Curse

Yukito Kunisaki · Dec 21, 2005, 03:13 AM // 03:13

Ah, Inspired Hex with a high curses and Domination Stat... Fun stuff! ^_^

8+1+3 Domination Magic
9+1 Fast Casting
9+1 Inspiration
10 Curses

An anti-caster nuisance designed to turn the tables against an aggressive hex user. [hopefully they're using an elite domination or curses hex ^_^]

Power Block {E}
Power Spike
Inspired Hex
Drain Enchantment
Spirit of Failure
Parasitic Bond
Plague Touch/Res Signet
Price of Failure

With the proper setup, you can keep your energy going using your various e. gaining skills, and easily shut out 3 people. The emphasis combo is usually 1 caster and 2 noncasters. If you're lucky and the enemy is using an anti-caster hex, your inspired hex can help you shut out up to 2 casters and 2 fighters.

Covering the entire enemy team with parabond no matter who they are is smart fighting. Should it get removed, you get healed for 90 hp. @ 5e. and 2s. recycle, why not? Nailing all of the non-casters with SoF and PoF with Parabond on top is just common sense in all circumstances.

Instead of interrupting and punishing everything a caster does [which is fine...], using Power Block {E} will usually surprise a caster and should they try a 2nd skill, Power Spike will put them down again. [most of the people I fight usually give up after over half their skill bar gets shut out]. Focus is definitely on keeping hexes off your teammates and on the enemy team.

Moving conditions to your enemies with Plague touch isn't a bad idea either if you really need to. [if you have a monk, res sig of course... or if you're smart on the uptake and avoid conditions when possible]

During one match, I stole a Spiteful Spirit and 'dog piled it' on one of their rangers using SS, SoF, PoF, Para-bond. Quite a satisfying setup.

Weaknesses? Sadly, plenty for your friendly monk to deal with...

If you run into a HEAVY hex user, then Inspired just won't be enough to stop him. Anti-casters are a given. Condition pileup may occur if you're fighting a Virulence happy Sword Warrior... [fighting with bleeding, deep wound, poison, and disease without a Draw/Restore condition teammate REALLY sux...]

Any ideas for a balance? And no, in the 4v4 arena [where most people scoff at you ;_;] going ALL anti-caster or ALL anti-warrior just doesn't give a good return on skill points/selection...

Serps · Dec 21, 2005, 04:03 AM // 04:03

Pity you can't fit Distortion. Will reduce the damage of warriors as well as feeding Pof/Sof engine.

Then again, signet of midnight's also nice with me/n, should you find distortion to be inadequate.

Yukito Kunisaki · Dec 21, 2005, 04:36 PM // 16:36

Signet of Midnight vs. Power Block... hmm...

Sentao Nugra · Dec 21, 2005, 04:56 PM // 16:56

Quote:

Originally Posted by Yukito Kunisaki

Signet of Midnight vs. Power Block... hmm...

if considering changing to sig of midnight, you might as well go anti warrior:

transfer your dom to illusion and run ineptitude + clumsiness. you may also want to get rid of one of your inspiration skills as you will have plenty of energy with inspired hex/enchant (hex is better IMO) and replace it with phantom pain or SV

if not:

still get rid of one of your energy management spells, probably spirit of failure since you have no control over the enemy attacking and their hitting %, and put in arcane conundrum to make your job of power-blocking a quick cast a lot easier

Epinephrine · Dec 21, 2005, 05:14 PM // 17:14

Neat build; hard to do a good job vs both melee and casters though - the 25% miss rates won't add up that much; I believe they are applied sequentially, so it's only a 43.75% miss rate (not bad though).

I'm not sure I'd pick PoF over Empathy - you would deal damage with every swing with Empathy, and more damage in fact. It wouldn't last quite as long (18 vs 30 seconds), but it'll deal the damage more than twice as fast, so that helps, and casts in 66% of the time, freeing your actions somewhat. I guess it would reduce the incoming energy from the SoF though, and would allow them to connect more often. Not quite the direction I'd take, but an interesting design to be sure.

Sentao Nugra · Dec 21, 2005, 05:26 PM // 17:26

Quote:

Originally Posted by Epinephrine

Neat build; hard to do a good job vs both melee and casters though - the 25% miss rates won't add up that much; I believe they are applied sequentially, so it's only a 43.75% miss rate (not bad though).
...
I guess it would reduce the incoming energy from the SoF though, and would allow them to connect more often. Not quite the direction I'd take, but an interesting design to be sure.

the incoming energy from using sof&pof or just using just empathy would be reduced by around 7 so its not TOO bad, but its still lost energy to capitalize on.

Bale_Shadowscar · Dec 21, 2005, 09:25 PM // 21:25

Nice looking build. Can't wait to try it out.

Yukito Kunisaki · Dec 21, 2005, 10:42 PM // 22:42

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sentao Nugra

the incoming energy from using sof&pof or just using just empathy would be reduced by around 7 so its not TOO bad, but its still lost energy to capitalize on.

The /of Failure skills are actually a nice synergistic defensive measure that someone advised me on a while ago. I still love Power Block {E} and 13s. of nothing for a caster is enough for two teammates to go splat...

From recalculation, it seems that the enemy misses quite a bit when both failure hexes are piled. The first hex is 75% hit rate and the next hex is 75% of that I believe. On a calculator, that's 56% hit rate, so the enemy will be hitting you about half the time if not a little more. Kiting becomes key in that regard should your hp start to dip.

Thanks for the inputs! ^_^