Dungeon Siege III

It shouldn't really matter what character you play with, just make sure it is the one you feel most comfortable with. It is worth considering that it is often easier to avoid damage in fights if you have ranged attacks to utilise.

Your main focus during any fight should be on avoiding taking damage, dealing damage comes after. Your AI friend for the most part will tend to stay alive and continue destroying your enemies.

I would recommend that you complete every side quest you can find for the experience points and level gains. Spend some time walking between towns killing easier monsters if you get stuck on any harder sections. The higher your level, the easier your fight will be, plus you will gain more gold to trade for solid items from the shop.

By far the most challenging fight in the game is when you first face Jeyne, she will stand with her sidekick behind a magical barrier. Swarms of fast, agressive melee enemies will be all over you, if you kill them more will spawn. All you have to do here is to kill the Ogre, then a second one will spawn, kill that too, then you will fight Jeynes sidekick.

The easiest tactic I found in this was to roll around the map, drawing the fast movers with you, feel free to pop off the odd shot to fill your ability meter. As you come round past the Ogre/Sidekick pop off a few attacks and abilities whilst dodging between each attack. Then youll be swamped again, so roll on round the map again. Once you are past this boss, it all gets far easier from then on in.

Reviving your partner is essential when then are downed, draw the enemies to the other side of the map, rush round and get them up.

When it comes to stats, Stamina will get you more hitpoints, armour will lower the damage you take when hit, both are important to get high. If you do actually block, then you can focus on that, personally I dodge instead of blocking so dont bother with that stat. If you prefer abilities then get your Will high and if you prefer standard attacking then get the Attack stat high. Chaos Vampire is extremely useful to keep your health up.

Make sure you max out any health related upgrades, having the fire demon as your co partner is really helpful if they have cauterize ability upgraded.

Try to get your defensive abilities mastered as soon as possible, then you can cast them on your whole party, not just you.

Apart from that, save often, and keep trying if you fail an area, if needs be, swap your equipment or party member to gain a new approach. Completing deeds will also gain you a nice permenant perk, you get these for doing various tasks like finding 30 pieces of lore, making a certain decision, refusing money for completing tasks.

Best of luck, feel free to ask if you have any questions.

hi all,

I started the game with reinhart on normal for my first play through, to get used to the flow of the game an certain attacks of bosses an enemies, an thought I would try my hardcore run with Lucas using katarina as my AI character, I found 2 builds on the internet for Lucas an Katarina for hardcore. I also picked up the perfectionist on this run an I would advise doing all possible side quests to bump your level up a bit more, I was level 29 when I finished.

Order of Ability Unlocks=
1. Graceful Repose
2. Wind Shear (you want this early so you can use proficiency points)
3. Shield Wall (you want to empower this early to give armor buff to party)
4. Unbridled Wrath (once again empower this early, you want to give focus regen to party)
5. Heroic Charge
6. Earthrending Strike
7. Vanguard's Strike
-If you use the shield + sword stance more than the big sword stance, then go ahead and unlock Vanguard's Strike before Earthrending Strike. Your choice.

Proficiencies= (in order for the most part, I max one out before going to the next)
Graceful Repose - Live by the Sword 5/5 - Combat Rage 0/5 (you want the 25% life steal)
Blade Dash - Hemorrhage 0/5 - Lightning Precision 5/5 (+50% extra chance for ability to crit hit)
Wind Shear - Wounding Gale 5/5 - Slowing Shear 0/5 (100% chance to apply bleeding status)
Unbridled Wrath - Unstoppable Wrath 0/5 - Endless Wrath 5/5 (interruption isn't a problem, you want extra focus regen)
Earthrending Strkie - either Tremor or Magnitude 5/5, it is a toss up, your choice (no matter your choice, make sure it is 5/5, either 100% chance to knockdown or extend range +10 meters, when empowered the extra length comes in handy as well the knockdown, once again it is your choice)
Vanguard's Strike - Vanguard's Gale 5/5 - Valorous Renewal 0/5 (the focus regen isn't needed with U.W.)
-Depending on the order you unlocked your abilities you might want to upgrade Vanguard's Strike before Earthrending Strike. It just depends on which stance you use more/prefer/need to level.
-Obviously Shield Pummel, Heroic Charge, and Shield Wall will not be leveled up in this build outside of empowering. Shield Pummel is weak even leveled, empowered version is useful though. Heroic Charge is really useful empowered but the proficiencies can be skipped. Shield Wall's proficiencies are not worth taking over the ones that are used.

Talents= (in order)
Victory Rush - 5/5 (20% chance to regain 10% HP when killing any/every enemy at any time, helpful for hardcore)
Wrathful Might - 5/5 (+20% attack)
Force of Will - 5/5 (50% of will stat gets added to attack)
Rejuvenation - 5/5 (+20% healing)
Death Defying - 5/5 (35% chance to shrug off/ignore attacks when HP is less than 25%, saves your a** in hardcore)
Devastating Criticals - 5/5 (+50% dmg to crit hits)
- Focused Strikes and Focus Rage are obsolete with Unbridled Wrath. Trade Master is useless for hardcore. Cull of the Weak is not useful.

i used this for Lucas.

Order of Ability Unlocks=
1. Charm of Eternal Life
2. Chosen Prey (the exploding enemies upon death under this buff makes it a no brainer)
3. Call of the Hunt (you want the damage boost, empower this asap to give to party)
4. Flintlock Fury
5. Warding Ritual
6. Black Hound Familiar
7, Thorned Rose

Proficiencies= (in order for the most part, I always max one out before going to the next)
Charm of Eternal Life - Soul Thief 0/5 - Zone of Sanctity 5/5 (will mak Kat a tank, 75% armour increase)
Caress of Suffering - Schadenfreude 0/5 - Excruciate 5/5 (a good debuff to help party out, decrease armor + attack)
Chosen Prey - Creeping Dread 5/5 - Life Thief 0/5 (another good debuff to help party, reduces speed + attack)
Call of the Hunt - Perfect Shot 0/5 - Crow's Feast 5/5 (this is a toss up, I liked the healing for hardcore)
Flintlock Fury - Suppressive Fire 1/5 - Rampage 4/5 (maybe put 2 into S.F. don't want 0 or 4+ in S.F. makes the ability weak)
Warding Ritual - Painful Rebuke 5/5 - Chilling Gale 0/5 (another toss up but again this is a hardcore build)
-Oviously the other three wont be upgraded (other than empowermet!). Heartseeking Shot is already powerful enough. Thorned Rose isn't worth the points. And Black Hound Familiar could be upgraded in place of Warding Ritual if you use it more.

Talents= (in order)
Rites of Restoration- 5/5 (+20% healing)
Markswoman- 5/5 (20% chance of rifle shot to ricochet, very useful pretty much two shots in one)
Steady Aim- 5/5 (+20% agility)
Critical Precision- 5/5 (+20% crit hit dmg)
Suprise Attack- 5/5 (dmg enemies in path of dodge roll, very useful in hardcore since dodge rolling is key!)
Spiritual Backlash- 5/5 (20% chance assailant will be pushed back, kat needs her room since she doesn't melee)
-Obviously, once again, Call Your Shots/First Strike/Swift Defense/Thrill of the Hunt- 0/5

and this for Katarina

Using these 2 guides for my characters the game seemed rather easy an the only boss I had trouble on was the one mentioned in the other guide.

All I simply did for this boss fight was roll around in circles activating unbridled wrath and shield wall and spamming blade rush on the first Cyclops then the second then when chakti arrived did the same. My AI partner went down during the second Cyclops and because I ignored most other enemies I just left her down.

Jeyne Kassinder still attacks so never stop moving she calls down a beam from the sky which starts as a big sky blue marker on the floor, her other attack is she shoots 5-6 white fireballs out in an arc, you can kind of tell this attack as it makes a distinctive noise.

all credit for the guides goes to Shellman704 from gamespotuk forums

here is the link to the page there found :-

http://uk.gamespot.com/xbox360/rpg/dungeon-siege-3/show_msgs...

if you vote negatively please explain why and I will try an rectify the problem sorry for any bad punctuation an i hope this helps.

This can be difficult, but I believe that Katarina is the best character to use for this. At first it will be a difficult journey, but when you finally reach a certain point you can start using an empowered ability indefinitely and killing all the smaller enemies in one shot. Bigger enemies and bosses won't die in one shot, but can still be dropped pretty fast though. This may or may not only work if you have the DLC, I'm not sure. I say that 'cause the DLC allows you to enchant items, and the two biggest ones are Doom and Vampire. Doom increasing critical damage on slower attacks, and Vampire having a chance to give you health when dealing damage. I'm mainly just providing the build, I don't really have any for sure strategies that work other than the final boss, but I will try my best. This will be very long, but I want to include as much information as possible to try to hopefully make it clear and understandable. I've posted a few guides before, but this is my first one that's really long so hopefully it comes out ok.

THE GEAR
First of all, if you do own the DLC DO NOT start enchanting your gear right away. Wait until you get a green quality ring or amulet with Will on it. The reason is because it's the cheapest piece of gear to enchant. I don't remember what the first costs are, but any additional enchantments costs 1300 for a minor essence, and 3900 for a major essence. The earliest I believe that you can get a green ring or amulet is at the First People Village after you beat the boss Maru-yatum. On your way out if you look on the mini-map there's a shop icon where a villager is selling things, and they have green rings and amulets. Transmute any items you get that have Doom, Vampire, and Stagger on it. Unless you have a ring/amulet with Will but no armor, then you have one more statistic to enchant either between Retribution or Warding. Neither of them really matter, but I went with Retribution.

You will want to get gear mainly with Agility and Will on it. If an item offered me more Agility, but less Stamina or Armor I took it anyways. Most encounters you're gonna keep dodging around to avoid damage anyways if enemies get too close or if there's some crazy attack happening. so having it extremely high shouldn't matter. My armor was only 148 by the end, and it was at least high enough to survive a lot of attacks and you could just use a proficiency in the Charm of Eternal Life ability to make up for that if you want. Now in my opinion, Will is more important than Agility but I liked to have enough Agility to keep my critical hit chance at 50%. So if an item gives you more Will, but less Agility and your critical chance is still at least 50% I'd say take it. I only had one item that was an artifact (orange quality) by the end because I didn't find anything better than it, and that was the Starjewel Barrette. This is a DLC item, and if you want it you'll have to beat the Daeva boss at the Temple of Azunai. If you can't get that, then you're at the mercy of RNG for the Clasp item like everything else. Remember this though: if there's a shop and a save point nearby you can reload a save game to refresh the vendors stock to try to get better gear out of it if you have gold to spare, but try to save a good amount for enchanting if you have the DLC.

ABILITIES, PROFICIENCIES, AND TALENTS
I will try my best to construct an organized way of the order I leveled up these things going by certain levels when you're allowed to pick a new ability, or when you unlock more talents and stating what you do prior to that level and what you do upon reaching that level. Before I get into all this I'm going to say use Heartseeking Shot as much as possible so you can master it, and unlock the empowered version. The empowered version later on is going to be what makes you dominate your foes.

Level 5
Prior to reaching level 5 you should be putting your proficiency points into Rapid Fire for the Heartseeking Shot ability, and your talent points into Steady Aim. Upon reaching level 5 you will unlock the next three abilities: Chosen Prey, Warding Ritual, and Call of the Hunt. Choose Call of the Hunt, and at level 5 it should grant you an additional proficiency and talent point allowing you to max both Rapid Fire and Steady Aim.

Level 9
Prior to level 9 you should put one proficiency point into Soul Thief for Charm of Eternal Life, and the rest into Perfect Shot for Call of the Hunt. One talent point should go into Rites of Restoration, and the rest into Markswoman. Upon reaching level 9 you will again be able to choose your next ability. This time pick Chosen Prey, spend your proficiency point on Perfect Shot, and your talent point on Markswoman.

Level 10
One level this time because now you will unlock new talents. Spend your proficiency point on Perfect Shot again, and this time spend your talent point on the newly unlocked Critical Precision talent.

Level 12
Prior to level 12 spend your proficiency point on Perfect Shot, maxing it out at this point, and your talent point on Critical Precision. Upon reaching level 12 you will unlock the next three abilities: Flintlock Fury, Black Hound Familiar, and Thorned Rose. Choose Black Hound Familiar, spend your proficiency point on Creeping Dread in Chosen Prey, and your talent point on Critical Precision. At this point, you will have all the abilities that will be used. Therefore, further ability unlocks is up to you. Black Hound Familiar will not be used until the final boss, unless you see a reason to use it prior to that encounter.

Level 15
Prior to level 15 put your proficiency points into whatever you want for Charm of Eternal Life. I personally went with Soul Thief, but if you want Zone of Sanctify at all that's up to you. Spend your talent points into Critical Precision, maxing it out at this point. Upon reaching level 15 you can again choose an ability which doesn't matter at this point. Again, spend your proficiency point on either Soul Thief or Zone of Sanctify whichever you prefer I did Soul Thief. Put your talent point into Markswoman.

Level 17
Prior to level 17 put your proficiency point into either Soul Thief or Zone of Sanctify, maxing it out at this point. Again, I personally picked Soul Thief. Put your talent point into Markswoman, maxing it out at this point. Upon reaching level 17 another ability choice, yet again doesn't matter. Put your proficiency point into Creeping Dread for Chosen Prey, and your talent point into Rites of Restoration.

Level 20
Prior to level 20 put your proficiency points into Creeping Dread, and your talent points into Rites of Restoration. Upon reaching level 20 you can unlock your final ability. Put your talent point into Creeping Dread, maxing it out at this point. Level 20 is a magical level in terms of talents because you unlock the most important one. Put your talent point into Thrill of the Hunt.

Level 21+
At this point there is no longer any new abilities, or talents to unlock. Put two proficiency points into Shadow Link for Black Hound Familiar, and three into Woman's Best Friend. After you've leveled up enough to reach that point any further proficiency points gained can be tossed anywhere. Put your talent points into Thrill of the Hunt until it is maxed, and then Rites of Restoration. At this point, the rest of the talents don't really matter, but I maxed Surprise Attack. If you have the DLC and can get to level 35, I also maxed Spiritual Backlash after Surprise Attack. Those last talent points are entirely up to you, but that is how I built Katarina for Hardcore.

STRATEGY
Never use the Dual-Wield stance. Dodge away until you can pop off a regular attack, or Heartseeking Shot. In early game you may have to do this a lot...it becomes a bit less later on, but that is essentially the strategy for any fight in this game really...dodge until you can attack. As I said before. use Heartseeking Shot as much as you can to unlock the empowered version of it. In the early stages of the game, I would try to weaken enemies so when I used Heartseeking Shot hopefully it killed them so I would regain some Focus. Also, I always dodged to get to the back of a group of enemies to get to the ranged enemies first 'cause it seems like there's always at least one and I would blast him with Heartseeking Shot. Sometimes they die, sometimes they get knocked down almost dead. When I got Call of the Hunt, I would normally use it when I see enemies and then use I think two Heartseeking Shots as soon as I could to get my Power Sphere back. If I absolutely needed some healing I would use Charm of Life instead. You can have both active at the same time if needed later on when you have at least two Power Spheres or if you build one back up before the other runs out, so that's part of the reason I didn't go with the healing proficiency for Call of the Hunt. I mainly only use Chosen Prey on bosses, and sometimes the bigger regular enemies. Clear out the smaller guys, use Call of the Hunt, use Chosen Prey, and give them everything you can until you notice the Call of the Hunt buff wore off and repeat it again when you can.

No doubt one of the first major challenges you'll have, at least for the main quest, is Rajani. As soon as the fight starts you'll want to start dodging because sometimes she will start with an attack right away. First phase is simple enough, keep your distance and the only attacks you will have to worry about is her throwing her spear and summoning a pillar of fire where you stand. If she gets too close, or you need to dodge by her for whatever reason she may start a melee attack combo, and at that point just keep dodging until you're far away from her again. Obviously use the Call of the Hunt and Chosen Prey combo to increase damage. As long as you don't get extremely aggressive and make it where you're stuck in an animation when she's attacking so you can't dodge you will be fine. It's very possible to beat the first phase without getting hit once. The second phase I honestly don't know how to help there...it's horrible. When it officially starts and she leaves the spot wherever you beat her first phase, she's always in one of the corners in the room. I always just ran straight up to her, and shot her with everything I could. Somehow she was unable to hit me, and she would teleport to a different corner. However, when I was playing with Lucas I was still getting hit so I don't know if I was dodging around at the same time or what, but somehow I was doing something preventing me from getting hit with Katarina and it worked. I wish I could explain exactly what it was that kept me alive by going up to her, but I honestly don't know. All I can say is good luck on this part.

Depending on whether or not you choose to get the meisters support over helping Queen Roslyn then your next struggle may very well be Ehregott, the boss at the Crypts of the Sacred Blood...again as soon as the fight starts immediately start dodging, because he will always immediately use his worst attack. He will charge up, and then charge towards you. This attack is really stupid, because it's hard to dodge and even if he stops in front of you and never actually made contact with you it can still register as a hit..and it's a hard hit. If it doesn't kill you, it's going to knock you down and most of the time you do not get back up fast enough before something else hits you to finish you off. I used Charm of Life as soon as I dodged his first attack. If you see Charm of Life run out, use it again. It can help a little just in case you get by other attacks from the other enemies so he doesn't kill you with the charge. Even though most of the time you die before you get up anyways, there still is a chance to get up. I think I killed some of the smaller guys, but I mainly focused on him. You should have two Power Spheres at this point, and Heartseeking Shot empowered if you used it enough. If you're confident to fire an empowered Heartseeking Shot at him, go for it. Just make sure Charm of Life is up before you do it, so you have time to get a Power Sphere back before it runs out. It also seemed like he only started charging up for the charge attack when he was a certain distance close to you, so keep your distance from him as much as possible so you have to deal with that attack as little as possible. Even more luck for you on this one...the main thing to watch out for is that charge attack.

Finally, if you can beat Ehregott then you should be good. Dapper Old Gent wasn't too hard for me, just play it safe if you need to, and try leave one Automaton alive so you can shoot the spawners. It seemed like no more would spawn until they were all wiped out. I hit level 20 after beating the Dapper Old Gent, and after that went to the DLC, but if you don't have that you'll be going to help Queen Roslyn and the Royalists. You should hopefully be able to max the Thrill of the Hunt talent before you get into anything major, and your playstyle will change a little bit after this point. You're going to start using Heartseeking Shot empowered indefinitely pretty much. If you get yourself in a position where you can hit multiple enemies, the odds of getting enough critical hits to restore the Power Spheres you just used is high, especially coupled with Call of the Hunt. You hopefully have about a 50% to critical hit from your Agility, Heartseeking Shot has a better chance of getting critical hits, Call of the Hunt maxed will increase your chance by about 10%, and you're shooting multiple projectiles. It's practically impossible to at least not get one critical. With a high Will and hopefully Doom if you can enchant items your potential to one shot small, regular enemies is very high as well. I think the highest damage I've ever seen was a critical of about 2000. I only use it when there's at least two enemies, but two isn't always enough to get both your Power Spheres back but you can always use regular attacks if needed for critical hits to restore it or just use a Heartseeking Shot because the act of using the ability will restore it, and if it lands a critical that will restore more. Now if there's a regular, bigger enemy like a Cyclops you can still use it indefinitely. If you get really close to them you can hit them with every projectile, causing massive damage and restoring your Power Spheres. I mainly like having Stagger for them because you can use regular attacks until they're staggered, and then safely get up close to blast them with your empowered Heartseeking Shot. Depending on their health, and whether or not you use Chosen Prey on them with your Call of the Hunt it'll probably take about two or three blasts to kill the bigger enemies I believe. As for bosses? You can't one shot them just like the bigger enemies, but you can kill them pretty fast excluding the final boss. Use Call of the Hunt, hit them with Chosen Prey, and try to get as close as you can before firing your empowered Heartseeking Shot so you hit them with as many projectiles as possible. That is basically how you play up until the final boss.

The final boss is very simple. For the first half of his health you'll have to shoot his hand after he slams it down trying to get you. He seems to be immune to critical hits, so I just shoot his hand with a regular Heartseeking Shot, then a regular attack which should be enough to use Heartseeking Shot again if you had 100 Focus before shooting the first one, and then just regular attacks until I can't hit his hand anymore. He will take his other hand and put his finger onto the ground to summon enemies. Use Call of the Hunt, get kind of close but not too close, and get ready for an empowered Heartseeking Shot as soon as they appear. You can potentially kill them all in one shot, but sometimes there'll be a few stragglers. After that he'll slam his hand again, and he'll do an attack until you get his health to certain increments which will trigger him to summon enemies again. Basically rinse and repeat. He has two attacks that involve shooting blue projectiles at you. One it like comes from the sky off screen, the other comes from like his mouth. I have no idea how to dodge the one from his mouth, most likely he will kill you but it's ok because the AI (Artificial Idiot) should have enough time to revive you before anything happens. Just dodge around as much as you can, and if you die from it no worries. After about half health you'll enter the next phase, the easiest in my opinion. Remember the Black Hound Familiar? Go into the Dual-Wield stance quickly, use him right away, and switch back to your Rifle. The boss will be spitting out a black liquid which will go on various parts of the arena, and enemies will spawn up front where he is. There's usually a lot of little guys, a big guy, and a Daeva which is the four armed thing. If you summon the Black Hound Familiar before they spawn, it'll end up running up there to fight them and it should keep the majority of the enemies up there. A few little guys may come to you, and seems like most of the time at least one of the big guys will come down to you. I just use Call of the Hunt and Charm of Life, and start using regular attacks. If one little guy starts coming towards me I blast him with a Heartseeking shot, and if there's multiple coming I use the empowered Heartseeking Shot. If one of the big guys is at a decent range to at least hit them with a few projectiles, I'll use an empowered Heartseeking Shot on them as well. The main thing you want to be looking out for is the little fireballs the Daeva shoots out, if you see those coming for you start dodging around until they're gone. Also, if you get overrun with lots of enemies it's probably best to dodge around a lot until the boss just kills them all because at that point stopping to shoot may cause you to get hit by every single one of them. If I haven't gotten overrun I usually do this until the boss shoots a blue beam at me, and that's usually when I hide behind the rock that's in the middle of the others, and I'll pop out around the left side of it to use empowered Heartseeking Shot if there are guys pretty close in the middle of the arena or going around that way. If there's black liquid stuff in that area, I hide behind the rock on the right. Still be ready to use empowered Heartseeking Shot on anything that may come up to you. Soon they will all just be killed by the boss, and he will shoot out the black liquid again. If your companion is dead revive them as soon as he's done, and get up to the front to prepare to do damage. I usually use one empowered Heartseeking Shot, Heartseeking shot, regular attack, Heartseeking Shot, and then regular attacks until you can't hit him anymore. This should get you enough Focus to summon the Black Hound Familiar again. Rinse and repeat that until he's dead. Most of the time the enemies will get distracted on the Black Hound Familiar, but if for whatever reason they all just come down to you kill as many as you can, and if they overrun you again just dodge all over the place. This fight is really easy compared to some other encounters in the game, so you hopefully shouldn't struggle with it too much. I personally did it first try, only dying once from the blue ball attack he has come out of his mouth sometimes.

As I said I mainly just wanted to share this really powerful build, so the strategy for the struggling fights other than the super easy final boss may be lacking or not very good but I said I'd try. I hope this can help someone in some way.