[2.2] Blade Vortex FLASK MASTER. 88% All Res, 75/75 Block, 500-800k DPS, INSTANT LEECH

upon some more debate with Ceryneian its pretty clear that critical chance is vital for this build.

Platinum/Gold Kris are mandatory, with as high crit rate to spells as you can get.

the next thing, in order to keep a high crit rate is i will most likely have a 6th link as PCoC. this will ensure all of your 5-6 power charges will be active at all times, raising your crit rate significantly, and spell damage slightly via passive.

and finally the last change will be to most likely drop atziri's promise flask and use a diamond flask. since Master Surgeon applies surgeon's mod to every flask, this includes diamond. the increase boost of your critical rate from a diamond alone should negate the lack of critical from gear, if thats an issue, so that your critical rate out performs your flask duration.


Ceryneian and i separately did some tests as well as math and figured out with Master Surgeon, in order to refill your flasks without The Retch, you'll need something like this...

50% crit rate with BV should be easily obtainable with one dagger, passive tree, power charges and assassin's mark curse (no crit rate on shield or gloves to obtain this).
with each crit, if you have poacher's mark, the magnate and druidic rite, you'll gain 2.7 charges when surgeon's activates, which is 20% of the time. unique flasks require 30 charges. this requires 11 surgeon's crits. flask duration is 5.5 seconds.
11 surgeon crits requires average of 55 critical hits. at 50% crit rate, since each blade hits twice, this requires you have 55 blades active per second...to refill it in one second. so in order to refill your flask in 5.5 seconds you would need to only maintain an average of 10 blades a second.

without poacher's mark you would gain 1.7 charges per crit, meaning you'd need 18 surgeon's crits, making that 90 crits in total. so over 5.5 seconds you'd only need to maintain on average 16-17 blades. this should be MORE than doable in 1v1 combat where this would only be an issue.
this is also not factoring in diamond flask.

so i think an easy goal would be to have 50% crit rate on blade vortex, with power charges and assassin's mark. you should absolutely be fine generating enough charges to refill your flasks before another use in one on one battles where you cannot gain flask charges from deaths.

this is essentially game breaking. and i regret posting this thread already, as i now expect this to get slightly altered before release so that things like this cannot happen.
this would allow me to even use a defensive curse such as warlord's mark, for endurance charges as well as a possible perma-stun from all the blade vortex critical hits. or enfeeble to basically ensure you'll never get one shot, ever.
or you could run another offensive curse like vulnerability to get crazy poison damage procs due to always poisoning enemies while your flasks are up.
all because even WITHOUT poacher's mark, you should without a doubt be able to keep all flasks up 100% of the time due to Master Surgeon.

DPS tested with proposed new gear (no dps dagger or shield, PCoC 6th link, no pain attunement, double ming's, auras charges totem and flasks).

without atziri flask (most likely replace it with diamond)
507k dps @50 blades, no righteous fire.
797k dps @50 blades, with righteous fire.


also have 63% chaos resistance. could easily cap it if you used vertex helm. again resistances are no issue because you'll constantly have flasks up so you really only need to cap them at around 40% each.

will most likely end up with approximately 5,800-6,300 ES depending if i use ES gloves or not, like voidbringer.

I highly recommend taking the "arcane chemistry" mana node next to the Scion duration cluster. You're already pathing past it, and 15% reduced charges consumed is amazing. This is even more true if you're using a blue flask with the Ample prefix.

Good stuff. Nah I don't think it will get nerfed - BF maybe, but BV is trickier to play and higher risk being always in melee range.

It really can be a tricky build to play because you need to micromanage so many different things unlike BF. i.e. manage your positioning for the blades (esp with conc. effect if you get out of position you won't leech), then manage the blade casting and keep an eye on how many blades, on top of that now you have to manage flasks 1 through 5.

You can't just spam the flasks lol because I've done that before when panicking in dangerous situations and it's a good way to get yourself killed when they run out hehe.

If you get 31% reduced flask charges used (15% from arcane chemistry and 16% from belt), you will be able to use your utility flasks that consume 30/60 charges three times as opposed to two.

First off I dont believe bv needs crit its very powerful without it, but it would be super easy to convert to crit if you wanted. Second high cast speed is very easy to get and makes it possible with little to no effort to maintain 50 blades since cast speed equals more dps then magic damage you should invest highly in it in both the tree and gear that adds allot of casting speed. I can do 50 blades in 2.5 seconds and Im no where near the cast speed I could get with the right gear and a few changes to my tree. The only thing I dont like about bv is I never like I can just relax and run though a map due to the fact you cant just walk in and wham anything youll need blades up first and if you have no defense or not enough you could die fast on high end maps, I suggest having a back up for these times.

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Ceryneian wrote:

Good stuff. Nah I don't think it will get nerfed - BF maybe, but BV is trickier to play and higher risk being always in melee range.

It really can be a tricky build to play because you need to micromanage so many different things unlike BF. i.e. manage your positioning for the blades, then manage the blade casting and keep an eye on how many blades, on top of that now you have to manage flasks 1 through 5.

You can't just spam the flasks lol because I've done that before when panicking in dangerous situations and it's a good way to get yourself killed when they run out hehe.

it is a bit of micromanaging, but im getting used to it pretty well. bouncing between vaal skills, flasks and keeping BV up, right now the only danger that still poses me is WHEN i spin blades up. if you do it in the middle of packs you can die pretty quick. of course right now im not using this extremely tanky version either.

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Ofnir_ wrote:

If you get 31% reduced flask charges used (15% from arcane chemistry and 16% from belt), you will be able to use your utility flasks that consume 30/60 charges three times as opposed to two.

arcane chemistry is okay, but you only save 4.5 charges per usage. you will gain that back in no time. i'd rather spend the 2 passives for a jewel but by all means get it if you feel its worth it.
druidic rite is necessity because of the duration. you gain 0.84 seconds just from that, not to mention the added flask charges. well worth it.

it would need to be tested which would be more beneficial, the magnate or a rare belt with reduced flask charges plus arcane chemistry. DPS wise it'll be the magnate that is absolutely for sure. but feel free to do whichever you think.

with 3 usages per flask you get a total of 16.5s use out of your flasks as opposed to 11s, but you also charge them up slower. its really difficult to guess which would be superior and i feel only real world testing could determine, as well as personal preference.

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sethbine wrote:

First off I dont believe bv needs crit its very powerful without it, but it would be super easy to convert to crit if you wanted. Second high cast speed is very easy to get and makes it possible with little to no effort to maintain 50 blades since cast speed equals more dps then magic damage you should invest highly in it in both the tree and gear that adds allot of casting speed. I can do 50 blades in 2.5 seconds and Im no where near the cast speed I could get with the right gear and a few changes to my tree. The only thing I dont like about bv is I never like I can just relax and run though a map due to the fact you cant just walk in and wham anything youll need blades up first and if you have no defense or not enough you could die fast on high end maps, I suggest having a back up for these times.

BV does need to be crit. you cannot get 500k DPS without BV being crit. not only that but you shatter everything when its crit. this negates those stupid pokey freaks that shoot spikes out on death, negates necromancers, and a few other effects INCLUDING volatile mobs. they will not blow up if you shatter them.
this also charges up vaal gems SUPER FAST when you socket "chill of corruption". allowing you to maintain two vaal gems at 100% uptime if you can micromanage it.

most importantly critical is used to charge up your flasks, come Ascendancy patch and Ranger Pathfinder class ALL of your flasks will gain surgeon's mod. 20% chance to gain a flask charge on critical hit. because you have so many blades active, and each blade hits twice per second, BV has an unmatched critical hit rate which will be used and abused to keep unique flasks up 100% of the time.

also cast speed does not add damage per second. cast speed only minimally dictates how many blades you can have up at once. each blade has its own damage, which is doubled because it hits twice a second, then you times it by how many blades you can sustain.
cast speed and duration are great, up until you can sustain 50 blades. at that point cast speed is pointless. you will not need 50 blades against anything but bosses, so as long as you can get 50 vs bosses you don't need more cast speed.

i used to have a BV build that used 2x Apep's Rage and lots of frenzy charges. i had so much cast speed i didn't know what to do with it. its almost useless. get enough duration until you can sustain 50 blades even for a second or two and you're golden.

Saw the new Manifesto on the flask changes. I don't think it changes much with this build. Max res will be a bit lower. HOWEVER, I do think they will change the tree and nerf/remove the Alchemist nodes by the Witch.

Looking at the new utility base flasks I don't think any would be attractive for this build even in unique form. Although I'm happy Stibnite flask and Quartz flask changes will help bring back ev melee.

ya the new flasks sound great, but i don't think they're necessary or really attractive for this build. some of the new mods might be nice on new unique flasks though, like inc duration/effect.

its hard to say if alchemist will get changed. i don't think it will get removed but it will be probably get scaled down (at least the flask effect potion). probably i think dropped to 5/5/10 for a 20% boost and 12% duration for 3 passives. i don't think it'll get cut entirely.

max resistance goes down a bit, instead of 88% it will become i think 83%. honestly doesn't really matter at all with instant leech anyway.


i've also changed my tree and stuff slightly. im level 70 on my ranger that im raising up just for this build, so i can now use all of my gear. still have a shield im waiting for ppl to be online in order to buy.



other changes include not using vaal clarity or grace. vaal grace is really not necessary. it gives you some dodge and spell dodge, but im going to use vaal discipline instead. at max level it should give me like 2500 additional ES which is MUCH better defensive layer to avoid one-shot from either physical or spell damage.
it doesn't last as long as vaal grace but grace just gives some avoidance, while discipline gives me the necessary resources to take a hit that might get through.
i also run vaal haste 100% of the time to better clear speed. it isn't as fast as other builds because you need to get within melee distance of every monster, but its pretty good still. should better when poison effect is added against everything.

also for helm and shield im using an evasion/ES combo. they are cheap, easy to get high values for, and i'll have a base of about 40% evasion on top of everything else. absolutely sick.

if you REALLY wanted to, you could easily become the tankiest character in the game with this setup (with still decent DPS im sure). tho the REAL tanky version would probably be better off as bladefall to skip out on duration, skip out on inc duration support gem and keep some range.

right now i have overcapped block and spell block (with just a 24% block chance shield). if i picked up acrobatics and phase acrobatics i could have 57% block, 58% spell block, 73% dodge and 63% spell dodge with 100% vaal grace uptime. and 40% base evasion.
this is INSANE mitigation. this actually equates to 93.034% physical damage AVOIDANCE (not take a single lick of damage), and 84.46% spell damage avoidance.

i don't know of any build that has these kinds of numbers, to be honest. you could even get higher spell avoidance by using rathpith globe rather than a rare shield, and using atziri boots rather than rainbowstride. you would just end up with approximately 1,300 less ES or so.
could end up with 57/72 block, and 73/75 dodge. thats still 93.034% physical avoidance but now 93% spell avoidance.
you wouldn't even need higher resistances, though you would still have those too!! not to mention 39% conversion of physical damage to cold, fortify, and 44% physical reduction just from Rumi's armour alone.
spell you'd have right now 88% resistances, after patch probably 82-83%.

could even make yourself tankier by replacing assassin's mark curse (just use PCoC as 6th link) with warlord's mark or enfeeble. warlord's would give you some steady leech, endurance charges (another 12% physical reduction and resistances) and possible stun locks. enfeeble would give you more physical avoidance via lowered accuracy, and lowered monster damage.


holy fricking hot shit, i may just spec my ranger to be this. you would STILL end up with about as much damage as my ranger has now without ANY of the physical damage nodes...which i still have 350k DPS with all flasks and charges up!!!


the change to my current tree and this tanky tree is that there is NO NEED to take stun avoidance. you just don't get hit!! stun is an on hit effect. if you avoid all hits from block and evasion and dodge, you can't get stunned. this includes from spells with spell block and dodge!

what do you think Ceryneian? should i spec out acrobatics, sac some DPS, and just go CRAZY tank variation?



could use bladefall instead of blade vortex.
only thing is doing this as ES will cut your ES down a lot because of acrobatics, but i think the avoidance and vaal discipline could make up for it.
so with my rare shield and rainbowstride i'd have about 2,550 ES total. i could grab up some more nodes and use a rare ES chest over shavs (just use coruscating elixir) and could probably get a total of about 4,000 ES even AFTER acrobatics. with vaal discipline that should be a total of about 5,400.

so essentially it turns into a game of what is better. double your ES? or +40% dodge and +30% spell dodge. eh. probably doubling your ES. dammit.

I think the new flask mods are only to roll on the magic flasks. The unique flask mods will probably stay locked I'm sure =(.


Alchemist:
Dammit the more I think about it, the more I believe the Alchemist nodes are getting removed. It would make sense to make these nodes "available" to everyone to roll on their regular flasks as a mod instead of restricted passive points.

This would also explain to me why the Pathfinder does not have any increased flask effect nodes.

It will also seem contrary to the game's theme to have a specialized Ranger flask ascension, and have most of the flask nodes by Ranger (3 clusters), yet still have a powerful flask cluster available by the Witch.

I love the Alchemist nodes and I love how efficient they are - enabling builds to get max block and max spell block using Rumi + 3 nodes + a shield is awesome. But given GGG's history with block I don't think they like how easy this is. So I really think Alchemist is going to get removed.

I'm rambling now, but if I'm right this would mean compounded damage increase through loss of block, and then loss of resistances. It will be a pseudo-nerf to the unqiue flasks as well - they will have max res of +6% instead of +13%, whereas regular sapphire/ruby/topaz can roll the inc. flask effect to get much higher max res than a unique flask.

But hey, maybe I'll be proved wrong - maybe Alchemist stays.

Overall, it's not a big deal for this build unless you were using it to farm Uber lol - and even then I'm sure you can counteract the damage icnreases by getting more dodge (see below) and going the CElixir version to get much higher ES.


Acro:
I really like your idea to combine the Acro with your build. Yup that would be the first ES build to do it, and yes there are no builds anymore that build dual block + Acro anymore (at least not at those numbers).

But I feel this is just too much damage avoidance hehe. I think for the tradeoff it is better to get double ES than the extra dodge.

Especially now that you can get extra dodge from a quartz flask - I'm guessing here but let's say 15% dodge and 15% spell dodge from using quartz.

Now with the changes outlined in the manifesto - Pathfinder is even stronger because you can roll increased % flask effect on your quartz flask (for more dodge) and another mod, and then replace the surgeon mod you would usually get with Master Surgeon. I believe % increased flask effect and increased duration flask will be prefixes like surgeon's.

My point is you could get 100% uptime of a dodge flask (with reduced aggro from phasing - perfect for BV) and combined with Vaal Grace will give you VERY good dodge and spell dodge united with your max block (if Alchemist is not removed/nerfed) and your 7K+ ES - which is a fantastic defensive profile and I think much stronger than getting more dodge but having 4k ES.

We'll have to wait and see. Ascendancy comes in about 4 weeks, but man this build has been awesome to play