I was playing with my friend "Tornado" and he had an awesome build that mainly involved of leaping in and rending everyone. We decided to experiment with hammer of the ancients coupled with rend and we came up with a few builds.
I always change builds and items but what you basically need to know that with these stats i can clear mp 5 very well no matter what specific alteration of the build im currently using (1h or 2h) but i do want to mention that doing ubers on mp7 is impossible for me using the 2h build since my attack speed is not high enough. But with the 1h build i can tank ubers on mp7 pretty darn good.
About gearing up for this build : If you are rich enough, getting gear with massive increases in attack speed could make this build even more awesome than it already is. I think that the lifesteal on the belt is a must but if you can afford a skorn with lifesteal then you can just get a good witching hour belt. For the attack speed you obviously go for lacuni prowlers and trifecta gloves / amulet / rings. Inna's pants is a good choice. I'd say that 400% crit damage is a requirement which is pretty low and easy to achieve in my opinion. It is highly recommended that your weapon will be a mace / axe for that bonus from the weapon master passive.
Left Click:Bash with Instigation - gotta have that fast fury generation. If you have good fury reg from gear then you could probably experiment with whatever you'd likfe here. I would say that going for Punish on bash would be nice for the extra 8-24% damage for that hammer. If you are even more rich and your gear has alot of increased attack speed, then you can prbably go for Frenzy with Maniac. You could always go for Cleave with Brod Sweep for a good overall splash damage.
Right Click:Hammer Of The Ancients with Smash - The build revolves around this build as it is the main damage dealer. I get critical hits of 1 million and up and my gear is in no way highly priced, its mediocre.
1:Leap with Death From Above - You are probably asking why leap instead of Sprint with Marathon? Well, just because leap allows you to jump in between the mob packs. I picked death from above rune because it stuns everyone where you land and gives you a few safe seconds to rend and start smashing. You could probably swap this slot with Furious Charge / Sprint but you will have to adjust your playstyle accordingly. Obviously, Iron Impact rune could work well here and even Call Of Arreat.
2: Wrath Of The Berserker with Insanity- The reason why i did not pick Thrive on Chaos is simply because i cannot keep up with it and keep my cd going. Besides, with insanity wotb on, no champ pack stands a chance, everything will 100% melt before the wotb runs out (atleast for mp0-6 with my gear). I can see someone swapping wotb for OverPower with Killing Spree but i just need that crowd controll immunity sometimes.
3: Rend with Bloodlust - This skill, along with some life steal on gear and the bloodthirst passive, simply keeps you alive while you smash away with your hammer. Its is absolutely essential to use rend as the first thing you do whenever you encounter a pack and jump into the action. If you have really high lifesteal then you could probably take the Lacerate rune for higher damage.
4: Battle Rage with Into The Fray - This ability is a must for almost every buid in my opinion. But what makes it special here, is that you can simply hammer infinitely especially with wotb on because you just crit so much you almost never run out of fury. I can see someone swapping into the fray with Marauder's Rage but that would require good fury generation on your gear.
About gearing up for this build : You need good one handers with life steal, strength, socket, and i'd say anything above 900 dps. Both your main hand and off hand should be good but sacrificing some damage on one for extra stats is always an option. Socket them with emeralds obviously. And as for the rest its pretty basic really, you have to get crit chance and crit damage on all the available slots of armor that allow either one or both of them. Life steal % is good but also life on hit works really well with this build since you are hitting very fast with frenzy. If you dont have movement speed on your gear then Sprint with Marathon is a must. If you get one handers with lifesteal then take Nerves of Steel or Superstition for extra survival.
Left Click: Frenzy with Smite - Really solid choice in my opinion, it really helps with champs / bosses / ubers. You can go with sidearm if you like to see axes flying, they also crit which is quite nice. Another solid choice would be maniac since it boosts your overall damage giving your hammer an extra smash.
Right Click: Hammer of the Ancients with Thunderstrike - Bigger area of effect than smash and that stun just owns packs of mobs and champs. Sure smash is also viable here in fact it could be better since you are hitting faster and your damage per hit is usually lower than using a two hander.
1: Sprint with Marathon - This is simply the best mobility spell in the game, it allows you to travel great distances very quickly. You wont be needing Run like the Wind because there is no Whirlwind involved. Other possibilities here are leap and furious charge.
2: Berserker's Rage with Into the Fray - For keeping that TOC up. When you hit fast with frenzy you crit alot, easily filling up your fury. Not to mention the infinite hammers you can pull off with big packs. A second choice here would be Marauder's rage if you take wotb Insanity.
3: Rend with Bloodlust - The build does not heavilly rely on rend as the main survival ability since hitting fast with frenzy also heals you up pretty decently however, it always important to rend some monsters before you start hammering away. A second option here would be Lacerate for the extra damage but i'd expect you to have alot of ls % on your gear.
4: Wrath of the Berserker with Thrive on Chaos - Obiously, TOC allows you to keep your wrath going on for forever. With frenzy you can simply hold left click on ubers and spamm your sprint if you dont like hearing your barb shouting every second. Other options is Insanity for that crazy 100% damage boost.
Not to be rude but this build is basicly a messed up hota build (read u have hota but don't have frenzy that buffs it's dmg which u alos mentioned it) and I would prefer to have something else instead of leap but guess with the reduced dmg it works out well and adds a bit of mobility.
However I think there needs to be better sites for d3 builds and guides like there was in d2 so good for adding in cause I'm not sure I have seen that many either beside random posts.
i do not like smash rune on HotA - the hit area is too slow and it does not give enough fury back, with thunderstrike rune i can stunlock elites, surronded by adds - it helps alot on high mp (i farm mp8 for keys), and i do not even need a basic attack for fury generation.
take a look at build in my sig (no gear in that stupid armory, since i've been doing naked achieve and it recorded me in that state ))
@zera: and what is frenzy good for when using a 2hander? bash works a lot better there, rune maybe personal choice..i'm using punish for 24% extra dmg (hello frenzy @ 20% after 5 hits..)
@aldoran: smash is the rune to go. radius may be small, but crits are very high..thunderstrike only works on kill, so for pure dps and high mp level i don't think it's very viable..
about the build itself, besides leap (i'm using overpower - ca) i'm using the same skills and only 2 different runes..my advice: either use wotb-toc & battle rage - into the fray, or use insanity & marauders rage..i'm using the first combo..and regarding passives, you should think about alternatives..i'm using superstition, which helps a lot in certain situations to keep wotb up (e.g. rakanoth & ghom).
Yep soon as I got my barb max level about two months ago and got a skorn this was about the same build I was running forever =D It's really fun.
BUT, I think I found my all time favorite build for barbs; The HammerWind build!
Use all the WW build skills, such as sprint / WW / battle rage, then ofc use hammer smash, add in whatever generator you like, I personally go with frenzy / smite for ubers. Keeping up 5 stacks means single target when I eventually run out of rage takes about 1.5 seconds to get full rage again to smash another 35 times, and I throw in wrath thrive on chaos because duel wielding, hammer smash alone will keep wrath up forever.
This build ends up covering arguably the best AOE skills barb has, and also probably the best single target barb has. There's no rend because with my 8% lifesteal two hammers will keep me at full HP on a single mob, and also sprinting / WW'ing once or twice around a group will leech more then enough life.
That's the exact build I'm using since patch 1.0.5 has hit them servers.
Except the passive Bloodthirst - I don't think it's really necessary. I mean, you have so much life back from belt (life leech 3%) and Rend, that it's more beneficial to use something else instead, like Tough as Nails. Having more armour is never a bad thing.
@aldoran: smash is the rune to go. radius may be small, but crits are very high..thunderstrike only works on kill, so for pure dps and high mp level i don't think it's very viable..
about the build itself, besides leap (i'm using overpower - ca) i'm using the same skills and only 2 different runes..my advice: either use wotb-toc & battle rage - into the fray, or use insanity & marauders rage..i'm using the first combo..and regarding passives, you should think about alternatives..i'm using superstition, which helps a lot in certain situations to keep wotb up (e.g. rakanoth & ghom).
thunderstrike does work better for high MP wiht enough dps(~130k is enough for mp8, for example) - i can stay in crowd and survive, and it has a higher aoe dps, than smash rune, because of two main reasons - bigger range -> more fury gain, that allows to spam it.
But it does suck for single targets, tho.
wotb-toc sucks for 2h - you will never get enough fury to get some meaningfull uptime, +=5 sec will not make such difference, like insanity or even slaughter
bash-4+ fury for mp5 and whatever. frenzy smite for ubers
hota-smash for stupid high single target and .8 coeficient. nearly unlimited fury vs 1 target. unlimited vs 2 targets. also, the aoe is quite easy to hit 2+ mobs with once u learn it
br-into the fray for unlimited smashes/tons of fury/ToC support
ToC- cuz being zerked is just tooooo goood
rend - bloodlust main tanking ability/aoe presence
sprint/warcry/anything
Thanks for all the replies guys, i appreciate your feedback. I will try to update this thread with more relevant information and possibly a video of the specific build in action. I also want to emphasize on the differences between the variations of the Hota builds a bit.
So Im 'Tornado' !!!
Ive played with other HotA runes , and with Seismic slam, all work pretty fine but smash is awesome on elites. Rend/ravage works on weak enemies like spiders etc that come in masses, leap helps u jump in middle of those and rend all of them with one blow, giving u bonus exp aswell.Bash/punish beats frenzy and gives u also nice single target dmg on the other fury spenders. The dmg u get is very good even for mp7+ but survivability is not so good, Id recomend this build for farming mp4-6 in a fast pace. Also instead of bloodthirst passive i use brawler thats amazing
So Im 'Tornado' !!!
Ive played with other HotA runes , and with Seismic slam, all work pretty fine but smash is awesome on elites. Rend/ravage works on weak enemies like spiders etc that come in masses, leap helps u jump in middle of those and rend all of them with one blow, giving u bonus exp aswell.Bash/punish beats frenzy and gives u also nice single target dmg on the other fury spenders. The dmg u get is very good even for mp7+ but survivability is not so good, Id recomend this build for farming mp4-6 in a fast pace. Also instead of bloodthirst passive i use brawler thats amazing
Hey dude!
I took some of the advices people wrote here and played with the build a bit, im using 2x 1handers with frenzy smite and hota thunderstrike. It works really good. I am trying to get an offhand with 3% ls and then i'll give up on bloodthirst possibly for one of the armor passives or brawler. I'm using sprint with marathon atm since my new boots have no movement speed on them at all xD
I like Thrive on Chaos even when using a 2hander. I cannot keep WotB up long enough as has been noted, but at MP7-8 some elite packs take longer than 15s for me to kill (240k dps with WotB:ToC up) so the extra time is helpful.
Also, it's easy to keep WotB up for 30-60s, meaning the cooldown for WotB is usually really short.
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