[Guide] Haruspex - Bow and Spear

[Apollo_Luck]

Hello everyone!

If you like seeing everything die before you, having great defense, and loving your character? If so, read on. If not, get some nachos or other Mexican delicacy and then read on. If you're not sure, please read on while the nachos are cooking. This will be worth your while.

I am new to these forums, but by no means inexperienced. I played TQ since its release, and my most recent character is a Haruspex (Hunter + Dream). So I decided to make a comprehensive guide for the Haruspex, since there isn't really one as of yet.

Without further ado: Here it is!

How to Play

At first, you will use bow to mob effectively, letting scatter shot do its job. Use shift to shoot where you stand. "Sniping" will be useful in survivability. Bow: LMB - Marksman, RMB - Study Prey. Spear: LMB - Psionic Touch, RMB - Phantom Strike.

Basically, mob with the bow, and use phantom strike as you approach bosses. Then continue to stab them with your spear. Every 4 shots, psionic touch will give +100% or so damage (assuming you have +skills). You will move fast, and attack fast, taking advantage of % chance to occur skills. Ladies, gentlemen, and satyrs, I present to you:

THE HARUSPEX

Definition and Reason for Choosing
The Haruspex combines offensive and defensive ability to become a very good character. Overall, it is seen in the top ten characters (data from multiple threads and forums). It combines Hunter, a great class for dishing out huge numbers, although you won't see them if you are using a bow, you WILL see your enemies slowly die. The Hunter excels at dealing damage to mobs and single enemies, using Base, but most of all, Piercing damage to get the job done. Dream is a class that combines well with any other class. It is also offensive and defensive, with trances and lucid dream to help you along the way.

The Haruspex focuses on using pierce damage to kill. Its skills focus on it, and endgame brings +<A big number>% pierce damage; magnifying your skills and your damage output.

This guide will focus both bow and spear. I believe that the hybrid is the most powerful build however, as Hunter focuses on utilizing the bow, while Dream focuses on melee weapons. Using both will result in a great character.

Pros:
- Great at mobbing, and to a slightly lesser extent, bossing.
- Moderate defense
- Easily hits the 100% Chance to Avoid Projectiles (CtAP) goal. This means that projectiles will always deal 0 damage to you = YAY!
- High OA and DA means more critical hits (with melee weapon) and less hits on you.
- Fast attack speed, and movement speed. This means that the % chance to activate skills (such as volley) will activate more often. This means more damage <-- Generally more damage is good.

Cons:

- Base defense is not great, although DA is amazingly high. This means that most attacks will either miss, but if they hit, they have an even smaller chance of critting.
- Hunter traditionally starts out slowly, but damage will soar around level 25, when newer and better items become available.
- Bows have on average, less base dps than the equivalent melee + shield combo, although Marksman + Synergies will take care of this.

Build

So you start out with a copper knife, trying to kill boars before they kill you. Welcome to hell. You should be fine until level 10, at which point I suggest getting the Shroud of Eternal Night, a great artifact with +18% attack speed (including the completion bonus) and extra damage here and there, and a Paean. This is a blue necklace which is great for boosting damage a bit. I found this around delphi from a Maenad A brigand's bow would help too. You can find this in many places. Satyrs, drop it the most, but most bow wielding monsters drop them also. There are 4 in total: Level 2, 3, 11 and 34 (although 34 is unconfirmed).

Choose Hunter first, and max mastery ASAP. Put one put into marksman, wood lore and herbal remedy as they pop up. Then, when you've maxed it, flush all your points (don't touch the skills I just named) into scatter shot. Then go on to max volley, and then wood lore. At this point you should be

Level 20

From here on, it gets slightly harder. By now, you should have upgraded your bow, and armor. At this point I was using the Labyrinth Set. Put one point in study prey, and max herbal remedy if you're getting too close to dying (you shouldn't have died yet). Next, put 4 points into dream mastery and put one into trade of empathy. At level one it reflects a bit of damage, but converts attack damage to health.

Now, you're starting to look strong. So, let's get EVEN STRONGER! Max lucid dream (+30% damage is glorious) and put one point into art of the hunt and trailblazing.

Up until now, you should have been using a bow. If you find a spear, take points out of marksman tree and reassign them to psionic touch. However, I used a bow until where I am now, level 43, mainly because scatter shot is awesome for mobbing. So let's continue with bow. Assuming you've left scatter shot to do its job, now put one shot into puncture shot. It is at this point that you put dream up to 16. After doing this, max Trance of Convalescence, of course removing ToE. This is

Level 34

At level 30, I was using the Hunter's set. It is great for any hunter, and give +skills and +pierce damage. Assuming again that you're obliterating anything that dares look at you funnily, put 5 points in nightmare and 1 into confusion. It will help at some points. 1 into distort reality won't hurt.

You're now level 36, and you may realize your nightmare is dying a lot (but I only just got it!) The reason is, when you move into epic, there is a significant move up in monster's damage (or rather everything's resistances going down by 40%). The nightmare doesn't have any resistance, and since your int determines its power, and your int is 50+Dream's bonus, Nightmare will die too much. Now, AGAIN assuming you're doing fine, remove ToE, nightmare and confusion. Put everything into mastery. Then start maxing ToW. -32% resistance is great. But why ToW? Well, if you're using a spear, everything near you get -32% resistance. If you're using a bow, it's not as good. However, if you pick of the ranged monsters first (they have slightly less health) and by the time the melee monsters get to you, ToW kicks in. Alternatively, you can run in with a bow to let ToW kick in, but prepare to drink potions like water. Once you've done this, put one in temporal rift. Distort reality is now the panic button.

Now, you're in epic. You NEED good items. I used the following. These items are the high aiming point. You're definitely not going to get them easily. Farming is an option, or you can always host a server saying "Buying ...." (That's how I got full Tracker )

Tracker's Hood

The Khan's Hunting Harness

Tracker's Gloves

Tracker's Leg Guard

Apollo's Will x2

Fury of the Three Amazons (this is the reason I swapped to spear).

Veteran's Siege Bow of the Hunt (+20% damage, +20% attack speed, enchanted with legendary Artemis's Bowstring). <-- This is the reason I swapped back to bow.

Shield of the Korybantes

Blood Gem

Pendant of Immortal Rage (Like Paean x9000)

I know this is asking a lot, but your DPS will be godly. I mean it. With the bow it's around 6K. With spear/shield, around 8K. Although you have scatter shot, so bow is a better idea unless you're bossing. Max find cover for the +% CtAP.

Level 43

Now, you're a god. You can 5 shot Hades, and farm Typhon. But you've still got 32 levels to go. Max psionic touch and put one in phantom strike, maxing its synergy. Don't touch trailblazing (you will have hit the run cap), but max call of the hunt and exploit weakness. This will prove a good bossing technique. The build then moves on to maxing study prey + synergy. You're doing well now, so let's get better. Max temporal flux, and premonition after, then temporal rift and phantom strike (if you're falling into trouble often, max TR first). You're now about level 65, you can rearrange whatever you want, because you hurt so many things so very well

Now, without further ado, here is the end build! Note: I am unfamiliar with high level artifacts, so just use a good one!

Note: +4 to skills is needed.

End Build

Tracker's Hood

The Khan's Hunting Harness OR Alexander's Cuirass

Apollo's Will x2


Pendant of Immortal Rage OR Aphrodite's Favor

Athena's Battle Greaves

Conqueror's Bracers

Any green bow with high DPS, and Legendary Valor of Achilles or Legendary Artemis's Bowstring.

Fury of the Three Amazons (this is the reason I swapped to spear). OR Khtonion Spears, which can be farmed from Melinoes in Act 4 (Thanks to Poinas for giving that information), OR Thorny Maul


Shield of the Korybantes

There you have it.

Haruspex is a great character in my opinion. I mean, 8K DPS at level 43 proves that. This is my preferred build, and I believe it is the best possible build for a hybrid (although the order of skills from 43 onwards is arguable).

Watch out for undead! They have high pierce resistance. This build is a hybrid, so the DPS won't be AS high as a focused build. But, since many people want bow guides, and many want spear, I thought hybrid was the best option.

If you read the whole guide, thank you. It took a while but I hope I have helped some of you.

Criticism/feedback/help/things to add is all welcome!

Thanks to the people who read this, the people who like it, and the people who use it.
Also thanks to Poinas for proofreading and pointing out the things I had to fix

Apollo_Luck

[Poinas]

Originally Posted by Apollo_Luck

Every 3 shots, psionic touch will give +100% or so damage (assuming you have +skills).

Every fourth

The Hunter excels at dealing damage to mobs and single enemies, using Base, Bleeding and most of all, Piercing damage to get the job done.

I'd leave bleeding unmentioned, so that no-one will make the mistake of even thinking of getting Gouge. It's animation is slower than your normal attack's animation.

Pros:
- Moderate defense

Cons:
- Defense is not great, although DA is high.

You get tons of CtAP, awesome DA boost, optional ~20% damage absorption, flat temporary damage absorption, a petrifying skill, a skill that slows down monsters, you can put enemies to sleep, crazy run speed...somehow thins translates to moderate defence? What is required for good defence?

- Bows have on average, less dps than the equivalent melee + shield combo, although Marksman + Synergies will take care of this.

You mean lower base damage, not DPS. Bows have higher DPS...

You should be fine until level 10, at which point I suggest getting the Shroud of Eternal Night...and a Paean...A brigand's bow would help too.

You're now level 36, and you may realize your nightmare is dying a lot (but I only just got it!) Now, AGAIN assuming you're doing fine, remove ToE, nightmare and confusion. Put everything into mastery. Then start maxing ToW. -32% resistance is great. Once you've done this, put one in temporal rift. Distort reality is now the panic button.

Now, you're in epic. You NEED good items. I used the following.

I think the resistance reduction is quite worthless for bow users, especially at level 36. Monsters have low resistances and Study Prey is much better, even at low skill level.

And about the items...you're suggesting that one should use items from higher difficulties. In my opinion that's not what guides should do at all. Getting a Paean in act 1? No-one should farm for it, unless they want to have the perfect equipment at all times. Also, if you recommend getting a Brigand's Bow for example, then it would be nice to mention where you can get one

[Apollo_Luck]

Thanks for the help Poinas!

Edited and fixed

[Aditya_214]

Try this build:
http://www.titancalc.com/TitanCalc.a...-0-12-0-12-0-0
AoTH maxed as +75% piercing all the time is better than +139% for 50 sec.
Mastermind doesn't work on you, the symbol may appear but doesn't make it work.
TB left at 0% as you have Tracker's Hood.(I'd put some for speed but points get spread out too thin)
Monster Lure is great in the SP.(Thanks Irma2, Asheron!)
I would focus on either spear or bow but since it's lvl 75, be a god.

[Apollo_Luck]

Thanks for the feedback!

The reason I suggest Mastermind is it shoots to level 5 with +4 to skills. This will help your nightmare survive; you don't need it at all.

[Poinas]

I forgot to say that for end-game spear, you're better off with a good Khtonion Spear than Fury of the Three Amazons. FotTA is one of the best legendary spears, that's for sure. But Khtonion Spear has higher base damage, and a huge OA bonus. You don't want to have too low OA when engaging regularly in melee combat. Khtonion Spears can be farmed from Melinoes in act 4.

[Kreigerrr]

I very much enjoyed your guide, Apollo Luck. After reading it, kind of threw a kink into my plan of making my next character a Spellbreaker, ha! Many thanks for your insight.

[ASYLUM101]

Just FYI: There is another haruspex guide, although it is for a pure bow user.

Windestahl's Guide

[computertech82]

Hunting is the worse to start with if working with a spear, since the haruspex includes dream, the most powerful mastery in the game. Starting with dream gives you the power to kill off the enemy quicker, deal with mobs, and even the ability to regenerate health/mana. Hunting should be improved once you get a spear to increase piercing.
Now if only working with a bow (completely different build then a spear/shield build), then hunting probably would be the first one to start with.

[Apollo_Luck]

You should start hybrid. Using bow in one slot, with spear/shield in the other. You snipe monsters until they get close, at which point you take out your spear and kill (assuming your spear has equal or higher DPS than your bow). With scatter shot rising at early levels, your bow's effectiveness will increase. Dream should only come in at level 18 or so, unless you're getting close to dying too often, in which case you might want one in ToE.