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Bunny Build for Hardcore, Reaper, and Epics
- Thread starter Careall
- Start date
Yea the meduim armor bonuses are nice but leaves out magical attacks and HCL is very difficult to get more than 100 MRR even at end game.
Failing on a 1 is half damage with Improved Evasion. So 50 MRR acts as 100 MRR.
You can carry a tower shield with you for traps too if you really want to better mitigate the damage with medium armor. I havent tested this yet though.
I was wondering if you were planning on taking Primal Avatar with DH. Im curious how the Dark Wolf will stack up to the Skele Knight!
Does Natural Evasion stack with Shadowdancers The Darkest Luck i wonder?
I have some testing to do too lol!
I've been running a test DH build on HC reaper runs, and now at level 11 - she hasn't died. Recently, I led a group through Slave Lords 1 and 2 doing the traps. If I caught the party-cleric's buffs, the Dark Wolf would spot the traps. I learned about this distinction nearly the hard way as I lagged right into a random set of 5 poison pressure plates. That was a close call with about 24 HP to spare before the cleric's heals started coming in. Being a bit more cautious through the rest of the quest, the traps were scarier than when I run through with a Bunny. However, despite a few more scratches, she made it through just fine.
So far, the build is just a 1/2Elf (Barb del) DH with a few points now in DWS. I am pleasantly surprised as to how well the tree does all on its own. Arrows have been my main problem: I didn't put anything in UMD for Flame Arrow wands and I haven't put AP into HW for summoning arrows. AA is not available unless I go through 1/2Elf tree. So, I've been buying and crafting tons of arrows. With ManyShot, she can pretty much take care of single Reapers or Champs. The snap trap is a nice touch of CC for one more dangerous enemy.
Basically, she's been working as a ranged aggro magnet and then a sniper to eliminate the more dangerous enemies on the battlefield.
Season IX Update:
I ended up running a Bunny variant this season for my main: 1/2 Elf Wizard 17 Fighter 3. She's the party's tank and rocks the role. We have (by design) a player running an Alchy. I intimidate the mobs and gather them together, the alchy tosses in some pots - inlcuding negative energy: I get heals and enemies get dead. It's a great combo - a sort of two-player build set. "Unimaginable Underelf" is now level 19 holding 20 with 9 RP.
I ran a farming Bunny Build, "Piketrain" ahead of Unimaginable to get her some sets from Slave Lords and Ravenloft. He hit 20, Heroic Reincarnated, and is now level 6 on his second life.
I ended up running a Bunny variant this season for my main: 1/2 Elf Wizard 17 Fighter 3. She's the party's tank and rocks the role. We have (by design) a player running an Alchy. I intimidate the mobs and gather them together, the alchy tosses in some pots - inlcuding negative energy: I get heals and enemies get dead. It's a great combo - a sort of two-player build set. "Unimaginable Underelf" is now level 19 holding 20 with 9 RP.
I ran a farming Bunny Build, "Piketrain" ahead of Unimaginable to get her some sets from Slave Lords and Ravenloft. He hit 20, Heroic Reincarnated, and is now level 6 on his second life.
EK/PM/HA is a very good hardcore build, albeit you have a a really good chance of walking into a Light crit at some point that one shots you. Stay away from the Vale of Twilight and your chances of a quick incineration go way down.
The new quest Catastrophe has Deific Vengeance. Sorry if thats a spoiler for some people lol.
I won't be running Running with the Devils because of that, but - yeah. However, I have noticed SSG seems to have capped runnaway champ damage for a lot of spells. Some other good examples were Polar Ray (Ice Flensers) , Cyclonic Blast (Thaarak Hound), Disintigrate (Beholders), and Searing Light (Ghaele Cleric). I noticed that Red and Purple bosses don't seem to spawn as champs any more: I could be wrong, but I've been trying to pay attention to prove the theory wrong. Also, the damage does seem to be capped. Epic exploding champ spiders (Red Rain) in R1 can kill a Bunny (Season VIII), but everything else is just soaked up.
PM builds can mitigate light damage by taking either of the two Core energy absorbtion options by eliminating the extra damage from being undead. Magus of the Eclipse's Mantle can further reduce light damage by 50%.
It almost feels like an attitude thing now. I just don't give traps and mobs a second thought: I run in and do what I need to do. Traps don't even seem to bother any more - hitting me less than they do the rogue with evasion. Mobs always attack regardless - even that lone archer that hasn't done any damage all combat and just watched all of his allies obliterated, including his commander. But he'll keep on shooting, perhaps thinking, "maybe I can still win this fight!" =)Careall, thank you for posting this build. It has gotten me further in Hardcore than any others I have tried. I got to Level 11 in game (not Pending) and the first tier favor prize before death (both firsts). Will keep toon and practice. First time doing a wizard that got off Korthos.
My advice is to start by relying on your skeleton pet - at least until level 7. There's a "All Hirelings Interact" keybinding option. I use that for early levels to send the skeletal knight and hire(s) to open doors or attack. Once you hit level 3, get Resist Energy and keep those up all the time. At level 7, that 20 points of energy DR is a life-saver.
Make sure your Lesser and Death Auras are always running when you're in combat. The trick is to have enough HP and damage mitigation so you survive a few hits until those tick again. When they tick, you'll want enough negative spell power and negative healing amp that a decent DA tick will almost heal half your HP or more. I never rely on LDA/DA doing damage, but they're good for that too.
Level 11 is your next power tier since your Resist Energy goes up to 30, which is better than House P buffs.
The last trick is how I ended up making this build: What killed me? How do I stop that from killing me next time?
What killed you at level 11?
DAVIDARCNO
Member
Running The Curse and the Captive Crustacean on elite, with all hierlings. Got into room with the crab and all of a sudden the mob was on me. Should be a Crab Boil Potion for that.
Oddly, the hirelings might have gotten you killed. Here's a Bunny build one HC season a while back, soloing Heroic Devil Assault on Elite. It's a level 18 quest, but you can only enter it in HC as a level 10 toon or less.Running The Curse and the Captive Crustacean on elite, with all hierlings. Got into room with the crab and all of a sudden the mob was on me. Should be a Crab Boil Potion for that.
I stopped using hirelings in that quest because they didn't contribute significantly enough to overcome the dungeon scaling. You do have to occasionally kite things, as I did in this video when a few unexpected things happened. IIRC, there was a champ fire elemental tossing some nasty fireballs, and my death auras had dropped! I also have an "Oh sh!t!" button that casts a Quickened Teleport to the Portable Hole.
Jump and balance are key secondary skills to Heal, Spellcraft, and Concentration - so you can get up quickly after being knocked down and can jump over mobs or out from when they dog pile on you. Getting Spring Attack or other leap ability is a good choice too, but you have to trade some stuff off to get those. Deep Gnome's Illusory Escape is a good option that will only cost a Feat (losing the Human bonus) and 2 AP.
Hotkey Negative Energy Burst for a quick heal when you've taken one too many hits.
DAVIDARCNO
Member
I did not get to watch the entire video, but I went in with a Level 15 Bunny Build, (Not the one I used in Hardcore, my regular). If I had not tried it I would never have believed this was possible. Again thanks for the build.Oddly, the hirelings might have gotten you killed. Here's a Bunny build one HC season a while back, soloing Heroic Devil Assault on Elite. It's a level 18 quest, but you can only enter it in HC as a level 10 toon or less.
I stopped using hirelings in that quest because they didn't contribute significantly enough to overcome the dungeon scaling. You do have to occasionally kite things, as I did in this video when a few unexpected things happened. IIRC, there was a champ fire elemental tossing some nasty fireballs, and my death auras had dropped! I also have an "Oh sh!t!" button that casts a Quickened Teleport to the Portable Hole.
Jump and balance are key secondary skills to Heal, Spellcraft, and Concentration - so you can get up quickly after being knocked down and can jump over mobs or out from when they dog pile on you. Getting Spring Attack or other leap ability is a good choice too, but you have to trade some stuff off to get those. Deep Gnome's Illusory Escape is a good option that will only cost a Feat (losing the Human bonus) and 2 AP.
Hotkey Negative Energy Burst for a quick heal when you've taken one too many hits.
It seems like about a year or so ago, SSG capped some spell damage cast by mobs. I am guessing the RNG for deciding champ mob stats might have left some champs with insane crit chances and damage. Without any crit caps, those made some quests unplayable without risking multiple deaths on a live server, let alone a complete SKIP on HCL. Spells like Polar Ray, Deific Vengeance, and Searing Light now feel like they've been capped and are no longer one-shot killers... unless you dump Con and Hit Points.EK/PM/HA is a very good hardcore build, albeit you have a a really good chance of walking into a Light crit at some point that one shots you. Stay away from the Vale of Twilight and your chances of a quick incineration go way down.
Now the things to watch out for are abilities that give you a visual clue warning, like red areas on the floor in Slave Lords part 3's final fight, Baba Lysaga's white floor circles in Raven's Bane, and Irk's targeting wind-up in Just Business' end fight. If you don't get out of the way of these in time, you're risking a one-shot death. Everything else seems to be generally sustainable for at least a few hits with enough HP and reduction/absorption.
Running Devil Assault heroic elite at level 10 on HCL requires preparation. I needed to farm some good gear and collect a few mana pots. When I was running it for folks to get their favor, I'd ask if they had extra mana pots to donate to the cause, which kept me running it a few times. Even in that video, there was a moment I was about to hit my Oh [****]! button (hot-keyed Quickened Teleport).I did not get to watch the entire video, but I went in with a Level 15 Bunny Build, (Not the one I used in Hardcore, my regular). If I had not tried it I would never have believed this was possible. Again thanks for the build.