User:Eyestothesky/Maya Build - Dark Star (ver. 1.3.1)

My first class in Borderlands 2 was the Siren. In keeping with my experience in the first game where Lillith was my main, I planned on doing the same in the second installment. And then the Mechromancer happened. The problem I ran into was that after playing the Mechromancer and falling in love with the play style required of that class, it became hard to go back and adapt to the Siren. So after a while, I started wondering if there was any way the Siren could be played in the same way I play my Mechromancer. Turns out she can be. This build will allow you to play similarly to other aggressive in-your-face play styles, thanks to a generous shield capacity and a quickly recharging Phaselock (the “Dark Star” of this builds name)that lets you practically spam Ruin keeping DoTs running constantly and slagging huge groups of enemies for easy kills to proc both of Maya's powerful defensive kill skills.

Pros

 *  This build allows the Siren to be played in a rush-down style quite similar to that of the Mechromancer.
 * 

Extensive boosts to cooldown reduction means Phaselocks cooldown can be reduced to as little as 8 seconds. This allows you to make excellent use of skills that are active while an enemy is Phaselocked despite not having points into Suspension.
 * Since this build doesn't specialize in any one element (unless you're using the Slayer of Terramorphous), you can effectively utilize it with almost any type of gun.

Cons

 * Since the build relies on Turtle shields, you won't get the effects other shield types have.
 * This build works best with legendary class mods which can take a while to get, even more so when seeking out the Legendary Siren since it only has a chance to drop off Vermiverous the Invincible, who is somewhat difficult to spawn, or the DLC raid bosses.

Motion
This trees main purpose is to provide defensive buffs via kill skills and Ward as well as give Phaselock increased utility.

 Ward 1/5 -   Our main means of increasing our shield capacity. Fortunately, the two optimal COMs for this build will bring this up to 5/5 or 6/5. That's more than enough considering the massive shielding we're going to be getting from our Turtle shield.

 Accelerate 5/5  -  One of the two key damage increasing skills we're using with this build. A straight up damage bonus is never a bad thing, and since this build utilizes guns that have slower than average projectiles, the extra bullet speed helps us a lot too. Depending on which of the two main COMs you're using, you'll have this boosted to either 9 or 10/5.

 Kinetic Reflection 5/5 –   We're skipping Suspension. Honestly, with the damage you'll be dealing, enemies in your locks won't be staying in it for the duration of even one point into Suspension, especially while playing multiplayer sessions. The extra damage reduction will help keep your shields healthy, and the damage dealt from reflected bullets will aid in your damage output without you even needing to shoot a gun. All around, a great skill.

 Converge 1/1  -  There's not really much of a downside to this skill. Turning your Phaselock into a singularity guarantees all enemies in range are going to be clumped together in one spot. Since we're using Ruin, they'll also get hit with those elemental effects. If you want, you can wrap things up fast with a rocket or grenade, and eliminate a potentially large number of enemies in a matter of seconds thanks to slag. The only drawback to this is if you lock an enemy in a congested area when you're low on shields, but even then, killing the locked enemy will trigger Inertia so you'll instantly start regenerating your shields, and since most of the enemies caught by the singularity effect will be suffering from its stagger effect as well as some kind of element, you can quickly keep the kills going to maintain Inertia.

 Inertia 5/5 -   One of this builds most important skills. This is the closest thing Maya has to Gaige's Blood Soaked Shields. There's no denying BSS is far more efficient; 100% of your shields restored every kill is just insanely powerful. But thanks to the beefy shield capacity we'll be running with, and the fact that you'll be killing stuff as fast as possible, this skill will definitely keep your shield in good shape through almost any fight. It's worth noting that this skill will render weaker DoTs completely ineffective since your shields will be able to recharge faster than the DoT can hurt you. You can see this perfectly in my Stronghold demo video as I get hit by a fire barrel in the very beginning. Oh yeah, and it also increases your reload speed. All around, this is a phenomenal skill and one of the best in Maya's arsenal in my opinion.

 Quicken 2/5 -   With Phaselocks capacity to spread DoTs and it's powerful singularity effect thanks to converge, the more often we can use it, the better. With two points into this you should see a noticeable difference in Phaselock's cooldown.

Harmony
Nothing in this tree really will make a huge impact on this build. While you're leveling up Sweet Release can help with your survivability for a while, but in the end you're not going to need it once you have a decent capacity Turtle shield.

Cataclysm
This is where we're going to be spending the majority of our points. Thanks to Ruin (combined with converge) this is where the build gets the name "Dark Star"...because the Phaselock does so much damage...and it's purple. Yeah, coming up with a name for this build was strangely difficult. Anyway, yeah.

 Flicker 1/5 -   A lot of the damage you'll be dealing as a Siren will be from DoT's, so anything that can help them is a bonus. The fact that we can get 5 points for the price of 1 makes it all that much sweeter. Drop a point in this one.

 Foresight 5/5 -   A larger mag size means more time shooting and less reloading. When you do have to reload, this skill will decrease the time it takes to do so. Win-win if you ask me. If you go with the Legendary Siren COM, this skill will be buffed instead of Sweet Release; a good thing since this is an all around a stronger skill for the most part.

<p align="LEFT" style="margin-bottom: 0in"> Immolate 4/5 – Basically, in order to move down the tree without having to put points into Blight Phoenix and/or Cloud Kill, we need to spend 4 points on either this skill, or Backdraft. While backdraft seems like a solid choice, essentially allowing your Turtle shield to act like a Nova shield with massive capacity, it won't always be as effective as it should be. Namely when you're fighting armored targets. Against them, the nova effect will do minimal damage. Now, you might be thinking the same about this skill; it deals fire damage too after all. The difference here, however, is that the fire damage is done on top of your guns standard damage. So while it's true the fire  damage from this skill isn't dealing its maximum damage, it's still free damage added to your guns normal damage, which should be an appropriate element for the enemy type in question. You could just respec when you're fighting loaders, but if you don't want to go through all that, Immolate offers a much more maintenance free route.

<p align="LEFT" style="margin-bottom: 0in"> Helios 5/5  -  We're looking to get as much damage as possible with our Phaselock, and the only element not covered by Ruin is fire, so Helios is going to cover that. If you're using the Slayer of Terramorphous COM you'll also be getting some added burn damage from it making this all that much more deadly.

<p align="LEFT" style="margin-bottom: 0in"> Chain Reaction 5/5 -   The Siren version of Gaige's Close Enough. Difference being the ricochet effect occurs when enemies are hit by your shots, not when they miss. Since we aren't taking a hit to our accuracy with the Siren, this isn't a problem. Also, the Chain Reaction ricochet doesn't decrease the shots power when it reflects. Since the majority of enemies are going to be grouped up and slagged thanks to Ruin, reflected shots actually have a high probability of actually killing the secondary target. Two kills for the price of one? I'm on board. Just remember that this skill only works while you have an enemy Phaselocked!

<p align="LEFT" style="margin-bottom: 0in"> Reaper 5/5 -   The most important damage increasing skill we're utilizing with this build. The added damage to any enemy with more than 50% health is fantastic, and will prove particularly invaluable with dropping your enemies shields since the main element of this build is fire, and without the added umph from this would take a bit longer.

<p align="LEFT" style="margin-bottom: 0in"> Blight Phoenix 0/5 -   With this build Blight Phoenix simply doesn't get an opportunity to really do any work. It goes excellently with the Black Hole however, and I'm hoping to have a variant of this build that can make use of it soon. Currently however, this one is best left alone.

<p align="LEFT" style="margin-bottom: 0in"> Ruin 1/1  -  With this your Phaselock is going to be a HUGE source of damage. Thanks to the slag, you'll strip foes of their shields in mere seconds regardless of the element you're using, and on most normal enemies you can stop focusing on them after depleting them and let the DoTs do the rest of the work.

Gear Loadout
<p align="LEFT" style="margin-bottom: 0in; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal">Look at the following section more as a few suggestions rather than a set-in-stone guide. The nice thing about this build is that it really doesn't cater to any one weapon or damage type, so you have a lot of room to improvise and use whatever you like best. The only thing I HIGHLY recommend is utilizing the elements. While non-elemental weapons will work okay, you'll be missing out on the added elemental damage Flicker provides with it's increased DoT chance. On top of that, damage from weapons using appropriate elements (fire against flesh enemies, corrosive against armored, etc.) will, in general, deal more damage than non-elemental weapons. But if you prefer non-elemental, you'll likely want to move a point from one skill into Mind's Eye. So long as you're using the Legendary Siren COM, it should be alright to move one point from Quicken since the mod will be giving you additional cooldown reduction. In terms of your COM, this build does truly work best with one of the two legendary class mods. Fortunately, the Slayer of Terramorphous isn't too tough to get your hands on since Terramorphous the Invincible is easily downed with even a group of first timers.

Guns
<p align="LEFT" style="margin-bottom: 0in"> Main Weapon: Element Appropriate SMG – I'm a huge fan of SMG's in this game. They deal decent damage, have a rather quick fire rate and reload speed, and have respectable accuracy, making them extremely reliable weapons. With that in mind, the E-Tech versions tend to be the cream of the crop when it comes to stats (which is true for the E-Tech versions of just about any weapon), so if you can get your hands on one, they're the way to go. If not, the Bad and Good touch make excellent choices as well. They offer less damage, but that's offset by their inherent health regen, and the fact that they don't require two ammo per shot.

<p align="LEFT" style="margin-bottom: 0in"> Other Slots:  You'll want one slot to be an opposite element from whatever your main weapon is. So if you're main is currently a corrosive to deal with loaders, you'll want a fire weapon as a backup to deal with the occasional Hyperion fleshy mobs. If your main is fire to quickly dispatch bandits, keep a corrosive weapon for those pesky Armored Psychos. I also like to fill my other slots with a different weapon each, that way I don't have to leech off of my main weapons ammo type to use my secondary weapons.

<p align="LEFT" style="margin-bottom: 0in; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal">Having a high damage neutral element weapon is also a good idea. Shock damage works nicely here, but it's rendered ineffective against thunder mobs and ION loaders. Explosive damage deals its bonus damage against everything and anything, but their shots are extremely slow moving and the weapons that use them are generally quite inaccurate. Non-elemental works here, but they don't get any bonus damage thanks to an element. The best weapon type to use for a non-elemental alternative weapon is a sniper rifle, namely a Jakobs thanks to their inherent increased critical damage. If you have the Hammerlock's Big Game Hunt DLC, and have the Seraph Crystals for it, the Tumtum Hawk Eye is a fantastic gun with it's insane 600% increased critical damage.

<p align="LEFT" style="margin-bottom: 0in; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal">Lastly, a good panic button rocket launcher is always a solid weapon to have around. My favorite is the Norfleet, but if you prefer explosive damage, the Nukem works wonders. If you go with either of these, they're best used as tools to get out of Fight for Your Life against tougher foes with more health such as badasses or bosses due to the weapon's huge splash radius.

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<p align="LEFT" style="margin-bottom: 0in"> Shield  –  Without the ability to instantly replenish your shields like the Mechromancer, shields with smaller capacities are rather hard to work with here. While they can certainly be used, I prefer to charge right into my battles without needing to worry about finding suitable places for cover. I found that the best shields for this type of play style on the Siren (and basically any class except the Mechromancer) are Turtle shields. With their massive capacities, you'll find you don't need to worry too much about the fact that they reduce your max health and with Inertia maxed out, their sluggish recharge rate and delay can be all but forgotten.

<p align="LEFT" style="margin-bottom: 0in"> The best way to go in terms of rarity is a purple with the highest capacity you can find. The purple I use has a capacity of about 81k, which is boosted to around 90k thanks to Ward. Stay away from the Fabled Tortoise. With Inertia, we're not going to be able to take advantage of the extra speed due to it being depleted, meaning you're constantly going to be slowly chugging along. The Hoplite however, actually works rather well. It does decrease your speed, but it isn't as bad as the Fabled Tortoise. It also has slightly less numbers for its capacity, but it's still far, far, more than what is needed. With this bad boy on you can take two Suicide bandits/EXP Loaders blasts and still have shields left over in solo play. If you intend on using this shield during multiplayer, make sure no one else is using it; it's special effect will decrease your speed further for each extra player wearing a Hoplite in your party! Also, to keep pace with your team between large battles, you'll want to keep an alternative shield around so you can swap it with the Hoplite and run at normal speed.

<p align="LEFT" style="margin-bottom: 0in; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal">Also, understand that if you use the Hoplite, you essentially have no health. The massive health decrease will likely leave you with less than 5k health at level 50, so if your shield goes down, prepare to get out of Fight for Your Life.

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<p align="LEFT" style="margin-bottom: 0in"> Class Mod  -  You can alternate between the Legendary Siren and Slayer of Terramorphous freely. The Legendary Siren is great and honestly the preferred choice due to its decreasing your Phaselocks cooldown, increase to gun damage, and to those using the Hoplite, it increases your speed by 45% while you have an enemy Phaselocked, which will be quite often thanks to the numerous reductions you have for its cooldown. Also, this COM swaps the bonus points Slayer of Terramorphous gives to Sweet Release for Foresight, which is a huge boost for your DPS.

<p align="LEFT" style="margin-bottom: 0in; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal">Slayer of Terramorphous, while not quite as good as the Legendary Siren, still is a solid option for this build. It's easier to get since it's a common drop from Terramorphous the Invincible, who is one of the easier raid bosses to deal with just after turning 50 and is easily available to anyone, even without DLC. The burn damage and chance increase helps a lot when you're using fire, and the added health will help with your stunted health due to Turtle shields. The plus four increase to your skills isn't bad, but unfortunately it gives bonus points to Sweet Release as opposed to Foresight. This actually makes SoT an excellent choice to those first starting with this build as a single point into Sweet Release will net you 5/5 and release 5 healing orbs per enemy killed while Phaselocked.