Part 32: Game Mechanics: Level 15 Skills

Divinity 2 – Level 15 Skills


I felt that something was missing from the end of the last update, so I added it in.




Excerpt from “The Last of the Dragon Knights”, by ZixZax the Almost-Wise:
“With a great sense of unease, The Dragon Knight finally stopped putting off the inevitable. The Dragon Knight moved towards Maxos Temple, knowing that temple also could be considered a "Temple of Doom" for someone. Maybe even the Dragon Knight them-self.”

Later today I will post the Act 1 finale, assuming I have no problems encoding it. And look for a new thread title in the coming days:

Divinity II: The Dragon Knight Saga –  Maxos! / I’m Laiken this shit! 


But I’m really here to discuss this:

Divinity 2 – Level 15 Skills


Warrior Skills

Regenerate
– “Forgoing the need of healing spells to patch up your wounds over time, the regenerate skill ensures the slow but steady revitalization of your life energy. This process gains in speed as its practitioner learns to use it more effectively.”

Regeneration Bonus: +0.21% -> +0.70%

This passive skill adds to the value of your health regeneration rate. The first point adds 0.21%, but subsequent points add only 0.02 to 0.04%, which is not much. Points in Strength naturally increase your regeneration rate, so points in this for a Strength warrior are going to be less helpful because of your naturally high regeneration. One point only for Yara.


Thousand Strikes
– “With a combination of cat-like speed and accuracy, you strike at your adversary with a series of vicious cuts: leaving him to incredulously stare at the bodily extensions on the ground before he has had the time to realize where his bane came from. Fast and brutal, it is one of the best melee attacks a warrior can master.”

Damage Multiplier (per strike): 1x -> 2x
Mana Cost: 118 -> 268
Cooldown: 15 -> 20 seconds
Knockdown Chance: 10 -> 80%

This is the Big Gun of melee attack skills. It’s not 1000 hits, only 6, but its six hits in two seconds, each of which can leech life or mana, and the hits can crit. The cooldown isn’t too bad at 15 seconds, considering that this can one-shot a lot of enemies, but the real catch is the high mana cost. Mana Leech won’t help with it because the mana cost is deducted AFTER the sequence lands. Yara will be using this as one of her main attacks, and it’s a high priority for spare skill points. I’ll have to monitor the mana cost, though and keep putting points into Spirit.



Ranger Skills

There is only one ranger skill at Level 15.

Explosive Arrows
– “The rarest of arrows are perhaps also the most powerful ones. Extremely dangerous in the hands of some bowstring-happy pyromaniac – and absolutely frightening in the hands of a skilled archer – these arrows explode upon impact: not only turning the original recipient into a bloody jigsaw puzzle, but also tearing apart anyone caught near the blast.”

Mana Cost: 29 -> 67
Cooldown: 5 seconds
Damage: 130 -> 941.6
Explosion Radius: 5 -> 20 metres

This skill in effect is a rocket launcher. It hits a single target, but there’s a radius effect, making it good to use on crowds. It ignores all stats except critical chance from your character or the bow, making it a good choice for non-bow users. In Ego Draconis it was overwhelmingly powerful (260 damage at level 1, going up to 2014 at level 13), and it was toned by about 50% in DKS, but even with that, it is still one of the better Ranger skills, which shows you just how absurd the damage was in ED. The downside is that the short cooldown means that you can use this often, which drains your mana quickly.



Mage Skills

Firewall
– “Once released, this great circle of red-hot flame will blacken anything caught in its blast radius and burn all who are foolish enough to enter its fulgent perimeter, thus providing you with the best of both worlds by combining offence with defence in one single incantation.”

Mana Cost: 29 -> 67
Cooldown: 30 seconds
Duration: 5 seconds
Damage/second: 58 -> 372
Total Damage: 290 -> 1860

This might seem to be one of the most powerful skills in the mage’s arsenal. At Rank 1 it can do up to 290 damage to all creatures caught in it for the full duration, and at maximum rank it can do 1860. However, the cooldown is long, and the radius is centered around you, so you need to get close to the enemies, which can be exceedingly dangerous.

The downsides are that the damage happens over time, so you need the enemy to stand still for 5 seconds to get the full damage, and the cooldown is 30 long seconds. Fireball is a much more powerful skill, with a huge radius at a distance, the damage it does is instant, and you can cast two in the time it takes for one Firewall.


Healing
– “When in combat you will get hurt. But not to worry, for this simple healing spell will douse any wound like water would fire – leaving your dazed opponents wondering why their blades don’t seem to have had much effect.”

Mana Cost: 101 -> 116
Cooldown: 10 seconds
Duration: 8 -> 1 seconds
Healing/second: 15 -> 303
Total Healing: 120 -> 303

This Healing spell is somewhat useful, although effectiveness drops over time. I generally only put three points into this, and two are probably a waste! The cooldown is short, which is good, but the mana cost is high, and as your total hitpoints climb it becomes less and less useful. Even Level 15 Yara with 1 HP wouldn’t be fully healed with a maxed out Healing spell. One point, but that’s all.



Priest Skills

Life Tap
– “As you become a powerful wizard, you may find yourself in a situation in which you’re casting all sorts of spells while you stay at a distance – unharmed and unthreatened. The problem is that your magical energies may start to run low. The solution: simply transfer some of your life energy to your magical energy and you can keep enjoying the grisly spectacle that you create.”

Mana Cost: 0
Cooldown: 60 seconds
Mana per Hitpoint: 2 -> 4

This spell drains 10% of your hit points, and it provides you with 2 to 4 mana per hit point. So with 350 HP, it would drain 35 HP and give me 70 mana. That’s a pretty good exchange rate. This is a really useful skill, more so for warriors and rangers than mages, because mages have high Intelligence, which means a higher mana regeneration rate. A Warrior has a high Strength, which means a high health regeneration rate. A warrior using this will lose a bit of health, but gain that back quickly with their natural regeneration, making the cost of this even lower. The mana exchange is basically instantaneous, so you can use this to get mana to cast a Healing spell. This will let Yara recover mana for Thousand Strikes faster, so I’ll be maxing this out as soon as possible.


Master Herbalist
– “Versed as you are in the powers and potentials of all plants and herbs that grow in Rivellon, it takes you fewer specimens to cook a successful brew. This has not only made you famous for your mushroom soup, but also for the efficiency with which you make useful potions..”

Ingredient Cost: -15% -> -80%

I’m not sure how this passive skill works, but people on the Larian forums seem to say it reduces ingredient costs by 1 per rank. This is of middling usefulness at best, since we’re close to the point where ingredients are infinite and practically free.



That's because it is a duplicate. The previous attempt got to 100%, then it claimed that the upload failed with an unknown error, so I uploaded it again.

I've changed the URL to the other video, so it should work now.