[3.24] 💥💫 The (Arch)Blade Blast Unloader 🗡️🔪🔫 - Screenwide 30m-55m Pinnacle DPS? Say yes to FUN!

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Attack speed "QOL version" with 10% lower DPS / eHP but will feel 40% better:

Why does attack speed make it feel so much better? is it just not faster shield charge?

Also how important is Runebinder?


Thank you!

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primaeva wrote:

This is the most reasonable, early league BBoU Archmage I have right now. The damage looks low, but that's because:

1) I ripped out Wrath, and put in Grace since we have strong recovery.
2) I ripped out Arcane Sigil because screw inflating PoB with stuff I don't have sockets for, or need a lot of uptime on.
3) It's also EO with items that are T2 mana or worse I believe - I don't believe all players know how to scale crit on Day 1 - those items are expensive. If you know, you know, scale this to the moon.
4) I use an honest PoB config for the BBoU - most people would set it to Blade Hits per CAST - which is basically how much a single cast does. That's dishonest, because you can only Unload a full 10-stack BV (11 stage BB) every 1. second or so.
4a) If I wanted to lie to you and show you 12m DPS instead, I'd show you Damage per CAST. I show you Damage per SEC which assumes 1 cast per second. This appears inflated since even with Empower/Enhance, Recall CD is 1.1s or so. But in reality due to Brands attaching and Runebinder, we generate more of ~18-22 stacks per second. This should THEORETICALLY more than double our reported damage but until I run frame-by-frames, I'm not lying to you about that. I'll settle for Damage Per Sec.


https://pobb.in/o9SOUqJMgCJz

Here you go! Dogshit tier gear, day 1! (Cast speed barely affects the actual DPS, if anything, I recommend stacking AS.)

Attack speed "QOL version" with 10% lower DPS / eHP but will feel 40% better:

Spoiler

https://pobb.in/UxThzeHJ9bbo
[/url]

Hey, if you think about a archmage version of this in general, wouldnt Kitava's Thirst be an option to trigger BV stacks ? Or is that to slow ? Getting rid of the brand would be a huge QoL for some and could free you up to do some other things.

Using storm brand of indecision for leveling out with the nerf? The clear on that bad boy was nice last league

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LazyBlanketCat wrote:

"

Attack speed "QOL version" with 10% lower DPS / eHP but will feel 40% better:

Why does attack speed make it feel so much better? is it just not faster shield charge?

Also how important is Runebinder?


Thank you!

Hi! So it feels better because - think about what you're doing to map fast.

1) You drop a brand every 2-3 shield charges.
2) You press Blade Blast of Unloading every time you want to wipe a screen or two.
3) To wipe a screen or two, you have two options

3A) Stand still like a doofus and wipe ONE screen, or
3B) Animation cancel the cast animation of BBoU with a Shield Charge / Frostblink, and SPREAD the BBoU "pulses" over 1.5 - 3 screens.

You can literally triple the area you cover with an open map layout and Shield Charging properly.

Now, that means most of your gameplay is literally Shield Charging. And I think that's a sign of a fast/fun build. A slow Shield Charge, then, slows your effective "DPS" during a map. Why clear one screen when you can clear 2 - 3?

Having 22% increased attack speed (and those nodes give 20% cast speed too, by the way) is MASSIVE, especially since we are not, in the Archmage version, going the Power Charge stacking route (yet. I still think Badge of the Brotherhood at least must be used late-game. And even Maven Belt. And even Void Battery.)

This loses us the ELEVEN - THIRTEEN FRENZY CHARGES worth of Attack Speed in the past. Your Shield Charge kind of slows to campaign-level speeds if you don't change anything up.

This build already has an excess number of buttons to press, but it also has seriously excess damage + QoL. It would be a waste to let all that big damage and new QoL get wasted just because our Shield Charge was slow af! Trust me, you can try spending the 8 or so regrets with and without those attack/cast speed nodes, and you'll feel the difference. I just wanted to give people the option.


Runebinder is ABSOLUTELY MASSIVE on Single Target damage. I think I did some napkin math a few posts back, but I will ballpark it to at least 18-23% more damage on Single Target. Doesn't do much while mapping, it's true.

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wengweng805 wrote:

Using storm brand of indecision for leveling out with the nerf? The clear on that bad boy was nice last league

I think I stanned SBoU last league only because the build was released somewhat mid-league (well, 1 month in) and most people were rolling their second chars. So SBoU was freely available and unnerfed of course.

Now we're in a league start situation, so I'm reflecting that - Arma Brand baseline is available on Day 1, and it takes you well into early yellows where it's perfect to transition into BBoU.

If you're joining the league one week later and have some friends to spot you maybe 10c, by all means just go SBoU! It takes care of business and is lightning-based, just like Archmage BBoU.

But yeah, combined with nerf + league start - we're dropping SBoU from the narrative!

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NoBotGamer wrote:

Hey, if you think about a archmage version of this in general, wouldnt Kitava's Thirst be an option to trigger BV stacks ? Or is that to slow ? Getting rid of the brand would be a huge QoL for some and could free you up to do some other things.

Hi there! That's a fair question I get often. The best way to look at this is to see how much value Kit's Thirst provides.


To get 10 stacks from Kit's Thirst, you need to cast an average of 10 BBoUs, which, standing still spamming, takes like 2.5 seconds if I'm not wrong.

To get 10 stacks from Brand Recall -- you walk around and every 1.3seconds (down to 1.1 at endgame), you receive 10 free BV stacks not doing anything.

Kit's Thirst is ALREADY half as efficient as Brands. But wait - there's more!

You spamming BV and standing still not only makes you a sitting duck for attacks, which defeats the spirit of this build... but you are ALSO consuming what small procs you're getting from Kit's Thirst. Every time you generate 2 stacks from a proc (don't forget Saboteur doubles Kit Thirst procs too) - you fire it off with BBoU - WHICH MEANS YOU FIRED OFF a 200% AoE BBoU RATHER THAN A 1000% AoE BBoU.

So not only are you blowing through tons of mana, standing still with a target on your face, you're firing off TINY Blade Blasts and now have to be in melee range of all your targets.

It sort of bricks the build, if you catch what I'm saying!

Finally, you lose the helmet slot, which is just too precious. Late game, you want Heatshiver, or a tanky helm. Early, you want Mindspiral, Crown of the Inward Eye, or just a rare with mana and life.

The opp cost to do less damage at a smaller range while standing still is too darn high!

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Zevz2990 wrote:

Hey, whats the most reasonable MTX to use for the build? and do you need the MTX for blade blast, blade vortex or both? Awesome build btw, looks super fun

Hi! Now this video I WILL do as it doesn't take long to do.

You can get a sneak peek through my videos of course, but the first page section dividers actually uses all 3 colours to show people.

That said, those dividers don't do the most important thing - and that's SOUND.

This is a CRAZILY NOISY BUILD with NO MTX and I should list that as a huge con. It makes you want to turn sound effects off.

Baseline BV makes an annoying whistling / metallic sound every time it stacks to 10.

Baseline BBoU sounds like the lid of a cheap, foot-operated plastic waste bin hitting the wall 10 times.

The BEST combo to reduce sound and still look CLEAN is, ironically:

1) Sawblade BBoU MTX (the original intro video). It makes an acceptable sound that kind of fades out. Runner up is the Illusionist Blade Blast, which is actually quite elegant, but I felt it was a little hard to see, so it doesn't look like you're doing much, everything just dies.

Everything else is SO GODDAMN NOISY!

2) ALSO Sawblade BV. With Demonic BV being the absolutely silent and subtle one.

ABSOLUTELY worth the MTX spend especially on Blade Blast though - this build has such ridiculous AoE, you just get more value out of MTX than most skills. Haha!

(Finally, even the Brand skin has an effect, but baseline one is actually relatively quiet, so I'll give it a free pass.)

Haha thanks! Feedback is that it HAS been super fun! It did lack defenses though. I think I will solve that somewhat this league for the baseline PoBs... the high-end players already did that with the Hall of Fame posts.

Hi! This build looks really fun and I want to league start it.

To confirm, that means going arma brand sabo, leveling to early maps, then buying one of the early BBoU's on AH if it's sc trade, right? If so, do you have a specific arma brand guide you recommend following for day one?

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jormungandrmml wrote:

Hi! This build looks really fun and I want to league start it.

To confirm, that means going arma brand sabo, leveling to early maps, then buying one of the early BBoU's on AH if it's sc trade, right? If so, do you have a specific arma brand guide you recommend following for day one?

That's right!

Jungroan's the incumbent master of this Arma Brand Recaller archetype, and he has just updated it for 3.24!


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wNXJEncb6tY

Now what I think can be dropped for most players is the whole Pyroclast Mine of Sabotage setup in his latest vid - it adds a metric ton of damage. But using the normal, mine-less Recall damage alone is enough to get you into the endgame. That's more for bursting down Guardians, etc. (I say this because a lot of people find mining before a boss clunky. I mean, I'd absolutely do it. It would even work for BBoU. It's just extra steps some may not like though.)

In fact, you may find yourself liking Arma Brand Recaller so much, and sticking with it!

This is his full run he recorded a while back which takes you to the basics. Only thing that's outdated is - you don't need to use Spellslinger any more, which is the worst part of the early stages. Just slap Automation in and you're good to go. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gm6FwHlmTY4

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primaeva wrote:

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NoBotGamer wrote:

Hey, if you think about a archmage version of this in general, wouldnt Kitava's Thirst be an option to trigger BV stacks ? Or is that to slow ? Getting rid of the brand would be a huge QoL for some and could free you up to do some other things.

Hi there! That's a fair question I get often. The best way to look at this is to see how much value Kit's Thirst provides.


To get 10 stacks from Kit's Thirst, you need to cast an average of 10 BBoUs, which, standing still spamming, takes like 2.5 seconds if I'm not wrong.

To get 10 stacks from Brand Recall -- you walk around and every 1.3seconds (down to 1.1 at endgame), you receive 10 free BV stacks not doing anything.

Kit's Thirst is ALREADY half as efficient as Brands. But wait - there's more!

You spamming BV and standing still not only makes you a sitting duck for attacks, which defeats the spirit of this build... but you are ALSO consuming what small procs you're getting from Kit's Thirst. Every time you generate 2 stacks from a proc (don't forget Saboteur doubles Kit Thirst procs too) - you fire it off with BBoU - WHICH MEANS YOU FIRED OFF a 200% AoE BBoU RATHER THAN A 1000% AoE BBoU.

So not only are you blowing through tons of mana, standing still with a target on your face, you're firing off TINY Blade Blasts and now have to be in melee range of all your targets.

It sort of bricks the build, if you catch what I'm saying!

Finally, you lose the helmet slot, which is just too precious. Late game, you want Heatshiver, or a tanky helm. Early, you want Mindspiral, Crown of the Inward Eye, or just a rare with mana and life.

The opp cost to do less damage at a smaller range while standing still is too darn high!

Hey, thanks for the answer, that makes sense, altough it is sad. Would be cool if you could sustain BV with shield charges or whatever.

On another Note. Im looking to maybe farm some logbooks or trialmaster this league. Have you done a good amount of these with this build ?

I would expect trialmaster to go good if the gear is alright but logbooks are probably still problematic as a hit based build has more bad remnants.