Challenge completed. I am sure my Dervish would be able to go on, and in the future I might do that. For now I am going to theorycraft a bit for a classless approach.
EDIT: Classless challenge started.
If anyone has an idea on how to get a better devotion spread than this for classless (focused on healing, defense and retaliation with some way of dealing damage), please let me know 
Current setup has 1 spare point, which is in Scales.
Continued the True Passivist challenge after some radio silence. Build is almost ready for Elite though I dread the day I will have to balance resistances for Ultimate 
Been meaning to post, but laziness got me. Tried Passivist thru Elite. Finally gave up; missed bashing too much. Still, fun while it lasted and picked up some tips for playing a retal build (non-passive). Thanks for posting this.
As for classless: not even thinking about it.
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Itās definitely a grindā¦
Challenge is completed as a classless passivist 
I donāt know what is next. I feel like this is close to the edge of what is possible with this concept, but I guess I could try to complete the expansions in Ultimate as well, reach level 100 and complete all roguelike dungeonsā¦ The build is definitely too slow for Crucible or SR. The problem is: Anything with regeneration walls this build completely.
One thing I know for sure is that I am not going to try to one-up myself and do a Hardcore Classless Passivist 
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Any particular choice between Kymonās and the Order? Same for the 3 Witch Gods.
And yes, I did get an item with Thorns drop in Lower Crossing. 
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Nice find! Also, choice for Kymonās or Order, assuming you have already unlocked the faction belts, mainly boils down to which questline you prefer. Killing Bolvar (ranged attacker) or Noveria (caster) should not be very different, depending on how you deal damage apart from retaliation. Killing Ravok can be kind of tedious though with classless, so I usually side with the Order.
For the Witch Gods, I donāt think it matters but I usually go for Bysmiel.
I will do a new installment once the expansion drops
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Iāve started a run as well
Decided to go with Demo first as I figured that while the rest of the mastery wasnāt that great, Vindictive flame is the best skill, bar none for this kind of run (I think) It provides health regen (so getting whaled on is not that bad) and Ulzuinās wrath can take care of ranged attackers. Later on, it still offers Blast shield, and flame touched is also not bad.
Decided on Shaman as the second mastery, so I have an āattackā to attach RR devotions with Wind Devil. Slowly making my way to maxing Wind devil, Vindictive flame and the Pact of Mogdrogen line, along with a lot of health regen gear and devotions.
This is what it looks like right now: Elementalist, Level 34 (GD 1.2.1.2) - Grim Dawn Build Calculator
One little caveat: I sort of went a bit out of your guidelines. I wanted to try the run, but really didnāt feel like doing the grindy bit to level 6 to access my first skillā¦ That alone would turn me away from that challengeā¦ So I allowed myself to use the starting club (And nothing else) until I had at least 1 point into Vindictive flame. (Another option I considered was to use a merit, grab a few lore notes, and go read them in ultimateā¦ it would make the run more āpureā but no longer SSF)
I hope that doesnāt invalidate the run for you
So far, this is pretty fun
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Donāt let me get in the way of playing however you like to play 
But yeah, when I originally started this challenge Wind Devils were nog permanent yet, but they are amazing now for leveling this build. Also, Demo is very good, @Volek used it to great effect in their setup, exactly because of the reasons you stated, and that build took down Lokarr and some SR. Good luck! Ultimate is usually where it gets tricky
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Litlle snapshot of where Iām at.
I just finished Veteran, Iām at Burwich estate in Elite. Just crafted an Eye of the storm.
I rearranged my devotions a bit. Used elemental storm for almost the entire playthrough, but considering that I will only ever have 1 āattackā skill to attach devotions, I felt like Scale was a better choice for a flat RR since it attaches onto a passive, and I can have Arcane bomb on Wind devil instead.
Had a (Badly rolled) Yeti horn for a while, and while the 4th Wind devil really helped, I couldnāt pass up the +1 shaman skills from Stormcallerās effigy
So far, Iām bulldozing pretty much everything in my path, thanks to very copious amount of health regen, Some bosses I have to be pretty patient, but Iām rarely threatened.
The plan is to fill the Demo line and place some points in blast shield, then max out flame touched. If I max out every other passive skills available, Iāll have spent every points Iāll haveā¦ unless I have a setup that includes a 2-handed weapon, where some points could go into brute force, but I donāt see myself passing up 2 extra wind devils from a stormsurge pistol and a Yeti Horn, so my skill points map is pretty obvious.
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Well, turns out that Arcane bomb canāt go on Wind devilā¦ And Scale on its own isnāt enough IMO, so Iāll have to revert back to Elemental storm. That cuts out anything else too, like Ultos or Reckless tempest.
Arcane Bomb is considered a āpetā and you canāt put pets on pets.
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Depending on your OA, Ultos can be a strong -rr option for the Wind Devils as well. You would then need to reroute a bit in the devo tree (things like Wraith, Full Behemoth, Messenger of War, Chariot of the Dead come to mind), but you can focus more on damage output and retaliation instead of regen. I am not sure if you feel squishy with this build at all, so it might not be great advice, but if you can spare the tankiness it would help a great deal towards killing regenerators (or ChāThon forbid groups of them) in Ultimate.
Also consider Colossal Fortress for off-hand, it is a pretty substantial boost to Vindictive Flame, which I assume in the long run will be a more important damage dealer than Wind Devils.
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I think the kind of RR Ultos provides is multiplicative and calculated last, so in the best case scenario (Where Iām fighting something with 95% resist) Once you remove about 35% from wind devil, youāre left with 20% RR ā¦ of the remaining 60%ā¦ so about 13% RR.
Since I donāt have many sources, I feel I need to go for the best possible one here.
I donāt
The last meaningful thing I did last time I played is beat the Logghorean, and I did that by parking my character right next to him until he died. I think I used a potion once.
Maybe there is room for more damage through devotions, however if it doesnāt translate to more damage in the end because I lack RR, I won,t have gained anything. Still, something could be said for putting points into Ultos without using the skill, just for the passives. Or finding a source of reduced resist through itemisation to replace elemental storm, so I can use Ultos.
I definitely will.
That Iām unsure of: Wind devil DoT damage stack with each other, and they stack with the main aura. So if I have 5 wind devils out, I have 6 concurrent sources of damage. I think in the end, an overcapped Maelstrom will be my main source of damage.
But like I said, I will try basically everything
Thanks for the pointers!
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I will admit, -rr mechanics still confuse me after reading through how they stack and work. But if you have no other sources of āreduced resistanceā, there should not be a problem, right? And in your example: Yes, it would come out like 12% flat, but that is still a 30% relative damage increase (from 40% of total to 52% of total), of course, in a good scenario.
That has been my experience too, but I found most other bosses to be stronger than it (like Bloodlord Thalonis, and quite a few of the expansion ones).
What is stopping you from routing Crown and Ultos? Or maybe I donāt understand what you mean by lacking RR in the devotion tree.
As far as I have always understood it (and that could be faulty, mind you), is that the auras of the Wind Devils do not stack, so the only damage multiplier summoning more will give you is from the Maelstrom node (solid but not amazing). Which is why Wind Devils are usually not included in builds for their damage, but rather only as a 1-pointer to carry maxed Raging Tempest. That being said, apart from my Immor(t)al Porcupine build, which is as of now still stranded somewhere in Ultimate, I have yet to see a build utilizing hardcapped Ulzuinās Wrath as a main damage dealer, so who am I to say
But that would also depend heavily on how you plan to deal damage, either by stacking %damage or with retaliation. The latter favours Vindictive Flame.
I meanā¦ it sure is better than nothing, but the alternative is not ānothingā ā¦ itās having something else thatās better. If I deal 1000 damage as a base, and my target has 95% resist (Which is VERY high, but thatās the best case scenario for Ultos as a source of RR) Iāve removed 35% with Wind devil, weāre down to 60% ā¦ then I could apply 32 from elemental storm. The targetās resist is now 28% ā¦ so it takes 720 damage.
If I have Ultos instead, that resist is now 48% instead of 28% and my target takes 520 damage instead of 720.
So, unless Ultos adds 200 damage MORE than elemental storm (Which also deals damage, albeit much less) then itās a net loss. Can Ultos deal that much damage ? I donāt know.
In the (more realistic) case of a target with about 35% resist, Ultos does absolutely nothing (Since 20% of 0 is 0) while elemental storm can take the resist value to the negatives.
Plus, Viper is the same kind of RR as Ultos, so I can still benefit from this type of RR without even taking Ultos and ad it on top of elemental storm.
Because I only have one āActiveā skill that will accept them: Wind devil. I canāt have both. The only source of RR I could have would be to add Scale (Which binds to a passive skill) so I could bind something else to wind devilā¦ but since elemental storm and Scale are the same ākindā of RR, they donāt stack.
So itās either Scale + Ultosā¦ or Elemental storm and Viper.
And trying to fit the requirement for both Ultos and Scale (So 8 yellow, 6 red, 10 blue and 6 green) is a daunting task.
Iāll try both for sure (especially once I start getting end-game gear) since with enough % ligntning damage, Ultos might actually produce a lot of damage to make up for what it lacks in RR.
Youāre right: the aura doesnāt stack, only Maelstrom does.
Iāve made builds int he past that heavily rely on Maelstrom for damage, and when overcapped, itās actually quite good.
Concurrent DoT damage stack for each, so whatever value you read for Maelstrom, you can multiply by 5ā¦ and apply it to 3 different targets eachā¦ Also, if DoT damage crits, it stays at that value for its entire duration (Unless overwritten by an even bigger crit). That works perfectly with Stormcallerās pact.
But one of the best (and worst) thing about it is that it canāt really be altered through itemizationā¦ Maelstrom is what it isā¦ so as long as itās overcapped, itās producing near maximum output (There are a few mods that increase WD damage, and thus Maelstrom, but they are not worth it here)ā¦ which leaves me room for gear that directly add to vindictive flame instead (Like the shield you suggested for example)
My plan is to max out Maelstrom, have as much %electrocute damage as possible, max out vindictive flame, find a Pyroclasm mark and have as big an Ulzuinās wrath as possibleā¦ and see how far it can go. With the right items and devotions, Iām fairly certain it can clear SR 75
Itās actually possible, but Iām not sure what stats Iād be lacking
Snapshot at level 91 : Elementalist, Level 91 (GD 1.2.1.2) - Grim Dawn Build Calculator
Just crafted a stormsurge pistol, and the Amalgamation dropped me this absolute beauty a bit earlier:
Still havenāt found a Pyroclasme mark, but I do have some cindertouch gloves and a nice pair of boots waiting for me at level 94.
Ah, I finally see the problem, this was what I was missing
Build is shaping up nicely! You may also consider the Elite Bysmiel Stormshroud Mantle for the shoulder slot to help overcap Maelstrom, though it would come at the cost of Raging Tempest, so might lover overall damage.
You probably already realized that both versions of Ulzuinās Pyroclasm Pyroclasm Mark would allow you to dual wield Stormsurge Pistols for insane Wind Devil numbers
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