Curse

NinjaKai · Oct 13, 2006, 10:37 AM // 10:37

This is a build that revolves around using synergy between Cultists Fervor and Awaken the Blood. This build is intended for PvE, its initially designed for characters created in Cantha. To counter balance the sacrfice from using cultists fervor it uses life stealing spells which are made spammable by the -7 energy cost on spells. Use a 20% enchanting mod.

Use a +1 Blood magic face scar with superior rune. And a superior rune on soul reaping.

Original

Attributes
Soul Reaping 12 + 3 = 15
Blood Magic 12 + 1 + 3 + 2 = 18

Cultists Fervor [E]
Awaken the Blood
Vampiric Gaze
Unholy Feast
Vampiric Swarm
Vampiric Bite
Blood Drinker
Optional

Cast Awaken the Blood before Cultists Fervor. Then choose your target and just spam the life stealing spells. And since its life stealing, not even a heavy armored monster can defend against it. Go for targets other than monks. They'll heal faster than you can steal their life. Choose a mod that hasn't been targeted.

Variation
Special thanks to killer_sss for his helpful feedback.

Attributes
Soul Reaping 8 + 1 = 9
Blood Magic 12 + 1 + 3 + 2 = 18
Death Magic 10 + 3 = 13

Cultists Fervor [E]
Awaken the Blood
Vampiric Gaze
Unholy Feast
Vampiric Swarm
Vampiric Bite
Dark Aura
Optional

Works the same as the original. But uses dark aura to deal more lovely unblockable damage. And because of the builds heavy life stealing any health loss is countered easily.

Glasswalker · Oct 13, 2006, 05:22 PM // 17:22

With BM 18, Cultist's Ferver sacrifices 18% per spell over 23 seconds because of the +50% sacrifice of AtB. With BM 16, Cultist's Ferver sacrifices 14% per spell over 21 seconds. Since neither one will meet the recharge of 30seconds on this skill, I feel it's worth noting. This could amount to a ~60% sacrifice difference over the full duration of CF.

I don't feel like doing the math right now on whether the extra life steal from those 5 skills will counter that...

Also, Vampiric Bite is a skill, and therefore the 15e cost won't be reduced by CF. Not that that would hurt you much in this build.

Hella Good · Oct 13, 2006, 05:55 PM // 17:55

I'd much rather cause some UF devastation by using GoR on it.

Pick Me · Oct 13, 2006, 06:11 PM // 18:11

I'm assuming that that 18 points into Blood is 12 + sup rune + head piece + awaken the blood.

Now that you have 2 sup runes (1 for soul reaping, the other as mentioned, blood), you have 450 - 75 - 75 = 300 max life.

Let's also say that CV goes down to 15% sac per spell. 15% + 15%/2 (from awaken the blood) = 15% + 7.5% = 22.5%. So lets say 22% sac per spell. 22% x 300 max life = 66 life loss per spell.

Vampiric Gaze = I think its 52 at level 16. I'm not sure, but I think it would go to 60 at level 18. This is would then result in a loss of life.

Unholy Feast = 54 at level 16, 62 at level 18, x 3 = 186 life gain. So this is good if there are 2 ore monsters that are affected by this spell.

Vampiric Swarm = 51 at level 16, 60 at level 18. x 3 = 180 life gain. So this would be good for 2 or more monsters in the area of effect.

Vampiric Bite = 65 at level 16, since this is a skill, it is unaffected by Cultist's Fervor, but at level 18, I think it goes to 71. So you gain all 71 health, at a price of all 15 energy.

Blood Drinker = 56 at level 16, but you bleed (unless you have under 51% health). At level 18, I think its 65, so you lose more life by using this.

These are just guesses at level 18 as to how much life you actually gain, so if someone can confirm what the correct amount of life gain you do get, that would be great.

But as it stands, it looks like you lose a lot of health if you are against 1 monster.

Hella Good · Oct 13, 2006, 07:20 PM // 19:20

At lvl 18 UF steals 76 health from 5 foes... How did you end up with the ridiculous 62x3?

And Vamp Swarm is at 69/18BM altho that's less of a blatant mistake.

NinjaKai · Oct 13, 2006, 07:35 PM // 19:35

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pick Me

But as it stands, it looks like you lose a lot of health if you are against 1 monster.

This build was specifically desgined for areas with large groups of monsters. And finding those isn't exactly hard in Cantha or Tyria.

Pick Me · Oct 13, 2006, 07:40 PM // 19:40

Quote:

Originally Posted by NinjaKai

This build was specifically desgined for areas with large groups of monsters. And finding those isn't exactly hard in Cantha or Tyria.

Granted, but then again, usually you will end up vs 1 monster. So I'm guessing you don't do much at that time, or you are able to kill off the remaining 2 or 3 at once.

Hella Good, as I said, I don't know what the actual life stealing damage was at level 18. As you pointed out, it was a poor guess on my part for UF (and maybe all of them)

Hella Good · Oct 14, 2006, 05:08 AM // 05:08

Meleemancing could be a bit tricky in PvE. I think maybe Vamp Spirit would be better suited for such a situation. Vamp Spirit and Channelling could work well together. I havent tried UF in PvE tho. It could work well. Kind of hard to compare it with such DPS winners like MM and SS.

NinjaKai · Oct 14, 2006, 09:34 AM // 09:34

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hella Good

Meleemancing could be a bit tricky in PvE. I think maybe Vamp Spirit would be better suited for such a situation. Vamp Spirit and Channelling could work well together. I havent tried UF in PvE tho. It could work well. Kind of hard to compare it with such DPS winners like MM and SS.

Where on earth did you get meleemancing from. And I made this build because I thought it would be nice to have something different to standard cookie cutter MM and SS.

Rainman · Oct 14, 2006, 09:41 AM // 09:41

if u used skills that sacrifice all the time then there is a skill that deals widespread damage every time you sacrifice (forgot the name

)

killer_sss · Oct 14, 2006, 05:45 PM // 17:45

if life is a problem because of the sac reduce your life even further. you will then gain more than you are losing also they are pretty much all spamable due to the high soul reaping

Quote:

if u used skills that sacrifice all the time then there is a skill that deals widespread damage every time you sacrifice (forgot the name )

this is dark aura death magic but would be very interesting to add to this build
maybe drop 1 or 2 points on soul slap on a sup death rune. that would bring you to 225 health and you could be dealing some mass aoe dmg to adjecent foes. putrid explosion wouldnt be to bad to add either for some mass dmg and spamability. both are spells which would help a ton.

roughly you will 59-61 health per hit but will be dishing out 40dmg and 68life steal at least more depending on the spell.

my only problem is blood drinker since you would be giving your self a condition that would drain on your health. bring along plague touch and that solves the problem

i would also recomend a plus 20% enchant thing on ur weapon stuff would be nice fore keeping things up longer would practically make cultist fevor make its recharge time

overall i give this build an A

NinjaKai · Oct 14, 2006, 07:27 PM // 19:27

Quote:

Originally Posted by killer_sss

roughly you will 59-61 health per hit but will be dishing out 40dmg and 68life steal at least more depending on the spell.

my only problem is blood drinker since you would be giving your self a condition that would drain on your health. bring along plague touch and that solves the problem

i would also recomend a plus 20% enchant thing on ur weapon stuff would be nice fore keeping things up longer would practically make cultist fevor make its recharge time

overall i give this build an A

I know about the enchant mod. Just forgot to add it to the post. And thanks for actually being able to see the potential of this build. Finally someone who can see past the average cookie cutter build.

Pick Me · Oct 16, 2006, 02:04 PM // 14:04

Quote:

Originally Posted by killer_sss

if life is a problem because of the sac reduce your life even further. you will then gain more than you are losing also they are pretty much all spamable due to the high soul reaping

this is dark aura death magic but would be very interesting to add to this build
maybe drop 1 or 2 points on soul slap on a sup death rune. that would bring you to 225 health and you could be dealing some mass aoe dmg to adjecent foes. putrid explosion wouldnt be to bad to add either for some mass dmg and spamability. both are spells which would help a ton.

roughly you will 59-61 health per hit but will be dishing out 40dmg and 68life steal at least more depending on the spell.

my only problem is blood drinker since you would be giving your self a condition that would drain on your health. bring along plague touch and that solves the problem

i would also recomend a plus 20% enchant thing on ur weapon stuff would be nice fore keeping things up longer would practically make cultist fevor make its recharge time

overall i give this build an A

Blood Drinker can be used as a safety net. Once you get below 50% of max health (being spiked for instance), you can use it and not incur the bleeding condition.

NinjaKai · Oct 16, 2006, 10:03 PM // 22:03

Quote:

Originally Posted by killer_sss

if life is a problem because of the sac reduce your life even further. you will then gain more than you are losing also they are pretty much all spamable due to the high soul reaping

this is dark aura death magic but would be very interesting to add to this build
maybe drop 1 or 2 points on soul slap on a sup death rune. that would bring you to 225 health and you could be dealing some mass aoe dmg to adjecent foes. putrid explosion wouldnt be to bad to add either for some mass dmg and spamability. both are spells which would help a ton.

roughly you will 59-61 health per hit but will be dishing out 40dmg and 68life steal at least more depending on the spell.

I see where your going with this idea. This could be an alternate to blood drinker.

NinjaKai · Oct 16, 2006, 10:03 PM // 22:03

Oops double posted

LouAl · Oct 16, 2006, 11:13 PM // 23:13

I think there is some faulty math in some of the above posts...

Wouldn't Cultists Fervor be a 12% sac at lvl 18?
Isn't max health 330 with 2 sup runes? 480-75-75=330

that means at 280 hp (2 sup runes and -50 offhand) your total sac would be about 50.4 hlth, right? Vamp Gave at 18 would be 68 hlth, I think, so you would only be netting a very small amount, but when you use some of the multi-foe stuff you will gain that back in a hurry. Unholy Feast alone would net you 28.6 hlth against only 1 foe and 107.6 against 2 foes, so I think you would be sitting pretty on health.

Now when you mix in Dark Aura is when you might have trouble on health if there aren't enough baddies around. It would seem to me that each spell would be a total loss of 68.4 health (not counting the gains from that spell) which might be hard to live through.

Of course, if you used 3 superiors and the -50 offhand (my recommendation) your health sacs, even with Dark Aura, would only be 54.9 (36.9 w/o DA). That is much easier and would, I think, make the survivability of the build go way up.

Anyway, I think it is interesting, and I suggest at least 3 superior runes and the -50 offhand (4 might be too much, but it would drop the sacs down to 41.4, but your max health would only be about 130 so that sucks).

NinjaKai · Oct 17, 2006, 08:01 AM // 08:01

Quote:

Originally Posted by LouAl

Of course, if you used 3 superiors and the -50 offhand (my recommendation) your health sacs, even with Dark Aura, would only be 54.9 (36.9 w/o DA). That is much easier and would, I think, make the survivability of the build go way up.

Anyway, I think it is interesting, and I suggest at least 3 superior runes and the -50 offhand (4 might be too much, but it would drop the sacs down to 41.4, but your max health would only be about 130 so that sucks).

Interesting suggestion. I'll give it a little test and see how it works out. (And I agree 4 sup runes is just stupid.)

Kit Engel · Oct 17, 2006, 08:09 AM // 08:09

Quote:

Originally Posted by NinjaKai

Interesting suggestion. I'll give it a little test and see how it works out. (And I agree 4 sup runes is just stupid.)

There's no need for four runes, but if you're using even 3, why not drop soul reaping slightly, grab some protection prayers, and bring protective spirit? It'll protect you against the worst of enemy attacks, for the most part... it'll probably let you last much longer.

NinjaKai · Oct 17, 2006, 08:16 AM // 08:16

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kit Engel

There's no need for four runes, but if you're using even 3, why not drop soul reaping slightly, grab some protection prayers, and bring protective spirit? It'll protect you against the worst of enemy attacks, for the most part... it'll probably let you last much longer.

I could always shove points into restoration and use weapon of warding.

Glasswalker · Oct 17, 2006, 03:15 PM // 15:15

Quote:

Originally Posted by LouAl

I think there is some faulty math in some of the above posts...

Wouldn't Cultists Fervor be a 12% sac at lvl 18?

It would, except the only way to (unconditionally) get to 18 is with Awaken the Blood, which causes you to sac 50% more. 50% of 12 is 6, 12+6 = 18%. When the skill listing was put up on guildwiki, they only followed the mathematical progression, they didn't show actual in-game numbers.