If not evasion, what?

[fco-karatekid]

I've made a splashed arty (monk) before, but I just TR'ed a character into what is to be a pure arty.

For those who have made pure, what are you doing to make up for the damage mitigation NOT gained from evasion? My splash feels nearly bullet-proof thanks to evasion.

I presume taking advantage of stability items and medium armor?

[CThruTheEgo]

I've made a splashed arty (monk) before, but I just TR'ed a character into what is to be a pure arty.

For those who have made pure, what are you doing to make up for the damage mitigation NOT gained from evasion? My splash feels nearly bullet-proof thanks to evasion.

I presume taking advantage of stability items and medium armor?

For traps: exercise your Mario skills.

For enemy spells: grin and bear it.

My first main character was a rogue, so I got lazy with traps and just stood in them. On my arti, I was impressed with what I was able to accomplish when avoiding traps. Use any HP boosting spells/scrolls before taking on a trap, radiant forcefield is also very handy.

If your WF you have the advantage of inherently higher HP and quickened repairs/reconstructs.

Mobs who throw spells you can't evade should generally be taken out first anyway. Keep your distance and take advantage of being a ranged class as well as your CC spells.

[fco-karatekid]

For traps: exercise your Mario skills.

For enemy spells: grin and bear it.

My first main character was a rogue, so I got lazy with traps and just stood in them. On my arti, I was impressed with what I was able to accomplish when avoiding traps. Use any HP boosting spells/scrolls before taking on a trap, radiant forcefield is also very handy.

If your WF you have the advantage of inherently higher HP and quickened repairs/reconstructs.

Mobs who throw spells you can't evade should generally be taken out first anyway. Keep your distance and take advantage of being a ranged class as well as your CC spells.

yah it's the mid-fight thing I'm concerned about, not traps. On the splash, evade pops up a LOT in the middle of the mobs converging on me, heh. I can just see this one getting pummeled.

[Memnir]

UMD if fleshie, Repair spells if not.

[fco-karatekid]

UMD if fleshie, Repair spells if not.

hmmm, that's what I was afraid of. She's gonna wind up scrolling when she should be shooting. I'll watch her as she levels (banking 5 now) and see if I need to splash monk or rogue.

Unfortunate - I wanted to try the arty capstone out.

[CThruTheEgo]

The capstone is nice to provide you with various 20 min buffs, but it's not the biggest advantage of going pure. More level six spell slots is the real benefit. It sounds like your fleshy, so you don't need reconstruct. But being able to constantly slot deadly weapons, blade barrier, and tactical detonation (a great CC option if you've built for it) gives you more versatility. If you've got to scroll heal in the middle of battle, drop a tactical detonation to buy yourself some time. You're ranged, so keep your distance. Lack of evasion really isn't a problem.

[fco-karatekid]

The capstone is nice to provide you with various 20 min buffs, but it's not the biggest advantage of going pure. More level six spell slots is the real benefit. It sounds like your fleshy, so you don't need reconstruct. But being able to constantly slot deadly weapons, blade barrier, and tactical detonation (a great CC option if you've built for it) gives you more versatility. If you've got to scroll heal in the middle of battle, drop a tactical detonation to buy yourself some time. You're ranged, so keep your distance. Lack of evasion really isn't a problem.

And that's another reason why I wanted to try pure. Splash couldn't slot all of those constantly - I had to swap one of the sixes depending upon where I was gonna be questing.

[Postumus]

hmmm, that's what I was afraid of. She's gonna wind up scrolling when she should be shooting. I'll watch her as she levels (banking 5 now) and see if I need to splash monk or rogue.

Unfortunate - I wanted to try the arty capstone out.

Construct Essence is a way around having to scroll heal. That with a ring of master artifice and you won't have to scroll heal much.

My human l20 arti crafter with all three dragon marks of making didn't have too many problems without evasion. I don't take him into EE though.

[fco-karatekid]

Construct Essence is a way around having to scroll heal. That with a ring of master artifice and you won't have to scroll heal much.

My human l20 arti crafter with all three dragon marks of making didn't have too many problems without evasion. I don't take him into EE though.

I intend to stay EH and below - EE gearing is too much like work.

[fco-karatekid]

...(a great CC option if you've built for it)...

meaning high dc?

[LongshotBro]

On my third arti life now, i do the same thing I've been doing, same as all classes but two do - get hit when i don't save. Except when i get to 20, when i use Unearthly Reflexes.

[CoasterHops]

Use smart twists, play in maxed Shadowdancer destiny when in Spell/trap heavy content.
Max int use the insightful reflexes feat.
Make use of fireshield/coldshield scrolls when relevant.
Basically artificers have at their disposal several methods of mitigating effects and this is what is needed to be done to make up for relatively poor saves.

If making a fleshy artificer I think I would go halfelf/pali dilli, primarily running in the shiradi destiny (good effects for both ranged and casting combat) and utilising healing spring coupled with good heal amp.
As previoiusly noted Unearthly Reactions is a top notch Tier I twist, cheap and easy to slot. Energy Sheath (Tier I Draconic Destiny) is also a decent twist if prepping for content heavy in acid or electricity, it's probably not something you want to keep twisted all the time but sometimes it can be a very good choice eg. Energy Sheath/Electric for Blue Dragon in Epic Tor.

Just some ideas, theres plenty of other ways to get your toon through without evasion.

[FranOhmsford]

If making a fleshy artificer I think I would go halfelf/pali dilli, primarily running in the shiradi destiny (good effects for both ranged and casting combat) and utilising healing spring coupled with good heal amp.
As previoiusly noted Unearthly Reactions is a top notch Tier I twist, cheap and easy to slot. Energy Sheath (Tier I Draconic Destiny) is also a decent twist if prepping for content heavy in acid or electricity, it's probably not something you want to keep twisted all the time but sometimes it can be a very good choice eg. Energy Sheath/Electric for Blue Dragon in Epic Tor.

Pally Dille Over Rogue Dille?

Really?

[dunklezhan]

My human, non-construct essence, pure artificer is a ranged character. I deal with AOE splashes mid-fight by being buffed with appropriate resists, and not being anywhere near where an AOE might land. This requires aggro management and my own reflexes. In my case both of these are poor, but must be passable because I'm frequently last man standing running around in circles dragging mobs through my blade barrier frantically clicking on raise dead scrolls. When my arti does die, it tends to be because I've messed up my aggro management and all the melee mobs have piled on me. With IPS, most caster mobs don't actually last until that point anyway. Far more dangerous are the early-rotation disintegrates and such that some caster mobs have that you just might not see coming.

In short: having not had an arti with evasion, I don't know how much of a difference it really makes, but my human, non-construct essence, pure arti is still my most survivable character. So I wouldn't worry about it too much, just stay on your toes.

[CoasterHops]

Pally Dille Over Rogue Dille?

Really?

+5 to all saves vs 3d6 sneak damage, for me it's not a hard choice. My feeling is that the more difficult the content the higher you want your saves to be.
Sneak attack damage is nice and all but those +5 to saves can easily be the difference between dead or alive in tough content.

Now of course if you are making a WF artificer then its a moot point.

[Lonnbeimnech]

Well you get resist energy (if you dont have ship buffs) and protection from energy. Its an int based class with good dex (if a repeater build) so you can have good reflex saves, or very good if you take insightful reflex feat. The combination of those means you arent going to get obliterated by spells.

The fact that its a range character means most mobs are going to be dead before they have a chance to hurt you.

Later on, blade barrier is used to zerg a bit harder. Gather up a bunch of mobs, shooting them as you run towards them, when you get a bunch chasing you drop a bb, turn around and shoot them as they run to you. But this is mostly for melee mobs.

Tactical detonation is awesome against divines and very good against arcanes. The good thing about going fleshy is you get these spells a bit earlier than a wf, since they are the same level as reconstruct and you wont be as tempted to slot that.

Max out concentration so you can scroll heal while being hit. Even if you are a wf, there might be times you really want to use a heal scroll.

[Lonnbeimnech]

and not being anywhere near where an AOE might land. This requires aggro management and my own reflexes.

Good point. You can manually avoid spells, and its much much easier to do on a ranged toon, compared to melee.

[CThruTheEgo]

meaning high dc?

Around 45 DC will get you no fail in EH, but you will still see good results with 40.

If all your concerned with is EH, then you'll be fine without evasion. Just manage your agro. If you've maxed your concentration, then scroll healing shouldn't be a problem either on EH. You can get away with quite a bit in EH.

[fco-karatekid]

Around 45 DC will get you no fail in EH, but you will still see good results with 40.

If all your concerned with is EH, then you'll be fine without evasion. Just manage your agro. If you've maxed your concentration, then scroll healing shouldn't be a problem either on EH. You can get away with quite a bit in EH.

OK, and I didn't post a few minutes later after reading your 007 build... I think I can mod that slightly for this character and hit mid-40's just fine... assuming _I_ don't derp it up

[CThruTheEgo]

OK, and I didn't post a few minutes later after reading your 007 build... I think I can mod that slightly for this character and hit mid-40's just fine... assuming _I_ don't derp it up

At the bottom of the first post in that thread you'll find suggestions for modifying the build to other races. That may or may not be useful depending on which race you went with. As far as gear, my goal was to maximize my casting capabilities, as much as reasonable, without sacrificing too much of my ranged or survivability. You can modify the gear quite a bit and still get max int to keep your DCs up, if that's your goal.