Hardcore sorc w/ Occulus

Am I dumb to consider using this item in hardcore? I play sorceress, I use

Stormshield and maintain 50% block at all times and capped resists. Like is it that bad? It seems like a sweet item.

I don't play hardcore which I can not say it is good or bad for hardcore player, but its random tp by struck sucks specially against souls,

Skeleton mages etc.
what I saw/heard, using Srormshield build normally going for 75% block, are you sure 50% is enough?

Flyhorse wrote: 3 years ago

I don't play hardcore which I can not say it is good or bad for hardcore player, but its random tp by struck sucks specially against souls,

Skeleton mages etc.
what I saw/heard, using Srormshield build normally going for 75% block, are you sure 50% is enough?

I like to have vita too incase of damages that cant be blocked. But if I were to use the occy maybe i would want to go higher incase of the inevitable fail

Teleport. It does add a nice defensive buff, but the more I think about it, the more I dont want it to kill my character lol.

You definitely want to think about the risk of using it. Specially the higher level of char, the more carefulness you want to be.

I'm admittedly torn. Back in OG D2, I hated

The Oculus because the randomness turned out negative more often than not.

In D2:R...complete opposite when I did use it. Though that may be in large parts due to much better gear on my occu sorc than back in the OG days.

The stats on it are pretty baller for an MF build, no arguing that. The only real question that determines a "yes" or "no" is what you think of the

Teleport.
That

Teleport may..
1) Get you killed because it randomly moves you into the middle of some fanaticismd extra strong boss back
2) Save your life because it teleports you out of that same pack after 1-2 hits after you accidentally teleported right into it behind a wall

I'd say #2 is a lot more likely than #1, generally speaking.

Beyond those extreme Edge cases though, what's the most dangerous thing to you? That is of course debatable and subject to your overall build but more commonly than not, it'd be 1) dolls 2) souls and 3) charging vipers. So basically..same as always.

Dolls are a very simple range issue. They tend not to be any real danger if you kill them but can become dangerous if you accidentally

Teleport onto them and your merc 1shots them back to back with you still next to them. Because of that, I'd say occi would actually save you more often than not because it gives you that chance of the doll hitting you as your merc blows it up, triggering the

Teleport and moving you to a safe distance because of it.

Souls tend to shoot at you or your merc who starts out on top of you and then moves towards the souls. They don't shoot at empty space. Because of that, any

Teleport along the line between you and them would make no real difference as it'd already be in a "hits you" area. But any

Teleport that takes you off that line of mid-air lightning (which is bound to be most of them) actually saves you from getting hit by it. So in this case as well, it'll do more good than harm.

Vipers are a bit of a worse scenario. They tend to

Charge you once at the right distance and become harmless afterwards (in terms of dmg done). If you have say 3 vipers against you, the

Charge of the first may save you from the

Charge of the others because it moves you out of the

Charge radius. That'd obviously be a good thing. At the same time though, you might get charged by 2-3, manage to survive that (but not much more), get teleported just a wee bit away and then immediately get charged by all of them again because you teleported to just the right distance. In that case, rare as it may be, it stands a good chance at getting you killed.

All in all, I dare say it does more good than bad on average and would be a no-brainer for softcore because of it. But it does come with the very real (albeit rare) possibility of randomly getting you killed with little to nothing you can do about it. That alone is probably enough to warrant not using it on hardcore, painful of a decision as it may be. It can make up for overly aggressive gameplay by saving you from your own carelessness time and time again. But eventually, careful or not, it will get you killed. It may be today, it may be tomorrow, it may be 10 years from now..but eventually.

HC is HC.
You CAN'T take any risks if you plan to survive. That means maximum control - no random skills like tele from occu, or leoric

Wand.
Even with all the precautions, something can - and sooner or later will - eventually happen. Inaccurate

Teleport, convo-souls blast, occasional crit-xplodin doll, occasional amplify (right 0-1 sec before that doll), even a damn lag - whatever. But these things (not lag) you can control - unlike random tele from occulus. This is why:
1) No occu usin at HC;
2) Just don't play HC at all if you hate your char to die, like me.

Go ES with 50/50 split if u want to farm

Baal

There are other options. Schnorki and Asha did a really good write up, I agree with them. To me, hardcore mode is all about risk management. Not "does the risk outweigh the reward?", no, no, no. In hardcore mode, personally, I try to mitigate ALL the risk. There are many good options for your weapon. I can't recommend using a weapon that adds a possibility of Death in hardcore. It could be the greatest weapon ever, but if it comes with a 1% chance of Death, I'd never use it in hardcore mode. That's just me, though. Good luck to you!