Arcanum

Pure mage > pure tech (guns or tech melee) > bow mage >>>>>>> thieves or generic melee >> throwing.

Almost no reason not to go pure tech or mage, makes the game incredibly hard if you try.

Pure mage is boring as fuck

I tried doing that but you miss a lot of sidequests because you're too stupid to get them.

Does melee affect backstab?

Nigger you're gonna max both either way, so what does it matter

It's more fun if you use the niche and obscure spells, instead of just harm and haste everything.

>throwing last
>generic melee second last
>Throwing characters can get 25 attacks a round
>Backstabbers can just lmao through any enemy with armour-ignoring crits that happen every second attack for 100 damage

My favorite easy or broken build is Mage/Thief with combat enhancing spells and teleport.
>Tempus Fugit!
>Time has stepped kid...
>*teleports behind u*
>nothing personell

The only good throwing weapon requires you to basically cheat to get it, and generic melee takes a ton of points to do what a tech melee or a mage can do for half the points. The rare tech weapons are great and magic is always strong.

Also bows are drastically better than throwing with comparable levels put in and more bow choices exist.

No worries, user, I hope you enjoy the playthough!
Backstab is one of the skills I didn't think about much when I first played, but once you use it you realise just how powerful it is. I don't really have the patience for rogue builds but I feel their others skills aren't particularly good anyway.

For what it's worth I've had a lot of fun playing spellsword-type mages because Raven a best big on buffing yourself and then using magical swords and chainmail, but it's very intensive on stats/skills unless you rush the blessings early.

Hey hey people.
youtube.com/watch?v=QXAPdwOza9U

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Playing a sneaky rogue is the worst. Your skills are so thinly spread out. Better off playing a beast master

user, for the cost of a single point in Explosives (and spending a decent amount of time shopping and rummaging through the trash) a throwing-based character can hurl twenty-five molotov cocktails per round. Bows are admittedly great, but I've found trying to get enough arrows to fire them (or supply Raven) even more of a hassle than finding enough fuel for molotov cocktails.

The Chad Rioter

>molotov
>good after your first trip to Tarant
I guess if you don't use party members that melee attack, but they aren't even very good to begin with. Also early on when your throwing skill sucks you'll probably completely miss every throw. Better off just making dynamite constantly.

Explosives can be good but that's a tech character not really a throwing character.

One of my first characters was an attempt at an explosives wielding apothecary, but I learned that it was more a meme than anything else.

Who are your favorite companions?

>get quest to clear out gangs from a slum
>cover the entire map in fire

>molotovs
>not good at any part of the game that isn't the Black Mountain Mines
Even with a melee party there's very little in the game that doesn't suffer from having 25 molotov cocktails hurled at them for knockback and damage once combat stats. The only things that really do are those resistant to fire, which are annoying for melee characters, but throwing weapons don't degrade even if you're using a boomerang on a Fire Elemental.

I'm not sure what you mean about throwing skill either; you can easily increase it steadily until maximum because it's governed by Dexterity (which is the first stat you'll max) and you can get Expert training for a massive range increase as soon as you get to Tarant.

>Explosives can be good but that's a tech character not really a throwing character
I mean, if your definition of a "throwing" or "melee" character is "no tech or magic skills at all" of course they're going to end up last, you're just intentionally restricting your character then.

Sseth made me wanna play this game.
How long is it? And can I run it through the Steam download or do I need to do extra shit?

Raven, Z'an, Magnus and Vollinger are my favourites. Loghaire is always good fun.

I launched it from steam and it works fine so far

Using only molotov is also restricting your character for no reason. Getting only one tech recipe and then dumping all levels into dex until it's usable is pretty restrictive.

You could just get a decent gun, level firearms and wait until you have access to the multiple cool and strong tech firearms instead. At level 1 it might not be as strong as the aoe of molotov but way more diversity in weapon choices.

Reminder that the gnomes get away with it and there's nothing you can do

>Using only molotov is also restricting your character for no reason.
I'm not saying that you should restrict yourself to just using molotovs, though (unless you want to of course). I'm just using that as an example to point out that even with very basic investment, the weakest crafted throwable is strong enough to base a very powerful throwing build on. Of course you shouldn't unnecessarily restrict your character unless you want to for a specific build; messing around with builds is half the fun of this game.

Gar is the GOAT

You can get Don Throgg elected President of the Unified Kingdom, and if you finish other quests right like ensuring the peace treaty is signed and restoring the rightful heir of Cumbria it does a pretty good job of fucking up their plans for society.

Burning every gnome and half-ogre you see to death is also a pretty good plan

Just get a single magic chakram.
As long as you balance out your magic/tech meter nothing bad will happen.
Hell, why not spend one point on dex/str magic buff?

I'm glad I'm not the only one who ended up engaging in gnome genocide.
I had to kill a decent chunk of the civilized world because they didn't like me killing random people, but it was worth it.

>no Vergil favorites
Maybe from a character standpoint he is meh, but his ability to Heal at the start is what makes him my favorite. Don’t need to waste money on potions at the Character Creation, and don’t have to worry if you aren’t taking healing as a starting skill
Has anyone ever talked to the city elf dweller themselves? I 100% of the time let Vergil deal with it

>city elf dweller
You mean the guy who comes to finish you off? I always talk to him myself so I get to kill him for muh exp.

Stun gun's pretty hilarious if you can make one. Massive fatigue damage leaving your opponents freely pummeled and gored by your followers.

That’s the one. I guess I’ll kill him this time around
I love how free this game feels, I wonder if the increase in graphics, voices, and scripted events have stripped games of their ability to be so nonlinear

>fully Technological characters miss out on the best bonus in the game because the gods themselves turn their back on you
Magic wins again, baby!

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>magic and tech argument
What even defines a tech ability? Magic is pretty strait forward, but is tech also things like Prowling, or just technology based skills like traps?

But the high god's blessing is received in Vendigroth that was full tech.

tech/mage buffed female half-orc best pc for roleplay

>but is tech also things like Prowling
No? Just the stuff you learn from tech tabs.
Those that aren't magic or tech tabs (eg. melee, archery, persuasion, etc.) are considered generic skills.

In universe anything where you force the world to change with your will alone is magical, any more advanced means of exploiting the world's rules is technology.

Interesting.

Are there any other games that take place in this setting?
This and Planescape have fascinating worlds, I haven’t played many modern games, but I really Hope modern rpgs managed to keep fantastic worlds and worldbuilding alive

No, there's not much quite like it out there. If you're looking for unique CRPG settings I gotta recommend the old Dark Sun games, though.

Only the technological disciplines themselves (Smithing, Explosives, Electricity etc).
The other skill categories (combat, persuasion, thievery etc) are considered generic skills available to anyone.

I'm not sure if it ever got fixed with update patches, but at least in the release version of the game, when you offer your life as a sacrifice to the All-father, fully Tech characters would be ''immune'' to the resurrection, so they'd just die.

It got fixed. I often went out of my way to get all the blessings in order before going to Vendigroth for the massive boon for tech chars needed.

That's good to hear. Utterly hilarious the first time the glitch happens to you, though!
I still play on my disc-copy version.

The blessing is pretty broken, even for the amount of work you have to put in to get it. I mean, skill mastery for only two points invested? Yes please.

>play melee character
>all your shit breaks against golems in the MINE

What’s the shittiest build in the game and why is it Charming Archer

Doesn't it also give you something like expert level in firearms?

Because it's the one most dependent on equipment and Raven will be better than you ever could anyway.

Yeah, it's busted.
Three skill levels in Melee, Dodge, Firearms, Persuasion and Pickpocket; +100 bonus health and fatigue, +4 bonus Dexterity, and 30 resistance to magic and physical damage

Great setting, some good plot.

Terrible mechanics, dreadfully unbalanced, lots of empty wandering.

Arcanum: Enhanced Edition when?

>empty wandering
Is there anything at all hidden in the map/world that isn’t marked?

There are places that can only be found wandering around but if it doesn't appear on map it doesn't exist.

Sorry for how long it's taken me to respond user, I missed your post at first and then ended up rewriting my response a few times. Hopefully it makes sense to a beginner player.

>First time ever playing.
Read the manual. Seriously, good advice for any game but in Arcanum it's invaluable just because of how much detail there is in how the skills/mechanics work. Especially if you don't have much experience with CRPGs, but even if you do I'd recommend reading the manual before starting because a lot of the mechanics work very differently to other games.

Dexterity is the best stat for any combat-based character, since not only does it govern every weapon skill you get 1AP per point invested plus a bonus 5 for reaching 20 Dexterity, making for 25 in total which is huge. For that reason, never ever choose a race that gives you a penalty to Dexterity unless you want a challenge game. Different actions and weapons consume different amounts of AP depending on their Speed rating, but the more AP you have the better.

Skills have two different qualities, a rating (the amount of points you've invested into the skill) and a Training level - you can only be trained in-game by characters you find. Skill rating increases the success chance of the skill (so your accuracy with weapons, for example), and is what you directly increase, while skill training offers different discrete but important benefits - for example the Apprentice training for every weapon skill increases your Speed with that category of weapon, allowing you to make more attacks. Essentially, for your core skills you want to both boost them as much as you can and get the highest training you can (Apprentice training can be bought from lots of people, Expert from a few specific... experts... and there's only one Master Trainer of each skill, who you'll also need to complete a quest for). 1/2

here are also the Technological disciplines and Spell colleges, which are pretty self-explanatory. I should also mention that skills have minimum attribute requirements (so each spell in a Spell College requires progressively higher levels of Intelligence/Willpower to learn. You can increase your attribute levels on levelup though, so it's not as bad as it seems, and buffs count towards the attribute requirement (it checks your modified level, not the base, so you can buff your Intelligence if you don't want to spend the points before you learn something)

Take a Backstab build, for example. You'll want Backstab at the highest level you can get it, but you also want a high Melee skill so you can land attacks and not eviscerate yourself with critical misses. Dexterity is far more important than Strength because it governs your skills, gives you more attacks and the damage you'll be doing is from bonus damage multipliers rather than the inherent strength of hacking things down with an axe, but you don't want too low a Strength and once you've maxed Dexterity you can start putting points in Strength for bonus damage and to use bigger weapons for even more damage. If you want to use Stun you need at least 9 Willpower to learn the spell; alternatively you could learn how to make stun grenades and take Throwing for a higher skill investment, etc.

Most of all - enjoy the game, user! Don't be daunted by the amount of options, you can always restart if you get half an hour in and find you're not enjoying the way you play, and the setting and narrative itself is very enjoyable. Plus if you have any questions you can always come back here, ask in a thread or make one, it's a popular enough game on here there's usually enough people to help you out.

2/2

What's a good bandit/gunslinger build?

Can I go through the game just on high beauty/charisma and some rogue stuff? Don't want to use magic or technology on one playthough.

Bought this on the last sale actually. Is Steam version good to go or do I need some external patches?

You totally can just let your followers rip shit apart though you need either really good stealth or dog for Black Mountain Mines. Having good persuasion and decent intelligence lets you skip at least one long dungeon crawl.

COCAINUM

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Firearms, Throwing and Explosives for molotovs and dynamite, Persuasion for "persuading" people to hand over their valuables.
Use only revolvers and be the bandit you always wanted to be!

it's been forever since I played it but it's a damn shame firearm builds are so shit unless you use like 1 of 3 very specific guns in the game

Like the other user said, you can easily get through the game just by letting your party slaughter everything in your path, especially if you have maxed Charisma to get as many as possible.
If you just want to avoid using magic and technology you can still make an excellent combat character, just pouring all your points into Melee/Dexterity/Strength and optionally Backstabbing will turn you into an absolute murder machine. At worst you might have to carry around a couple spare swords if you don't want to use technological items at all.

It shall be so!

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Easiest most OP build? If I fuck myself by having a painful time every fight I'm not even going to bother. The fun less optimized builds will be for 2nd playthrough.

Which ones? I am aiming to make gun build

It really is a damn shame since there's so many funny guns compared to magic weapons.

>tesla gun
>flame thrower
>tranquilizer gun
>grenade launcher
>that plasma pistol

Harm mage.

Is it better to play turn based or real time?

Range combat is busted in real time and melee combat in turn-based.

Harm or a pure melee/dodge warrior also tears through shit pretty effectively, pick up the Dog companion in one of the towns, Ashbury I think, he's broken as fuck.

Have fun, user!

Mage with Harm (and eventually Disintegrate) and lots of dexterity. It's pretty boring to play though, if all you're worried about is not having a rough time with every fight you can easily make a very powerful build in any archetype.

>get the dog
>becomes a Master of Melee and Dodge by himself
>the only other Master of Melee and Dodge in the game is a coward in the final area who's too scared to fight you

Master Backstab + Master Prowl + status grenades or Tranq gun is literally the easist the game could be. Plus you can get Master Prowl as soon as you want by forcing the Mountain Pass and Caladon's location on the map. Being able to prowl whenever and wherever regardless of time or amount of light is hilarious.

> had to hire a doggo in order to clear the mine from stone golems because everything breaks
> doggo somehow bites itself, tears apart his own body and dies

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Can't you target anyone to bully them into fighting you?

Turn-based is the real way to play, RTwP is boomer tier trash

>by forcing the Mountain Pass

For the longest time I didn't even know the Mountain Pass existed and just used boat or shipwreck point to get past the mountains.

The Bane of Kree and Z'an(with Raven) because their bickering is hilarious.

Virgil is a big reason I hate playing Science characters. It sucks when his constant heals, that you barely even notice in a Magic or Melee playthrough, suddenly bounce off you. Sure you can make your own medicinal heals or recruit that one chick that can make them, but it's so much more effort.

I've always wanted to play this game. Seems like it's well regarded here. It may be time.

God yes please. Arcanum used to be one of my favorite games, but I went back to it recently and it's unplayable. There are so many modern conveniences in new games that I just take for granted now that going back to a game that has none of them feels awful.

It's jank at times but atmospheric as fuck.

Diplomancer is actually easymode since companions are god tier and you can talk your way through almost everything.

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To be fair everything is shit compared to Harm.
Genuinely what were they thinking with it?

I believe Tim Cain has the source code for that stuff still, he talked about compiling it again recently in a Fallout 1 Stream.

But I somehow doubt the raw assets are still around, if only though.

If only.

It's always been real time. Turn based is a crutch that shitters rely on.

t. harmspam mage

I love forcing those two to get along.

Please don't let Beamdog get its filthy paws on it.
This game deserves an actual enhanced edition, not just a bundle of free mods with a full-price tag on it.

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>Stumble into temple
>Find Skeleton
>Quest ensues to restore flesh to Skeleton
>Best companion is acquired

Torian's voice was wonderful to listen to.

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>couldn't commit to either tb or rt
>both ended up broken
What a damn shame.

>"build"
dont do this

And melee and throwing and tech runs. You don't need turnbased for any of it, and if anyone tells you otherwise they're just bad.

Yeah outside of if you want to force Caladon very early or you are doing the God's blessing quest you never need it.
Black Mountain Mines are the death of many a diplomancer build, unless you have a trap finder and/or a prowl companion.

Meant to say gun instead of tech.

You can, I just think that it's hilarious that the only other master in the game is a legendary tyrant/mass-murderer who's too scared to fight you of his own free will or even do anything bad ever again if you let him back into the world

>unless you have a trap finder and/or a prowl companion.

There's scrolls of trap finding in the mines though. And scroll of exiting so you could just run it all through, read the pillar and exit.

Can you max out all mage schools?

Skill points might not be enough.

No. You can for sure max out 2 schools, maybe even 3, but I'm pretty sure that's it.

I think the earliest one you can get is stealing the hand cannon from the midget who insults you in the middle of the main big city. the gun you actually get in the starting screen is unplayable tier

Come to think of it, I'm basing this off playthroughs where I put points in other stuff like Haggle and such. So you could probably max out more than 3 schools, but there's still no way you could max them all.

>Only major patch
>Nerf looking glass rifle
>don't adjust Harm at all
What the FUCK Troika? Even if you try to chess the LGR you can't get it until much much later than you can get Harm. Even with max dex and Tempus Fugit you can't get more than 3 shots a round. I get that Tech was still coming into its own in setting, but firearms get shit on almost entirely across the board.

Favorite quest?
Mine is assassinating the King if Caladon even though the end result can be a tad annoying. Makes more sense if you also assassinate the King of Dernholm but don't bring the true king back from the Ise of Despair and assassinate Gilbert Bates
A first time player isn't going to know that though.

He just needs to grab Drog Black Tooth if he's still around Terra-Arcanum, we'd get the best of both worlds.

>joining the dark elves so the head dark elf will be at Ring of Brodgar
>then doing the Nasrudin's tomb quest so Nasrudin will be at Ring of Brodgar when you return from Vendigroth
>Nasrudin kills the dark elf as he's screaming about Nasrudin being dead

Wew lad.

Completing some of the Master Training quests - Backstab is absolutely hilarious, but completing the Dodge/Melee quests together and completely fucking over that fag Stout is great, I never tire of it.

Yeah its hard to do a playthrough where I don't do those quests because Adkin deserves to be happy, fuck Garrick.

Wut
I do not remember him.
And I played the game twice.