SureAI

Just curious: Here just shortly (I hope..) before Forgotten Stories, how many playthrus have people had on this addictive game.

I am at my second playthru now, where I have tried two different builds; a pure magitian/elementarist build and a more mixed spellsword build.
For some reason, both builds lead to the same ending, and the same character sympathy (Jespar).

2. My initial playthrough was mostly just the Main Quest with a hope-to-stay alive character on a fairly low level. Then I learned how to play and my second playthrough with a sneak archer/elementalist character on Iron Path level mainly exploring all of the areas and some side quests that I missed the first time.

I've only done two so far. First one where I did lots of exploring and my usual skyrim sort of build (sneaky archer/one-handed with a little bit of elemental magic thrown in). For my second one, I didn't do very much exploring because I mostly wanted just to go through the other ending and romance and to try a combat style I don't usually go for (entropy/heavy armor). Saving my third playthrough for the dlc release. Still some big areas I haven't seen much of yet like Thalgard so I'm pretty excited for all of it.

I don't think your build affects the game much beyond the combat aspect (though Jespar and Calia do seem to have different things to say about some of the Talents if you use them in front of them). I think it is only your dialogue choices that alter story line and character sympathy.

I had three, although I did not finish the main quest in the 3rd one, as I just enjoyed exploring the world and finding all the side quests! For the first 2 playthroughs, I explored the differences in the story by choosing Jespar / Calia. Jespar won.