The Warlord

[Ykt]

What if you don't have FOUR T3 LGS items?

[Blastyswa]

Embrace the master race.. Bladeforged..

I know you're somewhat kidding, but I actually did consider Bladeforged quite seriously on this build, so I'll give my reasons for and against Bladeforged that ended up pushing me towards human.

Advantages of Bladeforged:
1. Immunities. Mostly negative level immunity, for when a MoD run goes sideways. Immunity to the other things, like hold monster and paralyzing, I don't value as much because saves are high enough on this build that I rarely am incapacitated by one of those spells, when I am incapacitated I typically survive it just fine, and if it looks like I won't survive it I use the Harper Pin.
2. Reconstruction. Having a 6 second cooldown heal that, with a Legendary Heartwood and 450 Repair Spellpower, would heal me for around 1,500 HP, is very tempting; in addition, I could take Power of the Forge for an action boost to rule them all.
3. Higher starting constitution, same starting intelligence/charisma. Since this build uses both Force of Personality and Insightful Reflexes, the -2 penalty starting off to dexterity/wisdom is very minor, while +2 constitution could be pretty handy.
4. Instant swap docent. This is basically just for Reveler's +25% critical damage.
5. Minor PRR gains when being hit, -10% slashing damage. That -10% slashing damage is highly effective in situations where 1000's of damage are incoming (before PRR).

Disadvantages of Bladeforged:
1. Have to take Mithral Body. Having only 50 MRR and no evasion would really take away from the whole tank thing. In addition to that, not only does Mithral Body take up a feat slot, but Human gives 1 additional feat, so in total I'm down 2 feats compared to playing as a human.
2. No blessing. Depending on how you look at it, I could only be down 1 feat as bladeforged compared to human, because I take the blessing dragonmark as a human and I couldn't do that as a bladeforged. However, I actually enjoy and find useful the dragonmark, and not having it would also make my build just another pure 20 constitution warlock that performs decently on kills and doesn't die much. Personally, there's more than enough of those, so I don't want to swap out the main thing that separates my build out from other warlocks.
3. Bladeforged don't have a medium armor equivalency. Medium armor allows this build to use it's full MRR value; switching down to light armor drops 40-60 MRR, which is why I don't go down to the Light Armor of the Sage and pick up Insightful Spell Mastery. I would be able to use Heartwood as a Warforged, but since I use Mysterious Bracers and Legendary Boots of the Devil Commander, the actual benefit would be +12 PRR and +7 MRR over what I have right now.
4. Hamp. If I went bladeforged, I would go 3x tiers of Healer's Friend, 3x tier's of Reconstruct, and probably sink the last 2 points to get to Power of the Forge into +1 constitution. My hamp as a human is base multiplier 1, times 4.2-4.45 from hamp, so I heal 420-445% of every heal. As a bladeforged, I would have base multiplier 0.72 with Healer's Friend, times 3.6-3.85 from hamp (60 less than human, because I get 60 hamp from human), so I would heal 259%-277% of every heal. That's around a 1/3 drop in incoming healing; while my hamp would still be decent, especially for a bladeforged, I wouldn't be getting as much benefit out of my secondary heals, and would become much more reliant on reconstruct; in high incoming DPS situations like multiple lieutenants in LE Shroud or tanking in the LE Shroud endfight, healing once every 6 seconds for 1/2-2/3 of my HP isn't enough.
5. Lawful Good and paladin for first level. Because of this build's having charisma as a secondary stat instead of primary, using the fey pact will result in quite a few more saves against pact damage than when playing in GOO. Because of this, if I wanted to play as a bladeforged, I'd have to not only +1 LR the character, but also do an alignment change.
6. Starting ASF. This just means that I'd have to socket a -15% ASF augment in my gear, but at the moment I don't really have many slots to spare; probably I'd just drop my golem's heart, but at the moment it can be handy, especially when playing with fewer heals.

Those are the main reason's for or against Bladeforged. While I think that Bladeforged is definitely not a highly inferior choice (I consider playing something like an elf, gnome, or dwarf highly inferior) I do think that it loses out overall because of the cost, both in money and in Hamp/PRR/Feats/Skills, and the loss of blessing, which really is the thing that sets this build apart from other warlock builds.

[Blastyswa]

What if you don't have FOUR T3 LGS items?

Fair point. I haven't really considered it much since the character I play this build on is one of my main characters, but there are definitely some potential alternatives. Before I started on my T3 LGS items, my preferred gear setup would have looked like this:

Belt: Epic Belt of Thoughtful Remembrance OR Slavers Constitution/Resistance/Spell Focus/Quality Constitution (Slavers is superior, epic belt is less grindy for -6 DC, -10 constitution, and -3 saves less).
Boots: Legendary Boots of the Devil Commander
Bracers: Mysterious Bracers
Cloak: Legendary Earthen Mantle
Gloves: Legendary Dashing Gloves
Goggles: HGS +45 HP/+3 Saves, or Legendary Paramnesial Lenses (+2 Reflex Save, would make PK work fine, DC is in the 40-50 range without goggles)
Helm: Legendary Pansophic Circlet
Necklace: Legendary Pendant of Apparition (Basically entirely just for hamp, low priority)
Ring 1: Legendary Spinneret's Ring
Ring 2: Slavers Charisma/Acid Lore/Spellcraft/Quality Charisma (Or random gen/crafted charisma for low cost)
Trinket: Epic Litany of the Dead/Legendary Dragonscale (Litany is better, Dragonscale is easier to get)
Armor: Breastplate of the Celestial Sage (Very easy to get, <20 runs of HoX or LTS on EH across all toons, or pull it from a chest)
Mainhand: LGS +150 Positive/+7 Charisma (Tier 2 is cheap)
Offhand: LGS +150 Acid/+7 Constitution (Tier 2 is cheap, but this would be the first place to make a Tier 3 because of the DPS gains)

That would be my recommendation for a gearing setup if you aren't able to do lots of LGS. Some gear shuffling could be done potentially for more damage and less survivability with trades like goggles for acid lore LGS tier 2 (+30% crit damage) or moving slaver charisma to necklace and using a lantern ring, but the above gear setup is probably close to optimal for cost offense:defense ratio.

[maddong]

Are you going to bother with chest blessing anymore after crafting comes out?

It seems to me a fixed 3 slot item level 34 effect for all with 2 augments severely beats randomly hoping to get:
1. a 3 slot item instead of a 2 slot item
2. get useful slots
3. get high enough levels on the slots (what do the level 40 have a 7-8 level swing for each power? ie you don't get a 40/40/40 item you get a 39/32/35 item)
4. just forget about getting augments on the same item

Crafting seems like a way better deal since you no longer have to maintain treasure hunter elixirs, +2 jewels, and wasted AP/1 feat on dragonmarks....

[Blastyswa]

Are you going to bother with chest blessing anymore after crafting comes out?

It seems to me a fixed 3 slot item level 34 effect for all with 2 augments severely beats randomly hoping to get:
1. a 3 slot item instead of a 2 slot item
2. get useful slots
3. get high enough levels on the slots (what do the level 40 have a 7-8 level swing for each power? ie you don't get a 40/40/40 item you get a 39/32/35 item)
4. just forget about getting augments on the same item

Crafting seems like a way better deal since you no longer have to maintain treasure hunter elixirs, +2 jewels, and wasted AP/1 feat on dragonmarks....

I actually haven't tested Cannith Crafting on Lammania any, but as I understand Cannith Crafting cap's out at 34, while random loot can go up to 39 without blessing, or 40 with blessing. Random loot is more random than crafting loot, but I've pulled and seem pulled items like +16 hardy rings of +40 Sheltering, +17 wisdom goggles of umd, +16 charisma rings of +16 resistance, and plenty of other items that crafting wouldn't match the power level of. I'd personally think of Cannith Crafting as filler for effects you want until something random gen comes along that's better; I'm sure Cannith Crafting is going to be awesome, but random loot having the potential to produce better items is still a big draw. I also tend to use random loot on alts quite often, since most of those alts I can't spend the time to get much raid gear, much less LGS.

I hope crafting will be good, and I do plan to max out my crafting level, but I still think there'll be a place for random loot (hopefully). I also would likely go 17 AP in the Human tree for extra hamp anyways for the tanking part of this build, so taking dragonmarks instead of action surges isn't a major loss.

[vampiregoat69]

Updated as of u31.

I initially named this build "Dazling's Generalist Warlock" when I first started playing with it. After a few ETR's though, I changed it's name in my notes to "The Warlord" because in my opinion, it's one of the best possible warlock builds out there at the moment. As a little disclaimer, this build will output a little less DPS than Slarden's DC Focused Warlock build, due to a higher emphasis on survivability, but based on a direct comparison between my stats and those of the Voodu Warlock build mine has higher DPS and survivability (Not trying to start a fight, just based on HP values and epic spells taken).

Things this build can do include:
Quickened Resurrection
Tanking LE Shroud Hellball
Tanking LE Shroud Ruin (Yea that's right, it can take that 10k hit)
Intimidate most things easily (I have a swap in intimidate item for Xyzzyzy or Sorjek)
Maintain aggro, even without intimidate (+75% aggro, and +100% aggro. If they're multiplicative, which I think they are, that's a 3.5x multiplier to generated threat with spells)
Low cost DPS, through use of bursts and Arcane Pulse
High cost spike DPS, through use of hellball/ruin/gruin
Bless Chests; this is very useful on LE raids in particular; I've seen people pull insanely powerful random items out of blessed chests.
Multiple Self-Heals; depending on past lives self-heals might be different, but will still have at least 3 extremely hard hitting heals.
Over 300 hamp
Over 600 positive spellpower
1000+ ticks on consecration
5k+ buffed hp including temp, great for freaking out parties.

And here's the build; please note that enhancements/epic destinies aren't covered until later, where i have screenshots for them.

Dazling

Human

20 Warlock

True Neutral

Great One One Pact

Str: 14
Dex: 8
Con: 16+Level Ups
Int: 16
Wis: 8
Cha: 16

Notes: Int, Con, and Cha are all important stats for this build. Each of them affects a different save, as well as additional things like HP/spellpoints/DC's, so I wouldn't recommend starting any of them at below 16. Strength is at 14 because with full buffs, and excluding a store pot or any trickery like owlbear cookies or twisting in extra strength, I can crack 75 strength on this build, allowing me to do both the int runes and the strength levers in LE Tempest Spine. If you don't care about that, leave strength at 8 and put Con or Cha to 18 to start.

Feats:
Human. Maximize Spell
1. Empower Spell
3. Quicken Spell
6. Completionist (Or, mental toughness, spell focus: evo, toughness, enlarge spell)
9. Insightful Reflexes
12. Force of Personality
15. Dragonmark of Searching
18. Past Life: Cleric (Or, mental/improved mental toughness, spell focus: evo, enlarge spell, toughness)
21. Wellspring of Power
24. Intensify Spell
26. Epic Eldritch Blast
27. Ruin
28. Hellball
29. Arcane Pulse
30. Greater Ruin
Legendary. Scion of Fire

Notes:
This is my recommended feat order for the build. Completionist isn't necessary for the build, although it's better than any of the listed alternatives if you do have it. Dragonmark of Searching is for chest-blessing, and Past Life: Cleric is an additional massive and quick emergency heal. If you plan to do less tanking on this build, it can be swapped out for one of the alternatives. I like Wellspring of Power for Ruin-Gruin on Crystal in LShroud, to pop right before boss fights, and just for general usage for mobs (It also gives +110 spellpoints). Intensify Spell is better than Epic Eldritch Blast because it applies not only to bursts, but also ruin's, hellball, and Past Life: Cleric. Ruin, Greater Ruin, and Hellball are all good SP intensive ways to spike damage (Hellball hits 500 an element, 1300 on crit, ruin/gruin do about 5000/10000, 13000/26000 on crit). while arcane pulse should be casted with absolutely no metamagics. This makes it cheap enough to quickly stack up on enemies; one thing I do however, which is not necessarily mandatory, is cast lesser maximize (free maximize) and turn on maximize in order to get an extra +150 spellpower for arcane pulse. It's important to make sure when doing this that you never forget and leave maximize on after lesser maximize wears off, otherwise arcane pulse costs about 4x normal. Scion of Fire is mandatory for most casters because of the large +25% spell crit bonus; this build doesn't have any caps on MRR, so the +10 PRR/MRR is effective as well, personally more so than Scion of Celestia's +150 HP.

Skills:
Intimidate, Spellcraft, Search, and Heal are the big ones. Other options with those maxed out are tumble, jump, perform, spot, balance, or UMD. I personally don't put many points in UMD, because even without them the build passively sits at around 50-60 UMD, more than enough to cast Greater Restoration/Heal Scrolls.

Spells:
1. Jump, Shield
2. Invisibility, Blur
3. Dark Discorporation, DDoor
4. Evard's, Globe of Invulnerability
5. Finger of Death, Tenser's
6. Wail, PWS

Notes:
Jump and Shield are pretty much self-explanatory, Jump is for jumping and shield is immunity to magic missiles and +4 AC (Which doesn't really matter much). I refrain from taking perma-shield in Enlightened Spirit because it would require sacrificing something else in the tree, like 1 point constitution or 50% threat generation, and it seems better to just cast the spell. Invisibility is also pretty obvious, and while the build has perma-blur at level 29, I use the casted blur in heroics and 20-28, as well as casting it on friendlies if they request it. DDoor is a staple in most arcanes spellbook, and Dark Discorporation I'll explain a little bit. The spell reduces incoming damage (except untyped/force) by 50% for it's duration, as well as the invisibility and 25% incorporeal. This is removed upon attacking, but not by your warlock aura. This means that, for example, while tanking hellball or DoJ endfight using dark discorporation will act as a stacking 50% damage reduction, with a 120 second cooldown (20 second duration, so 1/6 uptime). While the build can tank hellball or EE DoJ endfight with the proper gear even without this spell, it certainly makes it easier to absorb the first big hit, after which it'll probably be on cooldown for the rest of the fight. Evard's is good CC, even with charisma as a secondary stat, and I use Globe for tanking Xyzyzzy. Globe removes Displacement, as well as haste, and any other low level spells on you, but it also prevents bees. I don't use globe after our charmer gets to work, as it reduces dogs DPS to not have haste, but until then it's nice to keep from needing outside heals (Which the build does sometimes need on LE tanking). Finger is a flavor choice, DC is high enough on this build to hit a lot of targets, but don't try and cast it in legendary content or some EE's, the build isn't focused on DC. Tenser's I keep up a lot of the time, for +6 AC and +4 Constitution, in addition to +4 strength in LE Tempest Spine. Wail DC won't catch difficult enemies, but it still Neg's them, and PWS is great for setting a champ up for easy killing. The build also has PWK from pact, and I'd advise throwing it on an enemy with no spell resistance that looks like a threat as soon as you find one whenever it's off cooldown. In addition, if you wait to cast tenser's until after PWK, the cooldown is a lot more reasonable. Spell pen on this build isn't fantastic (I have 3x wizard/fvs past lives, think my spell pen is about 40) so PWK won't really work in LE Shroud.

I'm putting all the pictures of character sheet/enhancements/epic destiny onto a different site so that it doesn't clog up too much of this post, so here's the link: https://imgur.com/a/TR3Kj
A few notes on pictures:
1. All pictures were taken in the cargo hold of my airship, while my aura was ticking legendary affirmation. I figured this was fair enough, since in a vast majority of content nothing hits hard enough to drop those temporary hitpoints anyways. If anyone's adverse to those temporary hitpoints, subtract 1000 from the temporary HP in my character sheet screenshot and that's how much the build has without.
2. I used Defense Boost for the screenshots. I use defense boost back and forth between human version and Enlightened Spirit version, which gives it a 100% uptime used correctly, for a duration of a little 260 seconds. This is more than enough time for most boss fights, which is where the defense really matters anyway. If anyone has an issue with that, just subtract 2 constitution and 15 PRR/MRR/AC from the character sheet values and that's how much it is without.
3. Epic Destiny Twists that aren't shown are Rejuvenation Cocoon and Primal Scream.
4. Primal Scream wasn't used in the character sheet screenshot, just a rage pot, because of it being a public instance. I also didn't use Staunch.
5. I tried to avoid using any cheesy methods I wouldn't normally cast in the screenshot; I do have cha/con/int yugo pots going as well as tenser's, like I usually do in questing.
6. The bottom three pictures are an updated enhancement tree version, a Shiradi setup (Extra twists are Endless Faith/Primal Scream) and the character sheet with Shiradi. That character sheet is accurate to how I play the build at the moment, but not how it's always played, because I have been running out of yugo pots recently. I also dropped defense boost recently, so PRR/MRR/AC took a 10-15 point hit.

A few notes on Enhancements:
I decided at least 17 points were going into Human, 21 into Tainted Scholar, and 41 into Enlightened Spirit, for 3x hamp/core 4/core 6 respectively. This meant that I had 1 more AP to mess with, so I just tossed it into human's active tree for an extra action surge point. It could also be put in ES for +7 light spellpower, Souleater for +5 universal spellpower, or Tainted Scholar/Harper for some lame reason; honestly, that 80th point just doesn't matter on this build. The hamp from human is important to maximize hamp on this build, which is very high (320, 345 2/3 of the time with shining through for me) and dragonmarks are necessary. Tainted Scholar gives crit damage primarily, as well as some other goodies and utterdark blast, Enlightened Spirit contains a lot of good defense and bursts. I took the SLA displacement from Enlightened Spirit because I don't want to constantly swap out clickies for displacement, or drop Dark Discorporation/DDoor. It can be dropped though at the players discretion.

A few notes on Epic Destiny:
I've considered dropping 1 point from block energy and putting it into commanding presence for additional threat gen. However, I have no problem at the moment stealing aggro from any build, including furys and DC warlocks, while EE DoJ endfight absorption comes a little close, and even kills me if I'm taking too much melee damage while the fire rains down. The constitution bonuses can also optionally be dropped in favor of taking Lighting the Dark for an additional massive heal. However, it personally has too slow of an activation time, even with quicken (the ability goes off instantly, but the heal hits about a second later) making it undesirable for an emergency heal, which is what it'd be good for. In addition to that, it kind of massively overheals, healing 10's of thousands of damage, and once hitting me for over 100k during wellspring of power with a crit. That's fine and all, but it just feels a little excessive. +20% HP is basically non negotiable, don't mess with that, and Resurrection/Undying Vanguard are in the same boat. Resurrection is great because it's a 6 second cooldown and it's quickened, so throwing it out during combat is a lot safer than scrolling res, although you can switch between the two for rapidfire resurrections. Undying Vanguard is the only way to survive the Codex's Ruin at the end of LE Shroud that I know of, although I suppose an incredibly gimped all out constitution based core 6 stalwart defender might could manage it as long as the fighter doesn't get hit by anything else before or after the Ruin. In my experience though, although I could be wrong, if the Codex's initial Ruin is survived on LE it doesn't recast it. I've had that fight drag on for a minute or more before, and if I absorb the first Ruin no one else gets insta-killed so massively. With a quick Ruin-Gruin on the Codex at the start with the massive threat gen of this build, I can usually hold it's aggro long enough to absorb that ruin without other party members having to hold back on DPS.

A few notes on Twists:
Consecration+Sacred Ground makes for a massive overtime heal; while temp HP will probably never be broken in LH Shroud or anything easier, LE raids commonly see my build get down into it's actual HP. When that happens, having renewal+Consecration ticking on me makes deaths incredibly infrequent, even when I'm going crazy intimidating 5-6 LE mobs at once. Rejuvenation Cocoon is a great little heal, ticking about 1k non crit without wellspring. Empyrean Magic is a great DPS boost that is charged by aura and bursts, and Primal Scream is +5 constitution which is a major stat for this build, affecting shining through and brilliance as well as HP; In addition, my Primal Scream usually hits 3-5k damage, over 10k on a crit, and close to 20k on a helpless crit.

Current Gear:
Key: Item Name (Augments) [Extra Comments]

Belt: LGS Positive Material Opposition
Boots: Legendary Boots of the Devil Commander (+15 Intimidate) [For the PRR, other boots would work at cost of some defense]
Bracers: Mysterious Bracers (+20 Vitality, +2 Good Luck) [Use them, great defense. In addition, mysterious is better slotted here than cloak so you can switch to prismatic/absorption cloaks without losing insightful MRR or exceptional hamp]
Cloak: LGS Cold Material Opposition
Gloves: Legendary Dashing Gloves (+8 Intelligence)
Goggles: HGS Balance of Land and Sky +45 HP +3 Stacking Saves [Other stuff works just fine. I mostly use these because I'm not seeing a lot of saves against pact damage anyway, and +45 HP in Sentinel with ES Capstone and LGS is like+70 extra HP. This is going to be the next piece of my gear to be swapped out once I get another Immortal's Heart]
Helm: Legendary Pansophic Circlet (Globe of Imperial True Blood)
Necklace: Legendary Noxious Embers (+8 Wisdom, +15 Spellcraft)
Ring 1: +14 Constitution/+7 Spell Saves Ring
Ring 2: +9 Charisma +10 Resistance [+16 Charisma +16 Resistance with a third effect would be optimal, main thing is put charisma here. If you use a Belt of Thoughtful Remembrance, can even not worry about the resistance]
Trinket: Epic Litany of the Dead (+2 Spooky Wisdom, +2 Spooky Intelligence) [Stat boost, and I use it as a clicky as well as the heroic one before I do ruin combos)
Armor: Breastplate of the Celestial Sage (+250 Power, Golem's Heart)
Mainhand: LGS Affirmation +150 Stacking Positive Spellpower/+50 Hamp/+70 Hamp [Can put +7 insightful cha as middle one instead, I opted for more defense over more offense)
Offhand: LGS Acid +150 Stacking Acid Spellpower/+7 Constitution/+37 Exceptional Acid Spellpower [I have 3rd tier now, It's useful on bosses, but the internal cooldown is universal, not per mob, and the damage is only good at 5 stacks, so it's DPS contribution against large groups of trash is about 3 damage. Seriously, 3. If you can only get to tier 2 LGS, don't worry about it too much.]
Quiver: Epic Dynamistic Quiver [Not needed at all, in any way shape or form. But there isn't any drawbacks to it, so whatever]

Gear covers basically all offense and defense bases, any change recommendations are welcome though if someone has a better idea on a few things. I don't have evocation focus anywhere, but that'll change with the next update.

I'm looking ahead to the next update's gear, and am planning to put several pieces of it into the build. I'll update this build to reflect that once u32 hits, but the basic gist is that I'll have a 3 piece set of the new gear, keep Epic Litany, the armor, and the weapons, still be going for Ender's Set, and still have the Mysterious Bracers and the hat.

This build is a BEAST mid to higher levels but only thing I had problems with NO ONE waits or listens when you tell them you can bless chests. They pop the chest before you can get to it and then run NO ONE seems to have any patients anymore. So 99% of the time I never get to bless them or I hear them say chests are not worth blessing mostly just junk.

[unbongwah]

They pop the chest before you can get to it and then run NO ONE seems to have any patients anymore. So 99% of the time I never get to bless them or I hear them say chests are not worth blessing mostly just junk.

Welcome to the wonderful world of being an underappreciated chest-blesser. A long time ago, one of my primary epic toons was a CHA-based bard w/Gtr Finding; "nice" to know some things never change...

[Blastyswa]

This build is a BEAST mid to higher levels but only thing I had problems with NO ONE waits or listens when you tell them you can bless chests. They pop the chest before you can get to it and then run NO ONE seems to have any patients anymore. So 99% of the time I never get to bless them or I hear them say chests are not worth blessing mostly just junk.

I saw this problem very often a few times when I first started chest blessing; it wasn't a big issue in most quest's since a lot of time's people would just forget to wait or whatever, but a few times I'd have LE raids or LE quests where people wouldn't wait for a blesser. What I did to help with this is I would remember who all specifically and intentionally opened chests before they were blessed (The people who sprint ahead and open chests after I remind them, and then don't indicate that it was an accident) and the next time they hit my LFM I'd /tell them that they weren't welcome for this run, because the party intended to wait for blessing. Usually after doing this just once the person shapes up, especially if you put up a lot of raid LFM's and LFM's for stuff like ToEE and Haunted Halls where people really want to join a group.

I've found that the longer you spend as a chest blesser, the more people will start to remember you're a blesser as well. I actually get invited to raids fairly often as a blesser, and sometimes people will even give me raid timer's to join their raid's if I'm on timer. I still remind everyone to wait for blessing before most chests, but after a while people get used to waiting when the blesser is in the group.

[Blastyswa]

Welcome to the wonderful world of being an underappreciated chest-blesser. A long time ago, one of my primary epic toons was a CHA-based bard w/Gtr Finding; "nice" to know some things never change...

Agreed, although I've found that quite often people will wait and appreciate the blessing. I don't really recommend blessing in anything below EE/LE, because people won't wait for blessing below those difficulties, and if they get used to not waiting for blessing then they won't wait during EE/LE either. In fact, even when I'm soloing, I don't always bless chests in quests like EE WGU or EE Mirror, because even blessed those chests still have a lower loot level than LE raids or LE quests.

[BigErkyKid]

Updated as of u31.

I initially named this build "Dazling's Generalist Warlock" when I first started playing with it. After a few ETR's though, I changed it's name in my notes to "The Warlord" because in my opinion, it's one of the best possible warlock builds out there at the moment. .

I think that if we break apart your build we have:

- CON based warlock in US
- All metamagics
- Rest of feats on defensive bonuses (force of personality, insightful reflexes)
- Epic spells (pulse, ruin, hellball)

Then you reach very high HP due to combination of native high HP destiny, LGS, warlock ES capstone, full out CON.

Basically you are focusing tremendously on survivability (at the expense of DCs) and spamming no save attacks.

I think this is strictly a tanking build, not really a generalist.

I think you are right that this is one of the "best" warlock builds, in the sense that it really exploits the warlocks ability to forego any investment in DPS and yet achieve something that can carry you through questing. However, how do you take 40k raid trash mobs down? I am playing a warlock myself nowadays and even with a more DPS oriented set up and destiny it is not that fast, I wonder what happens with this build.

[slarden]

I think that if we break apart your build we have:

- CON based warlock in US
- All metamagics
- Rest of feats on defensive bonuses (force of personality, insightful reflexes)
- Epic spells (pulse, ruin, hellball)

Then you reach very high HP due to combination of native high HP destiny, LGS, warlock ES capstone, full out CON.

Basically you are focusing tremendously on survivability (at the expense of DCs) and spamming no save attacks.

I think this is strictly a tanking build, not really a generalist.

I think you are right that this is one of the "best" warlock builds, in the sense that it really exploits the warlocks ability to forego any investment in DPS and yet achieve something that can carry you through questing. However, how do you take 40k raid trash mobs down? I am playing a warlock myself nowadays and even with a more DPS oriented set up and destiny it is not that fast, I wonder what happens with this build.

Alot depends on the content you are running. If he is running mostly LE shroud and LE Tempest spine it probably doesn't matter because 1 or 2 people will be running trash clearing builds so the dps hardly matters there. Against bosses it's mostly wellspring of power, ruin, greater ruin and arcane pulse so that dps loss doesn't matter as much. It's a much smaller percentage when you factor in ruin, greater ruin and arcane pulse to a boss fight.

In that regard this is the best warlock tanking build I've seen on the forums for end game content. It's also a really solid build for running LE shroud and LE tempest spine where other builds will take care of the majority of the non-bosses.

I switch my alt to US and con based for etr and it's definitely much slower clearing mobs, but it's also a total easy button - nothing will kill you. So I think it's a solid build, but the dps loss is noticeable being in US vs. shiradi or EA and being con based. At lower epic levels boss fights are tougher because you don't start getting ruin, arcane pulse, greater ruin until later levels.

The chest blessing makes sense esp on weekends like this if you are dumping DC as you don't need all that many feats. There isn't much I value more in a party member than chest blessing.

Just like anything else it depends on the content you are running. The build is an A+ in my opinion for the content it is running. Just like any builds there are trade-offs and the trade-off of this build is lighter dps against mobs, but the defensive gains are very significant.

[BigErkyKid]

Alot depends on the content you are running. If he is running mostly LE shroud and LE Tempest spine it probably doesn't matter because 1 or 2 people will be running trash clearing builds so the dps hardly matters there. Against bosses it's mostly wellspring of power, ruin, greater ruin and arcane pulse so that dps loss doesn't matter as much. It's a much smaller percentage when you factor in ruin, greater ruin and arcane pulse to a boss fight..

That's an interesting analysis. I agree that trash right now is best taken care of by insta killers in LE content.

But then, against bosses, is it really optimal to run this? Wouldn't it be better a shiradi spammer, with higher SP, better crit changes probably, and a good DPS rotation?

I mean surely you don't just pike on the boss, but the unique value I see for this is that of a tank that is not absolutely rubbish DPS. For instance there was Vancouver's unkillable cleric, but that was just tank (0 DPS).

[Blastyswa]

I think that if we break apart your build we have:

- CON based warlock in US
- All metamagics
- Rest of feats on defensive bonuses (force of personality, insightful reflexes)
- Epic spells (pulse, ruin, hellball)

Then you reach very high HP due to combination of native high HP destiny, LGS, warlock ES capstone, full out CON.

Basically you are focusing tremendously on survivability (at the expense of DCs) and spamming no save attacks.

I think this is strictly a tanking build, not really a generalist.

I think you are right that this is one of the "best" warlock builds, in the sense that it really exploits the warlocks ability to forego any investment in DPS and yet achieve something that can carry you through questing. However, how do you take 40k raid trash mobs down? I am playing a warlock myself nowadays and even with a more DPS oriented set up and destiny it is not that fast, I wonder what happens with this build.

I've actually toyed with Shiradi quite a bit, and I now run in either destiny fairly often; the only thing that changes between the two destinies are my twists, and I can easily change that around in less than a minute. For raid trash mobs in LE at the moment, as Slarden said, I typically don't have to take them down myself. The ability to survive not just 1-2 hits, but to actually be able to hold the aggro of 10 or so LE mobs without dying is more powerful to me than the ability to take them down faster, because grouping those 10 mobs together makes it very easy for someone else to do a wail of the banshee, circle of death, or fury shot to take out a majority of them at once. I can take down enemies myself, but not particularly quickly; typically my attack sequence is consecration-burst-burst-hellball-burst-burst-hellball etc, with ruins reserved for portals and end bosses. I've parked this character at max level for the time being (Might eventually finish my EPL's, HPL's/IPL's are finished on the character) and typically only use him to fast farm things like ToEE or Haunted Halls in Shiradi, to solo raids like DoJ, also in shiradi, or to run LE raids. The damage from all those no save attacks is more than enough to easily clear anything non-raid, and I maintain high enough damage through bursts (My DC's aren't completely dumped, charisma is kept relatively high, giving my pact damage/hellball saves somewhere in the 40-60 range I believe, which is enough to land decently in things other than LE raids) and hellball to typically lead kills in things like DoJ or MoD.

The main reason I call this build a generalist instead of just a tanking build is that when I think tanking build, I think of something like Vanooger's cleric tank, which I think is somewhere in the cleric section. A build like that focuses completely and utterly on the sole purpose of acquiring maximum aggro, at the cost of everything else. On the other hand, as you mentioned, my build takes many of the most relevant DPS feats (4 Metamagics, Arcane Pulse/Hellball/Both Ruins/Wellspring of Power, 1 Epic Eldritch Blast, Scion of Fire) while dropping several (2nd Epic Eldritch Blast, Mental Toughness line, Evocation Spell Focus) to pick up additional defensive/utility feats like force of personality, insightful reflexes, and chest blessing (Actually I wouldn't pick up the second Epic Eldritch Blast anyway, because I'd have to drop ruin, intensify spell, or wellspring). That's the reason I classify this build as a generalist; my goal with this build was to reach maximum investment in defense, offense, and utility with minimal opportunity cost.

I'll try and take a video of me stepping into a solo LShroud on this build and show how long it takes me to kill a few mobs; I agree that it isn't all that fast, but I wouldn't say I'm missing enough DPS (main losses are some saves on pact damage, some saves on hellball, Shiradi procs which is a big one, and mental toughness line) to put the DPS very far behind a DPS focused warlock build. This build will also benefit greatly from a 5 piece LGS set when I finish that, because of the additional spell crit damage and HP, as well as the Ender bonus. This build also has the advantage in Legendary Raids of being able to attack 10+ enemies at once without dying, as opposed to a more offense oriented warlock in Shiradi that can't hold the aggro of more than 2-3.

[Blastyswa]

Alot depends on the content you are running. If he is running mostly LE shroud and LE Tempest spine it probably doesn't matter because 1 or 2 people will be running trash clearing builds so the dps hardly matters there. Against bosses it's mostly wellspring of power, ruin, greater ruin and arcane pulse so that dps loss doesn't matter as much. It's a much smaller percentage when you factor in ruin, greater ruin and arcane pulse to a boss fight.

In that regard this is the best warlock tanking build I've seen on the forums for end game content. It's also a really solid build for running LE shroud and LE tempest spine where other builds will take care of the majority of the non-bosses.

I switch my alt to US and con based for etr and it's definitely much slower clearing mobs, but it's also a total easy button - nothing will kill you. So I think it's a solid build, but the dps loss is noticeable being in US vs. shiradi or EA and being con based. At lower epic levels boss fights are tougher because you don't start getting ruin, arcane pulse, greater ruin until later levels.

The chest blessing makes sense esp on weekends like this if you are dumping DC as you don't need all that many feats. There isn't much I value more in a party member than chest blessing.

Just like anything else it depends on the content you are running. The build is an A+ in my opinion for the content it is running. Just like any builds there are trade-offs and the trade-off of this build is lighter dps against mobs, but the defensive gains are very significant.

Yes, I primarily run LE raids on this build with static groups, with some quick EE runs of things like ToEE/Haunted Halls. For quests where I don't need the survivability, I will switch to shiradi for increased DPS. However, for tanking mobs in LE Shroud, or all 4 lieutenants in LH shroud (I can't do all 4 in LE yet), the extra defense works very well.

[Blastyswa]

That's an interesting analysis. I agree that trash right now is best taken care of by insta killers in LE content.

But then, against bosses, is it really optimal to run this? Wouldn't it be better a shiradi spammer, with higher SP, better crit changes probably, and a good DPS rotation?

I mean surely you don't just pike on the boss, but the unique value I see for this is that of a tank that is not absolutely rubbish DPS. For instance there was Vancouver's unkillable cleric, but that was just tank (0 DPS).

What would your increased DPS shiradi version look like? At the moment, in Sentinel, I believe I am losing 25-31 spellpower from Shiradi (Depending on if I went with much Fey Spring or not),and have 140 more spellpoints in sentinel. My crit chance is the same in each destiny, since changing between Sentinel to Shiradi doesn't really require any changes in my setup (usually I swap out consecration/sacred ground for Energy Burst/Endless Faith, for extra AoE damage and to compensate for the SP loss). My current DPS rotation in Sentinel on bosses is:
wellspring-empower maximize clicky-burst-burst-maxed arcane pulse-maxed hellball-Litany-Ruin-Gruin-maxed arcane pulse-maxed hellball-burst-burst-maxed arcane pulse-maxed hellball-burst-burst-normal arcane pulse-normal hellball, which takes about 25 seconds to execute, at which point if the boss isn't dead I repeat the process minus wellspring of power. My rotation in Shiradi is basically the exact same thing, except I have an Energy Burst before the empower maximize clicky. I tried including wild shot some, but for me that ability hits about 1000 damage a knife, closer to 3000 on critical hits, which isn't a lot compared to the 30k my gruin's do or the 1000-2000 I can expect from each quick activation warlock burst/blast. If you have any recommendations on what to change about my boss DPS rotation I'd love to hear them though. I've actually found that, even during the times I've messed around with foregoing +150% aggro generation in Sentinel for a different enhancement, bosses typically end up aggroed on me at around the ruin/gruin combo and stay aggroed for the rest of the fight (Exceptions being if a furyshotter uses his Unbridled Fury, or if someone runs up and intimidates boss).

I actually agree with that evaluation of the benefit of this build as a tank (as well as packing chest blessing, and having 150-180 temporary hitpoints for all nearby players every 2 seconds), except that I would change it to say that not only does this build not have absolutely rubbish DPS, but it actually has superior DPS to many non-broken builds I've played with, which was the design. I can typically out DPS builds like pure fighters, paladins, barbarians, or swashbucklers, while builds like Shiradi Warlocks (played correctly), Trees, Furyshotters, and Tempests deal superior damage to my build. This build certainly doesn't have maximum DPS, and I wouldn't ever say that it did, but it finishes solidly at a little above middle of the pack, with the added benefit of having 3-5 times the health of most other builds as well as blessing.

I do like that we both used Vanooger's build as an example of what my build isn't; I actually posted my first response before I noticed that you'd mentioned him as well.

[Blastyswa]

However, how do you take 40k raid trash mobs down?

I went ahead and took a video quick to show this, it's in post #3 of the thread. I certainly wouldn't say I'd volunteer for trash clearing duty, but given that the mobs each had about 50-60k HP, and that I was only using my normal attacks for trash mobs (primal scream at the start, then bursts/hellball, arcane pulse on the big guy) I'd say it's a pretty accurate depiction of how long it takes me to take out trash in an actual raiding situation. It took about 30 seconds to take down trash other than the orthon, and an additional 30 seconds on orthon, which I would attribute to his evasion and resistance to my acid damage. Based on that, my DPS on the normal trash on this build was about 2,000, and my DPS on the orthon was a little below 1,000; not particularly impressive, but then again I have 3,000 HP, was not using any excessive damage boosts (No ruins, no spamming spellpower boost, not even wellspring), and was able to survive in close contact with 6 LE Shroud mobs for a 30 second duration without crowd control, which is not feasible on many other build's. I'll try and think of a good way to show my boss DPS as well at some point; a Bruntsmash test doesn't work particularly well (I've tried it) because he consistently dies at the 2nd volley of ruin's, which puts my boss DPS at around 7,300. Given that my build does have a strong focus on boss DPS over trash DPS with the use of ruins, I expect that my boss DPS is somewhere over 5000, but probably not as high as 7300 due to the fact that on enemies like Sorjek LE I often run out of Litany clickies before the boss dies, and have to drop ruins out of my attack cycle or risk running out of sp.

[BigErkyKid]

I went ahead and took a video quick to show this, it's in post #3 of the thread. I certainly wouldn't say I'd volunteer for trash clearing duty, but given that the mobs each had about 50-60k HP, and that I was only using my normal attacks for trash mobs (primal scream at the start, then bursts/hellball, arcane pulse on the big guy) I'd say it's a pretty accurate depiction of how long it takes me to take out trash in an actual raiding situation. It took about 30 seconds to take down trash other than the orthon, and an additional 30 seconds on orthon, which I would attribute to his evasion and resistance to my acid damage. Based on that, my DPS on the normal trash on this build was about 2,000, and my DPS on the orthon was a little below 1,000; not particularly impressive, but then again I have 3,000 HP, was not using any excessive damage boosts (No ruins, no spamming spellpower boost, not even wellspring), and was able to survive in close contact with 6 LE Shroud mobs for a 30 second duration without crowd control, which is not feasible on many other build's. I'll try and think of a good way to show my boss DPS as well at some point; a Bruntsmash test doesn't work particularly well (I've tried it) because he consistently dies at the 2nd volley of ruin's, which puts my boss DPS at around 7,300. Given that my build does have a strong focus on boss DPS over trash DPS with the use of ruins, I expect that my boss DPS is somewhere over 5000, but probably not as high as 7300 due to the fact that on enemies like Sorjek LE I often run out of Litany clickies before the boss dies, and have to drop ruins out of my attack cycle or risk running out of sp.

Thanks for the answers, I always like discussions about builds. I'll try to answer more in detail the other posts later.

I am going to go ahead and say congrats on being to tank those mobs. It is not as easy as you make it look like.

However, you'll agree with me that you used a non-sustainable spell rotation. You dropped half your SP bar just killing a few trash mobs. This is OK, I understand that the best trash killer in LE is an insta-killer, period. So I am not holding your build to that standard.

As I said, I see this build as a good tank and it is, IMHO, superior to Vancouver's build overall. It is also not so gear dependent, aside from the GS HP set.

Now regarding how to increase DPS, I'd say that no build is better than a shiradi cone warlock. For DPS, I'd pick the mephistoles build.

https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthrea...-Fiend-Warlock

I'll try to answer the rest later.

[Phil7]

I can typically out DPS builds like pure fighters, paladins, barbarians, or swashbucklers, while builds like Shiradi Warlocks (played correctly), Trees, Furyshotters, and Tempests deal superior damage to my build.

You are underestimating pure Fighters and Barbarians
Curious, how does one play Shiradi Warlock correctly?
and Daz please use more paragraphs when u post I find it quite hard to concentrate when reading your replies

[Blastyswa]

Thanks for the answers, I always like discussions about builds. I'll try to answer more in detail the other posts later.

I am going to go ahead and say congrats on being to tank those mobs. It is not as easy as you make it look like.

However, you'll agree with me that you used a non-sustainable spell rotation. You dropped half your SP bar just killing a few trash mobs. This is OK, I understand that the best trash killer in LE is an insta-killer, period. So I am not holding your build to that standard.

As I said, I see this build as a good tank and it is, IMHO, superior to Vancouver's build overall. It is also not so gear dependent, aside from the GS HP set.

Now regarding how to increase DPS, I'd say that no build is better than a shiradi cone warlock. For DPS, I'd pick the mephistoles build.

https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthrea...-Fiend-Warlock

I'll try to answer the rest later.

Fair enough; I actually didn't notice at the time how much SP was going into killing those guys. Granted I wasn't bothering with using lesser maximize clicky, so the SP cost for all those hellballs would've been much less with that, nevermind the arcane pulses, but it is still very sp-intensive to take out trash mobs in LE raids thanks to most of the spike damage on this build being loaded into 5 stacking arcane pulse and using ruins.

So I would certainly agree with you that yes, this build is not the best at trash control in LE Shroud. In LE Tempest's Spine I can typically do a lot better, and in LE HoX I'm usually the charmer or tank (or both) so it doesn't matter as much, but in LE Shroud I never round up enemies in a circle like in the video I took and wear them down with hellballs and bursts. Instead, I typically round them up, intimidate to maintain aggro, run off and find a necro or a furyshotter, and then do the circle tanking until my friendly party mate notices what's going on and kills everything.

I like Vanooger's build for unkillability (I actually run a variant of it on an alt) but I do think I can safely say that my build has vastly superior DPS output, simply because Vanooger's isn't designed to have any. I think of Van's build more of something to go for if your sole purpose is to tank, while mine is better for someone who wants to tank without completely devoting themselves to defense only; my build uses medium armor, no shield, has less heals, and less PRR/AC, but has additional tools from warlock to compensate for that in addition to extra DPS; Vanooger's build might could've stood still tanking the mobs in the video and just casted heals, but it wouldn't have been able to take those mobs down.

I also think I should probably mention that, in all honesty, even the LGS set isn't completely vital to the build. It's obviously a very powerful bonus, but I was able to go through entire LE Shroud runs before I made a single LGS item with 0 deaths and middle of the pack kills. As long as every gear slot has a decent item, and the basics of the build (constitution based, some defensive feats, Sentinel) are followed, the build is pretty unkillable without too much investment.

I haven't actually looked into cone builds much, as I'm not a fan of the rest of the Souleater tree; I'll have to look into them and see what I think, thanks for the link.

[Blastyswa]

You are underestimating pure Fighters and Barbarians
Curious, how does one play Shiradi Warlock correctly?
and Daz please use more paragraphs when u post I find it quite hard to concentrate when reading your replies

Oh, I certainly didn't mean that pure Fighters/Barbarians aren't good build's by any means. But, in my own experience playing Barbarians, Fighters, Swashbuckler's, and my own personal favorite Paladin build (It's named after me, lying somewhere deep in the paladin threads after my main character switched to this build) the DPS output is not as high as my characters playing Trees, Furyshotters, or Wolves, as examples. I still love playing barbs/fighters and other builds like that; they are certainly capable of soloing any quest in the game (with exceptions of, you know, xorian cipher and stuff) and holding their own in LE Shroud runs.

I personally just think of there being about 4 basic tiers of character builds. Tier one is where build's like Furyshotters, DPS based warlocks, Trees, Missile Shiradi's, and Wolves are; these are the builds that are, in my opinion, overperforming and deserve a little bit of a nerf. I have alts playing each of these build's, and love the ability to spike 100k damage in one shot as a furyshotter, or get consistent 10k crits as a tree, or hit 12 times per second as a wolf; I think it's safe to say though that those abilities are very powerful, to the level that I think that they outperform other builds. Tier two would be builds like Pure Fighter's, Barbarians, Mechanics, and The Warlord build; they do great in all content, and in fact can often lead kills in groups, even with builds in tier one also being in those group's. However, a skilled player who plays as a furyshotter, with equal knowledge and skill with furyshotting as with playing a fighter, would do better as a furyshotter in my opinion. Tier three is just everyone who runs around playing melee non-tree monk's and elemental sorcerer's and pure buff bard's are, and tier four is the 9 monk 9 warlock 2 paladin past life build's that for some reason play LE raids, or the pure 20 charisma based halfling barbarians.

I don't see a lot of shiradi warlocks that are just completely bad; the time's that I would say they need to change something up is when they're sitting on 1000 HP and not a lot of PRR (I mean come on, you can easily reach over 1000 HP on any build, and warlock's have a lot of advantages in the way of defense. This build still sits at over 2,000 HP in Shiradi), they spam abilities like ruin's and arcane pulse's a lot (Those are boss abilities only, and not even needed as much for bosses if you're in Shiradi) or if they aren't using a universal spell lore item and a Legendary Pansophic Circlet (Honestly there aren't a lot of alternatives for maximum spellpower, LPC is just amazing if you cast out of a bunch of different spellpowers). Honestly though, mostly the shiradi warlocks that I'd say aren't performing as well as they could are the one's that aren't leading kills in quests/non LE raids; there's so much raw power in a Shiradi Warlock that even my own build, with it's high emphasis on survivability, outperforms almost any other class in quests and easier raids.

I get the "Don't have such big paragraphs Daz, it's annoying!" thing a lot actually, I'm starting to think people don't like reading through 20 sentence paragraphs or something, how odd...