Curse

Doug4130 · Mar 29, 2011, 04:12 AM // 04:12

Wenspire, any way you could post your builds? I can't figure out what some of your skills are

Wenspire · Mar 29, 2011, 04:37 AM // 04:37

This is what I have recently been using. In the vid, GftE is replaced with frozsoil. Heroes are using longbows and recurve I think. I suggest not giving them shortbows.

Jaba tha hutt · Mar 29, 2011, 06:33 AM // 06:33

Cant look at them all right now because I have to head off at any minute. The first file worked just perfectly though

Have you tried using the prep-shot build? I got inspired by this and I tried both and it just seems that unless you can get a REALLY good clump prep shot is a bit faster.

Jaba tha hutt · Mar 29, 2011, 01:50 PM // 13:50

Have you tried using the prep shot build? I tried both and it just seems like the prep shot one cleans up better... Maybe Im not clumping all the enemies up good enough or its just the areas Im in

miriforst · Mar 29, 2011, 07:22 PM // 19:22

Why drunken master and never rampage alone?

Wenspire · Mar 29, 2011, 09:01 PM // 21:01

@Jaba - Do you mean prepared shot in place of barrage for all the rangers? If every ranger used prepared shot in place of barrage there would be absolutely no aoe damage in the group. It's easier for an enemy healer/prot to keep a single target alive than a whole group. Prepared may do more + damage than barrage but also has 5-6x the longer recharge time. The energy gain from prepared isn't really needed if you are using a zealous string. In the video you will also notice that the hero rangers' en never really dropped much during battle.

@miriforst - I use both the skills together to reach the 33% IAS threshold. Also, the added run speed boost is nice to have when pulling.

On another note, upon rewatching my Selves run, I noticed the necro never used the skill Find Their Weakness. So, I did some testing on dummies in Kamadan training center by disabling every skill on his bar except FTW. He still never used it on me. I tried switching weapons from bow to: 1) spear, 2) sword, 3) hammer and 4) axe. Is this an AI bug or is there some condition that needs to be met before a hero will use that skill? There were a few times (maybe 2-3 out of all runs) while I was testing the group build out, that I did see a deep wound status applied onto my target.

UPDATE: Did some testing, and to make a long story short, heroes don't seem to use use Find Their Weakness on bows. Therefore, that skill is coming out from the necro bar and I will have to find a replacement skill. It's a shame too since the deep wound would have been really nice to have.

Doug4130 · Mar 29, 2011, 11:01 PM // 23:01

Modded your build a bit Wenspire to fit my needs, works great. Done a few vq's and dungeons with no problems whatsoever. I'd like to try to work in some melee hate though, might use throw dirt instead of LR on a hero.

I use spotless soul instead of cure hex, forgot to save it before I uploaded

Wenspire · Mar 29, 2011, 11:09 PM // 23:09

I prefer hex removal over condition removal. But I think as long as the skill works for you it's all good.

You'll probably want to watch your heroes when you give them throw dirt. For some reason, I recall that they tend to want to run around using that skill and sometimes up to the front line.

Wenspire · Mar 30, 2011, 07:30 AM // 07:30

Frostmaw HM. One wipe on 4th level when a wurm popped along with the madrigor group I was fighting. Level 1-5 times were 4/6/17/17/4.

And today's ZV, Verdant Cascades. I hate squiddies and chickens...

Wenspire · Mar 30, 2011, 11:37 PM // 23:37

Today's ZB: Cathedral of Flame. Pretty straightforward. No real problems. Tahl and Xandra died once each. The air-ele/channeling-rit enemies weren't as bad as I was expecting. My guess is that the ranger's +30 armor vs. elemental damage helped out. Pre-prepping splinter on your barragers against the main stationary boss-groups helps out a lot. Times for Level 1-3 were 7/8/11.

EDIT: I will have to take back my previous statement about the build not being able to do FoW HM. For fun I attempted it, but modified my prot monk to be more hex friendly (added P&H and Deny Hexes). I cleared everything except the wailing lord (wiped on the way to this while rushing) and griffons which isn'r ss/empathy heavy. I was at 1:22 when I died at the entrance to the forest. The Burning Forest was amazingly pretty easy. It usually gives me the most problems. I am pretty sad I didn't get to finish the whole run off, but at least I know it's not one of the problem areas for this build now.

AlsoSol · Mar 31, 2011, 08:18 AM // 08:18

Thank you, Wenspire. I love this thread. Been giving me hope.

What sorts of mods do you have on your weapons and what runes do you use (or is that one shown in the build picture?)

Wenspire · Mar 31, 2011, 09:13 AM // 09:13

I believe I use a minor marks with marks mask, minor bm/ws rune and major exp. For insignias I use radiant.

I switch between 4 bows depending on situation.
-1) 20% sundering longbow (used between battles for the en regen)
-2) vampiric shortbow (used when attacking a single target)
-3) zealous shortbow (used most of the time)
-4) zealous flatbow (used for pulling and attacking at long range if favwinds is up)

AlsoSol · Mar 31, 2011, 12:00 PM // 12:00

Ah, thanks. And thanks again for this thread. Brilliant stuff.

cataphract · Mar 31, 2011, 12:33 PM // 12:33

Looking at these screenshots almost makes me sad my ranger got gwamm before the 7-hero update. I would have loved being able to take 3 ranger heroes and their pets on vanquishes.

Wenspire · Apr 01, 2011, 05:33 AM // 05:33

Duncan HM. Wanted to do today's ZB (Rand) but had to clear Duncan first. I wiped once because I forgot to clear a group of touchers out and got bamboozled by the stone summit patrol while I was busy at it. This time I remembered to bring Swap (compared to my last run where I forgot).

Necro had Can't Touch This subbed in place of Well of Ruin. I subbed out GftE and Volley for Frozsoil and Swap.

Link for video of the run is listed below. I think it is 5 files of 22mb each.

http://www.gamefront.com/files/user/Zerodrag

AlsoSol · Apr 01, 2011, 08:12 AM // 08:12

All the links link to the first video.

Wenspire · Apr 01, 2011, 09:55 AM // 09:55

Sorry about that. I edited the post with a link to the main directory of files.

Thanx!

AlsoSol · Apr 01, 2011, 10:18 AM // 10:18

Sweet. These videos are really helpful. (I've discovered I don't pull enough).

Wenspire · Apr 02, 2011, 01:39 AM // 01:39

Shards of Orr HM: So I got a bit daring and wanted to try out the last difficult dungeon that I didn't think this build would work in. I am happy to say that I was wrong. Everything up to Fendi himself was fairly easy with no group wipes (both my rezzers died once in one encounter on level 1 so I ended up using a rez scroll though). The eruption blinding was sometimes annoying but didn't cut down on killing time by much. Microing extinguish helped out. It took 11 min to kill Fendi himself from the time I picked up the key on level 3. Wiped one time fighting him (working on him in his main-chamber was a bad idea). Times for levels 1-3 were 17/13/35.

I swapped out Well of Ruin for Foul Feast on my necro to help deal with the conditions.

Wenspire · Apr 02, 2011, 03:33 AM // 03:33

Bloodstone and Oola HM. Figured I would finish off the rest of the dungeons I hadn't tried the group-build on yet. Just have HoS and Arachni to go (not going to do Snowman).

Oola times for level 1-3: 20/14/3
Bloodstone times for level 1-3: 6/8/4