Please help me understand the VileBlade Pact set

[Kerham]

Hello everyone

This is my first post here, so first of all apologies if I am posting in the wrong section.

I played for ±250hrs this great game and in many aspects I am just scratching the suface. My first (and to the date only) toon played with any consistency is a lvl100 poison Witch Hunter. I took inspiration along the way from a couple of places, but the main source was Lefty’s builds on youtube, which I used as a rough guideline as to where various synergies might be.

In ultimate i haven’t bothered much with the content itself, finished AoM, I still have to do the Kovan, I focused on farming the starting area and a couple of others.

At the moment the toon has still a lot to improve, right now can resist in gladiator crucible up to lvl100 with improved defences, some oils and alot of sweating for both the toon and myself. Rashalga is doable in a couple of minutes with dodging that damn aura and in terms of nemesis the aethers, the beast and the chton are doable but actual farming I could probably do only on the beast. The rest of nemesis I have yet to encounter. Our actual ingame nemesis would be Fabius and Zantarin (the latter can one-shot even on aspirant?) but I would guess is rather a matter of mechanics.

I’ve been looking up to acquiring the Vileblade Pact set until last evening. With crafting and transmuting I transformed my two pieces in a full set… and… meh.

Please help me, if you have the time, to understand what improvement could that set bring me. My present playstyle is shadowstrike-pox-manticore punch, steel ring+wps as main dmg delivery and ABB to activate the modifier. Heal on demand and repeat the sequence as needed. After putting the set on, I did Steps of Torment as a test. At first sight I lose significant defence and some 10-20% lose on offence, despite the set itself giving decent OA and some -% res.

(I know my equipment can use alot of improvement in terms of augments and comps, was just some quick fix waiting for the Vileblade).

This is my present setup:

https://www.grimtools.com/calc/xZymy6eZ

And this is a Vileblade Pact poison WH which for the life of mine I have no idea how it gets to deliver that punch:

[1.1.3.0. - 1.1.7.1] Witch Hunter Strikes Back ... Again [c+][sr+]

In the age of Forgotten Gods, with the release of Dervish class, Witch Hunter got almost lost and … forgotten, hah. So I’ve decided to make a build which would not challenge Dervish in damage/clearing time, but just to be good and comfortable for playing as acid/poison build. 1.1.7.1 UPDATE: some changes in skill distribution, build became significantly stronger. GRIMTOOLS LINK - CLICK ME 1.1.5.2 UPDATE: changes in gear, devotions and skills. Far more damage, more survivability, easier to ge…

I would guess that the actual question would be, between my setup and the setup from that build, aside from my newbness and various components, oils and whatnot, just how instrumental is the set itself in achieving those results? I did my share of googling and research but honestly this is just beyond my understanding right now.

Thanks alot to everyone who would answer

/Kerham

[singletrack]

I haven’t played Vileblade Witch Hunter but it just looks like an ABB nuke set with all the damage conversions to acid plus procs. Spam Curse, ABB, and keep your buffs on. All the non-essential skills in afanasenkov’s grimtools are just one point fillers, which you can see by holding CTRL + Shift on the grimtools page.

You probably have too many points in WPS skills (for a non WPS build) in the dual blades line and shadow strike. Take those out and use them to max out vulnerability, night’s chill, ABB, and possession. As for devotions, you seem to have missed taking Bat and Guardian’s Gaze which is a huge chunk of the build’s sustain.

[afanasenkov26]

Vileblade Pact set is designed for ABB so you need to max it and Lethal Assault to get the best impact.
Also, not taking Abomination is a big mistake as one of it’s procs is a super-good AoE and another one gives you a considerable amount of flat chaos that is halfly converted to acid too.
Same for Guardian’s Gaze, chaos is converted and the eyes themselves deal nice damage and help clearing trash and survive due to ADctH.
The power of the final build comes not only from the set but also from 2 Shurot’s rings, conduit (that boosts ABB) and other items.
Maxing Night’s Chill and Merciless Repertoire is a must as you get huge impact out of it.

[Kerham]

Thanks both of you for your answers. I used Bat faithfully for a long time, played alot as a bleed/poison hybrid until I had to make a choice between the two and thought Bat is too bleed-oriented for my needs. Will have to take a look also at some wps builds instead of looking solely based on set.

Thanks again for clarifications

[fordprefect]

If you play WPS based AA, you gonna need Mad Queen Claws or Misery, or both. Ofc, chest and the helmet of the venomblade set can stay since they kinda have good stats.