[1.1.9.3] The Sparkle Bomber - Cold Canister Bomb/PB Saboteur [SR75+]

Grim Dawn Classes, Skills and Builds
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sparkly

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Stats with self-buffs + Lethal Assault, DPS shown is for PB

What is this build? I noticed caster saboteurs were kind of a rarity, so this is my attempt at making one. This one uses cold Phantasmal Blades and cold Canister Bomb together for damage, taking advantage of the gun for the second one. It isn't the most OP build ever, but it is fun and eye-pleasing, and is capable of SR 75-76.

It is extremely gear-dependent (if you want a cheaper, dual-wield melee route, check out Nery’s Beginner Cold Dual-Wield Saboteur), and not recommended for beginners.

Features

Pros

  • Does fairly solid damage, especially when you get multiple Canister Bomb casts from Ulzuin’s Chosen
  • Fast-paced playstyle; hard to get bored playing it
  • Screen full of ice sparklies and lovely devotion procs :snowflake:
Cons
  • Very fragile
  • Build is a bit piano with lots of things to keep track of, which can appeal to some but not others
Gameplay

Toss Flashbangs and throw down Thermite Mines. Use Canister Bomb and PB whenever they are off cooldown, and spam Chillspikes whenever they aren’t. Make sure Lethal Assault is up as much as possible. Kite around especially when Blast Shield is on CD, because you’re really not built to take hits.

Your main damage, especially main burst damage, will come from PB. Canister Bomb is more there as a support skill to use in between PB casts but it adds a decent chunk of damage as well, especially when you can spam-cast it.

Devotions I tried several devotion setups, and out of them all, I feel that this one is the best in terms of covering what you need. I had two T3s originally, Leviathan and either Blind Sage or Attak Seru I forget, but was running into some energy issues so I went for Harp. Bat is super nice here because of fully-converted vit and mostly-converted pierce.
Gear

Note: Ring crafted for physique.

There are a lot of conversions involved here, and I tried to cover as many of them as possible in this setup. In the end, we end up with nearly-fully converted Canister Bomb (the one exception is pierce conversion, which will be somewhere around 70% depending on rolls), and fully-converted Phantasmal Blades.

  • Weapon/Off-Hand - Build-defining items. M. Arcanum Frigus carries bonuses to both Canister Bomb and PB. Somewhat sadly, it’s also the only item support for cold CB in the game. M. Speaker for the Dead boosts PB and has a big chunk of vitality conversion for it.
  • Components - No Coldstones here unfortunately. We need Seal of the Night for Chillspikes, and Seal of Resonance for CC resists. Technically we could go without Resonance but then stun res/trap res would be a little lower than I’d like for this character. Also it does give health which is nice.
  • Helm - Namadea's Horns, gorgeous MI that is tailor-made for cold-based saboteurs. It gives us a whopping total 10% phys res (which is most of our phys res lol), as well as fire to cold conversion.
  • Shoulders - Kra'Vall Shoulderguards gives points to PB and partial chaos conversion for it.
  • Chest - M. Cortosian Chestguard gives PB points and piercing conversion, good for our Canister Bomb.
  • Hand - M. Chilling Grip of Hagarrad - more piercing conversion and nice nightblade gloves in general.
  • Pants - Went with Dreeg-Sect Legguards here for the stun res and OA. You can use other alternatives if you want.
  • Belt - Gargoyle Waistguard - the other half (ish) of our vit conversion for Heart Seeker, and +1 to all Nightblade skills. Ideally, the rolls on this and the off-hand will total 100% or at least close.
  • Boots - Galewind Treads - caps our freeze res. I find that important for this build, because the enemies that freeze you are also usually gonna be the ones most resistant to cold.
  • Amulet - Harra's Ward is just fantastic here. +1 to both our classes and bonuses to PB.
  • Rings - M. Time-Flux Band for slow res and Canister Bomb points. Nightscorn for the last PB points we need to hardcap it, and pierce conversion.
  • Medal - Galeslice's Mark has chaos conversion. Between this, the gun, and the shoulders, chaos-to-cold conversion for Nether Edge is guaranteed to be 100%. It’s also another nice sabo item, even after the nerf.
  • Relic - Serenity, not much to say. The health and circuit breaker are really appreciated here.

:large_blue_circle: What To Look For - Affixes on everything are flexible, there are no fantasy double rare shenanigans here. Just make sure to balance resistances and OA/DA, and look for %cold damage of course. The suffix of the Gildam Arcanum is especially amazing if you can get it.
:large_blue_circle: Alternatives? - Really, they aren’t many. Only the pants and boots slots are free. You lose damage here by wearing the Harra’s set, I tried it out (if you are wondering, the full set nets you +1 projectile to PB, but in return you lose the conversions for both PB and Canister Bomb which hurts. Defense is also unchanged because the 10% phys res on the set is exactly the same as the 10% phys res you get from wearing Namadea’s Horns on a sabo anyway :scorv:). You might also be able to squeeze out more hardcap points for Canister Bomb/Improved Casing/Ulzuin’s Chosen by swapping something, but then you’d lose something else important, so likely not worth the tradeoff IDK.

TL;DR the current setup is likely about as good as you’re going to get, unless I missed something, which is possible.

Performance

The build can do SR 75-76 decently but it’s frighteningly squishy, so 65-66 will be more reliable. I also did kill Lokarr and the Bourbon Clones with this char, they are very doable.

SR 75, first full run This run includes the big annoyance for the build, Moosi. He's not too bad though since you are ranged, so you can kite.
SR 75, second full run
Final words

Added to my wishlist for Christmas: more support for cold Canister Bomb, please. It’s so pretty. :grinning:

Thank you for reading, and feedback is welcome.
12 Likes
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Not a fan of Beethoven but the build is lovely. Love it!

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I like both the build and Beethoven. :wink:

As for comment about build not being suitable for beginners, DW melee have some real cheap setup opportunity for this class but casters are more expensive - this cold PB bomber and Ember set aura master.

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That’s true! I completely forgot about your beginner’s cold dual-wield guide. :smiley: I’ll edit my first post slightly to amend.

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Ah, thanks! It’s rare to see links for beginners guides in end-game setup, appreciate it.

Also it seems you graduate to serious builder, nice!

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Many great teachers and guides here. :grinning_face_with_smiling_eyes:

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As far as Cold beginner Sabo builds go, I think you could also play some casters with item skills

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My hands are not fast enough to play caster build. :sob: I want to try a build that use bone harvest as main skill tree, do you have any recommendations?

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I can answer that actually :smiley: Nery has a nice Bone Harvest build using Nightbringer here: Bone Appetit

Another one is this one by afanasenkov26. You can find more by searching the forum for the bone-harvest tag, though not all may be up to date.

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Hmm what I would do to improve, first I will totally deplete ABB-LA, build requires kiting and not use to much %weapon dmg. ABB is rly clunky with casters. So I can invest more in VoS to extend the debuff range. Spare points can put into Elemental Wakening/Merciless Rep for % cold and some flat forstburn dmg.
As you have modifiers on PB, how about a spam cold PB with Transmute? The piercing dmg is purely converted to cold though.

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Well, obviously ABB isn’t here for the %weapon damage. Not with 1 point on a caster lol. It is here for the Lethal Assault buff :slight_smile: But I agree, I’ve always kind of hated the skill even on non-casters. So I may take it out anyhow, and putting it in Elemental Awakening to make up the damage isn’t a bad call.

The transmuter turns the piercing damage into vitality, no? I don’t want that.

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Well somehow you misunderstood me, I know you want LA, but as I mentioned, only Chillspikes get the most benefit from %weapon dmg - 12%, so LA its only has a minor affection. You get better % cold dmg from MR and EA. 4 points only on VoS is quite bad for range caster.
The main skill already converted piercing → cold, it cant transmute twice, as I mentioned above, it’s pure cold.

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Exactly, you can’t double convert. Going by this order of conversion:

Base Skill > Skill Modifiers > Conversion on the Skill or Transmuter > Conversion on Equipment and Buffs > Equipment, Auras and Passives”

Conversion on the transmuter will happen before the conversion from the equipment (because that piercing > cold conversion is from equipment), so, the skill will just end up being vitality. Unless I am mistaken in understanding this.

Also, re: Veil of Shadow radius, I was under the impression that it’s not as important for ranged characters as for melee because they’re ranged. I.e, you’ll often be out of range anyway.

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That’s why as playing kiting/ranged chars, you prefer extend VoS as furthest as possible, at least 8/10, it also reduced mobs OA/AS. You invested 16/10 Night’s chill but only 4/10 VoS, the efficiency is heavily decreased.

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Transmuter and book happen at same time so it splits actually!

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Oh, huh. That is interesting to know, thanks!

It looks like either way, the answer will be the same in this case. :slight_smile: Spam cold PB is a no-go - ruins the total conversion.

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Build updated – dropped Lethal Assault after all because screw that noise. :grinning: Lost a few percent of %damage, even with the reinvestment of those points in Elemental Awakening, but should feel much smoother to play now. Upped VoS too, so radius will be more comfortable, thanks @holystar88.

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