Monsters’ Den Geniuses: I Need Your Skills

If it’s not too late, I should contribute some information on what skills are “good” and “bad.”

Warriors epitomize the defensive melee expert. They’re tanks, essentially. That means they are not STRICTLY offense material. They don’t even need to take the front line since they equip ranged or back-row weaponry on the side. Warriors equip swords, maces, axes, spears, bows, and crossbows. They can wear heavy armor.

Their line-up begins with Defiance and Power Attack. Power Attack is likely only useful if you want a single, solid blow at relative low cost of 40 Power. It tends to get outclassed by other combat skills. It also requires a Melee Weapon. I throw flak at Warriors for not having the offensive versatility that should come with a diverse armament selection; I use bows to pick off the back-row annoyances which makes my Warrior good for nothing more than being a meat shield. If I cannot use the cool tricks with all my weapons, I tend to question their appropriateness for the situation. Hence, either I don’t bother with bows or I don’t bother with the combat skills.

Defiance is a deceptively cool variant of Shield Wall where the Warrior does not die no matter how much punishment is suffered for that round. In the early game where it’s hardest, I station my Warrior front and center during the really big fights, particularly melee bosses, constantly casting Defiance until my Power wore thin. Meanwhile, everyone else who can afford to do so took positions in the back. A chunk of the enemies’ offensive is wasted while the back-row suckers peppers them with havoc. However Godfall turns out, making Defiance into a “stance” would really screw with the folk who realized what the ability is really good for.

Then came the active skills. Execute is nifty when your lethality is low and your power reigns high. Provided you have 100% accuracy, you can off a tank-like sucker such as the Troll or the “Chosen” magi-warrior in a single hit and not have to worry about pouring others’ energies into them. For most of my Skill Builds, however, I turned Execute aside. The mechanic ought to be switched around, like have it a low-power standard attack with increased Lethality depending on how injured the enemy is. If they’re at 70% Health, you get 30% Lethality with Execute. Another damning aspect, although it lends itself to some amount of realism, is how Execute is applicable only with a Melee weapon.

Resolve is another Skill I don’t use all too often. It’s a cheap version of the Heal Spell that affects only Warriors and doesn’t cure Poison. Like Defiance, Resolve gets better if your Endurance is high. If you’re like me and pour at least one or two points per level into Endurance, then Resolve can get you out of a bind. You do, however, blow a turn healing yourself when you could try something different. Resolve is thematically consistent but tactically limited, just a few steps above being utterly gimped.

Cleave is great… only if you’re in the front-center position and there are actually lines of pigs to slaughter. The program makes the Warrior attack every adjacent space. A Warrior with a Spear can be rear-center. It only deals a standard hit per faceless foe, so unless your striking power is high, you might prefer to save your Power for something else for the Warrior to do. Cleave is damnable because in certain enemy formations, I will shift my Warrior to one of the sides so they eat carnage “over there”. It is rare that I keep a Warrior in one spot throughout a dungeon and I despise having to retool my Skill selection for every fight to accommodate its use. It’s a matter of convenience that I often shun Cleave.

Bloodlust sounds like a Barbarian Skill and might be more appropriate in that selection, but this version deals paltry extra damage. The trick is: if you do decide to use it and manage to kill someone, you gain 50 Power, resulting in a net profit of 20! Bloodlust might actually be a silly complement to Execute or is an upgrade from Power Attack, even if the damage isn’t high. It’s meant to rip a sucker down and get you more than just one less thing to worry about. I used to swing Bloodlust around all the time when I first started playing Book of Dread. It makes the assumption that you butter up a foe before the Warrior gets a turn. What makes Bloodlust tricky is that you have to pause and CALCULATE how much damage you’ll actually do against the enemy’s resistors, because on several occasions I struck home but left the enemy with one point of health left.

Adrenaline Rush is now a Stance, huh? People think twice about blowing a turn on a Skill like this, but it makes all the difference with each blow dealt, and it comes with max Stun Resistance as well. It adds a little extra than what Inspire provides in terms of damage, and when you’re starting out with little to no Stun Resistance, this pretty much keeps basilisks, Guardians and Chosen Ones from ruining the Warrior’s day. How can you argue with that? Adrenaline Rush is one of my favorite “prep” Skills.

Inspire is cheap and cost-effective. It helps out against long, arduous fights by giving a little extra pep in everyone’s powers. With that said, this became my favorite Skill in Book of Dread.

Shield Wall is the expensive Skill used (at FULL Health) to divert all enemies’ attention to the Warrior. You need Shields, either Buckler or Tower Shield (sorry, no Parrying Dagger), as well as front-line combat positioning. It’s expensive but cool as fug. Now the greenskins know how I feel when one of their Orcish Elites issues a challenge and sends all my idiots scrambling to bump him off. Shield Wall also increases Damage Reduction by 25%, up to a max of 99% if paired with high AC and a Conjuror’s Eldritch Aegis.

For those who actually spent time with alternate gear builds and party compositions, a Warrior with Overwhelm can be a horrifying visage on the battlefield. It’s super-expensive and embarrassing to mess it up, but if you have at least one point of Quickness higher than your target, you throw two additional standard strikes upon that target. Each hit procs drain effects, stun attempts, and each one is modified by a Next Attack buff. It makes mincemeat out of anything. However, against the harshest of foes the Warrior requires a great deal of Quickness. For this reason, people shun and disregard Overwhelm. A Barbarian’s Boast, Ranger’s Swiftness, or Rogue’s Cripple are all options to bypass this issue.

Finally there are Passive Skills like Leadership and Armor Proficiency–one offensive and one defensive as per Book of Dread’s setup–but these satisfy the Warrior’s idiom nicely. Leadership is great for doubling your pleasure against a single target, perhaps superior to ordinary combat Skills when you’re saving up for an emergency Shield Wall or Defiance. Armor Proficiency just enhances the power of a Warrior in heavy gear, making those high Damage Reduction percentages possible.

None of the Warrior’s Skills ought to go away… but one or two, (Execute, Cleave) need to be retooled. Cleave, for instance, ought to be like Bloodlust, only that it gives the Warrior a second turn (or attack) if he manages to kill the target. This would grant a Warrior a second turn, something the plodding lug could really use.

Clerics are the stereotypical Paladin Class in Book of Dread, and about as annoying in their stereotyped grandeur. But they were also the first Class I used routinely in any Party Build. Unless a Sword is Consecrated (and most of those typically suck), the Cleric is not going near anything other than a mace. Heavy Armor, on the other hand, is a definite. Clerics can serve as moderately successful Tanks or front-line combatants, but a holy tool, a Censer, can be used in the Offhand as a means of pumping up their Healing Spell Power.

Both their Main Skills have Passive Skills to complement them, thus becoming staples of any Skill Build: Healing and Smite. These should not be stripped of their rank by changing how they operate. Healing cures poison and replenishes Health, while Benediction allows it to remove curses and ALL known ailments, including the Barbarian’s self-induced “Decreased Damage Reduction” effect from the Reckless Fury Skill. Not exactly as worthless as you might think, huh?

As for Smite, it always hits, deals extra havoc upon Undead, can be modified by the Inquisitor Mace and another one of those Elite Censers… and with the Passive Skill Wrath, can be made to Stun any aggressor. Smite becomes a traveling companion like Shotguns were in the original D00M.

Holy Light is great during the early days or any day, really, since it makes it harder for groups to strike you. The Blind effect (30%) is fixed, but it can deal damage to the Undead and always hits. This makes surviving long battles even more possible, although there are Gear Builds that allow Clerics to hose down single enemies with a massive Blindness penalty, so by that point Holy Light becomes antiquated.

Heal All is expensive and likely contains no advantages wrought from the Benediction Passive Skill. The only reason it exists is to satisfy most players’ desire for a spell that heals everybody all at once. I rarely use it.

Anoint is a good optional Skill if you have space for it. This pumps up an ally’s next attack by 75% of its normal output. Some rather sick combos are possible with it, but wait on it. It can help out a LOT, but in the early game other things help more.

Revive is a private shame–I never enter battle without it. The tricky part is having enough Power to cast it… as well as being able to keep the sucker alive and redirect enemy attentions elsewhere (or just get lucky), but suffering the indignity of a casualty keeps Revive in my Skill Set just in case something goes horribly awry. For a counterpoint to the usefulness or significance of Revive, I recall the original Final Fantasy prevented you from reviving characters in the midst of battle, which for the sake of realism would probably nail the coffin on Revive shut. I’d still miss her, though….

Litany of Pain… being that I often had a Mage or Barbarian or Rogue… or anybody else who did heavy damage and often delegated the Cleric to defensive/healing status, I rarely found a purpose for this one. For the situations where no Mage, Barbarian, or Rogue exist, maybe then.

Purify is a cheap trick that lets you cure Poison and Curses on everyone and grants 50% Reduction against Poison attacks. Again, this is great when you first start out or whenever you’re fighting those miserable Orc Shamans, but like Holy Light becomes antiquated by other things, notably a respectable Gear Build. Then again, if it ain’t perfect and you’re coming up against a Gorgon….

The last two Skills are for when people think they’re handling a Paladin and not a Cleric. Shield of Faith is just expensive enough to keep you from using it twice even if you have max Power. This is a front-line Skill meant to take some pressure off. To be honest, I was afraid to try it, chiefly because the description fails to advertise it as anything useful, at least for my purposes in keeping a Cleric as a ranged caster and healer.

Fervor suffers the same problem. It requires a Melee Weapon, but since I never pour Stat Points into Strength and think 60 Power is too high, I never think twice. Double the attack power in a single swing does not appeal to me. Now, if it became a Bonus like Increase Damage +100% for the battle….

The Passive Skills of the Cleric appear to affect two Skills. Several of the Skills in the Cleric’s catalog end up broken from this lack of attention. Fervor, for instance, would certainly catch my attention if it dealt extra damage based on Wrath’s Level (or simply dealt a Stun Effect), while Shield of Faith would be really cool if it spawned a residual regenerative bonus or treated the Cleric for status ailments with enough points in Benediction. Revive doesn’t have a great deal of power… why not allow Benediction to increase its healing by 3% per point? That way, it’s 100% fully healed character time! But such suggestions would surely throw off the balance of the Cleric, so just be judicious when retooling some of the lackluster Skills.

…The Mage is vicious. Also a good front-line combatant if you have the speed and strategy, even when limited to wearing light armor. Mages can equip either swords or staves, the latter of which serves as a ranged weapon when the magic is running low.

The first Skill we see is Freeze. Sounds redundant to have this lying around, but it punches a single target rather hard and is reasonably cheap. Freeze has a 1 in 4 shot at Stunning an opponent under normal circumstances, but that’s nothing to rely upon. Like most damage spells like Smite, existent Stun Chance is added to this number, so a 45% chance becomes 70% when Freeze is cast.

Fireball is like a Grenade from a Goblin Artificer, since it can singe an ally if you’re careless. This deals a punch to the center target and splash damage to adjacent spaces (except diagonal). It is reasonably inexpensive and deals fair damage to crowds. Being the cheapskate I am, I often preferred Fireball over Electrical Storm during the early campaign and only through its use did I learn to take full advantage of proper party positioning before every fight.

Electrical Storm is expensive but the reason everybody who champions a Mage champions the Mage. It deals a good shock to everything on the field, so it is often applied during major encounters. Like most Magi spells, it operates on Intellect.

Cosmic Prison can be a blessing or curse depending on the target. It always hits, deals damage, and gives a brief buff to Damage Reduction, but the enemy can resist the Stun effect if they have Stun Resistance. Cosmic Prison is great for pinning down opponents that can really trip up your odds at winning, like Acolytes, but you can’t quite follow up with the same extreme prejudice that you normally would. Still, a Rogue’s Coup de Grace is possible and you can concentrate your energies upon some other foe.

Invisibility is super-cool as a protection and for keeping oneself out of the way. It can be used on any member of the party, unlike the Rogue’s Hide Skill that is used upon oneself. If you need someone to stay out of the spotlight (like if they’re getting hammered and can’t recover on the very next turn) then shroud them with Invisibility. It lasts until the recipient’s next turn.

Arcane Armor is a cheap means of keeping a Mage alive through long excursions. It raises their Damage Reduction by 40%, effectively matching a Cleric or Warrior with a decent Gear Build. A Mage can make for a passable Tank alongside another armored ally, although most players lack the imagination to see the sucker as just a caster of lightning bolts, tucked in back where they assume it is safe.

Flickering Flames had occasional use. When wanting to buff everybody to dish hell back at the aggressors without lifting a finger, the Mage casts this on a player to get 100% Damage Reflection. This got added to existent levels, like 50% became 150%. I often found Gargoyles and Wraiths to be funny victims of this buff, but the Skill’s approach is in direct defiance to one’s preconceived notions of a bolt thrower.

Ha… Ensorcelled Blade is NOT a Melee-Range spell. It lets you take your sword, enchant it into flight… and then it swings viciously at one sucker four times. Accuracy is reduced by 25% for every swing (consider some preemptive buffs or compatible Gear Build) and it requires Strength instead of Intellect… but again, not all of the Mage’s Skills require Intellect. This nightmarish Skill is one of my personal favorites, because it let me play the Mage with alternate stat and skill builds. The other reason? I can cast this from the back row, so while I’m not swinging with someone in front of me, I’m likely busy with other spells to bother with that vulgar shit.

Incinerate is that Spell where Monty Python goes, “Now for something completely different.” It’s an Intellect-oriented melee-range spell that pumps one unlucky sot full of magical fire. It’s cheap and gruesomely efficient, but you can only spray the front-line suckers and has no bells and whistles beyond sheer damage potential. If a Mage is ever caught on the front-line for any reason, this spell better be the reason.

Power Siphon gets plenty of flak. Nobody knows why a Mage would cast it multiple times (a 100% accuracy rating helps out) against a large party–at least three enemies–but there you have it: a spell that sucks out the enemy’s Power. I hear the back-row suckers are far less annoying when they don’t have the power to cast back. Humans tend to recover a little faster but everything else is fair game; when an enemy is “powerless” they rely on their normal attacks. Sometimes, they can’t even do those. Power Siphon is also handy for recovering fast from Electrical Storm, so I often paired these two together.

Spell Mastery would be handier if it happened more often. A chance to negate the cost of a Spell altogether? Sign me up! However, I prefer a defensive caster with Shielding. It negates one blow of any amount of damage at the cost of 10 Power. Now, if that happened more often….

A Mage’s strongest selection of spells corresponds to the stereotyped idiom of dealing the most amount of carnage for any character, but the spells with intricate effects, as well as some of the tricky-looking ones, don’t have enough going for them to elicit anyone’s respect. They’re pretty much there… until a creative strategist comes along and messes around with them.

Rangers are the reason I survived and defeated my first campaign so many years ago on Newgrounds’ version of the game. They are agile and capable of hedging between sniping offenses and healing. They can wear medium armor and handle swords, axes, spears, bows, and crossbows. Their claim to fame revolves around archery but they can stick it out in the front-lines provided they have company. Rangers also equip quickness-enhancing quivers on their backs no matter their weapon.

Pierce is an amazing Skill for the archer on a budget, both in terms of arrows and in Power. At 30 Points, this deals a standard hit to the front and back in one deft stroke, mowing through one jerk and striking another. This nifty pup needs no changing.

Nature’s Balm grants full protection against poison and grants a regenerative effect based on Intellect. Why people pass on this I have no idea. Patience, maybe? It needs time to take effect, but this is great when you don’t want to end battles with 30% health per war dog, getting ready for a boss fight with no Shrine of Healing to spare. Keep one sucker alive until you’re fully healed.

Healing Lore got me out of a couple pinches. No, honest. It is nowhere near as potent as the Cleric’s Heal, but it cures poison and restores double of what Nature’s Balm does in one round. Healing Lore helps when alternatives to emergency healing are evaporated. Still, most Party Builds would negate the necessity of Healing Lore because most sensible types have a Conjuror or Cleric in them.

Hunter’s Prowess deals a little extra damage and doubles the pain against Deep Creatures, Rangers’ niche target. This applies to Legendary Monsters such as the Hydra, so don’t pass it up just because it deals only 10% extra damage. The 10% Lethality may also be compounded upon existent Lethality to broaden the odds of success. Hunter’s Prowess will, of course, get switched with either Pin or Poisoned Arrow whenever there are other targets.

Hail of Arrows throws two shots per space at 70% accuracy per shot. It’s expensive and annoying to have it work right the first time, but given some padding it should make crowds less harrowing. I learned to stick with techniques that guaranteed better accuracy….

Pin requires a bow, like Hail of Arrows, but it deals less damage. What good is that? What is good about Pin is that it ALWAYS STUNS A TARGET, provided there is no resistance to tread through. Pin’s chances against a resistant target, say a Greenskin or Dwarf, increases with the amount of ordinary Stun Chance available. Pin is great when you’ve tooled your Quickness with the Rogue so that you deal Coup de Grace kills on everything.

Force of Nature requires a Melee Weapon, seemingly against the trigger-happy idiom of the Ranger. Spears are applicable, as always. Melee Weapons also benefit from having Hunter’s Prowess, which is compatible with both types of weapons. Anyway, the 60% accuracy is evil as is the Power cost, but the chance bypass a Dwarf Commander’s impossible Damage Reduction is a chance I’m willing to take! It does strike three times. Again, people will ignore it because they forget all too easily that spears are melee weapons too.

Envenomed Arrow is one of my favorites, being that I often hanged out during battle for untold lengths of time. I peppered my steaks with some secret sauce and let them mold over. It can work even against Dwarves, makes mincemeat out of Humans and Greenskins, but the Undead are resistant, and some Deep Creatures are either very resistant or immune. One of the reasons I raise Intellect on my Ranger as opposed to either Dex or Strength.

Focus, another underrated gem, restores 25 Power per use. If you prefer to equip nothing but Power Regeneration, you’ll have an extra Skill slot for something different. But I often searched far and wide for the Assassin outfit, or tried to get other kinds of buffs from my Gear Build. Besides, do you know how much Power a Ranger goes through?

Swiftness is another overlooked clover that ensures you get first strike capabilities. When the group seems overwhelming, the first few moves you make are crucial. Try the Cleric’s Holy Light or set up a Shield Wall for that first round… try to Dismember the ringleader to keep him from one-shotting your Mage before that Arcane Armor gets set up. Even if Quickness can be enhanced through gear, you can get slowed down by Arachnoids and some guy named Garin knows how to lead an Onslaught….

For Passives, the Ranger is not without Creature’s Lore. This occasionally Procs when an attack is dealt, dipping the enemy’s Damage Reduction below 0% where applicable since it removes 40 of those. That one gets more fanfare than Vitality, which at highest level grants a regenerative bonus based on a percentage of max health. That makes a Ranger survive anything short of nuclear holocaust. I would start off with Creature’s Lore once I got my preferred Skill build.

Rangers are the only reason I continued playing Monsters’ Den: Book of Dread, strictly because they helped me survive my first nightmarish campaign. Of the classes, they demand the fewest changes.

Rogues apply stealth as a means of battle. They’re geared toward extreme prejudice… heavy damage, strike hard and fade away without a trace. Kind of the reason I always made my Rogue female, because the graphic provided was perfect for the role. Rogues wear medium armor and handle swords, maces, bows, and crossbows. Rogues can handle daggers that enhance quickness and draw from both strength and dexterity (the reason I concentrate upon endurance and intellect).

Right off the bat, Rogues apply Poison. It gradually gets rid of its target if not entirely immune. To one-up the Ranger, Rogues may apply Poison to any weapon. As a staple of the class, this better not change or get removed.

Piercing blows through the Pierce Defenses Skill comes second. It’s a little more expensive, but a single hit at full accuracy that bypasses any Damage Reduction is quite the feat. Constructs and armored Dwarves and Humans are in for a treat. This needs no change, especially since any weapon may apply.

Sneak Attack is designed for the melee Rogue who sees a back-row annoyance and wished that bow was strung. It is a little more powerful than a standard blow and can be dealt from any point on the battlefield. Now, it used to be a skill that dealt extra anatomical damage upon a foe who got denied any dex/dodge bonuses. If a melee attack that goes ranged seems redundant, make it like a melee/ranged single attack that, if you have superior quickness to the target, you deal extra damage.

Flash Powder is unique in that neither Stun or Blind added effects from your standard melee attack will improve upon the power of the Flash Powder itself. It will always be 50 Blind and 50% Stun. Hence, it can be antiquated very easily by a superior Gear Build. Then again, this Skill is a lifesaver in the beginning when those cutting-edge Gear Builds are impossible to come by. I still think you can halve the cost, though.

Create Opening deals less damage but orients another ally into performing an added attack. It works like the Warrior’s Leadership. Wouldn’t it be funny if you pulled this, then the Warrior procked Leadership and the Rogue struck again? For its price, I don’t think Create Opening is that great, because it hinges upon the ability of another fighter. The Rogue is designed to facilitate the sort of carnage that is now asked for in other guys who are likely built towards some other function. Maybe that’s why I don’t put Create Opening into my Skill Builds, or was it the fact that this requires a melee weapon? Can’t you set a jerk up with a timed arrow shot?

Hide might not prevent splash damage, but it certainly has the best (+100%) Next Attack buff and it keeps the Rogue from being anyone’s punching bag for a second or so. As flimsy as mine are, I always have Hide set up if only for emergencies. As usual, I always set up my attacks with Hide before dealing them. Again, patience.

Sap Strength is that special little gem that let me beat the Corruptor demon time and time again without having to wade through mirror images of myself. How? Dark Mirror is (gasp!) Power-intensive. Sap Strength also prevents Neophytes from becoming into worse threats. If there’s a drawback to this ability, it’s that you can’t use bows or crossbows to use it.

Thieves’ Luck prevents me from pulling my hair out whenever I tried to get my Warrior to deal that crucial Bloodlust blow and ended up WHIFFING at 99% Accuracy. It also helps set up those difficult, expensive attacks like Ensorcelled Blade or Force of Nature. Thieves’ Luck is always in one of my slots whenever I got a Rogue around.

Coup de Grace gets fanfare among anybody who uses Rangers, Mages, or Clerics who can stun adversaries. It also gets fanfare among archers and knife-wielders. Unfortunately, it gets no fanfare from dolts who lack any sense of timing.

Cripple enables Overwhelm and also helps get the jump on an otherwise agile opponent. It deals shit for damage and doesn’t kill anything, though. It can, however, be used with any weapon. That’s good. I didn’t use it a whole lot, but I can see it in grand schemes to drop or debilitate an adversary without worrying about getting retaliated.

While I had few problems with Poisoncraft, Elusiveness was a problem. This made life drearier for everyone else in the party, because havoc got redirected toward them more often than not, which compounded the damage they suffered. This refers to ranged attackers who occasionally took a potshot at the rogue but got redirected three times toward the ranger who barely survived the first volley. Hindrance. Poisoncraft is far easier to handle. On the other hand, Rogues are flimsy in any position on the field….

Barbarians are one of two new classes after the original Monsters’ Den, which had the first five described above. Barbarians can wear medium armor but not shields. They’re geared towards making heavy holes and disrupting the enemy’s ability to retaliate proper. They can equip swords, maces, axes… and that’s it. Of the classes, I have had the worst amount of trouble with these jerks. Unless severe amendments are made in Monsters’ Den: Godfall, forget ever seeing me try a Barbarian again. These guys took plenty of hits before I learned to despise them.

Let’s begin with the essential “big” problem: Reckless Fury has too large a penalty for most people to ever consider using, especially for routine use, or to have displayed as a first Skill! That reduction of 50% ought to be revised to something like 30% or 20%. Not even the D&D Barbarian suffered that harsh a penalty. You know what a -2 AC penalty is? 10% improved likelihood of getting hit, roundabouts. In any case, I gave it a whirl ages ago, shook with reckless fury and got cooked in that same round before I could unleash hot fury. I never used the damn thing again. Odd, then, how the Cleric’s Benediction-fueled Heal spell can get rid of the effect like it was an ailment. I found this out on a fluke… was it a glitch? Probably was….

On the other hand, Barbarians are nowhere near lame, for they get the exquisite Charge ability. Being without ranged weapons means their feet have to improvise. It deals a 50% shot at Stunning the target and deals ample damage to boot. Barbarians really paved the way toward proper battlefield placement each and every fight.

Dismember is another Skill I use with religious fervor, being that this sucker is flimsier than kittens. This kind of ability looks like something the Warrior would want to trade with the Barbarian for that Overwhelm attack. I digress: Dismember is the means of which to survive a melee with a boss… or to tone down any villain, to be honest. It’s pricey for what it’s worth, but if there’s a drawback to its effect, nobody will ever search for it.

Pulverize is not quite a favorite, strictly because I always have a Ranger with Creature’s Lore at the ready. In case that ain’t happening, Pulverize can certainly do. It also deals a little extra damage compared to its cousin, Dismember. Still, a 20% penalty to Damage Reduction doesn’t seem like much. Now, if this penalty extended below the 0% mark….

Jostle seems far too… I don’t know… necessary for everyone else? Only the Barbarian can switch spaces with another character. Why this happens at the cost of Power remains to be known. The only situation where it seems appropriate is when the Minotaur’s Labyrinth ability shuffles everyone into a bad, bad situation. Even then, people shrug this thing off. Another situation where it could apply was when the Barbarian needs to get the fuck away from all the haters slapping him from side to side. That’s about it.

Boast is NOT a “ranged attack for the Barbarian.” This only applies if there is a character with ranged capabilities, like rod-holding magi or archers. It can trigger a melee brawl in melee range. It’s primary use is to take an enemy’s quickness down a tad, helping to coordinate attacks before the hapless sot can react. It can pave the way to an Overwhelm or Execute before the fiend can use a devastating blow upon your party. This ability is quite handy and should be seen in case there are any Barbarians in the new game.

Whirlwind, seen in every variant that spawned from the pages of D&D up to and including World or Warcraft and Diablo II, is that special technique designed to obliterate a number of jerks. It deals heavy damage to one and lesser damage to adjacent punks. Everyone cheers about this thing as the definitive Barbarian Skill that should never be left out of one’s repertoire. To my astonishment and disgust. I don’t mind the accuracy or its similarities and even advantages over Cleave, but I don’t get a whole lot of use out of these multi-strike multi-foe attacks as some of these players do. It’s probably my approach more than anything.

Enrage looks great on paper, or during Tactical Mode when you don’t have Power regeneration… but to be quite frank, I hate it how I turn the ability on and EVERY MONSTER IGNORES THE BARBARIAN JUST BECAUSE I WANT TO RESTORE MY POWER FOR THAT ROUND! Yes, it happened to me several times. Ordinarily, the Barbarian is getting hit left and right, but I don’t bother with this as I often have other tricks to help me get by.

So what of Intimidate? That lovely Skill that boosts Quickness by 10 and prevents other creatures from targeting the Barbarian if another is available? This one caused as many headaches as the Rogue’s Elusiveness Passive Skill (see above) and often failed to protect the Barbarian from getting killed anyway. It was also very expensive. Now, if I tapped that and Reckless Fury in a perfect world, I’d be an ass kicker, right? No, the other party members would get attacked too much, eventually succumbing to a constant onslaught within the number of rounds needed to arrange for my ass kicker. I surrendered all use of that damned Intimidate Skill eons ago.

Last Stand is a brutal technique, and it adds onto Lethality which is always good. Sadly, you need to be in critical condition (20% or below) before you can use it. This, in turn, makes it way to risky to use. It also never comes up, considering most fiends can make wet work of a Barbarian in three hits, instead of five or six. If Last Stand exists as it does now for Godfall, either getting rid of the Power cost or alleviating the Health requirements (perhaps both) can at least salvage the Skill and make it attractive for players.

As for the Passive Powers, Brutality is always fun but is essentially a random proc that you cannot rely upon. As for Vengeance, it only provides a “Next Attack” bonus of of 30%, which is okay, but a little conservative. Better that than nothing at all if a Cleric is unavailable. Not to be ironic, the Barbarian works best if there’s a Cleric in the party… which I don’t find surprising.

Barbarians are among the biggest offenders for making any party featuring them into a total all-or-nothing crap-shoot. If this game involved cash bets, I would never play Blackjack with this idiot at my side.

Conjurors are available only through Kongregate, which fueled my ire considering they’re the better half of the new character classes in Monsters’ Den: Book of Dread. I first started playing on Newgrounds, where there were only Barbarians….

Conjurors summon creatures onto the scene, which help in evening out the odds against the unruly horde from the warrens below. They use light armor, swords, maces, and staves. Conjurors prefer the safety of the back row for the most part, letting their creations do the job for them.

Dire Wolves are expendable front-line creatures that die too easily and deal passable damage. All they know is fighting, but they have no special abilities beyond that. If they did, they’d look more attractive out there.

Wall of Shadows fills every empty space on your side with an illusion. If their turn comes up, they can Curse an enemy to suffer 50% of its damage dealt to you, or Balance Karma for an ally, thus removing a curse. While Clerics are straightforward in removing Curses, a Shadow has the added benefit of being a meatshield, an extra target the enemy must handle. Thus Wall of Shadows was often in my Conjuror’s repertoire well after gaining the other abilities.

Manasprites are weak melee fighters better suited toward restoring allies’ Power by 15 per casting of Mana Font. This is useful in Tactical Mode but seems to pale in comparison to what a Bloodsprite can do: heal at a decent amount on every character with Blood Font. Even in Tactical Mode.

Wargolems get heavy praise during the infinite battle scenario as a Meat-Shield capable of handling tons of havoc and dishing out decent damage. Their presence in the future game is guaranteed, so I won’t bother to wax strategic about these guys.

Vortex is a summoning that happens on an enemy square. It always hits, dealing damage and knocking the sucker to an adjacent square… unless those squares are occupied, wherein it suffers 20% extra damage. Applications range from keeping the pressure off melee fighters by displacing melee attackers to that elusive “push” that lands the body of the Hydra directly in front, straight into melee range. Vortex is useful when the Conjuror has something like the Book of Dread in the Off Hand and a Mace in the other but still wants the ability to attack from the back-row.

Banish is incredibly useful against Acolytes, transformed Neophytes, and even the Corruptor’s Dark Mirror hell-spawn. It instantly destroys a summoned creature. Naturally, it’s aimed at the enemies’ machinations. I stopped overlooking this sucker when I took it for a whirl in a human-populated den.

Refresh Energies is required for creature maintenance. It cures Curses, Poison, restores Health and replenishes Power. This one’s a no-brainer.

Eldritch Aegis, barring the Mage’s superior Arcane Armor, grants 15% extra Damage Reduction to everybody… making it the best Conjuror’s spell EVAR!!!11! Well, no. It’s all a matter of preference, but who wouldn’t prefer to have a thicker skin against an army of thick heads?

Call Soul leaves not just one, but two characters with little Power to start the next round… though it brings them to full health, which is why that happens. I guess in Tactical Mode, Call Soul is akin to being revived to a Death Sentence….

The Passive Skills are rather bland for Conjurors, either improving the attack power or the health of conjured creatures. Those sprites and wolves are downright flimsy, so I often start with Augment Health before Augment Strength gets a single point.

In all, Monsters’ Den: Book of Dread was one of those Flash Games that made me believe that Flash Games are actually worth the time. If Godfall’s line-up of skills needs changing, it’d be the Barbarian first, right before the Cleric and then the Rogue. Mages and Rangers compete for the bottom of the priority list.