Armor Games

going to try that, what about for the defend the gates version how would you do that one, I like a mage, warrior, summonor, and a clerk

sounds ok :)

I'm at lvl 120 with warrior cleric mage Barbarian,

Warrior 1 end 2 str each lvl cleric and mage 3 int each and barbarion 3 str each and it's working perfect.

This 'guide' will get you pwned on your first random battle on expert difficulty. Almost everything written in this 'guide' is crap and will work only on beginner difficulty - but beginner difficulty is pretty easily beatable even if you don't wear any weapon/armor.

um, honestly it wasnt such a great walkthrough. the information listed above is more "common knowledge" about the game than anything. you pretty much just reviewed 4 characters. a walkthrough should do just that. show you how to do things step by step. you pretty much just gave a broad overview of the four characters that the game defaults you. there are also 3 games within book of dread, and you didnt mention any of them. i mean, i missed the extra characters, and the extra games after the first time i played it so i don't imagine that you took a great deal of time or effort when writing this

i prefer to use a warrior in front middle, mage in back middle, and a ranger on each back side, one ranger w/ spear and one with bow/ xbow

Managing a team

I think I might as well take some initiative and put up a decent walkthrough around here.

Your team is very important. Although it is possible to have a team composed of only one class (best done with cleric and warrior if you're interested), it's much better to use a more well balanced team. That means that you not only need to have a class that can hit hard, you also need to have a class that can keep your hard-hitters alive. Attack types also need to be taken into consideration. Most fights will involve both the front and back rows, and you need to be able to have people that can hit enemies in the back.

My personal favorite team is a warrior, cleric, mage, and ranger. The ranger and mage provide ranged support, while the warrior and cleric are on the front for close combat. While warriors and mages can hit very hard, the cleric and ranger heal spells are very useful for keeping them alive and for removing debuffs. I am not very experienced with rogues, and even less so with barbarians and conjurors, so I won't discuss them.

Rangers: Rangers are a pretty interesting bunch. They're most effective in the back because of their medium armor, although they can be outfitted with melee weapons. I prefer regular bows over crossbows most of the time, because crossbows wreak havoc with your quickness. Rangers are one of the quicker classes, so use them to heavily weaken key enemies. The loadout I like to use is Ranged Attack, Pierce, Nature's Balm, Healing Lore, Envenomed Arrow, and Focus, with passive points on Vitality. The ranger's other skills aren't too bad (Stun in particular is a very viable alternative for Envenomed Arrow) compared to the skills other classes get to choose from. When battle, I usually like to start with Pierce to wound two enemies at the same time, then move into a support role. Poison damage on Rangers is a very powerful choice. Use your Orbs of Toxicity on your bows whenever you can.

Mages: The mage is your standard magic conjuror. Because many units like Voidstalkers, Aetherguards, and Wraiths are resistant to physical damage, a mage can do wonders against them with their magic attacks. Although mages can wield swords, putting them on the front line is a very poor choice because of their light armor. Instead, mages are better off as quick, ranged attack units, with staffs. The skills I use for the Mage are: Magic Attack, Freeze, Fireball, Electrical Storm, Flickering Flames, and Invisibility. The mage's other abilities are either close range (perhaps viable in the late game but an easy way to get yourself slaughtered in the beginning) or not particularly useful (especially Cosmic Prison). I'm not a particular fan of either of the passive abilities, but usually I side with Spell Mastery. When in combat, mages should be in the back. I like to use the Ranger-Mage combo in combat, where my ranger and my mage kill a unit before they even begin to attack. A Pierce and a Fireball will work wonders against enemies. Mages are also very good with poison damage.

Clerics: The cleric is an INDISPENSABLE part of any team, not just this one. His healing abilities will save your *** plenty of times. Clerics are one of the weaker classes, a lot of the time because their stat points are being diverted not only to strength but also intellect. Still, they are useful to mop up weakened enemies when your team is all healthy. The skills I recommend are Melee Attack, Heal, Smite, Heal All, Revive, and Fervor. I very strongly recommend spending your surplus points on Benediction; it will save you many a time. As for his other skills, purify is probably the most useful, although a properly powered Benediction renders it superfluous. Your first priority as a Cleric is to heal your teammates, then to attack. Letting your Cleric die is disastrous, but should it happen, that's why I recommend having a healing Ranger with you.

Warrior: Warriors are the best unit for just dishing out pure, unadulterated damage. Warriors can use a very wide variety of weapons. I strongly prefer Axes, but if you get a Hydra's Tooth in The Book of Dread and complement it with a good shield, it works just as well. Warriors, however, are quite slow, so most often you will use them to administer the killing blow to weakened enemies. Skillwise, Warriors are a pretty adequate bunch. I use Melee Attack, Power Attack, Bloodlust, Resolve, Cleave, and Inspire. Execute is an awesome attack against bosses, but generally it's not worth wasting the power on for mere peons. Warriors have some of the best passive skills, Leadership and Armor Proficiency. Either one works; I use Leadership to give me that final finishing move if I'm short. Warriors should definitely be in your front ranks, cause they can take a lot of damage. Damage reflection is especially useful in a warrior; doing more than 100% damage back to your opponent when they attack you is an awesome advantage that shouldn't be avoided.

Dungeon exploration

When you start, you will be very weak. As a result, you should stay away from boss battles and other large battles until you develop the skills and gain the armor to give yourself an edge. I don't recommend boss battles until at least level 5, when you fill up all your skills and have a decent set of armor.

As a rule, I always first upgrade, then do a cursory exploration of the dungeon. Grab all the treasure you can find and explore every room. Then, battle. Fight the weakest ones first, then fight in rooms where it looks like they lead to a significant portion of the dungeon. Use Scroll of Deception in the early game to bypass rooms like this with many enemies.

Most dungeons will have two Altars of Restoration, while a few will have one. If you're playing the Book of Dread campaign, you may occasionally find rooms with a blue circle; these give you special orbs and potions that effect permanent changes. I don't like to use Altars of Restoration until just before a boss battle.

Do note that dungeons are randomly generated. However, sometimes there is a pattern in which enemies appear, especially in the Den of Corruption campaign.

Keep your treasure, because they'll get you some serious cash when you go to the store. You should always have your inventory bursting with items when you use that portal scroll.

When should you use potions? That's a pretty good question. In the early game, you will have a greater dependence on potions because your health and power regenerations have not been developed. As you find more and more potions and as you get Runed or Soothing armor, though, you will be less dependent on them. Follow an as-needed basis. If it really isn't that much damage, just let your health regeneration cover it. I really don't use health potions that much, but I do use Power Potions with some more regularity. Revival potions aren't of much use after the beginning. Elixirs are topically useful; you really should only use them before a boss battle if at all.

Items

A big part of Monsters Den (sometimes disproportionate, I fear) is items. You will constantly come into dilemmas of what stats you should encourage. Fear not! I'll attempt to prioritize these and give a glossary to the different items you'll find.

Prefixes:

Unerring: Adds accuracy. Since all weapons by accuracy have 95% default, accuracy isn't as important as in many other RPGs.
Blinding: Reduces accuracy of a enemy. Blinding weapons reduce accuracy by at most 25-30 percent. It helps, but their attacks will still hit you most of the time. Not as useful.
Soothing: Adds health regeneration. Health regeneration is one of the most important stats. You should have at least 2-3 Soothing or health regenerating items on you.
Vampiric: Drains health (heals a percentage of the damage you deal). The most I've seen is 7%. Vampiric items are very useful in The Fall of Tellunos especially, where you have no chance to heal yourself outside of battle. In the Den campaigns, Soothing and Runed items are more useful.
Runed: Adds power regeneration. You need power regeneration to heal and perform your best attacks. By default, you recover 10, although that will most certainly not be enough as you go on. I recommend 1-2 pieces of runed items.
Protective: Adds armor rating. This mostly deals with rings. Protective rings are best used for mages, who often have low armor ratings and need every bit of damage resistance they can get. Pretty important.
Purifying: Adds poison resistance. Usually about 30% less damage from poison. Reflection and regeneration are much more useful than this.
Staggering: Adds percentage to stun. Most add about 10-15% chance to stun. Stunning is a very useful tool, so get this when you can, but don't get it by itself.
Venomous: Adds poison damage. Poison damage is one of the best ways to finish off your opponent or at least soften them up. Although many monsters have some degree of poison resistance, I think that it is still a valuable thing to have.

Suffixes:

Deftness: Increases Dexterity. Good for Rangers and Rogues.
Might: Increases Strength. Good for Barbarians and Warriors, as well as Clerics to a limited extent.
Insight: Increases Intellect. Good for Mages and Conjurors, also good for Clerics and Rangers to boost their healing capabilities.
Resilience: Boosts Endurance. Good for all classes.
Tenacity: Increases resistance to stun damage. Better than purifying items, but not incredibly important. It�s nice to have some around, but not necessary.
Reflection: Gives you damage reflection. Basically, when an enemy does you damage, it will inflict a percentage of that damage on them as well. Reflection is very useful for your frontline, because they will be attacked most often. I highly recommend reflective items; they work wonders in softening up your enemy.
Lethality: These weapons will give you a chance to kill your enemy instantly. Sadly, bosses always have instant kill immunity, but if you get lucky, they get pretty useful. They usually give you a 10-15% boost.

Items may also have other words describing their material, including Damascene, Plainforged, Trollhide, Thick, Suncloth, Aetherweave, Leather, Studded, Battered, Iron, Steel, Magesteel, Threadbare, Linen, Silk, etc. They seem to affect the armor rating, but such knowledge really is trivial.

So what should you take into consideration when choosing what to equip and what to sell? Here�s my list:

1.    Health Regeneration
2.    Reflection
3.    Power Regeneration
4.    Dexterity/Strength/Intellect/Endurance modifiers, depending on the class I want to outfit.
5.    Quickness for Rangers and Mages
6.    Armor rating
7.    Poison damage
8.    Lethality/Vampiric/Stun
9.    Poison/stun resistance

Orbs are also important tools in your inventory. You should use them on the purple �Unique� items, or any item that you will probably keep for a long time. Orbs include:

Toxicity: Adds poison damage. Only for weapons. Best for mages and rangers.
Recuperation: Adds health regeneration.
Brawn: Increases strength. Use on warriors and clerics.
Protective: Increases armor rating. Best for a good ring or cloak. I like to use them on mages, who are more susceptible to damage, but that�s your call.
Acumen: Increases intellect. Good for mages and clerics.
Perseverance: Increases endurance. Excellent for any class.
Alacrity: Increases dexterity. Good for rangers.

Cool cheat man. But I'm going to use my way on placing and recruiting.