Hello grimmers!
I tried to search on the forum but I found nothing, so I decided to open this topic.
Basically this helm catched my attention, since I have a Witchblade and I wanted to try something different than the Warborn Cadence build (I already have a character with that), so I was wondering if any of you tried to do something similar.
I was wondering if a melee chaos/phy/build witchblade was something possible to do or it would end up having a hard time against Nemesis, I did some experiments and even if I did well against many types of enemies… Fabius got the best of me because of not enough dmg done and too much damage taken.
Probably 2H handed with Obsidian Juggernaut. Stacking flat physical damage to be converted into Chaos. That’s the only build that comes to mind with that helm.
Yes, a chaos/physical build using Obsidian Juggernaut/M̶a̶l̶e̶f̶i̶c̶u̶s̶Fang of Ch’ton+Devil’s Grin will work and be able to clear all the content (without access to dlc to dlc at least)
Can face tank every nemesis as long as I go into defensive set with dagger+shield. Ideally I’d want a Peerless Eye instead of my current one but RNGeesus hasn’t decided to favor me yet.
Interesting build, I may try it because I was thinking about it too.
What about a sword and board with Fang of Ch’thon and swapping Kraken with Dying God and Arc Blade instead of full Cadence?
You guys think it’s possible to make a good build out of it?
I’m currently preparing a vit/bleed/phys conjurer around wildblood set, and I’m planning to use this helm. If i get the f**king recipe for it.
Seriously, I give up to 10 legendaries/recipes for it.
Fang of Ch’thon + Devil’s grin gets me about 70% of the listed dps I get with the hammer and more survivablity. It could be worthwhile to just ditch the hammer + kraken devotion, and replace Sigil of Consumption and Possesion with the shield skills in soldier mastery… But you’d just end up with a worse physical shield Witchblade with some different flavor in the end.
From experience, Blade Arc is bloody terrible at everything aside from having you wait on the cd of energy potions. Much lower damage than Cadence even with a two-hander and high OA, and the AoE isn’t really needed with all the one I already have from procs.
Ok I tried your build, but can you pls link the grimcalc page without the bonus from items?
I would like to cap Possession too to have more damage, but it’s not much clear what is capped and what is not…
Btw I have completely different stats from you, and that’s weird because I tried it on a test character with the same stuff taken from GD Stash so it should be the same…
@Norzan I noticed, took a lot to kill Fabius while I could have gone full Cadence and probably wreck him faster. It’s sad btw, that helmet seems made for a bleed witchblade
Cadence also deals bleeding damage (Fighting Form deals flat Bleeding damage and Deadly Momentum has multiplicative Bleeding damage), so the Bleeding Damage from the helm is not wasted.
I took the opportunity to revisit the build a bit, and I strongly recommend using a secondary defensive set of weapons for brainless face-tanking of stuff like Fabius: Fang of Ch’thon + a shield. Either Empowered Devil’s Grin, Empowered Oathbreaker’s Guard or Siegebreaker work just fine, no need to invest in the soldier shield skills. Much more effective than switching amulet to Warp Shard, but you can still do that and not even need to use Sigil of Consumption at all.
I agree.
Both Maleficus and FoC are good main hand (the latter is probably better for ias and life leech, Maleficus has interesting debuffs).
Btw I tried it sword’n’board against Fabius and indeed, you can face tank him
I was wondering why you didn’t go for Dying God and his massive Chaos bonus, I thought it was mandatory for any Chaos build but I guess melees need more defensive devotions than offensive?
Another question I have yet to clear: Defensive ability and Offensive ability have a soft cap?
Because I notice there is a huge difference when you have them over 2000, but not all the items have those stats… Did you take them in consideration or it just happened to have them around 2200?
I didn’t go Dying God because I’m completely biased in favor of defense over offense, but seeing how this build can face-tank Fabius so effortlessly, I guess it shouldn’t be a bad idea. Losing Tree would maybe make it hard on the energy management though…
I didn’t make any plans to get those DA/OA values, even if I did choose Field Command and Judicator signets to get them as high as possible without sacrificing much. I just had all that legendary chaos/physical gear in my stash and just threw everything together and tried to adjust resists as well as I could.
You need like 2350 DA so that even Fabius applying his debuff can’t crit you at all, and I see 2400 OA being recommended very often and that leaves you at like 20% crit chance depending on the target. There’s no cap or diminishing returns on those afaik (but I can be wrong). My retaliation warder can get to 80% chance of being hit by Fabius with 2667 DA before the debuff (and kill him without as much as having to touch the keyboard :D)
I find this build quite interesting! I will have a try. Btw, which augments will you be using on weapon, rings and amulet?
And which components would you put in sword and shield?
I use Potent Outcast’s Riftstorm on the Hammer, Outcast’s Riftstorm on the dagger + shield, Survivor’s Perseverence + Overseer’s Gaze + Mogdrogen’s Sanctity on the trinkets. If you have access to The Peerless Eye of Beronath, I would use it instead of what I have and replace Mogdrogen’s Sanctity with a second Overseer’s Gaze or Survivor’s Perseverence.
edit: I use 2* Symbol of Solael on the dagger + shield set
I’m considering either going Abomination or Dying God. Abominable Might looks awesome but it only procs on enemy death, which means not very useful against major bosses.
Hungering Void is also great but with great health regen cost. Guess i’ll have to stack a lot of health regen to keep this from draining my health.
And already seeing energy regen issues, mainly because of Possession. Why is Possession the only exclusive skill that requires energy regen to sustain? I hope they remove this in a future update.
It’s even worse than that, it requires you to kill the enemy with the skill you attach it to, so you can’t use that skill to proc Eldritch Flame or Fiend’s skill. The buff is extremely powerful, but it’s way too annoying to use for my taste.
Definitely go with Dying God if opting for one of the two, the health loss is irrelevant because we have BoD, SoC and defense mode.
I hasn’t been an issue for me even to kill Fabius and I can’t think of any other enemy with dangerous bleeding damage. Bleed is the only resist I accept being low because you can’t be insta-gibbed by it, and this build has tons of sustain to make up for it anyway. Aether isn’t maxed either because even with full augments in the armor and all the trinkets using Overseer’s Gaze or Survivor’s Perseverence (once all the other stuff is covered) only gets me that much.
If you want to patch it up, you can replace upgrades on amulet and medal with Wardstones. That’s what I had before getting the 1.006 shoulders to get my elemental resists. Just make sure you have enough spirit to use Fang of Ch’thon, I cant do so with 90 points into physique if I don’t have a Focusing Prism on the amulet.
