[3.21] Vatinas' Spiders + HoP Guardian - CI, 70K armour, 1400 ES on block, millions of DPS

Nope, it gets replaced witha Watcher's Eye as you get more currency

"Note that Energised Armour is very cheap with corrupted blood immunity, and, socketed below the start of the Templar, grants us the massive amount of 6K armour at the price of 200 ES. This might seem like a bad tradeoff at first, but keep in mind that armour = ES gained on block = effective survivability. You will almost never go below 75% ES, so losing 200 ES really is no big deal - while 6K armour means 120 more ES gained on block, i.e. at almost every hit we receive. Ultimately, you should look for one of the other jewels with the Corrupted Blood corruption and replace this with a Watcher's Eye (see below), but this is a great budget option."

I second everything Dobarn has been saying :) (Thanks again for helping with the answers by the way <3)

Just trying this build and so far it feels really good - i didn't expect spider's AI to be THIS aggressive, i would say half of their strength comes from it.
It will be sad when the harvest crafting will go away, it looks "relatively easy" to get "perfect" abyss jewels by buying +spellblock +t1 mana then target annulling the useless modifiers and target exalting defense for ES / elemental for resistances.
I have a question about watcher's eye - how strong is %damage reduction from Determination option? I'm thinking about maybe trying to get clarity "mana as es" option as it will grant a really decent amount of ES, it will obviously mess the gemslots a bit, but i believe a place for it could be found while also squeezing out the last bits of reserved mana for a bit more of armor/es.

"

MrOger wrote:

Just trying this build and so far it feels really good - i didn't expect spider's AI to be THIS aggressive, i would say half of their strength comes from it.
It will be sad when the harvest crafting will go away, it looks "relatively easy" to get "perfect" abyss jewels by buying +spellblock +t1 mana then target annulling the useless modifiers and target exalting defense for ES / elemental for resistances.
I have a question about watcher's eye - how strong is %damage reduction from Determination option? I'm thinking about maybe trying to get clarity "mana as es" option as it will grant a really decent amount of ES, it will obviously mess the gemslots a bit, but i believe a place for it could be found while also squeezing out the last bits of reserved mana for a bit more of armor/es.

Phys damage reduction is huge. For instance, going from 80% phys damage reduction to 90% might seem "meh", but it literally halves the physical damage you take (you go from taking 20% to taking 10% of incoming damage), so I really wouldn't drop it.

Hello Vatinas, Thank you for the detailed build. I'm gonna give this build a shot but i'm not a big fan of Cyclone. You mentioned we are free to use whatever skill we want, I'm just curious what other skills have you seen other people use that has decent results?

"

TommyLin1989 wrote:

Hello Vatinas, Thank you for the detailed build. I'm gonna give this build a shot but i'm not a big fan of Cyclone. You mentioned we are free to use whatever skill we want, I'm just curious what other skills have you seen other people use that has decent results?

I've never seen anyone use anything else than Cyclone to be honest. Cyclone has a very fast attack speed and allows you move while attacking, and no other skill has anything comparable; that doesn't mean you shouldn't look for a skill you like! :) It just means that I haven't experimented with anything else. If you want a starting point, I guess you could check the wiki page for attack skills, and look at what's there :)

Hi Vatinas,

THANK YOU for this AWESOME 10/10 build.

I have played this build twice in HC Harvest and have the following discoveries to contribute in no particular order:

1. Deathmark on spiders seems to also control HoP AI (even if HoP is not linked to DM) as the manual part of it is a targeted skill and minions generally swap aggro to target on things you click on.

2. HoP + Impale + Rotten Claws + Dread Banner = 90% chance to impale for HoP. The HoP inflicts large impales which are then procced by spiders. Spiders are able to proc all HoP impale stacks instantly so impale ends up acting like crit+crit multi for HoP. On single targets, the Impale DPS from spiders themselves also gets very high.

3. I added skitterbots and banner by using cluster jewels with uncompromising + self control and another one that gives uncompromising + stalwart.

4. Jade flask + Skin of Loyal + Shapers Touch = 10k EVA = +43% chance to dodge which is extremely strong. This pretty much makes a jade flask better than all other flasks for the 5th slot.

5. Molten Shell + max Inc Duration bound to left click = 5.91 secs of "invulnerability" with a 4 sec cool down.

6. Take Wicked Ward, our ES is constantly recharging as if we have 3k es regen/sec. Normally WW sucks but on this build since we can proc it reliably it is very strong, especially for Lab Traps. Just touch a trap, then proc WW then you have 4 secs of trap immunity which is enough to face tank walk thru all traps. By alternating MS and WW it is a big boost to the phased invulnerability of this build.

7. 20% inc minion dmg on an abyss jewel in Darkness enthroned is very strong. You can get 70% inc minion dmg this way and its the best mod for DE.

8. Arena Masters are Drox map specters that never die even without investment in minion life/regen. These specters offer a "vaal haste" type of aura for you and your minions. They are superior to Apes as the haste applies to you too so you finally get to move fast. They are superior to carrion golem as the dmg boost they offer is much greater. They also make it very easy to summon spiders as they bang their shields in unison giving you a 2 sec window to reliably summon spiders at the start of a map or during a boss phase. You won't realize how good these are until you try them. A couple of downsides are they are annoying in HO due to the noise and they also might die in AW8. Typically AW8 will kill 1 of my specters.

9. I did try an alternative build by investing in 7 points into +1 specter and grave intentions with Animated Guardian (Ephemeral Garb, King Maker, Mask of the Stitched Demon). This allows for the use of One Arena Master specter + 2 frenzy apes for maximum zoom zoom and theoretical dmg. However it was not as smooth as I imagined as you sometimes lose the fortify buff and its harder to cull things if every minion also has culling.

10. Multistrike on spiders + Flesh Offering to maximize the impale dmg and increase clear speed.

"

mav3j wrote:

Hi Vatinas,

THANK YOU for this AWESOME 10/10 build.

I have played this build twice in HC Harvest and have the following discoveries to contribute in no particular order:

1. Deathmark on spiders seems to also control HoP AI (even if HoP is not linked to DM) as the manual part of it is a targeted skill and minions generally swap aggro to target on things you click on.

2. HoP + Impale + Rotten Claws + Dread Banner = 90% chance to impale for HoP. The HoP inflicts large impales which are then procced by spiders. Spiders are able to proc all HoP impale stacks instantly so impale ends up acting like crit+crit multi for HoP. On single targets, the Impale DPS from spiders themselves also gets very high.

3. I added skitterbots and banner by using cluster jewels with uncompromising + self control and another one that gives uncompromising + stalwart.

4. Jade flask + Skin of Loyal + Shapers Touch = 10k EVA = +43% chance to dodge which is extremely strong. This pretty much makes a jade flask better than all other flasks for the 5th slot.

5. Molten Shell + max Inc Duration bound to left click = 5.91 secs of "invulnerability" with a 4 sec cool down.

6. Take Wicked Ward, our ES is constantly recharging as if we have 3k es regen/sec. Normally WW sucks but on this build since we can proc it reliably it is very strong, especially for Lab Traps. Just touch a trap, then proc WW then you have 4 secs of trap immunity which is enough to face tank walk thru all traps. By alternating MS and WW it is a big boost to the phased invulnerability of this build.

7. 20% inc minion dmg on an abyss jewel in Darkness enthroned is very strong. You can get 70% inc minion dmg this way and its the best mod for DE.

8. Arena Masters are Drox map specters that never die even without investment in minion life/regen. These specters offer a "vaal haste" type of aura for you and your minions. They are superior to Apes as the haste applies to you too so you finally get to move fast. They are superior to carrion golem as the dmg boost they offer is much greater. They also make it very easy to summon spiders as they bang their shields in unison giving you a 2 sec window to reliably summon spiders at the start of a map or during a boss phase. You won't realize how good these are until you try them. A couple of downsides are they are annoying in HO due to the noise and they also might die in AW8. Typically AW8 will kill 1 of my specters.

9. I did try an alternative build by investing in 7 points into +1 specter and grave intentions with Animated Guardian (Ephemeral Garb, King Maker, Mask of the Stitched Demon). This allows for the use of One Arena Master specter + 2 frenzy apes for maximum zoom zoom and theoretical dmg. However it was not as smooth as I imagined as you sometimes lose the fortify buff and its harder to cull things if every minion also has culling.

10. Multistrike on spiders + Flesh Offering to maximize the impale dmg and increase clear speed.

Do you mind sharing your pob? Was hoping to get more damage from my minions

"

mav3j wrote:

Hi Vatinas,

THANK YOU for this AWESOME 10/10 build.

I have played this build twice in HC Harvest and have the following discoveries to contribute in no particular order:

1. Deathmark on spiders seems to also control HoP AI (even if HoP is not linked to DM) as the manual part of it is a targeted skill and minions generally swap aggro to target on things you click on.

2. HoP + Impale + Rotten Claws + Dread Banner = 90% chance to impale for HoP. The HoP inflicts large impales which are then procced by spiders. Spiders are able to proc all HoP impale stacks instantly so impale ends up acting like crit+crit multi for HoP. On single targets, the Impale DPS from spiders themselves also gets very high.

3. I added skitterbots and banner by using cluster jewels with uncompromising + self control and another one that gives uncompromising + stalwart.

4. Jade flask + Skin of Loyal + Shapers Touch = 10k EVA = +43% chance to dodge which is extremely strong. This pretty much makes a jade flask better than all other flasks for the 5th slot.

5. Molten Shell + max Inc Duration bound to left click = 5.91 secs of "invulnerability" with a 4 sec cool down.

6. Take Wicked Ward, our ES is constantly recharging as if we have 3k es regen/sec. Normally WW sucks but on this build since we can proc it reliably it is very strong, especially for Lab Traps. Just touch a trap, then proc WW then you have 4 secs of trap immunity which is enough to face tank walk thru all traps. By alternating MS and WW it is a big boost to the phased invulnerability of this build.

7. 20% inc minion dmg on an abyss jewel in Darkness enthroned is very strong. You can get 70% inc minion dmg this way and its the best mod for DE.

8. Arena Masters are Drox map specters that never die even without investment in minion life/regen. These specters offer a "vaal haste" type of aura for you and your minions. They are superior to Apes as the haste applies to you too so you finally get to move fast. They are superior to carrion golem as the dmg boost they offer is much greater. They also make it very easy to summon spiders as they bang their shields in unison giving you a 2 sec window to reliably summon spiders at the start of a map or during a boss phase. You won't realize how good these are until you try them. A couple of downsides are they are annoying in HO due to the noise and they also might die in AW8. Typically AW8 will kill 1 of my specters.

9. I did try an alternative build by investing in 7 points into +1 specter and grave intentions with Animated Guardian (Ephemeral Garb, King Maker, Mask of the Stitched Demon). This allows for the use of One Arena Master specter + 2 frenzy apes for maximum zoom zoom and theoretical dmg. However it was not as smooth as I imagined as you sometimes lose the fortify buff and its harder to cull things if every minion also has culling.

10. Multistrike on spiders + Flesh Offering to maximize the impale dmg and increase clear speed.

Hi,

1. I've heard someone make the same remark, so it's possible, but Deathmark is still a huge damage gem nonetheless, so I'm planning to keep it.

2. Yes, it's possible to play pure phys, but I find the "phys as extra chaos" version stronger, for a few reasons.
a. Since the spiders hit very quickly, and since all 20 of them do, it's one of the rare instances in the game where we can reliably apply the maximum stacks of Withered, which is an insane damage increase if you invest in chaos damage. With Spirit Offering, even sentinels deal substantial chaos damage, which is further increased by withered.
b. It's easier to fit in "phys as extra chaos" gems into HoP compared to pure phys, as well as not requiring any other aura. This allows us to keep the Stalwart Commander notable, which is insane defensively. Since you play HC, I'm assuming you know what you're talking about in terms of defence, but I still prefer having this notable over Self Control / Uncompromising.
c. Going pure phys is a larger investment in terms of currency and sacrificing defences, and the damage increase you get from it is just not worth it in my opinion.

That being said, please feel free to keep experimenting with pure phys, and sharing your experiments with others here (myself included of course). :)

3. See 2. Also, I have fiddled around with 2 medium cluster versions of the build, and didn't like it; we get a lot of very good nodes from the tree, each of them having their own specific purpose, and I think all of them are crucial.

4. That's a good point, I was so focused on armour and block that I didn't consider the evasion we got from those two items! I'll look into it. :)

5. I don't like having Molten Shell on left click, for the simple reason that I want to control when I use it. 99% of the time, you don't need it anyway; and in the 1% of the time when you do, why take the risk of not having it up? I'm thinking, for instance, about Kosis' "leap slam" thingy, Sirus' meteor, harvest T4 seed bursts...

6. Wicked Ward halves our ES regen, which, unlike ES recharge, is constant and consistent. I'd much rather have permanent regen than occasional recharge. Plus, the only thing that can actually kill us is DoT, and DoT is exactly what regen is good against and recharge is bad against (since it prevents the start of the recharge). So I don't think that keystone is a good grab, unfortunately.

7. Indeed, you're right, but I prefer getting defensive stats in the implicits of my jewels. That being said, I mostly want mana, and ES/armour as a prefix is optional, so maybe I could look into jewels with mana + minion damage on them. I'll check it out :)

8. I had never heard of those! They sound interesting for sure. Plus, other pro of them, they get two support gems instead of "just" one like the golem, since we don't need to cast them when stunned. Feeding Frenzy, and maybe minion life to make them beefier? Like mentioned before, they should already have decent(ish) resists from Spirit Offering, so I'll need to flesh out the details. Also, remember that out Warcry taunts enemies, which could help them survive in A8 fights?... I'll be sure to give it a try!

9. Yes, I understand the problems you faced. But maybe it could still be a good idea, even without Death Attunement (to some extent)? Giving our guardian (the animated one :p) something else than Kingmaker could possibly solve the mentioned issues. I have to be honest, I have no idea what other weapon could be good on him, since Kingmaker has always been the go-to weapon... Apparently, giving him United in Dream won't give the Envy aura. Sign of the Sin Eater could make us "immune" to elemental ailments, and giving him Soulwrest + the abyss boots could give everyone 5% life (or ES, for us) regen as long as we desecrate under tht guardian... Lots of options. I'll look closer into it, but the idea sure is interesting. (Also, I hadn't thought about using Mask of the Stitched Demon for guardian regen without investing in minion life regen, nice one)

10. Like I mentioned before, I prefer the "phys as extra chaos" version. :)


Thank a lot for those remarks!

Awesome build, am I missing something? Where does the bleeding come from? Lotta skills do a ton more dmg with bleeding and I dont see what causes bleed in the build.

I added bleed+impale to cyclone and put cull and maim in place of empower/bloodlust on the 6L so I could run clarity with watcher's eye----gave me 9775 health @ lvl 93. I have 2 24% Circles of Guilt.