[WIP] Main Hand + Ungil's Gauche [HC/Beyond] High Critical Strikes, Block, Spell Block

This is a work in progress for the initial character I will be running in the Beyond league. For now it's just an info dump that I will update when I get the chance.

Edit: The information below assumes you want to use Glacial Hammer, but you can focus on any main hand-only or non-dagger skill with this plan. This includes Double Strike, Infernal Blow, Heavy Strike, Ground Slam, Leap Slam, and Glacial Hammer of course.

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I've been theorycrafting numerous versions of a critical Glacial Hammer + Herald of Ice build and decided upon this one as the best blend of damage and defenses.

The idea is to use a sceptre with high physical damage per hit and critical strike chance in your main hand and an Ungil's Gauche in your off hand.

The 20% additional block chance and 90% global critical strike chance of Ungil's Gauche provide both a substantial offensive and defensive boost at a low cost. Because the weapon is a dagger, the sceptre will always be the one you attack with.

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Passive Skill Tree

Level 100

With all the dual wielding block nodes and the right items you will reach 74% chance to block attacks, just 1% shy from the cap.

If you get a Stone of Lazwhar with block chance corrupted onto it, you should respec out of the Scion beginning tree nodes and into Studious Combatant and life nodes.

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Equipment

Weapons

• Main Hand: Doriyani's Catalyst or rare physical, critical sceptre.
• Off Hand: Ungil's Gauche.
  

Armor

• Chest Armor: Belly of the Beast, Lightning Coil, or rare evasion.
• Helm: Devoto's Devotion, Alpha's Howl, or rare evasion
• Chest Armour: Evasion, rare.

Accessories

• Amulet: Stone of Lazwhar.
• Rings: Coral Rings, rare.
• Belt: Doriyani's Invitation (Cold version), Meginord's Girdle, or rare Heavy Belt.

Flasks

• ...

[hr]
Gems

Chest Armor

• Glacial Hammer
  Melee Splash
  Multistrike
  Melee Physical Damage/Increased Critical Damage
  Cold Penetration
  Elemental Proliferation
  

Helm/Gloves/Boots

• Hatred
  Herald of Ice
  Grace/Determination/Purity of Ice
  Reduced Mana
  
  
• Glacial Hammer
  Multistrike
  Melee Physical Damage
  Increased Critical Damage
  
  
• Cast when Damage Taken (Level 5+)
  Immortal Call
  Increased Duration
  Enhance

Primary Weapon Set

• Leap Slam
  Curse on Hit
  Assassin's Mark
  
  
• Cast when Damage Taken (Level 1)
  Enduring Cry
  Spell Echo

Damn... I had the exact same idea. Got it from Ghudda's dual wield axe video.

Guess I'll be rocking something else then. GL with it.

Wow... even the tree looks exactly the same.

Lol, it happens man. But don't let it discourage you from trying it! We both came up with the idea, so it's not like own it or anything.

And yeah, the tree is pretty much obligatorily built that way. I've tried a bunch of variations and it seems to be the optimal approach for the whole off-hand Ungil's Gauche thing.

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Cast when Damage Taken (Level 1)
Enduring Cry
Spell Echo

Spell echo only works on self-casted skills so you can't have it in a Cwdt link.

Yep, I just don't know which to go with yet. Probably Cast when Damage Taken with Enduring Cry and some kind of totem.

Hey Iao, I saw this build and it looks very interesting, thanks for posting.

I am considering doing something similar with an alt in this upcoming league. I had a few questions for you.

I have never actually used Glacial Hammer on a character above level 20. At end game do you use it for your AOE skill? Does splash do enough to make it strong as AOE?

And, do you level this character using Glacial Hammer too? Before getting links for the skill, isn't it a pain to level using a single target skill?

Thanks in advance for any response.

Hi dday_0612!

Glacial Hammer would be the main skill in high level content. You would have one for multiple targets and another for single targets. Melee Splash certainly has a good enough area of effect.

You would level this build with Cleave and Dual Strike, dual wielding swords/axes.

"

iao wrote:

Hi dday_0612!

Glacial Hammer would be the main skill in high level content. You would have one for multiple targets and another for single targets. Melee Splash certainly has a good enough area of effect.

You would level this build with Cleave and Dual Strike, dual wielding swords/axes.

Thanks Iao, good info.

edit: I now see both your glacial hammer gems in the original post, thanks!

No problem!

Alright, so I've been playing in the Beyond league and things have gone very smoothly. I started with nothing and am in Merciless with no deaths. I leveled with Cleave and Dual Strike but just made the switch to Glacial Hammer and things are going great.

The switch really wasn't bad at all. In fact I don't notice the DPS difference because I'm freezing everything but super high health enemies, making so that the culling effect works almost all the time.

I have all the block nodes on the planed tree route and a Stone of Lazwhar. I am using just Glacial Hammer + Multistrike + Melee Splash for both multiple and single targets. My auras are Hatred and Purity of Elements.

So yeah, it's definitely working, and I don't even have a good weapon:

Thanks for this. I'm a few hours behind you and looking forward to making that switch.