Axel's THF Melee Cleric Build

[Aziz]

Here's what I'm tentatively thinking for a new endgame gearset. Please give me feedback/criticism on this. Very open to suggestions/corrections. After I hear some feedback I'll update original post. I don't yet have fillagree and augments filled out but should be able to fit everything else essential that is not mentioned through augments and fillagree. As for fillagree, will atleast do 5 piece Prowess set of course. Agr33n3's post on page 20 of this thread with 3 set bonuses and my old gearset gave me a lot of ideas to consider. After crunching through the wiki and wrapping my head around the gear tetris this week I cannot see any way possible to fit in all 3 set bonuses as in Agr33n3's gearset suggestion while still fitting in insightful accuracy, healing lore and assassinate DCs. You can fit in two of the three of Isle of Dread, Feywild winter and Sharn Legendary Part of the Family but not all three without losing atleast healing lore and accuracy. Atleast I've not found a way.

This tentative gearset below is very aggressively oriented. It gives pretty much max attainable melee DPS and healing but sacrifices survivability.

Pros - It fits in equip/insight/qual assassinate, insight accuracy, equip/insight/qual/profane/except WIS, healing lore, isle of dread and sharn set bonuses, armor/insight armor pierce, insight/qual spellpower

Cons - It makes some big sacrifices to survivability by dropping Feywild winter and insight/qual CON. It may be too much of a sacrifice for higher reapers though I right now think I can make it work with reaper points and past lives. I'm thinking I should still get to around 2,500 HP in reaper with 50 reaper points and a bunch of primal past lives. Which is definitely enough HP. Also lots of divine past lives will help make up PRR. However, a new character without past lives/reaper points would want to fit in feywild winter and sharn part of the family instead for the extra survivability. Without reaper points and past lives you'll definitely be too squishy for high reaper with this gearset.
...

I would swap the scale aug's from the artifact and your cloak so you get +15 to wis instead of the +14 you get from putting it in the cloak. The +20% positive spell crit will be the same whether it's in your cloak or in your artifact.
You can slot +5 insightful con as an augment, so you're only missing 4 con over all. Missing winter 4 set bonus is obviously a big chunk of hp but as you stated you've got the past lives to make up for that.
Does crippling apply to melee attacks? I know tendon slice does (or did when I was using it a few lives ago), but the ingame text specifically states ranged so wasn't sure.

I might pinch this setup, I was looking at something similar for my next life (pdk 1 fgt/1fvs/18 cleric), but using heart/devilscale bracers or a gomf with ravens-eye/windlasher as a base. I kept running into problems trying to shoehorn the iod set bonus in though. I'll probably swap out that trinket though, as I won't have the radiant servant capstone i'll grab the trance from war soul instead of falconry and then I won't have to worry about insightful accuracy. Swap out Kopru bracers for the admiral's wristwatch to get armor piercing back and then you basically have a free trinket slot.

[axel15810]

I would swap the scale aug's from the artifact and your cloak so you get +15 to wis instead of the +14 you get from putting it in the cloak. The +20% positive spell crit will be the same whether it's in your cloak or in your artifact.
You can slot +5 insightful con as an augment, so you're only missing 4 con over all. Missing winter 4 set bonus is obviously a big chunk of hp but as you stated you've got the past lives to make up for that.
Does crippling apply to melee attacks? I know tendon slice does (or did when I was using it a few lives ago), but the ingame text specifically states ranged so wasn't sure.

I might pinch this setup, I was looking at something similar for my next life (pdk 1 fgt/1fvs/18 cleric), but using heart/devilscale bracers or a gomf with ravens-eye/windlasher as a base. I kept running into problems trying to shoehorn the iod set bonus in though. I'll probably swap out that trinket though, as I won't have the radiant servant capstone i'll grab the trance from war soul instead of falconry and then I won't have to worry about insightful accuracy. Swap out Kopru bracers for the admiral's wristwatch to get armor piercing back and then you basically have a free trinket slot.

Thanks, this feedback was helpful. I actually forgot that insight CON augment existed from the champion vendor. That existing makes me feel better about this setup.

18c/1 fvs/1fighter is a super good alternative, and yeah it would free up the trinket slot as you described. I did think of that too, good points. I enjoy having the RS capstone but have considered dropping it. Just depends mostly on how much you prioritize healing vs. other things I suppose. It really sucks warpriest divine might doesn't have a WIS trance option to get insightful accuracy through trance like warsoul does. That would solve that issue and open up the trinket slot without a FVS splash.

Atleast it's a pretty easy swap if I ever decide to go 18/1/1. Just swap the bracer with the other IoD bracer and slot something else in trinket slot. Maybe the Bloodrage Chism, for example.

And yeah I considered devil set with the heart of sulo and devil bracers but keep in mind heart of sulo is a minor artifact so you can't slot both that and a craftable IoD minor artifact. Big reason why I disregarded that option.

I use raven's/windlasher in my level 20 epic gearset with epic GoMF, but pretty much threw out those options for the endgame gearset since the legendary GoMF doesn't have free gem rerolls like the epic one does so getting the exact 2 sets I want isn't guaranteed even if I spend a years worth of threads, with rerolls costing 100 threads each.

AFAIK crippling (from the croc tooth trinket) is ranged only.

[Aziz]

I try to roll one gomf a life, and if I get something that looks like it would be useful for a future life I keep hold of it. I rolled the ravens/lashers a couple of lives ago and have been trying to think of a cool build to use it with in future. Nice thing about them is they are bta.

Back to the build, looking at the belt you are only getting the invis guard and 14 con from there and the iod slot bonus (and +5% positive spell crit)
If you use a +14 con augment (pricey if you haven't been lucky enough to find one yourself) you can use Lindals belt (from the skellies raid) instead.
The 14 strength isn't that useful to your build, but it does get you +19 insightful sheltering which is.
For the +5quality pos crit you can stick that in your cloak where you have +35 magical sheltering and just get an aug from the vendor for +36 sheltering.
The invisibility guard is also slottable via the essence of the cloak of strahd if you like it.

I think that brings you up to around 100 mrr and 200prr dependent on reaper points/bonuses, so would probably go light armor as you're getting evasion from shadowdancer. Plus you should be able to hit dodge cap with your reaper points.

Filigree wise I was just going to use prowess/shattered. Not sure whether to get some +2wis raid augs and then another celerity for perma haste or not.

I'm currently at 23 running through eveningstar, will probably etr a couple of times before staying at 32 for raids and high reaper. Trinket wise I'm thinking I might do the legendary emblem of elemental evil, it provides +3 quality con, +15 stacking elemental resistances, natural armor and profane lifeforce, which isn't provided by anything else in the setup. Also leaves me free to swap in spell absorb when needed without breaking any set bonuses.

[axel15810]

I try to roll one gomf a life, and if I get something that looks like it would be useful for a future life I keep hold of it. I rolled the ravens/lashers a couple of lives ago and have been trying to think of a cool build to use it with in future. Nice thing about them is they are bta.

Back to the build, looking at the belt you are only getting the invis guard and 14 con from there and the iod slot bonus (and +5% positive spell crit)
If you use a +14 con augment (pricey if you haven't been lucky enough to find one yourself) you can use Lindals belt (from the skellies raid) instead.
The 14 strength isn't that useful to your build, but it does get you +19 insightful sheltering which is.
For the +5quality pos crit you can stick that in your cloak where you have +35 magical sheltering and just get an aug from the vendor for +36 sheltering.
The invisibility guard is also slottable via the essence of the cloak of strahd if you like it.

I think that brings you up to around 100 mrr and 200prr dependent on reaper points/bonuses, so would probably go light armor as you're getting evasion from shadowdancer. Plus you should be able to hit dodge cap with your reaper points.

Filigree wise I was just going to use prowess/shattered. Not sure whether to get some +2wis raid augs and then another celerity for perma haste or not.

I'm currently at 23 running through eveningstar, will probably etr a couple of times before staying at 32 for raids and high reaper. Trinket wise I'm thinking I might do the legendary emblem of elemental evil, it provides +3 quality con, +15 stacking elemental resistances, natural armor and profane lifeforce, which isn't provided by anything else in the setup. Also leaves me free to swap in spell absorb when needed without breaking any set bonuses.

Thanks, this is also great feedback. I had not considered the Skeleton's belt. Unfortunately, this is only obtainable from a drop in the opt chest and isn't tradeable with raid runes. I'll keep an eye out for it though. I do run this raid every week.