Haruspex question

[Crowcreek]

Using thrown and shield, how is the survivability?

[sarcastic_godot]

IMXp good - provided you keep your DA and Resists up to par.

Trance of Wrath is astonishingly effective on the defense side, thanks to the Skill Interruption, the melee types can't use their special moves (rushers excluded).

[Lobo de hielo]

Survivability is very good.
Wood Lore and Premonition (without +skills) plus the dex from Hunting mastery you will have over 400 DA even before adding any points in Dex and gear. +4 Skills and Wood Lore adds another 128 DA. not sure about Premonition.
Avoid projectiles 40% without +skills or gear.
Dreams ToW, Hunting poison resist, Dreams Distort Reality for mobs.
If having problems respec to ToC or ToE till you have the right gear and/or high enough level.

Actually writing that out, survivability "rocks".

[Crowcreek]

What would be better , spear/thrown with shield ?

[chris.ferrantegerard]

Originally posted by Crowcreek:

What would be better , spear/thrown with shield ?

Both would be pretty good. Haruspex is an extremely strong combo. Started one early on and was bow but didn't get around to finishing legendary. Spear might be better through as you'd be able to use Phantom Strike which is great. With all the damage avoidance from the class (DA, projectile avoidance, aura, etc.) you'd be really tanky as well.

[sarcastic_godot]

One switch thrown, one switch spear, shield in both ofc.

Spear's disadvantage: at some point in Legendary, you'll have to add OA to your gear, and while there's enough of that in the loot pool, it still limits your choices.

Thrown with Scatter Shot is good enough for all but the most hard-shelled enemies.

[Crowcreek]

I didn't really want to switch, just focus on 1 weapon style for the entire run.

[Lobo de hielo]

I prefer thrown. Quicker, kill a few before they reach you and good as melee. Some nice Green M.I's - Skeletal Dart , Jaguar Claw, Demonic Rippers.
Do not be put of by Skeletal Darts lowish base damage, the 50% pierce ratio certainly make up for it.
Although keeping a spear in secondary slot with Phantom Strike is great against some bosses.

[Crowcreek]

Awesome replies, thank you. With all my hours, I am trying for my first attempt to finish normal with 1 mastery and zero deaths self found ( No problem with dying in epic or legendary on this run) What I like about Dream mastery is the AOE and single target you can have early on, so much smoother for those first 2 dozen levels.

I want to attempt this with 1 weapon style ( no switch, personal preference) from the start but with a shield ( I know I need those resistances )

I have decided it will be Dream ( Second mastery I haven't decided yet) Thank you for all these replies, keep them coming =)

[Crowcreek]

The plan is ( I may be wrong and this is why I ask the elders =) ). To use DW/ToW with vit/fire resist at 60% or better and just do my dance around Typhon and the other baddies before I hit epic.

[sarcastic_godot]

Originally posted by Crowcreek:

The plan is ( I may be wrong and this is why I ask the elders =) ). To use DW/ToW with vit/fire resist at 60% or better and just do my dance around Typhon and the other baddies before I hit epic.

If by "Dance around" you mean farming them... ...don't overdo that.

The one thing you realy should have is the gear to get all your 1st-page resistances (excl. physical, that's different) north of 40% - because that's the penalty you'll get upon entering Epic.

The Relics and Formulae Typhon drops are worth farming for some time, but the blue stuff you get from that mostly is pretty meh.

Hades has some fire-specific set gear (Firewalker would be quite nice for you for a while), but the long run to get to him from the respawn well is rather annoying and not really rewarding.

The one boss that can be worthwhile to farm a bit more would be Hildsvini - super fast farm, you only need to max BleedRes to have an easy time, and some of the Ragnarök stuff you can get there is pretty good, e.g. the Rings of the Rhine[www.tq-db.net] shield.

While Surtr has a slightly better drop chances,the fight is too long - the time wasted duing his futile barfing attemps (at least that's what it sounds like) alone is long enough to do an extra Hildsvini run instead...

You can check what you can get where here: https://www.tq-db.net/en/monsters. Choose the "Loot Table" tab on top, and the "Normal" tab at the bottom of the card.

[Crowcreek]

If by "Dance around" you mean farming them... ...don't overdo that.


Dance around, I mean surviving my first encounter with Typhon and the rest, even trash I haven't encountered yet.

[Lobo de hielo]

Quick tip, save your character to desktop before heading for Typhon, just in case.

Me, I do not see much dance around.
I would respec some points into Phantom Strike.
Get to Typhon run clockwise and take first 3 buffs.
Lay down a scroll, Phantom Strike - hit him with a weapon of choice (best damage), back off and throw weapon him to death.
Just keep all resistances at good level, even the secondary energy leech and try to keep out of his attacks. The Meteors and Thorns most people know of, what annoys me the most is being caught in his life leech when I have almost killed him.

To your original question, survivability thrown and shield is very good, depending on build.
I actually have 13 builds all between late normal and late Epic with no deaths. All of them I have been testing out thrown weapons with. I love throwing weapons. Why? Because I always ended up with melee fighting 50% of the time using a bow, so why not take the best of both worlds.