Marauder - [3.5] Tectonic Slam Berserker - Forum

Introduction
My main inspiration for this build is the rework to tectonic slam. As well, I wanted to see if Berserker is as bad as all the Reddit memes make it out to be. Finally, Razor of the Seventh Sun got a pretty solid buff, and I wanted to put it to the test as well. The result: an awesome build that has basically tackled all content in the game. It feels very flexible with quite respectable single target damage, good mobility through a variety of map layouts, and awesome pack clear.

I'm trying a slightly different format for this guide. I recorded 5 videos detailing different aspects of the build. I am going to try and summarize the information here in the forum post, but you can click on the related video to see a slightly more detailed explanation. Here's all 5 linked in a playlist.

Is this build for you?
This build has great AOE clear, respectable single target damage, and is fairly mobile. It does require the player to be actively engaged in buff management to maximize clear, damage, and tankiness. This video of a minotaur map clear should give you a decent sample of what it looks like in action.

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Archetype: Melee but AOE ground targeting instead of namelock.

Mobility: High movement speed and above average attack speed for movement skills. Gem link setup can be modified for better mobility on leap slam.

AOE clear: Exceptional pack clear for a melee AOE skill. Charged slams are insane and basically allow clearing of entire screens of trash monsters with ease. General mapping and delving is quite smooth with this setup.

Single target damage: Not the strength of this build, but completely respectable. It is high enough that Uber Elder feels reasonably comfortable to kill with it. Farming guardians and shaper is completely reasonable if you want to do that.

Hardcore viability/tankiness: Although I think with some modifications this build can be hardcore viable, I don't particularly recommend it. Honestly, it is pretty tanky, but because its tankiness relies a lot on proper management of temporary buffs it is prone to errors. I played HC exclusively for about 2000 hours, so I understand that mistakes will happen. That said, you could modify this build to make it less prone to such errors. The version I am going to lay out here is probably not the best choice for it though.

Ease of play: This build does require a lot of micromanagement. In addition to flasks management and fortify, this build also requires you pay attention to the following: endurance charge number, warcry buff effects, focus, and the availability of the instant heal from warcries provided by the berserker ascendancy. As well, I do not recommend using multistrike with this build, meaning that proper positioning and targeting is required.

Gem Setup
For a bit more detailed discussion of the gem setup, check out this video of me going through the gems and all their links.

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Tectonic slam
Combustion
Elemental damage with attacks
Melee physical damage
Added fire damage
Increased area of effect/concentrated effect

Vaal ancestral warchief
Ancestral protector
Multiple totems
Elemental damage with attacks/melee physical damage

Leap slam
Fortify
Endurance charge on melee stun
Stun

Herald of ash
Arctic armour
Purity of elements
Enlighten

Enduring cry
Rallying cry
Increased duration

Warlord's mark
Molten shell
Cast when damage taken

Passive Skill Tree/PoB
For a more detailed look at my choices on the passive tree, check out my video discussion.

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Passive tree on official site

POB pastebin - https://pastebin.com/8KRnTKcc

Gear
This video goes through my gear choices and discusses other gearing options.

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Leveling
This video describes gearing and passive tree routing during the leveling process in a bit more detail.

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Ascendancy order
War bringer
Crave the slaughter
Rite of ruin
Aspect of carnage

Leveling skills
Level 1 - Ground slam
Level 12 (optional) - Sunder
Level 28 - Tectonic slam

Useful leveling items
Standard leveling gear, but a couple of notable mentions aside from things like Goldrim and Screaming Eagles.

This amulet is really nice for ensuring high uptime on elemental overload before you can nab the boot enchant (increased crit chance if you haven't crit recently), get enough attack speed, and start doing maps with enough density.

This ring with a warlord's mark gem in it will solve a lot of sustain issues as well as help endurance charge generation once you switch to tectonic slam. Thankfully, you can get your first big ascendancy points right around the time you can start using tectonic slam as well.

Please, if you have any further questions or comments let me know; I would love some feedback. I hope this guide format makes it easy to get the information you want without having to go through a bunch of information that doesn't interest you. You can also find me streaming at https://www.twitch.tv/cowpimp to maybe see the build in action and ask me questions live. Cheers!

Check out my other guides here:
List of forum guides

PS - I've added a clip from my stream of me killing Uber Elder. This was done with a slightly modified setup, and I will try to record a better kill. Actually, this setup is worse for it than the one laid out in the guide above. Anyway, here it is by popular request on Reddit: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/369386226

Last edited by cowpimp on Jul 26, 2019, 5:04:34 PM

Last bumped on Jan 28, 2019, 2:34:15 PM