Alternate Temporal Warden Insane difficulty guide

[Effigy]

I'm a fan of Cunning for basically every character. I would only dump it if I really needed three other stats.

[Snarvid]

If, due to a bizarre compulsion, you felt compelled to play with both Temporal Hounds and tinkers, would you drop Time Shield or Web of Fate out of your defensive lineup?

Playing as a possessor I quite like standing behind the hounds and shooting people through them, maybe less compelling for people who can regen HP.

[bpat]

Webs of Fate is way more important than Time Shield.

[Number43]

If, due to a bizarre compulsion, you felt compelled to play with both Temporal Hounds and tinkers, would you drop Time Shield or Web of Fate out of your defensive lineup?

Playing as a possessor I quite like standing behind the hounds and shooting people through them, maybe less compelling for people who can regen HP.

Do all of them, be a cornac, and only take max inscriptions.

[0player]

I disagree with your assessment of Weapon Manifold. It's been a long time since I last played, but I remember it putting out great damage and status effects midgame. Am I missing something?
Great guide otherwise.

[bpat]

Weapon Manifold does very low damage, just 85 at 5/5 with 100 paradox spellpower. Its statuses are really good if you can land them, but since you don't build spellpower, it's hard to get them to stick. Since you attack really fast there isn't any point getting more than 1/5 and you get a point in it anyway since Breach requires it.

[tabs]

[s]Having great luck following this guide on Insane. Done with the prides and am about to clear the tunnel bosses. Only fly in the ointment is that I haven't found any magic dispersion gloves. How much of a necessity are they for the final fight?[/s]

Nevermind. Found a set of dispersion gloves. Absolutely steamrolled HP and the final fight. Went on to murder Ata and Linaniil without a sweat. Thanks to bpat for this great guide on a super powerful class.

[bluesy]

I'm apparently too dumb to use the forums right

[bluesy]

TW is just silly OP on anything less than madness, it has answers to almost everything.

My first insane rogulike win was a Yeek with 5/5/4 in temporal hounds instead of threaded combat. 10/10 would make poor choices and still win again.

[Cathbald]

Temporal Hounds (locked)
I have been proven wrong about these. They're pretty busted so you may as well take them.

Understatement of the year even if it's only january.
Just a few hours ago this thread still read that hounds were bad and you should feel bad to take them, but then... this build won Insane/RL.
Further screen :0 prodigies!
my low damage (only 1/5 the mastery)
hounds OP damage

So yeah, hounds are OP and imo take them at level 10, and skip stasis entirely. Hounds carry you by themselves until the east, where you will have the rest of the talents online and dying will be impossible. Hounds will stay relevant until the end of the game.

Maybe another alternative guide incoming! :p

PS : will have to try Atha and Lina for sure. Final fight can be seen here as it was streamed, I will upload high peak video later.

[Arcvasti]

I'm not sure which part of the above surprised me more: That you only spent ~10 class points on things besides dogs or that your talent hotbar is three rows/columns long and on the side of the screen. I didn't find dogs to be THAT good the last time I played TW[Which, to be fair, was years ago], but I also didn't realize how good Invigorate was at the time. I've also gotten killed by enemies hiding underneath my hotbat before, so both surprises are probably better then how I usually play.

Also, out of genuine curiousity, why are you using a bow if you only have 1/5 in the mastery talent? A T5 staff gives you[And your doggies!] +30% temporal damage, which seems better then having mediocre Shoot damage.

[Cathbald]

My bow gives 85% phys damage and 15% temporal damage, way more than a staff could. Hounds deal 50/50 phys and temp damage and inherit my damage bonus.

My hotbar is 3 column but i slightly diminshed the icon size so it's the size of 2 columns at standard size. And I reduced tile size too, so even with the hotbar i can see to more than 10 tiles, no monster surprise!

[Snarvid]

I can’t add anything quantitative to the Temporal Hound discussion, but I will say this: I’ve bounced off TW many times, and Temporal Hound feels like the missing link for me in terms of enjoying their toolbox. TW are inherently hybrid melee/ranged, and that never clicked for me. Temporal Hound makes them hybrid melee/ranged/summoners, and their summoner component is simply beautiful. You’ve got a sustain and at most 2 other buttons to mess with, and my guess is you could get by without Breath (although it’s pretty cool), so Blink becomes a very simple “go here, focus down this guy while buffed” button. It also really increases the utility of Precognition, as the Hounds become a great “corner-snipe” option (i.e. “peek around here and see if there’s someone you’d like to kill nearby”), and Bow Threading’s ability to shoot through allies gives you great ability to support your summons while blocking LOS from those annoying gunslinger rares. Finally, the Hounds ability to survive and regenerate back from negative HP keeps them useful in endgame/high difficulty situations where you’d otherwise expect them to be one-shot.

On Time Dilation: I think it’s pretty great endgame. I start most serious fights with Rune of Reflection, Heroism, an attack to trigger PES (usually Blink Blade), then Grace -> Haste -> Time Stop -> Invigorate -> Timeless. With that much speed you’ve got plenty of time to move or Shoot between talents. Note also that your Command Hounds talents count for keeping Time Dilation running, as they’re non-instant. I find I’ve always got something off cooldown, at least until Invigorate runs out. As long as the number to the right of Time Dilation is >1, you’re fine doing a non-talent, and you can often sneak in another shoot the action after it becomes 1.

I really enjoy exploring the distinctive playstyles available in Tome, and juggling the various demands of Time Dilation and Blended Threads is part of what makes TW a fun puzzle for me. YMMV, obviously.

Edit: I learned more about Paradox, which only made Time Dilation better!

[Aesthete]

Fun interaction that I just found out sort of unexpectedly, weapon manifold procs from basic shoot or attacks seem like they can proc their own on spell hit effects. A bunch of the warden attacks are classified as spells too, so they seem like they can proc on spell hit effects by themselves, including from the arrow threading clones. Found that out when I popped on the exiler ring.

Not sure if that is useful, or if it makes certain artifacts a lot more useful than they would otherwise seem, but it is interesting.

[GlassGo]

I can say, that Shaloren have huge synergy with Temporal Warden, and PES has it too, and both three of them too. Lul.
That combo with PES, then Envigorate, then Timeless... incredible (also I played TW with PES before, so I probably knew it but forgot ).
Ranged variant also good in that your time clones attack in melee, and enemies often attack them too instead of you.