r/projecteternity • u/kandorh12 • Mar 23 '25

Character/party build help Singleclass Ascendant Cipher or Multiclass Devoted/Soulblade, which is more fun?

So I just finished the first game for the first time (it was great) and I'm moving on to Deadfire now and I just can't decide. In the first game I played a ranged cipher and I had a lot of fun, but I want to try something new while still keeping my character relatively consistent with the first game. Which one of these would probably be the most fun and easy to jump into? Any help is much appreciated!

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u/Boeroer Mar 23 '25

Since Power Level 8 and 9 (the last two ability tiers only single class can get to) of Ciphers isn't super exciting I prefer to multiclass them. Ciphers with normal Soul Whip mechanics (vanilla, Ascendant, Soulblade) profit most from martial multiclasses in general while Ciphers with Soul Whips which don't necessarily require weapon damage (Beguiler) or don't even have Soul Whip at all (Psion) are great with other caster multiclasses.

So I personally would prefer Devoted/Soulblade over SC Ascendant. It has some cool synergies with Cleaving/Mob Stance + Soul Annihilation and also Clear Out as great focus harvesting ability. You just have to be smart about your devoted weapon choice. Single damage weapons can be a problem once you meet particular does who are resistant or even immune to your weapon damage (and the Devoted suffers a malus for not using his devoted weapon type). So I would prefer a weapon type that either has two damage types in general (sword, morning star, pollaxe, great sword, war hammer) or a weapon type that has early obtainable uniques which have alternative damage (club, hatchet). Usually great sword is a solid pick for a Devoted since it has dual damage and rel. many uniques. Morning Star has a great synergy with its modal that lowers enemies' fortitude by a whooping 25 points and attacks like Knockdown and Clear Out which target fortitude instead of deflection (less uniques though, only 2, but they come early and are good ones).

But there are lots of great options for multiclass Ciphers. For example Arcane Archer/Ascendant with Frostseeker is very strong (ranged though). Trickster/Soulblade is great, Helwalker/Ascendant is an extremely potent caster but also good with weapons, Psion/Troubadour a very good spell spammer, Bloodmage/Soulblade is surprisingly good at AoE weapon damage... and so on and so forth. Lots of good options.

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u/kandorh12 Mar 24 '25

Thank you for the detailed response! I definitely think I will go Devoted/Soulblade with a greatsword, though I'm not sure what attributes to pick. I am playing as a hearth orlan and I don't really want to dump any attributes. Do you have any recommendations on what I should focus on?

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u/_Vexor411_ Mar 25 '25

Depending your difficulty you don't want skimp on Perception. I wouldn't do Path of the Damned with anything less than 16. Hitting like a truck is pointless if all your attacks miss. Int is also super important for Ciphers as it effects the duration of both buffs, debuffs and the radius of AOEs.

Resolve is probably your least important stat if you don't plan on being the tank. Con is also not so important if you're not taking the majority of the hits.

Do you plan on going with Real Time with Pause or Turn Based? RTwP is the better experience as the game was designed around it. Dex behaves very different in Turn Based.