[Build] Spirit Bears supporting IAS!
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Everyone that has played WD for long enough must have figured out that IAS is the last stat you stack for a WD due to mana constraints. Recently I decided to try and make IAS work for high MP farming. And to my surprise, after you have enough IAS, it actually starts to work for regular farm runs, but not ubers.
http://eu.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/witch-doctor#geUfdY!cfY!ZcccYY A step back in time to what old Vision Quest allowed us to do with some limitations
Main single target spell, replaces primary with 400% weapon damage. Auto-aiming and easy to use since patch 1.0.7. Very good vs targets that are hard to hit with bears or those that run away all the time.
One of the cornerstones for this build. 20 mana regen per target, this is what makes the build work.
Mandatory skill for any WD, rune is up to personal preference.
Bread and butter dps spell. This is where the ooompf comes from. With theoretical 706% damage per cast per target you can't argue against it. Cost reduction highly recommended.
Only active selfbuff for dps that we got. Always good to have, but not mandatory.
Good meat shield, can be any rune or can be dropped entirely for something else. Personally I like burning dogs because they proc a little LoH. Life Link is good too for that extra EHP.
Cornerstone skill. -15% mana cost on spells is HUGE. Impossible to get this build to work without the mana saving this skill provides. 1% life regen bonus is nice too.
Cornerstone skill yet again. This makes Haunt and Spirit Barrage work. Every time you cast a spirit spell you gain 5 mana regen for 10 seconds. This stacks and adds up very quick.
Serves mainly as a dps buff. Extra mana from globes is very nice, but it's not required. Can be dropped in favor of anything except for Pierce the Veil. Why does this work? Key here is Haunt and the regen it provides. Alone Haunt is not that impressive. 98 mana in exchange for 122 mana over 6 seconds or 20.4 MpS (mana per second) is not that great and doesn't really deserve a spot on the skill bar. However with Blood Ritual and Rush of Essence the numbers start to look better: 83 mana in exchange for 171 mana over 6 seconds or 25 MpS with additional 5 MpS for 4 seconds after haunt stops (RoE takes 10 seconds to tick). So how does this work again? Every mob hit by haunt gives you 25 MpS for 6 seconds. High attack speed is what makes this viable. With high attack speed you can quickly mark several mobs such as all elites in a pack very quick. After you haunt them your mana regen will spike from 90-104 MpS up to 200-300 MpS at least and it holds there for a good while. You can then proceed to use your massive regen to unleash a torrent of bears and sustain them for a while. Because your attack speed is so great you only take 1-3 seconds to tag some mobs with haunt, something that doesn't work with low attack speed. After your 3 second tagging you then have about 7 seconds of uninterrupted bear spam (mileage may vary depending on IAS and -cost on bears). This use of bears is nothing new, what are you selling here? Usually when you can't sustain bears your mana runs dry and you are forced to either wait or spam primary that does no damage while your mana recovers. With this build you can recast haunt as soon as you see your mana start running low and then you are back to full dps again. You don't rely on globes to feed you should the pack not die. Because of attack speed it's quick to recast and this is what makes it work. Tactics As you walk spam a few haunts before you unleash bears. Usually not a problem for trash unless you are carrying people. On elite packs mark everything then proceed to nuke with bears. When you start running dry just haunt again and keep on nuking. 1-3 seconds to cast 4-7 haunts doesn't really feel like a chore and is easily managed. You don't loose out on dps and it works great in a party. Anything that attempts to run or is not at optimal for bears gets hosed down with some WoS. WoS works great for teleporters, wallers, goblins, little tiny jumping annoying things, wasps in A2 and everything else you don't wanna get close to with bears. WoS also has huge range so if you find the floor is green and burning and freezing and there is lightsaber disco all over the place just retreat to a safer distance and let them have it. WoS can be powered forever with this build as long as you have 90+ regen (up to 2.4 aps, higher if you factor in haunt). Well of Souls and Rush of Essence mana stats Attack SpeedZombie Bears Mana cost Attack SpeedOther Skill Choises This build leaves 2 active skills and 1 passive open, those extra skills don't affect the functionality of this build. Here are some other good choices if you don't know them already.
Nice crowd control for when things get too hairy. Boosts armor by 100% for 8 seconds which improves tanking.
Crowd control that makes mobs take 20% more damage for 12 seconds.
Big AoE with good on-hit procs. Can be powered by haunt.
This build doesn't really require Rain Dance rune if you can manage your haunting properly so the only clear path is to go for more damage.
Some say that he once landed a critical hit on Siege Breaker and killed his master. Others have seen him stand on top of an arcane turret drinking tea for 10 minutes and then walking over to the next one. All we know is that he's referred to as "Garry".
When you just need to have that extra 15% EHP.
When you are made of glass and like to take hits.
Bears is poison damage, not ideal but can work.
This extra regen might give you what you need to make this build work if you are missing some pieces.
Needs pickup radius, Gruesome Feast does a better job with mana.
Edited by Enduros#2121 on 07/03/2013 15:13 GMT
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Great guide, good work !
The build is also great for ubers, I´ve been running with this http://eu.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/witch-doctor#gfUieQ!acf!ZcZZcb Ghom&Rakanoth: Position yourself against an upper pillar so that your bears will hit both targets, start by spamming haunt, after a while put down voodoo and start spamming bears and keep casting haunt in between to keep up manaregen from RoE and gaining 40 mana per sec from haunt, honored guest will replenish your mana giving you endless bears. An easy fight. King&Bit^^ Like above, except with spirits and keeping haunt up. When bit^^ goes to corner it´s a lot better to spam spirits than bears. Kullervo&beast: Bears are bad vs kullervo so it´s better to spam spirits and keep him on hex and unleash bears when your in a good position. Vs beast bears are a suicide. |
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I'd like to add that spirit walk procs rush of essence and using it with honored guest and spirit vessel lets you use it as your mana battery more often (and gaining slightly more mana).
Not for everyone but it gives a drunk player like me much more room for error whilst still working within this build. Well of souls is pretty awesome nowadays. Bears and WoS covers most eventualities and WoS is helping me a lot vs Gobs. |
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good read will test it out tomorrow :)
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I'd like to add that spirit walk procs rush of essence and using it with honored guest and spirit vessel lets you use it as your mana battery more often (and gaining slightly more mana). I'm well aware of honored guest, but I myself prefer heal because I mainly use it as a defensive spell. Should I add a section to explain the use of honored guest? |
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Nice guide!
Was hoping for a spreadsheet with the sweetspots of APS levels with RoE though. Guess I'll have to do the math myself. |
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Nice guide! Yeah this is a good idea, added some tables for bears too. Really shows how effective haunt is with 25 extra regen. For me the sweet spot with bears looks to be at 1.8 - 2.2 depending how much -cost you have. For WoS it seems that there's no limit if you include haunt. |
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Your build seems weak in high MP for large groups of white monsters. You can try to spam Haunt, but how many can you get off before they are on top of you? Then it's bears,bears, bears to keep them off of you.
While your build seems optimized for elites and ubers, it doesn't seem capable of handling large, high damage trash mobs on high MP efficiently. If I were going to use this build on high MP (8+) I would substitute Locust Swarm/Devouring Swarm (37 mana for each infected monster) for Haunt, as this will boost your mana for bears against mobs. You already have WoS for creating mana from elites and ubers. Plus on high MP, mobs mixed with elites are more common. WIth Locust Swarm you just have to throw it once to infect a whole group of monsters, as soon as it goes to work, you release your bears, and you get a very nice mana return, and should be able to bear down most mobs this way. I might also suggest the mana rune instead of the life regen on SW, but this will depend on your character and your other support skills. Anyway, food for thought.
Edited by skywalkerfx#1247 on 21/02/2013 16:13 GMT
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Nice guide enduros...food for thought, will test this out and see how it goes!
Good job, well put together. |
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Your build seems weak in high MP for large groups of white monsters. You can try to spam Haunt, but how many can you get off before they are on top of you? Then it's bears,bears, bears to keep them off of you. White mobs are never a problem though. In 2 seconds you can get off 4-5 haunts, white mobs take like 1-5 casts so they really aren't a problem. The build assumes you have mana regen on your gear and that alone should be enough to deal with white mobs. |
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Thank you very much for the spreadsheet.
Another thing worth mentioning is that WoS have very high proc coefficient, (33% per spirit!), which makes it work extremely well with LoH. |
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Ok. But for anyone that needs some burst mana in high MP, you can't beat locust swarm. I don't have a lot of mana in my build, so I need to use skills that are efficient, that way I can run PtV in high MP. |
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I only mentioned the spirit vessel / spirit walk / hounoured guest mana battery combo as it would help if you mess up with your haunt rotation. Better players than me wouldn't need it tho. I find I spammed bears for too long, haunt RoE has finished and now i'm oom. Every 13 seconds you're invulnerable and gaining enough mana to reset your rotation if you messed up.
I guess you can consider it as training mode. It just synergises so well in this setup. |
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I only mentioned the spirit vessel / spirit walk / hounoured guest mana battery combo as it would help if you mess up with your haunt rotation. Better players than me wouldn't need it tho. I find I spammed bears for too long, haunt RoE has finished and now i'm oom. Every 13 seconds you're invulnerable and gaining enough mana to reset your rotation if you messed up. The SW rune is meant to be open choice, must have forgotten it. But yea, this build relies on 3 skills and 2 passives, rest you can mix and match however you may want. Oh and btw haunt is much better for breaking rocks and doors then WoS. |
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Your build seems weak in high MP for large groups of white monsters. You can try to spam Haunt, but how many can you get off before they are on top of you? Then it's bears,bears, bears to keep them off of you. I´ve been doing a lot of mp10 4 players uber carrying with haunt,wos,bears and never had any problems when screen is full of white mobs and I´m alone standing in the middle of ´em. How is that a bad thing? You can keep casting haunt in between the bears. The more the better. |
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hi there, i had a go at this earlier (was playing around with SB (WoS) anyway) and heres my sweet spot...
http://eu.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/witch-doctor#gRdfUe!Tbf!ZaccZc There are a few differences to your original build - but works for me. On MP5 farming i dont need to use the haunt function all the time, i can just spam acid cloud for trash mobs and SB for the single target/stragglers honoured guest helps keep the mana in check here between mobs. When elites rock up then i cast haunt and SW when necessary. With this i can actually spam bears and Acid Cloud at the same time. Only downside to this build ive found so far is the lack of a pet. |
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Good work!
I was toying last week with RoE/Haunt to power up bears, but you pushed that a lot more than me, great guide. Kudos to you sir. |
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Love. The. Build.
Great job Enduros! PS. This is sticky material. Maybe Fean can add it? |
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nice build. Looks like a lot of fun :)
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Nice build :)
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