my second-ever attempt at Atziri

yesterday was a good Fragments day. I did 4 Corrupted Zones - 2 from content and 2 via map device - and got a full set. usually save those up, but now I just decided to go for it.
my second-ever attempt at Apex Of Sacrifice. first being at release of Sacrifice Of The Vaal.

surprisingly, I got my ass kicked earlier than the first, despite playing my trusty Frenzy/Tornado-Shot Ranger as opposed to the Melee Marauder from the first attempt (who was stopped by Atziri).
mainly due to making all possible mistakes.

but now that I tried it with more than one playing style, here are a couple things I like about Apex Of Sacrifice, and a couple things I don't.

first off, a lot of it is skill-based and I like that.
despite eventually losing the fight - and the map - at the Trio, I managed to do most of it without getting hit by either of them, and the same goes for Double Vaal.

but when they do hit, and my Ranger only has about 3k life, it hurts a lot.
which brings me to the major thing that bothers me: the DPS check.
my Ranger doesn't have Atziri-viable DPS, to put it lightly, and when you don't have the DPS - you kite. and kite. and kite. and hit&run. for long, long minutes which is a lot more room for mistakes.
and I made them.
mistakes like killing one of the Vaals first and allowing the second to become crazy-turbo, because I couldn't DPS both fast enough.
mistakes like killing 2 of the Trio at opposite sides of the arena, thereby leaving myself only a narrow corridor in which to fight literally a ton of constantly-spawning minions + an enraged Turbo Y'ara'az.

biggest cons of the entire run, were instant-heal, tainted ground, and Vaal's Ball Lightning.

instant-heal is a cheap, shameless mother-of-all-DPS-checks. when I kite all three down to their last hit-points, then only have the DPS to take one out (A'alai) and the other two insta-full-heal - that's a "what the fuck?" moment right there. my Cycloner had Culling Strike. my Ranger doesn't. and while I love the "enrage when allies killed" mechanic, I despise the instant-heal.

tainted ground (trio) is a bad thing too. it covers so much of the screen, and deals so much damage (heck I almost died just running through the corner of it) - it makes kiting those enraged guys near-impossible. you cull, huge-DPS, face-tank, or you're screwed. that's wrong.

GMP Ball Lightning? same thing. no one expects Vaal Oversoul to use that. it's cheap. I manually dodged countless Lasers, Slams and even Ice Rains during the long fight, but that attack which covers most of the screen and just destroyed me through capped Lightning Resistance? doesn't feel right. doesn't belong in a fight like this.

so if you bothered reading to this point, I enjoyed the overall Apex Of Sacrifice experience.
got very close to getting past the trio and facing Atziri, with a character that's hardly Atziri-viable.
much of it is about skill, but some things just leave a bad taste.
if GGG could change these, and ease the RNG-lock you need to pass to access the zone, it would be better.

It's a really fun instance. Whenever some buddies want me to run their sets I'm always up for it.
Sucks you couldn't progress further. 3k life is a tad low. I clear it with 3900ish and still get near oneshot here and there. The damage requirement isn't really difficult at all to achieve. Pretty much a 5L and 250ish dps harbinger and you're good to go. 15-20k tornado shot.

"

Kricys wrote:

15-20k tornado shot.

I have 8k :)

and this character has gear accumulated over literally 2 years.
great gear I'm very proud of.




don't really know how people achieve those kinds of damage outputs.
but given this character's proven kiting abilities, if I can get that kind of DPS I'll probably beat Atziri.

It's a bit of a weird tree jK, self evolved or pulled from somewhere?

The Apex is damn fun, but it's definitely a shit load of DPS/Gear check piled on top of sound strategy and movement.

You can brute force the strategy side with enough killing power, but thats not the fun way of doing it :)

I like how its a mix of 4 different styles of play, the Vaals, the Trio the trash and Atziri all need different approaches to get the best out of it with the fewest deaths. The trio is a massive challenge not only in the actual killing, but also the planning and order selection, and even the positioning of where they die so you don't have to run through the degen.

Getting stuck in a corner in the trio room, or in the throne room is such a bitch - I've managed to run myself into instant death so many times when I panic as the flameblasts start to grow :)

There is very little in the game I have enjoyed as much as the Apex runs, it'd be nice to be able to do them more often without all the grind grind grind.

"

It's a bit of a weird tree jK, self evolved or pulled from somewhere?

originally pulled together from various parts of the Ranger Forum after the latest re-spec, but I like to experiment a lot - so that's the result.
not optimal, but fun.
and it's indeed very enjoyable to play, but apparently not Atziri-viable right now because not enough DPS and far from enough tankiness, to counter the cheap parts of Apex Of Sacrifice, stated above.

if you can suggest something better with a similar playing style, I'm listening.

killing power to brute-force the fight mechanics?
well, when you don't have the killing power you leave a lot more room for making mistakes.
and you will make mistakes, and pay for them due to both the fair and less-fair (above) things.

so there really is little choice.

and strategy is only good when you hit the spike bitch at the center and she dies, because in my case she didn't. she had just enough life to survive one more hit after her colleagues arrived, and die in a place which later proved very, very bad.

the DPS checks and cheap parts take some of the fun away, for sure.

"

johnKeys wrote:

"

It's a bit of a weird tree jK, self evolved or pulled from somewhere?

originally pulled together from various parts of the Ranger Forum after the latest re-spec, but I like to experiment a lot - so that's the result.
not optimal, but fun.
and it's indeed very enjoyable to play, but apparently not Atziri-viable right now because not enough DPS and far from enough tankiness, to counter the cheap parts of Apex Of Sacrifice, stated above.

if you can suggest something better with a similar playing style, I'm listening.

You need someone with more brains than me if you want suggestions for builds/tree, but I reckon there is probably some pretty cheap respecing that could net you enough extra DPS and life to make the run easier.

I never managed a kill with my bow characters :(

There's room for improvement.

Why are you using Pierce gem with TS? Replace it with added fire, increased crit. dmg or faster attacks. I'd go for added fire or crit. dmg.

The pierce cluster is also a waste of points, you can save 4 passives and put them into DPS or better yet - herbalism life cluster.

I wouldn't go into Duelist area, but up toward Reflexes for more EVA, since you took Acro.

Either pick Mind drinker or find/craft a +1%/+2% mana leech item and drop BM gem for more deeps.

E: I see you already have mana leech on gear, why do you use BM then? I'm able to play my archer with 1% mana leech on around 100 unreserved mana.

E2: since you use frenzy, you should prob. pick up charges. 3 points for 2 charges is not a bad deal :)

E3: Also Hatred aura is a must here, remove Haste

I've got a very similar character to yours johnkeys, though I've never tried Atziri. Good to know I'll need more DPS if your 8k isn't enough. Though I'm not surprised, I felt L77 maps my DPS was a bit too low.

PS- I think your belt could easily be improved.

thanks for the great tips, Morbo.

specced out of pierce and into Herbalism. almost 3.5k life now which feels more durable.
I also took out Blood Magic from Frenzy, and replaced with Added Fire. almost 20k is nice, even if it now costs mana :)

Pierce was a relic from the good old Puncture days. swapped that out for Culling Strike which also gives extra damage, then switched LMP with GMP. tooltip DPS for Tornado Shot took a nose-dive, but a short test run in City Of Farm (ahem... Sarn) shows it's pretty effective.

and speaking of Sarn, that's not the best news I have.
casually jogging to Perpetus' house, I spot a wild blue Strongbox Of Singularity.
here's what came out:

On mobile so I can't really peek at the entire tree. First problem i saw tho was the weapon. Lioneyes crit is just far too low do a crit build and well, non crit is le suck. Old faithful can't really keep up with a half decent harbinger with crit. It seems you're going for phys crit. Alphas isn't necessary when all you need to run is hatred, ash and herald of thunder/curse on hit/ assassins mark. You'll have enough mana left over to sustain nado shot with 2% leech somewhere.
Rats nest is really nice, good crit and ms. Quivers nice. I'm a fan of the boots.
Aside from that your jewelry is holding the deeps back quite a bit. You pretty much want diamond rings and flat phys on both. Missing out on phys crit and multi on ammy as well. All the increased phys you're getting from the tree won't be doing its work without lots of flat phys on gear.
Crazy mirrored gear isn't needed for atziri.
I'm the ele version with windripper and I can clear the place in 5 min. I went the brute force route and just kill the bosses during Vaal haste. Ubers another story, I'm uhh workin on it.