[3.3] Sunder Zerker || FAST - Cheap - Great DPS || SSF Friendly
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INTRODUCTION
It feels like the perspective on Berserkers after the 3.2 changes has been fairly down. The ascendancy might not enable super unique play styles, but if you are looking for a extremely SOLID & FUN melee experience in POE give Zerker a try. The play style is active and requires management of flasks (piano), and abilities. Berserker as an ascendancy fundamentally exchanges defense for increases in offense. So we need to round out our character in other ways. My intention for this build was a SSF viable, Safe and Fast mapper so I could push ladder weekend warrior style. Dying at higher levels sets you back significantly, so I designed the character to have a nice balance. A choice of movement skills allows you to suit the playstyle to whatever type of maps you prefer, be they indoor or outdoor. The build is also EXTREMELY flexible with gear and you really feel each upgrade.(Something I personally miss with a lot of the overpowered builds) With good gear, i'm sure the build can kill guardians and shaper but sunder is more of a clearing skill so it will feel bad. We scale physical damage while making use of Added as %x Element on gems and gear. Primary defenses are layered and include: High Life Pool Evasion Blind Block Dodge Armour Fortify Flat % Physical Mitigation I play a significant amount of HC, after maxing out this character I can say if you choose to take a few extra HP nodes over DMG the build is acceptable. BUT the ascendancy itself heavily leans towards offense so you do sacrifice defense (You are not playing a Jugg here, don't expect to face tank everything) If you utilize this guide Please Showcase your character’s gear in this thread. It is great feedback for others to learn from! VIDEO T14 - Leap Slam with a Stat Stick T11 - Whirling Blades with Bisco’s Leash & Prismatic Eclipse Example of Degen OVERVIEW Pros: + Easy Damage Scaling + FAST + Feels Smooth to Play + SSF Friendly + Cheap to Gear + No League Specific Uniques Required! Cons: - Unable to Run Reflect Maps & No Regen mods - Less Recovery is Annoying GENERAL PLAYSTYLE Pop blood rage (once is all you need), piano your flasks, Leap Slam into a pack and go ape shit. Use your warcry to heal yourself and keep up endurance charges when needed. The warcry setup also gives a nice healing effect for 3 seconds. When you encounter a particularly tanky rare or dangerous situation use your Vaal Grace and throw down a totem. The Vaal Grace lasts 10 seconds so it has a very high uptime in general. DEFENSE While Koam’s roots are great I have one big pet peeve with them. Unwavering Stance Blind is one of the most broken mechanics in the game. The combination of: Blind on Hit Vaal Grace Setup Flasks These really are the core of the build. Everything else is flexible. Mobs will have a pretty tough time hitting us in the first place. If they do we have 10k armour, 27% Flat Phys mitigation, Fortify and Arctic Armour to help cut dmg from our large health pool DEGEN With a Marble Amulet and tree alone we can sustain 50 rage stacks. To sustain 50 stacks + Blood Rage we also need the 2% boot enchant and a stone golem. I usually skip over the stone golem since it is more a pain to upkeep. GEAR REQUIRED -Some Cheap Flasks -Blind on Hit Jewel -Vaal Grace EXAMPLE GEAR This was my gear in the SSF Flashback race. While not amazing, I would say it was pretty good. All of this is easily obtainable through crafting or on POE.Trade
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SKILL TREE Path Of Building Ascendancy Points: Aspect of Carnage -> Crave the Slaughter -> Rite of Ruin -> War Bringer Bandits: Kill All Pantheon: Soul of Lunaris & Soul of Tukohama --Provides a flat % of Phys mitigation and % Regen LEVELING TREES
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(20 Passives)
--I chose to go for the DPS nodes out of marauder and respecced them later once I got the axe wheel. If you don't feel like doing that, start from the 40 Passive Tree. (40 Passives) (60 Passives) (92 Passives) --The 90 Passive tree is where you should be if you farm blood aqueducts for a tabula before killing Kitava. (END TREE) --Once you get a Soul Taker or mana leech jewel drop the mana/life leech on the right of Golem’s Blood and Go for Splitting Strikes ****Flex Points**** --If you get a Poacher’s Mark ring, drop Primal Spirit --If you are ok with flask only leach, drop Splitting Strikes for whatever you want --If you use Haemophilia think about picking up the bleed chance near BloodLetting for more consistent explosions. SKILL TREE EXPLANATION Resolute Technique - We are not scaling crit, so RT is the only way to go. It allows for more budget friendly build options. Druidic Rite | Primal Spirit - Flasks are incredibly powerful. Much of our defense comes from flasks. These two nodes make flask management more comfortable. Dervish | Weapon Artistry | Aspect of the Panther - Solid DPS nodes and give great block chance while dual wielding. Sanctity | Combat Stamina | Warrior’s Blood | Master of the Arena | Heart of Oak | Golem’s Blood - The build has 10% degen when labs points are specced. These nodes help cover a significant portion of the life loss. All other nodes enhance our Damage, Attack Speed and Life. GEAR EXPLANATION
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JEWELS REQUIRED Get two jewels with % Blind on hit Jewels are our flex slots and used to fill out any resists or stats we may need. Try and pick up good three stat jewels with Life + 2 relevant mods. (My jewels for the race were crap but here are some examples) Stat priority: Blind on Hit Life -- % or Flat Flat Physical Damage % Attack Speed % Physical/Axe/One Handed Damage Unholy Might on Kill Resists / Stats Needed FLASKS Flasks are super powerful and a cornerstone of the build. We need to make sure that the suffixes include: Stauncing | Warding | Heat Catalyzed Eternal of Staunching - I tried instant flasks but they just don't heal much of our massive health pool. This flask along with the mods on Belly & Bloodgrip make it feel pretty great. Make sure the life flask gets the staunching mod. Chemist’s Basalt Flask of * - 15% Phys mitigation is amazing. Make sure it is a Chemist’s and you can get two activations out of the flask. (Can swap Warding & Heat Suffixes) Jade Flask - Adds a nice amount of evasion, in tandem with the blind makes the build feel super smooth in combat. The prefix can be whatever you desire, I like extended duration since it has two uses on it already. (Can swap Warding & Heat Suffixes) This flask is just super cheap, has bonkers DPS, 2% leech and the chaos Resist is nice. If you want to use only flasks for leech it can save you a ton of points on the tree. These two can be interchangeable. If you are in need of DPS go with the Lion’s Roar. It is a massive 25% more multiplier. If you are feeling comfortable on DPS but want some additional defense go with the Rumi’s. WEAPON BIS The BIS would of course be some mirror tier shaper axe. Playing in SSF I decided to use my chance orbs on a Soul Taker. It has solid DPS and allows us to fully reserve our mana. If you are unable to obtain one a crafted rare will do fine but you will need to drop arctic armour. Stat Needed on Rare Axe: %Phys Flat Phys % Increased Attack Speed OFF-HAND BIS BIS is debatable. If you want massive DPS go with a stat stick. If you want to zoom zoom with good DPS go with a 3 green socket Prismatic Eclipse HELM If you want a cheap way to massively boost your DPS pick up an Abyssus. It will make you squishier but it is an option. Otherwise just a rare helm with: Stat priority: Life Resists CHEST BIS Belly gives us the most life along with resists. A Loreweave is pretty nice if you can get a well rolled one and make up the resists/life elsewhere. If you can't afford a Belly anything with life and resist will do. I was stubborn and used a tabula until lvl 90 when I crafted a decent chest. GLOVES BIS The bleed explosions help pack clearing significantly. If your are comfortable with only flask leech, drop Splitting Strikes and grab the extra bleed chance near Bloodletting. Any gloves with Life and resists will do if you can't get Hemophilia. Flat phys and attack speed are a nice to have. Spike gloves are a good base to craft on. Stat priority: Phys Life Attack Speed Resists BOOTS HIGHLY RECOMMENDED BIS - Regenerate 2% of Life and Mana per second if you were Hit Recently Get the Lab enchant they are much easier to self farm than helm enchants since the pool is smaller. If you can't farm uber, go for the Merciless 1.5%. Movement speed doesn't really matter since we will be using Leap Slam / Whirling Blades Stat priority: Life Resists AMULET BIS I love this amulet since its cheap, has all the stats we need and makes bleed a non issue. Alternatively you can go big budget rare shaped Marble amulet Stat priority: Phys Life Gain % as an Element Resists RINGS BIS Pickup some steel rings with the basic stats needed to boost your DPS. I happened to chaos spam into a Poacher’s Mark on hit ring. Not necessary at all, but it does allow you to drop blood rage and still have frenzy charges(lose the bloodrage attack speed bonus). It also increased flask charges gained which is the real feels good part of why I kept using it. Not necessary, just nice to have. Stat priority: Phys Life Int (if needed) Resists BELT The belt is my favorite slot of the build as it is so customizable. I love all the unique choices. -Intimidate is a nice DPS boost -This belt pretty much gives us permanent uptime on Fortify & Onslaught (Normally these are conditional buffs we have) -The Zoom Zoom option, if you love to go fast, this belt is awesome! You can craft some fancy shaped/elder belt if you want or just a plain old rare with lots of life Stat priority: Life Resists Reduced Charges Used LINKS AND GEMS Main DPS Setup: Sunder->Maim->Melee Physical Damage->Multistrike->Ruthless->Concentrated Effect --If you are on a 5 link feel free to drop Ruthless or Conc depending if you have the required INT. Vaal Grace Setup Vaal Grace->Faster Casting->Increased Duration --Lowering the cast speed makes using Vaal Grace feel way better. Use it when hopping into a big group of dangerous mobs or bosses. Utility Setup Blood Rage->Enduring Cry->Blood Magic->Increased Duration CWDT Setup CWDT->Enfeeble->Immortal Call --I leveled up the CWDT to the point where is procs at 1.5k hp. This allows us to keep our endurance charges more often vs little pokes to our health pool. If you have less life, keep it at a lower lvl. Mobility Setup Leap Slam(Whirling Blades)->Fortify->Faster Attacks->(Blood Magic OR Endurance Charge on Melee Stun) --The Endurance charge on melee stun is a nice QOL gem to help keep up your charges. --You will always be able to leap slam around, if you are using a Sword/Claw in the offhand you will be able to use whirling blades. Personal Preference, but the choice is nice. If you don't have a Soul Taker you will need to use Blood Magic on your movement skill. Aura Setup & Other Hatred - Gives us a ton of added cold damage Herald of Ash - Mostly used for the overkill proc. This helps significantly with straggler cleanup Arctic Armour - Helps offset the increased Physical damage taken Ancestral Warchief / Ancestral Protector - We don't support them with gems so it is personal preference. Damage vs Speed. (I love the sound of high AS sunder) Stone Golem - I hate casting golems, its needs blood magic attached so I don't really use it. If you want to lvl up your CWDT to 20 you can attach the golem to that setup. **NOTE: Using a prismatic eclipse will make the sockets a bit more fiddly since it is a mandatory 3 green. I will leave that to you.** LEVELING These are my racing notes, and should make for a streamlined leveling guide.
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Make an extra Duelist - Grab all gear to sell for wisdoms - Check for Movespeed boots - Grab Molten strike from quest Level 1 -Check for Movespeed boots +Cleave, 2 iron rings, rustic sash +Chance to bleed gem +Get quicksilver flask - Post Quest Level 4 +Protector + Ruthless --- Before Brutus -Pickup weapon swaps to lvl support gems Level 8 +Added Fire --- After Brutus Level 12 +Sunder + Leap Slam Level 16 +Herald of Ash + Melee Phys + Conc Effect + Faster Attacks --- After Chamber of Sins & Weaver +Blood Rage --- Upon entering Vaal Ruins Level 24 +Hatred --- Post Tolmans corpse Level 28 +Warchief --- Post General Gravicius +Blood Magic + (Fortify) --- Library Level 34 +Stone Golem --- Post Voll Level 38 +Multistrike + Brutality--- Post Malachai Cruise to Blood Aqueduct LINKS: Sunder -> Onslaught -> Chance to Bleed Sunder -> Onslaught (Faster Attacks) -> Chance to Bleed -> Melee Phys Leap Slam -> Faster Attacks -> Blood Magic -> Fortify Warchief -> Faster Attacks -> Brutality or Melee Phys FLASKS: Get a Stibnite OR Granite ASAP Last edited by PelicanOfWar#5007 on Aug 29, 2018, 2:23:20 PM Last bumped on Sep 5, 2018, 1:52:18 PM
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nice bro, zerker back))
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Thanks for the first comment!
This is my first build guide, so any criticism is welcome. Will try and get some Shaper videos up now that the leagues have migrated. I hit rank 5 Berseker playing pretty casually. It was my first time playing SSF and Racing. Fun experience, would recommend it! Last edited by PelicanOfWar#5007 on May 30, 2018, 10:56:32 AM
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solid guide bro! So for this league do u have any suggestion for this build in ssf(mechanics stuffs)?
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" Thanks! The build is a solid template for any melee skill. I am currently picking up some melee gear in SSF and will try out the new double strike. My biggest tip while lvling in SSF is just do the rustic sash recipe and keep your weapon up to date. That along with the 40% more damage from the first lab will easily carry you into maps. Otherwise I am not to sure what you mean by mechanics. Nothing changed in 3.3 except for Vaal Grace. You only really needed it in sketchy spots so the cool down doesn't affect us really. Last edited by PelicanOfWar#5007 on Jun 6, 2018, 10:48:53 AM
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Have you killed shaper with this build?
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" The build was designed as a mapping character, so it is not really a high priority right now. I do mention in the original post sunder just feels pretty bad for end game bossing in general anyways. Especially with the new league out, want to try out Vaal Doublestrike with the build. This skill should do much better with end game bosses. Last edited by PelicanOfWar#5007 on Jun 8, 2018, 10:07:01 AM
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I also don't mind doing gear checks if people need help and can use some advice.
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Looks like a really solid build, you know it's easy to make a build with a full list of key items, but making a build that works with no gear is much more challenging and you have done that here.
When you say SSF does this also include HC ? |
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" HCSSF is the ultimate test and while I think its totally fine. Some players will feel uncomfortable since you don't have the same level of tankiness early on compared to other ascendancies. The build hits it stride in the late 70s and early 80s once you start to fill out the tree with life nodes and get some decent gear. There is that early teething period in maps while you are gearing up your character that it is possible to die if you do not play carefully. So my black/white answer would be... If you have a reckless playstyle and play HC, probably not for you. If you have a more cautious approach to HC (Thats how I play), jump in an have fun. |
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