Preface:

This is for people who find builds too confusing, honestly it's pretty easy. It doesnt take a bit of thinking though and I did a lot of thinking for this list. The main thing to remember as you level and build up is to focus on one thing at a time, prioritize getting damage output first, then resist in the late game. I used A2 engine before A3's release in preparation, fully expecting the skill tree to be identical and it a was.

They are kind of "fair" builds, to make the game almost reasonable, there are definitely builds out there you can make like 4x all-magic AoE nuker or 4x summons, that can completely break the game, this isn't really that. You can kind of see in the pictures how the builds changed from the A2 build-plans I listed as I played and can also see where the builds are heading as of level 34, if I was to keep levelling, but beat the game at this point with pretty much everything done.

General Logic for Builds:

I try to get enough lore, tool and arcane early to get the good loot and get rich ASAP. First Aid is a very useless skill in this game. Luck is still in the game for fun at this point, I put it on any character that tanks. For the most part the focus is to get your primary means of damage online either magic school for caster or weapon for melee/bow for ranger. Melee/bow works towards getting Adrenaline, while caster probably grab some weapon skills much later into the build if they want Adrenaline too. Throw is kind of a weird option that no one likes because they never added boomerangs.

Note:

You can ignore the stuff about group_cave lore, it's called Nature Lore in this game and those numbers aren't right, the rest is the same as the previous game. This is the exact 4 character squad I used in my playthrough, honestly there is much more points available in A3 than A2 so you can push these builds much further, this is a fairly "tight" build list to fit with A2's system and you can see how they turned out with slight changes in the new game.

Especially in the end game like you see in the pics, you end up buying a lot of skills with gold too as I did, so it's hardly a problem. These are all custom class characters and you can really see that even with imperfection, you can fit a lot of roles in a single character using the open-ended system without gimping yourself.


Character Builds:

group_cave 16
group_tool 20
group_arcane 23
group_luck 15


Cleric - buff,heal,doorstop

str 10
dex 15
int 22
end 22

melee 10
thrown 6
hardiness 10
parry 10
gym 6

tool 3
cave 3
priest 15

challenger 3
parry mastery 2
healing focus 5
blessing focus 5
strong back 1
sage lore 1
good health 1
robust health 1
perfect health 1
energy blessing 1
energy boon 1
unending mana 1
negotiator 1


Cleric would be working on Curse and Poison resist to 90%, more HP/STR and can start getting Riposte into the later levels, more raw damage isnt really needed as he rarely does anything productive in melee in the hard fights other than clearing out trash mobs.


NUKER - evasive mage

str 10
dex 20
int 27
end 12

thrown 15
gym 6

mage 18
spellcraft 2
arcane 5
resistance 2
luck 5
cave 5
tool 5

parry mastery 2
elemental focus 5
summoning focus 3
swordmage 4
strong back 2
sage lore 1
nimble fingers 2
good health 1
energy blessing 1
energy boon 1
unending mana 1
negotiator 1


In Exlie/Old Avernum there was always a way to make a very powerful Priest+Mage pure caster so I always make at least one in a group. In the new remakes the characters are so strong, you see this modern variant is able to start learning melee around the end, at the very least defensive skills. The character can do anything from here honestly, as you see from the picture from 30 I am working on grabbing some evasion.


POLEMAGE - melee/nuker/haster/summoner

str 20
dex 15
int 20
end 14

polearms 15
blademaster 10
hardiness 5
quick 5

mage 15
arcane 1
spellcraft 1
resistance 1
efficiency 1
tool 3
cave 3
luck 3

sure hand 1
mighty blows 3
parry mastery 2
blessing focus 5
summoning focus 3
swordmage 4
sage lore 1
good health 1
energy blessing 1
energy boon 1
unending mana 1
negotiator 1


This is a burst damage (adrenaline) build, you see there is room to go full mage summoner with the Soul Crystal and everything, without losing any power of a Min/Maxed raw melee polearm user. Though some will tell you that it is losing power if it's not one hit one kill any boss and I guess that's true but those people are also crazy. From this point in the build, I think I just variate Parry and Spellcraft from here on out if I level more.


RANGER - off-heal,off-buffer, ranged dps, lore/tool dump

str 10
dex 30
int 16
end 12

bows 16
sharpshooter 10
sniper 5

priest 10
spellcraft 1
resistance 1
tool 5
arcane 5
cave 5
luck 5

deadeye 1
sure aim 3
healing focus 5
blessing focus 5
sage lore 1
good fortune 1
great fortune 1
nimble fingers 2
good health 1
energy blessing 1
energy boon 1
unending mana 1
negotiator 1


I set out to make an Archer than could alleviate some buffing/healing duties as well (like a proper classic Ranger) but whatever they did to bows in this game, this ended up a full DPS build. Cleric carried early stages just blunt trauma everything and not dying, Mage and Melee has their glass cannon moments when they live, but the core consistent dps comes from here, really crazy output.



OTHER BUILDS:

Here is some ones I didnt use (I would if you could still make 6 characters), just some more ideas and for future playthroughs to try out but all these builds work fine, you just adjust based on what you need like gear limitations or spell schools and such, I think you can probably use it A1/2/3 with adjustment to taste:

Human Throw-Mage

str 10
dex 20
int 24
end 15

throw 15
gym 10

mage 20
spellcraft 5
arcane 2
resistance 5
efficiency 2
tool 4

elemental focus 5
swordmage 4
quick learning 1
great wisdom 1
sage lore 1
nimble fingers 1
energy blessing 1
energy boon 1
negotiator 1


Human/Slith Polemaster/Tank

str 25
dex 15
int 9
end 20

polearm 10
hardiness 10
blademaster 5
parry 10
quick action 5
deadly 3
thrown 10
gym 10

improved str 2
improved dex 2
improved end 2
sure hand 1
mighty blows 3
parry mastery 2
good health 1
robust health 1
perfect health 1
negotiator 1



Human Dualswords(tradstyle)

str 30
dex 15
int 9
end 15

melee 15
hardiness 5
blademaster 10
parry 1
quick 10
dual 10
deadly 10
thrown 1
gym 1

surehand 1
mightblows 3
parry mastery 2
ambidex 1
dual blade mastery 1
strong back 2
backstab 3
good health 1
robust health 1
perfect health 1


Conclusion:

So you see if you are stressed out about your build order or think you are struggling because you gimped yourself, do not worry so much. Like in any rpg, how you build around and towards end-game gear is almost as important as the skills, so it's something you figure out on the go and plus the game offers you crutches like fixing your build and patching up weak areas with gold. For example lore and Lockpick was harder to get in older games, sometimes you dedicate a weak non-combat character just to get it out of the way, now you can buy alot of it and dont really need to resort to doing so. Of course worse comes to worst, there's the always the editor.