How to best use varunastra?

The varanustra as i heard counts as all weapon types. Even for skill usage.

That means you can pick up a bunch of dagger nodes, and play ground slam with it.

So to use it to its full potential, you can either pick up the nodes that affect severall 1h weapons (very few on the tree). Or pick up very efficient 1h specific nodes. And mix and match the best ones, so you dont need to travell.

People who are saying that a dagger, or a 1h mace beats varanustra are forgetting that you can not play ground slam with a dagger, and that you can not play reave with a 1h mace. That is probably where varanustra will shine most.

And yes, a build centered around a specific weapon type and an amazing rare weapon will beat it, and that is how it should be. Rares should always be stronger, and uniques should be niche build enabling items. Like in this case varanustras 1h sword ground slam. Or whatever you do with it.

Of course, i do not forget this specific interaction with this weapon. In my build proposition i suggested Sunder attack skill, which is a mace/staff gem.

Thoo, it doesnt not change this fact: is it really worthy to lose points to compensate the lack of crit of this weapon?

I believe the answer is "no". In thoses builds i dont think that dagger nodes will give enough survivability with varu because varu needs more points to get the same crit efficiency.

So we need to spend more points of crit/increased and we lose thoses points because we cant put them somewhere else.

I can be wrong but i havent seen builds that will shine better with varu around shadow area.

Yes you can use a mace skill with varu, but reave is good and scale perfectly with dagger, bino will get 100% better crit efficiency than varu. So to get same crit than bino you need twice the amount of nodes and gear increased %, it's insane.

I do not see a reason to break your own build only to put varu on your character. Only to use a replacable skill gem?

Varu is decent and has potential, on it's own field.
It's not because everything is doable with varu that everything will be good or optimized ;)

@geisalt

Sorry if I sounded offensive. It's just that pointless negative posts that don't contribute but just serve to demotivate the op, it kind of pissese off. Especially when it happens repetitively. I have nothing against Deadpeng, just against the type of content of a lot of his posts.

Now on to the main topic.
I really don't like making comparisons between builds until I've built both of them. And as you can probably tell from my sig, that isn't an option for me atm. I do have a dw Bino build in standard that did well over half a million flicker dps in 2.1. Now, it might even hit one million. Can Varunstra compare? I don't know, and I'm too lazy to do the calculations.

So then why am I insisting that it's such a great weapon? Basically every weapon type has both efficient as well as bad clusters and nodes. The cool thing about varunastra is that you can totally ignore the bad nodes and cherry pick the best of them all. Will it beat my dual dagger flicker build in survivability and damage? Maybe not. Do I care? Not at all.

Like the guy before me said, the coolest thing about this unique is the ability to use pretty much any melee skill.

Edit: since I got ninjaed, might as well reply to your latest post.
You're basically saying that it's not a good idea to go crit because it would end up sacrificing too much tankiness. My response to that is, go to reddit. Theres a post by someone who managed to get to level 92 in phc with it. He has a video and everything.

"

Deadpeng a écrit :

This weapon over here costed me only 20 chaos and no amount of investment in your Varunstras can ever beat the DPS you can get out of this hammer. Just because you are trying hard, it does not mean some low budget weapon GGG made will work out.

Uniques were never supposed to replace top rolled rares, so that is correct. 20c is a lot more than 1c for the Varunastra, so this is all ok. :P
You can also use various different skills with Varunastra, which you can't with the hammer.

If his build is able to use Varunastras (which are pretty budget) and then somehow transfer into some kind of more expensive rares, I think this is all ok.

"

Etherfire a écrit :

@geisalt

You're basically saying that it's not a good idea to go crit because it would end up sacrificing too much tankiness. My response to that is, go to reddit. Theres a post by someone who managed to get to level 92 in phc with it. He has a video and everything.

nono, i do not say to not go crit, i say to not go use varunastra with dagger nodes in a crit fashion! Because there is a lot of daggers nodes very close to each others and a cheap bino will do the job better with a comparable setup.

It's ok to use varu instead of bino with such builds when you plan to buy bino later! but to build extensively for varu with this kind of setup will, in the end, only gimp your build and your evolution!

Yes it will work but badder, the copy will be worse than the original, it's problematic because the topic says " how to best use varunastra"!

It doesnt mean that's it bad, it only means that it's "badder", less optimized, less powerfull.

For this reason i suggested a build that has it's own field, specially done for this weapon and not reproducable with another weapon without a lot of sacrifices.

Varu builds can be done with dual wield or with shields, crit or not. But to make it tanky enough with enough dps it's harder.

"

Geisalt a écrit :

Spoiler

Of course, i do not forget this specific interaction with this weapon. In my build proposition i suggested Sunder attack skill, which is a mace/staff gem.

Thoo, it doesnt not change this fact: is it really worthy to lose points to compensate the lack of crit of this weapon?

I believe the answer is "no". In thoses builds i dont think that dagger nodes will give enough survivability with varu because varu needs more points to get the same crit efficiency.

So we need to spend more points of crit/increased and we lose thoses points because we cant put them somewhere else.

I can be wrong but i havent seen builds that will shine better with varu around shadow area.

Yes you can use a mace skill with varu, but reave is good and scale perfectly with dagger, bino will get 100% better crit efficiency than varu. So to get same crit than bino you need twice the amount of nodes and gear increased %, it's insane.

I do not see a reason to break your own build only to put varu on your character. Only to use a replacable skill gem?

Varu is decent and has potential, on it's own field.
It's not because everything is doable with varu that everything will be good or optimized ;)

I would honestly say, binos high base crit is overrated right now. Pick shadow and assassin, and with 7 power charges you are already at 8.5% base crit with varanustra and with no critchance from the tree it would bump you too nearly 40% critchance. Sure might not be the best option, but it is one. Also it might be an interesting weapon to bring back CI melee? As you are way more flexible with weapon nodes.

"

Deadpeng a écrit :

This weapon over here costed me only 20 chaos and no amount of investment in your Varunstras can ever beat the DPS you can get out of this hammer. Just because you are trying hard, it does not mean some low budget weapon GGG made will work out.

Varunastra double dips multi-weapon type nodes, sorry to say but your hammer doesnt have shit on a Varunastra blade.

"

deathspenalty a écrit :

"

Geisalt a écrit :

Spoiler

Of course, i do not forget this specific interaction with this weapon. In my build proposition i suggested Sunder attack skill, which is a mace/staff gem.

Thoo, it doesnt not change this fact: is it really worthy to lose points to compensate the lack of crit of this weapon?

I believe the answer is "no". In thoses builds i dont think that dagger nodes will give enough survivability with varu because varu needs more points to get the same crit efficiency.

So we need to spend more points of crit/increased and we lose thoses points because we cant put them somewhere else.

I can be wrong but i havent seen builds that will shine better with varu around shadow area.

Yes you can use a mace skill with varu, but reave is good and scale perfectly with dagger, bino will get 100% better crit efficiency than varu. So to get same crit than bino you need twice the amount of nodes and gear increased %, it's insane.

I do not see a reason to break your own build only to put varu on your character. Only to use a replacable skill gem?

Varu is decent and has potential, on it's own field.
It's not because everything is doable with varu that everything will be good or optimized ;)

I would honestly say, binos high base crit is overrated right now. Pick shadow and assassin, and with 7 power charges you are already at 8.5% base crit with varanustra and with no critchance from the tree it would bump you too nearly 40% critchance. Sure might not be the best option, but it is one. Also it might be an interesting weapon to bring back CI melee? As you are way more flexible with weapon nodes.

Yeah Assassin is nuts, the amount of free crit is insane.

"

deathspenalty a écrit :

"

Geisalt a écrit :

Spoiler

Of course, i do not forget this specific interaction with this weapon. In my build proposition i suggested Sunder attack skill, which is a mace/staff gem.

Thoo, it doesnt not change this fact: is it really worthy to lose points to compensate the lack of crit of this weapon?

I believe the answer is "no". In thoses builds i dont think that dagger nodes will give enough survivability with varu because varu needs more points to get the same crit efficiency.

So we need to spend more points of crit/increased and we lose thoses points because we cant put them somewhere else.

I can be wrong but i havent seen builds that will shine better with varu around shadow area.

Yes you can use a mace skill with varu, but reave is good and scale perfectly with dagger, bino will get 100% better crit efficiency than varu. So to get same crit than bino you need twice the amount of nodes and gear increased %, it's insane.

I do not see a reason to break your own build only to put varu on your character. Only to use a replacable skill gem?

Varu is decent and has potential, on it's own field.
It's not because everything is doable with varu that everything will be good or optimized ;)

I would honestly say, binos high base crit is overrated right now. Pick shadow and assassin, and with 7 power charges you are already at 8.5% base crit with varanustra and with no critchance from the tree it would bump you too nearly 40% critchance. Sure might not be the best option, but it is one. Also it might be an interesting weapon to bring back CI melee? As you are way more flexible with weapon nodes.

but will it reach the dps expected? yes it's doable with everything. Assassin is powerfull. It doesnt make bino overrated. With this setup, a dagger will be better.

No you aren't way more flexible with weapon nodes for CI, you pick a dagger or a claw and you do your CI build. You are done. All the daggers and claw nodes are packed at one spot surrounded by energyshield nodes, there is no melee weapon nodes in witch area so varunastra is not needed in this setup.

Ok i'm maybe a bit too harsh, it's doable if you go CI RT and pick the nodes around RT. Will it be on par with bino or decent ci build ? i wonder
For an hybrid or mom build... something may be doable too

"

Geisalt a écrit :

but will it reach the dps expected? yes it's doable with everything. Assassin is powerfull. It doesnt make bino overrated. With this setup, a dagger will be better.

No you aren't way more flexible with weapon nodes for CI, you pick a dagger or a claw and you do your CI build. You are done. All the daggers and claw nodes are packed at one spot surrounded by energyshield nodes, there is no melee weapon nodes in witch area so varunastra is not needed in this setup.

Ok i'm maybe a bit too harsh, it's doable if you go CI RT and pick the nodes around RT. Will it be on par with bino or decent ci build ? i wonder
For an hybrid or mom build... something may be doable too

I'm quite sure friend of mine is running around 40k DPS with 7k HP and ton of armor. I'm gonna check and give you an update. Pretty sure it is great to scale Ring/Amulet/Gloves Flat physical bonuses. So I'd say for a 1c weapon, this is pretty decent.

Sure, you will reach much higher DPS with daggers, but you will have to have that dagger. The idea is that you can do pretty much everything (except for the very high-end stuff), with this budget option, if you invest into specing differently. You can respec later, and have your godly rare to replace it, if you want.
This is why I think this weapon is pretty cool.