[3.1] Molten Strike Gladiator

Hi all! Ever wanted to zap popcorn in the middle of getting pummeled by Chimera? Then look no further. Life regen and block focused, this tank shrugs off all but the heaviest damage the end game has to offer.

This is my second build and fares even better in end game content, easily farming most Guardians though I haven't attempted Shaper yet.



Summary

This build has 8035 life with 1873 regen/sec, 1848 leech/sec, and 75% hit/spell block chance.

Offensively, molten strike provides good clear speed and single target damage with little investment. Molten strike's DPS is a bit tricky to calculate but here I'll give it a go...

Tooltip damage: 11818, along with 9 projectiles
Point blank: +50% more, since projectiles are close
Fire penetration: 23% + 20% from Ash on Xoph's Blood
Total: (11818 + (11818 x 9 x 0.6 x 1.5)) x 1.43 = 153788

This doesn't include Immolate, but should give you a rough ballpark. In short, this isn't a damage focused build but it's enough to clear endgame content comfortably.

Advantages/disadvantages of this build are...

+ Very tanky.
+ Decent clear speed.
+ Simple to play. You can facetank almost anything.
- Slow movement speed. This is not a farming build.
- Bosses take a few seconds to kill, as this isn't overly damage focused.
- Uniques below are expensive, though none are mandatory. Personally I like builds with a high ceiling cap you can work toward. Just be aware that some of the things below can cost a bit.

Quick summary of the equipment/gem links before we go into detail...

Weapon (Grelwood Shank): Vigilant Strike => Fortify => Stone Golem
Shield (The Surrender): Enfeeble => Curse on Hit => Chance to Ignite
Helmet (Elder): Molten Strike => Elemental Damage => Multistrike => Ancestral Call [=> Concentrated Effect => Immolate]
Gloves (Meginord's Vise): Anger => Vitality => Herald of Ash => Enlighten
Body (Kaom's Heart)
Boots (Kaom's Roots)
Amulet (Xoph's Blood)

Passive Tree

Now for the details...



Grelwood Shank is a great fit for molten strike. Decent damage, extra projectiles, and point blank. Vigilant Strike with The Vigil provides forty seconds of fortify with a single hit, making it simple to maintain.



With our high block chance The Surrender not only negates incoming damage but gives us life with 75% of hits. Ignite support boosts our molten strike damage thanks to Immolate, though I'll replace it with Flammability if I ever get a +1 curse amulet.



Helmet provides our psudo six link for molten strike. Ancestral Call makes for a delightful mapping experience, whereas Fire Penetration deals better single target damage.



Meginord's Vise provides great regen. Between gem and glove corruption our level five enlighten leaves us just enough mana to attack.



Probably the priciest unique here, Red Nightmare provides 12% block chance when placed in the templar section, getting us to the cap.



We build into templar and scion anyway for their regen nodes, so pure talent provides us with 1% leech, 5% penetration, and +25 attributes. We avoid maruauder since increased AoE worsens molten strike for single target.



Body, boots, and amulet are pretty self explanatory. High life scales both our regen and the leech amount we're capped at so we want this as high as we can go.



For our belt we're looking for the "increased life recovery rate" Elder attribute. This is effectively a 'more' multiplier for our regen.



Rings round out our resistances.



Though rarely needed the life flasks provide a 'panic button' when hit. Dying Sun and Wise Oak boost damage for boss fights.

When it comes to Guardian farming I've found that...

* Minotaur is the easiest. Just click and watch TV until he's dead. Barring nasty map mods nothing he does is threatening.
* Chimera is the second easiest. The only threat are his snakes which deal enough chaos damage to be a problem if you let them swarm you. Otherwise, Chimera himself doesn't do noticeable damage.
* Hydra is simple. She can't one-shot, but two lucky bursts is a risk so pop a life flask on the rare occasion you're noticeable hurt.
* Phoenix is the hardest. Between his flame burst and minions he occasionally one-shots so you need to be watchful.

This can still scale a tad further, but at ~70ex each none are yet in my price range...

* Helmet enchantment for +2 molten strike projectiles. I'm lab farming to get this on an Elder helmet I like but no luck yet.
* Xoph's Blood with +1 curse. With this we'll be able to replace our Chance to Ignite with Flammability, dropping fire reistances an extra 45%.
* Watcher's Eye with 20-30% increased life recovery rate, boosting our life regen even more.

Cheers! -Damian