[3.2][Budget][Uber lab viable] Spikes and Balls Diplomacy: Elementalist Ngamahu's flame Sunder

This is my first build this league and as soon as I saw the new changes in ELementalist Ascendency, I just have to try it. At the time of this writing, I am level 77 and I just finished my Uberlab (including Argus Kill). Firstly, I honestly don't know the limit of this build, but it does have very smooth mapping and single target DPS is not bad either. The best part is that its Cheap!!!!!

Pro & Con
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Pro:
- Cheap
- Smooth mapping
- Fairly safe (Surprisingly good leech)
- Non meta and typical build
- Did I mentioned that elemental reflect map will never haunt you again?
Con:
- Leveling could be annoying without constant upgrade
- The axe looks very heavy.



Some Words on the Gears
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Required Unique:

The Main reasons we want to use this Axe are for the 50% conversion and for the Balls which are very strong and since it doesn't require linking, we can maximize the potential of this weapon without much investing. Until you can afford it or until you can use it, just grab a good DPS rating axe.

Quality of Life uniques:

This helmet converts some physical damage taken to fire damage taken. This not only help with the defense in general, it also proc the Ascendency 'Paragon of Calamity' which gives damage boost to the element of the damage taken as well as additional flat 8% damage reduction for that particular element.

This (Crystal Vault) new unique converts some of physical damage taken and fire damage taken to cold damage taken. A mini 'Taste of hate' with decent armor. This not only mitigate some physical damage taken and fire damage taken to cold resistance, it also proc 'Paragon of calamity' which further reduce the cold damage taken by 8%. Since we are not relying on evasion and we are not as tanky like said Jugg, these mitigations give a big breathing room for our somewhat strong leech. If you think, you might as well just run a life armor or other uniques, that should not make much differences too.



Possible Problems during Leveling
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Since we are playing as a witch, we would start on the top of the tree and therefore, strength and dexterity would not be handed to you and therefore, stats gears would be needed.
Since we are making full fire conversion with Ngamahu's flame and 'Avatar of fire', until you get the ngamahu, you will either have to use 'Tectonic slam' if you want to use 'Avatar of Fire' early

or you will just have to not use 'Avatar of fire' if you want to use Sunder and instead use 'physical to lightning' gem.



Now, You may wonder Why Sunder?
Spoiler

I originally planned this character to use Cyclone as the main skill. However, due to us being witch and therefore do not receive much defense options, I decided to replace the skill with something I can use from a safer distance.
So, I shifted to Tectonic slam but I lost a lot of damage from not able to effectively generate endurance charges and also the AOE is not so predictable. Most importantly though, the damage is not as impressive as Sunder.
So I tried Sunder, because of the longer range and the Radius mechanic does make 'pendulum of destruction' AOE buff work well. This allow you to hit the enemy from a very safe distance. Especially, when we have 'Stone golem' to taunt and Ancestral warchief to distract the Bosses.



Gems Setup
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For The Weapon (Molten Burst)

Gem Priority:
ELemental Damage support> GMP > Projectile > Concentrated support> Ele Focus> Fire Pen

As for Sunder set up

Gem Priority:
Sunder> Melee Physical support> ELemental Damage support> Multistrike> Added Fire>
Ruthless/Ele focus (6th link)

Auras:
Herald of Ash (mandatory)
Hatred (optional but not optimal)
Blasphemy + Enfeeble/Temporal chain/ Flammability (I personally prefer enfeeble)

Golems:
Since we can have 2 golems up at a time, we will carry Fire Golem and Stone Golem.



My Gears (so far)
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I will add 'Lion's Roar' unique flask for more damage flask once I can afford it.
As for Jewels, look for life, fire damage or area damage or Damage with Axe, Attack speed.
I am using some cheap rares that cost me a couple of chaos orb to fill up my resistances and life.


Skill Trees


Bandit and Ascendency
Spoiler

Bandit: Kill them all for 2 passive points

Ascendency order:
- Pendulum of Destruction
- Paragon of Calamity
- Mastermind of Discord
- Liege of Primordial

We start with Pendulum of Destruction for the damage boost and AOE boost. Although they are not on all the time, nevertheless the boosts are sweet.
By the time you do your Cruel Lab, you should be at around level 56-60 and by then, the leech from Paragon of calamity along with the leech points from Duelist side should be showing their effects. Any earlier than that, our damage would not be strong enough to properly benefit from the leech.
We will pick Mastermind of Discord next since we are running herald of ash all the time. Finally Liege of primordial which is nothing mind-blowing. The damage boost from the Flame golem and the defense boost from stone golem are pretty sweet.



Final Notes
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I will level more and see how it will turn out. For now, I can promise you it is really really FUN.

I use Iron reflexes because I picked up Unwavering stance node, however if you want to use Kaom's Roots instead, you can drop the node and possibly pick more life nodes or even pick up Point blank node.

Since Molten burst is proc on hit, the starting point of the projectile will always be on the enemy and not from the axe, so point blank should benefit Sunder as well.

If you want to feel creative and make this build evasion based, feel free and let me know how it turns out XD




I hope this build can inspire some of you people who are looking for unique builds or hipster build.


Leveling Guide
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Level 1 to 12 - Use any skill to level, I used SRS (just because I can)
Level 12 to 28 - Use Molten Strike (You will have to get the gem from alternative character)
Level 28 to 55 - Use Molten strike/ Sunder
*Level 35 to 40 - Normal Lab
Level 55 onward - Pick Ngamahu Axe and Avatar of Fire

If you have Tabula Rasa, your leveling experience will feel a lot smoother, however it is by no mean a necessity.
Until you get the Ngamahu axe, use rare leveling axe with decent pDPS (physical damage per second).




Achievements
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So far, I had finished the story-line (Act 10) and just started mapping.
At the moment, due to my poverty I am running around tier 5 maps.
However, I decided to attempt the Uber lab at level 76 and I manage to beat it fairly easily. I even killed Argus easily (I was surprised!!!!)

Spoiler



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If you have any questions about this build, please post a comment. I will try reply as soon as I can. Don't message me in the game since I am also on DND mode unless I am trading.
Last edited by Stonesorrow#6846 on Mar 12, 2018, 5:34:31 AM
Last bumped on May 31, 2018, 3:17:05 PM
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Hey. I like your Build so far. I tried it on my level 90 Witch with low level Gems and changed the Auras / Cwdt Setups a bit. Uber Lab was very easy, next try will be some T13 and T14 Maps with decent Mods.

Can you tell us what Pantheon Powers you use or recommend?

Also a general Question, because I like to ask things..
you use Blasphemy Aura with Enfeeble, wich gives a really strong Aura, but since we have no Evasion we don't really benefit from it in my Opinion. What do you think about running Anger (I was surprised that you mentioned Hatred, but not Anger) instead and a Cwdt Poacher's Mark Setup for more Frenzy Charges and those Sweet Life on Hit?
"
Hey. I like your Build so far. I tried it on my level 90 Witch with low level Gems and changed the Auras / Cwdt Setups a bit. Uber Lab was very easy, next try will be some T13 and T14 Maps with decent Mods.


First of all, thank you for the message. I am really glad that you enjoy the build. My main objective for this character is to do Uber lab, and I guess its a success as far as uber lab goes.

"
Can you tell us what Pantheon Powers you use or recommend?


Pantheon is totally flexible. I change them depending on the map mods, but my favorite will be the one that give you chance to avoid bleeding (Ralakesh) and the one that gives physical reduction and movement speed based on enemies around you (Lunaris).

"
you use Blasphemy Aura with Enfeeble, which gives a really strong Aura, but since we have no Evasion we don't really benefit from it in my Opinion


This curse is actually very flexible, since my gears are poor I chose enfeeble purely for the damage reduction and chance to crit and crit multi reduction from monster just to increase my survival chance with those giant bosses attacks. However, if your gears are really good, you can swap it for poacher marks + blasphemy or cwdt, you can run flammability or elemental weakness for that. Anger actually gives lesser damage than hatred because our build is not pure elemental build but instead a conversion build.
Thanks for your Answer. I actually made a Build in PoB just to see the difference between Anger and Hatred, and Hatred actually gives more to Sunder. I can also confirm that the Tooltip Damage of Molten Burst is higher aswell. (I thought it might be not because of the Fire Pen Gem)

One more Question: How did you come to choose the Support Gems for Molten Burst? Are you sure about those? When trying out in PoB I used Molten Strike (Magma Balls) for showing most Damage Gems after I put GMP in and the Tool would prefer Iron Grip over PPAD, but only for Total DPS, not fore Average Damage and Fire Penetration falls far behind (Avg. and Total). Im clueless :o



check your wording on the activation of paragon from formless inferno and crystal vault. it's not consistent between the two. I understood that both items would be defensive in that they both shift damage into elemental resistances instead of being pure phys. you're right that it's a good idea. It just wasn't worded as clearly as it could have and was confusing if someone didn't already know how those items work. The wording sounded like the helm contributes to your phys to fire conversion for weapon damage. Crystal Vault doesn't have the note about paragon. just consistency.

added to the listing, look forward to videos if you can manage it. solid and fun looking build. cheers.
Hot Flashes: poeurl.com/bPZT
Balance: poeurl.com/btzp
Shocking EleHit: poeurl.com/bZXo
"
Kwitch wrote:
check your wording on the activation of paragon from formless inferno and crystal vault. it's not consistent between the two. I understood that both items would be defensive in that they both shift damage into elemental resistances instead of being pure phys. you're right that it's a good idea. It just wasn't worded as clearly as it could have and was confusing if someone didn't already know how those items work. The wording sounded like the helm contributes to your phys to fire conversion for weapon damage. Crystal Vault doesn't have the note about paragon. just consistency.

added to the listing, look forward to videos if you can manage it. solid and fun looking build. cheers.


Wording fixed!!!
Thank you very much for including my build in the listing and the suggestions, its my first time writing guide and I really appreciate every help i can get. Once I dealt with my exams, Ill work on the video.
cheer!!
"
JTiYo wrote:
Thanks for your Answer. I actually made a Build in PoB just to see the difference between Anger and Hatred, and Hatred actually gives more to Sunder. I can also confirm that the Tooltip Damage of Molten Burst is higher aswell. (I thought it might be not because of the Fire Pen Gem)

One more Question: How did you come to choose the Support Gems for Molten Burst? Are you sure about those? When trying out in PoB I used Molten Strike (Magma Balls) for showing most Damage Gems after I put GMP in and the Tool would prefer Iron Grip over PPAD, but only for Total DPS, not fore Average Damage and Fire Penetration falls far behind (Avg. and Total). Im clueless :o






Hi again :)
Yep, Hatred just give more damage. I am not an expert but I think Anger is more beneficial to builds with flat fire damage e.g oro's sacrifice... but not as much to conversion ones, however, if you have enough life and resistance and can sacrifice one ring slot, you can add pyre to convert the other half of cold damage from Hatred and at the same time destroy the monsters on kill. It seems very useful against porcupines.

As for Iron Grip, its a good passive, but just use PPAD in the gem slot and put one point into Iron Grip in the passive tree, since it is not far from bloodless and unwavering stance which are the nodes we allocated.
Speeking of Iron Grip Passive, do you (or someone else reading this) know a Melee Projectile Attack, other than Frost Blades? I thought of Spectral Throw, but I am not sure if this would count as Melee Hit to trigger Molten Burst.

Also, you did not say something about Fire Penetration.. :o (or how you made up your Decissions about the Support Gems in the Axe)

I hope you don't get me wrong, I like your Build and that you decided to make it. I'd just like to have some help in finetuning.

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