Thanks for making this guide.
A question though: If you go with an Aughild setup, and thus dropping APD, Azurewrath still continues to be the preferred offhand due to the Freeze procs from chains helping to clear trash right?
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Yeah that’s exactly what happened to me on PTR. I got 129 on frist try and spent 3 days fishing 130’s with no luck. At that point most mobs seem to become an obstacle.
Great guide Rage! Thanks for doing it! We need this sucker pinned.
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thx for this “how-to-slap-skeletons”-guide
Since all the Bastion’s chain hits can crit, I think your effective CHC will end up being pretty low. I’m not optimistic, but if you’ve got a good Broken Promises around, give it a try and see how it goes.
Sure.
Good point, I’ll have to fix that!
Yes, although in this case I guess EF will be even closer to AZ in potential, since you’re not getting the benefit of Freeze + APD. If you have good versions of each weapon, I would honestly try out both to see which one you like better. Sometimes, a particular piece of gear or skill is “mathematically” the best, but another is close enough, and fits your personal playstyle better, so that you are actually more effective at playing with that item/skill.
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Fantastic guide. I am a casual player. I will probably go up to only 1200 paragon and I aim for only solo GR 115-120. I have some questions.
- Given my modest goal, any specific advice, modifications for more casual players?
- Why swap shoulders specifically for Aughild? How about swapping head or torso?
- Is Ground stomp instead of FC viable? It gives a lot of direct stun. Mobility of this build is already pretty good.
- Any reasonable alternatives to swap Wrath OTB and Boon OBK out of this build? Then cooldown can be deprioritized as well.
Thank you again.
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Hey there, thanks for the kind words. Here are some answers for you:
1: I’d just go ahead and go with the “main” build to start with. I think the biggest problem you may run into is dying a lot, in which case, try some of the variants with higher toughness-- “Aughild”, “Aquilla/Unity”, and “I Want To Stand In Arcane Beams”, pretty much in that order. As you gain paragon, your toughness problem may be alleviated, and you can trade your toughness back out for more damage.
2: You can use any other piece with the bracers, but pants can roll 0 - 2 sockets and chest can roll 0 - 3, which makes it hard to craft good ones that have both max sockets and other good stats.
3: Sadly, I think Stomp will get you killed pretty quick. While your move speed with this build is quite good, it’s easy to get trapped by hordes of mobs, and without FC (or Leap), you’ve got no way to get thru them. Cue the slow-motion replay as that arcane beam spins around towards you as you try frantically to escape…
Very high paragon players (I would say 6000+) may have enough toughness that they could trade out War Cry for Stomp, but I would definitely not recommend this for you.
4: I think that a setup with WOTB and BOBK is always going to be the best for pushing, but if you really don’t want to use those, then swap BOBK for Juggernaut, to help mitigate your weakness to CC, and swap WOTB for Ground Stomp, to get extra damage from stun. Keep in mind that you’ll still want at least 20% CDR, or else you may have trouble keeping up BoM at times.
Thank you Rage for the quick and thoughtful reply. I will keep in mind all you said.
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Good point. I just ignored the possiblities of the followers. Well, I am not sure if there is more cc necessary than we got from Azure Wrath. But in fact the Templer offers quiet a few options.
But maybe you want to confirm the usage of the Enchantress, to reach the non-zerker BP. If the calculator I use is still valid (https://codepen.io/anon/pen/yOdVjd):
We need only 5% IAS on our gear to reach 7 FPA BP in Berserker mode (if we have 7% on Oathkeeper). But to reach 8 FPA BP w/o Berserker we need at least 12%. If we’re unlucky with our drops, we won’t have enough IAS to reach the BP’s. But the Enchantress might help us a bit and might get a better value than the Templer.
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Yes, I think your numbers are right.
Here’s what I’m seeing using D3 Planner (all these assume 10% in paragon):
7% on OK, nothing elsewhere: 9F Regular, 8F WOTB
7% on OK, Enchantress: 9F Regular, 8F WOTB
7% on OK, 5% Gloves, NO Enchantress: 9F Regular, 8F WOTB
7% on OK, 5% Gloves, Enchantress: 9F Regular, 7F WOTB
7% on OK, 7% Gloves, NO Enchantress: 9F Regular, 7F WOTB
7% on OK, 7% Gloves, Enchantress: 9F Regular, 7F WOTB
7% on OK, 5% Gloves, 5% Ring, NO Enchantress: 9F Regular, 7F WOTB
7% on OK, 5% Gloves, 5% Ring, Enchantress: 8F Regular, 7F WOTB
7% on OK, 7% Gloves, 7% Ring, NO Enchantress: 8F Regular, 7F WOTB
7% on OK, 7% Gloves, 7% Ring, Enchantress: 8F Regular, 7F WOTB
So yeah, with ideal rolls you don’t need the Enchantress, but if you are a bit less lucky with your AS rolls she can be helpful. I’ll mention this in the OP.
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If you want a quick cold% damage weapon, do not forget Utar’s Roar, crafted axe.
It’s gonna be an alternative to Azurewrath temporarily, and can roll with stun or freeze as a secondary…fyi…
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Question? Are AZ and EF applying too much hard CC?
Seems as if I lower the freeze-stun %, I get more time to hit the mobs without them going immune.
Asking for a friend…
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So I’m noticing that if you replace Azuwrath with Eun-Jang-Do you’ll be able to keep Str and get an entire break point 7.5 to 6.5.
Is that Str and break point worth it (you can still roll stun/freeze for secondary)?
Good thought!
Hmm, so DH asked a similar question the other day, and I was actually thinking further about my answer. It seems to me there are a few possible outcomes when you’re hitting an enemy with, say, multiple stuns.
1: The first stun takes effect, and subsequent stuns do nothing at all until the duration of that stun has ended.
2: The newest stun replaces all previous stuns.
3: All the stuns essentially “overlap” each other, and run concurrently.
CC resistance grows by 10% for every 1 second an enemy is under hard CC (to a cap of 95% resist), for all subsequent effects. That means that if you had an ability that stunned an enemy for 20 seconds, they should stay stunned for all 20 seconds, despite the fact that their immunity would grow to 95% after 10 seconds. Also, once a stun duration is under 0.65 seconds for trash + elites, or under 0.85 seconds for bosses, it has no effect at all.
So let’s look at what would happen if you had a 5 second stun ability, and were going to apply it once per second, using each of the models above.
1: “First Stun Only”
Second 0: CC immunity 0%, Stun applied, duration 5/5 seconds
Second 1: CCI 10%, Stun applied, no effect, original stun duration 4/5 seconds
Second 2: CCI 20%, Stun applied, no effect, original stun duration 3/5 seconds
Second 3: CCI 30%, Stun applied, no effect, original stun duration 2/5 seconds
Second 4: CCI 40%, Stun applied, no effect, original stun duration 1/5 seconds
Second 5: original stun expires
Second 5: CCI 50%, Stun applied, duration 2.5/2.5 seconds
Second 6: CCI 60%, Stun applied, no effect, 2nd stun duration 1.5/2.5 seconds
Second 7: CCI 70%, Stun applied, no effect, 2nd stun duration 0.5/2.5 seconds
Second 7.5: 2nd stun expires
Second 8: CCI 80%, Stun applied, duration 1/1 seconds
Second 9: 3rd stun expires
Second 9: CCI 90%, Stun applied, duration 0.5 seconds, below 0.65 second threshold, no effect.
Total stun time: 9 seconds, with a 0.5 second gap between second 7.5 and 8.0, so 8.5 seconds total.
2: “Newest Stun Only”
Second 0: CC immunity 0%, Stun applied, duration 5/5 seconds
Second 1: CCI 10%, Stun applied, duration 4.5/4.5 seconds
Second 2: CCI 20%, Stun applied, duration 4/4 seconds
Second 3: CCI 30%, Stun applied, duration 3.5/3.5 seconds
Second 4: CCI 40%, Stun applied, duration 3/3 seconds
Second 5: CCI 50%, Stun applied, duration 2.5/2.5 seconds
Second 6: CCI 60%, Stun applied, duration 2/2 seconds
Second 7: CCI 70%, Stun applied, duration 1.5/1.5 seconds
Second 8: CCI 80%, Stun applied, duration 1/1 second
Second 9: CCI 90%, Stun applied, duration 0.5 second, below 0.65 second threshold, no effect.
Total stun time: 9 seconds
3: “Overlapping Stuns”
Second 0: CC immunity 0%, Stun applied, duration 5/5 seconds
Second 1: CCI 10%, Stun applied, durations 4.5/4.5, 4/5 seconds
Second 2: CCI 20%, Stun applied, durations 4/4, 3.5/4.5, 3/5 seconds
Second 3: CCI 30%, Stun applied, durations 3.5/3.5, 3/4, 2.5/4.5, 2/5 seconds
Second 4: CCI 40%, Stun applied, durations 3/3, 2.5/3.5, 2/4, 1.5/4.5, 1/5 seconds
Second 5: CCI 50%, Stun applied, durations 2.5/2.5, 2/3, 1.5/3.5, 1/4, 0.5/4.5, 2.5/2.5 seconds
Second 6: CCI 60%, Stun applied, durations 2/2, 1.5/2.5, 1/3, 0.5/3.5 seconds
Second 7: CCI 70%, Stun applied, durations 1.5/1.5, 1/2, 0.5/2.5 seconds
Second 8: CCI 80%, Stun applied, durations 1/1, 0.5/1.5 second
Second 9: CCI 90%, Stun applied, duration 0.5 second, below 0.65 second threshold, no effect.
Total stun time: 9 seconds
So, you can see that if you have a stun you’re continuously reapplying, it doesn’t really matter very much which of these models operates, nor does it really hurt you that you keep reapplying it. The thing that builds up the CC immunity is the “time under hard CC”, not the reapplication of that hard CC.
The only time this effect really hurts you is if there is a specific window where it might be especially advantageous to have enemies under hard CC (for instance, when WOTB is active, or during a CoE cycle), but having a 5, 10, or 15% freeze chance on a weapon rather than 25% won’t really help, because in either case the effect is uncontrollable: during that “window” where you’d like to have the enemies under CC, you may well have built up a little bit less CC immunity, but you are also less likely to actually proc the CC you want during that window.
I hope this long-winded reply makes sense to your friend!
No, it’s not worth it. You gain 6.7% damage from the breakpoint but lose 6.9% damage from lower weapon damage. And 1000 STR is only worth as much as 20% Cold if you start with 7000 or less strength, which is not going to be the case for many players, for very long.
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Should Oathkeeper be in mainhand regardless of what second weapon? Please explain. Do I get attack speed on both weapons if I wanna RGK in group?
Cleared 123 with about 16.5k STR… took 3 or 4 keys. I can definitely feel the “damage wall” getting close…
Shouldn’t matter which hand Oathkeeper is in. Don’t bother with IAS on your offhand, it’s hard to get to the next breakpoint without dropping tons of other stats.
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All depends on which weapon the skeletons fear most, eh?
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What I the duration of the first proc of freeze for Azuwrath before cc effects, if you happen to know?
I don’t know, it’s easy to test though-- just go whack a few skeletons with Azurewrath and count the seconds they’re frozen. I think all “Freeze on hit” secondaries, including the one on Azurewrath, will probably share the same duration.
Got it. Will test it tomorrow.
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