How much STR in werefox to be decent?

cutebutpsycho wrote: »

Hiya, I'm a lvl 50 veno.
...
Current stats: Vit 82, Str 30, Mag 140, Dex 8

1) Your mag should always be at least 3x your level. At level 50, you should have at least 150 mag. At 60, you will need 180 mag to wield the TT60 weapon. So don't fall behind on allocating points to mag.

2) If you're pure mag or mag/vit, you don't need dex. Don't waste any more points in it.

3a) To be really effective in fox form, your str needs to be 2.5x your level, That's a heavy build. You're not going to be able to do that as an arcane build, especially as a vit/mag arcane build. Essentially, by choosing to be vit/mag, you've already decided to give up doing much damage in fox form (even if you didn't know you were deciding that at the time). Unless you're willing to restat and change your build, concentrate on doing damage in caster form. Drop into fox form only to debuff, then pop right back into caster form to do more damage. If you must do damage in fox form, concentrate on Fox Wallop, Befuddling Mist, and Leech.

3b) Your str should be just what you need to wear your armor. I believe that's (lvl/2)+4. So at level 50, you should have 29 str.

4) Most recommended vit/mag builds I've seen are only 0.5-1 vit per level. So your vit should be somewhere between 25-50. 82 is probably too much.

There's little you can do but restating but getting might rings with damage and accuracy adds will help a bit.

Salandri is entirely correct about your mag stat. You won't be able to keep up on damage in any form without an at-level weapon.

I don't entirely agree with the str stat part, however. I mainly use fox form, and I am a LA build. I have both magic tree and fox form tree skills pretty close to maxed to level, including maxed masteries. I take down mobs in exactly the same amount of time casting as in melee, and if I get lucky with crits, I'm faster in melee. I realize this could change as I level, so I can only refer to my current experience.

With your current build, you won't be able to do this or a HA build without a reset scroll. Since I shall assume you would rather avoid spending the money on that, if I were you I would stop putting points into vit until you get your mag stat up to level. In fact, I would stop putting points into vit entirely and go pure arcane from now on.

With your build you can augment you phys attack with might rings, garnet shards in your weapon, and +str gear. This would improve your damage, but I don't think it will really be worth the damage you would take away from your magic attack. And this isn't taking accuracy into account, which is a very important part of melee.

With this in mind, the most valuable fox form skills you will have are amp damage, purge, and leech. If you do decide to use fox form skills then it depends on if you will use them against mobs or bosses.

Amp damage should always be maxed for boss fights, it's one of the veno's jobs. Purge is great, esp later in the game, and is another skills venos are used for in a squad. Leech, when maxed, gives you an 80% chance of gaining 600 HP even if you miss whatever you are trying to hit. (I use this a lot against aoe bosses between potting to help ease the cleric's job when I decide to jump in and smack in fox form and the cleric isn't using BB)

Ok, now I'll run down all the other skills one by one: (the list isn't in order of usefulness, btw, just in the other I thought of the skills)

1. Befuddling Mist is useful against both due to the decreased accuracy component. When maxed, it's a 70% reduction. Against a boss, let's face it, any time the boss misses the barb, it makes the cleric's life easier, esp if for whatever reason the cleric is having trouble keeping up on heals. Against mobs, they might actually miss you or your pet which is also useful.

2. Fox Wallop is only useful against mobs, but it uses chi, and the time it takes to cast and the fact that it won't always hit makes it minimally useful compared to just casting venomous scarab. I have never seen the increased channeling time work against a boss when I've used it, so correct me if I'm wrong, but that makes it practically useless in boss fights.

3. Soul Degeneration isn't really useful until you hit sage/demon, except as a quick thing to make up the time between when you can use amp damage. Even then, I rarely if ever use it.

4. Stunning Blow is great for holding enemies still for a barb (or you in fox form; BM have so many stun skills that don't require a spark that really, if they are in your party you shouldn't need to use it) to lay into them. Unless you are already in fox form, this is hardly useful, and using a spark to do it seems a waste. Mind you, since I am in fox form so much, I use this all the time, but that's only because I don't have the range that casters do.

5. Consume Spirit can be very useful once you max it, but is less so before then and still situation-specific. To me, it's mainly only used in emergencies when I need mana right away to heal a pet and can't waste the time to go to human form to use natures grace and have run out of MP pots.

6. Malefic Crush, on the other hand, is useful when you are in the middle of a mob, your pet will die imminently, and the mobs are all almost dead, and you have 2 sparks. Obviously, at level 50 you don't have this yet, but it is useful. While I don't pvp, I would assume in a TW situation, the mana drain component of this skill is very useful since it's an aoe skill.

7. Crush Vigor is only useful in PvP, and as a result I have no opinion on the matter and don't even have the skill.

Don't know if that is helpful to you at all, but it should give you an idea of how the skills are used in fox form.

I just want to add some to your description, wich btw is pretty good ;-)

FionaAdamina - Heavens Tear wrote: »

1. Befuddling Mist is useful against both due to the decreased accuracy component. When maxed, it's a 70% reduction. Against a boss, let's face it, any time the boss misses the barb, it makes the cleric's life easier, esp if for whatever reason the cleric is having trouble keeping up on heals. Against mobs, they might actually miss you or your pet which is also useful.It also have a small Spray/fan AoE, wich is very effective in for example FC. Or when youre just taking on more than one mob

2. Fox Wallop is only useful against mobs, but it uses chi, and the time it takes to cast and the fact that it won't always hit makes it minimally useful compared to just casting venomous scarab. I have never seen the increased channeling time work against a boss when I've used it, so correct me if I'm wrong, but that makes it practically useless in boss fights.This skill comes into play if you choose to go Demon, as it grants a chance that all hits are critical for 5 seconds.

3. Soul Degeneration isn't really useful until you hit sage/demon, except as a quick thing to make up the time between when you can use amp damage. Even then, I rarely if ever use it.Sage gives 20% lower HP on target

4. Stunning Blow is great for holding enemies still for a barb (or you in fox form; BM have so many stun skills that don't require a spark that really, if they are in your party you shouldn't need to use it) to lay into them. Unless you are already in fox form, this is hardly useful, and using a spark to do it seems a waste. Mind you, since I am in fox form so much, I use this all the time, but that's only because I don't have the range that casters do.As you did note, to keep mobs still. Very useful for running mobs, as the freeze is up to 8 seconds. In a squad that sometimes enough to have the mob killed before it gets to run away again.

5. Consume Spirit can be very useful once you max it, but is less so before then and still situation-specific. To me, it's mainly only used in emergencies when I need mana right away to heal a pet and can't waste the time to go to human form to use natures grace and have run out of MP pots.I dont use this skill either, a decent replacement is to use Soul Transfusion and use leech

6. Malefic Crush, on the other hand, is useful when you are in the middle of a mob, your pet will die imminently, and the mobs are all almost dead, and you have 2 sparks. Obviously, at level 50 you don't have this yet, but it is useful. While I don't pvp, I would assume in a TW situation, the mana drain component of this skill is very useful since it's an aoe skill.A skill I rarely use, works if you want to take aggro off your pet a bit more stylish than healing. I rather use the sparks on Bramble hood

7. Crush Vigor is only useful in PvP, and as a result I have no opinion on the matter and don't even have the skill.

8. Leech is one of the most useful melee skills I can think of. Inflicts some extra damage and gives a relatively high % to gain 600HP(Sage gives 100%, demon 800HP at same % as lvl 10). Very useful for: Grinding witout using pots, AoE bosses to give the cleric a brake or just to DD. It dont cost chi, and by using this and soul transfusion I can keep grinding on mobs without ever worrying about pots.