[No longer updated] Pizza Sticks: Flameblast Totem Hierophant

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viperesque wrote:

Hey all. I've been away from home since the start of beta so haven't had a chance to test yet, but so far this build seems pretty much unchanged, as we largely escape the impact of the DoT nerfs by being focused on initial hit damage. I will be testing as soon as I'm home (next week), but initial on-paper thoughts:

-Dual wielding as CI seems a lot less attractive with ES nerfs. Probably not feasible anymore.

-Pious Path got a big buff, probably the way to go for CI now.

-MoM (and Hierophant) become a lot more appealing, especially with the insane buffs to Cloak of Defiance and the small Hiero buffs.

-As yet unsure about the state of prolif for pack clear. Have to test that.

Anyone have any opinions on the above, or more to add? Anyone been testing on the beta?

CI really isnt appealing anymore IMO. Additional life affixes on armor+mind over matter+huge es nerfs makes life way more attractive

Carcass Jack got buffed to 40-50% area dmg. Still worse dmg than an infernal mantle but it's a nice compromise between life and dmg now.

Also you should really mention doryani's catalyst somewhere in the OP. Great wep.

I have some issues with defenses and don't really know what to do. Could someone look over my equipment and suggest what I should change first?

I get way too much damage from normal enemys and easily 1 or 2 shot at tier 2 maps bosses.

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Stats: http://imgur.com/a/yu2zl

Hey this build looks great! Would going life now make more sense since ES has been nerfed?

where is skilltree for hierophant??????????? my friend is playing one and we cant find a skilltree for hierophant version

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quetak wrote:

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LowBudget780 wrote:

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quetak wrote:

why not use 2x herald - thunder+ice instead of anger? Dps wise its circa same, reservation is same but you got heralds effects + short freeze and shock. I just swithed to it and it feels much better.

Because Anger scales with the fire damage from FB.

but same does lightning and cold I think. "110% more Spell Damage for each stage" means all spell damage not only fire. Maybe if someone has lots of +% increase fire damage by passives its better to use Anger.
I dont have dmg meter so I cant say its better 100%. My tooltip dms is same as with anger so I guess it will be same also on flameblasts max stage.
And that shattering undeath, crabs ect. is awesome.

I agree on the numberwise DPS. There is no big difference on tooltip, with Anger having a slight advantage (At least on my char+gear)

As far as I have a grasp on the mechanics of PoE, Anger is good for burning damage.
So fire damage influences burning damage. Having the 2 Heralds active gives other nice benefits but has no impact on the burning damage.

I will go for 2Heralds, too. I want to see how quality affects the numbers and what is the final form. Also I find it appealing that I can run only one Herald in case Mana is a problem (on low regen maps for example) instead of switching of Anger.

Currently I chose between 2 Heralds, Arctic Armour and Vitality on my LHC char. Mostly I run 2Heralds + Vitality.

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squabby wrote:

I have some issues with defenses and don't really know what to do. Could someone look over my equipment and suggest what I should change first?

I get way too much damage from normal enemys and easily 1 or 2 shot at tier 2 maps bosses.

Stats: http://imgur.com/a/yu2zl

Overall defense is awful low. If you go Life, then you should prefer Armour bases.
You currently miss life on 3 items.
Why Slitherpinch Gloves? They add nothing special to this build.
Why is Temp Chains not in the gloves with OoS-CoH-PCoC?
Remove MasterMod from second Dagger and replace with something more useful.
Where is you Movement skill, Whirling Blades+Faster Attacks+Fortitude for dual daggers?
You urgently need to cap lightning, you risk getting shocked often with that number. Shocked means more damage when you get hit, resulting in frequent deaths.
Try getting a suitable shield and see if you have better survivability. (with shield you can opt in Shield Charge as movement skill)


And your chars are on private, so no chance to see the tree for other users and help you there.
I guess, you could improve the tree, too.

How about your playstyle? You getting one-shot hints me that your way to tackle bosses need improvement, too. This build is not built for facetanking or stand around anywhere, where he gets hit. Even strong blue mobs have a chance to pummel you to death.

Armor does nothing. Dont bother with armor bases.

So guys.. that build is broken to 3.0?
And about new support gems, cannot help with fire/burn dmg?

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LowBudget780 wrote:

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punkerox27 wrote:

So guys.. that build is broken to 3.0?
And about new support gems, cannot help with fire/burn dmg?

Yup build is destroyed in 3.0. Checked it out in Path of building, lost nearly 3k ES 10.5k to like 7.6 and secondary ignite damage went from over 100k to like 8k due to the double dipping nerf, lol

Completely disagree with the build being dead. The new shield mods make using a shield pretty much just as good as dual wielding in terms of DPS, so you can throw out the second dagger, rejig the tree a bit and end up with the same ES and initial hit DPS as before. The loss of a ton of ignite DPS does suck, but going from 500k to 400k total DPS does not exactly kill the build. Will only be noticeable against the tougher bosses.

What does seem pretty dead from my paper testing is the Hiero version. DPS drop is now just way too​ much - a single inquis totem deals as much damage as four hiero totems to a boss.

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LowBudget780 wrote:

Yeah I agree somewhat. I rolled this build on life earlier on in the league and it was pretty good up until t15, so life if still viable but it still felt way squishier than CI.

I'm trying to work on that right now. I think I have a fairly promising MoM version mocked up - lose a fair bit of DPS compared to CI but CI is always going to have to be the top tier version of the build I think. Tankiness is same as or better than CI - 166% life on tree and MoM (can potentially add Cloak of Defiance but I'm not convinced on paper that it has the mana pool for 50% MoM - will have to try in-game). Also tried theorycrafting a noncrit Hiero version with Aylardex(!!!) for 68% MoM - DPS is halved compared to CI Inquis but very very tanky. Options to consider.

Amusingly the crit Hiero version I was trying to salvage earlier didn't do any more damage than the noncrit supertank version does. Sigh.

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My main concern is that ES levels on gear are going to be lower in 3.0 all around so it will be near impossible to get close to anything that will be sufficient for defense considering we don't have potions. Right now I am sitting at 11.1k ES (Swapped out my boots from the post earlier) with a shield and chest that you won't even be able to acquire in 3.0 and according to Path of Building I will only have 8436K ES with the extra 3 nodes leftover from CI allocated to ES. I don't think 9-9.5K ES is enough for this build (If you can even get that much) and I wouldn't want to sacrifice damage for more of it. Ignite Damage isn't as big of a deal, I am still able to kill all of the guardians without any ignite so that aspect of the build is still safe.

I've never gone above 9k ES with this build due to my love of dual-wielding, and had no issues with any content up to and including Shaper. That said I am a confirmed softcore scrub.

Also, I think with the buffs to it and the general drop in tankiness, the Pious Path route is now going to be the way to go for CI. Still Instruments/Augury for life.

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I actually think the ES nerfs are a bit ridiculous considering instant leech has been scrapped from ES completely. They should just leave it alone and let people stack it considering the drawbacks. I really hope they change it before 3.0 because right now it sucks.

Yeah it does seem a bit much at present. I'm hoping they backtrack on at least one of the many nerfs.