Pohx's Dual Shock Wave Totems Build [ Budget ] [ HC ]

"

woodyfly wrote:

"

Hydrokugal wrote:

Hello Pohx,

im lvl 85 SWT with a 6L Carcass Jack and i have serious Problems with incoming damage. I Know the build is squishy. but i drop like half or even more HP when hit once. my damage is high enough to clear maps 71-76 with ease. I got 4k HP and max resis. Any suggestions? what do you do about that. As you mentioned i try to get Arctic armor running and see how that will help. Any other ideas besides not getting hit? :)

Thanks

I use artic armor (it will help ALOT but you'll still get chunked) but the most important thing is having a good immortal call CWDT setup. I highly recommend using enduring cry separately from cwdt. I always keep 3 charges up and it gives me 4s immortal call when it triggers. I can use enduring cry again when my IC is counting down and chain it manytimes. Keeping enduring cry separately allows me to time my charges as best as possible. I can practically keep IC ready at all times.

The real danger is magic damage, shock stacks and such. You can use saffels but I m man up for dual wands, I've never had a problem with magic damage.

What I have found works wonders for me is similar, use your own enduring cry, but in your CWDT setup, put in a frost wall. We do no direct damage, our totems don't care about the wall, and it actively separates us from whatever was attacking us, as well as any non-pierce ranged that is on the other side of that wall. It's an amazing defensive tool. It honestly gives you "immunity" for longer than Immortal call as the badguy must navigate or kill the wall, and it stops all kinds of damage, not just physical.

On the other hand of that, it CAN trap you with malicious sparks if you are next to a wall behind you, so that is the one downside to the frost wall. I'm surprised more people don't use it though, when you are toteming, it's the best defensive skill there is in my opinion, and it always places the wall directly between yourself and the badguy adding that time to run away and let your totems continue to be the wreckingballs they are.

still loving this build..... up to level 77 now.... no problems with maps so far (except dungeon boss, leaving that one for another day)

All on self found gear !! So great for beginners as well. With time I will have enough currency to bus some of the gear you use.. :-)

"

Pohx wrote:

Pohx's Build

Thank you for taking the time to share this build.

I have a couple of questions.

I was fortunate to get my hands on a Tabula Rasa at about level 30 and have been rocking it ever since. I'm currently at 61, about to hit 62. Unfortunately the Carcass Jack I acquired is not a 6-link and I currently lack the funds to make it so. While I intend to just test it out, I'm curious as to what others think about what would be best to use. A 4-link Carcass Jack or a Tabula Rasa?

I was also lucky to get a Geofri's Crest drop right before I decided to buy the Carcass Jack. I am a bit confused on it's use though. Is it a helpful leveling item or is it meant to be a endgame helm in this build? I mean, I understand that the quad-resist is nice, though they seem sort of low and the +1 to gems is obviously good, but what gems are best to put in it? Do I throw in the shockwave totem and it's supports til I find something better or make the Carcass Jack into a 6-link, or is it meant to hold the auras? Or something else?

I also picked up a corrupted The Magnate. Instead of the increase to stun duration it comes with a 6% increase of radius to area skills and no level requirement. (No question, I just thought that was cool.)

I have a level 70 shadow with a full respec (84 points) and am considering the "new player option" of this build. Since the build listed shows 113 points used, I am wondering what do I save for last? The witch area? The trek down to get MOM and IR?

Thanks from a relative noob.

You the man pohx, gonna give this build a try later on this week! keep it up

This was a lot of fun while it lasted on the Scion. I got literally 1 hit from full to zero against the Dungeon boss, and I had 3,500+ HP. What really sucks is I actually found a Carcass Jack the other day, but couldn't get the sockets/colours I needed, so it's still banked. Considering trying this again on Shadow...

Does anyone have ideas for making this build less squishy, or does the Shadow version mostly fix that? I wasn't even close to the boss; I got hit by the very end of his ground slam, which has a stupidly huge cone post-1.2.

[Edit] Should clarify that it wasn't desync.

"

GaryOakRobotron wrote:

This was a lot of fun while it lasted on the Scion. I got literally 1 hit from full to zero against the Dungeon boss, and I had 3,500+ HP. What really sucks is I actually found a Carcass Jack the other day, but couldn't get the sockets/colours I needed, so it's still banked. Considering trying this again on Shadow...

Does anyone have ideas for making this build less squishy, or does the Shadow version mostly fix that? I wasn't even close to the boss; I got hit by the very end of his ground slam, which has a stupidly huge cone post-1.2.

[Edit] Should clarify that it wasn't desync.

I play on Rampage, but he's 1 shot me at 4k health as well, when I was no where near him. And I was wearing a Carcass Jack. Maybe if you go IR with all EV/ES gear on, you will stand a chance against the big single hits, but basically, with this character having basically nothing invested in defensive nodes and requiring ES to run your SWT without giving you the benefit of a larger health pool, 1 shots are always going to be a threat.

You can take the "tanky" version that Pohx put at the top, but even with that, the 1 shots will still be possible. Especially in maps where damage is increased by the mods of the map.

I really hope the amount of possible 1 shots is drastically reduced by going with the Shadow IR/MoM build; playing a spec that can die that easily just isn't viable in HC, as some hits just aren't feasibly avoidable. Like, how are you supposed to hit deep endgame with a build that can just get 1 shot like that?

"

GaryOakRobotron wrote:

I really hope the amount of possible 1 shots is drastically reduced by going with the Shadow IR/MoM build; playing a spec that can die that easily just isn't viable in HC, as some hits just aren't feasibly avoidable. Like, how are you supposed to hit deep endgame with a build that can just get 1 shot like that?

With kind of crappyish gear, I only have like 15% reduction and maybe 10 - 15% evasion. I'm sure the answer to that question is to actually get better gear than I am working with. I just haven't had that luxury as this is my first character and I'm currency poor.

Until then, actively avoid areas where you know the massive hitters are.

That's my best advice.

Does anyone know if adding quality to Added Fire or Herald of Ash will increase totem DPS?