Bloodmage Solo POTD Upscaled Megabosses

[Waski]

I still don't get it. How can you start combat stealthed (solo, with trap) and buff yourself without Berath challange? Nobody is agro so combat ends after few seconds. I didn't tested it tbh but I remember thay Arkemyr Brilliant Departure was useless when I was soloing bm/tac, I tried it and after few seconds of invis combat ended.

[thelee]

15 minutes ago, Waski said:

I still don't get it. How can you start combat stealthed (solo, with trap) and buff yourself without Berath challange? Nobody is agro so combat ends after few seconds. I didn't tested it tbh but I remember thay Arkemyr Brilliant Departure was useless when I was soloing bm/tac, I tried it and after few seconds of invis combat ended.

this is a good point. the only times i've done this deliberatley is in my ultimate run (berath's) and in my most recent run, which had five god challenges on, including berath. i don't see how one could buff up like this outside berath's.

there are a few fights where you specially cannot leave combat, but they are few and far in between. Aside from SSS arena fights, I can only recall sigilmaster auranic (and is the only one i explicitly rely on this behavior outside berath's challenge, so i can exhaust her spells with summons without being relentlessly pummeled with sigils).

 

either way though, i feel at the very least that an enemy stepping on a trap *should* trigger combat for a few seconds, but it sounds like even that is not happening. @karemas how did you actually end up doing buffs before your current issues? did you actually stay in combat while stealthed and not actively hunted for by enemies?

[Boeroer]

You can keep combat running endlessly without Berath's Challenge if you use DoTs like Gouging Strike, True Love's Kiss etc. Endlessly not really because at some point the "dotted" enemy will die - but you know what I mean. Shadowing Beyond and Arkemyr's BD won't work (they break on any DoT tick) but Smoke Veil will not break. You can run away (out of sight) and prepare stuff all day, then return. Obviously Smoke Veil is no option as SC Bloodmage. But Potion of Invisibility works the same, so you could use that:

Hit enemy from stealth with Lover's Embrace, retreat a bit (Alacrity maybe), drink Potion of Invisibility and run out of sight. Then prebuff all you want and return.

[Waski]

2 hours ago, Boeroer said:

You can keep combat running endlessly without Berath's Challenge if you use DoTs like Gouging Strike, True Love's Kiss

I think dot from dagger doesn't work like this, I remember trying it and combat ended but not 100% sure ( it was few month ago), other thing about it is you don't have to be unseen,  just in stealth mode to trigger it ( I was trying to kill Arkemyr for grimoire on solo bloodmage early on, but his deflection was to high to be reliable)

[Boeroer]

I've done a whole playthrough as Assassin/Bleak Walker with Lover's Embrace (also Gouging Strike and Brand Enemy) and never did the combat end prematurely. Granted most of the time I used all three on one enemy. I can check later if the True Love's Kiss is an exception.  

Yes, Lover's Embrace only works from stealth. But you can sneak up tp any enemy with 0 stealth with the help of Bounding Boots and the "cancel action before landing" trick. Important part is that once you applied True Love's Kiss (obviously with single handed usage for the +12 ACC) you drink the potion and retreat. Then the combat shouldn't stop and you can do whatever you like (out of sight). There are some spots where that can't work due to space limitations (e.g. Water Dragon).

Other DoTs would also work but most of them don't last long enough to give you enough time for buffing up etc. 

Edited November 17, 2020 by Boeroer

[Boeroer]

Just checked Lover's Embrace + Potion of Invisibility on Edér in Fort Deadlight: combat did not end once True Love's Kiss was applied. 

[Waski]

Oki, maybe I misremembered.

[Waski]

6 hours ago, Boeroer said:

Just checked Lover's Embrace + Potion of Invisibility on Edér in Fort Deadlight: combat did not end once True Love's Kiss was applied. 

just tested it and combat wont end but you cannot switch weapons, that's what happend when I tried it before

 

[Boeroer]

Huh? Never heard about that.

I just tried again and I can switch weapons just fine whenever I want (while invisible or later), no problem. Doesn't matter if I use Smoke Veil or potion.

Maybe it's Pukestabber in your case? It has some buffs that work for all daggers (that are equipped) -  and maybe on weapon switch it overrides True Love's Kiss or something. No idea. I just switched from Lover's Embrace to Watcher's Blade and nothing weird happened. Combat and DoT went on as expected.   

 

Edited November 17, 2020 by Boeroer

[Waski]

20 minutes ago, Boeroer said:

Maybe it's Pukestabber in your case?

nope, strange that you have diffrent behavior (no mods installed on my end btw)

 

[Boeroer]

interesting. Well - for the case of this Bloodmage it wouldn't be a problem though because you can easily prebuff etc. first with Lover's Embrace still in hand and afterwards switch to another weapon, right after walking back in sight I guess. 

[thelee]

is it a matter of distance? i remember observing odd behavior in my ultimate run with invisibility buffing with tactician and brilliant that seemed linked to distance from enemies (too far or too close)

 

edit: never mind i see in your first video that you went off the corner as well

Edited November 17, 2020 by thelee

[Boeroer]

Too far: maybe. Although in my solo Assassin/Bleak Walker run I never experienced this. But most of times I only stacked True Love's Kiss with Gouging Strike and Brand Enemy (maybe finished off some weaklings with Ring the Bell etc. before going invisible), retreated and then waited until the enemies dropped dead. I didn't switch weapons a lot nor did I cast a ton of stuff while I was retreated.