1.3 [Newbie Friendly] GROUNDSLAMMER BUILD

@shrandis:
The General was a tough one for me too, my second death ever was by him in Cruel (first was a one-shot by Vall, i should have done my homework and not try to facetank his "ball-hand strike")...

@Konstanx:
Your observation is correct, since the respec i have done some more work and this is the latest "candidate" not-BM build tree:

But i am still not 100% sure, i am trying to figure out if i can make 2 Auras work:


PS:
I am also looking for a Saturated Hallowed Life Flask, if anyone has one for sale please drop me a PM :)

"

smokingkid wrote:

"

kompaniet wrote:

"

eithelonnen wrote:

hi guys... this build is only for new players? i can run with this build in Merciless without problems if i have a good gear? how about bosses?
thanks for understanding, i'm just a new player

this is the best beginner build period BUT this build also steamrolls endgame so it works for everyone. and no you don't need good gear even in merciless.

"

eithelonnen wrote:

anyone can tell me what a flashk's i can use in Merciless?

i use these.

Spoiler

here is my endgame marauder gear. pretty much all items self found.

Spoiler

have a better maul which i found yesterday i plan to start using once i get the sockets sorted.

here it is.

Spoiler

here's my tree i am using for end game if anyone's curious.

http://www.pathofexile.com/passive-skill-tree/AAAAAgEAAdwB5wJxBLMFLQ_MEuEUIBRNFy8YkRkuGjgb-iXfJ-0t0jIJNug62ECgQT9Hfk3YUEdQUFHmVElV1lcNWGNYr1nzXz9gS2EhZOdlTWaebEZuaXJscql07XbneA1673zZgKSBb4TZhO-HKYx2jM-QVZHOnjyeuZ7Nn8uiAKQZpmSnMKeEqWipbqvFrKq0L7ndvoq-p8AaxLjG2MmY0iHUj9X42WHeweLq5K3nUuw47w7wH_Iv9kj3vvrS

next levels i will get amplify on the left side templar starting area for more aoe damage.

stats:

lvl 77 marauder

glacial hammer damage: 14 000/sec
ground slam damage: 9000/sec
leap slam damage: 7000/sec

max res
7 endurance charges.
chaos resistance -33% looking for ways to increase this a little.

Do you use BM gem? or Mana leech? i'm thinking about respec from BM with auras but i'm not sure how and what to spec for

sorry for late reply. if you click the spoilers you can see the gems i use and gear.

yes i use bm gem for ground slam only. this is because ground slam costs 98 mana to use. impossible to keep up with this mana cost with 5 attacks/sec. mana leech is too slow. there is no mana on hit gem and vaal pact only works for life leech so the only way to maintain mana is to use a bm gem in the link.

you have to plan for how many auras you will use and do the maths to see how much mana you will have when your auras are in use. i only have 154 mana left with determination and hatred. but it's enough for warlord mark and glacial/leap slam. if you have too little mana you have to use a bm gem or get more mana reduction passives/alpha howl helm/max mana.

if you check the author's guide he has a section for specing out of blood magic. it can be found under improvements.

@Monty: Yeah wow, I didn't expect general to be so hard. Eventually I passed him with perfect kiting. I just had to kill those mages who cast flammability first (which makes his molten shell very, very scary) and played like a ranged char, thanks to ground slam's range.

I totally expected Piety & Dominus to kick my ass. Well, nope, they were easy.

Also this is my first char and my gear is crap. I can't imagine how much damage I'd do with a marohi erqi, lol.

Now starting merciless, let's see what happens... :P

Thanks a lot for this build. It's been both fun and strong.

Sorry if this question has been asked already, but what should I use my Orbs of Chance on? Are Marohi Erqi and Koam's Heart the uniques to shoot for, or something else?

Hey, really like the build, been playing since mid-closed beta, and just now got around to trying out a ground slam marauder. I have one idea that might help the usefulness of the guide as well as get newer players started on some basic gear knowledge.

What if you added a short section under Equipment that expanded upon the modifiers and helped newer players know what is decent quality gear by adding the Min/Max rolls on some of the stats you want on items? It's really just a QoL change for newer players so they don't have to skip around Google finding it, and I think it would make an already amazing guide just a little bit better. Anything to make this enormous game a bit less daunting would greatly help, I think.

Wow, this is a really awesome guide, being a noob myself this will really help me out a lot! Thanks for taking the time to make this guide and sharing it with the community! :D

I always think about this when making a character and go with it because I assume someone did the math, but in cruel difficulty Kraityn offers 8% increased attack speed. I'm assuming this isn't as good as 12% physical from Oak?

Awesome build! Works really well. It's like playing POE on easy mode.

"

shrandis wrote:

@Monty: Yeah wow, I didn't expect general to be so hard. Eventually I passed him with perfect kiting. I just had to kill those mages who cast flammability first (which makes his molten shell very, very scary) and played like a ranged char, thanks to ground slam's range.

I totally expected Piety & Dominus to kick my ass. Well, nope, they were easy.

Also this is my first char and my gear is crap. I can't imagine how much damage I'd do with a marohi erqi, lol.

Now starting merciless, let's see what happens... :P

For future reference if you're fighting the general, stand at the top of the stairs and throw out a decoy totem or something to pull the adds out. The general doesn't actually attack you until you walk onto his "red carpet". You can throw a decoy totem on the carpet and it won't pull him either. I always pull the flammability mages and charging dudes before I go at him. He's pretty easy with heavy strike 1v1. Just bring a Ruby flask if you need one and heavy strike with life leech should wreck him pretty easy.

Could someone give me some advice? I was doing fine right up until level 50, and then started having serious trouble surviving with the build. Up until level 58, yellow voidwalkers would pretty much one shot me, a group of blues or two yellows would be un-tankable, and even a group of 5-7 normals could drop me to half health before I could hit a potion (all docks, lvl 50). I ground my way 50-59 in the docks and was finally able to kill the general. I moved on, Kole two shots me and righteous fire in lunaris takes me down quite fast.

Resists 77 cold/fire, 66 light, -7 chaos, 2.1k health, 1.5k armor
Damage 800 ground slam, 1200 heavy strike (feels too low)

I'm not finding a lot in the way of gear, jack all actually, but based on the comments here I don't think I should be having as much trouble as I am. I've followed the build pretty religiously except for blood magic as I can't see how I could possibly survive with it (also mana potions are fine to sustain my usage of ground slam atm). I alch what I can, particularly weapons, but haven't gotten much better than what I've stashed from 2 previous playthroughs.



Is the problem just gear, or has survivability/life been lowered since release, or something else entirely?