[3.0] How to Flicker. Two Handed Weapon Edition!

That's just not how percentages work..

Kills per cast is valid. but, its also kills per stack of frenzy's not just one.


Foils have a 20% crit multi innate.
You do know that right? DW foil is global 40%
Daggers, of course, variable crit chance.

dw demon daggers.
7.28% 60% global.
52 average damage. 1.2 a/s
16% crit chance DW 150%. 8% damage increase.

Vaal rapier.
5%, 20% global crit multi
55 average damage. 1.2 a/s
5% crit chance, 210%. 5.5% damage increase.
DW vaal rapiers alone makes 1% crit,a 1.1% damage increase.

Daggers having higher crit chance just means you should invest in that more, then phys. (phsy is obviously still needed.)
But the basic math still says every attack should have some value of crit.

Its the same concept of "MORE physical damage". that damage is being multiplied into the rest of your damage. So 30% more physical damage is significantly more then +50% physical damage. crit is doing the same thing, and multiplying into that "more damage as well". you wouldn't pass up "another 10% more damage".
1.5*400*10*1=6000
1.5*401*10*1=6015
1.5*400*10*2=12000
extreme example. but adding 20% more to your other 400-600 physical damage is a minor total dps increase, compared to minor increases to that crit multiplier. 100% crit chance, and 35% crit multi will quadruple your crit damage ratio. from, 2.5 to 10% damage. How much +physical damage would it take to raise your total damage 7.5%?

Accuracy evening out, thus not making crit worth it, makes no sense. Esp since accuracy even comes in boatloads for 1 hand sword/dagger passives...
Last edited by Casia on Sep 2, 2014, 6:58:05 PM
Oh well i said what i had to say :)
Everyone is free to try out and test whatever combinations they like ^^
"I'm going to show you pain you never knew existed, you're going to see a whole new spectrum of pain!!!!! Like a RAINBOW!"
Where did you even get all that int for max level increased area of effect from?
The INT requirements for that gem are not that high .. and the answer of course is gear .. although you dont need it at high level .. it's just a luxury ;)
"I'm going to show you pain you never knew existed, you're going to see a whole new spectrum of pain!!!!! Like a RAINBOW!"
First of all , thanks for this guide. It's really well done.

I have always, _really_ wanted a 2H flicker build.

I started my duelist and for no particular reason ended up using cleave, and frenzy single target.

However I have been leveling the gems necessary for this build, esp flicker, melee splash, and multistrike so that I could try it out.

Here is my current build:



here is where i think that i will end up, but _definitely_ subject to change.



One thing i'm definitely going to try, although i don't expect it to be worth it, is to try applying crit. You can see that in my current tree. I _have_ to try it because i have a really nice sword with 6.3% crit chance,

Spoiler



so it would be lame to not at least try it out. also slashing comeback gives you excellent damage along with excellent accuracy boost. i have exactly 1 piece of gear with accuracy on it and i'm @ 93% right now.
The most obvious thing that probably isn't very smart, is i want to keep evasion so that i can use ondar's guile which is my favorite keystone in the whole tree. But as you point out in your guide, you are fairly immune to projectile attacks due to the teleporting. I expect i will go IR at some point.

WOW! what fun ! what lol's !

A few things i've noticed:

* 4L frenzy is incredibly effective. i was just amazed at how well it works. i can't wait to get a 5L.

* keep your granite running. i run with 2 granites and keep them up at all times. your kill rate means they recharge as fast as you need them to. more important for me since i'm not yet using IR.

* throw warlord's curse on a mob before starting flicker to really boost your survivability.

* i think blood dance are really good for this build. since you are keeping up frenzy charges you get that wonderful regen. (a pair with 28% frenzy chance dropped for me- that was really nice).

For a 4L i think running mana is the way to go. you do a lot of physical damage so between warlord's mark and mana leech on gear you are good to go. a blood magic link would really hurt the damage.

The advantage of having cleave/frenzy to fall back on, is of course for party play. However flicker makes such a great single target attack i'm going to try and come up with a set-up that allows me to always keep it slotted. Or maybe a secondary weapon for it so i can switch back and forth.

I just completed a run through lunaris and it was just hilarious.

it's just bunches of fun, but it definitely gives me a headache to play it too long, lol.

thanks again for the guide. i've spent a lot of time reading it :-)
I must say that crit is not the best thing for this build. Besides that 6.3% crit is not really a high base crit chance, dealing critical strikes can be extremely dangerous. You can end-up one-shotting yourself vs reflect.. and with flicker strike it's hard to avoid reflect packs because you can't really control it. Vaal Pact is the thing that saves you from reflect .. but with life based flicker striker you need life regeneration .. and unfortunately vaal pact prevents it.
I won't even mention that you dont won't to miss hits .. and that is unavoidable without Resolute technique ... no matter how much accuracy you have you'll still miss some hits.

A good weapon to be used for a crit 2h flicker build would be a staff because they have higher base crit chance and a lot of staff only crit nodes .. but again ... reflect is unbearable .. i'm saying this because i've tried it ;)
"I'm going to show you pain you never knew existed, you're going to see a whole new spectrum of pain!!!!! Like a RAINBOW!"
"
KorgothBG wrote:
I must say that crit is not the best thing for this build. Besides that 6.3% crit is not really a high base crit chance, dealing critical strikes can be extremely dangerous. You can end-up one-shotting yourself vs reflect.. and with flicker strike it's hard to avoid reflect packs because you can't really control it. Vaal Pact is the thing that saves you from reflect .. but with life based flicker striker you need life regeneration .. and unfortunately vaal pact prevents it.
I won't even mention that you dont won't to miss hits .. and that is unavoidable without Resolute technique ... no matter how much accuracy you have you'll still miss some hits.

A good weapon to be used for a crit 2h flicker build would be a staff because they have higher base crit chance and a lot of staff only crit nodes .. but again ... reflect is unbearable .. i'm saying this because i've tried it ;)


I understand, and i fully expect to spec RT, _if_ I decide to make this a "full time" flicker build. I almost did run a staff build, but I wanted to use a sword damnit, because Samurai ;-)

I'm not really running this as a "full time" flicker build right now, I'm just doing it occassionally.

So the crit actually _might_ make sense when I'm running frenzy/cleave. I could, with very minor changes in the tree, be running 20-25% crit chance and then, of course, i would be able to watch for reflect.

Mostly I just wanted to show you how different my tree was and demonstrate that it still works really well (without RT even). Also I was really surprised how well it works with just a 4L and only 4 frenzy charges ! I'm waiting to level and then I'm going to spec another frenzy charge and start running some maps to see how things work.

Basically, I'm saving my regrets ;-)
Been following this build(axe version), working quite nicely.

I had a 20% Flicker Strike which made me want to do this build. I see now that you get Resolute Technique though. Do you have any crit variant that you would recommend?

How bad would it be without Resolute Technique?
IGN: The_Lurch
Well in my opinion not as good. And there are a couple of reasons for that.

1. Axes, maces and swords have low base crit chance. and that leads to..
2. inability to get high crit chance to make up for the 100% chance to hit loss
3. Inability to stack large amounts of crit multiplier
4. Staves have awesome base crit chance and there are great staff only crit nodes BUT
5. Crit is DEADLY without instant life leech vs reflect
6. You can't use Vaal Pact to get instant life leech because you need life regeneration to counter the use of Blood Rage


Overall if you want to do a 2h life based crit flicker strike build - staves are the way to go but that way it is a lot more likely for you to die.


The way to run a crit flicker striker is to use daggers + CI or if you happen to have the Atziri gloves.
"I'm going to show you pain you never knew existed, you're going to see a whole new spectrum of pain!!!!! Like a RAINBOW!"
Thanks for the reply. I guess I will stick to your build. Can always use the extra crit from from flicker quality on another character.
IGN: The_Lurch

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