Pharoah Dog King talismans + synergy

[Kardas]

Hey everyone,
I managed to finish Underworld Normal the other day and got lucky with the Rare Soul reward: a Pharaoh Dog King.
Considering he's the only character above 3 stars that I have (along with the Soldier Eddie I leveled up), I'd like to build my team around him.

I don't have super much experience with the character though, so I don't know what weaknesses (if any) I should patch up. About the only stat he seems to need is Magic for his attack, so I was considering giving him 2 Paladin and 2 Penetrating Talismans, as well as 2 Health talismans. Is this a good idea, or should I pile on the health more (or less)? I also read something about the Energy talismans, but 3 greens seem a bit much for a Magus character.

What are some nice characters that mesh with him well? I reckon some magic attackers due to his Magic Charge, but the only ones I have are Wicker Man Eddie, Harpy (blue), Allied Soldier (blue and green), Corrupt Owl & Ox Cultist, Soulless Demon (purple), Rock Golem (green), Undead Allied Soldier (green), Wickerdog Queen and some 2 stars. I heard Axis Commander and Carriage Rider Eddie are great with him, but I need to get more magus soul shards for that first :p

For reference, my current team is Soldier Eddie and the 2 Allied Soldiers, all with 3 or 4 star maxed out Talismans.

Any advice and tips would be greatly appreciated!

[Qed]

Keep allied soldier blue with the dog, put in a magus eddie (i.e. Carriage or Speed of light or wickerman), you can keep also a soldier eddie, it's ok.

[Kaijester]

Yeah due to his magic charge party ability, it is good to use a magus type Eddie and the Magus Allied Soldier.

[Vaseodin]

I would go with the the allied soldier (everyone seems to really like that character, although I don't use him) or (if you want to be a little different) the purple soulless demon. The soulless demon will benefit from the dog's magic charge and has a very nice AOE attack. Being purple, you won't have a disadvantage against most foes (very few enemies in this game are yellow) and he can round out a team that would otherwise be pretty vulnerable to green characters. Plus, he looks really cool! For your Eddie, I agree go with Carriage Rider (if you are able to get him) or Mummy Eddie (all of his attacks are Magic, so you can make a tanky character AND do some decent damage with a character that otherwise has subpar damage output). Any of the assassin Eddie will also benefit from the magic charge, and the dog has a great passive that cleanses bad effects and also heals a bit. You obviously have a few choices, and I'm curious to hear what you decided!

[aur0ra85]

I'll throw out another suggestion: soldier Eddie with a magic damage build. I don't think it's been done yet, and it might be a bit awkward, but you won't know unless you try :)
I'll post in the other thread in the tips section about why I feel a magic build for soldier Eddie might be a good thing to at least explore. Purple soulless demon, any green or blue Eddie, axis commander, Allied soldier, etc would be solid builds.
The problem I'm facing with parties of all the same colour is your upgrade runes for talismans are severely limited, and although you end up with a party that has unreal synergy, the grind to get there is the longest in the game due to the farming mechanics. I myself at end game am going through such a process, I'm currently building two parties: all red, and all blue, getting the talismans to max is an incredibly difficult journey, but it speeds up after you max your first set. Think of it this way, between my red bat, red dog, samurai Eddie, and a damage build for soldier Eddie, I'm dealing with the mountain of maxing 20 red guardian fierce talismans, and a half dozen(?), yellow talismans. For my all blue party I have not counted exactly yet, but I'm assuming it's in the realm of 15 max blue talismans.

When you're starting g out I would suggest worrying less about the party synergy, and just building your best characters until you receive new characters that have that natural synergy. Put a lot of thought into your talisman builds with current characters, so they are easy to remove and add to future better characters. Blue talismans are all equally good as long as they are of the paladin variety. Red/yellow/green talismans are a completely different story and require some research. Good luck with the build.

[Kardas]

First off, thanks for the replies!

I think I'll try Wicker Eddie + blue allied soldier + PDK for a bit first. The purple Soulless Demon suggestion was pretty interesting, except I have no idea what talismans to give him, since most purple ones are attack based. He seems to be even more of a glass cannon than the warrior counterpart though.
The Mummy Eddie suggestion seems absolutely fantastic and I can't wait to try that if I ever get one. Will try for some Sentinel soul shards in the future. I could give him those Energy talismans perhaps, so I'll always have a Magic Charge and Reflect Shield on hand.

One last thing I was wondering about the Talismans:

Blue talismans are all equally good as long as they are of the paladin variety
I was considering giving PDK a pair of Penetrating talismans alongside a pair of Paladin ones, but I'm guessing Penetrating is lackluster? I looked over the 'Uncommon/Rare Talisman' thread and that one seemed to think they were all right.

[aur0ra85]

No one has had much concrete success with those yet.

[Vaseodin]

Yeah the penetrating ones are not as food as damage boost like paladin or Holy. The truth is you get to bypass the magic resist of a foe only 1/3 of the time. Most characters have low magic resist (pharaoh dog king being an exception), so you are not boosting damage by much. And if you average it taking effect every 3 hits, you'll see it doesn't compute to as much as 3 solid hits with guaranteed damage boost (15% of Magic or 20% of MR).

I agree paladin are better for the dog, but not most other characters. In most cases you get more damage from the Holy talismans. Check the character's MR and Magic stats before deciding on blue talismans and boosting them. Blue evolve materials are hard to find, so don't upgrade one only to find out you could have done better!

[kryton]

Be careful when using the PDK,he is glitched especially in higher levels. When I was using him trying to beat some of the harder levels,his bite was dealing NO damage what so ever. Except for his magic charge and the little bit of healing he does I was really only fighting with two characters. Do not get me wrong though, the PDK is a good character to use,very strong when working as intended.

[Coletrain]

Be careful when using the PDK,he is glitched especially in higher levels. When I was using him trying to beat some of the harder levels,his bite was dealing NO damage what so ever. Except for his magic charge and the little bit of healing he does I was really only fighting with two characters. Do not get me wrong though, the PDK is a good character to use,very strong when working as intended.

FWIW I have been experiencing the no-damage-bite at higher levels with my regular Pharaoh Dog as well. Rather frustrating...

[MuadDib-7367]

PDK is definitely glitched as I have had the same problem in the higher levels. Between that and the Underworld freeze up glitch, I am hesitant to start new levels until these glitches are addressed.

EDIT 08/11/2016 -- Glitch is fixed. PDK now is a very valuable magus type character.

[Orc71]

I have a 5 star PDK I never use because of the glitch which is a shame because I could really use him in Underworld madness. I'd like to pair him with my 5 star Samurai Eddie who of course is also glitched with the basic attack issue. All my other 4 stars are maxed but lately progression is difficult unless I'm using 5 star troopers. I hope they fix these issues soon maybe with the update? (fingers are crossed)

[kryton]

Seems as though the PDK glitch is fixed.
Now these talismans are no where near level 50,but his bite leaves one hell of a bruise.
2-Ascension Overwhelming
4-Holy Talisman's Power

So many talismans to level up and I just don't have the gold.