[3.4] Here comes the BOOM! - Crit Infernal Blow Slayer

Infernal Blow and Slayer? Isn't that a Marauder skill (and not particularly a good one)?

Well, on 3.3 I made an Infernal Blow Chieftain and while not good enough for end game content, it was fun and extremely enjoyable.

So, I started to look at the options available to attempt something with crit escaling. It´s how I got to look at Slayer and the reason why I stayed with Slayer can be summed up with this: it's a 9-link and 6 flasks Infernal Blow.

How?
-First ascendancy (Impact): This gives you 2 things, the first is Melee Splash, this is your 7-Link, Melee Splash and Ancestral Call are really strong all the way into high yellow maps, later the combination of 2 skill gems that take damage away from the skill is too punishing. With Impact, you can add more damage, especially because the splash hits for full damage. Also, Impact gives you 30% increased AOE, which is global, it affects Ancestral Call, Melee Splash, weapon range, Overkill of Herald of Ash and Infernal Blow explosions.

-Second ascendancy (Endless Hunger): 20% of Overkill damage is leeched with a skill like Infernal Blow that overkills packs after one touch equals to overkill for your leech cap. Also, in the minor node, you get 0.2 attack damage is leeched as life. Both points give you your build leech.

-Third ascendancy (Headsman): 20% increased area if you have killed recently. That makes it a 50% increase, that's a global level 21 Increase AOE support gem. That's the 8-Link. The node also gives MORE damage and, with us not converting all damage to fire, no Phys reflect is a nice bonus.

-Fourth ascendancy (Bane of Legends): OP Culling strike. 9-Link. Also, killing rares or uniques gives you Onslaught, so a Silver Flask can be good, but isn't necessary. This one could be swapped for Brutal Fervour if you want to be safer, but personally the Culling Strike makes too much sense, especially I'm not planning to take Vaal Pact (which helps make the Slayer leech the OP thing that it is).

Pros and cons:
-Pros:

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*High amount of DPS (according to PoB almost 600k Shaper DPS)
*That DPS above is with a 6 socketed, 3 linked Terminus Est. Upgrading damage with a nice Exquisite Blade with those links should be quite cheap.
*Enemies explode with a sound that fills you with satisfaction.
*With 194% increased life from tree you should have some beef.
*There is room for damage increases, it just would be expensive (500+ pDPS swords, a couple of Watcher's Eyes and 2 well rounded rings).

-Cons:

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*It's a melee skill, you put your face in front of enemies and they are allowed to hit back.
*Some of them hit hard.
*Some of them hit so hard that your low amount of defenses don't really matter.
*And you die (Not really recommending this build for Hardcore).

Leveling guide:
Level up with Cleave/Chance to Bleed/Ruthless until Infernal Blow is available with Nessa (The Siren's Cadence). Support IB with Added fire and Ancestral Call. As soon as you land a 4th RED link, test your damage output with Melee Splash. After you get Impact (First Ascendancy) change MS with Melee Phys Damage Support. For Bosses, change Ancestral Call for Elemental Damage with Attacks Support.

As soon as available, get your Auras (Herald of Purity and Herald of Ash).

Also, while leveling, get most of your traveling done before level 40, you can look at my profile for my current tree, I've traveled to both Crit wheel in Marauder and Sword wheel in Ranger.

Leveling Items:

Spoiler

The PoB link:
https://pastebin.com/WJ9bRZxA

Disclaimer:
I'll edit this thread in the future with Gear and Links explanations.

If you liked it, make stuff go BOOOM!

Looking forward to a full write up!

Added a short leveling guide and 3 leveling items that are useful early on. Wideswing should serve as your weapon until you upgrade to Terminus Est. If you feel like your damage output is a bit low before you upgrade to Terminus Est, you could try Rigwald's Charge and start getting Sword nodes.

Hey! I'm doing your build now. IB is rlly interesting skill so I will give a try to it. How u fell with slayer leech? It was mandatory to me for any slayer build to take Brutal Fervour.

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Hey! I'm doing your build now. IB is rlly interesting skill so I will give a try to it.

Nice to hear! IB is one of those skills that won't ever be meta because it isn't great against packs and single target, but it´s just SO DAMN FUN that some people like me will continue to try to make our builds better and better.

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How u fell with slayer leech? It was mandatory to me for any slayer build to take Brutal Fervour.

I struggled with this choice, not just because I love that ascendancy, but because the build doesn't escalate any form of damage mitigation, it only has some leech, some armor, very little evasion and won't generate Endurance charges, all to go along with an average amount of life.

So yes, Brutal Fervour looked extremely tempting, but then, having a 9-Link character with Infernal Blow won me over. It's going to be flashy, LOUD and it's going to die, but will still be worth my time.

Hopefully yours as well. Make stuff go BOOM!

Hello folks, providing an update for this build.

I've been working on it in Delve while also theorizing additional ways to ramp up for MOAR damage and so far, the theory looks great and that takes me to the update that I'm intending to make for the upcoming league.

* Budget with teeth. High amount of DPS in a budget as a League starter. Fully explained build with skills, links, gear, stats, item average cost and PoB link.

* Leaving the Realm of Budget. Recommended gear to escalate your damage output without being super rich and the thought process behind them. Separate PoB link.

* I'm rich and I enjoy making things go BOOM! GGG Gear, expensive stuff not for the faint of heart. HIGH amount of DPS and life. Separate PoB link.

I intend to continue with this build before next League in order to at least get tier 2 gear before I update the thread, so I'll catch up with you at that point.

Enjoy folks, next league looks amazing.

Any update on this build? I'm looking for a solid Infernal Blow build for 3.5"

* Cost of having good gear for yellow maps? Around 2 Ex, most of that in your 6-linked chest piece. Rest of that goes to fill out your resistances with gear choices (Boots with 25 to 30% move speed as biggest priority).
* War banner is a considerable upgrade, with this and ice golem, your accuracy is going to be around 95%.
* BiS helmet is a Pristine - Scorched - Serrated crafted helmet with Infernal Blow % of phys added as fire enchant. With Scorched you can get % fire pen on nearby enemies.
* BiS weapon is an Exquisite blade, with the build not needing the weapon to be 6-Linked, you can get +500 PDPS and you only have to put 6 sockets on it. (1-2 Ex.).
* End game gems include a change from Herald of Purity to Anger (this requires you to have a Watcher's Eye with % convertion of phys to fire). This way you can convert around 80% of Phys to Fire. (1-2 Ex.).

I still need to see how Betrayal/Bestiary Leagues mods are going to improve the Build, Betrayal is still too new and I never played Bestiary.

Not sure when I'm going to be able to fully update the build, I started very late Delve season and I'm going slowly in this one, but will try to update this later in the month.

If you still would like to give this a try, post your questions and I'll try to get back to you ASAP.

GLHF.

I'm having a lot of fun with the build currently! I use Ancestral Warchief to boost my dps via the damage buff and its own ranged-aoe damage.

The full splash works so great with Infernal Blow, anything that dies from any damage will explode and cause entire packs to just blow up instantly. Bane of Legends only makes that effect so much stronger. Love it!

I'm using Carnage Heart amulet for the 30% increased damage while leeching life - we'll be leeching a lot so why not turn that into more damage I thought. That would be very powerful if we had Brutal Fervour instead of Bane of Legends, so we could have 30+30% increased damage constantly, as leeching never stops, even at full life. I feel that could add some serious momentum to the mowing power of Infernal Blow. The faster they drop, the earlier they boom. Earlier boom = earlier the nuke goes off and nothing is left to kill :p

Single target damage is actually quite high as you effectively do 190% base damage every hit. IB level 18 does 120% base + 66% per charge = 186%. Of course it takes 6 hits to activate, or 2 seconds of inactivity for the charges to go off. I find 186% to be very high for a build that can apply so well to so many targets. And of course 6% corpse HP as damage when they actually die.


One critique point of the PoB build:
It's not clear to me how the build is mana stable with no mana influx other than the 0.6% boot enchant that only works after killing something, with only 15% unreserved mana against bosses.

May I suggest 1-3 points in the mana leech wheel at the sword wheel above Arrow Dancing. (Essence Sap / Mana Leech)

Hello there!

I was hoping that I would have been able to update this thread by now with the different budget versions of gear... But RNGeesus didn't liked the goats I sacrificed in his name, my guess is that he's a chicken guy...

Ever since Breach League I've been playing this game, not dozens of hours per day, but enough that I've gotten at least 1 exalted by the time I reach level 70 in all the characters I've played. Right now, I'm level 85, still no exalted drop and my best SINGLE drop was a 6-linked sword that I'm trying to sell for 15c... It's been a struggle, to say the least.

With the following gear I'm doing yellow maps quite comfortably, the most expensive piece is the BA for a cost of 1 Exalted (chaos recipe FTW!). Everything has been either bargain basement purchased or crafted by myself (~30c for everything).



With that gear I'm also Delving between ilevels 70 to 80, fast, furious and without dying. I die in the dark, due to greed. And due to stupid. Guilty.

My next purchase is an Impresence with Flammability because I can't see myself doing red maps with current single target damage output (can probably do it, won't be comfortable, will be RIPpy).

And this is my modified tree:

POB: https://pastebin.com/Q666t6y6