27 réponses à ce sujet

[Fredward]

I recently tried KE with my Qunquisitor. It was the first time I tried KE and it was after it was after the latest patch. I used Tidarion's Lightsaber for ++thematically appropriate points. It... it just wrecks. Everything. Everywhere. Fade step and that upgrade for winter's blast that does a 1000% damage, decloaking blast for another 1000%. Ring of doubt for invisibility and that other amulet that gives you guard, cooldown and draws enemies to the death that is you. The three incinerating blast thingies. Chain lightning. Fully charged blade slash. Everything just dies, gets mowed down. And! Nothing ever touches me, barrier almost never goes down cuz I just keep churning out that damage.

 

So what I'm wondering is how the others stack up, especially with the new skills. I've tried rift a bit after the patch but not much and it paled  to KE [I like it the best though from a lore PoV, KE from a gameplay {I like zipping around and being in the middle of shiz}] and I have never tried necromancer so I dunno about that. Are there any fun, flashy builds that turn you into a juggernaut for those? Or should I just stick with KE?

[ottffsse]

Fade touched neverite 75% target explodes on kill. With the new 900% walking bomb upgrade. Also use Ring of doubt but Max its potential. Late game craft stuff to get about 150-200% crit damage, 100-200% flanking damage and another 200% flanking damage from deepstalker sigil!. Kill a fool from stealth from behind with the walking bomb for a cozy 5400% weapon damage or so. It most likely dies and damages fools around it for 75% of that amount. Profit. But yeah ke is a beast especially with either inferno pact belt if using mainly fire or storm pact if using mainly lightning. I run storm pact belt on the multiplayer version of ke and can carry a team in the highest difficulty where your character is lvl 20 at most and enemies are lvl 30 and have the abilities of walk softly mode, you won't die as ke because of barrier/fade cloak. You won't die as necro as you can consistently self revive.

[actionhero112]

Nah they're all pretty good now. 

 

None of them reach the mind numbing freedom of the KE which is like playing a jedi wizard. But I think they all excel at certain things now.

[PapaCharlie9]

I recently tried KE with my Qunquisitor. It was the first time I tried KE and it was after it was after the latest patch. I used Tidarion's Lightsaber for ++thematically appropriate points. It... it just wrecks. Everything. Everywhere. Fade step and that upgrade for winter's blast that does a 1000% damage, decloaking blast for another 1000%. Ring of doubt for invisibility and that other amulet that gives you guard, cooldown and draws enemies to the death that is you. The three incinerating blast thingies. Chain lightning. Fully charged blade slash. Everything just dies, gets mowed down. And! Nothing ever touches me, barrier almost never goes down cuz I just keep churning out that damage.
 
So what I'm wondering is how the others stack up, especially with the new skills. I've tried rift a bit after the patch but not much and it paled  to KE [I like it the best though from a lore PoV, KE from a gameplay {I like zipping around and being in the middle of shiz}] and I have never tried necromancer so I dunno about that. Are there any fun, flashy builds that turn you into a juggernaut for those? Or should I just stick with KE?

RM is at least as good as KE, and in some circumstances like an elite mob, RM is superior.

The Fade Step/Winter Chill combo is available to any mage, so that's a wash.

KE takes the highest single skill damage with Decloaking, but its usage is limited.

On the other hand, Rift Mage can cast Stonefist at 500% damage every 6 seconds or so with cooldown buffs, so on a DPS basis is arguably superior to Decloaking. When combined with Pull of the Abyss AoE 500% it's at parity, though granted it takes two active skills to one for KE.

Spirit Blade's ability to rip through guard is comparable to Stonefist with the Unblockable Force upgrade.

KE has an advantage in close range combat, but RM has an advantage in CC and AoE effects that benefit the whole party (e.g., weaken an entire JoH mob, including the assassins and archers).

[Felis Menari]

I'm forty hours into my KE run (first mage), and I have to say, it will be difficult to play anything else afterwards. Great survivability, good damage output, and nice group protection due to reduced barrier decay. There's also Disruption Field for crowd control, but I can't squeeze it in. All of the spells I'm currently using are too useful to drop.

[Atreyu84]

yep KE is still really strong, DESPITE all the crying some people are doing.

 

side note, to the person that mentioned walking bombs new 900% damage toggle upgrade, not sure if you know, if you do ok, but that toggle does indeed make it 900% damage, but only on the target its on, it takes the aoe part of the explosion away. basically makes it a completely single target dot with huge single target nuke at the end.

[ottffsse]

Yes that's why I mentioned fade touched neverite which restores the explotion if you kill the target which you should but at 75% of thev total damage which is better then the 500% of the original 75% of 900. Yes you don't get virulence. Anyways I play with ff on. Alone I can manage the explotions but if I do this with party it absolutely annahilates them so I mainly use the 900% upgrade and the fade touched effect. I can with my build one shot stuff like other enemy mages and despair demons before they put up barrier and annoying effects.

[ottffsse]

But question to rift players: if you use the elemental pact pelts which is best in game belt for mages now how do you stay alive with something like 200-400 HP depending on the belt/specs? You can definitely get one shot if you are not aware of some enemy attacks on higher difficulties.

[PapaCharlie9]

But question to rift players: if you use the elemental pact pelts which is best in game belt for mages now how do you stay alive with something like 200-400 HP depending on the belt/specs? You can definitely get one shot if you are not aware of some enemy attacks on higher difficulties.

Uh ... don't wear that belt?

An RM can gear for heal on hit, heal over time Masterworks/upgrades, if it's that critical.

Also, not exactly the right comparison. KE gets barrier, so should take stuff the uses barrier (like Chaotic Focus) or that debuffs barrier. Similarly, RM gets mana, so should take stuff the uses mana or that debufs mana regen. Rounding it out, Necro gets HP, so should take stuff that uses HP or that debuffs HP.

QED, those belts were meant for Necro mages.

[Bigdawg13]

But question to rift players: if you use the elemental pact pelts which is best in game belt for mages now how do you stay alive with something like 200-400 HP depending on the belt/specs? You can definitely get one shot if you are not aware of some enemy attacks on higher difficulties.

 

The belts work if you can offset the health loss.  Heal on kill, heal on hit, etc.  Masterworks, rings, etc.

 

Same solution for all three specs.

 

Uh ... don't wear that belt?

An RM can gear for heal on hit, heal over time Masterworks/upgrades, if it's that critical.

Also, not exactly the right comparison. KE gets barrier, so should take stuff the uses barrier (like Chaotic Focus) or that debuffs barrier. Similarly, RM gets mana, so should take stuff the uses mana or that debufs mana regen. Rounding it out, Necro gets HP, so should take stuff that uses HP or that debuffs HP.

QED, those belts were meant for Necro mages.

What makes Necro different?  The only thing I can think of is the necro passive that heals on kill.  Which, by the way, does not stack with any other heal on kill.

[PapaCharlie9]

Which, by the way, does not stack with any other heal on kill.

Well that sucks. I didn't know that.

I forgot about guard generation. With Horn of Valor/Fortifying Blast, I'm running through Descent with all party members full up on guard all the time. So that helps with health debuffs also.

[Mornmagor]

The specs are roughly equal, you can dominate everything with any spec, but if you want a melee Mage you'll obviously go KE.

[Zachwalter]

... You go back to using what you did before. Sorry, just a joke based on the subject line of this thread. Personally, I believe it's apples and oranges, they're both fruits, but you have to eat them differently, so to speak. Personally, I favor the Rift Mage, mainly because I can keep my distance and fight, you know, like a mage. If you're basing this on their ability to survive in a front line fight then of course the Knight-Enchanter would win, that's what they're supposed to do. I almost never die as a Rift Mage (I actually died more as a Knight-Enchanter especially after it was nerfed), it just wasn't my style of playing as a mage in this game. I used it, liked it, but felt myself being drawn back to the Rift Mage, no pun intended. I found that as a cyromancer/Rift Mage I can beat nearly everything in the game especially with guard on hit and hidden blades Masterworks on my weapons and armor. If you play it smart ANY mage can survive innumerable battles.

[Evelynne]

RM is at least as good as KE, and in some circumstances like an elite mob, RM is superior.

The Fade Step/Winter Chill combo is available to any mage, so that's a wash.

KE takes the highest single skill damage with Decloaking, but its usage is limited.

On the other hand, Rift Mage can cast Stonefist at 500% damage every 6 seconds or so with cooldown buffs, so on a DPS basis is arguably superior to Decloaking. When combined with Pull of the Abyss AoE 500% it's at parity, though granted it takes two active skills to one for KE.

Spirit Blade's ability to rip through guard is comparable to Stonefist with the Unblockable Force upgrade.

KE has an advantage in close range combat, but RM has an advantage in CC and AoE effects that benefit the whole party (e.g., weaken an entire JoH mob, including the assassins and archers).

 

You sir, forgot about the KE's ability to Cloak almost every 3 seconds, as well, with the changes to Energy Barrage and Spirit Blade, you can max Spirit Blade Stacks for every swing, then there's Fire Mine, or Lightning, or the Winter Chill combo. Spirit Blade also rips through Barrier, which is AMAZING in Full Trials Nightmare. 

 

BUT, since we're talking about a Party environment here, arguments about superiority are useless -- since you can take both >:3!

 

I'll post a build as soon as I can of an updated Knight Enchanter (post nerf* *I don't consider this most recent patch a nerf.).

[ottffsse]

Quite honestly the new fire mine flame array and inferno belts makes any mage op against things not immune to fire and for others there are other options. 3 fire mines of roughly 20-25k damage each are not hard to get with tier 3 crafted items for crit chance and damage, that's with enhanced inferno pact on not superb which boosts fire damage output even more. Its a bit disconcerting seeing the damage numbers and literally one shotting enemies of the same level. I run with chaotic focus and am not quite sure how it works as it does not take any barrier now with flame array but those are the numbers I am seeing on a 77 damage staff, the cretahl vitaar, and about 130% crit damage bonus, at lvl 19. Using the close combat version of both the fire mine and ice mine reminds me his artificer throws elemental mines. Everything is frozen then takes massive damage hits.

[PapaCharlie9]

You sir, forgot about the KE's ability to Cloak almost every 3 seconds, as well, with the changes to Energy Barrage and Spirit Blade, you can max Spirit Blade Stacks for every swing, then there's Fire Mine, or Lightning, or the Winter Chill combo. Spirit Blade also rips through Barrier, which is AMAZING in Full Trials Nightmare.

No, I didn't forget. The re-up time for Decloaking Blast isn't the issue, it's that you have to position yourself near enough or in the enemy to get the damage effect. That is not always easy or possible.

And after spending some time testing Spirit Blade and recharging techniques, I can say that the full-damage swings per minute before and after Patch 10 have definitely gone down. Sure, EB and CL are very good at recharging the blade, but they don't take zero time -- particularly EB. Plus, there is the animation in and out of SB that has to be accounted for. Pausing in between skills seems to interrupt the animation, which is good, but it's still downtime where you are not doing damage.

[Jaison1986]

Since we are on the talk of knight enchanter, wich set up is better after the nerf? Two rings that increase damage by 30%, or the staff wrath of Lovias combined with two superb rings of critical damage? I'm not sure wich one does more damage overall.

[PapaCharlie9]

Since we are on the talk of knight enchanter, wich set up is better after the nerf? Two rings that increase damage by 30%, or the staff wrath of Lovias combined with two superb rings of critical damage? I'm not sure wich one does more damage overall.

What kind of damage? I'm not aware of any rings that are just +30% damage.

 

Is Wrath of Lovias crafted or looted? If crafted for crit chance, Lovias + crit damage rings is probably the best choice, but hard to tell with so many open questions.

[Jaison1986]

What kind of damage? I'm not aware of any rings that are just +30% damage.

 

Is Wrath of Lovias crafted or looted? If crafted for crit chance, Lovias + crit damage rings is probably the best choice, but hard to tell with so many open questions.

 

This ring: http://dragonage.wik...d_Blizzard_Ring

 

It increases ability damage by 30%.

[PapaCharlie9]

This ring: http://dragonage.wik...d_Blizzard_Ring

 

It increases ability damage by 30%.

 

Emphasis on ability damage. So it buffs damage from active skills, like Spirit Blade, not auto-attacks, I would presume. It's like all of the Enhanced Ring of XXX damage wrapped into one.

 

That being the case, Lovias crafted for crit + crit damage rings is probably better. Your damage with average crit would have to be less than 30% for the Blizzard ring to be the better choice. If two Blizzard rings stack, your average damage with crit would have to be less than 60% (I think they add, rather than multiply).

 

If they don't stack, you could split the difference and wear Blizzard on one hand and crit damage on the other, and still use Lovias crit.

[Jaison1986]

Emphasis on ability damage. So it buffs damage from active skills, like Spirit Blade, not auto-attacks, I would presume. It's like all of the Enhanced Ring of XXX damage wrapped into one.

 

That being the case, Lovias crafted for crit + crit damage rings is probably better. Your damage with average crit would have to be less than 30% for the Blizzard ring to be the better choice. If two Blizzard rings stack, your average damage with crit would have to be less than 60% (I think they add, rather than multiply).

 

If they don't stack, you could split the difference and wear Blizzard on one hand and crit damage on the other, and still use Lovias crit.

 

Welp, I did some testing and critical and wrath of lovias is really the way to go. Before each attack with spirit blade did no more then 250 damage or so, but now with the new staff and the critical rings I'm scoring about 400-600 damage per hit with critical strikes, that happen quite often BTW. Doing high damage with spirit blade feels like old times again.

[Evelynne]

Welp, I did some testing and critical and wrath of lovias is really the way to go. Before each attack with spirit blade did no more then 250 damage or so, but now with the new staff and the critical rings I'm scoring about 400-600 damage per hit with critical strikes, that happen quite often BTW. Doing high damage with spirit blade feels like old times again.

 

If you make use of Energy Barrage, you can max stacks on Spirit Blade and score the 2-4k range. Same with Fade Step  if there's enough enemies.

[JiaJM98]

i run my ke with pact belt (electric or fire).
but im wondering:
does the ice armour apply to barrier?
does the dot dmg from fire spells add to ur barrier?
dmg wise which tree would be better? electric or inferno? of course you can go hybrid but i want to make te most out of the pact belt.

also what mastetworks are best for ke? i seem to get 1shot by anything should the dmg penetrate through my barrier so i need to rely on guardian spirit. so i decided to go crazy for dmg and barrier strength. and so im using sigil of lyrium as well.

for masterwork, i use pota on my light saber.
if i use storm pact, i use 100% dmg chain lighting on armour, and for fire pact, i use walking bomb.

although im not sure if any of those masterworks are worth it.

oh and yet another question, is mind blast on hit any good at all?

[ottffsse]

The problem for close combat lightning ke seems to be that energy barrage is a terrible close combat spell. By the time those missiles hit something and animation time you might be dead on the higher difficulty dlc content. So you have chain lightning static cage and static charge. Fade stepping through static cage victims is fun. And static cage is ur akternative to mp aw pota. And chain l proc masterwork basically. fire generally is more friendly and fire mines get ridiculous at some point though, you can keep chain lightning or Frost step for stuff resistent to fire. Between that and spirit damage you should be covered. You need clean burn anyway and maybe gathering storm - easy to get after chain lightning to keep fade cloak on low enough cool down to be really good. Fade cloak on hit chance for defence and chain lightning/ immolate on hit for offense depending in on belt should be good. Andrastes sacrifice gives you guard on taunt BTW but as ur health pool is so low it won't do much. The only benefit of lightning ke is you charge up blade really fast and play style is nicer as you don't have to target immolate. Dispel is another staple and both upgrades are good.

[Rynas]

Ice Armor does apply to Barrier.  Ice Armor actually just increases magic/melee/ranged defense by 50 percentage points (not just a 50% reduction in damage).  Barrier benefits from defense, Guard benefits from both defense and armor.

 

FYI, since defense is capped at 80%, you only need 30% base magic/melee/ranged defense (or 20% plus True Grit) to reach max defenses when Ice Armor is up.  Although you can still get one-shotted by Hakkonites on NM if you allow that cold debuff to build up.