Brentos: yep, Health Regen goes up by almost 1 per level (to +46 at level 50), while Power Regen caps at +4.
But that makes sense, since you're getting 12 or more HP each level and your weapon damage is going up by 18-30 per level, while your MP is always flat 100.
I bet any composition of character classes can descend to level 50.
1. As you go deeper and deeper, a Rogue's Dagger becomes stronger and stronger (through combined STR+DEX scaling).
2. On the other hand, as your Power Regeneration increases, you become more dependent upon major spells (e.g. mass damage of Hail of Arrows and Electric Storm), and the Rogue doesn't have any Area-of-Effect spells.
3. It is also viable to build a front line with massive Damage Reduction END-based character(s) that absorb everything. The Warrior and the Cleric are the most effective for this, because they can wear heavy armor and tower shields.
4. Imho, a well-mixed party is a bit easier to work with, since you are always able to make use of all the best tech (such as an artifact spear or dagger or staff).
1. How do I change the Party order? The top PC hoards all the xp awards...
2. Interface is annoying. For example "initiate new dialog" uses the X key and "clear dialog box" uses the X key - so I'm busy trying to shut the NPC up when the game registers two keystrokes and I have to "... more ... more ... more ..." thru their whole spiel again. "On" and "Off" should be different keystrokes.
Be careful with Magic Items - a penknife with +150 damage is stronger than a zweihander. Also +87 field plate does no good if the dagger in your backpack has -99% defensive magic.
An easy way to cause 500 damage is to equip 2+ "Crushing" magic items (+100-300 dmg but no crits).
I found it easiest to use a bow & horseback since the interface is appalling.
Buy tons of reserves and mix missile & melee units - most of the time you won't lose any, but once your units start to die (e.g. your pikemen got firebombed, or the enemy is resistant to bows) they go down in hordes. If you put a distinctive unit (e.g. cavalry) every fourth reserve, you can tell how fast your units are dying...
Once you capture a capital city and recruit strong units, the rest is a blowout.
+X to Hit synergizes particularly well with reduced-accuracy attacks (such as Hail of Arrows). Poison synergizes particularly well with Area-of-Effect (such as Electric Storm). Speed caps at +10 and Power Regeneration caps at +4, so a Blue +10 spd +4 pwr hat (or boots or whatever) can be kept to lvl 50. Kill and Stun also seem to cap at 10% and Life Drain at 7% (except for purples). Meanwhile your Health Regen, Stats, Poison, etc., items need upgrading as you travel deeper and their values become obsolete.
All classes nicely playable - you could probably reach hardcore 50 with any set of 4 characters. Using a mix is probably easier, since you can sub in any dagger, staff, spear, heavy armor, etc., that you stumble across.
There are skill combo tricks (stun->coup de grace) and specialized builds (e.g. Str-based Ensorcelled Sword Mage, End-based Damage-Reflection tank), but its easy enough just to combine AoE (Mage Electric Storm and Ranger Hail) with raw damage (warrior melee, ranger bow, rogue dagger).