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  • posted a message on The "I Don't Have High DPS But I Wanna Feel Useful" Build
    Just tried out Mass Confusion: Mass Hysteria in place of Horrify and I like it. Horrify is good in that it's cd is obviously way shorter than MC, but the overal benefits of MC seem to outweigh it by a lot. Getting a lot of "Killed XX in one blow" notes too when walking into a room of skeletons.

    I'm missing my Sycophants, but SV is paying dividends. Just need more res gear and LoH to really make this build shine. Though really, I wish I had the dps gear and go back to dpsing lol.
    Posted in: Witch Doctor: The Mbwiru Eikura
    So, I've been starting to push into Act III co-op now and have not been lucky with gear drops, don't play enough to ride the AH's and haven't been successful with AH sales/not doing it right or whatever. Anyway, with all this in mind, and seeing how there only seems to be the tanks or the glass-cannons, I wanted to create a build for cc's and overall damage reduction; basically a support build. Works best obviously in a group where you do have both a tank (or two) and a glass cannon (or two)!Zeh!caaZZZ

    The Breakdown:

    Poison Darts: Snake to the Face. It's a pretty obvious spammer to go for. Works a treat on elites/champs especially the electric ring casting guys from the middle of act ii onwards. Has great interplay with Hex too. I've been able to solo an elite (just the elite) or even two champs at a time and keep at least one just about perma-stunned if not both.

    Grasp of the Dead: Unbreakable Grasp. Great way for the glass-cannons to fire off big nukes on a host of enemies in one go. Great for tanks to keep things all together. Great for us for kiting possibilities. One thing I do often find myself doing, is dropping GotD and then Horrifying in the middle. It buys your tank some respite, but doesn't make them all disappear out of tanks'/G-C's AoE abilities.

    Spirit Walk: Jaunt. Self explanitory. Get outta jail free card. Movement speed is great, as is dropping any snares on you. Also allows you to tank mobs for a few extra seconds, maybe waiting for Horrify to come back off CD. Could change this out for Healing Journey for a soft heal.

    Horrify: Stalker. Contemplating a swap between this and Frightening Aspect for the armour. Situational use, and as I said above, good interplay with GotD. Again, it's another form of CC for damage prevention/reduction, and the movement speed is great.

    Hex: Jinx. Having barely used Hex at all until I played around with this build, I'm finding it a whole lotta fun. I like how it will hex the target closest to you, which can lead to clever and timely hexxing opportunities. The Jinx is there obviously for increased damage against the target, and trying to burn down some of those elites/champs as quick as possible is always desired. This could be swapped out for Hedge Magic, again for a soft heal.

    Fetish Army: Devoted Following. These little guys are awesome and even in my normal dps build, I have them in the same place. Great way to prevent damage to the tank and if mobs are spreading out or heading to the G-C's, place yourself in the middle and these guys will round all the mobs up like a good sheepdog. The reduction in CD, coupled with the Tribal Rites passive, means they're up very often.

    Passives: Jungle Fortitude, Fetish Sycophants, Tribal Rites. Jungle is self-explanitory. Fetish Syco is a great way to buy your party some extra tanks. I'm nearly always running around with 2-3 of these guys following and again, helps reduce overall damage to the group. Tribal Rites is great for Fetish Army, but also works wonders for Hex. Assuming you use it on CD (which there's no reason not to), for that crossover time, you have two lil' piggies to shoot at.


    You're not dpsing (per se) and you're not tanking (per-se). You're keeping yourself alive to help keep everyone else alive. Balancing up these cooldowns, and chosing the right one for the occaision is crucial. You'll find yourself looking less at what enemies are and how big your crits are, but more at WHERE the enemies are in relation to your party. Glass-cannon's got a mob bee-lining straight to them (and they're freaking out at the prospect)? Throw a snake to it's face and save the G-C. Tank's biten off more than he can chew? Unleash some little devils or fear everything away for a few seconds.


    Well, as I said, if you're resorting to this build, you probably haven't been lucky with gear drops. That said though, if you want to make yourself useful, be able to put yourself in harms way when it's needed, then getting your resistence/vit up isn't such a bad way to start. As it stands on my character, i'm siting at just under 40k hp (way too much I know, but I can't get rid of it yet :( ) and about 400res. My dps stats are laughable, I think hovering between 15-20k (in Hell at times I think i was getting up to 25k+ but then no res.) and crit/AS/etc are nothing special. But that's the best thing about this build. You don't need high numbers to pull it off, and until they give WD's better options, this sort of a build will help you still feel useful. Since I've changed to this build for late act-ii and beginning into act-iii, I've found plenty of times where, though the other players mightn't know it, you've just saved the group by having that target hexxed, that one stunned, and those over there slowed. It kinda makes you feel like the bass-player in the band. Sure, you're not wowwing everyone with shredding guitar licks or making people screaming with your double kick peddle skills, you're the quiet one in the corner holding the whole band together. without you, the band would sound crap. You're the quiet achiever with the knowledge that you're flying this plane. And you sit in your corner and can't help but grin in this knowledge ;)

    EDIT: Oh, the only downside though is bosses that don't have adds...then you are basically useless. :S
    Posted in: Witch Doctor: The Mbwiru Eikura