Tesladin Questions

Which base would you prefer for Hand of Justice for a (HoJ/Dragon/Dual Dream) build?

mythicalpegasus wrote: 4 years ago

Which base would you prefer for Hand of Justice for a (HoJ/Dragon/Dual Dream) build?

1. + Holy Shock on your Caduceus is of no use as it is applied to your skills rather than your Dream ones. + Resist Lightning also does not work as synergies take into account only base skill points (the ones you actually spend into skill by pressing a + button). The best Caduceus would probably be + Zeal + Holy Shield + Smite.
2. Attack speed rules. You want to apply those tons of elemental damage as often as possible, and having the most important slots dedicated to the build you are quite limited in how you can stack attack speed. For the Phase Blade as one of the fastest weapon bases in the game you need only Highlord's Wrath and Laying of Hands to reach 24 frames per 5 Zeal hits cap. The Caduceus has 29 frames per 5 hits even if you wear Highlord, Goldwrap and stupid Sigon's Gage + Sigon's Sabot (30% IAS for Sigon's Complete Steel 2-set). So, to reach the 24/5 cap with the Caduceus you have to pick either Infinity for Act 2 merc and cap Fanaticism, or pick Faith for Act 1 merc and cap Conviction. Both options are pretty pricey. Though Infinity is supernice for many other builds and always can be a valuable asset to have if you can afford that. But Paladin's capped Conviction may be more useful in some situations.
3. Our Scourge HoJ repair costed like 500k+ Gold each time as Zeal (and Werebear) is not quite healthy for a weapon. I guess that Caduceus is going to cost waaaay more than a Scourge. Even if Gold is of no concern at all, the need to repair often is just frustrating.
4. The Caduceus has more physical damage (159-184 for top 330% ED roll) than the superior Phase Blade (137-155 for 344% ED). If you manage to reach the 24/5 cap with the Caduceus, you will have about 20% more physical damage. It would be still not very impressive even in comparison with fire DPS and we are not even speaking about lightning, but it does affect life/mana leech.
5. Caduceus gives massive boost to style points.

All things considered I would pick the Phase Blade.

P.S. You should accept that aura damage depends only on how many aura runeword items you wear and whether all synergies are capped. There is nothing you can do more, so weapon base does not affect it in any way.
P.S.2. Apparently + Holy Shield can't proc on scepters, so it may be better to think about + Conviction/ Fanaticism instead.

zebrilo wrote: 4 years ago

mythicalpegasus wrote: 4 years ago

Which base would you prefer for Hand of Justice for a (HoJ/Dragon/Dual Dream) build?

1. + Holy Shock on your Caduceus is of no use as it is applied to your skills rather than your Dream ones. + Resist Lightning also does not work as synergies take into account only base skill points (the ones you actually spend into skill by pressing a + button). The best Caduceus would probably be + Zeal + Holy Shield + Smite.
2. Attack speed rules. You want to apply those tons of elemental damage as often as possible, and having the most important slots dedicated to the build you are quite limited in how you can stack attack speed. For the Phase Blade as one of the fastest weapon bases in the game you need only Highlord's Wrath and Laying of Hands to reach 24 frames per 5 Zeal hits cap. The Caduceus has 29 frames per 5 hits even if you wear Highlord, Goldwrap and stupid Sigon's Gage + Sigon's Sabot (30% IAS for Sigon's Complete Steel 2-set). So, to reach the 24/5 cap with the Caduceus you have to pick either Infinity for Act 2 merc and cap Fanaticism, or pick Faith for Act 1 merc and cap Conviction. Both options are pretty pricey. Though Infinity is supernice for many other builds and always can be a valuable asset to have if you can afford that. But Paladin's capped Conviction may be more useful in some situations.
3. Our Scourge HoJ repair costed like 500k+ Gold each time as Zeal (and Werebear) is not quite healthy for a weapon. I guess that Caduceus is going to cost waaaay more than a Scourge. Even if Gold is of no concern at all, the need to repair often is just frustrating.
4. The Caduceus has more physical damage (159-184 for top 330% ED roll) than the superior Phase Blade (137-155 for 344% ED). If you manage to reach the 24/5 cap with the Caduceus, you will have about 20% more physical damage. It would be still not very impressive even in comparison with fire DPS and we are not even speaking about lightning, but it does affect life/mana leech.
5. Caduceus gives massive boost to style points.

All things considered I would pick the Phase Blade.

P.S. You should accept that aura damage depends only on how many Dream items you wear and whether all synergies are capped. There is nothing you can do more, so weapon base does not affect it in any way.

Thanks so much for the detailed write up!

mythicalpegasus wrote: 4 years ago

Thanks so much for the detailed write up!

Thanks for appreciation.
Of course, feel free to pick the Caduceus if you do respect style, are not afraid of repairing it and don't care much about those boring numbers. It is still fun even if not minmaxed af and without any merc at all (HoJ + Dragon + 2x Dream + Conviction). Just don't regret it when you spend tons of Gold or a Ral to repair it