YASD - Orb of Power/Ice/Ice

[Shadowdweller]

Tlaloc made me nervous... a negotiation unique? Negotiation already has one of the higher success rates... so I was worried about it becoming a freebie. But on the other hand, he's a unique, if he decides to be a jerk, there's no redo, so I went a little high (maybe too high) on his patience level. He'll probably be tweaked a bit as time passes, but I'm glad it sounds like I got the feel/tone right.

High success rate perhaps, but they often seem more costly in terms of resources than other link types. I'm going to guess that one is unlikely to successfully negotiate with Tlaloc without sacrificing SEVERAL demons? He is no doubt worth it, but that DOES hurt.

Anyway, regarding the new and changed demons I noticed:

Chindi / K-something throat-slitting-undead: Was that a cooldown decrease for haunt? Feels like I'm getting ambushed a lot more by them.

Kitsune: These things are nasty. Thunderous triggering at an inopportune time can be pretty lethal to one's self or one's minions. They seem worse/more difficult than Haietlik...but appear earlier? Mind you, I like the challenge

Barbazi: Didn't seem too bad. Slower, ice-based version of Raiju.

Charun: Agony is self-limiting, and they have a pretty mediocre magic stat by that point in the game, though of course the hard-hitting melee attack. Will have to play a bit more with these...but I suspect they're mostly a threat to low hp back-row minions that hurt by ranged attacks. Or poor observation skills.

Jinn: The range increase is probably a good call. I certainly feel threatened now.

Incubi: OMG WTF...presumably these appear in groups? Run, run away...and hopefully snipe.

Those are the ones I recall anyway, beyond some sort of bird-like creature appearing with Mananangals...whose abilities I can't remember anything about. Definitely feeling the extent to which encounter groups are being refined.

[Ferret]

You won't necessarily need to sacrifice several demons... but, you may have to if you're unwilling or unable to lower your HP/MaxHP, train him in abilities he wants, or give him enough of the (rather large) selection of items he wants. The items in particular are a decent option with him: if you've managed to get to Tower:19 without burning lots of mid/high level items, you can probably close much of the gap with just those.

Haunt's cooldown hasn't changed recently. However, I did recently change how the AI evaluates movement abilities (as part of getting Gremlins to use Dash during link attempts), and it is possible that before they weren't using it as often as cooldown allowed, but now they are due to the eval change.

Kitsune appear later than Haietliks, but not by much: if the RNG was in a funny mood, you could run into a Kitsune before a Haietlik. I think of them as sort of a reverse Haietlik really. Haietliks are focused on offense and offensive buffing, Kitsune, while they also Electricity, take a more support/defense approach to things. This is consistent with the mythology for both: Haietliks have a strong association with hunting, Kitsune with illusions.

Barbegazi: These exist mostly to have their Ice immune + tank nature "abused" by later demons.

Charun: The other trick up their sleeve is Mass Agony + Reaper's Mien (50% HP drain added to Dark damage you deal to targets at 50% or less HP). If that gets going in any significant way, their tankiness jumps up by a mile. They also tend to appear with demons that either also do AE damage and/or heal, helping the tactic from both directions. And I wouldn't underestimate that melee attack, especially if more than one gets on something.

Jinn: ::mutter:: The range increase was a keyboard slip. It's changed back now. I mean, I appreciate that everyone said it was more deadly and they liked it, but I can't leave one Arrow spell longer range than the others. I'll see if I can find some legit way to boost them up a bit in exchange.

Incubi: Mostly because I don't want to be responsible for damage to players' computers or sanity, these never appear more than 2 to a group for the most part. They tend to come with allies who run support for them, hoping to keep them alive long enough to let their enemies provide the damage dealing. You may have noticed Incubi actually have fairly terrible melee stats: their Strength and Magic are bad, and they're strictly average on Vitality and Agility. Their Cunning though.... that's quite high. They're basically a melee range Charm specialist.

Impundulu (Bird critter): Notable mostly for being a source of Mobility (a new movement speed passive that stacks with Swiftness, but has a catch) and for having a smite-target Electricity attack that, thanks to a new passive they exhibit, as a higher Shock rate the closer they get to you. Their stats are somewhat poor for the strategy they come with (Magic isn't so hot, fair amount dumped in Agility they don't need for accuracy anyway), but this is usually the case with demons that introduce abilities or combinations of abilities I consider very scary. Smite-target damage + Shock with only an SP cost is definitely that, especially with the proximity Shock chance increase passive.

[Sandman25]

I've seen multiple sacrifice requests as early as Anomaly:1 (sacrificed an ally for Cursed Blob and immediately was requested to sacrifice another one), I hope it is expected.

[Ferret]

Multiple *requests* are certainly expected. Whether or not you actually accept multiple requests is another matter.

For me, if it's a standard demon, unless it's one I really want, I usually decline sacrifice requests. But, when you're talking about good modified demons, that's a whole other story. As bad as a sacrifice might be, accepting it and keeping Patience high may be the better choice: refusing and sending Patience too low could put you in a position where you have to either agree to everything or lose the modified demon, whereas just getting it over with and keeping Patience high will leave you room to refuse any future requests that you don't want to or can't fill (such as one for a bunch of your MaxHP when you're already a low Vit build, or for an item you don't want to give up or don't even have to give in the first place.)

[Sandman25]

Sacrificing a demon is not a big deal for me, I usually have 8 demons already so I must dismiss one anyway. Not sure which smile to use here

Edit. Also there are a few modified demons in latest version of demon so sacrificing even 2 demons is not always a problem, even for me

[Sandman25]

By the way how does restoring max HP work? My impression is that you get 1 max HP back for every hostile demon killed, is it right?

[Ferret]

MaxHP comes back based on gaining XP. Generally speaking, you'll see a small bit of recovery per demon killed, but the recovery may be much larger if you say, kill a hero.

In a pinch, you can also restore some using Pure Stones/Gems, but this is somewhat inefficient. I'd only consider this if I had a ton of them, or if my MaxHP had gotten very low.

[Sandman25]

Good to know, thanks!

[Shadowdweller]

Hrm...I am having repeated issues with Ukobach groups this build. Not sure why.

[Sandman25]

I almost always have problems with them because of most my demons being weak to fire at this point and lack of ranged damage which is not fire.