[1.0] Complete Power Discharge Guide - Efficient Leveling Route & Detailed Gear Req.
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Hello,
The purpose of this thread is to group every available information regarding the DISCHARGE skill. The first part of this topic will present the skill and its mechanics. Discharge Discharge is a level 24 Intelligence skill dealing elemental damage depending on the number of accumulated charges. Each type of charge does a specific type of elemental damage: - An Endurance charge does fire damage - A Frenzy charge does cold damage - A Power charge does lightning damage The way the skill works is the following. When your character benefits from 1 or severals types of charges, the activation of Discharge will release a bolt of energy centered around your character while consuming every charge you actually benefit of. The charges will thus be consumed "in exchange" of the damage it produces. One important concept is that the skill, upon activation, benefits from all the bonuses the different charges are providing your character before they are consumed. This means that if you benefit from 3 Frenzy charges and 2 Power Charges, the cast time of discharge will be lowered by 15% (5% per Frenzy Charge) and its critical strike chance will be increased by 100% (50% per Power Charge) of the base critical strike chance, which is 8%. Each point of quality on the gem is increasing the area of effect radius of the skill as can be seen above. ____________________________________________________________________________________ [1.0 UPDATE] NEW SKILL TREE ____________________________________________________________________________________ The following section will present one of the most popular builds using Discharge. Power Discharger What is this build about? A power discharger refers to a build using Discharge in combination with Power Charges as the main source of damage. The build is focusing on critical strikes as primary source of damage while relying on granite flasks, High ES pool, instant ES leech and decent positioning to avoid deaths. The Keystones Chaos Innoculation - Maximum Life becomes 1, Immune to Chaos Damage Vaal Pact - Life Leech applies instantly Ghost Reaver - Life Leech applies to Energy Shield in stead of Life Unwavering Stance - Cannot Evade Ennemy Attacks - Cannot be Stunned This build is a build with a heavy burst of damage, which makes it very squishy against Elemental Reflect Maps or Auras. The only current way to counter this problem is Vaal Pact. The drawback of using Vaal Pact is the inefficiency of Health potions and the lose of Health regeneration. This is countered by relying on Energy Shield rather than on Life as main mean of survival. This choice forces us to use Chaos Innoculation and Ghost Reaver as well so that "Life Leech" becomes "Energy Shield Leech". The choice to use Unwavering Stance is mostly to counter the very long stuns that most CI characters are victims of. N.B.: This build is not efficient if the Eye of Chayula unique is used to replace Unwavering Stance since there is a very very good unique already taking the amulet slot. Bandit Quest Rewards Normal: Kill all the bandits for an extra skill point Cruel: Kill all the bandits for an extra skill point Merciless: Help Oak for +1 Endurance Charge or Alira for +1 Power Charge Oak should be helped if you are aiming at a slightly tankier build whereas Alira should be helped if you want a more glasscanon-ish build. Skill Tree Progression Normal
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Act1 Normal - 13 Skill Points The easiest way of going through normal is going Elemental Cleave Templar. Start by Rushing Amplify, Disciple and Training as well as Catalyse. You should be level 12-13 by now and should be using high attack speed swords or axes with the Cleave skill linked to Weapon Elemental Damage. Useful uniques for this phase are: Sadima's Touch, The Ingomon, Blackheart, Wurm's Molt, Ezomyte Peak. Act2 Normal - 29 Skill Points Act2 Normal should be pretty easy. Mind and Matter will help caping resists while Athleticism and Weight Lifting will help getting your Health pool up. Keep Cleaving and update your weapons as often as possible. Aim for some elemental damage on Jewelery. On 3L, add Life on Hit. Useful uniques for this phase are: Daresso's Salute & Aumrumvorax (if you have trouble caping resists). Act3 Normal - 40 Skill Points At this point, you should be heading towards Celestial Walker and Agility. This is one of the rought parts of the leveling since you will not be gaining much health from the passives. This is why it becomes crucial to have capped resistances and up-to-date life flasks as well as add granite flasks. Cleaving through the content should still be very easy due to good scaling of elemental sources. On 4L cleave, add mana Leech (RRRG). At this point, you should be leveling Discharge, increased area of effect and faster casting in second weapon swap slots. Useful uniques for this phase are: Lioneye's Paws (This is one of the best leveling uniques for this spec, it provides high Dex which is required to keep wearing swords and level gems). Cruel
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Act1 Cruel - 49 Skill Points Head down towards Vaal Pact and pick up the Life nodes on the path to it. Keep Cleaving through the content by updating frequently weapons and jewelery to fill your needs (Resists, Elem damage and Life). Useful uniques for this phase are: Goldrim if you lack resistances. Act2 Cruel - 58 Points Head down slowly towards Unwavering Stance and keep picking up every life node you can afford on the sides. Keep Cleaving through the content. If some zones are hard (Oak and Kraityn can be very hard with the current set up), do not hesistate to join some private parties. At this point, you should also be looking to aquire a Voll's Protector (Chest) and Voll's Devotion (Amulet) which we will start using in Act3 Cruel and on. Act3 Cruel - 67 Points Pick up Quickness, Unwavering Stance & Divine Toughness. At this point, you should be able to switch your weapons for Wand/Dagger + Shield or Double Wand/Dagger with spell power and Crit; cast speed is irrelevant. Your chest should be Voll's Protector (At least 4L: Discharge, Increased Area of effect, Life Leech and Mana Leech, all of which you should have leveled up (Life Leech can be used in stead of Life on Hit on cleave in the early to mid Cruel). You should also have a second piece of gear with 4Links, filled with: Ice Spear (lvl 1) + Faster Casting (Lvl'd up) + LMP/GMP + Critical Strikes. The Mana cost of your spells should be around: - Discharge: 34 (base) * 1.6 * 1.3 = 70 Mana. - Ice Spear: 7 (base) * 1.2 * 2 * 1.15 = 19 Mana. You can then start using Ice spear from far away until you stack up 4 Power charges (A couple of casts should be ) and then using Discharge to kill packs of monsters. An alternative way of building charges is to use a leveled Enduring Cry. Two or Three casts of Enduring Cry should build up 4 Endurance Charges which can also be used to kill packs of monsters. Merciless
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Act1 Merciless - 71 Points Nothing special, time to slowly head towards CI and Ghost Reaver. Put Goldrim back on if resistances are not capped early Merciless. Useful uniques for this phase are: Dream Fragments for the mana pool & Freeze Immunity. Act2 Merciless - 77 Points Pick up Instability and Deep Thoughts. At this point, your mana pool should be able to support an additional link on Discharge. Aim for Critical Strikes or Critical Damage depending on your overall crit chance. I have a personal preference for Critical Strikes since Critical strikes will replenish Power Charges and allow for a free extra cast of Discharge. Act3 Merciless - 85 Points Prepare for the CI transition, pick up Blast Radius, Deep Wisdom and get close to Doom Cast and Chaos Innoculation. This act is much easiler in party than solo. Things can go horribly bad if you do not get any crits on Ice Spears. Enduring Cry can still make up for this if you chose to go that way. CI Switch
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Level 70 Spec out of Divine Toughness (4Points), Weight Lifting (5Points), Athleticism (3Points), Discipline and Training (4Points), Catalyse (3Points) and the 6 Life Points near Vaal Pact (6Points). Total respec needed: 25 Points. Thus some regrets are needed in addition to the free repec point that are given in the various side quests that you should have done by now. Spec into Vaal Pact (1Point), Chaos Innoculation (6Points), Doom Cast (1Point), Unnatural Claim (2Points) and head towards Ghost Reaver (4Points), Bloodthirst (2Points), Critical Mass (3Points), Assassination (4Points), Spell Power (1Point) and complete the tree with an intelligence point in the templar tree to get the above skill tree. Total: 25 Points. At this point, critical strike chance should not be a problem anymore and for DPS purposes, Critical Damage gem is more important than Critical Strike gem. Level 75 Head towards Nullification and Body and Soul Level 80 Complete Body and Soul and Take Arcane Potency Level 86 Take Elemental Dominion, finish off ES nodes in the Shadow Part of the tree and take the Frenzy Charge on the shadow side of the tree. Pros and Cons Pros Very fun build to play Extremely Strong DPS on multiple targets Cons Squishy and sensitive to desync Relies on Charges to deal damage Low Single target DPS Required Gear
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Mandatory Uniques: Voll's Protector & Voll's Devotion & Dream Fragments Preferable Uniques: Rainbowstrides, Voidbringers & Void Battery Alternative Items: High Resists & ES Boots, High ES Mana Gloves & Divinarius/High Crit/Spell Weapon. Preferable Rares: Very High ES Helm, very high ES Shield with spell or spell crit preferably, High ES/RES Belt & Random Ring (Preferably giving High Mana). Poorman's Discharger:
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5Link Volls = 1.5 EX
Voll's Devotion = 1 EX 100ES Dual ResGloves = 1-4GCP 50ES Dual 1 res Belt = Craftable for around 30 Alts 300ES Helm & Shield = Couple GCP each, try to aim for a High res on shield, both should be buyable for 3-4 GCP each Divinarius = 0.5 EX 2 ES/RES Rings = 2 GCP Each Total = 2.5 - 3 EX In this case, need to use Dispel Frozen Flasks. Links on Gear
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Chest: Discharge, Increased Area of Effect, Life Leech, Mana Leech, Increased Critical Damage, Increased Critical Strikes (On 5L, drop Critical Strikes, on 4L drop Critical Damage).
Helm: Faster Casting, Blood Rage, Immortal Call, Increased Duration Boots: Purity, Discipline, Reduced Mana Gloves: Ice Spear (lvl 1), Faster Casting, GMP (lvl 1) & Chain (lvl 1) Weapon: Lightning Warp, Faster Casting, Reduced Mana Shield: Faster Casting, Enfeeble, Critical Weakness Gameplay Style
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Whatever the area you are entering, cast Blood Rage and activate both Purity and Discipline on your mana. The build does not allow us to run other auras since we have a very limited mana pool due to the drawback on Voll's Protector.
Run until you face a pack of monsters and start spamming GMP Ice Spear until you are full power charges, get closer to the pack, cast critical weakness then use discharge. If you crit, you will be back instantly to full power charges in addition to having 4 Endurance charges (Thanks to Voll's Devotion amulet) and probably 3 Frenzy Charges (Thanks to Blood Rage). You can then simply run to the next pack of monsters and Discharge it right away. If you didn't crit, you will only have Endurance Charges and Frenzy Charges left. At this point, if you are not in danger of dying, the best choice is to spam Ice Spear until you are back to full power charges. If you are in danger of dying and need to leech back Energy Shield ASAP, simply cast the discharge without power charges. 4 Endurance and 3 Frenzy charges are usually enough to get back to full Energy Shield in one cast. How to Deal with Reflect
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I often see people complaining that they die on reflect monsters with a power Discharger build. The way Discharge interacts with reflect is explained below.
Let's say you use Discharge on a pack of 2 Monsters which all have 18% reflection of elemental damage. The mechanics of the games are coded in a way that you will first deal damage to one of the 2 monsters with your discharge; you will suffer the 18% reflection (reduced by your own resistances) and then you will then leech back the 8.8% (Life Leech lvl 20) of damage done. You will then hit the second monster and the same exact procedure is true for this monster and all the subsequent ones as well. Thus, the only way to kill yourself on reflect is to die before you can leech back life, which is dying on a single monster's reflect. Since the 18% reflection of damage are reduced by your resistances (which should be at 78%-79% with purity. You actually suffer from 0.18*(1-0.78) = 3.96% of the damage you output. This means that the more damage you do, the more likely you are to die on reflect. The solution to NOT DIE on reflect is thus NOT TO HAVE TOO HIGH DAMAGE There are a couple of critical mistakes never to make when going into a reflect pack: Mistake n°1: Cast Critical Weakness. Using Critical Weakness against a reflect pack/in a reflect map will significantly increase the damage you deal to the monster, and thus the damage the monster deals back to you! Mistake n°2: Get up to Full Charges before casting Discharge. There is no need to get up 8 Power charges, 3 Frenzy Charges and 4 Endurance Charges before hitting the Discharge button. All these charges will only increase unnecessarily your DPS and also your change of dying. Going in with only 6-8 Power charges in more than enough most of the time. Mistake n°3: Neglecting Topaz Flask Using a Topaz Flask just when you are about to use a Highly Charged Discharge is very good since it almost divides by 2 the Lightning damage that is reflected back to you. Feel free to comment the skill tree or anything in this post. Will try to update according to the remarks you may make. Do not hesitate to ask questions, I will answer everything. You can add me IG to ask me questions shall you need. IGN: Stronkerthanbareskin --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Player Comments:
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" Last edited by Lydrica on Nov 9, 2013, 8:01:53 AM
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Thanks for the posting, just one question is that build viable at hardcore? And would you recommend it to new players?
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" Yea the build is viable on hardcore for sure. But you have to have some gear prepared before. Since the build is not using a pure ES chest, you severely lack ES at lower levels of gear. I would advice hardcore players to go into this only if they have some uniques already, such as 5L Voll's and Dream Frag/Rainbowstrides. I think it's okay for new players, but NOT for new players that are going hardcore straight away. | |
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Hey thanks for this guide on crit discharge, but how am i supposed to find someone who'll sell voll's devotion for just 3 gcp? Everyone sells it for at least 1.5 ex and im not swimming in currency.
IGN: Fumofu_Pendragon
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" Well prices may vary depending on what league you are in. Try to find a really low rolled one since it almost doesn't matter at all what kind of rolls are on it. If you really can't afford it, you can make this work without volls devotion. You either won't play with endurance charges (30% DPS loss), either you'll have to cast enduring cries from time to time | |
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Started using discharge at 35 lvl in onslaught league, now i'm at a2 cruel, goin well so far.
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" Nice to hear, I didn't think it would work DPS-wise to start using discharge so early. Be careful with reflect mods when you start merciless :) | |
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whats the best way to deal with single target?
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" I find there's 2 different ways of dealing with our low single target dps: 1. You have a second pair of gloves which you can put on Links: Freeze Pulse (max lvl) + GMP + Mana Leech + Inc Crit Damage 2. You swap around the gems and maybe drop Immortal call or some supports on either immortal call or bloodrage (remove Inc Duration i.e.) to put Discharge (20/20) + Conc Effect + Life Leech + Inc Crit Damage in Voidbringer Gloves. Indeed, Voidbringer gloves give +1 to the level of Discharge gem and grouped with Conc Effect, the second discharge will be very short radius (Conc effect reduction + No Inc area of effect gem) but will have three to four times the normal damage. Now, if you need to deal with Single target dps on a Reflect monster, it becomes very hard not to die with solution 2. I would thus opt for solution 1 even if it is annoying having to carry a second pair of gloves (Which should not be voidbringers, else you will never be able to sustain the high mana cost). | |
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Very nice and detailed Guide for discharge- thank you
RAAAAAAAA!
(╯ಠ益ಠ）╯︵ ┻━┻ ︵ ǝ︵ o︵ d I'm out. |
