Okay, so I've come up with a build and I'd like some feedback or advice on it. The original idea was to simply get the skills that give you XP bonuses to rake in as much XP as possible. So I went for: Big Game Hunter - for extra XP from animals Killer Vegan - for extra XP from vegetables Archaeology - for sending artifacts to the museum for XP Burglary - for all the lockpicking XP So that's the first synergy: XP Gain It occurred to me that I could also maximise my XP gain by being as good as possible at disarming traps. So I went for: Burglary - which I already had from the previous Tinkering - there's no better anti-trap skill Perception - A bit of a stretch, but more anti-trap stuff So that's the second synergy: Trap mastery Of course, getting the XP and being good with traps doesn't actually help me in a fight. I need something a bit more combat-oriented. And given the Killer Vegan skill that I've got I need something that can kill animals at range. But given I'd chosen six skills already, it would have to be either a skill that can stand on its own or a skill that fits well with the skills I already have. And then it struck me - a third synergy: Archery - because it's a ranged attack that doesn't use mana and force me to forgo heavy armour Perception - which I already have for better ranged attacks and visibility Tinkering - which I already have for making bolts and upgrading crossbows So that's the third synergy: Shooting Putting these overlapping sets of skills together, I ended up with a character with the following seven skills: Archery Burglary Perception Tinkering Archaeology Big Game Hunter Killer Vegan So what do the more experienced players think? Is this a viable set of skills for going all the way? Or is it doomed to failure? And how would you improve it?
Killer Vegan gives a debuff ever time you hit an animal in melee, and the debuffs get worse as you upgrade it. So unless you plan on never running out of bolts or baseballs, you might want to swap it out for something else. See if Piracy suits your fancy, it's all pretty good cooldown skills.
Killer Vegan actually is great if only you can learn to not hit the animals. And there are other ways to deal with animals besides baseballs and bolts, such as Animal Friend from Killer Vegan, or Big Game Hunter's "Release the Hounds". Actually if you are set on Killer Vegan, you could do better than Big Game Hunter as far as companion skills are concerned. It's kind of an anti-synergy, as all that meat it will give you is bad for a Vegan diet.
I was quantifying Killer Vegan's value in this build through his described bonus-exp synergy with Big Game Hunter solely. I would have to assume this meant he would be attacking animals indiscriminately, and while he would be getting an increased rate of exp, the cons of the awful debuffs out-way the pro of quicker leveling IMO.
I will be attacking animals indiscriminately *with my crossbow*, but if I'm out of arrows I can safely ignore them because they won't be attacking me. I tried this build yesterday briefly (DMPD), but died on level two due to a ridiculously out-of-depth monster poppinu up from the first Chest of Evil I opened.
