Is Pure FVS still good in solo/duo end game?

[ForwardWu]

I am a returning playing which had been away for 1.5 yrs. I have an old 16wiz/2mk/2fvs shiradi build. Now I want to tr my caster into a pure FVS (3 wiz, 2 soc 2 fvs pls) to solo or duo some of the recent epic contents. My friend is a pure monk and I will be a healer/damage dealer.

Is a cha-based light casting fvs good enough to play the ee content nowadays? If possible I will prefer to go pure FVS and get the CLW capstone freebie, so that I can haste my friend and use free heal while using my mana pool to dump some good light damage.

Thanks for any advice

[Miow]

I am a returning playing which had been away for 1.5 yrs. I have an old 16wiz/2mk/2fvs shiradi build. Now I want to tr my caster into a pure FVS (3 wiz, 2 soc 2 fvs pls) to solo or duo some of the recent epic contents. My friend is a pure monk and I will be a healer/damage dealer.

Is a cha-based light casting fvs good enough to play the ee content nowadays? If possible I will prefer to go pure FVS and get the CLW capstone freebie, so that I can haste my friend and use free heal while using my mana pool to dump some good light damage.

Thanks for any advice

Your going to find that your damage will not be enough, at least on mine i don't as mobs are bloated with hp.

Don't get me wrong it's okay...and implosion works some times. But in the newer content you have crazy SR/high dcs even if your a max player you will struggle a lot and run out of SP unless you don't mind taking your time to kill stuff and don't get me started on killing red names. Btw I only have 1 wiz,3 sorc,1 fvs PL so your ahead of me in the SR department.

[elvesunited]

My Light caster Favored Soul is a Sun-Elf with 41 AP angel of vengenace 23 AP war priest 16 AP Sun-Elf.

Casts a free to cast empowered/ Maximized Sun bolt SLA for a few thousand light damage to everything in a straight line every few seconds.
Casts one the most powerful blade barriers in the game. ( Damaging in upper epics / Room clearing in lower epics )
Has very high spell criticals and decent evocation DC.
Does well with Divine Punishment and fire spells.
Heals very well without even using metamagic feats outside of Quicken.

He's often leading in kill counts in stuff like the thunderholme epics. ( Particularly in quests where spellpoints aren't a big issue like EE devil assault )

He's wisdom maxed with Intelligence, Charisma and Constitution as secondary attributes.
Str: 8 Dex: 8 Con: 14 Int: 14 Wis:18 Chr: 14

Biggest problem is that he costs a Lesser Heart +1 every time he Iconic Reincarnates.

[ForwardWu]

I have noticed the capstone free sun bolt from Amaunator is quite powerful, yet I will have to go with wis-based build. I have read from forum that DC based fvs is not really that easy to handle. Thats why i am looking at cha-based light build.

I intend to take all the spell point feats (MT, IMT, Sorc PL), heavy armor (for shadow armor), quicken, max, emp and emp heal. I am not sure if it is going to work in epic contents.

[Braegan]

I am a returning playing which had been away for 1.5 yrs. I have an old 16wiz/2mk/2fvs shiradi build. Now I want to tr my caster into a pure FVS (3 wiz, 2 soc 2 fvs pls) to solo or duo some of the recent epic contents. My friend is a pure monk and I will be a healer/damage dealer.

Is a cha-based light casting fvs good enough to play the ee content nowadays? If possible I will prefer to go pure FVS and get the CLW capstone freebie, so that I can haste my friend and use free heal while using my mana pool to dump some good light damage.

Thanks for any advice

My main for a very long time is still a pure FvS, Wisdom based. That character has a few more heroic past lives than you have listed but you have a large majority of the ones that help with your spellcasting.

In my experiences it is a bit content dependent regarding performance. Some EE's I can solo. Others have too many red named or absurd saves to make it not efficient to solo on EE. I can solo those on EH pretty easily tho. As well as I can be in a group and contribute quite well in any EE quest and most raids.

In summary FvS are a bit underperforming in regards to other classes that have gotten buffed recently as well as missing their 3rd enhancement tree, but they can perform fine.

[elvesunited]

Well my favored soul can't tank, though I often put him in Unyielding Sentinel for some added survivability in some quests where you can get hit very hard. But he handles himself fine in epic elite. There are some battles where his combination of Sunbolt, blade barrier and leap of faith makes him the ideal toon. ( good damage distance / something to damage pursuers / get out of danger ability )

I originally did do him as a charisma maxed caster. But after a few levels realized that the favored soul naturally has a lot of spell points and the charisma wasn't adding that much. On the other hand, getting his DC to a more respectable level increased his damage significantly. For one, a lot less enemies were evading me.

[ForwardWu]

I have read from other FVS thread that DC casting at end game is quite difficult...
https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthread.php/433708-EE-Capable-Evoker-Soul
https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthread.php/435732-Ghostriker-s-build

Since I dont have any DC gears at all, is it easier to just go the direct damage path?

[EllisDee37]

For running endgame EEs, my understanding of the state of today's game would be that a pure FVS and a pure monk might possibly be the worst two characters you could have.

The monk isn't quite as weak as it was a couple weeks ago now that evasion got a proxy buff, and I guess wizard is probably weaker than FVS, but still, you'll both be at the bottom end of the power curve. Stronger characters now include bard, paladin, barbarian, warlock, rogue, and ranger.

[ForwardWu]

Thanks for the advice EllisDee, it seems that most caster type toon is relatively weak in doing ee from your suggested list....is that because the HP inflation of some mini-boss in ee? I have read some mini-boss has about 200k hp...which is really crazy for a caster type to mana dump on a red bar that has 200 times of the caster hp.....

[EllisDee37]

Thanks for the advice EllisDee, it seems that most caster type toon is relatively weak in doing ee from your suggested list....is that because the HP inflation of some mini-boss in ee? I have read some mini-boss has about 200k hp...which is really crazy for a caster type to mana dump on a red bar that has 200 times of the caster hp.....Partly, yes.

The other reason is that in the recently added "endgame" EEs -- ToEE, Trials of the Archons, Devil's Gambit -- trash mob saves are very high. Too high (and too numerous) for DC casters to handle in an efficient way. When you have to cast debuffs to land an insta-kill and there are packs of a dozen mobs at once, you will quickly run out of spell points.

So that leaves only dps spells, which as you note are ineffective due to mob HP bloat.

[Nordenfeldt]

That sounds like a very cool build, could you lay out the feats for him?



My Light caster Favored Soul is a Sun-Elf with 41 AP angel of vengenace 23 AP war priest 16 AP Sun-Elf.

Casts a free to cast empowered/ Maximized Sun bolt SLA for a few thousand light damage to everything in a straight line every few seconds.
Casts one the most powerful blade barriers in the game. ( Damaging in upper epics / Room clearing in lower epics )
Has very high spell criticals and decent evocation DC.
Does well with Divine Punishment and fire spells.
Heals very well without even using metamagic feats outside of Quicken.

He's often leading in kill counts in stuff like the thunderholme epics. ( Particularly in quests where spellpoints aren't a big issue like EE devil assault )

He's wisdom maxed with Intelligence, Charisma and Constitution as secondary attributes.
Str: 8 Dex: 8 Con: 14 Int: 14 Wis:18 Chr: 14

Biggest problem is that he costs a Lesser Heart +1 every time he Iconic Reincarnates.

[unbongwah]

The biggest flaw of AoV, IMHO, is there's only one SLA, it's only in the capstone, and only Amaunator's SLA (Sunbolt) is worthwhile in epics, which requires an LR +1 of a ML, SDK, or PDK to take it. [Although Searing Light might finally become useful again with Master of Light feat.] Whereas most other caster PrEs have 3 SLAs and Season's Herald gets six. Compare AoV to light Divine Disciple, which not only gets 4 SLAs but also adds Sunbolt/Sunbeam/Sunburst/Word of Balance to its spellbook.

Which means that FvS don't get cheap spammable SLAs which can be meta'ed for free like other casters; and they don't have access to some of the most powerful light spells. Somewhat ironic, considering AoV has some of the best caster bonuses for Fire / Light / Force, which is why so many builds splash FvS 2-4 just to gain access to those perks.

Light-based DiDis have their own problems (https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthread.php/468675-Why-is-Master-of-Light-so-much-worse-than-all-of-the-other-Master-of-quot-X-quot-feats), but FvS is the caster class most in need of an overhaul, IMHO.

[Atremus]

Searing light scales at half the rate of Sunbolt. Even after the +10MCL, searing light will do half of what Sunbolt will.

I agree that AoV could use some tweaks, like a few SLA's but spell damage is the real problem. I still play my FVS and he is sort of functional, but I invested years to get him there. Once there is a spell pass, FvS will be amazing again.

[Jasparion]

Searing light scales at half the rate of Sunbolt. Even after the +10MCL, searing light will do half of what Sunbolt will.

I agree that AoV could use some tweaks, like a few SLA's but spell damage is the real problem. I still play my FVS and he is sort of functional, but I invested years to get him there. Once there is a spell pass, FvS will be amazing again.

Good to know its not just me. My FVS had only been used to heal raids for the last few years. Now Im trying to get to level 30 and its impossible to run anything on my own.

Blade Barrier is nice but not good. Holy Smite is nice but not good. Searing Light is average at best.

I dont have the best gear, but its far from terrible. The class is just plain horrible compared to even Cleric - which is not that good.

[Atremus]

I feel bad for any under geared, alt FvS (or caster cleric). While running my backup FvS I was reminded of how crappy spell damage is. All of the power for a divine is contained in the Epic Destiny. And if you are leveling destinies, well good luck.

The spell pass/caster pass cannot get here soon enough.

[PNellesen]

I feel bad for any under geared, alt FvS (or caster cleric). While running my backup FvS I was reminded of how crappy spell damage is. All of the power for a divine is contained in the Epic Destiny. And if you are leveling destinies, well good luck.

Speaking as a somewhat undergeared Cleric who's leveling off-destinies... Yeah. Watching a maxed-out Evo/Radiance FvS do its thing is humbling.