Dragon's Immortal Tank (Updated for 1.2)

"

Halezor wrote:

Hey Dragon! I made a new 1H build I want to try in light of the changes to melee...I am planning on running it in HC. I was inspired to give 1H Melee a go b/c of your guide and was playing a 1H Infernal Blow from your guide prior to dying: I lost my HC Marauder due to bad play/lack of awareness (There's a boss in City of Sarn??? A hard hitting boss that spams EK and throws bear traps!?!?!?!?!? NOOOOOOOOO!!!!! LOL)

And yet another unsuspecting victim of the uncanny Perpetus. Sir, we welcome you into our grim ranks. :)

I'm sorry if this has been asked before, but i didn't have the courage to go through the 25 pages of the thread.

Have you considered trying an alternate version with glacial hammer and the 30% cold dmg node in the duelist starting area (which would require sacrificing a couple points) ?

It feels like Infernal blow is the better choice when it comes to solo and clearing speed, but for group play, using Glacial Hammer could bring some CC (especially if you manage to get enough accuracy to drop Resolute Technique and bring back some crits).

Also, is there any other skill that could work with this build ?

Hello Dragon,

I started using a build (below) very similar to yours in terms of the concept, with some MAJOR differences however:
- no unwavering stance,
- no iron reflexes (more +armor nodes / endurance charges)
- no auras (blood magic passive and more +phys melee nodes)

Here's my rather ambitious 109pt build for your reference:


Everything was going fine, I'm level 61 now in onslaught but then I started having doubts (which lead to the discovery of your thread! ^^)...
1) People explained to me that evasion results in a lot more armor than pure armor with iron reflexes
2) I'm concerned that my dps will not be relevant as I see that nearly ALL 1-hand block builds utilize a large number of auras for their damage

Are my fears justified?

Also I saw that someone was asking you about what you would do if you couldn't run as many auras, to which you responded:

"

Yes, I do believe this build is perfectly endgame viable with only 4 auras. Ofc, the auras I would be dropping would be a pretty steep loss in dps. I am not sure why this question interests you though. Even if the covenant trick gets fixed there are still BM gems and I can not see myself sacrificing 4 auras for any reason.

But if the covenant trick gets fixed, surely you won't be able to run 8 whole auras??? Am I missing something here? I ask because this is my first character in onslought and obviously don't have a covenant yet :D

Seems to me like the max I would be able to run with just a bloodmagic gem would be:
- vitality purity hatred from mana
- anger wrath grace on bloodmagic
even then, it seems like the blood magic auras would eat up a lot of health!

Is this correct? Would switching to your build be a good idea given the fact that I don't have access to awesome gear like your op shield and covenant?

Thank you so much for your help and guide--very inspiring stuff here keep up the good work!

PS: sorry for wall of text :s

PPS: you didn't get the increased area damage / radius node in templar tree??? why not!?

Hi Dragon,

Nice Build, I noticed it's quite similar to what I was planning.

However, I have a question not ultimately related to your build, but more in general:

How do you get that much total health?


When I calculate what your total health would be, I come around at 3888. Your tooltip however says it's 5139. Even if i messed up here and there, it's still a hell of a diffenrence.

From the Wiki i got the Formula for Max Life:

Maximum Life = (44 + (Level * 6) + (Strength / 2) + "to maximum Life") * (100% + "increased maximum Life")

From you screenshots, treelink and items i get:

Maximum Life = (44 + (86 * 6) + (430 / 2) + 604) * (100% + 182%)


Did I misintrepret the formula?

Videos and screenshots are old - before hp nerf.

What can you get for the extra skill point in cruel for bandit quest (killing them all) that it is worth more than taking the phys dmg from Oak?

I mean 18% phys dmg is great for this build isn't it?

"

Jadran wrote:

"

Halezor wrote:

Hey Dragon! I made a new 1H build I want to try in light of the changes to melee...I am planning on running it in HC. I was inspired to give 1H Melee a go b/c of your guide and was playing a 1H Infernal Blow from your guide prior to dying: I lost my HC Marauder due to bad play/lack of awareness (There's a boss in City of Sarn??? A hard hitting boss that spams EK and throws bear traps!?!?!?!?!? NOOOOOOOOO!!!!! LOL)

And yet another unsuspecting victim of the uncanny Perpetus. Sir, we welcome you into our grim ranks. :)

Hahahaha. Glad I'm not the only one. It was only in Cruel too, but dang he hit hard/moved fast. I was mostly defense/life oriented too. Those EK just chewed me up. Hard lesson but one well learned!

"

sondeckis wrote:

Videos and screenshots are old - before hp nerf.

oh wow. So he lost over 1200 life with the patch.

This means 3900 is a pretty "high" number now?


In other words, as a meele with no ES, for what max Life should I aim?




PS: Fuck everything about Perpetus!

Good morning ladies and gents! I see a bunch of questions today O_O so let's get started.

"

Bobbyblind wrote:

Spoiler

I'm sorry if this has been asked before, but i didn't have the courage to go through the 25 pages of the thread.

Have you considered trying an alternate version with glacial hammer and the 30% cold dmg node in the duelist starting area (which would require sacrificing a couple points) ?

It feels like Infernal blow is the better choice when it comes to solo and clearing speed, but for group play, using Glacial Hammer could bring some CC (especially if you manage to get enough accuracy to drop Resolute Technique and bring back some crits).

Also, is there any other skill that could work with this build ?

Hi bobby.
I use glacial hammer in maps with the ele reflect mod. The corpse explode from IB can sometimes cause surprise spike damage to you on magic packs with high hp such as rocks. Up until the recent buff to splash's radius I had not considered using GH full time. Without the aoe increase from both gems, splash used to feel very weak in terms of radius. It was a very noticeable difference when I swapped in my GH gem for ele reflect maps.

That is no longer the case now. With the buff to splash's radius I can absolutely see using it now. I still prefer IB personally, but sometimes you run with a group that dislikes all their precious corpses being blown up ^_^

"

Skol wrote:

Spoiler

Everything was going fine, I'm level 61 now in onslaught but then I started having doubts (which lead to the discovery of your thread! ^^)...
1) People explained to me that evasion results in a lot more armor than pure armor with iron reflexes
2) I'm concerned that my dps will not be relevant as I see that nearly ALL 1-hand block builds utilize a large number of auras for their damage

Are my fears justified?

Also I saw that someone was asking you about what you would do if you couldn't run as many auras, to which you responded:

"

Yes, I do believe this build is perfectly endgame viable with only 4 auras. Ofc, the auras I would be dropping would be a pretty steep loss in dps. I am not sure why this question interests you though. Even if the covenant trick gets fixed there are still BM gems and I can not see myself sacrificing 4 auras for any reason.

But if the covenant trick gets fixed, surely you won't be able to run 8 whole auras??? Am I missing something here? I ask because this is my first character in onslought and obviously don't have a covenant yet :D

Seems to me like the max I would be able to run with just a bloodmagic gem would be:
- vitality purity hatred from mana
- anger wrath grace on bloodmagic
even then, it seems like the blood magic auras would eat up a lot of health!

Is this correct? Would switching to your build be a good idea given the fact that I don't have access to awesome gear like your op shield and covenant?

Thank you so much for your help and guide--very inspiring stuff here keep up the good work!

PS: sorry for wall of text :s

PPS: you didn't get the increased area damage / radius node in templar tree??? why not!?

Hey Skol.
Sadly yes, your fears are justified. It is far better for armor builds to take IR and unwavering with grace aura. For 1h/shield builds, unless you specifically use passives for dps, it is very difficult to do respectable dmg without the 3 dps auras.

If the covenant trick were to get fixed the only aura I would lose is discipline. The loss of this aura would cover some of the increased hp cost of using a blood magic gem on the other auras. Without using the covenant, I can already have 4 auras on my mana. Purity, vitality, hatred, and tempest shield all fit and leave me with 33 mana left. All are linked to level 20 reduced mana ofc.

It is up to you if you want to switch to my build. Pure personal preference :) You can see what the build is capable of via the vids I provide in the guide. As for the templar aoe nodes? I get asked this a lot and I simply don't see the 2 points as justified for a small increase when I can buff the aoe with gcps and 2 points are better spent elsewhere. If you are just starting and do not have gcps to burn, then you can absolutely grab those nodes, but I recommend spec'ing out of them asap.

"

Twalrok wrote:

Spoiler

Hi Dragon,

Nice Build, I noticed it's quite similar to what I was planning.

However, I have a question not ultimately related to your build, but more in general:

How do you get that much total health?


When I calculate what your total health would be, I come around at 3888. Your tooltip however says it's 5139. Even if i messed up here and there, it's still a hell of a diffenrence.

From the Wiki i got the Formula for Max Life:

Maximum Life = (44 + (Level * 6) + (Strength / 2) + "to maximum Life") * (100% + "increased maximum Life")

From you screenshots, treelink and items i get:

Maximum Life = (44 + (86 * 6) + (430 / 2) + 604) * (100% + 182%)


Did I misintrepret the formula?

Hi Twalrok.
Indeed those screenshots were taken before the patch. When I get to a safe spot here in Onslaught, I will log over to my mara and post current stats. Thank you for reminding me that I need to update my stats in the guide.

As for your second question about how much life you should aim for? AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE lol. Seriously, all the people claiming that hp is no longer worth stacking should try going up against some high level map bosses or Temple map Piety. Sure stacking armor helps vs physical, but what about spell damage and status effects? HP is the answer.

"

buks wrote:

Spoiler

What can you get for the extra skill point in cruel for bandit quest (killing them all) that it is worth more than taking the phys dmg from Oak?

I mean 18% phys dmg is great for this build isn't it?

I answered him in game about this but I figure it is good to point out on the thread. I personally would not take the 18% physical buff from helping oak. You can achieve very respectable dps once you get your hands on a 6L and the purpose of the build is to be as tanky and immortal as possible. Never dying is so much better than a small increase to killing speed imo. In addition, there are some pretty nice 24% physical nodes for specific weapons if you really want to inc your dps.


I hope you guys aren't taking my answers to your questions as the absolute LAW. My answers are only based on my experiences in game with the build. PLEASE feel free to make any changes you see fit to the build. Everyone is different :)


-Dragon

Updated Screenshots in the stats spoiler to reflect current build stats post 0.11.0