[Guide] How to make a build

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Incompetent wrote:

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VoxelSquid wrote:

Perhaps you can put more emphasis (ie, a whole new paragraph in bold) on stacking life for non-CI builds? I think the reason why we keep seeing threads titled "armour/evasion/energy shield sucks" is because many new players think that just stacking ar/ev/es is enough to protect them.

I think this is often what it comes down to. There are also perils in having very low (hypothetical) life on a CI build: you are very vulnerable to stun, shock and chill/freeze. It doesn't totally undermine the concept of stacking ES instead of life, but it's something you have to be aware of when playing such a character.

Yes, I agree, although once a player switches to CI, I suspect it may be more advantageous to get stun reduction nodes/mods instead of (hypothetical) life.

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panplan wrote:

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schisist wrote:

You forgot to mention you can also Evade and Dodge Chaos attacks.

I didn't forget. I just think that evasion in general is an unreliable mechanic for all types of damage, not just chaos. New players should adopt a safer approach to get used to the game. Once they have known things throughout, attempting at more risky builds would then be reasonable. Besides, as I asked someone before, is it possible to dodge the chaos damage from the chaos damage over time aura wielded by a bear-form mob? I don't remember the exact name of that type of mob but they are in the first level of a multi-leveled dungeon.

Why do you focus on chaos damage when comparing armour and evasion when armour does absolutely nothing against it? At least with evasion you get a chance to avoid most chaos attacks. Evasion + Arrow Dodging builds are actually extremely strong against stuff like chaos spitting snakes, poison arrow archers and Vaal Constructs which are some of the most dangerous mobs in the game, especially for armor builds who have nullified their evade chance.

You should at least make a note about evasion mechanics in this game, in that it is deterministic and inherently prevents hit streaks (if you have over 50% evade chance you can never get hit twice in a row). I think it's also worth to mention the fact that no matter how much evasion/block/dodge you have you will get hit at some point and need to have enough life to not get oneshotted.

If there was a mechanic I would advice to avoid as a new player for first character it would be Chaos Inoculation but not Evasion.

In any case, the rest of the stuff in this thread is great tips for new players (if they want to build a cookiecutter character that is).

-Ropetus

-1, do not sticky

your opinion doesn't make mechanics disappear.

this 'guide' is just a guide on how to build characters YOU like and are familiar with.

As I said I did mention evasion rating, without converting it to armor using Iron Reflex, in Shadow. There are many reasons I didn't go into details of this mechanic such as:
- There are not many available guides about successful evasion build (even though there are individual reply posts claiming success of such build). Actually I haven't seen any.
- The reason why I place emphasis on armor is because classes or players having high armor naturally have 200-300+ Strength as well as high life. That amount will prevent them from being one-shot by chaos damage. On the other hand, evasion build, especially by witch and shadow will at best have 150+ Strength with inferior life nodes and either they have to invest more than the usual number of skill points for life or having less than enough life to withstand a strong chaos attack.
- Exactly because chaos goes through armor and energy shield cannot recover at will unless you are out of combat or take Ghost Reaver as well as complex combination of gears, gems and flask usage to make it work (not to mention I haven't even attempted such a build yet) I don't really want to recommend new players working on that build when they haven't even been successful with easier builds.

I would love to add such a section about evasion build if any experienced player in this area can write about it, such as what the least necessary to make it work, an example of a successful build, possible skill and tactic, etc.