I was hoping the community could provide me some advice on starting a pure demolitionist character. I found a few previous threads about similar topics, but most seem to just devolve into arguments over why you should or should not do a single class build. I wanted to start a new thread, as I was hoping it could avoid the forum banter, and be a little more useful. My scenario is as follows:
I’ve been wanting to do a dual wield pistol character (likely fire bases, but flexible) for a while, but I’m also eager to see what the inquisitor class can add to this. Therefore, I want to start leveling up a character, but still allow it to be inquisitor as the second class. So, I’m looking for advice on how to maximize a character that for now will be only demolitionist, but will then be ready to jump straight into inquisitor when able.
hiya. well honestly just pick whatever you want to use. if you want your character to be dual pistols and fired based, then firestrike as your main ability is the best choice, max everything in it as much as you can.
your whole build will revolve around getting the most out of firestrike, so you want to pick up some attack speed (with vindictive flame for example) and any form of resistance reduction you can get: blackwater cocktail for reduced res., flash bang for reducing DA and thus allowing for more crits; thermite mine for % fire res. debuff.
skills like stun jack or cannister bomb with its transmuter can give you some more CC if you feel the need for them. grenado can give you some really nice burst damage and mortar trap is nice if you want to have a lot of explosions!
if you want to choose the Inquisitor as your second mastery maybe take a look at the skills that are already knows (such as the DW skill) to maybe plan what you want from this mastery.
for devotions you want fire stuff obviously, id aim for ulzuins torch and well anything that you want/need for your build (dont forget to build up defenses, blast shield works great tbh)
You can play through normal/veteran by rushing canister bomb and using it almost exclusively. Respec out of it later, or don’t because with recent updates it still works in ultimate.
One of my initial concerns was how to get enough defense, with only one mastery bar to put points into… But then I realized for veteran and elite, glass cannon is probably perfectly fine
I completed veteran with a self-found Pistol and Shield Demolitionist. It was just for leveling, so that I will be able to add Inquisitor, when we start to play-test the expansion.
You should be fine on Veteran/Elite without worrying about it too much. Invest more heavily into Flashbang and Blast Shield if you’re having issues, and make sure you keep your resistances in mind by the time you move into Elite. Apart from that, just make sure you play smart. If you’re playing a ranged fire strike character, you should be able to avoid most damage simply by being aware and moving away from it.
Finally got to start trying to set this up the past few days, and great results so far. Granted, act in 2 veteran, there’s not too much challenge. However, I find a combination of fire strike, thermite mines, and Demon’s breath to be very strong. Working on some ADCTH, also. RNG happened to give me the chest armor that allows dual weilding when I was level 21
I am now curious what you guys think of demons breath. Is this something that will continue to be useful, or fall off in effect? Worth having two copies of it, so I can more or less constantly cast? Or is one enough?
Here’s where my character currently stands, nearing the end of Veteran. As expected, no major trouble yet. Looking for a bit of tweaking help, though, with the following:
I have 2 Devils Tongues pistols saved up for lvl 50. Best to use both, or a different combination?
Is there a better component for pistols than devil touched ammo?
ADCTH: currently have quite a bit from gear. Is it better to use a component for this, or devotion?
I have 2 chillsurge rings – beneficial to use one or both?
Devotion plan is to finish Scholar’s light, Hydra, Chariot, and then Ulz. Torch. Is there a more ideal setup with focus on DPS, resistance reduction, and OA/crit? Trade Chariot for ghoul and part of revenant for ADCTH?
For attribute points, I’ve gone nearly exclusively physique. Continue that? Add spirit for fire damage? Is it still recommended to get OA from other sources, not cunning, right?
Devotion bindings… what’s ideal? I have Elemental Storm (Rowan’s Crown) on firestrike, Flame Torrent (Fiend) on Thermite Mine, Eldrich Fire (Solael’s Witchblade – shows 27% proc chance in game) on flashbang, and plan to have Meteor Shower (Ulzuin’s torch) on Demon’s Breath.
Thanks for the help! I’m really trying to max the above areas, due to the limitations of single classing (until expansion).
Dude. Don’t use item generators on your first playthough on your first character…
Anyway.
Deviltongue is the best Pure fire damage gun in game for me, cos of the +skills it gives. Use it, with x2 Devil touched ammo.
You could also go for the Barrelsmith set (Crossfire and salve) that give you 2 WPS at 10% each, fire and pierce damage and so on, and they will add lots of skills to your mortar trap and so on
3. Not for your damage type
4. For leveling you, this is the order you wanna find stuff in :RESSISTANCES, +all skills, +brimstone, +thermite mines, +agonizing flames, +bwc, huge +fire damage(%). in your rings, look for +atk speed, ressistances.
5. I have light hawk viper ghoul chariot revenant(without the skill nod), hydra(without the pierce dmg), torch (without the 2 right hand modifiers) eldritch sword for DPS. And let me tell you, with an occultist, all this shit is e x p l o s s i v e
6. I went 20 cunning 65 physique. Found attributes are not THAT effective in a character and you should always boost physique to wear heavy crap.
7. Remove storm, doesn’t stack with agonizing flames. Shower on BWC keeps it up ALL the time. Alternative: Thermite mines - Every damage tick has a chance to spawn the shower. Chariot on V.flame, Ghoul on the other aura. Eldritch sword on Fire strike(you want -rr on firestrike and sword is awesome in general). Torrent, I have on CoF (occultist mastery), but you can use it on Thermite/BWC - Same principle, every damage tick on any mob has a chance to activate it. Throw both in a pack of mobs and you have 100% uptime shower and torrent (fire procs galore is how I call it)
The update is allegedly giving every character a free respec though, so we might be talking for nothing. In case you wanna risk it, go occultist and get an exterminus to couple up your deviltongue - it’s the combo every1’s using nowadays
Thanks for the reply, and thanks for the concern… but fear not! I have beaten Ultimate with 3 level 85 characters, respec’d one of them once, and did it again, have another lvl 81 and at Log’s door, and another ~lvl 35… so nearly all my gear is either self found from this character, or “hand-me-down” from my other toons
At this point, I’m trying to not use BWC – have it on my AAR char, and I like diversity. So, that’s why I was going with elemental storm instead of agonizing flames. Also, I want the character to feel like a pistol character – already throwing 2 thermites and 1 flashbang feels kinda like a castor. At this point, I’d rather not add another throw/“cast” to the mix
And I had seen the chillsurge rings in a gunslinger type guide – my take was that the chance of rr wasn’t significant enough, given all the other rr types this toon has setup, but was curious what others thought. So, glad you seem to agree that I can get more out of rings by going attack speed, fire damage, and resistances.
I see your point of meteor shower on a dot/constant skill – I had read that it works well on Demon’s breath, as the cd’s are almost the same, and it will have a 100% proc chance. So, cast when cool down is over, and it stay’s 100% active
Also, I’ve been really happy with flame torrent on thermite mine – I get a giant area of flame proc’s going on
Depends on what you need. You may lack ADCTH in which case you’d need a haunted steel. Purified salt or imbued silved for resists and racial damage may be an option as well.
Usually better to get it from devotion or gear, components can work for this but they convert damage to vitality which is a dps loss.
I would use them only if you can’t survive without them.
There are so many possible setups it’s hard to answer this. But your setup is fine as it is.
Current meta is that you should dump everything in physique unless you need to add spirit or cunning to use an item.
This is fine. You need a 3 second cooldown skill to get 100% activation on meteor shower, demon’s breath works, if you use other components try grenado.
As you can see the inq has quite a few fire and lightning skills, 2x a proc on duel wield and a flamethrower.
From the new devotions we know there is also a chain lightning with elemental resistance reductions.
It seems the mastery doesn’t have an auto attack replacer, so fire strike works well.
For now I’d focus on firestrike first, put one point in flametouched, then maxing explosive strike and the one hand modifier first. After that max flametouch, and put 8 points in vindictive flame.
I’m not sure you want to go beyond 15 mastery on the demo side as what you want from inq all seems quite mastery heavy, and you won’t be able to withdraw points invested in the mastery bar. Whether Wrath, Blastshield and the mines are worth it is better to decide when you have invested in inq.
That’s a great resource! I had forgotten about it. I like your advice, but unfortunately, since I started as demo only, and also with the goal to max firestrike and brimstone, I have already gone to max on demo mastery. Either I can make that work - or maybe we get the rumored reset option, or if all else fails, I just roll a new inquisitor
Sounds like a very similar preparation/plan!