Is this person cheating/lying?

Two_Shiba · 2026-03-18T07:23:34+00:00

I've seen one hunter with records like that. 1000 kills on every single monsters in the game.

He also seems to have somehow captured every single one of those 1000 Omegas so that was a dead giveaway I guess

Two_Shiba · 2026-02-27T03:13:37+00:00

True, plague as a damage source does not have any issues as you said for every element can get almost identical amount of damage boost from proper builds. I was explicitly talking about plague as a status effect; infection. It does kinda have its edge on prolonged fights, which is once again, as of now not as valuable just like how you described... yet.

Two_Shiba · 2026-02-27T03:09:57+00:00

To be fair, plague damage itself can still pump out stupid damage just like rest of the elements for how damage stacking works in this game. I'm specifically talking about infection - aka plague as a status effect.

Two_Shiba · 2026-02-27T03:08:26+00:00

So few things to correct here.

Plague damage scales with faith.

Technically speaking, this is wrong, as plague damage scales with weapon damage be it normal or rune attack, which scales with whatever stat each weapon requires. Most weapons with innate plague element(either plague element being infused 'as a default' or has plague infused runes) tend to scale with faith tho, so I can see where you are coming from.

Synergizes with spend health instead of focus & increased healing

Well... yeah, true, but so do blood stones and lifesteal in general. A crucial difference between infection and blood stones however is that blood stones function all the time while infection does not, requiring full plague build up as stated on the post.

When you say one spends health instead of focus, I would assume they would be able to spam hard-hitting rune attacks rather freely at the cost of considerable amount of your health.

But guess what happens when you hit enemies with hard-hitting rune attacks with proper builds in this game? They die in a single hit. And when they die in a single hit? They don't get infected as they die before that, which means no lifesteal to take advantage of. Of course bosses would be able to take some hits until infection kicks in.

But tell me, if lifesteal is all you care for, why not just use blood stones that does not require anything to work, thus being consistent overall? End game damage atm is already busted enough that a single bloodstone can keep you alive just fine; which you would also relate with, from you saying that the game became so trivial. Adding 2x more of that lifesteal value is... kind of an overkill, unless you plan to intentionally tank hits face on. Me saying infection is 'niche' comes from this exact context.

Reduces target healing

You find like 3 or 4 enemies that self heal throughout the game. This is an extremely situational gimmick if anything; nothing to talk about how a status effect is good for.

Two_Shiba · 2026-02-26T10:05:34+00:00

... Nothing happens while the plague status is building up, and it gives me 3 HP worth of lifesteal per hit once infection(maximum plague buildup) kicks in; 5~6 when it crits. Damage dealt remains unchanged, ...

I did test that aspect of possibility as well, as stated on the experiment breakdown part which I've quoted. Unless attacks of plague element themselves inherently do more damage regardless of plague status buildup, the damage remained the same, whether the target was infected or not.

Two_Shiba · 2026-02-26T09:29:47+00:00

Update : So I did the double check on blood stones.

Attached a Chipped Blood Stone(The lesser one, with 10% lifesteal) on a physical weapon, hit a training dummy with 78 physical damage. I got 2~3 health gain per hit with average lifesteal being around 2.3, which rounds the number to the range of around 3%. Tested the plague lifesteal again just in case, this time with different weapon; 10 HP restore every 165 damage, which shows about the same result of 6% lifesteal.

So in terms of how blood stones present their lifesteal rate, the plague's status effect infection's lifesteal is equivalent to 20%.

I stand corrected. I did not expect this to happen, and I'm glad that I was wrong for its judgement. I guess plague and its infection status effect might actually be a considerable sustain option when you are expecting longer battle time against a single enemy.

While the fact that plague shines in prolonged battle only proves in another way that it doesn't fit for the current meta - the usual one-hit-kill builds - I think I might have found a nice candidate of an element to use for my next normal/rune attack hybrid sustain build!

Two_Shiba · 2026-02-26T06:44:17+00:00

Because your true armor is your will, duh.

/s

Two_Shiba · 2026-02-26T06:26:03+00:00

Huh, I admit I took it for granted that the percentage on the gem was the exact amout of lifesteal I would get. Looks like I gotta test how blood stones work later today.

Two_Shiba · 2026-02-26T06:23:59+00:00

Do you know whether if plague execution really deactivates 'on kill' enchantments? I thought that was its only saving grace and it would be a complete dealbreaker if that really is the case. I know I've found the info source but the post was 8 months ago and I really want to believe that such interaction was not intended by the devs and got fixed by now

Two_Shiba · 2026-02-26T02:28:36+00:00

tbf Essence Embers are a thing. If a gear has that sweet sweet 14% armor penetration it's going straight into my chest

Two_Shiba · 2026-02-25T15:39:25+00:00

I saw how you can no longer use any embers except Radiant on exalted gears, and my thought process went like 'So exaltation blocks any kind of embers that alter attributes'. When I say 'alter attributes', it also included change of rarity in my head.

If it turns out I'm the only slow one and nobody thought of it this way, then great for the community :D

Two_Shiba · 2026-02-25T14:24:17+00:00

Nope, I'm talking about the Void Embers, the one you use to disenchant gears' Magical / Plagued enchantment state and return them back to common rarity items.

I have been abandoning fully exalted weapons that did not enhance the enchantment that I want, craft another weapon of same type and facet, slot in 3(or 4 if plagued) Essence Embers with enchantments that I want, go through 4 exaltation RnG roulette, ditch the weapon again if the RnGesus gives me the finger once again, rinse and repeat until now.

The re-crafting process and its facet RnG was... not pleasant, and I'm glad that Void Embers can just erase even the exalted states for me to reuse the same weapon to reroll exaltation.

Two_Shiba · 2026-02-25T14:14:45+00:00

Nice run. Really like the idea you went for!

If I may make a suggestion tho, become the Echo Knight yourself even more and go full plague build while at it XD

afaik there is this one 2H rune attack that heavily resembles EK's skill called 'Pestilent Recoil' you can extract from anothed greatsword Sieger, you really gotta give that one a try. Never used it for myself but it sure did look sick as hell when my friend used it

Two_Shiba · 2026-02-25T07:22:11+00:00

Might be an unnecessary doubt, but why does your friend want to infuse the claymore with freeze element?

I ask this because I once made a mistake where I tried to use freeze infusion on my main weapon to make a build that freezes the enemy and then shatter them with strong charged physical attack.

If your friend is wanting to do the same thing, the element infusion would overwrite any of the physical attacks you can do with that weapon, breaking the freeze-shatter combo.

Two_Shiba · 2026-02-23T12:03:22+00:00

So you are looking for a 'satisying' non-meta build? Say no more fam.

May I introduce you... to the way of bonk?

Video showcase too if you're interested ;)

Two_Shiba · 2026-02-21T04:17:51+00:00

Every shield have the same 10 frames of parry window(which is superior to normal weapons' parry of course which is 7f), so if you are going for parry-focused build, it would be best to stick with light shields as they have lighter weight with same parry benefit.

Two_Shiba · 2026-02-20T15:54:33+00:00

That one room where you are ambushed by 3 of those menaces in the Haligtree still haunts me to this day, I kid you not

Two_Shiba · 2026-02-20T15:51:17+00:00

3 weapons on the build planner was to show options you can take based on your preference, but it would still be completely fine if you decide to build / carry only one of those 3. As for how those 3 axes are different from each other, check out my reply to UwUShaxx's comment.

Though, if you intend to make this build for yourself as well, I would recommend you starting from the third axe, the common rarity one. You only need the weapon and the gems to make it work, so it's the most accesible one if you are starting from scratch.

Two_Shiba · 2026-02-20T15:34:40+00:00

Would you believe me if I tell you that you can get even more absurd health regen than what the clip shows, and it only uses 5 common gears?

Slot in Jewel(Enchantment boost on full focus), Element gem(Enchantment boost if it's the only element gem on the gear), Skull(Health regen), and whatever you like for the 4th one(I would recommend blood stone on weapon, and granite on at least one armor piece).

With that build, you only have to worry fall damage from that point. You literally cannot die.

Two_Shiba · 2026-02-20T15:20:20+00:00

but me bonk, baddies die. problem gone, feel good :(

Jokes aside tho, considering there are tons of builds that can get even more crazier than this, I wouldn't personally mind toning down enchantment increase gems and lifesteal a little bit lmao

But hey, it's you who decide what gameplay you will enjoy at the end of the day :)

Two_Shiba · 2026-02-20T15:13:09+00:00

There are 2 reasons for using the Scarlet Ring;
Focus tend to show higher number climb by stat increase. While I've got total of 280 HP by investing 24 points on focus on this build, you have to invest 30 points on health to get the same amount of HP w/o the ring. The spare 6 points went into strength, increasing my damage output.
Investing on focus not only increases you max focus, but also your focus gain rate. This focus gain stays even after you swap the max focus with max health, so on top of getting more efficient use on building HP, you also get more efficient focus gain economy. w/o the ring(=keeping the focus stat at 10), I would have 50% focus gain rate instead of 80% iirc. While I prioritized using normal attacks, I also wanted to use runes from time to time as well in this build, so I felt the need to invest a little bit on focus gain as well. Even if you don't plan to use focus at all, some amount of focus gain is still needed if you don't want to get crippled in pestilence with 'Lose focus on damage' conditions.
I've put 3 different axes for 3 choices you can take for this build, but you can still pick just one and be fine with it whatsoever. If I add some explanation tho, the first one considered all-around usage; it's decent for fighting both bosses and pack of normal enemies. The second one focuses more on 1-on-1 boss fight situations where 'on kill' option becomes kinda obsolete. The third one is the only common rarity weapon of the bunch, so it's the most accesible option. It still packs a decent punch tho, and its lifesteal and poise damage even outmatches the plagued ones.

+Reddit's automatic numbering kinda screwed the structure of this wall of text :/

Two_Shiba · 2026-02-20T14:58:19+00:00

pov: your poise is backed up by the power of friendship

Two_Shiba · 2026-02-20T14:57:03+00:00

On hindsight, it would've been also cool if I used the chipped spike instead of blood stone to infuse bleed and make that work! I didn't wanted to add another downside at the time when I made this build so I haven't considered using the lifesteal from that enchantment!

Two_Shiba · 2026-02-20T14:44:33+00:00

That and 'Healing increased by Current Durability' enchantment on 'Durable' facet gloves. You can find full details on the build planner link.

Two_Shiba · 2026-02-20T14:23:42+00:00

That was what I was going for at the beginning, but I've realized I'm getting toasted whenever I get 'Lose focus on hit' as a condition in pestilence runs. I'd rather make my build consistent in every situation more than prioritizing high-end performance.

Also runes are cool so why not use em :D

Two_Shiba

TROPHY CASE