Build Guide
Theory/Background - (The Why)
This build is made possible by the newly revised Holy Point Shot quiver. With the new quiver, impale will throw 3 knives instead of one. Each knife gains the 6p bonus damage from the Shadow Mantle Set. Currently its also possible, if positioned very close to a mob, to land all 3 buffed impales on a single target. So for instance the RG will take 3x the damage from impale than it does w/o the Holy Point Shot if standing very close while attacking it. This is an awesome change. This will greatly increase the effective damage output for impale. Not only that, all 3 knives will return the amount of hatred that is listed on your Karlei's Point dagger. Now with up to 3x the refunded hatred, it is no longer necessary to have a generator, while staying at near full hatred most of the time. This allows using and taking advantage of the Aquila Cuirass chest in the cube for 2x toughness.
Gearing/Game Play - (The How)
Make sure to have at least 36.7% cdr for permanent Vengeance. The required cdr can be accomplished with cdr rolled on one piece of gear, 15% cdr from the Gogok of Swiftness, a diamond in helm and 10% cdr in paragon. Tactical Advantage passive is desirable to use for speed runs. Use Leech for soloing higher GR's. Numbing Traps can be used to buff group toughness if needed. Single out should be used when pushing high GR's in 4man groups. Nemesis bracers are an excellent alternative to Strong Arms and are recommended for speed rifting. For pushing GR's in 4 man's, Lacuni Prowlers can be used for increased attack speed to better stack Stricken. For bounties there is no better choice than the Warzechian Armguards. For pushing high GR's with supports, wear an SOJ and cube the Convention of Elements for more damage, since the with supports the Elusive Ring may not be needed.
Try to stack life after kill on chest, belt, pants, jewelry and weapon if possible. Life after kill works beautifully with this build. Shadow Power will add 50% of your life after kill to life on hit, the leech passive adds another 75%. Together you will have 125% of LoK as LoH. This is a huge gain in health recovery, allowing for safe passage while playing very aggressively.
Note that if you play at a game difficulty where you are one shotting mobs, it will result in running out of hatred because there will be no opportunities for hatred refunds from Karlei's Point. Some examples of where you might run into this would be power leveling friends or running fast low level GR's to level gems. In order to mitigate this problem so you don't run out hatred, run Seethe instead of Dark Heard, replace Cull the Weak with Blood Vengeance and replace Aquila Cuirass with Visage of Gunes in the Cube.
Make sure to spam Vengeance, bladed armor and wolf when off cooldown. The constant activation of these skills can be achieved by num locking them. Beyond that, all that is required is to cast impale to attack and vault for mobility. Its really that simple. You do need to make sure to impale every 2 sec in order to have free vaults. I personally use vault actively to stun elites and RG's to interrupt their special attacks. This can be be extremely helpful in surviving nasty fights. Note that while vaulting you enter into a smoke screen like state that renders you invulnerable to incoming damage for the brief time you're traveling from point to point. Make sure to keep the elusive ring buff up at all times. This can be done by vaulting or casting shadow power. If you find yourself placed particularly well, as in next to an elite that you are impaling, casting shadow power to proc the elusive buff is preferable to vaulting if you can face tank well enough to stay in place. Note that this build requires hunting and killing mainly elites, especially for speed runs, but higher GR's will require gathering up and killing large packs of trash also. Just make sure to take advantage of the oculus circles when doing so.
Summary/Wrap Up - (The Results)
The build is very simple to play and a hell of a lot of fun. It gives insane mobility, good damage and high survivability. In fact fully self buffed with all dps gems and nems, its not uncommon to exceed a toughness of 600 mil at low paragon. That's awesome toughness for a dps class with no support. I have tested this build on the PTR for patch 2.5.0 in HC. In Season 10 with 1.07 mil sheet dps I cleared a GR 82 in 9:43 on the first attempt. This build can be used to compete for pushing the highest GR's for both solo and group play. For speed farming it is superb. GR 75's are taking under 4 min to clear (with 2 mil+ dps). Normal rifts are fast and fun. Split farming 4man T13 bounties is very doable once geared well. In short the build will do everything you need and want within Diablo 3.
I have thoroughly enjoyed playing and testing out this build and I hope you will find as much enjoyment with it as I have. Please leave a comment below if you have any questions. Please Upvote if you find this guide useful. Thanks.
Nice! And you're still deleting elites in 4 man groups?
@Kavika,
I think optimal 4man pushing play would be exactly as it is now. That is gather up density, elites included, for the WD to mow down for progression to the RG. Along the way the DH can help take out the elites and provide buffs. Once at the RG, the Shadow DH would shine.
For speed runs it would depend on on group composition. If the party was full of Shadow DH's then elite hunting would be the best. With a different composition, you will have to adjust the game play to what you have in your group.
This build reminds me of LTK monk where you bounce from elite to elite burning them down. When speed farming, is this the case? I only ask because my LoN LTK monk was great in T13 solo but in 4 man my damage really felt lacking. Just curious how well the power of the build scales with other people in the group.
@Kavika,
Yes you hunt and kill elites almost exclusively especially in speed runs. The power of this build will be more than adequate in a full party as long as everyone is carrying their weight.
Main reason I'm excited for 2.5 is this build, so far with 1400 paragon I was able to clear 88 with random augments and not optimized gear. It felt really really good. Thank you for the build!
@asolram,
Yeah this build will easily clear higher gr tiers than most other builds. Where as there are several top tier builds that can clear higher than this one, they tend to require a massive amount of fishing to do it. I like to think of this build as the anti-fish build. As long as you are not pushing the bleeding edge, no fishing is required to get consistent and fun clears no matter what maps or mobs you get. As you say, the build just feels good and especially in HC, very safe. Good Luck and have fun in Season 10!
2.5.0 is live, time to play this build on the live servers!!!
@BigJohnnasty,
Couldn't help but notice you cleared 91 in NS HC - gratz! Also, not gonna lie, I hate you a little bit for your freaking Primal Karlei's Point.
Had a thought regarding those two types of monsters that can instaproc you - since you can technically throw the knife at range, could you avoid getting one shot by simply backing away and attacking from afar? I know its not optimal, but if you don't get destroyed at range, then you could still kill those types of elites.
Tried the build and the power lvl compared to danetta's is insane. I'm clearing GR 70's in around 5 min with good ancient gear but no augments, and I still haven't gotten comfortable with the rotation yet (need to manage my Hatred just a little better). Really fun build, love seeing my toughness at 630 mil. I've had a goal for a long time now to clear GR 80 - this feels like the build to do it.
@BrownieMix,
Thanks, I cleared a 93 in NS HC and 91 in S10 on PTR. One thing that is missing on my live gears vs PTR is impale on the quiver. As far as the Primal Karlei's Point goes, I spent 12k DB's rolling yellow daggers to get it. That's one way to decimate your mat hoard quick :(.
The spinning Dervishes can be hit at range to avoid the reflect missile affect. It would be advisable to stay outside of their spinning radius when attacking them for sure. The Sand Dwellers, I'm not sure if hitting them at range will prevent them from reflecting impale back to you. I can tell you from my experience that the Sand Dwellers seem to reflect a higher amount of damage than the Dervishes seem to do. I was in a 4man party doing 90+ last night and with 2 supports I could tank some of the Dervish reflects, not to mention everything else, but once a Sand Dweller entered into the mix, it instantly procced my cheat death passive. Other than that Sand Dweller, nothing else ever procced my passive. I had a good friend rip his Shadow Assassin DH on t13 as a result of the Sand Dwellers. I would strongly advise extreme caution around either of them, as they seem to be one of the very few things that can one shot this build.
This build not only has more damage but a lot more toughness than UE Danetta's with similar mobility if you manage to keep impaling at least every 2 sec. Just as you are, I'm really having a lot of fun playing this build. You should have no issues clearing 80+ with this build if your DPS is north of 1mil. With 2 mil DPS, clearing something close to 90 is possible. Good luck with the build, I'm sure you will do well with it.
This might be a stupid question but everything I read about the impale build states that AD is not important but IAS is, why do you have AD listed as the second one in stat priority for the weapon instead of IAS?
As much as I love your Grenades build I love this one that much better. With crap gear only 550k sheet damage, and 840 paragon I did a 72 with 4 min left, ran out of time to progress further last night. Your HC 93 clear is most impressive.
@MstrWayne,
I had not updated that since first posting the build guide. I just changed the recommended stat priority for weapon as Attack Speed, %Damage, Dex then Area Damage. Yes I like this build a lot better than Grenades too. It's certainly able to clear higher than Danetta's with the same gearing/para/gems. Thanks, that 93 was done about 1.5 min quicker than the one I did on PTR even though I'm missing impale on the quiver.
Update: Just cleared a solo 90 with this build in softcore in 13:13 with 1.8 mil dps. Ofc I had to do it HC style with no deaths ;-)
@minotauruk,
I have gone back and forth on whether to use Strong Arms or Nemesis Bracers. After much play I have finally decided that for the highest GR's, Strong Arms are the best bracer to use. That being said Nemesis Bracers are an excellent choice that can be very good if there are lots of favorable pylons in the GR. In fact when not running very high GR's, I would recommend using Nems if no one else is. I revised the guild to reflect this information.
I would get AR on pants and boots when you can. If possible it would be nice to have life after kill on the belt, pants and weapon. Otherwise your gear is excellent. For GR pushes I would use Pain Enhancer over Bane of the Powerful (use PE when the BoTP buff starts falling off w/o killing the minions in yellow packs). Your skills are exactly as they should be. I normally run with the Enchantress with this build. As such I would recommend that you give her a Thunderfurry and roll bleed and cdr on it. Also give her a Wyrward ring. For her amulet I normally use the Overwhelming Desire.
My hats off to Blizzard for the revised Holy Point Shot quiver. It's an excellent example of creative thinking instead of just giving a flat % buff to damage. Have fun with the build and good luck in Season 10!
Hi BigJohn, I was able to clear gr90 with 1.9, this using BotP, now I need to test with Pain Enhancer. Thanks again for the nice build and also for all the answers that help us to understand better the dynamics.
@asolram,
There are several trade offs between using BotP and PE. Powerful gives a nice 15% DR from elites and 15% bonus dmg to elites and when procced adds a multiplicative 20% bonus to all dmg, but in higher GR's its a pain to keep the BotP procced w/o killing the minions of Yellow packs which is a wast of time. Still it does offer the potential of more damage on the RG and isolated elites. Pain Enhancer gives 3% increased attack speed for every mob withing 20 yds that bleeding (which is why it's nice to roll bleed on your Enchantress's Thunderfurry). This attack speed buff usually at least equals the dps output of BotP when it's procced, but in larger packs can far exceed it. For instance its not uncommon to have your DPS increase by 50% or more from PE. in very large packs I have seen it go up by 80%. DPS is nice, but increased attack speed also greatly increases health recovery from life on hit. It's because of this combination of greater dmg output leading up to the RG along with much better survivability that I recommend PE over BotP for high GR's. I do recommend that BotP be used for the speedier GR's though.
Hi BigJohn
Great to see your legendary Danetta 2.0 build heheh - but pls update this to a 2.5 build when this becomes possible on the site.
A couple of questions pls:
1. For solo GR, Powerful and Stricken don't seem to be ideal gems; I haven't tried PE but what about Gizzard or Esoteric so you can drop one of the defensive skills or passives for an offensive one? PE is a mob based gem, which the build avoids (especially when using Nems), and is useless with RGs which don't spawn adds. Is AS that important for the build?
2. Positioning seems tricky. I often can't get close to the elites after vaulting, and sometimes especially at the start of the fight, the elite doesn't seem to be damaged?
This admittedly may be a playstyle issue and I am learning the build which I only started playing yesterday. 1.1 m sheet dps, 1,100 para and I barely cleared an 80. The RG was a cake walk unlike fighting most of the elites with plenty of time wasted.
Thanks!
@tinkler,
Yes as soon as the guide builder allows for tagging for 2.5.0, I plan on getting this build guide tagged accordingly.
Bane of the Powerful is an excellent gem to use for speedier solo GR's. For the faster runs it should be no problem keeping up the buff even while ignoring the minions of yellow elite packs. I do agree that Stricken is overkill for the RG and offers little benefit leading up to the RG. I would only consider using a defensive gem like esoteric if you are really having issues with toughness, not to drop defensive passives or skills. On the higher GR's where it would be difficult to maintain the Powerful buff, the Pain Enhancer gem is really good to use. Don't discount the amount of increase in attack speed that can be gained from it, as the increase to your DPS can exceed 50% at times. Plus health recovery thru life on hit is increased with faster attack speed.
When you vault, the travel distance is always the same. Learn to estimate how far that is and then you can move to a spot that when you vault back into the elite, it places you right near it for easier access to impale. Gathering large mobs is not a bad thing when you have PE equipped. This will increase your DPS and give some area damage affect as well.
Clearing a GR 80 with only 1.1 mil DPS is a good showing especially if you are not well experienced with the build. In time with more practice you will surely do even better. Have fun with the build and best of luck in Season 10!
Thanks John you are v kind! I cleared an 84 with UE Grenades last season so I am looking forward to doing better with Impale. Will try PE.
I just tried this build before season 10 starts so i could get a feel for it, and damn it's good!
With shitty rolled gear, non-ancient weapon and without the shadow belt or strongarm bracers (didn't drop so i had to use kreml...), i managed to do a Grift 70 with 7 minutes to spare. It felt a bit clunky without the belt since i had to conserve my vaults, but it was still pretty good. Had an easier time clearing 70 on my DH with bad gear than on my lightning Wiz with decent gear.
@Holyfalafel,
I'm really glad you're enjoying the build. It doesn't ask too much from you and gives a lot back in return. I'm very spoiled by the belt and the free vaults that come with it, that had to be a chore to run without it. Have fun progressing with the build and good luck in Season 10!