Is a wake of fire Assassin viable? I went to a skill calculator, and found that with all synergies maxed, Wake of Fire does 264-302 damage. 453-520 damage is how much I will end up with, because I can reasonably expect my assassin to get +7 all skills using some equipment that I'm not using.
Assuming that this build is viable, where should I allocate my other skill points? Should I use shadow master or shadow warrior? Should I use burst of speed, fade, or neither?
Also, how do I go about dealing with fire immunes?
Here is my equipment I was planning on using:
Hexfire (+3 fire skills)
Magefist (+1 fire skills, mana, fast cast)
Peasent Crown (+1 all skills, my shako is being used by my sorc)
+1 all traps amulet
Skin of Viper Magi (+1 all skills, faster cast, resist all)
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I haven't tried this, but my personal opinion is it would be very difficult in Hell if that's your goal. The damage is just not that high to begin with, and it has an additional hidden timer (NextDelay) that will prevent some of the fire waves from overlapping if you stack traps. Unlike a lighning trapper, it has no built-in option for immunes. I have heard on another forum of people making it work, but they were using A LOT of +skills--20 or so, if I'm remembering right.
It's a cool skill though, and it's certainly good early in the game. If you want to make it work really well, I suggest dropping the Hexfire, Magefists and shield, and shopping for 2 +2-3 traps claws, and +2-3 traps gloves. The amulet, and probably the helm will have to go eventually too.
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Actually, +20 is not that hard... just shop hell Anya for +3 trap +3 WoF claws. +12 from the weapons, + circlet/amu, 1 armor, 2 gloves 21 already
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05-19-2004, 07:36 PM
(This post was last modified: 05-19-2004, 07:38 PM by bigeyedbug.)
If you think finding two +3/+3 claws is "not that hard", sure. I barely have the patience for plain +3s... Trading for them might be the best option-- that is, if anyone's holding onto WoF claws. PvPers maybe?
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DEF: "Not that hard" = not that equipment-demanding. You can buy the thing from vendors after all.
For me getting 20 in WoF would be hard if one went the: Harlequin, Mara, Barctuc, Arachnid, Chains of Honor, 10 skillers and an Anni route, whereas that character would be a lot more viable than a +3/+3 dual vielder.
Or for another matter, finding a darned +3 ES 4 socket staff (or +3 es white with the possibility of getting 4 sockets) seems a lot harder than getting a +3/+3 claw.
Luck varies, I won't do the math.
What if I just don't stack traps?
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If you don't stack traps, you're left with just 453-520 damage per shot (compared to the 2265-2600 you'd have if you could stack them without interference). This is very low damage.
Frozen Orb does less damage than that, and it's one of the most widely used sorc spells in the game... What does it mean to stack something anyway? I assumed it meant put one trap on top of another. If this is the case, why not just cast a triangle of traps or something?
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The frozen orb damage is per shard. You get lots and lots of shards with every cast and can hit the same monster with many of them. This is very different from wake of fire.
In this case, stacking means having multiple wakes of fire attacking the same monster. This would happen if you have multiple traps on top of each other or if you have multiple traps in about the same area as a monster.
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To build on that next delay means that no other attack affected by nextdelay can damage the target for 4(?) frames. There are 25 frames in a second. So that's a maximum of 6.25 hits per second. I have no idea how fast WoF fires, so I can't give any concrete comparisons. Frozen Orb, on the other hand, sends out over 30(or maybe even 40, I forget how many...) shards. If 10 of these hit the target, that's 10* whatever damage is listed, as opposed to 5 * the listed WoF per cast. Orb also has the benefit of chilling. Add in Cold Mastery, which can quadruple your damage against a 50% resistant monster...
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After a WoF hit, it'll be immune for the next 4 frames. So it'll really hit at best 5 times per second, and that's assuming they're all going off at exactly the right times.
However, all that said, it's almost certainly still a viable skill. Just perhaps not as powerful as you might like.
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Caaroid,May 19 2004, 12:46 PM Wrote:DEF: "Not that hard" = not that equipment-demanding. You can buy the thing from vendors after all. Well, I doubt I've ever seen one, let alone two. And I've played almost entirely Assassins. I'm not saying they don't exist--just that they're not something somebody should count on shopping at Anya's for a build.
That being said, I misremembered the number of +skills necessary--it was actually only +14 between All and Trap. The guy used LS as his backup. I imagine he had all the WoF synergies maxed. It still sounds a bit on the weak side to me, about 750-800 per wave--especially compared to LS. But hey, lightning trappers are a dime-a-dozen. :rolleyes:
Ok, I've got one opinion that says the build is viable. I'm not looking for something to replace a sorc here, just something that will be able to hold out in hell, as the spell itself is pretty fun. Will somebody just flat out say that it's swell or not?
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unrealshadow13,May 20 2004, 03:45 PM Wrote:Ok, I've got one opinion that says the build is viable. I'm not looking for something to replace a sorc here, just something that will be able to hold out in hell, as the spell itself is pretty fun. Will somebody just flat out say that it's swell or not? hold up in hell: party: yes. solo: no.
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05-20-2004, 05:01 PM
(This post was last modified: 05-20-2004, 05:39 PM by jrichard.)
WoF can be used to solo in SP. If your definition of swell is "kills easily", then no it's not. She won't be taking on hell solo in much over a two player game without a lot of difficulty. It is a fun skill to use, however, and in a few areas of the game does great. Go into building her with the idea of having fun and desiring to overcome a challenge most say isn't worth it and a fire trapper will fill what you're looking for.
The idea with WoF is to keep targets continually on top of a flame. The Nextdelay issue can be worked around. Notice when you lay the traps how they are firing. If they fire at the same time, space them out enough to separate the waves rather than stacking the traps. The flames spread out in a diamond pattern. Try to keep targets at the corners of the diamonds. That tends to let them fry for a bit longer.
As Bigeyed stated, you don't have the ready made immunity solution that lightning trappers have with fire blast. If you want to go the pure trapper route, you'll be looking at something along the lines of:
20 Fireblast
20 WoF
18 shock web
20 charged bolt sentry
That will give you CBS as an FI solution. Shock web isn't an FI solution imo. It suffers even worse than WoF from the Nextdelay problem. CBS works nicely as it also gains a damage synergy from Fire Blast. The points in Shock web won't give a damage synergy to any of your skills, but they are needed to make CBS usable. You could cut 9 pts from there if you wanted. It would weaken CBS considerably however. If you get death sentry and blade fury as well, you've got 82 pts put into the trap tree. Not enough pts left to get a decent level shadow. I'd suggest grabbing a single pt into a shadow (master would be my preference) strictly to use as a diversion. She won't be a lot of good for much else unless you have a huge amount of +shadow skills.
In the end, I say build her. The important results of any game are having fun and feeling satisfied with accomplishing what you've set out to do.
jrichard
edit: clarity
My friend said that trappers use shadow warrior, because they only have the spells you are using on left/right click, so they will use traps a lot.
If I use charged bolt sentry, then I would lose a lot of damage from wake of fire, because I wouldn't be able to max out Inferno (synergy) until a very high level. You sure about this?
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unrealshadow13,May 20 2004, 08:37 PM Wrote:My friend said that trappers use shadow warrior, because they only have the spells you are using on left/right click, so they will use traps a lot. AFAIK if you lay down 5 traps, and the Shadow Warrior lays down her traps as well, her traps will "overwrite" your own. So I'm not sure whether the Warrior is the Shadow of choice for trappers.
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Personally, i don't want my shadows casting traps when i'm playing a trapsin. There is a limit of five traps total that can be out at any given time. The traps the shadow drops will count against that total. I know about the shadow's synergy bonuses and her level of a skill and the subsequent synergy that skill provides to others being 1/3 the level of the shadow when you cast her plus 1/2 your level in the skill when she uses it. That works best when you have her using traps that you don't want to invest in. If you have her dropping the same traps that you are also pumping up, then her damage will be lower than yours unless you are near the maximum for +skills with legit gear. The shadow also will not place traps very optimally, i like my trap placement better. The only reason i would use a warrior would be if i wanted her to make use of fire blast. In the build i listed, i wouldn't have the pts to bring her to a high enough level to make her fire blast worth it. That's why i would go with the master.
You don't have to use CBS at all if you don't want. You asked for a FI solution, that's one which happens to be my favorite. Unless you go to a physical damage skill which trappers aren't really built for, you're not going to be able to provide a decent FI solution and a fully synergized WoF. If you're okay with relying on a merc or always play with a party who can handle the multitude of FIs in hell, you can pump WoI earlier.
jrichard
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Speaking as a ltng trapper, I don't mind when my maxed SM lays traps. I just lay a new 1; usually the trap being replaced has nothing alive in its range anyway. Also helps that I'm getting used to the SM AI: when at range, she lays traps; so if I charge in, so does the SM & she starts melee'ing.
I liked WoF in the early clvls. I had initially planned the skill pts. to max WoI, but with the various issues with both WoF & WoI, I just redistrib'ed the pts. into SM & the MA tree.
If 1.10a fixes these bugs & a lot of other things, I'd make a new LS/WoI/DS trapper.
-- Ryan
Between GW2, AirMech, Firefall and Torchlight 2, who has time for gaming? 
what does LS and DS mean?
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