LA Shadow Build - In early Development

I've played a duelist for a long time, buff or not...I want something easy for a little bit ;p

I'm half asleep right now so I'm sure I'm missing critical things but would love a quick look.


^Link to build

Primary damage source: Lightning Arrow
Backup damage source(single target): Poison Arrow(at least for now...)
Other Gems: Unknown at this time

Summary of build
87 Passive Points spent
140% Life
+20 Max Life
+20 Max Mana
22% All Resist
15% Cold Resist
15% Lightning Resist
24% Chaos Resist
18% Evasion
18% Energy Shield
10% Energy Shield CD Recovery
7% Movement speed
39% Projectile Damage
46% Physical Bow Damage
74% Lightning damage
235% Crit chance
90% Crit damage
18% ASPD
2% ASPD with Bow
5% Shock Chance with Lightning
2% Mana Leech on Physical
Bandit Quests: +40 life, 12% Physical Damage, Passive Point(these are not included in the other parts)
124 Str
222 Dex
192 Int
(I think that's accurate...yay hand counting)

I see I can easily pick up the other little set of resists, though I'm not sure if I should drop something for them, or just increase the point count to 90. Outside of that...I'm pretty sure there's some optimizing that can be done here and there...but too tired to look for it right now. So if you guys see somewhere to optimize and squeeze more out, let me know.

Nice!, Im going to use your build to make my LA build but i modified it little bit.

going something like this...

Thought I'd come back and say that since I made this I've been doing quite a bit of tweaking. Most recently it occured to me that mana is going to be an immense issue. To help curb it, I've picked up clarity, and decided to pick up a number of mana/regen nodes to help with it even more. Right now the build stands at 104 points, so I still need to trim it down, but until then here is where it stands...

The spec


The stat summary


Gem use as of this time is Lightning Arrow paired with Fork(to be replaced with Chain), LMP, and Lightning Penetration. Back up/Complementary skills are Poison Arrow with Faster Projectiles, Explosive Arrow with Added Lightning Damage and Concentrated Effect, Clarity, Projectile Weakness, and Bear Trap.

Honestly to keep up with LA's immense cost you're going to need to use elderich battery, this also means you can run multiple aura's giving you more offence and defense. Also 140% life is low, you want at least 200% - Personally I think you're too damage invested.

You'd get more DPS out of the two 8% projectile nodes you're right next to at the ranger start than the 4 points you invested in getting 24% lightning damage.

140% HP is borderline acceptable since this build is for lvl 68 or so. And you have an ES buffer.

However, running on mana, at minimum you need that Deep Thoughts cluster, and you might need the small cluster to the right of the ranger start as well.

If you go EB that will solve your mana issues but take away your ES buffer, which means you'll need more HP.

Also the 15% crit nodes aren't terrible, but those points are usually better used elsewhere.

Yea I've been thinking about dropping the crit. The original idea was for shock, but I don't think I much care about it anymore.

As to the projectile vs lightning. 50% of physical becomes lightning, which means the 24% buff to lightning is equivalent to a 12% projectile boost. It would undoubtedly increase the damage from non-LA sources, but not LA itself.

As to this mana concern you guys seem to be having with the build. I currently estimate the build to sit with a pool of around 260+(after aura) with roughly 60.8 mana per second regen. You guys really think it's not going to hold in a hit and run spec?

LA costs around 100+ mana doesn't it (when linked)? And you will fire at around 2 APS so that would be 200 mana per sec, minus the 60 from regen leaves you with 140 mana to recoup. So you may need mana leech and decent mana pots.

"

LA costs around 100+ mana doesn't it (when linked)? And you will fire at around 2 APS so that would be 200 mana per sec, minus the 60 from regen leaves you with 140 mana to recoup. So you may need mana leech and decent mana pots.

140ish to be prescise, and that is 5 LS and NOT 6LS.

another issue of this build is that, it doesnt even have static blow, % shock is more important than lightning damage of it's own, it's mostly about being able to shock enemies.

140 huh? it's going to nearly quadruple in cost by linking one more skill? hrmm I dunno...

In-game screenshot of cost


The bow it's in


It's not maxed yet but still...quadrupling sounds pretty farfetched to me :\

EDIT: As to Static Blow...that's a long way to go for only 10%. And yea I don't have experience in maps/late merciless but...do mobs really live long enough for it to matter? Seems like if it comes down to getting shock to do the damage you're already in trouble. Besides, every time you crit, that's a shock, 5% innate chance to shock....I plan to have GMP and Proliferation....so...7 unique targets, each releasing 84 hits out...I think I'll get a few 5% procs out of that, a.k.a. 4, proliferated, they all have max stack. Every shot. Assuming there ARE 7 unique targets.

Usual 5L Lightning Arrow Setup:

Level 20 LA = 15 Mana
Weapon Elemental Damage = 15*1.7 = 25,5
Chain = 25,5 * 2 = 51
Life Gain on Hit = 51*1,5 = 76,5
LMP = 76,5*1,5 = 114,75 Mana

If you run GMP instead, it's over 150 Mana per use.