Curse

arredondo · Mar 31, 2006, 08:39 PM // 20:39

One of my most potent build yet for you guys if you love to dish out the damage like I do:

=================================================
Blood Bomber

Blood: 14
Curses: 12
Inspiration: 10
Soul Reaping: 2

Vampiric Spirit: 47 Blood steal and -3E per spell cast, 19 seconds
Soul Barbs: 26 damage per Hex cast on target, 30 seconds
Faintheartedness: -3 degen for 29 seconds + -50% enemy attack speed
Wastrel’s Worry: 8 damage after 3s

. 5E, .25 cast, 1 second recharge

Drain Enchantment: net +8E for enchant dispell
Power Drain: net +16E per spell interrupt
Energy Tap: net +7E/-6E per target
Rez
=================================================

Now this looks REALLY interesting I have to say.

Cast Soul Barbs on the enemy, cover it with Faintheartedness’ -3 degen. Cast Vampiric Spirit on yourself. Get into “nearby” range of your target (for VS) and spam Wastrel’s Worry until they die… that’s it!

For non-Mesmer players here, WW comes out in ¼ of a second and recharges in one. The cost for each one under VS will be 8E a cast instead of the normal 5E. Since it is a Hex, it will trigger Soul Barbs on every use for 26 damage (Faint does as well).

Vampiric Spirit is the jewel here… you get 47 life steal damage with every cast of WW. Not only is that a major chunk from the enemy’s health every second or so, but it also gives you a lot of health rapidly to stay in pretty good shape! Together with Soul Barbs, each WW cast does a total of 73 damage to the enemy. Even if he has protect spells on, it’s still -47 to him because of the life steals.

Until I test it, I just added three energy gaining skills to make sure that I can out spam VS’s -3E penalty per cast for its duration. All of them show how much additional energy you receive after the cost of casting them is taken care of. An extra 30E plus your normal 48E-69E should last VS’s 19 seconds with no problems at all.

Let’s look at the stats. Since you can cast a WW every 1.25 seconds (counting aftercast), you can get 9 WWs out. This is calculated by starting with your first one at .00 (after Faintheartedness), and then counting each 1.25 as another cast until the last one at 10.00.

Maximum damage-per-second output, (or MDO) is my term for the most damage a build is doing over the most optimal ten second time period. For this build, ten seconds of WW+SB+VS spamming is 65.7 MDO.

Symbolic Self will double check my math, but that is some solid numbers (in a good way!). Now, counting ALL damage from the first time the enemy is injured, we need to back up to the end of Faintheartedness’ cast (27 damage due to SB). This also includes the -3 degen that begins as well. Altogether, the first ten seconds of damage is:

Faintheartedness: 27+60= 87 damage
7 WW casts (includes previous aftercast of VS): 7x73= 511

TOTAL (first 10 secs): 598 armor ignoring-damage

That’s still a high 60 DPS. BTW, this includes an awesome +329 health stolen for you over this period…. I may trade in something for Dark Aura just to make it more evil if it holds up well under assault. Final stat on damage shows that before VS ends, I can get in 17 WWs for a max 1,328 damage over that entire period if I don’t need to stop for energy recovery (lol, yeah right).

So now we have to look at paying the bills. Energy output/input are as follows:

SB/Faint/VS: -10E-10E-5E= -25E total
7 WW casts under VS: 7*-8E = -56E total

Total cast costs for prep and 10 seconds of damage= -81E
Natural regen for 16s= +21E
Net cost= -60E

I can get away with that using my -1/+15E weapon+focus of +3/68E max mana pool. I’m worthless after that though (and I like my +4 regen), so let’s look at getting energy back:

Total mana recovery from one full WW cast session using ET/PD/DE: 7E+16E+8E= +31E

Net energy spent: -30E

So if I stagger my WWs to gain mana, I can cast all the prep spells, spam seven WWs under VS, and I’ll still only be down -30E from full despite having done close to 600 damage. It looks like recharging SB (30s) is my main issue, but if I get quick deaths, I'll use that time to cast my +energy spells. That way my next victim will have me at full strength when his time comes to go six feet under. If the Blood Bombing spam works well energy wise, I may add Blood Renewal for the enchant cover and extra health bonuses for 'nearby' battles. E-Tap may be switched for it. Definitely looks like a fun build to test out.

Disclaimer for the forum troll-geniuses out there: This write-up shows MAXIMUM results only for reference... we all know results in game may vary depending on the circumstances, arenas, 8v8, GvG. Hex removal (I have a cover BTW), enchant removal (I may add BR for E.Tap), snares, etc. blah blah blah - it's understood already. Kinks can be worked out, but the big picture looks pretty good.

Byron · Apr 01, 2006, 07:20 AM // 07:20

While I like the spirit of the build, it lacks the most important thing for high end competitive play: flexibility. A little hex removal and a few interrupts and all that damage pretty much nullified. And as you say, it takes at least 30 energy to dish out the damage. A warrior can do that damage in 10 seconds with only adrenaline use, and no possibility of hex removal.

What can I say? Warrior damage>necro damage.

arredondo · Apr 01, 2006, 08:33 AM // 08:33

That's Arena.net's fault, not mine.

And that Warrior can't do as much damage with Wail of Doom on him, along with Faintheartedness, Enfeeble, while Sympathetic Visage is cast on me along with Guardian and Spell Breaker (read last paragraph please).

Plus this ignores armor and more than half gets through protective spells while healing you. Anyway, it stands as it is, no comparison to Warrior was intended. Oh, and I switched out E-Tap for Channeling.

Siren · Apr 02, 2006, 12:10 AM // 00:10

Quote:

Originally Posted by arredondo

Oh, and I switched out E-Tap for Channeling.

I was wondering when you were going to do that. lol. For a build like this, spamming a 5E spell with another 3E cost from Vamp Spirit, you could easily cover the cost of Vamp Spirit, even in RA/TA, and in an 8v8 setting, seeing a Channeling return of 4-5 is entirely possible, which means you're only spending 4-3 energy.

Plus, E-Tap's cast time really does suck.

Regarding Dark Aura...why? You're not using any sac skills from what I can tell.

I'd go with Para Bond over Faintheartedness as a cover. Even though it's only 1 degen, it's a better choice, since you're not looking to do damage with the cover hex. Plus, it'll give you a nice health return when it gets removed. And the recharge for Para Bond shats all over the Faintheartedness'.

And you should know that the final paragraph in your initial post was pretty lame.