Good cipher dps spells / builds

[SenSx]

Hello,

I have alwready 3 ciphers in my current run:

- My Rogue/Cipher cipher as a soulblade

- Seraphen as Barbarian/Cipher

- Ydwin as pure Cipher.

 

And yet I never considered any cipher DPS spell.

My rogue use more the accuracy buff and debuff, and Soul annhilation, so barely any cipher spells, and not dps.

Serafen will have just slightly more, I'm considering more crowd controll for him like the charm and dominations ones, maybe secret horrors to shut down casters.

But since his dps will come more from his barbarian class, I don't think he needs dps spells.

 

And that leave me with Ydwin, I haven't been curious much about cipher dps spell, and I think that would be boring if my 3rd cipher wasn't spec with those.

Do you have a good list of the best dps spells, and maybe a build for that please ?

I think I'll give her the frost bow Frostseeker that seems to build quite a lot of focus.

 

I'm also curious about good Witch (Barbarian/cipher) builds for Seraphen.

 

Thanks a lot

[Boeroer]

Maybe because the damaging spells of ciphers aren't super impressive in general compared to some other of the cipher's abilities (for example mind control).

Since ciphers have potentially unlimited resources their damaging spells aren't as impactful as Wizards', Priests' and Druids' in most cases - but they can cast more of them in an encounter (if they manage ro generate enough focus). 

Disintegration is great if you can make it hit (or even crit). Especially against tough single foes it's a great damaging spell.

For that to go nicely a party member with a Morning Star + weapon proficiency is very helpful: hit (or even only graze) the enemy with Body Blows from the Morning Star (which lowers the fortitude defense a lot), then cast Disintegration with Ydwin on him.

Best would be to charm or dominate him before or after - for example with the help of Serafen - so that the slowly dying enemy doesn't bother you anymore but even helps you - as long as alive.

Fortunately a charmed enemy will not get flipped back to hostile from Disintegration (or Soul Ignition which stacks with Disintegration but doesn't do raw damage but burn and has to overcome enemies' burn AR in order to be effective). So you can charm an enemy and calmly cast Disintegration on them afterwards which makes the process a bit more flexible.

Both beam spells (Antipathetic Field and Ectopsychic Echo) are good if your positioning and movement is great (for example when using Boots of Speed and immunity to disengagement attacks from Nomad's Brigandine or Gipon Prudensco) - and if you have enough PENentration and ACCuracy. They also don't rely on INT at all.

Antipathetic Field is the go-to spell to use in combination with Death of 1000 Cuts. 

Both are also great in combination with Combusting Wounds (from Aloth for example). 

For a nice combo of disruption and AoE damage Amplified Wave is still very good. But you have to watch your PEN and the enemies' AR. It does crush damage - so it's great to lower crush AR in an AoE before using it. This can be done with Expose Vulnerabilities (Wizard), a Mace with modal + Clear Out (Fighter), Hel Hyraff (Chanter) or the Sungrazer flail (its enchantment that lowers crush AR by 1 also works with spells from that character iirc).

Stuff like Mind Lance and Mind Blades is cool, but the damage:focus ratio isn't very good in most cases.

Soul Shock is a lot better in that regard - IF you can ramp up your AoE size (more INT mostly) and PEN - as well as having an ally that's often surrounded by enemies (like a main tank). The biggest hurdle for good DPS with Soul Shock is your casting speed and your focus generation. A combo of Reaping Knives on a fast attacking party member (like your Soulblade maybe?) with Time Parasite can give you a great outcome with spamming Soul Shock. Reaping Knives - despite their description - generate 5 focus per hit. If your party member does a full attack you get 10 focus - that's one Soul Shock. Now if the Reaping Knives wielder attacks twice as fast as you can cast and recover from Soul Shock you can spam it endlessly (in theory). A Psion would be the best subclass for this but it would also work with Ydwin.

Unfortunately Deltro's Cage, which would boost the Power Level of Soul Shock by 2 points, would slow you down. I don't know if it's worth it (besides its protective benefits of course). 

Edited July 29 by Boeroer

[yorname]

Disintegration is probably the best for a no-subclass cipher.

Death of 1000 cuts + Antipathetic Field is a good trick that kills bosses in seconds, if you can find another enemy to set this up.

The problem with lower tier spells is that while they can be focus-efficient, you're spending your time doing less impactful things even though SC ciphers won't lack focus when facing multiple enemies.

IMO when fighting multiple enemies, the best thing for a SC cipher to do is to make use of Shared Nightmare and AOE weapons. Open with Thunderous Report or something similar, cast Borrowed Instinct and/or Time Parasite, attack with hand mortars to remain at a high focus level, and occasionally use Amplified Wave to quickly consume focus when focus is near/already full.

 

[Chaospread]

23 hours ago, yorname said:

Death of 1000 cuts + Antipathetic Field is a good trick that kills bosses in seconds, if you can find another enemy to set this up.

I think other shred spell can be good with Death of 1000 cuts: disintegration, recall agony, soul ignition, pain link and reaping knives (especially this one imho).

Does DoT trigger Do1000C?

[Boeroer]

1 hour ago, Chaospread said:

I think other shred spell can be good with Death of 1000 cuts: disintegration, recall agony, soul ignition, pain link and reaping knives (especially this one imho).

Does DoT trigger Do1000C?

No, DoT ticks do not trigger Do1000C. Only direct damage attack rolls from Shred spells seem to trigger Do1000C.

Reaping Knives (the spell) might have the right keyword, but the attack from the knives themselves don't have it.

That's stuff like Mind Blades and Antipathetic Field. Mind Blades isn't too bad if you have a lot of bounces and only two targets.

Since Antipathetic Field rolls every second and is cheap it's the best option (if you can set it up) imo. If you bring a Berserker/Cipher you can anchor Apathetic Field to an ally who's flanking the enemy. If one really wants to make Do1000C work I would recommend such a party member. It also has other nice little things it can do with Confusion+Cioher spells (for example cast Amplified Strike on an enemy instead of an ally and deal double damage that way, cast Amplified Wave on enemies or anchor Ectopsychic Echo to enemies - and more). Blood Thirst + Soul Annihilation is a pretty great combo, too.

A Cipher Wall spell with the shred tag would be perfect. To bad we don't have one. 

I didn't try Pain Link. Maybe the retaliation has the shred keyword, but I doubt it. I guess only the appliance to the ally is keyworded. 

I guess a Soulblade with Sun & Moon who could spam smaller Soul Annihilations non-stop might also work well? Didn't actually try if Soul Annihilation attacks carry the shred keyword. Might be worth testing. 

I would have preferred if they had implemented Do1000C like Combusting Wounds, meaning that all damage rolls would work. To balance it out the effect then could have been weaker than it is now. The current implementation can be very potent but the complicated setup severly limits its overall usefulness.

 

Edited July 30 by Boeroer

[SenSx]

Ok thank you all for your answers.

I think I will only pick the best dps spells then: desintegrate and amplified wave, if I understood  correctly, and might look at some others like recall agony etc.

So there is no point picking too many dps spells, when they all use the same ressources, and many are not focus efficient end game.

 

The rest will be buff and debuff (charm etc.)

 

What weapon do yo advice me ?

A was thinking of the Frostseeker bow, I heard it builds lots of focus.

But you told me about the  hand mortars  ?

I would also like a second weapon with crush damage in case ennemies are resistant to piercing and slasing.

 

=> Boeroer

 

Don't worry about fortitude, I'm playing with the amazing Konstanten build you adviced me some time ago !

Thanks again !

https://forums.obsidian.net/topic/132831-konstanten-builds/#comment-2370060

 

[yorname]

Eccea's Arcane Blaster for single target, Fire in the Hole for multiple targets.

Eccea's Arcane Blaster has Imbued Ammunition, if you combine it with dual wielding trick or pistol modal + one-handed, the total damage and speed is comparable to a melee 2H weapon (which is already better than most ranged weapons). Imbued Ammunition doesn't graze, has high PEN and very good damage types, resulting in high and more importantly, reliable damage.

Reload weapons are better for a cipher, because you often need to immediately cast after attacking so that your buff/debuff don't expire. For example, when Psychovampiric Shield is about to expire on an enemy, recasting it before it actually expires or afterwards makes a big difference on its hit chance and duration.

 

[Boeroer]

1 hour ago, SenSx said:

So there is no point picking too many dps spells, when they all use the same ressources, and many are not focus efficient end game.

I would add "and target the same defense". It can be benefical to have one alternative to fortitude-targeting spells (like having Antipathetic Field or so).

Besides that I agree - especially because Disintegration does raw damage. You don't have to look at enemies AR and your PEN. And if you have a Morning Star dude like Konstanten who also lowers fortitude with chant and Spirit Frenzy you're all set.

1 hour ago, SenSx said:

But you told me about the  hand mortars  ?

I would also like a second weapon with crush damage in case ennemies are resistant to piercing and slasing.

Frostseeker is good. If you plan to pick Shared Nightmare then Hand Mortar + Fire in the Hole are great picks against hordes of enemies. Watershaper's Focus with Blast and Ondra's Wrath, too (especially with Time Parasite). Both of the latter have fairly low PEN though, so having a backup weapon set with crush or raw damage is benefical. If it needs to be ranged then there's only Eccea's Arcane Blaster, as @yorname said - or scepters. Current's Rush has the enchantment High Tide which triggers a cone AoE on crit that can proc itself. And that cone does generate focus iirc.

A quarterstaff could be used to be somewhat safe and still do good crush damage. 

If it were me I'd probably pick the Blaster for single targets and against pierce/slash resistant enemies, too. Raw damage takes aways any worries about PEN and AR which is so convenient. 

 

[Chaospread]

2 hours ago, Boeroer said:

I would have preferred if they had implemented Do1000C like Combusting Wounds, meaning that all damage rolls would work. To balance it out the effect then could have been weaker than it is now. The current implementation can be very potent but the complicated setup severly limits its overall usefulness.

To good to be real, I knew it

Especially in SOLO Deathof1000c lose too much versus one lonely boss cause you can cast Antipathetic Field.

Wondering if some mods balance this ability in some manner.

[abot]

Death of 1000 Cuts + Belt of Magran's Chosen + Mind Blades. When you have enough Death of 1000 cuts stacked thanks to 0.5 sec mind blades hits on enemy + fire blight, start using disintegration

[Chaospread]

Does Do1000C stack?

[Elric Galad]

23 hours ago, Chaospread said:

To good to be real, I knew it

Especially in SOLO Deathof1000c lose too much versus one lonely boss cause you can cast Antipathetic Field.

Wondering if some mods balance this ability in some manner.

Balance Polishing Mod just makes Screaming Souls work closer as intended, causing all vessels including allies in the vicinity to trigger a Shred AoE attack.

In Solo, with a SC Cipher, it won't help much. But with a party with the right set-up, you now have another Shred spell that can cause multiple attacks per cast vs lonely boss.

(also make Death of 1000 cuts target Deflection to distinguish more from Disintigrate)

 

At this point I wonder if the easiest fix won't be simply to allow Death of 1000 Cuts to work with any Cipher spell and/or with reaping knives attack. Respect the original vibe. I mean, AFAIK, it is the only Cipher spell that interacts with a Cipher KW.

Combo with Ectopsychic would be a tad too obvious. Is this that much better than Antipathetic Field ?

Much more convenient at least. Maybe I should lower the 31 raw instant damages if I go that way ?

Or maybe I should go with a Combusting wounds-like version that works vs everything (with even lower values).

Edited July 31 by Elric Galad

[Boeroer]

37 minutes ago, Elric Galad said:

Or maybe I should go with a Combusting wounds-like version that works vs everything (with even lower values).

This what makes the most sense to me. I mean it's called "Death of a thousand cuts" and not "Death of a thousand very specific Cipher spells".

Heh no... but I mean it makes the most sense mechanically. Everything else just feels so forced and unneccesarily complicated to me. On the other hand I don't really play Deadfire anymore (besides running some test session here and there) and will certainly not do an SC Cipher run in the foreseeable future - so my feelings on this matter mean very little.

[Elric Galad]

1 hour ago, Boeroer said:

This what makes the most sense to me. I mean it's called "Death of a thousand cuts" and not "Death of a thousand very specific Cipher spells".

Heh no... but I mean it makes the most sense mechanically. Everything else just feels so forced and unneccesarily complicated to me. On the other hand I don't really play Deadfire anymore (besides running some test session here and there) and will certainly not do an SC Cipher run in the foreseeable future - so my feelings on this matter mean very little.

Unless I'm mistaken, you don't even use mods (bar UI and CP) 

 

The duration extension par damages should be in line with "the shield cracks" which also trigger on damages. I think it's 3s, ney ?

EDIT : Or maybe it should be more challenging because it's damages, not just a debuff (2s or even 1s would be enough, maintaining it for unlimited duration should be challenging - and even with this multihit weapons would allow it).

The raw damages per damages should be... I don't know ? 10 raw damages maybe ? Combusting wounds have "base 6" (4 + initial tick) and easily reaches the 10 damage threshold due to its complicated refreshing meachanism.

EDIT : Ney, resonant touch is 15 damages and it is way harder to use.

Avenging storm is 7-10 damages is self only (at least switching target/using AoE weapons work better).

5 raw damages per damaged is a maximum IMHO. This and the DoT will be very valuable in the long run.

 

EDIT EDIT : to be sincere, I think it really could lead to something quite degenerate if we allow it with something else than (Cipher) spells.
The fact it doesn't even work on Shred DoT is sad though.

Edited July 31 by Elric Galad

[Elric Galad]

17 hours ago, Elric Galad said:

Unless I'm mistaken, you don't even use mods (bar UI and CP) 

 

The duration extension par damages should be in line with "the shield cracks" which also trigger on damages. I think it's 3s, ney ?

EDIT : Or maybe it should be more challenging because it's damages, not just a debuff (2s or even 1s would be enough, maintaining it for unlimited duration should be challenging - and even with this multihit weapons would allow it).

The raw damages per damages should be... I don't know ? 10 raw damages maybe ? Combusting wounds have "base 6" (4 + initial tick) and easily reaches the 10 damage threshold due to its complicated refreshing meachanism.

EDIT : Ney, resonant touch is 15 damages and it is way harder to use.

Avenging storm is 7-10 damages is self only (at least switching target/using AoE weapons work better).

5 raw damages per damaged is a maximum IMHO. This and the DoT will be very valuable in the long run.

 

EDIT EDIT : to be sincere, I think it really could lead to something quite degenerate if we allow it with something else than (Cipher) spells.
The fact it doesn't even work on Shred DoT is sad though.

Okay, I've changed a bit my mind.

The thing is, if Death of 1000 Cuts is changed to work with universal sources of damages, it would become a kind of passive. Take a blunderbuss and any issue about maintaining it is solved.

A passive that adds raw damages on each strike (like a party wide avenging storm, which is also more reliable because of raw damages) and a raw permanent DoT (like a better version of Gouging Strike). To avoid it being too strong I would have to tweak down the number a lot... which would completely changes the nature of the spell. Which might be fun, but isn't the purpose of Balance Polishing Mod.

Also I got the feeling that the spell would be too simple to use. Current Death of 1000 Cuts need effort to work properly, but that's what the game fun, ney ? Not permanent semi passive. At least stuff like Combusting Wounds have to be cast again to work (and Fire damages isn't a solution to all battles). So Gameplay wise, I think this change is not suitable.

 

Adding other trigger for Death of 1000 Cuts isn't out question but :

- Adding other Cipher Spells would automatically result in Ectopsychic Echo being the optimal choice. Only Antipathetic Field could compete, but it is harder to use. => Discarded

- Adding Reaping knives weapon attacks would also be too obvious as a combo : Cast Death of 1000 Cuts, cast Reaping Knives to every party member, profit. => Discarded

- The sadest thing about Death of 1000 Cuts is that it works only with direct damages shred spells. Disintigrate, Soul Ignition, Recall Agony and Pain Link don't work. That's actually a big part of all Shred spells that don't work (plus reaping knives) ! So I think it would be suitable to have Death of 1000 Cuts work on any Shred Graze/Hit/Crit (including Pain Link retaliation autohit). That would provide simple interactions with Disintigrate, Sould Ignition and Recall Agony. And also a really nice interaction with Pain Link, although not as obvious as Ectopsychic Echo would have been.

With the later simple change, there would be 3 spells "optimal" to use with Death of 1000 Cuts : Antipathetic Field, Screaming Soul and Pain Link. Still for Solo play for Dorudugan, Magran Belts + Antipathetic Field would still be the only solution. I can't really balance the game for that one fight (even if it is a relevant fight as arguably the hardest).

 

That being said, I'm only speaking about modding for Balance Polishing Mod.

If you really want a special version for your own use, ask me, I can make it (within a couple of weeks though  )

Edited August 1 by Elric Galad

[Chaospread]

Do1000C is a 9 level ability, it should be better than how is now, I think a solution is to have it working with all shred spells, also DoT and Reaping Knives and maybe drop the duration extension on damage.
Or drop its own DoT effect and keep duration extension with shred spells/RK on damage.

[Elric Galad]

2 hours ago, Chaospread said:

Do1000C is a 9 level ability, it should be better than how is now, I think a solution is to have it working with all shred spells,

This part I will do

2 hours ago, Chaospread said:

also DoT

This part isn't technically doable, at least not easily. What can be done is to apply the effect once when when the spell is cast. 

2 hours ago, Chaospread said:

and Reaping Knives and maybe drop the duration extension on damage.

This one is quite reasonnable from a pure balance standpoint. I can make it for you if you want.

But it deviates too much from the original for me to include in my mod's package. Also it forces usingit with reaping knives. 

 

I think you underestimate how it would works with my previous and proposed change

I've already changed the spell to target Deflection. Targetting Fortitude is Disintigrate main weakness vs the target you really want to hit with your big bad single target DoT as they tend to have gruesome Fortitude. Targetting Deflection instead is big asset of the spell.

Death of 1000 Cuts isn't bad. Its base damages (with 0 extension its base damages are the same as Disintigrate, albeit slower) and each hit adds a total ~90 damages. I think you focus a bit too much on using it how you intended to. Think about it like a passive that can last a whole battle. Again, I'm not claiming it couldn't have been better with another design, but I think the current one is good enough.

Pain Link will trigger it on each retaliation (in my mod, it lasts 30s) and you can put it on several party member, which is probably enough to have it up all the time. Probably very efficient vs things like Dorudugan. It won't make the kill, but the added damages for a single cast will likely be hard to compare with anything else.

2 hours ago, Chaospread said:

Or drop its own DoT effect and keep duration extension with shred spells/RK on damage.

I like it less.

[NotDumbEnough]

Regarding the original question, Ciphers do not have a lot of great single target damaging spells outside of Disintegration. Amplified Wave spam is pretty good on Ascendants if you are fighting a crowd. Against single targets ciphers mostly play a supportive role with Ancestor's Memory and Reaping Knives (high DPS weapons that also help a lot if target has high armor). Also consider Psychovampiric Shield (-10 resolve makes target much easier to hit, and makes all other debuffs last much longer) and of course Detonate as a finisher.

[Chaospread]

On 8/1/2024 at 3:05 PM, Elric Galad said:

This one is quite reasonnable from a pure balance standpoint. I can make it for you if you want.

It doesn't worth it, keep as you have developed now (targeting DEF etc) and is already good, thanks

[Chaospread]

On 8/1/2024 at 6:13 PM, NotDumbEnough said:

Regarding the original question, Ciphers do not have a lot of great single target damaging spells outside of Disintegration. Amplified Wave spam is pretty good on Ascendants if you are fighting a crowd. Against single targets ciphers mostly play a supportive role with Ancestor's Memory and Reaping Knives (high DPS weapons that also help a lot if target has high armor). Also consider Psychovampiric Shield (-10 resolve makes target much easier to hit, and makes all other debuffs last much longer) and of course Detonate as a finisher.

Against single enemy a cipher:

• buff her/himself
• debuff enemy
• spam paralysis
• do damage with weapons
• AND on top you have disint.

Do you wanna also another spell for single enemy?

Edited August 4 by Chaospread

[thelee]

On 7/30/2024 at 4:45 AM, Boeroer said:

I would have preferred if they had implemented Do1000C like Combusting Wounds, meaning that all damage rolls would work. To balance it out the effect then could have been weaker than it is now. The current implementation can be very potent but the complicated setup severly limits its overall usefulness.

adding onto this - on paper do1000c can do crazy things, but when i actually ran a party with a SC cipher that did this (i think ydwin) it was extremely underwhelming.

on most enemies and in most fights, it's completely overkill - a disintegrate is cheaper and will do basically the same thing. i would rather disintegrate more enemies than try to set up a single do1000c + antipathetic field on one target (that's almost enough for a second disintegrate). (edit: i guess with an ascendant you could do a lot more dumping of do1000c on enemy mobs, but you could also do other insane stuff with an ascendant and i'm not sure do1000c spamming is the best use of it)

on most bosses, it's close to overkill as well - a disintegrate is cheaper and requires less setup. it's really, really painful to miss or even graze do1000c, and then you actually need some enemy to help trigger a shred combo - or you need to somehow be generating tons of focus and consistently landing a different shred spell... it's kind of a waste of a cipher's action economy honestly. in the end it was mostly just useful as a secondary disintegrate for after when i'd already hit disintegrate and other debuffs on the boss.

also it's lame that the tier 3 beam spell is tagged as echo and not shred

Edited August 5 by thelee

[Boeroer]

On 8/5/2024 at 9:41 PM, thelee said:

also it's lame that the tier 3 beam spell is tagged as echo and not shred

Well, devs can't name it "Ectopsychic Echo" and then make it a shred spell, can they?

[SenSx]

What about recall agony ?

Maybe not on the pure cipher that won't have the dps, but I'm thinking of it for Serafer as a barbarian/cipher.

I don't know if that 30% damage buff can be better than desintagrate, unless both are just  complementary , recall agony being better on an ennemy targeted by many companions, all getting the 30% damage buff.

Or maybe just use desintagrate on an ennemy you are not targetting, and then recall agony on your target for max dps output ?

[Elric Galad]

On 8/10/2024 at 2:38 PM, SenSx said:

What about recall agony ?

Maybe not on the pure cipher that won't have the dps, but I'm thinking of it for Serafer as a barbarian/cipher.

I don't know if that 30% damage buff can be better than desintagrate, unless both are just  complementary , recall agony being better on an ennemy targeted by many companions, all getting the 30% damage buff.

Or maybe just use desintagrate on an ennemy you are not targetting, and then recall agony on your target for max dps output ?

Yeah, I'm wondering a lot about recall agony at the moment. 

The thing about it is that it synergizes with absolutely nothing. 

The added damages don't generate focus, wounds for shattered pillars, % lifesteal. 

They don't work on DoT.

They don't even work with Soul Annililation. 

 

It is only about the damages. 

 

The added damages might be cool on a boss (the spell isn't weak), but some other Cipher spell can have similar results. Disintigrate will do similar or better damages without having to worry about focusing (not same cost of course, but way more reliably).  Psychovampiric shield will debuff deflection for all your party buddies while having some utility. 

You really have few cases for which picking it sounds the right choice.

 

Actually I'm thinking about changing its effect to +30% damages received, or to +40% damages received because that would be additive damages, not multiplicative. For spells it would be similar, for weapon worse, but working with DoT would make so much more sense for cipher. Also focus generation and Soul Annililation would be improved. 

There is already a paladin ability that does this in an AoE. The effect is less unique, but the current ability having zero combo potential feels like a failed unique design IMHO. Or is there any synergy I miss ? 

[SenSx]

I really don't know Elric, I  haven't tested it much.

I think they probbly justify the weaker effect with a lower focus cost and a boss killer indeed.