Animancer's Energy Blade and Eccea's Arcane Blaster

[Gleenslayer]

Hello,

I have some doubts regarding these two weapons that only cause natural damage, they are:

• 1 -  Does damage scale with might?
• 2 - Do they receive passive damage bonuses from rogue and barbarian skills?
• 3 - Do they have penetration?
• 4 - What changes if I enchant them?
• 5 - What classes do you recommend to use these weapons most profitably?

 

I'm thinking about a build focused on these weapons, to kill resistant enemies faster.

Thank you in advance for your attention!

[Boeroer]

8 hours ago, Gleenslayer said:

• 1 -  Does damage scale with might?

Sure

8 hours ago, Gleenslayer said:

• 2 - Do they receive passive damage bonuses from rogue and barbarian skills?

They do

8 hours ago, Gleenslayer said:

• 3 - Do they have penetration?

No, they do raw damage which bypasses armor completely. What would they need penetration for? This means they can never underpenetrate (which is a serious damage malus) but they also cannot overpeneterate (which is "only" a 30% additive dmg bonus - underpenetration is much more severe since it's multiplicative).

8 hours ago, Gleenslayer said:

• 4 - What changes if I enchant them?

Nothing in regard to the damage type. Animancer's Blade can only be enchanted with quality though (no special enchantments besides the starting ones). Eccea's Arcane Blaster can get additonal elemental damage - but it doesn't change the raw dmg type of the iitial shot - it's just an addon of elemental dmg on top of that raw dmg. The other enchantments also don't do anything to the damage type.

8 hours ago, Gleenslayer said:

• 5 - What classes do you recommend to use these weapons most profitably?

 Classes or class combos with bad to mediocre weapon penetration - if you play Path of the Damned. On the lower difficulties it doesn't matter that much because the armor of enemies is weaker. Besides that they are not most suitable for a special class but rather great against special enemies with very high armor. Animancer's Blade has lower base damage than a regular sabre but is faster so the overall dps is comparable to a normal sabre - but the lack of further enchantments make it an inferior pick against enemies with normal to low armor - I mean compared to other unique sabres.
Eccea's Arcane Blaster is a great pistol for any pistolero build because its enchantments are great (except "Bullet Time" which doesn't work properly, so don't pick that). I used it with good success on several characters, among them a single class Kind Wayfarer (together with Scrodeo's Trophy), a Wizard/Ranger (also together with Scordeo's Trophy), a Beguiler/Sharpshooter (single handed with the modal and One handed style), SC Priest (Xoti, more than once) and more (I cannot remember all of them).

Watch out - if you use a Rogue then know that there's a problem with Deep Wounds: it requires a weapon with pierce, slash or crush damage to get triggered. Both weapons don't deal that type of damage but raw damage. Deep Wounds doesn't recognize raw damage so would be completely wasted if you mainly used on one of those weapons. So I'd say just spare that ability point and take something else.

Instead of or in addition to using those weapons you can also use abiities that deal raw damage. Like the Rogue's Arterial Strike, Gouging Strike and Ring the Bell. If you combine all three of those on a Steelclad construct for example it will die very quickly. Or you can use a Druid with Swarm of Insects + Infestation of Maggots and stuff like that. But something like Eccea's Arcane Blaster is indeed great against that sort of enemies. Animancer's Blade comes pretty late so I wouldn't plan a whole character build around it. But one can make a beeline for the Blaster and the fight where you cn loot it from also isn't difficult because it's just one mid-level wizard you have to take out (and you can start the fight from stealth).   

Edited May 28, 2023 by Boeroer

[Shai Hulud]

Animancer's Energy Blade is top tier against certain enemies. Since it does raw it is never resisted by anyone nor is anyone immune. And versus enemies with very high pierce/slash resistance like say Dorudugan, or any of the dragons, a regular sabre user is going to struggle to do much damage unless they crit most hits (crit gives a +50% penenetration). Against regular enemies where you would penetrate most hits a regular sabre will do more damage, but the universality of animancer's energy blade is extremely useful. Same idea with Eccea's Arcane Blaster though I haven't used it as much. You can enchant both up to mythic. What changes is the weapons gain bonus damage and accuracy. With the blaster the imbued ammunition gains penetration since it does crush/corrode, and also you can add certain effects like interrupt/knockback chance and chance for bullets to split.

They're both mid to late game items though so you might think about importing them from another run if you want to use them the whole game. Just put the weapons on a character and go to export tab on the character sheet, then export. Then in another run you can import the adventurer at an inn and take the weapons. It can be very expensive if you give him too many items so I'd just give him the energy blade and the blaster. Or if you don't mind disabling achievements you can just add the weapons via console.

As Boeroer has indicated the builds that would benefit the most from these weapons specifically are ones with mediocre penetration and accuracy. When you do raw damage penetration is meaningless, and accuracy is not as important since crits don't affect penetration of raw damage. Classes with high penetration: devoted, berserker, cipher, monk (with fists anyway). Classes with high accuracy: rangers, ciphers, sometimes monks (if you can maintain enduring dance), and priests, fighters with conqueror stance and disciplined barrage. 

Also a spellcaster class probably wouldn't need the sabre since they have spells, unless you built the class to be a martial caster like a wizard, who has many defensive buffs. 

So...I'm thinking the classes that would benefit the most would be regular barbarians, rogues, paladins, monks, and maybe chanters and wizards. There are some interesting multiclass combinations there. A barbarian/rogue would be interesting thematically with the sabre if you take blood frenzy and blood storm, since you will do a lot of raw damage. Barbarian / streetfighter in particular would wreck things meleeing. If you want to use the blaster more then a SC paladin could be pretty strong in the right party, particularly a kind wayfarer since you can spam flames of devotion and heal allies with white flames, and at higher levels will gain back paladin resources whenever allies die (including summons from a chanter). Holy slayer (pal/rogue) is also interesting, particularly steel garrote, since it is easy for a melee character to trigger the healing passive. Bleak Walkers could work as well since persistent distraction + flames of devotion gives two afflictions and triggers deathblows. For rogue half if it's a melee character I'd be tempted to do streetfighter since it is easy to get flanked, but trickster has some nice defensive buffs. A blood mage / rogue using wizard side for defensive buffs and occasional debuffs to trigger deathblows could also be good. 

I must note it's kind of weird to think about building a character this way, since normally I try to maximize accuracy and penetration, but they are just not as relevant here. Accuracy is still good, just not as essential, but penetration does nothing. Still the only classes where high penetration comes with large tradeoffs are berserker and devoted, so really I think you'd be fine with anything else...

I could give better feedback if you provided your other party members, what difficulty you're playing on, and the envisioned role for the character (DPS melee, ranged, melee/ranged hybrid, caster/melee hybrid, etc.?)

[Gleenslayer]

6 hours ago, Boeroer said:

Classes or class combos with bad to mediocre weapon penetration - if you play Path of the Damned. On the lower difficulties it doesn't matter that much because the armor of enemies is weaker.

6 hours ago, Boeroer said:

I used it with good success on several characters, among them a single class Kind Wayfarer

1 hour ago, Shai Hulud said:

I could give better feedback if you provided your other party members, what difficulty you're playing on, and the envisioned role for the character (DPS melee, ranged, melee/ranged hybrid, caster/melee hybrid, etc.?)

First, thanks for the responses and suggestions. I usually always play on maximum difficulty (PotD upscaling). I'm planning this build for a Solo Run with some margan challenges turned on. I've never played a Solo run before, so I'm pretty excited.

The idea behind these weapons was more because of the mega-boss and some other standard bosses, so I wouldn't worry too much about penetration. And I like them a lot thematically and visually, especially Animancer's Blade. I was thinking of playing as Kind Wayfaerer + Helwalker monk. The Kindwayfaerer Paladin because of all his healing, armor and some damage bonuses, and resource refunds, he would be my most defensive part. The monk because of his infinite wounds and his incredible abilities. +10 str and Lightning Strikes would slightly increase the low natural damage of weapons.

The idea would be this: Dichotomous souls + the pain persist and enduring dance. I would be dealing damage from afar, but depending on the occasion I would go in the front line with the dichotomous souls flanking the enemy. Using Shroud of the Phantasm to hopefully proc the Brilliant buff and recover resources. On very difficult occasions I would use a tower shield with the animancer's blade and play more defensively waiting for Brilliant proc, killing priority targets from a distance with the monk's pain persist.

What do you guys think?

[Shai Hulud]

6 hours ago, Gleenslayer said:

First, thanks for the responses and suggestions. I usually always play on maximum difficulty (PotD upscaling). I'm planning this build for a Solo Run with some margan challenges turned on. I've never played a Solo run before, so I'm pretty excited.

The idea behind these weapons was more because of the mega-boss and some other standard bosses, so I wouldn't worry too much about penetration. And I like them a lot thematically and visually, especially Animancer's Blade. I was thinking of playing as Kind Wayfaerer + Helwalker monk. The Kindwayfaerer Paladin because of all his healing, armor and some damage bonuses, and resource refunds, he would be my most defensive part. The monk because of his infinite wounds and his incredible abilities. +10 str and Lightning Strikes would slightly increase the low natural damage of weapons.

The idea would be this: Dichotomous souls + the pain persist and enduring dance. I would be dealing damage from afar, but depending on the occasion I would go in the front line with the dichotomous souls flanking the enemy. Using Shroud of the Phantasm to hopefully proc the Brilliant buff and recover resources. On very difficult occasions I would use a tower shield with the animancer's blade and play more defensively waiting for Brilliant proc, killing priority targets from a distance with the monk's pain persist.

What do you guys think?

Which challenges? This is kind of my specialty actually. Be aware if you have on Abydon's Challenge you can't really use any weapons at all besides summoned weapons and fists, as they'll break (though I expect flames of devotion doesn't apply damage to weapons). Woedica + Eothas (or even just Woedica) makes using per-rest classes very difficult, unless they're used for solely some passive bonuses, or you proc mind over matter and extend it with strand of favor. You'll have to use strand of favor (if abydon is on anyway) because just waiting for things to proc it by hitting you they'll break your gear. Exceptions are classes with extension abilities like blood mage and priests, though it is still tedious to proc each fight. And Hylea I think can actually be done with just about any build but controlling Vela is very tedious. The other challenges don't change the run that much from a standard solo POTD upscaled except a general increase in difficulty. 

Also the builds I mentioned earlier won't do well solo potd upscaled. Not tanky enough. Votaries are a good choice, IF you proc brilliant and wear the right gear this could definitely work by spamming flames of devotion. I made a L20 test build KW/helwalker. With dawnstar's blessing and practiced healer plus helwalker bonus I was getting about 44 health per attack and healing the dichotomous souls as well. Still I got killed in "tactical ogres" fight in SSS. When I gave myself brilliant and extended it I was able to muddle through the fight, though keeping alive the duplicates is difficult.

Animancer's Energy Blade doesn't seem necessary for this build though, except possibly in rare circumstances... crush damage is rarely resisted. Still your penetration isn't great (12 PEN at L20, can bump to 13 with potion of ascension and 15 with hot razor skewers). With the razor skewers and potion that is enough to penetrate nearly everything. And fists do more damage. Keeping the summons alive while you use long pain from behind them is difficult in some encounters. I expect it will work in many encounters, particularly if you give them +engagement gear, but sometimes enemies will break past anyway. 

The most effective votary I've played solo (or otherwise, really) is SG / FF, though you need the community patch for it to work right. Enfeebled triggers the SG 15% healing passive, and the FF attack heals you anyway when the curse runs out, so it is a brutally effective melee build. Doesn't even depend on armor, though it's probably easiest if you build it that way. Also FF attack has much better penetration than standard fists. It is high enough to penetrate everything that isn't outright crush immune.

I don't mean to dissuade you though, I only tested this for like 30 minutes and I think there's promise, though I'd probably use fist + tuotilo's palm with instruments of pain rather than animancer's energy blade, unless crushing were resisted. Hmm yeah I tried the encounter again, this time with blackened plate helm for +engagement, and with fist + tuotilo's palm and I survived. 

I may mess around with this later, very cool build idea. I just quickly scraped something together, human with 15/3/9/18/13/19 stats. After buffs, items, and helwalker + iron wheel it's 32/24/21/24/20/31

Think in retrospect I might drop MIG a bit for more INT, but this works pretty well. Definitely want two weapons most of the time, since Flames of Devotion triggers twice per use for like +88 healing with two fists or fist + tuotilo's palm (with instruments of pain). I'm unsure if flames of devotion healing gets triggered on swift flurry or heartbeat drumming. I'm going to guess...no. I didn't notice it anyway.

The more I test this build the more I like it. But if you're planning to proc brilliant every fight that will get tedious, I'd definitely extend it even though it's "cheesy". 

 

Edited May 29, 2023 by Shai Hulud

[Elric Galad]

I think Energy Blade should have a PEN values that only applies to non rash lash attached to the attack (such as Mon Shock lash) . 

 

@Boeroer, could you elaboratem a bit about billet time not working? I'll try to fix it with BPM. 

[Boeroer]

4 hours ago, Elric Galad said:

 

@Boeroer, could you elaborate a bit about billet time not working? I'll try to fix it with BPM. 

It is supposed to skip reloading for a certain duration. But it does nothing. I guess since the normal reloading cycle has a minimum animation time (you cannot shorten the reloading time more than down to a certain floor value) the reload time cannot be reduced to zero in a conventional way by just setting it to 0.0 secs or something like that.

I suspect the devs just went "ok, let's set reloading time to 0.0 secs for the base duration of x secs" but eventually forgot that even with 0.0 "official" reloading time the reload still takes that minimum amount of animation time. Instead I would look at how the Red Hand achieves its two shots with not reload in between and copy that behavior but give it that 10% chance and do like 3 or 4 shots without reload or whatever seems balanced - and scrap the "for x seconds". Just allow x shots with no reload in a row, no duration involved.

But of course getting "x shots without reloading" isn't the same as getting "shoot with a reloading time of 0 for x secs". Because you won't be able to influence the first one with INT and so on I guess. And naturally players would salivate over the possibility to extend that buff with Wall of Draining and so on. Not possible with a fixed amount of no-reload shots. 

So maybe the red hand method would be ven cleaner and more cheese-avoiding.

 

[Elric Galad]

On 5/29/2023 at 2:12 PM, Boeroer said:

It is supposed to skip reloading for a certain duration. But it does nothing. I guess since the normal reloading cycle has a minimum animation time (you cannot shorten the reloading time more than down to a certain floor value) the reload time cannot be reduced to zero in a conventional way by just setting it to 0.0 secs or something like that.

I suspect the devs just went "ok, let's set reloading time to 0.0 secs for the base duration of x secs" but eventually forgot that even with 0.0 "official" reloading time the reload still takes that minimum amount of animation time.

Exactly, and the floor animation time can't be changed. So the weapon probably can't be tweaked to work as intended? 

On 5/29/2023 at 2:12 PM, Boeroer said:

Instead I would look at how the Red Hand achieves its two shots with not reload in between and copy that behavior but give it that 10% chance and do like 3 or 4 shots without reload or whatever seems balanced - and scrap the "for x seconds". Just allow x shots with no reload in a row, no duration involved.

But of course getting "x shots without reloading" isn't the same as getting "shoot with a reloading time of 0 for x secs". Because you won't be able to influence the first one with INT and so on I guess. And naturally players would salivate over the possibility to extend that buff with Wall of Draining and so on. Not possible with a fixed amount of no-reload shots. 

So maybe the red hand method would be ven cleaner and more cheese-avoiding.

It can't be done. The number of shot before reloading is actually a parameter of the attack (which you can't replace for x second by another "attack" for X seconds). You could make the weapon fires n shot for x seconds... but that's a bit too close from the other mod option of the item.

So the cleanest I can think is to set Bullet Time to do -50% recovery for x seconds, x being much higher than the current 5s value. Would still fill like "bullet time" and with less immediate results than the other mod option.

Probably 10% chances -50% recovery for 12s. Allows about 2 more shots for its duration so similar power level compared to 15% double bullet and 5% triple bullet.

Less immediate results, but synergizes with INT and stuff like Wall of Draining (and not ideal synergy with Pistol modal and dual wielding due to additive speed bonuses stacking, albeit Arcane Blaster does come with a slowing modal through Imbued bullets). 

[Boeroer]

Then maybe do -80% (like the stealth bonus) to make sure the floor is def. met with Bullet Time?

 

[Elric Galad]

3 hours ago, Boeroer said:

Then maybe do -80% (like the stealth bonus) to make sure the floor is def. met with Bullet Time?

 

Meeting the floor would lead to making the pistol modal irrelevant.

I mean, if it was actually instant reload, then it would be OK to make it irrelevant, but since it's "just another speed buff", I prefer it would stack normally.

Also, because of the pistol modal / dual wielding / whatever speed buff, -50% reload has a good chance to be actually what it states (see that Obs ). Meanwhile -80% would hit the ceiling quite often and would sometimes be only-54%, -73%, etc...

[Boeroer]

Yes, but only from time to time for a rel short amount of time. Doesn't make the modal (which works at all times) redundant. To the contrary: the faster you can shoot the higher the chances to trigger Bullet Time in a given time frame.

Skipping reload (original idea) would also be an absolute buff which would make any speed buffs obsolete for a short amount of time. So I think when it's about coming close to the original (which doesn't work) -80% is more in the spirit than -50% imo. Doesn't matter if the 80% would be overkill often. But it would be very nice for characters with no actual speed buffs and feel powerful compared to their usual slow reloading speech. 

Another thing: does Bullet Time allow to get triggered while Bullet Time is active? I imagine if it worked like intended (0 reload time) it could lead to an extended duration because it gets triggered again during that rapid-fire phase. 

 

Edited June 6, 2023 by Boeroer

[Elric Galad]

8 hours ago, Boeroer said:

Yes, but only from time to time for a rel short amount of time. Doesn't make the modal (which works at all times) redundant. To the contrary: the faster you can shoot the higher the chances to trigger Bullet Time in a given time frame.

Skipping reload (original idea) would also be an absolute buff which would make any speed buffs obsolete for a short amount of time. So I think when it's about coming close to the original (which doesn't work) -80% is more in the spirit than -50% imo. Doesn't matter if the 80% would be overkill often. But it would be very nice for characters with no actual speed buffs and feel powerful compared to their usual slow reloading speech. 

I would plead -66% reload time for 10s then.

Why ?

Cause Pistol reload is 5s and min animation time is 1.67. So -66% would lead to reaching exactly the floor when no further modal/speed modifier is involved.

I think it would be a good compremise between coming the closest possible from actual intent in most case and having a description that match reality.

8 hours ago, Boeroer said:

Another thing: does Bullet Time allow to get triggered while Bullet Time is active? I imagine if it worked like intended (0 reload time) it could lead to an extended duration because it gets triggered again during that rapid-fire phase. 

 

No reason not to do. It could have been broken indeed, if it hasn't been bugged.

Edited June 6, 2023 by Elric Galad

[Boeroer]

How about 69%?

[Elric Galad]

1 hour ago, Boeroer said:

How about 69%?

Or 66,6%