HI all
I had some great feedback on my poison guy and wondered if anyone could explain to me why my cadence bm is a complete mess
DPS a wapping 1k
grimcalc
http://grimcalc.com/build/1006-hONobS
I’ve put a ton of points into cadence and am doing no dps.
devotions
Sailor’s guide
Anvil
Falcon
Hawk
I don’t know what im doing wrong but my cadence is not hurting anything Cal Tempest is though.
Any advice welcomed. Leveling is appalling on normal.
Many thanks
Turnip
Cadence and Markovian’s Advantage? Cadence and Callidors? Your build lacks focus.
Cadence would massively depend on your weapon, and physical dps scales VERY hard if stacked, but is shit if not stacked, due to how armor works in this game. Armor is effectively a flat -X physical damage.
Caster builds in general are much stronger early game, where base damage on the ability is significantly higher than weapon damage on attack, but fall off later in the game due to only having 3-4 avenues of scaling at best compared to weapon damage builds having 4-5 avenues of scaling. Also, Maven’s Sphere massively reduces your physical damage, further hurting your already weak early cadence.
Overall? You have way too many points invested in damage abilities for that early in the game. Your base stats much be shit as a result, generally by level 25-30 I already have a nearly maxed out Exclusive skill which is a major DPS up.
http://grimcalc.com/build/1006-xjyMwz Try something like this. You have Cadence, while weaker, for single target, and all of your AoE will be covered by OFF. You can drop OFF later on, but its a really really powerful early game leveling tool. Further more, the high ranks of Oleron’s Wrath give you a massive amount of physical amp + OA.
I will say this, Battlemage is a really bad class combo overall. It used to be a staple back a long time ago when ultimate was so hard that stacking pure defense was a must to survive, but nowadays its a really weak combo overall, and the non-existent synergy between Arcanist and Soldier for damage really shows. Your best case scenario in ultimate will be a barely functioning character that can barely do anything other then not die, and even then there are better class combos for flat out not dying.
Thats v depressing - maybe I should re-roll?
I heard cadence was impressive late game?
Amiwrong?
TY for your kind response.
Turnip
Cadence is really powerful, it’s a Tier 1 skill, but it’s a bit weak without major investment. You either dedicate everything to it, or flat out ignore it.
You just picked the absolute worst class combo for a Cadence build tbh. Cadence wants you to stack more and more physical damage, or transmute 100% of it into something else. That isn’t easy for a Battlemage to do in either way.
Cadence builds in general are purely focused on physical, or Chaos, as a result. Physical works for Warders, Commandos, and Witchblades, while Witchblades also have the choice to go for pure Chaos Cadence builds as well thanks to both the massive flat chaos damage they have in their skill trees, innate phys > Chaos conversion, and the fact that the Abomination Devotion proc gives +50% Phys > Chaos conversion, letting them reliably convert 100% with near 60%+ uptime, with the remaining time sitting around 50-60% conversion.
I honestly can’t understand how your DPS is low with so many points in Cadence… How are you geared up?
On a second thougth, you also lack buffs like Field Command/Squad Tactics, so I believe that’s why.
Just another tip in general, early game you want to rush Exclusive skills ASAP. The sheer raw stat value they provide you is a hundred times better than a few extra points in your skills, by far.
Extra points in your skills can even hurt your DPS, because you put such a burden on your mana pool that you can’t function. Sure, you overkilled a mob by 2x it’s hp, but you knocked out a third of your mana pool to do it. Meanwhile, you hit a boss for like 10% of it’s hp 3 times, you’re oom, and he still has 70% hp left to go.
Which makes the current state of Battle Mages even more hilarious.
Battle Mages have the option of two sets of very viable endgame exclusive skills, in Arcanist and Soldier.
Only Shaman competes, really.*
It is amazing, and disheartening, how badly the two combine.
*Possession is on a timer, after all.
Thanks for all the feedback.
Is there another soldier skill that would be better with Arcanist backup.
TY
If a BM has NO melee skill that makes him srtong lategame - that’s a fault of this game unfortunately. I rarely make game comparisons in threads but It’s very hard to create a toon in POE that doesn’t end up kicking a**
Is there no melee soldier skill that would save this guy?
This is a bit confusing - are you suggesting BM has good or bad endgame potential.
Thx
Its bad. Which is weird, because Battlemage specificly has the best magic AND physical exclusive skills. it’s just that you can only use a single exclusive skill at a time, and not only that, both halves of the combo are very self-centric. Most hybrid combos work well by mixing their abilities specificly, Battlemage you almost exclusively just want to use the second class as a basic stat-stick for increased durability, which has been massively de-valued in the current state of the game.
The problem is game balance has shifted in a way that while it used to be that Battlemages were literally the only viable class in ultimate, to the worst, because what the two classes bring completely contradict eachother, or some other combo does it 10x better.
About the only thing you really can do it you are desperate to preserve the character is to use a PRM Battlemage, and use Soldier as a defensive stat-stick.
And even then, you got a lot of wasted points in Soldier for that playstyle, but PRM is strong enough that you should be able to function with the correct build regardless.
And no, it’s not the game’s problem. A brute force melee tank combo’ed with a frail mage is going to produce either something that is just mediocre at everything because none of their stats match up, or be relegated to a tank with weak magic abilities. Soldier has the worst spirit (Magic) growth in the game, while Arcanist has both the worse Cunning (physical damage) and physique (health) growth in the game. When you mix both, you get a character that is average at everything in a game that specificly rewards hyper-focused builds.
Ok thanks mate - looks like I’m rerolling
Yea, sorry, it’s just the state of the game. It used to be that you would be laughed at for building anything BUT a Battlemage and trying to play ult.
Nowadays it’s just about the only class combo that is unviable. Game health has far improved from back then for build diversity.
http://grimcalc.com/build/1006-8OEDPG
Anyway, if you want to try and salvage the character, there is a skill build for it with devotions too for the endgame.
Cadence batlemage is more then viable, you can go aether or phys dmg its up to you but it is viable in both cases.
I’d agree, but he’s trying to go self found hard core, and he hasn’t even gotten into ultimate.
Lets not be optimistic about specialized builds that depend on very specific legendary gear for a self found hardcore character.
Yeah Cadence really, really likes +attack speed 
Like this for instance?
You dont need any specific gear except shield to make it ulti viable.
Impressive. You still are using an entire epic set, a farmed set of rings, and Empowered Legplates, a Black Star of Deceit, and the total bonus from your set is pretty close to a few legendaries in power, and something in me doubts that you self-found all of that without ever having a character in ult to transfer some of it back. You also have a top level relics and overall, the only notably questionable thing about the build is the dedication to not using a legendary, and as a result made a build that is harder to gear for than a build using legendaries. There was one guy who leveled a blank character, never spending a single point in skills, devotions, or attributes, all the way to level 50 in GD and beat Log. Its possible.
I mean, Soldier is probably the only class that can pure-class ultimate with enough dedication. But here is the thing, it takes a single fuck up in HC to take that all out.
If I’m going to do that, I want to do it with something that has a bit more innate power. And you’re only running 20k DPS. Sure, thats good. Compared to a caster. Most Cadence builds would run 50k+ without a problem. And you have mechanical knowledge of the game that is more than “Has not played Ultimate difficulty once yet”.
I mean, long term players set stupid objectives all the time. Copper shortsword (Literal worst weapon in the game) in Terraria to kill endgame bosses? It’s been done. Meanwhile a normal player can’t kill them with full gear and best weapons. I don’t want to give a player who is struggling the worst class combo in the game, and tell them to be great. I would want to recommend them something that can be a bit better then that. And he is complaining about feeling like he does no damage. Purposely playing the worst way to play a build won’t change that, he just will be able to squeeze out some function, which I said he could make a build that could work in ult even as Battlemage. I said it would barely be viable, because it pretty close to is unviable.
Thx 
Bottom line: If he goes soldier + anything, with shield he is ulty viable no mater what.
Edit: If he needs knowledge this forum is great source