8/21/10 - A Theorycrafter's Delimma

Borderlands 3 Amara the Siren
#1

So I started a conversation with someone today, particularly about amara’s temporary buffs and how they work. My main goal is just thinking about flat damage and exploiting this handful of abilities.

This is the spec I ended at. Please note that anything above the capstones in each tree are entirely debatable. I opted into damage increasing abilities as I could, I was basically racing in each tree to get what’s represented in the last skills purchased in each and ended up at 8/21/10.

Mystical Assault-
Wrath and Laid Bare, combining for 45% increased gun damage after using an action skill and 20% flat gun damage.

Fist of the Elements-
Tempest - 30% additional gun damage and 20% additional gun damage as long as we’re using a shock weapon.

Brawl-
Samsara - Some… amount of gun damage granted after action skill damage. I honestly for the love of god can’t figure out how this skill is going to work. It gives gun damage based on the amount of enemies hit and can stack? Do new applications of samsara rewrite it or… hoenstly, I have no idea, right now it’s just assumed that it can get real, real quick.

So here’s the issue.

I have no earthly idea what to do with the remaining 9 points, or what action skill/augment I’d use on this.

I can come up with several builds out of this shell that all do… pretty solid damage but with very different results.

I’m really curious to see what people cook from that.

#2

Action skill I would use: Phasecast + Deliverance

Remaining 9 points: 5 points into helping hands and 4 point intros Rise to Root.

Bonus: Laid Bare isnt 25% gun damage…its a 25% damage debuff. Which is way better…especially in co op.

1 Like
#3

Yep, the important bit im thinking of is gun, but you’re right.

#4

I’d vote Remnant. If your goal is to max out bonus damage, with good luck and timing you can pump that overkill damage into an orb?

1 Like
#5

Here is what I want to propose to you:

Samsara OP

You can shuffle around skills as you like, but the key is Avatar, cooldown reduction, Samsara & the dmg reduction. Gotta say, for me having this high hp regen (25% per sec) is also a dps buff. Having sustain and tank enables better “uptime” on enemies & bosses.

You can use ur action skill every 11 or so seconds. With this action skill & nova we should be stacking Samsara quite fast (you get a stack for every enemy damaged by ur action skill… up to 25% gun dmg & 25% hp regen, stacks decay after 20 sec.)
Thats basically the synergy I wanna go for. Have all my action skill related buffs up as often and long as possible by delaying action skills and only use them every 8 - 12 seconds.
Input is welcome, bear in mind you can change some skills around for personal choice… this is what i’m going for :slight_smile:

/your version could look like this for example build

another edit: i will personally go for Reload Speed & Weapon Switch/Mode Switch Speed from Fast Hand(s) instead of Alacrity, to switch to appropriate elemental guns faster

1 Like
#6

Unfortunately Avatar resets cooldown on the second cast so you cannot use your action skill every 11 seconds but twice back to back per cooldown.

#7

“Amaras action skill can be activated while it’s cooling down”
Dang there’s no mention that it would start the cooldown again…
What’s your source? Any video showcasing that mechanic?

#8

When I first saw it I wondered how it worked but it does reset. I’ll try to find my source.

#9

Thanks, that’d be super interesting to see. And my build would be obsolete :grimacing:

#10

https://www.twitch.tv/videos/471670958 2.20 Shows the small timer after he goes down is reset on second cast. I’m pretty sure later on he refers to it.

Sorry to hear your build would be obsolete. Good thing is there is still plenty of time to make another… ten or so. :slight_smile:

#11

You’re right… had to actually check with a timer there. His action skill had a cooldown of ~ 35 - 36 seconds. He used it once and after 4.5 sec again…in total ~40 sec cooldown for both. Thought it might be a UI thing (timer resets, but doesn’t count full time).
Welp, there goes my Amara build xD Guess im going elemental tree lol.

Honestly tho, it would have been waaay more interesting to not have the cooldown reset. But maybe to powerful.

#12

Like…I get it. But also, it seems awkward. Do they expect people to just Double Cast quickly? Lol if a class mod makes it 4 casts per cool down :joy::joy::joy:

#13

Yeah it is what put me off the mystical assault tree. That said if I got a legendary class mod that gave Avatar and let me phasegrasp and glamour two groups at once I wouldn’t say no.

1 Like
#14

This literally kills all builds that are centered around the post-Action-Skill bonuses. It also doesn’t make sense in regards to the downtime we will have now. A Lv 50 Amara centered around this (former) loop will now have roughly 30 seconds where she can shine and then 25 seconds where her survivability and damage output are going down like crazy. This really hurts the idea of looping her Action Skills a lot.

3 Likes
#15

Right? Like, none of my builds got avatar anyway, because I like New Non Zombie Immolate and Not With Claws But Whatever too much

#16

I’m not sure about your numbers… 30 seconds shine, 25 seconds not?

Assuming class mods offer points in cooldown and give cooldown themselfes, we can use good action skills for Samsara stacks every ~20 seconds. Action skill back to back, hopefully 4 - 5 stacks, 20 sec cooldown, rinse & repeat.

#17

I was really into the whole loop things as it had a high skill ceiling while also just sounding like fun. Don’t get me wrong, even with this new info “Avatar” is a great capstone and probably the one I would like to boost the most, but the way the skill works makes some skills so much less appealing than before. Also, it let’s her damaging action skills look even less effective than they already were. I personally thought that Gearbox increased the cooldown time of her skills because otherwise they might become too easy to loop and just crush everything once “Avatar” gets thrown into the mix. Now I don’t know anymore, why they did those changes.

@schmu666 yeah, I basically just used numbers I had in my head. For sure we can go much lower than 25 seconds, even without using “Phasegrasp”.

1 Like
#18

I have the tiny feeling, that Avatar is actually supposed to work the way we’d like to.
It would be a genious build mechanic that unlocks a fun & rewarding playstyle.

If not I will try to get a class mod with maybe 25% cooldown reduction & points in Restless.
Assuming 8/5 in Restless offers 40% reduction we might be able to use 2 action skills back to back every 16 - 18 seconds.

1 Like