[outdated] Caustic Arrow Solo Map MFer (20/300+)

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Serleth wrote:

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ughidk wrote:

Serleth - thanks for the guide. I tested around in CB and really like it and looks like a great starter build for the new league. Will definitely start with this build tomorrow in Warbands.

One question about your suggested leveling method. I managed to get through Normal quite effectively with EK/Flametotem/Firetrap. It did struggle with boss fights for dps. Want to try your suggested fireball version but struggled with having enough intelligence to use fireball. How do you suggest handling the stat issues?

Also, any thoughts on using Magma orb instead? felt I was getting better boss dps from magma than fireball early on

=D Glad you were able to enjoy it.

From all reports, Magma Orb seems like it's less potent for single target and a bit underpowered atm. I didn't get a chance to test it, but I'll be muling one tomorrow to try it out.

As for requirements, Lapis amulet, Primal Spirit early, and using an extra point for Trickery (ele dmg, crit, +20 int) which will scale Flame Totem and EK (added damage gem and a herald or Anger)

Great suggestions. I will use combination of your and Chronodroid's suggestions to help with the stat requirements. Been reading more about Magma Orb and you are right. I didn't test for more than few mins anyway.

Good luck everyone :)

Some of the patch lines that affect our PA build:

Poison Arrow: Reduced the mana cost across all levels. It now grants 0.5% increased area of effect radius per 1% of quality (was 1% per 1% quality).

Fireball: Damage increased by 15%. It now has a base chance to ignite. Its projectile speed has been increased by 30%.

flametotem NOT nerfed:
Flame Totem: Now adds additional projectiles to spray as it levels up. Totem life increased. It now increases totem life by 1% per 1% quality (was 3% per 1% quality).

Increased Area of Effect: Now grants 20% increased area of effect at level 1 (up from 14%). Quality now grants increased area damage rather than area of effect.

Pierce: Base increased pierce chance starts 10% higher. It now grants 0.5% chance to pierce per 1% quality (was 0.75% per 1% quality).

Item Rarity: Increased item rarity now starts at 40% at level 1 of the gem, and increments by 1% per level.

Slower Projectiles: Now slows projectiles multiplicatively with other projectile slowing effects. Also grants 20% more projectile damage at level 1 (up from 8%).

Concentrated Effect: Now functions multiplicatively with other area of effect modifiers. In addition, the damage multiplier now starts at 40% (down from 50%). The mana cost multiplier is now 140% rather than 160%. It now grants 0.5% increased area damage per 1% of quality instead of reducing the mana cost.

Ethereal Knives: Now grants 1% Increased projectile speed per 1% quality instead of increased projectile damage.

Catarina can now craft Added Damage for Spells on a range of weapons.

No patchnote-changes to Empower or any of our core Uniques.

did I miss some?

hyped like rarely before

Dunno if this will help or not but when I played this build in beta I actually went over to the witch tree and picked up the AOE nodes through heart and soul. This was because I couldnt afford a carcass jack for a little while. I left the dualist area to last and used frenzy with gmp to generate charges. Once I had the $$$ for the carcass I just spec'd out of witch and down to dualist and started running blood rage.

Anyway patch notes are out...off to read Chris' PHD :)

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Chronodroid wrote:

Some of the patch lines that affect our PA build:


did I miss some?

hyped like rarely before

Good one is
Devourers and Plummeting Ursae now spawn with some of their group submerged and some emerged. This change was done to prevent the large amount of burst damage they could deal, causing unfair deaths regularly

As a HC I thank them ;)

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Chronodroid wrote:

Poison Arrow: Reduced the mana cost across all levels. It now grants 0.5% increased area of effect radius per 1% of quality (was 1% per 1% quality).

Fireball: Damage increased by 15%. It now has a base chance to ignite. Its projectile speed has been increased by 30%.

Flame Totem: Now adds additional projectiles to spray as it levels up. Totem life increased. It now increases totem life by 1% per 1% quality (was 3% per 1% quality).

Concentrated Effect: Now functions multiplicatively with other area of effect modifiers. In addition, the damage multiplier now starts at 40% (down from 50%). The mana cost multiplier is now 140% rather than 160%. It now grants 0.5% increased area damage per 1% of quality instead of reducing the mana cost.

These are the central ones that may have changed since Beta.

PA was given a base damage buff to the cloud, which seems to have been retracted.

Fireball was buffed, but I think this is a slightly more powerful buff even.

I figured the Flame Totem nerf was just Rory trolling. I was right.

And there were no notes before about CE being multiplicative with other AoE modifiers I don't think.

The good news is the buff they made to PA's base cloud damage (and retracted) wasn't all that significant. I think it was 500-750 or so in a more or less finished build (level 20 PA, level 2 Empower).

In other words, nothing's changed, and Fireball's definitely the go-to spell now for single target, after our EK/FT levelling setup.

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d1alup wrote:

Dunno if this will help or not but when I played this build in beta I actually went over to the witch tree and picked up the AOE nodes through heart and soul. This was because I couldnt afford a carcass jack for a little while. I left the dualist area to last and used frenzy with gmp to generate charges. Once I had the $$$ for the carcass I just spec'd out of witch and down to dualist and started running blood rage.

Anyway patch notes are out...off to read Chris' PHD :)

Missed this.

Yeah, I did the same initially in Beta. I leave it up to the player's discretion to do that or not, but I personally find once you get the AoE gem slotted in, it's not necessary to do it.

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Serleth wrote:

These are the central ones that may have changed since Beta.

PA was given a base damage buff to the cloud, which seems to have been retracted.

Fireball was buffed, but I think this is a slightly more powerful buff even.

I figured the Flame Totem nerf was just Rory trolling. I was right.

And there were no notes before about CE being multiplicative with other AoE modifiers I don't think.

The good news is the buff they made to PA's base cloud damage (and retracted) wasn't all that significant. I think it was 500-750 or so in a more or less finished build (level 20 PA, level 2 Empower).

In other words, nothing's changed, and Fireball's definitely the go-to spell now for single target, after our EK/FT levelling setup.

Blink Arrow (and Mirror Arrow) will no longer default to the standard attack if they can't be executed. This prevents the case where clicking invalid terrain while trying to Blink Arrow to safety would cause the player to fire a standard attack arrow, taking up time while they're under attack.

I'm pretty sure many changes are not mentioned, but still made it.

I posted about clarification, no answers yet.

The question is, if the the patch notes are relative to the latest 1.3.x version or relative to the latest beta version of the game.

A prominent example: They removed Freezing Pulse shotgun, but gave it almost double the damage for the beta time. Now for beta, this was still rather weak.
In the patch nodes for 2.0 they talk about 25% increased damage and that shotgunning will be gone. You see why I'm a bit confused :)

Yeah, without knowing exact values, it's hard to tell for some stuff.

EG, Flameblast cast speed change not mentioned.

Some of your HC tree variants take an extra node (2 intelligence nodes vs 1 dexterity) beside the jewel socket above 'Blood Drinker'.