[3.3] Fiery Shockwaves, Totems Galore (HC/SC, cheap, beginner-friendly)

Overview

This chick can cast up to four Shockwave Totems and is making use of Avatar of Fire, Hrimsorrow and Cold to Fire support to achieve 100% Physical to Fire Damage conversion.

Because of its very high health pool and safe play style, this build may appeal especially to beginners. Those nasty one-shots can be very discouraging, there's little worry here. It doesn't use complicated mechanics nor does it require in-depth knowledge. Few items are mandatory and they're dirt cheap. With a 6-link body armour and a somewhat decent Sceptre we're talking around 30 Chaos, give or take. The build is using Blood Magic and health is sustained via Life Regeneration and Totem leech so popping flasks is rarely necessary (anti-freeze flask to open strongboxes, some damage-boosting flasks at bosses is all really).



(FIVE totems? Lucky screen shot ;)

Pros

It's a Totem build
Beginner-friendly
Budget-friendly
Tanky as phook (8k+ HP, lots of regen and Totem leech)
Safe & lazy play style

Cons

It's a Totem build
Not a DPS "multi-millionaire"
Elemental reflect map mod is a pain and better be avoided unless you want to sacrifice a blue gem for Minion/Totem Resistances.


Keystones

Ancestral Bond
Avatar of Fire (obsolete with Xoph's Blood)
Blood Magic (can be refunded with Tukohama's Fortress but the 35% increased max life beyond BM are really juicy so I recommend to keep BM)
Elemental Overload


Required Uniques

Hrimsorrow
Essence Worm


Optional Uniques



Ascendancy




Leveling




Bandits




Skill Trees




Gem Setup




Gear Choices




My Current Gear




Enchantments



Jewels




Flasks



Pantheon




Final Notes

I have played this build as Chieftain in Abyss League. Atziri and Uber Izaro are a walk in the park. The Guardians were easy enough, Shaper took me a while, a "Shaper farmer", however, it is not.

The Chieftain does have some perks, namely Totem Taunt and Fire Immunity (reflect is no longer an issue) at the expense of one totem. Due to the Acendancy changes Hrimsorrow, Cold to Fire and Hatred do no longer work, so use Anger instead. But you really want Watcher's Eye with "Gain xx% of Physical Damage as Extra Fire Damage while affected by Anger" to make up for the loss of Hatred. The Chieftain skill tree is very much the same except you don't want to take the Frost Walker notable.

A crit version of this build is certainly possible, but it will be a lot less tanky and more expensive to gear.


P.S. This is my first guide, so go easy on me if I have missed something. ;)

[reserved]

10/3/18: Skill tree section updated with "Path of the Templar".

Hey, will you be posting a video anytime soon? Always been interested in Shockwave Totem builds.
Also... Pros/Cons for chieftien vs Scion? I know you mentioned a few things in the Final Notes.

Thanks!

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kpshyazn написал:

Hey, will you be posting a video anytime soon?

I'm afraid this ain't gonna happen, my old potato of a computer isn't really cut out for video capture. Sorry 'bout that... not much to see anyway since there is little animation going on with Shockwave Totems. Over-sized dildos, very FPS-friendly! ;)

Here's a SWT Chieftain video (in Russian):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zouCvFMUpNY

He's using The Cauteriser so he's got only two totems and can't use Shield Charge, the video is most likely from 3.0 since Belt of the Deceiver has been nerfed in 3.1 (Intimidate no longer works for spells). Now, Shield Charge and three or even four totems will improve clear speed quite significantly.

"

kpshyazn написал:

Always been interested in Shockwave Totem builds.

By default Shockwave Totems deal only physical damage which doesn't really cut it for spell casters who rely a lot on elemental damage boost and this is where conversion comes into play. I've played a SWT Inqisitor in 2.3 or 2.4 with Physical to Lightning conversion which was pretty cool. In 3.1 SWT has seen some love and we got some cool mods which add physical damage to spells, a natural boost for Shockwave Totems.

"

kpshyazn написал:

Also... Pros/Cons for chieftien vs Scion?

Scion

via Hierophant Ascendancy:

One additional Totem (that's 50% more damage right there)
Gain Arcana Surge when your totems hit something (10% cast speed helps a lot)
20% increased Damage while you have Arcane Surge (which is all the time)

via Chieftain Ascendancy:

2% Life Regeneration, 1% Totem damage leeched to you
Ash debuff (causes the affected target to have 20% less movement speed and 20% increased fire damage taken)

Add to that the option to start at the Marauder or Templar start and five extra passive skills.

Marauder (Chieftain)

10% Fire Damage Penetration
Enemies near your totems deal less and take increased Damage
Totems are immune to Fire Damage (Hello, elemental reflect)
2% Life Regeneration, 1% Totem damage leeched to you
Ash debuff (new, see above)
50% of physical damage converted to Fire Damage (good and bad, I'll get to that)
Every 10 seconds gain 70% pf Physical Damage as Extra Fire damage for 3 seconds (new, really cool, it's like a free Cauteriser every few seconds ;)
Totem taunt... probably the best feature of them all, it makes life much easier as you can play the game pretty much unmolested (Now, since Abyss attack totems can taunt enemies via jewels but SWT is a spell totem, not attack. So taunting SW Totems remain exclusive to the Chieftain).

The new Ascendancy mod "50% of physical damage converted to Fire Damage" is bad insofar as it doesn't really work like Avatar of Fire which converts 50% physical AND elemental damage to fire damage. This means, the Chieftain is now deprived of the Cold damage goodies (Ascendancy + AoF = 100% converted to Fire already). Cold to Fire and Hatred are massive boosts for this build. So the Chieftain can only use Anger aura which is p*ss poor compared to Hatred (excuse my French). Anger only adds flat Fire Damage to spells and SWT only makes use of 60% of all added damage. This can be mitigated somewhat with Watcher's Eye with the mod "Gain xx% of Physical Damage as Extra Fire Damage while affected by Anger" (which is essentially a more damage multiplier) but this jewel is expensive as f*ck. Or you play without Avatar of Fire but then 50% of your damage remains Cold and doesn't benefit from Fire Penetration. Now, there is a new body armour which supports socketed gems with "lvl 20 Elemental Penetration" but unfortunately Shroud of the Lightless has 1 abyssal socket so it can only accommodate a 5-link SWT setup... ok, it's still a pseudo 6L and combined with Shroud's other features it might be an interesting option to explore.

Bottom Line, both classes are fine really. The Scion can have a larger health pool and one more totem, the Chieftain deals a bit more damage per totem, doesn't have to worry about elemental reflect and totem taunt makes life easier in general. However, in the "budget version" (i.e. sans Tukohama's Fortress) the Chieftain can cast only two totems so I'd definitely recommend Increased AoE rather than Fire Penetration for better clear speed, swap AoE for Conc Effect at bosses.

I haven't mentioned the Hierophant. I'm sure it's also a viable class choice for Shockwave Totems. But you can't use Tukohama's Fortress as you'll be using Mind over Matter for sustainability and MoM doesn't work with Blood Magic.

By chance could you set up a skill tree link for the leveling side. Makes it a little easier to follow the path you are taking.

I might do that but the tree is rather easy to follow anyway, as I said in the Leveling section:

Ancestral Bond > Blood Magic > Avatar of Fire > Amplify > Blast Radius ... by the time you get into maps, grab Elemental Overload > Explosive Impact. Just take life/damage nodes and jewel sockets along the way as you see fit.

If you chose Path of the Templar, before you refund the 6 passives at the Scion start make sure you have some Life Regeneration nodes (Arsonist, Quick Recovery, and maybe Combat Stamina) to sustain Blood Magic.

Edit: Done. ;)

Looks fun. Any examples of a more expensive version to take down guardians/elder/shaper?

Done all of them in Abyss with the gear posted above (sans the Opal Ring and ToH), as Chieftain with only three totems. What do you mean by "more expensive"? Tukohama's Fortress, Xoph's Blood, Watcher's Eye not expensive enough for you? ;)

But as I said, a "Shaper farmer" it is not. More like a decent League starter and Lab farmer. If you want to go after Shaper/Elder you're better off with some super high-DPS build. However, there are some juicy damage options along the tree to push the deeps output much further (e.g. Heart of Flame, Celestial Judgement). Depending on the player's skills and understanding of fight mechanics one can get away with a lot less life, 6-6.5k HP should suffice.

Added a Searing Bond setup for improved single target capability to the Gem section

Ever considered blade flurry - blind - faster attack - incr crit for proccing EO and blind? It's much better and quicker then OoS.