[Guide] Zodiac Rend (Season 20)

Don’t know, doesn’t matter. Parthans is BIS bracer by a mile when pushing.

For pushing?

Probably not. The value of FOT in push builds remains to be seen, but betting on the new item means betting on even more fishing–you’ll need 2 perfect pylons to make up for all the DPS stats you’ve lost.

Etlitch shouldn’t be your end-game amulet. Hellfire is likely still the best unless you get a perfect PHYS/CHC/CHD Flavor of Time.

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  1. Ok got it… I was kinda happy because I already got Primal APD and don’t want to replace it :D.

  2. About the amulet yeah… its very hard to get that perfect roll for FoT. I have to reforge it to get the required gem socket >< (Why can’t Bliz give all the legendary amulet and rings that drop a gem socket roll). I will still be on the lookout for hellfire then.

Thanks, appreciate your work!

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Don’t be so sure of that, the 50% DR and life per wrath spent from Mort’s are actually really really good. You know I love (and I mean love) Parths and the interaction with secondaries but I think Mort’s are the equal in DR because it’s always up. They’re better on RG for sure.

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I’m 100% positive that Parthans are better. There is no cap to their DR stacks, which means in extreme density–the kind the build needs to push end-game content–Parthans makes you functionally invulnerable from time to time. Even when you take a little damage, just 4 frozen enemies in range is already on par with Mortick’s.

Mortick’s is fine for speed-farming, low GRs, and content where you don’t need to dial everything in to full optimization. But when you truly push, nothing comes close to Parthans. Yes, Mortick’s offers more DR vs some RGs (those without adds), but that’s not where this build truly struggles in terms of survival. Once you have 800k+ Life, you don’t worry too much about RG hits.

Against RGs with adds? Parthans is, again, much more powerful than Mortick’s.

Some of y’all need to get off the Mortick’s hype train.

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Why do people keep bumping an outdated guide…

The guide is current for Season 18 so I don’t understand your statement. The speed farm section maybe could use a little polish with the Crimson’s set but overall the push build section of this guide is fine.

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Got it up in Dfans my friend. Beefy

https://www.diablofans.com/builds/104918-s18-zodiac-whirlwind

2 more days and I can finally post real links.

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Awesome, bud! Thanks for the support!

And don’t worry about Bagboy up there. Plain old troll.

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Hey Free,

Sorry if I missed it in the guide – but is EF in the cube + Trapped (or another legendary gem) instead of Pain enhancer + Furnace at all viable?

Thanks for all the hard work, as always.

It was posted on 2 months ago. Im pretty sure there’s a much better build using 6W/3C and EF in cube.

Free thinks everyone is a troll. Im sorry you dont have a life outside of a video gane forum.

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Free only thinks you are a troll when in fact you are a troll.
In response to Veldrenas, EF in cube creates alot of options for speed runs “only”.
you can literally run trapped instead of gogok or PE if you have an optimal build. I have done extensive testing with both nems/pride and mortiks/witching hour and both produce the same times. It just depends on your needs and gear availability. Run what makes you happy!!! If you are pushing free’s guide is still the best to follow.

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I ran the Guide for several seasons and it did well. Only thing I never like was Parthans. I never got the consistent DR from them. When fighting in density I would be invulnerable for a while then dead the next second. I eventually went away from them but that is me, the rest of the guide is solid for S17.

For season 18 I would think Flavor of Time has to be the best amulet. What would you rather have double the time on Power, condo and speed or 20% dibs?

I also think Captain Crimson needs to be considered in season 18. Up to 69% increase in damage all the time compared to 200% damage increase 25% of the time. There are situations where burst is preferable but in a long fight against the RG CC will win out. The extra damage resistance is nice as well. Not saying for sure that it is best for season 18 but it should have more consideration. Yesterday I jogged through a 105 with CC in 10 minutes not gather density and not a good gr.

Also I think EF may work for pushing. With the EF bonus going Anything less than 34 mobs EF does as good or better than PE. Throw in Trapped and your damage is only going to increase unless you have some ungodly number of mobs in the 200 range. If you look at the issue with the RG without adds, you still have Trapped compared to Furnace.

I think before someone pushes with these new items it is too soon to discount them. Not sure if I will push this build again but personally I like Mortick with the damage/defense bonus of Captain Crimson over Parthans with CoE.

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I acknowledge that you’re expressing your opinion on Parthans, but I want to clarify for newer players: Parthans offers way more DR than any other bracer or item. The DR doesn’t cap, meaning you can be literally invulnerable in density if only for a short time. Of course, using Parthans requires CC immunity management. This is why we made our Lamentation recommendations in the proposal.

Yes, of all the new items, Flavor or Time will likely become the best amulet for pretty much any build that doesn’t require Endless Walk. It still doesn’t represent a buff, though, and it’s reliance on Pylons means that GRs with bad Pylons means far less DPS and utility over a Hellfire, which makes the build even more reliant on fishing.

Nice for speed-farming or low GR gem ups, but not for pushing. COE’s burst damage on Wrath > Crimson’s.

It remains to be seen, but I don’t think it will be viable past a certain point–say, GR 115-120+. Until that point, it will offer more DPS throughout the rift, particularly as Bloodshed and AD quickly rack up the kills. But as mob HP increases along with kill time, EF’s bonus becomes harder to maintain, even in proper density. In addition, that extra 50% vs elites and RGs is going to mean a lot more as mob HP scales upward. When you have some elites in density and they’re getting pummeled by Dust Devils, AD, and Bloodshed, that extra elite damage is significant.

On the flip side, can it be made up by dropping PE and using Trapped? On average, most players will get between 40-50% increased damage against from the gem, and EF might make up the necessary attack speed for Zodiac. The problem is that outside density or vs the RG, your Zodiac procs may be insufficient resulting in more and more downtime on IP and Wrath. That, as you well know, will likely kill a push, since the only RG that will continuously spawn sufficient numbers of adds is Saxtris (and we’re already praying for him every push).

We won’t know for certain until someone wastes 500 keys pushing 125+ with the various setups, but I suspect that push build as outlined in the OP is going to be more consistent and reliable.

It’s likely that those who play casually with WW will also prefer the Crimon’s variant, but I’m confident that those who want to push end-game content will do far better with the classic build.

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You should give it a whirl. If you can, record some video too while you’re at it. Definitely worth a watch.

I think this amulet is actually going to have kind of an odd effect on fishing. It’s true that with it equipped, you’d be relatively worse off in a rift with less pylons, so in that sense you’ll certainly have to fish more. But with doubled durations, some things that would have been problems before will be less so now, and as a result, I think you’ll actually have to fish less. For instance, if you come across a conduit at the end of a map, with only one or two elites around, with FoT, you can zap them to death, and then probably have enough time to head to the next level and possibly zap another pack or two.

So, I think it will change the “character” of your fishing a bit, but I don’t know that you’ll actually need to fish more.

As for losing the hellfire and probably Brawler as a result, that’ll cost you somewhere between 7.5% and 10% damage, depending on how high your Taeguk is leveled and whether you’re using Falter.

I’m pretty dubious about EF as well, though I’m definitely not certain. It does seem like when you’re pushing at a high level, you’re not killing many enemies until you’ve assembled them into a big pile. And the EF bonus doesn’t last for long. Now, once you’ve got that pile made and you’re ready to start grinding them away, you may well get good returns from EF… I still think you’ll need PE, though, otherwise you may not get enough Zodiac procs to keep your skills cooled down (particularly when you are still in the “grouping” phase, rather than the “killing” phase). Though, if you’re using CC, you will have that extra CDR… hmm, well, like I said, I’ll look forward to seeing video.

Hmm, I don’t know that I’d say WW actually deals “burst damage” in the way that R6 HOTA or COE Leapquake do. Because with WW you’ve got Wrath up all the time, and once you’ve assembled your pile of enemies with Spear, you’re more or less continuously dealing damage to them till they’re dead.

Anyway, lots of stuff for somebody to try.

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If you look at the top pusher Worboss, he spends a lot of time gathering density then just stands there and fights in it for and extended period of time. There isn’t really a dashing back and forth like in R6 HotA where only short bursts of damage are needed.

To me that mean Average damage is > than burst damage. If CC doesn’t get you 50% increase then CoE will do more damage in the long run.

Also if you look at my build with CCs I get 50% damage reduction for Mortick, 5k LPFS and an additional 37% damage reduction from CCs. True that Parthan can be better but I don’t think it sustains better.

Also because you stack CDR to get a bigger damage bonus for CCs you don’t need any stacks from EF to keep up your zodiac proc.

Guys, don’t get hung up on semantics. I don’t mean burst damage as in “burst,” the kind of damage dealt in R6 HOTA. I mean that during your DPS Cycles, as described in the OP, you sync Wrath to Physical when you’ve grouped density, and you spend the other cycles re-grouping or re-positioning.

Blood Funnel + Ignorance is Bliss is all the sustain you need if you play the build properly. As for mitigation, it’s close but Parthans + IP is better: 50% + scaling DR based on density > 37% + 50%. The latter is more consistent vs single-target RGs, yes, but worse against RGs with adds and worse in the kind of rifts for which you fish: ultra-dense.

For those experienced with the build, dying isn’t the problem with WW. If dying is your problem, you aren’t playing the build properly. This is, when played properly, one our tankiest builds provided you carefully monitor monster CC immunity.

Saying that COE only provides an average of 50% damage is true in a sense, but fails to paint the picture about what happens in that 5 second Physical window: your Dust Devils, AD, and Bloodshed go up, up, up! As noted above, this isn’t true burst damage a la Star Pact or R6 HOTA, but that doesn’t much matter.

Let’s talk about CDR, because getting those rolls, in my opinion, hurts more than it helps. The easiest roll is on shoulder where you can still have AD, but on gloves, you’ll have to roll off Strength or some other DPS stat to get them. A good flavor or time provides another roll, but getting it on rings means giving up even more DPS stats (except the Zodiac ring where we already have it as our lone CDR roll). You can swap IAS for CDR on weapons, which is how we used to roll swords, but with the BK swords, that means you will have less Zodiac procs, and IAS provides DPS, however minor.

Yeah, I don’t see the Crimson’s variant being viable in higher GRs. I’m open to being wrong–maybe someone like Arch can test both variants out in GRs 115-130 and tell us his experiences, but I’m confident the classic build is going to remain the best for pushing.

If you go with CC you still get blood funnel and IP Ignorance is bliss along with morticks. Nothing changes with active skills.

Agreed with the dieing part. Most of the time people die is because they spam the keys and don’t hit IP at the correct time.

Someone is going to have to show me a clip of how to properly monitor mob CC immunity. When you have density you cannot see the individual mobs and you don’t have any icon that pops up. Working with Parthans is purely faith based, there is no way to know when they are going to fail other than an innate feeling that I need to move on after “x” amount of seconds which it turns out I don’t have.

As for CDR if you play long enough you get all the gear. I have CDR on multple gloves and it comes standard on Flavor of Time. Yes you may have to hunt for gear but it doesn’t take as long as it takes to get freeze on hit.

When looking at break points with full EF bonus, it didn’t make much difference in DPS if you had CDR on your weapons or IAS. If you have Attack speed you get one more break point so it turns out to be a push. I stuck with CDR so it is easier to hit IP at the correct time.

My comment was solely in regards to Parthans > Mortick’s.

There’s no icon, but you can judge it as follows (I should probably expand this and add to the OP):

  1. Freeze is a hard CC and will only work, per mob, about 3-4 times before they go functionally immune. However, that assumes a mob was frozen, which may not happen as it usually only has a 2-5% change to happen (based on secondary belt roll).
  2. Generally speaking, you can get 2 Physical COE cycles in before mobs are going immune if given proper density. Even then, not all of the density will be immune–just enough that you’ll start taking damage.
  3. CC immunity starts to wear off when a monster is not struck by a hard CC, its resistance drops 5% per second. This occurs when you move away to find new density and before you pull it with you. Rage Flip counts as hard CC, so you have to be accurate with your pulls.

If you have the necessary 3-4 screens of density grouped together, you’ll be practically invulnerable for 2 Physical COE cycles. As mobs die and/or go CC immune, you’ll start taking damage. Good rules of thumb:

  1. When you start taking heavy duty damage spikes, get out and find new density.
  2. When you’re fighting less than 2 screens of density, get out and find new density.

The breakpoints don’t matter. We don’t worry about those in the build. We’re only concerned with getting enough Zodiac procs because PE gets us the breakpoints in density.

Isn’t Wrath always up? It certainly is in density. Maybe it’ll sometimes drop against single target RGs, but that’s about it. And once you’ve gathered a big pile of density, you’re sure as heck not going to kill them within a 4 second CoE window, or even a full 16 second cycle.

Anyway, I’ll wait to see some video before making up my mind.

Negative. When you’re gathering density or moving between floors, it goes down, and you’ll likely also experience a little downtime vs certain RGs. You won’t kill all the density in 2-3 COE cycles, but you’ll likely kill enough to move on and create new clusters into which you drag the remnants.

You have to budget your Zodiac procs between IP and Wrath. IP can never go down. Wrath only needs to be up when you’re ready to DPS, and then it’s easy to maintain perma.