Melee Artificer Question

[Duscara]

My character is an Artificer who uses melee weapons and rune arms to attack.

Given how I've played her, she seems to use magic more for support rather than attacking.

Which of the three enhancement trees available to Artificers is best for that kind of build?

Other information that may or may not be relevant is that she is a Drow Elf, I don't plan to multiclass, and I plan to get Improved Construct Essence at Level 12.

[Discpsycho]

Battle Engineer. It's been a couple of years since I did a melee artificer life, but that was where most of my points went.

BE buffs your weapon damage, gives you a haste action boost, improves your runearm charge speed and increases its stable charge tier. If your goal is to melee, supplement with runearm blasts and use magic for support, there's not much else you need except CC, which kicks in at T5.

Before 12, I highly recommend picking up Mighty Slam and Battlefist from Renegade Mastermaker. I wouldn't pick up Reconstruct from RMM T4 unless you're really hurting for survivability - the Curative Admixture SLAs should carry you through heroics just fine

[Mercureal]

I play a ranged Artificer so take my comments with a grain of salt, but I know the Artificer trees fairly well. I agree with Discpsycho above, primary tree will be Battle Engineer, Renegade Mastermaker for more survivability and some special attacks, and a bit into Arcanotech where it seems useful.

Note that BE provides weapon bonuses, but they're narrow - you can get small bonuses to hit and damage, and +1 to critical range and multiplier, but only for Light Hammers, Warhammers, Morningstars, Bastard Swords or Dwarven Axes, and you need to be a level 20 Artificer to get the multiplier bonus.

[Discpsycho]

Note that BE provides weapon bonuses, but they're narrow - you can get small bonuses to hit and damage, and +1 to critical range and multiplier, but only for Light Hammers, Warhammers, Morningstars, Bastard Swords or Dwarven Axes, and you need to be a level 20 Artificer to get the multiplier bonus.

This is a very important point, especially since melee artificers can feel a bit lackluster compared to other melee builds due to their inherent hybrid nature.

For my melee life I used Warhammers pretty exclusively; I got AOE damage from runearm shots and since this was pre-Strikethrough, I prefered SWF to glancing blows. I picked up the Knight's Training feat, which add +1 crit range to Warhammers, toyed with Nightforge Hammer (innate x4 crit multiplier!) but settled on Echo of Whelm and later Stormreach Guardian Hammer for the shockwave and comparable crit boost

[Zdevor]

My character is an Artificer who uses melee weapons and rune arms to attack.

Given how I've played her, she seems to use magic more for support rather than attacking.

Which of the three enhancement trees available to Artificers is best for that kind of build?

Other information that may or may not be relevant is that she is a Drow Elf, I don't plan to multiclass, and I plan to get Improved Construct Essence at Level 12.

Hi there!

Here U can find my Melee Arti build. Ive been playing the same build for 3 years now and still having fun with it!!!
Its a hybrid build, but fun to play and very good for party play. Can solo too r4-6 with it.
Hope U can get some ideas from it! Peace!

https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthrea...56#post6340556

[unbongwah]

I haven't played it in a long while but this build is what I used for my dwarf Arty.