Archmage heirophant next patch?

The new archmage gem seems strong.

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Supported Skills gain Added Lightning Damage equal to 19% of Unreserved Maximum Mana (level 20)

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Supported Skills have added Mana Cost equal to 5% of Unreserved Mana

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Can no longer Support Brand or Orb Skills

Since the damage is desynced from the mana cost, it will now play well with heirophant's sanctuary of thought.

I wonder what the strongest variant of heirophant archmage is going to be? It no longer works with brands, so storm brand is out.

Maybe an unleash variant would be good? I'm going to try unleash archmage heirophant, with Crackling Lance of Disintegration, Firestorm, and Firestorm of Meteors on separate unleashes and just cycle between the three spells waiting for seals. I don't think I would need any uniques to make the build good enough to at least collect all the voidstones -- should be solid for a league starter?


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EDITED TO ADD:

FINAL THOUGHTS BEFORE LEAGUE START:

TL;DR:

At this point, after trying a bunch of things, I'm completely sold on the unleash variant of archmage heirophant.
I think there's no reason to use the same gems for mapping as for bossing. I will use the combo of Arc + firestorm + Armageddon brand for general mapping and also for the campaign, then temporarily switch to a frostbolt + frostnova of frostbolts setup for the pinnacle bosses. After trying a bunch of spells, these are the ones I liked the best.

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Final thoughts on different skills I've tried out:

FROSTBOLT + FROSTNOVA OF FROSTBOLTS: This combo seems really solid for bossing. Works great with double unleash links: send an unleashed pack of frostbolts at the boss, then detonate them all and it just dies. Easy and clean one-two punch. A+ bossing skills. C- for mapping.

BALL LIGHTNING: This isn't bad but I just prefer the other skills. It isn't the greatest at clearing screens and it feels weaker than the above combo for bossing. Although it wasn't unplayable. Someone who likes this skill could do well with it, I'm sure. B+ bossing, C+ mapping.

ARC: This seems like the best mapping skill -- clears packs dead, leaves nothing alive. Also it can hit that one rare mob with multiple times -- with 3+ targets, it can chain back to something it already tagged. Single target DPS is not very good though. D bossing, A+ mapping.

CRACKLING LANCE OF BRANCHING: I don't care for this skill. It has great range but often misses stragglers up close or behind and I'd rather use Arc if I'm going to use something with such low single-target DPS. D bossing, B+ mapping.

CRACKLING LANCE OF DISINTEGRATION: Originally I was planning to run this, but I've decided against it. Its width is just so tiny. It's really only good for applying the 70% shock to bosses. Maybe someone can make this skill work, but I don't prefer it. C+ bossing, C- mapping.

FIRESTORM: I still like this skill as an all-purpose high DPS nuke. As a secondary attack, it complements Arc well for mapping and the campaign. B+ bossing, B- mapping.

ARMAGEDDON BRAND: This feels great on a tertiary link. It doesn't work with archmage anymore, but its cast speed is so fast that we barely lose any time dropping it down while waiting for unleash seals from our other skills. Its cast speed is so fast that we can easily cast it while waiting for our lightning warp to teleport us, so while warping through the campaign it might as well be an instant-cast free-exp-button. Its also nice to have a way of dealing damage that doesn't drain our mana, since I don't want to overinvest in cost reduction and mana is an important defensive layer. Also, we can precast this on the ground if we know that something dangerous is about to appear (essences, harvest, etc). I had an extra 3 gem slots in my final build, so I put this on the same link as frostblink with two supports. I think it pulls its weight as a tertiary source of damage.

I was considering already starting mana stacker Hiero, cuz I never played one, but this Archmage change sealed the deal.

I was actually thinking of using some channeled skill, like Lightning Tendrils, but Firestorm is definitely interesting option too, since it's one of the few duration skills that still work with Archmage.

Since damage and mana cost are untied now, you can stack "reduced mana cost" to get it down to zero:
39% from 20/20 inspiration
16% from Righteous Decree wheel
15% from Dreamer wheel
10% from Mana Mastery
10% from Insightfulness(only on full ES)

For total of 90% just from these. Insightfulness is unreliable, so realisticly 80%. I'm sure you could get remaining reduction from somewhere, tho idk from where, never where bothered by mana cost to know. Sanctuary of Thought gives LESS mana cost, so it won't exactly help us, but I still would pick it for AoE and ES.

Then for any effects that actually require you to spend mana(e.g. Sigil of Power) we would just use Arcane Cloak.

Downside of this approach is that we can't use Indigon, cuz it increases mana cost, but I think we'll be fine without it.

Self-cast Storm Burst should be nuts with this as long as cost is dropped low enough/regen is sufficient. Thinking this is the way I will go for league start.

Channeling spells seems like you'd burn through your mana ... you could invest in reduced cost, but wouldn't it be simpler just to invest in mana% and crit multiplier and just run a mana potion for a while? I don't think self-cast channel is the way to go for this, at least not for league start.

I made a POB for a level 70 heiro league starter character with all blue gear and only 4 links, using triple firestorm unleash:

https://pobb.in/cwv1tof1ARw_

( edited in a level 30 added lightning damage gem to each of the firestorm links to add comparable lightning damage to the extra damage from the archmage buff, since the new archmage gem isn't in POB yet)

Unleash burst damage is around 310k per firestorm 4-link, of which I have 3 -- so that's 900k+ burst damage from 3 casts -- for approximately 0c of investment. 2.8k life, 3.6k mana with MoM, 1k ES, plus arcane cloak. Should be plenty strong to breeze through maps.

I'll be honest - I'm not 100% convinced by Conviction of Power, was more thinking of going Elemental Overload and grabbing Illuminated Devotion for life leech. I did some pobbing and damage seemed good on Firestorm.

Later I would've also gone Light Eater for ES leech and Sanctuary of Thought for big ES pool. This would make it also easier to switch to LL later.

And if you really wanna those Endurance Charges, just use Enduring Cry.

And yes, channeled skills burn through mana real quick and I'm now more and more convinced that they indeed aren't that good of an option for leaguestart. Self-cast, especially with duration spells like Firestorm, is way easier to sustain, even without reductions to mana cost, which would allow me invest points elsewhere, so I'll go that way. Not sure if Unleash is the way to go, but I still have some time to try things and figure out what I want.

> Elemental Overload

I've tested this with firestorm, and unfortunately, it's a bad fit. It only calculates crit once per cast, no matter how many times the firestorm hits. Its very, very difficult to sustain elemental overload on a firestorm build -- you'd need so much crit that you might as well just go crit damage.

Good point!
I can definitely adapt to that, no problem. And I even have free gem socket, so I could link PCoC to my Hydrosphere for easy Power Charge generation on bosses.

Thanks Millard

Did the calculations for running archmage with storm burst in POB and it maths out to be sustainable if using inspiration and taking all available % reduced mana cost on tree. Think I am going to try this at league start and see how it plays.

I like unleash because you have extra gem slots in this build since you aren't using your mana for auras. So might as well set up multiple links with multiple unleashes.

I'm still not sure on what the main skill should be... Firestorm is ... Okay... but maybe there is something better. The disadvantage of firestorm is that the damage isn't instant -- gotta wait for the meteors to fall and its hard to hit moving targets.

Crackling Lance of Disintegration seems obvious for the shock, but I don't think I would need it on more than one link.

Glacial cascade seems alright. What about eye of winter? How often does this spell even hit?

Or I could do frostbolt, and maybe ice nova of frostbolts to go with it...

decisions decisions...

p.s. doesn't illuminated devotion seem kindof weak? a major ascendancy point just for a small bit of AOE, ailment reduction, and leech? I'd rather take the more consistent charges from conviction of power.

Illuminated devotion is basically only worth running if you have a way to get 50% reduced duration of ele ailments from somewhere else for complete ele ailment immunity, and even then I would usually rather just get conviction of power for more damage and pdr and resists and sort out ailments via pantheon and maybe the protection wheel. As for what skills to run, eye of winter scales terribly with added damage and doesn't leverage aoe damage, which means it doesn't fit that well with other parts of the build, since we're already running archmage anyways, how about kitavas thirst for frostbolt + greater volley and run ice nova of frostbolts as the main damage skill?