Let's use this thread for completely unfair snap judgements of the new skills. I want to hear what you guys like and dislike and I want to hear why the person above you is completely and utterly wrong. I'll add some of my own as soon as I get a chance to play.
The Skepticism skill from Paranormal Investigator is pretty fun. Apparently, at least one of the Diggles in the dungeon was really a pile of softballs in disguise
So far the first skill in communism seems really strong Guerrilla something. Free attack + invis on a short cooldown. Probably the best or one of the best level 1 skills in the game. It's up there with mathemagics. Egyptian magic seems interesting. From what I understand the glyphs power up the sandstorm? The first glyph is pretty terribly by itself. Socialized Healthcare seems terrible if it doesn't scale.
I am using a build I call Spetsnaz: Communist Daggers Dual Wielding Burglary Assassination Big Game Hunter Magical Law I am loving daggers so far. Switcheroo, the skill which swaps places with you and the enemy is surprisingly useful. With highish sneakiness, it seems that after you have used it, the enemy will often not notice you, giving you a free hit and critical. This pairs well with the first Communism skill, which also basically gives you a free attack. So basically, daggers = free attacks and critical hits at the cost of raw power per hit, which is EXACTLY how daggers should work IMO, both from a thematic and mechanical standpoint. Furthermore, I love the ability to reposition with Switcheroo. It's way more helpful than it at first seems for getting off of acid puddles and fire and such, plus it can get you out of nasty situations where you are surrounded. Very useful for a lvl 1 skill. Anyhow, the only other thing of interest I have seen is the second level Magical Law skill, Polymorphic Injunction. This appears to change the monster type randomly, which is interesting and unpredictable. My idea is to use it to try and turn monsters into animal types, thus making more use of Big Game Hunter's Grisly Kill ability or whatever its called. However, once when I used it it turned a globby into one of those freaking mushroom things and I freaked out... managed to kill it and instalvled. Hmmm... potential for abuse?
The glyphs do power up the sandstorm, but they also have special interactions with each other. Asp+Imhotep was causing bursts of poison clouds on hits, and was giving another toxic resist+damage buff when that happened. That seemed to immediately stack to 3 each time I got it, for some reason.
Seconding the guerilla attack's strength. I'm having even more fun though with the Bankster line. Take out a loan, then immediately dump the debuff on an enemy, and you can rack up quite a lot of gold early on. Have to be careful though, since dumping can actually add a debuff, and taking a loan can add more than one debuff, while dumping only removes one debuff. I can't figure out how Insurance Fraud works, though. P.S. In retrospect, playing a Communist Bankster feels like a little paradoxical.
Paranormal investigator is AMAZING for crafters. Gives you recipes and it can potentially turn enemies into components I um think. Also potion transmuting for non alchemists or for REAL alchemists golly.
Well, Polearm seems pretty strong in the early game - the offensive stance ROFLstomps anything levels 1 and 2 can throw at you so far at least, and defensive one essentially stops you taking damage at all - be interesting to see how it scales later on. Maxed out Banker - a weird skill set that I think I'd need to think a little more about how to use effectively, the problem almost certainly lay my side of the keyboard on that one - I'd have thought from the description you'd have wound up rich but the damage mitigation -> money thing meant I was usually pretty much destitute by the time I found a brax >.<
Egyptian Magic seems stupidly strong if you can sustain your mana, which isn't a problem with Thaumaturgic Tap. Definitely my favorite of the new skills. With every glyph active, Call the Sandstorm just annihilates anything inside its' gigantic area, and it's relatively cheap for a zoo clearing spell.
Egyptian Magic is also a good skill for "Warrior wants place to dump booze". Not that there's anything wrong with that. Polearms are stupid strong. They don't have the same variety of procs that the core skills have, but when dual wielded those melee power bonuses are huge, particularly when you're throwing stuff. Use victory stance to throw crap, then switch to defense when enemies get too close. I may never need another weapon skill again. This might definitely needs a nerf. Communism is fun, first skill is crazy strong, not sure about the rest of the skill tree yet. Keep dying in Wizardlands, can't seem to rack up levels... =/ Daggers is a fun roguish fighting skill, have yet to figure out how to maximize its potential. Tourist is goofy fun.
I've enjoyed the Bankster skills a lot so far. The damage from 'Dump Toxic Assets' is nothing to sneeze at in the early game, and it recharges fast enough to make it quite useful. Plus, it's just a downright fun skill tree to use; it requires some careful planning to make it effective, and being careless with it can mess you up with some nasty effects (just like real-life investing). Fun!
Is the Egyptian skill, aside from Sandstorm, more like a melee wizard or a pew-pew wizard? Do you the other glyphs add to melee skills, like Asps does? What's Tourist do? TIA!
I like Tourist so far but that seems to be the only one, because I like being able to disarm traps early on and the other skills are quite useful. I've gotten a lot of use out of Meet Interesting People and the starting camera. The rest are either really confusing (I've read the descriptions for Bankster twice now and played one but still don't understand when you get debuffs etc) or waaaaaaay too specific. Communist gives you a cold AoE counter attack on top of yourself when you get hit on the third skill along, and gives you a hat to stop yourself getting killed by it. Except the hat sucks aside from its cold resistance, so you're stuck either wearing a single hat for the rest of the game (you can't turn the AoE cold off) or you die. I got to the 6th floor and by then nearly all of my health was being lost from the cold damage on my own skill. Really need to be able to turn it off. What's with so many of these return debuff skills anyway? Nearly all of the new classes have something to counter debuffs. Going to try out a Paranormal Investigator now. EDIT: Laughing at the Skepticism skill. Apparently the beeperson who was attacking me was actually an inanimate crossbow. Who would've thought it.
General Winter needs the drawback or it would probably qualify as OP. Haven't played with it extensively yet, so I'm not sure. If I could only stop dying on DL 2...
Imhotep is the only one that doesn't amp your damage. Egyptian Magic is overall very good for gish-type builds.
To be honest, I think it's pretty good even if its the only wizard skill in your build. I'm playing with five warrior skills, a rogue skill and Egyptian, and I'm loving it.
I'm playing it with unarmed combat and tomes in both hands with a bunch of mage utility skills to back me up. It gives you a little bit of everything, all it needs is some way to sustain mana (or just not spending it on anything else) and a way to heal and you're golden.
Ok so after playing around with egyptian magic I have to say it's quite strong. I don't know the full extent of the abilities and what they do just yet so I'll try and avoid going into detail. With all the glyphs active, you do massive fire/explosive damage to all adjacent squares with each hit and sandstorm seems to be about on par with necroeconomic's rift. It's hard to make out specifics, but it's a great great line for a gish character. Right now my build is daggers, communism, egyptian magic, leywalker, bloodmagic, archeology, master of arms. With the defensive stance in daggers the build is quite tanky. I'm running a orb + dagger with the best gear I can find that keeps magic power up a bit. Going for gish gear mainly.
Sheesh the new high grade items would put the crafting skills to shame without encrusting. Found a monofiliment sword 50 slashing damage on level 0. Good thing I can encrust it, high weapon crust instability seems to cause you to teleport uncontrollably when you hit enemies which is funny. Crafting is a lot better with crusts about. Also dissection from paranormal investigator is giving a steady stream of recipes. Weirdly transmuted potions refuse to stack even with potions of the same type they have been transmuted to. Running it with communism on my usual dual wield axe knight crafty build. I can see some sweet encrusting combos like using big game hunter meats to become a lumbering gaganaut.
