Spear build suggestions?

[Archaick]

I'm looking for any decent spear build suggestions. I've looked on youtube, but it seems a lot of them are pretty old. I'm not sure if there have been updates or anything to mess up the builds I've seen so I'm wondering if anyone had anything more recent.

[Cleric]

It's basically just a regular warfare build with caveats:
1.) No shields, no bouncing shield
2.) No Polymorph - you can't use tentacle lash effectively because it scales with strength.

Level primarily finesse, strength as you need to effectively wear heavy armor (14 STR max by Act 4). Once finesse is max and you have your strength and memory; level wits for crit chance.
Level primarily warfare then two handed. No other ability benefits a spear. You could put 1 point into huntsman for First Aid (A spell that levels with Finesse and character level), maybe a second point for Tactical Retreat which is better than Phoenix Dive. Can throw a couple points into necro for self-healing and Living Armor synergy.
Talents are the same as a regular warfare build: Executioner, Opportunist, Hothead/Living Armor, etc.

You've only got a couple weapon skills to work with:
Crippling Blow: Deals 15% more damage than regular attacks.
Whirlwind: 100% weapon damage.
Battering Ram: Movement, only 50% of weapon damage.
Ground Slam: Cone, 60% weapon damage.
Blitz Attack: 2 enemies, 70% weapon damage.
Onslaught: 5 attacks, 1 enemy, 50% damage ea (250% total)

You can take 1 poly for Bull Horns since that skill uses your weapon damage as opposed to strength stat (Tentacle Lash is a spell scaling off Strength), and gain Chicken Claw and Chameleon Cloak if you need them for whatever reason.

Your heaviest non-source hit will be crippling blow. Use it as soon as you can so you get as many uses out of it as possible. Use Blitz/Battering as movement. You have decent weapon range, making whirlwind and crippling bow much much easier to use.
Onslaught will be your burst hit. If you're an elf, make sure to use your racial skill first so you can get Crippling Blow and Onslaught off in the same turn with a damage boost.

Thick of the Fight and Challenge are good buffs. If you take 1 pyro, you can bring Peace of Mind and Haste for additional buffs. If the enmies are out of reach and you're out of their reach, take the turn to buff up and let them come to you. You need to save AP for when enemies are in range.

The only benefit spears have over anything else is their range (which isn't much in the grand scheme of things). They show up less in loot tables, have fewer useful uniques, lower damage than equivalent strength weapons. You have the least access to effective skills. Fextralife made a build that utilizes a bow and swaps between the two - better than a straight spear user but objectively worse than a straight bow user (mostly due to the AP you need to spend swapping weapons rather than dealing damage).

[Archaick]

Well ♥♥♥♥ :-( seems like spear got shafted in this game...

[EolSunder]

yea i don't see any benefit to a spear really, finesse builds usually do best with either an archer, or a dagger using combat thief who both use finesse, and neither of them has spear as a primary weapon, or really need a spear at all due to a bow build, or a dual dagger build being better.

The only thing unique would be a warrior spear using finesse build i guess, but even that will be weaker than a strength based build due to lower strength = lower carry. A spear build would be great in the game if they made it so you could fight with the spear, or "throw" the spear, which would magically return, and maybe make it do 50-75% damage when thrown instead of melee.

[Player 2]

spear is basically warfare with finesse. slightly weaker maybe but its make it up with longer range. like you can cripple blow melee unit from out of their reach so they cant attack back. have larger aoe attack of opportunity. also wirlwind more awesome with spear.

for me spear is much for fun compare to other 2 handed weapon. the only downside that probably matter is you can't lift heavy stuff but even that is not really a matter

[Texonater]

A spear build for me is generally a spear/ranged build. It's only 1ap to swap weapon. you can start ranged to focus on dps, then swap to melee with the spear... or, if it makes more sense to just do a certain fight melee, just do that.

[Chaoslink]

So, some good points above, some not so good.

The simple version is that a spear build is literally a Two-Handed Strength build that uses Finesse instead. That's it. Look up a Strength build and just swap Strength with Finesse. Done. That simple.

The above comment about Tentacle Lash not working? Nonsense. Sure, it'll hit for less, but it still hits, has range and applies Atrophy, a very useful CC for frontline fighters.

Comments regarding investing Strength for "heavy armor"? Nonsense. There's literally no reason to use Strength armor here. Get a little Aero and pick up Uncanny dodge if incoming physical attacks worry you. The entire point is to have Finesse armor and have that extra magic protection. You can either open up with Worm Tremor + Torturer on this character of have someone in your party do so. This roots your enemy. Once they're rooted, your spear character can melee enemies that can't melee back. This protects you from taking physical damage, making the STR armor redundant and unnecessary.

Do note that spear builds deal a slightly lower damage (about 5%) since their base weapon damage is slightly lower. However, they're better when trading blows simply because, if you use the root tactic above, the enemy can't attack back. Spider Legs used to be the go-to for this as you could get free Haste from standing in webs, but with the nerfs that spell got in the DE, Worm Tremor is just better.

Look for cleave on your weapon when possible. Spear have long reach and the cleave arc covers about 45% of a normal weapon Whirlwind cast. If you're paired with mages, this cleave with Sparking Swings can be nasty as you can hit more targets than other builds.

They're good at different things, and its very much a matter of opinion, but I'd honestly make the argument that spears are the stronger build, though the comparision would be something like 49.5% for STR and 50.5% Spear. They're close. Very. But the ability to trade blows without taking them in return using roots and the higher magic protection, I'd give Spears the win by a small margin.

[Chaoslink]

Originally posted by Texonater:

A spear build for me is generally a spear/ranged build. It's only 1ap to swap weapon. you can start ranged to focus on dps, then swap to melee with the spear... or, if it makes more sense to just do a certain fight melee, just do that.

Eh, I'd never recommend this. The AP loss is already a massive inefficiency, but you also have memory issues having multiple spells learned that you won't be able to use all the time. Since there's no repercussions for using ranged attacks in melee range, there's no reason to swap to melee.

It might be fun for RP or something, but actively switching can only hurt your effectiveness. There's really no advantage here that outweighs the costs.

[Archaick]

Originally posted by Chaoslink:

So, some good points above, some not so good.

The simple version is that a spear build is literally a Two-Handed Strength build that uses Finesse instead. That's it. Look up a Strength build and just swap Strength with Finesse. Done. That simple.

The above comment about Tentacle Lash not working? Nonsense. Sure, it'll hit for less, but it still hits, has range and applies Atrophy, a very useful CC for frontline fighters.

Comments regarding investing Strength for "heavy armor"? Nonsense. There's literally no reason to use Strength armor here. Get a little Aero and pick up Uncanny dodge if incoming physical attacks worry you. The entire point is to have Finesse armor and have that extra magic protection. You can either open up with Worm Tremor + Torturer on this character of have someone in your party do so. This roots your enemy. Once they're rooted, your spear character can melee enemies that can't melee back. This protects you from taking physical damage, making the STR armor redundant and unnecessary.

Do note that spear builds deal a slightly lower damage (about 5%) since their base weapon damage is slightly lower. However, they're better when trading blows simply because, if you use the root tactic above, the enemy can't attack back. Spider Legs used to be the go-to for this as you could get free Haste from standing in webs, but with the nerfs that spell got in the DE, Worm Tremor is just better.

Look for cleave on your weapon when possible. Spear have long reach and the cleave arc covers about 45% of a normal weapon Whirlwind cast. If you're paired with mages, this cleave with Sparking Swings can be nasty as you can hit more targets than other builds.

They're good at different things, and its very much a matter of opinion, but I'd honestly make the argument that spears are the stronger build, though the comparision would be something like 49.5% for STR and 50.5% Spear. They're close. Very. But the ability to trade blows without taking them in return using roots and the higher magic protection, I'd give Spears the win by a small margin.

Thank you so much for your feedback. I was thinking of starting as a human for this build. I hear elf is best for finese, but the elves look ehhhh....lol

[Chaoslink]

I mean, elves don’t really get anything for finesse specifically. Human has Crit bonuses that are always welcome though.