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Scaredy-cat Inquisitor build


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Ok, ok, I think I went too far with that title :D

 

But still, why scaredy-cat?

 

The answer is quite simple. We all know that Inquisitors actually like to take damage, in order to inflict much more in return. The build I will propose does just the opposite - this Inquisitor is actually afraid of taking damage and does his best to refrain from doing so.

 

BUILD SKILL SETUP OPTION 1 - more HP, more survivability:

 

Offense:

Dual Wield.pngDual Wield - 1 point here

Astute Supremacy Lore.pngAstute Supremacy Lore - mastered by level 113 (!)

Astute Supremacy Focus.pngAstute Supremacy Focus - mastered by level 75 (or stop at 31, then master it)

Gruesome Inquisition Focus.pngGruesome Inquisition Focus - mastered by level 75 (or stop at 31, then master it)

 

Defense:

Armor Lore.pngArmor Lore - mastered by level 95 (or mastered at 75 if you stop foci at 31)

Constitution.pngConstitution - mastered by level 78

Toughness.pngToughness - mastered by level 131 (or mastered at 75 if you stop foci at 31)

 

Support:

Concentration.pngConcentration - 1 point or mastered by level 166 - for extra defense (!)

Combat Discipline.pngCombat Discipline - mastered by level 148

Bargaining.pngBargaining - mastered by level 75 and kept at char level

 

BUILD SKILL SETUP OPTION 2 - going for immunity ASAP!

 

Offense:

Dual Wield.pngDual Wield - 1 point here

Astute Supremacy Lore.pngAstute Supremacy Lore - mastered by level 95

Astute Supremacy Focus.pngAstute Supremacy Focus - stop at 31, then master it (from 95 till 117) - master before Gruesome, if you want better damage

Gruesome Inquisition Focus.pngGruesome Inquisition Focus - stop at 31, then master it (from 95 till 117) - master before Astute, if you want to get to immunity faster (since hitting mastery will improve the CA level of the PC buff, thus the mitigation it provides)

 

Defense:

Armor Lore.pngArmor Lore - mastered by level 75

Toughness.pngToughness - mastered by level 75

 

Support:

Concentration.pngConcentration - 1 point or mastered by level 166 - for extra defense (!)

Combat Discipline.pngCombat Discipline - mastered by level 131

Ancient Magic.pngAncient Magic - Mastered by level 148

Bargaining.pngBargaining - mastered by level 75 and kept at char level

 

Weird mastery and skill selection, to say the least :) However, all of these choices are based on creating a fighting machine that shrugs of most damage and inflict a lot in return.

 

Obviously, the Astute aspect is the main source of offense, which means outright that we will utilize Clustering Maelstrom, Levin Array and Raving Thrust. Gruesome aspect is the support one, and a very important one actually, as it provides both offense and defense with a solid main and mini-buff. Dual wield acts as a support pick and provides the ability to carry around 2 weapons, which will boost the offense greatly.

 

Defense is comprised by all the skills that pretty much any char needs - Armor Lore, Toughness and Constitution.

 

The support picks are bargaining, concentration and combat discipline. Bargaining is extremely important here, and we'll keep it at char level. Concentration may stay at 1 point throughout the game and serve as an opener for the second buff. Combat discipline will boost the damage and reduce the regen times of all combat arts in a combo and that of our combos.

 

Keeping the build in mind, there are several very valid questions that arise:

 

- Once again, why scaredy-cat?

--> We take Purifying chastisement buff as a defense/offense booster, effectively modding it for Eradicate and Inure. We also take an abnormal amount of defensive skills for an Inquisitor, aiming at having BIG damage mitigation in the late game that will keep him safe and sound.

 

- Why bargaining? This build can do better with a skill like Ancient Magic instead!

--> Bargaining is essential. So essential, that we are going to keep it at char level in order to have an effective shopper. It's usefulness lies in the ability to make this build self-sufficient, along with the ability to shop for important rare torso and shoulder armor. Torso and shoulder armor may show up with very decent all channel damage mitigation - something all of the set items of the Inquisitors are deprived of.

 

- Why Astute Lore mastery is taken so late:)

--> This build has bargaining, which makes it self-sufficient. Its core is based on playing with as much + All Skills items that you can find/shop. This will boost even the 1-point skills to very, very respectable values. It is more important to ensure high CA level through mastering the focus first, as this way we can mod Reverse Polarity - one of the best buffs around. The reduced chance to crit provided by Astute Lore is compensated by Purifying Chastisement's Eradicate mod.

 

- So what are we playing for, really?

--> In short: mass destruction, great damage mitigation, quick level gain, and immortality. One thing I hate about Inquisitors is that, unless built properly, they are wickedly squishy, dangerous to play in hardcore and have really poor set items. Built like this, you can play with very high combat art levels, and a lot of free sockets for all skills/xp per kill to speed up the level gain after 125. You can also enjoy very serious immunity upon entering Niobium (and before that stage as well): the mastered toughness skill will provide at least 22% damage mitigation, the purifying chastisement buff will provide at least 20% damage mitigation, and the shopped torso/shoulder armor will provide at the very least 22% damage mitigation. That's a whopping 64% damage mitigation upon entering niobium - along with the nice reflect chances provided by Reverse Polarity and it's nice exploit mod, which, along with the Zealous Doppelganger buff/combat art, can boost it even further - somewhere along the lines of 75%. Really, really nice, huh? And it will get even higher as the levels go by and more + all skills stuff is equipped!

 

Another very important thing for this build is the use of buff suits to reduce the buff penalty on our offensive combat arts. We will need to have 2x 3-socket duals (can be spawned as well), filled with niobium level runes for each buff - Purifying Chastisement and Reverse Polarity. Along with those, we will need a complete set of armor with as much sockets as possible, in which both buff runes are split 50/50 among its sockets. Doing so will greatly help our offensive combat arts - effectively using them at very low regen time and very high CA level.

 

The combat arts to mod are:

Gruesome: Purifying Chastisement (Mystic - Eradicate - Inure), Frenetic Fervor (Fanaticism - Resolve - Relentless), Ruthless Mutilation (last, in case we make a suit with significant reduction on opponent's chance to evade and go boss hunting with a nice LL% weapon)

Astute: Reverse Polarity (Rebound - Counterblow - Exploit), Clustering Maelstrom (Chaos - Vortex - Vortex), Levin Array (Disperse - Hesitation - Dynamic), Raving Thrust (Bedaze - Vehemence - Tumble) and finally, Zealous Doppelganger (Vigor - Equal - Determination/Companion)

 

Based on the proposed Combat arts modding, Concentration can become a defensive skill if we master it. That's both a boon and a curse. By mastering it, we will start using the Zealous Doppelganger buff, which will need a 3rd pair of 3-socket weapons to maintain at a respectable level without destroying the regen times. With the exploit mod on Reverse polarity, we can obtain further damage mitigation. If we don't plan on mastering concentration, then the Determination mod on the Doppelganger CA should be picked - it will be a little bothersome to recast ZD so often, but still, it can be a good thing - this way the doppelganger will be here when you need it and gone when you don't.

 

GAMEPLAY:

 

In my playthrough, I swapped a skill. Since I expected the guy to become relatively immortal, I swapped constitution. You don't need this skill when many HP will mean just as much as few. This is why I chose Ancient Magic and played with only 2 defensive skills - armor lore and toughness.

 

The levels from 1 till 75 were a royal pain. I was pumping vitality like no tomorrow, to compensate for the lack of constitution. I also revamped the masteries by using the "stop at 31 points in focus" trick. I kept Astute Focus and Gruesome focus at char level till 31 and then started working on the skills that will eventually make him invulnerable - Armor Lore, Toughness and Bargaining. By stopping the 2 foci at 31 (Astute Lore is at 5 points), you have just enough points to master all the 3 skills necessary with your very last level 75 skill point. Now that's perfection! Yep, perfectly planned build.

 

So, from level 1 till 75 I decided to turtle. I started striking a 50/50 socket balance between + all skills and XP per kill, and I was doing mainly quests - with a few niob runes, even the cursed forest till the 10 eyes to kill point. Further in was a death sentence if more than 3 eyes were to swarm me and start leeching off my poor Inquisitor. It was not a slow going at all - Clustering + Raving combo is great even at low level, and the buff suits were keeping his regen times very low, which allowed me to eat a lot of runes (at level 60, upon entering gold, I ate around 16 runes in each CA). The damage output was a little low, but that could be easily compensated by herding a bigger mob, which in areas like the orc lands, desert, human lands, swamp and the blood forest is no problem at all, so the kill speed was high regardless of the lower damage.

 

I was always on the lookout for several set items:

1. Ilgard's judgment (arms) - provides Chance to Reflect: Combat arts. Outstanding synergy with the Reverse Polarity buff.

2. Saraki's Intuition (gloves) - provides chance to reflect: close combat, which also has great synergy with Reverse Polarity.

3. Insignia of Deference (head) - 2 sockets, physical damage mitigation. The third item to make the Inquisitor immortal.

4. Saraki's Demise (belt) - 2 sockets, has about 1% more physical damage mitigation than Deylen's belt. Combined with other buffs, items and toughness, does wonders.

5. Kuan's or Catharsis pants (lower armor) - 3-socket, the more sockets, the merrier.

6. The boots were a matter of preference - whatever was available.

7. Torso and shoulders - 3-socket ones, until level 75. As soon as level 75 is achieved, it's shopping time.

 

After I hit level 75, I went on extensive shopping spree. I was looking for torso armor and shoulder armor with all channel damage mitigation unlocked by armor lore mastery, and if possible, stacked all channel or all channel + physical mitigation. It took lots of hours in shopping, and most of the attempts were futile. Eventually, I took off with shoulders with 2 sockets (silver and bronze), all channel + physical damage mitigation and a torso with low grade all channel damage mitigation unlocked by armor lore (no mastery needed). It appears that it's really hard to find a plate-type armor for the inquisitor with damage mitigation even with close to 4x char level in bargaining. Sheesh. So I guess one should arm him/herself with a lot of patience when doing the equipment revamping part.

 

In the end, I ended up with these stats at level 75:

Close combat reflect: 42% + 8% set part (50% total)

CA reflect: 42% + 7% set part (49% total)

Ranged reflect: 42%

Toughness: 23.8% damage mitigation

Purifying chastisement buff: 15.3% damage mitigation (could be much more, but I need to use buff suits to keep the regen times low)

Armor: 45% Physical damage mitigation, 20.1% fire/ice/magic/poison mitigation

 

Total: 59.2% fire/magic/ice/poison mitigation and 84.1% physical damage mitigation

 

This result alone makes the tough leveling up to 75 worthwhile!

 

The next breakpoint was level 100. I went on to master gruesome focus (!) to improve the max PC buff level and after that mastered the astute focus. I kept my damage output a bit low on purpose - I really wanted to get to the high invincible status asap. Since I was playing with lots of All skills, it wasn't that much of a problem - there was nothing that 2-3x Clustering + Raving + Levin combo couldn't kill.

 

At level 100, the increase was relatively negligible, mainly because I wasn't very lucky with the set items and had to keep some of the lower-level ones. Still, the progress was easily noticeable:

 

Reflect Close: 56.7%

Reflect CA: 54.3%

Toughness mitigation: 25%

Chastisement mitigation: 16.8%

Armor mitigation: 46.7% physical, 21.7% fire/ice/magic/poison

 

Total: 88.5% physical, 63.5% fire/ice/magic/poison, along with increasing reflect

 

This calculation made me confident that if things go my way, by level 120-125 I can achieve physical immunity - and that's what happened. As soon as I hit 125, I logged my 140 shopper in and got him some nice +6/7 all skills socketables. I couldn't find better shoulder/torso armor for now, so I postponed it. The good news was that I had all the set equip I wanted, and at relatively decent level.

 

After I revamped the equip, this is what happened at level 125:

 

Close reflect: 65%

CA reflect: 62.3%

Toughness mitigation: 28.6%

Chastisement mitigation: 17.7%

Armor mitigation: 59% physical, 23.5% fire/ice/magic/poison

 

Which means: 105.3% physical mitigation (IMMUNE!), 69.8% fire/ice/magic/poison mitigation, and about 2/3 close and ca attacks reflected!

 

Now how about that? I don't really need to get him to level 140 to know that very soon, he will shrug off almost all the damage and hunt everywhere he pleases. This also allows for some leeway - I can switch some more sockets to XP per kill and speed up the level-ups even more without worrying that I'll lose the physical immunity. This also allows for almost free leveling in orc lands/desert/wasteland/human lands/elven lands. The blood forest remains a little dangerous, because life leech can't be mitigated, even though it can be reflected, as the eyes' attacks are CA based - at least by my observations.

 

CONCLUSION:

 

If you feel like you can survive 75 levels that will shape up the next 125, this build is for you :)

Edited by Dobri
  • Like! 1
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In softcore, hell of a lot :) For example, on level 30, with dual officers', at 25% HP the Inquisitor was inflicting over 3000 damage per hit (over 6000 total, not that anything could survive the first hit anyway). However, playing at the pain threshold is very, very dangerous and few hardcore players risk it. At 25% HP a few strong hits may easily finish you off.

 

This is why if I am to take damage, I'd rather take it gradually, not all at once - hence the high damage mitigation for this build.

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I like this build. Its similar to what I used with untwinked inquisitors, possibly same skill setup though I mastered toughness and armor at 75.

 

Anyhow cool idea. Have you leveled it up yet?

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In softcore, hell of a lot :) For example, on level 30, with dual officers', at 25% HP the Inquisitor was inflicting over 3000 damage per hit (over 6000 total, not that anything could survive the first hit anyway). However, playing at the pain threshold is very, very dangerous and few hardcore players risk it. At 25% HP a few strong hits may easily finish you off.

 

This is why if I am to take damage, I'd rather take it gradually, not all at once - hence the high damage mitigation for this build.

 

Always wonder..... get to 25%, slap on the 100% mitigation kit.... what build would that make?

 

Can have no Consti ofc.... or regen.

 

But! Nice build Dobri, was planning to try one soon, so guess this one will be the first :D

 

With you on the no damage/gradual damage tho :D Cannot be too careful sometimes eh!

 

Greetz

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Always wonder..... get to 25%, slap on the 100% mitigation kit.... what build would that make?

 

Can have no Consti ofc.... or regen.

It is very, very good, Barris! I used the RP+exploit mod to achieve virtual immortality... usually suffering about 50-60% of my health in damage to create the 6-8 ghosts to get from ~60% mitigation up to close to 100%. No need to change setups, tactics, etc. DoT is the only enemy at that point ;) I guess HC has to worry about LL, too.

 

But you can have constitution... just not mastery. :D

 

But that reminds me... can you get the doppelganger to cast a doppelganger on PC? I had it rockin pretty good with at least 3 "me's" and up to 8 or so for some tough fights. It only lasts if you have the buff, tho :(

Edited by essjayehm
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Well, I hit level 50 with this guy today. He has a little trouble running the blood forest yet, but I can easily see that he's showing some real promise. The eyes have really nasty life leech % that takes big chunks of his HP's, even though I'm working heavily on constitution (5k HP at level 50 is quite good). The buff suits are doing their job perfectly, keeping the regen times low and his defense high - 41% all channel reflect, 15% all channel DM. I'm kinda cutting back on niob smith arts in favor of all skills and xp per kill, which may not be a very wise choice, but we'll see :)

 

So far I find it a lot of fun when I manage to make a nice mob of skinned ones and zombies along with a few eyes :) Usually at least 15 of them lurk in the very entrance of blood forest, and if you walk around a bit, you can easily increase this number to like 25 or more. All it takes is a clustering + raving combo and bang! 80k+ XP bonus :D

Edited by Dobri
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Dobri, you will never stop coming out with out of the box, sandbox blasting ideas. This one tops the cake, and it comes with one of the best build titles ever.

 

Just had to post that and thank you for the read and drop off a point of rep.

 

+++

 

:)

 

gogo

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Thanks gogo :) I'm glad you enjoyed it. I've been thinking about this build for a long time and really felt like writing it down for the people to read and analyze. The name came out just like that really :P But it's fun, yes.

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What a brilliant idea for a build, I got to admit that I haven't played in a while but this build is tempting me into making time to try it out! I particularly like the idea of looking after your own skin first rather than all out berserk killing, it sounds much more realistic, especially from a Hardcore point of view.

Edited by podgie_bear
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  • 2 weeks later...

I've finished the testing of the scaredy-cat build and I am very, very pleased :)

 

I needed a char to test out the CM patch, so I decided that this one is just perfect. I even changed the build a bit, to make him easier to kill by swapping constitution (!) for ancient magic.

 

(read first post for gameplay info)

 

I may try to get him to 140 and see what happens there, but we'll see. I'd say the values that I achieved by level 125 speak well enough about the viability of the build... So there may be another guide incoming...

Edited by Dobri
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Dobri, I was waiting to see this newest build of yours with out of the box name does, and a gift this morning as I was drinking coffee and see what you're seeing success with decent levels.

 

As you have an official new build/guide now, would you like me to move this topic into the Guides section, I can change the title (as you wish) and you can edit the first post in this topic as well....or if you want, we can leave this topic here as the original discovery, and you can publish a fresh new build guide in the Inquisitor guides section.

 

:)

 

gogo

 

p.s. The mechanics your build is using, I believe would really impact if, with your explanation, you had a small video showing the invulnerability?

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Sure thing, gogo! Just please remove the (test finished) and I will merge the build into one cohesive post. As for the vid, I'll see what I can do about it tonight :)

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Great rewrite on the formatting of this guide. Classic Dobri detail, would not have expected anything less.

 

+++

 

I've moved the guide into the Inquisitor Guides section, would you be able to bring your guide, as well, over to the Wiki Player Contributed Guides section?

 

It's this link here:

 

http://www.sacredwiki.org/index.php5/Sacred_2:Sacred_2_Player_Contributed_Guides

 

Cheers!

 

 

:)

 

gogo

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Thats quite an accomplishment making a stalwort defensive inquisitor with leveling clustering ability.. Again I am impressed. Another nice feature that we don't see with a lot of builds is the self-sufficiency of bargaining making the build accessible for more players.

 

What did you find in experiments with mortifying pillory? I had thought you were testing this CA out.

 

Whats your call on Constitution versus Ancient Magic? There is no elemental damage on clustering. Do you think it would be hard to make damage without ancient magic?

 

What did you hold in your hands? I wonder if having both ancient magic AND constitution and dropping dual wield would be any good. Staffs might have some nice properties. And poles would allow some %LL bosshunting.

 

Anyhow Good Job!

 

 

:)

Edited by claudius
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@gogo

 

All done, mate :)

 

@claudius

 

Actually, I never got around to using this CA much... Since I did the "stop -XXXXX- focus at 31 points" for both foci, I never really had much mod points to get to pillory, and by the time I had those, he was already pushing up the damage mitigation up the board, so this is why I modded callous execution in the end. Not that I got around to using it... but if I get boss-hunting sick, I just might. All it takes is a LL% weapon and lots of enemy chance to evade stuff.

 

On the AM versus Constitution - that's exactly what I had in mind. For starters, when you're almost immune, it doesn't matter whether you have 5000 HP or 15 000. Second, I was really worried that enemies would get way too tough eventually. That's nothing a few combos won't kill, but still, I'd like to kill fast :)

 

My weapon choice was entirely based on the top 10 uniques list I made. I was constantly using dual officers' sabers, from level 18 on. All that changed was the socketed items into those sabers. In general, I really wanted to try dual tinwora's and I just might, but I can't seem to find any, and besides, I've been doing an accelerated test till level 125 (10x XP gain, then I switched to 1x), because I simply wanted to see if that build works properly and on achieving immunity asap. Actually, the accelerated test is pretty much the same as the normal killing, because it has you grind the same area for at least 20-30 runs, and if you don't die in those 30 runs, you never will even if you make 100.

 

In the end, my conclusion is that a person can easily hold out on that immunity till level 140. Becoming immune to physical damage and mitigating almost 70% of the rest is a little "taxing" on the damage and leads to a slower kill speed - that can be seen in the video that gogo asked for. I'm compressing the 6 parts of into 1 as we speak... so to say :D

Edited by Dobri
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Is it just me or do you have 11 skills listed?

 

Dual Wield, Astute Lore, Astute Focus, Gruesome Focus, Armour Lore, Constitution, Toughness, Combat Discipline, Concentration, Ancient Magic and Bargaining is 11...?

 

Edit: Nevermind, confusingly presented perhaps, but explained a little further down in the post.

 

Also, nice build, Self Sufficient Area of Effect tanking for the masses :)

Edited by Dragon Brother
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I did. If you read the descriptions, you will find out that I added Ancient magic IF you swap Constitution for it, in the constitution description :)

 

However, you have a point, this might be misleading. I will remove one of those or make a better clarification.

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In any case, I split the build into 2 options for better clarification. However, your note was very valid - a skill setup like this can be easily misleading to a new player or a person who doesn't read through the entire thing :)

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Were you able to toast champions as well in the clustering maelstroms (when tons of mobs) or did you have to finish off the champions afterwards with Levin Array or something?

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This is why I used the Clustering - Raving - Levin combo. Against low-hp monsters, that combo works perfectly up until level 100 or so. Around level 105, it takes 2 of those, and from 125 on, it takes more. Granted, I was way too preoccupied with my immortality rather than boosting the damage, but still, the kill speed isn't that bad. Keeping in mind that a combo takes like 3 seconds to execute, a mob would be dead in 15 seconds if you need to slap like 3 of those combos. I also kept levin array under 1s regen time to quickly finish off any champions.

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  • 3 months later...

Assuming I have a shopping network to support this char, what skill would you take to replace bargaining?

 

I was thinking maybe Tactic Lore to boost damage from CE/RM for use on bosses / left over champions?

 

Also you mentioned needing to socket minus enemy chance to evade to increase the chance of hitting with RM when boss farming. Would putting points in DW increase the hit chance of RM and if so will putting more points here be worth saving a few sockets?

 

Or would it be better to just spend more skill points in upping the damage of the Astute Aspect?

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For console play, I suggest Tactics. You will probably have to solo bosses to achieve the higher difficulties, and it will help speed those battles up a lot.

 

Definitely I am against pumping points in Dual Wield. If you want to boss-farm, I suggest having a "bosskilling" setup where you focus on your Gruesome arts instead of Astute arts. Using -enemy chance to evade or +chance enemy cannot evade are the aboslute best bang-for-the-buck (slot?) ways to increase chance to hit in the game.

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  • 2 months later...

Hello Dobri.

 

Your build looks rock-solid. :)

 

My brother has a Level 110 Two-Handed Inquisitor and is looking for Torso armor and Shoulder Guard with Damage mitigation for all channel. He has just left Level 65 empty so can choose Bargaining, (but not Dual ield for 2 1-handed Sword equipped)

He put 75 hard point into Bargaining and got 510 point in Bargaining at level 110 (if he had another weapon it would mean +42 point). With 510 Bargaining points spending 4hard hours into searching for he could just find a torso with damage mitigation for all channel +9%. He is looking for a torso with damage mitigation for all channel +20% plus a gold (must) and a silver slot.

How is it possible to get that torso?

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