[3.7] SC/HC - ED/Blight Trickster - Up to 10k eHP, Layered Defense, 3m DPS

So I got to low maps in LHC after a long weekend of grinding, wondering where to go next with my gear in terms of upgrades? I'm very poor still, haven't had any good drops and have only saved up about 12c to spend, so I should probably just buy a Consuming Dark + shield next?

This is what I'm using right now



I'm guessing that I should try and swap out my chest and shield for something that has much more ES. Probably the biggest area I'm lacking right now for the move to CI?

"

Trentemoller wrote:

So I got to low maps in LHC after a long weekend of grinding, wondering where to go next with my gear in terms of upgrades? I'm very poor still, haven't had any good drops and have only saved up about 12c to spend, so I should probably just buy a Consuming Dark + shield next?

Spoiler

I see a lot of people using Consuming Dark in this thread, but I suggest grabbing a decay wand/dagger for now. Early in the league, gear and gem levels are way too low to make good use of poison, and you'll be struggling with mana to keep spamming ED for single target. You'll get more bang for your bucks with a decay weapon, plus it's cheaper. Upgrade to CD later in the league, from personal experience around 25-30k tooltip dps.

Apart from weapon, I'd look for a 300+ es shield and 5L chest which is also dirt cheap, then start upgrading everything else. For the 5th link, I suggest pierce so ED can apply decay to multiple mobs in a pack and swap to slower proj for hard bosses.

I went CI with 6.5k ES and never looked back. Now I'm sitting comfortably at 8k, but my damage is a bit lacking still. I also forgot the pain of less regen maps, and mana in general. For smooth play, I have to use Rallying Cry and use 4% reduced reservation to use Contagion + ED without any delay.

Edit: double post

"

I see a lot of people using Consuming Dark in this thread, but I suggest grabbing a decay wand/dagger for now. Early in the league, gear and gem levels are way too low to make good use of poison, and you'll be struggling with mana to keep spamming ED for single target. You'll get more bang for your bucks with a decay weapon, plus it's cheaper. Upgrade to CD later in the league, from personal experience around 25-30k tooltip dps.

Is decay really cheaper? It looks like the essence is 9c on legacy league, and you aren't guaranteed good rolls off a wand.

"

Yoluun wrote:

"

I see a lot of people using Consuming Dark in this thread, but I suggest grabbing a decay wand/dagger for now. Early in the league, gear and gem levels are way too low to make good use of poison, and you'll be struggling with mana to keep spamming ED for single target. You'll get more bang for your bucks with a decay weapon, plus it's cheaper. Upgrade to CD later in the league, from personal experience around 25-30k tooltip dps.

Is decay really cheaper? It looks like the essence is 9c on legacy league, and you aren't guaranteed good rolls off a wand.

Decay Sais were cheaper than CDs when I bought mine earlier today

General question, but where do yall get most of the DPS from? My tooltip says only 4.6k right now, and that's with a 5L

I'm wondering the same thing. Seems like damage comes straight from gem levels and gem quality, as well as the DoT skills in the skill tree.

One thing I'm not sure about is the skill duration/Potency of Will node, and how that affects our dps, or does it just extend the duration.

I don't think DOT stuff goes on the tooltip? But I am not someone who knows things.

Since most people are wondering about poison, scaling and duration, I can sum it up quickly like this:

Get a decay weapon as early as possible. It will help you a lot in the early stages. I am Low Life with 20/20 ED on a 5L and I am still using a decay weapon. A decay weapon with useless rolls is better than Consuming Dark. If you can afford decay, get decay.

We scale our damage by getting around 5-600% increased damage from the tree and gear. It is when all our "more" multipliers from the gem links starts getting good we see the real dps. Getting stuck at around 10-20k DPS is completely normal. drop down a few map tiers, and you are good to go. Keep in mind that tooltip DPS as ED is never the real DPS, and even at 20k DPS you can easily kill t14-t15 bosses.

The duration is not very important when you use decay, and can be skipped. The problem many end up with is a combination of a bit too low DPS and not enough duration to kill monster because of that. First monster dies, ED spreads to the rest of the pack, ED runs out. We have achieved nothing this way, and the increased duration nodes helps a great deal fixing this issue. When we eventually go back to Consuming dark to really wreck things at high gear levels, the 3 points in increased duration gives us literally millions of DPS.