(UPDATED for 3.15.0d) We found stuff to consider when scaling the Reaper!!!
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Greeeeeeeeeeetings, Exiles!
TLDR:
- The reaper's ultimate ability, the one where you have to recast it at a location and it deals a big slice, is the big damage for this minion. - Reaper seems more of a bossing minion than a clearer. Scale the following for the player: - Cast Speed - Cooldown Reduction - Mana Pool and Mana Regen/Life Pool and Life Regen (if using life as cost) Scale the following for the minion: - Attack Speed - Base Damage - Bleed Damage (Not recommended until further testing) - Minion Speed in General Do the following to make life in game easier: - Recommend to use Carrion Golem as a sacrifice for the Reaper - Use Skeletons/Phantasms for Clear Speed unless you are scaling the reaper for clear; which I do not recommend. - I do not recommend Animate Weapons since creating these minions take too long initially and takes too much investment to synergize well with Reaper compared to the other two suggested. It is possible, and may work, but takes more investment. NOTE: Due to the patch notes, I'm updating a few stuff here in case anyone will read this after the patch. Highlights are: the Reaper's Bleed Damage got buffed so I suggest people test it to see if it is now a good way to scale the reaper's damage aside from just simply scaling its base damage. The cast speed for summon reaper is now significantly lower too as of patch 3.15.0d (from 1 second, it is now 0.6) It is now more inline with other minions and some 'nuke' spells. Okay, so after some playing around in game and in path of building; I finally found the ways to make our Summon Reaper skill stronger. First off, I will say, GGG did exactly as they said they would: They made a minion that you have to invest in more than an actual army to get right. It's one minion to rule them all. Well, in a way, it's like a girlfriend that wants you to get them everything they want and doesn't like you hanging around with your other friends. Anyway, off to what I found!
Disclaimer
All of the information you are about to read is from personal testing (and in the case of the information from other players, their testing) from the past couple days and not from any of the GGG team. The information you might get may not be accurate or not the same in the next new patches; so take what you read with a grain of salt
Factors
Here are the following factors to consider when you are planning to make a build with this minion:
For-the-Player-Factors:
>_Player-Cast-Speed
The base cast speed for the minion is now at 0.6 second (as of patch 3.15.0d). Although this might not seem big at first, you will soon realize this is a vital component of how summon reaper works; this is because of its 'Re-summon' ability which doesn't really summon the reaper again, but causes it to attack a target area. 'That' attack is what deals the most damage among the reaper's arsenal and probably what you might want to consider to keep upgrading. Going back to the point, by reducing the cast time for Summon Reaper, you can have it do the attack faster as well as move on to your next action sooner. It's like Blink Arrow in the way that you can scale either the attack speed or the projectile speed; in this case it's like making the attack speed faster. (I guess that last part was obvious, but still nice to have an example)
>_Player-Spell-Cooldown-Reduction
The Spell's cool down at the moment is 4 seconds. This means it takes 4 seconds before you can either summon the reaper again, or force it to attack a target location. If you can find a way to make the cooldown faster, then you can force the reaper to do its big attack sooner (Which is the one I highly suggest scaling). It's kind of like a gun actually, the cooldown is a reload and the reaper is the bullet. See that as you will hahaha
>_Mana-Pool-or-Mana-Regen
The reaper is mana heavy, especially on a six-link nowadays. If we want to make the most use of its big attack, then we need to have either a big mana pool or a fast mana regen. Either way, don't treat the Reaper as a minion skill, treat it as an AoE spell with a small AoE.
For_the_Minion_itself:
>_Base-Damage
...I mean, I think this should be obvious...? Scale minion physical damage. I suggest to not convert the reaper to an elemental one. This is mostly because of the bleed which will be off-set by converting the reaper to another damage type.
>_Bleed-DPS
Okay, first thing I will admit is that I've had a hard time scaling the Reaper's Bleed. This is mostly because bleed scaling for minions is already pretty hard. I do not suggest scaling the reaper's bleed, but focus on the reaper's base damage. I'm just placing this factor in here just in case anyone wants to attempt scaling the reaper's bleed damage. For those that don't know or forgot, bleed deals around 3x the base damage of the bleed while the afflicted target is moving, which is pretty big. So, if you are set to trying to scale its Bleed, here are a few ways I've found to make it work:
Knockback_Support_Gem
Takes a gem slot, but makes knockbacks even more consistent. I suggest placing this in one of your feed minions or your clear minions which will be discussed later. Aside from using it with minions, if you by any chance are already doing an attack build with the reaper as an assistant, then you can use the support gem with your own attacks. (Knock-backed enemies are considered to be moving while they are being knocked back)
Knockback_from_the_Skill_Tree
This is possible with the notable "Bodyguards" from the Minion Life cluster jewels. By stacking these, especially with the Knockback support gem, you can practically have your enemies consistently being knocked back if they can be. (Knock-backed enemies are considered to be moving while they are being knocked back)
Ensnaring_Arrow
The most consistent way to have your bleeds proc for any bleed build in this case would be having ensnaring arrow. One way is by using it manually on a bow, or alternatively using Maloney's Mechanism or Replica Maloney's Mechanism to trigger the Ensnaring Arrow. Ensnaring Arrow makes enemies get the ensnared debuff which causes enemies to be considered 'moving' even if they aren't.
>_Attack-Speed
Kinda the same with the other minions on this aspect, or any attack actually. Faster Attacks = Higher Damage Output or Damage per second. (We all know we want that DPS)
>_Feed-Minions
Ah, yes. The infamous ability of eating your allies to get stronk/gain life. Yes. It's as bad as it sounds. I personally lost a really good animated guardian because I was testing what the Reaper's priority (if there was) in choosing which ally to consume; I made the bad decision of doing it in a character with a set-up animated guardian. So. Don't make my mistake. What's a feed minion? A feed minion is basically a minion that you let the Reaper kill under any circumstance. The reaper does this for a couple reasons: 1: To regain back its lost health 2: To gain bonuses for itself 3: It's a selfish and possessive b**** With this in mind, you'll need a minion that is easy to re-cast and you lose nothing by it dying. One of my recommendations is Carrion Golems for a few reasons: - It will boost your other minions while it is alive - Cast speed is decent - Cooldown speed is faster than the reaper eating it. - It's four-linked mana cost is low enough to not be a problem in our mana starved world right now. My only suggested link for the golem would be Feeding Frenzy so that its aggressive and will always be next to the reaper; as well as potentially grant the 'Feeding Frenzy' buff which further improves your over-all damage. Aside from this, I'm still not sure if the Reaper consumes 'timed' minions like Skeletons; but this is a good segway to the next factor below
>_Minion-AoE-or-Clear
The Reaper's clear speed is not good. Alone at least. It's AoE abilities aren't as big as how some players would find 'comfortable', and the damage of its non-ultimate abilities that it uses when we aren't forcing it to attack is weaker than an army from Summon Skeletons. With this in mind, and the debuffs it imposes on our other buddies, I still suggest having an army. Scaling the Reaper's AoE while scaling its damage output is... hard. Well, I tried to at least but I think most people would find it easier to just scale one aspect of the reaper which would be either its AoE or its base damage. I suggest its base damage rather than AoE since there is an easy substitute for the clear: Summon Skeletons. The reaper eats zombies, carrion golems, and animated guardians (which I have tested so far; I'm not sure about the other minions yet but will try later on) so the only minion that could be consistently on the field and clearing packs would be the skeletons. And that practically solves the problem of clear speed while using the Reaper. Even with its nerfs to the skeletons while the reaper is on the field, the skeletons do a good job at what they do. More power to our skeletal friends. I suggest placing the Skeletons to a link Melee Splash in this regard. Additional Information from other players:
Bonus_Stuff!!!
" " " Closing thoughts: With all that said, I hope you found some of the information I have inspiring; or at the very least helpful in one way or another. I personally wanted to try the reaper as my league starter, but the testing in standard took longer than expected so I went with an ordinary army for now in the league. I'll probably try the reaper again once I have enough currency to invest into a build 'just' for it. For me, GGG did a fine job with this one. It's really a minion you have to invest in and you can see that it was designed to be a 'solo' minion; with other minion's support in some ways. It's still a minion that needs its friends, but it prefers to work alone. It's Batman. Aside from that, I do think the Reaper's base damage should be buffed. Its not entirely the 'one big minion masterpiece' that it could be given its current stats; especially since an army from a level 20 summon skeletons gem beat a level 20 version of summon reaper in a fair fight (as of pre-3.15.0d; the buffs to the reaper has to be tested, but otherwise, I'm sticking to my previous results that the base army from a level 20 skeleton gem is stronger than a base level 20 reaper). I get this feeling that the Reaper should be the 'boss' of the skeletons rather than the skeletons being stronger than it. Just imagine: The other minions are the gang Passione from Jojo and the reaper being an unexperienced Giorno. I see potential. Well, if I made an error or anything, feel free to comment below <3 I'll update the post if I find anything new or if there's an error pointed out But aside from that, I want to know your thoughts on our new resident Jack Skellington. Goodluck fellow exiles! - Reinier
About_the_Phase-Run-Weaponing_Build_Experiments
To the people that shared their input in a post I made a few weeks back, about builds that we could potentially make to weaponize Phase Run, I have to apologize that it might take a while before my next update on that project. The new mana cost changes and over-all nerfs to damage output is gonna make those projects a little harder to manage for the meantime. Thanks for the input though! - Reinier Act Rush Service~ IGN: Athiana_ Last edited by Reinier11 on Jul 29, 2021, 11:46:53 PM Last bumped on Aug 1, 2021, 1:30:50 PM
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Did a first unoptimised test a few days ago.
https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/3148505/page/6 Now that POB with gem info dropped, the gems i will run in my new tests and imo is the best combination for overall damage in combination with impale. Reaper Brutality (all damage) Multistrike (default attack, Ultimate) Impale (all damage) Conc effect (Ultimate,Whirl, Combo Slash) Minion Damage (affects all damage) Pulversise only affects Ultimate, while Melee Phys default attack + Ultimate. Ruthless nothing. And a second Reaper gem setup to spam his Ultimate and have more room for dmg links on the summoned Main Reaper. Low level gem is enough with second wind and if enough slots faster casting. Masterpiece of 3.16 lore "A mysterious figure appears out of nowhere, trying to escape from something you can't see. She hands you a rusty-looking device called the Blood Crucible and urges you to implant it into your body." Only usable with Ethanol Flasks Last edited by gandhar0 on Jul 27, 2021, 7:26:37 PM
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Very helpful, I was waiting on playing this skill.
~ Adapt, Improvise and Overcome
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(Thread updated for patch 3.15.0d)
I'm glad it helped some people <3 Take care out there exiles!!! Act Rush Service~ IGN: Athiana_
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Thank you very much, that was interesting to read.
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 One idea how to solve mana issues and bypass any mana investment. Reaper will eat skeletons. She just does that randomly. Won't do it while idle but will prioritize while on low life. If someone is interested this is what i've been working on to improve damage and clear with Reaper. (I've used build template for Cold Carrion Golems and modded it by Deadandlivin) https://pastebin.com/hzyYnVPF Idea is to go with Occultist,cold conversion and pops for clear. Double curse, EE and Second Wind. Second Wind in main 6L makes her more mobile because you can use her twice in a row and improve single target dps. Last edited by TorsteinTheFallen on Jul 28, 2021, 4:42:27 AM
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Some PoB numbers of the different Reaper abilities with my current gear (public) and Gem level 25 as Guardian. In this case all buffs are activated and with skeletons in mind, buffing & feeding the Reaper.
Spoiler
 Did a quick additional test with the new support gems mentioned here. Tested on purpose without other minions, for the most part, to see the pure damage only the Reaper does without its consume buff ability and without other minions buffing it. Keep in mind in this case without: feeding frenzy buff / maim debuff on enemies / consume speed buff. He benefits a lot from other minions buffing it and especially with gem level. With skeletons in the mix (and my salvaged shite gear + unoptimal ascendancy) Ultimate is around 402k dps, without only 287k dps. Ps: The 3x slash in the row he does is the Ultimate ability, the other less damaging abilities he spams in between are irrelevant dmg wise at my gem level. Vid: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ft55moBo_1Q Masterpiece of 3.16 lore
"A mysterious figure appears out of nowhere, trying to escape from something you can't see. She hands you a rusty-looking device called the Blood Crucible and urges you to implant it into your body." Only usable with Ethanol Flasks | |
" Nicely done! I'll add this to the main post above so that people can read this; I'll quote you of course xD " That's the same way I fix all my mana issues in the past few leagues xD well, until I get a devouring diadem which is one of my end game uniques :3. Nice to know people are doing the same xD !! After that, get 2-3 Abyss jewels with +16-20 energy shield regen and you're already good to go for "mana" in your minion builds! Act Rush Service~ IGN: Athiana_ Last edited by Reinier11 on Jul 28, 2021, 5:52:16 AM
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" How do you generate charges? Also Conduit notable does not work on minions as they are allies and no party members. https://pathofexile.fandom.com/wiki/Conduit In that case i would use holy flame totem to proc EE and grant them frenzy charges with the unique Victario's charity shield. Masterpiece of 3.16 lore "A mysterious figure appears out of nowhere, trying to escape from something you can't see. She hands you a rusty-looking device called the Blood Crucible and urges you to implant it into your body." Only usable with Ethanol Flasks Last edited by gandhar0 on Jul 28, 2021, 8:16:40 AM
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" Wrong keystone, clicked by mistake. Wanted Necromantic Aegis. https://pastebin.com/rUC2gSwG Charges you get from Victario shield on low budget or Rare crafted one that has +2 minimum Power and Frenzy charges. |
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