The reason was it let you get Nullification down to a VERY low CD. I could pop a nullification every 5-6 seconds if I needed to, and because the build is squishy, reflect targets a PoS, and such, it’s just very nice to have. For the most part, I had already maxed out everything that needed maxing, and a few more points in Maiven’s would have given me less overall survivability than the points in nullification gave me by far, in both being able to just nullify every single hero I came across without an issue, rather than having to save it for “High Threat” heros or reflect heros, increases it’s reduced elemental damage debuff (Which effectively increases my survivability against elemental damage, a nice bonus), and I just liked the feel of being able to nullify anything on demand rather than a few more points of absorbtion.
Seriously though, Nullification had saved me from my own high DoT damage several times, because each SS could very well chunk more than half my hp bar if I hit a reflect target. Being able to nullify the reflect from the target, AND the DoTs I had just hit myself with, at the same time, frequently, was a very big QoL improvement.
I had Maiven’s ranked up to a break-point, and more ranks past that would have had low yields per point unless I could get some serious overleveling on it, and I knew for a fact I couldn’t because of how much gear SS depends on to be maxed out perfectly at the time.
Steelflame, not sure if you are still monitoring this thread since the hotfix update reduced this build’s viability, but I’m still running v.1.0.0.4 in GOG (no automatic version updates unless I want them) so I’m planning on giving it go. Just wondering what your typical skill rotation would be when dealing with crowds and when dealing with bosses. Also how would you change your CP/skill bindings now that you can bind CP’s to OFF (which I don’t think was possible when you created this guide)?
Well, if you’re determined to give it a go, the crowd rotation was SS to most important target, Flash Freeze, SS either to another high threat target, or continue on the first to DPS them down. Cast Blade Spirits and Ring of Steel on CD to get the devotion procs out. I wouldn’t use actually change my bindings, OFF would be nice to bind stuff to, except I have nothing to bind to it, all of my devotions were already in use, and there was just about no way to even attempt to squeeze another in without sacrificing one of my T3 devotion procs, which wouldn’t have been worth it in the slightest. Just a statement on binding devotions to OFF, it’s rarely a good idea. You lose a devotion during boss fights, and you can’t attempt to target control where the proc goes either. It also only really works well with procs on a 1 second CD or less, as if it is any value over 1 second, even 1.1, you can’t get a proc but every 2 seconds.
I honestly just recommend not going this build, and if you want something of a similar feel, grab a Poison Witchhunter instead. You don’t have the infinite SS spam, but the build actually has basic function on current versions of the game, and you will be able to progress the character forward into the future if you were so inclined.
If Crate ever goes back on their dumpstering of the build, then I’d probably revive the thread, but other then that, don’t expect it to work well. It lost what was already its biggest weakness, single target DPS for bosses, just because the build was overpowered in the Crucible due to Crate giving more CDR to the player there (Despite other builds being able to be just as broken, AKA 75% CDR Mirror being on a 3.6 second CD…).