[General] Advice on crafting a Sampire suit

[Katrina Blade]

So I have scoured the forums, and taken in all the advice, and about to embark on making two Sampire suits! One for max damage and one with as much luck on as possible. I have (with soulstones) a 120 BS, Tailor, imbuer, 100 Arms, tinker, carpernter, inscribe, Alchemy, Fletcher.

I have read countless posts and think I have the basics, but wanted to make sure I knew what I was doing and get some confirmation or tips from the experts?

Suit 1 (built around glads gorget and animated legs). 75/95/70/95/75, HCI 45, DCI (as close to 45 as poss), LMC 40, min 50%DI, as much Stam, hit and mana inc (in that order) as poss and finally some stats. A 12% Damage eater would be the icing on the cake!

Suit 2 (built on Armour of fortune and the luck neck): 70/75/60/60/60 min, HCI 45, DCI close to 45 as poss, LMC close to 40 as poss. Min 50% DI and then as much stam, hit, mana inc as possible.

The process as I understand it:

1. Make a spreadsheet and update it as you go, the closer you get to finishing the harder getting the right piece to finish off the resists.
2. Craft lots of the piece youre making in base material until you get one with no additional resists on one or two of the slots.
3. Reforge the item with a runic kit.
4. POF the item (agapite and val only to 178-180) to 255
5. Imbue the stats you want onto the armour piece (using knuckleheads or another imbue calculator)
6. Enhance the item using the store bought tool (either for luck or for the final resists you want).
7. Start the next piece.

My questions, confusion arises from the below questions:

1. is the process above correct/the best way?
2. For blacksmithing, should i just make base piece from valorite etc?
3. Should i reforge using spiked/horned/barbed kit for leather, and like wise for carpentry? for Blacksmith what do I use to reforge? Should I be making the pieces brittle (as a melee samp i tried to avoid this) or should i be adding named properties and using powerful? or leaving it "clean" and imbuing what i want?
4. How do you get those uber armour pieces i see with high resists, stats, stam, mana and lmc etc? I cant for the life of me seem able to craft them!
5. Should i be solely relying on jewellery and extras (robes, sashes, etc) for the HCI/DCI/extra stats?
6. Whats the best materials to use, I was initially thinking plate or studded leather?
Ive heard a little bit about reinforcing with stuff (think one of the items is called lacquer?) how does this work and when should i do it?

Thanks, new to crafting after returning and a little confused by the whole process when i see peeps wearing uber armour and the best i can craft is a joke!!

 

[Sarak]

finding armor is always luck of the draw whether or not using a luck suit. my sampire does quite well and can solo most spawns, however i do have a legendary tunic, legendary bracelet/ring, the ranger's cloak tinker legs, a legendary gorget, mace and shield glasses conjurers garb with detective legendary boots and i also have some legendary gloves, youll find the armor/jewels usually with the best mods on them are usually antique then brittle, in my experience prized and clean are hard to come by thus when u find them, they are quite expensive. my resists in vamp form are all 70's and 75 on energy and actually im over capped on a few of the resists. the roof in TOL and the under water boss are good places to get the best chances for good armor however some seem to fall in the champ bosses but rarely on the undead boss neira. Exodus is also a great place for armor. hope this helps and i almost forgot i also use a corgul sash for the stam 1.

 

[Katrina Blade]

thanks sarak good advice, i have most of the artis etc, was more interested in how to build the pieces round them, dont quite get this crafting malarkey yet!

 

[Basara]

You always make the base items out of iron, if you are going the imbuing or reforging routes. You then reforge, adjust with imbuing if possible, then enhance using a forged metal tool to get 100% success chance.

If crafting with runics, though, you might want to use the colored material to start out, and be prepared to recycle a lot (as a cheaper method that doesn't require forged metal tools)

 

[Mikeltin5]

as far as the excel sheet goes...I have a line for each of the components which also includes any pots (for pvp suits) and town bonuses that may be used (+5 ssi etc) and a total at the bottom. I have each of the line items subtract from the bottom line. So for me...I preset the excel sheet with all the necessary attributes I need to have my suit exactly where I want it. I plug in all the knowns (arties, clothing, etc.) and see where i'm at. then find a legendary or 2 to help facilitate the resists and stats. craft the difference in the process you mentioned. If you have 1 or 2 metal pieces ur stam loss prevention will pretty much be there. the rest craft/use legendaries as studded for as much lmc as u can get. I also calculate an 8lmc studded piece as 11 on my sheet so it computes to its entirety. I also annotate next to the piece i'm working what enhancement I intend to use on it and add those bonuses to the resist calculation (i.e. Neck Barbed or Gloves Horned etc). That way I can account for the resist bump and know exactly what material I originally intended to use.

the brittle legendaries are no different than the imbued armor pieces, so I would shoot for 1 or 2 attributes u need to overcap (i.e. if imbuing lets u add 8 lmc but u need 10 lmc on a piece...shoot for that plus another) then pof, imbue what u need to finish up that piece and enhance if needed.

I personally don't recommend using legendary jewels. the suit isn't at its "true full potential" without epic jewels, but a samp takes serious damage. i'd rather not replace my jewels in a year. I've had to rebuild my suit enough times from learning new stuff over the years and game changes to not have the desire to change it merely cuz my jewels are burned out. or worst case, you don't catch that its low durability and u hit up a longer fighting boss and it reaches 0 dura mid fight. agonizing watching it deplete til u finish the fight.

the "reinforcing" is actually refinements, used to either raise DCI and lower resists or raise resists and lower DCI, depending on which grouping you use. if suit building and samp suit building is new to u, i'd hold off on those til u work through the suit, and bring ur completed suit back with all its stats to the forums for opinions. sure u'll get some crappy comments cuz everyone thinks they're Ultra L33T suit builders, but there's enough gentle hearted ppl that only wana help and ull get a pretty good basis as to whether or not its worth refining or more of a learning experience. you can also map out what you'd like the suit to look like and upload the excel doc so ppl can directly follow along and provide feedback.

 

[Basara]

Agreeing on the imbued/Brittle analogy. As long as you get good pieces without Imbuing, you can avoid that (and you can use POF on reforged items as long as they aren't imbued or brittle). Of course, the best thing is if you can find nice pre-revision jewelry that doesn't have durability.

If your build is PvM only and not on Siege ruleset, even cursed items can be an option for a piece or two, but it doesn't hurt to carry a non-cursed backup that's not as good in case you die, with a dress macro set up for it. You can usually get the cursed piece back easily enough.