Riftsin - I might need a bit help from you

Hey mates!

Played D2 "back in those days" a lot, but had no idea about anything. Now I'm an oldfag and really got an endgame build running, woohoo! Now I want to get into a very fun build (at least what I expect from it): The Riftsin!

I collected some stuff for her and I think I'm ready to dive into this build. On the other hand, it is going to get quite expensive for a cheap-ass like me, so I want to be sure what I'm doing.

So this is what I'm thinking, having or trying to get: https://d2.maxroll.gg/d2planner/ay0106co

Let me explain what I'm trying to do:

I want to have "2 builds in one", namely a Riftsin for the funs and a Kicksin for Bosses/Ubers.
Yes, I have to swap things out, but for the sake of convenience I did both of them in this one skill planer.

Weapon swap 1 if Riftsin, 2 is Kicksin. (Also obvious items in the inventory for swap-out on bosses/ubers.)

So there are still some questions on my build. Let me go through the slots and what are my concerns:

1. Head - what to socket?

- Riftsin / Nightveil: I thought about a "Scintillating Jewel of Fervor" (15 IAS, 15 AllRes), but that's quite expensive. Is the IAS needed for this setup, or am I good just putting an

Um in it?
- Kicksin / GFace: Same here, but as I'm likely to use Chains of Honor, I guess a simple 15IAS would do the work?

2. Body armor?

I think I go with the

Kraken Shell base, just because it's AFAIK the strength-cheapest armor that has the nice red body skin. Yes, there might be strength-less bases, but hey, it's all about the looks!
So Enigma is often recommended. I get that, as it did totally enhance the gameplay of my WW barb. But I'm very concerned about my resistances on the Riftsin. It seems that whatever I do, I don't get max resistances (or I'm not seeing something?). So that's why I think I have to go for Chains of Honor? I'd like to have the option of an Enigma much later (I won't get runes for a second Enigma too soon, trust me ), so if you have ideas on about to get resistances for the Riftsin, I'm very curious!

- Riftsin: Chains of Honor with an option for Enigma, if resistances aren't too bad.
- Kicksin: Chains of Honor seems like a must-have here. Which isn't too bad, as it would benefit the Riftsin-part, too.

Or would you recommend another armor? I don't know it enhancing damage stuff against demons/undead would really make a difference for a Riftsin at all, so maybe other runewords come to mind?

3. Hands

- Riftsin:

Dracul's Grasp - I don't know about other options and how they behave with the kicks. I think

Dracul's Grasp is just a-ok, so I don't have another part to change. If there is a better option for a Riftsin, I'm curious.
- Kicksin:

Dracul's Grasp - guess it's mandatory for Uber stuff.

5.

Boots

- Riftsin:

Goblin Toe would be a very good choice I guess. On the other hand, on PvM stuff I will mostly clear with Rift (I guess?) so maybe I could go for full-upped

Gore Rider? Simply because Enigma is in question and with

Gore Rider I would get movement speed instead, but also have Crushing Blow. Opinions?
- Kicksin: I guess best option is a full-upped

Goblin Toe. I get Open Wounds from

Dracul's Grasp and

Goblin Toe just has the highest Crushing Blow.

6 Rings

- First:

Raven Frost I guess is mandatory. Gives me Cannot Be Frozen, also Attack Rating (which I most likely very lack). Well, you get the tune. Another option would be

Cham into head and get another ring, but I guess focussing on resistances is more important.
- Second: Honestly I have no idea. Currently my merch will have Insight, so I don't think to run into Mana problems (we don't have Mana leech right now).

Dwarf Star could be an option. Or simply a dual-leech ring - if it also has resitances, it would be baller, but I first have to get one. Opinions?

7. Amulet

I honestly can't decide. I have the following ideas:

-

Mara's Kaleidoscope if I go with Enigma. The latter gives me mobility, while the amulet at least a bit resistances that I don't die on eye contact. I don't get IAS on the other hand, which might be important to reach a breakpoint.
-

The Cat's Eye gives me everything but resistances. I guess this could be good with Chains of Honor, if I decide for that armor.
-

Highlord's Wrath would be my go-to option, if I only need Lightning resist and get the others from other sources. I won't get mobility though.

As you see, it comes down to a "choose 2 out of 3" and I can't really decide which I get my fingers on. Or my neck.

8. Weapons

- Riftsin: well, Rift, surprise.
- Kicksin:

Stormlash with

Shael, I think I don't do anything wrong by keeping it classic.

9. Shields

- Riftsin:

Head Hunter's Glory with 3x Cold Rainbow Facet. Oooooh my purse, that will hurt! But AFAIK this is the BiS, even it will take some time to get all of it. Until then I guess I go with a

Stormshield socketed with a

Perfect Diamond.
- Kicksin: the already mentioned

Stormshield; otherwise for Ubers I guess I will do a Sanctuary. I just think of maybe another base, just to distinguish it a bit more from the Riftsin setup.

There are not that many option for shields, but if i missed something, please tell me.

10. Mercenary

Well, I guess the endgame is quite easy to frame:

Infinity plus

Vampire Gaze plus Treachery in any base.
But until I got that all, I think I have to rely on a simple Insight.

11. There was no 4th point.

---

Ok, I guess you see, that I know where I want to go. But I'm really not too confident in assembling a real endgame build, as this is rather new for me and I might miss out what you oldfags very skilled players are already used to.

So before I finally invest in this build, please correct me on anything, share your opinion - and lastly just help me with my ideas.

Would like to hear your thoughts!

I made Riftsin and didn't level it past 80. didn't think it was as fun as the youtubes said. maybe i just didnt spend enough currency or play it right but i felt like i had to pick between dying all the time and killing marginally faster. killing speed was never fast without spamming traps everywhere though so i just tried to max defenses.

bottom line is all the gear cost it requires would make nearly any build viable, but the meta exists because those builds are fastest. a pure cold sorc would benefit from nightwings and would just crush her specific areas way faster, that's what i ended up doing.

i used:

Treachery

Stormshield (

Um)
nightwings (+20/-5)
ravenfrost

Carrion Wind
maras +25
thundergods

Vigor

Gore Rider +

Blood Gloves +ias +res +ma skills
(or

Hellmouth)
bunch of +res +fhr charms

end up with 75% res (with

Fade proc), 75% block, 50% PDR and absorb for all 3 elements

i thought the

Stormshield was necessary for survival

I never thought COH would be worthwile because Treachery does everything COH does but is cheaper - also adds all but 5 ias for the breakpoint i wanted - unless you want to level

Fade up too use BOS, or you cant be bothered to stand in a fire to get the initial proc

Enigma would be great but you'd have to use different gear entirely to get up to the 50% ias BP and max resistances

but if you want a Rift i got one to trade

Thanks for your input!

That sounds pretty sobering. But I guess I'll still want to try it.

Why did you go for

Fade? Well, ofc because surviveability. But isn't BoS necessary to get her attack fast enough?

That's why I guess Chains of Honor come into play, as it enables

Fade bonuses, but you still can use BoS.

How was your Mana, did you run into shortages or had to use potions often?

Thanks for the Rift offer, that's one of the few items I already got.

CoH in

Kraken Shell? made it myself in 15%ed base. Awesome jacket, lovin it ever since.

Here is my riftsin currently

https://d2.maxroll.gg/d2planner/oj0106vo

I don't have any problems killing stuff with this build, I can farm cows,

Baal etc... But its no where near as fast as my Blizzard/

Fireball sorceress.
I do depend on my

Death Sentry a bit to help with crowds but that's part of the fun, having to play differently.
I love life/mana leech cause I hate being potion dependent and the only time I use any is if I get smacked by something hard or mana burn.
With

Burst of Speed I hit my max kick speed so I don't need other IAS gear.

Also watching 3-5 frozen orbs and

Tornado's flying out of my feet is all good fun

Asha wrote: 2 years ago

CoH in

Kraken Shell? made it myself in 15%ed base. Awesome jacket, lovin it ever since.

Nice to hear

I actually have a normal

Kraken Shell for it right now, could buy a superior. I would get 110 more def with it - but I don't think that would make any difference?

StonerSmurf wrote: 2 years ago

Here is my riftsin currently

https://d2.maxroll.gg/d2planner/oj0106vo

I don't have any problems killing stuff with this build, I can farm cows,

Baal etc... But its no where near as fast as my Blizzard/

Fireball sorceress.
I do depend on my

Death Sentry a bit to help with crowds but that's part of the fun, having to play differently.
I love life/mana leech cause I hate being potion dependent and the only time I use any is if I get smacked by something hard or mana burn.
With

Burst of Speed I hit my max kick speed so I don't need other IAS gear.

Also watching 3-5 frozen orbs and

Tornado's flying out of my feet is all good fun

Thaaaanks for your input!

While this is nowhere near BiS gear, I love to hear that it still works well!
I also see that much stuff about it is aimed towards resistances, which is my concern, that I get max resist. But I see that it will work.

IAS: Yes, BoS is a nice spell, but I played around with an IAS calculator. If I'm not too stupid, with 0 IAS it would mean to have a veeery high BoS skill (it was something over level 20). With at least 10 IAS it is around the level 10 mark and with 15 IAS even only one point in the skill (with plus skills) would suffice.
Unfortunately, even a bad Scintillating Jewel of Fervor (+IAS, +AllRes) is quite expensive, so I'm still looking for an option to achieve this all.

Leech: I currently do have a dual-leech ring (3% Life, 5% Mana), which I hope will suffice. It doesn't have resistances, which would help me a lot though. I'd still consider

Dwarf Star or similar as an alternative, just because I still don't hit all max resistances. I fear I'd fall down if I don't play too safe.

Clear speed: ofc Blizzsorc will be faster. But I'm no hardcore basement player. I still play a game for the fun and IMHO the Sorc gameplay is no fun for me. I do have a WW barb, which is so much fun (and clear speed still is very nice) and I think a Riftsin is a perfect mix betwenn "Sorc and melee". So I rather clear a bit slower, but have my fun with it.

Nope, the most expensive part of this build is the

Gul rune used in Rift, my

Teleport

Circlet, and the

Arachnid Mesh which I got all from drops.
I always try to max my resistances on all my characters which isn't always necessary. Doing cows you don't really need resistances so I could
swap some gear around and probably get more damage.

As for the IAS, I guess I'm not hitting max after all. I double checked and I'm 6.25 @ level 7 BoS vs 6.5 @ level 21 BoS....
not really worth dumping all those points for that extra .25 attacks imo.

That 3/5 dual leech ring probably wont cut it in hell difficulty. I have 24/14 and still depend on my dracs to proc in some situations but
it definitely helps surviving till the

Life Tap kicks in.

Don't overlook investing points into your

Shadow Master, mine kicks total ass and I haven't even been using a merc cause of how well she performs.
I should probably run with a might merc just for the added kick damage but its not necessary for the build.

Anyways let us know how its going and if you find some better build combos

I think the riftsin build worked better before Blizzard killed it. Increased attack speed was uncapped when D2R launched, but blizzard detected fun happening so they put the attack speed cap back on. Before they killed it, one could crank the attack speed up higher than can be achieved now.

Looks like you already did some digging, can't go wrong with the gear you listed.
Yet it's hard to evaluate your equipment as a whole with no clue about your preference between

Burst of Speed and

Fade. Even if you plan on using both depending on the situation, you'll want to optimize your equipment around one.

A few toughts that came to mind while I was reading your post:

• The easiest way to increase your resistances is through charms, a good rare ring and/or Sanctuary.

• Goblin Toe has more crushing blow but
  Gore Rider has better base kick damage. Upped
  Gore Rider also conveniently has the same strength requirement as
  Stormshield.

• Dracul's Grasp is insanely good unless you are using a Last Wish PB.
  Life Tap does make you almost invulnerable while kicking.

• Mana Leech on a ring is nice to have but not mandatory, all it does is saving you some mana potions.

• You need around 10% IAS for the last kick breakpoint with BoS but you don't have much room for IAS on your riftsin setup. So
  Highlord's Wrath or rare IAS gloves seems mandatory unless you are willing to sacrifice a Cold Rainbow Facet for a 15% IAS jewel.

• The riftsin setup with
  Head Hunter's Glory feels squishy. Playing a melee build with high dex / low vit, low block and almost no DR is going to be challenging.

• Are you planning to use your secondary kicksin setup exclusively on bosses/ubers? You might be surprised by
  Stormlash's effectiveness in densely packed areas. With
  Static Field and
  Death Sentry, you can unleash the kind of unrestrained carnage only a poisonmancer/CE can match.

• Harlequin Crest is an excellent helm for kicksin against everything but ubers.

• Fortitude is never mentioned as an armor option. The +300% damage from Fortitude does work with kicks and roughly translates to an additional 250-450 physical damage.

• +% damage againt demons/undeads on the other hand doesn't work with kicks.

Have fun with the build, hope you'll enjoy it

Hey thanks for that big input!

While some points explain themselves and I take them in consideration, I have a few questions:

Zelym wrote: 2 years ago

Yet it's hard to evaluate your equipment as a whole with no clue about your preference between

Burst of Speed and

Fade. Even if you plan on using both depending on the situation, you'll want to optimize your equipment around one.

I guess BoS, as otherwise I'd need much more IAS on my gear, which then mean other drawbacks. At least that's what I'm thinking?
Also I do love the high run speed. I would only get more mobility with Enigma, which then means I'd lose much resistance and so on. Well ok... I guess the other option would be

Fade and Enigma?
TBH that didn't come to mind for me until now...
Do you have recommendations on how to then break the IAS breakpoints?

Zelym wrote: 2 years ago

• The easiest way to increase your resistances is through charms, a good rare ring and/or Sanctuary.

Sanctuary is on my weapon swap

Zelym wrote: 2 years ago

• Goblin Toe has more crushing blow but
  Gore Rider has better base kick damage. Upped
  Gore Rider also conveniently has the same strength requirement as
  Stormshield.

Is the kick damage significantly higher? And doesn't my damage come from procced spells and crushing blow anyway? If not, that would be a good consideration.

Zelym wrote: 2 years ago

• Dracul's Grasp is insanely good unless you are using a Last Wish PB.
  Life Tap does make you almost invulnerable while kicking.

That's why I chose them, as Last Wish (which is also one of my favorite books) isn't an option, as I might want to rather use a Rift

Zelym wrote: 2 years ago

• Mana Leech on a ring is nice to have but not mandatory, all it does is saving you some mana potions.

I really *hate* potion management. I know it's part of the game, but it's also a reason why I don't like caster classes that much. So mana leech is mandatory for my sanity.

Zelym wrote: 2 years ago

• You need around 10% IAS for the last kick breakpoint with BoS but you don't have much room for IAS on your riftsin setup. So
  Highlord's Wrath or rare IAS gloves seems mandatory unless you are willing to sacrifice a Cold Rainbow Facet for a 15% IAS jewel.

How bout

The Cat's Eye instead? It would also give me faster movement, which adds moveability. It would only be challanged by an Enigma loadout. But maybe you have thoughts that

Highlord's Wrath adds even more benefits?

Zelym wrote: 2 years ago

• The riftsin setup with
  Head Hunter's Glory feels squishy. Playing a melee build with high dex / low vit, low block and almost no DR is going to be challenging.

I never played a Riftsin, still collecting all the gear. What would you rather take as a shield?
I thought tripple-faceted

Head Hunter's Glory is a big increase in damage. I don't know what it really makes for a difference when clearing areas.
As I already have my

Head Hunter's Glory (faceted) AND a Sanctuary, I could easily compare clear speed when I finally have my Riftsin composed.
I don't mind having the fastest clear speed ever; I just don't want it to feel *very* clunky.

I guess I'll add my thoughts to that when the build is completed.

Zelym wrote: 2 years ago

• Are you planning to use your secondary kicksin setup exclusively on bosses/ubers? You might be surprised by
  Stormlash's effectiveness in densely packed areas. With
  Static Field and
  Death Sentry, you can unleash the kind of unrestrained carnage only a poisonmancer/CE can match.

Second loadout is especially for Ubers, as this is a safe setup. But ofc I will try it for normal gameplay, too.
On the other hand, I'd then have a normal Kicksin instead of a memebuild Riftsin.

Zelym wrote: 2 years ago

• Harlequin Crest is an excellent helm for kicksin against everything but ubers.

I get that. Also it would add MF which I don't really have on my setup.
But then again it comes down to the same question as for

Head Hunter's Glory: Is the added cold damage worth it?

Zelym wrote: 2 years ago

• Fortitude is never mentioned as an armor option. The +300% damage from Fortitude does work with kicks and roughly translates to an additional 250-450 physical damage.

• +% damage againt demons/undeads on the other hand doesn't work with kicks.

I considered that. Also I didn't know that +Dmg vs Undead/Demons doesn't work. So I thought Chains of Honor would be the way better option.
Same question as for head/shield: Would the added damage really make a difference?

I'd also get a bit Attack Rating and bunch of Life, which would be great. On the other hand I'd lose ~40 All Resistance, where I even struggle with Chains of Honor to be maxed. I think that's quite a risk.

---

So thanks again for your thoughts and input! I'm really curious on what I can improve with this build
As being said, I'm not the richest player, so I want to be sure on what to spend so much for a build.

Sorry about the late response, I had a rough week.

Trollwut wrote: 2 years ago

I guess BoS, as otherwise I'd need much more IAS on my gear, which then mean other drawbacks. At least that's what I'm thinking?
Also I do love the high run speed. I would only get more mobility with Enigma, which then means I'd lose much resistance and so on. Well ok... I guess the other option would be

Fade and Enigma?
TBH that didn't come to mind for me until now...
Do you have recommendations on how to then break the IAS breakpoints?

Reaching the fastest ias breakpoint with

Fade is not easy but you only need 30% ias to reach the most important breakpoint at 3 frames / kick. So I would go either Treachery or

Highlord's Wrath /

The Cat's Eye + a 15% IAS jewel.
Although

Fade looks strong on paper, I personally stick to BoS most of the time.

Fade makes me feel like an armored slug, I hate it.

Trollwut wrote: 2 years ago

Is the kick damage significantly higher? And doesn't my damage come from procced spells and crushing blow anyway? If not, that would be a good consideration.

You can check boot's kick damage here.
50-145 vs 83-149, not a huge difference but like for normal weapons it is base damage before strength and skill multipliers are applied.

D2Planner also has an awesome tool showing theorical damage breakdown, for me it looks like this (with

Stormlash/Sanctuary and

Azurewrath/Spirit on switch):

Trollwut wrote: 2 years ago

How bout

The Cat's Eye instead? It would also give me faster movement, which adds moveability. It would only be challanged by an Enigma loadout. But maybe you have thoughts that

Highlord's Wrath adds even more benefits?

I completely forgot this amulet exist. I like

Highlord's Wrath for its +1 skill but

The Cat's Eye works fine too.

Trollwut wrote: 2 years ago

I never played a Riftsin, still collecting all the gear. What would you rather take as a shield?
I thought tripple-faceted

Head Hunter's Glory is a big increase in damage. I don't know what it really makes for a difference when clearing areas.
As I already have my

Head Hunter's Glory (faceted) AND a Sanctuary, I could easily compare clear speed when I finally have my Riftsin composed.
I don't mind having the fastest clear speed ever; I just don't want it to feel *very* clunky.

I like my equipment to be tanky enough to be able to play aggressively without being punished for small mistakes but your setup is by no means clunky.
I would feel comfortable with your riftsin setup in act 1/2/3 areas.
For CS / WSK, I would try those 2 options and keep the one I like the most:
- Keep BoS, switch

Head Hunter's Glory for

Stormshield or Sanctuary.
- Switch to

Fade (with 20 hard points for the hidden DR), keep

Head Hunter's Glory, get 30% ias on gear.


The good thing about all kicksin builds is, you don't need a lot of investment to be effective.
I used an upgraded

Skin of the Vipermagi socketed with

Um as a proxy for CoH for a while and it worked perfectly fine.

Nice Topic. That's a kind of 2-in-one Assassins that I'd wanted to make myself.

https://d2.maxroll.gg/d2planner/mf0106cp - that's my current setup (not enough mana leech and too lazy to spam mana potions to equip Inifnity to the merc yet ^^). There's few different build suggestions, not sure which one I should follow.
What

Scepter base would you suggest for Rift - does it even matter too much?

War Scepter/

Divine Scepter/

Caduceus, they are the fastest scepters.

War Scepter being the one with the lowest requirement.
But the first thing I would do would be to upgrade your boots.

Zelym wrote: 2 years ago

But the first thing I would do would be to upgrade your boots.

To the elite version you mean? Just needed the required level, will do asap

Yeah, the physical damage upgrade will help mana leech too.
Expanding your mana pool with a couple serpent's charm is also a good idea.

Just upgraded the

Boots, got myself Rift - hella fun and kill speed in cows isn't too bad .
Still need a bit higher mana pool and leech, yup .

I just did ubers for the first time with my budget riftsin and it was beyond easy. I didn't even switch gear from my normal a4/5 farming build. I used a lifetap

Wand to establish before Dragon flighting in and died only once during the whole thing to

Über Mephisto because his adds got in the way of me hitting him when he was at 1% health. I used Gface socketed with

Um, Treachery,

Stormshield socketed with

Diamond, draculs, upped twice goblin toes,

Wisp Projector, ravenfrost,

String of Ears

Belt and a +2 with allres crafted

Belt. I didnt use

Teleport because getting your body back can be very time consuming if you get unlucky and just kicked everything to Death all the way in. It was laughably easy. Much easier than my better geared smiter imo. I just used a 1pt

Fade and let Treachery do the rest. with lifetap and the insane attack speed from kick i didnt even need to use rejuv pots, or any others. I do recommend a tiny bit of mana leech though for

Baal especially, or you're going to have attacks interrupted by lack of mana, even chugging pots. I did switch to carrion for andy now that I think of it.

Also building a Rift/Kicksin right now. I did a lot of research recently.

So the plan is 1 Skill build with just some Gearswap for regular farm and ubers if I got you right.

Your overall setup looks good.
Just keep a few important things in Mind for Gearing.

Things that don't work for Kicks are:

% Damage to Damon's and Undead
Deadly Strike
Weapon Base Damage don't matter

Things that work:
% Enhanced Damage
Crushing Blow and Open Wounds

So that means for Ubers:
Consider a Fortitude Chest for ED

I prefer

Atma's Scarab Amulet.
Lifetap procc still will be up enough to not die vs Meph. But you feel the Amp Damage uptime a lot. It melts.

For

Boots I pref double upped Goblins because of higher CB and you get OW from Dracs.
Uped Gores are also fine. But no benefit from the DS.


Regular setup for non Ubers
I use :
Weap/shield: Rift and Phoenix
Nigts helmet. Enigma, Draculs,
Verdungos Gorerider (little CB for Bosses and FRW)
Maras,

Raven Frost, Dual leech AR ring.
So I keep up ED from Phoenix. Cover Res with Maras and small harms.

If that can help here's mine: https://maxroll.gg/d2/d2planner/gi0106xi

Still missing a couple of SD lifers.

Some notes

• I wanted to do a pure orb, not an hybrid trap or kick char
• DT lv36 will get you 7kicks with max APS if using BoS (which I am, zoom zoom)
• Survivability is outstanding with DR, cta (ard 3k life), 75% block,
  Life Tap procs from Draks and Thundergod - in my
  Baal runs I'm the one going for the souls
• AR is still somewhat of an issue still at lv89, some AR GCs could be of use before getting into higher levels. For reference I have 80% hit rate on
  Baal. Might need to experiment with AR a2 merc.
• Currently using a2
  Defiance merc (frost aura not useful with an orb char I guess). Basically untouchable but might test the AR one cf above.
• Not sure if replacing SS by mosers or troll's nest is warranted tbh - need to test but cold RF are expensive
• Damage is OK but this is a fun build, you won't get to the same ease of use as an orb sorc or hammerdin
• Given above, i would not try it out if you don't have a 6-7ber budget (what mine cost me in ladder2 right now). More specifically I think you need the Infinity to make this wor