quiz 1: any idea why I keep dying with... my saboteur?

here it is. https://www.grimtools.com/calc/L2Ja5l7N
ok this is quite a mistery to me, I’ve been playing a lot of gd and bring my old builds to a decent level. I’m quite proud of being able to reach 150k dps on a saboteur, but…
I keep dying against gargabol. and korvaak.
and no, it’s not gargabol’s vulcano nor the stuns from korvaak, it’s their melee hits (i think).
with gargabol, he sometime does the double hit, he manages to bring me from 100 to 10% hp, then since I can’t lifesteal fast enough from him I run for a while waiting for blast shield to return available, i go back and manage to hit him for some seconds and then have to run again… it’s quite frustrating.
what do you think is the problem of the build? low phys res?

I have this problem with atleast 2 other characters, (dw belgothian blademaster with 3k+armor and dw aether spellbinder). also korvaak managed to consistently kill my tanky witchblade with 50% phys res.

maybe its your almost nonexistent cc res?

i honestly dont know but would like to. i try to theorycraft my own builds too. even with 3.8k DA/armor and cant even survive crucible 150s. this game is confusing… :rolleyes:

Because Saboteur… 2 weakest defensively-wise classes in the game.

gargabol has 0 cc… also I have 60% stun 45% entrapment, I don’t think there are many ways to get cc reduction expecially if you don’t go for very tanky devotions/items, also the various class skills don’t give much even when maxed.

I don’t think there’s anything wrong with your build. The only thing I could say is maybe invest some more points into blast shield, but other than that, I think this is just saboteur being a weak class.

Hey,

Fire Sabouter is just not a good idea in general. Fire is not a strong element for melee and is especially lacking when only supported by resist reduction from one mastery (8% RR on that amulet does not count). You don’t have enough damage to leech properly and you don’t have enough defenses (and yes, cc-res) to withstand the onslaught.

But, good news for you, I have designed a green free melee Sabouter spec that is an absolute BEAST. It never dies in Crucible Gladiator 150-170 and is able to farm it as fast as 6:30 minutes. It also can farm Shards 75-76 quite reliably for a melee spec.

Here is the link. Just give it a try and you will never go to your old Sabouter ever again :slight_smile:

Problem is people often get biased over one particular stat (usually because they just managed to get it very high and wanna feel successful) and start thinking all defense depends on it. Usually it’s armor. Sometimes phys res. Sometimes da. Thing is even with 3500 da and armor on top of 50% phys res you can still get mopped.

In my experience, the most common holes in noob defense are cc res, res overcaps and sustain. Which seems to be the case with this build, too. Don’t forget that those things are inter-connected, ex. 0% slow res has a catastrophic effect on your sustain.

Actually I have up to 116% fire Res reduction plus viper, and 100-150k dps plus crit damage and nightblade’s wps, the damage should be enough, maybe I need more sustain, the problem though is I go down too fast unlike with some of my other characters. This build was incredible I think even before release, I see your build is a nex/ortus one, I recently respecced my inquisitor-nighblade to wear those, was restraining from doing the same with my saboteur but they are indeed better with fire strike, it’s just that I really loved blazeheart and the ability to convert all abominable might s huge flat chaos into fire.

Ok there should be some really high slow Res things around, I know that getting 50% reduced attack speed halves my sustain, I’ll look into it

Infiltrator is more gimped by Nex and Ortus combo then anything. Because the monster flat damage (acid to fire/cold conversion) is now attached to Flame Touched. If you want a melee Infiltrator I recommend Deathmarked or Belgothian.

I am really not sure if there is a working Sabouter build besides mine, by working I mean consistently farming end-game content. It’s just Sabouter is a very weak class combination. I have tested pure fire specs with Justicar spec, they just don’t work well at all, no matter how I tried.

ok, i’ve managed gargabol easily 2 times now, I checked the various fire damage/elemental damage sets… tried ulzuin (without rifle ofc), it gives phys res but my armor goes from 2300 to 1600 and i actually take more phys damage with grim internals, I think i could keep 2 justicar pieces for the +15% armor +15% absorption and go 3 ulzuin (losing only +1 to demo cause justicar helm gives +1 and ulzuin’s doesn’t).

the first try went pretty well and I only changed korvaak’s relic (for the slow res and + demo skills), allhadra’s spellblade (more slow res and nice conversion light–>fire to firestrike) and expecially ulzuin’s amulet. those -2 seconds and 12% heal to blast shield were the real game changer for me! i’m also planning to remove magi devotion to get something more defensive since after all most of my damage comes from fire strike and I don’t really need that shotgunning volcano expecially to sustain.

i dont have a single piece of shattered realm set tho, didn’t have the patience to go past sr 25 with any of my chars… (or don’t even know if i actually can :P) so it would be impossible for me to try your build.

SR set is super easy to get, definitely the most realistic set to get. If you traded other items, you can definitely trade items to equip at least one of your characters to farm Shard 50.

With fire Sabo you are just going to be bashing your (or your sabo’s) head against the wall I am afraid.

oh wait… i think i saw the new vendor at the end of shard 25… totally forgot about it. i do have a piece :stuck_out_tongue: btw no, i don’t trade but i’ve got tons of items and hours in the game, had about 10 ulzuin pieces, only needed to transmute the helm. i have a dw krieg spellbinder, dw infiltrator, dw belgo blademaster, snb bloodrager witchblade, warlock elemental summoner (my first char), bleed summoner conjurer, dual pistol chaos cadence witchblade, fire 2handed eor paladin, (plus many lvl 70ish chars and an on-hold lvl 97 poison nightblade-occultist…) all lvl 100 but most struggle to be able to finish cruci 170 alive with buffs n banners.

Well, that vendor right there is your road to full SR set (that and legendary items tranmuting). I guarantee that if you build my sabouter it’s gonna be your consistent Crucible/Shattered Realm farmer.