Holy cow, its that noob again I have come up with a couple of more basic questions about the AA's. I understand that there are two systems, one for KoS and one for the fae expansion (KoF?). From what i read it seems the expansion give access to two distinct systems for AA's with totally different trees. Is this correct? The way i understand it you have the KoS AA's from lvl20 and they can be invested in attribute related trees. I have seen references to Wisdom (or was it INT)/Strength tree etc. The fae points you can spend from lvl 10 and those are directed at your actual class. These points will give you faster cast times, enhance particular spells etc. You earn AA's for both of these systems by completing quests and killing mobs that are still blue to you. Also discovery XP can count towards this. Could someone please cover the basics about this for me? Im wondering about the warlock specifics here, i read all the AA for dummie threads i could find on the achievement forums but the information was either very old (hence unreliable) or non specific (most often both). I would like to know stuff like "There are four main lines, line A is good if you want to do this and B is good if you want to do that". The basics of the system and the choices you have to make. Since i dont even own the expansions yet i really dont know anything that i havent read on these forums.
If I had to do it all over again, I'd do the following: 8 Points into the first skill in the INT line (To give you the int boost) Train Catalyst (STR line) Train Freehand Sorcery (Wisdom line) FULLY. After all of that is taken care of (You'll need just shy of 50 AA to do that), start working on the Warlock tree. Currently I'm personally training the Explosive line. Edit: If you're itching for a special sooner, train Freehand Sorcery before Catalyst. Message Edited by Windowlicker on 12-19-2006 09:17 AM
i did str line 4/4/4/8 wis 4/8/4/8 int 5 This gives me max chance to crit, 8% extra base damage and max FHS to give me an extra 30% whenever i use it. also, This build gives me a nice little int buff of 20 points. I saw no need to get the end skill from wisdom line as i have no power issues so i dont need less power usage. I can also live without catalyst as i crit plenty with boots or terror, and MoA adding another 4.5% to the 11.9% str line gives me. Im really undecided about the 2nd tree. ive completed the protection line as far as i wanted to, 10 points in themagi shielding buff and 5 in improved concussive and so have vacuous. I really like the extra ward on the magi shielding, it helps a lot for soloing and means you can take the odd hit much easier. Im leaning towards Hastenings as my second line as im hearing mixed reviews about Aftershock in the explosives line. However, im tempted to change the 1st tree to wis/int and forget the str line to give me a little deaggro help and go for hastenings and explosives in the 2nd tree for max dps. im still undecided..... help! Message Edited by Pilgrim Divine on 12-19-2006 06:34 AM
My current AA Build KoS: STR line 4/4/4/5/8 - People say catalyst isn't worth it but critign every time I cast apoc, instead of a chance to crit it is a huge DPS increase AGI line 4/4/4/4/8 - I'm still not totaly convinced this is the best option, I prefer the Sta line 4/8/4/8 but I realy don't like not having a 2nd symbol slot EoF: Hastings line 5 in Soul Blister 5 in Scourge of Shadows 5 in War Pyre 5 in Void Distortion 1 in Focused Casting Explosives line 3 in Chaostorm 3 in Nil Absolution 5 in Apocolypse That is my plan for the 1st 30. After that I'm goign to try aftershocks, as well as 5 points in Corupt gift<with the 3 set bonus for our fabled gear this will rock> If Afteshocks isn't worth the aditional 10 AA's I'll probably put them to enhance Magi Sheilding, regenerating wards are always nice
Thanks for your answers. I would still need some kind of basic walkthough though. My questions are still more on the level of: 1) What kind of bonuses does the INT tree give (repeat for all attributes). 2) What are the major lines of the KoF trees? Dont need specifics, just stuff like "There are four lines, heres a one sentence description of each". It is true that i have think i have started understanding a lot of this stuff from reading between the lines; but i figure i might well have gotten it wrong. Again, dont need the specifics; would just like to know what the general idea is behind different lines and perhaps some reasoning behind popular builds. There is so much information available for the 2 year+ player but very little for the one week ones. (and thank you for your patience, i apreciate you taking time to answer stuff instead of shoving a huge RTFM in my face). Message Edited by Epictetus on 12-20-2006 12:28 AM
Personally, I'm going Str/Agi in my KOS trees, and unsure on EOF, but currently have Aftershocks. Im thinking about getting rid of it, as it doesn't do much dmg when compared to other classes equivalent spell. The basic run down of KOS trees are: STR - Boost dmg/Crits AGI - Boost spell reuse timers WIS - Boost Mana regen INT - Boost Hate Decrease STA - No Idea If I go Str/Agi, I get great dmg, but might have power issues. If I go Str/Wis I will have some boosted dmg, and no power issues, but have potential Spike dmg issues If I go Agi/Wis I get lots of spells off quick, and do good dmg, but I am missing out on the crits. Personally, I'll take the mana issues, and deal with them. Im setting myself up for being a raiding Warlock, so the DPS boost is worth more to me than the Mana, as I will always have better ways of regen power than solo/grouping. EOF Trees are harder to explain, and I haven't figured what I want from them exactly.
The four trees of the KoS line are str, agi, wis, sta. str tree is followed usually for the last two skills, firstly,spell expertise which, when maxed gives 11.9% chance to crit and then secondly, Catalyst which guarantees your next spell will crit at the cost of about 1000hitpoints (i think) agi generally has skills that decrease casting times and recast times. Lots of people choose this tree as we have long cast times. sta tree seems to be only pursued by pvpers (i may be wrong tho) it has little use in pve and i dont know one sorc who has followed it. Gives a manashield, increases phys damage resistance. largely useless in pve. wis tree seems to be the most followed as every skill in this tree is useful, free hand sorcery, brainstorm all increase your dps. requires your symbol slot to be empty. int tree varys in popularity. Is much more viable post EoF as int is no longer capped and as we do not receive an int buff , the added int available from this tree is useful. This tree also gives deaggro help with confounding staff, fairly handy as although you are never particularly close to a mob to start with, if you pull aggro , you can pull this out of the bag as an instant deaggro. When arcanic avoidance is maxed you get a 10.5% base hate reduction, Concussive blasts on the last skill decreases threat by 735 for each spell cast for a short duration. the five trees of the EoF lines are: Propogation Hastenings Explosives Removals Protection. Propogation generally gives all your spells that have a % chance to proc an increased chance of proc. Spells such as broodlings, poisonous veil, boon of the damned, nihilistics etc. End ability gives an extra 3% to proc on aforementioned spells. (ooooo, exciting eh? lol) Hastenings generally gives increased speed when casting and a decrease on recast timers on specific spells, war pyre, scourge of shadows, soul blister. thwart and void distortion. Culminates in focused Casting, a 15sec duration where all your casting speeds are doubled and recast duration halved. Explosives gives added radius and a max 10% increase in dps to your AoE spells, suffocating cloud, rift, apocalypse, void absolution.Culminates in Aftershock, a chance for each spell in the explosves line to do extra damage. Protection gives deaggro help, gives you a ward on magi shielding, (very helpful!!!) can increase threat decrease on Concussive and decrease timer recast on vulian interference. Also gives Vacuous which gives a 15% increase /decrease in effectiveness to non permanment spells that work with hate, taunts, deaggros etc Removals enhances your curse spells and dispell magic. seems pretty useless. The end ability Volitility seems intriguing but have yet to hear how good it is. Reduces targets AoE damage radius by 20%. could be handy for raid bosses with wide AoEs. Shame the skills leading up to this skill are so lame. hope that helps. Message Edited by Pilgrim Divine on 12-20-2006 02:15 AM
Now i have more of my questions answered. Thanks Will of course be doing a lot of thinking before i get there, but right now i think i would go for Str/Int and Hastening/Protection. I cant see myself adding more DPS without doing something about aggro. I have trouble restraining myself enough as it is. Message Edited by Epictetus on 12-20-2006 02:30 AM
well, i dont have catalyst from str or sagacity from wis. and i still have plenty of added Dps and crits. I would like to try catalyst tho, just my current build, see previous post in this thread didnt yield the points to have it. i still crit every fight on at least 2 spells. I dont need the end spell from wis as i have no power issues whatsoever as im pretty well dressed through raiding etc. if u go str/int on KoS, you can indeed get faster cast on certain spells from the EoF hastenings line. No mana regen though. Just get Flowing thought items, manastone, dracomancer gloves give mana font and you get a mana power leech for raid fights etc, Suffocating cloud is great, it always, always, seems to proc my broodlings the minute i cast it. I love it, is very nice spell i always use and can be increased in damage through explosives. Its often a bit underated but its a good PBAoE. (sorry, I answered your last post before you edited it, hence the info about suffocating cloud etc) Message Edited by Pilgrim Divine on 12-20-2006 02:42 AM
Heh, bit of a chain reaction. I edited due to the message above mine beeing posted after i wrote my first reply. These forums could do with a "warning messages have been posted while you where typing" warning. Anyway, yeah. The clouds are so sweet. I love em. If the lines that make em stronger make enough of a difference i might just do everything i can to maximise those and let everything else be secondary.
Hmm, no one uses the damageshield proc (if you wear symbol in 2nd) from the STA line? I capped at lvl 28 for a while and having that damageshield is quite usefull, it really procs quite a lot and does a nice amount of extra damage
For the EoF lines, hastenings seems really REALLY useful, since for most of the spells there, in addition to the 10% faster casting, it's ALSO a 10% increase in damage as well, so you get the combined effect there. So even if not chain-casting them, it's STILL a concrete benefit, if only on the top-level achievement (our fast-recast single-target nuke). Also, as has been said, the end ability really does let you dump some massive dps when the situation calls for it. It does essentially double our DPS as long as lag isn't too horrid and you can queue your spells up correctly. As for the KoS ones... I really dunno. I'm not that high yet, though because of agro issues, the INT line does seem quite appealing.
Don't plan your character around crappy groups that do not offer hate reduction. Plan for the groups that will allow you to fully unleash your DPS. You can always scale back in a bad group. But when you hit the *good* group, you want to be able to kick out as much DPS as possible. Hate reduction can be gained from spells, and equipment as well.
I agree with this POV. Once you reach 60+ keep an eye out for Skywatchers robe. It procs de-aggro. Avgs something like 100-150 threat reduce per spell iirc. Id rather have the capability to do insane damage, and regulate myself depending on the group. As I'm setting myself up for raiding, I'd rather not gear up for the lowest common denominator.
Pretty sure there's an adornment for onehanders out there that procs something in the order of ~1k deaggro when you cast a hostile spell. Combine that with regular deaggro spells, and the stuff you can find on equipment, I don't see any need to go down hate reduction AA lines.
While I agree that you should never plan your toon around weak groups with poor aggro management, I think Vacuous is an extremely useful skill for the entire group. Many of the deaggro options mentioned already, including the final ability in the int line, are single target deaggro only. For our class, the aggro issues are in our target encounter. the protections line helps immensely with this and allows you to focus 100% on damage everywhere else. Lets you go KoS str 4/4/4/8 and wis 4/5/4/8/1 or put the last ability for wisdom points into catalyst. Then you can either go for more single target DPS by picking the hastenings line or go the encounter DPS route towards aftershock. However, don't underestimate the usefulness of vacuous in either group or raiding environments.
I took the stamina line and strength line from the KoS AA tree. Why I took strength is obvious though I did skip the last ability (1 crit is not worth that much health). I took stamina line because manashield helps a lot with survivability in solo, groups and raids. Also because the original wording wasn't clear if you would start takign HP damage after your power was consumed. Also the secodn to last ability increases focus and disrutpion, I rarely gets resists even with the new resist system in EoF. I have not decided if I want to remove stamina and go for agility yet. Going to see how I do once I max EoF AAs also. I didn't take wisdom because I don't want to have an emtpy slot. To me an AA should be a choice on which direction to improve your character, not remove soemthing you already have to gian a bonus is soemthing. 1 empty slot may not seem like much, but I just don't like it.
If you cast the crit spell before combat you tic up rather fast. Or if you have a good warden the first thing he casts is a group hot just before combat. I use it almost every fight.
I agree. An apocalypse that is catalysted and freehanded will blow your dps way up. Nice way to pull groups of heroics when soloing . And yes when you raid with a good druid that 18% health should be back in no time. Dont underestimate the power of a much needed guaranteed crit. sometimes you really need a good 18k+ per target apocalypse or a quick 10k void distortion! Duels too. nice to precast for a crit on your first nuke Giot
