Sage or Demon in a "Pickle"

Argh, those two along with Lucky are the last I'm looking for, and Solandri and I are on same server. b:sad

The FB89 drop ones appear to have gone way down in price since I got them, so price probably not an issue to consider.

As far as I can see, the demon skills are more for a PVP veno or Pking veno. But the sage skills are more for helping squadmates and in group situations. Either way it's a choice between if ur more of a solo or a squad kind of veno.

Demon Veno=more for rpk or pvp
Sage Veno= more for squads and gaining chi

Vidalaire - Heavens Tear wrote: »

That's a broad generalization that is not completely true. As was stated earlier, Demon Bramble, Lending Hand, Venomous, Nova, and Purge are all much more PvE oriented than their Sage counterparts.

As for the chi issue, Demon Venos are just as capable of building chi quickly as Sage Venos. Sages get Master Li's, Sage Venomous, and Sage Lending. Demons gets Demon Crush Vigor and Demon Lending. In fact, I can build chi faster than Sage Venos. Sage Veno skills do use less chi, but the Demon versions of those skills do more damage. All in all, I'd rather have the damage.

Yes, but Crush Vigor is a melee fox form skill. As an arcane veno, I only use fox form to cast amplify/purge, and on occasion, myriad. I also try to avoid melee range as much as possible, so if things go bad, I have more time to react to the situation.

Edit, lets not forget, only venomous and master li's technique are available at level 89, and lending hand isn't available until 99.

Vidalaire - Heavens Tear wrote: »

That's a broad generalization that is not completely true. As was stated earlier, Demon Bramble, Lending Hand, Venomous, Nova, and Purge are all much more PvE oriented than their Sage counterparts.

As for the chi issue, Demon Venos are just as capable of building chi quickly as Sage Venos. Sages get Master Li's, Sage Venomous, and Sage Lending. Demons gets Demon Crush Vigor and Demon Lending. In fact, I can build chi faster than Sage Venos. Sage Veno skills do use less chi, but the Demon versions of those skills do more damage. All in all, I'd rather have the damage.

I would disagree about demon lending being more pve oriented, but it's not really important. On the chi issue though:
Sage - Master Li's=50/minute, Lending Hand=100/minute, Venomous=+6/cast (16 vs 10 average).
Demon - Lending Hand=80/minute, Crush Vigor=100/minute.

That's 150 for a sage and 180 for a demon before venomous. To match that 30 chi difference it takes 5 casts of venomous. Seeing as how venomous is cast 15-20 times a minute (or more with great channeling), that leaves the chi generating advantage in favor of a sage by about 75/minute (after accounting for more lucky from the demon). On top of that, as you've pointed out sages use less chi on their skills (though I don't find this advantage to be particularly large... I find it most useful on stunning blow). Sages have more chi by a pretty good margin. Without working out the exact chi generation for sage/demon, it looks like it's around a 25% advantage for sage and potentially use less (but never use more).

I'm not saying a demon can't build chi, but it's not as fast as a sages. If you generate chi faster than a sage veno, that veno either lacks skills or playing ability.

I wasn't going through with detailed casting on a per minute basis for sage/demon there, just looking at the generation for those skills. When you're accounting for the opportunity cost on skills you can gain 16 chi from befuddling (since you're in fox anyways), and with an average 60 chi per cast from crush vigor (including the 10 to cast it) that's only 44 chi for +88/minute.

Sage/demon have different casting patterns, because demon can cast lucky more and loses damage on blazing (even at full duration), that's why I didn't go through it second by second, it's too much work to do quickly.

When it comes to chaining venomous. With 33% channeling that's 1 per 2 seconds. 15-20 per minute is 30-40 seconds used on venomous. Then there's 12 spent in fox, and that leaves you 8-18 seconds for other abilities. If your pet isn't tanking, that seems perfectly reasonable to me.

Vidalaire - Heavens Tear wrote: »

Not everyone has 33% channeling. Realistically, most have 10-20%.

Most don't use Amp, or Ironwood on bosses either or have the equips to do everything their level allows or calls for. If they're buying sage / demon skills, I'd think they could afford some -6% gears.

Vidalaire - Heavens Tear wrote: »

Not everyone has 33% channeling.

Seeing as how we're including level 99 skills into the comparison, I think level 99 gear is reasonable to include. 33% channeling is having 6% channeling on 5 of 6 slots: neck, wrist, ring, ring, belt, weapon. Bracers are pretty much free 6% channeling, rings are fairly cheap atleast on DW. I assume they're more available on older servers. They cost about 6 mil here, as do necks (note: I don't have 6% on those slots... but I'm weird and refuse to use any crafted gear that doesn't say I manufactured it, they're still very obtainable for me though if I wanted to use them). That's four slots right there. A final 6% could be a weapon (blade of the red dust, neon purgatory, etc), a wraith conquerer+2 piece 99 bonus, or a 6% belt. That gets you 30, then there's the practically free 3% robe for 5k rep. 33% right there.

Realistically, most have 10-20%. The scenario you have there is the max amount of times someone could cast Venomous. That doesn't mean they cast it that many times. Most won't cast it that many times.

That's why I gave a range of 15-20 casts. There's plenty of mitigating circumstances such as lag, talking, and so on which you also mentioned. 15 for a low end seems perfectly reasonable though. That works out to casting venomous 50% of the time you're killing.

Also, keep in mind that if I get lucky with Crush Vigor that means I get 220 chi that minute which blows away anything a Sage Veno can bring.

You also have the same chance to get 20 chi in a minute from Crush Vigor which means a sage is going to utterly destroy you for that time period. That's why it's best to take the average for a comparison. You can spike, but you can also be unlucky and not spike.

EDIT: Just reread your post Brael and something clicked. I usually stay at 10m from a boss unless it has random aggro. If I used Befuddling Mist, I would have to run into melee range, cast it, and then run out of melee range to nuke. Just the time it takes to run in and out would take more than 3 seconds. That's not a fair comparison to Master Li's opportunity cost. If you wanted to make it fair, the only thing I could do to generate chi in Fox Form at 10m, besides casting another curse, is to use pet heal and pet heal gives 8 chi, I think. CV gives more.

True, I was assuming you would be closer than 10m to take advantage of fox skills. There's no real difference between 4m and 10m unless something has random aggro or a very short range ae. Why run in and out? And there's time for two skills with amp, so using CV alone isn't going to fill out your fox form time. Leech, befuddle, etc can all fit in there too.

Vidalaire - Heavens Tear wrote: »

Refer to my last post as to why not everyone chooses to get 6% channeling gear.

I suppose. It's always possible to swap it in though. Anyways, I think that as you hit higher levels channeling becomes less important for pet heals and more important for nukes, this is because there's just not that much content where you need a huge amount of channeling to handle, rather any veno can or can't handle it. If you give up 10% damage in magic attack/crit rate to gain 33% channeling, you're gaining about 9% more damage output (110% vs 120%). Anyways, I realize not everyone will have 6% channeling, but I was pointing out what you can expect standard for a veno that wants channeling.

True, but when I do get lucky it's easy to build chi faster than a Sage Veno. It's much easier to get lucky with Crush Vigor than Venomous or Lending Hand.

I suppose what you mean by getting lucky. Venomous gets far more trials so will be less spiky, and hold much closer to it's average. It also has a lower range. In 15 casts of venomous you get between 150 and 450 chi. In two casts of CV you get between 20 and 220 chi. Hitting either extreme with venomous is not only much rarer, but less detrimental when it goes bad.

As Squeakytoy pointed out, being further away grants you more time to react if things go sideways. Why bother being at 4m when being at 10m allows me to cast all my spells, be in the BB(if there is one), and allows me sufficient time to run/Bramble/Feral or whatever if things go wrong.

Veno's have the weakest nukes in the game. We have a tougher time pulling aggro with nukes than any other class. On a typical mob we're going to be behind the wizards and archers. Two classes that attack from range. I would argue that if you're trying to be away from the mob if things go bad, it's safer to be next to the mob than far away, because when the tank dies it's charging those wizards/archers, meaning it's moving away from you. In the case of BB, being at 4 leaves you in it as well as long as it's also hitting the Barb, and the whole argument of being at 4m rather than 10m is that it allows you to use more of your skills. Maybe it's less important for demon since as you've pointed out, CV is used when you go fox every 30 seconds. That only leaves you a potential one skill (leech most likely) to fill in the extra time.

I remember you posted that there's time to cast 2 skills plus Amp in the 6 seconds of Fox Form's cooldown only if you use a macro. I, for one, don't have any more space for another macro. Doing it by hand, makes it fit good enough. There's no seam between going into Fox, CV, AMP, and going out of Fox.

Right, you can probably do it without a macro too actually but you have to use lesser skills. Befuddle and fox are .7 channel/.5 cast while leech and consume are .8 channel/1.1 cast. I found out recently that my hotkey actually breaks if I use befuddle and leech because I hit the portion of the macro that takes me out of fox again before the cooldown has finished.

Also keep in mind, going by what you've said you have low channeling. With 10% channeling amp/cv are each 1.35 channel/1.2 cast. That's 2.55 seconds for each one or 5.1 seconds total with a 6 second cooldown on fox. After factoring latency in, even a fast skill (befuddle) is delaying you leaving fox by half a second.

Being 10m means I'm between the ranged classes and the melee classes. So yes, if things go wrong and the boss goes raging after a DD, I'm still safe and I'm in a more flexible position. Since I'm a caster Veno, my nukes do far more damage than my Fox skills and give comparable chi. So, the less time I'm in Fox mode the better my damage output will be.


Not everyone thinks channeling is the be-all end-all stat. Sure it may beat out any one of those stats but my gear has three of those stats per piece of equipment. I may be giving up some damage output, but the extra hp/defense makes up for it. Frequently, I see casters with equips with just -6 channeling. If that's what you want to do, go ahead, but I'd rather not be limited like that. I still have a high damage output, but that's tempered with a good defense and solid HP.

Vidalaire - Heavens Tear wrote: »

If a Sage Veno needs to sit there and machinegun Venomouses to keep up with a Demon Veno in the chi department, I think it's safe to say Demon Venos can do just fine building chi. Also, keep in mind that if I get lucky with Crush Vigor that means I get 220 chi that minute which blows away anything a Sage Veno can bring.

I know you guys are arguing about caster venos, and I'm not gonna comment on that since it doesn't really interest me. But I just wanted to point out that I'm planning to go Sage primarily for the melee mastery bonus (200% vs. 150% for demon).

4 chi per hit @ 1.25 attacks per sec = 5 chi per sec = 300 chi per minute. If you factor in the -0.2 interval I should have by 90, that works out to 400 chi per minute. True a demon veno could melee too, but outside of PvP they have much less reason to melee than sage veno (at least non-skill melee which is the prodigious spark generator). Add in master li's technique for 450 chi per minute, and I can spend 75% of my time doing single-spark damage.

Vidalaire - Heavens Tear wrote: »

Being 10m means I'm between the ranged classes and the melee classes. So yes, if things go wrong and the boss goes raging after a DD, I'm still safe and I'm in a more flexible position. Since I'm a caster Veno, my nukes do far more damage than my Fox skills and give comparable chi. So, the less time I'm in Fox mode the better my damage output will be.

I'm not advocating spending more time in fox, rather that the 20% of the time you're in fox (simply out of necessity to amp and cv) can be put to better use. I don't know what your physical attack is when you're in fox (without swapping gear) but I'm going to guess 1850-2550 since you have higher stat gear, and with sage melee mastery mine is 1950-2650. So lets call it 2200. Sage/Demon leech is base+3505 damage. So you're looking at 5705 damage. It's free damage, so why not use it? Calculating spells without knowing your stats becomes a bit of a mess, but that 5705 twice a minute probably works out to being the same as one venomous. It's not about fox on it's own being some amazing damage source for arcane venos, but rather that it's some decent damage to add in when you're otherwise not doing any, and the extra effects can be useful too.

Not everyone thinks channeling is the be-all end-all stat. Sure it may beat out any one of those stats but my gear has three of those stats per piece of equipment. I may be giving up some damage output, but the extra hp/defense makes up for it. Frequently, I see casters with equips with just -6 channeling. If that's what you want to do, go ahead, but I'd rather not be limited like that. I still have a high damage output, but that's tempered with a good defense and solid HP.

HP never really bother me, if defense is needed though I can handle myself. I've got physical gear I carry with me (which I think most arcane venos end up doing anyways at higher levels) for the times I need it. The difference though is most of it is cheap gear such as a fearless blaze that I crafted one day that has 4 sockets and 2 +94 physical bonuses, a cube lottery coin neck, an amulet of purity with 91 physical, and so on. I fully realize that one disadvantage to channeling is that your defense will suffer, there's no debating that. However, defense is one of those things that you don't always need. When you need it, swaps can be made and when you don't (the majority of the time) you've got better damage output.

Solandri - Heavens Tear wrote: »

4 chi per hit @ 1.25 attacks per sec = 5 chi per sec = 300 chi per minute. If you factor in the -0.2 interval I should have by 90, that works out to 400 chi per minute. True a demon veno could melee too, but outside of PvP they have much less reason to melee than sage veno (at least non-skill melee which is the prodigious spark generator). Add in master li's technique for 450 chi per minute, and I can spend 75% of my time doing single-spark damage.

Recalculate that with triple spark. 100 chi for 150% vs 300 chi for 500%. I would think you would come out ahead more.