If you’re having troubles with the difficulty, you’ll find help here.
Who this guide is for
You might have a hard time getting into Eschalon, like I did. I looked through the Steam Screenshots and the developers forum to find some guideline but figured out the most the hard way. This guide aims for people who have already tried the game out but feel either lost or stuck. To save you time and sweat, here’s your road to success. But be aware it might take some of the adventurous feel away. However before you put the game down cause of its difficulty, you find help here.
Outsmart the game
You can save the game before chests and barrels, if the loot doesn’t appeal to you, load and you get something different. This ranges from finding nothing to loot worth a couple of hundred gold.
The same works for picking locks, disarming traps, resisting deseases, landing hits and the like.
This tactic is commonly known as “save scum”.
Use the terrain
Kite enemy groups back to narrow passages or doorsills so only one enemy can attack you at a time.
Do the Luke-Skywalker-Rancor-move where possible (crushing them with a portcullis), it gives you less EXP, but is effective like nothing else.
Use light sources for better hit chance. The best way is to lure an enemy into light, while you can remain (partially) all'ombra. In most cases it’s not smart to fight in complete darkness, rather produce light or enhanced vision somehow.
Don’t fully run up to enemies, let them come to you when they are 1 tile away by pressing space. This way you can have the first strike.
Resting
The chance of an ambush is extremely high, you cannot count on needed healing in dire situations. Usually you will only worsen it. But if you sleep in short stages around 5 hours you are most likely fine. Save and repeat. I call it the F2-C-R tactic, you’ll know why.
You can camp almost anywhere including dungeons as long as there are no enemies in sight. If you are chased by fast foes leave the map, camp there, go a few meters up or down and come back. The enemies will wait where they lost your trail. They do not follow you to other maps and don’t regenerate life. Also change gear if you have Meditation or Survival granting pieces for faster regeneration.
Axioms
I found Agnostic to be the best.
The Druidic regeneration is ok, but not overwhelming. Can feel real slow underground.
Atheists can’t use some of the divination spells (cioè. guarigione), which would be extremely helpful. On the other hand you won’t get cursed that often.
Nefarious’ extra damage only applies to melee weapons, therefore only beneficial for those.
Virtuous only gives you “Bless” without the need for its requirements. Albeit one of the best spells in the game, I recommend waiting til you find it, which will be soon enough. It’s helpful if you play melee, but it’s no more than a small starting boost.
General character creation
Roll your stats til you are satisfied. The total amount of starting points can differ, look out for that if you want to power play.
It is better to only take few skills like attack, armatura, one utility skill i.e. lockpicking, and cartography 1 point unless you’re in for a challenge (you will be able to learn it soon for little coin, ma ancora).
Opening a skill is expensive, try to avoid, you will find many skillbooks that opens that skill (saves 3 punti) or if you already know the skill it will raise it by 2 livelli. For skills that can be learned by trainers it’s best to learn them to the maximum level (5) and read the book afterwards. For non-trainer-skills you should read the book and only then put points in it.
The most effective way is to even safe the majority of points so you can bump up your main skill(S) with your first level up. However this is not recommended on your first character.
Every stat matters for each build. A hammer wielding brute naturally will have little perception, intelligence and so on, but keep in mind these do aid your resistances (Str = toxin, Int = elements, Wis = deseases, Per = magick, End = all of them).
Abilità
Some are either pretty useless or 1 point does the job fine, ad esempio:
Spot Hidden, Mercantile, Move Silent, Scudo, Skullduggery, Lore, Short-blade (pugnale), Unarmed
The most OP in my opinion are the divination skills (wisdom). If you play mage, melee or hybrid, allineare, all of them benefit greatly from the use of divination. Rangers and Warriors don’t need much, just a few points to get access to the spells. You will find a trainer for that, but if you start with 1 divination it will be no mistake.
How to be melee
Start with light armor, as this are the first you will find or being able to afford. Switch into heavy later if you like. Don’t waste points on light armor unless you want to stick with it.
You will need a lot of strength for heavy armor, start with ~18 and never neglect it.
In addition to dexterity you need some concentration in order to hit, I recommend 10con and ~15dex for the start.
Blugdeoning weapons are faster to destroy barrels and doors, I found it a great starting weapon. Switching later is no problem due to trainers.
You should definately be using the most divination spells for buffing as above described. They can be obtained easily by looking for rings that increase your wisdom. This way you can reach 20 wisdom, while only having to spend points to ~14. You should learn Bless, Cat’s Eyes, Ogre Strength, Nimbleness, Leatherskin/Stoneskin, Haste, Enchanted Weapon. You can do the same for intelligence to get Enkindled Weapon too (this applies to more or less all characters). Beware that you can not hold too much weight in your hands while casting. Either have your strength up really high, or simply change weapon slot (accedere) to a lighter weapon. If you want to use a shield you must have a lightsource, Cat’s Eyes is best here, because you can’t light a torch without a free hand.
Alchemy should be learned at the trainer to level 5, then read the book (liv 7), spend 2 points at a level up (9), with two +3 rings you now reach level 15 which is required to craft the best improvements to your weapon and armor. Your weapon can be enchanted with both ToHit and Damage.
Finally your weapon of choice skill should be brought up very high. 30 o più.
Heavy Armor is ok from 10 in poi, but the better the more.
Neglect other skills, you can bring them up to a good level with trainers and books.
Eventually you need: arma 30, armor ~15, alchemy 15 with rings, wisdom 20 with rings, intelligenza 15 with rings if you like, survival 1-5 and maybe 1-5 to bow because it will come handy in some situations.
How to be mage
Perception is mainly your mana regeneration, iniziare con 25 points at least here and opt for 40 o più.
Intelligence/Wisdom however determine how much mana you’ll get per level up. The sooner this stats are high, the more mana you end up with over time. Take either 15, 20 o 25 in one of them for the start because these are the tier thresholds for spells. I don’t think you need more than 25, if even.
Also you should take meditation from the get-go because this regenerates your mana way quicker when resting.
Stick with light armor and don’t put too many points in here.
How to be cleric
Same as mage, but either you choose only wisdom, or play as hybrid (sort of Paladin) combined with strength.
When casting spells you cannot carry much weight in your hands (arma, gloves, scudo) according to your strength. Either focus on light stuff or switch back and forth from empty hand to your weapon by pressing enter.
How to be ranger
Start with decent Dexterity and Concentration (15d/10c). You must get the elemental spell Predator’s Sight as soon as possible, this is your most import spell because you can see enemies bright at night which results in a much better hit chance. After that get some divination spells, Bless carries the majority of the game here. In late game, same as described above, you want to use Haste and all of that stuff.
Early on you kind of have to save scum when enemies approach you. Each non hit shot should be reloaded. Of course depending on how hard/easy you want the game to be.
The skill Hide in shadows is very useful. I’d take it from the start, it becomes good around 10 punti. Much more is not needed. Then you’ll be able to stand next to walls, trees, big objects and you will not be spotted, if the skill is high enough even during daylight.
Besides your bow you will need a melee weapon too, especially for the beginning. I recommend Cleaving (assi), because it’s easier to find good bonus for these as well as the best cleaving weapon is relatively easy and somewhat early obtainable. Do not use daggers!
How to be rogue
You have to fight mainly in the dark and use “Hidden in shadows” in order to be not detected. Same as ranger, you stand in dark corners and next to walls or great objects. Producing light will naturally blow your cover. But because you cannot see yourself in the dark you need the elemental skill “Predator’s Sight”. When you see “Hidden in shadows” displayed, enemies will not see you, they come towards you, but you can just keep hitting them (both range and melee).
Unfortunately there are not really good daggers in the game or let’s say it will take you long to find a decent one, in that time you find other weapon types with up to triple the damage.
Furthermore there’s is no +skill equipment or trainer or anything for daggers which all other weapons do have. In Book 2 this is solved better, but here – just don’t choose dagger.
Personally I think rogue is the hardest way to get into the game. Also you most likely oversee a lot of loot and secrets in the dark.
Item management
Items that won’t be needed anymore (like letters) can be put into barrels. They will not disappear. You might also want to store heavy stuff in them sometimes.
Keep some equipment to change at hands. That might be lockpick-granting gloves or rings that bring up a certain skill to a threshold (looking at you alchemy).
Quicktravel
Click anywhere on the minimap to access the quicktravel menu.
To unlock them you have to touch either wooden town signs like in the beginning, black obelisks or celtic crosses . They might look different, so sometimes they’re easy to miss. So stay curious and click on things.
Guarigione
Potions can come scarce at times. Investing in alchemy might be a good idea for you. The skill’s threshold is every 5 steps. This means it doesn’t matter if you have 3 o 4 in alchemy, soltanto 5, poi 10 and so forth unlocks the next tier of potions. 15 is the highest requirement.
Cheap healing can also be obtained through resting at inns, only downside is you have to walk the way back.
For tough fights save up your level up since it will heal you entirely. Use it when you can take no more hit.
Identifying
There’s three ways to identify your stuff.
First one is when you’re in a merchant’s menu by simply right clicking on the item. This is pretty expensive though and therefore shouldn’t be done through the whole game.
Second is the divination spell “Lore”, 15 wisdom is required to learn it, the different spell levels you can do is determined by your divination level.
And lastly there is the regular skill “Lore”. This way you don’t have to click anything. When the skill is high enough items will be identyfied automatically. In Book 1 it’s not that much of a deal because you mostly have to identify magic weapons and equipment only, and also there’s a +6 ring to get, so save the points. In Book 2 however it will be much more needed.
Status conditions
Unfortunately there’s a lack of clarity (which has been eliminated in Book 2).
For instance when you are encumbered (not overburdened) you deal 20% less damage and hit less by 20% anche. I did not know this during the whole playthrough.
Silent means no enemy or NPC is aware of you. “Move silently” improves that further.
Deseases don’t display their outcome when you catch them. But usually they worsen some of your stats drastically. Better carry the regarding potions with you.
Using equipment you’re completely unskilled with should be avoided. You have less hit chance (even from wearing wrong armor) and less damage/defense.
Jolly adventure!
With all that in mind plus a little experience, you should have no grave problems traversing the land and story of Eschalon. I know this game is rather old, but I only got to discover it now, and probably I’m not the only one. So then, I wish you a jolly adventure.
