Infinity on merc

It's a conventional Wisdom to have an emilio on a fire, lightning or cold build. I'm still stubbornly using rogues instead, and made an analysis showing how much more dmg an emilio allows you in the current meta:
It is indeed substantial, especially against higher non-sundered immunities. Emilio also has an added benefit of his aura, stronger attack and crushing blow

But, apart from rogues looking better...

1) the gap is not as high as it used to be when most people got biased towards Infinity on merc (there was less -res from items before)
2) most of this dmg is overkill anyways
3) emilio dies more often and not always activates his aura
4) it's so sad to waste the natural -res on Infinity

As for the specific alternatives.. Fire sorc is well supported by Insight, Ice or Faith in case of enchantress (but really no good reason to avoid emilio..)
Cold sorc prly least compelling to use emilio.. But not sure what serves her better
Ice zon kinda needs Faith or Insight on merc
Fire zon - Faith is nice

Lightning Fury - Insight is mandatory imo

Lightning sorc,

Lightning Strike zon, or lightning assa will self wield anyways. Other elemental classes prly ver similar to the mentioned above

What about with an elemental Zon?

Whero wrote: 4 hours ago

What about with an elemental Zon?

Cold, fire, and

Lightning Fury Zons, are on the list.

ganseng wrote: 5 hours ago

It's a conventional Wisdom to have an emilio on a fire, lightning or cold build. I'm still stubbornly using rogues instead, and made an analysis showing how much more dmg an emilio allows you in the current meta:

Screenshot 2026-07-08 205535.jpg

It is indeed substantial, especially against higher non-sundered immunities. Emilio also has an added benefit of his aura, stronger attack and crushing blow

But, apart from rogues looking better...

1) the gap is not as high as it used to be when most people got biased towards Infinity on merc (there was less -res from items before)
2) most of this dmg is overkill anyways
3) emilio dies more often and not always activates his aura
4) it's so sad to waste the natural -res on Infinity

As for the specific alternatives.. Fire sorc is well supported by Insight, Ice or Faith in case of enchantress (but really no good reason to avoid emilio..)
Cold sorc prly least compelling to use emilio.. But not sure what serves her better
Ice zon kinda needs Faith or Insight on merc
Fire zon - Faith is nice

Lightning Fury - Insight is mandatory imo

Lightning sorc,

Lightning Strike zon, or lightning assa will self wield anyways. Other elemental classes prly ver similar to the mentioned above

Generally agree with this, with all the sources of negative res now, Infinity is more optional. I use Insight not Infinity on my

Ring of Fire WL that has -70 base negative res (-110 with apoc). I've just found my kill speed is similar on most mobs and I like not worrying about mana.

On 3), for fully powered characters it is very rare for Emilio to die on P1 except against Ubers, so not that important a consideration IMO. But the second part you mention on his aura activation is critical. The aura activates every 2 seconds. So if you are killing most mobs in under a second, the amount it helps is even less. And because the timing is in effect random versus when your attacks occur, I found myself often pulsing the full number of attacks as I can't react in less than 1/3 of a second (plus delay on spell reaching the enemy so reaction time is even less) to see that I don't need the last attack pulse, so all it does is result in me "overkilling" an enemy if the aura happens to pulse early in the 2 second period and happen to make the difference in number of attacks needed.

Against Heralds with high natural fire res, I do notice a difference. But I also like being able to spam spells w/o worrying about running out of mana against them.

ganseng wrote: 5 hours ago

It's a conventional Wisdom to have an emilio on a fire, lightning or cold build. I'm still stubbornly using rogues instead, and made an analysis showing how much more dmg an emilio allows you in the current meta:

Screenshot 2026-07-08 205535.jpg

Nice spreadsheet!

ganseng wrote: 5 hours ago

Ice zon kinda needs Faith or Insight on merc

Why is that? Mana sustain is not easy, so you could go Insight and

Sacrifice a lot of damage from Infi. But I would just try to some extra mana and mana leech + regen. My Ice Maiden has a Renewed Sunder with +55 mana, an SoJ and a gc with +58 mana (instead of a skiller). With CtA, I have 824 mana, which is enough for a

Freezing Arrow that costs 19 mana. From time to time, I have to chug a mana pot.

Fanaticism from Faith is not needed, either. The phys damage is irrelevant and you have plenty of attack rating through

Penetrate, that you can easily max, since you only need about 50 skill points for the damage skills (I went 20

Cold Arrow, 10

Ice Arrow, more is just not needed, 20

Freezing Arrow, of course). All the other skill points can be put in passive skills (

Penetrate 20,

Pierce 16

Valkyrie 7 etc. Plenty of points to "waste" here).


With an elemental build, I would never ever skip on Infi if damage is the most important aspect for me. And it usually is, because more damage means more kill speed. Infi's damage gain is just too huge to neglect. Mana and attack speed can be gained elsewhere for a lower cost.

Of course, you can always say that the game is too easy with high-end gear (which is certainly true) and you limit yourself. If you "ban" mana pot, for example, then going Insight makes much more sense.

i assume heralds are also very dangerous against an emilio (at least they are very likely to one-shot a rogue if they get to hit her). and that's exactly when you actually need the

Conviction...

varangium wrote: 4 hours ago

ganseng wrote: 5 hours ago

It's a conventional Wisdom to have an emilio on a fire, lightning or cold build. I'm still stubbornly using rogues instead, and made an analysis showing how much more dmg an emilio allows you in the current meta:

Screenshot 2026-07-08 205535.jpg

It is indeed substantial, especially against higher non-sundered immunities. Emilio also has an added benefit of his aura, stronger attack and crushing blow

But, apart from rogues looking better...

1) the gap is not as high as it used to be when most people got biased towards Infinity on merc (there was less -res from items before)
2) most of this dmg is overkill anyways
3) emilio dies more often and not always activates his aura
4) it's so sad to waste the natural -res on Infinity

As for the specific alternatives.. Fire sorc is well supported by Insight, Ice or Faith in case of enchantress (but really no good reason to avoid emilio..)
Cold sorc prly least compelling to use emilio.. But not sure what serves her better
Ice zon kinda needs Faith or Insight on merc
Fire zon - Faith is nice

Lightning Fury - Insight is mandatory imo

Lightning sorc,

Lightning Strike zon, or lightning assa will self wield anyways. Other elemental classes prly ver similar to the mentioned above

Generally agree with this, with all the sources of negative res now, Infinity is more optional. I use Insight not Infinity on my

Ring of Fire WL that has -70 base negative res (-110 with apoc). I've just found my kill speed is similar on most mobs and I like not worrying about mana.

On 3), for fully powered characters it is very rare for Emilio to die on P1 except against Ubers, so not that important a consideration IMO. But the second part you mention on his aura activation is critical. The aura activates every 2 seconds. So if you are killing most mobs in under a second, the amount it helps is even less. And because the timing is in effect random versus when your attacks occur, I found myself often pulsing the full number of attacks as I can't react in less than 1/3 of a second (plus delay on spell reaching the enemy so reaction time is even less) to see that I don't need the last attack pulse, so all it does is result in me "overkilling" an enemy if the aura happens to pulse early in the 2 second period and happen to make the difference in number of attacks needed.

Against Heralds with high natural fire res, I do notice a difference. But I also like being able to spam spells w/o worrying about running out of mana against them.

mine has 622 mana, 7% leech on her

Diadem, and she's the worst blue liquid addict. merc wears Faith for extra attack speed and fun.

Insight would indeed make the life much easier, but so would Infinity if she shot half as much but twice as strong..

mikelessar wrote: 4 hours ago

ganseng wrote: 5 hours ago

It's a conventional Wisdom to have an emilio on a fire, lightning or cold build. I'm still stubbornly using rogues instead, and made an analysis showing how much more dmg an emilio allows you in the current meta:

Screenshot 2026-07-08 205535.jpg

Nice spreadsheet!

ganseng wrote: 5 hours ago

Ice zon kinda needs Faith or Insight on merc

Why is that? Mana sustain is not easy, so you could go Insight and

Sacrifice a lot of damage from Infi. But I would just try to some extra mana and mana leech + regen. My Ice Maiden has a Renewed Sunder with +55 mana, an SoJ and a gc with +58 mana (instead of a skiller). With CtA, I have 824 mana, which is enough for a

Freezing Arrow that costs 19 mana. From time to time, I have to chug a mana pot.

Fanaticism from Faith is not needed, either. The phys damage is irrelevant and you have plenty of attack rating through

Penetrate, that you can easily max, since you only need about 50 skill points for the damage skills (I went 20

Cold Arrow, 10

Ice Arrow, more is just not needed, 20

Freezing Arrow, of course). All the other skill points can be put in passive skills (

Penetrate 20,

Pierce 16

Valkyrie 7 etc. Plenty of points to "waste" here).


With an elemental build, I would never ever skip on Infi if damage is the most important aspect for me. And it usually is, because more damage means more kill speed. Infi's damage gain is just too huge to neglect. Mana and attack speed can be gained elsewhere for a lower cost.

Of course, you can always say that the game is too easy with high-end gear (which is certainly true) and you limit yourself. If you "ban" mana pot, for example, then going Insight makes much more sense.

ganseng wrote: 1 hour ago

i assume heralds are also very dangerous against an emilio (at least they are very likely to one-shot a rogue if they get to hit her). and that's exactly when you actually need the

Conviction...

varangium wrote: 4 hours ago

ganseng wrote: 5 hours ago

It's a conventional Wisdom to have an emilio on a fire, lightning or cold build. I'm still stubbornly using rogues instead, and made an analysis showing how much more dmg an emilio allows you in the current meta:

Screenshot 2026-07-08 205535.jpg

It is indeed substantial, especially against higher non-sundered immunities. Emilio also has an added benefit of his aura, stronger attack and crushing blow

But, apart from rogues looking better...

1) the gap is not as high as it used to be when most people got biased towards Infinity on merc (there was less -res from items before)
2) most of this dmg is overkill anyways
3) emilio dies more often and not always activates his aura
4) it's so sad to waste the natural -res on Infinity

As for the specific alternatives.. Fire sorc is well supported by Insight, Ice or Faith in case of enchantress (but really no good reason to avoid emilio..)
Cold sorc prly least compelling to use emilio.. But not sure what serves her better
Ice zon kinda needs Faith or Insight on merc
Fire zon - Faith is nice

Lightning Fury - Insight is mandatory imo

Lightning sorc,

Lightning Strike zon, or lightning assa will self wield anyways. Other elemental classes prly ver similar to the mentioned above

Generally agree with this, with all the sources of negative res now, Infinity is more optional. I use Insight not Infinity on my

Ring of Fire WL that has -70 base negative res (-110 with apoc). I've just found my kill speed is similar on most mobs and I like not worrying about mana.

On 3), for fully powered characters it is very rare for Emilio to die on P1 except against Ubers, so not that important a consideration IMO. But the second part you mention on his aura activation is critical. The aura activates every 2 seconds. So if you are killing most mobs in under a second, the amount it helps is even less. And because the timing is in effect random versus when your attacks occur, I found myself often pulsing the full number of attacks as I can't react in less than 1/3 of a second (plus delay on spell reaching the enemy so reaction time is even less) to see that I don't need the last attack pulse, so all it does is result in me "overkilling" an enemy if the aura happens to pulse early in the 2 second period and happen to make the difference in number of attacks needed.

Against Heralds with high natural fire res, I do notice a difference. But I also like being able to spam spells w/o worrying about running out of mana against them.

For my fire WL no. Just too powerful with offense and defense. Lethargy (50% reduction in attack speed and therefore damage) and

Ring of Fire spam (stuns enemies repeatedly) are incredibly powerful defensively. Plus demon lancer to draw fire. And then offense is great too with Apoc,

Flame Wave and

Ring of Fire.

Occasionally Emilio will die, but usually due to some kind of bad setup, like a crowded room with objects that interfere with my

Ring of Fire spam, other enemies still roaming around, I have trouble landing the lethargy immediately on where the heralds will spawn (I play with controller so it's harder to target lethargy in the

Herald landing spot when there are existing enemies roaming), combined with amp damage and might/

Fanaticism/

Conviction and they land right on top of Emilio, it sometimes happens. But it's rare.

I need to use my other characters more to do

Herald hunting, but I don't have as much experience with them just because I like the fire WL so much and have primarily been using him.

why emilio specifically