[CLASS BUILD] The Glimmer Man (Sniper Swashbuckler)

[3x0du5]

These are very interesting finds for spell casters ! Great info

[Kaylon]

Updates:

4. Dorudugan takes full damage from Dragon's Dowry (it seems his ability to heal 100% of the burn damage doesn't apply to lashes), thus no need to switch weapons

5. Against enemies with burn immunity (magma oozes/flame blights) and high level vessels (pierce immunes included) the Red Hand is the best choice

6. The only enemies that can't be killed/destroyed with Dragon's Dowry/Red Hand are the Bog Lurkers and the obelisks - Eccea's Arcane Blaster and/or Gouging Strike are the best options to deal with them

7. Hauani O Whe remains the only weakness so far - from all abilities/weapons able to destroy the target on kill, the only one able to prevent the split 100% of the time seems to be Disintegration. 

[Boeroer]

4. Ha funny. Although the "base" attacks from Dragon's Dowry itself are tagged as fire attacks (+10 from Ring of Focused Flame and +1 PEN from Scion of Flame and so on).

[Wotcha]

1 hour ago, Boeroer said:

4. Ha funny. Although the "base" attacks from Dragon's Dowry itself are tagged as fire attacks (+10 from Ring of Focused Flame and +1 PEN from Scion of Flame and so on).

That’s a keyword vs damage type issue. Nothing does “Fire” damage. Only “Burn” damage.  The damage-to-healing effect that Dorudugan has operates against Burn damage, not Fire keywords. But it sounds like that status effect is only applied against the direct damage of an attack, not lashes.

This is interesting because this loophole probably applies to Flames of Devotion, Turning Wheel, and Mith Fyr as well, all of which I was expecting to be worse than useless against Dorudugan. If those abilities are not affected by this loophole, that’s also interesting in itself because it reveals a difference in code path between a weapon’s inherent lash and an additional ability lash. Also, what about Magran’s Spiritual Weapons?

You’d probably see the inverse effect at play with Boiling Spray, which does Burn damage but does NOT have the Fire keyword. I would expect Dorudugan to convert that to healing normally. 

[Boeroer]

I actually didn't use FoD against Flame Nagas because I thought it would heal them. After meeting them the first time and seeing their low burn AR (wondering "huh, why do flame guys have low burn AR?") I tried to roast them with Combusting Wounds and such and that went horribly wrong. After that I just assumed that all burn damage would heal them. 

[Wotcha]

9 minutes ago, Boeroer said:

I actually didn't use FoD against Flame Nagas because I thought it would heal them. After meeting them the first time and seeing their low burn AR (wondering "huh, why do flame guys have low burn AR?") I tried to roast them with Combusting Wounds and such and that went horribly wrong. After that I just assumed that all burn damage would heal them. 

If this little lash trick works the same against Nagas, it would work GREAT because of that low Burn AR issue (which suckered me in the first time too- IT’S A TRAP!). If the lash doesn’t get converted, it’s going to instead get the +30% Overpen bonus. That doesn’t apply to Dorudugan, because his Burn AR is sky-high like most of his other AR, instead of baiting you with a feinted weakness. 

[guildwriter]

Brilliant triggered by invisibility?  Well now I have a new build to play after my SC Assassin!  Great find.

I'm really curious to see what the limits are on this.  One of the biggest problems I ran into with the Assassin/Skaen was extracting every bit of value from limited resources.  I'd probably consider the following changes if going through a full run through:

• Pernicious Cloud in the build somewhere to avoid fatigue if you're going for a serious playthrough.  You can clearly potentially every fight by shooting once and going invisible but it will get super tedious.  You're going for a super high might and int so this will work nicely with it.
• Arterial Strike - Another fight texture choice.  Works incredibly well with kiting.  Pair with Boots of Winter for added hilarity.
• Harley is interesting.  I wonder how effective DoC, Ooblit, and Shadowing Beyond could be.  Your DPS throughput/overall efficiency could be higher by consistently funding more resources per re stealth.  Especially relevant on fights where you can't LoS enemies and are back in the fray once you drop stealth.  There are a lot of these in the DLC.
• Gipon Prudensco or Fleshmender seem like decent options as well depending on fight.
• I would consider Trollhide Belt or Upright Captain's Belt.  The second is insurance if you fat finger restealth and you get grabbed.  Prevents a midair death.

Unless Obsidian has fixed the way shipboard combat and other such fight setups works, I don't recommend Infamous Captain if trying a Ironman run.  There are fights where it will pre trigger combat during the cutscene and then you'll die without being able to do a thing.

Lots of ways to tinker with this!

 

[Kaylon]

Using other abilities will leave you visible and exposed to attacks - you might kill faster, but you can also be killed...

The Trollhide belt is indeed very useful in long fights (or if you play with Woedica's challenge) to heal the self damage from Dragon's Dowry, but you can have also Lethandria's Devotion in another slot and switch to it when needed. 

[Boeroer]

By the way: hit pause and switch to Lethandria's Devotion and back to Dragon's Dowry - and back an forth and so on. You will gain health with every switch to the shield setup.

[Raven Darkholme]

On 9/18/2019 at 5:18 PM, Kaylon said:

Abydon is not a problem - when you're using abilities the weapons don't degrade. Vela is probably manageable if you withdraw her out of the enemies sight (you can also use Out of Fire to move her to a safer spot).

The big problem is Hauani O Whe because it seems the Essence Interrupter isn't reliable to prevent the splitting...

I did not know this whatsoever (weapons not degrading with abilities) but often wondered why they'd never degrade over a long fight and then sometimes they degrade immediately after a fight starts.

Legit makes me wanna play the Ultimate again. tbf I've tested  a lot recently and both Rogues and Tacticians are high on my fun list since we all already know that priest mcs are op and no one else needs to prove it.

[Kaylon]

If there was a reliable way to prevent the splitting of the big ooze then we would have a strong candidate here.

A thing I don't understand however, is how the monk can stun with every hit of the WotW, while the rogue can't do it from invisibility.

[Raven Darkholme]

Well I was planning on using melee for Oozes and then just Mule kick (maybe with Wotep).

Can the monk really stun? First form of the ooze is might resistant, second form is different however and should be stunnable for any class (and stunning first form doesn't matter anyway since there is no merge yet)

 

edit: I just looked it up and even the Gigantic Black ooze is might resistant so it should not be possible to stun it and I'm not aware of a higher tier might affliction than stun

Edited October 8, 2019 by Raven Darkholme

[Kaylon]

No, only Hauany is resistant to might afflictions. That's why a monk spamming WotW has no problems dealing with the merge - the oozes are perma stunned. (You never watched the videos of  monks soloing Hauani?). The hardest mega boss for a monk is Auranic (but a monk can also stay stealthed and send unlimited Dichotomus Souls do the job for him).

[guildwriter]

14 hours ago, Kaylon said:

Using other abilities will leave you visible and exposed to attacks - you might kill faster, but you can also be killed...

This is part of why playing Assassin solo is so much fun for me: finding the limits of every encounter and trying to maximize the efficiency.  The way fights feel can change dramatically based on approach wheras a lot of the other solo approaches can feel incredibly facerolly due to the way they create degenerate value.

Smoke Cloud shooting is definitely safest overall, I just can't play like that for long without getting bored.

[Boeroer]

I'm currently trying a Bleak Walker/Assassin solo. Just because I want to stack True Love's Kiss, Gouging Strike and Brand Enemy and then vanish. It's usually very boring - but some encounters are very tricky and that's when it turns into fun.  And in the others I just get a coffee...

[Raven Darkholme]

8 hours ago, Kaylon said:

No, only Hauany is resistant to might afflictions. That's why a monk spamming WotW has no problems dealing with the merge - the oozes are perma stunned. (You never watched the videos of  monks soloing Hauani?). The hardest mega boss for a monk is Auranic (but a monk can also stay stealthed and send unlimited Dichotomus Souls do the job for him).

Hm I guess the wiki is wrong then, no I haven't watched any of those videos I will look them up.

edit: Yeah just looked it up and Gigantic isn't actually stun resistant, seems weird to me if Rogue can't stun it.

Edited October 9, 2019 by Raven Darkholme

[guildwriter]

So after some testing I think the reason why Brilliant and Invisibility can work together the way they do has to do with a peculiarity in certain fights in this game.

There are some fights where once combat starts, it cannot end until all hostiles are cleared from the map.  Examples of maps like this are ship boarding, lots of SSS fights, and certain fights in FS.  Even if the enemies can't see any hostiles and deaggro, you are still in "combat" mode and can't reset the fight and your resources. 

(I can think of a couple of reasons why someone might design an encounter like this intentionally but they seem pretty marginal.  It's so prevalent, especially in later content though that I feel like it has to be intentional.  This obviously ignores Berath's Challenge which is this exact behavior all the time.)

In a normal fight where you can drop combat using invisibility, this trick will not work.  Once enemies are out of their "aggro" mode combat will end and Brilliant will flash on once because combat is still going on but there are no party members in combat and no enemies in combat, which technically triggers Brilliant.  But Brilliant shuts off right after because combat is also done.  Using Gouging Strike in normal combat with multiple opponents never allows you to trigger Brilliant by going invisible because enemies will aggro if a nearby "friend" gets damaged and run towards them.  So the check is never fulfilled.  The megabosses and other fights like that allow all members to leave the fight, but combat not to drop, which means when Brilliant turns on, it will not shut off.  For general play this doesn't help much, but for the fights where a solo rogue probably couldn't win without resource generation it's golden.

That's my theory on how this all works based on observing the video Kaylon recorded and doing my own testing on some generic fights.

Edited October 13, 2019 by guildwriter
Clarity.

[Boeroer]

You are nearly right. However, Kaylon already reported that DoTs still let you trigger Brilliant.

I played this build for some hours and it's true that most of the time you don't need Brilliant because the fight resets anyway. Bit as Kaylon said, it's the fights that don't reset that matter here.

About Gouging Strike: if you use Gouging Strike or Bleeding Cuts or whatever DoT with 3 sec ticks or longer you can still trigger Brilliant. The thing is that between those ticks is enough time for the game to think "ok that's is, encounter's over soon", enemies relax and you will gain Brilliant (gaining resources right away - then the DoT ticks again right after that, you will lose Brilliant, enemies start running around again... the relax, Brilliant pops up, resources, tick, loss of Brilliant and so on. Works even better with longer tick intervals such as True Love's Kiss (6sec) or Poison Dipped (12sec). Doesn't work with shorter intervals I guess (Whirlig Strikes and Corrosive Skin etc. - but doesn't matter in this case).

[guildwriter]

I don't know what scenario Kaylon or you tested, but I just recently tested a fight in the Old City where I hit a Greater Earth Blight with a Gouging Strike and retreated.  There were enough enemies of varying distances to "ping pong" constantly between the hostile and passive state.  Differing move speeds also contribute to this. 

I have gotten the scenario that Kaylon describes to trigger in other areas like with the Bardatto quest in The Hole.  There the distances are short enough that enemies can ping pong back into place and deaggro to cause Brilliant to proc.

It is more accurate to say Brilliant *can* trigger between DoT ticks but it's variable on the encounter setup.  This will definitely make SSS and FS potentially non passable for this build as it lacks certain efficiencies to get past the fact that enemies do NOT go passive in some of those fights, even if you are invisible.  Something I have found through substantial testing and trial and error using my Assassin/Priest of Skaen.

Note that this was in regular PotD with no challenges.

Edited October 13, 2019 by guildwriter
Clarity

[Kaylon]

Yes, for some encounters Gouging Strike might cause such problems, but you're not forced to use it. Sometimes enemies also get stuck and can't reach their destination which keeps them in combat forever, preventing Brilliant from triggering - then you have to aggro them and become invisible again to reset their state... Sometimes it takes a little testing to find the best approach because strange AI behavior can cause some quirks. 

[Boeroer]

Yes, during my solo playtesting it became obvious that while the whole interaction can be very effective it can also be a bit fiddly from time to time. However - it was one of the easiest solo early-mid game I had so far. 

Edited October 14, 2019 by Boeroer

[Kaylon]

I finally found a reliable way to beat Hauani-O-Whe. 

The missing part of the puzzle was the unique arbalest Mechanical Marvel which attacks in a line (max 3 targets) and can be enchanted with 25% recovery reduction. With Acina's Tricorn, Sharpshooter's Garb, Abraham/Cutthroat Cosmo and Captain's Banquet it's possible to shoot every 4.1s with Overbearing Shot activated. Overbearing Shot knocks the oozes prone interrupting them and gives you enough time to shoot them again before they're able to merge.

How it works:

Step1: Kill the first form (like in the video)

Step2: Use the arbalest to remove the concentration from both gigantic oozes then shoot one of them until it's close to 50%hp. After that you can apply Arterial Strike/Gouging Strike and wait until it becomes Bloodied - now as soon as the oozes see each other they will try to merge. The only tricky part is to position yourself in line with both of them (not that hard once you understand the timing). Once the oozes are close to each other they will try to merge over and over again and you'll interrupt them over and over with your arbalest until the one with lesser health dies.

Step3:  We have now one gigantic and 2 massive oozes. The massive oozes don't patrol and it's a good idea to kill the gigantic one near the left/right sides of the area. The other gigantic ooze will continue to patrol and should be killed on the opposite side of the area.

Step4: We have now 2 pairs of massive oozes which are far from each other. Killing the first pair works the same way as for the gigantic - remove their concentration, shoot one of them until close to 75% and when they start to merge interrupt them over and over until one of them dies.

Step5: One massive ooze will split in 2 greater ones while the other massive one is near death. Now it's time for the scrolls: the greater ones are killed with 2 Tornados (it also knocks them up which interrupts them), while the 4 lesser ones are killed with a single Tornado.

Step6: Kill the second massive ooze and destroy the greater/lesser ones with another 3 Tornados.

Step7: Repeat steps 4-6 for the other pair of massive oozes.

Observations:

The scrolls of Tornado don't require very rare ingredients and only 12 scrolls are needed. That means we can have 3 quick slots free for other consumables (potions of Ascension, drugs, potions, etc)

Maybe it's possible to reach the required speed with just Coral Snuff instead of Captain's Banquet (which is less useful for the other encounters).

[Not So Clever Hound]

Well done! I salute your persistence. That must have taken some nerve and patience.

I love this build, this is what inspired me to do a Cipher/Assassin variant specifically to tackle HoW .

[Kaylon]

15 hours ago, Not So Clever Hound said:

Well done! I salute your persistence. That must have taken some nerve and patience.

It took when I tried to beat it with the herald... With the assassin I gave up pretty fast because I tried mostly to prevent the split since the phase 2 seemed impossible without hard CCs. I remember I tried interrupts also, however I didn't try Overbearing Shot because I thought it was too slow.

Lately I was thinking what would be the best weapon to interrupt the merge if I had Blade Cascade. Once I figured I can shoot fast enough even without Blade Cascade it went pretty fast.

[Not So Clever Hound]

Again, great job.

I've done many attempts too with an Assassin with max Arcana, max Accuracy and loaded with Gaze of the Adragan scrolls and top tier Fire DMG scrolls with Fire-PL boost items etc. With the goal to Gouging Strike Phase One and hard CC/Nuke Phase 2, 3, 4 Ooze by Ooze. In that set up I've also found that phase 2 comes relatively close but crumbles between the high defenses, wandering of the oozes, limited resources (even with 6 pocket slots).