It was already said, so I'll agree to reinforce the opinion. 1.5% crit is not substantial at all and is easier gained from other gear slots. Forging any other primary stats off would be a much larger loss. Forge the crit off.
I personally use thisbuild on my crusader. My sheet damage in game is 555,456 and my toughness is 17,073,082 while standing in town unbuffed. I'll preface this by saying that I play on hardcore, so my selections may not be desirable for someone who plays in a standard league. This build is meant for rounding up a lot of mobs at once and not for fighting small packs or single mobs at a time. More mobs means more blocking which means more 'exploding crusader of death'. Here is a rundown of my selections and why I chose them.
Passives: Heavenly Strength - I use a Fate of the Fell, so this is a no brainer.
Wrathful - This is basically my sole source of healing. Each point of wrath heals you for 825 + 1% of your +health globe bonus. This is an amazing passive and gives us some unique options for enchanting our secondary slots with the heal globe bonus stat. Aim for a flail with around +3-4 wrath per second and you can endlessly spam hammers while providing a steady stream of heals.
Hold Your Ground - Gain 15% block. This has great synergy with Punish and will not only increase your tankiness , but it also boosts our damage.
Divine Fortress - This is a massive amount of free armor, which provides damage reduction from all sources. Yes please.
I don't use Blunt because hammers aren't my sole form of damage. I find it easier to boost my damage capabilities via gear when we have amazing defensive passives.
Skill Bar Punish (Roar)- This is a filler skill that gives us a fire and forget defensive and offensive buff. 15% block chance for 5 seconds is huge. Every time you block you'll explode for a 45% weapon damage burst of fire. This can proc on fire chains and several ground effects, which turns you into a fireball of melee range death. This is just free damage while we're spamming hammers and a huge boost to our damage reduction. This is made even better because I use provoke, which taunts mobs (including ranged mobs) to attack me in melee range.
Blessed Hammer (Thunderstruck) - The low wrath cost of this ability allows us to constantly spam it without worrying about running into wrath problems. I prefer this rune over the others due to the guaranteed damage from the lightning arcs.
Iron Skin (Flash) - I use this ability to avoid frozen more than anything. If you find yourself in a tough spot or "stuck" due to wallers or mob collison you can simply pop this and get a boost of speed that allows you to ignore mob collision. If I were to get Illusory Boots from an act two bounty bag I'd probably drop this skill for a Law.
Provoke (Charged Up) - This ability will ensure that you never run out of wrath and can spam hammers constantly when you use it properly. It will also taunt melee and ranged mobs to fight you at melee range. This means more Punish procs and guaranteed damage on all mobs in a pack with Heaven's Fury and Blessed Hammer. You'll also get a nice 50% weapon damage boost as lightning damage for the duration.
Heaven's Fury (Ascendancy) - I use Fate of the Fell, so I use this ability. It works amazingly well with this build and is borderline too much when you also obtain an Eberli Charo. Provoke ensures that the beam (or beams with proper gear) will hit the entire pack of mobs for most of its duration. Yet another fire and forget skill to dish out while you spam hammers.
Akarat's Champion (Fire Starter) - This will make you explode for even more fire damage. Since we can spam hammers infinitely, this will proc constantly for free melee range damage on top of your Punish, Heaven's Fury and Hammers. Provoke also ensures free damage. The rally rune is also an option to be considered based on personal preference.
This certainly isn't the best route for all players, but I sure do enjoy it! Hopefully something here was helpful or thought provoking. Good luck on your crusade.
You need to pick up movement speed. This caps at 25%, but get at least 12% on your boots. This will do wonders for your farming speed and ability to survive.
Obviously gear with crit, crit damage and attack speed on gear is necessary, but you'll need to budget your way up and make minor to moderate upgrades as you go. Don't just immediately go for that perfect trifecta.
Slots where you can pick up some upgrades
Bracers - Crit
Helmet - Crit/Socket
Gloves - Crit/Crit Dmg/Atk Speed. All three are possible. Right now gloves with two of these are relatively cheap!
Amulet/Rings - Crit/Crit Dmg/Atk Speed/+Average Damage. +Average Damage is huge and overlooked by most players. Try to get that crit up to a reasonable level and then start worrying about crit dmg and attack speed.
You can generally get a double socket Manticore with a higher damage range than your current weapon for a couple million (sometimes less if you bid snipe the AH). This is an easy 266%-300% critical hit damage as well as 10-11% atk speed that you don't currently have on your weapon.
All of the above slots are lowering your dps severely due to not having at least one or two of the stats listed.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Try swapping your build around a build to survive a bit better. I drop Smoke Screen entirely and replace it with Shadow Power: Gloom. It lasts 5 seconds and makes it nearly impossible to kill unless you are standing in bad stuff. Rapid Fire seems very lackluster as a spender to me. I'd swap this out for Preparation to manage your discipline use better.
Lastly..I use ball lightning over chakram since it still has heavy aoe damage but doesn't bug out on walls or have strange pathing.
I'd be more than happy to give full build recommendations, but build choices will change depending on many factors in your gear.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
For farming stick to Act 3. The pony level is more for show than farm. In Act 3 you'll find high mob density zones and more elite packs than any other act. There are a handful of Act 3 runs that you can find outlined on this website or on youtube. Just modify them to fit how you want to play and you're set.
1 - Impale) I agree to some extent. I'm running over 500% crit damage so see some huge numbers here, but the sustained dps of other abilities outshines this for high health mobs.
2 - Grenades) I personally think these are fine especially considering you can get massive hatred regen amounts with this ability. They take some getting used to for sure, but I do like the idea of them exploding upon impact. Right now stutter kiting is more of a wrist workout than it needs to be with these. This also touches on #7. It is, however, very annoying how this ability will sometimes not hit enemies with smaller hit boxes when they are right in your face.
3 - Fan of Knives) If they removed the cooldown they'd have to nerf the damage to oblivion. It's fine and it's amazing.
4 - Marked For Death) Seems alright where it is to me in a group setup where there are multiple damage debuffs rolling.
5 - Multishot) I occasionally swap to suppression fire if I feel like dropping prep while farming. I don't think the cost should be changed, but perhaps the numbers should be changed.
6 - Sentry) I agree 100%. While this is "free" passive damage..it has a decent amount of setup time due to the cooldown and is limited due to range.
7 - Cluster Arrow) This is where build diversity comes in. Cluster Arrow does massive damage and with the right Passive/Skill setup you can get massive amounts of hatred regeneration. I'm currently running around tossing grenades about for massive discipline regen and spamming this constantly for ludicrous damage.
8 - Rain of Vengeance) Quite a few people use this ability, however, the only runes I find useful are Dark Cloud and Stampede. The others are just extremely disappointing since half of the mobs/affixes you come across run around like idiots.
I dropped Elemental Arrow entirely. People are really stuck on the skill. Don't get me wrong..it has plenty of uses, but we have so many other viable options that hardly anyone even looks at.
The build requires more precise play so is not for everyone, but allows you to use smoke screen as an aggressive ability alongside Fan of Knives to pull of some impressive nukes. In fact I can outright destroy all non-shielding champion packs in infinitely faster than I could with the IAS+Nether Tentacle pre-nerf build.
Grenadier as a passive is a great alternative for archery or sharpshooter depending on your gear. Additionally you can swap the Cluster Rune to something else like Loaded for Bear.
With sufficient vit+resist all you can drop SS for Shadow Power (Gloom) for a more efficient use of discipline.
How do I survive without caltrops or some form of slow? Use the scoundrel with Multishot and a cold weapon. It's more or less a permanent aoe slow. You also have enough burst to destroy reflecting mobs while SS is up (just make sure you read affixes before you fire off some huge damage and kill yourself)
There is huge burst potential with spike traps and you can set them up prior to pulling a pack. Afterwards simply Cluster->Evasive->Cluster->Smoke Screen/Run in for a FoK. If mobs aren't dead simply evasive fire out and they will die shortly after.
I totally changed my gear setup for 1.03 and am able to farm acts 1-4 as good if not better than I could prior to the "nerfs"
Should I use Rain on myself right after Diablo disappears and hope for the best, or wait til the clone spawns then use ss and rain at the same time?
The first clone will spawn where Diablo disappears from, so you should drop RoV in that area. Pre-SS after about 2 seconds, drop RoV and spam tentacles at that spot. From there on out you just need to be on your toes with smoke screen as Diablo vanishes.
You can just pick up the stun rune with Rain of Vengeance and perma stun your clone. That's how I managed my first kill before I could just blow it up in a 1.5 second window.
Here is the build I use to solo every act (1-4 inferno):
1)Smoke Screen - Lingering Fog
•Post-nerf this ability and rune are still amazing
2)This is my 'floater' slot between Marked for Death (Mortal Enemy) and Rain of Vengeance (Stampede)
•I used to think RoV sucked..but randomly decided to use it one game and have stuck with it since. With this ability runed properly you can hold an entire pack of mobs in place leaving them unable to cast or move towards you for a very long time. With this I am able to destroy pretty much any non-invulnerable/shielding pack. Even soul rippers aren't an issue with this ability. Try it out.
3)Prep - Backup Plan
4)Caltrops - Torturous Ground
•I don't use an 80% slow because certain mob types or fast mobs simple run through it as if I didn't even drop it. With the 2 second immobilize I can at least kite these packs long enough to land kills.
L)Hungering Arrow - Devouring Arrow
R)Elemental Arrow - Nether Tentacles
•Meatball cannon speaks for itself.
Passives: Archery, Steady Aim, Tactical Advantage
•I use TA over Sharpshooter since the utility and survivability from TA is absolutely amazing.
Follower: Enchantress (Charm, Armor, Erosion, Focused Mind)
•2500 damage and 65k health
•I prefer this over a templar mostly because of Charm. Charmed mobs in inferno outright one shot other mobs. Champion packs that are charmed will chunk 20+% of another champion's health off.
I run with 3.6 APS, 18% movement speed, +10 max disc and 68k damage without SS. With this I can unload and regen my hatred bar stupidly fast while kiting and am able to maintain discipline for quite a while before using preparation.
0
I love Immortal as much as the next guy, but forcing it on people with terrible (and loud) sound quality is kind of silly.
Congratulations on your accomplishment. I'm looking forward to messing around with my barbarian again this season.
0
0
Passives:
Heavenly Strength - I use a Fate of the Fell, so this is a no brainer.
Wrathful - This is basically my sole source of healing. Each point of wrath heals you for 825 + 1% of your +health globe bonus. This is an amazing passive and gives us some unique options for enchanting our secondary slots with the heal globe bonus stat. Aim for a flail with around +3-4 wrath per second and you can endlessly spam hammers while providing a steady stream of heals.
Hold Your Ground - Gain 15% block. This has great synergy with Punish and will not only increase your tankiness , but it also boosts our damage.
Divine Fortress - This is a massive amount of free armor, which provides damage reduction from all sources. Yes please.
I don't use Blunt because hammers aren't my sole form of damage. I find it easier to boost my damage capabilities via gear when we have amazing defensive passives.
Skill Bar
Punish (Roar)- This is a filler skill that gives us a fire and forget defensive and offensive buff. 15% block chance for 5 seconds is huge. Every time you block you'll explode for a 45% weapon damage burst of fire. This can proc on fire chains and several ground effects, which turns you into a fireball of melee range death. This is just free damage while we're spamming hammers and a huge boost to our damage reduction. This is made even better because I use provoke, which taunts mobs (including ranged mobs) to attack me in melee range.
Blessed Hammer (Thunderstruck) - The low wrath cost of this ability allows us to constantly spam it without worrying about running into wrath problems. I prefer this rune over the others due to the guaranteed damage from the lightning arcs.
Iron Skin (Flash) - I use this ability to avoid frozen more than anything. If you find yourself in a tough spot or "stuck" due to wallers or mob collison you can simply pop this and get a boost of speed that allows you to ignore mob collision. If I were to get Illusory Boots from an act two bounty bag I'd probably drop this skill for a Law.
Provoke (Charged Up) - This ability will ensure that you never run out of wrath and can spam hammers constantly when you use it properly. It will also taunt melee and ranged mobs to fight you at melee range. This means more Punish procs and guaranteed damage on all mobs in a pack with Heaven's Fury and Blessed Hammer. You'll also get a nice 50% weapon damage boost as lightning damage for the duration.
Heaven's Fury (Ascendancy) - I use Fate of the Fell, so I use this ability. It works amazingly well with this build and is borderline too much when you also obtain an Eberli Charo. Provoke ensures that the beam (or beams with proper gear) will hit the entire pack of mobs for most of its duration. Yet another fire and forget skill to dish out while you spam hammers.
Akarat's Champion (Fire Starter) - This will make you explode for even more fire damage. Since we can spam hammers infinitely, this will proc constantly for free melee range damage on top of your Punish, Heaven's Fury and Hammers. Provoke also ensures free damage. The rally rune is also an option to be considered based on personal preference.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This certainly isn't the best route for all players, but I sure do enjoy it! Hopefully something here was helpful or thought provoking. Good luck on your crusade.
0
0
Obviously gear with crit, crit damage and attack speed on gear is necessary, but you'll need to budget your way up and make minor to moderate upgrades as you go. Don't just immediately go for that perfect trifecta.
Slots where you can pick up some upgrades
Bracers - Crit
Helmet - Crit/Socket
Gloves - Crit/Crit Dmg/Atk Speed. All three are possible. Right now gloves with two of these are relatively cheap!
Amulet/Rings - Crit/Crit Dmg/Atk Speed/+Average Damage. +Average Damage is huge and overlooked by most players. Try to get that crit up to a reasonable level and then start worrying about crit dmg and attack speed.
You can generally get a double socket Manticore with a higher damage range than your current weapon for a couple million (sometimes less if you bid snipe the AH). This is an easy 266%-300% critical hit damage as well as 10-11% atk speed that you don't currently have on your weapon.
All of the above slots are lowering your dps severely due to not having at least one or two of the stats listed.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Try swapping your build around a build to survive a bit better. I drop Smoke Screen entirely and replace it with Shadow Power: Gloom. It lasts 5 seconds and makes it nearly impossible to kill unless you are standing in bad stuff. Rapid Fire seems very lackluster as a spender to me. I'd swap this out for Preparation to manage your discipline use better.
Lastly..I use ball lightning over chakram since it still has heavy aoe damage but doesn't bug out on walls or have strange pathing.
I'd be more than happy to give full build recommendations, but build choices will change depending on many factors in your gear.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
For farming stick to Act 3. The pony level is more for show than farm. In Act 3 you'll find high mob density zones and more elite packs than any other act. There are a handful of Act 3 runs that you can find outlined on this website or on youtube. Just modify them to fit how you want to play and you're set.
0
C/o: 100m
Tag: Moralus#1505 (Reason: Barb Neck)
0
2 - Grenades) I personally think these are fine especially considering you can get massive hatred regen amounts with this ability. They take some getting used to for sure, but I do like the idea of them exploding upon impact. Right now stutter kiting is more of a wrist workout than it needs to be with these. This also touches on #7. It is, however, very annoying how this ability will sometimes not hit enemies with smaller hit boxes when they are right in your face.
3 - Fan of Knives) If they removed the cooldown they'd have to nerf the damage to oblivion. It's fine and it's amazing.
4 - Marked For Death) Seems alright where it is to me in a group setup where there are multiple damage debuffs rolling.
5 - Multishot) I occasionally swap to suppression fire if I feel like dropping prep while farming. I don't think the cost should be changed, but perhaps the numbers should be changed.
6 - Sentry) I agree 100%. While this is "free" passive damage..it has a decent amount of setup time due to the cooldown and is limited due to range.
7 - Cluster Arrow) This is where build diversity comes in. Cluster Arrow does massive damage and with the right Passive/Skill setup you can get massive amounts of hatred regeneration. I'm currently running around tossing grenades about for massive discipline regen and spamming this constantly for ludicrous damage.
8 - Rain of Vengeance) Quite a few people use this ability, however, the only runes I find useful are Dark Cloud and Stampede. The others are just extremely disappointing since half of the mobs/affixes you come across run around like idiots.
0
0
http://us.battle.net...XPVh!aTe!bcZYcb
The build requires more precise play so is not for everyone, but allows you to use smoke screen as an aggressive ability alongside Fan of Knives to pull of some impressive nukes. In fact I can outright destroy all non-shielding champion packs in infinitely faster than I could with the IAS+Nether Tentacle pre-nerf build.
Grenadier as a passive is a great alternative for archery or sharpshooter depending on your gear. Additionally you can swap the Cluster Rune to something else like Loaded for Bear.
With sufficient vit+resist all you can drop SS for Shadow Power (Gloom) for a more efficient use of discipline.
How do I survive without caltrops or some form of slow? Use the scoundrel with Multishot and a cold weapon. It's more or less a permanent aoe slow. You also have enough burst to destroy reflecting mobs while SS is up (just make sure you read affixes before you fire off some huge damage and kill yourself)
There is huge burst potential with spike traps and you can set them up prior to pulling a pack. Afterwards simply Cluster->Evasive->Cluster->Smoke Screen/Run in for a FoK. If mobs aren't dead simply evasive fire out and they will die shortly after.
I totally changed my gear setup for 1.03 and am able to farm acts 1-4 as good if not better than I could prior to the "nerfs"
--------------------------------------------------------------
Most people will hate this build, but hopefully a few enjoy it. Enjoy!
Here is a video I came across with the build in action:
0
The first clone will spawn where Diablo disappears from, so you should drop RoV in that area. Pre-SS after about 2 seconds, drop RoV and spam tentacles at that spot. From there on out you just need to be on your toes with smoke screen as Diablo vanishes.
0
0
1)Smoke Screen - Lingering Fog
•Post-nerf this ability and rune are still amazing
2)This is my 'floater' slot between Marked for Death (Mortal Enemy) and Rain of Vengeance (Stampede)
•I used to think RoV sucked..but randomly decided to use it one game and have stuck with it since. With this ability runed properly you can hold an entire pack of mobs in place leaving them unable to cast or move towards you for a very long time. With this I am able to destroy pretty much any non-invulnerable/shielding pack. Even soul rippers aren't an issue with this ability. Try it out.
3)Prep - Backup Plan
4)Caltrops - Torturous Ground
•I don't use an 80% slow because certain mob types or fast mobs simple run through it as if I didn't even drop it. With the 2 second immobilize I can at least kite these packs long enough to land kills.
L)Hungering Arrow - Devouring Arrow
R)Elemental Arrow - Nether Tentacles
•Meatball cannon speaks for itself.
Passives: Archery, Steady Aim, Tactical Advantage
•I use TA over Sharpshooter since the utility and survivability from TA is absolutely amazing.
Follower: Enchantress (Charm, Armor, Erosion, Focused Mind)
•2500 damage and 65k health
•I prefer this over a templar mostly because of Charm. Charmed mobs in inferno outright one shot other mobs. Champion packs that are charmed will chunk 20+% of another champion's health off.
I run with 3.6 APS, 18% movement speed, +10 max disc and 68k damage without SS. With this I can unload and regen my hatred bar stupidly fast while kiting and am able to maintain discipline for quite a while before using preparation.
Good luck!
0
0