Most Useful Reaper 10 and Raiding Wizard

[Tilomere]

heyyyyyyyyyy just nailed a reaper stat pansophic circlet!

Much congratulations! Jackpot!

[SynalonEtuul]

heyyyyyyyyyy just nailed a reaper stat pansophic circlet!

Hehe, very nice!

[zappy]

crazy variation on the build...

what happens when you just want to DC cast and be very very defensive about it? take 9 toughness feats and fit 3 LGS pieces

now, this is not a well rounded build, this is setup for DC casting extreme difficulty raids like r10 killing time.

what feats do you NEED to be good at DC casting?

heighten, quicken, enlarge, a spell focus necro magistar, embolden, scion of shadowfell and i like a insightful reflex to keep the ref save high. so, what if you took the rest of the feats as toughness or epic toughness? keep deific warding at 29 as well. drop one tougness at 26 for mass frog if ya want.

now, if you fully drop damage and the need for any negative spellpower, you open the pale master tree right on up, forget the SLA's, forget the neg spell crit, get the HP and PRR and just go zombie only. 31 points to EK for 2 second deflect and all the int you can muster in the rest of the tree's. morninglord for arcanum as spell pen is an issue for some raids.

now to setup a gear list to max prr/mrr/hp/spellDC

take fade into the weave from magistar, this is an improved invisibilty effect,

twist 4/3/3/1/1

martial hymn
meld
piercing spellcraft from EA
endless faith (or an INT if you end odd)
draconic presence for 3 dc to PK

hat: arcsteel brim for all the mrr you could want.
neck: int22 artifact for spell DC
trinket: spell absorb swap spot, slave lord trinket for saves/intimidate/quality int to snag doom reapers on r10 if needed.
cloak:greensteel opp, fire resist
belt:greensteel opp, uncon range
ring1: shattered onyx with insightful int.
gloves:skin tight for dreadkeeper set
boots:greensteel opp. electric resist
ring2: celestial sapphire with +21 con
bracers:necromancers bracers
armor: med armor, blackmail
goggles: collective sight with 21 wis/insightful con 10

mainhand weapon: nightmothers
offhand: the lunar eclipse

this nets me 4300 HP with 350 prr 300 mrr in reaper. as well as a 130 necro DC that can be boosted to 141. this thing will survive a reaper 10 vengeance circle, and, does not need all the swapping and stance swaps that the other version of the build gets.

HOWEVER! big downside is 0 damage output for rednames, so, very party dependent.

[Marcb81]

crazy variation on the build...

what happens when you just want to DC cast and be very very defensive about it? take 9 toughness feats and fit 3 LGS pieces

now, this is not a well rounded build, this is setup for DC casting extreme difficulty raids like r10 killing time.

what feats do you NEED to be good at DC casting?

heighten, quicken, enlarge, a spell focus necro magistar, embolden, scion of shadowfell and i like a insightful reflex to keep the ref save high. so, what if you took the rest of the feats as toughness or epic toughness? keep deific warding at 29 as well. drop one tougness at 26 for mass frog if ya want.

now, if you fully drop damage and the need for any negative spellpower, you open the pale master tree right on up, forget the SLA's, forget the neg spell crit, get the HP and PRR and just go zombie only. 31 points to EK for 2 second deflect and all the int you can muster in the rest of the tree's. morninglord for arcanum as spell pen is an issue for some raids.

now to setup a gear list to max prr/mrr/hp/spellDC

take fade into the weave from magistar, this is an improved invisibilty effect,

twist 4/3/3/1/1

martial hymn
meld
piercing spellcraft from EA
endless faith (or an INT if you end odd)
draconic presence for 3 dc to PK

hat: arcsteel brim for all the mrr you could want.
neck: int22 artifact for spell DC
trinket: spell absorb swap spot, slave lord trinket for saves/intimidate/quality int to snag doom reapers on r10 if needed.
cloak:greensteel opp, fire resist
belt:greensteel opp, uncon range
ring1: shattered onyx with insightful int.
gloves:skin tight for dreadkeeper set
boots:greensteel opp. electric resist
ring2: celestial sapphire with +21 con
bracers:necromancers bracers
armor: med armor, blackmail
goggles: collective sight with 21 wis/insightful con 10

mainhand weapon: nightmothers
offhand: the lunar eclipse

this nets me 4300 HP with 350 prr 300 mrr in reaper. as well as a 130 necro DC that can be boosted to 141. this thing will survive a reaper 10 vengeance circle, and, does not need all the swapping and stance swaps that the other version of the build gets.

HOWEVER! big downside is 0 damage output for rednames, so, very party dependent.

Have you ever tried an AC version of this build? Not sure if Combat Mastery works the way I think it does, but if it gives 10% AC bonus while letting you cast necro SLAs without the cooldown penalty and doesn't effect the aura's you would cast before turning on the Defensive stance, then you could swap for this feat instead of shield mastery and use Leg. Giant's Platter instead of Mirror Plate (for NA bonus). I think this plus max martial AC epic PLs and some filigrees (Grandfather 5% and 10 NA from beast Mantle and as much Con as you can get) and running in US would let you hit 300 AC in addition to all your PRR and HP. Per wiki the 10% bonus from Combat expertise stacks with 10% mage armor and can be used with EDF for the 25% HP bonus at the same time.

[zappy]

Have you ever tried an AC version of this build? Not sure if Combat Mastery works the way I think it does, but if it gives 10% AC bonus while letting you cast necro SLAs without the cooldown penalty and doesn't effect the aura's you would cast before turning on the Defensive stance, then you could swap for this feat instead of shield mastery and use Leg. Giant's Platter instead of Mirror Plate (for NA bonus). I think this plus max martial AC epic PLs and some filigrees (Grandfather 5% and 10 NA from beast Mantle and as much Con as you can get) and running in US would let you hit 300 AC in addition to all your PRR and HP. Per wiki the 10% bonus from Combat expertise stacks with 10% mage armor and can be used with EDF for the 25% HP bonus at the same time.

This is a little off topic for a build as such, but lets talk about AC and how useful it is for reaper 10.

this build has clearly been reaper 10 capable and building for anything less at this point is much below my capabilities.

first lets bring up the times that you get hit, even if you had 1000 AC.

Champs. champs that have uncanny aim. This includes souless t3, light bearer t3 and randomly mark of chaos any tier.

whenever a monster hits anyway due to a diminishing return AC setup, gone are the days of the d20 AC system.

so. our build needs to be able to survive those things on reaper 10. as it sits right now, it does that job with no problems, however sacking 3x spell cooldowns for CE is simply not acceptable to a wizard of any kind. maybe if all you did was tank, but this build clearly states that you are a DC caster first, and tank second.

now lets talk about 300 AC and if it is useful on reaper 10 at all in the first place.



so in a modern day reaper 10 quest like Sharn Welcome, the general trash monsters have a CR of ~57 so around 142 on the chart. so. you still get hit 25-27% of the time with 300 AC.

getting hit 1/4 of the time still means you need to build to be hit. and on r10 you get hit really really hard.


now. lets say you are running a hard raid and tanking. yeah, some AC is going to help, but your aura is healing you for all of your HP every 2 seconds. is it really that big of a deal if you get hit? nah not at all.

now. lets say you have a reaper 10 raid tank with 550 AC. in reaper 10 Killing Time. a raid that as of the time of this writing, has not been beat yet. With 63 CR, you are getting hit around 15-16% of the time. but those hits that do it, they hit for 3-4k each, and can doublestrike and crit for even more, not to mention the breath attacks and chaos orbs and blue circles, and trash. so yeah you want you reaper 10 RAID tanks to have good AC as well as everything else, but sadly to say, this build is not tanking Reaper 10 raids at this time. i can always dream though.


as an alternative, it may be better to build for other damage mitigation, such as concealment, that wizards already get displacement and can cast clouds for, and dodge, which relies on meld or other clicks such as hoods of unrest, but getting base dodge to 25% would be great if it was possible.

[Marcb81]

This is a little off topic for a build as such, but lets talk about AC and how useful it is for reaper 10.

this build has clearly been reaper 10 capable and building for anything less at this point is much below my capabilities.

first lets bring up the times that you get hit, even if you had 1000 AC.

Champs. champs that have uncanny aim. This includes souless t3, light bearer t3 and randomly mark of chaos any tier.

whenever a monster hits anyway due to a diminishing return AC setup, gone are the days of the d20 AC system.

so. our build needs to be able to survive those things on reaper 10. as it sits right now, it does that job with no problems, however sacking 3x spell cooldowns for CE is simply not acceptable to a wizard of any kind. maybe if all you did was tank, but this build clearly states that you are a DC caster first, and tank second.

now lets talk about 300 AC and if it is useful on reaper 10 at all in the first place.



so in a modern day reaper 10 quest like Sharn Welcome, the general trash monsters have a CR of ~57 so around 142 on the chart. so. you still get hit 25-27% of the time with 300 AC.

getting hit 1/4 of the time still means you need to build to be hit. and on r10 you get hit really really hard.


now. lets say you are running a hard raid and tanking. yeah, some AC is going to help, but your aura is healing you for all of your HP every 2 seconds. is it really that big of a deal if you get hit? nah not at all.

now. lets say you have a reaper 10 raid tank with 550 AC. in reaper 10 Killing Time. a raid that as of the time of this writing, has not been beat yet. With 63 CR, you are getting hit around 15-16% of the time. but those hits that do it, they hit for 3-4k each, and can doublestrike and crit for even more, not to mention the breath attacks and chaos orbs and blue circles, and trash. so yeah you want you reaper 10 RAID tanks to have good AC as well as everything else, but sadly to say, this build is not tanking Reaper 10 raids at this time. i can always dream though.


as an alternative, it may be better to build for other damage mitigation, such as concealment, that wizards already get displacement and can cast clouds for, and dodge, which relies on meld or other clicks such as hoods of unrest, but getting base dodge to 25% would be great if it was possible.

Zappy,

Thank you so much for your quick reply. You're probably right about everything, but I can't help but think that I didn't explain myself very well.

You mention that getting base dodge 25% would be great if possible because it would reduce your chance of getting hit by 25%. Going from an AC of 150 to an AC of 300 changes your chance of getting hit from 50% to 25%, meaning you get hit 25% less of the time. I'm having a hard time understanding why Dodge 25% is so much better than 25% decrease in getting hit based on improved AC. Would you mind clarifying for me?

When I mentioned previously about combat expertise, I was under the assumption that Dodge 25% couldn't be obtained but doubling your AC from 150 to 300 might be, and that this might be worth pursuing since it also results in 25% decrease in getting hit. I know that Combat expertise is not something that you would want to toggle on always, but I was under the assumption that you don't run around with EDF toggled on all the time either. You only use it when you need to tank. This was the use I was thinking about when talking about combat expertise. In general, a wizard wants neither touch range spells nor 3x increased cool-downs (not including SLAs), but the tanking advantages give you something to think about. Maybe if you shared more about when during quests you use EDF, I might better understand why combat expertise is terrible but EDF is great. Lastly, Combat expertise opens up T2 Improved Combat for twisting, which gives another 20 PRR when running in US (obviously no room to twist this while in Magister).

Finally, I just want to be clear that I think your build is fantastic. I hope my AC question wasn't insulting. You had posted an HP intensive variant of your build, which made me think about other defensive variants such as AC. It was more just to discuss, and I can't help but feel that I insulted you somehow with my previous post, though I didn't intend to. I am heavily considering changing my current build to something like this (I have nowhere near your past-lives, raid items, and reaper points), and I want to try to understand the build fully before I make the decision. Obviously, your build handles R10, so it doesn't need to be any better than it already is, but I still find it instructive to try to understand why you made the choices that you did.

Sincerely,
Marc

[Tilomere]

This is a little off topic for a build as such, but lets talk about AC and how useless it is for anything.

AC is pointless for anything other than a min/max AC tank. FTFY.

Modern raid red names have almost 500 to hit. Modern dungeon red names and Dooms have near that. For tanking modern raids, AC < 255 is mathematically equal to 0, and AC < 300 is mathematically almost equal to 0.

doubling your AC from 150 to 300 might be

Doubling 0 (155 to 300) is still 0.

[zappy]

Zappy,

Thank you so much for your quick reply. You're probably right about everything, but I can't help but think that I didn't explain myself very well.

You mention that getting base dodge 25% would be great if possible because it would reduce your chance of getting hit by 25%. Going from an AC of 150 to an AC of 300 changes your chance of getting hit from 50% to 25%, meaning you get hit 25% less of the time. I'm having a hard time understanding why Dodge 25% is so much better than 25% decrease in getting hit based on improved AC. Would you mind clarifying for me?

When I mentioned previously about combat expertise, I was under the assumption that Dodge 25% couldn't be obtained but doubling your AC from 150 to 300 might be, and that this might be worth pursuing since it also results in 25% decrease in getting hit. I know that Combat expertise is not something that you would want to toggle on always, but I was under the assumption that you don't run around with EDF toggled on all the time either. You only use it when you need to tank. This was the use I was thinking about when talking about combat expertise. In general, a wizard wants neither touch range spells nor 3x increased cool-downs (not including SLAs), but the tanking advantages give you something to think about. Maybe if you shared more about when during quests you use EDF, I might better understand why combat expertise is terrible but EDF is great. Lastly, Combat expertise opens up T2 Improved Combat for twisting, which gives another 20 PRR when running in US (obviously no room to twist this while in Magister).

Finally, I just want to be clear that I think your build is fantastic. I hope my AC question wasn't insulting. You had posted an HP intensive variant of your build, which made me think about other defensive variants such as AC. It was more just to discuss, and I can't help but feel that I insulted you somehow with my previous post, though I didn't intend to. I am heavily considering changing my current build to something like this (I have nowhere near your past-lives, raid items, and reaper points), and I want to try to understand the build fully before I make the decision. Obviously, your build handles R10, so it doesn't need to be any better than it already is, but I still find it instructive to try to understand why you made the choices that you did.

Sincerely,
Marc

hey, didnt mean to make this come across as me being insulted, far from it. I appreciate the question. Truth of the matter is, 300 ac is not enough, and as a pure wizard even with swapping filigrees away from neg amp and into AC would not reach an acceptable level for tanking, and at the same time, give up negative spellpower and negative heal amp that does help the build survive

on the other hand, EDF does nothing to spell cooldowns, and the main spell im worried about is negative energy burst, the center on me big heal that will tag me for 5k healing in non reaper in case of an emergency, say mid straight breath with high stacks in r1 KT. Id rather have that on a 3.5 second cooldown than a 10.5 second cooldown if you get my drift.

this build self heals so well that almost 0 mitigation is required except for having enough HP to not get oneshot by anything.

as far as when i put EDF on, i go till the endboss or a sideboss without, then swap my gear and stance as we are setting up for the boss if i am the one tanking. for doom reapers, i usually just swap the hat to make sure i get enough intimidate and use meld, and most of my parties can kill a couple of doom reapers before meld runs out. while blocking sometimes i may activate EDF or swap a couple gear peices to opp LGS to get more HP if i feel it will be necessary.

good luck making the build, its a good one and heaps of fun when it gets all setup.

[Marcb81]

Thanks everyone (Tilo and Zappy) for the clarifications. It makes a lot more sense now why AC is so useless, and I hadn't considered negative energy burst for heals when thinking about combat expertise. I was so fixated on it not hurting the aura procs for heals. Everything makes perfect sense now.

Seems like a great build, and I'm glad you're still enjoying it. Please keep us all posted as you continue to develop it.

[Alrik_Fassbauer]

What I notice is that Pale Master seems to be the only viable form of wizard played by people.

It seems to me, once again proven by this thread, that all other forms of wizards are just ****. Why ? Because no-one seems to play anything else than Pale Master.

To put it cynically : This is a new form of undead ones ruling the city ...

[A-O]

What I notice is that Pale Master seems to be the only viable form of wizard played by people.

It seems to me, once again proven by this thread, that all other forms of wizards are just ****. Why ? Because no-one seems to play anything else than Pale Master.

To put it cynically : This is a new form of undead ones ruling the city ...

EK is perfectly fine too. It's just AM being trash-tier, so regardless if you're PM or EK, you've got points to spare in the other. So EK 41, leaves a bunch in PM, PM 41 leaves a bunch in EK.

That's the problem with only having 2 good trees. I'd say SSG should really prioritize number buffs to bad trees, so all classes have 3 trees to choose from, instead of 1 1/2. Won't happen though, since for some reason, number changes are never prioritized.

[Tilomere]

It's just AM being trash-tier ... I'd say SSG should really prioritize number buffs to bad trees, so all classes have 3 trees to choose from, instead of 1 1/2.

As difficulty increases, the game picks more and more of your build, stats, gear, enhancements, feats, spells, skills, and playstyle for you. You would end up exactly where we are now, where anything works on low difficulties, and your entire build is more or less picked for you on higher ones.

Take this build for example. As an MMO, only tanking, healing, and DPS are valuable as difficulties increase. In order to be valuable this build picked tank role to be valuable as an MMO character, even though a tank wizard is silly on the surface. That requirement to conform to MMO trinity and provide tanking makes almost all the build choices for this build.

The PM/EK dps is that MMO trinity dps role build. You can read Lich, with Axe for how all the choices on that build are more or less made for it.

That leaves Archmage as healer role. When looked at from this point of view, you realize the archmage tree is actually a fairly good tree. The spell points, universal spell power, crit, and multiplier from MoK/Empyrian off of Arcane blast/supremacy combined with free feats and metamagic cost reduction will power very powerful healing on an EA wizard twisting renewal, consecrate-sacred ground, and healing spring or cocoon, while still proving some mass hold and dust/ooze death aura support, and limited necro support. You can combo AM with EK for decent armor/shield defense. Unlike any other healer, between auras, reconstruct, and positive energy healing, you could heal anything in the game with ease. Dust + Ooze death auras + mass hold helpless will add tons of damage to a group.

It is just that you don't see that build put forward, because no one wants to play a heal support.

[A-O]

Take this build for example. As an MMO, only tanking, healing, and DPS are valuable as difficulties increase. In order to be valuable this build picked tank role to be valuable as an MMO character, even though a tank wizard is silly on the surface. That requirement to conform to MMO trinity and provide tanking makes almost all the build choices for this build.

I'd say that's a misunderstanding of how other "mmos do it". E.g. in WoW you can have a class with 2 (or more) viable DPS "specs" (See fire mages, arcane, ice, or fury/arms, etc.). Just because AM fails as a DPS tree, does not mean that if it didn't, EK would fail as a DPS tree.

E.g. you could (quite easily) have a meta where AMs work perfectly fine for a DPS (or dc) casting build - EK for a melee DPS build, and PM for a hybrid, or tanking, or healing, or CC/DC.

Further, since the bar is so ludicrously low in DDO, the only requirement to not fail as a tree is simply "don't suck". AM wouldn't have to be the best tree in the game to support the role (of a dps/dc caster), it simply would have to "not suck". Buff the SLAs, change master of knowledge a bit, and change the cores - bam, done.

[Chai]

I'd say that's a misunderstanding of how other "mmos do it". E.g. in WoW you can have a class with 2 (or more) viable DPS "specs" (See fire mages, arcane, ice, or fury/arms, etc.). Just because AM fails as a DPS tree, does not mean that if it didn't, EK would fail as a DPS tree.

E.g. you could (quite easily) have a meta where AMs work perfectly fine for a DPS (or dc) casting build - EK for a melee DPS build, and PM for a hybrid, or tanking, or healing, or CC/DC.

Further, since the bar is so ludicrously low in DDO, the only requirement to not fail as a tree is simply "don't suck". AM wouldn't have to be the best tree in the game to support the role (of a dps/dc caster), it simply would have to "not suck". Buff the SLAs, change master of knowledge a bit, and change the cores - bam, done.

This is lateral progression.

Usually when a conversation starts heading toward lateral progression, people begin to defend the status quo of switching the meta rather than adding to it.

While DDO has a high number of build possibilities, other games with less possible combinations actually have more viable endgame builds due to understanding how lateral progression works to add diversity to the game. Contrast that with DDO, where something new gets released and/or something old thing is buffed, and end-gamers TR into it due to the now predictable over-buff that occurs in these situations.

[deredriel]

Hello
i have few questions on your build and specially on the feats you take.
you take shield profenciency but you only use a shield when you tank, it's a tower shield if i remember.
Seem shield profenciency don't give tower shield profenciency. Don't see it in your list. Is it shield mastery? Don't read it in the description in the wiki but...
you take mental toughness, do you take it for a special goal or is it for the sp and 1% critical?
i will try the build soon to see how it's work
tc
valdo

[SynalonEtuul]

May I ask your tanking filigree setup, Zappy?

[noinfo]

People still playing DC wizards in 2020 unironically?

Only those who know what their doing

[zappy]

Hello
i have few questions on your build and specially on the feats you take.
you take shield profenciency but you only use a shield when you tank, it's a tower shield if i remember.
Seem shield profenciency don't give tower shield profenciency. Don't see it in your list. Is it shield mastery? Don't read it in the description in the wiki but...
you take mental toughness, do you take it for a special goal or is it for the sp and 1% critical?

great questions, shield proficiency is a prereq for shield mastery and the shield proficiency that you get from EK will not qualify for you it.
HOWEVER Tower shield does not have any negative aspects if you run it non proficient, and using masters touch will make you proficient anyway if you want to get rid of the exclamation mark in the top of your screen.

mental toughness is just for a few more spell points and spell crit. This could be swapped for maximize easily for faster leveling or doing damage in night revels or whatever other wizard feat you would like. This is just what i take.

May I ask your tanking filigree setup, Zappy?

tanking i use 2 fully different filigree and artifact setups depending on my situation.

for tanking high reaper my weapon is an epic bejeweled letter opener for the equipment bonus to heal amp to help the healers heal my undead rear end.
artifact has nystuls/electrocution mrr thread rare, snake bite/grandfathers shield +2 con and Purity/Touch of grace heal amp
letter opener has nystuls/electrocution mrr thread rare, snake bite/grandfathers shield +2 con and Purity/Touch of grace heal amp
, Nystuls MRR, CON and Radiant shield, Purity and Touch of GRace Heal amps.


for tanking r1 or hard raids, i keep the listed equipment out and equip filigrees for negative spellpower and negative healing.
artifact has nystuls/electrocution mrr thread rare, snake bite/grandfathers shield +2 con and Darkhallow Neg amp
Null has nystuls/electrocution mrr thread rare, snake bite/grandfathers shield +2 con and Darkhallow Neg amp
Nystuls MRR, CON, Wreath of flame, grandfathers shield CON, and Inevitable Grave Neg heal amp.


now with the new spark you can add another to filigree and i will post to main thread when i run the build next to update it for update 47

[zappy]

People still playing DC wizards in 2020 unironically?

lol bro. wizard is when you need a scalpel, sorc when you need an axe.

Wizard takes more thought to play the game, and some of us enjoy that. Good day to you, and I encourage you to come to Khyber to see how its done.

[SynalonEtuul]

tanking i use 2 fully different filigree and artifact setups depending on my situation.

for tanking high reaper my weapon is an epic bejeweled letter opener for the equipment bonus to heal amp to help the healers heal my undead rear end.
artifact has nystuls/electrocution mrr thread rare, snake bite/grandfathers shield +2 con and Purity/Touch of grace heal amp
letter opener has nystuls/electrocution mrr thread rare, snake bite/grandfathers shield +2 con and Purity/Touch of grace heal amp
, Nystuls MRR, CON and Radiant shield, Purity and Touch of GRace Heal amps.


for tanking r1 or hard raids, i keep the listed equipment out and equip filigrees for negative spellpower and negative healing.
artifact has nystuls/electrocution mrr thread rare, snake bite/grandfathers shield +2 con and Darkhallow Neg amp
Null has nystuls/electrocution mrr thread rare, snake bite/grandfathers shield +2 con and Darkhallow Neg amp
Nystuls MRR, CON, Wreath of flame, grandfathers shield CON, and Inevitable Grave Neg heal amp.


now with the new spark you can add another to filigree and i will post to main thread when i run the build next to update it for update 47

Thanks for your helpful response, this is great. I was thinking +2 con dual filigrees and get nystuls to 4 set, but didn't notice all the other duals. Thanks!

Now why oh why did I feed my epic bejeweled letter opener...

lol bro. wizard is when you need a scalpel, sorc when you need an axe.

Wizard takes more thought to play the game, and some of us enjoy that. Good day to you, and I encourage you to come to Khyber to see how its done.

Great response ^_^