[1.1.4.1] The Stingray - Chillheart Bonemonger, Cold DW WPS Infiltrator

Hey, Jabrix,

I was messing around in GT and what started as a meme Reaper ended up as a pretty sound melee Infiltrator. But then I found out (well, you reminded me) that you have already done something very similiar, duh.

So I am going to post my findings here, spent quite a bit of time polishing it.

https://www.grimtools.com/calc/D2p7xk6N

Crucible performance as recorded by @Plasmodermic

(he moved points for WoR to Arcane Empowerement tho)

If it’s 5:20 in plasmo hand, maybe it’s about 6 minutes in my hand. The build seems like not in a good place. I will try to revisit mine if I have time.

It’s ~5:45 ish in my hands, so should be same in yours, since everyone now plays with 4+3 setup which you should be familiar with. I think it’s in a decent place, but it’s a melee with Beronath’s Shard, so can’t really expect much here.

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I’ve noticed that as well and i’ve been meaning to ask why? It’s not x3 sustainable, you have to go for 4 and you cant reliably do that with a 6 min build. To gain those 2(?) remaining tributes you have to go and die quickly or smth? Why not take 4+4 at that point, if the rule is broken anyway?

Well if you do 4+3 3x times you’re one tribute short of repaying the costs. So not significant difference. 4+4 will rapidly drain your resources.

Defensively speaking Beacons is better, cause it kills quickly nasty minor mobs and you take Ulzuin buff that gives you DA.

Offensively it’s situational. @Plasmodermic for example achieve always better times with Beacons, while some players are faster with Vanguard buff.

Also builds that have massive flat and relatively small amount of %damage prefers Vanguard like N&O Saboteur. My Morgoneth Reaper it’s also faster with traditional setup for some reason.

If I have to evaluate your builds cold and acid DW will be faster with Vanguard. RahZin requires testing but added AoE of Beacons should lead to faster time.

Beacons are surely faster, at least for me. But i sense there are some agro issues when fps is low, i’ve noticed some correspondence in that regard. So beacon agro draw is crucial for me.

1 point short is still 1 point short. You need to either die (not everyone likes dying for no reason) or complete a 10 wave (real time loss right there). Why not take 4beacons+4buffs? It’ll be faster and it drains only 6 points. Still very easy to replenish.

Idk… maybe it’s icky only for me and my digital brain?

4+3 leaves you 1 point short whether you did three runs or four iirc. But one run from 1 to 10 (which takes like 1,5 minutes) gives you like 7 tributes which means it supports 7 full farming run sets (of three or four runs each). I’d say it’s pretty good. Plus you get valuable crafting materials from 1 to 10 run.

And yeah, it’s safer. Well, I guess Vanguard was nerfed too much and now it can hardly compete. It can but just on a few builds really, and that is if you don’t get unlucky with stragglers and mobs stucks in spawns (which happens much less often with 4+3).

EDIT: Or was it five tributes for 1-10 run? Can’t recall

Ok. So it’s a new pattern where you make a quick run into kindergarten to replenish the points. But where the line is drawn now?

I mean, based on what you described i can go not 1 but 2 tributes over the top. And if i can go 2 tributes, i’d rather take 3lvl1+1lvl2 beacons + 3buffs. lvl2 beacon gives 30 RR - there is little doubt it’ll give faster times than +5% OA, especially for RR starved builds.

From my experience flat RR doesn’t really scale well.

But about drawing the line: as a builder, personally, I think it should be all about efficient and sustainable farm models. Because otherwise having access to GDstash we can just put out 4 level 3 banners, take 4 blessings and drink all the potions and whatever. And next logical step would be tweaking core stats and giving your char few extra skill points, because why not.

That’s why I don’t like speedrunning meta, because apparently anything goes, even deducting seconds that take you running to Lokarr after 160 ends and using a build that would die like every second or a third time. Then why not use 4 level 3 banners of all types then?

But ranting aside, if your setup has the same efficiency time wise as 4+3 or 3+1 then why not. But then if that model takes much more time to replenish tributes than just one 1-10 run then it’s not efficient really. So gotta do the math on that.

Fair enough. Although now “the Cruci timer” has a different definition :smiley:

Not “the fastest run within a 3x completion pattern”, but “the fastest run within an efficient farming pattern”. Smth like that. These are two different things and you can’t really compare one to another (because you’d have to take those extra ~1,5 mins needed to replenish, devide them by 3 and add to the result).

True. Or better yet, estimate efficiency based on 10 runs or 100 runs (latter is tedious and I doubt anyone is nerdy enough to do that) or just your projection of 100 runs after doing like 15-20 runs. Like yeah, 3+1 is cheaper and doesn’t require extra 1-10 run every 1,5 hour or so. But what if build’s consistency dips a little with 3+1 as opposed to 4+3 and there is a risk of death so losing a lot of tributes and time? Then maybe it’s better keep it at 4+3 and make that “kindergarden run” once in 1,5 hours.

I think Banana is right. Should be 3+4, and away with you cunning/spirit junkies freeloading da from Ulzuin! :stuck_out_tongue_closed_eyes:

But ML is also right. Vanguard gets weaker as meta starts shifting from 2k% to 3k% global dmg, and spirit/cunning dump becomes more viable as it stops affecting health so much.

Thejabrixone is also right. Damn, everyone is right, what a thread! Some builds are better with Vanguard which very surprisingly includes Morgoneth.

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Which means I am right too. :smile:

Better if everyone is right that’s better than everybody be wrong.

I think cold and maybe Acid DW are better with Vanguard, cause they have enough AoE to clear trash and Vanguard is helping them clear Nemesis and bosses faster - the strong suit of the DW build.

You know what tickle me off? Madlee using Shadow queen medal when He tried so hard convincing that undying oath is the only options… :rofl:

But still, I think with 2x anus rings, iceskorn gloves should be BiS here. Also with the glorious seeker+ultos devo that Madlee hate…

But I just tested my [1.1.5.2] RUNECRAWLER (c5:30) (sr+) which has quite a lot of AoE and it seemed to work better with 4+3. Maybe the oa from Ulzuin has something to do with it? It already covers a part of lost Vanguard bonuses.

Oh yes, I love your new build.
Still kinda weird to see the use of spam skill when you’re dual wielding though. Never really work with me…

I concur. Also, I’ve had this weird feeling 2xanus make Imp viable for Chillheart cold, and with Box available for proccing. Can it be fit into Ultos+Seekers path?

I love nightblade wps action hybridized with nukes but on Runebinder with every node in inquisitor taken it’s too expensive. Also, low flat for melee. Chain Lightning is free and does the job.

https://www.grimtools.com/calc/w26K0epV

Yes, but it’s not pretty

I don’t love the no Hawk thing on cold without DG but it’s not that ugly.

I figured out that flat damage does not scale all that well in this build because of Beronath AA’s abysmally low weapon damage. So I decided to add strengths to strengths and invested more into OA (that scales well here because of set’s proc and respectable crit damage from DG) and into RR (which scales well no matter what). So gloves + medal give me 5% additional RR as opposed to Oath + Iceskorns and those gloves actually fit with their Vitality resist. Converting a bit of Pierce is also a nice bonus (and added damage to Veil of Shadow is a nice bonus as well on a build with 3000% to Cold).

Oh, but I have tried Seekers! And even Leviathan! Damage is more or less the same but it’s so hard to survive with those devos. Your old build has like 4% adtch, I have no idea how you survived with that.

I have tested Storm Box + Imp combo here. It felt like it was doing a lot of damage especially when you clump all nemesis together but timers were actually worse. So good old rule about making good autoattackers/spam-casters and chanellers still works: have as few disrupting spells as possible.