Getting full use of that one claw (or two)

It's that time of year again, testing ideas I want to play in the next league. Then again, it's always that time, and half the time I don't end up playing them. In keeping with tradition (!), I decided to make a claws build. Again. Different claws this time, though...let's see, claws.

list of unique claws

You might notice two things from that list. One, Cybil's Paw has LoH that's barely used in most Cybil builds. Two, Essentia Sanguis has 10% additional block chance while dual wielding claws. Huh, it seems my fascination with Essentia is not yet over.

Anyway. I decided to get around the link cost of CoC using claws. The usual CoC build practically requires life leech tied in, which means either 5L or naturally multiprojectile/multihit skills. Think lightning strike, split arrow, EK, firestorm. By going claws, I can get natural lifesteal while using xMP. And by claw, I actually mean single claw.

I have a 79 ranger with a respec, which I used to make a cast-on-crit skill tree for Cybil. Since I'm lazy and don't actually own Essentia, etc etc, shield block nodes or something. I paid 1.5ex for that shield I'm using, okay? It's beautiful.

skill tree
Links: ST - CoC - GMP - X

Tried ice spear in slot X, didn't much like it, tried FP, liked it a lot. However, the CoC play style in general is...different. Basically just throwing down ST, and when it doesn't crit you're barely surviving, and when it does...big kaboom and now we can move on to the next group of mobs. (Also, don't read too much into first-draft concept trees, particularly ones thrown together in 5 minutes for testing purposes. I need more block and spelldamage.)

Crit wise, power charges make a big difference. I can feel the difference between 33% and 47% crit, both here and on my ice ranger. Now, I don't like PCoC and won't have the links for it anyway, and I can't afford Romiras for testing, so Voll's it is. I brought Berek's Grip along for testing, though it's not likely to be present in the new leagues. Oh well, cross that bridge when I come to it. Not like I was shocking anything anyway, with no +lightning, but it's the thought that counts and lifeleech actually does work since FP and freezing, etc etc.

1.68aps is too slow. Bah. Given I'm not going to end up with a lot of shield nodes anyway, I'd like to dual wield if possible. From experience, ST doesn't really feel smooth until about 3aps. Also, higher aps = more potential crits per second, which is a really big deal for CoC and is why quillrain is consistently in favour despite its 5% base crit. 5% is terrible.

So can I fit Essentia into this build, and is it worth it? If not, then what?

Probably going to die to thorns/reflect a lot. By which I mean pay close attention to Mumble when someone warns of reflect, and stop throwing things. You only get one chance in HC, after all. GR has antisynergy with any sort of LL on a HP build, and really wants VP to make it work, but VP is a pain in the behind. Not to mention GR and EB just don't work together, and Voll's without EB can get fairly painful. ST's really cheap though, so it might be doable. Will respec ranger again after patch, if I can get hold of an Essentia from somewhere, to try the GR VP thing. Before that, I'll probably spend one of my free resets to take out EB, see how manageable it is for ST using Voll's. Thief's Torment, anyone? Feels like it might be really useful for this build.

If I can get any sort of LL at all on life rather than ES, that's really significant compared to LoH. So, maybe Essentia, maybe not. We'll see. I'm actually thinking of a second Tiger's Paw with high roll lightning and ias - that'll give me additional 15 LoH on regular hits, not quite as good as capping LL on phys damage, but I won't be dealing phys damage anyway. The lightning's just good for shocking. On like half the hits. Wake of Destruction makes life so easy, really, but Wrath can probably take that spot. Alternatively, a CoC dagger, but those things get expensive and stuff, and for survivability reasons I'll likely stick to claws unless I can finagle spell LL from somewhere.

Update: someone else did a CoC build. You bet I'll be learning from his experience.