chance to spot hidden places. Unlocking chance to find valuables & experience per kill is just too much to just brush aside. Besides, the TG is blessed to have it in the 1st part of the tree, which means you don't need to waste a skill pick for it. Actually the idea came from the BFG Seraphim I posted a pic not before long - she's at +82.4% xp per kill now just because of this. The TG can't get that close to this value because he can't use shields, but the battery may still get this attribute. And as we well know, the extra magic find is always useful and will get those rares and set items to drop much more often. I must confess that I always overlooked it, until I started playing my current BFG seraphim. This is why I get to pick that skill anytime I have the opportunity. Sadly, some class builds just don't get to it, but whatever. As for Deathly spears, that's my favorite skill. Get damage/fire/jab, add combat discipline, and the TG rocks, just as your analysis suggests. Surround yourself with enemies and Spears will pulverize them in no time. Well, I have to say that we're getting pretty close to the best TG build based on devout guardian here. What do you think about concentration? Is it worth taking it, since it'll stay at level 1 just because of the second buff?

Well... Cycling is all too good, but you need 5 skill picks just to cover them. Then you need concentration for buffs, it's 6. You need Armor lore, that's 7. This leaves only 3 skill picks for other skills. If you play close combat char, that's just not enough

Your analysis is making me think about concentration now... I still have 2 picks on my TG, 1 will be warding lore, the other may well be concentration for the battle aura. However, it is a tough call - which is better - to slap dedicated blows every few seconds (it usually connects for me and is 1-hit kill in 90% of the chances vs. normal mobs) or have some extra attack capabilities or, of course, try to combine both. Now this will take some testing...

Well, it doesn't matter - in any case, it's really great to have people on these forums ready to help, isn't it? Gj Arperum.

Assuming you're facing the barricaded door to the Old naval port - turn left and continue on the road to the village. You will (shortly) notice a path to your right going upwards in the mountains. Follow it until you reach an intersection with a post with two arrows (point them to get the directions). To the left is the old port administration (where you will kill the lich later on) and to the right is the old naval port, where you need to go and kill the zombies.

It most definitely will. However, I just don't like spreading myself between too many skills - and devout guardian will boost your primary attack Combat Arts, so it should be maxed. Warding energy boosts defense, so max again. However, you may be able to do what I wanted to in another TG build. I was considering taking Devout + Fusion to give the TG more attack options. I would really advise you to refrain from spreading yourself through 3 aspects, but since you want to play only through silver, I doubt this will be much of a problem. However if it's just for the test - go Single Player, mod the XP from quests in balance.txt in the scripts/server folder of your S2FA and see how the TG will fare. Since it's a test, it's not cheating - it's better to save yourself some time and play for a day or two for a test, than waste a month to realize this is not what you wanted.

After much replaying, rerolling and analyzing, that should be the final build I'd like to propose. Concentration is back in the game, although it will stay at only 1 point. Personally, I don't like picking up skills that I won't increase and/or use, but it seems you can't get away with that one. Based on that, I can offer the following TG build: 1st pick: Tactics Lore 2nd pick: Sword Lore 3rd pick: Devout Guardian (the skills in this tree are very powerful and you can still shoot and mod T-Energy Shroud) 4th pick: Armor Lore 5th pick: Concentration 6th pick: Toughness 7th pick: Combat reflexes 8th pick: Combat Discipline (this, combined with Devout Focus will force the TG to use skills almost non-stop, and dedicated blow is indeed an awesome skill) NOTE: You can swap the 8th and 9th pick if you feel the enemies are taking chunks off you more often that they should 9th pick: Warding energy lore (to improve your shield even more) 10th pick: Spell Resistance or Enhanced Perception NOTE: You can substitute enhanced perception with something else if you already have viable equipment for a TG. However, after I discovered the usefulness of this skill, I just can't get enough of it... This build gives you power to crush the simple mobs on the map easily, and as for bosses, my favorite tactic is to make ins and outs and slap an overpowered dedicated blow every 5 seconds or so. So far it hasn't let me down, so I guess it's pretty much viable. Since the build I'm proposing is also tank-like, I think it should fall into Llama8's topic, since the tank was his idea

The Temple Guardian is a very delicate character. First, I'd have to say watch out with him --- But I want to use the laser pistol until I find a good sword --- You can compensate the lack of mastery skill in different ways. For example, you got a unique or rare pistol with nice attributes. Switch to dedicated blow or battle extension (if you don't have the runes, trade for them). Your pistol will be your ranged weapon now. Try to buy as much items with sockets and start slapping Whef runes (the ones that increase damage and attack values) and a few anneal runes (the ones that increase defense). This should make you sturdy enough to beat the crap out of almost anything, even without a mastery for about 15 levels. Afterwards that tactic seems to gradually decline in terms of usefulness. So, use the gun and still pick you preferred weapon lore (say, sword). --- But what if I just took speed lore to raise my attack numbers? Is speed lore a bottom of the barrel skill? Or is it just not viable in niobium or whatever... --- Well, although it's nice to run around and have slightly improved values, it just isn't good enough in my opinion. I'd rather take the riding skill than speed lore. Speed lore improves speed, attack and def values. Riding nets you a unique mount that gives you HP, defense and speed, as well as reducing the cooldown of chosen aspect Combat Arts - that equals increased survivability. You just need to do a simple quest and that is it --- While I don't want to get stuck in silver unable to complete it or something my style of gaming isn't to always take the better skill etc. --- If it's just for silver, I doubt you'll have any problems. Bronze and silver can be beaten with even the crappiest builds. It's actually in platinum and niobium where the build starts to actually count. If you're looking for a build, I can offer you this one. It's been working for my TG for over 40 levels now, and he kicks ass without any problems (keeping in mind he was my first char in S2FA). I did not take concentration, because I discovered that the only buff I need is well-modded T-Energy shroud. 1st pick: Tactics Lore 2nd pick: Sword Lore 3rd pick: Devout Guardian (the skills in this tree are very powerful and you can still shoot and mod T-Energy Shroud) 4th pick: Armor Lore 5th pick: Enhanced Perception (I always underestimated this skill - no more!) 6th pick: Toughness 7th pick: Combat reflexes 8th pick: Combat Discipline (this, combined with Devout Focus will force the TG to use skills almost non-stop, and dedicated blow is indeed an awesome skill) 9th pick: Warding energy lore (to improve your shield even more) 10th pick: Bargaining (if you have no other char with this skill) or Spell Resistance or Riding (if you want to use the mobiculum, but I'd say TG is better on foot)

Here goes the final take of the BFG Seraphim. I'll be keeping this one - she's just bloody awesome!! I know I underestimated enhanced perception, but I never knew it can be THAT good. It also represents another take on the BFG build - if it proves to be successful (as it is right now) I will do a small writeup on it, since it sort of differs quite a bit from Erling's BFG build. NOTE the XP per kill value This will explain how did she manage to be level 53 in just 22 and a half hours game time on silver Hope you like it - and I'm on my way to the seraphim's island now

The arm-cannon is a unique weapon, the damage is taken from the battery & the equiped weapon (though if you're using a ranged weapon, you'll never fire the arm-cannon). Arm-cannon attack speed & chance to hit is taken from the equiped weapon & it's relevant weapon-specific lore (so if you're using a sword & have lots of points in Sword Lore, you'll have an accurate & rapid firing arm-cannon). Helpful as always, Llama8 Thank you very much for the info. It's good I did what I did Pumping points in sword lore and the rest on the skills I need. It's nice to see that my first ever char in S2FA wasn't a failure at all.

My bad then, I should have made a search first to check out whether someone else found it.

Having read through the easter egg section in the wolfe's site (and the analogies to Harry Potter, Forest Gump and such), I noticed he didn't add something I just observed now. I was doing "The undead legion" quest, and the name of the NPC that sends you to kill the three lich princes is Barti Slartifass. I'd have to say that sounds surprisingly like Slartibartfass, a character from the science fiction novel "A hitchhiker's guide to the Galaxy" Maybe they missed it. Here's a screenie I took when I was just completing the quest:

Well, it all come down to this: What do you want from the game? If you want to check the game with each char, make 1 of each class, read through forums and sites carefully, pick a build, and give that class all appropriate items. This way you'll have a lot of space and a lot of collected items. If you want to complete the game with one class and see it through, you'll need only the space in your stash + some of that in the shared stash. Actually it all comes down to what do you want in single player. Then you can plan the space accordingly As for what else gets saved: only you game advancement. You can change few or no things there. For example the can't respec your char, can't change the name, but you can change the hair color. That is it I would still go to My documents and keep regular backups of the Ascaron folder there. Just in case. I hate to lose chars I've beem playing for over a month now

It's absolutely safe. Since I also play Single, I have utilized both my inventory and my shared inventory. When this happens, all you can do is create toons from each class and start collecting class-specific stuff and putting it where it belongs Just be careful and don't delete them Since I'm a crazy item-keeper, this tactic is working wonders for me

Well, I just found out that ranged weapons lore does not work with the battery. I ran a simple test. I get ranged lore and have 2 picks left. I kill a simple kobold and my chances to hit are 80% with the battery. Then I use the 2 picks and kill another simple kobold with the battery. There should be at least 1% change in the chance to hit, but nah. So I guess the battery is just a battery and I'll have to find out which weapon lore increases its damage, otherwise the TG will be sort of inappropriately planned... It's all very well and good to have a all-round character, but if it's shooting skill is poor and I have to rely on a few skills and a sword, I sort of don't like it (although my TG does fare rather well on level 40 something). BTW, Misty, I checked the Ascaron sacred 2 forums. It seems that the build I'm giving you isn't that popular (although it works for me and my TG rocks), but you are free to try it out, of course. I would appreciate some feedback though The TG is a weird char and for all I see there is much confusion on the matter of the perfect build for him.

Having leveled up a TG over 40, I can share a few ideas T-Energy Shroud is the only buff you need. Untouchable force damages, but I still think it's rather weak to go with it. Here's what I propose: 1st pick: Tactics Lore 2nd pick: Sword Lore 3rd pick: Devout Guardian (the skills in this tree are very powerful and you can still shoot and mod T-Energy Shroud) 4th pick: Armor Lore 5th pick: Enhanced Perception (I always underestimated this skill - no more!) 6th pick: Toughness 7th pick: Combat reflexes 8th pick: Combat Discipline (this, combined with Devout Focus will force the TG to use skills almost non-stop, and dedicated blow is indeed an awesome skill) --- The following 2 picks are pretty much mandatory and are up to you. I would choose from these: Warding Lore (more shield energy), Spell Resistance (always good to have), Bargaining (shops are good for finding useful rings, ammy's and other rare items that may not drop ingame), Riding (to increase speed and survivability a bit) (I, personally, would pick Warding lore + Bargaining or Warding lore + Spell resist.) EDIT: I just found out that ranged lore does not affect battery performance. That sucks BIG TIME, rendering that battery sort of useless - except for socketing it, using it as armor, using it as boost to your other skills and having a low-damage ranged attack (whee ) I'm really interested in finding out whether ranged lore affects battery accuracy and firing speed. Since this is my only TG I play, I'm carefully selecting the picks, although I'm very tempted to start a new one with balance tweaks (to level up quickly), just to give it a shot and see how he fares in the world of Ancaria

Your Riot Control idea inspired me Although it cannot make a consistent fighting build, it can BE something ELSE. This is my point: Ugly, isn't she? Parts from all kinds of sets (leftovers from previous not-so-good BFG Seraphims), Djalek's Annihilator, strange rares... However, is this ugly? +43.5% XP EACH KILL. Not surprising at all that this little BFG Seraphim is leaving for the Kobold camp (having completed almost entire area west of sloeford) on silver difficulty on level 22 She still 1-shots everything though. No need for the all-powerful BeeEffGee weapon yet. My point is that a lot of items add XP pek kill. This seraphim has for example: Djalek's (level 27) - +7.9% Rare Helm - +10.3% Rare Ammy - +3.0% (I also have +4.0% level 30) Magical Spaulders - +5.6% Rare Shield - +7.0% Rare Sash- +9.5% SO, no more complaining about XP I guess This is more than enough, but I still feel like trying to push the XP limit over 50%. Now that would be cool! Now time to hunt for more, if it's possible EDIT: It's possible. At +62% XP per kill now!

I suppose Dexterity and Vitality mainly. Dexterity increases ranged damage and vitality will give your dryad some more hit points, which she'll need, you can be sure of that! Unipuma's build is solely based on direct damage and utility, with minimum micromanagement and a lot of utility skills (perception, bargaining). This means you will need to strike a good balance between damage and HP in order to survive. NOTE: Since blowpipe doesn't hit behind obstacles anymore (as of patch 2.34 or 2.31), it may be more prudent to go with a bow (I think unipuma made that change to his build in the ascaron forums, but maybe not here). I'd say whatever unique bow/pipe with 3 sockets you manage to lay your hands on

Since the HE was my third char (after the BFG seraphim and the TG), I had 2 rings with ~4.5% cast speed (yes, I'm a crazy item keeper ) and a unique staff with 10% cast (2-handed, Pirita's Staff I think with backup 1-handed with 7.9% cast + shield) so the execution speed was no problem at all. HE has nice armors with low weight (even now I'm well under 100%), and at level 46 with the staff and shield I have over 1800 armor with Crystal skin (yes, I use it when I'm in areas where mobs hit hard) and about 1500 with Incandescent (since I was using only runes that improve armor and reduce CA regen time) - I have absolutely no problem with mobs and bosses and compared to my first HE... Grab something please so that you don't fall of the chair... My first HE had Ranged Lore, Armor Lore, Shield Lore (Pistols FTW since I didn't want anything getting close to her), Concentration, 15+ seconds Fireball recharge time (stupid rune-eater) and 40+ secs Shower time - and imagine how many spots I have left for magic and other major skills... Compared to that HE nonsense, this one casts like crazy. For example, if 6 Kobolds swarm me, they're dead before they reach me (through fireballs only). If they are 8, one or two of them may get a lucky shot in. I went for the pure Pyro build (Pyro Lore and Focus, Armor, Conc, Combat Disc for 1-skill combos, Ancient Magic and I'll add some more utility skills on the free spots) and I'm amazed so far. With low regen time from armor, -10% from combat discipline, - gozzillion % from focus, this cute HE was eating Fireball and Shower runes like crazy. Even the 3-part combo (Shower-Fireball-Tempest) is only 4.8 sec regen time. To my mind, and to my experience, this sounds really cool and (so far) works really well I should also add that I'm not using a mount at all. I am considering it... EDIT: And I have tried it with a new HE. The Mount certainly adds survivability, but also creates problems. It will take some time (and points) to overcome the negative effect that you get on your Combat Arts regen time. BTW, I'm using 2.34 and always start on silver. Thank God for 2.34. Set items drop pretty often, but not necessarily from 1 particular set... Though it's fun watching my BFG seraphim in 50%-50% Blade dance/Endijian sets and the HE in 60%-40% Celdrahil/Ancestors sets A good option... HE is somewhat frail from lvls 1 through 20 and I think some help from other chars will come in handy. Collect some + cast speed rings/amulets, ready like 10+ fireball/shower/tempest/incandescent runes for careful and planned use, add some higher level uniques you don't need for starting money, save some unique/set equip found with your others chars and all I can say is that the HE Pyro will amaze you EDIT: HE is not frail as long as you buy her some items with sockets. Start adding Anneal and Enhance blacksmith runes as necessary. Completing a full set is the best thing that can happen, but still, don't miss out on weapons, shields and armors with a lot of sockets. More sockets = more enhance runes = less regen time = more bang for your buck.

Since I'm still testing the game in single player, I decided to mod the balance to check out all the chars (more xp from quests). So far I've found several builds that managed to spark my attention (and looked cool in my eyes). Although SP sucks because you can't do boss runs, the gameplay is still a lot of fun (and I still can't find the time to play online consistently). And so, in my eyes... First place for me goes to the BFG Seraphim. First of all, a big gun doing some cool damage. The arts of the seraphim complement this build nicely, and this is a cool starting char because it's a moneymaker and you don't need to bother about weapons. A cute BFG seraphim level 35 (legit, no balance tweaks) wielding level 50 BFG weapon and 1-shotting everything with hardly any micromanagement. What more do you want? The second place took the Temple Guardian. Having melee and ranged fighter altogether is fun. A great all-round character. Enemies far away or closing at ya? Shoot. Enemies here? Swing or scorch them for some major damage with jolting touch. Wheee! My 40 level Temple Guardian (legit too) with a strong shield (in-combat regenerating T-Energy shroud FTW) and sporting a cool battery and a Life-leecher unique sword is a killing machine. And the third place goes to the Pyromancer High Elf. I found this build to be by far the easiest to balance and keep in shape with low CA recharge time. Because of the test I have a 46 level High Elf (legit, no balance tweaks) shooting 2 homing fireballs every 2 seconds for over 1000 damage, and with incendiary shower raining down once every 5 seconds. Sweet and sassy. Big time killer, although you still need some micromanagement

A good idea is to download the Sacred 2 cleaner utility (I found it in the ascaron forums somewhere). Before each patch I forced it to clean all non-essential Sacred 2 data (that's what it does I think, removing the temp files) and bang, went to 2.34. I couldn't make myself believe it - after over 10 futile attempts (and at least 5 times my computer just stopped responding and had to restart with the button) - finally

I will most certainly have With any luck (and by that I mean my spare time) I may come and play online as well. Then I guess I'll follow your build to the letter

Since it's my first post, I'd like to say hello to everyone that may read it *** Your guide works like a charm. Great work! I would really like to share some ideas though 2 days ago I started a BFG Seraphim based on your guide directly on Silver difficulty (bronze is a moot in my opinion). She got her first BFG rune through rune trading with the master after the quest (at level 3, sheesh, keeping in mind I ran straight away to Sloeford to do that), but that was ok. I don't know whether you took into account the map exploration in the build (since some people tend to explore and area 100% while others just pass through it if it's irrelevant to the main quest), but if people tend to explore, I would say that: *** level 25- Warding Energy Lore----------- pump this skill up, this keeps you alive level 35- Exalted Warrior Focus---------- whenever the Warrior Combat Arts have a too high regeneration time put skill points in this skill *** these two should be swapped. I took Exalted Warrior Focus on 25, since I wasn't even entering Thylisium (and the Gar'Collosus is miles away), and was using BFG and Battle Stance (which is based on Exalted Warrior) as buffs. This is a recipe for 1-shotting even the champion mobs, which means I hardly take any damage that would dent my seraphim's HP lower than 80%. As such, I'm planning on taking Warding Energy Lore on 35, or depending on the way the game unfolds, even at level 50. I do realize that for people who tend to explore less, my idea may not actually work, but if one would like to experience the entire game as it is - beautiful and diverse, exploration of the entire map is a necessity