The storm-prophet of halvnast

The storm-prophet of halvnast
Scenery 13 of 31 · Halvnast, the mid-reach promontory shrine. Alone · Nightmare · Occultist.

Keep moving: she throws Nearest answer every 2.2 s. In 60 test runs, no run fell below 87% health, and no ground tell ever landed.

What you hold

Alone at scenery 13 you have had five boss drafts (after sceneries 3, 5, 7, 9 and 11), so you hold seven spells: your two starting spells plus one per draft. A draft spent on an upgrade ranks a spell up instead of adding one. Every tested draft order held seven.

• Tap: The Courtesy. A shadow bolt whose damage lands a moment after it hits. 2 charges.
• Hold: On the beat. A light shadow beam. You cannot move while it runs.

Each draft deals four cards. Card one is always one of the Occultist's own spells. From the third draft on, one card upgrades a spell you already hold. The rule: At each boss draft take, in this order: a new damage, control or summon spell; if none is offered, an upgrade of a damage, control or summon spell you hold; if neither, any new spell. Between two equal cards, take the Occultist's own. The build we used:

1. Draft 1: Spillover (card one). A shadow drop that leaves damage over time and arcs to 2 more bodies.
2. Draft 2: card one was the Spillover upgrade, so the run took Twice told from a random slot. A light arcane bolt, 3 shots.
3. Draft 3: Sunwell, a random card taken over the Spillover upgrade. A heavy holy self-cast, 146 damage.
4. Draft 4: Quietrot (card one). A heavy shadow bolt, 146 damage with damage over time after.
5. Draft 5: card one was the Quietrot upgrade, so the run took Stillair, a frost self-cast with 2 charges.

All ten builds ended up with Spillover and Quietrot, and all ten cleared. Card one was the pick in 18 of 50 drafts: once Spillover and Quietrot are held, card one is usually their upgrade. The fastest single run, at 107 s, used Quietrot, Citation, Spillover, Consecration and Sunderflame.

Talents

You have 12 points, and the runs put all of them into the Appointment tree. The talent screen accepted every purchase, in this order:

1. The Ink Itself ×2: shadow spells deal 3% more damage per point.
2. As Far as He Can Set One ×2: bolt spells reach 3% farther per point.
3. Not Much of Him ×1: +2% maximum health per point.
4. Longer in Hand ×2: shield, ward, empower and haste you apply last 4% longer per point.
5. The Colour He Expects ×2: take 4% less damage of the element that has hurt you most this fight per point.
6. Two on the Book ×1: appointments pay 4% more per point on an enemy carrying more than one of yours.
7. It Travelled ×1: appointments pay 4% more per point when the enemy is farther from you when they come due than when you cast.
8. Nothing in the Room Is Free ×1: appointments pay 4% more per point while every living enemy in the room owes you one.

Talents are your choice. Each point went into the deepest open row, a new talent before a second rank; rows open at 5, 10 and 15 points in that tree, the ultimate at 20.

The fight

1. She has one Resonance rook with her (Shin cross: jump). When she dies, the fight ends and the rook falls with her.
2. Nearest answer (bolt, every 2.2 s): strafe.
3. Reading (beam, every 9 s): strafe. Rail run (bolt, every 11 s): jump (Space / North).
4. Heave (drop, every 14 s): walk out; it leaves slow. Joint fence (halt, every 18 s): blink (Shift / East); it also leaves slow. Across 60 runs the hero walked out 60 times and blinked out 44 times, and was never caught.
5. Rotation sweep (beam): strafe. It comes every 22 s, every 17 s once she is below 66% health, and every 13 s below 33%. Dish (kite; leaves weaken) and Stillness (strafe) come once each.
6. On the beat carries the damage: the build we used cast it 71–83 times a fight. Hold cast (Left mouse / South) in the gaps between beams.
7. Throw Quietrot and Sunwell whenever they are back, and lay Spillover under her. Fire The Courtesy and Twice told on the move. Switch spells with E/Q or R1/L1.
8. Keep out of her reach. Each further contact hit in an enemy's reach costs more; half a second away resets it.

What goes wrong

• No run was lost, and no run fell below 87% health. These were automated test runs, not human play; do not count on the same margin.
• On Nightmare she ignores every control status: mark, weaken, slow, root and stun. The Courtesy's mark does not land on her, though its damage still arrives.
• Nightmare has no pause. Alone, going down ends the fight as Defeated, and you retry the room with full health.

Tested

We ran 60 automated fights on the shipped rules, with legal talent purchases: ten draft orders, three play styles and two skill levels. All 60 cleared, and none went down. The fastest took 107 s and the slowest 315 s. The lowest health in any run was 87.5%. The build we used took 158–230 s and never went below 92%.

Screenshots

One complete fight in the current build, played by an automated test player with the game's normal controls: the Occultist alone on Nightmare, holding the build used above. The fight took 2 min 50 s of game time.