[Guide][HC] Fite's Claw/Melee Build (Duelist/Marauder)[REWORK IN PROGRESS]



I no longer actively play this build and due to substantial changes in the game I can no longer guarantee the integrity of it as it was.
Thank you for your understanding.

Check anyway
If you're looking to get some questions answered, please contact me in-game @TheDetonatingDead or pop into my Twitch Chat - I simply don't have time to keep track of all the replies here and answer them reasonably fast.

Ever wanted to tank Vaal Smash straight to the FACE? Ever wanted to slap Dominus around like the little BITCH he is? NOW YOU CAN!
(and you only need 50 Exalted to do so... no just kidding, the investment to do this is fairly low)


You can use this as a sort of Template for almost any Melee-based Build, Claws are not at all required for this build to work, they are more of a Preference for me personally!

I very much recommend this build as a first character or on a fresh League - the only slight downside is that acquiring good Claws in comparison to other Weapons can prove a bit more difficult but not necessarily more expensive.

Patch 1.1

I am no longer playing this build so I can't tell you exactly what's best but an educated Guess would be using Vaal Molten Shell + Increased Duration + Life Leech + Iron Will for ungodly tankiness. Consider using Vaal Immortal Call + Increased Duration as well!


Videos
Leveling

Wurm's Molt or any other 1-3% Mana Leech item is a huge help -- trust me you don't want to have to use Mana Potions!

For Normal and perhaps also Cruel Difficulty (or just until you have two decent 1-Handers really) I kind of recommend you use Spectral Throw (+Lesser Multiple Projectiles + Added Fire + Faster Attacks) to level up due to it's simplicity as it only requires one, at least semi-decent Weapon instead of two.

If you are like me, and Spectral Throw puts you to sleep and/or makes you all kinds of angry ; You can use any and all kinds of Melee Weapons instead and level with Dual/Double Strike + Melee Splash etc, you don't have to narrow your choices down to only Claws!
This build is very Weapon-Unspecific in terms of Passives. Claws are more of an (Endgame) Preference-Choice due to the high amount of Life Leech that make this build as tanky as it is.

You should not have trouble getting to Maps all on your own especially once you use Claws, just make sure your resistances are maxed, your Armour is at least half-decent and most importantly your Weapon's DPS is acceptable for your Level!

Bandits

We help Oak on every Difficulty because he's an insanely cool dude!

Passives

Level ~30
Level ~40
Level ~50
Level ~60
Level ~70
Level ~80

I didn't calculate exactly how many points you would have at said levels, so adapt them yourself a little or feel free to ask if you're unsure at a certain point!

Level 90
Level 90 +6L

Level 90 CI Example

Gems


In that exact order of Priority.



Whirling Blades is excellent for quick movement, especially during Boss Fights. Enduring Cry simply for manual cast if your charges are about to drop off because you haven't procced your Cast When Damage Taken enough.



'CWDT' Link, can swap Vulnerability for Enfeeble if necessary.
We do not level these gems higher than what you see here, to make sure they trigger a LOT.



Preference Choice. I like using this for the occasional explosion & extra Life Leech.
Not a necessity at all and can be replaced with whatever you prefer.



Hatred should always be on, unless you direly need Resistances.
Use Whatever you want/need as your second Aura! (I sometimes even use Clarity for 'Half-Regen' Maps).


--


Cool to have in your switch, for jumping between platforms or simply using it for Movement (I recommend 2x Brightbeak!)



Preference Choice for that extra Rarity.

Gear

Most importantly of course, Life and Resistances.
Some Armour/Evasion is nice, but a high amount is not required due to Endurance Charges.

Due to our high Attack Speed we want to eventually use an Amulet, Rings and Gloves with flat Physical Damage added, but these usually don't come cheap.


Damage Reduction

Because of how Damage Reduction through Armour works, the bigger the hit on you, the less effective your Armour actually becomes. This works the same for monsters, by the way.
Our Character Panel's Armour Reduction is based on average hits of our current level (stops at 70), hits like Vaal's Smash are not average hits. Effectively this means 10k Armour Reduction will reduce Vaal's Smash by a fairly small margin compared to 1k Armour.
What this also means is that a ton of Armour will ultimately not save us from what kills almost any build ; One-Shot. (unforunate disconnect or lag not included)

HOWEVER! Endurance Charges are seperately calculated and always provide an independant, 'added-ontop' 4% Physical Reduction per charge, and as such, 7 Endurance Charges allows us to facetank almost anything without even using Grace or Shields -- Vaal, Dominus and most high-level Maps and their Bosses included.

Life & Mana Leech

With level-appropriate gear, using two Claws, we should be leeching the maximum amount of Life and Mana per second, which is 20% of your Maximum Life and 12.5% of your Maximum Mana.
If you for some reason leech more than 20%/12.5%, the leech duration will simply be extended past that 1 second, so you will notice the life leech continues even after you've stopped attacking.
(Vaal Pact removes the Life Leech limit, but Vaal Pact is a poor option for a Life-based Build. The CI Variant might be for you if for some reason you need or want more Life per sec)

7055 Life means you can leech up to 1411 per second.
824 Mana means you can leech up to 104 per second.


A simple formula for working out your current Leech :

first, unequip Added Fire Damage if you're using it and deactivate Hatred.
<your Dual/Double Strike tool tip DPS> x <Your total amount of Life/Mana Leech%>

it is important that you add a Zero(s) in front of your Life Leech. The Result should look something like this :

11758 x 0.11 = 1293 Life leeched per second (11% Life Leech)
11758 x 0.02 = 235 Mana leeched per second (2% Mana Leech)

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Figuring out your current Mana Leech Requirement to sustain your attacking is a little bit more tricky. I haven't worked out a perfectly accurate way to do it so by all means if you have a better way, let me know!

First you must unequip Multistrike. Then you 'simply' Calculate :
<your current Mana Cost> x <your attacks per second> = <'ballpark' mana leech requirement>

Example :
36 x 3.32 = 119.52

As I said this is no exact Science yet, it is simply a way to figure out the approximate amount!
Currently I leech 104 Mana per second and I regenerate 31.7 Mana per second and I am just below my requirement, I do run out of mana for a split second if I attack a single target for long enough without pausing.


My Gear Setup











Check out my other Guides!
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Last edited by Fite on Aug 23, 2014, 10:05:32 AM
About the CI version of the build - I think it has some inefficient routes to key nodes.

Namely the Iron Reflexes and the path to CI

Below a little modification and ends up with around 32% more ES 1 less Endurance charge, 106 % more evasion, and 8% more ele res, and 4 nodes around the scion area which can be mana or life regen instead of the 4 str nodes you took.

http://www.pathofexile.com/passive-skill-tree/AAAAAgAACGe-vJM6guS9J5ARGDyKr_noSsiCx26qKPq18uq6qW6ESHgNbEY8jr6KWK9ybAFvAdw26DIJV8ni6qQZAec0CmEhG_qnMJ_LtAwS4SXfns2TJ6LqhNnSIRzc705uaVcNf8Yotb6n2WHBxRGWKjjSTRkuLL_sGA5IwA8n7Yauj_rDbeOE1e3z3ayqxPYV19vniGtqk3KpWfM9D9eGRwa297ZBfNnAGiSLVmPC7F9qmZoRL04qZp73wXy7tMXrYymlcU2ePDrYQFUrCprPTdiBby3Sb1fBAENjjHYMjdsatzENSRB7WPX1S53Evjo=
"
Trevasotilo wrote:
About the CI version of the build - I think it has some inefficient routes to key nodes.

Namely the Iron Reflexes and the path to CI

Below a little modification and ends up with around 32% more ES 1 less Endurance charge, 106 % more evasion, and 8% more ele res, and 4 nodes around the scion area which can be mana or life regen instead of the 4 str nodes you took.


Because you can get such a huge amount of life these days I feel the CI version is not something I want to play anytime soon so I didn't refine this build a whole lot.
I've changed the CI build slightly based on this feedback, thanks for noticing! the Iron Reflex thing is a pretty big deal!

I've finally made a video guide to my build, it's right at the top of the page!
Last edited by Fite on Feb 9, 2014, 10:21:12 AM
Hey dude, thanks for sharing this build.

Do you think this build would be worth doing in the new league or is it too dependent on high dps claws? Also are there any reasons why it wouldn't be welcome in group play?
whats your DPS with this build?

can you also post your stats when using BOR for offense and defense
Last edited by Lesheart on Feb 11, 2014, 7:31:50 AM
Thanks for posting this build. It looks very interesting. Just some minor questions/requests:

1 - Would you recommend this build as a first character?

2 - Could you add a level progression passive skill tree links to the guide (ex: 20, 40, 60 point marks)?

3 - Could you post links to the Duelist and Marauder builds?

Thanks.
Critical Hit Jump Jets... Critical Hit Jump Jets...
"
Synteximus wrote:
Hey dude, thanks for sharing this build.

Do you think this build would be worth doing in the new league or is it too dependent on high dps claws? Also are there any reasons why it wouldn't be welcome in group play?

Good Claws are slightly harder to come by than other weapons due to the extra spell-based attribute rolls, but other than that it's very much viable for a first character or a fresh league. I can't see a reason why this build wouldn't be welcome other than the fact that Bringer of Rain's extra gore is a little harsh on your FPS.


"
Lesheart wrote:
whats your DPS with this build?

can you also post your stats when using BOR for offense and defense

DPS as is : Dual Strike : 20528.5 / Double Strike : 14198.7
Offense
Defense (without resist aura)

"
ghoultek wrote:
Thanks for posting this build. It looks very interesting. Just some minor questions/requests:

1 - Would you recommend this build as a first character?

2 - Could you add a level progression passive skill tree links to the guide (ex: 20, 40, 60 point marks)?

3 - Could you post links to the Duelist and Marauder builds?

Thanks.

1 : very much so

2 : coming right up ^

3 : if you look at the level 90 build, that's pretty much it. As you can see it reaches all the way into the marauder start, if you're a Duelist, simply ditch the Scion's starting node and maybe a resistance node or something else!

--

Sorry about the late replies guys, I'll remember to check this thread more frequently!
Best way to reach me is through twitch or in-game if it seems like I've forgotten you!
Last edited by Fite on Feb 12, 2014, 7:07:17 AM
revised the guide a lot, enjoy!
Can u updtae the guide plz? I need something like this ;)
"
Groshat wrote:
Can u updtae the guide plz? I need something like this ;)

done!

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