[3.3] Unstoppable Gladiator 78% Max Block/Spells. Best Low Budget League Starter

Would that also work with a 6L Belly of the Beast instead of the BoR?
For sure a bit lower DPS but the life pool is higher and also much easier to cap resists.

What is your opinion about it?
Before I respec and waste a lot of regets ^^

Greetings

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SearchMyAim wrote:

Would that also work with a 6L Belly of the Beast instead of the BoR?
For sure a bit lower DPS but the life pool is higher and also much easier to cap resists.

What is your opinion about it?
Before I respec and waste a lot of regets ^^

Greetings

The BoR decision is based initially (but not only) in making this build really cheap. But if you already got the 6L Belly, you should consider:

1. BoR gives you a 20% chance to gain an Endurance Charge on Block, so, if you don't have it, you should use a counter attack with "Endurance Charge on Melee Stun" and "Stun" to gain the 3 charges. Of course, you can put that on your helmet. Or exchange Enfeeble for Warlord's Mark.
2. BoR gives you +6% Chance to Block, so you need that from the Passive Tree, maybe go for Command of Steel and look for two jewels with +1% Block Chance (and life of course). This makes 3 points that you have to remove. If you take them from offensive stats I guess this will affect your DPS considerably.
3. Another option for the tree is to avoid using Iron Reflexes and go for a full armour gear. That makes some combined +x% armour/evasion points pretty inefficient and makes Cloth and Chain not worthy. In my opinion, without BoR you should remove Iron Reflexes and change your gear to full armour.
4. Blind is a nice addition to your overall defences, I guess it shouldn't be underestimated.

Right now, I don't know how much life adds at the end the Belly, but I feel that things that can kill you with the 5K life pool of this build, will kill you the same with a higher life pool. Unusual huge amounts of one-hit damage that couldn't be blocked and got you without utility flasks up.

And for cap resists, I know there's not much gear left, but it wasn't really that difficult thanks to Diamond Skin & Cloth and Chain (+30% all resistances). As you can see, my gear isn't expensive in any case. Another option is to avoid using Romira's Banquet, put a high life/resistances ring and exchange Enfeeble for Assassin's Mark to gain the Power Charges. In that case, you will loose a considerable amount of DPS (crit chance/multi, and chance to hit) and the defensive benefits from Enfeeble.

Hope you find this useful and covers your question. Please, send me your feedback. Thanks!

[Added] Additional thoughts, a 20/20 Melee Physical Damage and Faster Attacks adds 12% Melee Physical Damage and +18% Attack Speed so, finally, maybe DPS are not really affected that much. But for a 10 exalted chest piece the possible benefits doesn't seem really worth it in this particular build.

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mas_mariano wrote:

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crush4 wrote:

can someone tell me please what jewels to use?

The most important stat from jewels is the "+5-7% Increased Maximum Life". After that, if you don't need any Attributes or Elemental Resistances, go for offensive stats. The good thing is you have lots of possible good combination, because any 1H Weapon modifier applies thanks to Varunastra.

You don't need block modifiers because you already got it capped 78/78 with gear and tree.

Added mine in the Gear Section of the guide.

thanks for this! another question: wouldn't it be better to use Elemental Weakness instead of conductivity?

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crush4 wrote:

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mas_mariano wrote:

"

crush4 wrote:

can someone tell me please what jewels to use?

The most important stat from jewels is the "+5-7% Increased Maximum Life". After that, if you don't need any Attributes or Elemental Resistances, go for offensive stats. The good thing is you have lots of possible good combination, because any 1H Weapon modifier applies thanks to Varunastra.

You don't need block modifiers because you already got it capped 78/78 with gear and tree.

Added mine in the Gear Section of the guide.

thanks for this! another question: wouldn't it be better to use Elemental Weakness instead of conductivity?

Actually, I got INT attribute at 90. That means my curse should be at maximum Level 6. In case of Conductivity that means -30% lightning resistance. On the other hand, Elemental Weakness gives you -25% elemental resistances, but with Q20 you get -30% to all elemental resistances. With this Static Strike setup, 80% is lightning damage and the rest is cold damage.

Finally you have to choose between a +11% chance to shock from Conductivity or -30% cold resistance for the 20% of your damage. I guess both are good, so I will update that line in the guide.

But, after playing higher tier maps, I decide to use all the time Enfeeble and forget about Conductivity/Elemental Weakness long time ago. Look at Q20/L6 Enfeeble: -33% Accuracy (added to Blind), -35% Crit Chance, -40% Crit Multi and the most important -23% Damage (ALL damage). This really improve your defences, in my opinion, you should stay with Enfeeble.

Varunastra Vaal Blade is not 10-15c

The cheapest one are 2.5 ex on Poe.trade

Is there any weapon i could use instead?

Or could you sell me one for 10-15c?

Hey, nice guide I have a couple of questions if you don't mind.

What's the reasoning behind using static strike, just preference?

I'm thinking of making this build with Aegis and using Reave as main skill, that should work just as well right?

What do you think abour BoR vs Lightning Coil if you can afford it?

Do you get enough crit on the right side of the tree, it seems like 30% is a bit low.

Sorry for double post, I mean 'left side of the tree'.

Also, everything I'm asking about is with the thought of playing in perandus hardcore. Thanks again.

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Pevityli wrote:

Varunastra Vaal Blade is not 10-15c

The cheapest one are 2.5 ex on Poe.trade

Is there any weapon i could use instead?

Or could you sell me one for 10-15c?

Varunastra was introduced in 2.2, right now, there's almost no availability in Standard League. All prices are based on Perandus League, where as you can see in poe.trade, prices are between that range for a decent one (250-260 pDPS).

Changing the weapon has some implications in the build, basically, Deadly Dilettante and By the Sword are not useful without Varunastra. And if you not use a Mace, Blunt Instrument and Galvanic Hammer should be avoid. If you not use Deadly Dilettante, you should take the shortest path in the tree to the left from Master of the Arena to Constitution.

Trying to keep that price range in Standard League, I suggest an alternative using Doryani's Catalyst: removing Deadly Dilettante and By the Sword as stated before and then looking for Mace specific points and/or elemental damage. Maybe you need a +30 INT from the tree, because Doryani's requires 113 INT.

A 2-minutes tree that could work (please double check before use):

https://www.pathofexile.com/passive-skill-tree/AAAABAQCAAHcBIcEswUtBosKJgthDPcTzBQgFPYaPiDjITQhYCgqKaUvzDIJMk40jjWSOp064Ts7PAU8LT0PPT5AoEE_RJ5FR0d-TeNP81BHUeZTu185Xz9f2mBlYuxlTWebaPJp_mvZbEZvO3Jscql07XTxd1N343fleA15OXrvfLt-4oNfg8yE2YTvhjuK8ItPj5mSfZL3l3mYb5stnsWiAKZXqW6playvrj6vbLCrtC-1BLXytoq3Pr02vqfAGsBmwL_BgsSCxPbGrti92sHcI-Qi5FHlz-oY7MvvDu988B_x_vIv8kX3MvgC_gr-j__T?accountName=mas_mariano&characterName=Camacho_El_Boliviano


And you should change Whirling Blades, in my opinion, switch to Shield Charge.

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D_nasty wrote:

Hey, nice guide I have a couple of questions if you don't mind.

What's the reasoning behind using static strike, just preference?

I'm thinking of making this build with Aegis and using Reave as main skill, that should work just as well right?

What do you think abour BoR vs Lightning Coil if you can afford it?

Do you get enough crit on the right side of the tree, it seems like 30% is a bit low.

Glad you like the guide.

First of all, I never played Hardcore, hope not to miss something important for no having experience at all in HC.

Yes, choosing Static Strike is just preference. It works great in my opinion and is no GPU demanding at all, thing that truly makes a difference for me, even for solo play. Last time I tried Ice Crash I got the feeling that I was an angry frozen yogurt machine trying to kill my GPU.

About Reave, maybe you go for pure physical damage, so elemental damage modifiers has no use. In case of the tree, is just Galvanic Hammer and still is worthy. For gear, just the belt and now I use a corrupted Anvil with +x% Elemental Damage. Which setup will you use for Reave? But in my opinion, the main skill is no trouble at all, and could change based on personal preference.

As you can see, this isn't a Crit based build, so yes, is a little bit low. But it gets the job done (take a look at the video section). After reading Varunastra specs I wanted to try Deadly Dilettante + By The Blade + Disemboweling + Galvanic Hammer. I was able to play easily any map tier and normal Atziri with a laughable budget in the league, so I didn't go further. But avoiding crit and choosing Resolute Technique opens a loot of possibilities because all Mace/Axe/Sword specific modifiers in the Marauder (and Duelist) area are available. And this makes Romira's Banquet useless, so you can put there a high life ring or whatever you like.

Now the truly important things, Aegis and BoR/Chest. Both changes have a huge impact in the overall budget of the build, so first of all I choose not to, because my intention was to achieve my cheapest possible build that allows me to play (almost) all end-game content.

Please, before I continue, take a look at the answer to SearchMyAim so I don't repeat myself and make this answer longer than it will be.

About Aegis, of course is perfect for a build with 78/78 Block. Taking out BoR, you could take Command of Steel and with the +2% Block from Aegis vs Lioneye's you hit the Max Block. I think Aegis worth enough to rethink all your gear, for high Armour and decent ES (not only the amount offered from Aegis) for making it really worthy. But life and armour could be an issue, because Lioneye's gives a +100 Life and +1500 Armour which is great.

For that, regarding to Body Armour, I maybe consider 6L Belly as a good option. I know that Lightning Coil is great, but I don't remember a single time that I was killed by physical damage with this build. All the unfortunate deaths was for what I state in the "Things that can kill you" section of the guide: Damage over Time and mostly, Secondary Damage (annoying one-hit huge amounts of fire damage by explosions). So maybe a bullet-proof option could be Aegis and Belly (is just a thought). Is true that not having Lioneye's means less Armour which means less physical damage reduction, but still, choosing Lightning Coil for me could be a big concern about that two sources of damage that NEVER can be blocked.

Maybe another good thing to do is to exchange some points in the tree for getting more life (beginning of the Marauder tree (3 points for 24% Armour & 12% Life and/or Profane Chemistry: 3 points for 12% Life and life flasks improvement).

Final random comments: maybe Blood Rage will drain your ES, you could get the Frenzy Charges from Outmatch and Outlast Ascendancy point, but after using it, Violent Retaliation was much more rewarding as I thought in the first place. Linking Life Gain on Hit to Reckoning + Vengeance maybe improves survivability and using Riposte for Curse On Hit.

Hope you find this useful and please, send me your feedback about it!

I was just wondering and simply out of curiosity, if you were to choose an unique belt and/or gloves - what would it be ?