Pillars of Eternity: Combat Guide

Afflictions:

Some enemies and situations may cause Afflictions on your party members. These can be seen above each character portrait and can be hovered over for more information. Some Afflictions can be lost over time, others through healing and resting.

Endurance and Health

There are two elements that you should be aware of during combat: your party members’ Endurance and Health. As you take damage, your Endurance will deplete. If a character’s Endurance becomes totally depleted, that character will fall unconscious. Endurance is regained rapidly outside of combat and some characters (like fighters) can regain it slowly during combat. Health is also lost every time a character takes damage, but characters have much more total Health than Endurance. Health can only be recovered through resting. Once a character’s health is totally depleted, they will be maimed or die.

Injuries, Maiming and Death:

During exploration of the world, characters may suffer Injuries. These are long-term Afflictions that can only be healed through rest. Similarly, on some levels of difficulty, the first time a character is reduced to 0 Health, he or she will be maimed instead of killed. Maimed is a serious condition that inflicts grave combat penalties. Once a character has been Maimed, further reduction of Health will always result in death.

Injuries and the Maimed condition can only be healed through resting. There is no remedy for death in Pillars of Eternity. Once a character has died, his or her soul belongs to the Wheel.

Resting Your Characters:

In order to recover Health and heal many Afflictions, your party can Rest. You can rest anywhere, provided you have the Camping Supplies to do so. Camping Supplies can be found around the world and purchased in various shops. The amount of Camping Supplies you can carry is dependent on the difficulty setting of the game. Higher levels of difficulty will have more restrictions on supplies. Your party can also rest inside of Inns (for a fee) and at your Stronghold. Resting at an Inn or the Stronghold will not use up camping supplies.

The Rules of Engagement

When two or more hostile characters come into close (melee) range of each other, this is called an Engagement. Engagement can be broken by several means: the defeat / incapacitation of a foe, a shift in hostility (e.g. from enemy to friend), or by Disengaging (walking away). When one of the relevant characters moves a significant distance away from the battle, they trigger their opponent’s Disengagement Attack.

A Disengagement Attack includes an Accuracy bonus, does significantly more damage than a standard attack, and (if successful) will momentarily halt the affected character’s movement. These disadvantages make disengaging an inherently risky practice. Many characters and monsters have special abilities that interact with the rules of Engagement in unique ways:

• Fighters’ Defender mode allows them to engage additional targets.
• The Escape ability lets rogues break Engagement without provoking a Disengagement Attack.
• Barbarians can use Wild Rush to temporarily ignore the movement stop and hit reactions from Engagement and Disengagement Attacks, respectively.

• The Precise Disengagement talent makes Disengagement Attacks have higher Accuracy.
• The Tactical Withdrawal talent grants higher Deflection against Disengagement Attacks.
• The wizards’ Grimoire Slam knocks the target back, which implicitly means that it breaks Engagement.
• Many Afflictions, such as Stun, Paralyze, or Prone, will make the victim unable to maintain Engagement.