Preface.
This is an on paper build to inspire other more serious builders. I suck as a pilot for speed running crucible or deep diving in the SR. But the on paper numbers are comparable to other similar builds and it did SR 65 fine without me try-harding. (65 is near my pilot cap even with builds that other people do 80 with). So given that, no hard numbers on what the build can truly do but those are your on paper baselines.
I also did not optimize this build yet and more experienced builders will likely be able to do better in fine tuning devotions and augments. I will point out some of the sketchier decisions I made where improvements are likely to be found as well as places I have left open to adjust for myself later.
Concept and Aims
The Sentinel of the Three set has always been a little weird with regards to Vire’s Might. The set offers significant retaliation damage to Vire’s Might but little in the way to reduce the cooldown of the skill. Pair that with the way that most people find the fun in Vire’s Might to be found in zooming around like a speed skater or an ATV instead of playing a longer cool down hit like a truck charger and I don’t think I’ve seen a single build actually strait up make the Sentiel set’s premise of charging retaliation damage work. Most people just leverage the acid retaliation on the set for everything but Vire’s Might. So with the above in mind, I decided to give it a go and build the retaliating charger that was intended, but with a few possibly unintended wrinkles thrown in.
Base Build Grimtools
(Base Build means these are prefixless/suffixless MIs and no skill bonuses are selected for the relic)
The build at its heart does the following.
It wears the Sentinel of the Three Set to couple retaliation damage to Vire’s Might.
It converts all Fire Damage to Acid Damage.
It invests in a bunch of Acid Resist Reduction
It loads up on Acid and Fire Retaliation in that order through gear and devotions avoiding Physical Retaliation as much as possible for reasons below.
Then it slaps on 1.1 seconds of Vire’s Might cooldown reduction from a necklace and a new 1.1.7.0 MI helm, hits the 1.4 second cooldown reduction breakpoint of Tectonic Shift, pairs that with another ~25% cooldown reduction from shield, neck, and Path of the Three, and then goes zoom like the skating and ATV builds above which have similar reduction/cooldown numbers. Meanwhile unlike the builds above the Vire’s Might hits like a truck because it has a shield and all that retaliation damage. All the while cackling about how this was probably not an intended pairing of gear.
Oh and it also realizes that between the shield, necklace and the MI helm, all physical damage on Vire’s Might is now screwed up since it is now converting to Acid, Fire, and Lightning but who cares since the Sentinel of the Three weapon and Shield are base Acid/Chaos (weapon) or pure Acid (shield) and we have been avoiding physical retaliation.
Then it says screw it entirely and puts on a medal to convert physical from Vire’s Might into Chaos as well because why not at this point. The Chaos modifiers on the build are higher than Fire and Lightning anyway and we may as well convert the base pierce from Vire’s Might into Chaos while we’re at it while adding 150 raw points of Chaos damage to the skill and adding two more skill points to Vire’s Might.
And finally it concedes that while plate is protective and a shield makes you charge harder, they collectively offer crud energy regen so the build becomes best friends with Bard’s Harp so it doesn’t have to guzzle energy pots on cool down.
Here is the breakdown of parts of the build easily changed.
Righteous Ferver/Retribution. Retribution can give 10% Retaliation to attack to a lot of things. Volcanic Stride ticks (which you can really stack up with low cooldown and are fast multiticks to begin with before stacking), the swarm of eyes your rings make, the constant shots of acid from your belt, and the pools of goo from Fetid Pool. That is a lot of added damage. But it is also a huge pain in the butt to keep the stack of Ferver/Retribution up and going when all you want to do is zoom. It is also a lot of points that can go elsewhere. Try it out then take it or leave it.
For that matter the entire retaliation idea may be wrong. We might keep the set for the Vire’s Might/Path of the Three skill points, inherent weapon damage types, cooldown on the shield, etc but ignore the entire retaliation aspect of it. There is a lot to be said for just unlimited skating with a shield while in plate. We are still easily full converting all fire skills to acid so the entire Red/Green portion of the devotion sky becomes Acid Meteors or Acid Fissures or Acid Torrents if we to use some of them like the skate build does if we give up the retaliation constelations. Heck our belt is even doing 60% aether to acid and the ATV build claims Volcanic Stride with Imp does nutty things and the ATV build was only converting about that much aether. Or we might lean into the Acid and Chaos constelations strait up. Grab some more flat acid or chaos for harder charges. Dropping retaliation also opens ring, glove, boot, and the relic slots as well as resulting in a component overhaul. In short acid zoom skating does not need to be retaliation acid zoom skating.
Crane as a constellation is definitely wrong. It is a placeholder of the basic build to patch missing resists that actual resists on the MI pieces should handle and to cover for an earlier build which had vilescorn bracers instead of perditions in the glove slot. I also am undecided if I want more defense or offense. With minor point shifts crane could easily become more offensive either as Imp, Fiend, more retal or crit nodes or more defensive as Ghoul, Crab, Behemoth, Shield Maiden or simply more health, defensive ability, or physical resist nodes.
Speaking of the MI pieces, if we keep the retaliation concept Seraphim Head/Legs of Ulzuin’s Flame are the dream pieces under the retaliation plan (if stash generating dream pieces is your jam) while other more general acid damage and bleed resist affixes would do the trick whether we stick with retaliation as core to the build or not.
Resists on the MI pieces further open up augment changes on armor, probably for more defensive ability and health. Ring and Amulet augments are also a little sketchy and could easily be other things.
Finally I chose sustain and armor with a second Seal of Blades on my shield, but the numbers might work out better with a blocking component. Not a big shield user so I wouldn’t be surprised if someone more familiar with shields and the math behind them sees that and questions my decision making abilities.
Conclusion
This is a fast moving hard hitting acid/retal build. As it has been created by an amateur builder there is room for improvement. As a substandard pilot I have no idea where the build’s limits lie. But I haven’t seen anything like it yet, the numbers on paper look good, and it behaves well enough in my arthritic hands. If this build provides inspiration to better pilots or builders to have a good time taking it for a spin and/or polishing it up to their standards well I think we all come out ahead.