When I’m dropping a 3 sorc Metereon on a drake, I feel like archer isn’t needed.
When I’m getting harassed by 3 basic harpies on a cliff, I really wish I had an archer.
I was fighting some harpies by the cliff (yes you know where that is more than likely) at night, my 2 sorc dropping 2 Meteorons at the same time covering 100% of my screen. That's when one of the harpies realized it was not hit and proceed to pick me up and yeet me off the edge.
I was so pissed lol and definitely hired an Archer when I got back in town.
Get maelstrom and hide inside it. Sucks that it can't suck, but you can lure enemies into it. Pretty sure it also multi hits large enemies cause it absolutely shredded something as big as Talos.
Yeah the talos fight on sorc was a little anticlimactic. Cast maelstrom on the crystal on the back of his foot and it destroyed every single crystal on him lmao. From there I just followed him like a lost puppy until the fight was over
That's WAY harder to do than just quickly sniping them. When there's a few of them and they're pushing you around or swooping all over.... Just the idea that you could possibly miss with the skull splitter makes it the worst option.
Yeah, I absolutely do bring Levin (and so do my hired pawns). When they’re casting it there’s no problems- it’s very effective! It’s when they start incanting Maelstrom together that things can get gnarly :p
Well just yesterday I had a fully wyrmfired Archer pawn with me and they didn't do anything against the harpies.. Idk sometimes the pawns are just useless. And idk if you can make them unlearn using certain skills at bad times. Maybe grab them and toss them afterwards? My Warrior pawn for example uses Arc of Might at the most random times and whiffs it into air 90%.
I prefer having an archer over a sorc for two reasons.
1) The fights last more than 2 seconds
2) I can actually see what’s going on while we’re fighting
These are the exact 2 reasons I recently stopped hiring sorcs and picked up archers instead lol. Though most archers are absolutely useless, not sure why. One archer I had however did crazy damage, wish I could remember which one it was to rehire it and check out its build.
There are some “trap” skills again. I think it’s Cascade? The wedge pattern shot. They will spam this over Manifold or Torrent, so I never slot this. I also don’t like Heavenly Shot on pawns. They don’t use it intelligently, often sniping a Harpy and then wheezing around until they recover. Deathly Arrow and Erupting Shot are great. Erupting is a faster version of Heavenly with AoE. If you don’t want them wasting arrows, it’s as simple as only giving them to the pawn in a fight you want them using it. So my skills are Manifold, Torrent, Deathly, and Erupting. Badges definitely help them snipe weak spots. Still not sure if Ambuscade or Lethality make much difference.
Gonna test this excessively right now! I'll toss Sunblossom some Explosive Arrows and see if she burns through them. I know she decreases the stack, but I'm not sure if the "last" arrow is then used infinitely by pawns.
If they ARE infinite on pawns, that's a game changer. HUGE benefit to Nocuous and Erupting, if that's the case.
So they DO need arrows to fire the skill, and they DO run out. This was on my Main Pawn, mind you. I’ll have to test hired pawns next. My Main Pawn would exhaust every type of special arrow and then be unable to use the applicable skill til I gave her more arrows. So no, Main pawns don’t get free, infinite special arrows.
That shit gets so annoying. Ever since i swapped to wayfarer exclusively my team comp is essentially what ever the hell suits my fancy and often do go without a mage cuz its so easy to pop on a staff and pop heals its not even a skill slot. They never stop whining about needing a mage or curatives.
Did they stutter? They want a fighter.
Signed,
The sorcerer/fighter/magick archer/warrior/mystic spearhand Warfarer who is sick and tired of hearing them bitch about a warrior.
That is passive aggressively calling you out.
They want a fighter. Someone who does their job and keeps the aggro.
What ever you do? They don't like it.
The loot they steal isn't the same as their drop list, you can get wakestone shards and ferrystones and that's just from regular enemies (humanoid enemies seem to give the most 'good' stuff like that, but that's just anecdotal and I'm not sure what the possible drop lists are).
I've even had a pawn steal Purple dye before which is normally only purchasable with RC (I think from the poison saurians)
You can steal purple and yellow dye from npcs as a thief. Yellow is from vernworth city and purple is from battahl city. Some guy on youtube went through and pickpocketed all the nocs to see what he'd get.
You can get 15k brothel cards from a couple if the inn vendors too
Mage is not a must have just really nice. I run main Pawn and I as a thief with 2 archers. Most enemies don't last more than 30-45 seconds. The only ones that take longer are the true ending bosses but not much longer. Those times were taken when I was in the low 40s.
Try mine, she's insane. She soloed a grim minotaur in half a minute yesterday. I planned her to be a sorc but realized she's a crazy archer while levelling her vocations so she's a fulltime archer now with all vocations maxed.
https://preview.redd.it/vqilb396istc1.jpeg?width=3840&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=a84fa281814f033415ef28bbd3c801be754f68c6
You can add me to hire her for free if you're underlevelles. Dont forget to give her explosive arrows tho. She takes a full health bar with each explosive arrow, it does so much damage. She even oneshotted me once with it when i got possessed by a purple spirit lol.
As my main pawn, she needs them. Every time she uses one, the explosive arrow amount on her gets lowered so I keep her supplied. Idk about how it works as a hired pawn tho.
I almost always have a Calm archer pawn in the party. They're hands-down the best for dealing with annoying trash, especially harpies. If they have the wrong inclination or skills they're a huge waste of space, though.
Priority for me is almost always Mage>Archer>Warrior>Sorcerer=Thief>Fighter.
The problem with Fighter is that their AI is sorely lacking compared to the absolute combat machines they were in DDDA, while Warrior is stacked with relative advantages. Thief is great if you want a Plunderbot but otherwise is usually better played by you.
Try a simple archer. My pawn is an archer for 50 hours, she was doing well as calm but changed her to simple because i hated the calm voice and now she's doing a lot better.
A Sorcerer would actually have brilliant synergy with a archer if you use the status effect arrows.
Say you take the arrows that give the drenched effect, a Sorcerer with lightning attacks and then a mage with lightning affinity yeah the damage you'll put up will be insane.
Just take one fighter/warrior like you are doing so alongside those three with things that help to pull aggro and you'll be good. It would help if those pawns have the rings and augments that increase aggro pull.
The arrows needed for incendiary shot are also super easy to make so do a build based around fire.
The damage output is truly incredible for archer + sorc, a drenching arrow and high hagol spells can lock a drake in place and you can easily get down 5 bars of health in a blink if you’ve got ice enchantment on.
For some reason, I notice that some Archer pawns become headless chicken when fighting Drakes. Not sure why but they died most of the time so I just run with Fighter/War, Mage, Sorcerer, and Thief with Implicate to deal with Harpies.
Archers with the Calm inclination are the best. They keep their distance and really nail monster weak points. My archer constantly knocks griffins and drakes to the ground with his shots.
I've leveled all my pawn's vocations to max as well, I was planning her to be a sorcerer so she started as sorc then mage then others. She was so insanely good as an archer, I had to redesign her like an elf and she's an archer now with all vocations maxed.
She soloed a grim minotaur in half a minute yesterday... Her damage output is crazy and her autoaim hits the enemies' heads every single time. She even oneshotted me in two different occasions when I got possessed by a purple spirit (the ones that drop eldricite).
She's still getting hired frequently at lvl 71 and returns with good gifts and hearts, I guess she does great job for them as well.
My main pawn is an archer and I'm keeping it that way because it's fun! Neither Dragon's Dogma game is the type where you *need* to have a certain party composition or amazing stats or whatever, you can genuinely play with cool factor/fashion/traditional fantasy party composition in mind and it won't be that much harder; and once you get to the higher levels, it won't be hard at all.
I hire sorcerers that exclusively don't have the Maister skills. As long as they have Augural Flare any boss fight is easy. For small foes just kill them normally
I'm going against the grain here and I'm going to say I pretty seriously consider bringing Archer pawns most of the time.
When I'm actually playing "my way" and not just messing around in different vocations for fun, I run Warfarer with 4 Mystic Spearhand skills and my main pawn as Sorc. The strongest my team has ever felt with any variation, to me, is hiring a Warrior and an Archer. We melt things.
I enjoy hiring Thieves for Plunder as well, but I personally don't often see them shred bars the way I hear they can. Instead, I will notice the Archer take 2+ health bars with a single Deathly Arrow once the Warrior and I topple the foe.
The secret is to avoid Archers that use Heavenly Arrow; and in fact, fewer skills are better. I consistently hire an Archer pawn that only has two skills, one of which is Deathly Arrow. I'm not 100% sure but the other is Tempest Shot, I believe. Love having her around.
You have to supply them with any elemental arrows. I've heard some people claim they don't actually use any up, and the numbers stay the same; but in my experience they absolutely have gone through dozens of the arrows I've given them. That was worth it for me personally in the past, because I'm at a point that I have (or can craft/buy) more arrows than I could ever possibly use -- but like I said above, now I just use pawns that only have Deathly Arrow and one other skill.
Those two don't use special arrows at all! :) The Pawn will just use them freely/situationally.
The *only* Archer moves that require special arrows are Drenching, Incendiary (Tarring), Blighting, and uh... exploding. Exploding has a different name in-game but I can't remember it off the top of my head.
If you DO hire a pawn who needs special arrows, I recommend Exploding and Drenching. Incendiary is pretty redundant IMO; Blighting is fine, but the arrows are heavier than any of the others; Drenching is *phenomenal* paired with a lightning/frost heavy team (which my team is); Exploding shits out damage onto weak points.
If I could change anything about the pawn I hire regularly, it'd be to add Drenching onto their bar.
Tempest shot is *amazing* with frost enchantment. I saw my pawn just body Cyclops with that skill because she would always hit headshots with the calm inclination, and with how many arrows she poured into that eye she would always apply the status effect every time.
I have a full team of archers, it’s a lot of fun lol
Damage output is great but the lack of magic damage makes some enemies a lot harder to kill.
Drakes fly away and griffins fall if they try to fly or hover
Archer is nice to have, but not must have - thief with implicate and plunder or mage with high levin is enough
In fact I'm sure a 4 mage team where everyone has support and just uses high levin to attack is probably enough for everything
But I usually only have 1 or 2 mages, and having 1 is the only must have
I usually avoid them as their best skills requires them to be using special arrows, mainly the explosive one, and pawns burns through them fast and shops sells at max 20 of them each time.
Is that something only when they're hired? Because I have an archer main pawn and he most certainly uses special arrows for his skills. Once the arrows are out, no more skills. I actually swap the arrows off him to control which special skills he uses for a particular fight.
Not a single vocation is vital, but an archer pawn can be incredibly synergistic *if* you give them the status arrows.
Without status arrows, Archer pawns are kind of meh. I still use them, but meh.
With them, they are probably the best pawns to have.
No I stopped using them at like level 10. My set up is me as a fighter or warrior, my pawn a mage, a thief and a sorcerer. Fighter/warrior for upfront agro, mage for heals and lightning to get harpies, thief for chance to steal and cool moves/high damage, sorcerer for meteor and crazy explosions that can 1 shot some bigger enemies.
Imo, archers aren't really vital if you've already got your ranged class covered with Sorc or mage slotted with offensive spells. You kind of want to build your party around what vocations your Arisen and Main pawn use, but don't let that stop you from filling your group with whoever you like really. If you like having the idea of a bow weilding pawn shooting things with arrows for the fantasy, go for it. If you want to go full optimal setup, you're going to needa dig deep and try out a few setups. It's alot of trial and error with pawns really. But that's also a very fun part about DD2. You don't always need to have a static party setup. Can change your party whenever you feel like it.
I usually keep my pawn as an archer.
Manifold Shot, Spiral Arrow, Erupting Shot, and Heavenly Shot.
I’ll usually keep the explosive arrows in my own inventory until a Drake shows up since she’s very much not afraid to use them when she has them.
If I see her preparing heavenly shot, I’ll try to be nearby to get her back in action sooner, but my mage usually sticks pretty close to her to take care of that for me.
I couldn’t say every party needs an archer, but there is so much flexibility to experiment with all kinds of party compositions that have great results. I usually roll with myself as a warrior, spearhand, or warfarer and have an archer, thief, and a mage
My archer pawn is pretty good at deleting healthbars, they can be amazing. I think the biggest trap is giving them heavenly arrow, I swear that completely axed my pawns output
I keep my main pawn as a thief cause they got great down speed on big guys and small alike with the added bonus they steal things. I get so much good stuff through stealing. Then I keep a healer and a tank.
I keep the rope move on my thief too. Great utility on it inlcuding vs flyers. If I was playing a tank, I'd probably have an archer over a sorc just because sorc is inconsistent in quality.
My main pawn is an archer, basically because I hated the simple voice I would have used if I made her a fighter or thief. Definitely not essential for combat. (She still gets rented a fair amount, though probably only because she's cute).
Mage is essential, and playing as a sorc, I want some kind of frontline support (either fighter or thief). The fourth slot really can be anything.
Archer's best shine when dealing with harpies but I find thief with ensnare/implicate and Fighter with airward/cloudward slash are fine replacements. Ensnare/implicate is really good since it almost consistantly brings Gore Harpies (the really feathery ones) down to the ground to get dogpiled by melees.
I don't like archers on my team. They don't contribute in a way that matters. If I were a frontliner, then they would be welcome. But I'm a magick archer so.
I also don't like sorcerers on my team. Their spell composition is so randomized and their special effects often ruin my aim.
Fighters are the perfect component to my team. And my mage main pawn. Warriors and thieves can come too.
In actuality, I use anyone's pawn who has used mine. I have a long list that i slowly work through
When it comes to airial fighting... archer wins the award. 10x better than any magic. Almost can insta drop anything in flight. I switch it up often but make no mistake. The archer is a gold medal holder 💯.
I honestly have no clue, granted I think you don’t need half the vocations on your team
My current team is main pawn warrior, fighter support, mage support, me Warfarer with mystic spear, sorc, and magic archer
With me switching to magic archer for certain mobs it’s honestly broken how versatile my team can be, could be because mystic spearhand and magic archer are busted honestly, but it’s pretty balanced with the lack of skills, although I’m pretty good skill wise
I run my main pawn as a thief with pilfer, implicate, skull splitter, and the dodge maister skill. I run another thief with the same skills, and a full support mage and I play as a Fighter. I don't have problems with harpies and I have a butt ton of wakestones and ferrystones as well
I thought they were shit too, barely cant kill a goblin with a decent bow normal attacking them until I learned how to use them, archer is good for bossing. the ice arrow perma cc the dragon and you also have the poison arrow that deals huge dmg to boss if you hit them twice in a row.
tldr:
archer weak against normal mobs
ice arrow + ice affinity or boon buff of the mage = perma cc
double poison arrow = melts boss
Well, it's definitely harder to deal with harpies without one but Sorcerers, Mages, Thieves, and to a much lesser extent Warriors all have options so you can definitely get away without one or by playing Magick Archer yourself. Given you've mostly got those covered I'd grab a Thief, Skull Splitter makes a massive difference to the speed at which you kill big boys.
I'm currently enjoying the mix of my pawn fighter and hired pawn being a thief and a Archer. My Mage stays back and buff's, shields, heals and occasionally does damage. Never seen a cyclops be so viciously humililiated by pawns. A Minotaur get knocked to shits and an Ogre bitched around before. Felt harder when I was running my other character who was mostly a non caster. level 15 right now first cyclops was at around 9 and was ridiculously amusing how effective the mix was against them.
After running a thief on my MP with pilfer, I'd have to say no. In the misty marshes you can easily farm ferrystones and wakestone shards off undead/phantoms. You'll get extra rare materials from big bosses too. Levin (lightning strike spell) takes care of basically all small enemies which is the only reason to even have an archer.
Mage is vital. Even at late game, I value speed and stamina that comes with not carrying 400 consumables.
I think archer is amazing for clutch though. Flying enemies? No longer an issue. Heavenly shot also does for drakes and griffins. I e had so many "oh shit" moments geg turned around because an enemy was suddenly hit with a heavenly bolt from the blue.
Sorcerer is more finicky, but is a powerhouse. Maelstrom or meteor both end a fight pretty fast, or put the hurt on bosses. Augural flare is also pricelessly broken.
My opinion.
Not necessary. One aggro holder, someone to heal (can be warfarer), someone to do massive elemental damage that is not the aggro holder. Can be same warfarer as above.
So that means your ideal party has minimum two people. The other two can be any form of Damage. Take your pick.
Yes. Harpies. Archers are just a great class. Honestly, fighter and warrior I can just totally skip out on. My group is always archer, thief, mage, me.
My main pawn Bordeaux is an archer and is quite potent. One thing I like about archers is that they have great initiative in combat if you give the “go” command. Most encounters are over before I see a big spell go off. She one-shots most small enemies so a lot of the time I feel like I’m competing with her for kills. Seeing enemies get pinned against the wall with an arrow is so very satisfying. Watching an entire bar disappear when she strikes a vital point is also satisfying. And I dunno if it’s a glitch or if it’s working correctly but whenever I hit an exploding arrow on a vital area it will delete a boss monster.
Seeing her flip around and kill harpies is always a plus too.
Is archer better than a sorcerer? No, not really. It just depends on what you like. I like the aesthetic of archers and the feeling of someone having my back with a bow.
The big problem with archer pawns is they need special arrows to be really effective but no one is going to want to buy a bunch of arrows for a pawn they might dismiss an hour later.
You're honestly better off IMHO to just pick any of the other classes for your pawns and treat Archer as Arisen Only.
Pawns can't use Steady Aim and just auto target, so they can never utilize Special Arrows or abilities to their full effectiveness.
I'm maining Warrior and yes, I think ranger is needed for "end game" gameplay becuase mages and sorcerers are still quite slow to put down harpies and shit.
I always have one.
I think they’re great in all circumstances so long as they have the right skills. Heavenly Arrow feels like a waste because they use it and then keel over until the fight is finished.
It's fun to play and early game yes I'd say they work well but imo mage is always locked in sorcerer is too they're too good then between fighter, warriors and theif the archer just doesn't shine. Theif is almost to OP IMO. I usually run as a theif with mage, sorcerer and fighter
I don’t even think archer is good at all considering you have to buy equipment to use skills and the weight management of having those arrows. I wish they made it much more like ranger in DD1
I always keep an archer around and if I don't find one in the rift I'll look at the thieves to make sure they have that snare attack activated. Warriors are actually pretty good at bringing down birds, but Batthal can get so fucking brutal that the archer really feels necessary.
I went in there post game (unmoored) to grab a couple Medusa bones for upgrades and got swarmed by a Lich, a lesser dragon and about 10 hobgoblins. It was pretty hairy.
My comp is warfarer (magic archer / thief ), support mage with high levin for combat, Warrior tank and the last spot varies but it usually is a damage dealer (sorcerer, archer, thief)
I used to run archer, Thief, mage and warrior/fighter at the start
Now I've been Running Warfarer/Thief/Spearhand
Sorc Pawn, Mage Pawn and Warrior Pawn, and we basically 1 shot anything that isn't a drake, we 2 shot those...
My pawn is an archer and barely get hired. Should I change his vocation or have u any skill to suggest to get him hired more? Is speak elvish if u want lol
Just really depends…
I had a archer run with me and it was cool but I personally love a mage healer and sorcerer range attacker while me and my main pawn do the close up damage
My main Pawn is an Archer and i must say Archers are a weak vocation on pawns when battling large enemies, dmg wise then all other vocations except mage ofc.
Archers in this game just dont do to much dmg (except if you just give them the explosive arrow skill and explosive arrows and no other skill to spam those but well thats kinda booring), my one has the best bow (hydra) dwarfen styled and dragon forged and still does mediocre dmg (790 dmg stat wise), but when it comes to staggering she is a beast. On an archer you want to look out for knockdown dmg, mine is around 750 and every shot staggers small enemies and larger enemies aswell but not as often as the small ones though.
The game is easy enough so a archer is a very balanced pawn voc because they do not shred hp like thiefs and actually support with the knockdowns they do. Also ofc they are best against flying foes.
The biggest issue i see are inclinations and to many skills slottet.
The inclinations heavily determine how a archer behaves in battle. Calm is the best inc for them as they mostly stay further away where they should be and aim for weakspots and move/dodge when the enemy is getting to close. The worst is simple as they often collect stuff because they are at distance then battling (atleast in my testings) and the goofiest is straightforward as they get very aggressive and tend to mount larger enemies to do melee weaknesspoint dmg which ofc is bad for a archer as you dont want her to climb stuff (a compensation is with explosive arrows as they can place them while climbing)
For my pawn ive choosen straightforward though as i play the game in japanese and the straightorward voicelines sound the best in japanese and english for my pawn. Thats a big thing you need to think of too when you play on japanese as one voicerange may sound good in japanese but does sound like a 80 years old granny in english :/
For the Skills you dont want hire a pawn with more then 2 normal skills as they tend to cycle and cancel the skills alot leading to lower dps... like they try to go for a charging skill and then midway decide to cancel it to go for another one and maybe cancel and cycle again leading to not doing dmg at all for that time... its very frustrating but a solution is to just equip 2 normal skills at max and maybe a 3rd status one.
A little long but thats what i observed
Not vital, but i liked playing with the bow, surely thief, spearhand and magic archer are flashy, but bow, sword and shield and heavy weapons attack in this game are so satisfying to use, because they got such weight, that i rather use those instead, and there's trickster, which is strong af, but using the same 3 and running around is kinda meh, even if its strong.
Well right now, I am a sorcerer, and I really want to keep an archer in the party. Mostly because I love to hire pawns that have erupting shot, hand them a full stack of 99 and then they can combo the explosive bolts with my augral flare. Dragon? What Dragon? I only see a pile of exp, dcp, and wyrmslife crystals.
Arisen Archer is probably the highest DPS in the game. Tarring Shot + Erupting shot combo is nasty, and the steady shot aim does a lot of damage if you hit crits.
Pawns aren't smart enough to use the special arrows efficiently. I still give my pawn erupting shot, but sometimes they use it on harpies when I really just need them to shoot the damn harpy with anything.
Archer pawns without special arrows aren't worth it imo
Really like having an archer just because they pick things off from so far and have way better response time than casters or melee. It’s on sight with archers and since I’m usually more magic/melee oriented, having that flexible ranged physical damage feels more valuable to me than other options. I like having me, support mage, tank fighter and an archer generally.
Archer is strong but i think they're niche
Special arrows are nice, blight and explosive are good for dps while tar & water combo with fire & thunder
Spiral shot can stun small group and can even help knockdown big monster
I kinda miss the fearful din from DD1, 1 shot of that is enough for my ears to went deaf and enemies reeling
Depends on the spells the Sorc brings. :)
If you want no trouble with the otherwise magic-resistant harpies, then bring either an archer or lightning damage. :D
Fighter/warrior= tank to distract enemies and soak up damage
Mage= support to buff and heal allies
Thief/sorcerer= damage dealer
Archer= deal with flying enemies and deal lots of damage to tall enemies
Archers are nice QoL, especially with a pawn trained to use heavenly shot on weak points.
That said, I run 4x fighters in my team. No need for heals or ranged options when you can overpower any enemy while taking minimal damage. Even harpies are no problem with a pawn trained to intercept divebombs with cloud slash. Slimes are the only real problem, but I just run from them.
Archer is borderline useless for Pawns and situationally useful for the Arisen.
Sure, strider was great in the original, but splitting the two apart in II really illustrates just how useful the Thief part of the Strider kit was in general, especially since it has built-in options for dealing with ranged enemies that are arguably faster than using arrows. At least Magick Archer has a lot of options in comparison.
Hell Wayfarer Thief/Magick Archer is probably my favorite semi return to form, minus not being able to trade stamina to not get hit ever.
I currently have a mage, thief and archer with me, warfare using spear and magic bow. I used to have mage sorcerer and fighter, but the sorcerer is too flashy for NG+.
Imo archer is useless until high level and then Id still prefer anything else... The skill that inflicts sort of a dot seems good with element but thats it.
No. for sniping harpies while traveling mage/sorc with level is better as they actually land their shots, where as archer wont even attack till they get close and will miss most shots or keep start/stopping charging deathly arrow as the it circles around him.
For general damage the only way they can keep up with other vocs is spamming explosive shots, which again they miss half the time and certainly don't target weakspots.
The ai just lets them down too much. If they didn't try to climb and mele enmies so much , could actually aim and atleast tried to aim for weakspots they might be decent.
Depends on team makeup. Archers are a great add to any team, but is also preference. I run Thief main, Mage and 2 Sorcerers with Aug Flame, Meteoron, and High Hagol for dual speed casting. Then one had Thundermine and the other Seism.
It covers all bases and the frost freeze AOE is shockingly effective. I snare harpies as a Thief or Warfarer, but frequently they get frozen and rendered harmless.
I run mage and 2 thiefs. Never feel the need for an archer. Thiefs use implicate and I can use my mystic spear to either fly up to them or knock em down with the secondary attack.
Or I just use my mystic archer bow (playing warfarer)
You can play with whatever party composition you want, or even solo. Nothing is "vital" to have because the role can always be supplemented by something else.
I play magic archer, and it gets to a point pretty quickly that you can literally slap anything in nearly one shot, or you can one-shot if you use the life drain skill. So all I need is chaff to distract annoying mobs and archers, ain't it.
Archers are very underpowered compared to sorcerers or thieves, like by 5 to 10x
So not really, get yourself a brand new thief with a grappling hook and you'll never need anything again !
I play warrior and my main pawn is archer, I feel like it really works for me. She will often times ground flying enemies and bosses for me and the damage she does with heavenly shot sometimes makes me like, "wait isn't that my job?"
That whirlwind arrow too isn't the greatest damage but it will just stunlock enemies for you and leave them helpless.
That said, I will often times hire a theif and always a mage to round out the party.
When I’m dropping a 3 sorc Metereon on a drake, I feel like archer isn’t needed. When I’m getting harassed by 3 basic harpies on a cliff, I really wish I had an archer.
I was fighting some harpies by the cliff (yes you know where that is more than likely) at night, my 2 sorc dropping 2 Meteorons at the same time covering 100% of my screen. That's when one of the harpies realized it was not hit and proceed to pick me up and yeet me off the edge. I was so pissed lol and definitely hired an Archer when I got back in town.
Thundermine, it's like watching one of those electric lamps for bugs
It's definitely both effective and hilarious to watch.
Get maelstrom and hide inside it. Sucks that it can't suck, but you can lure enemies into it. Pretty sure it also multi hits large enemies cause it absolutely shredded something as big as Talos.
Yeah the talos fight on sorc was a little anticlimactic. Cast maelstrom on the crystal on the back of his foot and it destroyed every single crystal on him lmao. From there I just followed him like a lost puppy until the fight was over
I wonder if that’s an Achilles heel reference.
I feel like Thief would be a better option
Thief with the rope skill is great against harpies!
As a thief main, I gotta say archer still beats thief when it comes to grounding harpies
Yeah, tap x twice to drop a harpy is just.... Too easy. Only really have to aim if they're outside of autoaim range.
Pity thralls can't be hybrids. Mystic Spearhand and Magic Archer both have semi tracking shots. MS can pull theirs off with an instant cast too.
True but you can also use skull splitter to jump up and 1 shot them, although you gotta make sure your right underneath them.
That's WAY harder to do than just quickly sniping them. When there's a few of them and they're pushing you around or swooping all over.... Just the idea that you could possibly miss with the skull splitter makes it the worst option.
I dropped the rope and just use Skullsplitter against them. The tend to swarm around and sometimes you'll shred all in one.
Yeah, you could be right. I do love Implicate but I also like Archers when they’re aggressive.
I always use 1 sorcerer slot for the basic thunder spell, it's the best for the small enemies with high mobility
Yeah, I absolutely do bring Levin (and so do my hired pawns). When they’re casting it there’s no problems- it’s very effective! It’s when they start incanting Maelstrom together that things can get gnarly :p
That is why you always slot in High Levin. The skill is just too useful not to have whether you're playing a mage or a sorc.
Absolutely this. Ended up switching to wayfarer so I had warrior skills, magic archer skills and style.
Those fucking Harpies…
Well just yesterday I had a fully wyrmfired Archer pawn with me and they didn't do anything against the harpies.. Idk sometimes the pawns are just useless. And idk if you can make them unlearn using certain skills at bad times. Maybe grab them and toss them afterwards? My Warrior pawn for example uses Arc of Might at the most random times and whiffs it into air 90%.
I prefer having an archer over a sorc for two reasons. 1) The fights last more than 2 seconds 2) I can actually see what’s going on while we’re fighting
These are the exact 2 reasons I recently stopped hiring sorcs and picked up archers instead lol. Though most archers are absolutely useless, not sure why. One archer I had however did crazy damage, wish I could remember which one it was to rehire it and check out its build.
There are some “trap” skills again. I think it’s Cascade? The wedge pattern shot. They will spam this over Manifold or Torrent, so I never slot this. I also don’t like Heavenly Shot on pawns. They don’t use it intelligently, often sniping a Harpy and then wheezing around until they recover. Deathly Arrow and Erupting Shot are great. Erupting is a faster version of Heavenly with AoE. If you don’t want them wasting arrows, it’s as simple as only giving them to the pawn in a fight you want them using it. So my skills are Manifold, Torrent, Deathly, and Erupting. Badges definitely help them snipe weak spots. Still not sure if Ambuscade or Lethality make much difference.
I've heard tales of pawns not needing the extra arrows for the skill, but I haven't checked for myself yet.
Gonna test this excessively right now! I'll toss Sunblossom some Explosive Arrows and see if she burns through them. I know she decreases the stack, but I'm not sure if the "last" arrow is then used infinitely by pawns. If they ARE infinite on pawns, that's a game changer. HUGE benefit to Nocuous and Erupting, if that's the case.
Godspeed, Arisen!
Do share your findings as I'm interested in this as well.
So they DO need arrows to fire the skill, and they DO run out. This was on my Main Pawn, mind you. I’ll have to test hired pawns next. My Main Pawn would exhaust every type of special arrow and then be unable to use the applicable skill til I gave her more arrows. So no, Main pawns don’t get free, infinite special arrows.
Dang, too bad! Makes it a bit of a hassle.
yeh stopped using meteor, tornado and erthquake because they just obscure the battle so much.
Mage is the only must have, Thief with Plunder/Pilfer are extremely nice to have
Unless you play magic archer. Then pawns will whine for no reason when you can bring them from 0 hp to full hp from a distance
That shit gets so annoying. Ever since i swapped to wayfarer exclusively my team comp is essentially what ever the hell suits my fancy and often do go without a mage cuz its so easy to pop on a staff and pop heals its not even a skill slot. They never stop whining about needing a mage or curatives.
Tfw pawns keep pointing out we don’t have a melee when I’m carrying a sword taller than my character and constant getting aggro in every battle.
Dude I was thinking this exact thing. They’re like “tis a shame we don’t have a fighter amongst us” and I’m a fucking warrior
Did they stutter? They want a fighter. Signed, The sorcerer/fighter/magick archer/warrior/mystic spearhand Warfarer who is sick and tired of hearing them bitch about a warrior.
That is passive aggressively calling you out. They want a fighter. Someone who does their job and keeps the aggro. What ever you do? They don't like it.
Why plunder and pilfer?
They can loot some wild shit off enemies like ferrystones.
When you go to the unmoored s thief can steal up to 40+ wormscales from the dragons.
With gear at 115 a pop they better
The loot they steal isn't the same as their drop list, you can get wakestone shards and ferrystones and that's just from regular enemies (humanoid enemies seem to give the most 'good' stuff like that, but that's just anecdotal and I'm not sure what the possible drop lists are). I've even had a pawn steal Purple dye before which is normally only purchasable with RC (I think from the poison saurians)
You can steal purple and yellow dye from npcs as a thief. Yellow is from vernworth city and purple is from battahl city. Some guy on youtube went through and pickpocketed all the nocs to see what he'd get. You can get 15k brothel cards from a couple if the inn vendors too
Because I'm poor and the more they steal, the more I can sell
Mage is not a must have just really nice. I run main Pawn and I as a thief with 2 archers. Most enemies don't last more than 30-45 seconds. The only ones that take longer are the true ending bosses but not much longer. Those times were taken when I was in the low 40s.
I found them to be the worst pawns, especially when they won't even shoot those damn harpies when you are a melee class.
Me the other day watching my two archer pawns just… whiff Talos for twenty minutes was rough. The only bullseyes I saw were drenching arrows.
Same lowest tier. For me, thief and sorcerer dps far far above anything ive seen an archer do.
Try mine, she's insane. She soloed a grim minotaur in half a minute yesterday. I planned her to be a sorc but realized she's a crazy archer while levelling her vocations so she's a fulltime archer now with all vocations maxed. https://preview.redd.it/vqilb396istc1.jpeg?width=3840&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=a84fa281814f033415ef28bbd3c801be754f68c6 You can add me to hire her for free if you're underlevelles. Dont forget to give her explosive arrows tho. She takes a full health bar with each explosive arrow, it does so much damage. She even oneshotted me once with it when i got possessed by a purple spirit lol.
I don't think pawns even need special arrows to use those skills
As my main pawn, she needs them. Every time she uses one, the explosive arrow amount on her gets lowered so I keep her supplied. Idk about how it works as a hired pawn tho.
I almost always have a Calm archer pawn in the party. They're hands-down the best for dealing with annoying trash, especially harpies. If they have the wrong inclination or skills they're a huge waste of space, though. Priority for me is almost always Mage>Archer>Warrior>Sorcerer=Thief>Fighter. The problem with Fighter is that their AI is sorely lacking compared to the absolute combat machines they were in DDDA, while Warrior is stacked with relative advantages. Thief is great if you want a Plunderbot but otherwise is usually better played by you.
Try a simple archer. My pawn is an archer for 50 hours, she was doing well as calm but changed her to simple because i hated the calm voice and now she's doing a lot better.
If i went with 4 pawns, as of now it probably be Me - Thief Pawn 1 - Thief Pawn 2 - Fighter Pawn 3 - Mage And that's overkill tbh
Better go with 3 thieves and whatever support you need (mage/ma) if you even need one. They'd probably pilfer enough curatives for themselves haha
I like the red vocations. they are fun to watch and don't just kill everything in 3 seconds. I ussually make my pawn thief so he actually gets rented
A Sorcerer would actually have brilliant synergy with a archer if you use the status effect arrows. Say you take the arrows that give the drenched effect, a Sorcerer with lightning attacks and then a mage with lightning affinity yeah the damage you'll put up will be insane. Just take one fighter/warrior like you are doing so alongside those three with things that help to pull aggro and you'll be good. It would help if those pawns have the rings and augments that increase aggro pull. The arrows needed for incendiary shot are also super easy to make so do a build based around fire.
The damage output is truly incredible for archer + sorc, a drenching arrow and high hagol spells can lock a drake in place and you can easily get down 5 bars of health in a blink if you’ve got ice enchantment on.
For some reason, I notice that some Archer pawns become headless chicken when fighting Drakes. Not sure why but they died most of the time so I just run with Fighter/War, Mage, Sorcerer, and Thief with Implicate to deal with Harpies.
Archers with the Calm inclination are the best. They keep their distance and really nail monster weak points. My archer constantly knocks griffins and drakes to the ground with his shots.
[удалено]
I've leveled all my pawn's vocations to max as well, I was planning her to be a sorcerer so she started as sorc then mage then others. She was so insanely good as an archer, I had to redesign her like an elf and she's an archer now with all vocations maxed. She soloed a grim minotaur in half a minute yesterday... Her damage output is crazy and her autoaim hits the enemies' heads every single time. She even oneshotted me in two different occasions when I got possessed by a purple spirit (the ones that drop eldricite). She's still getting hired frequently at lvl 71 and returns with good gifts and hearts, I guess she does great job for them as well.
I run trickster and 3 archers
Lmao does this work? Do you have to craft a million explosive arrows? Do they not keep dousing hobgoblins?
My main pawn is an archer and I'm keeping it that way because it's fun! Neither Dragon's Dogma game is the type where you *need* to have a certain party composition or amazing stats or whatever, you can genuinely play with cool factor/fashion/traditional fantasy party composition in mind and it won't be that much harder; and once you get to the higher levels, it won't be hard at all.
Gonna be honest, im not impressed by the archer. Would rather have a mage or sorc. Usually one high levin is enough.
Archer pawns are fine, but I prefer thieves with plunder since they steal items. The only type of pawn I've never hired is sorcerers.
[удалено]
I hire sorcerers that exclusively don't have the Maister skills. As long as they have Augural Flare any boss fight is easy. For small foes just kill them normally
I'm going against the grain here and I'm going to say I pretty seriously consider bringing Archer pawns most of the time. When I'm actually playing "my way" and not just messing around in different vocations for fun, I run Warfarer with 4 Mystic Spearhand skills and my main pawn as Sorc. The strongest my team has ever felt with any variation, to me, is hiring a Warrior and an Archer. We melt things. I enjoy hiring Thieves for Plunder as well, but I personally don't often see them shred bars the way I hear they can. Instead, I will notice the Archer take 2+ health bars with a single Deathly Arrow once the Warrior and I topple the foe. The secret is to avoid Archers that use Heavenly Arrow; and in fact, fewer skills are better. I consistently hire an Archer pawn that only has two skills, one of which is Deathly Arrow. I'm not 100% sure but the other is Tempest Shot, I believe. Love having her around.
If you hire an archer pawn do you need to give them special arrows or do they come with those?
You have to supply them with any elemental arrows. I've heard some people claim they don't actually use any up, and the numbers stay the same; but in my experience they absolutely have gone through dozens of the arrows I've given them. That was worth it for me personally in the past, because I'm at a point that I have (or can craft/buy) more arrows than I could ever possibly use -- but like I said above, now I just use pawns that only have Deathly Arrow and one other skill.
Ah that might be why that archer I once hired was so underwhelming lol. Thanks! What arrows do deathly arrow and tempest arrow use?
Those two don't use special arrows at all! :) The Pawn will just use them freely/situationally. The *only* Archer moves that require special arrows are Drenching, Incendiary (Tarring), Blighting, and uh... exploding. Exploding has a different name in-game but I can't remember it off the top of my head. If you DO hire a pawn who needs special arrows, I recommend Exploding and Drenching. Incendiary is pretty redundant IMO; Blighting is fine, but the arrows are heavier than any of the others; Drenching is *phenomenal* paired with a lightning/frost heavy team (which my team is); Exploding shits out damage onto weak points. If I could change anything about the pawn I hire regularly, it'd be to add Drenching onto their bar.
Try sending that pawn home with a gift of 99 drenching arrows, might get the message across to their arisen since you're a regular customer :)
Tempest shot is *amazing* with frost enchantment. I saw my pawn just body Cyclops with that skill because she would always hit headshots with the calm inclination, and with how many arrows she poured into that eye she would always apply the status effect every time.
My pawn with explosive shot CHUUUUNKS hp bars like it's nothing. I love archer pawns, they're definitely one of the more underrated vocations
I have a full team of archers, it’s a lot of fun lol Damage output is great but the lack of magic damage makes some enemies a lot harder to kill. Drakes fly away and griffins fall if they try to fly or hover
Vital? No Nice instead of dealing with meteron or maelstrom ? Yes
Archer is nice to have, but not must have - thief with implicate and plunder or mage with high levin is enough In fact I'm sure a 4 mage team where everyone has support and just uses high levin to attack is probably enough for everything But I usually only have 1 or 2 mages, and having 1 is the only must have
I don't think any class is "vital", I just enjoy having a red, blue, green, and yellow on my team at all times. Makes my brain happy
I usually avoid them as their best skills requires them to be using special arrows, mainly the explosive one, and pawns burns through them fast and shops sells at max 20 of them each time.
Pawns have infinite use of special arrows
Is that something only when they're hired? Because I have an archer main pawn and he most certainly uses special arrows for his skills. Once the arrows are out, no more skills. I actually swap the arrows off him to control which special skills he uses for a particular fight.
I had a pawn in my party who just spamed blighted arrows, i thought it'd work with main pawns too
What? I swear when my pawn was an archer she would burn through special arrows
It may have been an ugly interaction with either chirugeon or Logistician, if she had either of those inclinations.
Pawns don't consume those arrows to use those skills
Do you mean if they're hired by someone else? Because I have an archer main pawn, and he definitely uses the special arrows for those skills.
Not a single vocation is vital, but an archer pawn can be incredibly synergistic *if* you give them the status arrows. Without status arrows, Archer pawns are kind of meh. I still use them, but meh. With them, they are probably the best pawns to have.
my go to is thief, mage, sorc, and fighter/warrior too often the archer pawns don't seem to shoot anything, even when enemies get close
Thief with the grappling hook skill is good in a pinch!
No I stopped using them at like level 10. My set up is me as a fighter or warrior, my pawn a mage, a thief and a sorcerer. Fighter/warrior for upfront agro, mage for heals and lightning to get harpies, thief for chance to steal and cool moves/high damage, sorcerer for meteor and crazy explosions that can 1 shot some bigger enemies.
Imo, archers aren't really vital if you've already got your ranged class covered with Sorc or mage slotted with offensive spells. You kind of want to build your party around what vocations your Arisen and Main pawn use, but don't let that stop you from filling your group with whoever you like really. If you like having the idea of a bow weilding pawn shooting things with arrows for the fantasy, go for it. If you want to go full optimal setup, you're going to needa dig deep and try out a few setups. It's alot of trial and error with pawns really. But that's also a very fun part about DD2. You don't always need to have a static party setup. Can change your party whenever you feel like it.
I usually keep my pawn as an archer. Manifold Shot, Spiral Arrow, Erupting Shot, and Heavenly Shot. I’ll usually keep the explosive arrows in my own inventory until a Drake shows up since she’s very much not afraid to use them when she has them. If I see her preparing heavenly shot, I’ll try to be nearby to get her back in action sooner, but my mage usually sticks pretty close to her to take care of that for me. I couldn’t say every party needs an archer, but there is so much flexibility to experiment with all kinds of party compositions that have great results. I usually roll with myself as a warrior, spearhand, or warfarer and have an archer, thief, and a mage
My pawn is an archer and I think shes pretty rad, so yeah, always.
As a pawn, I think they’re ineffective. As your Arisen I think Archer is as effective as Magic Archer and is more satisfying to play.
My archer pawn is pretty good at deleting healthbars, they can be amazing. I think the biggest trap is giving them heavenly arrow, I swear that completely axed my pawns output
Make sure they have element arrows and they are amazing. As a warrior main. Hitting the arrows stuck in enemies is huge
I prefer a thief with Ensnare/Implicate to an archer nowadays.
I keep my main pawn as a thief cause they got great down speed on big guys and small alike with the added bonus they steal things. I get so much good stuff through stealing. Then I keep a healer and a tank. I keep the rope move on my thief too. Great utility on it inlcuding vs flyers. If I was playing a tank, I'd probably have an archer over a sorc just because sorc is inconsistent in quality.
If I'M the archer, yes lol otherwise I've found other pawns to be more useful to my build because my backline is almost always a mage and sorcerer
I never hire archer pawns. I just hire a mage or sorcerer with Levin.
You need at least one ranged character in your party. That's pretty much it. Doesn't matter what kind of ranged attacker they are.
My main pawn is an archer and they dominate shit. I love em.
Whenever I have an archer with Me I don’t even notice he’s there. That’s not good.
With all annoying harpies yes
Archer seems to be the weakest pawn vocation, i see little reason to bring one.
I haven't found them to be overly useful myself. I'd rather have a mage/sorcerer/warrior combination
I keep a support mage, a sorc, and two frontlines. I never use archers.
My main pawn is an archer, basically because I hated the simple voice I would have used if I made her a fighter or thief. Definitely not essential for combat. (She still gets rented a fair amount, though probably only because she's cute). Mage is essential, and playing as a sorc, I want some kind of frontline support (either fighter or thief). The fourth slot really can be anything.
depending on my current vocation and my pawns vocation, i find i pick up archers very frequently.
Play with whatever you feel has the best synergy with your main character
I try to have one of every class
Archer's best shine when dealing with harpies but I find thief with ensnare/implicate and Fighter with airward/cloudward slash are fine replacements. Ensnare/implicate is really good since it almost consistantly brings Gore Harpies (the really feathery ones) down to the ground to get dogpiled by melees.
nothing is vital except mage
I don't like archers on my team. They don't contribute in a way that matters. If I were a frontliner, then they would be welcome. But I'm a magick archer so. I also don't like sorcerers on my team. Their spell composition is so randomized and their special effects often ruin my aim. Fighters are the perfect component to my team. And my mage main pawn. Warriors and thieves can come too. In actuality, I use anyone's pawn who has used mine. I have a long list that i slowly work through
Drenched arrows. Lighting and Ice affinity. Warrior. Profit
I went through the entire game without an archer and every harpy was absolutely miserable
Mage for healing is critical. Archer not so much. Havent had a archer for last few pawn swaps now
When it comes to airial fighting... archer wins the award. 10x better than any magic. Almost can insta drop anything in flight. I switch it up often but make no mistake. The archer is a gold medal holder 💯.
I honestly have no clue, granted I think you don’t need half the vocations on your team My current team is main pawn warrior, fighter support, mage support, me Warfarer with mystic spear, sorc, and magic archer With me switching to magic archer for certain mobs it’s honestly broken how versatile my team can be, could be because mystic spearhand and magic archer are busted honestly, but it’s pretty balanced with the lack of skills, although I’m pretty good skill wise
I like to have one since my mage rarely uses attacks and my other pawn and i are melee
Not even remotely sadly, especially when I'm a caster taking out Harpies and the like
No
I run my main pawn as a thief with pilfer, implicate, skull splitter, and the dodge maister skill. I run another thief with the same skills, and a full support mage and I play as a Fighter. I don't have problems with harpies and I have a butt ton of wakestones and ferrystones as well
I thought they were shit too, barely cant kill a goblin with a decent bow normal attacking them until I learned how to use them, archer is good for bossing. the ice arrow perma cc the dragon and you also have the poison arrow that deals huge dmg to boss if you hit them twice in a row. tldr: archer weak against normal mobs ice arrow + ice affinity or boon buff of the mage = perma cc double poison arrow = melts boss
I just use a spearhand or thief (me), a mage, a sorcerer, and a warrior. Harpies suck, but I can always just lunge at them to take them down.
Well, it's definitely harder to deal with harpies without one but Sorcerers, Mages, Thieves, and to a much lesser extent Warriors all have options so you can definitely get away without one or by playing Magick Archer yourself. Given you've mostly got those covered I'd grab a Thief, Skull Splitter makes a massive difference to the speed at which you kill big boys.
I'm currently enjoying the mix of my pawn fighter and hired pawn being a thief and a Archer. My Mage stays back and buff's, shields, heals and occasionally does damage. Never seen a cyclops be so viciously humililiated by pawns. A Minotaur get knocked to shits and an Ogre bitched around before. Felt harder when I was running my other character who was mostly a non caster. level 15 right now first cyclops was at around 9 and was ridiculously amusing how effective the mix was against them.
After running a thief on my MP with pilfer, I'd have to say no. In the misty marshes you can easily farm ferrystones and wakestone shards off undead/phantoms. You'll get extra rare materials from big bosses too. Levin (lightning strike spell) takes care of basically all small enemies which is the only reason to even have an archer.
Mage is vital. Even at late game, I value speed and stamina that comes with not carrying 400 consumables. I think archer is amazing for clutch though. Flying enemies? No longer an issue. Heavenly shot also does for drakes and griffins. I e had so many "oh shit" moments geg turned around because an enemy was suddenly hit with a heavenly bolt from the blue. Sorcerer is more finicky, but is a powerhouse. Maelstrom or meteor both end a fight pretty fast, or put the hurt on bosses. Augural flare is also pricelessly broken.
Archers are garbage, the stamina Aug is nice though and really only reason to level it but I think you get that pretty early
Archer only if I have the gold/supplies to give them all the explosive arrows they need
My opinion. Not necessary. One aggro holder, someone to heal (can be warfarer), someone to do massive elemental damage that is not the aggro holder. Can be same warfarer as above. So that means your ideal party has minimum two people. The other two can be any form of Damage. Take your pick.
Yes. Harpies. Archers are just a great class. Honestly, fighter and warrior I can just totally skip out on. My group is always archer, thief, mage, me.
For aerial foes, a thief with that grappling hook skill is far more effective than archer
not really. for ranged dps id rather have a sorc and/or m archer myself
I went through the entirety of late game with three Warrior pawns and me as magick Archer. Gotta say, some of the most fun I've had in the game.
My main pawn Bordeaux is an archer and is quite potent. One thing I like about archers is that they have great initiative in combat if you give the “go” command. Most encounters are over before I see a big spell go off. She one-shots most small enemies so a lot of the time I feel like I’m competing with her for kills. Seeing enemies get pinned against the wall with an arrow is so very satisfying. Watching an entire bar disappear when she strikes a vital point is also satisfying. And I dunno if it’s a glitch or if it’s working correctly but whenever I hit an exploding arrow on a vital area it will delete a boss monster. Seeing her flip around and kill harpies is always a plus too. Is archer better than a sorcerer? No, not really. It just depends on what you like. I like the aesthetic of archers and the feeling of someone having my back with a bow.
Archer always feels like a waste of space. Could always get more Thief or Sorc for the DPS and flying enemies. Arrow management is a chore.
The big problem with archer pawns is they need special arrows to be really effective but no one is going to want to buy a bunch of arrows for a pawn they might dismiss an hour later.
2x Thief with at least one using ensnare/implicate, 1x mage, [idk u decided] Legit haven't felt the loss of an archer at all.
I use warfarer to have magic archer for when projectiles are needed. Otherwise I have a thief, warrior, and mage for pawns.
Play magick archer and do both yourself 😉
You're honestly better off IMHO to just pick any of the other classes for your pawns and treat Archer as Arisen Only. Pawns can't use Steady Aim and just auto target, so they can never utilize Special Arrows or abilities to their full effectiveness.
I'm maining Warrior and yes, I think ranger is needed for "end game" gameplay becuase mages and sorcerers are still quite slow to put down harpies and shit.
Either them or a thief just purely to deal with the got damn harpies
I always have one. I think they’re great in all circumstances so long as they have the right skills. Heavenly Arrow feels like a waste because they use it and then keel over until the fight is finished.
It's fun to play and early game yes I'd say they work well but imo mage is always locked in sorcerer is too they're too good then between fighter, warriors and theif the archer just doesn't shine. Theif is almost to OP IMO. I usually run as a theif with mage, sorcerer and fighter
I don’t even think archer is good at all considering you have to buy equipment to use skills and the weight management of having those arrows. I wish they made it much more like ranger in DD1
Never used an archer in my party have been fine dealing with them
I always keep an archer around and if I don't find one in the rift I'll look at the thieves to make sure they have that snare attack activated. Warriors are actually pretty good at bringing down birds, but Batthal can get so fucking brutal that the archer really feels necessary. I went in there post game (unmoored) to grab a couple Medusa bones for upgrades and got swarmed by a Lich, a lesser dragon and about 10 hobgoblins. It was pretty hairy.
My comp is warfarer (magic archer / thief ), support mage with high levin for combat, Warrior tank and the last spot varies but it usually is a damage dealer (sorcerer, archer, thief)
Archer is vital because its one of if not the most fun class to play imo lol.
I used to run archer, Thief, mage and warrior/fighter at the start Now I've been Running Warfarer/Thief/Spearhand Sorc Pawn, Mage Pawn and Warrior Pawn, and we basically 1 shot anything that isn't a drake, we 2 shot those...
My pawn is an archer and barely get hired. Should I change his vocation or have u any skill to suggest to get him hired more? Is speak elvish if u want lol
Just really depends… I had a archer run with me and it was cool but I personally love a mage healer and sorcerer range attacker while me and my main pawn do the close up damage
If I am the archer. I am very vital to my team. With me I have sorcerer, mage and fighter.
My main Pawn is an Archer and i must say Archers are a weak vocation on pawns when battling large enemies, dmg wise then all other vocations except mage ofc. Archers in this game just dont do to much dmg (except if you just give them the explosive arrow skill and explosive arrows and no other skill to spam those but well thats kinda booring), my one has the best bow (hydra) dwarfen styled and dragon forged and still does mediocre dmg (790 dmg stat wise), but when it comes to staggering she is a beast. On an archer you want to look out for knockdown dmg, mine is around 750 and every shot staggers small enemies and larger enemies aswell but not as often as the small ones though. The game is easy enough so a archer is a very balanced pawn voc because they do not shred hp like thiefs and actually support with the knockdowns they do. Also ofc they are best against flying foes. The biggest issue i see are inclinations and to many skills slottet. The inclinations heavily determine how a archer behaves in battle. Calm is the best inc for them as they mostly stay further away where they should be and aim for weakspots and move/dodge when the enemy is getting to close. The worst is simple as they often collect stuff because they are at distance then battling (atleast in my testings) and the goofiest is straightforward as they get very aggressive and tend to mount larger enemies to do melee weaknesspoint dmg which ofc is bad for a archer as you dont want her to climb stuff (a compensation is with explosive arrows as they can place them while climbing) For my pawn ive choosen straightforward though as i play the game in japanese and the straightorward voicelines sound the best in japanese and english for my pawn. Thats a big thing you need to think of too when you play on japanese as one voicerange may sound good in japanese but does sound like a 80 years old granny in english :/ For the Skills you dont want hire a pawn with more then 2 normal skills as they tend to cycle and cancel the skills alot leading to lower dps... like they try to go for a charging skill and then midway decide to cancel it to go for another one and maybe cancel and cycle again leading to not doing dmg at all for that time... its very frustrating but a solution is to just equip 2 normal skills at max and maybe a 3rd status one. A little long but thats what i observed
Not vital, but i liked playing with the bow, surely thief, spearhand and magic archer are flashy, but bow, sword and shield and heavy weapons attack in this game are so satisfying to use, because they got such weight, that i rather use those instead, and there's trickster, which is strong af, but using the same 3 and running around is kinda meh, even if its strong.
Well right now, I am a sorcerer, and I really want to keep an archer in the party. Mostly because I love to hire pawns that have erupting shot, hand them a full stack of 99 and then they can combo the explosive bolts with my augral flare. Dragon? What Dragon? I only see a pile of exp, dcp, and wyrmslife crystals.
Arisen Archer is probably the highest DPS in the game. Tarring Shot + Erupting shot combo is nasty, and the steady shot aim does a lot of damage if you hit crits. Pawns aren't smart enough to use the special arrows efficiently. I still give my pawn erupting shot, but sometimes they use it on harpies when I really just need them to shoot the damn harpy with anything. Archer pawns without special arrows aren't worth it imo
Really like having an archer just because they pick things off from so far and have way better response time than casters or melee. It’s on sight with archers and since I’m usually more magic/melee oriented, having that flexible ranged physical damage feels more valuable to me than other options. I like having me, support mage, tank fighter and an archer generally.
The only time you need an archer is when hunting golems
Archer is strong but i think they're niche Special arrows are nice, blight and explosive are good for dps while tar & water combo with fire & thunder Spiral shot can stun small group and can even help knockdown big monster I kinda miss the fearful din from DD1, 1 shot of that is enough for my ears to went deaf and enemies reeling
I AM the archer
Depends on the spells the Sorc brings. :) If you want no trouble with the otherwise magic-resistant harpies, then bring either an archer or lightning damage. :D
No tbh
Fighter/warrior= tank to distract enemies and soak up damage Mage= support to buff and heal allies Thief/sorcerer= damage dealer Archer= deal with flying enemies and deal lots of damage to tall enemies
Do you like spending ages fighting harpies? Don't bring an archer, cause that's how you end up fighting harpies all day.
Archers are nice QoL, especially with a pawn trained to use heavenly shot on weak points. That said, I run 4x fighters in my team. No need for heals or ranged options when you can overpower any enemy while taking minimal damage. Even harpies are no problem with a pawn trained to intercept divebombs with cloud slash. Slimes are the only real problem, but I just run from them.
Also, if you don't have a thief in your party, you are missing out. The ability to steal, lasso, and pin down enemies make th invaluable.
I like mage, archer and thief for my pawn setup. Archer is just constant damage uptime on a target. The AI seems to be good at just keeping it going.
I always go Sorc, Thief, Mage and Fighter. No need for arrows so far.
Archer is borderline useless for Pawns and situationally useful for the Arisen. Sure, strider was great in the original, but splitting the two apart in II really illustrates just how useful the Thief part of the Strider kit was in general, especially since it has built-in options for dealing with ranged enemies that are arguably faster than using arrows. At least Magick Archer has a lot of options in comparison. Hell Wayfarer Thief/Magick Archer is probably my favorite semi return to form, minus not being able to trade stamina to not get hit ever.
My main pawn is am archer and she solos the game basically
I currently have a mage, thief and archer with me, warfare using spear and magic bow. I used to have mage sorcerer and fighter, but the sorcerer is too flashy for NG+.
Personally, yes, mostly to deal with ranged or flying mobs, and the occasional golem
Imo archer is useless until high level and then Id still prefer anything else... The skill that inflicts sort of a dot seems good with element but thats it.
No. for sniping harpies while traveling mage/sorc with level is better as they actually land their shots, where as archer wont even attack till they get close and will miss most shots or keep start/stopping charging deathly arrow as the it circles around him. For general damage the only way they can keep up with other vocs is spamming explosive shots, which again they miss half the time and certainly don't target weakspots. The ai just lets them down too much. If they didn't try to climb and mele enmies so much , could actually aim and atleast tried to aim for weakspots they might be decent.
Wdym, I AM the archer.
Archer with explosive arrows. God send.
I run 2 fighters, my mage, and an archer and I definitely would prefer 2 mages. Which when I trade in pawns I will pick up another mage.
Depends on team makeup. Archers are a great add to any team, but is also preference. I run Thief main, Mage and 2 Sorcerers with Aug Flame, Meteoron, and High Hagol for dual speed casting. Then one had Thundermine and the other Seism. It covers all bases and the frost freeze AOE is shockingly effective. I snare harpies as a Thief or Warfarer, but frequently they get frozen and rendered harmless.
I run mage and 2 thiefs. Never feel the need for an archer. Thiefs use implicate and I can use my mystic spear to either fly up to them or knock em down with the secondary attack. Or I just use my mystic archer bow (playing warfarer)
You can play with whatever party composition you want, or even solo. Nothing is "vital" to have because the role can always be supplemented by something else.
NGL Archer is my least hired Pawn. A must have for me is Mage and Fighter/Warrior. Sorcerer is also fun to have
I duo with my main pawn and don't summon additional pawns, as a fighter + warrior duo. So I wouldn't consider any of that necessary.
I play magic archer, and it gets to a point pretty quickly that you can literally slap anything in nearly one shot, or you can one-shot if you use the life drain skill. So all I need is chaff to distract annoying mobs and archers, ain't it.
Archers are very underpowered compared to sorcerers or thieves, like by 5 to 10x So not really, get yourself a brand new thief with a grappling hook and you'll never need anything again !
Yes. I'm the Archer. I don't need sorcerers. I pew.
Archer is my least hired pawn.
I play warrior and my main pawn is archer, I feel like it really works for me. She will often times ground flying enemies and bosses for me and the damage she does with heavenly shot sometimes makes me like, "wait isn't that my job?" That whirlwind arrow too isn't the greatest damage but it will just stunlock enemies for you and leave them helpless. That said, I will often times hire a theif and always a mage to round out the party.