Post by PoochieHellhound on Sept 30, 2011 7:04:43 GMT -5
Introduction: This build has the concept of being a plague incarnated or having the power of diseases. It uses DoTs and other thematic ways of taking out enemies in short order.
As of the On Alert! update, this build has become quite a lot bulkier. The Constitution spec tree brought along some nice, thematic treats, enough to make me want to pick it as my Primary Superstat. This made the build a whole lot more survivable.
Build:
PowerHouse (Link to this build)
Super Stats:
Level 6: Super Constitution (Primary)
Level 10: Exceptional Dexterity (Secondary)
Level 15: Exceptional Presence (Secondary)
Talents:
Level 1: Divinity
Level 6: Acrobat
Level 9: Finesse
Level 12: Ascetic
Level 15: Enduring
Level 18: Agile
Level 21: Intimidating
Powers:
Level 1: Infernal Bolts
Level 1: Infernal Blast
Level 6: Venomous Breath (Rank 2, Paralytic Bile, Infectious Bile, Locust Breath)
Level 8: Pestilence (Rank 2, Rank 3)
Level 11: Devour Essence (Rank 2, Rank 3)
Level 14: Supernatural Power
Level 17: Defile (Rank 2)
Level 20: Aspect of the Infernal (Rank 2, Rank 3)
Level 23: Conviction (Rank 2, Rank 3)
Level 26: Ebon Void (Voracious Darkness)
Level 29: Mindful Reinforcement (Rank 2, Rank 3)
Level 32: Ego Surge (Nimble Mind)
Level 35: Summon Shadows (Devouring Darkness)
Level 38: Hex of Suffering (Rune of Lethargy)
Travel Powers:
Level 6: Scarab Flight (Rank 2, Rank 3)
Level 35: Teleportation
Specializations:
Constitution
Unyielding (2/2)
Tough (3/3)
Adrenaline Rush (2/2)
Armored (2/2)
Resilient (1/2)
Avenger
Round 'em Up (3/3)
Ruthless (2/2)
Relentless Assault (3/3)
Offensive Expertise (2/2)
Guardian
Locus (2/2)
Fortified Gear (3/3)
Ruthless (2/2)
The Best Defense (3/3)
Mastery
Constitution
Explanation:
Infernal Bolts: Energy Builder. Carry on.
Infernal Blast: Used to refresh any stacks of Poison on your taget when fighting bosses or the like that will outlive the debuffs.
Venomous Breath w/ Infectious Bile: A thematic cone AoE that does pretty great damage, stacks Poison and has a chance to stun the opponent with the advantage. You'll use this, a lot. All the time, actually, unless you're fighting advanced enemies such as Master/Super Villains or especially powerful Henchmen. Be thankful it's so awesome.
Pestilence: A pretty great Offensive Passive that racks on even more DoT damage and boosts your Toxic damage. Also looks great with the flies swirling around you (and your target).
Devour Essence: Your single-target killer. Will do great damage, and heal for almost ~500 HPS with my stats. Moreover, killing things by stealing their essence is pretty great.
Supernatural Power: Gives you energy whenever you get low and are using a Supernatural power. Considered one of the best energy unlocks in the game, so don't worry about energy unless you're using your non-Supernatural powers in succession.
Defile: Ranged single-target hitter that you can use as an Alpha Strike (if you have the energy) or simply as a set-up for your other powers to use its Toxic resistance debuff. I don't have it at Rank 3, because I consider it more of a debuff power than anything else.
Aspect of the Infernal: Gives you a stack of Concentration every time you apply any type of poison. Concentration increases all the damage you do and gives you a burst of Energy. Essentially, this is a free damage increase.
Conviction: Clicky heal if you really need it. With all the healing from other sources (Shadows, Ebon Void, Devour Essence) you will only have to use this in emergencies. Also, it scales with PRE and can crit, which is why I chose it.
Ebon Void w/ Voracious Darkness: A great block for when you have to turtle while your DoTs do their thing. Can steal the health of enemies attacking you.
Mindful Reinforcement: A powerful shield for when you need some more time to gain health or lose aggro to your Shadows. Very useful against groups of enemies.
Ego Surge w/ Nimble Mind: Those of you who have read Kenpo's builds surely know why this Active Offence is so great, but I'll sum it up a little:
Additional damage
Additional crit severity through a raise of EGO
Additional crit chance
Summon Shadows w/ Devouring Darkness: A thematic pet (Thematic in the way that diseased may cause hallucinations for your foe) that deals very good damage and heals you with the advantage. Also helps with damage taken by taking some of the aggro off you.
Hex of Suffering w/ Rune of Lethargy: Another thematic DoT and AoE Root for when you need some additional crowd control.
Stats
I just have a quick recommendation regarding stats - Focus on DEX and CON primarily. You will want as much DEX as you can get with CON still on workable levels.
Specializations
Constitution
Unyielding: Extra Hold Resistance to help you deal damage as much time as possible instead of breaking out of Holds.
Tough: Extra health is always nice for would-be squishies like this. Just another thing to help with the survivability.
Adrenaline Rush: Now THIS is what I was talking about earlier. The treat of the Constitution tree. The mother of all heals. Heal 2% of your health when you crit. There may be an internal cooldown involved, I'm not entirely sure. But yes, this is also the reason I recommend pushing DEX. More crits = more healing = more survivability.
Armored: Increases your Defense by 20%, for a reason which I will get back to.
Resilient: Dumped my last point into this because more Knock Resist is always nice.
Avenger
Round 'Em Up: Reduces your enemies damage resistance to AoEs by 3% whenever you hit them with one. A good addition to make picking off those henchmen so much easier. It's also useful since you may want to use Venomous Breath on bosses to stack Poison, and this will cause that to deal more damage.
Ruthless: Increases your crit severity by 10%.
Relentless Assault: A stacking buff that increases your Offense by up to 150 that stacks when using Maintains. As most of this build's main attacks are maintains, this is gonna go up fast.
Offensive Expertise: Reduces the cooldown of Ego Surge by 14%.
Guardian
Locus: Whenever you connect with an AoE or are hit by one, you get a stack. At 30 stacks, you will get 49 Offense and Defense. This will go up fast against bunches of henchmen, and be most useful when you have beat them and go up against the big boys (or girls).
Fortified Gear: An additional 30% Defense. Hang with me, soon the reasoning behind it will be revealed.
Ruthless: 10% of additional crit severity.
The Best Defense: Aaaaaand here's the big revelation. With all the Defense buffs you have gotten through specs, you should be able to get quite a bit of Offense from this, considering it gives you Offense equal to your Defense score. With this, Relentless Assault and Locus all running, I get over 400 Offense. So have fun!
Mastery:
Constitution: Gives you 20 Constitution and 20 Defense. The 20 going to CON is nice, because more in your Primary Superstat is always nice. And the 20 going to Defense goes directly to your Offense, too, so it's a win-win-win situation!
As of the On Alert! update, this build has become quite a lot bulkier. The Constitution spec tree brought along some nice, thematic treats, enough to make me want to pick it as my Primary Superstat. This made the build a whole lot more survivable.
Build:
PowerHouse (Link to this build)
Super Stats:
Level 6: Super Constitution (Primary)
Level 10: Exceptional Dexterity (Secondary)
Level 15: Exceptional Presence (Secondary)
Talents:
Level 1: Divinity
Level 6: Acrobat
Level 9: Finesse
Level 12: Ascetic
Level 15: Enduring
Level 18: Agile
Level 21: Intimidating
Powers:
Level 1: Infernal Bolts
Level 1: Infernal Blast
Level 6: Venomous Breath (Rank 2, Paralytic Bile, Infectious Bile, Locust Breath)
Level 8: Pestilence (Rank 2, Rank 3)
Level 11: Devour Essence (Rank 2, Rank 3)
Level 14: Supernatural Power
Level 17: Defile (Rank 2)
Level 20: Aspect of the Infernal (Rank 2, Rank 3)
Level 23: Conviction (Rank 2, Rank 3)
Level 26: Ebon Void (Voracious Darkness)
Level 29: Mindful Reinforcement (Rank 2, Rank 3)
Level 32: Ego Surge (Nimble Mind)
Level 35: Summon Shadows (Devouring Darkness)
Level 38: Hex of Suffering (Rune of Lethargy)
Travel Powers:
Level 6: Scarab Flight (Rank 2, Rank 3)
Level 35: Teleportation
Specializations:
Constitution
Unyielding (2/2)
Tough (3/3)
Adrenaline Rush (2/2)
Armored (2/2)
Resilient (1/2)
Avenger
Round 'em Up (3/3)
Ruthless (2/2)
Relentless Assault (3/3)
Offensive Expertise (2/2)
Guardian
Locus (2/2)
Fortified Gear (3/3)
Ruthless (2/2)
The Best Defense (3/3)
Mastery
Constitution
Explanation:
Infernal Bolts: Energy Builder. Carry on.
Infernal Blast: Used to refresh any stacks of Poison on your taget when fighting bosses or the like that will outlive the debuffs.
Venomous Breath w/ Infectious Bile: A thematic cone AoE that does pretty great damage, stacks Poison and has a chance to stun the opponent with the advantage. You'll use this, a lot. All the time, actually, unless you're fighting advanced enemies such as Master/Super Villains or especially powerful Henchmen. Be thankful it's so awesome.
Pestilence: A pretty great Offensive Passive that racks on even more DoT damage and boosts your Toxic damage. Also looks great with the flies swirling around you (and your target).
Devour Essence: Your single-target killer. Will do great damage, and heal for almost ~500 HPS with my stats. Moreover, killing things by stealing their essence is pretty great.
Supernatural Power: Gives you energy whenever you get low and are using a Supernatural power. Considered one of the best energy unlocks in the game, so don't worry about energy unless you're using your non-Supernatural powers in succession.
Defile: Ranged single-target hitter that you can use as an Alpha Strike (if you have the energy) or simply as a set-up for your other powers to use its Toxic resistance debuff. I don't have it at Rank 3, because I consider it more of a debuff power than anything else.
Aspect of the Infernal: Gives you a stack of Concentration every time you apply any type of poison. Concentration increases all the damage you do and gives you a burst of Energy. Essentially, this is a free damage increase.
Conviction: Clicky heal if you really need it. With all the healing from other sources (Shadows, Ebon Void, Devour Essence) you will only have to use this in emergencies. Also, it scales with PRE and can crit, which is why I chose it.
Ebon Void w/ Voracious Darkness: A great block for when you have to turtle while your DoTs do their thing. Can steal the health of enemies attacking you.
Mindful Reinforcement: A powerful shield for when you need some more time to gain health or lose aggro to your Shadows. Very useful against groups of enemies.
Ego Surge w/ Nimble Mind: Those of you who have read Kenpo's builds surely know why this Active Offence is so great, but I'll sum it up a little:
Additional damage
Additional crit severity through a raise of EGO
Additional crit chance
Summon Shadows w/ Devouring Darkness: A thematic pet (Thematic in the way that diseased may cause hallucinations for your foe) that deals very good damage and heals you with the advantage. Also helps with damage taken by taking some of the aggro off you.
Hex of Suffering w/ Rune of Lethargy: Another thematic DoT and AoE Root for when you need some additional crowd control.
Stats
I just have a quick recommendation regarding stats - Focus on DEX and CON primarily. You will want as much DEX as you can get with CON still on workable levels.
Specializations
Constitution
Unyielding: Extra Hold Resistance to help you deal damage as much time as possible instead of breaking out of Holds.
Tough: Extra health is always nice for would-be squishies like this. Just another thing to help with the survivability.
Adrenaline Rush: Now THIS is what I was talking about earlier. The treat of the Constitution tree. The mother of all heals. Heal 2% of your health when you crit. There may be an internal cooldown involved, I'm not entirely sure. But yes, this is also the reason I recommend pushing DEX. More crits = more healing = more survivability.
Armored: Increases your Defense by 20%, for a reason which I will get back to.
Resilient: Dumped my last point into this because more Knock Resist is always nice.
Avenger
Round 'Em Up: Reduces your enemies damage resistance to AoEs by 3% whenever you hit them with one. A good addition to make picking off those henchmen so much easier. It's also useful since you may want to use Venomous Breath on bosses to stack Poison, and this will cause that to deal more damage.
Ruthless: Increases your crit severity by 10%.
Relentless Assault: A stacking buff that increases your Offense by up to 150 that stacks when using Maintains. As most of this build's main attacks are maintains, this is gonna go up fast.
Offensive Expertise: Reduces the cooldown of Ego Surge by 14%.
Guardian
Locus: Whenever you connect with an AoE or are hit by one, you get a stack. At 30 stacks, you will get 49 Offense and Defense. This will go up fast against bunches of henchmen, and be most useful when you have beat them and go up against the big boys (or girls).
Fortified Gear: An additional 30% Defense. Hang with me, soon the reasoning behind it will be revealed.
Ruthless: 10% of additional crit severity.
The Best Defense: Aaaaaand here's the big revelation. With all the Defense buffs you have gotten through specs, you should be able to get quite a bit of Offense from this, considering it gives you Offense equal to your Defense score. With this, Relentless Assault and Locus all running, I get over 400 Offense. So have fun!
Mastery:
Constitution: Gives you 20 Constitution and 20 Defense. The 20 going to CON is nice, because more in your Primary Superstat is always nice. And the 20 going to Defense goes directly to your Offense, too, so it's a win-win-win situation!