Marauder Incinerate/Firestorm/Blood Magic Build

I've been playing around with Incinerate lately, I'm currently level 68 and farming Lunaris temple for XP (Docks is horrible, too many fire resistant mobs). So far it has been incredibly easy, I use 1 fire trap to assist against ranged mobs and then just Incinerate as my primary skill.

After trying the skill out for the first time on the Ledge in merciless, I instantly realized that this skill is perfect for the idea I had. Basically I wanted to be a "melee tank", but focused around magic damage, fire in particular. Up until I tried Incinerate I was using LMP fireball in close range to "shotgun" the 3 projectiles on single targets, which worked fine, but wasn't exactly what I was looking for.

What caught my attention with Incinerate was the fact that I simply could not die on the ledge, it didn't matter how many mobs I pulled I would simply Leech my life back instantly. The lack of mobility meant nothing at that point, simply because I didn't need to move until after everything was dead.

The concept of my build is fairly simple:
Very high life
Very high armor
Stun immunity
Almost no skillpoints used on damage

Basically I wanted to be able to stand there, holding down my right mouse button and watch everything die.

This is my current character:


and this is the build I am working towards:


I will be using 5 auras, 4 of which will be 40% mana reserve auras (possible due to -mana reserve skillpoints and the reduced mana gem):
Determination
Purity
Vitality
Haste
Grace (Blood Magic gem / the unique chest armor)

My current 5L Incinerate: Incinerate, GMP, Blood Magic, Life Leech, Fire Penetration

I start combat by casting Molten Shell -> curse flammability -> cast enduring cry once -> cast incinerate

The reason I cast enduring cry even though the charges will most likely disappear before eveyrthing is dead, is because the only part where I am in any danger of dying is at the start where the damage is low, which means I leech less life.

Things to note about the build:
You will not be speed clearing, the kill speed is reasonable, but it is no Freezing Pulse or Lightning Arrow.

You will absolutely NEED Unvavering Stance, getting stunned while ramping up Incinerate slows it down conciderably and you WILL die if facing chargers, due to the inability of dodging while casting incinerate.

It will not be fun for everyone, I quite enjoy it personally, but some people prefer a faster playstyle where dodging is a part of it.

I hope you got at least some useful information from this far too long wall of text (assuming anyone even got this far), feel free to ask questions about the build or any variant you may come up with, I'll answer as best as I can.

Wow, that was almost exactly what I wanted, thank you so much!

The idea I came up with was exactly that, a immobile tower of fiery destruction, if I wanted mobility I would have chosen a Shadow.

I only have a couple questions about the build:

1. Why you went all that way to get Iron Reflexes? Is it because of Grace only, or you use hybrid (Duelist) armor?

2. The only thing that I want that does not fit right in your build is the Blood Magic keystone. Do you think it would be viable? Or are the reserve auras (I'm not sure how multiple -40% Auras would work) too much of a problem? I think having Blood Magic would also free up a support gem for more interesting combinations, like GMP+LMP or GMP+Faster Projectiles.

3. What gear do you use/intend to use? I assume you use a shield, or is it more effective in terms of life-leech tanking to use Searing Touch or double Scepters?

EDIT: And one last question, are the Body and Soul nodes worth it?

And I got a hell of a lot of useful information! Also, I don't think dexterity would be a problem, since my build has a path that allows it to easily grab +80 in DEX nodes with just 3 points, and I think 94 DEX is plenty of it just for leveling supports, plus that allows me to get Divinarius, and hence a LOT of Spell Damage.

I was farming ledge with the same incenerate setup as you did and it was great. But maps and other areas with fast nasty mixed monsters were not so great. And the question is not about how much melee or elemental hits you can sustain. There are a lot of mobs with mechanics require you to move. Poison arrow skeletons, bombs, charging enemies, teleporters to your back, curse+focused fire sluts, and others. And maps have varaing combinations of monsters. All still doable with incinerate but faster with firestorm.

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Khannis wrote:

Wow, that was almost exactly what I wanted, thank you so much!

The idea I came up with was exactly that, a immobile tower of fiery destruction, if I wanted mobility I would have chosen a Shadow.

I only have a couple questions about the build:

1. Why you went all that way to get Iron Reflexes? Is it because of Grace only, or you use hybrid (Duelist) armor?

2. The only thing that I want that does not fit right in your build is the Blood Magic keystone. Do you think it would be viable? Or are the reserve auras (I'm not sure how multiple -40% Auras would work) too much of a problem? I think having Blood Magic would also free up a support gem for more interesting combinations, like GMP+LMP or GMP+Faster Projectiles.

3. What gear do you use/intend to use? I assume you use a shield, or is it more effective in terms of life-leech tanking to use Searing Touch or double Scepters?

EDIT: And one last question, are the Body and Soul nodes worth it?

And I got a hell of a lot of useful information! Also, I don't think dexterity would be a problem, since my build has a path that allows it to easily grab +80 in DEX nodes with just 3 points, and I think 94 DEX is plenty of it just for leveling supports, plus that allows me to get Divinarius, and hence a LOT of Spell Damage.

1. I went to Iron Reflexes, because I was already in the area due to getting unvavering stance. At the moment I only have grace with evasion, but since I also use Determination the bonus from Grace is also multiplied, which makes it worth it imo.

2. I actually used to use the Blood Magic keystone, I switched to using the gem instead at around 63, mainly because I like having determination and purity to boost my survivability. I'm not sure if you can have enough survivability without them, I would assume you need very good gear to pull that off.

3. Right now I actually use double wands, because I have 1 with very high spell damage and another with a decent amount of projectile speed (because I ruined my 5L colour combination, so I can't use Faster Projectiles right now) I was planning on using a shield eventually, probably a high pure armor one, but I can't effectively do it right now.

4. The body and soul talents aren't the best armor talents in the tree, but they are not bad and they give me access to the Templar life skills.

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Xavyer wrote:

I was farming ledge with the same incenerate setup as you did and it was great. But maps and other areas with fast nasty mixed monsters were not so great. And the question is not about how much melee or elemental hits you can sustain. There are a lot of mobs with mechanics require you to move. Poison arrow skeletons, bombs, charging enemies, teleporters to your back, curse+focused fire sluts, and others. And maps have varaing combinations of monsters. All still doable with incinerate but faster with firestorm.

I'm very aware that this is the case, hell if I wanted map efficiency I would just keep playing my freezing pulse tank. :P

I wasn't looking for efficient leveling or anything like that, I was just looking to try out a concept, the 'immovable incinerator'.

So far it has been a great success for me, I have NEVER had such an easy time in Merciless. For the first time EVER I was able to 100% facetank every single boss in merciless (with the exception of Vaal for obvious reasons). This includes Piety in her Ice Form.

That said, I never had any intensions of getting to max level on ANY character, I simply don't enjoy the massive grind that is. I play this game to experiment with builds and try out different things, thats how I best enjoy it. :)

I'm experimenting with this build on my lvl81 Marauder.

Got 2 5L Searing Touch, one with Fireball, one with Firestorm. The burn from Fireball is good for some cases.Got a 5L Chest too that I didn't really use, saving up for a Kaom's heart. I didn't choose Wand + Shield because I really like to use the bloodmagic gem, and really want a Kaoms to get epic regen and tankiness. It's a super fun build, but I suggest you going Wand+Shield for double my damage. I think Saffell's is a good idea, since you have Molten Shell vs melee.

Wow, it's proving to be a really tough build so far. Alot of minions have elemental resistance on Act 3 (Not to mention that f**ckin Crematorium). I can actually deal reasonable damage with Flammability followed by Incinerate+LMP, but my mana dries up in no time and I end up chugging mana like a madman, and I end up relying on Flammability+Molten Shell most of the time to save mana.

However, I can make the transition to Blood Magic in about 2 more levels, and I already have Vitality. Should I go for the keystone, or wait a bit longer?

I have been working on a suitable fire-based marauder build as well so this post is very informative and useful (thanks!). What I have so far is very similar to Xavyer's build. I'm still a n00b but I've run a few characters to 60+ now so I know how important defensive passives are. As such I put even more into +life/regen.

Thus, my concern is how DPS will be heading into Merciless. I expect for most of my way up to that point I will just run leap/ground slam with no real problems. However, as I transition I'm worried I won't have the DPS to efficiently get through Merciless and on to maps. I'm definitely not rich so gear will always be a challenge. Thoughts?

Side note ... I was considering running two firestorm gems. One with +AOE and one with Conc. Effect for single target. Any thoughts on whether it's better to just go with fireball for single target?

Ok ... Been playing this on and off a bit. Level 65 at the moment and things are going ok. Need to work a bit on resists and focus on DPS in the passive tree. Life/life regen is doing great so far.

However, two question ... First, what armor type should I be gearing towards? I did not go with Iron Reflexes but would full evasion be good? What about full armor? Armor/ES?

Also, with Blood Magic keystone can/should I be running any auras? I've been running Discipline and Grace just because they don't kill my health pool but would love to hear other folks opinions on this.

Anyone running something similar have any thoughts?