[3.20] Ice Dancing Queen - Icestorm/Cyclone/CI - Viable For Everything

I think arcanist brand is really really underestimated. If I wanted to make my main build arcanist brand + WI should I still follow this build with some tweaks or would it make more sense to choose a different ascendency?

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RagozFenrir wrote:

As far as I can tell arcanist brand does far more damage than cyclone + CWC when you account for having an entire additional support gem. Swift brand support means you are casting 64% more ice storms than the base rate.

Not only does it do better single target damage but it will still clear packs as well. You have 6 brands total from the 3 additional on tree and will delete packs.

On top of all this whenever you brand recall with it bound to left mouse and walking around you'll activate all 6 brands to cast again immediately.

Forgive me if this is a stupid question, as I haven't played brands yet. But don't you still have to stop and recast the brands for .8 seconds every 3 seconds? With 6 brands, you couldn't even get them all out before the duration expired (at least not without decent cast speed investment) I mean, it's very doable, but one of the most awesome things about the CwC cyclone era is the fact that you don't have to stop in order to kill stuff.

Worth testing for sure, I'm sure there is something there, but it's not certainly not cut and dry.

The other big issue with brands is spreading yourself too thin. The defense and damage of this build comes mostly from stacking every single point of INT you can get. If you are losing 10-15 passive points picking up extra brands and cast speed on the tree, you are going to impact your defenses and damage per hit quite a bit. Again, I think there is likely something doable with brands and Ice Storm, but it's going to take a lot of experimentation.

Also, I would be very careful in your planning not to activate more than 15 ice storms every second. Awakened spell cascade activates 15 storms a sec and you can expect around 5-15 fps with that. I think hitting 20 or 30 activations would probably just crash your client.

Arcanist brand has advantages while leveling and early mapping: blue is much easier to get than green. Only one green possibly needed then: cold penetration.

At first, before Stampede, Cyclone doesn't move really fast either.

However, brands need skill investments, either increased skill duration on tree (45% for 3 points) or maybe more brands (3 points) and especially addtional brands attached to a single monster aka boss (4 points)

3-7 or maybe even 10 skillpoints is not a trivial investment. Cyclone uses a single socket in contrast, that's it. So 1 socket vs. at least 4 and probably at least 7 points since you want those 2 brands attached to the endgame boss since it doubles your DPS there. And either more duration or more brands for clear, or both.

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Breken wrote:

I think hitting 20 or 30 activations would probably just crash your client.

No, you just stay at single digit fps below 5. There was someone that did clustermines with WI, doesnt crash, fps is just bad.

Until we get the vulcan projectile cap (or icestorm mtx), we will always be bad fps.

any update regarding the viability of this build for 3.11? is it still good for endgame farming?

I'm still unsure if to start with this next league, Scion kind of sucks in the begining. But since I was able to clear all content with ease using this build I will be using it again.

Too bad about the Split P. jewels as I also was using 7 of the Int/ES and 1 Int/Mana version but seeing what some of you sai here I don't think it will be much of an issue as the build used to be strong long before Delirium.

Looking forward to seeomg the new tree and what Kelvynn and others come up with in terms of tree paths and jewel uses.

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Giammafix wrote:

any update regarding the viability of this build for 3.11? is it still good for endgame farming?

Yes. Still stronger than 3.9, which could do all. Its also insanely strong against league mechanic, since you can PRECAST!
Its just not as strong as fully min-maxed Split-Jewel 3.10.

I really hope


stuff like that will be rather easy to craft.
Hypno jewels with 2 cold and 1 int and 1 eshield are way stronger than the 3.9 tree at the start, but they are harder to craft and need like itemlevel 81-83 wheras cobald jewels can be ANY level...

Just one day left and i cannot decide. VD spellslinger or WI with arcanist brand :D Dropping brands to proc ice storms looks better for me than cwc cyclone. Also i upgraded my gpu to 1660 since last time i played WI (still have old cpu bottleneck, but game feels sooo smooth now). Checked WI with spell cascade (don't have awakened to test) with naked char, had almost no fps drops (vulkan), so i'm hoping that at least my 2nd char would be WI scion.
How hard is WI league starting? Is it possible to fast level it until a6 and respec after i get WI using respec points mostly from quest rewards? Any chances that WI with brand will be unplayable (don't want to play cwc or start another char if it will)? How hard is es and int stacking gear to obtain at league start? Depending on answers i'll chose between vd and wi :)

that sounds great.
I've read many posts of people getting shotted by sirus, and barely doing damage.
the cyclone won't give stun immunity anymore, on top of that.