Best Way to do a Venomancer?

[Bdawg]

I picked Rogue since I had so much fun playing a Venomancer in Diablo II.

I've dedicated a decent amount of my stats to the poison branch. When I had to pick my 2nd mastery, I picked Spirit since I had trouble with undead.

Since then, I've maxed out my Rogue mastery and am about halfway up the Spirit mastery. I've only allotted 1 point to Spirt Bane and Spirit Ward. I don't have any trouble with undead anymore.

However, I'm not sure what else I should be spending points on. Maybe Spirit was the wrong choice.

I thought about making a new character with a subjob of Hunting, but everything I see about that shows that you don't spend anything on poison since things die before poison matters.

If I'm wanting to play with a poison build, what subjob should I consider? Should I pretty much ignore a subjob and concentrate on mortal would and just use Spirit Ward / Bane when facing undead?

[Bdawg]

And if it matters, here's what I'm using for weapons.

Green bow with increased attack speed and IAS charm.

Deathweaver's Legtip (green)
25-30 dmg
20% piercing
+19% dmg
60 poison over 6 sec
5% chance of + 342% poison
+12% Offensive Ability
+8% IAS
Charm with
30 poison over 5 sec
18 poison over 6 sec

I have 2 green Osprey rings with (among other things), +10% piercing and +10 piercing damage.

I've had the Legtip for a while, and it's still far better than anything else I've found.

[Brightspear]

Hmm, I am sure you will get a lot of different answers on this one.

I would suggest sticking with spirit and seeing how you feel about it after a few more levels at least. I rate Deathchill Aura highly, since the slow effect gives you more time to react to things, and there are other useful skills in the mastery as well.

If you want to play on the poison theme more then maybe going for nature and taking Plague would be more your style. You could add Heart of the Oak for added survivability (useful since you are looking at a damage over time build really) and maybe pick up some pets to help out if you feel a bit weak.

Or you could go for warfare and use War Wind to apply poison to groups of enemies.

Good luck whichever build you choose, I like to see people playing slightly non-standard characters

[Felexitus]

if you go for spirit you might want to consider saving staffs that give poison damage. this way you can use ternion attack to spread the poison fast. thats why id play warlock for a poisoner too. also you get vision of fear to support your poison in making the enemies not attack you while the poison works its magic

poison is pretty much rogue exclusive theres no other mastery that helps poison per se, all you can ask for is a possibility to spread the poison on multiple enemies at once, thats possible in spirit, defense, warfare and.....ROGUE anyway ;-)

if its the damage over time you like then hunting is probably your way to go. the funny part: you wont get a bit better vs undead but you can have fun with bleed and poison at the same time ;-)

[BloodAndRoses]

Probably the single most effective way to spread poison (both damage from the skill and its effect upgrades) is Ternion Attack with a good Arcane Lore. Other than that, Throwing Knives with the upgrade maxed is pretty effective as well, since they have a native 100% to pierce. I found those two not only to be rapid and usable at range but also not too much of a drain on your energy supply (I don't like using potions).

However, you're not going to get the same killing effectiveness as in Diablo II, since poison is weaker in this game. Also, the "reduce elemental resistances" modifier might not work on the enemy's poison resists, although I don't know about that one for sure.

[Maktaka]

Your plan sounds almost exactly like my original idea. I found that poison was way too hard to maintain dmg for at higher levels. It'll get you through Normal no problem (actually it's pretty horrifying how much damage poison does on Normal), but unless you REALLY invest in it with all your equipment at the higher difficulties, you'll have a hard time hurting most enemies with poison. I've instead switched over to bleed for damage-over-time duty, but I still use the poison effects from Nightshade and Mandrake since those effect everything and cannot be resisted. Plus, I find that fewer things have bleed resistance than poison resistance among organics (check out the turtles in Greece, for example).

For the bleed, getting Necrosis+Anatomy+Throwing Knives+Flurry of Knives = lotta bleed. Necrosis lowers their bleed resist, Anatomy ups your bleed damage, and a point blank spread of knives will make them cry. I can even make skeletons bleed thanks to Necrosis (although not much). By the end of Epic, I found myself in need of a Lich to help on bosses, but since he does Vitality damage and Necrosis lowers Vitality resistance, he's pretty awesome. Plus, all the enhancements are skill based, not item based, so I'm free to get equipment that's of more general use to me.

My build right now.

[Bdawg]

So, I suppose the bleeding and poison both affect the same types of creatures? Both have problems with machines and undead?

[omgarm]

Skeletons can't bleed nor get ill. Nor can the Automatoi unless you plant a virus in them (Lame I know).

[Maktaka]

Most organics are vulnerable to bleed AND poison, but some (like the turtles in Greece) are immune to poison. I don't think there are any organics immune to bleed however.

Skeletons, Devices, Automotoi, Golems, and Terra Cotta Warriors are all immune to bleed and poison. HOWEVER, if you have Death Chill with Necrosis turned on, this will lower their resistance to bleed allowing you to do bleed damage to them. Gotta stay pretty close to them to keep the effect going however (only a 3.7 meter radius when maxed).

[Bdawg]

It really seems like poison is the red headed step child...