[3.13] Scarfuncle's Shield Charge Impaling Gladiator -Max Block, Great speed, Pack Explosions

OP here. If anyone is thinking of playing this build for the Mayhem league, I will be playing a crit-based version of this build so follow along if you would like.

I won't be playing this build for the delve event. Going solo in delve doesn't sound like fun for this build. Having access to Essence of dread and crafting is necessary and I don't think the delve event has easy access to either.

The build works great for Heist Flashback league. Keep on Shield charging folks!

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ok sry haha i play it again its so funny to play and sooo strong ^^ little question
Can you explain to me how I craft a shield from 1-
end game with which currency ? ^^

There guide explains this in the leveling through the acts section, beyond acts, and in the "shield" section of the gear. While you are mapping, Titucius' Span can get you from 30 to 62. After that, just buy the highest armour shields you can wear and afford from the market.

Here is a copy of the end game section on crafting

"

You want high armour – everything else is gravy. To craft your own super shield, buy an ilvl 86+ colossal tower shield and use a deafening essence of dread on it. Round this shield off with a craft for extra quality+int then for extra fun get Haku in research to improve quality even further. I think it is possible to get over 3000 armour on your shield. I’ve tested whether mods like “increased global phys damage” or “chance to deal double damage” can compare to extra quality, and quality wins every time.

If you're playing mayhem, you're going to have a difficult time getting a deafening essence of dread. or the quality craft. You need this to get a shield over 2000 armour. The market doesn't have them because people get to level 90 and quit.

If you're in Mayhem, just use Magna Eclipsis which you can craft for 6 chaos. It isn't great, but it got me to level 90 and tier 14 mapping. You may also be able to buy a better shield than it on the market if you sort by armour.

I reached level 90 and retired from Mayhem league. I had terrible gear but still kicked ass. It hurt not having the -mana cost craft, I will admit. I'm sure I could find it now, but on day 1 and 2 you can't find it in a little league like this. I used blood magic linked to shield charge (with impale, brutality, and fortify) and was doing Tier 14s like that. It's sloppy, but shield charge is forgiving and it was nice to not worry about mana. Call of Steel is so good for big Mayhem packs.

Keep shield charging, folks!

I ended up doing a gladiator version of this as well. I bowed out at 85 though because I wanted to take some time off before endless delve. I borrowed some concepts from the berserker version and my pathfinder version. Used an aegis aurora for the extra base crit and sustain, and aura stacking jewels to pump up pride, dread banner, precision, vitality, clarity, etc. Still used 2 -mana cost rings, but didn't need it on the ammy and mana wasn't a problem at all. I put the "effects enemy" auras in a 1c 5 socket victario's influence to avoid generosity and shield charge in pseudo 6-link gloves. Other auras went in an alpha's howl. Damage was just "ok" but good enough for yellow maps. It was really carried by the buffed up pride but didn't clear as well as my poison sc pathfinder (which cleared amazingly in heist due to poison prolif, but was mediocre on bosses without adds). I didn't have vulnerability auto cast so that would have obviously helped. ;)

It was super safe during harbinger encounters though. I actually glitched out crashing to the desktop because I would just shield charge into the middle of them (say at the end of trials) and end up with too many mobs on screen. I had iron reflexes but didn't even bother getting the last bit of reduced mana reserved needed to enable grace like I was planning! Has potential for next league if they don't nerf aura stacking I think.

For endless delve I'm seriously eyeing that starter shield for COC shield charge shenanigans. Too bad the base crit is 5%. The spell block and endurance charge generation on that thing are crazy.

@scarfuncle

Heya! I ended up doing a shield charge pathfinder again for endless delve despite the lack of an arakaali's fang and inability to craft/find a high armor shield. I was tempted to do some kind of CoC setup but was afraid I couldn't pull it off with the low base crit on that starter shield. I wasn't super happy about the slower clear speed of my glad in mayhem so I figured I'd experiment and fall back to viperstrike or toxic rain if it went terribly.

It went surprisingly well! I found a daresso's courage (great block but low dps) and had pathfinder poison prolif and plague bearer going. It would have been awful in anything but delve but between SC aoe, prolif, and the insane mob density, the low damage really added up once mobs start dying (and often I could sort of chain one pack to the next). Plague bearer took anywhere from about 1-5 seconds to recharge depending on how many mobs were around and adds something like 100K dps which is huge considering the lack of other options. As a results I could move around at ~180 depth pretty comfortably but harder mobs definitely weren't instant kills. I built uber tanky with lots of block/dodge and high regen with agnostic and vitality so that cut into DPS too.

I hit 92 yesterday and decided to call it there since I don't think I have it in me to push farther in the next 24 hours. I think this is the first time I've actually been listed on poe.ninja and it's pretty fun to have such a strange build actually succeed. :)

Making it on poeninja boards is an accomplishment! You worked hard for it and the glory is yours. Thank you for your report of an experimental shield charge model!

What's next for you in flashback? Are you going to redo your berserker or go a different direction? I played around with consecrated path a little yesterday but found it pretty underwhelming after zooming around with high speed shield charge.

Was hoping to league start with this. Shield charge got a small buff but Painforged lost the 40% damage increase so not sure how that balances out.

From patch notes:

Oh yes 40% dmg nerf is extrem Oo .