Diablo® III

I aim at building a slightly tanky wizard based on SB, Critical Mass and... you get the idea. Many crit procs etc. But I was also thinking about having SB replenish some of the character's life while Diamond skin is indeed on cooldown.

Should I aim for Life on Hit items? SB does 3 hits so... does anyone have an idea of whether it would be best to amass LoH rather than Life Steal?

Or is it a bad idea altogether? Should I stick with Life Regen?

Thanks in advance.

Well im guessing your not on hell/inferno, where melee wizz is practically useless.

The lifesteal abilities and such to my experience are very weak, and when you have 2-3 mobs beating on you, you will hardly notice it at all, you health will only go one way..... down.

I think the main thing you should go for is -resist all, + intellect + vit

If you get enough resist all, you won't take as much damage.
I would also consider using a shield, and force armor, with a shield your armor goes up by allot thanks to energy armor.

Use prismatic armor only if you have so much resist that the mobs hits you for small amounts.

The main problem with melee wiz isnt getting enough damage in, its staying alive long enough to actually get some damage in, if you don't have that resist, you will die.... QUICKLY.

So once you have enough resist to stay up for a duration of a normal fight, start stacking the damage.

Spectral Blade wizards aren't useless in Hell at all. I enjoy mine very much and tend to die a lot less like this. I suppose the playstyle appeals to me.

Also Life Leech % is worthless, the penalties are huge. If anything aim for Life on Hit.

And get the Increased Range rune for SB, it's absolutely a winner in my opinion, as even if you're a tanky wizard, you simply dont have the Life Regeneration as Barbarians or Monks have through abilities. You want a good hit and run strategy with something to dump Arcane Power on.

Here is a good list of Life on Hit with Wizard abilities.

http://www.diablofans.com/topic/44969-life-on-hit-for-wizards-courtesy-of-dekkar/

Remember, these values are NOT set in stone, it's rough estimates.

Well, hell might be ok, I don't even remember, its been a while.

But as for inferno, tanking is NOT, and i must really underline _NOT_ a viable option.
UNLESS you get enough resistance, trust me.

When I started in act 1, i had good dps and health, and i got through it quite easily, but if i got hit, i died. When i entered act 2 i got so owned that i figured I was doing something wrong gear wise, so i sacrificed health and dps for +resist all, and it did wonders,
Now i can equip a 2h, and tank act 1 inferno, with no problems at all, i can tank elite packs, i can tank the skeleton king, and the only difference in my gear, atleast the big difference is the +resist all.

I would love to have a melee wizard, which is kind of what im gearing up to, but as it stands now, to get the items to be able to be a viable melee wizzard, i need to farm using kiting, because if i go into act 2-3 with the same resistance as I can tank act1 with, i will get 2 shotted instantly. So the big tip is here, stack defense! resist all and armor, that should be your main objective, the life steal and stuff are reduced in inferno as well, by as much as 80% I've heard somewhere, so that is a dead end.

Excuse me???

http://us.battle.net/d3/en/forum/topic/5235709415

this build. I started playing it. It's 100 times more fun than your "traditional" wizard builds.

perfectly viable, great for tanking AND kiting. but it's extremely gear-dependent :)

Excuse me???

http://us.battle.net/d3/en/forum/topic/5235709415

this build. I started playing it. It's 100 times more fun than your "traditional" wizard builds.

perfectly viable, great for tanking AND kiting. but it's extremely gear-dependent :)

That's silly. With great gear many builds become viable. We're talking run of the mill players here, not people with multi-million dollar pieces of armour.

Most Wizards I've seen in game have either similar stats or worse stats than me and I cannot pull off your build.

Not to mention fun is very subjective. I happen to quite enjoy having my Hydra and Blizzard kill off mobs for me thank you very much.

Spectral Blade wizards aren't useless in Hell at all. I enjoy mine very much and tend to die a lot less like this. I suppose the playstyle appeals to me.

Also Life Leech % is worthless, the penalties are huge. If anything aim for Life on Hit.

And get the Increased Range rune for SB, it's absolutely a winner in my opinion, as even if you're a tanky wizard, you simply dont have the Life Regeneration as Barbarians or Monks have through abilities. You want a good hit and run strategy with something to dump Arcane Power on.

Here is a good list of Life on Hit with Wizard abilities.

http://www.diablofans.com/topic/44969-life-on-hit-for-wizards-courtesy-of-dekkar/

Remember, these values are NOT set in stone, it's rough estimates.

Excellent! Thank you very much!

Excuse me???

http://us.battle.net/d3/en/forum/topic/5235709415

this build. I started playing it. It's 100 times more fun than your "traditional" wizard builds.

perfectly viable, great for tanking AND kiting. but it's extremely gear-dependent :)

Saw the topic, and it is very close to what I have experienced. I hadn't prioritized defenses so much... until now.

SB helps Critical Mass proc a lot, especially Deep Cuts, although I prefer the 20yards rune myself.

And yes, the build is quite fun to play with, hacking along with melee characters :D Act IV Hell is OK, Inferno is quite tough since I just started upgrading my stuff.

it is in fact easier to succeed as a tank build in inferno than a glass cannon build.

If you get some life on hit it does really help sustain you.

You do not need a ton. When I had 1200 total I felt nearly invincible and was seeing +4000 +5000 heals popping up from wicked wind. Spectral blade is pretty decent too.

as long as you have semi ok resists you can do a ton with a melee wizard as long as you have around 25% crit or higher.

I am doing act 3 with like 24k dps and 30% ish crit and 600 ish resists. And I use that to tank elite packs.

it is in fact easier to succeed as a tank build in inferno than a glass cannon build.

If you get some life on hit it does really help sustain you.

You do not need a ton. When I had 1200 total I felt nearly invincible and was seeing +4000 +5000 heals popping up from wicked wind. Spectral blade is pretty decent too.

as long as you have semi ok resists you can do a ton with a melee wizard as long as you have around 25% crit or higher.

I am doing act 3 with like 24k dps and 30% ish crit and 600 ish resists. And I use that to tank elite packs.

You realize this thread is 2 months old and no longer relevant, right?