[1.3.x] Kungfooe's [Bloodlines] IronWill Glacial Cascade -- 7.7k Life + 10%+ Regen

Glacial Cascade is a hybrid spell--part cold and part physical. Because of this, elemental/cold nodes on the tree only scale the cold portion spell, and physical nodes on the tree only scale the physical portion of the spell. The only types of nodes that scale both portions are spell damage. However, there are few of these nodes on the tree.

Iron Will takes the % increased melee physical damage and applies it as % increased spell damage to spells. Thus, for every 5 str, we get 1% spell damage. Additionally, it is very possible to stack 1000+ strength from the tree and gear (200% spell damage, not to mention +500 life bonus). Because there are few spell damage nodes on the tree and the ability to get a lot of strength, Iron Will makes a nice choice for scaling both the cold and physical portions of the Glacial Cascade spell.

I have been asked "why no Righteous Fire?" in-game as well as here on the forums, so I decided to test it out and see how it did. The essential issue with running Righteous Fire is although it translates to higher tooltip DPS (I had about 9k tooltip with a level 18 Glacial Cascade in a 4L (FC - Echo - IW), it doesn't translate to clearing the map quicker, and the character seemed substantially less tanky. That is, the higher tooltip DPS does not translate to faster clear speeds, and made taking damage much much scarier. What I saw happening is white mobs would die almost instantly, but the blue and rare mobs would still take a little time to kill. So I would still get thumped by blues and rares but didn't have the regeneration to pull my life back up so quickly like I did when not running Righteous Fire.

I think the most important component of these observations is that it made the character go from feeling super tanky to feeling like a paper doll. All of the regeneration that was operating as a defensive mechanic was being used just to keep my life from degenerating when running Righteous Fire. That meant when I got hit, I didn't have my life begin to pop back up immediately with the high regen--my life would just basically sit around where I was knocked down to because all of my regeneration was fighting the burn from Righteous Fire.

It is worth noting that I think a build variant of Righteous Fire could work, but with my current gear and tree I did not find Righteous Fire beneficial for this build.

Main Damage Skill
Glacial Cascade - Spell Echo - Faster Casting - Iron Will - Increased AoE/Concentrated Effect - Concentrated Effect/Increased AoE

The essential 4L is GC - Echo - FC - IronWill. For the 5-th link, I have ran Increasted AoE for clearing regular mobs and swapped to Conc Effect for bosses, but didn't want to deal with switching gems and opted to just run the 4L. I do not think a 5L is necessary for this build, and is just a preference. However, a 6L will boost your damage and clear speed by quite a bit, since you won't have to sacrifice damage for AoE, or AoE for damage.

I've tested the added damage gems as a 5-th link (e.g., quality added lightning, added chaos) but they don't translate as more effective clear speed, despite the tooltip damage boost.

Auras

Herald of Thunder - Herald of Ice - Clarity - Reduced Mana

We cast spells. We want auras that effect spells.

Mobility

Lightning Warp - Reduced Duration - Faster Casting

Our mobility skill. Get it. Use it. Love it.

Cast when Damage Taken Set Up
Cast when Damage Taken - Enduring Cry - Enfeeble - Frost Wall

There are some players who may prefer a different set up, but these are the links I have found most helpful. What I want to stress is that we don't want to blow our endurance charges on an immortal call following Enduring Cry because they a) reduce the physical damage from future physical hits, b) help increase our life regen, and c) they help keep your resists overcapped in the case you get cursed and are face-tanking.

I use Enfeeble to help reduce crits from enemies because I don't have the Unyielding notable in the tree, and crits can really hurt. Additionally, the reduced accuracy it provides helps make the ~1k evasion I have more effective.

I think Frost Wall is the hidden gem (no pun intended) many players do not know about. Not only does it help put a barrier between you an other enemies to help keep you from taking burst damage (e.g., it stops a wave of charging rhoas so you're only hit by the first), but it helps keep the enemies at an ideal distance from you. When you're attacking enemies you want them a short distance away from you so the multiple AoEs from Glacial Cascade can hit them. Essentially, Frost Wall helps you achieve more effective DPS while keeping you safer.


Notes

This is not all of the gem slots in our gear, but I am currently unsure what the most efficient other choices are. I'd be interesting in hearing suggestions and thoughts about how to best use the other slots. I'm currently running a rarity, culling strike spell for some solo MFing (since I tend to run maps solo). What do you think might be best?

Doon Cuebiyari - The ideal main hand weapon. In addition to the % increased spell damage from the IronWill skill gem, this weapon also scales your damage by 1% for every 8 strength. At 1000 strength this gives us an additional 125% increased damage on top of the 200% increased spell damage from the IronWill skill gem. The % increased damage on Doon applies to both the physical and cold portions of the Glacial Cascade skill, scaling both up.

Alberon's Warpath - the % increased strength is quite powerful once a large amount of strength has been stacked from gear and passives. Once you have begun stacking strength on your gear, this item can end up being as good as a 125+ strength roll on a single piece of gear, a roll not even possible. Long story short, get these boots.

Astramentis - this is a really great amulet for this build. Not only does it give a lot of strength, but the all stats make it so you don't have to worry about grabbing extra dex or int nodes on the tree. Additionally, the 100+ strength is worth 50+ life, so it would be difficult, to find a rare amulet that will give you the same bonuses.



% Increased Life on Items - The 500+ life from having high strength scales very well with % increased life, either in nodes from the skill tree or on gear (e.g., Belly of the Beast, Rathpith). Thus, scaling our life as high as possible means that items with % increased life are very desirable.

Although I would recommend leveling as a melee build (e.g., Ground Slam, Molten Strike), I have talked to several players who have leveled as spell casters. If you chose to do so, and using Glacial Cascade, here is some gear that you may find useful.

Stone of Lahazwar

This item gives much needed int, but also has cast speed and mana. Definitely nice for leveling.

Lifesprig

I usually dual-wield these when rush-leveling. The life and mana regen on them is solid enough to keep your spell up and running without really needing any mana pots. Additionally, the spell damage and cast speed between them is really solid to rushing to level 24 where you switch to...

Reverberation Rod

Another solid leveling wand. Not only do you get +1 to your gems, you also get an echo at level 24. I usually switch to a spell damage shield such as or something with as much spell damage as possible, since you'll be getting solid cast speed with the Echo in the wand.


Of course, there are lots of other "standard" leveling gear pieces (e.g., Goldrim, Wanderlust), but these pieces have seemed to help the players I've talked to level as Glacial Cascade, or a spell of their choice, until they were ready to switch to Glacial Cascade.

Full Passive Tree (6L): Coming soon...

Normal - Oak (+40 health)
Cruel - Alira (4% cast speed) or skill point
Merciless - Oak (endurance charge)

I helped Oak in normal because this is a health build and we want as much health as possible. In cruel, I helped Alira for the cast speed because cast speed is lacking in the passive tree. However, killing all of the bandits and taking the skill point is also a good option. In merciless I helped Oak because I want to be able to have 6 endurance charges, which also helps with the build's focus on regeneration (through the endurance charge passive), as well as for damage mitigation.

Life Pool: Your number one source of damage mitigation is having a very high health pool. Because of so much health, it makes it difficult (but not impossible) to be one shot, and any stuns are for a short period of time. Couple this with 10%+ life regeneration and it's a very strong defense mechanic for this build.

Reflect: One, because Glacial Cascade is a hybrid skill, it makes it easier to deal with reflect, as only the physical or the cold portion is reflected when you hit a reflect mob. Between armor and endurance charges, the physical reflect is negligible, even in double (and probably triple) physical reflect maps. Elemental reflect is almost negligible, but not quite. If you cast into a large pack, you'll see your health dip slightly, and if you keep casting you can wear it down over time. If you crit, even into a big pack, you may chunk yourself for ~2.5k health or so, but you shouldn't run the risk of one-shotting yourself by a large margin. Although I don't worry about physical reflect on map mods, I do not run elemental reflect, and anticipate that a double elemental reflect crit would chunk your health substantially. However, I do not think it would kill you but have not tested this (and don't plan to given I'm in Bloodlines).

First, I want to be clear about how I am using the word "viable" here, as it seems to take on different meanings depending upon the reader. Viable, as it is used in this section, refers to being able to sucessfully work. For example, a map-viable build means that it can successfully complete maps. It makes no claims about the amount of time taken to clear the map, or how rippy the build is.

That being said, I would describe this build as Abbaxoth-viable, and "almost" Atziri-viable.

I have killed Abbaxoth on two separate occasions with this build (one in a 69 map the other in a 73). Granted, they were not the fastest kills compared to other builds that exist, and there were occasions when my health would dip down to ~20%, but on both occassions my character came out on top. Unfortunately, I do not have video of either case, as I wasn't streaming and was just doing some testing when they did occur, and didn't think to turn on the stream/record the fight.

With regards to Atziri, this build can progress all the way to the Atziri fight itself, but it does not do enough "burst" DPS to kill the adds during her heal phases, at least with a level 18 GC on the 4L outlined above (perhaps a level 20 or 21 gem would work, or a 6L?). Thus, every time I would get her health down, she would heal back all of the damage I had done. Thus, I was not able to kill her with this skill. I ended up swapping into a 5L with a level 17 Incinerate to kill her, as well as keep the adds from healing her.

Disclaimer: I had never done Atziri prior to this attempt, and I was able to progress all the way to the Atziri fight itself (i.e., got through double Vaal, trio bosses, blue mobs in between) without too much difficulty. The only scary portion was the trio, because I didn't know who to kill first, second, and third (killed the cyclone boss last, the 10%+ regen in this build carried me HARD).