Defiler newb Q - what heals the BOD?

[riftyman]

Hey There,

Just made a Defiler/Cab and played with it a bit. Fun so far, just learning to AOE solo with it for now, not healing others in a group.

1) What exactly heals the Beacon of Despair?
2) Should I use any of the 3 Link abilities? (I would guess not while soloing, but just want to make sure).
3) is Pain Transmission worth getting?
4) Is 61 points in defiler worth it?

Thanks!

[riftyman]

One more question.

Lets say your trying to (solo) defend against planar invasions (you know, those defend against 20 waves repeating quests).

So, at some point, you start getting more than 10 mobs coming in in big waves.

How do you manage which dots are on so many mobs at once? Is there a good approach to use when your surrounded by so many all at once?

Thanks again.

[Redcruxs]

1) The mechanic of defiler is such that (if you spec right) your damaging abilities will have a chance at applying a stack of the delayed heal foul growth onto the target of your links. the chance of applying a stack of FG is twice the amount of the link, aka a 20% link has a 40% chance of getting a FG per attack/spell you do. The FG's stack up to a maximum of 3, they don't do any heals untill the stacks expire either through running out of time or being forced to expire by an ability that says it triggers FG stacks to heal.

now your beacon has a link automatically on it for 50% of the damage, so every time you cast a spell/attack there is a 100% chance of applying a FG stack to it. now in order to actually trigger the FG stacks to heal the beacon you need to cast a heal on it to trigger them.

also, if you spec right every time you cast a heal your link damage shield will be automatically refreshed making it impossible to die from link damage if you are casting heals regularly.

2) if you are in a group, always use all your links, its up to you how you want to distribute the links to provide the most benefit to your party. I like to put my strongest link on the tank, 2nd on the healer, then on the melee dps, then ranged last. This makes my FG's stack up on them automaticaly which I can pop all at once with an AoE heal any time i want to help out the healer.

3) pain transmission is only good if you are in a group, it spawns a "soul drain" aoe around each member that you have linked. (including your beacon and yourself) if you are standing in melee range and have all 4 links on melee party members (and have beacon up in melee range) then pain transmission is one of the strongest abilities in the game.

4) up to you really, if you are going for maximum support with dps then go 61. if you are trying to be mainly a healer 40 is enough, but 61 works also. if you are solo'ing then it doesn't really matter but 61 will definately work.

[Redcruxs]

One more question.

Lets say your trying to (solo) defend against planar invasions (you know, those defend against 20 waves repeating quests).

So, at some point, you start getting more than 10 mobs coming in in big waves.

How do you manage which dots are on so many mobs at once? Is there a good approach to use when your surrounded by so many all at once?

Thanks again.

talking about cab or defiler?

its hard to say really, you just have to know how your abilities synergize and you can figure out a rough estimate of your dots. you don't have to have all your dots on every enemy to be effective

drop beacon (and keep it healed). use your tryanny of death on one mob and spread it with a bound fate, pop it with disentigration and repeat. other cabalist dot's can hit 8 nearby mobs so you only need to worry about one mob, the damage will spead itself if you use the right abiltities.

defiler dots can be spread with an ability but it only spreads to 5 mobs so don't worry about it

[riftyman]

This helps a ton, thank you! I am enjoying the new build.

[riftyman]

Sometimes the mobs attack me instead of the BOD.

How do you avoid this?
How do you get the mob to aggro back to the BOD pet after it starts attacking you?

Thanks again

[marobi]

3) pain transmission is only good if you are in a group, it spawns a "soul drain" aoe around each member that you have linked. (including your beacon and yourself) if you are standing in melee range and have all 4 links on melee party members (and have beacon up in melee range) then pain transmission is one of the strongest abilities in the game.

Pain Transmission is still a strong ability if you are solo. Stay close to your beacon during AOE or even if killing one mob drastically reduces the time to kill a mob. Figure two hits on a single mob and up to 6 hits (assuming 6 mobs) if doing AOE. Hits like a truck no matter how you use it. Much harder than Somatic Desecration.

You'll have to min/max your rotation through experience to know. I normally get all my bonds and DOTS/delayed, on my pulls (use Unholy Nexus if needed) make sure I am close to beacon and then pain suppression before a Bound Fate spam which usually isn't required by the time everything explodes or expires.

Your experience may differ and playing Defiler isn't for everyone. There are lots of DoT/Delayed and debuffs to manage. If you're grouped you will be managing your DPS, your Health, others health if you're needed for heal support and pay attention to what you're doing. It's a busy Soul, which I like. You may not.

[Redcruxs]

Sometimes the mobs attack me instead of the BOD.

How do you avoid this?
How do you get the mob to aggro back to the BOD pet after it starts attacking you?

Thanks again

while the Beacon is up all the aggro you generate is instead generated by the beacon. however, when the dies or is resummoned all that aggro that it had is transfered back to you (i think)

so basically don't let the beacon die and if it does and you have to resummon it then you'll have to do a lot of DPS in order for the mob to get back on the beacon.

[riftyman]

Wow your not kidding about being a busy soul. I just tried support/healing for a 5 man and was so preoccupied with all my buttons and timers that it was really hard to also think about boss mechanics.

I LOVE the spike AOE damage on this though. I will keep playing with it more from a solo or IA type of player I guess. I just cant see trying to juggle this many balls healing a 5 man.

Maybe with macros or a lot pf practice it gets easier...

Thanks for all the valuable info guys!

[Redcruxs]

Wow your not kidding about being a busy soul. I just tried support/healing for a 5 man and was so preoccupied with all my buttons and timers that it was really hard to also think about boss mechanics.

I LOVE the spike AOE damage on this though. I will keep playing with it more from a solo or IA type of player I guess. I just cant see trying to juggle this many balls healing a 5 man.

Maybe with macros or a lot pf practice it gets easier...

Thanks for all the valuable info guys!

even though you have a buff for healing or damage, you should probably only try and focus on one thing at a time

first practice just doing DPS, maybe popping an aoe heal if needed (61 defiler)

then practice just doing healing, no damage spells required (40 defiler/ 26 sent or puri or warden)

then you'll get a good grasp of how to mix and match the two options. trying to do too many things at once, simultanious dps/healing, will only mean you're doing nothing to help the group.

[Alessar]

The thing to keep in mind is that Defiler plays one way at low point #s, such as the 15 points that are suggested in the Ritualist premade, vs a deep build.

In the low point variants there are no automatic castings of Husk of Indifference on yourself or of Foul Growth onto the beacon. Thus, a Cabalist using a few points in Defiler for a minipet must actively manage the healing; I can see why Ritualist purpose includes 2 points of Purifier. It's essential.

In that configuration you really need to keep Symbol of the Torch on your link, and maintain Husk of Indifference AND Symbol of the Torch on yourself, else the 50% damage redirection (which will be amplified and not mitigated by the higher talents in Defiler) will quickly overwhelm YOU. However, the BOD makes it possible to quickly spread Tyranny of Death and apply all the tricks in Cabalist's considerable arsenal to destroy a group (such as a planar invasion) relatively quickly.

Additionally you may need to target your BOD and actually heal it if there are too many things on it. It can get dicey. One little trick I've found though is that whatever is cast on the beacon remains with it when it's resummoned, though resummoning it is a full heal. A mid-fight resummon is a bad idea because it drops aggro and ALL the aggro seems to go back to its own and stay there, but after a fight a fresh Symbol on it persists when it's summoned onto the next group, saving you a cooldown and letting you start blasting away.

[PlagueSD]

Sometimes the mobs attack me instead of the BOD.

How do you avoid this?
How do you get the mob to aggro back to the BOD pet after it starts attacking you?

Thanks again

I believe there is a max range for threat transfer (I'm thinking 30m) I group alot with my friend who's running a tactician build. All he does is stay by my beacon and aoe. I run around and just DoT everything up. I've noticed a few times when I get too far from my beacon, I'll pull aggro instead of everything running to it.