Best spell compliments for the archer?

Hello,

I specc'd through the archery tree - 71 for the main skill - (But didn't spend too much into muli-shot as it seems not to do much for me) but I wanted to know which spells would be best to compliment that tree....

I thought root would be nice so specc'd into Earth just enough to unlock root and got it to 40. So far I like it, as I can slow the target with disabling shot, hit an aimed shot, root and then free attack - rinse repeat and am able to avoid damage. I also put 40 points into bulwork of earth to raise my str (more health) and damage resistance.

I grabbed armor weak points and dexterity from subterfuge and from tactics I have 40 in each of armor preservation, train strength, weapon preservation, and healthy.

From light armor - acrobatics and swiftness.

But I wanted to figure out a way to implement a DoT to try and burn down the targets faster so put some points into fire arrow. But I cannot cast that while on the move, which I want to keep kiting, rooting, slowing. I also want to hit the 5 skull area mines, but the thought of all those mobs on me at once in the mine makes me hesitant to try.

And I have the understanding that I should spec all the way into a spell tree for attunement - but which?

Any advice would be greatly appreciated....

Thanks,

Psylent

 

Does ignite weapon or poison work on bow?...I think now they don't...and I hear they will...in that case fire could be interesting to look at...

 

...or if they start making combo glimphs more effective...air could have sense...

 

as an archer i have not touched any magic trees other than night vision, healing touch - blessing - and life power. pretty happy at the moment in 5 skull areas.

i will look into some others once i gm weak points, draw strength and dex

 

I did try ignite weapon.. unlocked it to realize it was for melee only. That would have been sweet - fire arrows.

Biggest issue was just dealing with multiple mobs effectively as I have been pulling one at a time and once in a while will get the occasional 2nd mob aggro but able to survive two for the most part.

 

I would say air for insane dmg + stun + combo

 

Honestly i havnt touched any.
Kinda set up same as you. Pure archer, no magic, and recently into taming. And i've never struggled to solo yellow/orange instances and compliment with partymembers taking down reds and bosses being the main dmg usually.
Ive speced for a pure crit archer ( pine - Supple - Masterworked ) With all the range skills except multi shot.
Recently got into taming which i have definitly loved, though im far from point of the guy being able to tank for me, hes just pure extra dmg (Skill is still low but getting there)

If i HAD to pick a line of spell to go into ( and i tried life for a while, found its easier for me to drop the mob spending my focuse on dmg instead of trying to target allies or self) i would do Death.
Solo play - The mob will hit you in mines. Therefore having even a locked in Life Drain, no fizzled chance drain from that chain is Super super appealing. Also the Skeli ally is easy to get, and though i havnt tested it, he could take the aggro for a while.

I decided taming over Death, but once i get further along i may go in it for the life steal, we will see.
Every other line seems counter productive for you to be casting , instead of shooting (which is your main dmg and puts you closer to ending the fight ), IMO.

 

Corpse explosion also gives you a much needed AoE. Kite them over and detonate ! Leech spells can get quite good with high attunement and scales with lost HP so they hit hard when you need them to

Summons are not great atm, but that may change. At least they are a distraction lol.

Death Shield is the best mitigation spell in the game as it works on all damage types.

I might be a little biased, due to my DK build

 

I've gone full archer, and dipped into each of the magic trees just to pick up the various Arrow spells, mostly just fro theme. However, I find Fire Arrow is almost mandatory in my deck, as are Gust (for comboing with Aimed shot to do knockback), and Root. Since I seem to either not have root available when I want, or run out of arrows, I've also invested into a Bludgeon secondary and the Earth passives.

Had I known originally, I probably would have went into the Air tree to get the multihit lightning, but I'm not respec'ing now. (Also, I can see the nerf hammer coming for that, so I'll stay with my preference for now.)

 

Definitely grab Gust and Dash from the Air tree. Dash will allow you to move 33% faster at base attunement. It stacks with Sprint. This will greatly help you with kiting as an archer. If you want a good DoT that you can fire and forget, then Ring of Fire might be a consideration. It puts a relatively large circular flame field on the ground that causes all enemies within it to burn over time. I think mine is currently at level 45 and it has a DoT of 8-17 damage every 2 seconds. You could then just constantly kite them through the fire circle. It doesn't stack multiple DoTs though. Fire is my secondary skill tree focus (I'm an Air mage). Mine currently has about 370 points in it to give you an idea of my attunement level in fire.

My Air tree is significantly higher though. I got up to 88 attunement in Air yesterday. My Chain Lightning and Lightning now have a max damage range on the tooltip of 130 when stacked 4 times. It's nowhere near as powerful as Earth's Obsidian Arrow is in terms of damage, but it does help by stunning. Just to give you some insight on what I mean by Obsidian Arrow's power... my guild leader who isn't that much higher level than me has a max damage range of 247 damage on his Obsidian Arrow when 5 stacked.... and it has a chance to ignore armor, has no reagent cost, and it's focus cost is relatively low.... I might end up switching to Earth just because of that insane amount of damage.

 

heh yea i woulda gone mage if i knew what i knew now.. but im devoted to the archer. Tried to keep the ranger theme for most part, but i finding with only taken 2 skills from the light armor, 2/3 from Subter.. and just ranged.. i can expand a little bit.
I was very disappointed in Multi shot .. and im ify on Piercing atm.. testing, its not good in PVE, trying to find in another forum if its worth keeping for the pvp. ( Aimed does more even against armored people then my piercing by a lot. ) So i am about to try implementing Death in as well. Hoping ill be happy with just the death touch, may grab ray/shield.. but we will see. The shield seems awesome, and i may implement in future but we will see.

All the combos for Ranged seem to be air based but i dunno air didnt appeal to me. Disabling shot seems to be all the slow/root i need to kite atm. But agian, i havnt done any PVP with this guy yet.

 

Blinding rays is really cool, AOE stun that actually works, which seems bad because one hit and they wake.. but in the one-target oriented skills that range uses, this would not be a problem at all, allowing you to easily stun a group and concentrate on killing one at a time.