Dubbell O'Seven - casting/ranged focused artificer

[Loriac]

The big downside to Strinati's (and by extension the Glass cannon) is you only get 2 hits of damage (vs. 4 for toven's and 5 for corruption/archaic). My recollection of strinati's was that mobs didn't save vs. force but did vs. fire, and that the two damage types were affected separately by fire / force enhancements. Also, just as reflex saves and evasion are an issue for Toven's, the same will apply to the Glass cannon.

What will be interesting is to compare how Glass cannon does vs Toven's against evasion mobs. My suspicion is that new runearms may be created with hidden boosts to DC (I can't imagine them staying relevant vs. inflated mob saves otherwise). If we don't see any evidence of this, despite higher mob saves in eGH, I think its fair to say that reflex based runearms are essentially dead for the highest difficulty levels.

I too was hopeful about the Glass cannon, but am very doubtful having seen some of the comments from Lammania. It will still function as a bigger better crate and door smasher however...

[Singular]

The big downside to Strinati's (and by extension the Glass cannon) is you only get 2 hits of damage (vs. 4 for toven's and 5 for corruption/archaic). My recollection of strinati's was that mobs didn't save vs. force but did vs. fire, and that the two damage types were affected separately by fire / force enhancements. Also, just as reflex saves and evasion are an issue for Toven's, the same will apply to the Glass cannon.

What will be interesting is to compare how Glass cannon does vs Toven's against evasion mobs. My suspicion is that new runearms may be created with hidden boosts to DC (I can't imagine them staying relevant vs. inflated mob saves otherwise). If we don't see any evidence of this, despite higher mob saves in eGH, I think its fair to say that reflex based runearms are essentially dead for the highest difficulty levels.

I too was hopeful about the Glass cannon, but am very doubtful having seen some of the comments from Lammania. It will still function as a bigger better crate and door smasher however...

My experiences with it so far are that it does substantially less damage overall. Yes, I can get a bunch of enemies - but since enemies don't decrease their dps even though they're damaged, you end up just aggroing a lot of mobs that you can't kill. With the force rune arms, you can kill each mob pretty quickly, usually in one shot, and then move to the next, keeping aggro off of you.

I played with both through GH in great dps groups. I was much, much more effective with the force rune arm.

[CThruTheEgo]

@Singular: No doubt that multishot rune arms will be better dps against single targets, but it would be nice to have a viable AoE option as well. Especially with the impulse120, I could see grabbing agro of a group and then kiting them through a blade barrier. I don't know, we'll see.

The reflex save issue is a big concern. If they don't get some sort of a boost, then Glass Cannon and Arcing Sky will be as useless as Toven's at endgame. Like Loriac, I'm hoping to be pleasantly surprised that Turbine dealt with this, but I also wouldn't be surprised if they didn't. I think Chill of Winter is a fort save, which would make it another viable option. And Corruption of Nature seems better than Turmoil Within because of its built in corrosion bonus. So if they don't fix the reflex save issue then endgame arti's will basically have only one more viable rune arm to choose from. We'll see.

[Loriac]

The green slot on the Turmoil may be more useful than the corrosion spellpower, but this depends on the rest of your gear set up. If you're investing in acid for Corruption or Turmoil, twisting (acid) energy burst is pretty much a given, meaning you'd want to slot in superior acid lore (even more than if you were just using the runearm). As such, epic tier 3 rock boots are probably still the boots of choice for such a build, and the additional 26 acid spell power from using corruption may be outweighed by the green slot.

Its a real shame that the new runearms don't get red or orange slots tbh instead of the yellow ones.

[Nodoze]

Thanks for all the good input & thoughts to consider. Even if the consensus comes out that the Glass Cannon isn't really viable at the top levels I will likely still grind out one just to get one as I don't have many rune arms and because maybe they will change something at some point that makes it more viable. My guild loves Gianthold (even before it went Epic) so I am not really worried about getting the other run arms from GH...

I do find the Glass Cannon interesting that it imbues 2 types of damage at level V to the X-bow so maybe that alone would make it worth it for at least Fusillades... Even if not using it much normally maybe I can swap the arm in/out for extra Fusillade imbues...

[Singular]

Hey,

got the fully upgraded glass cannon, tried it out in Crystal Cove.

The first tier sucks. By the second tier, it's worth it. The +114 to kinetic spell power increases the damage visibly, and the rune arm feels like it's making a difference.

Yes, the two damage types on your bolts will increase your xbow dps output. However, against single mobs, you're better off going with whatever rune arm you've specked for (I maxed out force and use archaic device nearly exclusively). Further, Glass Cannon increases the damage of your blade barriers and tactical detonation and, importantly, boulder toss.

If you can time using Glass Cannon well, then you play with aggro while boulder toss-criting for over 5000 hp damage - that's substantial, and basically takes out any single non-orange/red named target.

As with Loriac, I'm not sold on the third tier. I did it just because we can, but it only boosts you to 120 kinetic spellpower and a yellow augment slot. I don't plan on using the rune arm exclusively so who cares about an augment slot? What I'm thinking about is throwing Magi on there and wearing it for a 200 sp boost while I cast buffs.

Anyways, it was a lot of fun to use on undead - let it charge, fire, shoot off a tac/det, charge up the cannon, fire again. It's a lot slower than a sorc's fireball, but it does from 300-450 damage per mob, so that's good. Tough beginning fight, easy clean up.

[CThruTheEgo]

That's a pretty good assessment Singular, which I would agree with. I got mine to tier 2 last night, still working on tier 3. I didn't think to try mine out at tier 1 before upgrading. Did you notice an increase in both the blunt and fire damage with the upgrade? They do similar damage at tier 2, so I'm guessing they are both affected by the impulse.

I haven't used it very much but I haven't noticed a save against the blunt damage, so I'm assuming it doesn't have one. I have seen the fire get saved against a lot (about as much as Toven's), but with the blunt damage it's still a decent option against groups of mobs, especially skeletons. It's definitely not the first choice against single targets. Acid or force rune arms are much better for that situation.

Overall, I think it will be a good option when laying down blade barriers, to gain the agro of a group, and against large groups. Against single targets (bosses and most EE content), I'll stick with Corruption of Nature.

I'm still working on acquiring the new GH gear/rune arms, so more info once I do.

[Loriac]

That's a pretty good assessment Singular, which I would agree with. I got mine to tier 2 last night, still working on tier 3. I didn't think to try mine out at tier 1 before upgrading. Did you notice an increase in both the blunt and fire damage with the upgrade? They do similar damage at tier 2, so I'm guessing they are both affected by the impulse.

Are you wearing a potency item? I'd expect the force damage to be scaled down vs fire, so its possible that you're seeing similar numbers because the higher base fire damage is offset by the lower potency spellpower vs. lower force base damage / higher impluse spellpower.

If both fire and force are being equally boosted, the fire damage should look higher than the force damage, if both damage types follow the general scaling for force vs elemental runearms.

Reason I mention it is that I'm pretty sure that the two damage types were separately boosted on strinati's.

Quickest way to test is probably to unequip all potency so that your fire spellpower is essentially zero, and then seeing how the numbers compare. I'd test it myself, but I TR'd my old artificer into a juggernaut.


Edit: on reflection, I would guess that you don't have any spellpower enhancements, so its likely that you'd have 130+ difference in spellpower between fire and force, so unlikly to offset. Please disregard the above question.

[Singular]

That's a pretty good assessment Singular, which I would agree with. I got mine to tier 2 last night, still working on tier 3. I didn't think to try mine out at tier 1 before upgrading. Did you notice an increase in both the blunt and fire damage with the upgrade? They do similar damage at tier 2, so I'm guessing they are both affected by the impulse.

I haven't used it very much but I haven't noticed a save against the blunt damage, so I'm assuming it doesn't have one. I have seen the fire get saved against a lot (about as much as Toven's), but with the blunt damage it's still a decent option against groups of mobs, especially skeletons. It's definitely not the first choice against single targets. Acid or force rune arms are much better for that situation.

Overall, I think it will be a good option when laying down blade barriers, to gain the agro of a group, and against large groups. Against single targets (bosses and most EE content), I'll stick with Corruption of Nature.

I'm still working on acquiring the new GH gear/rune arms, so more info once I do.

Thanks

I apologize, I didn't pay so much attention to the damage. It looked like fire was doing more, but I really can't be sure. I'll do so soonest.

I picked up all the GH Hard rune arms on a lucky run (maybe before people realized they weren't bound to character), but haven't used any of them. I don't have spell power points in any of them, so not entirely sure about how useful they are to me - I guess snow on fire giants.

[Singular]

Ok, so I paid more attention to it - the fire and blunt damage do seem, as Loriac suggests, to be affected by each separate spell line. My force was most often doing more damage (I'm full force 7/6/6 and 0 fire, with only have general spell power boosts via the blue dragon armor set and cloak of the dragon, and no spell power favoring one line or the other through items). However, this did not always hold. The highest I witnessed from force damage was in the 700 range, lowest around 140 or so (more often). Fire was generally around 140, but occasionally went to around 300. When it did, it would exceed force.

It was most useful in the cove against undead - running toward the mobs, firing the rune arm, tac/det, jump in and blade barrier, fire the rune arm, jump out and circle to hit multiple targets with improved precision. Probably the most useful part of it is the increased tac/det and bb damage. Oh, and boulder toss was criting over 5000 hp damage, which was total fun.

Additionally, the rune arm is weak at close range - it either misses (most often) or does about half normal damage. In fact, there wasn't a lot of difference between firing at tier 3 and tier 5 at close range. Not sure why. That was annoying as mobs would often circle me and my puppie too close to shoot.

I found it not super useful against the hobgoblins, but needed to switch to archaic device. It's just a lot faster to use a single target rune arm and take high hit point groups down one by one thereby reducing their group damage output.

I see this rune arm being a useful contribution to Epic Normal and Hard content where the artie is content to play support to a fast paced melee group. In such cases, you'd be able to contribute overall damage to groups, making it easier for the melee to kill each mob. In EE, it's probably better to stick with single target rune arms so as to avoid aggro and disturbing whatever CC the party is using.

However, if you want to match kill counts with strong melee and casters, you're going to want to use single target rune arms and good timing to steal kills via high burst damage

[Nodoze]

Ok, so I paid more attention to it ... Additionally, the rune arm is weak at close range - it either misses (most often) or does about half normal damage. In fact, there wasn't a lot of difference between firing at tier 3 and tier 5 at close range. Not sure why. That was annoying as mobs would often circle me and my puppie too close to shoot. ...

Singular, With the GC when mobs are close, have you tried "targeting" the floor (mouse-look the reticule to your feet, the mobs feet, or maybe the center of your BB)? If quick-mouse-look-floor-targeting on the rune arm works for close up making it also viable when BBing a pack of mobs or when mobs circle you that would be huge to know... That & not getting a huge drop off between Tier 3 charge and Tier 5 charge may actually be a benefit for a solo Artie that needs to stay on the move against a group of mobs. When solo'ing with my force rune arm I often don't have the luxury to stay still long enough to charge past 3 as I am typically kiting through BBs and moving to keep the mobs lined up for 'Improved Precise Shot'.

Thx Singular for the testing and feedback. I knocked out Tier 1 & Tier 2 of the Glass Cannon Rune Arm but unfortunately I am still only level 23 & can't actually test... I do a lot of solo'ing and currently full Force speced as I only have Lucid Dreams (all I have had since level 19) & have a little in Fire for the occasional Flame Turret. I like the idea of keeping a Force arm for single target and a good AOE Force based option & the synergy with physical/untyped BB, Tac-Det, Boulder-Toss, Wild-Shots, etc... I also ground out Tier 1 & Tier 2 of the SpyGlass Trinket which I prioritize over the Rune Arm as it helps me be a better EE trap-meister for my guildies & because I really need spot when I solo (& I want the stacking UMD) & it boosts my int (dont have a planar trinket yet).

The AOE may be a good for me when solo'ing (I solo a lot) and if that works I am going to see if I can learn to easily target the floor when BBing a group of mobs. Unfortunately with my work schedule I am not sure I will have enough time to upgrade the Spyglass to Tier 3 let alone the Rune Arm to Tier 3 but I am glad I at least have both at Tier 2 now...

EDIT:

... I see this rune arm being a useful contribution to Epic Normal and Hard content where the artie is content to play support to a fast paced melee group. In such cases, you'd be able to contribute overall damage to groups, making it easier for the melee to kill each mob. In EE, it's probably better to stick with single target rune arms so as to avoid aggro and disturbing whatever CC the party is using.

However, if you want to match kill counts with strong melee and casters, you're going to want to use single target rune arms and good timing to steal kills via high burst damage ...

Thanks for the additional input. Much of my group play is EH running guildies through flagging quests or what not so this is great to know... Most are fast paced melee'ers (they all have alt-itus so there are many to flag) & though I contribute some on DPS I think they like more that I do all the trapping & can buff everyone with most everything (& the buffs last 20 mins) & that I can rez our healer when he goes down as well as off heal via scrolls when we are separated... Your tips help me contribute more & that is appreciated! I do enjoy trying to time the last shot with my rune arm to up the kill counts via bursts as it is good fun with the guildies so that will be a painful thing to give up by switching from a single-target run arm (choices-choices)...

[Singular]

Singular, With the GC when mobs are close, have you tried "targeting" the floor (mouse-look the reticule to your feet, the mobs feet, or maybe the center of your BB)? If quick-mouse-look-floor-targeting on the rune arm works for close up making it also viable when BBing a pack of mobs or when mobs circle you that would be huge to know... That & not getting a huge drop off between Tier 3 charge and Tier 5 charge may actually be a benefit for a solo Artie that needs to stay on the move against a group of mobs. When solo'ing with my force rune arm I often don't have the luxury to stay still long enough to charge past 3 as I am typically kiting through BBs and moving to keep the mobs lined up for 'Improved Precise Shot'.

I think that works - when I jump out from the skele mobs, I fire at the ground, hitting all of them.

Thx Singular for the testing and feedback. I knocked out Tier 1 & Tier 2 of the Glass Cannon Rune Arm but unfortunately I am still only level 23 & can't actually test... I do a lot of solo'ing and currently full Force speced as I only have Lucid Dreams (all I have had since level 19) & have a little in Fire for the occasional Flame Turret. I like the idea of keeping a Force arm for single target and a good AOE Force based option & the synergy with physical/untyped BB, Tac-Det, Boulder-Toss, Wild-Shots, etc... I also ground out Tier 1 & Tier 2 of the SpyGlass Trinket which I prioritize over the Rune Arm as it helps me be a better EE trap-meister for my guildies & because I really need spot when I solo (& I want the stacking UMD) & it boosts my int (dont have a planar trinket yet).

The AOE may be a good for me when solo'ing (I solo a lot) and if that works I am going to see if I can learn to easily target the floor when BBing a group of mobs. Unfortunately with my work schedule I am not sure I will have enough time to upgrade the Spyglass to Tier 3 let alone the Rune Arm to Tier 3 but I am glad I at least have both at Tier 2 now...

The spyglass is much more important, with its slot. The tier 3 rune arm is barely an upgrade (yellow slot + 6 kinetic spell power).

EDIT:
Thanks for the additional input. Much of my group play is EH running guildies through flagging quests or what not so this is great to know... Most are fast paced melee'ers (they all have alt-itus so there are many to flag) & though I contribute some on DPS I think they like more that I do all the trapping & can buff everyone with most everything (& the buffs last 20 mins) & that I can rez our healer when he goes down as well as off heal via scrolls when we are separated... Your tips help me contribute more & that is appreciated! I do enjoy trying to time the last shot with my rune arm to up the kill counts via bursts as it is good fun with the guildies so that will be a painful thing to give up by switching from a single-target run arm (choices-choices)...

It sounds like you know what you're doing!

Our builds sound pretty similar, actually - fully force specked, buffs, tac/det, bb, switching rune arms to max damage output/mob. Nice!

Update: tried out Glass Cannon in GH flagging quests, EH with a fast group of melee. Yes, it works well, getting all the barrels and doing AOE damage. Oddly, the winter wolves are not taking extra damage from fire. Not sure what is up with that.

Oh, and there's a bug right now that if you start shooting one mob, its friends won't notice. So it walks toward you, suicidally, like if you bluffed it. When soloing, I've been drawing one mob to me and killing it - but the Glass Cannon screws that up.

[Nodoze]

I think that works - when I jump out from the skele mobs, I fire at the ground, hitting all of them. ... It sounds like you know what you're doing!

Our builds sound pretty similar, actually - fully force specked, buffs, tac/det, bb, switching rune arms to max damage output/mob. Nice!
...

Thanks for trying the floor targeting and reporting back (the grind to 24 is almost over on my Artie so I look forward to trying the GC myself).

Thanks for the complement (aw, shucks) though unfortunately I only know what I have access to (mainly Force rune arms)... This Alt is my first Artificer & I am enjoying the Flexibility so much he is becoming my "new main" (thanks CThruTheEgo & wax_on_wax_off for posting their Artie builds)... In our static party on "my old main" I am the healer/divine buffer so it is habit to buff everyone after rests & to auto-scan the parties red bars and scroll heal/rez when needed. I am wiki/forum researcher at heart (I leveraged CThru's & Wax's sharing of experiences & mainly copied C's 007 build) so much of what I share I frankly initially learned in other threads (I remember a lot of what I read) before trying it myself.

Speaking of being a researcher, I updated the "Maximizing Rune Arm DPS thread" with your findings (& gave you credit).

I am watching the debate regarding Force vs Elemental Rune Arms with interest. I leveled up with pretty much only Force arms (including both DDO Store ones) & like that they target will saves & pretty much damage everything & love the homing tab-targeting but I don't have a way to contrast/compare DPS as I don't really have any high level elemental rune arms (yet)... I was hoping to get Toven's at some point but maybe the GC will be my AOE option instead and allow me to stay max Force & keep using the Force for pretty much everything... It looks like I will likely get the elemental ones from GH so maybe I can do some testing/comparisons myself then.

[Loriac]

I am watching the debate regarding Force vs Elemental Rune Arms with interest. I leveled up with pretty much only Force arms (including both DDO Store ones) & like that they target will saves & pretty much damage everything & love the homing tab-targeting but I don't have a way to contrast/compare DPS as I don't really have any high level elemental rune arms (yet)... I was hoping to get Toven's at some point but maybe the GC will be my AOE option instead and allow me to stay max Force & keep using the Force for pretty much everything... It looks like I will likely get the elemental ones from GH so maybe I can do some testing/comparisons myself then.

There is no contest. Elemental wins hands down. The only reason (imo) that people are wedded to the idea of force is because of blade barrier, tac det, and prismatic. Even though tac det and prismatic are not really good 'damage' nukes as the spellpoint cost:damage ratio is very poor. Even BB tends to be rarely used as you get into epic levels, unless you're solo'ing and kiting mobs through it.

Elemental is much higher dps against mobs that are not immune/resistant to the given type.

This probably isn't the right thread for the discussion however, so I won't go into it here (some of my earlier posts probably indicate my views on this topic however).

[CThruTheEgo]

Updated the OP with U17 gear setup and respecced to force/acid. Having tried some of the new rune arms, it looks like endgame arti's still only have a choice between force or acid. The inherent corrosion on Corruption of Nature makes it the highest dps rune arm. You could red slot 114 spell power for a different element, but then you are giving up potential damage on the crossbow. I intend to slot good bypass on the Needle to make it an all-purpose rune arm.

Sorry I haven't been keeping up with the discussion, real life has kept me busy.

Are you wearing a potency item? I'd expect the force damage to be scaled down vs fire, so its possible that you're seeing similar numbers because the higher base fire damage is offset by the lower potency spellpower vs. lower force base damage / higher impluse spellpower.

I believe you are correct about this. The fire damage is consistently a little lower than the blunt. +1 for the catch.

I see this rune arm being a useful contribution to Epic Normal and Hard content where the artie is content to play support to a fast paced melee group. In such cases, you'd be able to contribute overall damage to groups, making it easier for the melee to kill each mob. In EE, it's probably better to stick with single target rune arms so as to avoid aggro and disturbing whatever CC the party is using.

I would agree with this. And another good summary Singular, thank you and +1. I just began leveling FotW so I haven't tried boulder toss yet, but I'm looking forward to it.

have a little in Fire for the occasional Flame Turret.

I don't believe any kind of spell power affects the turret, since it is a summon, not a direct damage spell.

I am watching the debate regarding Force vs Elemental Rune Arms with interest. I leveled up with pretty much only Force arms (including both DDO Store ones) & like that they target will saves & pretty much damage everything & love the homing tab-targeting but I don't have a way to contrast/compare DPS as I don't really have any high level elemental rune arms (yet)... I was hoping to get Toven's at some point but maybe the GC will be my AOE option instead and allow me to stay max Force & keep using the Force for pretty much everything... It looks like I will likely get the elemental ones from GH so maybe I can do some testing/comparisons myself then.

I'm glad to hear the discussions have been useful Nodoze.

Loriac is mostly correct in his response to this, with some limitations. It's not really ANY element, it's force vs acid, specifically Corruption of Nature. Force does have excellent synergy with an arti's main offensive spells and I think it is definitely worth it to at least go 7/1/1 in force. But now that I actually have a Corruption of Nature, I am a convert. The inherent corrosion makes it do much more damage than any force rune arm. I suppose if you were to slot impulse in the helm slot (not a good slot because it competes with the dragon helm now) or ring slot then that might put force ahead. As mentioned above, I would hate to put it in a red slot on the crossbow.

With Corruption, 3 of the 5 shots almost always hit and 2 usually end up circling around the target. I never see this behavior with force rune arms, unless the mob dies before all 5 shots hit it. But even with 2 of the acid shots consistently missing, they do as much damage as all 5 of the force shots. Which means that when 4 or 5 of the acid shots hit, it does considerably more damage than the force rune arms.

I don't think any of the other elements will even come close to force or acid. As mentioned previously in the thread, Toven's is useless at endgame because of high reflex saves. Given the significant number of saves I noticed with the Glass Cannon's fire damage, I'm assuming that new rune arms did not get an upgrade to their saves. Which means that Arcing Sky is also useless.

Chill of Winter only fires 4 shots and has no inherent cold spell power, which means you'd have to slot it somewhere to even hope that the damage would come close to Corruption. As Singular has mentioned, I think Chill of Winter will be situationally useful against mobs that are weak against cold.

Corruption of Nature wins out against Turmoil Within because of the inherent corrosion. It's true that Turmoil has slots to offer, but slots are not in short supply anymore, so I'd be surprised if anyone was using it for that purpose. Plus you'd then have to slot corrosion somewhere to bring its damage up to Corruption's.

So we've essentially gotten a couple of situational rune arms: Glass Cannon and Chill of Winter. But the main dps choice is still between Corruption of Nature vs the force rune arms. I'm considering this with endgame in mind, so if you're only concerned with EN, and maybe some EH, you can afford to be a lot more flexible.

[Loriac]

Afaik, its not just about raw spellpower with force runearms. I recall an adjustment was stated to have been put in that scaled the overall benefit from spellpower for runearms by 50-80%, with the exact scaling varying by runearm. There was some conjecture on the forums as to what this meant, but I think the common understanding was that force was most likely getting 50% benefit, whilst the top elemental runearms were getting 80%.

This means that force will never 'catch up' with elemental lines.

There are also some question marks in my mind about what the best force runearm actually is. I found archaic delivered consistently better damage than lucid, but maybe thats because I wasn't being distracted by a huge ugly psionic bug on my arm when using it...

I agree that reflex makes Toven's a poor choice for endgame content (especially with eGH mob saves ramped up, as feared during the Lammania discussions), but its interesting to note that at the levels where it was usable (say around the Amrath quests), it was much, much better than either Lucid or Glorious Obscenity. Its a shame that there is no acid or cold equivalent that targets fort saves imo.

I've said it before: I think the force line feels 'instinctively' right for the artificer, but once you drop the attachment to casting 'damage' spells from your blue bar, spec'ing into an elemental line purely for the use of a specific runearm makes perfect sense. At the moment, only acid runearms are good enough for this commitment, but if/when new runearms are introduced that use other elements (most likely cold, though I think a sonic runearm would be a great addition) that can't be evaded, it will make sense for artificers to review their force investment on a total damage output basis rather than lingering attachment to spells that were useful during heroic levels.

[CThruTheEgo]

Afaik, its not just about raw spellpower with force runearms. I recall an adjustment was stated to have been put in that scaled the overall benefit from spellpower for runearms by 50-80%, with the exact scaling varying by runearm. There was some conjecture on the forums as to what this meant, but I think the common understanding was that force was most likely getting 50% benefit, whilst the top elemental runearms were getting 80%.

This means that force will never 'catch up' with elemental lines.

I do recall reading about the scaling in the release notes but never noticed any testing of it. Given the synergy, lack of resistance, etc., it would make sense that force would receive less benefit.

There are also some question marks in my mind about what the best force runearm actually is. I found archaic delivered consistently better damage than lucid, but maybe thats because I wasn't being distracted by a huge ugly psionic bug on my arm when using it...

I have used both quite a bit and never noticed a difference between the two, but also didn't do any actual testing to compare.

I agree that reflex makes Toven's a poor choice for endgame content (especially with eGH mob saves ramped up, as feared during the Lammania discussions), but its interesting to note that at the levels where it was usable (say around the Amrath quests), it was much, much better than either Lucid or Glorious Obscenity. Its a shame that there is no acid or cold equivalent that targets fort saves imo.

When I was maxing out my favor Toven's was essentially the only rune arm I used. It was fantastic for steam rolling through lower level content. As much as I hate to admit it, it makes sense that there is not an endgame AoE rune arm that targets fort or will saves. I'm not saying I don't want one or that I wouldn't use it if it were available, but it would be a bit overpowered.

I've said it before: I think the force line feels 'instinctively' right for the artificer, but once you drop the attachment to casting 'damage' spells from your blue bar, spec'ing into an elemental line purely for the use of a specific runearm makes perfect sense. At the moment, only acid runearms are good enough for this commitment, but if/when new runearms are introduced that use other elements (most likely cold, though I think a sonic runearm would be a great addition) that can't be evaded, it will make sense for artificers to review their force investment on a total damage output basis rather than lingering attachment to spells that were useful during heroic levels.

I agree with the value of going acid spec, but I disagree that the damage spells become useless at endgame. I play my arti very much as a caster and still get a lot of use out of the spells in EE Gianthold. You can't be as careless as you can in less demanding content, but that is true for any class.

[voodoogroves]

I have an Archaic Device that I put on when my Corruption of Nature puts up blanks because I'm fighting an acid immune mob. I also carry a Tira's Splendor and (for the hell of it) a Hand of the Tombs - but I rarely use either of those.

I did make a Glass Cannon, mostly because I want to try melee a bit. None of the arms aim well in melee for me, but I can aim that at the ground and get some results. I've not finished the LR yet to really try the melee thing out, and may drop back to ranged regardless if it doesn't work well.

Corruption is still my go-to rune-arm.

[Singular]

I would agree with this. And another good summary Singular, thank you and +1. I just began leveling FotW so I haven't tried boulder toss yet, but I'm looking forward to it.

Thanks - you too.

You will love boulder toss. I just saw my highest crit to date with it - 6500+ damage. It synergies with Glass Cannon nicely, b/c of the kinetic lore (as do all the high level artie damage spells). I intend to keep boulder toss as a twist - every 15 seconds, it adds 1500+ hp damage or an insta-kill, depending. Quite a nice dps booster!

FotW is actually my preferred ED for arties so far. I haven't yet tried Draconic or Magister, but the high hp and massive Xbow damage output is very nice - at tier 5, I was seeing 1000+ crits and you get a new (almost) auto-crit every 10 seconds + 7 free ones.

Re: Lucid Dreams vrs Archaic Device

My experience mirrors Loriac's. The symbiote is yucky. I mean, uh, the damage is lower. Using LD, I mostly see hits in the 100+ range and one or two crits. Archaic device is consistently 200+ and crits, averaging between 1200-1800 damage per group-shot (or per 6 seconds). I'm maxed out in force and wearing Flawless Blue Dragon Armor and Helm, plus anywhere between 0-30 extra spell power + max and emp always on.

Re: Toven's.

I picked this up in my 20's and found it utterly useless. I secondarily specked out for it (lightning is 7/4/4 or something) and find it useless regardless. It does around 600 pts damage or so - I was really disappointed with Toven's and think I'm going to respeck for Acid and try out the whole Corruption of Nature that Loriac and you tell me works well .

Although...part of me wants to boost my Xbow damage through Human Versatility and artie enchancement boosts and then try to beat the 1000 k crits in FotW... I mean, I've been doing very well just force specked. Why bother with other enhancement lines if I don't have a Corruption of Nature? I guess I could try it out for each of the GH rune arms and report back with how well they work. Right now, they're just taking up inventory space

[Loriac]

I think how much you can spend ap wise on elemental lines is dependent on your race choice. Warforged have about 26 free ap after what I'd consider 'essentials' to be spent on a combination of force and other lines. HElves have less because they will typically spend ap on their dilettante feat (say 6ap) as well as spend more on things like human versatility, and probably also the 2nd +1 attribute (most WF will not spend 4ap for the 2nd +1 Con).

This means a HElf may struggle to have 7/1/1 in force and one elemental line, whereas a WF can get to say 7/5/5 and 7/1/1 (or, as I had on my build, 7/1/1 x 2, 6/1/1 x1).

The HElf variant on the max'd Int caster/ranged arty probably should focus a bit more on the xbow, and spec for sneak attack damage and the precision feat. For them, it makes sense to go to FotW (which I agree by the way makes a very good but slightly left-field arty option), and possibly to restrict ap spend on force. Their overall damage will be equivalent to the WF arty, but more will come from the xbow than the runearm (relative to the WF).

The WF meanwhile should definitely spec either 7/5/5 force + 7/1/1 elemental (or vice-versa depending on how much you look to your blue bar for damage vs. your runearm, with spells for cc).

Before I played around with the ap spend, I used to buy the common line that HElves are higher 'dps' for arties, but I've now come to the conclusion that whilst they gain on SA damage on their xbow, they lose the high end runearm ability that a WF can afford to have. Its basically a wash between the two races, and which is best is dependent on your playstyle (however, from a pure 'by-the-numbers' approach, its almost impossible now to argue anything other than WF being the no 1 choice for an arty).