I’m trying to get the most out of the new stuff that’s coming out in the playtest patch for Bloody pox, but I haven’t played the game in months so I’m really rusty.
I recycled a character I had that was a Bloody pox cabalist to try making a conjurer instead, see if that works better.
The damage is much better that cabalist, so much so that I don’t need Fevered rage to get about the same result. Sustain is weaker however (Siphon soul does a much better job at that than Devouring swarm) and the resist overcaps are not great. It also has energy issues that Cabalist doesn’t have.
Bear in mind that both Bloodfeast’s mark and Death’s reach are better than what’s shown in grimtools since they both get buffed in the playtest.
Just ran SR65 with it and died twice to the same boss before remembering that “hey, it’s a bleed build, I can just apply once and run laps around him while the DoT does its job”
Otherwise, it feels a bit glassy… more than it should, despite the massive health.
Any advice to fine-tune this would be most appreciated.
so what you’re saying is Swarm needs a 9.8 buff for more ADCTH/more flat vit to heal
jk aside, curious if swarm ammy would actually “do” that, like it would increase base flat around 20%, question is if that would provide a good enough heal boost for you
otherwise maybe find a way to squeeze dryad in there
personally find wendigo rush a more comfy rune in such approaches, “better” healing too, since you can get healed while still moving away from your threat
could shift points from mog pact into wendigo totem for 6% heals instead? (regen loss is super minimal)
scales would obviously insta fix mana issues
tried with spark component? - mana leech scales with weapon dmg %
*pox isn’t maxed btw, (could take from black death, since decimal increments seem to not do much of anything for pox i think)
I’ve thought about going to the other side and use Scale and Dryad instead of Bat and Wendigo, but didn’t actually try it. It’s not as natural a path, but it would make healing more reliable and also fix my energy issue (And I might have enough points left to go to Unknown Soldier
I tried Wendigo rush at first, but since I have no other source of %Weapon damage to apply my flat bleed, Vampiric shadow gave me a bigger hit for that (And also gives me something to put on my left mouse button, since I really hate putting swarm there.) I also tried using bloody wheatstone as a component to use decapitate as my big %weapon hit, but I much preferred using Vampiric shadows instead for some… intangible reasons.
It’s true that it allows me to move away as its healing me, so if sustain is still an issue after trying out the other things, I’ll revisit this.
Mog pact was there for the energy regen, so if I get it fixed with scale, I could move those points there yeah, good call.
Pox is actually maxed in-game, probably something that’s boosted in the patch.
Here’s what I’m doing on testpatch and works well WITH fevered rage & does SR 75-76.
It isn’t the fastest or most durable toon out there but for what it is it does Pox well.
EDIT: Also keep in mind that boots offer +2 pox now, the proc on dark ones has less cdr & the heal % on wendigo was slightly increased.
Bone Blade now has 100% acid to vit. for pox as well.
That’s a really cool way to do it. I didn’t even think about going Dark One here.
A lot more vitality than bleeding for sure though, probably why it works better on sustain
One thing I’m gonna take right now though is Dark One’s gloves. What I have right now is basically just because they’re the only gloves that boost both bleed and Vitality. That also frees up my belt slot, since the gloves take care of damage reduction. What should I put there ?
I tried both Mark of the forgotten and Bloodfeast’s mark, and MoF worked better with my Cabalist, but Bloodfeast worked MUCH better on my Conjurer. Though I am going for bleed over vitality, so that’s probably why.
And it’s MUCH better.
Sustain went from mediocre without Fevered rage, to “pretty good” with it.
(That character hasn’t completed campaign yet, so there are a few skill and stat points missing still)
Ran SR 65 (Haven’t unlocked higher yet with that character) with no itch, even with pretty bad mutators.
Fastest character I took to crucible. (Died at wave 169 twice, but that’s definitely just me being really bad at crucible)
Crucible with Bloody pox is really fun
Things die offscreen before they reach you as they catch the pox from corpses on their way. And those that make it to you get there really fast thanks to Fevered rage. You just basically have to spray curse of frailty and Devouring swarm to everything you see.
The gloves and extra points in Wendigo totem really made a difference.
I’ll try to make another crucible run, and unlock higher SR, and I might post this.
I also did tinker with how u spend ur points a bit if u dont mind & switched aggressive to stalward on medal, u will need the da more & u have fat da shred from fever.
Basically you shaved points off Oak skin, Blood pact and Black death to max Brute force.
I’ll have to try that (Just oak skin to Brute force on its own makes total sense. I’ll check the rest too)
As for the medal, that one is not stashed, I happened to have it. Did not try to optimize the afixes yet. That one probably makes sense too. Though I really like having high OA on bleed builds as crits have a proportionally bigger payoff. But none of that matters if you’re dead, right ?
nah I removed the 1 witchfire & 2nd rite, 2p outa heart of the wild, set bloodpact to 12, set black death to 6 cuz ur weapon already gives enough duration & u dont convert enough of the poison to be worth it.
also maxed occ mastery line for more stats, life & such & maxed brute force for the sake of having more life
I ended up going with this: Conjurer, Level 100 (GD 1.1.9.7) - Grim Dawn Build Calculator
Which is very close to what you suggested. (I kept the points in Heart of the wild because they were strictly better for health than extra points in Brute force, but the rest is almost identical to your suggestion)
Thanks to the extra points in the Occultist line, I was able to redistribute my stats points a bit and put more into cunning, making up in part for the lost damage and giving me better total OA as well.
More occultist points also mean the energy issues are a thing of the past.
The build feels just as effective, maybe smoother ?
And sturdier for sure.
The extra health make both Dryad and Wendigo totem more effective (Since they are %-based)
I got a lil curious & intrigued by the weapon + the idea of bleeding pox/swarm so I made my own version on the test.
…and what a test it was with fevered korvaak & teodin on the run.
Turns out the build works fine and sustain is alright too with dryad, scales & chariot even tho things get hectic at times cuz, well, fevered mobs are kinda angry.
It’s a weird pace eh ?
Everything is so frantic, and everything you do lasts for 10-12 seconds, so you just watch them spaz and die It’s hard not to just spam buttons.
Care to go over what you did different and why, please ?
Just so I can pick your brain
Why the rings and gloves for example ? (I get the belt, if I changed gloves, I would go back to that)
I like that you went without Kraken, which I picked mostly out of habit (2-h = Kraken in my head) That opens up options.
But picking at brains hurt!
Jokes aside, sure… can try to explain why I picked x item.
The girdle, rings & gloves I picked cuz they all offer bleeding dmg while also providing good bleeding dmg procs & even DR in the case of the belt with decent aoe which allows for the gloves I use instead of dark ones in ur case.
Needed DA on rings & belt since we use fever and on top casting speed in gloves / rings with overall good res.
Boots have bleeding dmg, also DA, phys res, a good proc that helps with the angry mobs trying to smash ur face in and important entrapment res cuz u dont want to get stuck in the heat of thing.
Thx to the belt & gloves I also end up with more bleeding dmg duration.
In devos I ignored kraken even tho it obv is good for 2h cuz I dont have a single blue & I would’ve needed to go very outa the way to grab it.
Wayward offers a nice heal proc & needed da bonus + chariot points have CC.
Hope this roughly explains it for you!
EDIT: I also forgot about the most important thing…
Wtih all the blood pools spawning from the rings & gloves you put Kuba to shame and make him envy you!
hence the minimal mention
Thanks for your kind help
