Foreword:
This is my third build here, and my first two for some reason don’t appear on GrimTools. The author of the tool that’s supposed to upload them hasn’t responded yet, but from other comments I saw the issue might be that they were too short. So with this build I will try go a bit more into detail which hopefully fixes the issue.
Build concept:
This is actually a new iteration of one of my old builds. Since I started the game I loved Primal Strike and Korvan Wyrm was a weapon that really caught my attention. First iteration of the build focused more on physical and trauma damage, without bleed support. It was good enough, clearing SR 34 and Celestials. I still wasn’t satisfied and I wanted it to be even better, but I had no idea how to improve it so i shelved it for a while. Now that I have more experience I decied to try to rework it a bit and it was a success.
Skills, devotions and gear:
Since this build is using the cooldown Primal Strike, 1 point in Savagery gives me something to spam, while also giving physical resist, and even better Feral Hunger and Upheaval to stack bleed. Threw in points I could affor into Might of the Bear too, OA is badly needed here.
Maxed Presence of Virtue for the big OA boost and another trauma and bleed source, and got Rebuke to softcap mainly for reflect resist. No Ascension since it feels pretty irrelevant if not fully invested, and even then I really don’t like it.
There could be some rebalancing done here, mainly around Mogdrogen’s Pact line, PoV line, Resilience and Swarm, but this setup feels good so far so I left it like that.
I decided to ditch flat RR from devotions and use Judicator’s Seals so I can fit all the devotions I want, and they give really good stats by themselves and damage reduction too. This allowed me to fit in a bunch of amazing devotions - both physical and bleed RR, Hydra and Kraken, Ulzaad and Dryad (which is amazing for sustain here, since leech can only do so much with 1 pointer Savagery). Oleron is the main damage devotion, it works insanely well with Guardians.
Shattered Realm set felt like the best option here. I first tried using 3 piece Avenger set, this however feels better. Avenger belt is still here, it’s like tailor made for this build.
I decided to use Massacre, Deathstalker could possibly be better due to added RR, however I was too lazy to try it out.
Mark of the Farseer is a really interesting item I used here for added bleed on PS, but I would really like to somehow make a build around it - a lightning/bleed Vindicator, but I don’t think it’s really possible.
Shattered Realm:
Feels really good in shards, good damage, really tanky, great sustain. Only way to die in shards is if you get caught off guard by some random bs, like those shooting crystals that do insane damage. However with 24k hp, 18% absorption and great sustain and mobility it’s a pretty big chance you survive almost everything.
Boss rooms are good, a bit slower but good enough for me. For the first time playing I didn’t notice a build having huge trouble with a particular boss. Usually for every build of mine there are some bosses that give it a lot of trouble, but this one is pretty consistent against everyone. I haven’t fought all bosses so who knows that might change.
I managed actually to get all the way up to 41 boss room, where I ran into Alkamir who I couldn’t beat. Still, I’m super happy with that since it’s my personal record.
SR 40 clear
Celestials:
Ravager was pretty easy here, kind of slow but under no threat of dying.
Callagadra was really annoying since it can apply impaired aim, which make Primal Strike miss annoyingly. It wasn’t a big problem though, just needed a lot of kiting.
Crate was actually the easiest and fastest, one round of kitng around the interior of prison and he was dead.
Some thoughts on Primal Strike:
Now that the great build performance is out of the way, I want to talk a bit about PS. Reading around on older threads and builds, people don’t seem to rate Primal Strike in endgame highly. I don’t know if that’s the case still as of today, buuut I have to say I kinda agree. Which probably sounds weird after discussing a build with all the achievements I previously listed.
I do feel like it’s a bit underwhelming. The damage is not the greatest, especially when I tried focusing more on raising physical damage in my first build iteration, without trauma and bleed. The AOE can at times be pathetic, like when enemies are in a line it only hits a first few. The AOE works best when you’re in the middle of enemy pack, which kinda defeats the advantage of a ranged build. If you get hit with impaired aim it’s going to miss, and I’m not sure but I think i can also get deflected too. Infuriatingly, at least for me, it can target the ground, and if your mouse slips from an enemy a bit boom it’s a miss again. It still looks and sounds beautiful though, now in yellow color.
Conclusion:
There it is, overall a great build I feel like and it felt really good updating one of my first build ideas. I hope the Grimtools uploading tool will notice me with a longer post now, it feels bad seeing every build posted there except mine. Sadly I can’t record videos since I have a weak laptop, hopefully it’s not due to that, and I’m sorry I can’t provide gameplay for a better picture of the build, it is what it is.
Edit:
Slight updates, 1 pointed the Wind Devils line and bound Blind Fury to them, and switched Guardians to Rend which resulted in a big damage increase, and I managed to clear shard 41. Kudos to Gnomish_Inquisition and AngmarDT for the idea.
- everytime i mess with bleed PS or DoT PS i just default 1pt torrent because of it
Still sad I had to ditch it to make my Korvan Wyrm build work (it’s a spam version)