Lethal Assault + Nighfall + MR + Nightchill VS IEE + OFF + Inner Focus + Arcane Will

Grim Dawn Classes, Skills and Builds
1

Cold is a -secondary- damage type here. Got to decide between Nightblade VS Arcanist for secondary mastery. Only cold damage matters. Character is melee btw.

Lethal Assault vs IEE = cold damage about the same; LA gives some acid damage too while IEE gives some energy regen

Nightfall vs OFF = about the same; Nightfall hits harder, OFF has more range

Merciless Repertoire + Lethal Assault vs Inner Focus + Arcane will = all the % combined, the arcanist skills are better

But here the Kicker; Nightchill. We already know -% resistance is really good, but I have a hard time quantifying how good it is with rough numbers, is it good enough to switch over? How significant is -33% resistance?

What do you think?

edit: typos

2

I’d like to ask more. What are your primary class and dmg type? Melee you mention is DW melee or 2-H or melee&offhand/shield

Nightblade : it is worth for going DW melee, but not give many %cold dmg and also don’t have cold conversion. Pneumatic burst is universal useful and Nighchill is very good for -resistance.

It focus the usage of pierce&cold as a dmg. and -resistance.

Arcanist : It has overall good for elemental divide to fire&aether, lightning&cold line. it has elemental and cold conversion which is necessary if use those as a main dmg.

The cold dmg skill often use as a utility skill like OFF use for only mobs control.
TSS is good at dmg but small cd and more like goes to lightning(it give only frostburn multiplier and lightning, so didn’t provide much cold)

So, it depend on your primary dmg too. The entire class didn’t give only full potential for a dmg type but for 2-3 dmg type. It will be better if it can amplify your main dmg too.

Lethal Assault vs IEE : it use in the different scenario and I would like to compare these 2 with “Shard of Beronath” too.

IEE is mainly for elemental conversion (ex. your 15% convert to elemental dmg is 5% to each cold,fire and lightning) and IMO. If you don’t have multiplier in fire and lightning too. It’d be wasting a lot.

Lethal Assault is after the ABB. If you can’t make the best use ABB. I recommend you to use component “Shard of Beronath” instead. It’s very good. (If you’re not going to use like savagery, fire strike or those skill for default weapon attack)

Nightfall VS OFF : Again, it is use for different purpose.

Nightfall is use for approaching and can develop to main dmg skill for cold, pierce.

OFF often use as utility skill to CC, and get some frozen mobs - fire resistance to clear them by fire dmg.

Merciless Repertoire + Lethal Assault vs Inner Focus + Arcane will : I think in this comparison, arcanist more flexible and universal use, but it should be last part we discuss.

You can compare to other -X% resistance skill, devotion, item or components and you’ll discover that -33%(at lv10/10, -40% at lv15/10) is a very high resistance reduction for an aura.

but anyway, it depend on your other dmg source too because you say that cold dmg is secondary

Recommend to take a look
These are gears those you may interesting in them. [ul]
[li] Warpfire is a dagger which have 65-95% conversion from cold to fire dmg. (you only need flat cold dmg and fire multiplier)[/li]
[li] Deathmarked set is the set for DW melee which give you high cold multiplier (you need only flat cold dmg and can focus on your main dmg like pierce) [/li]
[/ul]

3

Hello, thanks for the imput. I’ve been toying with the question and came to the conclusion that Nightblade will be better in the campaign, and Arcanist will be I believe better in the crucible. I might switch later on.

I’d like to discuss some pts however:

Lethal Assault vs IEE : it use in the different scenario and I would like to compare these 2 with “Shard of Beronath” too.

IEE is mainly for elemental conversion (ex. your 15% convert to elemental dmg is 5% to each cold,fire and lightning) and IMO. If you don’t have multiplier in fire and lightning too. It’d be wasting a lot.

My initial calculation was with 15% conversion to each element so good to know it’s only 5%. How does it compare with very high weapon damage skill however? The conversion does scale with weapon damage right? If we were to base our calculations around a 300% weapon damage skill instead of the 100% from auto attacks, the additional damage from IEE’s conversion would logically be higher than the flat cold damage value one gets from Lethal Assault no? (well, now that it’s only 5% maybe not, but you get the reasoning)

I already use Shard of Beronath indeed, it’s not incompatible with Lethal Assault, it just requires one more button to press. (I wish it was better implemented too, and Amarasta Blade Burst would default to Shard of Beronath instead of the default weapon attack when on cooldown, but so it is)

Nightfall VS OFF : Again, it is use for different purpose.

Nightfall is use for approaching and can develop to main dmg skill for cold, pierce.

OFF often use as utility skill to CC, and get some frozen mobs - fire resistance to clear them by fire dmg.

That’s correct, and a reason I might value Arcanist over Nightblade in Crucible. For all intent and purpose, I’m only looking here at the general and numerical value I get out of it.

You can compare to other -X% resistance skill, devotion, item or components and you’ll discover that -33%(at lv10/10, -40% at lv15/10) is a very high resistance reduction for an aura.

Yes, I’ve had a look at this thread specifically http://www.grimdawn.com/forums/showthread.php?t=30082 and it’s clear that the damage one gets from the resistance reduction is unmatchable, the higher the mobs resistances, the more valuable.

but anyway, it depend on your other dmg source too because you say that cold dmg is secondary

That’s also correct. It’s difficult to tell without a proper combat log, but I’d estimate my cold damage to make for maybe 40% maybe more of my total damage output.

That puts Nightchill’s resistance reduction to maybe 33%x40%=14%ish damage increase against most enemies, higher against cold resistant enemies.

Which might as well be as good as all the other bonus I would get from the Arcanist mastery (10% OA, more % damage), unless I’m facing cold resistant enemies.

Now there are quite a few places in the campaign packed with cold resistant enemies (undead…), coupled with the fact that I like shadow strike for double even triple 300% weapon damage juke spams and the uncertain damage difference between Arcanist and Nightblade against common foes, leads me to believe Nightblade is the right choice for the campaign.

I’m playing around Vitality Cold and Chaos with Alkamos rare Scythe and the other mastery is Occultist btw.

4

About Elemental conversion. To be clearly I’d describe it here

Flat Elemental dmg - Divide to 3 type : 1/3 to each fire, cold, lightning
ex. 15 elemental dmg : 5 to each element.

% Modifier Elemental dmg - Get full % to each fire, cold lightning
ex. +50% elemental dmg : +50% fire, cold, lightning dmg.

Example of your physical attack is 100, you using skill 300% weapon dmg and have 15% convert to elemental dmg.
300 dmg = 255 physical + 45 elemental = 255 physical + 15 fire + 15 cold + 15 lightning

About crucible. I think the best way to beat it is to kill stuff as fast as you can (The appropriate time base on how long your build can take serious situation)
The situation in crucible pass 100th wave is chaotic and enemies run fast, some have high slow&freeze resistance.

Actually, Nightblade has Ring of Steel and it transmute to freeze surround enemies to freeze for 3 sec too.

I won’t talk about what combination is better at crucible. It should be participate in multi for best performance (in timing and spending tribute points).

About reduced enemies resistance. It always important in all case.
I use this thread as my reference. here.

You should focus on reduced you’re primary dmg type resistance from your enemies before secondary, but I don’t know which gear has -% vitality or chaos resistance.

Finally, I think you should try and develop your build. Face problems and solve them. If it doesn’t satisfy you yet. There are good warlock and witchhunter builds for you to change later.

If you have no idea the build you want will be good or not. Searching and figure your future best gear. Try customize it and you’ll know is there any gear those support yet. (If less gears support, it’ll be harder to get it to the best)

5

What is your secondary mastery? Aiming for cold damage, i would aim for Nightblade. Lethal Aussault at ranks 12+ provides a huge chunk of flat cold damage to all attacks and flat OA. And you need nightfall, otherwise you don’t have a tool to -% cold resist reduction. OFF is nice for CC but is pretty much useless vs nemesis and other resistant Bosses. On the other hand, Circle of Slaughter blesses you with CC and fumble chance.

6

Thanks InkOsk132, the build should be okay, but there is only one way to find out hah.

The other class is Occultist, Vulnerability already provides some cold resistance reduction, more is always good yes. In my example, bringing a creature from 0% cold resistance to -33% with Vulnerability is a 33% increase in cold damage. With Nighchill on top of it, from -33% to -66% is 24% increase in cold damage. If cold damage is roughly 40% of my damage output, Nightchill still provides a 24%x40%=10% damage increase all around against a creature with 0% cold resistance.

If I were to play the crucible, OFF wouldn’t be for the bosses, but for the mobs that clutter the screen. Maiven Sphere and Conversion would also be a good defensive option, stun/slow resistance is difficult to come by and very important in the crucible, and the damage absorption is just great. That’s true Circle of Slaughter fumble chance is solid too when maxed, although the range/cooldown constraint makes it the less reliable defensive option of the two. Do you know if the fumble mechanic also affects enemy ranged auto attacks and spells the likes of sigil of consumption, or is it only melee auto attacks?

7

So, Witch Hunter or Warlock. Both are very potent classes, but both usually don’t use Cold as a damage source. :smiley: Witch Hunter tears mobs apart with Bleed or Poison DoT builds and Warlock is more into full Chaos/Aether, but oh well.

If you want to stick to Cold as secondary damage source (whats your primary anyway?), I would still prefer NB as mastery, same reasons I mentioned above. Fumble affects ranged attacks but not the spells.

As for crucible, the common mobs should die pretty fast anyhow but a maxed out OFF is one of the best CC spells, that’s true. But have in mind, that OFF has a larger cooldown than Ring of Steel. Having the choice, I’d prefer Fumble nevertheless, just because Nemesis don’t give a shit about OFF and will tear you apart even with Mirror and Maiven (considering you are not playing a CDR build).

In the end, both classes will do the job and have their pros and cons. It’s also about personal playstyle preferations. Imo you should nevertheless consider chosing another secondary damage source but cold with these class combinations.

Edit: Okay, Cold Witch Hunters are a thing, sorry about that. Take a look here for example. A bit outdated and Cold as primary dmg, but maybe some inspiration.

8

Thank you for the details about fumble.

Alkamos Scythe deals Vitality and Cold damage, and you have a couple legendary amulet relic and armor pieces that also deal Vitality and Cold damage. I’d estimate my damage output to be roughly 40% vitality 40% cold 20% chaos.

If I were to play Warlock, I think I would go Vitality Cold and Lightning with Star Pact and the Trozan Sky Shard line to maximize the elemental damage and the cold damage conversion but that would force me into the playstyle of a mage which I’m not interested in. I much prefer brawling hah.

To give you an idea, my character currently has 50% innate lifesteal plus all the vitality skills devotions and gears pieces that heal for maybe 50% of the damage dealt each. Try to picture a frenzied Alkamos, Lord Executioner (final boss of Steps of Torment) with more pink and purple shenanigans, some life leech beast from the void Death Bringer of sorts, that’s the concept.

I’m open to suggestions built around Alkamos rare scythe or Cold & Vitality combined damage types of course.