MECHANICS OF AILMENTS EXPLAINED + example hybrid build (unfinished, 4mil crits, 178 done)
Ailment builds are by far the strongest builds in Wolcen. For some of those who had any success with them, they seem to be the only viable builds in Wolcen...;) Whether it is due to the fact that they are "broken" or that the other builds are vastly underpowered - is beyond the scope of this write-up. This is to clarify the mechanics of ailments for those who have trouble grasping this concept.
The WHAT and the WHY
Ailments are status effects you have a chance to apply on an enemy upon hitting them (or by a few other means). The difference between Wolcen and other aRPGs is that in Wolcen ailments stack, and the number of stacks sitting on an enemy at a given time influences various mechanics. Naked character will apply - if Ailment Chance roll is successful - 1 ailment stack with one hit up to the maximum of 10 stacks. Upon unlocking relevant passives from the Cabalist and Timeweaver tree, your character can apply up to 30 stacks of ailments of one type on one enemy, and apply multiple stacks with one hit. There are seven stackable types of ailments:
- Shock (from Lightning)
- Burn (from Fire)
- Bleeding (from Rend)
- Poison (from Toxic)
- Stasis (from Aether)
- Cursed (from Shadow)
- Weakened (from Sacred)
(On the margin, 1) the first four also deal DoT, 2) Stun in Freeze are omitted as they do not stack.)
So if you can apply ailments of all 7 types, it means you can potentially stack 30x7=210 stacks of ailments on one enemy. This multiplies damage enemies receive from skills such as Bleeding Edge and Bladestorm. Furthermore, killing an enemy with stacked ailments will activate a buff from the Cabalist passive Immortal Offering, multiplying your damage even further. This is a big part of the WHY. Now let's move on to...
The HOW
This is a quick checklist of the things every ailment build should do:
- take every node giving "+X Max Ailment Stacks" (Cabalist and Time Weaver trees)
- take every passive (main node) from Cabalist tree (except, optionally, Primordial Insights; it's not critical but it's also good as you will inevitably stack decent levels of DoTs as well)
- keep your Ailment Chance high through relevant bonuses (lack of which can be made up for by a small Wisdom dump - reluctantly - because full Ferocity dump is always best)
- take a skill as your main that has a modifier "Increasing damage per Ailment stack" (99% of the time - Bleeding Edge)
- take a variety of skills from different damage types that apply different ailments
- adjust flat damage bonuses on gear in accordance to the skills you chose
Now, that last thing often confuses many players. It's important to know that ailments are only applied by the skill's highest damage type (or two highest with Cabalist's Grievous Afflictions). This is important because many items have flat damage bonuses "X Damage added to Attacks" and "to Spells" which can contaminate ailments you want to apply with your skills. For example, Bulwark of Dawn with Sacred Grounds modifier deals Sacred Damage and applies Weakness by default. However, with too much "X Fire Damage to Spells," Fire value on Bulwark of Dawn will exceed Sacred, and it will no longer apply Weakness but Burn. By careful adjustment of flat damage bonuses to Attacks and to Spells on your gear, you make sure your skills consistently apply the variety of ailments you want them to apply - ideally all 7. It is especially important when you add Grievous Afflictions into the equation which adds another type of ailment to be applied by a skill's second highest damage value.
What's more, the damage type deciding what ailments your skills apply must come from the flat damage portion of the skill, not weapon damage. For example, let's say Bleeding Edge deals 250% weapon damage and 1000 Rend Damage. Only Rend will apply its ailment - Bleeding. Damage types included in the weapon damage portion will not apply their ailments through Bleeding Edge. Therefore, your weapon's base damage as well as gems (with X Damage added to Attacks) put on your weapon do not contribute to ailments (unless you wanna autoattack which - in Wolcen - you don't).
EXAMPLE BUILD
https://wolcen-universe.com/builds/Ox4pnO-elemental-be-ailment-hybrid-(work-in-progress)
Here's a build - work in progress - I've carried to lvl78, Expeditions 178 so far. It deals 4mil crits already with mediocre gear (first char with no crafting attempts yet, zero uniques and still a few yellows) and 5th skill slot still locked (only 6 stacks so far). It uses Consuming Embers and Thunderstrike for ailments of course but also for global dmg buffs which illustrates the importance of stacking flat damage from gear. These buffs from CE and Thunderstrikes contaminate all skills with Burn and Shock. But Shadow and Sacred to Spells on gear is high enough to exceed them and get applied very consistently.
The next step for the build will be getting the 7th ailment type which will empower the build a lot. The easiest solution at this point would be Toxic Emanation which does not work. Plagueburst is also problematic because it would require some Toxic to Spells to exceed the global Fire/Lightning buffs. Hope this illustrates the issue.
Thanks for reading. Please feel free correct if anything is wrong.
Replies: 11
Created: 4 years, 2 months ago
Category: Gameplay
