Advice: Playing Seelah

[Setver]

I started typing this post under the Hardest Character thread, but I wrote so much I decided it needed its own since there wasn't a Seelah thread.

I originally though Seelah was going to be weak, as most people seem to do. After bringing her upto Skinsaw though, i have to say she is anything but. Maybe I am lucky with her 'heroic action' which is what i call her "You may discard the top card of your deck to add 1d6 (○ +1) to your check. If the top card was a blessing (○ or spell), recharge it instead of discarding it." I have been burned at times with it.. but i use it when i deem it necessary. Which, when she has armor, isn't that often. This ability does let her close nearly every location, without requiring a blessing in hand. She only really has a problem with INT based ones, the rest, whether henchman or the common WIS/survival or WIS/perception, etc, are easy if you throw in that d6. If you happen to find a boon that you don't really care for, but someone else does, it will let you acquire this item. This ability plays better than it looks, so i took spells being recharged as her first power feat, and 2 cures with her card feat being spell.

You may examine the top card of your location deck at the start (○ or end) of your turn. If it’s a boon, put it on the bottom of the deck. This is an ability I use nearly every turn, unless we're really far ahead of the blessings deck. The thing is, you might miss out on some random loot, but you do get to see what it is. If its that Augury Ezren has been wanting, or the Holy Candle you can always opt to not close the location, leave it, find a way to shuffle it, etc. Seelah's one real weakness would be some barriers. Luckily, if you use this ability constantly, you know when they are coming, and if you can't defeat, you can hop on over to another location for your actual explore. When you get to examine and find the henchman in a harder location to close you can swap. When you find the villain, you get the option of that close now and shuffle, or leave him till you can temp close others.

Next up is her favored card, armor. Her having 3 armors lets her be more reckless. Against most encounters, the worst that could happen is you burying some armor. It lets you use less resources than other characters when you do have armor, because losing a skill roll is a big deal here. Not only do you take damage, you wasted that explore. She does need a weapon to start, but there are locations with them in nearly every scenario. At worst, you have to turn a card, or bury an armor. For this reason I am upping her hand size next to 5, as this allows a higher chance for a starting weapon. Once you get outfitted with magic armor that you can recharge when you reset your hand, you are able to find what you need sooner as well without permanent damage.

Lets move to blessings. She has a good starting number, and getting them to be Named blessings was always a priority. Luckily she has divine, so this wasn't too difficult. Discarding a blessing, instead of recharging, is a big deal on Seelah. I do it, but I'd much rather recharge it if possible. A bigger handsize here will help as well. You want these blessings, and your cure, in your deck, not in your hand or discard pile. When recharging cure, i always discard the top card, and pray for a blessing. Not recharging cure is the one real way she can die. So if we take a look at her deck, 3 weapons, 3 armors and 2 allies. Once you get a card feat, and are able to recharge spells off the top, that is 8/16. 50% isn't bad, when you consider you have 2 cures.

Concerning allies, she only gets 2. Not a lot, but with a d10 charisma, picking up ones you find usually isn't too difficult.. I believe I currently have a sage and a soldier. They are used for exploring nearly every time I do draw them. Sage is there for recharging cure, and soldier for if i get a hard combat on my free explore and feel i need the boost, which would probably be when i don't have armor.

All of this has been my experience from a 3 player game. I started with Lem and Ezren but Ezren died from Bruthazmus at the goblin fortress. We now have Amiri in his stead. Lem started with a cure as well, and was able to 'cover' me if i did discard mine before i was able to recharge it. I haven't needed a cure from Lem since that power feat. Being self sufficient has let them use less resources on me. This can't be overlooked. Skill/Power/Card feats have been a +1 to STR and WIS, recharging spells for 1d6, and an extra spell for cure. Next will be handsize, but I'm not sure on her skill feat. It will probably be wisdom. Acquiring new spells/blessings during an adventure is doubly beneficial to Seelah, and being able to recharge them is another reason for wisdom.

[Vrog Skyreaver]

It seems to me that Seelah's one big problem is that her highest die doesn't really go to anything she does: she doesn't cast with charisma (like she should) as her wisdom is where her divine is. she doesn't melee with it either (which makes sense, but still...). so what you get is a character who has 2d4s, 3d8s, and 1d10 (cha). I wouldn't say she's bad (per se), but I would say she's not the strongest character to be had.

[jacaluck85]

I was really surprised with her as well. Last night, I played her in a two player game all the way to the end of Burnt Offerings and I was surprised to say the least. I have used all skill points into str to up her melee and used my power to recharge spells on top of blessings. The best way to play her is to be patient and understand that her power with location decks lets you have 2 explorations almost half the time. Her perfect hand is to have a magic weapon, an armor or two, and at least one blessing. Once I get that, I seldom use a blessing to explore, instead opting to use her abilities for combat and exploration. The more blessings you can keep our of your hand or discard pile, the stronger she is. I didn't think I would like her as much as Kyra but she is very solid. I'm looking forward to picking up my new card perk to use as a spell so I can add mend to the mix so I can upgrade items from my hand to items I possibly discarded due to her power. I see this as a huge upgrade because of her limited hand size. All in all, favorite character I've played so far :D

[Setver]

It seems like her having a d8 wis/str, since those two are her most used die, is a problem. Its really not considering that d6 to any check. Melee and Divine both being +2 is really all she needs to start, as long as you aren't trying to recharge some really hard spells. I actually would say she is the strongest solo, as she has a chance to close any location without a blessing with that d6.

Gemini, you seem to be playing her almost exactly the same as me. Mending is cool, but a 2nd cure is just getting back more cards to cycle through for me. I thought about more STR, but auto acquiring every blessing with 2 into wisdom pushed me towards that. If you get a location with 2-4 blessings, you can plow through that location. I went through the temple 2 nights ago and even chose to not close it, with 3 people as it is the same play group, even then it took 4 total turns to close my location.

I started playing this character by roleplaying a paladin with an attitude that she is going to smite and overkill everything she can face. I expected her to die during the perils of the lost coast. I was surprised when she was destroying everything in her path. I've tempered it somewhat. I'm more cautious and use the d6 a lot less with armor in my hand, but without it, I will add it to everycombat, and use blessings in hand when they are rechargable, unless its truly needed.

[Russ Taylor]

I'm really a fan. As of Skinsaw, she has two extra spells, which are cure, cure, and fire sneeze. I use her d6 "smite" often, and took the recharge spells option for it after taking a 5th card. She went with strength, wisdom, and wisdom for her skill boosts.

Half her deck recharges when she adds a d6, and the cures keep her happy on a miss.