Heavy Build Venomancer

The heavy build is one of the possible builds Venomancers can have while retaining their effectiveness. This guide explains the stats and the common gears of a Venomancer wishing to use this build. Most Venomancers that use Heavy Armor are usually level 90 or higher. The reason for this is that it is usually not worth the money or effort needed to wear Heavy Armor before level 90. A proper Heavy Armor build can be quite expensive to pursuit in comparison to magic builds.

Reasons to go Heavy Armor
Pros:
 * Good physical defense
 * High HP
 * Better overall survivability
 * Able to deal decent damage in both fox form and human form
 * Ability to swap between arcane armor and heavy armor, or even mix them together if built right

Cons:
 * Low magic defense in the early levels
 * Very low magic attack compared to a full int venomancer
 * Build can be difficult and stats can be hard to obtain (if you're low 9x)
 * Low channelling
 * Expensive to make it efficient
 * There is no Rank 9 heavy armor for venomancers, which limits the build if you wish to be a competitive player

Basic Build
The best way to roll as a Heavy Armor Venomancer would be to go:
 * 2 pieces of Heavy Armor
 * 2 pieces of Arcane Armor
 * 1 magic defense ornament
 * 1 physical defense ornament
 * 2 magic rings, refined to give magic defense.

This combination gives the best overall defenses a veno can get without heavily refining adorns and rings. Your average defenses are around 5k physical and 5k magical with low refined adorns and rings, which is much higher than light armor, and a huge advantage over robes unless you plan on highly refining physical adorns.

Obtaining the needed stat points
At level 90 you have 445 stat points, the stats you need to obtain are 227 strength, 49 dexterity, and 270 magic. That's 101 stat points short. One thing every heavy Venomancer needs is the Twilight Temple level 90 gold cape which gets 27 of the stat points needed out of the way. Another nice thing to obtain for stat points is a Mystical Tome that gives you permanent extra stats.

The Mogwai belt is another good way of getting your stats, though this belt as it can't be refined. Only use it if you are going to be using a magic defense necklace with it. The Mogwai belt is a quest reward from the level 87 quest inside of Cave of Sadistic Glee, it's obtained after completing a long chain quest. It can give another 15-18 stat points.That leaves around 50 more stat points to get depending on the tome you have.

Other ways of obtaining the needed stat points

 * Your magic rings, they should both have at least 10 stat points in either magic, dexterity or strength on them.
 * Your necklace should also give stat points, assuming you are using the Mogwai belt for stats you should have a magic necklace that gives at least 5 stats, depending how lucky you are on finding one.
 * Restating your vitality down to 3 gives you another 2 stats.
 * The weapon you should be going for is the Twilight Temple level 90 Wraith Conqueror magic sword, but if there is no possible way you can get the stats to equip all your gear you can settle for the level 89 gold weapon mold. It's good for a low 90 Venomancer wearing Heavy Armor as it only requires 267 magic instead of 270 which is 3 less stats you need. It also gives 11 dexterity which can be restated out.

Level 100+ and Reawakened
When you have reawakened at least once and you are back to level 100, you will have an easier time obtaining the needed stats. This gives you more freedom to choose better gear pieces and improving your character. Reawakening twice is highly recommended not only for your stats to wear gear, but overall character improvement and restrictions to enter various Dungeons. Also be sure to level up your levels in the demon book for extra stats.

Build

 * Weapon: Sandy World is recommended but you can go for any as long you avoid wands and glaives, as they have lower physical attack.
 * Armor: Full Awakened Lionheart Armor Set
 * Magic ornaments of your choice and preferred playstyle
 * Rings that gives both physical and magical attack stats, preferred with channelling
 * If no War Avatar card set, use cards that gives either +10 dexterity, magic, or strength if you have. If the cards cost too much leadership, make sure you wear at least your durability card preferred of the type A or better.
 * Star Chart should have magical defense, otherwise settle for attack based stats while making sure your magical ornaments are refined well to make up for it.
 * Tome should give dexterity, strength or magic stats.
 * Armor shards should be citrines. Weapon shards can be garnet or sapphire depends on your playstyle. Keep in mind, your pet only benefits from sapphires.

You may choose a weapon with any stats you feel that fits your playstyle. You should obtain the cape before anything else due to its high stat bonus and no restrictions to wear it. Always go for high dexterity, strength and magic stats on your armor, especially on your cape and helmet. Make sure your leggings and footwear have a high Elemental Resistance percentage. The first card you should level is the Durability card for more magic defense and HP. Venomancers in particular gain the most HP from the Durability card.

If desired, you can swap out your Heavy Armor Wristguard with the Arcane version to gain -6% channelling, however this will cost you +20 Attack Levels. It makes your DPS lower but helps if you only play the support role.

The necklace should have the 5% hp add-on and be refining for magical defense. A good choice would be the Puzzle Cube Badge·Vain. The belt should offer good defensive stats and also be refining for magical defense. A good choice would be the Warsong Lock·Void. A cheaper alternative for both the necklace and the belt could be Old Heaven's Tear necklace and belt with -6% channelling and other useful stats. These belts can be found in the Auction House or bought from other players. You can also craft them yourself. Make sure it has all or most elemental resistances. There is a variety of choices for the rings there is a lot of different options, depending on your preferences.

Ring options:
 * Dark Flower Spirit's Ring: Lv96 legendary ring that refines for magical defense. It has good magic attack stats and a bit of physical attack. However, it lacks channelling and may be hard to find these days.
 * Chaotic Sign of Antiquity: Lv95 Lunar Glade ring that refines for magical defense. It has good magic attack, channelling and even critical hit rate. It also has physical defense stats. However, there are no physical attack stats. You can also choose its physical version called Chaotic Sign of Frost.
 * Cloud Stir: Lv100 ring that refines for magical defense. It has good magic attack, channelling, critical hit rate and attack level. It has no physical attack stats. It can be upgraded, but that is not budget friendly. It also has a physical version called Sky Cover.
 * The Rank 1 to Rank 8 ring offer both magic and physical attack stats along with channelling and critical hit rate. The stats are high depending on the ring level which depends on your reputation, however you can only get 1 of these rings and it cannot be refined.
 * The Rank 9 ring can also only be obtained once but it can be used alongside the Rank 8 ring and gives very good magic and physical attack, channelling and critical hit rate. However, it is expensive and cannot be refined. You can upgrade it and gain the ability to refine it for defense, but doing so can be expensive. It is considered one of the best rings in game regardless of your build.
 * Star's Culmination Ring is a very cheap ring that requires you to do Colosseum fights. You need 15 battles in within just one week and you will get a guaranteed 100 Arigora Coins which is exactly enough to craft this basic ring. This version cannot be refined, however like the Rank 9 Ring it can be be upgraded and refined, but it is very expensive and only advisable for endgame characters. The ring can only be obtained once.
 * Old Heaven's Tear rings can be crafted by yourself or other players. These rings will have random stats, but you may be able to find some with your desired stats.

Stats
At level 100 the require stats are 252 strength, 54 dexterity and 280-280 magic (depending on weapon choice). That is a total of 591 stats. If you only are reawakened once and both levels are 100, you have 515 available stats plus the standard 15. This means you need just 61 extra stats to wear everything.

The cape from the Awakened Lionheart Armor set can have between 24 to 48 stats. The helmet from the set is another 12 to 24 stats. With the worst possible luck, you will gain 36 stats. You could gain another 20 stats by reawakening the 2nd time at level 100, and it is very likely you will have at least one War Avatar Card with either 10 strength, magic or dexterity to complete your set.

If you gain average stats on both helmet and cape, you will gain 54 stats. That makes you 7 points away, which can be obtained by a War Avatar Card with strength, magic or dexterity stats. You can also get a tome with 7 stats or higher, or just reawaken for a second time.

If you lack stats due to an incomplete armor set, you can find temporary gear with a lot of stats. The Band from Heaven's Jail ring gives a lot of strength and dexterity along with great physical attack, however its not recommended to keep this ring as you will lack magical defense.

Pet Choice & Benefits
The pet choice doesnt differ much from regular venomancer build. Depends on your playstyle, you may choose a tank pet or high damage pet. Always choose a pet that can be evovled so it can benefit from your venomancers stats. Legendary pets are superior as usual.

The pets damage comes from your gears +magic attack stats and attack level. That means even though your magic attack is lower due to low magic in your build it doesnt matter, as the pet benefits directly off your weapon refinement and +magic attack stats such as rings, sapphire shards in weapon, and engravements.

Your pet also benefits highly from your heavy armor. Your pet should overall be more tanky because of your own high physical defense and HP which comes from your heavy armor.

Heavy Armor in PvP
Due to there being no Rank 9 Heavy Armor available for venomancers to use, it restricts your PvP ability as your defense level and overall defense will be too low. Therefore, Heavy Armor venomancers have no place in competitive PvP open world PK, unless organized by people with lower gears.

Smaller factions that doesnt do competitive TWs may be an option, and PvP with friends with similiar gear to yourself.