[3.00] Glacial Hammer Mjolner Berserker (Shaper Down!) (A Conversation)

Okay, it makes sense. You’re using standard Elemental Damage and Melee gems, with a switch between Increased AOE and Elemental Focus for mapping vs. bosses. I get that. But why would you swap out Ruthless for Bloodlust? Isn’t Ruthless much, much more consistent? How are you even bleeding enemies anyway?

I’m glad you asked! As you’ll see in the next cluster, I’ve got my Totem linked to the new Chance to Bleed gem. It’ll attack fast enough that it should be able to cause Bleeding in single target situations, and Bloodlust does way more damage overall than Ruthless.

I get that, but what about Elemental Equilibrium? Totem attacks count toward EE, and if it does any cold damage at all, it will ruin it! That means no Hatred, no Taste of Hate…

That’s what you think. Behold!

Oh, I get it—you’re using Brutality with your totem so that it can only deal Physical Damage and not screw up your Elemental Equilibrium! Surprisingly clever of you. But is this a consistent setup? Do you really think your totem will be able to provide bleeds often enough versus bosses that it’s worth the gem slot?

I can’t say for certain, but I think it will be. The bosses that tend to sit still or who only target one enemy at a time (Shaper, Chimera, Vaal Oversoul, etc.) will be prime targets. But otherwise we don’t have to use Bloodlust. I suppose it’s more for niche situations.

That makes sense. Now the big question, which Ancestral totem will you use?

Well, the Protector gives us better attack speed which is very nice, so that’s what I want to use while I’m leveling. However, at the highest levels when I have all my gear and passives and buffs ready, I don’t think I’ll need so much attack speed. Then the Warchief will be better for me, since it hits with splash damage and can cause bleeds on multiple enemies simultaneously.

Why Ball Lightning in your Mjolner cluster? Wouldn’t Arc do more Damage?

It would, but here’s the thing—I did some testing with Mjolner and Elemental Equilibrium back in Legacy League, and discovered some odd results. Fighting Merciless Kuduku with Resolute technique and few buffs as a sort of controlled experiment, I tried socketing different gems and seeing which had the best EE uptime.

Logically speaking, it makes sense that so long as you attack fewer than 8 times a second while having two spells socketed (due to the innate Mjolner cooldown of .25 seconds per spell), you should have perfect EE regardless of the spells you use. However, with an attack speed of 5 hits a second, I found that using Arc and Shock Nova didn’t work. No idea why! But it took me way longer to kill Kuduku than using Ball Lightning in the setup.

What’s even funnier is that a single Ball Lightning was enough to ensure perfect EE! So I could easily go for a Ball Lightning + Curse on Hit setup here. But instead I thought I’d use Ball Lightning to maintain EE and then any other Lightning Spell I wanted with Innervate in order shock enemies. I decided on Shock Nova because it looks cool.

At least you’re honest. But if you wanted to look cool, why not Ball Lightning and GMP?

Hmm…

Okay, I see a standard Whirling Blades setup. But I see you want to use Flicker Strike or Frenzy as a fourth link? Why? Wouldn’t Blood Magic be much better so that you don’t get stranded if you’re getting pummeled and run out of Mana?

I think you’re right that Blood Magic would be the safer option, but honestly I worry about Glacial Hammer’s mobility and playstyle.

Jane nearly spat out her drink in laughter.

But I thought maybe Flicker could help with that. Just imagine: I Whirling Blades in, I fire off a multistrike of Glacial Hammer, most trash mobs around die instantly, then I hit Flicker and immediately attack in place again. Just like that, bam! I finish off one or two of the stragglers. Then I identify any remaining targets and Whirl to them to repeat the process.

That sounds inspired and optimistic. Can you explain Frenzy in as passionate a way?

Not really. I thought Flicker wouldn’t be too effective against big bosses so I might as well socket in Frenzy and try to get myself some Frenzy charges.

Billy, are you saying you’ll use Frenzy just so you can pad your stats in Path of Building by adding Frenzy Charges to your DPS calculation?

Um…

Okay, Vaal Lightning Trap is a no brainer since it works on the Guardians and Shaper now, as is Increased Duration. Frost Bomb on a CWDT setup is smart since it’ll keep enemies around you at -20% Cold Resistance and slows Life Regeneration to a crawl. But is there any reason these are linked together in the same 4-Link?

Well, Frost Bomb can screw up a hit of EE if it explodes on the target. I thought with a longer duration that might not happen as often, but honestly it doesn’t matter much.

And here I see that you’re avoiding self-casting your Golem by having your Elemental Weakness curse apply only half as often as otherwise. Is that really a good idea?

Oh Jane, you know as well as I do that summoning a Golem in the heat of battle will never happen! And honestly I’m a little disillusioned with curses since they’re reduced in effectiveness so much against the final bosses. Even Frost Bomb has a bigger effect than a lvl 20 Frostbite curse!

Speaking of which, why a choice between Elemental Weakness and Frostbite?

Well, Frostbite is better for Glacial Hammer of course and helps us freeze more stuff (since we’re not going crit or stacking chance to freeze), so it’s a solid choice, but Elemental Weakness also buffs our Lightning Skills which can lead to more shocks. Either one would work.

And your Golem—wouldn’t the Lightning Golem mess up your Elemental Equilibrium?

Oh Jane, you should know better than that! A minion can’t apply Elemental Equilibrium.

I knew that I was just testing you haha Jane threw out quickly.

So I went with the Golem that would be best for my DPS. I suppose a Chaos Golem would be a decent choice too for some more survivability. It’s really a preference thing.

And of course you’re using Hatred for obvious reasons. You know you could also throw in Herald of Ash and maintain your Equilibrium. Did you think of that?

Yes, and it would also help our clearspeed too, but Hatred does way more damage.

How about both?

Are you nuts? That would ruin our Mind Over Matter, which is the only real Damage Mitigation we’ll have! Not to mention I don’t have a place anywhere for an additional gem.

I see that. You’re packed to the brink! You know, an excellent build maker would probably specialize in a few things and then have some extra gem slots to spare. But it feels like you need every single gem available and then some!

But there’s just so much to try out! So many ways to buff your damage. I guess I’m just not a Kaom’s Roots kind of guy.

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After triumphantly defeating Hillock, Billy purchased a Glacial Hammer gem from Nessa. Nessa was always very kind to him, and he hoped he would see her again in the new Act VI.

Not having a miraculous Goldrim drop from Hillock this time (the last two characters he made both did!) Billy decided to grab Diamond Skin for some easy resistances. Here was his early-game Passive Tree:


Wielding Glacial Hammer from the earliest possible moments, Billy was reminded how HORRIBLE it is to play a namelock melee skill at the beginning of the game. Constant misses, slow playstyle, no ability to dodge enemy attacks—it was a nightmare. Billy got so frustrated, he almost quit the character before finishing Act I!

However, Little Billy’s luck changed once he got the Melee Splash gem. It helped his playstyle feel more fluent and acceptable, and he forged onward. He found a miraculous Chaos drop early on, and used it to purchase the Winter Burial Jewel so that he could drop Melee Splash in favor of Faster Attacks. (Yes, you should not spend an entire Chaos orb on a Glacial Hammer Threshold Jewel. But Billy was desperate and it was early in the league!)

After getting the must-have passives in front of the Marauder’s starting point, Billy’s primary goal was to make it to the Duelist Leech cluster (grabbing the Strength Jewel socket on the way). This would help alleviate Mana problems and increase his survivability drastically. He was also excited to get the +2 Weapon Range from Master of the Arena.

Billy also found two Orbs of Regret early on in his adventures. He traded these in for a well-rolled Princess Sabre, which he would wield in his offhand for most of the rest of his journey. He found a second miraculous Chaos drop, and purchased with it an Atziri’s Foible amulet (oddly enough, Billy found two Chaos and two Regrets before finding a single Alchemy). This solved his Mana problems and also bolstered his Mind Over Matter stats once he pathed to it.

(When Billy goes Mind Over Matter, he likes to save up Passive Points until he can get all 4 nodes. He finds the idea of using Mind Over Matter without the increased Mana and Mana regen a scary prospect.)

Billy made sure to keep two Quicksilver flasks in his belt throughout the campaign because he is an impatient person. He also found a Stibnite and a Quartz flask fairly early on, and found the use of them together incredible for survivability!

As Billy progressed through the campaign, he found it fairly easy to get acceptable gear with the exception of primary weapons. He eventually found a comfortable routine of every 10 or so levels checking POE.Trade and searching for one-handed weapons within his level requirement that were priced for 1 Alchemy Orb. Then he’d sort them by Physical DPS, and purchase the best one-handed Mace or Scepter that he could.

Billy used Glacial Hammer paired with Faster Attacks, Melee Physical Damage, and Ruthless as his core 4L in the early game. He made sure to get Whirling Blades fairly early, which helped his character feel quicker and more smooth to play. At about level 40, Billy finally got access to the beloved Multistrike. He swapped out Ruthless for it and his build finally felt like it was coming together.

(If Billy were to level this character again, he would probably use a melee skill with some AOE, like Cleave or Sunder, until he got access to Multistrike—then he’d swap to Glacial Hammer.)

Billy was surprised at how solid his Glacial Hammer character was through the campaign. He was amazed to find he was tanky enough to defeat Act V Kitava deathless!

Billy’s success in the first five acts led to overconfidence, and he suffered his first death early in Act VI to a random Harbinger. This was likely due to not having his resists capped.

Billy used a 4L armor with good resists all the way through Solaris and Lunaris at the end of Act VII. Then he finally upgraded to a 5L. He purchased a white 5L base and then alch’d and scoured it until it was usable.

When Billy reached the start of Act X, he realized it was probably time to Ascend. Billy is an intensely lazy person, so he had skipped all the trials he came across until this point. He decided to run through them all so that he had access to the first three Labyrinths. He then tackled the Labyrinths one after the other.

At this point, he did not have Vaal Pact, so his survivability in the trap parts of the Labyrinth was exceptionally good (his Passive Tree had a ton of Life Regen). Merciless Izaro one-shot him with a slam on their first encounter. Billy tried again, being extra careful to avoid slams, and was successful. Luckily, he was level 60 by then and was wielding the mighty (and cheap) Cameria’s Maul, so he had enough DPS to make the Izaro fights fairly quick.

After completing the first three Labyrinths, Billy had the idea that he should use Mjolner to fight Act X Kitava—it just seemed like the right thing to do. He almost had enough Intelligence to equip it, so in order to meet the threshold he used an Essence of Spite on a Heavy Belt. The result was a belt with enough Intelligence and Strength that he was able to meet the intense requirements of Mjolner, and as a nice bonus it even had some Life and Resists.
Billy picked up Mjolner for the first time, equipped Elemental Equilibrium and Vaal Pact, and then headed to the Feeding Trough to take on Kitava!


It was a tough fight, and after one death to Kitava’s attack where he LIGHTS THE ENTIRE UNIVERSE ON FIRE (that’s just not fair), Billy emerged victorious! He was ready to take on maps.

As far as actually fighting Kitava goes, Billy watched a few videos to see what Kitava’s moveset looked like, and identified that most people seemed to die after standing in one spot for too long. Billy’s strategy became to throw out two Glacial Hammer flurries, then Whirling Blades away, and then repeat. This way he never stood in place for more than a few seconds and was never one-hit by punches or caught in the weird X attack. He also played defensively when he saw Kitava doing stuff he didn’t recognize. He didn’t expect to tank his way through any of Kitava’s attacks.

Billy has learned that this character is one that excels with a patient mindset. Very rarely should he charge in, hold down attack, and hope for the best (Mind Over Matter makes tanking a horde of enemies a very bad idea—your Mana won’t recharge quick enough to sustain that). Instead, constant hit-and-run to keep Fortify up and to avoid enemy attacks is key.

Little Billy had a ring and some gloves with tons of resist (and little else) to cap his resists for maps. He started as one generally does, with Jungle Valleys and Beaches. Here his clearspeed issues started to make themselves known, as hunting down all those little monkeys and crabs felt like it took an eternity.

Billy started using the Chaos recipe in order to build up enough wealth to purchase a set of Emperor of Purity Divination Cards. These would allow him to get a pretty cheap and easy 6L on a mediocre base. Once he got his 6L Holy Chainmail, he threw a Shrieking Essence of Greed at it and called it good.

He grew some levels and hit tier 3 maps, when in a random Grotto it happened—a Kaom’s Heart dropped completely randomly.

That was how Billy became rich overnight.

With his newfound wealth, Billy purchased an Astramentis with a perfect Explicit roll for 100c, and then used a couple Blessed Orbs to make it perfect overall. He swapped out his rings, boots, and belt for about 30-50c each, and purchased a Royal Burgonet with the a 15% added Cold Glacial Hammer enchant for 15c. He purchased a Shrieking Essence of Greed for it and got some decent resists too.

Billy decided not to rely on his Gloves for any resistances or stat points, so that he could easily swap between high-damage Spiked Gloves and Repentance Gloves. He purchased a pair of Spiked Gloves with Life, Strength, and Added Physical Damage for 5c, and then crafted Increased Attack Speed onto them when he managed to level Haku up enough to do so.

Billy’s final purchase with his windfall was a Princess Sabre corrupted with Culling Strike (he purchased it after attempting to corrupt one himself and failing a dozen or so times), for 50c. Out of sheer coincidence, it was already linked and colored exactly as he needed!

Now broke but actually geared up enough to do some real damage, Billy focused on exploring the Atlas and growing levels. He found that Harbingers and Breaches were overwhelming him, so he purchased a Lion’s Roar at his first opportunity and used it just for those situations. It greatly increased his survivability.

Also note that Billy no longer utilized the chaos recipe, as fast mapping was more valuable to him than steady, incremental increases in Chaos.

Wanting to speed up the leveling process, Billy purchased a pair of Repentance gloves, dropped EE, and went all-in on his so-called “Clearspeed” build. Although effective in clearing white and yellow maps more quickly than before, his single-target damage dropped drastically. When he started getting into red maps, he found this variant of the build clunky and dangerous. He used it until he hit level 86 or so, and then made a change to the “Tank” build.

Billy then spent a decent chunk of his savings on his Taste of Hate. He purchased a cheap one and tried to Divine it. Three Divines later, he ended up barely better than he started, but figured it was good enough for now.

Throughout his mapping, Billy would purchase “The Dream Trial” prophecies whenever he could. He was confident in his abilities to defeat Uber Lab (or is it the “Eternal Lab” now?), but of course he had to complete all the trials first. It was fairly expensive to always have a Dream Trial prophecy queued up, but it was worth it in the end—Billy found all the trials quicker than he expected and earned his final Ascendancy without too much trouble (although he may have unallocated Vaal Pact for running through the lab, and re-allocated it for the final Izaro fight).

From levels 86 to 90 Billy used the “Tank” build to complete most of the red maps under Tier 16. This build was the slowest map clearer of the three builds Billy had thought up, and it showed. However, he appreciated not having to worry so much about dying. He also enjoyed using the Soul of Solaris Pantheon Power instead of the Brine King.

In order to compensate for his slower clear speed, Billy started to use Flicker Strike more and more often, eventually using it as much as Whirling Blades while in combat. He was tempted to purchase a Green Dream jewel to allow him to Flicker even more often, but decided that it wouldn’t be worth the cost.

After accruing some more wealth, Billy purchased a set of Celestial Justicar cards and turned them in for a 6L Astral Plate. Since this would be his final Body Armor, he decided to go crazy and buy a Deafening Essence of Greed for it. It worked out nicely, and he ended up with a 6L Armor with over 150 Life and decent resists. Noticing there was still a prefix open, he slammed it with an Exalt and managed to earn himself an extra 10 Armor. WHAT VALUE.

When Billy hit level 90, he switched to the “DPS” build and started to clear maps noticeably quicker. He found Gorges and Shaped Atolls quick, easy, and reliable for leveling, although it did take a very long time compared to his previous characters. He ran some Beachheads too, but they were too expensive for him to sustain.

When Billy hit level 92, he decided his leveling was over and took a moment to finish the standard maps of the Atlas up to tier 16.

Billy avoided Elemental Reflect maps and some maps with reduced player maximum resistances. He also tended to play it safe when he was getting close to leveling up, avoiding maps with high enemy damage and crit chance. For Temp Chains, Vulnerability, and Elemental Weakness maps, Billy would sub out his Lion’s Roar flask for his Sulphur Flask of Warding, which usually did the trick. He also found he could run Elemental Weakness maps without his Warding flask by relying on The Wise Oak’s added resistances, but this was a bit risky.

Billy prefers to “take it slow” when leveling at the late 80s and early 90s, and run magic maps that he feels comfortable with. He has two rules that he forces himself to follow:

1. Never run a map that you are not 100% confident you can complete deathless.
2. If you die in a map, don’t re-enter it. What can kill you once can kill you again (barring things like deaths to Volatiles that are one-time only).

I don’t know why so many people call Chimera one of the tougher Guardians. The entire fight takes forever because it’s split into so many different stages, but it’s the same every time. It’s as if the whole thing is completely scripted, and once you know the order of events, there’s very little that can go wrong.

I agree, very good observation Billy. Any particular notes?

Sure, the only tough part of the fight are the Chaos snakes. I tried packing an Atziri’s Promise flask for them, but honestly I kept forgetting to save it. However, they went down easy enough.

What about the smoke phase? I know it catches a lot of people off guard.

Sure, but when you know it’s coming it’s not so bad to prepare. I did have one rough experience. My corrupted rare map didn’t allow me to regenerate Mana, so once the smoke phase started and MoM made me lose all my Mana, I wasn’t able to use Whirling Blades to move around! So he did get the upper hand on me on that run, but a hybrid flask was an easy solution.

What about your gem links? We’ve talked a lot about whether or not Bloodlust can be useful in the endgame fights—did you try it here?

Actually yes, I tried Bloodlust out and found it worked great! Chimera wouldn’t destroy my totem with splash damage on his normal attacks so it kept him bleeding throughout the whole fight, and it was fairly easy to get my totem to camp the animal summon spots too. I had more than enough DPS to make the fight quick (relatively) and easy.

The Minotaur is a very straightforward fight. The only thing you have to know is “don’t tank the falling rocks.” So long as he can’t one-shot you, everything else is perfectly fine.

But what about a corrupted rare map? Did you ever take him on with Damage mods?

Actually yes, I fought him on a Vulnerability and Elemental Weakness map with added Cold damage, but I prepared beforehand by getting myself a Sulphur Flask of Warding that I could keep up almost the entirety of the fight. With his other mods he could still one-shot me with his tunnel attack, so I just baited that out of him with my totem and otherwise had a fairly easy time of it.

Did you use Bloodlust against him?

I tried, but his normal attacks have enough AOE that it was difficult to place my totems. I decided to use Ruthless instead, and my damage output was fine.

Here’s the one I was curious about. I know the Phoenix is tough for straight melee characters. What did you think?

Yeah, he was tough, Billy admitted. It took me several attempts to get a deathless run. There’s just so much that can go wrong! At any moment you could walk into a little fire tornado and die instantly! Sometimes his whirling attack will do practically no damage, and sometimes it seems to one-shot you. You underestimate the range of his fire explosion attack, and it’s instant death. You accidentally get hit by three fire birds at the same time, you’re a goner!

But you did manage it?

Yep, with a lot of practice and a patient playstyle, I was able to defeat him deathless. I used Bloodlust and summoned a totem on him after every whirling attack. I paid attention to the birds and took them out whenever I could, and I avoided fire tornados like the plague.

I also learned that the fight gets much more difficult as his health gets lower, so I started saving my flasks for later instead of using them up all at the start.

I see. And you used a Ruby flask for the fight?

Um, actually I didn’t. Jane gasped. I tried! But it just didn’t last long enough to make a difference! I eventually decided that going 100% offence in my flasks was a better strategy.

I suppose that’s acceptable. Anyway, I imagine you were able to learn his attack pattern? A lot of people seem to misunderstand it.

Yes, I think I did! It seems that after every fire blast, he would perform a whirling attack very shortly afterward. The key was not to rush in to deal damage after his fire blast. He also liked to chain his whirling attack into a fire blast, but not if he had performed one recently. I had to get the rhythm down in order to know when to go in for an attack.

Yes, very good! I’m proud of you, Billy. That just leaves the Hydra and…well what’s so tough about her?

Billy frowned.

I hate the Hydra. She’s unfair. She has Barrage—I can’t compete with that!

Jane wasn’t impressed.

The constant frostbolts, the fact that I have to be point-blank to damage her with my melee attack while she can destroy me with one lucky Barrage or pretty much any of her attacks. I would try to get around behind her but she would end her attacks and start again so quickly. I definitely couldn’t use Bloodlust because my totems would die instantly, and every time I threw a Vaal Lightning Trap or activated my flasks, she’d move out of the way or teleport out of there.

Billy, she’s really not that hard. You just have to concentrate a little better and quit being so greedy by trying to tank her attacks.

On the contrary! I’ve had one deathless run, and it was one where I didn’t even care about strategy—I just wanted to obtain the fragment as quickly as I could. I stood in one spot and attacked without stopping, and I managed to take her down that way!

Huh. Well, sometimes brute force is a valid option. I’d still recommend you actually learn the fight, though… Anyway, you’ve got all the Guardians down, have you given Shaper a shot?

I sure did, answered Billy.