Hellcat5's Guide to Templar - Oro Ignis with Oro's Sacrifice 44k+ DPS - Spreadsheet Link Fixed

VIDEO - Hellcat5's Guide to Templar - Oro Ignis with Oro's Sacrifice

the Story Oro Ignis and Mokou's Embrace (along with build for Oro Ignis)

[Click "SHOW" Below to Expand the Story]

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OVERVIEW
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I created this Oro build to give people another viable and inexpensive option for the Oro's Sacrifice weapon. I've incorporated resistance nodes into the build so that the player can have more options when considering how to fill in the gaps for resistance with gear. The design for the weapon works very well with Templar. Shadow has some starting elemental nodes, but with consideration of the nodes available close to Shadow when comparing to Templar, the Templar offers the better option.

After I finished the design, I searched for other recent Oro builds, and found two. The first is a popular build titled "Oro's Sacrifice - Elemental "Flickerf**king" with Spectral Throw v3.0" created by Genusi The second is called "Proper Oro's (updated)" from KillerB I've taken time to create a spreadsheet (using OpenOffice, and Apache Community Project Microsoft Office should also open the file without issue. Download Open Office here - Download Open Office) that shows the mathematical comparison between the builds, which you can find here:

NEW SPREADSHEET LINK
Path of Exile Oro Builds Analysis

I used poebuilder.com to import the build trees for analysis.

When comparing builds (which includes gemsets, gear, and PST (Passive Skill Tree)) I found that KillerB's "Proper Oro's" included costly unnecessary items. I focus my builds to show players both new and old that creating a viable fun build has little to do with expensive and popular items. The Kaom's Heart chest and 6L Oro's Sacrifice used with "proper Oro's" for many players might seem hard to obtain, and are not necessary. While all three builds use Gang's Momentum These boots are also unnecessary. One can take a dual res pair of boots with life, and a boost to the armour defense stat and satisfy the build's viability just the same, and you can probably find something useful around 1-5 chaos.

I've taken the interest my youtube channel is receiving seriously, and because of the growing interest, I've stepped up my services to the community, both as a builder and information provider. To offer the best information possible, I watched a few related ZiggyD and Nugiyen videos to learn about what they've shared with the community so that I can offer my view, and fill in any missing pieces I see in what they present. And, while some might argue differently, both Nugiyen and I agree that more life or energy shield is not always better. Nugiyen's PoE: How To Make A Character From Scratch (Defenses) Now, I'll get into my thinking process behind the build.

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Comments on Oro's Sacrifice 2 Handed Sword
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Oro's Sacrifice brings build challenges to the table. Since Grinding Gear Games has not explicitly released the gameplay formula they use when creating monster damage and defense (a part of monster design concept) many people guess at what might be necessary for a build to become viable. While a major component in answering the question "is this build viable?" has to do with Passive Skill Tree mathematics, we must also consider gear as part of the formula. Once we verify the Passive Skill Tree mathematics for a build (you can do that part by comparing the mathematics of other known builds) through spreadsheet, we must look at gear. As we level, the monsters become more challenging. Thus, we must consider damage output and survive-ability. Damage and defense thresholds exist in the formula Grinding Gear Games uses to create gameplay. Once the gear we have passes the necessary threshold, more damage becomes excessive, and not necessary to to make the build viable.

While other builds with 6L weapons and gear might do a higher amount of damage, these builds are excessive viability builds. Often people make the mistake of thinking that "more is better" and as myself and Nugiyen agree, that's not always the case. When considering the Awakenings damage reflect mobs, one must govern damage output or realize killing one's own character many times. It will not be as simple as "I'll just switch skill types to avoid the reflection." because all damage (outside of chaos damage from what I've experienced) will be effected by the damage reflection rare monster mod.

To comment further, this build is primarily elemental damage. If you've tried physical damage compared to elemental damage, you can see a difference in effect. Kripparrian, a fellow Youtuber, agrees with me in one of his videos regarding elemental damage output in Path of Exile stating something like, "Elemental Damage is far superior to physical damage in Path of Exile." As another point of difference, if you compare a physical damage based [cyclone] chain with around the same DPS shown below with the DPS shown in this build, you'll see a difference also. To explicitly point out one bonus, the "shocked" status effect increases damage received from all sources by 50%.

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PASSIVE SKILL TREE
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ENDGAME:
Oro Ignis Passive Skill Tree - End Game

CURRENT UPDATED for 2.0 Awakenings:
Oro Ignis Passive Skill Tree - Current 2.0 Awakenings

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PLAYSTYLE DESCRIPTION:
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I have two main attacks with Oro's Sacrifice depending on the situation. The first is the the "FOR THE MOTHERLAND!!" approach where Oro Ignis jumps into the middle of a pack of mobs then begins spinning around, destroying everything in his path. This method does not have leech applied, and gives a high damage output. This can seem very dangerous, and it is. However, I've mitigated damage from physical attacks through a solid armor % bonus of 152%, and I also have the Unwavering Stance Keystone to ensure the mobs cannot stun me. To counter freeze possibilities, I use a potion that gives the "no chill no freeze" mod. Since I have this mod rolled on a Quality 20 Quick Silver potion, I get 6 seconds of worry free attacking when facing cold damage. To note, the cheapest way to quality an item is to apply the quality while it is white and un-modded.

To deal with piety Electric damage on end game Maps, I use an anti shock lightning resistance potion. I use two life potions currently, which I can switch out depending on how I need to adjust for the challenges I face depending on the map mods. While I won't cover all the possible situations we must mitigate, I hope to give you ideas on how to think about damage and status effect mitigation.

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GEAR
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Anyone can easily find my current gear by going to my player profile on the forums. Click the "Characters" tab to go to my list of characters, then scroll through the list to find the character you'd like to review.

For ease, I've provided a link to my characters tab:
Hellcat5's Characters

You can find all the current gear easily there.

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GEMS
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1. [Cleave] + [Life Leech] + [Multistrike] + [faster attacks] - I use [Cleave] because of the extended range from the passive tree to aoe skills, and to generate a high amount of fast leech. I've created a rare glove from Master Vorici to obtain a fast leech rate, and I use this skill to mitigate the damage reflection rare mod. In the current version, damage reflection comes in two types. However, in Awakenings, they've wrapped up the reflection into one mod for all damage types except (as far as I can tell) chaos damage.



You'll notice I have 5L for [cleave] in this screenshot. Last night after publishing this guide a guild member helped me 5L my Oro's Sacrifice. You can achieve the same damage output with a 4L but sacrifice the sustain from [Cleave]. If you remove Weapon Elemental Damage you lost around 4500 damage per second. While this might seem like too big a hit in dps, remember that [cleave] with this build is for sustain, and not the primary attack. Certain situations will call for you to use cleave more for sustain than other situations - and your play skill level will determine this.

NOTE: In the image, you'll see the DPS is 21735.6. If I find I want to achieve more damage (although more goes father beyond the lower bound of viable) I can switch out for a leveled [Elemental Weakness] curse. With a level 16 (level req. 60) [Elemental Weakness] curse, I gain an additional 35% damage against a mob that has a resistance of 0%. And in this situation the damage output goes to 29342.25. Considering mobs with resistance, the damage output will always be 35% higher from the resistance penetration. To further amplify the damage, you can get an item that provides an additional curse, or you can re-arrange path points to reach (Whispers of Doom) in the Templar upper right section of the Passive Skill Tree to gain an additional curse, adding in [Flammability] curse to the curse on hit chain. Lightning damage further amplifies the damage output from creating the status effect "shocked". When the mobs have the "shocked" status effect from lightning damage they take an additional 50% increased damage, bringing the damage total to 44013.375 at level 76.


2. [Cyclone] + [Blood Magic] + [Concentrated Effect] + [Weapon Elemental Damage] - This is a powerhouse for destroying mobs and bosses alike. I use this when I need a higher damage output than [cleave] offers, and when I want to continue moving through the map.



In this image, you can see [cyclone] has a damage output of 16656.6. We must manually calculate the additional damage from the [curse on hit] chain with [Elemental Weakness], and in doing so we arrive at 22486.41 against a mob with a resistance of 0%. Again, the damage output is always increased by the penetration amount, and this will go into negative resistance. With the "shocked" status effect, we further increase the damage output by 50% bringing the total to 33729.615 at level 76.

3. [Leap Slam] + [Faster Attacks] - I've included these gems to help with both map clear speed and initiation while in a group. When playing as a group, mobs go for the heaviest armor first (unless attacked by someone with a different armor rating), and so I can help mitigate damage from ranged players.

3. [herald of Ash] + [herald of Ice] + ([Anger] or [[Purity of Fire]) + [Reduced Mana] - I use these to amplify the damage output of this elemental build and the spread ignite through mobs. With how Oro works, having Herald of Ashe guarantees mobs become ignited which guarantees the bonuses provided by Oro's Sacrifice. A build that does not use Herald of Ash will attempt to compensate through gear and PST to increase chance to burn. That's not necessary with this build. During situations when I might need a higher resistance to fire, I can easily swap out [Anger] for [Purity of Fire] as shown in the video when fighting against the level 76 Crematorium Map Boss Megaera.





4. [Herald of Thunder] + [Curse on Hit] + [Reduced Mana] + [Warlord's Mark]- This combo amplifies the leech and mana regen, along with increased monster stun capability, and does so automatically. Alternately when I decide I need a higher damage out put, I can recolor the link from BBRR to BBBR and exchange [Warlord's Mark] for [Elemental Weakness]. I take [Elemental Weakness] over [Flammability] because this build works on not only the fire from Oro's Sacrifice but also the other elemental damage from [Herald of Ice], [Herald of Thunder], and [Herald of Ash] (and of course [Anger] when I use that gem). At level 16 (level req 60), [Elemental Weakness] give a 35% elemental penetration for all elements thereby greatly amplifying the damage output for this build.



5. [Cast When Damage Taken] + [Molten Shell] + [Decoy Totem] + [Increased Duration] - This is a damage mitigation technique I call distraction mitigation. You can replace [Increased Duration] with a life leech gem if you wish to amplify the recovery from when mobs break the molten shell.

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LEVELING
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Leveling for an endgame build only differs slightly from character to character. All character types have certain leveling uniques available to them to speed up the process. To start out, pick an AOE skill gem that you enjoy -

1. [Reave] for (dexterity) based characters [Duelist / Ranger / Shadow]

2. [Molten Strike] or [Static Strike] for (Strength) based [Templar / Marauder / Duelist] characters

3. [Fireball] or another similar aoe type spell for (intelligence) based [Witch / Templar / Shadow] if you plan to go as a spellcaster

I started with one of the two handed leveling uniques (Blood Thorn or Fencoil) then moved into a pair of brightbeaks at level 20.

I used a bramblejack for armor.

I used a goldrim for hat to help cap the res throughout normal difficulty.

I used Lochtonial Caress to increase my clear speed

I used Wonderlust boots to increase my movement and clear speed.

After level 20, upgrade to gear according to your statistical needs. Fill in the missing resistances until they are 75%, and by Merciless try to get gear that gives a combination of Chaos and elemental resistance to improve your survival chances.

Some people promote the "perfect gear" as the goal one should strive for end game. Their definition usually goes along this line "150% defense, flat defense, life, tri res and movement speed" However, this is a very costly goal, and not necessary with my builds. I provide a nice chunk of resistances through the passive tree without much sacrifice to end game viability (you can verify this through looking at the linked spreadsheet) So, when you look for gear, instead think of gear as puzzle pieces to fit together. a Pair of boots with life, chaos res and fire res, with some move speed combined with gloves that have cold resistance, lightning resistance, and attack speed for example. Any two damage resistance types combined on a piece of gear (with other useful mods) can make it build enabling.

When leveling, Avoid going after killing each mob you pass. Instead, look for the larger groups, and use the aoe skill to quickly take them out. if a rare mob has mods that might kill you, avoid it and move on. You don't have to kill everything. It's not manly or brave to try to kill everything you pass. It's unwise. you must have the proper mitigations in place before attempting some of the more dangerous mobs. Be sure to check the mods of the mobs you're fighting. Dying in Cruel imposes a 5% xp loss, and dying in Merciless imposes a 10% loss. So, while your goal might be to get the xp and drops from a nice shiny rare mob, you might lose out with dying a few times, and not getting any drops worth the time and xp loss. XP in game equates to time, and dying means you lose time.

When placing Passive Skill points, try to put them in a 2:1 ratio with more points towards the survival nodes until you get to where you have most of the survival nodes when leveling. While it's very tempting to all players to apply points into damage for faster clearing, if you cannot survive the different challenges, then you've wasted your leveling time. I target this goal usually:

1000 life or energy shield by the end of act 3 normal.

2000 life or energy shield by the end of act 3 cruel. (ranged characters can be around 1200 to 1500 if you've taken other damage mitigation steps through gems)

once getting into the 60+ range shoot for a 3000 damage pool before level 70, and 4000 to 4500 by level 80. A friend of mine does Atziri with a damage pool of around 5350 life as a [Righteous Fire] Templar. If you also use [Purity of Fire] aura you can have around that damage pool number sucessfully also and beat Atziri without dying by taking in a ruby flask or two.

I hope you've enjoyed the detail I've provided with this build. If you have any questions, please ask. You can find me on youtube by searching for "hellcat5" or clicking the image at the top of this post.

[reserved]

A lot of words with not much deal. Use spoiler tags so people won't have to dig through your textwalls. Also so much advertising in one post isn't polite.

As far as build goes it doesn't seem promising. Oro's doesn't shine damage wise and 3-link cyclone guarantee that dps won't go beyond 'pitiful'. Using separate link for leech isn't unusual but doesn't seem reliable. Also you can save one point by filling one node on lower highway and free two on upper one. (118 points /0\)

Post your gear here, post character screens, buffed/unbuffed numbers. Without this info this thread has little value.





Personally I've been trying to make Oro's work as an actual melee since 1.2. I started with defensive cleave, switched to lightning strike, then back to full-offense 5l cleave with anger wrath and HOT. Currently I'm trying cyclone and comk cyclone variants but still without much of success. My build isn't as defensive as yours and it takes it toll, but the real problem with oro's is that damage simply to low for 74-75+ stuff. Lower content is fine, more or less but even there prolif-HOA does more actual killing than cyclone.

I'm not claiming that my build is perfectly refined or that my gear super-cool but in all honesty I don't see how to push oro's to at least 50k. Way too few options for scaling, too few 'more' modifiers. Wish 'melee damage on full life' actually was 'melee damage' and not just physical. *sigh* I have some thoughts on low-life b-rage life-es hybrid but idk if I'll bother to try it before 2.0 if ever. And gearing would be insane too =(

"

Lorginir wrote:

A lot of words with not much deal. Use spoiler tags so people won't have to dig through your textwalls. Also so much advertising in one post isn't polite.

I've made some adjustments according to your suggestions. I hope you find the adjustments valuable.

"

Lorginir wrote:

As far as build goes it doesn't seem promising. Oro's doesn't shine damage wise and 3-link cyclone guarantee that dps won't go beyond 'pitiful'. Using separate link for leech isn't unusual but doesn't seem reliable. Also you can save one point by filling one node on lower highway and free two on upper one. (118 points /0\)

You mention two points on the upper highway that could be translated into one point. I presume, since you don't provide exact detail, that you mean where I take a point in Intelligence and Dexterity between the (Retribution) primary node and (Quick Recovery), then being able to put a point on the path between (Expertise) and (Combat Stamina). Strength gives no bonus to damage with this build, and the hp increased by this change is minimal. However, since Oro's Sacrifice requires 113 Dexterity to wield, I pathed 70 points of dexterity into the build so you don't have to get it on gear. If you manage to find gear cheaply that can compensate for dexterity, then by all means make the adjustment. Small adjustments like this gets into the topic of Optimization, which I do not plan to discuss in depth here.

"

Lorginir wrote:

Post your gear here, post character screens, buffed/unbuffed numbers. Without this info this thread has little value.

I've added in a section to the guide title, "Gear". I hope you'll find this section easy to use to identify my current gear. For convenience, I've copied the text here:

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GEAR
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Anyone can easily find my current gear by going to my player profile on the forums. Click the "Characters" tab to go to my list of characters, then scroll through the list to find the character you'd like to review.

For ease, I've provided a link to my characters tab:
Hellcat5's Characters

You can find all the current gear easily there.

Also, I've added in screenshots of the damage numbers under each skill chain.

"

Lorginir wrote:

Personally I've been trying to make Oro's work as an actual melee since 1.2. I started with defensive cleave, switched to lightning strike, then back to full-offense 5l cleave with anger wrath and HOT. Currently I'm trying cyclone and comk cyclone variants but still without much of success. My build isn't as defensive as yours and it takes it toll, but the real problem with oro's is that damage simply to low for 74-75+ stuff. Lower content is fine, more or less but even there prolif-HOA does more actual killing than cyclone.

I'm sorry you've experienced issues with playing your build. I'm uploading a video here in the next few hours (the authoring process takes a while, then also upload times) That shows a level 74 vaal boss kill, along with a run through of the level 76 map Crematorium. I picked this map because of the Oro's weakness against fire damage. You'll see, from the video, that rare and lessor quality monsters fall with relative ease. With use of varied play techniques, this boss is quite easy. I'll cover play techniques in another video.

"

Lorginir wrote:

I'm not claiming that my build is perfectly refined or that my gear super-cool but in all honesty I don't see how to push oro's to at least 50k. Way too few options for scaling, too few 'more' modifiers. Wish 'melee damage on full life' actually was 'melee damage' and not just physical. *sigh* I have some thoughts on low-life b-rage life-es hybrid but idk if I'll bother to try it before 2.0 if ever. And gearing would be insane too =(

Viability for end game maps does not require a 50k DPS. I've provided full mathematics for the build with the revisions I've made after reading your response, and you can see that it reaches a DPS of over 44k at level 76, which is beyond the viability threshold. With [cyclone] in a 4L scenario, the DPS reaches into the 33k range which, when compared with the physical cyclone build mentioned here [1.3] Uber Disfavour: flexible 2h cycloner comes close enough to the 42k DPS mentioned here "...or 42k+ DPS with great AoE..."

If we compare Passive Skill Tree mathematics between the above cyclone build and my oro build, we can see that I provide more defense through the PST. However, the DPS % increase of his tree is more after adding up the damage % increases and multiplying that by the attack speed increase, I come to 491.4% increased physical damage, where my Oro build provides 321% increased elemental damage. Yet, his 6L cyclone sits at 42k as mentioned above and as reported by a friend of mine who tried his build. Although his build provides a higher damage increase %, his build is excessively viable and unnecessary. Unfortunately we cannot review his current character data because he has his profile set to private.

To restate, I provide builds that are viable for endgame content at same or close level, without requiring a high amount of currency to acquire popular and high end gear. While this build doesn't achieve 50k+ DPS it does achieve 44k DPS at level 76. I've not spent the time to calculate what damage output I will have at level 85, or 90. But, I've got a decent amount of damage nodes to acquire still if you compare my endgame build to my current build.

I wish you luck, and I hope you enjoy your time in Wraeclast!

Love the lore text.

Also just a small question. Is unwavering stance necessary when you would actually be using cyclone a lot and it prevents stuns anyways. And maybe later people can respec out of the two dex nodes and get some dex on gear. After dropping this they can take the extra chance to ignite in the holy fire wheel and also take the two fire damage nodes in the celestial wheel.

Edit: Saw you node on removing the dex nodes. But maybe you can still post are more optimized variation of the tree

Nice to see someone using Oro's.

Some critiques/comments:
Making a build guide when your character is at level 77 is kinda early, because youre only starting to see its potential and often times youre still squishy (if in SC). Maybe you make an update once you've reached the late 80s.

Its a nice idea to use HoA for igniting enemies.

Your defenses seem low, you get hit pretty hard from everything. You dont mention your armour rating, I assume its around 6000, which is not really helping vs charging bone rhoas.

You cannot sustain the mana cost of cleave, therefore you have to use cyclone inbetween.

Did you consider using fire penetration?

The number crunching you've done is mostly paper dps. Your chance to shock is 5%, which makes linking herald of thunder curse on hit ... lets say "inefficient" for applying a curse. you practicly never curse, as seen in the video, you'd be better off manually cursing with eleweakkness - blood magic. Furthermore, your 50% damage increase from shock never really applies. Even if it does, the 50-930 lightning damage is not a reliable source of long shocks against high HP mobs (and yeah, those are the ones that you'd actually benefit from shocking, because they survive a few hits).

Why did you level the cleave gem?



On a side note, i disagree that physical damage is inferior to elemental. Krip's video about that is years old, and he didnt know that most mobs dont have more than 931 armor (source somewhere here) which is nothing if youre a physical crit build for example. Many bosses have 30-60 elemental resistances, and a reduced effect of curses on them, so unless you use only one element, dual curse and penetration, you wont lower their resists to the ground. Physical however barely is mitigated, and in presence of physical to lightning or hatred, the helpful status effects are in reach for physical too.

"

daveamol wrote:

Love the lore text.

Also just a small question. Is unwavering stance necessary when you would actually be using cyclone a lot and it prevents stuns anyways. And maybe later people can respec out of the two dex nodes and get some dex on gear. After dropping this they can take the extra chance to ignite in the holy fire wheel and also take the two fire damage nodes in the celestial wheel.

Hello! So, to talk about why I used unwavering stance. With the current version of POE 1.3.1, it's hard to use actual gameplay skill because of oos. I took unwavering stance so I can ensure I don't get stunned if I'm trying to kite leech. (I show the "kite leech" technique in the video) A player can absolutely change this in the Passive Skill Tree (PST) if he / she desires to use the points to path somewhere else.

When considering ignite, I've covered a 100% guarantee for ignite by using [Herald of Ash] so, with this build, I have little need for ignite chance through nodes. I don't particularly focus on burning damage with this build (if I did I'd have taken Avatar of Fire), but I use burning damage to amplify the damage output later on. And, of course, burning things builds frenzy charges with Oro's Sacrifice.

"

daveamol wrote:

Edit: Saw you node on removing the dex nodes. But maybe you can still post are more optimized variation of the tree

With the current Passive Skill Tree design, I focused the PST to provide access to cheap gear. Optimization really can't occur without considering gear of the individual player. While the exact process for optimization goes beyond the scope of this guide, I will create a guide on how to optimize with gear in the near future. Also, I will present an adjusted PST with the considerations that:

1. attributes necessary are on gear
2. resistances are on gear

I will post that later today.

you are not so efficient when building chars are you?

mine 108 points: http://poeurl.com/zo03IdX

176% life
105% mana regen
33% max mana
20% all resists
84% elemental
135% fire
44% melee
34% wep
50% fire wep

yours 116 : http://poeurl.com/zo04Rlu

188% life
125% mana regen
5% max mana
38% all resists
138% elemental
40% fire
44% melee
34% wep
50% fire wep

"

Nivius wrote:

you are not so efficient when building chars are you?

Spoiler

mine 108 points: http://poeurl.com/zo03IdX

176% life
105% mana regen
33% max mana
20% all resists
84% elemental
135% fire
44% melee
34% wep
50% fire wep

yours 116 : http://poeurl.com/zo04Rlu

188% life
125% mana regen
5% max mana
38% all resists
138% elemental
40% fire
44% melee
34% wep
50% fire wep

You don't shine either, actually. Saved you two points

"

cmphx wrote:

Nice to see someone using Oro's.

Some critiques/comments:
Making a build guide when your character is at level 77 is kinda early, because youre only starting to see its potential and often times youre still squishy (if in SC). Maybe you make an update once you've reached the late 80s.

Hello and thanks for commenting! I see you offer some valuable feeback.

I plan to start a stream this weekend so people can watch me level to the upper 80s (or higher) using this build.

"

cmphx wrote:

Its a nice idea to use HoA for igniting enemies.

Your defenses seem low, you get hit pretty hard from everything. You dont mention your armour rating, I assume its around 6000, which is not really helping vs charging bone rhoas.

My armour number is actually 4431, over 1500 points less from what you guessed. I'm not using what some people might consider optimal gear, as the focus on the guide is to show how Oro's Sacrifice and the Passive Skill tree can work with non-optimal (read: cheap) gear. For example, the level 57 armor piece I'm wearing is a nice piece for level, but it doesn't offer what some might consider necessary defense for late game damage output. It's a solid tri res armor (fire at 24%, cold at 28%, and lightning at 45%) with 85 hp, 110% armour and es, and 280 flat armor. A great piece of gear at level 57, but not the "optimal" choice for my level and maps. Yet, with it I manage to clear all packs of mobs (including rares) on a "to level" map. When considering leveling, what I've offered is viable with a little skillful play.

"

cmphx wrote:

You cannot sustain the mana cost of cleave, therefore you have to use cyclone inbetween.

In the video I show some changes to the character I made after a few people talked to me about damage output, and after obtaining the 5L Oro's Sacrifice. I dropped [Warlord's Mark] curse to use [Elemental Weakness] instead. When I was using a 4L [cleave] chain ([cleave] + [faster attacks] + [multistrike] +[life leech]) I had plenty of mana sustain with [Warlord's Mark] on my [curse on hit] chain. After 5 linking my Oro's Sacrifice (thanks to xJeSTeRo) I'm now including [Weapon Elemental Damage] in the [cleave] chain, which further increases the mana consumption by 50% in the chain. With these two changes, and to explain it metaphorically, I've gone from a from an automatic handgun to a burst controlled heavy machine gun. While I can't constantly attack, the regeneration is quick enough to where I can shoot, move, shoot, move, and so on. Also, I'm currently using a two link with vaal clarity and increased duration. This isn't necessary for play, but it offers around a 12 second spree of constant attacks if I want to "throw it all on the table". Since vaal clarity only takes 16 souls, I can have it ready most of the time.

"

cmphx wrote:

Did you consider using fire penetration?

I considered fire penetration in these different scenarios:

[cleave] receives the most damage bonus from [Weapon Elemental Damage] at level 20. Next in line for damage enhancement is [faster attacks], and third is [multistrike]. Since I designed this build for low budget, these are the best case scenarios for damage enhancement. Let's get into numbers:

NOTE: this is calculated WITHOUT consideration of the PST enhancements

My Oro DPS (Damage Per Second): (454+592)/2=523
Oro Attacks per second 1.38
523*1.38=721.74


Monsters with 0% resistance calculations:
[cleave] with [Weapon Elemental Damage @ lvl 19 58% inc. damage] = 1140.3492

[cleave] with [faster attacks @ level 19 43% inc attack speed] = (1.38*1.43)=1.9734
1.9734*523 = 1032.0882 To explain this, we take the base speed of Oro's Sacrifice (1.38) then multiply that by an additional 43% (1.43) to get 1.9734. Then we take the new attack speed of 1.9734 to multiply with the average damage (523) without attack speed multiplier. This brings us to the final number with these two gems: 1032.0882.

[cleave] with [multistrike @ level 19 106% inc attack speed] = (1.38*2.06)=2.8428
2.8428*(523-(523*0.36=188.28)=334) = 949.4952

[cleave] with [fire penetration @ level 19 34% penetration] = 721.74*1.34 = 967.1316

So we have these numbers:

Monsters with 0% resistance:

1. [cleave] + [Weapon Elemental Damage] = 1140.3492
2. [cleave] + [faster attacks] = 1032.0882
3. [cleave] + [multistrike] = 949.4952
4. [cleave] + [fire penetration] = 967.1316


Monsters with 60% resistance:

1. [cleave] + [Weapon Elemental Damage] = (1140.3492-(1140.3492*0.6=684.20952)) = 456.13968
2. [cleave] + [faster attacks] = (1032.0882-(1032.0882*0.6=619.25292)) = 412.83528
3. [cleave] + [multistrike] = (949.4952-(949.4952*0.6=569.69712)) = 379.79808
4. [cleave] + [fire penetration] = (721.74 (721.74*(0.6-0.34=0.26)=187.6524)) = 534.0876

So, from this we can see that [fire penetration] takes precedence over [weapon elemental damage], [faster attacks], and [multistrike] when facing a monster that has 60% resistance. Now, I'm going to give you something that I've not read before in a build - the threshold for penetration:

Monster with 42% resistance:

[cleave] + [weapon elemental damage]: 1140.3492 - (1140.3492*0.42=478.946) = 661.4032

[cleave=] + [fire penetration]: 721.74 - (721.74*(0.42-0.34=0.08)=57.7392) = 664.0008

From this we can see that if the remaining resistance is greater than slightly under 8% (perhaps 7.75%) then we do not benefit from the fire penetration gem. In short, swap out a gem of your choice for fire penetration against bosses or rare mobs with a high resistance. Of course this is depending on the links you have available. If you have a 6L, I'd include [fire penetration] in the linking if you can manage your mana. Otherwise, as I've demonstrated, the build is playable as I've suggested - without fire penetration.

"

cmphx wrote:

The number crunching you've done is mostly paper dps. Your chance to shock is 5%, which makes linking herald of thunder curse on hit ... lets say "inefficient" for applying a curse. you practicly never curse, as seen in the video, you'd be better off manually cursing with eleweakkness - blood magic. Furthermore, your 50% damage increase from shock never really applies. Even if it does, the 50-930 lightning damage is not a reliable source of long shocks against high HP mobs (and yeah, those are the ones that you'd actually benefit from shocking, because they survive a few hits).

As I've mentioned, Grinding Gear Games has a formula for gameplay. This "number crunching" shows the results of my analysis of Grinding Gear Games formula, and exists as both theory and gameplay experience. I've shown a formulaic comparison between two other builds. These other two builds come from people who've used them. Not included in the build comparison spreadsheet are the other build formulas I'm aware of, and have considered when creating the formula for this build.

I could get more out of my [elemental weakness] curse gem if I manually cast it. However, doing so interrupts the gameplay experience I want to have. If, in your playstyle, you want to manually cast the curse, by all means do it. It will give you a more consistent DPS against mobs that aren't curse immune.

Regarding the "shocked" status ailment, I want to say this - "shocked" is useful for pack clearing speed. I find it useful also, when it triggers, against stronger monsters. Faster attack speed helps in this regard. With this particular build, I can swap out my Devoto's Devotion with The Three Dragons to obtain a 100% chance to shock because I'm using [Herald of Ash], and with such my shock duration would be a fair length because of the amount of fire damage this build does.

"

cmphx wrote:

Why did you level the cleave gem?

Oro's Sacrifice isn't available until level 67. I used [cleave] while leveling. And, [cleave] offers a 10% increased attack speed at quality 20. once I reach level 20 with it, I will exchange it for a quality 20 level 1 [cleave], then leave it at level 1. To Note, [cleave] at level 1 costs 6 mana points without modifiers. [Cleave] at level 20 costs 9 mana points. With my current 5L setup, [cleave] costs 30 mana points. If I exchange my leveled [cleave] with a level 1 [cleave], the mana cost drops to 20 mana points.

"

cmphx wrote:

On a side note, i disagree that physical damage is inferior to elemental. Krip's video about that is years old, and he didnt know that most mobs dont have more than 931 armor (source somewhere here) which is nothing if youre a physical crit build for example. Many bosses have 30-60 elemental resistances, and a reduced effect of curses on them, so unless you use only one element, dual curse and penetration, you wont lower their resists to the ground. Physical however barely is mitigated, and in presence of physical to lightning or hatred, the helpful status effects are in reach for physical too.

The only source I've found that mentions monster armor is Armour which states "Supposedly the most armour monsters have in the game is about 983." I contacted GGG regarding this, and I'll quote the response: "As of 2014 when the Developer made that comment, that was indeed true. We cannot say whether or not that still holds true, only that it was true at the time the comment was made."

Since we lack any solid information regarding actual monster armour and resistances, arguing this point is invalid. Vulnerability doesn't penetrate resistances, but instead offers an alternative to penetration - increased damage. To argue that elemental damage isn't playable is illogical.

Enjoy your stay in Wraeclast!