Fist of Stone Specialization Guide - Dungeon Siege 2
Fist of Stone is a hybrid specialization between Melee and Nature Magic that was added into the game during the Broken World Expansion Pack. The closest comparison I can think of that makes sense is Fist of Stone builds play a lot like Paladins in most games. They can deal a minor amount of damage and also heal, but they don't really excel at either.
When playing Fist of Stone you'll need to figure out what purpose you want that character to serve. I personally enjoy making my Fist of Stone into either a tank or healer since they are great at both. As a healer you'll be extremely durable and able to take a beating as well as keep everyone alive. You could actually make your Fist of Stone a combination between tank and healer and have them do both if you wanted to as well.
As far as damage dealing goes... this is the Fist of Stones weakest area. In order to deal even half way decent damage on this build you'll need to invest heavily into Melee as well as Fist of Stone. Dual Wield seems to be the best for a Fist of Stone damage dealer since it'll allow you to maximize Tremor procs with your weapon attacks.
Below I have included each of the Fist of Stone play styles that I am most familiar with as well as a little information about each one.
Tanky Fist of Stone: As the name implies this is a character who will be using Fist of Stone to boost his mitigation mostly. Soul of Protection and Chant of Stone are great survivability skills for tanks, the more INT you stack the better Chant of Stone will be. I'd recommend you dump some points into Tremor and Quake too since they'll give us a nice boost in damage.
Healer/DPS Fist of Stone: Much like the tanks, healers will invest heavily into the survivability skills in Fist of Stone. I personally like putting a buff on this character too, usually Spirit Embrace. Chant of Stone is one of the best boosts for survivability for healers since it gets better the more INT you have. Fast Recovery and Healing Hands are both useful for healers too but I recommend you only put enough points into Fast Recovery to get Healing Hands.
Dual Wield Fist of Stone: If you plan to try and make a Fist of Stone character who is primarily a damage dealer then you'll definitely want to go this route. Tremor and Quake as well as Soul of Strength will be bread and butter abilities for you as well as most of the Melee tree. I recommend you use the Earth Blast Weapon Enhancement once you're a high enough level on your character.
Support Fist of Stone: This build is a hybrid build which can fill the role of spot healer, damage dealer and buffer. I like to put buffs like Wrath of the Bear or Spirit Embrace on this character and I would argue this is my favorite Fist of Stone build. For most of the game you'll be able to use this character as your only healer even if you don't invest many points into Healing Skills.
Tip: Stone Form is a great Power for bosses and other tough fights since it will increase melee damage output as well as survivability. I experimented with Fault Line and hated it since you have to properly aim it, Earthquake Aura is meh and Eruption seems to be the best damaging Power of them all.... However Eruption requires you to waste a bunch of points to max out.
Which spells you'll want to use on your Fist of Stone character will vary depending on which of the aforementioned builds you choose. I recommend that you put Resurrect on your character regardless of what build you choose since it's useful having this on as many characters as possible. Summon Teleporter and/or Transmute are nice too.
Other than these spells I typically don't recommend any other Active Spells for tanks or DW. If you're going to make your Fist of Stone into a healer or support you may want to use a heal as the Active Spell but I find that they work better under Autocast. I strongly recommend against using damaging Nature spells as the majority of them are not very good and you'll do more damage swinging your weapon.
For your other Autocast slots, Spirit Embrace or Wrath of the Bear are great choices as well as either Defender or Earth Blast. Healers/Support/Tanks will typically want to use Defender for the boost in armor but if you want to boost your damage you should use Earth Blast.
Assuming you have a heal in an Autocast slot too this will leave you with 1 open slot remaining, I usually recommend a Summoned Pet.
As always, your first Skill Points should be spent towards getting the Powers you want to use the most. For Fist of Stone I really like the Stone Form power for pretty much all situations but Eruption is really nice too for massive AoE damage. Earthquake Aura I actually prefer to Eruption since it lasts for awhile and deals a lot of damage when you add it all up but it lacks the same BOOM as Eruption.
Of course you could also focus on Melee Powers instead. Brutal Attack is always great for bosses and single target damage, Provoke is a must have if you plan to be a tank and abilities like Whirling Strike or Elemental Rage are great for DPS builds. Some of the Nature Powers are good too like Invulnerability but I would recommend Melee or Fist of Stone Powers.
For the skills themselves, Tremor and Quake are really good DPS boosts that I highly recommend. They get better if you have more Intelligence but are good without much INT too. Chant of Stone is one of the best skills in the entire game when it comes to boosting your survivability and I can't recommend it enough. Fast Recovery and Healing Hands are good if you plan to be a healer or support.
If you plan to be support, healing or a tank I recommend you use the Defender spell. This increases your overall armor and gives you a nice boost in survivability. Armor is very important in this game as far as reducing physical damage goes. If you're using Defender invest in the Soul of Protection Defensive Enhancements skill.
Damage dealers will want to get the Earth Blast spell instead of Defender which will add a powerful proc to each melee attack. If you're going with Earth Blast you'll want to make it more powerful with the Soul of Strength skill. As for the remaining skills...
Below you'll find a list of many general all purpose skills that are worth getting on almost all builds. They're mostly skills that involve survivability, Summoned Pets or Buffs.
General Purpose Skills:
Fortitude (Melee Skill): Increases your total health. This is a must have for basically all characters, it also leads to an important skill too.
Toughness (Melee Skill): Decreases Physical Damage taken. Equally important for casters and tanks as it'll make everyone in your group less squishy.
Reinforced Armor (Melee Skill): The more armor you have the more you'll benefit, definitely a useful skill for everyone though. Getting this skill requires you to get Barricade which will allow every character in your group to use a shield if you'd like to. Some 2h weapons grant a lot of damage boosts to casters but using a shield and a 1h for defensive purposes will allow you to spend more points on DPS Skills, if you want that trade off.
Dodge (Ranged Skill): Gives you a flat chance to dodge melee and ranged attacks. I usually put about 5 points into this skill on each character by the end of Mercenary difficulty; I am someone who really likes tanky characters and this ability is a great boost to survivability.
Survival (Ranged Skill): Increases your Fire, Ice and Lightning Resistances as well as gives you the ability to harvest Health Potions. Much like with Dodge I find the survivability this grants to be very important and put at least 5 points into it by the end of Mercenary.
Brilliance (Combat Magic Skill): Flat % increase to your mana pool. Both DPS casters and healers will want to invest points into this
Natural Bond (Nature Magic Skill): Decreases the mana cost of spells by a flat % as well as letting you harvest Mana Potions from bushes. Again, both DPS and healers are going to want to invest into this since it works for all spells.
Chant of Stone (Fist of Stone Skill): This ability will give you a boost to Armor and Health depending on how much Intelligence you have. You'll find this skill most useful for casters because they stack Intelligence. I have more Armor on Finala (my Combat Mage) than on my tank because of this ability as well as Corpse Transmutation and Repulsion.
If you decide to use a pet:
Summon Fortitude (Nature Magic Skill): Increases the health of your Summoned Pets. Usually I put 3 - 5 points into this skill and that's it. Diminishing returns start to kick in the higher you go.
Summon Might (Nature Magic Skill): Increases the damage of your Summoned Pets. This skill is very important for increasing your pet's damage I put about 10 points into it (to give 100% bonus damage).
Summon Bond (Nature Magic Skill): Shares incoming damage with your Summoned Pets. As a caster I typically put 5 - 10 points into this ability to boost my survivability. Melee, Fist of Stone or a Tank I often put 1 or 2 points into it and that's it.
Summon Alacrity (Combat Magic Skill): Will increase the attack speed of Summoned Pets, giving you a minor DPS boost.
If this character is using a Wrath/Embrace buff:
Enveloping Embrace (Nature Magic Skill): Will increase the power of any Embrace buffs that this character is using. You can use 1 Embrace and 1 Wrath spell on your group; only get these skills on the characters who are using the buff. They're a complete waste on any of your other characters.
Feral Wrath (Nature Magic Skill): Will increase the power of any Wrath buffs that this character is using. You can use 1 Embrace and 1 Wrath spell on your group; only get these skills on the characters who are using the buff. They're a complete waste on any of your other characters.
Return to Dungeon Siege 2 Class Guides