I’m currently level 59 and have now been playing around with my deovtion points a bit. I’ve been told that Time Dilation is good for Mirror and Mark of Torment and I imagine Devastation as well.
So with that in mind and aiming for some survivability alongside resistance reduction, this is what I cobbled together.
Imp, Tortoise, Widow, Vulture, Quill, Crane, Eel, Viper, Lizard alongside Tree of Life and Rhowan’s Crown where the last two aren’t completed and left once the skill is reached.
I find that you really need Harp with a AAR builds as cost an enormous amount of energy at over capped levels. Here is my take on a similar defensive devotion path. Forget the rest of the build as it was made before 1.0.7.1
By the way it is better to post just a link to build then such a large image as it messes up the thread (especially for those with small screen resolutions).
Edit: There is little point in taking Rhowan’s Crown with a AAR spellbinder as as the only way you would get “decent”(as much as possible for AAR binders in any case) damage is by converting the elemental damage of AAR to aether. Making Rhowan’s Crown fairly useless
Thanks for posting your version, it’s really quite similar to mine. Also I just wanted to provide an easy overview, didn’t realize the forum wouldn’t automatically scale it down. Did it myself now.
Yeah I’ve run into some energy issues but I thought gear would fix it. However gear has also enabled my AAR to go higher which has kept the energy concerns consistent. Might give the Harp a try.
Though in my opinion Rhowan’s Crown still feels pretty strong, my AAR does about half its damage in aether and the rest divided between fire and lightning and those procs are great for clearing trash. But maybe energy regeneration is more important.
EDIT: If I remove Lion and Eel from your build I can replace it with Tortoise and 1 point in the ‘Order’ crossroad to reach the same build.
Maybe I’m overvaluing Tortoise but it feels stronger than Eel and Lion combined.
IMO, the general nerfs to aether hurt AAR more than all targeted buffs could ever help it. Now since binders can’t depend on cdr they need very careful balancing of gear and devotions.
Devotions: Dying God, Aeon and Spear trio is almost set in stone. The rest depends on gear. If you don’t use Decree of Aldrich or full Iskandra/Agrivix then you gotta pick Manticore. However nerfed, some Fiend for sustain. Or Bat. As for going east for Harp or Turtle… whoever got points for that? Phoenix is also a popular option that gives some measure of defense.
Or… you could try your luck focusing on healing, health regen and dmg absorption devotions. I’ve seen it done but it could never compete with offensive setups.
What nerfs to aether? I haven’t spotted any nerfs to aether damage in the last patch, and if you mean Star Pact, why would you take it on a AAR build in the first place?
This is the only line I found in 1.0.7.0 that reduced aether damage:
Other than that, they reverted the buff to CT and reduced the damage from Spectral binding.
Other than that, AAR had 320 aether damage at level 26, now 395.
Yeah, I mainly meant spectral binding and star pact. But also the 200% off the Clairvoyant proc, the butchery of Iskandra and the Decree nerfs. Star Pact was always an option for all aether casters. More devastation, more nukes, more devotion procs, option to drop Eternity for Agrivix, more liberal gearing options due to more mirror-MoT. It’s history now.
But you’re right. Maybe I went too far with that statement. AAR got that extra flat and the conduit buff. But the general nerfs hurt AAR too and the buffs just don’t seem to be enough. I had plans to make an ultra offensive AAR build as soon as the buffs hit but now it seems that the only viable option is still 3pc Krieg + Anasteria + Eternity like in Sir Spanksalot’s old write-up. I’d like to be proven wrong, though.
Dying God? But that’s for a Chaos AAR using Tainted Power, Binder doesn’t really seem suited for that.
Similarly Manticore, Fiend and Bat all provide useless bonuses for an Aether build and you referenced sustain, they grant no energy at all whilst bat gives a miniscule amount of life steal (especially considering that it’s based on vitality damage, piercing and weapon damage, all three things that I ignore).
I could fit Spear of the Heavens into the build but not without giving up Harp which I’ve found really nice. If I can circumvent my energy problems with gear, this might be an option.
I was playing around with Phoenix before I made revisions to the build but I didn’d really like it, the proc was too rare and unreliable and the defensive aspect laughable. Maybe I need it tied to a skill that can proc it more such as Ravenous Earth or AAR.
Put together these two builds where one is with Harp and the other with Spear, alongside some other minor changes to accommodate those choices and to minmax (to the best of my ability) with point value/usefulness/requirements in mind.
Both focus on a mix of defence and offence with the obvious difference where the Spear build has more damage output but at the cost of energy regeneration. So the latter will be stronger if I can somehow manage to get by without the extra regeneration but at the current point in my playthrough this isn’t really the case, though I obviously have less than optimal gear at level 59.
Binders usually go for Aeon and Dying God in just next door, gives loads of oa and the best offensive buff proc in the game. Manticore gives flat resistance reduction (unless you already have it somewhere else). Bat works great if you have the right off-hand (Flashwarped Tome) which converts 50+% vitality to aether and even if you don’t it’s still some heal for no weapon damage casters. Fiend was nerfed again but still holds its ground assuming you have enough fire (and chaos) conversion. Spear in turn is the very best devotion for aether especially with elemental conversion and cdr.
But until you gear up it might be best to stick to the Harp. All of the above don’t matter if you have no energy.
