Instakill Soul Eater Aura Warlock?

[Zakan]

I've been hearing that warlocks who use the aura are much stronger than the ones that use eldritch blast cone shape, but I do like the idea of an infernal warlock using finger of death, wail of the banshee, hurl through hell, and devour the soul. That means that I'd have a lot invested in Soul Eater (41 points, and the tier 5s). My idea was to try and walk the middle road.

My question is this: will it work?

Drow Warlock, max CHA then Con.

Feats:
Empower
Maximize
Quicken
Heighten
Spell Focus: Necromancy
Greater Spell Focus: Necromancy
Spell Penetration, maybe toughness? Not sure about this one.

Enhancements:
41 Soul Eater. Eldritch Wave, Feed on Magic, Finger of Death, Devour the Soul, +2 CHA
6 Racial: +2 CHA
33 Enlightened Spirit: Eldritch Aura, Eldritch Burst, Spiritual Retribution, Celestial Spirit, +2 CHA

Things that I'm missing and wish I could have:
- Higher Con. I'm a drow, and I'm taking the CHA bumps over the CON bumps
- Spirit Blast. Extra damage is always nice, but I'm taking Soul Eater tier 5s.
- Shining Through. The temp hp would be very nice, but can't use the tier 5s.
- Ultimate Enlightenment. The missing 20% hp here really hurts, but I'm going for DCs and instakills, so I need soul eater capstone.

Things I have that I'm happy about:
- Finger of Death. Instakills are nice.
- Devour the Soul. Instakills are nice, ignoring death ward and working on undead is very nice.
- Hurl through Hell. Everything about this is great.
- Eldritch Wave. In my opinion, this makes up for not having Spirit Blast, as it is a very good SLA.
- Feed on Magic. This is my spell point battery, letting me cast almost infinitely.
- Stricken and Consume. Single target damage SLAs that also have great effects with other enhancements.



So, is it worth it to go ES warlock, or should I just stay Soul Eater with some Tainted Scholar? If I do the latter, I can pick up a little more pact damage and use Cone blast shape, some bonus spells, as well as some important stuff.

Important stuff I could get through Tainted Scholar:
- +2 spell pen through core.
- +1 CHA. I wouldn't put as many points into Scholar, so I could put 7 into Harper for the 2nd core.
- +30% spell crit damage.

I don't think these losses are huge, so if the points into ES are worth it, great. If not, then this is my alternative. Thoughts?

[Uifareth_Cuthalion]

I've been hearing that warlocks who use the aura are much stronger than the ones that use eldritch blast cone shape, but I do like the idea of an infernal warlock using finger of death, wail of the banshee, hurl through hell, and devour the soul. That means that I'd have a lot invested in Soul Eater (41 points, and the tier 5s). My idea was to try and walk the middle road.

My question is this: will it work? ...

No love on this proposal? I have something similar in mind, trying to find a build where ES Aura makes sense -- not that I have any complaints about a TS blaster.

[HungarianRhapsody]

Heighten

What specific spells do you want to heighten? Remember that it only pumps their spell level up to 6 because Warlock. That's +1 DC on some spells and MAYBE +2 on one or two.

[Zretch]

I've run this kind of build before.

Invariable I drop it and use a more standard ES/TS or SE/TS build, however. Tainted is just a really good support tree. I miss having Web, Utterdark, and Death Ward. It's also where you pick up wand and scroll mastery as you're leveling up for healing, and the stronger pact extra die are nice as well.

ES and SE kind of fight against one another. ES aura wants you to be in the middle of stuff, while SE cone wants everything to be in front of you. In order to use the ES bursts, you need to stop using the SE cone. When I ran the build, I tended to only use ES for brilliance and medium armor proficiency / no asf, so I stopped with around 24-25 points in it. I took the PRR/MRR and the aura defensive buffs, but none of the bursts or the light spellpower. It was a bit more survivable solo, and the vulnerability debuffing striken helped with the DPS a bit, but it allowed me to perpetuate some lazy habits.

Now if I'm going to build a CC / insta-kill character, I go all in on SE/TS and keep my distance. Everything is about keeping ranged locked down and melee away from me until I can kill them all. If I want to build a "up close and personal" trash killer, I go ES/TS and max out my pact die, pick up empower and maximize, and carry enough DCs to mass hold everything but pandemonium champs and insta kill pandemonium champs. (and stone Mark of Law champs, because those p0nks are immune to hold and insta-kill).

SE is decidedly better in a group.
ES is better for soloing in my preferred playstyle (jump into the middle of ****, drop a tentacles at my feet, and make it up from there).

You're not wrong to enjoy SE and the rapid fire insta-kills. It's a very strong tree. I just think it mixes a bit better with TS than with ES.

[slarden]

I've been hearing that warlocks who use the aura are much stronger than the ones that use eldritch blast cone shape, but I do like the idea of an infernal warlock using finger of death, wail of the banshee, hurl through hell, and devour the soul.

ES was probably the strongest tree early on due to the aoe slas, but they've nerfed ES three times and it would be hard to argue anything other than it being the absolute weakest main or secondary trees available unless you are going primarily for durability. The ES nitch is that you get 20% hp and shining through which requires both tier 5 and the capstone. You lose alot of offense (spellcasting and dps) for those defensive benefits. ES has two primary uses:

1) You can't survive in SE or TS or the extra survivability helps with your playstyle.
2) You want to tank or be tanky

Enhancements:
41 Soul Eater. Eldritch Wave, Feed on Magic, Finger of Death, Devour the Soul, +2 CHA
6 Racial: +2 CHA
33 Enlightened Spirit: Eldritch Aura, Eldritch Burst, Spiritual Retribution, Celestial Spirit, +2 CHA

The problem I have with this split is that you aren't getting the biggest benefits of ES - shining through and the 20% hp boost. Immunity to knockdown you can get with a zephyr back up stick. With SE your dps will be much higher with blast and cone - esp single target dps. You are losing an easy 30% crit damage from TS which is more important than ever with the high crit chance available with U42. Also, tainted scholar gives you a dc boost clicky for tougher fights.

You would be better off giving up the SE capstone and tier 5 and going ES/TS if you really wanted ES. My guildy does this as tiefling scoundrel fey (which uses fire in place of sonic for spellpower). He focuses on enchanting/blasting so doesn't lose much by giving up SE. He also goes for higher dps than I do. You are also losing utterdark which is the absolute best dps currently with the orb. You lose the stunning ability and the ability to bypass golem dr. It's alot to give up and not entirely sure what you are getting that comes close to that.

If you want to go necro SE capstone and tier 5 is by far the best option as you concluded. Hurl makes alot of sense but I would strongly look at tiefling which overcomes fire immunity, has better fire spellpower, better crit chance and honestly looks the part for a full darkside character. It doesn't come with healing amp but neither does drow.

Heighten

If you have past life wizard consider this instead. Devour the soul is spell level 6 and not boosted by heighten. Same with Wail. Finger is 5 and gains 1 by Heighten and also gains 1 by past life wizard, but all those spells gain 1 with past life wizard + every other spell as well.

The main spell it helps is Web but in my experience you don't gain much by the extra few dc with either web or tentacles.

- Higher Con. I'm a drow, and I'm taking the CHA bumps over the CON bumps

My suggestion is to move up to reaper if you aren't already. Put your first 14 pts into the caster tree and then the next 21 in the tank tree which will net you alot of hp and you are getting most of the dc benefits. Beyond this focus on itemization for hp rather than enhancements and epic destinies. With 35 reaper points and 21 in tank tree you are gaining nearly 300 hp. Collective sight and 1 slavers item beyond what you need for cha gets you potentially 21 con, 10 ins con and 4 quality con.

Go with flamecleansed fury set and take medium armor proficiency - much better than the esoteric set and it gives you all the lores you need - force, light, fire, positive. Between Divine Wrath, mass cure sla and cocoon you have really good self-healing on top of that. I haven't figured out what I am going to do with the upcoming epic destiny changes, but I will wait and see since the usual forum warriors are trying to convince the devs to nerf the planned magister dc bump and they have a good track record at persuading the devs despite facts.

[HungarianRhapsody]

You would be better off giving up the SE capstone and tier 5 and going ES/TS if you really wanted ES. My guildy does this as tiefling scoundrel fey (which uses fire in place of sonic for spellpower). He focuses on enchanting/blasting so doesn't lose much by giving up SE. He also goes for higher dps than I do. You are also losing utterdark which is the absolute best dps currently with the orb. You lose the stunning ability and the ability to bypass golem dr. It's alot to give up and not entirely sure what you are getting that comes close to that.

Which Orb? Because there are a few that could go nicely with that. I'm assuming that you mean Legendary Stygian Wrath from Same Old Song, but not positive?

[slarden]

Which Orb? Because there are a few that could go nicely with that. I'm assuming that you mean Legendary Stygian Wrath from Same Old Song, but not positive?

I am using this orb: https://ddowiki.com/page/Item:Legend...splendant_Fury

This gives me a large boost to dps with utterdark blast due to the stacking lore. It can be crafted with insightful wisdom, charisma or int.

[mr420247]

One thing to note i would wait until after the etr update pass and then decide

You will probably be forced into running in the Majister tree in most future content

because they will raise the dc bar guaranteed not if only when

So losing your ea heals will be a huge hit you can try and compensate and twist consecration but losing 2 twists isn't optimal for sub par healing

ES if your not going for shining through i wouldn't bother ts gets you spell crit multipliers which should boost your dps more if thats your thing

No completionist, no racial completionist, no wiz pl your going to be down on max cha by a lot in really hard content

I think you might have serious problems landing instakills you might be better off going max enchantment focus instead which will also help your dps

And spell pen do you have the 3 wiz pls if not i'd drop heighten for greater spell pen