[CLASS BUILD] Fulmineo Prondroni (fancy duelist monk on speed)

[Boeroer]

Ok, the basic idea is to create a duelist that runs superfast and can pick off enemies like wizards, priests and all these dangerous folks while completely disabling them with superfast attacks and prones. At the same time he should require almost no micromanagement as monks normally do. This one is an autoattacker drone that works just fine when the AI is on and set up properly. A nice side effect is that he can carry the Ectopsychic Echo of your fellow cipher behind the enemy lines fast, reliable and easily. Zahua can also use this build.

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Fulmineo Prondroni

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Difficulty: PotD, Version: 2.03

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Class: monk

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Race: Ocean Folk

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Background: Old Vailia - Dissident

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Stats:

MIG: 15

CON: 10

DEX: 18

PER: 15

INT: 11

RES: 9

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Skills: high stealth (nice for stealing and sneakin past enemy lines, rest is up to you)

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Abilities/Talents (!=essential):

Enervating Blows
Fighting Spirit

Flagellant's Path!

Force of Aguish!

Long Stride!

Iron Wheel!

Swift Strikes!

Transcendent Suffering 4

Turning Wheel

Lightning Strikes

Two Weapon Style!

Vuln. Attack

Lesser Wounds

Appr. Sneak Attack (or Fast Runner - slightly less dmg, more move speed)

Savage Attack

Weapon Focus Noble!

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Items ( * = echantments by me; ! = really important):

Weapon set 1: Sword of Daenysis! (accurate, rending, durgan refined*, speed, shocking lash*, except.*),

March Steel Dagger! (accurate, durgan refined*, speed, shocking lash*, except.*)

OR replace one of them with Spelltongue (accurate, Time Siphon, Concelhaut's Corrosive Siphon, except.*, shocking lash*, durgan refined)

Weapon set 2: just your fists (or two maces -looks weird, but better ACC)

Boots: Boots of Speed! (+3 move speed)

Head: Dandy Hat of the Diseased Yak (-1 INT. +2 RES) 

Armor: Padded armor (durgan refined*, exceptional*, crush-proofed*, a fitting stat bonus like dex+2 or so*) OR

Vailian Clothes (exceptional*, crush proofed*, stat bonus +2*) - if you want to spare ingots and gain even more speed.

Neck: Finreah's Grace (+3 DEX)

Belt: Blunting Belt (+5 pierce/slash DR)

Rings: Ring of Protection, Pensiavi mes Rèi (+3 MIG)

Hands: Bracers of Deflection, later: Blood Testament

Quick slots: healing potions, Sugar 

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Ok, let's zoom in:

Speed:

To stack as much move speed we take the Boots of Speed (Russetwood - north, in that landslide) and combine that with Long Stride. This way we will get a bonus of +5 move speed - which is hilarous. You can add Fast Runner later for +6 and eat some sugar for +7. He will be so fast that he reaches every enemy on the screen in less than 2 seconds. If the way is blocked, use Flagellant's Path.

To stack as much attack speed as possible I maxed DEX (+24%), took Two Weapon Style (+20%) and Swift Strikes (+25%). On top of that we own two weapons that have the speed enchantment... that we boost further with durgan refinement (+35%). This results in zero recovery without any buffs from friends, potions, food, whatever - as long as you have at least one wound for Swift Strikes. That's if you don't use Vuln. Attack and have no armor penalty. But I recommend Vuln. Attack against high DR foes for more damge. Even then the recovery bar is barely visible. If you like you can put on a durgan refined padded armor. It's only +5% recovery penalty. This may let your recovery bar reappear again, but only for a fraction of a second while making you more sturdy.

Now your're basically The Flash with a fancy hat and duelist blades. What else?

DPS and CC:

You're not only fast, you're interrupting like crazy even without interrupting blows. Even if you use Vuln. Attacks, your recovery bar will still not be visible while you gain dps (5 per hit is great). The Sword of Daenysis is rending, so your lightning fast toothpicks have a DR bypass of 8 (right) and 5 (left). You could put on Ryona's Vambraces for another +3 DR bypass if you like, but I highly recomment Blood Testament for the +2% raw lash per wound instead. Turning Wheel buffs your dps with a 5-50% fire lash if you have wounds. I combined this with Lightnig Strikes (how fitting) for +25% shock damage, then added a shocking lash to the weapons for a total of 2*+25% shock damage. Exceptional Weapons give you +30% damage, Apprentice's Sneak Attack another +15% (that's what the Enervating Blows are for if you want - and for Force of Anguish: weakened enemies have lower fortitude, Force of Anguish targets fortitude). Your MIG (with items) will add 24% dmg. With 10 wounds you will have a total dmg bonus of +139%. I know, I just tossed all modifiers into the same pot and stirred, but I'm to fast to disentangle all that 1/4-DR-lash-damge stuff - have to move on. 

Anyways - it's a lot of damage for such light weapons - especially if you're not fighting superhigh-DR foes. In that case switch to your fists - they do lots of damage per hit and are also pretty fast. Your toothpicks are way better against wizards and the lot though - and look much better.

For CC you just use Force of Anguish. You can run from foe to foe and knock them prone. Without recovery time you can prone so many foes in such a short time that soon they will all lie on the floor for more than 10 sec. Even targets with very high fortitude will also go down very soon: because one of your many hits will be a crit -> Enervating Blows will weaken him, lowering his fortitude. Then you use Force of Anguish and he's down. Normally spellcasters and their kind don't have high fortitude defenses. But it's good to know that even the big ones don't stand a chance. 

Survivability and wound generation:

Normal deflection, Iron Wheel, Blunting Belt and an enchanted padded armor (or cloth if you want to spare iron ingots ang have maximum speed) provide enough protection when you need it, but let you gain lots of wounds when you disengage to reach your targets. While you're running around you will get hit and it will hurt, but then Iron Wheel kicks in and you just shrug those hits off. Great ability, that Iron Wheel - love it! And don't ask me about robes - I hate the look of robes on my Fulmineo, madiccho! Every postenago knows that only priests and wizards wear robes without looking like a bazzo. 

So... you basically set your AI to Disruptor/Aggressive and let him loose. Works like a charm. Flagellant's Path and Force of Anguish should be triggered manually from time to time since the AI is still not very smart - but that's ok, combat is complex and sometimes you just want to touch your handsome little duelist. 
You can use a moon godlike if you don't want to sip a potion from time to time. That reduces micromanagment even further - but you will lose that lovely hat! Scioderie!   

Ok, that's it - have fun!

Edited November 13 by Boeroer

[AndreaColombo]

Another brilliant build that I must try out! Kudos, and extra bonus points for the Italian-flavored Vailian name (and lingo)

[Boeroer]

Thanks. I just discovered an absolutley awesome thing while letting The Backlash Beldam and Fulmineo fight against Thorfen's group:

http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/83181-nice-item-ability-combinations-what-works-and-what-doesnt/page-2?do=findComment&comment=1750537

 

Ok, wasn't so awesome, but still nice.

Edited November 18, 2015 by Boeroer

[KDubya]

Nice build and really nice concept.

 

 

What about changing Lesser Wounds for Interrupting Blows and/or using the "Mosquito" rapier that has the super high 1 second (same as a Morningstar) interrupt? I've always found lesser wounds to be worthless. 

[Elric Galad]

I wonder whether flagellant path is necessary...

 

Your monk will be so fast that it will be able to reach about any target. If engaged, you can just disengage, taking an attack is not a big pb for monk.

 

It can still be useful in some situations, for sure, but it sounds a bit as an overkill for me ^^

[Boeroer]

You can skip it. I didn't have it in my first iteration and took the duplicates instead. But then I wanted to do something different and not take the obvious abilites.

 

And it's just frustrating for your superfast friend when you can't get past an enemy line - like in doorways or other narrow places. Then Flagellant's Path is golden. You can dash through the pack and then you storm the field from behind (where all the casters are). 
It's also nice if you need to escape quickly if you're getting too many hits. And it does nice aoe damage. You can use Torment's Reach instead - but that's a lot of microing and I wanted to avoid that. And it just fits - thematically I mean.  

[Boeroer]

Nice build and really nice concept.

 

 

What about changing Lesser Wounds for Interrupting Blows and/or using the "Mosquito" rapier that has the super high 1 second (same as a Morningstar) interrupt? I've always found lesser wounds to be worthless. 

You can try that, sounds solid. I didn't need Interrupting Blows because he hits so fast that the enemy is basically stunlocked without it. And he uses Force of Anguish a lot - no need for Interrupts. The Mosquito has draining - so that might be nice. I wanted to go for maximum speed - an there are only two weapons in the game that have speed, are one handed and use the same weapon focus - and that's Sword of Daenysis and the March Steel Dagger. I evolved the whole concept and style around these weapons.

Edited November 18, 2015 by Boeroer

[mosspit]

I can totally imagine something hilarious about how this character generates Wounds.

 

"Oh no wounds? Ok let's engage a melee. Click back and forth do trigger a few disengagement attacks and get some Wounds. Go kill stuff while the poor melee sod tries to chase you in slow mo. Oh out of Wounds again? Where is that poor sod... There he is!"

[Boeroer]

That works. Sometimes I just shoot him myself with a Wounding Shot when he has no wounds. That's also a nice trick... if you don't use an arquebus.

 

What also works is to "round up" the enemy (it's hilarious): 

 

In open field, you sneak away from your party and start the encounter - then you chain movement commands (shift+klick) around the group of enemies. You can do, let's say, 5 rounds around the mob. After that they are totally clumped together and hinder each other while they are constantly trying to follow you (oh poor poor pathfinding). Now you can cast a nice aoe spell (or other aoe abiliy) from outside and you will hit them all - while Fulmineo is still running around them shouting "Come get me! Come on, do it! Do it!"

 

Best thing is: most of the time they won't cancel the chase and will not break out to attack the real danger. It's really cheesy - but it's also fun! :D

Edited November 19, 2015 by Boeroer

[Raven Darkholme]

Awesome build.

[Boeroer]

A totally cheesefest is to use five ciphers with Ectopsychic Echo plus Fulmineo: run towards the enemy, then run away so that they form a nice line. Then target the last one with Flagellant's Path while the ciphers cast Ectopsychic Echo on you. Run away - they will follow you and the beam will not get canceled (because of the great distance) once it's active.

Also works with Mind Lance, Rolleing Flame or Ray of Fire but you have to be super careful and step aside in the right moment.

 

Iconic Projection and Driving Wave would also work I think - everthing with a long and narrow aoe. 

Edited November 19, 2015 by Boeroer

[AndreaColombo]

After all, it's no secret that PoE's lead designer loves cheese (and so do we.)

[mosspit]

Haha yeah As much I really enjoy this game, the pathfinding really could use more work. Sometimes the enemies just run around like headless chickens. It is already apparent when one use a character with just a Boots of Speed, not to mention a specialized build like this.

[AndreaColombo]

That's A.I. more than path finding. A.I. should periodically reevaluate its target to see if it makes sense to change it (e.g. if someone's outrunning me and I pass by someone else while chasing, I should probably stop and attack the latter.)

 

Well, A.I. should be doing a lot of things, to be honest... But you can't always get what you want, can you?

[mosspit]

Well in a way pathfinding is also kinda AI related? But instead of target prioritising, it is finding the optimal route to a target. Some of the weird behaviour that I notice are probably due to both.

 

In any case, it isn't a deal breaker

[Boeroer]

At least the enemies should anticipate where you want to go and then take a shortcut to reach you more quickly - like every sane human would do in real life when you run around them. I mean it's not that difficult because the game knows where you clicked. ;-)

Edited November 19, 2015 by Boeroer

[mosspit]

Actually, that is not a bad idea. Even though, it feels like the AI is cheating... so make it so for PotD? Combine that with better collision detection and we should be onto something.

[AndreaColombo]

If you take The Dichotomous Soul with this build, Scion of Flame would get you more bang for your buck than Apprentice's Sneak Attack (+20% damage with Turning Wheel as well as to the fiery twin as opposed to +15% against targets with afflictions.) In that case, it might also be worth enchanting your weapons with burning lash instead of shocking lash, so the lash itself would also benefit from it.

 

Alternatively, you could take Heart of the Storm to get +20% damage on your lashes and Swift Strikes, but the twins wouldn't benefit from it at all (and if you don't take The Dichotomous Soul to begin with, Apprentice's Sneak Attack would likely remain the better choice.)

 

If only I could fit a Secrets of Rime there somewhere, now...

 

And if you want to play this build with Zahua but don't want to dress him up as a Vailian (RP-wise it would indeed be weird), you can enchant the Monk outfit he comes with. It's got the same characteristics as a robe but looks a lot cooler on Monks (but you'll need to invest Durgan ingots on it to get rid of the 15% recovery penalty.) You'd miss out on the hat, which is indeed pretty classy, but oh you know.

 

 

 

EDIT: Considering how this Monk is light-armored and likely to gain wounds speedily (also thanks to Lesser Wounds), Rooting Pain might be a good ability to have too. Crush AoE damage per every wound is good when you accumulate wounds quickly.

Edited November 21, 2015 by AndreaColombo

[Boeroer]

You can alter this build in a lot of ways without making it stink i think. I chose Apprentice's Sneak attack because it's nearly a flat +15% bonus since you passivly apply the weakened affliction via enervating blows. With this picture of Fulmineo as a Vailian Duelist I wanted to stick to abilites/talents that do not break this theme. Dichotomous Soul is indeed very powerful - but it doesn't fit stylewise and I just wanted do do something different.

 

Burning lash is indeed an option. I think even without the duplicates it doesn't matter whether you choose burning or shocking lash (if you took Turning Wheel). I mean you can easily get +75% burn damage that way and that's like a paladin's FoD with Intense Flames.

I just had a ranger with Stormcaller in mind and it's -6 shock DR reduction. So 50% shocking lash seemed to be very effective when you pair up with such a dude.

I even thought about freezing or corrosive lash to cover as much elemental damage as possible. But it's not very effective since the weapons' base damage is so low that sometimes, against high DR foes, the 25% don't even reach 1 point of damage and get discarded.

 

Rooting pain is also nice. Especially if you're getting too much damage and need to flee without eating further disen. attacks. Definetely a nice alternative.

 

Of course you can use this build and alter the weapons and the armor to fit to your idea of the char (or Zahua). Only thing you will lose is the +20% on one or both weapons if you want to stick to your weapon focus. Or you loose the 20% speed from Two Weapon Style if you choose Lwaran's Stick or the Blade of the EP. DPS will be better most of the time with that. I just wanted to stack as much speed (without foreign buffs and consumables) as possible.

[Boeroer]

So, I just read a posting from Abbzug that made me think: If you take Gallant's Focus instead of Weapon Focus you would only lose 2 points of ACC but won't be restricted to a weapon group. So you could consider to pair more one-handed speed weapons that are not in the same weapon group. That could lead to a whole different style (not vailian duelist any more) without losing speed. Like Unvorgiven + Strike Hard and so on. If you don't like vailian style that is.

[mosspit]

Gallant's focus is definitely viable. But the thing I dislike about GF is that it doesn't stack with some(?) ACC boosting spells. I haven't tested this extensively but, at the very least, it gets suppressed by the Priest's Blessing spell. On a fighter, it will also get suppressed by Disciplined Barrage.

[AndreaColombo]

^ It also doesn't stack with Scroll of Accuracy. That's the reason why I never rely on a Paladin's Zealous Focus—I tend to use Scroll of Accuracy a lot and it just suppresses the aura.

 

However, the argument in favor of Gallant's Focus still stands whenever you don't have or don't use Scroll of Valor / Blessing in a fight. Flexibility in exchange for 2 points of Accuracy is not a bad deal

[Boeroer]

Since I never use scrolls and traps (only exception: dragon fights) and also try to avoid potions and food that's ok for me. I also seldomly use Blessing or Armor of Faith - because you can have that as an aura and I like to keep micromanagement low. That's also a reason I don't like wizards (especially spellswords) too much althopugh they are very powerful. I like the concept but this whole buffing at the start of every encounter is to much for me. If PoE had a more flexible, scriptable party AI it would be different. You could say that at the beginning of every encounter, do this and that, then autoattack - or somthing like that. Maybe you know what I mean. That would be great. Or something like "If this than that" would be awesome... 

Edited November 22, 2015 by Boeroer

[AlexDeLarge]

This looks like a very interesting and efficient build, especially since i love to (ab)use Ectopsychic Echo in every encounter. I was previously planning a party of tankadin, offtank fighter, dps barb, full support priest, ranged dps cipher and blight wizard for Triple Crown challenge. But now i want to incorporate your speedy gonzales monk in the party. What would you recommend i take out, perhaps the barb?

[Boeroer]

You can use the paladin if move speed (for ectopsychic echo) is the only thing you want: take Zealous Charge, Fast Runner, Boots of Speed and The Last Tower (large shield in Crägholt, move speed +1). This all stacks to +7 move speed without other stuff (+6 without shield). You will lose a bit of tankyness, but seriously you don't need a deflection of more than 100 in most encounters anyway. And because of the tower shield you will have more than that. And for dragons there are the priest's buffs. A very nice thing is to use an island aumaua paladin with quick switch and weapon focus soldier. He can shoot 2 very hefty Intense FoD shots from an arbalest and an arquebus (both with fire lash), killing most squishy wizards and the like. This can trigger on-kill-effects like Inspiring Triumph or Strange Mercy (Kind Wayfarers) or The Black Path (Bleak Walkers). He can quickly switch from shooting to tanking (and running). Later the high move speed is very nice in combination with Sacred Immolation. Also: you can quickly reach your party members for Lay on Hands OR just run away when you see that an encounter goes down the drain. Pure paladin tanks are so boring (and not very effective after the A.I. got improved) - a little bit more dps makes them better - in my opinion. Their defenses are great anyway.

 

p.s.: In order to get The last Tower early, you can run solo through the Torn Bannermen in Crägholt without fighting them. You just have to reach the stairs of the tower while the Torn Bannermen and Undead fight each other. This is possible with all the +move speed talents/items I described above. You need some summons also to discract the foes that insist to follow you no matter how fast you are. If you are in the tower, just go to the treasue room and lockpick the chest with The Last Tower inside. I think you need 10 mechanics minimum to pick the lock. But in a TC run it's very risky - maybe you have to wait for the The Last Tower until your level is high enough.

Edited November 25, 2015 by Boeroer