Hi,
Decided to take my writing brush out again, this time it’s a guide on the Spellbreaker Trozan’s character I’m currently playing.
Some background info, feel free to skip:
- About me
ARPGs have been one of my favorite game genres for a long time— I started in Diablo 1 and never stopped since then.
Most of the big titles I’ve played in some way or another, and once I’d worn a game out, I’d look to mods to reinvigorate the experience.
The mods I like are content-expanding, or ones that improve or change the gameplay in some way, preferably to raise the challenge.
I’m not a fan of mods that make the game easier outside of some quality-of-life features, and I rarely use 3rd party programs or cheats since I’m looking to expand my interest in a game, rather than diminish it.
- About my builds
[SPOILER]
One of the parts I enjoy the most in these games is to think up builds that I find fun to play and that are also effective. Usually I just play blind and read over the skill descriptions and see where that brings me.
After a few playthroughs I look through skill calculators and available databases to work out any ideas I have. For these reasons, I never follow builds others made, although I do look at build guides and showcases sometimes to see what else is out there.
Since I mostly play solo and I don’t trade with other players, I don’t care much about how competitive my builds are— I just like creating them and (sometimes) to write about them.
To me, it’s more about materializing an idea that I thought seemed interesting and seeing how it works in practice. Some work better than expected, others not as well, but I usually can the truly unfeasible builds at the skill calculator stage, which saves some time.
Typically I will try to squeeze every last drop of performance out of a build by looking up the optimal items in every slot, the best investment-return ratio for skill ranks and their ultimate levels, and so on.
I’ll rarely go for cookie-cutter builds that use the popular sets, although I’ve made some builds using them in the past. I don’t find the sets particularly interesting anymore, since some of them are just too strong.
Plus as a player who doesn’t trade, it’s often hard to get all the parts. So rather than the large sets, I prefer to use a mix of Epics and Legendaries that fit my builds.
I played HC for a while for a change of pace, but now I’m playing SC again, which allows for slightly more experimental builds.[/spoiler]
- About this build
Pros
- [li]High damage for a caster[/li]Can kill most bosses quite quickly
[li]Good AoE damage[/li]With several spells at your disposal, trash mobs die instantly
[li]Relatively easy to gear[/li]Most of the items drop often or can be crafted
[li]Active playstyle[/li]Can also be a con depending on how you look at it: this isn’t the kind of build you play with one hand on your mouse and a beer in the other
[li]Surprisingly survivable[/li]Because of your active defensive skills, you can prevent a lot of incoming damage even in melee range
[li]Low cooldowns[/li]The CDR used to raise DPS on Trozan’s also means you have high uptime on Shadow Strike and Pneumatic Burst, etc.
[li]High OA[/li]Relatively, for a caster that is
[li]Strong in Port Valbury[/li]Aetherials don’t like cold much
Cons
- [li]Arcanist casters aren’t that good in the endgame in GD right now[/li]There are many reasons for this, but explaining it would be too long for this guide
[li]Requires timing and aiming skills[/li]TSS has a small AoE so you actually need to aim it for good results, HP is low which requires good usage of PB and Mirror and footwork to stay alive
[li]Low DA[/li]Thus prone to crits, but partially mitigated by Veil of Shadow and the Moonglow debuff on Crescent Moon (-100 OA)
- How this build came to be
I always liked Arcanist casters but I’ve also felt they were very weak compared to fighting characters, because many factors in GD promote a certain build style if you want to have top tier damage or survivability.
Over the patches I’ve played multiple Panetti Missile characters, which remains my favorite spell, an Olexra’s Freeze build and another Trozan build using a Warpfire to convert the Cold damage to Fire.
That build was quite strong, but as with almost any caster in GD, it wasn’t a pure spellcaster: the spells were just mediums to activate procs.
In 1.0.0.7 Trozan’s Sky Shard and its line had gotten some more buffs, and some items related to the skill had seen some buffs in prior patches and I thought I’d give TSS another try, this time attempting to focus as much damage on the TSS itself and on the Frostburn damage from Frozen Core.
I hadn’t really dabbled with DoT builds before in GD, so I wanted to see how strong the Frostburn ticks could get.
For the secondary mastery, I wanted to boost Cold/Frostburn damage as much as possible, so Nightblade was the logical choice.
- How this build works
It’s quite simple: you rush in the middle of packs with Shadow Strike and drop TSS and stuff dies.
- Cold/Frostburn damage Devotions are linked to your main attacks (TSS, Ring of Steel, Shadow Strike) to supplement your DPS and AoE
- Amarasta’s Blade Burst is used to boost your OA, since caster builds typically suffer from low OA which means they can’t get good crits
- Inner Focus gives you a further OA % boost, together they lead to an acceptable total so you can crit reliably
- Elemental Balance and Shattered Star both give large crit bonuses to leverage the above
The idea is to kill-before-being-killed in a simple multi-step program:
- [li]Get in the middle of things with Shadow Strike[/li]As the AoE on TSS is small, you really want to be as centered as possible. The SS will also release your linked Devotion
[li]Cast Ring of Steel to freeze everything[/li]You can kill most trash mobs before they unfreeze, and as above it releases a Devotion as well
[li]Drop a Trozan’s Sky Shard[/li]Anything that doesn’t die from the initial impact will die to the Frostburn + another linked Devotion
[li]Use Amarasta’s Blade Burst during the downtime[/li]It gives a short duration buff and you can’t cast other spells anyway, so you might as well use this
[li]Use Mirror of Ereoctes and Pneumatic Burst when needed[/li]If stuff doesn’t die right away. Also, keep up PB for its passive bonuses
The principle is simple: attack when your defensive skills are ready, and take some distance when they aren’t.
You won’t take much damage between the above and 20-30% dodge from Shadow Dance, and you can heal any damage that does go through with PB.
And when in doubt, don’t engage unless you have Mirror ready.
- Offense
Stats with auras on + PB -> stats with most combat buffs on
The main skill’s damage values
The main damage comes from TSS itself, which was one of the intended goals of this build, because I was tired of making yet another proc machine.
Because spell builds don’t get WPS (a big reason why they are inferior to builds that do), using multiple skills is necessary in order to use several active Devotion skills.
This build uses Blizzard and Whirlpool for extra damage and slow, and Elemental Storm for the 30 resistance reduction at max rank.
Because all the spells have a cooldown, the Devotions are all pretty much guaranteed to activate on usage.
A reason why Cold builds lack damage is because they don’t have a dedicated Devotion that lowers Cold resistance, which makes a very big difference compared to builds that do.
This build stacks quite a bit of resist reduction with what’s available:
- Elemental Storm: -30%
- Night’s Chill: -34%
- Band of the Eternal Haunt: -10%
- Crescent Moon: -15%
You could still get more by having a resist reduction % item (on an augment for example), but I didn’t have one at hand right now.
The reductions work on both the initial TSS hits and the Frostburn, which is nice.
- Defense
This build is squishy.
The latest patch seems to have made the game harder as well, so it’s not unusual to drop dead instantly to some attacks, even if you have maxed resistances.
All it takes is an unlucky sequence of crits or lack of dodges.
But if you use the above routine listed under 5, survivability is decent.
And what this build does have to prevent you from kicking the bucket is:
- [li]Mirror of Ereoctes: One of the most powerful (and arguably broken) skills in the game, it makes you immune to ALL damage for 3 seconds while retaining control of your character, and it has a decent uptime at higher ranks. Use it, love it.[/li]Even big packs that look scary are relatively safe to engage with this on.
[li]Maiven’s Sphere: As this build has very low max HP (8-9k), this skill is essential to prevent some OHKOs.[/li]As a cooldown caster, this build doesn’t use much Energy, so the Sphere’s upkeep is no problem. Its link gives some valuable reduced Stun duration as well. - Pneumatic Burst: As spellcasters without a WD % component can’t get leech easily, they need to get sustainability elsewhere. For this build, it mainly comes from PB.
-
Shadow Dance: another crippling weakness of Arcanist casters is that they struggle to get good DA, this skill gives a good amount and it gives a large dodge bonus to both melee attacks and projectiles. Supermax it and always keep it on for the dodge and speed bonuses.
[li]Ring of Steel: A very useful skill that requires little investment. You can charge into the middle of a pack with SS and freeze most of them for a moment with this, and then drop a TSS on top of them.[/li]This combo releases all 3 damaging Devotions as well for some extra oompf. While the skills are recharging, you can cast ABB for its linked bonus as well, it affects your spells. - Veil of Shadow: On fighter builds I don’t max this, but on this one it’s quite good. It increases the radius of Night’s Chill (which is small to begin with) and it also slows foes (stacks with your other slow) and lowers their OA. Remember the Caster Bad DA issue? This helps a bit.
- Nullification: Always put a point in this, it’s one of the perks of being an Arcanist. A peeve of mine is that there are many status effects in the game and DoTs are rampant and lethal, but the game doesn’t give you many ways to remove them. This is one of them. You can also use it offensively to remove Reflect or immunity shields from bosses, so it’s very versatile. Great skill.
- Giant’s Blood: Good ol’ reliable. Nerfed time after time but it’s still a go-to.
As you can see, it’s a layered defense with both passive and active elements. The best way to stay alive is good footwork though.
- Skill Trees
Note: the gifs show both the base and the augmented ranks periodically
Since my last build had many requests to include pictures with the base skills, here’s a Grimcalc link as well.
Both masteries are quite straightforward, so there’s no need to go in-depth about choices.
Trozan’s Sky Shard and its line is mostly maxed: this is the main damage dealer.
Elemental Balance and Shattered Star both give a lot of Crit damage, so investment there is good.
As for the passive damage boosts such as Arcane Will, Elemental Awakening and Merciless Repertoire: they may seem tempting on paper but they don’t give that much damage per skill point in reality.
Putting a value point in them is wise, but you’re better off not maxing them since there aren’t that many points in the game.
- Devotions
Also, see Grimcalc.
The main three to aim for are:
With some fiddling I managed to fit in Behemoth as well.
The rest are to meet the requirements for the main Devotions, and some Life % nodes. The first node of Mogdrogen gives 35 OA, since this build meets the requirements for that, it’s a nice freebie.
Update: this is a different setup I used for Crucible.
It’s not “better,” it just has more DA at the cost of some damage, which is needed for Gladiator.
The skill trees are tweaked slightly as well: I turned ABB and Lethal Assault into a one-pointer and invested in the NB mastery bar so I could get the fumble from Circle of Slaughter.
- Equipment
This build is relatively cheap to equip, since it doesn’t require one of the main Legendary sets (the 5 piece ones that give +2 mastery skills).
Most of the stuff is either easy to farm or craftable.
- [li]Head: Clairvoyant’s Hat— My favorite helm, the +1 all skills is a nobrainer.[/li]Component: Sanctified Bone— Resists, sizable bonus damage to 2 of the 3 main factions. Lack of alternatives makes this a shoe-in.
[li]Chest: Eastern Robes— This used to be one of the worst items and sets in the game, but after buffs it’s quite good. The set bonuses are no-nonsense and give you exactly what you need. [/li]Component: Chains of Oleron— speaks for itself.
[li]Weapon: Crescent Moon— This item sucks for fighting Nightblades, but there are almost no unique minus Cold resistance debuffs out there, which makes it good for this build. The -100 OA/DA part of the debuff is quite strong as well and mitigates some of the inherent caster weaknesses.[/li]Component: Purified Salt— Extra Aether resist and bonus damage to Aetherials. Another shoe-in because there are no good caster components comparable to stuff like Oleron’s Blood, Haunted Steel and Shard of Beronath, etc. If you really want to, you can put a Coldstone in, but the resists and faction damage are much better.
[li]Focus: Tome of the Arcane Wastes— Very strong allround off-hand: +1 all skills, high damage and OA. You can use Aldenar’s Vanity for the flat CDR or Tome of Names for the resist reduction, but I feel this one is best overall.[/li]Component: Imbued Silver— Chaos version of the above.
[li]Shoulders: Any good green. Moosilauke’s with a Stonehide prefix and a +Life suffix would be best for this build. I’m just using a random green I crafted with a Stonehide prefix, to fill some needed resists.[/li]Component: Antivenom Salve— This build’s items don’t give much Poison resist, so some extra is needed.
[li]Belt: Phantom-Thread Girdle— The best Arcanist belt by far, has a nice dodge bonus too.[/li]Component: Antivenom Salve
[li]Legs: Eastern Legguards— Part of the set, but pretty good in its own right. Decent HP/OA bonuses and gives you the means to supermax Frozen Core.[/li]Component: Silk Swatch
[li]Gloves: Eastern Gloves— Completes the set. It’s nice that Crate added some resists to many items, which makes them more appealing. And +4 to TSS.[/li]Component: Spellwoven Threads— No real competition here either.
[li]Feet:— Random green with Stonehide again, allows you to cap almost all resists with a good roll. Or a good random green or faction item.[/li]Component: Mark of Mogdrogen— HP, MS.
[li]Amulet: Peerless Eye of Beronath— One of the best allround amulets in the game. If you don’t have this (it’s rare), you can use a blue one with +1 all skills too.[/li]Component: Vengeful Wraith— Extra Frostburn damage. -
Ring 1: Lifegiver Signet— Gives some good resists and sorely needed Life. Mostly it’s a lack of competition thing, a green with similar stats can be as good or better.
[li]Ring 2: Band of the Eternal Haunt— Resists and Cold resist reduction.[/li]Components: Vengeful Wraith
[li]Medal: Badge of Mastery— Another staple. One with +3 TSS or something else useful is nice, but not mandatory.[/li]Component: Vengeful Wraith
[li]Relic: Iskandra’s Balance— No Frostburn damage on this, but high Cold damage boosts and a strong proc.[/li]Component: Gazer Man
Augments:
Weapons: 35% Elemental damage, 200 Health, 22 OA
Jewelry: 100% Frostburn damage, 150 Health, 25 OA
Armor: 6x 7% Aether/Chaos Resist, 1x 7% Pierce, 10% Poison Resist
- Conclusion
This was never meant to be a powergaming build, I just wanted to see how strong a Frostburn build could get.
The recent buffs to TSS and blue sets make The Eastern Pledge set very viable as an end-game option (I’ve beaten BoC and the new Port Valbury using it on Ultimate) and the build is quite fun to play.
It met my initial requirement of wanting a spellcaster that had a strong main spell rather than a proc medium.
The damage output is actually quite decent, it exceeded my expectations and it’s most likely my highest DPS caster in vanilla currently.
However, even with all this, caster builds simply don’t compare to fighter builds in GD right now. Fighter builds are more durable, have better sustainability and better offense in general. And they tend to have better movement speed and the availability of gap closers as well.
In short, they get more with far less effort.
Keep in mind though: this build is more than good enough to beat most of the content in the game, but if you’re a true min-maxer, there is a very noticable power discrepancy between the two arch-types.
I hope that Crate will address this issue and some of the (lack of) endgame and power-scale pacing issues in the future, which would undoubtedly make this game even better than it already is.
- FAQ
Why no Trozan’s set?
The Eastern set gives better single target damage and it leaves the highly contested weapon and helm slots free. And I wanted to focus on Frostburn damage, which the Eastern set fits better too. The procs on the Trozan set are quite powerful though, and give you slightly better AoE.
Can this beat the Avatar?
I haven’t tried, I assume it can if you overcap Lightning resist in preparation and only take risks when Mirror is up. The build has enough AoE to take care of the summons, but the fight itself would take forever though.
Actually gave it a try, and turns out I overestimated the AoE on this build, TSS’s target area is just too small to use effectively in this fight since the enemy minions cover a larger part of the ground.
I couldn’t clear them fast enough to be able to deal significant damage to the Avatar, so this build is no good against him.
How about Nemeses?
I actually haven’t unlocked any Nemeses on this character yet, I just rushed through the game after the patch came out and grabbed some of the stuff I needed from my stash.
This build shouldn’t have a problem beating them though, if they don’t spawn with ridiculous items. Mirror and Nullification make almost everything possible.
Crucible?
With great effort you can finish Gladiator (see this post, this build definitely isn’t made for that though). Challenger is a breeze.
Blade Trap/OFF?
Doesn’t work vs. most things you want it to, but if you want you can put a point in it to help with kiting some things.
Overload?
Sucks, the Elemental damage bonus doesn’t affect Frostburn, and the random bonus is for attacks only.
Devastation?
This build doesn’t have the right damage types for it nor the points, and it’s not needed.
Base stats allocation?
Everything into Physique. Surprised?
Cunning isn’t worth it for Frostburn, and Spirit doesn’t give enough returns even with Inner Focus, and this build is squishy as is.
Which faction?
Death’s Vigil for the Frostburn damage on weapons Augment.
Leveling guide?
Leveling is mostly about experience and I’m sure there are other guides out there that explain in detail how to level fast, so I won’t bloat this guide further.
One thing I’ll say though, it’s easier to level through normal with a fast maxed Panetti’s Replicating Missile than it is with Trozan’s, due to its cooldown and limited AoE.
- Gameplay videos
A Port of Valbury run I only ran this once on normal before so I didn’t know the layout, lots of backtracking. Cleared it fully though.
A Mad Queen fight By no means a fast kill, just showing that this build can kill her
Another Mad Queen fight With new setup
All videos are just to show how the build plays, no cherry picking or super plays.
- Reference Material
- Grim Dawn Wikia, in particular: Shrine and One-Shot Chests locations.
- Japanese GD wiki Very up to date with ultimate skill rank data and more, run through Google Translate if needed
- Grimcalc Char builder website
- Graceful Dusk Item database
- These forums here
- My Cadence Blademaster Another guide, based on the Cornucopia mod but mostly works in vanilla too
