Shoju's 1.0 Stuff.

[shoju]

Well, I can tell you that I have a CI shadow in standard that is currently using a pair of mightflay daggers, and I'm not as impressed with the DPS, but that might just be the skill selection.

[Frag]

Are you using Dual Strike?

[MonTy]

Physical Dual Wield is one of the strongest builds available. For high-end map running or for characters starting out in a fresh league. My lvl 90 is at 40k dps, 12k armor, 49% block, and 5k life. Only build I've seen run through maps faster is flicker strike builds.

For new leagues with limited gear and currency I would suggest a blood magic build. No pains of mana, blood magic gems, and you'll have great dps, block %, and life. Only downside to the Blood Magic build is lower Armor (No Grace or Determination Aura).

If you ever get a Soul Taker and Bringer of Rain, the build absolutely explodes in power. Soul Taker allows you to have Auras without needing a Blood Magic gem in your attacks. I believe this type of build would better suited if you acquire items of this power.

Once you get higher DPS weapons, better gear, more talents, and higher leveler gems, you don't even need a separate single target skill from your aoe one. Dual Strike+Melee Splash+Multistrike+Added Fire in a Bringer of Rain would be more like Bringer of Pain.

[shoju]

Frag - Yes. I'm using Dual Strike for Single Target right now, and Dual Strike + Splash for AoE.

MonTy - Im absolutely phobic of Blood Magic Keystone. Mainly, and probably unjustly so, because My first char was a blood magic keystone marauder, and I just got absolutely destroyed once I hit A2.

That was probably more due to first char, bad gear, bad everything, as opposed to something else, but it just left an awful taste in my mouth

[MonTy]

MonTy - Im absolutely phobic of Blood Magic Keystone. Mainly, and probably unjustly so, because My first char was a blood magic keystone marauder, and I just got absolutely destroyed once I hit A2.

That was probably more due to first char, bad gear, bad everything, as opposed to something else, but it just left an awful taste in my mouth

It's harder to pull off due to armor, so just have to make sure you can find decent armor pieces. You're losing Determination or Grace, but at the same time you're taking more armor talents. You gain a TON of DPS from not having to use BM Gem and adding in a DPS skill gem instead.

This is my current gear in Nemesis, he's currently finishing up Act 3 Merciless. I'm glad to say eight of the ten pieces were self-found, most from Merciless Merveil.

*edit - Ouch, my first major character death in over a year. This one stings as his gear was pretty good. Had 4k armor, 41% block, 4 end charges, molten shell, but I got one shot by +phy damage rare Colossal Skeleton in the Archives. I didn't granite or enfeeble in time, so that was my mistake.

[shoju]

Figured I'd give an update on my "normal" character post 1.0, since I haven't in a while.

Level 71, cruising right along,

I've been running pretty much nothing but maps and merveil for a week or so on her. I tried Piety a few times, but that run just takes far too long. Since there is no "exit" You have to port out, which means you are going back in at the WP, and I haven't found a quick way to clear it over and over yet. So, Maps + merveil is my plan to amass a small fortune in orbs, with the intention of purchasing a large weapon upgrade. That will be a while though... As the weapons I have my eyes on are pretty pricey. The cheapest one I saw that really "blew my hair back" was 12 ex, and I'm still at just ~3-4 ex worth of currency built up.

That will change as people start purchasing some of my wares from my shop, and I run more maps / Merveil.

I'm also doing something I've never done before with mapping. I'm focusing on my lowest level maps for now. I'm knocking them out, and holding onto my higher maps, so that I can hopefully build a stockpile. I ran a really nice +50% / Stun Immune orchard map last night, that ended up netting 5 maps, 4 of which were 67+ in level. If I can keep this up, I should be able to progress nicely.

If you are curious what my Scion looks like right now,

First Spoiler Tag has my current gear and build. I have my next 5 points planned out.

72: Enforcer (Keystone)- Templar Area, 18% Phys while wielding a 2h'd melee weapon + 20 Str.
73: Shadow Area - +10 Int
74: Reduced Mana Reservation: 5%
75: Aura Effect: 8%
76: Influence (keystone): 18% Increased Aura Effect
After this, I have a couple of areas that I'm thinking about hitting. I'll probably decide based on where I'm at in Maps / what my needs are. I have a path set up to improve / reduce mana auras (3 points), I have a branch to get more Life (3-8 points), I have a branch to get more armor and resists (7 points). I have an area to pick up more damage (5 points).

But I'm not going to put much into those until I get to 76, see what maps I'm running, not finding myself capable of running, and what area I need more work in. I'm pretty pleased with my progress so far, and I think that at this point, I have a good change to hit 85 before domination is over, which would be a pretty freaking awesome achievement for me.

[shoju]

Just so people know, from now on, if you click on my link to view gear, you will have to do some scrolling, to get past the disclaimer about the thread. With the explosion of popularity in the indexer's for trying to find trades, I have gotten roughly 100 PM's over the past week from people who can't read:

"Old Sale. Not Active"

I've tried to be nice to them, and tell them that things aren't for sale, but after one douchenozzle too many who can't read, can't see dates on posts, or anything else, I have gone to "drastic-er" measures, and included a picture, and a disclaimer at the top of the article.

[shoju]

If I can track down a Storm Cloud, (since I never seen to be online with time to spare to do well in the races), I fully intend to test out Barrage, with a Lightning Based Build. This is my current thought on where I'm thinking about going. It will probably be Barrage + RoA. I'll be using as much %increased Ele damage gear as I can find, and I'll run with a Storm Cloud as long as I can, probably forever, since I don't ever see myself coming across a Voltaxic Rift, about the only other bow that would work for what I have in mind.

But, with this build, I should be able to lay down enough Shocked that I can seriously mow some stuff down with the new skill. It would also provide me with the distraction I'm looking for right now, since I'm sort of snoozing on the scion at the moment, and A3 Cruel is proving most difficult to level the the RF Scion through.

But, Right now, I'm thinking Barrage + RoA + Conductivity / Temp Chains + Lightning Warp for movement. We'll see how it works out, but I have hopes that this could be the kind of "shocking" hilarity I want right now.

[Lissa]

If I can track down a Storm Cloud, (since I never seen to be online with time to spare to do well in the races), I fully intend to test out Barrage, with a Lightning Based Build. This is my current thought on where I'm thinking about going. It will probably be Barrage + RoA. I'll be using as much %increased Ele damage gear as I can find, and I'll run with a Storm Cloud as long as I can, probably forever, since I don't ever see myself coming across a Voltaxic Rift, about the only other bow that would work for what I have in mind.

But, with this build, I should be able to lay down enough Shocked that I can seriously mow some stuff down with the new skill. It would also provide me with the distraction I'm looking for right now, since I'm sort of snoozing on the scion at the moment, and A3 Cruel is proving most difficult to level the the RF Scion through.

But, Right now, I'm thinking Barrage + RoA + Conductivity / Temp Chains + Lightning Warp for movement. We'll see how it works out, but I have hopes that this could be the kind of "shocking" hilarity I want right now.

You probably won't need Acuity and the other two accuracy nodes with it as a Shadow as your accuracy due to Dex should be just about capped out.

[shoju]

Yeah, I've got them in there as a hold over from the previous version of the build, which had very very little Dex. Those will be the first points to shift as I see where my Accuracy is. I'd rather plan for it, and be able to not use them, then not plan for it, and then have to find where to cut, to get more accuracy.

[MonTy]

You can have my race storm cloud, it's ilvl 100.

Also probably not updating PoE posts for a while, bit burnt out.

[shoju]

Right before you whispered me in game, I purchased two storm clouds {-.-}.

I got them both for the super awesome price of 2 chaos, from the same buyer. One, is just a 3S/L ilvl27, and the other, his race unique, that I've got to 6S, and will now work on 6Ling at my leisure.

I got the shadow up to level 10 last night, tossed on the bow, and went to try it out. It's really interesting at this point, and I can see that this build is going to be very different for me. I've not really tinkered with elemental builds. Sure, I have a FP witch that I'm leveling gems on, and I had an Infernal Blow Templar, and a Cold Templar, but I really didn't "know" what I was doing with those. Now that I understand how things work, I plan on fully pushing the build to get as much damage as possible. We'll see how it works.

[Frag]

Let me know if you have any questions, leveled half a dozen elemental bow characters into the 50's and beyond.

[Chesspiece_face]

I got the shadow up to level 10 last night, tossed on the bow, and went to try it out. It's really interesting at this point, and I can see that this build is going to be very different for me. I've not really tinkered with elemental builds. Sure, I have a FP witch that I'm leveling gems on, and I had an Infernal Blow Templar, and a Cold Templar, but I really didn't "know" what I was doing with those. Now that I understand how things work, I plan on fully pushing the build to get as much damage as possible. We'll see how it works.

Let me know if you are looking for gear for this character. I've got a lot of stuff, including that ES chest you loaned out from the guild stash that are great for ELE bow users and there is a very low chance I will play much, if ever, in the near future.

[shoju]

Chess, Will do, I'd probably snag that when I drop down to standard.

Barrage is interesting. The DPS on the tooltip, is calculated per projectile, instead of as a skill (which makes sense, it's multiprojectile in nature). A lot of people pan it, because of the "tooltip DPS", and because they haven't mastered the art of using their cursor's range from char to augment their shot pattern. While Barrage has a "small" AoE template, it can still be manipulated in the same manner as other LMP'd / GMP'd type spells, where the closer your cursor is to your char, the wider the pattern.

It has been an absolute blast to play for the little time I've got on it. Barrage feels beefy, and with a LGOH on my RoA, My health never moves much. In the Cave, in A2, I think it took 3 casts to kill the great white beast. As my first two casts stacked shock nicely, and then my final cast just seemed to rip the last 50% of his health right off.

I am a little curious though. I'm looking over things, and doing math, and I'm unsure how people are making Storm Cloud work for them in a "This is my weapon, and I'll use it forever" type thing. It's definitely what attracted me to trying it, but I'm unsure how it works all the way to mapping. Maybe it's just my lack of knowledge related to elemental bow type things, but the bow I have is 66.12 DPS, with a fairly respectable 45% increased Attack Speed (max 50).

Obviously, my passives, and my gear will serve to augment this, but I'm just not seeing how it stays ahead of a very nice Grove, or Thicket, in terms of DPS. I don't know, We'll see. So far, I'm using

Storm Cloud + Ondar's Clasp, while sporting

Barrage + WED + Added Lightning Damage
RoA + LGOH and Faster Proj

I figure as I get more links, more gems, it will flesh out more, but I'm just curious how it will all come together.

Obviously, if I can score a Voltaxic Rift for End Game, I'll be doing jumping jacks, but that thing is stupid expensive.

[shoju]

The levels keep on piling up on my Scion. I'm now 76, Things are looking pretty good. I have changed around some of my jewelry, picking up ~300 HP, and getting my resists a little closer to cap (my cold res was in the 50's for my "general" mapping set), and I've picked up a little more DPS.

At this point, I'm not sure if I need more HP increasing nodes or not. With my gear as it sits, I'm pushing just over 3700 HP, and I still don't have HP on every slot, and I have at least one slot with low HP.

This is all new territory for me, so I'm unsure what I need to focus on. Currently, I've cleared up to level 69 maps, and my death toll in maps is very low. Normally, I only die to a Shrine + Champ pack or Shrine + Exile, or something silly like that, when I played poorly. Normally, I just cruise right along, no issues.

If I needed more HP, it would be really easy for me to spend points through level 87 on just HP % Nodes

Or, I can spend nodes from here until 91, and pick up
+70 Str
+30 life
-30% Crit Multiplier against me
1.9% Life Regen / Sec
38% life
43% Armor
2% Movement Speed

Problem with that plan: 91 is a very very very long way away. Even from 76. That is also thin on DPS. Which I think at this point, I should maybe start focusing more on, though I'm not sure.

The big problem with the DPS nodes, is that I've sort of exhausted all the "big ones" so to speak for Maces.

Easy Nodes:
12% damage with maces
2x 10% damage with 2h'ers
3x 6% Mace Damage / 2% Atk Speed (1 of which would open up 2x 12% Mace Nodes)
1x 15% Damage with 2'hers / 20% Accuracy (the accuracy is wasted)


Now, currently, my clear speed is fine. I don't feel like I'm going slow, but I know I could be going faster. I also know that every says that the changeover to 70+ maps is significant, and I don't want to find out that I screwed up. I guess from here to 80, I'm going to invest in DPS points, and we'll see what Happens. I can always regret away the points I spend right?

[shoju]

Yesterday, I had a Belly of the Beast Drop.

192% armor (8 from perfect)
30% Life (the worrst it could roll)
13% Resists (2 from perfect)

I was very excited. I personally, find this piece to be superior to Koam's in just about every way. Can have sockets, scales fantastically with Life, has resists, has comparable armor, and has an added effect with your Health Flasks.

I'm freaking stoked when it drops. I had been banking more orbs than I ever had before, trying not to do stupid things, or waste orbs. I dropped jewelers on it (about 80) to get to 6S.

I then dropped Fusings at it, and then started trading in my jewlers for fusings, and today, after blowing through 100+ fusings in stash (both banked and from jewelers) I finally turned in some Alts for Jewelrs to a fuse, and got my five link.

From there, it was just 5 chromes to get my setup, and BLAM!

I'm now rocking a super awesome, endgame quality chest. At this point, I can't see replacing it with anything, unless I were to get a PERFECT Astral Plate. And by perfect, I mean:

12% Resists base
100+ Life
Tri Resists
1500+ Armor
5L or better.

That's the only thing that I could possibly plan on giving up this chest for. Especially, since as I strap on better HP on my other slots, Belly of the Beast just gets better, and better.

I guess now, I can go back to farming maps, and having a good time, and working on my goal. I think at this point, I have ~80 days? to get to my goal. I want to be 85 by the time domination ends. I'd like to have a couple of the challenges done. At this point I need

1 shrine (echoing)
8 rare mobs (mostly the hardest to get, the diablist / sin lord types)
Use 3 more orbs - GCP - Divine - Eternal
And I have most of the stuff to finish off the recipe from vendros, but I'm not "really" excited about this one.

I would love to get the "kill all the bosses" done, but I'm just not sure that I will have the maps to do that. We'll see though.

EDIT: OH yeah, and it looks FUGGING AWESOME>

[shoju]

I haven't updated in a while, but I'm smashing through things, and having a great time.

Click Here
Post #2, First Spoiler (and then first spoiler inside that one), contains my current build, and my current gear. I'm pretty pleased with the gear, and build. I'm currently clearing lvl68 Maps, and stockpiling 69 maps. I tossed some 66 / 67 maps in the Guild Stash, and Told Vinnie to run them.

I'm hoping to find some Rare Rings / Necks soon, so that I can get back to vendoring full sets of gear for chaos orbs.
I also need to find a Divine Orb, and an Eternal Orb. If anyone would happen to have one of each of those they would be willing to part with, I'd love to snag them. I'd even try really hard to "purchase them", and probably wouldn't take an eternal for free. I'd make you take something. They are simply too expensive to give away.

I do have a general question about Maps.
How many do people normally have when they are "mapping"? I have ~2 dozen right now, and I feel like I don't have a lot, but then I don't really have a good basis for comparison.

[shoju]

Level 81, ranked on the ladder (woot)
Easily clearing 69 maps, but my map stock is dwindling fast. I'm just not able to replace them as fast as they are going out to keep up with my leveling. I had tossed a stockpile of maps into the Guild Stash for others to use (Vinnie and friends were beginning to map). Not sure I'm going to be able to do that anymore, as I just don't have the qty of maps anymore

I'm hoping it is a minor hiccup of bad RNG, but even level 69 maps are only giving 2 bars of XP now... It's a little disheartening. I'm hoping that in the next few days I will get up the courage to run my last unique map, Poorjoy's Asylum. Temple PIety will be droppping 11 Extra Rare Shields (yay.....) I'm more interested in the 150% increased XP.

[MonTy]

Hey Shoju,

Grats on 81! It does get a lot slower from here on out. 85 to 90 felt like it took forever for me, and that's when I felt like I needed to group, due to running out of my own maps and currency. Big part of maintaining your map pool is to roll them as efficiently as possible, but I haven't mapped since the change to map size, so not 100% sure what is best to roll now.

Checked out your current gear thread. Nice loot

*edit - I sent you a friend request on my self-found account. While I won't be trading or taking items on this account, I would love to chat it up when I'm on, if you can shoot me a guild invite.