[3.5] Death by a Thousand Cuts - Frost Blades & Blade Flurry Raider
PLEASE DO NOT MESSAGE ME IN-GAME OR THROUGH THE FORUMS. POST YOUR QUESTIONS DIRECTLY IN THIS THREAD.
Introduction A melee build relying on elemental conversion to crit through the game with Frost Blades for clearing and Blade Flurry for single target. Viable for everything (with a degree of skill required). Changelog
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* Updated for 3.5, no longer use Molten Strike Videos [3.5] TBA, give me a day or two Pros * Good clear speed * Good single target * Budget viable (to a point) * High EHP Cons * Relying on dodge, which is RNG * Melee * Blade Flurry can be unwieldy to use at times Skill Tree End Game Tree Bandits Alira or passives. Ascendancy Way of the Poacher -> Avatar of the Slaughter -> Rapid Assault-> Avatar of the Chase Maximum DPS. Absolutely no fear. If you absolutely need more defences (HC probably), take Avatar of the Veil instead of Avatar of the Chase Pantheon Fully upgraded Soul of Lunaris Soul Yugul/Soul of Garukhan Current Gear
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This is ~8 ex worth of gear (mostly the weapon and Chest) but you should be able to get by with much less. Check the below section for budget or alternate options. Gear Choices
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Weapons: High PDPS Crit Claw. Touch of Anguish or Wasp's Nest are good budget options. You can also use The Scourge which is a little iffy on the survivability side but does the most damage out of all the unique claws. Shield: Lycosidae removes accuracy problems and adds a bit of life & block. Helmet: The Tempest's Binding for 6L Frost Blades. If in a league where this item is too costly, consider Starkonja's Head or just a rare helmet with %Elemental Damage taken as Phys and/or -%Cold Res to nearby enemies. Body Armour: Loreweave, The Perfect Form, or a 5L Shroud of the Lightless. Use a rare with life & res on a budget. Amulet: Rare amulet with a combination of Life, WED%, %physical gained as cold, crit multi, WED. Gloves: Rare with life, attack speed, and res. Tombfist is actually great here but you need res too much. Boots: Atziri's Step for great movement speed and some spell dodge. If you're doing Uber Elder, consider Kaom's Roots. Belt: Stygian Vise with life, res, WED%. Otherwise just get normal rares with missing strength. Rings: WED%, flat cold/phys damage, life, attributes needed. Flasks: Life Flask, Atziri's Promise, The Wise Oak, Quartz Flask, Diamond Flask. Use Taste of Hate instead of Quartz if you really want even more damage. Magic flasks are for anti-bleed, anti-curse, and anti-freeze. Optimally you can try to balance your resistance for the Wise Oak to hit all 3, but prioritise high cold pen if you can't. You want 1 single Watcher's Eye with Phys Converted to Cold when affected by Hatred. On your other jewels try to always get Maximum Life %, other good mods are: * Increased Global Crit Multi * Increased Global Crit Multi with Elemental Skills * Increased Attack Speed with Claws * Increased Projectile Damage * Increased Attack Speed For Abyss Jewels, get any of flat life, flat emental damage, attack speed, ele pen, or dodge chance. Gem Links
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Blade Flurry - Concentrated Effect - Elemental Damage with Attacks - Added Cold Damage - Elemental Focus - Hypothermia
Your single target. Get as many multipliers here as possible. Frost Blades - Elemental Damage with Attacks - Added Cold Damage - Multistrike Put this into your helm. You can also put in Ancestral Call somewhere, but I hate it so I don't. ____________________________________________ Whirling Blades - Faster Attacks - Fortify - Blood Magic Our movement skill, very standard. You can also use Whirling Blades if you prefer, and Reduced Mana instead of Blood Magic if you have Alia. Hatred - Summon Lightning Golem - Herald of Ice General auras. Use Herald of Purity instead of Herald of Ice specifically for insane single target (pretty much just Uber Elder). Storm Brand (low level) - Power Charge on Critical - Culling Strike Power Charge generation. Frost Bomb (lvl 1) For single target only. Cast When Damage Taken (lvl1) - Immortal Call (lvl 3) - Increased Duration Defensive CWDT setup Leveling
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Level with Frost Blades and Blade Flurry when you get it. If you have a Tabula you can link these gems with the same supports. Be mindful of your defences and abuse Frost Blades range. Normal levelling uniques like Goldrim, Lochtonial Caress, Tabula Rasa, and Wanderlust are good as always, get a Seven-League Step if you can afford one. At 26 get a Ewar's Mirage for yourself. Periodically upgrade your gear with high PDPS Claw once you get to those nodes. Why is this no longer a Molten Strike build? Too much strength + jewel requirement got in the way. Blade Flurry is the perfect replacement. Editado por útlima vez por CynthiaCrescent#4617 en 29 ene. 2019 22:28:41 Reflotado por última vez en 12 feb. 2019 21:12:43
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Added Levelling section
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Absolutely going to give this a shot -- been looking for a way to enjoy frost builds when 3.0 hits and i'll give it a test run and report back. Much appreciated that you don't use anything ridiculously expensive, and that it's not CI/LL.
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Do you just switch your gems before boss fights? do you put one of your attack skills into your chest piece?
Editado por útlima vez por Jigga_Justin#3460 en 25 jun. 2017 2:58:49
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" From what I can see it, uses the chest for one skill and the sword for the other. Editado por útlima vez por adroanzi#6684 en 25 jun. 2017 13:18:54
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I got a question regarding molten strike last support gem "Physical Proj att dmg", aren't we converting all our damage to elemental? is the support gem doing anything? I might be confused with how it works. Thanks for your reply.
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" There're 2 options: * For convenience sake (which is what I'm doing), you have two 6Ls of your main skills, one in your sword and one in your body armour. * If you feel particularly feisty, you can have 2 different weapons each with a 6L so that you can switch to depending on the situation. This is extremely expensive since you need 2 6L weapons, but allows you to wear a Kaom's Heart which boost both our HP pool and Molten Strike damage (or wear a Legacy Kaom's Heart but if you can afford that then why are you playing this pauper build) Editado por útlima vez por CynthiaCrescent#4617 en 26 jun. 2017 16:48:11
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" Thanks. Since I'll be preoccupied once 3.0 comes having someone else experimenting will be great. |
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" We're converting all our phys to ele (cold & fire), but Phys Proj scales our damage before it gets converted, and that will then be scaled through our elemental %. |
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Any videos coming? How's it treating you still? May hop on this for 3.0 since I want to stick with Raider
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