Hi there. Here's my character. I'm currently speed farming mp2 and want to go higher up the chain. I would appreciate any advice you guys might have for me regarding gear/specs/playstyle.
Not many black ice builds, its not too effective despite being super fun, at best I can use it to survive mp7 but even then the dps can be troublesome and I just end up going back to archon.
As for your gear, problems are your high lack of crit chance, and no APOC, gonna be pretty starved at the high mp
With 20% crit chance he doesn't need APoC. Power Hungry and Astral Presence is more than fine (I tried to list all AP regeneration tactics recently).
Looking at your build and gear, it all made sense, there is no particular weak spot. How are you feeling in terms of survivability, just fine or too squishy? I think you just crossed the mark where LS becomes better than LoH, with every increase in DPS you should also feel more confident.
There aren't too many Black Ice wizards out there, which is probably why there's so little feedback. I haven't played it myself extensively, so I can't tell you much about it either. Just a few things:
-Maybe you want a little bit more pickup radius to make Power Hungry even more useful? That is, if you're playing on your own. If you're playing in a group, just take a Witch Doctor with you, they're like Health Globe vacuumers
-I was wondering why your Scoundrel has a Windforce... why not a Buriza to support Cold Blooded? Also, instead of the SoJ I would give him a ring with IAS, MF, GF, or even a Hellfire Ring. But it's a matter of personal choice.
-When you increase MP, your fights will last a bit longer and you're gonna get hit a bit more. So MS becomes less of a factor than survivability and damage. Have you tried using Ice Armor + Crystallize, Chilling Aura, Ice Reflect (for defense) or +Jagged Ice (for offense)? I really liked Crystallize a lot. Combined with Teleport as "WTF escape button" and a fast-shooting freezing Scoundrel it can save you on higher levels.
-You have no crit chance whatsoever on rings, amulet, and gloves. I'd start by replacing your SoJ... amulet and Zuni Pox might get expensive, but you'd have to check out using a spreadsheet or calculator tool.
-I think you would get a lot of DPS out of a Witching Hour. Of course, you'd also lose a ton of EHP, but I was thinking maybe you could also replace your chest by a Zuni Marrow then, getting the third piece bonus and getting at least some EHP back.
-Not sure about the exact prices, but I feel that the average damage on your Triumvirate is quite low.
None of these changes is particularly cheap, though. You should pick one by one and make a significant change, rather than small baby steps (because in the end I always feel that bumping up DPS in small steps makes you lose money, since re-sell value of items never increases).
I am playing a black ice wizard as well. I just returned to the game and had no cash to start. I have only been playing a few days for not a lot of hours. Using the gear guide and searching for some good buys on the AH I am here.
http://us.battle.net/d3/en/profile/Magusrex-1997/hero/4552603 I was able to get a Skorn with LS yesterday afternoon at about 500k. I had been using one with LoH, the difference is being able to tank elite packs with reflect on in MP4 and 5 in act 3 now. The build is better solo than grouping, you need the kills for black ice. Getting large groups to a choke points makes for super fast farming. The storm armor (reactive) actually kills things as they appear on the screen sometimes. I really enjoy this playstyle.
In groups where I am not getting the kills for black ice I will switch RoF to snowblast and storm armor to power of the storm. People move so fast, not running out of AP is key, although I was doing fine in Act 3 MP5 groups just want to try some things. Not a lot of feedback on these builds because the other ones are so good. Don’t have the resources yet to gear for the other popular Wizard builds. This is really fun though. LS has mad the build more fun for me because I am a little tanky when I want to be.
Your gear seems better than mine, try LS it is probably why I am able to farm higher MPs. I also find snowbound to be great. I can cover the board in Blizzard and still lay on RoF without AP issues.
OK.
Well just a reminder this is my character. It's updated and upgraded now.
I've tried all of your advice and it worked real nice for me
Got a skorn, switched the gloves, got some more pickup radius. (still want a bit more) and upgraded my CD and CC.
The skorn is the big winner here and with LS I can speedfarm MP4 and farm MP5/6 quite easily.
Also on higher MPs I switch storm armor with ice armor/crystallize and it's very helpful. Just so u know
Nice, thanks for keeping us informed. I have not tried ice armor yet, I have been wanting to. I switch to energy armor for higher MPS atm. I will try ice armor tonight. If I have enough mobs on the screen and spam blizzard my health doesn’t even think about going down not matter what I am standing in or fighting. It’s fun. Since this build doesn’t get a lot of press. If I try anything new I will post the results here, please continue to do the same.
Put me on friends even. Two black Ice wizards would probably pretty fun to farm together. Black ice everywhere J I would love to get my hands on some really good gear, it would be so much fun.
Jagged ice was VERY nice. It allowed me to move up to MP7, could probably go higher, just have to willing to kite some elites. The jagged iced solves a problem I had with certain melees.
I should mention that PTR builds are snapshotted off our current "work in progress" and sometimes picks up some changes and not others. In this case, the Disintegrate change was picked up, but the Ray of Frost change was not. Ray of Frost got a comparable damage buff as well, which will be seen in the next PTR build (along with the Witch Doctor Firebats damage numbers)
This will be awesome for the build
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Thanks in advance!
As for your gear, problems are your high lack of crit chance, and no APOC, gonna be pretty starved at the high mp
Looking at your build and gear, it all made sense, there is no particular weak spot. How are you feeling in terms of survivability, just fine or too squishy? I think you just crossed the mark where LS becomes better than LoH, with every increase in DPS you should also feel more confident.
There aren't too many Black Ice wizards out there, which is probably why there's so little feedback. I haven't played it myself extensively, so I can't tell you much about it either. Just a few things:
-Maybe you want a little bit more pickup radius to make Power Hungry even more useful? That is, if you're playing on your own. If you're playing in a group, just take a Witch Doctor with you, they're like Health Globe vacuumers
-I was wondering why your Scoundrel has a Windforce... why not a Buriza to support Cold Blooded? Also, instead of the SoJ I would give him a ring with IAS, MF, GF, or even a Hellfire Ring. But it's a matter of personal choice.
-When you increase MP, your fights will last a bit longer and you're gonna get hit a bit more. So MS becomes less of a factor than survivability and damage. Have you tried using Ice Armor + Crystallize, Chilling Aura, Ice Reflect (for defense) or +Jagged Ice (for offense)? I really liked Crystallize a lot. Combined with Teleport as "WTF escape button" and a fast-shooting freezing Scoundrel it can save you on higher levels.
-You have no crit chance whatsoever on rings, amulet, and gloves. I'd start by replacing your SoJ... amulet and Zuni Pox might get expensive, but you'd have to check out using a spreadsheet or calculator tool.
-I think you would get a lot of DPS out of a Witching Hour. Of course, you'd also lose a ton of EHP, but I was thinking maybe you could also replace your chest by a Zuni Marrow then, getting the third piece bonus and getting at least some EHP back.
-Not sure about the exact prices, but I feel that the average damage on your Triumvirate is quite low.
None of these changes is particularly cheap, though. You should pick one by one and make a significant change, rather than small baby steps (because in the end I always feel that bumping up DPS in small steps makes you lose money, since re-sell value of items never increases).
http://us.battle.net/d3/en/profile/Magusrex-1997/hero/4552603 I was able to get a Skorn with LS yesterday afternoon at about 500k. I had been using one with LoH, the difference is being able to tank elite packs with reflect on in MP4 and 5 in act 3 now. The build is better solo than grouping, you need the kills for black ice. Getting large groups to a choke points makes for super fast farming. The storm armor (reactive) actually kills things as they appear on the screen sometimes. I really enjoy this playstyle.
In groups where I am not getting the kills for black ice I will switch RoF to snowblast and storm armor to power of the storm. People move so fast, not running out of AP is key, although I was doing fine in Act 3 MP5 groups just want to try some things. Not a lot of feedback on these builds because the other ones are so good. Don’t have the resources yet to gear for the other popular Wizard builds. This is really fun though. LS has mad the build more fun for me because I am a little tanky when I want to be.
Your gear seems better than mine, try LS it is probably why I am able to farm higher MPs. I also find snowbound to be great. I can cover the board in Blizzard and still lay on RoF without AP issues.
Well just a reminder this is my character. It's updated and upgraded now.
I've tried all of your advice and it worked real nice for me
Got a skorn, switched the gloves, got some more pickup radius. (still want a bit more) and upgraded my CD and CC.
The skorn is the big winner here and with LS I can speedfarm MP4 and farm MP5/6 quite easily.
Also on higher MPs I switch storm armor with ice armor/crystallize and it's very helpful. Just so u know
Put me on friends even. Two black Ice wizards would probably pretty fun to farm together. Black ice everywhere J I would love to get my hands on some really good gear, it would be so much fun.
I should mention that PTR builds are snapshotted off our current "work in progress" and sometimes picks up some changes and not others. In this case, the Disintegrate change was picked up, but the Ray of Frost change was not. Ray of Frost got a comparable damage buff as well, which will be seen in the next PTR build (along with the Witch Doctor Firebats damage numbers)
This will be awesome for the build