What do I do?

[essjayehm 58]

Well, I thought about this for long enough now... and still cannot decide for myself. I've been working on an elf for a while now, and she has been doing very well for me so far. I know how much you guys love to scroll past blurbs like this , so straight to the build:

 

Attributes: 1 in Vitality level 2-49. All remaining into Intelligence level 50 on.

 

Bargaining - Necessary for me as I am offline, so no trading for the good stuff, I gotta buy it myself.

Concentration - 1 point only for this build. I'm not interested in a 3rd buff, and regen times are not an issue.

Delphic Arcania LORE - I put 21 points here ASAP. With one point in DA Lore later, this gives me 5 mod points for GI and Magic Coup.

Mystic Stormite FOCUS - I'm using the Crystal Skin buff and Glacial Thorns. 5 points has given me one mod for each of those Combat Arts

Armour Lore - Need 5 points to open Constitution. Spell Resistance doesn't work (I think) on console, and Pacificism isn't needed.

Constitution - Kept at character level until level 75, then master other skills before putting any more here.

Delphic Arcania FOCUS - to bump the levels of my Grand Invigoration and Magic Coup.

Ancient Magic - Will be mastered first along with Barg. and Constitution at level 75.

 

CA mods:

Glacial Thorns - Fusillade (more thorns)

Crystal Skin - forget the name, bronze mod to reflect detrimental effects

Magic Coup - Sure hits, steal mana, stray damage

Grand Invigoration - Stormite focus, life energy.

 

The "vision" or direction of this build was to make a "quadruple"-aspect High Elf. Yes, there are only 3 Combat Art aspects, but I have always considered melee/ranged a seperate "aspect" of a character, and I want my elf to do it all.

 

OK, firstly one notices there are only 8 skills here, and this is the point of my post. HALP!

The short-list of skills:

Arrant Pyromancer LORE - I am mostly using Blazing Tempest from AP aspect, and the lore is better than focus for this CA (IMO).

Mystic Stormite LORE - This will give some more damage for my Thorns, and increase the Physical Resistance offered by Crystal Skin.

Shield Lore - Will add a couple of layers of defence for the build.

Combat Discipline - Adds damage, reduces regen times, but most importantly lets me have 3-CA combos.

Enhanced Perception - mostly for the experience. per kill mods, but the MF is like icing on the cake.

 

So, at level 62, I have +allskills at about +34, so picking the skills gives me the following results:

 

AP LORE - Adding 9 points will give me 3 mod points. One would be to Incendary Shower (Skull Smash) and this would then become a bosskilling combat art (stun-locking the boss, makes things VERY easy . The other 2 would be for Blazing Tempest, and I would go with the "damage" mods. The results from this pick are very attractive: Current BT level 15.? has 192 damage, with 84.4 DoT. Adding the Lore and the 2 mods puts it up to 409 damage and 406 on the DoT. Since the DoT is what I'm using BT for, this is an increase of 500% DoT damage.

 

MS LORE - 1 point only. This increases the physical resistance bonus from Crystal Skin from 592 to 1166 (with the buff-suit). It also bumps the damage of Glacial Thorns by almost 50%.

 

Shield Lore - 1 point for now. This increases my defense value from 274 to 578, and the unlockable scaling block value would be 51.5%

 

Combat Discipline - was part of the original plan, but 2 things are working against it: I dislike combos (buggy on console) and we're not entirely sure how it works. Of course, having 3 combat arts in a combo opens up some of Rooster's immortality suggestions for the HE.

 

EP - For the Chance to find valuables and Experience per kill unlockable modifiers; pretty much I threw it in there for discussion purposes. With this build, I am not very interested in those mods. Yes, I am

 

With 2 skills to pick, I am uncertain about the "quadruple" aspect, but Bargaining can solve "almost everything" so I still cling to that dream a little. I'll give my thoughts, and I would greatly appreciate all comments and concerns from y'all.

 

Shield Lore + Combat Discipline: This was the "original" build idea, with Shield Lore additional defense, and CD adding offence (and indirectly, defense!) The general uncertainty of how CD works has me doubting that I need that skill.

 

Stormite Lore + Shield Lore: Will give the build the full benefit of the Stormite aspect. The best thing about these 2 skills in tandem is that the Orc Cave becomes less of a "scary" experience. BUT, Expulse pretty much does that already

 

Stormite Lore + Pyromancer Lore: That damage increase for BT is just too huge to ignore. With Ancient Magic mastery, the DoT "should" (I've never tested) do decent damage because the resistances/immunities would be lowered.

 

And my reasoning for having EP listed: IF taking AP Lore spreads my toon too thin, AND MS Lore doesn't "do enough" to justify the skill pick, AND Combat Discipline isn't a good option either, then it would be Shield Lore + EP.

 

Alrighty, that's it in a nutshell. Now you may proceed to call me all sorts of nasty things, but comments on the build would be appreciated

[chattius 2,527]

I would have chosen:

 

bargaining

arcane lore

armour

arcane focus

concentration

fire focus

shield

combat discipline

ice focus

constitution

 

The idea is that with 5 different damage types, there should be no need for ancient magic to break resistances.

We need arcane lore to boost life regeneration from buff and fixed life leech of magic coup. The fire and ice lore we will replace with combat discipline. Casting speed and more fire/ice damage can be got with the fire monkey buff and the skins.

 

As a bargainer we have to keep a skill or two low for quite a while. My choose would be constitution.

 

We will be able to modify all arcane spells, 123 in arcane focus, 75 in lore.

With 75 in fire and ice focus we will be able to modify 3 spells in each of these aspects.

Fire: fire skin, fire monkey (casting speed and fire damage) and a spell you like...

Ice: crystal skin, cascading shroud and a spell you like...

 

Modify magic coup for life leech, with regeneration per hit you will have high level magic coups and with them fixed life leechs in the thousands late game. While x% life leech is deadly for bosses, it has less use for normal beasts. But fixed life leech is great for these nasty fen fires and other ghosts/spirits which are resistant to magical damage. And this fixed life leech works on every target of magic coups stray damage modifier,

[essjayehm 58]

I would have chosen:

 

bargaining

arcane lore

armour

arcane focus

concentration

fire focus

shield

combat discipline

ice focus

constitution

 

The idea is that with 5 different damage types, there should be no need for ancient magic to break resistances.

We need arcane lore to boost life regeneration from buff and fixed life leech of magic coup. The fire and ice lore we will replace with combat discipline. Casting speed and more fire/ice damage can be got with the fire monkey buff and the skins.

 

As a bargainer we have to keep a skill or two low for quite a while. My choose would be constitution.

 

We will be able to modify all arcane spells, 123 in arcane focus, 75 in lore.

With 75 in fire and ice focus we will be able to modify 3 spells in each of these aspects.

Fire: fire skin, fire monkey (casting speed and fire damage) and a spell you like...

Ice: crystal skin, cascading shroud and a spell you like...

 

Modify magic coup for life leech, with regeneration per hit you will have high level magic coups and with them fixed life leechs in the thousands late game. While x% life leech is deadly for bosses, it has less use for normal beasts. But fixed life leech is great for these nasty fen fires and other ghosts/spirits which are resistant to magical damage. And this fixed life leech works on every target of magic coups stray damage modifier,

 

Well, since noone else wants to add their comments here... maybe we can debate some finer points of 3-aspect building, obviously for the elf. I guess I can add more reasoning for my build of this toon:

 

The original plan was only to use Blazing Tempest, Glacial Thorns and Magic Coup, with Crystal Skin and Grand Invigoration for buffs. So, effectively I was only thinking of the 3 damage types (Fire, Ice and Magic). Posion damage is hard to proc with the elf (I only ever poisoned an enemy with poison-gloves and a "left-click" attack), and while there are Physical aspects of Magic Coup and Glacial Thorns, I wasn't really looking at physical as a major damage source.

The general playstyle was to use BT to set enemies alight, then use exploding Coups for stragglers, with Glacial Thorns for champions/elites and bosses. I forgot how useful stunning meteor showers were, so I have to add that to my bosskilling strategy if I take an AP skill. In hindsight, having 2 bosskilling Combat Arts with different damages is "a good thing"^tm

I was not going to use the stoopid monkey at all, mostly because Concentration mastery is a waste of skill points, in my opinion. Casting speed can be found with bargaining... damage can be boosted with allskills and AP Lore. AP Focus did so little in the testing I did for this topic, I completely threw it out as an option.

I have my Magic Coup modded for Regeneration per Hit - to save sockets... this may be a mistake since my regens have been VERY easy to control thus far... and with the boost from Delphic Lore, the amount of RpH is just insane... lifeleech definitely would've been better option for mob-killing. ON THE OTHER HAND... I have the option of eating 25 thousand runes into my combat arts, and I thought that would be a neat experiment, having MEGA-level combat arts regenerated in one hit from a Coup. So that debate cannot be settled yet (maybe by level 100) because I'm only at about 50 runes per CA. Except Tempest, I think I only have 20 in that one - it has a regen of 12 seconds is regenerated in one Coup +/- 1 second!

Another major aspect of the build idea was to have as FEW modified combat arts as possible. This is because I want to sink as much points into defense as possible, and try to see how fast I can get my elf into Niob with "comfortable" defences. Level 75 is always the target, but 80 is more reasonable, with 85 the "latest" for this experiment. So I cannot afford the huge amount of skill points to modify a lot of Combat Arts.

 

Uhm... I had more to say, but my tummy started rumbling and I lost my choo-choo train of thought... me hungry go home now and eat. Will get back to this debate sometime... maybe not tomorrow or even until Monday - things are pretty crazy at work now.

[essjayehm 58]

Quick update for those interested: Ran for the platinum Guardians at level 75... the first one was taking 80% of my health with one-shot, so I ran away

 

Started the Empty Office Quest, and managed to find level 95 Officer's Saber, level 90 Atamark's Star and level 90 5-channel armour (Innocents' set) while grinding. Went and re-socketed for Anneals (4) and 4x Circles of Life (+8 Vitality and ~ +1500 HP each). Put the Atamarks into a Stalwart Safeguard. Hrm.. I think this is the first time I had Officers+Safeguard... +30% Survival Bonus! Basically that means I went from 90% to 95% SB

 

Went back to battle with the Guardians @ 78... and now I realize the POWER of the hitpoint pool. There was one flash of red while battling the 3rd Guardian (he double-hit me for 95% of my health), but otherwise I had no issues taking them down; other than the fact it took a while because I removed most of my offensive socketing.

 

Of note, is that I did take Pyro Lore to give me stunning meteors, which is probably most of the reason I got thru. But, still have one unpicked skill... It'll probably end up being EP so I can go shop out some EP-scaling Experience per Kill and/or chance to find valuables.

 

Moralofthestoryedit: Gear/socketing makes the difference!

Edited October 5, 2010 by essjayehm

[wolfie2kX 528]

Quick update for those interested: Ran for the platinum Guardians at level 75... the first one was taking 80% of my health with one-shot, so I ran away

 

Started the Empty Office Quest, and managed to find level 95 Officer's Saber, level 90 Atamark's Star and level 90 5-channel armour (Innocents' set) while grinding. Went and re-socketed for Anneals (4) and 4x Circles of Life (+8 Vitality and ~ +1500 HP each). Put the Atamarks into a Stalwart Safeguard. Hrm.. I think this is the first time I had Officers+Safeguard... +30% Survival Bonus! Basically that means I went from 90% to 95% SB

 

Went back to battle with the Guardians @ 78... and now I realize the POWER of the hitpoint pool. There was one flash of red while battling the 3rd Guardian (he double-hit me for 95% of my health), but otherwise I had no issues taking them down; other than the fact it took a while because I removed most of my offensive socketing.

 

Of note, is that I did take Pyro Lore to give me stunning meteors, which is probably most of the reason I got thru. But, still have one unpicked skill... It'll probably end up being EP so I can go shop out some EP-scaling Experience per Kill and/or chance to find valuables.

 

Moralofthestoryedit: Gear/socketing makes the difference!

 

OK.. I'll throw in my 2 cents... The build looks good. I would, however, consider throwing a few runes into Cobalt Strike. Mod it so you get the chain lightning effect, chain lightning effect, and explode. As you said, having more than one boss killing CA is a good thing. CS with those mods can get you out of somewhat tricky situations since it can reflect around corners. With the explode mod, if you've got a small fairly tightly clustered mob, you can damage or even take out more than one baddie each time it bounces. Very nice.

 

And for 2 more cents, I'd throw in some more advice - invest some runes into Expulse Magic. VERY handy tool. Especially handy in certain situations - like the Yeti chief dude on Northend Island (Haenir aka Walther from the Christmas Island quest). He's quite fond of casting EM and when he does, your other CAs do NOT work too well.

 

Oh.. Here's a bonus 2 cents worth of advice... I'd look into building a few combos. I'm not entirely 100% positive how they work on consoles, but on the PC, it's fairly straightforward unlike the way combos were done in Sacred 1. Drag an empty combo onto the Combo Editor slot and then drag the CAs you want onto the available slots. Then all you need to do is bind the combo icon in place of one of your regular combat arts.

 

I'd set up 2 combos for battling the likes of Haenir and the like. First combo item would be Expulse Magic followed by either Blazing Tempest, Glacial Thorns or Cobalt Strike. The 2nd would consist of Expulse Magic and any one of the three you haven't used yet.

 

The theory here is that you'd be using EM first on Hanier or any other spot where a boss can debuff you - before he uses it against you and throwing out a CA that will do damage to him at the same time. Per the wiki, he's fairly weak against Magic and Poison - so I'd use Cobalt Strike in one of the two combos for sure.

[essjayehm 58]

OK.. I'll throw in my 2 cents... The build looks good. I would, however, consider throwing a few runes into Cobalt Strike. Mod it so you get the chain lightning effect, chain lightning effect, and explode. As you said, having more than one boss killing CA is a good thing. CS with those mods can get you out of somewhat tricky situations since it can reflect around corners. With the explode mod, if you've got a small fairly tightly clustered mob, you can damage or even take out more than one baddie each time it bounces. Very nice.

 

And for 2 more cents, I'd throw in some more advice - invest some runes into Expulse Magic. VERY handy tool. Especially handy in certain situations - like the Yeti chief dude on Northend Island (Haenir aka Walther from the Christmas Island quest). He's quite fond of casting EM and when he does, your other CAs do NOT work too well.

 

Oh.. Here's a bonus 2 cents worth of advice... I'd look into building a few combos. I'm not entirely 100% positive how they work on consoles, but on the PC, it's fairly straightforward unlike the way combos were done in Sacred 1. Drag an empty combo onto the Combo Editor slot and then drag the CAs you want onto the available slots. Then all you need to do is bind the combo icon in place of one of your regular combat arts.

 

I'd set up 2 combos for battling the likes of Haenir and the like. First combo item would be Expulse Magic followed by either Blazing Tempest, Glacial Thorns or Cobalt Strike. The 2nd would consist of Expulse Magic and any one of the three you haven't used yet.

 

The theory here is that you'd be using EM first on Hanier or any other spot where a boss can debuff you - before he uses it against you and throwing out a CA that will do damage to him at the same time. Per the wiki, he's fairly weak against Magic and Poison - so I'd use Cobalt Strike in one of the two combos for sure.

Woot! 6 cents! Now I can do my "happy dance" (a la advertising for the Lotto here in Ontario) Joking, obviously

 

I think Cobalt has about 30 or so runes in it as a "backup spell" for the early levels (while waiting for BT or GT to recharge). I was heavily debating to mod either Cobalt Strike or Magic Coup, and I chose to go with the Coup, mostly because after I modified it for RpH, I didn't have to worry about regeneration times for my Combat Arts... unless I missed (and then it got "painful"). Definitely if I had chosen to go with a "pure" caster (without Coup) then I would've done Cobalt the way Schot had it: Increase damage, chain, explosion. But chain,chain,explosion could actually end up with more damage in the endgame (due to creating more explosions because it chains more), I may test that later on after I have some "free" skill points to throw into Delphic skills. VERY interesting point, I hadn't given it much thought other than maybe chain, weaken, explode to debuff groups of enemies (esp. Orc Cave).

 

Expulse I'm still on the fence about. On one hand... it's so awesome at giving the Elf some breathing space because it fears so many enemies away. On the other hand... it fears so many enemies away it takes away from her overall experience gain since a few of the enemies don't return to the fight. Banishing spells (aka Combat Arts) is kinda like having the bestest icing in the world on the most mediocre cake. So, I haven't read any more runes into it than I've found. I actually didn't even need it for the Plat. guardians; but I do use it occasionally if I've gathered a HUGE mob, ie more than I wanted. I don't have Haenir on console, luckily. But for White Griffin and Harpy Queen, I would never battle them without Expulse, I completely agree.

 

Combos aren't too bad on console... BUT sometimes the second/third Combat Arts inthe combo do not execute and it is random how/why that happens - that fustrates me enough to not use them too often.

Rooster suggested Expulse->Incend. Shower for bossfighting but that combo doesn't work console unless you're toe-to-toe with the boss. Usually I try to stay a couple of feet away from bosses to maximize Thorns damage (standing too close can sometimes miss the boss entirely on console......)

 

TY for the reply, Wolfie! I'll have to test those Cobalt mods at some point... it's given me another thought about how to use CS!

[wolfie2kX 528]

Woot! 6 cents! Now I can do my "happy dance" (a la advertising for the Lotto here in Ontario) Joking, obviously

 

I think Cobalt has about 30 or so runes in it as a "backup spell" for the early levels (while waiting for BT or GT to recharge). I was heavily debating to mod either Cobalt Strike or Magic Coup, and I chose to go with the Coup, mostly because after I modified it for RpH, I didn't have to worry about regeneration times for my Combat Arts... unless I missed (and then it got "painful"). Definitely if I had chosen to go with a "pure" caster (without Coup) then I would've done Cobalt the way Schot had it: Increase damage, chain, explosion. But chain,chain,explosion could actually end up with more damage in the endgame (due to creating more explosions because it chains more), I may test that later on after I have some "free" skill points to throw into Delphic skills. VERY interesting point, I hadn't given it much thought other than maybe chain, weaken, explode to debuff groups of enemies (esp. Orc Cave).

 

Expulse I'm still on the fence about. On one hand... it's so awesome at giving the Elf some breathing space because it fears so many enemies away. On the other hand... it fears so many enemies away it takes away from her overall experience gain since a few of the enemies don't return to the fight. Banishing spells (aka Combat Arts) is kinda like having the bestest icing in the world on the most mediocre cake. So, I haven't read any more runes into it than I've found. I actually didn't even need it for the Plat. guardians; but I do use it occasionally if I've gathered a HUGE mob, ie more than I wanted. I don't have Haenir on console, luckily. But for White Griffin and Harpy Queen, I would never battle them without Expulse, I completely agree.

 

Combos aren't too bad on console... BUT sometimes the second/third Combat Arts inthe combo do not execute and it is random how/why that happens - that fustrates me enough to not use them too often.

Rooster suggested Expulse->Incend. Shower for bossfighting but that combo doesn't work console unless you're toe-to-toe with the boss. Usually I try to stay a couple of feet away from bosses to maximize Thorns damage (standing too close can sometimes miss the boss entirely on console......)

 

TY for the reply, Wolfie! I'll have to test those Cobalt mods at some point... it's given me another thought about how to use CS!

 

Ack..!?! No Northend Campaign/Christmas Island quests for consoles? That bites big wind. It's almost a guaranteed place to level up very quickly at least a couple of times on the PC. The critters running around on the island are almost ALWAYS in the red zone - 2 - 4 levels higher than your current level - regardless of where you're at. It's a tough grind, but usually well worth the effort unless you're playing hard core and then it becomes downright dangerous... The baddies level up whenever you do.

 

But... I digress... Haenier/Walther is a nasty piece of work. He looks like a reskinned troll from the Orc region (he's got more fur..). He comes at you with Expulse and throws fire pots under your feet and insists on you getting a wiff of his bad breath as he wails on you with wildly swinging arms. I understand there's a character in the Crystal Plains called the Guardian that is the spitting image of Haenier/Walther. He too is quite fond of the same sort of tactics.

 

Incendiary shower is yet another good CA to use against bosses and even mobs if they're closely clustered. It can be quite useful if you've got enough runes/points in the skill to knock out Mage types (Orc, Ogre, etc..) who like to drop IS on your head. And would work well enough to nail trolls as well.

[rhs408 7]

If you want to try to squeeze EP in there, at this point I think your only choice would be Combat Discipline for the last skill, which will somewhat make up for the lack of MS and AP Lore so that you'll still have some decent firepower. Either that or you'll need to pick between one of the lores, although the lore that ends up not getting picked will reduce the strength of the Combat Arts in that aspect big time... they will be almost useless once you're in niob. You'll definitely need fantastic gear with only two defensive skills, bargaining and EP should be able to accomodate that along with your Stallworth and Artamark's Star. I think Shield Lore + EP won't be viable... your offensive Combat Arts just won't be strong enough to get by in Niob.

 

Personally, I think it is a waste of a skill to get only a focus or lore and not both, unless you had gotten one of them just to open mod points for a buff or something along those lines. One very strong CA always does a lot more than two moderately strong Combat Arts, especially once you get to Niob. Nowadays, if I have to choose between focus or lore, I usually choose to get neither... Better to boost something else entirely than to boost one aspect's Combat Arts to only half their potential. This isn't directed at you essjayehm, just a general statement... I'm sure you've already been down that road a few times as far as building up just one aspect to its highest potential, and now you want to give "quad-aspect" a shot... I'm interested to hear if it works out!

 

I never realized a Circle of Life could give that much HP? I always saw that item as a very crappy unique, maybe at high levels they are useful though? Gem of Life and Kybele's Tear have always been my favs for +HP.

Edited October 5, 2010 by rhs408

[essjayehm 58]

I never realized a Circle of Life could give that much HP? I always saw that item as a very crappy unique, maybe at high levels they are useful though? Gem of Life and Kybele's Tear have always been my favs for +HP.

 

OOPS... hehehe... they were Gems, not Circles... sorry about that! I scrap Circles of Life at all levels, they are pretty crappy compared to jewels that can be shopped, at any level/difficulty.

 

I do have a Tear that I was going to socket, but didn't need any more HP's.

 

Ran Niob camp from start to Twainbrook, to set up Free World shopping and offense was actually not too bad (fighting elves and kobolds, tho) but the defense is poor. The only thing saving me there was Expulse, with 15K hitpoints as backup for the few hits that manage to get through. 35-level difference is probably going to kill her at some point, so I will probably go back and finish Platinum Empty Office Quest (25 devs to go) and maybe kill off the minibosses.

 

Did about 30 mins shopping and already have a Helm, shield, boots and bracers upgraded. Just need to find a double-deathblow ring and I'd be a very happy customer

[FrostElfGuard 9]

I would just like to say that I've been reading this thread with interest, but don't have the experience to be able to make intelligent comments.

 

So, I want to help, but... well. You know how it goes. I'm pretty sure I'm not alone in this.

[essjayehm 58]

I would just like to say that I've been reading this thread with interest, but don't have the experience to be able to make intelligent comments.

 

So, I want to help, but... well. You know how it goes. I'm pretty sure I'm not alone in this.

That's OK, Frosty! IIRC, I invited anyone to flame in the OP

 

Actually, since this is my first "serious" elf, I am sure there are some, or even a lot of insights from newer players (or non-elf players) that would actually assist me in my overall project, which is to have an Elf equally adept with all 3 aspects, AND be a melee tank as well.

 

One of the biggest hurdles for me has been the fact that All Combat Arts modifier doesn't work (offline console). So I have her designed as a rune-eating machine... teh ability to memorize up to 25,000 runes into any Combat Arts has always piqued my interest, and this girl has been very good at this so far. Thank goodness (or the Holos Bros!) for the buff suit.

[essjayehm 58]

Well, a new discovery over the weekend, probably not news to many, but the difference I noticed was quite a bit larger than I thought.

 

Bronze, Silver, Gold and Platinum difficulties - Crystal Skin is a darn good buff. In Niob - not so much.

 

Incandescent Skin >>> Crystal Skin in the highest difficulty. BIG-TIME.

 

Now, this is considering casting CS at about level 50, and IS at about level 35! 50% close combat (from fireskin) reflecting saves a ton of health potions over the physical resistance/CA reflecting of iceskin. I always felt vulnerable with her in Niob running Crystal Skin. About 10 mins of fireskin in Niob and I was pretty surprised how good that buff actually is.

 

Now I got to go and shop out 4 more fireskin buffsuit pieces. I think I will also look at getting some damage mitigation going with her, just to off-set the huge damage amounts that do get thru the reflect.

[chattius 2,527]

Yes. Thats the reason why my polearm-elf and the shield maid of my daughter started with crystal skin and changed to fire skin at higher levels. I got a lot of comments why do you modify both skins and why do you put all points in vitality

 

A variant of the pre-addon Shield Maid, using the changes brought by the addon, is quite impressive:

best possible melee and arcane damage

fire aspect: 75% of the damage a pure fire elf will do

storm aspect: 70% of the damage a pure ice elf will do

[essjayehm 58]

Yes. Thats the reason why my polearm-elf and the shield maid of my daughter started with crystal skin and changed to fire skin at higher levels. I got a lot of comments why do you modify both skins and why do you put all points in vitality

 

A variant of the pre-addon Shield Maid, using the changes brought by the addon, is quite impressive:

best possible melee and arcane damage

fire aspect: 75% of the damage a pure fire elf will do

storm aspect: 70% of the damage a pure ice elf will do

I did want to ask why you suggested modifying both skins, but I knew there was some logical reason. Actually, in hindsight, I wouldn't even use Crystal Skin in the next elf (if I would play one). So some more skill points can be saved and only modify Glacial Thorns - 9 points in Stormite Focus. I think this would lead to needing Cascading Shroud or Shadow Step some more than I did with this elf, but that is OK.

[chattius 2,527]

I did crystal skin mainly because it is easier for newbie (as my daughter was) early on. With 75 storm focus: cascading shroud, icicles and blizzard would be my 3.

[essjayehm 58]

I did crystal skin mainly because it is easier for newbie (as my daughter was) early on.

 

Very good point. She was quite "automatic" for most of the Silver-Platinum run. A few instances where she got a red flash and I had to use health potions, but generally as long as Grand Invigoration and Crystal Skin were at decent levels, there was no worries at all. Niob has been a different story so far.

[JC_Druid 0]

Enhanced Perception - mostly for the experience. per kill mods, but the MF is like icing on the cake.

 

 

 

Excuse my daftness, but how does Enhanced Perception help experience per kill?

[locolagarto 15]

Enhanced Perception - mostly for the experience. per kill mods, but the MF is like icing on the cake.

 

 

 

Excuse my daftness, but how does Enhanced Perception help experience per kill?

 

 

there are rings/ammies with XP per kill modifier that is based on the Enhanced Perception skill. the bonus scales with the EP skill level.

[JC_Druid 0]

Enhanced Perception - mostly for the experience. per kill mods, but the MF is like icing on the cake.

 

 

 

Excuse my daftness, but how does Enhanced Perception help experience per kill?

 

 

there are rings/ammies with XP per kill modifier that is based on the Enhanced Perception skill. the bonus scales with the EP skill level.

 

oh wow lol that could be killer, I have a SW level 57 with no EP but has +75% experience per kill, funny thing is most of the experience per kill gear I get that requires EP is for the Inquisitor which doesnt get EP

 

do you know the mechanics to how the experience per kill gear that requires EP and the level of EP stack or rise?

[essjayehm 58]

Enhanced Perception - mostly for the experience. per kill mods, but the MF is like icing on the cake.

 

 

 

Excuse my daftness, but how does Enhanced Perception help experience per kill?

 

 

there are rings/ammies with XP per kill modifier that is based on the Enhanced Perception skill. the bonus scales with the EP skill level.

 

oh wow lol that could be killer, I have a SW level 57 with no EP but has +75% experience per kill, funny thing is most of the experience per kill gear I get that requires EP is for the Inquisitor which doesnt get EP

 

do you know the mechanics to how the experience per kill gear that requires EP and the level of EP stack or rise?

 

Loco, don't forget that armour can be shopped that has the EP-modified experience per kill! But rings with it and a good secondary mod are VERY tough to find. IIRC, amulets with experience per kill are never EP-modified...

 

JC Druid... not too sure what exactly you're asking there, but I'll take a stab at what I think you mean...

gear with the experience per kill mods that require EP to unlock can be found on any armour piece. They can be found on gear that is 1-star OR 2-stars (magic or rare on PC). The higher your EP, then the higher the experience per kill. These mods stack without diminishing returns, so they add up normally. I am unsure exactly how much 1 point in the EP skill raises the experience per kill value, but I would guess it is different, depending on the difficulty you got the gear from (ie Niob>Plat>Gold, etc).

 

And, finally, LOL @ the Inquisitor gear comment. I get quite a few good laughs from the randomness that Sacred can generate... Elf equipment with Max. Shield Energy, Temple Guardian equipment with polearms +X, yada yada.

[JC_Druid 0]

cheers for the answer essjay answered my question perfectly

 

sorry that it was a little difficult.

 

does that mean that the same thing goes for other utility skill reliant gear?

 

ie. duration of potion effects +X% that requires alchemy would be greater the higher your alchemy is?

[chattius 2,527]

A very slow spoken yyyyyyyyyyes. In the meaning of yes, but....

 

A shield with block chance melee unlocked by shield lore will start with 24.8% and climb into 75%+ with high shield lore.

Duration of Potions will have a starting amound and gains with better alchemy. But the amount gained by higher skill is lower by more than a factor 10 compared to shields.

 

I think noone did a study how unlockable modifiers are affected by the skill-level. I hoped that alchemy did same to potion duration, but its effect is way lower.

[essjayehm 58]

I think noone did a study how unlockable modifiers are affected by the skill-level. I hoped that alchemy did same to potion duration, but its effect is way lower.

I did run some simple tests, and there is some more information than I expected: For Enhanced Perception, there are 2 unlockable mods - experience per kill and Chance to Find Valuables. The % on these when the EP skill is picked is the same! Anyway, here are some tests:

 

Unlock

Skill------1pt+122allskills--------74pts+122---------75pts+122

EP---------20.3% (Niob)---------22.8%(Niob)-------22.8%(Niob)

EP---------12.1%(Bronze)--------no test-------------no test

Alchemy--26.8%(Niob)----------32.7%(Niob)-------32.7%(Niob)

 

So, we can see that the % value of the mods are different depending on the difficluty level. I only did the one small test in Bronze to show the difference.

Another interesting fact was that there is no "calculation shift" when mastery is reached; the modifier value is the same pre-mastery as after mastery.

One test I didn't think to do yet... the level of the item or character may affect the % values of the modifications. I'll get that done tonight and report back tomorrow. The above tests were done with char. level 100 and item level 108 (it had both alchemy and EP- modifiers lucky me to find it when I was going to do this test

Edited October 27, 2010 by essjayehm

[essjayehm 58]

Ok, back on-topic for this post... At level 100 I went and did about 5 hours of shopping, re-forging, etc. The toon had gotten very fragile and the offense was lacking as well, while I was in the Swamp on Niob difficulty. The improvement was noticeable, but ultimately fell short of my intention, which was to finish the Niob questline as low-level as possible. The demons in the wasteland were taking about 75% of my health in one-shot, but I managed to Expulse my way up to the Guardians without much trouble since everyone was constantly running in fear

Got the TG-spawners all killed, and lured the first Guardian out into the hallway for a little make-out session

 

OHKO (One-Hit KnockOut). Dead in one hit, the first swing, I hadn't even finished casting my first meteor shower

 

Darn. In hindsight, maybe going all-out Vitality is the only way to go if I wanted to finish Niob questline at this level. Yes, I could add shield lore skill and decrease my chances of getting hit by another 90-95%, but that still leaves her in the OHKO-range, where if she does get hit, she dies. I hate that, because it is really nothing that is wrong with the build, its the one-in-a-trillion die roll that I dislike. But that's Sacred, so I live and learn. AGAIN.

 

Stats, for those interested: Level 104 95.1% Survival Bonus 111 hours, 40 mins playtime Atttribute Distribution: Vitality levels 2-49 AND 100 on, Intelligence 50-99

Bargaining 75

Concentration 1

Arcane Lore 21

Stormite Focus 22

Armour Lore 54

Constitution 75

Arcane Focus 1

Ancient Magic 75

Pyro Lore 42

One skill empty, and 74 points leftover (for testing)

 

Allskills=105. HP = 18,965 Armour 13,091 (2863 Phys/2272 Magic/2552 Fire/3224 Pois/2180 Ice) Evasion 150% Block Chance 14.3% Damage Mitigation:Physical 10% 67.4% Deathblow

Blazing Tempest: 49runes, level 35.4 Damage-1605, DoT 2489 Regen time 4.9s Mods: Scorch, Conflagration

Incendary Shower: 78runes, level 40.9 Damage 2974, metors=16 Regen time 7.3s Mods:Skull Smash, Continuance

Glacial Thorns: 216runes, level 89.0 Damage 1363, thorns=140 Regen time 6.4s Mods:Fusillade

Magic Coup: 65runes, level 62.6 Damage 7341-8466 Regen time 1.7s Mods:Target Focus, Steal Mana, Stray Damage

Grand Invigoration: 141runes, level 79.3 HP regen=659/s, regen time -47.1 Mods: Stormite Focus, HP regen

Incandescent Skin: 1rune+146 from buff suit for level 46.6 875 Fire damage, 29.3 Fire Mitigation, -57.1 Pyro regen time, 55.7% block projectiles and reflect close combat, +143% Fire damage. Mods: Combusting Arrows, Reflect closecombat, +Fire damage.

 

OK, what can I say? I did run out of runes to read. As far as I can tell, the Steal Mana mod on Magic Coup is regen. about 12, maybe as high as 15 seconds of regeneration per hit with this setup. So there is a lot of room to read runes to increase my regens. But, offense isn't the issue with this girl, so that really doesn't mean too much. Maybe if I can find a Glacial Defender, and master Armour Lore and find some damage mitigation armour, I would have better luck withstanding the damages of late Niobium. Maybe if I just re-socket for 4-6K extra hitpoints. Maybe if I did X... maybe if I did Y. I dunno... chime in!

 

What I did learn - why they nerfed the max. runes read for the combat arts. Eating tons of runes adds huge damage, as long as the regeneration times can be managed. With the Steal Mana modification on Magic Coup, those regen times can be easily managed, since Steal Mana is affected by Arcane Lore (not tested, but an educated guess). Add Grand Invigoration and buff suit shenanigans, and start begging your friends for their runes.

 

Please, sir, may I have some more? Like, 100,000 more?