I find that more than anything, doing melee combat with a named mob always comes down to me hoping they don't get a counter since they usually do double digit damage to you, and a counter usually means you're boned (or really close to it). I guess it's kind of risk reward for being so beefy and being able to take hits, but when I play a mage I can blow things up from miles away and clear out monster zoo's in less than 5 turns. I think all of my melee runs have ended with counters and critical hits + counters, and there's really no way to prevent counters like there is with dodge so I feel it's a lot more problematic and a lot more luck based. Mistakes like walking into traps are fine because you can only blame yourself but with luck based insta gibs you cant really blame anything but the game (or yourself for trying to do melee combat with bosses!). So tell me, is there anything that I'm missing on my melee characters or is that just the reality of playing a melee character?
It's the reality of playing a melee character without a couple of spare bolts and a crossbow. You can play it safe and just shoot them from a distance and avoid the issue entirely, or you can trade one or two blows to determine how dangerous it is before retreating to shoot the boss to death.
Use something to weaken them before they reach you? Even if it's a bolt or two.. or a DoT. He'll have fewer chances of hitting you then, since it'll take fewer melee swings.
That's the thing though, the only way around the random luck is to try and lower the probability of a counter, while not actually doing anything about the counter it's self. Let's just put things in perspective a little bit: Dodge - 100% damage reduction, still get an attack in Block - X% damage reduction based on block value, still get an attack in Counter - 100% damage reduction, still get your regular attack in BUT also get a FREE attack for full damage! I feel that there should be a way where you can control counter chance like you can with dodge chance using enemy dodge reduction, but for now there's no skill that you can stack to avoid it. Blocking works fine since it's not 100% reduction and its dependent on another stat to determine its effectiveness
Agreed. I recently picked up archery for this and zoos and haven't looked back. Something should probably be done for those of you who want to hit enemies up close 100% of them time.
I'm playing an unarmed vamp on Dwarven / permadeath (UC, Vamp, Perception, Assassination, Berserker, Deadshot, and Archeologist) character dual-wielding some decent shields and was able to melee my way through an entire zoo which included about 4 or so bosses, due to a combination of a dodge rating of about 30+. That AE attack that UC gives you is just awesome, as are the bonuses you get at max level. I don't know how I'll fare as I get deeper (this is my current record for a game), but so far, melee is serving me quite nicely. That said, I aim to pick up a ton of ammo the next time I find a vending machine.
@Haldurson: I have the same skillset, LOL! I love dual-wielding shields. I always wanted to dual wield shields but no game allowed it so far. I hope they never take that away from us, since UC is foot based anyway ^^
