68 SW in Spinward...one shot ensues...what do I do?

bmcd73

I've leveled a OP to 70 through the 16 task grinds and they were hard enough. I wondered how someone that was squishy could possibly do this if I was getting beaten down as an OP.

So I hit 60 with my SW and decided to go back and do everything else but the new content. I got to 68. I then bought all blue items at the max level I can use (67-68) and fitted with all rank 5 enchants with item level of 1621. I have the Angel of Protection healing companion at max rank. One of my missions is to kill Axe Beaks. They hit for 10k each. So if I have more than 2...I'm pretty much insta-killed. I can barely finish killing any group with 3 mobs. Add a 4th and I'm done.

I am Hellbringer spec and HAVE to slot vamp embrace. I also use fiery bolt and killing flames. I didn't go the perma shadow puppet route...maybe that will afford me some more survivability. I am at a loss because I cannot do this content. Do I need to go back and do the earlier tasks until I hit 70 so that I can just barely do the level 67 content? Am I totally playing this SW wrong. Do I just need to shelve this guy until they change the difficulty?

This game pisses me off more than anything at this point. It FAR more frustrating than fun.

dominatorv7

I'm lv67 fury, I don't have items really since it's my first char, and I can't even do a Foundry quest. I've amazing DoT but easiest enemies can 5 hit me. There is nothing for me to do except pvp, without some tanker.

ghoulz66

I don't doubt it. I'm a damnation soulbinder with a taunting companion and even I've had a couple close calls.

Those stupid bird people and axe beaks will murder you before you even cast anything. The SW really needs it's lifesteal back. The GWF at least gets fortified with temp HP and DR, the SW doesn't get that nor tools to avoid being chased down and butchered.

diogene0

Do you have any CC spells?

jiubiizeekk

SW is quite possibly the worst class this mod. I quit my Geared SW at 66 because i was getting 1 shotted. in my t2 gear. My gwf leveled with no problems the same goes for my GF

diogene0

jiubiizeekk wrote: »

t2 gear

That's your issue. When the game says "recommanded" then it's better, and this time, the system works fine. You get drops better than your T2 gear as soon as lvl 63 or so. You chose not to equip it. Of course you're going to struggle.

empalas

SW is difficult. My temptation SW was able to manage barely. The new encounter you get at 62 Hadar's grasp or something like that was the only thing that made it somewhat survivable. on the Hurricanes and skyweavers I would use grasp, killing flames, and then dreadtheft...and repeat. Died a LOT but it was doable. Giants are only doable if you can get them one alone I found. If there are two of them or they are in a group with archons.

empalas

diogene0 wrote: »

That's your issue. When the game says "recommanded" then it's better, and this time, the system works fine. You get drops better than your T2 gear as soon as lvl 63 or so. You chose not to equip it. Of course you're going to struggle.

My guess is BI gear item level is incorrect because it is better item level than anything I ever picked up so I never used the newer gear. Does anyone know if this is the case? That the BI gear item level is in fact incorrect? So nothing was ever "recommended" for me to use it. The BI gear is all lvl 115 or 125...can't remember which. Its 116...looked up on gateway.

burkaanc

SW is a pain in the ***, hopefully they will add some changes

though i dont play sw much i had some success with mine in shore as tempt forgot_the_name_2nd_paragon(for heals from those stacks) focusing on max life steal and damage resistance using laz0r(mainDPS), bargain(for damage resistance and some heal on the way) those flying knives for 10% dr feat

though i dont know what it would do in higher lvl content, dmg might be too short

mjytresz

diogene0 wrote: »

That's your issue. When the game says "recommanded" then it's better, and this time, the system works fine. You get drops better than your T2 gear as soon as lvl 63 or so. You chose not to equip it. Of course you're going to struggle.

There's a good amount of older SWs who leveled to 70 with T2 gear, including myself.
So, no, it's not that big of a problem.

bmcd73

diogene0 wrote: »

Do you have any CC spells?

I do have one...grasp. I can try that. On a group of 3 with one hard hitter and 2 soft, this tactic should work. But is going to hurt on groups with 2 hard hitters or groups of 4.

I'll give it a try.

dominatorv7

diogene0 wrote: »

Do you have any CC spells?

I'm hellbringer, I have every spell(since I've few class feature) but I never use dreadtheft(****tiest skill I've ever seen in my life, like devs don't have the ability to.. idk), I don't use fiery bolt since killing three mob with that is impossible for me, so I focus on one, it takes 1-2 seconds but I usually get hit and die while skills are on cd. I've blades, arms of hadar, curse bite but I don't think they'd save me.

I go with Hadar's Grasp, Warlock's Bargain, Killing Flames and Hellish Rebuke, that kills one mob.

cybercyanide

Hellbringer/Damnation SW myself. I've had much better luck using :
Encounters: Infernal Spheres/Killing Flames/Dreadtheft.
At-will: HoB/DarkSpiral
Daily: Accursed Souls/Flames

Still, I get my butt handed to me in the Slaad lair...sheesh

darkstarcrash

Hmm, I think you may be running a little light on hitpoints. If you have less than 50k HPs, look to increase that above all other stats.

I just finished Spinward Rise on my Fury SW, running Warlock's Bargain, Blades/Killing Flames and Dreadtheft for encounters (Hellish Rebuke and Hand of Blight for at-wills, Brood of Hadar and Tyrannical Threat for dailies). I used the healing companion from the OP pack, but you say you have the angel, which is at least as good.

You really need to learn to use Dreadtheft. I know it can be annoying with any stun knocking it off, or even sprinting out of red zones -- but it's one of our best powers, and combined with Warlock's Bargain procs tons of Creeping Death stacks.

And don't be afraid to use Tyrannical Threat on any pack, don't save it just for big boss fights.

blackxxwolf3

cybercyanide wrote: »

Hellbringer/Damnation SW myself. I've had much better luck using :
Encounters: Infernal Spheres/Killing Flames/Dreadtheft.
At-will: HoB/DarkSpiral
Daily: Accursed Souls/Flames

Still, I get my butt handed to me in the Slaad lair...sheesh

slaad lair is really really really hard for everyone not just sws. i stopped doing them cause i died so many times with my hr.

empalas

darkstarcrash wrote: »

Hmm, I think you may be running a little light on hitpoints. If you have less than 50k HPs, look to increase that above all other stats.

I just finished Spinward Rise on my Fury SW, running Warlock's Bargain, Blades/Killing Flames and Dreadtheft for encounters (Hellish Rebuke and Hand of Blight for at-wills, Brood of Hadar and Tyrannical Threat for dailies). I used the healing companion from the OP pack, but you say you have the angel, which is at least as good.

You really need to learn to use Dreadtheft. I know it can be annoying with any stun knocking it off, or even sprinting out of red zones -- but it's one of our best powers, and combined with Warlock's Bargain procs tons of Creeping Death stacks.

And don't be afraid to use Tyrannical Threat on any pack, don't save it just for big boss fights.

I found this to be a big problem for me as to how to actually build my HP up since the BI gear which is "better" than anything found doesn't add much hp at all. I did notice on on the lvl 65 armor was adding 10k to HP so I have been looking to respec with 70 rare equip to see how much better it is.

dominatorv7

darkstarcrash wrote: »

Hmm, I think you may be running a little light on hitpoints. If you have less than 50k HPs, look to increase that above all other stats.

I just finished Spinward Rise on my Fury SW, running Warlock's Bargain, Blades/Killing Flames and Dreadtheft for encounters (Hellish Rebuke and Hand of Blight for at-wills, Brood of Hadar and Tyrannical Threat for dailies). I used the healing companion from the OP pack, but you say you have the angel, which is at least as good.

You really need to learn to use Dreadtheft. I know it can be annoying with any stun knocking it off, or even sprinting out of red zones -- but it's one of our best powers, and combined with Warlock's Bargain procs tons of Creeping Death stacks.

And don't be afraid to use Tyrannical Threat on any pack, don't save it just for big boss fights.

Oh wait, I've 28k hp... thx

pycon929

This is hard to read. Infernal spheres in PvE? DT bad skill? Wow...

Buy some blue PvP gear if you can. That will at least give you some decent stats at you level. You're gonna have trouble for sure since this mod was basically designed to go at it with a group. SW are still broken and devs are to dam lazy to fix this atrocity so you'll have to deal with the difficulty or roll another class. Sorry.

KF + DT + FB have solved every problem for me since....forever. Swap out FB for WB in long boss fights. Arms of Hadar isn't too bad for the CC. Hadar's Grasp is decent at best. Good for single target destruction sure, but way long cd. Best for PvP imo.

BoVA I enjoy sometimes, but I think it works best with SB lock in conjunction with sparks. HB lock is best at ranged.

You're probably dying a lot simply from lack of gear. Find some stuff with Hp (PvP gear is pretty solid) and you should see improvements. The faster you kill the mob the less time they have to kill you. Mod 6 is all about damage it seems. Stop tryng to control the mob and just blow it up.

thefabricant

diogene0 wrote: »

That's your issue. When the game says "recommanded" then it's better, and this time, the system works fine. You get drops better than your T2 gear as soon as lvl 63 or so. You chose not to equip it. Of course you're going to struggle.

Well....The system tells me a green shield level 10 is better for my op then dragon bone shield so...

theirage

I am also having issues leveling to 70 with my Fury SW. 69 though... almost there ! Swapped to a 4 set corr. BI gear from T2 around lvl 66 because of the incoming damage and that helped a little. However, I started the at the wind area last night (skipped fire, did water and earth) at level 69 already and o man... getting killed constantly and using potions in just about every pull. After finishing 2-3 of the quests that seemed to take forever, I just had to step out.

I took a break since November and started playing again on Friday. Between the repetitiveness of the 16 X 3 leveling quests and the degrading power (not gotten a single reasonable upgrade yet) with each level, I am not getting a lot of enjoyment and am considering quitting early before I invest any more time.

Does it get better at 70?

bmcd73

pycon929 wrote: »

KF + DT + FB have solved every problem for me since....forever. Swap out FB for WB in long boss fights. Arms of Hadar isn't too bad for the CC. Hadar's Grasp is decent at best. Good for single target destruction sure, but way long cd. Best for PvP imo.

That is my typical setup and with all blue items at my level and r5 enchants in all the gear, it is impossible to survive. I now use DT, Vamp, Grasp. This setup so far has given me the best survivability but I still get crunched pretty darn easy.

pycon929 wrote: »

You're probably dying a lot simply from lack of gear. Find some stuff with Hp (PvP gear is pretty solid) and you should see improvements. The faster you kill the mob the less time they have to kill you. Mod 6 is all about damage it seems. Stop tryng to control the mob and just blow it up.

Absolutely. But how to get the gear if the place you need to get the gear is impossible to do without the gear? I really hate PvP so I rather park my SW if that is the only option.

Here is what vexes me. It cannot be the intention to force people to PvP to get gear to be able to complete the PvE content. It also cannot be the intention to force people to group after we learned this the hard way from Everquest 20 years ago. It cannot be the intention to do an impossibly hard level 70 zone that rewards level 60 gear. Ghost stories for instance. There is no way a sub level 70 toon can complete this solo (well, almost impossible). So why make it a requirement as you are doing the campaign that is designed for lower levels? So I really wonder what the intentions are/were with all these changes. It's just really odd and feels totally out of whack.

My level 70 OP that has about 1800 item level feels about right with all this content. But getting there was a struggle. Not really a fun struggle. But looking back, a total breeze next to my SW.

ghoulz66

Accursed Souls daily is actually pretty nice now that I tried it out during mod 6. It hits twice, and you get a chunk of health back.

hustin1

blackxxwolf3 wrote: »

slaad lair is really really really hard for everyone not just sws. i stopped doing them cause i died so many times with my hr.

The slaad lair is pretty brutal, and Nimbus Tower is even worse. The problem with facing multiple giants is the constant interruptions and knockbacks.

wimpazoid

Don't know if anyone's mentioned this, apart from HP and powers, having a companion out to distract does wonders.
Not the Angel of Protection you are using of course, but one that will attack and draw attention, example the free frost mimic from winter event, Erinyes of Belial etc.

bmcd73

wimpazoid wrote: »

Don't know if anyone's mentioned this, apart from HP and powers, having a companion out to distract does wonders.
Not the Angel of Protection you are using of course, but one that will attack and draw attention, example the free frost mimic from winter event, Erinyes of Belial etc.

I've tried this too. I have a green defender at max level. He seems to get mauled almost immediately. I'll try that with my CC setup and see if it adds even more.

darkstarcrash

I looked on the AH for blue SW gear with hit points. There are lots of available pieces, many are pvp gear with tenacity, but some with pve stats -- and they would increase your HPs by easily 20k. Each piece 3-5k AD, quite reasonable.

d4rthd00fus

The Mod5 SW would eat spinward for lunch. Unfortunately as it's only tactic for staying alive is based on copious lifesteal and high damage, Cryptic essentially killed the class when they broke the lifesteal mechanics (sorry but anything based on the cryptic RNG is inherently broken). They have no armor to speak of and the only thing that made them dps monsters was the hellfire armor which is now obe and unusable due to the need for the HP packed into the new armor (im guessing it's lined with bandaids and plasma bags or something). I've seen many shortsighted decisions made in this Mod, but effectively killing off your previous new class goes beyond the pale. My SW survived spinward only due to a good high agro defender pet that kept the heat off of me while I waited and waited for my 7600 LS to actually proc and give me something.

It's unfortunate that really good classes are beaten so badly with the nerf bat once their successor shows up and makes me wonder how long before the OP can no longer be considered "OP".

zebular

As soon as a character of mine hits 61, I take them to the Auction House and buy them a full set of level 61 blue gear, costing around 15-20k AD total. It's far better and gives the necessary HP and stats needed for the new content. Then, as I level them up any green gear that drops that is better or quest gear rewards that is better, I swap to them. Then when they hit 70, I take them to the WoD vendor and buy their Elemental Chest piece. I then go back to the AH and buy level 70 blue gear for the rest of their gear. So far, I haven't had any issues and find that content feels just right. Not too hard and not too easy. Staying in level 60 old gear though definitely makes the game feel impossible on some classes.

Also, I've been respecing all my characters to give them every feat and boon that affects their Hit Points, Regeneration, Healing, and Incoming/Outgoing Healing Bonus. I find this to be very crucial, especially the first class feat giving 9% more HP.

d4rthd00fus

zebular wrote: »

As soon as a character of mine hits 61, I take them to the Auction House and buy them a full set of level 61 blue gear, costing around 150-20k AD total. It's far better and gives the necessary HP and stats needed for the new content. Then, as I level them up any green gear that drops that is better or quest gear rewards that is better, I swap to them. Then when they hit 70, I take them to the WoD vendor and buy their Elemental Chest piece. I then go back to the AH and buy level 70 blue gear for the rest of their gear. So far, I haven't had any issues and find that content feels just right. Not too hard and not too easy. Staying in level 60 old gear though definitely makes the game feel impossible on some classes.

Also, I've been respecing all my characters to give them every feat and boon that affects their Hit Points, Regeneration, Healing, and Incoming/Outgoing Healing Bonus. I find this to be very crucial, especially the first class feat giving 9% more HP.

A couple of issues with your method is for new characters, especially paladins where decent blue gear is significantly more expensive due to the rarity of blue drops. As for getting the WoD gear, that requires fangs that are surplus on toons that ran the campaign but very scarce for new toons that have to run the quests to get their 3 a day and with the bugged hoard return there is no way to get extra by turning in that quest. Removing the fang gate would alleviate this issue and make the new end game content much more palatable for new players or those running a new character.

zebular

d4rthd00fus wrote: »

A couple of issues with your method is for new characters, especially paladins where decent blue gear is significantly more expensive due to the rarity of blue drops. As for getting the WoD gear, that requires fangs that are surplus on toons that ran the campaign but very scarce for new toons that have to run the quests to get their 3 a day and with the bugged hoard return there is no way to get extra by turning in that quest. Removing the fang gate would alleviate this issue and make the new end game content much more palatable for new players or those running a new character.

Yeah, the Elemental chest piece will be my biggest fuss on several characters, as I really like having an armor slot and it's the only one in the mid-point from our old gear to the new gear, which kinda sucks, especially on my characters that I've never started WoD on yet. I've already decided though on those characters, I'll just suck it up and run them in level 70 blue chest piece without the armor slot until they get enough to buy the Elemental chest piece.

As for new characters/players: This really shouldn't be felt as bad as they will be getting leveling gear as they level from quests, drops and the auction house. The issue is so many of us have put a great deal of time and effort into our old 60 gear sets that we are basically gimped until we overcome our affinity with them and switch to the new level 61+ gear. With new characters/players, they won't ever see these sets and will just continue the level advancement to 70, using quest reward gear, drops and auction house purchases.

gomok72

bmcd73 wrote: »

I've leveled a OP to 70 through the 16 task grinds and they were hard enough. I wondered how someone that was squishy could possibly do this if I was getting beaten down as an OP.

So I hit 60 with my SW and decided to go back and do everything else but the new content. I got to 68. I then bought all blue items at the max level I can use (67-68) and fitted with all rank 5 enchants with item level of 1621. I have the Angel of Protection healing companion at max rank. One of my missions is to kill Axe Beaks. They hit for 10k each. So if I have more than 2...I'm pretty much insta-killed. I can barely finish killing any group with 3 mobs. Add a 4th and I'm done.

I am Hellbringer spec and HAVE to slot vamp embrace. I also use fiery bolt and killing flames. I didn't go the perma shadow puppet route...maybe that will afford me some more survivability. I am at a loss because I cannot do this content. Do I need to go back and do the earlier tasks until I hit 70 so that I can just barely do the level 67 content? Am I totally playing this SW wrong. Do I just need to shelve this guy until they change the difficulty?

This game pisses me off more than anything at this point. It FAR more frustrating than fun.

The underlined, colored word is your problem. Sacrifice the mediocre dps and survivability of Hellbringer for Soulbinder (can do Fury here to.). Make sure every piece of gear you have has hit points, defense, life steal, and armor pen for leveling. As far as companion goes I have been using my Khentarim Warlock and the synergy between me and her could only be better if the developers scale her hit points (legendary capped at 34k.).

Also, working with a group on those quests with people that has kept up on gear makes killing those strides easy as pie.
The only place where I have found a companion over a August (Ioun stone), completely worthless is the Bulette heroic where they tunnel under the ground. Companion is incapped almost 99% of the time.