[3.17] Wallach's Hierophant Freezing Pulse Totems (No Further Updates)

This is one of the fastest mappings builds to play. Not quite S-Tier, but very versatile.

Using Phase Run is very helpful to maximize clear speed. It not only makes you faster, but also decreases the amount of time it takes for a mob to react or engage you. We make use of that delay to place our totems and let them get a shot off. By the time the mobs react to us, they are either dead or chilled/frozen.

Finding the balance of aggressiveness takes a bit of practice, but since including phase run in my mapping setup, I haven't died once on juiced T15/16 maps.

Maps with long, narrow chutes are ideal for our build. The general pattern for me is to summon one or two sets of totems at max distance, flame dash halfway to them, flame dash to the edge (or even inside) the mob pack, hit phase run, go through the mob pack, and as I'm exiting, summon another set of totems. If the mob pack has a rare or high hp, I'll drop frostbite right before I hit phase run.

Hopefully, there is another pack nearby and I can repeat. If I hear any dings of good drops, I'll reverse, drop my totems at the edge of the new pack and flame dash to the previous one to pick up loot.

On especially larger packs or super-rippy maps, I'll pause for a second at the edge, letting my totems get one cast of bolts in before moving on.

On wide-open maps I do the same thing except that I'm more careful about not ending my phase run inside of a pack with unknown terrain. The only times I've ever been in danger of dying is when my phase run ends and I flame dash into a wall or edge.

Most of the rituals are extremely easy. I take the coward's way out and just hide in a corner behind my totems. For the first two rituals in a map, it's usually perfectly safe to just drop totems on the altar and run around until stuff is dead. For larger rituals, I find a spot at the edge where I have at last partial cover, then just drop totems in front of me, far enough that they have LOS to the altar, but close enough that they will instant target and kill/freeze anything that spawns next to me. The only time I move is to avoid beams, exploding fireballs, etc.

The above works on around 75% of rituals. For once where there is no cover, or where I revert back to just being highly mobile with liberal use of phase run.

This is by far the best build I've ever played for farming Legion encounters. Clear a wide area around the monolith, try and guess where the chests/generals will be based on available terrain, then cast your totems about 3/4 screen width apart, from outside in. The last totem cast should be right on the encounter, which you then activate and begin moving towards the area where you lack coverage. Drop frostbite curses as you move. After the encounter starts, wait 2 - 3 seconds for your outermost totem to finish killing everything in its range, then cast again. Move and repeat.

Watch your surroundings closely and don't waste time killing already activated statues. At the same time, don't spam your totem summons. As it will take a couple of seconds for your totems to kill the statutes, especially if you can't apply Frostbite.

I've been farming legion encounters for some amazing currency. Other than some instances where indoor terrain made it hard to maneuver, I've managed to activate/kill everyone in almost every encounter.

Blight encounters and maps are almost trivial. You can usually stack totems on your pump and never even bother building. But that's no fun. One of our biggest strengths is being able to do damage while moving. Place totems on the pump, then go around building whatever towers you want. Someomes I move the totems to target lanes, sometimes I just leave them around.

On blighted red maps, you have to be a little more involved with tower creation, but not much.

This one is a bit of a mixed bag. On open maps or large areas, we are amazing. When maps where the boss is not in a dedicated arena, I almost always kill him/her before they are even insight. Just drop totems, wait two seconds, pick up loot. Sometimes I'll dart in and throw frostbite and frost bomb, but for normal mapping bosses (even on red maps) that usually isn't needed.

For bosses with smaller arenas, it can be hard. Especially bosses that have unavoidable phases or high AoE. Chimera's smoke clouds are especially annoying, as you can't reveal them with your totems. Minotaur is fine as long as you avoid the slam. For these situations, controlled mobility is key. While mapping the name of the game is to always jump from pack to pack, as quickly as possible. Dial that back for small boss arenas. You want your movements to be more controlled, deliberately responding to something. Place your totems on the boss, pause, and plan out your next move. Maybe that is renewing a curse/frost bomb, or maybe it is flame dashing to a corner.

Our playstyle lets us learn boss mechanics easily, and we need that knowledge since we are basically glass cannons, able to survive at most one hit from a strong attack.

I'm reluctant to give this area a rating, as while I've completed almost all of the Maven content, it is still too new to get a feeling for difficulty. The regional 3, 4, 5, ... 10 boss fights are a walk in the park. Just place your totems on one of the boss spawn, drop curses, then move in the opposite direction. I think I died once on a semi-juiced 10-boss fight, but that was it.

Empowered (witnessed) encounters can be challenging, especially at lower DPS levels. Buffed Minitour was especially annoying and the fight took a long time because I kept having to lure the Minotaur into my totems.

One of the biggest issues people have with Maven content is the heal/regen she gives out. Thankfully this is a non-issue for us as we have very high DPS, and are already using frostbomb naturally in our setup.

The hardest fight is the four breach lords. The fight is phased, with two of them being released, and then 20 seconds later the other two. You absolutely want to take out at least one during the first phase. The problem is that Maven buffs him/her really hard. This is where knowing your damage rotation will become important. Understand what things contribute the most to your damage, and priority not wasting any actions.

I've only done this fight on white maps so far, and have completed it twice without dying. The other three or four times I would usually lose one portal to an AoE spell that I couldn't dodge.

Maven herself is great. Not quire Sirus levels of mechanics knowledge, but enough to make it interesting. There are a lot of insta-kills we need to avoid, but that is true for most builds that fight her. I didn't fight her until I already had ~20ex invested, and I had enough damage to keep the phases very short.

The only Maven content I haven't been able to complete is Maven buffed Uber Atziri. The flames manage to kill me every time, but I think that is more a matter of skill than the build. I also haven't tried since my last round of upgrades and I might have enough damage now to instant phase her.

Any kind of content that is designed for us to move to the mobs is going to be harder. Even with very high damage, I had trouble running a pure Chayula solo. The stutter-step of having to move/cast/move/cast, along with the slight delay between casting a totem and having it kill mobs, meant that to keep up with the timer I needed to dash/phase into packs instead of just being able to stay on the edges. Totem management is very important, as you need high APS to be able to stay ahead of the time (something I'm not great at).

Delerium is more of a personal weakness than it is the build. I know people have been running 100% T16 maps, but I never played in the league and haven't done much of its content. On normal delirious maps, I usually can only manage about 1/3 - 1/2 of the map before time runs out. Again, the stutter-step tyle of having to move/drop/move/drop, combined with needing to activate the pods, makes us less suited to this than other classes.

I haven't delved very deeply this league, but have done so in the past with a few different builds, and have played this one enough to anticipate how it will do. When sitting on nodes it does great. The nodes are just another ritual, with mobs coming to you. Just move to the edge of the encounter, clear anything behind you, then just sit there and ride out the encounter, keeping totems in front of you for protection.

The hard part is going to be escorting the cart. At mid and higher depths there is going to be a ton of damage coming at us and the only protection we have is to make sure we keep a rolling line of totems summoned, leapfrogging in front of the cart. It will be difficult to be able to race very far ahead, and so escorting will be kind of slow I thinl.

Rarity: Rare
Horror Thirst
Prophecy Wand
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Wand
Physical Damage: 35-64
Critical Strike Chance: 8.00%
Attacks per Second: 1.20
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Requirements:
Level: 68
Int: 245
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Sockets: B-B-B
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Item Level: 84
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Quality does not increase Physical Damage (enchant)
Grants 1% increased Area of Effect per 4% Quality (enchant)
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37% increased Spell Damage (implicit)
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+1 to Level of all Spell Skill Gems (fractured)
49% increased Spell Damage
29% increased Cold Damage
+38% to Global Critical Strike Multiplier
+1 to Level of all Cold Spell Skill Gems
68% increased Critical Strike Chance for Spells (crafted)
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Fractured Item
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Note: ~price 35 exalted