[3.16][HC][ON BREAK] Caustic Arrow Raider, DoT Focused | Tanky | 6k+ Health | All Content | In-depth

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SharkieJr wrote:

is the Prefix Non-ailment Chaos Damage over Time Multiplier better or Is Vicious projectile better? cause i was able to craft a +3 bow but i hit the Vicious projectile and i dont wanna gamble to annul it in case i mess up my +1 +2 prefix? please advice.

What you're asking is basically "Is extra support gem (~40-50% more damage) better than 40% additive multiplier (~28% real damage)?"

Yep, Vicious Projectiles is stronger, but has the downsides of the new support gem which are usually not significant. You hit a jackpot pretty much.

just to give people an idea of bow mods....
this is my bow



i was getting pretty unlucky with getting vicious proj, so i settled with lvl 18 instead of 20, but it was still easy to craft. probably only 900-1000 alts.

anyway the difference between 36% chaos dot multi and +1 socketed gems is about 4% damage difference. it would be less so if i divined it to 40% but i haven't done that yet.

anyway the difference in making a bow like this and making a +3 bow with vicious proj is at least 4 exalts.
this bow cost me basically 4 exalts to make. an exalt worth of crafting mats, 2 ex for multi mod, 1 ex for socketed support gems.

to get +1 socketed gems i would have had to craft cannot roll attack mods @ 1ex, use 1 ex to slam the mod (and possibly a bunch of suffix's which would add to the cost), craft prefixes cannot be changed @ 2ex, scour, craft multi and remaining mods.

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DankawSL wrote:

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SharkieJr wrote:

is the Prefix Non-ailment Chaos Damage over Time Multiplier better or Is Vicious projectile better? cause i was able to craft a +3 bow but i hit the Vicious projectile and i dont wanna gamble to annul it in case i mess up my +1 +2 prefix? please advice.

What you're asking is basically "Is extra support gem (~40-50% more damage) better than 40% additive multiplier (~28% real damage)?"

Yep, Vicious Projectiles is stronger, but has the downsides of the new support gem which are usually not significant. You hit a jackpot pretty much.

Thank you for your fast reply, so since i got vicious proj as a prefix do i sub the gem slot with damage on full life then? so 2r 1b 3g color bow? Empower,dmg on full, ca,void mani ,conc and swift afflic?

Hey man how did you die again?

I see your characters with that build are in standar all atm, im focusing in HC with that build now and just wanna know where is the trouble just for be more safe.

Thank you for the excellent build and guide.

I bought a 6 link bow with almost no physical damage because I had the impression it wasn't important. Now I see the build uses nodes that increase projectile damage and I get the impression that physical damage probably is important.

Is physical damage important?

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xMustard wrote:

Spoiler

just to give people an idea of bow mods....
this is my bow

i was getting pretty unlucky with getting vicious proj, so i settled with lvl 18 instead of 20, but it was still easy to craft. probably only 900-1000 alts.

anyway the difference between 36% chaos dot multi and +1 socketed gems is about 4% damage difference. it would be less so if i divined it to 40% but i haven't done that yet.

anyway the difference in making a bow like this and making a +3 bow with vicious proj is at least 4 exalts.
this bow cost me basically 4 exalts to make. an exalt worth of crafting mats, 2 ex for multi mod, 1 ex for socketed support gems.

to get +1 socketed gems i would have had to craft cannot roll attack mods @ 1ex, use 1 ex to slam the mod (and possibly a bunch of suffix's which would add to the cost), craft prefixes cannot be changed @ 2ex, scour, craft multi and remaining mods.

I cover crafting in dedicated section. The method you presented is more expensive for very small dps gain (~5% more from increases). Also requires you to have +2 support gems mod for which you need to get lucky (red map mastermind, 3x any mastermind), play with other char to obtain it or get someone else to craft for you.

Methods in my crafting section are great cheap options or the best possible ones that you can reliably craft (so no faceted fossil crafting). For example, cheap elder bow with Vicious Proj needs only 2 ex (one is a slam) while basically having the same damage (not counting 30% increased dmg from multimod). No need for annuls either.

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SharkieJr wrote:

Thank you for your fast reply, so since i got vicious proj as a prefix do i sub the gem slot with damage on full life then? so 2r 1b 3g color bow? Empower,dmg on full, ca,void mani ,conc and swift afflic?

That's correct. Optionally you could use Efficacy for pure reliable 25% more damage, but you should be at maximum health nearly all the time for DoFL purposes - especially during bosses where it matters the most.

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Fluctuoso wrote:

Hey man how did you die again?

I see your characters with that build are in standar all atm, im focusing in HC with that build now and just wanna know where is the trouble just for be more safe.

Most of my chars are in standard, they accumulated over multiple leagues and i leave very high level ones for testing purposes. I also get bored when game gets too easy and start doing rippy stuff, death is sometimes the result. I for sure know that my highest 97 (almost 98) died to DC, which sucked really badly. Two of my chars this league got killed by my ISP as well and one to bugged Elreon (confirmed by rips of other streamers). Anyway, the latest rip:

Death screen

Basically i was running through delve, easy content, i barely take damage and run through everything. Then i encountered this bottleneck (very common in fungal caverns) with 10 shriekers waiting for me. Since the corridor was super thin and only 1 arrow would fit through, i've run in there with my 150% increased MS and died instantly. Pop, i'm gone, no time to react. Have in mind, i've done that type of stuff before multiple times in the Delve league and barely received any damage every single time.

There are 3 theories:
* Static Pulseblood does damage and popped off right when i was in range (and possibly shriekers finished me off)
* Basically every shrieker launched attack and avoided my 45% dodge chance and rolled high damage.
* Extra damage also applies to elemental spells and got unlucky with the damage rolls / spell dodge. (it's commonly know to apply to physical, like extra phys as element. I've heard clashing opinions if it applies to skills with base elemental damage).

There's one thing to note, that with my speed monsters pretty much can never hit me if i'm running through them. Shriekers shouldn't be either, and if they did hit me then it should be only few of them (no line of sight until moment of death).

The build is still tanky as hell, it's just that i get too careless sometimes. I've had no issues in 340 delve last league when i was playing defensively. Basically avoid rares hitting you and that's it.

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0sync0 wrote:

Thank you for the excellent build and guide.

I bought a 6 link bow with almost no physical damage because I had the impression it wasn't important. Now I see the build uses nodes that increase projectile damage and I get the impression that physical damage probably is important.

Is physical damage important?

It's not, i never mention a single thing about physical damage. The build is based purely on base chaos damage from the skill.

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The build is based purely on base chaos damage from the skill.

I took another look at the Caustic Arrow card. It says "Modifiers to Projectile Damage apply to this Skill's Damage Over Time effect". Now I understand how increasing projectile damage affects the DoT.

Thanks.

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DankawSL wrote:

I cover crafting in dedicated section. The method you presented is more expensive for very small dps gain (~5% more from increases). Also requires you to have +2 support gems mod for which you need to get lucky (red map mastermind, 3x any mastermind), play with other char to obtain it or get someone else to craft for you.

Methods in my crafting section are great cheap options or the best possible ones that you can reliably craft (so no faceted fossil crafting). For example, cheap elder bow with Vicious Proj needs only 2 ex (one is a slam) while basically having the same damage (not counting 30% increased dmg from multimod). No need for annuls either.

i was posting because there was a specific question regarding chaos dot multi vs an extra gem level, type of thing.

giving background to what my bow is and how i crafted it was just context to answering the idea of which was better and by how much, and the price difference between the two.

i by no means said this was the best way to craft the bow or w/e, but anyway...

So i finally rolled lvl 20 vicious projectiles, but after regal it gave me another prefix. i annuled it and now i have this.

is this a brick cause i don't have another sufix or i just can continue with cannot roll attack mods and slam it with 1 ex in hopes that it will roll +1?
And if i'll get suffix will it give me +1 on the second ex?

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xMustard wrote:

Spoiler

i was posting because there was a specific question regarding chaos dot multi vs an extra gem level, type of thing.

giving background to what my bow is and how i crafted it was just context to answering the idea of which was better and by how much, and the price difference between the two.

i by no means said this was the best way to craft the bow or w/e, but anyway...

Well, your post without the quote/context just looked completely out of place. It's OK, i'm not mad or anything.

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TWERQEN wrote:

Spoiler

So i finally rolled lvl 20 vicious projectiles, but after regal it gave me another prefix. i annuled it and now i have this.

is this a brick cause i don't have another sufix or i just can continue with cannot roll attack mods and slam it with 1 ex in hopes that it will roll +1?
And if i'll get suffix will it give me +1 on the second ex?

As long as prefixes are free, it's not a brick. You'll simply have to spend additional money crafting it. Considering that you hit good suffix (T2 AoE), i would personally finish crafting it. You have two options:

Option 1 (cheap, 3-4ex cost):
* Cannot roll attack mods
* Exalt slam
* If you didn't hit prefix, ex slam again.
* Remove crafted mods and craft +2 support gems or 33-40% chaos DoT multiplier.

Option 2 (expensive, 1 free suffix, 7ex):
* Craft multimod
* Cannot roll attack mods
* Exalt slam
* Remove crafting mods
* Recraft multimod and craft +2 support gems
* Craft suffix of your choice

Obviously, exalt slams can be done through Leo's T3 bench in research to lower the cost.