Local retired Commando watching all the cool kids get more resist reduction
Poor guy, I feel your pain. But don’t cash all those pension checks just yet!
I’ve said before that Retaliation was my least played character type in the game. I just never got into it, even during the heyday when it had to be nerfed over and over. So while enduring the long wait for the new patch, I spent some time attempting to make a good Shattering Blast Commando. I had a ton of copies of unused retal gear so why not. Initially I was focused more on Lightning but the Kraken buff to retal prompted another look at fire so I converted another character to accomodate both elements.
Meet: Biggs and Wedge, two cranky old vets who bicker over who’s got the best grenado swag. (also they may or may not have inadvertently wandered into Cairn from another familiar reality?)
Biggs
Skyfire Lightning Grenado + Full Dawnbreaker Set
Biggs utilizes the awesome power of the Dawnbreaker set combined with the Mask of Infernal Truth for a powerful offensive retal combo of Grenado, Canister Bomb and Flame Breath. On the defensive side, Biggs has a static health regen of 2,800+ which can spike to 5k with Giant’s Blood and Dryad procs. Other circuit breakers include Menhir’s Will and the Serenity relic proc.
*I crafted the helm for slow resist. Serenity relic optimal bonus is stun resist.
Videos
Wedge
2-Hand Fire Grenado with the Infernal Brimstone
Like the Lightning version, Wedge also uses the Infernal Mask and the same attack rotation to subdue enemies. The usage of a Vilgazor Amulet also gives Wedge a slightly shorter Grenado cooldown. Also like his comrade, Wedge has the same high health regen and defensive procs to keep him healed up, although he needs to be careful with positioning as he naturally has less overall defenses from being a two-hander.
*I shared the helm with the other build so it’s the same slow resist craft. For the relic, aim for stun or needed resist.
Videos
vs Ravager
*swapped frozen heart to soul shard on ring
Build Mechanics & Gear
Resist Reduction
- On both builds, I’ve taken the Viper devotion and also use Hexxer’s Kiss augments. Normally on non-weapon damage builds this would be useless but we can activate both by using basic attacks. In order to do this, put grenado on left click and when it’s on cooldown, the character will default to the basic attack which applies a standard 100% WD. Also, Flame Breath has weapon damage (at 50% value). This isn’t a perfect solution of course but as I joke about in the opening, Commandos have to get creative to try and compete with the big RR folks.
Why the full Dawnbreaker Set?
- On the Lightning build, I tried a couple different variations:
-Scion of Burning Vengeance gun with 3 piece Dawnbreaker
-Vilgazor amulet with 3 piece Dawnbreaker
The Scion gun is a bit of a trap, unfortunately. The tooltip looks impressive but in practice it plays slower. Plus you can’t use Blitz with a gun. The full Dawnbreaker just kicks ass, plain and simple.
On the Fire side, every 1H + Shield combo I tried couldn’t compare to the Brimstone’s huge bonuses to retaliation.
Why the Serenity Relic?
- Neither build has +Soldier skills and they really need that boost. Like most bomber builds with Ulzuin’s Chosen, skill points are stretched thin.
Which prefixes/suffixes are best on the jewelry?
- You want to primarily look for OA and cover the lowest resists. Kymon’s Badge, Gollus Rings and Vilgazor’s all fortunately have a pretty good bias towards the “Aggressive” prefix. Gollus rings also have a good chance of rolling “Consecrated” prefix which will help with slow resistance (and undead damage boost).
Leveling & Budget End Game Setup
As mentioned, I got tired of swapping between fire & lightning specs so I leveled a second Commando (Wedge). Instead of doing another cookie cutter Forcewave-and-forget to 100, I decided to level as retaliation focused. Outside of Warlord (and maybe Sentinel), this is usually considered pointless because there is simply no retal leveling gear to fully support it. With a Commando, this is partially true. The class has no spammable RATA skill so it ended up being a hybrid of sorts until around level 60-ish where I then fully invested into grenado as a primary attack.
Although I already had all of the final gear ready to go, I spent some time and put together a respectable level 100 budget setup which can clear everything in the campaign and mid-tier SR so you can farm the gear for the final specs.
Here are some Grimtools snapshots at various points throughout and I’ll explain a little about the choices I went with. I’m not presenting this as a beginner’s guide though, because I don’t think there’s an absolute “right way” to go about this. A lot of it just boiled down to letting things hit you to trigger Vindictive Flame while mixing in various attacks.
Level 20 snapshot :Defeated Warden Krieg
Level 35 snapshot :Defeated Abomination
Level 48 snapshot :Defeated Loghorrean
Level 62 snapshot :Started Ultimate difficulty (skipped Elite completely)
Level 75 snapshot :Cruising through Ultimate, working on various Faction reputation
At start I rushed to Vindictive Flame, equipped Fireblast skill from Searing Ember component and put a couple points in Grenado. This was enough to clear A1 and well into A2 until I could pick up a Martin’s Crest medal. The added fire damage modifier for thermite mines is pretty strong for early game.
After level 35, I went into Port Valbury far enough to pick up the Conflagration relic blueprint from the vendor. In retrospect, I don’t think it was really necessary. The +1 Demo skills was nice but the skill itself eats the energy bar up unless you focus on regen to compensate. I think if I was going to level this character over again, I would just prioritize maxing thermite mines and let that carry me until near the end of Malmouth and then switch the focus to Grenado: Shattering Blast once I had enough % Retaliation damage. Note: you do need the Conflagration relic to eventually craft an Ulzuin Pyroclasm but it can be acquired later.
Once you get far enough in Malmouth to unlock the Resistance vendor, you can then purchase an Ascendant Conduit and Colossal Fortress. These two items will supercharge your Vindictive Flame and I think this is a good time to then switch your medal to a Kymon’s Badge and focus on Grenado and Ulzuin’s Chosen (around level 60-ish). Other than that, just refer to the snapshots to see what gear to shoot for. Fleshwarped Platemail and Gollus Rings are easy to get and should be core pieces. Later on add Ugdenbog Girdle, Vilgazor’s Amulet, and Dreeg-Sect pants.
In the final budget spec, I think the Fettan Mask is the best choice until you get the blueprint for the Infernal Mask. For the weapon I went with Hexflame as I think the RR to thermite mines performs better than a Conduit. Craft it with Ignus the Conclave smith for a chance at retaliation bonus. Fewmet Grips are easy to get, just put in the legwork to unlock Bonebleach Basin.
Budget Build Performance
Final Thoughts
The burning question… which one is better? It’s closer than you think but Lightning edges it out. Biggs has consistently better SR clear times and can take more punishment in general. Against celestials they were about the same. Both builds struggled some against Ravager mainly due to energy sustain. I’m not a big crucible fan but either one will do fine in that mode.
So I guess it comes down to which one you want to play, or both!