Breakdown of Ranged specializations and builds in Dungeon siege 2
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- Опубликовано: 26 июн 2021
- Website: www.almarsguides.com
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Charged Shots, which you like very much because of low maintenance, has a critical flaw: It's lightning damage, doesn't benefit from Amplify Lightning, and doesn't benefit from your weapon damage. It is literally flat damage added to bows and crossbows that aren't as set to make use of it as throwing weapons, on top of lacking synergies. If you can control your party well enough, take aim will work better most of the time. All you have to do is to click (either right or left) on the target after hitting the button for take aim to order an attack with take aim.
Spending for rune of blood and execute: 100% not worth it in a vanilla broken world setup. As discussed earlier, Thunderous Shot does more than enough AoE, and take aim more or less neutralizes boss encounters. Execute does not do enough single or multi target damage to make it worth using, because it's always better to stun a boss and take out it's lackeys that can cause damage, or burst it down with take aim. Rune of Blood takes too long to activate, and does not scale with your weapon.
On flurry, it solidifies the ranged/ranger character as a bona-fide melee specialist with AoE, since you want to hit with all three of your shots. This isn't that helpful when you are rather squishy, which is through most of the campaign.
Living Death: 100% worth it as it is so easy to do a pair enchanted legendary tier gloves or a ring for a bucketload of fire resistance (+spirit embrace also boosts fire-ice-lightning resist and is the best general purpose embrace spell), while physical resist is much harder to come by.
Now, let's do a bit of numbers crunching for Rune of Blood and Thunderous Shot for AoE purposes.
This assumes no mods, level 100 ranged, level 80 combat magic, 750 dexterity, and a weapon with 100 ranged damage base, the bare minimum skill points spent on biting arrow (12), and an otherwise naked character.
With that our damage is 100+225 from dexterity, with a 37% ranged damage bonus, totaling at a nice 445.
Now, let's look at Rune of Blood level 3: 8550 damage, rounded down. ((58 + 14.5 * ((#src_ranged + #src_combat_magic_level + 15) * 0.5)) * (2.30 + 0.036 * ((#src_ranged + #src_combat_magic_level + 15) * 0.5)))
Thunderous Shot level 3 damage %: 2250% (800 + 14.5 * #src_ranged)
Thunderous Shot damage with the aforementioned skills and gear: 10012, rounded down.
The main takeaway from this is that even at the barest minimum, which no self respecting ranged player would stop at, thunderous shot does more damage and has the utility of a stun.
On the topic of throwers and bow&crossbow being different because AoE:
I find Thunderous Shot to be a very good AoE option, not only clearing out a lot of semi-trashy mobs, but also for stopping beefier enemies that are clumped together, giving you some breathing room on top of that. As mentioned in another comment, with enough life steal Ravaging Strike becomes a second thunderous shot, just without the stun component. But if you go thrower and your main AoE consists of aping thunderous shot, then perhaps picking bow and crossbow would have been a better choice in the first place. Looking at shrapnel blast I see a very weak (half of thunderous shot) blast with strong projectiles (9 at lv3, double of thunderous shot damage), which is ironically probably better served against fewer enemies with large hitboxes.
Since both powers are based on weapon damage (as opposed to scaling from your dexterity), it's worth noting that Biting Arrow boosts ranged weapon damage, so while the %-s of each power may balance each other out, it just happens that thunderous shot will deal about 65-70% of the shrapnel pieces' damage to everyone in the much larger area.
The other component of AoE, Ricochet vs Shockwave, is entirely a matter of playstyle: If you run a mixed party, you'll get a lot more use out of ricochet, since the combat will be close quarters no matter what. If you play a fully ranged party (ranged +nature mage, with optional combat mage), then you have the option to micro your party so that most enemies (which are slow) stay in shockwave range or behind each other for penetrate to do it's work. It also makes skills like Ravaging and Thunderous shots easier to use since your party moves in mirror mode as a singular blob, rather than being spread out on the battlefield.
Now for the fun part that makes Throwers and Bow&Crossbow users different is bleed: Bleed rewards stacking dexterity and popping ricochet and penetrate everywhere, but doesn't stack, so multiple pure throwers do not work together all that well. Note also that by prioritizing dexterity over ranged damage bonuses, a thrower gains even less base weapon damage to scale the powers on. Notable however, is how throwers gain bonuses from flat damage. Flat on rings (jewels of the nexus set), blood assassin marks, ctc like Shred Blood (which isnt DoT but a single time bonus hit so it stacks) and so on work very well with throwing weapons doing multiple hits, especially while flurry is in play. Even better, with Wrath of the Bear in play, the lack of mortal wound becomes a nonissue and throwers can do well in a crit-focused setup.
Damn so much content to cover here, I just wanna say I really love the podcast style you utilize in these videos, its not really something too many youtubers are doing and its really nice to have something to listen to while playing games for sure! Wanted to add to your thoughts when discussing shred blood, people have to understand that stats work the same in dungeon siege 2 as they did in dungeon siege 1, if you invest time in a certain skill line, you will obtain the corresponding attribute. Unlike Dungeon Siege, in DS2 Broken World, the hybrid spell enhancements split the XP for you (super lazy but love it, wish they had it in game 1, or for cross nature/combat in game 2) so as a blood assassin, your intelligence will already be higher than the average archer, and balanced somewhere between standard archer and mage, not quite either, as the class is intended. Therefore shred blood is ALWAYS do more damage on a blood assassin than on an archer with the points invested but no further leveling in combat magic to boost intelligence. This also makes chant of stone much better on a blood assassin than on a standard archer, because your intelligence will naturally be higher, which is an awesome thing ;) Also, most blood assassin gear and set pieces up to midgame have a decent chunk of intelligence built into their stats, giving you a balance of both (though if you enchant your own gear its better to go full dex at least for throwing weapon builds) Another little gem I found out that might merit further testing is with regards to mark abilities. I was of mind with you in that marks are basically useless unless you use execute, I much prefer shades agility or repulsion. But I noticed something when dabbling in the combat magic tree, in a straightup comparison - shade's agility adds about 80% less damage overall than any of the marks (high end of the attack roll) or compared to something like mana strike, however the marks benefit from specific combat magic skill lines (not that you'd want to invest too much here, but for testing sake I played around) grim necromancy affects mark of the harvest on hit ability (maybe possibly the execute too? Idk I don't really like that execute doesn't hit more than each marked target), which leads me to believe that ALL corresponding combat magic skills will treat the individual marks as combat magic spells. This would make devastation add to their damage, along with specific spell line buffs like grim necromancy, amplified lightning and searing flames. This makes me wonder if maybe they are also linked to their second tier abilities as well, like if the flame mark will activate ignite, or vampirism will heal you even more from the mark, going to test more and find out, would be cool if ignite works and procs a 4th dot for blood assassins to just use at will :) Thanks again for the content, will see you on the next one!
I looked at the template, and base damage bonuses on mark of the harvest benefit from Improved Weapon Enhancements, Devastation and Grim Necromancy. Rending is the black sheep as it has no combat magic elemental passive to benefit from, so it only takes from Devastation and Improved Weapon Enhancements.
Execute damage on these spells ignores Improved Weapon Enhancements and takes bonuses from Mark Mastery instead.
Awesome, keep the game alive :)
Another really enjoyable one man, thank you so much for putting in the time and effort! Just wanted to make a few points, bow and crossbow is coupled together but has a distinction, most ranged powers (not blood assassin) deal damage based on your overall weapon damage per shot (much like melee ones will always deal more with 2hand as it's higher per single hit). So when designing ranged build, bow gives you faster hits and therefore more opportunities to crit (provided you don't have 100% through items and such) whereas crossbow deals much more substantial single target hits making it far superior in dealing out damage with powers. So if you want a similar marksman playstyle, you choose crossbow for power damage, and bow for faster hits (more overall dps if you include less costly misses and such). Another point was with regards to power recharge speed, I like how you put it how if your powers are always off cooldown anyways then absolutely right it serves no purpose. However if you are a person who wants to blow powers as soon as they are available, even in trash mob fights to clear the game faster or if you just prefer the powerful style of combat that offers, then you aren't wasting points in power recharge rate. Every % from point invested stacks with the various items that also provide power recharge speed, and they serve a very distinct purpose. Powers that you may want up ALL the time might be combat mage orb of energy for sustained dps, it can recharge while active so that would aid you in keeping the power up 100% of the time. Orb of energy is a very fast recharge however, but another power that benefits far more from such recharge rate is the nature power invulnerability, this power can recharge when active, and if you have enough points and gear invested, you can maintain invulnerability permanently in sustained combat. Super useful in bossfights that have unavoidable environmental effects, however it does trivialize some otherwise intense and fun fights.
Final thoughts I had were with regards to ravaging strike, just wanted to point out that with both powers sitting at 3rd rank ravaging strike deals 500% more weapon dmg on its attack than thunderous shot, with identical stun time (thunderous at 1221% for me and ravaging strike at 1771%) although the ravaging strike drains a substantial portion of your available health pool, this is offset the same way as you mentioned in your blood assassin video, where if you have even 5% lifesteal, you will be up at full health upon the power making contact with basically any enemy. I also find that the dot Ignite Blood on RS is decent on mercenary and vet, but basically useless in elite so that might be a wasted point past level 60ish. Ravaging strike also can proc bleed, and serves a very special purpose I'm only just testing out, which is that it can be used with throwing weapons (idk why I thought otherwise) this makes ravaging strike basically a throwing weapon thunderous shot, with extremely far range when you hit the max available with a throwing weapon, the power continues basically doubles the range of throwing weapons and hits everything in a decent radius and straight line. I often prefer this to shrapnel blast which deals more initial damage to first target hit, but shrapnel hits hit for only 305% of weapon damage, and only have a chance to hit targets around them, if they miss they do no damage, and I find that sort of unreliable. Maybe you should try out ravaging strike with the throwing weapon build, and just see how you feel about it, I use it to provide extra range and deal aoe damage where I also need a stun, it seems to suffer the same issues as take aim though, where there are times it just won't fire unless your playing the character, which is a pain in the ass. Good luck in all your future videos, I enjoy them very much!
Just heard something a little later, with regards to health steal it disregards how much health you have, health steal is in relation to damage dealt, which is why it doesn't take very much health steal on a dps class to even maintain full health, I wanted to mention this in the combat magic video, as with death magic you pointed out that it basically serves no purpose. Death magic builds are build for dealing various amounts of dps both single target and aoe are covered extremely well by their spell kit, as well as their debuff being tied to a dot much like drown in infect, but the REAL purpose of death magic builds is to have a combat mage you don't have to babysit. They heal themselves to full with basically every attack, so they are kind of fire and forget turrets, and often will even outlast your tanks as long as you keep them firing, use leech life for single target to maintain full health, or soul lance/skulls/impale for aoe healing on self. But yea they're damage is extremely random, but mainly just there to survive and not be squishy.
Glad you enjoy the series i put together on this game, I had a lot of fun with the game and doing the series =D
I am not used to high difficulty, but I have finished the game once (novice). Few days ago I decided to try again as archer and found blood assassin way. As I am just a fan of big crossbows and lazy to manage several heroes I played only by one. I found a bug: when you move your character after a shot, you can instantly shoot again, this means if you have enough APM, your damage increases! Now I use a crossbow with reagent from quest in Aman'lu and it's insane! I have no problems now , I just do brrrrrrrrt for every one or mute them ( ultimate silence ) .I tried double sword build and it's really hard: low damage, low distance, no money, no good weapon(
Thanks for your guide)))
you can bind a stop button to stop any action, it also cancels the post-attack animation for crossbows, allowing for 3 shot per second.
amazing
Thanks for all these guides. Are there higher level versions of the same set and/or unique items like in elite/veteran mode?
There arent higher level versions of unique and set items, only the non-unique and non-set items level with you
@@AlmarWinfield whats the best way for nature/combat mages to gain melee/range exp? I am not gaining any from weapon enchantment buffs that split exp. And how do I execute rune powers, ie. mark of the harvest? Thanks again
@@JD-hm2wo the only way to level the skills would be to use them sadly. Also you execute rune powers by using the mark of the harvest spell then using the rune power. Basically, using mark of the harvest applies a debuff on them that blows up when you activate the power
@@AlmarWinfield I was afraid of that. Does the same magic find % apply if I play a non-magic find character when i get loot and open chests? And you mentioned exchanging Ancient allagan tablets for Traveller's handbook at F&K npc, are any of other rewards worth it? I dont seem to find any info on those anywhere after searching online
how do you have 6 companions?
i am on max difficulty, each difficulty you advance to you unlock another companion slot