Im new, Marauder is Overpowered. This Game is AWESOME!

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fadeawayyx wrote:

You are correct on many points. I think +life, blood magic, % based life regen, resolute technique, elemental dmg mods are all op.
However..


Consider using the blood magic support gem instead of the blood magic passive.
This means your mana bar is free for purity/haste etc (% based auras).
I'm not saying it's the best way, in fact I prefer blood magic passive as the support gem slot is worth a lot to me. Hi lmp/chain/wpn ele dmg/life gain/culling/faster attacks.. omg why waste one of those for blood magic support gem. I also still have the chance to get % based auras from team members.


Now consider that the highest dps you will do is by stacking static +ele dmg mods on your gear. Even with a high level bow with a decent +physical dmg mod (+25-45 sounds good) you'll still struggle to break 100 average damage per shot unmodified.. (check the item and affix pages). Compare that with the 400 or so base elemental damage you're doing from mods. +10% elemental damage is roughly on par with +50% physical damage once you hit high level auras, inner focus, high level weapon/amulet/ring damage mods.

All of a sudden iron grip giving you an extra 40 or so physical dmg per hit doesn't look like it's scaling very well. That's the reason Nug specced OUT of iron grip at high lvl. You could even say that all of a sudden the witch passives giving +30% fire and +30% lightning (all of your ele dmg comes from these 2) for 6 points is looking pretty sweet.

So now we have even less point to being in marauder zone.


Note: just noticed a stray 2 passive points spent to the right of inner focus by accident. Ignore em.
The problem is... one of the most optimal ranged non-spell (aka bow) builds looks like this:
http://s7.postimage.org/ppvgigv7v/raudbow.jpg
And with just 68 points spent after picking up resolute technique, blood magic, templar +60% elemental dmg, 2.9% hp/sec, +5% max ele resists, static blows and inner focus...
Notice this SHELL is pretty much what nug, petrov, kripp, and that dude who talks in all caps and claims he has the best hc build ever in the marauder forums all use or used.

welll, where else are you going to go after you have this shell? If you want to start as a ranger like nug did you'll have to follow option 1.



Option 1:
You can either head south and grab unwavering stance, berzerking, curve round to golem blood +1.5% more hp regen and 28% more life, then north-east into ranger territory where you pick up a very useful 30% more ele damage, +15% all resists and just under +100% more life if you fancy it. http://s11.postimage.org/sdq8ba4c3/bowraud2.jpg All this and you've only just hit 100 points.
At this point you're so close to the ranger zone you COULD have started as a ranger. Personally I think armour and evasion are terribad so being forced to spend 4 points on evasion straight away would turn me off that idea. For the same reason I don't bother taking the +50% armour nodes or leather & steel down near berzerking. IR choice is up to you.

Option 2:
Go grab zerking and unwavering stance (seriously, for 4 points from blood magic that's a bargain).
Then instead of heading to ranger territory, head up towards iron grip like so:
http://s7.postimage.org/xdnexw07f/bowraud3.jpg
For a very similar cost (~100) to going towards the ranger zone you get similar hp (actually a couple of nodes of +life less, but ~40 more base hp from strength), similar elemental resists since you skipped diamond skin but picked up the 3 nodes in the center on the way to the 30% elemental dmg nodes to mimic the ones you would have found in the ranger zone. As you can see the net result of option 2 is actually very similar to option 1, only this way you lost out on a bunch of dex which you may have needed and picked up iron grip which like I said, imo is overrated.

Option 3:
I'm clutching at straws here now. I'm trying to offer a suggestion which ISN'T "farm the life nodes around marauder". I'd rather have the life nodes, but for a 30 point investment which leaves us at a similar # spent as option 1/2, we could grab the elemental damage nodes in the templar caster starting zone, and then grab the fire and lightning clusters near witch.
http://s3.postimage.org/wnvkaym8z/rauderwitch.jpg
This gives us almost +100% to both fire and lightning damage. When you consider your elemental damage out-damages your physical damage by about 4:1 BASE with high end gear and auras, this is actually a pretty spectacular damage bonus. Lightning arrow gets an added boost too. Rather nasty loss of around 100% in life nodes though..

Other options could include spending ~30 points grabbing zerking, unwavering, all 3 +armour clusters, the nearby +leather and steel cluster, and the duelist's hp cluster. Or perhaps upwards to the curse cluster. Neither of these give us a starting place better than marauder though.


What I'm trying to say is that the shell I originally linked which I believe to be one of the top specs in the game (Resolute, blood magic, static blows, inner focus, catalyze, +5% max ele resist) is very difficult to evolve into something which is just as good as if you had started as any class other than marauder. All other starting zones offer something which is irritating or useless. Duelist melee, templar mana regen, witch wastes several points on int/spellpower before even hitting our intended path, ranger is doable if you don't mind evasion...