I just don't get it. I can't get very far in Dragon Age Origins or KOTOR 1 for that matter. People say hard mode is too easy and I'm getting crushed on normal. I tried to find a guide online but came up empty. I click, I wait, I see my character get hit a million times, I die. I even try to move out of the way of a telegraphed attack but since the game is based on a dice roll it already registered as 'hit' so I still get hit. Help please
Help me understand Dragon Age's combat
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Im not expert since im pretty bad at dragon age myself but the combat is based nearly entirely on stats. You don't dodge attacks by moving out of the way or block attacks by pressing a button to raise your shield.
It's based around building a party with good stats that work well together and then during the battle positioning yourself correctly and prioritizing enemies and such. You usually want to get someone who can tank damage followed by someone who can deal damage with someone who can then heal your team and so on.
It's based around building a party with good stats that work well together and then during the battle positioning yourself correctly and prioritizing enemies and such. You usually want to get someone who can tank damage followed by someone who can deal damage with someone who can then heal your team and so on.
Abilities are your best friend... actually they're the only way you can win combat. In Dragon Age, you have limited stamina and mana to use your abilities. In Knights you have an infinite pool for weapon abilities, but limited amount of mana for force powers.
So all you can do is pretty much learn how to use these abilities and make the best of use to them. I'd suggest heading to the Mage's Tower quickly in Dragon Age if you're having trouble. The most powerful healer in the game is there.
Edit: Forgot about stats as well, read the above poster's post for that.
So all you can do is pretty much learn how to use these abilities and make the best of use to them. I'd suggest heading to the Mage's Tower quickly in Dragon Age if you're having trouble. The most powerful healer in the game is there.
Edit: Forgot about stats as well, read the above poster's post for that.
Your problem is, you're waiting. The combat is supposed to go: pause, select ability, select target(s), do the same for all party members (unless you have their AI set really well), unpause, wait for resolution, pause, select ability, select target(s), and repeat until the enemy is dead.
1 - Send in your tankiest characters.
2 - Wait for enemies to bunch up around them.
3 - Pause game.
4 - While paused, carefully cast AoE spells to hit maximum amount of enemies while avoiding friendly fire.
5 - Finish off survivors with rogue/fighter abilities.
6 - Profit.
Crowd control is king. Go for spells and abilities that stun/freeze/sleep/paralyse etc.
Prioritize enemy casters. They'll fuck you up if you don't shut them down immediately.
Lastly, best tip I can give is to get a mage with the spell "Cone of Cold" (or cone of frost or cone of ice, or whatever it's called) as soon as possible. Cast that on large groups of enemies, then follow up with rogue/fighter abilities that give guaranteed critical hits. Crits on frozen enemies are insta-kills. That combo will finish most fights before they begin.
2 - Wait for enemies to bunch up around them.
3 - Pause game.
4 - While paused, carefully cast AoE spells to hit maximum amount of enemies while avoiding friendly fire.
5 - Finish off survivors with rogue/fighter abilities.
6 - Profit.
Crowd control is king. Go for spells and abilities that stun/freeze/sleep/paralyse etc.
Prioritize enemy casters. They'll fuck you up if you don't shut them down immediately.
Lastly, best tip I can give is to get a mage with the spell "Cone of Cold" (or cone of frost or cone of ice, or whatever it's called) as soon as possible. Cast that on large groups of enemies, then follow up with rogue/fighter abilities that give guaranteed critical hits. Crits on frozen enemies are insta-kills. That combo will finish most fights before they begin.
both dragon age and KOTOR are really turn based combat pretending to be real time. so don't just click attack and wait. and don't bother too much with dodging (if I remember right in some instances it can be useful but usually movement mostly just effects who's in your range and what enemies are in range of you).simmysims said:
so constantly use monitor and balance your spells/special abilities, and yeah it's a good idea to constantly pause in order to set this stuff up
Well, the quickest way to understand it the combat in Dragon Age (and KotOR) is to understand that it's D&D-lite.
There's no point in trying to manually dodge melee attacks, and there's no shame in turning down the difficulty (I had to go down to the lowest difficulty for some of the blood mage encounters in Dragon Age: Origins).
Sword-and-board warriors are good for tanking damage, warriors wielding two-handed weapons, archers, and rogues are good for dealing out damage. Mages are the most unique class, and require a lot of micromanagement; Whereas with melee attackers you can usually position them around enemies and let them go wild, using a mage as your main character will require you to pay a lot of attention to positioning, as a lot of their spells will do area-of-effect damage and it can impact your party members. And you almost never want a mage to be in melee range with enemies, because they're too susceptible to damage.
Rogues do best when they can get behind enemies as well, so if you have a party with a good bulky character (like Alistair, or Generic McSoontobedead if you're still in the origin story part), make sure they go in and start attracting attention first. It takes a few levels for warriors to get the abilities that actually draw enemy aggro, but early-game sending them in first is generally fairly reliable.
Archers (rogues or warriors can specialize as an archer) are incredibly boring, just as it happens. They're not really interesting or fun to play until the expansion, Awakening.
There's no point in trying to manually dodge melee attacks, and there's no shame in turning down the difficulty (I had to go down to the lowest difficulty for some of the blood mage encounters in Dragon Age: Origins).
Sword-and-board warriors are good for tanking damage, warriors wielding two-handed weapons, archers, and rogues are good for dealing out damage. Mages are the most unique class, and require a lot of micromanagement; Whereas with melee attackers you can usually position them around enemies and let them go wild, using a mage as your main character will require you to pay a lot of attention to positioning, as a lot of their spells will do area-of-effect damage and it can impact your party members. And you almost never want a mage to be in melee range with enemies, because they're too susceptible to damage.
Rogues do best when they can get behind enemies as well, so if you have a party with a good bulky character (like Alistair, or Generic McSoontobedead if you're still in the origin story part), make sure they go in and start attracting attention first. It takes a few levels for warriors to get the abilities that actually draw enemy aggro, but early-game sending them in first is generally fairly reliable.
Archers (rogues or warriors can specialize as an archer) are incredibly boring, just as it happens. They're not really interesting or fun to play until the expansion, Awakening.
You can't physically dodge attacks or anything like that, they're both turn based games that just happen to run in pause-able real time.
KOTOR is incredibly unbalanced, so if you focus your character on either pure force powers or pure melee combat you basically become an unstoppable god. My preference is to slaughter entire rooms in seconds with force lightning, and dealing with any boss in the entire game by force choking them twice (it takes half of an enemy's health pool each time, no matter how large that health pool is). You'll have to be unrepentantly evil to make this strategy cost-effective of course, but playing a good guy in KOTOR is playing it wrong. Seriously, the evil options are too deliciously satisfying to ignore, and the good options are too mind-numbingly bland to endure.
As for Dragon Age, you may have to employ some tactics, at least at first. Make sure you have at least one tank (probably one-handed/shield user), one DPS (can be anything, I like two handed melee users) and one mage with heal spells. The tank runs in while activating all of his defense/taunt abilities, the mage heals him whenever necessary, and anyone else beats the crap out of the bad guys using whatever damage powers they have. The combat in that game only gets easier as it goes along by the way, so don't worry too much if you die a lot at first. Oh yeah, and always immediately kill or stun enemy mages or they'll wipe out your entire party with one shot.
KOTOR is incredibly unbalanced, so if you focus your character on either pure force powers or pure melee combat you basically become an unstoppable god. My preference is to slaughter entire rooms in seconds with force lightning, and dealing with any boss in the entire game by force choking them twice (it takes half of an enemy's health pool each time, no matter how large that health pool is). You'll have to be unrepentantly evil to make this strategy cost-effective of course, but playing a good guy in KOTOR is playing it wrong. Seriously, the evil options are too deliciously satisfying to ignore, and the good options are too mind-numbingly bland to endure.
As for Dragon Age, you may have to employ some tactics, at least at first. Make sure you have at least one tank (probably one-handed/shield user), one DPS (can be anything, I like two handed melee users) and one mage with heal spells. The tank runs in while activating all of his defense/taunt abilities, the mage heals him whenever necessary, and anyone else beats the crap out of the bad guys using whatever damage powers they have. The combat in that game only gets easier as it goes along by the way, so don't worry too much if you die a lot at first. Oh yeah, and always immediately kill or stun enemy mages or they'll wipe out your entire party with one shot.
KOTOR, roll a melee character. Seriously, blasters are utterly useless in the first game. Get the Flurry skill, and dual wielding. Grab a pair of vibroswords and chop things to tiny bits.
Amusingly enough, I've recently started a new KotOR game and my main character Jedi is currently more effective with a blaster pistol than her lightsaber. Which makes it sad that they do such little damage.Soviet Heavy said:
Get 1 Tank, 1 Rogue (I like them as archers) and 2 mages.
The Mages you go one towards heal and other usefull spells, i useually get them some stunning spells too, the AOE one is fantastic.
The second one you train towards dps, meaning all kinds of elemental magic.
Usually the combat goes this way.
Tank moves in and uses aggro spell.
All enemies attack Tank.
Once all Enemies are in one place, the mages stun/freeze them with AOE spells.
Knock out some damage with your troops, heal when necessary. Win.
Also play the pc version, i didn't play it, but i hear the console version is crap and your pc should be able to handle the game, it's not too demanding.
The Mages you go one towards heal and other usefull spells, i useually get them some stunning spells too, the AOE one is fantastic.
The second one you train towards dps, meaning all kinds of elemental magic.
Usually the combat goes this way.
Tank moves in and uses aggro spell.
All enemies attack Tank.
Once all Enemies are in one place, the mages stun/freeze them with AOE spells.
Knock out some damage with your troops, heal when necessary. Win.
Also play the pc version, i didn't play it, but i hear the console version is crap and your pc should be able to handle the game, it's not too demanding.
I found the combat in DA:O pretty ridiculously easy, even on the highest difficulty... but I was admittedly using a pretty cheesy strategy.
I spec'd Alistair to be a pure tank. I'd have him run into an area full of enemies and activate an AoE taunt to draw their attention.
Then I'd use the Mage spell "Force Field" on Alistair, making him temporarily invulnerable to all damage (though incapable of moving or attacking). With Alistair invulnerable and the mass of enemies clustered around him flailing uselessly at the Force Field, I'm now free to have the rest of my party AoE nuke all of the enemies back to the stone age (the Force Field on Alistair protecting him from friendly fire as well).
My party was Alistair (pure tank), Wynne (Healer/DPS), Morrigan (Healer/DPS), Mage Player Character (Healer/DPS).
For large boss-type single targets where my AoE nuking strategy wouldn't work particularly well, I went for an even cheesier strategy. First I'd send Alistair into a corner and forget about him. Then I'd have my three Mages spread out and start attacking the boss. When the boss focuses on one Mage, I'd have one of the others cast Force Field on it to make it invulnerable, then I'd continue DPSing with the other two Mages until one of them pulls aggro. When the boss turns its attention to the second Mage I'd have the third Mage cast Force Field on it, and continue DPSing the boss along with the first Mage which is now free of its Force Field. I'd repeat this strategy until the boss is dead.
Worked every time. I managed to get past most encounters, bosses included, without taking any damage at all.
EDIT:
Oh, also... combos are pretty sweet.
Petrify (or anything that freezes) + Crushing Prison = Shattered mobs.
With three Mages I could usually Shatter whole spawns without even having to fight anything.
I spec'd Alistair to be a pure tank. I'd have him run into an area full of enemies and activate an AoE taunt to draw their attention.
Then I'd use the Mage spell "Force Field" on Alistair, making him temporarily invulnerable to all damage (though incapable of moving or attacking). With Alistair invulnerable and the mass of enemies clustered around him flailing uselessly at the Force Field, I'm now free to have the rest of my party AoE nuke all of the enemies back to the stone age (the Force Field on Alistair protecting him from friendly fire as well).
My party was Alistair (pure tank), Wynne (Healer/DPS), Morrigan (Healer/DPS), Mage Player Character (Healer/DPS).
For large boss-type single targets where my AoE nuking strategy wouldn't work particularly well, I went for an even cheesier strategy. First I'd send Alistair into a corner and forget about him. Then I'd have my three Mages spread out and start attacking the boss. When the boss focuses on one Mage, I'd have one of the others cast Force Field on it to make it invulnerable, then I'd continue DPSing with the other two Mages until one of them pulls aggro. When the boss turns its attention to the second Mage I'd have the third Mage cast Force Field on it, and continue DPSing the boss along with the first Mage which is now free of its Force Field. I'd repeat this strategy until the boss is dead.
Worked every time. I managed to get past most encounters, bosses included, without taking any damage at all.
EDIT:
Oh, also... combos are pretty sweet.
Petrify (or anything that freezes) + Crushing Prison = Shattered mobs.
With three Mages I could usually Shatter whole spawns without even having to fight anything.
You don't say what class you're playing but general advice (assuming your PC is neither healer nor tank):
- Lower difficulty to start so it's a bit more forgiving.
- Ignore Morrigan's shapeshifting tree entirely and branch her into heals, support or damage (if you do Mage Tower first, ignore heals).
- Take Alistair straight down sword and shield route.
It definitely helps to have a sorta MMO mindset in terms of party config. You want will want a tank (yourself or Alistair) and a healer (yourself, Morrigan or Wynne). The other two spots can pretty much be anything as long as it can dish out damage, but a little utility gives you many tactical options.
The pause button is your friend. Don't be afraid to pause at any time, reposition characters, use abilities like taunt, heal, etc. and ensure you're attacking the right target.
If you're playing a damage-dealing mage, make sure to make use of the freeze and CC abilities as well. You can "outsource" that to a healer, but the healer should just have a large mana pool, some useful toggles and save the rest for healing. A DPS/Utility mage is very powerful to complement a melee or even a ranged thief.
In short, be aware of your characters abilities' (cones, aoes, friendly fire, etc), their positions (relative to monsters) and the group that you're fighting (f.ex take out mages/weakest first, tank taunts toughest monster, etc).
- Lower difficulty to start so it's a bit more forgiving.
- Ignore Morrigan's shapeshifting tree entirely and branch her into heals, support or damage (if you do Mage Tower first, ignore heals).
- Take Alistair straight down sword and shield route.
It definitely helps to have a sorta MMO mindset in terms of party config. You want will want a tank (yourself or Alistair) and a healer (yourself, Morrigan or Wynne). The other two spots can pretty much be anything as long as it can dish out damage, but a little utility gives you many tactical options.
The pause button is your friend. Don't be afraid to pause at any time, reposition characters, use abilities like taunt, heal, etc. and ensure you're attacking the right target.
If you're playing a damage-dealing mage, make sure to make use of the freeze and CC abilities as well. You can "outsource" that to a healer, but the healer should just have a large mana pool, some useful toggles and save the rest for healing. A DPS/Utility mage is very powerful to complement a melee or even a ranged thief.
In short, be aware of your characters abilities' (cones, aoes, friendly fire, etc), their positions (relative to monsters) and the group that you're fighting (f.ex take out mages/weakest first, tank taunts toughest monster, etc).
A big help I found was to delve into the Tactics screen for each character, to tailor how they respond in a situation and when they will use a ability.
For example with your healers, Morrigan and Wynne, it is a good idea to set them to heal your party members when they reach 50 or 25 percent health. However you also have to put that at the top of the tactics list, they tend to look at what to do in order.
in the end the main game has no achievements for difficultly, so turn it down until you are happy with the controls.
For example with your healers, Morrigan and Wynne, it is a good idea to set them to heal your party members when they reach 50 or 25 percent health. However you also have to put that at the top of the tactics list, they tend to look at what to do in order.
in the end the main game has no achievements for difficultly, so turn it down until you are happy with the controls.
GT GD NUB!
Are words I won't say, all I can do is repeat the advice of everyone else, these aren't games about dodging telegraphed attacks, these are games won and lost on stuns, status effects and having the right characters in the right place. (Although in Kotor, a melee build character with level 3 Force Wave and Lightening will literally curbstomp the entire game), when creating a Melee character also, it's not all about strength, you need a balance of strength, dexterity and constitution or you risk being a glass canon.
As has been pointed out by the others, these games are effectively DnD lite (Well Kotor is actually DnD 3.5) so as a general rule of thumb, here's how each stat relates to in game mechanics:
Strength: How hard you hit, how much you can carry.
Dexterity: How quick you are, how well you hit, how hard you are to hit.
Constitution: How much you can get hit, how resilient you are to poisons and toxins.
Intelligence: How many skill points you get, how good you are at magic.
Wisdom: How good you are at solving problems and riddles (will often be a highlighted conversation tree answer that allows you to avoid combat etc.)
Charisma: How good you are at talking your way out of situations, how cheap stuff in shops is.
Sounds fairly simple and I'm genuinely not trying to talk down to you, but I've known a fair few people unfamiliar with table top gaming, who tend to dump into a single stat and wonder why that doesn't work or the game seems too hard (one friend literally emptied all other stats and put them in strength once e understood why this wasn't working he was having much more fun). Also remember to read what feats and abilities give you before you pick them, this sounds simple, but oft times I tend to find passive feats more useful than late game active ones.
Also a good tactic is try not to play these games in real time, they feature a pause button for a reason, so don't be afraid of using it.
Are words I won't say, all I can do is repeat the advice of everyone else, these aren't games about dodging telegraphed attacks, these are games won and lost on stuns, status effects and having the right characters in the right place. (Although in Kotor, a melee build character with level 3 Force Wave and Lightening will literally curbstomp the entire game), when creating a Melee character also, it's not all about strength, you need a balance of strength, dexterity and constitution or you risk being a glass canon.
As has been pointed out by the others, these games are effectively DnD lite (Well Kotor is actually DnD 3.5) so as a general rule of thumb, here's how each stat relates to in game mechanics:
Strength: How hard you hit, how much you can carry.
Dexterity: How quick you are, how well you hit, how hard you are to hit.
Constitution: How much you can get hit, how resilient you are to poisons and toxins.
Intelligence: How many skill points you get, how good you are at magic.
Wisdom: How good you are at solving problems and riddles (will often be a highlighted conversation tree answer that allows you to avoid combat etc.)
Charisma: How good you are at talking your way out of situations, how cheap stuff in shops is.
Sounds fairly simple and I'm genuinely not trying to talk down to you, but I've known a fair few people unfamiliar with table top gaming, who tend to dump into a single stat and wonder why that doesn't work or the game seems too hard (one friend literally emptied all other stats and put them in strength once e understood why this wasn't working he was having much more fun). Also remember to read what feats and abilities give you before you pick them, this sounds simple, but oft times I tend to find passive feats more useful than late game active ones.
Also a good tactic is try not to play these games in real time, they feature a pause button for a reason, so don't be afraid of using it.
Well I can tell you that - for Dragon Age Origins anyway, I know nothing of KOTOR - if you're playing on a console, set it to Casual your first few go-rounds and if you feel frisky after that, go ahead and play on Normal, but you've got to be a button pushing demigod to do much better than that. The play is made for PC and ported to console and you get a LOT more control on the PC to play the harder difficulties with proficiency than a controller is going to offer you.simmysims said:
As noted, Dragon Age: Origins and Kotor are descendants of pen and paper RPGs. They aren't about real time reactions at all, rather, they center on character builds and proper use of abilities. If that's not your cup of tea, you probably won't enjoy them too much. The stories are decent IMO, if you like the Bioware template.
Some specific advice for Dragon Age:
Go straight to the Mage Tower after leaving Lothering to pick up Wynne, the game's best and for the most part only primary healer, with the exception of a PC Mage. Morrigan can and should be built for support heals to supplement her damage/CC, but even so, it takes time to get her going. Incidentally, if you bring Morrigan to the Mage Tower, DO NOT listen to her advice upon immediately entering. It will result in not getting Wynne.
Positioning is important only so far as you can attack the enemies you need to, hit them in the back if not tanking, not get hit in the back yourself (unless you have abilities to negate back hits), and avoid getting hit with your own or enemy AOEs in a clump.
Tanks: Whether Alistair or the PC you need a 1handed and shield warrior unless you are trying to get very creative (Mages can also tank with proper specialization, but that is probably not a good idea starting out.)
The trick with Warrior tanks is in assigning attributes (STR, DEX, CON) properly. It would stand to reason CON would be the best tank stat but it's really a distant third, all it really does is provide a relatively small health boost. DEX you will need to purchase certain tank skills (plan ahead). STR is, atypically, also a mitigation stat, because armor upgrades require higher strength to wear, and the strength required ramps up quickly (DA: O isn't very well balanced, but that's part of it's throwback charm). In order to keep pace, it takes at least 2 points of strength per level early on. When leveling up I usually alternate between STR, STR, DEX and STR, STR, CON, or maybe even STR, STR, STR if I have fallen behind the curve. Getting stuck in terrible armor can practically scrap a playthrough. Other classes also have some rather unforgiving stat optimizations strategies, but the builds are more intuitive.
Or if you understandably do not want to do research to play video games, just turn down the difficulty.
Some specific advice for Dragon Age:
Go straight to the Mage Tower after leaving Lothering to pick up Wynne, the game's best and for the most part only primary healer, with the exception of a PC Mage. Morrigan can and should be built for support heals to supplement her damage/CC, but even so, it takes time to get her going. Incidentally, if you bring Morrigan to the Mage Tower, DO NOT listen to her advice upon immediately entering. It will result in not getting Wynne.
Positioning is important only so far as you can attack the enemies you need to, hit them in the back if not tanking, not get hit in the back yourself (unless you have abilities to negate back hits), and avoid getting hit with your own or enemy AOEs in a clump.
Tanks: Whether Alistair or the PC you need a 1handed and shield warrior unless you are trying to get very creative (Mages can also tank with proper specialization, but that is probably not a good idea starting out.)
The trick with Warrior tanks is in assigning attributes (STR, DEX, CON) properly. It would stand to reason CON would be the best tank stat but it's really a distant third, all it really does is provide a relatively small health boost. DEX you will need to purchase certain tank skills (plan ahead). STR is, atypically, also a mitigation stat, because armor upgrades require higher strength to wear, and the strength required ramps up quickly (DA: O isn't very well balanced, but that's part of it's throwback charm). In order to keep pace, it takes at least 2 points of strength per level early on. When leveling up I usually alternate between STR, STR, DEX and STR, STR, CON, or maybe even STR, STR, STR if I have fallen behind the curve. Getting stuck in terrible armor can practically scrap a playthrough. Other classes also have some rather unforgiving stat optimizations strategies, but the builds are more intuitive.
Or if you understandably do not want to do research to play video games, just turn down the difficulty.
WHOA WHOA WHOA! You mean it's possible to enjoy a modern RPG without hours of grinding, build research and hunting down that one monster who drops the purple pants of fancy dancin' +11?InkySpines said:
You sir have my undivided attention.
(This wasn't meant to be an attack on you, you gave some really cool advice, I was aiming more at RPG tropes in general.)
I found it easy for the most part (some fights are still hard) but then I play party based rpgs all the time. Most people who say it is probably played many of the old rpgs.
I'm bad at giving advice but for DA:O have a tank (probably Alister or your PC) and keep them in the front.
Use choke points and CC's or the already mentioned forcefield cheese to rain down AOE death with your mage. One of things I use to do was have my my sitting to side of a doorway, use my tank to agrro some enemies and then run back through the doorway where my mage would Cone of Cold them and the rest of the party would start shattering them (frozen enemies die from a single critical hit and some skills are automatic criticals so this spell is more useful than pure damage) though you have to watch friendly fire (although I think you don't have that on all difficulties so that might not be an issue).
You can combine different spells for different effects for example sleep + horror and grease + fireball.
Remember to position your mellee rogues behind enemies.
For the most part don't have the AI automatically doing skills or spells other than healing at X% especially not AOE even without FF as they will waste them.
Check which behaviour script everyone is on (aggressive, ranged ect) and which targets they go for. This will save you a lot of headaches. I've seem people getting frustrated at their mage running in trying pitifully to fight with a stick and it's usually because they ignore the tactics screen.
Kill mages first.
The enemies from the black vials are suppose to be hard. Leave them and come back to them if they are too much trouble.
Go through your skills before you actually get to be able to to unlock them. You don't want to be doing something like spending a ton of points in str on a rogue and then realising you can take a skill which replaces the str modifier with cunning anyway though there is a respec mod somewhere if you want to be able to mess around with no risk of gimping yourself.
There is no shame in playing at lower difficulty, once you get the hang of it you can turn it up.
I'm bad at giving advice but for DA:O have a tank (probably Alister or your PC) and keep them in the front.
Use choke points and CC's or the already mentioned forcefield cheese to rain down AOE death with your mage. One of things I use to do was have my my sitting to side of a doorway, use my tank to agrro some enemies and then run back through the doorway where my mage would Cone of Cold them and the rest of the party would start shattering them (frozen enemies die from a single critical hit and some skills are automatic criticals so this spell is more useful than pure damage) though you have to watch friendly fire (although I think you don't have that on all difficulties so that might not be an issue).
You can combine different spells for different effects for example sleep + horror and grease + fireball.
Remember to position your mellee rogues behind enemies.
For the most part don't have the AI automatically doing skills or spells other than healing at X% especially not AOE even without FF as they will waste them.
Check which behaviour script everyone is on (aggressive, ranged ect) and which targets they go for. This will save you a lot of headaches. I've seem people getting frustrated at their mage running in trying pitifully to fight with a stick and it's usually because they ignore the tactics screen.
Kill mages first.
The enemies from the black vials are suppose to be hard. Leave them and come back to them if they are too much trouble.
Go through your skills before you actually get to be able to to unlock them. You don't want to be doing something like spending a ton of points in str on a rogue and then realising you can take a skill which replaces the str modifier with cunning anyway though there is a respec mod somewhere if you want to be able to mess around with no risk of gimping yourself.
There is no shame in playing at lower difficulty, once you get the hang of it you can turn it up.