I'm surprised we haven't seen more 1.0.4 build threads since most of us will be forced to change our build. I figure I'll start us off.
I currently run VQ Bats (I ran PtV Darts before but finally the lack of AoE damage started to annoy me)
The goal of my build is to farm Act 3 quickly and efficiently.
I'm a little unsure about my pick of PtV, do you guys think it's worth it in this build? It will help darts and garg damage a lot but it won't allow me to fire off many bears. Would it hurt my damage more than it helps it? What would you use instead (VQ probably?)? I mostly have bears to kill whites and to handle illusionist (illusionist really really sucks with only dart).
The plan is, between 4 pets and spirit walk, I shouldn't be in too much danger most of the time. This is assuming my pets can stay alive decently with my gear. I might need to remove some of my MF gear (currently displayed on my profile) for more int and resist pieces (I have a much better helm).
Recently, I've been attempting to use Jungle Fort instead of Spirit Vessel. Overall, I enjoy it more after I got used to playing more defensively.
I think Garg is pretty important now that he adds 100% damage to your build. In my case, he'll add 300% dmg against elites as long as he can stay alive long enough.
Most champ packs will involve the pets going in first while I shoot darts and once they are engaged, I'll sneak a bit closer and fire off bears until I need to go back to darts. The first champ should die fairly soon and it all gets pretty easy at that point. It's all about focusing fire on the mob my garg is attacking (hopefully he keeps locked on a single target).
I picked life link on the dogs because I have enough life return from spirit walk and soul harvest. This should make reflects damage pretty easy. I'm not sure how the 10% reduction from life link works... does it work 3 times if 3 dogs are alive or is it a flat 10% damage that gets split among the living dogs? Either way, I'm hoping this will eliminate all possible 1 shots (currently, in 1.0.3 tremor/axe skeleton elites will typically 1 shot me if they catch me (and tremors move like they're on crack)... most other mob types don't hurt me nearly as much).
The thing that could foil this is if certain affixes still completely destroy pets (I'd worry about plagued or molten). If they can't stand up to those I'd remove dogs and replace it with some sort of kiting (grasp or zombie wall). It's hard to say how viable pets will be without trying it out in the new patch.
Do you think I'd have trouble with certain affix types? It seems like I'd only have trouble with molten/plagued and that's if pets still get completely destroyed by it... do you think there's more than just that?
Looks pretty solid overall. I'm also probably going to drop spirit vessel after losing a second on the proc.
Only things I would suggest you consider would be:
-Corpse Spiders. You're probably going to want to at least test this patch day. They may have overtuned it. Who knows. Also the spiders work pretty well with all the doorways and separate rooms in the keep in act 3. 5 mana vs. 10 is also somewhat relevant in a build that hopes to cast lots of bears.
-Bruiser rune for the Garg. The stun is pretty OP in my experience. It almost acts as a form of mitigation for your Garg too since stunned enemies aren't pounding on him / casting arcane sentries, etc. With garg damage buffs Restless Giant damage might be too good to pass up, but don't count out Bruiser.
-It's hard to say without seeing our pets "Force Armor" in action, but Blood Ritual might also be a decent survival boost to pets (instead of jungle fort) while giving you more opportunity to shoot bears.
probably subbing out zombie dogs for one of the new skills that got buffed when I join multiplayer games, which is probably where I will be farming now.
It's tough to say without the talent calculator being updated yet. I have looked over the patch notes a couple times, but not committed them to memory. I'm sure that I will try to make some summon-heavy build work, but my WD has been quite neglected since a month ago so i'll probably run with whatever works for poor stats.
With the changes in the official patch notes and using gear / talents smartly it should be no problem keeping any pets alive. I'm interested to see what can work out. I'm sure your build will be alright, the only problem I really see is zombie bears with no mana gain from abilities or talents at all. Spiritual attunement in place of gruesome feast might be something to consider
I'm just excited to give spider queen a try and see if the Crit dmg / life procs count for her as well!!
I will be grouped mostly with a Barb, sometimes with a Monk. My hope is that Impunity turns my dogs and garg into really tough tanks (I have about 700 resist all before Impunity).
I didn't notice Big Stinker getting buffed so I opted for CleavyGarg instead. Restless Giant I'd take, but I hate how it gets wasted on white mobs. I'd honestly rather just have the cleave on champ/rares.
There are a lot of potential swaps you can make with the runes in this build depending on what you're doing.
Soul to Waste is simply so that I can maximize my uptime on 5-stacks for the damage and pet survivability. I do not want to have to find a 5-pack every 30 seconds. That pisses me off!
Pretty self-explanatory build that does focus on some big (but sustainable) AoE damage over single target damage.
Basically my goal is to have as much dps self buffs up as much as possible to make my bats, sacrifice, and garg all super powerful, and keep my mana up through sacrificing my dogs with final gift feeding my gruesome feast, as well as my SW and SH mana runes. might change things around after playing, but I really hope it'll be effective.
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Nerd: When you say it, you best say it with awe,
'Cause I'm the type of nerd that will bust your jaw.
The goal of my build is to farm Act 3 quickly and efficiently.
I'm a little unsure about my pick of PtV, do you guys think it's worth it in this build? It will help darts and garg damage a lot but it won't allow me to fire off many bears. Would it hurt my damage more than it helps it? What would you use instead (VQ probably?)? I mostly have bears to kill whites and to handle illusionist (illusionist really really sucks with only dart).
I think if your goal is to farm quickly and efficiently that you should drop splinters for an AoE-based primary honestly. It's one of the reasons I've slowly fallen in love with Roll the Bones over Splinters. I made the change and realized just how much I missed not having an ability like Piercing Orb or Ball Lightning on my WD.
Even with lower single-target damage, most of what you're doing in Diablo is AoE-based and that's my general beef with Splinters. It's by far a better choice for bosses. However, it's much easier to miss with a dart than it is with a fire bomb due to the bomb having an explosion radius, which means that even though you have a lower base weapon damage you are certainly afforded the courtesy of "losing" less damage against mobile mobs.
But back to your build, I do think you'll see some success using your pets and I don't think they're going to have too much trouble surviving as long as you have a respectable amount of resists, as that seemed to be a point that Blizzard took quite a lot of time to balance and make sure that they were viable in Acts 2, 3, and 4.
I also think you'll see good success using your bears as a "mana dump phase" and whatever primary you ultimately use as a "mana regen phase." As such I'm not sure that PtV is a horrible choice. If you can knock off, say, 67% of the mobs HPs before you OOM and then just polish them off with your pets and darts you'll probably be in a place where you have some in-fuckin-sane survivability and very strong kill speed.
And I agree with you about Jungle Fortitude. Preventing damage is a really powerful thing. I much prefer a permenant 20% reduction in damage taken than a "get out of jail free" card on a 90s CD. I try to train myself to not die which sounds obvious but sometimes Spirit Vessel removes that emphasis. With pets I think Jungle Fortitude is a clear winner over Spirit Vessel in anything but the most extreme of situations.
The goal of my build is to farm Act 3 quickly and efficiently.
I'm a little unsure about my pick of PtV, do you guys think it's worth it in this build? It will help darts and garg damage a lot but it won't allow me to fire off many bears. Would it hurt my damage more than it helps it? What would you use instead (VQ probably?)? I mostly have bears to kill whites and to handle illusionist (illusionist really really sucks with only dart).
I think if your goal is to farm quickly and efficiently that you should drop splinters for an AoE-based primary honestly. It's one of the reasons I've slowly fallen in love with Roll the Bones over Splinters. I made the change and realized just how much I missed not having an ability like Piercing Orb or Ball Lightning on my WD.
Even with lower single-target damage, most of what you're doing in Diablo is AoE-based and that's my general beef with Splinters. It's by far a better choice for bosses. However, it's much easier to miss with a dart than it is with a fire bomb due to the bomb having an explosion radius, which means that even though you have a lower base weapon damage you are certainly afforded the courtesy of "losing" less damage against mobile mobs.
But back to your build, I do think you'll see some success using your pets and I don't think they're going to have too much trouble surviving as long as you have a respectable amount of resists, as that seemed to be a point that Blizzard took quite a lot of time to balance and make sure that they were viable in Acts 2, 3, and 4.
I also think you'll see good success using your bears as a "mana dump phase" and whatever primary you ultimately use as a "mana regen phase." As such I'm not sure that PtV is a horrible choice. If you can knock off, say, 67% of the mobs HPs before you OOM and then just polish them off with your pets and darts you'll probably be in a place where you have some in-fuckin-sane survivability and very strong kill speed.
And I agree with you about Jungle Fortitude. Preventing damage is a really powerful thing. I much prefer a permenant 20% reduction in damage taken than a "get out of jail free" card on a 90s CD. I try to train myself to not die which sounds obvious but sometimes Spirit Vessel removes that emphasis. With pets I think Jungle Fortitude is a clear winner over Spirit Vessel in anything but the most extreme of situations.
Thanks, I'll try it out if I don't like how little I can cast bears without any mana regen passives. If I can cast bears enough to mow down white packs, then I'll stick with what I have. The only problem is that 70% less damage is a lot and I like to kill that first elite really quickly (because once the first drops the difficulty of the pack drops a lot). I'll probably try the current build, if that doesn't work (switch feast to vision quest), if I still don't like that, try out roll the bones instead of splinters (I'd probably change my secondary ability then too).
Now that I see they're nerfing Act 3 damage across the board, I may try the healing dogs instead of the 10% less damage passive. Depending on the HP I get back from the dogs, I may be able to switch spirit walk to give me more mana and still be able to handle reflects damage.
@Ruppgu: You plan on using Poison Dart a lot? If you have 75 regen + VQ you're looking at 98 mana / sec. Bears is 273 / sec with PtV and a 1.5 weapon. You're looking at 4 Bear casts before you switch back to Darts. Spined Dart is a definite possibility with Bears... they can still be used, you just need more regen than before.
@Rickarus: Bats is 238 / sec with a 1.5 weapon and PtV. With 75 regen I don't think Swallow Your Soul and Honored Guest are going to be great for making up that 163 mana / sec.
Against white mobs this doesn't matter, but I don't think GF will make up for this mana deficit aganist champs.
@Ruppgu: You plan on using Poison Dart a lot? If you have 75 regen + VQ you're looking at 98 mana / sec. Bears is 273 / sec with PtV and a 1.5 weapon. You're looking at 4 Bear casts before you switch back to Darts. Spined Dart is a definite possibility with Bears... they can still be used, you just need more regen than before.
@Rickarus: Bats is 238 / sec with a 1.5 weapon and PtV. With 75 regen I don't think Swallow Your Soul and Honored Guest are going to be great for making up that 163 mana / sec.
Against white mobs this doesn't matter, but I don't think GF will make up for this mana deficit aganist champs.
A Primary might be better if Spirit Barrage still casts supre slow.
edit......... Bears is less actually since the base attack speed is likely under 1 sec, but still, you need close to that amount / sec to spam it.
This is basically a splinter PtV build w/ pets and an AoE for a mana dump. I don't plan on spamming bears (that would be impossible no matter what build I chose with my current gear). My long term goal is to get a really nice 2 hander (w/ 200 crit dmg and massive int) and try a bats or bear build. Until then, I'm stuck with splinters or spirit barrage imo. The bears are in this build for three reasons.
1.) Mow through white mobs
2.) Handle life link/illusionist affixes better
3.) A short DPS boost while I'm at full mana
@ Sac: For solo, I'm not sure I would like your build (I don't like how your only AoE will make you vulnerable) but with more distractions in multiplayer I think that could be a fun build to try out. SB is really strong single target damage... I might work up a SB build to try out with the new buff to it as well. It may be better (and more fun) than splinters.
Garg + Humongoid is insane. It's brutal with PtV honestly.
Firebomb buff is legit. Cast animation buff is not super huge, but Roll the Bones clears stuff out fast. Therefore I'm going to assume this applies equally to the other abilities of ours which have received the same tweak.
Dogs are super durable with 32k HPs, 3k armor, 700 resist all, Jungle Fortitude, and Zombie Handler.
I cannot tell what the base regen is, but it doesn't seem to be quite as awesome as the blog may have indicated. Health Globes just got a lot more awesome with a bunch of pets out.
Soul Harvest is still clunky to use even with pets tanking. It has a learning curve, which I guess would be expected. I've considered switching to Horrify + Frightening Aspect. 100% armor buff with 50% uptime is... well that's nuts for the pets and very much an option for someone who is a bit undergeared.
Manitou with 100% uptime is nice and you feel the difference when you don't refresh it; it's no sweeping wind. The patch notes said 30 yards, but it does NOT feel like 30 yards. I can't tell or not if it procs LoH.
Explosive beast travels faster than bats but shorter, also gets caught on things, just about spamable
Groping eels is a nice increase in damage, but I think I may go for unbreakable grasp for better CC
New VQ feels fine I haven't had a moment where I really felt starved (this is combined with spiritual attunement)
Was using Acid Rain in lieu of charger at one point and it fell easily into a rotation of Rain Rain Splinters Eels
I was toying with some builds without PtV. Running without it is very sad however. Haven't tried RoTs or Firebomb yet though.
Soul Harvest: Vengeful Spirit feels amazing. Probably my favorite change in the patch - which makes me feel as sad as it sounds.
Dogs: I have 400 AR / 36K life - they die fast, too fast to tank a3 for me.
Garg: Stays alive like he did while leveling, only the toughest of fights down him. He can also hit decently hard. The AOE on the Bruiser stun effect is huge and I like it.
Medusa Spiders with vision quest feels amazing - probably like what all WD primaries should. Try this now! Also LoH of spiders seems pretty solid.
Acid Rain is still the best Acid cloud rune.
DoTs still feel weak- using a 1H / OH at least.
Grasp rune - death is life felt a little underpowered. Might be OK for tank doctors who can keep everything bunched up.
Still felt tied to Honored Guest for mana regen.
Spirit Barrage - phantasm seems to have some potential with rush of essence. Other runes still feel kind of floaty, although spirit is willing does kind of turn it into a strange primary.
That's about it for now. Everyone buy all the WD gear I've been stockpiling
Dogs: I have 400 AR / 36K life - they die fast, too fast to tank a3 for me.
At 700 AR, 32k life, 3k armor, Jungle Fortitude, and Zombie Handler my dogs very, very, very easily tank Act 3. A health globe here and there and that's about all it requires.
I won't claim any kind of efficiency level with this buy, but it's what i've been tooling around with since the patch. Considering just how poor my WD's gear is (13k dps unbuffed) she's doing pretty well. I've got 290% mf with paragon1, so another couple days until I can start shedding it for actual dps upgrades. [As an aside, this is my slow-pace approach to paragon leveling. Start with pure mf gear and remove it as I bleed over the mf cap. Certainly not the most efficient way to gain paragon levels or find items, but I don't have a huge amount of time to play so i'd rather make the best of each run.]
I'm not really sold on sacrifice, but the other variants I tried with voodoo/fetishes felt seriously lacking burst. Grave Injustice/Feast are fun, but I can't be sure i'm getting the most of either skill. Hope to see more builds and theorycraft around here soon.
With my current gear: http://us.battle.net/d3/en/profile/Rickarus-1630/hero/2503843 this build is kicking ass. I rarely have mana issues, and the changes to spiders are REALLY nice. Pets are really durable, and pump out lots of damage. I also find it REALLY fun.
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Nerd: When you say it, you best say it with awe,
'Cause I'm the type of nerd that will bust your jaw.
I ran the original build all day yesterday (paragon lvl 5 already, woo). Worked pretty well but there are a few tweaks I'd suggest.
The pets tank well enough to cast bears pretty well (it's a bit dangerous but worth it, imo). Because of this, I think the build does better with more mana regen. Also, I was getting annoyed by the garg always proccing restless giant on big packs of scorps so I switched him around as well.
It would be great if you guys could at least tell your DPS when talking about Pierce the Veil (with or without)
It would also be cool to know if you use one-hander or two-hander when talking about animation times
My account is currently blocked because I am travelling and I forgot my other phone (that I use as authenticator), but in 1.5 weeks I can unblock it and that's when I'll try all of these builds:
1) AoE DoT http://us.battle.net...Rkgd!bUf!ZababY
- I used similar build in 1.0.3 and I liked it. In 1.0.4 this is even stronger and it is easier to spam the skills.
Just to give you an idea about the damage:
spider queen = 42% per second
phantasm = 45% per second (stackable up to 3 times = 135% per second)
Acid Cloud = 50% per second + 115% Initial splash
Grasp of the undead = 40% per second
Use them all at once = 177% per second + 115% initial splash from Acid Cloud (885% damage over 5 seconds + 115% instant splash = 1000% AoE damage over 5 seconds)
I have +29 mana regeneration from gear, so with this build my mana regeneration would be 113.62 per second. I would have to re-use the skills every 5 seconds, which is fine. Every ~7 seconds I lose 617 mana. I get 568 mana over 5 seconds, which should be enough because it will take me a couple of seconds to use the skills. Every 25 seconds, I could even get additional 800% AoE damage over 5 seconds (and a guarantee that the enemies say in my kill-zone).
2) No-CD Sacrifce http://us.battle.net...dZUg!dWh!ZYYaZa
- I don't have to get it down to 0 seconds, because it takes a while for the dogs to reach the targets. Spirit Barrage for single-target DPSing and Sacrifice for AoE damage and healing. Grasp of the Undead for some "crowd control" and Spirit Walk for mana regeneration (spirit barrage consumes 140.4 mana in this build)
3) VQ-Bears http://us.battle.net...djUQ!cUT!YcaYZb
- With this build, I'd have 96.2 mana regeneration per second. Zombie Bears cost 119 mana with Blood Ritual... I can't spam them 24/7, but I should be able to spam them for several seconds. For example flaming dart -> zombie bears for some time -> spirit walk + soul harvest. I would also gain 14 from every enemy killed. Against elites, I would use slam dance and paranoia for maximizing the burst.
My stats are:
410 all resist (460 arcane res, 460 lightning res, 500 physical res)
4050 armor (no shield)
17% Melee damage reduction (string of ears)
45k HP
40.2k DPS (without buffs)
29 mana regeneration from gear
560 Life on Hit
2.5% Life Steal
1.61 attack speed
7 pick-up radius
8 second cooldown reduction on zombie dogs
PS: Zombie Dogs - life link divides the 10% across all dogs (each dog takes 3.33% if you have 3 dogs).
Pride = 293 mana per dog.
Circle of Life = 30% chance to get a dog from kill
Tribal Rites = decreases cooldown on mass confusion and summon zombie dogs
Grave Injustice = HP + Mana and decreases cooldown on all skills.
Big Bad Voodoo - Rain Dance against elites.
I'm definitely going try it as soon as I can. Like I said, I already have 7 pickup radius and 8 cooldown reduction and 74 mana regeneration. This means CoL and GI will have 15 yard range, which is more or less the range of the bears.
I think it has the potential of being more powerful than VQ-bears build
Yeah, I posted a similar build. With the right gear it should work out okay. For the time being, I enjoy the VQ bears build more just because of the line of pets you have to hide behind. It's a lot safer than having 0 pets in the front line. At least with my gear, I can't survive that. I'm a bit of a glass cannon... especially in my MF gear which I normally wear.
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I currently run VQ Bats (I ran PtV Darts before but finally the lack of AoE damage started to annoy me)
The goal of my build is to farm Act 3 quickly and efficiently.
I'm a little unsure about my pick of PtV, do you guys think it's worth it in this build? It will help darts and garg damage a lot but it won't allow me to fire off many bears. Would it hurt my damage more than it helps it? What would you use instead (VQ probably?)? I mostly have bears to kill whites and to handle illusionist (illusionist really really sucks with only dart).
http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/witch-doctor#afYTUd!aUY!accacY
The plan is, between 4 pets and spirit walk, I shouldn't be in too much danger most of the time. This is assuming my pets can stay alive decently with my gear. I might need to remove some of my MF gear (currently displayed on my profile) for more int and resist pieces (I have a much better helm).
Recently, I've been attempting to use Jungle Fort instead of Spirit Vessel. Overall, I enjoy it more after I got used to playing more defensively.
I think Garg is pretty important now that he adds 100% damage to your build. In my case, he'll add 300% dmg against elites as long as he can stay alive long enough.
Most champ packs will involve the pets going in first while I shoot darts and once they are engaged, I'll sneak a bit closer and fire off bears until I need to go back to darts. The first champ should die fairly soon and it all gets pretty easy at that point. It's all about focusing fire on the mob my garg is attacking (hopefully he keeps locked on a single target).
I picked life link on the dogs because I have enough life return from spirit walk and soul harvest. This should make reflects damage pretty easy. I'm not sure how the 10% reduction from life link works... does it work 3 times if 3 dogs are alive or is it a flat 10% damage that gets split among the living dogs? Either way, I'm hoping this will eliminate all possible 1 shots (currently, in 1.0.3 tremor/axe skeleton elites will typically 1 shot me if they catch me (and tremors move like they're on crack)... most other mob types don't hurt me nearly as much).
The thing that could foil this is if certain affixes still completely destroy pets (I'd worry about plagued or molten). If they can't stand up to those I'd remove dogs and replace it with some sort of kiting (grasp or zombie wall). It's hard to say how viable pets will be without trying it out in the new patch.
Do you think I'd have trouble with certain affix types? It seems like I'd only have trouble with molten/plagued and that's if pets still get completely destroyed by it... do you think there's more than just that?
//edit: Updated the build link to what I use now
Only things I would suggest you consider would be:
-Corpse Spiders. You're probably going to want to at least test this patch day. They may have overtuned it. Who knows. Also the spiders work pretty well with all the doorways and separate rooms in the keep in act 3. 5 mana vs. 10 is also somewhat relevant in a build that hopes to cast lots of bears.
-Bruiser rune for the Garg. The stun is pretty OP in my experience. It almost acts as a form of mitigation for your Garg too since stunned enemies aren't pounding on him / casting arcane sentries, etc. With garg damage buffs Restless Giant damage might be too good to pass up, but don't count out Bruiser.
-It's hard to say without seeing our pets "Force Armor" in action, but Blood Ritual might also be a decent survival boost to pets (instead of jungle fort) while giving you more opportunity to shoot bears.
That's all I can really think of at the moment.
My build's going to look something like this-
http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/witch-doctor#bRUiYd!cWY!caaZbc
probably subbing out zombie dogs for one of the new skills that got buffed when I join multiplayer games, which is probably where I will be farming now.
I'm just excited to give spider queen a try and see if the Crit dmg / life procs count for her as well!!
That's what I'll be using.
I will be grouped mostly with a Barb, sometimes with a Monk. My hope is that Impunity turns my dogs and garg into really tough tanks (I have about 700 resist all before Impunity).
I didn't notice Big Stinker getting buffed so I opted for CleavyGarg instead. Restless Giant I'd take, but I hate how it gets wasted on white mobs. I'd honestly rather just have the cleave on champ/rares.
There are a lot of potential swaps you can make with the runes in this build depending on what you're doing.
Soul to Waste is simply so that I can maximize my uptime on 5-stacks for the damage and pet survivability. I do not want to have to find a 5-pack every 30 seconds. That pisses me off!
Pretty self-explanatory build that does focus on some big (but sustainable) AoE damage over single target damage.
Basically my goal is to have as much dps self buffs up as much as possible to make my bats, sacrifice, and garg all super powerful, and keep my mana up through sacrificing my dogs with final gift feeding my gruesome feast, as well as my SW and SH mana runes. might change things around after playing, but I really hope it'll be effective.
'Cause I'm the type of nerd that will bust your jaw.
I think if your goal is to farm quickly and efficiently that you should drop splinters for an AoE-based primary honestly. It's one of the reasons I've slowly fallen in love with Roll the Bones over Splinters. I made the change and realized just how much I missed not having an ability like Piercing Orb or Ball Lightning on my WD.
Even with lower single-target damage, most of what you're doing in Diablo is AoE-based and that's my general beef with Splinters. It's by far a better choice for bosses. However, it's much easier to miss with a dart than it is with a fire bomb due to the bomb having an explosion radius, which means that even though you have a lower base weapon damage you are certainly afforded the courtesy of "losing" less damage against mobile mobs.
But back to your build, I do think you'll see some success using your pets and I don't think they're going to have too much trouble surviving as long as you have a respectable amount of resists, as that seemed to be a point that Blizzard took quite a lot of time to balance and make sure that they were viable in Acts 2, 3, and 4.
I also think you'll see good success using your bears as a "mana dump phase" and whatever primary you ultimately use as a "mana regen phase." As such I'm not sure that PtV is a horrible choice. If you can knock off, say, 67% of the mobs HPs before you OOM and then just polish them off with your pets and darts you'll probably be in a place where you have some in-fuckin-sane survivability and very strong kill speed.
And I agree with you about Jungle Fortitude. Preventing damage is a really powerful thing. I much prefer a permenant 20% reduction in damage taken than a "get out of jail free" card on a 90s CD. I try to train myself to not die which sounds obvious but sometimes Spirit Vessel removes that emphasis. With pets I think Jungle Fortitude is a clear winner over Spirit Vessel in anything but the most extreme of situations.
Thanks, I'll try it out if I don't like how little I can cast bears without any mana regen passives. If I can cast bears enough to mow down white packs, then I'll stick with what I have. The only problem is that 70% less damage is a lot and I like to kill that first elite really quickly (because once the first drops the difficulty of the pack drops a lot). I'll probably try the current build, if that doesn't work (switch feast to vision quest), if I still don't like that, try out roll the bones instead of splinters (I'd probably change my secondary ability then too).
Now that I see they're nerfing Act 3 damage across the board, I may try the healing dogs instead of the 10% less damage passive. Depending on the HP I get back from the dogs, I may be able to switch spirit walk to give me more mana and still be able to handle reflects damage.
@Ruppgu: You plan on using Poison Dart a lot? If you have 75 regen + VQ you're looking at 98 mana / sec. Bears is 273 / sec with PtV and a 1.5 weapon. You're looking at 4 Bear casts before you switch back to Darts. Spined Dart is a definite possibility with Bears... they can still be used, you just need more regen than before.
@Rickarus: Bats is 238 / sec with a 1.5 weapon and PtV. With 75 regen I don't think Swallow Your Soul and Honored Guest are going to be great for making up that 163 mana / sec.
Against white mobs this doesn't matter, but I don't think GF will make up for this mana deficit aganist champs.
I'm looking at this build: http://us.battle.net...UdYV!ZYf!baaYZc
A Primary might be better if Spirit Barrage still casts supre slow.
edit......... Bears is less actually since the base attack speed is likely under 1 sec, but still, you need close to that amount / sec to spam it.
This is basically a splinter PtV build w/ pets and an AoE for a mana dump. I don't plan on spamming bears (that would be impossible no matter what build I chose with my current gear). My long term goal is to get a really nice 2 hander (w/ 200 crit dmg and massive int) and try a bats or bear build. Until then, I'm stuck with splinters or spirit barrage imo. The bears are in this build for three reasons.
1.) Mow through white mobs
2.) Handle life link/illusionist affixes better
3.) A short DPS boost while I'm at full mana
@ Sac: For solo, I'm not sure I would like your build (I don't like how your only AoE will make you vulnerable) but with more distractions in multiplayer I think that could be a fun build to try out. SB is really strong single target damage... I might work up a SB build to try out with the new buff to it as well. It may be better (and more fun) than splinters.
Garg + Humongoid is insane. It's brutal with PtV honestly.
Firebomb buff is legit. Cast animation buff is not super huge, but Roll the Bones clears stuff out fast. Therefore I'm going to assume this applies equally to the other abilities of ours which have received the same tweak.
Dogs are super durable with 32k HPs, 3k armor, 700 resist all, Jungle Fortitude, and Zombie Handler.
I cannot tell what the base regen is, but it doesn't seem to be quite as awesome as the blog may have indicated. Health Globes just got a lot more awesome with a bunch of pets out.
Soul Harvest is still clunky to use even with pets tanking. It has a learning curve, which I guess would be expected. I've considered switching to Horrify + Frightening Aspect. 100% armor buff with 50% uptime is... well that's nuts for the pets and very much an option for someone who is a bit undergeared.
However my mana bar never even moved, so i'm going to try http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/witch-doctor#WfUdYT!dWg!bcZZYa
Basically switch out Grasping Dead for Bears for a little on demand burst, and switch to healing Journey on Spirit Walk to top myself or my pets off.
I ran this midway to act 2: http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/witch-doctor#aZUdfg!UbW!aZZZYc
I was toying with some builds without PtV. Running without it is very sad however. Haven't tried RoTs or Firebomb yet though.
Soul Harvest: Vengeful Spirit feels amazing. Probably my favorite change in the patch - which makes me feel as sad as it sounds.
Dogs: I have 400 AR / 36K life - they die fast, too fast to tank a3 for me.
Garg: Stays alive like he did while leveling, only the toughest of fights down him. He can also hit decently hard. The AOE on the Bruiser stun effect is huge and I like it.
Medusa Spiders with vision quest feels amazing - probably like what all WD primaries should. Try this now! Also LoH of spiders seems pretty solid.
Acid Rain is still the best Acid cloud rune.
DoTs still feel weak- using a 1H / OH at least.
Grasp rune - death is life felt a little underpowered. Might be OK for tank doctors who can keep everything bunched up.
Still felt tied to Honored Guest for mana regen.
Spirit Barrage - phantasm seems to have some potential with rush of essence. Other runes still feel kind of floaty, although spirit is willing does kind of turn it into a strange primary.
That's about it for now. Everyone buy all the WD gear I've been stockpiling
At 700 AR, 32k life, 3k armor, Jungle Fortitude, and Zombie Handler my dogs very, very, very easily tank Act 3. A health globe here and there and that's about all it requires.
I won't claim any kind of efficiency level with this buy, but it's what i've been tooling around with since the patch. Considering just how poor my WD's gear is (13k dps unbuffed) she's doing pretty well. I've got 290% mf with paragon1, so another couple days until I can start shedding it for actual dps upgrades. [As an aside, this is my slow-pace approach to paragon leveling. Start with pure mf gear and remove it as I bleed over the mf cap. Certainly not the most efficient way to gain paragon levels or find items, but I don't have a huge amount of time to play so i'd rather make the best of each run.]
I'm not really sold on sacrifice, but the other variants I tried with voodoo/fetishes felt seriously lacking burst. Grave Injustice/Feast are fun, but I can't be sure i'm getting the most of either skill. Hope to see more builds and theorycraft around here soon.
With my current gear: http://us.battle.net/d3/en/profile/Rickarus-1630/hero/2503843 this build is kicking ass. I rarely have mana issues, and the changes to spiders are REALLY nice. Pets are really durable, and pump out lots of damage. I also find it REALLY fun.
'Cause I'm the type of nerd that will bust your jaw.
The pets tank well enough to cast bears pretty well (it's a bit dangerous but worth it, imo). Because of this, I think the build does better with more mana regen. Also, I was getting annoyed by the garg always proccing restless giant on big packs of scorps so I switched him around as well.
http://us.battle.net...YTUd!aUY!acbacY
My WD is in my sig.
Yeah, I posted a similar build. With the right gear it should work out okay. For the time being, I enjoy the VQ bears build more just because of the line of pets you have to hide behind. It's a lot safer than having 0 pets in the front line. At least with my gear, I can't survive that. I'm a bit of a glass cannon... especially in my MF gear which I normally wear.