So just the total EHP matters? What about the subcategories? Is it just as systematic to have any degree of HP if it means I have more armor? Or should I be aiming for a certain HP range and a certain armor range and a certain resist range? Just curious.
~Peachie
P.S. What else gets you out of snares like jailer? Because I probably need at least one of those available to me, right?
When upgrading equipment, you should target your armor:resist ratio to get as close to 10:1 as you can -- at that ratio, your effective hit points are optimized. For a full discussion of the math behind this, go here: http://us.battle.net/d3/en/forum/topic/5836324621
If your build includes Force Armor or Prismatic Armor and you keep it up during elite fights, check the ratio with the skill active.
- Venom hydra is a must with any melee partner. This is the most powerful skill against immobile monsters in the wizard arsenal. By far. It scales directly with the displayed DPS number, including crit and IAS.
- Having a way to hitstun mobs will greatly improve the survivability of your partner. You want burst damage to do that, so either meteor/star pact or arcane orb.
- About archon/disintegrate: imo they are viable if you can burn down mobs so fast that they cannot reach you, which is only possible solo (mob health grows 110%/player) or with top tier gear. Or in 4-players party where you can often manage to have no mobs on you. But in a 2-players party, you get aggro quite a lot.
- For this very reason, take at least one defensive skill. If you keep only one, teleport/illusionnist is the most versatile.
- You can go the WW/CM route without being melee, High crit chance/AP on crit needed on gear. WW on your partner mobs should immediately refresh whatever skill you have on cooldown.
-So. Drop Magic Weapon for Venom Hydra?
-I'm still sketchy on Arcane Orb vs Dis. I just think Dis has more... power. But that might be a feeling - not an actuality. And I can literally burn through every single person there is if we're in a corridor or something. All the enemies walk in a straight line.
-Archon - not worried about damage output. XD But I figure I'll have teleport to get some extra ground if I need it against mobs. That's an additional 35y every time I get attacked. Plus Fracture will keep their attention. Thinking this might help Dis. But it's like I said - not sure about Dis vs. Arcane Orb yet. I just really dig Dis.
- Venom hydra is a must with any melee partner. This is the most powerful skill against immobile monsters in the wizard arsenal. By far. It scales directly with the displayed DPS number, including crit and IAS.
- About archon/disintegrate: imo they are viable if you can burn down mobs so fast that they cannot reach you, which is only possible solo (mob health grows 110%/player) or with top tier gear. Or in 4-players party where you can often manage to have no mobs on you. But in a 2-players party, you get aggro quite a lot.
- For this very reason, take at least one defensive skill. If you keep only one, teleport/illusionnist is the most versatile.
I always play 2-player coop with my wife (a barb). I love archon/disintegrate. I was using venom hydra for a while, but developed some reservations. First, it doesn't proc Life on Hit or Life on Kill. Second, it's most effective with the fastest weapon, so I had built up IAS. But I noticed that my disintegrate burned through AP waay too fast. So I replaced my IAS gear, replaced my wand and source with a 1-hand slower weapon (spear) and shield, and replaced venom hydra with diamond skin prism. I feel that I'm now much more effective. My build:
- Electocute Lightning Blast (while awaiting AP to rebuild)
- Disintegrate Chaos Nexus (the side beams help protect me when I draw aggro)
- Improved Archon (high damage and can shoot through walls, plus the "1" key explosion with it's short cooldown helps when mobs are next to me and it doesn't interrupt the beam)
- Force Armor (to help protect against the big hit)
- Diamond Skin Prism (more protection, but I also use it when Archon runs out; it helps Disintegrate last longer)
- Teleport Fracture (to escape when health gets too low)
- Astral Presence (to offset the Force Armor reduction of AP and to rebuild AP more quickly)
- Illusionist (necessary with Teleport)
- Galvanizing Wand (essentially halves the AP cost of Force Armor while rebuilding HP)
The difference in Inferno A1 is night-and-day. I can keep disintegrate up much longer and, when beaming, I can stand in there much longer before teleporting.
Galv ward was something I was really interested in. I mean, not having to refresh armor every two minutes is pretty great and all, but I heard one of the best ways to survive as a wizard - especially with illusionist/fracture - is to have an HP regen of like 700-1000 HP per second. That way it only takes you maybe 5 or 6 seconds before you can take another clear hit, and kiting with wizards is relatively easy for such a short burst in time.
Galv ward was something I was really interested in. I mean, not having to refresh armor every two minutes is pretty great and all, but I heard one of the best ways to survive as a wizard - especially with illusionist/fracture - is to have an HP regen of like 700-1000 HP per second. That way it only takes you maybe 5 or 6 seconds before you can take another clear hit, and kiting with wizards is relatively easy for such a short burst in time.
~Peachie
I never specifically looked for Life Regeneration, but have often found enough of it on pieces that had the affixes I was targeting. I'm currently working on increasing my Life on Hit.
I never specifically looked for Life Regeneration, but have often found enough of it on pieces that had the affixes I was targeting. I'm currently working on increasing my Life on Hit.
I heard Life on Hit and Life on Kill are just too low to even matter. I mean, Life on Hit might make you a bit formidable, but ultimately, you wanna be able to regenerate life without being in the way of danger. Then, Life on Kill seems... just stupid in Inferno. It seems more logical to me to have normal health regen.
I never specifically looked for Life Regeneration, but have often found enough of it on pieces that had the affixes I was targeting. I'm currently working on increasing my Life on Hit.
I heard Life on Hit and Life on Kill are just too low to even matter. I mean, Life on Hit might make you a bit formidable, but ultimately, you wanna be able to regenerate life without being in the way of danger. Then, Life on Kill seems... just stupid in Inferno. It seems more logical to me to have normal health regen.
I might be wrong though.
~Peachie
That must be some crazy life regen.... 6 to 7 seconds = glass cannon. I prefer + to health globes / radius over any sort of regen. LoH is more of a melee need, I find it doesn't help as much with a caster.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Playing Diablo since 97. I know nothing and having nothing good to say, I be a troll.
When your main goal is to produce as much dps as you can, Life on Hit will likely be pretty mediocre because the coefficient is pretty small (20-33% for most ranged nukes). Because of that Life Steal should out perform LoH at decent dps levels. For quick comparison, if you use Celestial Orb with 30k dps and 1.5 attacks per second, a 2.7% Life Steal weapon is approximately equivalent to 900+ LoH. With Tap the Source it's more reasonable at about 579 LoH since Tap has a higher coefficient. The higher your dps the better Life Steal comes out, especially if you're using a slow 2h. With a 1 attack per second 2h, that same life steal is equivalent to 800 LoH for Tap the Source rune.
That said, life steal or LoH is mainly useful for damage reflecting mobs, in which case you could always swap in a LoH/LS weapon.
Life regen is useful for damage reflect mobs too, but also is good for any other mobs that might hit you like ranged mobs, fast melee, etc. It also continues to work while you kite whereas LoH/LS only applies when you're actually hitting stuff, so Invulnerable mobs or Shielding mobs make it even less useful.
With this in mind, I prefer going the low HP (with sufficient EHP to optimize Force Armor), decent life regen route with either Life Steal on MH or with an extra weapon in bags with LoH/LS for reflect mobs, so you get a little of both (or just use Diamond Skin). If I had to choose to drop my life steal or life regen, I'd drop the life steal anyday.
When upgrading equipment, you should target your armor:resist ratio to get as close to 10:1 as you can -- at that ratio, your effective hit points are optimized. For a full discussion of the math behind this, go here: http://us.battle.net/d3/en/forum/topic/5836324621
If your build includes Force Armor or Prismatic Armor and you keep it up during elite fights, check the ratio with the skill active.
-So. Drop Magic Weapon for Venom Hydra?
-I'm still sketchy on Arcane Orb vs Dis. I just think Dis has more... power. But that might be a feeling - not an actuality. And I can literally burn through every single person there is if we're in a corridor or something. All the enemies walk in a straight line.
-Archon - not worried about damage output. XD But I figure I'll have teleport to get some extra ground if I need it against mobs. That's an additional 35y every time I get attacked. Plus Fracture will keep their attention. Thinking this might help Dis. But it's like I said - not sure about Dis vs. Arcane Orb yet. I just really dig Dis.
~Peachie
I always play 2-player coop with my wife (a barb). I love archon/disintegrate. I was using venom hydra for a while, but developed some reservations. First, it doesn't proc Life on Hit or Life on Kill. Second, it's most effective with the fastest weapon, so I had built up IAS. But I noticed that my disintegrate burned through AP waay too fast. So I replaced my IAS gear, replaced my wand and source with a 1-hand slower weapon (spear) and shield, and replaced venom hydra with diamond skin prism. I feel that I'm now much more effective. My build:
- Electocute Lightning Blast (while awaiting AP to rebuild)
- Disintegrate Chaos Nexus (the side beams help protect me when I draw aggro)
- Improved Archon (high damage and can shoot through walls, plus the "1" key explosion with it's short cooldown helps when mobs are next to me and it doesn't interrupt the beam)
- Force Armor (to help protect against the big hit)
- Diamond Skin Prism (more protection, but I also use it when Archon runs out; it helps Disintegrate last longer)
- Teleport Fracture (to escape when health gets too low)
- Astral Presence (to offset the Force Armor reduction of AP and to rebuild AP more quickly)
- Illusionist (necessary with Teleport)
- Galvanizing Wand (essentially halves the AP cost of Force Armor while rebuilding HP)
The difference in Inferno A1 is night-and-day. I can keep disintegrate up much longer and, when beaming, I can stand in there much longer before teleporting.
~Peachie
I never specifically looked for Life Regeneration, but have often found enough of it on pieces that had the affixes I was targeting. I'm currently working on increasing my Life on Hit.
I heard Life on Hit and Life on Kill are just too low to even matter. I mean, Life on Hit might make you a bit formidable, but ultimately, you wanna be able to regenerate life without being in the way of danger. Then, Life on Kill seems... just stupid in Inferno. It seems more logical to me to have normal health regen.
I might be wrong though.
~Peachie
That must be some crazy life regen.... 6 to 7 seconds = glass cannon. I prefer + to health globes / radius over any sort of regen. LoH is more of a melee need, I find it doesn't help as much with a caster.
That said, life steal or LoH is mainly useful for damage reflecting mobs, in which case you could always swap in a LoH/LS weapon.
Life regen is useful for damage reflect mobs too, but also is good for any other mobs that might hit you like ranged mobs, fast melee, etc. It also continues to work while you kite whereas LoH/LS only applies when you're actually hitting stuff, so Invulnerable mobs or Shielding mobs make it even less useful.
With this in mind, I prefer going the low HP (with sufficient EHP to optimize Force Armor), decent life regen route with either Life Steal on MH or with an extra weapon in bags with LoH/LS for reflect mobs, so you get a little of both (or just use Diamond Skin). If I had to choose to drop my life steal or life regen, I'd drop the life steal anyday.
Crusader DPS and EHP Spreadsheet, meant for Crusaders
My Wizard