Interrupt Build?

[mazeltov]

I think that ranged characters can even potentially be best for interrupting,

 

Of course, though classes with access to easy AoE (e.g. Wizard, Barb, Druid) will be the best Interrupters. Tanks get Interrupts as it were for free through Perception stacking, which makes things like Flails and One Handed Style even stronger for them, to convert their Grazes to better-Interrupting Hits.

 

Accuracy is useful for Interruption, to a point. Dedicated Interrupt builds should be able to generate very frequent or guaranteed Interrupts without the need for Crits.

[Achilles]

Both Sagani and Itumaak nail interrupts fairly consistently. Even with -20% recovery (penetrating shot) and a hunting bow

 

She is a DoT beast. Not sure I would do much to compromise that.

[b0rsuk]

So there ARE reasons not to take Penetrating Shot, after all! Also, interrupts seem to be better against enemies with slow attack animation, like ogres. They have to start from the beginning, and you can more easily interrupt them again.

Edited May 5, 2015 by b0rsuk

[Achilles]

I don't know that I would call that a reason

 

I'd rather have the DT Bypass and the DoT and take the interrupts as they come (knowing that I have Itumaak and 5 other party members contributing).

[Achilles]

Now that Interrupting Blows is (mostly) fixed, I'm posting my Interrupt builds.

 

High-interrupt Fighter

 

Emphasis on high accuracy and reduced recovery time.

 

Meadow Folk, Aedyr, Aristocrat (background optional)

 

M: 16 (13 base +3 Engwithan Adra Ban Amulet)

C: 17 (14 base +3 Girdle of Eotun Constitution)

D: 13 (10 base +3 Ring of Thorns)

P: 18 (15 base +2 Mail w/ Perception enchantment, +1 Hylea's Boon)

I: 10 (No bonuses)

R: 18 (16 base +2 Serel's Ring)

 

Other equipment (optional): Rabbit Fur Gloves, Boots of the Long March

 

01 - Constant Recovery, Disciplined Barrage (+10 Accuracy for 15 secs)

02 - Weapon Focus: Knight (+6 Accuracy with Sword, Crossbow, and Morning Star. All of these have Average-or-better Interrupt ratings)

03 - Defender

04 - Wary Defender

05 - Weapon Specialization: Knight

06 - Weapon and Shield Style

07 - Armored Grace (-16% to Recovery Time. Turns Mail into Leather)

08 - Weapon Mastery: Knight

09 - Critical Defense

10 - Interrupting Blows (Base Interrupt = 39 at level 12. All Hits will result in an Interrupt against opponents with < 15 Resolve)

11 - Confident Aim (convert Grazes to Hits = more Interrupts)

12 - Unstoppable (or grab bag)

 

 

High-interrupt Pallegina

 

Emphasis on high accuracy, critical hits, reduced recovery time, and sigificantly delaying enemy action when Interrupts occur.

 

M: 15 (12 base +3 Pensiavi mes Rei)

C: 13 (No bonuses)

D: 11 (No bonuses)

P: 14 (No bonuses)

I: 15 (13 base +2 Erij's Radiance)

R: 17 (15 base +2 Pallegina's Breastplate w/ Resolve enchantment)

 

Other equipment (optional): Boots of Zealous Command, Ring of Protection (if Deep Faith isn't taken)

 

01 - Faith and Conviction, Flames of Devotion

02 - Intense Flames

03 - Lay on Hands

04 - Weapon Focus: Soldier (+6 Accuracy with Great Swords and War Hammers, both of which have Average-or-better Interrupt ratings)

05 - Sworn Enemy (+20 Accuracy against target = more interrupts)

06 - Field Triage (arguably a waste of a Talent, but not worth respecing her over)

07 - Zealous Focus (+5 Accuracy, not just for her, but any party members within her aura. More Interrupts)

08 - Savage Attack

09 - Deprive the Unworthy

10 - Critical Focus (+6% chance to Crit - Crits add 25 to Interrupt rolls)

11 - Hastening Exhortation (or grab bag)

12 - Deep Faith (or Interrupting Blows)

 

 

Interrupt MVP Kana

 

Emphasis on debuffing enemy Concentration and significantly delaying enemy action when Interrupts occur.

 

M: 16 (No bonuses)

C: 14 (12 base +2 Fine Brigandine w/ Constitution enchantment)

D: 9 (No bonuses)

P: 14 (No bonuses)

I: 18 (17 base +1 Kana's Turban)

R: 10 (No bonuses)

 

Other equipment (optional): Boots of Stealth, Ring of Protection, Voice of the Mountaintop

 

01 -

02 - Ancient Memory

03 -

04 - Field Triage (arguably a waste of a Talent, but not worth respecing him over)

05 -

06 - Weapon Focus: Adventurer (+6 Accuracy with Estocs and Pollaxes - both of which have Strong Interrupt ratings)

07 -

08 - Two-Handed Style

09 -

10 - Deep Pockets

11 -

12 - Beloved Spirits (or grab bag)

 

Kana joins at Level 4 with the Level 2 Phrase, "Lo, Their Endless Host, The Harbingers Doom" (Frighten = -2 Resolve, or -6 Concentration). I've reported this as a bug, but it wasn't fixed in 1.05 so I'm assuming that it's intentional. At Level 5, take the Level 1 Phrase, "Thick Grew Their Tongues, Stumbling O'er Words" (-10 Concentration). Combine these two phrases into a chant for -16 Concentration vs Will. Tag team Kana and Pallegina on single high-value targets, via flanking. Their overlapping auras will significantly drop enemy Concentration while boosting Accuracy and Crits. Since both are using Strong Interrupt weapons, 0.75 - 1.0 second is added to the enemy's action timer every time an Interrupt occurs.

Edited May 6, 2015 by Achilles

[cctobias]

Does anyone know the stats for interrupting on ranger pets?

 

Make a party of all rangers, maybe you can keep the pets alive with by having 14 things dispersing tons of interrupt? 

 

Or possibly a chanter/priest for some buffs (interrupt/accuracy). 

Edited May 6, 2015 by cctobias

[mazeltov]

Does anyone know the stats for interrupting on ranger pets?

 

Based on the AC's Perception. Different ACs have different stats e.g. Antelope Per 15 vs. Lion Per 11.

 

A mixed animal approach might be amusing, using Lion's roar to reduce Concentrations by 6 and Stag to proc .5 second Interrupts in an AoE (Stag gets an ability similar to Barb Carnage).

[cctobias]

 

Does anyone know the stats for interrupting on ranger pets?

 

Based on the AC's Perception. Different ACs have different stats e.g. Antelope Per 15 vs. Lion Per 11.

 

A mixed animal approach might be amusing, using Lion's roar to reduce Concentrations by 6 and Stag to proc .5 second Interrupts in an AoE (Stag gets an ability similar to Barb Carnage).

 

So 1-2 lions and rest antelopes (who also have best defenses, which I think may suck no matter what though).

 

Chanter has a concentration reduction chant at 1st level.  Maybe the lion replace a chanter, but still the weapon fire aura would still be real good with so many actors.  Does that work for animal companions/unarmed?

 

Priest is good just for AoE accuracy bonuses.

 

Maybe 1 priest 5 rangers, 1-2 lions and 3-4 antelopes?  Make your priest actually fight too for more interrupt.  Let's say 3 actors on one monster for "safe" interrupts means 3.5 monsters "disabled".  And for some cases make an "antelope wall" for AOE/overlapping interupts.

 

Pure spitballing numbers there.

 

Edit: if priest is main you can make him Skaen for mini-sneak attack too, and its possible to leverage a lot of flank and sneak attack on the rangers too.

 

Edit2: or make a paladin with accuracy aura instead

Edited May 6, 2015 by cctobias

[mazeltov]

Maybe 1 priest 5 rangers, 1-2 lions and 3-4 antelopes?

 

Priests do have a special synergy for Interrupt builds toward the lategame, with a couple of spells that add huge Perception bonuses.

 

--

 

Testing, testing...

 

- party buffs work on ACs, including Chanter's Burn damage thingy

- Burn damage thingy works on Monk's Unarmed attacks, too

[cctobias]

 

Maybe 1 priest 5 rangers, 1-2 lions and 3-4 antelopes?

 

Priests do have a special synergy for Interrupt builds toward the lategame, with a couple of spells that add huge Perception bonuses.

 

--

 

Testing, testing...

 

- party buffs work on ACs, including Chanter's Burn damage thingy

- Burn damage thingy works on Monk's Unarmed attacks, too

 

 

tricky, very hard to decide on 4 or 5 rangers.

[Kriber22]

Can anyone tell me if damaging spells cause interrupts? For example, a Wizard with high Perception firing off a fireball, would that interrupt targets the same way a ranged or melee attack would?

[Achilles]

Yes, spells can interrupt (they will usually have interrupt ratings assigned, just like weapons). Durance frequently interrupts with Interdiction so per encounter abilities count too.

[Stahlbart]

Having this many choices regarding playstyle and class variety doesn't make it easy to choose, eh?

Never thought almost every class could be an interruptor or at least give siginifcant support towards the idea.

I think that's great.

Atm, I have the most difficulty figuring out a good balance between the actual interruptors and support (buff/debuff).

I'm pretty sure I'd go Barbarian, Wizard and Chanter.

So do I need more debuffing (Druid)? Maybe a dedicated tank (Fighter)? More of the 3 classes above?

I don't really have the time to test all this, so I'm gonna rely on theorycrafting... And hope that it'll work out!

[KDubya]

Interrupts are nice to get but not worth going all out to try to maximize.

 

They are like jimmies, or sprinkles, on an ice cream cone, nice to have but if they were left off you still have ice cream.

 

If your character would naturally have a high perception then they are a nice bonus. Any frontline melee that is trying for a large deflection will have a good perception and thus a good interrupt. Ranged rogues, rangers and casters can juggle stats and add perception at the cost of resolve (and lower will saves). A barbarian would be stat starved to go for an above average perception and would be the last character I'd try for a lot of interrupts unless the AoE of carnage leads to a large increase in interrupts.

 

Ability wise there'd be better choices than the increased interruption talent until maybe the last few levels, while it would have the most benefit at the early levels. On top of that the uniques, like mosquito, are miles ahead of standard weapons and would greatly limit your weapon choices. At early levels I try to get a weapon focus for the accuracy and then grab a weapon style at level 6. More interrupt chance is not better than increased damage via two handed or faster attack via dual wield.

Edited May 7, 2015 by KDubya

[Kaigen42]

Something that just occurred to me: if you want an interrupting Ranger, why not go melee? Swift Aim works on melee attacks and stacks with two-weapon style, giving the Ranger a faster unbuffed attack speed than anyone else for more interrupts. If you use Mosquito in one hand, you have an accurate Draining weapon with a boosted interrupt rating, and Weapon Focus Noble gives you your choice of Daggers, Rapiers, or Maces for the other hand. Depending on where you are in the game, Ravenwing, Aattuuk, Drawn in Spring, and Vierna's Leaves are all nice options (if they ever fix the Speed mod, the Sword of Daenysis might take the prize). And like any other Ranger, you can easily afford to dump Int in order to pump up Perception.

[cctobias]

Something that just occurred to me: if you want an interrupting Ranger, why not go melee? Swift Aim works on melee attacks and stacks with two-weapon style, giving the Ranger a faster unbuffed attack speed than anyone else for more interrupts. If you use Mosquito in one hand, you have an accurate Draining weapon with a boosted interrupt rating, and Weapon Focus Noble gives you your choice of Daggers, Rapiers, or Maces for the other hand. Depending on where you are in the game, Ravenwing, Aattuuk, Drawn in Spring, and Vierna's Leaves are all nice options (if they ever fix the Speed mod, the Sword of Daenysis might take the prize). And like any other Ranger, you can easily afford to dump Int in order to pump up Perception.

This is something I was thinking of trying with a 1 priest 1 chanter 4 ranger party.  All wood elves with max perception and dex.

 

Basically use hunting bow/swift aim on any casters at start and use melee dual wield for damage.

 

Priest is skaen with dw clubs/stillettoes, chanter uses -10 concentration and fear and possibly increase shoot speed in some cases, rangers use stags.  Leverage as many "of Marking" weapons as you can.

 

The main issue I have with this idea is the animal compaions really do attack slow.   Still 4 animal companions should be roughly equal to one more interrupter party member.

 

Not sure if its good enough to to actually work, if not you could put in a paladin tank instead of the chanter or replace a ranger.

 

Also wounding shot works with melee.

 

Edit: yes I would dump int on the ragners but not chanter and priest.

 

One ranger would probably go noble for the rapiers you mentioned.

Two rangers go peasant for hunting bow and spears (alot of nice spears, one can be marking and coordinating) and even hatchets

Priest goes ruffian

There are also a good rod and good wand, which fire as fast and interrupt same as hunting bow.  So that rod can be used for the Noble and One ranger as Adventurer can dw flails.  The chanter maybe go two handed and the marking poleaxe then use that really nice marking estoc from Paths

 

However I am not really sure that is this level of all or nothing interrupt would really mitigate enough damage to not have a tank.  You really need to lay down alot of interrupts to seriously cripple a mostly melee fighter.

Edited May 7, 2015 by cctobias

[cctobias]

Well I killed the two forest lurkers (hard) in black meadow with a 3rd level main and level 2 mercs using the above party.  They really are not set up right yet, I don't even have swift aim or interrupting blows.

 

 

So far its seems like you can really "slow" attacks down to a significant amount, but shutting things down completely is pretty iffy.  Its interesting in that you can actually turn 4 stags into decent-ish tanks.

 

I had no special weapons or armor, in fact I am using as low of armor as I can without being naked, used hunting bows and wands, had the priest beating on one with clubs.

 

3 of my stags died, my chanter went down towards the end.  Considering they have 8 DR and are level 7 that is not bad for a new party.  3 stags were alive by the time we took down the first one, I was dealing with DR via Mark prey and the chanter invocation that reduces DR.

 

I am not sure how this plays out with all rangers going swift aim + DW melee.  The concetrated interrupt clearly adds pretty significant mitigation, but its not exactly a shutdown, although sometimes it is.  Its weirdly spotty, sometime something just slips through, even when they appear to be "flinching" a lot.

 

I am running all these guys with like 5 con too.

 

I have a suspicion unlucky hits will make this party somewhat frustrating, at the same time its kind of like having a whole party of 10 off tanks.

[Stahlbart]

Of course you sacrifice damage and it's absolutely not the "best" way  to play.

But having fun is most important, right?

 

cctobias: The only problem I see with your setup is that you have no AOE interrupts (like from barbarian or wizard), wihch COULD be difficult later, when you are swarmed.

Maybe you can then disable 1 or 2 foes fairly decent, but the others will most likely bash your pets. Once they're dead, it get's bad. Your defense line is gone and you have a huge penalty on your rangers.

Again, this is only theory and I am far from beeing an expert and could be completely wrong.

Edited May 8, 2015 by Stahlbart

[Kaigen42]

Yeah, KDubya raises some good points about the limitations of focusing on interrupts. The elephant in the room is that once you hit level 9 your Wizard can spam Slicken (and up the ante with Confusion or Call to Slumber if necessary), so at that point more minor forms of CC like interrupts become fairly insignificant. That said, the parts of the game that you have to get through before you hit level 9 are generally the hardest, so if interrupts can help you with that early stage, it might be worth delaying some of your damage talents to be more effective against ogres and lurkers and the like.

 

The other thing is that I've already shifted my focus from "What is the most effective?" to "What fun ideas can I get away with?" for this game, so playing around with interesting subsystems like interrupts is a good way to keep engaged.

[Achilles]

I think this is why Interrupt as crowd control is folly. It's super useful against single, high-value targets (read: bosses, casters, and monsters), but for groups you want the spells/strategies you mentioned. Not always practical (or possible) to use those against a single bad guy. In those situations, you want interrupt.

[cctobias]

Of course you sacrifice damage and it's absolutely not the "best" way  to play.

But having fun is most important, right?

 

cctobias: The only problem I see with your setup is that you have no AOE interrupts (like from barbarian or wizard), wihch COULD be difficult later, when you are swarmed.

Maybe you can then disable 1 or 2 foes fairly decent, but the others will most likely bash your pets. Once they're dead, it get's bad. Your defense line is gone and you have a huge penalty on your rangers.

Again, this is only theory and I am far from beeing an expert and could be completely wrong.

 

I don't think there is any way to seriously AoE interrupt in such a way that it really matter except maybe 3+ barbarians.  

 

Even with two fast melee attackers with good interupt rating (like 30) things will get attacks off.

 

I mean I cleared the temple with the shades in gilded vale pretty easy at level 4main level 3 party, but of alot of that is using the "stag wall" smart and shooting.  I have barely used preist powers, but I think with some of the priest healing fields it can work pretty ok  In melee even with a lot of interrupts one of those shades can still teleport then daze one of your melee interrupters and your guy takes a fairly big hit.  In general focus fire on trash kills really fast such that I am hoping I can get by with things.  But I have a suspicion that I can't actually stop something like Adra Dragon from doing nasty things even with this much interrupt.

 

One nice thing about it though is that when the stags are taking all the damage you don't need to worry about health at all. 

 

Unfortunately its one of those all or nothing things.  Either it works or it doesn't.

 

It almost seems like its more the companions that make it work decently in that although I don't shut things down I shore up their lack of defense and there are 4 of them.  I picked stag for AoE and because they have 15 per.

 

But I am starting to think maybe 4 bears is better, I dunno I am too low to say and I really have not fully matured out the strategy yet, the shooting behind meat wall has worked well so I have not really tried a full split melee with 2 party+stag trying to neutralize three things.  Also I think you somewhat overstate the pet deathpenalty, yes it sucks, but at range it just brings a ranger to Fighter level accuracy and on my guys they still have 16+ stats even with the penalty.  It is a problem for melee though.

 

I doubt a full interrupt party really works right but it is pretty interesting.  I have a suspicion that a 3 interrupt ranger +  tank/cipher/mage party is incredibly strong.  I think people are perhaps overlooking how good of an offtank a cluster of companions is with some support.  In the party I am running I am trying to wring as much interrupt (and therefore damage to some extent) out of the companions as I can and we'll see how that works.

[cctobias]

So after messing around some with concentrated interupt I am fairly convinced that its extremely important to NOT have your guys attack in a synchronized manner especially at range.  You can get like 4 interrupts all at once and the guy you want "slowed" can slip the noose in the interval between.  You can have an entire party of guys beating on some one, but if they are all attacking in a sync'ed manner you just delay the guy for whatever the longest interupt was.  

 

So basically interrupt time does not stack (or possibly it just makes one "bar" to fill up whose maximum is never large than the cast time or largest interrupt not sure on that but not matter what 4 simultaneous 0.35 interrupts does not make a 1.4 sec time delay), as far as I can tell.  So while you could have enough interrupt to make something not able to attack you have to somehow line it up right to keep resetting their actions.  Due to the way the game works if you are using similar weapon on many guys this can actually happen quite often unless you specifically micromanage delays between you guys, like start one guy shooting, move one guy a few paces over and start him shooting.

 

For melee this is probably less of an issue due to movement "naturally varying" attack initiation but for ranged they get synched real easy if if they are all using same speed item with same range if you select them together.

 

This is rather a pain in the ass to manage, but doable.

 

Update:

 

going through a few easier fights will spell casters I made sure to stagger ranged attack initation on xaruip priest and high priest and also a pair of trolls.  There is a very obvious difference.

 

Completly preventing something from casting takes more than just a lot of interrupt you have to micromanage it well or you can get anything from slowed to a cast fairly quickly to complete shutdown.

 

I suspect two properly syncopated melee dw/swift aim/IB rangers can completey shutdown a caster (maybe a lot of other things), but am not sure since this mechanic makes it very hard to really say.

Edited May 8, 2015 by cctobias

[cctobias]

I did a bit of testing on a single Forest Lurker in the woods east of defiance with these results:

 

You basically are probably gonna get hit by something's first attack without some kind of ranged prep, so ignoring the first hit.  This is for level 4 guys.  On hard diff.

 

Rangers are dual wielding a mix of weapons that in general are working crappy agains the lurkers DR (spears etc, against is 16 peirce DR).  So about 2 damage sometimes a lucky 7.  They are using IB + swift aim+ DW feat, no focus yet.  They have a 45 interrupt rating.

 

4 rangers + 2 stags  = Lurker is completely nullfied can't do anything, no attack after rfirst

 

3 rangers+2stags = nullfied

 

2 rangers + 2 stags = Lurker got one attack off before dying.

 

 

All attacks were against a stag as I have them go out first, which means even with 2+2 there is no long term health damage.  Although 2 lurker hits on a stag at level 4 is close to knocked out.

Edited May 8, 2015 by cctobias

[KDubya]

I was fight club testing ranger builds at the tavern and discovered that interrupting blows makes a big difference in generating interrupts and that the bonus applies to your animal companion as well.

 

With the animal companion also benefitting from interrupting blows that makes rangers with high perception and taking the interrupting blows a much better build than I was giving them credit for. It also makes bow rangers more desirable than gun rangers due to better interrupt chances and quality.

[Achilles]

Nice find!

 

I think Sagani and Itumaak do well enough on their own right now, but will definitely keep this mind if I ever build a custom Ranger.