49 lld kicksin idea

[Bash_]

49 lld kicksin idea

Ive thought a bit about what a lvl 49 kicksin build would look like. I want an asn who is focused on anticaster, but when the need arrives, do decent in melee too.

Skills:

20 venom(lvl 49 after skills and buff)
12 mind blast(lvl 25 after skills)
5 dragon talon(lvl 12 after skills - 3 kicks reached)
2 Weapon block(lvl 19 after skills - 57% block(lvl 18 yields 56%, hence 2 pts))
1 shadowmaster
1 CoS
1 WoF
1 LS
1 BF(bladefury)
1 BS(bladeshield)
1 dragon flight
and the rest are prereqs

Ok, now for the items(caster setup)

Weapons: Primary: Fools greater talons of quickness, 2 sockets, 2x UM.(or an equal rare with 2 sockets) Offhand; Bartucs, socketed psn die facet.

Armor: Duress. Duress just has it all - 40 fhr allowing us to hit the 86 fbeasily, minor dmg with %ed and the cold, almost the same resists as viper and finally one of our best weapons, the open wound.(though, you will want shaft vs zons.

Helm: Rare +2 MA, 20 fc circlet with visionary mod. If you cant get that, get a rare with +2, 20 fc and 2 sockets. 15 ias/res is needed to hit 9 frame traps and 7 frame kicks. Facet the second slot, in case of 2 socks.

Belt: caster belt with 10-15 fc, stats, hp etc. We need this to reach the 65 fc BP.

Gloves: Trangs. Only option.

Boots: IK boots. Great mods for casters.

Ring 1: Soj
Ring 2: Ravenfrost

Amulet: +2 MA, 10-15 fc, stats etc.

Charms: 10x shdw dcpl skillers with 30 life, or whatever the max is for that level. 4x 5fhr/17 mana sc's, 6x 20 life/17 mana sc's.

Prebuff: +3shdw decpl +2-3 venom, sojs, viper. If you have trouble hitting(which i doubt) you can always get an obediance polearm for the enchant, since demon limb isnt available.


Melee setup:


Armor: Switch to shael/facet shaftstop

Helm: Guilliams ias/ar

Boots: Goreriders

Your anticaster setup makes you a foe to be reconned with.

Summing up:

Lvl 49 venom available(though 45 is more realistic) with about +75% psn dmg
~70% OW
57% clawblock
High AR for a kicker
65 fcr
86 fhr
40 r/w (Dragon flight is used for improved mobility)
High resists, since LLD is often on normal
50%DR with melee setup, 20% without
Decent HP, im guessing for around 1,5-1,7k (bo isnt available)
Wide variety of skills: Multiple traps, shadow, bladeshield, bladefury
Multiple sources of damage: DOT, physical, elemental etc.

Thoughts for improvement?

 

[brokensvt]

49 = MLD. Level 30 is the cutoff for LLD.

 

[Bash_]

Fine, ok, whatever :thumbsup:

 

[NewForumBloke]

No up'd tri res greaves for casters? Or Gore riders for melee?

-BLoke :smug:

 

[Bash_]

Our res is already huge, so i see no need for further. 40 run, 110 ar and 44 hp is more beneficial.

And i mentioned gores when changing to melee, its up there.

 

[brokensvt]

Being MLD, the common dueling grounds is Nightmare mode. Take that into account with resists. Also, your main adversary would be a 49 Blizz sorc with massive Cold Mastery + Facets.

 

[crawlingdeadman]

why so few kicks? with that many +skills i'd think you'd want to go to 30 and have 6 kicks or at the very least lvl 24 for 5. my lvl 30 kicker has lvl 24 kicks so i dont think it'd be a big deal for a higher level to get more. what "aura" are you going to use? fade of bos?

edit: what the hell you care about fcr for anyway? only thing i can see that it would help is mind blast spamming and arent you just going to dflight in and start kicking? no tele so cant be that... so yeah, what's the fcr for?

edit2: you mention enchant from obediance, arent enchant and venom mutually exclusive? a better "if you dont have enough ar" option would be to have angelic ring/ammy on hand.

edit3: so you're not going to have a shield on melee set up? why bother with a melee set up at all? you're going to get the snot beat out of you without it.

 

[brokensvt]

^All valid points. "edit2" is absolutely correct, I would personally use at least the amulet and one ring all of the time to deal with paladins/barbs who have huge defense. The second rings should be a Raven ofc.

I was going to mention "edit3" myself, thought I'd leave that for learning

 

[HappyAssassin]

Enchant and Venom are not exclusive, people use it all the time.

65 FCR is for trap locking people. It's very hard to trap lock below 65 fcr. Trap locking is the kicker's bread and butter.

Fewer kicks are good for dueling casters. If you have a very long kick sequence, you lock yourself in place for too long. You also lose the ability to reinforce your trap lock. A good kicker can traplock the opponent, kick them and then add more traps + MB to the lock, which is important because kickers don't do a ton of damage and can rarely kill a well built character before it escapes from a wake of fire lock (the trap only shoots 5 times).

@ the author: You DO need a shield for melee, you will get absolutely destroyed if you try and go with claw block. Getting block will cost you life, which will hurt you against casters. Decide if you want a vs. all or a caster killer kicksin, they have their own advantages/disadvantages, but know that if you play a caster killer kicksin with a DR switch against serious melee you will die a lot.

 

[Bash_]

Happyassassin pretty much said it. For casters, mobility and stunlocks are key. Mindblast is an absolute mandatory for this build to work at its full effect.

Nightmare or not, losing 40 rw is not worth it. They would have to have tri res and 30 r/w to be worth it. If i can find some, sure ill consider it, but i dont think that my cold resists are lacking

30 anya, 45 duress, 30 trang gloves, 70 fade, 30 from various equipment, raven for absorb, and i could easily get another 40 from sc's.

A small note, i simply forgot to put on my whitstans on the list, ofcourse i will use a shield for melee.

 

[brokensvt]

My level 30 Blizz sorc has -155% enemy cold resist through Mastery. 19 more levels + facets can have a dramatic effect on this number, not to mention better gear. Oh, and I have a pair of 30 r/w, 10 fhr, c/f/l resist boots, they do exist and are multitudes more useful than IK.

 

[Bash_]

OK, i guess i will take that into consideration. Any1 got more tips or criticism?

 

[Wuben]

I've made a level 49 kicker and noticed a few things:

First: melee can only be beaten by expert use of traplocking, you lack in range, AR (without substituting too much), good damage, defense and life. If they don't have max poison resists, it's okay, otherwise you're kind of dead meat.

Second: You don't want +ma skills on your helmet/amulet, you want shadow skills. Just skill enough to get 3 or 4 kicks on both your setups. I used 4 kicks on my caster and 3 kicks versus melee IIRC.

You'll arrive at the exact same number of mindblast, but just with higher clawblock, shadow master (immunity is sexy), venom (without prebuff)..

Third: Kickers are stash gear characters. You need Shaft/String, Duress, 120 res armors and more. I'd use 2 Bartucs (Um'ed one) if I were you and keep the fools claw in stash for melee. I'm not even sure if fools work on kicks, I thought it was bugged. You need additional IAS though, but BoS is superior anyways in 90% of your duels.

Fourth: Mana is very important in this build, you'll be lacking majorly if you don't pay attention (not towards OP), so get those 17 mana scs.

Fifth: In pubs, I loved using that decrep weapon in a fast scepter. The aura bugs them and the slow/physical damage factor rapes them. It has 10 dex as well, so it saves a bit on blocking.

Sixth: I used scarabshell boots with 30 frw/2* 30+ res/some ar in pubs and gores versus melee. Scarab has the highest kick damage on level 49 and the mods were pretty sexy.

Seventh: Blade shield is completely useless, it doesn't transfer OW and it only transfers crappy venom damage. I never used fury for that matter.

Can't think of more atm. Belts with 10+ Fc don't exist though.

 

[Bash_]

thank you very much wuben!

A few notes

1) Yeah i expected this much, hence im building around anticasters.

2) Yeah i made a typo, ofcourse i want shadow, not MA.

3) I did think about using BOS and get a string, but that would mean losing 65%FC which is a bad idea. Besides, if i get a 40ias fools(hopefully with some other sexy mods) i already reach max kick and trap laying speeds, so BOS would give me nothing but runspeed.

4) Mana pots? Raven and soj should bring me up there, since mana pots arent considered BM like they used to..

5) Hmm, mid lvl duels in pubs? Havent seen that, usually lld/mld is a closed, GM circle. Whats special about the aura?

6) Ofcourse! Why didnt i think of this. That would even make them superior to gores in melee as well. Thanks.

7) Ive read from the ghost guide that it does in fact trigger OW. Still, its worth a single point, dont you think? We need WoF and bladefury anyway.

and lastly, no biggie, i would just need to find a 15%fc ammy.

 

[Wuben]

Few things; please check up if fools works on kicks. It would be kind of useless if it didn't. It will be really hard to find that claw.

Regarding 3; You should try to keep 65 if possible, but the BP below that is also doable. At least, I could live with it. 65 is more for trappers, I believe.

About the BoS; I did build my char around it, meaning I didn't need additional IAS (extra socket and ability to use dual bartucs and lawbringer in scepter) and I had massive FRW. FRW is really useful in most duels. You want to move around like crazy to connect Dflight. Clawblock doesn't work when walking.

4: I always thought manapots were bm, but that was just me.

5: in Europe we used to have at least 20 level 49ers. Enough to fill public games. The aura somehow lags your opponent majorly. Everyone was complaining about it. The decrep is cool though.

6) Physical damage isn't everything and versus a barb you probably want as much OW/CB as possible. In most other cases, I used my sexy scarabs though.

7) I'm quite sure it doesn't.

Lastly, you cannot find a +2 shadow/10+ fcr amulet, since the requirement would be 52. You can only get a +1 assa/10-20 fcr amulet where I value life/mana/resists highest. When it has strenght or dexterity on it, the level requirement jumps up pretty fast.

 

[Bash_]

Im quiet sure that fools work on kicks, but ill double check..

Regarding bos..

Its a tough choice, because both of them actually benefit both vs casters and melee. BoS allows you to play more offensively, while fade keeps you safe.

Honestly, get frw elsewhere.

The ultimate sollution for this, would be a 1.08 valk wing socketed -15req+dex. Not only do we save a socket for ias, our claw could even settle for 20ias. We can also use another belt. We could reach 86 bp(and even free up 3 charms) by using bartucs, valk wing AND bladebuckle(dont up this).

Why not a second bartucs?? Because we dont need the fhr, since the 30 wont yield a new breakpoint. We dont need the stats either, as dex is irrelevant(since bartucs is our highest dex item), and the +str from our one bartucs, is enough to use our heaviest item, -15 req valk. So it comes down to 20%AR, +2 all(3MA), vs fools, an extra socket and the potential of +mb, cb, shadow etc on the fools. Its an easy pick.

we hit 65 fc with nothing more than valk, trangs and 15 ammy.

Granted, we lose +2 shdw dcpl, but those arent relevant to our most potent weapons, fade and venom as we can simply prebuff with the +MA circlet.

Now as i said, we hit 90 fhr with simply buckle, bartucs and valk wing - duress has an extra 40%. The sollution is in fact, to use a crow caw, unique tigulated mail. Socket it with a 9dex/15 res jewel, and you get the following:

15 ias(allowing our claw to have 10 IAS if we wanted)
24 dex
2% more open wounds
-30% cold res
-15% CB
no cold dmg
5% more runwalk (since duress is in a light armor)

Worth it? Maybe, if we can find ourself a godly claw that lacks ias, then definitely.

The sollution is outstanding, we would need to relocate some skills, but the benefits are overshadowing..

Pros:
45% more runwalk (if we use 5 sc's with rw), 60% more fhr, 48 stats(bladebuckle+crowcaw+2x9 dex jewels)

And the only thing we miss here is +2 shdw, a small amount res/cb/cold dmg/run whatever mods the belt and circlet might have had, besides the faster cast.

 

[HappyAssassin]

You're still going to want BoS. The ability to run fast is crucial to catching casters when you can't teleport. The faster you run, the better. Dflight is a very inefficient way to catch an opponent, you need to give it every advantage possible, which means you need to get on their screen and be able to dodge a LOT of attacks thrown at you. Remember, ghosts have high FCR teleport to give them mobility which is why they can use fade. You don't get that with a MLD.

In terms of gear, I think the best way to figure out your build is to go out and duel. You can come up with a really solid theoretical build, but the most important part of making a build is to test it against quality opponents.

Fools does work with kicks, though you will not see the AR boost displayed.

Blade Shield is a luxury. On a character with a very tight skill distribution, it's not worth it. On a HLD Ghost with tons of skill points to throw around there's no reason not to get it. On this char, skip it.

 

[Bash_]

But as a anticaster, the 75% res from fade is really, really going to hurt. How am i ever going to make it up? Additionally i would need string(just vs melee, but it means i cant have str on the belt), and fhr on the boots.

What if i decked out with run charms? That would mean 95% run/walk. Surely, thats enough, no?

Thanks for the fools clarification - i could not find any concluding info. Thats very good news.

About bladeshield - yea i guess you are right, i could always get lucky and find it on a claw right? It does give me 3 more skills to place in MB.

 

[HappyAssassin]

Yes the resists will hurt to make up. Assassins vary a lot depending on who's playing them, there are a lot of different styles. My advice would be to try dueling with BoS and some res stack gear (a 2 socket circlet with shadow skills, fcr and resist jewels stuck in it could help, you seem to have lots of resources available), and try with your valk setup with Fade. You'll have to juggle charms and gear to get the right mix of FR/W, Life and Resists no matter what setup you use, it's all a balancing act. Either way, get some good MLDers together and try different setups against them, decide what you like and go with that. My kicker was lvl 30 (so quite different), but I found that I liked BoS because I could dodge more attacks with it, whereas with fade I got hit more (but it hurt less). As I said, balancing act.

You can get Blade Shield on your claw, but Dragon Flight would be more beneficial (since you HAVE to get it anyway) whereas blade shield is really optional. It would be nice for you if you could get Blade Shield on one of your prebuff claws, since it's precastable. This would save space for +MB and + Dflight on your main claw (Venom isn't really an important mod on the Fools because your switch is +shadow claws).

 

[Bash_]

Thanks for the insight. You seem to have alot of these advice, the small ones that when unified, are considerable. Things that make sense, but that you normally wouldnt consider. Subliminal, i would call it.

The dream would be a claw with bladeshield, dragonflight and LS, since i need prereqs for them. That would mean more points into mb, than if it had +mb (unless ofcourse, i ignore them, which i wouldnt like to)

The conclusion is obvious. My hunch tells me that 95% runwalk is enough and sacrificing my gear wouldnt be worth it, but reality would claim that i need more experience and find my own style to judge so.

Do you have any notes on my equipment or skills otherwise? Like, small tweaks and such.