Lord of the Runes, Infiltrator (beginner's WIP)

Grim Dawn Classes, Skills and Builds
1

I am the one treading the shadows in the name of light. You may not know my name, nor know of my deeds, as I am an Infiltrator. I’m not blazing in the front row, bargin in to down my enemies guns ablaze like my brothers and sisters do.
Yet I bring fear to those that are of sin. I am the shadow on the bridge above the wretched and while they look up to see if there is someone in the shadows above them they do not see the runes that were placed at their feet, while they step right into their judgement…
I instill fear to the wicked ones. Cause as they feel my presence as I come near they can feel the fires of justice burning their sins away, while the cold grasp of their own since freezes their souls like fingers of pure ice. Both laying down the judgement of the righteous.
Perpetrators beware! The light of judgement is upon you out of the shadows. Rejoice those pure of heart, as the shadow does not only bring dread to you, but also hope and light for the Elements of the world will bring down those who want to bring eternal darknes with Fire, Ice and Lightning…

…

Ok, so much for the introduction. Anyone managed to get to hear and endured my babbeling… Sorry P&P RPG got the better of me. :wink:

I already thought about a mine laying character and found the Inquisitor runes a nice go for it. As I first planned to only go for the Rune of Hagarrd I chose the damage complementing Nightblade to get an Infiltrator.
As I said this was my first plan. While levelling I took the other Rune as a filler, but it made life so much easier to have two runes alternating in cooldown I toppled my first idea and went elemental. :wink:
After replanning my devotions I luckily didn’t have to respec much, as this is a levelling character and I could go with my start and just changed the later constellations.
My experience so far while going from start to the Coven in Veteran and doing the Necromancer and Slith in Elite is very smooth. So smooth I killed some of the bosses on the way without noticing they were so. In Elite neither the Necromancer nor the underground Slith got even close to me. Aspirant Crucible up to 100 was almost a breezes… Almost I had some hectic moments with running and pressing 9 (heal pot) franticly hoping to be out of reach of a lightning. :smiley:

Playwise you put your runes between you and the mobs, if you can channel them through a narrow path, great. Then place the Seal in the ground and then pull with the Storm Box. The Elemental Seekers will usually have taken care of the trash if the first mobs arrive. Out in the open or confined spaces you will be running around a lot to dodge. Here you can place Runes along the way, while the Storm Box can be counter-intuitive, since you have to move the mouse towards the enemy and thus have to stop running. This can backfire.

My layout so far:

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

So… Why no equipment and just the basic plan?
As I said this is a WIP levelling character. It is my second character reaching the Coven and Elite. So I lack the pool of shinys to reach into and outfit the character as I wish. Also I am going for self farmed. No mod, no cheat. :slight_smile: So of course I know gpong for four of the five Runebinder’s set equipments would be nice… But still I have none and do not know if I will get them. :slight_smile:
This is where the experts come in… That is you. :wink: Could you give general feedback on the build, which is working great on Veteran and the start of Elite (two stage bosses didn’t get to me on Veteran, as they found themselves standing on Runes when they transformed), for example on gear that is farmable for beginners on the way, or things to look out for.
Or the devotions. I pretty much calculated back and forth to get the Sage, Typhoon and Attak Seru done. The Elemental Seekers combined with the Storm Box are pretty much clearing many things right away and elemental Storms appear in the vicinity even otuside the visible screen also doing some substantial damage. Unfortunatly I’ll have to put Arcane Currents on my RoS, which is my backup when being closed in, but often saved my rear.

So thanks for reading up to here and for pointers

2

why the wierd distribution of skills in storm box, lightning teather? Storm Box would serve mostly as a devotion proccer, or monster DA shredder. Same goes with Ring of Steel… why?

You might wanna put more points into either Pneumatic burst and or Word of renewal. Really good buffs and also serves as a mini-healing potion.

Devotions, you might also wanna pick up the murmor devotion, for more cold resistances shredding.

3

https://www.grimtools.com/calc/RZR4pbB2

Maybe I’ll post a guide one day :rolleyes:

4

Interesting build for a starting character. Good one!

5

Looks like one I made a few weeks ago, but I did not use any of those components that takes like 50 Ugdenblooms to make :stuck_out_tongue:

I think Rumor procs too seldom when it is on execution?

6

The build is somewhat tight on resistances (like any Beginner’s build really), but it’s possible to rework constellation setup and get away with cheaper components.

It’s a strong one btw. I was able to clear Gladiator 100 with 2 buffs.

7

Yeah, that is basically what I have done. Not able to push more than 2.8k OA with deadly aim on but really nice with “free” ~25% physical resist though, just from skills!

Also think my version has about 200 more armor rating.

There are also a few nice pierce -> cold conversion items, which are not too rare

8

Ideally you’d use Myth. Silver Sentinel which is super strong on this kind of build, and by super strong I mean it could rival some other builds full decked with legendaries. Add in Starfury Emerald and voila.

But I just love the idea of guaranteed faction items.

9

Yeah, I meant the mythical ones. I also have a few nigtscorn rings for even more pierce -> cold, and there are more items that does that, in partuclar the rings dropped by Alkamos seems very fitting for this kind of build.

Mythical Starfury Emerald seems sick yes

yeah, I have been working out a few faction builds myself. I really enjoy reading and trying out the ones you have made so far so I figured I should try to make some of my own too :slight_smile:

10

Nice! Do post them if you come up with something strong.

Among the non-posted I also have this Ranged PS Conjurer, which is a direct upgrade of “Storm Bolter”.

There’s also gear for beginner’s Forcewave, which is bound to be fairly strong, but since the weapon is obviously Obsidian War Cleaver it may take some time to get a decent one, still better prospects than farming specific legendary items though :rolleyes:

Beginner’s PRM and CT - tried, failure.

11

Made some changes to the skill point distribution. https://www.grimtools.com/calc/vNQzw3X2

Bear in mind that I’m coming at this from a crucy point of view. So, I’m not sure how it’d translate to MC.

12

Nice faction setup there, but silver sentinel is just way too common to not even include 1 piece of it :p. Don’t know if some people don’t get to drop the set but I personally completed 2 sets already before hitting 100 on my purifier.

13

I feel the same, drops all the time :stuck_out_tongue:

14

Somehow I feel my thread is being hijacked. :frowning:

What I have in mind, and works so far, is a Rune Caster. So no WPS or close combat. The focus is not on cold as in the beginning of my play, but on elemental damage, since you can buff it together. The distribution of points is trying to get something out of my skill choice and not having to handle too much buttons. If you check you’ll notice they are mostly 50% up to the maximum, where my main skills are at max. Pneumatic Breath is planned as a elemental damage buffer, rather than a support heal.
Kiting and placing runes and keeping up the tether is sometimes hectic enough. :slight_smile: Went through Ancient Grove yesterday. Made it through it even against the level offset, but the enviromental hazards got the better of me. It worked way better as with my Witch Hunter… Until the flames came and even they I could handle some time. The movement constraints are hard to circumvent, though.

So let’s see. If I really neglect the damage of Storm Box and drop it down to 1 Box/1 Tether, omit the Seal (Can’t always be used anyway) and get RoS down to three points (the moment it hits 100% weapon damage and thus fully applies any flat damage from devotions), I’d have 27 points spare. This still would not be enough to get both Pneumatic Burst and Word of Renewal to full potential. That’s the main problem… Not enough points. :wink: With downgrading those skills and lower the damage output I could either go 12 Word of Renewal/ 10 Steel Resolve / 6 Pneumatic Burst, or go for full Storm Box. Also dropping Phantasmal Armor and the resistance that comes with it I could go for 12 Pneumatic Burst instead of six in the first scenario.
The Storm Box was more or less an addition for Elemental Seeker seeing I buff Lightning Damage anyway due to the elemental damage buffs.

Now for the devotions. Murmur nicely shreds cold damage, but not so much elemental damage as whole. Even more I can not see how I squeeze the lady in pointwise. What I considered was dropping Typhoon, since he is cold only, or going for the fire equivalent, Ulzuins Torch. Or Dropping Typhoon taking Crab. But then I’d have nothing bound to Rune of Kalastor. Unfurtunatly Arcane Currents can’t be bound to Runes. :frowning: Perhaps I could switch from Typhoon to Chariot of the Dead for some proc heal…

Thanks for the first advices and questions. Yet it is easier to judge and ponder if not only “take x” is contained, but what to drop and most of all why… I saw several builds only going to max their main skills (the runes in my case, Artifact Handling and Aura of Censure in my case) and leaving the supportive skills at one point to 50% of max. Seen this pretty commonly, that’s why I just this border.

15

Reducing resistances to your damage types are very important, that is why it is hard to go with several types of damage - hard to pick up relevant devotions and also get a highest tier devotions, high OA/DA and so on. 6 points in storm box will do basically 0 damage, try to steer away from elemental damage and focus on cold/fire if you are set to use the Runes.

Stupid Dragon: I did include this ammy in my newbie friendly version https://www.grimtools.com/db/items/7568 and I also took some points into Death Sentance so that the Pierce damage become a bit more potent. Will be another button to push, but -15% RR is worth it :stuck_out_tongue: You will also loose some skills but that is probabaly worth it too since it is quite easy to get 26/16 Haggard rune anyway

16

In theory I have three highest tier devotions with Blind Sage, Attak Seru and Leviathan (just noticed I continually posted the wrong name) on my sheet. Two of them raising Elemental Damage and one Cold Damage.
The latter has no RR an any devotion according to the Wiki. One that has Elemental RR is incorporated with Rhowan’s Crown, whereas Viper would need a skill with Weapon Damage to apply the RR. Fire only comes with Solael’s Witchblade, which has rather lower synergies. Lightning RR on Widow comes with a (in this context) strange focus on Aether Damage. Am I missing any?
Blind Sage boosts Elemental Damage and all three singe Ele Dmg sources. Attak Seru gives some resists and 100% Ele Dmg. So both seem to fit nicely, but have high prerequisites.
What could be considered instead of Attak Seru would be to try to get both Leviathan and the Torch, haven’t checked if all three are possible, but IIRC that means one skill too less to have all skills that come with the Devotions bound to long distance skills.

17

Storm box will no nothing apart from shredding DA, that would be the only reason to max it. If you go with murmor and witchblade devotions, you could actually go with the other inquisotor aura to get some really nice physical resists and still maintaining reasonable high resistance reduction. At some point, reducing resistances is way much important than increasing % damage.

18

Played around with devotions. At first glance it seems the resists on my side mostly go down or shift a little. Damage modifiers are mostly cut half. I tried goinjg for Light of Empyrion with some more def and Murmur and the Winter constellation and another setting with Leviathan and the Torch of Ulzuin. In the latter I could get Crown, Murmur and the blade IIRC. But +n dmg goes down from 900% to 400 - 500%, resistances do not go up a lot and instead of three tier 3 constellations I only got two, due to the spread.
The Storm Box is mostly a proc trigger. So I can see why reducing it to 1/1 can be viable. That RR is needed I got, that’s why I chose the Aura of Censure, as it comes with handy elemental RR.

19

Perhaps too much with both word of renewal AND pneumatic burst, from a beginners perspective.

20

You will get plenty of +dmg% from gear

don’t forget about defenses, you deal 0 dps when dead