What is written in brackets ( ) is usually sup-optimal to use, what is with a ‘?’ I consider that as supoptimal or hard/not useful to build around. Never means it cant happen though
In Part I is the character building template with all the availabilities of each class in regards to affixes.
At Part II we choose one class and I`ll go through the process of building the character from abstract idea to concrete gear to give a definite direction. The skills and passives can be fine-tuned at a later stage through the leveling process
On Part III you`ll find a summarized “how to use / build your items” guide, that may help navigate all the affixes on all the items a little after the theory building.
Part I - Character building
Acolyte
Int based
- Lich - 1% of damage leeched, increased dmg per % health missing
- melee, spell, (minion)
- leech, regen, ward
- protections/glancing, (dodge)
- DoT
- direct spell, necrotic, physical
- melee, necrotic, physical
- (minion dmg)
- Summoner - +1 Skeleton, +1 Skeleton Mage, 50% more minion dmg
- spell, summon, (melee)
- ward, regen, (leech)
- dodge, health, protections/glancing
- DoT
- direct spell, necrotic, physical, poison
- (melee, physical, necrotic)
- minion dmg
Mage
Int based
- Spellblade - ward on melee hit, mana spent on melee convert to ward
- melee, spell
- ward, regen, leech
- dodge, protections, health, glancing
- DoT
- melee, physical, elemental
- direct spell, elemental
- Sorceress - +50 to mana, + % dmg by amount of mana spent on spell use
- spell
- ward, regen, leech
- dodge, health/glancing/protections
- DoT, channelled abilities
- direct spell, elemental
Sentinel
Str, Att, (Dex) based
- Void - chance to double cast void skills, 50% more melee void dmg
- melee, spell, (throwing)
- leech, ward?
- protections/health/glancing
- melee, physical, void, throwing
- direct spell, void
- Forge armor - 30% more armor/fire res, 3% less Damage taken when hit (up to 30%)
- melee, throwing, (minion)
- leech, regen/ward?
- protections/health/glancing
- melee, physical, throwing, fire
- direct spell, fire, elemental
- Holy - increase physical and fire Damage per % life missing
- melee, spell, throwing
- regen, leech , (ward)
- dodge, health, protections, glancing
- Dot?
- melee, physical, fire
- direct spell, fire, Elemental, physical?
Primalist
Str, Att based
-
Beastmaster - +1 companion, + 50% melee and minion dmg
- melee, summon, (totem)
- leech, regen
- protections, glancing, health, dodge?
- DoT
- melee, physical
- minion dmg
-
Shaman - 10 att, - 5 totem mana cost, more elemental protection on active totem
- melee, spell, summon/totem
- regen (leech)
- dodge, protections, glancing, health
- DoT
- melee, physical, lightning/cold
- direct spell, lightning, physical, cold, elemental
- minion dmg
-
Druid - 20% mana/health, dmg reduction after shape
- melee, spell, semi-summon/totem
- leech/regen
- dodge, protections/health/glancing
- DoT
- melee, physical
- direct spell, cold, lightning, physical, elemental
- minion dmg
Stats outside of specifics to consider individually:
- mana efficiency / mana
- crit /melee crit/ spell crit
- block / block protect / block armor
- attack speed / cast Speed
Part II - Detailed Example
Choose what you want to be - ideally check out the skill trees and passives and see what skills you want to use in which combination.
Lets say I want to play the Acolyte. I`m interested in playing a summoner-caster-melee hybrid. So I study all the skills and passives, and conclude:
I want to use skeleton archers (minions), hungering souls (spell) and use Harvest (melee) to buff my minions (+%dmg and crit chance from skill tree). I use the node that turns harvest into necrotic so that it matches my spells damage which is also necrotic.
I check how I can assign passive points to best accomodate my build
Now I check the spread:
- Summoner - +1 Skeleton, +1 Skeleton Mage, 50% more minion dmg
- spell, summon, (melee)
- ward, regen, (leech)
- dodge, glancing
- DoT
- direct spell, necrotic, physical, poison
- (melee, physical, necrotic)
- minion dmg
Im caster, melee and have minions to block. I think dodge would be nice in addition with life reg per second for this playstyle.
I will use a necrotic spell and turn harvest into necrotic damage, so I choose necrotic as my offensive stat along with any kind of minion damage. I also choose crit chance+multiplier because it buffs my spell and my melee. I wont go for spell damage or melee damage, because they would only buff one of my offensive abilities, therefor I cant stack each one high enough. I search for the “lowest common denominator” always.
Intelligence buffs all my skills, so its nice to have in case
So I have my 5 Affixes I want to stack for my hybrid summoner: dodge, life reg, necrotic, crit, minion dmg
My defensive Body parts will be full of dodge and life reg, with the rest filled with protections, vitality, int, health etc.
I will use a 2h stave for melee damage and +% base spell modifier, put +melee necrotic and +crit chance as prefix on it and put +minion dmg on Suffix, and some defensive.
My Amulett, ring and relic will be full of necrotic damage, crit chance/Multi and minion damage, with the remaining suffixes filling my defensive gaps (void protection, +% health reg, dodge, elemental resist, etc.)
Now I`m well-rounded and know what Im Looking for ( see part III for gear-slot and Affix guide)
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The guide to gearing your character
There are prefixes and suffixes on every item.
Prefixes focus on most of the offensive stats like damage and crit, and has many strong defensive stats like glancing blow, increased dodge % and +x life regen per second. They also inhibit stats like intelligence, strentgh, vitality and attunement.
Suffixes mostly add to our defense, providing protections (elemental, void, Poison, necrotic) and stats that synergies with their prefixe counterparts, e.g. +x to dodge, +% life regen per second, +x to armor, +x to void / fire / cold protections etc.
Health, protections and armor are your basic defensive stats. They can roll on most items, and should therefor be put on items, where there is room left after choosing the other important stats. E.g. you can get protections on every item.
Armor and protections all work as an added health pool - so having 100 health and 33 cold protection, it will show you 33% protected. That is because every point of protection is equal to 1 health to that element. So in that case you`d have 133 effective health against cold damage. More exampels: 40 armor equal 40 health against physical damage, and 233 void protection equals 233 health against void damage. This is also why your % Icon will sometimes become lower when you equip an item with +x to health than it was before.
Then there is glancing blow and dodge chance. These are stats you want to choose to become effective at mitgigating damage. Glancing blow reduces Incoming hits by half their damage, and dodge evades the damage completly. Getting glancing blow to 100% is worthy the Investment, and you can reach 50-75% dodge chance. So choosing either makes sense - getting both is costly and not necassery for most builds imo
The surviving stats will be placed on helm, boots, belt, armor and gloves - because these slots dont roll offensive stats mostly. That is why we want to look out for stacking defenses on these slots.
We will use offensive stats which are mostly prefixes on rings, amulett, relic, offhand and weapon for all the other stats such as crit, extra damage (spell, light, physical, melee,…), minion damage etc. The suffixes can also provide defensive stats of every kind. This can be used to fine-tune our defense at the end, to e.g. buff our dodge or protections a bit more where needed. But it is not our focues
To get max glancing blow, you would stack it on your defensive body parts. They roll as prefixe. There are 2 different prefixes - glancing blow with health and with armor. You can roll them both seperately on one item to achieve higher glancing blow.
To get high dodge chance, you can get +% dodge chance as prefixe on defensive parts, and +x to dodge as suffix on most item parts.
To get life reg per second high, use the prefixe +x to reg per second on defensive parts. All items can have +% health reg per second as suffix, to up your life reg further. Get a few of these.
To get life leech, you will want to look out for hybrid leech stat. It can roll on rings, relic,… and uses a prefixe. Its worth getting, but remember that it costs you a prefixe on a valueable item slot. Consider that you can get leech through other means (skills, passive tree) and that survival can be mitgigated through life regen and ward as well, for instance. It all depends on your playstyle, and styles can be mixed.
Attack and cast speed you can get as prefixe on weapons, gloves, and amuletts if I´m not mistaken.
Block is also a way to mitigate damage (passive trees, skills and shield slot provide block stats). Since I always use 2 hander more or less on every char, I dont know about block. Sorry
You want to get crit chance as prefixe on weapons, rings, amuletts and relics. You get crit Multiplier on weapons, amuletts and relics. So save these slots
Any increased damage such as light, spell, necrotic, physical… also as prefixe on weapon, ring, Amulett, relic. This also Counts damage over time, although you can find these also e.g. at your belt as prefx!
Since slots are limited, and you want to stack stats - best choose 1-3 offensive and 1-3 defensive stats max each. For example I will use Lightning, spell and crit/spell crit as offensive and stack that, and use dodge and life reg as defensive stats mainly. Remember that protections are universal, and you need all of them to survive, so when you choose defensive stats, you choose other forms of dmg mitigation and survival (glancing blow vs dodge, life reg vs ward vs leech, etc.)
Remember that some item slots grant more of a stat.
1hweapons - 150% of stat bonus
2h weapons - 270% of stat bonus
Body armor - 170%
Amulett - 117% or something
So if you use the prefix “+% critical strike chance” on a 2hand weapon it receives a 270& bonus and gives up to 130% chance instead of the initial 50% on Tier 5.
Health regen would be up to 180% on a 2hand weapon at Tier 5, and 125% on a Body armor (170% increase) and 75% on every other piece of gear. So choose wisely what to put on your weapon Slot and your Body armor, since these will get you high values!
You can get important stats as base rolls affixes on items. E.g. “Gladiator helm” has 130 base armor
Most common examples:
- High Armor through good base rools on armor, helmet, boots, belt, gloves
- Minion damage on rings and Amulett (which can roll minion crit chance)
- Crit chance on amulett, crit Multi on relic
- rings: health, dodge, stun chance, +% elemental protection, movement speed, life
- shoes: armor, movement Speed
- Body: increased healing, armor, lightning resist
- helm: armor, mana, base spell damage, increased life regen per sec,
- relic: crit Multi, resist, +fire spell dmg
- Amulett: said minion dmg, crit chance, mana, base spell dmg, attack speed, cast speed, - throwing attack Speed, life