Fighter Build

[NathanEschalon]

Hi! I'm new in town but I've been lurking and searching around the boards for a bit. I've seen many build recommendations for mages, rogues, rangers, etc but not a lot for heavy melee/paladin class. Is that because they're so underpowered it's not worth playing them?

My thoughts:
Male, NorLander, Virtuous, Fighter (paladin ish character)

Stats:
Hold out for a decent starting roll then shoot for Str, Dex, Con at least 15 with the rest of the points going to End (hopefully 30ish)

Skills:
Swords 5
Repair 1
Cartography 1

Questions:
With the above skills I still have 5 starting skill points to spend.
1) Should I pick Heavy or Light armor?? I've seen much debate on this
2) Maybe Divination for an early jump on some healing/buffing spells??
3) What about Medicine or Mercantile?? Are these mostly useless?
4) It sounds like Swords are great weapons in this game, but Bludgeon would be so handy for the feat and for bashing. Are they worth the extra weight??

My Plan:
All early skill points will go toward Sword until 20 ish and stat points toward Endurance until 40 ish. Then start working on Divination buffs and eventually some Alchemy for permanent enchantments.

Any thoughts?? Pros/Cons?? I hate to start with something only to find out I need to re-roll because I left out some crucial skill or spent points on a worthless one?

Thanks!!

[Randomizer]

Hold back 2 points so when you level up you can put 5 to swords and get your first feat. It'll be 100 turns between using the feat, but the extra damage will be worth it since you usually can run away until the feat is recharged.

On the whole light armor is almost as good as heavy and a lot less weight. Since it's mostly random what you can find it doesn't matter and you usually can get a book for armor by Port Kuudad.

Divination for healing is useful, but for a melee fighter the casting of bless and ogre strength is even better. However you can wait until the trainer in Port Kuudad.

Mercantile is useful for getting more money and you can always use it for training money to get powerful quickly. Medicine isn't as helpful.

Bludgeoning weapons are heavy and the worst part is interfering with spell casting.

If you are playing with the wear and tear on armor and weapons, them Repair is useful to maintain your equipment and repair loot to get more value when you sell it.

[NathanEschalon]

Saving the extra skills points was a GREAT idea. Having that sword feat at level 2 feels mighty powerful. Repair has saved me fortunes already too... so nice to have it work automatically when camping.

I have a few more questions about secondary skills:
1) Does a melee focused paladin have enough room to add Alchemy and/or Foraging to the mix? That combination seems like a great money generator. Will it be redundant for buffing if I plan to train Divination eventually? What level should I be before picking them up??

2) Even at level 2 I'm already finding loot that I can't identify in the field. Would it be good to pick up Lore?? If so when? Such a let down to haul that unknown breastplate all the way back to town to learn it's nothing special.

3) Bashing chests/doors is seriously tedious. Would it be useful to eventually train Bludgeon or even Unarmed to crack them open easier? I spend a lot of time camping to repair my bashing cudgel. I doubt I'd need to spend a lot of points in it unlike Lockpicking which seems like it would cost far more in skill points and purchasing picks to be effective?

Thanks for the great input!! Loving this game so far!!

[Dragonlady]

If I remember correctly, unarmed combat can't be trained (with cash/trainer). I've found it quite useful for barrels, chests and doors using my fist instead of risking my weapons. Makes me feel powerful Foraging is good too because you can sell the spell ingredients. Once you know your way around the map (after 1 full game) you don't need to take Cartography at the beginning as you can pay a trainer for that later. Find book on Lore, or buy spell (divination). Don't waste skill points, use those for fighter skills.

[Kreador Freeaxe]

Personally, I think the bludgeoning skill feat is better than the sword skill feat, but that's because I don't like to get into situations where I'm toe-to-toe with more than one foe. With the bludgeon skill feat, it not only does great damage that turn, it makes it easier to do damage to tough foes in subsequent turns (by halving their armor rating).

While there is no unarmed trainer, there are rings and a book. Even just one ring will get you through doors, though it's still tedious.

[SpottedShroom]

I personally don't spend points on anything but my main combat skill until I get to 32, which gets you the minimum number of turns between feat uses. By that point you'll have access to trainers for many of the other skills, which will leave you plenty of points to bump things like Alchemy and Elemental/Divination beyond what's possible with just trainers and skill books. I'd suggest magic rather than Foraging or Lore, as it's more versatile.

I agree with Kreador that bludgeon is probably the best melee skill despite the weight of bludgeoning weapons.

[NathanEschalon]

Completed the game as a paladin (melee with some divination buffs). I started with swords but switched to bludgeon mid way through. The bludgeon feat is definitely far superior to sword! It was not unusual to see crits for 150-200 damage with my fully enchanted war maul and skill in the 50's (not to mention powering through locked doors/chests). I spent 90% of the game in Power combat mode.

Alchemy was very useful for keeping my equipment enchanted, especially since I used only light armor. Foraging was also the obvious compliment with alchemy to keep the reagents flowing (never raised it more than trainer+book provided).

I'm going through again as a mage this time. So much fun!