[3.11] CoC Ball Lightning Assassin - 20M+ Shaper DPS/10k ES/fortify - League Starter Guide Included

ball light was nerfed :(

Also curious to know if this is still a viable option after patch notes come out tomorrow. Was planning to play this build for Heist..

Nobody knows the numerical values of the nerfs yet, and more specifically how they are gonna nerf ES on hit watchers.

But the core concept of CoC BL will be just fine.

"

Silay wrote:

Also curious to know if this is still a viable option after patch notes come out tomorrow. Was planning to play this build for Heist..

Seems like the nerf reduced our DPS by roughly 35%. This means that 1/3 of our damage has been lost. I wouldn't say that the build is dead because 65% of 40M shaper DPS is 26M, which is more than enough. However, you'll need more investment to become "goodlike".

Also keep in mind that every league introduces new power creep. New alternate quality gems, for example, may give us a big power boost.

With Harvest gone, I wonder how you can gain %chance to avoid being stunned. This is my concern as stun is always a problem for CI builds.

Finally, the leveling build (spellslinger-BL-wave of conviction-arc) may not be good enough anymore.

I'll update the guide after I get more knowledge about the Heist league.

Idk if i am right so please correct me if i am wrong.
How much AoE do we need for the need hit ranges of Ball Lightning=

with :
10% reduced projectile speed from passive (Adjacent Animosity)
30% Lesser Projectile speed from Gem
(and the 18 Radius from new Ball Lightning)

should the new Hits per cast be:
8 Hits with 0% Increased AoE
9 Hits with 5% Increased AoE
10 Hits with 32% Increased AoE
11 Hits with 63% Increased AoE

TbH if i lose 1/3 of my DPS it shouldn't be a huge problem, but the aoe might get pushed higher in terms of clearspeed.

Delved with this build to about 1150 last league and even there my Damage was ridiculous so still clearing t16 and 100% delirious maps shouldn't be a problem i guess.

Hey N0esy,

While you're updating the guide for Heist, I have two recommendations to update along:

1. Hex Breaker's curse part is useless since the nerf for Harvest. For anyone who isn't pushing for the 10APS breakpoint, the whole notable is useless. I recommend noting that only the IAS is relevant and adding the alternative of Unwavering Focus, which provides some physical reduction and increases the duration of our Immortal Call.

2. GMP is vastly underappreciated for clear. When stationary, or when circling a stationary target, obviously, we lose a lot of damage by not utilizing Slower Projectiles. However, this effect is *completely* negated when we move with a constant speed in one direction (typical for delve and narrow maps). What happens here is essentially the Doppler Effect but with lightning ball casts instead of sound wave peaks aligning on top of each other in front of us:



When we hit our cycloning movement speed to coincide with the third diagram from the left, we are essentially shotgunning everything in our path. When we have enough damage that even this becomes overkill, we can increase our movement speed (e.g. Alchemist's QS of Adrenaline, etc.) to move as in the rightmost diagram, moving the shotgun area a bit to our sides, increasing the clear effectiveness even further.

I did my best to showcase this in-game, didn't work out quite as well as I'd like to, but should give an idea:

"

xdnil5xd wrote:

Idk if i am right so please correct me if i am wrong.
How much AoE do we need for the need hit ranges of Ball Lightning=

with :
10% reduced projectile speed from passive (Adjacent Animosity)
30% Lesser Projectile speed from Gem
(and the 18 Radius from new Ball Lightning)

should the new Hits per cast be:
8 Hits with 0% Increased AoE
9 Hits with 5% Increased AoE
10 Hits with 32% Increased AoE
11 Hits with 63% Increased AoE

TbH if i lose 1/3 of my DPS it shouldn't be a huge problem, but the aoe might get pushed higher in terms of clearspeed.

Delved with this build to about 1150 last league and even there my Damage was ridiculous so still clearing t16 and 100% delirious maps shouldn't be a problem i guess.

Remember that the radius of a skill is rounded down. 5% inc AoE won't do anything since 18 * 1.05^(1/2) = 18.4, which is rounded down to 18. You need 13% inc AoE to hit the next breakpoint (18 * 1.13^(1/2) = 19.1, rounded down to 19).

@Irfy84
Yes, Hex breaker is not good anymore. it's outdated. Thanks for pointing it out.

As for the second point, I tried GMP in the past, but it was underwhelming most of the time. As a player who always try to push to level 100, I prefer having good DPS to kill dangerous enemies like Syndicate members and beyond bosses quick enough. Additional projectiles doesn't help you very much because BL projectiles travel very slowly, even without slower projectiles support.

The Doppler effect stuff has nothing to do with extra projectiles, doesn't it?

I played coc ball lightning for the entirety of harvest league and I want to share my experience to help people who are considering this build.



The dps formula in the guide is bit simplified and maybe outdated so I've come up with a more accurate dps formula. The formula currently listed in the guide might give players an inflated dps number.
Ball Lightning Single Target DPS = (([Ball Lightning Radius] + [Cyclone Radius]) / [Ball Lightning Projectile Speed]) * [Cyclone Attack Rate] * [Cyclone Crit Chance] * [Ball Lightning Activation Frequency] * [Ball Lightning Average Hit Damage]
My BL DPS before 3.12 = ((23 + 19) / 33.6) * 10.1 * 0.98 * (1 000 / 150) * 868 000 = 71 595 533
My BL DPS after 3.12 = ((19 + 19) / 33.6) * 10.1 * 0.97 * (1 000 / 150) * 635 000 = 46 905 081 (34.5% Less DPS)

With how much the base ball lightning aoe was nerfed in heist notes, increased aoe has large diminishing returns.
Area of Effect Radius = [Base AoE Radius] * sqrt(1 + [Increased AoE %] / 100)
Example: Area of Effect Radius = 22 * sqrt(1 + 15 / 100) = 23.54

Shock effect is a bit confusing. The formula for shock effect was changed in patch 3.9 (metamorph). Shock is an elemental ailment that causes targets with lower maximum health to take more lightning damage. Target Ailment threshold is equal to the enemy's maximum health in most cases except for bosses. The ailment thresholds for bosses are undocumented but a reddit post theorized a8 sirus to have a threshold of 25 million.
You put this value as your shock value in your PoB configuration.
Shock Effect % = ([Damage Per Hit] / [Target Ailment Threshold]) ^ 0.4 * 0.5 * (100 + [Increased Shock Effect])
Example: Shock Effect % = (795 000 / 25 000 000) ^ 0.4 * 0.5 * (100 + 18) = 14.85

Skill Links that I use


If you are new to this build and considering playing it next league, I will give you my opinion of the biggest pro and the worst con of this build. This build is absolutely lag proof. During harvest, I was successfully clearing insanely juiced delirium maps at 5-10 fps and not dying, sometimes dipping below 1 fps. The biggest downside of this build is that your dps is accelerating and not immediate. You will not reach your maximum dps on a single target until 1-2 seconds after you start attacking. This can be quite frustrating versus targets that move around a lot.

Hey awesome build having a blast with it. question, what are the slight mods you were talking about for iiq?