01-01-2013, 02:37 PM
And this one went up yesterday. One more note: the "new, favorite build" thing is kind of a running joke, since I tend to switch up every few weeks-or days.
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So I’ve got a couple of witch doctor updates. I added Firebomb/Ghost Bomb to my build mentioned above (subtracted Plague of Toads). It has a wider area of effect which comes in handy at times. I also swapped in Pierce the Veil (moar damage!) as a passive in lieu of Blood Ritual. I was able to kill fast enough to regenerate mana with health globes, so while I ran out of mana more often, I still gained a little killing speed. I got a couple of paragon levels with this build, but I couldn’t resist switching things up again-into my new, favorite build.
One of the runes on the Spirit Barrage spell got a buff in the V1.05 release. I had played with it a bit when it first came out, but switched back to a more mainstream build soon after. I had also read a post about how to use it a few weeks after that, but never got around to experimentation with it; that is, until last week. SB is the cheapest of the Decay skills (which also include Zombie Bears and Acid Cloud). These are your primary damage dealers/mana hogs in most witch doctor builds. But whereas Zombie Bears and Acid Rain rank 1st and 4th, respectively, amongst the most-used skills, SB/Well of Souls is a lowly 50th. It’s not even the top rune on Spirit Barrage, which comes in at 25th. And I think I know why…it’s a bit tricky to use.
Speaking of little-used skills, the least-used passive chosen is Rush of Essence, which returns mana over time for any spirit-based skills you use. The contrarian in me wanted to give it a try-especially since I’m frequently out of mana with my WD. And on top of all this, I had my eye on the level 63 legendary ceremonial knife on the AH. A lot of good WD items are in/near my price range since it isn’t the most popular character class. I had purchased the level 61 legendary (The Gidbinn since it has magic find) for around 2 million gold. (Note that I found a lower-quality one, then spent gold on one with more DPS.) The next one up always rolls with a 15-second cooldown reduction for the skill Mass Confusion, which I had never used before. And on top of all this, my old Skorn was sitting in my stash waiting for enough paragon magic-find to be brought back into play. So, what would I want long-term: a new ceremonial knife or an upgraded Skorn? In the short-term, I only want to buy one of those. My plan was to try out this Spirit Barrage build and see if I liked it.
I did.
The first run with the new build looked like this:
Spirit Barrage/Well of Souls
Unbreakable Grasp/Death Is Life
Hex/Jinx
Spirit Walk/Severance
Mass Confusion/Mass Hallucination
Soul Harvest/Vengeful Spirit
Gruesome Feast, Grave Injustice, and Rush of Essence
Fun fun fun. This was the first build in ages where I didn’t run out of mana. Ever. I could stand in one spot and spam Spirit Barrage over and over, even on Extra Health elite packs, and not empty the blue ball. Amazing to someone who has always had trouble coming up with enough mana. I did, however, notice a downside: I could stand in one place and spam Spirit Barrage over and over. Generally speaking, standing in one place in Diablo 3 is not a good idea, and I found myself in a lot of dangerous situations due to laziness/sloppiness.
For the next test, I made the conscious decision to run out of mana more often and selected Pierce the Veil instead of Rush of Essence. Moar damage! Since endlessly spamming was no longer an option, I had to move more frequently and make more tactical decisions on when and where to cast. This was an OK compromise since it kept me a bit sharper mentally during the elite pack battles. I did a final run with Blood Ritual as the third passive, but while that gave me life regen I still ran out of mana occasionally-so I settled on Pierce the Veil.
At this point I need to confess that I lied to you earlier, dear readers. I was not formerly in “Full-On Poltergeist Mode” because I didn’t have Mass Confusion on my skill bar. Now I do, and it is hilarious to watch a big ol’ spirit walk slowly through elites, damaging them and laughing maniacally the whole time. (For clarity, the specter is laughing maniacally-not me. I’m cackling.) Mass Confusion causes some of the monsters to fight for you, which is a great advantage in the early stages of an elite battle. By the time it wears off it’s usually a simple matter to clean up whatever remains, and the cooldown is short enough that you can use it for just about every elite pack you encounter (Grave Injustice helps with this as well). And it’s more even poltergeist damage, at least to my simple mind. A lot to love.
But the build lives or dies by Spirit Barrage/Well of Souls, which has its own pros and cons. A minor problem is that the damage is not instantaneous. It takes awhile (2 seconds?) for all 3 souls to reach their targets. Whereas you can spam 5 Acid Clouds rapid-fire, it’s going to take a little time to dish out your full SB damage. The silver lining is it allows you to conserve mana a bit-plus SB costs less than Zombie Charger and Acid Cloud.
The far bigger con, and I imagine the main reason it ranks in the 50s in most-used skills, is that the targeting is tricky. The worst way to use it is to target a monster and click. The pathing of the souls doesn’t work very well at this point, since the 2nd and 3rd souls tend to go off in other directions. The better way to use it is to cast near your intended target so that all the souls are seeking out an area instead of a monster. If you get it right, all 3 souls will hit the same monster with a nice burst of damage over a short amount of time.
One other minor disadvantage is that SB is not nearly as good at destroying the environment objects as, say, Rain of Toads. But I can live with that.
Where SB/WoS really shines is against the dreaded elite modifier: Waller. It simply ignores the walls; it paths right over them! I don’t know how much mana I’ve wasted casting bears or acid rain and watching it fall harmlessly against a wall instead of the monsters. I no longer need to worry about wasting mana in that manner; every SB cast sails over the walls and into mobs. It’s a beautiful thing.
So I finished last night at Paragon 46, meaning that I could upgrade from The Gidbinn to Last Breath (or switch back to my Skorn) and remain at max magic find. I bought a nice Last Breath for 1.5 million gold on the AH, and am going to keep using this Spirit Barrage build for now. I’ll probably also work in some testing with the Skorn (going back to Acid Rain) since it still has about 5k more damage-but less mana. I’ll also test the Blood Ritual passive some more since the new knife has life regen on it. Of course, the Fierce Loyalty passive would allow my pets to gain my life regen, and it’s been awhile since I’ve used a pet build. Hmmm…
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So I’ve got a couple of witch doctor updates. I added Firebomb/Ghost Bomb to my build mentioned above (subtracted Plague of Toads). It has a wider area of effect which comes in handy at times. I also swapped in Pierce the Veil (moar damage!) as a passive in lieu of Blood Ritual. I was able to kill fast enough to regenerate mana with health globes, so while I ran out of mana more often, I still gained a little killing speed. I got a couple of paragon levels with this build, but I couldn’t resist switching things up again-into my new, favorite build.
One of the runes on the Spirit Barrage spell got a buff in the V1.05 release. I had played with it a bit when it first came out, but switched back to a more mainstream build soon after. I had also read a post about how to use it a few weeks after that, but never got around to experimentation with it; that is, until last week. SB is the cheapest of the Decay skills (which also include Zombie Bears and Acid Cloud). These are your primary damage dealers/mana hogs in most witch doctor builds. But whereas Zombie Bears and Acid Rain rank 1st and 4th, respectively, amongst the most-used skills, SB/Well of Souls is a lowly 50th. It’s not even the top rune on Spirit Barrage, which comes in at 25th. And I think I know why…it’s a bit tricky to use.
Speaking of little-used skills, the least-used passive chosen is Rush of Essence, which returns mana over time for any spirit-based skills you use. The contrarian in me wanted to give it a try-especially since I’m frequently out of mana with my WD. And on top of all this, I had my eye on the level 63 legendary ceremonial knife on the AH. A lot of good WD items are in/near my price range since it isn’t the most popular character class. I had purchased the level 61 legendary (The Gidbinn since it has magic find) for around 2 million gold. (Note that I found a lower-quality one, then spent gold on one with more DPS.) The next one up always rolls with a 15-second cooldown reduction for the skill Mass Confusion, which I had never used before. And on top of all this, my old Skorn was sitting in my stash waiting for enough paragon magic-find to be brought back into play. So, what would I want long-term: a new ceremonial knife or an upgraded Skorn? In the short-term, I only want to buy one of those. My plan was to try out this Spirit Barrage build and see if I liked it.
I did.
The first run with the new build looked like this:
Spirit Barrage/Well of Souls
Unbreakable Grasp/Death Is Life
Hex/Jinx
Spirit Walk/Severance
Mass Confusion/Mass Hallucination
Soul Harvest/Vengeful Spirit
Gruesome Feast, Grave Injustice, and Rush of Essence
Fun fun fun. This was the first build in ages where I didn’t run out of mana. Ever. I could stand in one spot and spam Spirit Barrage over and over, even on Extra Health elite packs, and not empty the blue ball. Amazing to someone who has always had trouble coming up with enough mana. I did, however, notice a downside: I could stand in one place and spam Spirit Barrage over and over. Generally speaking, standing in one place in Diablo 3 is not a good idea, and I found myself in a lot of dangerous situations due to laziness/sloppiness.
For the next test, I made the conscious decision to run out of mana more often and selected Pierce the Veil instead of Rush of Essence. Moar damage! Since endlessly spamming was no longer an option, I had to move more frequently and make more tactical decisions on when and where to cast. This was an OK compromise since it kept me a bit sharper mentally during the elite pack battles. I did a final run with Blood Ritual as the third passive, but while that gave me life regen I still ran out of mana occasionally-so I settled on Pierce the Veil.
At this point I need to confess that I lied to you earlier, dear readers. I was not formerly in “Full-On Poltergeist Mode” because I didn’t have Mass Confusion on my skill bar. Now I do, and it is hilarious to watch a big ol’ spirit walk slowly through elites, damaging them and laughing maniacally the whole time. (For clarity, the specter is laughing maniacally-not me. I’m cackling.) Mass Confusion causes some of the monsters to fight for you, which is a great advantage in the early stages of an elite battle. By the time it wears off it’s usually a simple matter to clean up whatever remains, and the cooldown is short enough that you can use it for just about every elite pack you encounter (Grave Injustice helps with this as well). And it’s more even poltergeist damage, at least to my simple mind. A lot to love.
But the build lives or dies by Spirit Barrage/Well of Souls, which has its own pros and cons. A minor problem is that the damage is not instantaneous. It takes awhile (2 seconds?) for all 3 souls to reach their targets. Whereas you can spam 5 Acid Clouds rapid-fire, it’s going to take a little time to dish out your full SB damage. The silver lining is it allows you to conserve mana a bit-plus SB costs less than Zombie Charger and Acid Cloud.
The far bigger con, and I imagine the main reason it ranks in the 50s in most-used skills, is that the targeting is tricky. The worst way to use it is to target a monster and click. The pathing of the souls doesn’t work very well at this point, since the 2nd and 3rd souls tend to go off in other directions. The better way to use it is to cast near your intended target so that all the souls are seeking out an area instead of a monster. If you get it right, all 3 souls will hit the same monster with a nice burst of damage over a short amount of time.
One other minor disadvantage is that SB is not nearly as good at destroying the environment objects as, say, Rain of Toads. But I can live with that.
Where SB/WoS really shines is against the dreaded elite modifier: Waller. It simply ignores the walls; it paths right over them! I don’t know how much mana I’ve wasted casting bears or acid rain and watching it fall harmlessly against a wall instead of the monsters. I no longer need to worry about wasting mana in that manner; every SB cast sails over the walls and into mobs. It’s a beautiful thing.
So I finished last night at Paragon 46, meaning that I could upgrade from The Gidbinn to Last Breath (or switch back to my Skorn) and remain at max magic find. I bought a nice Last Breath for 1.5 million gold on the AH, and am going to keep using this Spirit Barrage build for now. I’ll probably also work in some testing with the Skorn (going back to Acid Rain) since it still has about 5k more damage-but less mana. I’ll also test the Blood Ritual passive some more since the new knife has life regen on it. Of course, the Fierce Loyalty passive would allow my pets to gain my life regen, and it’s been awhile since I’ve used a pet build. Hmmm…