[2.4] The Vampire - Tanky 2H Slayer Duelist (90k+DPS) [budget,acrobatics,evasion,leech] - Core Clear

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alucardtheotaku wrote:

why not vaal pact?

Vaal Pact and Endless Hunger are two different playstyles that involve deep investments into Life Leech.

Vaal Pact favours lots of frequent small hits, requires you to contantly attack the enemy (i.e. "facetank") and removes regen and "increased life leech rate" bonuses. But being not limited by life leech rate, it can (potentially - aganst boss only with high DPS and % damage leeched as life stacked) restore your HP in a blink of an eye. Vaal Pact has an advantage against reflect, but tend to have weakness against DoT damage, due to its nature.

Endless Hunger favours hard hits with moderate speed and does NOT require to constantly attack an enemy (you can make a few hits, then run for while to kite - leech will still have full effect). It also does NOT remove your life regen and you can take benefit of "increased life leech rate" (found on passives) which greatly improves your leech percentage. Endless Hunger is particulary strong against DoT damage, but tends to have weakness against reflect, due to its nature. However, your leech rate is still capped (at 38% of life per second, if built properly), and that means you cant facetank incoming damage greater than ~40% your life per second.

I find both viable.

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MortalKombat3 wrote:

However, your leech rate is still capped (at 38% of life per second, if built properly), and that means you cant facetank incoming damage greater than ~40% your life per second.

If one was to nitpick he could say you can facetank even that because life flasks are still a thing :P

But yeah, it's a different playstyle altogether, going vaal pact means you would have to spend more points, lose all your regen & it makes blood rage much harder to run. You would also have a harder time reaching the same amount of leech versus a single target without bigger DPS values.

There is also the benefit of the leech persisting between hits (and sometimes packs) with Endless Hunger, unlike vaal pact, which means you can basically ignore bleed damage almost entirely most of the time.

This build so far has no issues on reflect maps except the fact my glove enchant can 1 shot me due to it's high physical damage per hit.
For phys reflect maps you switch out conc effect with physical to lightning, elemental reflect isn't an issue anyway.

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Mannoth wrote:

There is also the benefit of the leech persisting between hits (and sometimes packs) with Endless Hunger, unlike vaal pact, which means you can basically ignore bleed damage almost entirely most of the time.

This build so far has no issues on reflect maps except the fact my glove enchant can 1 shot me due to it's high physical damage per hit.
For phys reflect maps you switch out conc effect with physical to lightning, elemental reflect isn't an issue anyway.

With MY build (crit staff earthquake slayer), life leech effects persist for 10-20 seconds. I take good use of that in lab - just 1-shot a pack, and i can run through all traps for 10 seconds without much risk - leech will heal up all damage taken.

As for reflect maps, i just choose Ice Crash+PtL for physical reflect ones. My 2.4% attack life leech and 0.8% attack mana leech are more than enough to sustain me there.

Cyclone is a good skill on its own, but to take full benefit of Endless Hunger, you should use slow hard-hitting skills like Earthquake. Only then life leech duration will be long enough to persist between packs, reducing chances you'll be hit/stunned/killed when leech isnt up to zero.

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MortalKombat3 wrote:

Only then life leech duration will be long enough to persist between packs, reducing chances you'll be hit/stunned/killed when leech isnt up to zero.

But that is kind of the point, when are you going to get stunned by playing cyclone anyway? :\

I can't remember last time I got stunned playing a life based cyclone character, especially not on this build seeing as I run over 5k life, 6 endurance charges, fortify, basalt flask, evasion and acrobatics.
The point of leech between packs is also a silly one to me, since between packs there is nothing dealing damage to you anyway, the moment you meet a pack you will start leeching from it anyway, especially with cyclone.

There is no right or wrong way to play around Endless Hunger in that regards, you play what you prefer. Slow big hits leech lasts longer but takes longer to reach the cap versus single target whereas faster hits reach the cap faster and it lasts shorter.

Heya, love the build! Do you have a tankier version? And what do you think about sunder or earthquake? Im in love with Sunder atm, haha.

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Midas_ wrote:

Heya, love the build! Do you have a tankier version? And what do you think about sunder or earthquake? Im in love with Sunder atm, haha.

Tankier tree would be moving the 4 points from cleaving into phase acro, which I plan on doing once I get more levels.
It already grabs a ton of life via tree + jewels and gets 6 endurance charges on top of 10k evasion, fortify and acro, so don't think it gets much tankier really, especially since with Kaom's Heart you should be reaching 7k life also.

Earthquake and sunder work good with the tree as it is, cruel bandit switch to Oak or the Passive Point because you don't need a lot of attack speed with those skills.

For sunder you might want to remove concentrated effect in favor of higher shockwaves overlap and put something like Added Fire instead for higher initial hit.
That being said sunder is rather weak as a single target skill so if you plan on running with it just make sure you don't go for Kaom's Heart so you can run a separate single target setup (or switch in earthquake / cyclone for bosses).

Edit:

You can swap in Enfeeble instead of Punishment on your CWDT link for more survival, if you find it lacking.

Unexpected turn of events transpired:



Needless to say I will be playing more of the character now & pushing for level 95 as soon as the servers get a bit better.

Mapping cyclone DPS is now at 60-136k range depending on the number of buffs active.

Updated main post with new stats & gear at level 92 (gear linking is bugging out so feel free to view it from my characters via account link).

I am now 1 level away from 7k life, but will probably stop leveling the character for a while since I am burnt out a bit.

Will try to post more videos of RIP t12/13 maps and a Ambrius Legion Slayer fight if possible.

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Mannoth wrote:

The point of leech between packs is also a silly one to me, since between packs there is nothing dealing damage to you anyway, the moment you meet a pack you will start leeching from it anyway, especially with cyclone.

Well, except for a labyrinth :).

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MortalKombat3 wrote:

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Mannoth wrote:

The point of leech between packs is also a silly one to me, since between packs there is nothing dealing damage to you anyway, the moment you meet a pack you will start leeching from it anyway, especially with cyclone.

Well, except for a labyrinth :).

Not really relevant since traps are avoidable and Izaro is a pushover, maybe if they introduce a uber labyrinth.