[2.0.1] Mahesys's Tanky Firestorm/Flame surge build for HC leagues

I'm playing this build now and I have to say it is really easy and efficient. I'm level 55 atm and so far I don't even use flame surge to often. My combo is to throw flame totem and then cast a few firestorms and everything is dead. Fire totem and chaos golem provide enough distraction for those few seconds needed to kill a pack. Really nice. I went for the witch area first instead of scion and I hope I won't regret it on merc. Also I would recommend dual weilding for leveling. Great work, ty.

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Maverick8809 wrote:

I'm playing this build now and I have to say it is really easy and efficient. I'm level 55 atm and so far I don't even use flame surge to often. My combo is to throw flame totem and then cast a few firestorms and everything is dead. Fire totem and chaos golem provide enough distraction for those few seconds needed to kill a pack. Really nice. I went for the witch area first instead of scion and I hope I won't regret it on merc. Also I would recommend dual weilding for leveling. Great work, ty.

Actually flame surge it's not necessary until maps, firestorm alone melts everything.

Yes btw dual wielding for leveling is highly recommended. This build has more than enough hp and armor while leveling and sacrificing a shield for more DPS is ideal

Started a build that was pretty similar, but thought I had bricked it by not stacking crit passives.
Then I read this and now feel inspired going to retry firestorm Templar.

So thanks for writing this guide, cheers.

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lemonades wrote:

Started a build that was pretty similar, but thought I had bricked it by not stacking crit passives.
Then I read this and now feel inspired going to retry firestorm Templar.

So thanks for writing this guide, cheers.

Imo, this is a build that really doesn't need critical, you lose loads of survivability in return or some extra damage. IMO it's simply not worth it, since without critical firestorm and flame surge combo are already powerful enough even in 78+ maps

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Mahesys wrote:

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xXNightsageXx wrote:

Oh damn - was the best leveling experience ever..

Got oneshotted with lvl 53 (2,8k life) by a powerful crit skele in the library which was hiding behind a bookshelf...will play this again - unreal dmg :D

Damage specially while leveling is indeed very high. It keeps up later on even in 78+ maps

And i build hardcore, a softcore character can build even more damage and give up some survivability :)

How would such a SC Build look like for you? :)

Awesome concept, I'm about to try this build out. I'm assuming leveling with flame surge and firestorm would be pretty good?

Question: Have you considered picking up the increased duration nodes by the scion wheel to extend the length of your firestorms? You are already close to it after picking up the scion life nodes.

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Reicta wrote:

Awesome concept, I'm about to try this build out. I'm assuming leveling with flame surge and firestorm would be pretty good?

Question: Have you considered picking up the increased duration nodes by the scion wheel to extend the length of your firestorms? You are already close to it after picking up the scion life nodes.

I can confirm leveling with only firestorm is a breeze, best combo is firestorm + flame totem imo but firestorm + flame surge works well too

Yes i considered picking up the extra duration nodes but imo they're not worth the investment. Usually you're going to cast firestorm 2 or 3 times (in less than 2 seconds) on ANY mob pack and thus my 2,9 seconds of duration per firestorm are more than enough. The only exceptions are extra fire resistamt mobs + enfeeble curse maps combo.

As for bosses, i usually overlap 4(*2 with spell echo) firestorms and then start flame surging them. Usually they drop before the firestorms end :D

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Mahesys wrote:

Good advice

I'm level 41, just finished normal difficulty in 8hr30min. By far this was the smoothest leveling experience I've had yet while being totally self found and no gg leveling uniques. Malachai is usually difficult for me even on normal, but I had zero trouble taking him down with no ports used.

You are right, and I can now confirm that so far firestorm leveling is a beast when paired with flame totem. I think flame totem might actually be overtuned at low levels because of how fast and efficiently it kills things with no passives/supports dedicated to it. Set your totem down, cast firestorm on top of it and that pack is dead.

All in all awesome build so far. A couple general questions to myself as I level:

1) Is there no cap to how many firestorms you can have going at once? Meaning that the amount of firestorms you can have up at once is limited only by how high of cast speed + inc. duration you can get to make them overlapping?

2) Does added ele damage, like on herald of ice/thunder, anger, "adds X-Y damage to spells" etc., apply to every fireball from the firestorm, or just one individual fireball per cast, or is there an internal cooldown on this? If every fireball from the firestorm added that ele damage, wouldn't this build be a monster with added lightning/added chaos/HoT/HoI/anger etc?

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Reicta wrote:

1) Is there no cap to how many firestorms you can have going at once? Meaning that the amount of firestorms you can have up at once is limited only by how high of cast speed + inc. duration you can get to make them overlapping?

2) Does added ele damage, like on herald of ice/thunder, anger, "adds X-Y damage to spells" etc., apply to every fireball from the firestorm, or just one individual fireball per cast, or is there an internal cooldown on this? If every fireball from the firestorm added that ele damage, wouldn't this build be a monster with added lightning/added chaos/HoT/HoI/anger etc?

1) yes no cap, the more cast speed and duration you have the more firestorms can be overlapped

2) Yes added X damage apply to every fireball of firestorm. There is no internal cooldown every fireball will be affected by the added X damage mods, from passives or from wands/sceptres.

But added X fire mods doesn't scale well for a reason: firestorm has a 30% damage effectiveness, which cuts off all added X damage mods by 70%, if you have an added cold gem giving 10-20 damage, it will be instead 3-6 damage

Usually, rough spell damage% works way better than added X damage for this reason

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Mahesys wrote:

1) yes no cap, the more cast speed and duration you have the more firestorms can be overlapped

2) Yes added X damage apply to every fireball of firestorm. There is no internal cooldown every fireball will be affected by the added X damage mods, from passives or from wands/sceptres.

But added X fire mods doesn't scale well for a reason: firestorm has a 30% damage effectiveness, which cuts off all added X damage mods by 70%, if you have an added cold gem giving 10-20 damage, it will be instead 3-6 damage

Usually, rough spell damage% works way better than added X damage for this reason

I see, thanks for clearing that up!