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Good setup for Darkness?
shotcoil
Posts: 3 Arc User
I was looking for some advice/build for a darkness template. Any help is much appreciated :biggrin:
Post edited by shotcoil on
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First, try to explain to us here about what you envision for they style of play for this character's theme build. You can describe it in terms of role you're going to put the character in for the most part (i.e.: tank, ranged DPS, healer, passive support, etc). But more specifically this is about what would be fun (keep in mind you can do everything, what's the character's combat speciality or personality like?)
Once you got a rough idea in you mind, it's time to take a closer look at this set you're wanting: Darkness.
Second, you'll want to choose one (or maybe two) key powers to build around. If you had to choose one active power, what would it be and why?
Third step will be selecting specific stats to accomplish this and the specializations, other powers which buff this up, slotted passive, etc.
So... Go ahead, answer those questions and you can start getting help from the people here.
Consolidate the currencies! (Please!)
Does your Champion have a theme song? (share it!)
Got a funny in-game screenshot? (share it!)
Please fix the Overdrive energy unlock! (Should help promote thematic build diversity!)
Name:
Archetype: Freeform
Super Stats:
Level 6: Intelligence (Primary)
Level 10: Endurance (Secondary)
Level 15: Constitution (Secondary)
Talents:
Level 1: The Invincible
Level 6: Investigator
Level 9: Boundless Reserves
Level 12: Healthy Mind
Level 15: Field Ops Training
Level 18: Discipline Training
Level 21: Covert Ops Training
Powers:
Level 1: Shadow Bolt (Despondency)
Level 1: Grasping Shadows (Unyielding Agony)
Level 6: Spirit Reverberation
Level 8: Lifedrain (Rank 2, Rank 3)
Level 11: Void Horror (Rank 2, Rank 3)
Level 14: Aura of Ebon Destruction (Rank 2, Rank 3)
Level 17: Ritual of Ebon Summoning (Rank 2, Unbound Ritual)
Level 20: Manipulator
Level 23: Ritual of Radiant Summoning (Rank 2, Unbound Ritual)
Level 26: Summon Shadows (Devouring Darkness)
Level 29: Pyromancer's Blades (Rank 2)
Level 32: Ball Lightning (Rank 2, Triplicity)
Level 35: Field Surge (Rank 2, Rank 3)
Level 38: Howl
Travel Powers:
Level 6: Flight
Level 35:
Specializations:
Intelligence: Preparation (1/2)
Intelligence: Enlightened (3/3)
Intelligence: Battle of Wits (2/3)
Intelligence: Tinkering (2/2)
Intelligence: Expertise (2/2)
Commander: Evasive Action (1/2)
Commander: Rapid Response (1/2)
Commander: Multitasker (3/3)
Commander: Durable (2/3)
Commander: Relief (1/3)
Commander: Savage (2/3)
Sentinel: Torment (2/2)
Sentinel: Sentinel Aura (3/3)
Sentinel: Moment of Need (1/3)
Sentinel: Wither (2/2)
Sentinel: Genesis (2/2)
Mastery: Commander Mastery (1/1)
Grasping Shadows with Unyielding Agony Advantage will trigger Spirit Reverberation for energy. Wither from Sentinel Tree will make it do more damage while Torment from Sentinel will make Grasping Shadows last longer.
Lifedrain is a good single target attack that heals you. As a Support toon, you don't want to use aoe attacks too much as this will make you a target. You could take Vampiric Sympathy for Lifedrain to heal pets in an area around you, but Sentinel Aura will already do that a little.
Aura of Ebon Destruction will make your pets do additional damage. The Skills from the Commander Tree will also buff pet damage and make them tougher and less expensive to have out.
I added more temporary pets than permanent pets, you can always change that. However some temp pets are freaking great. Summon Shadows has an Advantage that heals you. You might be a bit squishy so that can help. That's also why I put Ritual of Radiant Summoning. The angel heals and attacks enemies.
Field Surge is a good emergency force field for you.
The Manipulator Form relies completely on Grasping Shadows to work. You might check what others Forms could be helpful to you. If you plan on using Lifedrain alot, Compassion might be a better Form for you.
Forms:
http://www.champions-online-wiki.com/wiki/Form
Consider trading something for Evasive Maneuvers with Sleight of Mind Advantage to wipe Threat from you and keep enemies from attacking you. Or even Smoke Grenade could help there.
Then again if you're focusing on pets, you focus on pets, and not shadow embrace. The topic starter seems a bit confused, so I'll help with shadow embrace as the focal power of the build... ^_^
Given Champions STILL hasn't been hooked up to Core Connect and the old character page system is down I can't link you to a build of an exceedingly effective tank, a friend of mine, Dante@vergilthefallen.
He's a huge, winged demon using CON as the primary, and INT & REC as secondary stats. Shadow's Embrace IS the main attack he uses to pull groups (has challenging strikes on it too); he uses it frequently. His passive is regeneration, and he's pretty much always got the Dark Aura device toggled on. I can't remember which gives more energy for him, MSA or Spirit Reverb but it's one of those two. He uses resurgence to heal in a pinch, and he has the darkness set active offense. For a tanking boss he uses ebon ruin, the ebon void shield (with the advantage), and shred (with crippling challenge) with his long claws. I recall he uses Ebon Rift and leaves it running while he goes to back to shadow embrace. His build has many variation posibilities, and it's delightfully menacing. Ebon void an enemy from far to open, shadow embrace as they charge you, and what you don't kill, like a boss, he'll then rip their flesh off in person with shred (devour essence could work too).
Alternately, you could take shadow embrace down the ranged hybrid-DPS route by getting the shadow offensive passive and active offense, and stacking up with lifedrain and conviction and possibly even the bubbles (protection field). PRE would actually be a good primary stat (get the specialization that give offense per point of PRE), and you'd need a Gambler's core in your primary offense gear then. (i.e.: DEX or PRE primary, REC&END)
Consolidate the currencies! (Please!)
Does your Champion have a theme song? (share it!)
Got a funny in-game screenshot? (share it!)
Please fix the Overdrive energy unlock! (Should help promote thematic build diversity!)
Perhaps I can take a stab at this, since I've been playing around with a similar build in PowerHouse. Please note that I am just returning to CO after a long break so you should view my recommendations accordingly. To start, I need to ask: are you entirely or very new to the game? I'm going to guess that you are, and I hope that you won't be offended by that. I don't like rattling off abbreviations and introducing concepts without explanation if you're not already familiar with them.
1.) Darkness can be the main focus of your build, yes, but you will have to go out-of-set if you want to be a support character. There are several passives to choose from that interact well with Darkness, especially once you add pets into the mix: Seraphim (Celestial) or Aura of Radiant Protection (Radiant Sorcery) may be good choices if you want to emphasize the "support" part of your character, whereas Shadow Form (Darkness), Aura of Primal Majesty (Primal Sorcery), or Aura of Ebon Destruction (Ebon Sorcery) will work better if you lean more towards the "damage-dealing" role.
2.) Shadow's Embrace is a good start, but you should probably first think about whether or not you will use Darkness' powerset ability - Fear. Although the damage debuff it applies is generally useful, there are several Darkness powers that exploit Fear in some manner. If you only have Shadow's Embrace, which applies Fear, and no other powers that interact with it, you may want to broaden your focus slightly and add another Darkness power to your list. Since you mention pets, you'd probably like Void Horror (a controllable pet) and Summon Shadows (three uncontrollable pets). The Void Horror has a power called "Feed on Fear" that increases damage done to targets that are affected by Fear. (On a side note: I don't like saying "things that are Feared". I'm not afraid of the thing I'm shooting bolts of primal darkness at.)
3.) On the subject of Superstats, whose specialization trees are somewhat new to me, that again involves looking at the Darkness powerset. Once you've decided on how much of your build's basic framework involves Darkness (and Fear interactions), you can look at its Energy Unlock. Spirit Reverberation returns Energy whenever you attack a target that you've debuffed with Fear. The Energy it returns scales with two stats: Constitution and Recovery. If you decide to use Spirit Reverberation, then you have two Superstats chosen for you already and your remaining choices are to: a) decide on a third, and b) decide which will be your primary. The primary superstat is important because it has a larger boost than your secondaries and it determines which specialization tree you will use. Ego would be the "simplest" because it boosts ranged damage, a category into which all Darkness offensive powers fall; however, that does not strictly make it the "best" choice. Most of the other Superstats will support your build given the right conditions. Agentnx5 gives an example above of how Presence can be useful to you. All you need is a finished build and you can decide from there which of the remaining stats best fits.
With that in mind, here's a very simple framework to build upon if you decide to use Darkness primarily and take Spirit Reverberation:
PowerHouse (Link to this build)
Name:
Archetype: Freeform
Super Stats:
Level 6:
Level 10: Constitution (Secondary)
Level 15: Recovery (Secondary)
Powers:
Level 1: Shadow Bolt
Level 1: Shadow Embrace
Level 6: Spirit Reverberation
Level 8:
Level 11: Lifedrain
Level 14:
Level 17:
Level 20: Summon Shadows
Level 23:
Level 26:
Level 29:
Level 32:
Level 35:
Level 38:
This includes a nice core of Darkness abilities that you can expand on. The first choice would be to pick a slotted passive at Level 8 - there is the short list of suggestions back near the top of this post - and build from there. This basic outline covers what you've asked for so far: it includes Shadow Embrace, a self-heal in Lifedrain (which adds an area of effect heal if you take the advantage "Vampiric Sympathy"), and has the temporary pet power Summon Shadows. The rest depends on how heavily you want to build towards support, damage, and/or pet control.
For the more experienced readers, please feel free to pick my post apart if I've provided any bad advice. I hate willfully spreading misinformation, moreso when I'm the one doing it.
Actually I'm enamored with the professional tone and thoroughness! I will say Vampiric Sympathy just isn't worth the cost (especially with how other players move about), but other than that... I'm not seeing any glaring errors, just lots of good advice (that the readers shouldn't skim over).
Hmm, I can't seem to get the menus to work/display correctly on this device, thus I can't use the Powerhouse web utility at this time. Can you help me out here and sketch up the friend's tank build I mentioned above?
I realize it won't be completely copied & finished (which is for the better, because if don't want to just copy out an entire build somebody else made, point for point), but it'd be nice to have the skeleton framework of the build shown in an easier to read format.
PS: I also know that build of his uses Fuel My Fire maxed out (specializations), gives him rapid energy gain as long as he uses Shadow Embrace properly to pull groups of enemies.
Consolidate the currencies! (Please!)
Does your Champion have a theme song? (share it!)
Got a funny in-game screenshot? (share it!)
Please fix the Overdrive energy unlock! (Should help promote thematic build diversity!)
| The Phoenix - A Fiery Jack of All Trades | The Nightmare - Dark Summoner | The Ranger - Archery/DB DPS |
| The Packleader - Bestial Petmaster |
Consolidate the currencies! (Please!)
Does your Champion have a theme song? (share it!)
Got a funny in-game screenshot? (share it!)
Please fix the Overdrive energy unlock! (Should help promote thematic build diversity!)
http://powerhouse.nullware.com/
I got Shadows Embrace confused with Grasping Shadows.
Since Grasping Shadows is a Crowd Control power, some of the choices in Skill Trees for the build I posted are meant to help Holds.
http://powerhouse.nullware.com/powerhouse.html?v=4&n=&d=1623HGJOKPY1370K004K104K20HN503N600KA05K900L804KF03KB04KD07K405BG00K3040nOH0aGG3UbL
So Basicaly you start the fight with summon shadow, they get increased effectiveness from your Aura of Ebon Destruction. Aura of the Sentinel + Lifedrain refresh your stacks of compassion buffs and sinds you use Dark transfusion you will get very fast energy regen and always loose a bit of health to refresh those in combat.
When you have setup everything you need, start the fight with a fully charged Shadow blast, it has 100% chance to fear, combined with Avenger spec and Nyctophobia advantage your Ebon Ruin will deal an extra 30% base damage. When you repeat this combo a second time, Shadow blast will Stun the feared target, and add Psychotic Break Debuff wich will stun your opponent, increase damage done via Wither (when that advantage is fixed) and with Sentinel Mastery you will regen more than 2% of your max health because of the DoT component Psychotic Break advantage.
Your Shadow Embrace is like a defensive power, it will hold 5 ennemies and with Unyielding Agony you get basicaly 10% health (+ bonus heal power) regen every 1sec for the next 8sec with Sentinel Mastery.
Life Drain in you build is more like your team healing ability, it will heal a ton of health, and when I say a ton, it is realy a lot. While Ebon Destruction will allow that skill to do some considerable damage too.
I also added an active defense that has synergy with the set, but if you don't like it you can switch for another one, same goes for the active defense.
Finally your block has extra damage resistance against Elemental damage sources and will fear anyone that hits you wich helps build up psychotic breaks and holds for more regen overtime. But you can also switch it with Ebon Void if you don't like it.
The basic tactic for this build is use DT to fill your energy pool and suck your victim dry.
Also don't forget Shadow Shroud and Ebon Void for when things get tough.