14 réponses à ce sujet

[kristinie13]

Currently, I have Merrill using Blood of the First, Elemental Weapons, Rock Armor, and Wrath of the Elven.

Elemental Weapons (10%) + Rock Armor (10%) + WofE (20%) = 40%, after which I am unable to activate BotF, because of "insufficient mana."

However, when I activate BotF (70%) + WotE (20%) + RA (10%) = 100%, after which I am able to activate Elemental Weapons after, even though it goes over 100%.

Not sure what I'm doing wrong... This seriously hurts in the middle of a long fight when her health gets too low (I have her tactic Self: Health <50% - Deactivate BotF) she can't turn BotF back on, preventing the use of Wounds of the Past and forcing her to use... lyrium potions.

[SuicidalBaby]

you could run tactics to turn off everything at a certain hp and enable in the proper order to get the desired result.

[Relix28]

Easiest solution? Drop either Elemetal Weapons or Rock Armor.

And btw, from my personal experience, Merrill is able to cast Wounds of The Past with Blood of The First turned off, if done via tactics/AI control.

[esper]

Blood magic must NOT be activated last.Blood magic has to not hit 100% or above 100% the other sustain does not care.
So active blood magic first and hope she does not drop out of it.
If she does deactive it some of the sustains that quickly reload, heal her, reactive blood magic and then reactive the other sustains.

Modifié par esper, 22 novembre 2011 - 07:30 .

[kristinie13]

Thank you everyone for your responses, the easiest way seems like to simply drop Elemental Weapons. I feel like turning all the sustains off and then back on again via tactics would take too many tactic spaces... and even if I did that manually the sustains would take a few precious seconds of combat time to not only cooldown, but also to activate.

[Merlex]

That's a shame because EW is very nice. I had the same thing happen to during Act 3 Bonebit encounter. Anders was dead, and she almost died, luckly it was between quarters. I switched Hawk to a bow, took manuel control of Merrill moved her out harms way until she could get her sustains back up.

After the fight i deleted her 'drop out of bloodmagic tactic'. But i had to adjust Anders' tactics, so he would not auto cast heal on her anymore. I keep an eye on her health, manuelly deactivated Blood of the First, if neccessary; along with Wrath or EW. Heal, mana potion, back in the fight. I reactivated BOTF and the other sustain asap, if the fight is still going. A pain in the ... but to have all 4 sustains is worth it to me.

Let me take this chance to say that they really screwed bloodmagic in the patches. I get it, they want people to drop in and out of bloodmagic. But they didn't have to nerfed it that bad. JMO

Oh, for this to work Merrill cannot have any items that  her 'stealth when xxx', as i read somewhere here (i think) that breaks Bloodmagic? 

Modifié par Merlex, 27 novembre 2011 - 05:30 .

[kristinie13]

Merlex wrote...

Oh, for this to work Merrill cannot have
any items that  her 'stealth when xxx', as i read somewhere here (i
think) that breaks Bloodmagic? 

Mhmm, it deactivates all sustains when the character goes into stealth.

iOnlySignIn wrote...

Elemental Weapons is useless after the first few levels because its damage bonus does not go through any multiplier (from abilities such as Cleave, Elemental Mastery; from Gear; from Criticals). The only reason to use it is because it looks good.

Exactly, I actually respecced Merrill once I stopped using Elemental Weapons, for that extra ability point

[labargegrrrl]

I always set Merril up to only hit Blood of the First once her mana drops below a certain point and then to drop out of it once health hits below 10% (if Wrath has upgrades) or 25%. she can do some powerful area effects without wounds, so i don't worry much about that spell as much as i do her mana pool, which seems to always bottom out pretty quick with me.
unless i'm RPGing heavy anti-blood mage, then I refuse to even give her the spell or never take her along.

[Merlex]

kristinie13 wrote...

Merlex wrote...

Oh, for this to work Merrill cannot have
any items that  her 'stealth when xxx', as i read somewhere here (i
think) that breaks Bloodmagic? 

Mhmm, it deactivates all sustains when the character goes into stealth.

iOnlySignIn wrote...

Elemental Weapons is useless after the first few levels because its damage bonus does not go through any multiplier (from abilities such as Cleave, Elemental Mastery; from Gear; from Criticals). The only reason to use it is because it looks good.

Exactly, I actually respecced Merrill once I stopped using Elemental Weapons, for that extra ability point

Good to know thats its all sustains. I must have missed that ew loses it usefullness in the build guides,. But i 'm been concentrating on DW Hawk and companions. Nice, another point.

[Merlex]

labargegrrrl wrote...

I always set Merril up to only hit Blood of the First once her mana drops below a certain point and then to drop out of it once health hits below 10% (if Wrath has upgrades) or 25%. she can do some powerful area effects without wounds, so i don't worry much about that spell as much as i do her mana pool, which seems to always bottom out pretty quick with me.
unless i'm RPGing heavy anti-blood mage, then I refuse to even give her the spell or never take her along.

This is how i had BOTF setup, as per suggested tactics in the build sticky, before she started dropping out. Since ew is useless at higher levels, that solves it.

I didn't give her WOTP, since it's physical damage. I gave her Cold-Blooded  (cold damage) in my currect run. There are other spells that are more efficient imho. But i'm sure i'll use it at some point.

Modifié par Merlex, 27 novembre 2011 - 02:56 .

[Quething]

Merlex wrote...

I didn't give her WOTP, since it's physical damage. I gave her Cold-Blooded  (cold damage) in my currect run. There are other spells that are more efficient imho. But i'm sure i'll use it at some point.

Wounds of the Past is not physical. It uses whatever damage type her currently equipped weapon has. Also, it ignores damage resistance, so even if she's got a lightning staff equipped she can fry Qunari with it on Nightmare. If it had the same STAGGER proc as Hemorrhage it'd be the third most brutal spell in the game.

[Merlex]

Sorry double post

Modifié par Merlex, 28 novembre 2011 - 10:47 .

[Merlex]

[

Quething wrote...

Wounds of the Past is not physical. It uses whatever damage type her currently equipped weapon has

 

Sorry, I didn't mean that cold blooded would render the spell worthless. But that it would not benefit from the cold damage bonus. My current Merrell is heavily invested in the Primal Tree. I didn't have room for upgraded WotP and Winter's Grasp and Cone of Cold. The description says physical damage, which is why i said it was: 

Wounds of the Past
 
Activated
Activation: 60
Cooldown: 30s
Requires: Level 11
Requires: Blood of the First
Requires: 3 points in Dalish Pariah[/b]
This alluringly powerful spell allows Merrill to control the blood of her foes, rending them from the inside. Enemies in the targeted area take damage that bypasses armor and damage resistance. Creatures without blood are immune.

Physical damage: 4.5x
Enemy armor: Momentarily 0%
Enemy damage resistance: Momentarily 0%
Size: 10m

Also, it ignores damage resistance, so even if she's got a lightning staff equipped she can fry Qunari with it on Nightmare.

I know about the damage resistance. It's good to know that it uses the equipped staff damage type. A nice way around damage resistance.  My main objection  though wasn't damage type. It's the high activation for the return. After the hack job the patch did to bloodmagic. Of course that's not considering the upgrade. Which makes it much more viable. All things considered, it might be worth taking another look at.

If it had the same STAGGER proc as Hemorrhage it'd be the third most brutal spell in the game.

Now that would be something.

Modifié par Merlex, 28 novembre 2011 - 10:47 .

[Quething]

Yeah, I'm reasonably sure it's a bug, and they just forgot to flag that spell to do physical damage instead of leaving it on the default "weapon attack, times x" damage string that most abilities use. But bug or not, it's in the game, which makes it incredibly powerful. Merrill is hit harder by the bloodmage nerf than Hawke (since she doesn't benefit from the spatter/one foot in buff of madness), but that one bit of flexibility means WotP is still crazy good - a huge, FF-safe resistance-ignoring AoE in whatever element you want? - and even if you never put her in blood magic ever, it's still worth spending the point in the sustain just to unlock that one spell. (As others have said, she'll cast it from tactics whether BM is up or not, so that's perfectly viable.)