Thx so much. My question: Is a 600+es chest better than CoD for this build? CoD would save me 4 points while a High ES chest would give me about 800-900 more mana(I didn't do math here). And should I try to run another aura or just keep the mana as unreserved?
The main difference between CoD and a pure ES rare chest is that CoD may give you more protection against single spike damage, making it less likely to get 1shot.
1. Let's assume 4000 Life as per your example, and compare minimum unreserved mana for full effectiveness of MoM or CoD.
ES Chest: EHP = 4000/0.7 = 5714, with 1714 Mana unreserved.
CoD: EHP = 4000/0.6 = 6667, with 2667 Mana unreserved.
As you can see, CoD can potentially give you almost 1k more EHP, but you need to leave this additional 1k unreserved. This is a lot harder than it seems, because CoD has shitty ES, and Geofri's compounds the problem (compared to, say, a 300+ ES helm). You can obviously choose to compromise and reserve more Mana, lowering your EHP, that is personal preference and works fine if you don't find yourself in near-death situations much. Honestly, if you decide not to facetank heavy attacks, an EHP of 5.7k as per your example is more than enough, unless you decide to do Maps with multiple damage increasing mods.
2. The next issue is, would getting the extra ES on pure ES chest be worth it? Let's once again use your current stats; 4000 Life, 3500 Mana, and let's just assume you gain 1000 Mana from using a pure ES chest over a CoD. All mana reservations are rounded up to the nearest integer for these calculations, but I cannot remember if it's rounded to nearest integer Mana value or Mana reservation value (someone CMIIW here).
Current scenario: HoI + HoT + TS + Clarity (all L20 and supported by L20 RM) would reserve [3(0.25)*0.71*3500]+520*0.71 = 2234 Mana, leaving 1266 unreserved (EHP = 5266).
So if your Mana increases from 3500 to 4500, you only get an additional 467 Mana to play around with. That's nowhere near enough to run an additional aura unless you respec for all the Mana reservation nodes, and/or use Alpha's Howl. Even then, what additional aura would you run? Haste? Disc?
Also, note that 1733 unreserved mana is very close to your original 1714 required for full utilization of MoM (assuming your Life remains constant at 4000).
For the pure ES option I'd leave the Mana unreserved for more EHP if I were you. I personally prefer using CoD to save on passives, but it does mean that you must obtain significantly more ES from your boots/gloves/rings to make up for the mediocre ES on CoD.
Thx so much for the detailed explanation. I guess I would use a CoD with all ES based gears rather than a high ES chest.
Thanks for this. I'm currently levelling your build now. Only death so far was due to a complete disconnect. What do you think about swapping in a Heatshiver over the Geofri's to favor the regen? You'd lose the energy shield so I can see how that might not be worth it. But for me, it'd be free so I'm debating it once I find some free dex.
1. Makes resistances extremely problematic, takes away valuable chaos res.
2. Takes away valuable mana.
3. Won't roll a BBBB very easily
4. Doesn't give +1 to gems
I'm not OP obviously, but I did get LT to drop the other day.
I'm not sure what to think of Lightning Tendrils so far. It has a very very short range, and by default has an AOE area that is somewhat similar to LMP Incinerate. The single target damage seems ok, I haven't leveled it enough to get a good sense of what it will eventually be capable of, and if it is a good substitute for Incinerate for single target.
To give you a rough sense, this setup (with the LT gem at non-quality and level 16) gives 18,795 DPS with Herald of Ice up:
Needs some more leveling (or maths, which I'm not inclined to do :P) to see whether it will eventually out DPS Incinerate.
LT is definitely on the radar. It's got a LOT of damage potential, and it is a strong candidate for that CQC spell when used with FC + SE + LP + Conc eff. It won't be compatible with the lightning coil version though.
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So I'm interested in this build and I recently had a pair of thunderfists drop. I was wondering if those would be worthwhile for this builds arc setup over geofri's crest, if so would you recommend a rare ES helm or just sticking with geofri's for an aura setup. I'd probably have about 10-15 exalts(standard) to spend on the rest of the build and I'm pretty sure I could manage enough lightning resist to run coil. Any thoughts are appreciated
So I'm interested in this build and I recently had a pair of thunderfists drop. I was wondering if those would be worthwhile for this builds arc setup over geofri's crest, if so would you recommend a rare ES helm or just sticking with geofri's for an aura setup. I'd probably have about 10-15 exalts(standard) to spend on the rest of the build and I'm pretty sure I could manage enough lightning resist to run coil. Any thoughts are appreciated
I wouldn't really recommend them. The stats on Thunderfists are very poor for a spellcaster build as opposed to the high utility that a Geofri's has to offer in terms of resists and implicit stats. Also, the increased mana cost of that added lightning gem will have a significant impact to survivability/sustainability.
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LT is definitely on the radar. It's got a LOT of damage potential, and it is a strong candidate for that CQC spell when used with FC + SE + LP + Conc eff. It won't be compatible with the lightning coil version though.
I tried a 5L LT with non-high-lvl gems, the DPS is around 10K. But I just feel it's so weak, the single target dps can not even beat 4L Arc. And with Conc eff, the radius is too small like a melee char.
Do you have any suggestions about using LT instead of incinerate ?
(I could keep +lighting damage nodes for both LT and Arc)
LT is definitely on the radar. It's got a LOT of damage potential, and it is a strong candidate for that CQC spell when used with FC + SE + LP + Conc eff. It won't be compatible with the lightning coil version though.
Some initial impressions:
1. I don't like the inability to cancel LT mid-cast, unlike Incinerate.
2. Using ConcEff, the AoE of LT is ridiculously small, although this doesn't present a problem if used solely for single target DPS. However, LMP/GMP Incinerate can clear large dense packs of mobs (especially a Q20/23 Incinerate) and is used to complement Arc's inability to do so. For instance, I would definitely use Incinerate over LT for Jungle Valley boss room, though that's just a 72 instance.
3. So far LT does seem to have a higher damage potential than Incinerate, and can crit. Mine's still only L18 though, so I can't say much. However I can foresee the crit being a potential problem against double Ele reflect mobs, compared to reflect immunity using Incinerate/AA.
Will do more testing if I have time, to supplement any discussion.
So this is the gear I'm planning on using. I've got all my resists maxed and I think I should have enough Dex so that I don't have to take any from the tree. So would investing in The Vertex be worth it, considering I already have my resists maxed or is there something else you would upgrade first.
Loving this build. What are your thoughts on Rainbowstrides?
Rainbowstrides are only useful if you refuse to use a SoL as your ammy. Even then, you'll obtain only 85% of your block as spell block assuming perfect rolls on Rathpith and Rstrides, so it's not optimal. The rest of the stats on Rstrides are quite meh.
So this is the gear I'm planning on using. I've got all my resists maxed and I think I should have enough Dex so that I don't have to take any from the tree. So would investing in The Vertex be worth it, considering I already have my resists maxed or is there something else you would upgrade first.
The main difference between a Vertex and a Crest is the toss up between having much more ES->Mana at your disposal, or overcapping resistances enough to do EW maps without being affected.
It's pretty much personal preference. I'd rather start with FM-crafting your rings, since they have huge Mana regen on them, but nothing much else other than resistances.
