Barrage Wonder Wanderer – how to DEMOLISH maps (1.3.X)

I have also been thinking about the tree, in particular the aura nodes.

The initial tree provides +32% effect and -20% reservation. The reservation is absolutely necessary to run 2 60% auras with one of the new heralds(also amazing). The EK version needs Grace and Hatred and Herald of Ash/Ice, but the Elemental version uses Haste instead of Hatred. Haste is... shit. 21% Attack speed and 12% movespeed at lvl20. If you remove the points spent getting the aura nodes (at least 12, depending on your tree) you can easily get nearly the same, or better, AS from the tree as well as getting evasion nodes to compensate for the reduced effect of Grace (in my tree over compensate).

It is also worth noting that the Heralds do not benefit from aura effect nodes. Also without the extra aura you can run the low level clarity on mana instead, freeing up a 3 slot space in your build for whatever you want (extra CWDT?).

My Tree Suggestion

Its 3 points less than OP, I have left the choice of how to compensate the AS how you want (18% from Beserking cluster, 12% + 8% Movespeed from Quickstep, or 9% and 36% accuracy from Acuity cluster).

My tree gets more life, evasion (even with the reduced Grace), intelligence (although I'm cheating here by getting 2 notables) as well as + 14% all resist (yay cheaper gear) and +1 max cold resist. The max cold resist is very useful against reflect as I think Ice spear and Arctic breath are now the best 2 spell combo. For fireball users it may be better to go into Revenge of the Hunted for similar evasion but with life instead of resists.

Interesting to note here, with the extra max resist, and 2% extra cold leech from Doryani's Invitation and Catarina's crafting, and a level 20 LL gem, your life leech with vaal pact is exactly the reflect damage you take from a reflect map. Probably not worth the investment but interesting nonetheless.

Its even better actually as Ondars Guile means 30% of those reflected spells get dodged, which means (on average) just the level 16 LL puts you ahead on an 18% reflect map. Thats without purity or pots. Dps in the hundreds of thousands and reflect maps are not an issue. Thats fucking hilarious.

Finally, my tree has 2 AS clusters and 2 life clusters on its path not taken that can be used at lvl 85+ to round out the character.

If you have good int on your gear you can get an even better tree. Although above level 90 the first tree is going to be better probably.

Another option is to run haste and not Herald of Ice, however this way Clarity needs to go back onto health. I don't have a high level char to test this out on, but I suspect the damage will be comparable.

Anyway, just my $0.02. I have made my trees quite defensive (for this build anyway XD), you could easily forgo the extra evasion parts for more AS, either way its still better dps and survivability than with the aura nodes and Haste. Also I'd still love some discussion on Ice spear (see my thoughts on it a few posts above).

TL:DR Stop running haste and the aura nodes for the elemental build

Hm, I'm level 73 in beyond league and having troubles even doing 66 maps...

Got about 80% critchance with all power charges up (Barrage->CoC->PCoC->LifeLeech->EK-Chain or Faster Projectiles).

Even though it's at 80, it's too unreliable, sometimes I get 5 barrages in a row without crit, that makes me lose too much hp.

Dual wielding wands with about 9% critchance, only got one 20% critnode left in tree which will get me to like 82 I guess. Wearing maligaros, rats nest (cant wear crit ring, too expensive with resistance and life).

Any ideas on how to proceed? Farming a 62 docks zone is getting kind of boring when I'm so high level.

e: I even went twin terror which isn't in your tree, but gives me TONS of more crit.. still only 80%.

Hi, "twin terrors" worth it with the new skill stree ? a cluster with 2 +25% critical chance nodes and twin terror with +75% critical chance when dual wielding.

"

Xenyum2468 wrote:

Hi, "twin terrors" worth it with the new skill stree ? a cluster with 2 +25% critical chance nodes and twin terror with +75% critical chance when dual wielding.

There's honestly not much of a reason to dual wield imo cuz with crit rings/ammy and rats/mali gloves you'll have like >90% crit so you honestly dont need the benefits from twin terrors cuz it doesn't really benefit you too much

"

AgentKay wrote:

I have also been thinking about the tree, in particular the aura nodes.

The initial tree provides +32% effect and -20% reservation. The reservation is absolutely necessary to run 2 60% auras with one of the new heralds(also amazing). The EK version needs Grace and Hatred and Herald of Ash/Ice, but the Elemental version uses Haste instead of Hatred. Haste is... shit. 21% Attack speed and 12% movespeed at lvl20. If you remove the points spent getting the aura nodes (at least 12, depending on your tree) you can easily get nearly the same, or better, AS from the tree as well as getting evasion nodes to compensate for the reduced effect of Grace (in my tree over compensate).

It is also worth noting that the Heralds do not benefit from aura effect nodes. Also without the extra aura you can run the low level clarity on mana instead, freeing up a 3 slot space in your build for whatever you want (extra CWDT?).

My Tree Suggestion

Its 3 points less than OP, I have left the choice of how to compensate the AS how you want (18% from Beserking cluster, 12% + 8% Movespeed from Quickstep, or 9% and 36% accuracy from Acuity cluster).

My tree gets more life, evasion (even with the reduced Grace), intelligence (although I'm cheating here by getting 2 notables) as well as + 14% all resist (yay cheaper gear) and +1 max cold resist. The max cold resist is very useful against reflect as I think Ice spear and Arctic breath are now the best 2 spell combo. For fireball users it may be better to go into Revenge of the Hunted for similar evasion but with life instead of resists.

Interesting to note here, with the extra max resist, and 2% extra cold leech from Doryani's Invitation and Catarina's crafting, and a level 20 LL gem, your life leech with vaal pact is exactly the reflect damage you take from a reflect map. Probably not worth the investment but interesting nonetheless.

Its even better actually as Ondars Guile means 30% of those reflected spells get dodged, which means (on average) just the level 16 LL puts you ahead on an 18% reflect map. Thats without purity or pots. Dps in the hundreds of thousands and reflect maps are not an issue. Thats fucking hilarious.

Finally, my tree has 2 AS clusters and 2 life clusters on its path not taken that can be used at lvl 85+ to round out the character.

If you have good int on your gear you can get an even better tree. Although above level 90 the first tree is going to be better probably.

Another option is to run haste and not Herald of Ice, however this way Clarity needs to go back onto health. I don't have a high level char to test this out on, but I suspect the damage will be comparable.

Anyway, just my $0.02. I have made my trees quite defensive (for this build anyway XD), you could easily forgo the extra evasion parts for more AS, either way its still better dps and survivability than with the aura nodes and Haste. Also I'd still love some discussion on Ice spear (see my thoughts on it a few posts above).

TL:DR Stop running haste and the aura nodes for the elemental build

I'd love to hear OPs response to this, seems pretty cool

"

Hm, I'm level 73 in beyond league and having troubles even doing 66 maps...

Got about 80% critchance with all power charges up (Barrage->CoC->PCoC->LifeLeech->EK-Chain or Faster Projectiles).

Even though it's at 80, it's too unreliable, sometimes I get 5 barrages in a row without crit, that makes me lose too much hp.

Dual wielding wands with about 9% critchance, only got one 20% critnode left in tree which will get me to like 82 I guess. Wearing maligaros, rats nest (cant wear crit ring, too expensive with resistance and life).

Any ideas on how to proceed? Farming a 62 docks zone is getting kind of boring when I'm so high level.

e: I even went twin terror which isn't in your tree, but gives me TONS of more crit.. still only 80%.

Hello .. From my experience, Maligaros is only viable if you can get amazing other items. Same goes for Tween-terror. I swapped it around quite a bit, but in the end decided to go for a shield and a bit lower critchance. Playing in higher beyond maps defenses should be your primary concern, but you still need atleast 80% crit tbh. I'm not using Maligaros and my choice was 94% crit with Tween, or 83% crit with shield. I opted for more defenses. If I can get my hands on some gg jewellery, I'll consider Maligaros. But currently I'm really having no trouble clearing 72 maps. Also - don't even think about swapping chain in general situations. It's one of the key points of this build :)

"

ImoK wrote:

Hm, I'm level 73 in beyond league and having troubles even doing 66 maps...

Got about 80% critchance with all power charges up (Barrage->CoC->PCoC->LifeLeech->EK-Chain or Faster Projectiles).

Even though it's at 80, it's too unreliable, sometimes I get 5 barrages in a row without crit, that makes me lose too much hp.

Dual wielding wands with about 9% critchance, only got one 20% critnode left in tree which will get me to like 82 I guess. Wearing maligaros, rats nest (cant wear crit ring, too expensive with resistance and life).

Any ideas on how to proceed? Farming a 62 docks zone is getting kind of boring when I'm so high level.

e: I even went twin terror which isn't in your tree, but gives me TONS of more crit.. still only 80%.

Firstly a slight correction, you are seeing 5 barrages in a row without a CoC, not without a crit. You have a 0.032% chance of 5 non crits in a row at 80%.

With 80% crits and a lvl 16 CoC (60%), ignoring accuracy (I shouldn't be but meh, it makes the calcs easier) you will see a CoC 52% of the time. 5 in a row non CoC's is 3.8% chance.

You could show us your gear and tree, but I'll tell you right now its your wand(s) that are letting you down. 9% is pretty crap for this build. My first wand had 9.7% and I was able to get to 85% crits, and I don't dual wield (therefore no twin terror node). Really you should be aiming for over 10.5% crits. But make sure this is on a 1.5 APS base wand, its impossible to get the same CoC/s with other wands once you gear up and start hitting 90%+ crit chance.

With 300-330 crit chance from tree (no need for Twin Terrors) ~180 from gear (easily obtainable with average rolls on 3 jewelry, or good rolls on just 2) and 250% from the PC's an 11% wand will hit 95% crits.

None of this gear is too expensive, especially if you stop dual wielding and grab a shield. You can get 100+ resists and life on a shield for less than 3 chaos, which frees up your jewelry to be more flexible.

"

AgentKay wrote:

I have also been thinking about the tree, in particular the aura nodes.

Sweet RNGesus, that's some insightfull post!

"

AgentKay wrote:

Haste is... shit. 21% Attack speed and 12% movespeed at lvl20.

IMO both of those are quite nice to have, boosts clearspeed quite nice. But then again, your tree looks really interesting, and all that with less points!

Have you tested any of these changes? What level are you with your EleCoC? I'm currently 65, respeccing into CoC, and I'll propably go same way as you, since I don't have leveled Haste yet. I plan to respec later to Haste version, if clearspeed is too slow.

"

Leszczu wrote:

Have you tested any of these changes? What level are you with your EleCoC? I'm currently 65, respeccing into CoC, and I'll probably go same way as you, since I don't have leveled Haste yet. I plan to respec later to Haste version, if clearspeed is too slow.

In order to run Haste without the nodes clarity has to go on life and Herald of ice cannot be run. It is possible to get over 21% AS and 12% MS (and the extra evasion from the buffed grace) on the tree for less points than you spend on the aura nodes. I just use those point to go for more defense and life. There is no reason to use haste IMO. You can have Over 30% AS 13% Move speed, and evasion accuracy and life for those 12 points.

Haven't played since saturday, but I got to lvl 60 on rampage and just turned on the build. ATM I'm only running clarity and grace, will turn Herald of Ice on in a few levels once reduced mana gets high enough, the damage it adds when I put it on atm is ~15-20%. I am leveling a haste as well to test, but I doubt that without the aura nodes it will be better. Here are a few of my findings so far:

Firstly, Herald of Ice adds damage to the barrage projectiles. Enough damage to be noticeable, and most importantly enough damage to leech a reasonable amount of life for those times when RNGesus decides ye shall not crit. It saved me once already, and I've only tried it out twice as I have to turn off grace to use it.

I am currently using Ice spear instead of Fireball, which I am still leveling to test when they get higher level. Impossible to notice the damage difference, but tooltip says IS is 10% lower per hit. However the pierce and crit stages increase its effective damage to way higher, plus as another ice spell more freezes, plus as a higher crit chance (and the super crit stage) freezes are further increased, plus the increased projectile speed (less lag in life leech) all make it much better. May be confirmation bias though, thus it will require some quantitative testing at higher levels when I can have a consistent punching bag to test on (hello Dom, hows it going?).

My tree will be complete in 5 levels, I just need Vaal pact and the 3 crit nodes below it. From then on its just life, evasion, AS and the resist nodes. I am currently using second build I posted as it spends less points traveling. But it has less Int and less opportunities for AS and Life, which is only important once I get to lvl 80+, so I imagine I'll spend the respec points around then to change it to the first build.

An update to the tree, the extra point getting the 18% PC duration is, for me at least, by far the best QOL choice in the build. I also run a Doedre's Elixir to keep the PCs up when I can't reach the next pack in time, or to give me the extra time to ID/roll a strong box. Hell I use it when I start the map just to kick start the PC building process XD. Between those 2 I can have 24 seconds between seeing mobs. Note though, that node and the flask are completely unnecessary if you have PCoC in your main attack.

I use Barrage > PCoC > Curse on hit > Ass Mark as by utility/PC building set up. It works WONDERS! The Assassin's Mark instantly gives a huge increase in crit chance, which is most useful when you don't have PCs, which is the reason you are using this setup anyway (so much synergy it hurts). It's also is great against rares/uniques as it pushes my crit chance over 90% and the multiplier is a huge damage buff. Thanks to Ass Mark I would say about 75%+ of these barrages produce a PC, thats if you only hit one mob with the burst, more if you hit more.

I'm also trying out Projectile weakness on my CWDT set up (with EC and IC), and its the best thing since sliced bread. Its the knock back thats the bees knees. Because of Ondars guile its melee attackers who hurt most, and with this you end up knocking them back the second they do much damage (so much synergy I'm having trouble breathing). The chance may be low, but one barrage (8 projectiles) even without the extras from the CoC's has an 88% chance to knock back. With the projectiles from CoC, if they somehow survive, they will be pushed at least halfway to the edge of your screen. Temporal chains is another good defensive option that I have yet to test on this char, but from previous experience I know its a solid option.

With Clarity on mana I have a spare 3 slot, so I put in the always faithful skelly brotem (Spell totem > Summon Skeletons > Faster Casting). Haven't put it to much use as I'm currently killing everything too fast, but I know from previous experience it will be very nice to have.

I'm level 69. Did my respec at level 67 (since I had leveled gems from previous char that required 67). Here's my current tree & items:





Still lots of room for improvement. Until I get Rat's Nest and I level my gems I'm using Increased Crit Chance gem instead of Life Leech. Witch Surgeon's Flasks, it's quite easy to do 66-68 maps, even with reflect mobs. I'm still waiting for a full effect when my gems get better.

I'm also wondering, which gems benefit the most from quality. This is what I've come up with:
- Cast on Crit, obviously
- Barrage (10% projectile damage)
- Power Charge on Crit (20% charge chance)
Any other? I'm wondering if GMP's cast speed is beneficial to dps?