Hardcore cold infiltrator's devotions

Hi there,

I’m not a completely new player but not a very experienced one either, and I was wondering if there was some feedback to be had about my currently planned devotion setup, seen here: https://www.grimtools.com/calc/qNYkpBlV Major devotions are Murmur, Leviathan and Amatok, notable earlier devotions are e.g. Ghoul, Solemn Watcher, Empty Throne, Tsunami.

Playing a Shadow Strike Cold infiltrator, on hardcore. I don’t have any very exotic gear nor do I have all the blueprints, so I don’t have every option available for BiS items, components and augments.

One thing I’m pondering is if I actually need that Solemn Watcher. My current in-game built actually has it all the way unlocked, including the last node, which is now missing in the Grim Tools build as I’ve taken the cold damage node from Murmur. If I took Solid Watcher out, I’d not really need Eel either, giving me 7 points - but then, it is Hardcore. Is there anything better defense wise to put those points to?

That Leviathan is another question mark. There’s decent amount of cold damage in there. I haven’t ran with the skill it gives though, and on paper it doesn’t seem like it’s the most impressive thing ever. How good is Whirpool? Do I want to keep it? If I took it out, I could also drop e.g. Raven which I now have to make up for the requirements for Leviathan.

So anyway, what are you guys’ opinions?

Your route lacks +health and CC resistance, which are both really crucial in HC play. The purple route to Leviathan got some help with Chariot’s buff in 1.1.7 (adding slow res). But even with Chariot I’d still take the upper route with Amatok only and not use Leviathan. You miss too much going purple-heavy.

Upper route: https://www.grimtools.com/calc/O2GqnrXZ

Lower route to Leviathan, notice the loss in hit points: https://www.grimtools.com/calc/YNnO8DO2

Mm yeah, getting both Amatok and Leviathan is a bit risky. I’m not 100% convinced about Chariot; I don’t mean that it’s a bad devotion, it definitely isn’t, but I’m unsure if I personally really need it or want it if I already got Ghoul and Scales of Ulcama. Now that Scales of Ulcama, that looks really nice.

You can use the devotion route from my lazy Infiltrator. I needed some extra tankiness to cover for lack of offensive spells :wink:

https://www.grimtools.com/calc/mN4LgGxN

It still isn’t overkill for HC in Ultimate and the stats still end up significantly better than Amatok+Leviathan. Yugol is good too as Nery uses, but the damage reduction is redundant since you are on an Infiltrator and will be using Censure, so personally I can take it or leave it. I’d prefer to have more stun/slow res by having Chariot, Sailor’s Guide and Empty Throne.

Yeah I now agree that Amatok+Leviathan is not a great route, misses a lot of other good devotions.

I may leave Chariot out at first, maybe, and take something fun to its side. I’m OK with some risk, all of my 110 hours on the game are on HC and only had one HC char die, though I’ve never pushed all the way to level 100. But if it seems like it’s getting tad bit too close to dying, I’ll just respec into it.

I’m not as experienced as a lot of the other people on this forum in GD, but I have 700 hours in and I’ve done a lot of the endgame content, Gladiator Crucible and Shattered Realm 65 on Ultimate, Lokarr, Nemesis farming, Tomb of the Heretic. You can’t be prepared enough, especially with a high-skill cap class like Infiltrator that is kinda squishy. It’s risk enough just to be there, even if you feel overprepared.

If you die, it’s because you lacked enough health for an alpha strike, you lacked enough DA and got crit, you had shredded resists due to not being overcapped enough, or because you got trapped and couldn’t escape a bad situation. Your devo route does OK on two out of the four. The upper route I gave does well on all four. Scales of Ulcama is extra-nice because it still works if your skills have been disrupted.

  1. Your devotions got no flat RR. Is it gonna be a saboteur SS with BwC?

  2. No “% reduced” RR either. Not as important as flat but always good. Either Viper or Ultos.

  3. The whole point of Solemn Watcher is the last node.

  4. First get the gear, then think skill levels and devotions. See what you’re missing. Setting devos in vacuum makes little sense. I’ve not been playing much since last patch, but before that my favorite devos for cold SS were either Amatok-Ultos-Scales for tankiness or Amatok-Ultos-Revenant-Korvaak for dmg (check out both in this thread [1.1.6.2] SHADOW TANK - SS/BS Tanky Infiltrator (c+) (sr+) SR and Crucible setups). Leviathan path potentially gives most dmg (world Crucible record [1.1.5.1-1.1.6.2] MORGO (sr+) (Crucible Champ) has it, and afaik it’s still not beaten even after fixing aggro) but it leaves too many holes.

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Isn’t Night’s Chill and Aura of Censure enough for that?

I’ll unlikely play enough to get the BiS gear.

ya1 meant FLAT RR like Elemental Storm (Rhowan’s Crown) or Reventant skelets.
As opposed to -%RR like you mentioned there.
Get multiple -%RR (like you already did) AND ONE FLAT RR like those i mentioned.
Skip Amatok and even Ultos (go Viper instead) for more points to spend on strong defensive devotions.

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In GD, rr has no diminishing returns. Stack all you can. “-X%” stacks so grab every source there is. “X reduced” doesn’t stack so you need just one. Same with “X% reduced”.

Right now, maybe 40-50 hours, and you are likely to gear one char alright. If you know what you’re doing. I started from scratch this year and made 3 almost complete legit chars in maybe 50 hours.

F-cking components is the worst. Not gear. I finally gave up because every little change in gear equaled hours of farming Ugdenblooms and Chthonic Seals.

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