Mocker22

Ya I haven't tried it but I'd have a hard time doing a single class ranger for ranged dps. So many options to add in a ton more dps. That said, it would be plenty viable if that's what You wanted to do.

Thanks guys. With the limited casts I feel like there are some wizard PLs that just have too many good spells, while others feel largely unused(lvl 7 especially feels weak to me personally), while level 2 has an absurd amount of stuff I want to use like Combusting wounds, mirror image, Miasma, etc, etc. Level 3 feels rough too as I'd almost always want to use Llengraths and DAOM which leaves nothing for some of the nice debuffs and nukes that are available here. I really miss how versatile wizards felt in POE1, where as now I feel like every fight I would just self-buff and use the same 3-4 nukes(1-3 once you get pl 8 and 9).

Hey guys, there's been plenty said about the high end nuke potential of wizards. I'm looking for some reviews of some particular spells I'm considering and if they are worth it and "feel" good. Most were powerful in POE1 but I have not seen a lot of talk about them here. Mostly it's the higher tier CC spells. Confusion - still OP? Arkemyr's Capricious Hex Tayn's Chaotic Orb Mechanically how do the last two work? Does each affliction get a separate roll vs. will? Would greatly increase the chance of a few things landing I would think. Any other extremely good CC spells that might not be totally obvious? Thanks for the time.

I'd personally plan on multiple respecs as well with a Cipher. Low level you need the damage skills, but you would never use them later in the game.

Absolutely Dual Wield Fire in the Hole and Hand Mortar. Hitting in that big AoE will almost always fill your focus in one attack, and then its Ascendant time. Do keep in mind, what I found playing Ascendant is I never wanted to use many of the crowd control or ally buffing spells, even though they are very good. When your in Ascended you kinda just feel like spamming your nukes to quickly annihilate enemies.

One popular Spellblade build would use Citzal's Spirirt Lance. Persistent Distraction allows for auto death blows on anything engaged with you, and you can use things like Blinding Strike and Toxic Strike to apply big debuffs or DoTs in an aoe.

I haven't wrote anything up, it was more just a concept in my head, but the idea would be that Wahai Poraga hits three enemies at a time, greatly increasing your chance of proccing Swift Flurry or Heartbeat drumming for a second attack. Cleave will contribute to the extra attacks as well. I based my idea for his gearing heavily on the Undying Titan build, meaning I incorporated items to handle all the affliction resistances that Determination does not. Stat wise, pump might, dex, and perc, lowish con, dump res, and decent intel to help durations. I think there might be a build in the build list thread based on this combo, but it was from early after game release iirc. This was more just something I was working on on paper, I haven't played it all the way through. I'm sure someone could confirm if the idea would work. I'll write up a full build if people want...... Just remembered to add that I would guess at some pretty decent CC potential with Mule Kick, Stunning Surge, and Clear out if you want to take them all. I think I had decided to get Penetrating Strike instead of clear out for those high armor enemies.

Ya man, welcome to POE. It's an outstanding game imo. I grew up on BGs, NWN, IWD, etc. Sounds like your more into roleplaying your character which will work just fine for you. Wizards are insanely powerful btw, so you'll be set for whatever. If you want some advice on powerful spells and stuff I'm game. I'm actually slowly replaying POE1 with a wizard right now. Can be fun to experiment and try stuff out though as well.

Didn't know if the action speed boost applied to spellcasting or not. What would be some good 'stat sticks' then? People seem to suggest Magran's Favor and Sun and Moon quite a bit. Watershaper's Focus from Teheku for ice/air spells. Magran's Favor or Sun and Moon for fire. Griffon Blade for all spell damage, and Chromoprismatic staff late game is very nice, and too me I just like the roleplaying aspect of it. My pure caster wizard dual wielding a sword and battle axe makes me cringe. Keep in mind you don't have to Empower a Missile Salvo every single fight either, nothing says you have to break the game by using the most OP spells possible. One fun aspect of wizard in both poe games is trying out different spell combos to see what works good. Besides, imo a wizard that is reaching archmage type levels of power (level 8-9 spells) should feel really powerful.

Durance will do well if you focus on buffing your party, and late game nuking with fire spells, which is very in character for a priest of magran. Pick up Interdiction and Painful Interdiction early, and Inspiring Radiance is amazing.

Certainly pick any stats you want from a roleplay perspective, but for a powerful wizard Might, dex, perc, and int are king. Don't under value duration and aoe. Hit more targets and make your CCs last much longer. Perc to make sure your stuff lands(although this is very easy to buff) dex to speed you up, and might to make sure you hit hard.

15 is low? What would you say would be a "high" Dexterity? Suppose I tend to think of that more as 13 dex. I don't typically count gear bonuses when assigning attributes for myself. That's just me.

I haven't personally played sage, and this build is known to be like WTF crazy OP......but worth mentioning it's gonna take some time to get to feeling that good wouldn't it?

Nope, you have 40.5% hit to crit conversion. Conversion chances don't add up. They go together mutiplicatively: 0.7*0.85-1 = -0.405 or 40.5% Thanks for the correction. At least 40.5% is still quite high. That does make Uncanny Luck seem quite a bit less useful though. Hmm. I don't think there's a problem with posting basic or "cookie cutter" builds, as long as it makes good decisions for that type of build. When a new player is trying to find a build that they'd like to play, a basic build is going to be more useful to them than a concept build that requires some weird interaction between a specific skill and a specific piece of equipment that they can't get until well into the game. Some of the builds that have been posted require an interaction like that, and are built entirely around it, so they don't discuss how to play that build in a general sense. And some of those builds are no longer functional because the equipment no longer functions in that way or the skill has been patched to work differently. There have been a lot of builds that sounded interesting, but I ended up not trying them because they are based around something that sounds like it'll be patched soon. A basic build can help a new player, or an experienced player who hasn't tried a particular class before, learn how to use that class in an effective way (e.g., by helping them not pick useless abilities), and then they can grow their knowledge from there. Thanks for the support man. I tried to make it apparent in the description that this is not the most optimized dps build ever, but I guess I could have emphasized this more. But I did enjoy it quite a bit, and I think newer players, or even experienced players that like slightly less micro-management could get some decent results from it. Or if someone just likes the concept like I did, which is what led me to optimize this particular class combination.

Nice thing about wizard's is there is very little limiting how you build it. You can always use multiple grimoire's to suit whatever occasion and you'll be very powerful almost no matter what. Even though you'll be able to use Fleet Feet and DAOM, the low dex makes me shudder. If your willing to drop con/res some more, I would. But that's me. Gear wise a common practice is to heavily prioritize +fire PLs. Dual wield Magran's Favor and Sun and Moon, plus certain pets add to this. If I remember right you can boost Fire powerlevel by like +11. Then cast Meteor Storm......and win.

Well there are tons of very high dps melee builds out there. As previously stated Rogue and Monk add tons of dps, and barbarian really can as well. One thing to consider is how much survivability you want as well. I've been working on a Fighter/Monk build using Wahai Poraga. The single target dps will be ok, but I'm thinking that with Wahai hitting 3 mobs at once, high crit chance coupled with Swift Flurry and Heartbeat drumming and Cleave......the chain reaction should be absurd, and Unbending allows you to tank mobs in the face. Ultimately there are tons of options. If there is a particular class you are keen to play for whatever reason, we'll be able to suggest some nasty builds. You also may consider mentioning things like if you mind a build that takes a while to get going.

Yup, all true Somnium. It really was intended as a low maintenance build. Thanks for bringing up the pierce-immune problem that I forgot to mention. You do need something to deal with this.

Hey guys, this is my first time posting a full build here, so any advice will be welcomed. This build started out more as a roleplaying idea. I think of him as a bounty hunter/frontiersman that can track his prey anywhere with the help of his faithful wolf sidekick, and then take them down as a master with his rifle. I'd say there are other builds that could certainly do more damage, but I like this setup because it is low maintenance to play, and less of a glass cannon than a lot of top ranged dps builds. I don't like having to babysit glass cannons that can get gibbed at any time if your not careful. I also enjoyed that the build takes off very early. As soon as you leave Maje you can gather up all of the essential gear pieces. So here goes.... The Rifleman Difficulty: PotD v. 2.01 Class – Hunter(Devoted/Sharpshooter) – you can go Ghost Heart for less pet management if you want, not a big loss Race – Human (Hearth Orlan is better, but not my preference to play) Living Lands, Hunter Stats: (with Berath's Blessing) Might – 22 Con – 9 Dex – 20 Per – 18 Int – 15 Res – 6 Abilities: mostly just designed for maximum dps, with a couple fighter abilities as Oh s*** buttons to stay alive. I find the animal companion to be a bit of a pain and many fights he just guards the backline, so most of the companion talents are very optional, and could be replaced. With good CC and engagement control the pet can add some good dps though. 1 – Disciplined Barrage, Marked Prey, Arquebus proficiency 2 – Wounding Shot 3 – Vicious Companion 4 – Gunner, Fighter Stances 5 – Two-Handed Style 6 – Marksman 7 – Disciplined Strikes, Marked for the Hunt 8 – Accurate Wounding Shot 9 – Evasive Roll 10 – Weapon Specialization, Predator's Sense 11 – Penetrating Strike 12 – Vigorous Defense 13 – Driving Flight, Armored Grace 14 – Unbending 15 – Conqueror Stance 16 – Improved Critical, Uncanny Luck 17 – Merciless Companion 18 – Resilient Companion 19 – Weapon Mastery, Protective Companion 20 – Stalker's Link (would like this earlier but undecided what I could give up) Gear: an * shows that something is pretty essential, but there is plenty of room for personal preference. Weapon: The Red Hand(Guilty Conscience)* Armor: Sharpshooter's Garb* Helm: Acina's Tricorn* Gloves: Gauntlet's of Discipline Boots: Footprints of Ahu Taka(or Boots of Stone) Necklace: Precognition Belt: Upright Captain's Belt* Cloak: Nemnok's Cloak Ring: Ring of the Marksman* Ring: Chameleon's Touch Pet – Cutthroat Cosmo Skills: Whatever you want really, Alchemy is always strong. I ended up doing quite a bit of Mechanics and Stealth which fit with the roleplaying a bit more for me. Strategy: This was meant to be a very simple ranged dps build. Keep Disciplined Strikes activated and I use Evasive Roll frequently for the Quick inspiration. If you draw agro or start to take too much damage you have Vigorous Defense and Unbending to save your butt. The build has incredibly high accuracy with +45% hit to crit conversion, and you will crit a ton. Also you have very high penetration for a ranged build in my opinion with 13 base from legendary Red Hand, +2 Devoted, +1 Ring of the Marksman, for 16. Consumables and buffs push this even higher, with the ability to use Penetrating Strike for those extremely high armor targets in PotD. On most enemies you can overpenetrate, and the frequent crits will help with this as well. Devoted + Improved Critical keeps your critical hit damage respectable, even with the malus from arquebus. Reloading is fast with your gear, high dex, and no armor penalty. Hope someone finds this useful. Let me know what you think.

As stated Ranger/rogue is very powerful. If you are dead set on focusing on single target, then the Red Hand aquebus is insane. Personally I would dual wield Hand Mortar and Fire in The Hole, both obtained very early through Serafen. With a high intel your AoE will be great, and you can apply many of the rogues debuffs and dots in an aoe. Throw in Sharpshooter's Garb, Acina's Tricorn, and Ring of the Marksman. Rogue gives you amazing active abilities and effects, while ranger will provide tons of accuracy bonuses and reduced reloading speeds. In general, rogue is extremely powerful and works with almost any other class. Plenty of room to pick whatever you like and make it work.

Ya Surge upgrade will be very nice indeed. I'm surprised by how quickly this character started feeling good. I was expecting it to be awesome around level 16 but by 10 it was doing some serious work.

Ya, just target a different enemy each time and a bunch of them are stunned. The duration is pretty long with like 27 intel. Also Stunning Blow in an aoe.

So far its working good at level 11. Once you get Silent Scream you can really lock down a fight and do some impressive aoe dmg. Biggest problem is the potential to get gibbed instantly. For encounters that are easy to control, and tank packs of mobs, no problem at all. For things like ship to ship combat I instantly cast Barring Deaths door on her to prevent this. By the time she could die again, things are locked down. In general it is incredibly easy to max focus and wounds within seconds. I start the fight by activating Dance of Death, Swift Strikes, and Mort. of the Soul. Once the mobs group up, use Stunning Blow with the two hand mortars equipped (just got em to Superb) Instant full focus and a bunch of stunned enemies. Then spam away. Can't imagine what's going to happen with Amp Wave and Disintegrate and another 7 might on top. I'll plan to publish a build once I get a bit higher and decide on the best talents. I think I'll find myself never wanting to use some of the party buffs from Cipher that are so good. Why bother when I can just use that time to spam aoe dmg/cc.

Might have been said already but wizard works well with barb. Lots of self buffing and I think carnage attacks proc Citzal's aoe? Also frenzy is always good on spellcasters for when you want to just unload on a pack.

I liked that Somnium. I used to roleplay a paladin in old school IE games like that, due to the restrictions. He was cold and dispassionate, and the gods help anyone who broke the law because Carsomyr was going to be lodged firmly up their butt.

I remember in POE1 really struggling with a character that I could roleplay how I wanted without the power-gamer in me having a freakin cow. I almost ALWAYS took GOTM and Effigy. I want my +2 stats gdi! One character I've been having fun with is a female priest of Magran. I roleplay her a bit like a Viking warrior. Think Lagitha(spelling?) from the show Vikings. Most people watching that show liked the character, yet she didn't balk at human sacrifice to the gods, leaving her son out of pride, pillaging other peoples for profit, etc. I feel like this character would be ok with sacrificing someone they knew, or using the souls for additional self power, because she must make herself as powerful as possible to be able to stop Thaos. That being said, she tends to have a soft spot for children, or women that have been mistreated. I'd say its a "do what must be done" attitude more so then "I want to save/help everyone". Remember that most people that do "bad things" would not consider themselves evil. You'd be looking at a particularly bad brand of psychopath/ mental illness for someone to know how evil they were and continue murdering, etc. Consider every great civilization in human history. Roman's thought of themselves as highly advanced and sophisticated and basically the supreme civilization of their time, and to an extent they were. They also had tons of slaves, liked to watch people fight to the death for entertainment, and wanted to conquer the world. Also, it may be worth considering where the world of Eora is in the evolution of social justice and equality. If their way to thinking is even close to what it was in our way say, 100 years ago, a lot of what we would describe as cruel, evil, bad, etc.....would be fairly common.