[FAQ] Speaker for the Dead | 74-minion Mass Summoner 💀
|
I ran out of room in my build thread, so I moved the FAQ here to its own thread.
Build guide: {3.8} Speaker for the Dead | 74 minion Summoner League Starter, Leveling Guide | 4.7M Shaper DPS TABLE OF CONTENTS 1. About the Guide / Author 2. Build Viability 3. Troubleshooting 4. Recommendations 5. Game Knowledge 6. Alternative Skills 7. Alternative Items 8. Reply Indexes Last edited by Hercanic on Oct 20, 2019, 8:32:08 AM Last bumped on Nov 11, 2019, 2:55:26 PM
| |
|
ABOUT THE GUIDE / AUTHOR
If I have questions, what's the best way to reach you?
For questions or anything else, please post in this thread (questions about anything in the FAQ can be asked here, too). This will allow anyone with similar questions to see my answer to you. Other players may even be able to answer quicker than me. It'll also help keep the build thread bumped to the top of the forum so more people are likely to discover the build.
Please do not message me ingame. A quick hello or thanks is appreciated, but asking build-related questions is not appropriate. I have even less time to game than I do to write forum posts, so by stopping to respond to ingame questions I am sacrificing premium time for something that really should be asked here in this thread. I would love to help, but I have to draw a line somewhere. In short, I will ignore any ingame requests. Please do not Private Message me. Don't worry, I read every post here. However, it takes a great deal of time to write thorough responses, with links, research, calculations, and citations, to give you the best and most accurate knowledge. If this is done over PM, only one person is benefiting from my time. I cannot easily quote or link to any of it for other uses. If you can explain why you must ask privately, I may be willing to make an exception, but otherwise I will no longer be answering build-related questions over PM.
Can I add you to my Friends list?
I decline all unknown Friend requests. I am certainly up for leveling and mapping with a group, and playing the game socially. But I want to know who I'm talking to. So send me a PM first that quickly introduces yourself and let's me know why you've sent the Friend request.
Please do not use this as a way to ask for build advice. All build questions should be posted in the build thread. Read the "If I have questions, what's the best way to reach you?" section above and "Can you look over my gear?" below for more on why I take this stance. I hope you can respect these boundaries.
Why so much useless fluff?
Call it a test of temperament, a few candles to set the mood.
Summoners aren't the best at clearing. For that, you want a build like Poet's Pen, Inpulsa's, Tornado Shot, Kinetic Blast, or anything that can instantly cover several screens and cause chain explosions. Summoners aren't the best at bossing. For that, you want a build like Molten Strike, Blade Flurry, Indigon, Glacial Cascade mines, Volatile Dead, or anything that has multiple ways of scaling to absurd levels and can be pre-stacked to burst down a boss. Summoners aren't the best at delving. For that, you want a build whose source of damage can't die, avoids or mitigates most damage, and uses monster scaling against the monsters like on-kill %life explosions. If you want to be efficient with your time, in other words, there are better builds out there for each major challenge. So why play summoner? Well, they are pretty solid for new players, so they're great to start out with. That's why I invested time into creating the New Player Guides section. Ultimately, I don't think new players will mind some fluff to ease them into the complexity of PoE. They likely wouldn't know what to even do with a shotgun blast of info, so they probably wouldn't seek it out either. Rather, it's more important that they feel excited and intrigued, motivating them to want to learn more. For veterans, they might be curious for a new experience, or they already enjoy commander-type playstyles. Or, like me, they simply love the theme of summoners and necromancers. The latter is who I wrote this guide for. I didn't want to make just another infodump of a guide. I wanted to engage players with a wisp of story, mystery, and reward each click of the spoiler button with beautiful art that captures the fantasy of the Necromancer. Is it a bit inefficient to scroll past a "useless" image? Sure. It's a second of your life you won't be getting back. A tiny moment that I stole... No, no, that's not right. This was a proper agreement. You read the fine print, did you not? For my knowledge, you pay a modicum of your soul. If you didn't think it a fair exchange, why click "I Accept"? Tsk, tsk, youths these days... Summoners are inefficient masters of none. Losing Zombies is annoying. Nurturing your Spectres' level is tedious. Doorways are frustrating. If you didn't like wasting time scrolling past a few pictures, I honestly don't think summoners will be fun for you. Put bluntly, I am weeding out those who wouldn't have the patience for a summoner to begin with. I know my approach won't appeal to everyone, and I don't intend to. I am open to suggestions, of course, and willing to work in compromises, but I will not compromise my overall vision. Thank you, though, for the morsel of soul. It was tasty.
Build origin?
I have been playing lesser versions of this build for many leagues now, but Delve is the league where everything came together. I've used Phantasms with Spectres since Phantasms first released in Bestiary league (March 2018). They were completely overlooked by most of the community until Soulwrest released (Delve, Aug 2018) because people were hung up about the "On Kill" requirement. But the only time that's an issue is against bosses. If I devoted my Spectres to clear, who also synergize with kills by gaining infinite cast speed from the Unending Hunger jewel, and used something like Skeletons for single target, like Bow users use Barrage, made viable by Shaper/Elder items, then Phantasms should work just fine.
During Incursion league (June 2018), though, I felt a lack of damage when racing against the clock and contending with corners (I hated not always getting 100% clears in T15+). To compensate, I started incorporating Projectile Weakness on Blasphemy (my poor MoM eHP). This worked fine with max block and Shield Charging into monsters' faces, but I wished I could push it further somehow. Then in Delve, with the introduction of Mark of Submission freeing up Blasphemy, I had reason to abandon Mind Over Matter for Herald of Agony and Hatred. These two gave the damage boost I needed, while the necessity of poisoning monsters for the Crawler created an opportunity to push Skeleton DPS further than ever before and self-generate Victario's Frenzy Charges. The new Holy Relic regen buff made Zombies seem more feasible. Finally, Delve justified taking damage as far as possible while also emphasizing the value of freezes. I was happy to have a reason to switch to Frost Sentinels, who are just such cool sniping Spectres. Their range is as long as a Solar Guard's Special Beam Cannon, and their extra projectiles combined with casting from further back gives them massive screen coverage. They don't deal splash damage or have AOE overlap potential, but that's okay because I have other minions for pure damage. In the end, I have 6L Skeletons on four sockets, ~5L Agony Crawler with ~5L Zombies on three sockets, 5L Spectres with 5L Phantasms on six sockets, and an 8L Charged Dash on four sockets and a ring. Hatred, Victario's Frenzy Charges, Elemental Equilibrium, and Projectile Weakness are like adding four more links to everything. With damage numbers for monsters and minions suddenly appearing on PoeDB, I felt compelled to start working out my actual DPS. The result surprised me enough to finally share this build, and the update to PoB that very same day confirmed my calculations. And now here we are. Again, thank you for giving my build a read. I wish you the best!
Will you make any other guides?
No. I wouldn't have the time to maintain multiple guides.
I don't mind sharing anything new that I come up with, but I won't support or recommend them, nor explain in any great detail. Please refrain from asking any questions about these. If you can't figure out what I'm doing, it'd be best not to copy them. Chances are they're terrible anyway. If you're still curious, then here you go:
Storm Brand/Magma Orb MoM Inquisitor (Synthesis League)
Character: Octannicus
Passive Tree GEAR 1. Dual Shimmerons (degen countered by Inquisitor regen) 2. Gloomfang (lightning leech corruption) 3. Helmet Enchantment: +2 Magma Orb bounces 4. Shaper Ring: +15 LGoH for Spells (to counter Gloomfang) 5. Loreweave (counter Shimmeron degen and -max resist maps) CLEAR SKILLS Herald of Ice (turn off against hard bosses for more MoM eHP) (+ Elemental Proliferation for smoother shatter chains) Storm Brand + Power Charge on Critical (essential for power charges) + Chain (fantastic increase to clear speed with zero investment into Brand-specific passive nodes, and a huge damage increase against 2 or more enemies) + Ice Bite (frenzy charges and freezes) + [glove prefix] Mana Leech (20% mana regen, very useful) + [glove suffix] Faster Casting (= DPS, shock/freeze sooner, faster placement) (+ [glove suffix] Blind) SINGLE TARGET Magma Orb + Slower Projectiles + Unleash (cast and move) + Energy Shield Leech (always leeching due to Shimmeron degen, helps further mitigate Shimmeron degen) (+ Critical Strike Chance / Elemental Focus) (+ second Magma Orb to double up on Unleash / Intensify / Empower / Knockback) MOBILITY Flame Dash + Faster Casting + Arcane Surge (lv.7) SUPPORT SKILLS Holy Flame Totem (places Consecrated Ground under enemy) + Multiple Totems (+ Totem Resistances / Combustion) (+ Infused Channeling / Added Fire / Physical to Lightning) Cast When Damage Taken + Purifying Flame (places Consecrated Ground under enemy) + Warlord's Mark (mana leech) + Cold Snap (chill, Frenzy Charges) Lightning Golem Brand Recall My wife is playing a Soulrend character. She takes care of Despair and Wither stacks, which greatly enhances Gloomfang's damage, while my Consecrated Ground protects her. Last edited by Hercanic on May 17, 2019, 5:21:09 PM
| |
|
BUILD VIABILITY
Is this build viable for Solo Self-Found (SSF)?
Absolutely. The recommended items make the build stronger, but none are required. The only issues would be keeping Zombies alive without level stacking and making sure you get enough life on gear. If necessary, you can sacrifice damage for defense by dropping Hatred for Mind Over Matter. You'll want to put a few more passive points into mana nodes and carry some hybrid flasks to help restore your mana.
Skip Bloodlust Support on Skeletons, since you likely won't have a source of bleed (Elder gloves with Chance to Bleed). This will make room for Minion Damage Support, since you likely won't have an Elder helmet with Minion Damage Support as an affix. You can use Maim Support with Agony Crawler/Zombies since you likely won't have an Empower Support or a Shaper weapon with Maim Support as an affix. Pierce Support would be better than Maim Support for the Agony Crawler, if you want to increase your clear speed, since you likely will not have a Mark of Submission ring to reliably apply the Projectile Weakness curse. You will have enough free mana that you can run War Banner or Dread Banner. War Banner will help Phantasms for clearing, and the accuracy bonus is helpful for the Agony Crawler and Zombies who aren't level-stacked. Meanwhile, Dread Banner is only good for bosses, but provides defense. You can drop Cast When Damage Taken to make room for a banner. You can then either manually cast Spirit Offering for its buffs, or trade it out for a Stone or Chaos Golem. Since you likely won't have Elder gloves with Poison Support as an affix, you'll need to drop Greater Multiple Projectiles on Ball Lightning. If you don't have an Abyssal Jewel (Hypnotic Eye) with flat Added Chaos to Spells, you'll need to use Lesser Poison Support, since it'll give flat Added Chaos Damage to Ball Lightning. It shouldn't be too hard to craft one once you find any Hypnotic Eye and scour it. Then you can use Poison Support instead of Lesser for the higher chance to poison. You probably won't have a 6L for a while. With a 4L, use Raise Spectres + Summon Phantasms + GMP + Faster Projectiles Support. With a 5L, add Elemental Proliferation Support. If Zombie deaths are too annoying, drop them if you haven't done Uber Lab for Flesh Binder, since they won't be providing much without it. They only come into their own when you can level-stack their life to 20k. If you do drop them and don't have an Unset Ring, you can place Holy Relic in the open socket. As for the gear, target-crafting the gloves and helm with fossils is possible. Weapon can be done with Alteration spam, since we only care about two affixes (+gems and Maim). If you manage to find enough Exalts, you can then multi-mod it with + minion attack/cast speed, + minion life/damage, and +2 to Support Gems if/when you unlock the craft from Catarina. You can use Chance Orbs to get Victario's Charity on a Laminated Kite Shield. Same with Mark of Submission on an Unset Ring.
Hardcore (HC) viable?
I can't make any guarantees, as I don't play HC, but a few players who do have reported success with the build.
Summoners are generally a very safe playstyle, with boss-melting damage built in and plenty of distractions to take the heat off you. I can easily go through the entire campaign without dying, and the rare death is entirely from me being lazy. Like: "Hmm, I wonder how long I can run with this spinning spike pillar trial trap because I don't feel like waiting for it to give me an opening, and ahh I really don't feel like moving my hand to press the flask button... alright I guess I should press it... hm, too slow. Well that was silly of me. Oh well." Like that level of laziness (true story). You will want to make modifications. Use Mind Over Matter instead of Hatred while leveling, and, it should go without saying, absolutely prioritize life and resists. Standard HC cautions, really.
How does the build handle doorways, corridors, and Syndicate forts?
Bottlenecks tend to really hurt summoners, since your sources of damage cannot reach your targets. This build, however, does extremely well for a summoner, because we have such a variety of minions who cover one another's weaknesses.
In the worst case scenario, you always have Skeletons to summon on demand anywhere you can aim. Although we normally save them for bosses, spreading them around during an Incursion can help purge multiple directions and rooms simultaneously, earning you a comfortable 20+ seconds to get that passageway unlocked. Since their AI acts independently and they last 20 seconds, they're basically fire-and-forget. The Holy Relic stays near you, giving you personal AOE coverage when your other minions might be off frolicking about. The Agony Crawler is summoned at your location, so he won't always be lagging behind you like other minions. Frost Sentinels have twice the action range of the Solar Guard's fireballs, so they are able to respond to new targets very promptly over a wide range. The Phantasms that your Spectres create are summoned at the location of a kill, which has the unique benefit of putting minions forward and outward of your position. The Phantasms can clear out the room they spawned in when all your other minions are stumbling through the doorway. Phantasms spawned at the end of a hallway can aim down a turn that you're too far away from, preemptively clearing it. Just by being further out, they'll bait monsters into getting closer while you're at a safe distance and your long-range Frost Sentinels then act like artillery. Keep in mind I did say, "for a summoner". It's not absolutely perfect, it's not like on-death explosion chains or pre-nerf arc, but it has many advantages over any other type of summoner. I'm actually very comfortable clearing out maps like Cells or Dungeon. The teleport of Charged Dash is especially great for that, slipping through the bars instead of needing to find and open a door. Minions auto-teleport to you when you get a certain distance away, so I like to be aggressive in my mobility to take full advantage of that feature.
Hardest content you've done?
Not as much as I would have liked before boasting about how awesome the build is. Frankly, it should perform well at any content if you have a solid skill level and an understanding of the boss mechanics. People have beaten the hardest fights with less health, damage, and mitigation.
Guardians died very quickly. I have not run Shaper, but there shouldn't be a problem. You just have to dodge his telegraphed mechanics. Uber Elder will be sketchy if you have trouble anticipating the multiple boss attacks coming your way. The build's high damage should help keep both these fights relatively brief, though. For very deep and dangerous Delves, I would suggest incorporating the Knockback Support gem in a second pair of gloves. Combined with Projectile Weakness's knockback chance and Ball Lightning's constant hits, this will hilariously bulldoze monsters and keep you safe. You could also swap your green Mark of Submission ring for a second blue-colored one socketed with Enfeeble for more protection. With an Extra Curse amulet corruption and gloves corrupted with a Temporal Chains implicit, you can double-up on the defensive curses: Against Delve bosses, I have yet to find one, so I cannot comment.
Deepest Azurite Mine depth?
This build was made during Delve League, so it was designed with deep delving in mind. Namely Freeze Proliferation, triggered Spirit Offering to destroy Unstable Weta corpses, Knockback from Projectile Weakness, and Acrobatics for avoidance.
The build can easily handle 300+, but due to a lack of time, Sulphite, and lots of rerouting due to dead ends, I have not pushed the build to whatever its deepest delve might be. The only dangers at 300+ are rare Enhanced Vaal Fallen in Vaal Cities dashing onto you, or invisible rare Cavestalkers in Abyssal Cities who can't be damaged until they swipe at you. Constantly keeping on the move is the best defense, since identifying them among a chaotic melee and when they're about to use their ability is tricky. As you venture far deeper, you may want to use Knockback Support on Ball Lightning to always keep everything away from you. Frost Wall shenanigans may help, too. Last edited by Hercanic on May 17, 2019, 5:50:59 PM
| |
|
TROUBLESHOOTING
Can you look over my gear?
I would love to, but it takes a lot of my time to investigate and write up. Doing this once in a while wouldn't be a problem, but I started getting slammed with too many requests, not only in the thread but by PM and ingame, too.
Although it gives me some insight into where people might be getting confused, and thus highlight aspects of the guide I could improve, a lot of what I would write is specific to an individual and thus cannot be easily repurposed for guide content. That means it's an inefficient use of my limited time to refine the guide. As a compromise, I have written a generic checklist of what I look for when reviewing someone's build:
How do you get a third Spectre?
Check out my fossil-crafted rare boots. They grant +1 Spectres.
You don't actually need the third Spectre, though, as it's pure luxury. Two Frost Sentinels are plenty. They're just here to summon Phantasms.
My Virulence isn't going higher than 5 to 15 stacks.
You are likely only poisoning with Charged Dash and not Ball Lightning, which would be because you're missing one source, like a jewel, with Adds x to y Chaos Damage to Spells.
Be sure to read the Item Requirements section in the main build thread under "I Accept" -> "EVERYTHING YOU NEED" if you missed it.
Why does Charged Dash sometimes stop on its own?
Charged Dash releasing prematurely without anything else around may be a sign of the mouse or keyboard button you're holding down is starting to wear down and malfunction.
Otherwise, it means your character was stunned, which breaks the channel and thus teleports you to your illusion. This can be to your benefit, dodging further hits from whatever stunned you, such as how I easily teleported out of Red Elder's stun-siphon. If your total life is low, stuns will happen more frequently. In that case, keep your channeling brief to avoid getting knocked too deeply into enemy territory.
Isn't Taunt disabled by the Holy Relic / Herald of Agony?
No. "Minions Cannot Taunt" is local to the gem, and only applies to that specific minion. It would say, "Your Minions Cannot Taunt" if it applied to all minions.
Last edited by Hercanic on Mar 29, 2019, 12:42:32 PM
| |
|
RECOMMENDATIONS
Labyrinth Enchantments?
We don't really need any. If you happen to get a useful one, great! But I wouldn't go out of my way unless I have nothing else to spend a vast amount of wealth or time on. For gloves and boots, I'd want anything defensive.
GLOVES
BOOTS (odds of each is 4/58)
HELMET BOSSING
CLEARING
DEFENSE
MOBILITY
UTILITY
OTHER (can swap CWDT+Spirit Offering for:)
Hall of Grandmasters? (Unique Map)
Hall of the Grandmasters is not a map designed to be fair. The exact opposite, in fact. These Grandmaster Rogue Exiles are outfitted with top-level player gear, having been designed by players, and they exploit every broken mechanic imaginable. Not only their gear, but their skills and skill effects are legacy versions. Which means all past OP interactions, like Lightning Arrow triggering off of Frost Walls, is preserved and working for the Grandmasters.
Summoners just do not do well in this sort of ridiculous AOE and DPS meatgrinder. If you want to earn solo completion, you'll have to make some temporary adjustments. You need to be able to deal damage without hitting (damage over time), or you'll never be able to kill the immortal ones that gain recovery from being hit. You need to be able to off-screen, or you'll be off-screened because the burst damage can be insane. You want:
Last edited by Hercanic on Oct 2, 2019, 8:51:38 PM
| |
|
GAME KNOWLEDGE
How fast does Virulence stack to 40?
Conclusion: ~2 seconds against a single small boss. Larger bosses are even faster.
Explanation: Maintaining Virulence stacks is very easy for us. Remember, the build is attacking AND casting at the same time. Charged Dash has a 4.71 attack rate, 81% accuracy, and 80% chance to poison. That equates to a 64.8% chance to land a poison, or 3 Virulence per second. Using this Ball Lightning DPS spreadsheet we can calculate the number of hits one cast will achieve against an enemy of a certain size. The player character has a radius of 2. Most bosses are much larger than this, but since their exact value is unknown to me, I will use 2 as a launching point. 2 radius = 6 hits 4 radius = 7 hits 8 radius = 8 hits 12 radius = 9 hits 14 radius = 10 hits 18 radius = 11 hits 22 radius = 12 hits Cast While Channeling gives a cast rate of 2.86, and I have an 80% chance to poison. So we get: 2 radius = 17 hits / 14 Virulence per sec. 4 radius = 20 hits / 16 8 radius = 23 hits / 18 12 radius = 26 hits / 21 14 radius = 29 hits / 23 18 radius = 31 hits / 25 22 radius = 34 hits / 27  Going by the above image, I would estimate bosses usually have a radius of 5-10. That would give me 16-18 (+3 from Charged Dash) Virulence per second. So ~2 seconds to reach cap vs a smaller boss, without factoring Virulence degen. If I need to continuously dodge, then here's what to expect from the Agony Crawler: Agony Crawler DPS at Differing Virulence 789,681 (40 Virulence = 100% damage) 618,559 (35 Virulence = 78% damage) 473,438 (30 Virulence = 60% damage) 352,254 (25 Virulence = 45% damage) 252,966 (20 Virulence = 32% damage) 173,511 (15 Virulence = 22% damage) 111,838 (10 Virulence = 14% damage) 65,896 (5 Virulence = 8% damage) Also: Life on Hit ends up calculating to 140 from Charged Dash (92% damage effectiveness) and 120 from Ball Lightning (40% damage effectiveness), per target per second, vs. a radius 4 target.
Difference between Charged Dash vs. Shield Charge while leveling?
Shield Charge gives 75-90% movement speed, but has a very slight delay at the start and a longer delay at the end. Your weapon's attack speed reduces these delays, while global attack speed and additional movement speed shortens the travel time.
Charged Dash sends out an illusion that travels at 1.3 times your movement speed. Unlike Shield Charge, which scales from movement speed and attack speed (to a lesser degree nowadays), only movement speed affects Charged Dash's illusion. If we assume a level 29 character using Wanderlust boots and Brightbeak, we get: Shield Charge: +100% movement speed; +140% w/ Quicksilver; +170% w/ QS of Adrenaline; +190% w/ QSoA + Onslaught vs. Charged Dash: +56% movement speed; +108% w/ Quicksilver; +147% w/ QS of Adrenaline; +173% w/ QSoA + Onslaught A character's base movement speed is estimated to be ~38 units per second. Shield Charge's max distance is 60 units, and I estimate Charged Dash's max range to be ~52 units. Charged Dash's illusion seems to be sent out immediately, so calculating it is pretty straightforward. Shield Charge, on the other hand, gets tricky. How exactly does global attack speed affect movement speed? Is it a multiplier? Is it added on as if it were movement speed? Is either case weighted in any way? If 100% increased attack speed = 2.0 multiplier, it would double Shield Charge's movement speed. Charged Dash's 1.3 multiplier would fall far short in comparison. Right now I'm at 128% increased attack speed, increasing to 140% when my minions kill. That'd be a massive 2.4 multiplier. We're talking about a level 29 character, though, who would be at mid-Act 3. By this point you'll have Spirit Command, which grants 11% attack speed. Retribution gives another 5%. A lvl4 Faster Attacks gives 28% increased attack speed. So in total you'd have 44% increased global attack speed, meaning: Shield Charge: +144% movement speed; +202% w/ Quicksilver; +245% w/ QS of Adrenaline; +274% w/ QSoA + Onslaught vs. Charged Dash: +56% movement speed; +108% w/ Quicksilver; +147% w/ QS of Adrenaline; +173% w/ QSoA + Onslaught A significant difference, but we can't forget Shield Charge's attack delays. Mine has an attack time of 0.29. Does this represent only the final attack, or both the start and end times added together? If it's not both, then we have no way of knowing how much of a delay the start animation adds. I will assume the attack time includes both. So my attack time is derived from 1 divided by 1.5 weapon attack speed divided by 2.28 global attack speed = 0.29. So for the level 29 character, it's 1 / 2.10 Brightbeak / 1.44 = 0.33. Thus, for Shield Charge, 38 units per sec * 2.44 movement speed = 92.72 units in one sec. 60 units max distance / 92.72 = 0.647 seconds + 0.33 attack time = 0.98sec total time. Shield Charge: 0.98sec @ +144% movement speed; 0.85sec @ +202% w/ Quicksilver; 0.79sec @ +245% w/ QS of Adrenaline; 0.71sec @ +274% w/ QSoA + Onslaught Since Charged Dash doesn't have a discernible delay, we'll ignore its shorter max distance and assume a constant rate of movement over 60 units. Charged Dash: 1.01sec @ +56% movement speed; 0.76sec @ +108% w/ Quicksilver; 0.64sec @ +147% w/ QS of Adrenaline; 0.58sec @ +173% w/ QSoA + Onslaught Interesting. So when low level they are equal at first, with Charged Dash pulling ahead as we add more movement speed. Shield Charge is better at dodging, and will scale much faster as you gain attack speed, but it's nice to see Charged Dash is actually competitive over distances early on, especially when considering its teleportation ability.
How do you zoom out on the game, like in your videos?
I play in Ultrawide screen @ 2560x1080. It lets you see further, but toward the corners of the screen there's a deadzone where skills will not activate if you click there. So you just need to be mindful of that. If you do not have an ultrawide monitor, you can simulate it by changing PoE to Windowed Mode, and setting the dimensions to a ratio of 21:9.
How do you add items to a post?
Start editing or creating a new post and click inside the text field. Wherever the cursor is, that is where the item codes will be inserted.
Now click on your character's portrait in the top left corner of the website, which will open a subwindow where you can explore your characters, their gear, and your stash. Click on any items you want to post. To close the subwindow when you're finished, click its X or outside of its border. In the text field you should see a bunch of new code. Preview that to make sure it's what you wanted, and then submit!
What's the point of Zombies and Flesh Binder?
Every minion has its weaknesses. Builds that focus solely on one minion feel that especially. We instead use a variety of minions to minimize our overall weaknesses. Ranged minions, for instance, can't do anything to monsters under a Proximity Shield. You would either have to drag or Convocate your ranged minions under the shield, wait for the shield to dissipate (some monsters have a permanent shield), or ignore the monsters altogether. But if you have melee minions, they will naturally get under the shield to deal damage. Without Zombies, our only melee minions are Skeletons, which require us to stop and cast to summon them. Having Zombies means we can focus on other things while they commando in and take out the shield monsters for us.
Zombies primarily serve a utility role for us. They block many types of projectiles just by being there. They act as decoys. They help Taunt and Blind when you have minion jewels. They Maim faster than the Agony Crawler can do on its own. They also provide Physical Damage Reduction to you and all other minions with Flesh Binder. Eight Zombies are the equivalent of two Endurance Charges. Twelve are the equivalent of three. If you stack this with other sources, like a "+1 minimum Endurance Charge" craft on a rare amulet and ring, Chaos Golem, Basalt Flask, and a few others, the protection grows exponentially the closer you get to 100% (like Elemental Resistances). It's possible to almost reach 50% for us, which would halve phys damage and essentially double our effective health against it. I did some calculations in an earlier post about this and found we could actually survive a 17k phys damage Shaper Slam by going down this route. But even if we don't stack it, 10% phys reduction means taking only 90% of phys damage, which equates to (1/0.9 =) 11% more life against it (@200% life, a 5% node on the passive tree is worth ~1.5% more life). As Necromancers, we get almost no direct defensive options. As long as we can keep Zombies alive (which is why we level-stack to boost their life, which also simultaneously boosts the Agony Crawler's damage), Flesh Binder is our best. (The resistances from Commander of Darkness become meaningless with decent gear; Mistress of Sacrifice with Bone Offering is an unreliable ~14/14% attack/spell block chance, while Spirit Offering's ~9% of your life as energy shield is bottlenecked by CWDT's 0.25sec cooldown, so it won't protect from every hit, and both are cut down further by Acrobatics.) Zombie damage is decent, but our ranged minions will often obliterate everything before the Zombies can even get into melee range. Sometimes, though, that's not always the case. Maps with lots of corners, pillars, and other projectile-blocking clutter can restrict our ranged minions. Melee minions, on the other hand, naturally go around these obstructions, smoothing out our overall clear. They aren't the stars, but they clean up well. And all for one gem socket. Last edited by Hercanic on Apr 9, 2019, 3:58:42 PM
| |
|
ALTERNATIVE SKILLS
I hate Charged Dash.
Ball Lightning is the heavy lifter for Virulence stacks, so there is flexibility in how we produce it.
Cyclone or Blade Flurry can replace Charged Dash. We use a Channeled skill with CwC to increase the cast speed and reduce the mana cost of spamming Ball Lightning. We use an Attack instead of a Channeled Spell so we can inflict Bleed with Chance to Bleed Support as an Elder glove affix. Bleed lets us use Bloodlust Support on Skeletons for a massive 59% more damage multiplier. If you wanted to use a Channeled Spell instead, you'd need to replace Bloodlust with either a level 4 Empower (great additional life & damage but rare and super expensive), Multistrike (locks them in place so be careful with knockback), Ruthless (requires three hits to have any effect, so it won't always be doing anything), or Hypothermia (target must be chilled, which requires a minimum hit of Cold Damage equal to 0.33% of the enemy's maximum life, which against Shaper's 20M life = 66,000 cold damage). Spells with the most utility are Blight for its 80% Hinder or Wither with its boost to Chaos Damage for the Agony Crawler. Scorching Ray would be nice if you have anything with Added Fire Support, but otherwise we don't deal much of any Fire Damage. Winter Orb would be perfect because it lets us be mobile, but it deals Cold Damage and we use EE and Hatred. We can't use Avatar of Fire because then we couldn't Poison, and Cold to Fire Support with a Pyre ring still leaves 10% Cold Damage so it wouldn't work out. The reason we use Charged Dash in particular is because of its built-in mobility. It's a huge improvement to clear speed over the normal stutter-casting. The ability to go up cliffs and across gaps is also a life-saver in maps that prominently feature those obstacles. You can overcome this by incorporating Flame Dash into your build.
I want to manually cast Ball Lightning.
Then you can drop Holy Relic and Chance to Bleed/Bloodlust, as an Attack is needed to trigger both. The Vulnerability curse is a way to add Bleed back for Bloodlust, while Shield Charge can still be used to trigger the Holy Relic, albeit less frequently.
I recommend linking Ball Lightning with Unleash and GMP. The fourth socket can be filled with whatever you want. As for another support gem, you have quite a few options to choose from:
I hate Frost Sentinels.
SOLAR GUARDS
Solar Guards would be fine to use. Their fireballs have half the range (-50% maximum action distance) of ice spears, so aside from their Special Beam Cannon they won't respond as fast as Frost Sentinels to distant packs and generate Phantasms in their midst. You'd also lose out on the buff Hatred grants to Cold Damage, but we were doing just fine pre-3.6 before Hatred ever affected Cold Damage. KITAVA'S HERALDS Kitava's Heralds should be okay, but not great. They can inflict Bleed, which lightens the burden off you for supporting your Bloodlust Skeletons. They're very tanky with 360% base life, which means you could probably get away with not taking the Soul Weaver ascendancy. Dealing Physical Damage means they'll benefit from Hatred and can thus Freeze. All this aside, their downsides are extremely limited range (mainly melee) and area coverage (projectiles are mortars and not used very often). They should deal decent enough damage to spawn Phantasms, but they won't be spawning them very far out like Frost Sentinels.
Vulnerability? Elemental Weakness?
Between clear speed or boss slaying, which do you want to improve?
For map clear, Projectile Weakness is a huge 54% multiplier for your clear speed minions (Phantasms, Agony Crawler, Frost Sentinels/Solar Guards/Kitava's Heralds' mortar). We use Projectile Weakness for the unlimited Pierce it gives our Agony Crawler and Spectres. Curses are not as strong on bosses, due to their 33-66% less curse effectiveness trait, so our curse is intended for clearing. Most of our clear damage comes from projectiles. Projectile Weakness increases all damage of those projectiles, including elemental and chaos damage. Vulnerability will only benefit the physical portion, while Elemental Weakness will only affect our Spectres and Hatred. For boss slaying, you can assist Skeletons with Vulnerability. A larger chunk of their damage is physical rather than cold. As a side bonus, you'll also gain more frequent and reliable bleeds and maims from the curse. In situations where you won't be able to consistently hit with Charged Dash, Vulnerability will take the burden off you by granting your Zombies and Agony Crawler a 10.2% chance to inflict Bleed for the Bloodlust Support on your Skeletons. Let me put the physical/elemental damage split into perspective: Hatred w/Generosity is 44% more damage as cold (= 35% extra cold * 1.25 more cold). So a Skeleton deals 100% physical and 44% cold, or 144% mixed. Of a Skeleton's total damage, (44/144=) 30% is cold vs. 70% physical. Now, Vulnerability (39%) will stack additively with Maim's debuff (14%), while Elemental Weakness (39%) will stack additively with EE (10% vs. Shaper, 20% vs. boss, 50% vs. trash). We'll ignore the impact of these additives since vs. Shaper it's pretty close. Since both Vulnerability and Elemental Weakness increase their respective damage types by the same value, it therefore comes down to whichever one contributes the majority of damage:
So the only exception is the Agony Crawler, simply because 40% of its physical damage gets inherently converted into chaos.
Banners?
A Banner reserves 10% mana. Agony Crawler reserves 25% * 1.25 for Empower * 1.15 for Maim = 36% + 50% for Hatred = 86% reserved. Dread Banner would put us at 96% reservation, leaving 4% to cast from.
I have 100 mana at 7% remaining mana (due to also having Added Fire on my Crawler). So we would have ~57 mana and 51 regen to cast Skeletons at a cost of 35 mana. We would probably get three casts before hiccuping on mana depletion. It would be a little awkward, but manageable. The problem could be avoided with some reduced reservation, such as an Elder helm affix, Lab helm enchantment, a Hatred version of Aul's Uprising, or spending a couple passive points on reduced reservation nodes. It's a shame Eldritch Battery is too out of the way. Dread Banner is essentially 13% increased physical damage taken. If at max quality and max stacks when placed, it becomes 19%. Generosity would boost it to 23.7%, but it's no good because then you can't trigger impale yourself and thus no stages earned. It only benefits attackers (so Phantasms and Holy Relic are sad), but can build up stages against bosses unlike War Banner. Skeleton DPS is 61% physical. So Dread Banner is worth 7.9% more Skeleton damage, or 11.6% when placed at 50 stages. That's 218k / 320k DPS. The Agony Crawler is 31% physical. So roughly half the effect. Added Fire was 20% of its damage, so we actually take a ~100k DPS loss here. Zombies are 49% physical. Same issue with Added Fire, a ~40k DPS loss. If you don't have the option for Added Fire, then this point is moot. But if you do, then the DPS trade-off only nets a small gain that you have to replace a gem for and deal with mana issues. I wanted it to work, but these numbers aren't favorable. We'll have to see how accurate my mathematical hip-shot is when PoB is updated with the new skills.
Animated Guardian?
You could replace Zombies with an Animated Guardian for empowered life, or swap Fortify on Shield Charge for him. Either way you would be able to unsummon him with weapon swap, but you'd have to remember to reactivate Herald of Agony too. Alternatively, he could replace CWDT.
10% increased minion damage is worth ~2% more damage at 400% total increased minion damage, so Leer Cast would give 3% more damage. Dying Breath would be 3.6% more. Crown of the Tyrant would mess up EE unless you set it to Lightning Damage. The flat damage is roughly equal to a level 13 Wrath aura, which would add 0.5% more damage to Skeletons and 0.2% for the Agony Crawler. The -10% Elemental Resists is 3% more damage for Skeletons and 4.6% for the Agony Crawler. So a Tyrant+Breath Guardian would give roughly 7% more damage for Skeletons and 8.2% for the Agony Crawler. The Guardian's contribution would be worth ~250k DPS, and Enfeeble would reduce boss damage by another 1% (worth 70 life @ 7k total life). Not bad, but you have to worry about keeping the Guardian alive. I'd rather not deal with it, personally, but you could make it work. 3.6 UPDATE: " Animated Guardian might be on the table now, depending on how far "nearby" turns out to be. Perma-Fortify? Yes please. The crit multiplier would also be excellent for minions when they get Power Charges, since they only have a base 30% crit multi and three Power Charges boosts them to 35% chance to crit. The contribution of three Power Charges would go from 10.5% more damage to 28% (plus any elemental ailments). At the very least, it'd be a strong way to increase Skeleton and Zombie survival. Including Kingmaker will depend on how large the aura is, and how expensive Soul Taker and Heartbreaker become (the ingredients to create Kingmaker). There's a chance it could catch onto a meta, where practically any build could run an Animated Guardian for the free Fortify. We could potentially target-farm The Soul divination card in Crater, Overgrown Shrine, or Sepulchre maps. Adding an Animated Guardian to this build would mean dropping CWDT. Spirit Offering can also be traded in for Minion Life Support or a War Banner/Dread Banner. If the aura is big enough so we don't need our own Fortify, then we can drop it from Shield Charge in favor of a Chaos Golem for more Physical Damage Reduction. We could also use Infused Channelling Support instead of GMP on Charged Dash for even more protection. 3.6 UPDATE 2: I am currently testing and compiling a video of Kingmaker so everyone can see how large the radius is. Spoiler: It's kind of small.  RECOMMENDED ANIMATED GUARDIAN GEAR Weapon:
Body Armor:
Helm:
Gloves:
Boots:
Elder boots with a Fortify Support affix would be a way to eke out some more defense for your Guardian, since they don't benefit from Kingmaker themselves. Kingmaker, Crown of the Tyrant with a white socket, Garb of the Ephemeral, Asenath's Gentle Touch (or a rare with curse corruption), and Victario's Flight would offer the most possible utility. Zahndethus' Cassock with Bringer of Rain and Rainbowstride would synergize with block to generate Consecrated Ground. Percent life is better than flat life for minions, due to their high base life.
Anger?
Hatred is better. It's 25% more damage for Frost Sentinels, 43% more damage for the rest of our minions, and allows Phantasms to proliferate Chill and Freeze.
Anger would not be scaled by the Agony Crawler's 880% increased Physical Damage or Empower. It would not be increased by our Skeletons' Melee Physical Damage Support, Bloodlust Support, or +3 levels. Just look at the base damage of our minions. A level 82 Frost Sentinel's Ice Spear deals 1009 to 1513 Cold Damage in its first form, and gains 50% more damage in its second form. Anger, boosted by Generosity, would add (99 + 140 = 239 / 2 for average damage = 120 * 1.39 for Generosity increased effect =) 166 fire damage. 166 is only 16% more for 1009 damage, the lowest damage range of the Frost Sentinel. At level 82. A level 84 Frost Sentinel deals even greater base damage. Flat elemental damage is just no good on minions who already have very high base damage, and who are scaled with additional levels and physical-specific supports. Hatred, meanwhile, scales from all of that.
Storm Brand?
It doesn't hit nearly enough on a single target to replace Ball Lightning. Unless:
2 base * 2 keystone * 2 cast speed * 2 golden rule = 16 poisons per second. For comparison, Ball Lightning gives us, based on radius of target, @80% poison chance: 2 radius = 17 hits / 14 Virulence per sec. 4 radius = 20 hits / 16 8 radius = 23 hits / 18 12 radius = 26 hits / 21 14 radius = 29 hits / 23 18 radius = 31 hits / 25 22 radius = 34 hits / 27 So you can do it, but it'll require around 10 or more passive points and 31% additional increased cast speed from somewhere. The Mistress of Sacrifice ascendancy could solve that, maybe. You could use Charged Dash + CwC + Spirit Offering. Then use Spell Totem + Unearth + GMP + Multiple Totems (needed since we took Runebinder). But fitting that when you already need sockets for Storm Brand + Faster Casting + Poison (+ Lesser Poison to save passive points and take back a jewel socket) will require dropping something. Although the constant ES from spamming Spirit Offering would be nice, this just ends up being a convoluted way to achieve the same thing as the original setup. Gloves1: Storm Brand + Faster Casting (+ Poison as Elder Affix) Gloves2: Hatred + Generosity (break links so Faster Casting doesn't affect) Shield: Charged Dash + CwC + Spirit Offering Boots1: Unearth + GMP + Multiple Totems (+ Spell Totem as Elder Affix) Boots2: Any spell here will be supported by Spell Totem, so maybe Vigilant Strike to get Fortify? Kind of janky. No, a better idea would be Bubonic Trail boots and making a carpet of Desecrate + Spell Cascade to run/Shield Charge over. Last edited by Hercanic on Aug 1, 2019, 4:21:29 PM
| |
|
ALTERNATIVE ITEMS
The Queen's Hunger? (Body Armour)
800+ life from Belly of the Beast is hard to beat.
The Queen's Hunger may be decent depending on which three Veiled mods you get. It can roll up to 10% life, with another 8% from a Veiled mod. If it also gets a flat life Veiled mod, which I think only goes up to ~25, then you're looking at (360+75=) 435 life. The self-offerings might give you block chance or energy shield or movement speed, but you can't count on having one or the other and there must be corpses. Its randomness makes it hard to build around. The Queen's Hunger is a decent ES chest, so it may be good in a hybrid ES variant.
Yriel's Fostering? (Body Armour)
Snake Version
First off, the poison and chaos damage only apply to Projectile Attacks, not Spells, so Ball Lightning would not be affected. The level 70 Summoned Cobra (Lv20 Bestial Snake) deals 255% damage, can't be evaded, and has the Chaos Damage mod. That means 40% of their Physical Damage is converted to Chaos Damage, like the Agony Crawler. Its base damage is 927-1390 with an attack rate of 0.91, for a total of 1069 base DPS. This is weaker than a Frost Sentinel, so this Yriel's Fostering is already behind a Vis Mortis, which has +1 Spectres. Rhoa Version The Summoned Rhoa would be better. 342% melee attack damage (1434 base DPS), cannot be evaded, Shield Charge, and intimidates nearby enemies. Intimidate causes targets to take 10% increased attack damage, which would benefit Skeletons, the Agony Crawler, and Zombies. You also get 15% increased movement speed. Ursa Version The Summoned Ursa has 255% melee attack damage, can't be evaded, -50% stance (?) movement speed, Ground Slam, and Inspiring Cry (a Rallying Cry knockoff with 25% increased damage for 4 seconds for allies). If Inspiring Cry includes Taunt, then you'll take 10% less damage from enemies it taunts. I don't have confirmation on whether the increased damage is further scaled per 100 nearby enemies like the real Rallying Cry, or if it's just a flat 25%. If it did scale, it'd have potential. Otherwise 25% increased damage is only worth ~5% more damage. Verdict I don't think any are worth it. We use Belly of the Beast to improve our survival. Yriel's Fostering only offers 100 life. With 200% and 2000 life, it'd be 800 life from Belly vs. 300 life from Fostering. A difference of 500 life. We also get 50% life flask rate and +15% all elemental resistances from Belly. For a minor minion and small increase to DPS? No, not worth it.
The Scourge? (Weapon)
The Scourge claw would put your Skeleton DPS at 3,358,642 if you use Maim Support instead of Empower Support with the Agony Crawler and Zombies. However, Agony Crawler will drop down to 375,110 DPS, and Zombies drop to 24,677 x 8 = 197,416.
You gain: 596,228 Skeleton DPS 199,184 gem-swapped single-target Spectre DPS = 795,412 DPS You lose: 414,571 Agony Crawler DPS 140,896 Zombie DPS = 555,467 DPS = 239,945 net DPS gain. Since you aren't level-stacking, Zombies would only have 12.6k instead of 20k, so I don't think they'd be worth keeping. You do get wolves, which can spawn from proliferated Ignite kills, but this won't help against bosses. If we change Zombies out, losing their 197,416 DPS, for Minion Damage Support, we can get the Agony Crawler up to 568,212 DPS with 13% unreserved mana to spare. That's a gain of 193,102 DPS, so only slightly less than Zombies and it's guaranteed not to die off. We'd lose Zombie body-blocking and Physical Damage Reduction, however. So Scourge vs. +1 Maim/Added Fire claw = 240k boss DPS (but less clear DPS) + Puppet Master DPS gain vs. 20k life Zombies, Flesh Binder's 8% Phys Damage Reduction, and ~140 or more LoH per sec per target (The Scourge is % life, not flat life on hit). The Scourge should be easier to get than a +1 Maim/Added Fire claw, and it'll be cheaper than a level 4 Empower. I'd say it's a solid alternative, better offensively but less defensive. If we take Dread Banner and Puppet Master or Commander of Darkness, I wonder if we could break 4 million on Skeletons alone...
Arakaali's Fang? (Weapon)
The Spectral Spiders are fairly powerful, but require work:
More minions are welcome, but they must be practical enough to justify the cost of their inclusion. You would cripple/lose Zombies and the Agony Crawler for a temporary minion that demands a lot of attention and upkeep. The weapon itself doesn't offer much to the rest of the build, either. The chaos damage and poison chance are local, so they don't apply to Ball Lightning. The bonus attack speed per Spider is nice for Shield Charge, though. You can definitely make it work, but it'll come at the cost of other things, rather than as an addition to the build. Drop Zombies, change Flesh Binder to Puppet Master for the duration buff, drop Spirit Offering/CWDT for Desecrate and a Banner, drop a 3-point jewel socket on the tree for the Potency of Will cluster, and add one or two Writhing Jar flasks.
Al Dhih? (Weapon)
Compared to a rare claw with +1 gems, Maim, and multi-crafted with +2 supports, minion life/damage, and minion attack/cast speed, Al Dhih is blown out of the water, but while leveling it'd be fine to use.
I honestly wish Al Dhih worked better, as I love on-death monster explosions, but the small AOE and 4 second cooldown render it kind of pointless. Anything packed close enough to be debuffed by Abyssal Cry is going to melt to our minions regardless. What we would really benefit from are explosions that chain, to cleanly delete packs of any shape or size across multiple screens. If you wanted to temporarily specialize this build into a map clearer, you could swap your Skeleton helm for a Speaker's Wreath socketed with Herald of Ice (+ Ice Bite [130%] and/or Hypothermia [120%] and/or Increased Area Effect [140%] with Elemental Proliferation [110%] to chain). You'd have to drop the Solar Guard to avoid ignites and solve the reservation issue, though.
Citaqualotl's 95% minion damage? (Incursion weapon mod)
Since our minions have 300-400% increased minion damage in this build, you can divide any new minion damage by 5 to roughly figure out how much More damage it's worth.
95 / 5 = 18% more damage. Our claw can be crafted with up to 28/28% increased damage/life, which is 5.6% more damage. So it becomes a difference of 13.4% more damage. Now the question becomes, how much does +1 and Maim contribute to total DPS, and does it outweigh 13.4% more damage? Keep in mind +1 and 28% increased minion life improve Zombie survival, which means maintaining the Physical Damage Reduction they provide to you and all minions. We'll ignore Added Fire Damage Support, since that tends to be difficult to get as an affix on the claw in conjunction with everything else for most players: Zombie vs. Zombie w/o +1 Maim 32,824 vs. 19,069 = 72% more damage Agony Crawler vs. Crawler w/o +1 Maim 640,258 vs. 371,926 = 72% more damage Now, we're going to do this quick and dirty, so we'll figure out the contribution percentage of the two minions from the total with the numbers in DPS Breakdown (slightly out of date, but it'll give us an idea): 338,312 Zombies / 4,726,230 = 7.1% of total DPS. 789,681 Crawler / 4,726,230 = 16.7% of total DPS. So these two minions account for 23.8%, or almost a quarter of our DPS. 72% more can then be scaled down to a quarter for comparison to the 13.4% of the mace. 72 * 0.238 = 17.14% more damage. RESULTS Citaqualotl = 13.4% more damage vs. +1 Maim Claw = 17.14% more damage This doesn't include the loss of Maim's 14% increased Physical Damage Taken debuff on Skeleton or Phantasm damage, either.
Circle of Nostalgia? (Ring)
The ring can have two out of five possible mods:
Hungry Loop? (Ring)
To what end?
As a replacement for Mark of Submission, you'd have to manually cast that 5L Projectile Weakness. There really aren't any good supports for it that would outweigh the convenience of Mark of Submission. As a replacement for the Unset Shaper Ring, we'd lose its life, resists, and 15 Life Gained for each Enemy Hit by your Spells. Would you deck out the Holy Relic, or replace it and lose its regeneration buff? ANIMATED GUARDIAN There's not much you'd want to link to an Animated Guardian outside of survival. 1. Minion Life 2. Fortify 3. Empower That's pretty much it. Additional options would be: A. Culling Strike B. Blind C. Combustion D. Melee Splash (if their gloves curse on hit) E. Withering Touch + Multistrike F. Maim (if your Zombies/Crawler don't have it) G. Endurance Charge on Melee Stun + Ruthless + Stun H. Bonechill I. Decay These all offer some utility but aren't especially compelling or reliable to sacrifice a ring slot for. CHAOS GOLEM The buff from a Chaos Golem is great, but their damage is extremely lackluster and split between a default melee attack, cascade spell, and a degen aura, making them very hard to support for damage. You might as well use a normal Unset ring and forget about them dealing any damage. FLAME GOLEM It is strong, but we're not a golemancer. We don't stack a dozen Primordial Harmonies to get their skill cooldowns down to a second. Magma Ball, the Flame Golem's best spell, has a 6 second base cooldown. Plugging a 5L Flame Golem into our build in PoB, I get: Flame Golem (21/20) + Minion Damage (20/0) + Combustion (20/0) + Greater Multiple Projectiles (20/0) + Spell Echo (20/0) Magma Ball (6sec cooldown) 12,278 average hit 5 projectiles 2 casts per 6 seconds = 122,780 damage (assuming all projectile AOEs overlap) = 20,463 DPS due to cooldown Immolate (no cooldown) 7,832 average hit 1.6 cast rate 12,531 DPS Flame Wave (2sec cooldown) 10,092 average hit This doesn't even beat our 1L Holy Relic. ICE GOLEM For DPS, you'd have better luck with an Ice Golem: Ice Golem (21/20) + Minion Damage (20/0) + Multistrike (20/0) + Melee Physical Damage (20/0) + Bloodlust (20/0) Default melee attack 22,264 average hit 4.88 attack rate 108,703 DPS Cyclone (6sec cooldown) 17,780 average hit 4.88 attack rate 173,615 DPS (repeated 3 times due to Multistrike working with this version of Cyclone) Ice Spear (2sec cooldown) 8,771 average hit HOLY RELIC For good measure: Holy Relic (21/20) + Minion Damage (20/0) + Vile Toxins (20/0) + Controlled Destruction (20/0) + Empower (20/0) 79,208 average hit 158,416 DPS RAGING SPIRIT Why not: Raging Spirit (21/20) + Minion Damage (20/0) + Melee Physical Damage (20/0) + Spell Totem (20/0) + Multiple Totems (20/0) 2,504 average hit 5.26 attack rage 13,180 DPS each 1.62 cast rate x 5 second duration x 3 totems = 24.3 possible spirits = 20 cap reached = 263,580 total DPS (20 Spirits) Substituting Multiple Totems for Bloodlust is 211k, because you'll only get 8 spirits out. You'd have to invest in cast speed and duration somewhere to make Multiple Totems fall out of favor. CONCLUSION In the end, we can't surpass the DPS of even 1 Skeleton with Hungry Loop, so if you really want to incorporate it, then it would be better to think in terms of utility.
Tavukai? (Amulet)
It's bad for us. Damage is way too low. We would need to make significant changes to our build for it to work.
CwC alternates between multiple spells. It does not cast them simultaneously. So if you replaced GMP with Summon Raging Spirit, every 0.35 seconds it will alternate between a Ball Lighting and then a Raging Spirit. That means half the normal Ball Lightnings, and one Raging Spirit every 0.7 seconds. Raging Spirit's cast time is 0.5, so this is slower than manually casting them. With a base duration of 5 seconds, increased to 6.5 from the amulet, you'd only be able to get out 9 spirits. With the Minion Instability keysyone, since they detonate by time (~3-4 seconds to reach low life) rather than on a target, they are likely to uselessly explode in transit instead, or their target might be killed by our other minions before they finally detonate. This means for clear, their inefficiency wastes damage potential. Speaking of damage, without supports like Minion Damage and Minion Life their explosion damage will be limited to our increases and EE. Plugging a L21/Q20 Raging Spirit gem, 80%/100% damage/life to simulate the amulet, and a 28%/28% damage/life weapon craft, into our PoB setup, we get: 12,876 Shaper DPS per Spirit * 9 spirits = 119,554 total melee DPS However, they'll degen to low life within 3-4 seconds, so you'd only have 4-5 spirits out before they start detonating. * 5 spirits = 64,380 total melee DPS 12,755 Life * 33% MI = 4,209 base MI fire damage * 1.1 EE * 1.12 Frenzy Charges * 5.52 increased damage = 28,625 explosion damage * 1.43 spirits per sec = 40,892 MI DPS after ~3-4 seconds of ramping up. = 105,272 total DPS against a single target if you can maintain channeling (lower than if they didn't have MI). At the cost of your amulet slot and GMP. 105k would equal ~2% more damage for us. We'd get more out of 15% increased minion damage (=~3% more) than this amulet. The one passive point spent on MI would be better used on a dangling 10% damage or 4% attack/cast speed minion node, even before considering the danger MI represents to Spectre, Zombie, and Skeleton survival. Last edited by Hercanic on Jun 16, 2019, 4:16:59 PM
| |
|
reserved
| |
|
REPLY INDEXES
Hotlinks to all replies I have made across Speaker's multiple threads are provided here, along with short searchable descriptions of each. To get the most out of it, open a section and use CTRL+F to find keywords to questions I might have already answered.
1. Main Build Thread
Last edited by Hercanic on Apr 1, 2019, 3:49:53 PM
|
