Mercenary skills

[Zenogs]

So not sure why devs even developed any skills for this class other then grenades and basic attack everything else is absolute trash. Would have been better if they made sword branch instead if this is best they managed XD Seriously Mashine guns skills deals 0 dmg, High end skills are all about falling from the sky randomly or need detonation. Why? For who? These kind of stupid ideas what ruined diablo all the dumb ass mechanics that nobody fcking asked for.

[Neithan]

Originally posted by we_are_ven0m:

Originally posted by Neithan:

Still campaign so dunno if it will carry into maps, but I have great fun and performance with Frag bolts from the beginning, tested out grenades but wanted to be a "Gunner" more than a grenade dispenser.

[snip]

Dunno how the "endgame meta/viability" will look like, but at least for campaign there is alot more than grenades to use as a Merc.

Elemental gunner builds do exist, but they take longer to kill big packs of enemies. I currently get up to around 50 million XP per hour using grenades as they even kill things that are not on the screen yet.

So viable yes, but much less efficient.

Only, I am not an elemental gunner, yes I utilize Glacial bolt for freeze, but mainly to synergize with the Frag rounds shatter-effect.
So for damage I go completely into physical, for poison and bleed.

So, it's a Physical Ailment Gunner with a touch of cold ;)

[ShivaFang]

the exploding fire shot is fine. Outperforms my grenades. The armour break shots are more utility than damage though.
I gave up on the overheating fire shot, just wasn't up to par for anything else..
Honestly most of the skills I use on 3 different characters are getting buffs... I'm unironically using crossbow skills, bone spells and chaos spells on different characters.

[mfish518]

Laughs in pure lightning build

[Volfuric]

i can't be the only one that refuses to use grenade builds just because everyone else does right??

[Zenogs]

Originally posted by 5ean5ean:

Originally posted by Zenogs:

Huh spark is plenty strong on itself XD You named the very skill I can use as example. Spark has plenty of damage and capability synergies make it even better, but in itself its good. The car analogy is weird it would require to have no engine or wheels to be accurate analogy, tho i don't think you would buy car like that.

Please just sit on your hands and let the adults talk. Everyone is telling you you're wrong yet here we thinking you know more and your not even in maps yet.

Making my head hurt.

You call yourself adult but make childish remarks from high horse. Why should I be in maps is that only time games enjoyable? People sharing their builds is not exactly saying i'm wrong. They just found different synergies, but none of them is as optimal as grenades because the skills are extremely under powered and very niche. And the skills they mention is mostly shotgun outside of grenades meaning as i stated 90% of skills could be out and no one even noticed.

[Overeagerdragon]

Originally posted by Volfuric:

i can't be the only one that refuses to use grenade builds just because everyone else does right??

I built mine like a machinegunner with a dash of shotgun for CQC... works like a charm

[p00se2]

Originally posted by 5ean5ean:

https://youtu.be/H0vul6HOTeo?si=B5xH28qa5zI7Lx3K

whats the gem setup on this ?

[Bjornn "Boxy" Steeleye]

running the shotgun with ice shards build so far and its been doing great. threw in Contagion for some early level aoe mob clear and it does work until i pick up poison herald, so it can spread the poison from the shotgun rounds to everything instead and aoe break all the armor.
anything that survives that, typically bosses or elites, get clips of overpen rounds for constant bleeding, high damage, and high stagger damage. and this is only at level 31 going gemling so i can use any support gem and a ton of benefits from stats.

at the start the merc feels clunky and you dont have the support gems to make most of the skills worth it, if its your first character, but man it starts to ramp up pretty quick specially if once you get the 30% reload speed node.

[Tomuto]

the merc grenade build is completely unuasble in the end game. I am level 91 and I cannot even move the t18 map bosses hp bars from full hp or break their energy shields because the damage is so weak. my friend is monk with HOWA and he killls any boss in 15 seconds, its making me want to quit :/

[p00se2]

Originally posted by Tomuto:

the merc grenade build is completely unuasble in the end game. I am level 91 and I cannot even move the t18 map bosses hp bars from full hp or break their energy shields because the damage is so weak. my friend is monk with HOWA and he killls any boss in 15 seconds, its making me want to quit :/

yeh
its the elemental damage
as most bosses have no resistances of any kind
but they have like a million armor reducing physical damage to negative zero

any high end merc xbow gonna cost 100-200 div
when a bad monk staff for a few div can reach 100k+ dps easy

[Revolver Foxelot]

You're doing something wrong with your passive tree pathing or you're lacking the proper gear.

My SSF lvl 90 Gemling Legionnaire has finished all ascendancies and I don't use grenades.

[Carian Champion]

Originally posted by Revolver Foxelot:

You're doing something wrong with your passive tree pathing or you're lacking the proper gear.

My SSF lvl 90 Gemling Legionnaire has finished all ascendancies and I don't use grenades.

can i see your build and weapon?

[p00se2]

Originally posted by Revolver Foxelot:

You're doing something wrong with your passive tree pathing or you're lacking the proper gear.

My SSF lvl 90 Gemling Legionnaire has finished all ascendancies and I don't use grenades.

what do you use


show gear / skill tree ty

[swim]

I have grenades on mouse 1 mouse e and mouse 3 and I've basically walked through the game lol

[NotxEevee]

Originally posted by Zenogs:

my normal shot is 3k dmg galvanic shard 300 XD it ain't much of discution XD

The DPS for Galvanic seems to show damage per projectile. Since it can shotgun (multiple projectiles can hit the same target), it deals much more actual dps than what is shown. Plus the beam has an innate chain, so you can skip that support to clear groups.
With the proper supports, it's one of the best skills for mapping in general.

I only optimized it as a shock source with Lightning Pen/Conduction/Fork on my witchhunter with Galvanic/Shockburst yet it still clears insanely well.