An Impossible Build

[Bjond]

If you want a true challenge -- as in I doubt it can be done at all -- try to make a caster'ish "carry build". I usually play a carry build when PL'ing a character, but I like to pick a carry with a similar feel. It's easy for melee and ranged. I think it's not possible for a caster.

Ranged? 41 AP in INQ can carry anything. Melee? Qstaff, 5 levels of rogue, and thief-acrobat. The other levels could be completely unsuitable and you can still blow through R4 from zero to cap. It will be mediocre at cap, but the entire point is to maximize play and minimize rebuild+refarm on the TR cycle.

Ponder it; would be really curious if anyone can come up with something that uses less than the majority of 20 base levels, plays like a caster, and strolls through R4 solo in the epic levels (like INQ & Qstaff can); ie. it could use 6+6 levels with 8 for the "carried" class -- doesn't have to be a single class or any class at all if you think universal trees can cut it.

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I had hopes for Feydark Illusionist when it came out, but the tree is missing a spellbook and is rather cute but pathetic (it told me it dreams of becoming a real tree someday .. I told it those dreams were illusions).

I tried a short AOS on HC. It plays "OK" in heroic .. can kinda do R1 (not blow through as INQ & Stick can, but can do it), but it flops rather hard in Epic. This could be a gear issue (live chars get ideal/perfect gear every time, HC gets creative motley). Still, both INQ & Stick on HC were much MUCH stronger in bad gear.

 

[Grunndi]

AoS seems the obvious choice to me since you can still get your full power Eldritch Blast. Haven’t played it personally but this Feydark based version seems your best bet.

https://forums.ddo.com/index.php?threads/warlock-for-past-lives.9840/

Obviously casters lose a lot more from a short split since they lose high level spells and caster levels, so leveraging universal/racial/epic SLAs seem like how you have to do it.

 

[droid327]

I would doubt that any caster could be made Epic R4-compatible without things like L9 spells and capstones. Casting just doesnt scale into Epic like martial builds do. A martial build will still be using the same buttons they got at L1-6...casters in Epic will use almost none of the offensive spells they had before L12

As you point out, there is no viable "universal" casting tree, and it wouldnt really matter if there were, because enhancements for casters in Epic are more about boosting their L9 and Destiny/capstone attacks, not providing viable attacks themselves.

And Destinies do not provide enough buttons for a complete rotation...you might be able to get by with some kinda Draconic/Primal/EA or Machro or Magus mix with an Epic Strike with the secondary SLAs, plus Ruin/Gruin...but idk what you'd use to actually level to cap.

Ponder it; would be really curious if anyone can come up with something that uses less than the majority of 20 base levels, plays like a caster, and strolls through R4 solo in the epic levels

AoS seems the obvious choice to me since you can still get your full power Eldritch Blast. Haven’t played it personally but this Feydark based version seems your best bet.

You wont be able to take the Epic Blast and Epic Pact feats without 12 AotS levels. Its a big frustration that they added the new class that's specifically designed to let you use EB with other classes, but then arbitrarily prevented them from doing it past L20.

Lots of people have been asking for the prereq on those Epic Feats to change to "12 Warlock levels or Ultimate Pact Attunement"

 

[Enoach]

Unlike melee and range focus, caster power scales in two ways. Caster Level and Spell Level.

Limiting any caster class to 6 or fewer levels limits spells to level 3 Spells tops.

Now if the feat Practiced Spell Caster was introduced it could help resolve the Caster Level aspect of spells, but still leaves the Spell Levels available as a problem.

Even Warlock would have difficulty keeping up with damage output being the primary from Pact without supplementing it with Range/Melee options.

Current mechanics it comes down to CL and SL being the limiting factor which goes with Caster Multiclassing being the hardest tradeoffs.

 

[Grunndi]

You wont be able to take the Epic Blast and Epic Pact feats without 12 AotS levels. Its a big frustration that they added the new class that's specifically designed to let you use EB with other classes, but then arbitrarily prevented them from doing it past L20.

Lots of people have been asking for the prereq on those Epic Feats to change to "12 Warlock levels or Ultimate Pact Attunement"

I actually didn’t know that, hmmm, learn something new every day. Never done a low split warlock, but I’ve done a fair few AoS 18/1/1 for PLs.

And yes that alternate prerequisite would be very useful.

 

[droid327]

Never done a low split warlock

8 Aco/2 FvS/10 XXX is crazy, stupid, insanely good for Heroic PLs. Just absolutely devours every major quest (except the Sharn one with all the Iron Golems ugh lol)