[1.3.1.1] Cold DW Tactician Zohlan 100% SR34

Grim Dawn Classes, Skills and Builds
, , , ,
1

Introduction
This build started from a simple idea: I wanted to play the Arctis. Stacking two copies doubles the cold conversion, the Zolhan’s Technique bonuses and the Deadly Aim regeneration, so I built a Tactician around it.

In my opinion, this is not a top-tier build. The elemental Tactician seems stronger to me (here from @banana_peel), and this one is more of a fun, slightly meme build. It works and it’s comfortable to play. As far as I know there’s no other cold DW Tactician on the forum, so I thought it was worth sharing, and sharing builds like this is a good way to start some theorycrafting.

Build
GrimTools (1.3.1, current version based on @AetherPistachio’s setup): Cold DW Tactician
Run: SR34 clean run

Concept

  • Two Arctis convert all physical damage to cold (global conversion + Field Command modifier)
  • Cadence is the main attack + 100% Zolhan’s Technique
  • Rune of Hagarrad is mainly taken for Biting Cold (reduced enemy Defensive Ability)

Patch 1.3.1
1.3.1 reduced the Zolhan’s Technique activation chance on the Arctis and the Ironeye helm. To get back to 100%, the Ascendant affixes with +5% Zolhan’s Technique chance are now mandatory.

Gameplay
The build is simple to play: spam Cadence, and place Rune of Hagarrad and Inquisitor Seal. The Seal is what lets you tank, so keep it up at all times; without it, you can easily get caught off guard.

Thanks
Thanks a lot to @Noksion, @TheNex, @AetherPistachio and @Naphal for the feedback. The build has improved a lot thanks to your suggestions.

Old version – not optimized, the relic overcapped the WPS chance.
Cold DW Tactician (old)

Any feedback is welcome.

2 Likes
2

Maxing fighting form is somewhat useless because outside of extra targets it boosts flat bleed and %phys / %peirce, which are borderline useless.
Could at least get 4 points out of it (to still have 5 extra targets) and spend elsewhere (I would put them into Field Command / Squad Tactics). Could also tune FF to 2 points invested which would still keep you at 4 extra targets.

3

Thanks for your feeback
I hesitated to drop it because I wanted the maximum number of extra targets, but you’re right: the rest of Fighting Form’s stats do nothing on a cold build. 2-4 points is enough to keep most of the targets.

Updated build with Field Command maxed

What do you think about putting the extra points into Inquisitor Seal instead?

4

Go further, you could still get two points back (down to 2 invested) while still keeping 4 targets.
As for where exactly to put the points - that’s the choice preference I guess.
Seal is good.
But Word of Renewal, Military Conditioning are too.
Veterancy, Decorated Soldier and Scars of Battle have their advantages too.

Also, I would probably put 1 point into Menhir’s Will. 33% isn’t particularly great threshold for a breaker, but it might save your life once in a while. Especially with seal.

On a side note, what I mostly see with soldier or inquisitor is that people usually don’t full pump Fighting Spirit and Deadly Aim. Wouldn’t hurt to experiment with taking half the points out of them and putting them elsewhere (above mentioned). Might turn out well.

1 Like
5

What’s the point of using Oleron’s Blood on a (supposed) 100% Zolhan’s build? That just muddles the weapon pool

6

My bad, I didn’t think it through. I saw the OA on it but didn’t pay attention to the procs. What would you put there instead?

7

I’ll definitely go for Scars of Battle at 8 points and probably put the rest into Inquisitor Seal. Maxing it should work well, it’s very useful for face tanking.

Good call, it could really help against nemesis from time to time.

That’s definitely something I’ll test, it could really help make the build smoother and faster.

Thanks a lot for the feedback. I’ll update the Grimtools properly, do a few runs and post one if it’s worth it.

1 Like
8

GT updated. Tests show the build is stronger and holds up better overall.

9

You’re overcapped in wps mate. That’s 99% on Zolhan, plus 25% on Mutilate in the Relic.

How about if you switch things to this setup

Edit, I would personally reduce the number of points in scars of battle to just 3 and try to reroll the green ring to a stoneface prefix for the stun res and dump whatever left points into Menhir and Squad Tactics.

2 Likes
10

I completely missed the WPS on that relic…:roll_eyes:

You’re right, your setup seems better that way then.

11

Idea:
With such a strong WPS which triggers nearly all the time( id even use fatebreakers chains as gloves here, arctis gives so much physical conversion that its phys->aether becomes irrelevant) - what about gimping cadence and go for heathens decree? Or use cadence like you would bone harvest / amarastas in a lot of builds just for the deadly momentum procc.

The gloves would also make the need for your relic obsolete and allow for e.g ignaffars combustion. You could convert the gained aether flat damage via several options here - a few would actually benefit the overall build.

This would also open up a ton of skillpoints which you could spend on things like deadly aim/word of renewal / 12/12 fighting spirit / blindside for the DA shred.

Just an idea where i feel like the gains would be worth it :slight_smile:

12

Heathens decree isn’t that good unless you’re doing pure aether dmg and have no other way to proc wps. This build also boosts Deadly Momentum with flat cold dmg as well as Physical to Cold Conversion, not to even mention the extra attack speed that can surpass the 200% threshold, so it would be a huge nerf not using Cadence/Deadly Momentum.

13

Yeah thats why i added literally 1 sentence after this:

14

Yeah, who doesn’t like clunky builds that require half baked skills just to fit in another unoptimized item. /s

Next up someone will recommend doing wep swaping.

15

Entirely unnecessary.

1 Like
16

First post updated with the current GrimTools and a new SR34 run. Thanks again everyone!

1 Like
17

Thanks for pointing that out, although i felt compelled not to reply to the original post. I mean, my “idea” was just that - an idea which can either be trash or be something worth pursueing. The results would speak for themselves one way or the other - success will always be built from failure as a starting point.

But i decided to do some simple math which, worth pointing out before, doesnt represent the reality completely - different DOTs will still play a role although this particular build doesnt really builds upon their strength.

Lets assume were working with cadence in the previous setup - were going to neglect added bonuses to skills for the moment.

So in a 3 hit sequence we have a 478% WD damage Cadence hit followed by 2 260% WD zolhans hits which in total equals 998% WD.

Now we do the same for Heathens Decree.

Now we got a 1.36*260 % WD procc 3 times in a row = 1060 % WD.

If we now keep in mind that Cadence has 0 flat bonuses here (besides its inherent 249 ) but zolhans has A) the inherent bonuses from the skill - which only apply to the DOT-component though and B) the flat damage added from the weapons themselves which totals 480 and C) the chance to refresh deadly aim duration, we can argue that the latter setup would be way superior everything else being equal.

What would not be equal?

  1. The loss of the amulet slot means -10% attack speed and -10% max attack speed. That means a theoretical 5% dps loss ( if we dont account for the DOT portion, so reality is less than < 5%)

  2. We have 1 DoT procc less as only zolhans is activated

The flat cold damage previously given by the amulet would be more than compensated by the aether flat on heathens decree if we convert it later, which we will do anyways because of the gloves - so in turn we get actually more flat damage than we had before.

How would we convert it in the most efficient manner possible ?

Id suggest rimespark cord for the belt which gives 60% and + 2 censure - although we lose + 1inq ( heathens decree compensates for that though), and then preferably either a frostplume mantle or a magi ring ( second ring would become obsolete in a non cadence setup anyways). Then adjust the rest accordingly.

And then we have all those skillpoints which we spent on cadence before and are now free to spend where we like - especially the blindside DA shred would be extremely valuable and its DPS impact immeasurable. Im still getting the impression that this setup would be way superior - at least with cadence as a temp-buff activator :slight_smile:

And slight addition: We still have no Viper or Ultos in the devotion setup - which could be neglected in -rr heavy classes especially for less resisted damage types , but is imho kinda mandatory for a tactician which needs every ounce of RR they can get.

2 Likes
18

Hello. Beginner here, trying to find a build to follow. I was going through your build, i looked both masteries but i don’t understand how can you dual wield weapons. Can you explain it to me please? Thank you

19

There are items that enable dual wielding. For levelling, most convenient are the relics, but the endgame build can’t use those because they come with a WPS, so they ended up using gloves to fix this. Not sure how you would go about levelling this specific build though, the conversion items are endgame only

20

The gloves, they allow you to dual wield. You can find other items in the game that also grant that ability.