[Theorycrafting] RF Iron Will Blade Vortex with loads of strength

Hey everyone,

Blade Vortex got me hyped and after realizing it's considered a spell I got even more excited because I originally planned to build something around RF, Iron Will and stacking strength like Dwayne Johnson in the new league.

Is there any viable way to combine these elements?
Ideas are highly appreciated.

Here's my first take at a skill tree (highly inspired by Fenril's RF Iron Will Totem Hulk [all props to him]):

I don't wanna be salty, but "theorycrafting" indicates you already theory-crafted something. You didn't. On a less salty note, it all depends on how cast speed dependent Blade Vortex will be. IW builds generally struggle in this department and that's why spells like Incinerate or Firestorm are much more common. Another question is, will Blade Vortex be worth picking over Cyclone. Mind that I'm not saying you shouldn't play Blade Vortex, but you should know that your only defense will be life. And with that being said choosing a melee spell doesn't sound like a good idea. Cyclone gives you a huge defensive buff since it makes you kite most of the incoming damage. It also allows you to pick up crucial defensive nodes/keystones/supports without losing damage (for example IR, LGoH). Not to mention that Blade Vortex will also require huge amounts of INT. All in all, I think it's going to be a fun skill, but not as IW.

im doing exactly this, but as a ranger start to be honest.

i'll have masses of strength, life and regen. something around 540 str, probably 211% life i think it was, and upwards of 19% life regen (with frenzy charges/blood dance boots).

i'll be running RF for more spell damage, doon cuebiyari for the str and cast speed, EK as secondary damage+mana leech (unless blade vortex turns out being a POS then i'll use EK main damage).

i'll be using this skill tree


as well as placing 2x unique jewels that turn dex into str at the place right of ranger start, and place between ranger/duelist starts. this will boost my str by 150 alone.

for a 6L chest i'll be looking at blade vortex, empower, conc effect, spell echo, inc duration, iron will.
however i'll need to test things out. may need to replace iron will with faster casting, or might need to socket in mana leech too, really not sure how it'll play out but we'll see. maybe empower will suck with blade vortex and faster casting will work better, who knows.

in my doon 3L (auto lvl 30 iron will) i'll have EK, which will have amazing damage already from that, reduced mana, and mana leech to sustain blade vortex spam...hopefully.
EK will get a total boost of 232% spell damage just for being socketed, which is insane.

blade vortex will have 177% inc spell damage, 59% more spell damage, 50% more damage, and another 40% more damage (10 frenzy charges come 2.1), as well as 3 more levels, +164% duration total, and +55% cast speed (10 frenzy/passive tree/doon/haste, including negative cast speed from blood dance), and 70% more cast speed.

i can't fricking wait for this patch

"

xMustard wrote:

i'll be running RF for more spell damage, doon cuebiyari for the str and cast speed,

That was also my plan ... I now finally had some time to make an attempt at a skill tree.

I want to link Blade Vortex to Increased AoE, Increased Duration, Spell Echo, Iron Will (+Added Fire Damage or Faster Casting).

This maybe combined with a 4l consisting of Cyclone - Curse On Hit - Vulnerability - Life Gain On Hit.
Putting this in a swift dagger with high spell damage and a shield might give quite some survivability.

I might also fool around with a dual Mokous' Embrace, which gives us fairly decent cast speed (40% when ignited) and the ignition won't bother since we are fairly immune to fire damage.

Edit: Just an idea ... Could this work as Avatar of Fire? Because Mokou's would greatly push fire damage ...


One more thing to consider: Using Blood Dance would greatly decrease your Cast Speed (which sucks with Iron Will builds already). What about using Alberon's Warpath? This could give you up to 18% more strength.

blood dance does decrease your cast speed, but its only 30%, while having 10 frenzy you get a bonus of 40% cast speed already. so you still end up with +10% cast speed even with blood dance boots on.

if i can out regen RF without them, then i won't use them. then i'll have ENORMOUS boost to cast speed with my gear/tree/setup. +85% in fact.

cast speed is great, but it also depends on my mana usage. its fine to cast 5 times a second but if you can't afford that anyway then whats the point? my tree looks great but i greatly suspect i'll have mana issues.

i'll probably drop haste and run herald of ice and thunder, since each of their damages added to spells would be PER cast for blade vortex (albeit at 35% effectiveness). tho this will scale greatly.
i may also just run blood dance boots anyway since again, mana is going to be my limiting factor more than anything, so the added cast speed might not be of any benefit at all.

i do like the cyclone curse on hit tho. i was thinking of running curses as auras but that won't work considering you essentially have to use purity of fire + whatever other auras you want.

"

highly inspired by Fenril's RF Iron Will Totem Hulk

<3 though I wasn't running RF in the primary/recommended build :p

I've been toying with a tree for this sort of build since Blade Vortex's reveal, though I am not 100% on board just yet. This is mostly due to the unknown mana cost increases of Blade Vortex on leveling it up and the uncertainty of all of the 2.1 balance changes. I point this out primarily due to the option of Elreon Rings. If Blade Vortex scales in a similar pattern to Incinerate then we can drop the mana cost to 0 and not be concerned about how much mana regen we have or whether we use blood magic. Hell, if we can drop the mana cost to just 1-2 it would open up quite a few venues for gear. As such, here's my proposed tree:

You'll notice the 482 base strength plus the slot by Witch where we can, once our gear allows for it, put in an int --> strength gem and get a whole lot more. It also sits at 229% life and 12.8% life regeneration, plenty to sustain RF. I also like this version because I end up grabbing both AoE clusters, something that I think will be required rather than simply an option for Blade Vortex to feel good.

My only concern past that is our base cast speed. If the spell is going to act similar at all to the scaling of SRS or Incinerate, we will need a lot of it. I'm, unfortunately, only getting 14% on my speed but hopefully this can be made up by some nice cast speed jewels. I'd guess that the jewels will end up making or breaking the build more than it does for a lot of other specs. This is also interesting because I'd bet jewels are going to get a nerf come 2.1 considering their current absurd power levels when rolled well.

I'd love to hear some more voices on this build because I have a feeling it exists somewhere on the passive tree but I'm not wholly satisfied with my version nor, admittedly, any of the ones posted here.

EDIT: Also for what it's worth, I don't think increased skill duration is going to matter. The playstyle will likely be closer to SRS so the minute increase to the amount of blades we have out won't likely be worth the passive points compared to simply increasing the damage.

"

Chris wrote:

Righteous Fire's radius has been increased by 60%.

Woop woop.
This should burn down quite a lot of mobs before they even reach us.

Sweet Jesus, I'm so looking forward to this :D

"

xMustard wrote:

im doing exactly this, but as a ranger start to be honest.

i'll have masses of strength, life and regen. something around 540 str, probably 211% life i think it was, and upwards of 19% life regen (with frenzy charges/blood dance boots).

i'll be running RF for more spell damage, doon cuebiyari for the str and cast speed, EK as secondary damage+mana leech (unless blade vortex turns out being a POS then i'll use EK main damage).

i'll be using this skill tree

Spoiler

https://www.pathofexile.com/fullscreen-passive-skill-tree/AAAAAwIBAF4A7gguFr8ZjiP2JJ0mlUMxR35M_02SVUtVhVoaYeJiWmVNbWxuaX11hNmNfZuNo4qly7VIvTa95r6nwzPTftX47YPvev665oHLvYw2D6v2oxUgLOmGsypNPydfmFltzzLawXTtBS167y2DGbRqk_ljVP5KyO4Obqq18jWS2L3-Crc-QYf56ILHHb4zhwPu8kU64aZXTeP-j5XM7T_ndOjWmyYF-RXwzeqDzDwtg1_Grgthr2xo8vAfogCuPmeb5FFQR-8OFCBfPwxfHKdTpdSPGS7ZYa2Nz34EszGewGY=?accountName=xMustard&characterName=Dr_Mustard

as well as placing 2x unique jewels that turn dex into str at the place right of ranger start, and place between ranger/duelist starts. this will boost my str by 150 alone.

for a 6L chest i'll be looking at blade vortex, empower, conc effect, spell echo, inc duration, iron will.
however i'll need to test things out. may need to replace iron will with faster casting, or might need to socket in mana leech too, really not sure how it'll play out but we'll see. maybe empower will suck with blade vortex and faster casting will work better, who knows.

in my doon 3L (auto lvl 30 iron will) i'll have EK, which will have amazing damage already from that, reduced mana, and mana leech to sustain blade vortex spam...hopefully.
EK will get a total boost of 232% spell damage just for being socketed, which is insane.

blade vortex will have 177% inc spell damage, 59% more spell damage, 50% more damage, and another 40% more damage (10 frenzy charges come 2.1), as well as 3 more levels, +164% duration total, and +55% cast speed (10 frenzy/passive tree/doon/haste, including negative cast speed from blood dance), and 70% more cast speed.

i can't fricking wait for this patch

Why ranger ? your main blade vortex armour will be probably a Str based astral plate so those 6% extra evasion wont help . Start as a marauder same thing only that u get armour+life.

Other things : blade vortex is a physical spell i wouldnt take trikery passive.
BV is an aoe spell and u dont have any aoe passive maybe something to consider
And lets be honest u will have more chances to survive with better armour that with more life.