Ranged Marauder

There don't seem to be a lot of threads regarding this particular build style so I figured I could add something to it.

Builds:
Resolute Technique (Blood Magic) 76/111

Crit (Blood Magic) 54/111 - Basic build, can branch out to several other nodes

Crit (w/ Mana) 64/111 - Can still branch out

Crit + Knockback (w/ Mana) 74/111

Crit + Knockback (Blood Magic) 69/111

Crit + Knockback (w/ Mana) v2 80/111

Elemental Damage 66/111 - gets Crit and Knockback, can still branch out, can go for either Mana or Blood Magic
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Points and tips:
- Status effects like burning and frozen proc on Crit.
- Bows are considered gimped without Crits (perhaps also for the above reason).
- Sustained spells, like Auras + Blood Magic = no good.
- Blood Magic is less effective at higher difficulties and is a problem to use with good attack speed without good HP regen.
- Iron Grip seems to be essential.
- Iron Reflexes is very good.
- Point Blank is interesting if survivability isn't an issue.
- Nodes like Piercing Shots, Heavy Draw, Fury Bolts, Master Fletcher, King of the Hill, Heartseeker, Deadly Draw, Heartpierce, Fending and Troll's Blood are the ones that you'd be interested in getting depending on your build choices.
- Catalyze and Celestial Walker are must haves for elemental damage.

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EDIT:
Somehow deleted the entire post by adding a link.
Redoing the work.
Most of the links are up again, as well as some tips. Let me know if I'm missing anything.

Honestly it looks like you could make it work well. What is your plan for skill gems and support? I ran around a bit with a marauder archer the other day and he killed much faster than I did.

My current skills gems include:
- Frenzy (used instead of regular auto-attack)
- Burning Arrow (main nuke)
- Poison Arrow (great DoT so far)
- Lightning Arrow (good AoE on close quarters)
- Rain of Arrows (I like having AoE)
- Anger (that extra Fire damage is nice)

For Support, I've been carrying around:
- Life Gain on Hit
- Weapon Elemental Damage
- Added Cold Damage

I also used to carry Wrath around with Anger but seeing how I'm using Blood Magic, I'd rather not abuse sustained spells.

Since this build doesn't really get many Int nodes, I think Mana would always feel scarce, so I'm content with Blood Magic so far.


I've not been getting a lot out of Frenzy, so I'm wondering whether to try to raise Attack Speed or not (haven't needed it so far, honestly).

Also reconsidering the Crit nodes. Apparently Bows don't have a very high crit rate, even with passives. Getting Resolute Technique could probably compensate for it and it would also mean I wouldn't have to bother with Accuracy nodes.

Hm. I wonder.

Passive skill tree build

How the build would look if I went with Resolute Technique instead of trying to build into Crit.


It certainly looks like the base damage would still be good. Getting those Greater Impact and Heavy Draw nodes was not something I could do before.

And it still leaves room for a few +Evasion/Armour nodes for survivability.

Maybe instead of going into +Evasion nodes, I could go just get more +HP nodes. By getting Resolute Technique, I'd be pretty close to the Life Leech node, so that's pretty nifty.

Plus, getting Golem's Blood along with Troll's Blood would be pretty great to keep churning out the spells with Blood Magic.

Passive skill tree build (more HP regen)

Still torn between going with Resolute Technique or going with Crit nodes.

What do you guys think?

The problem with getting Resolute Technique is that burning, the lightning increased damage debuff, and the forzen debuff are all activated when you crit. Chance to ignite can make up for this a little, but you still lose a lot of the elemental debuffs you would otherwise be able to get.

Not necessarily saying you shouldn't get RT though. Also you will need a lot of dex to use end game bows, and with that automatically comes accuracy, which well be wasted with RT.

"

h0b0_lemnade wrote:

The problem with getting Resolute Technique is that burning, the lightning increased damage debuff, and the forzen debuff are all activated when you crit. Chance to ignite can make up for this a little, but you still lose a lot of the elemental debuffs you would otherwise be able to get.

Not necessarily saying you shouldn't get RT though. Also you will need a lot of dex to use end game bows, and with that automatically comes accuracy, which well be wasted with RT.

^ What he said. He worded it well

Alright guys, thanks for your input. Wasn't aware that those effects procced with Crits.

I'm definitely more inclined to go with Crit nodes then.

I can't believe I missed this thread!

I also use a ranged Marauder build. Perhaps that only marauder in the top 10 is ranged as well? :P

I wanted to build a ranged character around Resolute Technique and Iron Grip. IOW a rapid gunner build that always hits. A Ranger would've used more skill points reaching RT, so it has to be the Marauder, located in between the two skills. Got both skills by level 18.

Here is my tree so far:



First its down to Resolute Technique, then to Iron Grip. After that we move into the Ranger tree as shown.

To make up for the lack of Criticals, every hit must count. The more hits, the more damage, which requires poison arrow, faster attack speeds and (so far) a fast Grove Bow (over 3 attacks per second). Currently at over 3000dps with the Anger and Hatred Auras with a Highborn bow. So there is still offensive power waiting to be tapped.

Well, that's all I have done! Made it all the way to Level 56, reached Merciless yesterday, hopefully I will enter Chaos by the end of this week! Need to get past Merveil. Gulp!

...and I still haven't assigned 20+ skill points, and it is a glass cannon admittedly. It's still fairly flexible, tight confines or distances snipe with poison arrow, with the Offensive Aura support; or in the open fields of Act 2, slot in the Point Blank skill gem to shotgun the apes and vipers in the face in one hit. For large mobs and bosses use Temporal Chain then run leaving a trail of poison behind while they walk into it, while smacking them in the face (no need for faster movement passives yet)


I can also go down several routes

Defense: Continue taking the life passives on the Marauder tree, (since RT negates Dexterity)

Offense: continue down the Ranger Tree, focusing on the bow speed passives and more projectile damage, and relying more on evasion and ES (from gear) more.

Hence saving all those passive points for Chaos (Haven't been there yet!). Can't wait!

Other tips from ranged Marauders are very welcome!!!

Props to the sellers! Aerlin, Lyfra...

Edit: I jus realized Burning arrow causes more overall DPS damage compared with Poison arrow, at least 20% more and costs 1/3 less mana :/

But with poison arrow as explained above is useful for Kiters and takes mobs down very effectively.