Chantress Input

[quadeddie]

Chantress Input

Heya, I'm making a chantress now for fun and have gotten her up to lvl 50 with maxed chant and warmth. With tarn, salamander staff (+2 fire, +3 warmth), +1 ammy, magefists, my chant is up to an OK 25 with warmth at 28.

Maxxed out, I guess I would replace salamander with hellplague (once I find one) and sig shield, and add two sojs and a silks, and replace +1 with a +2 ammy bringing the skill up to 30.

It's kind of fun playing her, she's got a ravenclaw so I'm able to solo nm cows just fine (and provide tangible help in groups).

The problem I've got is: Where do I put statpoints? If I'm going ravenclaw, I'm getting a good boost in AR - especially if I add something like sig gloves + sig helm for ias + ar. I was able to get to 50 with 130 stat points in reserve (LOL).

Str: I put a fair amount here, I'll end up at 100 for silks

Dex: My AR jumps like 30-40 points when adding one dex point. However, with Ravenclaw exploding arror - do I even need dex? Doesn't that always hit? Chanted with sig's helm and Raven, my AR now is 2555. I can hit nm cows with no problem, and I can add dex gear, so I'd like this to be a last resort for points.

Life: This is where I'd like to put everything, but worry about dex above in the later stages of the game. (I'd like to occasionally whip out the bow and help out ya know)

Energy: Base - I rarely mana pot unless I"m chanting 8 ppl with golems and stuff


Thoughts?

 

[fledgeling]

you can find a +2 skills +3 enchant staff (better than sigon shield + hellplague)

 

[quadeddie]

you can find a +2 skills +3 enchant staff (better than sigon shield + hellplague)

mnnn, my thoughts were wandering in that direction. How about a +2, +3 Ench, +3 Warmth staff :smiley: - shoppable, no?

EDIT: Actually, I don't think the above is possible, but a +2/+3 Enc/+2 Warm is possible. I just shopped a +2/+3 Enc/+1 Bliz tongue in 20 minutes, so I'll keep working for a 2/3/[1/2] warmth staff.

 

[-Tempus-]

i'm sure you know the best +skill setup
tarn
+2 amulet
silk
fist
+2 sorc +3 chant staff
2 sojs
for lev 32 chant

but to use the silk it helps if you have +str boots, belt, amulet so you dont need to add so many points there.

when using a killing setup and you need AR just go with some of the set items that add AR per char lev.

where to put the rest of your points....

max lightning mastery: if you use a 6 p topaz sword + chant

max Telekinesis: with your max warmth and no real use for mana, energy shield works well for this build. using a +2 +3 ES staff is also a great way to get ES without spending 4 skill points to get lev 1 ES.

max a cold armor: if you get hit a lot

max Static Field: at high levs you can do a full screen of cows. since this is classic you can SF monsters 2-3 times and do more dmg then most attacks. then using a lower lev attack you can finsh them off.

max Inferno: gets dmg from warmth but not much use, could be funny.

max orb/mastery: a good attack vs fire imms (when also using SF)

i max'd SF on mine. when i'm running behind people and chanting them i'll just use my max SF on everything.

for stats i also went with a vit build but going with a mana build will also work. my stats are str to use silk (after str items) dex to use bows (after items) rest vit. when using melee weapons i use twitch, sigs and other stuff so my base stats are 61 str 31 dex rest vit.

-Tempus-

 

[WarlockCC]

Mind you in the current version of Diablo 2 classic, the only boots which can drop and provide str are the Tearhaunch greaves.

And like Fledgeling suggests a +2 sorc +3 Enchant staff is better for your purpose. Not to mention that you can also just buy such a staff in the shops rather then have to trade for them like with Hellplague and sig shield.

About the warmth on your salamander or on your dream-staff, it won't help your enchant damage. any +skills won't help synergies, with the sole exception of prayer(I do like my healer ). In effect, as far as your enchant is concerned, you have level 20 Warmth. You could test this by buying a +1 Warmth staff and equipping that, check your enchant, then go empty-handed and check your enchant again.

So, Max Enchant, Max Fire mastery and Max warmth for you, then as much +sorc,+fire and +ench from your equipment.

 

[Rawly]

As far as AR goes you dont need much more than 1k ar before enchant as high enchant gives big boost to ar.

And also once enchanted it will last 12-14 minutes depending on level so you can switch out +skills stuff without losing much damage (you will lose some as the increase in fire mastery improves your damage).

Think enchantress is very welcome in a flayer game, giving enchant to babas and backing up with raven, if you got sigons gloves + helm and twitch you will be firing very fast and have plenty of AR.

 

[goomba]

interesting. once I get a chanter to mid 50s, I consider her "done".

the only thing I use them for, is being a mule, chanting new characters, and/or making cows. on both ladder, and NL, my chanters are barroned, and can make all levels of cows. (I don't let them enter portal to risk someone waxing the king)

she also makes a good place to put a rclaw (or two) in 'storage' for lvling new chars. having two pc's, and a spare cd really, really makes this a useful char to have on hand.

however, when I was levelling her, and using the rclaw, I tossed angellics on... altho with the splosive nature of the rclaw, one really doesn't have to hit anything.

once in the mid 30s range, I tossed twitch, and a triple p diamond shield on, and did seal popping/teleporting duties for a dozen or so cs runs. voila' lvl 5x.

oh, and I private barroned her, with my lvl 91 din. A nice +2 din ammy with +12 str, and single digit dex fell, with a couple of other not as useful mods.

couple of folks wanted to know why I barroned her. well, I like to MF the hell cow king, and it's easier if my chanter makes the game, and chants my mf baba for quicker killing

 

[WarlockCC]

Indeed, to hit things with a raven you don't need ar. Once the arrow animation makes contact with a target animation, the explosion will go off.

And like you typed Goomba, a chantress/opener should never enter the cow level. If people want ench they can simply come to the rogue camp drive-trough instead of thinking the mountain will come to them.

I was playing a bit with a new raven and the difference with the 1.09 ones is really amazing. Took forever to kill a simple maggot-type monster in the Canyon. In fact, clubbing them was faster. Now I know why you need that ench for the new raven.

 

[goomba]

Indeed, to hit things with a raven you don't need ar. Once the arrow animation makes contact with a target animation, the explosion will go off.

And like you typed Goomba, a chantress/opener should never enter the cow level. If people want ench they can simply come to the rogue camp drive-trough instead of thinking the mountain will come to them.

I was playing a bit with a new raven and the difference with the 1.09 ones is really amazing. Took forever to kill a simple maggot-type monster in the Canyon. In fact, clubbing them was faster. Now I know why you need that ench for the new raven.

the angies were however more useful for their added life, FR (I used armor/ammy too) as well as, if I recall correctly for use before she could equip rclaw, and was using a junk bow that was literally found on the ground. I do the same thing when rush-levelling other new chars, be it a necro, baba, or whatever

 

[Beepy]

melee sorc ftw

 

[goomba]

melee sorc ftw

it would be super amusing to me, to see a sorc, with a chanted staff doing a WW type attack...

 

[quadeddie]

Mind you in the current version of Diablo 2 classic, the only boots which can drop and provide str are the Tearhaunch greaves.

And like Fledgeling suggests a +2 sorc +3 Enchant staff is better for your purpose. Not to mention that you can also just buy such a staff in the shops rather then have to trade for them like with Hellplague and sig shield.

About the warmth on your salamander or on your dream-staff, it won't help your enchant damage. any +skills won't help synergies, with the sole exception of prayer(I do like my healer ). In effect, as far as your enchant is concerned, you have level 20 Warmth. You could test this by buying a +1 Warmth staff and equipping that, check your enchant, then go empty-handed and check your enchant again.

So, Max Enchant, Max Fire mastery and Max warmth for you, then as much +sorc,+fire and +ench from your equipment.

Awww, the non synergistic effect of +items bums me out. Oh well.

Thanks for the good advice everyone! Definitely got some interesting ideas here like the Chanted 6 PTop'ed Sword and LM for immunes. It's likely though, that she'll end up being a cow opener chanter like goomba uses her for. For that reason, I'm taking the precaution of lvling her up as much as possible in cows before getting the D quest for that lvl. Once I do, I don't ever go back down into a lower cows (cause then I can get the quest).

Plus, isn't the chant sound just cool?

 

[Beepy]

Don't forget that Fire Mastery isn't a synergy as such so +items will work for that

Edit: chant sound ftw

 

[goomba]

Don't forget that Fire Mastery isn't a synergy as such so +items will work for that

Edit: chant sound ftw

I have heard things both ways with respect to fire mastery being a synergy for chant. I have found, for what ever reason, that maxing it is definately noticeable, but now that I think about it, I dont' recall if it's more damaging, or if it helps make it last longer. this of course is only by observation, not via any scientific testing. your mileage may vary, batteries not included, and stay out of the sun....

 

[Fearlessone]

Enchant not just for others...

You can carry a raven claw wielding enchantress well into the upper 80's, and play aggressively, but they die alot. There are very few who choose to go all the way in this game, fewer who stick around and play repeatedly with us, and fewer still (almost zero) who will wield that bow in the hardest places.

The sig gloves and helm are uselful for just ias. A twitch is good too, I cant remember if goldwrap was helpful with ias, I decided that I needed resists and hit recovery since no shield. So dex isnt a problem. Mine go with 51 dex to wield shard, to tele around fast, rushing and cs runs. Do u really want to go up to 100 str just for the silks?

Tempus' description is very good. I carry these sorts of items in my enchanters inventory all the time. The +2/+3 staff takes anywhere from 5 min to several hours to find at the venders, its just luck. At least lvl 10-12 static field is the way to go to have a back up skill and to damage the mob, I use a low lvl orb to finish them off or just keep them off me all the time.

I would enchant with a +2 sorc ammy, magical is fine, but switch to one of those 20% priz ones with 2 extra big resists, to get 100-120% total resists. You arent likely to find a +2 sorc ammy with fcr and 20% priz with +40% lightning and fire resists.

Total damage: with ur fire mastery it will push over 4000 to 5000 with a raven claw - per arrow. You know u have max damage with that staff when it says something like 5800 regular attack damage. I think thats the max here in classic. The damage will go down when u switch off the soj's, silks, tarn, staff, and magefist - presumably because the bonus from fire mastery has fallen 8 skill points, back to near lvl 20. This is hard evidence that fire mastery isnt a synergy. If it were, then u would be giving this huge damage bonus to the barbs. You dont, it says on the enchant icon that your are giving about 1400 enchant damage.

 

[WarlockCC]

Don't forget that Fire Mastery isn't a synergy as such so +items will work for that

Edit: chant sound ftw

yes indeed, fire mastery does boost the damage of your chant. (that is why I listed it in my things to max catagory )
So get as much +sorc skills and +fire skills as you can. Since Fire Mastery is a level 30 skill, it won't spawn on staffs, so don't bother looking for that ever illusive +2 sorc +3 chant +3 fire mastery staff.

I have taken my chantress to over 66 so she can wear a +2 amulet (which you can buy for a mere 500k gold at your local high level gambling addict)
As Tempus pointed out, you can get level 32 Enchant from +skills. On top of that you could get yourself a Battle Command (+1) and a skill shrine(+2).
At level 32 it will last for 888 seconds and add about 9xx-14xx fire damage.

 

[goomba]

my non ladder chantress is, as was mentioned lvl 67 to wear the +2 ammy.

she also has enough str (with a belt to add to it) to wear silk.

so, tallying up her +fire/skill items

silk +1
tarn +1
magefist +2 fire
sorc ammy +2 (blue/magic)
soj +1
+2/+3 enchant stick
Probably the only time she enchants w/out a battle command, is in norm games, by the time she's chanting characters in nm and beyond, most barbarians have BC.

I also found her a handy place to put/mule the sole pair of hot spurs I have, sorta pointless, as I'm sure it doesn't add to her enchanting others, but can't hurt if I were to decide to mess around and actually use her for something other than chanting/making cow portals.

as for my ladder chanter, she adds about 1,100 dmg with hellplague/sig combo, and only a measily +1 ammy, at lvl 5x. Good enough for the purpose I have tasked her with. *shrug*

 

[WarlockCC]

so, tallying up her +fire/skill items

silk +1
tarn +1
magefist +2 fire
sorc ammy +2 (blue/magic)
soj +1
+2/+3 enchant stick

I have yet to find those very rare magefists which give +2 fire skills.

 

[purplelocust]

Speaking as a big fan of the Ravenclaw using (and lending) enchantress, the advice above is sound. One thing that is worth mentioning is that in addition to Battle Command there is also the skill shrine to boost your enchant and it is definitely worth remembering where one is (and leaving a TP open to it if it is not near a WP) for getting the most out of your enchant. So with that in mind, the max enchant possible in Classic is:

20 Enchant/20 Warmth/20 Fire Mastery skill points +

+1 Tarnhelm
+2 amulet
+1 Silks
+5 from +2 all +3 enchant staff
+2 dual SoJ
+1 Magefists
+1 Battle Command
+2 skill shrine

gives level 35 enchant, lasting for 960 seconds 1855-2205 dmg with +326% to AR.

I have made enchantresses each ladder season and have the whole setup except the SoJs. Finding a skill shrine is much cheaper than getting two SoJs!

Sometime, I'd like to have a team built for maximum utility of Enchant. That is, say a Conviction pally + one or more Lower Resist summoners +
some multishot Zons + enchantress = speedy progress anywhere. But that would take some cooperation and planning.

One thing that is not often understood about enchant is the way that Enchant can be overwritten. It is different than BO/Shout/BC- for those, only the most recent one has any effect. That is why people get grumpy when someone does a level 1 BO overwriting a level 30 BO and their max life plummets. But for enchant, a lower level enchant cannot overwrite a higher level enchant. (By "cannot overwrite" I mean that if a sorc tries to cast a level 5 enchant on a character that already has a level 20 enchant going, then the sorc won't be able to cast the spell and she won't even lose the mana trying to cast it.) This is both good and bad. It's good in that a wimpy enchant cannot overwrite a strong enchant* but it also means that if a sorc cast a high level enchant a long time ago which is about to expire, if her current enchant is lower (maybe she switched her gear around some, maybe the shrine wore off, maybe BC wore off,...) then she cannot cast a new enchant until the old one is completely gone.

*Not exactly true- all that matters for seeing if an enchant is overwritten is the level of the enchant. That is, an unsynergized, no fire mastery level 20 enchant (doing around 80 average damage) would overwrite a completely synergized, full mastery level 19 enchant (doing 500+ average damage, for a slightly shorter amount of time and with a slightly smaller boost to AR.)

 

[goomba]

I have yet to find those very rare magefists which give +2 fire skills.

fat fingered it, or mixed it up with my ladder chanter, using the hell plague/sig (with the plague offering +2 fire).

trying to remember details, about a hobby/past time that I dont' take super seriously, whilst multi tasking at work, is not my forte'