Post by Vichya on Feb 7, 2014 18:12:56 GMT
This is my attempt at creating a Herald of Storm suitable for end game runs. It is focused on crowd control and persistent area damage spells from the sorcerer's line of spells and mainly uses the druid spells for buffs and utilities.
Just like any Herald this build excels at two aspects: crowd control and persistent area of effect damage. To some lesser extent it can also serve as a utility build with GMW +16 and several weapon buffs which the tanks in your party will love. Before playing a Herald you should know that no Herald can replace a normal mage for end game runs. Their spells complement and not substitute each other and Heralds miss several key instant kill spells such as Weird and Disintegrate and the high damage per time ability of normal mages.
That being said a Herald is fun to play because it is completely different compared to the standard mage.
There are several ways to build a Herald, their many casting ability can either be wisdom or charisma, their control class can be druid or sorcerer and a third splash class can be useful - in particular a monk level.
Druid vs. Sorcerer:
The main differences are that Druids get more skill and hit points than sorcerers. Using Sorcerers as control class on the other hand gives the Herald more spells and allows the player to take the Extra Known Spell feats to furhter increase the number of known spells. The choice of control class also determines which non-enchantment and conjuration spells are useful. This mostly affects buffs as offensive spells with only 40-45 caster levels are mostly useless. Buffs like GMW, Energy Buffer and Ethereal Visage on the other hand are not.
Wisdom vs. Charisma:
... is in my eyes a very easy choice. Using charisma as the casting ability means you get more sorcerer spells per rest. Wisdom on the other hand gives more druid spells and most importantly also increases your will save. The wisdom artifact is also a lot easier to get than the charisma one.
Monk splash:
... only makes sense when using wisdom as casting ability. When using robes and flag or torch a monk splashed Herald can get high AC which allows him to survive longer when being attacked. The downside of course is the decrease of the Caster Level (CL) which also descreases the Spell Penetration (SP). That can be negated by using a Caster Level ego item of course.
The build I chose to create is a Sorcerer control class Herald without monk splash. This gives the best offensive capabilities while still retaining a decent defense.
Goals of this build:
(This is just a first version of the build table for my level 80 Herald, stats for different levels will come soon)
(More details about spell selection coming soon)
Sorcerer level 9:
Dominate Monster removes an enemy from combat. The duration varies. It's useful for removing mobs from battle against which your party has problems. That can include kickback mobs, and enemies that buff and heal others, such as Adarus.
Gate is used to port around. Useing !gateset or casting the spell will save your current position and the next casting of Gate will teleport you back to it.
Mordenkainens Disjunction is pretty much mandatory for mages. It serves two purposes: lowering SR in an area and dispelling buffs, particularly Spell Mantles.
Sorcerer level 8:
Antipathy turns your Herald into a Turner. Cast it on an enemy and all enemies around your Herald that have the same race as the target of the spell are turned and run away. You can't instant kill with it.
Horrid Wilting is mainly used against enemies that die from it, such as Black Puddings, and some other Abyss mobs.
Mass Blindness and Deafness is very good against enemies that lack True Seeing.
Mass Charm is a high DC AoE daze spell. I usually take that instead of Stinking Cloud because the cloud counts against the Herald Cloud spells.
Sorcerer level 7:
Greater Orb of Cold
Greater Orb of Fire
Rebuke is an instant kill spell that only respects Immunity from Mind Spells. Most often you can use it against mobs that can also be weirded, but there are some exceptions. It is also used against fey like mobs in Abyss.
Static Field
Sorcerer level 6:
Acid Fog is the best elemental damage cloud spell you have. It also lowers acid immunity which makes it incredibly good against enemies weak to it.
Ethereal Visage gives you 67% concealment if you use "!mm channel 2" to cast it.
Planar Binding summons creature to fight for you. The summon you get depends on your alignment and in general the evil ones are better. Keep in mind that you can buff it using GMW, GMF and your weapon buffs.
Sorcerer level 5:
Cloudkill is a persistent AoE death spell that has the same DC as a standard sorcerer CoD. It's good to use against mobs that have high SR and/or Saves because eventually it will kill them and you don't have to waste spells for that.
Energy Buffer gives you some elemental resistance.
Freezing Fog
Mind Fog
Vitriolic Sphere is one of the few AoE direct damage spells you have and it works very well in combination with Acid Fog.
Sorcerer level 4:
Confusion can be useful against some enemies but I only rarely use it.
Evards Black Tentacles is your main physical damage spell. It's incredibly good but produces huge amounts of kickback.
Orb of Electricity
Orb of Sound
Sorcerer level 3:
Flame Arrow is an AoE (line) direct damage fire spell. I only rarely use it.
Greater Magic Weapon will make tanks love you. +16 bonus on a weapon negates almost all damage reduction in the game.
Gust of Wind is used to gust enemy cloud spells or effects.
Stinking Cloud is a persistent AoE daze spell. I've never really used it since I don't have enough quickslots to put it there and daze isn't as good as some other effects.
Sorcerer level 2:
Flame Weapon gives the target a fire weapon buff. If used with "!mm channel 3" it will give +4 dice.
Ghostly Visage is used to escape from harm quickly. It only gives you sanctuary for a short time but has no cooldown.
Melfs Acid Arrow is a single target acid damage spell. Use it empowered to maximize the damage.
Shock Weapon gives the target a fire weapon buff. If used with "!mm channel 3" it will give +4 dice.
Web is simply one of the very best spells you have. It has a +5 DC bonus which can make the DC go up to like 65. It holds mobs on place, including some which you would think are immune to it, like Pit Fiends.
Sorcerer level 1:
Charm Person is a spell I never used but it's enchantment so it could be useful in the future
Endure Elements gives you some elemental immunity
Grease is another great spell to use. The +6 DC bonus you get from Conjuration feats make it extremely high DC
Mage Armor can be used on summons to increase their AC
Protection from Alignment is used in Abyss to protect you or your party members from being turned
Sleep is yet another low level enchantment spell which can be used to make Abyssal Ant Swarms sleep, but has not many other uses
Druid level 9:
Planar Perinarch doesn't work at the moment but could be an excellent spell.
Storm of Vengeance is a high DC persistent AoE spell which does electrical damage and more importants stuns affected enemies. It is very useful in Azzagrat 1.
Druid level 8:
Premonition gives you physical damage reduction.
Storm Tower is another great utlity spell. It gives every player and enemy inside it electrical immunity and makes ranged attacks going through it miss.
Druid level 7:
Creeping Doom is mainly used to lower physical immunity. Its damage part is only good after quite some time, at which point the enemies are most likely already dead.
Druid level 6:
Stonehold is yet another spell which holds enemies in place.
Regenerate gives the target around 25-30 regeneration.
Druid level 5:
Augury is used to make you immune from breach and dispel spells. Without divination focuses it won't soak many but it's still good to have on some runs.
Monstrous Regeneration gives the target 15-20 regeneration for a long time.
Druid level 4:
Hold Monster is a single target spell that paralyzes enemies.
Druid level 3:
Caustic Weapon uses conjuration as school and thus gives the target +4 dice acid buff.
Greater Magic Fang gives your summon +17 magical damage.
Druid level 1:
Grease
Special thanks to Twilight Semner for the build's name
Just like any Herald this build excels at two aspects: crowd control and persistent area of effect damage. To some lesser extent it can also serve as a utility build with GMW +16 and several weapon buffs which the tanks in your party will love. Before playing a Herald you should know that no Herald can replace a normal mage for end game runs. Their spells complement and not substitute each other and Heralds miss several key instant kill spells such as Weird and Disintegrate and the high damage per time ability of normal mages.
That being said a Herald is fun to play because it is completely different compared to the standard mage.
There are several ways to build a Herald, their many casting ability can either be wisdom or charisma, their control class can be druid or sorcerer and a third splash class can be useful - in particular a monk level.
Druid vs. Sorcerer:
The main differences are that Druids get more skill and hit points than sorcerers. Using Sorcerers as control class on the other hand gives the Herald more spells and allows the player to take the Extra Known Spell feats to furhter increase the number of known spells. The choice of control class also determines which non-enchantment and conjuration spells are useful. This mostly affects buffs as offensive spells with only 40-45 caster levels are mostly useless. Buffs like GMW, Energy Buffer and Ethereal Visage on the other hand are not.
Wisdom vs. Charisma:
... is in my eyes a very easy choice. Using charisma as the casting ability means you get more sorcerer spells per rest. Wisdom on the other hand gives more druid spells and most importantly also increases your will save. The wisdom artifact is also a lot easier to get than the charisma one.
Monk splash:
... only makes sense when using wisdom as casting ability. When using robes and flag or torch a monk splashed Herald can get high AC which allows him to survive longer when being attacked. The downside of course is the decrease of the Caster Level (CL) which also descreases the Spell Penetration (SP). That can be negated by using a Caster Level ego item of course.
The build I chose to create is a Sorcerer control class Herald without monk splash. This gives the best offensive capabilities while still retaining a decent defense.
Goals of this build:
- High offense with maximum DC
- High defense with 65 Fortitude, Reflex and Will and a lot of hit points
- Most of the useful Herald sorcerer spells
(This is just a first version of the build table for my level 80 Herald, stats for different levels will come soon)
Build | Drd 17, Sor 23 (Drd 16, Sor 4 pre-epic, Drd 17 at level 40) |
Race/Subrace | Gnome (-2 Str, +2 Con, +2 skill points per level) Rilmani (+4 Con, +6 Wis, SpF+GSpF Conjuration, Spell Penetration, Epic Skill Focus Animal Empathy |
Abilities at character creation (Str, Dex, Con, Int, Wis, Cha) | 6, 8, 16, 10, 18, 14 |
Pre-epic and epic ability progression | Wisdom 10 |
Legendary level ability progression | Wisdom 10 |
Pre-epic feats | Strong Soul (swap it to Dauntless using !charedit) Spell Focus - Enchantment Greater Spell Focus - Enchantment Metamagic - Silent Metamagic - Empower Metamagic - Maximize Toughness |
Epic feats | Great Charisma I Great Charisma II Great Charisma III Great Wisdom I Great Wisdom IV Great Wisdom V Great Wisdom VI |
Herald feats | Great Charisma IV + V Great Wisdom II + III Epic Spell Penetration Epic Spell Focus - Conjuration Epic Spell Focus - Enchantment |
Sorcerer bonus feats | Extra Spell Known (level 5) |
Legendary level feats | Legendary Spell Penetration Legendary Spell Focus - Conjuration Legendary Spell Focus - Enchantment Extra Spell Known (level 7) Extra Spell Known (level 8) Legendary Valor Great Wisdom VII |
Paragon level feats | Paragon Spell Penetration Paragon Spell Focus - Conjuration Paragon Spell Focus - Enchantment Great Wisdom VIII Great Wisdom IX Great Wisdom X |
Tome | Illusion |
Artifact | Wisdom |
Abilities at level 80 (Str, Dex, Con, Int, Wis, Cha) including +16 bonus | 28, 30, 38, 22, 78, 41 |
Skills | Animal Empathy 43 Concentration 63 Craft Armor 34 Lore 63 Parry 43 Spellcraft 20 Tumble 40 |
AC | 114 |
Saves (Fort, Ref, Will) | 71, 62, 88 |
(More details about spell selection coming soon)
Sorcerer level 9:
Dominate Monster removes an enemy from combat. The duration varies. It's useful for removing mobs from battle against which your party has problems. That can include kickback mobs, and enemies that buff and heal others, such as Adarus.
Gate is used to port around. Useing !gateset or casting the spell will save your current position and the next casting of Gate will teleport you back to it.
Mordenkainens Disjunction is pretty much mandatory for mages. It serves two purposes: lowering SR in an area and dispelling buffs, particularly Spell Mantles.
Sorcerer level 8:
Antipathy turns your Herald into a Turner. Cast it on an enemy and all enemies around your Herald that have the same race as the target of the spell are turned and run away. You can't instant kill with it.
Horrid Wilting is mainly used against enemies that die from it, such as Black Puddings, and some other Abyss mobs.
Mass Blindness and Deafness is very good against enemies that lack True Seeing.
Mass Charm is a high DC AoE daze spell. I usually take that instead of Stinking Cloud because the cloud counts against the Herald Cloud spells.
Sorcerer level 7:
Greater Orb of Cold
Greater Orb of Fire
Rebuke is an instant kill spell that only respects Immunity from Mind Spells. Most often you can use it against mobs that can also be weirded, but there are some exceptions. It is also used against fey like mobs in Abyss.
Static Field
Sorcerer level 6:
Acid Fog is the best elemental damage cloud spell you have. It also lowers acid immunity which makes it incredibly good against enemies weak to it.
Ethereal Visage gives you 67% concealment if you use "!mm channel 2" to cast it.
Planar Binding summons creature to fight for you. The summon you get depends on your alignment and in general the evil ones are better. Keep in mind that you can buff it using GMW, GMF and your weapon buffs.
Sorcerer level 5:
Cloudkill is a persistent AoE death spell that has the same DC as a standard sorcerer CoD. It's good to use against mobs that have high SR and/or Saves because eventually it will kill them and you don't have to waste spells for that.
Energy Buffer gives you some elemental resistance.
Freezing Fog
Mind Fog
Vitriolic Sphere is one of the few AoE direct damage spells you have and it works very well in combination with Acid Fog.
Sorcerer level 4:
Confusion can be useful against some enemies but I only rarely use it.
Evards Black Tentacles is your main physical damage spell. It's incredibly good but produces huge amounts of kickback.
Orb of Electricity
Orb of Sound
Sorcerer level 3:
Flame Arrow is an AoE (line) direct damage fire spell. I only rarely use it.
Greater Magic Weapon will make tanks love you. +16 bonus on a weapon negates almost all damage reduction in the game.
Gust of Wind is used to gust enemy cloud spells or effects.
Stinking Cloud is a persistent AoE daze spell. I've never really used it since I don't have enough quickslots to put it there and daze isn't as good as some other effects.
Sorcerer level 2:
Flame Weapon gives the target a fire weapon buff. If used with "!mm channel 3" it will give +4 dice.
Ghostly Visage is used to escape from harm quickly. It only gives you sanctuary for a short time but has no cooldown.
Melfs Acid Arrow is a single target acid damage spell. Use it empowered to maximize the damage.
Shock Weapon gives the target a fire weapon buff. If used with "!mm channel 3" it will give +4 dice.
Web is simply one of the very best spells you have. It has a +5 DC bonus which can make the DC go up to like 65. It holds mobs on place, including some which you would think are immune to it, like Pit Fiends.
Sorcerer level 1:
Charm Person is a spell I never used but it's enchantment so it could be useful in the future
Endure Elements gives you some elemental immunity
Grease is another great spell to use. The +6 DC bonus you get from Conjuration feats make it extremely high DC
Mage Armor can be used on summons to increase their AC
Protection from Alignment is used in Abyss to protect you or your party members from being turned
Sleep is yet another low level enchantment spell which can be used to make Abyssal Ant Swarms sleep, but has not many other uses
Druid level 9:
Planar Perinarch doesn't work at the moment but could be an excellent spell.
Storm of Vengeance is a high DC persistent AoE spell which does electrical damage and more importants stuns affected enemies. It is very useful in Azzagrat 1.
Druid level 8:
Premonition gives you physical damage reduction.
Storm Tower is another great utlity spell. It gives every player and enemy inside it electrical immunity and makes ranged attacks going through it miss.
Druid level 7:
Creeping Doom is mainly used to lower physical immunity. Its damage part is only good after quite some time, at which point the enemies are most likely already dead.
Druid level 6:
Stonehold is yet another spell which holds enemies in place.
Regenerate gives the target around 25-30 regeneration.
Druid level 5:
Augury is used to make you immune from breach and dispel spells. Without divination focuses it won't soak many but it's still good to have on some runs.
Monstrous Regeneration gives the target 15-20 regeneration for a long time.
Druid level 4:
Hold Monster is a single target spell that paralyzes enemies.
Druid level 3:
Caustic Weapon uses conjuration as school and thus gives the target +4 dice acid buff.
Greater Magic Fang gives your summon +17 magical damage.
Druid level 1:
Grease
Special thanks to Twilight Semner for the build's name