I agree, the changes I made were minor overall. It was just to give an idea of what the build would like using Hood of Dreeg over Voice. Thanks for your thoughts.
Hello everyone.
As a returning player I have some questions regarding crucible farming without a lot of the new mythical items.
- In terms of farming speed (gladiator 100-150), how does a SnB Aether DK compare to a Cadence witchblade (like the one linked 5. for 150-170 builds)?
Got a witchblade up to hc ultimate but its damage doesn’t seem great (although I lack most of the items but not sure how much the damage will change when I have everything).
- One big issue I noticed is the super low OA which gets me like 95% hit chance and 5% crit vs level 110 bosses, often not even giving me assassins blade procs.
Due to that I tried changing the devotion setup a bit. Anyone want to critique my attempt at merging the best of its survivability with some additional OA/damage sources?
https://www.grimtools.com/calc/lNk3yLRN
Basically I dropped ishtak since I dont like that it only has like 30% uptime, which doesnt seem like it’s crucial for face tanking stuff for extended periods of time.
I also dropped tree of life since passive hp regen just doesnt seem that appealing compared to the damage I receive and how much leech heals me.
I could also drop light of empyrion for another 6% OA and some more leech, but that devotion actually seems pretty strong assuming the damage reduce stacks with warcry. Does it stack?
Thanks in advance to anyone taking the time and answering my questions!
-
Aether DK is roughly equal to cadence witchblade in farming crucible. There will be a difference only if one has offensive devotions and the other has defensive.
You said yourself you lack good items, so obviously you’ll become stronger when you get them. Withblade is one of the strongest classes in the game. -
Your lack of OA is due to lack of items. If you play HC you should think twice before going more offensive, but campaign is so easy for a witchblade that you can do whatever you want with your devotions, you won’t die unless you mess up really hard. For crucible I’m convinced defensive setup is the best for a HC player. Don’t even try 150-170 without the superdefensive version presented here.
Your devotion choice is totally fine for campaign and for 100-150 crucible probably too.
I was told that Empyrion damage reduction does not stack with War Cry. Still a great constellation.
Just a minor change to BWC sor: swap Tome of Arcane Waste for Aldanar Vanity, better proc, the char has more DA and burn dmg, only lost 8% crit bonus and some OA(but 2x coils already grant a huge source).
Thanks for your reponse.
Been doing very well with the devotion setup I posted, just wished I could get Targo as well without dropping anything major but I dont think it it possible.
Another question though, what exactly makes Witchblade particularly good for a physical build like this?
Wouldn’t arcanist or necromancer instead of occultist work similarly well?
DK has same -% phys res and a bit less OA but health and more leech for example.
And wouldn’t inquitor as a secondary class outshine either of the others? 18% OA, 20% crit from deadly aim, several defensive and offensive bonuses from word of renewal, maybe even seal if some skill points can be spared.
Just seems superior to CoF and BoD in terms of the bonuses provided or what am I missing here?
The flat -phys from the flames of ignaffar transmuter doesnt stack with break morale, right?
I noticed that none of the melee builds is using the Essence of Ch’thon weapon augment. Could someone explain to me why?
15% resist reduction seems stronger than some 55% additional damage, and the 8% chaos resistance is a nice bonus.
You will soon see a melee phys build that does 
Hmm indeed i used to use that augument a long time ago. I wonder why i switched, probably looking blindly at dps i guess.
Well, even your DW Blademaster does not use it. Mind enlightening me why?
Witchblade has always been a top class for many reasons. First, Soldier is the strongest mastery in the game. I think it was intentionally made like that to help new players so they could start with something strong, easy and reliable.
Second, physical is the strongest damage type in the game. Most of monsters do not have physical resists so physical attacks deal a lot of damage.
Third, this game is designed around reducing monsters’ resists (RR). And ocuultist privides exactly that with curse of frailty, further amplifying physical damage. Fourth: yes, now we have death knight who also has physical RR, but occultist also has Blood of Dreeg with Aspect of the Guardian. This is a superb skill that provides OA, regen, heal on demand, ton of resists and even super rare physical resist.
All of this provides unmatched quality of life for a physical build, no one can offer that much. It heals more than DK. Arcanist does not have physical RR, so it has a ton less damage. Deadly aim only works 50% of the time, you need huge cooldown reduction so it could match RR curse of frailty provides and physical builds don’t have it.
Flat RR does not stack with each other, only highest applies. So yeah, flat -phys from the flames of ignaffar transmuter doesnt stack with break morale.
This is a complicated one. There are three types of resist reduction in this game:
-X% resistance - the best type as all sources of it stack with each other
X reduced target’s resistance - does not stack with other sources of this type, only the highest applies
X% resist reduction - this one is most complicated. As I understand it amplifies the other two but its effectiveness really depends on how many resists does the monster have. Some people say it does not work good enough for that reason and prefer to skip it. Sources of it don’t stack with each other.
Thanks for your response.
I assumed deadly aim would have 100% uptime which seemed superior to CoF in combination with tactician’s other boons like +20% to chtonic and eldritch and a ton of flat physical damage.
And last question, why no significant investment into blitz and blindside? Just no points to spare or why do the aether conversion builds use it but not this one?
If you mean build 3 its main damage source is internal trauma, not direct physical damage. But i still use Blitz in my version, it’s Actuanpanda’s choice not to use it.
In build 5 it’s author’s choice, I do use maxed blitz in that build and recommend doing so. No points left to max blindside unfortunately.
If you’re talking about my build, the one you mentioned earlier, it’s a matter of preference. You should look at these builds, every one of them, as models or frameworks that were tested against the odds on the Crucible and survived, but you can make the build the way you like. For example, you can take the overcapped levels from Break Morale, leaving it at 12, and spend then on Blitz, and you can take the points of fighting form, keeping one point there to take advantage of gear bonuses, and spend the rest into Blindside. You will lose the small AoE from Cadence and some Physical RR from Break Morale, but your blitzes will hurt more and reduce more of the enemies DA, giving you more chances to crit.
Deadly Aim’s description is a little misleading. The cool down on it starts after the duration runs out. So unless you have 100% cool down reduction, it always has down time.
Cause Coven’s guile also overcaps my elemental Resits further along with dmg. You need 60-70 overcap to even think of 150-170 crucible. Anyway current setup will be very much changed when i update
I think you should relocate a few points (and by a few I mean most of them) from Blitz/Blindside to Bladearc/Laceration for another powerful trauma source, flat IT from Laceration + Clean Sweep >>>> Blindside meaning you can get a decent amount of damage with pretty minimal investment. I did that recently and I found stuff to melt noticeably faster, also another button to smash = more fun.
Was talking about the cadence version but thanks anyway. No fighting form I assume?
Yeah I was talking about your build. Was curious why you took fighting form over blitz with most other builds I saw using blitz and only keeping 1 point in fighting form.
Doesn’t blitz provide more AoE and isn’t your main AoE the doom active anyway?
I made that build for main game, more specifically, to solo the secret boss. Since the boss has a lot of energy drain and the battle is mostly single target, I decided to focus on maximizing the Cadence damage to keep energy . For trash mobs in the main game Doomforce and Blitz the way it is are working fine enough for me.
Would be cool if Internal trauma from LAceration would be added to BA % weapon dmg, still it’s strong
So in particular Break Morale does not stack with Blind Fury?
What if I wear two Bladetwister’s Signets? Will the -X% resistance from it’s proc stack, or will the second one only help to increase the uptime of the debuff?