[outdated] Caustic Arrow Solo Map MFer (20/300+)

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Serleth wrote:

The manual frenzy is for prolonged fights when you won't be killing anything, but since 90% of your map time is spent killing stuff, Blood Rage just makes life easier. It's guaranteed uptime on frenzy charges with minimal time investment. Just min-max stuff to run both.

Not to mention, a Frenzy - GMP - Curse on hit - Vulnerability setup is really convenient. It breaks barrels. It keeps Frenzy up on bosses. It can pierce enough to apply a quick Vuln to a big pack to help you take it down faster (I tend to save wither for bosses, really). It juices. It dices. It slices. :)

running shadow IR
sigh, colouring 3 blue is so meh, 4k dps is also a bit meh, enough for merc DL tho.
i decided to run like that

switch aoe for irr for bosses only. playing safe way tho, so im just starting maps at 72 with 4k hp and 50% phys reductiod

wither rocks hard, using this setup atm


was lucky to get lvl2 enlighten from box, and that made running clarity+grace a lot easier.

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That Jewel in the shadow area seems really expensive too, and in my opinion should be the last jewel slot to get. Not only does it cost the 2 dex to get it, but it also costs coldhearted calculation and the near-by evasion/energy shield node. It seems best to get the one by method of madness first, or even the one by golumn's blood.

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d) It's two points. We don't get coldhearted calculation. We go up, get Nullification, cut across into Blood Drinker, then deliberately path up beside the jewel socket on the way to Growth and Decay, specifically to save the travel point.

If we look at the image below, we are at the 'standard' position before working our way up to Growth and Decay (point A). Which path to take? The path on the left gives us 10% evasion, 5% energy shield, 12% AS, 20% mana regen and 12% spell dmg (inconsequential). The path on the right gives us 10 dex. Do you have a jewel? If no, take left path. If yes, read on.

So if you have a jewel, then the path on the right makes more sense (puts you close to jewel location). But that jewel had better be worth the extra 2 points + all that stuff I just listed out - because that is the 'true cost' of taking the right hand path. That's why I said it is an expensive jewel slot (compared to the other ones). It only saves a travel point IF your jewel is worth those other downsides. Otherwise it is a worse path to take.

In conclusion, take every other jewel slot first before taking that one - it's expensive.

http://imgur.com/cSJc0IZ

Demonstration tree only.

Initial segment (from Shadow): 10 points.

Now you take Blood Drinker, you want Sniper, which means Nullification is fine for the 1 point investment.

17 points This is the fork point.

Your suggested left path through Coldhearted Calculation in order to grab that jewel, and growth and decay:

27 points

Conversely, pathing right:

26 points

Remember: you'll already have pathed up to Growth and Decay along that right hand side before you take any jewel slots, anywhere on the tree, because you need the base increase in damage from Growth and Decay.

Why the right hand side regardless? Because:

Even if you remove the jewel from the equation entirely, the Coldhearted Calculation path is 24 points, meanwhile so is the right hand path.

Therefore this:

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Do you have a jewel? If no, take left path.

Makes no sense. You take the right hand path REGARDLESS of whether or not you have a jewel, because you're wasting a point, or regrets, going through Coldhearted Calculation by the time you want to path into the jewel anyway. So, you path right.

Sorry buddy, but you're wrong. There's only one jewel in the tree that's less expensive, and that's between Duelist and Ranger on the way to Scion.

@ Serleth- what are your current DPS numbers?

Check OP for Standard dps, though it doesn't have the switch from SP to VM.

Currently 4.240k in Talisman, level 71, no charges, no golem.

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Your suggested left path through Coldhearted Calculation in order to grab that jewel, and growth and decay:

No, not my suggestion at all. I'm suggesting that going the coldhearted way and completely skipping the jewel is worth evaluating as a 26 point alternative to going the right path and getting the jewel slot, and that getting the jewel requires the sacrifice of coldhearted + 10% evasion and 5% es.

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Sorry buddy, but you're wrong. There's only one jewel in the tree that's less expensive, and that's between Duelist and Ranger on the way to Scion.

Most jewel slots require going off path 2 points. The one between ranger / duelist is a 1 point wonder (excellent value). This one requires 2 points, but also taking a route that has less-desirable stats, making it less efficient... and should be taken into consideration when choosing that jewel slot. That makes it 'the most expensive' by a wide margin.

Lets examine this slot with Armageddon bliss (your jewel from front page). For the same amount of points, you can have AB (7% life, 10% stun recovery, 10% proj dmg) + the int nodes and dex nodes to get it - or you can have the coldhearted path, and get 2 more 5% healths, or another 2 10% proj damage somewhere. Viewed as a bundle of 4 points (2 for the path, 2 for the jewel) that jewel pales in comparison to points spent elsewhere. For a causal player without top-end jewels, coldhearted makes a lot of sense.

But whatever - you can socket sol shard or AB in there, and I'll pick up cloth and chain instead for the same cost.

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SoSkrood wrote:

and that getting the jewel requires the sacrifice of coldhearted + 10% evasion and 5% es.

Most jewel slots require going off path 2 points. The one between ranger / duelist is a 1 point wonder (excellent value). This one requires 2 points, but also taking a route that has less-desirable stats, making it less efficient...

Exceedingly minimal benefits. In fact, basically worthless. You don't use ES in this build, and 10% evasion without any health benefit has no point.



That all res means Andvarius gets equipped a lot sooner, and we get dps.

Took me 20 alts.

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For the same amount of points, you can have AB (7% life, 10% stun recovery, 10% proj dmg) + the int nodes and dex nodes to get it - or you can have the coldhearted path, and get 2 more 5% healths, or another 2 10% proj damage somewhere.

Viewed as a bundle of 4 points (2 for the path, 2 for the jewel) that jewel pales in comparison to points spent elsewhere.

You're basically only gaining 10% Evasion and some mana regeneration, which isn't even required. The ES has no value, and 10% evasion on its own isn't significant enough to warrant caring about.

Essentially, worthless. Meaning, you're getting basically the same effect taking attribute nodes anyway, for all you'll actually feel the difference.

Therefore we're only dealing with two nodes for the jewel. 5% life & 10% proj damage versus a very affordable 2-affix blue jewel (1-4 fusings) that can have a 7% life roll and 13% damage roll.

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For a causal player without top-end jewels, coldhearted makes a lot of sense.

As above, no. It's ineffectual points.

It's significantly better to prepare for a jewel socket. You can buy a two-affix jewel as above for 1-4 fusings, at which point it immediately becomes more efficient to socket a jewel rather than having 10% evasion. A jewel of that cost is attainable for even the most casual of players.

Since most people don't value resistance on jewels, you can get a life + damage + resistance jewel for 2-4 chaos. That's three valuable affixes for this build, readily attainable.

I appreciate what you're trying to say but literally any useable two-affix jewel that beats out the minimum roll immediately is more efficient than any one standard node on the tree. By standard, I mean 10% damage, 5% life.

I mean if you really want to waste the regret to respec after you grab that duelist/ranger jewel, then yeah, it's the absolute most bare minimum improvement compared to preparing your tree to take that jewel, but those are quest respec points you could be spending to tweak your tree if you need to make adjustments or if you're a new enough player and are constantly moving points around, suddenly you're spending regrets which slows down your gear progression.

In other words, I'm thinking for the long-term game of this build to absolutely maximize its efficiency from start to finish, rather than worrying about minimal benefits en route to completing the build.

what do u think about running essence drain as extra dmg for killing bosses?

do chaos dps stack? PA + ED dmg?

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unlucky_child wrote:

what do u think about running essence drain as extra dmg for killing bosses?

do chaos dps stack? PA + ED dmg?

Yes, it does, and I've been using it myself. Not sure it'll be necessary in a finished build but while levelling it's super awesome.

Also, put Wither in a Spell Totem. =)